Quoting northbloke:

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Now if we were to go to a single field name... hint, hint.

NOW you're talking! 

Quoting T!M:

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Quoting northbloke:

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Now if we were to go to a single field name... hint, hint.

NOW you're talking! 

Gets my vote! 

You may have missed my post at the top, but currently your idea can't work because we don't parse the "credited as" name, you would end up with only the common name information in your profile and this wouldn't match the end credits, which is what I'm guessing you'd want.

So for this to work, we'd first either have to start using single field names (yes please!) or start parsing the "credited as" names (please God no!).

Is no-one going to answer my question?

I seriously would like to understand where people are coming from?

Very true.

Also, I find it inconceivable that anyone WOULDN'T want to have correct common names in their database. There's no added value in choosing to NOT have them there whatsoever. Better yet: even if you don't care for them, having them still doesn't hurt you, as the program will still always show you the "credited as" data in display mode. At no point do you LOSE anything - you just gain something. It doesn't even matter if you personally have use for it or not, but it can't possibly hurt you. All in all, there's no downside whatsoever. With that in mind, I'd rather see Ken spending his time on improving the system, trying to make it work better, writing/clarifying some rules to get more users on the same page and so on, rather than on trying to make special exceptions for a very, very limited number of users.

Quoting T!M:

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Very true.

Also, I find it inconceivable that anyone WOULDN'T want to have correct common names in their database. There's no added value in choosing to NOT have them there whatsoever. Better yet: even if you don't care for them, having them still doesn't hurt you, as the program will still always show you the "credited as" data in display mode. At no point do you LOSE anything - you just gain something. It doesn't even matter if you personally have use for it or not, but it can't possibly hurt you. All in all, there's no downside whatsoever. With that in mind, I'd rather see Ken spending his time on improving the system, trying to make it work better, writing/clarifying some rules to get more users on the same page and so on, rather than on trying to make special exceptions for a very, very limited number of users.

While I understand your point T!M....here's my issues with it.

1. Not everyone uses the credits as their first source of reference (despite what contribution notes and the rules state).

2. If the source of the cast/crew is NOT the film credits then the information held in the CLT is also wrong.

3. I have fully audited every single one of my film and (until I trusted other users) they were 100% accurate as per the film credits.

4. When I find a name in my local database that looks like it's the same person (eg. Wanda De Jesus and Wanda De Jesús) I attempt to delete the entries to see how many titles I have that actor in. From there I then check the CLT.
I won't tell you the amount of times I have looked in the CLT and found that the most 'common' name is wrong because the profiles have not been taken from the credits. Therefore, if the profiles are wrong to start with then the CLT is wrong too.

5. On occasion I have gone with what I consider to be the common name (based on my fully audited and correct profiles) and therefore have not been able to contribute my cast changes; or I have had to double the work re-editing the title after contribution.

6. So, if I blindly accept all Credited As contributions there is a very high possibility that the information is wrong or that I don't agree with it.

7. Even you, T!M, make mistakes. You are pretty much the only person I see doing credited as entries....but, I also see you re-editing profiles stating that your earlier work is now wrong because you have done further research of the CLT results have changed.

8. Just because you find it useful it doesn't mean that other people do. I'm sure there are users who would prefer a 'clean' duplicate of the credits and don't give a hoot about crosslinking.

So, for all these reasons I would like to see this feature as optional.

Quoting DJ Doena:

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For me it doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to work. Thus I ripped off the cast list from the database we don't speak of and locked all my profiles. Actor crosslinking works like a charm ever since.

I did the same thing (except roman numbers which are replaced by birth year (real or fake if necessary). In fact, if I see a great advantage to have common names for linking reasons, I never saw any interest in the name as it appears in the credits (with the problem of capitalized letters which causes many errors with accentuation). If somebody can explain why this form is interesting, I perhaps could learn something...

Quoting Pantheon:

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I also see you re-editing profiles stating that your earlier work is now wrong because you have done further research of the CLT results have changed.

That's because it's, by it's nature, an ever-evolving beast. What's a correct entry today can easily need to be corrected next month. That answers Skip's question as well: per Ken's instructions, "correct" equals "most-credited", and I'm sure we all agree that we don't exactly have the best imaginable tool (or even some guidance) on how to establish that. As such, using "the most-credited form" effectively means that we'll never be done. Mind you: at the start of DVDP 3.0, I campaigned long and hard for using documentable "correct" names, which would have meant less changes in the long run. But Ken went with "most-credited" instead, which, by definition, will mean that things will keep evolving. I may have preferred another solution, but I'll work with what I've been given.

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Just because you find it useful it doesn't mean that other people do. I'm sure there are users who would prefer a 'clean' duplicate of the credits and don't give a hoot about crosslinking.

I simply can't imagine why... Why would anyone put endless hours of work in something which ultimately is of absolutely no use at all? And again: accepting the common names into your database won't hurt you - display mode in the program will still show you your "as credited" data. There's no downside. Again, it seems like such an odd choice - it's like entering all your credits in ALL-CAPS and then asking Ken to accomodate accepting and contributing cast and crew updates despite that strange local choice. Linking people's credits together is one of very basics of collecting cast and crew data. There's not a single cast & crew database out there that doesn't aim to correctly link various credits/appearances together. None of them has tried to make it "optional" - why would they? It just doesn't make sense.