History:Release Type Restructuring Proposal

Proposal

I have been thinking over this album release thing quite alot, the previous redrafts, ideas and talks in the mailinglist where contributional factors to this, I have tried to include what those people have said, and asked for, plus my own usage of release types. Here is my proposal and restructuring (the option 'I don't know' is implied) after this list follows a list of groups & settings and explanations of their meanings

my new idea is a base of 3. it also involve tickyboxes on some, but not all options. All the new options are italic, already exsisting ones are not.

Physical Media

• CD
  • 3"
  • 5"

• DVD
  • DVD-A

• SACD
• MiniDisc
• Vinyl
  • 7"
  • 10"
  • 12"
  • other

• Cassette
• 8track
• Digital Media (webalbums / stand alone mp3/ogg etc)
• Other

Release Status

Official | Commercial | Bootleg

Main Types

• Album (LP)
• EP
• Single
  • Maxi-CD

...

• Split
• Compilation
  • Highlights

• Remix
• Remaster
• Live
• Soundtrack
• Classical
• Data (when clicked, either option under is possible, but not both)
  • audiofile disc
  • multimedia 2 session disc

• Other
• Promotional
• Demo
• Spokenword
  • Interview
  • Audiobook
  • other narrative

Description

Physical Media

pretty much says itself, what is the thing you have in your hand? These types are not tickyboxed, only radio buttons. a CD is not a cassette. later in restructuring we may want to add the possibility to add *several* physical media types, ideally connected with release dates. (this requires complete rewrite of the releasetype+releasedate tables, I know. so I'm not going there. yet ôô)

CD

just a regular audio CD, also known as CD-A.

DVD

we are going to get pure musical DVD's eventually. There are a few thousand according to wikipedia, the same is true for DVD-A.

SACD

separated from DVD because it is a different coding process entirely, hybrid SACD discs that have the capability of being played on regular CD-player should go under this to

MiniDisc

(minidisc or minidisk?) more info goes here There are not many new releases but a lot of older ones.

Vinyl

finally we have Vinyls! subgroups of 7", 10" & 12" and 'other' for that one nth" type laying in PRAEst76's attic ;)

Cassette

just your average tape

8track

for really old wonky releases on 8track

Digital Media

(webalbums / stand alone mp3/ogg etc)

Other

random obscure types!

Release Status

the status of this release. these do *not* have ticky-boxes, as a release can only be *one* of the options.

Official

exactly like it is today, sanctioned by *both* the artist and the record-company (if applicable). These releases are most likely listed on the artists' own website and most fansites.

Commercial

a new type, this is for releases that are pretty much sanctioned by the record-company (or resold to other companies) but *not* the artist, exactly. These albums will usually *not* be listed on the artists website or fansites. Examples of this kind of records are the various greatest hits / best of xx's, time-life / the best XXXXX in the world, POP! # NOW! [name] [number], etc. type VA compilations fall into this category. some SingleArtist compilations also come under this type. they are usually not (if at all) listed on Artistssites or Fansites. (but usually on recordcompany-sites or buy sites like amazon) (in essential, *all* classical music will be this option. but perhaps 'official' should be retained for classical albums where the performer(s) are *serious* (an example of *serious* albums would be http://musicbrainz.org/showalbum.html?albumid=275610 & http://musicbrainz.org/showalbum.html?albumid=160240 and examples of *unserious* albums would be http://musicbrainz.org/showalbum.html?albumid=208493 & http://musicbrainz.org/showalbum.html?albumid=80661 basically you can tell with the CD and jewelcase. *serious* ones make a big hoopla and have richly including liner booklets and are usually released by one of the big 'classical' record companies (EMI, Decca, deutche gramphone, Naxos, Philips etc) while *unserious* ones tend to have small linernotes (or none at all) and will be from small "bootlegesque" record companies)

Bootleg

same as today. albums not sanctioned by *neither* record company nor artist. these albums *can* be listed on the artists website (rare), but most good fansites have a bootleg section.

Main Types

these mostly have ticky-boxes. The exceptions are album, single and EP, as they are pretty much exclusive of each other

Album

same as today, first time releases.

EP

same as today, for releases clearly marked 'EP'

Single

same as today, single releases

Maxi-Single

some much stuff

(the following all have ticky-boxes)

Compilation

for compilations, same as today: releases that are selections of tracks from one ore more artists that has been released before.

Split

releases that are re-releases of 2 or more releases on one disc (f.ex No Heavy Petting / Lights Out) or releases where two or more artists share a disc (f.ex Light the Fuse and Run/Hot Cross Split ). both are typically called a 'split CD'.

Remix

same as today, remixes. although they will be stored with albums on the 'albums' page in APR

Remaster

while there is an AR for this, sometimes an album isn't a remaster of another, unmastered older album (vinyl, cassette, old CD's) but rather remasters of tracks find on several albums (making them compilations) track by track adding of remaster AR's is exhausting, to say the least, plus we already have AR's for 'remix' (which is also a releasetype)

Live

same as today, a live release. however one can chose [compilation] [live] for releases that aren't of a single live 'session'

Soundtrack

same as today, with the addition that one can chose [compilation] [soundtrack] for comps of soundtracks.

Classical

for classical albums or albums that utilise ClassicalStyleGuidelines chose [album] [classical] for "full works" and [compilation] [classical] for several works by the same or more composers on one release.

Highlights

after discussion with Clutcher I agree. this should be (at least) a subtype in its own right. please use with Classical or Soundtrack

Data

this is for releases that are either

• a) audiofile discs, cd's full of audio files such as mp3's or ogg
• b) multimedia 2 session disc (bad name please change) cd's that typically have 2 sessions, one which is data and the other which is comprised regular of audiotracks, such discs are typically computer-Game CD's or CD-lens cleaners.

Promotional

same as today, for releases that are given away (usually free) by sweepstakes. magazines, competitions etc.

Demo

a new type. a demo is released by an unknown band to promote themselves, usually released in a crude format such as a home burnt CDR or homemade cassette (f.ex blink-182's Buddha demo). Alternately a demo can be an early version of a song, recorded before the final layout of the song has been... layed out. The demo release type *is not for* releases that were, either commercially, officially or unofficially, compiled and released after the final cut/album was released.

Other

ideally this type should now be obsolete, it should however be retained because a) we still lave loads of releases with this type and b) no matter how you try to cater for releases there is going to be the odd one out that breaks the mold

Spokenword

this is now a heading type. it is still used the same as before. however it is implied that if something is 'audiobook' or 'interview' it is also at the same time 'spokenword'

• interview same as today, for interview discs
• audiobook same as today, for audiobooks
• other narrative other spokenword type releases not already covered.
  • do we want/need Drama-Disc? anything else?

this is my release type proposal mrk2. super thanks to DJKC, PRAEst76, fuchs and uraani for arguing with me!

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Discussion

please leave all ideas in the discussion part of this document. esle it gets clowed

• how do we describe *serious* vs. *unserious* classical albums (I am sure the classical mods understand what I mean. but others are probably confused as heck XD)

For DVDs, I'd suggest to separate audio-only DVDs from concert/music video DVDs, discs with audio-only and video parts, and whatever other disc type should be added (IMHO, it wouldn't make sense to add movie DVDs because someone ripped the score). --derGraph

this your proposal sounds good, and I agree, it fits well with the " though we are not cdbrainz, we are not moviebrainz either. we are *music*brainz " mentality ~mo

I'm not sure if it's a good idea to add vinyl as a media type. Clicks, pops and hissing will surely affect the TRMs, resulting in a large amount of bogus TRMs. Tapes may also be of poor quality. And in the end, every non-digital source bears the problem of conversion into a digital format; and each conversion will have a different result. I don't know how much difference between two sources that still produce the same TRM is possible, but knowing that even the track length affects the TRM, I think we should have digital media only. --derGraph

uh, there are releases that are only released on Vinyl, TRM's are completely not in the equation, neither are mp3's. there are releases that where released on Vinyl/cassette but never will be released on CD or SACD And often if releases *are* rereleased they are released with a *different* tracklisting than the original Vinyl and perhaps cassette with a bonus track. perhaps the LP Vinyl is split onto two cassettes, and the CD release has 4 extra bonus tracks. currently there is no way of saying that 'this release is vinyl' we need this.

• But does it make any sense to add media that need to be digitized before a TRM can be caluclated? As far as I understand MusicBrainz, it's not a discographies library, but (in the first place) a system to help identify and tag ditital music tracks. Now with advanced relationships, it also helps to explore relationships between artists, persons, tracks, etc. (in contrast pure user preference comparison as Audioscrobbler does). I think that it makes sense to include such ARs into MB, especially because the "framework" is alredy there. But then, if someone wants to read an artists discography, she could just follow the discography link. --derGraph
  • Let's just say there are different views and different opinions on what musicbrainz is and should be, and mine seem to be as far aways from yours as possible. To me musicbrainz is about recording knowledge about music, period. An extended discography if you will. See it as the imdb of music. Personally I wouldn't have a big problem if we lost all the trm information tomorrow. THen there's the other side (you and others?) that are here because they have too many mp3s that they want to tag. But I still don'tr really see you'r point, even from that point of view. There are still loads of mp3s flowing around out there that are ripped from vinyls and others. Don't you think people might want to tag those aswell? //bnw
    • If there are some files on the net, and matching TRMs... fine, go ahead! I just wouldn't like to have some thousands of new TRMs just because some people tag their vinyl collection with MB. But then, who can tell they didn't already do? - This is pointless; you're right. --derGraph
      • TRMs in theory could be the same for Vvinyl and CD rips - the resolution is quite low, I believe. Pops and clicks shouldn't matter. Also, one rip from vinyl could get widely distributed on the net. Anyways, TRMs and their (possible) weaknesses shouldn't really factor into our decisions since they aren't neccesarily a permanent feature of MBz anyway... --Gecks

I already have a plan how to handle releases that where released as a vinyl and as a cassette and as a CD etc. with the same tracklisting. I will write up that after this proposal is finetuned and eventually put into work. ~mo

I really can't see any usefulness in having a Classical release type (apart from generating more and more flames about it) but I'm neutral to this. About classical album vs compilation, we know it's a tricky matter and open since composer never released an album but performers do everytime; I can't think about a couple of Piano Sonata written in different times but released once (and maybe on a single recording session) as a compilation which to me is a collection of previuosly released material. Moreover we have the highlights case: often it's not a compilation of best tracks of a full performance but they record just only parts of a 3 album work to fit in one. I'm open to discussion about all this but I think we need to reach consensus: make the nth exception for managing classical/opera or fit them somehow in standard rules? --ClutchEr2

• I infact envisioned this 'classical' type namely to *be* this 'nth exception' you speak of. also i wanted a way to assign any type of release where different rules than the regular ones where used in the upsetting of the release information (artist, track name etc) namely that whenever an album has the 'classical' tag, it will *always* have the composer as the artist, and not the performer (which is usually the case) I wanted to ask you though, should 'highlights' be a subsection under 'compilation'? or is that not necessary? ~mo
  • To be really strict, IMHO highlights should be a subset under Album or even better a different type at the same level: it's not already released material but it's not an album thinking from the composer side. Anyway I'm not asking so much, probably common sense sees it fit under compilation. --Clutcher2

What about those "official bootlegs" or "fan club albums"? Examples: The official Dream Theater bootlegs,Threshold discography containing fan club albums and the Symphony X fan club produced a cd which is available only for fan club members. Shall we just say they are official? --Shepard

• Well, they are official aren't they? But we might add a flag for releases that are not by the artist's record label, but by the artist herself. --derGraph
  • yes, they are 'offcial' there needs not be a flag for this. in the new age of self publicing this will be more and more the norm, adding a "flag" (o_O) here is non-functional - in 20 years or so, will we have the majoraty be flagged?! any such info for now can be but in an annotitaion ~mo

I'm currently listening to Ayreon's The Human Equation. This two disk album is one of the rare cases where the track numbers are continuous on both disks (i.e. tracks 1-11 on disk 2 are a short "intro" to track 12). But though I tagged the files with MB, I changed the album tag afterwards, removing the (disk no.) part. Looking at last.fm (prev. Audioscrobbler), the majority of users did so. Therefore I thought we might add a "Tag as" name, more or less like the artists' sort names. Another case where those names were useful are the ASP albums, which have ugly names if named according to the style guide. Perhaps future tagger apps might ask the user which name to use. --derGraph

• I'm sorry derGraph, but I don't understand what this has to do with release information? ~mo
  • Great question. Or a bad one, 'cause I don't have any answer to it. Maybe I should just stop typing after 30 hours without sleep...? --derGraph
  I don't know either but I just want to give a short comment here: as for disc numbers there are possibilities to store the current disc number and the total of discs in ID3v2 (and the disc name), so later we might add support for this and delete the disc info from the title. Perhaps when release groups will be implemented. And for the ASP albums: I'm also hoping that we can add support for subtitles someday. For tracks this is supported in ID3v2, for album titles not AFAIK. --Shepard

I like the idea of a Physical Medium description. I also think that while vinyl and cassette will not be the method of importing, they should be included in an extended "Release Type." eg "Sgt Peppers, 1967, UK, album/8 track" "Sgt Peppers, 1987, US, CD" This way, when the only difference is the physical media, it would just result in extended release notes.

This way the "Physical Medium" option group could be freed up for a better abstraction. For example:

• Single Disc
• Two-Disc set
• Box Set/ Multi-Disc
• Single
• Maxi-Single
• EP
• song 'for single song releases/ maybe merge with non-album tracks.
• Set/ Show 'for complete sets or performances

The exact specifications of the disc type and format could be part of the extended release notes mentioned above.

Lastly, I would like to suggest that in addition to

• Official
• Commercial (which is a great idea), and
• Bootleg

there also be a category for

• Broadcast

This would include anything taken from FM/XM, TV, Cable, or PPV. These should not necessarily be categorized as "Bootleg" There is a difference, and it is well worth the distinction. When "Robert Plant on David Letterman" surfaces on mp3, or "Take a Load Off Annie, by The Band on SNL" there would be a good place to catalog them, and still keep them separate from the Official releases. --Chuck__Carmody

• But this'd belong under the Main Types, not under the Release Status. And also it's very equal to Live. A broadcast differs from other types, yes, but only as long as you have the view on how music is brought to you. Yet musicbrainz only focusses on how music is recorded and stored. So broadcast cuts can be everything from web album/bootleg/live to cd/official/interview. --Shepard
  • There is no way any Official CD or bootleg show could be considered a Broadcast. A broadcast is a live or tape-delayed performance meant to be consumed in real time by the audience. A bootleg recording is different, as is anything already released on disc. Simply playing albums over the air would not qualify. A good example of a Broadcast "set" would be Paul McCartney at the Super Bowl last year. That was a distribution method not meant for posterity initially, but for immediate consumption over broadcast airwaves. They would not necessarliy have to be airwaves, cable/ppv/onDemand would qualify, but the point being it was neither "Official" "Bootleg" "Promotional" etc... It was its own means of distribution and authentication. I think a lot of people have trouble separating the music from the packaging it comes in, and even though it would be challenging, I would hope MB would be open to the idea that music can be distributed in ways other than glass and plastic.
    • No, sorry, you didn't understand what I was saying (or did you even read it?). Of course a broadcast is different. It is a different way of distribution. But! As long as it is not recorded we don't care about it! There is no sense in saying "at date XXX the band Y made a broadcast stream on radio Z performing the songs A, B, C" and storing that data in MB because it is not of any use for people out there - the same as for concert - it's a one-time-event. But if someone starts recording this and distributes it, then you can say "here we have the recordings of this and can store it with the track times" - and the important thing is that you can hear it over and over again. A different thing is of course if the broadcast is not one-time but permanent. If for example you have a site that distributes albums of several artists only as live streams. But in this case this would go in the category "Digital Media" in mo's proposal (or in a subcategory stream if you want one). --Shepard
      • OK, you're right, I don't think I understand your point of view yet, but here is mine in a nutshell. If I record something that is broadcast, then I have a recording. I definitely don't mean the broadcast as the medium, like CD, Album, StreamingAudio. That's not what I mean. I just meant if I get McCartney's halftime show to tag, it doesn't fall under any category neatly (Official? Bootleg? Promo?), and it would allow for tagging of music ripped from artists' performances on TV shows and the like, that's all I meant.
        • If one rips it, does a nice cover for it and stuff and distributes it either over net or on CD-R it's a bootleg. All things less "official" than that we don't care about. Just for the reasons mo said: everyone can rip it like he wants, so you get differences in track times, track titles and even the audio data. MusicBrainz is a database for music data that is distributed to many people. Do what you want with your personal rips. If you get rips from the net, then live with whatever titling is used or if it classifies as a bootleg, add it. --Shepard

I would also put "Promotional" here because it would seem to be mutually exclusive against the rest of this list.

• Official
• Commerical
• Promotional
• Broadcast
• Bootleg
• Demo

--Chuck__Carmody

• Promotional is already under the Main Types in mo's proposal. --Shepard

Well, much of what you are calling "Main Types" are really just attibutes that can be on or off. They are not really types, some of them. They are just things that may or may not apply to a particular release. Release status is not about how one perceives the music, but how the release was intended to be released. Officially means the intention was to have a physical disc for sale. Bootleg is the opposite. Somewhere in-between are Promotions (give-aways), Demos (hopeful investments), and Broadcasts (free, but worth it for the face-time/air time). If you don't believe me, then tell me whether a Demo should be official or bootleg. Why not give it its full glory for what it is, a release type, rather than delegate it to a attribute under the main category section. Remix, Remaster, Live, Soundtrack, Classical, Spokenword have to do with what is on the album. Promotional and Demo have to do with the way the album was distributed. Which is why I think they belong in the same category as Bootleg (another distribution method) and Broadcast, a method of distribution of music different than Official (similar to Promotional, but not close enough). These are not just means of perceiving music, they are methods of distribution.

They are also mutually exclusive, which makes them good candidates for an option group:

• Official: It was an Official release.
• Commercial: It was released Commercially.
• Bootleg: It was a Bootleg release.
• Promotional: It was distributed Promotionally.
• Broadcast: It was Broadcast.
• Demo: It was a Demo release.

-- Chuck___Carmody

• I've done a *LOT* of thinking on this, you seem to think I haven't thought to cather for these ideas ;), no really the reason that both demo and promotional are in the main types is this: ever heard of a "demo-single"? or a "promotional-EP"? ding.

• Secondary your broadcast idea, what do you mean exactly? if it exsists as a CD, add that, if it exsists as webalbum add that, only tracks downloadable from the bootleg site? add that. do you mean like, ripped and distributed on kazaa/soulsearch/winMX etc type things? the problem with that is that the rip can be ripped almost identically but with slight variying different times and parts of the show by different people. This is the reason why for example The Simpsons' epsiode rips are rejected addition to the DB, nobody can be sure that any two rips are identical. ~mo

Well, why can't Promo stay as release type. We have Promo-EP's now, I'm only suggesting we retain that. What is ding about that? If you add Demo to the release type, you can have Demo-Single just like Official single. What is ding about that? Nowhere do I suggest that Demo and Single should be mutually exclusive, so I'm not really sure what you're getting at. (And what does "ding" mean?)

As for the "broadcast" idea, I guess it would be exactly what you are suggesting. I only mean it to cover "releases" that are not on physical media. I guess your Simpsons example hits that right on the head, and if that's already been considered, then I don't really have anything new about that.

It just seems like there should be a way to catalog that music, whether or not any two rips are identical.

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Some random ideas...

Let's separate Album from Release in the following way:

• Album
  • different track listing: different album
  • different title: different album (as in box sets or special editions)
  • one album, multiple releases

• Release
  • one release, multiple pressings (separated by disc ids)
  • attributes of a release:
    • one or more disc id(s)
    • date
    • country
    • label id (the sub-division on the lowest level)
    • distributor name
    • Cat.no.
    • ASIN
    • BarCode, BarCode-type (EAN/UPC)
    • ISAN (mentioned in ID3v2Tags but I don't know what that is)
    • ISBN (also mentioned there.. do albums in some cases have ISBNs?)

What label id am I talking about? Well that's part of my AdvancedEntity proposal. If we have an entity for a label then the LabelCode can be attatched to this and does not have to be included in this release data. -- Shepard

I like your ideas alot, I have tried my best to always write 'release' since I don't mean 'album' I have also taken a look on your proposal page, could add some more explanatory text, but it's looking good! : ) ~mo

• Well my definition is a bit oppositional to the definition in ReleaseGroups where Release is what I call Album and Album or even Data-Set is what I call Release. But I think Release is actually one edition, one characteristic of the abstract idea of an Album because.. yeah it stores the release data. :) (And one level below we then have pressings of a disc) --Shepard

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misc links: bla

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| Original author: mo