So far, I've been really lucky that everything I've bought was already in the database. One exception was a different edition that I was able to copy an existing profile and convert it. Amazingly enough, it was accepted. I'd almost rather it wasn't. How can you learn from that?

I recently got "being human" Season Four, UPC 883929232901 with no match by either title or UPC. There IS a BluRay Profile, UPC 883929232895, but it's nearly empty. So... What I have so far is covers, some info from VSO Inspector, some info from the videos themselves and a bunch of questions.

Disc 1
Volume Label: 1000264693
Disc ID BAC337AC686F6215
Creation Date: 3/30/2012 10:42:54 AM
Layers 2
sales preview for Sherlock Season Two
Episodes 1-2-3
Trailer
Prequel - Hal
Prequel - Tom
Prequel - The Old Ones

Disc 2
Volume Label: 1000264693
Disc ID 64C845C6B1F3D8E7
Creation Date: 4/3/2012 12:28:14 PM
Layers 2
sales preview for Bedlam Season One
Episodes 4-5
Interviews from 6 cast/crew

Disc 3
Volume Label: 1000264693
Disc ID 6950FC982A50DF70
Creation Date: 4/12/2012 12:19:12 PM
Layers: 2
Episodes 6-7-8
Toby's Guide
Goodbye Russel
The Fall of George
Adam Returns
Allison
The Museum
Deleted Scenes

1) The title would be Being Human Season Four, even though the print on the cover is all lower case.
2) There's no way to play the sales previews from the menus, so they should be disregarded, right?
3) The trailer on disc 1 is a collection of clips from the first three seasons, and the prequels are (I'm guessing) background info that's not in the story? That would make them and the stuff on disc 3 features, right?
4) Release Date seems to be 4/23/2012, although I've also seen 1/15/2013, which seems to be off a little bit.

I just checked http://www.bbcamerica.com/being-human/guide/season-4/ and it seems that the episodes first aired right around the time these discs were manufactured...  I started wondering about these when they came in a keep case, rather than a digipak, and then having all the volume labels the same looked a little strange, too. How can you tell if you've got a bootleg? If they ARE, they look a lot better than the other bootlegs I've seen. I bought them used from an (up to now) trusted Amazon partner.

Well, checking the other three seasons, they all used the same volume label for all the discs in the season, so that's something.

Help? Am I wasting time trying to catalog something that shouldn't even exist???

Thanks. 

1) I believe this should be Being Human: Season Four
4) Where are you getting the 4/23/2012 date from?  I see that the disc creation dates are from March and April of 2012 however that could simply be the case if the same discs from the UK release were used for the US release.  Blu-ray.com, Amazon, DVDEmpire, and WBShop.com all show the 1/15 date.  More research will probably have to be done to make sure.

In terms of the case type, WBShop, DVDEmpire, and Blu-ray.com all show a standard keepcase.  Why do you think these should have come in a Digipak?  Where prior releases in digipaks?  If so, that doesn't stop the studios from changing the packaging midway through a series and it definitely wouldn't be the first time they've done that.

rdodolak, Rizor... I was going by the fact that the other three seasons were released in digipak format. I have enough DVDs that I know consistency is the exception rather than the rule, but it just seemed odd. Usually the packaging gets cheaper, not better.

The file creation dates on the three discs were 3/30/2012 for disc 1, 4/3/2012 for disc 2 and 4/12/2012 for disc 3. However, a little calmer examination of the results of the google search shows that the 4/23/12 release dates were all at UK sites. The other sites were a mish-mash of the data, but not all together. Since the UK is region 2, and these discs are region 1, they can't be the same discs, although maybe they're the same data. I have no idea how the region settings are emplaced.

The thing is that I bought them USED... ordered on the 19th. I never thought to look at the release date until now, but... I guess it's possible that people would buy them, rip them and then turn around and resell them but... I've just been burned a couple times in the past, and I guess I panicked. I still don't have a warm fuzzy feeling, but I'm feeling a little better.

so...
5) Release date would be my USA release of 1/15/2013?
6) When you're getting the cast and crew info, where do you draw the line? Do you add EVERYbody that's credited, even though they may never be in anything again? The only ones that came up from episode 1 were the five main characters, not woman, nor Fergus or several of the others that didn't register. I didn't even get to the crew.

I guess that's enough for now re the contribution, but I'm sure I'll have more dumb questions.

Thanks again, to all.

Thanks again for the feedback.

If I understand correctly, you enter the cast separately for each episode, once for the entire set, and once again on each child? (entering each disc as a child of the set) I don't suppose there's an easy way to do that, is there?

ETA
I just thought of something. Do they all need to be checked through the Credit Lookup Tool? What exactly IS the proper use of that thing?

K... I've been kinda busy lately, so I didn't really get a chance to look at the data I got from the credits for Episode 1 until tonight. Cast was easy... but I still have a question. An example was Mali Harries, credited as Lisa. Would it be appropriate to add (social worker) to clarify who the heck Lisa was, or would that be something for my personal database after submitting the profile?

How in the heck do you enter Crew data? I have nearly 60 credits that don't seem to match up with ANYthing! I got Producer, Creator, Writer and Director from the opening credits, but although I'm sure there must be a Director of Photography, I don't see one anywhere. Although somebody had to compose the background music, the closest I found was Music Supervisor. There's a place for Make-up Artist and Make-up Effects, but the closest I have is Make-up Assistant. That just doesn't seem the same.

I think I'm going to go ahead and get the rest of the Cast data and submit the profile. Is there someone who might volunteer to look at the text files of the Crew credits and see if he/she can make sense of them? If not... I may not even bother typing them.

Thanks for listening to me rant. 

Quoting SampleAndy:

Quote:
How in the heck do you enter Crew data?

Carefully, very carefully.   

Quote:
Music Supervisor. Make-up Assistant. That just doesn't seem the same.

You'd be correct. Neither is a valid entry in Profiler.

For composer - sometimes that's listed as 'Score by' or 'Music by'.
Crew is something that gets easier the more you do it. If you get stuck on a specific credit feel free to PM me and I will tell you if it's a valid entry.

Hope that helps.

Quoting KinoNiki:

Quote:
Use of the Credit Lookup Tool is optional.

Says who? The contribution rules simply state:

Quote:
Use the "Credited As" field where the person's name differs from the credited name.

And the rules go on to explain how we're to do that, exactly, but there's no mention at all about being it "optional".

Quoting scotthm:

Quote:
Quoting T!M:

Quote:
Quoting KinoNiki:

Quote:
Use of the Credit Lookup Tool is optional.

Says who? The contribution rules simply state:

Quote:
Use the "Credited As" field where the person's name differs from the credited name.

And the rules go on to explain how we're to do that, exactly, but there's no mention at all about being it "optional".

It's optional in the same way that omitting some contributable information is optional.

---------------

Not to mention the fact that its use requires knowledge that there is a different name out there.  Since we can't possibly know this for every name, it has to be optional.