Well, personally, speaking, Hal, I would have cut it off several days ago.  And now you want to cut it of, hmph.  Looks pretty inconclusive to me.

Skip

If you ask me, at this point, you close out the thread, and restate the poll, with a larger explanation of both. Advantages and disadvantages (now that they're more known) of both sides. There will be people here on both sides of the coin who voted and won't come back to see the new information, which makes this poll invalid.

Quoting skipnet50:

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Quoting hal9g:

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Quoting Rifter:

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The problem is that I though we were having a discussion, and that it had moved from one point to another, where we should have asked Ken for his input.  That didn't happen though, did it?  What happened is one person changed his vote, said THIS is the right way, and implied that any more discussion was pointless. 

Is it possible that some people simply hadn't thought it all the way through at the time that they voted.

After seeing some of the later arguments, maybe they started to understand how difficult it would really be to implement Option 1?

Isn't that really what this discussion should have been all about?  Getting everyone's viewpoint out here and letting people decide based on all points of view and information what the best solution is?

Is there some kind of time table to cut off the voting and submit the poll results to Ken?

This thread simply evolved over time.  Sorry it didn't turn out the way you wanted it to. 

Maybe I'm laboring under a misconception, but when I left yesterday, Option 1 was the preferred choice by a wide margin.  I assumed (my bad for doing that) that Ken would be called in to pass judgement on what we had come up with.  Shame on me for taking that for granted.

So, let's restate the objections on both sides here:

Option 1: Put the main cast at the top above the dividers, with all other cast under dividers per episode. [Note: I will expand on the main cast below]

Option 2: Enter ALL the cast for each episode under a divider, main and all.

OK.  Apparently everybody has decided #2 is better, but I see a couple problems with this.  First, you have to repeat however many cast members are in the main cast under each episode, which is lot of extra typing.  Second, even if you use cut and paste, its still a lot of extra work.  Third, several people say use Tom's guides, but to make a point of order, I shouldn't have to use another program to make THIS program easier to use.

Some have raised the objection on #1 that the main cast changes from week to week depending on who is in a particular episode, so you can't list them in proper order per the rules.  We already established that the main cast is credited even when they aren't in an episode.  If one looks at the booklet that comes with 24: Season 1 that contains the overviews, on the back page is a list of main cast and crew broken down by disc (6).  It lists the main cast for ALL the episodes on that disc in aggregate, not by episode!  Does it matter, in all honesty, if some cast member isn't in a particular episode?  The producers are crediting ALL of these actors regardless of how many episodes they are in. What's wrong with that?

There are a number of places in the rules where things are done arbitrarily for ease of use of the program, and other places where we have compromised on changes and had them sanctified by Ken. That's all I really wanted to happen with this, and where I thought we were headed. 

I will also grant that entering all that data for cast and crew is a royal pain whichever way its done, and I can see why some are using Tom's data.  But however difficult it might be to do from scratch, we shouldn't have to use another program just to satisfy a certain group who think that's the best way - and I suspect that's primarily because it's already done.  But maybe that's just the cynic in me coming out.

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Maybe I'm laboring under a misconception, but when I left yesterday, Option 1 was the preferred choice by a wide margin.  I assumed (my bad for doing that) that Ken would be called in to pass judgement on what we had come up with.  Shame on me for taking that for granted.

Two things:

First, if I may bring up an example from another orginazation that builds rule systems, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), one of the requirements for a rule set to become a full recommendation is that there needs to be two interoperable implementations in existance for it.  The 'interoperable' is because it's part of the web, and programs need to be able to work together.  The 'implementation', however, is what I want to point out.  It has to be shown that all the ideals and rules that are hashed out in the various discussions can actually be made to work in real, practical terms.

That's basicly the point that we reached.  It looked pretty solid that there was a consensus, so some people started trying it out.  What they found out was that a number of cases did not work out as well as what the 'ideal' of the implementation would hope for.  Given the small sample set, the fact that it became an issue so quickly does not bode well for long-term use.  Thus they post their experiences to feed back into the discussion, which caused other people to reevaluate their preference.  Some change their votes, but I'm sure a large number of the voters (from both sides) haven't even come back to check the tail end of the discussion here, so their votes are based on incomplete discussions.

Second, had Ken come in here and accepted the recommendation as it was, and then it was found to not be as practical in real terms, or that additional information came to light that for other reasons invalidated the conclusion, we'd have to go back and start all over again to get the rules changed *back*.  While at some point a decision does have to be made, we don't want to be ping-ponging the rules sets.  

For what it's worth, I'm having a similar issue in the box+1 thread.  It looked like it had pretty much settled down to a single choice with only a slight variation to work out, then suddenly a number of additional votes have made the entire debate inconclusive, so we need to go back and start from the basics again.  It's just how the process works sometimes.

Quoting pplchamp:

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John, you apparently did not read Pete's post of why eh changed his mind.

Series: Charmed.

[b]Main Credits: Include Julian McMahon (Cole Turner) and Dorian Gregory (Inspector Darryl Morris).

However, if they are NOT in an episode, they are NOT credited in the main credits.
[/b]
Thus, you can have one, none, or both credited depending on the episode. These are the credits at the start of the show during the opening theme.

Example.

Dorian Gregory is credited in epidoes 1, 2 and 5 and 6 (first two discs).

In some he is credited above Alyssa Milano (credited in all episodes) in others he is credited after Alyssa Milano (credited in all epidoes).

Do you see the lack of logic in option A yet?

I believe Erik I explored that very early in this thread or in some thread dealing with this topic. Since we deal with credits the data is correct to the credits.

Skip

"The other issue with Option 1 as I understand it, is that it is worded to say "Main Cast are those that appear in every episode".

Meaning the credits, another case of don't apply your interpretation, ask the author.

Skip

Again you are appying your interpretation to what was written Hal, i am telling what the author intended and I was the author. Do NOT try to tell me what i meant by YOUR interpreting, if I am unclear I will be most happy to clarify, but you aren't qualified to interpret what was in my mind....don't even TRY.

Skip

Quoting skipnet50:

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Again you are appying your interpretation to what was written Hal, i am telling what the author intended and I was the author. Do NOT try to tell me what i meant by YOUR interpreting, if I am unclear I will be most happy to clarify, but you aren't qualified to interpret what was in my mind....don't even TRY.

Skip

What you intended and what you wrote are two different things, then.

I am only interested in the meaning of the words that were written.  As you pointed out, I cannot read your mind (and wouldn't want to)! 

If you meant something else, I suggest you go back and correct the wording to be clear in your intent!