Quoting hal9g:

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I guess I'm not being clear.

I completely agree that we enter "as credited" first and foremost.

However, you agreed with Vega's statement above:

"If there is no variation in the way they've ever been credited then there is no need for the whole Common Name..."

My point is, how do you know for certain that there is no variation out there?  Do you own and have you validated his credit in every single movie?

I think you're opening a whole other can of worms.  The name of the poll was "Standardizing Names Without Variants", so I was going on the assumption that it has already been determined there are no other variants.  How that is determined is a different question, but I was responding to the poll (and others probably were also) based on that question already being answered since that was how it was titled.

Not saying this particular can doesn't need opening, because it does, but just wanted to clarify my original response.

As for the answer, I think the Credit Lookup could be that answer with some enchancements.  For starters, it would be nice if it broke down the returned entries between "As Credited" and "Credited As".  Currently it lumps them all together and you can't tell which is which without selecting each record.

Quoting hal9g:

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Unfortunately, the Lookup Tool, does not currenlty reflect the true "as credited" name in many, many cases, which means we are either saying that we want names based on 3rd party DBs, or when we finally get around to fixing all of the "bad" credits" we are going to have to fix all of the "common names".

Either way, it's a big mess!

I understand your concerns, however I honestly believe these cases would be so far and few between, it's worth the risk. The work needed to standardise the current names just in case would be far greater than the work needed to fix the odd one that  matches your scenario.

Skip, if you refer to this sentence:

Quoting hal9g:

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Unfortunately, the Lookup Tool, does not currenlty reflect the true "as credited" name in many, many cases,

then it means that currently many many profiles still have not been audited to "as credited" situation (neither using pure "As Credited" nor utilizing "Credited As") but are still a copy from other sources. These "bad" profiles obviously distort the result the Lookup Tool has at this moment.

Quoting hal9g:

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I guess I'm not being clear.

No, you were quite clear.

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I completely agree that we enter "as credited" first and foremost.

However, you agreed with Vega's statement above:

"If there is no variation in the way they've ever been credited then there is no need for the whole Common Name..."

My point is, how do you know for certain that there is no variation out there?  Do you own and have you validated his credit in every single movie?

I don't know for certain, but the rules don't require me to.  The rules tell me to enter the name exactly as I see it.  The only time I am to deviate from that rule is if I find that the actor has a different credit out there.  I am not going to ignore the rule simply because there might be a variant out there that I am not aware of.

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And even if there is no variation out there today, who's to say that there won't be one tomorrow, which will require that we decide on a "common name" which is different than what is being used in the database.

No it won't.  If an actor has used the same name for 3 films and changes it in the 4th, why do we use a different name?  Just use the name from the first 3 films as the 'common name' for the 4th.

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Again, if 'John Doe Jr' is the only credit to date, then you are saying that's how it should be entered in DVDP.  Tomorrow he is credited as 'John Doe, Jr.".  Since we are agreeing (I think) that IF an actor is credited differently we need a "common name" and in the case of suffixes, we have agreed (I think) on the standard of 'John Doe, Jr." WHEN a "common name" is needed, then all of the old profiles will then require updating.

It seems to me that if we use the "standard" from the git go, then we will not find ourselves in this dilemma later.

This is why I was against arbitrary standards from the beginning.  If you had just used the 'most credited' form of the name from the git go, you could have avoided this dilemma completely.  Unfortunately, you guys have painted yourselves into a corner.  It sucks, and I am sorry, but I am not willing to sacrifice 'as credited' simply because you didn't see this coming.

I apolagize if this has come across as harsh, but the basic foundation, that DVD Profiler was built on, is 'as credited' whenever possible.  This 'standardization' takes us away from that and I can not support that.

only problem is it is not just being reflected upon... it is a poll to decide if we should break the rule. Reflecting upon it is one thing... and no problem... but as long as the rule is there telling us to use the tool that is what we have to do.

Quoting skipnet50:

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I agree with Pete, this is more than reflection. Common names may well change over time anyway. About the only ones that I would expect would NEVER change would be those involved in the Star Trek franchise, I suspect it would be a real stretch to imagne that there might be more than 100 credits for Bill Shatner or Leo Nimoy.

The "common name" in DVD Profiler is not supposed to change over time. That will ultimately be achieved by the Lookup Tool.

I agree, Bill and Leo are probably not in trouble...

@Pete:
Agree, I made a bad choice of words. I had two or three others at first, but obviously still failed

Quoting Unicus69:

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I apolagize if this has come across as harsh, but the basic foundation, that DVD Profiler was built on, is 'as credited' whenever possible.  This 'standardization' takes us away from that and I can not support that.

I completely disagree with the above statement that I have quoted. (and no I am not going to apologize for disagreeing).

We have a field for "as credited" and that is exactly what it should be used for 100% of the time.

The "Actor Name" (sometimes referred to as the "common name") field is something altogether different.  Ken wants us to use the "most commonly used form in the Invelos database".  Unfortunately, that is currently far from being the most common "as credited" form in many cases.

As the current database gets "cleaned up over time" as some have suggested, the Lookup Tool is going to give a different result for many, many names than what we are getting today.  That means that every profile containing those names is going to have to be fixed one by one at some later date when the new form becomes a majority in the database.  Some of that is unavoidable, however, standardization of certain things like suffixes could reduce the problem significantly.

And I don't want t hear any more BS about becoming IMDb.  That is just a huge red herring crock of sh!t. (not directed at you, Unicus)

Quoting Unicus69:

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I am not willing to sacrifice 'as credited' simply because you didn't see this coming.

How would 'as credited' be sacrificed by what's in the name fields? The name and 'credited as' are separate when both are present.

Quoting Ken Cole:

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Notes:
- The credit match is done by displayed name, which will be either the full name or the Credited As name if entered, and so should be a true indication of the credit's frequency.

As long as the displayed name is 'as credited' it doesn't affect the credit lookup if the name is standardized, non-standardized, numeric, reversed or riddled with exclamation points.