I've been noticing an increasing trend recently of using the "profile" count from the CLT for changing or establishing common names and I feel this error needs to be pointed out so users can understand what they're looking at.

Profile count from the CLT is, for the most part, irrelevant to finding the most commonly credited name.  The more important number is the Title count.  Even that isn't perfect, but it's definitely more accurate that trying to use Profile count.  The number of profiles has nothing to do with how often they're credited. It has more to do with localities and different editions.

Here's a simple example:

"John Doe" is in 2 different TV shows and 1 movie that did okay, but nothing special.  The TV shows get released on DVD in only a few localities so there's just a couple profiles for each and same goes for the movie so there's just a few profiles for it.  Then he's in a huge summer blockbuster and he's credited as "John C. Doe".  This movie gets released in tons of localities and there's like 4 different Special and Limited Editions that come out.  So in DVDP there's over 100 different profiles showing him as "John C. Doe".  So now a user uses the CLT to look him up.

John Doe - 3 titles (9 profiles)
John C. Doe - 1 title (112 profiles)

Going strictly by profile count (as many users seem to be) they will try to set his common name as "John C. Doe" even though he's only got 1 single credit in that name.  Meanwhile there's 3 different credits using just "John Doe" which is actually the most commonly credited name.

Of course, it's never that easy, but I just wanted to try to raise awareness of using the Title count instead of the Profile count.  The Title count still isn't perfect since the CLT will count titles in different languages as different titles and there's probably other little things it doesn't catch. So a little more research may be required to get the true number if the numbers are close between name variations.

Unless my understanding of this is completely wrong, then please tell me.  I can take it. 

Completely disagree on the use of profiles to determine most commonly credited. One incorrect entry on a popular title with many profiles completely distorts the CLT.

Even that is not good, the CLT result is a combined result of cast ad crew:
If you do a CLT for Michael Thomas you see what I mean:
The actor and the writer get even mixed up with a Director Erwin C. Dietrich, who has a credited as [Michael Thomas], coloring the CLT result.

I think everybody has forgotten the point of this 'count' - it is supposed to work out which name would require fewer changes so that all the profiles will show as being done by the same person.

therefore the count should be done with profiles.

Trying to only use Titles is irrelevant - we are not trying to use a 'correct' name - purely the one which appears in the most profiles.

Quoting pauls42:

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Trying to only use Titles is irrelevant - we are not trying to use a 'correct' name - purely the one which appears in the most profiles.

No, we're not. Per Ken's specific instructions, we're after the "most-credited form". I consider that to be slightly different then "the most profiles". Most-credited does not mean: use whatever he's credited as in the one, or the few biggest blockbuster(s) he's in. If there are two huge blockbusters with name variant A, and eight "smaller films" with name variant B, then name variant B is the "most-credited form" - no matter how many copies of those two blockbusters there are...

Case in point: again Robert Jayne vs. Bobby Jacoby. In the meantime, I've "dissected" the CLT results - look here. It looks like there are 17 Bobby Jacoby credits and 4 Robert Jayne credits in the database. Sure, based on 'Pearl Harbor' combined with a few IMDb-mined credits you can claim Robert Jayne is the common name, but with 4 against 17 credits that is rather ridiculous, wouldn't you agree? Especially because in the end, it's all about what you end up with in your local database. It's ridiculous to let blockbusters like 'Pearl Harbor' carry more weight than "smaller" titles, because that doesn't match any of our local databases. It may influence the CLT results, but nobody has 75 copies of 'Pearl Harbor' in his local database. With 17 Bobby Jacoby against 4 Robert Jayne titles, chances are that "Bobby Jacoby" is not only the most-credited form in reality, but it'll also be the most-credited form in the local databases of most users. Why then would we attach so much weight to those 75 copies of 'Pear Harbor'?

Quoting T!M:

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Quoting pauls42:

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Trying to only use Titles is irrelevant - we are not trying to use a 'correct' name - purely the one which appears in the most profiles.

No, we're not. Per Ken's specific instructions, we're after the "most-credited form".

But Paul's got a very good point. The idea of using the name that appears in most profiles makes sense. And the phrase "most-credited form" is very vague and can mean either titles or profiles.
Last time this came up I was on the side of using titles, as I saw it as 1 title = 1 credit.
However I do see the logic of using the name that appears in most profiles as what would be the point of having to change 75 "Pearl Harbor" profiles, simply because an extra also appeared in a couple of small independent films that only have 1 profile each. Makes more sense to change the 2 profiles to match the 75!

Quoting northbloke:

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However I do see the logic of using the name that appears in most profiles as what would be the point of having to change 75 "Pearl Harbor" profiles, simply because an extra also appeared in a couple of small independent films that only have 1 profile each. Makes more sense to change the 2 profiles to match the 75!

But again: you would only own one copy of 'Pearl Harbor'. There may be many profiles of 'Pearl Harbor' in the database, but there will always be only one copy (well, maybe someone has double-dipped, but still) of it in your local database. With such a huge majority of "Bobby Jacoby" credits, chances are that despite owning 'Pearl Harbor', that still isn't the most-credited form in most users' databases. If 80% of his credits are as "Bobby Jacoby", why would anyone want to declare the 20% variant to be the "common" one?!

I don't understand the relevance of how many copies I would own of each title. Why should that make a difference to how we decide on common name? There's always the chance that regardless of how the common name is achieved I would own more films that contain the other name, that happens now I'm sure.
To be honest, both sides have good cause and good reasons for saying their way is the right way. Unfortunately, as with all these debates, the only way of resolving them is for Ken and Gerri to make a decision...