Attribute None, none, no dialogue in Language section

Thanks Michelle. Hope to hear from you soon on this!

Thanks a bunch Will.
I only just now saw that the following attributes also exist: (Silent) (50 titles), (silent) (5,149), (Silent film) (1), (silent film with English subtitles) (4), (silent film with music only) (9) and (silent with eng subtitle) (1). Can you fix this as well please?

Hi Marco,

The policy states:

Silent Movies should be listed with a language of None and an order number of 1 ('silent' should also be added to the sound mix section). If onscreen text appears in the original version of the title, add the language that the onscreen text appears in with an order number of 2 including an attribute explaining in what form the text takes - (intertitles), for example.

So based on this it seems that the use of those attributes is valid, or at least without knowing the content of those titles we shouldn't remove the language if certain languages do appear on screen.

Regards,
Will

Of course; but the attributes formed as the same word should have a uniform case, and the one "(silent film)" assignment should be changed to "(silent)". In general, everything should be brought "up to code", so to speak. I guess, alternatively contributors could possibly fix these themselves by using the IMDb alternative interfaces data sets to find out which title entries that each attribute is assigned to, if attribute assignment information is even available.

Will,

Thanks for the response, but I fail to see why (most of) these attributes are valid.
-(Silent), (silent) and (silent film) give the exact same information as the language None. Therefore, they add no further information, serve no purpose and should be deleted.
-(silent film with music only). Actually, according to the guide, this shouldn't be an attribute. The guide says that if onscreen text appears in the original version of the title, a language + attribute can be added. In a silent film with music only, there is no onscreen text. That being said, I can live with this attribute, although it doesn't really serve a purpose as long as there is the display issue in which attributes aren't shown on site. (and the guide should probably tweaked a bit to be able to allow this attribute).
-(silent film with English subtitles) and (silent film with eng subtitles) should, at best, be changed to (silent film with English intertitles), but the better way to go would be to delete them all together because - as the guide clearly indicates - the attribute (intertitles) in combination with the language is enough.

So maybe I'm missing something here, but I still feel most of them are invalid and a (yellow) warning should appear when someone enters the word silent, ideally with a link to the guide.

Maybe there should be a new language option "Unknown" in cases of silent movies that show people talking but which include neither subtitles nor intertitles (nor title cards nor credits) and in which it is generally hard to tell what is being verbalized merely by lipreading.

The "(no dialogue)" attribute belongs in both the sound mix section and the language section, for works to which it would apply. However, I agree that the "None" option in the language selection doesn't need any attributes, least of all "(silent)".

As for silent (or dialogue-free) films with subtitles or intertitles, the proper language option should be selected and simply accompanied by the attribute "(subtitles)", "(intertitles)", "(text)", "(credits)", "(title card)", "(version)" or some combination thereof, because there is indeed a language.

That should cover all bases.

Maybe there should be a new language option "Unknown" in cases of silent movies that show people talking but which include neither subtitles nor intertitles (nor title cards nor credits) and in which it is generally hard to tell what is being verbalized merely by lipreading.

Hmm, I see your point and I wouldn't object to it, but I think this would mostly confuse people and might lead to wrong corrections of people trying to "fix" it. (I also think there are very very few of these titles, but that shouldn't be a reason to include or exclude this option). Apart from that, one could say that a silent film without subtitles/intertitles doesn't have any language, so None would be fine to use.

The "(no dialogue)" attribute belongs in both the sound mix section and the language section, for works to which it would apply.

Can you give an example of a title to which it would apply? The way I see it, if the language None is used, it's already clear that there is no dialogue in the title, so I think it should never be used, or at least, not in combination with the language None.

As for silent (or dialogue-free) films with subtitles or intertitles, the proper language option should be selected and simply accompanied by the attribute "(subtitles)", "(intertitles)", "(text)", "(credits)", "(title card)", "(version)" or some combination thereof, because there is indeed a language.

Agreed. And for clarity, I feel (subtitles) shouldn't be used because it also has a different meaning. Also, I feel (title card) and, in most cases, (text) shouldn't be used because (intertitles) is apparently preferred.

Marco, an exception would have be be made for language "None". I meant to make that clear, which is why I stated that such a language should have no attributes whatsoever. Capisce?

Well, the attribute "(subtitles)" will have to be used for cases in which subtitles do indeed appear. Of course, it has a different meaning. Nobody suggested otherwise. Indeed, we can stick to just "(subtitles)", "(intertitles)" and "(credits)", as "(title card)" would be kind of redundant with "(intertitles)" since the term often used to refer to intertitles rather than strictly the on-screen title-of-the-movie, and since "(text)" is vague. Anyway, the whole point of the attribute field is to explain the nature of the selected item. The language of a movie can come in a variety of attributes, unless the language is None. I'm not sure what term or word best describes the title-of-the-movie indicator within the content of the movie, but there probably needs to be an attribute for it.

Marco, an exception would have be be made for language "None". I meant to make that clear, which is why I stated that such a language should have no attributes whatsoever. Capisce?\

I  understand what you mean now. Thanks.

I've done so now adding a new block and message to prevent this from happening again.

I hope a staffer will read this, because although I do see the blocks for (none) and (no dialogue), I also see that in the dropdown menu (none), (None) and (no dialogue) are still listed, with 179, 367 and 2,998 titles attached to them respectively.

I've done so now adding a new block and message to prevent this from happening again.

I hope a staffer will read this, because although I do see the blocks for (none) and (no dialogue), I also see that in the dropdown menu (none), (None) and (no dialogue) are still listed, with 179, 367 and 2,998 titles attached to them respectively.

I've converted all instances of (Silent) and (silent film) to (silent)

Thanks for that.

however I wouldn't want to remove all instances of (silent) on those titles without a full audit being done that confirms that there are no subtitles or intertitles on those films.

That's understandable.

I've converted all silent film with music only entries to none.

Thanks again.

Thanks Marco.

Our technical team is aware of this issue (that some attributes are still visible even though they have been correctly removed from the database) and will be investigating this in due course.

Once we receive an update on this then we will update you.

Thanks for your patience.

Thanks for the update Rida. It's a pity a problem I reported in the summer of 2018 still hasn't been fixed, but that's the way things are I 'spose.

Our technical team is aware of this issue (that some attributes are still visible even though they have been correctly removed from the database) and will be investigating this in due course.

Due course hasn't come yet I 'spose.