Colon's replacing Comma's?

@Peter_pbn​ The Guidelines are definitely right I think if it comes to (the vast majority of) scripted characters and legit character names but yes, some thought and clarification in them regards self credits would be good since these are often regards job titles. Comma's are vastly common in these scenarios and I've had zero issue replicating these credits exactly and adding them over the years even when interacting with staff members, so I should imagine there is no issue with that but these colon's are just coming out of nowhere it seems.

For everybody's information, the main reason that the particular guideline (that no commas should be used) exists was because the presence of commas in role fields prevented hyperlinks to character pages (cconst targets) from forming properly in the public display logic of title pages and name pages, and perhaps vice versa. (Such is my best understanding of the matter.) The system behind the character type of IMDb page was taken offline roughly half a decade ago. We don't really need the particular guideline anymore. I hope Col Needham, the founder of IMDb, provides feedback on this matter.

(I would also like to hear from Owen Rees, maybe Will Swift; staff emeritus of IMDb.)

I don't think it should be a special rule for self credits only. That just makes the rules more complicated.  If commas can be used when used on screen, that can apply to all credits. If they must be replaced with hyphens, that also applies to self credits.

@Peter_pbn​ Might be best to remove that line totally with no adjustment if Jeorj is correct.

@jeorj_euler​ Great info. Mulling it over for a bit, if indeed that guideline is outdated and needs removing or updating, it being there in the present form could be why someone interpreted it as 'comma's = bad' and just never used them and went as far as to start replacing them on the site as well but going against that thought is, why would they pick colon's when hyphen's are right there as a better option in the guidelines.

I did wonder if, as you mentioned something similar recently, a contributor was using a device to add credits where comma's were of a code not recognised by the site so they couldn't use them (I might be misunderstanding what you were talking about there though) but it'd not make sense to alter other credits as well.
So it leaves me thinking maybe they just made a choice that there's seemingly no rule against and are implementing it across the site.

Not the first time I've seen something just be invented by someone and become widespread on the site.

On the other hand, of course, it has been the custom for a long time to use the hyphens in many contexts, mainly the format such as "Name - Occupation" (e.g. "Alice - Host", "Bob - Guest" and "Charlie - Staff"). Yet there could be "Name - Occupation, Location" for disambiguation purposes without using the prepositions "of", "at", "on", "to", "for", "upon", "from" or "with", likewise "de", "a", "por" or "para", stuff from other foreign languages too.

In this thread, @phil_g tries to get an answer about this subject, but he can't. His main concern there is "Slashes should be used only to separate two different characters played by the same actor" part in the same section of the guide, if slash should be used if it's shown onscreen but it's not there to separate two different characters, in that case as he shows using slash actually corrupts data and creates two characters while in this case comma is harmless.

Looking at the outcome of that thread, my understanding is that these restrictions under "Punctuation" section are mostly for when there is no character name onscreen and it's a guide for when you had to write a character name yourself because there is none onscreen but when there is a character name onscreen it should be replicated exactly (even if it corrupts the data like a slash)

Also another relevant response from Michelle:

To clarify, it is correct that commas should not be used as a separator for credits, instead a hyphen should be used. However, if a comma is what is displayed on-screen, then a comma is acceptable.

If there is no comma displayed on-screen then our preference is the use of a hyphen.

Also there is this response:

our policy to replicate exactly what is seen within the onscreen credits stands for the usage of comma's, and these credits should not have been replaced

I just reviewed the episode title page and can confirm that the cast credits are now correctly displaying the comma's.

And there are observations of @ljdoncel about the "norms" "not written, but applied in practice" in the same thread

Yes, problems concerning slashes in the role field are very old and apparently chronic.

@eboy​ I get that, my example did have the comma. I do use Hyphens also when appropriate or when used onscreen. Comma's and Hyphens I see often, very rare I see a Colon and all the credits I see on the site with these do not have them on the screen.

I've even had some of my added credits that featured comma's altered to having Colon's instead. So it's not just a punctuation choice, someone is trying to largely introduce colon's into the mix, I'm not sure why.

@Michelle​ Thanks. I hope they get to read this thread especially Jeorj's posts, it seems comma banning in cast credits is an obsolete technical notion.

As for how the thread started, it does not seem there is any reason (technical or otherwise) for Colon's to exist in a cast credit unless it visibly appears onscreen. Maybe add that to the guide as it looks visibly rubbish on the site. No issue with it in crew credits tho, that's fine.

@VonPunk​ I just found this happening to me. 

In a scripted show, I tried to add actress Erin Port's character as "Erin Port - Founder, Simple Purposeful Living" because that was the onscreen descriptor. It was changed to "Erin Port - Founder - Simple Purposeful Living". I settled on "Erin Port - Founder of Simple Purposeful Living" and it was accepted.

@david_glagovsky​ That work around is nicer to look at than a dash that isn't there on the screen. I only know one series that uses dashes onscreen (which I replicate exactly) but other than that it's all commas on everything, banning them is stupid.

@VonPunk​ Agreed.

@VonPunk​ 

This must be brand new because I know I added some self titles with a comma a few days ago. I agree it looks terrible. There is absolutely no reason to exclude commas from name/descriptions.

@adrian​ Yeah it kicked in Thursday night (about 9 or 10 hours ago) as I was between episodes, it was fine before that.

I agree that commas should be allowed, particularly as part of a Self identifier if that is how the person's on-screen description is shown.

I'm not seeing the autocorrection currently.

@Peter_pbn​ I just fixed Erin Port's credit (see earlier in this thread). I put in the comma and got the yellow warning. After checking the "go ahead anyway" box, it was accepted (green). Hopefully this is the end of automatic hyphens.

@Peter_pbn​ Cool, I expected it to lift at some point, seems to be par for the course with these things to appear, then lift, then return later on. So I'm going to do same as David, just get my head down and try input as much as I can while the coast is clear.