Launch Announcement: Music Video Title Type

Hi,

Following our launch of Podcasts last month. We are happy to announce that as of today, we have fully launched a new title type for Music Videos.

From today, there is a new option available within our New Title Form -> https://contribute.imdb.com/updates?update=title for Music Video.

We have also made changes across all IMDb & IMDbPro web and app experiences to ensure that titles of this type have the correct type displayed, and that music videos are discoverable via search features. For example:-

Adele: Easy on Me → https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15567264/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

Credits for Music Videos are displayed appropriate on their pages e.g. on Adele’s page → https://www.imdb.com/name/nm2233157/ you see:-

Music Videos are discoverable via our Advance Title Search -> https://www.imdb.com/search/title/?title_type=music_video

We have updated the associated submission guide -> https://help.imdb.com/article/contribution/titles/submitting-podcasts-commercials-or-music-videos/G75CJL7UUDSWV7U5#

Please do let me know if you have any questions, or spot any issues.

Cheers,

Rachel

eboy

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2 years ago

Hasn’t really happened to me. Do you perhaps add some kind of ”songwriter” attribute (which I never do)?

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mbmb

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I believe they use "songwriter" word with the meaning of someone who composes/writes the music. So in this case only dj/producer who made the music should be added to composer section I think. Lyricist should only be added to music department. That's what I do at least, I only add the person who makes the music to composer section.

I think they should use a more specific word there instead of "songwriter" since it can mean both.

Perhaps @MarkC can clarify this as well?

(edited)

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2 years ago

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MarkC

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Hi @mbmb, your interpretation of the intended use for songwriter and composer are correct, although we do not have a hard rule on when someone can or cannot be defined as a songwriter, so @eboy your approach of matching the official song credits is valid and aligns with IMDb's wider policy of deferring to official credits where available. Next year we will be exploring how we can improve credit categorisation for Music Videos to remove some of this ambiguity and ensure the labels are relevant to this category of entertainment.

When we commence this work we will seek input from contributors to help guide our decisions.

Thanks again for your input and passion in this area,

Mark

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2 years ago

eboy

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2 years ago

Usually the people who wrote the song are listed in the album/cd/single/etc credits (usually the music video itself doesn’t list this info, let alone other credits for that matter). I always try to go with the ”official” song credits.

If the song says (e.g.) ”Lennon–McCartney”, it means (in this case) that they both wrote music and lyrics. In those cases I would just add the Composer credit (IMDb music videos) for both, and not separate lyricist at all.

With (e.g.) ”Rodgers and Hammerstein”, I would add Rodgers as a Composer and Hammerstein as Lyricist.

The guide is a bit vague with this type of info, considering how differently songs are credited and sometimes it’s not that easy to know who actually is the ”composer” and who’s the ”lyricists”. IF they’re two different people in the first place.

(edited)

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niceboy

17 Messages

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260 Points

1 year ago

I believe that, the IMDb can list Music Videos as well... just like the Trailers, the site can show music videos! It will become 1-stop source of Entertainment! Just my 2 cents. Take care. +

PS : YouTube videos are scattered all over the place... IMDb can do very well!

Note: This comment was created from a merged conversation originally titled Why don't the IMDb list music videos?

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brianrisselada

84 Messages

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1.8K Points

1 year ago

@Rachel Since you were the one that seemed to be primarily in charge of reporting on this new Title Type, you may also want to be aware that it has been nearly 10 months and Music Videos still aren't showing up on the IMDb Datasets files available for download.

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MarkC

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@brianrisselada Thanks for highlighting this! I've passed this on to the relevant team. I do not have a timeframe for this yet, but it's on their backlog.

Thanks,

Mark

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1 year ago

keyword_expert

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@brianrisselada At least you have not been forgotten!

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1 year ago

brianrisselada

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@MarkC I appreciate you following up and giving me an update!

@keyword_expert Thanks for watching this too :)

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1 year ago

keyword_expert

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1 year ago

I don't know if staff are still monitoring this thread, but yesterday I posted this as a reply to another comment, and now will post as a new comment to call attention to it.

Several thousand music videos currently have the Short genre applied to them, as can be seen in this link. I don't know if that means these videos were never cleaned up in the first place, or if one or more contributors have been reapplying the Short genre over the past year, unaware of the change in guidelines.

It probably makes sense for IMDb staff to do another sweep of the titles in the database to remove the Short genre from thousands of titles. It would take contributors a lot more time, since I am assuming staff have ways to speed up the process of deleting genres.

A few music artists in particular have had most or all of their titles listed as (changed back to?) the Short genre. These include the artists listed below. On each page, search for "Music Video short" and you will see what I mean.

Of course, some titles do in my opinion qualify as both short films and music videos. I'm referring to videos with acted parts before and/or after the music. A good first-glance indication of these titles in IMDb is when a "music video" is longer than 10 minutes. What about, for example, Michael Jackson: Thriller? It is unclear to me whether these titles should be designated as both music videos and with the Short genre. I would tend to favor using both, but I might be misinterpreting something.

Here is the link again that I used to find these titles on IMDb, this time sorted by popularity: https://www.imdb.com/search/keyword/?keywords=music-video&mode=detail&page=1&ref_=kw_nxt&genres=Short&sort=moviemeter,asc

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keyword_expert

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p.s. Also, there are currently somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000 music videos on IMDb that have the keyword "music-video" but not the Music Video type. Many of these also have the Short genre. This link helps find them:

https://www.imdb.com/search/title/?title_type=%21music_video&keywords=music-video&sort=runtime,asc&start=101&ref_=adv_nxt

(edited)

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1 year ago

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MarkC

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Hi @keyword_expert , Thanks for highlighting this. I'll get the team to take a look and see if we can migrate them all to Music Video title type. We appreciate you bringing this to our attention.

Thanks,

Mark

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1 year ago

keyword_expert

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@MarkC You're welcome. The reality is the titles on the links I posted can likely only be migrated manually, since there will always be exceptions (titles that should not be migrated). But if IMDb staff have ways to do high numbers of migrations simultaneously, us volunteers can assist by doing any "cleanup" work.

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1 year ago

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MarkC

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Thanks again @keyword_expert ! Yes, we came to the same conclusion that many of the titles do need correcting, but that there are exceptions. We'll do as many as we can in bulk. I'll update this thread to let you know when we have completed the bulk updates.

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1 year ago

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Launch Announcement: Music Video Title Type

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