Submit In-Progress Cast and Crew Contributions Before September 19th

That too has got me worried and want to ask a lot of questions of this post that they put in the editing system that says: "Any contributions that include cast or crew credits which you have started but not submitted may break between September 19th - September 29th. This includes both unsubmitted “Saved Updates” in your contribution history and any unsubmitted contributions that are open in your browser. It only applies to contributions of Cast and Crew data (e.g. Trivia will not be impacted). This is due to some changes that we plan to make to contribution interfaces during this period. To avoid issues, please submit any large contributions that you have started by 0:00 midnight UTC on September 18th. We also suggest trying to finish and submit any contributions started during this period as quickly as possible." First question: Will this new system for the cast and crew edits deleted a few or more past edits made by IMDb users on their filmographies especially ones that seem wrong? Second: So from September 19th - September 29th we can not make any edits to people that are cast and crew members on IMDb until it is fixed, but can we still make edits to companies to soundtracks? Final: Will this new system, proof read any future edits to cast and crew members on IMDb?

Hi My apologies if this message has created any unnecessary panic. It is not as bad as it sounds: In response to: "First question: Will this new system for the cast and crew edits deleted a few or more past edits made by IMDb users on their filmographies especially ones that seem wrong?"... No - edits that have already been submitted in the past will be unaffected. In response to: "Second: So from September 19th - September 29th we can not make any edits to people that are cast and crew members on IMDb until it is fixed, but can we still make edits to companies to soundtracks?"... You absolutely will still be able to make edits to cast and crew members. Only unsubmitted cast and crew contributions have a chance of becoming slightly corrupted, if you leave them unsubmitted for a long time. I also want to clarify that the risk of this happening is low. We will just make a change at one point during the period, and if your submission happens to be started but not yet submitted when we make the change, then there is a small risk that some of the data might become slightly corrupted. For example, you might need to re-enter some text into fields like character, in some rare cases. These changes should be obvious to you. You should see automatic warning messages in the tool, alerting you to anything that has changed, and prompting you to fix it before submitting. Given this low risk, we just suggest that users try to avoid spending many hours building up a submission in the contribution UI without submitting, in order to minimize the risk of having to fix lots of items before submitting them. In response to: "Final: Will this new system, proof read any future edits to cast and crew members on IMDb?"... The new system will continue to behave exactly as before in this regard.

@dylan Okay and thank you so much.

@assmn108 - TV shows will be affected in the same way as other title types like movies. If you have large contributions that you have not yet submitted, for TV shows, movies, or any other title type, then we suggest completing and submitting those before September 19th.

Is there an announcement coming on what’s being changed?

What’s being changed? Will we see it on September 29?

As I read it, a submission started on or after 19 September could also be affected. When the text says, "We also suggest avoiding spending many hours building up large contributions during this period," I assume "this period" means the period starting 19 September, though it is perhaps unclear.

@MykolaYeriomin It is both updates which are explicitly saved via “Save for Later” (those are the most at risk) and also any browser tabs left open for a long period without being submitted. If, like most people, the way you contribute is to click the “Edit” button, type away, and then immediately submit you will be fine. We are preannouncing this because of some changes to the way the data is structured on the server side. The last time we did this, a number of contributors came forward to complain that they should have been told not to keep any updates saved as they would be difficult to recover. It is a tiny number of updates which could potentially be affected. Hope this helps.

Will we see the changes October 8?

Michelle (or anyone) should update the opening message, which still says September 19 - September 29. Taking the chance that all contributors will make it down here to find this update sounds like a gamble.