Redacted: News

[Len]

Updates: retail bundles versus box sets & filename and tagging rules.

Please read the rewritten rule about box sets which clarifies the difference between a box set and a retail bundle (2.2.20), and the re-written rules about filenames (2.3.11, and 2.3.11.1) and tagging (2.3.18, 2.3.18.1, 2.3.18.2, 2.3.18.3, and 2.3.18.4).

Summary - retail bundles versus box sets:

2.1.20 wrote:

2.1.20: Show

Some examples of these retail bundles include collections sold by retailers from multiple commercial albums which are identical to the individual versions. Warehouse clubs sometimes do this for physical releases, and some web retailers (particularly smaller specialty retailers) will offer sales which include every album they sell, or an entire artist's discography that they sell. If you're having difficulty determining whether something is an official box set or a retail bundle, please seek advice in the help forum, the #red-help IRC channel, or staff pm. Remember, box set content should never be uploaded individually, and retail bundles should never be uploaded together.

Summary - filename rules:

2.3.11 wrote:

2.3.11: Show

This is a combination of wording and formatting changes to greatly increase clarity, a movement of the rules to where moderation has been heading, and a few changes to reflect user expectations, and what is and isn't a good use of staff and user time.

Be aware that the minimum requirements for filenames have not changed. 2.3.11.1 mentions "artist names and titles" because some people include artists in most cases, and many more people include artists in compilations. See 2.3.12 (path lengths), 2.3.13 (track numbers), 2.3.14 (track number formatting), and 2.3.15 (multi-disc filenames).

2.3.11 has been clarified to make sure users understand that the addition or omission of diacritical marks (e.g., "Björk" versus "Bjork") are not grounds for trumping, but that this is different from substituting "lookalike" characters (2.3.11.1, which can result in incredibly unintuitive sorting in media players and other applications (e.g., "Pixies" (Latin) versus "Ріхіеѕ" (Cyrillic)). "Stylization all-caps" are not a thing, and is trumpable in filenames. Translations or transliterations of foreign track titles are neither required nor prohibited, but encouraged, as has been done here.

Ｆｕｌｌｗｉｄｔｈ or ＂ｖａｐｏｒｗａｖｅ＂ characters are allowed only when the artists use them in their own materials (most often on their Bandcamp pages, their album art, and their own promotional materials and websites), but they are never required to be used and are not grounds for trumping. However, if applied to artists who do not use them, for instance The Beatles, such pointless use of fullwidth characters would be trumpable.

Summary - tag rules:

2.3.18 wrote:

2.3.18: Show

2.3.11 and 2.3.18 were re-written in tandem to make sure they agreed with one another again. This hasn't always been the case in the past, and has been the cause of confusion on behalf of users and staff, here and at What.CD. Therefore, with 2.3.18 and 2.3.18.1, the above notes about filenames also apply to tags (diacritical marks, similar character substitution, fullwidth characters, etc.).

Additionally, 2.3.18 is broken up into subrules, some of which introduce specific ideas.

2.3.18.1 specifically covers the artist tag and the use of lookalike characters in the artist tag, which were in the previous rule.

2.3.18.2 specifically covers capitalization in required tags, which were in the previous rule Note again that stylization is not a defense for use of all caps.

2.3.18.3 specifically covers combined tags, which were in the previous rule.

2.3.18.3.1 specifically allows an exception to allow catalog information in the album tag, but stresses that this should be limited to those cases where it is reasonable to presume that this would be helpful, which is to say when there are other similar releases it could easily be confused with, such as radically different editions, an album and a single with the same name (where it might be more helpful to label the single), etc.

2.3.18.3.2 specifies that it is allowed (but not required) to include guest artist information in either the artist or title tags - neither is trumpable.

2.3.18.3.3 goes into detail about adding disc number information into the album tag. Generally, it should not be done and is trumpable. The rule goes into a few exceptions, where each disc has a subtitle or a conceptual name. "Disc 2" is not a subtitle or conceptual name.

2.3.18.3.4 specifies that track numbers are valid with or without zero-padding (01, 02, 03 ..., 10, 12) or (1, 2, 3 ... 10, 12) and that vinyl track/side numbering is valid for vinyl-sourced content (a1, a2, a3 ... b1, b2, b3) - you'll usually see this in physical vinyl, and the occasional vinyl-sourced WEB release. This puts tagging in line with the filename rule 2.3.14.

2.3.18.4 covers tag trumping rules, which were in the previous rule.

Given that most of these filename and tag rules are either the same as the old rules but organized a bit more clearly, more flexible re-writing of older rules, or reflected existing moderation guidelines, there shouldn't be a lot of confusion from existing users. 2.3.18.3.3 is probably going to be the one that long-term users need to pay the most attention to in the future. The defense that "EAC/XLD writes the tag this way" has been used in the past and isn't strictly correct - it's more a function of what database EAC or XLD uses, and as these databases are user-created, they aren't authoritative and are subject to user habits and mistakes.

If you have any questions, please let us know. Thanks!