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  #1  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 09:00 AM
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Default Submissions - Release Date

Current Guidelines
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Enter the day, month, and year of the release date printed on the album. Failing which, use the earliest release date.

The day and month can be left unspecified, but a valid release year is absolutely required.

You may also specify the release status of the album: whether it has been delayed, cancelled, or recalled by the publisher. Further details may be placed in the notes section.
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Technical Changes to Implement
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Proposed Changes for Discussion
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  • Officialize the release date for contest prizes
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  #2  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 09:01 AM
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There is one thing to be decided -- what release date do we use for albums that are released as contest prizes? Possible choices are the contest announcement date, the shipping date, and the receipt date.

We also might want to add a guideline for approximate dates.
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  #3  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 09:08 AM
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Receipt date is to be excluded i think as different persons will receive the album on different dates.

Shipping date is better but albums could be send to different dates..

So.. Contest Announcement is our best bet i think, it's an accurate information, and the same for everyone.
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  #4  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 09:38 AM
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Since the shipping date basically is the release date - the earliest date at which it's available to people (even if realistically most people will receive it a day or two after) - it seems logical for that to be the date we'd want to use. If that can't be found I think the final date for applying is good as well.
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Last edited by seanne; Jun 12, 2010 at 10:36 AM.
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  #5  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 09:52 AM
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Regardless of the choice, I say we add all the possible dates to the notes field. That info is usually hard to find.

I prefer shipping because a contest announcement can be done early before the album is even created, then people recieve it months later. I think this and this are precedents. It isn't 'released' until people can actually have it, no?

Some suggestions:
- Somehow I suck at reading numerical dates and takes me a while to process them. It'd be great if there was an input box after the date status where I could just copypasta stuff like 2010年07月20日, 2007-05-15, 30/03/2010 and some magical javascript would load the day/month/year fields for me. Though it may be a bit too particular feature to add if only I care.

- The from/until dates in the label/artist edit pages use a different format compared to the albums pages, could use some unifying.
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  #6  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 10:03 AM
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First off, do we have to follow the printed date even though it's obviously wrong? I know it was discussed elsewhere the other day (regarding an iTunes album or such) but this is another example (how a reprint could be released on the same date as the original release? )

Anyway, the biggest problem with the announcement date is that it isn't usually announced in the first place. I know some people find it quite odd, but I think it's pretty common that winners will receive the prize without prior announcement. As far as the prize draw or reward album such as Club Nintendo soundtracks, I personally think another solid choice is the application date (I mean, the first day of the application period). We can go with this date when we also handle a made-to-order soundtrack such as this.

Ideally, when we handle prize draw, reward or BTO albums, we could specify "release periods", rather picking up only one specific day, in my opinion.
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  #7  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 10:25 AM
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For albums which have a set period of application/contest/whatever, I think the best choice would be the closing date; it's the most close you can get officially, to the shipping date (as that will be in most cases impossible to find out)
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  #8  
Old Jun 12, 2010, 10:29 AM
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Additionally I think it would be very helpful if the information regarding release year letters that Blah uncovered is added to the release date notes.
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  #9  
Old Jun 19, 2010, 03:51 PM
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So it looks like Shipping Date is the preferred choice for contest prizes.

Also, in the cases Cedille mentions, the actual release date trumps what is printed on the package. For a lot of things like digital releases and bootlegs, the best we might be able to do is estimate the year.
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  #10  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 01:57 AM
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I'll go along with the consensus, but on a practical level, I think it's hard to know the shipping date. We could determine the receiving date by picking up the earliest one from blog or forum posts, but the shipping date sounds like something we have to calculate, occasionally even taking account of where the person who receives it lives. Maybe month only is a solution, but even then, when we see some persons receiving a Super Mario Galaxy 2 OST On July 1st, do we determine that it must have been shipped in June?
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  #11  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 02:48 AM
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We could just use the best known date in this order: shipping > earliest receiving date > announcement.
So if no shipping date was announced by the publisher, recieving date. If we don't know that one either, announcement. In all cases: put date info in the notes.
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  #12  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 03:28 AM
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That sounds neat, but I also wonder if we call some of them the release date, in the first place (looks like something we can more specify by selecting a header from a pull-down menu).

Anyways, with two posts, I still completely forgot to request multiple release date fields. This is useful typically when an enclosed album is released in both Japan and US. But perhaps we could introduce a bigger change in connection with other ideas like multiple price tags or the region.
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  #13  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 05:03 AM
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If there's doubt about the release day just the month and year should be used (I think.)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Cedille View Post
Anyways, with two posts, I still completely forgot to request multiple release date fields. This is useful typically when an enclosed album is released in both Japan and US. But perhaps we could introduce a bigger change in connection with other ideas like multiple price tags or the region.
You know, if the region and release date are different I think that's enough to warrant a child entry.
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  #14  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 05:11 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ira View Post
You know, if the region and release date are different I think that's enough to warrant a child entry.
But when the media content and the packaging remains the same, we've not added it, so under this stance, I think we need alternative ways.
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  #15  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 05:30 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cedille View Post
But when the media content and the packaging remains the same, we've not added it, so under this stance, I think we need alternative ways.
The system we have in place for re/alternate-prints is for these kind of albums, I don't see why we need another way of doing the same thing. Granted, I think the way we handle alternate prints could be overhauled, but is low priority (and off topic.) Also, if we have some kind of policy saying not to add child entries that only vary slightly (like region and date,) I never heard about it, nor agree with it.
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  #16  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 05:45 AM
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We don't add child entries if the physical albums are identical. And if a single letter on the packaging is different, they're no longer identical.

But yeah, it could be useful to have multiple release dates, especially if those are officially recorded by the publisher (e.g. event + retail dates). We'll need a flag to identify the printed date.
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  #17  
Old Jun 20, 2010, 06:10 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ira View Post
The system we have in place for re/alternate-prints is for these kind of albums, I don't see why we need another way of doing the same thing.
I think that's because the system can't catch up every release that is especially on the borderline (digital releases, for instance).

With the policy Blah mentions, when an enclosed album is released in multiple regions while the packaging remains the same, we have to single out the only one release date. While I agree we should prioritize the release date of the original region release over that of a localized version, I think it's also convenient if we can add multiple dates. For instance, I want to have more ways to tell that Deathsmiles Premium Arrange Album is enclosed with the US port of the game than just mentioning to it in the discussion thread/note field. Preferably, it's listed by our release calendar so that more site visitors are aware of it.
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  #18  
Old Jun 21, 2010, 03:18 PM
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Multiple dates would also be nice for music that's pre-released at Comic Market and then officially available at a vendor at a later date.
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  #19  
Old Nov 20, 2011, 09:42 PM
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What should we do in the exceedingly rare case that an album is pre-released at an event and released generally later, but the pre-release date is the one printed on the album? By the current standards we should go with what's printed, even though it's not the general release date, but I wanted to check if that's an intended consequence.

EGG MUSIC has done this with their physical albums.
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  #20  
Old Nov 21, 2011, 04:36 AM
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I think that's probably the only we to handle it too. Just put the later release date in the notes.
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