New Wave Outpost Forum

PKPN wrote:It's amazing how grown adults can get this far in life and think their poop doesn't stink. The release histories tell a different story than the tales of oppression spoken here.

Folks, it's not that hard. Be tolerant of other people's mistakes, and be gracious and contrite when people fix your mistakes or give you the opportunity to fix them yourself, even if they aren't super polite about it. If you have a disagreement or don't understand why the rules are the way they are, politely take it to the site's forums, and be prepared for any outcome, good or bad.

If you contribute to Discogs a lot, and make lots of good edits, you will get lots of good votes which will help you weather an occasional bad/unfair vote or two. But if, from Day One, your nerves are so frayed that you throw up your hands and storm off in a rage because of one moment of unfairness, then it's probably for the best that you just interact with the site as a passive observer, because you have no business in public forums, and your are just going to find that things go even worse when you are the one making mistakes.

Regarding the Erasure 12": Someone made a mistake and immediately questioned the correction that was made, but there was no reply. Two years later, another user did not do their due diligence in evaluating the situation, and they made a mistake and voted Entirely Incorrect, which undid the edit. They are human. They messed up. They should have noticed that the user said they timed their own rip themselves, and should have given the user the benefit of the doubt...or at worst, someone should have PM'd the user to double-check. But the harsh vote was cast and the result was unfair. Yet if you look, you see it eventually got resolved with an apology by the original submitter, and it did not require very much discussion or editing at all. Yes it did take a little bit of time, but was it ever really that urgent? Is this really worth giving up on the site or holding such a grudge over?

Regarding the Fixx CD: Similar situation. There are two pressings in the database. One is the original 1999 release, and the other is a later pressing, which cannot be from 1999 because it mentions EDC as the manufacturer. An attempt was made to enter the date on that one as 1999, and this was undone via an Entirely Incorrect vote. Again this was way too harsh a vote for a wrong edit made in good faith, but some users dish out EI votes out of impatience and frustration at the ineffectiveness of leaving comments or lighter votes or fixing other people's mistakes for them. Notably, another user pointed out how the vote was too harsh. Nevertheless, the attitude of the person who wanted to make the change should be "oh, sorry, I didn't realize there were two pressings and that an EDC pressing couldn't be from 1999. ya learn something new every day!" ...not (paraphrasing:) "Someone denies my expertise in this matter? Well, I'm leaving and never coming back!"

Regarding the the OP's complaint, this is a bit different. Mistakes were not made by other users. In fact, no one made any mistakes until the OP decided to start undoing other people's additions and corrections. It was OK to not initially enter copyright data. It was OK for someone else to come along and enter it anyway, since it is on the physical item. It was not OK to remove this correct information, even if it seems superfluous.

The other users could have explained better, although they did say what needed to be said. It would not have done much good, though, because they were up against someone who seems to feel (and this is a common attitude among artists and label owners) that he is entitled to more deference, privilege and authority than anyone else, and that he does not need to collaborate with anyone. He seems to think the site's rules do not apply to him so he doesn't need to read or heed them. He violates some of the most basic code of conduct required of users on any website. He becomes obstinate when challenged, digs in his heels, engages in back-and-forth edit wars, offers childish and unprofessional responses (e.g. "who are you, Discogs police? get a life", "moron", and, to paraphrase: "I'm taking my toys and going home" and "tell me your name so I can ban you from my store"), tries to go over everyone's heads, and gripes in other forums. All this over 4 lines of copyright data and some images!

Despite having a marketplace and forum bolted on, Discogs is first and foremost a space for collaboratively creating a database of artist, label and company discographies. This naturally requires some rules for data entry, as you will find in any database. There are some restrictions imposed by the data entry system itself, as well as a boatload of rules which everyone must follow.

The rules ("submission guidelines") and challenges of collaboration ultimately frustrate everyone sooner or later, but it mostly works out. The rules exist sometimes to simply ensure good data is entered, so that releases are sufficiently distinguished and the discographies are fleshed out properly. Some guidelines, like the rules for capitalization, are more just to put an end to arguments and keep the site tidy. The good news is that the barrier to entry is low: when submitting a release, you can enter a minimal amount of info and someone else will help out sooner or later by adding more info and images. Everyone benefits from everyone else's work. Mistakes are made, and mistakes are fixed. Sometimes things don't go your way, and you move on and work on other parts of the site. None of it is worth having a heart attack over.

Just trying to add a little perspective here. Chill out, everybody.