10 ms·

There's a reason wikipedia classifies IMDB as an unreliable source. Apparently Michael Madsen has a real problem with people adding him to films in production i

by bragr 4y ago

There's a reason wikipedia classifies IMDB as an unreliable source. Apparently Michael Madsen has a real problem with people adding him to films in production in an effort to get financing. https://www.cinemablend.com/new/Why-Michael-Madsen-Hates-IMDB-70936.html https://www.cinemablend.com/new/Why-Michael-Madsen-Hates-IMD...

leephillips 4y ago
That’s hilarious. Wikipedia classifies IMDB as unreliable because...anyone can edit its pages.
- theamk 4y ago
  ..without public edit history, active moderators and useful watch tools.
- judge2020 4y ago
  Wikipedia allows anyone to audit edits and raise issues if things are fishy. IMDb allows edits but the history is only visible to admins.
  - Eleison23 4y ago
    IMDb is crowdsourced and accepts user data submissions. https://help.imdb.com/article/contribution/contribution-information/how-do-i-contribute-data-to-imdb/GVZTHQ48SWS47WDK# https://help.imdb.com/article/contribution/contribution-info... External users are not part of it. It's a "curated" model. IMDb clearly stakes their reputation on accuracy and comprehensive coverage. IMDb's TOS ensures that you relinquish all copyright claims and grant them an exclusive license to your content. IMDb won't cite their sources nor attribute contributors. They own and control everything on the site. Their rates for abuse and misinformation are unpublished. IMDb is an opaque, black box. Wikipedia has a similar model for protecting articles known as "Pending Changes". Anyone can submit an edit to the article, but the revisions and new data is held back from the "front page" publication until approved by someone with the proper user rights. Almost anyone in good standing can obtain those rights, and it's 100% transparent. Every edit is reviewable by anyone with Internet access, every edit is attributed and licensed under CC-BY-SA. The servers, editors, and bots track and tag vandalism and other forms of abuse with public records. Verifiability is mandatory.
  - 6510 4y ago
    Me and my gang of companion editors, who have a long edit history going many years back (100% deleting content) shall revert your audits and reject your issues. There are 10 of us! You have no further questions. If you continue being disruptive you will be banned.
    - kshacker 4y ago
      Are you talking about here, imdb, or maybe Wikipedia?
    - worthless-trash 4y ago
      I don't know if this is tongue-in-cheek, but it is very accurate.
- jwilk 4y ago
  Wikipedia is not considered reliable either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Wikipedia_and_sources_that_mirror_or_use_it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Wikipe... > Content from a Wikipedia article is not considered reliable unless it is backed up by citing reliable sources. Confirm that these sources support the content, then use them directly. But, unlike IMDB, it's (supposed to be) verifiable.
  - nostromo 4y ago
    IMDB is just as verifiable as Wikipedia. It cites its sources. In fact, all it is a list of citations.
  - chx 4y ago
    Except you can use obscure dead tree books as sources and no one will take the effort to check whether the book indeed says so. Use a book obscure enough -- especially in a non-English language -- and it becomes almost impossible to execute said check.
    - johannes1234321 4y ago
      It depend so. The amount of trust I want to give. By citing an obscure book I can judge the fact "hm, that book sounds obscure, why isn't there some other source?" and then decide how much weight I give to it. And if I don't have the book at hand I can identify the person who added the citation and can see what other edits they did to judge their domain knowledge.
      - chx 4y ago
        No one does this. And Wikipedia myths spread to other media until it's hard to pinpoint where it started.
        stordoff 4y ago
        Sometimes referred to as citogenesis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_reporting#Circular_reporting_on_Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_reporting#Circular_re... There is a list of known incidents: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_citogenesis_incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_citogenesis_...
- amoghs 4y ago
  Such a throwback to high school and every teacher talking about not trusting Wikipedia
  - leephillips 4y ago
    An important lesson, that many seem to have either forgotten or never absorbed.
starik36 4y ago
I was an extra in an indie film because a friend asked me to help out. Lo and behold - I now have an IMDB page - presumably the film producer added me. Fast forward a year and now there are 5 films credited to my name. I had nothing to do with 4 of them. I am unclear how and why this is happening.
- danuker 4y ago
  Huh. Are the other movies from the same studio? Maybe they reused footage with you.
  - starik36 4y ago
    That's a good point. I'll have to check. Thanks.
- exikyut 4y ago
  Sounds like a great conversational icebreaker if you ever talk to an agent!
- namrog84 4y ago
  I've had 2 LinkedIn accounts since the early days. There was a brief time that my 2nd account showed as endorsing my other one. Despite me never doing such a thing. Probably a bug but I know I've heard lots of similar stories and I'm always sus of just automated engagement in any social media curated or created site. Including imdb. Its 1 thing when its bots, its another when its real accounts.
throwoutway 4y ago
Ironically, Wikipedia is an unreliable source. I’ve given up making fixes
- bufferoverflow 4y ago
  Different parts of Wikipedia are completely taken over by interest groups. Try making any factual change, they immediately revert and claim you are a vandal.
  - debesyla 4y ago
    [citation needed] Just kidding. But I do wonder - what parts are you talking about? Like some specific languages? Or topics?
    - bragr 4y ago
      This is such a well known phenomenon I feel it falls under the "sky is blue" exception. However, here's a good example: a specific group of contributors active on pages about composers really don't like infoboxes. Despite being clear (to me) across most topics and languages that there's strong consensus on the use of infoboxes, they will not allow them on any composer's biography. Seriously pick out some random composers [1] and there's a conspicuous lack of them. If you are an unlucky editor, who stumbles upon one of these pages and think an infobox would be an easy, helpful contribution, well prepare to be bitten by a highly active, coordinated group and have your changes reverted. This has been going on for over a decade and blow up to the top levels of dispute resolution several times. [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_composers_by_name https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_composers_by_name [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Composers/Infoboxes_RfC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Com...
      - debesyla 4y ago
        Dang, I honestly had no idea this was so open! Thank you!
      - 4y ago

by bragr 4y ago

leephillips 4y ago

That’s hilarious. Wikipedia classifies IMDB as unreliable because...anyone can edit its pages.

theamk 4y ago
..without public edit history, active moderators and useful watch tools.
judge2020 4y ago
Wikipedia allows anyone to audit edits and raise issues if things are fishy. IMDb allows edits but the history is only visible to admins.
- Eleison23 4y ago
  IMDb is crowdsourced and accepts user data submissions. https://help.imdb.com/article/contribution/contribution-information/how-do-i-contribute-data-to-imdb/GVZTHQ48SWS47WDK# https://help.imdb.com/article/contribution/contribution-info... External users are not part of it. It's a "curated" model. IMDb clearly stakes their reputation on accuracy and comprehensive coverage. IMDb's TOS ensures that you relinquish all copyright claims and grant them an exclusive license to your content. IMDb won't cite their sources nor attribute contributors. They own and control everything on the site. Their rates for abuse and misinformation are unpublished. IMDb is an opaque, black box. Wikipedia has a similar model for protecting articles known as "Pending Changes". Anyone can submit an edit to the article, but the revisions and new data is held back from the "front page" publication until approved by someone with the proper user rights. Almost anyone in good standing can obtain those rights, and it's 100% transparent. Every edit is reviewable by anyone with Internet access, every edit is attributed and licensed under CC-BY-SA. The servers, editors, and bots track and tag vandalism and other forms of abuse with public records. Verifiability is mandatory.
- 6510 4y ago
  Me and my gang of companion editors, who have a long edit history going many years back (100% deleting content) shall revert your audits and reject your issues. There are 10 of us! You have no further questions. If you continue being disruptive you will be banned.
  - kshacker 4y ago
    Are you talking about here, imdb, or maybe Wikipedia?
  - worthless-trash 4y ago
    I don't know if this is tongue-in-cheek, but it is very accurate.
jwilk 4y ago
Wikipedia is not considered reliable either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Wikipedia_and_sources_that_mirror_or_use_it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Wikipe... > Content from a Wikipedia article is not considered reliable unless it is backed up by citing reliable sources. Confirm that these sources support the content, then use them directly. But, unlike IMDB, it's (supposed to be) verifiable.
- nostromo 4y ago
  IMDB is just as verifiable as Wikipedia. It cites its sources. In fact, all it is a list of citations.
- chx 4y ago
  Except you can use obscure dead tree books as sources and no one will take the effort to check whether the book indeed says so. Use a book obscure enough -- especially in a non-English language -- and it becomes almost impossible to execute said check.
  - johannes1234321 4y ago
    It depend so. The amount of trust I want to give. By citing an obscure book I can judge the fact "hm, that book sounds obscure, why isn't there some other source?" and then decide how much weight I give to it. And if I don't have the book at hand I can identify the person who added the citation and can see what other edits they did to judge their domain knowledge.
    - chx 4y ago
      No one does this. And Wikipedia myths spread to other media until it's hard to pinpoint where it started.
      - stordoff 4y ago
        Sometimes referred to as citogenesis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_reporting#Circular_reporting_on_Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_reporting#Circular_re... There is a list of known incidents: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_citogenesis_incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_citogenesis_...
amoghs 4y ago
Such a throwback to high school and every teacher talking about not trusting Wikipedia
- leephillips 4y ago
  An important lesson, that many seem to have either forgotten or never absorbed.

starik36 4y ago

I was an extra in an indie film because a friend asked me to help out. Lo and behold - I now have an IMDB page - presumably the film producer added me. Fast forward a year and now there are 5 films credited to my name. I had nothing to do with 4 of them. I am unclear how and why this is happening.

danuker 4y ago
Huh. Are the other movies from the same studio? Maybe they reused footage with you.
- starik36 4y ago
  That's a good point. I'll have to check. Thanks.
exikyut 4y ago
Sounds like a great conversational icebreaker if you ever talk to an agent!
namrog84 4y ago
I've had 2 LinkedIn accounts since the early days. There was a brief time that my 2nd account showed as endorsing my other one. Despite me never doing such a thing. Probably a bug but I know I've heard lots of similar stories and I'm always sus of just automated engagement in any social media curated or created site. Including imdb. Its 1 thing when its bots, its another when its real accounts.

throwoutway 4y ago

Ironically, Wikipedia is an unreliable source. I’ve given up making fixes

bufferoverflow 4y ago
Different parts of Wikipedia are completely taken over by interest groups. Try making any factual change, they immediately revert and claim you are a vandal.
- debesyla 4y ago
  [citation needed] Just kidding. But I do wonder - what parts are you talking about? Like some specific languages? Or topics?
  - bragr 4y ago
    This is such a well known phenomenon I feel it falls under the "sky is blue" exception. However, here's a good example: a specific group of contributors active on pages about composers really don't like infoboxes. Despite being clear (to me) across most topics and languages that there's strong consensus on the use of infoboxes, they will not allow them on any composer's biography. Seriously pick out some random composers [1] and there's a conspicuous lack of them. If you are an unlucky editor, who stumbles upon one of these pages and think an infobox would be an easy, helpful contribution, well prepare to be bitten by a highly active, coordinated group and have your changes reverted. This has been going on for over a decade and blow up to the top levels of dispute resolution several times. [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_composers_by_name https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_composers_by_name [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Composers/Infoboxes_RfC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Com...
    - debesyla 4y ago
      Dang, I honestly had no idea this was so open! Thank you!
    - 4y ago