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    Invelos Forums->DVD Profiler: Contribution Discussion Page: 1 2  Previous   Next
Where to find DVD distributor
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DVD Profiler Desktop and Mobile RegistrantStar ContributorVoltaire53
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Registered: March 13, 2007
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If it's not obvious (!) if we're searching in that bit of text that appears on the back of most DVDs do we look for the bit that says:

DVD Packaging design copyright XXX
or the bit that says
Sold and distributed by YYY

... and what does the other one count as (if at all)?

TIA
It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar ContributorWinston Smith
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Registered: March 13, 2007
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I refuse to involve myself here. Depending on what you are refrring to exactly, Distributor is usually easy to sort out, notice I said usually. It takes some solid background and knowledge of the industry sometimes. But since no one has yet to be able to even define "publisher" with any kind of clarity...uh uh.

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CBE, MBE, MoA and proud of it.
Outta here

Billy Video
DVD Profiler Desktop and Mobile RegistrantStar ContributorVoltaire53
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Apologies for not being clear, I was referring to Publisher as per the new field - the one that Publishes (and distributes?) the DVD itself, rather than the film/content.
It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar Contributorsnarbo
Registered: March 13, 2007
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This IMHO was when the mistake was made, it should have been left clearly as Distributor, the main company responsible for the deployment of the title to the retail outlets be they high street based or internet based.

Whereas technically the publisher could even be defined as a small one / two man company working out of a garden shed sitting there with a host of DVD copying machines (legitimately) and a printing press for the cover art work. (How else did you think some of these companies started).

Steve
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar Contributornorthbloke
Registered: March 15, 2007
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Quoting Voltaire53:
Quote:
If it's not obvious (!) if we're searching in that bit of text that appears on the back of most DVDs do we look for the bit that says:

DVD Packaging design copyright XXX
or the bit that says
Sold and distributed by YYY

... and what does the other one count as (if at all)?

TIA


I would generally say that XXX was the publisher and YYY was the distributor. For a lot of major releases it's the same company, so if YYY is listed but there's no mention of an XXX I'd list YYY as publisher.
It will mainly be the smaller publishers we'll have problems with as they're more likely to use an external distributor.
DVD Profiler Desktop and Mobile RegistrantStar ContributorVoltaire53
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Quoting northbloke:
Quote:
Quoting Voltaire53:
Quote:

DVD Packaging design copyright XXX
or the bit that says
Sold and distributed by YYY


I would generally say that XXX was the publisher and YYY was the distributor. For a lot of major releases it's the same company, so if YYY is listed but there's no mention of an XXX I'd list YYY as publisher.
It will mainly be the smaller publishers we'll have problems with as they're more likely to use an external distributor.


Thanks for your thoughts... FWIW the one I'm looking at is not a small one at all;
XXX=Universal Studios and
YYY=Universal Pictures (with UK Ltd added though we drop this)
It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar Contributornorthbloke
Registered: March 15, 2007
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Quoting Voltaire53:
Quote:
Thanks for your thoughts... FWIW the one I'm looking at is not a small one at all;
XXX=Universal Studios and
YYY=Universal Pictures (with UK Ltd added though we drop this)

I may be wrong, but in that situation I would class Universal Studios as the Publisher and Universal Pictures as the distributor, as although the film studio is also called Universal Pictures, Universal Pictures (UK) Ltd is the name of their UK distribution counterpart. Of course, now that we're no longer allowed to record the (UK) bit, we can no longer differentiate them!
DVD Profiler Desktop and Mobile RegistrantEvo2Me
Registered: March 15, 2007
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'Packaging design' clearly denotes a designer or design company; in most cases the copyright for it is likely owned by the distributor/publisher.

IME the publisher/distributor will not make a secret out of itself, to the contrary, teh advertise their name quite clearly on the DVD case [actually the piece of paper containing, among other things, the cover art]. A quick glance over my collection shows that only very few discs come without the publisher/distributor's logo on the spine.
DVD Profiler Desktop and Mobile RegistrantStar ContributorTheMadMartian
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Registered: March 13, 2007
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This is easier to disect now that I know the names.

DVD Packaging design copyright Universal Studios

This is neither the publisher nor the distributor.  The package design is usually based on imagry from the film or it's promotional material.  That material is copyrighted by the parent company, Universal Pictures.  All this credit does in extend that copyright to the case design.

Sold and distributed by Universal Pictures (UK) Ltd

Assuming USHE doesn't extend to the UK, this would be the publisher.  It is unfortunate that we are not allowed to include the (UK) portion as that is the only thing that separates the movie studio from the media publisher. 
No dictator, no invader can hold an imprisoned population by force of arms forever.
There is no greater power in the universe than the need for freedom.
Against this power, governments and tyrants and armies cannot stand.
The Centauri learned this lesson once.
We will teach it to them again.
Though it take a thousand years, we will be free.
- Citizen G'Kar
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar ContributorWinston Smith
Don't be discommodious
Registered: March 13, 2007
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I absolutely agree with you on the (UK) aspect, sometimes our users like to shoot themselves in the foot Why? Don't ask me, i have some theories but....

Skip
ASSUME NOTHING!!!!!!
CBE, MBE, MoA and proud of it.
Outta here

Billy Video
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar ContributorT!M
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Quoting Unicus69:
Quote:
It is unfortunate that we are not allowed to include the (UK) portion as that is the only thing that separates the movie studio from the media publisher.

What do you mean? Ken specifically added a "publisher"-only filter, to ensure that we can easily filter separately on the movie studio "Universal Pictures" and the publisher "Universal Pictures". I don't believe there's anything you could do when you had the suffix which you can't do now, or vice versa. As far as I can see, there's honestly no downside whatsoever.
DVD Profiler Desktop and Mobile RegistrantStar ContributorTheMadMartian
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Quoting T!M:
Quote:
Quoting Unicus69:
Quote:
It is unfortunate that we are not allowed to include the (UK) portion as that is the only thing that separates the movie studio from the media publisher.

What do you mean? Ken specifically added a "publisher"-only filter, to ensure that we can easily filter separately on the movie studio "Universal Pictures" and the publisher "Universal Pictures". I don't believe there's anything you could do when you had the suffix which you can't do now, or vice versa. As far as I can see, there's honestly no downside whatsoever.


Yes, he added a filter option, but he didn't give us a separate data set like he did with cast and crew.  The data that goes into the studio field is mixed in with the data that goes in the MP field.  Universal Pictures and Universal Pictures (UK) are two different companies that serve two different functions.

While it may not matter to you, the following display is misleading and just looks stupid...IMHO:

Studio:    Universal Pictures
              Imagine Entertainment
Publisher: Universal Pictures
No dictator, no invader can hold an imprisoned population by force of arms forever.
There is no greater power in the universe than the need for freedom.
Against this power, governments and tyrants and armies cannot stand.
The Centauri learned this lesson once.
We will teach it to them again.
Though it take a thousand years, we will be free.
- Citizen G'Kar
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar ContributorT!M
Profiling since Dec. 2000
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Quoting Unicus69:
Quote:
While it may not matter to you, the following display is misleading and just looks stupid...IMHO:

Studio:    Universal Pictures
              Imagine Entertainment
Publisher: Universal Pictures

So it's just an esthetic thing? You may feel that "looks stupid", but to me it looks great, while I always felt it looked exceedingly stupid with the locality suffix. Well, to each his own, I suppose. I do know that I saw dozens of enthusiastic comments both on my own and other user's contributions removing them ("glad we can finally get rid of these!" and so on - and I'm not making stuff up here). That's because for most of us, especially the non-R1-users, it's not just an esthetic thing, but it has actually helped tremendously in cleaning up the studios list. No more pointless multiple entries for the same companies. No more inconsistencies stemming from the fact that some companies differentiated between various local branches using different corporate identifiers, which we left out anyway, while other companies were making the same distinction through the use of locality suffixes. Dropping one but keeping the other led to an absolute mess. I'm very glad we've finally cleared that all up.

As for separate data sets: well, I originally felt we needed that as well, but by adding the separate filter Ken has effectively eliminated that need. As it is, I don't believe there's anything left to gain by splitting them up.
 Last edited: by T!M
DVD Profiler Desktop and Mobile RegistrantStar ContributorTheMadMartian
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Registered: March 13, 2007
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Quoting T!M:
Quote:
So it's just an esthetic thing? You may feel that "looks stupid", but to me it looks great, while I always felt it looked exceedingly stupid with the locality suffix. Well, to each his own, I suppose.


No, it is not 'just an esthetic thing', and you would have known that had you actually bothered to read my post.  It is also misleading as 'Universal Pictures' and 'Universal Pictures (UK) are two completely different companies that do two completely different things.

Quote:
I do know that I saw dozens of enthusiastic comments both on my own and other user's contributions removing them ("glad we can finally get rid of these!" and so on - and I'm not making stuff up here).


And I have seen people who are unhappy that it was removed...one in this thread.  But, hey, as long as you get what you wanted let's just ignore those users.  Right?

Quote:
That's because for most of us, especially the non-R1-users, it's not just an esthetic thing, but it has actually helped tremendously in cleaning up the studios list. No more pointless multiple entries for the same companies. No more inconsistencies stemming from the fact that some companies differentiated between various local branches using different corporate identifiers, which we left out anyway, while other companies were making the same distinction through the use of locality suffixes. Dropping one but keeping the other led to an absolute mess. I'm very glad we've finally cleared that all up.


You have no idea what it means to 'most of us'.  All you know is what it means to you so, please, stop trying to speak for the masses.
No dictator, no invader can hold an imprisoned population by force of arms forever.
There is no greater power in the universe than the need for freedom.
Against this power, governments and tyrants and armies cannot stand.
The Centauri learned this lesson once.
We will teach it to them again.
Though it take a thousand years, we will be free.
- Citizen G'Kar
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar ContributorWinston Smith
Don't be discommodious
Registered: March 13, 2007
United States Posts: 21,610
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Perhaps, Tim you find mul;tiple entries for Studisos toi be bad. But you are historically INCORRECT, there is not a single solitary Studio in Hollywood that has not over time used different names for different reasons and that data is IMPORTANT to film historians and is only of no value to amateurs. And as Unicus said, the ONLY person you can speak for is YOU.

Skip
ASSUME NOTHING!!!!!!
CBE, MBE, MoA and proud of it.
Outta here

Billy Video
DVD Profiler Unlimited RegistrantStar ContributorT!M
Profiling since Dec. 2000
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Quoting Unicus69:
Quote:
It is also misleading as 'Universal Pictures' and 'Universal Pictures (UK) are two completely different companies that do two completely different things.

Which is why we list them in separate fields, and Ken gave us the ability to do a separate filter on them. So you still get exactly what you want - there's certainly nothing "misleading". You even get to track the "(UK)" bit as well: we have the "locality" field for that.

As for "speaking for the masses": I personally know about a hundred users who LOVE this change, versus about four who don't. And those few people that don't like it, are generally R1 users that don't even own (m)any affected titles. Did you actually have any studios with locality suffixes in your database? I had a quick look at your collection, and I didn't see any. So what's the problem, then? Are you just arguing for the sake of arguing? Having been faced with the problems that these locality suffixes caused for many years, and having discussed that with a rather large number of other users, I do feel I'm qualified to say something about that, and I will continue to do so.
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