TMDB moderation issues

This reply actually does want me to “rehash” it again.

There has been no course of action proposed by Trakt about the issues people have with TMDB, except saying “it’s tough to replicate” and paraphrased “some things are getting fixed.”

An override for their bad data would be a significant improvement, it doesn’t have to be a full recreation. Just saying “we’re looking into alleviating the situation” would also suffice.

“Let’s not talk about it” is honestly the worst response Trakt could give.

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This reply actually does want me to “rehash” it again.

Felt the same way when I saw that comment tbh. @justin I don’t know why you think TMDB is a closed issue. It’s not. It’s an ongoing process full of issues your users encounter because of a decision you made.

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My reply and closing the thread was related to the comments from banned TMDB users complaining about being banned. Right or wrong, TMDB banned them for not following their rules, but we don’t need to complain on Trakt about it regularly :slight_smile:

Trakt does allow for some data to be overridden and we handle this through our moderation reporting system on the website. For example, we can set the runtime, genres, images, etc and lock those fields.

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What exactly do you want the Trakt employees/owners to actually do? They don’t run TMDB. They don’t have any real power over how TMDB handles their own business. I know they can feed them advice, but what does complaining about TMDB do here? If you have such a problem with TMDB, go complain on their message boards. Otherwise, my advice is to be more constructive about this and approach the people from Trakt with ideas, requests and support instead of venting your frustrations with another product that Trakt has no control over.

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My reply and closing the thread was related to the comments from banned TMDB users complaining about being banned.

That is one user mentioning being banned in 2 comments out of 45.

No one since the thread was commented on again since December 2023 mentioned bans.

another product that Trakt has no control over

That Trakt uses as its primary data source. Trakt having no control over TMDB is precisely why issues from dealing with TMDB some up.

If you’re banned on TMDB, that means you can no longer contribute to this website. That’s not irrelevant. So,

What exactly do you want the Trakt employees/owners to actually do?

Not lock threads unnecessarily. Said thread that’s full of people discussing this exact question btw.

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Why can’t trakt lock the thread as it wasn’t going to go anywhere anyways since Trakt has no control over TMDB decision making.

This discussion would make more sense over on TMDB but I know if you’re banned that’s a bit difficult to do but it’s not like TMDB mods would be on here to look at TMDB complaints.

It’s like someone ordering food from a restaurant using ubereats and the delivery guy picked it up on time but never make it over to your house. Do you think it would be the restaurant’s fault and fair to complain to the restaurant? It would be ubereats fault.

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Ability to collectively override their decisions on data that is displayed on Trakt? Slightly better communication? Trakt is keeping a copy of some of the data anyways, extending the scope of the data that can be overridden shouldn’t be impossible. (That could also have been a sufficient last reply, that it’s being looked into or whatever)

That is not asking Trakt to go and change their database contents. Like many have repeatedly said, “Trakt has no control” over those things.

I also don’t think anybody is here asking for a coup there and it’s really the first time I saw mentions of someone being banned, both of those things seem fairly off-topic. (Though judging by how they operate you might get banned on a whim of theirs anyways.)

Anyways, let’s try to focus on things Trakt actually has control over. Saying “TMDB just is how it is and Trakt has no control and can do absolutely nothing and let’s not talk about it” is just silly and not true.

Silly? They already make changes to adapt, often even changing their own data. But how long until those changes start causing problems?

If you owned a software company, would you just let any random 3rd party company modify your stuff? I don’t think so. I’ve said before, the best Trakt can do is what they are already doing…so if that doesn’t satisfy your problems/needs, then maybe you should open support tickets on the related platforms…so that maybe they CAN combine resources to make some changes.

What kind of changes? Are they the right ones? Why do they need to be made?

All of these questions pertain to the database Trakt uses. Therefore it’s pertinent to talk about it.

But how long until those changes start causing problems?

Another thing to talk about.

If you owned a software company, would you just let any random 3rd party company modify your stuff? I don’t think so.

Except that’s what Trakt does. Sure Trakt makes it own changes to some series but there are some series that are plain wrong. Re:Zero for example.

so if that doesn’t satisfy your problems/needs, then maybe you should open support tickets on the related platforms

Sounds awesome. Unfortunately the mods can be obstinate and refuse to make necessary changes.

We’re on a forum dedicated to the site. Of course we’re going to talk about, as you say yourself, related platforms. Especially the main database.

I think you are confused. Trakt does have it’s own database(s) because this app/platform/website (what ever you consider it) provides us a service of tracking what TV Shows and Movies we watch. That’s the main data that Trakt stores. In connection to that, Trakt uses TMDB and Just Watch’s API’s. Trakt does not control or modify or store any information TO those platforms. They take what is offered from those API’s and provides us with that info, that we then track so that the info is stored - per user - to one of Trakts databases.

None of what we do, as users here on Trakt, changes what’s on TMDB/TVDB/Just Watch. They have their own interfaces for people to add/modify their data. That’s why it’s critical for you/us as users take those kinds of issues up with those platforms on their support forums/forms/tickets/etc.

I don’t know how else to explain this.

I’m not confused at all.

Trakt uses TMDB as a datasource. Sometimes that datasource has problems and the mods refuse to change it. We then talk about it because Trakt uses TMDB as a datasource.

That’s why it’s critical for you/us as users take those kinds of issues up with those platforms on their support forums/forms/tickets/etc.

We do! These problems get reported and mods refuse to change it. That’s the problem!

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Yeah, I get it. And as much as you don’t like to hear it…95% of the time Trakt can’t do anything about it on behalf of those other platforms. The other 5% of the time they are doing internal data changes. But like I said, at what point do these customizations start causing problems? What happens when data discrepancies become to much to handle?

I think you’re confused as to what is being requested. I will repeat my previous comment, nobody is requesting Trakt to take over or modify TMDB itself. That idea is silly. The fact that people want issues with the data fixed does not automatically imply modifying TMDB directly.

In order to provide the functionality described above by justin, Trakt has their own database for overriding some of these things. They can set the runtime, genres, images, etc and lock those fields. Some of the issues people have described could be fixed by extending that same system.

In the end, Trakt can and is already doing things to alleviate these issues (some of these methods were described by justin above). And again, Trakt doesn’t have to and is not being asked to do anything on behalf of those data sources. Trakt is being asked if they are planning to and if they could improve their systems. What they can and can’t do is what Trakt should be describing.

There is no fixing TMDB data if they (TMDB) don’t want to which seems to be the case given that Travis doesn’t want to be involved with the community anymore by his lack of presence and mods won’t ever budge for some weird reason…

That said, to improve on things: With the recent launch of the “official” trakt scrobbler for streaming services - is there any reconsideration regarding the stance of not changing the default episode group display of a show? Previously it was argued that it won’t be done as to not mess with scrobblers but I feel like it is in the best interest to actually go along with what the “streaming” reality is? this way TMDB data can still be used in those cases.
(Eg. ReZero is 3 seasons on Amazon, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina 4 parts on Netflix, etc.)

As for segmented episodes - there isn’t really a way of fixing it by the way of being fully compatible with TMDB but you could implement a view which joins together episodes by date… if the effort is worth it might be the bigger question (since everyone hates this rule the majority of anime comedies/4komas are not entered that way and luckily have never been moderated).

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For the segmented episodes part, it seems TMDB changed those rules for most anime. Urusei Yatsura and Ranking of Kings: The Treasure Chest of Courage are no longer split into segments and they did revert it on a few others I reported. Some others are still open reports. So at least that rule shouldn’t be an issue anymore.

As for the seasons, we use their TMDB IDs to identify the episodes, but I would need to test if it imports correctly in these cases to know if it works as intended, because of the different listings.

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totally missed that. thank god :sparkler:. funny that all it took was a trendy show Travis was probably watching himself lmao…

if that already works then it would even be less of an issue then (for people using the TMDB scrapper). sadly Travis still hasn’t implemented absolute numbers in their API which would also make things easier…

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Got to say I’m just about fed up trakt and tmdb as a team.

tmdb won’t change their stance on season\episode numbering and trakt has erased tvdb from the site (no more links, comparisons or abitlity to request shows fetch data from tvdb vs tmdb)

I have paid for vip for multiple years here but my subscription is due to renew in a few months and I plan on canceling and finding a more accurate source to house my data and money unless some progress is made.

tmdb won’t listen to any one so fixing the data at the source is moot but on trakt, being able to choose which episode group shows up as default, fetching correct season artwork for said episode groups and being able to scobble correctly numbered episodes would be great steps in the right direction (although I will still miss the tvdb link for shows).

Please advise, I really like this site a don’t have a problem paying for vip (at my current price) but I can no longer stomach to pay to have my data displayed/organized incorrectly.

Hi!

trakt already has the episode groups. I don’t know about selecting them as default. I thought that wasn’t possible (yet)

For example all the groups on One Piece;

Thanks for the reply, I already know that, what I’m talking about is displaying the episode groups by default for shows that tmdb organizes incorrectly (currently airing shows like The Apothecary Diaries - Trakt or Shangri-La Frontier - Trakt ) both of those shows are supposed be split into two season but because of tmdb their not.

Maybe by accident you brought up a perfect example, One Piece, how would you like that show to only have one season with a thousand+ episodes while also loosing every arc name and season poster. That is what tmdb intends for that show except they haven’t got around to it yet.

No issue to me at all. They can’t do it soon enough. :woman_shrugging:

You have the arc names with the episode groups. And posters maybe in the future they’ll support them for episode groups.

I don’t think picking a default episode group on trakt for the whole user base is a good idea because it will only lead to discussion. One person wants it that way the other the other way. As long as everything is there episode wise, does it really really matter? Ive stopped caring that much honestly.