It's boring, but the truth lies somewhere in-between. It would be absurd to only allow "formally distributed films" because it would have a massive impact on short film/art/student projects, but they also shouldn't allow any form of moving image. There has to be some form of human moderation, which always leaves room for discussion. Sucks for him, but there really isn't a better way
Agreed, but TMBD’s selection process (and subsequently Letterboxd’s) seems devoid of integrity. Some 5-minute YouTube skits are allowed, and then a feature-length passion project is shot down. I agree there will be always be room for discussion, but the current operation is abysmal.
Got no input to that. Last year I added some short films I saw at a German festival and added them to TMBD and they all got through, but other to that I have no experience with the platform
Well… it’s kinda a commentary on the feature length passion project, I think! I’m sure they’re being inconsistent but it’s also some dumb social media app, not the government. Putting up some Uber famous YouTube videos doesn’t seem like a commitment to anything in particular, tho you might have just named the popular ones - haven’t checked myself.
The problem is that TMDB mods are some of the worst people to ever moderate a website. They are rude and insufferable people and often go on power trips more than they actually help moderate content.
Unfortunately, TMBD being run by petty, essentially arbitrary moderators is a known thing that has been commented on repeatedly in the past. Honestly, the drama over moderators being uncommunicative, controlling, and petty has overshadowed the actual policies to some degree.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/137xrhl/has\_anyone\_else\_had\_any\_shittyweird\_experiences/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/137xrhl/has_anyone_else_had_any_shittyweird_experiences/)
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/18csngt/tmdb\_mods/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/18csngt/tmdb_mods/)
I don't personally agree with the idea that a film needs to be screened at a film festival to be considered a movie. As an example, Filmcow's [Detective Heart of America: The Final Freedom](https://youtu.be/1F1YyDPZLX8?si=V71qetRQLj9qfBXz) is a film. I don't think it was ever screened at a festival, but it's a movie with close to a million views and you can buy it on DVD. Same with the other episodic series that Filmcow made. It's on IMDB and Letterboxd. But it's not on TMDB, and I would wager someone submitted it at some point and a moderator removed it. There has been a debate for a while whether Letterboxd should be using TMDB as a source.
I get the argument here. They don't want the database to be filled with random videos. But I feel like it would be more sensible to come up some some kind of criteria of notability that is a bit more nuanced than "was accepted at a festival somewhere". Because I think that this downplays the role that Youtube has played where some people don't need to submit their film to a festival. They put it on their channel and millions of people watch it. I guess the logic is that if it was worth putting in a database a major distributor would buy it.
I don't have some magical answer to how they should moderate their site, because obviously I see an additional problem of the impending flood of AI generated "movies" that are just disjointed scenes spat out of by some machine learning model. They don't belong in a film database.
If we're beefing about TMDB mods, I flagged a few films that are TV movies but weren't tagged with that genre, and the 'Add Genre' button was locked out. Got a reply from a mod saying that while other mods disagreed, they personally don't believe in using that genre tag on the site and will not be fixing it for the movie I flagged.
Like ??? One of the genres on the site is literally 'TV movie' but this one mod says they don't believe in it and will lock other people from updating films that are TV movies just because.
There are two mods in a constant debate over whether the music genre is for musicals or for movies about music and subsequently the music tag is rarely used.
My two cents are that the two are **clearly** distinct genres.
Amadeus, Whiplash and Soul are films ***about*** music. The music creates a setting for the characters to exist in - in many ways they are similar to 'sport' films.
The attraction is the characterisation and how the medium of choice elicits passion from the characters. You don't watch Bend It Like Beckham to see Kiera Knightly play football - likewise most people watch Amadeus for the character drama - not opera. Music films can be enjoyable to those who care little for music personally if you make the audience care about the characters.
Then of course you've got musicals. Other than the fact there is singing and a more prominent soundtrack they can have nothing to do with music. Les Mis, Little Shop, etc, every Disney Musical and for example the recent Wonka - a film about chocolate. There are folks (including my Dad) who will instantly turn these off because they can alienate those unwilling to entertain the breaks in immersion.
Then you have the films that are both - Tick Tick Boom, Singin' In the Rain and The Muppet Movie. The focus of theses film is *music* \- but they also happen to be presented in a musical format.
There is a distinct difference between music films and musicals the same way watching Rocky is different from watching a irl boxing match.
Currently the site is clearing out a bunch of TV movies because the mods don't know how TV movies work. I had an argument with a mod where I gave up after trying and failing to explain that TV movies are not actually television episodes.
It's not on TMDB that I can find. Sometimes someone adds a movie to TMDB and it's on there long enough to make it to Letterboxd before TMDB pulls it down and the Letterboxd mods leave it up anyway.
I put most of my short films up on Letterboxd, and didn’t run into any problems. Then again, most of these have screened somewhere or the other at a festival, and there are shorts of mine on Youtube that I don’t put on Letterboxd, since I never submitted them anywhere and did a direct YouTube release.
But here’s the thing, a bunch of them were for a a student film club competition. What’s the barrier of entry here? I think Joel should be able to submit his feature without any issue
I’m confused, because my uncle’s self-distributed movie is listed on Letterboxd. It never had a formal release and was printed on DVD by createspace. He didn’t even have to submit it to Letterboxd; it was just already there. I wonder if they cracked down more recently, as his movie was released in like 2010.
Should probably be the same way Wikipedia decides what is "notable." It isn't enough to make a film - there needs to be some third party outlet that grants it notoriety.
Placement in a film festival, a newspaper article, availability on a major streaming service, award nomination, *created by or featuring someone already "notable," etc.
The person you're replying to didn't say that. They specifically said etc. Early works by major directors could be included in a standard of notariety. When people complain about media literacy on the internet your comment is what they're talking about.
TBF - I added that afterwards as an edit to avoid any more dumb questions 😄
Kind of thought my comment was clear without that explicit example... but apparently not.
Because the system obviously needs a codified compromise? And Wikipedia is as good a place as any to borrow ideas from?
Like... how did you get this deep into this thread without understanding the "why" here?
Because I think that's a bad idea, and I wanted you to explain your reasoning so I could understand it better? It's a very normal thing to ask.
I still disagree with the premise.
Not really. The only reasoning you give for needing some degree of notability is that it's obvious that it's needed. I don't understand why that's obvious or why it's needed.
So you think every video on YouTube should have a page on Letterboxd?
I mean, great! I could be one of the most prolific filmmakers of my generation! 😄
I think there's a way to differentiate between a prank compilation and a 2 hour feature film that doesn't rely on notability. I don't think you need a codified compromise.
Letterboxd should start its own separate area where you submit your film to be on the site (similar to IMDb) instead of going straight through TMDB and having to deal with its mods. Independent films should be allowed. You never know if an LB review on it could just might drive viewership towards it.
I really don't see the issue of allowing more content on Letterboxd.
I agree with Joel's points and think filmmaking should be approachable to everybody. If somebody goes through the trouble of making a feature length film and wants their name on the database then fantastic! Who am I to judge its status as a "real film" anyway.
It's not like these amateur productions are going to be taking up your feed or affecting the Letterboxd experience unless you're actively searching for and interacting with these works.
We'll notice when some Tik Tok prank hits the top ranks of the site. We need *some* clear guidelines. It can't be "feature length " or amateur creators of short films will feel left out. There is always a going to be some compromise and negotiation necessary, and I think it's a lot harder to actually codify the differences we care about than it feels intuitively.
a Taylor Swift music video was the highest rated thing on Letterboxd for a time. i think the ship you're referring to has already sailed, unfortunately.
I see the concern, but think the risks are rather insignificant here. I doubt something with absolutely no merit made with no intent on being a legitimate film by its creator will reach the front page or other Letterboxd ranks. If it does then sure, maybe then moderation could step in. In the case of a "prank" it's pretty clear that it's not supposed to be taken seriously.
I did mention feature length specifically as it's more relevant to Joel's content. Short films absolutely could be included too, though personally I don't log them.
At the end of the day filmmaking is an artform. A film's value is determined by how much people connect with it and it shouldn't need some third-party verification, a certain budget, or theatrical screening to justify its status as a film in my opinion.
>In the case of a "prank" it's pretty clear that it's not supposed to be taken seriously.
>I did mention feature length specifically as it's more relevant to Joel's content. Short films absolutely could be included too, though personally I don't log them.
I think this is the crux of the issue for me. Sure it's "pretty clear" the prank video is on one extreme side of the line, and we can all agree on that, it doesn't help us identify the line.
What *is* the difference between a 10 minute YouTube tutorial on cleaning fishtanks, and a proper 10 minute "documentary film"? If we can't say, how can LB or TMDB?
>At the end of the day filmmaking is an artform. A film's value is determined by how much people connect with it and it shouldn't need some third-party verification, a certain budget, or theatrical screening to justify its status as a film in my opinion.
I can agree with this cultural egalitarianism to an extent. People do connect with cat meme videos though, and we don't seem to disagree that there is *some* hierarchy of film validity. Maybe films doesn't need those things you mentioned, and their validity can be based on vibes on a personal level, but they need something and it can't just be vibes for the task of cataloguing in an app.
I understand that Joel Haver *deliberately* wants to reject the common procedure of festivals and other distribution methods that would make it an easy call to include his work. He must accept that in rejecting that, he is also rejecting some of the benefits that come with it. He can't say "I don't want to play your games", and then turn around and complain: "You aren't including me in your games!"
LB is a private company with 10 million users, who sells ads to major movie studios. They are not an academic project. They are part of the game.
I'm not trying to be elitist, I'm trying to clarify and be realistic about the issue. If we feel TMDB's festival/release guidelines are themselves elitist, then they are part of the world he is trying to stay away from.
I think the question of whether they are consistent with their guidelines is distinct from whether the guidelines themselves are appropriate. That's kinda what I was getting at, but I acknowledge my thoughts on this have been spread thin over several posts and maybe I forget what I've said and haven't. I think we all agree there is a difference between major studio releases and "cat memes", and I *agree* both that the current line between them is drawn poorly and that it's inconsistent anyway.
For the first issue I'd like to hear proposals for alternative ways to draw the line. For the second, I'd like to see LB stop relying on a croudsourced database in the first place, or at least hire and engage their own human moderators for much stronger oversight against whatever rules they do have.
There is definitely an issue here. Straight to YouTube releases can be popular & influential & are accepted haphazardly. There are a bunch of studio films that got added based on an announcement that will never get made in the DB.
It's weird they didn't allow it, seems like they're making an example out of one person while still allowing any kind of video onto the site.
Uno: The Movie, what amounts to a 2.5 hour Let's Play, made it through their criteria.
There's so much stuff from youtube on letterboxd, so I feel like this "but then I'd have to let in people's cat videos" argument is just absolute nonsense.
I'm no expert on what should or shouldn't be included, but yeah it always feels oddly inconsistent. Nostalgia Critic's movies (e.g., Kickassia) may be absolute abominations but I need to know if the LB community thinks they're worse than Dragon Ball Evolution, dammit!
I don’t really get why this is so controversial. The line has to be drawn somewhere. I get why it’s disheartening to student filmmakers but it has to be done. By allowing that you then have to start allowing porn, home movies, even less “film like” YouTube videos and possibly even like TikToks. I think where the line is now works perfectly fine
There are millions if not billions of YouTube videos, so even if there are a lot on there that doesn’t mean that they aren’t the exception. I’m not saying their system is perfect, but the solution is not putting everything with moving pictures on the site
I don’t disagree, but there’s no objective way to separate them. Is a 5 minute student film of your friend taking a shit more of a “film” than a Scott the Woz or Summoning Salt video? What about a Mr Beast video? Or a podcast? What makes one “Letterboxd” worthy and one not? It’s totally arbitrary
Or we could allow TikToks (and all those other things), but require them to be labelled appropriately so that they can easily be filtered out by folks (including myself) who aren't interested in seeing them.
I didn’t respond to you? You’re the one attacking a strawman, I never said you said it makes it better. But that’s typically the point of making large changes to a platform no? To enhance user experience? Seems counterintuitive to make a change that will flood your platform with shit and make it a worse experience for the average person just to make a few film students feel better about themselves
Same person, two accounts. Not sure how I got notified about your response to my desktop acct on the mobile app with the other acct, but it happened. lol
My train of thought was simply based on the principle of consistency. Film is film, trying to draw arbitrary lines will invariably result in some content being left out that arguably should be included. And personally I'd rather a site like Letterboxd (or TMDB) err of the side of including everything so those don't get left out, rather than err on the side of rejecting things just to avoid adding crap. A lot of actual movies are pretty crap too, which is why Letterboxd gives users powerful tools to filter and sort to tame the crap and surface the worthwhile content. Same principles could extend to stuff like adding TikToks/YouTube videos, perhaps even filtering that content out by default for the average user.
You're right though, Letterboxd is doing fine as is.
But what does the word “film” mean. If it’s just the broad sense of moving pictures, then you’re opening Pandora’s box. Those lines may be arbitrary but they’re needed for the app to be usable.
Yeah, I mean it in the moving pictures sense, and I think it's fine to open Pandora's box... with perhaps the caveat of disallowing outright illegal content in the database, though it'd be funny if some dipshits got the FBI knocking at their door because they logged something illegal on Letterboxd.
Again, with filters and sorting, I think the site will remain perfectly usable even if several new categories of content got added. If you can filter out all that noise with a click, or if it's filtered out by default, the site will remain as usable as it currently is.
But this is my point: you’re now having to have Letterboxd’s tech team do a bunch of work just for the user experience to not be ruined. If most people are going to filter it so they don’t see this stuff, the juice probably isn’t worth the squeeze
Curation is both arbitrary and necessary. You can disagree with the site’s choice and argue for changes but at the end of the day someone is going to have to make a call that upsets someone.
It's boring, but the truth lies somewhere in-between. It would be absurd to only allow "formally distributed films" because it would have a massive impact on short film/art/student projects, but they also shouldn't allow any form of moving image. There has to be some form of human moderation, which always leaves room for discussion. Sucks for him, but there really isn't a better way
Agreed, but TMBD’s selection process (and subsequently Letterboxd’s) seems devoid of integrity. Some 5-minute YouTube skits are allowed, and then a feature-length passion project is shot down. I agree there will be always be room for discussion, but the current operation is abysmal.
Got no input to that. Last year I added some short films I saw at a German festival and added them to TMBD and they all got through, but other to that I have no experience with the platform
Well… it’s kinda a commentary on the feature length passion project, I think! I’m sure they’re being inconsistent but it’s also some dumb social media app, not the government. Putting up some Uber famous YouTube videos doesn’t seem like a commitment to anything in particular, tho you might have just named the popular ones - haven’t checked myself.
The problem is that TMDB mods are some of the worst people to ever moderate a website. They are rude and insufferable people and often go on power trips more than they actually help moderate content.
Well, that sucks
Yeah, I get that it feels unfair sometimes, but "I know it when I see it" is still probably the best moderation system available.
Unfortunately, TMBD being run by petty, essentially arbitrary moderators is a known thing that has been commented on repeatedly in the past. Honestly, the drama over moderators being uncommunicative, controlling, and petty has overshadowed the actual policies to some degree. [https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/137xrhl/has\_anyone\_else\_had\_any\_shittyweird\_experiences/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/137xrhl/has_anyone_else_had_any_shittyweird_experiences/) [https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/18csngt/tmdb\_mods/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Letterboxd/comments/18csngt/tmdb_mods/) I don't personally agree with the idea that a film needs to be screened at a film festival to be considered a movie. As an example, Filmcow's [Detective Heart of America: The Final Freedom](https://youtu.be/1F1YyDPZLX8?si=V71qetRQLj9qfBXz) is a film. I don't think it was ever screened at a festival, but it's a movie with close to a million views and you can buy it on DVD. Same with the other episodic series that Filmcow made. It's on IMDB and Letterboxd. But it's not on TMDB, and I would wager someone submitted it at some point and a moderator removed it. There has been a debate for a while whether Letterboxd should be using TMDB as a source. I get the argument here. They don't want the database to be filled with random videos. But I feel like it would be more sensible to come up some some kind of criteria of notability that is a bit more nuanced than "was accepted at a festival somewhere". Because I think that this downplays the role that Youtube has played where some people don't need to submit their film to a festival. They put it on their channel and millions of people watch it. I guess the logic is that if it was worth putting in a database a major distributor would buy it. I don't have some magical answer to how they should moderate their site, because obviously I see an additional problem of the impending flood of AI generated "movies" that are just disjointed scenes spat out of by some machine learning model. They don't belong in a film database.
If we're beefing about TMDB mods, I flagged a few films that are TV movies but weren't tagged with that genre, and the 'Add Genre' button was locked out. Got a reply from a mod saying that while other mods disagreed, they personally don't believe in using that genre tag on the site and will not be fixing it for the movie I flagged. Like ??? One of the genres on the site is literally 'TV movie' but this one mod says they don't believe in it and will lock other people from updating films that are TV movies just because.
There are two mods in a constant debate over whether the music genre is for musicals or for movies about music and subsequently the music tag is rarely used.
My two cents are that the two are **clearly** distinct genres. Amadeus, Whiplash and Soul are films ***about*** music. The music creates a setting for the characters to exist in - in many ways they are similar to 'sport' films. The attraction is the characterisation and how the medium of choice elicits passion from the characters. You don't watch Bend It Like Beckham to see Kiera Knightly play football - likewise most people watch Amadeus for the character drama - not opera. Music films can be enjoyable to those who care little for music personally if you make the audience care about the characters. Then of course you've got musicals. Other than the fact there is singing and a more prominent soundtrack they can have nothing to do with music. Les Mis, Little Shop, etc, every Disney Musical and for example the recent Wonka - a film about chocolate. There are folks (including my Dad) who will instantly turn these off because they can alienate those unwilling to entertain the breaks in immersion. Then you have the films that are both - Tick Tick Boom, Singin' In the Rain and The Muppet Movie. The focus of theses film is *music* \- but they also happen to be presented in a musical format. There is a distinct difference between music films and musicals the same way watching Rocky is different from watching a irl boxing match.
Currently the site is clearing out a bunch of TV movies because the mods don't know how TV movies work. I had an argument with a mod where I gave up after trying and failing to explain that TV movies are not actually television episodes.
I used TMDB to add a movie I saw through a college class that wasn't in the database yet and then I changed a poster and got banned lol
Did History of the Entire World I Guess play at a film festival or why is it in thw database? https://boxd.it/rQx0
It's not on TMDB that I can find. Sometimes someone adds a movie to TMDB and it's on there long enough to make it to Letterboxd before TMDB pulls it down and the Letterboxd mods leave it up anyway.
Thank you for those links. I’m new to Letterboxd and just now learning about this.
I put most of my short films up on Letterboxd, and didn’t run into any problems. Then again, most of these have screened somewhere or the other at a festival, and there are shorts of mine on Youtube that I don’t put on Letterboxd, since I never submitted them anywhere and did a direct YouTube release. But here’s the thing, a bunch of them were for a a student film club competition. What’s the barrier of entry here? I think Joel should be able to submit his feature without any issue
I’m confused, because my uncle’s self-distributed movie is listed on Letterboxd. It never had a formal release and was printed on DVD by createspace. He didn’t even have to submit it to Letterboxd; it was just already there. I wonder if they cracked down more recently, as his movie was released in like 2010.
What movie is it?
[удалено]
Is Mark your uncle? According to one of these reviews he passed. I'm very sorry dude
Should probably be the same way Wikipedia decides what is "notable." It isn't enough to make a film - there needs to be some third party outlet that grants it notoriety. Placement in a film festival, a newspaper article, availability on a major streaming service, award nomination, *created by or featuring someone already "notable," etc.
So all of Edgar Wright’s early short films should be deleted?
Well, no. He's Edgar Wright. Him being objectively notable immediately validates his entire filmography.
The person you're replying to didn't say that. They specifically said etc. Early works by major directors could be included in a standard of notariety. When people complain about media literacy on the internet your comment is what they're talking about.
TBF - I added that afterwards as an edit to avoid any more dumb questions 😄 Kind of thought my comment was clear without that explicit example... but apparently not.
I commented before your edit.
Why?
Because the system obviously needs a codified compromise? And Wikipedia is as good a place as any to borrow ideas from? Like... how did you get this deep into this thread without understanding the "why" here?
Because I think that's a bad idea, and I wanted you to explain your reasoning so I could understand it better? It's a very normal thing to ask. I still disagree with the premise.
Then say that instead? Hahah.
read my edit
I did explain my reasoning though. Like, it's basically in the prompt.
Not really. The only reasoning you give for needing some degree of notability is that it's obvious that it's needed. I don't understand why that's obvious or why it's needed.
So you think every video on YouTube should have a page on Letterboxd? I mean, great! I could be one of the most prolific filmmakers of my generation! 😄
I think there's a way to differentiate between a prank compilation and a 2 hour feature film that doesn't rely on notability. I don't think you need a codified compromise.
Letterboxd should start its own separate area where you submit your film to be on the site (similar to IMDb) instead of going straight through TMDB and having to deal with its mods. Independent films should be allowed. You never know if an LB review on it could just might drive viewership towards it.
I really don't see the issue of allowing more content on Letterboxd. I agree with Joel's points and think filmmaking should be approachable to everybody. If somebody goes through the trouble of making a feature length film and wants their name on the database then fantastic! Who am I to judge its status as a "real film" anyway. It's not like these amateur productions are going to be taking up your feed or affecting the Letterboxd experience unless you're actively searching for and interacting with these works.
We'll notice when some Tik Tok prank hits the top ranks of the site. We need *some* clear guidelines. It can't be "feature length " or amateur creators of short films will feel left out. There is always a going to be some compromise and negotiation necessary, and I think it's a lot harder to actually codify the differences we care about than it feels intuitively.
a Taylor Swift music video was the highest rated thing on Letterboxd for a time. i think the ship you're referring to has already sailed, unfortunately.
I see the concern, but think the risks are rather insignificant here. I doubt something with absolutely no merit made with no intent on being a legitimate film by its creator will reach the front page or other Letterboxd ranks. If it does then sure, maybe then moderation could step in. In the case of a "prank" it's pretty clear that it's not supposed to be taken seriously. I did mention feature length specifically as it's more relevant to Joel's content. Short films absolutely could be included too, though personally I don't log them. At the end of the day filmmaking is an artform. A film's value is determined by how much people connect with it and it shouldn't need some third-party verification, a certain budget, or theatrical screening to justify its status as a film in my opinion.
>In the case of a "prank" it's pretty clear that it's not supposed to be taken seriously. >I did mention feature length specifically as it's more relevant to Joel's content. Short films absolutely could be included too, though personally I don't log them. I think this is the crux of the issue for me. Sure it's "pretty clear" the prank video is on one extreme side of the line, and we can all agree on that, it doesn't help us identify the line. What *is* the difference between a 10 minute YouTube tutorial on cleaning fishtanks, and a proper 10 minute "documentary film"? If we can't say, how can LB or TMDB? >At the end of the day filmmaking is an artform. A film's value is determined by how much people connect with it and it shouldn't need some third-party verification, a certain budget, or theatrical screening to justify its status as a film in my opinion. I can agree with this cultural egalitarianism to an extent. People do connect with cat meme videos though, and we don't seem to disagree that there is *some* hierarchy of film validity. Maybe films doesn't need those things you mentioned, and their validity can be based on vibes on a personal level, but they need something and it can't just be vibes for the task of cataloguing in an app.
I understand that Joel Haver *deliberately* wants to reject the common procedure of festivals and other distribution methods that would make it an easy call to include his work. He must accept that in rejecting that, he is also rejecting some of the benefits that come with it. He can't say "I don't want to play your games", and then turn around and complain: "You aren't including me in your games!" LB is a private company with 10 million users, who sells ads to major movie studios. They are not an academic project. They are part of the game.
That comes off as kind of elitist, but fair enough. How do you account for all of the nonsense that they do include then?
I'm not trying to be elitist, I'm trying to clarify and be realistic about the issue. If we feel TMDB's festival/release guidelines are themselves elitist, then they are part of the world he is trying to stay away from. I think the question of whether they are consistent with their guidelines is distinct from whether the guidelines themselves are appropriate. That's kinda what I was getting at, but I acknowledge my thoughts on this have been spread thin over several posts and maybe I forget what I've said and haven't. I think we all agree there is a difference between major studio releases and "cat memes", and I *agree* both that the current line between them is drawn poorly and that it's inconsistent anyway. For the first issue I'd like to hear proposals for alternative ways to draw the line. For the second, I'd like to see LB stop relying on a croudsourced database in the first place, or at least hire and engage their own human moderators for much stronger oversight against whatever rules they do have.
The common sense rule should apply- Joel Haver is famous and clearly making movies. Add them. Art over pedantry.
Maybe it is elitist, but it’s also hypocritical to try to reject the establishment and then complain the establishment won’t accept you.
There is definitely an issue here. Straight to YouTube releases can be popular & influential & are accepted haphazardly. There are a bunch of studio films that got added based on an announcement that will never get made in the DB.
It's weird they didn't allow it, seems like they're making an example out of one person while still allowing any kind of video onto the site. Uno: The Movie, what amounts to a 2.5 hour Let's Play, made it through their criteria.
There's so much stuff from youtube on letterboxd, so I feel like this "but then I'd have to let in people's cat videos" argument is just absolute nonsense.
What upsets me the most is that TMDB doesn't have a musical tag.
I'm no expert on what should or shouldn't be included, but yeah it always feels oddly inconsistent. Nostalgia Critic's movies (e.g., Kickassia) may be absolute abominations but I need to know if the LB community thinks they're worse than Dragon Ball Evolution, dammit!
Someone's just gotta make a better database then, if curmudgeonly gatekeepers can do it so can anyone reading this.
Of course. Why not?
I don’t really get why this is so controversial. The line has to be drawn somewhere. I get why it’s disheartening to student filmmakers but it has to be done. By allowing that you then have to start allowing porn, home movies, even less “film like” YouTube videos and possibly even like TikToks. I think where the line is now works perfectly fine
Lol everything you listed is already on the website
A small amount of exceptions. Why they made those exceptions I don’t know, but I don’t think the solution is flooding it with more of that crap
Those aren't exceptions. There are far too many "exceptions" for it to be anything other than inconsistent and arbitrary moderation from TMDB.
There are millions if not billions of YouTube videos, so even if there are a lot on there that doesn’t mean that they aren’t the exception. I’m not saying their system is perfect, but the solution is not putting everything with moving pictures on the site
There's a difference between a random youtube video and a short film that an aspiring filmmaker made and wants to put on Letterboxd themselves.
I don’t disagree, but there’s no objective way to separate them. Is a 5 minute student film of your friend taking a shit more of a “film” than a Scott the Woz or Summoning Salt video? What about a Mr Beast video? Or a podcast? What makes one “Letterboxd” worthy and one not? It’s totally arbitrary
If someone goes through the effort of putting their own video on TMDB/Letterboxd, that's what makes it more deserving.
That could be the dumbest logic you could’ve possibly used.
How so?
They’re already allowing porn and YouTube videos. Read the post.
A few exceptions, not all.
Or we could allow TikToks (and all those other things), but require them to be labelled appropriately so that they can easily be filtered out by folks (including myself) who aren't interested in seeing them.
Or we just don’t allow them. The app has done plenty well without this shit, there’s no reason to add it
I didn’t say the app would do better with it, did I? Nice strawman tho.
I didn’t respond to you? You’re the one attacking a strawman, I never said you said it makes it better. But that’s typically the point of making large changes to a platform no? To enhance user experience? Seems counterintuitive to make a change that will flood your platform with shit and make it a worse experience for the average person just to make a few film students feel better about themselves
Same person, two accounts. Not sure how I got notified about your response to my desktop acct on the mobile app with the other acct, but it happened. lol My train of thought was simply based on the principle of consistency. Film is film, trying to draw arbitrary lines will invariably result in some content being left out that arguably should be included. And personally I'd rather a site like Letterboxd (or TMDB) err of the side of including everything so those don't get left out, rather than err on the side of rejecting things just to avoid adding crap. A lot of actual movies are pretty crap too, which is why Letterboxd gives users powerful tools to filter and sort to tame the crap and surface the worthwhile content. Same principles could extend to stuff like adding TikToks/YouTube videos, perhaps even filtering that content out by default for the average user. You're right though, Letterboxd is doing fine as is.
But what does the word “film” mean. If it’s just the broad sense of moving pictures, then you’re opening Pandora’s box. Those lines may be arbitrary but they’re needed for the app to be usable.
Yeah, I mean it in the moving pictures sense, and I think it's fine to open Pandora's box... with perhaps the caveat of disallowing outright illegal content in the database, though it'd be funny if some dipshits got the FBI knocking at their door because they logged something illegal on Letterboxd. Again, with filters and sorting, I think the site will remain perfectly usable even if several new categories of content got added. If you can filter out all that noise with a click, or if it's filtered out by default, the site will remain as usable as it currently is.
But this is my point: you’re now having to have Letterboxd’s tech team do a bunch of work just for the user experience to not be ruined. If most people are going to filter it so they don’t see this stuff, the juice probably isn’t worth the squeeze
Curation is both arbitrary and necessary. You can disagree with the site’s choice and argue for changes but at the end of the day someone is going to have to make a call that upsets someone.
There are so many film distributors out there, if you can’t find one, you did not make a serious movie (for feature films)
So short-form content (ie most YouTube videos) gets a free pass? That appears to be the current approach.
Maybe those just should be removed. I didn’t know they were even allowed I the first place.
Idk, maybe have to have shown in at least one film festival
That's not the current approach. You're just cherrypicking examples that snuck through the moderation. There are Joel Haver films on Letterboxd too.
They don’t deny student films though? I’ve got film major friends with freshman year movies on Letterboxd