The all new "Official Sputnik Ideas and Suggestions"-thread

[mx]

I was in a funk jazz band for two years -- there is a huge relation.

[Stoic]

Suggestions
Having the sub genre bar in all the pages would make navigation easier. More specifically, here (http://photobucket.com/albums/a193/StormWarrior/?action=view&current=sputnikscreenshot1.jpg) I am in the death metal index. I click a review (http://photobucket.com/albums/a193/StormWarrior/?action=view&current=sputnikscreenshot2.jpg) and see that I cant go directly back to the death metal index or to any other sub genre so I am forced to visit the general metal index to make my choice.

/hopes this makes sense

Also, in R&M we have a great amount of FAs and FGs that could be used in Sputnik as well.

In the end, a "search for a reviewer" feature could be a thing to consider as well as a link from MX profile to the Sputnik profile.

[Shadows]

There seems to be a problem with rating albums. Sometimes when I try to rate an album a specific number I'll get an error message saying "Malformed URL". Other ratings for the album will work, but the one I want won't. :( what's wrong with this?

[Stoic]

There seems to be a problem with rating albums. Sometimes when I try to rate an album a specific number I'll get an error message saying "Malformed URL". Other ratings for the album will work, but the one I want won't. :( what's wrong with this?

I got this twice, when I tried to rate an album after I posted a comment...

[gaslight]

Yeah, I personally get the Malformed URL error message whenever I try to rate an album as "Superb".

[mx]

I'll take a look at the ratings

[standard]

<3 the malformed URL error

[Storm In A Teacup]

I'm not liking how when I comment on a review that has multiple reviews for it and if I'm commenting on the untagged review it will take me to the other review after I post. Can something be done about it?

[Wanker]

I noticed that whenever I go back to edit a review, a forward slash ( \ ) appears between any apostrophies ( ' ) that are in the track listing. Is that a bug?

Also, whenever I edit reviews and submit them, an "error invalid .jpg" message appears.

[Storm In A Teacup]

It's always like that, for both. It's okay.

[Storm In A Teacup]

- User ratings should now return you to the correct review

How about making this the same way with commenting? :)

[mx]

Can you give me an exact example? The code looks fine

[Shadows]

It just happened to me.

Once I read that ratings were fixed, I went to the page for The Absence (http://www.musicianforums.com/sputnik/album.php?albumid=4423) (no review, but the album's listed) to change the rating. Once I changed the rating, it took me back to a random Rush review (http://www.musicianforums.com/sputnik/album.php?albumid=4423).

[Storm In A Teacup]

:confused: Huh, seems fine now. I did a test and it's all good again, weird. Maybe I was just imagining things, or it was fixed when you fixed the rating albums. Oh well.

[mx]

It just happened to me.

Once I read that ratings were fixed, I went to the page for The Absence (no review, but the album's listed) to change the rating. Once I changed the rating, it took me back to a random Rush review.

Try now

[Shadows]

It's still happening.

[morrissey]

This is just a minor idea that would be cool, though it isn't essential. How about adding user statistics like on RYM, such as "user X has contributed 3 artists, 7 biographies, and 219 albums to the database". It would just be nice to keep track of what a user has contributed to the site (in addition to keeping track of their comments/reviews/ratings as the site already does), even if is just a minor thing like that. Just expand on the statistic side of things, because I love those little numbers. :)

[Dave de Sylvia]

Lots of bad biographies are submitted anyway. I think Med's diagnosed the main problem though.

[morrissey]

Yeah I can definitely see the problem with biographies, but I still think the artist/album statistics would be nice.

[Shadows]

I'm at a loss on this idea, so somebody please give me some advice. I'm debating whether or not to add another album. It's just a re-release of one of the band's previous albums, but it has two extra tracks and new cover art. I was thinking about adding it separately because it does have major differences, but aside from the cover, it's only two more songs.

Any ideas? I'm leaning towards adding it as another album.

[Dave de Sylvia]

Unless you plan on actually reviewing it, I'd advise you not to.

[Shadows]

I was planning on reviewing it.

I'll think about this for a while though. Now I'm having second thoughts since it's exactly the same album aside from two tracks which have been available in the past. I may just review the original and make a note of the re-release.

[Dave de Sylvia]

That's what I'd do.

[innerdark]

and if the cover art is different, provide a link too the new art work

[Dave de Sylvia]

I noticed a slight flaw, if it is a flaw, when I tried to edit a news item I submitted. When I returned to edit the item, I figured I had to use html to italicise words, as the page breaks were in html, but when I did so all of the html tags disappeared and I was left with a huge block of text. I reformatted it with bbcode and it appears fine now, sans html.

Also, do rumours count as news or should we steer clear of anything that's not concrete?

[Jom]

I would await Med's and Damrod's answer on this, but this is what I would say:

I'd discourage the posting of rumors only because they are oftentimes fallacies. News is factual - and as you said, concrete - information. Meanwhile, rumors have a great potential to be misleading, which isn't what that portion of Sputnikmusic should be for. Also, I don't want to see the Music News portion of the site to get swamped with crap.

There is one possible exception, which I don't want to address until Med and Damrod (and mx, if he sees this) gives a more authoritative answer.

My answer at this point is that I'd discourage the posting of rumors due to their uncanny ways of being completely amiss.

[Dave de Sylvia]

I figured as much, that's why I didn't post it B-) No Gn'R news until 2019, then :(

[Neoteric]

I noticed that whenever I go back to edit a review, a forward slash ( \ ) appears between any apostrophies ( ' ) that are in the track listing. Is that a bug?

Also, whenever I edit reviews and submit them, an "error invalid .jpg" message appears.
For your first question, that happens but you can easily just edit it out. For your second thing, that always appears if you don't upload an image.

[Neoteric]

I have a request for the mods. When I did the review for Eighties Matchbox B-line Disaster's - The Royal Society for the old CD review forum, I put it under punk rock which was fitting but when the review got transfered to Sputnik. The genre changed to simply "punk" when they aren't simply "punk" I ask the mods if you could put the band in Alt Rock as that fits the description of them better. And another small thing is if you could put the dash in the band name ;) But if the mods can't do this or think it's unnecessary then that is fine.

[Damrod]

Hm, done. I hope you don't set us up with genres here ;)

[Dave de Sylvia]

Kylie Minogue is still listed under M, dating back to when she was 'Minogue, Kylie.'

http://www.sputnikmusic.com/letter.php?genre=38&letter=m

[gaslight]

One thing I have been noticing on Sputnik is really starting to annoy me.

I don't know if people have brought this up before or not (they probably have) but I will vent it anyway - it seems really pointless for people to post things in the comments of reviews that have absolutely nothing to do with the album. I see people post things like "that review is longer than it needs to be", "you could have shortened that", and crap like that. I am new to browsing Sputnik but it already seems like a problem to me. It seems most of the people who have a really high number of comments probably have it because they go around posting crap like that. What are other people's views on this?

Personally I think if you can't add a personal opinion of the album, based on actually listening to it not something like "my friend sez it sucks" and things like that, then is there really any reason to post at all? Certainly nothing either constructive or informative happens, and the issue of community is null as well because telling people "ur review is 2 long make it shorter bcoz i can't sit down and read for 5 minutes" is hardly community activity.

Thoughts?

[Jawaharal]

One thing I have been noticing on Sputnik is really starting to annoy me.

I don't know if people have brought this up before or not (they probably have) but I will vent it anyway - it seems really pointless for people to post things in the comments of reviews that have absolutely nothing to do with the album. I see people post things like "that review is longer than it needs to be", "you could have shortened that", and crap like that. I am new to browsing Sputnik but it already seems like a problem to me. It seems most of the people who have a really high number of comments probably have it because they go around posting crap like that. What are other people's views on this?

Personally I think if you can't add a personal opinion of the album, based on actually listening to it not something like "my friend sez it sucks" and things like that, then is there really any reason to post at all? Certainly nothing either constructive or informative happens, and the issue of community is null as well because telling people "ur review is 2 long make it shorter bcoz i can't sit down and read for 5 minutes" is hardly community activity.

Thoughts?
If someone writes a long to drawn out review, we'll try to let him know so that he can improve for his next one. Its like helpful suggestions and constructive critisism.

[Dave de Sylvia]

One thing I have been noticing on Sputnik is really starting to annoy me.

I don't know if people have brought this up before or not (they probably have) but I will vent it anyway - it seems really pointless for people to post things in the comments of reviews that have absolutely nothing to do with the album. I see people post things like "that review is longer than it needs to be", "you could have shortened that", and crap like that. I am new to browsing Sputnik but it already seems like a problem to me. It seems most of the people who have a really high number of comments probably have it because they go around posting crap like that. What are other people's views on this?

Personally I think if you can't add a personal opinion of the album, based on actually listening to it not something like "my friend sez it sucks" and things like that, then is there really any reason to post at all? Certainly nothing either constructive or informative happens, and the issue of community is null as well because telling people "ur review is 2 long make it shorter bcoz i can't sit down and read for 5 minutes" is hardly community activity.

Thoughts?
I can't remember the last time anyone said a review needed to be shortened, to be honest. This is a music reviews site; we help each other improve our reviews.

[Storm In A Teacup]

I'm sure half of Eliminator Jr.'s post count is complaining about the number of reviews I turned in for the months of Nov. & Dec.

/17 each :-/

[Storm In A Teacup]

I think in the user cp it should list the number of news articles a user has contributed.

[Shadows]

I submitted the new In Flames album without a review, and now it's gone. I'm assuming a mod deleted it?

[Jom]

It wasn't me, but it's certainly possible. If it was Come Clarity, then I know why it would have been deleted.

[mx]

I can give credit for news, good idea

[Storm In A Teacup]

I can give credit for news, good idea


Happy to help out. :)

[Shadows]

It wasn't me, but it's certainly possible. If it was Come Clarity, then I know why it would have been deleted.
Why? Because it hasn't been released yet? I'm curious to know, because the tracklist and cover art have been officially released, so it's not like I added any info that may have been incorrect.

[Jom]

Why? Because it hasn't been released yet? I'm curious to know, because the tracklist and cover art have been officially released, so it's not like I added any info that may have been incorrect.

Yeah, but that doesn't matter. The album itself hasn't been officially released. By adding it, it would encourage people to prematurely review it. I don't condone reviewing leaked albums, and it's Sputnikmusic policy to not review albums that haven't been released yet. It's not even out in the next month, so please, just wait until midnight on that Tuesday to review it :)

[Shadows]

Yeah, but that doesn't matter. The album itself hasn't been officially released. By adding it, it would encourage people to prematurely review it. I don't condone reviewing leaked albums. It's not even out in the next month, so please, just wait until midnight on that Tuesday to review it :)
I wasn't planning on reviewing it, but okay then. I asked and it was mentioned that adding unreleased albums without reviews wouldn't be violating anything.

You should know that there is at least one other future album added by me.

[Jom]

I wasn't planning on reviewing it, but okay then. I asked and it was mentioned that adding unreleased albums without reviews wouldn't be violating anything.

You should know that there is at least one other future album added by me.

I'm not going to take a magnifying glass and run around Sputnikmusic trying to find the clues, unless there's a blue pawprint and little kids screaming "A CLUE, A CLUE!" instead of that damn "SAY SOMETHING!" ad.

But remember, I was just speculating. I didn't delete the album, but I'm just offering a plausible explanation. I'm not passing off anything for fact, here.

[Brain Toad]

I like the idea of integrating your sputnik profile with the forum profile, but I have a slight suggestion concerning it.

Would it be possible to put a feature in say Edit Options of the UserCP that would make what site's profile see first as a default. Like make it so everytime I view a profile it's the forum profile and not the Sputnik one, instead of having to click "Old Forum Profile" to get to the forum links or other info such as the See all Threads link etc.

[mx]

I'd rather just add that functionality to the new profile. It's the same site, there should be one profile.

[Jom]

Can there be an invisible mode still, where it doesn't say when I last logged in to Sputnikmusic?

[Damrod]

Cleaning time, new Suggestions thread can be found here (http://www.musicianforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=429373)