Quoting JTh:

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Wow - Thanks for all honest and constructive reply's  It's great to see that people really care about what we contribute and how to do it. Appriciated 

Don't mention it, it was a pleasure.

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Regarding IMDB - I'm quite aware of the copyright issue, and when making updates data should always come from the source. But then we have the issue about the correct source.

For DVDProfiler purposes there is only one source: The DVD itself.
Advantage: in theory every error in a profile is easy to spot, and could/should be corrected with the next profile update.
Third party material is only allowed as supporting sources for birthyears. Here you'd usually need at least two independent sources, or the official site of the Cast-/Crew- Member.

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In some cases (actually a lot) - the movie it self do not provide all the required info. DVD versions of "old" movies don't always contain the credit and info list at the end of the movie - in these cases you have to use other reliable sources.

Correct (for the first part),
the problem with external sources usually is their reliability. That's why for DVDProfiler's maindatabase there are only two "sources" allowed for uncredited cast:
1) Personal identification: (you'd have to recognize the actor/actress). For making this verifiable to other users it has shown to be useful to give a timecode of the appearance, even though it is not required by the contribution rules.

2) Other already accepted profiles of this title: Personally I don't like this source very much, because it's inclined to spread errors throughout the maindatabase. It has a certain value though.

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[...] And at the end you realise that the information you have gathered - in most cases are aligned with the info in IMDB and other sites (because they have done the same exercise). So if you use these kind of sites as pure validation, I can not see the issue.   

The issue is, that IMDb has on several occasions been proven to be incorrect.
There's even the assumption that IMDb implements errors on purpose, for cases where they'd have to prove a copyright violation ("This is our incorrect data, and if it appears in your database, you stole it").
So, as said before, feel free to do whatever you like in your local database. You can customize this program and it's data to be of as much use as possible for your personal purposes. You just shouldn't (for not saying: "must not") contribute this data to the main database.

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The correct source can always be challenged - I have even discovered errors in the credit list at the of a movie. We just have to do best we can and hope for the best in our  updates.
Thanks again 

The source is the source, and by definition undisputed.
There is a main error-source though:
typos:
-a) either by the contributor of the profile, which should be corrected with the next profile update

-b) or in the credits, for this we have the "Credited As"-feature, that should ensure a correct linking. (e.g. you find a movie where "Lino Ventura" accidentally got credited as "Vino Lentura", for solving this, in the profile editor you click on the correct name (Lino Ventura) and in the next window you'd enter the credited name (Vino Lentura). This got established to provide a correct linking while still showing the correct credit.

Quoting JTh:

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There are though information about the movie itself that is hard to gain, if it's not mentioned at the end of the movie; prodution year, country, location, release year / date - in these cases I can not see any alternatives other than to search infomation from third party sources like studio og actor sites - Or? 

Yupp,
you're correct here.
I'd like to add "SRP" to the list of your examples.
But if you don't have highly trustworthy sources (official site of the movie/studio), it's always best to name at least two sources.

Some countries don't have SRPs (ie. Hong Kong).

Quoting kjz:

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Also an interesting observation i made:

Some entries in the database are very old, i.e. contributed a long time ago. Some informations are wrong but no one cares. So I made some corrections. But suddenly another contribution appears, making more corrections and my own contribution is voted with 'No'.

Why some user don't react or care for month or years but then make instantly a competing contribution?

Thankfully I haven't seen this too often, but it's still a right pain when you've gone out of your way to make a good submission.
Personally I'd prefer it that no one can submit a change to a profile that has a change pending. Let that one take its course before submitting.

Quoting northbloke:

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Quoting kjz:

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Also an interesting observation i made:

Some entries in the database are very old, i.e. contributed a long time ago. Some informations are wrong but no one cares. So I made some corrections. But suddenly another contribution appears, making more corrections and my own contribution is voted with 'No'.

Why some user don't react or care for month or years but then make instantly a competing contribution?

Thankfully I haven't seen this too often, but it's still a right pain when you've gone out of your way to make a good submission.
Personally I'd prefer it that no one can submit a change to a profile that has a change pending. Let that one take its course before submitting.

This would be nice, but sometimes, there are very much bad contributions at the beginning, which would take a lot of time until the first big or good updates will come through.
But a big advantage: It would also make the comparison much easier.

Nice thread. Just wanted to stop by and give props. Some good info here ...

Quoting synner_man:

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I agree with this, except one cavaet: don't duplicate the same corrections as the pending contribution (unless you are fixing info that is still wrong in that contribution).  If the person is entering corrected CoO, Release Date and SRP, but you found that the subtitles and audio tracks were also wrong, only submit the two that are necessary.  I occasionally see someone swipe the work of an existing submission in addition to the changes they want to make and it is unnecessary.

When I do the audit, I will always incorporate the current submission(s) into my audit (as long as they are correct).  I try not to contribute (sometimes I jump the gun accidentally) until the contribution(s) are accepted.  That way I can lock down mine during the update, and not miss the good information.  Now when I contribute mine, it will show up as a non changed item.  No fuss.