TVDB will change into a payed service in 2021 (1 Viewer)

Lehmden

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  • December 17, 2010
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    Hi.
    Maybe you've not noticed but theTVDB.com will offer it's services on a subscription base only starting in 2021. Then you not only need to add the content of their service yourself, no you also have to pay to use your own work later. Every tool, every App using TVDB as data source must be adjusted to send the User API key and every user has to pay 12$ per year to use community driven content. This also affects MediaPortal. The MP1 plugin MyTVSeries is making heavy use of TVDB and in MP2 TVDB is one of the possible data sources for series metadata. Both need to be changed to make use of the new API key model during the next year...

    See here:
    Subscribe - TheTVDB.com

    Personally I've stopped adding content already and I will delete my account as soon as they shutdown the free API. I'm not willing to put my work into something other people make a ton of money out and making me pay for using my own work. A completely NoGo for me...
     

    Gcarr

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    I thought something might have been happening behind the scenes when they changed up everything several months ago. Yeah, I won't contribute anymore either.
     

    bta489

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    March 17, 2013
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    Troubling news, indeed. I understand the need for covering the cost of the infrastructure, but this is simply not the way to do it. No wonder they haven't announced it more prominently on their site. I only stumbled upon it by accident, while browsing their site recently.

    I won't subscribe either (after careful consideration) and stopped my contributions for now, as well.
    I just hope MPTV-Series will find a way to move on.
     

    Ronski

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  • June 21, 2008
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    Edit. Just realised the last post was in November, so perhaps the info below has been added since.

    Perhaps you all missed the part that says "and that allowing free access for data contributors (coming soon!)"

    And at the very bottom of the page the OP linked

    Earn a Free Subscription

    Coming soon! We completely understand that some people are unable to pay. Whatever the reason, we're offering a free subscription to any user that helps contribute good data to the site. We have safeguards in place to help ensure the data quality is good, which means that your free subscription might be slightly delayed. This is in the best interest of all of our users as we seek to be the most accurate source of TV and movie information around.


    Currently, we offer just a few ways to earn a free subscription. This list will be expanded over time.

    • Enter missing IMDB IDs to movies, TV shows, and people.
    • Enter missing EIDR IDs to movies, TV shows, and people.

    So by stopping contributing you may actually lose a free subscription.
     

    Lehmden

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    So by stopping contributing you may actually lose a free subscription.
    Not really. There are only very few data that is qualified as "good data". Adding new series or episodes is no "good data" in TVDB's opinion... This "free" subscription only is for very few people wo are able to add data that is not public available. And it is for a short period of time only. In my opinion this is a marketing "fake" just to keep people adding content... Another really bad behavior, like all the other things that went wrong there in the past. The folks on TVDB are very arrogant, behave like despots and don't respect the work their "customers" have done to the project. Way too often content is blocked or even deleted without any further notice and without any approval if the changes are right or wrong. If one of the "gods" there think it's wrong it is deleted, no matter if you can proof it is correct...

    Aside this both, TVDB and TMDB are adding more wrong than correct data lately. That's why I mostly create the data for my media as I like them and I'm sure there right.

    As one example... There is a very long running documentary series in German TV named "Eisenbahn- Romantik". You may say it's the German "Doctor Who" (in terms of long live)... It has more than 1000 Episodes available and every week there is a new one added. Until some weeks those episodes were in one single season listed... S01E1005 is an issue for many tools as they never could imagine more than a thousand episodes in a single season. Now they decided to separate them by year. Generally this is a very good way to go, if you have a series that has no continuing story as most documentaries are... But instead of adding them as "S1994E01" they still are counting them absolute. So the "real" S1994E01" is named "S1994E87". Season 1994 is starting with episode 87 not with episode 1 as you may expect. Makes no sense at all as you have something like "S2020E1005" to deal with, what is even worse than S01E1005... I'm doing this as S2020E25 (as it is the 25th episode aired in the year 2020) in my own metadata (.nfo file) and so I have it in my HTPC listed... Texts and graphics most often are missing so I always need to add them myself looking at the TV stations website. Then I easily can change the season and/or episodes numbers as I want them too... So why should I use TVDB as this I can't contribute, even if I wanted too?
     

    Ronski

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  • June 21, 2008
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    @Lehmden Sounds pretty bad, I wouldn't have a clue, I've used TVDB many times, may have contributed once many years ago, I was just going by what it said on the website, but clearly it's not what I thought.

    I have been on the receiving end of good data being deleted elsewhere though, and it's not nice at all. I added some filming locations to the series "Humans" which was filmed locally, so I recognised the locations and added them to the wiki, but one of the "gods" just deleted it, so I didn't bother again.
     

    ajs

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  • February 29, 2008
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    There was a handy site for serials, with good enough content, and specializing specifically in serials. Now I guess I'll have to bother with TheMovieDB. :cautious:
     

    Imzadi

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  • June 18, 2008
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    The link cleary states, that the free subscription is availabe for the following data being add. That means, new series and episodes are indeed being counted, as long as you add the missing imdb. There is no mention that this is only temporarily.

    Currently, we offer just a few ways to earn a free subscription. This list will be expanded over time.

    • Enter missing IMDB IDs to movies, TV shows, and people.
    • Enter missing EIDR IDs to movies, TV shows, and people.
     

    Lehmden

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  • December 17, 2010
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    Hi.
    Nice try, but... IMDB ID are mostly not available for episodes, so adding new episodes mainly is adding "bad" content. Thanks, but no thanks. I'm really pissed of that I had done so much work in the past with adding content to TVDB. Now you are making tons of money out of my work and beside this, I should pay to access my own data. :mad::mad::mad: This is absolutely unbearable. This is an impudence that couldn't be bigger. TVDB is dead like a Dodo and as I see on the reactions outside your fanboys it is dead not only for me but for most people out there. By the way my account is deleted already...
     

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