[rfu-automation] Re: D'oh!

Fri Jun 23 17:59:11 CDT 2006

I concur with some sort of labeling. But Gary I'm not sure which kind  
of labeling in iTunes you're talking about. There are a bunch of  
different ways we could do it, here are some as examples:

1. We could use the "grouping" field and use a code indicating  
whether something is unchecked, safe-harbor-only, or safe.
2. We could use the "genre" field for the same purpose (advantage:  
you can browse by genre; disadvantage: there's only one genre per  
track so this would destroy existing genre information on tracks, FWIW)
3. We could modify the title and put some indication in the title.  
(advantage: if Zara or any other component in the automation system  
reports or logs the track names we will know exactly when what kind  
of music is played; disadvantage: it's hard to sort on, unless you  
put the code before the title).
4. We could create three playlists in iTunes, one for each category  
(advantage: we can put a track in more than one category;  
disadvantage: there's no way to tell given only the file  which  
playlist it's in)

I don't really like any of these options, but thinking about them in  
the context of all our recent discussions it seems to me the safest  
strategy is to modify the title--like Jenn suggested but not using  
caps. Here's what I would propose. If I have the following CD:

artist: Joe's Risque Lounge Act
album: Steppin' Over the Line
track 1: The Parental Advisory Tango
track 2: Butterflies and Unicorns

lack of notation on the titles means the tracks are unchecked. Now we  
check them and find out track 1's safe-harbor only, but track 2 is  
safe, so it's indicated this way:

artist: Joe's Risque Lounge Act
album: [explicit] Steppin' Over the Line
track 1: [explicit] The Parent Advisory Tango
track 2: [clean] Butterflies and Unicorns

what I'm proposing is twofold:

1. we put the code *first*, so when we sort any playlist by title  
it'll be sorted into the three categories.
2. we label an album "explicit" if any track on it is explicit

The downside of putting the codes first is that the titles are gonna  
look pretty ugly. But it would certainly call lots of attention to  
the status of each track to anyone casually looking at a playlist or  
album in iTunes, and even if all someone could see was the title of  
the track they would be able to tell its status. We could also  
analyze Zara logs and determine when what kind of music is playing,  
what percentage of it is checked/unchecked, etc.

--
Joe Futrelle
Person

On Jun 23, 2006, at 10:52 AM, Gary Cziko wrote:

> Lynsee:
>
> I would prefer explicit labels, as someone not knowing or observing  
> such a convention involving upper- and lower-case letters could  
> lead to errors.
>
> We could go with just two labels as used on iTunes: "clean" and  
> "explicit" as anything without a label would be obviously unchecked  
> while obscene is not put on the computer in the first place or  
> removed immediately if discovered.
>
> --Gary
>
>
> On 6/23/06, Lynsee Melchi <lynseemelchi at gmail.com> wrote:
> I liked Jenn's suggestion of putting a certain type of album/artist in
> all capital letters.  For example:
>
> Lynsee's Band (local)
> with the albums HOME ON THE STRANGE
>                        Doggy Dog
>
> HOME ON THE STRANGE is not checked or explicit
> Doggy Dogg is safe.
>
> Or something like that.
>
> Lynsee
>
> On 6/23/06, Gary Cziko <g-cziko at uiuc.edu> wrote:
> > Joe:
> >
> >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >  So there are really four tiers that we're talking about here.
> > >
> > >
> > > 1. Unchecked: starts on the safe-harbor playlist
> > > 2. Completely unplayable: is removed from the automation  
> computer as soon
> > as we discover it
> > > 3. Indecent/profane: kept on the safe-harbor list and  
> safeguarded in our
> > procedures from being played at any other time
> > > 4. Safe: copied from the safe-harbor playlist to the safe playlist
> >
> >
> > So we would play only  no. 4 between 6 am and 10 pm and play nos.  
> 1, 3 and 4
> > during safe-harbor hours. I wouldn't want to exclude Safe music  
> during
> > safe-harbor hours.
> >
> > We would then need to add descriptors after the album and/or   
> track titles
> > on iTunes so we could easily create the two ZaraRadio playlists  
> using labels
> > such as "clean," "explicit" and "unchecked." (there would be no  
> use for an
> > "obscene" label as these tracks would be deleted as soon as  
> discovered to be
> > obscene--actually people should know enough about the music and  
> artist so as
> > not to put such music on the system in the first place).
> >
> >
> > If the label applied to every track in an album, the label could  
> be added to
> > the album title (this is visible in the ZaraRadio explorer windows).
> > If the label applied to some tracks and not others on an album,  
> no label
> > would be put on the album title and an appropriate label would be  
> added to
> > each sont track. If all this is acceptable, then we have to  
> figure out who
> > is going to do this work. I am willing to show people how to do  
> this, but I
> > am not going to be listening to and labeling albums and tracks  
> myself.
> >
> >  --Gary
> >
> > P.S. I am still testing out the ability of getting ZaraRadio to
> > automatically switch from one playlist to another at the right  
> time. So far
> > it looks posssible, but need to test a bit more.
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> --
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>           ***************************************************
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>
>
>
> -- 
> ---------------------------------------------------
> Gary Cziko
> Professor
> Educational Psychology & English as an International Language
> University of Illinois
> 1310 S. Sixth Street
> 210F Education Building
> Champaign, IL 61820-6990
> USA
>
> Telephone +1-217-333-8527
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>
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>
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