Discographies NA‑class

This page is within the scope of the Discographies WikiProject, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's collection of discography articles and lists. If you would like to participate please visit the project page. Any questions pertaining to discography-related articles should be directed to the project's talk page.DiscographiesWikipedia:WikiProject DiscographiesTemplate:WikiProject DiscographiesDiscography NA This page does not require a rating on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.

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There is a discussion regarding the use of rowspan in discography articles at Talk:Sabrina_Carpenter_discography#WP:ACCESSIBILITY violations. Editors are welcome to participate and voice opinions.

. Flooded with them hundreds 17:38, 14 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This is actually a very important discussion, that this project should be made aware of, as the second example table at WP:DISCOGSTYLE is in fact flawed in WP:ACCESS terms. There may be a followup discussion at WT:WPACCESS about this specific and other related issues. Suffice it to say that most of the Discography tables on this project are problematic, and the consensus decision may be that they need to change in order to conform to WP:ACCESS. (And this is not the kind of thing that will be challengeable on WP:LOCALCONSENSUS grounds...) --IJBall (contribs • talk) 13:47, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Some artists like Michael Jackson and Eminem has several lists of discographies for specific things. How does one know when a split or separate article is waranted?★Trekker (talk) 16:40, 16 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

1. Should I add other songs section for songs not released on any albums or released only on compilations etc. to discography while certain artist has separated article for list of songs? Eurohunter (talk) 16:41, 1 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
2. Should I add songs written or produced to the section Credits in discography or should it be included only on list of songs but the question is even if it should be there (list of songs). Eurohunter (talk) 16:44, 1 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

No streaming format in album details? It exists in some singles and albums articles. Eurohunter (talk) 20:54, 15 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Greetings! I ran into this peculiar problem while editing the article 1200 Micrograms. The project is known to be defunct, but recently an anonymous editor labeled the project to be active again.[1] Moreover, four new singles and one new EP were added to the Discography section.

However, the closest one to their project website that I could find — the website of their record label[2] — doesn't support the information added. I even approached to their bookie[3], Sastra Rothfield, but have got no answer so far.

That makes me wonder, when citations are needed within the discography sections / -articles? In this case, I had to remove the recent insertions since they obviously couldn't be verified by the source. Still, even the most famous discography sections / -articles do not make any inline citations. I tried to consult MOS:WORKS, WP:DISCOGSTYLE, WP:WPMAG, and Template:Infobox artist discography already, but without anything dealing with a case such as this.

So, when are citations needed within the discography? Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 15:51, 17 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There's a recent discussion of aspects of this at Talk:Jerry Hahn. EddieHugh (talk) 16:28, 17 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There's also another discussion of a similar issue at WikiProject Albums. The consensus emerging from these discussions appears to be that everything needs a citation, no exceptions, and that published albums are not sufficient sources to verify their own catalog data. Chubbles (talk) 12:36, 28 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure if this has been brought up yet, but I see that an entire column has been added to the Nicki Minaj singles chart with positions on the Rolling Stone Top 100. It appears this is just an edit to show that "Megatron" is not a "flop" single, as some might believe. Is there consensus to add the Rolling Stone Top 100 to discography pages? I know a lot of old artists have Cash Box and even Record World, but this raises a lot of questions. Currently, "US" means Billboard. "US RS" seems very confusing. Also, it now adds an 11th column, and I know the standard is 10. The methodology is completely different as the RS doesn't count radio, so streaming is emphasized and hence songs by certain artists can be made to look more successful by the addition of this column. Also, the position of where it would go is concerning. How will readers differentiate between BB and RS chart positions? This all seems very confusing. I don't think it's the right time to start adding a new column for a new chart that doesn't really have a track record yet. Also, the data is different. I was reading a yearly music sales thing from BuzzAngle Music which provides info for the RS charts, and it differentiated from Nielsen. All articles use Nielsen SoundScan sales, now are we going to incorporate these alternative ones?

IMO, Cash Box and Record World are there for historical comparison when there was actual competition between chart companies back in the day and all were taken as a measure of success. RS Charts is kind of a joke ATM. I know radio doesn't have the greatest track record when it comes to things and can be *influenced* by certain forces, but to add an entire column for a chart (not just a genre like a BB Streaming column) that completely ignores a good chunk of the music audience? How is that a measure of success? I think it misrepresents the actual impact of a song. Again, it seems like songs by certain artists can be made to look more successful by the addition of this column. Rolling Stone should at least have to "prove its worth" and be taken seriously by the industry before it's added to discography pages on Wikipedia (which would legitimize it).

Again, this is all really confusing! I think sticking with Billboard and Nielsen is good for now, but is there any consensus? What about the singles pages themselves in the "Charts" section? Heartfox (talk) 05:13, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I see no reason to including Rolling Stone's rankings in discographies as of right now. Like Radio and Records and Cashbox, they are more than acceptable and in fact encouraged (if you can find them) in songs and singles pages, but having two charts for one country seems a bit excessive, especially when the Rolling Stone charts are not only new, but use a proprietary analysis system that is owned by Rolling Stone's parent company. If anything their singles chart is basically just the Billboard Digital Songs and Streaming rolled into one - it excludes radio play. So it's less useful than the Billboard one. Toa Nidhiki05 00:06, 15 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I've nominated Michael W. Smith discography, an article under this project's purview, for featured list. For anyone interested, any and all comments are welcome. Toa Nidhiki05 00:02, 15 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hello,

I'm working on Lecrae discography and I have a few questions.

1) Should remixes of an artist's work (in this case, Lecrae songs) be included in "other appearances" if their remix says "featuring X artist"? Or should this not be included for Lecrae, since the work is a mashup of previously recorded material and is not a newly recorded featured appearance?

2) Lecrae is part of a hip hop group, 116 Clique. Some of the 116 Clique songs say "featuring Lecrae [plus other artists]". Should these be included, since they technically are featuring Lecrae and not all the 116 songs feature him, or should they be restricted to the 116 article because Lecrae is a member of the collective?--3family6 (Talk to me | See what I have done) 14:20, 6 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This edit may be of interest to the project. It claims to be more accessible. As the change was made with respect to comments and changes to allow the article to be a feature article, it may set some precedent, so discussion may be required. Walter Görlitz (talk) 23:01, 6 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There is a discussion on the appropriateness of external links to Allmusic and Discogs on the reliable sources noticeboard. If you're interested, please participate at WP:RSN § Musician Discographies from Allmusic and/or Discogs. — Newslinger talk 01:54, 17 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The RNS is already archived, but the conversation over the theme seems to be fragmented across various venues. For example, there's been lengthy debates on a user Talk Page, and more recently an open thread on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Discographies. Even an RfC has passed concerning the matter. Ideal would be, however, that all the conversation over the topic would be concentrated in one, single place. Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 22:09, 21 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I have nominated Fantasia Barrino discography for featured list removal here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets the featured list criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks; editors may declare to "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Aoba47 (talk) 00:51, 14 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Would like confirmation on whether the song "Let Me Know" counts as a single for its inclusion in this discography article (and its inclusion in the infobox of the artist's previous single): Lauren_Jauregui_discography#As_featured_artist. Info: The song is from new independent artist Clear Eyes (Jeremy Lloyd from Marian Hill); the song isn't notable enough for an article (received some light media attention due to it featuring Lauren Jauregui, who has a higher profile); Lloyd released it digitally/on streaming, and it has no radio or promo. Lapadite (talk) 19:25, 13 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Now launched at WP:VPT#RfC: should the "Authority control" template continue to include MusicBrainz identifiers?. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:25, 28 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Are discographies of session musicians (i.e. a list of every song/album a musician has played on) notable? I don't think they are... it means everyone who's ever played on an album is notable enough for a discography article. But I don't see how these can ever be supported with any sources other than the liner notes of each album... a session player isn't ever going to get any in-depth coverage of his contributions to each record. I ask this because Tim Pierce discography has recently been created, and I think it should be redirected or deleted. Richard3120 (talk) 16:53, 2 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Depends how long it is. I just saw a very long and unsourced discog section on Larry Carlton and that was a problem for me. Walter Görlitz (talk) 22:50, 3 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

It's long, and it's completely unsourced. I'm thinking of putting it up for AfD. Richard3120 (talk) 23:51, 3 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Am i mistaken, or is this a good example of how not to format a discography? Are raw Youtube links WP:RS in this scenario? It seems more like a fan page than a properly formatted/referenced artist discography. Acousmana (talk) 16:58, 3 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, it's terrible. Shouldn't be including the entire track listing of each album, and the YouTube links aren't good either. It's pretty unreadable, really. Richard3120 (talk) 00:38, 9 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to bring a discussion about catalog numbers to this Project's attention for a broader consensus. Please see: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums#Catalog numbers. 78.26 _{(spin me / revolutions)} 15:05, 11 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Should any of the following singles discography tables be considered an acceptable alternative to the current predominant format (example) and be implemented in a discography style guideline? Heartfox (talk) 01:09, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Support any of these 3 as an acceptable alternative to the current WP:DISCOGSTYLE, and all three are better in terms of readability and MOS:ACCESS than what is generally done with these tables. (I personally think the tables at Taylor Swift singles discography is a mostly unreadable mess, and is YA example of why I don't trust WP:FL ratings.) Option 1 is the most likely to gain support, while Option 2 is actually the better way to do it. Option 3 is actually the best of all, but it's the least likely to gain support... So I support any of these three formats, while noting that Options 1 or 2 are better than how WP:DISCOGRAPHY tables are done currently (e.g. again, see the example provided), and would put WP:DISCOGRAPHY tables more in line with the general formatting of WP:FILMOGRAPHY and 'Awards' tables which usually list year first (i.e. providing more consistency across different WP table formats), and thus make 'Year' the "row-defining element" of the table. I would certainly support WP:DISCOGRAPHY doing the same with their tables. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 06:00, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• None The third option is the cleanest, but it should be Title, Year, Album in that order. Because we are discussing the singles, they should appear first, the year the single was released should be next, and finally the album name. Walter Görlitz (talk) 07:44, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Walter, I wouldn't be starting with the albums when we are talking about a singles discography. Richard3120 (talk) 14:35, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Walter Görlitz and Richard3120: But what about the comment at MOS:ACCESS about how the table should be organized by most rowspanned to least rowspanned? Option 2 and Option 3 are great examples of how it goes from most rowspanned to least, and a lot of editors have expressed concerns over the current discography tables that are listed at WP:DISCOGSTYLE#Samples. Please see Talk:Olivia Rodrigo#Table for that talk discussion. D🐶ggy54321 ^{(let's chat!)} 15:22, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Then start with year, as 'Filmography' and 'Awards' tables do (i.e. Options 1 or 2). Consistency. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 15:33, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Doggy54321: Then don't span. The content is about the song, not the year or album. Walter Görlitz (talk) 16:57, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Walter Görlitz: So would you support removing spans from discography tables as a whole? That way, we’re respecting the guidelines. D🐶ggy54321 ^{(let's chat!)} 17:03, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If it helps with MOS:ACCESS, but I don't see this discussion cross-posted to the project and I have never read that spans should not be used. In a recent discussion I had there, two key editors indicates it was much less of a problem now. Walter Görlitz (talk) 17:05, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There's no "requirement" to do anything on Wikipedia, really. This is about maximizing table readability. WP:DISCOGSTYLE does actually say "It is our goal to provide information in the best way possible, so a strict adherence to the guidelines listed above may not always be the best way to accomplish our goals." – does the current formatting of 'Singles' tables actually accomplish this goal?! I will argue pretty strongly that it does not. MOS:ACCESS says "Web accessibility is the goal of making web pages easier to navigate and read. While this is primarily intended to assist those with disabilities, it can be helpful to all readers." Again, does the current formatting of 'Singles' tables actually work towards this goal? And let's not forget WP:Readers first. It seems like WP:DISCOGRAPHY has fallen into a habit of doing 'Singles' tables a certain way "because it's always been done this way", and has never really examined the question of what is the best way to present this information in tabular form. That's really what this discussion is about. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:12, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Please tell all the other WP:DISCOGRAPHY editors this then! (I can tell you they won't listen, and will continue to needlessly rowspan.) And the exact same argument can be made about WP:FILMOGRAPHY and 'Awards' tables – that it's about the "title" or the "award" – but that doesn't prevent these tables from generally being organized by year, because that is a logical way to organize these types of tables, 'Single' tables included. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:07, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Any of the three examples per IJBall's comment and MOS:ACCESS. D🐶ggy54321 ^{(let's chat!)} 15:22, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• None A discography is defined as "a descriptive catalog of musical recordings". Professional discographies usually contain information about the recordings with date released, record label, format. I have seen and own several: none are almost exclusively focused on commercial performance. These simply are not discographies. —Ojorojo (talk) 15:50, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Care to give a Wikipedia example of what you mean? And care to share your opinion on the excessive and poor use of rowspan in most current Discography tables on Wikipedia? – Because it's the latter issue, and the severe readability problems they pose, as to why we're here... I will also note that Wikipedia is under no obligation to reflexively follow what others do, as per WP:ONUS, etc. – we have our own MOS. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 16:01, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

"Discography" is a "term of art", which is defined as "a word or phrase that has a precise, specialized meaning within a particular field or profession". WP cannot decide that "volcanology" should apply to weather or trees; ensuring that a misuse of discography meets WP:ACCESS does not make it any less fundamentally flawed. —Ojorojo (talk) 17:33, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong None, for exactly the reasons given by Walter Görlitz. Option 1 is a list of years (which we don't want/need), Option 2 is the same, and Option 3 is a list of albums (which is every bit as wrong as Options 1 and 2). But the RfC is completely begging the question: why would we change the format from something that works well and has finally achieved an accepted consistency? What "problems" are these proposed options supposed to solve? — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 12:48, 23 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • @JohnFromPinckney: Somewhere in MOS:ACCESS, it states that tables that use rowspan should have the most spanned element as the row-definer, and then it decreases by span level. Therefore, to respect MOS:ACCESS, we must either change to a year/album-first model of discography (as those are the two most/only discography table elements that are spanned) or not use rowspan at all. If the songs are going to be the row-defining element, then rowspan can’t be used, because songs don’t span across multiple rows. D🐶ggy54321 ^{(let's chat!)} 21:26, 23 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Doggy54321: You state "Somewhere in MOS:ACCESS, it states that tables that use rowspan should have the most spanned element as the row-definer", but that's not true and is exactly the opposite of what is needed for accessibilty for a screen reader. The item that defines the row has to be unique, otherwise it's useless, and it should be obvious that row-spanned items are not unique, by definition. --RexxS (talk) 16:00, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There's got to be some element of taking clarity into account though... if the first thing you see in a table is "non-album single" and then "2019", for example, I don't see how this is going to be clear to the average reader. Surely the first thing you want to see is the name of each single. Richard3120 (talk) 23:59, 23 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• It's not just that – the two columns that editors insist upon rowspanning aren't even adjacent to each other, which makes the readability even worse when rowspan is used. We can actually potentially drop this if WP:DISCOGRAPHY would just agree to never use rowspan in their tables, ever – but we all know that will never happen. So Options 1 or 2 are the next best answer. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 00:10, 24 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• It doesn't "work well" – many 'Singles' tables are basically unreadable. (And "consistency" is not greater importance than "readability", no matter how you slice.) As usual, the only people who think these tables "work" well are Discography editors themselves, which is incredibly frustrating because a substantial portion of Discography editors are apparently incapable of not using rowspan horribly... And I have yet to see anyone make a convincing argument as to how 'Years'-first is so "horrible" for Discography tables while simultaneously being just fine for Filmography and Awards tables. Bottom line: This seems to be a case of WP:LOCALCONSENSUS in the true sense of the term – nothing has ever "convinced me that their actions (in regards to these tables) are right". --IJBall (contribs • talk) 00:10, 24 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• IJBall, you say, many 'Singles' tables are basically unreadable, which astounds me. Can you give, say, three examples of such unreadable tables? — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 02:53, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Why don't we just turn this around – prove to me that Taylor Swift singles discography is the most readable way to present that information? And, no, I'm not going to pull out more examples, because everybody here knows that most Discography tables are formatted exactly the same way as the Taylor Swift article. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 04:31, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Most discography tables are not formatted this way. Here are four discographies are the formatted in the most common way: The Beatles discography Led Zeppelin discography U2 discography Stryper discography. The fact that it's much better is also an improvement. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Walter Görlitz (talk • contribs) 06:26, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Looking at just the 'Singles' tables, which are always the problem – Stryper discography is actually 'Year-first', exactly what is being proposed here in Option 1 – of your 4 examples that's the best one, but it's a smaller table without the 'Sales' column. Of the other three, the Beatles (not surprisingly) is the next best one because they don't rowspan the 'Album' column there, but I would still say that table is difficult to read overall, and I still don't think that's the best way to present all of that info in tabular form (maybe there isn't a really good way to present all of that info in a single table? I don't know...). AFAICT, the other two article examples there have 'Singles' tables have the exact same issues that this whole proposal is about. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:25, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

No, Stryper discography fails MOS:DTT by a long way. The tables in there need to be re-written with the identifying title marked up as the row-header. That's not negotiable. --RexxS (talk) 17:57, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I can't prove that that's the best way, as I'm no scientist, and what we're doing here isn't a rigorously scientific activity. I'm just an occasional, volunteer editor of Wikipedia, who likes to see info clearly and consistently presented. Which brings us back to the beginning: now that you've (repeatedly) mentioned Swift's discography, can you explain what you specifically don't like about it? In what way is it unreadable? I can't suggest improvements if I don't know what you see as broken.

As to the four discogs provided by Walter:

The Beatles' is challenging because it lists two, not one, album per single; it lists 13 charts, more than the suggested limit of 10; it shows A-/B-side titles, but provides nasty double listings of peaks separated by <br />. Also, a lot of the songs don't even show the year released, because of rowspans (e.g., rowspan="19" for 1964) so I have to vertically scroll a lot just to see them.

Led Zeppelin's discog is easier for me to grok, mostly because it's smaller (vertically) than The Beatles', and also confines itself to 10 charts. I dislike the fact that the year is in the first column (which may be why Walter pointed to it; it's the most common form, even when it's not WP:DISCOGSTYLE-conform), and I am irritated by the micro headings on the Peak columns (75%, in contravention of WP:ACCESS).

The U2 discography is the best of the bunch for me, although it, like the other three, uses rowspans. That's the only beef I have there, except for the rows in the 2010s table purporting to provide "Total top ten hits" and "Total number-one hits". Those rows should be removed.

The Stryper discog is non-conformant to WP:DISCOGSTYLE and the entire page needs reworking.

Those are things I don't like about those discogs, and I'd love to see us do away with rowspans for the years (including in Taylor Swift's discogs), but what you don't like remains unclear to me. — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 22:13, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 1 or deprecate rowspan use. As much as it is most stylistically pleasing to have the title of the singles presented first in the discography table, we must commit to making the project accessible to all its readers, including those with disabilities. It is very easy to argue against these changes, especially when they have remained in place for years, but that's a privilege we hold as fully able-bodied people. Wikipedia must be be easy to read and navigate to as big of an audience as possible. This is not a hill worth dying on and we should be willing to compromise—because our experience on Wikipedia will remain the same. This can not be said for those living with disabilities.
  I support option 1 because it is the closest to current practice and has the song title closest to the beginning of the table. I firmly oppose options 2 and 3 simply because it doesn't make sense to put the album name ahead of the single name in the section about a musicians singles. I would also support deprecating the use of rowspan in discographies if that's how readers expect the information to be displayed. ƏXPLICIT 01:22, 24 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This makes a lot of sense. I am very much opposed to option 3 as I don't think it would make the table very easy to follow to anyone, but if MOS:ACCESS has to be the priority then option 1 would be by far the best option for me. Richard3120 (talk) 01:39, 24 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

1. Support option 1 as causing the least friction and some improvement, but honestly as a screen reader user I'm so used to the way the tables are already formatted that it really doesn't matter to me. Graham87 14:58, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• • Changing !vote to support no change; see below. Graham87 16:30, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Graham87: as a screen reader user do you share the same concern as RexxS below with regard to the "table mode" in option 1? Heartfox (talk) 15:19, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Heartfox: Yes, I do now that I've read the discussion below ... I hadn't thought of it that way. Graham87 16:30, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose all. Screen readers are able to work in "table mode" which allows the reader to navigate up and down columns as well as back-and-forth along rows. To facilitate that, they are usually able to read out the row header and column header before each data cell. On the current Taylor Swift singles discography #2000s table, a reader might want to read down the Sales column. This is what they would hear for the current advice and each of the three options (reference: HTML Tables with JAWS):

I challenge any of the supporters to explain how the screen reader user gets the required information when reading down the Sales column with any of the three suggested options. The item that uniquely identifies the row is the title of the single and that has to be the row header. --RexxS (talk) 15:52, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you RexxS. Walter Görlitz (talk) 17:06, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

And, again, this isn't just about "screenreaders" – this is about all readers. MOS:ACCESS is actually for everybody, which it makes very clear. So, again – prove that you guys are presenting this information in the best, most readable way possible for all of our readership. Because if you believe the current format of Discography tables with rampant use of rowspan (in non-adjacent columns) is the best, most readable way to present this information, then I have a bridge to sell you. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 04:31, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@IJBall: Yes it is about screen readers. Any crappy layout can be read by sighted readers, but we have an obligation not to exclude the visually impaired from our articles, and you should be ashamed of lending support to proposals that obviously makes the experience worse for them. MOS:ACCESS is there to ensure that all readers get a good experience, and that doesn't mean sidelining a disadvantaged minority just to add whistles and bells to please the majority. You have an obsession with removing rowspans, and 10 years ago, I'd have been with you - see User:RexxS/Accessibility where I demonstrate the effects of rowspans on the Lynx (browser), a standard used by the RNIB at the time. But those days have gone, and the majority of screen readers in use will cope with rowspans, and you're letting your fixation with rowspans cloud your judgement about more important accessibility issues. Screen readers won't cope with marking up the wrong row-headers, though, and you've offered absolutely no argument why we should degrade the experience of already disadvantaged users any further. I'll ask you again: looking at how the three tables you support would change the way a screen-reader would voice Taylor Swift singles discography #2000s when in table mode, how can you possibly maintain that they are acceptable alternatives from an accessibility viewpoint? --RexxS (talk) 16:54, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

And now you are deliberately misrepresenting my point – don't put words into my mouth. I never said we shouldn't care about screen readers – in fact, I've been one of the people fighting for our screen-readership on this for the past decade. My point is that the fact that screen readers can now in many cases handle "bad rowspan" use doesn't absolve of us from the obligation to actually present tables that is readable to our entire readership, including those that don't use screen readers. And, no – a "crappy layout" in many cases cannot be read, or at least not be read well, by "our sighted readership" – so why the hell are we throwing them under the bus? "How can you possibly maintain that they are acceptable alternatives from an accessibility viewpoint?" – Option 1 is basically the exact way that 'Filmography' tables (which are considered accessible) are now formatted (with the exception of the rowspan use in the last column, which 'Filmography' tables don't do)... Again, the other option is, as suggested by others, is to keep the current format of these tables after completely deprecating rowspan use in them to maximize readability for everybody, but nobody ever seems to want to embrace the simplest option. Or maybe these tables are just shitily designed from the get-go and should be totally redesigned from scratch. But your "solution" is to keep throwing our entire readership under the bus to accommodate an unhealthy rowspan fixation of the editors of a single WP. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 17:16, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

What a collection of blinkered nonsense. When you support proposals to make the experience worse for screen readers, you demonstrate your uncaring attitude to them. I'm happy to support your efforts to improve readability for the majority, but never at the expense of making it worse for the already disadvantaged minority.

And yes, any crappy layout can be read by sighted readers, but your preferred tables can't be read usefully by screen readers. It's not a difference of degree, it's the fact that they can't tell which single or album is being referred to in table mode if we follow your flawed suggestions. I've demonstrated that above, and you've failed to address the obvious issues shown.

The only people you're throwing under the bus are those using screen readers, but you've backed yourself into a corner and can't bring yourself to admit it.

Option 1 is not "basically the exact way that 'Filmography' tables (which are considered accessible) are now formatted". It's anything but. Option 1 is purely replacing the title (the unique identifier) by the year, which is useless to let a screen reader user know which row they are on. How on earth can you maintain that anyone hearing "Teardrops on My Guitar; Sales; US: 3,000,000" gets the same information as hearing "2007; Sales; US: 3,000,000"? The same goes for Option 2, and Option 3 is even worse, proposing to replace the single title with the album title, which would fail to uniquely identify any of the first five rows in Taylor Swift singles discography #2000s.

Personally, I'm happy to discourage the use of rowspans, but these proposals are about replacing the unique identifier as row-header with another, useless field, and my objection to that remains unanswered. You still don't understand that not everything is about your pet crusade, and while you remain fixated on that, you'll contribute to throwing the disadvantaged minority under the bus, without ever understanding the actual issue here. --RexxS (talk) 17:50, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

And you seem more concerned with throwing around insults than in actually crafting a solution to this issue. If the (best) solution is to deprecate rowspan use in 'Singles' tables, you should have led with that. In fact, WP:DISCOGSTYLE actually does this right, but 'Discography' editors never bothered to formally implement it apparently, and its editors have been roundly ignoring it anyway. But the issue is getting all Discography editors to sign on to that, if that is the answer. If you can get that to happen, the proposals in this RfC become moot. Again, the main question here is – "How to best present this information?" (for all readers). That should be the focus. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 19:35, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'm concerned with making sure that callous disregard of the problems faced by visually impaired readers gets shown up for what it is. The best solution is nothing to do with rowspans; they are an irrelevance; you're the only person obsessed with them. The current guidance meets MOS:DTT, which the alternatives don't, so there's no problem to find a solution for. The guidance at MOS:DTAB enjoys site-wide consensus and editors ignore it at their peril. Just as I did in 2010, when these issues first came to light, I'm more than happy to explain how we can best meet the accessibility guidance for tables, and I'll even explain why we do it that way to anybody who is willing to learn. I'm also prepared to take admin action (or file an ANI report whenever I'm involved) in order to maintain good accessibility practice on Wikipedia. --RexxS (talk) 01:15, 31 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@RexxS: could you please explain exactly what admin actions you would take? "Admin action" can mean anything from protecting a page to blocking a user indefinitely, and the latter would most definitely get you de-sysoped real quick. Please clarify. As well, I would be interested to learn your viewpoint on what you explained in 2010, as I’m always happy to learn more. Thanks! D🐶ggy54321 ^{(let's chat!)} 16:31, 2 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@RexxS: let’s try this ping again and hope that it goes through this time. D🐶ggy54321 ^{(let's chat!)} 16:33, 2 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Doggy54321: Well, whatever admin action I'd take would depend on the behaviour of the editors concerned. You understand that MOS:ACCESS has site-wide consensus, right? and that WP:CONLOCAL means that no local consensus can override that site-wide consensus? So if I observed an editor repeatedly changing an article in a way that that breached MOS:ACCESS, and another editor was reverting them to restore the accessibility, I'd warn the first editor and invite them to self-revert as a first step. If that didn't solve the problem, I wouldn't hesitate to block the first editor to prevent further damage to the article. If you think that would get me de-sysoped, you really have no idea of how Wikipedia works, and of the importance the community puts on its policies and guidelines, not least of which is accessibility. I hope that makes it clearer to you, and disabuses you of some of the odd notions you seem to have developed. Cheers. --RexxS (talk) 17:33, 2 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@RexxS: Ah sorry, I see now that not all the words I typed actually made it onto the final comment. My keyboard glitches like that sometimes. I meant to say “blocking an editor indefinitely without reason”, and that would most definitely get you de-sysoped. As well, I do understand that MOS:ACCESS has sitewide consensus and I also understand that can’t be altered by local consensus, but I appreciate you for clarifying just in case. D🐶ggy54321 ^{(let's chat!)} 18:01, 2 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Option 1 To me, this layout makes the most sense, and I feel it would make sense to most readers too. My problem with placing an album row near the start of a singles table is that it draws a focus to the album (to me anyway), and I feel like non-album singles would not read well on the other two layouts. – DarkGlow (contribs • talk) 15:01, 2 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  How does Option 1 make more sense than the current guidance? Option 1 breaches MOS:DTAB and can't be read properly by a screen reader in table mode. Why wasn't the current guidance shown for comparison? --RexxS (talk) 15:30, 2 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There is no current "guidance" per se (that I'm aware of?). WP:DISCOGSTYLE has been a dormant proposal since July 2011. The above is not a common example either as usually 1st Album would be rowspanned across three rows, to the first row of 2020. @RexxS: I have two questions: can scope be used in any cell (e.g., the title column in Table 1) while retaining table accessibility, and given your concerns above, would you consider the tables at WP:FILMOGRAPHY problematic too because the first cell, for example, would be read as "1982, Role, Carol Anne Freeling"? Thanks for hopefully clarifying, Heartfox (talk) 07:55, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Heartfox: the current guidance (without the scare quotes) is included in MOS:DTAB and MOS:DTT and you ought to be aware of it. WP:DISCOGSTYLE complies with those accessibility requirements, but none of the three options you suggest do.

Rowspans are irrelevant, although having fewer rowspans usually makes it easier for screen readers in complex tables. However, in these simple examples, it won't make any difference.

The HTML5 specification limits the scope attributes to table header cells, so you would have to make each of the cells in the Title column in Table 1 into a row header and make each of the cells in the Year column into normal data cells. Make yourself a mock-up of that, but I guarantee you won't like how it looks with row-headers in the second column. Why don't you just put the row headers in the first column, which is the obvious, simple, most accessible way to lay out a table?

I agree that the essay at WP:FILMOGRAPHY fails the accessibility guidelines as the year sometimes does not uniquely identify the film. Because modern actors and directors usually make no more than one film per year, the problem is less obvious. But I think it is clear that hearing "1983, notes, Episode Fun House", "1983, notes, Episode The Woman in White", "1983, notes, 3 episodes" in the "Television performances" table is far less informative than hearing "CHiPs, notes, Episode Fun House", "Matt Houston, notes, Episode The Woman in White", "Webster, notes, 3 episodes". Don't you agree? --RexxS (talk) 14:02, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Please be aware that I have not even voted yet; I'm just trying to gather information to make an informed decision. The only difference I see here from what is commonplace is that rows are not spanned across other spanned rows (1st Album is listed again beginning with the 2020 span). Thank you, Heartfox (talk) 15:15, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

It's a little kinder to screen readers not to span rows across earlier (in the right-to-left sense) rowspans, so I'm in the habit of splitting them in the way the example I gave does. I'd be just as happy with removing all rowspans, or rowspanning across other rowspans (well, a little less happy). However, I feel that by highlighting a minor accessibility concern (rowspans), it diverts the discussion from the major accessibility flaw of failing to use unique row headers. No RFC closer can possibly ignore the complete failure of the suggested options in that respect. --RexxS (talk) 21:54, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose option 3: plenty of singles were never released in albums. No change, option 1, and option 2 are all equally fine, says I. Lereman (talk) 06:19, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Lereman: the cells do not require an album be named. For example, it could be titled "non-album single" if the single was not released as part of an album, as most discography tables currently do. Likewise for the sales column in the options above—if there are no sales figures then it obviously doesn't need to be used. Heartfox (talk) 07:59, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Using "non-album single" to identify the single is probably even worse that using the name of the album to do that. It's not acceptable as the row-header. --RexxS (talk) 13:31, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• No change. Option 1 may be acceptable, but seems unnecessary. Options 2 and 3 are non-starters for reasons given by others, notably Ojorojo and Walter Görlitz. People struggling with technical issues should consider what is likely to be most useful to most readers. Ghmyrtle (talk) 09:05, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Most readers is not the low bar here. We should recognize that if we are discussing a change for ACCESS then accessibility should be our goal and all of the options fail at that. Walter Görlitz (talk) 17:50, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment I've looked at a sample of discographies that have been recognised as featured lists. As far as I can see, all of the discographies that have been promoted after the creation of WP:DISCOGSTYLE adhere to DISCOGSTYLE and have a unique row-header in the first column. As a test case for these suggested options, I've nominated Abingdon Boys School discography for featured list removal as it fails MOS:DTAB. The result of that should give a clear indication of whether the community finds those variants acceptable from an accessibility viewpoint. --RexxS (talk) 21:54, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose all per concerns raised by RexxS and Graham87, who know what they're talking about. Heartfox (talk) 05:37, 8 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment – Are the "oppose all" editors at least willing to reiterate that the WP:DISCOGSTYLE example is how these tables should be formatted, with no 'rowspanning' of the 'Year' column? Because if we can at least get agreement on that – that in fact most current 'Discography' tables are out of compliance with this, and should be changed – that would at least be progress. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 12:34, 25 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  Well, I'm willing. Incidentally, the WP:DISCOGSTYLE example specifically (intentionally) includes repeated years to show that rowspanning is not the expected formatting. I don't believe we have any guidance text to that effect, though. I would have no qualms about de-spanning rows when I'm tweaking tables anyway, if I knew there was at least some community support. — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 15:48, 25 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I have nominated Abingdon Boys School discography for featured list removal. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets the featured list criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks; editors may declare to "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. --RexxS (talk) 14:02, 3 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Due to the fact that the number of WP:DISCOGSTYLE watchers is only a half of this page, I will discuss my opinions in this page. Well, WP:DISCOGSTYLE become dormant through years, modifications and changes are needed. Here are my several ideas of changes, you are welcome to discuss! -- BrandNew Jim Zhang (talk) 05:51, 19 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

1. Separate types of releases should be in a certain order, usually studio albums -> live albums -> compilation albums -> EPs, an example: Taylor Swift albums discography.
2. Certification references should be ones of Template:cite certification (like "American certifications – Metro Boomin". Recording Industry Association of America. in Metro Boomin discography), editors should avoid using Template:cite web, because the titles are difficult to unify and be understood by readers. (cite web examples: "Gold & Platinum – RIAA". in Cardi B discography and "Gold and Platinum - One Direction". in One Direction discography)
3. Pure sales should be clarified when the sales reached that amount, an example: the note "Worldwide sales figures for Up All Night as of 2013" (in One Direction discography)
4. Sales and certifications in the header row should be wiki-linked, an example:
5. For entries of singles and albums, if the album or single does not have an according page, references should be added following its title (not the artist). Once the page is created, the reference should be removed.

A lot of changes should be applied on the style guideline and my further ideas will be append to this section. -- BrandNew Jim Zhang (talk) 15:07, 19 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@BrandNew Jim Zhang: what is your brief and neutral statement? At over 3,200 bytes, the statement above (from the {{rfc}} tag to the next timestamp) is far too long for Legobot (talk · contribs) to handle, and so it is not being shown correctly at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Wikipedia policies and guidelines. The RfC may also not be publicised through WP:FRS until a shorter statement is provided. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 13:02, 19 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Redrose64: thank you for your notice! I tried to modify it and I wonder what it looks like now. :) -- BrandNew Jim Zhang (talk) 15:07, 19 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it did work :) --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:36, 19 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

BrandNew Jim Zhang, it's not clear to me what you want here, unless you're just hoping to revive interest in WP:DISCOGSTYLE, which unfortunately never made it to the MoS. But I'll make a few comments anyway...

Your Point 1 is de facto the case already; are you proposing that it be nailed down in the documentation (similar to MOS:ORDER)?

Point 3 deals with sales figures, which are often problematic. You (apparently) want to mandate some "as of" text where we name figures, an idea which I know has been discussed, but not clearly accepted. Wouldn't be enough to insist upon an access-date in the ref? That the sales figures (when we even have them, which I'd rather not) become outdated is a problem all across Wikipedia. Any figure we mention which can still change (not, e.g., number of Apollo missions or population of Paris in 1789) needs to be clearly referenced and taken as a snapshot of some point in time.

Point 4: When working on WP:DISCOGSTYLE, we specifically rejected linking "Sales" to anything. And we didn't add sales for individual singles, as you've shown in your example table, but then, you partially changed your example from albums to singles, but left some of the albums version, so I'm not clear if you are proposing making such a change.

Point 5: Personally, I think everything on every WP page ought to be reffed, whether there's an article somewhere else or not. I'm not sure this view is universally held by the project's contributors.

Your example table, ostensibly for singles but originally for albums, includes a link to US, an album chart. I now think the table caption is rather long, and should probably be shortened somewhat. Also, if you want to work on new forms for such tables, you should include ref citations for peak positions so people can discuss the pros and cons. You might want sample certs in the table. But again, I'm not sure what you're trying to achieve here. If you wanted to rework WP:DISCOGSTYLE, you could have put the RfC there and advertised the RfC here, where there are more watchers. — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 16:34, 19 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This is not a valid use of the RfC process. The issue should be discussed beforehand (See WP:RFCBEFORE), and there should be a brief neutral statement of the question that is to be settled (see WP:RFCOPEN). I've therefore closed it procedurally. Please continue the discussion either here or at WT:DISCOGSTYLE to explore the issues, and there may be consensus found through that process. If there is no consensus emerging in a reasonable time, then RfC becomes a reasonable procedure to decide consensus on unresolved issues. --RexxS (talk) 19:25, 19 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Agree with all points ≫ Lil-Unique1 -{ Talk }- 13:27, 22 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Miki Matsubara's discog section is wholly unsourced and idk how to proceed since it may more than likely be impossible to find articles for many of the older releases aside from the more popular ones that have been receiving coverage recently. I think most of her catalog has individual Oricon profiles. Could using liner notes work too? (Ik those are usually just for tracklists but they have the release year in them and I believe all the info is available on discogs.com as well.) -- Carlobunnie (talk) 02:30, 3 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Tables#Conflicting guidance on headers, which concerns MOS guidance on "year" and "title" columns in tables (specifically, which column should be the rowheader, and the ordering of the two columns). — Goszei (talk) 06:36, 24 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

See current discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Classical music#Recordings lists in articles on individual compositions (please discuss there, not here). --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:46, 25 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Does a standalone discography article have any kind of inherent notability requirements? For example Leo Ku discography, which has been tagged for notability since 2017. Is that tag justified?

The way I understand it, per Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Music#Discographies, size is the only consideration for splitting off a discography; it doesn't come with any additional notability requirements. So even though the discography is now a separate article, it's still 'notable' as long as the artist is notable, just as is the case for a Discography section of an artist's article. In this particular case, the discography is unsourced, which is obviously an issue, but that's not a notability issue the way I see it.

Is this assessment correct or am I missing something? Thanks in advance. Lennart97 (talk) 12:16, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Per WP:SPLITTING, the new article needs to be notable as well - ... only if the new articles are themselves sufficiently notable to be included in the encyclopedia. Hzh (talk) 14:38, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, sure. But if a discography’s notability is independent of the artist, and independent of the individual items (albums/singles) that make up the discography (I assume), then what are the notability requirements for a discography? I can’t imagine there’s a lot of significant coverage solely dedicated to discographies. Lennart97 (talk) 15:37, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'm pretty sure that a notable artist would have articles that describe or list their works in part or as a whole, that should be sufficient. You don't need sources that are dedicated to discography, even though there are sites like AllMusic. Discography articles are just specialized list articles, and you don't need sources that have all the individual items listed in one place per WP:NLIST. In the case of Leo Ku discography, I'm sure it's a matter of just looking into Chinese-language sources if anyone feels inclined to do that. Hzh (talk) 16:32, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Article size is also a consideration. If the discography, with sources to show the charting positions and release dates, etc., is starting to make the article too large, it should be moved. The easiest thing to do to determine the readable prose size is 1) render the page, 2) copy the text of the article, 3) paste that text into a word processor or text editor, 4) do a word count. If that word count is less than 1000 words, it probably does not need to be split simply because there's a discography. It's still quite readable. There are obviously other considerations for a split; this is only one. Walter Görlitz (talk) 19:44, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

So imagine you have a discography section of an article which is too long and should, size-wise, be split off, but there's no evidence that a standalone discography article meets the notability requirements. What do you do? Conversely, if one were to merge Leo Ku discography into Leo Ku, even though it would create a size issue, would the notability issue be solved? Lennart97 (talk) 20:03, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

That's a tough question. If it's not sourced, should it even be in the main article? Walter Görlitz (talk) 22:33, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

That's a tough question, too. Ideally, unsourced content shouldn't be anywhere, of course. Most discography entries, however, can be confirmed to at least exist with a reasonable degree of certainty by a quick Google search - stuff like listings on Spotify, Amazon and the like. So while not currently supported by RS, they're not exactly contentious, either. Lennart97 (talk) 23:02, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If an artist has an article large enough to be worth consider splitting, there should also be sufficient RS to support the article. If there aren't sufficient sources, the artists or bands is probably only just about notable, and should not have a separate discography article. The one problem I have come across is fans of very minor singers or bands who create a disproportionately large discography section on very obscure albums or songs that are mostly self-released with little coverage, and then want to split the discography section into its own article. If the discography section is split, only a small article is left, just barely above stub level or even just a stub. The person who wanted to do it argued that Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Music#Discographies allows him to do it because the discograph section has become disproportionately large in relation to the rest of the article, which makes me think that the the wording of item #2 of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Music#Discographies should be adjusted by adding the proviso that the article must be sufficiently large before it can be split, which would reduce problems with non-notable discography article. Hzh (talk) 00:21, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This is a very good point, which I hadn't really considered. I agree that the Discographies MoS should be updated to reflect this requirement, because as it stands it really does seem as if length is the only consideration. Lennart97 (talk) 18:12, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]