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Separators: Template:Certification Table Separator and replacing Template:Certification Table Summary

I noted some editors are creating separators inside the certification table, for example for listing streaming or mastertone certifications separately. Rather than creating specific ready-made separators, like {{Certification Table Summary}}, I created {{Certification Table Separator}}, which accepts |title=. You can see a usage example here. Since {{Certification Table Summary}} is now just a wrapper for {{Certification Table Separator|title=Summaries}}, I am going to phase it out when I get the time. --Muhandes (talk) 08:59, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Add a param for Singapore cert

As I am unable to edit this template, I would like to request an addition for Singapore's certification (by the Recording Industry Association (Singapore) or RIAS). Apparently all awards can be found here, and it seems that this certification database has been newly created just since 2019. Thank you, HĐ (talk) 02:36, 18 December 2020 (UTC)

@HĐ: I see no reason not to add it for the 2019 certifications. That will first require to add them to {{cite certification}} which I can also easily do.
  1. Do you have information about the certification levels? All I have is this from 2013.
  2. I see from the top of this page that certifications are based on sales. Do you know if they include streaming or not?
--Muhandes (talk) 10:00, 18 December 2020 (UTC)
This page specifies that for Singles: Gold = 5,000 units / Platinum = 10,000 units; it seems to be the same for albums, though I am not sure what "units" mean in this situation (likely to include both streaming and sales), HĐ (talk) 10:49, 18 December 2020 (UTC)
@HĐ: Thanks, that settles it. I added this to my TDL, and if no one objects, I'll add it soon™ --Muhandes (talk) 18:29, 19 December 2020 (UTC)
@HĐ:  Done, see use example at ÷ (album). Let me know if there are any issues. --Muhandes (talk) 08:51, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Footnote cleanup effort

I've been meaning to do this for ages, but now I finally feel like it's time. There are many cases where the footnotes do not match the table. I could never find a good way of automatically fixing this, and I still don't have one, but here is my idea of how to fix it, at least once. I am writing this here to let users of this template know this effort is going on.

I hope this will not cause any harm, but if it does, let me know and I'll try to fix it ASAP. Feel free to revert this edit and this edit. --Muhandes (talk) 18:29, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

I surely did not expect these numbers. With over 10,000 pages to fix, this is definitely going to be a bot job. I'll need to look into it. --Muhandes (talk) 13:43, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
@Muhandes: just to clarify here, you are talking about the footnotes in the {{Certification Table Bottom}} template, where for example it might say "* sales figures based on certification alone", and in reality all the certifications in the table are based on shipments, so the "nosales=true" parameter should be activated to remove this redundant footnote? Richard3120 (talk) 14:14, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
@Richard3120: Exactly. For example, 12,490 articles which use sales footnotes, but only 6,692 which have the sales mark. We need to add |nosales=true to almost 6,000 articles. --Muhandes (talk) 15:37, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
Got it, just wanted to make sure I'd understood correctly, and I'm totally on board with your proposal. I'm not surprised there are thousands of articles that need fixing – as the default is to include all footnotes in the table, most editors don't take the time to add the parameters which will remove the unneeded ones. Richard3120 (talk) 01:02, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

FYI: A bot was run, resolving about 13,000 table mismatches. There remain a few hundreds more, which I am now resolving manually. --Muhandes (talk) 12:24, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I have manually fixed the remaining couple of hundred mismatches, and for now we are  Done. I will do cleanups from time to time and hopefully this will remain manageable. --Muhandes (talk) 11:46, 13 November 2020 (UTC)
It might be worth pointing out that following this mega-thread this cleanup effort continued, and became an ongoing cleanup effort. For any interested party, following are the tracking categories in convenient table form. At ideal state, the columns should show identical figures.
Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with sales figures (7,425) Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with sales footnote (7,425)
Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with shipments figures (16,216) Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with shipments footnote (16,216)
Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with streaming figures (18,021) Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with streaming footnote (18,021)
Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with streaming-only figures (1,366) Category:Pages using certification Table Entry with streaming-only footnote (1,366)
--Muhandes (talk) 10:25, 24 December 2020 (UTC)


Please adjust note

Single certification no longer reflects actual sales figure since it now includes streaming,[1] so it would be useful for the understanding of what certification means if the wording for single sales is adjusted. Hzh (talk) 13:15, 3 August 2013 (UTC)

And most singles nowadays only get digital release and do not have physical release to be "shipped" to record stores, so the "shipments" term is kinda unnecessary to most cases. I change the "Shipments" word into "certified units", which better describes the inclusion of streaming and TEA (tracks equivalent album). I believe that whenever the real "sales" data available, we should use the "sales" figure instead of its certified units. Regards. Bluesatellite (talk) 04:18, 26 June 2016 (UTC)

Case fix

Please change "/Sales" to "/sales", per MOS:CAPS, which suggests lowercase except where caps are necessary. Dicklyon (talk) 22:00, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

 Done DannyS712 (talk) 23:07, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

MOS:TABLE

Per the MOS, shouldn't this template include a parameter/fields for creating a caption? ≫ Lil-Unique1 -{ Talk }- 21:27, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

@Lil-unique1: You mean the |caption= parameter? I never used it, but it seems to be there. --Muhandes (talk) 06:41, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
Muhandes, apologies, yes I meant that. All tables need to have a caption per accessibility requirements so it should be used. ≫ Lil-Unique1 -{ Talk }- 08:04, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
@Lil-unique1: We can add a default value. I think most of the template's users follow Template talk:Certification Table Entry, maybe we should discuss it there. --Muhandes (talk) 13:26, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Category:Certification Table Entry usages of salesamount without salesref (0)

This is mainly for Kleool who asked for it, but others may also be interested. Category:Certification Table Entry usages of salesamount without salesref (0) was created for pages using |salesamount= without stating the |salesref=. In many cases this is the correct certification number. Either parameters were missing, or the template is wrong. In the former case, missing parameters should be added. In the latter, the template should be fixed. However, in many other cases, this is simply an unsourced number which should be removed.

For your convenience, the category is sorted by region. --Muhandes (talk) 17:19, 26 December 2020 (UTC)

@Muhandes: thank you for creating the category, but could you look if the category could be a reason that templated entries behave weirdly , e.g., Let Her Go has Venezuela (does not have inbuilt thresholds thus added manually via salesamount) and the table looks really weird Kleool (talk) 21:04, 26 December 2020 (UTC)
@Kleool: I found a workaround for the Venezuela issues, by using only the left eight characters for the indexing, though this is only a workaround and I'm sure there is a better way. I'll keep looking for it. --Muhandes (talk) 22:40, 26 December 2020 (UTC)
@Muhandes: thank you for your swift help, but while we're on topic for Venezuela (and other similar cases), what would be the proper way to handle cases, where we have a non-template region and certref, but salesamount are being manually inserted without salesref (e.g. assumed amount by some kind of source, such as the wikipedia pages of the cert bodies (CUD, or List of music recording certifications)? I'll be grateful for advice Kleool (talk) 13:28, 27 December 2020 (UTC)
@Kleool: My opinion is that WP:V always applies. The template provides verifiable numbers, but if this is a number which was not provided by the template, a source is required. Either provide a source or use |nosales=true. The issue I encountered when implementing this, is that if one provides a source, one cannot leave a footnote. That's currently a limitation of the template. If we find this problematic, we can think of a solution. --Muhandes (talk) 15:49, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

Norway

@Muhandes: Our template seems to bring up incorrect certification-levels for albums certified in Norway. I came across Mariah Carey's Music Box, and the template generates 160,000 units for 8 times Platinum. That album was released in 1993, the correct number should be 400,000 units. Based on my research, Norway operates based on release dates when applying certification-levels to albums. One example is Metallica's album Metallica which was certified 2 times Platinum for 100,000 units in 1994, and later it was certified 3 times Platinum in June 2012 for 150,000 units. The certification-levels for albums in Norway were lowered in January 2007 from 40,000/20,000 to 30,000/15,000. In other words, had they applied their then recent certification-levels to all albums regardless of release dates, Metallica's 3 times Platinum in 2012 would translate to 90,000 units.--Harout72 (talk) 01:47, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

@Harout72: I believe both the number in Music Box and the number in Metallica (album) are correct. It is true that the 2007 update very clearly says utgitt, so it does not apply for releases before 2007. However, 2018 update is also very clearly uavhengig av utgivelsestidspunkt so it applies for all certifications from 2018, independent of release year. So indeed, the 2012 3× Platinum certification of Metallica (album) is for 150,000. following the levels when it was released, yet the 8× Platinum of Music Box is only 120,000180,000, following the levels when it was certified. By the way, all the sources used by the template can be found here. --Muhandes (talk) 10:22, 27 December 2020 (UTC)
@Muhandes: OK good to know, thanks for pointing out all that to me. I'm just beginning to put together the Norwegian certified sales for all artists at the List of best-selling music artists. You meant 160,000 units for 8x Platinum of Music Box, correct? Because the Platinum level for albums has been 20,000 since January 2018.--Harout72 (talk) 14:20, 27 December 2020 (UTC)
Oops, fixed. --Muhandes (talk) 15:51, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

Portuguese certifications

Hi. The website used for the Portuguese certifications has been updated, so the template has to be updated too. The parameter id doesn't work anymore, cause it adds the id at the end of the URL "http://www.audiogest.pt/documents/files/". With the change of the website, it should add the id at the end of "http://www.audiogest.pt/uploads/files/" instead. If anyone can change it, I would appreciate it. Thanks! ManuelButera (talk) 12:48, 7 January 2021 (UTC)

This discussion is specifically about {{Cite certification}}, but most editors using it are here. Pinging Kleool and Richard3120 who were involved before. This is slightly more complicated than ManuelButera puts it, since they also changed the file names. For example, week 31 of 2018 was http://www.audiogest.pt/documents/files/Top%20AFP-AUDIOGEST_31_18-imp.pdf and it is now http://www.audiogest.pt/uploads/files/file_2020-03-31-16-01-51.pdf. The good news is that it seems like all old files are still there, so there is no need to redo all of them. The bad news is that I still can't figure out how the file name is determined, other than providing the file name itself. I think that since the existing urls still work, adding another parameter (maybe |filename=?) will be the easiest to implement. If we have |filename= the template will use "http://www.audiogest.pt/uploads/files/", otherwise it will use the obsolete "http://www.audiogest.pt/documents/files/". What do you think? --Muhandes (talk) 13:47, 7 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: i'm fine with just replacing all the id's. In my opinion, a new parameter so soon after implementing the first has potential to become messy quite fast. I'm not sure about what is possible automations-wise, but if text replacement is possible on region-only level, maybe a temporary parameter which i'd fill, and then just switch that out to id? if that's not possible, i could just go through and replace.. would take week(ish) (there are approx 530 pages, and quite a few are with other type of reference)? Kleool (talk) 19:35, 7 January 2021 (UTC)
@Kleool: Such automation is easy to do, and if it is only a few hundreds I can handle it myself. I am therefore going to take your offer on this. I added an undocumented parameter |best= for Portugal, which uses http://www.audiogest.pt/uploads/files/. Once you are done replacing all the occurrences of |id= which used http://www.audiogest.pt/documents/files/ with |best=, I will remove the option to use http://www.audiogest.pt/documents/files/ and use AWB to switch it back to |id=. --Muhandes (talk) 09:22, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: ok. i'll start over the weekend and let you know when i finish ^^ Kleool (talk) 09:52, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: I'm done. Personal suggestion (to save time) would be creating temp category(?) to give you list of only pages with |best= (because there are a lot of cert's based on articles/"old" cert db's). Note: there are few pages which have only |best=, without |id= as i stumbled on few pages where the pdf was linked through a full cite, and i wasn't sure how to better do it, so only put the new doc link into |best= Kleool (talk) 11:43, 10 January 2021 (UTC)
@Kleool: Impressive, you did some 300 citations in two days. I (semi-)automatically replaced |best= back with |id=, removed the temporary |best=, and |id= now points to http://www.audiogest.pt/uploads/files/. ManuelButera, this is  Done. --Muhandes (talk) 10:20, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: thank you! Kleool (talk) 10:37, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
@Kleool: Wow, thank you both! Muhandes ManuelButera (talk) 12:14, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

If you need another mini-project...

This template and certifications in general are an endless source of projects. If you are looking for one, see Category:Pages using certification Table Bottom with no footnotes (0). At the simplest case this is just a matter of replacing {{certification Table Bottom}} with {{Table end}}. However, in most of the articles I sampled this was a total misuse of the certification templates, requiring an overhaul of the table, removing unsourced certifications etc. Have fun. --Muhandes (talk) 13:47, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

Is IFPI Chile still certifying albums?

In List of music recording certifications it is implied that IFPI Chile has stopped certifications in 2010. Does anyone have any information on that? I take it sources like this refer to sales awards being made by the labels rather than IFPI Chile and should not be listed. --Muhandes (talk) 08:43, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

Mexico, Argentina and Brazil aside, I've always had a real problem finding out information about certifying bodies in Latin America. I've lived in Colombia for over a decade, but I've still been unable to find any information at all about Colombia's certifying body ASINCOL... I don't know whether it's changed its name, whether it still exists... I can't even find an address in directory listings. And yet every so often an article appears in Billboard stating that a record has gone gold or platinum in the country. In general this is a culture which cares very little for the kind of verifiable facts that Wikipedia relies on... if a record company says their act has a gold record, people accept that at face value, and there is no history at all of music journalism, like the US and UK are used to, hence there are almost no reviews of albums (or films, for that matter)... people here simply don't see the point in reading someone else's opinion to find out whether something is good or bad before they pay for it. Richard3120 (talk) 15:08, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

Japan "old" certifications

@Muhandes: Hi! could ask if you could check out the Japan thresholds for singles (physical singles, not the digital for which we use |digital= ) pre-June 2003 (aka "old" standard, when thresholds were divided into domestic and intl). I tried to make fix to a certification, only to realise that template gives me 50k for Gold for certification made in 2000, even when i tried |domestic=true, even though it needed to give me 200k. Thresholds on RIAJ wiki page are correct. If you could fix it, it would be great. Thank you in advance! Kleool (talk) 20:17, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

@Kleool:  Done I added support for |domestic=true for Japan. I also corrected the date of change from June 2003 to July 2003 per Recording Industry Association of Japan. --Muhandes (talk) 10:07, 26 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: thank you very much!Kleool (talk) 10:13, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

For certifications, Finland lists certifications/sales with different url's based on whether they're domestic or intl act.
E.g. Template currently generates url like https://www.ifpi.fi/tutkimukset-ja-tilastot/kulta-ja-platinalevyt/?ulkomaiset=1&q=Lordi (where Lordi is the artist), and it works, except if you're a domestic artist. For domestic artists format would be https://www.ifpi.fi/tutkimukset-ja-tilastot/kulta-ja-platinalevyt/?q=Lordi
Or another option would be format which opens artist page: https://www.ifpi.fi/tutkimukset-ja-tilastot/kulta-ja-platinalevyt/artistit/lordi/ . What are your thoughts @Muhandes: ? Kleool (talk) 19:38, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of that. It seems like the easiest solution would be to address the artist's page, it should be quite straightforward to do. I hope it works in the same way when it comes to spaces and such, it's work making sure. --Muhandes (talk) 20:03, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: Clicking the links in ifpi.fi website gives artist links with + in places where spaces would be, e.g. , https://www.ifpi.fi/tutkimukset-ja-tilastot/kulta-ja-platinalevyt/artistit/iron+maiden/ , but i tried with space instead of + and it worked when i wrote it directly in url bar, but template often has problems with such stuff, so maybe just use space replace with +? Kleool (talk) 07:27, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
@Kleool: Oddly, I looked at the code and it seems to have always worked in the desired way. As you can see |domestic=true seems to work. Am I missing something? --Muhandes (talk) 08:16, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
Region Certification Certified units/sales
Finland (Musiikkituottajat)[1] {{{award}}} 0[1]
Finland (Musiikkituottajat)[2] {{{award}}} 0[2]

References

  1. ^ a b "Iron Maiden" (in Finnish). Musiikkituottajat – IFPI Finland.
  2. ^ a b "Lordi" (in Finnish). Musiikkituottajat – IFPI Finland.
@Muhandes: facepalming so bad right now. Either i didn't see the |domestic= in the description, or i made a typo while adding it.. sorry for wasting your time, really Kleool (talk) 08:19, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

Italy

Italian albums certifications include streaming since 7 July 2018, when they were included in the methodology for the Albums chart (See here: "Obviously, this kind of integration will also be considered for gold and platinum certifications". Full mehtodology is explained here). At the moment, the template always refer to the footnote "sales figures based on certification alone" instead of "sales+streaming figures based on certification alone" for albums certifications. Could someone update it, please, so that certifications issued from July 2018 will show the "double-dagger" sign?

Moreover, as stated in the FIMI wikipedia page (citing an e-mail by FIMI itself: — (April 7, 2020). "RE: FIMI's certification-levels for Singles". Letter to. Retrieved April 8, 2020.), Italian certifications for both albums and singles are issued with thresholds depending on the certification date, not on the release date. This article released by FIMI, focused on popular Italian songs released before 2009, also states that "these records [...] reach the current thresholds only considering sales registered after the introduction of official FIMI/GfK certifications". --Stee888 (talk) 09:23, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

@Stee888: Regarding footnotes, too bad you didn't partake in this discussion, where we we just went through an overhaul of the footnotes. Nevertheless, I will change the footnotes for albums starting July 2018 when we finish the current iteration.
Regarding thresholds, for albums we are following release year. For singles we are following release year before 2010 and certification year from then on. This follows a very old discussion on the subject, and I could find this and this in the archives. I suspect that at some point they started doing the same for albums, but I don't know when, so more research may be needed. Pinging Harout72 who was involved (sadly IndianBio is no longer active). --Muhandes (talk) 13:32, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
@Stee888: Refer to this discussion. I had a conversation with a FIMI employee via e-mail, who stated that they apply most recent certification-levels to all singles when they certify single titles, regardless of the release dates.--Harout72 (talk) 14:06, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: Ok, thank you very much and sorry for missing those conversations.
@Harout72: I strongly suspect they are applying new thresholds for albums too, but Muhandes is right: we should do some more research on that. I guess they have been doing it since the introduction of the new certification system in 2010, but I'm not sure about that and I don't know how to verify it. I will try to contact them, as you did for singles. Thanks! Stee888 (talk) 17:31, 11 January 2021 (UTC)
@Stee888: I implemented your request re:footnotes for albums starting July 2018. I also took the liberty to implement the same fallback we implemented for other regions, that is to use |relyear=/|relmonth= in case |certyear=/|certmonth= are not available, and this was used for both albums and singles. So I'd say we are  Half done. When you have more information about thresholds for albums please let us know and we can implement the other half. Muhandes (talk) 10:42, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
First of all, thank you very much for your implementation!
I sent an email to FIMI, asking them to explain how they handle methodology changes for albums. I also used an example (the album The Island Chainsaw Massacre, released in 2011 and certified in 2020). This is a rough translation of FIMI's answer. I hope my translation is good enough, sorry if it's not grammatically correct! Anyway, you can read the original here:
"[...] I confirm you the update of parameters in the methodology of FIMI data gathering does not have retroactive value, therefore it is considered only starting from the week in which it becomes active. The new methodology invalidates and replaces the old one. Particularly, we count copies sold until that moment with the previous methodology, and we add copies sold with the new methodology. Finally, to answer your question, I confirm you that the platinum certification for the album The Island Chainsaw Massacre was based on the 2020 methodology."
So, as far as I understand, data gathering criteria is not retroactive (e.g. streaming inclusion and conversion rate). Still, new certifications always follow the latest methodology, therefore thresholds are the most recent ones, as they confirm for my example. Stee888 (talk) 21:17, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
@Stee888: How long has FIMI been using this practice for albums? He doesn't seem to have mentioned that in the e-mail. Would you mind sending him another e-mail (since you just had a correspondence with him), to clarify whether or not FIMI has always been applying the most recent certification-levels to all albums when issuing certifications, regardless of their release dates. Because FIMI database goes back to 2009, and since then they've made quite a few changes in albums levels. If you feel uncomfortable contacting him again, let me know please, I'll try to contact him. This is an important information. Thanks.--Harout72 (talk) 01:24, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

He told me that each new methodology replaces the old one. I think it means they have been doing it since they started their certification programme in 2010 (for sales starting in 2009). Anyway, no problem: I'll ask them to confirm what I said, and I'll let you know FIMI's answer. As they stated here, before 2010, gold and platinum certifications were based on recording companies auto-certifications, "without an official certification system", even if thresholds were defined by FIMI. Therefore, I don't think they will give us any information about pre-2010 certifications, since they did not handle them. Stee888 (talk) 22:31, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

@Harout72: Sorry if I took too long; anyway, I sent another e-mail to FIMI this morning, and they confirmed me that all certifications are issued based on threshold valid at the certification date, regardless of the album's release date. You can find their answer here, together with the original message. Since I wrote in Italian, let me know if you need some help to translate their message. Stee888 (talk) 14:19, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
@Stee888: Ok thanks for getting confirmation on that. @Muhandes: Looks like we're gonna have to re-program the template for FIMI to reflect the correct levels. This is going to make a big difference on older albums especially.--Harout72 (talk) 15:01, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
Added to my TDL. --Muhandes (talk) 18:23, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
@Stee888 and Harout72:  Done I believe I handled all cases, but this was a total rewrite of the Italy code, so please verify the correctness. --Muhandes (talk) 09:14, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
It seems to bring up correct levels, thanks.--Harout72 (talk) 14:17, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
Thank you! Stee888 (talk) 23:56, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Japan digital album

@Muhandes: hello! it seems that template does not accept |digital= for albums like it does for singles. Template should work same as for digital singles (digital certifications are under same link, same as non-digital singles/albums link to same place).Kleool (talk) 13:50, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

Clarification - only the footnote is incorrect, not other changes are necessary, sorry for confusion, thank you ! Kleool (talk) 14:01, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
I was not aware that there is such a thing as digital album certification, but I'm taking your word for it.  Done --Muhandes (talk) 15:49, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: They don't happen often (18 titles since 2015 have achieved any certs), as Japan till this day is heavily set on Physical sales, and they count ONLY digital sales (no streaming) for the cert. If on digital certification search page for category ('カテゴリ') you select 'アルバム' (means album) from the drop-down, you can see list of certifications.(this description meant if you wish to check yourself) And thank you! Kleool (talk) 16:44, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 6 February 2021

Moved from Template talk:Certification Table Bottom
 – centralized discussion is here. —⁠andrybak (talk) 13:35, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

Greetings and felicitations. Please render the footnotes into sentence case and add periods. I.e.:

*Sales figures based on certification alone.
^Shipments figures based on certification alone.
‡Sales+streaming figures based on certification alone.
†Streaming-only figures based on certification alone.

—DocWatson42 (talk) 09:04, 6 February 2021 (UTC) DocWatson42 (talk) 09:04, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

@DocWatson42:  Done. If anyone opposes it can always be undone. --Muhandes (talk) 16:25, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: Thank you. ^_^ —DocWatson42 (talk) 08:25, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

Argentine certifications

Hello! I have noticed that the certification table entry for Argentine certifications is erroneous as it displays certified units based on old standards. The current accreditation numbers were lowered in July 2016, but the template shows certified units for releases before that date. You can take a look at the current certification levels here or in this document published by CAPIF. For example, albums released before July 2016 were required 20,000 copies sold to get a gold certification, but albums releaesd after that date require 10,000 copies sold to get a gold certification. Unfortunately, there is no data base for Argentine certifications and they become public when the artists get the plaques and artists, labels or websites post or publish the news, so the "certref" parameter is required. I hope somebody can update the numbers that are displayed on the "certified units" column. Thank you! --Swe97 (talk) 20:59, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@Swe97: Noted, added to my TDL. --Muhandes (talk) 08:42, 9 February 2021 (UTC)
@Swe97:  Done I gave it the full monty and also implemented support for |digital=true, |streamsonly=true, for which I also implemented the correct footnotes, and even |type=compilation, which I doubt will ever be used. Without a database I'm not sure how useful it will all be, but meh. --Muhandes (talk) 16:41, 11 February 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: Awesome contribution! Thank you so much! --Swe97 (talk) 20:24, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

UPFI certifications

OPPOSE
Gave it two weeks, interested editor haven't shown up, unanimous closure. - Muhandes (talk) 17:13, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

While cleaning up some articles, I noticed that back in 2014 an option for adding French certifications by Union des Producteurs Phonographiques Français Indépendants (UPFI) was added by Davykamanzi. I could not find any discussion prior to it, but from what I can see all it does is replace SNEP with UPFI. It does not change the threshold levels nor the footnote. For sure it does not include automatic sourcing. This leads to a situation where almost every single usage of this feature is now wrong in one way or another. The feature was never documented, which may be the reason why there seems to be very little interest in this feature since then, which seems unacceptable to me. I did some preliminary research:

  • Sources: I see that UPFI has an archive starting 2016. There are archives for 2013 2012 2011 2010
  • Thresholds: Thresholds prior to July 2009 and after that date are archived here. Current ones are supposedly listed here. Album thresholds did not change, but since January 4, 2019 they include streaming. Singles supposedly included streaming since 2016, and change certification levels starting April 2018.

Before I move on to properly implement this, I invite discussion. Should these be added at all, or should the option be removed? Are there any other archives or sources for thresholds? --Muhandes (talk) 18:16, 30 January 2021 (UTC)

@Muhandes: i had noticed that UPFI was used sometimes in wiki articles, but was hesitant about what to do about them. Because in theory, it is not the national certification body. It was also unclear of why there are 2 certification bodies to begin with, and why were they different (title having UPFI, but not SNEP and vice-versa). I have not gained any idea's still. BUT in terms of thresholds, based on Billboard article [here], UPFI has (as of time of article) used SNEP's thresholds. And as the thresholds seem to match even now, i guess they continued matching? Kleool (talk) 13:57, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
@Kleool: If the conclusion would be that the thresholds are the same as SNEP's then there is less work to do. We still don't even have consensus that UPFI should be used. --Muhandes (talk) 15:25, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
@Muhandes: it would be akin to question, if we accept IMPALA "awards"/certifications as valid? In template we have IFPI europe awards (SNEP is IFPI affiliate) vs IMPALA (UPFI is a member). Articles here and here seem to list UFPI (as SNEP) organisation which can awards certifications. In terms of myself, i'm indecisive about this and don't know enough about French certifications in general. It would be great if Davykamanzi would explain how it came to be in the first place (possibly he knows a lot more?)Kleool (talk) 17:49, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
Are there any situations where there is a certification on UPFI which isn't on SNEP, and would therefore require its use? Just checking the recent certifications on both websites, the certifications seem to be identical. Richard3120 (talk) 18:08, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
@Richard3120: snep database between 2009 and 2014 is spotty in general. So many of the titles in documents linked above wouldn't be in snep db at the moment, but they might maybe be in the archived pages. But exmaple from 2011 - ALPHA BLONDY album Vision - has UPFI gold but does not have snep cert (because snep db is a disaster in that period, archived page available here). But there are also historical cases, e.g., from Billboard magazine (in 1995) said 300k cert assigned to musician by UPFI (with picture/caption), but it does not exist on snep, or http://www.infodisc.fr/ (which usually is pretty precise about old snep cert's) Kleool (talk) 08:04, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
Well, it has been a week and I left notices at WT:SONG and WT:ALBUM, so it's time to try and reach a consensus. Pinging Richard3120, Kleool and Davykamanzi again. Please wither support or oppose adding this option. --Muhandes (talk) 16:21, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

Opinion, should we add UPFI properly

  • Oppose - This entire UPFI issue seems like one editor's side-mission, and even that editor lost interest by now or they would have voiced their opinion. The 2014 change should be undone and these certifications should be removed if no SNEP certification exists. --Muhandes (talk) 16:21, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Oppose - whole UPFI/SNEP business is weird. Even though i think UPFI "award" could be used for sales (with manual referencing), i do not think it should be noted as an official certification and added/left in the template - SNEP is for that. And as Richard3120 has mentioned, recent certifications UPFI matches SNEP, so it also has become somewhat redundant too.Kleool (talk) 22:01, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Oppose: unless we know that UPFI is an official certifying body, I don't see how we can include their data... I suspect they might be reproducing the SNEP certifications anyway. Richard3120 (talk) 22:17, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Implementation

Usage of UPFI should end up in Category:Certification Table Entry usages for France by UPFI (0). So far there were only eight articles which used this hidden UPFI feature, and per consensus I removed them. I will give this a few more days and then I will remove the hidden feature itself. --Muhandes (talk) 09:08, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

And  Done. If anyone every wants to add UPFI certification they will need to have consensus this time. --Muhandes (talk) 08:22, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Taiwan certifications

I noticed quite a number of Taiwan RIT certifications added incorrectly, and since it is all easily archived here, I added support directly from the template. --Muhandes (talk) 12:59, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

I just realized that all Taiwan certifications come with a certified number, just like Finland. Implementing that might be difficult and not worth it for so few certifications, and it can be easily done manually with |refname= and |salesref= (see e.g., here), so I might not bother. Let me know if you have an opinion either way. --Muhandes (talk) 13:55, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

French certifications

Please, can someone adjust the template for French certifications (SNEP)? When I try to access a cert for SNEP site, it shows the following message: "This domain name does not refer to any website." This message is showed in English, French and Dutch. I don't know if it's a passing problem, or if this domain was extinct. LuanCampSouza93 (talk) 02:07, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

LuanCampSouza93, the website is down, how do you suggest we adjust the template? Muhandes (talk) 06:51, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
LuanCampSouza93, the website is back up. --Muhandes (talk) 11:02, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

Greek certification 2021

I noticed that since week 4 of 2021, the IFPI Greek chart started publishing awards again, see e.g., here. Does anyone have any more information on that? These are obviously digital certifications so the footnote needs fixing, but does it include streaming? Are there new thresholds? Is there any interest in adding this citation option? --Muhandes (talk) 08:47, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

I just got this message from IFPI Greece and I'm not sure how to handle it. On one hand, this is not a pure streaming certification so I feel uncomfortable displaying it as such. On the other hand, we do not have the digital sales translation number because it is "not disclosable at the moment", so I see no other option. Any thoughts? Pinging Richard3120+Harout72+Kleool.--Muhandes (talk) 16:37, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
I guess as they have converted the iTunes downloads to "stream points", this is kind of an all-streaming certification anyway. As you say, there doesn't seem to be any other way of handling it other than calling it a pure streaming certification. Richard3120 (talk) 17:13, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
Based on all the info you have available including "not disclosable at the moment", I'd say treat the listed certifications as purely streaming generated. There isn't anything else to work with. All in all, Greece has never had a music market significantly sizable enough to even enter the IFPI top 20 music markets, nor have they ever been organized enough to provide the public with their certifications and/or levels, so leaving Greek certs out altogether would not hurt anyone in my opinion.--Harout72 (talk) 20:40, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
FWIW, this is  Done. I took the opportunity to correct titles for all uses, listing the exact chart used and adding support for |certyear= and |certweek=. --Muhandes (talk) 11:33, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Australia certifications

Following up on this discussion I added the option to cite Australia from the ARIA top 50 and top 20 Australian artist charts. See documentation. --Muhandes (talk) 11:56, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

I just noticed that Australia also has the yearly charts archived here with certifications, which can be used for certifications as early as 1988. Anyone wants this added? --Muhandes (talk) 08:21, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
I would assume the answer will very much be "yes" from other editors – as we know, ARIA removed the accreditations (certifications) archive from their website last year, leaving only the 2020 accreditations which stopped in August anyway [2]. So unless all the previous years accreditations were archived on the Wayback Machine (which they probably were), this will be the only way to retrieve them. But more importantly, that archive only went back to 1997 anyway, so this will be the only method to obtain accreditations for 1988 to 1996, I think. Richard3120 (talk) 14:22, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
All your assumptions are correct. I am just trying to avoid feature creep by making sure that this is practical functionality rather than bloat. --Muhandes (talk) 15:21, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
@Richard3120:  Done I implemented the option to cite the ARIA yearly charts through |recent=yearchart. Hopefully it's going to be used. --Muhandes (talk) 13:24, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

Open another thread but also about Australia certifications. The latest version of ARIA Accreditations is archived at webarchive dated Aug 31, 2020. The current version's template for 2020 cert is dated Jul 31, 2020. I think the version of the webarchive should be updated :) -- BrandNew Jim Zhang (talk) 11:15, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

@BrandNew Jim Zhang:  Done, and I took the opportunity to test all Australia archived URLs and fix them so please report any errors. --Muhandes (talk) 12:20, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
👍 Like -- BrandNew Jim Zhang (talk) 01:22, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
@Richard3120 and BrandNew Jim Zhang: It seems ARIA has been publishing their accreditation lists for 2020 and 2021 on their dropbox, here and here. These are official publications, linked from this page, so I added them to the template. --Muhandes (talk) 08:50, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

Whether to display certified units while sales amount given

Many thanks for Muhandes' notification that I was doing stuff against the consensus. But I would like to discuss it here.

In this example (I remember I did a lot like that Smiley Sorry! ), I add certified units although sales amount given considering following reasons:

  1. The column title says Certified units/Sales, the according amount of both certified units and sales should be given.
  2. WP:DISCOGSTYLE also contains both sales amount and certs.

-- BrandNew Jim Zhang (talk) 15:05, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

The heading "certified units/sales" is shorthand for "certified units OR sales".
As it stands now, the template allows for one of two modes:
  • Certified amount, which is calculated automatically from reliable sources and to which the correct footnote is added automatically, also based on reliable sources
  • Sales amount using |salesamount= followed by |salesref= with a reliable source for said amount
So, as can be seen, both modes of operation were designed to be based on reliable sources. Directly adding a number followed by the code <sup>{{double-dagger}}</sup> for footnote goes against everything the template (and our small community) has been trying to achieve. It is only because we didn't think of this abuse that the template even allows for it.
Having said that, if the consensus of the community will be that we need both numbers, I can code to allow for both numbers and footnote to be displayed properly, based on reliable sources. --Muhandes (talk) 16:49, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

Threshold sources

Changing the threshold sources from Wikipedia articles to actual sources in the table will inspire more confidence in this template. Heartfox (talk) 20:00, 8 April 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what you mean. Richard3120 (talk) 20:43, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
In the supported regions table some of the links in the "sources for thresholds" are Wikipedia articles. Heartfox (talk) 23:14, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
Ah, you mean we have a WP:CIRCULAR reference. Yes, this table should be updated with links to official IFPI pages or whatever. Richard3120 (talk) 23:16, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
I'd be more than happy if someone could take this upon themselves (although to be honest, after ten years and more than 20,000 inclusions, I hardly think we have a confidence problem). At the time, using weblinks seemed good enough. Now that I look at it, I think using proper citations and archived sources will benefit everyone interested in knowing the threshold sources. If needed I'd be happy to provide and explain the relevant source code for every region. For future edits, I'll make sure this is done. --Muhandes (talk) 09:41, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
I'll be happy to do it, although I always say that and then I get sidetracked by real life. I'll try and make a start on it this weekend – if you don't see any activity, Muhandes or anyone else is free to give a me a kick to get me working again. I may need some help locating the sources for some of the less widely known country certifications, but we'll come to that when necessary. I assume people are looking for something like this?
  • Before 1985: [cited source and link]
  • 1985 – June 1996: [cited source and link]
  • July 1996 – present: [cited source and link]
Richard3120 (talk) 14:04, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
FWIW, whenever I edit the template, I now state the sources used very explicitly. For instance I just edited France and corrected the sources. --Muhandes (talk) 09:22, 27 May 2021 (UTC)

www.infodisc.fr

Anyone knows where www.infodisc.fr went? I'm specifically trying to find certification month for Agent Provocateur (album), Discovery (Mike Oldfield album), Forever Young (Alphaville album), It's My Life (album), Tonight (David Bowie album). --Muhandes (talk) 12:59, 27 May 2021 (UTC)

Mexico's Amprofon

Amprofon has raised its certification levels for albums and also singles. New levels for albums are 70,000/140,000/700,000, older levels were 30,000/60,000/300,000. New levels affect all album titles released after November 1, 2020.

For singles (Single Tracks), they have only listed streaming levels, new levels being Gold=22,000,000, Platinum=44,000,000, Diamond=220,000,000. While the ratio is unclear, note that they have listed streaming levels for singles released before November 1, 2020, Gold=9,300,000, Platinum=18,600,000, Diamond=93,000,000. Amprofon's levels for Single Tracks before November 1, 2020 were Gold=30,000, Platinum=60,000, Diamond=300,000, when we divide the older streaming levels by older Single Tracks levels, we get 310 ratio, 310 streams being equal to one download. The new ratio seems to be a bit higher (314...) when we use the same calculation system for newer steaming levels.

So it seems, the levels for single are also at Gold=70,000, Platinum=140,000, Diamond=700,000. To be precise, the template for new Single Tracks levels could be programmed based on streams levels as stated on their PDF document.--Harout72 (talk) 01:45, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

@Harout72: It makes sense to me to use 70,000/140,000/700,000 for both albums and singles. I will like to take the opportunity and provide means for properly listing all possibilities of Amprofon certifications. We currently have |award=Platinum+Gold, |award=Diamond+Gold which makes sense, but also |award=Platinum+Diamond or even |award=Platinum+Diamond+Gold with |number= being the number of Platinum awards, where the order of awards is counter-intuitive. Apart from being counter-intuitive, there is no automatic calculation for multiple Diamond for example 2× Diamond+Platinum+Gold for "Without Me", not to speak of things like 8× Diamond+3× Platinum+Gold for "Tusa". I would like to change this by only allowing awards of the format |award=Diamond+Platinum or |award=Diamond+Platinum+Gold and adding |number2= for the number of platinum awards in these cases. This would mean Mexico will get special treatment in the coding, but the result will make much more sense. What do you think? --Muhandes (talk) 09:52, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
Having 70,000/140,000/700,000 levels for both albums and singles is appropriate. I personally don't know how the template programming works as I've never been involved in that or discussions for it. So it's not possible to program it in a way so the template could bring up multiple Diamond and Platinum awards at the same time as the song "Tusa" has? If I understand it correctly from your suggestion, we can only program the template to read maximum of 2 Platinum awards, and not for example 2 Diamond + 2 Platinum + Gold? If that's the case, then yes, let's do that.--Harout72 (talk) 12:49, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
Indeed, the current implementation does not allow it. I propose tp make the template more intuitive to use on one hand, and add the capability to use it in all cases for automatic calculation on the other. The downside is that we will need to go over some existing certification and fix them, but I'm pretty sure there are not many of them. --Muhandes (talk) 14:17, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

 Done I made quite a big change in the template. I tried to test all options, but I may have missed something. Please report any errors. --Muhandes (talk) 12:33, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

So far I've tried one and it works, thanks.--Harout72 (talk) 12:52, 4 June 2021 (UTC)
I just realized that prior to 1999 there was actually double gold award (e.g. for Caifanes there is Platinum+2× Gold) so I'm going to add support for that. I'm not sure there was ever a Diamond+Platinum+2× Gold awarded, so it's not implemented. Let me know if you find one, and I'll need to add |number3=. --Muhandes (talk) 14:01, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

Venezuela certifications

Quite a number of articles use this source for Venezuela certifications. Does anyone have any idea where it is from? Keeping in mind that there is no evidence that Association of Venezuelan Phonograph Producers (APFV) ever had single certifications, there is nothing showing that this is official in any way.--Muhandes (talk) 18:50, 1 July 2021 (UTC) I found another source which might be the origin of the above source. Again, no evidence that this has originated from APFV. --Muhandes (talk) 19:12, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

That report has come from this website [3], which looks very suspect to me. Apart from being hosted on a "build your own website" service, it's very patchy in its information and claims to hand out the awards itself – the fact it can't spell AVINPRO correctly despite supposedly working with them doesn't inspire me with confidence. Looking at the "Artists" section, which has all of seven artists listed, it gives supposed chart positions in Venezuela and Colombia dating back to the mid-2000s... but Colombia for one didn't have an official chart until 2009. So there's no information about where these chart positions come from, and given the lack of information on the website and overall lack of professionalism displayed, I couldn't say that this was in any way reliable. Richard3120 (talk) 19:56, 1 July 2021 (UTC)
Good catch, this really looks dubious and I think this website belongs on WP:BADCHARTS. --Muhandes (talk) 21:49, 1 July 2021 (UTC)
I also agree, the domain is dubious. --Apoxyomenus (talk) 00:44, 2 July 2021 (UTC)
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