Cataloging DVDs

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LibraryThing is currently not set up to optimally handle media other than books. However, that has not stopped many LibraryThingers from entering their other collections.

[edit] Who is the author?

For now, there is no general consensus as to who counts as the "author" of a movie. Many people use the director as the author, but others have used the screenwriter, the star actor, or simply left it blank. You should not use the author of the original book as the "author" of the movie, however, because this will merge book and film into one work, which is obviously wrong.

[edit] Helpful hints

If you want to enter your movie collection, here are some helpful hints:

• If you do not want to manually enter your videorecordings, your best bet for finding existing records is public library catalogs. Currently, there are four in the US list:
  • MINERVA (Maine)
  • ILCSO (Illinois Libraries)
  • ACCESS Pennsylvania
  • Harris County Public Library

• Check to see if your movie has an ISBN. Many recent releases have an ISBN-10 above the barcode. Entering this in your book record will make combining your copy with other peoples' entries much easier.

• It helps to include some indication in the title of your entry that this is not a book. This is particularly important if you leave the author field blank or use the author of the source material. "The Fellowship of the Rings [dvd] by J. R. R. Tolkien" is unlikely to be combined with book version, but "The Fellowship of the Rings by [blank]" is often indistinguishable from the book. Common approaches on LibraryThing include adding [DVD] or [movie] in the title field; library cataloging standard is to add [videorecording]. This problem can also be avoided by filling out the author field with someone from the film; for example, "Jackson (director), Peter" in the author field.

• In general, most people who are entering movies have chosen to list the director in the author field. Having the author field filled, and filled with the same person as others who have cataloged the film, will make combining much easier.

• After adding your movie, please check to make sure it is not incorrectly combined with a book of the same name. If it is, then change the title, author, and/or ISBN if necessary to distinguish your DVD from the book, and then go to the editions page and separate your DVD from the work for the book. If you need help with combining and separating, ask in the Combiners group.