The IMDb is a great database. As they are trying (AFAIK) to index every movie (not only significant ones), the site is frequently used all over the web to link to movies.
The Wikipedia is often used in the same sense (to link to a movie when talking about it etc.), but the Wikipedia doesn’t try to capture every movie (only notable ones), so the IMDb will probably be linked most of the time.
Being such a de-facto canonical database for movies and therefore getting so much backlinks, is valuable for the operator. Who is the operator of the IMDb? It’s Amazon.com (since 1998).
Wow. amazon.com is often used as link target for movie DVDs, imdb.com is often used as link target for movies. Both in the hands of Amazon.com, Inc.
While this would be no problem per se, it may become a problem when the operator (i.e. currently Amazon) goes evil. Let’s assume imdb.com gets a paywall and can only be accessed for free by Kindle users. Now all our old links to the IMDb are "worthless". And all our content is "gone".
Gone, becuase imdb.com doesn’t license the user-generated content about movies/actors/etc. under a free license like Creative Commons.
When Wikipedia goes evil, we can take our content to another place. Not so with the IMDb.
So I wonder: Which could be an alternative online movie database that can be used to link to movies?
There are only two requirements:
- license the user-generated content under a free license (preferably under CC BY-SA, which is used by Wikipedia
- allow to index every movie/actor/etc., not only notable ones
IMDb only complies with 2., Wikipedia only complies with 1.
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