Wikidata:Property proposal/MPA certificate number
MPA certificate number
[edit]Originally proposed at Wikidata:Property proposal/Creative work
| Description | unique certificate number from the Motion Picture Association as included in a film's credits |
|---|---|
| Represents | Motion Picture Association film rating system (Q1987792) |
| Data type | External identifier |
| Allowed values | \d{1,5} |
| Example 1 | Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope (Q17738) → 24925 |
| Example 2 | Jurassic Park (Q167726) → 32451 |
| Example 3 | A Lad in Bagdad (Q41573722) → 21550 |
| Example 4 | Sleepless in Seattle (Q107167) → 32238 |
| Example 5 | Jurassic World Rebirth (Q124380480) → 55488 |
| Source | https://www.filmratings.com |
| Formatter URL | https://www.filmratings.com/search-results/?cn=$1 |
| See also | MPA film rating (P1657), BBFC reference (archived) (P8794), ICAA film catalogue ID (P5128) |
| Applicable "stated in"-value | FilmRatings.com (Q47425783) |
Motivation
[edit]This number is often included for film items with MPA film rating (P1657) using the qualifier rating certificate ID (P2676) – see the example of Star Wars: A New Hope. Now that the new filmratings.com website surfaces this information, we could track this more formally, similar to BBFC reference (archived) (P8794). —takeawaybox🥡 (talk) 08:42, 15 January 2026 (UTC)
Discussion
[edit]
Support Looks like a good addition. Jean-Fred (talk) 09:09, 15 January 2026 (UTC)
Comment Out of curiosity − why does the Star Wars certificate in the example has two hits in the database? Jean-Fred (talk) 09:09, 15 January 2026 (UTC)
- I was wondering about that also. The entry has a note that it was edited and re-rated. I think the current rating is a re-issue from 2004. But presumably, that number 24925, appears "sequentially older" than 2004. Presumably, they reused the original certificate number. And that might have something to do with two entries appearing? Happily the two duplicate entries share the exact same number. takeawaybox🥡 (talk) 20:44, 15 January 2026 (UTC)
- Comment Since these are numerical identifiers in search form, I am afraid that we are dealing with the same situation as with PEGI. The identifier may be duplicated, as in this case [1], [2], [3], [4], [5] or even worse, shared with several others (see for example [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14]), which, as I am noticing, is typical for identifiers in search form. Of course, we could try using identifier shared with (P4070) for each search ID, but as I mentioned earlier in the PEGI proposal, these are not the usual numerical IDs that we think of. Regards Kirilloparma (talk) 02:00, 16 January 2026 (UTC)
- Wow, really strange there are those later collisions! It looks like 32451 is unique to Jurassic Park, you can see it included here in the film's end credits roll at 6:05. It also looks like Jurassic World Rebirth is correct with 55488 which is included in MPA CARA Ratings Bulletin No. 2883 (found as a PDF here from archive.org). Maybe those collisions are cataloging errors. takeawaybox🥡 (talk) 04:39, 16 January 2026 (UTC)
- So, I looked into this. The consensus appears to be that the certificate numbers are intended to be unique.
- The first film to be issued a number is the 1934 film The World Moves On (Q600904). Its certificate number is 1. You can see the certificate number appearing at the beginning of the film here.
- From 1934 until 1968, certificate numbers were were issued by the Production Code Administration of the MPA. This showed that they complied with the Production Code. You can see more certificates in use here in the Audiovisual Identity Database.
- The relevant section of the production code reads: The completed picture shall be submitted to the Code Office and if it is approved by the Administrator, the producer or distributor shall upon public release of the picture place upon an introductory frame of every print distributed for exhibition in the United States the official Seal of the Association with the word “Approved” above the Seal, and below, the words “Certificate Number,” followed by the number of the Certificate of Approval.
- Beginning in 1968, the system switched from the Motion Picture Production Code (Q610292) to the Motion Picture Association film rating system (Q1987792) but the numbering appears to have continued sequentially. Every (compliant) film exhibited after Friday, November 1, 1968 was required to have a rating.
- It appears the first film to be issued a certificate in the new MPA ratings system is possibly Pillaged (Q3316293) with 21787. I'm assuming that other titles like Prefabricated Pink (Q7239791) had earlier certificates such as 21587 and ratings were retroactively attached to them.
- There is a list of films from 1 to 46047 here at filmonsuper8.com and archived from chello.nl here with contributors listed but there are some mistakes such as Hellfighters (Q1217025) being listed as 21651 but it is apparently 21851.
- There was previous known collision on certificate number 39360 (My Boss's Daughter) discussed on reddit in 2012 but apparently it was brought to their attention and they fixed it by issuing Scary Movie 3 40335, Adventureland 44388, and so on. takeawaybox🥡 (talk) 09:18, 16 January 2026 (UTC)
- Oh, one other note, those particular examples are mysterious for another reason: they all are 3 digits. I'm confident the first ratings occurred around the 21xxx series. Three digit certificates should have been issued decades earlier. As a possible clue, in your link 6, The Scarlett Letter (1934) has certificate 158 (issued in 1934, and presumably the canonical of the two). Letter appears to have had a (post-1968) rating retroactively added in 1970. The film that collides with it is Cherry, Harry & Raquel! which originally came out in 1969. This makes me think Cherry… is supposed to have a 5 digit certificate but maybe a data entry problem has omitted two of the digits. takeawaybox🥡 (talk) 09:50, 16 January 2026 (UTC)
- @Jean-Frédéric, Kirilloparma: Would you like to give your opinion? -- Regards, ZI Jony (Talk) 05:36, 29 April 2026 (UTC)
- Notified participants of WikiProject Movies. Trivialist (talk) 13:33, 16 May 2026 (UTC)
Question What is the benefit of this as it's own property over using rating certificate ID (P2676) as a qualifier for MPA film rating (P1657) like we already do? All of the examples provided already have a MPA film rating (P1657) and any movie with a MPA certificate number should also have the rating, right? MrRobertman (talk) 17:07, 16 May 2026 (UTC)
- @MrRobertman, ZI Jony: I mentioned that qualifier but that's an interesting point: I guess all our identifiers could be tracked as qualifiers instead. But using a unique property allows us to provide a human and machine-readable proximate link using formatter URL (P1630) and also provide things like third-party formatter URL (P3303), formatter URI for RDF resource (P1921), etc. I'm not sure if qualifiers can include links, particularly when they are used for multiple sources of data (we also use that qualifier for BBFC, others). To be honest, your question is above my paygrade but my rough guess to approximate an answer to your questions is that we would do this to gain the general benefits listed at WD:ID and Wikidata:External identifiers. takeawaybox🥡 (talk) 06:58, 31 May 2026 (UTC)
- @MrRobertman: Hi, do you have any further thoughts on this? Yirba (talk) 19:41, 9 July 2026 (UTC)
- No more questions, I can Support this MrRobertman (talk) 03:50, 21 July 2026 (UTC)
- No more questions, I can
- @MrRobertman: Hi, do you have any further thoughts on this? Yirba (talk) 19:41, 9 July 2026 (UTC)
- @MrRobertman, ZI Jony: I mentioned that qualifier but that's an interesting point: I guess all our identifiers could be tracked as qualifiers instead. But using a unique property allows us to provide a human and machine-readable proximate link using formatter URL (P1630) and also provide things like third-party formatter URL (P3303), formatter URI for RDF resource (P1921), etc. I'm not sure if qualifiers can include links, particularly when they are used for multiple sources of data (we also use that qualifier for BBFC, others). To be honest, your question is above my paygrade but my rough guess to approximate an answer to your questions is that we would do this to gain the general benefits listed at WD:ID and Wikidata:External identifiers. takeawaybox🥡 (talk) 06:58, 31 May 2026 (UTC)
- @Chchowmein: Could you please clarify the comments above by @MrRobertman:. -- Regards, ZI Jony (Talk) 18:30, 16 May 2026 (UTC)
- Support Makes sense to me. Provides easy access via formatter URL to rating and content descriptors. Format constraints can be applied to prevent errors. External ID properties don't need to have unique values. -- Yirba (talk) 18:51, 21 June 2026 (UTC)
- @Takeawaybox, Jean-Frédéric, Kirilloparma, ZI Jony, Trivialist, MrRobertman:
Created as MPA certificate number (P14671). Yirba (talk) 09:09, 23 July 2026 (UTC)