Pipers Sermons: Bible Tags are off

Everett Headley
Everett Headley Member Posts: 951 ✭✭
edited November 2024 in English Forum

I've read through several of Pipers sermons and the Biblical references are not right.  There are far too many for me to report each one.  I've reported dozens before I quit.  Who does the QA for this; and why is the MAIN SELLING POINT of Logos (tagging) being so sloppily done?

Comments

  • MJ. Smith
    MJ. Smith MVP Posts: 54,945

    Without having examples of the errors, it's hard to help you. However, you should consider the following options:

    1. Are the errors systematic in the sense that there is a mismatch between the versification scheme used by Piper and used by you? This is one reason I want the default translation used specified in the metadata.

    2. Are the errors in the Piper source documents? If so, Logos likely cannot make the changes with Piper approval.

    3. Are the errors related to the format in which the reference is given i.e. is there a common reference format that the Faithlife auto-conversion doesn't process correctly?

    4. Are the errors simply random and within the margin of error Faithlife tolerates ... in this case the priority is likely the same level as many other resources needing updates and corrections. You can change this by endowing a position at Faithlife to address your priorities first ... just kidding 'cause I'm often tempted.

    Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."

  • Mark Smith
    Mark Smith MVP Posts: 11,826

    I've read through several of Pipers sermons and the Biblical references are not right.  There are far too many for me to report each one.  I've reported dozens before I quit

    I've read through a number and found no errors so we must be reading different sermons. ;)

    As MJ asked, I wonder what are the nature of the errors you are finding in such quantity and also in what volume or volumes (years) are you finding them? Perhaps some volumes were not handled or proofread as carefully as others.

    Pastor, North Park Baptist Church

    Bridgeport, CT USA

  • Doc B
    Doc B Member Posts: 3,650 ✭✭✭

    I've read through several of Pipers sermons and the Biblical references are not right.

    Everett, I have that resource set and would like to check this out.  Can you tell me specifically which sermon(s) you found the errors?

    Eating a steady diet of government cheese, and living in a van down by the river.

  • Everett Headley
    Everett Headley Member Posts: 951 ✭✭

    This is cleary a Logos QA issue, not a source material issue.

    In "The Fruit of Hope July 1986" under "Be In the Spirit" the reference should be for 1 Thessalonians but is tagged to Romans.

    Again, this has happened many times through multiple sermons.

  • RyanB
    RyanB Member Posts: 686 ✭✭✭

    I believe this is an example of what Everett is referring to:

  • MJ. Smith
    MJ. Smith MVP Posts: 54,945

    Is the verse 8 on the first line actually a Romans reference? If so, this is a common error that is difficult to identify automatically and very dependent of proof readers reaind carefully with understanding not skimming for errors.

    Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."

  • Graham Criddle
    Graham Criddle MVP Posts: 33,247

    MJ. Smith said:

    Is the verse 8 on the first line actually a Romans reference

    No it's a reference to Colossians 1:8 - with verses 3-8 being the text for the sermon

    But, as you can see from the red box, there is a reference to Romans immediately afterwards

    The particular reference shown in the post above is about the sixth which incorrectly pops up Romans between the start of the sermon and the one quoted. 

    There have been intervening "full references" which I thought might have "reset" any defaults but it doesn't as shown below

  • MJ. Smith
    MJ. Smith MVP Posts: 54,945

    Generally a full reference does reset it. I would expect that to especially be true when a "sermon on" reference has been set.

    Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."

  • Everett Headley
    Everett Headley Member Posts: 951 ✭✭

    My point is that after about 2 dozen of Pipers sermons this is a common occurence.  I paid Logos $69 for just this kind of tagging.  All of these sermons are free on desiringgod.org.   Logos is a buisness, what is their expectation of quality? My expectation would be that these incorrect tags would be far less frequent.

  • Graham Criddle
    Graham Criddle MVP Posts: 33,247

    Logos is a buisness, what is their expectation of quality?

    All we can do as users on this forum is to help clarify the problem - which we have tried to do here. 

    If someone from Faithlife sees this thread they may comment.

    If you want to ensure you get a response from them I would contact Customer Services.

  • RyanB
    RyanB Member Posts: 686 ✭✭✭

    Hi Everett,

    Your feelings about the lack of quality in tagging has been shared by several others. This is especially frustrating since "Quality is the Standard" (see slide 18) at Faithlife.  For me personally, I have no expectations of 100% perfect resources every time, but I have noticed over the past year or so there seems to be more and more missed taggings in new resources I've purchased.

    However, in this particular case, I suspect the errors are probably due to an algorithm error. Hopefully it's an easy fix.

  • Kyle G. Anderson
    Kyle G. Anderson Member, Logos Employee Posts: 2,239

    Thank you for the report. We'll take a look at the issue.

  • Jannie van Niekerk
    Jannie van Niekerk Member, Logos Employee Posts: 229

    Logos is a buisness, what is their expectation of quality?

    All we can do as users on this forum is to help clarify the problem - which we have tried to do here. 

    If someone from Faithlife sees this thread they may comment.

    If you want to ensure you get a response from them I would contact Customer Services.

    The problem has been noticed!

    Sorry for the poor quality of these. We do want to make it right and will put these through the "QA" process again.

    Thanks.

  • Everett Headley
    Everett Headley Member Posts: 951 ✭✭

    TYVM Kyle and Jannie!  My experience is that the forums get more results than an email.  

  • Kyle G. Anderson
    Kyle G. Anderson Member, Logos Employee Posts: 2,239

    I don't want to over-promise anything but I hope to have a detailed forum post up in the next couple of weeks that gives a bit of insight into the book production process. Hopefully this will include how and when resource updates are done.

    One of the issues we're continually facing is how/when we will do resource updates. The original tagging for this resource was done in 2008. The only significant update it's had since then was to add sermon labels. Production methods/QC that were in place have been substantially increased by 2015. This doesn't mean we're bug free but we do use bugs to continually improve how we produce books.

    We regret any mistakes that we have made but we do take those same mistakes seriously as they help inform our production process.