Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 16:22, 10 August 2007

Please stay calm and civil while commenting or presenting evidence, and do not make personal attacks. Be patient when approaching solutions to any issues. If consensus is not reached, other solutions exist to draw attention and ensure that more editors mediate or comment on the dispute.

Archives

Archive 1

Archive index Misplaced Pages talk:Warn readers about spoilers/Archive 1 Misplaced Pages talk:Warn readers about spoilers Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler warning/Archive Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler warning/Archive2 Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler warning/Guideline status Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler warning/Guideline status2 Misplaced Pages:Spoiler warning/RfC Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler warning/RfC Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Policies/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning Misplaced Pages talk:Requests for comment/Policies/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler warning/guidelines Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler/archive3 Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler/archive4 Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler/archive5 Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler/archive6 Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler/archive7 Misplaced Pages talk:Spoiler/archive8

This page has archives. Sections older than 30 days may be automatically archived by Lowercase sigmabot III.

Mandatory

I think that every page that spoils all important details or most of them should have a manditory Spoiler Warining on it. If it doesn't new people to Misplaced Pages can have things ruined for them. Don't say people will see plot summary and think it gives away things, because not everybody would think that. Sometimes they think it is like the summary on the front or back of a book. Adding the spoiler warining would take like 5 seconds and that helps many people. I hope some or all of you agree. Rembrant12 22:52, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Every single page on Misplaced Pages contains a link marked "Disclaimers", which warns you that:

WIKIPEDIA CONTAINS SPOILERS AND CONTENT YOU MAY FIND OBJECTIONABLE

Adding more is really just pandering to rampant stupidity. --Tony Sidaway 23:26, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

You killed your own argument in word 8. The pages contain a link that says wikipedia contains spoilers. However the spoilers are right there on the page, sometimes even above the cut. Readers are not steeped in wiki culture, but reach wiki pages through google, msn, whatever. There is a difference -between being "rampantly stupid" and simply "not a part of Tony Sidaway's world view".

What argument is there for having a full synopsis of every fictional work on Misplaced Pages? Do regular encyclopedias do that? No they do not. The effect of replicating fictional works in painstaking joyless detail is not to further the knowledge of mankind but to devalue the works themselves and destroy the pleasure of uncovering the plot points in the order intended by the author. Surely a much more socially responsible approach is to include information concerning why the work is viewed as meritorious or controversial. A synopsis in the detail I've seen on wikipedia is tantamount to simply repeating the work itself. Sweavo 15:58, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Additional: you have to SCROLL PAST the spoilers to get to the (tiny) disclaimers link. Tony, do you read every web page from the bottom up, starting with the smallest fonts and clicking all links before getting to the thing you came to the page to read about? If so, then I retract my argument.

This all just sounds like special pleading to me. If you admit that "the spoilers are right there on the page, sometimes even above the cut", then the disclaimer is correct, and it doesn't matter whether anyone can be bothered to read it or not.

If you have an issue with the location of the disclaimer note on the default skin, then edit the default skin so that users will see the disclaimer link at the top (an example of how to do this is given in the Cologneblue skin, where the disclaimer is at the top). If you don't think our articles on fictional subjects should have a full synopsis, argue for this on the relevant page (Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style (writing about fiction)). I agree with you that some plot summaries are far too detailed, and they often also have an inappropriate in-universe perspective.

But while readers may not be "steeped in wiki culture", they're certainly capable of using their commonsense. Those few to whom it is not immediately obvious that an article will discuss its subject in reasonable detail, soon learn. --Tony Sidaway 16:37, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the illuminating info. Though I also disagree about users being certainly capable of using their commonsense :-) . I was not previously even aware that the skin was up for modification. I think further discussion on the style guide is the correct next step from my perspective. Sweavo 10:48, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Tony, you asked me to refactor my comments on here. I removed the inserted text from above. However, I have no oustanding issues here, so I'm happy for you to go ahead and delete everything I've written on this page if it suits you, no objections from me. Sweavo 12:07, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I can't really consider it a good faith mistake when the most simplistic straw man arguments are used. These and other related straw man arguments I doubt are honestly believed--they suggest that the proponents of them don't care at all if any fiction they are going to read/view is in any way spoiled, ever (which is what you get when you're suggesting it's silly to have spoiler warnings at all). The issue has nothing to do with Misplaced Pages articles discussing things in detail nor any lack of knowledge that they do that. The issue is WHERE in the article those 'spoiling details' are discussed. Readers are not _psychic_; they can't predict where, for example, a plot twist will be described with no warning.

If you've ever read a news paper plot summary or seen a plot summary given on a tv review/promo, you'd know that plot summaries are frequently designed to exclude spoiling details and stick to just the overall premise. Very often people want to read something like this and other times may want to read tertiary or factual details about a work of fiction.

I'd love to see a straw poll asking: "who honestly doesn't care if any work of fiction they will read/view will ever be spoiled for them (e.g. plot twists or the ending given away) before they read/view it?" The problem with people on the "anti-" side talking about compromise is that a) the numerous edits were made removing the warnings wholesale and b) the proponents of the warnings are much more willing to compromise, but it seems anything short of a guarantee that only 0.000000001% of articles will include warnings is bad.

One last thing regarding the cabal statements. Whenever someone points out well known social hierarchies on Misplaced Pages working together (and various many sheep following suit when they see certain names), the name 'cabal' is brought out as a thought-terminating cliche, when really no one is suggesting that this is secret in any real sense. Even the IRC channels are public. (And yes, I've seen logs and various other things in the past of higher up members essentially asking for meat puppetry in not so many words, so it's not unbelievable). -Nathan J. Yoder 09:55, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Because it's seriously THAT HUGE and THAT OBVIOUS. Who the hell clicks the "disclaimer" link? Kuronue 23:39, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Who the hell clicks on the legal disclaimer? Doesn't make it any more or less valid or important. Girolamo Savonarola 01:51, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

This is an excellent point. However, I would note that the content disclaimer itself links to WP:SPOILER, which states that we do use spoiler warnings. So anyone doing their homework (the mythical "ideal reader") will see (1) there are spoilers, but (2) there will be warnings. This is just yet another argument that should be laid in its grave. Postmodern Beatnik 18:13, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, Tony, the fact that the disclaimer page (which I admit I'd never visited) uses the word "spoiler" settles the issue of whether the term "spoiler" is appropriate for WP. It is. It's there on the disclaimer. Internet culture is here. Case closed. But I agree with you, since a top level disclaimer on the project has the warning, then additional disclaimers are probably not necessary except in significant cases. (Like the hugely popular Harry Potter series, in which kiddies and adults who don't click the small type disclaimer ;) might not know that the plot will reveal, well, the plot. :} David Spalding (☎ ✉ ✍) 13:43, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

You seem to confuse use of the term on an editorial level (mandated since so many people have complained using the term) and on a textual level (bad because it's a neologism that doesn't appear in the OED or Merriam-Webster). That is to say, the word can form a part of policy discussions on Misplaced Pages and a part of the resultant policy, as this page shows. But it ought not appear in the articlespace. Phil Sandifer 13:45, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I think you're mistaking the issue under discussion. No one disputes that "spoiler" is the word in common currency to describe the situation where someone "spoils" a fictional work by giving away key plot details. The word has probably moved beyond the "neologism" phase; it now appears regularly in newspaper articles without a definition—suggesting that professional editors believe the meaning is well known, and doesn't need to be explained. The issue here is not the use of the word per se, but whether (if ever) articles require an additional warning—beyond the standard disclaimers—that such details are about to be disclosed. Marc Shepherd 14:13, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

If we're engaging in this level of nitpicking, it looks like the great spoiler debate is effectively over. --Tony Sidaway 14:34, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Guys. I have a brain. I am not Albert Einstein but that does not mean that I am not smart. I would never do more homework than I had to. Instead of linking people here, which brings them there which finally tells them something in technical talk that only very honed minds can figure out, why don't we just say "SPOILER WARNING, gives away details and information"? It simplifies matters and is much easier to understand. Rembrant12 19:11, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Does it take "a very honed mind" to figure out that a heading labeled "Plot" discloses the plot?

One compromise I could support would be to modify the {{current fiction}} template to include the explicit word "spoiler." The wording of that template already says that the article may contain "detailed information on the characters, plot, and ending of the work of fiction it describes." It doesn't take Einstein to figure out what that means. However, as "spoiler" is the word in common currency, we might as well use it, and remove all doubt for those who don't seem to understand what "detailed information" means.

This compromise works for me, because {{current fiction}} is an already accepted disclaimer. It appears at the top of articles, and doesn't disrupt the flow the way {{spoiler}} does. Also, it doesn't involve judgments about precisely which parts of the article are "spoiling" it for somebody. And lastly, there's a tacit understanding that {{current fiction}} doesn't last forever. For instance, it is on the latest Harry Potter book, released under a week ago, but it's not on the other six books. At some point, Darth Vader's "No, I am your father" becomes part of the popular culture, and it's just tough luck of someone stumbles across it by accident.

Under no circumstances could I support spoiler warnings on everything ranging from ancient works of literature to nursery rhymes, as was the case before. Marc Shepherd 16:13, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Of course you then run into the problem of what is {{current fiction}}.Just the other day I came across a book that according to it's copyright notice was first published in 1995 in the US but only in 2007 in the UK. American editors could rightly say it's not {{current fiction}} but it is to British readers. So who's correct if the tag is used on an article about the book .Garda40 20:44, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Most spoilers will never become part of 'popular culture'. Which nation's popular culture is the standard?--Nydas 17:56, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

As you know, I don't think spoiler warnings are needed. This view is culturally neutral, and doesn't presume which works are "popular." It so happens that articles on "popular" works seem to generate the most debate, but I have never suggested a different standard for those works. Marc Shepherd 18:50, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

It's not culturally neutral, it's an expression of Misplaced Pages's institutional bias towards English-speaking developed countries and hardcore fiction fans. Fiction articles will get updated when the fiction is released, inevitably favouring regions where fiction gets released first. It also favours people who know release dates off by heart and see fiction very shortly after it is released, i.e. fans.--Nydas 19:52, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages is full of bias. The article on Terri Schiavo is longer than the article on Mother Theresa. There are more Misplaced Pages articles on the Harry Potter universe than on the entire output of William Shakespeare. The bias, both towards English-language subjects and recent subjects, pervades the encyclopedia. It's nothing to be proud of, but I don't see how the spoiler policy will fix it. Actually, I don't see any correlation between the two. Marc Shepherd 20:17, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

You don't see how it is biased to declare 'everyone knows this' or 'it's been out for a week' as a grounds for spoiler tag removal?--Nydas 20:28, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I never suggested that "everyone knows this," which would be absurd. But let's say we adopted the approach of putting spoiler warnings on every article that discloses plot details of fictional works. I have to ask, "Where is there a parallel for that?" Find me a reputable source on Shakespeare or Dickens that has spoiler warnings. They just don't do it.

So when people advocate widespread use of spoiler warnings, as it appears you do, I have to ask: Why is that right for Misplaced Pages, when most other sources don't seem to have found it necessary? I also have to ask: How effective could it possibly be, when other comparable sources don't do the same? I mean, we could kid ourselves into thinking that we're the go-to source on Shakespeare, but it just isn't so. And no one else who writes about Shakespeare seems to think it necessary to warn people before mentioning that Hamlet dies at the end. (Ooops, I just gave it away...sorry.)

There does seem to be a commonly observed exception for brand new works. Many media sources are actually using the word "spoiler" before giving anything away about the new Harry Potter book. But typically it's only for that book, not for any of the earlier ones, and it's only temporary. It's not as if, 5 years from now, they're still going to be putting "spoiler" out there whenever they mention that Harry Potter defeated Voldemort. (Ooops, I just gave another one away...sorry.) Marc Shepherd 20:54, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

You're side-stepping my point about the geographic and fannish bias implicit in the removal of spoiler tags. If it's out in the US, it's considered out in the world. If fansites and blogs have been talking about some plot point, then it's considered common knowledge.

I have advocated a spoiler guideline that mirrors WP:ENGVAR, stressing that spoilers are neither good or bad. It's not likely that spoiler tags would return to Shakespeare, Dickens, fairy tales or any of the other common 'examples' under such a guideline. Regarding your points about reputable sources, I am not aware that Misplaced Pages was in competition with anyone. As for your claim that people don't come to Misplaced Pages first for Shakespeare, it is just that, a claim. Tailoring articles so they're aimed at people who are already familiar with the fiction is another example of our fannish bias.--Nydas 09:16, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that Misplaced Pages isn't in competition with anyone, but clearly it aspires to be an encyclopedia. When people ask, "What should an online encyclopedia be?" they take their guide from other encyclopedias. The comparison is particularly relevant with respect to spoiler warnings, because they only work if they're widely used.

I had taken you to be advocating spoiler warnings on all types of narrative fiction, including Shakespeare, Dickens, and fairy tales. If that's not your position, then it might be helpful if you start a new section and crisply state your proposal. At this point, I know what you're against, but I don't know what you are for. Marc Shepherd 12:19, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

If people scrupulously copied everything done before, we'd still be living in caves. Misplaced Pages has five pillars, and none of those prohibits spoiler tags. 'Encyclopedia = no spoiler warnings' is like 'swan = white feathers', it's not a logical argument. Something can easily pass all the criteria necessary for being an encyclopedia and still have spoiler warnings. Probably the main reason why other encyclopedias don't usually have spoiler warnings is technical limitations. I think they're appropriate because they help dispel the 'fans only' or 'everyone knows' biases.

The claim that people want spoiler tags on fairy tales etc is a longstanding strawman. I want an open spoiler policy that does not depend the whims of a tiny number of editors adhering to a de facto 'no more than six' policy. If the anti-spoiler brigade had any confidence in their own claims of 'consensus' they'd lay off and see how things develop.--Nydas 17:51, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

As an more philosophical aside, I'd like to just remark that if spoilers "ruin" a work, then how easy it would be to quickly dispense with the need to actually digest media! I wouldn't need to read all of Shakespeare - I could just read all the "Plot" sections of the wiki articles! Of course, we know that this isn't true. So why prize the plot as being more "precious" and "fragile"? Could you not say that the cultural context and metaphor of The Crucible is actually more important (and worthy of something-equivalent to spoiler warning) than the plot of the play, for instance? Spoiler-obsession is to value to the plot at the expense of the mood, style, and subtext. Which, quite frankly, are the more defining characteristics of the work and its skill. Anyone can write a murder mystery - it's how its told that is more important and defines the work. Plot is one small element in this process. To venerate it so much speaks poorly of ones ability to absorb media critically. Girolamo Savonarola 21:33, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Why should Misplaced Pages be reworked so that it flatters the aesthetic beliefs of people who find narrative suspense distasteful?--Nydas 09:16, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Who says I find it distasteful? I said I find it disproportionally valued. But suspense is not the job of an informative encyclopedia article - quite the opposite - the purpose is to lay out the information neutrally and evenly. I'm saying that discussion of a work needs to be more evenly-rounded. Girolamo Savonarola 12:40, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

That you find plot 'disproportionately valued' is irrelevant. If you wish to 'improve' people's aesthetic tastes, get a website or a blog. Spoiler warnings do not interfere with the informative and neutral layout of articles, nor do they discourage discussion about mood and tone.--Nydas 17:51, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree wi/ all. Razorclaw (talk · contribs) 21:48, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with adding the words "SPOILER WARNING" to the template. And the template's font should be larger and some pages have it in bad spots or not at all. (Harry Potter 7) Rembrant12 23:46, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with returning the word "spoiler" to the tag. That's what it is. But spoiler tags are a content notice, not a warning — there is no danger. Large fonts and all caps increase the 'cry wolf' aspect of the false warning. (Also, not a warning means it's not a disclaimer.) Milo 14:26, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Also, Girmolo. We are not talking about "ruining" a work. It is just upsetting to have the ending given away for it does take away some of the enjoyment. Rembrant12 23:49, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Which is why I choose carefully before venturing into the plot section of a film or book that I might be interested in. I've spoiled myself silly in the past, but I did consciously choose to. Why is that so difficult to swallow? Girolamo Savonarola 00:40, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I completely oppose using the term "spoiler" in any Misplaced Pages template. Simply because what is a spoiler is too vague and left up to each person's interpretation. For some, only those plot details that absolutely ruin a movie, book, or TV episode for everybody would be considered spoilers. For others, every plot detail, no mater how insignificant, is considered a spoiler. And then you have everything in between. It's better to avoid such a vague term altogether. --Farix (Talk) 00:52, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

"For others, every plot detail, no matter how insignificant, is considered a spoiler." Pardon, but that's extremist nonsense. Such fans could not read teasers in order to access the book or movie.

"what is a spoiler is too vague" A spoiler is not vague, it's clearly defined. Rather, it is indefinite per case and by fan. Like porn, fans statistically know what is a spoiler when they encounter it.

I frequently encounter this inexperienced notion that statistical subjectivity somehow makes rulecrafting for specific cases impossible. Not at all — this kind of judgment has been made for governments and public exhibitions by art juries for about a hundred years. Misplaced Pages's art jury is already functioning, it is the local consensus. Milo 14:26, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

"Such fans could not read teasers in order to access the book or movie." And yet, I've still seen people repeatedly call these "teasers" spoilers and insist on a spoiler warning.

"A spoiler is not vague, it's clearly defined." Actual practice does not conform to your statement. That is because individual's definition of what is a spoiler varies from person to person.

"Like porn, fans statistically know what is a spoiler when they encounter it." Which is a very poor test for Misplaced Pages to determine when a plot detail is a spoiler because it is rife with POV issues. Misplaced Pages editors should not be determining what is or is not a spoiler. --Farix (Talk) 15:15, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Farix, I do not think you are treating the argument fairly. Just because some fans say every last detail is a spoiler doesn't mean they are correct. Whether we want to think of them as extremists or not, we are still free to reject their (perhaps idiosyncratic) definition of the word "spoiler" in favor of one more amenable to Misplaced Pages. Moreover, it is not implausible that a definition could be crafted that was suitably specific and yet not overly narrow. And if we did so, most POV issues would evaporate. Will there still be some judgment calls? Perhaps. Probably, even. But that's why this encyclopedia is being built by people, and not information-gathering automatons. So much of the anti-spoiler campaign seems to be an effort to shy away from a task simply because it is difficult (and only difficult insofar as it is not always clear cut). Such editors, in my opinion, only hurt Misplaced Pages by shirking their duties in favor of laziness. Editing an encyclopedia isn't easy; it is fraught with ambiguities and difficult choices. We might as well accept that fact. Postmodern Beatnik 18:17, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

In short I will settle for adding just SPOILER WARNING to the template. That, I beleive, will clear up any doubt about the subject. Rembrant12 02:12, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

The trouble is that almost every use of {{spoiler}} gets reverted. As of this moment, there are only two transclusions of it in all of English Misplaced Pages. Any new appearance is quickly removed. Until people agree about the circumstances in which it can be used, the wording doesn't much matter, because it will hardly ever be seen. Marc Shepherd 02:19, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Archiving

Please explain why this page needs an automated archiving bot when there are thousands of talk pages on Misplaced Pages, including high-profile ones like Misplaced Pages Talk:No original research, which have longer talk pages. Postmodern Beatnik has already complained about his discussion being archived before he could finish it.--Nydas 19:31, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, apologies for inadvertently removing your comments in the last revert. I should have watched for comments, and I failed to do so.

Secondly the page is more than 85kb in size, and I'd like to avoid it getting any larger. I've set the archiving period to a generous eight days. That means that a section is archived if there have been no new comments in more than a week and one day.

Thirdly I've tried manually archiving sections but you have reverted several sections over six days old, and even two archived after over seven days without new comments, calling the archiving "heavy-handed and pointless". I know not why, but I hoped that you'd find archiving by bot less heavy and more objective.

The page size does need to be kept under control, and the archives contain all discussions, so there's no reason we shouldn't agree a reasonable archive period. If eight days isn't enough, try ten. --Tony Sidaway 19:49, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

There are thousands of longer talk pages on Misplaced Pages. Why is this one being singled out?--Nydas 19:59, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I've no idea what you mean. This page isn't being singled out, except in the sense that if I'm going to be regularly loading it I don't want it to be ridiculously large and full of dead discussions. --Tony Sidaway 20:10, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

The talk pages on WP:V, WP:OR, WP:NPOV are much longer than this one. Why have you not applied the same standard to them? Misplaced Pages talk:Biographies of living persons (which you are involved in) is the same size and yet has no archiving bot.--Nydas 20:15, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually, it does, but doesn't have a template.--Nydas 20:17, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I find very long talk pages an obstacle to comprehension, for the same reason that very long articles are discouraged. The fact that some long talk pages aren't regularly archived doesn't mean that their example ought to be emulated. Marc Shepherd 20:18, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I haven't edited Misplaced Pages talk:Verifiability, Misplaced Pages talk:No original research and Misplaced Pages talk:Neutral point of view regularly. I last edited the first of those two or three times just over year ago, when the page was about 70kb in size. I last edited the NOR talk page, less than half a dozen edits in all, at about the same time. The page was around 100kb in size. As for the latter page, the talk page of NPOV, it has not seen an edit by me in its last 5,000 edits.

Misplaced Pages talk:Biographies of living persons, which I have edited on some occasions since late April, ballooned up from 40kb to about 400kb during the denoument of a related arbitration case, the Badlydrawnjeff arbitration, until it was manually archived by User:Slim Virgin . I installed Miszabot archiving immediately afterwards, on 26 June of this year . Often a very busy page, in its set fourteen day archiving period, it veers between approximately 250kb maximum in busy discussions and its current minimum of about 90kb, during a lull. --Tony Sidaway 21:37, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I set the archiving period parameter to 8 days during a time when I think the Talk:Spoiler page was much more active and ballooning. But as I previously mentioned, the problem with automatic archiving is that a slowing topic will go to zero posts. That will leave no threads to indicate where the last previous wave of debates came to a lull, when new editors arrive to join the next discussion wave.

To solve this problem, I think Mizabot needs two additional threshold parameters to set:

• The minimum kilobyte page size below which unposted-to-topic archiving does not activate. Takes precedence over minimum number of discussion topics, since a few topics have gotten very fat.
• The minimum number of discussion topics below which unposted-to-topic archiving does not activate. Leaves a minimum number of unposted-to-topics, unless minimum kilobyte page size is exceeded.

Theoretically, an editable consensus could be reached and top-posted on doing this manually, until/if the Mizabot programmer implements those additional threshold parameters. A semi-manual method would be for concerned editors to turn Mizabot on or off using those top-posted parameters. Milo 22:34, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

If the discussion comes to an end and the archiver puts everything into the archive, that is a good thing. The archiver is operating as intended. Discussions that become stale shouldn't be kept around forever. The archives are always there. --Tony Sidaway 23:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

We should agree to disagree. Such extreme tidyness has costs. I think extra clicks to locate and access an archive is unnecessary navigation work and discourages discussion. Most WP talk pages I've seen work by default the way I've described. Some low-interest articles discuss very slowly, and might not communicate if archived the way you suggest. This week I saw several fresh posts to year-old discussions on philosophical issues, in a high interest article that only gets posted in waves. Milo 02:55, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

The question remains as why this intrusive archiving system is needed at all. The reason Tony has offered is 'I post here', which doesn't give him the right to apply idiosyncratic philosophies about talk page cleanliness. We've already had one person complain about their discussion being lost, that should be an end to the matter. It's better to live and let live than applying non-standard archiving bots that mindlessly hurl valid discussion into the dustbin.--Nydas 07:09, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

(←)I would like to add my voice towards consensus on this. I much prefer that discussions not be archived on an automated schedule (unless a page is growing quickly and becoming unmanageable as this one was a while ago). Digging around in the archives to find prior threads takes extra work. Automated archiving bots are great on fast moving pages like WP:AN, but on a page like this is now, there's no hurry. Let's allow the discussions to remain visibile for editors to follow the debate without extra work. --Parsifal _Hello 08:00, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps when the page size reduces to a more manageable size, we'll do that. --Tony Sidaway 12:04, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

What's a manageable size? What happened to your self-invented policy of blank talk pages?--Nydas 13:32, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

"What happened to your..." Tony does occasionally moderate his extreme positions, as we all should in process. Applying some carrot here, I think he should be encouraged toward further moderation in the direction of consensus. Milo 16:19, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I think the current size is too large, in the sense that someone viewing a discussion for the first time has an awful lot of stuff to wade through, much of which is no longer current. Those of us who've been watching the page daily don't have that problem. But frankly, I'd like to find a way to draw some new blood into this discussion. Right now, we have the same 5 or 6 people repeating themselves ad infinitum. I think that new people find a very long talk page (which this is) somewhat daunting. The automated bot has its drawbacks, but at least it is neutral. If Tony does the archiving manually, the pro-warning camp thinks he's being heavy-handed. Marc Shepherd 15:45, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

The current number of topics, 11, looks and feels too small to me for such a complex set of debates. Prior to automated archiving there were about 100, and I thought that was too many to easily sort out the then-currently posted ones.

Technically, without the need to scroll, 25 would fill a classic computer screen, and more would fill a hi-res large screen. Milo 16:19, 1 August 2007 (UTC) re-edited 07:05, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

While there may 11 top-level headings, there aren't really 11 topics. The content under those headings tends to repeat itself over & over again, usually with the same few people making the same points they've always made.

As I suggested in a topic below, there are really only 3 questions: When (if ever) are spoiler warnings/notices appropriate? If they are appropriate, where on the page should they go? And what form should they take? Marc Shepherd 16:51, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I cannot fit all of this single topic on my moderately large computer screen, let alone 25, but I've no idea what that has to do with archiving.

To describe the position that a 100kb page should be regularly archived, as in any way extreme, is nonsensical. Until just a year ago or so, pages that exceeded 32kb in size would show a warning message when edited. A 100kb page load is large by all reasonable standards --Tony Sidaway 16:29, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

"To describe the position that a 100kb page should be regularly archived, as in any way extreme, is nonsensical" But I did not so describe.

My quoted phrase was: (Milo 16:19) "What happened to your..." from Nydas' sentence: (Nydas 13:32) "What happened to your self-invented policy of blank talk pages?", in reply to you: (Tony Sidaway 23:29) "If the discussion comes to an end and the archiver puts everything into the archive, that is a good thing" — by which you (Tony) promoted that the archive bot should be allowed to blank the talk page. That is an extreme position since I've never seen that happen anywhere, probably because most editors think archive page blanking is undesireable for the reasons I've previously stated.

"cannot fit all of this single topic on my moderately large computer screen, let alone 25," Pardon, I was referring to the table of contents box for 25 topics.

"no idea what that has to do with archiving" If one can see all the topics displayed at once in the table of contents, and if one can also recall those in which one is posting or desires to post, then archiving is unnecessary even for stale topics. This recall can still be done by scrolling the TOC, but at some point the sheer number of topics challenges one's memory and it takes excessive time for scrolling. Milo 07:05, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I certainly agree that this page needs regular updating, as Safari can crash on these pages- granted, its an older version (1.3) but I don't think everyone has the fastest browser out there. Secondly, Nydas, why the hell are you arguing about automatic talk page archiving? Have you decided that since arguing the actual guideline is "pointless", you're going to argue about increasingly fickle stuff? David Fuchs 16:50, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

True or not, it renews suspicion under the previous hot topic of supressing spoiler tag debate. Milo 07:05, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

That is not what you were doing, you were archiving six-day old discussions as 'stagnant' when the page was only 87K, and you have suggested that blanking is a desirable outcome for the page. The archives are longer than 100K (by a lot), should they be archived themselves?--Nydas 16:49, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I believe it's desirable that the talk page reflect the actual state of discussion rather than continue to contain stale discussions. If there are no further discussions, there is no need for anything to be on the talk page and eventually any archive scheme is going to result in a blank page. To parody that as being in favor of "talk page blanking", as you have done once or twice, and repeat above, is amusing but not productive.

I was archiving discussions which, you seem to admit, had not had a single new comment in six days. I don't see anything wrong with that, but I've set the bot archive period to eight days, and I don't see why you shouldn't increase it to any reasonable value if you want. --Tony Sidaway 23:33, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

The goal of archiving is not to clean up pages. It's to clean up pages which have become excessively large and unnavigable. There is no reason why old discussion should be archived, in and of itself. The benefit of keeping recent "dead" topics available for perusal is that redundant discussions can be avoided or, if unresolved, re-opened. If rampant archiving becomes the norm, we may all find ourselves rehashing the same arguments every few days (if we aren't already...) Girolamo Savonarola 23:43, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

"eventually any archive scheme is going to result in a blank page" and "To parody that as being in favor of "talk page blanking..." Hmm. You favor using an archive scheme which results in blanking the talk page, yet I-hear-you-saying you aren't in favor of "talk page blanking", {shrug} it's just an archiving side effect that the talk page ends up blank. That strikes me as a Clintonesque parsing of statements that you need to either own outright or moderate your position. Milo 07:05, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I concur with Girolamo Savonarola. There is no reason to move topics off this page because they are not recent. This topic clearly is of interest to many, since new editors continually add comments. What's the hurry to blank this page?

Even Misplaced Pages developers tell us: Misplaced Pages:Don't worry about performance. We're talking about pages of 100KB plain text. Let's be realistic - that's only a couple seconds of broadband time. How much data is on an average Amazon.com page? I just checked and their main page tonight came in at around 600KB, and their main page is smaller than most of their product pages.

This page should be archived manually, not by bot, unless it becomes much more active.

A blank talk page is not a goal, a talk page rich with conversation is a plus for Misplaced Pages. --Parsifal _Hello 07:25, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I just have to say, Tony's position REALLY makes no sense to me either. I *love* to read talk pages on a topic, and I'm far less inclined to go digging through an archive. The way I look at it, leaving old topic on a page is a GOOD thing, especially when there's not much discussion -- it allows people to see the ebb and flow of the discussion, as it were. It also helps avoid rehashing things -- if something two months ago was talked about, but nothing much since, it'd be silly for someone to bring it up again instead of having it right there to read and possibly respond to with new thoughts (and see who shares their own). ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 11:46, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Notwithstanding that, the question is moot at present because the page is increasing in size despite archiving, and the constant discussion is likely too keep it topped up for the forseeable future. If the last person to leave the page is of the persuasion that believes in leaving clutter on talk pages, he can switch off the archiving as his final edit. --Tony Sidaway 13:09, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

At this point, there is no consensus on archiving by bot. Currently, more editors have complained about that than supported it, so I removed the bot template. Regarding the comments by some that their browsers crash loading large pages or that they don't like waiting around for the pages to load - that's not a strong argument. 100KB or more is very small for web pages. As I mentioned above, even the Amazon main entry page is usually around 600KB and most of Amazon's pages are larger than that. I checked Ebay tonight and their main page is 500KB. Those companies need maximum users to be able to access them so they can make a profit. Doubtless, they've carefully determined that 500KB or 600KB is no problem for the vast majority of users, so we can easily handle a third of those sizes. And we also have our developers telling us Misplaced Pages:Don't worry about performance. Combine that with editors in this discussion complaining about sections being archived when they still have value to the community for reference and comment, and it seems we do not need automated archiving on this page. --Parsifal _Hello 07:08, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

You can change how many days the bot waits to archive. You're thrown the baby out with the bathwater. -- Ned Scott 07:27, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I see you've re-instated the bot, with a 30 day period. I prefer manual archiving by consensus, per discussion topic. However, I accept your 30 day solution as reasonable compromise. --Parsifal _Hello 07:42, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

30 days is far, far too long a period. If the archiver had been working consistently on a 30 day archiving period over the current debate, this page would contain every discussion section in which there existed an edit on or since 5 July. This would include at least six sections from archive6 (75 kilobytes) the whole of the contents of archive7 (255 kilobytes) and the whole of archive8 (about 15 kilobytes) plus the whole of its current contents (100 kilobytes). That's a total of 445 kilobytes. A little less rampant stupidity about this would be in order, I think. --Tony Sidaway 09:38, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Why is having a normal talk page rampant stupidity? Parsifal, Milo, Melodia and Girolamo have made solid arguments, why don't you address them? --Nydas 17:03, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I wish Tony hadn't used the phrase "rampant stupidity." That said, how many 455k talk pages do we have, and how "normal" is that? Marc Shepherd 17:35, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages talk:Attribution/Community discussion is 192KB and has no automated archiving bot. It has one archive page that is 463KB.

Misplaced Pages talk:Neutral point of view is 282KB and has no automated archiving bot. It has many archive pages, done manually by topic and date, some of them are short, but a couple of the archives are 176KB and 244KB.

Those are core policy talk pages with discussion by many respected editors, and they don't seem to find the page size a problem. The question of archiving did not even come up at all on those pages (so far as I have been able to find).

I haven't had time to search for more, but those are two quick examples on important policy pages.

Also - with the bot at 30 days, or if it's disabled, manual archiving can be done when there are sections of the discussion that seem to be resolved and there are not wide objections to archiving them. --Parsifal _Hello 17:46, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

(in reply to Marc) 455K talk pages aren't normal, but no-one has advocated them.--Nydas 17:48, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I have attempted manual archiving, but it's nearly always reverted. Also the only extant complaint about an ongoing discussion being archived was due to manual archiving when Nydas last turned the archiving bot off. We don't want to have these ridiculous arguments every time someone dares to archive a section, so automation is a more sensible choice.

Archive pages themselves can be as big as you like, 250kb is a popular choice What's important is that the discussion page be kept at a reasonable size. The busier the discussion, the more important that is. Actual page size will depend on the volume of debate, but for a busy and highly repetitive discussion page a six or eight day archiving period is reasonable, up to fourteen days is acceptable.

Somebody set the archiving period to 30 days and someone else accepted that "as a compromise". I showed, with accurate calculations based on real data, that this was "rampantly stupid" because it would end up with a ridiculously large discussion page: I could have added that the page would have contained many redundant repetitions of the same arguments. --Tony Sidaway 18:05, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

You were reverted because you were archiving six-day old discussions on an 87K talk page as 'stagnant', not because the page was getting too long. Your views on talk page cleanliness (including page blanking) have no basis in policy or precedent. Try putting them up for comment elsewhere.--Nydas 18:34, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

What's important is that the discussion page be kept at a reasonable size. Who determines what is reasonable? I made several comments above regarding specific page sizes and load times, and reasons that size of 100KB is arbitrary, but you didn't reply to any of my points. You also did not reply to the valid debate points of Milo, Melodia and Girolamo. Instead, you have stated your personal determination that you believe "six or eight day archiving period is reasonable, up to fourteen days is acceptable", but you've supplied no basis for that.

Why is it so important to you to shorten the talk page or move prior discussions to less visible locations? The page loads twice as fast as an Amazon or Ebay page and multiples faster than a medium resolution image from the Commons. On an average broadband hookup this page takes under one second. On a moderate cell-phone wireless card it takes maybe two seconds. The TOC allows quick jumps to any section for editing and response. It's pretty clear that there are not technical problems with a larger talk page. That means the issue is not technical. Why do you want the older topics to disappear more quickly? --Parsifal _Hello 19:18, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I've just reverted another load of archiving by Tony Sidaway, which included hiding this debate on a subpage. There is clearly no consensus for such measures, as this discussion shows.--Nydas 06:30, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

So far, you haven't reverted the archiving, just caused duplication. If you do revert an archiving operation, please make sure to actually remove the threads you claim as "active" from the archive. Kusma (talk) 06:49, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I'd still like to know why it's so important to keep this page short... None of the comments or questions above on that topic received replies. Instead, this section was moved to a different page without consensus, after only six days and over the objections of at least five editors. --Parsifal _Hello 07:00, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I question your apprehension of the word "short". --Mark H Wilkinson 07:21, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

OK, "short" doesn't exactly apply to this page, you have a point there (and it "short" reads pretty funny in retrospect). The term used in the debate was "reasonable size'', and that's what I had questioned, with examples, and received no replies other than the moving of this discussion . --Parsifal _Hello 07:54, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Look, I personally have no interest in seeing the page dwindle down to nought, even though there are few signs that that's possible. However, the simple fact is that, despite some archiving being done, this page has grown from 126,354 bytes on 07:54, 21 July 2007 to 171,909 bytes on 07:54, 10 August 2007. The page is far from short; at the current rate of archiving, it will get a lot longer. Something needs to be done. --Mark H Wilkinson 08:20, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I understand that you are concerned about the page getting too long. But you haven't addressed any of the specific points I made about this in the discussion above, and neither has anyone else. I offered examples of other long talk pages, calculations of very quick page-load times, and other related points, and I asked a couple direct questions as well. So far, none of that has received any replies to the substance. Since the questions and examples are still listed right in this section, just above, I don't want to repeat them. But I am interested in replies about the reasoning for the page being kept to any particular length, because I don't see any problem with interesting extended talk pages on important topics. --Parsifal _Hello 08:35, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

In view of the spiteful and petty-minded resistance by Nydas to my attempts to maintain this already groaningly large page at a reasonable size by archiving discussions that are long over, I am forced to withdraw from this discussion. There has in any case been no serious debate in several weeks now. --Tony Sidaway 15:08, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I am re archiving some of the sections as they are old discussions. If someone whats to revisit one of the topics, then they can start a new one at the bottom. But I do find Nydas reverting of the archives to be borderline disruptive and if he continues, should be taken to WP:ANI. --Farix (Talk) 15:39, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Address the points raised, rather than claiming my edits are disruptive. They are in line with the consensus. Tony Sidaway has not indicated that he has retreated from his unprecendented belief in talk-page blanking, nor has any substantial reason for the highly unusual archiving procedures been offered.--Nydas 15:48, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Archiving old discussions isn't something that needs to be discussed. I don't see any valid reasons why you are objecting to archive those old discussions other then as sense of WP:OWNership. --Farix (Talk) 15:53, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

You can see the objections above, mostly not from me. As for ownership, Tony indicated that his presence here necessitated the use of highly unusual archiving procedures. Do you support his 'blank talk page after ten days' wikiphilosophy?--Nydas 16:01, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

The only objections I see above are from you, and they can be summed up in that you don't want the discussions to be archived. --Farix (Talk) 16:11, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

You might want to read the objections again -- they are in response to Tony's want to blank ALL inactive discussion, not trim down big pages. In fact, this page wasn't being archived at all (it was HUGE) until I first mentioned it. What Tony did overnight was fine, the page is still quite large. You're reverting it for no seeming reason that I can see. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 16:22, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

What about the posts made by Parsifal, Girolama, Melodia and Milo?--Nydas 16:20, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Taxonomy of the spoiler debate

As I have said before, I think too many of the pro-warning proponents are too heavily fixated on the past removal of spoiler warnings—which they believe was too heavy-handed—rather than on what, if anything, should be done now.

If we focus for a moment on content, the debate seems to have these dimensions:

1. Which articles get spoiler warnings?

• All articles discussing works with fictional content, from nursery rhymes to the latest episode of Lost
• Only some of those articles

If the latter, which ones?

2. Where does the warning go? Once it is decided which articles get the warning, where does it go?

• On the entire article?
• Only on the portion(s) of the article that editors deem to have "spoiler" potential

If the latter, what exactly is considered a "spoiler"? Is it the whole plot, or only a portion of it?

3. What does the warning look like? Regardless of where it goes, what does the warning look like?

• Is it big and bold, or more subtle?
• Does it explicitly use the word "spoiler", or some kind of alternative wording conveying the same idea (e.g., "Significant plot details follow")

It might make sense if those in favor of the warnings try to answer these questions. Marc Shepherd 19:43, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Your taxonomy is fatally flawed in all three questions. They are not warnings, they are spoiler notices, because there is no danger. Check M-W.com dictionary under "warning". The dictionary misuse promptly sidetracks serious discussion with a red herring debate on disclaimer policy. Since there is no warning, there is no disclaimer. Spoiler notices are content notices like the table of contents box and the (non-contents) disambig notices.

Well...I consider myself slapped with a wet noodle. A quick search shows that both proponents and opponents often call them "warnings." Marc Shepherd 11:59, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I'll correctly substitute the w-word in your questions.

"1. Which articles get spoiler notices?" All articles about structured entertainment with designed surprises, including but not limited to all fictional works, infotainment documentaries, toys with stories, amusement rides, and planned outdoor adventures. The particular articles eligible and which are the particular spoilers should be decided by the art jury of local consensus. The spoiler guide should supply five real examples covering the range of what is to what isn't a spoiler according to guide consensus. Demanding to exclude all fairy tales and all Shakespeare is micromanagement. Every article should be art-juried on its own merits. Limiting spoiler tags to recent fiction simply ignores that old fiction is new to millions of students every year. This is a transparent ploy to reduce spoiler tag use to tokenisms.

Are "art juries" used anywhere else on Misplaced Pages? Maybe they're a good idea, but if this is the only Misplaced Pages guideline that depends on the concept, I think it'll confuse a lot of people. Marc Shepherd 12:09, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I think your "designed surprise" nomenclature tracks with the original meaning of spoiler. But there are many people these days who think that any plot detail—even if it happens on page 2 of a 500-page novel—is a spoiler. J. K. Rowling complained bitterly about purported spoilers in two book reviews of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows that were published before the official release date. Yet, those reviews did not disclose any more than you would expect in a standard newspaper book review. Marc Shepherd 13:22, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

"2. Where does the notice go?" Anyplace that a spoiler may follow. The art jury consensus decides that, too, and it may include tags preceding a "Plot Summary" heading. Despite the constantly repeated fallacy, plot summaries may or may not contain spoilers, readers cannot correctly assume otherwise, so spoiler tags may or may not be appropriate.

"3. What does the notice look like?" To readers who don't activate them, hidden spoiler tags don't appear, leaving tag complainers with their hidden agendas exposed. (See them below.)

There are many Misplaced Pages guidelines about which there is pronounced disagreement. Why should this one, and only this one, be the guideline that require "hiding" software because of "hidden agendas"? Marc Shepherd 12:09, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

When activated for viewing, my spoiler tag design suggestion is:

Note: spoiler details follow

which in text code looks like <span style="text-decoration: overline"><center><small>''<u>Note: spoiler details follow</u>''</small></center></span>

The word "spoiler" is in the tag because that's the name of it, everybody knows it, it's used in BBC news reporting, and after some months of neologism notions, it was found it in the American Heritage dictionary.

I think nearly all of the current tags are too large and noisy because of the "warning" fallacy. This is a purposefully minimalist design because spoiler tag activating readers will see a lot of them.

If we're going to have them, I think your design suggestion is a good one—except for the optional "hiding" feature. Marc Shepherd 12:09, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Ok, that's done, but pardon, IIRC, you are new to this discussion and a lot of this is plowed ground.

Good job of alleging that everyone but me knows this. A quick perusal of the past discussion shows that the ground isn't quite as "plowed" as you say. Marc Shepherd 11:59, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

A taxonomy view is interesting, but it won't help much with a forward-looking spoiler Wikiguide, because the technical problems are easily fixed. Compromise hidden tag implementations have been on the table for months. The real problem is not pro-spoiler-tag fixation on past removal of spoiler warnings, rather it is a simple refusal by the clique to compromise to any satisfactory degree on the central issues. The top-level connected clique decided that the tags should be removed because Britannica doesn't use them.

The Britannica model is increasingly obsolete; Misplaced Pages's academic and public reputation was globally devalued circa March 22, 2007, because of its unpredictably unreliable information model; the reader profile paradigm shift is moving Misplaced Pages into uncharted internet territory; yet the clique are desperately holding on to their grander illusions of the past.

I think most Wikipedians would agree that Britannica is obsolescent. But many Misplaced Pages guidelines and policies are derived from print analogues. For instance, WP:V, WP:NOR, WP:NPOV, and WP:RS are very close to comparable policies for print reference works. Misplaced Pages policies need to be tethered to some kind of reality, so it is helpful to examine what other media, in similar situations, have done. Marc Shepherd 12:09, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Speculatively, the clique may have been further motivated by up to 60% of editors with a laundry list of dislikes for children, teenagers, presumed-immature adults with childlike interests in fiction, fiction-loving adults who somehow aren't facing reality during a time of war, adults who make Hollywood profits by provoking fans to 'cry wolf' and demand falsely hyperbolic "warnings" of spoilers — all compounded by a centuries-old western theological condemnation of acting and theater as a lifestyle of lies.

Frankly, I think your proposal would be far better off if you addressed the merits of it, rather than wasting your time speculating about the purported dislikes of 60% of editors. Marc Shepherd 12:09, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

The clique's open and hidden agenda reasons for not compromising on hidden spoiler tags deconstruct to include elitism and WP:Ownership of all Misplaced Pages fiction articles.

The elitism includes a vague fear that the hidden spoiler tags will attract 'the wrong kind of readers', i.e., young people who have grown up with some ill-defined socialization known to the clique as "internet culture". They can't really define it, so rather than analogizing to racism, it's more like McCarthyism frightened of commies under the bed.

Their spoiler tag WP:Ownership caricaturizes to two rules: 1. We the clique, control Misplaced Pages fiction articles because we can; 2. If you disagree, see rule #1, and then log out. Milo 06:36, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Wow. Stunning. Completely absurd, but stunning. For me personally, I'm against spoilers because an encyclopedia exists to inform on all relevant aspects of a subject, impartially. Simple as that. I believe that most people understand that. For those that don't, we have a content disclaimer. But I must say - I wish I had the power of this hyperbolic cabal/clique - we wouldn't be having this conversation then. Girolamo Savonarola 07:18, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, I wonder. Does Bigfoot edit Misplaced Pages? ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 11:36, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

We see David Gerard only slightly more often than Bigfoot.--Nydas 12:37, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

As I have said before, I think too many of the pro-warning proponents are too heavily fixated on the past removal of spoiler warnings—which they believe was too heavy-handed—rather than on what, if anything, should be done now.

I actually agree on this, though it may surprise people. Even though I do heartily agree it was heavily handed, I think too many people are fixated on it. However, I think there is a very related case here on the 'what should be done now'. And that is the problem where a few people on the anti-spoiler side (again, not alleging a conspiracy here - it literally doesn't matter if they work together or not, so long as there are multiple people doing it) can _watch_ the placement of every single spoiler tag, and then, if they desire, jump in to either negate it or vote against it, making it difficult to get consensus on it on any page where there aren't a huge number of people editing it. By contrast, it's impossible for the pro-spoiler tag to keep a watch on pages where spoiler tags are removed to try and place them again. It's analogous to them having a tank while we have guns, and that may be a fine way to win a war, but Misplaced Pages isn't about warring and using the most effective weapons you can find to defeat the enemy, it's about consensus building. And the fact of the matter is, when this is done, it obscures consensus, because this small number of people can override hundreds of different people on the general policy of spoilers, because a situation exists where they can win almost every battle regardless of how many people are on each 'side' of the spoiler debate, because they can devote their full manpower to every battle, where the other side has to scramble to find out where the battle is taking place (when someone's mentioned that often there's a lone dissenter edit-warring against six or seven other editors, he usually neglects to mention that it seems to be the SAME six or seven people every time, versus a _different_ lone dissenter). Would, overall, the consensus skew to removing spoiler tags, or to having them? I honestly don't know for sure, and I don't think we ever will so long as this sort of activity goes on. _This_ is part of what should be done now, and still needs to be considered.

I think most people could be satisfied with 'local consensus decides the issue in borderline cases', but this is not what's happening, and it seems to be what a few people on the anti-warning side seem to desperately fight against.

Almost all Misplaced Pages guidelines operate that way. But for starters, you need to have a guideline that addresses the "heartland cases," so that local consensus will have a baseline to work from. Marc Shepherd 13:14, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I missed replying to this yesterday when I first read it, but you've actually got a point here, one I've tried to make before. For a while, things were going relatively smoothly with the debate and discussion, and it seemed we were making progress. As that happened, it looked like the area of compromise was trending towards something along the lines of (in a nutshell, and omitting the noncontroversial parts of it): 1) spoiler warnings in 'plot' type sections are presumptively not allowed (because it should be assumed). Like all cases, it might be overruled by local consensus if it's felt necessary on a case by case basis. Very recent fiction (whatever winds up being used to defined that) can often be considered an exception. 2) spoilers in other areas on fiction-related articles, if they exist, should be 'presumptively allowed' - if the information actually is a spoiler, a warning should be allowed, and the _removal_ of the warning would have to be justified.

This would provide a basis of handling the cases, and to some degree cut out on the problems with the 'spoiler patrol', those who search for all uses of the spoiler tag and are devoted to removing it. The guideline would help back up anyone who tries to restore spoiler warnings in these other areas, by the people who charge in to try and remove just about every one. It's not a perfect solution, mind you - they can still gang up and try to push it through (maybe a further option would be a 'disputed spoiler warning' tag, so that pro-warning people can search on that and, if they feel the need, add their voice to cancel out the automatic no votes, but I'm getting off topic), but eventually if we have enough 'presumed allowed' spoiler tags actually in place, it will be harder for them to patrol for every new use to make sure it conforms to their own personal standards as they do now, and local consensus can once again start to form.

This compromise got _close_ to materializing, and would do what you mention: define the heartland cases and leave the rest to (ideally) local consensus. It wouldn't have been my ideal compromise, but it would have been satisfactory to me. Of course, it didn't materialize. The current policy now seems to read: 1) There is usually no need for a spoiler warning in plot sections, or in articles about fictional people, objects, places', and 2) It can occur in other areas, _if_ local consensus deems it necessary.

Which to me seems, 'outright hostile to spoiler warnings' in plot sections, and 'presumptively no spoiler warning allowed' in other sections (along with the fact, not immediately clear to the reader, that any halfway determined set of people who are against spoiler warning can make sure that, if nothing else consensus can't form to include a spoiler warning, because there will be 5-6 automatic votes 'against'). I think this is how we've gotten to the state where we used to have thousands of spoiler warnings, and now, in what should be a state of compromise, we tend to have less than 10 at any given time. That can't be what most people consider a compromise.

So, by all means, let's edit the guideline to address the heartland cases in a way that's truly a compromise in both intention and effect. Wandering Ghost 16:26, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I've asked them individually to stop the behaviour. I've attempted various compromises, such as suggesting the inclusion of a "only X number of spoiler related edits per day per person allowed under this guideline" (whether removing spoilers or adding them), or a 'no crusading' rule, but it's always been a no go.

To me, we either have to push through some sort of rule to combat this, or we have to open up the guideline itself to explicitly permit spoilers in some areas. Otherwise, this can not end in a satisfactory way.

Perhaps, if we worked together, both the pro-warning crowd and the reasonable members of the anti-warning crowd, we can push through something like this and make the rest of the debate go by much more easily.

When you start with a presumption that the word "reasonable" applies only to some members of the anti-warning crowd, you're off on the wrong foot. Both sides have their share of reasonable and unreasonable adherents. Marc Shepherd 13:14, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I assume you meant to say 'unreasonable' in that first statement, because otherwise you just said the same thing in your last sentence. See my reply to Melodia below (since I wrote it first) for specifics, but that's not what I'm presuming at all, though I concede it must have looked that way due to poor wording - What I meant by saying that the pro-warning group and the reasonable members of the anti-warning group could reach a compromise was more along the lines of... sure, the unreasonable members of the pro-warning crowd would probably join this coalition, because it brings it closer to their side. Just as the unreasonable members of the anti-warning crowd join the agreements that the reasonable members of both make, that reduces the number of spoiler warnings. Everyone still gets a voice, even the unreasonable people. I'm certainly not against anyone having that voice heard. But IMHO the goal for the group as a whole should be a compromise that reflects what people want or can agree on, without allowing the extremists on either side to overwhelm things, either with their policies or their actions.

It still comes down to one issue, always, for me. Consensus. Do you honestly believe consensus exists to remove and keep off pretty well all spoiler warnings? If so, well, I disagree, but it can be a gentlemen's disagreement, and would like to see some evidence of this argument, to debate that end. If you and the majority of the anti-warning group think that there is no place for spoilers on wikipedia even IF consensus says there should be (or if consensus is divided enough that the natural, to me, answer is to find a compromise somewhere in the middle), because it's against the general policies of Misplaced Pages, then it's clear what needs to be done. All this arguing is irrelevant and a waste of time - both sides need to go to arbitration together to get a ruling on that. Wandering Ghost 12:52, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

My policy has always been that if you have consensus on an issue like this, you don't need a group of people who is dedicated to enforcing it - it will enforce itself, on a local level. If you don't have consensus, the rule shouldn't exist. And I'm perfectly willing to lose on consensus - if, on a level playing field, it seems to me the majority of people felt spoilers had no place here, I wouldn't have a problem with it - this is in fact why I didn't do anything against the mass spoiler warning removal, because I naively assumed it must have reflected a new consensus. It was only when I actually got into the debate I realized it was nothing of the sort. Wandering Ghost 11:58, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

"My policy has always been that if you have consensus on an issue like this, you don't need a group of people who is dedicated to enforcing it - it will enforce itself, on a local level."

— Wandering Ghost

What an ideal consensus policy statement. I recommend it for enshrinement on a WP essay page. Milo 04:49, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps, if we worked together, both the pro-warning crowd and the reasonable members of the anti-warning crowd --- are you really suggesting that ALL of the pro-warning 'crowd' are reasonable, but only some of the anti-warning ones are? ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 12:48, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Presumably a "reasonable" anti-spoiler editor is one who doesn't just remove unnecessary spoiler tags but limits himself to "X number of spoiler related edits per day". Of course, anyone who went to the effort of writing a bot just so that he could do things like search for home-made spoiler warnings, must be utterly beyond reason! <grin> --Tony Sidaway 13:03, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh, of course not, Melodia. There are people on both sides of the debate (hell, probably every debate) who are unreasonable. To use one example, I think anybody who demands the restoration of all 45,000 deleted spoiler tags is being unreasonable (despite the fact that I agree they were removed wrongly). Also, since we're here to compromise, anyone who wants a spoiler warning on every fiction entry, whether ancient fairy tale or newest movie, is unreasonable, and anyone who wants a blanket spoiler warning for all plot sections (even though I personally would be okay with those situations, it's clearly not what consensus wants, so to demand it is unreasonable). However, I do believe that the nature of the unbalanced situation that's occurs is more likely to push away the unreasonable members of the pro-warning group, because they can't get any traction, and can't get any compromise and so are more likely to get frustrated and move away from the debate, while the unreasonable members of the anti-warning group have a lot of success with their methods and thus can continue in the debate with full confidence, and can push even harder. Wandering Ghost 12:52, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Taxonomy of the spoiler debate part 2

1. Which articles get spoiler warnings?

*Only some of those articles

If the latter, which ones?

I'd think we can cut out fairy tales, and, in general, Shakespeare and classic literature, things over, say, 100 years old, although there should be still room for exception in certain cases.

2. Where does the warning go? Once it is decided which articles get the warning, where does it go?

*Only on the portion(s) of the article that editors deem to have "spoiler" potential

If the latter, what exactly is considered a "spoiler"? Is it the whole plot, or only a portion of it?

One of the key things about the spoiler debate is that a spoiler warning _is_ useless and redundant if it's just at the top of the article. That's why the 'current fiction' template isn't really useful either, because I might want to read an article on current fiction to learn something about it, but I don't want to read the spoilers. So the warning doesn't help me at all. Also, people routinely forget that people do use the spoiler warnings _actively_... that is, people read pages and scroll to the spoiler section, because they want to read about the twist. This is what separated spoiler warnings from other disclaimer templates, that many people will use them to _find_ specific content. It's not something that works in a table of contents, but it's a useful tool nonetheless, and for that tool to remain functional, it the more targetted the spoilers, the better.

Although some people consider any part of the plot a spoiler, they seem to be a minority. Most people seem to think the spoiler is things like the ending, or a surprise twist to the plot. (Most people seem to _like_ knowing _something_ about the plot before they watch it, and those who don't like to know anything are unlikely to read a page about it before they do).

3. What does the warning look like? Regardless of where it goes, what does the warning look like?

It should be bold enough that it can be seen while scrolling, it should contain the word 'spoiler' (because 'plot details' is vague, and not all plot details are spoilers), but otherwise it should be relatively unobtrusive. No need for a huge space or big flashing lights. Wandering Ghost 12:06, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

• The correct answer to question 1 (no article should have spoiler warnings) implies that it is not necessary to even think about 2 and 3. Kusma (talk) 12:52, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Begging the question gets you nowhere, Kusma. But thanks for playing. Postmodern Beatnik 17:54, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I was just pointing out my view which was not yet included in the description of the debate above. Kusma (talk) 19:24, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Kusma, I'll give you an ESL pass on the construction of your statement. I might have used a personal position stated thusly:

(example:) I take the position that no article should have spoiler warnings in question 1; that assumed, it is logically unnecessary for me to answer questions 2 and 3.

I hope this helps. Milo 20:15, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

That's basically what I was looking for out of Kusma—a more qualified statement that did not presuppose the correctness of his position. I am not in the habit of checking to see if one is speaking English as a foreign (or "second") language, nor am I convinced it should entirely matter; but in the interests of comraderie I will also give an ESL pass on the statement's construction. Postmodern Beatnik 18:10, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Wandering Ghost...I have to ask. Which fairy tales can we cut out? Cinderella? The Kokiji? The recent novel Wicked? And why is it 100 years exactly? Is the disappointment of someone who gets spoiled about the plot of Bleak House irrelevant to us, while someone who gets spoiled on Catcher in the Rye has a serious concern? I hate to push this into absurdity, but I think that the idea of these distinctions is, at best, absurd. At worst, it is patently a way of enshrining one particular cultural / subcultural POV into the way articles are indexed and warned. And yes, I use the word 'warned' advisedly. A table of contents does not pander to the emotional concerns of the reader. A spoiler tag does. Ethan Mitchell 00:08, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

"idea of these distinctions is, at best, absurd" I agree. Only central-control micromanagers have these concerns. Leaving these distinctions to the existing art jury function of local consensus makes all these issues go away.

"I use the word 'warned' advisedly" Does that mean you intend to dictionary-misuse "warning", because profit-driven falsely-hyperbolic spoiler-avoidance publicity has successfully duped almost everyone? (Including me until I did the dictionary research.) I don't think it would have mattered, except that in a search for encyclopedic correctness at Misplaced Pages, editors began making a chain of incorrect arguments rooted in the false "warning", such as invoking the red herring false WP disclaimer, created because of the false WP warning, created because of the false external warnings, created though formally incorrect in the absence of bone fide danger. Mixed metaphorically, the buc stops here — somebody has to tell the emperor he has no clothes.

Your apparent refusal of dictionary correction seems to be a promotion of neologism OR in the spoiler guide. Unfortunately, it makes hypocritical WP:KETTLE of your other POV claims here. Perhaps you should rethink your positions.

"table of contents does not pander to the emotional concerns of the reader" Neither do spoiler tags pander. Again, heed the dictionary:

COED pander, v. reads: "gratify or indulge (an immoral or distasteful desire or habit)."

Btw, this is mostly a rerun debate, so how about searching the archives for the set of keywords here so you can at least try to think of some new arguments? (If you have only a primitive browser search tool, and if no other topic heading or single keyword works better, I suggest an archive-page browser search for "Milo".) Milo 04:49, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Couldn't have put it better myself. Girolamo Savonarola 00:35, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

As I take it, Wandering Ghost was making a sincere attempt to find a compromise. He is one of only about 2 people on Misplaced Pages who seem to be interested in finding a middle ground.

Misplaced Pages is meant to be an encyclopedia and a reference source. It is therefore to useful to inquire what other encyclopedias and reference sources—both online and offline—have done. Well, I did a quick online check, and other websites that discuss Bleak House overwhelmingly do not have spoiler warnings. This makes me wonder:

A) If other references sources didn't seem to think Bleak House needed spoiler warnings, then why do we?

B) If we include them anyway, just how effective are they likely to be? They will work (assuming the reader even cared about this) only for those who happen to look at this site, and no other reference source.

Where Bleak House is concerned, those arguing for spoiler warnings have a tall hill to climb, given that others who were faced with the same task never thought they were necessary. Exactly where one draws the line is open to debate. But the conclusion that Bleak House is firmly on the "no warning" side of that line seems unavoidable.

On the other hand, where Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is concerned, the spoiler-warning proponents may have a legitimate concern, since websites of all stripes have reached the same conclusion: the warnings are useful.

So, if any compromise is going to be achieved, it lies somewhere between Bleak House and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Those who categorically oppose compromise are free to keep bashing their heads against the wall. Marc Shepherd 01:17, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

The 'other encyclopedias don't do it' argument is akin to arguing for tank crews to wear cavalry spurs. There is no inherent property of encyclopedias that 'forbids' spoiler tags.--Nydas 17:21, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

That's a poor analogy, because there's no longer a cavalry, but there are other modern, current, contemporaneously published encyclopedias and reference works. Your analogy would make sense if we were attempting to compare Misplaced Pages to the 1911 Britannica. But that's not the comparison we are making.

A more relevant example is if someone is building a new army, and is arguing strentuously for something no other contemporary army does. Maybe you're a visionary, and someday this viewpoint will be adopted by everyone else. But that's always a tough case to make. Most of the time, armies that ignore settled wisdom get slaughtered.

You will find that many Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines are derived from what other encyclopedias have historically done. After all, Misplaced Pages didn't invent the word "encyclopedia," so people come here with some ideas about what the word means. Misplaced Pages has a no original research policy because encyclopedias in general don't present original research. Misplaced Pages has a verifiability policy, because encyclopedias in general confine themselves to what is verifiable. And so forth. Marc Shepherd 17:59, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Tanks were contemporary with cavalry for many years, and it was suggested as late as the 1930s that tank crews in the British Army should wear spurs. Misplaced Pages is contemporary with old-fashioned encyclopedias, but is different enough to make generalisations about minor features like spoiler tags unconvincing.--Nydas 18:21, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages is contemporary with a lot of reference sources. Are you suggesting that every last one of them—except for Misplaced Pages—is old-fashioned? Misplaced Pages isn't the only modern thing out there. Surely there is some other lodestar that you would accept as relevant in some sense.

Anyhow, I am not the one who has any convincing to do. As of this moment there are 14 articles in the main namespace with spoiler tags, compared to thousands without. Regardless of how we got there, that is the status quo. The burden or persuasion is with those who want to change it. I humbly suggested that it might be helpful to look for guidance at what other reliable modern sources have done. Perhaps you're ignoring them because they don't produce the answer you want. But in that case, you need to come up with some other reasoning.

If you prefer to suggest that all other sources are irrelevant, go right ahead. I was just trying to suggest a way forward. Marc Shepherd 19:07, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Paper encyclopedias, specialised reference works, fan wikis are examples of what Misplaced Pages is not. There are a few that do use spoiler tags; why are they ignorable? Is it a case of them being in the minority?--Nydas 09:21, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Well...um, yes. I do think that if most sources don't use them in a particular situation, it tends to suggest that they are unnecessary. You keep mentioning what Misplaced Pages is not. But if you are ever going to make a case, it needs to have a positive reason, not merely an "absence of negatives." Marc Shepherd 21:39, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't categorically oppose compromise - I think we have a compromise in place, in fact - one that allows for spoiler warnings to cover genuinely surprising information about recent works that is not found where a reader would expect it. Beyond that, I oppose arbitrary bright line guidelines that suggest that there is some calendrical date at which point, magically, a work stops being something that we worry about spoilers for. Phil Sandifer 01:23, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

What's in place here is the more or less unilateral compromise of tokenism. Spoiler tag tokenism is being enforced by a quiver of schemes, ploys, denials, and circular logics, some of which are so anti-intellectual that I hope you privately cringe with academic embarrassment at being a clique fellow traveler.

You got what you most importantly wanted — I was a relatively early (or the first?) compromise supporter of your requested writing standards — but did you support my equally valid compromise request for hidden tags? No, you didn't, and you should have. Good writing and hidden tags of many useful kinds will make excellent partners for the coming interactive encyclopedia. If you and others continue helping the clique to stand in the way, Misplaced Pages may not be an active fork of that 'next encyclopedia'.

Bright lines go away when the art jury function of local consensus is allowed to operate without centralized micromeddling or editorial enforcement squads. Milo 12:57, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

And people wonder why I'm skeptical about this whole "compromise" thing being offered. Phil Sandifer 16:35, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Seriously, could you be more specific? What philosophical objection do you have to the win-win compromise of optionally hidden spoiler tags? I can't believe an academic like yourself would buy into vague fears of attracting undefinable "internet culture" readers. Milo 00:02, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Because I tend to find comrpomises with people who are so openly vitriolic to be ill-advised at best. There's a metaphor here about sheep, wolves, and couture that is apropos. Phil Sandifer 00:19, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

That's a process objection, but I know it all too well.

In the absence of your comment on the win-win philosophy of good writing combined with optionally hidden spoiler tags, I'll assume that you are standing aside for now to see whether that compromise principle can gather consensus.

Just as there was talk here that this debate was about over, it turns out that the clique's timing for the tag removals this year could not have been worse. Since globally popular billionaire J.K. Rowling and the media-tech influential SF Chronicle have externally raised the $poiler-avoidance $takes, Misplaced Pages is now potentially a target of public criticism for its mass spoiler tag removals.

The top level of Misplaced Pages now has financial reason to encourage a mutually satisfactory spoiler tag compromise to keep the donations flowing in. Milo 01:37, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

My objection to hidable spoiler tags is one that has been raised before - it's a technical solution that exacerbates the fundamental problem that it is childish to be concerned with this in the first place. That's the core of the problem - concern about spoilers is inexorably linked to an immature, fannish, and bad style of writing that pollutes the article space with junk that should not be there. If you are editing an article from a perspective that is concerned with guarding the purity of the aesthetic experience that the text offers, you are editing an article from a perspective that leads to bad writing. Phil Sandifer 05:52, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I have to wonder. Did I REALLY just read those words above me, or am I imagining them. I can't fathom how anyone could actually believe what was written there, to say nothing of writing it in serious. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 01:56, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Really, I was as astonished as you are, at news more unexpected than fiction.

Here's the SF Chronicle by-lined editorial: Want to know if Harry Potter lives? Then keep it to yourself (SFC internal link name is "Editorial: Spoiling is immoral"). Here's J.K. Rowling's don't-spoil plea as reported by Scotsman.com: JK slams spoiler sites ahead of book launch. JKR says it's not that "...spoilers are part of the hype and that I am trying to protect sales rather than my readership." Sure, I believe her, but her publishers have a fiduciary responsibility to think otherwise. This is record-setting sales event, and the collateral precedents set will spill over into the rest of the industry.

The 40+% of readers of Misplaced Pages who want spoilers tags could post "WP is a spoiler site" opinions at fan sites throughout the world. If Misplaced Pages gets labeled as a "spoiler site" then donations could suffer.

What would you do if you were one of the Wikimedia foundation honchos in charge of talking nicely to big donors, and you kept hearing, 'My friends in the publishing and movie industries keep muttering about Misplaced Pages being a 'spoiler site'. Can you tell me what this is about?'

I'd guess that Mr./Ms. Honcho would suggest that Jimbo communicate some friendly suggestions to the clique about consensing a mutually satisfactory spoiler tag compromise for the good of the project. Milo 06:37, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. Milo, There is only a cabal if you want there to be one. Girolamo Savonarola 16:38, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

My early research suggested this operation was the work of a top-level connected political/power "clique" (mostly admins/ex-admins/ex-arbcom and other WP long-timers), as found in most volunteer organizations. This affair has been way too clumsy for an organized secret cabal to have been pulling the strings. However, based on the earlier smell of several process abuses, I suggested the demonstration that a fix was in at #Clique fix is in: Formal AWB complaint dismissed as "rancor". While the exact nature of the AWB denial-of-justice will have to await some future revelation, it looks like either a hierarchy bias or old-boy/old-girl mutual CYA operation.

Based on external site reports by anonymous admin insiders, there is a lot of mutual-backscratching chatter on IRC. It's reasonable to postulate that ex-arbcom David Gerrard asked for non-specific assistance in repelling the AWB misuse charges against him. But more likely it is that an admin sees a big name like Gerrard's in the dock, and gives him a hierarchy-privilege pass. I lean toward that explanation in the AWB case. The "rancor" pass was so hastily concocted, it lacked the slightest fig leaf pretense of a due-process investigation. Milo 00:02, 4 August 2007 (UTC) re-edited 06:37, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

While I may not have entered into the discussion until recently, that is irrelevant - I have been a member of Misplaced Pages for over four years and I've been following the spoiler discussion for a good while longer than my participation within it. Even had I not, the archives are available for perusal and consultation at all times. But I do take issue with your attitude, regardless of if you claim to like me.

You are making lots of wild accusations regarding secret groups and deals. Whether or not they are dictionary-definition cabals, the point of my comment was germane. Our processes here are to be as transparent as possible - that does not mean that people are legally bound not to "talk out of school"; it's inevitable. However, since all discussions on Misplaced Pages regarding the matter are open and publicly accessible, they are the only discussions which can be used by either side to carry any weight (short of a diktat by J Wales).

While I also would like to have seen ArbCom take on the issue, I completely understand why they did not, and I feel that their points were valid. Now if you think that their refusal of certiorari was wikilawyering, that's one thing - but if you are accusing them of favoritism, then please stand and level those accusations in the proper forum on this site and leave your own name on the line there instead of alluding to them here. Most of us are here to discuss specific issues of policy/guidelines, not specific people. Girolamo Savonarola 01:18, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Last time I counted, there was half a million bytes of Talk:Spoiler archive, and it may be well over a million by now. Do you claim to have read it all??

Pardon, but despite your statement that you've been reading here a "good while longer", you archly connected me with a "cabal" concept that I have previously mentioned only once as a repartee joke on 6/27. That made you appear to be too new to the discussion to know my actual positions about the clique, who are a fairly well-defined inner group of about six editors, and a more loosely defined outer group who help or associate with the positions of the inner group. If you weren't sure what I intended to imply by "clique", I think you should have asked.

"You are making lots of wild accusations regarding secret groups and deals." No, I didn't. Please be fair. If you read carefully what I actually wrote, I concluded that was not the most likely explanation in the AWB case.

"Arbcom" "accusing them of favoritism" What? I most certainly did not do so — that would be your own freely-embroidered interpretation about a group I didn't even discuss.

If you wish me to consider you as strongly aligned with the clique's positions, then naturally we will disagree on some of the issues you mentioned. The long-established pro-tag position is that editor conduct is directly related to the core spoiler tag issues and will be discussed here.

I assume that other editors who give me cheeky personal advice expect to tolerate some in return. If that's not repartee in which you wish to engage, please refrain from initiating it, and we will have a mutually respectful personal relationship. Milo 06:37, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

You know this "if any compromise is going to be achieved, it lies somewhere between Bleak House and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" approach ignores one singular fact: that there is no spoiler tag on the latter article. I myself have twice added a {{spoiler}} tag to the article Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows but both times it was removed. I think the problem with the pro-spoiler tag arguments is this: that they simply fail to recognise the strength of opposition to the use of spoiler tags. --Tony Sidaway 01:40, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the Harry Potter spoiler notices that were removed, neither of those edits supports a contention that there is consensus at Harry Potter not to have spoiler notices. The first example was removed here - by someone who also removed the entire plot because they did not think the spoiler notice was strong enough, not because they didn't agree with the notice being present. The second example was removed here by someone who used this talk page discussion as the basis for removal. Those are both interesting events, but they don't support the argument that there is consensus that spoiler notices are not wanted or useful. --Parsifal _Hello 03:06, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Not sure what you're trying to say. Someone said that compromise "lies somewhere between Bleak House and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" and I pointed out that the Harry Potter article doesn't contain a spoiler tag despite my adding one on at least two occasions. If compromise lies in that direction, it seems to me that we already have that compromise. --Tony Sidaway 09:46, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Well...the current situation is that there are practically no spoiler warnings on Misplaced Pages. As of moments ago, {{spoiler}} was transcluded on just 22 pages, and I believe at one time it was thousands. Obviously the mass-removal a few months ago worked, and there are now a sufficient number of editors who will remove every spoiler warning they find. There is no denying that this sea change came rather suddenly. A few months ago, thousands of pages had warnings, and there was a persistent faction dedicated to maintaining them.

Now, although I am far closer to the anti-warning camp than the pro-warning camp, I am not so foolish as to think there there was a sudden shift in public opinion. Rather, after the mass-removal of the roughly 45,000 existing warnings, editors realized there had been a tectonic shift, and are enforcing a de facto ban.

It's rather interesting to peruse the 22 pages (as of this writing) that have the spoiler template here). There's obviously no standard for which pages get the warning. But when they do get it, overwhelmingly editors choose to put it on the entire plot, not just the portion of it that gives away a "surprise ending." Marc Shepherd 11:53, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Now down to 10 .Garda40 18:51, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

<-- actually, only one now.1 on Sōsuke Aizen, actually, in the lead (which was discussed by an editor (Phil Sandifer) wishing to remove it, who backed off as soon as a special circumstance rationale was given (the show has aired in Japan, not the US yet). I myself removed one today, on Liar Liar, as it was in the plot section. David Fuchs 03:03, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Good article writing with hidable spoiler tags compromise

(Copied from #Taxonomy of the spoiler debate part 2 above)

"My objection to hidable spoiler tags is one that has been raised before - it's a technical solution that exacerbates the fundamental problem that it is childish to be concerned with this in the first place. That's the core of the problem - concern about spoilers is inexorably linked to an immature, fannish, and bad style of writing that pollutes the article space with junk that should not be there. If you are editing an article from a perspective that is concerned with guarding the purity of the aesthetic experience that the text offers, you are editing an article from a perspective that leads to bad writing. Phil Sandifer 05:52, 4 August 2007 (UTC)"

"concern about spoilers is inexorably linked to an immature, fannish, and bad style of writing"

I've had substantial experience with volunteer organization rulecrafting. That experience makes me less cynical than you seem to be about the realistic possibility of combining good writing and optionally hidden spoiler tags. In short, I don't take the extreme position that they are inexorably separated. I believe in the power of education.

When I said I supported your good writing standards for fiction articles, I was completely sincere. Though I don't expect perfection, I believe that can be done well enough for Misplaced Pages. I think it's mostly a question of writing adequate instructions about the philosophy to achieve, suggesting priorities, things to avoid, providing real examples, and recommending the concept of balance among all competing factors.

Simultaneously, I believe that equally good instructions can be written for the art jury function of the local consensus, as required to place the optionally hidden spoiler tags. If the tags are hidden, they can be about as freely placed as the fans want them, making the spoiler tag placement consensus an easy task.

As yet, there is no pressing need for compromise to make this happen. However, depending on how things play out in the external world as I've reported above, that many web sites may be condemned by the publishing and movie industries as "spoiler sites" (a bad thing), then the 40+% of disappointed tag-seeking readers here might lay that tar brush on Misplaced Pages. If that happens, if donations fall, then I think a compromise will be needed, and I think one is available. Milo 07:38, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

It may be theoretically possible for {{spoiler}} not to indicate a badly-crafted article, it just doesn't seem to happen - David Gerard 10:11, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with Phil's views. Spoiler warnings are inextricably linked to a neutral, worldwide point of view. The removal of spoiler tags has been justified with biased, fannish beliefs like 'released in the US means released in the world', 'only fans will look at this article' and 'everyone knows this'. It's a fansite mentality. It's not surprising that people who 'don't know' (i.e. are non-fans) have been disparaged so much during this debate.

That the tags lead to bad writing is incorrect; we have had many featured articles with spoiler tags.--Nydas 10:15, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Inextricably???? Evidence for this, please? Inextricable basically means "impossible to separate." To disprove this, only one counter-example would be required, and there clearly are many. Marc Shepherd 21:49, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

If you think inextricably is too strong, then just 'strongly linked' will do. Phil thinks certain articles are fans-only and non-Americans should learn to cope. How is that a neutral point of view?--Nydas 08:40, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

"Spoiler warnings are inextricably linked to a neutral, worldwide point of view." What on earth? So any alleged spoiler we can't find a reliable third-party source for that says it's a spoiler shouldn't be tagged, then? - David Gerard 12:43, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

It's a stylistic issue, like having 'early life' sections in biography articles.--Nydas 13:43, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Now you're just being silly. The argument is not that "everybody knows this," it's that any even remotely diligent attempt to research the subject is going to reveal this. Now, mind you, we do have articles that only fans will ever look at - Valen, for example. That's just not a topic that's mainstream enough to be looked at by someone who isn't already somewhat committed to Babylon 5. And "released in the US means released in the world" is clearly not true - though the fact of the matter is that being on the Internet and not in the US does basically mean that you learn to be careful and avoidant of spoilers without tags. But to reduce these instincts to fannishness amounts to proclaiming that Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia. We can write articles with an eye towards providing a thorough, encyclopedic overview of a topic. Or we can write articles with an eye towards preserving the sanctity of the aesthetic experience as designed by the author. We can't do both. Phil Sandifer 14:13, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Once you have start applying bizarre metrics like 'any even remotely diligent attempt' or 'fans only', then you have rendered yourself incapable of producing a general-purpose encyclopedia. It is not our place to guess what sort of people are going to read an article. Expecting non-Americans to learn the ways of the Internet is easier said than done. So much for stopping 'encroaching Internet culture'.--Nydas 15:55, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Sure we can do both. Nothing about spoiler tags prevents a thorough, encyclopedic overview of the topic. Nothing. All it does is offend a few people who think they're unnecessary and insulting, but unfortunately, being offended or insulted is not grounds for removing something from Wiki. And, guess what? You're missing a hidden trap in your own argument. Spoiler Tags PROMOTE thorough overviews of a topic. Why? Because, although people can (and do) monitor whenever people place in a spoiler tag, and remove it if it offends their sensibilities, you CAN'T easily monitor when people edit an article to subtly obscure or remove a spoiler in the text itself. You have to be monitoring the particular article in which it happens. So, on all those articles that have only a few watchers, that may have been once thorough and encyclopedic and contained spoilery informations with a warning, could change after anti-warning people removed the warning. And then they move on. But if one of the few people watching doesn't replace the warning, but instead removes the spoiler itself, they'll probably never know. And they've made the article _less_ thorough.

Baseless speculation? Perhaps. But I don't watch too many articles, and I've already seen it happen once. Runaways (comics) used to have a character list that included spoilers, about characters who died, and so on. It was warned. There was a brief tussle over it, but the warning was removed (I was infact warned against 'edit warring' because two of those people who remove all spoiler warnings reverted my edits). Shortly after that, that section was rewritten, and a note (not visible in the article itself, only the editting section) that people shouldn't mention the deaths in the character listing, because it's spoiler territory. This is despite the mantra of many anti-spoiler people (and, for that matter, many pro-spoiler people) that concern about spoilers should never impact the STRUCTURE of an article. But when you remove the spoiler warnings, you remove options, and some articles will take the options that reduce the amount of information. I certainly didn't try to change it back, because I felt that with spoiler warnings being constantly quashed this was a better way to handle the problem.

So, let's re-evaluate your closing thoughts: We can write policies with an eye towards providing a thorough, encyclopedic overview of topics. Or we can write policies with an eye towards making sure a single little tag is absent from all articles. We can't do both.

(Oh, and btw, it's not necessarily true that only a B5 fan will read a Valen page... a lot of people browse. Someone might get interested in a work of art for the first time by stumbling on a page related to it.) Wandering Ghost 12:35, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

And again, the argument fails on the basis of, why ONLY spoileresque content? I've seen people remove pictures (both photos and drawings) from articles like clitoris, presumably because they find them disgusting/offensive/OMG THINK OF THE CHILDREN, etc. Does that mean they shouldn't still be there? No of course not. Similarly, we shouldn't allow spoiler warnings because some editor MIGHT make incorrect edits in an article. That note at Runaways is silly, and should be removed (not that I will, as I don't feel like doing it just to get reverted). People claim bad circular reasoning supported the mass removal of the tags -- I put forth this reasoning for adding them is pretty much just as faulty and circular. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 13:58, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

And, more to the point, this kind of hideable content has been pretty explicitly rejected in far more serious cases than spoilers. Phil Sandifer 15:20, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

For the record, despite the heading of the topic I'm posting in, I'm actually against 'hideable spoiler tags', or at least, I'm not particularly in favour of it, at least if the default is hidden. I'm speaking more about spoilers in general. And I've gone through my reasonings on why spoiler warnings are different from other content notices in response to you several times. You've never responded, to my recollection, but I can only assume you disagree, and that's fine, but I really don't feel like typing it all out again, since although it's convincing enough to me, there's nothing new in it that would convince you this time if it hasn't before. However, there is one key part of it that bears repeating: It's different from other notices because people WANT it. Consensus is not to remove spoiler warnings, no matter how much you might want it to be. I can only assume consensus is with the other content notices, although I haven't investigated the issue because frankly, I don't care. But on this subject, I know consensus is divided, and so at the very least, we should have a policy that allows some spoiler warnings, so your "but spoiler warnings are all bad we don't have other content warnings" argument is fine for stating your view, but otherwise doesn't advance the debate anywhere.

Again, if the position of most of the anti-warning group is that it doesn't matter what consensus is, that we should be removing all spoiler warnings because it's fundamentally anti-wiki, then please, let's all go to arbitration, together and without rancor, and get a ruling on that once and for all. Otherwise, can we please stop repeating the general "Oh no, spoiler warnings are bad!" vs "Spoilers warnings are good!" debate here, and try to deal with how best to do the compromise?

I also continue to maintain that a policy that ignores how people actually behave within it is a bad policy. That's why a policy that causes people to add less information is a sub-optimal one. The people who add information to fiction articles are often fans, and fans are often more spoiler conscious because they want others to enjoy the work, so without a means to mark spoilers, many will not include really spoilery information - I know I'm much less likely to. I (unlike some) might not protest and remove it if someone else does, but I'll let someone else do the work. Combine that with the fact that probably a fair number of fiction articles are only maintained by a small number of people, those which are maintained by the spoiler-shy will likely remain with less information for longer periods. Net loss of information results from banning spoiler tags, even ignoring the information the tags themselves provide. Conversely, people who add to articles that might contain nudity or graphic sexual depictions and such are usually people for whom nudity and frank sexual depictions don't particularly matter, so there's less likely to be information loss, and maybe there'll even be information gain where people feel free to discuss things frankly. By the same token, a policy that looks like a compromise on paper, but allows one side to dominate in fact (say, because of a super-easy ability to gang up on new spoilers, and an inability to easily track their removal), is a bad policy in my book. Maybe that's a minority opinion that you have to look at the effects of a policy to judge how good it is, but it informs how I look at things, anyway. Wandering Ghost 13:52, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Wow. That's probably the most sensible argument for the warnings I've seen. And how long did it take? Two and a half months? Your points have merit, but there's always WP:DEADLINE to consider. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 14:58, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

If you want to argue for a worldwide point of view, you will need to argue that people in other parts of the world actually expect spoiler tags. I see no reason why someone who doesn't already frequent Internet fan sites will expect to have plot details specially marked, or will be upset if they learn the plot here.

People who don't know aren't disparaged - we write articles to help them learn. What is disparaged are people who don't want to learn the plot details but nevertheless decide to read, for example, a section called "Plot". — Carl (CBM · talk) 12:50, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

From Misplaced Pages's perspective, there aren't 'other' parts of the world. English-language coverage of the Harry Potter launch in developing countries should be enough to show that spoilers are a worldwide concept. Spoiler warnings are not only used on fansites .

It is not obvious that a plot section will contain spoilers. It is to you, but not to people who are unfamiliar with Misplaced Pages.--Nydas 13:43, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Many things are not obvious to people who are unfamiliar with Misplaced Pages - for instance, why an article sometimes just says "PENIS!" or why we don't let you make an article about yourself. The assumption here is that readers are capable of learning. Phil Sandifer 14:13, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

The difference being that people won't come in search engines looking for those things.--Nydas 15:55, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

On the contrary, someone coming in from a search engine could EASILY run across a recently vandlaized page right off the bat. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 16:04, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. We get about a dozen complaints a day on OTRS of "Page X was vandalized" from people who don't seem to get that they can go and fix this in less time than it takes them to tell us about it (and by the time we read it, it will have already been fixed.) This has not led to any attempt to make pages harder to vandalize. We're a top 10 website at this point - we have the power to declare that people should know what we are. Or at least, we have the right to decide not to cater to people who dont. Phil Sandifer 16:33, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Who's this 'we' you're referring to? I don't believe that there was ever any consensus to remove spoiler warnings. In any case, popularity should never give 'power to declare' things.--Nydas 08:40, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I second the comment from Nydas there was never any consensus to remove spoiler warnings. After following this discussion for months, I still don't understand what the problem is with notifying readers that a spoiler is up ahead. It seems like a total non-issue to me. There is no evidence that users all over Misplaced Pages were tearing their hair out about those horrible spoiler notices, thinking to themelves "If I see one more spoiler notice, I'm going to buy a $60 subscription to Britannica so I don't have to look at those unencyclopedic travesties any more." --Parsifal _Hello 09:48, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I cannot think of another example in Misplaced Pages where the text of an article is "optionally hidable," so that those who object to the text don't have to see it. The closest analog is hidable table-of-contents and navigation boxes. But in those cases the material isn't totally hidden; it's just shown in a compact form. But I can't think of a case on Misplaced Pages where text just totally disappears for some readers.

Now, in the first place, I don't think this issue is important enough to be the first example where Misplaced Pages optionally hides text from readers who would rather not see it. I can think of a lot of things on Misplaced Pages that some readers would probably rather not see, if they had their druthers. It really does open a can of worms. And in the second place, like every other contested issue on Misplaced Pages, I think the answer is to come up with a middle-ground solution, and get consensus. There are lots of editorial decisions I disagree with, but I don't go around insisting that the software be modified to give me a personal version that hides the content I wish wasn't there. Marc Shepherd 22:03, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Furthermore, is there any other instance where the MOS encourages articles to have dedicated tags within the text? Usually the whole point of inserting tags into the text is to point out sections that have serious problems and need attention. I can't think of any exception to this aside from the spoiler tag. It seems rather poor form to insist upon the permanent installation of an impinging tag. Girolamo Savonarola 22:49, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I've brought this up before. Outside of interwiki links (like "commons has content on X") and a couple things at the top (disambig, redirect, etc), all meta-info is temporary...except for spoiler warnings (as they used to be, at least). It doesn't make sense why this ONE issue should be an exception. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 23:53, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Maybe it is an exception. Why does that mean it should be avoided?

Another way of looking at an exception is: Innovation. A new idea, like Misplaced Pages itself.

Wasn't it an exception innovation each time Misplaced Pages has done anything in a new way? Doesn't that pretty much apply to just about everything on Misplaced Pages?

Is Misplaced Pages already so old and set-in-its-ways that we only follow tradition and do things the way they were done before? Too late for any new innovative solutions ever again? --Parsifal _Hello 09:24, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

The set of things Misplaced Pages has never done is infinite. Hidable spoiler warnings, therefore, are like infinity other things that Misplaced Pages doesn't have. Obviously Misplaced Pages is not immune to change. It is changing all the time. But given the size of the site, first-of-a-kind interface changes require more careful consideration.

You also have to recognize that after there's a first-of-its-kind, there will surely be a second, and a third, and a fourth. So you have to ask, not merely whether hidable spoiler warnings are a good idea, but in general whether different readers should see different text, depending on what pleases/offends them. That's a pretty fundamental shift. And that kind of shift doesn't happen very often. Marc Shepherd 10:30, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, those are good points, and I doubt it will be done in this situation. My response was only to indicate that "there are no other instances" or it's an "exception" are not a good reasons not to consider the solution. For example, if we had a consensus here (obviously we're not even close, but if we did), then we could ask the developers if it would be easy or hard. Who knows, maybe it could even be done with a CSS skin or something simple (not saying that's so, just that we don't know). Then we could take that information and float a trial balloon about it in a wider forum, such as WP:AN to see if there are objections to requesting the feature and if anyone sees a deeper policy issue. So we're along way from actually doing it, of course, and it's not likely to happen. But "exception" is not a good argument about something new that's technical - and it's also not a good argument for something that might require a change to the MoS, because that can be changed as well if needed. --Parsifal _Hello 18:25, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I didn't follow the last previous technical discussion closely, but IIRC, the final poster said it's already doable in CSS, and that the tags would be unhidable in only a few ancient browsers.

I think the point a lot of posters have missed is that I've started here a topic on compromise mandated from the top down. If that happens, technical cooperation is already a done deal, and therefore need not be further considered here.

Likewise, a mandated compromise immediately throws overboard simple preferences of the 'I don't like it' class. Also quickly discarded are precedent concerns, such as 'it hasn't been done before'. In this topic, all that needs to be considered is practical operational and philosophical issues.

Milo, whom do you think is going to "mandate" it? Marc Shepherd 13:25, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Operational concerns would be for example, can the hide/unhide interface functionally work in practice for press release reading reporters. (Never mind will some/many/no people use it later - that's not important for restoring the donations flow, because technically Misplaced Pages would no longer be a "spoiler site").

Philosophical concerns would include Phil's worry/belief that any tags and good writing are mutually incompatible. (That concern can be tested with demos, and collected statistics.)

One value of a mandated compromise discussion is that having identified what's really important to the donations flow, it then becomes not easy, but easier, to discuss a bottom up compromise intended to prevent the "spoiler site" label from ever becoming a donations issue. Milo 20:41, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Out of interest, when is this donations crisis due to start? --Mark H Wilkinson 21:06, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, indeed. Milo, you are not a member of the Wikimedia Foundation - please stop speaking as if you are doing so on their behalf. As far as I'm concerned, unless this concern is directly discussed by them, your continued reference to this matter is a straw-man affair. Girolamo Savonarola 21:40, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

My judgment is that we are not communicating from a common frame of reference; therefore, debate between us is, to use Phil's term, ill-advised. Milo 05:40, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh, somewhere between 1 year and never. A lot depends on how much big publishing estimates this current wave of spoiling is going to cost them in sales. I think it's reasonable to assume that the bigger the spoiling loss, if any, is to big publishing, the larger and sooner the reaction will come. I say big publishing, because what lessons are learned from the Deathly Hallows spoiling, will be applied to the rest of the industry.

If they estimate that they've lost a lot, they'll spend a lot to hire big PR to crush the spoiler sites, and Misplaced Pages might get caught in the backdraft. (If you aren't familiar with big PR, check out PRWatch.com.) If JKR's claim that people will buy the Deathly Hallows book anyway is correct, then maybe nothing but periodic whining will emit from the publishers' in-house PR offices.

Given that Deathly Hallows set a sales record, it's pretty safe to guess that JKR was indeed correct that the alleged "spoilers" didn't hurt sales. Marc Shepherd 13:25, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

How important are the spoilers, might have an impact on the losses, if any.

Death is mentioned in the title of the Harry Potter book. For TV series, the rerun value is hurt when major characters die, so TV producers avoid this. By contrast movies seem not death-averse.

I have a questionable personal example of how spoiling might affect sales when major movie characters die. I'm a fan of the Mission Impossible TV series, so I originally had considerable interest in seeing the movie. After I heard the spoilers, I decided I not only was not going to see or rent that movie, I was going to turn it off if I found it playing on TV. OTOH, it was a movie based on a TV series, so maybe my reaction was TV-series-like rather than movie-like.

So, are Harry Potter books more like TV series or movies in the fans' reactions to spoiled deaths? Milo 05:40, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Which Harry Potter books do you mean? The ones that have enabled J K Rowling to fill up several banks, or the ones that have sunk without a trace due to their having been spoiled? Forgive me for saying this, but I reckon a suitably cynical individual might read your thesis on this page and come to the conclusion that you've conveniently identified a problem for which your preferred stance on spoiler tags happens to be the solution, via a methodology described in the mathematics trade as "making it up as you go along". --Mark H Wilkinson 08:29, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

"Which Harry Potter books do you mean?" "Books" plural only refers to my question about the fans' expectations associated with character deaths in a book series, TV versus a typical one-off movie. The financial aspects of spoiling are reported to be about Deathly Hallows. Here's a diff to the unexpected news links on which I've based my commentary: SF Chronicle aka "Editorial: Spoiling is immoral" & "JK slams spoiler sites ahead of book launch"

"conveniently identified a problem" As they say in the news trade, "don't shoot the messenger". I call 'em as I see 'em, and I've fairly laid out the broad range of possibilities. It turns out that the clique bet mass spoiler removals against a publishing/Hollywood establishment that makes big profit from avoiding spoilers. Betting against establishment profits is widely considered unwise, but Misplaced Pages could still slip under the radar. However, if you can't see what's known as "exposure" in the risk-based industries, then just laugh it off and exit the mandated compromise discussion that is not intended for you. Milo 14:03, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Neither of these stories is evidence that the publishing industry considers spoilers to be impediments to making profit. Indeed, neither even dares to suggest that industry finances might be threatened in such a manner. So, it's still not clear that this is an issue that exists exterior to your imagination. Which does rather beg the question of whence this mandate arises. (Oh, and thanks for your advice on whether I have sufficient understanding of risk-based industries to continue in this discussion. I shall give it all the consideration it deserves.) --Mark H Wilkinson 14:29, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

"evidence that the publishing industry considers spoilers to be impediments to making profit" JKR mentioned sales and that's good enough for me to read between the lines. Likewise, it did not escape my notice that the SF Chronicle's taking the principled position that spoiling is immoral, conveniently aligns with big profit.

You've made your point that you don't agree with my interpretation of the available facts, so I prefer to leave it at that. Milo 15:37, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

What constitutes a spoiler?

Milo, I think we'd all prefer to leave it at that. Hence why no other pro-alert editors seem to be joining your side in this regard. While I obviously disagree with the stance, I can at least respect their positions as being reasoned and consistent. This aspect you keep on hammering on about seems an attempt akin to emotional blackmail. Well, for better or worse, it is not illegal for an encyclopedia to spoil a work. It is not our job to attempt to divine what PR agents want us to do - were that to happen it would be necessary to incur hidden tags for good portions of the biographies of politicians.

Which also raises the issue - what constitutes a spoiler? Is it merely the ending to a plot? Is it the entire plot? What if I'm working on a PhD in English literature and don't want to be spoiled about the critical commentary? And hey, if we're going to protect people from reading things that they don't want to, simply because of a vocal contingent, need we stop at spoilers? Perhaps if the Christian Right is vocal enough, we could hide large portions of human sexuality, to say nothing of penis, vagina, and so on. Because what the hell, I mean, they can always choose to unhide it, right? But why should information be hidden, segregated and demarcated, prepackaged in a manner easily censored should one later choose to? It is not our job to make such distinctions. As far as the encyclopedia is concerned, there are only two types of information that are important and need be identified publicly - sourced and unsourced. Girolamo Savonarola 16:20, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

"we'd all prefer " I'm sure you meant to exclude the Wikimedia Foundation. :)

I could think that we'd all prefer to avoid the multi-rerun topic of what constitutes a spoiler, but I'd probably be wrong. Milo 17:52, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

We do hide large portions of human sexuality. Most (all?) of our articles about sex have no photographs, relying on line drawings or ancient pottery.--Nydas 16:52, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

(<--)Nydas, have you ever thought that the reason for this might be for reasons other than self-censorship? Would you be willing to photograph yourself naked or whatnot and post it on Misplaced Pages? If you did to clearly illustrate something, I doubt most sane people would stop you. But that, along with copyright issues (which is why we dont have porn stars for sex positions, natch) is what I would say is the largest reason for the 'self censorship' you always bring up. David Fuchs 16:55, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

We are able to find pictures for the sexual organ articles, so it can't be that difficult.--Nydas 17:11, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Then, by all means, take it upon yourself to do so! — Preceding unsigned comment added by David Fuchs (talk • contribs)

There is a difference between a lack of content and a willful obstruction of it. What it sounds like you're saying is akin to complaining that most articles aren't FA-quality. Is there any evidence that there are sections of the sex articles which are hidden and require clicking a button? Or even just have warning signs? Please. Girolamo Savonarola 17:16, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

My point is that Misplaced Pages is not censored is a sporadically enforced policy. We don't use unsafe content tags because there is hardly any unsafe content. For example, indecent exposure has had its images removed. The claim about spoilers being a gateway to censorship of sex articles is a red herring because the censorship is already there.--Nydas 18:01, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

First of all, my claim had nothing to do with spoilers and sex articles directly - it had to do with the idea that if we hide content to cater to one group, why shouldn't the principle infect other sets of articles. Second, the idea that our policies are an all-or-nothing package in which they should either be obeyed with perfection or disregarded entirely is quite clearly a fallacy. Were our policies perfectly implemented at all times, we clearly would barely have need of the Misplaced Pages talk namespace. So let's not argue the matter on the basis of the existence of imperfection in the mechanism of enforcement; that's a logical fallacy. Girolamo Savonarola 18:34, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

The fallacy is that censorship has anything at all to do with spoiler notices. It does not.

Is a spoiler notice a form of censorship? Certainly not, because it does not stop someone from seeing or reading anything, it gives them a choice and does not control their access to the information.

Is Misplaced Pages censored? Certainly it is, even though the policy says it is not. Sexual pictures are removed, certain religious images are modifed or removed, information about living people is tightly controlled, legal threats are strictly forbidden on talkpages. Those are all forms of censorship. I'm not making a judgment about whether those limitations are a good idea or not, I'm just pointing out that they are applied regularly. Sometimes referring to a policy like "WP is not censored" can be a shorthand for something that is not truly understood or explored, resulting in a discussion being based on a faulty foundation.

Spoiler notices are not censorship. And, Misplaced Pages is censored anyway. Therefore: The idea of censorship is not a valid basis for contesting spoiler notices. Censorship should not be used in this discussion as a support for the position of prohibiting or even minimizing spoiler notices. --Parsifal _Hello 19:16, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the whole censorship issue is a red herring, because no one is arguing that the content should be removed. The issue is whether the user should be warned in advance about potentially objectionable content, when we don't have that type of warning for any other content.

The people who say Misplaced Pages is censored need to look up the definition of censorship. There are plenty of reasons why material is not present on Misplaced Pages—so many that I probably couldn't list them all. But censorship is not one of those reasons. Marc Shepherd 19:50, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

My point is if you are hiding the information, it is an obstruction to it being clearly available. Additonally, it can break the formatting in certain forms of browsing (such as some mobile phone platforms) and prevent any accessibility even with intention. And no, Misplaced Pages is NOT censored, nor should it be. The purpose of BLP is specifically to prevent libel, not fact-dissemination. I find it incredible that you are claiming otherwise. Just because a wiki exists does not mean that anyone can do anything to it. Does banning someone from uploading images of child pornography constitute censorship? Does deleting nonsense articles constitute censorship? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Girolamo Savonarola (talk • contribs)

This is, as Marc Shepherd noted, a red herring, but to put it to rest, I have to say that yes, both BLP and preventing child-porn are indeed forms of censorship. They just happen to be forms of censorship that I agree should be used, but they are censorship nonetheless. Deleting nonesense articles is different, that's just the community deciding that it's not interested in something, not censorship. The policy issues and the procedures are different than for BLP or child-porn, so that's a red herring of a red herring.

On the other hand, here is an element of this question that can bring it out of red-herringdom and back into spoiler-noticedom. I don't happen to agree with the censorship of sexual imagery that is not child-porn, and that does also occur on a regular basis on Misplaced Pages even though it's not policy. But that's a more complex question because it's different where only adults are reading the material, than if children are reading Misplaced Pages. I don't have a bright line to apply, so I would prefer to leave that to the parents of children using Misplaced Pages. To deal with that, I think it would be great to have a technical solution - ie, the ability to set the preferences of an account, using a parental password, to show or reveal certain elements that the Misplaced Pages local-article-editor consensus determines is material that should be available only to adults. This is similar to the hidden-spoiler-notice question, except it would be controlled by the parent, not by the reader themselves. The technology would be the same and could effectively protect young eyes from seeing things that only us jaded spoiler-talk-page editors should see. --Parsifal _Hello 03:30, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Parental controls are already an accepted feature of TV and other web media. Censorship as it does actually exist, should be in the home and under the control of users and parents to the extent possible. These are matters of balance, gray areas, imperfect solutions, and existing laws, but where there is an actual choice available in practice, users should decide for themselves. Right-wingers can choose to turn off all the body parts for themselves only, and I'll turn off all the things I don't want to see or read, but only for myself. If Misplaced Pages plans this customization in an organized way for everyone, it should preempt the right-wing's give-inch, take-mile tendencies.

I have already alluded to user optional spoiler hiding as being one of a class of user customizations for the 'next encyclopedia'; which fork may or may not be Misplaced Pages, depending on whether editors here stand in the way of what reasonable numbers of reasonable users want customized. Milo 04:02, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Template talk page

In case interested parties don't have the template talk page on their watchlist, an editor has added a comment here that already has a couple responses. --Parsifal _Hello 19:04, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

2nd RFAr rejection

I eagerly await the next venue - David Gerard 19:57, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, David, I know the truth! That you used your admin mooshoo to trick the weak-minded! ...Well, maybe people will let the perceived cabal to go to seed and concentrate on the guideline, if that is possible. David Fuchs 02:04, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I've been giving this some thought.

IIRC, two Arbcom members wanted to take the case. (Maybe more but Tony deleted the local record I created for this purpose.) Fred Bauder last time, and Raul654 this time, suggesting they thought there are editor conduct elements. Two more of Arbcom, Mackensen and FloNight said the community should decide policy issues.

If these Arbcom votes are combined to conceptualize mass spoilers removal as being half conduct and half policy issues and the community should decide, it suggests that the spoilers removal case should taken to the Community Noticeboard. Looking through the rules there, I think it's reasonable to formally submit the case as a request for a topic ban on all spoilers-related editing for the involved editors.

David, as I've said to you before, for me anyway, this isn't personal, it's a way to get a decision on whether six+ editors can turn Misplaced Pages 180 degrees on a dime. If the outcome is by default or decision that everyone can do this, many other editing cliques can concoct big plans for turning Misplaced Pages on many dimes. I think that's a unwise future, but if those are the decided rules I'll play by them. The key is that they need to be decided rules.

Hopefully, the Community Noticeboard will enact the spoiler topic ban on one or more of the clique, as decided because no one should do such mass removals. Hopefully, that will force Arbcom to take the case on appeal. Hopefully Arbcom will uphold the general decision that no one should do mass removals anymore, but lift the personal ban on you and the others, and ruling that you and the others should now follow the new rules along with everyone else.

If it works out like that, I think that would get the case decided, and also be personally fair to involved editors. Milo 03:08, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

The Community Noticeboard can't hand out bans, and thinking it could nearly got it MFDed last time. Your line of thought appears to be "we're making all this smoke, there must be someone who'll believe us saying there's a fire" - David Gerard 07:38, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

"a decision on whether six+ editors can turn Misplaced Pages 180 degrees on a dime." I can answer this one for you: no. What they can do is note that it is the right time for it to have done so. Note that this started from a nomination of Template:Spoiler for deletion altogether because it was clearly being used very badly indeed. Then, when you take it out of "Plot summary" sections where it's clearly stupidly redundant, there aren't a lot of examples of it left.

Consensus does change, but it's got to be at the right time. I suggested using {{unreferenced}} through 2004. Early 2005, anyone started accepting it as not a horrible idea. Even then people argued "it shouldn't go on articles, it'll make us look unfinished!" Now you can't get away from notes pointing out our precise failings. Because it was the right time. - David Gerard 12:33, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

"a decision on whether six+ editors can turn Misplaced Pages 180 degrees on a dime." ... "no. What they can do is note that it is the right time for it to have done so." That's a good defense, but it still needs to be ratified, along with related issues.

Also such changes need to be regulated because the changes you made proved to be unrevertible. I want to see consultation and enforceable limits set on the means, scope, and speed used to make unrevertible changes. For the aspect of powerful tools use like AWB, the analogy I use is to the U.S. Supreme Court 'speech plus' case, in which they decided that government could regulate the use of bullhorns at free speech demonstrations.

"The Community Noticeboard can't hand out bans" I'm referring to the Misplaced Pages:Community sanction noticeboard. Your experience of Misplaced Pages venues and procedures exceeds mine, yet you seem to have presumed a done deal where there remains an unresolved controversy: "a WP:CS{N} 'ban' is big medicine..." 14:49, 25 July 2007 Chairboy There are quote marks around 'ban' so maybe there is some technical distinction to which you are referring.

"and thinking it could nearly got it MFDed last time" That discussion is here but the result of the May 3, 2007 discussion was No consensus, and it is still functioning, doing whatever it does, which looks a lot like ban handing.

The main WP:CSN page contains a number of statements that can be interpreted for venue suitability either way along strict construction and broad interpretation lines. I select the following statements:

• "Requesting a ban against an editor is not a step to be taken lightly or without trying other means to resolve the situation first." A million-some bytes worth of trying is probably enough to qualify.
• "If it is judged that your case is not a straightforward case for a community restriction, you will be guided toward a more appropriate venue." Ok, let them guide.
• "Complex or ambiguous cases should go to dispute resolution." That's been completed. Two Arbcom members have now said the community must decide, so I see the Misplaced Pages:Community sanction noticeboard as having an Arbcom mandate if they choose to accept it.
• "community ban requests should be a last resort" Ok, it is. WP:CSN seems to be the only remaining pathway to get Arbcom to take the case on appeal. Milo 15:15, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Go ahead, Milo. Knock yourself out. Carry your grivance around for the rest of your days, if you'd like. But I am not expecting any different answer from the Community than you got from ArbCom. All the time spent looking in your rear-view mirror, is time not spent moving forward with any kind of new proposal. Marc Shepherd 15:51, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Knock yourself out - David Gerard 16:41, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Maybe it's the 'right time' for it?--Nydas 17:10, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

You know you want to complete the set - David Gerard 21:55, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

"Maybe it's the 'right time' for it?" If not now within weeks, then probably not at all. The spoiler mass removals case might be submitted to WP:CSN soon following August recess, but probably not past September.

There are three advantages to submitting the case even if it's not accepted:

• Pundits will later claim it should have been done, because of background things not presently obvious.
• It creates a precedent for asking WP:CSN to handle bigger issues that seem to need handling.
• It further publicizes the issues in a case where publicity is useful for past events and the future outcomes.

It's the next opportunity in a long campaign I originally estimated at one to two years. I estimated that time based on clique interference with the spoiler tag consensus process, and a personal sense of how slowly WP mass consensus emerges without a well-organized venue for the determination of consensus. My estimate could be wrong, but consider it a target estimate for others to improve on.

If this case isn't submitted or accepted at WP:CSN, it's probably time to wait — for this clique or their emboldened rivals to make some other controversial big WP change, or for Misplaced Pages to get caught up in "spoiler site" trashing. Either of these two possibilities could cause Jimbo to step in on his own, limiting all big changes in the first case, and requesting spoiler tag compromise in the second. And both could happen. Or neither. A lot depends on industry research into whether spoilers are a significant financial harm or just a nuisance.

Externally begins an 'other shoe drop' wait for big publishing/Hollywood to decide if the Deathly Hallows profits could have been even more record-breaking without interference from spoiler sites. Since there is no limit to organized greed, if the bigs conclude that spoilers are cutting profits, it's just a rate-of-return question as to how much could be expensed to cripple spoilers sites' ability to function.

"Carry your grievance around" I'm surprised by the amount of personal advice I've gotten recently. In return, I could offer you advice on how to manage a long-term public issues campaign; unfortunately, I have limited amount of time. Pay attention and who knows, you might pick up a few pointers. :)

"Knock yourself out" I'd like to help, but I'm soon scheduled for Wikivacation, so this decision will need to be made by others.

Milo 00:46, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

comment by Wedineinheck

I see no need in reading all of this rather long-winded debate : it is quite obvious that the spoilers question is extremely annoying to a lot of people. Why can't we reach a consensus and simply decide that a spoiler tag should be added to every page revealing crucial plot details and resolution ? It won't hurt anybody and it will appease the anti-spoilers. Moreover, I see absolutely no reason why an encyclopedia should be "expected" to reveal the endings of works of fiction. Wedineinheck 12:32, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

"I see no need in reading all of this rather long-winded debate" - see, that's your problem right there: not taking the time to distinguish a live issue from a thin film of horse cells on the asphalt - David Gerard 21:56, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

If you want to know why not, you will need to read some of the archives. In any case, it is quite unlikely we will return to a situation where every page that has plot details carries a spoiler tag. The remaining question is to delineate the set of circumstances in which the tag is appropriate. — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:27, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually, the spoiler tag is unnecessary when ending and crucial plot details aren't given away. Otherwise, not giving any warning to users is just plain rude. I've been using wikipedia for some time and find it quite odd that it shouldn't warn its readers anymore.Wedineinheck 17:16, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

If a section of an article about a fictional work is titled "Plot summary", is it necessary to warn people it contains details of the plot? --Mark H Wilkinson 17:31, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

To Wedineinheck: please read the archives. This argument has been argued ad nauseum. also see the wikipedia content disclaimer... as to digby: though some of course disagree, the general consensus is that spoilers were generally redundant in sections expressly labeled plot summary, etc. In fact, the vast majority of spoiler tags were used in such as sense until the RfC in May. David Fuchs 17:56, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

The mass removals were started two days into the discussion. There was no consensus.--Nydas 19:19, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Nydas, drop the mass removals for now. They do not factor into the fact that while people disagreed on whether spoilers should be had at all, or the usefulness, in several cases (fairy tales, plot sections) they were determined to be redundant. I know you and several other editors disagree about this, but I'm going with what was stated. David Fuchs 19:27, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm going by what actually happened. No consensus existed after two days of discussion, nothing was determined. That's why the nonsensical 'there is no significant resistance' line was adopted.--Nydas 20:06, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

No amount of debate can restore the articles to their condition prior to that discussion. Whether the correct process was followed or not, the mass-deletion of spoiler notices is history. It's over now. Finito. The choice is to move on, or to continue focusing on the rear-view mirror. Marc Shepherd 20:23, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

"No amount of debate can restore the articles to their condition prior to that discussion." And why is that so ?Wedineinheck 06:08, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

You can see for yourself that the backward-focused debate participants, like Milo and Nydas, are making no progress whatsoever. If you think the re-hashing the events of May will result in positive changes to Misplaced Pages, by all means continue to re-hash them. The "rear-view mirror" crowd has already made multiple attempts at obtaining "Wiki-sanctions," and failed at all of them. If you still think that's a fruitful strategy, there's nothing I can do to stop you. Go ahead. Knock yourself out.

In my view, the only conceivable way forward is to accept that the 45,000 edits are over with, and no one is going to adjudicate that they were improper. Right or wrong, it's a fact of history. We have a new baseline. The only debate that has a chance of progress is the debate about what the articles should look like, not the debate about how they got that way. Marc Shepherd 13:44, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Any proposal will be rejected out of hand by the anti-spoiler brigade. Even very tame ones, like spoiler tags on recent works not being removed on sight, are shot down.--Nydas 11:54, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I think Wedineinheck has actually hit the nail on the head. Wedineinheck believes that he or she is entitled to be warned (oooh, it's the W word, which is anti-dictionarial or something. I'll say hail Marys, really...) about plot spoilers. He or she is not even interested in considering any arguments to the contrary. Does this demand raise cultural bias issues? Screw 'em. Does it contradict existing wikipedia policies, however badly those policies might be enforced? Hey, them's the breaks. Not only is Wedineinheck unmoved by these concerns, Wedineinheck is not even interested in reading about these concerns. The pro-spoiler position is self-evidently true and righteous, and does not need to be discussed. Ethan Mitchell 22:07, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Much as the pro-fair-use-on-anything-that-looks-nice position is inarguable ... and for that one, the answer is "No." If that's the only answer in this case as well, oh well, so much for senses of entitlement - David Gerard 07:19, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

What 'cultural bias issues' and 'wikipedia policies'? We've had a senior admin stating that certain pages are fans-only and non-Americans should lump it, so WP:NPOV is being chucked out the window.--Nydas 11:54, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

You appear to have misunderstood somebody. Kusma (talk) 12:28, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Do a text search for 'Valen' on this page.--Nydas 14:40, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Let's have a guideline

Nydas, here's a radical thought: do you actually have any ideas about spoiler warnings? You have plenty of ideas about archiving, NPOV, censorship, "cabals," and edits that took place three months ago. But I have yet to see a proposal from you about the actual topic of this page. Do you have one? Marc Shepherd 12:33, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I advocate a guideline similar to WP:ENGVAR, stating when it's OK, and when it's not OK. That would take care of unrepresentative examples like fairy tales, the Crying Game etc, whilst leaving it up to editor discretion otherwise. If there's a consensus against spoiler tags, then they won't reappear. If (as I believe) most Wikipedians support them, then they'll return in some capacity.--Nydas 14:40, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

We already have a guideline on spoiler tags. This is it. Spoiler tags don't seem to be making a comeback. --Tony Sidaway 14:53, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Nydas, you're amazing. Seriously. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 15:06, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I thought that is what this guideline already does. I don't want to leave it entirely to the editor discretion as leads to too many NPOV issues as to what is a spoiler and what is not. I would support adding a set of objective criteria on how to determine when plot information is a spoiler and when a warning can be added, much like how we have the notability criteria. And if there are alternatives to using spoiler warnings, then those alternatives should be used first. But we shouldn't give editors a blank check on applying spoiler warnings.

In other words, no "I think this is a spoiler and there should be a warning" line of reasoning should be allowed to stand. EVER! --Farix (Talk) 15:24, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I made edits that said spoiler tags *might be* OK on recently released fiction, but those were reverted as being 'bright lines'.--Nydas 16:05, 10 August 2007 (UTC)