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Alternative to Wikia?

Someone mentioned Meta proposals above, and they had one for fiction in 2006. Here's an old demo, but we could do it way better. I think a non-profit fiction sister project could really help with the acrimony. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 01:25, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't see why not just have the one wiki for everything. Why complicate things by having spinoff wikis? Best, --A NobodyMy talk 01:31, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
To the point that detailed coverage of fiction to the level fans want would violate the free mission content (that is, the excessive descriptions of works of fiction usually are considered derivative works, and thus are burdened (but not prohibited) by copyright, but they are not free content either.) --MASEM 01:35, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
I've heard you say that before Masem. Where is this described? What if it isn't excessive? What is excessive? The non-free people don't mess around, and I think if an article of plot wasn't free enough, that would be the never debated reason to delete in AfDs. I'd really like to know. If we had a clear explanation, it could either be built into the sister projects guidelines, or I would no once and for all it won't work. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 01:45, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
A widely known example would be Harry Potter & the Copyright Infringement Lawsuit, and I cannot imagine how a non-profit fiction sister project describing intrinsic details of for-profit fiction would result in any less lawsuits. WP:WAF, WP:NOT#PLOT and promotion practices at WP:GAN and WP:FAC give you a rough idea for what's considered excessive. Previous attemps to put "excessiveness" into words failed, but most experienced editors have developed their own rules of thumb for non-excessiveness and know excessiveness when they see it. – sgeureka t•c 15:11, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Should we dig up the Mike Godwin quote? As I recall it, he was asked about the legal status of plot summaries and responded by pointing out the crucial detail that we're not receiving takedown notices. Saying that editors "know excessiveness when they see it" seriously scares me - are they judging what is and is not legally liable by their laymen's grasp of copyright? Wikimedia has an employee whose job it is to make expert decisions about these things, and he has yet to warn us. The legal status of Wikipedia's editor-created text should not be a factor until he does. --Kizor 22:54, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
As I recall it, and I was one of the people who asked Godwin and got a reply, he actually stated "From a legal standpoint, I see no reason for contributors to worry about coverage of fictional universes, so long as relevant provisions of copyright law, trademark law, etc., are followed." I don't see how anyone can argue that Godwin did not state that we have to remain within the law, and he certainly seems to have left it to editorial judgement to define how we do that because it doesn't at present merit his time because we aren't getting takedown notices. Hope that clarifies and perhaps corrects any misunderstandings. Hiding T 00:12, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Found it.] --Kizor 07:23, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Oh, and haven't seen you around for a bit. Hope you've been doing well. --Kizor 22:55, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Yea, we can't let that concern about copyright issues influence us, but we still need to worry about the free content mission and derivative works, which is outside the legal aspects and more philosophical. At some point, excessive plot summaries (as one would normally find in a fan site) will become significantly derivative works and no long free content, so we should make sure our summaries of works of fiction stay away from venturing there. That's why I don't think these would ever be a Foundation-funded project, because it will lose its openness to do such. --23:08, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Because the deletionist that took over wikipedia, don't like long or detailed articles, or side pages they don't see as absolutely necessary. Character pages are still allowed, for the moment, but weapons and equipment pages are not according to the rules. They still exist, but only for articles with enough editors around to defend them. Since the two types of editors, inclusionist and deletionist, will never agree on how things should be run, its best to just split into two groups. I suggest we do a general vote, to decide which group gets kicked off, and who can stay and reshape the wikipedia as they see fit. Dream Focus (talk) 01:39, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
There allowed so as long as we keep up the arguments in AfDs and rescue efforts. We don't have to be dictated to by anyone or permit others to ruin Wikipedia. Best, --A NobodyMy talk 01:44, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
This is something to discuss with the Foundation. You're not going to get any traction on such a project here. FWIW I don't see that the argument that the Foundation should underwrite something which is essentially "the bits which Wikipedia doesn't want" is going to be very effective. I don't see that Wikia's for-profit status is any real detraction; the content itself is still free content, and the adverts can be adblocked. Furthermore, it already does help with the acrominy - various whole WikiProjects (such as the 40K project, and a lot of people who moved from here to the various Star Wars wikis) thrive on external wiki sites now, in some cases largely because WP became a less hospitable host for in-universe content. What's left is the extremists, who won't be happy regardless. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:13, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

What does any of this have to do with the proposed guideline for notability of fictional subjects? Protonk (talk) 23:36, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

On episode articles

I apologize for my few days departure from this discussion. I wanted to get a bit of data. So I nudged up against the limits of the rules a bit, and used a sock I had about from an old experiment editing as a newb, and I nominated two articles for deletion. Both clearly failed WP:N. One, The Fusilli Jerry also clearly failed this proposal. The other, Colony in Space, was marginal but probably failed. The Fusilli Jerry is completely unsourced. Colony in Space is sourced entirely to BBC published or licensed material, and though it has a production section, none of the information is actually about this episode.

I nominated both for deletion: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Fusilli Jerry. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Colony in Space.

Both were kept. Overwhelmingly. One was speedy closed as a snowball with nobody saying to delete it. The other was kept with a single merge comment. These were not close votes that were swung by die-hard Seinfeld or Doctor Who fans. These were cases where absolutely nobody in practice actually thought the articles should be deleted.

In light of this, I do not think there is any justification for any policy that establishes any requirements above real-world perspective for episode articles. It is clear that the "That would allow articles on every episode of every series" argument is bunk. There is clearly not a serious opposition to episode articles - even ones that flagrantly and thoroughly violate our policies.

As it stands, actually, this policy is clearly significantly stricter than actual AfD practice. It should not be tightened any more, and in fact should probably be loosened via the second prong being situated where it was originally intended - giving automatic passes to episodes and major characters. Phil Sandifer (talk) 02:39, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

AfD is a crapshoot at the best of times; the Fusilli Jerry's nom in particular doesn't appear to have attracted very much attention outwith the usual suspects, and the Colony in Space nom looks doomed to fail because it's actually notable (although again, that the nom's comments appear to all be from either Doctor Who fans or the usual suspects is telling). I would not describe this as a particularly rigorous bit of science. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:36, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I could be more rigorous, but I wanted to avoid disruption. Two AfDs seemed like the right level to accomplish that. And had they been close, that would be one thing. But both of these were blowout keeps. Phil Sandifer (talk) 14:35, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I would not describe an AfD with four replies, three of which are from editors generally regarded as having considerably more lenience towards articles on fictional content than the project as a whole, as a "blowout keep". Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:02, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
It does get rather easier for you if you dismiss all editors who voted to keep as more lenient than the project as a whole, yes. But notably, of the three keep votes, only DGG was someone who has even weighed in on this process. On Colony in Space, two of the 8 keeps were from people who have commented on the proposal. It's not as though there's a cadre of inclusionists hijacking and skewing every discussion. Not only was the RfC more inclined to say that a looser guideline is appropriate, a more or less wholly separate group of editors showed up on AfD. And notably, even if we widen the second prong to automatically pass episodes and characters, the third prong would still take out both articles. So even the widening in question - automatic passing of the second prong for episodes and major characters - still leaves us significantly stricter than AfD. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:14, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Given that the three editors who !voted keep on the first AfD all !voted keep on the second, I'm having difficulty with your assertion that "a more or less wholly separate group of editors" were involved in it. The hypothesis that "there's a cadre of inclusionists hijacking and skewing every discussion" is mostly nullified by the average admin paying little attention to the expected keeps from Wikipedia's career inclusionists, rather than by their not participating. I'm not actually debating any issue here other than that the examples here are not what I would consider to be a rock-solid indictment of the current guideline. The second isn't really an "episode" and the first is somewhat less SNOWy than the 75% keep/delete ratio would suggest when one actually looks at who commented. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:59, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I meant separate from the policy discussion. I expect two AfDs on episodes listed consecutively on AfD to have some overlap in comments. And I'm really skeptical of the idea that there are editors who are discounted as a matter of habit on AfD. Phil Sandifer (talk) 16:07, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
You can feel free to try the RFC process again giving an automatic pass to episodes and any character the article writer deems "major" if you want, Phil. I can virtually guarantee failure. With the language we actually had, we came within hair's breadth of consensus, and if people had focused on tightening the language instead of changing the meaning of the prongs, we could have gotten there.—Kww(talk) 15:27, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
You seem to be ignoring the fact that many of us - myself included - voiced support for a proposal that we viewed as giving a pass on the second prong to episodes and characters. I, at least, would oppose your version - especially after this little experiment, which leaves me thinking that the proposal is already a significant tightening of the rules from the status quo. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:33, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm not ignoring it ... I'm literally bewildered by it. A group of people have stated that they voted for something because it said something that it did not. I have no way of judging how large that group is, and the only approach I can think of is to discount votes from people that explicitly said they had that misapprehension, the same way we would discard votes from people that saw it as requiring that elements surpass the GNG, or other similar misapprehensions.—Kww(talk) 15:41, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, it's more problematic, though, when the language in question was explicitly and documentably written to give episodes and major characters a pass. I mean, you're a bit far through the looking glass when you're arguing for discounting the votes of the primary authors of a proposal on the grounds that they don't understand the proposal. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:46, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
I simply argue that the words didn't match the meaning you ascribe to them. I grant that it is far more likely to mean that you didn't write what you meant. Doesn't change the basic fact that the prong, as written, allowed articles on those episodes that were central to understanding the work, not all episodes, and any attempt to expand its scope to include all episodes is too substantial of an expansion to be done under the guise of "clarification".—Kww(talk) 16:18, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Kww, you have to get over this. The belief they had was in good faith. Sometimes it's possible that wording is so vague as to make two interpretations possible. In which case, people were actually !voting on two different proposals. It's unfortunate for consensus building, but you need to stop blaming people for "misinterpreting", when they could just as easily lodge the same criticism at you but don't. We're not here to argue about who is right. We're here to come up with something fair to all sides. As long as editors continue to insist that "it doesn't matter what you think, because I'm right", we're not going to have a consensus, and we're not going to have a guideline. Randomran (talk) 16:54, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Feel free to change the meaning and redo the RFC ... that's fair. Feel free to clarify the wording without changing the meaning and not rerun the RFC. That's fair, too. But don't feel free to change the meaning and call it clarification. These three sentences are different:
  1. The element should be an episode or recurring character that is central to understanding the fictional work.
  2. The element should be an episode or a recurring character that is central to understanding the fictional work.
  3. The element should be an episode, or a recurring character that is central to understanding the fictional work.
If the sentence had been number 2, I'd buy that the sentence was ambiguous. If it was number 3, I'd agree that episodes were excluded from the test. But it was number 1: different in both punctuation and grammar from number 3, and hence different in meaning. I'm not arguing that people didn't act in good faith, and mistakenly write the wrong sentence. I'm simply arguing the difference in meaning is too substantive to change under the guise of clarification.—Kww(talk) 17:08, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
  • We're no longer communicating. *Shrug* I tried. The best I can say is to read what I wrote again. Randomran (talk) 17:23, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

—

  • I'm sincerely trying. I've read it multiple times. The best I can see, you are arguing that the meaning of the words is irrelevant: so long as any group of people disagree on its meaning, people are free to change it under the guise of "clarification", even if that changes its meaning. I think that's a very difficult stance to justify ... if the meaning is changed, the results of the RFC are invalidated, regardless of which prong you change to what, and whether you make it tighter or looser. I don't care much for the language that is there right now, because it has a different meaning than the original. I don't care for Phil's proposed change, because it has a different meaning than the original. If somebody went and added third-party sourcing to the second prong based on their personal understanding of "verifiability", that would be wrong, too, because that would be a different meaning. I'm standing on a very basic principle: you can't change the meaning of a proposition after the vote.—Kww(talk) 18:06, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I'm not talking about who is or isn't free to change the meaning, let alone under the guise of clarification. I'm trying to explain to you that we thought we had an agreement, and it turns out we didn't. That's everyone's fault, for agreeing to a wording that didn't actually document what both sides wanted. The fact that you think the wording is closer to what you wanted than what your critics wanted is irrelevant, because even if you're 100% right or 100% wrong it still means there was no consensus. The RFC can't be invalidated. If it were a vote, you'd be right that it's impossible to know what the heck everyone meant. But an RFC is just a series of comments that we use as a basis for further edits. That's WP:BRD. So yes, you're right that we don't have a consensus, that much is obvious. Can we start to focus on how we build a consensus now? Randomran (talk) 18:13, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
  • If I could get a clear statement from the main people debating this topic, specifically including Phil, that there is no consensus, I'd stop complaining. What I worry about is changing the wording and then pointing at the RFC as support.—Kww(talk) 18:17, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I don't think anyone reasonably believes we have a consensus now. But I sympathize, and hopefully others can chime in and agree to disagree. That said, I also don't think it's time to stick a fork in this proposal until we've brainstormed some ideas to reach out to moderate inclusionists, moderate deletionists, or anti-WP:CREEPs. Randomran (talk) 18:30, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Policy is what is effective as policy. The Wikipedia policy pages are usually out of phase with the current run of consensus at afd; this is because AfDs must reach a decision, or at least a declared no-decision, which establishing any change in policy means a supermajority (however achieved--sometimes by outlasting a group of dissidents unreasonably objecting the process, sometimes by outlasting a considerable group with reasonable objections). I've much more than this page in mind--I'm thinking of the MOS also, or WP:SCHOOLS or WP:MALLS, where there is an almost complete practical consensus at AfD but not at the guideline page. It becomes a test of endurance. There nearest thing to reasonable change is new people joining, who evaluate the existing situation and think for themselves what seems reasonable. In this case, the discrepancy emphasizes once more the need for a compromise.
Personally, I only support doing separate article as a routine method because otherwise the content shrinks. If we established a standard that episode sections were required to include the full plot of the episode in reasonable but not excessive detail, I would support merge as a default. At present, I do not, because those who wish to diminish content on fiction wish to diminish it wherever it is, and separate articles are the practical defense to keep Wikipedia encyclopedic. DGG (talk) 17:06, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

The Policy doesn't adequately address the Double Standards on Wikipedia

After trying to read this page, i'm still left with a major question: How can stuff like South Park, Star Trek, Dexter, etc. etc. can get away with huge amounts of episode articles on Wikipedia, yet the rest of TV land must make do with episode lists? I can see certain episodes meriting their own articles (The intro of the Mirror Universe in Star Trek via Mirror Mirror, the controversy with Scientology and South Parks Trapped in the Closet episode), but most of them don't, to me, seem memorible. In fact, some of the articles looks to me like they try to skirt Wikipedia:Verifiability by trying to rework sources to make the episode seem to be significant (I've noticed South Park Episodes has violated this rule numerous times in some episodes by both using TV reviews and previous episodes to make the episode seem to be significant), or can be done by another article (All the Treehouse of Horror episodes from The Simpsons could find nicely in the "main" article instead of being "lengthy thesis papers" with dodgy claims)

It kinda boils down to this: Whats stopping me from making individual episode articles of Top Gear or Detective Conan which have big fanbases around the world, when I can point out and argue that South Park and Star Trek have their own episode articles for the vast majority of their episodes with filmsy a/or no references? --293.xx.xxx.xx (talk) 20:34, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

It depends on the shows fan base, and the existance of sources discussing the episodes. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 20:51, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Another substantial factor is the unwillingness of admins to ignore WP:ILIKEIT votes at AFD. The shows you name are serious problems, but that problem can't be erased by a guideline ... it will require better judgement and a bit of a stiffer spine on the part of closing admins.—Kww(talk) 21:05, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
So long as you can add references to articles on those episodes, there is no reason why we wouldn't cover them. Best, --A NobodyMy talk 21:08, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
You need a fairly substantial cleanup project with dedicated editors to get a group of articles up to a good quality. The Final Fantasy Project is resoundingly successful in this regard. Nifboy (talk) 21:23, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
Agreed. The double standard isn't legislated, but part of the culture. So it has nothing to do with FICT. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 22:48, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
There is effectively a double standard because only the fewest editors have the guts and patience to put up with the harrassment and claims of abuse that a certain editor got for trying to remove that double standard. What seems to work though is to keep picking the low fruits in the hope to reach the big franchises one day, and/or to come to a peaceful agreement with fellow experienced fans that one quality main article containing all the info is worth more than ten abandoned crappy subarticles, and hope that other fan editors will follow your lead. I am amazed how well the second approach works for video game articles, but television articles are still struggling massively (the voluntary merge work on e.g. the Smallville and Stargate articles didn't seem to inspire (m)any people). – sgeureka t•c 00:52, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
Improving articles seems to give one much more clout, like in the Smallville articles, and not in TTN's case. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 01:00, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
The Star Trek eps definitely have possible sources out there for improving them (the DVD commentaries, StarTrek.com production info for some of them, and whole books such as the Deep Space Nine Companion,) it's just no one is improving them and they sit as plot summaries; even Memory Alpha has better coverage on 90% of Star Trek articles (I'm mostly busy on the films). On one hand, I'd be happy to merge everything to lists, but it's time-consuming and I'm loathe to go hacking because I'm not sure which can merit expansion and which can't. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 01:45, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
It doesn't take guts to pick low fruit Sgeureka. If you had guts, you *would* be going after the big franchises like The Simpsons. And why does it matter if the information is on one page or ten? Have you considered the possibility that the merge work on Smallville and Stargate doesn't inspire people because they don't see it as an improvement? Your work on Stargate has been described as "death by a thousand cuts." Episode articles have over seven years of precedent behind them, which is why it's a struggle for you when you try and get rid of them. --Pixelface (talk) 03:30, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Try picking the high fruit first since most of the low fruit are done by new editors whom we should be welcoming, not pushing away with tons of edit warnings.じんない 03:34, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
To get an answer for your question, you'll have to ask the people who are enforcing episode lists. It's their double standard, not Wikipedia's. Episode articles have over seven years of precedent behind them. Most information in episode articles can be verified from the episode.
What's stopping you from making individual articles for episodes of Top Gear? Mostly because it's a non-fiction show. Since that TV series is not fiction, this proposal would never apply to it. Personally I think episode lists are fine for most non-fiction shows. It looks like people have gone the LOE/season route with Top Gear.
What's stopping you from making individual articles for episodes of Detective Conan aka Case Closed? They're already made. It looks like Case Closed *did* have episode articles, but an editor named TheFarix redirected them all because of WP:NOT#PLOT (which is disputed) and WP:NOR (but it's not original research to summarize a TV episode). That show now has a LOE and season articles. A lot of that comes from WikiProject Anime and Manga. You can complain to them, but don't expect them to listen. They may act like they own those articles, but they don't. --Pixelface (talk) 04:36, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
There's a difference between a concise plot summary balanced with real-world detail, its an entirely different thing to have minute-by-minute plot summaries. I'm not exactly familiar with those particular articles but in my experience TheFarix has been very open and fair, not at all like you described. Your comments seem to be bordering on incivility. --Kraftlos (Talk | Contrib) 11:22, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
You're right, there is a difference. There's also a difference between one-or-two sentence plot summaries in episodes lists and plot summaries in episode articles. If you look at the contribution range I linked to, I merely described what TheFarix did and said. I don't know why you think my comments are bordering on incivility. This and This by ThuranX is incivility. This by Randomran is incivility. Saying that members of WP:ANIME tend to favor episode lists and season pages is not uncivil. And saying WikiProjects tend to have ownership issues is also not uncivil. --Pixelface (talk) 12:38, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree that those comments are uncivil (I think the one from randomran was needed (the conversation was descending into childish bickering). Still, singling him out, claiming that farix thinks he owns the pages. The pages that were redirected because of WP:PLOT are an appropriate application of existing policy and one does not need permission to be WP:BOLD in editing, being bold is not the same as claiming ownership. --Kraftlos (Talk | Contrib) 18:30, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
Ooh, glad I can help as an example. LOE are fine for most episodes, fiction or not. Episode articles should only br broken out of the LOE when there's coverage by reliable independent sources; a feat South Park achieves with (once) surprising regularity, as a result of the fast production of new episodes to permit them to be timely. ThuranX (talk) 20:29, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
Individual episode articles have over seven years of precedent. It's only recently that people have thought that the choice was LOEs vs episode articles. It's not. As that link shows, it was LOEs in addition to episode articles. Frankly I don't know where the idea that "episode articles should only be broken out of the list of episodes when there's coverage by reliable independent sources" comes from. Perhaps the "episode review" process. But Ckatz said about that: "I honestly don't think it accurately represents a community-wide perspective, and as such it isn't fair to describe it as a consensus." And if WikiProject Anime and Manga prefers LOEs over episode articles, that's their decision, not Wikipedia's. It's schizophrenic to say that a television program is notable yet the episodes are not. The episodes are the program. The program is nothing but episodes. --Pixelface (talk) 07:43, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
When I said "They may act like they own those articles", I was referring to WikiProject Anime and Manga, not TheFarix. I don't even know if TheFarix is a member. And WP:NOT#PLOT does not have consensus to be policy. And it never did. I was answering 293.xx.xxx.xxx's question about what's stopping him from creating individual episode articles for Detective Conan. They already exist. You're right, being bold is not the same thing as ownership, but try unredirecting those articles and see what happens. --Pixelface (talk) 07:43, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

This isn't our purview. NOTHING will "fix" this. If it is even a problem. I could just as well complain that Theoretical computer science suffers from chronic underparticipation while Shakespeare has plenty of editors willing to make and improve articles. That is fundamentally driven by the fan base for the content and the proportion of that fan base which edits wikipedia. No magic wand will make Photon as popular as Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, and no policy should force both over the same Procrustean bed in order to produce a seemingly more equal distribution. Some shows don't have a lot of viewers. That sucks. Oh well. They probably will have crappy wikipedia pages--forever. Some shows have bajillions of viewers. They will have the editing muscle to fill 24+ templates with articles. They also have enough people watchlisting them that deletion/redirection isn't a viable option. This is just part of the community. The best solution is to attempt to be fair to the under-subscribed topics. Protonk (talk) 23:34, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

This proposed guideline is useless instruction creep

I appreciate the attempt to come to a compromise, but as such, this proposed guideline is completely useless instruction creep. Here is an AfD, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Individual Space Ghost: Coast to Coast episodes, which uses this proposed guideline as a reason to delete 6 episodes, at least one of which quite clearly passes the GNG by being covered in several independent reliable sources which are cited in the article. So instead of giving us a guideline allowing us to argue to keep articles where GNG isn't clearly passed (as the proposal's more inclusionist sponsors would have us believe), it gives a new reason to nominate articles for deletion and to completely ignore the GNG, despite the guildeline's wording. And as written, it doesn't give us anything that is any less vague than the GNG itself. Almost anyone who would argue that something doesn't meet the GNG will argue that it doesn't meet this guideline either, as they only need to pick "one" of the three prongs to wikilawyer over. We already, under the GNG, bicker about whether sources are "reliable" enough, whether sources are "independent" enough, and whether the coverage is "significant" enough. All this guideline does is give us new things to bicker about, whether the work is "important" enough, whether the role of the element is "significant" enough, and whether the coverage in secondary sources is "real-world" enough. It won't change the opinion of any inclusionists or deletionists, and those who fall into neither camp will just be left wondering why all these vague "prongs" are worth arguing about.

Rather than introducing more and more vague rules which no one will ever agree on how to interpret (just look at the variety of interpretations just in this talk page alone!), we should be coming up with simple, bright-line rules, like nearly every other subject-specific notability guideline does, that we can agree on and can use when the GNG is not so clear, as is often the case in matters fictional. Rules like "if a majority of episodes of a series pass the GNG, then all episodes of that series are presumed to be notable." Or "if an actor was nominated for a significant award (e.g. Oscar, Emmy, Golden Globe) for portraying a certain fictional character, then that character is presumed notable." Or "if a character or other element significantly appears in multiple, independent, notable works, it is presumed notable." I'm not saying those are necessarily the rules which will gain consensus, but that is the format we should be going for for a fiction notability guideline. If we are going to argue about things, lets at least argue about things that are easier to determine than the GNG, not harder. DHowell (talk) 01:48, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

I saw that AFD, and that, to me, implies more a problem with the AFD process in that, because the only reason you should send an article to AFD, by its current invocation, is if you believe the content needs to be delete (not redirected or merged, but outright deleted). Yet, trying to bring merge/redirection discussions up on article pages (the only major place to talk about them) usually leads to a strong number of "i like it" keeps, despite if the article fails a guideline. As long as it's agreed there need to be notability guidelines, there needs to be a way to challenge an article's notability but at the same time, discuss merging at a larger body of people. But starting an "x for discussion" process seems to be more "process" that people want. It's a catch 22.
As to people ignoring the GNG over this FICT (and in fact, using this FICT now as a reason to delete) is just wrong. The GNG alone is sufficient to show notability. --MASEM 02:20, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Here's another AfD, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Brooke Freeman (character), where FICT was used as a reason to delete, and was ultimately useless because the issue was decided by the GNG. Yes, there is a problem with the AfD process, but this guideline does nothing to help with that. Yes "I like it" may dominate merge discussions on talk pages, but this guideline does nothing to help with that. We have a "merges for discussion" process, it is Proposed mergers. If that process is inadequate, then we should be figuring out what to do to improve it. But I see no evidence that "The proposed instructions truly solve this problem (as opposed to treating symptoms or making symbolic gestures)" and plenty of evidence that they have "undesirable side effects (such as false positives, overcomplexity, or unnecessary prohibitions)". This proposal fits the very definition of instruction creep. The only thing that most of here agree on is that "There is a good indication of an actual problem (as opposed to a hypothetical or a perceived problem)". The problem is none of us seem to quite agree what the actual problem is. Actually there are multiple problems, but they all culminate in the fact that we are spending far too much time debating the notability of fictional topics. This proposal will do nothing to reduce or resolve those debates, and will likely increase it. Can you show me any evidence that this guideline, or anything similar to it, actually helped resolve a debate that was not resolvable by existing guidelines and policies? DHowell (talk) 04:35, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
Because FICT has not been a guideline for close to two years now, it's hard to point to any specific recent example where FICT helped to resolve the issue. Does that mean it is necessarily creep? Not really. There is an issue with fictional elements that has to be resolved; I'm sure ArbCom doesn't want to see Eps & Char #4 pass their door again. Adding a guideline that helps to allow better coverage of fiction than what the GNG can offer is a step to end the constant edit war. Mind you, you're probably right that AFD sorts fiction elements out, but its on the whims of what the closing editor states. I'd rather see something more concrete in place for fiction elements than what we have now. --MASEM 04:49, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
"It's hard to point to any specific recent example where FICT helped to resolve the issue." Yet I've already pointed to specfic recent examples where it DIDN'T help resolve the issue. Add Phil Sandifer's "experiments" above and that is at least four concrete examples of this proposed guideline failing to resolve anything. Adopt this flawed "three-prong test" as a guideline and I can almost assure you there will be another ArbCom case. There is absolutely no evidence that this proposed guideline, or anything similar to it, will "help to allow better coverage of fiction than what the GNG can offer" or will be a "step to end the constant edit war". I can understand you and others have put a lot of work into this (and perhaps you can relate to the frustration felt by numerous editors when their hard work is callously tossed into the trash as "fancruft"). But unfortunately from what I can see, this proposal is not something "more concrete in place for fiction elements than what we have now". DHowell (talk) 03:40, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
DHowell, you may be interested in this survey I've been working on. Please edit it or leave comments on its talk page if you would like. --Pixelface (talk) 04:57, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
FICT isn't going to be able to solve any issue if it's not a guideline. If you point to any application of it at AfD it's useless as people are just going to toss it out as an unenforceable essay. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 04:48, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Few are uncomfortable with WP:V, WP:FIVEPILLARS, and WP:RS. But what do you say when looking at WP:NOR, especially WP:PSTS? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:48, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Historically, even Britannica had articles based entirely on primary sources. Published primary sources (a strategy guide, for example) should be sufficient for spinoff lists of characters or weapons. I don't support us having article based on primary sources that try to make some kind of argument, however. But again, all of these things are covered by something other than the subjective and elitist term of "notability." Once we move beyond this no starter term, then we can have a real compromise over objective inclusion criteria. Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 07:53, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
The comparison you make with Britannica is entirely misleading. The editors of Britannica and other published encyclopedias decide what topics are allowed based on their personal opinions; contributors write their articles based on original research. Compared with Wikipedia, Britiannica is actually much more "subjective and elitist" because it edited and written by a small panel of self-appointed experts. The reason why we have notability as an inclusion criteria is that is a much more democratic in the sense that anyone (including non-experts) can create a stand-alone article, provided they adhere to a set of transparent rules based on objective evidence (i.e. the citation of reliable secondary sources).
We can't use the same inculusion criteria that Britannica uses, because it won't work for where the editors set rules, because in the paper-beats-rock-beats-scissors world of editorial disputes, the relative validity of personal opinions can only be resolved via objective evidence. Notability is not a set of vague or pointless inclusion criteria that can be bent or broken at a push of a deletion button; many proposals have been put forward to relplace or abolishish notability, but a better alternative has yet to be found for an encylopedia to which anyone can contribute, even if they are not experts. --Gavin Collins (talk) 09:11, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
I agree that we should not use the same inclusion criteria as Britannica, because we are a paperless combination general and specialized encyclopedias, almanacs, and gazetteers per our First Pillar. "Notability" is an elitist and subjective hindrance that is indeed trumped by much better guidelines and policies: WP:V, WP:RS, WP:FIVE, etc. Why not just have a page called "WP:Inclusion guidelines" that says, "In order to be included on Wikipedia, the content of our articles must be verifiable through reliable sources and be consistent with the kind of content found in general encyclopedias, specialized encyclopedias, almanacs, or gazetteers. Verifiable content that cannot realistically grow beyond stub class may be merged and/or redirected per WP:PRESERVE. Copyright violations, hoaxes, and libel will be removed and/or deleted." Something nice and simple that is objective and links directly to the other inclusion guidelines and policies. We should make these things as clear and to the point as possible in the interest of userfriendliness. If this somehow means that certain articles some editors who frequent AfDs don't like get kept, so what? As long as it is relevant to another segment of our community and meets the criteria in the above sentence, then I am far more concerned about including knowledge then not just because a fraction of the editors or our critics don't care about or subjectively see as unimportant. There is no such thing as unimportant knowledge. And some knowledge is more important than others sounds a lot like four legs good, two legs better. If we cut the subjective sticking point word of "notability," is what I wrote in quotations above really that far removed from what editors reasonably want? Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 17:50, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
  • You say that there is no such thing as as unimportant knowledge, but what is important to you might be unimportant to other editors, i.e. the topic might fail WP:NOT. In order to resolve this difference of opinion, we look to reliable secondary sources to provide objective evidence that a topic is important enough for inclusion in Wikipedia as a standalone article. If you accept that inclusion should be based on objective evidence (which I think you do), then I think you have to accept that reliable secondary sources has to be that evidence because anything less is not reliable or is not independent. Verification that a topic exists (e.g. an entry in a glossary) is not enough evidence that you can write an article, as you need commentary or criticism, context, and analysis from reliable secondary sources in order to provide encyclopedic coverage of that topic. --Gavin Collins (talk) 12:26, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
Sure. We rely on whether there are secondary sources to show notability, except when we don't. The many places where we don't want to are enumerated in NOT, and the analogous BLP criterion of what we don;t want an article on. We could equally well have a policy page, perhaps called BUT: the following things are important enough for an encyclopedia:..... The encyclopedia can be what we want it to be. The chance of sourcing is only roughly correlated with notability. But i would say that the matter of notability has any relation at all to whether an article should be separate or a section--it's a matter of verifiable material, style, and convenience for the readers and writers. Once the overall subject is notable, then I think the N guideline should not apply at all--we should never have used it for that purpose. DGG (talk) 23:28, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
I think that is the key determinant here. Whether we think there is a reasonable expectation that a separate spinout article could become a full-fledged article with about the same level of comprehensiveness as the primary one, which includes information beyond in-universe information and trivial real-world information.じんない 00:01, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I don't think DGG's views don't fit in with writing encyclopedic articles at all. You still need inclusion criteria for standalone articles and for the sections within them. Notability is inclusion criteria for a topic, and the focus of the topic is the inclusion criteria for sections within an article. The idea that you can spinoff articles without inclusion criteria is based on the mistaken view that every sub-topic is notable, but without objective evidence, notability cannot be inherited. It seems to me that when it comes to notability, the opponents of this guideline have learnt nothing nor do they remember anything. --Gavin Collins (talk) 19:56, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Perspective

The 48 archives of this page add up to roughly 13,000kb of data with the average archive being about 250kb in size. Your average deleted fiction article is less than 20kb. This giant, unending and totally unproductive discussion is about the same size 600-700 decently sized articles.

So there you have it. Through Wikipedia's confounding methods the readers of the site have lost an enormous variety of information on an array of fictional works and has gained a mind-numbing and completely useless tower of babble that they'll probably never see, let alone read. Good job, Wikipedia. Good job. - Norse Am Legend (talk) 17:43, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

This isn't a productive thread. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 19:54, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It is not supposed to be as Norse Am Legend is trying to make some sort of point. --Gavin Collins (talk) 19:59, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
It's a valid point, though. We're spending reams of time trying to address the narrow objections of one or two people, when we have a straw poll that shows that the language we had weeks ago is on the strict side of acceptable, and when we have in-the-field evidence that the proposal is probably a good deal stricter than AfD is in practice.
But because we're willing to allow the fringe perspectives to bully the mainstream, we're doing nothing. Which is absurd. Phil Sandifer (talk) 20:27, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
The commentary from my bros Chris and Gavin have thoroughly... irked me. To start, the concept of calling this thread "unproductive" makes my stomach churn a bit. Hundreds of completely redundant discussions have taken place on this talk page and the ultimate outcome of all of it is a still argued guideline(not even the guideline itself most of the time, but the wording.) that applies to less than half of the fiction-related articles on the site. Unproductive in context to what? Certainly not anything going on here, because that was the point: to comment on how counterproductive Wikipedia's methods are. Nextly, speaking of "points" (Gavin broski), I don't believe the things I've said here are disrupting anything important that hasn't happened at least a dozen times prior. I mean, look at the discussion below this one: "Moving forward". I think that's been said so many times you guys could've transversed the globe on foot by now. - Norse Am Legend (talk) 22:18, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Yes, welcome to the business of policy making. Nifboy (talk) 22:59, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Moving forward

I've changed the second prong to reflect the intent of the compromise on it prior to the RFC. I recognize that this is controversial. But, well, we've got to do something. I made this proposal initially, and if we're all going to sit around and be timid, I'll make the change in my capacity as the proposer. Those who find it a dealbreaker and who oppose the proposal on those grounds are welcome to do so.

That said, there is not support for the deletion of episode and character articles based on WP:N. I can demonstrate lack of community support for that position. This proposal represents a middle of the road position - one that still removes a large swath of poor articles, but moves away from an overly strict deletionist position that does not enjoy consensus.

For my part, I see an RFC that ran substantially more towards concern that the guideline was too strict than the other way around. I see substantial opposition to notability in general. And I see substantial evidence that even with this change the proposal is significantly stricter than AfD. So for me, this is a firm line. This is the absolute strictest I am willing to accept. Anything that makes it stricter than this version I will oppose. And I suspect that view is representative of a non-trivial segment of the editor base.

To be blunt, I see essentially two options here.

  1. Accept the compromise as a usable middle position between the two extremes.
  2. Fight it out, in which case this goes back to the arbcom.

I think there is more support for position #1 than #2, and think that we should tag the proposal a guideline in that spirit.

I furthermore oppose further "votes" on this matter. We have significant community input. We can and have shaped the proposal to reflect that community input. It either works or it doesn't at this point. More input is a delay tactic, and a clear vote for option #2 above.

In its current form, this is as close a reflection of community consensus as is possible, and should be tagged as such. Phil Sandifer (talk) 20:27, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Not with an exemption for episodes from the importance test. I've tried my best to work with you on this, but you know that point is a deal-breaker. If you really want to send it back to arbcom, fine. Or, you can leave it alone, and have me nervously on board. But claiming consensus after making such a massive modification? No.—Kww(talk) 20:40, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Fine. It breaks the deal then. You have the minority position here. The coalition loses less support forcing you out than forcing inclusionists out. You want to fight it more, fine. I'll widen the tent more by ditching the independent sourcing requirement - something put in to appease you and basically you alone. You have nothing whatsoever to stand on here. Your position has repeatedly failed to be borne out on AfD, through and through. I went actively looking for evidence of your position on AfD. It wasn't there. Phil Sandifer (talk) 20:56, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Forget that, Phil, you're adding in language ex post facto. It doesn't matter what you "meant" to say, It wasn't in the version ratified before the RfC. It's dirty pool and you know it. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 20:43, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
No, dirty pool is capitalizing on a poor bit of phrasing to ram through approval of a proposal that is demonstrably stricter than community practice. If you want to derail the proposal with that tactic, fine. Mark the proposal failed, and we'll go from there.
But to be perfectly, 100% blunt, the position you're holding - that episodes and characters require sources to prove significance to be included - does not enjoy the support of the community, nor of a majority of the people who spent time crafting this guideline. You have no moral high ground on that one. The proposal fails with the second prong as you want it. It fails. Outright. If you say it fails the other way, fine.
That said, if you take that route, this turns back into a battleground issue. Because clearly one side - yours - is unwilling to compromise. This proposal is demonstrably stricter than community practice, and I can show that. Saying "it's not strict enough" is, frankly, tendentious and disruptive, and I will act accordingly if that's the playbook you're going to work from. Phil Sandifer (talk) 20:56, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
No one is capitalizing on a "poor bit of phrasing" ... the language clearly demanded that episodes and characters be central to the work. Whether that required sourcing is a bit tenuous, and if you wanted to argue that, I think that could be argued in good faith. But removing the lead sentence that required that the episode be central to the work? That's a non-starter.—Kww(talk) 21:02, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
The phrasing was added by Randomran here: [1]. Randomran has said that he did not intend for the interpretation you are ascribing. That complicates your position rather significantly. You can go with "the language said" all you want, but when the author of the language explicitly did not intend it to say that, it's a problem. And pointing out that problem is not bad faith. Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:14, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Pointing out that a mistake was made certainly isn't bad faith. Attempting to ignore the consequences is.—Kww(talk) 21:19, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
The consequences are that it renders the RFC one step harder to read. I accept that. But the overwhelming evidence is that the community is wildly more tolerant of fiction articles than your preferred position, and significantly more tolerant than the proposal in its current form. I mean, as I said, I tried to nominate two completely trivial episodes of Seinfeld and Doctor Who - as unremarkable and unimportant episodes as can be, frankly. Not a single vote to delete either one. Not "kept in close AfDs where fans swung the vote," but "no support whatsoever for deletion." That, combined with the lack of any affirmative evidence that an article with real-world perspective would be deleted, combined with the ongoing controversy about notability, and combined with the long-standing history of including such articles, makes it clear that the deletionist position is deeply untenable. I am genuinely having trouble seeing what possible argument for a policy stricter than the current proposal has going for it beyond "but I really want to delete fiction articles." Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:27, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Two case studies is all you have to back up your sweeping statement? That's laughable. Phil, admit that you have ownership issues with this guideline. You're treating it like your baby, with all this "as the nominator" and "for me" and "I'm willing to accept" and "I'll make the change in my capacity as the proposer". I can't believe I wasted so much time trying to craft a decent compromise when you've been using this as some sort of ego boost or power trip. Just please don't say we're the ones "standing in the way". --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 21:46, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Well look, I don't want to nominate more articles because it would be a WP:POINT violation. But if you seriously think that you're right about what's accepted, by all means, nominate the following: Godsend (Heroes), Crash & Burn, Die Hand Die Verletzt, Hero (Battlestar Galactica), Que Será Será (House), Something to Talk About (Grey's Anatomy). All unreferenced articles for completely generic episodes of their respective series. If you think your position has consensus, nominate them for deletion. Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:59, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
And when you finish those you can try some major characters. Frank Tripp, Angela Montenegro, Joyce Summers, Frank Costanza, and Violet Turner would all be articles that fail this proposal even as written, to say nothing of their failure of WP:N. You think any of them would actually get deleted at AfD? Phil Sandifer (talk) 22:08, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Just because an article fails now doesn't mean that it would fail at AfD because some people actually look for sources. Take Godsend. There's not much online, mostly minor mentions[2][3][4] however I found two fairly significant mentions via print archives; probably enough to meet WP:GNG, although depending on how much production info, et al you could produce via interviews or DVDs I would still advocate a merge. If I really wanted to waste more minutes of my life I could probably dig up enough to suggest a weak keep on most of them, though whether or not they should be merged is a different situation. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 22:23, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
While that may be true, it has little to do with my central contention - even without a single extra source coming forward, most of those would be kept. Phil Sandifer (talk) 22:43, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Here is an example that demonstrates that episode articles can and do get deleted on notability grounds. The articles you've cherry-picked are poor examples because they clearly have the potential to meet GNG. Using them to argue that the deletionist position has little support is as unconvincing as it is disingenuous. Reyk YO! 01:24, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm a long way from convinced that the series that episode came from passes the first prong, so whether or not it passes the second prong is far from relevant. JulesH (talk) 18:58, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I don't see how Phil's change can be accepted by anyone with the slightest bit of common sense. We know already from all of the discussions to date that it is the consensus that some form of objective evidence is need to pass each prong, otherwise they become sham tests or hollow platitudes. Now you are saying that the topic of every spinout article passes the second prong as long as its about "major characters and episodes/storylines of a serialized work" without any evidence having to be provided will not stand up to peer review over the long-term. In answer to Phil, it seems as if you have learnt nothing nor remembered nothing from all of the past discussions. Kww has already made a key argument in this debate about the need for objective evidence: it is impossible to resolve disputes between editors with conflicting but equaly valid points of view without it. We already know that their is no real-world difference between a major and minor fictional character, that these are relative terms based on personal opinion, even if those opinions are those of Aristotle. We have gone down this road before, and we know it leads to a dead-end. --Gavin Collins (talk) 21:47, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I think "it is an episode or major character" is something that can be satisfied with objective evidence, Gavin. I don't see a lot of problems there. Maybe a bit on the fringes of "major character," but a footnote will probably deal with the majority of issues. Certainly "episode" is not up for any gray area. Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:59, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Also that in many cases major characters would also fall under consensus of what is a major character.じんない 22:32, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
I can't say I approve of the practise of shifting the goalposts after people have agreed to something; whether it's intended or not, it is deceptive and I can fully understand people withdrawing their support on general principles. Also not a fan of your massive ownership issues. You've treated this proposal as your personal property from the word go, even to the point of deleting it and stamping off in a huff because ThuranX and others were misbehaving. Finally, I don't see the point of the examples you provided to the Well-tempered Fox: they obviously have the potential of passing this guideline and even have a a fair shot at meeting the stricter WP:GNG. Having said all that, I still support this guideline. It accepts that standards for sources are of a different kind, and somewhat less strict, than for other areas of Wikipedia, while still setting a minimum standard that blocks out most of the gigantic flood of crap so many of us dread. I will still support it as long as this business of stealthily nudging the bar lower stops right now. Reyk YO! 22:44, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
I say we take it to arbcom. I only wish they would do something about this. It's all fine and dandy for them to say "quit annoying us, because we don't write guidelines -- the community does". But they haven't actually tried writing this stuff. I'm not saying that they should write it for us. But they NEED to point us to a process that will get us there. We've tried MULTIPLE RFCs, including a watchlisted RFC. They need to show us something new: binding mediation, or sending us back to the drawing board with a guiding principle, or even just telling us that we're allowed to ignore certain fringe opinions (demote notability altogether) as complete fantasy and totally untenable on a diverse community such as this. Too often, these discussions are derailed by "principled" parties on the extremes -- both notability and anti-notability fanatics. This isn't a principled proposal -- it's a compromise. No principled proposal is going to gain consensus. Yes, we have to go through the ugly process of making sausage. We may need ArbCom to say so. Randomran (talk) 23:18, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
I wish they would help, but I don't think they will. Most of them may recuse, anyways. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 23:26, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
We need something else. Something that hasn't been done before. Or we need people to acknowledge that the guideline won't look like what they want, and someone to actively say "let go of what you want, because 2/10 and 8/10 are off the table" -- in essence, forcing us to negotiate between 3 and 7. Randomran (talk) 23:46, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
A possible next step, which requires more work but may likely have a better end compromise, is to address exactly how we write articles on fiction and describe what an appropriate approach is to dealing with elements of fiction within it, instead of necessarily focusing on notability itself. That is, we need to tackle WP:WAF, possibly abandoning a FICT guideline but describing how we have to concern ourselves with independent and secondary sources to be able to expand out fictional elements; at the same time, we have to concern ourselves with making sure that lists of episodes and characters are allowed, though defining how these should be defined and what type of content is appropriate for them. I think the only way we can make any type of concession to both sides is to make sure those that don't want to see the proliferation of fiction cover to identify the bounds they are comfortable seeing, while those that want to include more on fictions to help define the levels they feel are necessary for these works, and figuring out what types of article structures, sourcing requirements, and the like are necessary to make both sides happy. This may result in no direct notability guidelines for fiction, however, at the same time, this would help encourage more on merging instead of deletion. --MASEM 00:10, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
I think a huge issue is if you try and write an MOS entry that's anything less than "this is what an ideal article should look like", the pitchforks and torches would have to be brought out. Good Articles was started with the explicit goal of "recognizing articles that will probably never make Featured", a goal which quickly fell by the wayside because one of the core ideas surrounding FA is that any article that deserves an article can be brought to FA status. Nifboy (talk) 02:34, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
That's a problem beyond this scope, but it is a legitimate problem because not every article for fiction can get that far simply due to the strict nature of how reliable sources are applied for every statement, even uncontroversial ones dealing with plot which usually require secondary, not primary sources for them.じんない 02:46, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
More to the point, the gap between "FA-worthy" and "merge-worthy" is inhabited by articles like Bulbasaur which fall pretty squarely into the criteria proposed here. Pretty much all talk of "ensuring quality" as it relates to notability is directed at closing that gap. I don't think the "entrenched deletionist" camp is going to go away unless you can somehow satisfactorily explain why we should give up on trying to get 100% of our articles be Featured. Nifboy (talk) 03:04, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
The "every article should be featurable" crowd isn't very effective. The are tens of thousands of articles about remote villages that won't ever grow beyond stubs, and people that try to delete them are reviled even more than people that go after bad fiction articles. It amazes me that we've wound up at this point: are there really that many people that believe that there is no such thing as an unimportant television episode?—Kww(talk) 04:11, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
Given that there are more episodes of Pokémon than there are species thereof, I feel it's a legitimate concern. Nifboy (talk) 16:22, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
(ec)Which is why I think we need to come at it from a very high level view, understanding that (for all practical matters) contemporary fiction cannot be written about in the same manner as most other subjects simply due to the large volume of primary works relative the small volume of secondary analysis. But we can't make exceptions for fiction either for proper referencing and the like. --MASEM 04:12, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
I have removed the blanket exemption for major characters and episodes given to the second prong[5] by amending Phil's changes. I think this is a much more reasonable version relative to the version at the start of the RFC. --Gavin Collins (talk) 11:33, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

The change by Phil Sandifer was unacceptable, and his stated dilemma of "if these articles don't get deleted, my change is correct" is false, since many articles which would fail the current proposed guideline would not get deleted but get merged or redirected. Anyway, if no consensus about this guideline (in whatever version) can be reached, then it should just be marked as failed, and the general notability guideline would become the guideline for elements of fiction as well, just like it is for many other classes of articles. I don't see the need to involve ArbCom in any of this. Fram (talk) 11:56, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

ArbCom will get involved the next time that edit warring over fiction article occurs and Ep & Char 4 gets started (Though TTN hasn't been editing for several weeks now, so there may be no one with that aggressive an editing schedule). Marking this failed seems appropriate, but letting it sit and doing nothing to seek alternatives is not appropriate. --MASEM 12:31, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Doesn't exist but is notable

There are plenty of things that get tagged onto sources that don't appear in the sources themselves, but form a consensus commentary about the subject that we ought to reflect.

Should all of the following be deleted simply because they didn't come from the sources they're tagged to?

"Play it again Sam."

"Retreat, hell! We're attacking in a different direction!"

“Get there firstest with the mostest.”

If you strip these away from their so-called sources then where do they go? Do we write up a new article on just the person or work that misquoted the original?

Hcobb (talk) 18:06, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Prong 2

We're getting nowhere on this, just going backwards and forwards between the two different versions. How about we simplify it?

  • The element must be a significant part of the work which is important to a full understanding of the work. Major characters and episodes containing important plot points are more likely to be significant than minor characters or episodes that have no effect on ongoing continuity.

This leaves the question of how to determine what is significant or not to discussion at AFD, where, frankly, consensus is more likely to be achieved than here and now. It gives the bare minimum of guidance, but guidance I think we can all agree is accurate. If AFD contributors want to see evidence of the significance of an element, let them demand it at AFD. In most cases, I think it will be self-evident. JulesH (talk) 19:09, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

I like it. I think the old version got too mired in "prove it" language that the original meaning was lost. Nifboy (talk) 20:43, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
  • The test is meaningless, as no objective evidence is required to pass it. You may as well say that all fictional elements are a significant part of the work. --Gavin Collins (talk) 20:58, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
  • There was a time when you said you could live with that, because the third prong was strong enough. Randomran (talk) 21:18, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I think we get too mired up in the evidence requirement, and I'm not going to play the game of approving changes to the meaning I like, and then arguing that you can't change the meaning if I don't like the change. The language that was in place during the RFC did require sourcing, but it didn't make any requirements as to whether it be primary or secondary or third-party. I don't think it's appropriate to tighten it at this stage of the game. If people want to explicitly point out that the nature of the sourcing isn't specified, I'll buy that under the guise of clarification. Either eliminating the requirement or tightening it by requiring that the sources be either secondary or independent isn't fair play.—Kww(talk) 21:32, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
In answer to Randomran, if you split the third prong into two seperate tests, making the second prong a test for real-world coverage and third into a test for substantial coverage only as I have proposed ages ago, then you have two out of the three objective tests needed to make up the three prongs. But to base the second prong on subjective criteria won't work, as it is not usable as guidance in editorial disputes where there are differences of opinion. You may as well say "'The element must be a significant part of the work, but only if WP:ILIKEIT". --Gavin Collins (talk) 21:49, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I think we need a bit of a history lesson here, because what you're talking about is the original version that was put together by Phil in his userspace, before he put it out here to work on back in December. Back then, it was written in such a way that you can prove importance by reference to the primary source -- at a minimum. If I understand you correctly, that's what you're saying you'd be okay with.
    Gavin Collins wasn't okay with that. He was concerned that a reference to a primary source would at best be debatable, and at worst would *always* prove importance. Someone would say "Character X killed 12 vampires throughout the story! Of course he's important!" The issue was revisited countless times. He ultimately conceded he could live with the second prong only because the other two prongs existed, but that he felt it was useless and would always be passed in practice.
    Not wanting to settle for mediocrity, I wanted to tighten up exactly what kind of statements of importance -- with reference to the primary source -- we could accept. One of those standards was "this is a recurring, non-cameo character". If you have a bunch of episodes where the character shows up and does something important, then that would prove enough to pass the second prong. And as a compromise to that, I offered that *everything else* would need better sources than that -- an inanimate object like The One Ring would need proof of importance from reliable third-party sources because it's the exception more than the rule.
    Somewhere along the line, that became interpreted that third-party sources were required for all fictional elements, and that the statement about characters being recurring was a statement of clarification, let alone a statement to make the standard even tighter. Of course, this was simultaneously misinterpreted to be closer to the original version in December, so basically we had two groups of people agreeing to a guideline with two different meanings. (Again, I point this out not to say which side gets to be right, but more to point out that we can't have a guideline unless everyone agrees to something. The past is the past, it's time to come up with something we can all live with.)
    So what do we do now? As a concession to inclusionists, I think we *have* to have at least one prong that can be passed by reference to primary sources in *some* cases, or we have to scrap the prong entirely. If the requirement is reliable third-party sources, we're back at WP:N -- plus we've made it harder to reach a consensus by adding the first and third prongs to make it even more stringent.
    So yes, let's allow people to pass the second prong (importance) by reference to primary sources, because that's the only way we're going to have any support from moderate inclusionists. But for the sake of guys like Gavin who are worried that this will make it too easy to prove importance, it would help us if we could clarify what kind of stuff from primary sources would prove importance. I'd say "recurring character", but if that's a non-starter, I'd like to see some brainstorming. Because "no, no, no," isn't working, isn't getting us anywhere, isn't building a consensus. Randomran (talk) 21:55, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I thought "reoccurring, non-cameo characters" was a good phrase that would get a majority of more important characters while weeding out the obviously minor ones.じんない 22:26, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I think we are in fairly close agreement on this issue, Randomran. Given the language we had during the RFC, I think a well-reasoned argument for importance based on primary sources alone would pass the second prong.—Kww(talk) 00:51, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I'm glad we're making progress, and it's big of you to find ways to expand support for this guideline among inclusionists. I think this is actually pretty generous. Maybe too generous, for a lot of the reasons that Gavin Collins said: what does a well-reasoned argument for importance using primary sources look like? "We'll know it when we see it" leaves this prong open to abuse, and the whims of crowds. The intention of something like "show that this is a non-cameo recurring character" was meant to tighten it up. I'm not married to that as a definitive standard. But I hope you understand why some people would like this to be tighter, and hope that you have some ideas of how to get us there. For example, "a character will pass the second prong if reliable (primary) sources can show that X..." Randomran (talk) 00:56, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I'll refer back to my earlier comments on this topic. As for language, I maintain that the simplest language that conveys the same meaning that we had is The element must be an important element, and its importance must be verifiable. The importance of characters and episodes can be demonstrated through the use of primary or secondary sources, while the importance of other elements must be validated in secondary sources. As for tightening, I'm not really in favor of shifting the meanings of the prongs. I think the best that can be done is a paragraph of explanation that provides a list of possible arguments, but with a strong caveat in the paragraph that those arguments aren't magic tickets: they have to be accepted at AFD time.—Kww(talk) 01:11, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I hope that you'd reconsider. Not just to get the support of anti-wikilawyers (people who worry that people will manipulate any subjectivity in a guideline to their advantage), but to gain the support of inclusionists and deletionists who are just as worried about people twisting the guideline based on WP:ILIKEIT/WP:IHATEIT. You couldn't think of one test that would even give us a *presumption* that a character passes the second prong, a presumption that could be overridden by common sense? Randomran (talk) 01:28, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Aside from my aversion to changing, as opposed to clarifying, the problem is also one of this being a very unusual case in the first place. The element is from an extremely popular work, or it wouldn't pass the first prong. There's substantial real-world information about it, or it wouldn't pass the third prong. But yet, there aren't two third-party sources that discuss the element directly, because, if there were, it would pass WP:N and we wouldn't be arguing about prongs at all. That's what's causing my reluctance to list a presumption, because we are at an exception case already: why did this element that is so important to the work go unnoticed by all reviewers and commentators? If it went unnoticed, why is it important? I think that really is a case-by-case issue.—Kww(talk) 01:47, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I can live with that, at least until someone else tries to revisit the issue. I think it would help a lot if you added the language you mentioned above. (I'd add it myself, but seeing as I've already modified that prong a lot I wouldn't want people to get the impression I was trying to monopolize it.) Randomran (talk) 01:58, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I'd like to see someone chime in on this little subdiscussion first.—Kww(talk) 02:03, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It sounds good to me. These changes seem minor to me, though. In the abstract, they may be important, but I don't think a very large percentage of articles are going to be effected (read different AfD result) by them. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 02:14, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Could you kindly explain what you perceive the difference in meaning to be between my proposed text and the text of the second prong in this version?—Kww(talk) 02:59, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Sure. Your proposed text is meant to require proof for episodes and characters, wehreas the second prong in that version is meant to whitelist them. As a firm believer in authorial intent (at least for today) there is a big difference there. Phil Sandifer (talk) 03:44, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Please answer the argument neglecting authorial intent, as few RFC !voters reviewed the hundreds of kilobytes of preceding discussion, so authorial intent was not clear to them. They read the words, and expressed an opinion on the words. I'm traveling today, and will be unable to reply before 11PM Atlantic Standard Time. Please don't interpret a pause as anything other than that.—Kww(talk) 09:46, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I do not see speculating about the possible motivations of RFC !voters as a particularly useful mode of analysis. Clearly some thought they were supporting a whitelist. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:08, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I don't place a high value on speculation either. That's why I support restricting changes to clarify text as actually written. Not how I think one group perceived it, or how I think another group intended it, but as actually written. I oppose efforts to increase the requirements for sourcing beyond what was written during the RFC phase, and I didn't see a prohibition for primary sourcing for the importance of episodes and characters in that language. The second sentence made such a requirement, but it was about other elements. The third indicated that an argument above the level of a blind assertion had to be made, and linked to a requirement for sourcing in general.—Kww(talk) 14:33, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Primary sources are of no value as a basis for a objective test because they require personal interpretation. I thought we had dropped the idea that primary sources could be used in the second prong ages ago. I have therefore reverted part of Randomran's changes[6]. For the first time in ages, this guideline is fully compliant with WP:V, WP:N and WP:RS. What ever change comes next, please don't construct an exemption for characters or episodes, as their importance relative to other elements of fiction is a matter of unverifiable opinion, not fact. --Gavin Collins (talk) 14:49, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
What if we were to take Prong 2 like this:
The element must be a significant part of the work which is important to a full understanding of the work. It is presumed that episodes of X and characters of Y (see below) are always important; any other fictional element should have objective evidence from third-party sources to show importance to the work.
The X and Y are placeholders but I would envision them in this fashion:
"Episodes of X" - "Episodes of any nationally-broadcasted prime-time show"
"Characters of X" - "Lead character of a work of multiple volumes (which includes a television show, a book series, a video game series, or a movie series), appearing in more than 75%"
The reasoning is for the above is to assert some leeway for inclusionists while providing objective evidence that the deletionists are looking for. In the case of the episodes, nearly every nationally broadcasted prime-time show is going to have a review or ratings information, so even at the creation it may not have those details but likely can get them to meet the third prong. Now, we can probably argue left and right on "lead characters" but realistically, it is something that any English-taught person is going to be able to make the rationale distinction, moreso when in a group; however, by asserting some "%age" of works they appear in, this gives a better definition of when they should be described; in this fashion, because of the high number of appearances, is likely to be mentioned to some degree in reviews of the series or individual elements of it.
It's by far not perfect; I'm sure someone like Kww will disagree to the point on episodes, but given that during TTN's merging processes that these raised the most ire, I'd rather see them get the benefit of a doubt and be kept, though still encourage editors to merge, not due to notability but just editorially, to a list to improve the overall comprehension. (Remember that articles still need to meet the third prong ultimately, so this is not a complete allowance for all episodes). Gavin probably won't like the "lead character" designation (there are minor characters that appear in >75% of works, such as Neviel Longbottom from Harry Potter) but I think it is necessary to recognize that third party sources will not specifically identify characters as being important despite discussing the character to length, and thus any "allowance" on a character is going to have to assume best practices and good faith that editors can fairly distinguish a "lead" character from a "major" one or a "minor" one. And of course, for all other elements, we still ask for some statement of importance, so it's possible for other television episodes, characters, and other facets of fiction not listed here to gain their own articles. It's ultimately a bit of give & take, to recongize bounds of what should be covered in greater depth compared to what sources are available.
Of course, the criteria are free to be toyed with, I think they are a reasonable mid-point now, but there may be better ways of stating it. --MASEM 14:58, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
I am happy to cut some slack, but constructing an exemption for characters and episodes just because they are considered to be important in the mind of an editor (even a great mind, such as Masem) is not a good idea, because it means the test is not based on objective evidence, and cannot be peer reviewed. A better idea is to say that an important character or episode is one that is the subject of real-world coverage, i.e. it is the subject of commentary that treats it as an element of fiction, not as an element of plot. Since you need real-world coverage to write an article in anycase, please consider this counter proposal. That leaves the third prong free to focus on defining substantial coverage. --Gavin Collins (talk) 16:13, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
Well again, I've provided three statements for prong two that are about as objective as we can state:
  • The element has a third-party source to describe its importance to the work.
  • The element is an episode of a prime-time show.
  • The element is a lead character that appears in a majority of the portions of a serial work
These are objective, save for what one may define as "lead character" but again, I implore that "lead character" is harder to dispute than "major character".
We already have the third prong that is there to establish the element as a part of a work of fiction, and not in terms of the fiction itself. If there is a need for "substantial" coverage then the third prong can be amended to include that, but as has been pointed out, we do sorta need something to protect any element of any show that's on DVD that has developer commentary from suddenly getting an article just because the developer said it. That said... (see next section) ---MASEM 16:36, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
Articles covering elements within a fictional work are generally retained if their coverage meets these three conditions:
  1. Importance of the fictional work: To justify articles on individual elements, the fictional work from which they come must have produced significant artistic impact, cultural impact, or general popularity. This is shown when the work (not the element) exceeds the relevant notability guidelines.
  2. Role within the fictional work: The element must be an important element, and its importance must be verifiable. The importance of characters and episodes must be verified through real-world coverage that is independent of the primary source, i.e. coverage beyond what is revealed in the plot of the fictional work. Sometimes this real-world perspective can be established through the use of sources with a connection to the creators of the fictional work, such as creator commentary.
  3. Significant coverage must exist on the element. Examples of significant coverage include: creative influences, design processes, critical commentary, and cultural reception. Merely listing the notable works where the fictional element appears, their authors or respective release dates, and the names of the production staff is not sufficient. In practice, this is generally the most important of the three prongs.
Could you have a look at this and if it is not acceptable (which it might not be) then draft a version that is more likely to be acceptable from a wide range of viewpoints as I believe this one is. --Gavin Collins (talk) 23:23, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
The problem I have with this in general is that importance to the work is not necessarily going from "real-world sources", case in point being Cliff Notes to describe more classical works, as CLiff Notes are almost always in-universe but third-party. The key that I get from Kww and yourself is that we cannot accept importance to the work from a source anything less than an independent (third party) source, which makes complete sense to prevent system gaming. The "real-world" aspect is part of the third prong about additional sources.
Which brings me to why the above third prong is somewhat a problem. Remember that this is meant to be an olive branch to at least bring some calm to fiction. Thus, insisting on "significant coverage" (which, I read as being of quantity, not quality) of real-world information is a high barrier for most fiction and is definitely too strong (IMO) to appease that side. The third prong is better stated as "Non-trivial, real-world coverage", and the rest of that is fine. --MASEM 00:49, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
Please don't misrepresent me, Masem. I've stated multiple times that I'm willing to accept an argument for importance based on primary sources.—Kww(talk) 05:47, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I don't see how primary sources can be used to discern whether an element is important or not, as it only through the medium of real-world commentary, criticism or analysis that a fictional element would be identfied as such. And in answer to Masem, I don't see how we can justify an exemption for any class of fictional element other than on the basis of subjective criteria (which all boil down to WP:ILIKEIT), becasue blanket exemptions are not based any objective evidence, just opinion.--Gavin Collins (talk) 09:56, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Sorry, Kww, I must have misread your comments.
  • To Gavin, I've given two examples of criteria that are about as objective as you can get; episodes of prime time nationally broadcasted shows (that's clearly objective) and lead characters of serialized works ("lead character" has some wiggle room but much less than "major character") --MASEM 13:27, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
  • They aren't Masem. For instance, on what basis was it decided that episodes of prime time nationally broadcasted shows should get their own articles? Masem' opinion. This criteria is not going to stand up to peer review, as it is basically a personal judgement on what you think is are valid criteria. No matter how valid your judgement is with regard to this issue, it is still your personal opinion and can't be validated. The problem which arises from a lack of objective evidence is two fold - firstly if anyone has a favourite episode that was not nationally broadcasted which they think should be featured in a Wikipedia article, then they are going to invent their own inclusion criteria based on arguments that are equally valid as your own. Imagine yourself in a perpetual editorial dispute with Pixelface about an episode which neither of you can agree should be or should not be included as a standalone article (may the gods preserve you from such a fate). To resolve this dispute, you will need more that you own personal view that "Masem believes that episodes of prime time nationally broadcasted shows should automatically pass the second prong", because it won't wash with Pixelface (or anything else you might say that runs contrary to his viewpoint). You will need some form of objective evidence to resolve such a dispute.
    Secondly, there is no point in aserting that a episodes of prime time nationally broadcasted shows should pass the second prong if sufficient coverage to write an encyclopedic article is not available. I think you might be assuming that there ought to be significant real-world coverage will break down if none can be found. Your whole argument boils down to putting the cart before the horse - assuming a topic is important before evidence of importance can be found. Alas, this approach won't work. --Gavin Collins (talk) 20:21, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

A thought

We seem to be hung up on sourcing issues. Maybe there's a completely different way to do this, and that could be something as "simple" as:

An element of fiction is presumed to be notable (having its own article) if it meets the GNG (significant coverage in secondary sources), or has at least one non-trivial third-party source in addition to at least one primary or first party source such as directory's commentary and interviews that describe the real-world aspects of the element.

No prongs, nothing. One of the barriers on fiction is "significant coverage" as most do not get anywhere close to that, but do have the primary sources and commentary to establish real-world. Taking the idea of the second and third prong and combining them (of some variation), to me, you get something that says basically we want 1 third-party source among other real-world sources and we're happy. Nothing to do with the work's importance or the element's importance. (And of course, any GNG-meeting topics are fair game). All we have to be aware is what is non-trivial (which does have some subjectivity to it but I think we can define that pretty decently), the rest is purely objective.

I know this is probably stronger than Phil's original vision of the prongs, but this seems to be language that at least simplifies the prongs and addresses the sourcing issues that people have. I still believe that there ought to be limited exception cases as I describe above (episodes of a prime time series, and clear lead characters of a serial work) based on presumption that sourcing can be found for these, and with strong emphasis on editorial decisions to merge content for better comprehension. --MASEM 16:36, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

I like it. AfD's way of working already saves most fictional topics (against our guidelines, thankfully) and this wording would actually give editors a pretty good idea on how to improve articles. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 02:43, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
Wow. This is much better than the "three-pronged test" and is more in line with what I had been trying to propose all along. Simple, reasonably objective tests, only one of which need to be passed for a presumption of notability. This is a good start and if we could at least agree on this wording, we will come a long way towards a good fiction notability guideline. If we could add to this that articles which don't pass these criteria should not be nominated for deletion if there is a relevant article on a notable topic to which it can be merged or redirected, then you'd likely have a guideline with my support. DHowell (talk) 05:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Opposed

I am, at this point, categorically opposed to this proposal. The second prong, as it stands in Gavin's accounting, is the most strict version of this prong yet proposed. It is clear that this guideline - which was already a significant compromise on the inclusionist side at the start - is simply going to be shifted ever closer to WP:N.

As it stands, the proposal no longer reflects the original intent, AfD consensus, actual practice, or anything but the desire of the most rabidly deletionist fringe dressed up in the language of compromise. I apologize profusely for any role I had in crafting this debacle. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:10, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

The current second prong is the standard I have seen used in many AfD's and so on: articles on minor characters, episodes, ... are merged to lists. This is in line with this proposed guideline, which only states that minor characters...should not have separate articles, not that these articles must be deleted. A rabidly deletionist guideline would be completely different, and the current proposal is a significant compromise from both sides and has the consensus of many people who are neither inclusionist or deletionist (a group which represents hopefully the majority of editors on Wikipedia). But as stated, I have no objection on marking this proposal as "failed", and using the GNG as the guideline for all fictional subjects. Fram (talk) 15:33, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I still consider either a whitelist or the abandonment of the second prong necessary for support. Anything else is too strict. Phil Sandifer (talk) 23:21, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Primary source are not acceptable. See my proposal above, but sources other than primary sources have to be used to establish importance, as that would be an example of self-referencing. The autor or creator commentary is only acceptable if it is substantial and made from a real-world perspective, i.e. the commentary goes beyond beyond what is revealed in the plot. --Gavin Collins (talk) 23:25, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Which is the third prong. As I said, for the second prong (and the second prong alone) I either want to whitelist episodes and characters, or simply drop the prong and depend on #1 and #3. Either is an acceptable outcome for me. Phil Sandifer (talk) 05:26, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Whitelists are a non-starter. For a begining, you need to have inclusion criteria to compile them, and having inclusion criteria within inclusion criteria seems absurd to me, unless I have misunderstood the proposal. Secondly, whitelists that are drawn up based on personal opinion dressed up as consensus won't stand up to peer review unless they are backed up with objective evidence of some sort. I think we must coming to the point where we all agree that each prong must be backed up by some sort of evidence other than the opinions of Wikipedians.--Gavin Collins (talk) 10:02, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Just to be sure here, Phil and Gavin - you're not really talking about the creation of a whitelist, are you?  —SMALLJIM  14:45, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm going to reiterate that I'm as opposed to tightening the second prong at this stage as I am to loosening it. Moving the goalposts is moving the goalposts, and I don't care which team benefits. As to the specific content of a whitelist, I'll restate and amplify my reasoning: this guideline isn't supposed to be a floodgate or a roadblock, it's supposed to be a compromise. When we are dealing with material that lives or dies by the second prong, these conditions apply:

  1. The work itself is extremely well sourced, or it would have failed prong one.
  2. The sources provided have given a wealth of real-world information about the topic, or it would have failed the third prong.
  3. Independent sources haven't directly discussed the element, or it would have passed WP:N, and we wouldn't be talking about prongs.

Given that set of conditions, we are at an inherent contradiction: the element is being represented as important, but yet, our primary measure of importance, the availability of independent sourcing, says it is not. Getting past that contradiction requires an explanation of some sort. Whitelisting turns the compromise into a floodgate: you might as well write Television episodes that have been presented on DVDs with commentary are inherently notable, which few exclusionists would take as a compromise. Requiring third-party sourcing for importance does essentially change this into WP:N, and no inclusionist would view that as a compromise.

That leaves us with essentially two choices: requiring at least developer commentary to substantiate importance, or allowing arguments based on primary sources to substantiate importance. Allowing primary sources is more open to abuse, and requiring developer commentary is seen by many as too strict, but both of them at least represent a compromise position. This takes us to the language we had: for those things that we pragmatically recognize tend to get articles, episodes and major characters, it did not require secondary sourcing, although it still required justification. For everything else, those things that tend to get a higher level of scrutiny, like rings, guns, locations, wands, fictional organizations, it explicitly called out a need for secondary sourcing, without raising the bar to the level of requiring third-party sources for them. Since that is what was in the language during the RFC, and since it represents a compromise withing a compromise, I really feel we need to stick with that as the rules. The language which expresses those rules is debatable, but I don't think we should be debating the rules themselves anymore—Kww(talk) 15:25, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

It seems to me at this point Gavin is the only one calling for independent third-party sources and Phil the only one who called for a whitelist and thus both sides are at the extreme edges with little support for either.
I am willing to say for reoccuring non-cameo characters and episodes in serialzed work that the primary source or development staff's commentary (should be somewhat vague since different forms of media use different terms and different setup) while anything else requires the latter and cannot use the primary source.じんない 22:58, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I am not calling for independent third-party sources. I want to see "importance of episodes and characters must be verified through real-world coverage that is independent of the primary source, i.e. coverage beyond what is revealed in the plot of the fictional work". Perhaps my wording is unlear, but this is requirement is not dependent on independent third-party sources - any reliable source will do. --Gavin Collins (talk) 10:42, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

The way it works

Looking at the current version of the three prongs[7], it would be useful to see a flowchart, but I see them working well because each prong is working towards a set of tests that will encourage encylopedic content. Since you need real-world coverage to write an article, I think the second prong is a "no brainer", since without real-world coverage, the article is at risk of failing WP:NOT#PLOT. I think the second prong is useful that it also promotes citing coverage that is independent of the plot, as most in universe coverage tends to come from promotional sources. The third prong is a test to encourage non-trivial coverage. So for instance, you cannot have an article on Allison Cameron if the only real-world coverage from the New York Times were to say "She looks good in a white coat". We need commentary that provides context, criticism and analysis - the minimum you would expect from a school essay. Having listened to everyone, I think this version is more likely to achieve widespread support, because it provides common sense guidance on writing encyclopedic articles about fictional topics. --Gavin Collins (talk) 10:21, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I'll repeat these two points from above:
"Importance to the work" is not something that is always evidenced by real-world information. A source may say "John Smith is the lead character of X"; that's not a real-world perspective, as that's still dealing with the fiction itself, but (importantly) as long as it is being stated by a third-party source, it establishes that "John Smith" is important to the work. The real-world aspects are the comments and criticisms that extend beyond the fiction and thus are part of the third prong. (The third-party source here is necessary to prevent someone that creates their own works to assert that all elements are important in their work and then having that source used to justify several separate articles.)
Calling the third prong "Significant coverage" (borrowed from WP:N) implies quantity, but your description implies quality of the sources. This probably is better called "Non-trivial coverage" or "Non-trivial real-world coverage". --MASEM 13:24, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
This is beginning to get silly. Are we playing a big game of darts with this guideline? Every couple of days we have a new set of "prongs" to throw darts at in the vain hope that something will stick. Seriously people, quit the games already. Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 15:28, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
In answer to Masem, I am trying to help you out here. If an element of fiction passes WP:N by being the subject of coverage (real-world or other wise) from a reliable secondary source, then you don't need to concern yourself about the three prongs. But if it does not, then passing the three prongs seems to me the next best thing. Capiche? --Gavin Collins (talk) 20:33, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
Right, but I'm pointing out that, using your version of the three prongs, there are subtle problems. The third one is simply a wording issue, since "significant" in the context of WP:N means "quantity", but the way the third prong is written, that's not what it is looking for; it's looking for non-triviality of the sources (which yes, could be implied by "significant" but it's going to be confusing having two different "significant"s in two different guidelines. But the important factor here is the demonstration of the importance of an element does need to come from an independent source (and we discussed this specifically excludes the creators of the work, since they are biased as to what is important), but this does not need to be a "real world" facet of the element. That is, since we're talking "importance to the work", the source is going to likely talk about the element within the concept of the universe of the work of fiction itself. Thus, the phrase "real world" should not appear in the second prong, but should be a factor of the third prong. --MASEM 12:13, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I think you will find that significant coverage is more than quantity, as WP:N says it means that sources address the subject directly in detail, and no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than trivial but may be less than exclusive. I didn't see any mention of quanity, so that is something you are reading into the term "significant" all by yourself.
    As regards importance, I think real-world coverage is a key indicator. From the perspective of writing an encyclopedic article, it is a key prerequisite. From a critical or judgemental perspective that is used in commentary, a real-world perspective is also needed, because no fictonal character I know of has every been judged to be important within the context of the plot or narrative. Clearly the real-world perspective must be independent from the plot. We can't talk about an element being important from the perspective of the plot, because every element of fiction is important, otherwise they would not have been created in the first place. --Gavin Collins (talk) 22:44, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
  • "Significant" in WP:N is often considered (if mistakenly) "2 or more sources". It's not stated like that , but that's what many read as a rule of thumb. We don't want that same mistake here and from the discussions, the precision term for the third prong is "non-trivial real world sources". As for the second prong, if a reliable third party source states "Character X is a lead character", that deems that character "important to the work". The importance to the work has to be frame in the in-universe context, which may include a real-world facet but does not have to. --MASEM 23:05, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
  • I disagree. Significant has no association with a requirement for 2 or more sources in Wikipedia, real-life or anywhere else. WP:N requires multiple sources, it is true ("N=2RS"), but that has nothing to do with significance. In any case, we are all argreed that significant coverage should the basis for prong 3, because nobody wants to to use on trivial coverage as a basis for inclusion criteria. --Gavin Collins (talk) 16:40, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

current danger to the compromise

The only hope of consensus here is a compromise. Any compromise will involve having less than full separate articles for some characters of borderline notability. The information on them would need to preserved instead in combination articles, which is a highly appropriate manner not running afoul of what some people think to be the Notability requirements--since the contents of an article does not have to be every paragraph of it notable. I'm therefore dismayed to see the AfD WP:Articles for deletion/List of M.I.High Characters--where a list of exactly this nature is in danger of being deleted. If this sort of danger to content is going to be present, I can no longer support any compromise like the one being discussed--to preserve content we will then need a definition of Wotability (to use a word of A Man in Black's devising) that makes it clear that separate articles on all significant fictional characters are justified regardless of secondary sourcing. If we can't be sure of keeping even compromise combination articles, we would do better to try whenever possible to hold onto as much as possible as separate articles. The information has to go somewhere. If there are people who absolutely insist on excluding such information altogether, they are clearly unwilling to compromise. I believe there are in fact some people who want to restrict content on fiction to the minimum. I hope they will see the wisdom of not trying to fight on such a basis. DGG (talk) 02:42, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

The danger in your line of thinking is where you contend that all information on Wikipedia belongs on Wikipedia. The fact that episode X in the Y television series makes a three-second aside about figure G does not need to belong in figure G's article. Wikipedia isn't a dumping ground for trivial information, and it hasn't been for a while. Not all content on here deserves to be preserved. Themfromspace (talk) 05:03, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
DGG you need to switch tack, and consider whether such topics would be supported by enough coverage to write an encyclopedic article. For instance, List of M.I.High Characters has none, it fails WP:NOT so there is no point in preserving it. I am willing to compromise on how to achieve this end, so long as we are agreed that the objective is to write encyclopedic articles, rather than permit topics on random stuff to be dumped in Wikipedia that has no real-world content at all. --Gavin Collins (talk) 10:37, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
DGG, I am not singling out any editor here but keep in mind that many of these editors on the AfD circuit are practicly single purpose accounts, in that all they do is delete other editors contributions. As I wrote on WP:Articles for deletion/List of M.I.High Characters:
"It appears that even lists are not immune from deletion now. So much for the great FICT comprimise." Ikip (talk) 09:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
We have specifically avoided stating anything on how lists are to be handled for the time being. That's a much larger sticky wicket that would need to be dealt with. --MASEM 14:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
No, the current danger is that an already agreed upon compromise is now being rolled back, once again in favor of making the guideline stricter, despite the fact that we are already at point where it is stricter than existing practice, and where, in the RFC, more people objected to its strictness than its leniency. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:18, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
The version in place at the moment you wrote that comment is in no way stricter than the version commented on during the RFC. Have you ever stopped to consider that perhaps the greatest danger to the compromise is people that refuse to compromise? People that insist that television episodes inherit notability from their parent series, and refuse to recognize that a common practice for episodes is to segregate them into list articles?—Kww(talk) 15:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Your insistence on denying the reality that people, in good faith, read the old version as a whitelist is problematic. There are comments in the RFC *specifically referencing* the free pass to episodes and characters. The fact of the matter remains - a compromise was reached to whitelist episodes and characters. Now that compromise is being renegotiated. That is bullshit. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:29, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
I haven't denied that people misread it. I've said that there's no fair and just way to accommodate that problem. People have misread all kinds of things, and voted all kinds of ways based on various misapprehensions. That doesn't give us license to change text to match misreadings, only to clarify text where misreadings occurred.—Kww(talk) 15:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Phil, I think you are trying it on. Exemptions were firmly rejected in in the RFC. Editorial walled gardens for certain types of character or episode is something we all agree must be avoided. In anycase, your suggestion goes against the spirit of WP:NOTINHERITED. However, I still think we can find a compromise that will work. --Gavin Collins (talk) 15:59, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
The problem, however, means that the RFC gives us little to no data on the subject of support or opposition for a whitelist. In which case the previous compromise on a whitelist - one that Gavin, if I recall, was party to - retains some credibility. More to the point, however, is the fact that this is stricter than current practice, and that the whole guideline seems to me stricter than there's a broad consensus for.
I, at this point, propose removing the second prong outright. It is clear that no good compromise exists on it, and a strong case can be made that "importance to the fictional work" amounts to an in-universe importance that is lacking in credibility. Elements of highly significant fictional works about which there is a lot of real-world coverage is an adequate notability standard. Phil Sandifer (talk) 16:03, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
I thought this was how I was helping you, by seperating the requirements for significant and real-world coverage by splitting them between prongs 2 and 3. But if you want to drop prong 2 and roll the two requirements into prong 3 then I won't complain.--Gavin Collins (talk) 16:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
The importance test of the second prong is an important part of the guideline itself, and should not be dropped. There is no reason to allow Wikipedia to become an echo of DVD commentary. Again, this is too substantial of a change to the guideline to make without invalidating the results of the RFC. Eliminating the second prong is logically equivalent to generating a universal whitelist.—Kww(talk) 16:30, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
I've always viewed that the version of FICT based on Phil's original proposal is not a permanent version, only one to get into place to prevent massive disgruntlement on either side of the argument over fiction while setting the stage to discuss treatment of fiction as a whole overall (WAF, support or lack thereof for lists, etc.) as well as possible notability arguments (though to me, it seems we've now since had the latter discussion, showing that WP:N really isn't likely to move anywhere).
That said, my belief for the best outcome here at FICT is something that is at least addresses the major issues with poor sourcing that most fiction element articles end up with, while balancing with a level of inclusion that can be generally met by more significant fictional elements, with the balance on inclusion for the time being until we can address the larger picture. Not a license to create tons of fiction element articles, but at the same time, preventing the next ArbCom Ep&Char case from happening because of rampant merging or deletions.
This is why I agree that a final permanent version of FICT should not presume any episode and character to be immediately notable without sourcing, but in this interim version, I am willing to acknowledge (and hope that others) that some episodes and characters may not need that type of sourcing for the time being, specifically limiting it to those cases that will generally have sources if you look hard enough. For me, I've offered this limited exception to primetime TV episodes and the lead characters from serial works or series - both areas that you just need to do some leg work to source appropriately and thus should have the benefit of the doubt for the current intermediate version of FICT only. Once we've sat down to talk about fiction handling in general, and set out a new FICT, that benefit of the doubt goes away (unless we decide it should be retained). Again, this is merely an olive branch to help keep things at bay until we work out the larger problems with the whole system. --MASEM 16:19, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Masem, you are just muddying the water by trying to bring articles that fail WP:NOT#PLOT into the equation. Such plot-only articles (which you refer to as "articles with poor sourcing") are not encyclopedic, becuase they don't have any real-world content. --Gavin Collins (talk) 16:32, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
I'm talking about articles that likely have good potential to be sourced to meet the prongs or the GNG, in the same manner that WP:MUSIC, WP:BIO, etc. work by defining certain objective criteria that lead to well-sourced articles, even if they currently exist in a poorly sourced state; we're not supposed to be judging by the present article state but the potential article state and that's why considering two limited cases which often produce well sourced articles after some elbow grease has been applied is appropriate. --MASEM 16:41, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Mistaken Attribution

Elements that have no relation to the creators and no role in the work itself can still get tagged on by later sources so the second prong vanishes. Otherwise please delete Play it again, Sam. Hcobb (talk) 17:31, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I think you will find this is an example of mistaken attribution, another example being Let them eat cake. Establishing the notability of such topics using WP:N is very important in order to avoid potential POV forks. --Gavin Collins (talk) 17:47, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Mistaken attributions are marked all over Wikipedia both inside main articles and as standalone articles. Since these do not appear at all in the main work this proves that the second prong cannot stand. The notability of elements in works of fiction are defined by society at large rather than by their placement (or lack thereof) in the works themselves. Hcobb (talk) 20:22, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Oh Really? Please do give some examples. --Gavin Collins (talk) 21:42, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
I think this might be another case where the word "notability" is a hangup, if you replace the word with "inclusion criteria" then it would read "The inclusion criteria of elements in works of fiction are defined by society at large rather than by their placement (or lack thereof) in the works themselves."; which makes no sense. We're not concerned here with notability in the general sense of the word, but in a rather narrow sense of the word; and that can only be defined here, not by society. --Kraftlos (Talk | Contrib) 18:51, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Guideline structure

Judging from the current revision, considerable effort has been made to accomodate me and those who made similar comments. Sadly, the improvements are pure cosmetic in nature. I still preferre my original proposal, but even though I do not understand the craving for more guideline text, I've come up with a more verbose version that would be acceptable to me. Note that opposed to my first proposal I did not try to replicate the current meaning of the guideline, as there currently doesn't even appear to be a consensus for it. This proposal is more about the structure than an inclusionism/deletionism compromise. I do not support or oppose the compromise described within it. Some portions were added simply to show where I would place them.

Here it is. -- Goodraise (talk) 18:35, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

I am may be misunderstanding, but the sentence "This guideline does not require significant coverage in third-party sources, but it is still needed, because it is required by the guideline on reliable sources and the policy on verifiability" seems to be in conflict with itself; either reliable secondary source are needed for a standalone article or they aren't, not both. How does this work in practise? --Gavin Collins (talk) 22:36, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
I think it means to say that significant coverage in third-party sources is required to get the facts right (ie. satisfy WP:V and WP:RS), but is not necessary to establish notability. I disagree with that second part, needless to say. Reyk YO! 22:46, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
One problem I have with how the guideline is done right now is that it goes beyond its scope in that most of its text is restatement of existing policy and guidelines (even of Manuals of Style). As I understand it, people want this to be a "tool". I can live with that. What I don't understand is why it has to look as if this guideline does it all (replacing all existing policy and guidelines, when it comes to fiction). Instead it should focus on defining "notability" for fictional elements and point to relevant guidelines and policy. "Notability" does not mean that a topic should have an article on Wikipedia, at least not the way I understand it. If for example I find several RS game guides, then I could write an article that would pass the GNG. But it would fail NOT, so it would be deleted. V says: "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found featuring significant coverage of a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it." That means that whatever notability guideline whatever topic passes, if it does not have "reliable, third-party sources featuring significant coverage" it will still fail V and be deleted. But this is just an example. Whether reliable, third-party sources featuring significant coverage should be a requirement for notability is not my issue. (And not only because it makes no difference...) What particularly disgusts me is that the current text still wants to create its own (completely superfluous) terminology: "For fictional subjects, terms such as reliability and independence have specialized meanings." For reliability that's not even the case. What is required for reliability is depending on the area of expertise. That's not something special to fiction. And then comes the most hideous part about independence. The guideline tries to satisfy the deletionist side by calling for "independent sources" then it goes on to reduce the standards of what an "independent source" is. This is a contract with so much fine print that at the end of the day nobody knows if they cheated or were cheated. -- Why not take the bits of this guideline that are backed by other guidelines and policies and put them aside, pointing out that they are required no matter what this guideline says. And then focus on the actual disagreement: what is needed for "notability" (as in "one inclusion criteria among several others"). -- Before the RfC, the regulars of this page deluded themselves into thinking they had a consensus, because they evaded the actual problem instead of confronting it. -- Goodraise (talk) 04:55, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
  • Putting aside "the bits of this guideline that are backed by other guidelines" is an arguement for construction an exemption for fiction from Wikipedia policies and guidelines, and creating entirely new ones just for the subject area of fiction. Its an arguement that has a lot of support here, as I think this is the position from which many editors such as Phil Sandifer and Masem share with you, together with majority of contributors to Wikipedia:Notability/RFC:Reevaluation. However, there are two problems associated with this position.
    Firstly, what would be the alternative? As you will see from the RFC, there is no agreement on what should be the alternative to existing policies and guidelines, and what proposals that have been put forward have not received anything like strong support. The problem for those seeking change is that a large majority of editors with an interest in fictional topics accept the entire pantheon of Wikipedia policies and guidelines with the exception of WP:N, WP:NOT#PLOT and WP:INUNIVERSE - I suspect this is at the heart of your own disagreement with WP:FICT. Once you accept this, you will come to realise that it is very hard to seperate these three from the rest, because guidelines and policies support each other in a consistent and comprehensive fashion, e.g. WP:NOT#PLOT prohibits plot only articles, whilst and WP:INUNIVERSE discouragres articles from being written from the perspective of plot. In order to get the result you want, you will have to admit that policy and guidelines cannot be changed to accomodate unregulated articles on fiction - only an exemption will do.
    Secondly, once you realise that it is an exemption for fiction that you are seeking in order to loosen the restricitons imposed by Wikipedia polcies and guidelines, you will discover that this will open a whole new can of worms. Although constructing an exemption for fiction sounds like a clean, straight-forward operation that can be done by rewriting WP:FICT along the lines of "elements of fiction should be allowed their own article if supported by +1,000 words from any source", you will find that such exemptions are in fact inclusion criteria that will come under scruitany just as much as, say, WP:N is now. The problem with exemptions is that they are, in effect, a form of inclusion criteria that does not require any objective evidence, and as such, will be hard to get agreement that will last long, for a set of inclusion criteria that is not underpinned by objective evidence is built on the shifting sand of everchanging opinion. Even if you choose to follow this path, there are going to be occassions where the guidelines will need ojective evidence in any case, i.e. where editorial disputes that cannot be resolved on the basis of strength of opinion. One example springs to my mind, and that is the special case of content forks; in order to avoid them, you need to have inclusion criteria that based on objective evidence that can be used to adjudicate in such disputes. Other instances of where you need inclusion criteria based on objective evidence is where the subject matter is contraversial or offensive.
    Overall, I would say that trying to construct an exemption for fiction is akin to trying to build an editorial walled garden. It is possible, but as time passes, you will find more and more reasons to knock down that wall and rejoin the rest of us Wikipedians who want to contruct a truely open encylopedia. --Gavin Collins (talk) 09:44, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It seems I have to apologize for my complete failure at conveying my position. I'll try again: You seem to think that I'm an inclusionist. You are the first to think that. I neither want exceptions to be made, nor do I want exceptions not to be made. My problem is that the proposal reads as if it defined a whole new set of rules for fictional topics, while it actually does not. Most of it is only restating what other guidelines and policies already say. The only thing it really changes for fictional topics is giving an alternative to the GNG. That is where the core conflict lies in this dispute. The Deletionist Confederacy and the Inclusionist Alliance have to draw their border onto the map. -- My first version was an attempt to show where the proposal of the last RfC actually drew that line. (I wrote it with the intention of exactly mirroring the meaning of that proposal and I still think that I managed to do just that.) The opposition it received was because people missed the additional text, which they said would be a useful tool at AfD. Simply re-adding it as a non-binding explanatory text wasn't enough for them. -- The version I posted above is mostly meant to demonstrate how a wordy proposal that I could agree with would look, regardless of where the line is drawn. It's a concession to these people, first of all Phil Sandifer, who said: "I oppose it. Flat out. I will fight it tooth and nail if any attempt is made to swap it for the current proposal. [...] This is an absolute deal-breaker, and will switch me to the most vehement and vigorous opponent of this effort that you have ever seen."[8] -- Goodraise (talk) 10:49, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
Even if we were to use something like your proposal, which i doubt, the composite article section would have to be removed as we are specifically not addressing lists at this time.じんない 11:02, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
You have completely--as in 100% of it--missed the point. My reply of 10:49, 28 February 2009 (UTC) might clarify it. -- Goodraise (talk) 11:15, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Final adoption as a guideline

This is a Request for comments on the final adoption of WP:FICT as a guideline. A straw poll showing broad, informal support is above. This proposed guideline represent months of compromise between editors across the inclusion spectrum. As a compromise, it will not mirror your exact feelings about fictional subject notability. If you support this guideline, please tell us why. If you oppose this guideline, please tell us why. If you are ambivalent, well, tell us why if you can be bothered. :) If you have already told us why in the dozens and dozens of threads above, you can probably just tell us you support the adoption of this as a guideline. Protonk (talk) 01:39, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I might add... you are allowed to support this even if it's not your ideal choice. If you do decide to swallow your pride and support this, feel free to let us know what you would prefer. Randomran (talk) 02:18, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
The strawpoll above polled editors who watched this page, and were involved with its creation. This is true with the first 10 or 15 posts below, but as this RfC has been advertised the wider community, it is clear that the "broad" support is only within a walled garden.
I caution editors to support this if you have problems with this page. Once a proposal becomes a guideline, it is usually difficult to change because the larger incentive to comprimise is gone. Ikip (talk) 20:50, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

  • EDIT: I also don't like that it gives character articles less need for justification than other elements because of AfD, yet also critizies other practices done in AfD. Sounds to me like a double-standard is being applied with reguard to character articles, but it's not enough to hold up an entire guideline over on minor point.じんない 03:41, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I respect your efforts to comprimise. But I believe that this guideline also does too much. This guideline destroys the unofficial exception that television episodes and characters had shared with schools. If passed, this article will create a three prong test that all fiction articles are judge upon. If these articles don't pass, they are deleted or merged. Hundreds of articles will then be deleted and merged. 12:23, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
No such "unofficial exception" existed. Episodes and characters are rarely deleted based on the presumption that they can be merged to lists or series articles. Nothing about that changes.- A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 12:46, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Respectfully, User:Starblind/DeletionWars#Inclusionism and two AfD's which entire premise was based on the disruption caused when an editor merged articles.Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Episodes_and_characters, Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Episodes_and_characters 2 disagree with this assessment. An editor was topic banned for 6 months for merging articles. Ikip (talk) 15:44, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Okay? I can make User:A Man In Black/Let's tape Ikip up in a box and mail him to the moon but it doesn't much affect anything, no matter how many stamps I buy. The fact of the matter is, most of the articles this guideline will affect are obvious merge candidates, save the exceptionally bad or the exceptionally good. They'll be merge candidates before this and they'll be merge candidates after this and when all is said and done this won't do much of anything save take out some of the trash and give some people some hopeless AFDs to rage about. All heat, no light.
Raging against this as some sort of deletionist catspaw would be hilarious if it didn't marginalize opposition that has something to do with reality. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 21:24, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Please calm down and drink some tea. Lets focus on the substance of what I wrote. thank you. Ikip (talk) 16:07, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Things people say in userspace pages don't necessarily have anything to do with reality, and TTN was in trouble not for merging, but merging obnoxiously and aggressively. Again, most of the articles that fail this guideline, should it pass, are merge candidates anyway. The only reason they would be deleted is because AFD can't be shouted down by one loud fan. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 17:13, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
  • The point of that paragraph is that articles entirely without independent sources (but pass the current guideline due to having developer commentary) don't pass GAN/FAC and thus should be merged in the long run if no independent sources are found, as the articles can't move up the assessment chart. I absolutely agree that only a handful of independent sources (for conception/development/reception/etc.) are needed, and that they don't need to constitute a majority of the sources in the article, but this points to the editorial decision of merging to better present material that has no hope of passing GAN/FAC. It also implies that "a subject is notable on the reasonable belief that adequate evidence of notability exists" because we keep stuff based on its potential to reach GA/FA (i.e. obviously notable stuff like Luke Skywalker), and it's easy to argue that independent sourcing likely exists in that case. — sephiroth bcr (converse) 10:33, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
  • Your insinuation that my comment is dishonest is uncivil. Should I suggest that your lack of understanding or hectoring is improper and so disqualify your comments? I shall perhaps say more on this in the new section about this process below but my general aim is to be brief since these interminable discussions are tiresome. You may be sure that I could expand on my comments at great length and consider them both cogent and accurate. Colonel Warden (talk) 10:55, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
The full quote: "I actually think that "notability" is problematic. It's a shorthand way of speaking, but it leads people to think about the issue in an invalid way. The real work can mostly be done by "verifiability", and "verifiability" is much more amenable to consensus. The Simpson's anomaly is probably my own personal fault, because [quote above] My increased "deletionism" is very mild when it comes to things like Simpson's episodes - not much harm done. But it is quite strong when it comes to biographies of living persons, where serious damage can be done." Not much harm done, pretty mild. Is this guideline pretty mild? Ikip (talk) 20:19, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Actually, in the full quote Jimbo is emphasizing verifiability over notability. If you believe this guideline should be rewritten to strongly emphasize third-party sources— for which Jimbo's emphasis is not "pretty mild"— while de-emphasizing WP:NOTE per the quote above, then we can agree this guideline should be more strict. Otherwise you are just quote-mining Jimbo in support of generic inclusion, which is not his position. / edg ☺ ☭ 21:04, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Also, keep in mind WP:JIMBOSEZ. Protonk (talk) 03:05, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
I refactored out the Jim wales quote. I didn't misquote or quote mine Jimbo (look up the definition), Jimbo changed his mind. I am disappointed in Jimbo's change of heart but not surprised. An increase in so much Bureaucracy could not happened without Jimbo's consent. I guess the WP:JIMBOSEZ essay was meant for both the old quote and the new one? The bottom line is that this article is poorly written, and is Bureaucracy and Rule Creep. That is why over fifty people oppose this policy, and this policy has failed twice before already. Ikip (talk) 11:48, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
The first time this policy fell apart, Radiant's FICT, it was simply overtaken by time. The original WP:FICT was vaguely worded and very know-it-when-I-see-it, and while it didn't hold up on its own, its general philosophy sees unwritten consensus. (We don't cover very minor characters, we merge characters into lists, upmerging fictional item articles into setting or list articles is preferable to deletion, etc.)
The second time it fell apart, Deckiller's FICT, it was just "WP:GNG applies to fictional subjects." This was crushed under "Well duh, only an idiot needs a separate guideline to tell them that," "What about lists? I thought we liked lists," and "WP:GNG eats babies."
This guideline is informed by the failure of Deckiller's FICT, and Radiant's FICT accomplished its goal. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 12:14, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
By "This guideline is based on what currently occurs at AFD":
1 So you mean, new editors contributions are deleted? (The majority of articles for deletion are by new editors)
2 Do you mean that with this policy, editors will delete articles, as they do in AfDs now, ignoring: WP:PRESERVE, Wikipedia:Notability "If an article fails to cite sufficient sources to demonstrate the notability of its subject, look for sources yourself.", Wikipedia:Deletion "When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page...If the page can be improved, this should be solved through regular editing, rather than deletion" WP:INTROTODELETE and Wikipedia:Potential, not just current state. where editors expect other editors to add content and make no effort themselves? If the answer to these two questions is "yes" than I can see where this policy would be a contiutation of AfDs. Ikip (talk) 16:19, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
What is your complaint with this guideline? This guideline doesn't take a moral stance on what is occurring at AfD. It doesn't dictate that deletion should occur. It is based on the assumption that subjects have sources, not necessarily articles. WP:PRESERVE, WP:IMPERFECT and WP:MERGE are all linked to in this guideline. If you don't like it that people don't follow WP:BEFORE, take it up at WT:AFD or that editor's talk page. The existence of WP:PROF does not force people to follow or ignore policies and norms with regard to deletion. Neither does this guideline. We are making a compromise in order to expand what can be considered notable in the fictional world. That's it. Protonk (talk) 16:26, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I was responding to Masem, and the end result of this page. This guidleline will be used by editors to delete hundreds of episode and character pages. That is the bottom line. Again, your premise is that their should be a guideline, I say there is enough, rule creep and Bureaucracy imposed on editors trying to contribute to articles on wikipedia already. Ikip (talk) 16:43, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I know who you were replying to. If your bottom line position is that WP:N shouldn't exist, I'm afraid that your opposition to this particular guideline won't be given much credence. Protonk (talk) 16:45, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm not sure we really have anything to gain by continuing to argue with Ikip. He's clearly assumed a borderline-delusional level of bad faith such that nothing we say has any chance of changing his mind. Best not give the misimpression that we are taking him at all seriously. Phil Sandifer (talk) 16:43, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I wish you would remove this personal attack phil. Thank you. Ikip (talk) 06:41, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
I don't support the personal attack. If I were Phil I wouldn't have made it, because it lends you more credence in this discussion. What Phil was saying (where I agree with him) was that your intransigence on the subject of notability makes it impossible to work with you to form a compromise--the very heart of WP:CON. You don't support this guideline. Noted. We will move on without you. Protonk (talk) 18:34, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
(refactored) In this RfC, we now know how established editors feel, many who wrote this page, but you are going to have to roll over a lot of editors who are actively working on these fiction pages, and you can't as easily ignore them.
Having a respect for other editors contributions, and a concern for the future of the project, based on the universal negativity of the media and dropping edits, is not an impossible position to comprimise with. The only disruption and personal attacks has come from those who support this page, not me.
The three prongs are three more hurdles which we are forcing on editors. Ikip (talk) 18:48, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
If you can find some method to poll every editor working everywhere, I'm all ears. All we are trying to do is make the best possible attempt to determine consensus. We can't assume that all editors of fiction care about the layout of fictional subjects or care specifically about this RfC. I understand the argument that the best solution is to not mess with those authors. I largely agree. A policy should be relatively hands off--allowing people to make the articles they want to make. But we have to stick to V/NOT/NOR. Those are fundamental goals for the project. WP:N (specifically the GNG) is a shortcut to those goals. IT says "here are the kinds of subjects likely to have sufficient source material available so that articles will meet our core content policies". The GNG does an ok job of this but it has limitations. It creates arbitrary (to the work of fiction) rules about article creation and it limits the organizational flexibility available to editors (not all characters should be mashed into "...of series XYZ" lists. Because we have to have some shortcut means to V/NOT/NOR and because the GNG is too broad a brush, we tried to come up with this compromise. It's the best we've got. A lot of good faith effort went into this. So, yeah, it's probably distressing for Phil (and for me) to see people come by and just say "no any limit/expansion of fictional content is worthless. It will create/destroy millions of articles that I love/hate" (Pick your poison). So this is my last offer. We are here in good faith. We want to work together. We want to work with you, even. But we can't work together if you refuse to accept that we are here in good faith. We can't work together if you still think that Phil's deletion was a stunt (coordinated with the rest of us) to foist this upon the community. We can't work together if the basis of your participation here is to delegitimize any work that we have done in the past. So lets find some compromise that is amenable to you. If we can't, ok. Then you will remain opposed and we will try to make a compromise that is amenable to a strong majority of the people commenting here. But lets work toward that. Protonk (talk) 18:57, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Your comments make a lot of assumptions. My concern is the future of wikipedia, as I mentioned above. Your words are warm and fuzzy, "community" "good faith" "comprimise". Thats great, when people sell their ideas like this it garners support. Part of being a good member of the "community" "good faith" "comprimise" is acknowledging the views of those who disagree with you, describing other editors comments as "bad faith" "delusional" "delegitimize" "move on without you" does not. The three prong (hurdle) will delete a lot of editors contributions. Ikip (talk) 19:09, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
And I'm not concerned about the future of wikipedia? I'm going to ask you one last time. Please do not interpret my actions here as an attempt to sell you a bill of goods or to trick you or to gloss over serious problems. I am entering into this discussion in good faith. I am here to compromise. The other editors involved heavily with this guideline are here to compromise. If you are not here to compromise, fine. Your objection to the guideline will be noted. What I said about "legitimate" and "illegitimate" reasons for opposition remains true. If I work on a government committee that adjusts taxation rates on energy (just for an example) and I propose a relatively small change to some tax rate on Gasoline or Uranium, I would expect that opposition to that change be based on the merits of the change. It would not be reasonable for me to forgo that change based on opposition that stated that the government has no right to tax individuals at all. That opposition doesn't give me reason to support or oppose the tax change. Just like general opposition to notability gives me no reason to oppose or support this guideline. If someone opposes WP:N without exception, then that doesn't impact whether or not loosening standards is a valuable exercise. We are asking people "Should elements of fiction be covered under the GNG or should they be covered under this guideline?" Door number three: "No guideline at all" is not a policy option on the table. Protonk (talk) 19:23, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Protonk, again, you make so many assumptions in your statments, and make many assumptions in mine. No one said your "not concerned about the future of wikipedia". I am here to comprimise too, and yes, no guideline at all, is an option. If enough editors explain here that we should not adapt this proposal (thats the tag on the page: a proposal) then it will not be a guideline. You and Phil brought up all of the questions about my sincerity, not me. Phil made it personal, I attempted to remove that person attack, and you stated you agreed with what Phil in part. The bottom line is the three prong (hurdle) will delete a lot of editors contributions. This is my last post in this thread...have the last word :)Ikip (talk) 20:36, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I don't want "the last word" I want us to see eye to eye. Ok. You are correct in saying that if this proposal is rejected then there will not be a guideline for notability of fictional elements. However what will remain is the general notability guideline with its much more strict requirement for multiple independent sources which cover the subject in specific detail. So we have a few options: A. Adopt this guideline (or something like it) and loosen standards somewhat. B. Somehow convince the majority of editors that the GNG is not in force. C. Create some other compromise which is more inclusive than this guideline. Simply opposing this guideline doesn't mean no notability guideline applies to fiction, it means that no small exception to the GNG is carved out. It is a net negative for inclusion of fictional subjects. If you want to start another RfC on WP:N, you may (though I suggest you read the last one first), but I suspect that you won't find consensus to mark the guideline as "historical". If you want to propose some more inclusive compromise, please do so, but note that the "deletionist" editors here who support this guideline are basically at the edge of what they would support and further pushing may cause their support to be lost. This is a delicate balance and, like any compromise, means that those who strongly support one end or the other aren't going to like it much. As for questions of your sincerity....let's just say that we didn't start that all by ourselves. I am willing to believe that you are here to reach a compromise (or to fight for what you believe is right). I already believe that you are a passionate inclusionist. I want you to believe that Phil is as well. That I once was as well. Protonk (talk) 22:44, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I have to comment: "Simply opposing this guideline doesn't mean no notability guideline applies to fiction, it means that no small exception to the GNG is carved out. It is a net negative for inclusion of fictional subjects."
I think it is very important that editors know this is NOT the case. This article is creating three prongs (hurdles) that all fictional articles must pass, "A subject that meets all three prongs may qualify for a standalone article." This guideline destroys the exception that episodes and characters now have. It is a net negative for fictional subjects, and it will result in the merging or deletion of hundreds of articles. Ikip (talk) 07:05, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
If a fictional element (like the Cheshire Cat) is covered in enough detail that it meets the GNG, this guideline doesn't matter. From the lede of the current revision: "In all cases, if a subject relating to a work or element of fiction meets the requirement of the general notability guideline, it is presumed to satisfy the inclusion criteria for a stand-alone article." Any subject that is important to the overall work, has some connection to the outside world and has some non-plot information (like Horus Heresy) can be included under this guideline though would be deleted if the GNG were strictly applied. A subject that doesn't meet this guideline will also not meet the GNG. So I'm having some trouble visualizing this as "deleting hundreds of fiction articles". Remember, the important thing is not the absolute number of deletions but the relative difference. How many pages will be saved from deletion if this guideline is accepted? It will be greater than zero, at least. Protonk (talk) 07:16, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
What about the 3 prongs (hurdles) for inclusion on wikipedia? These are new, or at least they are a codification of existing policy.
would be deleted if the GNG were strictly applied'
Your argument presupposes that GNG is strickly applied now.
The reality, is notability has not been strictly applied. Currently there is an unofficial truce, that high schools and television episodes do not have the stringent rigidity of notability. This truce is based on years and years of fighting. This guideline brings those television episodes into the strict notability guidelines, which means hundreds of episodes will be merged or deleted.
There are so many problems I find with this policy, one is that the episodes obviously do exist, any person can turn on the television or rent a DVD, or read about them on TVguide.com. Yet for many people here, who have an exclusionist view of what wikipedia should be, those episodes should not be on wikipedia, and they are so certain they should not be on wikipedia, they are going to force their views on others.
The three prong (hurdle) and guideline, is not a comprimise, it is a defeat for those who feel that episodes should exist. It will result in the deletion or merging of hundreds of articles. Ikip (talk) 12:00, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
I believe episode articles would benefit the most from this guideline. By relaxing the requirement for independent sources, episode articles will be able to exist mostly sourced from information from the developers. Even children's TV shows have DVDs with commentary, official websites, companion magazines nowadays. I've had plenty of articles I've been involved in redirected because they failed the GNG, but this guideline would allow for the resurrection of the information because there is the capability to give the articles a real-world perspective and not such a high demand of individual notability.
If the "unofficial truce" comes to an end and this guideline isn't in place, then the GNG and NOT#PLOT will be the reason behind the deletion and merging of the articles. With this guideline there is the potential for covering much more information. Development sections are currently summarised into the main topic article or season list. With this guideline in place there can also be a much more detailed section of production in each individual article too. With current guidelines we have one paragraph of plot sumamry in a list. With this new guideline there can also be articles with plot summaries of 3 or 4 paragraphs. This compromise on individual notability is opening the door to covering much more information in much more depth. I can't see how you see it as a defeat. --Bill (talk|contribs) 16:37, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
You are correct, there is an unwritten truce. You are incorrect if you feel that the terms of that unwritten truce resemble "anything fictional is a-ok". While agreement and application is pretty heterogeneous, the informal outcomes basically match what we are trying to do here. More important elements (as in, important to understanding the story) get kept. Less importance elements or elements where no verifiable sourcing exists on material outside of PLOT summary get merged or deleted. Protonk (talk) 16:46, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Your entire premise is based upon the idea that there should be a guideline in the first place. I disagree stongly. I think there is enough acronyms which editors use to delete other editors contributions already. This is WP:BURO WP:CREEP, which will disrupte a lot of editors contibutions, and alienate even more editors. Everyone who supports this proposal gives empty repeated assurances here that articles will not be deleted, but the past behavior of many of these editors here[12][13] tells a starkly different story. My concern is what is best for the project. Is it beneficial for a small group of editors to push this policy against the will of hundreds of contritibutors? This proposal, and prospals like this guideline, are the reason why journalists are universally negative about wikipedia's "draconian" deletion policy. The Economist says that deletion policies like this one are the reason why wikipedia editing has dropped. As Wales says, "All those people who are obsessively writing about Britney Spears or 'The Simpsons' or Pokémon -- it's just not true that we should try to redirect them into writing about obscure concepts in physics...Wiki is not paper, and their time is not owned by us. We can't say, 'Why do we have these employees doing stuff that's so useless?' They're not hurting anything. Let them write it..." Stop worrying about what everyone else is doing, and focus on contriubting more, instead of pushing your idea of what wikipedia should be on others. Ikip (talk) 16:35, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
There already is a guideline. We are trying to work in a reasonable exception so that more articles can be created without fear of deletion. Unless you think that the current state of affairs better suits marginal articles or that some better compromise with the "deletionist" editors (who aren't going away) is forthcoming, I'm not sure why you would oppose this on the basis that more articles will be deleted. Protonk (talk) 16:38, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
RE: Phil. Message received. Probably not worth reverting again. Protonk (talk) 16:59, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Nah. You are the occasion of the address, not the sole target, if you will. :) Phil Sandifer (talk) 17:03, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Roger. I'd say it isn't worth the bother but that's up to you. Protonk (talk) 17:04, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
"Unless you think that the current state of affairs better suits marginal articles or that some better compromise with the "deletionist" editors (who aren't going away) is forthcoming, I'm not sure why you would oppose this on the basis that more articles will be deleted."
This is a strawman argument. There are other options.
Creating three hurdles (prongs) which every ficitional work must pass will mean more deletions of editors work.
Editors, many of these editors here, will not actually work on many of these articles (in violation of WP:PRESERVE but they will be these articles up for deletion, demanding that other editors meet these three hurdles. Ikip (talk) 17:34, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
It certainly is not a straw man. A substantially more inclusive compromise is not forthcoming. Opposing this guideline on the basis that some more inclusive alternative will swell up in the vacuum is unrealistic. Further, I have to reiterate that the problems you mention have 'nothing whatsoever to do with this guideline. Nothing. At all. You are upset that things get deleted. Ok. We get that. Protonk (talk) 18:31, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I think Michael said it best: "There is absolutley no reason to institute a flawed guideline that could itself cause dissention and disruption across the project...there is no deadline" I am explaining the inherient problems of this policy. A three prong test is a three prong hurdle for editors. Many articles will be deleted based on these three prongs. Ikip (talk) 18:48, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Aye, articles will be deleted or merged because of this, but other articles will be kept that would have been deleted or merged otherwise because of their commentary of development and such. It's called a reasonable compromise. The fact so many editors complain that it's too inclusive and so many editors also claim it's too deletionist shows this better than any comment I can make. Also, while Wikipedia does not have a deadline, not having a policy for such a broad area of Wikiepdia's articles causes more harm and disruption that passing something that has been hammered out by editors from both extremes.じんない 22:56, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
What is a "watchlist notice for all registered editors" sounds big...Ikip (talk) 20:14, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I found it: Watched_article#Watchlist_notice, that would be incredible, let me know if I can help in anyway (sincerely). Ikip (talk) 20:17, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Here is the request: MediaWiki_talk:Watchlist-details#Add_notice_to_advertise_WP:FICT.27s_adoption_as_a_guideline Ikip (talk) 20:18, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
A Few Good Men is the work itself; an element would be the props, actors, setting. This guideline does not cover the work itself. It says so in the first paragraph.じんない 05:02, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps I was unclear, but I understand the difference between works and the elements of said work. I was saying that the level of misunderstanding between the people that have been a part of the creation of the proposed guideline and the people who are coming to comment demonstrate that it isn't stated clearly enough in the guideline to begin with. Compare this guideline to one that has been thoroughly clarified, such as WP:N. I just think that the text is not quite there yet. Perhaps someone with a closer relationship to the guideline could jump in and fix it up. I understand that this has been a long, frustrating road to get to this point, but as soon as this becomes a real policy, it will affect all of Wikipedia, not just the people who have been arguing over it. It needs to break out of its shell of carefully tempered tight-rope walking between the two parties here and be made into a workable policy. In my opinion, it is not yet clear enough to work effectively. SMSpivey (talk) 05:29, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
This doesn't need to be perfect prior to adoption. If you think that the wording can be improved upon, please help us. If you think that it is fatally unclear, say so. If you can live with the basic idea (that important elements of notable fictional works can be included with less sourcing than is normally required by the GNG), then please support the guideline. Protonk (talk) 05:51, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Now you're the one doing the interpretation. WP:V does not require the source to be wholly independent of the subject. Furthermore, this is only limited to the 2nd prong, ie importance within the work itself. It clearly defines what an self-publshed source. For the promotion of a fictional work, that would not fly, since an author does get more money in theory to promote his work. However, writing a data book about Sasuke Uchiha doesn't doesn't benifit by trying to promote that Sasuke is more important than another character. Fiction is not the same as real life.じんない 05:24, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
There already is an exception to notability guidelines, based on 4 years of edit warring. This policy will result in the merge and deletion of hundreds of articles. Hardly a compromise for the hundreds of editors who worked so hard on this articles. Ikip (talk) 09:06, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
This is a fine forum to argue rule creep and Bureaucracy. This guideline is an attempt to delete and merge hundreds of editors contributions. This proposal absolutely DOES NOT represent a net increase in articles kept, as is explained above. Ikip (talk) 11:36, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
This rule creep and Bearacracy creates a complex set of new rules, stricter than the status quo now. I commend Werdna for recognizing this. Ikip (talk) 14:57, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
Since wikipedia is not paper, the true and best improvement is in its continued growth...not in making it a paperless clone of Britanica. That was not why wikipedia was founded.Ikip (talk) 20:45, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
Adding more rule creep and bureaucracy are not going to magically solve 4 years of edit warring. Ikip (talk) 19:58, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
According to ArbCom's decision to not heard Ep&Char 3, it will help. The current situation is not acceptable to continue indefinitely. --MASEM 20:33, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
I am not familiar with that decision, where is it at? It comes down to respect, respect of editors and respect of other editors contributions. This guideline will not solve the problem, once and for all, it will simply inflame it. Once editors move in to merge and delete hundreds of episode and character pages, editors who contributed to those pages are not going to simply say, oh, there is this brand new approved guideline, please go ahead and delete several months work. Ikip (talk) 10:03, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Closing administrator please note, this editor has only 6 edits. Ikip (talk) 10:45, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
I would also mention that this would, if it went into effect and was actually enforced (which would be rather difficult IMO), create such a plethora of lists relating to fictional content as would reflect poorly on the overall nature of the encyclopedia. WP:NOT says "Wikipedia is not a directory" - this includes such lists. Our readers come here to read articles, not browse through lists. And I think we should consider that carefully. –The Fiddly Leprechaun · Catch Me! 21:58, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
The intention of the test is to create a more lenient criteria for judging notability, but in practice you only need the third prong. Basically, the proposal is flawed. Regarding your example, Sideshow Bob would merit his own article in the first place because he has been covered and discussed by several secondary sources. The other two tests are useless. WesleyDodds (talk) 23:04, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Well, then we just have a difference of opinion. I agree that the third prong is noticably stricter than the first prong. But both are needed. I support this compromise because the status quo leaves us with deleting characters who are central to a work of fiction regardless of that centrality. That is an outcome that illustrates (to some) the disconnect between WP:N and "reality" (you can argue about their definition of reality). This guidance attempts to bridge that without giving away the farm. Protonk (talk) 23:14, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Unfortunately not everything merits an article. Some fictional articles should be deleted. That's a harsh truth. Really, if the subject can't fulfill the third criteria, whether or not it meets the first two is pointless. Also, comparing this guideline, to say, the ones determining notability for musical groups and songs, it's very lacking. Those guidelines deal with what kind of sources are acceptable to determine notability. In comparison, this guidelines feels very insular. How many other notability guidelines were consulted in crafting this? WesleyDodds (talk) 23:25, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Of course. Not everything merits an article (though there is a range of opinions on that as well). I would also argue that most people feel that some real world connection should exist in these articles, but that a range of opinions exists there as well. We are attempting to write a guideline to allow for that range. We want to avoid infinite splits into increasingly more trivial articles and we want to avoid just saying ">2 RS or it goes" for articles which may have been spun from their parent due to SIZE. How do you suggest we do that in the fashion that MUSIC or NB does? Wikipedia:Notability_(books) offers 5 criteria. One is basically the GNG (which is what most books are kept/deleted on anyway). 4 is spotty in terms of falsifiability. 5 is pretty indefensible as a notability criteria. Wikipedia:Notability (music) doesn't really analogize well. If a musician charts or is broadcast, they can get an article. Ok. What is the analogue to WP:FICT? Even then, charting doesn't map well to independent sourcing (presumably the idea) and there are several cases where an article would be deleted by WP:MUSIC and kept by the GNG. Likewise with ATHLETE, which is just as arbitrary. I'm not trying to drag those guidelines down, just note that we aren't really placing them under the same scrutiny and that they don't serve the same functions. A musician or author isn't an obvious daughter to a larger, notable subject. Every fictional element is. That doesn't translate across. So we have looked at some of those guidelines (note below the discussion of the size of this guideline in comparison) when creating this, but for some of the reasons I pointed out, that referencing will not be noticable in the text of the guideline. Protonk (talk) 23:38, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
As someone who has worked both on fiction articles and music articles, I can say the music guidelines for notability have been far more useful and relevant than these proposed guidelines. The real problem is that priority emphasis is not being placed on secondary sources. When I work on a fiction article, my first thought is "What sources can I find at my library or online?", not "How important is this to a larger fictional work?" Because it's irrelevant. Secondary sources will determine if it is important enough to merit its own article. That's why the songs guideline works so well. Charting on a national sales chart is a very clear-cut criteria for gauging notability based on secondary sources. We don't have that here; instead there's a focus on how much a character has appeared in a series and so forth. Personally I think there needs to be another overhaul of the proposed guideline, and until then, I will continue to oppose. WesleyDodds (talk) 23:48, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
"Charting...is a very clear cut criteria for gauging notability based on secondary sources". I agree, partially. It is a good proxy. Charting doesn't mean that something will be covered. It means that it is likely to be covered. But I think that we understand each other well enough. Hopefully some overhaul of the guideline can be made so that it satisfies your concerns (though it seems like you are looking for a recapitulation of the GNG). Protonk (talk) 23:57, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Oppose. I have given my reasons below as part of a general discussion, but as I see that !votes in this straw poll are still being counted, I place mine here so my view is counted. Then, according to Wikipedia:Policies#Proposals we should tag this as failed. It has had several years to gain consensus and constantly fails. My suggestion is that we mark it as an essay rather than a failed proposal. SilkTork *YES! 08:41, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Strong Oppose. The text at present is inconsistent (there is still reference to the three pronged test but the test has been renamed for instance, and the text now talks about conditions). It suffers from massive WP:CREEP. The guideline, if adopted, would also immediately generate hundreds, if not thousands of additional articles in need for cleanup, review, merging or deletion - a severe case of WP:BURO. "Notability of Elements of Fictional Works", in particular the first and the third conditions, are ackwardedly worded and will be constantly subject to the systemic bias that if one editor doesn't know about something, it cannot be notable - a source for more senseless edit wars instead of less of these. Last but not least, per Ikip. The text should be completely frozen during the RfC for adoption, since the early voters and late voters aren't considering the same guideline anymore. MLauba (talk) 12:29, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

  1. ^ a b c d e Not enough empahsis is put on third party sources
  2. ^ a b Proposed policy is too inclusionist.
  3. ^ a b Proposed policy is too deletionist.
  4. ^ Proposed policy focuses too much on article quality
  5. ^ a b Appears to be stricter than other notability guidelines.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h Guideline's wording is confusing or unclear.
  7. ^ Proposed policy does not meet no original research guidelines.
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