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Part of the dispute over WP:PLOT is that it is used as a reason to delete. Can we amend the wording at other policies and guidance to make it clear that listings in WP:NOT are not reasons for deletion, but rather possible problems with articles for which they may be listed for deletion, and that editorial consensus is free to over-ride WP:NOT per WP:IAR? I know I washed my hands on this, but I'm not averse to looking through a couple more options in a bid to find the middle ground. HidingT 15:35, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
WP:NOT does usefully provide grounds for deletion - so, no. Eusebeus (talk) 15:42, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
No, to amended the wording in that way would probably not work because we cannot tell admins not to delete an article just because it fails WP:NOT#PLOT when there is a clear consensus to delete. Articles are protected from arbitary deletion by the process of AfD, so we don't need to make such an amendment.--Gavin Collins (talk) 16:28, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
You know, to some degree Eusebeus and Gavin are correct.. but when I look through all the various clauses and terms about NOT, this is a policy on content, but not a policy on the suitability of topics for inclusion, and thus by corollary, not a policy about what articles should be deleted. Mind you, if an article is written in a manner that clearly violates this and there is no hope to improve it, deletion makes sense, but I almost think in every case listed, assuming the topic is appropriate to be included, then a NOT violation is not means to delete, but means to improve and/or reorganize thoughts (including merges) as to still keep the coverage, just making it in line with what content is expected for WP. --MASEM 20:22, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Hiding, you're looking for DEL, specifically WP:DEL#REASON. This policy is a list of things that do not belong on Wikipedia — content NOT suitable for an encyclopedia. Either plot summaries belong on Wikipedia or they do not. It appears to me that plot summaries do belong on Wikipedia, so this policy should not say they are not allowed. --Pixelface (talk) 04:06, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
What do you think WP:NOT#PLOT says? It says Wikipedia articles are not simply plot summaries. It says articles that are just plot summaries make Wikipedia an indiscriminate collection of information. It says articles that are just plot summaries are NOT allowed on Wikipedia. But plot summaries ARE allowed on Wikipedia, so PLOT does not belong in NOT. --Pixelface (talk) 23:16, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
False logic. We are saying "X alone is not allowed" but this does not imply "X is not allowed". --MASEM 00:58, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Now why would X be allowed but not if X was alone? And the articles Cosette, Baldrick, and Lenny Leonard suggest that plot summaries alone actually *are* allowed. --Pixelface (talk) 02:48, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Because X alone may not be an approach approach to an encyclopedic treatment of a topic, and only combined with Y does it gain the appropriate meaning. As for your examples you keep bringing up, show us cases that have survived deletion or merging discussions, not articles that may have existed for years that no one has brought to attention to be improved. --MASEM 02:58, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Really? So telling readers what Cosette does in the novel and musical is not an "appropriate encyclopedic treatment" of the subject? Summarizing the events of her fictional life is not an appropriate encyclopedic treatment of the subject? Telling readers Iron Monger's character background and history is not an appropriate encyclopedic treatment of the subject? And I've already linked to multiple cases that have "survived" deletion discussions. But here they are again.[1][2][3] The following were merged, not deleted.[4][5][6][7]. Can you think of anything else in WP:NOT that could be merged into another article? Original inventions? Personal essays? Propaganda? OpEds? Advertising? Sales catalogs? How-to guides? Unverifiable speculation? You can also see this AFD, where there was no consensus to delete, but the closing admin deleted it anyway.[8] And here are some more AFDs you can look at.[9][10][11] (later merged[12]} [13] --Pixelface (talk) 06:06, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
It's pretty obvious that fiction and plot related issues are different from things made up in class one day. OpEds, Ads, etc. are things that are deleted with consensus; fiction/plot deletions are frequently (usually?) made against consensus. Hence this discussion. Big difference. As someone mentioned above, this is partly the result of TTN's endevours. While all the ramifications of PLOT were ignored, it had consensus/momentum. As soon as it was applied, we had massive edit warring and arbitrations. There's one type of consensus when something is applied and not challenged, and there is another type of consensus when something is challenged as soon as it is applied. PLOT's consensus is the second kind. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:48, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
As I just mentioned in the previous section, WP:DEL places alternatives to deletion before reasons for deletion. Editors should not be trying to get a page deleted unless they believe that the reason for deletion can't be fixed. There may be a behavioural issue here, and if so, it's a widespread one. SamBC(talk) 10:01, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
And you think this behavioral issue could not be remedied by moving PLOT to a guideline? --Pixelface (talk) 23:17, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
If there is a behavioural issue, it applies to most if not all reasons for deletion; there's no reason to believe that it affects only PLOT-based nominations. Jakew (talk) 23:26, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
PLOT is a policy version of NOTE applied to fiction. There was never any consensus for something like that. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:22, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
When PLOT was added, notability was not the form it was in today (in regard to secondary sources). However, I do agree that as it is written now, it implies notability which I suggested in a form above that can be removed without removing the key point of PLOT: We do not simply regurgitate plot details in our coverage of published works. Aspects of notability and style tell how one gets around just simple regurgitation. --MASEM 05:35, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
(outdent) It was your comment above which made me realize PLOT was just a form of NOTE (or vise verse). I didn't realize it was older, althought that makes sense. It just makes me think this isn't the right place for it. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:49, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
PLOT is hardly unique in implying notability. Many of the core content policies do so. WP:PSTS, for example, largely implies WP:N through the requirement for secondary sources, but that doesn't mean it is "just" a form of notability; it is an essential part of our strategy for producing a quality encyclopaedia. Jakew (talk) 10:54, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
How about "Wikipedia is not Wikia?
This may sound obvious to those who know, but it may not be obvious to newcomers or others that the various Wikia sites are not under the Wikipedia Foundation. Another editor just removed an addition to the policy that in fact linked to just such a Wikia. This would also have a bearing on AFD discussions, because I have on occasion (not so much anymore, I'll admit) seen folks suggesting certain articles be transwikied to places like the Memory Alpha wiki, etc, perhaps thinking that those sites are somehow spinoffs. Yet I know from visiting these sites that they vary with regards to their policies on image use (many Wikia sites are more loose in their image-use policies), in-universe discussion, OR, etc. and therefore Wikia sites don't always follow the same policies and mission of the Wikipedia Foundation. It's possible this topic is covered in another "official" article, in which case a link is probably all that's needed. This is just something that occurred to me when I spotted the recent edit. 23skidoo (talk) 20:42, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
I think the problem here is that "what is Wikia" is not a well-defined issue; technically, Wikia is "WP + more", but what "more" is, is highly subjective. Certainly policies and guidelines should suggest that material not appropriate to WP can be contained on GFDL-compat wikis (including Wikia), but NOT already spells out a lot of what would be Wikia material, but the rest would be very difficult to distinguish. --MASEM 21:02, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Masem, and want to point out that this could be used to exclude otherwise acceptable material that is also on a Wikia wiki, and there's a lot of it.. We'd do better to keep to specifics.DGG (talk) 18:56, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
That's true. Wikipedia is not Wikia. Perhaps we should rewrite WP:NOT#PLOT to say "Plot summaries. Articles that are only plot summaries are only acceptable when accompanied by banner ads." --Pixelface (talk) 02:51, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
I have to dignify this with a smiley. :-) For the record, you tell me up above that I'm looking for WP:DEL. In all honesty I'm just looking for the middle ground. I'm not trying to shuffle this debate off or anything, but I would like to see if we can work up a page which tries to work out where the middle ground is. I don't want to sideline this debate, but let's knock up Wikipedia:Plot summaries, and if we can all sort out the consensus through editing the page, then we can come back here and take whatever action that consensus dictates. It might work, it might not. HidingT 11:17, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
The reason we came here, unfortunately, is that in discussions there we were told that many of the proposed solutions to plot summaries were insupportable because they conflicted with this clause of WP:NOT. Perhaps we could evade it, but it's much better to change the rule here to clarify that it does not prohibit reasonable plot summaries. Alternatively, if we cannot agree on wording, eliminate the clause and then we can go and settle everything at WP:FICT. DGG (talk) 16:26, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm puzzled. From the current version of this policy, "A concise plot summary is appropriate as part of the larger coverage of a fictional work." How much clarification is needed? Jakew (talk) 16:30, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
I think the point I was trying to get at wasn't so much what's appropriate in Wikia vs. Wikipedia, but the fact that some people (and I confess I was one of them up until about 6 months ago) were under the impression that Wikia was in fact run and operated by the same organization behind Wikipedia. This is obviously incorrect, but I think it needs to be explicitly stated in a WP:NOT venue so that when it comes to AFD arguments someone suggesting content be moved to a Wikia site can be made aware that such requests are still de facto deletion because it involves content being removed from Wikipedia Foundation purview, and that using a Wikia link as a citation is not necessarily acceptable under Wikipedia rules for reliable sources. Am I making sense here? 23skidoo (talk) 16:35, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Jajke, you're right. Now if we remove the references after that to disputed guidelines, maybe we can go on to the more basic things of whether any of the NOT prescriptions on content should be policy or guidelines. DGG (talk) 16:43, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't think we should be linking to proposed/disputed guidelines. Removing them would be a first good step. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 17:11, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Strongly disagree, at least for guidelines that may have in the past had some consensus. Even though a guideline may be under changes or dispute, NOT should point the reader to these so they can learn the various issues with them; they may not get as clear an answer as with undisputed/stable guidelines, but until the guideline is completely disputed by all parties trying to correct it, there's still information and language that helps to clarify NOT further. --MASEM 17:32, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Linking to proposed/disputed guidelines does not clarify NOT. It only confuses editors. I suppose it would be good if more people participated with proposed/disputed guidelines, but WP:NOT is not a place to promote guidelines that do not reflect consensus. --Pixelface (talk) 04:46, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
I think we should be especially careful to remove guidelines that in the past had consensus but now may not have it. Otherwise its putting up a hidden resistance to real changes of opinion by refusing to recognize them. If we do include it, it should be as a footnote--see also the challenged guideline XXX, for informational value only. By all means inform people of ongoing disputes of importance, particularly so they can perhaps come to participate and help achieve a stable guideline, but make it absolutely clear when it is not currently fully accepted--otherwise we are confusing not clarifying by a referral to information and language which may now be obsolete.. DGG (talk) 03:50, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't want to fragment the conversation any further. I made a comment at Wikipedia talk:Wikimedia sister projects#Fiction sister_project. That doesn't seem to be a trafficked page so please reply here if you have an opinion. Anyways, one of the few ways to actually solve this issue is with a sister project (like wiktionary, not like wikia) for expanded fiction coverage. Maybe we could get something like this started. It seems like such a no-brainer that there must be some obvious reason it can never work, hopefully beyond Jimbo owns wikia, but I don't know. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:12, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
---
Could someone explain the reason behind this edit? I can understand the desire to remove links to "proposed/disputed" guidelines, though I disagree with this reasoning, but I cannot understand why one would wish to replace these links with one to Wikipedia:Plot summaries. If one follows the "don't link to proposed/disputed guidelines" principle, then adding Wikipedia:Plot summaries makes no sense. On the other hand, if one follows the "do link to proposed/disputed guidelines" principle, then deleting those links makes no sense. Jakew (talk) 18:49, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
If you read the text you'll notice the link to Wikipedia:Plot summaries is of a different nature to those removed. It is a link informing people that the matter of what is and isn't a plot summary and how to treat them is under discussion in two places, allowing people who visit that section to contribute to the debate and making people aware there actually is a debate. It's similar to what the arbitrator FT2 did at WP:DP regarding the discussion over whether to reverse the default position on no consensus at WP:BLP. I removed the other links because of the discussion to that effect here. I hope that clarifies for you. HidingT 21:45, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Looking at the wording change, you're right: the context is different. I apologise. Jakew (talk) 23:46, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
While it's protected, let's talk. This started on articles and AfDs, moved on to wikiprojects and guidelines, moved to higher guidelines, and now we're at the policy level. Up until this point, the main argument against allowing plot summaries at the article/project/guideline level is that there's a policy against it. Now that we're at the policy level, that argument is no longer valid. Playing devil's advocate, I think reasoning against plot summaries is that we're an encyclopedia, and as we know Britannica doesn't cover character, episodes, etc. WP isn't really an encyclopdia though, it's a wiki, a website, and a megacompendium. To a certain extent we're here to please our readers and our editors, and the readers and a lot of the editors seem to like articles that go against PLOT. For the readers, if you look at the top 100 articles there are frequently articles on there that don't meet PLOT, articles about Naruto, etc. As for editors, looking at wikirage shows that editors frequently edit articles that don't meet PLOT, and don't seem to have much interest in fixing them to meet PLOT (the latest South Park ep is usually on there for instance, brimming with trivia). Until TTN and a few others came along, PLOT was ignored and most people seemed happy. PLOT/FICT/etc. was then enforced and we get lots of edit warring and arbcoms. Exactly why is PLOT good? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 22:42, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
The larger justification is that Wikipedia's mission to be a free (as in speech) content encyclopedia; non-free content can be used, but should be kept to a minimum. Plot summaries are non-free derivative works regardless of how little or how much they cover, but I will quickly point out that we should not be fearing copyright concerns based on the most recent communication with Mike Godwin on the matter (I think Black Kite emailed him two months ago) - we should not be invoking PLOT to avoid lawsuits until we are told that is the case. However, derivative works are still non-free and against WP's goal, and while we shouldn't be trying to avoid them in light of the above, we should be trying to limit their use, and justify their use by placing them in context of other aspects that help to support the fair use of non-free content. In this case, we justify that with "real world context", which is both free and helps to provide the right justification for why we have derivative plot descriptions.
The short answer: We simply do not just regurgitate the plot aspects of published works.
Now, sure, there are articles out there that are plot-only, and likely some of the top read articles. That's fine: the intent from all this discussion is that PLOT first applies to the ultimate state of an article, not the instantaneous state. If a plot-only article can be improved by adding appropriate sourced material about the work's context and not content, we don't delete it, but should improve it. The other aspect is that PLOT is implied (but maybe not written appropriate) to apply at the topic level and not the article level. It is perfectly acceptable to have a tv show's page which includes the show's context outside of the plot, but then to have one or more pages supporting the show's episodes that are strictly plot only; no one is clamoring to try to rid WP of those. But this itself points to the fact that PLOT points to how the work's plot is treated: an encyclopedic treatment of the work, such as a list of episodes or a list of characters, is preferred over individual articles that may pontificate more on the element or work.
There is another aspect, but this tends to assume bad faith, however, it is a fact: the allowance of plot-only articles tends to attract poorer writing and poorer quality articles. As mentioned, trivia sections love to creep up into these, along with both original research and point-of-view approaches to writing. Fictional characters become treated as real living persons, and we get issues with articles being written in-universe. I will caution, however, that we should not be basing the issue of why to keep PLOT strictly on the fact it avoids this type of writing, because as noted, it assumed bad faith and can bite newbies, but it is a fact of life that plot-only articles tend to be of poorer quality than other articles.
I will point out one more thing is that all this likely started back almost a year ago when WP:NOTE introduced the "significant coverage in secondary sources" aspect for notability. When combined with PLOT, clearly this questions the justification to keep plot-only articles, and I shouldn't have to state how much "fun" WP:FICT has been over the last year from that. I don't see the change in NOTE being questioned (it brought up the issue of what are secondary sources), more so than it is questioned further, and since that has become a standard, PLOT almost becomes important to meet that. However, I have noted above and others have noted that PLOT almost begs for notability to be policy, which is should not, and that's why I have tried to offer a few suggestions on rewording it to remove that point and covering the approach above more accurately. --MASEM 23:39, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
"It is perfectly acceptable to have a tv show's page which includes the show's context outside of the plot, but then to have one or more pages supporting the show's episodes that are strictly plot only; no one is clamoring to try to rid WP of those." Oh, you are wrong, I am clamoring to rid Wikipedia of these, and I don't believe I am the only one. While subpages are a good thing when the main page gets too long, it should only be done for sub-subjects which are notable on their own, not to just create plot summaries. Every page that is only or mainly plot summary should either be improved with real world info, if it is a notable subject, or be merged or deleted. If a page gets too long but the potential sub-subjects aren't notable, then the page should be trimmed, not split up. Fram (talk) 08:00, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
(ec) Exactly why is PLOT good? Because wikipedia has decided that this article is feature-worthy (900 words for 90 minutes plot and 2000 words sourced "real-world information"), while a fanwiki has decided this version on the same topic is feature-worthy (3300 words for 90 minutes plot, 500 words "real-world information" plus 2800 words of plot-based original research). Without PLOT, everything else would go *poof*, we'd only have the second type of article, and that would be pretty bad. – sgeurekat•c 23:53, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Masem: nice reply, I didn't know that plot summaries were derivative works and that's a good thing to know, and it makes sense. The topic vs. article issue is an interesting one. Single articles do seem to attract more bad writing, although I'm starting to see the character lists bloat in a similar fashion. Episode pages: I love them, but the only part of them I don't really care for are super long summaries. They aren't useful. Unfortunately, the only part of episode articles that work well in the ep lists is the summary. The parts I like and find useful, like the infobox and individualzed external links, are the parts that don't fit well. The individual ep pages are just more useful. It's kind of freeing to be having this discussion here, instead of where WP:USEFUL isn't a valid argument because NOT:DIRECTORY, PLOT, etc. prohibit it. :-)
Squereka: did you create those fancy Carnivale pages more because they were up for deletion/redirection or more because you wanted to make them GA/FA? I'm not saying we should have giant plot summaries, I just don't like how PLOT is being used to control the arrangement of articles within a topic. In a case where neither has references but both have small summaries, the individual pages actually have a higher OOU info to IU info ratio.
Now, I know this is crazy talk, but I think it would be beneficial if PLOT didn't straight jacket us when trying to find the best way to organize a topic. Right now, it actually prohibits the work we've done at FICT. Also, it would be nice if it didn't sort of move NOTE up to the policy level. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 00:23, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I would love to get WP:NOTE up to policy level, but I'm afraid that the people wanting to get rid of PLOT will also do everything to stop this happening, as it would threaten the existence of many articles on minor aspects of fiction.Fram (talk) 08:00, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
It's not the people trying to remove PLOT from NOT you have to worry about. It's the 169 people who are against notability guidelines. Nevermind that coverage does not make something worthy of attention. --Pixelface (talk) 18:11, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Sgeureka, WP:NOT is not the featured article criteria. Articles don't have to have featured article potential to be included on Wikipedia. Wikipedia and Lostpedia obviously have different standards as to what articles they consider their best work. PLOT didn't exist until July 2006. Did everything go "poof" on Wikipedia for its first 5 1/2 years? Does WP:N being a guideline prevent people from nominating non-notable subjects for deletion? Why would PLOT be out of place in the guideline regarding writing about fiction? --Pixelface (talk) 18:30, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I like the idea to wait for concensus. I only just noticed this discussion and find much of it to be a rehash of the arguments raised at WP:FICT time and again, only, frequently appearing to be far more aggressive here. The level of aggression appears to be severely hindering improvement of WP related to this issue. I found myself so disgusted by the back and forth cyclical arguments. This is related to a longstanding and complicated issue on WP. No single comment is going to make everyone smile and fall into place, so there is no need to behave in such a manner.
Specifically concerning my opinions on initial proposal, I agree with masem in that I am also unsatisfied by the open-ended nature of notplot, it seems in my mind to stand out from the other headings of the policy. I rather like the first sentence in masem's original proposal, though after reading opposer's comments I found they did raise some valid points. Once I saw that I was unsatisfied with notplot, I spent some time to see if I could think of anything better, and I couldn't, so I dismissed the thought. After reading the alternative suggestions, I still don't think they are sufficient improvements as to override this level of contention, and I despite being unsatisfied, I still can't think of anything better.
I think the idea of removing notplot altother is also an interesting one. Since I don't think it fits with the rest, then perhaps it just doesn't belong. But something is needed; and I believe that something should be policy. So what is the alternative? Make WP:FICT policy? That is unreasonable as that guideline/proposed guideline has even less concensus.
I think if the policy is to be altered, it will only be through very slow, careful crafting of a statement that both resolves the ambiguities, and reflects concensus. The only way this will come about is through high collaboration from proponents of all sides of all arguments. Until this begins in earnest, such fervent discussion is futile as it appears to be swaying no one. Leave it as is, and slow down the discussion with the intent of higher precision and greater work towards empathizing with alternative viewpoints. -verdatum 15 May 2008 (whoops, forgot to sign yesterday)
Careful crafting sounds like a good idea. Leaving the issue alone doesn't seem like the right thing to do, since editors are interested now. I agree the debate is pretty agressive, but that's because both sides feel they're right, and it's totally in good faith, which makes it difficult. It seems like a few of the suggestions are 1) leave it as it is 2) remove it entirely 3) remove it and replace it a differently worded fiction prohibition 4) move it into the Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, or textbook part. Probably a few ideas that I missed. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:49, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Peregrine, I don't share your philosophy that Wikipedia is not an encyclopedia and that it is just a wiki. It is an encyclopedia, and plot summaries on their own fall outide Wikipedia, because they don't provide real-world information about a work of fiction's context, content, analysis, development or critisism nor do they provide any evidence of notability, which is the cornerstone of Wikipedia wide consensus. Secondly, I don't think you can move this section to Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, or textbook, because it does not belong in this section which relates to real-world guidebooks, and text books but not summaries of fictional works. I think there is general consensus that real-world content sourced from reliable secondary sources is the ideal form of content, which I think you agree at least enhances an article which previously was comprised of plot summary only. Lastly, If articles with reliable secondary sources are generally considered to be ideal, I see no reason to water down WP:NOT because that goes against the consensus; Wikipedia already accomodates them through local consensus in AfD discussions. Why should we settle for policies on works of fiction that are of lower standard than the rest of Wikipedia? --Gavin Collins (talk) 07:12, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
My thoughts exactly... Fram (talk) 08:00, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Fram: If the GNC becomes the end all criteria, coverage will suffer. No matter what some editors want to believe, this does not have consensus.
Gavin: I believe, as you do, that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. However, it is an online wiki-encyclopedia that is different than any other encyclopedia in history. This is the same old struggle of coverage versus quality that has been waged for years. The question comes down to, "Do you prefer a modest number of professionally written articles or do you prefer a gazillion articles, articles on every bit of minutia known to man, of highly variable quality." Make no mistake, though, this is simply a matter of preference. Ursasapien(talk) 08:56, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I disagree, I don't think coverage will suffer. There are many Wikiprojects working towards improving articles that are just plot summaries. The objective of WP:NOT#PLOT is not to reduce coverage, but to improve its quality. I think we all want that, and I think we should all admit that WP:NOT#PLOT encourages improvement, not proscribes coverage.--Gavin Collins (talk) 10:11, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, you can disagree all you want but it is simply an empirical fact that demanding quality will proscribe coverage. Demanding that all content be sourced to reliable, independent publications will limit the topics in the encyclopedia. It seems a bit disingenuous to say we can have Encyclopedia Britannica standards, but we will not be limited to their coverage. Ursasapien(talk) 10:33, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
an empirical fact? Please cite your evidence. --Gavin Collins (talk) 10:38, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Kender- if we lose this article we WILL LOSE COVERAGE! What is so difficult to understand about that? Ursasapien(talk) 11:14, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
And what if we lose coverage of non notable subjects? What's the problem with that? The argument has been used (don't remember by whom, probaly Pixelface or Peregrine Fisher) that plot articles are amongst the most popular ones. While that is true (although, obviously, it is impossible to know if people come for the plot or for the real world information), it is quite irrelevant. Apart from popular fiction, the two most popular categories of articles are news and sex related. Still, we are not a news source (see WP:NOT and Wikinews), and not a porn provider. We should not lower our standards to get more readers. The aim is not to be the most popular website ever, but to be the best free encyclopedia. Articles which consist only or mainly of plot summaries are not encyclopedic. In general, articles about non notable subjects are not encyclopedic. While our definition of "notable" is much looser than that of Britannica (I suppose, I don't think they have a public inclusion policy), it doesn't mean that it should be ignored to please the audience or some editors. Fram (talk) 10:52, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Fram, I completely get the place from which you are coming. You are forthright and genuine. You have already stated in plain English that, "I am clamoring to rid Wikipedia of these . . . [plot-based episode lists]." What I object to is the implication that we can have highly restrictive policies and not proscribe content. That statement defys logic. Ursasapien(talk) 11:14, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Two things. First I have not argued to get rid of plot based episode lists, I have argued to get rid of plot based single episode articles. While I'm not a fan of season articles and so on either, I do believe that in many cases, they are an acceptable compromise (I perhaps wasn't too clear about this distinction though). Secondly, we already proscribe content, whether we have PLOT or not. BLP, OR, NPOV, FRINGE, NOT, ... are all partly content policies. WP:NOTE is a content guideline and will hopefully one day be a content policy. I believe it is quite logical that any wiki will proscribe what kind of content is wanted, and what is unwanted (with of course always a grey zone inbetween).Fram (talk) 12:50, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Masem, your claim that plot summaries are non-free derivative works is simply not true. And I suggest you get Mike Godwin in here in case you want to claim that again. Why would PLOT be out of place in the guideline about writing about fiction? Does the Andrey Nikolayevich Bolkonsky article "fail" PLOT? How is the idea of derivative works even an issue for the Andrey Nikolayevich Bolkonsky article if War and Peace was translated into English in 1922[14]? How is copyright an issue for the Fantine and Cosette articles if Les Miserables is in the public domain[15]? Is there any question that War and Peace and Les Miserables are notable works? Why would it be unacceptable for the War and Peace article to contain information on its reception and impact and the character articles not contain that information? --Pixelface (talk) 18:20, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Plot summaries are, by US copyright law, derivative works. However, I am trying to impress that that fact, in of itself, does not imply any legal issues that we need to worry ourselves with. You're exactly right that Godwin has stated that we should not be worrying ourselves on copyright concerns. However, derivative works are still non-free, and goes against WP's mission. There's a different between avoiding being sued in court for copyright violations, and maintaining a specific mission asked for by a private entity, and it's the latter is what we should be concerned about. Now it is true that numerous works are public domain, so derivative works of these are free, so this is not a concern. However, we need a policy that should be neutral with respect to copyright, and it makes sense to edge on the side of limiting non-free use per WP's mission.
PLOT, as it is being presently interpreted, covers too much and thus why there's a lot of arguments on this. I believe parts of what PLOT implies should be in WAF and FICT (what is encyclopedic approaches, and what is necessary for notability), but there is still a piece of PLOT that belongs in NOT, in that we do not cover topics of works of fiction by only reiterating the plot. The only reason that character articles would need to have additional information to be acceptable is because as others noted below, our verifiability policy requires that articles show reliable third-party sources. --MASEM 18:41, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Plot summaries are, by US copyright law, derivative works. Not according to Wikipedia:FAQ/Copyright#Derivative works, which states Generally, a summary (or analysis) of something is not a derivative work, unless it reproduces the original in great detail, at which point it becomes an abridgement and not a summary.. Of course, I wouldn't rely on the FAQ as legal guidance, but I think that page has been fairly carefully vetted. older ≠ wiser 20:44, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Masem, we already have a policy on copyright, WP:C. Putting copyrighted text into your own words is legal. Mike Godwin told Father Goose "You're missing the fact that we are not receiving DMCA takedown letters regarding plot summaries, and that plot summaries, in general, are not taken to be copyright infringement so long as they do not include any great degree of the original creative expression."[16] Unless a plot summary includes any great degree of the original creative expression, copyright is not an issue. And non-free material does not go against Wikipedia's mission. Wikipedia contains all kinds of non-free content. It's allowed under fair use. And the person who added PLOT to NOT is the same person who suggested adding the part about third-party sources to V. Using one to prop up the other is ridiculous. You don't need a third-party source to summarize Les Miserables, the full-text is viewable at Wikisource[17], and can be summarized like any source on Wikipedia is summarized. We don't need a third-party to summarize a New York Times article for us. --Pixelface (talk) 10:40, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
PLOT is relevant because plot has been and still is the general consensus of Wikipedia. I completely disagree with Peregrine Fisher that we only did certain things because we had a policy entry, since all the cleanup and higher standards started long before it was an entry. WP:NOT describes things that we know have strong community consensus, and that is the power it holds, not the page itself. I'm sorry you guys have your panties in a bind because there's some users who don't apply things from WP:NOT correctly, and misunderstand what it says. Jebus people, that's been a problem for every single WP:NOT entry. Is the issue with the policy page, or is it with the droves of novice editors? The best thing we can do is to educate people, not stick our heads in the sand because it's hard to work with volunteers. While a ton of users that mess it up, there's far more editors who do understand the actual meaning of things like WP:NOT#PLOT, and it's been extremely well established that the concept is true and leads to better articles. -- Ned Scott 11:34, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
So should we add something about lists so that PLOT doesn't contradict FICT? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 18:41, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
It doesn't contradict FICT. A long time ago we specifically changed WP:PLOT's wording to mean per topic rather than per article for that very reason. -- Ned Scott 06:44, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
A guideline is currently being discussed to decide how articles on criminal acts should be covered. This was in response to a large number of AfDs on biographies of people killed in shootings such as Eve Carson. The general problem at the AfD was the conflict between the notability guidelines allowing inclusion if covered sufficiently by reliable, third-party sources, and between WP:NOT#NEWS which has some isolated statements that can be interpreted against inclusion or as irrelevant to the debate.
Consider:
"Wikipedia considers the historical notability of persons and events. News coverage can be useful source material for encyclopaedic topics, but not all events warrant an encyclopaedia article of their own. Routine news coverage of such things as announcements, sports, and tabloid journalism are not sufficient basis for an article. Even when an event is notable, individuals involved in it may not be. Unless news coverage of an individual goes beyond the context of a single event, our coverage of that individual should be limited to the article about that event, in proportion to their importance to the overall topic. (See Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons for more details.)"
When used in debate, the first sentence became a fight between "won't know it is historical until later, but it is notable now per WP:N" vs. "wait for it to become historical before inclusion"
The next two sentences in the debates could either be split apart to favour exclusion using the "not all events warrant an encyclopaedia of their own". or read together with the second sentence clarifying the first, meaning that not everything in a newspaper is valid for inclusion, such as announcements, sports and tabloid journalism.
The remaining parts of this paragraph were the source of debate, but this seems to be resolved with the criteria in place at [[WP:N/CA] should it be adopted. However, the proposed guideline attempts to interpret the conflicting interpretations of NOT#NEWS in relation to criminal acts. Most editors who have commented so far don't believe the proposal conflicts ( see Wikipedia talk:Notability (criminal acts)/Opinions ), but one or two questions have been raised. I would therefore like to invite comment on the talk page of WP:N/CA. Sorry for the essay-like length here, but trying to bring everyone up to speed. Fritzpoll (talk) 14:08, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
that phrase "historical notability" is the problem. first of all it does not mean we wait until its covered in history books, but that we include things that are likely to be of permanent significance if we can tell that now. So it is in conflict with is "notability is not temporary" If its notable this year, its notable forever. Second, it does not mean notable enough to be in general one-volume histories for junior high schools. If it is the sort of thing an historian would possibly write a specialised article about, that is enough. For example, the events at some recent shootings will be matters that people will probably be writing about indefinitely, as both they and the response to them define the nature of our society. The events at some miscellaneous robbery, however, are not. I suggest theelimination of that sentence. The rest is good enough to do the job. DGG (talk) 19:24, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Wording of "how to" section
Just because Wikipedia is not a how-to guide does not mean that an article cannot explain how to do something, and have that explanation have encyclopedic value. This policy seems to say otherwise. I mean, not even a single math article could exist, as they usually explain "how to" derive the formula. All manufacturing sections would have to go. Maps can't exist because they explain "how to" get somewhere, lots of technological articles explain "how to" use the technologies. I could keep hitting the random button and finding legitimate how-to information, but I think you get the point. This policy, as is, could be wikilawyered to prevent any of those examples. And the person could just claim they were following policy.
That would be a misreading of the policy. The phrase "how to" does not even occur in the policy, and "Howto" only shows up in the policy shortcut. Anyway, a "Howto" is a particular type of instructional manual which is forbidden under the policy. It is perfectly allowed to explain in an article how to do something, as long as it is done in a manner consistent with the goal of being an encyclopedia: the explanation or example should be informative rather than instructional. Sometimes this is a bit of a fine line, and in practice it is often a matter of tone rather than content. (E.g., explaining how something is done rather than how to do something.) silly rabbit (talk) 17:32, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
Please add Telugu wiki link
Can someone please add interwiki link for Telugu Wiki in this article [[te:వికీపీడియా:ఏది వికీపీడియా కాదు]] . Thanks --Kajasudhakarababu (talk) 11:05, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Unprotected
It's been a week, so let's see how it goes. I will restore the protection if necessary, though. Black Kite 06:29, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
Return to discussion
Let me build on this with a formal proposal that we table the discussion for at least 2 months. We are past any possibility of reaching concensus at this time. It is clear from reading this debate that participants on both sides of the argument have stopped listening to each other. Let's let the status quo lie for a while so we can all go work on other things and gain some perspective before returning to the discussion. Rossami(talk) 22:04, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
You might want to re-phrase that; in many countries (including where I am in the UK), to "table" a discussion means to put it forward for consideration, not to put it aside. Yes, I'm a pedant :) Black Kite 22:20, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Support putting aside the discussion and letting the original status quo remain. AnmaFinotera (talk) 23:38, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Agree with Rossami's judicious suggestion, his choice of US-centric wording notwithstanding. As I read the debate, most participants supported or strongly supported the initial wording, so nothing is really lost. Eusebeus (talk) 00:36, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
"initial" if this means current wording as protected, yes. alternatively, what do you think of as the "original" wording? Normally, the practice per BRD is to discuss until there is agreement. i do not despair on reasonable people being able to agree. DGG (talk) 02:41, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Now is not the time to stop. This discussion is necessary and could take a couple of months, no reason to postpone something that will take that long. If nothing else, we should have it finished before TTN comes back and enforces it with an iron fist. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:04, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Black Kite, you're not an uninvolved party in this dispute. WP:PREFER of the protection policy says "Administrators should not protect or unprotect a page to further their own position in a content dispute." It's evident from your participation on this talk page that you *are* involved. Your protection of this policy page was inappropriate and you should undo it. --Pixelface (talk) 07:55, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
People are trying to fix things that can't be fix with a rewording of WP:PLOT. The different proposed wordings don't even change the meaning greatly, though some are better written than others. It's like watching a bunch of people who don't actually disagree, but they don't understand each other, and are filled with assumptions and frustration. What on earth do people think the original wording means? I think the whole lot of you are thinking too hard about this, and are looking for solutions in the wrong places. -- Ned Scott 04:30, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Changed to {{pp-protected}} - Nabla (talk) 16:43, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
If y'all agree to table the discussion, please remember to unprotect the page so other people can work on other unrelated issues. :-) Thank you! --Kim Bruning (talk) 18:35, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Actually there weren't even that many reverts. Let me see, Hiding and Collectonian are removing the WP:PLOT from WP:NOT , and DGG is "reverting to the consensus version" (that's defined as "Not The Wrong Version") ... errr... oops. Is that what you meant, DGG :-) ? --Kim Bruning (talk) 18:49, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
It's not so much reverts; since 6 May, there have been 12 changes, which is about 11 too many even if the 1 had consensus, which none of them do. Black Kite 18:55, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
That's actually pretty typical. I don't think those edits are wasted: they show several people's opinions, and that is very useful information. --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:00, 14 May 2008 (UTC) consensus is formed by a compromise between different people's opinions. Often when people haven't reached a conclusion yet, you can already predict it yourself, just from reading the page history. :-)
No, I agree, but I could see the possibility of it sliding towards a free-for-all, so it seemed like a sensible idea. Black Kite 08:13, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, as long as people don't revert-war, and just try out different edits, that's the kind of free-for-all we call the wiki process ;-). Don't forget to unprotect the page as soon as you have an agreement to a ceasefire. Which users still need to be approached on that matter? --Kim Bruning (talk) 13:49, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Quite a lot, looking at the discussion above and below. I've no problem unprotecting, but it really would be nice to have some sort of actual consensus first, instead of the wiki version of pushing those little magnetic letters around on a refrigerator door :) Black Kite 00:38, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm sure folks don't agree on what they want on the page yet. That's no problem. What we're worried about wrt page protection is that they don't actually go right back to edit warring. If they all agree to work together productively (or at least not edit war) we can safely unprotect. If there's any folks you think are still willing to edit war, I'd be glad to help by talking with them and getting them to bury the hatchet. Can you indicate which people you think will still edit war, or do you figure things are safe now? --Kim Bruning (talk) 16:17, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I would like to nominate Hiding for special hatchet treatment. Who is worse, the editor who starts an edit war, or the editor that provokes an edit war?[18]--Gavin Collins (talk) 16:27, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I come here not to wave the hatchet, but to bury it. ;-) I'll talk with Hiding shortly. Can you think of more people who you think may still be waving hatchets? --Kim Bruning (talk) 16:47, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Correction, Kim, I was not removing Plot from this page. I was undoing Hiding's MOVE of plot to another section. I also was not edit warring, as there was no consensus for the move nor the removal.AnmaFinotera (talk) 16:52, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I have removed it once, as documented on talk, to see if there was consensus for it to remain. I have also moved it once, since there were points made about it being in the wrong place. I have not edit warred at any point, and tend to practise 1RR or at worst 2RR. I have attempted to build a consensus, however. HidingT 16:59, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
@Hiding: Alright, and your other edits were to other sections? --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:23, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
Which other edits? What timescale? This month I've edited WP:PLOT exclusively. I believe I have not edit warred once. I have attempted different edits in response to other edits in an attempt to capture consensus. Because the page is currently protected, it is hard to tell if any of my edits have consensus. Who am I supposed to be edit warring with? I note that myself and Urasapien and Black Kite had what may be an edit war at the beginning of May, although I only suggest that may be an edit war given recent edits have been viewed an edit war and look, to my eye, to be somewhat similar. The edit I find contentious is Ned Scott's wholesale reversion of an edit because, well, looking at the edit summary, because he seems to believe you cannot edit a policy page. HidingT 15:03, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
@Collectionion: While you thought there was no consensus for the move nor the removal, that's not a valid reason to revert. (Only if you yourself disagree, and provide detailed reasoning.) . But if you do that once, ok, fine, you get to explain yourself, and we listen. But instead, you did so three times. There's no 3RR exemption for reversion of good faith edits, however. Reverting good faith edits with no background reasoning is just rude. So the conclusion there was that yes, you were edit warring. Maybe you didn't realize how strict the rules are on that though, so we'll let you off this time. It'd be nice if you apologized to people for getting the page protected though. :-)
Is anyone else likely to edit war? If not, we can unprotect, if so, please explain who. --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:23, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
But the issue at policy level is whether articles should simply be plot summaries. The other debates and issues are somewhat different. You've got people who don't want articles on stuff they don't like, you've got people wanting articles on stuff they like, and it's an endless back and forth. The ultimate issue at this level is regards whether articles which consist almost entirely of plot summary are within our remit. This doesn't rule on any other aspect of the article. It doesn't say such articles should be removed. Yes, I appreciate that can be how it is used, but if an article has no hope of being anything other than consisting of plot, that's a valid reason for listing it for deletion. That doesn't mean it has to be deleted, if consensus decides otherwise. The problem here is that people like Fram who wish to hold a strict encyclopedic line, and people like Peregrine Fisher, who wish to hold a compendium line, need to recognise each other have equally valid views and they need to embrace each other in order to build a consensus. Instead of this constant battle on Wikipedia, we need to work out what good articles on fictive topics look like, and guide towards those. Maybe all of us can list a few examples of what we think a good article on fiction is. And let's not use Featured Articles. Unless people seriously want every article except our featured articles deleted. Here's some starters:
I picked a few of those from the Wikipedia comics clean up backlog and others have or are proving divisive. Also, some further thoughts: fiction is somewhat different from real life. Our verifiability policy grew up from the idea that information we add should be plausibly verifiable by other editors. In the real world, it prevents us describing our houses, things like that, because you can't verify it until you visit it. In fiction, that isn't the case. People can be reasonably expected to be able to get hold of the source material. And Notability is not a policy and in some cases it conflicts with our goal, which is to be as comprehensive an encyclopedia as possible. Where it conflicts with that goal, we are allowed to ignore it. So if possible, let's avoid discussing the rules, policies and guidelines, and instead concentrate on working out what an encyclopedic article looks like, on what types of articles they are possible and move onwards from there. And let's not avoid the elephant in the corner. Does deletion of a bad article improve or harm Wikipedia?HidingT 13:12, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Hiding, I think you're missing an important concept of WP:V and WP:NOR, which is that Wikipedia articles should not be based entirely upon primary source materials. That applies as much to, say, influential political treaties as it does to fiction, even though in both cases readers "can be reasonably expected to be able to get hold of the source material", as you put it. The point is that readers ought to be able to get more information than is in the primary source. In the case of a political treaty, they ought to be able to understand the context, the significance, and the long-term effects of the treaty. In the case of fiction, that's no less true. For example, does a plot contain a particularly clever twist that influenced later work? How did it relate to the real world (consider Orwell's Animal Farm)? Is there any controversy over work itself, or aspects of the plot or characters? As with any other subject matter, there's important contextual information that cannot be found in the text of the primary source itself. That's why secondary sources are so important.
The problem arises when an article is basically just a restatement of the work itself. Imagine, for example, that Mona Lisa contained nothing more than a reproduction of that painting, and perhaps a bland description of it. Would you find that satisfying as a reader of an encyclopaedia? Now compare with the content of that article, in which the description of the work is a small part of an informative, encyclopaedic article about the work in a wider context.
Also, I think it's important to bear in mind that, like many WP guidelines and (esp.) policies, PLOT is already a compromise between those who believe that plot summaries are largely inappropriate and those who think it acceptable to have an article consisting of nothing but a plot summary. Jakew (talk) 13:53, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
PLOT currently prohibits the lists of characters of and lists of episodes that have consensus over at FICT. Shouldn't this policy be brought into line with FICT? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 14:06, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
There is a wording problem with PLOT, in that while those that read policy and guidelined by their spirit understand the intent plot (it may read right now that lists of episodes are not allowed, but these fit into the spirit), many editors try to read policy by word alone and wikilawyer over terms. However, I suggest we hold off suggesting wording changes until this present discussion is resolved in order to work out better language. --MASEM 14:42, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm not missing them. Which ones are they? And does ignoring them improve Wikipedia? Maybe they need to be removed if they don't reflect current best practise? What is current best practise? I have on my shelf an encyclopedia, Collins Modern Encyclopedia, 1969, which has this to say on the Mona Lisa: "[Ital:La Giaconda] world famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci; in Louvre, Paris." It also reproduces the painting. Many people found that satisfying, since it was published. I don't deny it is useful to have more information. The point is, what information is not enough? What information shouldn't be included? What information does not help educate people who may know absolutely nothing about the thing upon which we can inform them? Original research is a trap one can fall into when writing from primary sources, but that does not exclude us from writing from primary sources. We are merely prohibited from performing original research. HidingT 14:13, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict) It doesn't prohibit the lists of episodes, as long as these contain at least more than just plot summaries (actors, production numbers, air date, viewing figures, ...). By putting these in a list with short plot summaries, the plot summary is no longer by far the largest part of the article, as it is for many individual episode articles. As for character lists: the yshould be gone, but we let them exist as a compromise between what should ideally happen, and what "public demand" wants. PLOT articles are popular with editors because they are easy to make (at least initially: some of them have taken a lot of work). I don't think this should be a consideration though, but I am willing to compromise between the strict interpretation of the policy, and a more lenient actual practice of character lists for major works of fiction. I haven't looked at all examples provided by Hiding, but articles like [[Scimitar (Marvel Comics)]] in its current form are useless and not what I expect of Wikipedia. The Green Hornet, on the other hand, is an interesting article, although undersourced in many parts. To use some other examples: Handy Smurf should be deleted (redirected at most to the list of characters), while The Black Smurfs is currently a rather bad article, but with clear potential. To come back to the basic problem: I believe PLOT should be a (part of a) policy, although it does not necessarily have to be a part of WP:NOT. In my view, the best solution would be to make WP:NOTE a policy, include PLOT as part of it (with room for compromises), and make clear that all other notability guidelines (and proposals) will not become policies, and can never be more loose than the basic notability policy. By doing that, it would become hopefully clearer what are the minimum requirements for separate articles, no matter if they deal with science, politics, biographies, sport, or fiction. The essential part is the multiple reliable secondary sources, a basic requirement to write an encyclopedic article about almost everything. By turning character articles and episode articles into season articles and group of character articles, chances are much better that such sources exist and that the balance between in universe (plot) and out of universe (real world) information will be improved. As I said above, there will always be a grey zone, there will always be compromises and exceptions, and there will always be people on both sides who think the policies are too strict or too loose. Fram (talk) 14:33, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
(ec)Well, for one thing, we need to be clear that if an article on a published work's characters or elements or thereof is cited for violating PLOT or whatever version ends up being, the topic covered by that article should never ever be deleted off Wikipedia: such articles should be merged and trimmed, with excess content if possible moved to an offsite wiki. This, I think, is a key point: yes, we should have coverage within Wikipedia of topics that can only be described from primary source (aka plot summaries) if its anything more than simple minutae or trivia. We have no idea what the general reader (non-fan of a work) may be looking for, but, say, he hears "Bulbasaur" and wants to know what it is, we should be providing that information, ideally as a first hit to an article, to a redirect or to a disambig page. I think this is a point that everyone can agree on. What becomes difficult is how the information on these topics is presented, which is the primary issue here.
Also, I think it necessary to consider that while the goal of WP is to be comprehensive, we also must stick to the free content tenets as well; these of course are goals that pull the project in two different directions. Where these are at a happy coexistence with each other is when topics are approached encyclopedicly, providing sufficient coverage of topics to be comprehensive while balancing the concerns of derivative works and fair use.
The question is still there, what is an encyclopedic treatment of topics that can only be written about in terms of their plot? Here's some ways I'd judge:
Is the topic's coverage comprehensive to the casual reader? Is the topic treated in a manner requiring no previous knowledge of the work for the reader to understand the concept? To say Wolverine is an X-man. compared to Wolverine is a fictional character who is a mutant that is part of the group of fellow mutants in the self-title comic, tv, and movie series, "X-men" is a world of difference to the casual reader, even though those statements say the same thing. This applies throughout the article, and while wikilinking takes care of avoiding repeated descriptions of key terms, the approach to writing is rather crucial.
Is the topic's coverage in balance with other plot-based topics of the same work? If there are 5 characters in a work, each equally important to the work's main plot, one character should not be described in much more detail than the other characters; a casual reader may stumble on the larger article first and then be expecting the same from the other 4, or may hit any of the other 4 first and then be overwhelmed by the details of the 5th; either way, they walk away with the impression that that one character is more important than the others. The use of lists to group these types of topics together helps for editors to see that balance easily.
Is the amount of "plot summary" information provided appropriate for the overall notability of the published work? At some point, we have to consider notability, but for this discussion, I'm only considering the notability shown by the published work and not the topics therein. It is not encyclopedic to provide deep coverage of a work such as Viva Laughlin (which lasted all of two episodes) even if it is possible to approach all plot topics that are part of it in an encyclopedic manner as outlined above. This is not to say we cannot include coverage of the plot topics, but we should be aware that giving the same treatment to a character from such a work compared to one from a long-running TV show is not encyclopedic. But that leads to...
Is the amount of "plot summary" information provided in balance with the treatment of other published works? This is a lot harder question because it requires us to look at WP as a whole. There are some published works which do have an incredibly large number of articles beneath them (Star Wars and Star Trek, to name a few). Mind you, these are large franchises, and there's a lot more information available compared to less popular works, and so larger coverage is expected. However, these works also tend to delve into more detail that other works cannot, supported by the "weight" of the plot information behind the work. As with the case of balance of topics within a work, if a causal reader comes across the bulk of Star Wars/Trek coverage first, they may be expecting the same from other published works, or on the other hand, they may be overwhelmed by the Wars/Trek coverage if that's not their first stop. This question, however, does not have a static answer, because it is based on the sum whole of the coverage of published works on WP.
Ultimately, this about limiting what topics from published works that we cover, but to what level of detail we cover them. What this all means to the discussion of PLOT is that PLOT should be tailors to prevent, or discourage articles on the topics within a published work that are approached in an unencyclopedic manner, as outlined above. These, however, are all issues of cleanup, not deletion; a topic should never disappear from WP unless it's clearly obvious trivia, falsehoods, or other egregious violations of policy. --MASEM 14:36, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I disagree in part. If a character, location, ... is mentioned once in some book, movie, ... then should it even get a redirect here? "X is a mountain in novel Y. It is mentioned on page 357 when the hero sees it in the distance." We all (hopefully) agree that this, as a standalone article is useless, but should it get a line in "Minor places in book Y"? I don't think so, and I believe the better solution is to delete the article and to not redirect or merge it at all. Fram (talk) 14:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
That would be a case covered under the "obvious trivia" catchall. Topics that have absolutely no substansive contribution to a work's plot should not be covered. --MASEM 14:49, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I think it would have to depend on the notability, and depth of external coverage, of the work itself. A minor place in a very major novel, for example, might have enough discussion in secondary sources to warrant a redirect to a "minor places in novel X" article. On the other hand, a minor place in a work that is itself fairly obscure isn't worth mentioning anywhere. Jakew (talk) 14:58, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
This isn't about limiting what topics from published works we can cover, I think it's well established that WP:NOT does not limit topics, but rather the shape of article content. The purpose of this policy is to guide readers as to what an encyclopedic article looks like, by giving examples of what it doesn't look like. Like I say, if we either work out what we agree an encyclopedic article on fiction should look like, we can better advice readers on what ot shouldn't. Or voice versa. So, are encyclopedic articles plot summaries? What particular issues are there with the above articles? HidingT 15:23, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, in light of what I was trying to get above, here are some of my concerns (not the whole list, but just a start):
Bulbasaur 's appearances section is what through this one off for me. It's a character from the franchise, so dur, I expect it to likely appear in all media from that franchise. However (sad to say I know this), it's anime appearance is probably the most important to note since it was one that Ash carried around and thus got frequent screen time. This section is written as to try to justify the article from all the AFDs it has been getting, which has led to it being awkward and non-comprehensive. Cleanup is needed, but likely can stay an article.
Psylocke is written very non-comprehensively. The article requires a lot of a priori knowledge of the X-men universe and background in addition to the character's own background. Eg in the Body section, it starts After her physical transformation into an Asian ninja assassin she gained highly developed fighting skills in addition to her telepathy..., but I see no mention of this transformation beforehand - why it occurred or what prompted it (and here's a case that I am NOT familiar with the core material, so I can see the deficiencies here). That's not to say there's potential for this article to be better in terms of comprehensiveness. There's also something that feels exhaustive to the article as if they are trying to get every key detail about the character listed down. It's well sourced to the primary work, which is fine, but as a causal reader, this is overwhelming and I feel I don't know any more about the character. This likely can stay as an article but cleanup is necessary.
Crimson Dawn is a case where why this particular aspect of the X-Men universe gets special merit but why not other concepts? This is where coverage of this topic is better merged to a larger subject, whether in the article about the general X-Men mutant, or a list of concepts for X-Men, or the like.
Kender is a case where, ok, great, there's established notability, but the details of coverage are excessive. The fact there's a "life cycle" for a fictional race is where the comprehension is lost: we should not be treating a fictional race in the same manner that we treat a living species. Not that the information in that section can't be relocated (I know Wanderlust needs to be mentioned), but when fictional elements are treated in the same manner as real world objects, eg the in-universe approach, this can confuse the casual reader. However, this is only a cleanup issue, certainly not one to prompt the merging of this article into others.
Scimitar (Marvel Comics) is like Crimson Dawn - there's no evidence why this character should get special mention over others, and thus should be merged to a list of equivalently characters.
I've spot checked the other ones, and all generally fall into the two categories based on what I wrote earlier: either in their present state they lack appropriate comprehensiveness that is necessary for the casual reader (but not necessarily saying the article should be deleted or merged), or that a better encyclopedic treatment can be obtained by merging to a larger topic, those still keeping topic coverage. --MASEM 16:14, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
That's great stuff. What does it indicate to you would be best practise on plot summaries and how they operate within an encyclopedic article, based on those articles? HidingT 09:21, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, were I do try to extend the concept further, here's some criteria I'd use:
Written from an out-of-universe approach - Topics from works of fiction are pieces of fiction, and thus how we treat them compared to an equivalent real world object should be vastly different. This is best summarized by the use of out-of-universe writing styles and avoiding making character articles read like real person biographies or.
Comprehensive without requiring a priori knowledge of the work. While some of the background for the work should be provided through wikilinking, an article of this nature should clearly establish a frame of reference and approach the discussion without having the reader intimately aware of the work. This is combined with out-of-universe writing approaches to avoid problems; changes to a comic book character, for example, would not be split around fiction timing divisions, but about either real-world changes (such as a new writer) or around clearly defined plot arcs.
Intended target audience is the reader unfamiliar with the work. This is similar to not including a priori knowledge, but also refers to how other information is presented. EG the Bulbasaur list of appearances, as written, is likely of little interest to someone that is only there to learn what the word means, and this section is otherwise relatively confusing. This section can be improved significantly (likely reducing its length) to make it clear that the characters has appeared in nearly every iteration of Pokemon media without having to list each one.
Plot summaries should fall out of larger articles with relative ease when needed The shorter articles above feel like they were created because someone thought the topic should be called out. However, I don't see this articles ever growing past their stubby feeling. If there's a need to make sure a topic term is searchable, we have redirects and disambig pages for that. Creation of such articles should only occur when WP:SIZE concerns appear.
It's likely not the complete criteria for encyclopedic articles but a start. --MASEM 09:48, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
So you would conclude that an encyclopedic article, the very thing we are trying to coach towards here, is not simply a plot summary? There has to be more than a plot summary? HidingT 10:28, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Specifically saying "article", I'd have to say no; we do have certain cases where we allow for plot summary articles, ones that can pretty much be only sourced from primary works. When you apply it to "topics" that's a different issue; the topic of the work of fiction needs to be shown notable, and cannot simply in its overall coverage be plot regurgitation. I will leave open the possibly that certain plot-only articles can be approached encyclopedically; lists of characters and episodes quickly come to mind, but some of the above in the list, I can see that with cleanup, we could approach an encyclopedic treatment that meets the spirit of what we want on WP and within the intent how we want to treat fictional elmeents on WP. --MASEM 10:41, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Interesting. Can you provide some examples of articles which are simply plot summaries? Be advised I do not see lists as articles. They are instead lists. HidingT 11:23, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
That have been retained after being up at AFD or a similar discussion? No, none that I am aware. Is it necessarily true that there can never be an encyclopedic article supported only by primary sources in WP? That's a question I can't answer. My personal feeling is no there shouldn't, but that's me, not consensus, and I think this is a core issue. I can see, with some improvement, that Bulbasaur, Psylocke, and Kender could likely be written to have the same quality as some of the best featured articles, except for the lack of secondary sources. Should these stay? Personally I think they shouldn't, but I can also see the case where they arguably should. The problem that becomes here is that technically, any devoted fan of a work can take the most miniscule topic from the work and create a similar article in quality which could be argued to be able to stay around, and at some point, we pass the threshold of indiscriminate information. It could be possible we need something that could allow for articles under the topic of a notable work of fiction that are encyclopedic treatments of plot summaries of major aspects of the work (such as major characters, only).
However, there are several concerns with that which is why my gut says we shouldn't allow for that. First is that these articles generate examples that newer and less experienced editors will follow. This in turn could lead to the creation of many more articles that may attempt the same level of detail and discussion, but likely miss short. This is compounded by the fact that if it is the case that such articles are generally the highest viewed on WP, they will likely gain the most new editors, bringing about the addition of trivial elements and further degradation in quality. This also leads to a maintainance issue. An editor may be eager to make numerous articles now on every character in a work, say adding 40 new articles to WP, but then disappears. We know have 40 articles that could be without a caretaker, and considering the issues above, will potentially become rapidly decreasing in quality. For those reasons is why I think we should avoid allowing these types of articles. As to how that reflects in PLOT, I'm not sure; I don't know if we need to go at the article level to say that plot-only articles are bad with the understanding that lists are not articles for this purpose; this explicit fact may be better stated at WAF and FICT, but there's still an element of PLOT that remains here. --MASEM 14:28, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
WP:V and WP:PSTS seem to indicate that an article must rely on secondary sourcing rather than primary sourcing. This would seem to indicate that there cannot be articles which are solely made up from primary sources unless consensus changes. Would you agree with that? Does that change your position, thinking or the consensus on PLOT? HidingT 15:12, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Firstly, both use the phrasing "should rely on", implying that exceptions are conceivable (more so than usual, in any case, as exceptions are always permissible, except with policies like BLP and removal of copyvios). Secondly, WP:V makes no mention of secondary sources, but rather third-party sources. It is entirely possible for a source to be both primary and third-party. For an article on a piece of fiction, the fiction itself is both primary and first-party, but I just wanted to clarify those points. More substantively, remember that wikipedia isn't finished and there is no deadline; articles with only first-party or primary sources can usually be seen as not having them yet, so long as they don't have content that consensus has determined requires secondary or third-party sources to support. SamBC(talk) 15:36, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
My apologies, I was simply relaying what JakeW had told me further down this page. You also seem to have missed my argument further up the page that articles shouldn't be deleted because they are plot summaries. For contrasting thoughts on how our lack of deadline applies, you might want to look at WP:DEADLINE; some people argue this means we don't have to include material immediately, other people argue it means we don;'t have to remove it immediately. It's a dual edged sword. For the record, I added the second half of the essay, and have long maintained Wikipedia is a work in progress. However, looking at the policies and taking them together, and looking at clean-up tagging, featured articles and other standards, would it be reasonable to assert consensus appears to be that articles should rely on secondary sources? Does that feel right? I don't want to get bogged down in an IAR conversation, we can take it as read that's applies as it always does, where appropriate. HidingT 16:33, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
(@Hiding) I am trying to make the reasoning based on everything but policy. I completely argee with others that as soon as you through V and PSTS into the mix, plot only articles are verboten (and I must emphasis to the points above that I am considering the ultimate state of such articles, in that plot-only articles may have potential for cleanup to become not-plot-only.) My points are to try to address as Hiding asked to ignore all other policies and guidelines in that, do plot-only articles have a place in an encyclopedia. Now, there's an interesting point in that if others agree that encyclopedic plot-only articles are appropriate, does that mean that how we approach verifiability may be off? Or if verifiability is completely off limits from being changed, that makes any consideration of plot-only articles moot. --MASEM 17:06, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
But do others agree that plot-only articles are appropriate? What's current best practise on Wikipedia? What happens to plot-only articles? And do plot-only articles have a place in an encyclopedia? You seem to indicate that they do not. Is that correct? HidingT 17:22, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I am of the present opinion that yes, plot-only articles are not appropriate. However, that's only my opinion, nor is my opinion immutable. --MASEM 18:03, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I think that descriptive plot-only articles are inappropriate. However, analytic plot-only articles may, in rare cases, be appropriate, with the obvious condition that they can be written without original research. For example, let's suppose that the plot of Shakespeare's Macbeth has received significant scholarly attention in its own right, and is a recognised subject of academic papers and books (this may be the case, but it is just an example). In this case, an encyclopaedia article can be written about the plot of Macbeth, because we can document the different analyses, comment on controversies, and - of course - provide references for verification and further reading. But the important thing here is that people have actually written about the plot, and we're not simply extracting the plot from the primary source itself. We're acting as a true tertiary source, as is appropriate for an encyclopaedia, and the resulting article contains more breadth of information than the reader could obtain any one source alone (ie., it doesn't just regurgitate the original plot).
In the vast majority of cases, I think that plot-only articles are symptomatic of a larger problem. One such problem is that the work itself has received little or no attention in reliable, secondary sources. That means that it's impossible to include encyclopaedic treatment of the work: we can't give an overview of what secondary sources have to say about it, and we can't discuss the significance, reception, analysis, etc. In a sense, it's verifiable, but that's like me saying that a previously undiscovered species of plant in my garden is verifiable: sure, you can visit and look, and you might perhaps be able to look at a photograph, but in a more encyclopaedic sense it isn't really verifiable until we can learn what experts have to say about it.
Another possible problem is that we're trying to give a work a disproportionate amount of coverage, as compared to the amount of coverage that it has actually received in secondary sources. As a hypothetical example, suppose there's a novel that received little attention from critics, but has a wide fan base. Consequently, WP's article grows and grows until it gets huge, and someone decides to spin out a 'plot of X' sub-article. Perhaps there are just about enough secondary sources to sustain one article, but there really aren't enough to sustain two, and consequently we have a descriptive plot-only article that relies (perhaps exclusively) upon the primary source. Now, I would argue that spinning out the sub-article was the wrong thing to do, and the right decision (though it may be tough, or unpopular) would be to trim the main article down, such that it is proportional to the available sources, and above all, an appropriate amount of coverage for an encyclopaedia (albeit one that isn't paper).
In all of these cases, I think PLOT is showing us the correct approach (it may be a little confusing with respect to the analytic plot of Macbeth example, but I wouldn't call this a simple plot summary - it's closer to the "larger coverage" in the current wording, I think). Sometimes PLOT tells us to trim content, when it has grown too much for the subject matter. Sometimes it tells us to merge. And, sometimes, it tells us to delete. But I have trouble thinking of a situation where it tells us to do something that causes WP content to be less encyclopaedic. Jakew (talk) 22:54, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I would go further than Masem by saying that even a plot-only article is not encyclopedic, no matter how heavily it cites primary sources. The reason is that plot summaries fail one of the most important policies in Wikipedia, namely that All Wikipedia articles and other encyclopedic content must be written from a neutral point of view. Works of fiction are written from one or more points of view[19], such as a first, second or third-person narration. Once you try to summarise a work of fiction, the perspective can change and a books meaning is altered in the process, but also the bias of the person writing the plot summary creeps in to replace that of the author, or reinforces a bias towoards a fictional perspective that may seek to portray real-life events from a literary viewpoint as if it were objective. A classic example of bias creeps into the article Lords of the Nine Hells, whereby the story used in a role-playing game written in the 1980's is retold as if it were part of a quasi mythical story cycle. This is more than a style issue: it is not just the in universe perspective that is at fault, there is a content issue relating to bias of summary that makes this article unacceptable. The reason why WP:NOT#PLOT should be kept is that bias of this type always creeps into plot summaries; only real-world content, context, analysis and discussion of the development can be relied up to describe fictional topics; plot summary is too open to bias to be trusted. --Gavin Collins (talk) 11:43, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
What's the difference between a story used in a role-playing game and a quasi mythical story cycle? Also, is it your assertion that an editor may be giving one plot point more prominence over another, and that prominence is bias? That's an interesting point. How does one determine the main plot points of a story? Is it something we can leave to editorial consensus? That's usually how we handle other disputes over neutrality. HidingT 12:04, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Well put, Gavin. I'd also add that an article that relies entirely on primary sources would not conform to WP:V and WP:PSTS. From another angle, if secondary sources can be cited, it should be relatively easy to write from an out-of-universe perspective. Jakew (talk) 12:41, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Excellent points. So based on those, that would seem to indicate WP:PLOT is supported by other policies and is not merely a guideline promoted beyond its reach? HidingT 12:53, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I'd agree with that statement, yes. Jakew (talk) 13:40, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
The difference between a story used in a role-playing game was written by the creators of that in recent times for the purpose of suporting role-play; a quasi mythical story narrative that contains systems of thought and values of fictional characters. The bias of the article is that this character is part of a myth, when in fact it is part of a game, and this bias is used to support an in universe perspective. The point I am making is that disputes about plot summaries cannot be resolved by consensus - the bias of one or more editors will always remain, and the style in which it is written is dependent on the editor who writes it. However, only by citing reliable secondary sources can this bias be revealed. --Gavin Collins (talk) 12:26, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm perhaps puzzled by your use of the word "quasi". Also, is it part of a game, or part of a mythology used within a game? As to your points regarding consensus, why is that not true of all consensus so reached? Surely every consensus is influenced by the biases of editors who take part. At the moment we seem to be stuck between your bias and that of other editors. Maybe it is your bias that is "wrong"? Which is not to imply that you are wrong, nor that you are biased or wrong even to be biased. Rather it may simply be that your opinion does not carry the day. HidingT 12:53, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, last I checked WP:PSTS supports the use of primary sources to make purely descriptive statements, and plot summary should be purely descriptive; if it's not, then it's not a summary, it's an analysis, which does require secondary sources. It is perfectly possible to write a non-analytical plot summary; even easier if you use first-party secondary sources, like official synopses. Oh, and "first, second or third-person narration" is really not the kind of point-of-view meant by WP:NPOV. SamBC(talk) 12:55, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I agree that NPOV is not the issue here (although of course the plot summary should be as neutral as possible, just like any article). But looking at WP:PSTS, it says that "Wikipedia articles should rely on reliable, published secondary sources. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors" Articles that are plot summaries do not rely on reliable, published secondary sources and should therefore be improved, merged, redirected or deleted. Fram (talk) 13:14, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Yes. WP:SOURCES (in WP:V) also states: "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy". There's also WP:BURDEN (in WP:V), which states: "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found for an article topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it." There are probably other examples as well; the importance of the need for secondary sources is such that there are numerous references to it throughout the core policies. Jakew (talk) 13:40, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
No. Only if you assume plot summaries do not exist in secondary sources, which is empirically not the case. Catchpole (talk) 13:47, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
For many works of fiction (excluding the important ones), there are no plot summaries in independent secondary sources. The plot summaries for many TV episodes are provided upfront by the creators, so are not independent. Very few plot summaries for such episodes are written after the fact by independent reliable sources. Apart from that; yes, there are many plot summaries in reviews, but these are mostlyvery short and rarely describe the whole story (spoilers). Often, what you'll find are two- or three-line summaries, descriving the theme and general setting of the work of fiction, but not really summarizing the story like we do too often. Fram (talk) 14:07, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Also, based on how we define secondary sources, I would argue that if can find a reliable secondary source that contains an appropriate plot summary (more than just a few lines, as Fram states), you will also find sourced analysis or other synthesis that can allow more than just plot summary to exist in that same source. It's more than likely that you'll find analysis from secondary sources than plot summary, pretty much. --MASEM 14:34, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, for starters I'm not suggesting any article should be only plot summary; I was disagreeing with Gavin's assertion that NPOV and PSTS disallow plot summaries entirely (unless backed up by secondary source). Where a plot summary is part of an article, it can be sourced entirely from primary sources, provided it doesn't "make … analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims" and only makes "descriptive claims about the information found in the primary source, the accuracy and applicability of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge". This is entirely possible with works of fiction. Indeed, summarising a work of fictional neutrally is no harder than summarising any other source, be it primary or secondary, which is what we generally do. Even so, it's probably better to source plot summaries from secondary sources, but there's no way our policies and guidelines require it. SamBC(talk) 13:59, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I partly misunderstood your point, and agree basically with what you said here. Fram (talk) 14:07, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I stick by my earlier point about WP:NPOV. Since a work of fiction is the author's viewpoint about a fictional world they have created[20], only reliable secondary sources will reveal the author's viewpoint(s) (or at least good analysis and criticism will). If a work of fiction is based on the POV of the author, then plot summary must be based on the point of view of editors who summarise a work of fiction. This seems to be big problem in the article I, Claudius, where there is a content dispute about the correct viewpoint to adopt in the plot summary - is it fiction based on fact or is it fiction based on fiction? I disagree that a plot summary can be purely descriptive, because the only way to eliminate POV in plot summaries is to reproduce the work of fiction verbatim. The idea that plot summary can written without any bias is a fallacy - see Edward Said's Orientalism for a critic of this view. What WP:NOT#PLOT should be saying is that plot summary is not suitable for inclusion in Wikpedia because it is based on second hand point of view of one or more editors of what are a work of fiction says.--Gavin Collins (talk) 16:02, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
That's an interesting viewpoint. So what you're saying is that if an author writes "Jack died horribly.", for us to state that Jack dies in the work is a POV because we have omitted one word? HidingT 16:39, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm also interested in how this would apply to a work of art. It would seem to me we could also not describe a work of art unless we source that in secondary sources. For example, take our featured article on The Third of May 1808. The article states "A square lantern situated on the ground between the two groups throws a dramatic light on the scene." Are you suggesting this is a biased viewpoint? Curious. HidingT 16:51, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Sometimes the statement "Jack died horribly" can be contraversial if no context is provided. For example, plot summary of the film Munich is biased in my view: the assassination of a known terrorist could be viewed as state sponsored murder of a political activist if you look at it from a Palestinian perspective. I think you can claim that plot summary is not POV on the grounds that the retelling of a simple story is unbiased, but since the publication of Edward Said's Orientalism, most people would consider that the wishful thinking. I think you should be a little more questioning, and accept that plot summary is biased, even if unintentionally.--Gavin Collins (talk) 17:57, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
So it would be wrong to state that the Wizard of Oz depicts a girl called Dorothy? Or that she has a dog whom she refers to as Toto? That's simply wishful thinking on my part, and in fact nobody is sure what the Wizard of Oz depicts? Hmm. This is confusing. Now I have to wonder how this applies to secondary sources. Can we even summarise those without introducing bias. You may well have uncovered a flaw within the whole project. Can you demonstrate support amongst other Wikipedians for your point of view? HidingT 18:52, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Hiding may be confused: the fact either the book or the film the Wizard of Oz depicts a girl called Dorothy is to identify a character in the story, its not plot summary per se. I wonder if he has ever studied English literature or composition? Before he goes to the Village Pump to announce his discovery, I suggest he get a book from his local library and check out the definition of "plot summary". --Gavin Collins (talk) 11:46, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
I am confused. I said so. So when we summarise things depicted in a work of fiction, that is not always plot summary? Is that correct? Also, you are basing this viewpoint upon your interpretation of a book, is that correct? So you are suggesting that, based upon your intepretation of a book, it is impossible to briefly describe a storyline, without introducing bias? This is confucing. For starters, how do we know this is true and not simply your bias? Looking around Wikipedia, I think you would agree that consensus is that it is possible to summarise plot. Can you show that your view has consensus amongst other editors? If not, I suggest we simply disregard it. HidingT 15:10, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
It seems like the discussion is split with another parallel discussion at the proposed guideline Wikipedia:Plot summaries. --Kevin Murray (talk) 20:51, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
sometimes a plot summary can be controversial, and need balancing of different sources which talk about the work differently--there are areas that are matters of opinion. But most of it isn't and the problem is describing concisely but adequate the events--which is not trivial, but the the question of policy. Perhaps we should have a policy: WP IS NOT BAD WRITING -- but thats another matter; desirable as it might be, I see no practical way to get there. The examples above are real--but they respect not the plot itself but the relationship of the plot to the RW events--and this is increasing a problem to the extent that the work is not fiction--we have this problem with discussing all historical fiction and fictionalized biography and the like. Fortunately, when this arises, there are always sources for the controversy. DGG (talk) 04:18, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
I think you have brought out an important point, that only reliable secondary sources can be used to tease out different interpretations of a particular plot. For instance, the plot summary of The Homecoming is virtually an abridgement rather than a summary of the play's plot. I think this becuase it would be hard to write a plot summary for this work that would encapsulate such a complex piece of work that would be satisfactory to every editor, and so the writers of this particular plot summary have chose to almost reproduce the work at great length, rather than to summarise it, in order to avoid controversy. The reason for this is that it is "A highly ambiguous, enigmatic, and (for some) even cryptic play". No one is quite sure what that was the POV of the author, and for a plot summary to be written without bias towards one interpretation or another would be difficult. Basically what I am saying is you cannot have articles that are just plot summary, because to write an article about a work of fiction (which is the POV of the works author in the first place) based only on the POV of one or more editors is just not acceptable under Wikipedia guidelines. --Gavin Collins (talk) 12:03, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
This brings a good point that we need to strongly enforce that plot summaries (including characters, etc.) should always be sourced just like we ask everything else to be sourced; ideally from secondary sources whenever possible, but if not, at least primary sources. Exceptional claims require sourcing, so if you include any empathic language in the plot summary, it is excepted that the need to express that is clearly shown through sources. Otherwise, plot summaries should be written as neutral as possible, almost to the point of "A did this. B did that"-type writing style, repeating key events without any interpretation. Mind you, such language is rather bland, and I have seen plot summaries that do have more engaging language without introducing inappropriate amounts of OR and POV; it's more long term editing practice than anything else that helps there. --MASEM 14:22, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
Sorry Masem, that is not my point at all. Plot summaries are POV pure and simple, since you are retelling the author's story from your own viewpoint [21], and regardless of what style they are couched in, they are not accpetable on their own. In response to Hiding, there is a clear consensus in Wikipedia against articles that are comprised soley of POV (see WP:NPOV for details)). Unless anyone can come up with argument or can quote a Wikipedia guideline that says articles can or should be wholly comprised of POV (regardless of whether that opinion is sourced or not), then I think there is no reason to remove WP:NOT#PLOT from this guideline. If you do have any opinion on the matter, it would be more useful if participants in this debate cite sources that support their arguements, rather than make statements based on the assumption that their opinion represents Wikipedia consensus.--Gavin Collins (talk) 09:25, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Nonsense, plot summaries can be based on reliable sources just as any other article can. A plot summary is an essential component of any article on a fictional subject. Catchpole (talk) 09:49, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Although that PDF you linked to offers good criticism on the subject of plot summaries, none of it supports your suggestion that "plot summaries are pure POV". You've made no argument so far, just an accusation.--Father Goose (talk) 09:59, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Actually the PDF article Gavin has cited arguably makes the opposite point that he intended. The PDF gives advice about how to write a "literature essay", not an encyclopedia article. If you followed the advice of this article, you would run completely contrary to the policy against original research, as it specifically encourages "establishing your personal interpretation of something in the work". The article also says to "assume your reader has read the work," something which we should not be doing when writing an encyclopedia article. At the end, it gives two examples, only one of which is "acceptable in a university English essay", the other being "well-written plot summary" which "contributes nothing to our understanding of the significance of the episode." However, what might be good in an English essay would be original research in Wikipedia, and what might contribute nothing to the understanding of someone who has already read the work may contribute a great deal to the readers of an encyclopedia seeking information about a work they may not be familiar with at all. Only the "well-written plot summary" would be acceptable here without a citation to a secondary source. DHowell (talk) 00:32, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Maybe you missed the earlier discussion which centered around the fact that works of fiction are written from one or more points of view.The problem with reading or writing about fictional topics is that when "we enter a fictional world, we do not merely ”suspend” a critical faculty; we also exercise a creative faculty. Because of our desire to experience immersion, we focus our attention on the enveloping world and we use our intelligence to reinforce rather than to question the reality of the experience (see page 9). Basically, it is not possible to write a plot summary which is not a reinterpretation of the author's interpretion of the ficitional world they originally created.--Gavin Collins (talk) 11:18, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
That argument could be applied to any topic and would lead to a rather sparse encyclopedia. Catchpole (talk) 12:23, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Gavin, policy says "As the name suggests, the neutral point of view is a point of view, not the absence or elimination of viewpoints. The neutral point of view policy is often misunderstood. The acronym NPOV does not mean 'no points of view'. The elimination of article content cannot be justified under this policy by simply labeling it "POV"." Further, your quotation is from an article about video games, where players are expected to immerse themselves in the game's fictional world. It has nothing to do with writing about fiction from a neutral point of view. It is no more difficult to write about fiction (especially non-interactive fiction) from a neutral point of view than it is to write about anything from a neutral point of view. Your final sentence is logically equivalent to saying "it is not possible to write a summary of a source of real-world information which is not a reinterpretation of the author's interpretion of the real world they live in." DHowell (talk) 00:56, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Have you any evidence to support your personal opinions? --Gavin Collins (talk) 07:32, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
It is self-evident. If you take the stance that any summarizing of a work of fiction is necessarily synthesis and POV original research, you must logically come to the conclusion that any summarizing of any written (or otherwise transmitted) information must, necessarily, be synthesis and POV original research. Ursasapien(talk) 09:19, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
Gavin does have a point, I think. If you consider a random work of fiction with two or more secondary sources describing its plot, it's likely that these secondary sources describe it very differently, identifying different key points, and so on. Arguably, these are different points of view about what the plot actually is. Having said that, of course, in many cases it is likely that there are significant areas of agreement between secondary sources. No doubt this depends on the nature of the work itself.
The trouble is that there's a very fine line between description and analysis, and this is probably more so with fiction, partly due to its immersive nature, and partly due to the fact that it is inherently linear, and is rarely structured to facilitate a high-level overview. Fortunately, if a work of fiction passes notability guidelines, there must be third-party sources, and so it is overwhelmingly probable that we can rely on secondary sources for any summary, rather than writing one from the primary source. Jakew (talk) 15:29, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm confused. The method for ensuring a NPOV is maintained is editorial consensus. Why, therefore, is this an issue? Consensus will determine the NPOV way to write plot summaries, as it does anything else. Are people attempting to obstruct the consensus model here? HidingT 12:01, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Because there is a difference between Wikipedia wide consensus and local consensus at Wikiproject or even article level, we cannot adapt WP:NOT to fit in with every interpretation of local consensus, and in a sense WP:NOT does obstruct local consensus from developing if Wikipedia wide concerns are ignored. Take for example the article Brainiac (comics), which possibly fails WP:NOT#PLOT. Plot summary taken from various editions of the comic has been used as the material for a lengthy Fictional character biography. Whilst I admit the editors who have contributed to this article have been highly innovative in the way they have built a plot summary around this fictional character, I do not think they have considered its encyclopedic value. Clearly the consensus amoungst the contributors is built upon the point of view that plot summary is the primary method of describing comic book characters to the exclusion of all forms of content. Whilst I agree consensus is important to the way in which contributors work together to write the content of an article, I do not think local consensus alone can be relied upon to provide a consistent approach to writing encyclopedic articles. That is why WP:NOT#PLOT is an important element of this policy; to remind contributors that when they build a consensus about its content, local consensus is also in agreement with Wikipedia wide consensus. --Gavin Collins (talk) 13:22, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Whether or not you accept the statement that "it not possible to write a plot summary which is not a reinterpretation of the author's interpretion of the ficitional world they originally created" (or whether or not you accept the sources I have cited in support of this arguement), nonetheless I think it is important to recognise that unsourced plot summary is open to over-reliance on the point of view of one or even several editors because:
One reason why I might do this is that I might have a great affection for a particular work ( such as a film), or I may even be particularly fond of a scene, episode or character within that film, which might lead me to write a plot summary that places undue weight on that particular scene, and in so doing, fail to provide the context which a plot summary is supposed to provide, not just those aspects or parts that I like.
To avoid this, I think it is important to cite the primary sources in a plot summary, as citing sources and avoiding original research are inextricably linked. There is currently a proposal being tabled that there is no need to source plot summary, on the grounds that "the citation would be the work itself". However, I do not subscribe to this view, for if no sources are provided, how can we check to see if the plot summary is accurate, biased or places undue wieght on certain scenes? To go back to the example of writing a plot summary about a film, I think it is important to cite the particular segment of the work (such as chapter or scene) so that anyone—without specialist knowledge—who reads the primary source should be able to verify that the Wikipedia passage agrees with the primary source. I therfore propose that WP:NOT#PLOT should be changed to that "A concise plot summary is appropriate as part of the larger coverage of a fictional work, provided the source of summary can be verified though the use of in-line citations." Since WP:V has very strong support in Wikipedia, I believe that there is proposal should inherit this support, as it broadly follows the consensus view that every editor should indicate the source of their article contributions. I think this would help end disputes about undue weight, excessive length and accuracy disputes which seem to plague unsourced plot summaries.--Gavin Collins (talk) 11:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
I think this is a silly proposal. The obsession with in-line citation is bad enough without adding a requirement for plot summaries to have a footnote stating that the source is the subject of the article. It should be obvious to all readers that the source for a plot summary is the work itself unless stated otherwise and so can be verified if they choose to do so by examining the work in question. Catchpole (talk) 11:48, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
It is quite rare that concise plot summaries violate OR and UNDUE that I consider your proposal overkill, Gavin. I'd rather add a sentence to Wikipedia:Plot summaries pointing out the risks of overlong plot summaries, and promote concise plot summaries in that way. – sgeurekat•c 12:22, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
I am very uncomfortable with the idea that plot summaries are exempt from WP:V and WP:PSTS, and that it is perfectly ok for them to have an implicit citation to the primary source alone. I think that idea represents a fundamental misunderstanding of verifiability in the context of WP. Plot summaries, like other content, should be based for the most part on reliable secondary sources, and should cite those sources, just as is expected of other content. (I'd also point out that, if the work is remotely notable, this should not present any difficulties.)
That said, much as I approve of in-line citations, I can't support mandating them in policy for a single type of content. Just as I believe it is inappropriate to relax WP:V and WP:PSTS for plot summaries, I also think it is inappropriate to arbitrarily tighten the requirements. Furthermore, it should be obvious that core content policies apply to plot summaries, and the right place to discuss their requirements is WP:V, etc. If we try to insert a condensed version into NOT, it is likely to be inadequate.
I would support something along the lines of "as with all WP content, plot summaries must conform to core content policies, including WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, WP:V, etc." However, I'm not entirely sure that it's necessary. Jakew (talk) 12:46, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
It's worth pointing out that it isn't an exemption from PSTS. PSTS states that primary sources are fine for certain types of content, and plot summaries can certainly be written within those restrictions. Policy states that articles should generally rely on secondary sources, not any particular content within them. As such, primary-sourced plot summary cannot be the sole content of an article, but we already accept that (that's pretty much the point of agreement in terms of the disagreements about what WP:PLOT should say (of course there's exceptions like the circumstances where there seems a need to split out plot information into a separate article, but that should only really ever happen if there's analysis, and therefore secondary sources. SamBC(talk) 13:00, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
"Fine for certain types of content" is one way of putting it, Sam, but I think it's missing the point somewhat.
To show you what I mean, consider the following: "Primary sources that have been published by a reliable source may be used in Wikipedia, but only with care, because it is easy to misuse them. ... Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. To the extent that part of an article relies on a primary source, it should: ... make no analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims about the information found in the primary source. ... All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors." — WP:PSTS
Now, I realise that plot summaries could be seen as descriptive, but can you honestly say that you can write a plot summary without making "analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims"? I think it would be very difficult to do in the vast majority of cases, and I would be genuinely interested to read a plot summary that did not make such claims. I would further submit that, although PSTS does permit usage of primary sources "only with care", it strongly encourages use of secondary sources instead. Jakew (talk) 13:15, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Previous consensus in discussions I've seen and participated in (including at WT:NOR) has been that basic plot summaries meet those rules. However, it's certainly valid that secondary sourcing for such summaries is better, and I've said that on a number of occaisions. There's no need to prohibit plot summaries based on primary sources, but policy and guidelines already indicate that secondary sourcing is preferable. If people think this doesn't apply to plot summaries, then reiterating it may be worthwhile. However, the phrasing must not be such that people can reasonable feel that it justifies removing primary-sourced summaries that do meet the requirements of PSTS. SamBC(talk) 13:38, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
All right, we obviously disagree about a few things, but can I try to enumerate the points of agreement here?
Core content policies (WP:NPOV, WP:V, WP:NOR, etc) apply to plot summaries (I'm deliberately leaving out issues of interpretation on this point).
It may be helpful for this policy (or Wikipedia:Plot summaries, if that is intended to become a guideline) to clearly state the previous point.
While we disagree over whether it is required for plot summaries, we agree that secondary sourcing is preferable to primary sourcing (might it be helpful to mention this somewhere?).
Whether primary-sourced material meets WP:PSTS or not can be determined through reference to that policy; this policy does not need to endorse one interpretation of that.
Do you agree with the above? Jakew (talk) 14:01, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
As far as all that goes, it sounds fine. I'm not sure where or if it's worth pointing out that those policies still apply, or that secondary sourcing is preferred; those are certainly true, although DGG's pointing out that a good primary source may be better than a bad secondary source. It is not the case that any and all secondary sources are better than any and all primary sources. SamBC(talk) 16:56, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Good primary sourcing from the plot itself is a better source than incompetent program guides and the like, which are written for the purpose of attracting attention to the show, not describing it.
Incidentally, I agree that in line citations to particular places in the plot are an extremely good idea for key points, but taken to extreme, it gives a density of citation that is not really appropriate for a general encyclopedia. DGG (talk) 15:55, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't see that so much as an argument for primary sources, but more a question of whether "incompetent program guides and the like, which are written for the purpose of attracting attention to the show, not describing it" constitute reliable sources in the first place. If there are so few available sources, and of such poor quality, that one only has a choice between such a source and the work itself, then I'd suggest that there's a more fundamental problem with the article... Jakew (talk) 16:44, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
But an article may have perfectly good secondary, third-party sources for everything else, but source plot summary to the work itself for lack of better sources; I don't see anything wrong with that, nor that it would be indicative of any sort of "fundamental problem". SamBC(talk) 16:53, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Intuitively, it seems obvious to me that if these perfectly good third-party sources exist, and discuss the work in enough depth to support the rest of the article, then they're sure to say something about the plot itself (I can't think of a book or film review I've read that didn't at least briefly describe the plot). The concept that multiple third-party sources could have significant coverage and yet not one of them even mentions what the work is actually about strikes me as incredibly unlikely. Am I mistaken? Jakew (talk) 17:04, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Yes, that is worth saying; where it is practical to refer to a specific point (there being standard and popularly-known reference points like chapters, line numbers in verse, that sort of thing; edition-specific page references are less useful), that's worth doing, but not everywhere. Remember, no particular form of in-line citation is required, it's only necessary to ensure that people can easily find the relevant material. SamBC(talk) 16:50, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
In terms of the "good primary sourcing" versus "incompetent programme guides", that's a very valid point in terms of practicality. It wouldn't be here, but it's worth noting somewhere that promotional synopses (even if they are third-party) aren't a good source when it comes to fiction. SamBC(talk) 16:50, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
This is kind of ridiculous. Practically everything written for Wikipedia is a summary of some other material. Hell, even if we had a reliable source that summarized the plot of a story, we'd still need to summarize that article. -Chunky Rice (talk) 21:05, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
There are some differences to consider. The first difference is that secondary source material is typically organised in a way that readily facilitates a summary (an extreme example might be if Prof Plot begins his paper about the plot of X with an abstract outlining his key points). The second difference is that the amount of compression involved is typically far less extreme (if you estimate the ratio of words in a source to words in our article, this figure is typically enormous when directly summarising, say, a novel, but much less so when summarising an existing synopsis in a book review). I'd guess that the risk of introducing original research is roughly proportional to the degree of compression. Finally, a more subtle point: a plot is an abstract concept which we consider to be contained within a work of fiction, but the work isn't itself a plot, and the plot only exists in a meaningful sense once it has been described. Jakew (talk) 21:33, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
You're making a lot of assumptions about the length of both primary and secondary sources that I don't think are necessarily always the case. Yes, a newspaper article is shorter than a novel. But a non-fiction book or dissertation about a subject is certainly much longer than a short story or poem. Both kinds of sources come in all sorts of lengths and forms and to paint them with such broad brushes is a mistake, in my opinion. -Chunky Rice (talk) 21:41, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I'm sure there are exceptions (which is why I said "typically"), and I don't mean to suggest that all (or even most) secondary sources are shorter than primary sources. However, I suspect that this is often the case in this particular context (plot summaries). I'd suggest that it's highly likely that if a book or dissertation discusses a shorter fictional work, it will likely contain a fairly short summary of the primary source, due to the structure that I noted in my first point above.
In a wider context, I'd also point out that, as a general rule, we don't strictly summarise sources. Instead, we usually extract and rephrase a few pieces of information from several sources, and weave them into a (hopefully) coherent narrative. Each source acts as a source of claims or facts rather than as a subject being studied. Plot summaries are somewhat unusual in that they seek to describe the subject — which is also a primary source — as a whole. Jakew (talk) 22:20, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
My point is that, generally speaking, nobody has a problem with using a large, unweildly text to support a single point. You take the point being asserted, read the text cited and see if it supports the point, as claimed. There's really no difference for plot summary. If I say, "Character X was born in 1975." that is a purely factual statement that is either supported by the primary source or not. I honestly don't see the difference. -Chunky Rice (talk) 22:35, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
I think we may be talking at cross purposes. I don't see a problem with citing a primary source in support of a statement like "Character X was born in 1975". I might, however, see a problem in saying something like "is about character X and character Y, who spend much of their childhood avoiding each other due to a rift between their parents. Then, X rescues Y from a near-fatal road accident, and the two gradually get over their differences, and eventually form an off-shore oil drilling partnership." (There is a reason why I don't write novels...) Jakew (talk) 22:58, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Any good plot summary should be able to be broken down into a series of simple statements that are supported by the primary text. Hypotheticals are difficult to work with because we have no actual text to compare them to. But let's say we're doing Harry Potter. We can say that Harry Potter is an orphan. He lives with his aunt and uncle. They don't like him. He doesn't like them. On his whatever birthday, he receives an invitiation to Wizard school. He goes to wizard school and meets whoever. And so on and so forth. Simple declarative statements, all easily supported by the primary text and unconvtroversial in nature. If a plot summary starts delving in to deep symbolism and motivation of characters without explicit text to support it, that's a problem, but not one inherent in plot summary. -Chunky Rice (talk) 23:07, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
exactly. If the fiction is even remotely notable, there will be sources available for that. But this is an editing question , that arises frequently in all sorts of articles. The limit of what is acceptable is in practice usually determined when someone challenges it, the usual way of community editing. . DGG (talk) 02:52, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Protected
Whatever the consensus, alleged consensus, perceived consensus or anything else, constantly changing a policy page is clearly not useful to anyone, so I've protected it. Let's get an actual consensus, agree on a wording. and then change it. Before anyone says it, note that I'm not acting in an involved or biased manner here (I'm actually OK with DGG's wording). Black Kite 19:22, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Thank you (and wholly agree with protection). AnmaFinotera (talk) 19:36, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
no objection either. DGG (talk) 19:38, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
For my own part in it, I don't have strong feelings about changing the wording, but my objection was to the way the policy page was being treated as a draft page. We owe it to the project to consider things beyond this talk page, and to not be so shallow that we flip out right away because of some recent discussion where some people got all pissy. -- Ned Scott 21:24, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
The policy page is a draft. This is a wiki. That's how they work. There's a flowchart up above which may delineate that fact a little better than I can. HidingT 12:57, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Not with a policy page like WP:NOT. You don't go acting like a fool like you did and remove sections of policy because you're having your period. -- Ned Scott 11:43, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Actually, yes you can do so with a policy page like WP:NOT. HidingT 11:59, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
There's a big difference between being bold/being able and treating something like a draft/brainstorm. We both know that, we both understand what each other is trying to say. Yes, I get it, everything is a work in progress, but you also get what I'm trying to say, which isn't that no one can edit it, or that things are in stone. Can we please stop pretending to not know what the other person means? -- Ned Scott 12:16, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
The problem is that I don't understand you. You seem to indicate that we are not allowed to edit the page until we reach a consensus on what it should say. If that is not what you mean, please explain what you do mean. For example, say I write on the page; "Wikipedia is not a dictatorship. Jimbo Wales does not wield executive power, and does not have the right to do what he wants." Now imagine another user rewrites it to "Wikipedia is not a dictatorship. No user wields executive power, power exists with the community and decisions are reached through consensus." And then I add something like "Users are free to act unilaterally per WP:BOLD, but when such actions are disputed they are expected to resolve it amicably through both editing and discussion. Where necessary, users may find it helpful to ask for outside input." And then another user adds "For more information see WP:DR." What is the problem with that? What would be achieved if the first person to come along simply removed my words and said "You can't do that"? Given that policy supports that I can, hasn't that person made a fundamental error? If they mean, I don't like that, that's fine. But they are expected to say so, giving reasons. They might say, I've removed this because it directly attacks Jimmy. Then we could still get to the second revision. If all we are told is that "You can't do that", the discussion turns into, well actually, per WP:CONSENSUS, and WP:B I can. And the second user will say, but per WP:BRD I can simply remove it. And you've spent a lot of time on an unproductive argument, which could and should have been spent more productively. So can you perhaps explain why we are not allowed to treat policies and guidelines like drafts, brainstorming additions, rewrites and revisions, and could you show examples in both policy and page histories where this has proved effective? Pages where the approach I have described has been shown to work include this one, see the way this page has altered this year. All built through consensus editing. [22] Reversions even work, providing the reverter uses a descriptive edit summary which doesn't amount to "No Consensus" or the like. Because that again leads to a circular argument; how do you demonstrate consensus has changed if you can't change it? This is exactly why policy pages are drafts/brainstorms. In fact, they actually lag behind the consensus, it's well documented that we decribe what we do after we have done it. Therefore they have to lag, because we don;t describe what we are going to do, since we don;t know how it will turn out, and we haven't actually done it yet. But I'd be interested in hearing your model, it might prove to be better. HidingT 10:24, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I have a hard time believing that you don't understand what I mean. It's pretty simple, it's ok to be bold, but when you know (completely, 100%) that your changes are going to be controversial, hotly disputed, and will escalate existing disputes, it's probably a bad idea to be willy-nilly with a policy page. Not to mention that we make policy based on far more than just recent discussion, but based on long term editor opinions and on pages beyond just this talk page. Consensus can change, yes, but that doesn't mean you throw out previous discussion altogether.
We can easily propose wording on the talk page, give notice in other places, and calmly move forward. That's what I did when ever I made changes to WP:PLOT, and there were no edit wars and no anger-driven arguments. But hey, I must be crazy to think that's a better idea than what you've done, like just flat out removing it and causing an uproar. -- Ned Scott 06:40, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
So I'm crazy to expect people to respect WP:CONSENSUS, WP:EW and WP:CIV and WP:AGF, and not make anger-driven arguments and edit war? That seems to be the substance of your comments. Also, I see no edit warring, or anger-driven arguments after I removed it from most participants, who were discussing it and editing the page in a collegiate manner. HidingT 09:35, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
I think I said I don't understand what you mean. I think we assume good faith, and that when someone says something, we act as if we believe them. Here's what you seem to be stating. You seem to be stating that I knew, with 100% certainty, that my edits would be controversial, and that therefore they should not have been made. Can you explain why you believe that to be the case? Also, could you explain if you have made any edits you knew would be 100% controversial? And you are absolutely right about how we make policy. We base it on consensus formed through editing and discussion. Are there editors currently editing Wikipedia who disagree with WP:PLOT? You seem to be suggesting we disregard their opinions when we write policy. Is that correct? HidingT 15:16, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
I thought maybe you were being theoretical (for a lack of better words, it's late..). The edits to reword plot or move it were not that controversial by themselves, but considering we have a thread from just a few weeks ago talking about the wording itself, it's frustrating to see discussion that recent thrown to the wind, rather than have it continue.
I also think there's a problem of what exactly people disagree with about WP:PLOT. There seem to be those who might not disagree with what it says, but disagree with what they feel it's doing to the project. Clearly, some situations dealing with fictional articles have been (and still are) handled badly. Then we have editors saying things like LOE's violate WP:PLOT, even though we specifically worded it to allow things like LOEs. I think it might be a good idea if maybe we made some kind of poll about what people think WP:PLOT means, and we'd better understand each other and our concerns.
Because of these things happening in the heat of a dispute, I don't think it's the best time to actually be making changes. I could be wrong, but I just want to let you know that it's not that I feel we can't edit policy, but rather this was a situation where it might not be a good idea to act with haste.
"Are there editors currently editing Wikipedia who disagree with WP:PLOT? You seem to be suggesting we disregard their opinions when we write policy. Is that correct?" Not at all. I want to understand their objections, and I want to include their voice in this consensus. However, the editors on this talk page are just a small part of Wikipedia, and while that might not mean one thing or another (since it is the argument that matters, not the numbers), I'd still rather give time for the discussion to stabilize and take in what other people might have to say (it's mostly been just the normal group of us in these discussions across several different pages).
I hope that clears up my line of thinking some more. -- Ned Scott 05:50, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, but I don't see a reason there why the shortcuts are "necessary". They exist and seem to work fine. Anyone can start using them. But we just went through an exercise of pruning all the shortcuts from the page and tried to standardize on the ones in the WP:NOTfoo format. These seem redundant to shortcuts that already exist (WP:NOTDIRECTORY and WP:NOTCATALOG) and don't follow the preferred format. By the way, none of the other shortcuts have been deleted - we're just not choosing to advertise every possible variant. What makes these special enough to justify the extra space on this page? Rossami(talk) 05:34, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I just thought that all shortcuts were added, and I didn't know about the discussion linked by TheBlazikenMaster. I think the decision at the discussion was correct. I take out the request since it's obvious it will be denied anyways. Cheers --Enric Naval (talk) 12:38, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
This is more evidence that pruning the shortcuts was completely unnecessary. --Pixelface (talk) 06:47, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
In case you're wondering this is the discussion. It was decided last month. TheBlazikenMaster (talk) 09:25, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I looked there, and only the shortcuts to WP:NOT itself are listed there. It appears that shortcuts to subsections of policy are not provided for any of the policies, so I haven't added them --Enric Naval (talk) 12:38, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
It looks like you're right. Where do we list shortcuts to section of policy? HidingT 12:44, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Should we start one? HidingT 15:17, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
I used AWB to make this list of current shortcuts to NOT. --MASEM 16:05, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm tweaking it to show what links where. Anyone can play. HidingT 13:13, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Does WP:PLOT apply to mythic stories?
Some editors have recently suggested that we should have separate articles on at least some individual mythic stories. Would WP:PLOT apply to prevent going into great detail regarding these stories, or would it be permissable to recount at least the most important myths in detail? My personal guess would be that these stories might be better contained in their entirety at WikiSource, but that is a comparatively uneducated view. John Carter (talk) 16:12, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
I fail to see what would prevent articles on individual mythic stories, since most of them have been analysed to death. Therefore I must be missing something. The full text of the myths themselves would be better at Wikisource, yes, although how you'd decide on which version I don't know. HidingT 16:17, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
WP:PLOT says "Wikipedia treats fiction in an encyclopedic manner; discussing the reception, impact and significance of notable works. A concise plot summary is appropriate as part of the larger coverage of a fictional work. " If you can name a myth or folk story that has an article with no information other than a re-telling of the myth, then yes, it would apply, but because myths and folk stories are by definition culturally significant, then I would be very surprised to find an article about a myth that is unable to provide any encyclopedic information. Calgary (talk) 04:08, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
I could imagine articles for mythic stories that have, at the very least, inspired a great deal of other works. That alone would justify some coverage on Wikipedia, even if those articles don't directly have a lot of real world context presented on the same page. I believe this is in spirit with the concept that the greater topic can justify this additional summary, because you'll likely have incoming links from other articles. However, at the same time, I'm hard pressed to think of an example where it would be hard to find some real world context that one could put directly on the same page. -- Ned Scott 05:44, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not a forum, however I think there should be one - A place for wikipedia editors to chat or talk etc. I'm not sure if this is relevant or not but... munchman | talk; 12:50, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
I notice that someone has recently added an explicit Wikipedia is not a forum policy subheading to the Community subsection. I don't think I agree with the placement of this for a number of reasons. First of all, it is generally agreed that article talk pages are not for the purpose of general discussions, but rather only for discussing the subject of the article, this is already amply covered by the WP:FORUM policy under the Original thought section. Secondly, I find the acceptable use of the article talk page to be far too narrow, as one is only now permitted to discuss issues related to the comprehensiveness or neutrality of an article. What about other content, such as style, accuracy, possible copyright violations, and so forth? I think the scope of the article talk page should be left somewhat vague, in order to facilitate any possible use in order to benefit the article or encyclopedia as a whole (see WP:IAR). Thirdly, it is overly facile to say that Wikipedia (as a whole) is not a forum, and that all interaction must directly benefit some article. There are some more forum-like aspects to the encyclopedia, such as the reference desks and, especially, userspace. siℓℓy rabbit (talk) 16:16, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
Just another note: this is a fairly major edit, in my opinion, and doesn't seem to have been discussed here. Are there any thoughts about this besides my own objections? siℓℓy rabbit (talk)
It was already covered sufficiently so those edits should probably be removed. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 00:07, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Moved the bit about plot summaries to Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, or textbook
I think it better fits there. After all, everyone agrees Wikipedia is not a guidebook to the plots of all the works of fiction and fictive things ever published, yes? Is it better that Wikipedia articles should not read like plot summaries, or that Wikipedia articles are not simply plot summaries? HidingT 11:20, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
I am not comfortable with any changes that Hiding has been making to this policy since he removed WP:NOT#PLOT section altogether at the begining of May.I don't beleive that he should be using policy page as his personal sandbox, or as a soapbox to canvas support for his agenda of policy changes that do not have widespread support. It seems to me that his edits are an attempt to down-grade, water-down and generally mess up this section. Where is there evidence that any of these changes is warranted or justified? I think Hiding has been through this process before, and I think if he wants to get rid of this section, then he should do so explicitly, not try and do it 'by the back door'. --Gavin Collins (talk) 12:47, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict) If its going to be moved there, I think it should be expanded to further emphasis Wikipedia is not a guide to the fictional series at all and should not include extensive character guides with one-episode and minor characters, excessive in-universe information on locations/settings, or any of the other crufty stuff people like to put in. Wouldn't mind also seeing guide more explicitly updated to clarify "not a game guide" but that's another issue. I also must partially echo Gavin, though I think it is possibly more of Hiding attempting to make a point and, like most of us, sick of certain people continuing to stir up this issue hoping to wear everyone down until they get their way.AnmaFinotera (talk) 12:52, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Which is what (re)started the whole plot debate when someone offered up again my suggestion that WP is not a study/fan guide. However, there are two ways PLOT can be taken:
We can say it should not be a study/fan guide, which does make it more appropriate alongside guidebooks and textbooks. However, that approach to PLOT was not well accepted, in that exactly what is a study or fan guide to a work is unclear. This would be a significantly shift in the approach to published works if treated like this.
We can say more towards the absolute fundamental aspect of PLOT, in that we do not simply regurgitate plot information for published works; topics covered only in this manner are indiscriminate information. This is truer to the current accepted version of how PLOT is normally used.
Of these two, I think we should be keeping PLOT in IINFO's section, since implying PLOT is not a study or fan guide by grouping it with the other "guide" NOTs, and this enforces a view that I don't think has been sufficiently tested in the waters to make policy yet, while the IINFO approach of PLOT is more ingrained. It is not that the guidelines don't approach this themselves, but I don't think there's enough consensus to support this particular means in policy. --MASEM 13:20, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Gavin, the image to the right demonstrates how consensus is formed on Wikipedia, and I would hope refutes any claims you make against my behaviour. To Collectonian, no I am not making a point. I would also suggest that if you want to expand the policy, you should do so per the flowchart I have presented. Also, if you are echoing any of the baseless accusations levelled at me by Gavin, then I suggest that instead both of you concentrate on discussing ways to document current best practise on Wikipedia rather than attempting to impugn my better nature or second guess my motives. I simply want to build a consensus in good faith regarding the way an encyclopedia treats plot summaries, considering all reasoned points of view. All the best, HidingT 13:22, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Apologies Hiding, if I have a bad faith opinion of you, it is because I don't agree with what you are doing, and I its true I should not be judging you as a person on that basis. Feel free to make as many edits to any policy or guideline as frequently as you wish, regardless of any opposition from me. However, my view is that WP:NOT#PLOT should not have been moved out of the "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information" section, since an article that comprises purely of plot summary does not contain any context or analyis that a guide (like a movie guide) would. If Hiding can provide some sort or reasonable explainaiton as to why he thought the moving WP:NOT#PLOT out of this section was logical or at least marginally sensible (other than "I think it better fits there"), then would he do so now. --Gavin Collins (talk) 19:01, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
without prejudice to where it should appear, I restored Hiding's version of the text--Collectonian was not supported by consensus in removing the entire section, and Ned Scott restored to an earlier more restrictive version that did not have consensus either. As for location, I don;'t think it make much difference. Personally, I think Hiding's placement is more logical--right next to the section of lyrics which has roughly similar problems. I'd leave the placement issue be for the time being and see if we do actually have consensus on the wording. This topic is being discussed in so many places that it is extremely confusing--so confusing that I stopped commenting for a while as I could not keep track of it all.. The way to simplify the discussions is to get a general statement here that--admittedly--could support various interpretations--and then discuss the interpretations as a guideline elsewhere.DGG (talk) 15:12, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
I for one disagree with what you have done DGG. I don't see that you have a monopoly over logic or consensus. Your changes make the situation more confusing, and I do not see what you have done helps. --Gavin Collins (talk) 15:19, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Actually, no, I didn't remove the section (and never would, as I firmly support it), I just undid Hiding's move which is what had absolutely no consensus. I also agree with Ned's restoration because it is fustrating to have it keep changing when this is a policy pages, and really is shouldn't be changed at all until consensus can be reached.AnmaFinotera (talk) 15:34, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Given this discussion, perhaps we should put some kind of "dispted" template at the top of the project page to indicate the lack of consensus. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 15:38, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Why on earth would we do that when its only one single item disputed? Putting a disputed on the whole page would just be asking for beyond all kinds of unnecessary trouble, just like the crap happening because WP:FICT and WP:EPISODE are "disputed" and so people are running around trying to claim its invalid and should be completely ignored. AnmaFinotera (talk) 15:45, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
This is really growing out of proportion. It all started as a content dispute on a few article talk pages and AfDs, then guidelines began to be marked as disputed, then it's arbcom, and now it's disputing policies accompanied with soapboxing. No, thanks. (This is not aimed at you, LGRdC, but a certain trend here is undeniable). – sgeurekat•c 16:08, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
IS there a tag for one section of a policy page being disputed--I could not find one. It would seem useful, and I will make one if necessary, adapting the one for the article along the line of of the one used for articles. DGG (talk) 19:44, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Yes, {{Disputedtag|section=yes}}. -- Ned Scott 21:27, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
On the more general matter Sgeureka raises, since this policy page was being cited in the article discussions on dozens --probably hundreds -- of article talk pages and AfDs, and the guideline discussions kept referring to it as a limitation of what the guideline could read, and it seemed from those discussions that the policy did no longer have consensus as originally worded, it was reasonable, inevitable, and indeed necessary to discuss it. Consensus on policy can change,and when it does, we discuss it on the policy talk page. Where better? DGG (talk) 19:44, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
We've had a ton of discussion about this. Ever since the beginning of Wikipedia it's been clear that we wanted to be more than just a plot summary (again, this doesn't mean we can't have them). If you guys want to freak out because of some recent discussions on this particular talk page, then get a grip. Wikipedia is more than this talk page, and that section doesn't suddenly lose support because a hand full of Wikipedians have their panties in a bind. -- Ned Scott 21:16, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
You're right Ned. There have been a ton of discussions about this [24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43]. There's even a discussion in the archives about moving PLOT under GUIDE instead of IINFO. From Archive 17 to Archive 6, there are only two archive pages where PLOT is not discussed, 14 and 12 (which is devoted to Jimbo's NEWS addition). And many people in the archives have favored removing the PLOT section. It's obvious that Wikipedia is more than a plot summary. However, the Plot summaries portion of this policy was added in July 2006. That's over 5 1/2 years "since the beginning of Wikipedia." WP:NOT#PLOT says editors cannot create articles with just a plot summary. WP:NOT#PLOT says articles like Cosette and Baldrick and Lenny Leonard and A Star Is Torn are content not suitable for an encyclopedia. PLOT is ignored in AFD debates[44][45][46][47][48][49]. PLOT simply does not have the consensus required to be in policy, so it needs to be removed. --Pixelface (talk) 08:46, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
It has consensus. Your examples of articles with "content not suitable for an encyclopedia" are good exampels of why we need PLOT. Cosette gives no indication of the importabce of the character, the impact she had, and so on. The same goes for Baldrick. Lenny Leonard is a collection of quotes and trivia. A Star is Torn has no information one would expect in an encyclopedia. Reception? Impact? Production history? Does that mean that any of these articles should be deleted? No, but they need very serious reworking, and PLOT helps in enforcing this if needed. As for your AfD's: History of For Better or For Worse was deleted after the DRV, so not a very good example. The lists of characters were kept because individual character articles would violate PLOT, and people accepted this as a compromise. Plot of Naruto I was an AfD of 2006. As some people say, consensus can change.. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Storylines of EastEnders (2000s) was a no consensus, needs to improve closure, not really going against WP:PLOT there... Looking at recent discussions involving PLOT, let's take a look at the April 30 discussions. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Mandalorians was a merge, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Marv Merchants, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/WcDonald's, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cameron McIntyre (Coronation Street) were deleted. Nothing which could fall under WP/PLOT was kept as far as I can see. For April 29, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mas Amedda was kept because real world information (with sources) was added; so PLOT was not ignored here. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Rule of Two was a no consensus. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Springfield's state again was kept because the article had a section with real world information. So looking at some recent AfD's, it seems to me that PLOT has a fairly good consensus, indicating that articles without real world information regularly get deleted or merged. AfD is not an exact science, so exceptions will happen, but to claim that there is no consensus for it based on some rather old AfD's, some of which don't even support yçur position, is not really consistent with what actually happens. Plot should stay in WP:NOT and if needed be strenghtened, to discourage articles which contain little real world information. Fram (talk) 09:43, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
It has consensus? Which revision? [50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76][77][78][79][80][81][82][83][84][85][86][87][88][89][90][91][92][93][94][95][96][97][98][99][100][101][102][103][104][105][106][107][108][109][110][111][112][113][114][115][116][117][118][119][120][121][122][123][124][125][126][127][128][129][130][131][132][133] Did you happen to notice that WP:NOT was just protected for edit-warring over PLOT? Is that your idea of consensus? You said "Does that mean that any of these articles should be deleted? No..." but WP:NOT is a list of things Wikipedia is not. It's linked to from the deletion policy. Things that appear in WP:NOT are things not suitable for an encyclopedia. PLOT is a reason for deletion. History of For Better or For Worse was deleted even though there was no consensus to overturn at the DRV. Read through it. A plot summary was split off[134] from the For Better or For Worse article and it was taken to AFD when a {{merge}} tag would suffice. And lists that contain plot summaries and nothing else still violate PLOT, and yet the list was kept. PLOT was given as a reason for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Storylines of EastEnders (2000s) and people said keep anyway. Is there anything in WP:NOT that could be merged into another article? Original inventions? Propaganda? Advertising? Sales catalogs? How-to guides? Unverifiable speculation? Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Mandalorians had nothing to do with PLOT. Those other 3 AFDs you link from April 30 were for notability concerns, something which has nothing to do with WP:NOT. And the AFDs you link to from April 29 were also about notability, again, not this policy's concern. I suppose you could say "articles without real world information regularly get deleted or merged", but that's related to WP:N, not PLOT. And I'm not just referring to AFDs when I say PLOT has no consensus. Look through the archives of this talk page going back to Archive 6. Look at the posts further up this talk page. PLOT actually doesn't discourage articles that contain little "real world information." New contributors don't read this policy before they create articles. PLOT says plot-only articles are NOT ALLOWED. So it's a reason in AFD nominations. It turns a cleanup issue into a forced cleanup issue. When someone nominates an article like Plot of Les Miserables for deletion, people say that PLOT should be changed. The closing admin ignored their arguments and deleted the article when there was no consensus to delete. The article was taken to DRV 2 days later. There wasn't actual consensus to endorse the deletion in that DRV either. But Xoloz endorsed the deletion yet restored the article anyway. Do you think the Cosette article needs to be deleted or expanded? If it needs to be deleted, PLOT belongs in NOT. If it needs to be expanded, PLOT belongs in WAF. How about the Andrey Nikolayevich Bolkonsky article? If PLOT has consensus, please tell me what the consensus for PLOT to say is. --Pixelface (talk) 12:35, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
You don't have to go back to 2006 and 2007 all the time, you know... Anyway, you are using flawed logic. Some people dispute the wording of WP:PLOT, so a discussion is going on to find the best wording (with some people arguing for complete removal): sibce it takes some time to find the exact wording, it means that there is currently no consensus for the actual phrasing, although from discussions here it is patently clear that there is quite a wide agreement that PLOT should be included, and what its meaning should be. "Is there anything in WP:NOT that could be merged into another article?". Well, yes: dictionary definitions, and news reports. But if it makes you happy, we can change "plot summaries" to "mere plot summaries", to bring it in line with "mere collections of external links": Wikipedia does have external links, despite this policy. I believe the policy is quite clear to most people (thos not trying their hardest to get it removed altogether at least): while articles on notable fictional subjects can have plot summaries as an integral part of the articles, we shouldn't have articles that consist mainly or solely of plot summaries. This is reflected in the AfD's I listed: articles which consisted of plot summaries (WP:PLOT) and had no obvious chance of being rescued by including real world information (WP:NOTE) were deleted, the others were kept or merged. PLOT does not exist in a vacuum, it has to be interpreted and taken into account in combination with other policies and guidelines. But it looks to me as if there is a pretty clear consensus for this, even though some borderline cases will always exist (just like with every policy). Compare the list of Mandalorians AfD listed above with the Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mandalorian, and you'll see what I mean. As for Les Misérables: it was deleted, and the plot summary in the main article is all we need. Having discussion about apolicy, and having a number of people disagree with a policy in one discussion or another, does not mean that the policy no longer is consensus based or should be removed completely. I have seen people disagree with WP:V, WP:NOTE, WP:BIO, WP:OR, WP:COI, WP:EL, WP:NPOV, WP:FRINGE, ... when those policies and guidelines went against their preferences, but they are still all valid. That PLOT is being discussed and finetuned is a good thing, but I have seenb no indication that it doesn't represent the consensus. Fram (talk) 13:33, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
You're right, I don't have to go back to 2006 and 2007 to show that PLOT does not reflect consensus. I can quote people from this very talk page that have commented within the last few weeks. There is not "quite a wide agreement" that PLOT belongs in NOT. PLOT no longer has consensus. Father Goose said "This is more a style issue than a content issue, so the appropriate place for it is arguably in a guideline, not in a content-exclusion policy."[135], DGG said "More generally, NOT PLOT as it is written does not belong in NOT--policy should be general principles, not the details found there."[136], 23skidoo said "I agree with those who feel this is better suited for MoS rather than trying to pigeonhole it into a policy that, technically, is intended to supress content."[137], Eubulide said "I object to treating plot details in a different way than other types of sourced information in WP." and "This is done only for plot summaries and nobody gave an explanation for this exception. If an article is missing real-world context, the reasonable approach is to add such context, not delete the rest."[138], SmokeyJoe said "I think WP:NOT#PLOT, as written, belongs in WP:WAF."[139], Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles said "We should remove the plot section of what Wikipedia is not."[140], Hobit said "I'll chime in by saying I don't think issues of plot summary should be here."[141] and Hobit later said "I think at the least WP:PLOT lacks consensus and shouldn't be here" [142]. Plvekampsaid "The article on Winston Smith fails WP:NOT. Therefore, it should be deleted. Anyone willing to prod it? If not, then it seems to me that you agree that that WP:PLOT is a MoS issue, not a WP:NOT issue. Please address this point, anyone." Wassupwestcoastsaid "I believe the current version contradicts the 'no original research' and 'verifiability' policy. In other words, if an editor can write a 'plot summary' from good secondary sources outside of the work itself, then why not? I'm certain one can write a very good article on the plot of Hamlet from scholarly sources." DHowellsaid "WP:NOT#PLOT should be removed" and "The problem with WP:NOT#PLOT is not necessarily how it is worded, but how it is used. Because the deletion policy gives WP:NOT as a reason for deletion, it is used in AfD and DRV debates as a reason to delete, rather than improve, many articles about notable published works." Ursasapiensaid "This is a style issue that can be improved by editing, not a content issue per se." and "Secondly, we should not create or amend policy in an attempt to force editors to write excellent articles on the first try." and later said "I also believe that a valid argument can be made that this is a manual of style issue." Quasirandomsaid "Responding to "But the whole reason that WP:NOT exists is to guard against types of content which are not encyclopedic and do not demonstrate notability" above in a thread that doesn't allow for easy assertion: If that's the case, then it would be better to not be indirect, but instead directly say, "Articles about works of fiction that only summarize the plot do not demonstrate the notability of the work." At which point, however, it doesn't belong here but in WP:N." Peregrine Fishersaid "While all the ramifications of PLOT were ignored, it had consensus/momentum. As soon as it was applied, we had massive edit warring and arbitrations. There's one type of consensus when something is applied and not challenged, and there is another type of consensus when something is challenged as soon as it is applied. PLOT's consensus is the second kind."
I realize that Wikipedia has external links. Could you point me to an article that currently exists that is all external links? An AFD for an article composed of all external links that resulted in no consensus to delete? So this policy is quite clear to you and those that think PLOT belongs in NOT but it's unclear to those who want to remove PLOT, is that right? Why exactly should we not have articles that consist mainly of plot summaries? Articles like Baldrick and Andrey Nikolayevich Bolkonsky? Those articles qualify as content not suitable for Wikipedia? In those AFDs you listed, PLOT was not given as a reason for deletion. You're right, PLOT does not exist in a vacuum. It came from WAF, and that's where it belongs. If PLOT is some attempt to turn WP:N into policy, it *really* doesn't belong in NOT. And I certainly didn't see a consensus to merge at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mandalorian. Plot of Les Misérables was deleted when there was no consensus to delete it. In that AFD, people were saying PLOT should be ignored clear back in July 2007. And WP:NOT was protected today because PLOT does not have consensus, or do you think edit wars equal consensus? --Pixelface (talk) 16:23, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
"WP:NOT was protected today because PLOT does not have consensus," I'm going to start a list of every time you say something so mind-blowingly stupid and false. Do you think the protecting admin gives a crap about the dispute? No, they protected it because there was an edit war over the wording (which didn't even change the spirit of the text). Damn it, Pixelface, the adults would like to have a nice conversation now, could you please knock off all the nonsensical ranting. -- Ned Scott 11:39, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Ned, would you please have another reading of the civility policy (a policy which has far more consensus than WP:NOT#PLOT) and consider rephrasing your response to Pixelface to be more in line with that policy? The adults would indeed like to have a nice conversation now. Thank you. (Feel free to delete this response after you have rephrased your comment above.) DHowell (talk) 23:43, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
While there doesn't appear to be consensus to remove PLOT from wikipedia, there also doesn't seem to be consensus to keep it in NOT#IINFO. Moving it to WAF seems like the best thing to do to me, although I'm sure we could include it in a number of places. It could be moved to the guideline section, but that doesn't really change anything. I don't think it should be above FICT or NOTE, since it contradicts both and is supposed to outrank them. The best fiction consensus we've had so far is the one over at FICT concerning lists, which is currently prohibited by PLOT. And things like an article on the plot of Hamlet would obviously meet NOTE, but would be prohibited by PLOT. You could say the Hamlet plot should have analysis, but that's a writing style/improvement suggestion, not a reason to delete a hypothetical well sourced article on it. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 00:54, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
The core concept of PLOT needs to stay in NOT (and policy): We do not cover topics of published works with only plot summaries and the information therein of the work's content. The current wording (which may be the "wrong" wording when the page was protected) says Wikipedia treats fiction in an encyclopedic manner; discussing the reception, impact and significance of notable works. A concise plot summary is appropriate as part of the larger coverage of a fictional work. I see nothing against how FICT or NOTE works against this, because there's nothing about the article level, only the topic level. But, I can see us trying to make the language as clear as possible for this point. --MASEM 01:44, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
It says work, and it says article. "Current consensus is that Wikipedia articles are not simply" vs. "larger coverage of a fictional work." If we agree that FICT has as good a consensus as we're going to get right now (and it seems to), then that should be reconciled here. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:13, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I would certainly challenge that FICT has any consensus other than a lull from people being tired at the end of the academic year. the only reason NOT PLOT has any consensus at all is that it can be interpreted in so many different ways to fit whatever argument one likes. DGG (talk) 02:38, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't know if FICT has true consensus or not, but since the deletionists (less Gavin) and inclusionists have at the minimum agreed to something that's prohibited by PLOT, PLOT should be changed to reflect this. Wherever the true consenus lies, it isn't at a hard and fast rule that WP articles are not plot summaries. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contributions) 03:11, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
WP:PLOT is left open to reflect consensus, which is, in fact, that we don't have a one-size-fits all definition. What we do have is the spirit, the attitude, that our coverage of fiction should be with real-world context. -- Ned Scott 04:59, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
But how are we supposed to make a sentence without pushing the letters around? You can't arrange them on the counter and carry them to the fridge and stick them up, because people argue over who gets to carry them. The consensus seems to be that WP:PLOT stay in the indiscriminate information section. I'm not really interested in moving it again, that looks like it will be counter-productive. I am interested in what it should say though. I think the consensus is that Wikipedia articles are not simply plot summaries. That would indicate we need more than a plot summary, so I guess the nest step is what we need. Looking at our featured articles, what we desire in something we call our best work is discussion of the reception and the like. So I guess the consensus is with the current wording. Would that be correct? Is that best practise? Does that get us to the goal of writing an encyclopedia? Of course, I'm assuming that our featured articles represent what we think of as encyclopedic, whilst all other articles are merely working drafts we are attempting to get to that standard. Would that be correct too? If it is, I think the consensus is with WP:PLOT. Are there examples of featured articles which don't have anything but plot summary? The next problem to address is that of deletion. Maybe we need to add something to Arguments to avoid in deletion debates, along the line of article consists solely of plot. That's not a reason to delete. A reason to delete would be article unlikely to ever consist of anything except plot summary. HidingT 09:58, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Some articles are simply plot summaries (Andrey Nikolayevich Bolkonsky[180]); some articles are not (Pauline Fowler[181]). Are you saying that plot summaries merely being true, or even verifiable, does not automatically make them suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia? Featured articles may have reception information, but do stubs have to be featured articles on the first revision? Wikipedia is a work in progress. I don't think all articles have to be able to be FAs one day. WP:NOT is the lowest bar for inclusion. It's not the featured article criteria. If you've been describing best practice and saying everything that's not best practice is NOT suitable for Wikipedia, I think that's a problem. The five pillars says "Although it should be aimed for, perfection is not required." Saying that everything below best practice is not suitable for Wikipedia goes against the editing policy. Do I think the Andrey Nikolayevich Bolkonsky article represents best practice? No. Do I think it should be deleted? No. WP:NOT#PLOT *is* used as a reason to delete. Is it common practice to delete articles that are solely plot summaries? Perhaps, but it's also common practice that there is no consensus to delete articles that are solely plot summaries. You can't add something to the essay WP:ATA and expect people to follow it. If you think an article consisting solely of plot is not a reason to delete, I don't think WP:NOT#PLOT belongs in this policy. Or you could try inserting language to that effect into WP:NOT#PLOT, like Kyorosuke did[182], an edit that was not discussed beforehand on WT:NOT. I don't think proposals like Wikipedia:Postponed deletion are a good solution. You said "A reason to delete would be article unlikely to ever consist of anything except plot summary." Do you still think a plot summary plus an infobox violates PLOT? --Pixelface (talk) 06:22, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Good points. I tend to think an article which can only ever be plot summary and an infobox is probably not suited for Wikipedia, and will tend to vote! delete because I don't like them, but I'm astute enough to know I only do so because I don't like them, (see WP:PTN) and if the consensus is that such an article should be kept, then hey, Wikipedia is a big place, I don't have to look at it. So let me, if I can, cut to the chase; we're looking for a wording that would incorporate the spirit of something like: consisting solely of a plot summary is grounds for expansion and cleanup, not deletion? HidingT 15:12, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Not quite that language; this is different from an article that passes NOT but may be poorly written, lacking sourcing (but is otherwise verifiable) and other details, where cleanup without considering deletion is the correct answer. Cleanup should first be attempted (and that implies that notification that the article needs cleanup has to occur) and only deleted after a reasonable amount of time when shown that PLOT cannot be met by the topic. --MASEM 16:38, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
I'd disagree with this interpretation as that opens a big can of worms for less notable characters in less notable works of fiction (where is the cut-off point?). But if someone would AfD this character's article, I have no doubt that it would either be expanded to meet WP:NOT#PLOT, or it would at worst be merged, not deleted. Concerns that not meeting a strict interpretation of NOT#PLOT results in deletion may be justified at times, but there is no automatic correlation as soon as a certain potential is there. – sgeurekat•c
WP:NOT#PLOT is not an exact definition for an article to meet. On a per-issue discussion, however, editors should discuss if that additional plot summary is required for some other real-world context, on that article or on another. If the additional summary isn't needed, then it should be deleted, trimmed, etc. -- Ned Scott 05:07, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
So History of For Better or For Worse is not part of Wikipedia's coverage of For Better or For Worse? Plot of Les Miserables is not part of Wikipedia's coverage of Les Miserables? PLOT allows for articles that are solely plot summaries? WP:IINFO says "Wikipedia articles are not simply", not "Wikipedia topics are not simply." Even among people who think PLOT should stay in NOT, they don't seem to agree whether the restriction against sole plot summaries applies to individual articles or topics in general. --Pixelface (talk) 03:20, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
If that additional summary was needed for real-world context, either in those articles directly or another, then they should have been kept. If it was just coverage of plot that wasn't required for real-world context, then I see nothing wrong with their deletion. -- Ned Scott 05:07, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
Just because an article, this instant, fails any part of NOT (including PLOT) does not mean the article should be deleted; nor does it mean there's anything wrong with this policy. However, the problem is, as I've pointed out before, behavioral: there are editors that see something that violates NOT, and immediately walks it to AFD without giving it a chance. I've put an idea out to correct part of this (allowing concerned editors to request a postpone AFD for four weeks to allow them to show that it does not fail NOT). I've put it out there, it seems to have interest, so this takes care of the fact that someone may nominate an article without any input to the editors of the article, allowing the editors to correct it. (and no, its not expected in four weeks to have perfection either - just that any issues with NOT or other deletion reason can be shown to be no longer valid) Still, we need to help editors get away from the mindset that AFD should be the first step in content dispute. That probably means some stronger wording changes at Deletion Policy and making sure some editors don't abuse that part of the system. This applies to all parts of NOT, not just PLOT.
In NOT, we need to make the point stronger that for all suggestions in this list (not just PLOT), that we are evaluating the article and/or/both its topic in its ultimate state, not its immediate state. This is why AFD should not be a first step of content resolution, because some articles can be cleaned up or improved to remove any issues with NOT. If something fails NOT right now, such as examples given above, are those reasons for deletion? No, of course not, however, they cannot remain indefinitely in that way. Authors or wikiprojects should be notified that the article fails, and time granted to bring the article to some agreement with NOT (perfection is not required, just demonstration it can met the concerns of NOT). Only, if after time and good faith effort that the article cannot be shown to pass NOT should AFD be brought into play, and even then, that may attract some more eyes to help fix it. However, I completely agree 5 days is not enough time to fix certain problems. Again, right now there's a behavioral problem that the first step is commonly not done; there are editors that jump the gun with shades of WP:IDONTLIKEIT, and we have the situation where we have now where NOT's listings are considered combative and argumentive. My proposed deletion is a bandaid, but not the cure: we need to make sure that it is clear that failing NOT right now should not be a reason to delete; only in the case where the article cannot be shown to pass NOT should it be then considered for deletion; we then need to make sure editors that send articles to AFD as the first step are aware this is not the best approach to dealing with such contact.
Notice that I didn't say anything specific to PLOT because these problems are consistent across all of NOT; PLOT just tends to be the most visible. But the intent of what I'm trying to say applies to PLOT clearly: if a topic dealing with a published work or element within cannot ultimately be shown to pass PLOT, then it should be deleted. A topic on the same that is only a plot summary and an infobox of easily-discovered data, right now, should not be deleted. That doesn't mean it can sit in that state forever: if I feel it needs to be improved, tagging and notifying authors that there's a problem, and then giving them time to correct, is the right first step; if they no effort to improve in reasonable time, and as a good editor I've looked to see if that's truly the case (that there's no other information that can be added to expand the article beyond a plot summary), only then should I consider an AFD. The only "gotcha" here compared to other aspects of NOT is that PLOT should be applied at the topic level; we allow lists of characters and lists of episodes that are plot-only (though in some cases, they can be more than that), but these articles are considered as part of the larger coverage of the published work's topic. If I cannot show, when prompted, that I can talk about the published work in more than just plot summary (including these supporting articles), then the entire topic should be deleted including its supporting articles. However, when we start talking individual characters or episodes or other individual aspects of the work's internal universe, giving these concepts their own article no longer makes them supporting, but instead become treated as their own topic; if ultimately you cannot show these individual aspects can be talked about in more that just plot summaries, they should be deleted. This approach right now is not well reflected in the current wording, though it is there by spirit, and we should consider rewriting PLOT to reflect it better.
There is nothing wrong with the concept behind PLOT, and it should stay in NOT; the consensus here seems to show that if the best ultimate possible state a topic can be brought to is simply a plot summary, the topic should be deleted. But we have two problems to make sure this is clear:
Make sure that it is clear via NOT and DEL/DP that the instantaneous state of the article failing NOT is not a reason to delete, it is what ultimately the article can be that should be considered. For this purpose, we need to allow time to move from that instantaneous state to what the ultimate state could look like, but we do not expect perfection, merely the good faith efforts that NOT is passed.
Make sure that PLOT is given at the highest level description: topics should not be only plot summaries, moving exactly what material (NOTE/FICT) and how it can be added (WAF) to help a topic satisfy PLOT and NOT.
(And I will cavaet that when I say "deleted" in any of the above, this includes merging appropriate content to larger articles and/or transwiking material to off-site wikis, leaving appropriate redirections behind.) --MASEM 14:08, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
I think WP:NOT#PLOT is a good reason to delete an article, and I don't think that this consensus, as evidenced in many AfD debates, can be overruled. --Gavin Collins (talk) 08:50, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
What consensus? You think there is consensus that WP:NOT#PLOT is always a good reason to delete an article, despite the evidence against this being consensus on this talk page alone, even among people who believe that WP:NOT#PLOT is an essential part of policy? And despite the evidence on this talk page alone which points to a lack of consensus in many AfD debates? You believe that such a nebulous "consensus", evidence for which you assert but fail to demonstrate, cannot be overruled, despite policy which says the opposite? I respect that you have strong opinions about this matter, but I believe that to claim that your opinions have consensus and cannot be overruled is a just a hop, skip, and a jump over to the M:MPOV. DHowell (talk) 00:37, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
