Wikipedia talk:Notability (fiction)

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Break?

Okay, it looks like discussion has died down somewhat, but we have a large variety of opinions being addressed here. We're all out for the benefit of the encyclopedia, and we all want to figure out the best solution. It will clearly require a bit of everyone's opinions, even if we decide to implement Wikiproject-specific notability guidelines as I (and others) suggested as a possibility should consensus for this version not exist. I suggest we all take a break from this discussion, avoid controversial fiction actions for a while, and revisit this discussion in a week or two. — Deckiller 21:29, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Wouldn't bother me, but for the heck of it here's my take on the discussion so far: some level of having a separate article for style/size/whatever reasons is generally acceptable. But, at the same time such articles still should follow WP:NOT#PLOT. Sourced or not, tons of articles that are mostly summary are something we generally avoid (note, I said generally). Even if we split an article because of the layout of the article series, notability should still be on the minds of editors. So to what extent should we allow split articles for style before it's become it's own topic?

My opinion, a List of Characters or Characters of is generally acceptable right off the bat for style issues, but when you start breaking it down character by character then notability should kick in. The same with a List of episodes, and maybe a few others. Regardless of if you agree with my specific opinion or not, I think the discussion should now be about what is acceptable for style and what requires notability, while still keeping the amount of plot summary in control. Thoughts? -- Ned Scott 02:16, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm immensely disinclined to "take a break" for a week just when the discussion is dying down - surely this is the best time to complete a productive discussion and come to an agreeable consensus. The time to ask for a break (of a few days, perhaps) would have been last week, when the word count was going like a rocket. Now that everyone has calmed down, the people with only one thing to say have left, and a useful number of respectable editors have this page on their watchlist, we can hammer out a guideline that truly reflects consensus. Happy-melon 16:46, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Has the other side even shown that this needs to be changed? Fully objective evidence (i.e. something more than a personal interpretation of common practice) that shows that fiction is somehow exempt from WP:N would be a good start. Otherwise, it's just the same old "notability sucks" discussion that takes place there every month, but at a lower level. And we all know how those end up. TTN 17:17, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

While I don't at all blame you for not reading the whole of this bloated talk page, I'd have thought that you might have reached my comments, which are only a few paragraphs above. I do not believe that fiction should be exempt from WP:N, far from it. The fundamental foundation of WP:FICT is correct. My problem is the overly prescriptive (and in many cases proscriptive) wording of the current version, rather than the descriptive wording that is approved form and that you'll find is used for every other Wikipedia policy. The authoritative wording - "Articles about fictional concepts are notable if they contain substantial real-world content... These topics are also organized into complete articles... notability must be established... the article is presented correctly... Topics within a fictional work are covered in the article on that work of fiction..." - gives this guideline unnecessary, and undeserved, authority. This is not written as a guideline. It is written as if it were policy. In fact, it's even stronger than policy - this is written as a law. Even something as deeply ingrained as WP:BLP, where Wikipedia can get sued if it's not followed, does not have such strong wording - the conditional tense is still used, rather than imperatives. Discounting the "notability sucks" argument you mentioned, I think the majority of this discussion is about the overpowering authority that the current wording imparts.

The current guideline is (deliberately or subconsciously) written as a list of criteria that an article must meet to continue existing. It was written to make deleting some of the fancruft that litters Wikipedia easier. There are merits to that. Unfortunately it is also not the civilised way of doing things. The wording engenders an aggressive approach towards articles which assumes a 'guilty until proven innocent' attitude. This is inappropriate for Wikipedia. What I want is a rewrite to a less aggressive, more neutral, (above all) more descriptive wording, that preserves (let there be no mistake) the fundamental principle of using reliable sources as evidence for notability. If this is completed, an awful lot of the discontent at this policy will go away. There will still be the "notability sucks" attitude, which I believe is misguided. However I hope and think that most of the moderate editors want to see a guideline that is rooted in policy, but is also fair and neutral. That's why I think a rewrite is necessary. Happy-melon 20:16, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict - partially answered by Happy-melon. I agree with Happy-melon stance, recommendation, and viewpoint -- G.A.S 20:38, 2 September 2007 (UTC))

I agree with the intended break.

Just to recap (As I am having difficulty following the complete discussion)

1. What is seen as wrong with the current version? Why are changes required? What is the main issue(s)?
2. What are the proposed changes to this guideline?
3. What will the consequences of such a rewrite be to the articles themselves?

Regards, G.A.S 20:38, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

1. The main issue with the policy as it currently stands is an overly authoritative and prescriptive wording which implies an unhealthy pass/fail system and an inappropriate "guilty until proven innocent" approach.
2. A rewrite is proposed to bring the wording and presentation more in line with other notability guidelines, such as WP:BK and WP:NOTFILM, without changing the spirit of the guideline (that notability should be based on coverage in independent sources).
3. The status of an individual article in relation to the guideline should not be affected, however the mentality that "articles that do not meet the guideline should be deleted" will hopefully be replaced by a mentality that "information on a particular fictional universe should be condensed, restructured and improved such that the universe receives an encyclopaedic coverage". The issue is not really with the guideline itself but the way it is interpreted, but the only way to change the interpretation is to change the guideline. Happy-melon 21:30, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

It wasn't really created to make deleting fancruft easier; the guideline stresses that deletion be performed only as a last resort. The guideline also stresses a reasonable time be given to articles/subarticles that do not adhere to this guideline; it doesn't say they should be sent to AfD left and right. I think what you are saying is that the "defining notability for fiction" section needs to be copy-edited to read with less of an authoritative approach. As the main writer of this guideline, I can assure you that I am one of those who addresses matters in a "civilized" manner; thus, the issue lies in a few word choices (i.e. the bolded words you mentioned above), and those word choices were an outside recommendation. I don't mind if it's replaced with the conditional tense. — Deckiller 20:52, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

I can accept that it was not intended specifically for making deleting fancruft easier, as you rightly point out several checks and balances. However it would appear from the number of times I've had to tell people in AfDs to read the sections you mention and realise that WP:FICT is not an axe to swing at articles, that those checks and balances are consumed by the overall tone of the wording. I think that I'd like to see something more severe than a little copy-editing, as the issues are pervasive throughout the article (for instance, an overly strong focus on dealing with articles that don't meet the criteria) but my desire is not a rewrite that changes much of the spirit of the guideline. I'm working on something in one of my sandboxes at the moment, which I'll put up for consideration when I've finished tweaking it. Happy-melon 21:31, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

It looks good so far; however, the current version of WP:FICT is not really concerned with the dependence or independence of sources (it uses the term "real-world content" instead, so that more of the possible exceptions are covered). — Deckiller 22:46, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Eh, I seen people, a lot, cite things in AfD that didn't back up their argument. -- Ned Scott 03:14, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Section break

Issue: Content of guideline

Another problem I have with the guideline is that it describes what should be and what should not be in the articles, rather than being a specific implementation of WP:Notability.

SnowFire suggests that the rewrite should include:

Articles on fictional concepts are notable if real-world recognition from reliable primary secondary sources exists. However, such concepts are often best presented in a single cohesive article rather than many short stubs, even if they meet notability standards. Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction) covers the proper presentation of articles on fictional topics.

I agree to the degree that articles should be of high quality and (to a degree) notable.

Wikipedia:Article size prescribes that article length should be considered when editing (see a rule of thumb). As such it means that rather than having short stubs, a more coherent list may be more applicable.

Wikipedia:Summary style also covers this to a degree: A non-notable article may be notable as a part of another topic though, and a stub there would not be such a problem. If such an article grows to an acceptable degree and is sourced (primary or secondary sources), it should/can be split off per Summary style. (Considering WP:NOT#PLOT of course)

These changes should rather be added to WP:WAF and be removed from this guideline; it seems to be more of a styling issue. G.A.S 07:17, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Issue: Summary style vs. notability

It seems to me that Wikipedia:Summary style and WP:Notability are to a degree contrasting guidelines.

It seems that they can be consolidated though:

• If an article are very notable creating a stub article is acceptable, as it will grow to a high quality article through the input of many editors.
• If an article is not notable, creating a stub is not acceptable, as it will not likely grow to a high quality article (quickly), but it may be split off later (see also my comment in #Issue: Content of guideline).

This should be included in this guideline. G.A.S 07:17, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

I see where you're going with this. But we should definitely look at to what extent do we allow sub-articles before notability really kicks in. I suggested above that notability should always be on the mind of the editor, and should really kick in when they go beyond stuff like a list of characters or of episodes. (and I'm sure there's more than just those two) It might seem somewhat arbitrary, but I think it's something we should definitely mention. -- Ned Scott 03:24, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

True, for instance individual episodes regularly does not have more than plot content. If such excessive plot content are reduced to a concise summary, the article is too short to be seperate, and belongs in a list.

The same may be applicable to locations in fiction.

Characters on the other side, often have a lot of in-universe content, but can be presented in a out of universe view (unlike episodes).

If such info is appropriately sourced, to secondary and primary sources, such an article may be quite decent, although in essence still part of the main article. (See GA Sailor Mercury for example)

This would obviously be applicable to the main characters: once off characters hardly ever deserves mentioning (outside of maybe an episode list), and even less deserves a seperate article. Minor characters can usually only be provided in a list: there is too little information to justify a seperate article.

This guideline should acknowledge and reflect this fact.

Regards, G.A.S 06:45, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Sailor Mercury is far better than most fictional articles, but it's really lacking in real world information, so I'm not sure if it's really a good example. If you are sourcing plot info, there's no problem. We don't really care about getting tons of sources for something you can learn by seeing the show. When we talk about getting sources, we're talking about getting real world information. Sailor Mercury really isn't GA level in a strict sense. Still, Sailor Mercury passes WP:FICT in that we know these real world sources exist (I'm not a fan of the show, but I know that there are a number of interviews and articles with the creators, voice actors, etc, especially for such a successful franchise). Sailor Mercury has far more potential than what its currently at, and this guideline wants it to reach that. -- Ned Scott 09:05, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

My point exactly: currently it is in the strictest sense a sub article.

GA criteria requires broad coverage, FA extensive coverage. If the necessary out of universe content is added, I think the article could easily make FA class.

At that point it will be a seperate article, not just a sub article.

Regards, G.A.S 10:35, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

An attempt at a new wording

As per my comments above, I have been working on a new proposed wording for the guideline, which is now complete (in green, below). The text is enclosed on its own subpage to keep its page history separate - I would encourage editors to feel free to work on it until we can find a consensus over its content.

An analysis of changes

It is irrefutable that the proposed new version is substantially different in wording to the previous version. Let me summarise and attempt to justify the changes, in a loosely descending order of importance:

1. Descriptive wording - This is the primary change, as argued for above
2. Requirement for real-world content removed - When writing this new wording, I was constantly asking myself if it would be failed by existing fictional Good Articles with which I am familiar. I came to the conclusion:

• The requirement was not an extension of WP:N
• The requirement was almost impossible for any article to meet while remaining focused on the fictional topic
• The requirement unfairly discriminated against topics which have notability, but the sources for which are best included in a "Further Reading" or "External Links" section rather than as referable or includable material
• The requirement distracted editors from the main criterion, which is notability as expressed by prevalence of real-world sources.
• The requirement was not necessary to discriminate between articles which were notable and those which weren't, as the rest of the guideline was sufficient.

1. Greater explanation of the nature of reliable sources - I feel that this rewording improves the legibility and comprehension of the underlying policy. I attempt to put increased focus on the requirement that the coverage must be "non-trivial", which was not very thoroughly covered in the old wording.
2. Clear restriction of the guideline scope - the rewording has excluded from the scope articles about works of fiction, which (as inherently factual articles rather than fictional ones) I feel are better covered by WP:BK, WP:MOVIE, etc, than by this guideline.
3. "Dealing with fiction" converted to prose - I feel this permits a more neutral coverage of the issues. More emphasis is given to reviewing articles within the scope of the coverage of the fictional universe as a whole. I'm tempted to add a phrase about WikiProjects here, but I think that might be superfluous. This concept has grown from (and largely replaced) comments about organisation of articles, subarticles and stubs.
4. Example section removed - I am neutral about the inclusion of the examples. I don't feel that they are a necessary addition to the guideline, but I am willing to be persuaded.

This page is an extension of the Wikipedia guideline on notability which deals specifically with fictional topics, as defined below. The guidelines set out below should be used to decide whether a topic warrants an article on Wikipedia. Topics that meet these notability guidelines usually make acceptable articles. Failure to satisfy these criteria is not a justification for speedy deletion.

What is a fictional article

A fictional article is focused on a topic that does not exist in the real world, but instead exists in a fictional universe. An article about a novel is not a fictional article, but an article about one of the characters in that novel is. The book exists in the real world, while the character exists only in that book. Fictional characters, fictional locations, fictional events (including alternate histories) and fictional concepts are examples of fictional articles.

The notability criteria for fiction

Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. Its mandate does not include comprehensive coverage of every fictional universe ever created. It should include only as much information on a subject as to ensure an encyclopaedic coverage. Wikipedia covers only notable topics.

Wikipedia:Notability is the guideline that defines notability for Wikipedia. It says:

A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject.

A fictional topic is therefore presumed to be notable if it has been analysed by independent sources in a non-trivial fashion. For articles about fictional topics, "independent sources" fall into two categories:

• Sources which consider the popular appeal, critical reception or cultural impact of the topic in the real world. Sources of this type include scholarly analyses, documentaries, and PLACEHOLDER. Note that while critical reviews and interviews are generally sources of this type, their focus is usually on the work as a whole, and any consideration of individual topics is likely to be trivial.

• Sources which critically analyse the importance of the fictional topic within the fictional universe. These sources generally imply notability only if they are reliable, not of questionable integrity and independent of the subject. Their focus should be on analysis rather than description.

Both types of sources should strive to be independent of the subject. Sources which are published by the author of the original work, or under the author's direction, are generally not good indicators of notability. However, sources which required the author's permission for copyright reasons are not usually excluded for that reason.

The difference between notable and important

Notability is very different to a topic's importance. A lead character may be crucial to the plot of a work of fiction, or a fictional universe may depend on a particular technology. These topics may be important, within the confines of that fictional universe. However, their importance within the work of fiction does not assert their importance to the real world, which is a crude definition of notability. "Importance in the real world", or notability, is best demonstrated by inclusion of reliable, independent secondary sources of the type indicated above.

Dealing with fictional topics

Some fictional topics can assert their notability on their own merits, and can easily justify their own article. A common feature of good articles about fictional topics is a prevalence of real-world content; a focus on the impact of the fictional topic outside the fictional universe. Such articles should conform to the relevant sections of the manual of style, and should be of an appropriate length. If it is not possible to produce an appropriately-sized article while remaining within the guidelines of What Wikipedia is Not, No Original Research and Proper Perspective, it may be necessary to consider merging the article despite its own notability.

More commonly, a fictional topic is not able to assert its own notability, and it becomes necessary to reconsider how best to approach the encyclopaedic treatment of the topic. Fictional topics rarely exist on Wikipedia except as part of a larger body of work on a fictional universe, connected to a factual article describing the work of fiction itself. When a topic is unable to assert its own notability, it should be considered in the context of this larger body. In many cases, while a very narrow topic (eg a certain character or location from fictional universe X) cannot assert its own notability, it may be able to support the notability of a larger topic (eg, "Characters from X" or "Locations in X"). In instances such as these, it may be prudent to consider merging similar topics into a larger article. Larger articles are not, of course, exempt from the need to assert their own notability, however it is often easier to do so with a broader topic than it is with narrower ones.

If a fictional topic is extremely important within the fictional universe, but is not notable outside it, it may warrant inclusion in the article describing the work of fiction itself. For instance, the details of a key character in a book may warrant inclusion in the article about the book itself. However, this is generally necessary only if a knowledge of the topic is essential to an encyclopaedic coverage of the work of fiction.

If it appears that there is no likelihood of the topic asserting its own notability, or of being merged into a larger topic, it may be necessary to consider removing the content from Wikipedia. If possible, the content should be Transwikied to another Wiki with a compatible license. Many prestigious Wikis exist for fictional content, often focusing on a particular fictional universe; examples include Wikia and Wookiepedia.These Wikis generally have lower criteria for notability, so articles on fictional topics are commonly permitted on these Wikis where they would not be permitted on Wikipedia.

Only if the options above have been considered and found to be impossible or impractical should the article be considered for deletion.

Other information

Fanfiction and unreleased fiction

Fanfiction is seldom notable, unless the work has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. Examples of fanfiction include self-published works, topics found fan-websites such as fanfiction.net, or published by vanity press. Information about a player's character in roleplaying or MMORPGs and unofficial computer game modifications are very rarely notable unless the level of real-world following is extensive.

Fiction not yet written is generally considered speculation, which is grounds for deletion because Wikipedia is not a crystal ball.

Some common relocation destinations

• Wikibooks, Wikipedia's sibling project, contains instructional and educational texts. These include annotated works of fiction (on the Wikibooks:annotated texts bookshelf) for classroom or private study use.
• Wikisource holds original public domain and GFDL source texts. See Wikisource:Wikisource and Wikibooks.

An ideal solution for comprehensive coverage of a fictional topic is to make use of all of the Wikimedia projects combined. An encyclopaedic article about the work of fiction on Wikipedia could give an outline of the fictional universe along with real-world content about its popular following and critical reception. Wikibooks is the ideal destination for a chapter-by-chapter annotation and a certain degree of literary analysis, while the full source text may be appropriate for Wikisource if the work is in the public domain. These disparate articles could be connected with interwiki links to join them all together into a cohesive whole. Note, however, that Wikibooks opposes in-universe books,so it is not an appropriate place to transwiki large quantities of in-universe material.

Fictional material unsuited or too detailed for any Wikimedia project can often be transwikied to an appropriate Wikia, such as Final Fantasy Wikiaor Wookieepedia. Other sites, such as Gaming Wiki, may also accept material. Transwikied material should be edited to meet the guidelines of specific wikias; do not just copy and paste. The Wikia Annex is a staging area for transwikied material and a place for non-notable fictional material that does not have another home; the original Wikipedia versions will also be stored there.

Comments and criticism, particularly per change 2 above, is requested. Happy-melon 20:46, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

I prefer notability established by substantial real-world content. Heck, this requirement is actually more of a compromise than requiring multiple independent sources, because a lot of interviews and other material might not be independent. This version of the guideline would actually result in an even greater cutdown of fiction, because a lot of material published about fictional universes is somehow tied to the publisher and/or author, or is only mentioned in passing in various independent articles. That is why we wrote WP:FICT to say "real-world content" instead of "coverage in independent sources"; afterall, there would be no reason to have this page if it was just the same as WP:N. — Deckiller 22:55, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

• If I'm reading this right, it sounds like this would require everything to actually be a notable real-world subject in its own right, independent of the work it is attached to, rather than the current which seems to be based on the notability of both the element and work. Which is to say, an even more extreme bar to jump than the current version, and even more prescriptive since it doesn't reflect the current reality in the slightest. Speaking of which, I have yet to see a suggestion with better practical potential than Iorek's earlier draft. Why aren't we using that? --tjstrf talk 23:03, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
• I think a comprehensive rewrite at this point may be premature. Better to articulate the main points of contention and establish the main points one by one, although the effort is appreciated. At a minimum, dismissal of the out-of-universe standard is going to be problematic. I suggest a resume of the debate with the main points highlighted before a rewording of the guideline is attempted. Eusebeus 03:20, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Given the choices, I prefer the current version of WP:FICT. I'm not saying it's perfect, or that we shouldn't do anything, but much of what people are proposing brings us a step forward and a few steps back. For example, we should not think of "fictional articles" as being different from real world articles. Yes, they're different in nature, but so is an article about an apple vs the history of a religion. And notability is partly being used in the context of helping to avoid massive plot (a slight over-lap with WP:WAF, but no guideline is an island.) I understand and generally agree with the idea that some sub-articles should be allowed for style reasons, but they are still a part of that parent topic, (basically they are a part of the parent article, but stored in a different document. If you viewed the parent article and sub articles as one article, would the size of the sub articles/sections be justified as being a part of the main topic? etc etc etc) -- Ned Scott 03:36, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
    • I think the point you bring up is a pretty valid one. Quite often, we give undue weight to a work of fiction as a whole and subparts of it by writing too much. If the amount written about a work of fiction is outstripping the real-world sources available, or what's being written is mainly in-universe, it's time to start cutting, not splitting. Also, as there are now a lot of fan Wikias, transwikification of the in-universe material may be an option as well. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 04:14, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Undue weight is a concept applied only when dealing with articles that have opposing POVs. There is no such thing as giving a subject undue weight by writing too much accurate information about it as a whole.
        Indeed, the only paradigm under which that sort of statement makes sense is one in which certain types of articles are considered inherently inferior to other types based not on their quality of writing but on what concepts they describe. --tjstrf talk 05:30, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
        • I disagree. Undue weight is a perfect way to explain the situation. Yes, on Wikipedia we tend to use the term when it's related to POV, but the expression works just as well in this different context. -- Ned Scott 05:37, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
        • That's what I was trying to suggest before. Fictional elements of articles that contain such need to be written as concisely as possible, as to not give undue weight to the in-universe information. Only if by page length or additional notability of a specific element should more be written. The problem is that fans of fictional elements are usually editors of such elements (I'm one of those two), and tend to write a lot more than is needed from an encyclopedia viewpoint when most of this information can likely be found on existing websites or should be moved to appropriate wikis. Certainly any page on WP could end up this way, but fiction draws a lot more editors than scientific or historical elements. That's why its very important to stress conciseness and undue weight in fictional notability and writing about fiction. --Masem 05:57, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
          • Running out of server space now, are we? If not, then that's nothing more than a politically correct way of saying we should get rid of articles on "inferior" topics because some people don't like them. That Wikipedia has more information about the USA than ancient Mesopotamia when Mesopotamia is more historically important does not mean we need to reduce the amount of info we carry on the USA because we're giving it "undue weight" in our encyclopedia. Unless we're talking about the setup of a potential CD release, there is no foundation to that argument. I'm sorry if it embarrasses you when the hecklers make wikigroaning blog posts. --tjstrf talk 07:24, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
            • We're not running out of space, but we're not a dumping ground for plot. Do not confuse the two issues. When I think of "undue weight" for fiction, I was thinking he meant that within the topic itself. As in, elements of plot being the main focus of such articles, rather than their impact on the real world, or facts about how these works come to be and how they were created. Personally, I don't care if Wikipedia has more fiction-related topics than all other topics combined, but those articles need real world information, something you can't just learn by watching the show. We're not here to retell the story, we're here to tell you everything that makes the story, the real people who worked on it, the real impression it made. What's more important, which character got to power level 50 or who influenced the lead artist who designed the characters? What's important, some run-of-the-mill, generic monster that whatever team fought on episode 5? Or is it about how the special effects they used were the first of their kind, and impacted the real world of entertainment? -- Ned Scott 08:52, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
              • Both are important. A main article on a series that consists solely of in-universe info is useless. A main article on a series that consists solely of out-of-universe info is useless. The wish to avoid undue weight in these articles is the very reason why creating sub-articles to keep from drowning out the out-of-universe content in the main article is so useful to us editorially, and why guidelines forbidding the creation of such sub-articles are harmful to the encyclopedia. --tjstrf talk 09:16, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
                • Sub-articles shouldn't be created just as dumping grounds. To an extent, I can understand a list of characters and so on, but those are not the kind of articles we're trying to improve with WP:FICT. We're trying to avoid the articles that are about different types of guns used in an action series, or character articles that go into more detail than is needed for basic understanding. Excessive summary should be cut back, not merged to drown out the main article. When we come along to a bunch of articles and say "these should be merged", that does not mean a completely raw merge.
                • Some "just-plot" info is needed for basic understanding, yes, but there's a limit to that. Our articles on fiction are not supposed to retell the entire story, giving the blow-by-blow. The reason we have these articles is to tell people things you can't just learn by watching a show or reading a book. That's why info that is just plot, and isn't needed for basic understanding, is not notable on it's own. -- Ned Scott 09:34, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
• I think that both sides here have made important points. I think the key issue here is "encyclopaedic coverage" of the work of fiction. It seems that my wording of the paragraph starting "If a fictional topic is extremely important within the fictional universe, but is not notable outside it, it may warrant inclusion in the article describing the work of fiction itself" is overly restrictive. Indeed, the necessity of creating subarticles for complex fictional universes may be essential. However, I am unsure as to how best to reword that paragraph to prevent the creation of a loophole to permit anything that is "important" to the universe. I'd be interested to hear any suggestions. The concept of "undue weight" as suggested above may be helpful, if it can be properly worded.
• Vis "fictional articles being different to other articles", I'm not sure what the concern is. Fictional articles are different to factual biographies, to the same extent that factual biographies are different to scientific concepts. Restricting the scope of WP:FICT to ficitonal articles is similar to the restrictions placed on WP:BK and WP:MOVIE. However, while the question of whether or not an article is about a film is ludicrously obvious, "fictional articles" need a bit of definition. Although the idea of considering fictional articles to be entirely different from real articles is tempting, I agree that it must be resisted.
• Vis my removal of "real-world content", which I was aware would be the most controversial change; general consensus seems to be that this is not desirable. Some articles, however, have a number of reliable sources which indicate their notability, but it would be extremely difficult to include information from the sources in the article. The best place for such sources is a "further reading" section. It would be inappropriate to exclude such sources, or their articles, because of this. Perhaps it would be best to include both ideas as evidence for notability: either a topic must have received scholarly analytical coverage, or it must be able to include real-world-content from a wealth of (relatively trivial) sources which would not qualify under the other criterion. This makes sense: if a topic has been critically analysed, it is notable in a similar way to a scientific topic. If a topic has real-world content, its notability is obvious. Would including both options be a good improvement?
• Finally, general points at the beginning of the comments. The real problem with "Iorek's draft", which is well above, is that is it not really a guideline at all. It is a very extensive list of examples. You won't find any other guideline written like that. And a rewrite is never "premature" - the volume of discussion on this page proves that this policy is not considered consensus. The sooner the policy attains consensus the better. What is important is that the correction is not a patch job, but properly discussed before implementation. Happy-melon 10:11, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
• I think there's a difference between "don't make excessive plot summaries" (which most people would agree with) and "don't write about characters/places/etc that have no real-world content" (which would, in essence, call for the deletion of thousands of articles on fictional elements). I'm not saying we should have articles on every minor character, but a "list of characters in <foo>" seems like a worthwhile article even if it has no bearing on the real world. >Radiant< 13:53, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
  • There is general consensus I believe that Character and Episode Lists are perfectly reasonable repositories for the details of fictional works. It is the plethora of individual articles that is the focus of the guideline, almost none of which aspire to out-of-universe context. Eusebeus 13:59, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Just as a note in regards to the above common: For any guideline, I'd be careful to not state that "A 'List of Characters in X'" article is always appropriate"; only that if to meet WP:MOS and length guidelines, it is not unreasonable to create such a list, its notability being inherited from the parent (though OOU information is highly recommended whenever possible). Not every fictional work needs a special character list; it should only be borne out of necessity to be able to scholarly describe the plot. I'm not going to go create a list for a TV show that lasted all of 3 episodes, for example. Again, the problem is that newer editors will tend to rush off and create masses of fictional element articles for a new fictional work because they're following the examples that other established fictional works have them. It's important that we state that there's a reason why this lists are notable and relevant to WP, and why each list has to be considered on a case by case basis. --Masem 14:14, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Yes, but it would seem that "real-world content" or "out-of-universe context" isn't such a good term for that, because a Character List likewise has no real-world or out of universe relations. WP:FICT has traditionally stated that short articles should be merged into lists, not that "anything without real-world content is bad". >Radiant< 14:16, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Well, WAF has required OOU content for as long as I can remember. Purely in-universe stuff belongs on fansites or Wikias. Given the existence of so many fan Wikias, transwikification might be a good option for some of the more crufty stuff though. The thing with in-universe is, we should have as little as possible to put the material in context. To put Superman in context, it is necessary to state that he was a superhero from another planet with multiple superpowers, that he has a secret identity as a newspaper reporter named Clark Kent, and that he has a romantic interest in a coworker, Lois Lane. It's not necessary to run through every little detail, splitting off subarticles for lists of one-time villains and various plot points. The whole idea here is to keep in-universe to a minimum, and get a lot of it trimmed and merged. Let the fans write the massive detail on the fansites, not here. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 14:23, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
        • I don't think sweeping such articles under the rug is all that helpful, and I doubt there is consensus for that in the first place. The issue is that WAF calls for the rewriting of such articles, but FICT has recently been used to call for the deletion of such (which, incidentally, has not been particularly succesful). >Radiant< 14:35, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
• It is not about sweeping them under the rug: it is about asserting a notability standard that should be met for individual fiction-related articles. Many such articles have been turned into redirects - not deleted, so the information is still there and the article can be recreated if out-of-universe notability can be established. There are many problematic articles per the current guideline, that is true. But to change the guideline as a response seems to me to be the wrong thing to do. (btw, we need to summarise and then archive this debate; getting extremely long) Eusebeus 14:52, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Masem's most excellent modifications

I think Masem has done a great job just above summarizing a reasonable point of view that differs only slightly from the existing version, but would mitigate the unnecessarily black & white / prescriptive nature of the current wording. I will quote Masem here for convenience:

Just as a note in regards to the above common: For any guideline, I'd be careful to not state that "A 'List of Characters in X'" article is always appropriate"; only that if to meet WP:MOS and length guidelines, it is not unreasonable to create such a list, its notability being inherited from the parent (though OOU information is highly recommended whenever possible). Not every fictional work needs a special character list; it should only be borne out of necessity to be able to scholarly describe the plot. I'm not going to go create a list for a TV show that lasted all of 3 episodes, for example. Again, the problem is that newer editors will tend to rush off and create masses of fictional element articles for a new fictional work because they're following the examples that other established fictional works have them. It's important that we state that there's a reason why this lists are notable and relevant to WP, and why each list has to be considered on a case by case basis.

Two key points I see in Masem's articulation here include:

• Sub-articles created to meet WP:MOS (or WP:SS for that matter) can inherit their notability from the main article, although OOU information is highly recommended whenever possible.
• Not every work of fiction deserves a "List of Characters in X" or a "List of Episodes" article, and the worthiness of such sub-articles needs to be adjudicated on a case-by-case basis. Some of the criteria for evaluating whether such sub-articles should be created include style issues to break up long articles, and the necessity of having the sub-article to ensure a scholarly/encyclopedic treatment of the overall work of fiction.

If wording that made these two points were worked into the existing guideline, and some of the absolutist language that's there today removed, I think it would go a long, long way toward improving the existing version. Fairsing 00:29, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Notability is not inherited. Else every person on the planet is notable, inheriting their notability from being a human on Earth which is in the Milky Way galaxy in the universe, all clearly notable topics. The idea here is to prevent undue weight, to encourage trimming before splitting, and to eliminate primary-source-only articles, which WP:V forbids. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 02:20, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

It should be, and it is; In your example, only those humans which add to the understanding of the article, that are necessary for an encyclopaedic treatment of 'humans', and which are too long to fit in a summary in the main 'human' article, would have articles. As they do now.

Most of the time, sub articles created for length would already be notable, but some of them will be verifiable, but not notable. Primary sources should be fine, as long as they are not the only sources. Iorek 03:11, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

The issue comes when people say "we have to create this article because it will make article Y too long," but key is that no one even attempted to try it the way this is assumed will cause an article to become too long. It becomes an excuse to have long plot sections for episodes, or heavily detailed plot information for character appearances, and less about how any of that relates to the real world. The actions should start by building a comprehensive article about the main topic, and then filter out. You don't act bass ackwards and create a character article before you've even developed the film or television article (or season or list article...as is the case when you deal with television shows).  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 03:15, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Totally agree. Which is why my original proposal (and the current wording) includes "causes it to become long". Sub articles should only be created when the article becomes long, not before it does, as is standard procedure with articles on all subjects. Though I guess this isn't technically to do with notability, but style. Iorek 04:31, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Exactly, which is why I believe WP:WAF says that very thing. Though I cannot remember, so I'll go check......*returns* It doesn't. It should though, since that is the style guideline for fictional topics. It can be mentioned here, but I think that maybe this page should point to a section on that one which provides a bit more detail into what really constitutes justification for separation based on size. A lot of people simply click "edit this page" and look at the number given and then decide if the page is too long, which isn't an accurate assessment of article size (because of all the coding and spaces throughout the article).  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 04:39, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Bignole: as Iorek points out, it's not difficult at all to tell when people have split out the content prematurely. If they get to the point where they are making in-universe articles with no significant utility or possibility for expansion, then remerge them. That's the very thing that we're trying to write this guideline for, remember?
As for determining how long is too long, that's an issue of editorial judgment. The best rule of thumb is that if the article is written in legible English but you still can't read the article in one sitting without dying from the length, then it's time for a split. You could also try the prosesize userscript.

Seraphim: My equally valid opinion disagrees. Unless you have some sort of evidence to support your opinion here, then your view that "notability is not inherited because I say so" is duly noted and discarded. Even WP:NOTINHERITED disagrees with you here, since it specifically states that the creation of subarticles for "ease of formatting and navigation" is acceptable. --tjstrf talk 04:52, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't agree with it for books and albums, either, which is actually all NOTINHERITED mentions it in context of. Schools finally got sorted, fiction's the current cleanup project, one thing at a time. A lot of albums need upmerging to parent band articles, as they are not in themselves notable, but that will come in time. Some of the cleanup work that needs doing is difficult for people to accept and kind of needs doing a piece at a time. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 04:56, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I suppose you also hate WP:BK, which has as a specific criteria stating authors can be so historically notable that all their work is notable by default. --tjstrf talk 05:12, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

That's rare, if you look at the explaination they give. Few fictional authors fit that criteria.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 05:14, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but it is a case of officially recognized inherited notability, and even one instance is enough to refute Seraphim's claim that there is no such thing. --tjstrf talk 05:30, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

TJ, have you had a lot of experience on articles related to television series? I'm not being condescending, I'm being serious, because the reaction you get when you merge prematurely created articles causes a lot of problems. That was why the television review process got initiated, because there were tons of AN/I up, with editors complaining about the merging. There were edit wars out the whazoo, and lots and lots of fighting. As for article size, I know how to determine "actual article size" (it explains it clearly on WP:SIZE), and I know what SIZE's rule of thumb is for splitting articles. I was not referring to me, I was referring to people who do not know about SIZE, or misinterpret it, causing them to split articles prematurely (and then go through that whole thing I just explained about complaining and reverting). Creating of subarticles for navigation may be acceptable, but branching off 22 episodes a season, when you haven't even written a comprehensive season (or LOE) article first, is not acceptable. You can say "just remerge it" all you like, but until you've actually tried to do that in a bold fashion, and had to deal with the backlash and outcry from editors because of it, then I suggest a different approach.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 04:59, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

"I" have a featured LOE, if that counts. I also understand that telling people that some dozen-odd hours of their work has ended up being against policy is difficult. However, in my observation most of those AN/I threads and edit wars were caused by the rushed and abrasive cookie-cutter editing manner in which the merges were conducted (for all their other merits, TTN and AMiB are hardly the most tactful of people), not the merging itself. If you actually take the time to educate, explain, and deal interpersonally with the (usually newbie) authors of the pages, rather than going "I'M FOLLOWING POLICY, RTFM!" then the merges can go through with hardly a hitch, a much better result than triggering angry defensive reactions and enraging the authors off to the point where they leave.

Incidentally, that LOE I linked makes an excellent example of a case of where sub-articles for style are quite useful, since the ability of the LOE to contain minimal plot summary while still making sense to non-fans is possible only due to the network of articles explaining what all the stuff it mentions actually is. I will admit that the subarticle count and content is more excessive than it need be (we're working on pruning them back right now), but they too were grown organically. If you look back to 2005, all the characters were in the main Bleach (manga) article. Then they were split out to a character list. Then only after that (when the character list was creeping up on 150kb) were a lot of individual character articles created. Though we initially made too many, a mistake that has been rectified by the creation of multiple character lists to merge all but a few of the previous short single-character articles into. (Manga franchise with 40+ major characters and an episode count of over 100 = 7th circle of hell, as far as Wikipedia's fiction policies go.) All this has been done with barely a peep of complaint. --tjstrf talk 05:30, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Smallville (season 1) proves that you can write a comprehensive article on an entire season, and not have to split every episode into its own article (which wasn't done on the Bleach LOE you linked), which is something not happening on other pages. The "complaint" also has to deal with the project of editors working there. I still get complaints about the Smallville season pages, and how "we should have an article for every episode." I'm in a discussion right now with episodes of Angel. There is a whole slew of articles going under review right now about that, doesn't change the complaints. If it did, we wouldn't be having this huge discussion on this page to begin with. Everything always boils down the simple fact of someone's article having been deleted or merged because of this guideline, or some other guideline that contradicst the existence of the article in question. It seems to me, that if we followed this guideline, WP:WAF, SIZE, and any other guideline that explicitely talks about starting from one and working out (instead of the other way around, as is currently done) then we wouldn't be having these debates because there wouldn't be a problem. If you took characters and developed them reasonably on the main article, then split that into an LOC page (which could be split by seasons if its for a show and you have guest stars or something), then there wouldn't be an issue. A point brought up (I believe it was by Seraph, but I'm not sure without scanning the whole debate) is that editors like to add every detail they can about a character's fictional life, and that is what leads to excessive lengths. If you look at FA character articles, most of the plot information is smaller than on articles that are not even GA, and the FA ones have more real world content around them as well. It's all about summary style, and too much weight being given to fictional information. If that was kept in check, a lot of the problems about size wouldn't be problems anymore. (off to bed, so there won't be a response any time in the next several hours).  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 05:43, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

That's precisely why I was saying it's a user education problem. (You're sort of preaching to the choir here.) Many editors don't know what TV episode coverage is supposed to be like, and then since their first exposure to the rules is some stranger swooping in and effectively deleting 12 of their pages, they never get the chance to be peaceably taught. --tjstrf talk 06:53, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

(←)Generally addressing some of the comments above, when I wrote the above and the statement earlier up, it is a two pronged approach, and one with a timeliness element to it.

• We are about to enter a new TV season in the states, meaning that there will be a plethora of new shows; we are also about to hit the holiday movie parade and numerous new video game properties. Now is the time to establish the "expand fictional elements only when absolutely needed" rules that this discussion seems to be around as to help shape those new articles, identify common concerns for editors and the like, and basically to make sure these guidelines are sensible.
• Then, once we can demonstrate that these work, we need to make a strong effort to education other editors, and to have them take a serious look at their existing fictional elements. The hypothesis being "if you had to start from square one and rewrite all the fictional element sections of this topic again, knowing the new WP:FICT/WP:WAF guidelines, how would you do it?" . This is not meant to throw away what has been written, but to make editors take a serious look at their work, and prune and merge and delete as neeed, (hopefully) comparing it to strong examples that result from the first point above (this late 2007 inrush of new fiction). If this means making sure the major projects that deal with fictional elements are on board and outline/reference to this in their own MOS, so be it. As both Bignole and tjstrf note, you may encounter a strong resistance to change, which is why having a set guideline, WProject support, and strong examples of what works in your back pocket will likely help.

I think another key point of any notable/WAF proposal is that lists of fictional elements beget more lists of fictional elements; unless you plan to be editing your article on an hourly basis from newer editors, you should only use lists of fictional elements when absolutely necessary. If you can put information like characters in strict prose form, you get a lot less (from personal experience) drive-by additions and makes such articles easier to manage whether in the fictional element body or its own subarticle. A list really should only be used if you can fully exhaust what goes in that list - a list of episodes in a series, yes, a list of characters in a long-running TV show, not so much. And one other idea. Does it even make sense, lest even such a mechanism, to have a talk template that can be used on lists of fictional elements that have been split from the main work for purposes that have been debated by the editors, such that such "legitimate" splits can be tracks and thus easier to determine the issue of inherited notability? I'm thinking along the lines of how Template:ArticleHistory has various tracking elements on there to allow tracking back to oldid's and to conversation threads in the talk page. I'm not sure how necessary such is, if it's too much work, or what... --Masem 06:06, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Boiling down the issues

As has been mentioned above, there are several issues that this guideline must deal with, some of which are not strictly about notability, and some of which can indeed be contradictory to each other. Each of us here obviously has their own personal priorities in the quality checklist that they want to be emphasized, and if the guideline is to be useful it must reflect all of them. So, in order to really progress any further in this discussion, we need to reach a consensus on what our goals are.

I see 5 major issues relating to coverage of fiction on Wikipedia, all of which must be balanced in high quality coverage and none of which can be significantly sacrificed without losing quality:

• All Wikipedia subjects must be notable.
• All Wikipedia articles must be readably formatted.
• All Wikipedia articles on fiction must be understandable to non-fans.
• Coverage of in-universe elements on Wikipedia must be succinct.
• Coverage of in-universe elements on Wikipedia must be accurate.

And a 6th issue that has less to do with article content but loads to do with this page:

• Wikipedia editors must be educated in a civil manner about best practices.

Can we agree that these are the key points that must be followed in order to have balanced and high-quality articles on works on fiction within Wikipedia? --tjstrf talk 07:27, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree, but see an additional point: Plot summary articles with no real world information that goes beyond basic information (which needs to be defined) is not notable. We split articles when we have something encyclopedic to say about them, not because we want to dive into total in-universe detail. Something could meet all five of the points you've made, but still be excessive plot summary (in-universe information) that is unnecessary (isn't notable). The focus and the true value of these articles should be with real-world information, with plot summary giving us our basic background understanding of the works. -- Ned Scott 07:37, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I believe that would fall under the basic point that "Coverage of in-universe elements on Wikipedia must be succinct."

How exactly we define succinctness, like the details of all the other basic points there, is an issue we should discuss, but after we have the main points laid out and agreed on. In an ironic twist, we've fallen into the same error as the people who jump into retelling the entire script of episode 6 of their favorite show when the main article doesn't even say who directed it yet: this debate has been going in circles for 100s of KB due to divergence into discussion of minutia before we have our outline decided on. --tjstrf talk 07:51, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Alright, I can understand going at it from that perspective, but then maybe we should say "Coverage of in-universe elements on Wikipedia must be balanced"? I guess I was kind of thrown by the wording, but whatever, I see where you are going with this now. :) -- Ned Scott 08:00, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Considering that succinct means "as little as possible while getting the point across", saying it has to be balanced is a lot weaker of language than saying it has to be succinct. (Also, balance is a horribly nebulous term.) --tjstrf talk 08:36, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• I suspect this simply needs a better terminology. Excessive plot sections are not a good idea; however, the present wording also objects to a list of characters (etc) with a sentence or two per character, as this has no "real world information" - yet AFD precedent clearly indicates consensual support for the existence of such lists. >Radiant< 08:40, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• A lot of that comes from the way that numerous policies have completely different and at times illogical effects when their wording is applied to fictional articles. (e.g. some wikilawyers are currently claiming that primary sourced in-universe articles violate WP:V, since a literal reading of that policy suggests that third party reviews are a more reliable source for in universe content than the series canon is.) What we may really need is a Wikipedia:Coverage of fiction guideline that unites the various unique issues about fiction on Wikipedia. --tjstrf talk 08:53, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Fully agreed. As I recall this was one of the big stumbling blocks for WP:ATT. >Radiant< 09:53, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• I agree with TJ's boiled down points, so long as we are going to explain them and have some kind of banner to show everyone (kind of defeats the purpose if we clarify issues and no one sees it other than those that actually visit this page, or like pages). TJ also has a point about saying "balanced", because when I see "balanced" I really see a scale, and to me that means I could write a plot section equivalent in size to my real world information...and if you've seen Jason Voorhees's real world information, that would be a huge amount of plot. At least, that's just how I could see someone abusing the term "balanced" (see Pauline Fowler who has two sections devoted to her fictional life, one written with OOU information and the other strictly IU), even though I really know what Ned is suggesting. What I've seen from character articles, and other like articles, is that editors either do not wish to, or just do not know how to, find real world information and just want to create biographies of IU information. I guess I'm concerned with how we are to "spread the word," so to speak. There's still people that disagree with the television review process (which is basically the merging process, just a little more organized for people to know about it), and even there all you hear is "oh, it's a guideline, we don't have to follow it." I kind of see the same thing here. That, even if we all agree on how to work on the pages, and how and when one should break them down to separate pages, I just don't see anything changing beyond us having an more clarified guideline of practice for these articles to point to.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 12:59, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• For spreading the word, you hit at least one outlet; we make sure the WP Projects that deal with fictional works all the time on board and aware and, actually before that, help review if we do make changes to this or make a "Coverage of Fiction" article (which I'm surprised doesn't have such beyond what already is in some projects). We need to cite why this change is being made; the whole thing about WP:SPOILER and exclusion of the spoiler template is still being debated because there was no clear idea of why change was needed -- it just seemed to happen (to most). If we can root the guideline changes to some general change in policy at WP, that strengthens the case before you have to defend it to those that aren't going to go back and read through the articles. But getting the WP projects on board is almost a necessary first step for the distribution of these changes once they're made. --Masem 13:14, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

• One question that comes to mind deals with issues of "succintness" and "notability". As some of you might know, many of the major comics publishers regularly indulge in mind-numblingly long crossovers, some of which include several "notable" events, for instance, the death of Captain America during the Civil War story. Or, alternately, there's the amazing number of potentially "significant" character deaths in Crisis on Infinite Earths; see Crisis on Infinite Earths#Deaths during Crisis, which I don't think lists even close to all the deaths in that storyline, just those that specifically happened in the series itself, and maybe not all of them. I don't object to seeing such developments summarized in a separate section from the plot overview, but the question of how much significant information some of the these articles might have is a real one. John Carter 21:27, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Forgive me for apparently jumping into the discussion, but I've been offline for a few weeks. I support absolutely the work you are doing to tighten and improve the guidelines surrounding fiction. Unnecessary and poorly developed articles are being created faster than they can be dealt with on a case-by-case basis, so firming up central policy is vital, so well done. If a good policy can be developed here that can cover all forms of fiction (books, television, film, comics etc) then it will improve things across the board. I was part of a group that tried to sort things out at Television (focussing on television episodes!), which was not easy and was stalled by a number of mud-slingers. Therein lies your problem, I'm afraid. I went round notifying every relevant Wikiproject and noticeboard I could think of, but very few people were interested in contributing to policy/guideline discussion. We had some support from a few, and a couple joined in constructively, but most people who made the effort to join in were editors trying to justify their own articles (ie against any centralised process). You must notify Wikiprojects, of course, but just don't expect them to jump on board immediately. Better to look upwards to centralised noticeboards and discussions. But come up with a strong proposal first...too many contributors and you get nowhere in your discussions. The stuff above looks good. Format it and run with it for a while rather than waiting for more comments before you start. Let's get something watertight that can be written downwards (into the various media and genres) and will stand up in AfD discussions. Hey, those are my ideas, and they've probably all been said by someone else, in which case forgive my rambling. Good work so far. Gwinva 04:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Archive

Can we please archive and summarise this discussion one thread per issue (with H3 Headers) and continue this discussion in seperate threads? It is currently very chaotic as seperate issues are often mixed. We will come to no consensus this way. G.A.S 07:57, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I think that's what we are trying to hammer out on the section above this one. -- Ned Scott 08:01, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Not quite: although the above tries to identify such issues

1. It is not treaded
2. All issues are still together

I say we split all issues. If someone think there is another issue; start a new thread. That way we can hopefully close off such threads quicker. G.A.S 08:10, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I suggest that we archive at least all up to the header "#Probem with this page", and possibly summarise and archive up to #Break?. However I would be cautious about threading the discussion. If we take the five points above, and split this discussion into five threads, we'll get five different guidelines out of it!! Happy-melon 12:07, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, as you said yourself, there are five issues, maybe more.

Currently there is no way to determine when everybody agree on one of them (at which time that issue can be closed off: You yourself said "My problem is the overly prescriptive (and in many cases proscriptive) wording of the current version, rather than the descriptive wording that is approved form and that you'll find is used for every other Wikipedia policy". Well, that is one such issue. No new guideline could possibly come from that.

• All Wikipedia subjects must be notable.
• All Wikipedia articles must be readably formatted.
• All Wikipedia articles on fiction must be understandable to non-fans.
• Coverage of in-universe elements on Wikipedia must be succinct.
• Coverage of in-universe elements on Wikipedia must be accurate.

Again, for the above, at least 3 could be closed off almost immediately. There would be no need to keep discussing them further.

And obviously, the rest would have a direct influence on this one guideline. If everyone stays on topic, I believe this might actually work. The current method obviously did not; this discussion has been going in circles for a long time, and we are exactly where we were before it started.

Threading works: take nominations for FA class. They do not end up with 5 articles in the end, only one well written article. Regards, G.A.S 15:14, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Archived through the end of August, since all those threads either resolved or collapsed under their own weight. I'd have no problem with using a threaded format for discussing details once the basic tenants are agreed to (which seems to have nearly happened already), but we need to consider that this page may not end up as the best venue for the discussion. --tjstrf talk 15:27, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Maybe a sub-page then?

Remember each thread will have two parts namely (1) is this really an issue for this guideline and (2) OK, what do we do about it? G.A.S 15:39, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

At least then we can decide where to put a lot of the recommendations: I have seen many that is actually more applicable to WP:WAF than this guideline. G.A.S 15:46, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

(←)Maybe perhaps we need to do a new guideline WP:Coverage about Fiction as someone suggested before. WP:WAF covers a number of OOU elements that should be in a article about fiction to ground it in reality but has little to do with plot. This guideline, WP:FICT, is most about notability, but given the suggested 5 tenets, we are going beyond that; we are suggestion methods to editors of how to meet WP:WAF, WP:FICT, WP:MOS, and other guidelines when they create and describe fictional elements. I believe this goes beyond just Notability. --Masem 16:02, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, they do go beyond just notability. They also go beyond just style, just verifiability, or even just in-universe vs. out-of-universe. The problem is that these issues are all inextricably linked, but since the policy pages have been historically treating them independently this has made policy regarding fiction a self-contradictory mess (any change to WP:FICT will also have ramifications for guidelines like WP:WAF, WP:RS, numerous more specific style guides, etc.). --tjstrf talk 16:10, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Regarding WP:Coverage about Fiction: The last thing we need is another guideline. Most information will be quite happy to be in WP:WAF.

This guideline should really limit its purpose to notability and maybe how it interacts with WP:LENGTH and WP:SS. Everything else, aka the use of lists, OOU vs IU, etc. is really WP:WAF or WP:NOT#PLOT's content; there is no need to have it here. Even the part about what to do about non-notable content, is not relevant here. G.A.S 21:58, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Are you familiar with the WP:ATT policy rewrite attempt? Its goal was to take several policies that had developed around the same subject, each of which had slightly different but heavily overlapping scopes, and rebuild their content from the ground up, creating a new policy that possessed all the desirable aspects of the old ones but without all the WP:CREEP and contradiction. Although it ultimately failed due to having too many participants in the debate, the idea behind it was excellent, and will become increasingly necessary as time goes on and Wikipedia's rules have to stretch to cover more and more cases. (Otherwise we're inevitably going to be doomed by our own bureaucracy eventually making real work impossible.)

We currently have 3+ policies that all deal with the same thing: coverage of fictional content. These policies have to match up, or else we have contradictions in our rules. Usually, however, they don't. This is because they were each written with only a certain portion of the tenets in mind. As any controversial fiction deletion debate will show you, this means that 4 people can show up with 4 radically different positions, each supported by a different policy or guideline, and the result is a mess.

So, if a new policy did come out of this discussion, it would be to make things more simple and less contradictory by uniting the general policy on fiction into one page, rather than letting the different policies all diverge until they end up pointing in totally different directions. --tjstrf talk 23:28, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Then lets rename the page Wikipedia:Fiction and make notability a section, but basically say the same thing over-all. -- Ned Scott 04:15, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Have a look at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (Anime- and manga-related articles). Is something similar not rather what we should work at then? G.A.S 04:38, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

However, I still think WP:WAF is the place that should be changed: I mean: the name says it all. G.A.S 04:45, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: Will there be any use for this guideline as opposed to WP:N? Does this guideline say anything different? G.A.S 04:45, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I still think a lot of it is a notability related topic, even if we are saying if an article falls under SS or not. It's basically a page that says "should you make an article for something or not", with notability as the most common factor/situation we face? (for a lack of better words). I see your point though, and I think it would be a great idea to evaluate the organization between the fictional/entertainment guidelines, but we should still expect some level of over-lap. Also, even if something technically doesn't fall under "notability" or "writing style" or whatever, sometimes you just got to make a statement because it's associated in the mind of the editor (trying to word this better.. think of it like... if we're telling them X, then it would be a good time to tell them about Y, even if Y isn't completely X related, because telling them about Y later on might not be as helpful / impactive.) But hey, I'm not really sure what is the best way to present all this information, but I do agree with most of it. Not really taking a position on anything, just thinking out loud. -- Ned Scott 05:12, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Hmm.. all other points aside.. maybe it is time we got all the fictional/entertainment guidelines together and just had a big brain storming session. Even if nothing changed from it, it might be fun. A lot of these guidelines developed independently, or contain information that didn't have another home at the time. Then there's the effectiveness of how the information is presented and all that. hmmm.. -- Ned Scott 05:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

G.A.S., I consider the separation of the guidelines to be a major part of the problem. They were all developed independent of each other, but cover completely interdependent subjects. I doubt there's ever been even a single concentrated effort to make sure they reflect the same principles. --tjstrf talk 05:36, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Then let's do it. Drop a note on the talk pages of every guideline/policy/wikiproject plus village pump etc and invite them to a centralised discussion. here, or somewhere else. Let's all sing from the same hymnsheet from the start. Gwinva 05:43, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I sort of wish we were at the start of summer, since a lot of us are losing their free time right now (like Deckiller and some others), but I think we can still work something out. -- Ned Scott 05:54, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, I do think they share the same principles, and a lot of us frequent between these pages, but I can understand it from an organizational standpoint (granted, with some clarification of the whole "what sub articles are ok and what need notability" issue, but that's more of a technical issue). -- Ned Scott 05:54, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I suggest Wikipedia talk:Fiction as the best location for centralized discussion, since while it is currently a redirect (to this page) it only has like 5 incoming links and is the most basic of the potential titles. (An additional advantage is that it lets us hijack the unused WT:F shortcut.)

As for a concrete proposal, I have a bit of stuff I've been throwing together in my userspace and head, both as far as what I'm envisioning and what process we could go through here. (It looks like we have no complaints with the premises I laid out, so hopefully that means the next step will be equally simple.) --tjstrf talk 06:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I think we should probably hammer out the details of the sub-article issue before diving into a full-blown reconstruction, though. I don't imagine the reconstruction changing things as much as just moving things (to simply make the process manageable). -- Ned Scott 06:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Well, I had a look at the guideline as it stands now:

Lead — 2 quotes.

1. Defining notability for fiction — Wikipedia:Notability say virtually the same, but is much better worded.
2. Dealing with fiction
   1. Notable topics — Could easily be put in one place other than this guideline
   2. Non-notable topics — Have a look at User:G.A.S/Managing related non-notable articles. That essay may need a bit of updating, but I think it is much better for the purpose.
   3. Fanfiction and unreleased fiction — This is valid content, but could easily be put in one place other than this guideline
   4. Examples — There is no need for this, but if needed could be placed using inline notes.
3. Relocating non-notable fictional material — Have a look at User:G.A.S/Managing related non-notable articles. That essay may need a bit of updating, but I think it is much better for the purpose.
4. See also — Not needed.

Rest of the discussion

Maybe we should deprecate this guideline (as there is nothing actually unique about it. Have a look at any of the other notability guidelines, for instance, Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies) — it actually redefine notability for organisations, something this guideline does not) and start working from scratch. G.A.S 06:23, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah, no. A great deal of this guideline is important information, and the last thing we're going to do is deprecate it. Having a specific focus on fiction, even if other pages basically say the same thing, makes the guideline more effective (otherwise we really wouldn't have other notability guidelines) -- Ned Scott 06:25, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

My issue is, there is nothing new about it, see the section above. Have a look at the other notability guidelines. Maybe we should take one of them then, and tweak it to suit our purposes then. Because as this one stands now, it is useless and terrible; and the rewrites thereof has been no better.

Wikipedia:Notability suits the purpose for fiction better than this one.

It has been noted that everything here should be rewritten, including the other guidelines.

• This guideline should stick to its core purpose. Currently it does not. Look at Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies). It takes notability and makes it applicable to different organization types. This one does not take notability and make it applicable to different types of fiction.
• Subsections vs articles is more a manual of style issue. Look at WP:SS#Basic technique and WP:MOS-ANIME#Sections part 4, characters and WP:LENGTH#A rule of thumb.
• After this guideline is rewritten to suit the core purpose, we can set about writing a MOS for fiction that takes all of the separate guidelines and consolidate them.

G.A.S 06:44, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

This complete talk page went off topic a long time ago: We should discuss one thing only regarding the guideline. When is an article about fiction notable? That is what we try to describe. And that is what the guideline should answer. G.A.S 06:56, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I strongly disagree with your assessment of this guideline. I can see the potential for some clarification, and some restructuring, but WP:FICT is not going away any time soon. -- Ned Scott 07:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Also, WP:MOS-AM is nothing more than a dump from WP:ANIME, and in reality isn't just a MOS guideline. It's development was to be a general guideline of all article issues related to anime and manga. -- Ned Scott 07:13, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

As for WP:MOS-AM, that might be how it started, but in essence it is a styling guide.

My point is it should stick to the core principal. G.A.S 07:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It was like last week that it was moved. My point is that MOS-AM, right now, is more than an MOS. -- Ned Scott 20:45, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't mean to sound harsh, and I do understand your point. I just mean to say that it's not a bad thing when stuff over-laps a little bit, which is often necessary for context. -- Ned Scott 21:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The sub-article issue

Since Ned Scott requested a discussion on the specific subject of sub-articles, I'll throw in some of what I've been brainstorming.

I see three general "classes" of articles on in-universe subjects that are permissible:

1. Independent notability. Even if their original work somehow magically became non-notable, we have enough evidence of notability from other sources that this specific element would still deserve an article. It may even be more culturally notable than the source work itself. The classical example would probably be Superman or Sherlock Holmes, but this could also be a page about a character that, while not particularly famous, created a new archetype which has been analyzed in depth by literary scholars (that one chemical superhuman guy that's from a book nobody's heard of, but which created the entire superhero genre), or a fictional location that became the template world for most future high fantasy (Middle-earth), or a fictional representation of a historical figure that became the primary way most people think of him (some of Shakespeare's plays had this effect), or whatever. These are articles that qualify as independent subjects, and the only cases where I'd consider something like an article on a single character capable of supporting its own sub-articles.
2. Dependent notability. These aren't necessarily notable without their attached work, but do possess real world notability as an aspect of the topic. In other words, because of the work's popularity we have out-of-universe info on them that makes it possible to write a decent quality article. Character articles where we have information on their inspiration and development, lists of episodes with both production information and plot summary, and similar content would fall into this description. These are the minimal level that all in-universe articles should be hoping to become, if it is at all possible.
3. Utilitarian notability. This is where the "sub-article" justification really comes in. These things aren't notable in the real word, and don't have significant OOU information either, so they normally wouldn't get an article. However, since we need their content to understand an existing out-of-universe article or articles, and that article has exceeded readable length, they are an acceptable split off. This is for stuff like fictional concepts that are ridiculously complex so you can't shove them into the main article without significantly sacrificing readability or accuracy, or the character list for that show that has several hundred episodes so its significant character count is in the dozens and takes 6 pages of text to give even bare-bones context to, or that article on the central location of a 15 novel series that's been split off so that you don't have to endlessly rehash its main points in all 15 book articles. This type of strictly in-universe article shouldn't contain any more content than is necessary to understand its main article. It should be emphasized that these are something to avoid when possible, and that we should not let laziness prevent us from searching for OOU content to add to these pages.

Also, to show my reasoning above, here is the justification for the existence of the "utilitarian notability" class of articles in terms of the 5 key points we agreed on --tjstrf 07:51, 6 September 2007 (UTC):

In an article about a notable subject, if the inclusion of succinctly written in-universe content causes it to become unreadably long, and the in-universe content cannot be further trimmed without sacrificing accuracy or making it difficult for non-fans to be able to understand the article's subject, then sub-articles to contain this content may be split off even if their subjects lack notability in the traditional sense.

Comments? --tjstrf talk 07:14, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

That is spot on. Put it in the guideline (or at least that is what the guideline should contain). G.A.S 08:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

That's good. Also shows how notability in fiction differs from general notability guidelines. Gwinva 07:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

What happened to lorek's proposal about different degrees of coverage based on the scope of the article/subarticle? I liked that idea... would have saved quite a bit of drama and editwarring over the last six months or so. MalikCarr 09:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't know. Seems to have been deleted (or lost in archiving) What specifically were you referring to? Iorek 11:49, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

If that's reference to what may be appropriate for a long-running TV show compared to a single-shot movie or video game, I think the brief summary captures the essence of that; we can describe rules of thumb in more detail in a guideline page to help to clairify where certain list/sub-articles can be more appropriate, though we must be clear that these are suggestions and should be take neither as example or as rule. --Masem 14:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Excellent summary; two points: First, "non-fan" is not the best wording, I'd use "anyone" , "layperson", or something else to not necessarily imply fandom. Second, I would make sure that the utilitarian notability aspect is not a free ticket to complete describe every fictional element of a work (likely violating WP:NOT#IINFO); when such a list is needed, it should only be elements that directly attribute to the plot description of the notable work.

Now , as I was writing that, I'm thinking to the case of the Pokemon lists that are already been condensed down from individual articles for each pokemon type. But even by the above utilitarian, such a list is overly excessive and possibly another WP:NOT violation. How would this fit in, or are these lists themselves even in violation? (I'm not for or against them, it just came into my head). --Masem 09:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

This is off-topic, but may be a good example: Lists are usually acceptable, due to #1 above (There are more than enough secondary sources to create a list), and due to WP:LENGTH. At least the lead paragraph should focus on OOU content. Have a look at Featured lists for what I mean: The lead paragraphs are almost always exclusively OOU. G.A.S 10:17, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I'll hold off on discussing this more; beyond a few wording changes, tj's captured what I think is a good policy for disucssion and a basis for updated policy, I'll reoffer the pokemon when we actually get to discussion mode. --Masem 13:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I like this tjstrf; perhaps a little stronger wording on trying to get out of universe sources where possible might improve it. Iorek 11:49, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Can we get some examples of what really qualifies as a necessary split off (pages with absolutely no chance of real world information)? It will probably help with trying to implement this, as I believe that we're on totally different pages regarding what is actually necessary. TTN 18:23, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The articles that have this problem the worst are foreign subjects, and old subjects. Category:1980s American television series and Category:Anime of the 1990s are good places to look. We could probably even come up with sources for a lot of this stuff if we could search old newspapers or read japanese, but effectively, we can't. - Peregrine Fisher 18:49, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

We need specific examples of what different people think are acceptable. Unless you're saying that all of those need character lists just because they exist, that doesn't really help sort out anything. TTN 19:01, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• I am in agreement with TTN: examples would be useful. Utilitarian notability seems to me flawed. First, although it contains the word notability, nothing notable needs be asserted. Second of all, we don't get around the problem of the mass accumulation of fan-enthusiasm-driven in-universe detail. I agree, however, that insofar as this justifies episode & character lists (and no-one is arguing to get rid of these even under the current guidelines) and discourages individual articles that fail to assert out-of-universe notability, I like the intent. Eusebeus 19:25, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The main problem I'm having is with the character lists. If written correctly, sections in the main articles should be able to cover the characters in enough detail. If you combine that with the plot summaries in the episode lists, you should essentially have the level of detail that character lists provide without it being cluttered. There are exceptions to that, but the number really is a lot less than it currently seems. The problem with this proposal is that people are going to ignore that and automatically think that it is impossible to cover the characters accurately in the main article. That is why we need to get discussion going with examples, so we can see where everybody is at this point. TTN 19:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I strongly feel that a "list of fictional elements of X" created via the utilitarian notability assertion idea needs to have some talk page template that points to discussion on the main page for "X" that indicates why the list was moved out, as to established the necessity of the utilitarian notability so that, a year later, a whole new set of editors don't come around and delete the list page without question because of "lack of notability". Just an idea... but to the examples, List of characters in The Simpsons (still excessively long winded for my taste) is, by size, too much to put into a main "The Simpsons" article; for simplicity, I would put list of characters across a long series of fiction into a single article as well as per List of characters in the Harry Potter books. Long series don't always require this: I know I spent time to condense much of Pinky and the Brain to keep the characters within the article body, and comic strips like Get Fuzzy and Pearls Before Swine, while having excess minor character sections, can likely keep such character lists within the scope of their article (That is, I do NOT recommend separate list of X for these last three examples). Basically, the separate "Lists of X" will likely come from the longer episode materials , but this isn't a guaranty. --Masem 19:55, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• As Peregrine mentioned, most of the things that would actually qualify for a "utilitarian notability" exception (rather than being "dependently notable" elements of a work) would be things where we normally could logically expect there to be OOU information about them, but due to the age or origin of the work it's difficult or impossible to find.
  One example that comes to mind would be JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. The series is one of the most notable manga ever written. It has been running since 1986, is 800+ chapters long, has had a major influence on later works, its author is a premiere authority and lecturer on manga, etc. etc. etc. Plus, because the series is so long, and especially because the plot and setup fundamentally changed at numerous points in the series, you cannot accurately give even a basic accurate summary of the in-universe elements in the main article.
  Normally, this wouldn't be a problem: after all, if the series is so notable, we should obviously be able to find OOU information about its plot and characters, right? Well, in a perfect world we should, but reality isn't always so kind. For all its notability, the series never made it stateside. It has virtually no official presence in English, so you can't find sourced OOU information about its elements without being able to read Japanese. Because of this, its character lists and the like lack any normal assertion of notability in the real world, but can't be removed without significantly damaging our encyclopedic coverage of a notable subject. (I'm not really discussing the current versions of the articles here by the way, since the in-universe articles on JoJo really need to be significantly trimmed from their current state, which has independent articles for incredibly minor characters, i.e. the initial protagonist's dead dog, and its OOU coverage needs majorly expanded in order to really justify even future trimmed and merged IU articles.)
  And, just to reiterate, I am not arguing that we have to cover every little detail of fictional universes, hence the point about succinctness of coverage and how these sub-articles shouldn't contain any information that's not directly relevant to understanding an out-of-universe article. --tjstrf talk 20:17, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

That doesn't really seem to be a very good example. Seeing as the ideal version of the main article will be fully sourced, the separate series articles will likely be sourced in their ideal versions. Within those, all of the characters specific to a series can be covered within it, and then major topics can be covered within the main article. If split off, those would likely be sourced. Within that, there seems to be no need for any of these special cases. TTN 20:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

But we don't have the ideal version, so we have to live with the best version possible under the circumstances (where we lack all but the most basic of OOU info in English). You make a very good point that, since the main work is broken down into segments, these segments could probably host all or most of the necessary in-universe information for understanding, but even then there are a few shared concepts that I believe would be dealt with best by splitting off. Specifically I would argue for (trimmed versions of) Dio Brando, Jotaro Kujo, and Stand (JoJo's Bizarre Adventure), which all played significant roles in multiple arcs of the story and would be quite difficult to accurately cover in the other articles without restating large amounts of content. This is true of Dio Brando in particular, since, along with the protagonist always being named "JoJo", he's the single thread that ties together the entire work.

However, I believe your specific objection there could be placated if we put into the guideline that where the need for information on in-universe elements could be met within articles containing out-of-universe information, such as pages on the seasons of a television show or the books of a series, this is the preferred method.

Another thing that would be important to mention is that necessary in-universe information is not to be confused with interesting in-universe information. As an example for this, knowing the details of the battles Guts has participated in during the course of Berserk (manga) may be quite interesting, but all you actually need to know about all but a select few of them is that he 1. has been in a ton of battles 2. is a really good fighter 3. hunts apostles. In contrast, you do need to know what an apostle is within the context of Berserk. (Fortunately, this can be defined in the main article.) --tjstrf talk 21:11, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The ideal version idea factors in the fact that it may take a while. It just has to be possible to actually have that version at some point (people mistakenly think that no deadline means that we can wait forever to do the impossible). If sources are not possible at all, then we need to reconsider the organization of the topic. The shared ones are the major topics that I mentioned. Whether they need articles or not would be up to an actual discussion. TTN 21:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I think we're mostly agreed on this point, actually. My point in listing the "utilitarian notability" case is so that we could use it to describe when these split-offs are acceptable as provisional measures, and so that we could then qualify it to say when it was unacceptable (shouldn't be used to dump in minutia), and that the editors should be seeking OOU information to upgrade their status. Basically, to make it so that these pages are no longer in policy limbo, and their fate is no longer dependent on the whims of AfD and which of the contradictory guidelines the closing admin decides should overrule the others. --tjstrf talk 21:34, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Personally, I believe that there are enough external and third party sources that list of episodes and list of characters are notable on their own, or dependently notable. (i.e. where it only goes into as much details as most sources does being major and minor characters (recurring or not), but not once-off characters/victim of the day.)

As such Utilitarian notability would extend to single (major) characters (where the plot archs): usually enough detail are available to describe the character within the universe (See GA Sailor Mercury as an example, as it stands now, with work and OOU content I believe it could make FA class). However, minor/once off characters like this has not even enough in universe content to write a proper lead paragraph, never mind anything else than a short plot summary or trivia.

In shows where everything resets, like Pinky and the Brain, there is no character development (in the story), as such such character articles can never satisfy Utilitarian notability. However, they may satisfy Independent notability, for instance Mickey Mouse.

G.A.S 20:55, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• It seems to me that this has become a fairly nuanced discussion about how to establish grounds for character and other in-universe lists (such as the list of spells from Charmed) such that they can thrive even without O-O-U context (which if I am reading his comments correctly is the point being made above by tjstrf). For practical reasons (length and/or organisation), that is frequently good practice and I doubt there is much disagreement. What editors like myself, TTN, Ned Scott and others (if I can be so bold) still maintain, however is that the guideline as it stands is an effective discussion of what constitutes notability for fictional characters. An article like Gregory House is the poster boy for what is wrong in ficiton articles: huge, packed with minute details from the show, and almost entirely without out-of-universe context. As it stands, that article (and the thousands like it) are prime candidates for redirection to list pages and the current guideline would make such an action both understandable and largely beyond dispute. Eusebeus 21:50, 6 September 2007 (UTC)