Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Wikipedia policies and guidelines/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning

Moved from Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion as that process is expressly not designed for discussing changes to guidelines. This move allows for comments already made and any emerging consensus to be preserved as part of an active discussion.

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Archived MfD and TfD discussions

The follow have been moved their their own subpages for archival purposes and to reduce the load time for those participating in the active discussion.:

MfD for Wikipedia:Spoiler_warning

TfD for Template:Spoiler

non-deletion discussion

As this is apparently no longer a deletion discussion, let us think about what is wrong with the current use of spoilers again.

• They make editors decide the order of presentation not by what makes the best encyclopedic article.

• If a work of fiction is most notable for a plot twist, then that belongs in the lead section.

• They are often redundant:

• Use in "Plot" sections: There is no need to warn people that information about the plot may be found in such a section

• They appear in serious articles that do not carry spoiler tags in any other encyclopedia:

• People are commonly using spoiler tags on the Bible, the works of Shakespeare, Homer, or Dickens

The first point could be addressed by making it clear that WP:LEAD always takes precedence, but it is not clear whether people will follow this in practice. The second point could be addressed by prohibiting spoiler tags in sections that are already clearly marked by their section title. The third point could be addressed by only putting spoiler tags on works that are newer than a month.

Whatever the outcome of this discussion will be, it seems clear that a large number of people wish to see a significant reduction in the use of spoiler tags. If spoiler tags are not to be deleted outright, they will need to be strictly limited in their use and not allowed to grow wild again like they do now. Kusma (talk) 13:10, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Please read the above, folks. Virtually all those wanting to maintain the present use have not dealt with these objections; they just say "But I like it!" without concern for addressing these pertinent concerns. Some people have not been helpful with one-liners like "Delete, not encyclopedic", but these are valid issues — we should not be splashing these all over the place so liberally as we do now. Like it or not, when the choice is between writing a proper article and avoiding spoilers, we must go with the former. In some cases, there is no conflict between these two goals; but in cases where there are, our encyclopedic nature comes first. Johnleemk | Talk 14:06, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• I agree with this, plus CzechOut's excellent "rant" at the beginning of the delete debate. If an outright rejection of spoiler warnings altogether is not accepted, perhaps spoiler warnings could be limited to use only in, say, articles on movies still at the theatre or in the new releases section of the video store, and television episodes of the current season. That way, spoilers can be left only for those items that readers might be expected to only be recently aware of and which they might currently be contemplating seeing. As for books, "recentness" might not be considered as helpful, but the use in, say, Catcher in the Rye (in which there isn't even an ending template; almost the entire article is considered "spoiler") is completely ridiculous. Lexicon (talk) 14:35, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• Well, I think a proper article about fiction containing spoilers needs a spoiler warning. Now what? --87.189.89.215

  Well you could explain why, perhaps. Why do you think an encyclopedia article needs to carry a warning to tell the reader that he may learn something he doesn't know? Isn't it implicit in the purpose of writing an encyclopedia article that it will contain mostly information that the reader doesn't know? --Tony Sidaway 14:42, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

  What's at issue here is information some readers specifically do not want to know.--agr 14:50, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

  WP:NOT#PAPER, we have the opportunity to offer both sets of informations for both kind of readers: The one wanting to look up an actor or a budget or the one wanting the while shebang. Why do you want to remove that opportunity? --87.189.89.215

Comment: Why are people intentionally posting spoilers in this spoiler warning RFC? Doesn't that violate WP:POINT? Ken Arromdee 14:32, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Not really. The "spoliers" in this discussion are used as examples to prove a valid point, not to disrupt. Lexicon (talk) 14:35, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

By spoilers here, does Ken simply mean that people are discussing the plots of books, films, television shows and plays? I'd say that they are doing so, but that it's seldom disruptive to do so. The "Snape kills Dumbledore" spam was a rare and exceptional case where the intention was to spoil enjoyment rather than inform or engage in legitimate comment. --Tony Sidaway 14:40, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• It is my view that the use of spoiler templates/warnings ought to be retained, but modified. In no case should content be omitted from an article to avoid a spoiler, and rarely should it be put in a different place in an article (the lead to an article about an unreleased or very recent work should probably not include major spoilers: for example "Snape kills Dumbledore" should not have been in the lead of the relevant article in the week that the book was released, IMO. WP:NPOV must always trump spoiler protection. If there was a consistent way to mark spoiler warnings so that those with a suitable preference setting or css setting would not see the warnings, this would be good, but IMO such warnings should default to being seen by non-logged-in users. As for their use in section labeled "plot" or the like, yes in a sense they are redundant there, but not all plot sections contain significant spoilers, indeed not all plots contain the sort of twists that make their endings a 'spoiler. More importantly, humans are not perfectly logical beings, we sometimes need a reminder about things that ought to be obvious. I think that in spite of the technical redundancy, having spoiler warnings on, or within, sections labeled "plot" or the like should not be prohibited or discouraged. It is mentioned above that most encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings at all, or do so in a much more limited way than wikipedia. This is true. But most other encyclopedias don't cover fiction and popular culture in nearly as much detail as wikipedia does, and don't include nearly as much plot detail. Given that difference, a different approach to spoiler warnings seems warranted. I do think that some changes should be made, however. My suggestions are:
  1. Spoiler warnings should not be used on classic, widely known works such as the Bible, the plays of Shakespeare, or the works of Homer.
  2. However, spoiler warnings should not be limited to recently released works -- many long relased works are new to particular readers.
  3. Significant facts should not normally be omitted from an article lead merely to avoid spoilers. This may be temporarily suspended for unreleased or recently released works.
  4. There should normally be a marker used to indicate the end of a section that contains spoilers, if a spoiler warning is used.
  5. Editors should be urged to consider whether plot details are really "spoilers". Works where the plot details are relatively obvious and not in any way surprising, and no attempt seems to be made to surprise the reader should probably not have spoiler warnings used at all.
  6. Plot sections in general should be reduced in size ans scope. WP:FICT calls for this now, but is widely ignored.
  7. The use or non-use of spoiler warnings in a particular article should be a matter of consensus among the editors of that article, to be determined on its talk page, just as with all other matters of article content. Drastic changes without consensus are discouraged.
  8. The general format of spoiler warnings should be uniform across wikipedia, and should be a matter of general consensus. Drastic changes should not be made without seeking consensus for the change.
• I hope that these suggestions will be useful in this discussion. DES ^(talk) 14:42, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
  • It is bad enough that there are spoiler warnings in our pop culture sections, but the part of our content that is also present in other encyclopedias should not look less professional. Oh, and articles like List of suicides don't need spoiler warnings at all (but my removal got reverted anyway). Kusma (talk) 14:48, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
  • User:DESiegel (DES), most of that sounds reasonable. I'd expand that to say that we shouldn't normally put unnecessary warnings into articles. We should instead put a note into the site disclaimer saying that the full plot of fictional works will be disclosed in an appropriate manner dictated by our relevant content policies, and no extra warning will be given. We don't put nudity warnings into our articles about famous artists or anatomy, we just have a notice in the site disclaimer. --Tony Sidaway 14:51, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
    • Yes, we could do it that way -- it would be consistent. i think it would not get consensus, and i strongly suspect that it would lead to frequent edit disputes when some editors attempted to remove information that constituted spoilers, and to significant dissatisfaction on the part of a subset of our readers. If that is our policy choice, i will of course go along, but I don't think it would be the wisest possible choice. A general disclaimer, while logically equivalent, simply does not have the impact that a specific one does. And yes, I agree that a similar argument could be made for nudity and other content that is offensive to some readers, and i don't want such warnings. The difference is IMO that lots of people want to remove or hide all such content, and warnings might encourage this, and also that people might depend on such warnings in ways that we cannot guarantee would always work. Whereas the perceived "harm" of seeing a spoiler is far less, so if someone reads a spoiler that doesn't have a warning, there will be Far less in the way of violated expectations, IMO. DES ^(talk) 16:31, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
      • Actually after making the above suggestion I went to look and found, to my surprise, that our content disclaimer already warns of spoilers, in very large letters. I've changed my opinion on this: I now believe strongly that spoiler warnings are nearly always an unnecessary intrusion on articles. They should never be used except when there is a very strong justification. Perhaps for the first month of Snape Kills Dumbledore, or perhaps not. --Tony Sidaway 16:52, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
        • Tony, if someone uses Google to find information on a book or movie, such as John LeCarre's novel The Honourable Schoolboy, and the Wikipedia article on the novel tops the list of search results (as it did in 2005 when I first searched for it), what percentage of people do you suppose will consult the content disclaimer before reading the article? Maybe, 0.000001%? -- DS1953 ^talk 18:02, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: People seem to be ignoring the fact that sexual content, medical content, profane content and violent content are not warned on Wikipedia, which I am adamant almost everyone will defend. Yet all "keep" voters are shouting "be courteous"! It doesn't make any sense, they are no different. A person may find spoilers objectionable, a person may find nudity objectionable. More bizarre is the fact some people claim you can't "un-read" spoilers - what? You can't "un-read" nudity either. They are really no different. Even worse is I saw a person yelling "apples and oranges". Yeah, we're allowed apples, bananas, pears, peaches, kiwis and passion fruit, but oranges are different! --Teggles 19:39, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

  Using hysterical hyperbole does not help your argument. --Farix (Talk) 19:42, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• • My comment wasn't wholly composed of that. If you'd prefer, I'll restate the last comment, but the point gets across either way. --Teggles 19:47, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Why spoiler warnings are not only bad practice: they're unnecessary

The ugliness of spoiler warnings and the way they skew our writing and interfere with the execution of Wikipedia policies and guidelines such as Neutral point of view (WP:NPOV) and Wikipedia:Lead section (WP:LEAD) has already been discussed.

What I'd like to address here is why they're unnecessary. Firstly they're unnecessary because this is an encyclopedia. Unlike the fictional works we write about, the value of our work does not rely on maintaining suspense, and (as discussed earlier) in fact hiding information from the reader or confining it to carefully corraled areas of the article distorts our work. Secondly, the reader is aware that he is reading an encyclopedia. If he's reading the article, it means he wants to know about the subject. Warning him that he may learn something he doesn't already know is superfluous: he already knows this otherwise he wouldn't have started reading the article.

Finally, we've had a warning in our Content disclaimer for years, years. The current version has at the very top, in very large words, the following:

WIKIPEDIA CONTAINS SPOILERS AND CONTENT YOU MAY FIND OBJECTIONABLE

So it's absolutely unnecessary. If we find people who really are stupid enough to come to an encyclopedia expecting not to learn about the subject of the articles they read, they can be pointed in that direction.

I'd argue that even that disclaimer is unnecessary, beccause it's implicit in the nature of an encyclopedia, but that's another argument and I don't mind the disclaimer because it's linked form every page without being thrust bodily into the articles to distract from content and distort the structure of articles, as our spoiler warnings do. --Tony Sidaway 15:09, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Comment. Spoilers, despite the arguments of some people above, do prevent people from reading information. The fact that there is no understood definition of what is and isn't a spoiler means that a reader has no idea just what is or isn't included in a section of an article marked with a spoiler template. Spoilers are subjective, they're based on the views of the tagger only, and the reader has no way of knowing what is and isn't considered a spoiler. As such, when a reader stops reading because they see a spoiler template and there is information within the spoiler section that he or she would have appreciated reading, he or she has been cheated out of what we, as editors of an encyclopedia, have a duty to provide them. As such, the warnings must go. Lexicon (talk) 15:14, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Spoilers are no more subjective than many other thing on WP. If you disagree with the way a particular warning is set, discuss it and change it.

Nobody stops the reader from reading. --87.189.89.215

• Rewrite somewhere else, marking this travesty historic Like I said a long long time ago on the Spoiler RFC, "Spoiler tags are a dramatic violation of our encyclopedic tone, and as such their use should be constrianed to places where the value of the ending to the plot at large overweighs our desire to be completist with information. Examples - M. Night Shalaman movies. Most other tags should go." (note when I wrote this MNS had just released a new movie - spoiling it now is no longer a problem) Rewrite the guideline to make it clear that spoilers everyone knows that are central to the understanding of the work (BRUCE WILLIS IS DEAD), spoilers than don't ruin the work (THE GREEKS WIN THE TROJAN WAR) and spoilers that are trivial (DREW BARRYMORE DIES IN SCREAM) are not excluded from the lede or plastered with ugly tags. Hipocrite - «Talk» 15:15, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree, once WikiMedia asks every person (or, say, 50%) on a particular plot point, and all claim to know it, the warning may go. Until then, don't assume everyone has the same media-consuming habits as yourself. --87.189.89.215

Now you've gone and done it! The Greeks won the Trojan War... Grrr. Lexicon (talk) 15:21, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I crap you not. Hipocrite - «Talk» 15:25, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

So start a discussion on the /Talk about whether or not to remove it. Start a discussion elsewhere on how warnings should be applied. Just don't treat bad and good spoiler warnings the same. --87.189.89.215

We're having a discussion right here about how the warnings should be applied. The consensus appears to be somewhere between "never" and "sparingly," with your use of it on articles like Romeo and Juliet being in the distinct minority, 87. Hipocrite - «Talk» 15:30, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see a consensus like that. My recent rvs were just rvs of a mass implementation of the policy some would like to introduce. Whatever the result of this discussion, implementation should wait until it's over. --87.189.89.215

I see we have a spoiler warning on Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Left to their own devices, spoiler warning fanatics would have us rename the article because the title gives plot details away... - Nunh-huh 15:46, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Funny, but obviously ludicrous. Let's not undermine a valid debate by making up utterly insane hypothetical scenarios that will never come to pass. --Bishop2 16:11, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

"Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Unwell." --Tony Sidaway 15:54, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Even that would give something away. "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern May Or May Not Be Dead". There we are. Lexicon (talk) 16:06, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Ah, but the public would interpret the redundancy as "beating around the bush", meaning they are dead. — Deckiller 16:07, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

How about this: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Encounter A Novel Application of the Schroedinger's Cat Gedankenexperiment." Obscure enough to baffle the kind of people who care about spoilers, apposite enough to tip off the cognoscenti. --Tony Sidaway 16:09, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Or simply "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern May Or May Not Be Dead (But Don't Think We're Just Beating Around The Bush Here, We Assure You That You Really Are Going To Have To See The Thing To Find Out Which One It Is)". Lexicon (talk) 16:11, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

At one point, Darth Sidious had a "soft redirect" to Palpatine to avoid giving away a spoiler. I think the public understands that we contain spoilers. Or if they are so paranoid about spoilers, why would they blindly go to a Wikipedia page that takes a few seconds to load and clearly has a lot of content on it, thinking that the spoilers wouldn't be included? Spoiler tags insult the public's intelligence; they're anything but a "courtesy". If they wanted to come here to read about a product to see if they want to buy it, then they've come to the wrong place; we're not an advertisement service. — Deckiller 16:04, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

First, they assume that, like many other pages on the web, WP would contain warnings, since WP:NOT#PAPER.

Second, WP article should offer as much information as possible. If someone stops reading media articles because the contain spoilers, WP fails to offer any information to that person; on the other hand, a warning won't reduce the amount of information for other readers. --87.189.89.215

Couldn't the same be said, of, say a warning that says: "WARNING: Pictures that may offend some are on this page"? ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 16:31, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes. That's why Republicopedia or however the thing is called was founded. --87.189.89.215

While I initially comment to keep the page because I felt the MfD process was completely inappropriate to resolve this dispute. I do feel it is necessary to give my view on the usage of the spoiler tag.

I'm largely ambivalent to the spoiler tag as a whole. In other words, I don't think it neither helps nor hurts Wikipedia for these tags to be present in articles about modern literature and film. I also think that both sides of this debate are "blowing smoke". The presence of the tags will not lessen the professionalism or credibility of Wikipedia, but I also have to say that those who are saying that they can not edit/read articles on Wikipedia for fear of being "spoiled" if the tags are removed are simply engaging in hyperbole.

I do however agree that some editors often grossly overuse the spoiler tags. For example, no classical work of fiction or any work of fiction older then 20 years should ever have a spoiler tag anywhere on the article. The same goes for articles on recent works of fiction whose plot points are widely known. I also agree that having spoiler tags in a plot section or in a characters' bio is also redundant. Are the tags helpful? Maybe. Are they necessary? No. But one thing I must insist is that spoiler tags should never be included in the lead section of an article. But frankly, I don't think anyone who looks up an article on a work of fiction is do so without the intent of spoiling themselves to some degree about the work's plot. --Farix (Talk) 17:47, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

On what do you base your assumption about hyperbole? There are no warnings on de: and I can assure you that I don't read any article about fiction, actors etc. there unless I'm absoluteley sure that I know the article's topic and any related work (!) very, very well; ie. almost never.

Another personal observation: Last week I bought Yojimbo and Sanjuro, two movies from 1961 and 1962. I knew none of them before I decided to buy them, but I was able to use Wikipedia to assess them based on topics covered, importance, participating artists etc. I would not have dared to access these articles without an established pattern of spoiler warnings on en:Wikipedia. (And no, neither do I know Fistful.) In effect, the warnings added content for me. As I often contribute to the articles I read, it also adds content for any reader.

Sadly this discussion never was about details of spoiler handling. --87.189.124.195

I agree that spoiler warnings are useful to many. I fail to see how they hurt Wikipedia in any way. Wikipedia is different from printed encyclopedias in many ways, and the ability to place a spoiler warning is one of these. And, just as 87.189.124.195 posted, there is no reason for them to be confined to 20 years of fiction. I also look at older works to judge their critical or artisitc merit, or to see their place in a director or producer's history. I prefer to not know the plot at this point. Now, would I be devastated if spoiler alerts were removed? I suppose not. I would just be sure to watch the film before reading about it. Would this be inconvenient? Sometimes it would be. And that will decrease Wikipedia's usefulness to me. TK421 15:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Outstanding issues

Since the deletion discussion has essentially been abandoned in favor of a free-for-all, I'm going to make a vain attempt at adding some order to the discussion. As I see it, there are four major objections to this policy that I raised. Two of them touch directly on NPOV, which adds a third rail to this discussion - the onus becomes for those who support a policy for spoiler warnings to explain how this policy can be made to work around NPOV. Until the policy does this, it cannot continue to retain guideline status. The other two do not necessarily provide a necessity for the policy's demolition, but they are big problems none the less. I've explained the four problems below. I encourage supporters of this guideline to show why these objections can be overcome. Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Writing around spoilers (NPOV)

The nature of the spoiler policy is that it traps spoilers into specific sections of the article, demarcated by spoiler tags. By extension, things outside the spoiler tag are limited in what they can talk about. This makes it difficult to give proper weight to critical perspectives that depend on the spoiler. Sue Dibny absolutely needs to discuss her rape and murder outside of a plot summary section. You can't write a good section on critical responses to Citzen Kane and only discuss the ending in the plot summary. Other articles, like Valen or Alex Wilder, need spoiler content to put the character in any useful perspective. The spoilers are so vital to those topics that they cannot be exiled into particular sections. These are cases where the spoiler content is important enough that it needs to be woven throughout the article. Inability to do so necessarily marginalizes major perspectives, in violation of NPOV. Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I disagree that the policy does this. In fact, it explicitly states, "The question of spoilers should never influence decisions about article content and structure," which is in direct contravention to your point. If these things need to be discussed where you say they need to be discussed, then the guideline we're talking about does not prevent it. JulesH 18:13, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Right, it might be saying that, but its not saying that prominently enough. As the many examples go to show, people are using this to structure articles around the spoiler warnings. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 19:01, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Theoretically the policy says that, but in practice, articles get heavily refactored into an inconsequential, fluffy lead, and then the real meat of the article only further down in a spoiler section. Luckily the spoiler situation hasn't gotten so out of hand that this has happened to Romeo and Juliet, as their deaths are essential to the plot and meaning of the entire story and must be mentioned in the lead-in sentence, but I've seen it affect only slightly less famous works (including even some of the works of Homer). The spoiler creep is getting ridiculous. No other encyclopedias have spoilers, and for good reason. I think we should bow to their experience and remove ours. They're unprofessional and they hurt the quality of the encyclopedia by causing bad article refactoring. --Cyde Weys 22:38, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

There was even a spoiler alert on the article about David Brock's Blinded by the Right, a nonfiction book, FFS. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 02:14, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

That addition is very recent, for one. But the more pressing problem here is that this is essentially in the guideline as a saving throw - "avoid spoilers, unless you really, really have to." This is still too much of an imposition on sane practice. Phil Sandifer 03:02, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Precisely. Good encyclopedic writing should always take priority before avoiding spoilers. The latter is nice to have; the former is compulsory. Moreover, policy is decided by description, not prescription, so the fact that there is a divergence between the two indicates we need to discuss this again and hash out the issue. Johnleemk | Talk 05:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Even more important than "good encyclopedic writing" (whatever that means) should be offering of information. Spoiler warnings effectively do that.

There are a number of rules on WP abused to worsen articles. If you find an instance where this is done, discuss it on the talk page, then fix it. Why is that a problem?

No other encyclopedia has hyperlinks, so should we remove them? WP:NOT#PAPER --87.189.124.195

I don't see the point here. Just do your article as you would have done anyway, then slap on warnings on any sections needing them, or the whole article, and be done with it. How do warnings force a structure?

Also, sections already force a structure. Assume that someone wants to write the article about Ilias by interweaving plot and any discussion related to a particualar detail of the plot. This is rarely done because many people see a point in putting things in sections, ie. explain the plot first and add any discussion later. If this is completely fine with section headers, why is it completely off-limits with warnings? --87.189.124.195

They create the wrong approach. This is a wiki, people do not first write an article, then put tags on it. The article is evolving, and once there are tags in some sections, this serves as a strong incentive not to put spoilers above these sections. That is wrong, and there doesn't seem to be an easy way around this problem other than deleting all spoiler warnings per WP:NDT. Kusma (talk) 10:30, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Article organization changes all the time. Most of the articles I started six years ago are hardly recognizable, and articles are regularly reorganized if someone wants to feature them. --87.189.124.195

Lead paragraphs vs. spoilers (NPOV)

A lead paragraph should cover all of the major aspects of the article, forming, as Wikipedia:Lead paragraph says, a short article unto itself. Some perspectives on texts need to be in the lead paragraph. If these perspectives depend on spoilerish content to be understood then the spoilerish content needs to go there too. The Crying Game has been the example I've been using most often, but there are others: Sue Dibny, Metroid, Taming of the Shrew. All of these have major perspectives on them that are fundamentally based on spoilerish content. These perspectives have to go in the lead, or else NPOV is violated. Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

As per my comments in the above section, the guideline as it currently stands does not interfere with this need. JulesH 18:15, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

No, the guideline as it currently stands has a tacked on bit saying "o btw don't mess up the article ok". That's pretty clearly just there as a sop to objectors - David Gerard 20:08, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the comedy relief! Someone changes the rules to meet your request and you use this to reprove him? Is there any way to make to happy short of suicide? --87.189.124.195

I think it's an untenable position that major plot points (not major critical perspectives) must be included in an introduction, in every case, and so no courtesy to the reader is ever called for. I'll also point out that the "German solution" that's been proposed is quashed by this assertion as well, since it describes "spoiler" information as appearing in sections or discussions of the plot per se. Even in The Crying Game, the facts are that the inclusion of a transvestite character attracted the attention of the LGBT community; and that the marketing of the film was marked by the distributors exhorting reviewers and reporters not to give away the twist. Deciding that our requirement to report these facts translates into "Dil has a weiner!" is just as childish as unencyclopedic as some of the silly examples of overwarning that have been enumerated in this discussion. I would be surprised, in fact, if the introductory section of any other encyclopedia (should it have a specific entry on The Crying Game at all) had this plot detail specifically stated. I would be surprised if this were true for Citizen Kane or any of the other serious examples here were, and have offered a donut--yes, a donut!--to anyone who can show me one. Demi ^T/_C 21:20, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Demi's position here. It is soemtiems essentiol to include a plot twist or major plot point in the lead paragraph or section of an article. More often it is not important enough to be mentioned there, whether there is a "spoiler" or not. I do agree that in those cases where such information should be mentioned in a lead section, the desire to tag spoilers should take second place. This should be made clearer than it has been, and shold be enforced more consistantly. DES ^(talk) 22:14, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually, if we went by other encyclopedias, from my check on the subject, we'd delete all our film articles or reduce them to stubs. No encyclopedia I could find has summaries at all, spoiler warninged or not. So they're not that helpful a guide here. More broadly, I tend to feel like the major problem is still that consideration of spoilers is getting introduced into the idea of how to write a lead. I largely agree with Demi, inasmuch as I think a good lead will write itself and decide whether a spoiler is essential or not. To that end, I don't think this policy does anything useful - other things, like the general sense of what a good lead and a good article look like, will control this adequately. Adding a spoiler guideline only creates opportunities for misinterpretation. Phil Sandifer 03:08, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Fuzzy definitions

The lack of clear line between spoiler and non-spoiler is a problem. I'll agree that Spider-Man 3 can validly be spoiled, and that there are good reasons not to discuss its ending right now. (Chief among them - the film is too new to have any critical perspective on its ending, so there's no good way of knowing if it's the most important thing about the film) I'm more skeptical about Spider-Man 2. I'm quite skeptical about Braveheart. And I think the idea of spoiling Birth of a Nation is ludicrous. There's some point at which it's just not sensible to keep shuffling information around. The guideline thus fails because it does not provide a key piece of guidance - when are these tags useful, and when are they not? How can that guidance be provided? Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Why is the idea of spoiling Birth of a Nation ludicrous? Cop 633 17:13, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Because the film is nearly a century old. The important things about it are virtually all critical perspective at that point, not its aesthetic experience to a new viewer. To my mind, it's firmly in a category where nobody approaches it blind. Everybody who sees it sees it in the context of its impact and criticism, and so spoiler warnings are beside the point. The question, for me, is where that line gets drawn. I'd say The Godfather is at this point similar to Birth of a Nation, for instance - it's not a film that meaningfully gets approached blind. Phil Sandifer 17:18, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but that's simply not an objective thing to say. When I watched BoN I didn't know how it was going to end. Indeed, I was rather surprised by its ending. I certainly knew a few things about it - watched it knowing that it would be racist, knowing it glorified the KKK, and knowing that it was the first feature length film. That was all. If your argument is that nobody watches silent movies for the simple aesthetic experience, well you're wrong, mate - some people do. In fact, they should, silent movies are great! And if you're applying that argument to The Godfather ... well, again, you may know the ending, but many people don't. This debate about spoilers is very interesting, and raises important questions, but age of the work is not a factor in the discussion, I believe, and is not an area of 'fuzziness'. Cop 633 17:44, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Hm. I don't think you're really responding to what I'm saying, exactly. This is partially my fault - reading my comment, I was unclear. Let me try again. There comes a point, and I think this point is correlatable with age, though not caused by age, where the critical response to a text becomes more significant than the aesthetic experience of the text itself. That is to say, where an article that is focused on the way in which the text is aesthetically experienced is just the wrong article to have. Romeo and Juliet seems the most dramatically far I can go on this scale - there is just nothing to say in 2007 about that topic that does not assume the ending to be known. It just doesn't make sense to talk about the play in an encyclopedic fashion as an unfolding event, which is what spoiler tags and concerns about spoilers by their nature do. But that's not because of age as such - age just makes it easier for a more fundamental transition in the way the work is received to take place. This is not objective, I'll grant, but I don't see why it has to be either. Phil Sandifer 17:54, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Let us not forget that the reader can infer that they die on the /very first page/. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 18:03, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think R&J can ever serve as an example for this question. As pointed out before, the ending is plainly told before Act I even begins. The whole work was never meant to be "an unfolding event" the way modern books and movies are. --87.189.124.195

You're talking about a very complex question. I think they're necessary when a significant number of editors feel they're necessary. What's wrong with letting people exercise their judgement? JulesH 18:16, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, I think the point at which "the critical response to a text becomes more significant than the aesthetic experience of the text itself" is not something that can be pinpointed or decided upon by individuals. I'm with you on Romeo and Juliet, but only because, as Melodia points out, their death is expressly stated in the prologue. I dislike the notion that Shakespeare is not alive today as an aesthetic experience. Think of The Tragedy of Cymbeline ... which isn't a tragedy. You might think you know the ending from the title. But you don't, and the surprise can still be thrilling 400 years later. I'm not saying the ending can't be written about, I'm just saying a few warnings are polite. Cop 633 18:32, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

And I think you are reverting a lot of well-reasoned and good faith edits by a lot of experienced editors, many of them admins. Is there really anyone left in the world who does not know the plot twist in Citizen Kane? Guy (Help!) 18:58, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Is that a trick question? There are probably five billion people who don't. (Not everyone is born in the USA, imagine that!!) --87.189.124.195

Sure it acn be decided by individuals. It's no harder than deciding the relative importance of any two viewpoints in an article. Which arguments go first in Existence of God? Which criticisms of a philosopher go first? We have to make ordered distinctions like this all the time. Phil Sandifer 03:16, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

When I took a film course at university, no-one had seen Citizen Kane and most knew nothing about it at all. Several had never heard of it. Cop 633 19:17, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Then they might have benefited from reading our article on Citizen Kane. --Tony Sidaway 19:28, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

... whether it contains warning or not. They might even enjoyed the twist ending if it wouldn't. --87.189.124.195

The fact that a style guideline requires a judgment call is not grounds for objecting to it. Lots of them do--we are okay with guidelines that call for judgment, trusting that editors will exercise it. And when they don't, and the guideline needs clarity, we can address that, too, by improving it. Demi ^T/_C 21:28, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I agree. If anything, I want this guideline to call for more use of judgment, not less. But what bothers me here is that the guideline offers no provision for judgment on this sort of an issue, nor does it make any gesture towards how that judgment might be made. So my question remains: how can we help editors draw this line? Phil Sandifer 03:16, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

• I disagree with teh idea that only recent works can be spolied, or that spoiler tage are only appropriate on recent works. I will agree that the more recent the work, the more reason for a tag. I also agree that in the case of very widely know works such as the bible or the plays of Skakespear or the works of Homer, tags are clearly inappropriate. But many people newly read or watch works that are far from new, and may well be wish to avoid spoiler information. Not everery one know all the plot details of every work published more than a few years ago. Particuarlly with works that are nor recent, but are also no very widely known, spoiler tags may well be appropriate. DES ^(talk) 22:11, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• • Sure. I mean, I don't pretend there's a bright line distinction. I hate bright line distinctions, in fact. Never found one on Wikipedia that was any real use. (Except maybe the 3RR) Hardly anybody seems to seriously believe Hamlet needs a spoiler tag. And I think almost everybody can accept that when Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows comes out, there will be some reason to segregate spoilers from the main text for a bit, though whether a tag is appropriate is an open question. But between that is a world of discussible points, and I think some guidance on navigating that world is in order. Phil Sandifer 03:16, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

First of all, I think the idea that everyone knows how a particular work of fiction ends is just wrong. I do know a lot more about films than most people around me, and I see significant movies for the first time all the time (eg. last week Yojimbo from 1961). I could think of major literary works that I don't know faster than I could write them down. The whole notion that a certain work can be considered known by anyone is just unfounded arrogance.

The whole argument is IMHO something of a red herring. There are lot worse problems than these spoilers to decide (eg. who started WWI, how many people died in the Holocaust), and Wikipedia copes quite well. Does the fact that Laura Palmer is murdered merits a warning? Does the name of the murderer? These questions can be answered trivially most of the time, and after some deliberation in the remaining cases. --87.189.124.195

Fighting the taylorized robot hordes

Guidelines are dangerous things. If you make a guideline, people will follow it. With gusto. Hence the spoiler tagging of everything that has a structure that might be considered narrative. This is bad, and part of why we should be cautious with guidelines. This guideline, as it stands, does very little to discourage crazed and single-minded application. And that has done harm to a vast number of articles. (Night (book) had a spoiler warning once. That's just not good.) Small harm, to be sure, but harm. And who knows how many times articles got inappropriately re-arranged to hide things behind spoiler tags. How can this guideline be rewritten to discourage, rather than encourage horrifically Taylorized applications? (Generally, I find that guidelines that call for judgment repell the most Taylorized of our editors. I've seen very few people go on mad NPOV sprees, and far more go on mad "cite sources" sprees.) Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd say the description of works it applies to should definitely be narrowed to fictional works. Biographical or historical works should not have spoiler warnings in most cases, I think. I don't see any reason not to include them in most articles on fiction, though.

The current text stating (essentially) that spoiler tags should not be considered when making decisions concerning the structure of the article perhaps solves some of the issues you're talking about, and I understand this text was added recently. JulesH 18:21, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't, because it still puts the default on the side of Taylorized application. I tend to think Morven has it pretty on-target below. Phil Sandifer 03:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

We at the very least need to make it clear that not having a spoiler tag is the default, and that, like fair-use images, a good case has to be made for their inclusion in each specific article they are used in.

I personally can tolerate spoiler warnings in articles about recent works of fiction, especially where there is a significant secret that can be spoiled. Someone made a good point above - I think it was Phil Sandifer - that when a work has accumulated enough criticism and analysis that the importance of such plot twists is critical to discussing the work in general that spoiler warnings need to go.

This requires a judgment call on each article they are used on. It's my experience, as Phil states above, that too many Wikipedia editors prefer hard rules to judgment, and would prefer a short algorithm by which they can determine whether a spoiler warning should be present. Well, sucks to be them; you're not getting one from me. Use your brain. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 20:01, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I think this is exactly on target - the default is no spoiler warnings, with a case needing to be made for why they should go in. Phil Sandifer 03:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

This point about commentary is an important one, because I think our practice should be based - at least in part - on what the sources do. Do they add a casual warning - as I've seen some media coverage of newly released works do - to avoid reading further lest secrets be spoiled, or do they assume that the twists are known already? We should be adopting the stance taken by our sources. Johnleemk | Talk 05:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. Sites like IGN are some of the most reliable video game news sites, but they also contain game guides etc. The key reason here being that those sites are not encyclopedias. If encyclopedias were to use spoiler warnings, I might reconsider my stance. --Teggles 05:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

We're kind of redefining the concept of a traditional encyclopaedia - as Phil Sandifer pointed out, normal encyclopaedias don't even have articles on most of the pop culture things we cover. Obviously proper encyclopedic writing normally deserves priority over spoiler warnings - what I'm saying is that one major factor in determining whether we should be giving the question of spoilers more weight is whether our sources show concern about avoiding spoilers. Johnleemk | Talk 06:13, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

But these sites are not a good representative of what Wikipedia should include. As I stated, sources like IGN and GameSpot contain things we would never think to include; game guides etc. Why apply different reasoning for "spoiler" content? --Teggles 06:27, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Um...you're assuming our guidelines are enforced by automata who lack the ability to apply editorial judgment. What I am saying is that in editorial judgment, an important factor should be how our sources treat the subject. Does Ebert worry about exposing a spoiler? That might tell you something about whether we should be putting a spoiler in the article. Johnleemk | Talk 06:50, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

When there is a critical focus (as in the case of Ebert), it is expected that it there would be omission of "spoilers". A critic's goal is to provide advise on the worth of a movie. An encyclopedia's goal is to provide comprehensive information. To let their goal be a strong factor in the inclusion of spoilers is nonsensical. Of course there is an editorial judgment, but as this section infers, people do follow an automata-like approach. --Teggles 07:05, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Ebert is probably not the greatest example to illustrate appropriate spoiler-warning, since the motivation for checking out a review of a film is rather different to that for checking out an encyclopedia article. Indeed, a review pretty much presupposes that the audience has not yet seen the film being reviewed. --Stormie 07:08, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Ok, so please provide two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias who tell the spoiler of Fight Club without warning. --87.189.124.195

Morven's statement above seems reasonable. I can see spoiler warnings being very cut back and becoming temporary tags for those with a strong argument to use it. While I still don't see spoilers warnings as "bad", a courtesy is not a guaranteed right, and should take a back seat to other concerns. -- Ned Scott 06:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with Morven. Spoilers should be used in every instance in which they are appropriate, and his suggestion would exclude them in a significant number of fringe cases. Warning opponents have yet to show what actual damage is done by warnings, so I don't see why the bias should be against them.

There is no useful definition of "recent" for this.

Discussion of a work is not hampered by warnings.

I wholeheartedly agree with the brain thing. --87.189.124.195

(deindent) I fail to see why we should assume that our audience has already viewed the subject matter. We don't assume the reader of World War II was alive at the time the war broke out; why do we assume that the reader of an article on a particular topic has some familiarity with that topic at all? Also, the discussion of a critic's role seems to have missed by a mile the fact that critics assess the overall worth and significance of a movie - or any work, for that matter. Ebert does occasionally include the odd twist, and IIRC, he once railed against the spoiling of Million Dollar Baby by critics who disapproved of a message delivered by the twist - that in particular is what I had in mind.

Also, you have to bear in mind that with time, sources naturally stop worrying about spoilers. For instance, if Ebert were to write anything about Million Dollar Baby today, I doubt he would be as worried about spoiling it as much as he was a few years back. The point of looking to our sources is to have a basis for assessing whether something is still considered too recent to be spoiled.

For example, today, all our sources on [some iconic movie] probably avoid excessive spoilers without giving a warning, so this tells us: 1. what to avoid spoiling (avoiding the original research problem); 2. that now is not necessarily a good time to give away any twists in the plot. In due time, our sources will likely not worry about spoiling the twists, and we can make the necessary changes.

Referring to our sources is a good idea because otherwise any decision we come to on spoilers - short of getting rid of them altogether - will be by and large arbitrary and possibly subject to original research and/or POV. I don't see a good reason to totally ignore what our sources are doing. As for editorial judgment, the solution to that is thwacking the ignoramuses with a cluestick - not to try to develop rules that prevent those with a clue from using it. Johnleemk | Talk 07:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

In the first paragraph, I don't know what you're making an argument against (no one said anything along the lines of that), but the assumption is that by going to an article, they should expect to read information on the subject. No need for warnings. I see what you're trying to say in regards to critics, but this would only be valid if spoiler warnings were used on a selective basis; I want them gone entirely, and I want no withholding of information just because they're "spoilers". Also, "thwacking the ignoramuses with a cluestick" does not work. You can try removing spoiler warnings from plot sections on movie articles and you'll have a huge backlash, no matter what your argument. However, if the guideline doesn't end up being removed entirely, changing the guideline is very good. There would be a basis for the acts of those who have a clue. --Teggles 08:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Stormie said that reviews presuppose the reader has not seen the work, and implied that we do not make any such presupposition, which IMO, is ridiculous. That's what I was dealing with. As for using spoiler warnings on a "selective basis", yes, that is the whole point - to severely reduce the frequency of how we use these tags, but not to eliminate them entirely. Hard rules like "never use spoiler tags" are as bad as "always use spoiler tags" because although they are easy to enforce, they cause a lot of pain and grief for the exceptions to the rule - which are often more numerous than you might expect. And the point of this discussion is to reach a consensus so we can develop a guideline adequat for cluestick thwacking. Johnleemk | Talk 12:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Make the guideline explicit enough (over time - no need to rush it) that the bots can help. Alternatively, explicitley forbid bots. --87.189.124.195

Aim of policy change

I have another point to make: What is the aim of this policy discussion? I seem to see some voices who wants to get rid of spoiler warnings altogether, so this is what I'm arguing against. As with nearly everything, I see room for improvements for the way warnings are handled. --87.189.89.215

The way I've been reading your arguments, they are a defence of existing practice; you haven't been arguing against just wholesale salting of the spoiler tags, you've been arguing against reasonable claims that they are harming how we write the encyclopaedia. Johnleemk | Talk 16:51, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Of course I haven't argued against reasonable claims, else I would be unreasonable.

I support current practice mostly. I cannot see where I defended excesses, or warnings in historical works etc. --87.189.89.215

Here, here, here, here, need I go on? Hipocrite - «Talk» 17:09, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Read all my comments: "My recent rvs were just rvs of a mass implementation of the policy some would like to introduce. Whatever the result of this discussion, implementation should wait until it's over." --87.189.89.215

I suggest you stop. Hipocrite - «Talk» 17:12, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

That would be convenient, wouldn't it? --87.189.89.215

If you don't support your edits, don't make them. Hipocrite - «Talk» 17:14, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

So you think it would be useful if any disputed policy is implemented by both sides of the discussion during the discussion? I don't, so I revert it. You might have had a point if I had added new spoiler warnings to an article. --87.189.89.215

I know you're new here, but yes, guidelines are described by practice, not practice described by guidelines. The first step to getting spoilers off of Romeo and Juliet is not to edit the guideline, but to remove the spoiler. That's how we do things here, 87. Hipocrite - «Talk» 17:20, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm far from new, and I know that changes are regularly made that way. I just don't think it would be the best way to proceed during a discussion like this. These changes are distracting and they are perfectly able to spoil any good mood which might have been prevalent earlier in the discussion. Now please don't claim that the articles are broken by the warning in a way that immediate action is unavoidable. --87.189.89.215

What ip addresses/accounts have you edited from in the past? Hipocrite - «Talk» 17:33, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Move this discussion on my /Talk. --87.189.89.215

Well I can tell you that my aims would be to remove all spoiler tags. I've thought this for about a year and a half now ever since I saw spoiler tags on literature from literally more than two thousand years ago. If you come read an encyclopedia article on a subject, you should expect a thorough discussion of it. Spoiler tags are amateurish and do not belong in a real encyclopedia. --Cyde Weys 22:40, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Please stop claiming that spoiler tags remove content. It's childish.

Please provide two major encyclopedias which tells the spoiler of Fight Club without warning. --87.189.124.195

The above IP is replacing spoiler tags on *nursery rhymes*, and so is not to be taken too seriously.--Doc^g 12:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

The above user is doing Ad Hominems and violates WP:NPA and so is not to be taken too seriously. (Also, see section PLEASE STOP EDIT WARRING for my motives of the reverts Doc talks about.) --87.189.124.195

What is a spoiler?

Isn't the very declaration that plot point X is a spoiler, and plot point Y is not a spoiler, original research (unless backed up by a reliable source saying "this is a spoiler," which they almost never are) and thus forbidden?

If I didn't know, going in to see Titanic, that Leonardo DiCaprio was in the movie, and I found my enjoyment of the movie heightened by not knowing that until he appeared on screen, should that information be considered a spoiler, and marked as such, to preserve the same potential enjoyment for anyone else who might see the movie?

If I figured out in the first thirty seconds of The Sixth Sense that Bruce Willis's character was dead, and I still enjoyed the movie, does that mean that information isn't a spoiler?

I'm curious to hear from those who support keeping the spoiler tag just how a spoiler is defined, and whether there's any objective, non-OR way to do so, short of marking the entirety of every article on Wikipedia a spoiler. (And before you jump in with "fictional works," keep in mind there are non-fiction books with twist endings whose enjoyment may be reduced by knowing the ending in advance.) Chuck 17:33, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Titanic was heavily marketed as a Leo DiCaprio film. Sixth Sense was heavily marketed as a film with a twist in the end and is discussed as such in pop culture. That seems to answer those questions. But I'm sure there are grey areas that are best discussed on a case by case basis... Cop 633 17:47, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

So should a spoiler warning only be applied when a reliable source indicates that the information is a spoiler or twist? That would eliminate probably 99.9% of spoiler warnings in Wikipedia. Chuck 17:56, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

If I o to Wikipedia to look up Sixth Sense, you may rely on the fact that I will want to know what the twist is. If I want to see a teaser which does not give anything away, I'll go to Amazon reviews or a fansite. Guy (Help!) 18:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Might I suggest that there might be others not just in our community but amongst our readership who do not share your personal views on spoilers? I rather disagree that providing spoilersis mollycoddling the reader; it is simply polite to let people know that they may not wish to know specific facts about the movie's plot. Whether a person has been under a rock, or has simply been living in a country where certain movies are either are not permitted to be shown (Cannibal Holocaust in Italy, Borat in Saudi Arabia and 300 in Iran immediately springs to mind). It is not unlikely that someone from one of those countries would want to know what the fuss is about, and still not want to know what the plot details are. Ergo, spoilers prove useful.

I agree that the few exceptions which have been brought up as demonstrations of the misapplication of spoiler guidelines are indicative of both the dissent within the community as to the definitions and usefulness of the guideline. Clearly, a great deal of those wishing to 'delete' the guideline are of the opinion that it is also unencyclopedic. I would argue that as an online encyclopedia, some internet conventions have been observed without significant public outcry - including the use of spoilers. It should be noted that the detailing of specific plot twists might actually get us sued. Film reviewers (as well as their parent newspapers) have been held liable for revealing plot twists of recently released films, as it damaged potential box office or DVD sales; we could be treading into this territory as well.

If the matter is one of misapplication of the template, then the best course is to educate the community on how to properly apply it. If the issue is that of usefulness, I think that avoiding lawsuits while providing what our readership wants and expects is entirely useful.

I think that perhaps the use of the spoiler tag does become stale after time, and its application to films over a certain age shouldn't require them, though I would would not want to hazard what that cut-off date should be. Certainly, spoiler tags shouldn't apply to the B&W King Kong, or other films of that time period. Arcayne (^{cast a spell}) 20:01, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Last time I checked we have a spoiler warning linked to every page. Please keep in mind we are an encyclopedia. We do what is best for the article's flow, not shoving select information into select locations, unless the flow of the article dictates that. In any case, I would like to ask, how do we figure out what is and what is not a spoiler? That determination relies on the tagger's point of view. Cheers! —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 20:26, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

"That determination relies on the tagger's point of view." - and it is in this way that spoilers violate WP:NPOV. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 21:23, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The base of this issue

At the base of this issue is a conflict of interest. Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclopedia. At the same time we don't want to "spoil" our readers fun - for if one would have to constantly worry that somebody might "spoil his fun" for a movie or game, he would not use Wikipedia to inform himself about this thing.
Let me start with an example: You have noticed the Game "Super RPG Adventure" which is praised by your peers for its deep story and plot. So you look at the Wikipedia entry for "Super RPG Adventure" and read "... and in a twist ending, it is revealed that the player's enemy, which the player has been guessing for the entire game is actually RandomDude..." From a objective view, everything thing is fine, no factual errors etc. From a subjective view the reader will probably be unhappy, because he feels "cheated" out of a great game and storyline. In a non theoretical example, The Game (film), is based entirely around having the audience guessing what exactly - really - is happening. If the audience exactly knows what is happening, the movie is far less enjoyable. Spoiler tags allow Readers to stop accidently "spoiling" the film for themselves. So the question is, do we want to do away with spoiler tags and rid us of the burden of deciding what is a spoiler and what not, or do we keep them and thus prevent "spoilers" for our readers. As a editor, I would not mind either way, but as a user I'd like to look up Movies, Games and Stories without having to worry of finding myself spoiled. "Snape kills Dumbledore" - I wonder how many friendships got broken over those three words, uttered before the second party managed to read the book? CharonX/talk 17:48, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

"If the audience exactly knows what is happening, the movie is far less enjoyable." -- And who gets to decide that? Chuck 17:57, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

We're an encyclopedia. We provide the facts. Our readers know this and if they're too stupid to realise it then we gently point them at the content disclaimer. We're hard-asses, party-poopers. We're dedicated encyclopedists and in the decision on how to present the information the user's enjoyment plays no part. The readers know that and those who can't handle it avoid our site in favor of a fan site that will treat them like children instead of adults. --Tony Sidaway 18:12, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you! We're not here to hold our readers' hands and insult their intelligence. This isn't a GameFAQs message forum (although certain Wikipedians treat it as such when they debate by acting uncivil, writing in caps, etc.) or a fansite; it's an encyclopedia, and we must treat all sensitive content in a professional manner. That means not providing ridiculous, common sense warnings. Go to the Penis page, and you'll see images of penises. Go to the Final Fantasy VII page, and you'll find out that Aerith dies. — Deckiller 18:53, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

You seem to have a personal grudge against people looking for background information about a film without spoiling it for them. Why do you want to restrict use of Wikipedia to people who don't care if a work of fiction is still as appealing after reading a WP article? --87.189.124.195

The thing is, if you think your enjoyment will be spoiled by reading a comprehensive article about the thing, then don't go to an encyclopaedia because encyclopaedias provide just that: comprehensive coverage (see wikt:encyclopaedia, in case it wasn't obvious). In any case the real argument here is about whether 100% of the spoiler warnings are absurd or only about 95% of them. Anybody who doesn't know the salient facts about the plot of Citizen Kane, Titanic, Gone The Wind, Casablanca, The Book of Ruth (FFS!) or the Iliad or whatever, obviously has a pretty good mechanism for avoiding spoilers without help from us. The clue is usually in the section title: "plot details". Guy (Help!) 18:21, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I would certainly be in favour of a change to the guideline stating that a spoiler warning is unnecessary in a section of the article whose heading makes it clear that it contains a plot summary. Warnings are clearly redundant in such situations. But having them in other situations, where you might not be expecting to see plot details, can be helpful. JulesH 18:24, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

That would require warnings at the very top of many articles, as the header sections should, when valuable (which I think is "very often", and perhaps "nearly always"), include plot details. Lexicon (talk) 18:37, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

No that simply requires us to not use spoiler templates as often as we do. We really ought to avoid using it in cases where the header of the section is "plot" or some other wording of that. I'm still wondering why we even need it, we are not narrating a story to folks, we are an encyclopedia :). Plus how do we determine what information is a 'spoiler'? That determination is inherently a Point of View of whoever adds the tag. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 18:46, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

While I said "header section" I meant "lead paragraph", which should summarize the entire article, and therefore include "spoilers" (and would, since it doesn't mention that it's a plot summary, require a spoiler warning). The fact of the matter is, a well-written article on a movie, television episode, or book, should "spoil it" within eight sentences. Lexicon (talk) 18:52, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Yep and our content disclaimer covers that :) No need for these banners to be in the top of every article on a movie, book, etc. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 18:59, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

{{spoiler}} has some mildly useful purposes: in most video game articles it is synonymous with {{original research}}, and in an article on any book or film published more than ten years ago it's usually an indication that the article is dominated by fanboys and there has not been sufficient scholarly input. Guy (Help!) 19:05, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Let me tell you something about my kids. They love the Harry Potter films and books. They have watched the films at three or four times, and read the books cover to cover time after time. I've read Lord of the Rings six times, and watched the films four times. You know something? I still enjoy them. Yup. Pleasure not in any way spoiled by knowing the ending. Whereas having spoiler tags on King Kong just in case there is some poor sap who's been hiding under a rock all these years and doesn't know that (look away now) 'the gorilla dies, makes us look, well, silly, really. Guy (Help!) 19:02, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

That brings up another point in relation to what is and isn't a spoiler, how do we determine what is and is not common knowledge? Aside from King Kong, Final Fantasy VII is another great example of this. The game has been out for 10 years, and has several sequels (1 film, 2 novellas, 2 games). According to all of their storylines, Aerith was killed by Sephiroth during the events of FFVII. Is this now common knowledge? If it isn't do we mark the fact that Aerith is already dead as a spoiler in the article on Final Fantasy VII Advent Children? Anyone who sees the movie (or even read about it) is already fully aware that Aerith dies, so is her death still considered a spoiler in FFVII's article, when the fact is advertised so blatantly? This is an example where calling something a spoiler is an example of POV. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 19:45, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

You are arguing a different problem. Would you kids mind if I tell them the end of the next Potter book before they read it? --87.189.124.195

I'm going to have to go with eighty-seven here. How about mystery novels? Detective books? The ones where the point of the first read-through are the suspence, the clues, the anticipation? --Kizor 20:42, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Sucks for them. It's one thing to be able to give a courtesy note, but we can't and shouldn't attempt to save people from spoilers. -- Ned Scott 20:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

We can and we should, because it's free. There is no downside whatsoever expect for some editor's hurt feelings. --87.189.99.112

Final Fantasy Advent Children is a sequel to FF7. We can assume, when writing an article about a sequel, that the reader knows the events of what it's a sequel to, so we wouldn't need a spoiler warning. Ken Arromdee 15:13, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

We need a Spoiler Warning policy guideline

Whatever people may say about spoilers, we need a policy about them. The policy may well end up saying "don't use them", but there still needs to be a policy. Just getting rid of the existing policy will result in a large amount of inconsistancy. People will still include spoiler warnings (in lots of different ways, since there would be no standard template), and other people won't be able to remove them without causing trouble if there isn't a specific policy banning them.

Once you realise that whatever we decide, we still need a policy, it becomes worth coming up with a policy that is a little more subtle than just "don't use spoiler warnings". We can have a detailed policy saying where they are and are not appropriate (no spoiler warnings in "Plot Summary" sections, for example). The various problems people are coming up with do not require removing warnings completely, they just require a more reasonable use of them. --Tango 20:15, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Err... we don't need a policy, at maximum if we choose to keep these at all, they would be under a WP:GUIDELINE. Policy is for things like blocking policy, etc. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 20:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, guideline, then. The difference is purely semantic. It's not like policies are set in stone anyway - there's always WP:IAR. --Tango 20:58, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, they are more dictative then guidelines. A Policy we must follow, save for the extremely rare WP:IGNORE. It's recommended that we do, but we don't have to follow a guideline. That makes a world of difference, so it's not "purely semantic." --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 21:26, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The important thing is that it is detailed enough to be a solid base for any decisions on warnings. --87.189.124.195

Other examples of content warnings?

Besides for spoilers, is there anything other content that we mark with warnings? I know we have templates related to character encoding issues (like Template:SpecialChars), but is there anything else? --- RockMFR 20:47, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Well as noted above somewhere, there's a tag similar to the spoiler everyone is talking about, for magic tricks and so forth. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 20:54, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Proposals

In light of the potential and actual abuses of spoiler warnings and other ways of accommodating readers who might not want spoilers, perhaps we could transform some of the objectives into useful proposals:

Spoiler warnings not permitted, no writing-around permitted

Compliance with the guideline demands ignoring concerns about revealing details of plot or character in every instance. The spoiler templates should be removed and deleted.

Spoiler guidelines strengthened for NPOV

The guideline should more strenuously encourage writers not to interrupt the flow or clarity of an article, and stress compliance with NPOV. Spoilers (plot details) generally to be avoided outside of appropriate sections unless particularly relevant to the scholarship of the work.

Spoiler warnings like fair-use images

Spoiler warnings are allowed, but like fair-use images the burden is on the person adding them to explain why they are necessary for this article. The default remains no spoiler warnings. Phil Sandifer 03:19, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Current practice

Leave the guideline as it existed before its MFD nomination.

A suggestion

Why not put a flag at the top of the articles with spoilers in, along the lines of Template:Current (and Template:Current-section if only a single section is affected)? That way, it doesn't interrupt the flow of the article. If consensus can be reached on the length of time that things remain a spoiler, then that could be mentioned in the template, and the template could be removed after that time period. Mike Peel 22:00, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

We already have a whacking great big banner in the content disclaimer which is linked through the Wikipedia:general disclaimer from every single page in the wiki. A heading at the very top of the disclaimer says (and I do not exaggerate the size):

WIKIPEDIA CONTAINS SPOILERS AND CONTENT YOU MAY FIND OBJECTIONABLE

I think that should be clear enough for most of us. It certainly doesn't intrude on any articles although it's linked from every single one. --Tony Sidaway 22:33, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Your argument is exactly as relevant as the percentage of readers reading the disclaimer each time before reading an article. --87.189.124.195

Yeah, this notice is rather annoying and unnecessary. It's pretty obvious that encyclopedia articles contain "spoilers". It doesn't need to be made explicit, and doing so is just kind of insulting to our readers. --Cyde Weys 22:41, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

There you have it. Every page already is warned to contain spoilers, thus the spoiler template and spoiler guideline are both redundant to the content disclaimer, and should be speedily deleted. --—NicholaiDaedalus 22:43, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, cancel parts of my comment, obviously I did not fully read the comment I was responding to. I was under the impression that he was suggesting to add that notice to the top of every page containing spoilers, but of course, he wasn't; he was merely pointing to where it is already on the disclaimers page, which is linked to from every article on Wikipedia. Mea culpa. --Cyde Weys 22:48, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The funny thing about this is that the idea of removing the warnings doesn't bother me, what bothers me are these lame and flawed reasonings. Do you realize how many people have never even read any of our disclaimer pages? Saying that every page as a link... to a link... to something with big text... doesn't change the fact that the pages are easily missed, and hardly anyone ever clicks on them. If we want to get rid of spoilers lets do it for good reasons. Don't treat the people in this debate like they're stupid. -- Ned Scott 00:29, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Ned there are many other valid reasons above. Cheers! —— Eagle 101 00:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm just commenting on the above reasoning, not on all of them. -- Ned Scott 00:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

It's damned good reasoning. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. Encyclopedia articles on fictional works contain sections marked "plot summary" or "synopsis" and nobody would be amazed to find that those sections contain details of the plot. For the people who are too stupid to work this out, we can point them to the content disclaimer. --Tony Sidaway 01:31, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I am not joking when I say... Wikipedia has a content disclaimer? I certainly haven't realized its existence in 4+ years... ugen64 07:06, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

That's a completely different line of argument (which was done repeatedly before), not a reason to rely on the disclaimer. Ignoring section headers is not the same as ignoring a linked page. --87.189.124.195

Ain't broke, don't fix it

According to this article: What is Popular on Wikipedia and Why? cited recently on Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost, 43% of WP articles read are on entertainment, and of these about 60% are on the kind of articles which use spoiler warnings — films, comics, TV series, games, books. Suggests there must be something right in the current practice. I certainly appreciate the spoiler warning flag... there are frequently reasons to consult articles on books etc I havn't read. It doesn't seem clever to me to turn off a large fraction of actual WP readers in the name of some theoretical model of what WP ought to be. No-one is claiming that this guidline should take precedence over policy, but there hardly ever needs to be a conflict (as demonstrated above in suggested leads for The Crying Game). PaddyLeahy 01:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I also read articles on things I haven't read. I want to know the context, how a book was received, how it stacks in the author's career, other trivia, etc... It's true that removing all spoiler tags would result in eventually everyone figuring out that there are spoilers on these pages, the number of first time users and occasional users dictates that we really shouldn't spoil a plot for them to learn this.--Loodog 02:32, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Why would these readers even bother looking at the "plot summary" or similar sections of articles on books they haven't read? In general, the lead section doesn't spoil twists (or it shouldn't, since lead sections should be succinct), and the couple of sentences for plot exposition in the lead will give them an idea of what the book is like. Or they can actually view an advertising or review site. — Deckiller 01:25, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Well I do think people read the plot sections of articles on fictional works they haven't read. At least, I do, and it's the main reason I would read an article about a fictional work. We shouldn't be ashamed of the fact that we're not an entertainment website, but an encyclopedia. Our business is putting the information out there. We shouldn't apologise for presenting all the information about the subject, and anybody who can't handle it can run off to whatever site they may be able to find that only presents part of it. --Tony Sidaway 01:34, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. I'd rather see us ranked 30th and become a complete and concise encyclopedia instead of 1st and full of cruft, reviews, and advertisements. Especially because the latter will actually alienate our target audience. — Deckiller 01:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Gladly, nobody wants cruft, reviews or advertisements, and neither will articles be forced to include such by adding spoiler warnings. --87.189.124.195

Please don't assume that all those who use spoilers are fanboys/girls. -- Ned Scott 01:38, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

That wasn't necessarily in response to the spoilers; rather, it was a response to us being deemed an entertainment forum or database in general. — Deckiller 01:44, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

>.>

<.< -- Ned Scott 01:57, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I generally agree with this view, and have thought that spoiler warnings really should have just been reserved for non-obvious situations. The needless application of a spoiler warning is a problem (obviously, from this very discussion itself). I'm not sure if it's a big deal in the end, one way or another, but a lot of people here are just venting anger about a misuse rather than the concept itself. I's not a big deal, nor is it wrong, to say "there's a spoiler here". -- Ned Scott 01:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm a bit confused here: Are we only discussing warnings in Plot sections? Do you think lead section should be spoiler-free?

Anyway, I think it is wrong to assume any particular reading pattern. Spoiler warnings add information to the article, just like section headers, which allows the reader to make his/her own decisions on what to read. --87.189.124.195

"Why would these readers even bother looking at the "plot summary" or similar sections of articles on books they haven't read?" When I read an article on a work that I'm not familiar with that has spoiler warnings, I am able to easily and unambiguously identify those areas that I wish to avoid. When I look at one without warnings, I must be continuously on guard for spoilers, and still run a high risk of accidentally viewing them. --Kizor 17:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with the OP, I think the spoiler warning serves an important role here. Aaron Bowen 13:35, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Identity crisis

Is Wikipedia a website structured as an encyclopedia; or is it an encyclopedia that happens to be online?

If it's the former, and WP really is just slightly better organized "crap off teh Intrawebs," and readers shouldn't expect tightly written, informative discussions of the subject of an article, then spoiler alerts belong in articles. It's the custom on the web and when you go to most websites, you're expecting, the material to be fannish and not very well organized.

On the other hand, I know of absolutely no encyclopedia that contains "spoiler alerts," because when you are reading an encyclopedia you expect to be fully informed about a topic. If you don't want to know the end, you don't read the article. Amazon.com and Yahoo! Movies are that-a-way. -->

In addition to the substantive advantages, eliminating "spoiler alerts" sends the right signal about what Wikipedia is: an encyclopedia, not a website. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 02:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

• With that said, seeing that this is an encyclopedia that happens to be online, and not a fanforum or website, spoiler warnings seem awfully unencyclopedic. You wouldn't open up the World Book Encyclopedia (or insert encyclopedia of choice here) or any other professionaly published material and see one of these spoiler warnings before a section entitled "Plot summary" or at all. DarthGriz98 04:25, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

This is a false dilemma. Wikipedia is obviously more than an encyclopedia that happens to be online, but it does not follow that it has to be "better organized crap". Again, please name two major encyclopedia which name the spoiler of Fight Club without warning.

Amazon does not contain spoiler. (Don't know about Yahoo! Movies.) --87.189.124.195

More than an encyclopedia online? It would seem to be exactly an encyclopedia that happens to be online: the free encyclopedia anyone can edit, not the free encyclopedia and movie, game and book review site anyone can edit. Amazon and Yahoo Movies don't contain spoilers precisely because they have different purposes than WP: you read those sites to determine if you want to see a movie; you read an encyclopedia because you simply want information about it. Could you provide me an example of an encyclopedia that contains a spoiler warning before revealing the spoiler in Fight Club? I'd be interested to see it. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 14:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

What I meant is that it's more than a traditional encyclopedia that happens to be online.

Again, a spoiler warning does not prevent the inclusion of information. Please stop claiming so.

I don't use traditional encyclopedias as precedent, so I don't have to. --87.189.124.195

Spoiler warnings are infantile and need to go

Spoiler warnings are infantile and not worthy of an encyclopedia that wants to be taken seriously. We report the facts, and a summary of the most important ones belongs in the article's lead section, whether they "spoil" or not. The general disclaimer already contains "Wikipedia contains spoilers", and that is all that's needed in this regard. All arguments by Phil Sandifer in the original deletion request are convincing and to the point. AxelBoldt 04:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

The vote is over, we are now collecting arguments. --87.189.124.195

iffy spoilers

I have ran a bot and have compiled a list of 4868 instances of iffy spoilers being used on wikipedia pages. These can be found at User:Eagle 101/iffyspoilers. The criteria for getting on this list was to have a spoiler come immediately before or after a section with the header of plot, plot summary, synopsis, overview, etc. These titles make it clear to the reader that guess what? the plot is going to be discussed. As such the spoiler tags on these articles are probably redundant. Removal of these probably would not be a bad idea. This counts for ~10% of all {{spoiler}} tags that we have in use. (we have approx 45250 +- 500 if I recall correctly). Again I suggest that at a bare minimum these tags can be removed, as they are superfluous to the existing headers. :) —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 05:34, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

This debate has been characterised by action rather than talking, which has not helped tempers. Rather than proposing making the change first, how about proposing a form of words for Wikipedia:Spoiler warning which would legitimise this action? (If and when any action is approved, please remember the end spoiler warnings too; people concerned about "Wikipedia looking silly" have not apparently been concerned enough to avoid leaving unmatched end warnings in place.) Notinasnaid 06:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

The list is there if anyone wants to do anything with it, to me it shows a fine example on how our guideline has mislead some of our editors to putting spoiler tags on very obvious locations. If the header says plot what do you expect to see there? :P In any case, I hope that the list is useful for debate as well as taking action when and if it is needed. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 07:45, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Doc proposed a form of wording for {{spoiler}} which involved blanking it. I support this wording - David Gerard 09:46, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I do not support this. It feels like a fait accompli, since at a stroke this bypasses all other discussion, and also makes the guidline under discussion impossible to follow. Notinasnaid 09:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Bear in mind that some Plot sections are clearly "spoiler free" and can be easily read without problem, others are far too detailed and include many spoilers. My own view would be that a plot intoduction should be kept spoiler free. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 08:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Keeping a section about the plot spoiler free is a contradiction to being an encyclopedia, which has a mission of informing people about stuff they look up. Kusma (talk) 10:17, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Also, many articles seem to have {{spoiler}} added to the plot / synopsis section as a matter of course, simply because it's a plot or synopsis section, which is absurd. Spoiler warnings are irrelevant in anything over ten years old anyway, redundant in sections called plot or synopsis, and used in place of {{original research}} in many video game articles. Guy (Help!) 11:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I can't tell if anyone else has voiced this opinion on this gigantic page, but I certainly do not agree with your position that "Spoiler warnings are irrelevant in anything over ten years old". I can't see why the age of the work should make any difference. — The Storm Surfer 12:17, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Do you really beliebe that Iliad should have a spoiler warning (spoiler: the Greeks win). Or Jesus? (spoiler: he is resurrected). Kusma (talk) 12:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

It's hard to tell if you aren't merely trying to make my position look absurd, but I think that your examples are poor because the 'spoilers' you choose are widely believed to be historical events. (Using the Jesus article is particularly ridiculous since it presents its subject as a historical individual rather than a literary character from the very start.) — The Storm Surfer 13:56, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

And that there is one school of thought which holds that he never actually died to begin with. We could have a flame war over whether {{spoiler}} in that instance would violate NPOV guidelines! -- llywrch 23:02, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"Target Audience"??

Some editors here are clearly unhappy with the success of Wikipedia and would prefer it to be much smaller, e.g. User:Deckiller refers to "our target audience. I notice this isn't linked, presumably Deckiller couldn't find the page WP:Target audience but in fact it's there on the home page "The free encyclopedia anyone can edit". Presumably Deckiller wants this to be: "The free encyclopedia anyone can edit but only the educated elite should read". WP is more than an encyclopedia: no encyclopedia would have an article on every pokemon, every steam locomotive that ever ran on UK railways, or every US highway. WP is a resource that can grow up with the reader, a bit like a primitive version of A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer. Today's fanboys are tomorrow's avid readers of your articles on, er, Final Fantasy.

Also, enough of this "real encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings". Paper encyclopedias are not designed for scrolling text, so spoiler warnings would be much less useful in them. PaddyLeahy 09:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

There's no difference between skipping text when reading online or offline. Actually, it is easier to put a paper on your offline book than to hide text on your monitor. Kusma (talk) 10:08, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there is. Every one of our articles begins on the top of its own page. There is no chance of an accidental glimpse as you search for the beginning. Further, online skipping text has machine assistance by way of the search function. --Kizor 21:33, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Also, other mainstream online encyclopedias do not contain spoiler warnings either. Nor do online encyclopedias that concentrate on fictional topics: note that wookieepedia:Anakin Skywalker and MemoryAlpha:Spock do not contain a warning, although they contain major spoilers. Kusma (talk) 10:23, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Some TV encyclopedias also have sensible spoiler policies. See wikia:24:Wiki_24:Spoilers: they say "Spoiler warnings are NOT given for already aired episodes." Kusma (talk) 10:40, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

And Wiki 24 does not give spoiler warnings on any already aired episodes, even though the description might spoil the episode for people who haven't seen it yet. If we followed that standard, we should have a spoiler warning for any plot points of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows currently, but the spoiler warning would come off the day the book is published. But I don't think that's what any of the pro-spoiler-warning folks here are advocating. Chuck 14:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Please name two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias which name the plot twist of Fight Club without a warning. --87.189.124.195

Please name two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias which name the plot twist of Fight Club with a warning. Chuck 14:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Why should I, I don't claim that Wikipedia should be exactly as other encyclopedias. --87.189.124.195

OK, then, show me two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias which have articles on Fight Club. Chuck 17:24, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

In case I find none, should we delete Fight Club?

The implication of this thread is obvious: Other encyclopedias are different in many ways, so any argument in copy them religiously is bogus. --87.189.99.112

I agree with Paddy Leahy; there certainly is a difference between reading on screen and in print. And I would like to know what the heck the point of the whole discussion is. Deb 11:50, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

It is that Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia, and online encyclopedias do not contain spoiler warnings. Kusma (talk) 11:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

But Wikipedia's competitors also pale in comparison of their coverage of pop culture and current (and ongoing) entertainment. Sure, there's no warning about plot summaries surrounding Moby Dick or Henry V in E. Britannica, but there's also no coverage of, say, The Sixth Sense, Harry Potter, or 24. --Flex (talk/contribs) 12:30, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

As I've said elsewhere, every last 'edit this page' link is a breach of tradition, and the existence of Wikipedia is proof that we've built a good (or otherwise, depending on your opinion) resource not only on the basis on what is conventional, but what's good and what works. No other online encyclopedia has our resources, our breadth or our coverage. --Kizor 21:30, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Who cares vs who accepts

Perhaps not the best header name...but one thing that crossed my mind. I think a LOT of people come to Wikipedia and see the warnings, so they assume the warnings are the way it's done -- not that they want/feel the need for them, simply think "Ok, so WP has spoiler warnings". I know that's how I initially felt. I wonder if we got rid of most/all the warnings, would people in general still feel like they are "needed"? Then again, perhaps WP has become too popular that the number of people who think WP is "supposed" to have them outweigh those who'd come and not even think about it upon reading articles without the tag. Just a thought, and I know I probably don't make too much sense there. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 12:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

PLEASE STOP EDIT WARRING

There is a discussion above. When it reaches a consensus, that will be the time to roll out your opinions into the encyclopedia. AndyJones 13:02, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

See [1], [2], [3], [4].

Here is another one: [5] --87.189.124.195

The only one I see who is engaged in an edit war is you. A consensus has been retched that redundant tags and tags on classical/historical works are completely unnecessary and can be removed. --Farix (Talk) 13:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

So I revert back and forth all by myself? Ok, I promise that I will never do that again. --87.189.124.195

The IP caught me interest because he/she was replacing spoiler tags on nursery rhymes. I consider that vandalism and disruption - and will treat it as such, unless anyone can make a coherent case for how a spoiler tag on Little Red Riding Hood or Cinderella improves the encyclopedia.--Doc^g 13:06, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

You are picking your examples. I reverted a large number of changes which are currently discussed here. Sadly, when dealing with people disrupting Wikipedia you don't always have the luxary of judging each change by its merit, so not all your changes might be wrong.

So let's make a deal: I remove all spoiler tag on nursery rhymes you can point out and you revert any spoiler-related changes to any other article pointed out above. Will that work for you? --87.189.124.195

Like I suggested at your old IP, I suggest again that you don'r make changes you don't agree with. Hipocrite - «Talk» 13:14, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Like I answered then, reverting disruptive edits is something I support very much. --87.189.124.195

It's your reverts that are disruptive. These editors have seen a consensus form over the remove of spoiler tags that are clearly redundant or are clearly inappropriate. --Farix (Talk) 13:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

So you say doing mass edits while a heated discussion about a directly related policy is ongoing is non-disruptive? Do you think the warnings are so destructive to the articles that removing them could not have waited until the storm is over? --87.189.124.195

What I'm saying is that these two usages of the spoiler tag now has a consensus. Other usages of the tags are still being debated. But that doesn't mean that we must wait for all points have been settled before act on any settled point. --Farix (Talk) 13:48, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

That was understood. I still would like to here anyone's opinion about whether the edits should have been done during a lively debate about a policy directly involving the edits. --87.189.124.195

What aspect of inappropriate or redundant spoiler tags is still being debated? --Farix (Talk) 14:03, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Please answer my questions: Is doing mass edits while a heated discussion about a directly related policy is ongoing is non-disruptive? Do you think the warnings are so destructive to the articles that removing them could not have waited until the storm is over? Do you think the edits should have been done during a lively debate about a policy directly involving the edits? And a new one: Do you think the edits are completely independent of the discussion? --87.189.124.195

Depends on what is being discussed. If it is on a point were a rough consensus has been reached, even though other aspects of the policy or guideline are still being discussed, then it's not disruptive. If it is on a point that is still hotly contested by several editors, then it would be disruptive. But again, these two points have not being hotly contested by several editors. --Farix (Talk) 14:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see that you understand the point. I suggested (several time) that these changes should wait to avoid heating up this discussion. Your point does not address that AT ALL, so please stop bringing it up again. (Also, again, see above for more opinions about spoiler tags in plot sections.) --87.189.124.195

Replacing spoiler tags which we should assume were placed earlier by other editors in a good faith effort to improve the encyclopedia. Are you suggesting that these editors who originally placed the spoiler tags were all disruptive vandals? What I find disruptive (though obviously not vandalism) is that people are making sweeping changes in line with their interpretation of a guideline that is being hotly debated. I think the best thing for the encyclopedia would be to effectively freeze all the spoiler tags for a few days rather than making hundreds (thousands?) of speedy edits and reverts in the same period. I'm suggesting that those of us involved in this discussion about spoiler tags should voluntarily refrain from adding or removing them from article space for a while. I think this will help keep everyone calm and civil, in addition to making things a whole lot easier to sort out when a consensus is reached. — The Storm Surfer 13:51, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I do think a rough consensus has been reached on these two usages of the spoiler tag. Enough so that it has now been included in the spoiler warning guideline. So it's not disruptive or vandalism for editors to act on this rough consensus by do mass edits. However, it is disruptive for another editor to go around and revert these edits crying that, "More discussion is needed!" --Farix (Talk) 14:03, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

So in conclusion, because your point of view is TRUE, you can ignore repeated request to postpone trivial edits, can stamp concerns about the timing as unecessary and just go on with whatever you were doing. Ah, it must be nice to live in such a simple world! --87.189.124.195

Thank you. I see this was added with this edit [6], what, three hours ago? So it seems a little brisk to be accusing people reverting based on what they understood to be the guideline of being disruptive, especially if edits are not referring to the updated guideline. So, does anyone dispute that a consensus was reached on these issues: "not in plot sections", "not in classic works" (whatever that means), "not where the subject of much external debate". I think it is important to be seen to be forming consensus properly, to avoid developing even more ill will than there already is. I also agree that putting off these edits may help to reduce the apparent tension here. Why, indeed, is there such a desperate hurry to do this? Notinasnaid 14:19, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Their case must be very weak if they use tactics like this.

I can't find the section of /Talk the edit comment is referring to. Could someone please point it out? Could someone please revert the change until it is pointed out?

This is clearly trying to deceptivly establish a policy which is widely contestet, so could someone please mass-revert the changes pointed out above? --87.189.124.195

This very talk page is where the consensus has been established. The only one who has been contesting that redundant and inappropriately used spoiler tags should be removed has been yourself. --Farix (Talk) 14:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

So that must be why you claimed that the disruptive changes have nothing to do with this discussion! Care to explain why you should be taken serious in the future?

(Also, please unignore section "iffy spoilers" for some other voices on this.) --87.189.124.195

Hi, still here. — The Storm Surfer 16:38, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Got to agree with the keepers

Spoiler warnings are as natural and normal to the online medium as links and back buttons. We might as well scrap wikilinks, external links, see also and infoboxes, and anything else which doesn't appear in any paper encyclopedia. The fact that they are sometimes used on ancient plays or works especially known for their twist ending isn't a reason to scrap them entirely. Just exercise editorial judgement.

I don't see how the spoiler tags induces rambling plot summaries and other fanstuff; you only have to look at the articles which don't use it to see that this is not the case; Super Mario Bros. (TV series), or Mega Man X (video game), for example. The deleters confirmation bias would seem to be at work here, we had plenty of great articles which used it without any problems.

The use of spoiler tags on a plot section may seem redundant, but not everyone is familar with the customs of Wikipedia. If you saw a section entitled 'plot' in a newspaper, or a press release, or a magazine, not everyone would magically know whether it contained spoilers. The presumption that they should is not one we are qualified to make. The same goes for the facile arguments that 'well, everybody knows it' or 'I enjoyed it even though I knew the ending'. Personally, I'd be surprised if even a tenth of the world's population knew the ending for The Empire Strikes Back, or any of the other 'obvious ones'.

The link to the disclaimer is obviously not adequate, since much (most?) of Wikipedia's traffic comes straight from search engines. I find the view that 'they should read the small print' rather distasteful and thoroughly unWikipedian. As are the endless comments above about how 'stupid' people are who don't know how Wikipedia works. Spoiler tags are simply a normal (and necessary) aspect of online life.--Nydas^(Talk) 14:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how the argument to delete the policy (and template) can possibly hold water. Killing the template *removes information*, and is a one-way (permanent) operation. Consider the four options: those that want warnings get them, those that do not want warnings get them, those that want warnings do not get them, and those that do not want warnings do not get them. Two of the cases are "happy" -- people get what they want. So consider the "unhappy" cases. If those that do not want warnings get them anyway, they can follow the guidelines at the end of WP:SW and turn them off -- one action and they'll never see them again. After taking that action, they will always be a "happy" case. However, if those that want warnings do not get them, they cannot unlearn the information they have read, and will continue to learn things they did not want to know without recourse every time they read a spoily article. I for one will be much less likely to read about books/movies/TV shows/games on WP if I know that half the time it will spoil the experience for me -- why drive away potential WP readers for the sake of "style"? 144.51.111.1 15:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Killing the template removes, in 99.9% of cases, original research. (Let me be clear: I'm not saying that "Macbeth dies" is original research; I'm saying "'Macbeth dies' is a spoiler" is original research.) As for "you can't unlearn it," that argument hardly applies only to plot spoilers. Do we put warnings on articles on evolution, because the information therein may be upsetting to creationists, and once they read it they can't unlearn it? Chuck 15:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, "original research" being WP-ese for "your unfounded opinion," I can basically agree with that. BUT, there are other cases where you pretty much have to make a decision on incomplete information, see WP:SENSE. I find it disingenuous of some people on this page to suggest that "Bruce Willis is already dead" is manifestly not spoily -- would the same information on the day after the film's release have been "common knowledge" or "obvious"? If you agree that it would not, then should the spoiler tag go away after some set time? How long? What's the threshold where "enough" people know it to make it un-spoily? Yes, all those questions can only be answered by "original research". But it's beside the point -- should we force the admittedly-small segment of WP readers who don't know it to choose between enjoying the movie as it was meant to be enjoyed or reading the WP article about it first? I'm not denying that some degree of personal opinion is involved in deciding what is and is not spoily. I'm not even denying that this aspect of the problem may detract from the overall encyclopedic nature of WP. I'm saying obey WP:IAR -- if inserting a tiny bit of opinion ("original research") makes WP more enjoyable to more people, enjoyability ("improvement" per IAR) wins hands-down. 144.51.111.1 16:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Spoiler warnings are no more original research than any logical section grouping in a Wikipedia article. Should we scrap 'Early life' sections in biographies, for example? It's purely a question of style, and for an online encyclopedia, it's a basic requirement.--Nydas^(Talk) 17:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Many readers come to a Wikipedia article about a book or film because they are considering reading it or going to see it. They are looking for a review, which should never spoil the viewer/reader's enjoyment by giving away the facts which the author intended to come out only at a certain point near the end. In contrast an essay which analyzes the work will in fact give away the ending, unmask the villain, and reveal the gimmick. Spoiler warnings are extremely valuable in a review. They are not needed in an essay, if the reader is warned at the top (not in some distant unread policy page) that an essay is what he is reading. The pest who seeks to spoil another's enjoyment of a book or movie by revealing the ending is a classic comic figure in radio and TV shows going back to the golden age of radio and I Love Lucy. Spoilage is the intentional depriving of a reader or viewer seeing the storyline unfold as the author intended, with suspense about the outcome. There are jokes about someone seeing another reading a mystery novel and saying "The butler did it." It is a form of intellectual vandalism. Movie reviewers are careful not to similarly ruin the enjoyment of the work. Essayists are not. Yes, one can watch a movie or read a book more than once, but the subsequent times are different and the first time is special. If a work has a "gimmick" as one critic in the Psycho article described that film, or in "Sixth Sense" or any other work of M. Night Shymalan, then revealing it to someone who thinks he is reading a review is as objectionable as the "SNAPES KILLS DUMBLEDORE." If we function as a review, the a spoiler warning is highly appropriate. If we function as an essay, then a disclaimer at the top of every page is required for articles about fictional works. Edison 16:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles are neither reviews nor essays; they are (at least in the ideal) encyclopedia articles. As such, one would expect the full plot to be described, at least in a sufficiently detailed encyclopedia article on a work. The "warning" you seek at the top of each page already exists, in the upper left, where the site logo says "Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia," which should alert readers to the fact that they are reading an encyclopedia, not a review site, nor an essay site. Chuck 16:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Jesus, this is getting old already. Saying "this is an encyclopedia and therefore there will be spoilers" is the bluntest of all possible instruments. It does not address the argument that spoiler tags make WP more useful (and therefore better) by allowing for more precise isolation of spoily content. If you think making WP more useful to more people is not a worthy goal, please defend that point of view. 144.51.111.1 16:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Making WP more useful is a worthy goal, but not the only goal of Wikipedia, and it must be balanced with other goals, such as, say, being an encyclopedia. If making WP more useful were the only goal we had, we would include things like reviews of restaurants and hotels and places of interest such as Wikitravel does, for those surely would also make Wikipedia more useful to readers. But Wikitravel allows, even encourages original research, which is not appropriate for an encyclopedia, no matter how useful it would make it. Chuck 16:53, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Chuck beat me to the punch, I'll reiterated his point that Wikipedia is not a review site and anyone who comes to Wikipedia to reads an article for that propose of reading a review is coming here for the wrong reasons.

I'll also point out that Wikipedia is not censored, so we have absolutely no obligations to protect readers from spoilers. A spoiler warning is simply a courtesy, but it is a courtesy that we are not required to give. The problem comes when a small minority of editors treats the courtesy as an obligation. --Farix (Talk) 16:43, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"I find it disingenuous of some people on this page to suggest that "Bruce Willis is already dead" is manifestly not spoily" - On that much we agree, and I'm disappointed to see people making that argument (along with its cousin, "well, I don't care if I know all about a movie going in, so no one else should either"), because it does not support the anti-spoiler-warning position. I do agree that such information is "spoilery." My argument is that people who don't want to be spoiled for The Sixth Sense shouldn't read an encyclopedia article about The Sixth Sense. No, wait - my argument is stronger than that. It's not just that people who don't want to be spoiled shouldn't read the article; it's that people who don't want to be spoiled won't read the article. For all the hand-wringing along the lines of "oh, those poor people who will have a movie ruined because Wikipedia spoiled it for them," is there one single example anywhere of someone who claims that a movie/book/etc. was ruined for them because they read an untagged Wikipedia article, not expecting to be spoiled, and were? I haven't seen any. OTOH, we have had several people on this page (allegedly arguing in support of spoiler warnings) say, "well, if we remove spoiler tags, I won't read articles on works I don't want to be spoiled for," to which I respond, "Yes!! That's exactly what you should be doing!! And you should be doing it now, even with spoiler warnings, since there's no guarantee that every article which ought to have a spoiler warning will have one!" I wanted to remain unspoiled for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, so--I know this will surprise and astound some people--I didn't read the article on Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince until I had read the book (and I didn't read it until it came out in paperback, so I had to remain unspoiled longer than many). I didn't load the article and scan it to see whether it had spoiler warnings, and then assume that sections of the article without spoiler warnings were safe for me to read--I didn't read the article, period, which is the common-sense thing to do if one wants to remain unspoiled. Chuck 16:48, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Why the IPs

I find it somewhat disturbing that the RfC was closed when the vast majority of 'keep' comments were unregistered IPs. Why are we particularly paying attention to these anons when trying to form policy? Not to argue the veracity of their arguments, just the impetus of these arguments. David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 15:03, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Yeah I noticed that to - IPs or newly registered users - do they know that they're votes usually don't count?danielfolsom 15:06, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Especially since some appear to only be making a point- 87.189.124.195, for instance, has only participated on this page and in adding spoilers to various articles. David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 15:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

This is seems to be getting pretty Ad Hominem, but is easily foiled: I get a new IP address every time I login. --87.189.124.195

So in other words you still do nothing else but argue for spoilers. Your contribs suggest nothing to the contrary. David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 15:28, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

No, in other words, you don't know what dynamic IP addresses are. Do I make the impression to be a newbie? --87.189.124.195

Yes, seeing as you do not create an account. David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 15:34, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

If this is your entire definition of a newbie than I guess I am. --87.189.124.195

Whether you are or are not a newbie, there is no way for us to know that you are not. Your contribs are dedicated solely to this debate/subject, and you are an unregistered IP. Everything we have to go on says that you are a newbie, and a single-purpose account at that. You are asking us to take your word that you are not, and we simply can't because any newbie can read a few policies and claim to have been editing a while with different IP's than the one they are using now. This is why we have registered accounts, to track edits that are done despite what IP is used. This way, someone can see that you have been editing for a long time, and we can take you seriously. But without that type of verification, we can't. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 16:19, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Whatever, just ignore my person, read my arguments and answer them. --87.189.99.112

I do not have an account because I don't feel the need to create one just to read articles, and I rarely if ever edit them. I would like to strongly suggest that the outcome of this debate has much greater impact on the silent majority (those who read WP articles but do not write/edit them) than on those who care enough to create and account and create/edit articles. 144.51.111.1 15:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I point to my little paragraph above. I think quite a lot of the silent majority only expect spoilers because they are here. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 15:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Here's the thing: we clearly cannot come to a consensus on who thinks one way or another. So see my little paragraph above -- without regard to how many people want to keep or want to delete, the damage done by deleting is manifestly much greater than the damage done by keeping, unless I have missed a significant argument pro-deletion. All the pro-deletion arguments I have seen have leaned on either consensus or a "style"/"un-encyclopedic" issue, which all flies in the face of WP:IAR.144.51.111.1 16:29, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Wait a second - you want a consensus? How bout the delete votes nearly doubling the keep votes in the above vote.danielfolsom 21:23, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"The damage done" is purely your hypothetical personal estimation of the damage. We have yet to see a single instance of anyone reporting having a work ruined for them because they read an untagged spoiler in Wikipedia. I assert that there would be no damage done, as people have the common sense (even with spoiler warnings!) not to read an article about a work they don't want spoiled. Of course, neither of us has any evidence to back up our claims, but it is disingenuous to present your estimation of damage, with no evidentiary support therefor, as if it were established fact. Chuck 17:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh, come on, now. If someone has their enjoyment of a work ruined by Wikipedia, what do you think are the odds that they're going to write it down in some place you can reference? Ken Arromdee 17:57, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, if he became aware of a discussion on Wikipedia about whether Wikipedia should include spoiler warnings, I think the odds are quite high that he would report his story there, since he of all people should support the use of spoiler warnings. Yet here we are. Chuck 18:01, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I can be reasonably certain that most Wikipedia readers are not aware of this discussion. I myself am only here because I happened to be reading MfD when someone listed the guideline page. — The Storm Surfer 18:10, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Come on. You want a report? That's happened to me, personally, several times just recently, the last time with Big Dumb Object revealing the point of Report on an unidentified space station. What reason would I, or anyone else, have to write it down? Additionally, for a subject as huge as this, there's been very few informing going on. I am only here because I happened to look deeper into the matter when I noticed that {{spoiler}} had changed. --Kizor 23:41, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

To correct a misnomer, this RfC has not been closed. Only the preceding MfD has been closed because it is no longer active, but people were still !voting under the impression that the guideline was up for deletion. --Farix (Talk) 16:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

The great thing about this not being a vote is that the anonymous users either have cogent arguments or don't, and there's no need to worry about who they are. — The Storm Surfer 17:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Encyclopedia Disclaimer

Ok, spoiler tempaltes are unencyclopedic and all around useless. If you don't want information on the movie - don't go to the page - get the movie, watch it, then go to the page. I think this could all be solved by a giant disclaimer on the main page: "Contrary to seemingly popular belief per spoiler vote - Wikipedia's Articles DO Contain Information!" danielfolsom 15:06, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Your point being? --87.189.124.195

Put more eloquently, saying "get the movie, watch it, then go to the page" discourages use of WP and therefore violates WP:IAR -- pushing people away from WP does not "improve" it. 144.51.111.1 16:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

But even with spoiler warnings you can't recommend that someone who wishes to remain unspoiled read the page and skip over the spoiler-tagged parts, as there's no guarantee that the spoilers are all appropriately tagged. Chuck 17:40, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Yeah what? That argument made no sense. I said if you don't want to know what happened- see the movie, then go to the page, but you said that that discourages use of WP - but in reality - they won't be seeing information on the thing that they didn't want to know about in the first place.danielfolsom 19:26, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

But - in my experiences - there's a very high probability of the spoilers being appropriately tagged. Lacking tags are rare enough to consider it a virtual guarantee, at least as long as there are no big pastel maintenance boxes at the top. (Yes, I did previously say that I've run into untagged spoilers several times - there's no contradiction, the total number of articles I've checked is a #¤&$load. I'm a Wikipedia fanatic, do you expect my use to be non-disproportionate?) --Kizor 23:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

87.189 is currently blocked for edit-warring

... to keep the spoiler template on Sleeping Beauty. Well done. - David Gerard 16:21, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

It's a pity that he couldn't keep his head clear. He seems intelligent and quite insightful when he works within the rules, and surely more intelligent arguments here are only a benefit. But why the need for a whole section about the block? --Kizor 20:07, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Six editors deeply involved in this debate have full two-word names as their nicks... suddenly I'm feeling underdressed. --Kizor 06:21, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Er.... you lost me here. What has the length of the name to do with anything? --87.189.99.112

Just kidding around, seeing as how several of the most active debaters of that time were using full, real names, and I'm hiding behind an obvious nick. It doesn't mean much. :P --Kizor 21:41, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

My head was clear alright, I just don't usually give a fuck while IPing. I use dynamic IPs anyway and couldn't use the old one if I tried very, very, very, very hard, so the whole blocking is more funny than anything else.

Anyway, there are some badly deceptive admins at work here, and I did my share to try and stop them. Now it's up to the non-IPs to get these guys kicked out (or at least reverted), I stick to the dicsussion. --87.189.99.112

When *is* a spoiler appropriate?

Looking at the above, these are the places it isn't:

1. Anywhere under a Plot, Summary, Synopsis, Story or similar header
   1. arguably from this, anywhere the spoiler content should be under such a header
2. Articles about fictional characters - no-one would look them up without knowing the stories
3. Any article where almost the entire article would have to go under a spoiler
4. Fairy tales, Shakespeare, classical mythology or similar cultural canon, under the proviso of "don't be stupid"

What's left? - David Gerard 16:21, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Excellent question. I'm curious myself. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 16:23, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I do not see consensus above for "Anywhere under a Plot, Summary, Synopsis, Story or similar header" and i don't agree with "Articles about fictional characters" as an abdolute principle. In most cases this is true, but when a character is featured in multiple works and information on the cahracter page reveals a key plot twist in one of those (as for example info on the page about Hercule Poirot spoiling the novel Curtin) then a spoierl tag may be appropriate. DES ^(talk) 16:25, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

DESiegel makes such an excellent point that I think it bears repeating. Suppose a new fan of a work of fiction looks up a character in a series -- frequently, one of the first items in the entry will be when the character was introduced, as well as when that character was killed off. But supposing the new fan hasn't gotten far enough into the series to know that. Who wants to remove our ability to "cordon off" that information? Otherwise, we must caution all WP users to only read articles about e.g. a TV show (or a character on a TV show) if they have watched every episode of the entire run, lest they ruin an ending for themselves. Can anyone doubt that at least *some* people would stop reading WP about TV shows altogether? Again, I cite WP:IAR -- clearly, any modification of policy that causes people to stop reading WP has a hard time making a case that it's "improving" WP. 144.51.111.1 16:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

By that argument we ought to tag all articles which contain potentially spoilery information, no matter how old the work is (indeed, I think I would have enjoyed Citizen Kane more the first time I saw it had I not known in advance what "Rosebud" was, even though it was ~60 years after the movie had been released that I saw it). Yet most if not all of the pro-spoiler-warning people here are arguing that classics/Shakespeare/the Bible/etc. should not be spoiler tagged. How do you reconcile that discrepancy?

And no, I don't think avoiding spoiler warnings will cause people to stop reading Wikipedia. Having spoilers may cause people to stop reading Wikipedia, but there seems to be a broad consensus here that having the spoilers in the article is a good thing, it's just a question of whether they should be tagged as such or not. Suppose we do eventually come to a consensus that spoiler warnings should be used. And suppose that a reader hasn't seen The Sixth Sense and wishes to remain unspoiled for it. What is that reader more likely to do: look up the article, saying to himself, "any spoilers will be appropriately tagged, and thus I can safely read untagged portions of the article?" Or will he say, "even though Wikipedia has a spoiler-tagging guideline, some spoilers may not be appropriately tagged, either due to oversight on the part of the editors or to vandals," and not look up the article at all? Spoiler-tagging parts of the article on The Sixth Sense isn't going to somehow attract readers who wish to remain unspoiled for that movie. Chuck 17:10, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I've changed your bullets to numbers for our convenience in discussing them. I hope I haven't overstepped my bounds in doing so.

Re. 1: I don't see how one line under the plot header is such a bad thing, but I'll consider that most of us seem to have agreed on this.

Re. 1.1: I don't think I understand your phrasing.

Re. 2: I have nothing to contribute on this point.

Re. 3: I'm guessing this is the provision for The Crying Game and such?

Re. 4: I disagree with this at least in part, do not think that I am alone in this, and do not appreciate being called stupid. I'll go into more detail on this last point shortly, as I don't want to type too long and get another edit conflict. — The Storm Surfer 16:47, 17 May 2007 (UTC) On second thought I probably won't. — The Storm Surfer 17:23, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Off the top of my head, there are "Themes." The reader cannot know whether or not such a section has spoilers, and to what extent. It's feasible both with or without it. So's "Reception" - if, say, a particularily gory scene is fundamental to the splash caused by a movie, it has to be covered in discussion about reception, but other works have spoilerless versions of such sections. --Kizor 21:47, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

It may certainly be useful to divide the issue into a number of areas where spoilers have been used and then assess 1)where there is consensus that they should normally be used (if anywhere) 2) Where there is consensus they should not be used (if anywhere) 3) where there is no consensus either way. We might then be able to develop a policy that said:

1. Spoilers should be used if.....(perhaps just released works, or this section may be empty unless there is a consensus that there are any such cases)
2. Never use spoilers on (e.g. Shakesphere, fairytales, English literature?, works over x number of years old?, where it is obvious that the plot is gong to be described.)
3. What you should do where there is no general consensus. Which probably means discussion on case-by-case with those working on the article - but no outside 'enforcement' either way. An AD/CE style truce.--Doc^g 16:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I think part of the problem with #4 is an (understandable) concern of, shall we say, vertigo. That is to say, it is simply more jarring to have a neologism like "spoiler" tossed onto Romeo and Juliet than it is to have it tossed on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. "Spoiler" isn't part of the language used to discuss these older texts, and there's something.... fundamentally uunnerving about seeing the word used on texts that old. Phil Sandifer 17:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

And as for when spoilers should be used, I can see a good justification for using them for articles on television series currently airing, movies still in wide release, etc. Though even then, I am fundamentally uncomfortable about the neologism... Phil Sandifer 17:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I support the use of soilers directly before reveling the twist-ending/shocking fact, the spoiling of which would likley cause substantially diminishment the enjoyment of the reader, of fiction within a short but arbitrary time period after the initial-release of said movie or book. For example, mentioning that Snape Killed Dumbledore is fine now, but would have required a spoiler tag for, lets say, 2 months after the english language release of the book (english because we are en). There. 2 months, twist/shocking only, fiction only, would likley cause substantial diminishment. We have a guideline. Next? Hipocrite - «Talk» 17:45, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"Soilers" (sic) I love it.--Doc^g 18:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

THAT I can agree with, to a point. I am fundamentally against inserting something that will only serve a function for a short-term period, but this is perhaps the first proposal aside from outright deletion that I can accept. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 17:53, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

BTW: "Snape kills Dumbledore" is not that much of a spoiler. Why he does, how he does and (this is a spoiler) whether he in fact does may well be - David Gerard 22:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Be careful

I suggest that spoiler warnings be used if there's a good chance that someone reading the article doesn't know about the spoiler and doesn't want to hear it.

If you adopt that rule, we could delete the warnings from articles like The Three Little Pigs or Romeo and Juliet, while not making any changes to articles like Valen. From the discussion, both here and on the wikien mailing list, I get the strong impression that people who want to remove spoilers want to remove them from examples that are a *lot* more controversial than Romeo and Juliet and are choosing their examples carefully to make their position seem more moderate than it really is.

I caution everyone not to interpret a consensus at removing spoiler warnings from My Pet Goat as a consensus to remove spoiler warnings from everything more than a year old. Ken Arromdee 17:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I support the removal of the ugly tag from Valen and believe that my proposal directly above makes that perfectly clear. This series ended more than 2 months ago, there is no "twist," and users who are spoiled are not "substantial[y] diminish[ed]." Hipocrite - «Talk» 18:07, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

What if a series is playing at different times in different countries?--Nydas^(Talk) 18:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

2 months after it's first release in english. If there's a border case where the guideline isn't adapting to a unique case, WP:IAR. A series that ended 10 years ago isn't a border case, it's right down the center. Hipocrite - «Talk» 18:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Why should the place where it's released first get the privilege of spoiler protection? It's better to work on a case by case basis than pull time periods out of a hat.--Nydas^(Talk) 19:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Its not the place, its the language. Of course there are cases where you could argue WP:IAR and say that since English speaking country X is getting the work released 1 month later then our guideline states, and that would be ok. I mean its more or less just using common sense, once its nolonger new there is no need to have these tags. Trust me, I know that Snape kills dumbledore by now... and I never even read it (I knew from in real life). There just is a point where its just no longer a spoiler. An arbitrary number like 2 or 3 months sounds about right.

I mean if we really want rules to cover every case, you could come up with something like, spoiler tags go off 2 months after first release, OR 1 month after last release in an english speaking country, but the total time is never to exceed a year. Tweak those numbers as you see fit. This would work for games that are released first in europe, and then take 3 months to make it to the states (U.S.). That would be 4 months our article would have the spoiler tag on it. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 20:28, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh... and please keep these tags out of obvious sections such as plot. Thanks. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 20:35, 17 May 2007 (UTC)#

Plot sections don't 'obviously' contain spoilers because not everyone is magically aware of how Wikipedia works. If one saw a plot section in a newspaper, magazine, film website, company website, or press release, you would not automatically know whether it contained spoilers.--Nydas^(Talk) 07:38, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Valen's identity certainly is a "twist". It's one of the biggest twists of the whole series; just because it doesn't come at the end doesn't mean it's not a twist. Ken Arromdee 23:57, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Babylon 5 popularized what's known as a "Wham Episode", a sudden change of course in mid-plot. Twist? Very definitely. --Kizor 03:37, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

What is the rationale for 2 months other than "I don't like spoiler warnings so I want to see a time limit that lets me get rid of most of them"?

Not everyone watched Babylon 5 when it first aired. There are people watching it for the first time now, and they won't know who Valen is, and will not *want* to be told ahead of time. There's no reason to put any sort of time limit on spoiler warnings. Snape killing Dumbledore is an unusual case because Harry Potter is so high profile and that's such a big event in the series that even non-fans will have been exposed to some spoilers about the series. You can't go from Snape kills Dumbledore to spoiling the identity of Valen. Ken Arromdee 23:41, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Please re-read what I said, the numbers are changeable, its the idea. Those numbers can be 6 months, and 3 months respectively with a 4 year limit. Frankly its just an idea :) Thanks. User:Gnome (Bot)-talk 23:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

6 months is still too short for Babylon 5. If you need to compromise on a limit, how about "so old that it is not chiefly read as part of popular culture"? That would be 50-100 years, and would still prevent people from putting spoiler warnings on Hamlet. Ken Arromdee 00:04, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The issue with Valen seems to me not to be a matter of whether the revelation is still surprising - it's a damn fine twist. The issue is that the revelation is the heart and soul of the topic. Any lead section of Valen that does not mention who he really is just isn't doing a good job of introducing the article. It's misleading to introduce the topic without the spoiler in this case. Ergo the spoiler warnings is inappropriate, not because the show is X years old, but because the vast majority of what there is to say about the topic depends on the spoiler. Phil Sandifer 04:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Regarding Spoilers

As someone who's recently had something spoiled for myself, I'll weigh in. I recently picked up Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, and after playing for a few hours I hopped on to Wikipedia to do some editing. After puttering around here and there, I decided to check the KOTOR article and had a fairly important plot point spoiled for me. I can only blame myself for doing that, which is why I don't support Spoiler tags in most cases.

Regarding spoiler tags in plot summaries, they're ludicrous. Silly. Patent nonsense. I can use several stronger words, but you get my point. By the very nature of the section, a plot summary should not have the spoiler tag.

Most media, however, should NOT contain "spoiler" information within the lead unless it is the defining characteristic of the media in question. The Sue Dibny article works under the defining characteristic I've outlined. Media for which the "spoiler" elements are not the defining characteristics should not contain these elements within the lead. It would be bad form for the Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince article to begin with the lead:

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, released on July 16, 2005, is the sixth of seven planned novels in J.K. Rowling's popular Harry Potter series. Set during Harry Potter's sixth year at Hogwarts, during which Snape kills Dumbledore.

I agree, however, that relatively recent items should have spoiler tags, just in case someone is foolish. While we're trying to build an encyclopedia here, we're also unlimited by space, storage, and temporary structure during the release of new information. It's only fair to not go out of our way to possibly spoil the enjoyment of someone's reading of recent material in the interest of professionalism when we can simply wait. Cheers, Lanky (YELL) 20:26, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

That reminds me of those ads which say things similar to "Vitamin C is important, so eat Florida oranges today". The inclusion of the word "Florida" is gratuitous and bears no logical connection to anything else; the ad could just as well say "Vitamin C is important, so eat oranges today".

What's wrong with "It's only fair to not go out of our way to possibly spoil the enjoyment of someone's reading of material in the interest of professionalism"? Just end the sentence there without the gratuitous references to recent material and waiting. Ken Arromdee 01:47, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

"But normal encyclopaedias ..."

There's one recurrent fallacy in the above discussion that needs clearing up right now. That is the compound fallacy of what "normal" or "traditional" encyclopaedias are and what they do, used as a basis for further arguments. The fallacy has been expressed in several ways: Traditional encyclopaedias don't have articles on films or other works of fiction. Traditional encyclopaedias might discuss Henry V or Moby Dick but won't have articles on 20th and 21st century works. Normal encyclopaedias don't discuss pop culture.

The difference between these encyclopaedias and Wikipedia is not that they are "traditional" and "normal" and we are not. Those adjectives are entirely the wrong distinction to be making. The difference is that they are proprietary, whereas Wikipedia is free content. Proprietary encyclopaedias can be as modern as Wikipedia, and cover the ground that Wikipedia covers.

Encyclopaedias such as Britannica and Encarta are proprietary encyclopaedias, but they are far from the being the only proprietary encyclopaedias in the world. Wikipedia is both a general-purpose and specialist encyclopaedia. As such, comparisons in this discussion should not be solely with the likes ofBritannica and Encarta. There are plenty of specialized proprietary encyclopaedias that do have articles on works of fiction, and on recent ones at that. There is no shortage of encyclopaedias of film that one can find listed in the catalogues of one's favourite library or bookstore, for example. There's even an encyclopaedia of popular culture (Sara Pendergast and Tom Pendergast (2000). St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture. St. James Press.).

I have a proprietary encyclopaedia lying open beside the keyboard as I type this. It is Science Fiction: The Illustrated Encyclopaedia (ISBN 0751302023). It has individual articles on The Uplift War, Hyperion, Neuromancer, The Difference Engine Queen of Angels, Red Mars, Feersum Endjinn, A Fire Upon the Deep, and quite a few other recent works of fiction.

It also has an article on Ender's Game, where the twist in the tale is an integral part of any analysis of that novel that needs expounding right at the start (as demonstrated by this article in Computer, this piece in the New York Times, and this article in Communications of the ACM all relating the novel to real life). Our article contains a spoiler warning. Clute's has none, and gives away the twist to the tale in the second sentence. Uncle G 20:44, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't know about anyone else, but I was under the impression that the argument was that "normal encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings" and Uncle G seems to have proven that correct. Axem Titanium 21:00, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

This is a compelling argument, and it has swayed my opinion somewhat. The argument "normal encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings" has been used before, but it seemed irrelevant to me. Normal encyclopedias don't have such extensive links either. However, the comparison to specialized encyclopedias is better. Wikipedia is like all the specialized encyclopedias put together, and has features a general-use encyclopedia doesn't. So what is the precedent in an encyclopedia of film? I would imagine it is like your science fiction encyclopedia - no spoiler alerts. TK421 21:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

More to the point, how much stock should we put by "precedent"? Every last 'edit this page' link is a breach of tradition, and the existence of Wikipedia is proof that we've built a good (or otherwise, depending on your opinion) resource not only on the basis on what is conventional, but what's good and what works. --Kizor 21:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I see your point, but there must be a limit somewhere. We can't be Fancruftpedia or Everyforumpedia, we must be an encyclopedia and it looks like the only difference between Wikipedia and other encyclopedias is the ability for anyone to change it (for better or for worse). Our motto is "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit", which implies that we do everything an encyclopedia does with the only difference being it's open. Thus, we should follow the example of professional encyclopedias rather than the decidedly unprofessional internet forum mentality. Axem Titanium 22:07, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Uncle G's comments is strongly convening me that spoiler tags should not be in Wikipedia articles. Of course I already knew that specialized media encyclopedias did not include any such "spoiler warnings." The thing that Uncle G's made me realizes is that spoiler warnings are a courtesy that is almost exclusive to the internet—and from what I understand, born from Usenet. You won't fine such courtesy warnings outside of the internet.

Somewhere around the house, I have a Star Trek Companion stuffed in a box, and I don't every recall coming across any spoiler warnings even though the books give details and trivial of every original series Star Trek episode. The publisher didn't include any warnings about plot details because they were being rude to people who may have seen most of the episodes, but not all of them. But they assumed that if you read the article about a particular episode, then you didn't care if you were going to be spoiled or not. The same philosophy goes for the set of Star Wars RPG sourcebooks that I own that are based on the novels. And that same philosophy also applies to Wikipedia articles on fictional works. --Farix (Talk) 22:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I find Uncle G's example quite compelling and illustrative of the issues at hand. JavaTenor 00:26, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

As do I, in defense of spoiler tags. There are general-purpose encyclopedias, which do not go into spoilery detail or do so only when necessary, and there are specialist encyclopedias, which can assume that its readers know or want to know the details. Wikipedia, can be (and is, and I say should be) both on fiction. This is entirely due to spoiler tags, and this seems to be the reason behind spoiler tags. We're not the Star Trek Companion, but neither are we Encyclopedia Britannica. Several people have advanced the opinion on this page that spoiler tags are not needed because spoilers are segregated to their own sections, but even if that was so, the spoiler tags are the cause of this segregation. End use of spoiler tags, and as soon as it can no longer be reasonably expected for an article on fiction to have its plot spoilers separate from the rest, Wikipedia's entire coverage of fiction becomes restricted to the specialist model. (That can't help cruft any, either!) --Kizor 01:32, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Spoiler warnings are a relic of Usenet. All articles on Wikipedia are expected to cover the material at the specialist level. In essence, Wikipedia is meant to be specialist on everything, not a general use encyclopedia. If we take that into consideration, then it becomes clear that spoiler warnings are being used as a crutch to avoid this process of specialization. Cruft is an entirely different issue pursued by an entirely different set of people. A specialist level of detail about a subject does not entail cruft in the least (see Characters of Final Fantasy VIII, for example). Axem Titanium 01:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I did not mean that specialism entails cruft. I aim to provide counter-examples by my own editing all the time. I meant (as a bit of a throw-away line, hence the exclamation mark) that specialism-only articles must attract at least as much cruft as general & specialism articles.
For the record it's 5 AM in here, again, so my further responses until I rest will have to be sporadic at best. --Kizor 01:51, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I've now gone through WP:NOT, Encyclopedia, WP:CRUFT, the "writing about fiction" part of WP:MOS and Foundation issues, and still can't find where it says that Wikipedia must not be used as a general purpose encyclopedia. Update: Five Pillars says quite the opposite: "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia incorporating elements of general encyclopedias, specialized encyclopedias, and almanacs." I hate to quote the rules at people, but I can't see where you got the idea. --Kizor 02:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

You also won't find spoiler warnings in any general encyclopedia either. But none of those things you cited also says that a spoiler warning is needed or required. I would like to point out Wikipedia:No disclaimer templates. This guideline tells us not to use disclaimer templates on articles, which a spoiler warning templates are a form of disclaimer templates. --Farix (Talk) 03:05, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I've always interpreted that to mean a specialized encyclopedia with a general encyclopedia's breadth of coverage. Axem Titanium 02:50, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually, normal encyclopedias don't provide plot summaries at all. So they are of mixed use here. The better statement than "normal encyclopedias don't have spoiler warnings" is probably "normal encyclopedias don't use neologisms in the course of their basic presentation." Phil Sandifer 04:19, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

• I agree with Phil (which does nto preclude wanting 99.9% of spoiler warnings out) ad I completely agree with Uncle G, as usual, and I have read most of those books, and the examples are sound. The fact that I cannot personally think of a single article in which a spoiler warning is appropriate does not mean they should never be used, but it is clear from looking at the lists of spoiler warnings that the vast majority - almost all - are either redundant (in a section called plot) or patently ludicrous (Three Little Pigs and Jack and the beanstalk being two particularly priceless gems here). All of which adds nothing, so I should add an <AOL> tag I guess. Guy (Help!) 18:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
  • If someone Googles a movie and sees the Wikipedia article near the top and clicks on it looking for a REVIEW of the movie to decide whether to watch it, they are sure to be annoyed if they see a spoiler in the first couple of sentences, which would decrease their enjoyment of the work. Someone claimed that the word Encyclopedia" in the upper left hand part of the Wikipedia page was a sufficient disclaimer. I strongly disagree. It is in tiny type and in italics. Most online writings about a movie are reviews, and the user should be warned that this is not. Any fiction work with a "gimmick" or plot twist deserves a spoiler warning in some form, since users may come to it from a Google search and not be aware that Wikipedia claims to be an encyclopedia. I looked at Encyclopedia Americana for the article on the film Psycho to see how they handle the plot gimmick. Guess what? No article. Real encyclopedias probably mention many movies and books somewhere, but they do not imitate online databases whith the plethora of fan written articles that we do. So maybe someone's "Science Fiction Encyclopedia" contains unwarned spoilers; the user knows what he is reading, and if he has read a couple of the entries knows to expecet spoilage. People come to a Wikipedia article out of the blue and can reasonably expect it not to be spoilerpedia, at least without some prominent and unmissable warning. At the same time, I would hate to see articles of the type that might be in a real encyclopedia, such as an analysis of Hamlet, have "spoiler" warnings. I would restrict them to recent pop culture of movies and thriller novels. I can live with no warning on the article for the 1960 "Psycho" while having a small one on the recent "The Village." Edison 19:41, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I see that both Phil Sandifer and Edison are still repeating the fallacy. Proprietary encyclopaedias do discuss plots of works of fiction, and do have articles on movies and books. If one doesn't think that they do, then that is a result of one not being familiar with enough proprietary encyclopaedias. It is not the case in actual fact.

And any editor who erroneously thinks that the word "encyclopaedia" is "in tiny type and in italics" when one does a Google Web search for something, needs to perform a Google Web search and remind themselves of what they actually see on the very search results page itself when a Wikipedia article is one of the results. Uncle G 00:36, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Paper encyclopedias which do cover popular culture topics have no spoiler warnings because it's expected that only people who don't need or don't want to be spoiled will use them. Someone who doesn't know who Valen is and wants to find out by watching episodes just isn't in the target audience for a Babylon 5 encyclopedia in the first place; it's expected that anyone who reads the encyclopedia doesn't mind or already knows the spoilers. Wikipedia is aimed at a *general* audience, and must cover a wide range of readers, both Babylon 5 fans who know very well who Valen is, and people new to Babylon 5. It cannot limit its audience like the B5 encyclopedia does. Ken Arromdee 15:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Temporary spoilers

Setting a time limit is ridiculous. Not only are there going to be lots of opinions on what constitutes the right length of time, but also who wants to go back later and remove them after x weeks have expired? Clarityfiend 21:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Word up on thay, yo. Snape kills Dumbledore: spread like wildfire in a matter of weeks, if not days. The Mousetrap: From 1952, and now somewhat famous over how few have had it spoiled. --Kizor 21:40, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I notice that User:Hipocrite is systematically removing spoiler warnings from any article mentioned on this page. Seems a pretty petty and vindictive attitude... PaddyLeahy 22:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Seems to me like implementing "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia" - David Gerard 23:12, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Frankly speaking, I expected more from you than what comes across as condescending smugness. Well, it does. --Kizor 23:51, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Edits that even the presence of this template encourage that are cause for its destruction

Add your own examples!

1. The Passion of the Christ: [7] - David Gerard 22:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
2. Three Little Pigs: [8] - David Gerard 22:24, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
3. Hamlet: [9] - David Gerard 22:24, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
4. Sleeping Beauty [10] - David Gerard 22:28, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
5. The Passion of the Christ (again): [11] Read the edit summery and you see why I'm posting this again --Farix (Talk) 23:24, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
6. The Mystery of Edwin Drood, maybe? -- llywrch 23:25, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
7. Sunset Boulevard (1950 film) [12]--Doc^g 00:11, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
8. Mary Poppins (film) [13]--Doc^g 00:11, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
9. The Mousetrap [14] Hipocrite - «Talk» 17:09, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
10. Casey at the Bat - Eclecticology 17:15, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
11. King Kong (1933 film) - Eclecticology 17:15, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
12. John Wayne in the list of the ways he died in his films. Eclecticology 17:15, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

And the tens of thousands of non-extreme instances that do not cause trouble and are not controversial? Does this have much of a point other than ridiculing the other side? --Kizor 23:28, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

It is evidence that this template is direct incitement to bad and ridiculous editing, per the original nomination way up there on the page - David Gerard 23:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

The proper response to an abused rule is not to get rid of the rule. And while these examples are ridiculous, limiting spoiler warnings to 2 months gets rid of a *lot* more than the ridiculous examples. It's what I was saying before--opponents of the rule keep picking ridiculous examples to justify the need for a change--but the change they want encompasses much, much, much, more.

I would be in favor of a spoilers rule that *only* got rid of the above ridiculous examples and others like them. But I know very well we're not going to be seeing that. The examples are Hamlet and Passion of the Christ, but the rule's going to be used against Valen.

(And I don't want to see a "compromise" that uses 6 months instead of 2, either. It's easy to game the system by proposing a length of time even shorter than you want and "compromising" on the length.) Ken Arromdee 00:01, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

That's why a set length of time is bad. Instead, we should accept the fact that Wikipedia has spoilers and eliminate the need to use a warning at all. Axem Titanium 01:10, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

That's why a set length of time is bad. Instead, we should accept the fact that Wikipedia is useful for both those seeking non-spoiler information and those seeking spoiler information, and leave the warnings in. --Kizor 01:19, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The spoiler warning is an artifact of the internet and do not exist outside of it. Those who seek information from an off-line encyclopedia would not have the benefit of a spoiler warning, so why should Wikipedia have spoiler warnings? --Farix (Talk) 01:31, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

...You're really saying that since readers of other works don't gain this benefit, those who read our work shouldn't gain it either? --Kizor 01:35, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Readers would also benefit from OTHER disclaimer templates, why don't we have those? Not to mention, they'd benefit from phonebooks listings, price comparison charts, pictures of living people, music samples on every album page, and external links to fansites... ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 02:08, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Those are false analogies, as you know. There are reasons against all of them that are not an issue here. --Kizor 20:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

It's obviously not a benefit if readers are insulted by it and it also prevents proper coverage of material. Wikipedia should not cater to the minority who don't consider Wikipedia an encyclopedia and wouldn't expect spoilers. Axem Titanium 01:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Again, those are extreme examples, and clearly should never have had spoiler warnings. This wasn't what we had in mind for spoiler warnings. Most spoiler warnings don't insult a reader's intelligence, and they don't prevent anything. Spoiler warnings were thought to be helpful for those who were clicking on links from search results for recent and popular TV shows and movies, and has nothing to do with how people consider Wikipedia. Keep in mind, I'm leaning towards removing them all, but it was never "wrong" or stupid to have spoiler warnings. So stop trying to play it off as some massively bad thing, when really it's just a tool we no longer need. -- Ned Scott 02:21, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

At any rate, it feels just a little POINT-y to be listing ridiculous uses of the spoiler warning here. Just a little. Axem Titanium 02:47, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Template:Endspoliler

Can we at least agree that {{tl:endspoiler}} should be deleted? I see no purpose in that template at all. The Placebo Effect 02:22, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

That'd be far too easy, now would it? I think it's the best thing since sliced bread. There are many more spoiler-free areas than just the lead sections. Take the Heroes article, for instance: At present, it's well-organized and structured for those who are familiar with it, yet those who aren't can avoid plot revelations to read all relevant data. Without endspoiler, if I was unfamiliar with the series, I could only learn the basic premise. With it, I could also learn about its reception in detail, the surrounding creative use of new media, stuff about the filming and controversies, and when my national TV network will start showing it. --02:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

How, exactly, did I manage to leave that signature? --Kizor 02:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Five tildes. --Random832 <- three. five -> 02:59, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Cool, thanks. --Kizor 03:01, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Advice

I've given this a lot of thought (well, not all at once, but over time), and I think the solution is.. Remove the spoiler warnings, but stop insulting the people who supported them. It wasn't such a bad idea, not at all, and it's not our fault that someone put a spoiler warning on some classic like Hamlet. It made sense at the time, so have some respect for our logic and reasoning. Maybe because Wikipedia is more well known now, maybe because we have stronger guidelines for fiction now, maybe because Wikipedia is maturing, whatever the reason, we have it, and those are strong enough reasons alone, without having to insult the other side.

Even if you really think these things, just bite your tongue for a while and you'll find that pro-spoiler warning people will be a lot more accepting of the removal. It also wouldn't hurt to help phase things out, instead of going cold-turkey, simply because people react harshly to drastic change in something they're accustom to. Look at the reactions to when templates were just blanked, or when people wanted a fast conclusion.

When this whole debate thing started I instantly felt like I went into "defense mode", which was wrong for me to do, but not surprising given the situation. It really made me think about why this whole thing seems more like a battle than a discussion. Lets try to not trigger each other's defense modes, it will make the process a lot smoother. -- Ned Scott 03:30, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

And that goes for the pro-spoiler warning people too. Don't insult the people who want to remove the warnings. If you want to keep them, focus on your core reasons and don't make low-blows. And I apologies for my own low-blows and bad calls. -- Ned Scott 03:31, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

There are warning-opponents that act disruptively throughout the discussion. I don't consider calling them out a "low-blow". --87.189.99.112

Other warnings

There are no profanity warnings. There are no sexually descriptive warnings. There are no violence warnings. There are no nudity warnings. But there are spoiler warnings. Things that are outright banned or restricted in many forms of media in many places... are not warned. Yet spoilers, something I don't think are banned or restricted in anything except Internet discussion... are warned. Can you understand the illogic here? I have seen the argument that spoilers are different - you can't forget spoilers. That's an outright lie. For a child to see violent content, it can give him or her nightmares, emotional trauma. Let's make it clear here: spoilers are objectionable, sexual/violent/profane content is objectionable. They are ultimately no different. It's time to adhere to the principle created by more "reputable" subjects of Wikipedia.--Teggles 05:06, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Usability and the vast horde of non-editors who read Wikipedia

Fascinating comments. I never knew before that I am but among "children" rather than adults. My intelligence is also apparently very low, because I prefer spoiler warnings which apparently are somehow an insult to the average reader's smarts.

Anyway. I will not try and argue the main point, as others have detailed the reasons as to why some people prefer spoiler warnings rather thoroughly, and detractors have also detailed why they don't like spoiler warnings. Fine. Both sides have some points, and we know that some people like them, and others don't. So which side to choose?

This is ultimately a matter of personal preference. Wikipedia is not an idealization; it was meant to be used so the preferences of the users should be taken into account. That's the point, right? To be read by someone? Now, if spoilers are compromising Wikipedia's editorial style and policy in other ways, then obviously let those guidelines win. No one is supporting torturing an article's structure to separate spoilers out, and where that has occurred, it should rightly be combined (and perhaps stick a spoilers tag on top of it all). Therefore, any discussion on these lines is a red herring; the pro-spoilers crowd is not, in general, standing by this.

Also, while I think it's quite a minor issue, removing the spoiler tag from under sections labeled "plot" is generally perfectly sensible, but only for the reason that it's a wasted line. It's the kind of fine tuning that should go into good and featured articles, but hardly worthy of seismic policy shift. Same with Shakespeare and so on. If it's older than 50 years, the statute of limitations has probably expired. No heated arguments here, either.

That leaves sheer personal preference. This is a case where a popularity contest is perfectly reasonable, because this isn't a matter where there is a universal "right" answer that can be reached via debate. Now, I believe that the last RFC is instructive on this. First of all, spoiler warnings were kept by a sizable consensus. Secondly, those against spoiler warnings were mostly "hardcore" editors. There were a fair number of experienced editors in the pro-spoiler camp, too (I'd estimate they split maybe 50/50?), but the casual editors who happened across the debate were overwhelmingly in favor of spoiler warnings. Also, though it's hard to tell, I've seen enough spoiler tags added by IPs (or even fakey not-using-the-tag spoiler warnings) for me to think that the non-editors like spoiler warnings too. Almost every time I've seen a spoiler tag removed (just the spoiler- ignoring blanking vandalism, obviously), it's been by established hardcore editors. I suspect that most non-editors who have no idea this discussion is even taking place would be either pro-spoiler warnings, or simply couldn't care less.

How about impact? Maybe if one side felt really strongly, that could swing things away from a "guess the majority" type issue. However, this favors spoiler warnings as well. I challenge anyone against spoiler warnings to call them any worse than "annoying." They're an extra line- ugh, maybe, but big deal. However, I can say outright that if spoiler warnings were removed, I would not be willing to use Wikipedia for most media I haven't experienced, at least beyond the lead paragraph. Others would probably still use it, but may get actively annoyed at having something spoiled and come off with a bad experience from Wikipedia.

So. If you are the type who doesn't care about spoilers, congratulations. Have a gold sticker. Really, I envy you. However, one of the good things to come out of the previous RFC was the ability to turn spoiler warnings off. Do so! Just turn 'em off! Voila, problem solved! If my hypothesis about most people detesting spoiler warnings being hardcore users is true, then anti-warning editors are unusually likely to possess the skill and inclination to do this. However, for the herd of us poor fools who do have our enjoyment "spoiled" by too much information, could you please humor us and let us have it? SnowFire 05:26, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Ironic

I haven't contributed to the main discussion, and I don't plan to. I don't really have a solid decision either way yet, but I have noticed something ironic:

When this discussion started, nearly everyone voted to delete the spoiler tags. Things were going pretty solidly in the direction of deleting them . . .

Then, some people got excited over their consensus and got trigger-happy. They started deleting templates all over wikipedia, triggering edit wars and pointing users to the "consensus" on this page for support of their actions.

Promptly, the "consensus" (although that's hardly what it is, still) began to sway notably to to "keep" end. By getting trigger-happy and rushing to implement their new desire, these editors actually invited spoiler-tag fans to add to the discussion. Very ironic. It's like inviting the opposing candidate's voters to the polls.

Moral of the story: Sit tight and wait sometimes. Don't get trigger-happy. After all, guns backfire. Wrad 07:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how the consensus is with the keep people - considering they were outnumbered 43 to 23.danielfolsom 11:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Wishful thinking. Wrad is one of the helpful souls who's been putting spoilers back on Shakespeare, no doubt for the purpose of vastly improving our coverage of Shakespeare - David Gerard 12:43, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

WP:CIVIL, WP:AGF. AndyJones 13:02, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

WP:WOTTA - David Gerard 14:28, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

As someone undecided, condescending comments like David Gerard's make me want to support spoilers. Also ironic. TK421 14:15, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I fail to see how it's in any way a good faith act to wait untill a page has false consensus to impliment it. If the only reason that people don't object to the policy change is that they don't know about it, that's not consensus, it's steamrolling. I know that some of the supporters of spoilers might want to steamroll, but that's not wiki. Hipocrite - «Talk» 12:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

You are using disruptive methods to achieve your aims with no regard WP policies throughout the discussion. Stop claiming that you are the one steamrolled. --87.189.99.112

There was only a false consensus in favor of deleting them. Only the most truly dedicated editors visit MFD - which is fine, normally. However, for issues in which casual editors have differing opinions, XfD can lead to the "wrong" result. When this is because casual IPs aren't familiar with notability policies at AFD, this is okay, but that is not on the table here.

If we really want to find out what people think, then while TFD is the wrong forum, a TFD-style comment should be added to the spoiler warning again directing people to the RFC. We may find out what most people actually think. SnowFire 12:52, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The tags once removed tend to remain so, and the content of the article isn't harmed at all. It's quite clear that, despite a small number of people who think removing spoiler tags is wrong, there is a very strong consensus for their removal. --Tony Sidaway 17:21, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

No, there isn't, from actual editors of Wikipedia. This is not necessarily the same thing as "people who have noticed this discussion." Example: Nacirema (warning, spoilers, etc.). There was previously a spoiler warning in the lead (!!) despite spoilers basically being unavoidable for this topic. I removed the warning. It was quickly put back, and if you examine the talk page, you'll see a consensus from no less than three very low-contribution count editors in favor of the spoiler warning. Now. I still don't see much point to the warning in that article, but if there's a strong consensus by most Wikipedians in a case where a warning probably isn't appropriate, what do you think the consensus is in cases where a warning has some justification?

If there's such a strong consensus for removal, let's find out. Let's put the TFD-style message back on the Spoilers template with "The status of spoiler warnings is currently being discussed; see this debate," linking to this page. Not quite as dramatic as the whole attribution policy deal, but we'll see where the actual consensus lies. Wikipedia is viewed by many many more people than the tiny minority posting here. SnowFire 17:55, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I would support this, though I'm way too opinionated on it to make the change myself - if you can convince any other admin to, go for it IMO - David Gerard 19:23, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Sidaway, you are using disruptive methods to achieve your aims with no regard WP policies throughout the discussion. Stop lying by claiming that any kind of consensus for removing the warnings is reached on this page. --87.189.99.112

Just want to point out to all concerned (although I can't see why you would be) that I did indeed put spoilers back on Shakespeare pages early on, before I knew about the debate. At that time, I didn't know about this discussion, as the deleters failed to tell me about it, and I thought what they were doing was vandalism. Once I saw this discussion and read through it, I just didn't want to be part of the edit wars. I honestly don't know what I think, and don't really care anymore. Just wanted to make an Ironic observation. The below section, called "Hamlet", is copied and pasted from the Hamlet page, and occurred before I knew about this discussion. Wrad 19:27, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Just adding that I knew nothing of this discussion until people started deleting the spoiler tags and I added them back and saw them deleted again.

I'm for spoiler tags as I know some people like to know in general about a film, book etc and though there is some articles with vague plot details I've seen many articles with very detailed plot details and the only reason I wasn't spoiled was that I had seen or read the work in question .Garda40 20:38, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Something else we've been assuming

There seems to be an assumption that sections like "Plot", whose name inherently implies spoiler, should avoid spoiler warnings, since they're redundant.

I'm *not* convinced.

All forms of human communication have redundancies. My calendar has columns labelled "Monday" and "Tuesday" even though the "Tuesday" provides no information at all. The day after Monday has to be Tuesday by definition; labelling it as Tuesday only tells people something they already know.

Yet most calendars label all the days of the week. There's a reason for this: we want a consistent user interface, and redundancy for the sake of consistency is an important part of user interface design. The user should be able to find the day of the week for May 14 the same way he can for May 15--by looking at the top of the column.

Removing spoiler warnings from "Plot" sections because everyone knows that "Plot" contains spoilers is like removing the Tuesday from the calendar because everyone knows that the day after Monday has to be Tuesday. Ken Arromdee 15:12, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Not really. The spoiler warning is distracting (it's designed to be) and since it's superfluous to the informational content of the page when it follows "Plot" it's better to remove it. --Tony Sidaway 17:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Someone above pointed out that spoiler warnings can be turned off. If so, distraction is a non-issue.

And as for being superfluous: well, I just got finished explaining that being superfluous isn't necessarily bad. If you reply to that by saying "but it's superfluous", you're really not saying much at all. Ken Arromdee 17:21, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The current version of the spoiler guideline already outlines why they're usually bad. That they're also dispensable is just the icing on the cake. --Tony Sidaway 15:59, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Spoiler warning? (Discussion from Hamlet page)

At the expense of making a long page longer, but with the aim of un-splintering this discussion, the following is the relevant section of Talk:Hamlet:AndyJones

The following discussion is archived. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

I believe spoiler warnings on classical works are absurd. Obviously, some editors disagree. I understand that there are arguments for both sides (see this discussion), and I don't want to engage in edit warring, so I propose a straw poll.

The article should have a spoiler warning

• Wrad 12:42, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
• AndyJones 12:59, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
• Goldfritha 00:07, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
• Smatprt 03:42, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
• Waggers 11:35, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The article should not have a spoiler warning

• Ashenai 10:46, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
• Paul B 12:03, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Voting is evil

• On Wikipedia, we make decisions by discussion, not by voting. --Tony Sidaway 17:23, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• Polls are fine if they facilitate discussion, which seems to be the whole point here. Wrad 17:33, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

• For goodness, not another poll. Discuss, don't poll. --Iamunknown 19:52, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Discussion

• If we don't put one up, people will come along and complain about it, or add it in themselves until we finally give in. I've seen it happen again and again. It doesn't really hurt anything, so we might as well just put it in, I think. Wrad 12:45, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

The article must have a spoiler warning, because Wikipedia is worldwide, for one thing. Hamlet may be a classic work in English literature, but it is not so in Chinese or other cultures. It is not correct that everybody who comes by will already know the story. JeffJo 23:50, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, "classics" are often classics only to selected cultures. Goldfritha 00:07, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes - all plays should have a spoiler warning. These pages are not just for Shakespeare buffs. This is why its good that most synopsis are close to the end of the articles.Smatprt 03:53, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm removing the spoiler tag because we don't treat our readers like imbeciles. There is a very large warning about spoilers in our content disclaimer and further warnings are intrusive and unnecessary. This is a 400-year-old Shakespeare play, not some bloody silly comic book. --Tony Sidaway 17:13, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

In doing that, you're acting against most editors of this page, and will definitely get reverted within minutes. Might want to try swaying the opinion before making enemies. Wrad 17:16, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I've already got lots of friends, thanks. Consensus has changed, spoilers are out. --Tony Sidaway 17:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

[15] People who keep deleting the spoiler mentioned this link, I think it's pretty good, so I'll go ahead and do their job for them and post it here, although I don't think it changes anything. It's a debate, not a policy. Wrad 17:14, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Template:Spoiler itself notes that it should not be used in sections named "Plot summary" or similar ... as these can be presumed to contain, um, plot elements. So reverting with no edit summary, against all sanity and against the documentation contained in the very template one is including is ... silly - David Gerard 17:20, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The arguments for the spoiler tag have been stated as follows:

• if we don't do it, others will do it until we give in
• It is not correct that everybody who comes by will already know the story/These pages are not just for Shakespeare buffs. This is why its good that most synopsis are close to the end of the articles.

If someone puts an unnecessary comment on the page, it can be removed like anything else that doesn't belong. No question of giving in. If they persist we show them the content disclaimer which has warned about spoilers now for years.

It is absolutely true that people coming to this article may not know about the play. This is precisely why they come to the article, Furthermore, if they see a section marked "plot" or "synopsis", they know that the section is a discussion of the plot of the play. It is not necessary to say the same thing twice. --Tony Sidaway 17:28, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see where the content disclaimer page talks about removing spoiler tags. Seems like it advocates them. Wrad 17:31, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Not that I can see. It does point to Wikipedia:Spoiler warning, a guideline that has recently been strongly opposed in discussion and, insofar as it used to advocate spoiler warnings, no longer enjoys consensus support.

I applied to have the page protected so that those who believe that this article should have a spoiler warning in addition to a section heading clearly marked "Synopsis" will come here and argue for it instead of just reverting every time it's removed and saying "we have more votes" (which incidentally isn't at all true). --Tony Sidaway 17:58, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

It now appears to be protected.

Personally, I see no good reason for warning that sections like 'plot' or 'synopsis' may reveal things like plot twists and endings. We do generally expect our readers to have living & functioning grey matter between the ears. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 23:55, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with whoever said "the concensus had changed". I see no evidence of that. In fact, I still see more editors in favor of spoilers. FYI, after they leave high school less than 3% of Americans ever see a Shakespeare play, much less read one. As an advocate of the theatre, I think spoiler warnings should stay. Wikipedia is for the common man, not just special interest buffs. Spoilers have been on most of the plays and have been agreed to in many previous discussions. To claim "consensus" has changed is just plain wrong, as this recent discussion proves once again. Smatprt 01:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

This discussion demonstrates very well how radically consensus has changed. Moreover your arguments for inclusion of these superfluous warnings don't hold water.

The common man, as you put it, can read, otherwise he wouldn't be reading the article. It follows that he can read the word "Synopsis", "Plot", "Plot summary" or somesuch at the start of a section and be informed thereby that the following text is a summary of the plot.

In the unlikely event that he's too stupid to realise that sections marked "Plot" in encyclopedia articles about a Shakespeare play are going to contain information about the plot, his misconceptions are easily remedied by referring him to the content disclaimer which is linked to every single page on the wiki.

There is no need for any extra warning, let alone these frankly insulting, ugly and intrusive warnings. --Tony Sidaway 02:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"after they leave high school less than 3% of Americans ever see a Shakespeare play" - I daresay less than 3% of Americans ever read an encyclopedia article on a Shakespear article, either. Those who do, do so because they are seeking information on the play, and if they choose to read the section on the play's plot, it is ridiculous to warn them that they may.. learn something they didn't know about the plot. --Stormie 03:29, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"Too stupid?" seems an insulting comment from someone who actually gets insulted by a template. If you are going to make a bunch of mass edits to the Shakespeare plays, (on which your infrequent edits indicate you don't see them as that important), then please bring up your proposed edits at the Shakespeare project page so you can discuss this with editors that actually work on these pages on a daily or weekly basis. Thanks Smatprt 02:38, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

In my opinion, the wise thing to do would have been to wait until an official policy came out before changing these tags. Coming out and claiming consensus on a page that, frankly, has only had a few editors respond to it (The spoilers template page), and then blowing through and changing everything on several pages, ignoring previous debates and discussions, is inappropriate and rude. If you can point me to an official policy that says we have to take the tag out, or if a consensus for changing it develops on this page, then it would be alright to change, but your tactics now are hardly going to get us anywhere. Wrad 02:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"Too stupid?" seems an insulting comment from someone who actually gets insulted by a template. If you are going to make a bunch of mass edits to the Shakespeare plays, (on which your infrequent edits indicate you don't see them as that important), then please bring up your proposed edits at the Shakespeare project page so you can discuss this with editors that actually work on these pages on a daily or weekly basis. Thanks Smatprt 02:40, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

If you wish to discuss the use of the {{spoiler}} tag, you should go to the centralized RfC page located at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Policies/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning. There is no point it splintering this discussion which will result in multiple "consciences agreements" that are in conflict with each other. There should be one general guideline for all. --Farix (Talk) 00:54, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

• That seems to be the view of the Shakespeare wikiproject, also: namely that all discussion should be directed to the RfC. I'll copy this discussion there. AndyJones 07:59, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Not needed

We don't need a spoiler warning. This is an encyclopedia; we don't need to warn readers that they're about to read some information. It's basically saying "Warning, you're about to read details about the topic of this article". When I really don't want something spoiled, like the outcome of a sports event that I've recorded, I don't even turn on my computer, let alone visit the encyclopedia article that discusses it. If we place spoiler warnings before plots, we could equally place them before mathematical derivations that some people like to come to on their own, before summaries of the careers of fighters, and on articles about every Super Bowl. If you can agree that spoiler warnings would be inappropriate in these cases, then you should also agree (I think) that they are inappropriate in the case of plot discussions. Sancho 14:55, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

"Warning: the following article might make you smarter", eh? You're saying what's been said before, but I agree. The presence of the spoiler warning is just an open invitation for everyone to think that it's okay to go into detailed plot summaries, which are misplaced on Wikipedia (not to mention potentially illegal).

There's been a lot of commenting on this page, originating here or moved from elsewhere. I'm really losing track of what's going on. Are RfC's always this chaotic? :D We need some kind of bullet point digest of the major issues that are being raised. --Darkbane ^talk 15:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

One reason we do need spoiler warnings is precisely that this is a proper encyclopedia (among other things). Contrast on-line "encyclopedias" such as Wookipedia (Star Wars) and MemoryAlpha (Star Trek), which, as has been pointed out approvingly by the "anti" party, don't use spoiler warnings. These sites are pure fancruft and therefore spoiler warnings would be entirely redundant. (And surely these sites can't really function as models for editors hoping to make WP more "serious"??!) One positive virtue of spoiler warnings that has not yet been mentioned is that it reminds editors to put in non-spoiler material, which generally includes the "outside view" material that we would expect to be foregrounded in a genuine encyclopedia article. PaddyLeahy 16:41, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

All of that is already covered in WP:ATTRIBUTION, WP:NPOV, WP:N, WP:CRUFT and many other policies, guidelines and essays that remind us that we should include information other than plot summary. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 16:46, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Sadly, not all editors take the time to read every policy, let alone every style essay, before they dive in. However, media fans working on WP can hardly fail to notice the spoiler warning concept. PaddyLeahy 17:01, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The solution to that, is to point them to the welcome page, where it is more than adequately covered. And if they aren't new editors, ignorance of our policies and guidelines (and to a much lesser extent essays) is no excuse. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 17:32, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Apologies, I meant to make clear that my point is that the particular virtue here is that new editors are encouraged to to write better articles without intervention by more experienced editors, hence saving a lot of work all round. PaddyLeahy 17:40, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Invisible tags?

Does the functionality exist to tag spoilers invisibly (e.g. <!-- spoiler starts -->kaiser sose is rosebud<!-- /spoiler ends -->) - User preferences could then be used to either display or hide the appropriate sections. This assumes that nobody wants to read both the spoilers and then spoiler tags. - Tiswas^(t) 16:22, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Functionally, it would serve no purpose. Why mark invisible spoiler tags if you're not going to mark visible spoiler tags? If anything, that would invite casual editors to automatically add a spoiler tag if they saw that, in effect you might as well just add a normal spoiler tag. It also would not solve the problem of formatting articles that have spoilers spread throughout multiple places with non-spoiler info in-between in the interest of better info organization. It also doesn't settle the issue about what is and is not a spoiler. In fact, it has exactly the same issues that visible spoiler tags have, except that it's invisible.--—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 16:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

This is a proposal for replacing visible tags, not as an alternative choice. It addresses the issue of spoiler tags littering articles, from the perspective of the end user. From a formatting perspective, there is no reason why multiple tags could not be used in line - much the same way as commented out text has no impact on formatting. The only imapact is on the end user that chooses to set their preference such that they cannot see the spoiler content. However simplistic it may be, out of sight, out of mind seems like a reasonable compromise. - Tiswas^(t) 16:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

If it's going to be invisible, what's the point of having them at all? --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 16:49, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Nevermind that previous comment. However, that would add a whole new dimension to formatting issues. Now, editors are going to have to keep in mind how to write the prose so that the information makes sense with both spoilers displayed and spoilers not displayed. And when casual editors add the invisible tag, they may not fix the grammar and prose properly. Holes will seem to appear in the prose as one setence makes no sense from the previous setence. This would only further complicate the issue. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 16:54, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Granted, but why not let those be the lumps to be taken for them that wish not to see spoilers. - Tiswas^(t) 16:58, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Spoiler Examples

In any discussion like this about spoilers, it stands to reason that people will use spoilers as examples. I'm concerned that casual editors who find their way here are going to see information that they would expect to see in the articles, but not here. Until we settle this dispute about whether spoilers belong or not, or until we can determine what is and isn't a spoiler, let's try to not come up with new examples of spoilers unless it has bearing on a new discussion point. Let's try to use the same examples that have already been provided if possible (Sephiroth kills Aerith, Snape kills Dumbledore, etc.). Spouting off a spoiler in the attitude of "This is how it is, get used to it" is just being a WP:DICK, and doesn't help the anti-spoiler side look any better. --—NicholaiDaedalus 16:41, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's necessary to extend the virus any further than the article space (where in my opinion it has gotten quite out of hand.) In normal conversation one would discuss plot details such as those of The Crying Game, The Sixth Sense and even the latest Harry Potter where they are relevant, so I don't know why it should be so different just because we're discussing things online. --Tony Sidaway 18:53, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Because while I disagree with using Spoiler Warnings at all, I am not about to enforce my views until a consensus is reached. And people who advocate spoiler warnings come here to advocate them and do not want to have spoilers revealed to them, not even here. Forcing them to see spoilers by posting them loudly on the very place that they come to to address this issue doesn't give them much choice in the matter. --—NicholaiDaedalus 20:23, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I will not be constrained in my use of illustrative examples such that people who need to read WP:ENC do not learn that Portia dresses up as the judge and takes all of Shylock's money in the trial. Hipocrite - «Talk» 20:27, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Forcing them to see spoilers? Perhaps the person with the loud signature in Greek would like to reconsider the term. Please do tell us how they are being forced - what method - gun to head? Kidnapped children? Other? Tell me. I don't mind finding out. KillerChihuahua^?!? 20:30, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Killer Chihuahua: You're use of personal attacks aside, I mean simply that in order to express that they do not wish to see spoilers they have to read spoilers in that very discussion.

Hipocrite: I'm not asking anyone to constrain their arguments, but rather not blurt out needless spoilers that do nothing for the discussion aside from make a WP:POINT. And if it can be said with an already discussed example, then use that. If it can't be said with an already discussed example, then use a new example to make your point. --—NicholaiDaedalus 20:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

• What personal attack? Substantiate that accusation or withdraw it. KillerChihuahua^?!? 20:54, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Your rather insulting reference to my signature. You don't like my signature, fine you don't have to. But that has nothing to do with this discussion so leave it out. --—NicholaiDaedalus 20:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

A descriptive phrase is not a personal attack, Nick. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:19, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

"person with the loud signature" is insulting as "loud" has a negative connotation. If you did not intend to insult me, then you should not have referred to my by any sort of description in the first place, you should instead refer to me by name as it's considered polite. But I repeat myself: "(this) has nothing to do with this discussion so leave it out." --—NicholaiDaedalus 21:33, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Nonsense. "loud" is not inherently insulting - I find that a truly odd notion, if you didn't want it loud why is it so dramatic and colorful? - so again, not a personal attack. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:50, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

If you don't intend to insult, then refer to people by name and avoid the risk of misinterpretation. --—NicholaiDaedalus 21:58, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

• • • • • To the casual reader, this comes across as a clear insult. "person with the loud signature in Greek" is clearly a choice INSTEAD of using their name. If you are going to make a choice not to use someone's name and create a "description" instead, with the obvious (and successful) attempt to egg them on, then at least have the guts to own up to it.Smatprt 01:07, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Nonsense. People call me MurderousCanine or similar variations on my nick's meanings, and I find it amusing. Its absurd grandstanding to call it a personal insult. A personal insult is something like "stupid *expletive* *expletive* jerk" - no ambiguity there. Telling me to "own up to it" is ridiculous. Presuming an insult was meant is clearly an AGF violation. KillerChihuahua^?!? 19:11, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Functional consensus already exists. We're just waiting for everybody to accept it. I do agree that we shouldn't needlessly use spoilers in examples, although the spoilers we're seeing are hardly that: Crying Game, Harry Potter and whatnot. --Tony Sidaway 20:58, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

"Functional consensus already exists. We're just waiting for everybody to accept it." Isn't wide-acceptance what determines consensus? --—NicholaiDaedalus 21:00, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for saying that. Concise, effective, hits the nail on the head. :) --Kizor 21:49, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

It's over. It's done. Normality has been established. --Tony Sidaway 15:55, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. --Kizor 17:15, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Jeffrey Archer

I can see the case for not having this at all; although I appreciate it. But if we are going to have it, we should use it where necessary.

In this article on an author, there is a full summary of one of his short stories with a twist ending, which is most of a paragraph. Shouldn't this have a {{spoiler}} as much as anywhere else? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:04, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd be much more inclined to just nuke that entire example - it's hardly a very good one. Phil Sandifer 18:12, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

That would be one acceptable solution.

Spoilers on author articles are second only in odiousness to spoilers on generic non-artistic terms like anagram and kiss (really - there were spoiler warnings on these). Write around if you must, or ignore for neutrality - David Gerard 19:02, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Why? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:41, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Plot vs. Plot Summary

Many contributors here claim that it is obvious that any section marked "Plot" will contain a summary of the plot that functions as a spoiler. While this is true for many (maybe most) articles about works of fiction on WP, it need not be. It is often possible (though not easy) to write about the plot without giving away so much of it that it spoils the experience for the reader. This is the stock-in-trade of book reviewers. I think it is a shame that this is not practiced more on WP, partly because it encourages writing from an external and critical perspective. On the other hand, a section marked "Plot Summary" pretty much guarantees a plot spoiler. (same for "synopsis" although our mythical naive reader may not know what that means). A spoiler tag on such sections is redundant, but like User:Ken Arromdee I think the redundancy is useful and harmless. PaddyLeahy 18:10, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

We are an encyclopedia, we are not book reviewers. Our goal is to provide complete, comprehensive coverage of our subjects. This is not possible if we do not include important plot points, especially twists and endings that may be subject to criticism and reception. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 18:33, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

We should cover what is notable and only that. It is far from clear that notability in a work of literature confers notability on every detail of the plot. In fact I'm sure the contrary is stated in some WP guide or other. PaddyLeahy 18:39, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

In FFVII it is notable that Sephiroth kills Aerith. In fact, this has been identified as an iconic scene from the game in several reviews and magazines, It is an important detail in the overall storyline, as her ghost plays a major role in FFVII:Advent Children as well as The Maiden Who Walks the Planet. the fact is, there are spoilers that are neccessary to discuss a subject. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣΣ 18:42, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

That still doesn't mean that every plot point or spoiler is notable enough to mention. -- Ned Scott 18:44, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

[To Daedalus:] So? When a spoiler is required in a discussion of the plot, a spoiler warning would be a good idea. In many other cases no spoiler is required in the plot section. The book/game/comic may have a twist but its plot may be notable for something else entirely. (Or maybe the existence of the twist is notable, but the details of it are not). PaddyLeahy 18:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

This is one example. In general, complete comprehensive coverage requires that nothing is left out, including notable twists and endings. We should not alter our scope of coverage just because someone may not want to read the information contained in the article. If that's the case, then don't read the article in the first place. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣ 19:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

(lost indent count) On the contrary, every encyclopedia article leaves out almost everything about its subject. The art is to decide what to include. As per WP:FICT and WP:WAF plot summaries should always be a minor part of articles, which should mainly be based on secondary sources (e.g. reviews) not primary sources (the book/film etc itself), and should take an out-of-universe perspective. If these guidelines were followed more in practice, spoilers would be much rarer in WP articles, and the need for warnings about the occasional spoiler would perhaps be more acceptable, even to zealots. PaddyLeahy 20:23, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Neologism

Is there any way we can at least find a better word for this? For me, a large part of the problem is that "spoiler warnings" are a neologism, and are not really suitable for the overall structure of an encyclopedia. It's not that other encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings - it's that other serious reference works don't use neologisms. Phil Sandifer 18:12, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

This is a good point. The word "spoiled" means ruined. And claiming that a classic work of art can be ruined by knowing the plot, is making a POV statement about that work of art. By warning readers that, say, Romeo and Juliet or A Doll's House will be ruined by learning the plot beforehand is rather insulting to these works of art. I claim they can not be ruined that way. That's one of the reasons they are classics and that people see them again and again. Shanes 20:11, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

One example of a "classic" (at least, best seller in its day) which has been literally spoiled is Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The original novella was a mystery: who was Hyde and what was his connection to Jekyll? For a modern reader it now falls totally flat. (No, I don't think a warning is needed for that one!) PaddyLeahy 20:32, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Funny, that. The thriller element is still present and is just as enjoyable if you know that Hyde is Jekyll from watching Lon Chaney or Spencer Tracy transform from mild Jekyll into demonic Hyde on TV. It's in the writing. It has nothing to do with whether you know in advance or not. --Tony Sidaway 21:04, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

They still shouldn't be in classic fiction articles, though. The more and more I think about it, the more I don't see them as necessary, even for recent works. -- Ned Scott 20:15, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't consider this a problem myself. Consider that the neologism is a couple of decades old (pushing the definition?), very well-known, integrated into mainstream language, intuitively and easily understood, and explained in the template itself. (And it's not like we have to prove ourselves anything, including a serious reference work - some of the talk on this page about "sending a message" about being an encyclopedia has the tinge of an inferiority complex.) Then again, I'm more breezy than most. If it should be changed, in a pinch it could be trimmed down to "Plot and/or ending details follow", with a hyperlink in the words to spoiler or the guideline page. --Kizor 20:24, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

It's still not in Webster's or the OED, thus putting it in violation of Wikipedia:Manual of Style (neologisms). Phil Sandifer 21:01, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh really, if the word "spoiler" is such a problem then just eliminate it from the template; in fact also eliminate the word "warning" if that causes such trouble, and just let the template say something like "the following section contains plot or ending details". There, now it's completely NPOV. It does not say anything about "spoiling" anything for anyone. It does not try to "warn" anyone about anything. It just states a completely objective fact -- that the section about to follow contains some plot or ending details. And if you think even that is too obtrusive, why not make it in a smaller font, and less intrusive colours, and so on ... ... ? Henrik Ebeltoft 01:14, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Straw polls

I think that it is time for a couple of straw polls to see at least where we are in the consensus building process. I'm only going to poll for three issues that I think we can easily come to a consensus on. --Farix (Talk) 21:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Please sign your name using four tildes (~~~~) under the position you support, and please add a (hopefully brief and well thought out) comment. If you are happy with more than one possibility, you may wish to sign your names to more than one place. Extended commentary should be placed below, in the section marked "Discussion", though brief commentary can be interspersed.

Poll 1

Should spoiler warnings be placed on articles about historical and classical works of fiction?

Use spoiler tags

1. Yes, if (i) said work relies for its impact on a surprise (ii) the surprise is not common knowledge (iii) work is still read for pleasure by a significant number of people (example: Sherlock Holmes mysteries). PaddyLeahy 21:44, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
2. Yes, if needed. One man's classic in another man's new discovery. Most shakespeare plays remain undiscovered by 97% of Americans. Smatprt 01:07, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
3. Yes per above, let's not be ethnocentric. It is an international encyclopedia after all. Brisvegas 01:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
4. Yes, imposing a time limit on spoiler tags doesn't make any sense. — The Storm Surfer 13:30, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Don't use spoiler tags

1. Farix (Talk) 21:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
2. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣ 21:39, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
3. danielfolsom 21:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
4. Spoilers should be limited to the synopsis section anyway, and it is obvious that that section will reveal the plot. -- Cielomobile ^{talk / contribs} 22:00, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
5. -- Ned Scott 00:44, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
6. David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 01:01, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
7. Dlong 01:05, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
8. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. Regards, High on a tree 02:12, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
9. Embarrassing and unprofessional. --Stormie 04:12, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
10. I don't really go for the "unprofessional" line of thinking; I just find them redundant, too difficult to adequately use with hard and fast rules because we need a bit of violation of OR and NPOV to use them, and I find it compelling that hardly any other encyclopaedia (online or offline) uses them - indicating that encyclopaedia readers generally do know enough when to avoid reading an article which may have spoilers. Johnleemk | Talk 06:00, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
11. No. Spoiler tags are an embarrassment to the encyclopedia under any circumstances. Informing about the content of works is what we do. Sandstein 07:41, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
12. No, the placement of a spoiler tag on Iliad would be ridiculous. Garion96 (talk) 09:53, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
13. Absolutely not, this is ridiculous. --Cyde Weys 14:05, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
14. Definitely not. The structured division of the article should be more than enough to indicate where potentially "spoiler"-ific material is located. Coverage of historical works is one aspect where we can approach the quality of a printed encyclopedia, and placing spoiler tags is counter to that idea. We're not in the business of babysitting our readership. --Darkbane ^talk 14:38, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Other

1. Maybe. "Historical" comes closest to the correct distinction, but a better idea is that (as someone suggested in the 'yes' section), a work which is read for pleasure by a good chunk of the readers needs a spoiler warning. This is almost historical, but not *quite* the same; older works like Sherlock Holmes stories may require spoiler warnings when some newer ones don't. It also gets fuzzy when you come to cases like Shakespeare. (Something like Romeo and Juliet, though, should be covered by another rule: you don't need a spoiler warning when most people who read the article can be expected to already know the spoiler.) Ken Arromdee 15:35, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Poll 2

Should spoiler warnings be placed on articles about fairy tales?

Use spoiler tags

1. Can't think of any where they would be needed, but decision should be made case-by-case, not by category. PaddyLeahy 21:51, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
2. Agree with PaddyLeahy completely. Stop trying to own every page and let the various page editors decide. NEW fairy tales are written every day.Smatprt 01:07, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Don't use spoiler tags

1. Farix (Talk) 21:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
2. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣ 21:39, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
3. danielfolsom 21:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
4. -- Cielomobile ^{talk / contribs} 22:00, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
5. -- Ned Scott 00:44, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
   • I'm assuming we're talking about classic fairy tales? -- Ned Scott 01:17, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
6. David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 01:01, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
7. Dlong 01:05, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
8. Agree not to use sweeping categories for fairy tales, but if someone is researching a fairy tale there's a higher probability they already know the outcome, so spoiler warnings may not be necessary in all cases. Brisvegas 01:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
9. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. Regards, High on a tree 02:12, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
10. Even more embarrassing, although unintentionally hilarious. --Stormie 04:12, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
11. See my reasoning earlier for the first poll. Johnleemk | Talk 06:01, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
12. See my reasoning under poll 1 above. Sandstein 07:42, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
13. No, expect to find the ending when you look up the article about Snow White Garion96 (talk) 09:53, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
14. Seems kind of obvious that an article about a fairy tale would contain spoilers about it, so the tag is superfluous and ugly. --Cyde Weys 14:06, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
15. Even more pointless than spoilers on historical articles. If reader doesn't want to know the plot/ending, he shouldn't read the plot section. --Darkbane ^talk 14:46, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
16. No. It's very unlikely anyone old enough to read Wikipedia would be reading fairy tales for pleasure and care about not knowing the ending in advance, even assuming that they didn't already know it simply because our culture is already full of references to them. Ken Arromdee 15:37, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Poll 3

Should spoiler warnings be placed in sections titled "Plot", "Plot summary", "Synopses", or any variation thereof?

Use spoiler tags

• Yes, if relevant. Non-crufty discussion of plots can and often should avoid spoilers, therefore, spoiler warnings should be used if necessary. PaddyLeahy 21:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
• Yes, if relevant or likely to ruin the story for anyone (not just experts in the subject, but the rest of us)Smatprt 01:07, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Of course, since not all plot summaries necessarily contain the ending. Brisvegas 01:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Sure, it's only one or two lines after all. — The Storm Surfer 13:32, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Depends on the situation; a synopsis that goes into detail on the plot twists is probably plotcruft anyway. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:34, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Yes. As I've pointed out, plot sections should contain spoiler tags for a consistent user interface. The fact that everyone already knows that a plot section probably contains spoilers is irrelevant. Please don't just count votes on this when many of the people voting "no" don't even address this point. (Besides, a plot section doesn't *always* contain spoilers in the sense of twists.) Ken Arromdee 15:41, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Don't use spoiler tags

• Patently redundant and crufty Farix (Talk) 21:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
• --—ΔαίδαλοςΣ 21:39, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
• danielfolsom 21:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
• Extraordinarily redundant. -- Cielomobile ^{talk / contribs} 22:01, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
• -- Ned Scott 00:44, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• emphatic 'no' here. It's called plot summary for a reason. David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 01:01, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Dlong 01:06, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. Besides, it is a real insult to readers to treat them as if they were stupid enough to be surprised by information about the plot in a section titled "Plot". Regards, High on a tree 02:12, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Completely redundant. --Stormie 04:12, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• See my reasoning earlier. The natural caveat, of course, is that WP:IAR exists so this rule can and should be violated if necessary - on a case-by-case basis. I would prefer an option like "Treat them like fair use images; never use spoiler warnings unless you really really really have to", but I'm a bit lazy to make a new option and this option works just as well for me thanks to IAR. Johnleemk | Talk 06:02, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• See my reasoning under poll 1 above. Sandstein 07:42, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Same reasoning as before, if you go to a article, be prepared to get all the information. Garion96 (talk) 09:53, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• Redundant and ugly. If you're smart enough to read English, you can figure out that, if you don't want to be spoiled, you might not want to read the section header labeled "Plot summary". --Cyde Weys 14:06, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
• If a reader does not realize that a section about plot will contain plot details, then we need to ask them to leave the Internet on account of being fucking stupid. I don't think such readers exist in any significant quantity =) --Darkbane ^talk 14:42, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Discussion.

Spoiler tags violate the Wikipedia policy on disclaimers - and they're redundant. Think about it - if you didn't want to know about a movie (including the plot line) then would you look it up in a paper encyclopedia? No - because a paper encyclopedia would obviously have the ending. Same goes for an online encyclopedia. If they want to know some specific detail, use google, but Wikipedia (and any other encyclopedia) isn't for that. Encyclopedias are for giving out facts about a subject, no disclaimer neccesary.danielfolsom 21:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

• In general, I see no reason to use spoiler tags. True spoilers should only be in the synopsis/plot section, and it would be redundant to have such a tag there in the first place. -- Cielomobile ^{talk / contribs} 22:01, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I disagree. Take a "Themes" section. The reader cannot know whether or not such a section has spoilers, and to what extent. A philosophical work about the exploration of space would have this premise on the back cover, and coverage of its themes could be spoilerless. I bought a scifi book on the basis of a rightly non-spoiling theme section this week. For a work about identity that throws in a last-minute twist that turns the entire premise on its head (such as Fight Club), any coverage of themes and subtext, not for "Synopsis", would have to deal with spoilers. Or take "Reception" - if, say, a particularily gory scene is fundamental to the splash caused by a horror movie, it has to be covered under reception, but other works have spoilerless versions of such sections. --Kizor 22:10, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
    • Alright, perhaps in certain contexts where there needs to be a spoiler in another section, the warning might be merited. But in general, spoiler warnings are meant, for example, to stop the reader from discovering that a certain wizard has killed another certain wizard in the latest Harry Potter, and that simply should not be stated in any section other than the synopsis section. If you find an example of an article that truly merits a spoiler section outside of the synopsis section (where it is redundant anyway), I would like to see it. -- Cielomobile ^{talk / contribs} 22:16, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
      • Final Fantasy VII#Legacy for one example off the top of my head. I am illustrating that it is not limited to the plot section, I am not agreeing that it needs a spoiler tag. --—ΔαίδαλοςΣ 22:28, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
      • The Fight Club article seems pretty good to me. --Kizor 22:38, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Finally! I was beginning to fear that we would never have an opportunity to discuss this! --87.189.99.112

• • • • • What is the harm in a little redundancy if it helps someone. Can anyone explain why having the occasional spoiler is actually harmful?Smatprt 01:07, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

While I'm not totally against the idea of spoiler warnings, cutting their usage way back seems like a good idea. In the very least I think it's been shown that we don't need such warnings in classical works, or in clearly marked sections. -- Ned Scott 00:46, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

My thoughts exatcly. People can't complain if they read the synopsis; what do they expect, hidden spoilers? David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 01:01, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

• • • • • I disagree that it has "been shown" this. One man's classical work is another man's new discovery.Smatprt 01:07, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

While I find a number of arguments against spoiler warnings ridiculous (including the idea that it's okay to spoil fairy tales or classical works because "everybody knows the ending"), I think overall spoiler tags do more harm than good. They force us to structure the article around the tags - people are encouraged to put anything spoilerish between {{spoiler}} and {{endspoiler}} regardless of whether the information would be better off in another section - and I think confining spoilers to just a synopsis section would be just as bad an idea for the same reason. When this is happening, we basically give up writing and comprehensiveness for the sake of avoiding spoilers - an excessive concession that hardly any other encyclopaedia makes (which indicates readers of encyclopaedias do have enough smarts to generally avoid spoiler articles). Johnleemk | Talk 06:06, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

While I'm not totally against the idea of plot summaries, cutting their useage way back seems like a good idea. Many editors think that spoiler tags are redundant because they think that the main purpose of articles about works of fiction is to recite the plot. They are wrong. They need to read Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction) and take careful note. To me, plot summaries are the least useful parts of such articles; I'm usually looking (vainly) for comments about critical reaction etc. PaddyLeahy 10:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I think you are mischararacterizing here. I'm not aware of any editors who think spoiler tags around Plot sections are redundant "because they think that the main purpose of articles about works of fiction is to recite the plot". Indeed I have seen several users who advocate removing spoiler tags from Plot sections concede that one useful purpose they serve is to draw attention to what is often excessively over-detailed recitation of the plot! Spoiler tags around Plot sections are redundant simply because it is obvious that if the section is labelled "Plot", it will talk about the plot. No more, no less, and certainly no claim that reciting the plot is the primary focus of an article. --Stormie 11:21, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Not really a mischaracterization, but more of a reminder for us to be mindful of WP:WAF, just in case we weren't, I think. -- Ned Scott 11:43, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Enough with the polls! By now, hundreds of spoiler tags have been removed from prominent articles. There has been very little opposition and those who have opposed are overwhelmed by those who support. It's done, there is consensus for the current guideline: spoiler tags are to be used only where a strong case can be made that the quality of the article is improved by their presence. That is, hardly ever. --Tony Sidaway 15:44, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

In part because two of the loudest opposers have been off being blocked as a result of the unilateral nonconsentual muttermutter change, and there was no way to infer the presence of this debate from the removal of those spoiler tags... --Kizor 17:18, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Response to Ken Arromdee

• plot sections should contain spoiler tags for a consistent user interface.

  Consistent with what?

• The fact that everyone already knows that a plot section probably contains spoilers is irrelevant.

  So you admit that everyone knows, or should know, that a plot section would contain spoilers. But the fact everyone knows and thus renders a spoiler warning redundant is irrelevant? How is avoiding or reducing redundancy irrelevant? This seems more of an, "the facts inconveniently counters my argument, so I'm going to declare the fact irrelevant," line of reasoning.

• Please don't just count votes on this when many of the people voting "no" don't even address this point.

  This is a straw poll to see if there is a rough consensus among editors. If not, the discussion will continue. But if the overwhelming majority is taking one side of the issue over the other, then the straw poll indicates that a consensus has been reached.

• (Besides, a plot section doesn't *always* contain spoilers in the sense of twists.)

  But people still put spoilers warnings even when any aspect of the plot is discussed. --Farix (Talk) 16:01, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

A complete non sequitur

Just to take people's minds off the seriousness of the issue, I'd like to thank all participants for helping improve my English skills. I doubt that I would've been able to use words like "superflous" or "undermining" before. :) --Kizor 21:57, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Hahaha... thank you for that. That reduced a lot of wikistress in me! --—ΔαίδαλοςΣ 22:03, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The ignominy of this discussion is a blemish upon us! Yes, that really has nothing to do with what was said, but hey, its a non sequitur! David Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 01:03, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

The compromise

Taken from Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Policies/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning#Time to close this - results are obvious, Tony Sidaway's adaptation of the German policy, several of the above comments, and a few of my own ideas:

Wikipedia:Spoiler warning/draft

Doesn't ban spoiler warnings, but greatly cuts them back. Feel free to edit and modify this proposal, or simply comment on it. -- Ned Scott 01:22, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Well i saw this once on de.wiki in a book article, why not make a section plot overview and a section plot details. i think this works even better as the overview is guaranted to be free of any spoilers and the details part is for the people who want to know it all. Note that this is not really practiced in de.wiki i just saw it once in an article bout the latest harry potter book, but thought it was quite a good idea. This way you can get rid of silly spoiler templates, who warn people that the plot is revealed in a section called synopsis or plot summary and also have a section for people, who don't to get spoiled. But please restrict this proposal to only new works, otherwise it will creep in to culture articles. 80.133.173.182 01:40, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I think it would depend on the article. -- Ned Scott 01:43, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I also propose that we move Wikipedia:Spoiler warning to Wikipedia:Spoilers. -- Ned Scott 01:42, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

That draft has its own problems, including banning the word "spoiler" because it's a neologism. As the neologism article says, we can use neologisms if the neologism has been written about in a reliable secondary source. I'm sure someone will find one sooner or later, and then we should be able to put the word back. Ken Arromdee 15:47, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

It says we can write about them. It still discourages their use in the article namespace, however. All that means is we can probably have an article called Spoiler. That does not justify its use in articles on other subjects, however. Phil Sandifer 17:29, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Protest against premature removal of spoiler warnings

While this discussion has been going on, several editors have been engaged in wholesale removal of spoiler warnings from wikipedia. Moreover, admins on the anti-spoler side have blocked at least two editors who tried to undo this work. One justification offered is that there has been little opposition to this. (Despite topic #PLEASE STOP EDIT WARRING above). Therefore, for the record, I PROTEST. Maybe I'm the only one who feels this way. If not, kindly add your protest here. PaddyLeahy 10:04, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but go take a look at the actual guideline. That's been changed too. Perhaps you should be protesting that instead. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 11:10, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

The presence of (what appears to us etc.) greater injustice prevents us from acting against other injustice? --Kizor 20:37, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

The same should go for those readding the spoiler tags. But frankly, I think this is a good candidate for Wikipedia:Lamest edit wars. --Farix (Talk) 12:01, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Paddy, I should point out that at least one of the IPs above who got blocked was adding spoiler tags to other works, so in this case at least the block was entirely justified. David Fuchs 13:38, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely. Strongly agree with PaddyLeahy. Very little maturity or good judgement being displayed on Wikipedia these last few days. The whole affair has certainly damaged the goodwill of many editors towards the project. AndyJones 13:54, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Some of these blocks are warranted, by the way. As an anti-siler myself, I still agree that we should not be removing the tags until concensus is reached, which it isn't yet. --—NicholaiDaedalus 14:48, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Consensus sometimes has to be demonstrated by actual editing. The actual editing performed over the past day or two has shown that there has been excessive centralized discussion and there is in fact very little practical opposition to the removal of the unnecessary and intrusive spoiler tags that follow clearly labelled "Plot" headings and the like. Discussion is important, but so is being bold. --Tony Sidaway 15:49, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

While myself trying not to remove any given inappropriate spoiler warning more than once, I see that three (so far) of the editors replacing them have been blocked for 3RR, i.e. are hotheads anyway. What I'm finding is that almost all my removals are sticking - that is, that the wider Wikipedia populace really doesn't seem to care, and actually people are nothing like as attached to spoilers on Wikipedia as their advocates here seem to think. I've also yet to hear of complaints from actual aggrieved readers, i.e. the people the spoiler warnings are supposed to be for - David Gerard 16:14, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

In the last 4 days David Gerard has removed nearly a thousand spoiler tags from articles he has previously shown no interest in whatsoever. The above comment is an absurd attempt to justify the unjustifiable. All you are doing is creating a lot of pointless work for yourselves and for other editors because most of these tags will reappear over time, and rightly so. PaddyLeahy 16:38, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Will they? Now that the guideline has changed, you might not want to think that so quickly. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 17:10, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

The rules were changed later, so he never broke the rules?
Incidentally, I presume Gerard refers to me as one of the blocked editors - I took care not to break 3RR. --Kizor 20:36, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Spoiler Warning Picture/Logo and Option

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned anywhere, but wouldn't a small icon at the top right of an article (where the edit-protection logo goes) be an appropriate solution to this problem? I don't know how far the wiki markup language goes, but maybe even tagging sections or subsections of the article with a spoiler tag and being able to show or hide spoilers by clicking this image at the top right of the screen. Even a preset in user options? My own view is that spoiler warnings are irrelevant in an encyclopaedia. It is analagous to a forum I read often, users complain when people talk about the latest episode in the "Official Heroes Thread" after the episode has aired. Spoilers are to be expected when you read about something. I feel that the spam usage of spoiler warnings in wikipedia is detrimental to the quality of articles. – ARC Gritt 14:41, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Ugh... so come up with spoiler levels? David Fuchs 15:09, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what you mean by "levels", I am just changing the way they are handled by the wiki software. At the moment, a large banner is placed before and after the section which contains spoilers. I am proposing that instead of these banners, the section be tagged as a section which contains spoilers. By default, the article would show all spoilers, and look like a normal article. However, if the user has selected in their preferences to hide spoilers, each section containing spoilers would be collapsed, like the option in some templates, and have a <show> button which reveals the section. In addition, the page would have a logo at the top right which indicates the presence of spoilers in the article.– ARC Gritt 15:28, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Sounds more like a plan for censorship, which is against Wikipedia's policies (WP:NOT#CENSORED). And yes, hiding information because a reader could find it objectionable is a form of censorship. --Farix (Talk) 15:43, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

The argument put for by the pro-spoiler contingent is that the spoiler warning is there to protect readers because the reader way not be conscious enough to realize that an encyclopedia article will contain spoilers. So how is a small icon going to accomplish that? --Farix (Talk) 15:21, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

A big icon then. The main point is that the text and quality of the article is not affected by the fact that some people do not want to accidently read spoilers. – ARC Gritt 15:28, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Again, who does an image protect an reader from spoilers? --Farix (Talk) 15:43, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

This suggestion is absolutely unacceptable. --Tony Sidaway 15:51, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Very unacceptable. We can't have ANYthing that would allow "sectioning off" spoiler text -- because it just usually makes the article have to be /written around/ that text, and just makes it worse. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 16:14, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Excellent proposal from Ned Scott

Ned Scott has put up a not-insane propsal at Wikipedia:Spoilers, being actively discussed on the talk page. It's been hacked around a bit since then, but it's IMO a workable solution to this discussion - David Gerard 16:16, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

There is so much talk going on about this subject, please could you be more specific, and perhaps provide a link? Thanks. – ARC Gritt^TALK 20:14, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm rather concerned about the way its edit history is composed overwhelmingly of one side of this discussion. Phil Sandifer, Tony Sidaway, you, TheFarix, JzG, Doc Glasgow, Alex Titanium -- all have spoken on this page for the need to delete spoiler tags outright or at least severely reduce their use, none in favor of retaining them. Not a recipe for a balanced view. It's a bit of a relief to see that PaddyLeahy, of the opposite opinion, has just jumped in - props to him. --Kizor 20:32, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps that just show who cares more? ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 20:41, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not very enthusiastic about willing to be louder than the other side being an advantage, either.
It helps that one of the most insightful pro-spoiler editors is still under a brief block after losing his temper in not excusable but rather understandable circumstances (including being briefly blocked, mistakenly as it turned out, by the administrator who'd been deleting his comments from AN/I), and I'm actively trying to disengage myself from this matter in order to keep my studies from going down in flames. --Kizor 20:55, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Is there anything in the proposal that you disagree with? If there is raise the objection here or on the talk page. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 20:57, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Could it be that perhaps the vast majority of editors are anti-spoilers? Perhpas the word your looking for is consensusdanielfolsom 20:59, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how we could infer that, when there is no "vast majority" on this page. Incidentally, your MfD vote used the reasoning that this is in violation of our disclaimer policy - how could it have stood unchallenged for years? Wikipedia:No disclaimer templates has an "exception" section that states the express opposite. An old-timer editor points out on its talk page that the policy was first designed to not forbid spoiler tags. --Kizor 21:05, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Ahh I'm sorry - I forgot that it's impossible for something to be overlooked for a long time. And how can I infer - it's not so much an inference as a observation - look at the vote numbers from the MfD (deletes nearly double keeps - many of which are new accounts or ips), and this guy said himself that the discussion was pretty biased as the votes and discussions are " composed overwhelmingly of one side "danielfolsom 21:14, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

As to your latter comment - an "old time editor" can obviously be wrong - as one of the reasons for no discalimers on that page is "redundancy" - and if you want redundancy- look at spoiler templates and Wikipedia:Content disclaimer.danielfolsom 21:17, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Er, first, that guy was me. Second, I said that this discussion is not that, and that the edit history of the spoiler policy proposal, not this discussion, is. The TfD has a keep consensus.
As for the old time editor, I mean that as in one who took part in making the policy. That was admittedly unclear. --Kizor 21:21, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

WP:CCC, a policy or guideline is not set in stone and as evidenced by 250kb, there is considerable debate over this guideline's status. I think the fact that the "old time editor" is you is irrelevant; anyone can be wrong and being "old time" does not give your opinion more weight. Also, strictly vote-counting the TfD, barely 60% voted "keep" which does not satisfy the super-majority needed for so-called consensus. Axem Titanium 22:40, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

In addition TfD is not a vote :). I just had to note that :D —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 23:24, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

We should also not make the mistake of using the outcome of the TfD as an endorsement of the guideline in its original from. Especially when you way in the MfD and subsequent discussions that followed. --Farix (Talk) 23:52, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

What. The. Fuck.

I wrote about this subject politely and in great detail in a previous wiki-process of some sort (which I can't find again) like a year ago. This clearly is an issue which won't go away, as an unwelcome link in an article so helpfully informed me.

If you don't warn readers, most of whom don't know about and couldn't give a sweet fuck about "process", what they might find in a top-10 Google hit, than you're pissing off people USING, rather than EDITING, this "encyclopedia". Do you honestly believe this project should be for the wankers worrying about edit-count and adminship rather than the tens of thousands who don't care who can edit the wikipedia, just want to read it?

Seriously, anyone blathering on some principle saying warning people about spoilers is contrary to some imaginary principle of wikidogma should see their family die in a hotel fire, let alone be taken seriously in yet another masturbatory exercise in displaying their keen insight into what an encyclopedia should be. dharmabum 12:28, 20 May 2007 (UTC)