Classifying Tropes, Trivia, YMMV, Audience Reactions and Flame Bait

They also might be getting slightly different banners for all that they're going on the same pages. I am making the distinction because the mods want the distinction made between tropes, and not tropes.

Fair enough. How about the distinction between Trivia and Audience Reactions I mentioned?

So, if I understand it correctly, YMMV are still tropes, we are just not sure if they are truly happen, so we don't list them.

Like the difference between Bigfoot and the Na'vi. The Bigfoot is certainly an animal, but we are not sure that it is an existing animal, so you don't find it in zoological enyclopedias. The Na'vi objectively don't exist in this world, and objectively exist in their own fictional world, where they aren't animals anyways, so you don't find them in zoological enyclopedias either, but they are a different sort of not-objectively-animals.

(Copied from thread in Wiki Talk)

So what is YMMV now? Is it a catch-all term for both Tropes as to which Your Mileage May Vary and Audience Reactions or does it apply just to tropes?

If it applies just to tropes common sense dictates we shouldn't have Audience Reactions on a "YMMV tab". If it's a catch-all term, we now don't have a name for Tropes-as-to-which-Your-Mileage-May-Vary.

edited 29th Jan '11 10:36:50 AM by TripleElation

Doesn't matter anyway, since we can rename the tab to something broader, or make two separate tabs, if we really want to make unneeded work for ourselves.

Edit: Sorry, I assumed those were two separate posts.

edited 29th Jan '11 10:53:36 AM by Killomatic

What answer?

Format of post above: Question. If answer is A then B. If answer is C then D.

At any rate, I believe YMMV is too ingrained as a catch-all term and we need something new for the YMMV-tropes. I'd suggest going back to "subjective tropes" but I recall Eddie saying something about trying to get away from that.

edited 29th Jan '11 10:48:28 AM by TripleElation

What was his reason? Subjective Tropes sounds good.

Wasn't it because tropes, by definition, aren't meant to be subjective, just objective? Making Subjective Tropes an oxymoron?

Or something like that?

edited 29th Jan '11 11:47:37 AM by Arctimon

My memory is hazy, but recent consensus seems to be that yes, there is such a thing as a trope that's subjective, if the subjective part is whether the trope was played or not played.

So where do we stand? I have no idea. Thread Needs Eddie Badly.

He's busy tinkering with the scales thing right now, I think.

Things listed on YMMV get the scale when they are in a bullet on a Main page. They also get the YMMV banner.

Things listed on Audience Reactions get the YMMV banner, as well.

So does the term "YMMV" include Audience Reactions or doesn't it?

It's become a mishmash. There's a YMMV banner, there's the "things as to which your mileage may vary" classification, there's a class of items that we now sort of call YMMV items, there's a second class of items we may or may not also be referring to when we say that...

edited 29th Jan '11 12:51:11 PM by TripleElation

Things that aren't Trivia? Either Flamebait or Trope. If it is a trope, it is on the wrong list.

I'm... Lost. I'll try asking again and hopefully in a clearer way this time.

We have:

1. Tropes
2. Tropes as to which your mileage may vary.
3. Audience Reactions.

Currently, we sometimes use the term "YMMV" as as a catch-all term for 2 and 3. And some other times we use it explicitly to refer to 2. Which is it?

edited 29th Jan '11 1:11:07 PM by TripleElation

Audience Reactions are clearly the sort of things that vary from person to person. They are a specific [large] subset of YMMV kept on their own list because they have the distinct feature of being re about how the audience receives the work.

edited 29th Jan '11 3:42:12 PM by FastEddie

So, what are different the sub-categories of YMMV, and how do we determine the difference between Audience Reactions and Flame Bait?

Fine, but what do we call the other subset?

edited 29th Jan '11 3:49:55 PM by Killomatic

We have tried 'subjectives', 'opinions', 'argenfargles' and right now they are YMMV's — all terms that manage to bring quibbles about the definition. They are not objectively present storytelling tropes. There doesn't seem to be one word for them.

I think, Natter Bait would work best as the unified term. After all, this is the reason why we want to remove them, isn't it? Because they cause natter. this tite would communicate well, that it's not just that we don't like them, but we know from experience that they are bad for the wiki.

edited 29th Jan '11 4:21:42 PM by EternalSeptember

That might sound too much like that no examples, final level before Darth Wiki category.

That describes them quite well.

I can't think of a single properly bannered page, that wouldn't fit this requirement of causing natter.

I'm officially tired of this name-picking. Are we gonna give these whatever-you-call-them a different banner, or do we keep the same old YMMV and make a new one for Audience Reaction?

edited 29th Jan '11 4:34:49 PM by Killomatic

I like Natter Bait since it provides the most detail on its index.

Most of them aren't really Natter Bait though. Things like Tearjerker and Happy Ending are YMMV, but they don't really attract Natter. It's only a few that have gotten bad and given the rest a bad name. Otherwise they don't attract much more natter than objective tropes.

edited 29th Jan '11 4:41:01 PM by shimaspawn

If they don't attract natter, they are not YMMV.

Happy Ending, for example, is a perfectly objective trope.

And Tear Jerker does attract natter, because everyone feels obliged to list the huge list of scenes that they found the most sad.