Name is same as a work.: The Magic Goes Away

Regardless, anyway...

The crux of the matter is, this is the Trope Repair shop.

While there certainly seems to be a problem with this trope, it is not to do with the work titled the same. You are trying to fix something that is not actually a problem in this case.

I have offered up an alternative solution:

Add a note on The Magic Goes Away stating "Not to be confused with the story The Magic Goes Away. Please make sure you are using the correct namespace when linking this."

Add a note on The Magic Goes Away stating "Not to be confused with the Trope The Magic Goes Away. Please make sure you are using the correct namespace when linking this."

If this is not a good solution, please state the reasons for this.

^ Also a point.

edited 6th Aug '11 12:08:04 AM by CyganAngel

Actually, the datum that would decide this would be an instance of the phrase in use predating the short story (published in 1976), which favors your side, which does put the burden of proof on you.

Um, thinking descriptions are substitutes for name problems just makes you look like you're new here. It's been long agreed that they don't, and it's not just just Eddie that declared that. Several mods and tropers have stated so.

edited 6th Aug '11 12:11:46 AM by DragonQuestZ

We do not only use phrases that are pre-existing. We do often use terms we make up for our own tropes. You are claiming that we used the title of this book as the trope name. There are other ways we could have developed it. Therefore, no, sorry, the burden of proof is on you to show that it happened this way as opposed to any other way. That is how the concept of 'burden of proof' works- you must show proof that it happened this way in order to have your claim validated. Without said proof, your claim is unverifiable.

I am providing solutions for something that has not even shown to be a problem. People are confusing the namespace for the book because- gasp- guess what? It is the only namespace that actually exists for this title.

Besides which, you are taking the lazy way out. Rather than making an effort to show Tropers that they should be linking to the correct namespace, you are attempting to rename it.

Now tell me. If we rename it to "The Magic Comes To An End", what do we do if somebody proceeds to publish a work called "The Magic Comes To An End" in the future? Are we going to rename it again then?

You're argument for being named for the work is that the page saying so is not enough, and the name could have just been thought up independent of the work (as in you are claiming author intention, and you haven't even claimed to be the author of the page).

That's fallacious, as it assumes the term just magically appears in people's heads when they think of this trope.

And claiming you're providing a solution ignores the fact that it's been long accepted to be a bad solution.

edited 6th Aug '11 12:28:39 AM by DragonQuestZ

wut

No, I am sorry, can you repeat that in terms that actually make sense? Because it sounds like you're saying that there is absolutely no way people could think of the term as a way to describe a trope with the concept of "The magic goes away"...

But that can't be correct, because that would be incredibly stupid...

As to your edited point, actually, you are the one claiming knowledge of the editor's reason for choosing that name.

Many thing that are accepted around here are not very good, and many of the things that are accepted as bad things are not all that bad.

Then again, I think I see why people label this place a giant circlejerk. People here just accept whatever behaviours are around instead of trying to be productive and actually repair broken tropes.

This practice you are defending is called "Delaying a problem".

Instead of encouraging editors to not be lazy and to link to the correct namespace- to link to the Literature namespace instead of the Main namespace instead of the book- you are renaming it on the off-chance that it could cause confusion.

Not because it's actually causing confusion, but because it may cause confusion, and you do not want to extend the effort to correct people who link to the incorrect namespace.

edited 6th Aug '11 12:31:29 AM by CyganAngel

"Because it sounds like you're saying that there is absolutely no way people could think of the term as a way to describe a trope with the concept of "The magic goes away"..."

Well it's so unlikely, that you had to have written the ykttw with that name in order to actually claim such a thing with any credibility. You're insisting it might have been the case, which is just a guess on your part. And don't claim I'm guessing, as it's on the trope page (and no I didn't edit it in, as you can see in the page history).

argh

It's not really all that hard a conclusion to jump to.

The trope's premise is "The magic that used to be stops working." The name is kind of Exactly What It Says on the Tin. It's exactly the type of name that would come to mind when thinking of it.

Also, the edit history does not show past August of last year apparently. So I cannot tell when or where that was put in.

That's not a good argument either. The exact wording is not so magically perfect for the trope that it's what everyone would think of. Even if you would, you're presenting a personal experience as a fact.

But it is a possibility.

Regardless, jesus christ can we get to addressing the issue here rather than continuously addressing each other's points?

The issue is that the trope has the same name as a work.

I ask. Why is this a problem?

When I first saw the trope The Magic Goes Away, literally the first meaning I thought of was "Oh, it means there used to be magic, and it went away."

I remember at least one instance of a passer-by stating a work as a Trope Namer when it very much wasn't.

Come on, people. Only two weeks ago this forum decided to rename Return Of The King precisely because it's named after a work.

Yes, Dragonquest has a good point, and yes, this trope is clearly named after one of the most famous books by Jack Vance. This should be routine, not a big deal. Just find a synonym for "goes away"; that solution seems to work fine for ROTK as well.

Which is, once again, treating the symptom rather than the cause of the problem. That is the problem here. It is being renamed because... why? Because people apparently get confused and link to the trope rather than the work. So, instead of attempting to, you know, educate Tropers as to how to link to the correct namespace and standardize italicization of work pages, both of which are things that are meant to be done anyway, you are renaming it.

This ignores the fact that the works and titles currently in existence are not the only works that will ever exist, and that a work may pop up in the future bearing the new name, or the name of another trope. So you will rename that, and you will rename it again, and you will rename the one after it, instead of actually making sure that you are stopping the cause of this problem.

You are content with saying "Renamed, problem solved". What you should be trying to do is ensuring you can look at situations like this and say "There is no problem here."

Yes, precisely because tropers get confused and link to the wrong page. That's the thing. You can't expect editors to read the Manual Of Style before editing, and you can't expect people to know that names of a work should be italicized according to that MOS, or that this particular work is in a specific namespace even though the overwhelming majority of works isn't. That's not how wikis work. Heck, that's not how interfaces work.

People don't read manuals, so you can't practically solve any problem by adding a line to the manual that says "it wouldn't be a problem if".

Ah, yes. I can't expect people to know that short stories would go under the Literature namespace. How ridiculous of me! After all, there is surely not currently an effort to move all works to their correct namespaces, amirite? And it would be totally unintuitive for a short story to go under Literature. How ridiculously silly of me.

Sarcasm aside, yes, actually, we do expect editors to read, at the very least, the list of editing tips. You know, the one that pops up every time you go to edit a page and tells you what is and is not acceptable while you are editing? The one that says "Do this" and "Consider this before you do this" and the like?

There are some very basic things that every editor should know. This includes linking to namespaces when referring to a work, and italicizing work titles. Both of these are really very simple.

If they do not read the list of what is and is not acceptable, then that is their fault.

But then again, I suppose I do not know very much. I suppose it is perfectly acceptable to leave "This Troper" in main articles, and for third-level bullet points to crop up all over the place, and to leave natter lying around, and to allow incorrect trope examples, because god forbid we actually require the readers to follow the standards of what is and is not acceptable on the Wiki.

If people haven't read the manual, they shouldn't be editing.

Tl;dr: What Forzare said.

That is an interesting point of view, but not a practical one. The reality is that people can register and edit without being aware there's a manual in the first place. If you want stronger qualifications before people may edit, well, you should probably bring that up in a different forum than the Trope Repair Shop.

The point is that most literature is not in fact in the literature namespace. I'm sure this will be fixed eventually, but until it is, it's not a good argument.

Then the problem is that the editing guide isn't visible enough. I don't think it's that much to ask to read the rules before you edit.

No, no. You can't say that.

It may not be practical now, but now that people are aware of the issue it will be brought up and changed. Actually, I'm going to start that topic soon.

Regardless, not looking up the rules/tips of editing is what's called 'being a bad editor'.

If you focus on how things are and accomodate that, you will never improve. You need to focus on how things should be and focus on achieving that.

A part of this involves expecting people to know to link to Namespaces correctly. This may need to be brought up in a different topic, but it's relevant here too. In saying "The point is that most literature is not in fact in the literature namespace. I'm sure this will be fixed eventually, but until it is, it's not a good argument", you are saying "Well, it's not like that now so why should we even bother trying in advance"?

The fact is, it will be that way. Efforts are already underway to achieve this. And if you just throw up your hands and say "Well, we can't expect people to know that", you have pinpointed a problem.

People should know this. We need to make things work as they should, not accept them as they do.

But I don't know if what I'm saying makes much sense at all.

^ Seconding this entire post, because Cygan said pretty much exactly what I think only better and with more words.

edited 6th Aug '11 3:50:03 AM by Forzare

Well, if you think rules are so important, then remember that one of the rules says that trope pages shouldn't be named after a work. So by the rules, we should rename it.

There are three things wrong with that, though.

First, everybody keeps talking about how the trope was named after the work. You all seem to be ignoring the fact that it's a fairly intuitive name, and one that describes the concept. There is a work with the same name, but that does not mean they are related at all.

Second, if you really want to get in a rules discussion with me...

Reasons not to rename:

• It ain't broke.

Hm.

• If the name has good inbound links, it is working.

The Magic Goes Away found in: 205 articles, excluding discussions.

This title has brought 166 people to the wiki from non-search engine links since 20th FEB '09.

• If the name is being accurately used around the wiki to refer to the trope, it is working.

It is not. That is not to do with the title, though- in every misuse I found, it was used to mean something along the lines of "Some magic disappeared" or "Magic power was lessened". That's a problem with the article description.

• If it doesn't have unnecessary complaining and gushing, it's working.

It does not.

That is two out of three reasons to rename disqualified, and the third reason is not to do with the title but with the content of the article.

Now for the rule you quoted:

• Named After A Work Of Fiction: For instance, Halfway Plot Switch, Die Hard On An X and Parent Trap Plot used to be From Dusk Till Dawn, Die Hard and The Parent Trap respectively. These are confusing for the reader. Were you talking about the movie, or not?

Were we talking about the movie, or not.

Hm. I do not know.

Was the link italicized? If so, I was referring to the work. Which namespace was it in? If it was in the Main namespace, I was referring to the trope. If it was in a Media namespace, I was referring to a work.

In other words, that rule is just a way to support this concept I was talking about, wherein you are treating the symptoms without treating the cause of the problem.

In any case, I did not attempt to quote rules at you. I told you that people who wish to edit the Wiki really should be reading the rules first, because they list what is acceptable and what is not, and they list tips such as how to link to Media namespaces so as to eliminate this problem rather than avoid confronting it.

30% misuse is definitely a concern, however it is also across a sample size of only 10 percent or so. Which is not a bad percentage, but an additional sample may be needed anyway.

edited 6th Aug '11 6:12:28 AM by Stratadrake

Yeah. Unfortunately, I did not have a lot of time because I was helping to move somebody into a new house and had to post from a DS for a while, which cannot allow you to load multiple pages at once. Sorry.