Awful Name: Chuck Cunningham Syndrome

First off, it's a character name and second off, it's not actually a syndrome. The description says that the name is supposed to invoke, "Who the heck is that?", but how many people would actually understand the name? I associate it with the Cunningham family from To Kill A Mockingbird, personally. Disappearing Important Character would be a better name. This character name is terrible.

"Oh great! Let's pile up all the useless cats and hope a tree falls on them!"

Not only is it character-named, that character is notable for not being well-known.

Becky: Who are you? The Mysterious Stranger: An angel. Huck: What's your name? The Mysterious Stranger: Satan.

I agree, this is a bad name. The series that it's from ended twenty-eight years ago, there are many people and things named Cunningham, and the trope isn't about a syndrome either.

I'm invoking the Grandfather Clause. This page has brought nearly 20,000 people to the wiki in the past year alone. Absolutely massive.

edited 3rd Jan '12 2:27:28 PM by SeanMurrayI

That's a point, but the page has three redirects. Due to the way the software works, inbounds to a redirect are counted as inbounds to the main page. So we can't be sure if that large inbound count was because of this name.

Regardless - we've renamed The Mario, The Umbridge, and The Libby (among others), so we can surely at least discuss this one. T Vtropes is not formal enough to have a grandfather clause.

Even then, the only redirect that gets substantial use is named after the same character.

The Mario, The Umbridge, and The Libby have all also had far fewer wicks and inbounds at their peak. Again: 20,000 inbounds in a single year. You don't change a page pulling that kind of weight without showing that something is clearly broken with the name.

And TV Tropes has a Grandfather Clause, and it does get invoked when pages this massively popular become a subject of attention.

edited 3rd Jan '12 2:39:23 PM by SeanMurrayI

Chuck Cunningham Syndrome is a preexisting term that predates this wiki. Those don't get renamed except under really really extreme circumstances.

Just so we're clear, this was already renamed once from Brother Chuck to Chuck Cunningham Syndrome. Thus, action has been taken on this at least once and all the inbounds are almost certainly links to Brother Chuck if not the current name.

If the page had been renamed in the past year, the inbounds which Brother Chuck would've already had gathered up until being renamed would have been retained and available for us to take note.

I'm reading zero inbounds for Brother Chuck since January 1 of last year. All the 20,000 inbounds in the same time frame, at present, had to have led straight to the Chuck Cunningham Syndrome page.

edited 3rd Jan '12 2:59:56 PM by SeanMurrayI

Okay, but could you please show some citation or links for that?

edited 3rd Jan '12 2:56:51 PM by Spark9

I believe it was well over a year ago that it was renamed. However, I don't recall the exact dates.

Look, I'm sick of inbounds preventing us from renaming horribly named tropes. This name does not in any way, shape, or form suggest that it is about an important character who randomly disappears sometime.

Let's take Gainax Ending for example. It's an absolutely terrible name if you don't know what Gainax is, and "Mind Screw Ending" would have been much better, but the inbounds prevented it from being changed.

Why must we always concern ourselves with inbounds?

"Oh great! Let's pile up all the useless cats and hope a tree falls on them!"

That was not the arguments used in the case of Gainax Ending, but rather that it had 'caught on.' I don't agree, personally, but that's not the issue here.

Because inbounds are beneficial to us. The more inbounds a name brings in, the more beneficial the name becomes and the more value the page has for the wiki.

Vasquez Always Dies is a shitty name, I agree, but we're not going to get rid of it if it brings 70,000 individual people to the wiki in a matter of weeks.

edited 3rd Jan '12 3:06:56 PM by SeanMurrayI

In any case, I'm currently neutral on the issue. Lightflame, if you want a rename, we will probably need evidence of failure to thrive or disuse.

Okay, I'll do a check for misuse when I have time.

"Oh great! Let's pile up all the useless cats and hope a tree falls on them!"

http://www.google.com/search?client=opera&rls=en&q=Chuck+Cunningham+Syndrome

Subject to the Google algorithim providing different results for different people, the first hit is us. The ones immediately following are writers at respected sites/blogs - Wikipedia, SF Gate, Straight Dope, etc - using the term with no reference to us. I don't think we need any more proof than that. Mass media got here before we did and our policy is to go with the existing term where possible.

edited 3rd Jan '12 3:17:01 PM by Elle

This is not a thread for discussing general rename policy. Take that over here if you must.

Being named after a character is not, in itself, a mandate to rename a trope. We have stricter standards for actions like this and we're not going to rename solely on that basis. You should do a Wick Check and gather more evidence first.

And that's very strong evidence against renaming.

edited 3rd Jan '12 3:15:00 PM by troacctid

Rhymes with "Protracted."

Similar to Jumping the Shark, Chuck Cunningham Syndrome is indeed a preexisting term outside the wiki. See the Wikipedia article on Happy Days. Jump the Shark is just as non-indicative if not worse than Chuck Cunningham Syndrome, yet you don't see anyone complaining about that because it's a somewhat more well-used term outside the wiki.

As already stated, this name was changed over a year ago. I highly doubt it's going to be changed again. Yes, inbounds are important. They're the reason any of us are here in the first place. Nobody just happens to put "tv" and "tropes" into Google by coincidence.

"Did anybody invent this stuff on purpose?" - Phillip Marlowe on tequila, Finger Man by Raymond Chandler.

While I agree that this is not the place for discussing changes to our renaming guidelines, I will point out that you are misrepresenting them.

The guidelines explicitly state that yes, being named after a character is a good reason for renaming; and that no, a wick check is not necessary for renaming. Of course, precedent shows plenty of examples of both.

No, that doesn't mean we're automatically changing this one, we're still discussing this (and yes, a large inbound count is grounds for caution). However, misrepresenting guidelines never helps the discussion.

On the other hand, being named after a character is rarely accepted as much of a sufficient reason for renaming in and of itself, and it always helps to have a wick check no matter what the circumstances.

edited 3rd Jan '12 3:42:10 PM by SeanMurrayI

Pre-established term, so it'll take an act of God to get this one changed. Do we want to come up with some more redirects to aid searching? We already have Character Abandonment and Character Existence Failure.

That's your opinion, but the guideline says otherwise (on both counts).

See, we're an informal wiki, so it's perfectly fine to not have a rule backing your opinion. We care about opinions. But if you're going to claim that the rules says that X is forbidden or Y is mandatory, then you should first check whether the rules do in fact say so. Because very few things are really forbidden or mandatory on the wiki.

edited 3rd Jan '12 3:49:13 PM by Spark9

The name was changed from "Brother Chuck" sometime begfore September 11 of 2010. Here's a thread started that day asking that it be changed back from Chuck Cunningham Syndrome to Brother Chuck. Going by this post in that thread, the name change occurred sometime between April and September of 2010.

As to how well the name is working: On October 9th of 2010, Chuck Cunningham Syndrome was at 8982 inbounds, and had gained 430 new inbounds in one month. Since then, it's gained 10,998 more new inbounds — an average of 785 a month over 14 months.

Misuse will need to be massive (like in the 75%+ range) to counterbalance that sort of performance.

...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.

Nuh-uh—I said: it's not a mandate, in itself, we're not going to rename solely on that basis, and you should do a Wick Check. Don't think any of that is contested by anyone around here.

edited 3rd Jan '12 3:53:05 PM by troacctid

Rhymes with "Protracted."