GuessTheTrope: Mining Accident On Troy

Guess The Trope: what is Mining Accident On Troy really about? It strikes me as a pretty common trope, but with only 46 wicks and 14 inbounds, it clearly isn't thriving.

An issue is that the trope is not particularly related to mining, and that the "Troy" referred to is not the famous location of the Trojan wars (and countless books and films on the subject), nor one of the many people and locations by this name, but a briefly mentioned planet from an eight-year-old episode of Battlestar Galactica.

I think this needs a rename to something that actually shows what the trope is about.

Convenient Tragedy? No, that sounds more like plot-related convenience...Spies Come From Nuked Towns? I don't know. Other than going for the boring Unfalsifiable Fake Background, I can't think of anything decent.

Tragic Cover Story?

Unverifiable Background or Unverifiable Cover Story?

I know that we had an old thread on this, but it's not coming up on a forum thread title search. Hmmm.

Anyway, I agreed then that the name was too vague and still do. Something like Conveniently Unverifiable Cover Story would hit all the major points, and Convenienty Uncheckable Cover Story might be even better.

It's important to the trope that it be a cover story, not a legitimatre background. It's also important that the cover story can't be checked out beyond a very superficial level: Was there a mining accident on Troy? Yes. Did this person live there before it? No way to know...

edited 16th Jan '12 12:46:55 PM by Madrugada

This phrase:

Seems apt.

Conveniently Unverifiable Cover Story?

Edit: DAMMIT FOX NINJA!

edited 16th Jan '12 12:52:01 PM by Flyboy

As I recall the last discussion, we got hung up over a nitpicky argument on whether the cover story was "unverifiable" (unable to be proved true) or "unfalsifiable" (unable to be proved false).

To that, let me just point out that "verifying" is a much more common term than "falsifying", and therefore clearer as a trope name, regardless of which of the two can be said to be technically correct.

Yes, it was nitpicky. It was nitpicky in the extreme. It's still what stalled the change which otherwise had strong support. Hence my suggestion that perhaps "uncheckable" might be better.

There's a small contingent of editors who try to push through namechanges based on very narrow technical definitions: an instance I remember was "Harmless Electrocution isn't about electrocution, because that technically only applies when it's both fatal and an execution". They don't usually succeed, but they take time and energy away from tropes that have real problems.

edited 16th Jan '12 1:28:05 PM by Madrugada

Yes, the crowner was called in favour of a rename but it stalled out on actually coming up with a name.

Supporting Conveniently Unverifiable Cover Story.

Support as well. It's a good title.

Conviently Uncheckable Cover Story

I prefer Unverifiable to Uncheckable. It's not so much that they can't check a system but that they can't get the information to prove anything one way or another.

Well, I made a crowner to hook, and lo and behold, not only was the old one (from July of 2010) still live, but Unverifiable Cover Story is in the lead, with twice as many total votes and a higher approval ratio than the one in second place. Shall I add Conveniently Unfalsifiable Cover Story, Conveniently Uncheckable Cover Story, or both, or simply leave it alone and see whether things change in the next couple of days?

edited 17th Jan '12 12:06:05 AM by Madrugada

It's been almost a week, plus however long the crowner was active the first time around, and there seems to be a stable consensus. Any objections to calling it?

Calling crowner in favor of Conveniently Unverifiable Cover Story.

So, just a regular rename?

Page moved, wicks fixed, and post made on the renamed tropes thread. Hollering for a lock.

Apparently (according to the crowner mentioned in post #10), yes.