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Clean out the gratuitous Understatement references

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Brought up in the Trope Repair Shop, we need to take out the in-jokey Understatement references. People are using it to make any given example "witty" rather than actually using the trope.

It's is extremely excessive, by early calculations there is a 95% misuse rate in that regard. But don't worry, the actual number to fix seems to be less than 9,000 (about 8700).

{Note, as of 12:30 am September 19th, the tally is down to 4228; We've gotten over halfway.}

{Note 2: as of 8:37 pm September 29th, it's down to 2412}

{Note 3: as of 6:16 Am October 3, there are 1868 wicks remaining. If the original assessment of ~90% misuse turns out to be correct, there will be between 800 and 900 good wicks left when we're done.}

{Note 4: As of 2:50 pm, October 6th, there were 1079 wicks remaining.}

{Note 5: as of 8:58 am on October 10, there were 729 wicks remaining. The entire list had been scrubbed. 111 of that 729 are those that a software glitch counts even though the page it's supposedly on no longer exists.}

{Note 6: Fast Eddie has modified the wick counter so that it no longer counts the dead namespaces "JBM" or "Crowning *". This killed off 75 of the phantom wicks remaining, for a final tally of 655 good wicks remaining of 8700+ original wicks}

Cleared Punctuated titles starting with:

  • Completed!!

Cleared unpunctuated titles starting with:

  • A-Z!

edited 21st Oct '11 8:54:57 AM by Madrugada

unhappyyak :( from Minneapolis Since: Apr, 2009
:(
#151: Oct 3rd 2011 at 12:06:08 PM

I did the M's.

First key to interpreting a work: Things mean things.
Nocturna Since: May, 2011
#152: Oct 3rd 2011 at 2:59:54 PM

Should the various Made Of Win archives be cleaned, or should they be left be because they're archives?

unhappyyak :( from Minneapolis Since: Apr, 2009
:(
#153: Oct 3rd 2011 at 3:53:12 PM

I left them because they're archives, but I could be wrong.

First key to interpreting a work: Things mean things.
32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#154: Oct 3rd 2011 at 4:39:11 PM

I think that those shouldn't be touched, just like I wouldn't touch a forum post (in an alternate universe where I had mod powers), even though these forums are a hotbed of misuse for the trope (certain users are prone to it; I've discovered that people don't appreciate being contacted about such things, though, and I let it go).

It's unabashedly bad use; but there's a line as to where I'm not comfortable crossing, and anything like that is where mine is. YMMV pages are about the limit of what I feel comfortable rinsing, and even then, I think I'm lucky that I haven't been flamed over it.

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Nocturna Since: May, 2011
32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#157: Oct 4th 2011 at 8:07:09 AM

I think someone ninja edited... looks like K was finished and L is done through Lazy Backup.

Sorry I couldn't do more in the last couple weeks; life got busy. I'll hammer away more at L today.

EDIT: Okay, finished through Leisure Suit Larry. Next up is Lemmy's Land.

The current number is at 1567; the end is in sight. Also, don't forget that, due to artifact listings from cut pages and the old It Just Bugs Me pages still being up, the number is actually inflated by pages that no longer properly exist.

edited 4th Oct '11 9:34:31 AM by 32_Footsteps

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Oreochan from Pennsylvania Since: Dec, 1969
#159: Oct 4th 2011 at 8:38:37 PM

I cleared all the ones that start with N except Nietzsche Wannabe, which is locked. Anyway, we are down to 1452 wicks.

"Learning without thinking is labor lost. Thinking without learning is dangerous."
32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#161: Oct 5th 2011 at 7:24:54 AM

I'm sweeping back over examples, and I'm noting some have been leaving in quotes like "To say It Got Worse would be an Understatement."

There's also a habit of potholing quotes to Understatement when the statement is extremely accurate (in many instances, clearly mistaking this trope for Deadpan Snarker - while understatement is frequently used by them, it's just one of many methods available to snark).

To let folks who have joined in partway, these are just as much misuse as a sinkhole, and need to be removed (some rewording is likely required). Understatement requires two things to be correct usage:

1) It needs to be in-story, not commentary on something in-story. 2) It actually needs to understate the situation. Correct statement or overstatement are not understatement.

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
desdendelle Hooded Crow from Land of Milk and Honey (Sergeant) Relationship Status: Hiding
Hooded Crow
#162: Oct 5th 2011 at 7:27:50 AM

I'm trying to get these as well. Also, for some odd reason, a lot of stuff that shows up in the 'related' page doesn't have the word 'understatement' (not case sensitive) in it at all.

On empty crossroads, seek the eclipse -- for when Sol and Lua align, the lost shall find their way home.
32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#163: Oct 5th 2011 at 7:36:58 AM

Actually, what might be happening is that multiple people are tackling the same part of the alphabet at the same time. I just tried to do a little work in the L section - were you as well? If so, I may have ninja edited some of those.

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Osmium from Germany Since: Dec, 2010
#165: Oct 5th 2011 at 1:06:18 PM

Q and R done. Down to 1180.

edited 5th Oct '11 1:06:52 PM by Osmium

Nocturna Since: May, 2011
#166: Oct 5th 2011 at 9:08:48 PM

L is finished, except for UnfortunateImplications.Live Action TV and DethroningMoment.Live Action TV, which for some reason didn't keep any edits I tried to make. (The pages aren't locked, and other people have edited them recently, and I edited other pages just fine, but for those two I would go in, make changes, hit save... and nothing would change. I tried multiple times.)

O is cleared up to Oblivious to Love.

unhappyyak :( from Minneapolis Since: Apr, 2009
:(
#167: Oct 6th 2011 at 6:55:06 AM

[up] Those two pages might be too long, which sometimes makes things wonky. We might need to split or prune them so that editing them will work.

First key to interpreting a work: Things mean things.
Madrugada Since: Jan, 2001
#168: Oct 6th 2011 at 9:35:24 AM

I just did a huge pruning job on Unfortunate Implications (from 316 lines to 160 and from 180,000+ characters to ~90,000). It was indeed too long. Got the Understatement, as well.

I don't have time to do Dethroning right now,

edited 6th Oct '11 9:39:12 AM by Madrugada

unhappyyak :( from Minneapolis Since: Apr, 2009
:(
#169: Oct 6th 2011 at 10:47:08 AM

I'm doing cleanup of the Live-Action TV right now. It's...taking a while.

First key to interpreting a work: Things mean things.
Madrugada Since: Jan, 2001
#170: Oct 6th 2011 at 10:58:36 AM

Yeah.sad

What I did was grab the source code for UI and put it in Wordpad, then did the clean-up there and pasted it all back in as one big chunk when I was done. I didn't have to worry about the page lock running out, and I had a much larger edit screen to work in.

unhappyyak :( from Minneapolis Since: Apr, 2009
:(
#171: Oct 6th 2011 at 11:44:41 AM

I'm having major problems getting it all back in there. I reorganized them so that they'd be by show, but I'm not able to get all of them back in there. Looks like I'll have to do more pruning... *sigh*.

Edit: Finally done. Sorry for the mess.

edited 6th Oct '11 1:12:55 PM by unhappyyak

First key to interpreting a work: Things mean things.
Nocturna Since: May, 2011
#172: Oct 6th 2011 at 2:50:35 PM

[up][up][up][up] and [up] Wow guys. I'm impressed. They look great.

Also, Old Kingdom is up next for clean-up.

Madrugada Since: Jan, 2001
#173: Oct 6th 2011 at 2:56:10 PM

I am impressed, 'yak. That is so much better, and that page was so much worse than the Unfortunate Implications one.

unhappyyak :( from Minneapolis Since: Apr, 2009
:(
#174: Oct 7th 2011 at 7:31:48 AM

I think L's are done, except for possibly Legendäre Tropen. I don't trust my German enough to figure that one out. :P

That means A-N are done, right?

edited 7th Oct '11 7:32:01 AM by unhappyyak

First key to interpreting a work: Things mean things.
Nocturna Since: May, 2011
#175: Oct 7th 2011 at 7:37:06 AM

[up] That's the "this trope has this name in German" legend for the German translation project. There's no misuse.


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