TLP Crash Rescue - Fixing prematurely launched TLPs and pages

Re: The Lightfooted: Send it back. The trope is confused about being charming or agile, which are only figuratively related through the word "grace." Is is about people who are charming (a la Proper Lady) or people who are agile (the contrast with The Klutz)?

Re: Mod Post: Some minor issues have included namespacing (work pages and Useful Notes pages), so having the option for the namespace could be useful. Specifically, if the draft name starts with a recognized namespace followed by a slash ("/"), the software should send the draft to Namespace/PageName automatically instead of "Main/NamespacePageName." This could at least be helpful with tracking the origins of new Useful Notes pages.

Larger issues, though, I would say having pre-written notifiers attached to tags. What I mean is an automated method of explaining yourself. So, if you select the tag "duplicate," the system requires you to fill in at least two boxes. One with the CamelCase of the duplicated trope, and the other with your reasoning. Then, when you submit the tag, a pre-written message is created in the comment section. Something simple like "I believe this is a duplicate of Trope for the following reason: [what I wrote]." And if they don't write anything in the second box (i.e. their reasoning), then the tag is automatically discarded. And have something like this for all of the tags. If someone tries to add the same tag, they should be brought directly to the automatically generated comment instead.

edited 24th Feb '17 3:16:22 PM by WaterBlap

I don't participate here all that often— mostly just lurk— but one suggestion I remember from a while back was reworking the "bombs / hats" iconography to make it clearer that a downvote is just "this needs more work" and not "!@#$ this idea forever and !@#$ you for bringing it up" and an upvote is "this is ready to launch, as is, right frigging now," not, "this is a good idea that shows promise, let's work on it some more."

For example, some kind of "under construction" icon in place of a bomb— a hardhat, a crossed hammer and screwdriver, something like that— and a rocket ship in place of a hat.

The problem is, under that interpretation, there is no way to discard duplicates if people only bomb tropes for being in an unlaunchable state, leaving us to have to let them launch, discuss them here, and then cut them. We need a system that places a proposal on hold when someone says We Already Have This One, and we need a way to make people understand that it has to be more than just a Subtrope, Sister Trope, or a mashing together of several existing tropes.

For example: Nazi Zombies. it's in a perfectly launchable state, I'll admit that much, but it's own description says it's a form of Ghostapo, and it can also be covered under Night of the Living Mooks. It's a complete duplicate trope, with people even suggesting to strip examples from the Ghostapo page and place them only on the proposal.

edited 24th Feb '17 4:03:34 PM by sailing101

Re: Madrugada's post

Like High Crate, I'm mostly a lurker here, but I think adding a couple of thumbs-up/thumbs-down buttons might help avoid misuse of Hats and Bombs. Then people could easily indicate "This seems promising" without saying it's launch-ready and "This doesn't seem promising" without jumping straight to a Bomb, and those votes could be shown in aggregate (like the Hats/Bombs) so the general feedback would be obvious without going through the whole discussion.

Ideally, I'd like to see separate thumb-ups/thumbs-down buttons for a few key trope aspects, e.g., concept, title, description, and examples. Then, one could see at a glance that, e.g., a lot of tropers think the concept and description are promising, but the title and examples are problematic.

"So far I know that 1) Bring back the tags, and 2) "do something to require that adding a bomb needs a reason" have come up before."

Personally, I think adding a Hat should be at least as "difficult" as adding a Bomb, so I would also require some justification for adding a Hat. IMO the burden of "proof" of tropeworthiness should rest with the TLP draft and tropers who think it's ready, rather than on those who think it's not yet ready. For instance, I think it might be useful to require the Hat-adder to check off that each aspect of the trope is launch-ready before adding the hat. I.e., if you want to add a Hat, you'd get a box to enter a comment and a list of checkboxes, e.g., "Is the concept meaningful?", "Is the description clear?", "Is the title clear and does it match the description?", "Is it distinct from related tropes?", "Is the example list sufficient?"

"Personally, I'm inclined to wish for some sort of a counter, so that it can't be launched if Bombs outnumber Hats, no matter how many hats it has."

This seems necessary for the Bombs to serve their stated purpose. If the ability to launch is based only on the number of Hats, then Bombs are only useful as a thumbs-down for tropeworthiness and as a threshold for discarding, which supposedly isn't their purpose.

To be honest, I have no idea why the system doesn't already operate like this. It makes no sense that bombs are effectively meaningless so long as the thing manages to muster enough hats.

The system even tells you that adding a bomb is "taking away a hat" even though it doesn't actually have that effect. If a counter is not implemented, then can this be changed to have that effect? (Or for the descriptions of bombs and hats to be revised.)

I mean, if a draft had 7 hats and gets 3 bombs, it should not be able to be launched; it should have 4 hats and 3 bombs, with the bombs remaining regardless of new hats. Thus, the 4 hats, 3 bombs would become 7 hats, 3 bombs if the draft were to get 3 more hats. That's a bit different than a counter (where hats are the positive to bombs' negative).

EDIT:

RE: The Lightfooted: The sponsor of The Lightfooted also recently launched Temporarily Exaggerated Trait. My concern with TET is that the description is essentially two sentences, the description's formatting could use work, and there was a concern in the comment section in its draft about describing the contrast/compare with Compressed Vice (which the launched page does not do). I get that it's been "ready to launch" since November 2016 (sponsor's words, not snark quote marks), but it could have used a YKTTW Bump asking for contemporary comments.

edited 24th Feb '17 5:49:28 PM by WaterBlap

@sailing101 - While there are certainly instances where someone is married to a specific vision of a trope that is simply not tropable, I've also seen instances where a TLP that I would have sworn was fundamentally unworkable does manage to reach a launchable state with enough rethinking and workshopping. So I'm not sure that baking an actual "!@#$ this idea, discard it" button into the system is a good idea. Theoretically, if nobody does the work to overhaul an untropable TLP, it will just wind up slipping quietly into the void anyway.

Along those same lines, giving downvotes the ability to actually block a TLP from launching could conceivably cause problems when many people downvote a half-formed TLP, that TLP eventually does reach a launchable state, but not enough downvoters go back to re-evaluate it and reverse their votes.

I'm not sure what the solution is to that, though. I don't think downvotes should be totally toothless the way they are now, but they shouldn't be a permanent black mark against a TLP either. Maybe there could be some method of wiping the slate clean after a certain amount of work has been done?

edited 24th Feb '17 8:23:11 PM by HighCrate

I'm not advocating a @#$# This trope button, I'm advocating a we have this trope button.

@ Madrugada:

First, I think the TLP drafts need a holler button to streamline reporting of problematic troper behavior.

Second, I think the hat/bomb system needs to be split into three parts: Pass, Needs Work, and Get Rid of This. It would help clarify what is a very common misunderstanding with regards to the current bomb system.

Third, I agree that there should be an insistence, imposed by software if necessary, that people give a reason why they are adding hats/construction signs/bombs. The idea has precedence in what happens when items are flagged for P5 review, where you can't proceed without coherent text. It would assist with the constructive and helpful behavior we value on this site.

A random idea, that probably isn't practical in programming terms, would be a way to sign up to be alerted when new tropes are launched. Those who are interested in monitoring them can look at them and see if they need work or not. (And some tropers will be interested just because.)

Right, but if that button actually discards it, it doesn't account for the possibility that the TLP could be reworked until it's not a duplicate any more. Which does happen.

edited 24th Feb '17 8:46:05 PM by HighCrate

A button preventing a launch based on 'we have this trope' could also be used by trolls. Nope, nope, nope.

@ sailing101: Re: Nazi Zombies

Okay, there is really no need to presume bad faith on other editors part (we're not mind readers, and neither are you) whenever you, personally, object to a draft. That sort of attitude is simply unhelpful; we discuss things as a community. People can disagree if a new proposal provides a meaningful distinction or not. In fact, I did take your concerns seriously and tried to discard that draft before. It just ended up back at the top of the list for no clear reason.

@ Madrugada: Pretty much the options you've posted in that meta-post I support. We've discussed the bomb/hat deduction/net tally system before, as well as bringing back tags to make automated input to TLPs easier.

I'm also of the opinion that we do need a discard option separate from a 'Needs more work' one. I'm not convinced by the concerns posted above that it would just be used for trolling. If somebody is blatantly misusing it, we can always report them.

edited 25th Feb '17 1:11:11 AM by Morgenthaler

~Larkmarn: Are comments on @4731 still wanted?

I agree with cutting/sending back Trivia.Underside Ride and The Lightfooted especially given that the examples seem to be all over the place. I've also suspended the latter's launcher for Example Indentation issues including in the TLP despite being warned about it.

As for possible TLP improvements:

• As said before, permit a discard of a draft immediately after it's posted. Otherwise junk drafts will drown out stuff.
• Keep some kind of log on who adds hats and bombs. A lot of people clearly need to be educated on what the pretty buttons do. Perhaps also on un-discards.
• I'd like to see what kind of stuff people want to holler before having a holler button.
• Restore tags like "motion to discard". And make bombs actually remove hats.

I think that any kind of "don't launch this" button should not work by actuall blocking the launch, per what High Crate said. Rather, I'd have a launch of such a draft create some auto-holler or auto-report in a forum thread so that moderators can take action.

Speeking of the duplicate Nazi Zombies, It was launched. Can we cut it now?

If a troll abuses a we have this buton, that person was not worth allowing on the wiki anyway, same as the trolls who currently spam the launch button. I never said the duplicate flagging button would automatically discard it, rather it freezes the proposal for a mod to look at, limiting the posters to the OP, the whistleblower, and mods.

Finally, if the OP decides to discard their own proposal, they should have the option to lock it as well.

edited 25th Feb '17 5:19:06 AM by sailing101

I don't mean to beat a dead horse, but RE: Gods Of Adulterers And Harlots / Everybody Loves Zeus / Everybody Loves Aphrodite (all launched or sponsored by Informal Fallacies) & Everybody Hates Hades:

Informal Fallacies (ban evader) also launched Death Rides A Skateboard. I'm pretty sure this was meant to be directly related to Everybody Hates Hades (going by that troper's history of spamming related YKTTW drafts). Moreover, I'm not convinced this is different from Don't Fear the Reaper. Note that the draft discussion only had five comments, and it seems like it was pushed through pretty quickly IMO.

• Don't Fear the Reaper compares itself to Everybody Hates Hades ("when authors do the opposite with death-related deities")
• Death Rides A Skateboard compares itself to Everybody Hates Hades but doesn't explain how it is similar or different
• Death Rides A Skateboard compares itself to Don't Fear the Reaper but doesn't explain how it is similar or different, presumably because it's not very different
• Death being "cool" or "hip" is really similar to "friendly" But More Specific and I think it's so similar that it deserves some discussion as to whether or not this is The Same But More Specific or a Sub-Trope. If it's a Sub-Trope, I think it should be sent back in order to be written more like a Sub-Trope rather than an independent trope.

edited 25th Feb '17 10:00:22 AM by WaterBlap

Wait, that was made by a banned troper? I already wanted to cut it for being a blatant duplicate. Now I'm positive we should.

Yes, more feedback or action on some of the feedback is appreciated. I should tally them up when I get a chance...

As for the general reformation discussion...

• Get rid of hats and bombs entirely. No one knows what they mean. People think a bomb means discard (and I don't blame them) and a hat means "I support this in general" not "this is ready to be launched" (and I know TLP makes it very clear, so this is a case of us needing to idiot-proof TLP for those that don't read. As long as we have that imagery, people won't care what the TLP says they do.
• Of course, I love the idea of tags returning. Especially if a user can remove a tag they put one if it's been resolved.
• Someone earlier mentioned the idea of launching not actually "launching" the trope but moving it forward for mod review. I like this idea, but I understand if it may be taxing on the already likely overworked mod staff.
• I am against anything that makes it more difficult to add a tag/bomb. While in a perfect world we could make people comment on it, the truth is it just puts a roadblock on making criticisms is the opposite of what we need. Our problem is not with tropes not getting launched, our problem is that it's too easy to launch them. A trope percolating in TLP a bit longer isn't going to kill anyone.

edited 25th Feb '17 3:00:57 PM by Larkmarn

We're trying to avoid making too much extra work for the mod staff, especially after the new functions are up and running.

Allowing a system where clicking one button prevents a launch is making more work since the mods would not only have to call the troll into the office, they'd have to undo the button click every time.

I'd like a holler button for a few reasons. One is when banned tropers make sock accounts and start making a million drafts, often duplicates of the drafts they created in the first place. A holler would point the mods directly towards the problematic drafts from the first, bypassing the reporting and linking that happens now.

Another is when a troper starts acting up in the first place.

It could also be used when tropers are unconstructively squabbling in the threads. They wouldn't have to come to ATT to report it, and the mods would immediately see the context.

I don't think we should get rid of the hats/bombs completely. To me, shifting them to a three part system where reasons for adding a hat/sign/bomb are needed would work best from an information and labor standpoint. A bomb/trash can easily do double duty as "We have this one" under such circumstances.

As for reviewing for launch: well, if we go that way, and I am not sure we're at that point yet, it would require a committee along the lines of P5 if we want to avoid dumping more work on the mods.

But to me, the primary goals here are revamping the TLP format and process while dumping as little extra work on the mods as possible, especially long term.

I'm also against forcing people to comment if they want to bomb (at the current time). We need to fix the issues related to how easy it is to launch articles before we put up roadblocks to bombing.

edited 25th Feb '17 5:47:49 PM by Karxrida

EDIT: I've updated this post up to this post by Sept. It's just easier to do that than repost all of this information. Thus, this is basically from page 187 to page 192. I also updated the section on the Works Brought Up folder.

Because there is technically three convos going on in this thread right now, it's kind of difficult to keep track of votes to cut, keep, etc., and it's kind of significant that we get some actionable things done I guess. This tally goes back to this post on page 187. I did not tally what others reported as tallies, only "primary sources" so to speak.

Folderized because there are so many lines!

• The key to the tallies"
  • c = voted to cut or said/implied this was Not A Trope;
  • sb = send back or "cut and send back" which is the same thing as this;
  • k = voted "keep" or "I'm fine with it";
  • un = unsure, not I'm not sure but they aren't sure;
  • n = neutral, they expressed neutrality or abstained for some reason;
  • dv = didn't vote but commented (great);
  • trs = they voted to bring this to TRS, they commented that this was too old for this thread;
  • ??? = I don't know how to count this one, I'm not sure what they voted

edited 26th Feb '17 5:00:45 PM by WaterBlap

Might as well throw some opinions in.

• Send back Actually Real Magic.
• Keep Creator's Pest. Agree that it needs to be monitored, though.
• Keep Film Of The Ride. Agreeing with an earlier sentiment (from Mad, I think) that it's rare but still tropeable because of its unique aspects.
• Keep Gentle Touch vs. Firm Hand. Might need a description tweak (something about how it's written bugs me) but it seems fine otherwise.

edited 25th Feb '17 11:21:32 PM by Karxrida

I didn't vote to send Creator's Pest to the TRS, I think it's a trope that as long as it's watched carefully should be kept. However, I do believe Mystery Arc should be sent to TRS because it's too old for this thread and I believe it's a workable concept that can be saved. However, I believe Mystical Item TM should be sent back because it has an awful name and the description needs work, though I believe the concept (mundane item with magical properties) is workable.

Death Rides A Skateboard is just weird. What is so special about death and skateboards? Cut unless explanation to the contrary can be offered.

The biggest objection I have against requiring moderator approval for TLP launches is the bureaucratism involved. I am wary about creating a "surveillance state" in terms of new page creation where you need Word of Mod for everything.

I've sent Actually Real Magic and Mystical Item TM back to TLP. Messaging ~Just Troper.

Otherwise:

• Cyborg and Wild Metal Country: Comment out ZCE and crosswick the rest. And index.
• Unforgettable: I've messaged the creator. If the page isn't fixed cut it.
• FanWorks.Sizeshifter: I've cut it. Not a proper use of the namespace.
• Where They Were: Archived discussion means TRS. It also doesn't show an unlaunchable YKTTW.

I updated that huge post (rather than reposting it). Sorry, A Drago, I thought I understood what you were saying, but I've updated the current tally to reflect your correction. (My bad.)

• Quick links to things we've sent back to TLP, for those who would like to contribute directly to those drafts.
  • Actually Real Magic (link)
  • Mystical Item TM (link)

x5 I myself reported pennygadget's spam pages and got them cut and the spammer bounced. Not sure about the other one.

DanganronpaRPForScrunts.Danganronpa RP For Scrunts may need a check for content (it's hard to say if it even exsists) and no standard namespace

Timeline.Donald Trump doesn't strke me as very useful