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Policy Question: Spoiler tagging Trope Names on character pages

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TotemicHero No longer a forum herald from the next level Since: Dec, 2009
No longer a forum herald
#101: Feb 7th 2014 at 1:49:31 PM

One thing of note is to ask if we're disabling it for specific namespaces, or specific page types. The latter seems easier to me from a coding perspective, but would tie pretty much into my second solution (no longer using character pages as example lists), as that's something that's reflected in selecting a page type in the first place.

Expergiscēre cras, medior quam hodie. (Awaken tomorrow, better than today.)
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#102: Feb 7th 2014 at 1:51:34 PM

I think doing it by namespace would be simpler, although Eddie can program the parser to do either. All subpages don't need to be tagless, just the ones that cause trouble.

edited 7th Feb '14 1:51:53 PM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#103: Feb 7th 2014 at 1:52:25 PM

By page type is not suitable - "examples" is both for character pages and trope lists of works that have been split - and they require completely different spoiler policies.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
TotemicHero No longer a forum herald from the next level Since: Dec, 2009
No longer a forum herald
#104: Feb 7th 2014 at 2:00:34 PM

Hence why it would go hand-in-hand with making those pages not serve as example lists. Why would we leave them as that page type in that case?

Expergiscēre cras, medior quam hodie. (Awaken tomorrow, better than today.)
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#105: Feb 7th 2014 at 2:04:08 PM

Why would a Characters page not be for examples? That makes no sense. We just wouldn't allow spoiler tags on it. So either you put the spoilery stuff in the main article or you just accept that there will be spoilers and let it ride.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#106: Feb 7th 2014 at 2:04:45 PM

Because character and trope list pages need the YMMV dot and other subpages don't need the YMMV dot. That's why we can't change the page type system.

edited 7th Feb '14 2:05:08 PM by SeptimusHeap

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Discar Since: Jun, 2009
#107: Feb 7th 2014 at 3:36:25 PM

Removing all spoiler markup—either from the entire wiki or just character subpages or whatever—is something that needs to be actually discussed, preferably in a properly named thread. This thread currently seems to be skipping straight to "Well, how do we implement this?"

Fighteer: Yes, we have a lot of people overusing spoiler tags. This is in no small part due to the fact that we have never enforced any spoiler rules until what, two weeks ago? Give the policy a chance to actually spread before declaring spoiler tags in general a failure and a waste of time.

Writing a post-post apocalypse LitRPG on RR. Also fanfic stuff.
Trivialis Since: Oct, 2011
#108: Feb 7th 2014 at 11:25:21 PM

It's true that the site is about describing tropes and that sometimes this involves some spoilers. But I think the message that needs to be conveyed with that is that you don't have to come to Tropes for all your needs. For some reason, some people seem to treat this single site as the place for everything. If you have several different needs you need to visit various different sites; one place is not enough. Even Wikipedia, which gets treated as the first option for quick information about whatever, has a whole list of "What We Are Not". The site needs to amicably (as in, not a "go away") direct the readers to other places when the site is not appropriate to address a need of those readers - in this case, spoiler-free information.

I actually kind of like the idea of having subpages spoiler tag-free, to a degree. This turns the main page into a loose analog of a synopsis, and delegates the more specific, detailed information to the subpages.

However, I don't support disabling the spoiler markup, either on character pages or on other parts of the wiki. It's too much of sweeping away something that may still have potential usefulness. There exist other markups that are supposed to be used only for a particular reason even if they can be used anywhere on a wiki page. It seems going out of the way to make different parts of the wiki behave inconsistently at a technical level.

Having specific pages with "warning: spoilers" message in lieu of individualized spoiler tags doesn't seem to be that bad, though. We have "no real examples" and "do not list this trope on a work page" for specific tropes, and those work out. It depends on the case.

edited 7th Feb '14 11:25:56 PM by Trivialis

Wyvernil Since: Jan, 2001
#109: Feb 8th 2014 at 2:34:18 AM

If I'm understanding correctly, the main issue with the spoiler tags is that:

1. Large swaths of white text look ugly.

2. Spoiler-tagging trope names is useless because people can just mouse over the tags and be spoiled by the link.

I wonder if a possible solution might be to change the way spoiler tags work so that they're more like hottips or notes? Sort of like this.

Or this.

This would help to solve both of these problems. The pages no longer look like a heavily-censored government document, and people have to actually click on the spoiler note to see the spoilers. Would this be a feasible solution?

edited 8th Feb '14 2:35:22 AM by Wyvernil

SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#110: Feb 8th 2014 at 2:38:27 AM

It's something worth considering, although it would not feasibly resolve the "spoilery trope name" problem.

Also, the issue with spoiler tagging trope names is that it renders the trope entry useless if you can't identify the trope in question.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Noaqiyeum we must dissent (it/they) from across the gulf of space (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
we must dissent (it/they)
#111: Feb 12th 2014 at 9:44:24 AM

I don't have much to comment on the actual policy just now (I'm a little confused what the issues are beyond spoiler-tagging trope names, work titles, or entire paragraphs), but I would much rather help enforce the policy than disable the tags.

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bwburke94 I am mad scientist! It's so cool! from 1.048596% (Y2: Electric Boogaloo) Relationship Status: She does the things you do, but she is an IBM
I am mad scientist! It's so cool!
#113: Feb 21st 2014 at 3:19:34 AM

What about putting spoiler tropes within a separate folder?

Have folders named Alice, Alice (Spoiler), Bob, Bob (Spoiler), et cetera.

2025: the year it all ends?
SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#114: Feb 21st 2014 at 3:25:23 AM

That was discussed several times. Unless there is heavy curation, it's a problem to maintain such a split.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Shaoken (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Dating Catwoman
#115: Mar 1st 2014 at 1:25:18 AM

Curating is the key issue here. I've done some work on several character pages and put up big blocks of commented out warnings that fill up the entire initial edit screen stating exactly what the ruling is, and some tropers completely ignore it and violate the policy anyway.

Any solution that basically requires a troper to monitor the page every day to make sure nobody's doing the wrong thing seems very counterproductive. I am leaning towards the idea that we either need a permanent troper tip at the top of every edit window in eye-grabbing colours to get the point across or to disable spoiler tags on character pages altogether.

Irene (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Crazy Cat Lady
#116: Mar 1st 2014 at 6:47:32 AM

At this point, it's just best to have an auto-tip to not use spoilers and to disable them as well on Character subpages. It saves everyone tons of times. We can worry about editing out the spoiler markup when the pages grow a little too big, meaning we don't need to get it done hyper fast, but still can work on it here and there.

Shadow?
Discar Since: Jun, 2009
#117: Mar 1st 2014 at 7:57:58 AM

I really think you guys are overreacting. This is still a new policy (or at least one we're actually enforcing). It's the same as the ZCE policy; yes, it needs curating, and yes, lots of people still violate it. But as long as the people making the mistakes get whacked properly, people will learn. Yeah, it's not going to happen instantly. It never does. Just give it some time.

Writing a post-post apocalypse LitRPG on RR. Also fanfic stuff.
Discar Since: Jun, 2009
#118: Mar 1st 2014 at 8:20:00 AM

Double post to say that I made a spoiler cleanup thread. I think part of the reason this got out of hand is that we never had a thread for it. Could have sworn we did, but I wasn't able to find one.

Writing a post-post apocalypse LitRPG on RR. Also fanfic stuff.
Adannor (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#119: Mar 8th 2014 at 11:30:27 PM

Hmm, how about splitting only the highly spoilery characters - the ones who are not what they seem to be initially, that do a complete turnaround at some point.

So for example Frozen's may have two entries:

  • Hans (Pre-Reveal)
    • Here go all the tropes about him being a sweet guy. Nothing to really spoil here.
And then at the bottom of the page, after an extra line of spoiler warning goes
  • Hans (Post-Reveal)
    • Here go all the tropes about him being Manipulative Bastard. All non-spoilered due to the extra warning.

Some works may have Pre/Post Face–Heel Turn entries and so on.

edited 8th Mar '14 11:32:21 PM by Adannor

Nohbody "In distress", my ass. from Somewhere in Dixie Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: Mu
"In distress", my ass.
#120: Mar 8th 2014 at 11:33:33 PM

Already been discussed and more or less rejected. At the very least, it encourages duplicate entries, with people going down to where they'd think the trope would be but not seeing it (because it's hidden at the very bottom of the page) and adding it in the "non-spoiler" section.

All your safe space are belong to Trump
Discar Since: Jun, 2009
#121: Mar 9th 2014 at 9:13:33 AM

It does occasionally work, but only in special circumstances. Like, let's say for the entire film, the party is being chased around by the Dark Knight, then at the end they find out he's actually Bob, one of their party members. Well, then both Bob and the Dark Knight get their own folders, and you keep all the spoiler tropes under the latter (maybe with a warning that spoilers will be unmarked in that folder).

But that doesn't work for most situations. Still haven't seen Frozen, but it doesn't sound like one where it would.

Writing a post-post apocalypse LitRPG on RR. Also fanfic stuff.
crazysamaritan NaNo 4328 / 50,000 from Lupin III Since: Apr, 2010
NaNo 4328 / 50,000
#122: Mar 9th 2014 at 2:22:03 PM

I think I was one of the ones supporting it before. It only really works if the work itself treats the reveal as a surprise. We'd have folder names like "Bob" and "Dark Knight (spoilers!)", or "Hans" and "The Villain (spoilers!)".

When the work doesn't do much at hiding the information (say, the reveal is 30 minutes into a 70 minute movie), it really doesn't split well. If the two aspects of the character are built up (Like "Dr. Jekyl" and "Mr. Hyde") as separate people, then even an early spoiler can work well in that situation.

Mostly, the value of using that as a spoiler trick depends on how much value is gained by considering the spoilery parts of the character as a separate character.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.
captainmarkle Limited Patients from Behind you Since: Feb, 2011 Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
#123: Mar 25th 2014 at 11:23:03 AM

So to make sure I've got this right. Saying a character dies is okay and should be left unspoilered in the vast majority of cases, but when and how should be spoilered? Granted, I guess that having an example where the "Killed Off for Real: At the end of Season 2" stuff occurs still gives most readers an idea of what the spoilered trope is.

Cheers.

Trans rights are human rights. If you don't think that, please leave.
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#124: Mar 25th 2014 at 11:44:36 AM

You don't spoiler tag Killed Off for Real. It's inevitable that there will be some unmarked spoilers in a Characters page; that is the risk people take by reading it. Incidentally, "in episode 2" or "in season 2" is a Zero Context Example because when is not as important as how. Also, Killed Off for Real is not Character Death; it's only when a character dies in a way that is atypically final for the work.

edited 25th Mar '14 1:03:54 PM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
ChadM Since: Jan, 2001
#125: May 27th 2014 at 10:31:26 AM

I just got linked here from one of the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. discussion pages (where Characters is currently a tag soup trainwreck, and I've become the resident Spoiler Tag Nazi on the Main and Recap pages) and I just wanted to say that I agree with disabling spoiler tags on subpages only, for the simple reason that if you're that averse to being spoiled, I don't know why you would go grubbing around in subpages anyway. At some point you have to say, "Don't want to be spoiled? Go watch it, then!" It also doesn't hurt that folders exist and can serve much of the same purpose anyway.

I also support the idea of a tag similar to noreallife disabling spoilers on a per-page basis, if that's possible. Some tropes and even some works are just inherently a sea of spoilers, at which point it's completely fair to say "here be spoilers" and not ruin the pageflow for people who aren't looking at pages they shouldn't. It's always annoying to me to encounter a page with a giant unmarked spoilers warning followed by spoiler tags in every example.

Finally, I have to specifically call out the idea of collapsible spoilers as an abomination. The solution to too many spoilers is not to force me to individually click on all of them.

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