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Deadlock Clock: Mar 27th 2017 at 11:59:00 PM
Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#1: Jan 2nd 2017 at 2:00:16 AM

Polish the Turd is pretty close to 100% complaining and backed up with around 90% generic examples. Personally I would nuke it from orbit but I suspect that won't happen due to the number of inbounds. As an alternative, I would recommend wiping all the examples except for the "tropes used to polish turds" list and turn it into an index.

edited 2nd Jan '17 2:00:36 AM by Daefaroth

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#2: Jan 2nd 2017 at 8:44:39 PM

Going ahead and openin this as there's a Image Pickin' thread whose fate rests on what happens here.

Memers Since: Aug, 2013
#3: Jan 2nd 2017 at 10:06:50 PM

I expected this to be a retool that didn't work but instead its the No Mans Sky trope.

Promo material that doesn't show off 'actual gameplay' and other misleading practices to promote a work is trope worthy but this is far more negative than it should be about the works themselves.

The work could be the best ever but the commercials and other promo materials do not actually show it. An example would be the old Chrono Cross playstation commercial. The damn game was godly and widely considered the best RPG on the Playstation but not a single part of the actual game is shown in the commercial.

A rename and rework to be not so negative would work.

edited 2nd Jan '17 10:10:52 PM by Memers

Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#4: Jan 2nd 2017 at 10:12:50 PM

Maybe Deceptive Marketing? Potentially the Missing Supertrope to Covers Always Lie and Never Trust a Trailer.

edited 2nd Jan '17 10:14:58 PM by Daefaroth

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Getta Since: Apr, 2016
#5: Jan 3rd 2017 at 3:45:31 AM

Seems that we have 2 tropes here: what Daefaroth was said (as a complaining magnet, which should be exampleless and just be turned into an index) and what Memers was said (deceptive marketing).

"Polishing the turd" or "making the thing look better than it actually is" to me doesn't sound like it's specific to advertising and might in fact be applied to in-universe examples.

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SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#6: Jan 3rd 2017 at 3:54:46 AM

How is it used in wicks.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#7: Jan 3rd 2017 at 4:45:17 AM

Here is a chunk of the usage

edited 3rd Jan '17 4:48:30 AM by Daefaroth

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Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#8: Jan 3rd 2017 at 5:24:01 AM

And some more

edited 3rd Jan '17 5:24:46 AM by Daefaroth

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Prfnoff Since: Jan, 2001
#9: Jan 3rd 2017 at 9:00:07 AM

I think it's worth having some sort of article about the ploys media companies use to bury bad reviews and manufacture raves. I don't think the generic examples are worth keeping, though.

Larkmarn Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Hello, I love you
#10: Jan 3rd 2017 at 9:58:55 AM

I think the thing to do is make it an index for tropes that try to make a work seem better than it is and cut non-literal examples entirely.

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PhiSat Planeswalker from Everywhere and Nowhere Since: Jan, 2011
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#11: Jan 3rd 2017 at 11:11:19 AM

I agree that we should have a separate section/trope for deceptive marketing.

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Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#12: Jan 3rd 2017 at 8:35:18 PM

So where is the spilt? Deceptive Marketing and Hype Marketing?

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Getta Since: Apr, 2016
#13: Jan 3rd 2017 at 10:04:04 PM

[up] No, it's between "deceptive marketing" and "polish the turd".

We don't need justice when we can forgive. We don't need tolerance when we can love.
Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#14: Jan 3rd 2017 at 10:26:02 PM

Yes, but "Polish the Turd" by nature of the phrase invites complaining and needs to be renamed.

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shoboni Since: Oct, 2010
#15: Jan 3rd 2017 at 11:57:37 PM

Nope. Polishing the Turd is an actual industry term for hiding a bad or sub-par product under a coat of polish that distracts from the flaws so I'd say a change is a no-go.

Throwing a huge special effects budget at a bad movie script to distract from the horrid story or putting pretty graphics on an otherwise broken game (ie: Sonic 2006) are examples of how it works. Using distortion and noise to compensate for poor playing in music and cover up mistakes is another common example.

edited 4th Jan '17 12:00:19 AM by shoboni

Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#16: Jan 4th 2017 at 12:05:12 AM

Just because it is an industry term doesn't mean it isn't complaining. It is literally comparing a work to poop. If the name stays it can be nothing more than a list of tropes commonly used to make works look better and have no examples at all. If it is going to be a trope with examples it needs to have a neutral name that won't be a complaint magnet.

Polish the turd would have to stay as a redirect due to the inbounds, but I think we can come up with a better name for it.

edited 4th Jan '17 12:43:32 AM by Daefaroth

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SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#17: Jan 4th 2017 at 1:18:23 AM

If it's an industry term, it can stay as such. But if the examples are useless removing them may work. And tighten the definition.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
shoboni Since: Oct, 2010
#18: Jan 4th 2017 at 2:48:14 PM

[up]I'm fully against example cutting if we can at all avoid it

[up][up]AFAIK, we have a rule that we can't mess with the names of stuff that's already an established term outside the wiki. It falls under the same protection that keeps Tropes Of Legend like Xanatos Gambit that violate newer naming rules from being renamed.

edited 4th Jan '17 2:49:00 PM by shoboni

Getta Since: Apr, 2016
#19: Jan 4th 2017 at 3:36:16 PM

[up] Limiting it to in-universe only could work.

We don't need justice when we can forgive. We don't need tolerance when we can love.
shoboni Since: Oct, 2010
#20: Jan 4th 2017 at 4:02:01 PM

I honestly hate limited at all because I'm off the opinion we're way to liberal swinging around that chainsaw.

If worst comes to worst, just move it to the Dark Wiki and leave it be for complaining.

edited 4th Jan '17 4:02:26 PM by shoboni

Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#21: Jan 4th 2017 at 8:17:04 PM

Darth Wiki for complaining and then just pruning links off other work and trope pages works fine for me.

[up][up][up] If there is such a rule I can't find it. The only thing I can find is a Grandfather Clause, but that is about a term being so embedded in this wiki that it would be too much work to clean it up. I don't think trope names are safe purely on the basis that it is used the same in the real world.

edited 4th Jan '17 8:20:11 PM by Daefaroth

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shoboni Since: Oct, 2010
#22: Jan 4th 2017 at 8:57:38 PM

I seem to recall us having a rule that prominent usage outside the wiki protects tropes from name changes.

Agreed though. I'd be cool with moving it to the Darth Wiki and leaving it for complaining about dressing up bad works in a deceptive (ie: pretty graphics on an otherwise shitty game) or attempts to cover up quality issues in a half-assed manner while removing wicks form work pages.

Memers Since: Aug, 2013
#23: Jan 4th 2017 at 10:53:43 PM

It is also an established term outside media, one that even the Mythbusters even tried to see if literal matched the figurative.

I am very much against continuing using the title as the trope is more specific than the usage of it.

Getta Since: Apr, 2016
#24: Jan 4th 2017 at 11:57:05 PM

Darth Wiki isn't a dump, though.

@ Daefaroth: Naming A Trope says that pre-established terms are a priority.

We don't need justice when we can forgive. We don't need tolerance when we can love.
Daefaroth Fnord from California Since: Jan, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#25: Jan 5th 2017 at 12:20:28 AM

^No it doesn't. It says that pre-existing terms are good, but nothing in there says that pre-existing terms get priority or immunity. If anything gets priority it is 'clear'.

Darth Wiki isn't a dump, but it is a place that negativity is allowed. As it stands polish the turd is overly negative. It either needs to be made more neutral or placed where the negativity is acceptable.

^^Regardless of what decision is made here I think that it would be good to run a Deceptive Marketing trope (or trivia maybe?) through TLP.

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PageAction: PolishTheTurd
7th Feb '17 8:07:07 PM

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What would be the best way to fix the page?

Total posts: 59
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