has made a decision that all articles in the Let's Play namespace (list of pages in that namespace) should be moved to other namespaces.
Since let's plays are usually video-based, the target namespace is usually WebVideo/. However, some are text-based, and the consensus was to handle the namspacing of those on a case-by-case basis, with Blog/, Fanfic/, and Literature/ brought up as potential targets.
Before any given article is transplanted, we should confirm that it meets the standards for being a TV Tropes work article. Note that these often serve as hybrid articles for their creators in much the same way as the Music namespace. If there is insufficient content, the articles end up becoming about the creators, violating our "no troping real people" policy.
The crucial question is whether the article has any tropable, creative content. This means that it's more than just "Alisha plays games and makes faces." What counts as tropable, creative content? Here are some examples.
- Creating a fictional/roleplaying narrative that is distinct from the game being played or the real person doing the LP.
- Using the game as a medium to craft original content: songs, videos, machinima, and so on.
- "MST'ing" or creatively riffing on the game's content, as long as it's sufficiently transformative.
What are not criteria for a tropable Let's Play by themselves?
- Adopting a quirky personality, cracking jokes, making funny faces, or overreacting to jump scares.
- Cosplaying, playing with toys, unboxing merchandise, etc.
- Having a "gimmick" that makes them stand out, such as a repeated Catchphrase, eating loudly on microphone, or calling their viewers "Doggo fam".
- Playing games in a particular way (speedrunning, evil runs, no-kill runs, etc.) that fall within what it is possible to do in the game itself, with or without mods.
- Modding the game.
- Being very popular.
- Having lots of memes arise in their fandom.
Note that the same general principles apply to any Web Video creator, especially those whose main work is in news, reviews, vlogging, and/or reaction videos.
There are a few outliers that will need to be handled on a case-by-case basis.
- After-Action Report: I would move it to literature, although it could be considered fanfic.
- Liveblogs, which are probably not tropable.
Web Video cleanup sandbox
This project has several purposes related to all things Web Video:
- Cleaning up the WebVideo index
- Cleaning up the WebVideo/ namespace to move pages that belong elsewhere
- Cleaning up individual Web Video pages that have massive issues
Overview
The easy-seeming part when I started on Web Video (the index) was just removing things not even located in the namespace— found in Creator, Film, Web Animation, etc. Then I started noticing there were many things put in Web Video (the namespace) that were basically Creator pages, lots of Let's Play, other video game streaming that doesn't currently have an index, other misuses in index and/or namespace placement...
- original live action, meaning not animated or reusing existing footage;
- narrative/creative, a bit unclear, but it's not someone simply reviewing another work/reacting to other works/playing through another work;
- a work, which is... a work, not a creator.
) is much more broad:
"Live-action videos and video-based Lets Plays originally or only released online. Covers both YouTube videos and web-exclusive series, but does not include those that belong in the WebAnimation/ namespace. For big-budget series exclusive to streaming services such as Netflix, use Series/ or the appropriate animation namespace instead." — Not limited to original or live action footage, narrative works, etc. However, people have mistakenly created Web Animation pages in this namespace, made what are essentially creator pages, typed it as "Webvideo", etc.
:
Reaction channels tend to straddle a line here, but are not generally tropable unless they create some sort of distinct creative endeavor rather than stare at a video and laugh a bit. Also it helps if they are reacting to fiction, not to real life. The latter may be entertaining but falls into the same general category as gossip. We can trope these only for their use of production and artistic tropes, not for their topics.
-
No Analysis Channel index— corrected! - No index for non-Let's Play video game streaming unless they're on Twitch. If they don't fall into the Let's Play format and aren't on Twitch, where do they go?
- No
Gag Dub orGag Sub index - Where should we put channels based on prank calls, scam-baiting, other audio-based things where the video is incidental?
Pages identified for cleanup:
- A Dose of Buckley — see this ATT for more info
- The Mysterious Mr. Enter and subpages — issues include troping the creator and not the works
- The Nostalgia Critic and subpages — see this project thread
- Smosh and subpages — Smosh is a channel, and the pages have multiple works (may need a hard split)
- Thomas Sanders — Creator, lots of biographical details, previously hard split for Sanders Sides but may need another
See also:
- Cleanup: Review/Let's Play YMMV Tropes
- TLP: Actual Play genre/index
Just the index cleanup itself is a considerable project, figuring out what stays and what needs a different index, but there are also many pages with significant issues to clean. This is a very big project, but I've seen other people notice these issues, too. I hope we can at least get the index under control.
(![[nja]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/user_ninja_2074.png "[nja]"){kind=small}
For clarity and re: review stuff. Continue to edit as things occur that are useful to keep at the top of the thread.)
Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 2nd 2023 at 9:02:00 AM
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Probably should just remove anything that’s not troping a fictional narrative.
Angry babby
Enter does have some skits and creative editing, so he's definitely tropeworthy. I've deliberately not kept up with him since 2020 but I used to watch him religiously so I could probably help clean older examples.
I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
"Cool. Coolcoolcool."
Yeah I say keep and cleanup Enter.
Fan-Preferred Couple cleanup thread
Honestly I don't remember Enter having skits but it's been so long since I've watched him. Honestly I don't think Enter is tropeworthy since he's not playing a character, he is just himself but he's represented by a cartoon avatar.
He/Him
Idk about you but I do think John plays a character. While he talks in the same monotone voice in real life, he also acts more like a Large Ham and/or is prone to Chewing the Scenery in his videos.
Edited by AudioSpeaks2 on Jul 21st 2023 at 2:44:14 AM
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
That's not really a character though, that's just an exaggerated persona. A character would be a fictionalized version of yourself, not just putting on more of a show.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Edited by badtothebaritone on Jul 21st 2023 at 2:07:32 PM
If he actually has done some skits, those can be troped. His usual review material isn't tropeworthy because it's just him rattling off his opinions with a mysterious avatar on the screen.
He/Him
What about Short Fat Otaku?
He just seems to be doing response videos to internet stuff. Barely any character or narrative.
Edited by AudioSpeaks2 on Jul 23rd 2023 at 10:19:56 PM
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
"Cool. Coolcoolcool."
Yeah looking it over I am leaning cut.
He/Him
Just so that we don't add controversy again like with The Drinker, I'm just gonna put a temporary notice over his page.
Edited by AudioSpeaks2 on Jul 23rd 2023 at 11:26:34 PM
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
the Retromancer
Leaning on cutting BFO. Looking up his channel, he seem to just be watching tiktok videos and news to give his (anti-woke) commentary with nothing else.
TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
He/Him
Even ignoring his politicsnote , his videos just consist of him reacting to articles or videos online.
I'm leaning on cutting the guy.
Edited by AudioSpeaks2 on Jul 24th 2023 at 12:00:59 AM
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
He/Him
I think we need to establish this, but what should the minimum number of voters be as to whether a page here should be cut or kept?
10 voters, 15 voters? 20?
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
Friends forevermore
It'll be hard to get a defined requirement in place, because we have no idea how many people tend to vote on these polls.
(And it would be in the form of "X votes for the leading option", not "X votes overall", to avoid any risk of the requirement being manipulated.)
I had a dog-themed avatar before it was cool.
He/Him
I think pinging those who frequently edit the page to this thread here would be a good idea.
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
Honestly, we shouldn't be just counting votes for this sort of thing. It's too easy for a group of people who don't like someone's opinions, or have arbitrarily decided their politics don't line of with said person's, or a bunch of fanboys, or trolls, or the like to just pile in long enough to conserve articles for people they like and delete articles they don't. We need to put a pin in this piecemeal deletion nonsense, sit down and actually decide set-in-stone standards for what to keep and what to delete, and then apply the new standard en-masse. Because honestly, with the way we're just arbitrarily deleting articles of webshows right now, with no real rhyme or reason other than "all animals are tropable but some are more tropable than others", it's only a matter of time before drama arises from it.
Friends forevermore
Have there been any obviously brigaded crowners in the past? We shouldn't go out of our way to prevent brigading unless there's a proven history of brigades.
I had a dog-themed avatar before it was cool.
"Cool. Coolcoolcool."
Are you basing this on something that has happened on this site or you just basing it on a what if? Because this site as a whole goes by "concensus" and the most objective way to do so is votes or crowners.
As for the the we need to put a "pin to pencil", we already have a thread discussing new rules which will undoubtedly do what you just described and set standards to make us tell what is and isn't tropeable easier.
Edited by Bullman on Jul 23rd 2023 at 8:58:51 AM
Fan-Preferred Couple cleanup thread
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
Not as far as we can prove. There's been crowner wonkery in the past, but nothing to the degree mentioned here.
Edited by WarJay77 on Jul 23rd 2023 at 9:57:10 AM
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
On another subject, how do we judge Garfielf and things like it? They're narrative works but definitely not live-action, so one could argue that they should be moved to WebAnimation/, even though calling them Limited Animation would be rather generous.
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
Hmm. I think right now Web Video is sort of a catch-all for any "videos" that aren't animated. I may be wrong though.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Friends forevermore
Do we have pages for any individual YouTube Poops? That's the closest I can think of.
I had a dog-themed avatar before it was cool.
Just knowing how the internet works in general more than anything, Bull. I'd rather avoid drama if possible. Also thinking it would be easier and faster to just not touch the web original stuff until we've actually created a standard of "what's good" and "what's not good". We wouldn't even need to discuss things individually if we did that, and it's not like there's any rush to delete things.
And, maybe I'm using the term wrong (English isn't my first language) but when I say "put a pin in something" I mean "stop it for now." I say we stop purging articles, focus on the policy of what is and isn't good, then come back as a group with brooms and do all the purging in one fell swoop.
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
Mate. You can't just demand changes to our consensus gathering method based solely on anecdotal evidence you have no proof applies to this site. We've run on crowners for years with zero reason to believe they've been "brigaded".
It's not easy to have one generalized rule. Context obviously matters. Some pages may be technically keepable but not in their current state. Others pretend to be keepable but are in reality fudging things to make real-life troping pass as a narrative. We're currently working out a more consistent rule for tropeworthiness, but that won't save all or even most of the pages currently under debate.
Edited by WarJay77 on Jul 23rd 2023 at 2:49:39 PM
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness