Scope of laconics

Per crowner, Laconic/ pages for certain namespaces are no longer allowed, specifically:

• Characters/
• Indexes (Main/)
• Creators (Creator/)
• Administrivia/
• Recap/

while keeping Laconics for works, tropes, Just for Fun and Useful Notes.

A list of Laconic/ pages with matching names to pages at affected namespaces is here: Sandbox.Liminal Laconics List.

Almost all of these are to be cut, though note that a few could have been applied to trope or work pages with the same name and thus don't have to be cut.

The crowner decided to keep Laconics for Useful Notes except for "certain" categories, which are still under discussion.

Original OP

Following up on this ATT report, there seems to be a bit of confusion concerning where having a laconic is appropriate.

I was under the impression that only trope pages had them, but apparently some works pages have and the ATT report linked above has them on Useful Notes pages.

So should we limit them only to certain pages, or allow them as long as they aren't breaking rules?

Edited by Tabs on Jan 16th 2023 at 8:47:28 AM

I didn't choose the troping life, the troping life chose me

Oh, they're very common for work pages. You'll see a lot of them pop up if you frequent this thread.

While I personally have always believed that they should be restricted to trope pages, I'm aware that arguing for such a thing will be such an uphill battle I'm not actually interested in changing the status quo. Work laconics are pretty harmless, they're mostly just there for fun, and they don't have the same "tricking people into spreading misuse" issue that trope laconics do, so whatever.

I will take a stance on the fact that things that aren't works and tropes should not get laconics, though. At that point, it just crosses the line from "practical but misused" to "entirely useless". I've seen laconics for Administrivia pages, for instance, which just seems... highly unproductive. And I feel the same about the laconics for UN pages, as both namespaces have completely incompatible goals and purposes.

Edited by WarJay77 on Dec 19th 2022 at 3:42:57 PM

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness

I'm on the side that think Laconic are useful, as they provide what someone may want to know about a page in the minimum time and are useful to be copied to certain indexes or for search purposes.

This applies to trope and work pages, and I think I'm too foot in to reconsider.

Of course, I understand they sometimes miss details that are actually important for tropes, but I'm more inclined to blame individual tropers and not the concept.

I would however agree that every other namespace do not need laconics for separate reasons.

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup

I agree that Laconics should be for trope and work pages only, for the record.

TRS Queue | Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall

Administrivia/ and UsefulNotes/ absolutely shouldn't have Laconics. I can take or leave them on Creator/ and creators in Music/.

I genuinely think in practice, laconics do more harm than good even for trope pages given just how inaccurate they can be. I've done wick cleaning for tropes in which part of the source of the misuse seemed to be coming from misleading laconics, for example.

That said, getting rid of all laconics is not a fight I want to pick because I'm well aware that's a minority opinion.

I'm fine with laconics for tropes, kinda fine with laconics for works, and against laconics for all other page types, Useful Notes included. I've seen indices with laconics and most index pages already have brief, self-explanatory descriptions

Edited by amathieu13 on Dec 19th 2022 at 4:17:06 AM

What about recaps? A good chunk of, say, Recap.Doctor Who has associated Laconics.

I had a dog-themed avatar before it was cool.

That was a bit of a grey area to me, but in the end I'll base on "Recap of a recap, really?", "The first sentence of the Recap/ page typically says what the episode is about anyway" and "What are the odds they'll be plagiarized from official tv guides".

Edited by Amonimus on Dec 19th 2022 at 1:45:10 PM

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup

Recap pages definitely shouldn't have Laconics. Good Recaps should already have short descriptions.

If a tree falls in the forest and nobody remembers it, who else will you have ice cream with?

Really? I thought the point was to summarise the whole plot?

For every low there is a high.

Yes; why wouldn't a summary be brief? If you describe everything that happens, then you're getting closer to reproducing the work in written form than you are to a recap.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

Recap pages are sorta like work pages so I'm not upset about them having laconics, but I can see why they wouldn't be useful, especially as we're not meant to give a full plot synopsis.

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness

to Laconics for Recap pages

Laconic.Speculative Troping exists, and I've been told that Administrivia pages shouldn't have laconics. Should that be cut?

right now, we're discussing what pages should have laconics to help establish a definitive site wide policy. We're not really in the "what should we do about specific pages' laconics" part since we're still trying to establish a consensus on what pages should be included.

I would venture out on a limb and say no to any laconics on Administrivia pages ... these are the policy pages, I'm surprised open editing is allowed on them at all.

I didn't choose the troping life, the troping life chose me

Big to having Laconics for Administrivia pages. I think people should have to actually read the rules for the site—Laconics for those pages discourage actually doing that IMO.

TRS Queue | Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall

I support having Laconics for trope and work pages. No opinion on the other kinds of pages.

135 - 158 - 273 - 191 - 188 - 230 - 300

I support limiting laconics to trope and work pages, although I will say that laconics for recaps are far less problematic than laconics for useful notes or administrivia pages, so I won't exactly die on the "no laconics for recaps" hill.

Bigotry will NEVER be welcome on TV Tropes.

to Laconics in general because they help summarize things, like Recap pages and works (and Useful Notes pages). Plus, I actually find them harmless in general (EDIT: at least compared to something like misleading trope names on second thought).

A weak for Laconics for Administrivia pages, though, since tropers should read the whole pages and a Laconic might encourage them not to do so. For the record, I'm aware that can happen with all pages, I just feel it's the most notable with Administrivia pages since we're supposed to read those most of all. (In case I need to say this, I know we're supposed to read Tropes' main pages too.)

Edited by RandomTroper123 on May 15th 2023 at 6:58:15 AM

I would definitely ban laconics for administrivia (can likely skip a lot of nuance for newbies and be genuinely harmful) and indexes (since an index page is usually very clear, has a short description, and is defined by what pages are on it). Mostly fine/ambivalent when it comes to other page types.

Edited by Piterpicher on Dec 20th 2022 at 1:03:50 PM

Currently mostly inactive. An incremental game I tested: https://galaxy.click/play/176 (Gods of Incremental)

And it goes without saying that straight-up disambiguation pages shouldn't get laconics.

Edited by bwburke94 on Dec 20th 2022 at 4:03:51 AM

I had a dog-themed avatar before it was cool.

Seconded. Those are unneeded.

to Laconics on UsefulNotes, Administrivia and Recaps.

Great for works and tropes, but beyond that...

Laconics for tropes are obviously useful, they just need more attention to ensure they remain useful, without being misleading and/or filled with asides about minor details.

We were never in favor of laconics for works to begin with. probably waffled on that once or twice tbh but that was our broad trend as we recall it But they're unlikely to cause real problems even if they do get really bad, so we don't bother fighting that one anymore.

Administrivia seems like a solid "this could be good but only if the mods vet them all to ensure they're not misleading". Which, uh, sounds like a huge pain to actually implement.

Creators are an obvious no. You can't laconic a person.

Useful Notes are also an obvious no. The long page is the information.

Edited by wingedcatgirl on Dec 20th 2022 at 7:24:59 AM

Trouble Cube continues to be a general-purpose forum for those who desire such a thing.