Um, last I checked TV.com and EpGuides.com were not encyclopedias. More specifically, the project (not a policy or guideline) you cited has a list of encyclopedias that are their main focus. TV.com and EPGuides.com are not on that list. As a matter of fact, IMDb.com is not even on that list. As a matter of fact, the only mention of television is for missing articles on television shows (not television show episodes). If you follow that project's link to Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles/List of TV shows, you'll find your TV.com, EPGuides.com and other websites there. But, the big issue on the page is not "episodes" but the television show itself.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 22:14, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Um, books like the Brittanica aren't the only encyclopedias. I pulled this definition straight out of Misplaced Pages: "An encyclopedia... is a comprehensive written compendium that contains information on all branches of knowledge or a particular branch of knowledge" (italics are mine). This one comes from dictionary.com: "a book or set of books containing articles on various topics, usually in alphabetical arrangement, covering all branches of knowledge or, less commonly, all aspects of one subject." Geĸrίtz (talk) 23:14, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

(Continuing) Moreover, Misplaced Pages Founder Jimmy Wales publicly expressed the desire to encompass "the full body of human knowledge" made available to the entire world. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gekritzl (talk • contribs) 23:18, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

TV.com and EPguides.com are not "branches of knowledge", or "sets of ooks containing articles", they are merely guides that list the plot summaries of television episodes. There is nothing on them that would be considered a "comprehensive written compendium that contains information on all branches of knowledge". They don't fit either of your definitions. As far as Wales is concerned, "the entire body of human knowledge" does not constitute "every single topic in the world", as not everything is really "knowledge". My personal life story would not be worthy of an article on Misplaced Pages. More importantly, let's just say we include the idea that ever television episode should be included on Misplaced Pages as part of Wales's idea that Wiki should contain all the world's knowledge. What that does not say is how that information is displayed. What this guideline, and many other policies and guidelines state, is that not everything deserves their "own page", not that they shouldn't be mentioned. We have List of Episode articles and season articles that can encompass all there is on an individual episode that would not otherwise be sufficient to support itself on its own page. See Smallville (season 1) for how that is possible. Just because it should be included on Misplaced Pages does not mean that it should, or deserves, its own page. This is why we have a notability guideline.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 23:25, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Of course your personal life story would not be worthy, as indicated in the notability guideline. And of course TV.com and EPguides.com are not "branches of knowledge" - they are MEDIA, containing a branch of knowledge (television episodes aired to date). Whether you personally consider them unimportant or not, television episodes aired to date constitutes a branch of human knowledge, and meets notability guideline. Geĸrίtz (talk) 23:53, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

That doesn't meet NOTE. NOTE says "significant coverage". TV.com and EPGuides are in the business of cataloging all television shows and episodes, that is their business. They do not provide coverage on the episodes beyond plot summaries. That does not constitute "significant coverage" by NOTE's standards. Having 50 sources that do nothing but recite the plot of a show's episode is not "signicant coverage" either. There is a difference between many sources providing significant encyclopedic information about a show, and many sources providing the exact same, limited information (limited as in just plot summaries) about a show. One is the criteria for article creation, the other is not. We don't put every movie on Misplaced Pages just because IMDb has a page for it. IMDb has pages for films that are not even being made. TV.com is an episode guide (i.e. lists episode titles/airdates/plot summaries etc etc, all the same stuff you typically find on the show's official website), nothing more.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 00:02, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't know exactly where to come in here but I will just say that I am very upset over the deletions/merges of episode pages. Those pages contained useful information that people who weren't as lucky as myself to have seen the information when it was available won't be able to now. I used Wiki as a primary reference for TV episodes since other sites aren't as good or organized and now my work is being hindered because of it. I wish that they would allow individual episode pages. I mean, if they can have individual pages for singers' radio singles which are usually nothing more than a line or two, much less than even the smallest episode stub contains, then why can't we have episode pages as well? And as was said only a handful of people patrol against people adding the info back while hundreds complain about it.

Vala M (talk) 06:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Notability and "problem" articles

There does not appear to be consensus that individual episode articles have to assert notability, as evidenced by the hundreds of sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes. I also object to this guideline suggesting a {{notability}} template be placed on articles, because this is not a notability guideline. The suggestion that episode articles be merged or redirected also does not have community consensus. That is why I removed what I did from this guideline. --Pixelface (talk) 13:34, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

That is your interpretation and you very obviously have a conflict-of-interest in doing such edits because it pushes your very specific point-of-view. If consensus actually agrees with such, then a neutral editor who hasn't spend hours upon hours debating ad nauseum in here should do whatever actions is decreed by consensus, when it is agree that consensus is reached. As for the Simpsons article, it is my understanding that the Simpsons project is, in fact, actually working on establishing notability for those articles, hence those articles currently being left alone. Many Simpsons episodes have managed to gain enough notability (and notoriety) to support a full article, such as A Streetcar Named Marge. Now, if they are no doing what they promised, by all means merges, redirects, or AfDs should commence.

As for other shows, many people who love to claim "OMG, this episode is so notable for X, Y, Z" never bother to edit the article to reflect this notability, then complain if it is AfDed for being unnotable. There are several AfDs going on right now about some television characters and episodes where people are arguing at length that they are notable, but not actual working on the article (which would factor into the result of the AfD and could sway votes). Maybe if more people quit wasting so much time in here trying to change a perfectly good guideline and actually, oh, fix the articles they claim have notability, maybe there wouldn't be so many issues.

Is every last episode of every last television show notable? Not at all and they don't need individual articles. Despite the complaints, most people have yet to actually be able to provide evidence of notability for most episode articles. They just wan to keep certain articles because they love show X and want to turn its Misplaced Pages entry into a fan site and show guide (which Misplaced Pages is not Being a "fan favorite" isn't notability. This episode featured the first lesbian kiss and reaction. That's notable. The first episode of a series to deal with a heavy social topic (if there was a verifiable reaction) would be notable. The first episode of a season, not notable unless it broke some unspoke television taboo or had, again, heavy reaction, criticism, or other coverage. For probably 95% of television show articles, they will never be anything but the title and the plot (and an excuse to try to throw in a non-free image). Some episodes of shows are notable, and those individual episodes could warrant an article, but that doesn't automatically mean that every show in that series should get one too. It is a case-by-case thing. You see an article that doesn't establish notability, tag it. Nothing has been done in a reasonable amount of time, PROD it, redirect it, suggest a merge, or AfD it. All valid options for dealing with such articles. Collectonian (talk) 13:56, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Those editors build. The slash-and-burn editors destroy. The former take far more time than the latter. If you're constantly dealing with slashers in AfDs and on unilaterally #REDIRECTED pages trying to repair the damage, you don't have time to do much else.

Tag for notability. Give editors a warning. Then leave them alone so they can build.Torc2 (talk) 14:33, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not my view alone that individual episode articles don't have to assert notability. It's evidenced by the sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes, List of South Park episodes, and List of Futurama episodes. You might as well say that a neutral editor should have restored what I removed if it was determined there was consensus for that information being in this guideline. If The Simpsons WikiProject is working on establishing notability for The Simpsons episode articles, they clearly haven't gotten to all of them yet. I think the sub-articles of those 3 list articles show that individual episodes do not have to assert individual notability — or at least that notability is not entirely dependent on independent coverage.

Notability is a subjective concept. I don't think published reviews of episodes are the only way to establish notability. AfD should not be used to force people to work on an article. To completely ignore television ratings when it comes to episode notability is laughable in my opinion. Every episode of every television show may not be notable. But what about notable television shows? What about episodes that millions of people have watched? What about episodes of shows that have been on the air for years? The sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes seem to indicate that Misplaced Pages is being used as a fan site and show guide. Many of the articles have links to snpp.com, but that site is built upon episode capsules posted to the newsgroup alt.tv.simpsons on USENET. Your opinion of what content makes an episode notable is interesting, but I see no reason why an article should be redirected or deleted if it doesn't meet those standards. If an episode article has an infobox, it already goes beyond a mere plot summary which WP:PLOT advises against. I don't see how it's a case-by-case thing. The sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes are not evaluated on a case-by-case basis. People are saying that some of the articles are good so all of them should stay.

The notion that episode articles with plot summaries and infoboxes are a "problem" is strange to me. I removed what I did because I think it's clear from looking at what is actually done that individual episodes do not have to assert notability. If a list of episodes article gets too long, it should be split per WP:SIZE and WP:SS, and the question of notability should only apply to the parent list article. The idea that a show is notable enough for a Misplaced Pages article but the episodes of the show are not notable seems odd to me. The show is nothing but a series of episodes. There is no show apart from the episodes. If you say a television show is notable but none of the episodes are notable, how is the show notable? WP:N doesn't link to this guideline — and for good reason — this is not the notability guideline for television episodes. --Pixelface (talk) 14:41, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

The Simpsons, Futurama, and South Park are cases where 1) a large number of episodes are on DVD and most of these have additional commentary from the directors and 2) are shows that, due to large numbers of fans, generally recieved individual episode reviews from reliable sources. Together, between the reviews and development, nearly every episode of those series can reasonably be expected to be notable. These are exceptions. Very few other TV series have both that level of reflection from creators, and reviews from popularity, to really allow for individual episodes to be notable. This is not to say that they cannot eventually achieve this level of similar coverage.

No one said TV ratings aren't useful information for notability. Anything dealing with the episode's creation or development, why (not just who) actors were selected or included for guest roles, broadcasting coverage (ratings, etc), and critical reception are all appropriate information for notability demonstration. Just one of these alone is not completely sufficient, but a combination of these helps to support it. If millions of people have watched an episode and that was a notable fact, likely there's a reliable source that says this episode topped the nielsen charts. Notability is not the same as importance or popularity, though the demonstration of notability can include the coverage of those aspects as long as they are reliably sourced.

Notability is "significant coverage in secondary sources". An infobox giving out details of a show, even if sourced to a reliable source, is not "significant coverage". Those are details that are important (and thus why they are included in episode list tables), but since every television episode can provide such, there's nothing unique about having that information.

Shows themselves may be notable for overall themes, actors and creators, or other aspects that occur in pretty much every episode, but the actual episodes may be non-notable. For example, "Sesame Street", sit-coms, soap operas, and game shows are notable, and general plot changes/format changes over the season/years are notable, but certainly all but a handful of episodes are non-notable. Notability can be thought of "what makes this topic exceptional (that can be shown through sourcing) that makes this topic worthy of inclusion on WP?" In the case of many television episodes, beyond plot changes, there is not much that makes them notable, and thus there's no purpose in covering them further than summarizing them in an episode list and discussing the seriers' notability. --MASEM 15:05, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Um, Scrubs DVDs have audio commentaries as well. And many articles about episodes from The Simpsons, South Park, and Futurama have zero reviews from reliable sources. So episode articles for The Simpsons, South Park, and Futurama are exceptions to this guideline? Then add that to the guideline. This guideline doesn't mention TV ratings. Notability means "worthy of notice." Frankly, I don't see how reviews in IGN make an episode worthy of notice. It was worthy of notice before IGN even reviewed it. Again, every sub-article of List of The Simpsons episodes, List of South Park episodes, List of Futurama episodes does not contain "significant coverage in secondary sources." That indicates that episode articles do not have to contain significant coverage in secondary sources to establish notability. There's really no purpose in redirecting and deleting episode articles en masse when the sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes, List of South Park episodes, List of Futurama episodes are ignored. Either every episode article has to contain significant coverage in secondary sources to establish notability or every episode article does not. The sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes, List of South Park episodes, List of Futurama episodes show they do not. That is the consensus among editors. --Pixelface (talk) 15:29, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Those shows are exceptions to typical television episodes, not to the guideline; if anything, they define the guideline. Now, cavaet - yes, not every episode yet has notability. But lets take the Simpsons: up through season 10 is on DVD (audio commentaries), and from what I've seen through GA reviews that pretty much every episode in that sublist of articles is notable. Now from season 11 on, there's no DVD out, but it can be reasonable expected that such will occur. Additionally, as Simpsons is a well covered show, there are usually news blurbs on important guest stars or the like. There is a reasonable assumption that each episode can demonstrate notability based on past episodes. Futurama and South Park -- maybe not so much, as while DVDs are out, they don't have the same detailed commentary or the level of media coverage. That's not to say the majority of the episodes can likely demonstrate notability, but I will agree that there's probably some trimming that can be done.

But still, even if not every episode is notable, these three series are exceptions, not to the guideline, but to most TV series, in that there is a lot of additional information that exists. But because these are "exceptional" they warrent the additional coverage that notability for Misplaced Pages allows for.

Scrubs episodes were removed because no one bothered to distill the audio commentary into notable information as well as added critical reception (commentary on an episode alone is not sufficient). Spot checking episodes that have been redirected, there was no such information or attempts to add that information, and they had at least a month to get them to speck. Even if there was a good faith effort to add them, such as an editor saying "I'm swamped right now, but I can add in the audio commentary!", then merging them should have been held off but I don't see anything like that. --MASEM 15:55, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

No, the sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes, List of South Park episodes, List of Futurama episodes show that this guideline is flawed. Even Bart the General fails this guideline, yet it's not redirected. The article Bart the General has existed since May 8, 2003. It's allowed to exist for over 4 1/2 years, yet each and every episode of Scrubs (TV series) has 1 month to meet this guideline? Why is that? It's clear to me that individual episode articles do not have to assert individual notability. The idea that certain television episode articles have potential should be afforded to all episode articles, not just articles about episodes from shows one is a fan of.

Like I said, episodes of Scrubs (TV series) are on DVD too and have audio commentary as well — although I don't see how an audio commentary would establish notability. The Simpsons, South Park, and Futurama are not exceptions to most TV series. They are not exceptions to this guideline. Their episode articles show the actual consensus among editors in regards to episode articles. And this guideline needs to be rewritten to reflect that consensus.

I suspect Scrubs episode articles were redirected because the editor who redirected them didn't care for the show. Episodes don't suddenly become notable when reviewed by IGN. Episodes are notable before that. Again, why should each and every episode of Scrubs (TV series) have 1 month to meet this guideline while the article Bart the General is allowed to exist for over 4 1/2 years? Is this some new guideline that applies to every television show except the ones an editor personally watches? --Pixelface (talk) 21:06, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

If you feel that those articles need to be merged, feel free to put a notability tag on them and merge/AfD them in one month; that's why Bart the General has survived, because no one has tagged it yet. I know you feel WP:EPISODE doesn't have consensus, but it's consensus is what comes from WP:PLOT and WP:NOTE, and given that, even if the AfDs were made quick and hasty without giving editors time to improve, the AfDs for removing episode uphold the consensus. --MASEM 21:48, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't feel those articles need to be merged. Bart the General has not been redirected in 4 1/2 years because individual episode articles do not have to assert notability. Either that or episode articles inherit notability from other episode articles from a show. Saying WP:EPISODE's consensus comes from WP:PLOT and WP:NOTE is ridiculous. If we already have those, why do we need this guideline? WP:PLOT says articles are not simply plot summaries and WP:NOTE is a guideline which says "A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject." Go look up the word "presumed" in a dictionary. AFDs are not the place to determine whether or not WP:EPISODE has consensus. --Pixelface (talk) 03:03, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:EPISODE was born from a centralized community discussion regarding episode articles, which is far more community involved than how most guidelines start. WP:EPISODE's original consensus comes from the talk pages of this very page, and has been reenforced by the rationale arguments presented in AfDs, WikiProject discussions, article talk page discussions, and so on. I'll let you in on a little secret, this was consensus before we had WP:PLOT and when WP:NOTE was still tagged as an essay. When we say that this is consensus because of NOTE and PLOT, we do so because those guidelines echo what was being said here, and vice versa, not because those guidelines suffice on their own or not, when applied to a more specific situation. -- Ned Scott 03:11, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

No, it shows that no one has challenged the notability. Big difference. AfD shouldn't HAVE to be used to force people to work on an article, but most won't bother even if its tagged, issues raised on the talk page, etc. Unfortunately, the plain fact is, many merges and redirects have happened quietly, without much issue, in articles without a huge fan following. It's only when it gets down to "oh no, not my favorite show" that people tend to jump into this argument. I'd be curious to see how many people in this argument came here because one of "their" episode articles was merged/redirected or deleted, rather than because of a neutral interest in the discussion.

I don't think published reviews are a way to establish notability of an episode at all, but that's my humble opinion. I certainly would find an RfC or the like on the whole Simpsons thing interesting, since I do somewhat agree with you that it does throw the whole idea into whack and shows a certain favoritism. An infobox does not add ANYTHING regarding notability to an episode and just shoving one in does not in anyway negate it from being nothing but pure plot summary. If a list of episodes gets too long, you're probably right on a size split, but into separate lists for each season, not straight into single episodes. Also, size is not an absolute either. 30k? Ha, almost every decent medical article blows that one out of the water, as do many featured articles. I wouldn't mind seeing WP:SIZE challenged to go higher, or reconsidered as a whole, since a good part of the size of a list of episodes probably comes from the layout code. Size is also built on a deprecated software limitation, if I'm not mistaken.

"The idea that a show is notable enough for a Misplaced Pages article but the episodes of the show are not notable seems odd to me. There is no show apart from the episodes." Let's reverse that...is the episode notable apart from the show? If the episode were not specifically a part of X show, is it notable? Or, to use a more real world (if somewhat exaggerated) example: A star athlete couldn't live and do what he does best without his brain, right? So then, does that mean the athlete's notabiltiy automatically should extend to his brain and we should give his brain his own article, even if all there is to say about it is "its a brain, here's a description of it"? To return to the fictional realm, do you also advocate an article for every chapter of every book? After all, the book could not exist without the chapters so if the book is notable, each chapter must be notable as well, right? See my point?

The basic steps from going to series to episode should be

1. create the article on the television series
2. expand as more verifiable info is available
3. include the list of episodes
4. if the list of episodes gets to be too long (from my own editing, I've found that usually happens at around 13 episodes when there are plot summaries), move the episodes over to a List of Show X's episodes. And, for the note, lists of episodes are not fully sub-articles, but should be seen as stand-alone lists related to the show that must follow the guidelines of Misplaced Pages:Lists, including having proper referencing, a full intro that establishes its context and what the list includes, etc. Also, a list is not the same as an article, having different requirements of notability (which, I think, is really none...I've seen lists deleted for being NPOV, OR, etc, but I can't think of any deleted for being unnotable).
5. fill in and expand the new episode list article, including a proper lead section, sourced air dates, summaries, writers/producers if different for each episode, etc); DVD and official downloadable episode information are optional as it can also go into the series article
6. if any particular episode of the series is notable as an individual unit, not soley because it is an episode of a notable show, and it can sustain an article, then it should be created. Even though FICT is challenge, the basic notability guideline still notes "is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject." The episode airing is not significant coverage. A book about the series by the show creators is not independant. If the episode is controversial, ground breaking, award winning, etc. that information can be found in neutral, independant sources. However, even then, some discretion should be used. If the only thing one can say beyond the plot is "it won X award," without even being able to give a context for why it won, then why break it out?

I think, to me, that is the big issue. No discretion is used right now with the creation of episode articles, regardless of the current guidelines, either because people are unaware of them or just don't care what they say and ignore them. Would you consider every episode of Chip N Dale's Rescue Rangers notable enough to have their own articles? How about every episode of Dora? Or the infamous Sesame Street? Are all 4000+ episodes of the show notable enough to have an article each, or should only the few that were ground breaking or controversial enough to have independant coverage be given articles.

I'm curious, though...considering your views on spoilers, I'm honestly surprised to see you on the side of an article for every episodes, which would, by nature, be full of spoilers for the series and every episode. If anything, I would have expected to see you want to ax episode plot discussion at all. Collectonian (talk) 15:26, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

No one has challenged the notability because the episodes are considered notable despite not having significant coverage in reliable sources. There's obviously a different criteria for notability being considered. Many redirects have happened quietly and that's the problem. Editors who put alot of work into an article may not even know it's been redirected. It seems to me that when it comes down to an editor's favorite show, WP:EPISODE is ignored. I think how WP:EPISODE is being applied shows favoritism, but I think the sub-articles of List of The Simpsons episodes, List of South Park episodes, List of Futurama episodes show the actual consensus among Misplaced Pages editors — episode articles do not have to establish individual notability.

An infobox means an article is not just a plot summary. An article with an infobox does not violate WP:PLOT. I didn't say an infobox establishes notability. I've certainly seen many list articles for separate seasons, but I still see individual episode articles to go along with them. Why should an episode have to show notability apart from the show? That's not what is done by actual editors who contribute to episode articles. If an athlete's brain was taken out of their skull and watched by millions of people, yeah, I would say their brain was notable. Saying each and every episode has to establish notability is like saying each and every bone in the human body has to establish notability. I don't advocate an article for every chapter of a book. But I would see no problem with individual articles for every chapter of The Green Mile, because they were released separately. If a book article got too long that the chapters had to be split into sub-articles, I don't think each chapter article would have to assert notability.

Your idea of the basic steps that should happen are nice, but that is not the consensus among editors and their edits. The Seven-Beer Snitch does not assert individual notability with independent coverage, yet it is not redirected. You quote the notability guideline but the notability guideline says "presumed". That doesn't mean significant coverage in reliable sources is the only way of establishing notability. If this guideline is being ignored, the guideline does not reflect consensus and needs to be rewritten to reflect consensus. And the consensus appears to me to be that individual episode articles do not have to assert individual notability. If a show is notable enough to have an article, the episodes are notable enough to have an article.

How could Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers be notable if none of the episodes are notable? How could Dora the Explorer be notable if none of the episodes were notable? How could Sesame Street be notable if none of the episodes were notable? I suppose you could say the shows are notable for being franchises used for merchandising, but I think the shows are notable for more than that. Scrubs is notable enough to have an article, yet only 6 of its episodes are notable? The show is notable for 6 episodes?

The only concern I have about episode articles is shows with thousands and thousands of episodes, like Days of our Lives, which has 10,735 episodes as of January 8, 2008 — and that's only because I can't quite imagine that many articles. If an editor decided to create an article for each episode, I wouldn't stop them. But currently it appears that an article for each episode is not the route those editors are going, instead they have Days of our Lives storylines. If an editor or group of editors did manage to create 10,735 articles that followed our policies, they would get my respect. And it would be a travesty if one editor redirected all of their work after 2 weeks of discussion or according to some decision reached on another page.

Frankly it's biased to say that The Simpsons can have an article for every episode but other television series can't. The editing policy says perfection is not required. The editing policy says "During this process, the article might look like a first draft—or worse, a random collection of notes and factoids. Rather than being horrified by this ugliness, we should rejoice in its potential, and have faith that the editing process will turn it into brilliant prose." It's clear that TTN thinks The Simpsons episode articles have potential, but he does not think other episode articles for other television shows have any potential.

It's true that TTN has hidden many spoilers with his edits, but that was not out of some concern over readers being spoiled. I support removing plot summaries per WP:RS when editors say an article cannot have a spoiler warning and readers are upset by reading spoilers, but removing plot summaries entirely is an extreme move and turning articles into redirects is an even more extreme move. My opinion about spoiler warnings and my opinion about episode articles are based on current practice in article space. I really don't give much weight to what a handful of editors decide should be done on some page most of Misplaced Pages's editors have never even heard of. Policies and guidelines flows from consensus, not the other way around. --Pixelface (talk) 02:53, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

People, quit the bellyaching.

If someone objects an article about an episode by saying it's not notable (using just WP:N), you fix the problem. Stop it with the pointless wikilawyering and actually improve the articles. For example, Truth & Consequences was singularly merged to the list of Heroes episodes. I objected to the merge, but instead of pointless debating about it, I asserted the page's notability. Will 15:54, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me that the people complaining an episode of a notable show is not notable are the people who are bellyaching. --Pixelface (talk) 16:32, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Both sides are. I mean, the past dozen ANI archives all have threads on TTN. Will 16:48, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Yeah well maybe the ANI threads and arbitration case are an indication that his actions don't reflect consensus. --Pixelface (talk) 20:27, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I have only recently taken an interest in TV show articles, and I have found that certain editors like TTN and Jack Merridew are very keen to revert you even when you add the references they request. I think the bellyaching is a symptom of a sickness that needs to be treated. Catchpole (talk) 20:30, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

If you are going to make accusations against other users, please provide evidence. This isn't the place to voice vindictive complaints. Collectonian (talk) 20:58, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

TTN , Jack Merridew . Catchpole (talk) 21:21, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't see any reverts of an addition of a secondary, reliable source on either of those articles. A television without pity recap is not a reliable source nor can it establish notability. An article discussing random car scenes is also not a reliable source for the notability of the episode, it only confirms a scene happened. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Collectonian (talk • contribs) 21:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

And more importantly, while the Faulty Towers ones had two references that likely provided development information, that information has to be included in the article, not just the references themselves. --MASEM 21:49, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Conversely, one could say that the number of episode articles having the same result in AfD or being out-right deleted are an indication that his actions do. Indeed, when TTN has AfDed articles, the majority of the keeps have nothing to do with the article but personal dislike of TTN and the work he's done. When someone else nominates the episode, delete or merge/redirect is the results the vast majority of the time. Collectonian (talk) 20:58, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

No, Collectorian, This isn't about personal dislike of TTN. It's about his rampant AfD and similar crusades. I don't care whehter he does it, you do it, ot someone else does it. It's flat out wrong. ----DanTD (talk) 02:37, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Talk show episodes

Is it good to have episode lists for talk shows, such as The Jerry Springer Show and The Steve Wilkos Show. Mythdon (talk) 21:51, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Probably not. There are thousands of episodes, and they all fall into one category, really: Scripted knuckleheads fake fights to win $1500 trips to Chicago. ThuranX (talk) 22:58, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for that wonderful POV statement. In response to Mythdon's question, I see no reason why Misplaced Pages could not have them. --Pixelface (talk) 02:41, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Pixelface, you do understand that POV is an article policy. The talk have is where people are supposed to have points of views. -- Ned Scott 04:37, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

I understand that. But from several comments I've seen ThuranX make (such as this one), he needs to tone it down a bit. --Pixelface (talk) 18:17, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

What about talk shows with episode names. Mythdon (talk) 23:19, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Probably the same. More interesting things would be articles on common recurring elements in a talk show for instance. Or an article that discusses the way the scripts for the jerry springer show are actually developed. Think about that what will expand everyone's knowledge instead of giving people data that is uninterpreted and just a list. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 00:05, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Works well at List of The Colbert Report episodes (2005) for example. -- Wikipedical (talk) 05:16, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

It probably doesn't require much plot summary beyond what the topic was, but AFAIK, these shows are still given episode numbers and arranged into season, so they should probably be treated that way here. Torc2 (talk) 05:18, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Is there anywhere where Misplaced Pages says talk shows can or can not have episode lists?. Mythdon (talk) 06:45, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

The simple answer to your question is no. My commentary is, nor should there be. We want to be careful about painting ourselves into a corner. I do not think any guidance should say "all episodes" or "no episodes" get an article. Ursasapien (talk) 07:33, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Are you saying that it does not matter what genre the show is, the show should still get an episode list article?. Mythdon (talk) 07:59, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

No, I am saying that individual episode articles should be based on the merits of individual episodes. I do not believe in "all" or "none" guidelines. Ursasapien (talk) 08:06, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Im not saying "all" or "none". Im trying to see if it is actually appropriate to actually have an episode list for a talk show that uses episode names, witch is rare among talk shows. Mythdon (talk) 08:10, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

You're talking about different things. Mythdon is talking about an episode list. Ursasapien is talking individual articles for individual episodes. Torc2 (talk) 08:13, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

I do not get what Ursasapian is saying. I think Ursasapien is trying to change my subject. Really, does anyone know if it is appropriate for a list of episodes for talk shows?. Mythdon (talk) 08:24, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, now I think I understand your question. Truth is, there is no specific guidance that says definitively one way or another. First, the show article needs to be developed. Generally, episode list articles are created when the list gets too large or involved for the show article. Basically, I do not see why a talk show couldn't have a list of episodes article. Ursasapien (talk) 08:53, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

The article List of The Colbert Report episodes (2007) would seem to indicate that lists of episodes for talk shows are fine. If you were thinking of creating lists of episodes for The Jerry Springer Show, I would separate it into 17 season pages because 3,357 episodes have aired as of January 11, 2008 — too many for one page. I would use titles like The Jerry Springer Show (season 17) or List of The Jerry Springer Show episodes (season 17), (or the year instead of the season), etc. --Pixelface (talk) 18:33, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Wow, Thuranx. There's something I can actually agree with you on here. That and soap operas, or at least daytime soap operas. ----DanTD (talk) 02:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Centralized Discussion

Template:RFCmedia Over the past months, TV episodes have been redirected or deleted by (to name a couple) TTN, Eusebeus and others. No centralized discussion has taken place and many feel that the deletions are unwarranted. However, those who delete the articles cite sources and say almost no episode belongs in wikipedia without any real world relevance (this is but one argument). So I'm asking everyone who has been involved in this issue or even if they have not, to voice their opinions here in this centralized spot, be they pro or anti. This issue is and will effect all TV episode articles in Misplaced Pages. Many feel that Episode has been re-shaped into a baton and so, a community consensus needs to be sought. Currently there are many discussions taking place over this very issue. An arbcom case taking place here , a Mediation Cabal an Administrator Noticeboard , and discussions taking place at , , , and , , and lastly , (see also RfC's , , , , , ). I want to propose that we centralize this discussion to this page as well as this arbitration case () so that this issue can be resolved effectively and for the benefit of the community.

Things to accomplish:

1. Create a central place for effective discussions to take place and come up with a community solution.
2. Determine whether the suggested guideline Episode has community consensus?
3. Determine what we can do to prevent edit wars?
4. Come up with a mutual solution over TV episodes that will benefit the community?
5. Determine how we can tone down the massive deletion rush and amount of articles being deleted and allow editors time to fix issues?
6. Are we (either side) being destructive to wikipedia or constructive?

During the discussion, I would kindly like to ask all parties cease and desist immediately, deleting, reverting, and moving TV episodes for 36 hours and instead, focus on the discussion and a community resolution. Please keep cool heads and come to a solution rather than a back and forth jab. --Maniwar (talk) 17:54, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Part of the problem is the sheer speed with which this is happening. Huge numbers of episode articles are disappearing under some rush to impose a half-thought out policy, before the greater community has a chance to notice and express consensus. It seems the likes of TTN (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) are on a mission to destroy the comprehensive coverage for which Misplaced Pages is reknowned. Frankly, judging by the amount of discussion generated in just a couple of weeks, I'm amazed that TTN and others have not been blocked indefinitly for persistent high-speed vandalism and edit warring on a massive scale. Astronaut (talk) 18:19, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

A very, very good point. The speed alone I think is highly inappriopiate, especially when these things always create contravesy. There seems very little attempt to merge any information (to a List of episodes page for example), it just a quick redirect. I think to be honest if people want to redirect episode articles then information should be merged, i.e. actually rewriting the plot summary (at a suitable length) in an episode table, no just redirect and effectively delete the information. The constant troubles that the likes of TTN cause are a clear sign there is not a clear consensus on this. Misplaced Pages should be a encyclopedia of all knowledge, if we have small stubs on Olympc athletes and pointless MPs from hundreds of years ago, then why not have articles on episodes (obviously one-line articles should be redirected). Yes, all articles should be improved with additional info, but Misplaced Pages has no time limit, it is ever improving and expanding. We should concentrate our efforts on improving articles, not deleting them by redirect. Misplaced Pages should be a group project and this sort of behaviour is not so. --UpDown (talk) 19:00, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the inappriopiateness of the speed at which this happens. In many cases, no disussion takes place and the articles become redirects. Taric25 (talk) 20:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

One thing seems clear to me; there's nothing approaching a community consensus for the current episode guidelines that are removing so many episodes. (editorial remark, while agree that for many of these episodes independent reliable sources are hard to find, this is somewhat similar an issue as to why we have separate articles for every single olympic athlete; even if we can't easily find such sources, the probability that they do in fact exist is close to 1). JoshuaZ (talk) 18:26, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

What I suggested on WT:FICT is to drop the requirement for secondary sources to allow commentaries and such to be used for notability (I'm fine as long as the pages aren't one-sentence lede, plot, infobox). I think such a wording would be fair to both parties - Misplaced Pages won't get overrun by bad plot summaries, but at the same time won't lose pages where there's a full chance. Another way we can improve the episodes we can is to find more specialist sources (e.g. A Brief History of Time (Travel) or Battlestar (Galactica) Wiki, the latter having development information for most episodes). The best way to go about this is a moratorium on episode merging and reversion until around Easter, in order for both parties to help to assert notability of as many episodes as possible. Will 18:39, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

And to add, for those of us working on FICT, dropping "secondary", or more specifically, calling things like interviews and commentary (following carefully issues with self-publishing) as "secondary" sources is actually appropriate, as they are secondary to the fictional aspect. In as what defines secondary is under dispute, the current proposed version of FICT requires "reliable sources that demonstrate real world context" (which includes interviews and commentary). This helps to set a better bar for many TV episodes, but as Spectre states, plot + infobox still fail the test. --MASEM 18:53, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Plot + infobox doesn't violate any policy if that's what you mean. --Pixelface (talk) 19:07, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

It's fine to use those as references for factual statements in an article. But they are not independent sources for establishment of notability. --Lquilter (talk) 21:42, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Plot +infobox violates WP:PLOT. That's precisely what it was suggested to proscribe against. Hiding T 23:38, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Unless the word "should" in WP:PLOT means "must", a plot summary and an infobox does not violate WP:PLOT. Looking at WT:NOT, I see WP:PLOT was rewritten a while ago. WP:NOT#INFO says "In addition to other sections of this policy, current consensus is that Misplaced Pages articles are not simply:... 2) Plot summaries." That's what matters when it comes to episode articles — if an article is just a plot summary or has additional information. --Pixelface (talk) 03:18, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The word should means if it doesn't, please amend it. The word must means it cannot possibly be otherwise, obviously an impossibility on a wiki anyone can edit. Note that you should obey the law, not that you must obey the law. You can break the law, and there may not be consequences, but should there be, you are enforced to accept them. An infobox is not enough to balance an article composed entirely of plot. Especially when an infobox is not considered a part of the article itself, but a template summarising aspects of the article. I seriously doubt one could add an article consisting of plot and a template and argue it was not solely plot and expect the community to accept that. Hiding T 13:55, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Again, the word "should" at WP:PLOT is used as a recommendation, not a requirement. The information in infoboxes can easily be written as prose. Just because the information is in a template doesn't exclude it from being in an article. An article with a plot summary and infobox is "not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot." --Pixelface (talk) 18:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I just explained how the word "should" is used in the English language and in WP:PLOT. If you choose to ignore that, then there's no point carrying on this conversation and you are not working to build a consensus but are concerned on pushing your own point. Happy editing, Hiding T 12:49, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

"Another way we can improve the episodes we can is to find more specialist sources". I think Will was on the right track when suggesting using specialised sources on the Internet. In many cases they are very detailed and well-researched. The current arguments against them is them being fansites. We should not use them exclusively but outright rejecting them is not a particulably feasible idea when intending to improve on an article. Dimadick (talk) 16:30, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

A site being deemed a fansite or not isn't the deciding factor. It has more to do with reliable sources. There actually are some fansites that we consider appropriate to use for sources of information in an article. -- Ned Scott 04:42, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

arbitrary SH 1

We should not determine whether WP:EPISODE has community consensus — we should determine whether the guideline accurately describes community consensus (current practice) per the consensus policy. I think it's clear that WP:EPISODE does not accurately describe current practice. Current practice is to give television episode articles years to develop.

Take the Bart the General article for example. The article was created May 8, 2003 and the first reference to outside sources was added January 14, 2008. That's over 4 1/2 years until the article contained outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take for example the article Mind War. It was created March 26, 2004 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take for example the article Pinkeye (South Park episode). It was created April 14, 2005 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take the article Our Mrs. Reynolds for example. It was created August 17, 2005 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take the article Colonial Day for example. It was created March 19, 2006 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop.

The consensus among editors is that these articles are about notable topics. Each episode article does not have to assert notability — if a television show is notable, the episodes are notable because the show is nothing but episodes. The consensus among editors is that the articles should be given time to develop, there is no deadline. The editing policy says "Improve pages wherever you can, and do not worry about leaving them imperfect." It says "one of the great advantages of the Wiki system is that incomplete or poorly written first drafts of articles can evolve into polished, presentable masterpieces through the process of collaborative editing." It says "During this process, the article might look like a first draft—or worse, a random collection of notes and factoids. Rather than being horrified by this ugliness, we should rejoice in its potential, and have faith that the editing process will turn it into brilliant prose." Perfection is not required. --Pixelface (talk) 18:56, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Episode has community consensus with the community as a whole, as is shown in more neutral areas like AfD, ANI, and ArbCom (which notice, all the discussions linked above do not says WP:EPISODE is wrong, but specifically speaks to the actions of a select few users). Would we ax the BLP guideline if a handful of people started complaining because it keeps them from having their personal biographiess up here? Or even the biographies of most local people? No..and many biography articles are AfDed every single day. The current complaints are from another handful of users have no actual basis within policy or guidelines, but basically boil down to "we like episode articles, but we don't to comply with that silly WP:N thing so we'll just try to get rid of the guideline instead." The guideline had consensus when made and it has it now. A few sour apples does not consensus make.

The plain and simple truth is, even if episode is gone, nothing will change. Episode is based on the Notability guideline, so every episode article redirected/merged/deleted under Episode would get the same treatment under the Notability guideline. So unless the complainers want to go against that next, I'd suggest instead of continuing to attack the guideline, people deal with the real issues: episode article fans are annoyed at the surge in article clean up and don't like the methods being used by a select few editors. They like to proclaim every episode is notable, yet never do anything to edit the article to say so (or even throw out some sources to prove it). Over the last few months I've seen exactly 2 episode articles survive AfD, and that was because the editors actually got off their tushes and established notability. Rather than wasting hours and hours of back and forth discussion that will really never get anywhere, as can be seen from all of the above discussion and the ones at the fic notability guideline, and the fiction MOS, and in ANI, and in ArbCom, etc WP:EPISODE isn't the issue, its how the clean up process is being done, as well as suggestions of favoritism towards a few series (most notably the Simpsons). Its a people issue, not a guideline issue or a policy issue.

For 3 and 5, that's simple. Come up with a clear set of steps for dealing with episode articles. My personal preference and the way I've been handling them (with much less strife, I might add, except from wikistalkers) is:

1. Tag the episode article for notability issues. This alerts editors in that article that they need to work on it.
2. If, after a reasonable amount of time (1 week works for me), no work is done to improve the article and no discussion started that provides a clear idea that notability can be established, tag it for merge to the episode list.
3. Attempt to discuss and, if needed, give examples of some of the FL episode lists to show how good it can be, and examples of GA and FA episode articles to show why the one under discussion is lacking. If notability still is not established and there is no consensus after a reasonable time, AfD the article. If there is discussion, but those opposing merge can, again, not give evidence for being able to establish notability or put forth no other argument than "I like it" or
4. Most likely outcome of AfD, is straight redirect to the episode list.

Of course, another possibility would be to have the merge equivalent of AfD (AfM?). I think there is a place for discussing it, but it doesn't have the teeth AfD does, so a beefed up AfM could work similar to the AfD with commenters suggesting merge or leave alone. Item 6, constructive! Misplaced Pages is a laughing stock in large part because of the glut of fictional episode and character articles versus the real-world ones. The episode articles go against notability guidelines, whether people want to accept it or not. They need to be cleaned up. Better quality articles around around is always constructive and an improvement to Misplaced Pages. A bunch of episode stubs with non-free images, an often overly detailed plot run through, and maybe some IMDB copy/paste trivia tacked on is not.

This whole issue is really no different from what's going on in WP:NFCC with a minority of users highly upset at the mass removals of non-free images from character lists and the like. The only difference is the actions of WP:NFCC are backed by something bigger than policy, namely an edict handed down by the Foundation and, from what I understand, a non-negotiable deadline. Maybe the Foundation needs to do the same. Collectonian (talk) 19:00, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Are you suggesting that television shows are not composed of episodes? If a television show is notable enough to have an article, the episodes (which are the show) are notable. You're acting like television episodes of a notable show are non-notable by default. How did they lose notability? --Pixelface (talk) 19:06, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Notability does not inherit. The episodes are notable within the show article, and within the list of episodes (which, in this case, is a list of unnotable items that collectively are notable). When someone decides to make an article for it, it must establish notability on its own. Collectonian (talk) 19:17, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

There's nothing to inherit. The episodes are the show. The television show The Simpsons exists as a series of episodes. Episodes of a notable show are by default notable. To say that each episode has to establish individual notability is like saying the First metacarpal bone article has to establish individual notability apart from Skeleton. If an article gets too large per WP:SIZE and has to be split per WP:SS, the sub-articles do not have to re-establish notability. --Pixelface (talk) 19:27, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

For 99% of the articles, the episodes were not broken off due to Size issues and merging them back in would not create a size issue either. I've notice y'all claiming that a few times now, yet have seen no actual evidence to support that the episodes just had to be broken off because the article was too big. Hell, I've seen a few episode lists with over 100 episodes that are still within the size limit while including all the pertinent details and having summaries for every episode. Episodes of a notable show are not notable by default. All of the parts of a skeleton have individual notable and extensive real world research and validity. Most episodes are doing good to have a summary on TV.com and more than a brief mention in fan sites. You can't compare apples to oranges. Collectonian (talk) 19:37, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Merging the information from the episode articles into a list would create size issues. But editors enforcing this guideline are not actually (or very rarely) merging any information. If we're going to tell readers that they have to go to another website to read about television episodes, that's fine — we then need to eliminate all television episode articles. If not, we need to give episode articles time to develop and an episode article should be presumed to be about a notable episode if the show is notable enough to have an article. --Pixelface (talk) 21:13, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:SIZE says "size or style" - Breaking them off can be done for purely orgazational reasons under WP:SIZE. Torc2 (talk) 22:02, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

(@ Collectonian) If "Episode has community consensus" and "The current complaints are from another handful of users" were true, why has there been pages and pages of discussion in just the last few days? Clearly, there is no consensus. It has been thought up by a small group of deletionists and mergists, discussed amongst themselves, and think they have consensus without having taken it to the wider community. Only now are the wider community noticing that the useful info about their favourite shows is disappearing with unseemly haste. Astronaut (talk) 23:38, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Assuming consensus has been reached while an argument is ongoing is an error. On both sides of the spectrum. I have seen both approval and dismissal of recent mergers and deletions by users who have not participated in the discussion process. As well as people who remain curiously silent. For example User:Alexlayer who had worked to upgrade several articles to "Good Article" status only to see them recently merged. I don't think he/she is thrilled but has not bothered to complain either. Dimadick (talk) 16:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

arbitrary SH 2

And notability cannot be established, it can only be presumed and suggested (unless a reliable source states "X is notable.") The presumption that an episode of a notable show is non-notable is wrong. One week to let an episode article establish notability is not current practice. The article Bart the General took 4 1/2 years. We're talking years. WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS and the essay it comes from has to be the stupidest thing I've ever seen. The way things have been done is what policies and guidelines describe. I've seen no evidence that Misplaced Pages is a "laughing stock" because of it's coverage of fictional topics. And I have to be suspicious that people removing content about fictional works en masse are actually employees of Wikia. The notion that this sort of content is harmful unless accompanied by advertising in order to monetize webtraffic is ludicrous. And the idea that websurfers must instead go to TV.com or IMDB to read about television episodes is absurd. Stubs do not harm Misplaced Pages. Allow me to quote policy: Perfection is not required. --Pixelface (talk) 19:27, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Notability is something to be established when the article is created. In damn near every other area of Misplaced Pages, if notability is not established on creation, the article can (and often is) CSDed very quickly. Those without a CSD criteria hit AfD. I'd hedge a guess that 80-90% of AfDs stem from articles not asserting notability, and not just episode articles. The episode articles have managed to hang around from sheer quantity and sliding in under the radar. Please be careful of making subtle accusations. I can't speak for others, but I don't work for Wikia and, in fact, never use it. I get my TB episode information from TV.com where it belongs. If we're gonna quote policy: wikipedia is NOT a directory (of episodes), a guide book (for television series), nor is it a collection of plot summaries. Collectonian (talk) 19:37, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Episode articles have not slid in under the radar. Like I've said, the Bart the General article has existed since May 2003 and only "established" notability a few days ago. Editors probably saw episode articles like that and figured that episode articles are okay. Then it spread. I could see how an article about a band would need to establish notability. I can see how an article about a restaurant would need to establish notability. I could see how an article like The Simpsons would need to establish notability. Misplaced Pages is not a vehicle for advertising. But once a television show in general has established notability, it seems to me that episodes of notable television shows are considered notable. When a television network decides to air a show, they are betting their advertising revenue on it. If a show does not get good ratings, the show gets canceled. The viewing public decides if the show is worthy of notice. In that way, ratings establish notability.

If it's decided that information about television episodes belongs on TV.com instead of Misplaced Pages, that's fine with me. If it's decided that Misplaced Pages is a comprehensive written compendium that contains information on all branches of knowledge or a particular branch of knowledge (except information about television episodes), that's fine with me. You say "wikipedia is NOT a directory (of episodes), a guide book (for television series), nor is it a collection of plot summaries." but List of The Simpsons episodes and it's sub-articles contradict that.

I notice that if episode articles are not "fit" to be on Misplaced Pages, but they are "fit" to be on Wikia, it aligns with Wikia's bottom line. I think Wikia is a great site and I'm glad it exists. But it's business model is dependent on free labor. I'm not accusing anyone specifically, but there needs to be full disclosure among editors removing fiction content from Misplaced Pages whether or not they are employees of Wikia. --Pixelface (talk) 20:34, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

An article's subject should be notable when the article is written, otherwise it's WP:CRYSTAL. It need not include the references yet, but if they should already exist, to the extent that it is self-evidently notable, or the cites can be produced on demand at an AFD. We grant time for editors to improve articles that are notable, not to wait until notability has been created by new scholarship and journalism being written. As for your example of the Bart the General article, in my view it is still not independently notable. There is not one single cite that actually focuses on this episode in a substantive fashion. Each cite is merely a brief discussion of the episode from an episode guide or DVD review, or the DVD commentary; and there is one cite to a newspaper article on humor that, in passing, mentions that this Simpson's episode was shown to people in a study on humor. That's great for documenting an article, but it sucks for establishing notability. Not one of these cites include what any scholar would call "critical" information; all of them include in-universe plot information or a small bit of production information. This is not notability, wic; this is an episode guide with fake references. --Lquilter (talk) 22:05, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Episodes of a notable show are notable. If Misplaced Pages has an article on the show and the show is considered notable, the episodes are notable. To say that there is a television show called Heroes is actually a misnomer. It's just one episode after episode after episode. If anything, we should have articles on episodes and not "the show." TTN has stated that he considers The Simpsons episode articles to have more potential and do not have to establish notability right away. The idea that episodes of a notable television show are by default non-notable is ridiculous. When did they lose notability? The ratings a show gets is an indicator of notability.

Notability cannot be "established." Notability can only be presumed and suggested — unless a reliable source comes right out and says "X is notable." Significant coverage in reliable sources is one way of suggesting notability — WP:N does not say it is the only way. Nevertheless, WP:N is a guideline. Guidelines are supposed to describe current practice. Current practice is that editors consider episodes of notable shows as notable and it's simply contradictory to say that episodes of notable shows are non-notable. There's this strange idea going around that the show is something other than episodes or the episodes exist apart from the show. The "show" is episodes. The episodes are the "show." You cannot have a television series without episodes. --Pixelface (talk) 00:47, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I have to agree on Bart the General, and, unfortunately, even the Simpsons articles that made it to featured article status ... they may build up a pile of citations, but those citations generally don't rise above passing mention. To count as a source, the source has to contain a direct and detailed examination of the topic, and very, very few of these articles find such sources.Kww (talk) 22:17, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

The article Human skeleton doesn't even have a pile of citations. Does that mean the topic is not notable? Misplaced Pages is a work in progress. There's no point in pulling up crops when they're half-grown. --Pixelface (talk) 00:56, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Human skeleton is self-evidently notable; we all know that it is, so please don't try to muddy the waters. One of the main problems with many of the individual episodes under discussion is that they are not self-evidently notable, and there is no content or references in the article to suggest notability. "In progress" doesn't mean "put everything in and wait until it becomes notable" or "put everything in and wait until there is evidence that it is not notable". It means "put notable things in and wait until they're improved". If an individual episode isn't self-evidently notable, then it can be challenged; if it's notable, then it can be proved on challenge to be so. That's a very different argument from saying we should delete things just because they lack cites -- I would never make that argument, and that's not the argument most people here are making, from what I can tell. -Lquilter (talk) 02:13, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

If a television show is notable and has an article, the episodes are self-evidently notable because the "show" is actually just a series of episodes. --Pixelface (talk) 03:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

In an academic setting, passing those off as references would amount to academic dishonesty, and certainly wouldn't qualify for publication. It's really an embarrassment. --Lquilter (talk) 22:19, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

An embarassment to whom? Misplaced Pages is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit. If you can't accept that, another project that's more "academic" might be more to your liking. --Pixelface (talk) 00:51, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

You're verging on uncivil. Please don't tell me to go work in academia, and I won't tell you to go edit IMDB. --Lquilter (talk) 02:03, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I apologize. But there's really nothing to be embarassed about. Misplaced Pages has over 6.2 million registered volunteers. Not all of them are going to be able to write material that would "quality for publication" and it's not necessary that they do. --Pixelface (talk) 03:26, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

It is necessary that better editors be able to edit the material such that it does qualify for publication. If there aren't enough sources, those better editors won't be able to do it. Hence, redirection or deletion. Why have the lesser editors work to create articles that can never become good?Kww (talk) 03:38, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but what's our publication deadline? And the idea that there are "lesser" editors is completely absurd. --Pixelface (talk) 18:45, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:NOT says Misplaced Pages is not solely a collection of plot summaries. I don't know why editors feel like they can ignore the word "solely". Torc2 (talk) 22:00, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Nobody's ignoring the word "solely", which was put in there in response to the proliferation of articles that were "solely" plot summaries. The guideline in context spells out what an article should look like:

Plot summaries. Misplaced Pages articles on published works (such as fictional stories) should cover their real-world context and sourced analysis, offering detail on a work's development, impact or historical significance, not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot. This applies both to stand-alone works, and also to series. A brief plot summary may sometimes be appropriate as an aspect of a larger topic. (See also: Misplaced Pages:Television episodes, Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (writing about fiction), Misplaced Pages:Notability (fiction), Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Films/Style guidelines#Plot)

and you can see that, in context, "solely detailed plot summaries" is meant to discourage people from writing articles that are solely plot summaries. It is not meant as a justification to write articles that are plot summaries, which is what you seem to be trying to make it do. --Lquilter (talk) 22:22, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not a a discouragement to write articles that include plot summary. I never once said it justified writing articles that were solely plot summaries. Torc2 (talk) 23:25, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

"I've seen no evidence that Misplaced Pages is a "laughing stock" because of it's coverage of fictional topics." Me neither actually. Seems to be seen as a pretty good resource for them. The main problem is: can we verify our own content? Dimadick (talk) 17:04, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

arbitrary SH 3

I'll start out by noting that WP:N and WP:EPISODE have wide consensus. Believe me, if they did not, TTN would have been wiped off the map by now. The reason he survives is because most of us feel that he is doing something that most people agree needs to be done, and we are at a loss as to how to do it better. I don't want to bother to go argue with a little cult of Crash Bandicoot fans, and then go argue with a little cult of Belldandy fans, and then another little group of Gilligan's Island fans. Most episodes of most television shows simply are not independently notable, and there is no reason to have individual episode articles. Before the gnashing begins, I will point out that I have stated that about Simpsons episodes, Futurama episodes, M*A*S*H episodes, and Ah! My Goddess, all of which are personal favorites of mine.

TV episodes are the equivalent of chapters in a book. Once the TV series exists, the episodes are an inevitable follow through. A few rise to true notability ... the get nominated for an Emmy, they receive an unusually high viewership (like the finale of M*A*S*H), or something else. The rest? Not truly notable. One problem that arises is that some do make it to what I call "Misplaced Pages notability" ... they aren't particularly important, but they did get enough written about them that verifiable sources exist. To fix that, I would prefer a blanket policy: no TV episode articles about any show, unless that episode is a premiere, a finale, or nominated for a significant award. That way, all concerns about favoritism disappear.Kww (talk) 19:20, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:EPISODE does not describe current consensus — it's an attempt to create it. If a book article got so long that it needed to be split into sub-articles for each chapter, each sub-article does not have to re-establish notability. There's absolutely no reason that episode articles need to establish individual notability apart from the show itself. The episodes are the show. The show is nothing but episodes. If a television show has an article and there are only 1 or 2 articles about episodes of that show, you're saying that the show is only notable for those 1 or 2 episodes. You can't make a policy against TV episode articles because policies describe current practice. If an episode is watched by millions of people, it's notable. If an episode is part of a notable show, it's notable. --Pixelface (talk) 19:40, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

If an article about a TV series got that long, it's because it's violating WP:PLOT. You are quite right, that I cannot make policy ... I can only suggest it. If we incorporated articles about television episodes into the CSD criteria, all the edit warring would go away quickly. Misplaced Pages would be a nicer place to work. Ultimately, its going to go one way or another ... either people trying to get rid of the episode articles will be forced to stop, or people that try to create them will be forced to stop. I know which side I'm on.Kww (talk) 19:53, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:PLOT says articles are not simply plot summaries. It doesn't limit the number of plot summaries that can be in an article, nor does it limit the length of those plot summaries. WP:SPEEDY says if it's possible an article could be improved, merged, or redirected, speedy deletion is probably inappropriate. WP:CSD#A7 does not apply to television episode articles, and to add television episode articles that do not establish notability to WP:SPEEDY would be turning WP:N into policy. WP:SPEEDY says lack of notability is not sufficient by itself to justify speedy deletion. Editors redirecting episode articles in massive numbers are not supported by policy. I see that the The Joy of Sect article was listed for VFD a day after it was created. If that article had been deleted, it wouldn't be the featured article that it is today. --Pixelface (talk) 21:33, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Wait, so you can use television episodes articles less than a year as an example that consensus exists for keeping them, but you refute Episode having any consensus when it was discussed for more than a year before being implemented as a guideline, and constantly worked on? Collectonian (talk) 20:22, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I can use television episode articles that have existed for 4 1/2 years. It sounds like WP:EPISODE was discussed by a few editors talking about how they would like Misplaced Pages to be, instead of describing current practice — which is what guidelines are supposed to do. It looks like 19 editors have made 3 or more edits to WP:EPISODE Here you can see who's been talking on this talk page. Their idea of how they want episode articles to look like does not override the current practice of hundreds or thousands of editors who work on episode articles. --Pixelface (talk) 19:02, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I am strongly against the removal of content from television show pages as has been done, and would like to draw users attention to the fact that in a number of cases history sections have been PURGED, preventing the salvaging of any useful content. Something which goes against the ethos of Misplaced Pages. Especially as a number of the purged histories were subject of official merge rulings, which are now impossible.

A TV show is part of popular culture and therefore should be considered notable based on cultural guidelines, the current fiction guidelines ill equipped to deal the modern reality that a show is notable based on duration and audience, not on whether it appears in some peer review journal or newspaper headline. Fiction should be amended to allow for shows to be considered notable simply by the fact that they are headlining on notable channels or because they have big audience followings.

WP:V also needs to be amended. Fiction is self referencing. You don't need to reference a third party to say X happened in episode Y.

I also strongly oppose the unilateral manner in which the current changes have been made. - perfectblue (talk) 19:41, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

If WP:EPISODE was marked historical then nothing would change. There's still the general notability guideline and WP:NOT#PLOT. WP:EPISODE provides some good advice on television episodes. The part that's contested (which results in the merging) is based on older, more established policies which have had consensus for a long time. Remove WP:EPISODE and TTN and others will still be covered by policy if they kept on merging articles which are just an infobox and plot summaries. If the aim of this central discussion really is to stop the merges then getting rid of WP:EPISODE wont do a thing. Having said that, I support the leniency given to The Simpsons. Precedent isn't used much on Misplaced Pages, but The Simpsons is a consistent show with a huge editor-base and in the past it's clear that the Simpsons WikiProject especially can do good work with episode articles. I do support a leniency towards other prime-time shows but not so much as there's much less evidence that articles will get improved. But as always, the burden is on the editors who want to keep the material in the encyclopedia. If somebody did redirect The Simpsons episodes or South Park episodes that fail WP:NOT#PLOT and the general notability guideline, then I wouldn't argue too much about it (infact if it's a Simpsons episode then I would probably try to fix it). ●BillPP 19:58, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

There was consensus to merge, unfortunately 99% of content was removed and the earth was salted with a string of redirects etc that make it hard for users to track down the original content. What we agreed was a merger, what we ended up with was a deletion, not a merger. It's probably worth noting that the pages that are left actually contain fewer sources than the original pages and give no account of notability at all, not even within the franchise. They would not pass an AFD on their own right. - perfectblue (talk) 20:05, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I totally agree, as TTN's "mergers" that are actually deletions are pervasive. Taric25 (talk) 20:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I think some of several recent "mergers" have not actually preserved any usefull content and thus are not mergers at all, yes. The process is not particularly helpful and actually loses what sources the lost articles had going for them, yes. But I think the discussion is centering a bit too much on TTN and too little on how to improve some of the new, very poor articles created by the mergers. Or are they suppossed to remain like this until someone deletes them too? Dimadick (talk) 17:18, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree, too many have been mergers by name alone. Far too much of this discussion is focusing on the events and the rules, rather than on how to form high-quality, information rich, articles and lists that avoid any future problems. That is what we really need to be doing. LinaMishima (talk) 17:30, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

In addition to my original comment. I'd like to add that I agree that redirections should not be consistently made while using the term merge. I'm sure in a lot of circumstances the material can be merged in to provide better plot summaries in the LOE. Using the words merge and redirect interchangeably is not helpful to the situation. ●BillPP 18:04, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

arbitrary SH4

WP:Fiction and WP:Episode are both woefully outdated, and WP:V is insufficient to deal with fiction. Fiction should be considered to be self referencing, and content from "making of" etc should be considered to be independent sources. This is essential as even the most popular TV shows never generate much more that a couple of interviews and a few articles in TV guides etc which are actually very very hard to source from as they are usually here one minute and gone the next. If you want ot demonstrate that a character did something or said something then you should only have to point to the episode where they did or said that. If it's in the script then it's verifiable, which is Misplaced Pages's primary concern.

Equally, notability should be relative, not absolute. If a series is notable, then anything that it notable within that series should also be considered to be notable. It's silly to ask for real world notability for something that isn't real. - perfectblue (talk) 20:05, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

If one wants to change how episode pages are treated, they need to participate in the discussion on WP:FICT. Changing this page won't do anything. FICT needs to be marked historical, and then WP:NOT and WP:PLOT need to be changed. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 20:09, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

arbitrary SH5

My two Euro-cents -

1. Agree with comments about notability of the series. I think that cult series such as the Prisoner and Twin Peaks qualify, and every episode can be listed, especially as both were fairly brief.
2. Long running soap operas should be excluded - too much. Reality TV should be excluded. Too ephemeral.
3. Some time should pass before episode article is created. This prevents what some wiki'ns call "recentism" (horrible word!) - if an episode is remembered in two years time, five, ten etc, then that's a point in its favour.
4. If all episode summaries are extremely brief, then a merge is in order.

--MacRusgail (talk) 20:10, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm against the deletion of episode articles. TTN and his followers have made my experience on this website a total nightmare. This all started, for me at least, with the deletion of the Code Lyoko episode articles, which have made many fans of the show really angry. TTN doesn't listen to reason at all, and we do not even know who s/he is. He is promoting deletionism. Angie Y. (talk) 20:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Angie Y. , if you know other Users that want to protest, please notify them to participate in the discussion. Also please offer a couple of decent resources for Code Lyoko. Dimadick (talk) 17:36, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Take a look at an example of a Code Lyoko article. Wow ... not content with simply retelling the plot, they have to retell it twice, once as "summary", and once as a "recap". It's got a "memorable quotes" section, including such classics as O.K., are we rolling?, and a trivia section, including such important details as how the artists were inconsistent in drawing the lock mechanism on a door. This is a perfect example of what a bad episode article looks like.Kww (talk) 17:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

So what are your suggestions on how the article could be improved? Does a redirect improve the article? Does a redirect make it easier to improve the article or does it just sweep it under a rug? --Pixelface (talk) 19:08, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Which is why I was enquiring about some decent resources. I could stomach the long plot and love the references to art inconsistencies if we could at least source them to a website. Dimadick (talk) 19:40, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't believe the article can be improved, which is why I think the encyclopedia is improved by the absence of the article.Kww (talk) 20:31, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

One of the things that was attempted with WP:TV-REVIEW was to establish the idea that we only have to show potential for a good episode article, regardless of the current shape of the article. If there was no realistic reason to believe an article had such potential, it was then merged or redirected (many were redirected since the plot summary itself wasn't even in good shape, and could be better stated from scratch). That concept might not have a strong enough presence in WP:EPISODE. By emphasizing on that we have the potential for editors to not be rushed, but also to not be stalled indefinably because "anything might be improved". -- Ned Scott 04:17, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment Part of the problem stems from the manner in which WP:N is applied, and the fact that it does not necessarily reflect the differing needs of different subjects. With respect to television episodes, it is often difficult to find commentary on an article not from a lack of notability, but instead as a result of the nature of the television industry. Using as an example the series Lost, a single episode will be watched by millions (tens of millions?) of people in North America alone. The next day, there will be countless conversations and discussions about said episode, and it will have a very definite notability with those millions of viewers. However, that does not always translate into "notability" (as defined by Misplaced Pages) because the viewers don't get to comment publicly, and the opportunities for independent coverage are severely restricted by forces other than the actual perceived value of the episode. Newspapers have limitations due to physical size, while television and radio broadcasts are limited by time. On top of that, the corporate influence plays an enormous role in what gets covered. Using Lost as an example once again, ABC can't "review" the episode as it has an obvious bias in doing so. CBS, NBC, FOX, and the other networks won't review it because it is not in their corporate interest to promote a competitor's product. Many newspapers, radio stations, magazines and web sites are also affected by this as a result of their ownership structure. Does that negate the notability the episode to the viewers? Certainly not - but it does make it harder to meet Misplaced Pages's arbitrary standards. (A similar problem was recently under discussion with regards to radio stations, which have obvious notability but seldom if ever receive independent coverage due to the competitive nature of the industry.) --Ckatz_spy 21:10, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

• I disagree that television episodes have sufficient notability for their own artilces for one fundamental reason:

Televison episodes have no notability outside of the television series for which they were commissioned.

I very much disagree that even the "most notable episodes" can actually stand on their own legs when it comes to meeting the requirements of WP:N or WP:FILM and I believe that WP:EPISODE has been created to sidestep this fundamental issue. The evidence which supports this viewpoint are as follows:

1. Even a widely written about series such as Friends must be seen as a single body of work, and individual episodes cannot be viewed in isolation. The context of a television series is that the story has been subdivided into episodes with the purpose of retaining an audience over a period of weeks, months or years; without understanding this context, the view that an episode is notable in itself must be seen to be a falacy. I would go further by saying that series seasons that are commissioned in quick sucession (Friends: Season 1,2,3 et al) are really a continuation of the first. The reason is that without the previous episodes, the new seasons could not stand on their own feet; we must return to the basic view that an episode has no notability per se before we can discuss this issue in a sober fashion;
2. From a creative prespective, a television series employs a body of actors, crew and writers to produce the series; this ensemble is not disolved after every episode; continuity is maintained. A single episode cannot support such an ensemble; its producers have commissioned it with a view to obtaining revenue in future periods, on the assumption that each new episode will build a following. Even if you can think a single episode that you could watch over and over in isolation, you still have to remember that it was produced as a single body of work;
3. Lastly, there is the issue of continuity of theme and story. Each episode has some commonality with the others in its series; having seperate artilces for each episode is simple a repetition of those themes, and serves no encyclopedic purpose. Many of the articles I have read about television episodes assume that reader already knows about the underlying story, but in fact this is a convenient means of not having to repeat what has already been said in the lead article about the series.

So overall I beg to differ, and what motivates me is a terrible trend that is developing in Misplaced Pages: the substitution of real-world content, context, analysis and critisism with the unencyclopedic padding such as plot summaries, and other in universe references to the primary material. Furthermore, I support the merger of articles on episodes, as this has the effect of eliminating this type of padding, and I applaude editors who are bold and are taking a lead in this process. --Gavin Collins (talk) 22:06, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

The Twilight Zone is an example of a TV show that doesn't have such continuity that you describe. Each episode is a self-contained story. (Granted, that article needs sources...) My main point is that any "absolute" isn't really absolute. The Outer Limits is similar in this respect. There are exceptions. Several of episodes of The Twilight Zone have been the subject of multiple parodies (or "tributes" if you like), making each of them notable in this respect, as I'm sure that there are many references (interviews, etc.) where the creators clearly state their inspiration/intention to do the parody, critical (scholarly) analyses by others pointing out the obvious parallels, etc. See, for example, To Serve Man (The Twilight Zone), It's a Good Life (The Twilight Zone), The Eye of the Beholder, and (probably the most "cultural reference nods" goes to) Nightmare at 20,000 Feet (again, secondary sources should be supplied for all of those "in popular culture" notations, I suppose, to satisfy all the WP requirements, but it's obvious the cultural impact these kinds of shows have had in some cases). (I'm not, however suggesting that all episodes of The Twilight Zone are necessarily notable.) --Craw-daddy | T | 02:07, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, there are episodic / plot-generator shows that lack internal continuity based on characters or plot. That's an argument for including an individual plot synopsis on lists of plots, but it doesn't necessarily tell us that the individual episodes each need separate articles. What would be a notable episode? Pilots of long-running series; episodes that win awards; episodes that were highly influential or famous or received significant critical acclaim or broke highly notable viewership records -- for example, the "who shot JR" episode of Dallas is famous for its cliffhanger; the little boy who could change the world episode is a highly influential episode of The Twilight Zone; "Hush" is a highly notable Buffy episode. --Lquilter (talk) 02:18, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The answers to your questions in the order stated... Those that satisfy WP:N, WP:V, and WP:RS... Perhaps, if they are truly notable... Yes, doesn't that mean they satisfy WP:N? (or are at least "half-way" there by winning an award?)... (and) Well, yes, "highly influential" (as demonstrated by WP:RS for example) and "significant critical acclaim" are all part of WP:N, correct? --Craw-daddy | T | 02:32, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes - my question was actually a rhetorical question. I would agree all those are notable; that's why I was giving them as examples. --Lquilter (talk) 02:54, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

• Exactly so, Gavin Collins -- This is what people arguing for separate articles for each aspect don't seem to get. That from a critical perspective, this database-style division and repetition (and necessarily, inconsistent repetitions) is harmful to writing good articles about these very issues. I was just looking at articles on Firefly characters, and there were tiny little synopses in the Malcolm Reynolds article on the character's relationship with other characters. Presumably each of the articles on the other characters have similar little blurbs. This is completely useless as a reference and in fact discourages the creation of a holistic article that would treat characterization and character arcs, plot and plot arcs, in a serious, useful, and referenced way. --Lquilter (talk) 22:18, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I think you have it backwards: A TV series is notable because its episodes are notable. Without the episodes, the series is nothing. A series and its episodes are essentially the same thing, just in different sizes. It's like arguing that a Long Island Ice Tea will get you drunk, but gin, vodka, tequila, and triple sec separately won't. Torc2 (talk) 23:29, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

What you're saying is true, but a complete red herring -- it is simply not relevant to determining notability of a particular article about a particular episode, or -- the larger question -- whether individual episodes should be organized as individual articles. Every thing is comprised of smaller things. For any serial, one could write articles about the series or about the individual members of the series or both. Radio series, journal issues, and so on. (In fact, one could make an excellent case for journal issues with the arguments laid out here. Each journal issue is separately numbered, has unique contents, often has a unique editor, certainly has unique contributors; even very poorly cited academic journals probably have way more references in scholarship than any Simpson's episode.) So some notable thing simply being composed of multiple elements does not mean that every smaller thing that comprises the larger is notable, nor does it mean that the composition is notable. So this is altogether unhelpful in assessing whether episode information should be organized in separate articles, one article per episode, or whether episode information should be organized in articles that aggregate multiple episodes (e.g., episode arc articles; season articles; series articles). What is helpful? Notability is one major way we assess things on a per-article basis; size is another; article layout another; and so on. --Lquilter (talk) 00:06, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

No, you cannot simply break everything down into smaller pieces. A television show is not just the same as any other series, and often, the timeline is discontinuous and each episode tells its own self-contained story. You can't (with few exceptions) have a character that's notable without a surrounding storyline, and the storyline for these shows is often is episodic, not serial. Clearly the notability originates from the episode and flows to the series. Torc2 (talk) 00:17, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

But the character behavior and typical situations they encounter are a constant and/or develop over the course of a show, and this is what the show is, after time has past, known for. I can't remember any specific episode of the original "Transformers" cartoon, but I can tell you the characters and the plot. Episodes can be described as falling under "newsworthiness" in that you'll remember exactly the elements of an episode tomorrow, a week from now, or even a year from now, but as time progresses, it is the overall collect of characters, character growth, and story arcs that identify the TV show, not specific events. This is not to say that an individual episode can obtain notability on its own, but simply because a tv show is notable does not make every episode of it notable. --MASEM 00:25, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting character articles can't be made. I don't remember which talk page I mentioned it, but one issue I had with the all-in-one approach was that organizationally, it's easier to have different perspectives of the show separated. Maybe, depending on the series, the episode itself isn't as important as the characters' storylines or the entire season arc, but for a lot of shows, sorting by episode is going to be the most logical way to communicate the information. What I'm against is us prescribing one solution for series presentation and hiding behind notability as the reason for not organizing the series logically. Torc2 (talk) 00:40, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

PS - The analogy is amusing, and drinkable, but a better analogy would be a chemical compound comprised of 10 to 200 smaller compounds. Are each of them notable? Who knows? Just because the chemical compound itself is, doesn't mean all the smaller ones are. Consider any creative work: They're all composed of smaller parts. A painting is a pretty whole and entire thing, and we don't discuss all the constituent parts of it, even though there is no question that the painting is comprised of lots of individual dabs of paint. Sometimes we discuss the individual brushstrokes. Consider a film or tv show, comprised of some gajillions of individual photographs -- sometimes we discuss one frame that is particularly notable, as in the Zapruder film. That doesn't mean all the others are. Consider Buffy the Vampire Slayer. There were episodes that won or were nominated for awards, significantly furthered the overall plot or character arcs, or had some external real-world notability -- scholars and commentators wrote a lot about them, fan groups formed for the episode, etc. I'm thinking of "Once More, with Feeling (Buffy episode)", but then compare it with the demon eggs episode in season 2, "Bad Eggs". That one is going to sink into critical history, noted largely as a footnote to the series. The argument that each and every episode must be handled as a separate article is, implicitly, an argument that each and every episode is equivalently worthy of critical attention. Come on. We all know it's not. Each and every episode is worthy of tracking in episode guides, definitely, but in 50 years, students are not going to be writing papers and using wikipedia to research "Bad Eggs". --Lquilter (talk) 00:15, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

For one thing, we do have articles for every element, so I wouldn't use that as an example to say the parts aren't notable. We don't, however, have articles for only the largest combination of those elements. We have articles on famous paintings, but we also have articles for paint, brushes, canvas, and every color out there. We have articles on bands, and we assume if the band is notable, their major releases are notable. Most series rebroadcast on TV aren't rerun serially; they're rerun as episodes, usually out of order. The episode, not the series, is the basic unit of television. Rarely are seasons shot as a continuous whole and then broken up into episodes; they're shot as episodes and later assembled into seasons. Comparing this to a frame on Zapruder is the red herring; nobody ever suggested anything smaller the basic unit.Torc2 (talk) 00:32, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I gave a number of examples. In each, one can't simply assert that just because individual components are notable, the combination is notable; nor can one assert that just because a combination (or series) is notable, that each and every individual component is notable. --Lquilter (talk) 02:01, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

You gave a number of tangents that ultimately asserted nothing on topic. I never claimed every component was notable; I said the basic unit of television is the episode, and that the reason a show is notable is its episodes. When you watch TV, they don't show entire seasons, or unmeasured chunks of a series. They show episodes, in neat little 30 or 60 segment chunks, often totally self-contained. If you sit down and watch episode 403 of Duckman, you're not going to be lost in total darkness because you never saw an episode before. (For some series, yes, you would be lost, but not all.) Episodes are the basic unit of television. Why would we not recognize that here? Torc2 (talk) 02:33, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Torc2, what is the your proposal on how to feature information on individual episodes? Semantics aside, I don't understand what you are getting to. Dimadick (talk) 17:36, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I totally agree with User:Torc2. Episodes are the basit unit of television. If the episodes are not notable, the "show" cannot be notable. --Pixelface (talk) 19:11, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I want to be part of this discussion, but I have to go pack for a 3-day trip and everything above was only written in the last six hours. So I will just link to my statement at "The Television Episodes Edit Wars" request for arbitration. –thedemonhog talk • edits 00:10, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

On point 6: Are we (either side) being destructive to wikipedia or constructive?

I'm not even going to try and debate the other points directly, especially since the hardcore players of wikipedia (editing wikipedia is too similar to what you find with |MMOs to call it anything else once politics is involved) are determined to ride roughshod over the userbase. What is worth commenting upon however is the constructive or destructive nature of events. Properly referenced Articles on TV episodes (such that anything other than a careful plot summary and credits are sourced from elsewhere) result in:

• More reader hours spent on wikipedia (which increases the chance of new editors)
• A sense of worth to the editors of the page, which makes them more likely to contribute elsewhere on wikipedia
• Those with an interest in the article feel that wikipedia caters for their interests, and so view it more positively (and so are more likely to become editors)
• A greater level of accurate comprehensive coverage (again with all the benefits this brings)
• Another page that needs to be maintained and could hide vandalism
• A sense that wikipedia is too concerned with 'trivial' matters

Of these, only the last two are bad. The last point itself is an unavoidable aspect of wikipedia, which needs to be discussed in context with the other arguments against the above and other common fallacies. To simplify discussion , I shall refer to TV Episodes and similar content as 'trivial', whilst other, more important and arguably more preferable articles, as 'serious'. To those arguments, I present the following:

• A product or service exists for its user. Even at high-school level design courses, it is stressed that one makes products not for the maker, but for the user. There are, truth be told, two types of users of wikipedia. The editors, who view contribution as the game and indulge in politics (regular nice editors are not included here, as they are the makers in this context); And the readers, those who simply browse wikipedia but do not actively take part in the editing process. Using (and assuming it to be representative), one can compare the visits to major wikipedia space pages to those on mainspace articles, it becomes clear that the true bulk of users have no real interest in the policies and politics. Misplaced Pages exists for the benefit of its readers, first and foremost.
• Misplaced Pages exists for its readers and must abide by the reader's wishes. Misplaced Pages is a product that has gained fame through its readers first and foremost. One cannot dismiss the interest of the readership and state that it is the editors that define wikipedia, for this directly changes the objective of wikipedia from an free encyclopaedia (a product to impart knowledge) to simply the game that it is treated as by many.
• On matters of wikipedia's nature, the gaming editors will currently always seem to have consensus. Looking at the stats listings, it is apparent that a small minority of readers have any interest in policy pages in comparison to the overal number of visitors. From these interested people, the regular contributing editors need to be seperated out from the gaming editors (from here, editors will be used to refer to gaming editors unless stated). A number of editors who would game may also look at such material and occasionally join in, but thanks to becoming sick of politics and literal interpretations may have stopped getting involved in almost all consensus debates. Given the desire of the gaming editors to win, they often argue with such force that even regular debaters may feel unable to present their case, especially in strong matters of doctrine (as this issue surely is). As such, the raw consensus will appear biased towards the gamed approach. In this style of play, so often seen throughout wikipedia, reasoning is usually overturned in favour of the current majority-of-the-loudest-not-biggest opinion.
• The trivial nature of wikipedia is an unavoidable consequence of being freely editable. Real people are interested in what they are interested in, one cannot make a lover of cat flaps want to learn about quarks. Within such an open environment, were permission need not be sought before creating an article, it matters not what rules exist - articles will be created. What matters is the reaction to this.
• The trivial nature of wikipedia is in fact desirable. The long tail theory alone should be enough proof here. Whilst major topics see heavy traffic on wikipedia, the success of the project has become such that it is often used for first-port-of-call to find out about something. As such, a significant amount of traffic begins exploring wikipedia from articles of little absolute importance. The individual entry articles have low traffic, but the numbers add up over all the various topics. Misplaced Pages's users, the readers, actively want to find out this information.
• Eliminating trivial articles or shortening them will not enhance or expand articles on serious topics. Just as the trivial nature of wikipedia is unavoidable because it is the work of volunteers acting upon their personal interests, people are not suddenly going to contribute to serious articles because they cannot find trivial articles to donate to.
• Enhancing trivial articles or creating them cannot damage or hinder serious articles. If it has escaped your notice, your typical editor to articles on mathematics is not within the same set of editors who are typically active on stargate sg1. Volunteer projects which do not turn away any volunteers can only suggest how they focus their contributions, not enforce.
• Editors to trivial material will contribute to the project as a whole. Recent change patrolling is easy to do, and once you are used to editing a trivial article, you become more confident and willing to contribute to more serious articles. Many editors joined because of the long tail and went on to help with the whole.
• The presence of trivial content encourages more editors than the lack of it ever will. Although removing articles that are trivial may make a small number feel that wikipedia somehow more 'professional', this number is tiny compared to those with an interest in the varied trivial matters who will contribute if they feel welcome on wikipedia
• Vandalism is not a major issue with respect to well-referenced trivial articles, and dealing with this and maintaining the article will not eat up the time of serious editors. Typically, people watch articles they make or contribute to, and as such the majority of maintenance work is done by those with an interest in the matter. Recent Change Patrolling is a quick activity now, thanks to scripts and tools, and bots also exist which monitor changes.
• Removing trivial material will not improve wikipedia's image. Those outside wikipedia who study its quality typically seem to be aware of the work-in-progress user-generated nature of the content that results in trivial coverage. Most analyses see specific serious content being looked at, rather than the wiki as a whole. As the trivial content is of value to our readers and encourages new editors, any external reviewer who criticises wikipedia for this material is at fault for missing part of the purpose and nature of wikipedia. Indeed, most complaints about wikipedia are about the lack of sources, not regarding the breadth of articles (which is generally well-spoken of).
• Trivial material distributed by means which allows a significant number to have access to it is unlikely to result in a purely vanity or tribute (in joke, praise or dislike of something personally close to you) article.

Whilst my tone in places is harsh against the current system, hopefully you have followed through so far and reach the same conclusion I have - that the removal of TV episodes is a destructive act that removes value and editing potential from wikipedia. Allowing the presence of those that properly verify their content (And not requiring additional secondary sources for anything other than statements that need them to be verifiable) is in fact a highly constructive act that adds significant value over time. LinaMishima (talk) 21:04, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, LinaMishima, for the detailed opinion. I just wanted to note that I don't interpret your comment as endorsing a free-for-all, or as a suggestion to allow unverified and speculative fan material. Instead, it appears to be an argument for seriously examining how we view the project, and how we achieve the overall goal of providing a comprehensive body of information to a diverse general audience. --Ckatz_spy 21:18, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you! It most certainly is not in favour of a free-for-all, and I am a very strong proponent of WP:V (although a sensible one, check my personal rantings for a poorly-worded attempt to state my thoughts). LinaMishima (talk) 22:16, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm...if Misplaced Pages is for the readers, why do we even have restrictions at all? If the readers want an article on their favorite unnotable website, topic, person, etc, why do we argue? Why don't we let college kids use their term papers to update articles? Why don't we flood every article with all those IMDB copy/paste trivia tidbits? Or let them link off to their favorite YouTube videos related to the topic? Or, the biggest one, let them fill every article with lots and lots of pictures? Because Misplaced Pages is NOT for the readers. To quote, again, from policy: "is an online encyclopedia and, as a means to that end, an online community of people interested in building a high-quality encyclopedia" - catering to the whims of readers does NOT equal high quality. Misplaced Pages:Five pillars - written for the benefit of does not automatically mean catering to the desires of. Collectonian (talk) 21:27, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

What does that have to do with episodes? It's a simple matter to craft guidelines which allow TV episodes from important shows, but not people's pets or words they've invented. The slippery slope argument is a non-starter.--Nydas 21:37, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Readers value an encyclopaedia for both the breadth, and (most importantly here) the accuracy of its content. As I believe I stated, the most common complaint I see about wikipedia is its reliability, that articles need to be better referenced and researched. As such, the readership as a whole appears to support WP:V, WP:NOR, WP:RS and WP:NPOV (and plenty of WP:NOT). It is those characteristics that define an encyclopaedia. As part of these principles, we must not allow edits to remain unchecked by those unduly close to a subject and prevent article creation by such people (as initial article bias is hard to remove and often vanity or in-joke articles start out poorly verified if at all). In addition, material added should be of a degree of wide importance to the topic covered within an article, such that all those with detailed knowledge of the topic will agree that the mention belongs within the article. Notability as a measure of weight, of length of inclusion, basically - small articles of small overall importance may well merit a link to a youtube video which formed an essential part of the topic itself, whereas longer articles themselves on matters of global importance probably do not merit a youtube link, unless there is no copyright violation and the video is a major respected reference material on the subject. Misplaced Pages articles themselves are the desired form of knowledge training, and as such linking to a documentary which presented no additional material to the subject is probably not worth while, and certainly not if that video is not reliable or considered one of the most important documentaries. It is the principles of encyclopaedic content and writing style that lead us to this conclusion and the exclusion of vanity or personal additions.LinaMishima (talk) 22:04, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

As for your quote, it raises the question - does wikipedia exist for the purpose of being "an online community of people interested in building..." or for the purpose of being "a high-quality encyclopedia"? User statistics point towards it most commonly being used as the later, whilst many editors, the gamers as I refer to them, believe in the former. Also, if you look at the media coverage around wikipedia, it focuses predominantly on the fact that it is an encyclopaedia, rather than an online community. This wider belief is what has gifted wikipedia with its current status, wikipedia has, unlike in the case of minority groups within society, actively benefited from the public belief about itself. LinaMishima (talk) 22:04, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

• (1) I agree, in general, with the use of WP:FICT to closely examine the notability of individual TV episodes. The fact is that not every TV show is notable, and for notable TV shows, not every episode is notable. The gold standard for an encyclopedic topic is one that has had peer-reviewed literature published. Some episodes meet that gold standard. The vast majority do not. (2) Rather than trying to rehash WP:FICT here, let me suggest that this comes back to the definition of an encyclopedia. Misplaced Pages is not a comprehensive database of all information. It is manifestly unsuited for work as a database: There are no fields, no way to normalize data and make sure it's the same in different contexts and places, and so on. Misplaced Pages is an encyclopedia, and encyclopedias are reference sources that compile previously published scholarship and journalism on particular topics. Articles about TV series that are notable are great. Articles that analyze characterization on TV series, or character and plot arcs through the series' episodes, or articles that analyze particular, notable characters or episodes, are great. Articles that attempt to systematically document, database-style, all the individual components of a notable TV series are not helpful. Imagine the high-school student in 50 years who is writing an article on TV series of the late 1990s. Will she be well-served by having to scan through 50 different pages on individual characters and episodes, each with a tiny piece of the information, some of which is in conflict with other pages on the same topic? Or will she be better served by having a single, comprehensive article, which discusses the episodes, characterization, and other aspects of the series, with links to the emmy-award winning episodes of season 2 and 4? If you want to say "But over the next 50 years there will be lots written about each one of the other episodes", then that's great -- once there is sufficient scholarship & journalism to justify separate articles, then we should definitely spin those articles off. In the meantime, if they can't be justified now, then they are not presently notable. --Lquilter (talk) 21:52, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
  • In stating "each with a tiny piece of the information, some of which is in conflict with other pages on the same topic?", you confuse the issue of stubs with the issue of the merit of well-detailed and researched articles of little majority appeal. As someone who conducts research, I would find fully fleshed out, well-researched articles on characters far more useful than short entries on a list that go into little depth. However, when material exists such that only a short stub can be made, it is my belief that a list is preferable to a collection of stubs. With regards to TV episodes themselves, it is good writing style (and indeed a guideline here) to summarise articles on the pages they have been spun off from, allowing the casual or high-school researcher a quick overview, but a person with a more detailed interest to discover more. As for the episodes themselves, it is my experience that the single-line summaries often used within episode lists do not provide the proper context and often miss out key events, preventing a whole understanding of the flow of the plot. I do not care if the information is retained on seperate pages or on a detailed list, to me they are equivalent until the entry lengths within a list grow to such a size so as to cause spin-off articles to be required. What is ultimately being discussed here, in my opinion, is the information content itself. Sadly the refactoring I see as solving this issue is typically overlooked by many editors, unable to see past the quick and thoughtless options of "keep" or "delete" LinaMishima (talk) 22:13, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Minor point: Actually, I wasn't confusing stubs with unpopular lengthy articles, but I was shorthanding a problem with stubs, and my shorthand may have been confusing to readers. Let me explain: One long article is much, much better than 50 short stubby articles that contain exactly the same information. This is true for style reasons, as you clearly describe, but it's also true for a technical reasons -- maintenance of the consistency of the content. The problem with individual pages that are short stubs that replicate related material is that they will inevitably decay into inconsistency; this is simply a principle of data management, and why databases are good for maintaining information that is presented in multiple forms. Misplaced Pages's tracking of information is not database-style -- the content of each article is stored as a separate piece of information, and not integrated with other information no matter how similar. So imagine the list of episodes is now split into 50 individual episode articles, and the mini-arcs within the episodes often have some repeating synopsis information. Over time information that is redundantly stored will become inconsistent. Thus as a matter of data management one eliminates redundancy. So, if there's not going to be more than stub information that is sometimes redundant of other stub information, that information is better maintained in a list than in multiple separate stubs. --Lquilter (talk) 22:38, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I think I'm following you now. In my experience, plot arc material, once written/aired, is fairly stable and has little need for such maintenance, similarly with character details. As TV shows and books are typically written such that the content of previous works does not change upon later releases, and that the material can be understood without needing detailed history to be known (although many shows have strong plot arcs, few have such that heavy maintenance will be required on older material as new material is produced - many of such possible reworkings may also be attempts at strong synthesis, which we cannot allow). Despite this, however, I think I broadly agree with what you are getting at. However, as I stated, wikipedia culture is such that sensible solutions (such as detailed entries within a list) will always be overlooked in favour of information destruction or redundancy, hence why we have even reached this point of policy discussion. I'm not sure this is the best place to debate such matters, as I think it builds upon this document agreeing on the merit of the information, and then the preference of detailed lists as the presentation format needs to then be discussed elsewhere. LinaMishima (talk) 22:56, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

No, this is a fine place to talk about it. Because this guideline is about whether individual episodes need separate articles. If they are not notable right now, then they should be part of lists, for several reasons, only one of which is the redundant-stability issue I discuss above. (That only applies to information that is redundant; for instance, a 3-episode arc, or character-relationship-with-character information.)

--Lquilter (talk) 22:59, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Just because something is or is not notable does not mean that something gains or loses the right to an article. Notability is a dreadful measure for this, and you yourself point out the better one - can the material be expanded? Notability, especially in it's current, highly arbitrary, form, cannot be used to judge this properly. And until expansion, there is no harm in having the material contained within a list, even such material that has high potential to gain a lot of new references fast. The reason why I suggest that this is not an appropriate discussion for right now is simply that, as stated, wikipedia culture prefers the simple route (deletion) to more sensible means to resolve the issue. As I understand it, this debate exists to stop the further wholesale of articles, and an outcome in favour of lists at this stage will likely result in further article deletion before projects have had a chance to organise and merge content properly. If the sensible merger result can be assured, however (such that episode lists gain effectively the full content of the previous short articles), then that would of course be prefered. But that result is highly unlikely, and given the circumstances that led us to this point now, it is likely to be interpreted in a roughshod manner by those not actually working upon the trivial material itself. LinaMishima (talk) 23:12, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

• Looking more closely at the individual questions and trying to relate them to this discussion, I see that much of the discussion complaining about merges and deletions are really simply responses to WP:FICT and WP:EPISODE. As for points one and two "creating a central place for effective discussions...", the right place for those would be on these two talk pages. Three is handled by editing guidelines already -- even if people disagree with things they shouldn't be edit-warring. Four is a rehash of #s 1 and 2, I believe. Five and Six are simply, again, restating unhappiness with mergers and seem phrased to evoke the oft-repeated complaint that deleting information is "destructive". This again seems like a problem with WP:FICT and WP:EPISODE. For the record, WP:EPISODE looks fine to me. --Lquilter (talk) 22:59, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

• However, I do think there is a core issue that needs to be addressed: The timing of how these processes take place. First of all, redirects should be done, and these are non-destructive; there's no reason that I can see for edit histories to be purged. If the episodes get split out later then those edit histories may have useful content to resurrect. Second, we should just agree on a period of time. I propose one week for a "merge" notice. Third, the standard is not whether the article has been improved, but whether it can be improved. A highly notable episode from a series in the 1950s probably has many fewer fans writing about it than any episode of a semi-popular TV series from the early 21st century, although it probably has much greater likelihood of the sorts of reliable secondary sources. People must realize that many recent episodes are frankly not going to be "notable". --Lquilter (talk) 22:59, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
  • See my above comment at 23:12 UTC. Your timing and processes proposal do seem to deal with some of the issues here. Implementing what appears to be our shared preferable solution (lists with all the old non-speculative information, rather than small articles) is however a big affair, needing not just a lot of time, but also a proper clarification on the new style of writing episode lists (the old style that is commonly in use assumes separate articles per episode, and is unable to handle the removal of these episodic articles). Before any further work regarding the episode articles can take place, I would recommend that a new common style for episode lists be agreed upon. Once this has been done, it is reasonable to expect project groups to work to rewrite their episode list, merging in content, and as such then a reasonable deadline (that accommodates fairly those shows that have only a few active editors) deadline should be set, at which point the articles will become redirects (projects may and indeed should request this happen sooner for their material, of course). LinaMishima (talk) 23:20, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

• There is a long discussion (now archived) about this in Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive351#User:TTN bulk redirecting episode pages. For each set of episode pages affected, there should be an AfD discussion first. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 23:22, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
  • As I understand it, this discussion is to decide on the actual policy and guidelines which may be needed for such AfDs or their stead. An equally favourable (if not moreso) outcome is one that prevents such AfDs being needed for anything other than procedural purposes, hence the discussion about merging into lists. LinaMishima (talk) 23:27, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

• Comments

The only time we have every had a deadline for improving material or having it deleted or redirected has been for copyright violation. It is taken by most editors as a threat, and is not appropriate. We AGF that everyone will work at whatever reasonable rate they can manage. If a group isnt going fast enough, join and help them.

I would not base anything on WP:FICTION, as it is very possible that there will never be a consensus version of that guideline.

Simple Basic guideline: Not too long, not too short, and understandable without expert knowledge of the series. The sort of articles on episodes a year ago were absurdly detailed, to the extent that if you didnt know the series you couldn't figure out the major plot line. The paragraphs now being written in most combined articles are so sort that they dont give enough information to find out what is happening. It's an equal but opposite over-reaction. What is needed is good clear writing, more than any length specification.

DGG (talk) 23:47, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

My personal mention of deadline was based upon other people's implied deadline ideas. Personally, of course, AGF working towards the goal is preferable. As for the style of the merged entries, The Enemy Within (Stargate SG-1) as it stands can almost be placed into a list with no changes (aside from the production details and infobox being merged into the list's standard entry format spaces for such things), and seems to be about the right level of detail for something without additional detail on wider effect or aspects essential to understanding the episode (vitial trivia, as it were). LinaMishima (talk) 00:05, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

If a list can keep this amount of detail, I would support it. However if we one day have a set of relatively well-written episode articles and the next they are all merged into a list resembling List of King Leonardo and his Short Subjects episodes,which features no information other than names and order, I would hardly consider it an improvement. Dimadick (talk) 18:03, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The Enemy Within (Stargate SG-1) has (to me) an appropriate amount of plot detail (take away a few EOLs, but either way, not too much, not too little); characters can be linked to a character article as to not necessitate the need for actor names of reoccurring characters, but special one-off notable guest stars can be included as parenthetical links after the character's first use. You may need to have several ep lists, one for each season, but that's not a huge problem. --MASEM 18:10, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

LinaMishima, I wholeheartedly agree! 86.49.72.53 (talk) 18:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC) I would also like to add that Misplaced Pages should have a "Feedback" page for casual users and readers (preferably linked from main page), which would have question for them, about what they like and what they don't about Misplaced Pages. For example, the questions could be: Do you find lists of episodes useful? Do you find articles about individual episodes useful? Samohyl Jan (talk) 18:53, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

SH 7

I would like to mention this is not the first attempt to hold centralised discussion, as a glance through the archive pages will demonstrate. The basic guidelines arose out of a discussion in 2004 regarding deletion policy. It became a centralised discussion in 2005, which can now be found archived here. The guidelines were then developed, and were consistent with WP:NOTABILITY. Minor changes were made (see edit history of the guideline page, archived link or archive 2 as well. The archives also contains a wide-reaching discussion but the pertinent information to the changes is here and following. It is worth noting that the recent changes expanded the guideline (ie making it more explanatory) but did not change it. Look at diff carefully (ie. word for word). (I would like to mention here that I was responsible for most of that, in an effort to improve the clarity, not to alter the actual spirit of it; I occasionally edit TV articles, particularly Doctor Who which does have episode articles, so I am not anti, but neither am I a fanatic: my main interests lie in the Middle Ages and my involvement in this project was an effort to mediate). Most of the new additions are quotes from other guidelines/policies such as WP:WAF, WP:NOT, Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources, Misplaced Pages:Verifiability, WP:TRIVIA, Misplaced Pages:Non-free content to make it easy for people to find the info. If anyone a problem with any of those, then this is a wikipedia-wide problem, not a WP:EPISODE problem, and must be taken up more widely. Consensus might change (Misplaced Pages is organic, after all), but it is wrong to claim that this guideline was created without consensus. The fact that it has held together for pushing three years, through discussion after discussion, shows that it can't be lightly tossed out. Further discussion regarding what to do with problem articles (ie those that fail WP:N) can also be accessed at the talk pages of WP:TVE and WP:TV-REVIEW, Misplaced Pages talk:Television article review process. Moreover, the recent discussions have not occured in some back-block region of Misplaced Pages. I became involved in the issue mid-2007 following an AN/I regarding TTN's actions (and would like to state that I was one of those who originally questioned his actions). We began a discussion much like this, to determine consensus (again, a read of archives would be useful for any interested parties, and to prevent the continual re-crossing of old ground). The review was raised at the village pump (twice) and I left messages on the talk pages of all the television-related wikiprojects. Thus the group working on this guideline and WP:TV-REVIEW was enlarged by people from all over Misplaced Pages. When people are notified correctly, silence is taken as approval of actions. Basically, this guide line only clarifies issues mentioned elsewhere in Misplaced Pages, so a removal of this guideline should not actually affect the principle that unreferenced articles, with no likelihood of gaining references, have no place on Misplaced Pages. Anyone is welcome to offer suggestions for improvement, but they CANNOT be contrary to existing guidelines and policies. If anyone has a problem with any of those, then the first step is to bring the issue up on those respective pages. (eg. WP:WAF, WP:NOT, Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources, Misplaced Pages:Verifiability, WP:TRIVIA, Misplaced Pages:Non-free content). In addition, on the subject of plot, which is enirely relevant when discussing Episode articles, most of which consist mainly of plot: the main issue about their replication is whether it breaches copyright: the summary cannot be a substitute for watching the programme, but an aid to understanding the rest of the discussion. Whatever people might want or prefer, that is the hard fact of the law. See: WP:EPISODE#Plot summaries. In other words: "sorry folks, no can do detailed plot summaries". Gwinva (talk) 00:30, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Verifiability addresses this quite succinctly: "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found for an article topic, Misplaced Pages should not have an article on it." Not "(unless it's a splitoff)" or "(unless a lot of people are fans of it)" or "(unless a lot of people think we should have an article on an episode or character or the like in the absence of significant reliable sourcing on the episode or character itself.") If an article has a lot of material on a subject there's very little sourcing for, it's time to trim, not to split. Trimming and cutting is something any good editor does. It is not evil, it is not bad, it's an essential part of writing any work of good quality. Seraphimblade 00:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The topic is the television program. The episodes are sub-topics. And WP:V says "should not", not "cannot". WP:V also doesn't specify a time frame for finding third-party sources. --Pixelface (talk) 07:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

A possible compromise?

The question is: Are the episodes themselves notable? Misplaced Pages overall has been cluttered with a lot of non-notable stuff. I don't really know what to say other than to agree with ThuranX and add that I share the same perception that Misplaced Pages is cluttered with non-notable directory entries (one only needs to surf Special:Random to confirm this.), while also agreeing with those who worry that such a policy would lead to deleting all episode lists. Unlike encyclopedias, Misplaced Pages is not paper, so it can contain silly (but informative) stuff like Category:Exploding animals and internet memes. Overall, though, this tends to get out-of-hand very, very quickly and the lack of clarity of policy on this makes it worse. Although there is already policy to address this, it should be explicitly stated as the following:

Television episodes may be added as lists, if the episodes are themselves notable. The notability of a TV show does not imply the notability of every episode. A crucial sign of notability is that the episode is referenced in other media.

So, for example, a lot of episodes of Happy Days, Taxi (TV series), Seinfeld, South Park, Colbert Report, etc, are notable and encyclopedic because they've influenced American culture. They just aren't included in paper encyclopedias because it would be too much work. However, those who simply list every show, though, especially newer shows, like Dharma and Greg are violating WP:Notability and to some degree, even WP:Spam. There's even the likelihood that some of these cancelled shows or shows with poor ratings are being propped up by the mainstream media cabal. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 00:42, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I think you mean more than lists, you mean paragraphs in a combination article.DGG (talk) 00:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Television episodes may be added as lists, if the episodes are themselves notable is the opposite of of WP:NNC. If I have an article on My Talk Show that has been proven notable, the article can have an episode list (and plot summary for each episode) regardless of individual episode notability. Torc2 (talk) 00:45, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I think this is too strong. I've not seen anyone argue against a straight-up episode list (the list itself possibly be non-notable or possible being notable) that contains very brief (like, no more than 4 lines of plot) as part of the episode listing, along with other details. Whether there now exists a wikilink off to a more detailed aspect of that episode or not, regardless of episode notability, is in question. --MASEM 00:51, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Main problem I think is that it isn't happening. With there is a wide Redirect going on by TTN and others, you can't even get to make a list of episodes. I agree that most episodes in long running series do not have enough WP:N per-se. And shouldn't have an article just for them. The best compromise right now, would be stop the redirecting, and starting converting the episodes in lists. From there, and searching for other sources. A good change, and compromise for WP:EPISODE would be to allow a time frame from an Episode Article to move away from stub in to a full article. And by that it would need to satisfy WP:V.

I don't think either that DVD commentaries can be used as the only secondary source. A third party should be provided. By the simply fact that someone will always have something to say about something s\he did. Samuel Sol (talk) 11:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Thought I'd throw in my opinion:
On Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines are established through consensus, there is (or at least should be) a consensus for the current established guidelines and policies that are in place which have not been tagged as disputed.

WP:N(guideline) states: "A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject." and

WP:DP(policy) gives: "Subject fails to meet the relevant notability guideline (WP:N..." as a reason for deletion.

WP:NOT(policy) states: "Misplaced Pages articles on published works (such as fictional stories) should cover their real-world context ...not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot.This applies both to stand-alone works, and also to series."

WP:DP(policy) gives: "Content not suitable for an encyclopaedia" as a reason for deletion.

WP:V(policy) states: "The threshold for inclusion in Misplaced Pages is verifiability, not truth.... material added to Misplaced Pages has already been published by a reliable source"

WP:RS(guideline) states: "Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy."

WP:DP(policy) gives "All attempts to find reliable sources in which article information can be verified have failed" as a reason for deletion.

WP:OR(policy) states "all material in Misplaced Pages must be attributable to a reliable, published source."

WP:DP(policy) gives: "Article information that cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources" as a reason for deletion.

WP:WAF states "Articles about fiction, like all Misplaced Pages articles, should adhere to the real world as their primary frame of reference"

It therefore follows that:

Articles for TV episodes should ONLY exist if they have recieved significant coverage from third party reliable sources AND there is enough verifiable, real world information available to make that article more than just a plot summary.

This probably is the case for some episodes, which may have won awards, been part of a real world controversy, been the subject of real world accusations, had a major affect on the show in the real world or have sparked other reported upon incidents but is likely not true for many others. Personally I think that the current “rules” are pretty clear, the only real questions are:

1. Do those “rules” truly represent the current consensus of Misplaced Pages editors?
2. If this is the case is there a good reason to reject those "rules" in this instance? ]

If anyone was an avid collector of any of the numerous TV, film and other media- related magazines there are often detailed 3rd party reviews and commentaries. Doesn't anyone read these things? cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:28, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Guest9999, the key words in the policies and guidelines you quote are presumed, should, and solely. The word "presumed" has multiple meanings (and pretty much none of them match the meaning that WP:N provides), the word "should" can mean "must" and it can mean "ought". I think the word "solely" is clear. I think WP:EPISODE needs to become a notability guideline and it needs to state that TV ratings can be used to suggest notability, and being an episode of a notable television show can also be used to suggest notability. --Pixelface (talk) 05:45, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Obviously there isn't consensus for how you have interpreted those, or this page would be extremely short. There's been a ton of debate on this above already. Here's my perspective on these:

WP:N, WP:DP - The topic is the TV show; information about the episodes, regardless of whether they're on the same page or different pages from the main article on the topic, is simply an orgazational issue. Placing episode information in sub-article does not mean that sub-article is a totally separate topic - it's still part of the main topic, the series.

WP:NOT - Covered (ad naseum) above. Not solely a detailed summary...

WP:DP: - In-universe description as part of a larger article (or collection of sub-articles) about a topic is not "content not suitable for an encyclopaedia".

WP:V, WP:RS, WP:DP, WP:OR, WP:DP: If secondary sources for the series has established notability, primary sources can be used in the article as long as no interpretation of information occurs, and those primary sources are verifiable and reliable. In other words, it's perfectly acceptable, once the series meets the other criteria, to include information about what happens within the story itself. It's just not OK to have only that information.

WP:WAF - Primarily, not only. As long as real-world information is included, in-universe information can be included as well. Torc2 (talk) 01:29, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree with Torc2 on this. --Pixelface (talk) 05:49, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Torc2: WP:NNC seems to have been created to avoid people removing certain sentences and saying, "This sentence isn't notable!" which would be silly. But there is an ambiguity here: If 99% of the article on Dharma and Greg contains an episode list, then that is in violation of the spirit of WP:Notability. It should be clarified that small sections or statements that are not notable may be added, but entire sections of article content, especially if they are quite large, should be removed if they are not notable. The reason is simple: If 99% of an article contains non-notable stuff, despite it not having its own article and despite it being in accordance with WP:NNC, it is in violation of WP:Notability. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:34, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

If the 1% establishes sufficient notability for the series, and the episode list is factual, the article is fine. It needs improvement, but that improvement should be addition or real world info, not subtration of basic episode information. (For that matter, an episode list is not in-universe information: the titles and episode numbers are real-world. Torc2 (talk) 01:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I think the issue is, are there enough other references outside of the episode and show itself to add verifiable content to the article beyond the plot summary. Awards won and reviews of the specific episode would clearly show such, however the absence of ANY outside commentary or recognition of the episode should mean that the episode should not get its own article. Per WP:SUMMARY, we should be thinking about episodes as derivatives of the show article itself, and we should consider the following structural framework when creating content about TV shows:

1. First is to create the article about the show
2. When the article gets too big, split off content into lists, such as "List of Characters" and "List of Episodes".
3. When an element (such as a specific episode) can demonstrate that there is independent notability by showing that someone, somewhere wrote about it in a reliable source, it can be split off from the list article.

This is meant to be taken in order. Note, however, that this framework does NOT excuse TTN of the massive redirection campaign. I personally think that each currently existing episode needs to be discussed by uninvolved parties before redirecting.--Jayron32.talk.contribs 01:35, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I think the crux of your interpretation is that articles can exist as "sub-articles" with a seperate main article establishing notability. This is effectively inherited notability which is generally considered to have been rejected by the community. Such sub-articles are not mentioned in the various policies and guidelines that they are supposedly exempt from (WP:NN, WP:V, etc.) and the guideline for splitting off sections of articles (WP:SS) makes no mentiond of this type of article. In essence policy and guidelines do not show that there is any consensus for such articles to exist. ]

I've only seen a reference to "inherited" notability at an essay, WP:ATA. WP:N doesn't talk about "inherited" notability. With television episodes, nothing is inherited anyway. It doesn't make sense to say that episodes inherit notability from the show (or don't inherit notability from the show). The episodes and the show are the same thing. The "show" is just a term for the episodes as a whole or in general. If none of the episodes are notable, the show cannot be notable. --Pixelface (talk) 05:58, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not really the same thing as inherited notability (a term which has also been greatly inflated to cover much more than its initial meaning). Saying "these parts are all part of a whole construct" is not the same as saying "this came from this, so it inherits all its traits automatically". If you're reading a book, and you turn the page, is the new page expected to be a totally different story that has to reestablish its plot and characters from scratch? As for existing articles like this, there are plenty of examples: Major albums from notable artists are by default accepted because nobody wants to read two hundred lines of track lists on an artists' main page; long lists can be split into alphabetical sections without having to reestablish the purpose and notability of each section of the list independently; and List of Topic X articles are assumed notable if Topic X itself is notable.Torc2 (talk) 01:53, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I interpret inherited notability to mean that one topic cannot depend on the notability of another in order to establish notability; irespective of whether that topic is a component part of the notable topic, or related to that notable topic in any other way. A seperate article is not the same as as the next page in a book, there no difference - technical or otherwise - between a "sub-article" and all other; every article should stand on its own merit. You say major albums from major artists have pages, I think what is really accepted is notable albums from notable artists. What major album from a major artist hasn't been the subject of discussion from numerous independent secondary sources? ]

What policy are you reading to get that interpretation? I can't even argue this because I can't find anything authoritative that actually specifies it. As for your question about albums, check Past Masters, Volume One. The only external link is AllMusic, whose coverage cannot be considered to establish notability given the number of NN albums it covers. Or The Beatles Box Set, which has no external reference. Go ahead and nominate that AfD that article and see how far you get. The point is that the guideline for music, either in theory or in enforcement, is much more lenient than TV episodes, and Wiki's coverage of albums is, I believe as a direct result, much, much better than its coverage of TV shows. A full-length studio album by a notable band will never get AfD'd because the information is sufficient content for the artist's article, but organizationally it makes more sense to separate it.Torc2 (talk) 03:26, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I will quote from WP:MUSIC:

All articles on albums or songs must meet the basic criteria at the notability guidelines. In general, if the musician or ensemble that recorded an album is considered notable, then officially released albums may have sufficient notability to have individual articles on Misplaced Pages. Individual articles on albums should include independent coverage. Demos, mixtapes, bootlegs and promo-only records are in general not notable; unreleased albums may not yet be notable without substantial coverage from reliable sources.

Album articles with little more than a track listing may be more appropriately merged into the artist's main article, space permitting.

Most songs do not merit an article and should redirect to another relevant article, such as for a prominent album or for the artist who wrote or prominently performed the song. Songs that have been ranked on national or significant music charts, that have won significant awards or honors or that have been performed independently by several notable artists, bands or groups are probably notable. A separate article is only appropriate when there is enough verifiable material to warrant a reasonably detailed article; permanent stubs should be merged to articles about an artist or album.

Now, the equivalent for TV shows is that the production studio or actor or broadcast network is the same as the artist/ensemble, the TV show is the album, and the episodes are the individual tracks. WP:MUSIC clearly defines that the songs are not notable simply by inclusion and thus need notability. --MASEM 03:40, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Two things: One, the "space permitting" portion is important given that it exempts the individual notability requirement. And two, I did specify in practice. The policy seems on par with WP:EPISODE (although the specific requirements seem much lower), but its interpretation is nowhere near as strict. I also think that albums are more analogous to episodes and series are more akin to catalogs. The analogies will never stand up completely, but I reject the idea that a 22-minute episode on broadcast TV is the same as a 3-minute deep cut. Torc2 (talk) 03:55, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

<edit conflict> I'm sure that a lot was written about the sets at the time of release, it's hard to imagine that "the first time a music fan could purchase the entire Beatles catalogue digitally formatted in a single set" would go unreported by the press. Even if this was not the case - which I doubt - I those particular articles might present examples of where ignoring all the rules might be appropriate - since The Beatles are pretty much the biggest musical act to have ever existed (although I would completely understand the opposing view, since - I agree - the articles as they are do not establish notability). ]

Really? Because it's hard to imagine that an episode of a moderately popular TV show from 1992 wasn't discussed in a print medium back then, before the benefit of the Internet. Unfortunately such faith is not respected. I wish it was. Torc2 (talk) 03:55, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

(reset indent) I don't find episode = song to be a good analogy. They're more like albums. Think of the number of people involved in the creation process. Director, writer(s), actors, assorted crew, etc. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:50, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

But while not in similar numbers, there's the same type of people involved in the making of an album (rarely just the artist themselves) - and in most cases, these same people are used throughout the album on every track just like the same crew is used through a season (if not a series); if a track has a special guest performer, its the same as a special guest star on a TV show. --MASEM 03:55, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

You probably don't want to look at number of crew, differences in crew, and number of viewers unless you want to support individual episode pages. Other than the actors, the writers, directors, and other people involved in the creation of an episode change frequently. I guess they are the same "type" of people, but that's true of all media. An album is certified gold if it sells one million albums. TV shows with only several million viewers per episode are frequently cancelled. Objective views of notability (including reviews) have been judged unacceptable by the deletionists. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:25, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

If we're comparing television to music, I think the TV "show" is the band (the people who make it) and the episodes are the albums. The songs are the three acts in a 30-minute program, like in Treehouse of Horror IV. --Pixelface (talk) 06:16, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Torc2 has already covered most of my objections to Guest9999's assesment of the situation. I don't think the matter of inherited notability is limited to episodes or fiction. After all we have articles on Laddie Boy, Rex and Millie. I have trouble comprehending how their notability is not inherited from their owners. Dimadick (talk) 18:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Two points: first (and this is also related to the Bart the General example) - just because an article exists on Misplaced Pages presently does not mean it has consensus to exist on Misplaced Pages, as likely only a handful (if not just one) editors is even aware of the article. If that article has been challenged at one point as to why it should exist and remains, then we can consider the merits of why that consensus exists for that article.

Second, lets assume that the Presidental dogs are notable (I argue they are not, or, more likely, there's a "List of Pets by U.S. Presidents" that would be a better way to summarize the information - but that's not my point). I would imply you'd also suggest that the President's immediate family is also notable by the same inherited notability. Oh, probably the parents and cousins and grandparents and grandkids and in-laws and so forth. So for any notable person, their entire family is automatically notable. I don't think this is an appropriate comparison if you see what I mean. --MASEM 18:39, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Ah, but you moved from the President to "any notable person". From a couple of hundreds close relatives to 42 American Presidents to a significant portion of the world's population. I think the question of proximity comes to mind. It often does when dealing with royalty-related articles. See for example past discussions on Frederica of Hanover]. Dimadick (talk) 20:19, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

(indented previous comment to help convoflow) The question is, that if you consider that someone closely related to a notable person is automatically notable, where do you draw the line for this rule applying for any person, somewhere between the President of the US and, say, a reality show contestant or the star of an internet meme?

That's the problem with trying to use inherited notability - if it applies in one case, it can be demonstrated to readily supply in many cases beyond what the intent was. Things can have dependent notability - episodes need not demonstrate why the TV show itself is notable, but they still need to demonstrate why that specific instance out of all others of equivalent nature is notable. --MASEM 21:05, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

If the person has received significant coverage from reliable independent sources then they are notable enough for Misplaced Pages. It doesn't matter who they know or related to, only the coverage that they specifically have received. ●BillPP 21:10, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Just to point out after a quick Google search - which is not neccessarily the best way to find sources on a dog that's been dead for almost 80 years - I managed to find quite a few secondary sources describing Laddie boy. Someone interested in improving the articles might want to look for sources for the other dogs. From the New York Times and , from A Dog's History of America: How Our Best Friend Explored, Conquered, and Settled a Continent , from Time and from the Ohio History central . I'm sure a lot more could be found but frankly that's more than is avaialble for most television episodes. ]

Let's see...Laddie Boy is notable for having a statue of himself in the Smithsonian, Millie is notable because she is "technically" an author (stupid, yeah, but she's credited as an author), and all three receive tons of news coverage, including Rex's death being covered by Times Magazine. All three are also frequently mentioned in books of famous dogs not written by their former owners or people associated with them. That's notable. Show a television show talked about in Time, or a character death, and hey, they probably have notability for an article too. I.E. the Pokemon episode which made worldwide news cause watching that one could be detrimental to your health. Collectonian (talk) 20:54, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Another idea

Perhaps, and this is an alternate solution, it is time for an AFM (articles for merging) process akin to the AFD process. Like deletion, non-controversial merges and redirects can be done without much comment. Tag the article as a "CSM" (candidate for speedy merge) or do the redirect yourself. If the merge is likely to need discussion, a "PROM" or "AFM" discussion can be begun. The problem with the whole TTN episode-redirecting issue is that the redirection process is being used as a surrogate for deletion. The net effect is the same: Content is removed from easy access. If deletion is open for consensus-building discussion like AFD, than contested mergers/redirects should as well. If a redirect or merger is challenged, there needs to be a centralized place to discuss this. I know this reaches to a wider issue than the TV Episodes deal, but this entire thing could have wider reaching effects. If consensus TRULY is to merge episodes back into show articles or list articles, such a process will show that over time. If consensus varies depending on the specific article, and such consensus is built on a case-by-case basis according to established policy and guideline, then what would be wrong with this? This way, we don't need to decide here a blanket policy that all episodes should be merged, or that all should be kept. There are WAY too many articles to deal with that way. We need a centralized location to deal with each article as its issues come up... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 01:35, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that WP:AFM may be a good idea to consider, but I worry that each and every discussion will be "These articles need to each establish individual notability" / "No they don't, they're sub-topics of a larger notable topic". --Pixelface (talk) 06:23, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment

I believe that at the least, we should encourage every deletion to consider transwiki. Working with the wikiprojects I belong to, I will admit that a several articles are inappropriate for wikipedia - but are exemplarary for their respective wikia. I actually ask, nearly every time, for the deleting admin to transwiki the article. TTN could easily do this as well, and avoid most of the issues that people take with him. I agree with most of his argument - that many times, the specific article isn't appropriate for wikipedia. However, I have seen over and over that he makes little attempt to preserve any of the information, whether it would be useful or not.

It might almost be a solution to encourage wikipedia to only house content that could not find a wikia, just for the sake of organization.

I do take issue with the idea that wikipedia is meant for the community of editors, not the readers - if this is so, why do we have all the physics, math, etc. articles? Why not just list politics and art, which is pretty much the main sources of commentary?Not even Mr. Lister's Koromon survived intact. 03:17, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I think part of the problem is that the administrators either don't care about the issue, or some actually side with TTN, Eusebeus, and their friends on their "mission" (as evidenced by the previous request for arbitration against TTN...which was ruled as "everyone go out the door they came in, it's a hung jury..."). Otherwise, they'd certainly be gone for Gaming the system and for Disrupting Misplaced Pages. I have grown tired of TTN's taunting and threats as well, and his arrogance needs to end. RingtailedFox • Talk • Contribs 04:09, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, many administrators do support the cleanup of a lot of cruft which has been allowed to build up for too long. That doesn't necessarily mean that I approve of all of TTN's methods, because indeed I do not always. I suspect that is true of many, even of many who overall agree. At the same time, I can hardly see it as anything but "doing the right thing, if sometimes a bit overzealously". I find it hard to look at that as disruption, and indeed I often find that those who impede cleanup efforts are more disruptive (revert warring merges/redirections without any attempt to fix the problems, add sources, or even see if sources exist; clogging AfDs with irrelevant arguments such as popularity, importance, or ILIKEIT rather than relevant discussion based on sourceability, and the like. That's disruption, cleanup and trimming is a normal part of the editing process, and should within reason be every bit as encouraged as addition, not impeded at every turn.) The fact remains, if one really wants to prevent an article from being merged, deleted, or redirected, one should present substantial amounts of secondary sourcing. If that is not done (and especially if it cannot be done), the article will eventually be merged, redirected, or deleted, as appropriate, and it should be. Seraphimblade 05:57, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

TTN redirects even when notability has been established. I don't expect this group to do anything about it, but I've seen him even revert Ned Scott and others who are on his side. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:00, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

It's notable if TTN thinks it's notable. TTN thinks The Simpsons and Futurama is notable. Other television series? Not so much. It's as simple as that. --Pixelface (talk) 06:30, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

No, it's not, and your slanderous descriptions of him need to stop. -- Ned Scott 06:34, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not slanderous. TTN thinks Futurama is notable and TTN thinks The Simpsons is notable. Entourage? Not notable. Six Feet Under? Not notable. --Pixelface (talk) 06:47, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

You just posted diffs showing the exact opposite of what you just said. The fact that he believes they are being dealt with is not a sign of favoritism, it just means that those articles are actually being dealt with. You either know this and are playing stupid in an attempt to make false accusations on TTN, or you just don't get it. Either way, it has long since become unacceptable behavior. -- Ned Scott 07:11, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, well every television episode article is being worked on — there's even a WikiProject for it. But only a select few are given time to develop instead of being redirected. There are hundreds of Simpsons episode articles that do not establish notability by citing significant coverage in reliable sources, yet those articles are not redirected. Surely they should be redirected until editors can improve them, right? --Pixelface (talk) 07:18, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

This has nothing to do with a "select few". Any group of episode articles that shows reasonable progress, or does something that would realistically indicate that the episode articles are being evaluated with WP:EPISODE in mind, are being redirected/ merged/ expanded/ worked on. The ones being redirected have no realistic indication of the necessary information existing, let alone active users working to improve the situation. What you have is people who don't believe there is anything to improve, and simply because that episode articles should exist, no matter what. That's not the consensus on Misplaced Pages, and that's why we don't count arguments from those users.

So again, stop trying to blacken TTN's reputation by making false accusations. -- Ned Scott 07:28, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

And another argument on notability of content and methodology of mergers degenerates into whether users support or opposse TTN. I was under the impression this is not strictly about said user. Dimadick (talk) 18:29, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Pixelface - I'm confused as to how you interpreted TTN requesting that we discuss merging the Futurama articles (as he is doing in the link you provided) is showing favoritism. He is treating them the same way he has any other series by bringing up the discussion on the relevant talk pages (Talk:Futurama and Talk:List of Futurama episodes, and in this case the relevant wikiproject). As someone who works heavily on the Futurama episode article I recognize that there is not as much information available for them as there is for Simpsons episodes and that many of them cannot at this point conform to the relevant policies and guidelines. Unlike many previous discussions I have convinced TTN that we should review the episodes individually rather than as a set because they are in various stages (some are WP:GA and some are hopelessly stubby with no reliable sources). Anyone who is interested is free to come join such a discussion once it starts, it might be interesting to see how much information is needed before a majority of people think the episode has established notability. Stardust8212 21:36, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

And, just to point out that one can have civil conversations about these things, look at the peer review for Hell is Other Robots.Kww (talk) 21:53, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

A Comment

I'd first like to mention that I'm not some huge time editor that knows a ton of stuff on this whole notability stuff. I'm just the average editor, trying to improve the encyclopedia. Thats right, I improve articles, not waste time with stupid, endless bickering. And, that just seems to be what all of you are doing. Hiding behind your guidelines and policies and redirects and all that mumbo jumbo. As far as I know, this whole website is supposed to be a collaborative project to make a good online encyclopedia for people to use, or in other words, improving upon things. I saw an example of this while this whole, huge debate was going on.

Someone had mentioned the article, Bart the General. When I looked at it the first time it was mentioned, it wasn't looking good. However, the WikiProject I belong to, WP:SIMPSONS, was fast to improve the article. Yes, we did not come here to try to counter debate on why our episodes should stay. No, we went ahead and gave it a reason why it should exist. And now, it's a GA nominee. You heard me right. And now you say something like, it took four years for us to do it? We weren't fast on it, thats right. But you know what? We actually went ahead and did something about it. And we weren't focused on that particular episode. We do other things in our WikiProject, believe it or not.

In conclusion, if you are angry that things aren't going your way with the episodes of a TV show you like, then do something about it. Stop fighting. Go and actually make the article better, give it a real reason to exist, don't just sit around trying to bicker with others to explain why. I'm sorry that this was outside of your huge, 289kb debate, but I just wanted to share my opinion on all of this sillyness. xihix(talk) 02:16, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

So, how is that whole "condescening superiority" thing working out for you, anyway? Torc2 (talk) 02:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Was that a necessary thing to write? He's right, a lot of the users here seem more willing to fight the policy rather than to do any work to save the various episode pages. -- Scorpion 03:40, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

There's a simple reason for this; no one has the time to save literally 1000s of articles, which is literally what we are talking about. The only alternative is to target the policy. And since the policy doesn't appear to have any consensus, that's a highly reasonable response. JoshuaZ (talk) 03:59, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Given the tone of the comment...yes, yes that was necessary. And saying "just fix it" is easy enough, but I don't have stacks of TV Guide from last century stacked up in my garage. Pop culture rarely receives the kind of intense, long-term analytical scrutiny that "serious" art forms receive, which shouldn't make a difference to Misplaced Pages since notability is not temporary, but does simply because it's so much harder to find the old material. And I don't consider debate over policy that will affect hundreds, if not thousands of articles somehow less important and less noble than cleaning up articles that are at risk of being deleted anyway. If you had necrotizing fasciitis, your first priority wouldn't be to find makeup.Torc2 (talk) 04:03, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, in general, I'd have to agree with the original sentiment (if not the exact tone in which it was delivered). Seems like far too much time is spent navel-gazing and spit-balling that could likely be better spent in other pursuits. (And before someone says it, no, I'm not suggesting that WP:N or other guidelines be ignored either...) --Craw-daddy | T | 02:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for taking time out from improving articles so you could waste your time with us here. Be sure to visit again in another four years when another Simpsons article from season one is a GA nominee. --Pixelface (talk) 06:39, January 16, 2008 (UTC)

I used to have sympathy for you, but I truly can't after that statement. Over the last year the Simpsons Wikiproject has made over 70 articles GA and 7 FA. We even started before there were a WP:EPISODE. It doesn't take years to make an article GA. In fact~, it usually only takes a few hours. If you start producing GA's then they can't delete them. Anyway, I can't see why you take all your anger out the Simpsons Wikiproject. We have done nothing to deserve that. --Maitch (talk) 09:57, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it did take editors years to make Bart the General a GA nominee. I'm not taking any anger out on the Simpsons WikiProject. But people saying this page is a waste of time and then commenting on this page seems a little odd to me. I think the Simpsons WikiProject has done great work. Other editors consider the work an embarrassment. --Pixelface (talk) 18:33, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks you had all the time to make it a GA, too bad the rest of the episodes are not having a chance when they are been redirected and deleted (and not merged on lists) before anyone has a chance to do it. Samuel Sol (talk) 12:14, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Excuse me Torc2, what do you mean? xihix(talk) 02:26, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Very well said, Xihix. -- Ned Scott 02:44, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

He's saying that he'd rather work at the policy/guideline level than save one episode page while thousands are removed. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:14, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Redirects are not the end of the world. A lot of folks are claiming that redirect is "Deleting under a different name". That's not true. The versions of articles prior to redirect are available (I can show how to anyone who wants to). work on an article in a sandbox, and then when it complies with Misplaced Pages policies (regarding notability, verifiability and Reliable Sources), merge it back to to the article.

BTW, I was the one who brought up Bart the General on the ArbCom case, and I want to commend the WP:SIMPSONS project on fixing the article. If more people spent time fixing issues rather then bellyache about "OMG how evil those deletionists are", we wouldn't BE in that situation. Take heed from what they did. SirFozzie (talk) 04:39, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Are you going to teach 6.2 million registered users as well as every anonymous editor how to bypass redirects? WP:N is not a policy and WP:RS is not a policy. And the idea that each episode is a separate topic that exists outside a series is ridiculous. If people spent time finding sources for articles and citing TV ratings instead of sweeping articles under the rug, we wouldn't be here. --Pixelface (talk) 07:10, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

They're not policies, but you're going to have a hell of a time trying to override the consensus backing those pages. If users don't understand how to bypass redirects, then take it up with the developers so they can change the interface. -- Ned Scott 07:30, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

This seems to be a common type of reply. If you don't like how FICT is used, go discuss it at ??? (NOTE and PLOT?). If you don't like how redirects are being used, go talk to the volunteer software devolopers. Talking to the people who are creating this lack of conensus is the right first step. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:36, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the assumption of bad faith. I actually believe it should be easier for users to understand how to undo a redirect. My point was that it was a limitation of the interface that could be fixed, and the idea that one had to teach 6.2 million users was a false dilemma. -- Ned Scott 07:41, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Xihix may well represent another breed of Wikiusers. Those who care more about content than endless discussions. They only take notice when locating big changes decided in their absence. Ned ,seriously, the reply is getting repetitive. It sounds like a constant invitation for your ideological opponents to leave the discussion ground and start another one elsewhere. Both Misplaced Pages talk:Notability and Misplaced Pages talk:What Misplaced Pages is not actually already contain recent discussions on their current wording and/or interpretation. Do you actually think three simultaneous discussions would actually resolve anything? I think it would confuse everyone involved and leave us trying to locate who said what and on what pageDimadick (talk) 18:56, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Dimadick, seriously, my reply was not intended to be like that at all. Seriously, man, seriously. If you look at my comments you'll see I've done very little of "go take it to X talk page". I even pointed out once that WP:PLOT wasn't the result of a discussion on its talk page (not completely, just the proposal of the wording), but the result of several discussions in many places, thus one didn't necessarily have to change talk pages to change that policy (simple version, I suggested they could keep talking on the same talk page). People start to assert a lot of things in these kinds of heated debates. Things like "these people are deletionists, and they enjoy deleting articles" or "they hate TV shows" or "all of them do this or that". Now you've taken one of those assertions and applied it to me based on my lack of better wording in the above comment.

But while we're talking about it, it is a reasonable point that many users won't know how to undo a redirect. One idea brought up in WP:TV-REVIEW was to leave a list of old-id links to the articles on the talk page, making it easy for any user to understand how to undo the redirect (the thinking was they would do this when they found some real-world information/context). Feel free to take this in place of my suggestion (that the interface can change) as a rebuttal to Pixelface's comment and we won't have someone saying "take it to another talk page" and my point will still be made. -- Ned Scott 04:35, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I was asked to come here and voice an opinion in a centralized place

I was asked to come here and voice an opinion in a centralized place. What I would like to see happen is for this guideline to be deleted; for the people who are destroying wikipedia plot contents just because they lack enough non-plot content to be banned from wikipedia; and for that destruction to be reverted. People whose edits consist of deleting content that can be verified from widely available and popular primary sources are destroying an important part of wikipedia and should be permanently banned from wikipedia. WAS 4.250 (talk) 08:19, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

No, they are removing plots because they breach copyright and fair use issues. US law states that replication in detail of fictional content is derivative work unless it used sparingly for critical comment or to illustrate/illuminate a discussion of the work. Plot-only articles are ILLEGAL. They must have non-plot content to justify their use. Gwinva (talk) 18:39, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

"Permanently banned"? I don't think this is the opinion they were asking about. This is not about elminating opponents. Or at least I hope it isn't. Dimadick (talk) 19:03, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Uh...since when do we ban for editing? I don't like to see garbage articles (e.g., plot summary only) scattered all over the places, but those doing so are editing in good faith, if poorly, and I'd never desire to see them banned. Those who pick up the trash are also editing in good faith, and while, again, that can be done poorly, even those who do it poorly are doing it in good faith and should not be banned. Finally, cutting and trimming is not "destruction". It is editing. All good editors cut. The best cut ruthlessly and frequently. Seraphimblade 19:20, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Many, many episode articles that have been redirected have more than plot summaries. Television episode articles are not being redirected because they violate copyrights or pose fair use issues. They are typically redirected because editors consider the episode "non notable." --Pixelface (talk) 19:25, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Gwinva, you are clearly wrong here. A proper plot summary is not replication in detail, indeed the definition of summary prevents detail. If you were to actually look at the plot summaries on wikipedia for major TV episodes, you will see that they are sparse and accurately form a paraphrasing of the content (which, as it is then referenced to the source, is perfectly acceptable and does not constitute plagiarism). The legal allowance for plot summaries is clear from the existance of television guides, which feature an abstract for the episodes yet to come or coverage of those past. SFX magazine features a monthly spoiler section featuring the plot summaries of shows that have yet to air within the UK. Although these cases special legal allowance might have been sought, the fair simpler explanation is that these are seen as a perfectly acceptable creation and no special permission is needed. LinaMishima (talk) 19:58, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

However, one still needs to consider that plot summaries are derivative works, and technically, falls under non-free use issues. That said, the Foundation has not stated anything one way or another about this. There have been legal trials in the past against basically episode/show guides with the publishers losing, but while that may be an issue for the Foundation to worry about, until they state otherwise, we should just keep in mind that limited plot summaries support the fair use of non-free works, providing real world context even moreso (aka the allowance of free use for education purposes). Let's keep the copyright issue out of the picture as it is not our place as editors to decide this. --MASEM 20:03, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) :::see Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (writing about fiction)#Fair use. Yes, the good articles on Misplaced Pages have succinct sumamries, I agree. But articles cannot contain only plot. Then they exist solely to retell the story (even in brief form). Gwinva (talk) 20:08, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Should the viability of this guideline be listed at the Village Pump?

The "round-and-round" arguments between the same people is getting very tiresome. It is extremely obvious that WP:EPISODE does not have consensus. It is extremely obvious that a line has been drawn and editors are lining up on both sides. At this point, I would say the sides are close to even (my perception that the inclusionist side is larger may, I admit, be my bias). I agree with Kww that this will not die until one side or another is stopped. One possible solution is opening up the discussion to a wider audience, getting some new voices in the discussion, and that will, hopefully, tip the balance. Win, lose, or draw- it would tell us something. Does anybody have any other ideas for a broader forum? Ursasapien (talk) 08:57, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

This issue has been listed in Village Pump and a broad range in the community has and is being asked to participate in the discussion. --Maniwar (talk) 14:52, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem, like I tried to explain to Maniwar on User talk:Ned Scott#Centralized TV Episode Discussion, is that without some kind of structure to the debate/discussion, many users will be turned off by the chaos of it all. Something like Misplaced Pages:Spoiler warning/RfC might be good, Although, that discussion itself didn't really go anywhere, it was still easier to organize, considering the inevitably large amount of discussion. -- Ned Scott 04:51, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Please see my suggestion below for steps going forward by getting an RFC on the core issue of episode notability in community consensus, and then moving from there. --MASEM 04:58, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

My opinion in a different perspective.

I thought that this topic could be added as part of the TV talk. If I can use a metaphor instead of using Wiki talk maybe you'll understand what I'm talking about. Editing web pages is simply like writing a book. For example, I wrote a book about my dream world. When my book hits the store, other writers will think either good or bad. Good writers will write about their dreams but bad writers is pushing for excitement and intensity you want in a book. To add another level, you're going to need an assistant to check up on your work. If your assistant is suppose to clean up and edit its work into the book, then the book you write will be different in structure and tone. The Seinfeld page has gone from a badly organise webpage to a saving grace page thanks to Gprince007. If you want your work to be excellent than consider asking yourself before you work on the page.

What is your goal? You must have a goal. Example I want to add music to a page. That's a goal.

Where do you start? Introduce us what is about. Example Seinfeld is nothing but is actually something.

When do you edit? Only if something wrong was in the page. Example "The male-unbonding" should be "Male-unbonding".

What to delete? When something is irrelevant. Like musicals are boring should be deleted as an example.

Why edit the page? If you decide that you want to delete that section than answer it in the most simple way the talk page. If people disagree with your deletion than you must give in.

The ups should be that anyone can edit but be warned that if you decide to delete the most value information, you should consider the consequences that the other editors have worked so hard on. If a paragraph is done by thousands of editors and you decide to delete it, you're going to pay the high price for it. Right now I'm neutral between those ideas. You can respond to my opinion but think of a metaphor to back up your claim. That way people understand you more clearly. Well thanks for mentioning it in the Seinfeld talk page. Johnnyauau2000 (talk) 08:58, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

When the seagulls follow the trawler, it's because they think sardines will be thrown in to the sea. ]

An attempted summary of what is and is not being discussed

What I find quite telling is not what is being discussed, but the manner in which some of the discussion is taking place and what is not even being discussed in depth at all. I found not writing some of the below as weighted statements too difficult, so please use common sense were mine failed. As I currently see it, there are really only a few matters actually up for debate here:

• The need in WP:V for reliable, third-party sources
  • It should hopefully be obvious that verifiability is non-negotiable for an encyclopaedia. The debate here is about the level of third-party sources needed, if coverage of the series transfers to individual episodes, if significant coverage is required from third party sources, and if commentary tracks and the like count (technically, they are second-party, I believe)
• The importance of episodes to the coverage of a TV Series
  • There is a lot of talk about the 'inheritance' of notability, yet almost all I've seen simplify matters too much. I doubt there is a simple rule for when the individual episodes of a TV Show are or are not important enough to merit individual coverage.
• The purpose of wikipedia - for the editors or for the readers?
  • I can't actually believe that this is even being discussed, but there are a few people here stressing an opinion one way or another, and the result of this directly influences aspects of this debate.
• The purpose of 'cruft' and notability to wikipedia
  • The really interesting thing here is that my comments regarding the constructive or destructive nature of verified 'cruft' have had little discussion at all. This really addresses flaws in other policies, however this matter is at the heart of a lot of actions taken.
• The best form for information - articles versus lists?
  • Misplaced Pages culture favours articles, to the point were small articles are often seen as something to delete rather than something to find a better home for the information. There is also a focus on list entries being extremely brief, based upon an assumption that entries will have articles spun out from them if more than a single line of description is desired. Is this how wikipedia should be?
• The best means to improve the information on a subject - delete and rewrite or work from a starting point?
  • Again, this is a wider wikipedia culture issue. Current culture is such that were properly verified material is seen as not up to a high enough quality level, editors without the time or inclination to work on the article may nominate it for deletion. Deletion removes the entry for the article from the system, preventing later merging of the writing or a proper rewrite. As a rule, volunteers for any project (including wikipedia) find it easier to do small tasks than more significant contributions. Does this make deletion harmful, but is it not true that it is simple to add content again later?
• The process by which deletion, merger and implementation of policy and guidelines is performed
  • Ultimately we would not even be here today if a degree of sensible due process had been followed.

If I have forgotten any key aspect, please let me know. Some of the above may not have been directly discussed or are with regards to other policies and guidelines, but they form an essential part of the debate. I strongly suggest that, rather than bickering on general terms, we break down the debate and look at each of the above issues in turn, excluding comments that do not directly focus on the individual matter at hand (however, of course, those that tie in closely are allowed, and the debate should be structured so that those issues that influence others will be discussed first). LinaMishima (talk) 11:04, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I am more interested in what sources we are allowed to use. If every available comprehensive work available to us is uncritically thrown out because it was created by fans and not professionals then we are seriously limiting ourselves. Dimadick (talk) 19:11, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

To some extent, I agree that as more information is available only digitally, there's less a distinction between professional and fan. We still have WP:RS to guide what can't be used, but I would argue that if there's a resource (and the best example I can think of is Television Without Pity) that the community can agree is a reliable review source for establishment of notability, then great. But trying to demonstrate notability with two or so reviews from such sites is a bit wary - it would be nice to suppliment in this case additional information from development and other aspects if at all possible. However, I would say that 1) if such sites are community agreed as reliable sources for reviews and 2) the episode article at the time only demonstrates notability through those types of reviews, then the article should not be merged/moved/whatever, though editors should still strive to improve it. --MASEM 19:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

According to the Music recording sales certification article, in the UK, an album has to sell 100,000 copies before it's certified "gold"; in the US, an album has to sell 500,000 copies before it's certified "gold." I think that ignoring Nielsen Ratings when it comes to the notability of television episodes is severely flawed. --Pixelface (talk) 19:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem with Nielsen Ratings directly is that that information exists for each episode; it is a non-notable to find that data (it is useful data to include, but it is just that, just like air dates, producers, and other infobox data). I can an argument saying that Episode X, based on neilsen ratings, was the nth highest watched show during that week, where n is a reasonably bound number, maybe 10 or 20? Though it would be better if this data was filtered through some other news source, there's at least a few TV sites that report the top X shows of the week and how that reflects on the networks' performance. I would also argue that Neilsen ratings, unless others made notable, are more like flash-in-the-pan news items, since it only describes the first airing of that episode and not subsequent ones. --MASEM 19:54, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

So, set a threshold for automatic inclusion and allow ratings to be used as argument for other episodes on a case-by-case basis. It doesn't matter if it's just data - if the ratings say 500k or 1m TVs tuned into an episode, it's notable. Torc2 (talk) 00:04, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

"Notability", in our twisted use of the word, can also means that there should be enough real-world information about an episode to warrant its own article. The idea being that there are many things vastly more important than TV shows, such as certain processes of our own bodies, that share an article with more than one topic. (which has many different deciding factors, and can change from topic to topic, so YMMV) Even without that, raw data still needs context. A show gets higher ratings because of the show, or because the other channel is showing a boring political debate? -- Ned Scott 05:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree with LinaMishima that those matters should be the main focus of the debate. --Pixelface (talk) 19:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

• "The need in WP:V for reliable, third-party sources" A lot has gotten lost in the sea of debate here. One of the things that most of us do agree on is that sources do not have to be strictly from a 3rd party. In fact, a great many acceptable sources come from DVD commentaries and writers notes, that would not be considered "3rd party". I like to think of it as "dependent notability". It's not enough to isolate the episode from the parent articles, but it's definitely what we would consider acceptable.

• "The best form for information - articles versus lists?" A good point. In my own experiences, when one cuts out what many would agree to be "unnecessary" plot summary, or to write it in a more succinct way, that what's left is a stub that can easily be merged to another article, be it a list of episodes or a season page (an idea that really hasn't gotten proper attention). I don't believe "Misplaced Pages culture favours articles", rather I believe that to be a misconception on many levels (for example, some people, on both "sides" incorrectly view this as an all-or-nothing situation).

• "The best means to improve the information on a subject - delete and rewrite or work from a starting point?" this reply I gave for another thread on this page summarizes how I view this question:

"One of the things that was attempted with WP:TV-REVIEW was to establish the idea that we only have to show potential for a good episode article, regardless of the current shape of the article. If there was no realistic reason to believe an article had such potential, it was then merged or redirected (many were redirected since the plot summary itself wasn't even in good shape, and could be better stated from scratch). "

• Add to that last point what I said in my second point here.

• A very decent summary (although, I hope that some of these issues are seen in a different light, like I tried to bring up in some of my responses above, to depolarize some of the discussion) -- Ned Scott 05:11, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Prior consensus

There was a consensus previously established regarding the Pokemon characters, the consensus being that the articles should be merged to lists in line with WP:FICT. I believe that demonstrates a community consensus for WP:FICT which has changed little since, and that therefore the consensus is that major episodes have their own articles, while minor episodes should be merged into lists. Hiding T 14:01, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I will also add that WP:ANIME seems to have no problem with this as well (applying it both to anime episodes and manga chapters): List of Naruto episodes (seasons 1-2), List of Fullmetal Alchemist episodes, List of Yotsuba&! chapters are just a few of the Featured Lists from the project, and none have a specific episode page. Heck, even the List of Pokémon episodes (season 1) follows the same with only 1 episode link since that one was notable (the seizure one). --MASEM 14:32, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, the project is actually making a concerted effort to do the same with most other anime series that have had episode articles spawned off of them. It's also discussing making a task force dedicated to nothing but the episode, character, and media articles and dealing with those sub-articles that shouldn't have been spawned off. That is a whole project worth of consensus, and one of the two biggest effected by Episode. Collectonian (talk) 14:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Refocusing

I'm trying to bring everyone back to the discussion and refocus back to why we are here. Of course I have my bias, but I will try to be as neutral as possible. I was sucked into this issue a few months ago editing my first episode. I 'was' in the process of improving, adding sources, and removing POV statements from TV article. The article was wiped out with no discussion, no tagging, and no explanation. I had added six or so sources, worked some on MOS and was moving through the main article as well as the sub articles as I found info. When I tried to reason with the individual, it was reverted, and redirected. Then the assistance came along to bully me. After they lost an AfD, the article was restored. The main issue in this whole thing is the lack of communication and the sheer volume of deletions taking place per day. Do some articles belong in wikipedia? No...But I'm not the one to answer that question, but what I would like to see is AGF and spirit of co-operation. If an article is deemed bad, tag it, allow a month, one week is too short, then come back and redirect or start a discussion. The current system is degrading wikipedia and the sides are growing ever larger and larger and creating edit wars.

A redirect and the bullying should not have happened on the article I was editing because it was in an improvement drive. I personally do not believe that WP:Episode has the consensus and many times in various other discussions, it has been pointed out that it has been changed to the current standing over the past six to eight months. I think if a compromise could take place benefiting both sides, the issues would be brought to a nil. Yes articles need to be improved, but do not alienate the community. Another Note: The argument has moved from Wp:Episode being the guideline, to WP:N, to WP:Fiction, to WP:Television; this gives the opinion and view that some people just want the articles removed. What can we accomplish here allowing both sides to work together. One thing I notice is that some have refused to take a 36 hour break and seek a resolution. Articles need to be improved and if they are not, then and only then, redirect them. However, if an article is tagged, it should be removed if effort is not done to improve it. My proposal

1. If an article is found, Tag and allow a one month improvement Drive. One week is not enough and editors do need to be notified.
2. WP:Episode needs to seek community consensus (be it gained or lost) so that this issue is resolved and the questioning put to ease
3. Editors need to improve the article within the time allotted, and if not, refrain from attacking those who feel it necessary to clean up wikipedia.
4. The volume of reverting needs to be cut to a fraction, and instead tagging take it's place. Allow people the opportunity to improve.
5. If an article is being improved (currently) do not tag it or revert it.
6. Taggers/Deletionist's - communicate to people and discontinue the insults and beatings.
   1. Stick to one argument for the tag and later reverting. Be consistent
7. Instead of just redirecting and deleting, actually move some of the information to the proposed article.
8. Remember there is no cookie cutter solution. Many articles will not have the wealth of internet information as the internet was not around. The Honeymooners will not have tons of real world information because it was well before the internet existed, or even some shows in the 80's, 70's, 60's...so be willing to compromise and scrutinize differently.

I'm sure there are more and I will add to it as I think of them, but this is just a start towards keeping the AGF and community spirit. --Maniwar (talk) 15:19, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Most of what you are suggesting (per procedure) is similar to what we've found seems appropriate for any fictional work per the rewrite at WP:FICT. A month after notification to given some measure of good-faith effort for improvement (give or take on readily available sources) seems appropriate. In fact, I don't think anyone seems to have any issues with this save for the notification process, and that's more a matter of how can we improve it (where should people be notified, where should discussion take place, etc. EG the idea of an AfM board), and making sure both sides follow it. I am, however, not of the opinion that the core problem is here.

As per Pixelface and Torc2 and others, the two points of contention seem to be notability related, and are specifically are:

• Are episode of a notable show automatically notable without further demonstration?
• If the above is not the case, then For an episode article, is simply a plot summary and a complete infobox a demonstration of notability and/or satisfy WP:PLOT?

We need to address these points, neither from the viewpoint of trying to save articles nor get rid of articles, but fundamentally, what makes a TV episode notable. People need to step back, take out their dislike for other editors, their worries of losing information they've lovingly put into articles, and just only consider these issues with respect to WP's core policies and guidelines. --MASEM 15:36, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Your issues cannot be addressed until WP:Fiction and WP:Episode is addressed. Both are contested as not having consensus and both are questioned in how they're being applied. And both are suggested guidelines, not guidelines and not procedures. The nine issues addressed above will resolve your questions. --Maniwar (talk) 16:23, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Consider notability as defined by WP:N, "significant coverage by secondary sources". FICT and EPISODE ultimately have to fall within that definition, refined for the specific genre/medium. --MASEM 16:34, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

No, episodes of a notable show are not inherently notable. No, an infobox and plot does not satisfy notability. Notable episodes are those that have been nominated for individual awards; have had elements of that episode nominated for an award (i.e. "best supporting actor" for a guest-starring role); reached an unusual peak of ratings (such as the finale of M*A*S*H); or achieved other notoriety (the "seizure-causing" episode of Pokemon; the Trapped in the Closet episode of South Park, etc.)Kww (talk) 16:28, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

So M*A*S*H is only notable for its series finale? Pokemon is only notable for it's seizure-causing episode? South Park is only notable for the Trapped in the Closet episode? A show is its episodes. --Pixelface (talk) 20:36, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Debate is not helped when you purposely misread an opponent arguments. I never argued against series articles, and, as a matter of practicality, don't argue against season articles. Much like I would argue against separate articles for each issue of Detective Comics, while I have no argument with the existence of that article, either.Kww (talk) 20:51, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I didn't purposely misread what you said. I asked you a question. If you say "episodes of a notable show are not inherently notable", it seems to me like you're saying that a television show is notable for the episodes that are notable enough to have articles. I don't think you've argued against series articles. I might argue against separate articles for issues of comic books as well, but I think television episodes are more akin to short films. --Pixelface (talk) 00:23, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

That connection is one that you continuously make, but doesn't make any sense to me at all. Please don't ascribe it to anything I write.Kww (talk) 00:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, didn't see this response before. Wiki assumes certain levels of notability about certain items based solely on the nature of the item. Take this list of topics:

1. A rural airport with no commercial passenger service.
2. A town of 1,200 people in northern Manitoba.
3. A greatest hits collection by a major band that includes no new material.
4. A TV episode broadcast on a major national network in prime time.
5. A high school with an unknown number of students.
6. A TV episode that receives a 0.8 Nielsen rating.
7. A musician whose only release reached #97 on the Billboard Music charts and stays there for a week.
8. A small private university.
9. A band that performs several dates across Switzerland, but never releases anything.
10. The president of a small South Pacific country who dies a month after taking office.

Assuming the existence of the item is proven, which of these, either through rule, consensus, or practice usually get kept in an AfD discussion based on the default assumption they're notable? Which of these would you expect to be notable by default?Torc2 (talk) 01:37, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Nothing is automatically notable by Misplaced Pages's standards. You have to show it is notable through independent coverage, no matter what the topic is. ●BillPP 01:46, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Really? Are you sure? Every topic up there except the TV episodes, which actually affect more people than any of the other topics, are presumed or deemed notable by various precendences or guidelines. The criteria given for the episodes listed are clearly enough to establish episode notability with no other information. Torc2 (talk) 02:23, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, they're notable by precedents and guidelines, but you will still need to provide sources to show that they meet the criteria. There's a reason that these precedents and guidelines don't exist for Television episodes. Without the secondary coverage they violate other existing policies such as WP:PLOT. Also without the critical analysis from secondary sources and the articles just are a recap of the episode, then their could be legal issues as it might not qualify for fair use. ●BillPP 03:12, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

No, you generally don't. As long as you prove they exist, the notability is assumed, and the topic will survive an AfD. That's been the case time and time again. The criteria is as low as "Can you prove this an airport?" "Yes." "Then it's notable." That's should be the criteria for an episode: Was it on a major network in prime time? Yes? It's notable. Is there any question whatsoever that more people have watched any given episode of Scrubs than have collectively attended an average high school in the U.S.? Torc2 (talk) 03:51, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The town and the head-of-state would be the only ones on your list where notability is assumed from the nature of the article. We even cover heads of government with very short tenures. The band is the most likely to get deleted because of having no chance to get press coverage and notability. But which episode articles do you suggest should get notable status by their very nature? Dimadick (talk) 11:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• WP:FICT is a guideline. The wording is disputed, granted, but the principle itself is a guideline, everyone discussing the guideline is agreed on the fact that there is a guideline there. Let's just knock that one on the head. There is consensus in a version of WP:FICT, be that one from a year ago, one from six months ago, one from last week or one we are currently writing. We are trying to work out which version has the strongest consensus, but, as noted above, the principle that major fictional things have an article but minor ones are merged into a list has been guidance on Misplaced Pages for something like four years. Let's not pretend otherwise. Hiding T 16:45, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

A few points:

• There is some claim that WP:EPISODE has changed recently: it has merely been expanded, to include quotes from other polocies. See diff carefully (ie. word for word). (apart from the "what to do with problem articles" and a few helpful examples)
• people claim WP:EPISODE has no consensus. Which specific points do people not agree with? For each point has been taken from another policy; These all have consensus on their respective policies and represent the wider Misplaced Pages policies (which are core, and without which Misplaced Pages would not be an encyclopedia).
• It is supposed to be helpful rather than prescriptive: people come not knowing how to write an article, or what Misplaced Pages's core policies are. This presents a straightforward example of a good approach, and provides links to the policies it rests on. Its aim is to encourage people to write good articles; it does not (and should not) exist as an excuse to delete/redirect. It would be silly to say FA or GA guidelines are wrong (or have no consensus) because not all articles are like that now (or will ever be). It's an "ideal article" guideline or "how-to" guide, not a "do this or you're all condemned forever" kind of order. Look at it this way: if an article conformed to this guideline, would it be a good and strong one? Yes. That's a good thing to aspire to, isn't it?
• what to do with "problem" articles is another issue. Suggestions above are similar to what was tried at Misplaced Pages:Television article review process, but which lacked enough support to keep it going, (and there were a couple of sabateurs who tried to MfD it out of existence) so things went back to the "Be Bold" rational of redirecting/merging what you want, without warning. Perhaps the concept could be revisited.
• we want to be constructive and help people make better articles. Best way is to show them good ones, and point out ones that, unfortunately, to not yet meet WP:N guidlines, or would be speedy deleted in any other context.
• a lot has been said about plots "plot summaries are good", "don't delete my plot-only article". Whatever we want or prefer, we must still conform to US Copyright law which law states that replication in detail of fictional content is derivative work (and thus must initiated/licensed by the original author only) unless it used sparingly for critical comment or to illustrate/illuminate a discussion of the work. Plot-only articles are ILLEGAL. They must have non-plot content to justify their use.
• lists are not bad. Merging small articles to create larger onnes is good. See Smallville (season 1) for example of how this has been done well. Gwinva (talk) 19:15, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Who has defended plot-only articles?Torc2 (talk) 19:21, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The diff you provided shows that an editor made some huge changes to WP:EPISODE and included material from some essays. That doesn't sound good to me. WP:N says nothing about television episodes and WP:EPISODE seems to suggest that television episodes are a topic completely separate from a television series — which is false. If WP:EPISODE is meant to be helpful, it needs to be merged or redirected into Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Television/How to write an episode article — because WP:EPISODE is clearly being used as a "notability guideline" (it's not, it's a content guideline) and editors are saying articles "fail" this guideline. There's the guideline and then there's how it is actually applied. The guideline is being widely mis-applied, so the guideline needs to be changed. It seems clear to me that "problem" articles can be dealt with by editors associated with WikiProject Television and the episode coverage task force. Redirecting an article only provides an obstacle to improvement.

Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Television/How to write an episode article is there to help editors make better articles. Even if articles with only plot summaries can be construed to be a derivative work, most episode articles I've seen that have been redirected have more just a plot summary. And merging articles is great. But editors adding merge tags to episode articles are very rarely merging any information. I think the major contributors to episode articles (which can be found using aka's tool) should be notified on their talk pages of merge discussions, with a template like {{mergenote}}, which I created and is similar to {{AFDNote}}. Also, I think Carcharoth came up with a great idea at the request for arbitration. A list of oldid urls of the articles before they were redirected should be placed on the talk page of the list of episodes article so editors who want to improve the articles can do it more easily. --Pixelface (talk) 20:32, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Even if you manage to depreciate EPISODE, notability will still be judged by FICT, and barring issues with that, NOTE. There will always be (unless WP:IINFO is changed) a notability guideline. And barring behavior of how episode articles merged or the like, this is one of the two core issues - what defines episode notability - it is our normal notability guidelines (discounting the show's notability) or is the episode automatically notable if the episode is notable. I do not think we will be able to find a consensus here because this is not a direct policy issue, but instead an issue of semantics (is the show notable because of episodes, or not?), unless we open up a much larger discussion to proceed. --MASEM 20:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages is not an indiscriminate collection of information

Ultimately, that's what all of this comes down to. The argument is about WP:Episode, WP:FICT, WP:N but ultimately it all comes down to this one section of this one policy. The question thus is how to interpret it. The key word in this sub-policy is "indiscriminate". Misplaced Pages is certainly a collection of information. And ultimately, I think it comes down to what we really want Misplaced Pages to be doing in terms of content related to fiction. Misplaced Pages is not an indiscriminate collection of information, so clearly there are certain guidelines for inclusion. This is why the guidelines about notability exist. But this must be balanced by the other thing that Misplaced Pages is not: a paper encyclopedia. It is not a free pass for inclusion, but it points out correctly that the ultimate rule for inclusion is not what can be done, but what should be done. And now my rambling argument reaches a new point of interest: the definition of the word "encyclopedia." An encyclopedia, ultimately, is a collection of information. Its sole purpose is to inform the reader. Thus, ultimately what "should be done" is determined not by policies or guidelines, not even by the contributors, but by the readers. We the contributors must try to deduce what the readers are looking for. If enough people are looking for it, we put it in.

I'm not really trying to argue in favor of one particular thing over another. Rather, I think the important thing is to think about what we want Misplaced Pages to be doing. Ultimately, DO we want it to be OK with plot summaries? It doesn't matter what the policies say on the matter right now. We should decide what we want, and see if we can't make it wanted enough to BECOME the policy on the matter. Let's not talk about policies and guidelines at this point. Who cares if TV episodes are notable? The real question is simple: what do we want Misplaced Pages to be doing in this regard? How do we want to define notability? What is our fundamental wish on this topic, regardless of what anyone else or any policy would dictate? Policies change. Let's figure out right now if we think this one should. --Maratanos (talk) 21:51, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I believe that episodes such as Series Finales, Pilots, 100th episodes, and any others that are notable in some other way. Scrubs works this way, I believe, but shows like Nip/Tuck, That '70s Show, etc. have NO articles at all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.176.166.228 (talk) 23:38, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

This is a common misunderstanding of WP:NOT#INDISCRIMINATE, which is actually different from WP:NOTABILITY. The "indiscriminate" clause is more to do with articles staying on-topic, or with article topics being narrow enough to have a coherent article. In other words, "List of appearances of the London Eye in popular culture" can be an indiscriminate listing, or a narrow, focused listing. The criterion sometimes used is whether the instances are "notable", but that has little to do with the basic premise that poorly-conceived articles and lists often try to pull together disparate factoids in an indiscriminate fashion. This should be distinguished from the question of whether Misplaced Pages, as a whole, should select what it choses to cover. The criterion usually used to select what to cover is notability. In the case of episode articles, people do often chose to be less discriminating and cover plot and characters more widely than others would, but the narrow focus of these articles on an episode doesn't make them inherently indiscriminate. It is more the choices of editors over what to include that can be described as indiscriminate. Carcharoth (talk) 11:42, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Possible solution

Copied over from my statement at the request for arbitration.

It should be noted that the smerging of a long episode article (shortening and merging the article) can result in lots of text being edited away and made difficult to work on (not many people are aware that the previous text is still accessible in the page history of the redirect, for example). I think there are several ways for the community to resolve this without involving ArbCom. What is needed is a solution that satisfies people at both extremes. I propose the following (previously posted at ANI) as a starting point.

It is trivially easy to generate a list of the page revisions before all of TTN's redirects, and to put such a list of links to those old articles, either on an external website or on a WikiProject page or talk page. Linking to old versions from within an article itself would subvert the entire Misplaced Pages process, but it is technically possible, so something should be done to forbid putting links to old versions of other articles in current articles. For Open All Hours, try this list of episode articles I generated from looking at "what links here", and filtering for redirects and then grabbing the oldid numbers of the versions before the redirects:

• Open All Hours Pilot
• Full of Mysterious Promise
• A Mattress on Wheels
• A Nice Cosy Little Disease
• Beware of the Dog
• Well Catered Funeral
• Apples And Self Service
• Laundry Blues
• The Reluctant Traveller
• Fig Biscuits And Inspirational Toilet Rolls
• The New Suit
• Arkwright's Mobile Store
• Shedding At The Wedding
• St Albert's Day
• A Mattress on Wheels

I would suggest that in cases where lots of text is being smerged, that TTN (and others) leave such links in a central place, as a courtesy to editors who may wish to work on the removed material and provide sources. There are already talk page templates that call oldid numbers for featured articles - the same sort of thing could be done here. Would this be a workable compromise? The redirects would stick, but editors are pointed to older material to work from if they find sources. A similar principle applies at Category:Redirects with possibilities. Indeed, I would suggest that some template is used (if it doesn't already exist) to group the redirects into categories of: (a) Redirects from episode articles; and (b) Episodes of ABC. See Misplaced Pages:Categorizing redirects for more on how that works. Thus TTN (and others) would simply have to remember to put this template on any redirects they carry out, and they or others could create categories to hold the redirects, and lists (using oldids) to the episode articles in a "episodes with possibilities" page on the relevant WikiProject. People could then pick a particularly promising episode that they have several sources for, and work it up to a full article again. There are other ideas, but this one could, I think, help avoid the incessant drama, as it provides way for both sides to work together instead of revert warring. TTN and others would help ensure material with possibilities is not made too hard to find, and those wanting to work on episode articles would still have easy access to the text and a starting point for debates.

So, what do people think? Is this workable? Is this centralised discussion the longest ever? :-) Carcharoth (talk) 01:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think it's a great idea. Getting editors who redirect articles to actually do it is another matter altogether. --Pixelface (talk) 04:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Technically those doing redirects should do it, but even if they don't there is nothing to stop you doing this instead of reverting redirects. Generate the list of "before redirect oldids", and then start a discussion that can use the links to debate which articles should be their own articles. If you do this, and the "other side" (remembering that we are all on the same side, of course) continues to carry out redirects at a rate outstripping the ability of you and other editors to keep up with discussions and keeping track of things, then I think you will find attitudes changing even among those who feel that none of the episode articles being redirected should currently have articles. In the area where I've been doing redirects, I've been doing full merges into lists, so this problem doesn't usually arise. It is good practice though to leave a link somewhere to the pre-smerge version when carrying out a smerge. Carcharoth (talk) 11:22, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think you've got a great idea. I think it would be quite possible that people would realistically do that (especially if the other side showed equal good faith by not using the link list to perform a mass revert). Seraphimblade 05:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Of course. Mass reversion and mass redirecting are both disruptive. Hopefully some system like this will help keep track of what is going on. When an article gets deleted, the AfD is a permanent record. Smerges should similarly have a more visible record. In theory, the "what links here - show redirects only" tool should show all the redirects, and such a link could be permanently placed on the "list" article's talk page, and then expanded to show links to the pre-smerge versions. Carcharoth (talk) 11:22, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Editor Methodoly

One thing I think should be addressed is that if editors like TTN (an administrator here) are treating the article by doing blanket reverts; wouldn't it be safe to say this is something of an abuse of his admin role? WAVY 10 Fan (talk) 13:59, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

TTN is not an administrator. --Pixelface (talk) 16:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

/* Refocusing */ radical rethinking can be helpful

I was asked to come here and I have read all this page and have a suggestion. Why don't we just throw out wikipedia's "core policies and guidelines"? Obviously nobody likes them (except a few very negative-seeming people). i've seen no justification for any of these principles, only harm. Misplaced Pages is very strong and does not need them. Maybe it once did, but not now. I know this seems radical (literally), but maybe we need thinking out of the box and maybe my eyes are newer than others in this discussion. Just delete the ones that don't allow articles on TV, which we can all agree is a significant factor in our culture and important to write about, so we know these are bad policies.==206.105.184.27 (talk) 16:40, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The core policies don't militate against episode articles, though. An episode stub doesn't violate WP:NPOV, WP:OR or WP:V.--Nydas 17:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Nydas, the user is suggesting that Misplaced Pages can survive without policies. I think he/she took a very literal definition of "radical" at some point. Dimadick (talk) 19:23, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

However, it's taken from a false premise. The user starts from the premise that core policies forbid writing about TV. If that were really the case, I would be inclined to say "Hey, you know what, there really is something wrong here." But that premise is false. The television article seems to be alive and well. The article on The Honeymooners sure still looks to be there, as does the one on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and General Hospital and NBC and Fox News and...hey, it looks like we've got a lot of writing about TV! The only thing we're now missing is a load of permastubs consisting of nothing more than a plot summary of a single show. That's not a bad thing. That's the place of a fansite, not an encyclopedia. Seraphimblade 19:28, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Stubs are perfectly acceptable on Misplaced Pages. Read the editing policy. And an infobox is more than a plot summary. Articles with infoboxes and a plot summary don't make Misplaced Pages a fansite. And there's nothing wrong with "fans" editing articles. I would think that most articles are edited by people interested in the topic. Volunteers don't get paid, so they tend to edit articles about topics they are interested in. I think Misplaced Pages is not the place for fan fiction, but fans doing source-based research on fictional works is perfectly fine. --Pixelface (talk) 20:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

IAR

What about Misplaced Pages:Ignore all rules. I think it is pretty clear that in order to improve Misplaced Pages, the nitpicking on "Oh, this doesn't meet WP:whatevertheheckyouthinkiswrong so it's getting deleted" needs to cease. The deletion of many pages does NOTHING to improve Misplaced Pages, nor was there any consensus to it in most cases. The outsiders look at this kind of crap and the perception of Misplaced Pages itself goes down. Let me repeat: THIS KIND OF ACTION HURTS THE REPUTATION OF WIKIPEDIA. I've heard it said many times before that WP admins are only admins for the power trip, and it's a widespread belief. This debacle just goes to prove it.

I think the notability issue comes down to perspective. If you aren't a fan of the show, none of the episodes will appear notable. If you are a fan, many of the episodes will appear notable. Danakin (talk) 19:35, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

The notability issue comes down to the notability guideline. That way it's not subjective and it's supposed to be easier to see if a topic is notable or not. ●BillPP 19:38, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Even the notability guideline says notability can only be presumed or suggested. I think it's obvious that if a televison show is notable, it suggests that the episodes are notable. And I think Nielsen Ratings also suggest an episode is notable. --Pixelface (talk) 20:15, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Danakin, you make a number of excellent points. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles 17:21, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Notability as perspective respects the spirit of the laws; quoting notability "policy" respects only the letter of the laws. I don't write about TV episodes; I wouldn't even be writing about them in the absence of the current poisoned atmosphere. I don't have the time to do the research, and prefer to spend my time on other matters. When the matter comes up in outside conversations I do look up relevant episode articles as the occasion requires. I appreciate that they are there. In that respect I suppose that I'm like most of Misplaced Pages's passive reading public. The real embarrassment to Misplaced Pages is not the immense number of stub articles, it's the reputation that is descended upon us by querulous cliques of POV pushers engaging in bad-faith crusades to eliminate whatever doesn't satisfy their overblown standards of importance. Far more bandwidth is wasted arguing about their destructiveness than would ever be spent on utterly ignorable stubs. They don't help their cause with point to a nauseating string of policies which they hope to use as excuses for their bad behaviour. If these people spent as much time working to improve the articles they criticize as they do trying to destroy them, the improvements that they pretend to seek would be achieved much faster. Eclecticology (talk) 21:59, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Moving forward: my ideas

Most of the dispute rests on how much emphasis this policy is given, through claims of "no consensus" etc. But none can deny that an article conforming to this guideline would be a good one. so:

• Re-define this page not as a prescriptive "content guideline" but as a "editing help" or "how to" or something like that, and make sure it links people to all the appropriate guidelines and policies. A first-step advice kind of thing, reminding people of other issues.

Some consider episodes to have inherant notability:

• take this discussion to WT:N, to determine if notability can be inherited, and whether components of a whole assume the notability of the whole. Allow that policy to determine notability.

People have taken exception to the mass "deletion" or "redirection" of articles, or are concerned about how to bring televison articles into line with Misplaced Pages's core policies:

• people who are interested in moving forward on some process regarding this should move to Misplaced Pages:Television article review process, familiarise themselves with the existing proposal, and discuss there what should be done (resurrect or redevelop or get rid of in favour of something else). people of all persuasions encouraged to contribute!

How's that? Gwinva (talk) 19:42, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Oppose to the first item. The majority of the arguments have still focused more on TTN and his actions and those of similar editors rather than real problems with this page. This page should remain a guideline, and the real issue of the best method of application focused on. Again, those wanting to dump it seem to think it will solve all the episode article issues, but it won't. Go get rid of WP:N and WP:FICT, because otherwise it will continue. I've already seen AfD's dropping mention of WP:EPISODE while its tagged disputed in favor of just listing all of the other WPs episode stublets violate.Collectonian (talk) 20:20, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to correct some errors in your thinking that you have led you to interject incorrect comments several times.

• The majority of the arguments have still focused more on TTN and his actions and those of similar editors rather than real problems with this page.

• The majority of the arguments have focused on the real problems with this disputed guideline, including: the fact that it is confusing as it is neither a true notability guideline nor simply a style guideline, the fact that some of this guideline is redundant without any greater interpretation or clarity, the fact that it has no consensus, and the fact that it is too specific to address the true issues that editors face.

• Again, those wanting to dump it seem to think it will solve all the episode article issues, but it won't.

• I and many others have said that this will not make anything better. It will deprecate this prescriptive, redundant piece of instruction creep. It will focus our efforts on WP:FICT and WP:WAF- the true notability and manual of style guidelines for fiction. It will force us to develop solutions for all fiction on Misplaced Pages (including comics, books, video games, etc.)

• I've already seen AfD's dropping mention of WP:EPISODE while its tagged disputed in favor of just listing all of the other WPs episode stublets violate.

• And, there, you make my point beautifully for me. EPISODE has become a crutch for a certain segment of editors. When asked, "What in EPISODE does this article exactly violate?" you never get a response quoting the "guideline." You either get the snide, "Maybe you should go read it," or you get a quote from WP:N or WP:FICT. EPISODE has NO consensus, but you continue to hear it quoted as if it has some relevance. Ursasapien (talk) 10:36, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think that a focus on WP:FICT and WP:WAF may be good, but not all television episodes are fiction. --Pixelface (talk) 12:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Um, thanks, but my thinking needed no corrections and actually, my point is that EPISODE is NOT a crutch for certain editors, its a faster way to reference a bunch of policies, but all the inclusionists will do if its removed is make delete arguments longer from having to cite everything summed up nicely by EPISODE. Collectonian (talk) 16:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Merge to How to write an episode article

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

The intro of this guideline states "The following guideline aims to promote the creation of high-quality articles about television shows and their episodes." So I am proposing this guideline be merged into Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Television/How to write an episode article. --Pixelface (talk) 20:09, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

loose support given my suggestion above I have to offer support for a merge. or a similar retitling/move. Gwinva (talk) 20:15, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Oppose this is a guideline, that is not even an official manual of style. This "merge" suggestion is just another attempt to downgrade WP:EPISODE to something people will feel they can easily ignore. And can't we finish one merge "discussion" before starting another one? Like this page isn't moving fast enough as it is...Collectonian (talk) 20:17, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I suggest we postpone discussing this while so much discussion about other aspects is going on. Adding another thing to talk about is just making it all too complicated to follow, especially for people just coming to the discussions. ●BillPP 20:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment: I have taken the liberty of removing the merge tag for now. I've certainly no personal objection to considering the proposal, but at present we have a rather involved discussion under way regarding this very guideline. Attempting to conduct a merge discussion at the same time is counter-productive and will only complicate matters. It would be more appropriate to conclude the discussion, assess the results, and then consider whether or not to merge. Thoughts? --Ckatz_spy 22:21, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Just because Maniwar decided this talk page would be the best place for a centralized discussion about television episodes, that does not mean a merge discussion cannot also take place. It may be a good idea to postpone the merge discussion, but who knows how long the centralized discussion will go on. One of the disputes over this guideline is that one editor is performing massive edit-warring under the mistaken belief this is the notability guideline for television episodes. This is not a notability guideline. If this guideline is meant to help editors write better episode articles, a discussion to merge it into Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Television/How to write an episode article is perfectly acceptable in my opinion. --Pixelface (talk) 23:15, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

In normal circumstances a discussion would be fine, but due to the scale of the current discussion I'd recommend against it. There has been nearly 300 edits to this page in just over 24 hours since the centralised discussion began. Also there may be some ramifications for this discussion depending on the outcome of the centralised one. The discussion on the merge proposal is valid, but it would be most useful if it took place after the conclusion of the centralised discussion. ●BillPP 23:27, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I'll archive this thread and we can postpone it until the centralized discussion is winding down. --Pixelface (talk) 00:08, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Some concepts to be taken into account

I want to say something about the value of the works we are talking about here. I'm a journalist and writer from Italy, I'm specialised in cinema and visual media. I have come here from the Scrubs episode list. I'm not a "fan" of Scrubs, I'm writing a book on Scrubs. That means I need all the info I can find about Scrubs and Scrubs episodes, even mere plot synopsis are very useful to me, as I can recollect memories from each single episode through them, while I make connections, compare narratives and summarise styles and visual ideas. What can ben inferred from this? It's very simple: an episode overlook of ANY sort is not a mere fan service, as it can be very useful to researchers. And damn it, academic researches about pop art and popular media are common ground today! And more and more will be tomorrow! It's very very very very stupid to think a "serious" encyclopedia should not treat these matters, because that will turn it into a old-fashioned dumb encyclopedia. And Misplaced Pages can't be so.
But there are some other things to be noted. From an expressive point of view, some Scrubs' (or other series') episodes are far superior to most movies (and NOT necessarily the awarded episodes, nor the most appreciated ones by fans over the web, a very stupid way of selection for a "fan-less" encyclopedia indeed). The worst movies in film history are covered in great details here on Misplaced Pages. What makes some teen ninja movie a better subject for a Wiki page instead of a complex-structured, experimental episode of Scrubs?
And we can deep further in this area of hypocrisy showed by the "deletionists": actually Misplaced Pages is a place where I can find the very important information " Bynes, who has a dog named Midge and drives a white Lexus SC430", or " Hilton is known for her love of small dogs, including a Yorkshire Terrier and a female Chihuahua named Tinkerbell". After reading that, it looks very silly indeed to call for an encyclopedia without fan content. I can know all about every American starlette, but I can't have a page about an episode of Scrubs, because the latter is "for fans only". It asks for some serious meditation. Kumagoro-42 (talk) 20:41, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

No, not really. Amanda, Paris, and all the other "starlets" (such a quaint term) are notable because they are famous, in the news with appalling regularity, and covered by numerous verifiable, neutral, and reliable sources. You can not compare living human beings who make news regularly to some episodes of a television show that are only covered as a standard listing in the various TV guides and maybe some personal and fan site reviews. That's not even apples and oranges, thats like comparing steak and grapes. As for films versus episodes, again, not a valid comparison. Crappy television shows get articles same as crappy films. Heck, even television series that never aired a single episode have articles. We do not, however, have articles on every chapter stop of the film's DVD, which would be the rough equivalent to a TV episode, nor do we have articles for every chapter for every last book written, notable or not. Collectonian (talk) 20:59, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I do not think that significant coverage in reliable sources is the only way of suggesting notability. I think Nielsen Ratings should be taken into account. And I think the analogy of episodes to chapters of a DVD is not apt. I think the analogy to chapters of a book is also not apt. Some television episodes have production costs in the millions. In 1998, episodes of The X-Files cost $2.5 million to produce. No, I think a better analogy for television episodes is music albums. If Sting releases a new album, it's presumed to be notable — no matter how much coverage it gets. If a new episode of The Simpsons airs, it's presumed to be notable — even if The New York Times doesn't review it. --Pixelface (talk) 21:21, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

But Collectonian did not only mention notability ;) They make a strong argument aside from notability, even if they do not deal with some of the underlying issues that Kumagoro raised. Sadly stats.grok.se is not happy right now, so I can't perform a rough comparison between a starlett and a single episode of a TV show, however I would estimate that, when a minor starlett is out of the news, they will not differ too much. The difference is that the starlett would peak in visits significantly higher than an episode, whereas a TV show episode, once the period of initial airings has passed, will remain fairly constant in terms of visits. LinaMishima (talk) 23:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I hope Collectonian was just kidding. What we are talking about? An encyclopedia someone wants to purify from useless informations, or a news portal about star gossip which must stay tuned on the people of the day? A literary or film work can always deserve to be archived for posterity, a gossip star will be wiped out from media coverage in a matter of few years. But again, I'm not saying here the right way is to delete the Paris Hilton-like pages too. Because someone can happen to develop interest in writing an article or essay about Paris Hilton, or about the type of show business she represents, the social meanings of all that, and so. The point here is: it's terribly terribly wrong to judge relevance from such a weak basis, because even academic works in the global village can't conclude anything about artistic or mediatic relevance of mediatic phenomena. And Misplaced Pages will be judged also, by the way, and it will grow to become a principal subject of studies (other than a tool to obtain study materials), more and more in the future. And no, sorry, TV fiction episodes can't be compared to a movie chapter (this concept being inexistant, by the way, it's only a necessity in dvd conversion). It's a totally different form of narrative, each episode it's like a short film per se, there are film festivals about television that treat each episode like that. Each episode has different direction, writing, stylistic choices, often guest actors (or actors tout court: think of shows like Twilight Zone). All of that will often be included in a narrative flow with recurrent characters, the way modern movie franchises attempt to mimic. Anyway, I'm not saying Misplaced Pages should try to cover ALL the fictional tv shows. But if it wants to be a valuable source of informations, it should at least cover the episodes of the most relevant shows in TV history, regardless of existence of strong fan bases for them.Kumagoro-42 (talk) 14:12, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Um, no, I wasn't kidding. They may be stupid, but they are real people who have plenty of notability. Now, if the articles are in crappy shape, tag them as such, but they have inherent notability. Each episode is NOT notable and every last one does not need an article, period. List of episodes is more than sufficient to cover the basic info on episodes. If an episode has notability on its own (like the Pokemon episode), then it gets an article. Otherwise, no. Collectonian (talk) 16:22, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Certainly some television episodes are more notable than others. But I don't think anyone is saying that every television episode that airs on television is notable. If millions of people watch the episode, it suggests the episode is notable. To say that Finger is notable, but Thumb, Index finger, Middle finger, Ring finger, and Pinky finger each have to establish notability is absurd. --Pixelface (talk) 16:44, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Please deprecate this page and FICT

I don't seem to be getting much traction with this suggestion, but it seems like the obvious thing to do. When people want to change these "guidelines," they are told the info within them comes from NOTE and PLOT, so it can't be changed. When I mention that that makes them unnecessary, I'm told that they are useful for further explanation. NOTE and PLOT are pretty easy to understand, and a constantly changing guideline doesn't seem to be helping anyone with their understanding. These pages just create hugely trafficked talk pages where people come to complain, and the root issues cannot be addressed. I think getting rid of these pages wold help the inclusionists and the deletionists. The inclusionists would have the correct forum for any changes they propose. The deletionists would be able to truly have a consensus behind their decisions. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 00:45, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

If NOTE and PLOT are easy to understand, there would be absolutely no issue of anything in this or FICT and we wouldn't have anything to discuss here (as the last 300 edits soundly counter). Nor would removing them change the behavior either inclusionists or deletionists. It is completely appropriate to have more specific guidelines, particularly notability, for specific areas to cover how they should be handled. --MASEM 00:55, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not that they are difficult to understand that brings people to FICT and EPISODE. Explaining NOTE and PLOT at FICT in great detail or concisely isn't helping anything because it isn't that people don't understand, it's that they don't agree. That's why all of the conversation should be centralized where the actual policy/guideline is set. Maybe if FICT said something like "if you don't agree with this, go to NOTE and PLOT." That's something that people don't always get. It would be a bit silly though, when we could just use NOTE and PLOT. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:07, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

But I don't believe anyone is specifically complaining about PLOT and NOTE. It's their interaction for fiction and specifically TV episodes that is not agreed to. Moving the discussion to either location will be unwelcome by those there and still will split the issues. --MASEM 01:41, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

You are probably right that PLOT and NOTE editors would prefer not to be bothered by TV episodes. That's not a reason to put people in an unproductive area for their discussion, though. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:33, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Suggested pathway for moving forward

I am going to suggest a 3 step path that we can move forward and try to resolve this issue without ArbCom (there's a case request, but hasn't been taken up yet.).

• STEP 1 - We put out a community-wide RFC to get community consensus on two key points (getting support or opposition to both):
  1. At WP:MUSIC, consensus agrees that albums released by notable artists and groups are automatically notable and do not need to demonstrate additionally notability. Should the same apply to tv shows and episodes: specifically Are episodes of a notable television show automatically notable themselves?
  2. Assuming that the above statement is not true, then Are both Misplaced Pages is not a collection of plot summaries and notability satisfied by an episode article that consists of, at most: a lead section, a plot summary, an information box summarizing show and airing details, cast and crew listings, and trivia information.

We wait for these two be resolved (because I strongly believe that we will never gain a consensus considering only editors involved in the issue currently - we need community-wide consensus at this point). If either statement has sufficient consensus support, then we have our answer as to what episode articles can be like, and thus we no longer have to merge episodes or the like. ISSUE RESOLVED.

• STEP 2 - If neither statement in the RFC gains consensus, then we must review here what are appropriate reliable sources for demonstrating notability for an episode article. There seem to be some fringe cases we can work from.
• STEP 3 - Once we can state what can be used for notability, we then draft a proper approach for those that want to tag and merge non-notable episode articles to allow time for such articles to be improved, possible setting a grandfathering date 3 to 6 months from the decision of this point to allow all older articles to get up to speck before any notability tagging or forced merging can be done.

I think the last 24 hrs have shown that collectively, those involved in this discussion at this time are not going to come to a consensus. There is too huge a gap that statements in Step 1 involve. We get the wider WP community to help determine which side of the gap consensus is on, and then we can go from there. --MASEM 01:54, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think this sounds like a very reasonable approach and I would love to see it be effective regardless of what the community decision is. Stardust8212 02:07, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Largely agreed. I think the problem with some of this is that consensus is probably that only highly notable shows should have all their episodes here. And that gray area will be difficult to deal with. That said, I agree it isn't getting done as it stands, so taking it to the larger community is the way to go. Hobit (talk) 03:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• I mentioned in a thread above about how Misplaced Pages:Spoiler warning/RfC might be a good example of how to handle a beast of a discussion. Like having the summary front page, or the preemptive section headers seen here on the talk page. Granted this was a while ago for myself, and these specific examples might have some flaws in them, but I'm hoping everyone gets the general idea of this suggestion :) -- Ned Scott 05:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Possible solution (redirect)

Please see Wikipedia_talk:Television_episodes#Possible_solution. Pointing it out here as I suspect it could otherwise get easily lost in this now rather long page. Carcharoth (talk) 01:59, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Collective notability vs. individual notability

The root of the issue is the distinction between collective notability and individual notability. As a series, it is fairly easy to presume through reliable third-party sources that a series is notable. But this kind of notability is collective. When taken together, the episodes that make up the series can be presumed to have notability. This is just fine when working on the series articles, such as a list of episodes.

However, collective notability can only extend so far, and that usually is when you begin dealing with individual subjects. When an editor splitting off the episodes into individual articles, the episodes become individual subject and can no longer is covered by the collective notability of the series. Instead, the episode should establish individual notability separate from the notability of the series.

Let's take for example a notable forest, say Sherwood Forest. Now Sherwood Forest does have notability do to its connection with the stories of Robin Hood. Now the forest has collective notability, but does that imply that the individual trees that make up the forest are automatically notable as well? Of course not. While you can't have a forest without the trees, the individual trees do not have individual notability because they belong in a collectively notable forest. Instead, the Major Oak is notable for reasons separate of being a part of Sherwood Forest.

The same goes for songs and albums. Just because the collective album becomes notable doesn't imply that the individual songs that comprise the album are automatically notable. Instead, the songs must establish their individual notability separate from being a part of the collective notable of the album. --Farix (Talk) 03:12, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Well said. Thankyou. Gwinva (talk) 03:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

If the tree is on ABC at 9PM on Wednesday and draws 500,000 viewers, do you still insist only on writing about the forest? Torc2 (talk) 03:42, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The tree is written about - it is simply written about as an entry on a list rather than on its own independent article. We need to separate the issues here of information and articles, and current list quality and intended ideal list quality. LinaMishima (talk) 03:58, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Readers aren't going to want to read a forest to find the one tree they want. If the content is the same, it should be parsed in the way most easily digestible to the reader. That's not always all on one huge page. Torc2 (talk) 04:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The dying tree wasn't notable because ABC's Primtime Live aired it. It was notable because it was part of a publicity stunt that brought a great deal of ridicule and parody. It short, it was a demonstration that the "Live" aspect of Primtime Live had jumped the shark. Had there been no controversy, then the tree would not be notable. --Farix (Talk) 04:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Of course, this is all assuming that the tree was not notable before the Primetime Live broadcast. --Farix (Talk) 04:18, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

No, it was notable because a major network chose to air it in prime time. The controversy is irrelevant. The guidelines for other topics focus on distribution: a band is notable if it's released two albums on a major label or toured internationally; there's no requirement that people bought the album or saw the shows. A book is considered notable if its author is notable; there's no requirement that anybody actually buy or talk about the book. An airport is notable because it's an airport, regardless of whether anybody flies to it. Torc2 (talk) 04:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Either you missed the point entirely or you are just being facetious. Primetime Live's dead tree didn't become notable because someone put a "live" camera on it one night. It became notable because of the ridicule and scorn that resulted from media critics. So the controversy is very much relevant to its notability. --Farix (Talk) 11:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think I agree with you, although I prefer depth of coverage as a guide for when separate articles are appropriate (mainly because it is possible for something to be highly notable yet have little content, and because extremely detailed coverage should only be possible through being notable). I very much agree with the focus on lists (although most current season episode lists are frankly extremely poor). LinaMishima (talk) 03:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, length (depth) is a good point. Even if episodes were "notable" on their own, is there enough information (referenced etc) available to support an individual article, or can it be contained within another page? (which is not arguing for removal of content, just rationalisation of it). A plot summary is not long enough, but critical comment and analysis and production detail would fill an article..and if you have access to that, then it suggests there is enough verifiable third-party sources, hence it fulfils notability. A reasonable rule of thumb to consider. Gwinva (talk) 04:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Most list of episodes articles I've seen don't assert notability either. The episodes of a notable show are presumed to be notable. I repeat, the episodes of a notable show are presumed to be notable. An episode doesn't have to establish individual notability. If a show is considered notable, each episode is notable because the show title is just a blanket term for each and every episode.

I knew someone would bring up forests and trees and the comparison is ridiculous. If millions of people sat around every night and watched a tree on television, and advertisers paid to run ads during the show, I'm sorry, but the tree is notable. Trees reproduce by themselves and need no human intervention. Television episodes don't just spring up on their own.

The analogy of episodes to songs is a bad analogy. You could say that Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, and Yeardley Smith have produced 410 spoken-word albums. An animation studio put visuals to their voices. It is then called an episode. Millions of people have seen every single one of those episodes. Each and every episode is notable, even if you can't find a newspaper that reviewed one of the episodes.

You cannot say a television program is notable if none of its episodes are notable. And if a television show has only 1 or 2 articles for its episodes, that means that the show is really only notable for those 1 or 2 episodes. Notability applies to topics. The Simpsons is a topic. Duffless is not a topic, it's a sub-topic. Duffless is notable because its topic is notable. If you put all 410 Simpsons episodes in the The Simpsons article, it would be too long. So it's split into sub-articles. Sub-articles do not have to re-establish notability.

Television episodes are most like short films. If Steven Spielberg puts out a short film, it's presumed to be notable. If a television episode stars notable people, it's presumed to be notable. There is no need to re-establish notability again and again and again for each and every episode. --Pixelface (talk) 05:02, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

If Spielberg puts out a new short film, then it is presumed that it will have sufficient coverage by reliable third-party sources. And it is that presumption that establishes the short film's notability, not that it was directed by Spielberg. However, if that presumption is challenged, then the defenders of the article have to come up with the reliable third-party sources or else the article will either be deleted or merged into the article about Spielberg. --Farix (Talk) 14:22, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

And that's the same process we deal with disputed facts - if you question the validity of a statement, you {{cn}} it, ultimately deleting the statement if it's not backed up. Makes perfect sense that if you challenge the notability of something, you tag it, and then deal with it if it's not demonstrated appropriately. Some projects appear to be very good at doing this when challenged, others aren't so much. --MASEM 14:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I repeat with emphasis what Pixelface just said: television episodes are most like short films. It's what they truly are, I'm sorry most of people can't see that, probably due to a lack of study experience in the field. And this is another major point: should a media expert be called to judge what is relevant in the field of mathematics or physics? I think not. So why the matters of relevance in the media field should be judged by people with assorted knowledge, or even people with no knowledge at all about what we are talking about and about what is more needed by the students in the field?Kumagoro-42 (talk) 14:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Because notability must still be verifiable. One should not have to go to an "expert" to determine if something is notable; that is what we have third-party sources for. A short film which does not receive coverage by reliable third-party sources is not considered notable. --Farix (Talk) 14:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

And to verify your "notability" you should be sufficiently "expert" to know where to search for it, which are the criteria, and so. A short film that collects critical appreciations in some festival will not be reported on Variety or Entertainment Weekly! Should Misplaced Pages become the flagbearer of the mainstream culture by the entertainment industry, with no coverage at all on more obscure media works, such as all the brilliant short films which not got an Oscar nomination? Should Misplaced Pages collect only data on subjects about which everybody is talking about, the others being not sufficiently "notable"? Kumagoro-42 (talk) 14:59, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

There are other sources besides Variety and EW. They just need to be shown to be reliable. --15:04, 17 January 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Masem (talk • contribs)

If a short film has received critical appreciations and it has been published by a reliable source, then the critical appreciations can be used to presume notability. However, "water cooler" talk doesn't presume notability when it is not published. That would actually be a violation of Wikipiedia's core policies of verifiability and no original research. --Farix (Talk) 15:07, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Disputing a statement by placing a {{cn}} tag is much different than questioning the notability of an episode of a notable television show. Tagging an article for not demonstrating notability and then redirecting the article in two weeks without notifying anyone who has contributed to the article does not help improve the project. --Pixelface (talk) 17:16, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages has thousands of articles on short films that contain no coverage by third-party sources — but the short films are still considered notable. Since notability can only be presumed and suggested, it is a form of speculation unless a source says explicitly that something is notable. If a notable film director releases a short film, I think it's safe to assume that the short film is notable. If notable actors star in a television episode of a notable show, and millions of viewers watch that episode, I think it's safe to assume that the episode is notable. Many film reviews are written so audiences can decide whether or not to spend money at the theater. Television episodes are shown for free on TV, so there's no big incentive for newspapers and magazines to review each and every episode. That does not make the episodes non notable. The viewers decide if the episodes are worthy of notice. If a show is not attracting any viewers, a television network will cancel it. --Pixelface (talk) 17:08, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Continuing discussion

WP:N seems to be an important thing to keep in mind. Being a component of a series doesn't necessarily mean it is notable enough to warrant its own article. Subjects need sources. If a subject has sources, it ought to be considered notable. Most television episodes have available sources, even if those sources haven't been tapped yet. As such, they are merely stubs and shouldn't be deleted. I hate to see stubs last for years, but can a stub really be deleted on the grounds that nobody has improved it yet? -Freekee (talk) 04:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Generally speaking, an article should cite, at minimum, one decent secondary source. If it were up to me, "no sources cited" would be a speedy criterion (if a full article) and a reason to revert edits exempt from 3RR (if part of an article), and then we might actually find people bothering to cite them, and verifiability would have some enforcement instead of sitting there impotent. (If we were as lax on vandalism enforcement as we are on verifiability enforcement, we would tell vandals "Well, it would be really nice if you stopped inserting profanity into that article someday", but never blocked them and didn't exempt those reverting them from the 3RR. Failing to enforce verifiability, at least to me, is just as harmful if not more so than that situation would be.) This, however, would likely not gain consensus. Even at current, however, bear in mind that just "sources" are not enough. There are sources on me—public records and the like, even a couple of very minor in-passing media references. But there should not be an article about me. Substantial, independent, reliable, non-trivial sourcing is required, and as verifiability makes clear, the burden of proof is on those who wish to retain to prove sufficient sourcing exists once challenged. If this is not actually done, yes, the information should be removed. Seraphimblade 05:03, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

RFC: Notability of individual television episodes

Please note, this RfC request is just a continuation of the above conversation which must also be taken into consideration.

Template:RFCpolicy In order to resolve this issue, we need to achieve a community-wide consensus on notability issues regarding episodes.

There are two possible statements that community consensus would go a long way towards resolving the present editing conflicts on TV episodes.

1. WP:MUSIC states (and seems to have community consensus) that if an artist or group is notable, then released albums from that artist or group are automatically likely to be notable (but not necessarily the songs on that album). Applying this concept to television shows, Are individual episodes automatically notable (and thus deserving of their own article without additional notability demonstrations) if the television show itself is notable?
2. If this statement is not the case, then, Does an article about a television episode considered both notable and "more than just a plot summary" if it contains no more than a lead, a plot summary, and an infobox with relevent data on the show's airing and cast and crew? (add) More specifically, with such an article, is no further improvement necessary to ultimately meet present policy and guidelines?

Please provide your input to help in this matter. --MASEM 05:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• WP:MUSIC does not say that. seresin 05:21, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• You're right, the arguments we've been having on this blurred the language. It suggests notability in MUSIC but people are stating here that episodes are automatically notable. Slight adjustment to the question --MASEM 05:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Like I mentioned above, we might want to consider some form of structured discussion to avoid repeating ourselves, allowing things to be easier to follow for newcomers, etc, before diving right into this. -- Ned Scott 06:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• I think a poll on just these two questions is fine. At least, if we get this information, we can see what consensus says about episode articles. Ursasapien (talk) 06:18, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• If you want to see what consensus says about episodes articles, look at episode articles. Look at the articles that have existed for years and years. Take these for example. --Pixelface (talk) 12:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Articles who's existence/content/format has not been challenged directly do not indicate any consensus. If they challenge and survive or are dropped, that's consensus. --MASEM 14:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Oh, so you're saying AFDs like these can be used to indicate consensus? --Pixelface (talk) 14:45, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Yes, those can be used in conjunction with all other AfDs to determine where consensus is, along with merge discussions and any other discussion on what to do with such content. You cannot just pick and choose which AfDs and merge discussions you want though, you have to consider the whole body of episode articles, and also must be aware that consensus can change. --MASEM 14:54, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Although I like your example of Misplaced Pages:Spoiler warning/RfC, I do not know that the for and against arguments have crystalized to the point where we can articulate them in this way. I am not sure we could even say with what we agree and disagree. However, if you would like to tak a stab at it, I would support a nicely laid out page similar to Misplaced Pages:Spoiler warning/RfC. Ursasapien (talk) 06:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• I would not suggest anything relating to television episodes be handled like spoiler warnings have been handled. --Pixelface (talk) 12:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I added one clarification on the second question. This is to imply that if the article only contained that information, then there would be absolutely, ever, no need to add anything else to meet policy or guidelines. It's one thing to have a stub during the editing process, but consider the case if that episode article would never be edited again - is such an article appropriate then. --MASEM`

Statement by Seraphimblade

To the first, I have no problem with saying "X is more likely to have sufficient sourcing available if the following is true...", so long as that doesn't turn into "We should have an article on X even if in this particular case that sourcing isn't actually present." Unfortunately, that seems to happen in many cases, you just see "Keep, professional athlete" or "Keep, album from a notable band", resulting in retention of sourceless, garbage articles without any discussion of actual source material available. If that is done, we should make crystal clear that sourcing is still required, we're just giving suggestions as to when a search for sources is more likely to prove fruitful. Notability (or the lack thereof) is verifiable, just like anything. In its case, the verification that something is notable is that reliable, independent sources have chosen to write significant quantities of material regarding it, the lack of such indicates that it is not. We do not second guess reliable sources, we simply mirror them—mirroring includes writing little or nothing when independent and reliable sources have chosen to write little or nothing. Anything else is undue weight. To the second, no, an article regarding a television episode is acceptable if it includes substantial reliable independent source material on that episode, and unacceptable if it does not. Formatting is irrelevant. Seraphimblade 05:37, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Farix (Talk) 14:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Stardust8212 14:43, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 15:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC), with the exception that while "reliable independent source material" may satisfy WP:NOTE, an article may be unacceptable per other policies, current or future
• Lquilter (talk) 15:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ursasapien

Either episodes are part of a whole or should be considered as individual works. I think part of this depends upon the television show. If they are part of a whole, then I think it is more of a style concern rather than a notability issue. Episode list articles vs. individual episode articles, in this scenario, would be just sub-articles split out for summary style reasons. If they are to be considered individual works of fiction, then I would say most any show that makes it on television should be sufficiently notable for episode articles.

The second question is more interesting. I would consider that to be great stub with much potential. I think it should have all those parts, but I think this would be a proper Misplaced Pages article. Ursasapien (talk) 06:18, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Dimadick

Concerning notability, I think general coverage of a subject in both written and online resources should be taken into account. In past discussions online sources seem to be dismissed out of a hand even when (1)they state their sources, (2) contain detailed analyses of our subject, often going beyond plot (3)Point to the notability of the subject around the Internet.

I would consider the article style described by Masem to be an average stub. Nothing to write home about but not too embarassing. A basic skeleton. Dimadick (talk) 12:49, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Kww

Repeating myself here, I think: episodes do not inherit notability. Plot summary + infobox is insufficient to support an article. I think we need crisp, clear definitions of what makes an episode notable, and not leave it vague. I think we also need to be extremely clear that 99%+the vast majority of all episodes, even of the Simpsons and South Park, should never have an independent article.Kww (talk) 14:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Farix (Talk) 14:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 15:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC), but per Lquilter the 99%+ figure may be too high
• Lquilter (talk) 15:52, 17 January 2008 (UTC) (I'm not sure of the exact percentage but am taking 99%+ to be rhetorical hyperbole indicating a large majority.)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:25, 17 January 2008 (UTC) (and agreed, it is time to stop playing favorites and hold all to the same standard)

Statement by Farix

I am simply going to restate what I have already said above.

The root of the issue is the distinction between collective notability and individual notability. As a series, it is fairly easy to presume through reliable third-party sources that a series is notable. But this kind of notability is collective. When taken together, the episodes that make up the series can be presumed to have notability. This is just fine when working on the series articles, such as a list of episodes.

However, collective notability can only extend so far, and that usually is when you begin dealing with individual subjects. When an editor splitting off the episodes into individual articles, the episodes is being treated as an individual subject and can no longer is covered by the collective notability of the whole series. Instead, the episode should establish individual notability separate from the notability of the series. While the individual notability of the episode adds to the collective notability of the whole series, the individual notability does not affect the individual notability of other episodes.

Let's take for example a notable forest, say Sherwood Forest. Now Sherwood Forest does have notability do to its connection with the stories of Robin Hood. Now the forest has collective notability, but does that imply that the individual trees that make up the forest are automatically notable as well? Of course not. While you can't have a forest without the trees, the individual trees do not have individual notability because they belong in a collectively notable forest. Instead, the Major Oak is notable for reasons separate of being a part of Sherwood Forest.

The same goes for songs and albums. Just because the collective album becomes notable doesn't imply that the individual songs that comprise the album are automatically notable. Instead, the songs must establish their individual notability separate from being a part of the collective notable of the album. --Farix (Talk) 14:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Stardust8212 15:11, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 15:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Lquilter (talk) 15:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:25, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by edgarde (talk · contribs)

WP:EPISODE has been repeatedly determined to be a reasonable interpretation of WP:NOTE (and other core policies) in Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents and in other decisions regarding redirects by TTN. It also provides a helpful (and probably necessary) explanation of how WP:NOTE (among other policies) can be applied in writing episode articles. The redirecting of non-notable episodes is a reasonable implementation of this policy. Editors who wish episode articles to not be redirected should endeavor to find article content that will create articles which merit inclusion on Misplaced Pages per Misplaced Pages policy. Continued attacks on policies that have broad acceptance in the Misplaced Pages community (beyond certain editors of TV-related articles) will probably not help matters.

The example taken from WP:MUSIC is policy shopping. If anything, WP:MUSIC's policy on individual albums should be brought into line with WP:NOTE; it is not an example of how episodes should be treated. / edg ☺ ☭ 15:25, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Lquilter (talk) 15:54, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:28, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by DGG (talk · contribs)

• The opposition to this guideline shows that it does not have the claimed consensus. Consensus is the willingness to live with the rule, and that is clearly not present. Somewhere between one-third and two-thirds of the many people interested do not agree with the current guideline. One-third disagreeing with the guideline, and not willing to accept it even as a compromise, is enough to destroy consensus either way. The question raised, about what WpP people in general think, I think would also come out between one-third and two-thirds. There's no fixed numerical value for consensus, below which a splinter group cannot be taken into account to block the consensus, but I think for a matter affecting so much of wikipedia, 1/3 would be more than enough dissent. We could probably emerge with a compromise working, but it would not necessarily be accompanied by real compromise in practice with respect to merges and AfDs. Still, such a wording, accompanied by a statement that further details are specifications are not settled, would be the best solution--the only practical one we are likely to achieve. DGG (talk) 16:21, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• --Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles 17:17, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Hiding (talk · contribs)

Television episodes are not always noted in the historical record. Many episodes come and go without record, there are probably over 10 000 television stations in the world, and thus in any given day there is the potential for over 120 000 television episodes to have been transmitted. Are these all discussed, critiqued, disseminated, analysed and their cultural impact evaluated? No. Is there discrimination in which ones are covered so by the wider world? Yes. Does Misplaced Pages cover every television episode ever transmitted? No. Is anybody stating that be the goal? It appears not. Therefore there is agreement that we should discriminate on which episodes to cover. How do we do that? Well, our policies state that when we are writing an article we look for sources to summarise, and that we are very limited in how we can use primary source. Why do they state that? Because Misplaced Pages is contributed to by anyone. Unlike other encyclopedia, its authors have no credentials, therefore everything added must be sourced to prove its reputability, if Misplaced Pages is to be trusted as an encyclopedia.

So our policies guide us to use secondary sources. Therefore we need to look for third party sources and summarise them. A plot summary and a summary of transmission data is not enough to satisfy WP:PLOT, which notes that an article on a fictional work needs to do more than regurgitate plot. It should first cover their real-world context and sourced analysis, offering detail on a work's development, impact or historical significance, and then a brief plot summary is acceptable. If there is no sourced analysis, no detail on the work's development or no commentary on a works impact in other sources, then there is nothing we can write on the article.

Therefore, to answer the two questions, it is quite clear that Misplaced Pages cannot cover every television episode, and it is quite clear that an encyclopedic article on an episode needs more than a plot summary and an infobox. It needs to source opinions on the episode, development data, reception and legacy. Hiding T 16:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• edg ☺ ☭ 16:57, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by sgeureka

An idealistic yet noble goal of wikipedia is to have every article Featured (or at least Good) someday. Notability (i.e. the existance of significant coverage in reliable sources) is a must for this goal, but since wikipedia is a work in progress, the proof usually just needs to be brought forward when notability is challenged (at Newpages control, by tagging, in merge discussions, or at AfD), but ideally already at the point of article creation. Editors defending their articles against this need aren't helping the situation, and usually just postpone the merger/redirection/deletion.

Individual episodes are notable when they can prove that they are notable, or are presumed to be notable if comparable sibling articles can demonstrate notability (but the presumption can still be challenged). The lead and the infobox of an article are supposed to summarize the whole article, the plot summary exists to support the real-world information (sales figures, critical and popular reception, development, cultural impact, and merchandise), trivia and popcult sections are generally discouraged, and unsourced sections have no right of existance per WP:VERIFIABILITY. A cast list is usually already included in the show's main article and doesn't need repetition. So (generally speaking), without a sourced production and reception (at least), what would such an article consist of if it got cleaned up with the reasoning above? "Episode X is an episode of show Y, was written and directed by A and B, and had plot C." This stub can be covered in Lists of episodes, or season articles. But there should never be a blanket ban for episodes; if someone can establish notability of an episode beyond a doubt (awards), or has so much production information that the LoE/season article would get too long, then he should not be barred from writing a good article because of a guideline that doesn't apply in this particular case. – sgeureka 17:01, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• edg ☺ ☭ 17:21, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Technical question

Why has the above RfC tag not put this page on Template:RFCpolicy list? However, listed there is Misplaced Pages talk:Centralized discussion/Television episodes, which is declared "inactive" yet pertinent to this discussion (but not linked from it). Is this not reactivating that RfC? Gwinva (talk) 06:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, a bot will add the RfC to the page once added here. But as to the previous RFC, this is a more direct question(s) compared to the first. We get a consensus on those questions, and we get much closer to resolving the issues on our own, then trying to get everyone involved in the larger debate. --MASEM 06:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, huh, it's been several hours and still not added. A bot is supposed to do it, but I will go check VPT to see what's up. --MASEM 15:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm assuming that the problem is the result of there being two RfC tags on the talk page. It may be advisable to split the more recent RfC off onto it's own page so that the bot can treat it separately. --Farix (Talk) 16:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Is it worth doing a watchlist message like they did for the rollback proposal, and is it worth moving the rfc to another page or archiving the rest of this page for ease of editing? Hiding T 12:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Not sure if the issue is large enough for that - at least, we need more than a few additional eyes on the subject, but while this does have an impact on a large number of articles, it doesn't affect a large proportion of WP articles. If the question, instead, were "Is WP a fan guide" that would change how any fictional and some non-fictional works were handled, then I would seek wide-area announcement. --MASEM 14:13, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think a watchlist message is a good idea. This discussion was recently publicized mostly in TV-related groups, but this issue tends to pit TV article editors against what may be a wider consensus on Misplaced Pages. / edg ☺ ☭ 15:28, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

That was my thinking, we need to establish a wikipedia wide consensus on this. It sadly appears to be the only way to settle the debate one way or the other for the time being. Hiding T 16:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)