Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 03:05, 1 May 2008

The following is a proposed Misplaced Pages policy, guideline, or process. The proposal may still be in development, under discussion, or in the process of gathering consensus for adoption.

This page in a nutshell: Articles on a work of fiction or fictional element(s) should demonstrate real-world notability from reliable sources. Non-notable elements should preferably be concisely covered within articles on the main work or on notable elements. Coverage of fictional elements should focus on the demonstrated notability for the topic, with an appropriate balance of plot information

For articles about books and films, rather than fictional elements therein, refer to Misplaced Pages:Notability (books) and Misplaced Pages:Notability (films).

For information about writing articles on fiction, refer to Manual of Style (Writing about fiction).

Misplaced Pages:Notability (fiction) covers the notability of characters, items, places, and other elements (including individual episodes of serialized works such as television or comic book series) in a work of fiction.

Defining notability for fiction

This guideline is based on three excerpts:

From Misplaced Pages:What Misplaced Pages is not#PLOT:

Misplaced Pages articles on published works (such as fictional stories) should contain real-world context and sourced analysis, offering detail on a work's development and historical significance, not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot. This applies to both stand-alone works and series. A concise plot summary is appropriate as part of the larger coverage of a fictional work.

From Misplaced Pages:Notability:

A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject.

From Misplaced Pages:Editing policy:

Whatever you do, endeavour to preserve information. Instead of deleting: try to rephrase; correct the inaccuracy while keeping the content; move text within an article or to another article (existing or new); add more of what you think is important to make an article more balanced; or request a citation by adding the {{fact}} tag. Exceptions include: duplication or redundancy; irrelevancy; patent nonsense; copyright violations; or inaccuracy (attempt to correct the misinformation or discuss the problems first before deletion).

For articles on fiction, reliable sources may cover such things as design, development, reception and cultural impact. This is real-world coverage because it describes the real-world aspects of the work. Fictional coverage describes the work's fictional elements, such as the setting, characters, and story.

Based on this reasoning and the above excerpts, fictional concepts can be presumed notable if they have received significant real-world coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. However, notability for individual topics on fiction should be judged on a case-by-case basis while following Misplaced Pages's core policies of verifiability, no original research and neutral point of view.

Demonstrating notability

Works of fiction

Articles on a work of fiction (a book, movie, television series, video game, or other medium) should demonstrate notability by citing critical reception, viewings or sales figures, development and other information from reliable sources. Such sources can include creators' commentary and interviews regarding the work or topic, bearing in mind the restrictions if the work is self-published. Although data such as cast and crew members, publication or airing dates and length of work can be taken from reliable sources, such information may not demonstrate notability.

Certain media have additional notability guidelines: WP:BK for books and printed material, WP:MOVIE for films, and WP:TOY for toys, traditional games, and video games. A work of fiction is presumed to be notable if it meets the general notability guideline, the guidelines presented here, or the guidelines specific to its medium.

Elements of fiction

Elements of a work of fiction, including individual stories, episodes, characters, settings, and other topics, are presumed to be notable if there is significant coverage of the element(s) in reliable secondary sources. For fictional elements, this will typically include the real-world context and analysis of the elements, and can include influence and other aspects of its development, critical reception of the elements, and popularity of the element through readership/viewership ratings and marketing. Notability of an element may also be shown through secondary-source analysis of the main work of fiction, citing the importance of the element to the work. Reputable academic studies of individual elements may also demonstrate notability.

Data such as actors, cast and crew, publication and airing dates, appearances in a larger body of works, and production codes, while useful and sometimes necessary data for articles on fictional elements, are not sufficient for notability as these are trivial data that can be learned for any other work in the same medium by reviewing the original work or through sites and resources such as IMDB or TV Guide. Editors may request evidence of the notability of any article, including those on fictional elements, either through the addition of a {{notability}} template or through listing for deletion at articles for deletion, where consensus will determine any notability. Notability, in accordance with this guidance, is best demonstrated through citations to reliable secondary sources.

Other external data are however relevant: awards, audience or circulation or sales, authoritative rankings, and the like. These need to be demonstrated through Reliable Sources.

Notability may be shown for an individual element or for a certain grouping of elements, commonly characters or episodes. When notability can be shown, the element or grouping of elements merits a separate article. This article should be summarized in the parent article, and {{main}} or {{seealso}} templates should be used to direct users to where they may find more information. Further details can be found in the Summary style approach section of Manual of Style (Writing about Fiction).

However, even where an element or group of elements is notable, it may be more appropriate to include the information in an article on the work itself if:

• The resulting article would be very short, with little or no likelihood of expansion.
• The resulting article would have, by necessity, excessive plot detail and in-universe information.

Fictional topics as part of a larger topic

If consensus on a given work of fiction or fictional element is that it is of unproven notability, editors should seek to retain the information where it can improve the encyclopedia. Such coverage may be placed as part of the main article on the work of fiction, or if better suited, an article on a notable fictional element. If this makes the main article too long, per Misplaced Pages's article size guidelines, then there are several steps to consider:

• Merge coverage of less-notable elements to into a list article as described above.
• Trim away material to reduce the size of the article. The approach to covering non-notable fictional elements is more fully described in Manual of Style (Writing about Fiction), but in general, non-notable fictional elements should only be given sufficient information for the reader to understand its relationship with the entire work.
• Transwiki material to a GFDL-compatible wiki. It is still appropriate to leave some mention of non-notable elements within the Misplaced Pages article, while linking to the other wiki for more details.
• Remove material that may be of trivial or of only highly detailed interest to the general reader. Characters that appear only once in a work and have minimal influence on the work need not be listed, though again, they can be covered in a off-site wiki.

In rare cases, where none of the above steps can resolve the length problem without damaging encyclopedic coverage of the work, groupings of individually non-notable elements can merit their own supporting articles. This should be considered only for highly notable works, and the information within the supporting articles should not exceed the necessary depth of coverage for the main article's topic. Under current practice, these supporting articles are generally one of the following two types:

• Lists of characters in a highly-notable work or series of works.
• Lists of episodes or serial elements in a serial work, sometimes grouped into smaller sections (e.g. by television season).

Subject-specific guidelines may limit these cases, or give other cases when such articles are considered appropriate. Articles that fail to meet these requirements can have their inclusion challenged through a deletion debate and are often deleted through editorial consensus. Articles that fail to meet the guidelines presented in Manual of Style (Writing About Fiction) can also be challenged and deleted or improved to meet our style.

Depth of coverage

Articles on fiction should be structured around evaluations and critiques of the work or topic, with an appropriate balance of real-world and plot information, as outlined at Manual of Style (Writing about fiction). The size of a plot summary is often determined by building consensus for each article on a case by case basis. Editors should compare approaches taken on featured and good articles about fiction for examples of length and tone.

Depth of coverage within an article should be guided by the amount of real-world information which can be sourced. A single movie, book, video game, or other work of fiction has most likely not generated large coverage in sources which Misplaced Pages can summarize. Therefore, the article will be able to summarize those sources in one article. On the other hand, a series of books, television shows, or video games could contain elements which are better covered in a separate article or articles, helping to provide suitable background and supplementary information for each work within the series. See elements of fiction above for more details.

At times, better depth of coverage may be accomplished by combining notable and non-notable elements into a single topic, such as a character cast or a single season of a television show, instead of individual elements. WikiProjects that deal with fiction have guidelines describing what depth of coverage should be provided for plot information relative to the length of the original work. The complexity of the work should also be taken into a consideration; uses of certain creative elements (such as time travel or flashbacks) may require more detail to clearly explain the concepts in an encyclopedic manner.

If there is an imbalance of fictional information in an article, consider trimming the text or moving the fictional information to an appropriate GFDL-compatible Wiki.

Dealing with non-notable fictional topics

Articles on fictional topics that lack demonstrated notability should be improved either by adding demonstrated notability, or by other editing actions such as trimming, merging, or moving content to another Wiki. Nevertheless, the lack of demonstrated notability is not one of the criteria for speedy deletion, and good faith improvements are expected as part of the editing process. Editors should review specific guidelines or approaches outlined in the appropriate WikiProject, such as Wikiproject Television or WikiProject Films. Other concerns about dealing with fictional notability can be raised at the Fiction-related Noticeboard.

First and foremost, if you can provide reliably sourced, verifiable information on real-world facts that establish the notability of the topic, be bold and include it in the article. Here are additional suggestions to improve articles that lack demonstration of notability:

• If you believe the article will never have a chance of demonstrating notability or cannot be merged elsewhere, and that its deletion is unlikely to be contested, place the article up for proposed deletion. An article about a character in a TV show that only appeared on-screen for a few seconds and is never referred to otherwise is probably non-notable; however, by using the proposed deletion process, someone may be able to provide the required notability. If you are unsure if this is the correct step, then do not perform this step.
• Inform the editors of the article on the article's talk page of your concern about the lack of notability. This can also be done by tagging the article with the {{notability}} tag on the article page, though it is recommended to discuss your concerns with the editors as well in this case. If many such articles within the same fictional universe exist in a similar state, attempt to find a project or task force page for that fictional work and let the editors there know your concerns.
• If the article can be grouped with an existing article or other articles on the same type of fictional elements, then it may be appropriate to discuss a potential merge. This may require that information be trimmed from the article. If articles are merged, leave redirection pages in their place to the appropriate page, and link the old article or articles in your edit summary to comply with the GFDL. Consider using redirection templates to help track such redirects. You can boldly merge articles, but consensus will often be required before major changes are accepted by the community.
• If an existing GFDL-compatible wiki for the fictional topic exists, suggest transwiki'ing the information. Again, articles that are moved should be replaced with redirection pages.
• If the above options have been considered and determined to not be possible or if you feel that any action taken has not remedied the situation, it may be appropriate to nominate the article for deletion where the merits of the article can be debated. However, this should be considered carefully for an article that otherwise does not violate any further Misplaced Pages policies or guidelines such as those regarding original research or verifiability.

Editors are cautioned against performing the above actions on numerous articles en masse; an Arbitration Committee case stated that editors are "urged to work collaboratively and constructively with the broader community and the editors committed to working on the articles".

Relocating non-notable fictional material

Wikibooks, Misplaced Pages's sibling project, contains instructional and educational texts. These include annotated works of fiction (on the Wikibooks:annotated texts bookshelf) for classroom or private study use. Wikisource, similarly, holds original public domain and GFDL source texts. See Wikisource:Wikisource and Wikibooks. One possible action to consider is to make use of all of the Wikimedia projects combined: to have an encyclopedia article about the work of fiction on Misplaced Pages giving a brief outline, a chapter-by-chapter annotation on Wikibooks, the full source text on Wikisource (if the work is in the public domain), and interwiki links joining them all together into a whole. However, Wikibooks opposes books on fiction, so it is not an appropriate place to transwiki large quantities of fictional material.

Fictional material unsuited or too detailed for Misplaced Pages can be transwikied to a appropriate GFDL-compatible wiki, such as Wookieepedia or the Gaming Wiki; editors should check with related Wikiprojects to determine if a specific wiki has been selected for transwiking materials. Any transwikied material should be edited to meet the guidelines of specific wikis.

See also

• For examples of high quality fiction articles, see the articles that have been rated as Good and Featured.
• Misplaced Pages:Fancruft
• Misplaced Pages:Writing better articles#Check your fiction
• Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (writing about fiction)
• Misplaced Pages:Television episodes
• WikiProject Films guidelines on plot summaries
• WikiProject Novels guidelines on plot summaries
• WikiProject Soap Operas guidelines on character articles

Notes

1. For example Superman, Jason Voorhees, Troy McClure, Pauline Fowler and Hell Is Other Robots
2. For example Characters of Kingdom Hearts or Smallville (season 1)
3. For example, an overview of Characters of Carnivàle is provided by the "Cast" section of Carnivàle, while a brief summary of Squall Leonhart is included in Characters of Final Fantasy VIII to compare with other listed characters
4. Highly notable works are taken as those that substantially exceed the minimum standards for notability, having large coverage in secondary sources. This would typically include those that have been the subject of extensive academic analysis.

• Misplaced Pages proposals
• Misplaced Pages notability guidelines