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New perspective

There is a new discussion of the naming convention of TV shows at the disambiguation talk page. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 16:42, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Poll now available for Voting

A new draft poll is available for comment and revision. The poll will begin on January 24 and end February 15, 2006. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 21:49, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

The Misplaced Pages:Naming conventions (television)/poll has begun and is ready for votes. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 05:35, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Do not begin a mass renaming

Despite the closure of the previous poll, this is still remains a proposed naming convention. Please do not begin renaming shows until this convention arrives at some sort of consensus. Many articles have remained at their title for years without dispute, please do not start changing them until discussions are complete. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 21:22, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Wiki-discussions or standards are never "complete". That being said, if there is an unusual case, bring it up here. -- Netoholic @ 21:50, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Unresolved issues

I still think that there are some unresolved issues in the naming convention that need to be dealt with. Issues which I have suggested in a follow up poll. As such, I do not think that this proposed policy is ready to be a guideline.

Unresolved issues

  • TV vs. television
  • Television movies
  • Show vs. program/me
  • TV in use with "game show"

While I do not own this article, I have put significant effort into making sure that the first poll has run smoothly, a process which I think has been usurped by an editor who has made controversial edits on this topic in the past. Because of this controversial past, I have put an emphasis on process to make sure that this issue is satisfactorily resolved without dispute, something at which it appears I have failed.

If you feel that these issues need further discussion, please leave suggestion and comments here. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 22:28, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

TV vs. television

The decision was split, but several people in the poll indicated willingness to side with "TV" just to get consensus and consistency. -- Netoholic @ 22:46, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

  • 14 - 12 is not a majority! Television should be included as an option. If the consensus (and not just two editors) suggest that they were willing to change I would accept this. There needs to be a follow poll or at least a discussion before it becomes standard. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 23:21, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
    • This precise issue is the root cause of many of the frustrations with regards to this page. Most articles today use TV, and even you said you'd change your vote to reach consensus. Don't object on principle. If we want a standard, we need to choose one option. My additions related to industry terminology includes use of (television), so now it's just about "TV series" vs. "television series" (.../movie/program) in programming articles. -- Netoholic @ 00:30, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
      • I'm not objecting to (television) for television related terminology. As I said at the time, it was a good suggestion, but I disagreed with you bypassing process. My objection is that the page as it stands is that it does not say "TV series" or "television series" (.../movie/program). That issue is unresolved and was not included in your updates from my suggested naming convention. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 04:46, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
        • It is not fully resolved, and so the current, long-standing, version of that convention has not been changed. I think you'll agree that some standard is better than none. This page aligns with, by any measure, what most articles presently adhere to. - Netoholic @ 06:08, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
          • Current!? long-standing!? Your proposal was rejected, soundly a long time ago. It never stood on its own. It is not current. It is now in dispute! You are AGAIN trying to force it. There are many shows with television in the title. Respect the opinion of other editors who chose television in the poll and those who use it articles. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 13:23, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Emotions aside, this is a difficult case. Voter overwhelmingly rejected a heterogenous solution (use either TV or Television, depending on what one feels like), but were split right down the middle on which it should be. At the end, one person changed his vote in order to get a consensus, giving "TV" a slight edge, and RR voiced a willingness to do so as well. I voted "television", but I would also be willing to switch for consensus sake. In addition, if a re-vote were held, my gut feeling is that some people would switch from "television" to "TV" simply because it was decided to use "television/TV program/series", and some people would think "television" looks better on its own, but "TV program" looks better as a grouping.

For these reasons, I think we should use "TV" as the standard, and only hold a re-vote if several people think it's important enough to do so. – Quadell 15:50, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Television movies

"TV movie" is the more frequent usage by far. -- Netoholic @ 22:46, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Show vs. program/me

The connotation of "show" implies anything broadcast (repeating series, movies, etc), whereas "program" is more clearly a one-time production or event. -- Netoholic @ 22:46, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

I will address everything here because I think that the issues are related. News shows are not related to each other in terms of content or coverage. The episodes are presented independently of each other, i.e. they are not in a series. The format may be consistent between shows, but there is no larger context driving the show, each report is independent of each other. News program cover current events not create interconnected stories which are essential to a series. Similarly sketch comedy and variety shows are only loosely connected. There may be recurring characters but each of the sketches are not connected to the previous sketch.
I disagree that program/me or show implies a single non-episodic television - Television special usually covers that concept. Also see Category:Television programs, which covers most episodic television. Category:Television series by country shows that most country have organized series and program/me together. From what I have seen, show/programme is used fairly interchangably for episodic television, and still needs to be resolved, particularly for categories. For example Category:2000s TV shows in the United States .
I've tried to collect most of the shows that use program/me and show
The oldballs are the news programs and sketch comedies, everything else fits into a series or movie. Show and program/me were never used to disambiguate single shows. In such cases of non-episodic shows such as documentaries Category:Television documentaries other disambiguators were used.
There are some other difficult to classify shows, typically produced by PBS such as MotorWeek, This Week in Baseball, This Old House and Square One Victory Garden which only identify themselves as television program or a television show. I would consider these "magazine shows" or as educational shows, but could define them as TV series. Crossfire (TV series) - talk show or series? --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 04:46, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
In the world of one-time programs, there is likely very little naming conflict. "TV program" should be quite rare. In your list, I don't see any that are exceptions to the "TV series" basic rule. News shows and sketch comedy are produced by the same companies, often have the same on-air talent, and are periodically returning - they are rightly considered series. From Television program - "A program may be a one-off broadcast or, more usually, part of a periodically returning television series." I am completely comfortable if not every article fits neatly into the convention, either. I don't want us to complicate things just for a couple exceptions. -- Netoholic @ 06:26, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
You can see that people do not use program/me for one-off broadcasts. Why complicate the issue with AE/BE. Show does the job with the same and has the same context of "one-off broadcast" and episodic television. Furthermore it states in "A one-off broadcast may be called a "special."", this is a specific convention, not ambiguous like program/me.
News shows are not a series which "related set of things that occur one after the other (in a succession) or are otherwise connected one after the other (in a sequence)." They are covering news or more specifically current events. There is no sequence, each show is independent. News shows/soap operas "have daily or weekly episodes, don't go on hiatus, and are not often put into seasons/series." --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 12:06, 17 February 2006 (UTC) Updated 13:48, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps as a comprimise for new shows, sketch shows, magazine style shows and educational shows would use (TV show) since they are not a series. This would simplify the naming and use an commonly used disambiguator --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 15:27, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

  • "TV show" should not be used because it is ambiguous -- it can apply to every type of programming. If I say "What time does that show come on?", am I talking about a news show, a TV movie, a series, a game show? -- Netoholic @ 15:45, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Animated television series

Cartoon, TV series and animated series are common disambiguators. I think these should use "TV series" by default and animated series only when disambiguating from other shows. Cartoon should be depricated. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 04:46, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Game shows

TV + "game show" feels extremely redundant, and the way things have srpung naturally, "game show" alone has been preferred. -- Netoholic @ 22:46, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

  • There are radio game shows, radio talk shows. This would keep it consistent with the naming convention. Plus if TV + something is redundant why do we need TV in front of "series" when (television) would do? --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 23:21, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Most radio game shows eventually transferred onto television, and so would be best handled together in one article - "TV game show" would be too limiting in that case. "Series" and "miniseries" can apply to other media, especially books and comic books. Those titles are more likely to overlap with TV shows, especially shows based off of books. In that case, the (book) and (TV series) are more likely to be separate articles. -- Netoholic @ 23:43, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
(game show) is fine. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 04:46, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Soap operas

While some of the articles at Category:Soap operas use (soap opera), just as many use (TV series). I think it should be clear that only (soap opera) if there is another television with the same name --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 23:44, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Disagree for the same reasons as (game show). Many soap operas started on radio, and so using "TV series" would not be right. Also, soap operas have daily or weekly episodes, don't go on hiatus, and are not often put into seasons/series. "Series", has a connotation of being a show that has a "yearly" cycle of episodes. -- Netoholic @ 23:49, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
SOME soaps started on radio but that doesn't mean that period can't be covered in the article. Not all relevant material about a person or topic needs to be covered in the title. Why should another classification be created when the category is available. Series also has other connotations which implies an ongoing product. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 23:58, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
At this moment, I'm unconvinced that Category:Soap operas is very good. Looking at some entries, it seems many articles don't fit that genre. Several included are merely female-oriented dramatic programs, and not soap operas. -- Netoholic @ 00:02, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
Riverdale (TV series), Richmond Hill (TV series), Santa Barbara (TV series) Prisoner (TV series), Dynasty (TV series) Dallas (TV series) are not soap operas?
Also none of the shows using (soap opera) as a disambiguator has a history as a radio soap opera. The disambiguation is not very useful --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 00:04, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
"TV series" is fine... just watch out for articles that may include the history of a radio version. Be careful also of articles named with (soap opera) in Category:Soap operas which may not be television productions. -- Netoholic @ 00:17, 17 February 2006 (UTC)


Episode articles

Episode summaries should be combined onto a single page (List of Knight Rider episodes) or organized as a summary by season (The X-Files (season 1)).

I think that it is generally understood that "season" applies to US series, but other countries (especially the UK) use "series" instead.   — Lee J Haywood 22:34, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

My impression was that in the UK , season and series were interchangable when talking about a "year's worth" of episodes. Also, in the UK, that series can mean both the "year's worth" and the entire multi-year run. I don't want to step into a AE vs BE thing here, just find a way to be consistent without being confusing. -- Netoholic @ 22:42, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Red links on page

Can the example links be modified so that they are not red? It looks awful. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 22:57, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

I think the technique makes the convention stand out amongst the other text more clearly. -- Netoholic @ 23:34, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
But no other naming convention uses that technique. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 23:41, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
I Was Bold. -- Netoholic @ 23:45, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
Being bold doesn't mean that it has to be unattractive. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 23:52, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
I don't find it unattractive, but it's many times more clear and useful. -- Netoholic @ 23:54, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Then why do all other naming conventions follow another style if the convention is so important to see? --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 23:59, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

I didn't write them. -- Netoholic @ 00:12, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
Other conventions use examples to draw attention. Do you mind if I change it? --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 04:46, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

The tt looks better than my font tags. Thanks. – Quadell 14:40, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

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