User talk:Richard27182/sandbox/drafts-etc/Wake of the Red Witch-plot-001

Latest comment: 8 years ago by DESiegel

MOS:PLOT says: "The plot summary for a work, on a page about that work, does not need to be sourced with in-line citations, as it is generally assumed that the work itself is the primary source for the plot summary. However, editors are encouraged to add sourcing if possible. If a plot summary includes a direct quote from the work, this must be cited using inline citations per WP:QUOTE. Sometimes a work will be summarized by secondary sources, which can be used for sourcing."

In accordance with this, if the plot summary draws on the TCM summary, that should be cited, IMO. Sourcing to the film itself is implicit, although a single citation to the film for the plot as a whole is not a bad idea. This is not all that common, but IMO is a good practice.

The plot summary should avoid analysis, not saying which plot details are particularly important, for example. Any analysis should be sourced.

The current text of the plot summary looks good to me, except that any parts derived from the TCM page should be cited, as noted above. DES (talk) 15:25, 28 February 2016 (UTC)Reply


Hi DESiegel.  I've added the two references as you suggested.  (I used the simplest referencing format because that's the only way I know how to do it.)  Please see the User page and let me know if you feel the material is ready to be copied to the actual article.  I do have a couple questions I need to ask:
  1. I know that when material is copied from an article to a work space (such as a sandbox), the edit summary must disclose the source article and provide a link to it (in order to make it possible to trace the past edit history of the material).  My question is: is the reverse also the case? ie, when I copy my plot summary from my work space to the actual article, does the article's edit summary need to identify my work space and provide a link to it?  (And if the answer is yes and if the page name is too long, can I just make a brief edit summary directing the reader to see the talk page for details and put the required information there?)
  2. Once the material is copied to the actual article, what (if anything) am I required to do concerning the page I used as work space?  Must I preserve it indefinitely as is; or must I blank it out or overwrite it; or must I tag it with a delete request; or may I do more or less whatever I want with it (within reason)?
I realize I must be taking up a lot of your time with all this, but I really want to make sure it do this correctly.  And once I complete this first significant contribution to an actual article (ie, more than just a brief sentence or two), I'm sure I'll feel more comfortable and confident making similar contributions without needing so much help.  I do very much appreciate all the help you've given me.
Richard27182 (talk) 10:27, 29 February 2016 (UTC)Reply
Richard27182, if you are the only editor on a work page, in userspace or draft space, you may freely copy and paste it into an article, just as if you had done the editing off-line in a word processor. Your attribution is preserved by your edit inserting the content. If there are multiple editors, you ought in general to use {{copied}} or some similar means of preserving the attribution of the individual edits, or at the least mention the source page and perhaps a list of editors in the edit summary and/or on the talk page of the destination article. However, this can be omitted if all other editors involved waive their attribution rights. When this is done, the source page should normally be preserved, not deleted, so that its history can be consulted. it may be stupped or blanked except for a short statement of why it is being preserved, or converted to a redirect. See Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia for more detail. However, in this case, my contributions were so slight (as indicated at Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia#Where attribution is not needed that I think you may safely ignore them. If you create a draft of a new article, or a draft to completely replace an article, it is better to move it to the destination than to use copy&paste. This may require admin help if the destination article already exists. DES (talk) 23:15, 29 February 2016 (UTC)Reply