Wikipedia talk:Plot-only description of fictional works/Archive 1

Archive 1

Excellent idea

imho, of course : ) - jc37 00:08, 10 May 2008 (UTC) This is a very helpful article, in that it provides a concrete example you can get your mind around. Dactyllic (talk) 23:24, 28 July 2008 (UTC)User:dactyllic —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.182.106.139 (talk) 23:21, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Good start

I don't think there's anything wrong with plot summaries except that almost all of them are much too long. My personal preference would be for something that's a little longer than the capsule you get in, say, Leonard Maltin's compendia, but far short of a blow-by-blow (and he did this, and she did that). Maybe three paragraphs, tops. (What does the word "summary" mean, anyway?) If people want to analyze each scene they should be pointed to Wikia.

I would also have much love if the spoiler template came back, or even better, if an entire plot summary section could be given a show/hide button. I don't really see why this simple courtesy should be a problem, but apparently there are those who insist on our articles on movies not looking different or something.

Anyway, I'm not sure we need a separate guideline. We just need better enforcement of the guideline we've got. Maybe this should be flagged more clearly as a section of the WP:MOS instead.--Dhartung | Talk 17:34, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

What little guidance we've got on the issue does almost nothing to discourage blow-by-blow summaries (except when an article contains nothing but such a summary), and our convention of putting plot summaries at the top of articles couldn't be much more spoily if we tried. So, yes, some serious rethinking, discussion, and improved guidance on the issue of plot summaries is long, long overdue.--Father Goose (talk) 21:44, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Oh yes, please: Very overdue. - jc37 00:05, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

agreed, a good start. Its not the length which is critical , but the writing. The plot summaries at Wikipedia tend to run to either extreme--so detailed that they dont make sense unless one is already familiar with the plot, or too brief to give an adequate idea of it. We write for the general reader: the general reader wants to know what a book or show is about. That means what happens in it, its plot. The plot is what makes fiction fiction, and is the main thing that is worth writing about. Describing a plot properly is not a trivial matter of sitting down and transcribing what happens scene by scene--it requires thought in how to organize the material and how to present it so it will be clear without seeing the show. Thought is exactly what it generally does not get.

Plot by itself isn't enough, of course--we need to know why the plot is worth reading about in the first place. we need to know that the work is important,and we have good and accepted criteria for that. But once the work is accepted as important, a description of what takes place will be a major part of the content. How major? that depends both on the intrinsic importance of the work,and the complexity of the plot. Some relatively trivial works are known for exceptionally complicated plots--as this is part of their notability it must be described. I have a guideline: if i missed an episode and wanted o discuss it with someone who has seen it, what would need to know? DGG (talk) 01:35, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Ultimately, we want to encourage quality and an encyclopedic approach, and I agree that if a plot section may be longer than other, comparable works but is very well written and gives an appropriate high-level treatment of the work, we should not be telling those editors to cut it down. Quality is what we want, not brevity.

However, I would argue that not all editors, at least initially, can write to the quality that we are looking for, and tend to be more wordy than appropriate. I think it is reasonable to guide new editors to keep plot sections short, but only out of concern for plot sections getting out of hand. With experience in editing comes better understanding and skills to write such sections, so eventually these editors will be able to judge the balance of quality vs length better. So only out of concern of keeping the quality of new articles on such works high from the start should we only encourage shorter plots, letting more experienced editors help to round them out appropriately. It is much harder to cut down from extensive plot summaries, almost to the point that restarting an article is better, than to expand a short plot summary. --MASEM 03:55, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

It's an intersting problem. I recently worked on Girls Just Wanna Have Fun (Xena episode) a bit in resonse to its AfD. It had an overly large plot summary (the article started at 7,745 bytes) and I considered replacing it with a three sentence summary to be expanded at a later time by an interested editor. I ended up watching the episode and completely rewriting it. Getting people to write summaries is easy and doesn't take long (for wikipedia, not the editor who writes it), so it might work well to basically remove or section stubify an overly large summary and wait for the next summary. A good one will appear given enough chances, I guess. I don't do this because a small page is more likely to be speedied or put up for AfD though. Anyways, just an observation. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:16, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

That is true - I have done a few plot reductions recently, and having more details in the plot summary helped me to remember the work better to cut it down. However, it was not like I could not review this work again myself, nor read different summaries on different sites to make the same reduction. I still, think, however, we want to encourage shortness for newer editors with the expectations that someone else will be able to reduce it; the shortness being to write as much as you feel hits all the significant plot points with some discretion but if not sure, include it. All this is near impossible to quantify. --MASEM 04:47, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

How to respond on this?

Talk page or on the main page? :) --MASEM 00:58, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

At WT:NOT, where {{cent}} should have pointed to in the first place. --Pixelface (talk) 03:45, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Should we change cent? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:54, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

No, let Hiding split the discussions into two places if he wants. --Pixelface (talk) 04:02, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Then should we put the converation about NOT into cent? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:07, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I prefer discussing this subject here; WT:NOT is host to discussion of dozens of different topics relating to WP:NOT, while the "plot summary" issue goes far beyond what WP:PLOT (currently, and not necessarily permanently part of WP:NOT) does or should go into.

As for where to discuss it, I'd say discussion goes here on the talk page, with the main page being reserved for background material, outlining of the issues, and tentative guidance.--Father Goose (talk) 05:29, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Maybe, but this issue is important and I'm not sure this page draws the amount of attention we'd like. The issue has percolated up from various pages to FICT and lately to NOT. NOT is the highest level as far as I can tell, so it seems more appropriate to me. This page's project page now includes stuff about spoilers which may be appropriate for a page with this name, but isn't really relevant to the discussion that started this page. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:02, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, this page is linked to from CENT and NOT, and we can link to it from FICT, WP:VPP, and other pages as well for even more visibility. It's not all that important that NOT is a "high level" page; wherever people congregate is where work gets done. And this page got started because the issues with plot summaries exceed what can or should be addressed via NOT... so here we are. So far so good.--Father Goose (talk) 17:47, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

• Just edit the main page. Write up the guidance on how plot summaries should be used in an encyclopedia. Hiding T 11:25, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Definition of plot summary

I've added a section on what the definition of a plot summary is (as to encapsulate the scope that this guideline should cover); that itself I doubt is a problem, but I will note that I am using what I think is generally meant by this, that this is more than just a "summary of the plot", and I expect this to be a potential issue with others, thus opening this section here for discussion. --MASEM 16:03, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I recognize both the merits of your approach, and the problems, and proposed a more flexible wording. DGG (talk) 03:28, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Changed is fine as to clarify what this covers. --MASEM 03:32, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Expansive approach and copyright concerns

Hi, I am not sure as to the necessity of this section. I have read other commenters suggesting copyright concerns over plot summaries do not rise to the level of restricting article content (though there may be other valid reasons for restricting content). I think this section obviates itself when it concedes plot summaries should be limited to "our purpose" in building the encylopedia -- in other words, other guidelines (which define "our purpose") are controlling factors, making the copyright question irrelevant.Fletcher (talk) 15:13, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

• Other commentators can say what they want. The Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel Mike Godwin says we have to edit following copyright law, trademark law, etc. [1] That clearly indicates that we have to respect copyright law and that copyright concerns affect us. The copyright question is very relevant. Where policies and guidance may inadvertently allow us to breach copyright law, we need to make it very clear that is not allowed. Therefore, at some point we have to discuss the copyright concerns, since we are not allowed to breach copyright law, trademark law, etc. Copyright law very clearly restricts the content of our articles; that is the whole point of copyright law. Hiding T 15:47, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

• • Do we really need an attorney to tell us we are bound by the law? Of course the law applies here as elsewhere. The question is whether, in practical terms, copyright considerations will shape our coverage of fictional topics, or whether other considerations will limit our coverage long before copyright exposure becomes a factor. Godwin only gave you a one-sentence answer but it seems more in line with the latter than the former; he seems unconcerned with the matter, and only added that we still have to follow the law so as not to imply obvious copyright violations (e.g. 20,000 word excerpts from Harry Potter) would be acceptable here. If Godwin thought a 500 word plot summary is OK, but 1,000 words could get Wikipedia sued, I'm sure he would have said so. Thus, I stand by my opinion that this section could be safely removed. It's a little like worrying your life span will be restricted by the sun's evolution into a red giant. --Fletcher (talk) 17:11, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

To what degree are plot summaries, independently written by our contributors and licensed under GDFL, approaching violation of copyright? Unless they're simply copying summaries from other websites, or copying screenplays/scripts/etc. that are copyrighted, is this really a big issue? I don't have any experience in this area, and certainly not with the law, but I'm not aware of any restrictions on publishing a summary written in one's own words, that's not a copy from some other work, especially when it's not for profit but rather licensed under GDFL. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:30, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Reiterating the content of a copyrighted work is a derivative work regardless of the amount. That's not to say derivative works are illegal or the like, but when considering the concept of a copyright infringement, the size and nature of that derivative work are brought into question as well as the context and purpose for the work. In other words, when we discuss the in-universe details of works, that is all non-free fair use of derivative works of copyrighted material. Now, from the standpoint of WP's legal standing, as Mike Godwin's stated, lets not fear the copyright police until we're told otherwise. But, it is important to note that WP's mission is to be a free (as in thought) encyclopedia, and the inclusion of large amounts of derivative works without appropriate fair use justification goes against this mission. Thus, not for the purposes of being legally correct, but for stickly to the mission of WP should we really concern ourselves with the depth of coverage we give to plot summaries and the like. --MASEM 18:42, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Gotcha. I'm definitely a proponent of concise plot summaries as opposed to expansive ones because I believe that is much more in line with WP's goal of being an encyclopedia, and our guidelines about providing mainly real-world context when discussing works of fiction. I just wasn't aware of the extent of the legal issues, particularly the degree of them being derivative works. I think one source of confusion for some of our editors is that IMDb now allows users to write plot summaries ([2]), and encourages them to include as much detail as they would like to ([3]). When trimming down excessive detail from plot summaries, I've seen some editors take offense and use the IMDb example as a defense. Of course the goals of IMDb and WP are different, and I don't know what policies IMDb has in this regard, but I could see how an editor might not understand that a lengthy, highly detailed plot summary might constitute copyvio since IMDb pretty much encourages such things. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:58, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Unless someone can cite case law to the contrary, the notion that plot summaries constitute derivative works not protected by fair use seems theoretical, not something we should be much concerned about. I objected to this section because it is vaguely threatening, but does not provide concrete guidance on how editors need to limit what they include -- likely because such information is unknown. --Fletcher (talk) 19:54, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

It's a wiki. If you don't like anything, be bold. See how the consensus forms through editing and discussion. Why not change the page to better reflect your views, and if I don't like it I'll amend accordingly. As long as we don't blindly revert each other but instead change the language until we arrive at something we're both happy with, we should be okay. The more editors we get involved in the editing, the better the consensus will be. Deal? Hiding T 09:09, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I have taken your suggestion. Hope it's an improvement.--Fletcher (talk) 22:45, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

There's separate concepts here. The first is that plot summaries are derivative works by US Copyright law, considering them as "abridgement" or "condensation" of the original work. The second is that by US Copyright law, only the original work's owner enjoys the right to make derivative works freely; in other words, ignoring the fair use issue, derivative works are non-free and thus rub against WP's mission of being a free encyclopedia. The third point is that derivative works are covered until appropriate fair use provisions, granted several issues, including the purpose of the work (such as parody, education, or critical commentary), and the amount of the original work used. This is where the fears of copyright policing may come in, and that we shouldn't be worrying about the legal concerns as per Mike Godwin, but by requiring more than just plot summaries, as to make provide the additional aspects generally required by fair use, helps to offset the issues of non-free work inclusion into WP. --MASEM 09:52, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't have time for a lengthy response now but derivative works doesn't seem to say anything about plot summaries; you may be correct that they are derivative works but that seems to be your interpretation of the law (which Godwin may or may not agree with). I note most examples of derivative works involve actually copying the work and using it in something new (e.g. cutting out chapters from a long novel and selling the shortened version). I don't see textual summaries of works being cited as derivatives. Perhaps more importantly, because it can be argued that copyright violations need to be dealt with aggressively, including language about copyright in our plot guidelines could be used as a trump card by people who would prefer quickly deleting sub-par articles rather than gradually improving them. I'm not always against deleting articles, but it should be done for the right reasons. --Fletcher (talk) 22:45, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I've already had this discussion, and I'm unconvinced that anything in US law, or Wikipedia policies and guidelines indicates that plot description is a copyright violation. The "creative expression" is protected; the ideas are not. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 21:29, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

That is not an entirely useful distinction; plot is a portion of creative expression, and is more than just "ideas". But it's not useful to be making a legal argument about plot summaries at this time, because as yet we have not faced any legal action regarding them. I contacted Mike Godwin about the issue some months ago, and the gist of his reply was that in the absence of "DMCA takedown requests", we don't have to do anything about the issue.

The problem is, we might yet receive those requests. The publisher of a "Guide to Twin Peaks" was successfully sued for providing extensive character, plot, and setting descriptions, much like what we provide on various pages of the encyclopedia. Personally, I'd rather we stay mindful of this issue, rather than treat it like one that could never possibly arise.--Father Goose (talk) 09:12, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

It strikes me that some guidance to avoid the obviously legally problematic may be in order, and some other guidance avoids the possibly-problematic stuff while also encouraging good style. For example, "A summary of the plot of a work is appropriate, a synopsis is not" or even "care should be taken that the summary does not become an effective abridgement", if we can define the terms appropriately; that way around is from my understanding, whereby a synopsis clearly describes every vaguely important feature of the work including character interactions etc, while a summary gives a vague-ish outline. A more explicit guidance that's strong might be that "a summary must not describe every event described in a work, or even the most important ones, especially not in detail". The really best thing to do might be to have some "this is good" examples, but not pointing at like wiki pages as they are liable to become bad examples. Statically in this page, or pointing to an oldversion, would make sense. Possibly an example of a very conservative plot summary and more expansive, but still permissible one. This would help tackle legal concerns and advise good style. SamBC(talk) 11:23, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

There are no legal concerns for editors who follow existing guidelines. For editors who don't know, or don't care, what the guidelines are, it doesn't matter what the guidelines say. Telling editors to write a summary but not a synopsis is just confusing and represents instruction creep, IMHO. --Fletcher (talk) 18:18, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

The relevant case law is here, it's the Twin Peaks case. Please read footnote 2 in that ruling for an example of what the offending text looked like, and section I.A.2 for a discussion of how it constituted copyright infringement (Quote: "we have little doubt that the record supports a finding of substantial similarity through comprehensive nonliteral similarity. Chapter 3 of the Book is essentially a detailed recounting of the first eight episodes of the series. Every intricate plot twist and element of character development appear in the Book in the same sequence as in the teleplays") – Ring any bells? If a commercial downstream re-user took all our episode and character articles from any given TV series, strung them together and printed them as a book, they'd get a work of precisely the same scope and nature as the offending work in the Twin Peaks case. They would almost certainly be liable to a comparable copyright action. Therefore, it's non-free. When Godwin made those remarks saying we shouldn't worry and we aren't receiving any takedown notices, maybe he meant we are still legally okay. But that's not enough. Here's where Foundation policy kicks in: we need to be not just legal, but free. If it's not free for the downstream user, it's not free for us. Maybe we would have a fair use defense that the downstream user wouldn't have. But that's beside the point. If it's non-free, it must be minimized. Restricted to the amount that is absolutely necessary to support encyclopedic, analytic discussion. We don't wait for DMCA takedown notices forcing us to reduce our non-free content (we don't get those in the case of most nonfree images either, do we?) We reduce it for the sake of our own free-content ideals. Fut.Perf. ☼ 05:50, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

I note this is a Second Circuit ruling; assuming it hasn't been appealed and affirmed by the US Supreme Court, does it have jurisdiction over Wikipedia, which falls under, if I'm not mistaken, the 11th Circuit? As copyright is a federal law I'm not sure how it interacts with the circuit courts, which have their separate jurisdictions. --Fletcher (talk) 03:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't think jurisdiction of this particular court is an issue here. We are not talking about Wikipedia being drawn into this particular case; it's just a precedent established and as such part of US case law. Seems to be cited in discussions of fair use issues pretty frequently. Why would its relevance for case law be dependent on what circuit it came from? Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:28, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Has anyone seen this book? It would be nice to know how detailed the plot descriptions were. Were they 500 or 5,000 words? I looked on google books a bit, but mostly they just mention the case without giving stats. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:37, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Sections 11 & 12 of the case summary seem to give some specifics:

“ PIL concedes that 89 lines of dialogue were taken. TPP claims that a far greater amount was taken. But even on PIL's concession, the District Court was entitled to find that the identity of 89 lines of dialogue between the works constituted substantial similarity. See Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enterprises, 471 U.S. 539, 548, 105 S.Ct. 2218, 2224, 85 L.Ed.2d 588 (1985) (finding substantial similarity where defendant's work excerpted 300-400 words including some uncopyrightable material).

Moreover, while the District Court confined its inquiry to literal similarity, we have little doubt that the record supports a finding of substantial similarity through comprehensive nonliteral similarity. Chapter 3 of the Book is essentially a detailed recounting of the first eight episodes of the series. Every intricate plot twist and element of character development appear in the Book in the same sequence as in the teleplays. The elaborate recounting of plot details consumes 46 pages of Chapter 3. The degree of detail is illustrated by excerpts set out in the margin.

”

I also find sections 22 & 22 quite interesting:

“ PIL's use of the protected expression in the teleplays consists primarily of summarizing in great detail the plots of the first eight episodes. Inevitably, some identification of the subject matter of a writing must occur before any useful comment may be made about it, and it is not uncommon for works serving a fair use purpose to give at least a brief indication of the plot. Works of criticism, teaching, and news reporting customarily do so. In identifying plot, the author of the second work may or may not be said to have made what Judge Leval has usefully called a "transformative" use. See Pierre N. Leval, Toward a Fair Use Standard, 103 Harv.L.Rev. 1105, 1111 (1990). Such use would occur, for example, if a plot was briefly described for purposes of adding significant criticism or comment about the author's plotting technique.

In the pending case, PIL's detailed report of the plots goes far beyond merely identifying their basic outline for the transformative purposes of comment or criticism. What PIL has done is simply to recount for its readers precisely the plot details of each teleplay.

”

--IllaZilla (talk) 06:53, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, yes, those are exactly the relevant bits. I can see no possible way to avoid the conclusion that these descriptions would 100% fit our material. Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:25, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

True, but I note a key distinction (albeit a bit of a vague one): They note that some identification of the subject matter must be made before commentary or critique can be made. This includes a brief description of the plot. They judge, however, that PIL overstepped this in their book because they directly copied 89 lines of dialogue, and had an entire chapter that was "essentially a detailed recounting of the first eight episodes of the series" including every plot twist and element of character development. Further, PIL's purpose was commercial and their book did not include commentary or critique of the series. I don't think that most plot summaries on Wikipedia fit this description. Obviously we wouldn't allow direct copying of large amounts of dialogue or blow-by-blow recounting of entire works; that's the kind of detail I believe this discussion is meant to reduce. In addition, our purpose as en encylopedia is to make critical commentary, including sourced critiques. This is a non-commercial purpose that fits the criteria that the case report describes for fair use. Obviously any summary we include isn't going to be free...it's probably going to fall somewhere within the realm of fair use. We do want Wikipedia to be as free as possible, but for a critical analysis of a work like a book, film, or TV series some kind of plot summary or description is essential to the discussion. Otherwise it would be like an article on the Mona Lisa that didn't include an image of the painting. It could be very informative, but is made exponentially more informative by inclusion of the picture, just as an article on a work is made significantly more informative by including a plot summation, and removing it would be detrimental to a reader's understanding. This is precisely the threshold for fair use inclusion on Wikipedia (per WP:NFCC).

What we ought do draw from this case summary, I think, is a lesson about the level of detail in plot summaries that we should aim for. Obviously saying "Star Wars is about a war in outer space" is woefully insufficient. IMO we need to aim for something between what you might see on the back of a DVD jacket (a basic description of the premise, but not enough detail to support critical analysis of the plot), and a full-on detailed summation. What we want is to summarize the work (including relevant plot twists & the ending), not merely describe it, but do so in a succinct manner that avoids deep detail and clearly supports the rest of the critical commentary in the article. This type of summary would, I believe, constitute approprite fair use.

In the end, of course, questions of legality on this issue can't really be answered by editors. It's up to the Foundation to determine how the law applies to this situation and to render an appropriate decision in that regard. That said, as someone who writes a lot of research papers I've always been taught that the ability to be concise is one of the highest qualities in writing. If you can sum up an idea in a sentence, don't use a paragraph. Don't use 10 words if 3 will suffice. When editing plot sections in articles I always aim for this goal, and frequently go back and reduce until I'm left with something that adequately summarizes all the important aspects of the plot in as succinct a manner as possible. I think that should be our end goal here. --IllaZilla (talk) 00:33, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

So they did 89 quotations and 46 pages of summary for 8 eps? That seems a lot more detailed than what we have. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 00:41, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Apparently the publishing standard is 250 words per page, so they were devoting about 1250-1500 words per episode, or 28-34 words per minute. Wikia better be careful. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:38, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

To IllaZilla: I quite agree: of course true plot summaries can't be outlawed, and of course, even if they constitute non-free elements, we need some of it, under fair use. But the point is, if it's non-free (and you just agreed it is), we not only should but we must minimize it to what's absolutely necessary. The argument that we are not commercial and therefore would have a better standing in a fair use case is beside the point: to be true to our mission, we must ensure freeness even for the commercial reuser. Therefore, plot summaries must be integrated and functionally subordinated to analytical discussion so tightly that they will be constituting legitimate fair use not only for us but for every conceivable scenario of downstream use. – Other than that, I of course agree about your point about what the true main reason for having shorter rather than longer summaries is: they are simply better writing. If all wikipedia editors were good writers, we wouldn't even need to be here. – To Peregrine Fisher: Please read the quoted passage of prose from the Twin Peaks book, in footnote 2 of the ruling I linked to. It is precisely of the same level of detail as many of the worse plot renarrations I've seen on Wiki. And the 89 lines of literal dialogue were just occasional "memorable lines", that's another thing many of our articles do in addition to plot renarration. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:12, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

• I think it is important to restate this: Black Kite about 2-3 months ago emails WP's lawyer regarding this case and WP's plot issues, and Godwin returns back that basically, WP's not yet received notices of copyright concerns, and thus until such happen, we should not worry about the legal issues; he will let us know when it is a problem. It is worth the while to consider the effect of such cases on plot summaries, but we should not make decisions on WP-wide issues in fear of the lawsuits. --MASEM 04:51, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I don't see any sign in Godwin's remarks that he gave any deeper consideration either to the particular case ruling we're discussing here, or to the repercussions on our free-content-only mission. I repeat, fear of lawsuits is not the reason we should be doing this. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:12, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Policy

The following was cut from the project page as it does nothing to help explain the policy

What should the policy with regards plot summaries and what makes an encyclopedic article be? Should we have one? Should we, through policy, state that which is encyclopedic and that which is not, or should we leave that matter for guidance, guiding on how best to write encyclopedically? Is it better to do one or the other, or should both options be used?

Dbiel ^(Talk) 03:29, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

• There isn't any policy, therefore it explains it perfectly. Hope that helps. Hiding T 14:49, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

All real-world information should come before the plot summary

This article brings up an excellent point about the way articles on fiction typically make "Plot" the first section following the lead. I agree completely that this is a practice that ought to be changed. The spoiler issue is one thing, but another good reason for changing this practice is that new editors typically learn by example, and seeing the plot summary as the first thing after the short lead gives the impression that the plot is the most important thing, and thus may be what leads editors to create countless articles consisting of nothing but plot summary.

If we put information about the development, production, distribution, and cultural reception and impact of the work before the plot summary, we would show to the world that we do consider those things more important, for encyclopedic purposes, than the plot, and we would provide good examples for editors to follow. I believe that this ultimately would lead to better articles on fictional works, and would be a far better approach than the heavy-handed enforcement of WP:NOT#PLOT, which leads to edit wars, controversial AfDs, and ArbCom cases. DHowell (talk) 04:44, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

The problem with putting plot after all this is that it is usually necessary to provide the plot to set the stage to be able to describe all the real-world aspects. There are probably cases where the plot is irrelevant to the real-world aspects, but this is not true for many works, and for consistency across projects, the same ordering of information should be retained. But one could also play this the other way : a short plot gets one to the real world details a lot faster; a long plot would make the article difficult to understand. --MASEM 05:14, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

A basic description and background of something normally comes first in any given article. -- Ned Scott 05:37, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

A basic description, yes. Most of our "plot summaries" are anything but a basic description. I can't say I've seen any articles where more than a actual basic description of the work was needed to make sense of any other part of the article. Wikipedia is still very weak on plot analysis (necessarily due to WP:NOR in many cases), and enormously overweighted on plot description. Critical reception, production details, relations to other works -- none of these depend on a detailed plot summary. (We're usually weak on all that type of information too -- it requires research and referencing, while plot description can be written extemporaneously by anyone who's seen the work.)

What we really ought to have, instead of putting a "plot" section at the top of articles, is a "description" section, describing the fictional aspects of the work in general terms -- its premise, main character(s), and themes -- in one or two paragraphs (more if it's a very complex work). This would give the reader a general sense of the work (especially in concert with other real-world information about it) without requiring that we open the article with what is in essence a reproduction of the work. A more detailed "plot" section can appear later in the article, in concert with critical analysis (hopefully there is some). All real-world information (production, casting, critical reception, etc.) should be placed between the two.--Father Goose (talk) 07:45, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

I think that's the right approach. It's what we do in analogous circumstances, in discussing, say a philosopher. 14:07, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Allowing an "expanded" plot section seems to open the door to plot bloat (why be concise when you already have the "description" above it?) As I see it, the very beginning of the article constitutes the "description," giving some basic information, then a plot summary follows, then real world info below it. Clear guidance on word count and keeping it proportionate to real world info is what is needed to make these articles better. --Fletcher (talk) 18:29, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

The lead of an article is meant to be a summary of the article, not of its subject, so plot details should generally not be in the lead of fiction articles. However, it does make sense to give an overview of the actual fictional work following the lead, to give background and context to all the sections that follow. The key word here is overview -- the "plot summaries" that usually appear following the lead are the exact "plot bloat" you speak of.

This is why I advocate switching to a short "description" section for section 1 instead of the "plot" section we usually use right now. Plot details don't belong in the lead, though an overview (and only an overview) of the fictional work should appear after it. (Whether a complete reproduction of the plot should ever appear anywhere in an article is an issue I will leave aside for now -- but if it is ever appropriate, it should be towards the bottom of the article, paired with critical analysis.)--Father Goose (talk) 02:32, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I grant your point about the lede, but still, to me what you are calling the overview is the plot summary -- provided it is reasonably concise in keeping with existing guidelines. For instance the film style guide is 400 - 700 words. I concur with Masem's point that in many cases this needs to come first in order to make real world analysis comprehensible to the reader. I'm not sure of the benefit of providing an extremely brief summary; are there examples of this structure you have in mind? --Fletcher (talk) 15:21, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

There is a clear difference between a plot overview and a plot summary. For an example, take a look at our featured article on Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. The second paragraph of the lead is a plot overview, the "Plot" section is a plot summary. I personally think it would be an improvement to take the entire Plot section and move it to the bottom, between "Radio Drama" and "References", or at the very least it should be between "Current Rankings" and "Cinematic and literary allusions". None of the more detailed plot information is essential for understanding the production, development, release, and critical reaction information, and the cast section gives sufficient overview of the various characters for understanding of that aspect of the film.

"Plot bloat" could be a problem whether the "Plot" section is at the beginning or at the end, though I believe it becomes less of a problem if it is near the end, as an overly detailed plot section at the end of an article, rather than at the beginning, becomes both less of a distraction for readers, and less of an encouragement to editors to create similar "plot bloat" in other articles. DHowell (talk) 23:52, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Most movies and other fictional works probably have little connection between specifics of the plot and the notable aspects of the work. However, this is not true for a good number of them; you have to explain the way Memento 's plot is presented before you can talk about the reaction to it, as an example. Also, in many video games, it is common to put the plot before the gameplay as to reduce tediousness in the gameplay in covering the same aspects over and over again.

The other problem, and this is more speculation, that if we relegated the plot to the last section or two before references, you'd have tons of inclusionists all over this idea claiming it was a step to rid plot summaries off Wikipedia. You'd have fans who come not for the notability but for the plot do the same. Good or bad, I'm not sure of the outcome of this, but that would likely start yet another massive headache for all editors involved.

The early plot reveal, I think, is the most comfortable to the casual reader because this is how most reviews are given: a quick plot summary followed by the meat. It's what english readers have come to expect, and while it might solve plot bloat to move it to the end, I think we really need a much stronger reason to do this. --MASEM 00:04, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Wow, I'm pretty sure most would consider me an "inclusionist," so to suggest that inclusionists would think this would be part of some deletionist conspiracy would be pretty wild speculation. I could turn this around and say that the current approach is what is encouraging the deletionists, because one of the first things they see in any article in a work of fiction is a detailed plot summary which might spoil their enjoyment of a work they haven't viewed yet; delete it! Most critical reviews do not give an "early plot reveal", but just as much of a plot overview to explain their review, as most reviewers certainly do not want to spoil the readers' experience. A "quick plot summary" (or plot overview) is exactly what I suggest to precede the reception information, but with a somewhat longer plot summary, including spoilers, to follow that information. I didn't look at the Memento article because I haven't yet seen the movie and I don't want to be spoiled, which is a problem, though we apparently have chosen to sweep it under the rug and pretend it is not a problem. While we should provide comprehensive information and therefore shouldn't avoid spoilers, I don't see why we can't arrange our articles to be more useful for both the readers who don't want to be spoiled, and for those who don't mind finding out what a movie's twist ending is before seeing it. (I wasn't involved in the spoiler discussion, so perhaps some of these issues have already been addressed there... feel free to point me to any prior spoiler discussion that is relevant to my point.)

This is not to say that I think "Plot" has to be the final section of an article; if there is third-party critical analysis of plot details or the like, or significant plot details which had widespread cultural impact, I have no problem with that type of information coming after the plot summary (if not interspersed with it.) I just don't think that everything other than the lead section should have to come after the most detailed plot summary we are willing to allow, whatever that may end up being. DHowell (talk) 02:06, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Arb break - the Issues with spoilers

(outdent) I don't believe that possible plot spoilers ruining readers' enjoyment of the work should be a concern. The content disclaimer clearly states that Wikipedia contains spoilers, and WP:SPOILER reflects the consensus that "It is not acceptable to delete information from an article because you think it spoils the plot. Such concerns must not interfere with neutral point of view, encyclopedic tone, completeness, or any other element of article quality (for example, Wikipedia:Lead section)." This is why we don't use spoiler tags, and in my opinion NPOV and encyclopedic tone/completeness are all valid reasons to continue using plot summaries without regard to whether they "spoil" the plot for the reader. It is also my opinion that when discussing a work of literature, film, etc. it is very useful to give a summation of the plot before delving into the real-world aspects of the work, the reason being that having a basic understanding of what the work is about gives the reader context for the rest of the information. For example, it makes little sense to discuss important casting decisions if you don't yet know what the roles of the characters are. Otherwise why would it be important who was chosen for the roles? Another example would be discussing special effects; reading about how they created the Death Star and such would have little context if one didn't yet know what the Death Star was and how it is significant to the plot of the film. These probably aren't the strongest examples I could give, but I'm a bit frazzled at the moment. Note that I am in favor of concise plot summaries as opposed to expansive ones, but I definitely think they are essential to a reader's understanding of the work in question and I don't think that the possibility of "spoiling" the reader's enjoyment of the work itself should be a concern. Common sense dictates that if you don't want to spoil your enjoyment of a work you haven't seen/read yet, you shouldn't be reading in-depth articles about that work (just like how you, DHowell, chose not to read the Memento article knowing that it might spoil your future viewing of the film). This is simply common sense. --IllaZilla (talk) 02:51, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

The reason we don't use spoiler tags is because JzG added "Wikipedia contains spoilers" to the content disclaimer[4] at the request of PseudoSudo[5][6][7], in May 2007 Phil Sandifer suggested the spoiler tag be "nuked" on the mailing list[8] because the Valen article looked like "a complete piece of shit", Phil Sandifer linked to Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning at TFD[9] and a discussion took place here[10], David Gerard made several posts on the mailing list telliing editors how to remove the tag from every article[11] [12] [13], David Gerard removed the tag from 10 to 20,000 articles[14] and others removed the spoiler tag from articles for a total of around 50,000 articles[15], other editors removed the tag from every article for months, and then someone came along and nominated the tag for deletion in November 2007 and JzG closed the TFD as delete when there was no consensus to delete — despite the template only appearing in under 15 articles throughout the TFD and not the 50,000 it appeared in as of May 2007. And then Xoloz endorsed the deletion at the DRV in November 2007 because apparently comments like "A major spoiler???? This is fucking LEGO! Even my kids don't give a shit about this, seriously."[16] don't pose a conflict of interest. Kusma rewrote WP:SPOILER. Tony Sidaway removed the exception of spoiler tags from WP:NDA[17]. The {{current fiction}} tag was suggested as a replacement for the spoiler tag in the spoiler tag TFD and then the current fiction tag was deleted at TFD in December 2007. WP:NDA was rewritten[18]. And now Tony Sidaway removes every instance of the word "spoiler" he sees from every page on Wikipedia, based on the output list from his bot TonyBot. Phil Sandifer suggested that readers will be "burned" once by reading an article and finding out how a film ends, and then they would learn that Wikipedia contains spoilers. If you mention any of this, JzG will start talking about deceased horses, so it's best to just keep quiet about it. That is why we don't use spoiler tags. Although you could read discussions about the issue of spoiler warnings at the numerous archives of WT:SPOILER. --Pixelface (talk) 04:47, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Interesting bunch of diffs Pixel. It's nice to have conversations summarized with diffs. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:27, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

If only they displayed the same zealousness in removing every instance of the term "notability". Catchpole (talk) 05:29, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Note is mentioned/linked to 14 time in NOT, about half which treat is as policy. Something we should look at. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:54, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

What happened with the spoiler issue is a shame and it still makes me cringe to think about it. I myself supported phasing the spoiler tag out, but what actually happened was something I would never support, and greatly disrespected the sprit of consensus. -- Ned Scott 06:20, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Interesting. I never really knew how I went down, I just noticed at some point that spoiler tags started disappearing. To be honest, though, I'm not as riled up about it as some people. Sure, it could have been handled better, but I completely agree with the assertion that spoiler tags and the like have no place in an encyclopedia. This isn't a blog or a fanzine, it's an encyclopedia. Encyclopedias contain lots of detailed information about the topics they cover. What person with any degree of common sense looks up a work of film/literature/etc. in an encyclopedia and doesn't expect to read something about the work's plot? And to make the common sense argument even more apparent, anybody who sees a section in an article entitled "Plot" or "Plot summary" in big, bold letters, reads it, and then gets upset that it spoiled their enjoyment of the work obviously has no leg to stand on in complaining about spoilers. Why would you read a plot section unless you wanted to know the plot? Anyway, this really isn't the point of this discussion. I just happen to believe that spoiler tags, or any other such warnings, are completely inappropriate to an encyclopedia. I wasn't aware of the rather unilateral actions taken in removing them from WP, but honestly I'm relieved to be rid of them. --IllaZilla (talk) 07:09, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

These are arguments that have been brought up in the past on WT:SPOILER:

• Encyclopedias don't have spoiler warnings
• Encyclopedias don't reveal spoilers

• Nobody can agree on what a spoiler is
• Spoilers generally refer to surprises or twists in a story, foreknowledge of which would "spoil" the surprise

• Describing something as a spoiler counts as original research
• Editors are able to judge whether something is neutral or not, so why aren't they able to judge whether an event was a surprise or not?

• Some readers expect to read everything that happens in a story
• Some readers expect a brief idea of what a fictional work is about

• We shouldn't be warning people that they're about to read information
• A spoiler warning is more like a roadsign telling you that a city is X kilometres/miles away

• If readers don't want to read spoilers, they shouldn't read them
• Once you've read a spoiler, you can't unread it

• People should expect to read spoilers if they see a Plot heading; a spoiler warning under a Plot heading is redundant
• Some readers don't expect to read spoilers in a Plot section; not all Plot sections reveal spoilers

• A Plot heading is a sufficient warning
• Spoilers in an article aren't always in a Plot section

• All spoilers should be placed in Plot sections
• The lede/lead of the article should also contain spoilers

• Plot summaries should be as comprehensive as possible
• Plot summaries can be written without revealing spoilers; film critics and videogame critics do it all the time

• People who want to remain "selectively ignorant" would do best to avoid reading Wikipedia
• Different people use Wikipedia for different reasons

• Articles should not be read by people thinking about whether to see a film or not
• People who have already seen the film really have no need to read a Plot section anyway

• If someone doesn't expect to find spoilers on Wikipedia, they'll read a spoiler and learn that Wikipedia contains spoilers
• There's no reason to ruin people's enjoyment of a fictional work. There are less articles on Wikipedia than their are potential readers of Wikipedia

• If some articles have spoiler warnings and some don't, a reader could have the film spoiled for them anyway
• It only takes one person to be spoiled to add a spoiler warning

• Everything that happens in a film is a spoiler
• No, just the twists

• Fear of spoilers is irrational
• If someone would enjoy The Sixth Sense more without knowing how the film ends, that's their right

• After a certain time, an event in a film is no longer considered a spoiler
• If you haven't seen a particular film, the film can still be spoiled for you

• But everybody already knows how that film ends!
• Everyone on Earth? Everyone who hasn't been born?

• The idea that knowing what happens in a film before you watch it somehow "spoils" the film is stupid
• It's not your job to reveal all the surprises an author has created; if a film generates suspense by the viewer not knowing what happens next, telling them what happens next removes all the suspense and destroys what the author has created

• Omitting spoilers would make Wikipedia less comprehensive
• Revealing spoilers may make consumers less likely to spend money on a fictional work, affecting an author's right to profit from their work

• Spoiler warnings are unprofessional
• Nothing about Wikipedia is professional, it's written by amateurs and volunteers

• Spoiler warnings are disclaimers and we don't put disclaimers in articles
• Spoiler warnings are not disclaimers, because they are not "a statement intended to specify or delimit the scope of rights and obligations that may be exercised and enforced by parties in a legally-recognized relationship."

• The content disclaimers already says Wikipedia contains spoilers
• Websurfers aren't required to read the content disclaimer before accessing Wikipedia

• Spoiler warnings are a courtesy that have been used on the Internet for years
• Spoiler warnings make Wikipedia look bad

• Intentionally spoiling fictional works for people is a malicious act
• Nobody forced them to read the article

• Spoiler warnings can be cited to reliable, third-party sources
• There's no reason why we have to adopt their POV as Wikipedia's POV

I think that covers most of the arguments/counter-arguments regarding spoiler warnings. Personally, I've come to accept that having no spoiler warnings is easier than having thousands and thousands of them. People still add spoiler warnings to articles though. And one editor removes them. --Pixelface (talk) 05:42, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

For purposes of what Hiding wants this page to be, lets assume that we don't warn or edit around spoilers in any section dealing directly with plot summary type information, however, what do we do in other sections that are not plot summaries is not yet set. (This will go back to order of information in a second). Say there's a work that a lot of time and development went in to making the spoiler reveal as dramatic as possible such that it provides a lot of good sourced information to be added in a "Development" section. I would argue that one could write that section in both ways, being direct about the spoiler which likely makes the writing much easier to read, or that you could approach it obliquely, referring to it as a "dramatic scene" and leaving names or places or other information out, and leave that section relatively spoiler free, but this likely leads to bad writing as there would be a lot of pronouns without proper nouns, or just outright difficulty in understanding what is being talked about.

Now, if the order is plot first, we should reasonable expect the reader did not jump from lead to the TOC to the development section, skipping the plot section all together (though this is possible). They have read the plot, they are well aware of the spoiler, and thus there's no need to obfuscate language to prevent the spoiler from being revealed in the development section. However, if we allow the order to be changed, such that plot and the full spoiler reveal is last, we have a more difficult problem. Now say Development is first. A user who doesn't care about spoilers will find the sentence about development to be extremely confusing because it is very unlikely the overview of the plot in the lead will go into enough to understand it, regardless if we include the specific details of the spoiler or obfuscate around it. This is just an extension of the idea above that there are cases where it is necessary to know the plot to be able to talk about specific Development, REception, and other information, and without out it, too much confusion can take place.

However not all (if not most) spoilers are not linked to this type of information. Rarely does the actual nature of the spoiler really bring out addition non-primary sources to talk about it. However, it is possible depending on writing style to either write other sections such as Development and Reception "with spoilers or "without" , neither way obfuscating the text. I would argue that in any case where it is possible outside of the plot information, that avoidance of spoilers should be performed as long as it does not dull the text, as a courtesy to readers; if too much obfuscation occurs and spoiling can assist to remove that as to improve the writing, then so be it. This, in turn , reflects that plot summaries should always come as the first section in order to set the up what the spoiler is for the reader that actually needs to learn about the topic. --MASEM 12:48, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

But the reader has no way of knowing in advance whether Development and Reception can be written without spoilers, so, barring any reincarnation of spoiler tags, this "courtesy to readers" is in practice moot. If the reader is wary of spoilers, he will avoid the article until he is ready for it. If the reader is unaware Wikipedia contains spoilers, he is going to get burned pretty quickly, regardless of any courtesy we try to extend to him. We should expect (force) readers to train themselves to avoid articles on works they don't want to be spoiled. Or, maybe just keep the intro to the article free of spoilers, as a rule, so a reader can get some minimal information about the work while keeping his eyes on the top of the screen. --Fletcher (talk) 13:30, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I acknowledge that some development or reception information might be difficult to write about without the reader already being aware of the spoilers, but clearly other information can be written without any such revelations. Personally, I think that such information should be included before a detailed plot summary (but after a plot overview or synopsis sufficient to get the gist of the work). We don't even need to rely on our own judgment in many cases, because reliable sources such as critical reviews do not typically reveal spoilers, so can be used to separate the spoiler-free content from the spoiler-containing and spoiler-dependent content. In my perfect Wikipedia, an article about a film which contains spoilers might be structured as follows:

Lead

1. Plot overview (could be part of lead)
2. Cast
3. Development
4. Critical reception
5. Plot
6. Twist ending
   1. Development
   2. Critical reception and analysis
7. See also
8. References
9. External links

It would be relatively obvious to any reader that the "Plot" and "Twist ending" sections would contain spoilers (without the need for any warnings or even the word "spoiler"), so readers who wish not to be spoiled can avoid those sections, while still being able to learn about the cast, development, and critical reception of the film in general. DHowell (talk) 03:24, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

How much plot? A real-world based take

So, we know that Wikipedia is meant to combine aspects of general encyclopaedias, almanacs, and specialist encyclopaedias, right? Well, I've heard people talk about "how much plot gets covered by Brittanica", and various arguments why that's the wrong question, but here's mine: we combine aspects of specialist encyclopaedias, there's no reason that shouldn't include encyclopaedias of fictional topics. There are quite a few, general and more specific; I used to have the Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and there's multiple editions of the Star Trek encyclopaedia. I'm also fairly sure I've seen encyclopaedias of fiction more generally. So, how about we pool experience of and reference to such works and use this as a basis. Working only with successful, published works, of course. SamBC(talk) 10:11, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

A cautionary point is that works that call themselves encyclopedias may actually not be that. Encyclopedias are tertiary sources, but some of the fiction-based ones are actually third-party primary works - they only summarize the show itself and rarely include other sourcing to make them appropriate tertiary. That said, there are also likely true encyclopedias of fiction, I believe the F&SF one you mention is one such case. --MASEM 14:14, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, they're often first-party, and rarely primary - they're usually secondary. For example, the Star Trek encyclopaedia is generally considered first-party as the authors are intimately connected with the production, but it's secondary or even tertiary because it's based on the episodes and other information (primary sources making it secondary) and, from time to time, other sources. Also note that you can't always tell what sources publications used, because they don't always list them. I don't remember bibliographies or citations in Brittanica. However, your point in general stands. SamBC(talk) 15:22, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

It's almost impossible to define globally. But my own take on it has been that what we include is based on real-world relevance, since we are a real-world encyclopedia. That might be a vague definition, but it's the only one that truly works on a project-wide scale. -- Ned Scott 05:36, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm suggesting we take our cue from such works; how is "Science Fiction: the Illustrated Encyclopedia" (published by Doring-Kindersley, IIRC) not a real-world encyclopaedia? Yet if memory serves, it gives fairly concise descriptions of the plots of key works. Not very concise, just fairly. And it was constrained by space, limiting the number of works it could do this for. That might be the best cue we could take, although I'm sure there are other works not limited to SF. I just wish now that I still had a copy, rather than letting it go on bookmooch, but I never looked at the darn thing anymore… for that matter (being Devil's Advocate briefly), how does the definition of wikipedia as a "combinbation of general encyclopaedia, almanac, and specialist encyclopaedia" incontrovertibly define it as "real world" except for it existing in the real world? SamBC(talk) 11:14, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

The encyclopedia discusses the things which are found in the real world. Fiction exists in the real world, as does every work of the human imagination: religion, philosophy, science, art, music. To not discuss the content of the fiction would be like trying to discuss a religion without saying what its doctrines are, and just talking about its external history. Obviously one cannot understand the history without knowing the doctrine. However, it is possible to discuss the doctrine as an internal system existing at a particular point of time, without knowing the history--that's not usually considered a good way of understanding, and it corresponds to discussing the plot only , without the significance. As an example, I was trying to rationalise some article on a UK soap opera, but I was able to do so intelligently only after I first found out about the overall significance that it has in the genre. that's why we need both. As fully as we can do intelligibly that might be of interest to the readers here. And supported by sources. The sources for plot and characters is of course the fiction itself for the basic events, & the criticism of it for the interpretation. DGG (talk) 14:06, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

As is generally the case, DGG, you make a great deal of sense. I have, however, two concerns:

• Firstly, that principle ("as fully as we can do intelligibly that might be of interest to the readers") can be interpreted in many different ways, and can easily be interpreted (by those who wish to) as leading to covering pretty much as much as a contributor wants to, which has lead to amounts that many have considered excessive. I think more precise guidance would be useful, to help people work out, in any given case, what amount is appropriate. SamBC(talk) 14:31, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
• Secondly, even though this makes sense, how can we counter assertions that, for instance, any summary written by contributors is inherently going to be an NPOV violation, or that describing a fictional race in fantasy as a fictional race is OR, or so on? SamBC(talk) 14:31, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

first,then, yes, we need to deal with the problem of over-detail. If I weren't so disillusioned about it's relevance here, I'd say common-sense. My own experience is that when first coming here I was horrified by the over detailed exposition, which was so detailed that it was impossible for someone who didnt already know the show to follow the actual plot line. So that;'s my own guideline--if its only intelligible to the fans, its too detailed. As a practical matter the idea of a guideline on word length, if treated flexibly, might be the best way to deal with it as far as plot is concerned. For characters, there have been detailed discussions of guidelines for what are the principal characters, and whether the work is important enough to discuss them separately or not, and in the other direction how major a character has to be to be not even worth an indirect. (One of these is even generally accepted--that a character in only one episode of a series does not normally get a separate article.--so there's hope we can find similarly reasonable rules.)

Second, those people who think that a summary is intrinsically POV should learn how to write good summaries. Any particular one can be challenged. Many plot summaries here do cross over the line into analysis. Usually the factual line of events can be taken from the work, and the implications and meaning from a review. There's a good deal of sources available, actually,but it takes work finding them. The careless articles by fans are what discredits this subject. DGG (talk) 04:15, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

• DGG might be mistaken in refering to plot summaries as "factual". Remember the subject of a plot summary is fiction and that works of fiction are written from one or more points of view. The problem with reading or writing about fictional topics is that when "we enter a fictional world, we do not merely ”suspend” a critical faculty; we also exercise a creative faculty. Because of our desire to experience immersion, we focus our attention on the enveloping world and we use our intelligence to reinforce rather than to question the reality of the experience (see page 9). Basically, it is not possible to write a plot summary which is not a reinterpretation of the author's interpretion of the ficitional world they originally created. So it is important to keep plot summary to a minimum, and perhaps say that it should only be used to provide context in relation to non-trivial real-world content cited from reliable secondary sources. --Gavin Collins (talk) 13:10, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
  • A plot summary is a factual summary of the plot contained within an actual work of fiction. The POV issue you bring up is, again, a red herring; the term might be "point of view", but point-of-view in that sense is entirely different from the sense meant in WP:NPOV. Oh, and the issue of editors' interpretations occurring in the case of summary, that would apply no matter what was being summarised, fiction or not. It begins to seem, Gavin, that you are either:
    1. Grasping at straws in your drive to remove (or at least substantially reduce) coverage of fiction on wikipedia;
    2. Incredibly misguided and misunderstanding a wide number of things, despite the patient attempts of others to explain them;
    3. Simply trolling, plain and simple.
  • On the basis of WP:AGF I will continue to assume that it is option number 2; I just thought you might appreciate knowing how you are now coming across, increasingly often. SamBC(talk) 19:22, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Describing the contents of a work, fictional or otherwise, is not original research, as outlined at WP:PSTS (part of WP:NOR). If all editors in question agree that the description is accurate, then it is accurate. Speculation or analysis included in a plot description (aside from uncontroversial, "duh"-type explanation) are original research, and should be removed. But if multiple people can independently agree that a given description is accurate, it does not hold water to claim that they are all writing their own work of fiction.--Father Goose (talk) 03:39, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

To reply to SamBC, to write plot summary in line with policy and avoid introducing point of view, we simply need to follow the guidance on summarising primary source material, which a work of fiction is. Note we are not summarising an author's interpretation here, but rather the fiction itself, since such can and in fact often do differ. If we wish to comment on the author's intepretation, we require a statement of that opinion. If we wish to summarise the plot, we stick to the following:

“

• only make descriptive claims about the information found in the primary source, the accuracy and applicability of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge, and
• make no analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims about the information found in the primary source.

”

So doing avoids any point of view or original research. What constitutes "analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims" or something which is not "easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge" is best left to editorial consensus. Hiding T 13:27, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely on the button (more or less). I guess, given as I was asking "how do we convince" the answer is simply that some people won't be convinced. SamBC(talk) 19:24, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrary section break

• The statement that editors can "make descriptive claims about the information found in the primary source, the accuracy and applicability of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge" runs contrary to existing Wikipedia policy and guidelines. If you can provide evidence that plot summaries are not based on the authors' point of view, and are based on some other source (other than synthesis, that would be useful. However, it should be objective to this guide to encourge plot summaries to be short as possible. I think there is a mistaken assumption that a guy sat in front of his television can write a plot summary about a television programme is some how acceptable is mistaken: effectively he is carrying out orginal research. I think you are skating on thin ice with your intepretations about plot summaries, and I would recomend you do some research into this subject. --Gavin Collins (talk) 07:54, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • The quote that Hiding makes is taken directly from (the policy) WP:PSTS (which is part of WP:NOR). So how can it "run contrary to existing Wikipedia policy"? What more are you looking for? --Craw-daddy | T | 08:12, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Gavin, please look at Sam BC's list again and consider what category you might be fulfilling. Your persistent obtuseness is making it difficult to continue to assume good faith. I fear you are sabotaging any progress toward consensus. Ursasapien (talk) 09:16, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Let's look at few of these specific claims. I'll sign after each point so that people can respond to each directly; it makes it much easier to follow than bunching all the issues together.
    • The quoted statement runs contrary to policy is, as Craw-daddy points out, hard to accept, as it is a direct quote from policy. If it weren't the case, coverage of factual material would be awkward, as whatever source we tried to summarise, we'd need a source saying that summary was accurate, and we'd need source to summarise that sources, and we'd need a source… SamBC(talk) 09:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
    • Plot summaries are based on the authors' POV I'm not sure if you mean the original author or the wikipedia editors, so I'll address each. If you are referring to the original author of the work of fiction, then there's no POV; the work itself is definitive as to what the work says. There's no POV there. If one were using historical fiction as a source for the history itself, or science fiction as a source for science, then there'd be a problem (a pretty huge one, really); however, using any fiction as a source for what the fiction says is perfectly reasonable, as long as one operates within the bounds of WP:PSTS. If you mean the wikipedia editor's POV, then that's an issue with editors summarising anything; we get around that by having lots of editors, and requiring that content sourced to primary sources not be analytical etc. Oh, and the synthesis issue doesn't apply if the summary is based on a single original work, as synthesis requires the use of multiple sources (as we define it in WP:SYNTH). SamBC(talk) 09:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
    • It should be the objective of this guide to encourage plot summaries to be as short as possible That's not exactly demonstrable fact, it's your opinion. Everyone else wants them to be of appropriate length, and the question is figuring out what that is and how to define it. As far as I can tell, your view of "appropriate length" is, as you seem to indicate, "as near to nothing as possible". SamBC(talk) 09:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
    • The assumption that a guy sat in front of his television can write a plot summary about a television programme is some how acceptable is mistaken: effectively he is carrying out orginal research well, no, not how we define original research. That's making use of primary sources, and as long as it's purely descriptive it's allowed. SamBC(talk) 09:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
      • Additionally, you seem to be saying that "Joe Editor" is not qualified to summarize information from a source and put that in the encyclopedia. This seems to violate the principle that this is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Perhaps you can help me if I am misunderstanding, but are you saying only "qualified" people should edit the encyclopedia? If you are simply trying to say that watching a television show and summarizing it's plot is, of essence original research, I think Sam has answered that aptly. It is no different than an editor reading a book or journal article and then summarizing this material to create an article. Ursasapien (talk) 11:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I concur with the view the plot summaries are not original research. Relying on a fictional work as a primary source is explicitly allowed at WP:PSTS. Sometimes a plot summary is polluted with original research, but it is often quite easy to tell when this is the case (when the editor makes speculative claims, interprets possible metatphors, describes the characters' feelings which are not expressly shown, etc.).--Fletcher (talk) 14:57, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
    • I think we want to be clear that what I believe what most of us consider to be an appropriate plot summary is not original research. However, it is possible to insert original research into a plot summary, particularly when they start to get expansive. This is certainly a concern about why we should limit plot summaries to some point: tracking such insertions becomes difficult with more and more expansive plot summaries. --MASEM 15:18, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
      • I agree with Masem's approach as the only practical way of resolving it. While some think, " it should be[the] objective to this guide to encourge plot summaries to be short as possible" and others think pretty much the opposite, we obviously simply must get somewhere it the middle. Masem, I did not really accept some of your previous wordings of this as I thought it too narrowly prescriptive, but I'd be glad to support something less restrictive in both the long and the short directions to accommodate those cases where a short description of a simple work is enough, and those where a long discussion of a major complex work is needed. DGG (talk) 14:52, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
        • I wish there was a way to say "Plot summaries should be exactly the right length to cover the key details of the work." without that being argued to description. Limiting by word count per measurement of the length of the work is generally a good place, but should not be binding nor considered hard limits. Some works just need more space to clearly convey the high level plot details, while shorter or less complex works should not be trying to squeeze every plot element into that word count. I've been finding that there's a "quantum" nature to plot summaries, in that there's certain length/wording/overview that click to being just right, give or take minor wording, for the one-two line in the LEAD and for good plot summaries in the article body; once you get above that arbitrary length, regardless of the quality of how it's written, it's just too long and detailed. But again, this threshhold is near impossible to set. The best we can ask is that editors should consider that on average plot summaries are around a certain word count, but they should not consider this a limit. --MASEM 01:46, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree that editors should be reasonable and do things reasonably. But it's appropriate to offer a more detailed guideline for two reasons: first, to guide the inexperienced. People setting out to write a plot summary typically haven't the least idea of how to do it or what to aim for--they can look at Wikipedia and see quite a range or god and bad examples. Question--has any article in considerable part plot summary ever made GA? Second, we need some protection against the extremes. I'm still putting up with the tedium of visiting AfD on these, and some people will argue to support anything no matter how unlikely and some oppose no matter how suitable, and it would help to have something to point to. DGG (talk) 03:59, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

In universe vs. out of universe mistake that used to be made at WP:WAF

This page is saying that plot summaries should contain out of universe info within them. It has two big OOU examples in Wikipedia:Plot_summaries#How_are plot_summaries_used_on_Wikipedia.3F then a small sentence that says "A third approach..." This isn't how reliable sources write about plot summaries, and it isn't how WP articles describe plots (look at fiction FAs). We had a big brouhaha about this at WAF awhile back and what it says at Wikipedia:Waf#Contextual_presentation was what we came up with. We shouldn't backtrack on this issue. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:07, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I can see a couple of problems with those examples. For starters, there isn't any plot summary content in the first one, it's just production details. The second one is analysis, with virtually no plot details. They aren't examples of good plot summary writing, because they're not examples of plot summary writing. It would be fair to say there is an editorial choice as to whether to intersperse analysis and production information with plot detail, where it is relevant, or not, and I would say that it is impossible to give a general view on which is better, as it varies in subtle, hard-to-define ways. SamBC(talk) 09:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm also concerned that the current draft seems to be trying to redefine the current wiki-wide position on spoilers. While it is logical to say "don't spoiler for the sake of it", the current draft goes well beyond that. SamBC(talk) 09:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

• @PeregrineFisher: I simply summarised the different approaches taken in featured articles, so I am at odds with your statement that I should look at featured articles to see how it is done. But I'm havoing trouble understanding what you believe is wrong with the section, so unless you outline that through editing or discussion, I'm not sure how to move on.

@SamBC: Regarding spoilers, simply edit the page closer to where you feel consensus lies. This is just a brainstorming session. Please, both of you, do not treat the text as sacred or immutable. Edit away. Hiding T 11:29, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Scope of all this

I'm wondering what the scope of this page is. We already have WP:NOT#PLOT, Wikipedia:WAF#Plot summaries, WP:FilmPlot, Wikipedia:Episode#Plot summaries, Wikipedia:WikiProject Soap Operas#Plot summaries, and Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Style guidelines#Plot summary. Is this page meant to organize all that information? Supercede it? Just generate a new discussion? I haven't checked but I suppose those pages may contradict in certain ways. Are people trying to describe here how they think plot summaries need to be utilized in order to be "encyclopedic" or are they trying to describe what millions of Wikipedia editors actually do? Best practice, worst practice, okay practice? And what about what readers want? --Pixelface (talk) 00:23, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Hiding described this page as a way to brainstorm ideas, I believe. It does seem to be helping discussion. Maybe it will be a guideline, or maybe we'll take parts of it and put it in other guidelines, I don't think we know for sure yet. -- Ned Scott 05:06, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

• I don't as yet know what the scope is, but now should I, it isn;t my page it is the communities. I have no grand plans. The community, through consensus, will decide what become of anything we write here. What I would like to see from you, if you don't mind, is a section on the main page detailing what we should do with plot summaries. You've stated at WT:NOT that WP:PLOT should not be a reason to delete. So I'd like a section here on what to do with them, and you seem to be the best person to write it. Hiding T 09:59, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • What should we do with plot summaries? We should describe current, widespread practice. Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy and rules are not the purpose of the site. There are over 7 million registered editors on this site. In general, Wikipedia allows editors to do what they think would be appropriate. We should simply describe what has been done. We could pick some FAs and describe how plot summaries are used. We could pick some GAs and describe how plot summaries are used. We could pick some regular articles and describe how plot summaries are used. We could pick some articles that have been nominated for deletion where there was no consensus to delete and describe how plot summaries are used. We could pick articles that have been deleted and describe how plot summaries were used. We could pick some film articles, book articles, videogame articles, comic book articles, fictional character articles and describe how plot summaries are used. Allow people to consult the primary source and write a descriptive summary of that source. Don't allow unpublished speculation or analysis that serves to advance a position. If a fictional work is copyrighted, an editor should summarize the work in their own words. That's what I think we should do with plot summaries. --Pixelface (talk) 05:50, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree; we should focus on describing WP best practices as they have evolved over time, and how that reflects general consensus on how plot summaries should be used. But we should also (as I understand the point of all this) attempt to explain how those practices relate to WP's mission and policies. For example, prior to this discussion I had no idea that plot summaries could be interpreted as derivative works that might fall under fair use, nor that there was some legal precedent to that. Understanding that has led me to reconsider how I write summaries. So our scope, partially, should be to discuss whether the current practices are appropriate and should continue, or whether it might be pertinent to look at them in a new light. Remember when it was determined that album covers in discographies, galleries, and lists weren't appropriate fair use? Up until then it was a general practice to use album covers in all of those situations, in part because no one questioned it. But once editors started to discuss it, a new consensus was reached and a change in policy and practice resulted. This illustrates that the current, widespread practice is not always the best way. I definitely think that starting with examples from all classes of articles is the way to go, but we should also attempt to illustrate how those examples relate to WP's goals and relevant policies. In the end we should allow editors to draw their own conclusions, but we should try to present all sides and hope that doing so will lead them to write summaries in the manner which you describe. --IllaZilla (talk) 06:15, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

RE: Spoilers

I understand the purpose of this section, but I have attempted to reword it to bring it in line with current consensus. The simple fact is that we are talking about encyclopedia articles on works of fiction. Encyclopedia articles are going to contain information. The section as it was seem to be saying Wikipedia is not censored, Wikipedia contains spoilers, but every effort should be made to arrange this information so that readers will not see them. Article headings should be arranged so that they logically follow and cover the topic in the most effective way. There should be no consideration for readers who "are determined to read an article about a work of fiction but avoid any details of the work's plot." Ursasapien (talk) 09:21, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

As to the reason why the "Plot summary" section is typically the first section in an article on a work of fiction (following the lead, of course), I think this is rather evident. When I talk about any work of art, I start with a general description "This is a portrait painted by Van Gogh that he entitled The Poet," but then I immediately go into a discussion of it's content. "It depicts Eugène Boch, a Belgian painter, born in Saint-Vaast, Hainaut, and the younger brother of Anna Boch, a founding member of Les XX." This just seems to be the natural flow of such a description. Ursasapien (talk) 10:50, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

That's your opinion. Until we find it written down somewhere, I think it is disingenuous to present this as the way it has to be. Part of the point of this page is to describe what is happening, why it is happening and what works best. Just because we have always done it this way does no mean we always have to do it that way. Two people have noted in the page that we don't know why we do it this way. if you are the only one removing that info, I'd suggest the consensus is that we don't know. This page is not a policy, it's not a guideline, it's not anything but a brainstorming page in an attempt to find common ground and to challenge existing standards and practises because consensus can change. Let's just see where we go. Hiding T 11:24, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, it might also be consensus, we'll find out I'm sure. However, I think it's not likely to be written down in many places simply because it's so natural and obvious. You can't talk about anything to do with a work (except dry production details that will either fit happily in the lead or belong in an infobox or table) without referring to its plot, hence summarizing that plot sufficiently comes first. SamBC(talk) 12:36, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate all of that. But a relevant point is whether we want to carry on doing it. Maybe we do, maybe we don't. I want this page to act as much as a devil's advocate. I'd rather not have edit wars and reverting, but tweaking and refining. If that's the reason, put it in the page. Hiding T 12:41, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

To clarify, so there is no misunderstanding, by I want this page to act as much as a devil's advocate, I wanrt this page to challenge preconceptions, and make us work out why we do them, and work out if that is best practise, or if best practise might be something else. I also want it to include all opinion. Our guidance used to describe what we did. It used to say, some people do this, but oithers do that and we don't know what the best way forward is. If a page does this, it is thought best not to change it to that without good reason and editorial consensus. Lately we've seen that drift, and concepts such as global and local consensus have drifted into Wikipedia, although if you push people to define global and local you'll find it may amount to our gang here is global because we're in this namespace. Even though current practise in that namespace, performed by more editors, differs, that's local. That seems a complicated and confusing way of looking at things, so it think it is fair and open and worthwhile to explore whether what we think of as established ideas with global consensus actually reflects what actually happens in article space. If the two are conflicting, we have three choices; pick one of the two options or find a third way. I don't care which we happen to pick, only that we pick the one that has the greatest consensus. Now to do that we need to involve as many people and as many views as possible, and not treat this page as having to preach perfection or one viewpoint. Let's be inconsistent, because let's be honest, Wikipedia is inconsistent. The failure to recognise this in our policies and guidance when even arbcom declares it, is causing issues. All that tends to happen is when someone points out the inconsistencies they are brushed under the carpet, either pointed to some essay or other, or told, we know, but this is how we'd like it to be. Well, a new user might be inclined to say, well hang on a minute, who is this "we"? Bleh, I've expounded a lot of rambling yet again. Hiding T 12:51, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

You bring up a profound point about "local" vs. "global" consensus, and I have started a new discussion at the consensus policy talk page about it. DHowell (talk) 04:26, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

there is already fairly good consensus that we do not use spoiler warnings, as they are appropriate to [program guides and the like, not to encyclopedias. there is also complete consensus that the lede of an article must summarize the content of the article in general--and in this case, really must give an indication of what the plot is about. But it is generally possible to do this without giving away the ending right at the start, if there is a relevant question of suspense. As for writing style, my opinion is that the plot would usually come first in the discussion as the background for the information about the production, distribution and reception--but I can see other possibilities also -- eg production, plot & characters, reception. DGG (talk) 16:37, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Agree with DGG above. Let's not turn this into a sounding board for WT:SPOILER, which is an utter train wreck. Spoiler warnings do not belong on wikipedia. Whether editors wish to tuck spoilers away until the completely relevant section is entirely up to concensus; as long as the article doesn't suffer for it, it matters not. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 13:24, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Essay marking

I have marked this page as an essay. It is clearly valuable as the opinions of the several Wikipedians who have contributed to it, but it is not so clear that there is consensus enough to push it to guideline status.

I have also delisted it from {{cent}} as discussion has more or less dried up. Stifle (talk) 08:33, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Merge

• Wikipedia:Plot summaries
• Wikipedia:How to write a plot summary

I think both these pages should be merged together.

A fair amount of both is mostly duplication, and what isn't would just strengthen what's here. - jc37 22:47, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Entirely agreed, there are a ridiculous number of pages talking about essentially the same thing. It becomes impossible to follow them all. Sandpiper (talk) 01:01, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Now add Wikipedia:Plot-only description of fictional works to the list. I am going to boldly attempt the merger. Rossami (talk) 21:43, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Archive 1