Wikipedia talk:Television episodes/Archive 6

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People, quit the bellyaching.

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

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

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

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

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

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

TTN [1], Jack Merridew [2]. Catchpole (talk) 21:21, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

Talk show episodes

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

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

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

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

I understand that. But from several comments I've seen ThuranX make (such as this one[3]), he needs to tone it down a bit. --Pixelface (talk) 18:17, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Centralized Discussion

Over the past months, TV episodes have been redirected or deleted by (to name a couple) TTN, Eusebeus and others. No centralized discussion has taken place and many feel that the deletions are unwarranted. However, those who delete the articles cite sources and say almost no episode belongs in wikipedia without any real world relevance (this is but one argument). So I'm asking everyone who has been involved in this issue or even if they have not, to voice their opinions here in this centralized spot, be they pro or anti. This issue is and will effect all TV episode articles in Wikipedia. Many feel that Episode has been re-shaped into a baton and so, a community consensus needs to be sought. CThe issue has grown from a small handfull of edit wars to countless edit wars, numerous AfD's, numerous RfC's [4] and [5] (just to name two), An arbcom case taking place [6], another Arbcom case here [7] (this is the second one on this specific topic), a Mediation Cabal [8] an Administrator Noticeboard [9], an Administrator Noticeboard Watchlist [10], a watchlist discussion [11], and discussions taking place at [12], [13], [14], [15] and [16], [17], and lastly [18], (see also a few RfC's [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24]). And, sadly, the issue has even made it to youtube [25]. I want to propose that we centralize this discussion to this page as well as this arbitration case ([[26]) so that this issue can be resolved effectively and for the benefit of the community.

Things to accomplish:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Again, the word "should" at WP:PLOT is used as a recommendation, not a requirement. The information in infoboxes can easily be written as prose[27]. Just because the information is in a template doesn't exclude it from being in an article. An article with a plot summary and infobox is "not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot." --Pixelface (talk) 18:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

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

If the point you're trying to make is plot + infobox violates policy, you're wrong. And the world "should" certainly has an ambiguous meaning.[28] And the spirit of the "rule" trumps the letter of the "rule." The common purpose of building an encyclopedia trumps both. If this common purpose is better served by ignoring the letter of a particular rule, then that rule should perhaps be ignored. I agree that articles ought to offer detail on a work's development, impact or historical significance. But if that is currently lacking, the article is not in violation of policy. Whether you like it or not, an article with a plot summary and an infobox is not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot and the infobox does offer real-world context. The information about casualties of World War II in the World War II article is still part of the article even though it is presented in a template. --Pixelface (talk) 11:46, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

arbitrary SH 1

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

Take the Bart the General article for example. The article was created May 8, 2003 and the first reference to outside sources was added January 14, 2008[29]. That's over 4 1/2 years until the article contained outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take for example the article Mind War. It was created March 26, 2004 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take for example the article Pinkeye (South Park episode). It was created April 14, 2005 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take the article Our Mrs. Reynolds for example. It was created August 17, 2005 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop. Take the article Colonial Day for example. It was created March 19, 2006 and as of today contains no outside sources. The article is allowed time to develop.

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

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

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

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

1. Tag the episode article for notability issues. This alerts editors in that article that they need to work on it.
2. If, after a reasonable amount of time (1 week works for me), no work is done to improve the article and no discussion started that provides a clear idea that notability can be established, tag it for merge to the episode list.
3. Attempt to discuss and, if needed, give examples of some of the FL episode lists to show how good it can be, and examples of GA and FA episode articles to show why the one under discussion is lacking. If notability still is not established and there is no consensus after a reasonable time, AfD the article. If there is discussion, but those opposing merge can, again, not give evidence for being able to establish notability or put forth no other argument than "I like it" or [[WP:OTHERTSTUFFEXISTS|show X has it", AfD.AnmaFinotera (talk) 19:00, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
4. Most likely outcome of AfD, is straight redirect to the episode list.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

arbitrary SH 2

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

I'm not sure what you mean by "fake references." The refs are sufficient to verify the claims made in the article. Zagalejo^^^ 08:53, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

arbitrary SH 3

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

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

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

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

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

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

I can use television episode articles that have existed for 4 1/2 years[30]. It sounds like WP:EPISODE was discussed by a few editors talking about how they would like Wikipedia to be, instead of describing current practice — which is what guidelines are supposed to do. It looks like 19 editors have made 3 or more edits to WP:EPISODE[31] Here[32] you can see who's been talking on this talk page. Their idea of how they want episode articles to look like does not override the current practice of hundreds or thousands of editors who work on episode articles. --Pixelface (talk) 19:02, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

arbitrary SH4

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

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

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

arbitrary SH5

My two Euro-cents -

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if a student had to discuss "Bad Eggs" in a paper. Anything is fair game in cultural studies, depending on the argument you want to make. A couple of years ago, I wrote an undergrad English paper about the Twilight Zone episode "Steel". You never know what might be useful... Zagalejo^^^ 08:47, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Except, of course, it wouldn't matter in that case because most, if not all, universities do not allow Wikipedia to be a source for a paper :-P AnmaFinotera (talk) 09:16, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

• A product or service exists for its user. Even at high-school level design courses, it is stressed that one makes products not for the maker, but for the user. There are, truth be told, two types of users of wikipedia. The editors, who view contribution as the game and indulge in politics (regular nice editors are not included here, as they are the makers in this context); And the readers, those who simply browse wikipedia but do not actively take part in the editing process. Using [33] (and assuming it to be representative), one can compare the visits to major wikipedia space pages to those on mainspace articles, it becomes clear that the true bulk of users have no real interest in the policies and politics. Wikipedia exists for the benefit of its readers, first and foremost.
• Wikipedia exists for its readers and must abide by the reader's wishes. Wikipedia is a product that has gained fame through its readers first and foremost. One cannot dismiss the interest of the readership and state that it is the editors that define wikipedia, for this directly changes the objective of wikipedia from an free encyclopaedia (a product to impart knowledge) to simply the game that it is treated as by many.
• On matters of wikipedia's nature, the gaming editors will currently always seem to have consensus. Looking at the stats listings, it is apparent that a small minority of readers have any interest in policy pages in comparison to the overal number of visitors. From these interested people, the regular contributing editors need to be seperated out from the gaming editors (from here, editors will be used to refer to gaming editors unless stated). A number of editors who would game may also look at such material and occasionally join in, but thanks to becoming sick of politics and literal interpretations may have stopped getting involved in almost all consensus debates. Given the desire of the gaming editors to win, they often argue with such force that even regular debaters may feel unable to present their case, especially in strong matters of doctrine (as this issue surely is). As such, the raw consensus will appear biased towards the gamed approach. In this style of play, so often seen throughout wikipedia, reasoning is usually overturned in favour of the current majority-of-the-loudest-not-biggest opinion.
• The trivial nature of wikipedia is an unavoidable consequence of being freely editable. Real people are interested in what they are interested in, one cannot make a lover of cat flaps want to learn about quarks. Within such an open environment, were permission need not be sought before creating an article, it matters not what rules exist - articles will be created. What matters is the reaction to this.
• The trivial nature of wikipedia is in fact desirable. The long tail theory alone should be enough proof here. Whilst major topics see heavy traffic on wikipedia, the success of the project has become such that it is often used for first-port-of-call to find out about something. As such, a significant amount of traffic begins exploring wikipedia from articles of little absolute importance. The individual entry articles have low traffic, but the numbers add up over all the various topics. Wikipedia's users, the readers, actively want to find out this information.
• Eliminating trivial articles or shortening them will not enhance or expand articles on serious topics. Just as the trivial nature of wikipedia is unavoidable because it is the work of volunteers acting upon their personal interests, people are not suddenly going to contribute to serious articles because they cannot find trivial articles to donate to.
• Enhancing trivial articles or creating them cannot damage or hinder serious articles. If it has escaped your notice, your typical editor to articles on mathematics is not within the same set of editors who are typically active on stargate sg1. Volunteer projects which do not turn away any volunteers can only suggest how they focus their contributions, not enforce.
• Editors to trivial material will contribute to the project as a whole. Recent change patrolling is easy to do, and once you are used to editing a trivial article, you become more confident and willing to contribute to more serious articles. Many editors joined because of the long tail and went on to help with the whole.
• The presence of trivial content encourages more editors than the lack of it ever will. Although removing articles that are trivial may make a small number feel that wikipedia somehow more 'professional', this number is tiny compared to those with an interest in the varied trivial matters who will contribute if they feel welcome on wikipedia
• Vandalism is not a major issue with respect to well-referenced trivial articles, and dealing with this and maintaining the article will not eat up the time of serious editors. Typically, people watch articles they make or contribute to, and as such the majority of maintenance work is done by those with an interest in the matter. Recent Change Patrolling is a quick activity now, thanks to scripts and tools, and bots also exist which monitor changes.
• Removing trivial material will not improve wikipedia's image. Those outside wikipedia who study its quality typically seem to be aware of the work-in-progress user-generated nature of the content that results in trivial coverage. Most analyses see specific serious content being looked at, rather than the wiki as a whole. As the trivial content is of value to our readers and encourages new editors, any external reviewer who criticises wikipedia for this material is at fault for missing part of the purpose and nature of wikipedia. Indeed, most complaints about wikipedia are about the lack of sources, not regarding the breadth of articles (which is generally well-spoken of).
• Trivial material distributed by means which allows a significant number to have access to it is unlikely to result in a purely vanity or tribute (in joke, praise or dislike of something personally close to you) article.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

• Comments

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

SH 7

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

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

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

A possible compromise?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

It therefore follows that:

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

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

1. Do those “rules” truly represent the current consensus of Wikipedia editors?
2. If this is the case is there a good reason to reject those "rules" in this instance? [[Guest9999 (talk) 00:55, 16 January 2008 (UTC)]]

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

I think the crux of your interpretation is that articles can exist as "sub-articles" with a seperate main article establishing notability. This is effectively inherited notability which is generally considered to have been rejected by the community. Such sub-articles are not mentioned in the various policies and guidelines that they are supposedly exempt from (WP:NN, WP:V, etc.) and the guideline for splitting off sections of articles (WP:SS) makes no mentiond of this type of article. In essence policy and guidelines do not show that there is any consensus for such articles to exist. [[Guest9999 (talk) 01:44, 16 January 2008 (UTC)]]

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

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

I interpret inherited notability to mean that one topic cannot depend on the notability of another in order to establish notability; irespective of whether that topic is a component part of the notable topic, or related to that notable topic in any other way. A seperate article is not the same as as the next page in a book, there no difference - technical or otherwise - between a "sub-article" and all other; every article should stand on its own merit. You say major albums from major artists have pages, I think what is really accepted is notable albums from notable artists. What major album from a major artist hasn't been the subject of discussion from numerous independent secondary sources? [[Guest9999 (talk) 03:00, 16 January 2008 (UTC)]]

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

I will quote from WP:MUSIC:

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

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

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

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

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

<edit conflict> I'm sure that a lot was written about the sets at the time of release, it's hard to imagine that "the first time a music fan could purchase the entire Beatles catalogue digitally formatted in a single set" would go unreported by the press. Even if this was not the case - which I doubt - I those particular articles might present examples of where ignoring all the rules might be appropriate - since The Beatles are pretty much the biggest musical act to have ever existed (although I would completely understand the opposing view, since - I agree - the articles as they are do not establish notability). [[Guest9999 (talk) 03:44, 16 January 2008 (UTC)]]

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

Verifiability, not truth is the threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia. [[Guest9999 (talk) 19:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)]]

Who was it that said "I'm sure that a lot was written about the sets at the time of release"? Torc2 (talk) 19:58, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I was refering to one specific example. With the Beatles I think that there are enough people and organisiations dedicated to tracking down every scrap of information that has been written about them that if such information exists it should be relatively easy to find, this will probably not be the case for the majority of older television shows. Personally I don't think that most individual episodes of television shows today recieve significant coverage from reliable independent sources - which is why the vast majority of articles on epsiodes don't refer to any such sources - and I doubt that it is any different for older shows. "notability requires objective evidence". [[Guest9999 (talk) 21:00, 17 January 2008 (UTC)]]

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Just to point out after a quick Google search - which is not neccessarily the best way to find sources on a dog that's been dead for almost 80 years - I managed to find quite a few secondary sources describing Laddie boy. Someone interested in improving the articles might want to look for sources for the other dogs. From the New York Times [34] and [35], from A Dog's History of America: How Our Best Friend Explored, Conquered, and Settled a Continent [36], from Time [37] and from the Ohio History central [38]. I'm sure a lot more could be found but frankly that's more than is avaialble for most television episodes. [[Guest9999 (talk) 20:29, 16 January 2008 (UTC)]]

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

Another idea

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

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

Comment

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

It's not slanderous. TTN thinks Futurama is notable[39] and TTN thinks The Simpsons is notable[40]. Entourage? Not notable. Six Feet Under? Not notable. --Pixelface (talk) 06:47, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

That was an amazing display of hubris and foolishness,in misrepresenting TTN in that manner, Pixelface. TTN took the time to acknowledge that a project was doing what it's supposed to, improving articles. He asked how it's going, and checked up on it, no doubt after other discussions about their intent to fix bad articles. That's a good thing, and shows that his actions can have great positive effect. I recommend you drop this entire mess of a debate and go fix your favorite episode of Maude by improving it, because I see that comment as a personal attack on TTN, not a valid debate strategy. ThuranX (talk) 23:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

On June 23, 2007 TTN added a {{Dated episode notability}} template to several Futurama episode articles, like Fear of a Bot Planet[41]. He then left a message on Talk:List of Futurama episodes, saying "Many or all of the existing individual episode pages for this series appear to fail the notability guidelines for television episodes, and have been tagged accordingly." (nevermind that WP:EPISODE is not a notability guideline and also wasn't at that time. That much seems consistent with how he deals with television series.

However, TTN did not redirect the articles after 2 weeks. Over 5 months later, TTN said "Would you be against a review starting at this point? It'll be as slow as you guys need, so don't feel any pressure or anything."[42] Wow, so Futurama episode articles can be reviewed "as slow as [WikiProject Futurama] needs", but when it comes to Six Feet Under, editors are told "The way for these articles to be improved is through the inclusion of real-world information from reliable sources to assert notability. That is unlikely to happen...", "If there are no objections, these will be redirected soon.", and "If you like the information, that's fine and dandy, but your opinion doesn't really count towards anything..." 36 days after putting a {{merge}} tag on List of Six Feet Under episodes, TTN removes the wikilinks to the articles and redirects the Six Feet Under episode articles.

TTN seemed downright reasonable at Talk:List of Futurama episodes, but when it comes to other television series, the articles are redirected in 2 weeks to a month, and the editors who worked on the articles are not notified on their talk pages. I don't see the point. Is it so readers clicking Random article end up on list of episodes articles more often? Is it so people searching for individual episodes end up on the list of episodes article?

TTN has made a total of 9 edits[43] to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Television.[44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52]

If TTN really wanted the articles improved, he'd be asking about episode articles at WT:TV or starting WikiProjects for each television show. Apparently individual episode articles have to assert notability, but List of X episodes articles are presumed to be notable. How does that work? --Pixelface (talk) 17:21, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

In that last part a have to agree with him. A List of the episodes is more notable than each episode. First for the ammount of info it has, and second because a collection of what made that Series is important for each and not individual pieces (and there are a lot of analogies you can get from here).

But I agree with you on the history. Based on those accounts you give (therefore I will not state this as a fact), it looks as a case of bias. Saying that Futurama is fine to take as longs as it wants, but live-action TV series can't is WP:POV. Samuel Sol (talk) 17:38, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Let us take for granted that TTN's behavior is under scrutiny. There's enough complaints, AN/I's, and ArbCom about his approaches and the inconsistencies that either we or Arbcom has to address them. TTN's ultimate goals may be in accordance with WP's mission and policies, but his approaches have been known to be problematic. I do agree that his approach suggests favoritism though I would need to read through all the talk pages involved to see if there's anything aside from that.

What we want to do is make sure that, if the current RFC shows that episodes must demonstrate notability, that there is a proper and consistent procedure that those that want to merge should follow that can introduce no editor bias into the process. We make sure this process has steps that ensure that 1) only episode articles that truly fail notability are merged (and what is necessary to define that notability) 2) merges only occur after there is no evidence of attempts to demonstrate that notability after the article's editors have been notified (and how they should be notified), and 3) merges are done appropriately so that old version of the information is not lost and/or transwikied to an appropriate GFDL wiki for the show. We make sure that most of these steps cannot be biased beyond two subjective issues: what is needed to determine episode notability, and what efforts should be expected as part of good faith towards demonstrated notability (short of actually including such in an article). We can't fix what's happened already beyond reprimanding past behavior, but we can make sure that current and future process is established for clear rules on how non-notable episodes are dealt with to avoid any such argument again.

And again, that is if the RFC consensus shows that episodes are not immediately notable themselves and must demonstrate their own notability. If the consensus agrees that episodes are automatically notable, then we know that actions like TTN's will never happen again. --MASEM 17:47, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

(undent) I think it's important to look at the whole picture and not just what was happening with Futurama at that time. Futurama was one of the very first series tagged with the episode notability template (TTN's favorite? Somehow I doubt it). This was when the discussions were supposed to be dated much like an AfD. Many of the tags were immediately removed by fans and a revert war was spawned resulting in at least one article (Jurassic Bark) being fully protected. This combined with a variety of other factors resulted in the episode notability template being deleted, a variety of AN/I discussions and the deprecation of the episode review process. At this point I can only guess at TTN's thought process as he no longer felt it necessary to participate in community wide discussions, most likely because the majority of them devolved into everyone getting angry for one reason or another. So TTN seemed to start working on series with smaller fanbases for reasons I won't speculate on. I don't know why he didn't come back to the Futurama articles, possibly because some of them showed actual improvement (Space Pilot 3000 and Hell Is Other Robots are now GAs). The we all had a big party at ArbCom where the only outcome was that we were encouraged to discuss. TTN has now come back to the Futurama articles (once again, if he favored them he wouldn't be discussing them at all) and as recommended by Arbcom is engaging in discussion. You're preaching to the choir when you tell me that many of his past tactics were less than ideal but I think it is ridiculous to now get mad at him because he's taking the time to handle things properly now. If he goes back to his old ways then it's time to be concerned but the way he is handling things now shows distinct improvement and there's no reason to punish someone for doing what they were told to do. As a side note: the Six Feet Under example is from over two months ago which indicates to me that his methods are changing with time, not that he is treating one series differently. Stardust8212 18:38, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, perhaps TTN has turned a new leaf after the arbitration committee's remedy. Or perhaps not.[53] --Pixelface (talk) 19:20, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

A Comment

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

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

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

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

Was that a necessary thing to write? He's right, a lot of the users here seem more willing to fight the policy rather than to do any work to save the various episode pages. -- Scorpion⁰⁴²² 03:40, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

I agree with Xihix on this issue. Also, if the article on an individual episode has almost nothing worthwhile in it, it should be deleted and maybe a two sentence description of it should be on a List of Episodes page. On the other hand, some articles have a lot of useful information and belong on Wikipedia. Enigmaman (talk) 15:45, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

My opinion in a different perspective.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

When the seagulls follow the trawler, it's because they think sardines will be thrown in to the sea. [[Guest9999 (talk) 10:01, 16 January 2008 (UTC)]]

An attempted summary of what is and is not being discussed

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Then it's notable. If it wasn't, nobody would watch the show either. They'd turn it off or throw on a movie. Torc2 (talk) 22:16, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

The show is notable, which is why they watch the episode. How are viewers supposed to know if the episode is notable or not before watching it? They don't, but they do know the show itself is good. You seem to have missed my point, in that when we say "notability" on Wikipedia, we don't actually mean notability. On Wikipedia notability is just an inclusion criteria with a misleading name. Notability, as the real world defines it, does play a big part in our inclusion criteria, but there's more than just that. This is because notability has so much to do with perspective, and because there are other considerations that Wikipedia takes (such as WP:NOT#PLOT). Just because X number of people doesn't make an episode notable. It can hint towards likely notability in some cases, since popularity can increase the chances of viewer interest in "behind the scenes" information, and thus give us a better chance at having those sources, but until we know those sources exist we shouldn't be making plot-only articles. -- Ned Scott 03:18, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

There's no guarantee the audience is familiar with the series when they watch the episode in your example. It sounds like what you're suggesting is that something cannot be notable unless we know in advance it's notable. Of course a lot of people paying attention to something makes it notable; trying to hide behind semantics and claiming "notability" on Wikipedia somehow excludes a lot of people noticing something is a real stretch. Torc2 (talk) 04:54, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

That's why the word "notability" doesn't accuracy describe what we are looking for WP, but it's the closest word that we have. WP's version of "notability", requiring sources, helps to make sure all topics adhere to being verifiable, non-original, non-bias researched, and making sure we don't make WP into something it's not. If we can find a better word to describe what we are calling "notability" so that it's meaning is not mixed up with "important", "popular", or the more casual definition of "notable", we'd be better off, but I can't think of any better word for that. --MASEM 05:04, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Trying to skirt around common definitions of common words essentially makes the word useless. At some point this will eventually break down to just saying "what gets in is what we say get in", which won't be pretty considering the number of editors who obviously want all this information included and just don't pay attention to guideline discussions. I understand that notability and popularity aren't synonymous, but I don't think notability, under any definition, can just disregard popularity. Torc2 (talk) 19:14, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

This is why many of us simply refer to notability guidelines as "inclusion" guidelines. -- Ned Scott 23:28, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Masem, I think the word you're looking for is "coverage." --Pixelface (talk) 07:36, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Prior consensus

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

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

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

Refocusing

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Nothing is automatically notable by Wikipedia's standards. You have to show it is notable through independent coverage, no matter what the topic is. ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 01:46, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

I'll have to concede that point there as it does appear there is a consensus among the editors of airport articles that any airport is automatically notable. However it does contradict WP:NOTE and I do believe that it's a dangerous precedent to set. I think if a similar criteria was used for television episodes it could lead to massive endorsed violation of WP:PLOT, so it would be a bad idea. ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:23, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

A few points:

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

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

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

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

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

Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information

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

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

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

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

Also, I take issue with this common "for the readers" misconception. A lot of readers are looking for everything from a place to put a vanity or joke article to a free billboard to scrawl their ad on. Just because a whole lot of people vandalize doesn't mean we say "Alright, alright, we get it, we'll start allowing vandalism." Not paper, true, but that doesn't mean we'll include just anything. Nor does popularity mean we'll include it—I have no idea if we allowed some well-written, very funny "joke" articles that those would be quite popular, but that doesn't mean we should do that. If people want that, there's somewhere they can go. If people want to write a vanity bio, they can do that too. And if people want plot summaries and episode lists, there's a place for that. But in none of those cases is that place here, unless the subject establishes notability by significant coverage in third party sources. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 20:33, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Many editors vandalize articles but many editors (and bots) remove vandalism as well. It's just not common practice that articles for television episodes each have to assert notability by citing significant coverage in third-party sources. WP:N does not accurately describe current practice in that regard. --Pixelface (talk) 21:08, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Once again, consensus does not come from non-discussion of an issue. I can go create a 1000 articles that violate policy, not link them to anything, and wait 6 months, and claim, since they exist, that must be consensus thus overriding consensus - and get laughed out of the conversation. Consensus is derived through discussion (like on the RFC we're having), through the accumulated knowledge of merge discussions and AfDs, and any other place where issues are talked about. It is absolutely not the case that just because an article exists in a certain form for a long time means that consensus for that article, how its written, or other aspects regarding policy and guideline, that consensus must exist for that; only if the article has been discussed in a wide forum is that the case. --MASEM 01:01, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

And you can go write an essay and turn it into a guideline in 2 weeks based on some trend you see in AFDs, but that doesn't mean every article created before you wrote your guideline is now invalid. The article Homer's Odyssey has existed for over five years, and as far as I can tell, nobody has ever challenged the notability of that episode. Consensus can be achieved in RFCs, but consensus can also be achieved by diverse editors, editing articles with no idea what other editors are doing. If they are doing the same thing, and it's a common practice for years, that is consensus. I don't know how many people will participate in the RFC, but to claim they speak for 6.2 million registered editors and all the anonymous editors is ridiculous. It's clear to me that WP:EPISODE is being discussed by more people now, and it does not have consensus. You talk about wide forums, but how "wide" was the forum that decided WP:N should be a guideline? --Pixelface (talk) 02:56, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

To avoid repeating what's already been written, WP:WAX. (Yes, its essay, not guideline). --MASEM 03:01, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I think WP:ATA is an essay that can safely be ignored by every editor (especially since this is not a deletion discussion). How are you supposed to determine what is common practice if you cannot look at what currently exists on Wikipedia? --Pixelface (talk) 19:46, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

And when I said "And you can go write an essay and turn it into a guideline in 2 weeks based on some trend you see in AFDs, but that doesn't mean every article created before you wrote your guideline is now invalid." I was referring to WP:N and the articles that have existed on Wikipedia long before it was a guideline. --Pixelface (talk) 19:48, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

We are discussing notability. Notability, as Phil S. states well in his RFC comment, nearly always involves deletion in one form or another. Yes, we are not talking strictly about deletion of an article, but the discussion of say "well, something exists, therefore, there's consensus to keep anything else like it" for deletion discussion and by relation, notability. That's why WP:WAX is very relavent here. Yes, it's an essay, it has no weight or enforcement ability, but the discussion of using "what about x?" in the context where deletion may be a result is perfectly valid to consider in the case of notability. It is wise to remember that guidelines and policies, and to some extent essays, are not just words to wikilawyer with and around. They are meant to be translations of what the current consensus is on various aspects of editing WP - this is why they are not considered "rules" and in only a few places in WP are there hard and fast requirements due to edicts set forth by the Foundation: WP:BLP and WP:NFC for example.

And I have suggested the idea of a grandfather clause - not that we give articles before a certain date a free pass to exist as such, but certainly give them much more time (anywhere from 3 months to a year) than an article created after a certain date. We have to decide what a notable episode is first, but as to help calm the editing wars, I'm perfectly fine with giving a fair amount of time to let authors correct articles, but only once is it very clear what the consensus is for episodes, which we don't have yet. Once it is very clear and announced to all what notability for an episode is (whether "any episode is notable" or more stringent reqs), then we can set the clock running for grandfathered articles. --MASEM 20:24, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Possible solution

Copied over from my statement at the request for arbitration.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Editor Methodoly

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

TTN is not an administrator[54]. --Pixelface (talk) 16:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

/* Refocusing */ radical rethinking can be helpful

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

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

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

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

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

IAR

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

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

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

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

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

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

These observations about the "reputation" of Wikipedia seem a bit manipulative ("This place used to be cool"), and if anything demonstrate only that people will make ad hominem attacks when they disagree with policy. If someone wants to "Ignore all rules" and make edits they expect will improve Wikipedia, they are certainly welcome to do so, and as the edit window warns, be edited mercilessly. However, WP:IAR opts itself out from discussions of non-behavioral policy. / edg ☺ ☭ 17:39, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Users must edit under a neutral point of view. Bending poilcy to fit your likes and dislikes is not acceptable. If users can't see a situation from a neutral point of view, then it would be best for them to step aside from the matter all together.And as for the power mad administrators, that's why there's reviews and stuff like that. I'm not sure if they work though. Pacific Coast Highway ^{{talk • contribs}} 00:38, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Moving forward: my ideas

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

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

Some consider episodes to have inherant notability:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Merge to How to write an episode article

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Some concepts to be taken into account

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Please deprecate this page and FICT

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

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

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

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

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

Suggested pathway for moving forward

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Possible solution (redirect)

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

Collective notability vs. individual notability

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The dying tree wasn't notable because ABC's Primtime Live aired it. It was notable because it was part of a publicity stunt that brought a great deal of ridicule and parody.[55][56][57] It short, it was a demonstration that the "Live" aspect of Primtime Live had jumped the shark. Had there been no controversy, then the tree would not be notable. --Farix (Talk) 04:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Notability doesn't have to be verifiable — that would mean you'd have to cite someone who explicitly said something is notable. WP:N says a topic should be notable and then says significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject suggests a topic is notable. I think WP:N is a good guideline to have, and I think "significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject" is a good basic criteria, but I don't think that is the only criteria for suggesting a television episode is notable. --Pixelface (talk) 17:24, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

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

Editors interested in an article should be watching the article on the watchlist; when the article is tagged for notability, that is their notification. That said, I believe that's the absolute bare minimum in notification and it is better to include a talk page message about it as well, but the same problem occurs if interested editors are not watching their talk pages for this. I will agree two weeks is too short between notification and the expectation of good-faith improvements; this should be about a month. --MASEM 17:25, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, editors should check their watchlist, but they're not required to. I don't know about you, but I have over 10,000 pages on my watchlist. That's not something one can easily sift through. Unregistered users don't even have a watchlist. WP:AFD says "it is generally considered courteous to notify the good-faith creator and any main contributors of the articles that you are nominating for deletion." and I think the same can be said about articles about to merged or redirected. That is why I created {{mergenote}}, which is a modification of {{AFDNote}}. The main contributors of an article can be found using aka's tool, and if people want articles improved, the main contributors would probably be the editors most willing to do that. They ought to be notified on their talk pages and told what an article needs. When an editor gets a new message, every page they visit informs them of that at the top of the page and it's a little hard to miss. --Pixelface (talk) 17:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

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

Continuing discussion

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

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

That's fine but it's irrelevant in this case. Not every fact needs a citation. The facts presented for most stubs of this type are non-controversial, and can generally be assumed to be true - air dates, guest stars, writers. -Freekee (talk) 04:55, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Really? 68.101.123.219 (talk) 02:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

RFC: Notability of individual television episodes

Please note this page transcludes the discussion from Wikipedia:Television episodes/RFC Episode Notability

RFC on Television Episode Notability

{{RFCpolicy}}

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

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

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

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

Please provide your input to help in this matter.

To avoid spamming this page with a lot of agrees/disagrees, please:

1. Make a statement if you feel it adds something new to the discussion - don't just say "I agree with what X wrote".
2. If you strongly agree with a statement, sign your name below it with any additional comment.
3. Do not use this page to create discussion threads on editors' views.

Above all else, please remain civil.

Statement by Seraphimblade

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

Statement supported by

• Farix (Talk) 14:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Stardust8212 14:43, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 15:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC), with the exception that while "reliable independent source material" may satisfy WP:NOTE, an article may be unacceptable per other policies, current or future
• Lquilter (talk) 15:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Carcharoth (talk) 17:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC) - clear statement that accurately summarises the key issues.
• Seraphim ^Whipp 18:14, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Gwinva (talk) 20:01, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• -- Ned Scott 21:00, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 21:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree, and note the infobox argument that has emerged recently is spurious; an infobox just gives basic facts that might otherwise be in the first few paragraphs — it is mere formatting. --Jack Merridew 08:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Guest9999 (talk) 23:50, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Secret ^account 22:06, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• Edison (talk) 03:39, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Ursasapien

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

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

Statement supported by

• Pixelface (talk) 07:38, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Support partially (specifically the line "Episode list articles vs. individual episode articles, in this scenario, would be just sub-articles split out for summary style reasons.") Not every television show is notable, though. - PeaceNT (talk) 19:31, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Maniwar - partial support. --Maniwar (talk) 19:49, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

Would this justify the amount of plot-only information found on the average episode article as summary style in light of WP:PLOT? How would you feel about season articles that provide an in between, allowing a little more recap than a list, but not as much as individual episodes? -- Ned Scott 09:39, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I suppose, if we go with the concept that episodes are individual works, that a plot summary or a plot summary and an infobox would not be enough. However, we could use information and sources that support the series to create individual episode articles. If we consider them parts of the whole, like chapters in a book, then season lists are the more acceptable solution (and then, only for summary style/size issues). Ursasapien (talk) 11:15, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Dimadick

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

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

Statement by Kww

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

I can't make it blink, so I will have to settle for bold italics. There's a discussion going on at Proposed Objective Criteria for TV Episode Notability. This discussion is about what objective criteria might be, not whether objective criteria are needed. If it is decided that objective criteria are not needed, the discussion is moot, so, if that's what you want to say, please say it in a more appropriate place.Kww (talk) 03:31, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Farix (Talk) 14:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 15:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC), but per Lquilter the 99%+ figure may be too high
• Lquilter (talk) 15:52, 17 January 2008 (UTC) (I'm not sure of the exact percentage but am taking 99%+ to be rhetorical hyperbole indicating a large majority.)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:25, 17 January 2008 (UTC) (and agreed, it is time to stop playing favorites and hold all to the same standard)
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC); albeit w/o the quantity assumption stipulation.
• Seraphim ^Whipp 18:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Stardust8212 18:08, 17 January 2008 (UTC) Generally agree excepting that there will likely be a wide variety of views on what the crisp clear definition should be and what % will or will not be included based on that, that's a question for after this initial stage though.
•  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) - But, that "should never have" is a little strong. I don't think the idea of "never having" is good, if one day they "can have". I think "will probably never have" is a little more accurate, because we don't know exactly how far down the line someone may pick some random episode and analyze it ten fold for some reason.
• Gwinva (talk) 20:02, 17 January 2008 (UTC) with the proviso mentioned by Bignole above
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 21:49, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Carcharoth (talk) 03:20, 18 January 2008 (UTC) - while agreeing with Bignole's caveat.
• Agreeing via Bignole's caveat. -- Ned Scott 06:33, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree — and offer "will likely never warrant" as better phrasing of Bignole's concern. re: "99%+the vast majority" While we should note that most episodes should not have an individual article, we can't prejudge what source may be found. We should emphasize reliable and significant sources and enumerate specific sources that are not appropriate; imdb.com, tv.com, tvsquad.com, tvguide.com and anything else that amounts to a phone book of episodes. --Jack Merridew 08:31, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Samuel Sol (talk) 11:32, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Though, I would change "should never have" to "probably will never warrant". The whole point here is, it's not up to us whether individual episodes should or should not have independent articles, it's up to reliable sources. Thus far, those sources have largely said "no", by failing to write much. If someday they do tons of in-depth study of every last TV episode ever done, and we can get hold of multiple sources, then they've said "yes". It's their decision, not ours. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 20:39, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Guest9999 (talk) 23:48, 19 January 2008 (UTC) - agree with sentiment, I think that every episode should be looked at objectively without the assumption of notability or of lacking notability.
• Edison (talk) 03:40, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
• Fabrictramp (talk) 16:01, 26 January 2008 (UTC) Strong agreement that notability is not inherited and that most episodes do not need their own article. Also, the implication about what WP:MUSIC says at the top of this page is wrong. It says if the artist is notable their albums may be notable.

Statement by Farix

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

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

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

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

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

Statement supported by

• Stardust8212 15:11, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 15:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Lquilter (talk) 15:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:25, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:51, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Seraphim ^Whipp 18:08, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
•  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) - Make some good points with regard to the "inherited notability" idea.
• Gwinva (talk) 20:04, 17 January 2008 (UTC) a key issue: notability cannot be inherited or assumed but must be demonstrated. (applies to across Wikipedia).
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 21:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC) - Great analogy!
• Carcharoth (talk) 03:22, 18 January 2008 (UTC) - with the caveat that there are (rare) situations where WP:SIZE calls for articles to be split off if there has been so much coverage that the article is becoming too large.
• Agree, though there are some episode articles that are valid, but I wouldn't call completely independent of the parent topic. -- Ned Scott 06:31, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. --Jack Merridew 08:36, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Guest9999 (talk) 23:53, 19 January 2008 (UTC) - Sherwood Forest would probably be notable without Robin Hood.
• Edison (talk) 03:41, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
• Fabrictramp (talk) 16:02, 26 January 2008 (UTC) Well said

Statement by edgarde (talk · contribs)

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

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

Statement supported by

• Lquilter (talk) 15:54, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 16:28, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Kww (talk) 17:37, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:51, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• The only issue I disagree is that using WP:MUSIC as an example is policy shopping. While how it defines the notability of albums is a bit problematic, the relationship between the notability of albums and the notability of songs is very similar to the relationship between the notability of television series and the notability of the episodes. Even under WP:MUSIC, the collective notability has a clear limit. --Farix (Talk) 18:12, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Adding the italicized phrase "describing individual albums as automatically notable" for clarity. / edg ☺ ☭ 18:26, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Gwinva (talk) 20:07, 17 January 2008 (UTC) WP:EPISODE is consistent with all other policies and is a useful "joining of the dots" for editor reference, to make it easier for people to see the connection between the policies, and how in practice they apply to the specific case of writing about television.
• These are still guidelines, so not sure on the wording of policy, but I agree with this. Because it is not a policy there will be limits to how this is enforced, which seems to be the main issue, and not the guideline itself. -- Ned Scott 20:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 21:51, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. Comment: WP:MUSIC may need work, I would have to look at current state of it. The mapping between Music stuff and TV stuff may be better viewed as: Artist -> TV series, Album -> Series season, Song -> Episode. --Jack Merridew 08:58, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Seraphim ^Whipp 14:07, 18 January 2008 (UTC). Agree with first paragraph, no opinion on the second.

Additional comments

• Could not disagree more - WP:EPISODE has been determined to be a mixed up jumble of a prescriptive interpretation of Notability, Style, and over specific editorial guidance. It repeats yet still conflicts with WP:FICT and WP:WAF. Therefore, it is confusing, lacks consensus, and is unecessary because the only valid parts are redundant. I see no consensus at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents either. Even ArbCom and other avenues have led to a lack of consensus in this meta-editorial war. Claiming, "We're right and you all are wrong," does not make it so. Ursasapien (talk) 12:24, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

• How does this conflict with WP:FICT or WP:WAF? How is it confusing? Also, arbcom looks at editor conduct, and does not settle content disputes, so I don't know why you would even mention them. -- Ned Scott 09:21, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

• I need to look back at a side by side comparison (and of course FICT and WAF are fluid at this point), but I still maintain that EPISODE adds nothing. It does not clarify how notability is determined for a television episode nor does it adequately describe how to write such an article in the proper manner.
• Yes, arbcom looks at editor conduct. However, they could not come to consensus as to whether TTN's behavior or those reverting TTN were right. They essentially said "edit war = bad" and "consensus = good".Ursasapien (talk) 01:23, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by DGG (talk · contribs)

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

Statement supported by

• --Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 17:17, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Catchpole (talk) 18:38, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Nydas^(Talk) 22:01, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Well said. Torc2 (talk) 04:43, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Cube lurker (talk) 05:29, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Pixelface (talk) 10:59, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Ursasapien (talk) 12:01, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Dimadick (talk) 12:41, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Bláthnaid 16:30, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Galadree-el 16:40, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• - PeaceNT (talk) 19:21, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Kizor 20:20, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Hobit (talk) 01:30, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• W.marsh 18:02, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• DWaterson (talk) 23:16, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• ~Floppie^{(talk • contribs)} 21:26, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
• --R. Baley (talk) 16:27, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

• The point of this RfC isn't really to declare a consensus on WP:EPISODE or not. We are asking people if individual episodes are automatically notable, or if there is some form of criteria for their creation. In other words, this RfC is one of the steps towards finding the current consensus, so there's not much point in a statement like this. -- Ned Scott 09:35, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

• Please don't dismiss an opinion just because you don't like it, especially when said opinion is endorsed by a number of established users here. - PeaceNT (talk) 15:33, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

• You misunderstand me, I'm not dismissing anyone's opinion. If anything, I'm asking what DGG thinks about the episode notability question. That is the point of this RfC. -- Ned Scott 03:46, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

I am less concerned with what I personally think the consensus ought to be, than by whether there is a consensus and how we are to determine it. But if you want my personal viewpoint: of course individual episodes are not automatically notable--that's a straw man which nobody supports. First of all, the show must be notable. Second, I dont think that for the shows that just qualify as notable that the episodes if really trivial are worth articles as a matter of course, and I dont know anybody at all who maintains that position. Merges of articles on those episodes retaining minimal information are always in fact supported. The practical question is whether for a successful and widely watched show and commented-on show, such as Buffy or the Sopranos, the individual episodes in at least the canonical portion will be necessarily notable. I think they would be, for shows such as those. As we go down the ladder, it becomes more difficult. As we go up, into Star Trek country, it seems rather clear that there is a sufficient literature for each one of them by any reasonable standard. It is not black and white, all or nothing. It's an editing question , to be decided by reasonable people. DGG (talk) 06:11, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Hiding (talk · contribs)

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

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

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

Statement supported by

• edg ☺ ☭ 16:57, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Stardust8212 18:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Seraphim ^Whipp 18:11, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Lquilter (talk) 18:18, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Farix (Talk) 18:18, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Gwinva (talk) 20:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 21:52, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Carcharoth (talk) 03:17, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 04:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• -- Ned Scott 06:26, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. nb: I am concerned that there are editors who want to cover every single episode of every single show ever shown (with a dollop of systemic bias as they may not care to cover shows shown in, say, Liberia). Can someone give a link that shows the number of current episode articles? --Jack Merridew 09:08, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Guest9999 (talk) 02:16, 21 January 2008 (UTC) - agree with sentiment, although I don't think that all of the elements mentioned are always going to be essential, they are likely to be in most cases.

Comment: the arithmetic does not hold up. Most of the 10,000 stations do not originate most of their shows, but we are dealing with network shows in general. A show produced by a local station and not distributed elsewhere might not even be notable as a show, let alone the episodes. If we did have 1,000 shows and 100 episodes each on average, we could handle it. We could handle any number of articles, if they were notable--but of course not all of them would be. No one before has even suggested a separate article for each episode broadcast by each individual station.DGG (talk) 19:26, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

How can abstract maths not add up. You notice the word "potential" up there. I'd also argue that it is being asserted by some that every episode broadcast by each individual station is suited to an article, since it is being stated that a plot summary and an infobox is enough to meet Wikipedia standards. Hiding T 19:48, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

• NBeale I think there has been an absurd proliferation of articles on episodes of TV Series, and that we should have a basic presumption against such articles unless there is significant and substantial coverage in reliable sources. NBeale (talk) 21:03, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by sgeureka

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

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

In reply to what some people said below, I agree that winning an award is not a claim of notability that would justify keeping a poor separate article forever, but it should be enough to pass Newpages patrol and driveby redirecting/AfDing (if it is noted in the article, that is). – sgeureka ^t•c 19:05, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• edg ☺ ☭ 17:21, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:54, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Stardust8212 18:11, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Seraphim ^Whipp 18:13, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Scorpion⁰⁴²² 18:16, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
•  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) - Agree. I don't think it needs to be a "Good" (i.e. the Wiki ranking) article to exist, but it needs to be able to support itself beyond what can easily be covered on an agregate page (like an LOE or season page). Even awards can be covered on aggregate pages if they are few and far between (i.e. a single episode was nominated for a single award). Sometimes making the bare minimum of notability means that you would probably benefit from being part of a larger scope.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 18:19, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• I wasn't originally sure to what extent I supported sgeureka's statement. Even an episode that wins an award, that doesn't imply that there is sufficient verifiable information from reliable sources to sustain an article seperate for a LOE. I do agree with the idea that the plot section should be the least significant part of an episode article. If you can axe the plot section and still have a perfectly viable article, then it's a good indication that you may have enough information to establish notability. --Farix (Talk) 18:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 18:39, 17 January 2008 (UTC) with the same caveats as Bignole. It it won a single award, but nothing else can be said, keep it in the list and note the award there and/or in the main article.Collectonian (talk) 18:39, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Lquilter (talk) 18:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC) (awards are one example of a way in which notability can be established)
• Gwinva (talk) 20:10, 17 January 2008 (UTC) agree: EPISODE does not apply a blanket ban, but encourages good articles about episodes, and discourages unnotable ones; but as stated above, an award is not always sufficient to determine notability.
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Completely agree. -- Ned Scott 06:25, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree — with a minor irk about the use of the term driveby which which is a highly pejorative term that amounts to a personal attack (by those who commonly use it, not sgeureka). --Jack Merridew 09:16, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Maitch (talk) 09:37, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Pixelface

To answer the two questions above...if a television show is notable, that suggests an episode of the show is notable. An episode with an infobox and a plot summary is a perfectly acceptable stub and does not violate WP:IINFO, because the article "is not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot."

WP:POL says "Policy change comes from three sources..." One of these sources is "The codification of general practice that already has wide consensus. These are statements of practice that document the way Wikipedia works. A single user cannot dictate what best practice is, but writing down the results of a well-used process is a good way of making policy. The easiest way to change policy is to change common practice first." The general practice among editors is that television episode articles do not have to assert notability by citing significant coverage from reliable sources. Take the articles in the category The Simpsons episodes, season 2 for example. That is common practice. The episodes are considered notable because they are part of a notable show and millions of people have seen them. The episode is not some topic that exists separate from the television show. The List of The Simpsons episodes article is a featured list and does not contain significant coverage from reliable sources. The episodes are presumed to be notable.

WP:N is a guideline. WP:POL says "Guidelines are more advisory in nature than policies, and should be treated with common sense and the occasional exception." WP:N says notability can only be presumed and suggested. Unless a reliable source comes right out and says "X is notable", notability is an assumption. We are taking the presence of significant coverage in reliable sources as a suggestion that something is notable. I do not think that is the only way of suggesting notability. I think a television series needs to be notable in order to have an article. But once it has an article, the episodes of that series are notable. If millions of people watch an episode, the episode is notable. If an episode stars notable people, the episode is notable. If a television network is willing to bet their primetime advertising revenue on an episode, the episode is notable.

Television episodes are like short films. Wikipedia has hundreds and hundreds of articles on short films. Many short films are considered notable, even if the articles do not contain significant coverage from reliable sources. Just because an episode article does not currently contain "significant coverage from reliable sources", that doesn't make an episode non-notable. Newspapers don't really have the space to review each and every new television episode that airs.

We could describe all 410 episodes of The Simpsons in the Simpsons article, but then the article would be too long. We wouldn't have to establish notability for each one of the episodes in the Simpsons article because notability pertains to article topics, it does not limit article content. When splitting articles into sub-articles, you do not have to re-establish notability for each sub-topic. To say that Hand or Finger is notable, but Thumb, Index finger, Middle finger, Ring finger, and Pinky finger each have to establish notability is absurd.

When a television network decides to air a pilot in primetime and millions of people watch it and newspapers and magazines and TV critics write about it, the show is notable. When millions of people watch an episode, the episode is notable. The viewers have declared it notable. When a television show gets poor ratings, it indicates that few people think the show is worthy of notice and a television network will cancel the show. In this way, ratings can help determine if an episode is notable or not. I also think iTunes television episode downloads could be used to indicate notability.

The television episode Make Love, Not Warcraft was watched by 3.4 million viewers when it originally aired. The episode is considered notable. The episode was considered notable even before it won an Emmy Award. The television episode My Intern's Eyes was watched by 7.7 million viewers when it originally aired[58], yet some editors claim it is not notable. I can understand their point of view. The article does not contain significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject. But I have to ask, have they looked?

I know that the burden of evidence is on the editor who wishes to keep or restore material, but if someone is going to claim an episode of a notable show is automatically not notable and won't bother to check, and if this sort of thing is done hundreds or thousands of times a day, and the editors who have worked on the articles are not notified that the articles are considered a problem, I have to question the intent of all this redirecting.

Could the article My Intern's Eyes be improved? Certainly. But sweeping the article under a rug does not improve the article. Redirects are an obstacle to improvement. Redirecting the My Intern's Eyes article does not improve the Human skeleton article. We need to consider how the encyclopedia is improved or damaged by each edit. Improving articles improves the encyclopedia. Redirecting articles that need improvement damages the encyclopedia.

I certainly don't think we need an article for something just because it airs on television. I think a television show needs to be notable before we have articles on its episodes. But the idea that a show is separate from its episodes needs to stop. --Pixelface (talk) 19:06, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• --Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 20:54, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• A drama episode with 20 million viewers but Google doesn't spit anything out? Not notable! A sci-fi episode with 3 million viewers, a creator forum post and a mention on a reliable fansite? Notable!--Nydas^(Talk) 22:01, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• It is a clash between notability as defined by Wikipedia, and real-world notability. I think that Nielsen Ratings or surveys like Britain's Best Sitcom should be the way to decide which shows should have episode articles. Bláthnaid 23:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• ~Floppie^{(talk • contribs)} 00:56, 18 January 2008 (UTC) - if 20 million people watched the episode, a decent portion of them will be looking for information about the episode.
• Limited support of the "don't sweep it under the rug" point. It is possible to keep track of the redirects and the page versions before redirecting, and maintain records for projects that want to work on episode articles, or indeed any redirects with possibilities. This is one of the strengths of Wikipedia and its page histories. Don't support the hand and finger analogy, purely because, other than big toe, we don't have articles about the other four individual toes of the feet. Carcharoth (talk) 03:11, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Torc2 (talk) 04:42, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Cube lurker (talk) 05:30, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Kamek (talk) 06:46, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Ursasapien (talk) 12:03, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Dimadick (talk) 12:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC) (Though Carcharoth makes very good points about redirect policy, I am afraid few people are willing to follow them.)
• The most reasonable statement I've read so far. Galadree-el 16:35, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Wise voice. - PeaceNT (talk) 19:24, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Kizor 22:04, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Colonel Warden (talk) 04:37, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment

I wish to ask a question, Pixelface, which I beg you will not take as a challenge. I agree with much of what you have said during this discussion, but cannot agree with your conclusions that "if a series is notable then the episodes can be presumed notable, also". Of course, I agree that they do not exist apart of the show, so there is some sense of 'collective importance'. But do you think allnotable series require/deserve/warrant articles on all their episodes? Let's look at a few specific examples. Doctor Who has a large following, and a lot of sources to call on. It has demonstrated a collective and independant notability in so many specifics, that I believe it warrants articles about each of its 200-odd episodes, and would stongly resist anyone who went through each saying "this one's notable, this one's not." It is safe, on evidence to presume they are all notable. What of MASH? Extremely notable series, with 251 episodes. Should we have articles on each? Possibly not, but I wouldn't protest. What of Friends? Is there anything to be said which is not contained in List of Friends episodes? To less notable series, then. The Golden Girls? It has no episode articles, but would it warrant them? Or King of the Hill, and a sample episode article "And They Call It Bobby Love"? Teletubbies? Magic Roundabout? You have said Wikipedia should not have articles about everything that's ever been seen on television, but if they don't deserve episode articles, then are they not notable enough to have a Series page? Again: this is not a challenge; I merely want to know where you draw the line...it might be that our lines are not so very far apart. thanks. Gwinva (talk) 02:47, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Or the very popular Detective Conan, which currently has 491 episodes, and is still on the air. -- Ned Scott 04:04, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

An even better example, Sazae-san has over 1,820 episodes and is still on the air. -- Ned Scott 07:07, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

A couple of ongoing Soap operas from the UK and the US - Days of our Lives 10,735 episodes, Coronation Street 6,739 episodes. Guest9999 (talk) 03:05, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Also to point out that in the UK soap operas are on air during the equivalent of prime time and have some of the highest viewing figures of anything broadcasted. Guest9999 (talk) 03:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

No topic requires an article on Wikipedia. If volunteers want to make articles for every episode of M*A*S*H or Friends or The Golden Girls or King of the Hill or Teletubbies or Magic Roundabout or Detective Conan or Sazae-san or Days of our Lives or Coronation Street, why shouldn't they be able to? Are the hard drives full?

I'm against articles for everything that's ever been on television because Wikipedia is not a vehicle for advertising — Wikipedia is not for free publicity. Wikipedia is not the place to plug your public access television show. --Pixelface (talk) 08:38, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

These two paragraphs seem to contradict each other. If volunteers want to make articles for your public access television show, why shouldn't they be able to? I assume you find them consistent, so how do you distinguish? --Lquilter (talk) 14:03, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

They don't contradict. People should be able to make article for public access television shows. i see that there are many articles for those. However, people should not make articles to advertise their own public access television shows or in order to get free publicity. --Pixelface (talk) 08:13, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

So, then, if I understand you correctly, people should be able to make articles for any tv show they want, so long as they are not publicizing/advertising their own show. Your inclusion criteria is "volunteers want to make articles" and your exclusion criteria is "not publicity or advertising". Is that correct? --Lquilter (talk) 15:57, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Lquilter

Wikipedia is not a directory, not a media database for production details, and not a recap service. These are all great reference tools and each of them have different purposes and functions. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, which produces prose articles about notable topics.; the prose articles synthesize previously published commentary.

There are no special rights or special handicaps for TV episodes. Notability, sourcing, process, and so on, are all as applicable to TV episodes as to any other work of fiction or any other type of article whatsoever.

Television episodes are unique works, published in a series. Episodes and series have independent claims to notability, although they are related and influence one another. It is conceivable to imagine a TV series that was not notable but had a single episode that was notable. Similarly, it is conceivable to imagine a series that was notable that had no single particularly notable episode.

The notability of a series, season, individual episode, or specific arc of episodes is, as all works on wikipedia, based on WP:N. An individual TV episode is not notable simply because it is part of a notable TV series. Moreover, an episode of a fictional work must have REAL WORLD notability. For example, significant (reported) response politically, artistically, critically, or in levels of popular reception. Works can grow in notability over time as they are appreciated or rediscovered.

As with any source, the level and depth of attention to the specific episode is a key factor in evaluating whether the source supports the notability of the episode: A passing mention is not much evidence; a brief discussion comparing an episode to something else is more evidence; a detailed discussion is even more evidence; and a scholarly or journalistic work dedicated primarily to the episode is strong evidence of notability.

• Awards to a particular episode are evidence of notability. Because nomination and voting processes can vary, particular awards, placements, or nominations must be handled on a case-by-case basis.
• Detailed critical commentary in the peer-reviewed literature or in professional, non-trade, journalism is strong evidence of notability, because peer-review and editorial review provide strong indicia of reliability to those sources.
• Extraordinary levels of coverage within trade and fan publications may also be evidence of notability. Trade publications that routinely publish reviews of works may provide supporting references, but if the only sources available are fan publications, non-independent publications (books of essays done by or with show creators; DVD commentaries); or short reviews by trade publications, then this alone may not be sufficient to demonstrate notability.
• Homages, remakes, or influences on other works -- where acknowledged by the creator -- may be evidence of notability.
• Extraordinary levels of popular reception, such as record-breaking ratings, purchases, downloads, etc., if verifiable, may be evidence of notability.
• Strong reactions in the world -- boycotts, censorship, political discussion, effects on consumption or culture or health -- may be evidence of notability.

--Lquilter (talk) 19:40, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Collectonian (talk) 20:00, 17 January 2008 (UTC) strongly support and very well written! And as a side comment "it is conceivable to imagine a series that was notable that had no single particularly notable episode" is actually shown already. We have multiple articles on television series notable for the fact that they never aired, but the never aired episodes have no notability at all (can't even give them a plot summary).
• Gwinva (talk) 20:13, 17 January 2008 (UTC) Strong support: a very good summary of the issue.
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:31, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Seraphim ^Whipp 21:53, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 21:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Kww (talk) 22:44, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Carcharoth (talk) 02:30, 18 January 2008 (UTC) - with the strong caveat that this kind of analysis usually only applies to contemporary episodes and contemporary reactions. It is difficult to assess what the notability was of episodes broadcast 30 years ago, and similarly it is difficult to assess how things will have changed 30 years from now. Some episodes currently assessed as non-notable may get increased attention in future years, and episodes that made a big splash now may have dropped off the radar and become no more than a footnote in history in 30 years time. Wikipedia can only mirror what the current coverage is, but should be flexible enough to change as the coverage changes.

good point - I'm adding a note (in italics) above to recognize. --Lquilter (talk) 03:26, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

• -- Ned Scott 06:22, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree — and would like to note the use of the word extraordinary (levels of coverage) and that is a contraction of extra ordinary, i.e. more than ordinary coverage. This is key to notability. --Jack Merridew 09:22, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Samuel Sol (talk) 11:28, 18 January 2008 (UTC) - Congratulations to it.
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:35, 18 January 2008 (UTC) Excellently written!
• edg ☺ ☭ 13:00, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Edison (talk) 03:46, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
• Fabrictramp (talk) 16:07, 26 January 2008 (UTC) Well said.

Statement by Nydas

I've turned against harsh fiction guidelines since I realised that their principal effect was to accelerate our institutional bias against certain kinds of fiction. It's a safe bet that the 'notable episodes' will be even more disproportionately concentrated in Wikipedians' favourite fiction than the current episode line-up. As for the notability rules, they will always be bent, broken or rewritten to suit the shows we like.--Nydas^(Talk) 21:52, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• The redirection of the classic 1970/80s comedy Open All Hours episode articles is a good example of this institutional bias. Bláthnaid 23:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Support the thinking behind this, but I am more optimistic that Wikipedia can be aware of and work to overcome this systemic historical bias. Carcharoth (talk) 02:33, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• ~Floppie^{(talk • contribs)} 03:15, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• I don't think this is the goal of those intent on removing episode articles, but I believe it's the end result.--Cube lurker (talk) 05:33, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• I can see where this is going. Let's hope it doesn't come down to that. Kamek (talk) 06:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• I can see what you mean about historic bias. Did anyone notice our article on Rawhide (TV series) is substandard and the one on Till Death Us Do Part only features information on a single character? Dimadick (talk) 13:04, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Galadree-el 16:39, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• - PeaceNT (talk) 19:25, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Kizor 20:23, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Indeed. One generation's trash is another generation's classics. Colonel Warden (talk) 04:43, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• Ursasapien (talk) I think our emphasis on "multiple, reliable sources" as the only path to notability leads to snobbery and lobotomized thinking. It is similar to the "zero-tolerance" policy. Ursasapien (talk) 02:05, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

• For starters, Nydas's thoughts about editorial bias are so fundamentally flawed that I'm not even sure it's worth making a response here. However, even if he did have a point there is nothing in the guidelines that promote a bias. It would only leave that there might be a bias with the editors, but there certainly isn't any bias in the guidelines themselves. Very often being popular actually increases scrutiny on that show's articles. If this is about people not working on a set of articles, that's not something you can force, but that's still a matter of man power, not bias. -- Ned Scott 09:30, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

• I think Nydas's point is that a certain group of editors have taken a certain group of guidelines as a mandate to merge episode articles on a massive scale. However, they are biased in the series they select. I, personally, find nothing notable, redeeming, entertaining, or even midly interesting about South Park. Nevertheless, that series' episode articles (like The Simpsons) are considered sacred. This is an example of our institutional bias. I might agree with you that a set of words (the guideline itsself) does not lead to this bias, but the application of the guidelines are biased. Ursasapien (talk) 01:42, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• That's it. Just as we can't force people to work on articles in a balanced way, we can't force fiction deletionists to target articles in a balanced fashion. The solution is a less harsh guideline which gives them less ammunition.--Nydas^(Talk) 15:27, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

There's a point. Like speeding: so many people do it, and the police only target speeders in certain areas, so 1. get rid of speed limits because so many people speed anyway 2. the speed limit gives police too much ammunition to fine in an unbalanced way, so we must make the speed guidelines less harsh. Gwinva (talk) 19:14, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

It is more like a police department that tickets everyone going one MPH faster than the limit, except themselves, the mayor/councilmen, and all their families. How long before the citenzry revolt and say, "We need to make the law less stringent or more fair across the board." (This doesn't even get into the police ignoring all the other crime while enforcing the speed limit. -This would apply in our situation as well.) Ursasapien (talk) 11:25, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

That actually has nothing to do with Nydas's or Gwinva's points.

People seem to be confusing bias with the fact that we cannot fix every single article at the same freaking time. The fact that some articles have not been fixed or scrutinized only means that they have yet to be fixed, and is in no way an endorsement of their current condition. If one editor decides not to evaluate a group of articles, because they honestly believe they will be fixed without their intervention, that is not bias.

A few talk pages ago someone brought up the example of Digimon, probably because I work a lot on those articles. If anyone cared to look, they'd see I work on cleaning them up. Look further back and you'll see me nominating a lot of articles for deletion. Ghost in the Shell is one of my favorite series, but I pushed to merge and trim many of those articles. I'm a big fan of Scrubs, but I have to agree with most of the episode articles being redirected. I'm sure others who have been labeled as "deletionists" have similar statements to mine. For just about every speculative comment about bias, I can counter with real examples that suggest otherwise. -- Ned Scott 23:50, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Redirecting exceedingly minor characters doesn't equate to balance; by your own standards, not a single Digimon character is notable.--Nydas^(Talk) 08:29, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

And? Do you think that's it? Do you think I'm even close to being done on what I think should be done for those articles? More than likely, with the sources we have right now, most if not all individual character articles will be merged. Again, the flaw in your logic is that you think we're done working on these articles, or that we endorse their current condition. -- Ned Scott 06:15, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

What sort of timescale are we talking about? The usual for non-animated sitcoms, soap operas and other unworthies is one month.--Nydas^(Talk) 09:51, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, kid, but I have to work for a living, and Wikipedia isn't my life. I've transwikied every single one of those articles, so feel free to AfD any of them. I'd likely support it. You'll probably piss off a lot of people, and make the same work take longer (since there's GFDL issues where content from one article is used in another, but not properly noted, etc), but if it makes you feel better go and do it. These articles are going to be improved, they're going to be merged, but you don't get to demand what gets worked on and when. All we asked for was reasonable potential for articles, or for article improvement, and that's normally enough to give local editors the time they need without concern that things won't go anywhere. We sure as hell have shown that for these articles. -- Ned Scott 11:00, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

If I were TTN, and you were defending some classic sitcom or something, what effect do you think your words would have?

Luckily, I'm not TTN, and I'm not going to destroy your hard work. I used to be more of deletionist, and I know what a buzz it can be. Why not extend your pleas of mercy to all fiction, not just Digimon?--Nydas^(Talk) 21:21, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

"Why not extend your pleas of mercy to all fiction, not just Digimon?" Oh, but I have. While they're not always going in the best direction, there have been groups of editors for topics like Gundam and Dragonball that have shown that they can improve articles. When a ton of Gundam articles were being listed for AfD I started to export the XML files that contained the article history for those articles, and strongly urged the nominator to slow down on the AfDs so that the whole group of articles could be looked at, and have a plan of action for clean up. I've even reverted TTN a few times where I thought an article at least asserted some notability, and should be given a shot. Shortly after I nominated a bunch of Pushing Daises character articles for AfD (which were redirected, an outcome I supported), one editor undid one of the redirects and went on to write a pretty good start for Ned (Pushing Daisies) (and if anyone is wondering, the reason I even found out about that article was because I have Ned on my watchlist :) ).It has a ways to go, but is far better than it was before. -- Ned Scott 04:54, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Those are just random incidents, what about at an institutional level?--Nydas^(Talk) 13:49, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by ThuranX

Much has been made of the premise, repeatedly expressed by Pixelface, among others, that each Episode is inherently notable and heritably notable. He argues that any episode comprises the larger 'Series' and is thus notable, that there is no Gestalt, and the whole is only the sum of its' parts, and not greater. However, any number of shows, and the way they have been referenced later, put this to the lie. For example, I have heard, on News & Notes, an NPR program which often focuses on racial issues, references to Friends as being unrealistic for an NYC show where only white people appear. Seinfeld is regularly referenced in ways that only make sense if one's familiar with the overarching premises of the show (mostly the small pettinesses and lack of any meaning). As such, there's a clear gestalt. The sum is notable independent of its parts, and in fact, the mention of the sum (show) does not necessitate the mention of particular episodes.

I'd also like to present what I consider to be a particularly salient comparison. Sports articles. Pixelface, in another discussion on this, brought up the presence of all the sports articles here, and wanted to know what made them more notable. I argued a few major points. One, it's all real people, not characters, thus, not subject to WP:FICT, that sports teams have notable and incredibly significant impacts on communities, neighborhoods, cities, states and even nations, by economic, political, quality-of-life, media (ie scandals) levels, to name just a FEW aspects. I'd like to take the comparison in a new direction. Sport is to Genre as Team is to Show as Game is to Episode. or:

Genre :: Sport

Show :: Team

Episode :: Game

Actors :: Players

We don't write up ever sports game of every season, nor should we. We should explain a sport, just as we should explain drama, comedy, dramedy, and on. We generally explain a show, just as we generally explain a team, though we may not list all the A and AA minor league teams. We often explain actors, and players. We don't explain each game, despite the hundreds of thousands of dollars just one can generate for a city, and likewise, we don't need to explain every single episode, esp. those that can't show serious real-world notability. I find that this shows that either, Wikipedia really is for nerds who don't like sports, or more likely, it's understood that the games make up a larger seasonal identity for the team, much like Episodes and Seasons. I went and looked up one of the most notable games I could think of that occurred during the internet era, making easy reference finding possible for editors, and instead, I found it as Pacers-Pistons brawl, showing a far more neutral approach to focusing on the notable information. Please notice, there is no link to an article on the game itself.

If sports, which in a single game earn as much as a single episode can, if not more at times, and which is comprised of real people doing real things and which have far more individual effects on their hometown than the aggregate effect of Hollywood on LA, aren't broken down into Wikipedia articles, then why does every single episode need an article, if not for 'I LIKE IT' purposes? ThuranX (talk) 23:51, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Seraphim ^Whipp 03:20, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Collectonian (talk) 04:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC) and good analogy.
• Hewinsj (talk) 06:06, 18 January 2008 (UTC) I really like that analogy. Clever way of framing the problem.
• Very well said! -- Ned Scott 06:19, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 07:24, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree --Jack Merridew 09:31, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. I took me a while to realize that a show is not just the collection of its episodes. The comparison is great. -- Magioladitis (talk) 16:56, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• The sport analogy makes the point very clear and demonstrates that episode articles are currently out of line with Wikipedia's overall practice. Stardust8212 18:46, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 13:00, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree, as I believe there are no notable episodes, only a series with a lot of notability.--Gavin Collins (talk) 15:37, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

Sorry to come in with a response here, but I find the sports analogy fascinating. Have a look at Category:FIFA World Cup Finals (a collection of articles about the finals in the Football (soccer) World Cups). Most of those articles are exactly the sort of "guide", "infobox", short, stubby articles being fought over here. Indeed, most of the finals don't have articles. There is, however, one famous game that does justify its own article: Uruguay v Brazil (World Cup 1950), known as the Maracanaço. It is notable both for the large attendance and being a big upset result. Looking at the 18 World Cup finals, articles have been written about the last five (arguably none of these are really notable), and about two historical ones (the 1950 'final' and the 1966 final). The 1966 final has had a lot written about it in the English literature for obvious reasons (England won). It could be argued that the other 5 'finals' articles are examples of "sportscruft" that should, like non-notable episode articles, be merged to the articles about the whole tournament. I am sure other sports will have examples of notable games (I can probably think of a few in chess, mostly found in Category:Chess games), but the pattern will probably be consistent - a few notable events at the microscale of individual games/episodes, but mostly a vast array of non-notable games/episodes. To take another field, that of academic journals and science, most individual papers or magazine articles are not in themselves notable, but there are always the exceptions, as found in Category:Journal articles and Category:Magazine articles. The classic examples are Frank Sinatra Has a Cold and Annus Mirabilis Papers. The overall point is that, as you look at any field of human endeavour or study, and move from the large-scale, overview topics, down the scales of granularity to the smallest, indivisible elements, the notability will, of necessity, decrease, but will not completely vanish. The situation will move from almost 100% notability at the large scales, to much smaller levels (maybe 5% to less than 1%) at the smaller scales. The same applies for people - large organisations of people can be notable, but only a few individuals will themselves be notable - the vast majority will be non-notable. The same principles apply to episodes as well. Carcharoth (talk) 02:58, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't think I've ever "brought up the presence of all the sports articles here." And notability can only be presumed according to WP:N. If a television series is notable, I think it's safe to presume an episode of that series is notable. It's one thing to say the whole is more notable than the sum of its parts. Quite another to say the whole is notable but the parts are not. --Pixelface (talk) 08:06, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

(To Pixelface) A lot of people here are expressing the view that individual episodes do not inherit notability, so no, it is not "safe to presume an episode of that series is notable". That is your personal opinion and I can't see consensus for that view. Seraphim ^Whipp 13:59, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

(To Seraphim) And there are also a considerable number of people expressing their endorsement to Pixel's opinion. It is a personal opinion that is broadly regarded. What is more, no consensus has been attained and I also confidently claim that I can't see any consensus for any view stated until now. We are all here to discuss the issues and to state our "personal opinions"; it is our primary aim to do so so that the ultimate outcome will be generated as soon as possible, which will put an end to this long-lasting contention that directly hinders everyone's productivity in contributing to the encyclopedia. Pixelface sensibly expressed his opinion, as he stated "it's safe to presume" , meaning that it is his presumption on notability issue, not an assertion of consensus. Galadree-el 17:08, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

But it's not an opinion which is founded from either policy or guideline, which have consensus to begin with. I should have clarified that better. It seems like a lot of the problem is people not being satisfied with the notability criteria. Personally, I believe we should treat articles consistently; you prove notability in every article and that means episodes too. Finally, everyone has the right to express their opinions and I didn't mean to suggest that they weren't, so I apologise if my comment sounded like that. Seraphim ^Whipp 19:20, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

"...founded from either policy or guideline..." Well, we actually have no policies here, so the other viewpoints cannot be based on policies, either. For the record, pages like WP:EPISODE, WP:FICT and even WP:NOTE are just guidelines. The first two, as you may see, are terminally disputed and subject to change everyday, thus do not have much merit. We can change guidelines to better the way we edit articles here, that's why we are having this dicussion. If a guideline, once created, cannot be modified because all opinions in following debates must be founded on the original one, then there will never be any changes/improvements at all. :) - PeaceNT (talk) 20:23, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:PLOT is policy. "The first two, as you may see, are terminally disputed and subject to change everyday, thus do not have much merit. " Uh, what? These pages hardly change "everyday", and also, being disputed does not mean consensus was lost for those guidelines. -- Ned Scott 09:25, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

If the policy demonstrates to be a blemish, then its standing as an official policy will be questioned. When the guidelines are put to uncertainty to satisfy the community's general consent, consensus of those ones, though not lost, is no longer a precise barometer for argument shaping. Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy; the original consensus is not the rule for the present situation. Galadree-el 13:44, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Pixelface, I am frustrated that you completely ignored my essay, but still felt the need to comment on it. I know you did not read the essay, because the entire point was that notability cannot be assumed to inherit, but must be inherent. Perhaps it is that you do not know the difference between the two words. Please, look them up. Inherent is an innate quality posessed by a thing; inherit is to recieve from another being via genetics at birth or legal decree. One cannot inherit innate abilities. Even if the progenitor and recipient both have the quality, that still does not preclude innate over inherit. A stone is hard, a mountain is hard. Should a stone break away from the mountain, it has not inherited the hardness, but the hardness instead is an innate quality attributed to the molecules that comprise it, molecules which are also common to the mountain it broke from. All other stones anywhere in the universe comprised of the same molecules have the same innate hardness, and heritability isn't a part of that. Or, Red hair and Male Pattern Baldness are Inherited characteristics in humans, bipedality is not, it is an innate part of what homo sapiens are. ThuranX (talk) 00:33, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Girolamo Savonarola

The issue here comes down mainly to one policy: WP:FICT. If there is no real-world context, then the article is legitimately challengeable. Much like WP:V, the editing burden comes upon the challenged. Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 00:19, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Collectonian (talk) 04:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• In some sense, yes, though I believe that one only needs to show reasonable (and realistic) potential for real world context, and doesn't necessarily have to clean everything up right then and there. -- Ned Scott 06:13, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Though WP:FICT is disputed, WP:NOT#PLOT has the same message for articles, that plot summaries need to be accompanied by real world information. I also agree with Ned's belief that reasonable potential for real world info (through sources) is good enough for an article to exist and that there's no immediate deadline for improvement if potential is shown. ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 07:24, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree; above comments, too. --Jack Merridew 09:34, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. Note about editing burden makes it clear that there is a burden of proof, and that notability & other burdens are not met ("inherited") merely by being part of a (notable) series. --Lquilter (talk) 14:53, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:36, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 13:00, 19 January 2008 (UTC), with either WP:PLOT or WP:FICT (which quotes "real-world" language from WP:NOT#PLOT, and is generally a good guideline).

Additional comments

• WP:FICT is not a policy and even if it was a policy, not all television episodes are fiction. --Pixelface (talk) 21:18, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

• He likely meant WP:PLOT. -- Ned Scott 09:22, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

(short) Statement by Guest9999

In order to keep with current Wikipedia policies and guidelines, which were formed by the consensus of the community; articles for TV episodes should only exist if they have received significant coverage from reliable, third party sources and there is enough verifiable, real world information available to make that article more than just a plot summary. Guest9999 (talk) 03:23, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Seraphim ^Whipp 03:32, 18 January 2008 (UTC). Our views are very similar...in fact they are the same but yours is far more eloquently put :).
• Collectonian (talk) 04:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Support, but noting that while we strive for third party sources, there is some reasonable allowance for real world information that comes from production notes and commentary, that might not be considered "third party". -- Ned Scott 06:10, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 07:24, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. --Jack Merridew 09:36, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 14:42, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. --Lquilter (talk) 14:53, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Gwinva (talk) 21:14, 18 January 2008 (UTC) exactly. Episodes should be subject to the same rules as every other article on Wikipedia.
• edg ☺ ☭ 13:00, 19 January 2008 (UTC), clearly and consisely put
• My thoughts on the subject Secret ^account 22:07, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Seraphim Whipp

Notability is gained from significant, second party, reliable sources, independent of the topic (bolding my own). Episodes shouldn't be exempt from the notability guideline, just because it's a guideline. People have also said "a plot with an infobox means it doesn't violate WP:NOT#PLOT". An infobox does not cover "real-world context and sourced analysis, offering detail on a work's development, impact or historical significance" in any way shape or form. So if an episode fails our notability guideline, cannot be sourced, thus fails WP:Verifiability policy and only contains a plot, thus violating WP:NOT#PLOT policy, they shouldn't exist (yet). Seraphim ^Whipp 03:25, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Collectonian (talk) 04:53, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Guest9999 (talk) 05:23, 18 January 2008 (UTC) sound, policy based statement (and similar to my own).
• Support, but noting that while we strive for third party sources, there is some reasonable allowance for real world information that comes from production notes and commentary, that might not be considered "third party". -- Ned Scott 06:11, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 07:24, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. --Jack Merridew 09:38, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Karanacs (talk) 14:43, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Lquilter (talk) 14:54, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• — pd_THOR ^{| =/\=} | 17:36, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Gwinva (talk) 21:15, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 13:00, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Secret ^account 22:07, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Carcharoth

This RfC is primarily aimed at opinions on notability, but some of the concerns and conflicts surrounding these issues are to do with editor behaviour as well as interpretation of policies and guidelines. In particular, the practice of "s-merging" ('slight merging' described at Wikipedia:Merging and moving pages#Selective paste merger) can be extremely disruptive if carried out on a large scale. In terms of episode articles, this process involves carrying out a redirect and omitting much of the original text from the merge (particularly if the destination article is judged to have enough information already). The precise level of merging is often subject to debate and should not be carried out by on a large scale by single editors without some central record benig made of the process. In particular, the s-merge should be recorded to a greater extent than just in an edit summary. Suggested additions to the process would include: (a) Categorising the redirects (note that {{R from merge}} should be used in any case); and (b) a centralised recording of the oldid numbers of the episode articles before the redirects, allowing groupings such as WikiProjects to work on assessing which episodes are notable enough for their own articles. This would help to address the feelings that editors who work in this area are being overwhelmed by the rate of redirection and s-merging taking place. Carcharoth (talk) 03:40, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional comment - Those carrying out merges should also read WP:REDIRECT and be aware that if they are merging and rewriting a shorter summary of the episode, based on words written by others in the longer article being merged, then they need to attribute that work by others per the GFDL. The way this is done in practice (lacking a simple way to merge page histories in such cases) is to put the full, linked name of the destination article in the redirect edit summary, and the full, linked name of the original article in the edit summary when rewriting the summary for the list article. Carcharoth (talk) 04:00, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Update: {{ER to list entry}} has been created and is starting to be used. Carcharoth (talk) 14:03, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Collectonian (talk) 03:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC) with the caveat that many times s-merging is needed because the article being merged has an excessively long or detailed plot to rival those of most movie articles, while lists of episodes usually have tighter summaries. If the episode lists summaries are lacking, then the article being merged should be used to fix it if possible. As a side note, thanks for mentioning {{R from merge}}! I didn't know such a template existed or I'd have been using it before now. ~goes to back apply to a few things~ Also will be reading that Categorizing redirects, as I've always thought they shouldn't be, but it seems there may be reasons to do, so will study that. Collectonian (talk) 03:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Seraphim ^Whipp 09:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC). Well summarised and offers a solution. I also agree with the point Collectonian raised.
• Agree, but cautiously and with Collectonian's caveat. Also, note that we need to put a lot of the burden where it belongs, on those who created problematic articles in the first place. We do not need impediments to clean-up. For example, interested wikiprojects could maintain lists of oldids they were interested in cleaning up. --Jack Merridew 09:54, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Nothing in particular to do with fiction here. But I agree this should be standard practice for mergers. Dimadick (talk) 13:13, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree in general. Would suggest way to deal with Collectonian's cmt is to clean up the article of everything that couldn't be merged; let it rest; then merge per Carcharoth's documented process. --Lquilter (talk) 14:56, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• edg ☺ ☭ 13:10, 19 January 2008 (UTC), agree per Jack Merridew's caveat. {{ER to list entry}} is a good idea, but excessive barriers should not be imposed on the merger. Collecting oldid #'s may be a good idea for a WikiProject planning for future work, but requiring from the merging editor may impose undue obstruction.
• Agree in general -- a reasonable approach with a reasonable, doable process. -- ArglebargleIV (talk) 17:54, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Torc2

Setting the other issues aside for a moment, one issue here is simply the organization of information. Topics can branch out into several different directions, and it's only logical to allow this information to be parsed out to different Wikipages. Critics have pointed out that there is no guideline that allows for this. They are correct only in as much as we have not codified it yet, but this is already accepted in practice for albums, multi-part lists, "List of" articles, and was for many TV episodes prior to the campaign to redirect. The only thing stopping this from being instituted is the tenure-like status we have ascribed to these archaic guidelines. If what is specified in guidelines is only practiced and enforced by those who wrote the guideline, it does not have consensus.

There is no logical reason to cling to the outdated notion that information in a different article must exist on an island. The idea that an article about an episode from a TV show cannot use the notability of the main series article makes no sense. The main article about a TV show, articles about its episodes, characters, locations, are all one topic. Wikipedia guidelines should treat them as such. Yes, this is a system-wide change, but it has to start somewhere.

Allowing episodes to be parsed out to different pages does not adversely affect Wikipedia in any way, but does allow for better readability and better organization of information. Forcing all episodes into the main topic does make that article more cluttered, harder to read, and harder to navigate, yet does not affect overall content whatsoever. The argument that this is carte blanch to add anything anybody wants to add is false, and is driven by some irrational fear of "cruft". But this is not about content; it is simply about the organization of content. The guidelines need to catch up to current, reasonable practice.

The easiest solution for this is to add a hatnote at the top of the sub-article that points the reader to the main article. This will establish that the necessary real-world information and sources that apply to the main article also applies to the sub-article. It will allow episodes to be placed in their own articles if it makes organizational sense. It will allow Wikipedia to catch up to where the rest of the internet was in 1992. Torc2 (talk) 05:28, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• --Cube lurker (talk) 05:37, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

• Basically supporting. it's already been widely agreed upon that sources for real world context don't always have to be completely independent from the parent topic. Most of our FA episode articles aren't strictly stand-alone articles. The current version of WP:FICT does allow this to some extent, and WP:EPISODE does too, though not very clearly (at least to some). It was never the intention to merge simply to have everything in one document, but only to merge when the resulting content was not enough to warrant its own article (as in, after excessive plot summary has been trimmed). -- Ned Scott 06:07, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

• I strongly support this statement as it applies to television episodes, and the summary style guideline echoes it. This statement is also echoed by the article series guideline. Pixelface (talk) 08:34, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

• --Ursasapien (talk) 12:04, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• I agree in practice. For reasons that are not limited in fiction. I simply don't think we need to either desperately keep all information in a single article or automatically delete them. Moving two sections into their own article should not mean they are necessarily suddenly a strictly independant topic. Dimadick (talk) 13:18, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Bláthnaid 16:32, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• A point well made. DWaterson (talk) 23:22, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Indeed. Merging individual episode articles into lists does nothing to address concerns about free-standing notability since the lists dilute the potential for critical commentary per WP:LAUNDRY. Colonel Warden (talk) 04:56, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• Hobit (talk) 22:40, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• ~Floppie^{(talk • contribs)} 21:41, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
• If information about an episode is large enough that it would be unwieldy to contain within an article about a season or a series, then it makes sense, according to summary style, to split it off into its own page. That page should be considered to be part of a larger article, and held to the standard of verifiability (which the vast majority of episodes meet) rather than notability. — PyTom (talk) 09:07, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Second comment by Torc2

The analogy between episodes and songs is flawed. Consider:

1. A season is aired a half hour (or hour) at a time, one week apart. An album is generally consumed in one sitting in less than an hour; roughly the same time it takes to watch an episode.
2. Individual songs are not previewed by the track immediately prior or advertised during the week to encourage listeners to continue listening.
3. The number of people who buy an album pale in to the number of people who watch a prime time TV show, even an unsuccessful one, and the number of people who hear an average non-charting song is infinitesimal compared to that.

That aside, even if we accept the analogy, it still tilts towards a default assumption of notability for many episodes. Billboard charts are admissible to establish notability for individual songs to be included as separate articles. If a song has received national radio play or has charted, it's assumed to be notable. Do the same standards exist for episodes? If an episode rates in the top 50 for that week, or is aired nationally, why is that not an indication of notability? Why are ratings not a significant indication of notability for TV shows, when radio play and sales are for records? The argument also exists that simply airing a TV show doesn't make it notable due to the fact that there is no secondary coverage. I would argue that in many cases, the network itself is the secondary coverage. Neither Cartoon Network nor Comedy Central created the episode "My Three Suns", but both have deemed it notable enough to air it repeatedly. Both networks are totally independent of the creators of the episode, and there is no necessity for either to air that episode rather than any other episode in the series. Torc2 (talk) 01:31, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional Comments

• I'll point out again from WP:MUSIC (which doesn't seem to have dispute): "Songs that have been ranked on national or significant music charts, that have won significant awards or honors or that have been performed independently by several notable artists, bands or groups are probably notable. A separate article is only appropriate when there is enough verifiable material to warrant a reasonably detailed article; permanent stubs should be merged to articles about an artist or album. " (emphasis mine). Setting certain conditions such as Billboard topping do not "assume" that its notable - it still has to be shown, it's just that there is likely more resources to draw notability about it. --MASEM 14:17, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Note also that the music guidelines say not to create a separate articleunless there is enough verifiable material (see WP:V). Karanacs (talk) 18:13, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• To Colonel Warden above, and others, regarding lists. I agree that two many lists appear to be laundry lists, but lets talk about good articles, not the bad ones. I've given this example before, but look at Smallville (Season 1) for an excellent list. Critical comment etc is not diluted but enhanced by the ability to dicuss several episodes at once. Gwinva (talk) 19:22, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

User:Hiding's response to statement by Torc2

User:Torc2 Makes a good point on breaking articles out, which is in accordance with summary style and article series. However, it is possible to break out an article in the form of a list of episodes as well as articles on individual episodes, and how to break them out is a matter for editorial consensus. That is the very question being posed here. Where there is not enough information from which we can write an article on an episode of a television series, is it better to have many articles containing only plot summaries and an infobox, or to merge them to lists. I think prior consensus was to merge minor topics into lists. This would mean episodes which can be written about with appropriate sourcing in an encyclopedic manner should be, and those which have no such sourcing be merged into lists. I do not think that current guidance calls for articles on all television episodes, and I do not think community consensus exists for that approach. Hiding T 12:01, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

• I support this response. Season pages can be a good way of covering this information. See Smallville (season 1) for a good example. It contains everything that would be included on separate episode pages, plus offers a good platform for discussing reception, production, thematic and charcacter issues across the season, which is harder to do on separate pages. Gwinva (talk) 21:20, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Samuel Sol

To answer the first question posed by Masem, about WP:MUSIC I better analogy would be that an Album is equal to a Season, and each Song equals to an Episode. Therefore, articles about a Season are notable per se, but articles about each episode not necessarily. Someone before used the example of Friends, a well-know great series, remembered by the whole, with but a few notable episodes (the only one I remember receiving coverage, at least here in Brazil, was the last). Moving to animations, I'm a fan of Fairly OddParents, but I know that not all of the episodes there are notable. Even for the series itself some are just bland.

And Pixelface, the fact that some problems existed, specially in The Simpsons, it is not an excuse to keep doing it. In fact, if we can't make a The Simpsons or South Park, citing only two, episode notable, they need to be treated just like the others.

But a great issue I think a lot of us have with this situation, myself included, was the way that everything was done. Instead of trying to get a compromise, a bunch of redirects with little if any warning and reasoning. People saw articles they are working on (and another user noted that in his case there was third party reliable sources, so it passed WP:N) just disappearing and becoming a redirect. And when they looked to revert it, they got re-reverted. There for, I think a compromise we can all take, and would solve a lot of the problems:

• Stop doing blank redirects and merge the episodes articles into Season Lists;
• Leave individual notable episodes with its own articles. And by notable, I may any episode that received 3rd party coverage. Be it in magazines, news, etc. And by coverage I mean more than just a note that it will air, or that it exists. But news, info, or other details about it;
• Give any episode article that is just a stub now (infobox and plot summary) time to develop into full-fledge articles or be deleted. The way it is been done now (hundreds of articles disappearing in a day) it is impossible to do this. So I would suggest a 2 or 3 week notice to the main editor, and relative Project;

Anyway, sorry for the possible English mistakes there, it ain't my main language. Samuel Sol (talk) 12:14, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Seraphim ^Whipp 14:13, 18 January 2008 (UTC). I agree with all but the first and last bullet points. In some cases, the editor who puts a redirect in place, might be working alongside another editor (who might be more knowledgable on the topic), who will merge the info. In fact, that sort of pairing system could work very well and would encourage collaboration. There was a rejected process in which episodes were assessed and there was a time period allotted to allow for improvement before the articles were reviewed. ^{In addition, your English is very good :)}
• This is a good summary (and good english) and I think the song-episode analogy is apt. Like Seaphim Whipp I also have slight issues with the first and last bullet points. I wouldn't make any strict rules about redirects because sometimes a blank redirect is appropriate when the content is already sufficient in the list. I would definitely like to see more actual merging done though. Again I wouldn't make any strict allowances for articles as stubs, as always it's up to the editor who wants to keep the information in the encyclopedia to provide reasons to. Articles can be challenged if no reasons are apparent. I support leniency though and would suggest that editors wanting to redirect would use discussion and thought on whether or not to merge/redirect, by seeing if there's currently an episode cleanup/expansion going on, whether other episodes in the series have been able to reach a good status, etc. ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 19:40, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Blathnaid

I think that notability for episode articles should be conferred from the real-world popularity of a series, because it is then very likely that Wikipedia's readers are going to want information about these episodes. (I don't think that every show ever made should have individual episode articles.) I think that the episode articles are easier and more convenient to read. I'll echo Torc2's statement that no article is an island -- the main series articles contains real-world information. Some episode articles do go into too much detail and veer into original research in their plot summaries, but that can be fixed through editing.

According to Wikicharts, Scrubs (TV series) and House (TV series) are currently the 85th and 86th most viewed articles in Wikipedia. List of Scrubs episodes is 166th and List of House episodes is 286th. It is likely that a good amount of readers would move from these articles onto the episode articles. They have read the real world information in the main article. The Scrubs episodes were redirected in December, and it has been proposed that the House episodes should also be redirected. Wikipedia's readers may not edit policy pages, but I think they should have a say in what articles Wikipedia contains.

I'm going to commit a WP:BEANS here, but I think it is important to highlight the utility of episode articles. A few days ago, the blog Pharyngula had a post asking for opinions about the television series Father Ted, a show that the writer was not familiar with. Two commenters provided links to Wikipedia's individual episode articles. Nobody linked to the main series article. Wikipedia was a good, quick, and convenient source of information for these people.

Also, I think that research should be done by the mergers/redirectors before any merging/redirecting occurs. For example, books have been published about Fawlty Towers, and there are DVDs with commentary. A quick Amazon search for Fawlty Towers would have established this. If these articles were brought to AfD they would not be deleted, yet they were, in my opinion, effectively deleted through redirection. Real-world information could be added to these articles, it just hasn't happened yet. It takes time and money to gather the sources that could be used to add this information. There is no deadline, and in the meantime the episode articles meet the WP:V, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV policies. WP:N is a guideline. WP:PLOT is IMO avoided through the main series article (and the infobox :p). Bláthnaid 16:26, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

(Reply to Seraphim Whipp's question below) I don't see how institutional bias and not having episodes articles for every show ever made clash. IMO the world's bias as to which are the most important shows should be our criteria for inclusion. Criteria such as repeats, DVD releases, ratings, and surveys could show which shows society has judged as notable. I don't think that episodes and MySpace bands are comparable, or that WP:N should be applied in the same way to them.

I disagree with the statement that Wikipedia should not be useful -- it is used because people want information quickly, not because of people's love of a well-written encyclopedia. I think that the episode articles are encyclopedic -- they are well presented, concise, and reliable. There is no pre-requisite for real-world information in the definition of encyclopedia. Anyway, Wikipedia is re-defining what an "encyclopedia" is. It wasn't so long ago that the idea of pseudonymous people with no special qualifications writing an encyclopedia on the internet would be laughable (it still is laughable to some people!). Many of our articles would not be found in regular encyclopedias but are accepted here (eg our featured lists and the porn stars). Bláthnaid 22:43, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• --Pixelface (talk) 16:57, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• I agree with the principle here: many programmes/series will warrant articles about their episodes, because they meet WP:N and WP:V. We must not throw the baby out with the bath water by smerging/redirecting these because we do not take time to assess their potential. Gwinva (talk) 01:30, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• - PeaceNT (talk) 07:45, 19 January 2008 (UTC)\
• ~Floppie^{(talk • contribs)} 15:45, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Agree. It is too easy to overlook the interests of Wikipedia's ordinary readers - the vast majority of whom I am sure rarely if ever become regular editors - by rigid adherence to policy where it is obstructing our greater objective of building an encyclopaedia. DWaterson (talk) 23:29, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Catchpole (talk) 14:31, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• Ursasapien (talk) 02:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• Nydas^(Talk) 15:31, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• Torc2 (talk) 22:18, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• Hobit (talk) 15:37, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
• Dimadick (talk) 20:35, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

"I don't think that every show ever made should have individual episode articles" but you agreed with Nydas' statement about institutional bias...could you give more detail as to why we shouldn't have every show ever made? Also, "Wikipedia was a good, quick, and convenient source of information for these people" - but we don't exist to be useful because we're an encylopedia and we have to present information in an encylopedic way. One could then argue that it would be useful to have article's on every band just because it's useful. We don't allow non-notable bands...there are bands whose myspace pages have had a million views but we can't nesecessarily give them a page just because they have real-world popularity. Seraphim ^Whipp 19:31, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't think anyone has said every television show ever made is notable. The process of producing a television show and getting it on the air and keeping millions of viewers watching each week is vastly different than getting a guitar for your birthday and making a MySpace page. --Pixelface (talk) 21:28, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

That seems somewhat biased towards shows from countries with populations in the millions and yet still includes the vast majority of television episodes ever made. Where is your limit on what we should include? Does each episode of the Magic Roundabout get an article? Does each episode of Civilisation get an article? Each episode of The Two Ronnies, Touché turtle, In the Night Garden, Muffin the Mule, Blue Peter? What's your line in the sand? Hiding T 23:04, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

For me, the line would be crossed with soap operas and children's shows -- there is a difference between these and prime-time programmes or shows with longevity like Fawlty Towers. I understand the worry that Wikipedia might be inundated with thousands of episode articles, but if Fawlty Towers or Open All Hours can't have episode articles, then I think that something is going wrong somewhere. Bláthnaid 23:48, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. There are some programmes that warrant episode articles, such as Fawlty Towers, Yes Minister, Star Trek, Doctor Who, because their cultural effect is huge. How can we tell? By the amount of articles and books written about them (the episodes). Um, WP:N, anyone? Gwinva (talk) 01:25, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I disagree with Blathnaid, Gwinva, and Pixelface here. Star Trek and the like as a whole may have had a huge cultural effect, but that does NOT automatically mean every episode is notable or that they automatically be given an episode article. Even Star Trek in all of its iterations had episodes that only the most die hard of fans have every heard of. Hiding and Seraphim Whipp are correct that if we start giving free passes, where is the line in the sand and what then happens to neutrality (as the list seems to be based on "favorites"). We need to look at every episode individually, otherwise, we have the same situation that's already being labeled favoritism as we have now, particularly with the Simpsons. I mean, I totally love Lassie and in its day (and even now) it had a huge cultural impact, but I sure wouldn't argue that every episode was notable or needed an article. Collectonian (talk) 02:07, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

In response, can I clarify my point. I mention those not because they have a free pass, but because there is a lot of material written about them, and because a number of episodes have been shown to be notable. Thus, I am presuming that some of the rest are likely to be also notable. I did not say they warranted articles about all their episodes (but that may be the case). See my statement regarding notability below: #Statement by Gwinva. Gwinva (talk) 03:03, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

(Reply to Collectonian) My favourites? I like Fawlty Towers and Father Ted, but have seen very little of the other shows I mentioned -- and I dislike Scrubs. Lost, The Simpsons, Scrubs, and House are all in Wikipedia's top 100 viewed articles in Wikicharts. The Simpsons and Lost's episodes have not been redirected because they have active, committed Wikiprojects behind them. Scrubs and House do not have the same backing from editors and their episodes were/will be redirected -- that is our institutional bias. I don't know much about Star Trek, but I think there should be episode articles -- sources like this guide to every episode of Star Trek The Next Generation could be used. Bláthnaid 14:00, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Cube lurker

The following page has been created Wikipedia talk:Television episodes/Proposed Objective Criteria. The opening paragraph indicates (see below) that the opinions of those who disagree will be Quickly and Ruthlessly Deleted. Upon creation notification was given, however only to one side of the debate. (A few examples [59] [60] [61] etc.). I believe this approach is unwise. Consensus cannot be achieved by excluding dissent. Although having a debate with only one side of the controversy may provide an illusion of consensus, it is inherently invalid. Discussion needs to be held in the agreed upon page. If a spin-off page is needed or desired, both sides need to be notified, and input accepted from all viewpoints.

I was contacted by KWW and in fairness I will add the entire header section without interpretation: For the purposes of this discussion, it is assumed that TV episodes do not inherit notability from being a part of a notable series. This is a contentious issue, but this page is not the place to discuss it. Comments indicating that the discussion is useless because the notability is obvious will be quickly and ruthlessly deleted.--Cube lurker (talk) 03:50, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Though I am on "the other side" and I agree with the statement in the paragraph, I believe that all involved should be invited or notified in some way. However the statement that notability is not inherited should remain because it's out of the jurisdiction of this guideline and in the hands of WP:NOTABILITY and WP:PLOT. ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 23:41, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Bláthnaid 23:57, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• In the shadows another fait accompli is attempted. --Willow Wait (talk) 00:10, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• I strongly support this statement. So is this the part where I create Wikipedia talk:Television episodes/Actual Criteria and only notify my good buddies? And the idea that a concept such as "worthy of notice" could be anything but subjective is laughable. --Pixelface (talk) 02:22, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Sadly, I cannot see an elaborate proposal made entirely by the criteria of one party, in a heated and ostensibly cooperative dispute, being useful as much more than a battering ram. Pixelface's statement may not represent the intentions behind the page, but likely effects do look like it. --Kizor 05:05, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

• As the miscreant that created the page, I don't feel that I acted in bad faith, or did anything very questionable. In my statement above, I indicated that I felt there should be objective criteria for notability. A large group of people supported that statement. I then drafted a starter list, and notified those people that had indicated they supported the idea of objective criteria that I would like their feedback. Obviously, if it is decided that TV episodes inherit notability, the entire discussion is moot, so there is no reason to discuss that issue on that page. The page is to discuss what those objective criteria would be if it is decided that objective criteria are needed. Anyone that can hold to that concept, and discuss what those objective criteria should be can participate. If all that happens is people keep complaining that every objective is unnecessary because every episode of every TV show ever produced is automatically notable, discussion would be unable to proceed.Kww (talk) 00:56, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

  For the record, I never accused bad faith, just that it was unwise. Had there been a noticable post that you had taken the step to draft that hypothetical discussion, I wouldn't have made my statement. But for there to be a secret negotiation is something I can't support.--Cube lurker (talk) 01:03, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

  Moved this to additional comments, hope you guys don't mind. --Kizor 03:21, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

• It's called a sandbox, and people frequently use them as sidebars to work something out before taking it to a broader audience. People who luv the TV episodes could be writing up their own draft proposals too and hashing out discussions amongst themselves. Everything we do on wikipedia is open -- edit-tracked and noticed on relevant comment pages -- so there is evidently no attempt to hide anything. Geez. I really wish people would relax and remember this is an argument about whether to do lists or articles about episodes of tv series in an open encyclopedia where opinions can change every few months anyway. I really recommend that everyone who is freaking out go take a walk or hang out with a loved one, or, hey, watch some TV. --Lquilter (talk) 03:33, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

  Sorry, if it was off a user page, sandbox is cool, a subpage of a policy discussion, strongly disagree.--Cube lurker (talk) 03:35, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

  That's just a bit finely-haired to be so worked up. Surely it would have been fine to post a note on the starter's page and say -- if this is private it should probably be in userspace. --Lquilter (talk) 03:38, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

• I've added a notice to my comment above ... all bold and italic, so hopefully people won't think it's hidden.Kww (talk) 03:42, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• A lot of bad faith accusations to what is clearly a brainstorming page for people who support a certain view. There is nothing wrong with that. -- Ned Scott 04:20, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Gwinva

Much has been made of analogies, but unfortunately their usefulness is restricted when people cannot agree whether an episode is analogous to an album, a song, or the band-member's cat. Perhaps I can offer a more abstract approach. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, with the noble aim of containing all encyclopaediac knowledge. It is not paper, and thus has an infinite number of potential pages or articles. But it also has policies regarding what can be contained in those pages. Let's take X, which is any existing or future article. Page X contains a certain amount of "blank space" (not infinite, since it is limited to a practical downloadable size), and the ideal/aim is to fill that blank space with encyclopaediac content. By policy (and Wikipedia's own reason for existence since it defines itself as an encyclopedia, not a repository for information), each sentence within article X should be referenced (verfied) by a reliable source. i.e. someone reputable must have stated or presented that fact in another place. Anything else is deemed "original research" and could legitimately be removed. In practice, most editors tag it specifically, or the article more generally, to encourage editors to reference their statements, effectively giving a stay of execution. This is laudable: it is what stops Wikipedia becoming a forum for rumour, speculation, or "what my friend's uncle's second-cousin once said". It is why we can rely on Wikipedia being (mostly) accurate. This is effectively what Wikipedia's concept of "notability" is: not whether something is important, or popular or essential to life, but whether enough people have said enough about it in reliable sources for the page's blank space to potentially be filled by cited facts and comments. If this seems unlikely, the page is (or should be) deleted, via speedy or AfD. If X is short, but has the potential to be filled by referenced facts, then it is classed as a stub. If it has a few cited (or citable) sentences, but is unlikely to have more, then the recommendation is to merge it onto a parent page, or a page with similar content, on the principle that one good page is better than half a dozen short/weak pages. It is worth noting here that none of these processes are the "final decision". If it later comes to light that there are many reliable sources for X then it can be re-created. (And, conversely, an article may later be shown not to have the potential to be fully cited, and is therefore deleted/merged then). Yes, this dependence on citability does lead to recentism, but not only in television: it is considerably easier to find sources discussing a starlet who will be forgotten in fifty years than it is to provide a detailed biography of an 8th century ruler. It's the nature of the beast.

So what does this mean? Each television article (be it about episodes, seasons, series, characters, actors, lighting teams, film studios...) is subject to the same rules. There must be the potential for the page to be filled with fully referenced discussion (ie. not just stats and cast lists), otherwise it does not warrant its own page. The burden to provide proof of its potential is on the creator/regular editor. If it cannot be shown, X does not warrant its own article now. In the future? Who knows. Gwinva (talk) 23:19, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

addit (forgive me; I intended this to be in the initial statement, but missed it) Regarding the issue of parent article size: once X becomes too large, it is recommended practice to split off part(s) into a sub-article: Xy. But the burden of notability remains: Xy must demonstrate that it has the potential to be fully verified (ie. is verifiable). If it cannot be, then it quite probably did not warrant inclusion in X in the first place. If only a small amount is verifiable, then only a small amount should have been in X, so X needs pruning, not splitting. Gwinva (talk) 01:11, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Collectonian (talk) 23:29, 18 January 2008 (UTC) A well stated break down of notability. Only caveat, based on the addition, is that size alone should NOT be used as an excuse to make an episode article, and, in fact, should rarely if every be a reason for needing a split. Rather, if X becomes to large, first section Xy, presumably episodes, should be broken into list of LX. If LX becomes to large, first look at pruning. If still too large, i.e. more than 3-4 seasons, 40-50 episodes, then split into list of LX episodes (season z).
• Support. Karanacs (talk) 03:33, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Support. A well crafted visualization of the problem. I agree with Collectonian that size alone does not a sub-article make/mandate. Instead, subarticles should be premised on a major sourced section of the parent article. ThuranX (talk) 00:27, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• Support, and also support Collectonian's caveat. -- Ned Scott 04:18, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• I like this; well-said. Pruning, not splitting under certain circumstances needs to be in the appropriate guideline. --Jack Merridew 07:41, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Phil Sandifer

This page seems a disaster to me. Yes, television episode articles should have a real-world focus. But deletion (which, let's face it, is what notability pages are about) is not a solution. We will never have a television episode article that does not start with a plot summary. Heck, we don't have film articles that don't start with a plot summary. Whatever my feelings on these (and I generally oppose them), they seem to me merely bad articles, not fatally flawed ones. Leaving them with tags and firm demands to expand seems to work - especially because, over time, a given show gets one or two editors committed to making the articles better. In short, I do not see what this concept adds to our policy that WP:WAF does not already give us, and furthermore gives us without the spectre of ugly deletion debates. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:13, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• --Pixelface (talk) 21:15, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Carcharoth (talk) 02:48, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• --Cube lurker (talk) 03:34, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• Colonel Warden (talk) 05:04, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• Except the first sentence. - PeaceNT (talk) 14:40, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
• Ursasapien (talk) Here, here! I could not agree more. Ursasapien (talk) 02:23, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• Nydas^(Talk) 15:28, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• I agree with anything but the notion of "real-world focus". I see it more as just another aspect to cover. Not the main one. Dimadick (talk) 19:13, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

Firm demands will not lead to many articles being fixed. While some shows have editors attempting to improve episode articles, I doubt Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide or Robot Chicken episodes would get this type of attention (let alone become notable), no matter how firmly requested. Such demands would lead to attacks on whatever template is used, and attacks on the cited policy. Editors who create and maintain this sort of article seem to consider this sort of article acceptable, and want policy brought down to meet the requirements of their articles.

If an editor or a WikiProject wishes to flesh out episode articles in User/Project space until sufficient evidence of notability is found, good luck with that. Non-notable stubs should not be routinely created in Article space. / edg ☺ ☭ 15:38, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

And deletion will magically make this problem go away? Deletion is our most hostile, ugly process. It is the one that drives contributors away and most often gives us a black eye in the mainstream press. Taking an intractible problem to AfD is the worst thing you can do with it. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:52, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Would you consider the process of merging with redirects and/or transwiki move of the information an appropriate replacement for deletion or the equivalent of deletion, or something else all together? This assuming that editors have been notified and given time to demonstration good faith efforts at article improvement, but no progress has been demonstrated. At least from what we've been trying to write for FICT, particularly for fictional topics, doing any steps to avoid AfD for articles goes a long way to cooling down tentions. --MASEM 16:17, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I tend to be pretty eventualist on it when it comes to in-universe material. As long as there is plausibly out-of-universe material to be had, my inclination is to leave the stubs and wait for an editor to come along who wants to fix it. And for me, episodes are generally on the good end of the in-universe line (whereas characters are less often so). Phil Sandifer (talk) 16:59, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

At the time WP:EPISODE had it's last big rewrite, we had also started WP:TV-REVIEW, which emphasized that articles only needed reasonable potential, to stay as individual articles. TV-REVIEW didn't catch on, but it seems that concept didn't have much presence in WP:EPISODE itself, which is an easy fix. How would you feel about a WP:EPISODE that had that further emphases? Also, regardless of how we handle the situation, what are your thoughts about individual episode notability? -- Ned Scott 04:16, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:EPISODE is okay. It's the few users who cite it but then disregard it who are causing problems. Redirecting every episode of a show, without even checking that show's article on Wikipedia to look for sources or merging the material with care is the cause of this dispute. Catchpole (talk) 14:27, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Gavin Collins

I disagree that articles about a television episodes can possess notability at all and that WP:EPISODE has been created to sidestep this fundamental issue. The evidence which supports this viewpoint are taken from three perspectives of an episode's as follows:

1. From a logical perspective, a series, as its name suggest, is a single piece of work, story or theme that has been subdivided into episodes with the purpose of retaining an audience over a period of weeks, months or years. Even a portmanteau of stories (such as Alfred Hitchcock Presents) will have a common theme if not story line, and to see an episode being separate or in isolation from the series it forms part of must be seen to be a fallacy. I would go further by saying that series seasons that are commissioned in quick succession (Friends: Season 1,2,3 et al) are really a continuation of the first. The reason is that without the previous episodes, the new seasons could not stand on their own feet; we must return to the basic view that an episode has no notability per se;
2. From a creative perspective, a series employs a body of actors, crew and writers to produce each episode; this ensemble is not dissolved after every episode; continuity is maintained, although it may evolve over time. A single episode cannot support such an ensemble; its producers have commissioned it with a view to obtaining revenue in future periods, on the assumption that each new episode will build a following. Even if you can think a single episode that you could watch over and over in isolation, you still have to remember that it was produced as a single body of work;
3. From a notability perspective, many people have argued that there are notable episodes, but I would say that that there are no notable episodes, only a series with a lot of notability. Each episode has some commonality with the others in its series; having separate articles for each episode is simple a repetition of those themes, and serves no encyclopedic purpose; there is no need to operate Wikipedia like a database, breaking each category down into sub-categories. Many of the articles I have read about television episodes assume that reader already knows about the underlying story or theme, but in fact this is a convenient means of not having to repeat what has already been said in the lead article about the series.

So overall I beg to differ, and what motivates me is a terrible trend that is developing in Wikipedia: the substitution of real-world content, context, analysis and criticism with the unencyclopedic padding such as plot summaries, and other in universe references to the primary material. Furthermore, I support the merger of articles on episodes, as this has the effect of eliminating this type of padding, and I applaud editors who are bold and are taking a lead in this process.--Gavin Collins (talk) 16:36, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

Collectonian (talk) 20:31, 20 January 2008 (UTC) though I do think a few rare episodes are notable (i.e. the infamous Pokemon killing people episodes :P), but it is a rarity and should not be presumed.Collectonian (talk) 20:31, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Hewinsj (talk) 13:40, 21 January 2008 (UTC) - But I agree with Collectonian, that specific episodes can be written about in independent articles if enough material on production can be presented. There is plenty to write about the production/development/reception of Pilot (Smallville) for instance, but nearly nothing to write about any other episode for that series that can't be handled just as well in a list.

Jack Merridew 14:15, 21 January 2008 (UTC) — Very well put, thank you. This is why {{Unencyclopedic}} needs to be kept.

Questions and comments

I'm curious about your statement regarding "the substitution of real-world content, context, analysis and criticism with the unencyclopedic padding such as plot summaries, and other in universe references to the primary material." I agree that real-world material is vital to these articles, but substitution suggests that real-world content is being actively abandoned and short-changed in favor of in-universe trivia, which is not a trend I've noticed. I've noticed plenty of editors who don't really get the concept of a real-world focus, and who contribute primarily in-universe material, but I've always found that treating them as somewhat mediocre stub-writers and cleaning up their articles slowly but surely works. Have you had a different experience? Are there cases where real-world material is actually treated with hostility? Phil Sandifer (talk) 17:14, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• I agree that my use of the word substitution is not very clear, perhaps dilution is a better term. Rather than contributing well sourced content to articles on a television series, many editors are choosing to add plot summaries and character descriptions to the episodes instead (see Statement by ThuranX regarding his point about "'I LIKE IT"). When all the episodes are added togther, plot summaries account for the majority of material about a particular series. This is the substitution effect I fear is already taking place. Eventually there will be a two tier Wikipedia; the core series articles, and the episodes based on unsourced fancruft. --Gavin Collins (talk) 17:32, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• Well, it's rarely unsourced - it's using primary sources, but that's explicitly and deliberately allowed on Wikipedia. I agree, we have a two-tier system on articles about fictional subjects - but that seems no different than any other area where we have undeveloped and developed articles. The interesting and relevant question, to me, is whether fancrufty articles develop into good ones. My sense is that they do. At a slower than desirable rate, but probably faster than they would if we deleted them. Phil Sandifer (talk) 18:44, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• As always with Wikipedia, improvements tend to happen when more users take active interest in an article. Our article on David , for example, is arguably among the best we have in Biblical figures. Meanwhile our article on Othniel Ben Kenaz is still largely based on an 1897 dictionary and features nothing resembling a discussion of historicity. But this is no reason to delete the articles that don't get the necessary attention. Dimadick (talk) 19:32, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• "I disagree that articles about a television episodes can possess notability at all " Really? Something that 10+ million people spend an hour watching can't be notable? That seems pretty non-intuitive. Notable movies might see less total viewers than that. Hobit (talk) 15:43, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

By that criterion, staring off into space is notable, too. --Lquilter (talk) 20:09, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Absent-mindedness Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:34, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, maybe we should have more articles on it absent-mindedness, breaking it into numerous subparts .... --Lquilter (talk) 14:58, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

• • Indeed - a number of episodes quickly spring to mind as individually important, with Goodbye, Farewell and Amen being the most obvious. I cannot think of any sane standard of notability that would not maintain that article. Phil Sandifer (talk) 19:40, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Andrwsc

I have been following this debate from a distance, and can empathize with both sides of the debate. However, a recent personal experience made me think about a possible solution to this problem.

On the weekend, I finally got around to watching Battlestar Galactica: Razor, which had been sitting on my DVR for a couple of months. A few times I paused the show to look something up on Wikipedia, finding articles such as Helena Cain, Number Six (Battlestar Galactica) and so on. It struck me — as an experienced Wikipedia editor — that those latter articles probably shouldn't exist here, as they are "unencyclopaedic", completely lack external references, etc. However, as a casual reader, browsing for information, I found those pages to be quite useful, and I was grateful that some die-hard fans out there took the time to write pages like that. I know that I've had similar experiences in the past with other television shows, and with video games. Yeah, I admit that I enjoyed this "fancruft"!

So, how do we reconcile these views? We obviously need to adhere to the fundamental principles of making a great encyclopedia, but I think we need to find an effective outlet for the passionate fan-based content, including television shows. A solution that I have not seen proposed here would be to create one or more Wikipedia:Wikimedia sister projects for such material, which do not necessarily have the same criteria Wikipedia has for notability, in particular. Obviously, if they were to be free-content wikis, then policies for copyright infringement must be followed (e.g. length of plot synopses, number and type of screen-shot images, etc.) so I'm not proposing that these alternate wikis are "free for all" playgrounds where no rules apply.

This proposal also requires effective linkages between Wikipedia and these alternate wikis in the same way we link to Wikinews, Wikiquote, Wiktionary, etc. with templates like {{wikinews}}, {{wiktionary}}, et. al. We wouldn't want for this content to be "ghettoized" and difficult to find if moved off Wikipedia, but I think a boundary like this might make it clear as to what material goes into an encyclopedia and what goes into a comprehensive guide.

I admit that I haven't fully thought through this idea, but I wanted to float the idea and generate some comments. Some "out of the box thinking" seems necessary to this debate. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 22:24, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Karanacs (talk) 22:41, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• I very much support a sister project for more detailed information. Something like "Telepedia". A similar box to the Wikiquote could be used in LoE pages saying "Telepedia has additional detail on _____." As long as everything's GFDL compatible I think a lot of information could be transwikied. ●BillPP ^{(talk|contribs)} 22:59, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
• I strongly support the idea of an official Wikimedia fiction wiki. In the meantime, I support giving equal and non-biased support to 3rd party wikis of reasonable quality and potential as unofficial partners of Wikipedia. -- Ned Scott 03:35, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
• A really good idea. So many people have useful contributions to make and knowledge to offer, but which unfortunately do not fall within Wikipedia's remit. I have seen support for this idea on other talk pages. Gwinva (talk) 20:08, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

Off-site wiki approaches are strongly encouraged. There is Wikia which is run by the Wikimedia Foundation however, some people feel there's a conflict-of-interest or tax /non-profit issue with this, so there needs to be statement to confirm its use, but GFDL wikis can be created as well for this, and interwiki maps can be used for easy directing of material. --MASEM 22:37, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

" There is Wikia which is run by the Wikimedia Foundation" Huh? The Wikimedia Foundation doesn't run any Wikia wikis. As far as off-site wiki approaches being discourage, that's obviously not true. The fact that we can preserve hard work done by editors, even if it doesn't belong on Wikipedia, is one of the reasons why things like the GFDL and CC are so great. Some people feel there's a COI, but far more often than not, this is based on a misconception. There is absolutely no threat to the non-profit tax status of the Wikimedia Foundation. Even if the Wikipedia community did have some kind of semi-official endorsement of a site like Wikia, because the Foundation places the community (which are a 3rd party) in charge of those decisions. The notion that there might actually be a serious COI is absurd. -- Ned Scott 03:33, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

You're right, its not the foundation... the issue that others have (I agree that there's no issue) is that J Wales has financial interest in Wikia and thus any direct supporting of moving content from WP to Wikia is effectively putting money in his pocket. But I agree that the content's already GFDL so there's absolutely nothing wrong in moving things around. --MASEM 12:35, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Doctor Who are working hard to bring all their articles up to encyclopaediac standard, and have seen the virtue in such links with other wikias: See the logo/link they have placed at the end of some pages. Gwinva (talk) 20:08, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

New statement from Hiding (talk · contribs)

WP:EPISODE should be merged into WP:FICT. It either restates the guidance at WP:N and WP:FICT, which is rooted in WP:V and WP:NOT, or it goes further. If it does the first, it is not needed. If it does the second, it does not have consensus since i must by definition contradict policy, and is not needed. Hiding T 13:37, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

comment By this principle only one policy would be permitted: everything else would either just restate it or contradict it. The point of this is to deal in more detail with a particular aspect.DGG (talk) 19:29, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

You seem to fundamentally misunderstand me. I am asserting that a guideline cannot go further than policy. If you desire to make this a policy by all means say so, otherwise, for the reasons stated above, I can't see the need for it. If it is to be a guideline, it is either redundant or conflicts with policy. At Wikipedia we are not a bureaucracy, we avoid instruction creep and prefer to keep it simple. We do not need ever extending guidance to apply to each particular aspect an editor may stumble upon. Hiding T 19:51, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I currently prefer having WP:EPISODE as its own page, but as I've said before, if we can do the same job by organizing the advice between WP:FICT and WP:WAF, I would likely support that as well. I am mindful of instruction creep, and welcome such improvements when they can be made. -- Ned Scott 23:58, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I have held this position for several months. In general, I have been maligned for maintaining this concept, and told repeatedly I was wrong and disruptive. Ursasapien (talk) 10:55, 23 January 2008 (UTC) You may want to see this poll and weigh in there. Ursasapien (talk) 10:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment

I very much do not want WP:EPISODE to be merged into WP:FICT. The latter is a notability guideline for ficitonal things, the former for a type of works of fiction. It's bad enough trying to keep the distinction of what WP:FICT is about clear in everybody's mind -- adding clauses dealing with something with real-world existance would hopelessly muddy things. —Quasirandom (talk) 00:54, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

This is a good point - WP:FICT is intended to deal with fictional concepts (characters, locations, etc.), whereas television episodes are fictional works, just like books, films, plays, etc. The problem we have in dealing with television episodes, in contrast to most other media, is that a reasonably long-running television series will amass a much greater number of individual works (episodes) than most film series or book series would. There are notable exceptions, of course - The Hardy Boys, or James Bond, for instance. JavaTenor (talk) 17:19, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Um, comic books? Radio programmes? And let's examine books. Most episodes of television series can be viewed as chapters. Would we have articles on every chapter in every book? If separate guidance is deemed worthy, then at least make it serialised works to broaden the scope. Hiding T 11:43, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Shirahadasha

• W:N and all its descendents were never made policy. They are only guidelines.
• Because they are guidelines, we have flexibility to adapt them to our particular situations.
• Guidelines implement policies for the project's benefit and convenience, not for their own sake. They don't have to be universally applicable or consistent. We can apply one set of standards to one area and another set to another if this is in the project's best interests.
• The television production and broadcast system inherently involves a multi-party system which can be understood as satisfying a reasonable interpretation of WP:NOR and WP:V. The producer's decision to produce verifies the screenplay. The network affiliate's decision to broadcast verifies the production. Every television broadcast depends on multiple verifications by multiple outside parties.
• Nothing in WP:NOR and WP:V requires that eligible third parties always have to function in the same way that they work in academia, merely that they exist.
• From this point of view, stub articles with bare plot summaries or similar verifiable from the episode itself would satisfy WP:NOR and WP:V.
• Unlike libel or copyright, notability is something we made up ourselves for our own convenience. We own it. It doesn't own us.
• Claims that our existing criteria require such-and-such are simply appeals to continue what (is claimed) was done in the past. But we aren't bound by what was done in the past. We can change.
• It doesn't matter what our notability criteria say or don't say. We get to decide what they should say, what it's in the project's interests for them to say.
• We don't have to please people's ideas about what they think is serious or important or worthy. All we have to do is be able to vouch for what we say.
• For this reason, we could decide if we wanted that if a television series meets our standard notablility criteria, we will accept articles about the individual episodes as an exception to our standard notability criteria.

Best --Shirahadasha (talk) 23:42, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Absolutely. The networks that air or syndicate a TV show are (usually) not first parties. Torc2 (talk) 00:11, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
• These are accurate statements, and several of them are fundamental to the issue. (A pity that they only seldom come up.) --Kizor 04:52, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
• Very well put. --Pixelface (talk) 08:27, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

"From this point of view, stub articles with bare plot summaries or similar verifiable from the episode itself would satisfy WP:NOR and WP:V."

I agree with that, but that's not really the concern here. People really aren't worried about sourcing the plot. When we ask for more sources it's usually because we want the real-world information that those additional sources give us. However, some episode articles do start to synthesize information, which could be why you see some people asking for sources for what seems to be plot-only information. Generally speaking, and I really want to emphasize on this, sources for basic plot information are not the reason episode articles get removed, redirected or merged.

"Guidelines implement policies for the project's benefit and convenience, not for their own sake. They don't have to be universally applicable or consistent. We can apply one set of standards to one area and another set to another if this is in the project's best interests. "

True, but I've yet to see anyone make a reasonable argument for plot-only articles for every episode of a show. The rationale behind the policies and behind the community's thinking that set those guidelines and policies feel that, for most situations, excessive plot is not in the projects best interests. A reasonable explanation is needed if one believes that WP:EPISODE or WP:FICT doesn't apply to a set of articles. Without good reason, larger community consensus overrides local consensus for a set of articles.

"It doesn't matter what our notability criteria say or don't say. We get to decide what they should say, what it's in the project's interests for them to say. " "Claims that our existing criteria require such-and-such are simply appeals to continue what (is claimed) was done in the past. But we aren't bound by what was done in the past. We can change. "

That's all true, but again, the community at large, and the arguments presented, suggest that we still have the same spirit of WP:EPISODE: that not every episode automatically gets an article, and that such coverage needs to be more than just recapping plot. That's not to say that WP:EPISODE is perfect, or that we shouldn't change anything, but so far we have not seen enough to indicate that the community has changed its mind on the spirit of the guideline and policies. -- Ned Scott 07:13, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by thedemonhog

With some popular shows covered extensively by the media, like Lost or Heroes, all episodes are notable, but this does not mean that they should be kept. Many of the articles have failed to demonstrate notability, although they easily could (Entertainment Weekly reviews, interviews with writers, etc.). If an article never demonstrates notability, it is basically not notable. Thus, episode articles without reception and production sections should be redirected for the time being. –thedemonhog talk • edits 19:09, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

Comments

• Would this be more suitable as a line in the sand? –thedemonhog talk • edits 19:11, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by 23skidoo

This being one of the first times I've commented on an RFC, I hope you'll excuse me if this is possibly in the wrong location, and I'm making my statement independent of what has been written above because I haven't had time to read through the discussion, coming in a little late to the party.

My problem with the current anti-episode article sentiment lies on a few grounds. First there's the whole "Wikipedia is Not Paper" philosophy that says we should be more lenient in what is on Wikipedia. And I know a lot of people would like to have that guideline stricken from the books. Last I looked it was still there under WP:NOT (that doesn't make me necessarily an inclusionist, but it does place me on the opposite side of some factions of the "no episode articles" or "restrict episode articles" crowd). Second, it requires a WP:NPOV-violating judgment call to determine what TV series are more notable than others and therefore which ones deserve individual episode articles and which don't. Third, the demand for third-party sources is problematic because of Wikipedia's current bias towards fan sites, informal sites, newsgroups, blogs, etc. This bias needs to be updated for the realities of 2008, and one of those realities is that very few actual published books based upon television series -- the third-party sources people are demanding -- are being made anymore because most of this is being done online now through fan sites. A prime example is the Star Trek franchise. It's been years since any officially licenced published reference works, series guides, etc., have been published and it seems unlikely any more will (except perhaps a making-of-Star Trek 11 book). If Wikipedia starts demanding that every episode have multiple sources -- beyond the primary source, which up till now has been good enough -- then it needs to abandon the "no blog, no fan site, no unofficial site" stance, at least with regards to television episodes. (Due to WP:BLP issues, I can understand maintaining such a ban when it comes to biographical articles). 23skidoo (talk) 00:34, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

• Additional comments. Support for individual episode articles is proven by the naming of articles such as Doomsday (Doctor Who) to FA status. 23skidoo (talk) 15:44, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

• The fewest people in this RfC have commented in absolute disfavor of episode articles, so it is unlikely that such articles will be forbidden per se. However, the huge number of policy and guideline violation of such articles (i.e. quality) has been expressed as a major concern. Allowing fan blogs etc. etc. does not increase quality. The approach to judge potential episode articles on the basis of the availability of production information and independent recognition would however significantly increase quality and still allows for enough flexibility. – sgeureka ^t•c 17:24, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

• Dodgy sources are used in articles which fiction deletionists cite as being good. When is a fansite not a fansite? When is a creator forum post allowed?--Nydas^(Talk) 08:15, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

• When they are the only sources. -- Ned Scott 07:31, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

• What happened to reliable sources? Is it still 'anything goes' for fiction that's important in the Wikiverse?--Nydas^(Talk) 16:23, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Serpent's Choice

The focus here has, rightly, been on television episodes, but there are wider issues here that are beginning to play out elsewhere in Wikipedia. Fictional topics, in general, are going to be right back here in this big mess of an RFC/RFAR/edit war without some consideration of the greater whole. Fundamentally, what is at hand here is not so much about the wording of WP:WAF, or WP:FICT, or WP:EPISODE, but about the intersection of notability with the notion of article spinouts. Let's not fool ourselves; in a very real sense, articles about television episodes, or individual characters in a movie, TV series, novel, manga, or what-have-you are spinouts. They are a more detailed examination of a subtopic that is cannot be covered in the parent article due to the constraints of size and style. Spinouts are an established part of Wikipedia style; they allow for summary-style articles. Many of our FAs link to spinouts for subtopics, as well they should. But they also fall into a very gray area in terms of notability and sourcing.

• Q1. Notability is not inherited, but do spun-out topics require unique claims to notability?

Spinouts aren't, in some ways, like main-topic articles. They are more like a subsection that has been given its own page. Indeed, early in Wikipedia's history, they were suppages with the "/" in the title and all (-- please don't think I'm advocating a return to that model). Within a normal article, not every subtopic demands the level of independent review necessary to meet notability guidelines. That is to say, we still write about the birth and education and personal life (within limits of WP:BLP and responsible editing) even when the topic is known for being an actor, or photographer, or engineer. The material must be verifiable, but is not independently notable. Does this change when a section is spunout for stylistic or space concerns? Can we create spinouts that could not be main-topic articles? If we find the answer is "no", then a great many articles outside of even fiction may need to be re-examined.

• Q2. What requirements are needed for source to address a spunout topic?

This is the individual vs. collective notability argument. We require that topics have "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject" (from WP:N). "Significant coverage is more than trivial but may be less than exclusive." But the two examples given in the footnote to explain that are less than helpful -- an entire book about a topic is clearly significant; a single sentence is trivial. What about a chapter? A page? A paragraph? Obviously, there can be no cut and dried rules due to the varied nature of topics and sources. But nearly every non-bit-part fictional character in a work of any significance has material written about them in the context of larger works. For example, Moby-Dick has been the subject of endless literary analysis. Nearly every character has been poked and prodded by critics and commentators and even grade school students since 1851. Any treatment of the novel describes the crew; many ascribe different sets of symbolism to the sundry characters. Although I won't clutter this RFC with citations, it is a matter of 15 minutes' work to find much more than paragraph apiece for them, and often much more than a page. Notwithstanding the generally meager condition of our article on the novel itself, two characters have been spunout for closer inspection: Ishmael and Queequeg, but not, oddly enough, Captain Ahab -- although I could write that article within hours if I didn't think that to do so at the moment would only serve to inflame the discussion. This is the much the same lot that episode are in. There are no sources, except in the rarest of instances, that directly discuss one episode as the part and parcel of their content, but many sources that make mention of individual episodes and comment upon them. Is that enough? How can we tell? -Serpent's Choice (talk) 16:52, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Statement supported by

• Colonel Warden (talk) 20:21, 2 February 2008 (UTC) A very lucid exposition.
• Nydas^(Talk) 21:17, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Additional comments

It says a lot that you're put off creating an article about Captain Ahab. This is why I oppose the 'series fiction is generally more notable than standalone' paragraph in the fiction guideline.--Nydas^(Talk) 21:17, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

• This statement unfortunately elides the most significant problem -- when to "spin out" an article from a sub-topic of another article. By focusing on "whether a spun-out article needs to separately develop notability", the statement attempts to frame the issue as a part and subparts. Unfortunately, the significant question of when separate subparts are justified has been ignored. If there are 24 episodes and the only sourceable content is a paragraph of plot & production information, then that should never be spun out to a separate article to begin with. We don't need to reach the question of "what do spin-offs need", because if there is sufficient justification to spin it off, then it already has what it needs to meet ordinary standards. If it doesn't, then it should never have been spun off to begin with. --Lquilter (talk) 16:38, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Lines in the sand

Would it help if we started garnering on people's line in the sand? I think the very least we have all agreed at the RFC so far is that no-one wants an article on every episode of every single television show ever made. So maybe we need to, as a starting position, outline where our lines are, where we will say, no, that's too far, you can't have an episode on that.

User Hiding's line in the sand

Basically I run off of WP:V. If you can find third party discussion of the episode then you've got enough to merit a mention on Wikipedia somewhere, whether it is in a list or not. For an episode to merit an article rather than/as well as a list entry it would need to be able to be expanded beyond a permastub whilst not violating WP:PLOT and WP:NOR. Basically it would need the plot summary kept succinct and not representing the majority of the article, and the summary could only describe plot events which are undisputed and need no specialist knowledge to understand. That's my line. Hiding T 21:22, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

comment: but permastubs are generally and universally acceptable in all cases for all kinds of articles. Do you intend that this policy should be changed in general ? or, why should it be more stringent here than everywhere else in WP?DGG (talk) 22:37, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

If we covered the first series of Catweazle in 13 permastubs, I personally would rather merge those permastubs into one informative list, for ease of navigation and perhaps better management and presentation. I also think that's the spirit of Wikipedia guidance and philosophy. I'd be interested to hear if you disagree with that position and why the ten permastubs would be a better proposition than one full article. Hiding T 23:04, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Hiding, would you extend that to most books as well? Even for relatively famous books it can be very hard to find third party discussions about it. Jon513 (talk) 20:10, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I can't speak for him, but I absolutely would. To have a full article about a book, we should have enough material for it. (And to respond to DGG, no, permastubs aren't really accepted and are often in practice merged and deleted. They're sometimes tolerated if someone can make a good enough case that maybe it's expandable, but they'll eventually get merged/deleted if it's not. As well it should be, we shouldn't be a trivia collection.) If the book's author is notable, we could merge a short mention of the book into the author's article. If even the author isn't notable, well, why do we have an article about a non-notable book by a non-notable author? Get rid of it! Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 20:35, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

You're asking me if I think Wikipedia:Verifiability should apply to articles on books? I tend to think it should apply to all articles. Hope that clarifies. Hiding T 13:38, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

• I think there's something to be said for the idea that some notable topics merit and can support lengthier articles than other notable topics. It's absurd to imagine that every perfect encyclopedia article is 32K, or whatever. That's distinguishable from so-called "permastubs", of course, but I wanted it out there. That said, when an editor's attention falls to a set of related articles that would work well as a single article, and perhaps should have been started as a single article, merging is completely appropriate & for the good of the encyclopedia, no? It should be a case-by-case decision, generally. That works as a general rule, I imagine, once we get over the hump of what to do with the mass of articles on individual episodes that some editors created, templating out entire series, that many other editors feel are not independently notable. --Lquilter (talk) 14:39, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

"Sorry I didnt get back here earlier. There is no policy saying permastubs are no be deleted, or are even deprecated. There is an essay WP:Permastub that argues exactly the opposite. There has never been consensus on deleting permastubs at AfD -- on any subject. I challenge Seraphimblade to find something to support her statement that they are not 'really" accepted. --if she does, of course, it is time to see if there is consensus to change it. DGG (talk) 12:08, 1 February 2008 (UTC).

Well, she is a he. :) But he does wonder if you read the WP:PERMA essay which you are apparently referencing? "Permastubs are unsatisfying articles - they leave little potential for future editing, and by their nature are not very informative. Where possible, they should be merged to larger articles and redirected there. When there is no possibility for any expansion, nor any topic that they could be merged into, it is possible that a permastub should be deleted." That doesn't sound too hot on the idea to me. But it does sound like an excellent way to handle them. Also, generally, when there is consensus that an article is never improvable beyond a stub, consensus generally (though not always) forms to merge or delete it. Often, debate centers around whether that's actually the case, but other than you, I've never seen any consensus that articles which can never be more than a stub are acceptable, and I've seen plenty of times consensus forms the other way around. (Stubs are different than short articles. A well-referenced article that comprises a page or two and a couple of sections isn't a stub, even if it's short, and an unreferenced or primary-referenced, long, rambling article is a stub at best.) It's still all on published source material. Does the amount of published source material on the subject justify us giving it its own article? If not, we're giving it more weight than sources do, and we don't do that. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 12:52, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Phil Sandifer's line in the sand

I cannot accept any proposal that is based on a mechanism of deletion instead of repair. I have no problem in theory with an article on every television episode ever, though I tend to think that they should stem organically out of expanding coverage of the series. Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:44, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

• How far do you think copyright concerns affect us? I'm thinking of Rowling's suit against the website http://www.hp-lexicon.org, who were going to publish the material from their site in book form as the Harry Potter Lexicon. Because broadly I don't disagree with your statement that we should be about repair rather than deletion, but broadly this whole dispute is about how to repair, and why. I can see an article on every television episode ever one day, when we have the framework, but I can't defend the right for all of those articles to exist now or to be created and actively maintained in violation of the five pillars. Which is not to say I would advocate their deletion, but I would advocate something other than active maintenance in such a state. Hiding T 22:11, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

their site was as a whole more detailed than any individual WP article. DGG (talk) 22:37, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

But how about the Wikipedia articles on the Harry Potter universe taken together? Hiding T 22:59, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Those seem questions for Mike Godwin - I doubt we have any sincere liability here, and I'm certainly opposed to copyright paranoia. Phil Sandifer (talk) 23:35, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't want to indulge in copyright paranoia, I just want to be clear; are we leaving that as being a matter for the foundation? Hiding T 13:22, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

In my mind this is less about "deletion" than it is making way for healthy article growth. So many of these episode articles would need to be rewritten from the ground up that there is little value to holding onto bloated plot summary. However, keeping that plot summary in the history of a redirected page means that it is available when a proper article is ready to be written, in the event that it is useful.

Lets say nothing was redirected, but the plot summary was still trimmed. Very often what we are left with is something that fits nicely on a list of episodes or on a season page. Other times, such as with many of the Scrubs episodes, there is no actual content at all except one sentence saying "this is X episode of Y" and a list of cast members which is almost identical to the normal cast list. Why don't we just leave them alone, then? Because they encourage newer editors to write more excessive plot summaries, which would be removed even if the article is kept and even turned into a featured article. You get people who spend a lot of time on those things, and then they get upset when they are removed (like we are seeing now). I think "why didn't anyone tell me before I worked hard on all of this, that it shouldn't be written on Wikipedia?" is something many of them must ask themselves. -- Ned Scott 00:08, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Why are those articles so bad? Hiding T 16:30, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Individually, they're not so bad. It's just that collectively it becomes a problem, and gives the false impression to new editors that they should be making similar articles. -- Ned Scott 06:57, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

In what way are they a problem? And why would it be a false impression to new editors? Hiding T 13:38, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

New editors are rarely aware of the policies and guidelines until they run afowl of them, as there's no mechanism that requires them to be familiar with them before they start editing (nor should there be one). Particular for a subject they are interested in, they see that other comparable works exist and make the logical leap that they can create an article of comparable content. Now, if the "plot summary only" articles were the minority of all episode articles, I think the creation of such articles would be more manageable - seeing more episode articles with notability demonstration may deter some newer authors from writing just a plot summary for a new episode article. But I believe the situation is reversed, and that plot-summary-only episode articles seem to be the norm, and thus they will tend to think that similarly-written articles are also appropriate. Because of the size of the TV project, tracking these new articles can be rather tough, and it may take a while once they are entrenched to discover them. (Comparison: on the Video Games project we are very strong about the inclusion of "game guide" material to the point that there's not a lot of it for video games; as such, we will once in a while get a new editor that creates a list of weapons or equivalent, but the rate at which these are generated (allowing for involved editors to eventually discover them) is easy to resolve those creations.) --MASEM 14:26, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

How do you stand with the editing policy then? Hiding T 23:15, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

• When you say "deletion instead of repair", do you consider merging separate items to a list to be a deletion, or a repair? --Lquilter (talk) 14:33, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Hobit's line in the sand

If an episode has multiple reliable third-party sources (reviews, DVD commentary etc.) then it having an article seems acceptable. I don't think that this "real world notability" needs to be the focus of the article, it merely needs to exist (and should be clearly cited). (That's the main issue I have with WP:FICT and WP:PLOT.) By the same token, if these sources don't exist for an episode, but do for a season, then that is the lowest level of granularity that we should have here. This does mean, most any "notable" show will have most of it's episodes be notable also. Hobit (talk) 22:13, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

• DVD commentaries aren't usually (ever?) "independent"; are you suggesting that "independent" isn't necessary? Or was that just an oversight on your part? (PS -- it would be teh awesome if there were truly independent commentary tracks, other than MST3K -- can you imagine being able to buy a movie & pick any number of separately recorded commentaries by scholars or other filmmakers?) --Lquilter (talk) 14:32, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
• Sorry, I should have said that they can be secondary sources. Hobit (talk) 21:56, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Right, I get that they're sources -- they are certainly sources for facts, and I'm willing to call them reliable for some kinds of facts. But WP:N talks about "reliable sources that are independent of the subject." DVD commentary tracks are rarely if ever "independent of the subject". So it seems like you're suggesting that DVD commentaries should count for notability for TV episodes, although they wouldn't ordinarily fit within the WP:N guidelines. Am I understanding your position correctly? --Lquilter (talk) 05:26, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

• Good point. I'll withdraw the DVD commentary part. Hobit (talk) 23:23, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

• Another question: It feels like you are making two points and I want to make sure I understand them. (1) When you say, "this 'real world notability' [does not] need to be the focus of the article", do you mean, that the wikipedia article shouldn't be focused on the real-world notability? In other words, is this a comment primarily about the structure of the article? Are you saying that plot information, if referenced and notable, is sufficient for the content? And (2) I think I understand the notability point -- you say that in terms of determining whether an episode should be a stand-alone article or incorporated into a season article or series article depends on whether sources exist for the episode alone, just the season, or just the series; is that right?

If I understand you correctly, I think I can support number two. I'm not sure about number one -- it seems to me that if there are sources, it's our job to be discussing what those sources say. If the sources only talk about the plot, then fine, we really have no way to talk about things beyond the plot because it would be unsourced. But if the sources talk about the way the episode was a model for three other works, and then it was parodied and fans had an intense love-hate relationship with this episode, then I think we should be talking about that -- summarizing the source. In other words, we should reflect the sources and only the sources (WP:OR). I'm not sure I understand if you're trying to add or take away from that, or neither. --Lquilter (talk) 16:07, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

DGG's line in the sand

I am not particularly concerned by what should have an individual article, but about preservation of good material and deletion of excessive detail. The detail in a episode section of article should be sufficient to follow the plot & the development of the characters and remark on any special features, whether separates of together. I think only the most notable sows really justify separate episode articles, but all justify an adequate treatment of the episodes. But had not the mergers and redirects started removing important content I would never have objected to them. DGG (talk) 22:37, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments

User Ursasapien's line in the sand

To be honest, I think the thing that makes Wikipedia a "laughing stock" is not many articles on the minutia of television or other fiction, but the seriousness with which we take ourselves. Polling about a half dozen of my real-world friends/associates who do not have the wiki madness, they do not care if they get information from a list, a separate article, or the show's article. Nevertheless, they do expect the information to be there when they come looking. They love our articles on the minutia of every subject in the universe. We are often the first thing that pops up in a Google search, and they like our generally informative articles. However, they all had a little derisive laughter when I told them of the epic struggles regarding spoiler tags, bad-sites, and episode articles.

In a nutshell: I believe we should include the maximum amount of information, in whatever form we decide is best through collegial consensus forming.

Comments

The thing to remember is that WP does not exist in a void of information particularly when it comes to fiction. If we completely removed the coverage of a show, there are other resources that would be able to take its place, some already existing, some not. There will always be coverage of such works elsewhere. Furthermore the Mediawiki software makes it very easy for there to be tight integration between Wikipedia and any other wiki through interwiki mapping, so that WP can easily link as it would any other topic to that wiki, and that wiki back. This process, done right, is completely transparent to the use beyond site layout changes. Thus, with proper wikis set up for all televsion series, WP can give the top level of information reported in a scholarly manner, and then give similar information on the wiki in more fun, plot-oriented manner. We don't have to lose information if done correctly. --MASEM 14:51, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Why is this necessary? I mean, are we moving off all the stubs on snakes to a snake wiki, or a biology wiki? Why can't Wikipedia be a complete resource, or attempt to be, through teh editing process? Hiding T 15:04, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

WP's goal is to be a encyclopedia, not the end-all of human knowledge; it is a tertiary source meaning that it should never be authoritative (that is, we are not the experts on a subject, we are merely summarizing what the experts have said and providing that resource). But because we are not paper, we can cover a much broader spectrum of material that is not typically covered by an encyclopedia, but we are still covering these topics from a 60,000 ft level; we should be giving overviews, not textbook or guide material, of the topics at hand. So for a TV show, we can describe the show, the general plot and characters, provide a list of episodes and short summaries, how well the show did and so forth, but we should not strive to be the expert on the show by necessarily providing a complete guide to the series. Of course, if specific episodes or characters are notable for an encyclopedic treatment, we can cover them as well. However, we can certainly point to the expert source (this being a wiki for that work) from Wikipedia to allow a reader to gain more information. Additionally, moving some of this content (which qualifies as non-free fair use in several cases) off Wikipedia to other wikis helps to meet it's goal of being a free-content encyclopedia.

As specifically to the snakes, I'd consider the fact that a topic on a species of snake, county roads in the US, or towns in Ireland to have shown in the past a reasonable amount of coverage to be appropriately covered as an encyclopdic topic as any television show. But again, this would be an encyclopedic treatment; if I wanted to list every study of a specific species of snake, or all the specific attractions and resturants and gas stations along the road or in the town, or equivalent, every episode of a TV show, that would be demonstrating the expertise that WP should not be showing, and is more appropriate for a secondary resource such as a wiki. We can cover a topic on both WP and the wiki, it's just that the depth of coverage will be much more deeper for the wiki than on WP. --MASEM 15:33, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

You misread me. I meant, why can't Wikipedia be a complete encyclopedia, an encyclopedia written for the benefit of its readers, including elements of general encyclopedias, specialized encyclopedias, and almanacs. Why shouldn't we aim to be as authorative as possible within WP:V, WP:NOR, WP:NPOV and WP:NOT? We're not restricted to covering from a 60 000 ft level, that's quite clear at the five pillars and summary style as well as Wikipedia not being paper and other thoughts on Wikipedia. The only limits on what we cover are the aforementioned policies and consensus. There's no policy on Wikipedia which states that we have to be restricted to a 60 000ft level. I'm also disturbed to see you describe a wiki as an expert. A wiki is not an expert by its very nature. They are all unreliable as sources as we have usually described ourselves as being. I also do not see how moving stuff of of wikipedia helps us in our goal of being a free-content encyclopedia. Allowing other people to use it does that. Farming it off to someone else does not, in fact one could argue it actually contradicts the idea. We are supposed to improve articles through our editing policy, not our deletion policy or some transfer policy. I am also not alone in seeing some form of conflict in some of our links to wikias and the way we transwiki, although I appreciate the community is divided on that issue. As to whether Wikipedia is a tertiary source or a secondary source, it's somewhere in the middle. We strive to be tertiary, but at times we are also a secondary source. However, the nature of sources depends upon the usage of the source. For some people who cite us, we are secondary source, in other instances we are primary source. I think we all agree that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. I think the difference may be that there are those who would prefer to improve our content so that it is encyclopedic, and those who would remove content which is not. Then there are those who would argue about how to improve it. Which is probably where we came in. I think the biggest confusion in all of this is the misunderstanding about the hurry with which articles are being treated. Where's the fire? Has the foundation announced the deadline yet? Otherwise, how do poor articles which are correctly tagged in any shape or form "damage" wikipedia. I assume they must damage us, given the fact that people attempt to correct them with such haste. Hiding T 16:01, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

This is along similar lines to what I have already written on the main talk page regarding the constructive or destructive nature of such content. Although this is a straw man argument, it is worth noting that many articles on advanced mathematics are not written from a general overview point of view - they are practically inaccessible to casual readers. Depth of coverage is, as I have previously stated, an inherent effect of the nature of wikipedia, and, as long as well-written layperson overviews exist, cause no harm. The problems with external wikis as a solution are that this is not a universally agreed approach, that external wikis are not as trusted as wikipedia (as certain rules are not guaranteed to be common), and the process is not transparent - one cannot search wikipedia and get results from other, specialised, wikis (All of these are surmountable and would indeed be a noble issue to deal with and could enhance overall quality, but this is not the present state or one we can expect soon). LinaMishima (talk) 16:17, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

On WP being a secondary or a primary source, by WP:OR we cannot be: we cannot be the first publisher of original thought nor can we make analytic or synthetic claims. People may use WP like that, improperly, but we should not be editing as if we were those types of sources.

Remember, "free-content" is free as in speech, in addition to free as in beer. We have to make sure that what we provide in WP is not burdened by copyright issues (outside of meeting the GFDL) or other intellectual property issues. That's why we push to reduce the amount of non-free image use via WP:NFC, and that's why we should be careful to the depth of coverage we give to copyrighted fictional works. Not because we need to fear the copyright reaper, but that this does burden WP's free-content mission.

I would not say this is so much a "we have to fix it by X" timing issue, but more that a switch has been flipped (the addition of the secondary source requirement for notability), and shit has hit the fan because of that (TTN's approach citing that change, among others, and the resulting disgruntlements against FICT and EPISODE). The existence of non-notable episodes and other articles had been a problem that really never surfaced until that point, and now we really need to figure out how to deal with it in order for a lot of areas of WP to move forward for further improvements. We could just let the ArbCom pass another judgement again, and do nothing else to determine content issues, but someone else will come along and do the same thing and we're back to square one. The issue is now at the forefront of many editor's minds, it makes sense to deal with it now. And given that the issue of systematic bias has come up, it also makes sense that once we've come to a consensus on the issue to re-evaluate all appropriate articles as well to re-assess them as to dismiss the issue of systematic bias.

As for external wiki's being "experts", for most pieces of fiction work, the true experts are the creators and producers of the work, but the likelihood of them providing information at the level of detail that readers seem to want is highly unlikely. Instead, the best "experts" are those that are fans of those works, and even moreso when you get them to collaborate together. Yes, inherently, any wiki (including WP) is unreliable, but I think that if we make the process more transparent for both moving information to and interlinking between WP and wikis, we ideally would help encourage these wikis to become better. Use of wikis definitely needs to be a better spelled out process and more widely available so it doesn't sound like we are intentionally dumping off material to never be improved again. --MASEM 16:55, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

"On WP being a secondary or a primary source, by WP:OR we cannot be": regarding being a primary source, you are entirely correct (regards to article content), however we must remember that for our uses of primary sources, wikipedia becomes a secondary source (as in indirect, rather than strong analytical, and 'weak' synthesis is the basis of being an encyclopaedia, the collecting of relevant information). This is an unavoidable fact, and the confusion over source types is a major problem with wikipedia, for it can result in absurd claims (like that a coroner's report cannot be used to show someone's death, and other such matters. LinaMishima (talk) 17:03, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Regarding notability, I am a strong believer that notability enforcement has gotten out of hand, and has perverted all intent of the concept. I found it quite telling to note what was not discussed in previous discussion, actually. However, the problems with notability are far, far outside of the scope of this discussion and many times further still harder to address with consensus. It should be noted that the TV show articles are but the tip of the iceberg - recent examples of problems also include coverage of Olympic athletes, and no doubt will soon extend further. In many respects, this makes it an imperative to come up with a generalisable solution to the problem of less notable, less expandable, articles. That is why I am very much in favour of detailed lists that allow even for notable content to simply be an entry, for such a solution is highly generic. LinaMishima (talk) 17:10, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

External wikis should not be viewed as a 'solution': As I stated earlier, external wikis have several major issues with respect to being considered a solution. Even with appropriate technological measures in place (such as wikilinking words automatically finding the appropriate wiki, and free and transparent searching across a collection of wikis), the sociological problems remain. WP:V, WP:NPOV, WP:RS and WP:NOR are certainly not guaranteed, and they may all use distinctly different styles of content presentation. To put it simply, we would go from a single trusted source, to one trusted source devoid of the desired content, and at least one source with the content but without any establishment of trust. This issue is simply too big to address here, but as part of the resolutions we draw up, the eventual addressing of these problems might be a good matter to suggest for future investigation. LinaMishima (talk) 17:18, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Huge tracts of fiction don't have wikis, and only a very few are actually good.--Nydas^(Talk) 17:33, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

There are tons of generalized TV or fiction wikis. There doesn't have to be one for a specific show. In fact, I plan to propose that several of the ones on Wikia are merged to more general ones to help centralize efforts. As far as their quality goes, they're as good as Wikipedia, because they're allowed to copy everything we have and work on that as a starting point. -- Ned Scott 11:04, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Copying content is quantity, not quality. Don't confuse coverage with those aspects of a wiki that cause the wiki to be a trusted resource. LinaMishima (talk) 13:25, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Which is one reason I want to start a project to help external wikis develop good guidelines and core values such as NPOV, and still maintain a reasonable level of verifiability, even if it is on a "fan" wiki. I'm not confused at all, and I know the shape most of external wikis are in, but I don't see that as permanent. I see many of these external wikis as having as much potential as we did years ago when Wikipedia was starting out. For context, my response was more directed at Nydas's specific concerns than yours. I agree with much of what you say, which is why I would love it if Wikimedia had it's own wiki for fiction. -- Ned Scott 05:18, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

As I proposed in my statement above, I think an "external" wiki concept is certainly something that should be explored. I think the difference is that I am proposing a "sanctioned" wiki that is a peer sister project of Wikipedia, in the same vein as Wiktionary, Wikinews, etc. I do not believe that "Wikifiction" (or whatever it's called) would have the "sociological problems" you infer. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:19, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Your concept would certainly work well, and indeed there are other solutions to the sociological problems. However, implementing these solutions is outside the scope of WP:EPISODE, and would require a timescale and process a magnitude bigger than that for the debate over policy here. Whilst it may be a very effective eventual solution, we can only suggest be looked into, not mandate and solve all the issues relating to. I am, however, broadly in favour of such an approach in general terms and on the longer timescale. LinaMishima (talk) 19:15, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

(EC) @Lina: a question we should be asked is: What is the "problem" that wikis can't be the solution for. We have two issues of concern here. One is (WP-defined) notability - we should be covering topics that have appropriate independent sources. This doesn't mean that anything non-notable does not get covered, it just likely is part of a summary in a list or similar description. (The rewrite of FICT makes sure that this type of non-notable list article, whether its characters, episode guides, or whatnot, is perfectly appropriate in a summary style approach to talking about the work of fiction). However, even if notability is established, and more commonly for non-notable topics covered under a notable one, we have the issue that some editors would love to go into lots of detail about the topic at hand (look at the length of some of these plot "summaries" for episodes). We don't want to completely alienate these people, but such depth of in-universe detail is really not appropriate for WP (per WP:PLOT). To that second problem is what external wikis are better for. They allow for expanded discussion of topics that an encyclopedic approach should not go in depth into. There is no reason that we cannot, in coverage of a TV show on Wikipedia, mention and briefly describe every episode and every minor characters within the show's history (and appropriate merging and redirection can help make finding these easier), but any further discussion of these points should be pointed to somewhere outside WP. Basically, outside wikis should not be considered simply a dumping ground for fiction-related material, but instead with the appropriate level of coverage in WP with lots of inter-wiki links, the external wiki content can easily augment and expand the limited details provided by WP. And to the previous statement, I agree it is outside the scope of EPISODE to establish better WP-wiki interactions, but we definitely should remind ourselves as we consider what to do with EPISODE (back to my original point) that WP does not need to be the sole repository of this information. --MASEM 19:21, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

As I have said several times, I am all for appropriate external wikis, and indeed they do solve the 'problem' very well. However they currently do not, thanks to the aforementioned issues. Whilst the rest of the internet does exist, so does upon this internet vast ammounts of details about art, science, history and important people. The 'sole repository' argument is not a particularly fair one, since this could be said of all wikipedia content. The major difference, however, is that wikipedia is, depite its flaws, fairly well trusted and understood. I find it hard to see the benefits that the argument brings to the discussion, aside from reminding people that wikipedia is just a collaborative website and not something Holy and existance-affirming (essentially, to have perspective on the ultimate importance of all of this). I believe we can reach the same conclusions as to how to deal with content without ever having to resort to the "elsewhere" argument, simply by working from our intended user's needs and wikipedia policy. LinaMishima (talk) 19:51, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Seraphimblade's line in the sand

• "A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject." (emphasis added)
• "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found for an article topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it."

There we go! There are our lines. They're simple, they're easy, and best of all, editors don't need to do any deciding at all. Since we're a tertiary source, we shouldn't be deciding what to write. Independent sources should be deciding for us. We do not second guess them, and we do not give things more weight than they do. If they decide "This topic isn't worth writing much about, and only in conjunction with other parts of the whole", we follow their lead and write a small blurb in a list. If they decide "This topic isn't worth writing about at all", we follow their lead and write nothing. Easy, simple, follows existing policy, and best of all, doesn't require editors to argue over or decide about a thing. The source material is there, or it is not. That's the end of the story. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 20:49, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

This is nit-picking, but 'significant' and 'reliable' are deliberately vague terms, so editors do have to make decisions :P Reliability is far more well defined and less subjective than significance. Thankfully FICT gives us guides on significant, and generally there are rules we can follow to determine reliability, so there is much less work to be done, but matters can and will still be debated unless quantifiable measures are written up. But that's just me being picky :P

"small blurb in a list" is a term that has to be used carefully (since too small can result in a pointless entry), as does the idea that a slightly notable (for instance, an episode that has won an award) matter must have an article (however this is somewhat covered by your assertion of "amount written", since simply winning an award does not mean more gets written about the subject matter). LinaMishima (talk) 21:09, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

You have a point, though realistically "reliable" isn't hard to gauge. Is the source routinely cited or quoted by other sources known to be reliable? Is it written by professionals? Do other professionals fact-check, peer review, or editorially control it? Is it independent of the subject it is writing about? Is it well-known and reputed to be reliable (by those who are aware of it/work in the field, popularity isn't the consideration here)? If we can answer "yes" to all of these, we can say with pretty good certainty that our source is reliable. If the answer to one of those is "no", careful evaluation is required and the source is at best questionable. If the answer to more than one is "no", the source is most likely not reliable. Significant coverage can, generally, be evaluated similarly. Is the full work (article/book/etc.) exclusively or mainly about the subject? Is the subject evaluated in-depth rather than being "name-dropped" during an evaluation that's about something else? Is there more than a paragraph written specifically about the subject in the source? More than a page? Is the work itself as long as normal articles or works normally featured in the same source, or is it a "sidebar", "in other news", or "human interest" type blurb? All "yes" answers indicate the mention is probably a substantial one, one "no" indicates questionable (but still may be substantial in some cases, like a book about something else devoting a full chapter to the subject), more than one "no" very likely indicates a trivial, passing mention. Finally, we can evaluate significance over time and scope. Is the event or subject the recipient of substantial coverage over time, rather than coverage only once related to some "news" type event? (Many things which were initially news events still receive study and coverage over time, such as school shootings, but many others are mentioned and forgotten.) Are many different facets and parts of the subject covered in reliable sources? Are the sources covering the subject independent of one another (not reprinting the same AP story, for example?) And here yet again, all "yes" answers indicate that the subject has received significant coverage over time, one "no" is questionable, more than one "no" indicates that the event is likely news or fleeting, not encyclopedic. All of these things can be evaluated using objective measures. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 00:31, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Torc2's line in the sand

If an episode reaches a certain ratings threshold (TBD), that is sufficient evidence of notability. If an episode was broadcast on a major nationwide channel during prime viewing hours, that is a strong indicator of notability. If a network does not produce the episode of a show it is airing, the act of airing that episode is to be regarded as coverage by a source independent of the subject. Torc2 (talk) 07:05, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Umm ... what? Airing an episode is "coverage"? First of all, it is not "coverage", because there is no separate commentary; it's simply broadcasting. I see what you're trying to get at -- you want some third-party credit for the fact that someone other than the production company, which has a financial interest in the work, is supporting the work -- but the "independent coverage" is intended to be coverage about the item, not "reprints" of the item. Second, you realize this picks up syndication, right? Is that your intent? --Lquilter (talk) 14:29, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

2 cents worth

While Wiki prides itself on not being a paper encyclopedia, there are still limits on what can be said and written about here article-wise. And having browsed through WP as an editor and a person doing reference, I must say that I am amazed at some of the clutter. And it is not limited to articles for episodes of TV shows, but I digress.

Are individual episodes of a notable TV show (ie., Star Trek, Bonanza, etc.) notable in and of themselves? No! But chances are it is going to be a fan, whether casual or avid, doing the determination of notability with the possibilitiy of violating NPOV. And frankly, any notable episodes of any TV show is only going to be of priamry interest to fans of that show and the reason for notability is something they probably are already aware of and is more of trivial interest to others (for example-The first appearance of the Cybermen in Doctor Who is the episode "The Tenth Planet").

Frankly I would not think of Wiki as a place to find episode guides and plot summations, and frankly it shouldn't be used that way. If I want that type of information, I will look it up in a more appropriate venue.

Basically, there should be no articles (or episode guides) for any individual TV show episode. And I will go as far as saying that an article such as the one on the completely fictional holiday "festivus" should also be included in this ban. IMHO. Hx823 (talk) 23:30, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

RFC Summary To Date / Possible Solution/Compromise

This is only a summary to date of what I believe I am reading from all the various comments on the RFC and how I think they fit in to fill a better approach to dealing with television episodes and notability. This should not be taken as the final consensus on the issue, but I would like to see if the approaches I describe are agreeable with others, or if we are radically missing something here.

Part of what makes this RFC difficult is that people have strong feelings against what TTN and others are doing to the episode articles, and I can certainly understand that point. However, for purposes of trying what we do with episode articles in the future, I ask that people try to ignore TTN's effect on this.

First, the answers to the specific questions on the RFC:

• Are episodes of a notable TV show automatically notable? - This seems to be a strong "NO". (it's not unanimous however)
• Is a plot + infobox sufficient for an episode article? - This also seems to be a "NO". (again, not unanimous)

Now, part of the people that have responded positively to these questions have pointed out that accurately, there are numerous articles that exist that are simply plot summaries, including those from popular shows. I am considering this as a systematic bias and have a suggested route for dealing with it, such that every TV series is given the same fair treatment based on the available sources to draw from. I know that won't satisfy everyone that is in this group but I'm trying to make a compromise here.

So, given this, we are back at saying that a television episode must demonstrate notability to have it's own article.

Now, there's three ideas here to consider:

1. What is episode notability? This is still a question that is being asked over at Wikipedia:Television episodes/Proposed Objective Criteria. While that discussion is still in progress, the summary here to date is that: notability for an episode is (as expected from WP:N) when an episode is discussed extensively in reliable third-party sources. This likely is the case (aka "probably notable") when an episode has won a major award from a notable organization, has had some unusual impact in the real world (Pokemon seizure), or has a strong influence on subsequent works ("classics", as one editor put it), but in all these cases, these have to still be backed by reliable third-party sources. Note that ratings and viewership, as well as having developer information, are argued to not be acceptable. Again, these are not in stone, and discussion should continue on these. I also suggest making sure that with web-only sources, there is some identification of reliable sources from non-commercial entities that site somewhere between a personal blog and a magazine site (aka Television Without Pity is such an example). Again we have yet to fully define episode notability so editors are still strongly encouraged to help with that process to make the distinction clearer.
2. Based on discussions, it seems reasonable that we can allow for larger expansion of plot summary information within the episode list for a show, particularly if we break each season of a show onto its own page. The season page does not have to demonstrate notability, being effectively, a list of episodes written as a summary style - however, there is a better likelihood that notable information may be found per season than per episode and thus, a better chance that notability can be demonstration, but for a list of episodes in a season notability is not required. This doesn't mean we try to fit 1000 words of plot summary into an episode description, but we can add information that may not make the episode notable but that is sourced. For example, being nominated, but not winning, an Emmy, a possible ratings impact, or the like. Also, since the average show has plots that develop and are bookended by seasons, additional sections outside of the episode list can be added to describe the general plot trends, allowing the episodes to defer to those sections for the progression of such. (eg "Bad Wolf" of the new Doctor Who, or the 3rd season of House MD where House is trying to select his new staff via a competition) We can indicate guest stars as parenthetical additions after the character name, and so forth. This allows us to bridge the issue of going into more detail than a typical current episode list allows over plot-summary only episode articles. It was noted that The Enemy Within (Stargate SG-1) is an example of a larger, yet terse, plot summary that would be appropriate to fit into an episode list, but I would argue that even to help bridge the gap of this episode notability that a plot summary of the length in Deep Space Homer would be maybe the maximum limit.
3. How to appropriately merge non-notable episode articles. Obviously, not TTN's current approach, but we need something that clearly helps at each step of the way. I propose that the following steps:
   • If you see a set of non-notable episode articles for a show, make sure to tag each one with {{notability}} and ideally leave a message on the show's page and likely existing "list of episodes" page. The editor that does this should judge how "active" the articles are and consider dropping a note at WP:TV if they are not very active.
   • After no less than a month , revisit the pages, and determine if progress has been made to improve notability:
     • If it seems that there's a fair effort to improve all articles, do nothing
     • If only a few articles seem to be improved, or no such efforts have been made, propose a merge request, again at each episode page, with a discussion on the main show main and list of episodes page (and WP:TV if not active). Merges do not have to be all or nothing: if a handful of articles are notable but others aren't, let those notable ones be and tackle only non-notable ones.
       • If there is either clear consensus to merge, or no input at all (again , noting that WP:TV should be notified if the pages seem inactive), the merge can be performed. If there is no consensus, a larger audience should be brought in by asking for help at WP:TV to help decide. If the consensus is against any merge, but you feel that they still need to be, you may consider other dispute resolutions processes such as the WP:MEDCAB to help ( I will note we are considering making a Fiction-related Noticeboard at WP:FICT to be an intermediate step between page/project level and WP-wide level, but at this time it is not set up).

To merge once determined the appropriate action.

1. If the merge is a result of consensus, allow those involved in the articles to move content appropriately from the articles to be merge to the episode lists before performing redirection.
2. Otherwise (or even in addition) Transwiki all pages to be merged to the Annex/Wikia (someone suggested creating a straight-forward television portal there for this purpose) so that their information is lost.
3. As a courtesy to editors, provide a list on the talk page of the episode guide of versions of the last non-redirected edits of the TV show for each of the articles that are to be merged.
4. Use the new {{ER to list entry}} redirection tag as to help identify the redirection as an episode-related one. Note that within the episode list, the {{anchor}} element should be used to identify episode names so that the redirection can jump right to its entry in the episode list.

What this allows is that if a user feels they can add notability to an article, they have a way to resurrect the text without admin assistance and not necessarily having to understand how to access redirection text, and can work on improving it in their user space or where the article is located.

Now, assuming we can come to agreement on these aspects (notability, expanding episode coverage in episode lists, and how to merge episode articles appropriately), I suggest that we reactive the Episode Coverage task force of the WP:TV project to set out to review every television episode article to determine if it should be merged or not to episode lists, once these are established. Basically, if we are to do this, then:

1. Given a certain date after all above conditions are met, we start a 3 month period during which we strongly encourage editors to bring episode articles in line with the established notability guidelines; during this time, no episode article should be put up for AfD, and discussions of merging from an editor not involved with a page should not happen (however, if editors want to voluntarily merge pages, great, let them do that). This period will be announced as far as it can be so that people are aware of this grace period and the process that is occurring.
2. In the 3rd month as part of this grace period, we will have editors voluntarily run through a series they are not involved with and, if any episode is deemed to fail notability, it should be tagged as such, with the series page and episode list page notified, and marked as such on the WP:TVE page. This probably will take about a month to complete, such as to time with the end of the grace period. (Dates when sweeping is completed for a series will be noted).
3. In the 4th month and no less than a month after a series has been swept, any remaining non-notable episodes will be merged into an appropriate episode list, if they haven't already been done. This will follow the same merge process outlined above (transwiki info, appropriate redirection, and a courtesy list of old articles) so that no information is deleted. Any episode article that is not merged should be tagged with a special category (for the next step) to indicate they've been checked as such.
4. Following this step, we should then have all episode articles either showing notability or merged into a list. We can track new episode articles as they are created (they will lack the category above), and if they appear to have notability problems, we can then tag them that way and give them the time to develop the article further before worrying about merging it again. This basically helps to keep things in check as we progress beyond this period, sort of a managed peer review with respect to notability.

I know this seems like a lot of work, but I think that once we complete this to bring all episode-related articles to the same level, maintenance will be much easier and we will likely never run into the same situation as TTN's edits has lead us to, at least with respect to television articles.

These solutions, I believe, help to compromise the many positions that I've seen taken on this page: we avoid deletion of content, help to maintain encyclopedic coverage of episodes, and yet still allow for a bit more expanded coverage of plot information and non-notable details when episodes aren't notable. --MASEM 18:15, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Motion in favour of Masem's proposal

Support:

1. LinaMishima (talk) 18:40, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
2. – sgeureka ^t•c 18:54, 24 January 2008 (UTC) (I am already in the process of getting consensus for a voluntary transwiki/merge/redirect for two shows, and will volunteer for the suggested review taskforce.)
3. Bláthnaid 20:29, 24 January 2008 (UTC) Automatically notable seasons and a taskforce look like a good compromise to me. A sister Wiki dedicated to fiction is a good idea also, and might be the only way to settle the debates once and for all.
4. Dimadick (talk) 20:52, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
5. Still some details to work out but I'd support this approach. Stardust8212 20:53, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
6. edg ☺ ☭ 17:30, 26 January 2008 (UTC), entirely good. While the grace period seems overgenerous, it should accommodate the episode stub defenders.
7. Fantastic proposal Masem. Whilst I would like to see the huge plot "summaries", useless lists of trivia, and assorted fancruft swept away, some of the information in episode articles is still useful. Your proposal is a measured approach to the current problems and it's close enough to what I was going to propose. You have my full support. Astronaut (talk) 19:44, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Oppose:

1. Alright in general (and I don't like votes, they don't allow for nuances), but I see no need for any "grace period". The approach is already to just redirect, not hard-delete, so there's not some need for articles to be left lay around. If someone finds significant sourcing for one, they can always bring it back, if not, let's not have some kind of enforced asking people to stay out of things. The rest of the proposal, with a methodical and documented cleanup approach, is excellent and I fully support it. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 21:05, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
   • I am just concerned that when we say "ok, we are now starting the cleanup" on a certain date, there's going to be a large volume of work to be done by a good number of editors, and I don't necessarily want to overwhelm them. But I do agree that giving enough fair warning and the above process for keeping old copies around, we really don't need that long a period. --MASEM 21:46, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
2. While I agree with most of the proposal, I think that a 30 day notification period on notability is excessive. One week, two at most, should be good enough to show progress on an article. And, since we are primarily redirecting, then the article can always be brought back and improved. Furthermore, I would take off all the bolding that lists don't need to show notability. Lists should probably inherit notability from their parent, but if the show hasn't established notability, then the lists shouldn't exist. Karanacs (talk) 21:10, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
   • A month seems to be the timeframe that is suggested, given that we are all volunteers and not living our life by WP (ha!) and that people go on vacations or have periods they can't participate. Maybe as per Seraphimblade's comment, the initial period could be a month, subsequently, 2 weeks is sufficient, since the process shouldn't allow new non-notable articles to stagnate? And the bolding is only there to emphasis for purposes of discussion that, as you say, it's notability is from the parent article about the series, treating it as if it were written in a summary style form, just so it's clear that while there are notable season pages (Smallsville (Season 1) we should never expect every season to live up to those examples. --MASEM 21:46, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

   I don't have any issues with an initial grace period of 1-3 months, but after that I would think 2 weeks would be plenty of time. And if the article ends up being redirected or deleted before someone has time to save it, they can recreate it in a better format after getting the info from the history. Karanacs (talk) 22:15, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

3. Strong oppose. It feels like a railroad as the proposed level of notability is too high. Higher than any other area IMO. A handful of episode reviews by reliable sources is enough to establish notability per [[WP:N] as I read it. That should be the bar. Hobit (talk) 22:00, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
   • Episode reviews from reliable sources establish notability as currently being discussed. The only issue that I mentioned is that we can't use personal blogs or the like, but there are websites that are more than that but less than fully commercial sites, and should they be considered as reliable sources for such reviews. --MASEM 22:10, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
   • The notability guidelines are not fully fleshed out yet (participation is still encouraged), but substantial coverage in multiple reliable, independent third-party sources would likely meet notability criteria. (This would likely exclude personal blogs, personal websites, and forums, but if the episode were reviewed in multiple newspapers/magazines it would likely be notable.) Karanacs (talk) 22:21, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
     • Once the guidelines crystallize, I might be able to agree with this plan. But my sense of the discussions thus far is that this will merely be a set of additional restrictions on top of WP:N. That's what happened with WP:FICT in my opinion. We have to meet WP:N and WP:FICT. Not the right thing IMO. Hobit (talk) 19:06, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
       • WP:FICT (at least as I'm proposing) does not restrict any more than WP:N - if it's got independent reliable secondary sources, it's notable for inclusion in WP. The same is being said presently at the notability of an episode: reliable independent secondary sources are needed for episode notability. Only what FICT and EPISODE try to do is say where the notability is likely going to be best demonstrated in terms of looking for those sources, given that WP:N is written more from a scholarly standpoint. The alternative: rejecting this, EPISODE, or FICT, will still result in editing wars because WP:N will still remain; these are only meant to help say, "given WP:N, here's how to make an episode notable within that requirement". --MASEM 19:15, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
         • I'll admit I've not been following the WP:FICT document in the last week or so. Let's see: We have a requirement about how the article is structured. That's not part of WP:N, or even WP:PLOT (which just says the information has to exist). The current WP:FICT would appear to be closer to WP:N and WP:NOT. Also we have a higher standard for stubs than elsewhere. Also, your WP:FICT seems (to me, as mentioned in talk) to strongly restrict sub articles. Hobit (talk) 01:13, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
           • I think you're right: how EPISODE is stated presently really should be split into "Notability (television episodes)" at EPISODE, and "Manual of style (television)" (MOSTV?) for the article structure, as structure shouldn't be considered a part of notability. And I will try to make sure that the issue of subarticles being ok is much clearer because I don't believe anyone has an issue with allowing summary style subarticles. --MASEM 03:33, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
4. Oppose. This is TTN plus mountains of paperwork. I note that AfD is taken out of the process, presumably because it often waves aside our dysfunctional fiction guidelines in favour of common sense and neutrality.--Nydas^(Talk) 22:26, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
5. Oppose. I agree with Nydas, this proposal is attempting to circumvent WP:N by creating lots of new rules that will be used to justify the spamming of plot summaries. His proposal also presumes there is something wrong with TTN's approach to enforcing the WP guidelines, an aspect on which his proposal is strangely silent. --Gavin Collins (talk) 09:08, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

   To both Gavin and Nydas' comments. I support what TTN is trying to do, but am under no allusion that his approach is extremely disruptive. (There's clear evidence of BRRRRRR... instead of BRD in many of his redirections, and the fact that we are here talking about this after an ArbCom case previously decided that it was disruptive is clear evidence his methods are not acceptable). To Nydas: you have argued before that some shows get systematic bias because they are pet favorites of WP admins. The purpose of the episode re-evaluation is to remove that bias by evaluating all shows for the same notability guidelines (making sure uninvolved editors for shows review those shows to avoid favoritism). Purposely, for this cleanup, AfD is removed because we don't want to spam AfD with deletion requests (again, nothing should be deleted, only redirected). Once done with the cleanup, from then on, standard dispute resolution takes place, which may include AfD, but I certainly hope that a full effort here will reduce the volume that such articles take up at AfD.--MASEM 14:57, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

   Firstly, this re-evaluation has zero legitimacy because of the low numbers of people involved (any powerful Wikiproject will just ignore it). I'm not sure how this re-evaluation will achieve no bias; your idea of getting 'uninvolved' editors is opaque and complicated, and who decides who is uninvolved? Fiction deletionists have a proud history of trying to circumvent AfD as much as possible because their weird doctrines carry less weight there, and this seems to be another example.--Nydas^(Talk) 10:40, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

   WP:AGF. --MASEM 14:43, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

6. Oppose. Sorry, because much of the proposal has great merit and I know the compromise it has taken. Nevertheless, I think this proposal presupposes our definition of notability. I think both in AFD and in other community discussions, it is clear that notability can be asserted in other ways aside from being "discussed extensively in reliable third-party sources." The proposal also does not make allowances, IMO, for "potential." Certainly 3-4 months is enough time for editors to find some sources on popular, contemporary television, but it may be much more difficult for older or more obscure programs. Ursasapien (talk) 11:13, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

   I suggest that to resolve the first point, you shold provide where AfD and community discussion (not on this page) where other sources of notability besides reliable third-party sources have been suggested, and present that to where we are talking about notability. On the issue of "potential", I will classify it into three parts:

   • "Potential" in that editors have shown a good faith effort to demonstrate that something is notable, just maybe lacking one or two more independent sources. (Maybe they've added an award it's won, but not a review or the like but know they can get them). In the process above, this article would stay, no merge would be needed.
   • "Potential" as in, the last 23 episodes of this series has had notable episode articles, and this current episode in the same season just came out but has not yet been expanded to included it. Definitely it is fully expected to have potential for notability, and in time, would be equivalent. It would not be merged immediately in the process, but if the article is not shown to be notable in the same fashion as the other articles in the same amount of time, then it should be merged.
   • "Potential" as in that there will likely be notable information about the episode some time in the future, but not present now (and doesn't fall in the case above). WP is not a crystal ball, and until such can be demonstrated, the article should redirect to the episode list. If notability presents itself as stated at a later time, great, recreate and expand the article.

   And that's the key thing to remember - we are not deleting any content. If a merged episode can demonstrate notability, then recreating it has been made simple to allow this to happen.

   Now, on the older programs issue, certainly in a volunteer project chasing down references for those would be rather difficult, and unlike newer media, is likely all paper. But do we really have people working on older shows in this fashion? I don't see the harm that until someone wants to step up to the plate to create an encyclopedic entry for episode articles, that these be redirected w/o deletion to an episode list with allowance for a larger plot summary.

7. Oppose per WP:CREEP. My eyes glaze over as I read this endless attempt to create formal rules. It is a clear principle of Wikipedia that it should not be a bureaucracy. Colonel Warden (talk) 23:17, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

   It is a set of rules that needs to be implemented for a short period of time for those that opt to participate in the task force in order to bring the "playing field" of episode articles back to the same level. It is not much different from other "sweeps" types projects such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/Project quality task force/Sweeps or any other task force. Again, this part is voluntary for editors to participate in, as long as they follow the recommendations through; and if you don't participate, there is no change from what is normally expected of editors. --MASEM 23:39, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

8. I continue to think that an infobox+plot article is, by long-standing consensus, fine for almost any film as a stub. I am hard-pressed to come up with a persuasive reason why it should not be fine for television episodes, and deleting stubs is silly. Phil Sandifer (talk) 00:15, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

   Film? o.O -- Ned Scott 03:42, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

   Edited to clarify. Phil Sandifer (talk) 04:50, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

   Oh, so films are something you are comparing episodes too. That's comparing apples and oranges, though. One is considered a complete work of fiction in itself, and in this case even has its own set of notability guidelines (Wikipedia:Notability (films)), the other is a sub-topic/element of a work of fiction. It's pretty reasonable to assume that a film that passes WP:MOVIE is independently notable, and thus obviously has potential to be a full article even if it is just a plot and an infobox. WP:ANIME has a ton of articles like that. That same obvious potential to be more than an infobox and plot isn't apparent in an episode article. And that is all we need, reasonable potential, to keep an episode article from being merged, even without being cleaned up right away. -- Ned Scott 06:39, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

   Not to say that I completely support this proposal. I'm still thinking about it myself. -- Ned Scott 06:40, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

   I think the independence of television episodes is more contestable than that. Certainly we have no problems having an article on Where The Truth Lies, which had, in its theatrical run, around 100,000 people watching it. Yes, it had notable actors in it and was from a notable production company and all that jazz, but I have a very hard time arguing for its independent notability while arguing against the independent notability of every episode of CSI, which dwarfs that in people watching, and which, as CSI is not a very plot-arc based sort of show, is distinctly an independent and complete work of fiction. Phil Sandifer (talk) 23:08, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

   I see where you are going with that, but I tend to view independence in terms of production, rather than plot and viewership. With episodes you're normally dealing with the same actors, writers, producers, and technical staff. Most of what can be said could be said about the show in general. Not to say that it is always like this, and often times there are notable changes in production on a per-episode level. I just view it as.. what can be said about these episodes for their production and reception? Does it differ from episode to episode? If it does, by how much, and would it be enough to have a full article for each episode? I also believe a lot of this is simply limited by our available sources. I believe as time goes on that we will have more published information about production on these shows, and it's very possible that we will have articles for almost every TV show episode someday. It just depends on what information we have available. -- Ned Scott 07:48, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

9. Oppose. However this is decided, it cannot be a bureaucratic process radically different from anything in place for other categories of articles. Otherwise, we'll be right back here in 3 months again, with an RFC on the notability of fictional characters, of video games that are part of a series, or of certain types of books. All of these have had, to varying extents, merge/redirect/stub arguments and edit wars recently. We just don't see them at the level of the episodes issue because they lack the visibility of episodes (and because the editors involved haven't been put under the community magnifying glass). Also, frankly, I oppose any proposal based on adherence to notability guidelines that aren't done being written yet, on principle. Serpent's Choice (talk) 22:34, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

   See discussion below: it is not meant to add rules, it is only a "sweeps" type task force (commonly done around WP) that is meant to help address the issue with the claimed bias that some series have over others; furthermore, the suggestions (removing the grace period) make this more like standard policy, only that it's a sweep force. Yes, the same could like and may need to happen with fictional characters and the like, but it is much more difficult to determine that grouping as compared to TV episodes.

   Also, note this would not be even started until the notability guidelines for TV episodes achieved consensus. You're right it makes no sense to do this without that set. --MASEM 08:35, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

10. Strong Oppose In 3 years, again and again--I have never ceased to be amazed at how vicious editors can be to other editors. I continue to think: editors cannot become more pushy, overbearing, and domineering in forcing their destructive, counter-intuitive narrow views on everyone else, trampling on others' hard work. But then an even more draconian proposal comes along like this one today, which is even more cruel.
    Wikipedia is not harmed by television episodes, Wikipedia is not paper, "there is no practical limit to the number of topics it can cover".
    Editors who destroy other people's work senselessly is the biggest reason why wikipedia edits are dropping, and so many people leave wikipedia in utter and complete disgust.[62] Proposed policies make contributing to Wikipedia not fun anymore.
    I think what one AfD editor wrote about why he was on Wikipedia rings true to most of these editors who find happiness in destroying other people's contributions:
    "I began to realize that, for me, the nasty truth was that much of it was a power trip."
    I wish I could delete several of these editors contributions just so they can get a small sense of empathy and humanity. For those who support deleting thousands of hours of hundreds of hours of editors work: Shame on you all. travb (talk) 05:13, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Discussion of Masem's proposal

In general, I support Masem's approach here. The important thing to note seem to be:

• Most of the content of well-written episode plot summaries and the other details of stand-alone articles remain!
• Even in notable episodes, plot summaries should be kept short. I second his comment regarding the length of the plot summary in Deep Space Homer as being around the upper limit for such things. Details of how to write succinct summaries may need to be discussed as part of a MOS.
• Minor notability (such as nominations or lesser awards) may be placed in list entries
• A suggested process for resolving the current backlog of episode articles
• Redirects not deletion, which allows episodes to still be used as references in character descriptions

There are a few matters still for debate around this, so I urge people to consider the principle, rather than the details. Details will be arranged easily enough as long as we are all working towards the same goal. The process of dealing with episode articles will no doubt merit additional discussion, as will the definition of significant notability for episodes. LinaMishima (talk) 19:00, 24 January 2008 (UTC) It also should be noted that an appropriate list of transwiki destinations is still required and needs to be written. An appropriate wiki as per this list would be the prefered destination, rather than Annex. However, aside from the process of plot summary rewrites or extended 'passing mention trivia', I cannot see much that would really warrant transwiki for most episode articles. The process should generally be fairly smooth. LinaMishima (talk) 19:04, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

please see Uncle G's excellent close at the closely related Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Bulbasaur (2nd nomination):

The result was speedy keep. This is Articles for deletion. No-one wants an administrator to press a delete button here. This is an ordinary editing dispute that is addressible with ordinary editing tools. It was pointed out a Deletion Review that that was the improper venue for discussing this, and that the proper venue was the article's talk page. AFD, too, is not the proper venue for discussing this..... Articles for deletion is for discussing deletion, the pressing of a delete button by an administrator. Do not bring articles here if an administrator pressing that button is not what you want. The correct venues for discussing redirects, mergers, and other ordinary editing matters (which do not involve deletion in any way) are, as 81.104.39.63 pointed out, the articles' talk pages, employing Wikipedia:Requests for comment if necessary. There is enough traffic at AFD discussing articles where deletion is genuinely involved. AFD is not a way of gaining a wider audience to a talk-page discussion. That is Wikipedia:Requests for comment. Other venues for raising matters for general discussion are the Wikipedia:Village pump, and Wikipedia:Centralized discussions

On opposition because of 'excessive' time allowances - a custom notability template? For those people opposing simply because they feel that there is too long being allowed for articles to worked on, I have a few words to say. Firstly, it was the apparent rapid disappearance of articles that got us into this whole mess in the first place. We need a long enough run-up to merging and redirecting to ensure that we can categorically state that even infrequent visitors may have been informed. It may be useful for this purpose to devise a custom notability tag, informing the reader of the process under way. Two weeks may sound like a long time to an active editor, but a month is nicely dramatic. Secondly, many TV shows will simply not have active editors that, in a period of two weeks, will definitely have visited wikipedia. Allowing a month makes it far more likely that someone willing to work on the articles would get involved. A custom notability template could also link to the plans and instructions on how to merge into a season episode list, allowing natural editors for that series to take up the work. Regarding the fact that we will be redirecting not deleting, it is worth noting that the episode list wikilink to the episode article (now a redirect) will be removed. Once this is done, accessing the article becomes harder, and so working to properly merge in the content becomes far more difficult. Finally, there is simply a massive amount of articles we will have to look at! If we assume the intent of a working group on this matter would be to do this process properly, helping with mergers, then we would need appropriate time to do this in. LinaMishima (talk) 22:31, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

An attempt to summarise the reasons against as of the morning of 25th Jan:

1. The notification period is too long (Seraphimblade, Karanacs)
2. The bar for notability is too high or too specific (Hobit, Ursasapien)
3. Too much like TTN and made more complex (Nydas)
4. AfD taken out of process (Nydas, Ursasapien)
5. fiction guidelines are disfunctional in comparison to AfD (See statement by Nydas before assuming meaning) (Nydas)
6. Circumvents WP:N to allow episode articles at all (Gavin Collins)
7. Presumption of a problem with TTN's approach (Gavin Collins)
8. No inclusion of potential for notability (Ursasapien)

Of the above, #1 should be easily resolved (although see my comment on #4). #2, #6 and #8 desire less strong rules on notability, whilst #5 is effectively directly opposed to this entire discussion (See Statement by Gavin Collins). #3 and #7 are directly opposed viewpoints (with #7 arguably ignoring how we got to this point in the first place). #4 deals with AfD being taken out of the process, and should be easily resolved with some minor process changes and appropriate allowances of time. LinaMishima (talk) 12:54, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Quite realistically, AfD can't be taken out of the process anyway—if one wishes to nominate an article for AfD, then to AfD it goes. But AfD is not an "articles for merge" process either, and many people see an article being brought to AfD to indicate that someone wants the article deleted (as in, was a bluelink, now a redlink.) I really wouldn't mind seeing AfD take a more "articles for discussion" feel, where it would be considered perfectly valid for the nominator to suggest merge or redirection rather than outright deletion, but that is not currently the case. I think, then, that AfD is not really a good venue for discussion regarding anything aside from, well, the hard-deletion of an article by an admin, which is its intended function. No one is really suggesting hard-deletion here, just redirection and/or merger, so AfD really isn't an appropriate venue, and we should leave it to its intended purpose. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 10:58, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

To be quite clear, my complaint was not so much that AfD was "taken out of the process" but that redirects can be done with little to no discussion, consensus, or consultation from outside parties (those not readily identified as deletionist or inclusionist). BTW, my problem is not with WP:NOTE but with certain editors interpretation of the guideline. Regarding "potential notability," I am talking specifically about articles that note an award but do not have a source for a review yet or an article that has one source but has not garnered a second source yet. Ursasapien (talk) 01:19, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Resolving the differences

What can be done to resolve the differences that people have regarding this proposal? Perhaps a rewrite and rewording of the implementation procedure is in order, along with further canvassing for wider support (I suspect the issues with regards to notability and AfD will become less of an issue with a more carefully worded process). LinaMishima (talk) 20:04, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

It pretty much does come down to how we handle these situations, however WP:EPISODE was meant to be separate from the cleanup, and more of just a definition, for a lack of better words. At the time it had it's last big rewrite we also tried WP:TV-REVIEW, to have that handle the cleanup process, but it was a rocky road, people lost interest, and the proposed process lost support. I'm all for trying to attempt something again. It could be a part of WP:EPISODE or its own thing, doesn't matter much to me as long as we are trying to figure it out. -- Ned Scott 05:35, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Given the question about the grace period, I think it is fine to reduce it to a month: that is, notification that this would be occurring would be made, followed by people reviewing episodes for a show and tracking such details. I do agree that we should create a special template to say that this is going on to point the unaware editors to the project. I had proposed the idea of an external wiki list to make finding and adding new wikis appropriately for transwiki'd information.

I am a bit concerned on letting AfD back into the process. At least as it stands now, as DGG pointed out, AfD is for deletion, and unless you want that as the ultimate goal for an article, it is not the right venue for an article. I see no reason why wouldn't want to leave redirects around for episode articles so they can be searched and found easily.

Beyond that, I know there are some editors that read this that are likely going to be dead set against this. Unfortunately, I don't know if we can satisfy everyone here. --MASEM 07:32, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

How about putting a redirected article to AfD, but only after the redirect has had time to "bed in" for some time? Astronaut (talk) 13:56, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

But if the redirect has been around for a while without challenge, then why AfD, especially when deletion is not the goal? I'm beginning to think that the general acceptance of stubs for articles which will never expand is part of the issue here, to be honest. Looking at the discussion we have had here, it may be possible to persuade people to favour lists over separate stubs in general. LinaMishima (talk) 14:31, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I see no reason why we have to send a redirect to AfD at all. In fact, I think (given that the above approach is reasonable to consensus), that there's nothing wrong and in fact encouraged that every individual episode name (within the appropriate namng conventions) should have, at minimum, a redirection back to the episode list (if the episode cannot be shown notable), and appropriate entries on disambig pages. This allows people to search for and easily find information about the episode (even if it does end up in a list), helps to simplify building the web for other articles that point to episodes, and of course, maintains that if an article had content before and was redirected, the information it contained is never deleted. --MASEM 14:47, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Deleting redirects is seldom necessary; WP:RFD#HARMFUL basically recommends deleting redirects only if they confuse search engines, link to non-existent articles, or insult someone. None of this would be the case with {{ER to list entry}}. / edg ☺ ☭ 14:59, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

• I've mentioned it above, but maybe broadening the scope out to serialsed works rather than television episodes would allow us to widen the pool of debaters, bringing in people from the comics and manga projects, and allow a broader consensus to be achieved. I think we also need to look at what the fundamental differences are and what are non-negotiable princip0les people hold, and where we are all prepared to give ground. I'd rather not implement or even discuss timescales, they seem somewhat arbitrary and potentially divisive. Would it be possible to perhaps pick a set of articles and workshop in a sandbox possible solutions and see if we can generate a consensual position that way that we can then write up afterwards. Use the editing process, keeping within the 3RR, possibly even 1RR, and allow weight of editors to work it out? This would of course require all editors to assume good faith and observe all behavioural policies, but is it worth a shot? Hiding T 11:49, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Broadening the scope seems to be a good idea to me also. I think many of us, including parties involved with the arbcom case, are treating it as the broader case, as are those parties who caused all this mess in the first place. Various project groups have already moved towards implementing something very similar to Masem's proposal, with the Stargate group working on season articles as we speak. The discussion of timescales has ended up occurring because for many, it was the speed of actions like those taken by TTN that aggravated them, not the end result. LinaMishima (talk) 12:45, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
    • Let's consider this then (that ties in with a previous comment as well). Let's take anything that deals with format and style of a TV episode article to a MOS for WP:TV (I don't see one there yet), and then leave notability for individual episodes of an episodic work here at WP:EPISODE (yes, directed at TV episodes, but the same idea applies to any other similar work). Thus, EPISODE becomes a true notability guideline, working aside FICT, and then there will still be a MOS for episode guidelines. The TVMOS and EPISODE pages should link to each other much like FICT and WAF do, since it's hard to talk about one without talking about the other. --MASEM 14:37, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
      • Absolutely agree about not implementing formal definitions of time scale--they always arouse hostility and many a potentially good policy has been rejected because of rigidity here. I at least am indeed treating is as of broad scope,subject to appropriate adjustments for the different media. for books, we've normally regarded volumes in a series as the equivalent of episodes. for operas, on the other hand, it's individual arias.DGG (talk) 04:52, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
        • I can see the idea here, and I certainly think TTN's aggressive approach has not in the end been helpful (though one may say it has stimulated discussion on the matter, and there has certainly been stonewalling on both sides). I hope everything can be worked through, and I think something to get past that stonewalling on both sides is a good step. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 14:58, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Regarding Hiding's proposal that we pick a set of articles and sandbox them I'd be open to doing something similar with the Futurama episodes, I think they have a good mix of stubby/plot-only articles up to one GA and one FA. TTN and I are attempting to start a discussion of the merits of the first season as it is and I'd be interested in getting a wider variety of inputs. If there's any interest there's a subpage at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Futurama/Season 1 review. Stardust8212 16:12, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
    • That would seem to imply that there is some sort of problem with stub and start-class episode articles.--Nydas^(Talk) 17:15, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
      • There is nothing wrong with well referenced stub articles. In my opinion there is something wrong with an article that contains nothing except a plot summary and an infobox with no references. That's not the point of my comment of course, the point is that Futurama has a wide range of article qualities which makes it, once again my opinion, ideal for an experiment to workshop on how the various people involved in the debate think the dispute can be resolved. Discussing a series which has all plot-only articles or all FA quality articles doesn't give the proper range of discussion. Stardust8212 18:25, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Regarding sandboxing, as I believe I have said earlier, a number of project groups are already working on this sort of thing. Take a look at WP:STARGATE, in particular Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Stargate#Go from Episode articles to Season articles?. The aim is to have reasonable length summaries of the episodes within an overall article on the season itself, linking to more detailed episode articles were more notable, together with production information and other details. Stargate is a good project for this, for as you state, a wide range of article qualities are needed. LinaMishima (talk) 22:17, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
    • What about the vast majority of TV shows, which don't have Wikiprojects and are only edited very slowly?--Nydas^(Talk) 23:06, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
      • If there are demonstrated good faith efforts to try to improve all the episode articles for notability or similar cleanup, they should be left to their time scale to be able to do so. For shows where there are no active editors (responding after a month or so) and bulk of episodes not presenting notability, then these should be made, by default, into season-by-season episode lists performing a "sloppy merge" of copying the plot information into the episode list entry, even if the plot information is excessive; redirecting as noted. My gut tells me there will be people that want to help on the merge side, and a different set of people that will likely want to help on plot cleanup, and as long as what needs to be done is centralized (category or whatever), it can be done fairly. --MASEM 23:11, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
      • I was pointing this project's attempts out purely because of the suggestion that we should form a sandbox to determine what the end results should be like, a suggestion which seemed to suppose that no-one had any ideas as to what an end result should look like. This does not preclude the same results being taken for less popularly-edited shows, not at all. I agree with Masem's proposal of 'sloppy merges', as it is far easier to prune down a long list entry than it is to either look up the original article or rewrite from scratch. I think Masem is also correct that, over time, people will work to get the articles up to MOS standards. Perhaps a MOS notice board could be formed, or a general TV project group could take up the general tidy and cleanup tasks, working through series methodically? LinaMishima (talk) 23:25, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
        • I think I mentioned before we can reactivate WP:TVE to help centralize this. A table can be used to track a series, who's taking the lead on checking notability for each episode (and which I would argue would thus also be responsible for at least the "sloppy merge" into episode lists should it need it), and then a separate line for who wants to take lead in cleaning up (it could be the same as the one reviewing for notability, but doesn't have to be). --MASEM 23:30, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
• If you have a place where editors can sign up for a task force to improve and gather source material for television-related articles, I am there! I would love to see editors on Wikipedia in general, take the time to improve articles rather than hurriedly try to redirect or delete them. I have worked on several obscure articles and found source material, even when I had little knowledge of the subject. Ursasapien (talk) 10:38, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Technical question

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

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

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

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

I will note I have just done that, also for the likely reason that we'll want to have this discussion as a backbone for far-future issues of notability (like the pokemon project has for their mass merge). --MASEM 18:39, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I just looked at the bot that is suppose to update the page and found that it has stopped working since January 15. --Farix (Talk) 19:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

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

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

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

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

I believe this needs to be a Wikipedia-wide discussion, since at its core is the concept of inherited and collective notability whic will have implications in other areas (such as music, books, biographies etc). If this debate ever reaches a conclusion, a precedent will be set, and used in other discussions. Secondly, I am technologically inept so I have no idea why, but this page (or transcluded page) is still not added to RfC. So at the moment, only TV people know the RfC exists. Gwinva (talk) 19:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that we need the whole community's input on this discussion and that it involves more than just television episodes. My main concerns are that we do not fail in our project's goals of providing the sum total of human knowledge in an unprecedented manner and that we do not turn editors and readers away from Wikipedia by limiting our coverage. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 20:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think this is a common misconception. Wikipedia is not striving to provide "the sum total of human knowledge." It's striving to provide a free encyclopedia within the boundaries of wiki policies. Karanacs (talk) 22:05, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

My basis is "Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing." - Jimmy Wales in this Slashdot Interview (28 July 2004) Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 22:55, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

There already is a Wikipedia-wide consensus on this. Take for example the articles Homer's Odyssey, Mind War, Pinkeye (South Park episode), M*A*S*H the Pilot, Our Mrs. Reynolds, Colonial Day, etc. Individual television episode articles for episodes of notable television shows do not have to establish notability by citing significant coverage in reliable sources. It matters little what a handful of editors think on this pseudo-guideline talk page if what they think is not actually common practice. --Pixelface (talk) 22:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Just one thing. Just because there are pages that exist that violate the guidelines, does not mean there is "community wide consensus" on the issue. Please don't confuse a disregard of the rules for "consensus".  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 22:55, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

The idea that an article like Homer's Odyssey has "violated" WP:N for five years and nobody noticed is ridiculous. --Pixelface (talk) 22:58, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I said this once already: consensus comes after the issue is brought to a wider audience. The nature of WP allows one to have a "submarine" article that may fail to meet many policies and yet last for years before it is noticed. If you thing an article fails something now, tag it, and then either 1) editors will fix it or 2) athere will be a consensus on what to do with it. --[[User:Masem|MASEM</