Wikipedia:Fiction/Noticeboard

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  • A new (6/3/08) RFC on the global acceptance for WP:FICT is underway.

More issues and discussions at the fiction notice board

This noticeboard aims to serve as a place to report incidences relating to the merging, splitting, redirection or notability of a fiction topic. Often, such topics can be branched out without due consideration of guidance on plot summaries or the notability of the topic itself. As the guidelines given at Wikipedia:Notability (fiction) state, topics dealing with a work of fiction or elements of a fictional work should demonstrate real-world notability from reliable sources. Wikipedia aims to reflect academic consensus.

Note that the purpose of this board is not to remove any mention of the fictional topic, but rather to ensure that proper balance is maintained. Wikipedia articles dealing with fiction topics aim to reflect both the consensus and the diversity of mainstream academia. Discussion of fiction will depend entirely on their notability and reliable coverage in popular media. Also, fiction should never be presented as "fact."

Before posting a concern on this noticeboard, please try to work out local consensus with the editors of the page in question; you also may wish to seek assistance and consensus of any WikiProjects that the article or topic may belong to, particularly if dealing with several articles at a time. This Noticeboard should only be used in cases where no consensus can be reached, or additional advice or opinions are sought for topics and articles relating to fictional works. Should the suggestions from this Noticeboard fail to resolve the issue, other dispute resolution measures should be taken.

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[edit] List of Gilmore Girls characters (see characters in the template at the bottom)

More trouble with merged articles: Some of the/my Gilmore Girls character mergers are getting reverted (and reverted), although the proposal discussion lasted over three months (no-one but one person even cared to comment, and this one was a WP:ILIKEIT vote) and the actual merge happened several weeks ago as well (before and after the injunction). All articles violated WP:NOT#PLOT and WP:OR really really badly. User:Phil Sandifer is not fine with the mergers as of yesterday, didn't seek discussion before reverting the mergers, and has basically resorted to edit-warring despite my encouragement to have him report this incident here (the noticeboard). I'd like to avoid an edit-war at all costs, but my explanations and justifications based on policy and guideline don't seem to be enough. It also seems like another long wikilawyer session is about to begin, which I'd like to cut short by bringing this up here. I have already notified Phil so that he can explain the situation from his point of view. But if this is the kind of counter-behavior that is to be expected and accepted for completed mergers where proper procedure was followed (unlike some of the often-cited TTN situations), I'd rather abandon merge proposals for fiction articles in favor of AfD again so that they can't be resurrected without going through the troubles of deletion review first. – sgeureka t•c 08:06, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I am one of the strongest inclusionist on Wikipedia, but I can see where you are coming from. The "References" section is simply a collection of quotes from the show. We can surely do better than that. I would prefer for someone to find proper references that would speak to the real world impact of the characters and leave the articles, but they should not remain stand-alone articles in their current shape. All the same information is in the list article. I am not sure what can be done as far as "enforcement" of merges, but perhaps I can try my powers of persuasion. Perhaps Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles can come up with some decent reference material in the meantime. Ursasapien (talk) 10:11, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
These merges should never have been done - the "consensus" for them consisted of a single commenter who opposed the merges. Several were reverted at the time. To say that any sort of wide consensus ever existed is simply untrue. The character articles are, generally, fairly poor. However to say that this was proper does not seem to me true, and to suggest that the articles cannot be fixed is ludicrous - all seven seasons of the show are out on DVD with numerous directors commentaries offering real-world information on characters, and the show was a critical darling with lots of commentary available. These articles easily can be expanded, it is transparently clear that they can be, and nothing in them violates existing content policies except inasmuch as there's not enough other stuff. Mergism does not fix these. Phil Sandifer (talk) 18:49, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
I've said it before, I'll say it again: Policies and guidelines express standards that have community consensus, and one person cannot annul that on a talkpage. Neither can two people. I have edited according to policies and guidelines (even gave the articles the benefit of a doubt for several weeks and months) and can thus claim to have consensus. I am not suggesting the articles cannot be fixed – I'm suggesting that no one is fixing them (counter evidence anyone?), so I'm fixing them. To my knowledge, only Paris Gellar was reverted once for a good reason, and that was because stupid-me had forgotten to place the merge tag; everything else falls under the previous sentences. And FWIW, I have the DVDs, and AFAIK there is only one (pretty disappointing) director's commentary for the 100th episode. – sgeureka t•c 06:14, 12 April 2008 (UTC)
I see evidence that the articles in their current form require edits and improvement. I do not see which policy or guideline mandates their merging in an incontrovertible way. Phil Sandifer (talk) 22:15, 12 April 2008 (UTC)
WP:FICT#Demonstrating notability for fictional topics for a start. – sgeureka t•c 07:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
Note that I said "which policy or guideline," not "which proposed policy or guideline." Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
The wording and the fineprint is proposed, the rest isn't as you can see from browsing the page history. Even July 2007 (maybe even much earlier) said "Major characters and major treatments of such matters as places and concepts in a work of fiction are covered in the article on that work. If an encyclopedic treatment of a character causes the article on the work itself to become long, that character is given a main article." No articles show any kind of encyclopedic treatment, rather the exact opposite per WP:NOT#PLOT. Premise is wrong, conclusion doesn't follow. – sgeureka t•c 09:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I would have to agree with sgeureka that the demerger is unwarranted. Effectively, the demerger by Phil Sandifer has created a number of articles which do not demonstrate notability. The merger was a method of cleanup for these characters, demerger is not an improvement. If the articles fail WP:NOT#PLOT, WP:SYNTH and WP:WAF, then surely is down to Phil either to improve the articles so these cleanup issues are addressed, or allow the mergers to be reinstated. Its not good enough just to say that there is no consensus for the merger when there is clear evidence that the articles do not meet the requirements of Wikipedia guidelines in the first place.--Gavin Collins (talk) 14:15, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
  • The only one of those that is an inclusion guideline as opposed to a stylistic guideline is NOR. The other two do not mandate removal, they call for improvement. It is OK to have poor articles - we are a work in progress. Tag them to note their flaws. But neither of those mandate removal, and they should not be construed to mandate removal. They say what fiction articles should do, not what they must not do. The only thing that mandates removal is NOR - if any of the articles are original research then indeed the original research (and possibly, by extension, the article) must go. However, there is no sane application of that policy that would treat these articles as original research. To treat these merges as required by policy is an egregious misunderstanding of policy at best, and a vicious lie being employed to dismiss the work of your fellow editors at worst. Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
  • WP:PLOT is a mandate against these articles as well as the general ones in WP:NOTE, in that their ultimate form needs to be more than just plot elements from the work. When there is a large collection of plot-only articles for the same work of fiction, it is generally more accepted to have a list of these than to let them sit as separate articles, and even then, this is a tenacious solution as some editors feel this still violates WP:PLOT and WP:NOTE. Yes, WP is a work in progress, but as part of the editing process, editors are expected to improve articles when others are asking to be bold to remove such due to failure to meet policy. If there is notability information to be found, we are expected to give a good-faith effort for you to find it but you also need to show that effort to include it. --MASEM 21:33, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The wording on WP:PLOT is key, though: "Wikipedia articles on published works (such as fictional stories) should contain real-world context and sourced analysis, offering detail on a work's development and historical significance, not solely a detailed summary of that work's plot." This is a very different statement from the one about, say, dictionary definitions - the issue here is that Wikipedia should contain more - it's a policy about addition to articles, not removal. I will leave WP:NOTE be - I do not think it is a helpful injection into this depate, particularly given that the attempt to implement it for WP:FICT has so spectacularly failed to gain consensus. Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

A plot-only should contain more, and if the article can't because that information does not exist, PLOT doesn't mean it could stay around. Remember, PLOT is within What Wikipedia is Not, meaning that these are things that should not be in Wikipedia. Of course, if you can add notability to satisfy PLOT, all the better.
If you are ready to dismiss WP:FICT due to its prolonged proposed status, then all articles on fictional elements are judged by WP:NOTE, and thus requiring secondary sources. It is very critical to this debate if you are rejecting FICT. (Mind you, we are trying to see if there are special cases where fictional elements may be considered notable without secondary sources, which is part of why the guideline has remained proposed for so long). --MASEM 21:46, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
The information clearly exists. This was a critical darling of a show where every season is out on DVD, and each set has troves of documentaries, interviews, and special features to shed light on the creative processes going into the characters. I can get 899 news stories mentioning Lorelei Gilmore from 2001-2004. [1] took me a minute or two to find and has a couple good pull quotes that could be used to flesh out the article. I'd add them and go find more, but I'm strangely disinclined to given the apparent desire to delete any work I put into them and re-merge the articles. Phil Sandifer (talk) 01:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
You have proven that one character out of maybe 20 exists, nothing more, nothing less. Now it's your job to filter out encyclopedic facts in significant numbers and add them to each article. All articles that don't can be trimmed because of WP:WAF#Notability and undue weight, short articles can be merged seemlessly because they still fail WP:FICT, and that's what happened after giving sufficient time. Since you keep rejecting my ways to improve the encyclopedia (which also happen to be backed up by policies and guidelines), that automatically makes it your turn. So, are you going to do some work, or are you just leaving a mess, hoping that others will do your work for you (which obviously no-one was willing to do in the last four months now)? I'd be happy to see that the former is true. Regards, – sgeureka t•c 09:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
I am not going to put any effort into the articles while you are actively threatening to delete them, no. That seems a waste of my time. Get off your high horse and find something else to ruin on the project and I'll be happy to put some time into fixing them. But as long as you're actively threatening to delete the articles, no, I'm not going to put in the effort of re-writing them all. It's trivial to find sources for any of them - even if you pick a more minor character like Logan Huntzberger you can readily find interviews like [2] and [3] - both of which will require effort to follow up on and find the full article. You could find all of this too in a trivial amount of time. Now - are you going to back off and let me work on the articles, or are you going to keep bullying and threatening? Phil Sandifer (talk) 13:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
I am puzzled why you want others (e.g. me) to do the work when finding and adding the sources is so trivial and easy. "Threatening" the articles or not, no-one (including you) has ever worked on the articles in an encyclopedic manner, that's why they were proposed to be merged in the first place. Ample time was given to allow volunteers to show up, but no-one did (show up), amplifying the need for merging. If you check back on all your comments regarding these articles, you will notice that you never announced you'd like to fix them, but rather that you don't see the problems with these articles and that you reject my cleanup attemps, even going so far as to edit-war. So I had to assume you ignore policies, guidelines, and proper wiki-procedure. But I am hopeful with your last reply that you're sincere with improving the articles through encyclopedic expansion so that they can stand alone. I'll check back in a couple of weeks for progress. If university is too time-consuming for you at the moment (I know it is for me), I am sure you can live with the merged articles and improve only one article at a time. – sgeureka t•c 15:53, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
I think a display of good faith on your part would be preferable. The articles clearly can be improved. I doubt you have any serious disagreement with that notion, given the availability of sources for the two I showed you. Given that the articles clearly can pass all requirements, it is preferable to have them in place. Phil Sandifer (talk) 17:39, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
If you want to keep the articles, then the burden of proof to show notability is on your end. Now, that said, if you can show reasonable improves to two or three out of twenty characters in a reasonable amount of time, with the resulting articles agreed to have sufficient notability, then other editors should recognize your good-faith efforts to do so (knowing that WP is volunteer work) and allow the other articles to remain, re-evaluating the efforts after a few months. (Editors that don't allow for this would be strongly urged to pause and re-read this discussion and the ep&char 2 arbcom case). Alternatively, work the articles up in sandbox space so they are not challenged at all, and then present them. Either way, you or any other editor that wants these articles is responsible for showing why they should remain, given they have been challenged for some time now. --MASEM 12:30, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
That sounds very reasonable. I've got a very packed week (my PhD exams are Friday), but I'll start work on these over the weekend, and try to get a cross-section of them (i.e. not the three most important characters) started. Phil Sandifer (talk) 13:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
  • In the meantime, I suggest you userfy the articles: I propose that the merger be reinstated, just in case Phil Sandifer is too busy to make improvements other than a merger. --Gavin Collins (talk) 10:40, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Phil has said above he will start fixing these articles if I only backed off. I promised to do so for the next few weeks (a month), and now it's Phil's turn to keep his word. I am sure if he finds himself unable to do so, he will be more than glad to hand over his burden to cleanup the articles back to the editors who can (and already did) cleanup the articles instead of him. The merge can be reinstated then, and Phil can continue in userspace at his own pace so that the quality of the encyclopedia is not more strained than it has to be. – sgeureka t•c 12:28, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Not a single edit by Phil (or anyone else for that matter) in the last month to establish real-world notability of these characters. This makes it five months now since the initial merge discussion started. I am going to redirect all the characters now to the List of characters agin. Should anyone be interested in adding significant amounts of real-world information to a character, he is certainly encouraged to resurrect this one article, but not all at once to leave them in their former bad shape. – sgeureka t•c 14:42, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, the link doesn't work anymore since the articles are all redirected now. But it showed about 15 edits in the last 30 days, mostly by IPs, a cat-bot, and some edits by an editor who made some minor edits and a major one adding an infobox. – sgeureka t•c 16:31, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm the editor who made some minor and major edits recently. I was attempting to fix the articles relating to the characters of Gilmore Girls, but I see now there has been lots of issues regarding this. I was more than willing to take the time to clean-up the articles but if all that's going to happen is a redirection into one article, I'll put my efforts elsewhere. Gospelgal23 (talk) 18:24, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
If you want to work towards adding sourced and non-trivial real-world content (see WP:GA and WP:FA for many good examples), then please don't be discouraged by the redirection. From experience, you won't need more than one paragraph for each season to summarize the character arc, which mostly already appears in the characters list (that's why they were redirected in the first place). Everything else should be about e.g the casting, the reception, independently-sourced analysis of the character's characteristics and motivation, and maybe mentions in popular culture. This may be fairly easy for the very main characters (Lorelai, Rory), but it will probably be hard work finding sources for everyone else. – sgeureka t•c 19:06, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Bulbasaur

Bulbasaur is one of the four remaining Pokemon articles left after the other 489 were merged to lists. It has no reason to exist, but it has stuck around for some reason. The main argument to keep it is that it was once a featured article, but that's a moot point because it, like many other fiction articles, were demoted after our standards changed. Many of those have also been merged. The actual topic has nothing to establish notability, and for that reason it needs to be redirected. It has survived a few discussions so far because of wikilawyering, but it would be nice for that to change. I doubt this'll accomplish anything, but it's worth a try. TTN (talk) 22:50, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

If by "I doubt this'll accomplish anything" you mean "I doubt I will be able to create a consensus to merge this article," I suspect you are correct. However, the article does have some things going for it. It does have some marketing information. The character has appeared in many different mediums, all of which are sourced. It has some creation and conception information. While I agree that the article still has a way to go, it seems to have a good deal of potential. Are four articles about individual Pokémon really hurting the encyclopedia that much?
Wikipedia has SO MANY articles that are not in good shape. Only a small percentage of them involve fiction. The encyclopedia only has four articles on individual Pokémon and you want to merge them, while it has thousands of poorly formed articles on biological life forms that have individual articles. Please move on. Perhaps you could begin by reading up on what the term wikilawyering really means. Why not help us out on #Character Lists in Play articles? Ursasapien (talk) 05:56, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
For context, when did WP:POKE become inactive? And where were the most recent discussions about a merger of Bulbasaur? (I remember that there was a lot of hubbub a few months ago, but I didn't care joining then). I must say though that I would not be terribly embarrassed to see the article kept because a certain quality is there, but the article still just repeats what the Pokédex said, and where and when Bulbasaur appeared (i.e. everywhere). Any article for a Pokémon can do that. There are only a few bits of information that make Bulbasaur unique, and I am not sure he needs a separate article just for these bits. TTN, would you merge the article into List of Pokémon (1-20)#Bulbasaur as you see fit, without redirecting the article? That would make it easier for outsiders to see what content there really is (I read B.'s article, but I don't know how much of it is really important or significant). – sgeureka t•c 06:56, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Actually, I agree with you (FOR ONCE) TTN. It's not notable enough to stand on its own on this site (Unlike Pikachu, Jigglypuff, and Meowth). It needs FAR more sources and information than just "It's a toy at McDonalds!" & "It's the main star in 2 children books!" to stand out on its own, according to the current standards, correct? Oh, and to Sgeureka, I don't think his current restrictions allow him to merge articles at all, at least, that's how I remember it. ZeroGiga (talk) 11:39, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
I think it died a few months ago. The discussions can be found on the project page if I recall correctly. The article has already been merged at this point. There is nothing else relevant to add. I believe I can move information over, but I have no real idea. TTN (talk) 14:00, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Bulbasaur is on the cusp of being legitimately spinoutable, I think. With its creation section, it's better than the other 400 odd ones. Sceptre (talk) 14:20, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
The only actual information in that section is just your average generic information. The mention about the article is just complete junk that was added to try to make it passable. It just hasn't been removed yet for some reason TTN (talk) 14:34, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
(to ZeroGiga) TTN can in fact merge all he wants, he just can't merge&redirect. (to TTN) The promotional food chain merchandising of the character is not mentioned in the list, neither is the voice actor of the anime, and that B. was a main character of two children’s books (at least that's what I imagine is important to the real world). The ref-sourcing in the article should also replace the {{fact}}s in the list. – sgeureka t•c 15:17, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Unless the merchandise is somehow special, it'd be pointless to list it for each individual one. The same goes for the books (there are various ones with books if I remember correctly). The voice actor information is pretty minor. It doesn't really matter if its there or not. Last time I checked, many of the references were pretty bad, but maybe I should look at them again. TTN (talk) 15:31, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
a clear example of the continuing all-or-nothing attitude that got us into this to start with. There's no real consensus over these, and the obvious thing to do in that case is to keep the best. This is among the better ones compared to the general run of such articles. so people of good will should simply let the matter rest & work on improving thousands of articles in this subject area that need improving. DGG (talk) 22:55, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I have no real issues with this article as is. I would rather we tackled articles with more problems than this on, than attempt to prove a point with this article. I agree with DGG. We need to build a working compromise whereby we wrok together as a whole towards a common goal. Hiding T 12:26, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I fully agree with Hiding, there are bigger fish to fry and since this one is at least making an effort there's not a dire need to deal with it right now. Stardust8212 12:49, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Powerpuff Girls episodes

Just a heads up, we're getting really badly written episode articles popping through here. Sceptre (talk) 19:16, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Try notifying User talk:ThegreatWakkorati, the guy who's writing them. User:Krator (t c) 19:21, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Pasted summary is the majority of the article

Not sure what to do here: Pygmy (novel). The copy and paste of an official summary makes up most of the article. Any ideas? Does fair use really allow for this? Thanks. --Rividian (talk) 18:52, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I have paraphrased it, although someone more attuned to our exact copyvio policy may want to warn the originating editor for removing the copyright vio. tag -- does citing the source automatically make something less of a copyvio? --EEMIV (talk) 19:04, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
Citing the source makes it a quotation, not a copyvio... but if an article is almost entirely a quotation, that's just too much fair use. Thanks for summarizing, the issue seems resolved unless someone wants to warn the editor not to remove tags, but because of how WP:SCV works removing tags doesn't seem to stop the cleanup process. --Rividian (talk) 19:11, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Content dispute at Glitch City

Hello, please forgive me if this was posted in the wrong place.

There is currently a content dispute at the article Glitch City, which is supposed to be a redirect, but a stubborn user continues to revert it back to an article. Glitch City is simply a glitch in Pokémon Red and Blue, and is non-notable, which is why it was changed to a redirect in the first place. My discussions with him can be found at Talk:Pokémon Red and Blue#Glitch City and Talk:Glitch City. Can I have a third opinion of this please?

Thank you Artichoker (talk) 01:58, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I moved this from WT:FICT to get broader input here. Ursasapien (talk) 09:08, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
The article is currently up for deletion. Deletion debate at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Glitch City. Taemyr (talk) 14:42, 2 June 2008 (UTC)