Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television)
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This page documents an English Wikipedia naming convention. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should follow, though it should be treated with common sense and the occasional exception. When editing this page, please ensure that your revision reflects consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page. |
When disambiguating articles related to television from other similarly named programs, series, movies, books or terms, use the most appropriate method as described below. Remember that the disambiguator should be added only if multiple articles would normally have the same name. If the title of the television program is the most common usage of the phrase, let it be the title of the article; for example, The Apprentice or Guiding Light.
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[edit] Television programming
Most television shows (both broadcast and cable) are typically produced under a single name, with each episode relating to the others in an understandable way. For these, use (TV series).
- Examples: Lost (TV series), Survivor (TV series)
- Other genres
Use these, where appropriate, instead of "TV series".
- Game shows use (game show)
- Talk shows use (talk show)
- Miniseries use (TV miniseries) or (TV serial) according to common usage in the originating country
[edit] Non-episodic television
- For Made-for-TV movies, use (film)
- For all other programs use (TV program) or (TV programme) according to common usage in the originating country
[edit] Additional disambiguation
Use the following when there are two or more television productions of the same name.
- Prefix the country of broadcast – (U.S. TV series)
- (Write U.S. with periods, but write UK without periods as per WP:NCA.)
- Prefix the year of release or series debut – (1997 TV series)
- Prefix the network identification – (BBC TV series)
- Prefix with "animated" – (animated TV series)
[edit] Series in different formats
For articles about series that have been presented in multiple formats such as radio, television, or novelization where a significant portion of the article covers information other than television and disambiguation is needed use (series)
- Examples: Beulah (series), Dragnet (series)
[edit] Season articles
- Please follow the recommendations at WikiProject Television episodes, notability of fiction and MoS writing about fiction when creating articles about television seasons.
For an article that describes one season of a television show (possibly with an episode guide for that season), the article should be named first by the name of the show, and then by the season number, such as "24 (season 1)"; alternatively, if each season is given by a distinctive name, that should be used instead, such as "Survivor: Borneo". A consistent naming scheme should be used for all season articles of a TV show: if one season is named something special, this should be noted through redirects and in the article's WP:LEAD, but the article should be named in the same fashion as the other season pages. For example "The Amazing Race 8" was known as "The Amazing Race: Family Edition", but maintains the naming format as other seasons and the second link being a redirection to the consistently named season page. Navigation to other season pages and to the main show page should be provided by navigation boxes at the bottom of the article, and it is often useful to include preceding and following seasons within the infobox (if one exists) for that season. Redirections should be created for ease of searching by the end user.
If there are multiple shows of the same name, include the disambiguation, similar to the above for TV series in the season description, for example, "The Apprentice (U.S. Season 1)" and "The Apprentice (UK Series One)". Similar names should continue even if one version of the show has several more seasons than the other; for example, in the case of the above, the U.S. version of The Apprentice has had three more seasons than the U.K. version, but the naming continues up through all of them, including "The Apprentice (U.S. Season 7)". Hatnotes should be used to provide links to the other shows' existing season pages if needed.
[edit] Episode articles
- Please follow the recommendations at WikiProject Television episodes, notability of fiction and MoS writing about fiction when creating articles about television episodes.
Episode summaries should be combined onto a single page (List of Knight Rider episodes) or organized as a summary by season (24 (season 3), In Bed with Medinner (series 1)). Note that this use of "season" and "series" in the page name depends on the originating region.
For an article created about a single episode, add the series name in parentheses only if there are other articles by the same name:
- Bart the Genius (no other article with that name exists)
- The Sting (Futurama) (to differentiate the episode article from the 1973 film of the same name)
Where an episode title is the same as a character or object from the series which has its own page, disambiguate further using the word "episode":
Editors are encouraged to create extra redirects to help with internal linking and avoid creation of duplicate articles. For example, for the Lost episode All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues, one could create the following redirects:
- All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues (Lost)
- All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues (Lost episode).
[edit] Articles about television
Articles which relate to general concepts related to television technology, terminology, and industry (but not programming) should use (television).
