Talk:Media franchise

Creation
Please add mobile gaming to the Silent Hill template. Orphan and Last Escape are not part of the main plot. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.235.160.40 (talk) 15:49, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I just created this article. It could probably use a section on what "canon" means to a fiction media franchise. It could also use some video game examples. It probably needs to be reorganized a bit. I wrote it mainly with film franchises in mind, and when it occured to me that the ...for Dummies books were an example of a media franchise, I just tacked it on. And it's just occured to me that some mention should probably me made of such huge media franchises as Playboy (magazine, books, TV channel, movies, website, video games, merchandise, pinball machine[!]) and Martha Stewart (TV show, magazine, books) should be added. --Tysto 05:03, 2 January 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree, at least in part, and I may add some other bits to it as well. I did already create a redirect from television franchise.  FrozenPurpleCube 14:08, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

NPOV - Playboy?
The following quote regarding Playboy magazine doesn't seem to be NPOV

"The Playboy franchise began with the pornographic magazine, ..."

I question if the word 'pornographic' is correct in describing this magazine. Request discussion leading to Consensus. Possibly, the combined term softcore porn might be a more accurate term. --TGC55 (talk) 14:35, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Possible Cleanup
I was pointed out to this article on IRC, as someone wanted to translate it into French. Now, I have some idea what a media franchise is, this article isn't that clear, especially for someone who might not be familiar with the concepts. I added this to my to-do list, but I've got another article that's in need of a lot more help. help both but do the french minecraft they need that.Bold textTrue kerfoot I like your writing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.232.152.22 (talk) 18:21, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

Incorrect Usage
I know it's been in common usage, but a franchise is when you operate a business on behalf of another business, such as owning your own fast food restaurant. When more than one movie comes out based on the same theme, such as Batman or Star Wars, it is a series, not a franchise. A "Star Wars franchise" would be if other people were making their own authorized films using the name, themes, and characters for George Lucas, but not Lucas himself. Individual McDonalds restaurants, or local network television stations, i.e., an ABC affiliate, are a franchise. Unfortunately the media itself has been dumbing down the English language for a while now, and one writer just copies what they hear, even if it is incorrect usage. If people are having a hard time grasping the subject in non English speaking countries, it's because it's not the correct usage of the word.

Franchise: (noun)

"an authorization granted by a government or company to an individual or group enabling them to carry out specified commercial activities, e.g., providing a broadcasting service or acting as an agent for a company's products."

DavidRavenMoon (talk) 14:38, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Nerds don't get to tell the movie industry that they're using a word wrong. A "horse opera" isn't a proper opera either. So what? --Tysto (talk) 01:51, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Incorrect Usage - I Agree/Historical Note
I very much agree that it's incorrect to call things like "Star Wars" franchises. Some of the things on the list are borderline, like the Bond films, but the majority of them aren't franchises at all.

However, there are film series which are franchises. For instance, a studio or production company made Horror Film I, II and III themselves but after that, they sold the rights to just about anyone who had enough money and basic qualifications to make IV and after. In that case, they really were acting exactly the way McDonalds acts when they let anyone with a certain amount of money open a McDonalds.

So I think this page should have a prominent note explaining that the usage is wrong, but also giving an example of a series which was turned into a franchise, to show how the error came about and the word became applied to any series of films.

hostile17 (talk) 23:49, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

My cut
"Recently, some parts of the film industry have erroneously begun to use the word "franchise" as a synonym for a film series. However, unless the owners of the copyright to a film series also have trademarked the names of characters and other elements in the films, and are licensing the use of these to others, a film series is not a franchise, as the act of such licensing is what constitutes franchising. " Wow! That's a very POV paragraph. It also ignores the fact that many of the film series that have been called franchises (such as Star Trek, Batman, etc) are licensed adaptations of concepts from outside of film with the entire concept being the "franchise". That is, that the "Batman franchise" consists of the comic books, television shows, toys, trading cards, etc as well as the films. --Khajidha (talk) 15:15, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Merge Media mix into this article
There's no need to give it a separate page. It's just about how the Japanese companies run media franchise under the Japanese Engrish term. (Perhaps, one may create a new section explaining how the franchises are ran in country-by-country cases?) JSH-alive/talk/cont/mail 16:22, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Oppose There is a need to give it a separate page. It is about how Japanese companies invented the concept and successfully exploit it for 50 years now. There are whole books written about it. You are welcome to add a section is you find reliable sources which say that mediamikkusu is nothing special and known under some silly hollywood+siliconvalley buzzword concocted by americans who think they invented all civilization staring from forke and spoone. -M.Altenmann >t 05:58, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Oppose The article's existence is completely justified.--FollowTheSigns (talk) 05:40, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Alright, Bring It!

 * The following discussion 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.

(For those joined us from Requests for comment, we are discussing about whether the Engrish term media mix deserves an own entry or not, when it is no different from 'Western' media franchise.) 07:22, 27 December 2015 (UTC)

What makes Japanese style of franchising and merchandising distinctive from that of Western world (especially United States)? 1.225.235.213 (talk) 13:28, 10 December 2015 (UTC)


 * As you can see above the merge proposal was rejected. If you think this was the wrong decision then re-open the discussion, don't just push a merge through against consensus. Betty Logan (talk) 18:01, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

Okay! Let the formal merger discussion begin. Bring what you think it is a unique example in Japanese practice, then someone will prove that there is the Western equivalent. 1.225.235.213 (talk) 10:40, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
 * oppose "Western equivalent" may have a separate article about how it copycat the Japanese one. Japanese is unique because it was fisrt and because it is ..er.. Japanese. - üser:Altenmann >t 19:22, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Comment Umm... okay? Citation needed? Which Japanese franchise started it, and when did it began? 1.225.235.213 (talk) 07:22, 27 December 2015 (UTC)
 * did you read the article? dont be confused. media franchise is not simply casting a film from the book or writing a song for the film. in such simplistic terms you can probably trace it to middle ages (book/theatre/song). in any case, even skipping pissing contest, we merge articles when subjects are the same and texts overlap. in this case it is clearly not. - üser:Altenmann >t 17:01, 27 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Oppose - Summoned by bot. This proposal should not be in the form of an RfC. I'd suggest reopening the discussion in a new section but for the time being, I oppose the merge because the pages cover different topics and there is no overlap. Meatsgains (talk) 16:21, 12 January 2016 (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.

Merge this with Media Mix
Since the title of this page is incorrect ad these entities aren't franchises like KFC are, why don't we incorporate the information from this page into Media Mix instead of the other way around?--143.167.25.73 (talk) 04:16, 29 May 2016 (UTC)

Videogames and Education quote
For reference, here is the unedited quote used in, directly from the source as represented in Google Books:

"In one of the most celebrated ventures in media convergence, Larry and Andy Wachowski, creators of The Matrix trilogy, produced the game Enter the Matrix simultaneously with the last two films of the trilogy, shooting scenes for the game on the movies' sets with the movies' actors, and releasing the game on May 15, 2003, the same day as The Matrix: Reloaded. Likewise, on September 21, 2004, Lucasfilm jointly released a new DVD box set of the original Star Wars trilogy in 2004 with Star Wars: Battlefront, a combat game in which players could reenact battles from all six Star Wars films. In 2005, Peter Jackson likewise produced his blockbuster film King Kong (2005) in tandem with a successful King Kong game designed by Michael Ancel and published by Ubisoft. In the last several years, numerous licensed videogame adaptations of major summer and holiday blockbusters were released a few days before or a few days after their respective films, including: all three Star Wars films (1999–2005); all five Harry Potter films (2001–2008); all three Spider-Man films (2002–2007); Hulk (2003); The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002); The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003); The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (2005); The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008); Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006); Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007); Transformers (2007); and Ironman (2008). These multimedia franchises have made it more difficult to distinguish the production of films and videogames as separate enterprises."

—151.132.206.250 (talk) 19:20, 23 January 2021 (UTC)


 * [same user as above] The quote as used is missing a word here and there, but is there any real need to quote such a long passage, rather than do something like this? I don’t think there’s anything here that stretches credulity to anywhere near the point that it demands immediate material proof. —96.8.24.95 (talk) 23:36, 23 January 2021 (UTC) edited 00:12, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I propose merging media mix to multimedia franchise. Media mix is currently a stub with relatively little reliable sources and is a sub-category of multimedia franchise. From what I can see, "media mix" is a marketing strategy in Japan to use all sorts of business ventures to promote a work, such as creating different adaptations (anime, manga, live-action), or creating idol groups for the series, which is similar to what a multimedia franchise in itself. lullabying (talk) 05:12, 1 August 2021 (UTC)


 * support Its basically the same thing but with a different name.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 05:36, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose So, I actually just finished reading Marc Steinberg's book on the media mix and was planning to expand on the article. Steinberg clearly separates the media mix from other kinds of media franchises (for example, with the birth of the media mix in Astro Boy, Tezuka was inspired by Disney's merchandising practices but went beyond that model); additionally, media mix has its own, lengthy institutional history in Japan. There may be relatively few sources in that article currently, but there is a large variety of scholarship on the media mix (ex. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) that can be used. Now, certainly, media mix is a subcategory of multimedia franchises, but I think there is enough information to merit a separate article for how multimedia franchises have manifested in Japan specifically (i.e. the media mix). Sandtalon (talk) 11:48, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Are you able to improve the article at the moment? Furthermore, I'm not convinced at the distinction between Western franchising and media mix in Japan. lullabying (talk) 18:17, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * support - Per user Blue Pumpkin Pie. Maybe there could be a mention of what the term is called in Japan, but both terms to me, seem to essentially be the same, just different terminology. Clear Looking Glass (talk) 08:58, 1 November 2021 (UTC)`


 * ✅ Klbrain (talk) 07:45, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Proposing to move this back to media franchise
I just noticed that User:FMM-1992 moved this article without warning from "media franchise" to "multimedia franchise" on 11 June 2020, with the following rationale: "More common, accepted, and better term, even its list has uses this term: List of multimedia franchises."

That makes no sense at all because as anyone who is familiar with media franchises is well aware, "media franchise" is by far the more common term. Google Ngram Viewer confirms this. It's not even close. Anyone who regularly reads EW, THR, Variety, Deadline, and TheWrap regularly would already know this. (I scan the headlines in all five at least once per week.)

As a matter of common courtesy, editors need to be wary of the risks of unknown unknowns (as Donald Rumsfeld famously put it) when operating outside of their areas of expertise and to not make unnecessary work for other editors with profoundly incorrect edits and moves.

Any objections before I fix this mess by moving this back to the correct title? --Coolcaesar (talk) 03:45, 25 October 2021 (UTC)


 * Hello user:Coolcaesar, thanks for your attention and notifying me. I checked Q196600 that shows this is the only Latin script article that has "multi" in its title and I realized now that not every media franchise is multimedia, because, a multimedia franchise has installments exist in multiple forms of media, such as book, comic, film, TV series, and video game; but not all media franchises have such outputs, so I have no objection against this move. Thank you and good luck. -- FMM-1992 (talk) 04:35, 25 October 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 28 October 2021

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: Page moved on yesterday: diff. (non-admin closure) FMM-1992 (talk) 08:52, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

Multimedia franchise → Media franchise – This article was improperly moved without warning by User:FMM-1992 from Media franchise to Multimedia franchise on 11 June 2020 with the following rationale: "More common, accepted, and better term, even its list has uses this term: List of multimedia franchises." However, as anyone who follows the entertainment industry closely and is familiar with media franchises is well aware, "media franchise" is by far the more common term. Google Ngram Viewer confirms this. It's not even close. I have already raised the issue on the talk page for the article and User:FMM-1992 has graciously conceded the error. Therefore, I propose to move this article back to the correct title. Coolcaesar (talk) 13:52, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Support If it was moved in error then I would suggest closing this move discussion and filing a technical request at WP:RM instead. Betty Logan (talk) 00:31, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Support multimedia is a subset of media. "Media franchise" is by far the most common term, and the subject of the article.  Now that Coolcaesar has gone to the trouble of listing this "requested move", just let some kind-hearted soul chose this one out. --Bejnar (talk) 01:18, 29 October 2021 (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.

Wiki Education assignment: CMN2160B
— Assignment last updated by Xinyue Hu (talk) 13:29, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

self-titled website

 * … on websites like tumblr, Reddit and the self-titled "wiki" site, Fandom.

What does that mean? Is Fandom a non-wiki pretending to be a wiki? —Tamfang (talk) 04:32, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Marilyn Monroe
Why is Marilyn Monroe listed in the middle of a collection of fictional characters? (If this were Twitter, I'd say: Wrong answers only.) —Tamfang (talk) 16:39, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
 * . InfiniteNexus (talk) 16:49, 8 March 2023 (UTC)