Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Wikipedia policies and guidelines/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning/Archive 1

Why spoiler warnings are not only bad practice: they're unnecessary
The ugliness of spoiler warnings and the way they skew our writing and interfere with the execution of Wikipedia policies and guidelines such as Neutral point of view (WP:NPOV) and Lead section (WP:LEAD) has already been discussed.

What I'd like to address here is why they're unnecessary. Firstly they're unnecessary because this is an encyclopedia. Unlike the fictional works we write about, the value of our work does not rely on maintaining suspense, and (as discussed earlier) in fact hiding information from the reader or confining it to carefully corraled areas of the article distorts our work. Secondly, the reader is aware that he is reading an encyclopedia. If he's reading the article, it means he wants to know about the subject. Warning him that he may learn something he doesn't already know is superfluous: he already knows this otherwise he wouldn't have started reading the article.

Finally, we've had a warning in our Content disclaimer for years, years. The current version has at the very top, in very large words, the following:
 * WIKIPEDIA CONTAINS SPOILERS AND CONTENT YOU MAY FIND OBJECTIONABLE

So it's absolutely unnecessary. If we find people who really are stupid enough to come to an encyclopedia expecting not to learn about the subject of the articles they read, they can be pointed in that direction.


 * Sorry to interject so late in the day here, but I found this argument laughable - who reads the content disclaimer first!?!? Stephenb (Talk) 14:51, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * This is a terrible arguement in itself. The content disclaimer is there and it's no one's fault but your own whether you read it or not. It's the same in retail, if you buy something you agree to the terms and conditions, you can't then ignore those simply because you didn't read them. Nightjim 16:58, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd argue that even that disclaimer is unnecessary, beccause it's implicit in the nature of an encyclopedia, but that's another argument and I don't mind the disclaimer because it's linked form every page without being thrust bodily into the articles to distract from content and distort the structure of articles, as our spoiler warnings do. --Tony Sidaway 15:09, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Comment. Spoilers, despite the arguments of some people above, do prevent people from reading information. The fact that there is no understood definition of what is and isn't a spoiler means that a reader has no idea just what is or isn't included in a section of an article marked with a spoiler template. Spoilers are subjective, they're based on the views of the tagger only, and the reader has no way of knowing what is and isn't considered a spoiler. As such, when a reader stops reading because they see a spoiler template and there is information within the spoiler section that he or she would have appreciated reading, he or she has been cheated out of what we, as editors of an encyclopedia, have a duty to provide them. As such, the warnings must go. Lexicon (talk) 15:14, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Spoilers are no more subjective than many other thing on WP. If you disagree with the way a particular warning is set, discuss it and change it.
 * Nobody stops the reader from reading. --87.189.89.215


 * Rewrite somewhere else, marking this travesty historic Like I said a long long time ago on the Spoiler RFC, "Spoiler tags are a dramatic violation of our encyclopedic tone, and as such their use should be constrianed to places where the value of the ending to the plot at large overweighs our desire to be completist with information. Examples - M. Night Shalaman movies. Most other tags should go." (note when I wrote this MNS had just released a new movie - spoiling it now is no longer a problem) Rewrite the guideline to make it clear that spoilers everyone knows that are central to the understanding of the work (BRUCE WILLIS IS DEAD), spoilers than don't ruin the work (THE GREEKS WIN THE TROJAN WAR) and spoilers that are trivial (DREW BARRYMORE DIES IN SCREAM) are not excluded from the lede or plastered with ugly tags. Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 15:15, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree, once WikiMedia asks every person (or, say, 50%) on a particular plot point, and all claim to know it, the warning may go. Until then, don't assume everyone has the same media-consuming habits as yourself. --87.189.89.215


 * Now you've gone and done it! The Greeks won the Trojan War... Grrr. Lexicon (talk) 15:21, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I crap you not. Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 15:25, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * So start a discussion on the /Talk about whether or not to remove it. Start a discussion elsewhere on how warnings should be applied. Just don't treat bad and good spoiler warnings the same. --87.189.89.215
 * We're having a discussion right here about how the warnings should be applied. The consensus appears to be somewhere between "never" and "sparingly," with your use of it on articles like Romeo and Juliet being in the distinct minority, 87. Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 15:30, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't see a consensus like that. My recent rvs were just rvs of a mass implementation of the policy some would like to introduce. Whatever the result of this discussion, implementation should wait until it's over. --87.189.89.215

I see we have a spoiler warning on Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Left to their own devices, spoiler warning fanatics would have us rename the article because the title gives plot details away... - Nunh-huh 15:46, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Funny, but obviously ludicrous. Let's not undermine a valid debate by making up utterly insane hypothetical scenarios that will never come to pass. --Bishop2 16:11, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Unwell." --Tony Sidaway 15:54, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Even that would give something away. "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern May Or May Not Be Dead".  There we are. Lexicon (talk) 16:06, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Ah, but the public would interpret the redundancy as "beating around the bush", meaning they are dead. &mdash; Deckiller 16:07, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * How about this: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Encounter A Novel Application of the Schroedinger's Cat Gedankenexperiment." Obscure enough to baffle the kind of people who care about spoilers, apposite enough to tip off the cognoscenti. --Tony Sidaway 16:09, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Or simply "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern May Or May Not Be Dead (But Don't Think We're Just Beating Around The Bush Here, We Assure You That You Really Are Going To Have To See The Thing To Find Out Which One It Is)". Lexicon (talk) 16:11, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * At one point, Darth Sidious had a "soft redirect" to Palpatine to avoid giving away a spoiler. I think the public understands that we contain spoilers. Or if they are so paranoid about spoilers, why would they blindly go to a Wikipedia page that takes a few seconds to load and clearly has a lot of content on it, thinking that the spoilers wouldn't be included? Spoiler tags insult the public's intelligence; they're anything but a "courtesy". If they wanted to come here to read about a product to see if they want to buy it, then they've come to the wrong place; we're not an advertisement service. &mdash; Deckiller 16:04, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * First, they assume that, like many other pages on the web, WP would contain warnings, since WP:NOT.
 * Second, WP article should offer as much information as possible. If someone stops reading media articles because the contain spoilers, WP fails to offer any information to that person; on the other hand, a warning won't reduce the amount of information for other readers. --87.189.89.215
 * Couldn't the same be said, of, say a warning that says: "WARNING: Pictures that may offend some are on this page"? ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 16:31, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes. That's why Republicopedia or however the thing is called was founded. --87.189.89.215

While I initially comment to keep the page because I felt the MfD process was completely inappropriate to resolve this dispute. I do feel it is necessary to give my view on the usage of the spoiler tag.

I'm largely ambivalent to the spoiler tag as a whole. In other words, I don't think it neither helps nor hurts Wikipedia for these tags to be present in articles about modern literature and film. I also think that both sides of this debate are "blowing smoke". The presence of the tags will not lessen the professionalism or credibility of Wikipedia, but I also have to say that those who are saying that they can not edit/read articles on Wikipedia for fear of being "spoiled" if the tags are removed are simply engaging in hyperbole.

I do however agree that some editors often grossly overuse the spoiler tags. For example, no classical work of fiction or any work of fiction older then 20 years should ever have a spoiler tag anywhere on the article. The same goes for articles on recent works of fiction whose plot points are widely known. I also agree that having spoiler tags in a plot section or in a characters' bio is also redundant. Are the tags helpful? Maybe. Are they necessary? No. But one thing I must insist is that spoiler tags should never be included in the lead section of an article. But frankly, I don't think anyone who looks up an article on a work of fiction is do so without the intent of spoiling themselves to some degree about the work's plot. --Farix (Talk) 17:47, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * On what do you base your assumption about hyperbole? There are no warnings on de: and I can assure you that I don't read any article about fiction, actors etc. there unless I'm absoluteley sure that I know the article's topic and any related work (!) very, very well; ie. almost never.
 * Another personal observation: Last week I bought Yojimbo and Sanjuro, two movies from 1961 and 1962. I knew none of them before I decided to buy them, but I was able to use Wikipedia to assess them based on topics covered, importance, participating artists etc. I would not have dared to access these articles without an established pattern of spoiler warnings on en:Wikipedia. (And no, neither do I know Fistful.) In effect, the warnings added content for me. As I often contribute to the articles I read, it also adds content for any reader.
 * Sadly this discussion never was about details of spoiler handling. --87.189.124.195


 * I agree that spoiler warnings are useful to many. I fail to see how they hurt Wikipedia in any way. Wikipedia is different from printed encyclopedias in many ways, and the ability to place a spoiler warning is one of these. And, just as 87.189.124.195 posted, there is no reason for them to be confined to 20 years of fiction. I also look at older works to judge their critical or artisitc merit, or to see their place in a director or producer's history. I prefer to not know the plot at this point. Now, would I be devastated if spoiler alerts were removed? I suppose not. I would just be sure to watch the film before reading about it. Would this be inconvenient? Sometimes it would be. And that will decrease Wikipedia's usefulness to me. TK421 15:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Honestly how many people do you think read disclaimers? I've more than once read something i wished i didn't (B4 I became an editor). I accept than they shouldn't be used too much, but I think they should be kept

For Example I read articles more copmfortably when I know I wont accidenally read a spoiler while examining other stuff 'bout it (critical reception, Intro etc.).

I agree how ever that no non-fictional artical what so ever should have spoiler tags. Also spoilers that are easily guesses (Such as the My Brother Sam is Dead, Around the World in 80 Days, Halo: The Fall of Reach etc.) shouldn't be tagged.

I dont see how it violates NPOV...

--Armanalp 15:40, 20 May 2007 (UTC)


 * One other problem about the spoiler thing: you can't always skip the summary to avoid the spoiler, which basically defeats the purpose of having a spoiler warning. WAVY 10 17:00, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

i got told off by quadratus for posting a spoiler on the doctor who episode 'gridlock' talk page--Lerdthenerd 10:46, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

I like having spoiler warnings as it allows me to look up basic information on a topic, for example a film, and I can easily skip the parts of the text which are considered 'spoilers'. I often look on Wikipedia to find out who is in a film, or where a film was shot, or even the running time of a film, before I have actually seen the film and hence I do not want to know too many plot details. The spoiler warning allows me to quickly identify which parts to skip reading. We should definitely keep them.

--Citizen Ray 08:42, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Outstanding issues
Since the deletion discussion has essentially been abandoned in favor of a free-for-all, I'm going to make a vain attempt at adding some order to the discussion. As I see it, there are four major objections to this policy that I raised. Two of them touch directly on NPOV, which adds a third rail to this discussion - the onus becomes for those who support a policy for spoiler warnings to explain how this policy can be made to work around NPOV. Until the policy does this, it cannot continue to retain guideline status. The other two do not necessarily provide a necessity for the policy's demolition, but they are big problems none the less. I've explained the four problems below. I encourage supporters of this guideline to show why these objections can be overcome. Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Writing around spoilers (NPOV)
The nature of the spoiler policy is that it traps spoilers into specific sections of the article, demarcated by spoiler tags. By extension, things outside the spoiler tag are limited in what they can talk about. This makes it difficult to give proper weight to critical perspectives that depend on the spoiler. Sue Dibny absolutely needs to discuss her rape and murder outside of a plot summary section. You can't write a good section on critical responses to Citzen Kane and only discuss the ending in the plot summary. Other articles, like Valen or Alex Wilder, need spoiler content to put the character in any useful perspective. The spoilers are so vital to those topics that they cannot be exiled into particular sections. These are cases where the spoiler content is important enough that it needs to be woven throughout the article. Inability to do so necessarily marginalizes major perspectives, in violation of NPOV. Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I disagree that the policy does this. In fact, it explicitly states, "The question of spoilers should never influence decisions about article content and structure," which is in direct contravention to your point.  If these things need to be discussed where you say they need to be discussed, then the guideline we're talking about does not prevent it. JulesH 18:13, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Right, it might be saying that, but its not saying that prominently enough. As the many examples go to show, people are using this to structure articles around the spoiler warnings. ——  Eagle 101 Need help? 19:01, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Theoretically the policy says that, but in practice, articles get heavily refactored into an inconsequential, fluffy lead, and then the real meat of the article only further down in a spoiler section. Luckily the spoiler situation hasn't gotten so out of hand that this has happened to Romeo and Juliet, as their deaths are essential to the plot and meaning of the entire story and must be mentioned in the lead-in sentence, but I've seen it affect only slightly less famous works (including even some of the works of Homer).  The spoiler creep is getting ridiculous.  No other encyclopedias have spoilers, and for good reason.  I think we should bow to their experience and remove ours.  They're unprofessional and they hurt the quality of the encyclopedia by causing bad article refactoring.  -- Cyde Weys  22:38, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * There was even a spoiler alert on the article about David Brock's Blinded by the Right, a nonfiction book, FFS. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 02:14, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Most other encyclopedias have enough lag time in publication that spoilers are irrelevant - by the time the encyclopedia sees print, the spoilers are long since not a secret. -- DrGaellon (talk | contribs) 20:11, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That addition is very recent, for one. But the more pressing problem here is that this is essentially in the guideline as a saving throw - "avoid spoilers, unless you really, really have to." This is still too much of an imposition on sane practice. Phil Sandifer 03:02, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Precisely. Good encyclopedic writing should always take priority before avoiding spoilers. The latter is nice to have; the former is compulsory. Moreover, policy is decided by description, not prescription, so the fact that there is a divergence between the two indicates we need to discuss this again and hash out the issue. Johnleemk | Talk 05:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Even more important than "good encyclopedic writing" (whatever that means) should be offering of information. Spoiler warnings effectively do that.
 * There are a number of rules on WP abused to worsen articles. If you find an instance where this is done, discuss it on the talk page, then fix it. Why is that a problem?
 * No other encyclopedia has hyperlinks, so should we remove them? WP:NOT --87.189.124.195
 * I don't see the point here. Just do your article as you would have done anyway, then slap on warnings on any sections needing them, or the whole article, and be done with it. How do warnings force a structure?
 * Also, sections already force a structure. Assume that someone wants to write the article about Ilias by interweaving plot and any discussion related to a particualar detail of the plot. This is rarely done because many people see a point in putting things in sections, ie. explain the plot first and add any discussion later. If this is completely fine with section headers, why is it completely off-limits with warnings? --87.189.124.195
 * They create the wrong approach. This is a wiki, people do not first write an article, then put tags on it. The article is evolving, and once there are tags in some sections, this serves as a strong incentive not to put spoilers above these sections. That is wrong, and there doesn't seem to be an easy way around this problem other than deleting all spoiler warnings per WP:NDT. Kusma (talk) 10:30, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Article organization changes all the time. Most of the articles I started six years ago are hardly recognizable, and articles are regularly reorganized if someone wants to feature them. --87.189.124.195
 * Article organization changes all the time. Most of the articles I started six years ago are hardly recognizable, and articles are regularly reorganized if someone wants to feature them. --87.189.124.195

Fighting the taylorized robot hordes
Guidelines are dangerous things. If you make a guideline, people will follow it. With gusto. Hence the spoiler tagging of everything that has a structure that might be considered narrative. This is bad, and part of why we should be cautious with guidelines. This guideline, as it stands, does very little to discourage crazed and single-minded application. And that has done harm to a vast number of articles. (Night (book) had a spoiler warning once. That's just not good.) Small harm, to be sure, but harm. And who knows how many times articles got inappropriately re-arranged to hide things behind spoiler tags. How can this guideline be rewritten to discourage, rather than encourage horrifically Taylorized applications? (Generally, I find that guidelines that call for judgment repell the most Taylorized of our editors. I've seen very few people go on mad NPOV sprees, and far more go on mad "cite sources" sprees.) Phil Sandifer 16:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I'd say the description of works it applies to should definitely be narrowed to fictional works. Biographical or historical works should not have spoiler warnings in most cases, I think.  I don't see any reason not to include them in most articles on fiction, though.
 * The current text stating (essentially) that spoiler tags should not be considered when making decisions concerning the structure of the article perhaps solves some of the issues you're talking about, and I understand this text was added recently. JulesH 18:21, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * It doesn't, because it still puts the default on the side of Taylorized application. I tend to think Morven has it pretty on-target below. Phil Sandifer 03:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * We at the very least need to make it clear that not having a spoiler tag is the default, and that, like fair-use images, a good case has to be made for their inclusion in each specific article they are used in.


 * I personally can tolerate spoiler warnings in articles about recent works of fiction, especially where there is a significant secret that can be spoiled. Someone made a good point above - I think it was Phil Sandifer - that when a work has accumulated enough criticism and analysis that the importance of such plot twists is critical to discussing the work in general that spoiler warnings need to go.


 * This requires a judgment call on each article they are used on. It's my experience, as Phil states above, that too many Wikipedia editors prefer hard rules to judgment, and would prefer a short algorithm by which they can determine whether a spoiler warning should be present.  Well, sucks to be them; you're not getting one from me.  Use your brain. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 20:01, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I think this is exactly on target - the default is no spoiler warnings, with a case needing to be made for why they should go in. Phil Sandifer 03:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * This point about commentary is an important one, because I think our practice should be based - at least in part - on what the sources do. Do they add a casual warning - as I've seen some media coverage of newly released works do - to avoid reading further lest secrets be spoiled, or do they assume that the twists are known already? We should be adopting the stance taken by our sources. Johnleemk | Talk 05:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I disagree. Sites like IGN are some of the most reliable video game news sites, but they also contain game guides etc. The key reason here being that those sites are not encyclopedias. If encyclopedias were to use spoiler warnings, I might reconsider my stance. --Teggles 05:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * We're kind of redefining the concept of a traditional encyclopaedia - as Phil Sandifer pointed out, normal encyclopaedias don't even have articles on most of the pop culture things we cover. Obviously proper encyclopedic writing normally deserves priority over spoiler warnings - what I'm saying is that one major factor in determining whether we should be giving the question of spoilers more weight is whether our sources show concern about avoiding spoilers. Johnleemk | Talk 06:13, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * But these sites are not a good representative of what Wikipedia should include. As I stated, sources like IGN and GameSpot contain things we would never think to include; game guides etc. Why apply different reasoning for "spoiler" content? --Teggles 06:27, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Um...you're assuming our guidelines are enforced by automata who lack the ability to apply editorial judgment. What I am saying is that in editorial judgment, an important factor should be how our sources treat the subject. Does Ebert worry about exposing a spoiler? That might tell you something about whether we should be putting a spoiler in the article. Johnleemk | Talk 06:50, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * When there is a critical focus (as in the case of Ebert), it is expected that it there would be omission of "spoilers". A critic's goal is to provide advise on the worth of a movie. An encyclopedia's goal is to provide comprehensive information. To let their goal be a strong factor in the inclusion of spoilers is nonsensical. Of course there is an editorial judgment, but as this section infers, people do follow an automata-like approach. --Teggles 07:05, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Ebert is probably not the greatest example to illustrate appropriate spoiler-warning, since the motivation for checking out a review of a film is rather different to that for checking out an encyclopedia article. Indeed, a review pretty much presupposes that the audience has not yet seen the film being reviewed. --Stormie 07:08, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Ok, so please provide two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias who tell the spoiler of Fight Club without warning. --87.189.124.195
 * Morven's statement above seems reasonable. I can see spoiler warnings being very cut back and becoming temporary tags for those with a strong argument to use it. While I still don't see spoilers warnings as "bad", a courtesy is not a guaranteed right, and should take a back seat to other concerns. -- Ned Scott 06:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I disagree with Morven. Spoilers should be used in every instance in which they are appropriate, and his suggestion would exclude them in a significant number of fringe cases. Warning opponents have yet to show what actual damage is done by warnings, so I don't see why the bias should be against them.
 * There is no useful definition of "recent" for this.
 * Discussion of a work is not hampered by warnings.
 * I wholeheartedly agree with the brain thing. --87.189.124.195


 * (deindent) I fail to see why we should assume that our audience has already viewed the subject matter. We don't assume the reader of World War II was alive at the time the war broke out; why do we assume that the reader of an article on a particular topic has some familiarity with that topic at all? Also, the discussion of a critic's role seems to have missed by a mile the fact that critics assess the overall worth and significance of a movie - or any work, for that matter. Ebert does occasionally include the odd twist, and IIRC, he once railed against the spoiling of Million Dollar Baby by critics who disapproved of a message delivered by the twist - that in particular is what I had in mind.
 * Also, you have to bear in mind that with time, sources naturally stop worrying about spoilers. For instance, if Ebert were to write anything about Million Dollar Baby today, I doubt he would be as worried about spoiling it as much as he was a few years back. The point of looking to our sources is to have a basis for assessing whether something is still considered too recent to be spoiled.
 * For example, today, all our sources on [some iconic movie] probably avoid excessive spoilers without giving a warning, so this tells us: 1. what to avoid spoiling (avoiding the original research problem); 2. that now is not necessarily a good time to give away any twists in the plot. In due time, our sources will likely not worry about spoiling the twists, and we can make the necessary changes.
 * Referring to our sources is a good idea because otherwise any decision we come to on spoilers - short of getting rid of them altogether - will be by and large arbitrary and possibly subject to original research and/or POV. I don't see a good reason to totally ignore what our sources are doing. As for editorial judgment, the solution to that is thwacking the ignoramuses with a cluestick - not to try to develop rules that prevent those with a clue from using it. Johnleemk | Talk 07:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * In the first paragraph, I don't know what you're making an argument against (no one said anything along the lines of that), but the assumption is that by going to an article, they should expect to read information on the subject. No need for warnings. I see what you're trying to say in regards to critics, but this would only be valid if spoiler warnings were used on a selective basis; I want them gone entirely, and I want no withholding of information just because they're "spoilers". Also, "thwacking the ignoramuses with a cluestick" does not work. You can try removing spoiler warnings from plot sections on movie articles and you'll have a huge backlash, no matter what your argument. However, if the guideline doesn't end up being removed entirely, changing the guideline is very good. There would be a basis for the acts of those who have a clue. --Teggles 08:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Stormie said that reviews presuppose the reader has not seen the work, and implied that we do not make any such presupposition, which IMO, is ridiculous. That's what I was dealing with. As for using spoiler warnings on a "selective basis", yes, that is the whole point - to severely reduce the frequency of how we use these tags, but not to eliminate them entirely. Hard rules like "never use spoiler tags" are as bad as "always use spoiler tags" because although they are easy to enforce, they cause a lot of pain and grief for the exceptions to the rule - which are often more numerous than you might expect. And the point of this discussion is to reach a consensus so we can develop a guideline adequat for cluestick thwacking. Johnleemk | Talk 12:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Make the guideline explicit enough (over time - no need to rush it) that the bots can help. Alternatively, explicitley forbid bots. --87.189.124.195

Aim of policy change
I have another point to make: What is the aim of this policy discussion? I seem to see some voices who wants to get rid of spoiler warnings altogether, so this is what I'm arguing against. As with nearly everything, I see room for improvements for the way warnings are handled. --87.189.89.215


 * The way I've been reading your arguments, they are a defence of existing practice; you haven't been arguing against just wholesale salting of the spoiler tags, you've been arguing against reasonable claims that they are harming how we write the encyclopaedia. Johnleemk | Talk 16:51, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Of course I haven't argued against reasonable claims, else I would be unreasonable.
 * I support current practice mostly. I cannot see where I defended excesses, or warnings in historical works etc. --87.189.89.215


 * Here, here, here, here, need I go on? Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 17:09, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Read all my comments: "My recent rvs were just rvs of a mass implementation of the policy some would like to introduce. Whatever the result of this discussion, implementation should wait until it's over." --87.189.89.215


 * I suggest you stop. Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 17:12, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That would be convenient, wouldn't it? --87.189.89.215
 * If you don't support your edits, don't make them. Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 17:14, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * So you think it would be useful if any disputed policy is implemented by both sides of the discussion during the discussion? I don't, so I revert it. You might have had a point if I had added new spoiler warnings to an article. --87.189.89.215
 * I know you're new here, but yes, guidelines are described by practice, not practice described by guidelines. The first step to getting spoilers off of Romeo and Juliet is not to edit the guideline, but to remove the spoiler. That's how we do things here, 87. Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 17:20, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm far from new, and I know that changes are regularly made that way. I just don't think it would be the best way to proceed during a discussion like this. These changes are distracting and they are perfectly able to spoil any good mood which might have been prevalent earlier in the discussion. Now please don't claim that the articles are broken by the warning in a way that immediate action is unavoidable.  --87.189.89.215
 * What ip addresses/accounts have you edited from in the past? Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 17:33, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Move this discussion on my /Talk. --87.189.89.215

Well I can tell you that my aims would be to remove all spoiler tags. I've thought this for about a year and a half now ever since I saw spoiler tags on literature from literally more than two thousand years ago. If you come read an encyclopedia article on a subject, you should expect a thorough discussion of it. Spoiler tags are amateurish and do not belong in a real encyclopedia. -- Cyde Weys 22:40, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Please stop claiming that spoiler tags remove content. It's childish.
 * Please provide two major encyclopedias which tells the spoiler of Fight Club without warning. --87.189.124.195
 * The above IP is replacing spoiler tags on *nursery rhymes*, and so is not to be taken too seriously.--Docg 12:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The above user is doing Ad Hominems and violates WP:NPA and so is not to be taken too seriously. (Also, see section PLEASE STOP EDIT WARRING for my motives of the reverts Doc talks about.) --87.189.124.195

The base of this issue
At the base of this issue is a conflict of interest. Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclopedia. At the same time we don't want to "spoil" our readers fun - for if one would have to constantly worry that somebody might "spoil his fun" for a movie or game, he would not use Wikipedia to inform himself about this thing. Let me start with an example: You have noticed the Game "Super RPG Adventure" which is praised by your peers for its deep story and plot. So you look at the Wikipedia entry for "Super RPG Adventure" and read "... and in a twist ending, it is revealed that the player's enemy, which the player has been guessing for the entire game is actually RandomDude..." From a objective view, everything thing is fine, no factual errors etc. From a subjective view the reader will probably be unhappy, because he feels "cheated" out of a great game and storyline. In a non theoretical example, The Game (film), is based entirely around having the audience guessing what exactly - really - is happening. If the audience exactly knows what is happening, the movie is far less enjoyable. Spoiler tags allow Readers to stop accidently "spoiling" the film for themselves. So the question is, do we want to do away with spoiler tags and rid us of the burden of deciding what is a spoiler and what not, or do we keep them and thus prevent "spoilers" for our readers. As a editor, I would not mind either way, but as a user I'd like to look up Movies, Games and Stories without having to worry of finding myself spoiled. "Snape kills Dumbledore" - I wonder how many friendships got broken over those three words, uttered before the second party managed to read the book? Charon X /talk 17:48, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * "If the audience exactly knows what is happening, the movie is far less enjoyable." -- And who gets to decide that? Chuck 17:57, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * We're an encyclopedia. We provide the facts. Our readers know this and if they're too stupid to realise it then we gently point them at the content disclaimer.  We're hard-asses, party-poopers. We're dedicated encyclopedists and in the decision on how to present the information the user's enjoyment plays no part.  The readers know that and those who can't handle it avoid our site in favor of a fan site that will treat them like children instead of adults. --Tony Sidaway 18:12, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Thank you! We're not here to hold our readers' hands and insult their intelligence. This isn't a GameFAQs message forum (although certain Wikipedians treat it as such when they debate by acting uncivil, writing in caps, etc.) or a fansite; it's an encyclopedia, and we must treat all sensitive content in a professional manner. That means not providing ridiculous, common sense warnings. Go to the Penis page, and you'll see images of penises. Go to the Final Fantasy VII page, and you'll find out that Aerith dies. &mdash; Deckiller 18:53, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You seem to have a personal grudge against people looking for background information about a film without spoiling it for them. Why do you want to restrict use of Wikipedia to people who don't care if a work of fiction is still as appealing after reading a WP article? --87.189.124.195


 * The thing is, if you think your enjoyment will be spoiled by reading a comprehensive article about the thing, then don't go to an encyclopaedia because encyclopaedias provide just that: comprehensive coverage (see encyclopaedia, in case it wasn't obvious). In any case the real argument here is about whether 100% of the spoiler warnings are absurd or only about 95% of them.  Anybody who doesn't know the salient facts about the plot of Citizen Kane, Titanic, Gone The Wind, Casablanca, The Book of Ruth (FFS!) or the Iliad or whatever, obviously has a pretty good mechanism for avoiding spoilers without help from us.  The clue is usually in the section title: "plot details".  Guy (Help!) 18:21, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I would certainly be in favour of a change to the guideline stating that a spoiler warning is unnecessary in a section of the article whose heading makes it clear that it contains a plot summary. Warnings are clearly redundant in such situations.  But having them in other situations, where you might not be expecting to see plot details, can be helpful. JulesH 18:24, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * That would require warnings at the very top of many articles, as the header sections should, when valuable (which I think is "very often", and perhaps "nearly always"), include plot details. Lexicon (talk) 18:37, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * No that simply requires us to not use spoiler templates as often as we do. We really ought to avoid using it in cases where the header of the section is "plot" or some other wording of that. I'm still wondering why we even need it, we are not narrating a story to folks, we are an encyclopedia :). Plus how do we determine what information is a 'spoiler'? That determination is inherently a Point of View of whoever adds the tag. ——  Eagle 101 Need help? 18:46, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * While I said "header section" I meant "lead paragraph", which should summarize the entire article, and therefore include "spoilers" (and would, since it doesn't mention that it's a plot summary, require a spoiler warning). The fact of the matter is, a well-written article on a movie, television episode, or book, should "spoil it" within eight sentences.  Lexicon (talk) 18:52, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Yep and our content disclaimer covers that :) No need for these banners to be in the top of every article on a movie, book, etc. ——  Eagle 101 Need help? 18:59, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * spoiler has some mildly useful purposes: in most video game articles it is synonymous with original research, and in an article on any book or film published more than ten years ago it's usually an indication that the article is dominated by fanboys and there has not been sufficient scholarly input. Guy (Help!) 19:05, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Let me tell you something about my kids. They love the Harry Potter films and books.  They have watched the films at three or four times, and read the books cover to cover time after time.  I've read Lord of the Rings six times, and watched the films four times.  You know something?  I still enjoy them.  Yup.  Pleasure not in any way spoiled by knowing the ending.  Whereas having spoiler tags on King Kong just in case there is some poor sap who's been hiding under a rock all these years and doesn't know that (look away now) 'the gorilla dies'', makes us look, well, silly, really. Guy (Help!) 19:02, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That brings up another point in relation to what is and isn't a spoiler, how do we determine what is and is not common knowledge? Aside from King Kong, Final Fantasy VII is another great example of this.  The game has been out for 10 years, and has several sequels (1 film, 2 novellas, 2 games).  According to all of their storylines, Aerith was killed by Sephiroth during the events of FFVII.  Is this now common knowledge?  If it isn't do we mark the fact that Aerith is already dead as a spoiler in the article on Final Fantasy VII Advent Children?  Anyone who sees the movie (or even read about it) is already fully aware that Aerith dies, so is her death still considered a spoiler in FFVII's article, when the fact is advertised so blatantly?  This is an example where calling something a spoiler is an example of POV.  --&mdash; Δαίδαλος  Σ  Σ  19:45, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You are arguing a different problem. Would you kids mind if I tell them the end of the next Potter book before they read it? --87.189.124.195
 * I'm going to have to go with eighty-seven here. How about mystery novels? Detective books? The ones where the point of the first read-through are the suspence, the clues, the anticipation? --Kizor 20:42, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Sucks for them. It's one thing to be able to give a courtesy note, but we can't and shouldn't attempt to save people from spoilers. -- Ned Scott 20:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * We can and we should, because it's free. There is no downside whatsoever expect for some editor's hurt feelings. --87.189.99.112

Final Fantasy Advent Children is a sequel to FF7. We can assume, when writing an article about a sequel, that the reader knows the events of what it's a sequel to, so we wouldn't need a spoiler warning. Ken Arromdee 15:13, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

We need a Spoiler Warning policy guideline
Whatever people may say about spoilers, we need a policy about them. The policy may well end up saying "don't use them", but there still needs to be a policy. Just getting rid of the existing policy will result in a large amount of inconsistancy. People will still include spoiler warnings (in lots of different ways, since there would be no standard template), and other people won't be able to remove them without causing trouble if there isn't a specific policy banning them.

Once you realise that whatever we decide, we still need a policy, it becomes worth coming up with a policy that is a little more subtle than just "don't use spoiler warnings". We can have a detailed policy saying where they are and are not appropriate (no spoiler warnings in "Plot Summary" sections, for example). The various problems people are coming up with do not require removing warnings completely, they just require a more reasonable use of them. --Tango 20:15, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Err... we don't need a policy, at maximum if we choose to keep these at all, they would be under a WP:GUIDELINE. Policy is for things like blocking policy, etc. ——  Eagle 101 Need help? 20:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * OK, guideline, then. The difference is purely semantic. It's not like policies are set in stone anyway - there's always WP:IAR. --Tango 20:58, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, they are more dictative then guidelines. A Policy we must follow, save for the extremely rare WP:IGNORE.  It's recommended that we do, but we don't have to follow a guideline.  That makes a world of difference, so it's not "purely semantic."  --&mdash; Δαίδαλος  Σ  Σ  21:26, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The important thing is that it is detailed enough to be a solid base for any decisions on warnings. --87.189.124.195

Other examples of content warnings?
Besides for spoilers, is there anything other content that we mark with warnings? I know we have templates related to character encoding issues (like Template:SpecialChars), but is there anything else? --- RockMFR 20:47, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Well as noted above somewhere, there's a tag similar to the spoiler everyone is talking about, for magic tricks and so forth. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 20:54, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Proposals
In light of the potential and actual abuses of spoiler warnings and other ways of accommodating readers who might not want spoilers, perhaps we could transform some of the objectives into useful proposals:

Spoiler warnings not permitted, no writing-around permitted
Compliance with the guideline demands ignoring concerns about revealing details of plot or character in every instance. The spoiler templates should be removed and deleted.

Spoiler guidelines strengthened for NPOV
The guideline should more strenuously encourage writers not to interrupt the flow or clarity of an article, and stress compliance with NPOV. Spoilers (plot details) generally to be avoided outside of appropriate sections unless particularly relevant to the scholarship of the work.

Spoiler warnings like fair-use images
Spoiler warnings are allowed, but like fair-use images the burden is on the person adding them to explain why they are necessary for this article. The default remains no spoiler warnings. Phil Sandifer 03:19, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Current practice
Leave the guideline as it existed before its MFD nomination.

A suggestion
Why not put a flag at the top of the articles with spoilers in, along the lines of Template:Current (and Template:Current-section if only a single section is affected)? That way, it doesn't interrupt the flow of the article. If consensus can be reached on the length of time that things remain a spoiler, then that could be mentioned in the template, and the template could be removed after that time period. Mike Peel 22:00, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

We already have a whacking great big banner in the content disclaimer which is linked through the general disclaimer from every single page in the wiki. A heading at the very top of the disclaimer says (and I do not exaggerate the size):

WIKIPEDIA CONTAINS SPOILERS AND CONTENT YOU MAY FIND OBJECTIONABLE

I think that should be clear enough for most of us. It certainly doesn't intrude on any articles although it's linked from every single one. --Tony Sidaway 22:33, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Your argument is exactly as relevant as the percentage of readers reading the disclaimer each time before reading an article. --87.189.124.195

Yeah, this notice is rather annoying and unnecessary. It's pretty obvious that encyclopedia articles contain "spoilers". It doesn't need to be made explicit, and doing so is just kind of insulting to our readers. -- Cyde Weys 22:41, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * There you have it. Every page already is warned to contain spoilers, thus the spoiler template and spoiler guideline are both redundant to the content disclaimer, and should be speedily deleted.  --&mdash;NicholaiDaedalus 22:43, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Okay, cancel parts of my comment, obviously I did not fully read the comment I was responding to. I was under the impression that he was suggesting to add that notice to the top of every page containing spoilers, but of course, he wasn't; he was merely pointing to where it is already on the disclaimers page, which is linked to from every article on Wikipedia.  Mea culpa.  -- Cyde Weys  22:48, 16 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I've been reading wikipedia for ages, and I AM one of the few people in the world that read instructions and follow links. And I've never ever seen that notice.  If the spoiler warning isn't in the articles, it doesn't exist and New Users will have to learn that wikipedia contains spoilers THE HARD WAY.  Thus almost every single first impression for new users will be an angry bad one. CraigWyllie 17:37, 20 May 2007 (UTC)


 * The funny thing about this is that the idea of removing the warnings doesn't bother me, what bothers me are these lame and flawed reasonings. Do you realize how many people have never even read any of our disclaimer pages? Saying that every page as a link... to a link... to something with big text... doesn't change the fact that the pages are easily missed, and hardly anyone ever clicks on them. If we want to get rid of spoilers lets do it for good reasons. Don't treat the people in this debate like they're stupid. -- Ned Scott 00:29, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Ned there are many other valid reasons above. Cheers! —— '''Eagle 101 00:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm just commenting on the above reasoning, not on all of them. -- Ned Scott 00:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * It's damned good reasoning. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia.  Encyclopedia articles on fictional works contain sections marked "plot summary" or "synopsis" and nobody would be amazed to find that those sections contain details of the plot.  For the people who are too stupid to work this out, we can point them to the content disclaimer. --Tony Sidaway 01:31, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I am not joking when I say... Wikipedia has a content disclaimer? I certainly haven't realized its existence in 4+ years... ugen64 07:06, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That's a completely different line of argument (which was done repeatedly before), not a reason to rely on the disclaimer. Ignoring section headers is not the same as ignoring a linked page. --87.189.124.195
 * Content disclaimers are not really intended to be read in advance. They exist so that you can point to them if you encounter someone who doesn't understand the blatantly obvious. --Tony Sidaway 17:53, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Ain't broke, don't fix it
According to this article: What is Popular on Wikipedia and Why? cited recently on Wikipedia Signpost, 43% of WP articles read are on entertainment, and of these about 60% are on the kind of articles which use spoiler warnings — films, comics, TV series, games, books. Suggests there must be something right in the current practice. I certainly appreciate the spoiler warning flag... there are frequently reasons to consult articles on books etc I havn't read. It doesn't seem clever to me to turn off a large fraction of actual WP readers in the name of some theoretical model of what WP ought to be. No-one is claiming that this guidline should take precedence over policy, but there hardly ever needs to be a conflict (as demonstrated above in suggested leads for The Crying Game). PaddyLeahy 01:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I also read articles on things I haven't read. I want to know the context, how a book was received, how it stacks in the author's career, other trivia, etc...  It's true that removing all spoiler tags would result in eventually everyone figuring out that there are spoilers on these pages, the number of first time users and occasional users dictates that we really shouldn't spoil a plot for them to learn this.--Loodog 02:32, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Why would these readers even bother looking at the "plot summary" or similar sections of articles on books they haven't read? In general, the lead section doesn't spoil twists (or it shouldn't, since lead sections should be succinct), and the couple of sentences for plot exposition in the lead will give them an idea of what the book is like. Or they can actually view an advertising or review site. &mdash; Deckiller 01:25, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Well I do think people read the plot sections of articles on fictional works they haven't read. At least, I do, and it's the main reason I would read an article about a fictional work.  We shouldn't be ashamed of the fact that we're not an entertainment website, but an encyclopedia.  Our business is putting the information out there.  We shouldn't apologise for presenting all the information about the subject, and anybody who can't handle it can run off to whatever site they may be able to find that only presents part of it. --Tony Sidaway 01:34, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Indeed. I'd rather see us ranked 30th and become a complete and concise encyclopedia instead of 1st and full of cruft, reviews, and advertisements. Especially because the latter will actually alienate our target audience. &mdash; Deckiller 01:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Gladly, nobody wants cruft, reviews or advertisements, and neither will articles be forced to include such by adding spoiler warnings. --87.189.124.195
 * Please don't assume that all those who use spoilers are fanboys/girls. -- Ned Scott 01:38, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That wasn't necessarily in response to the spoilers; rather, it was a response to us being deemed an entertainment forum or database in general. &mdash; Deckiller 01:44, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * <.< -- Ned Scott 01:57, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I generally agree with this view, and have thought that spoiler warnings really should have just been reserved for non-obvious situations. The needless application of a spoiler warning is a problem (obviously, from this very discussion itself). I'm not sure if it's a big deal in the end, one way or another, but a lot of people here are just venting anger about a misuse rather than the concept itself. I's not a big deal, nor is it wrong, to say "there's a spoiler here". -- Ned Scott 01:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm a bit confused here: Are we only discussing warnings in Plot sections? Do you think lead section should be spoiler-free?
 * Anyway, I think it is wrong to assume any particular reading pattern. Spoiler warnings add information to the article, just like section headers, which allows the reader to make his/her own decisions on what to read. --87.189.124.195
 * "Why would these readers even bother looking at the "plot summary" or similar sections of articles on books they haven't read?" When I read an article on a work that I'm not familiar with that has spoiler warnings, I am able to easily and unambiguously identify those areas that I wish to avoid. When I look at one without warnings, I must be continuously on guard for spoilers, and still run a high risk of accidentally viewing them. --Kizor 17:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree with the OP, I think the spoiler warning serves an important role here. Aaron Bowen 13:35, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Definitely, the spoiler warnings need to stay. I read articles about video games, etc. to get an unbiased POV on just parts of it, so I'm not seeing "Ooh, this game is the BEST EVER!" on review sites. At the same time, I don't want to see spoilers; I just want to skip them over. 65.19.65.78 01:30, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Definitely, the spoiler warnings need to stay. I read articles about video games, etc. to get an unbiased POV on just parts of it, so I'm not seeing "Ooh, this game is the BEST EVER!" on review sites. At the same time, I don't want to see spoilers; I just want to skip them over. 65.19.65.78 01:30, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Identity crisis
Is Wikipedia a website structured as an encyclopedia; or is it an encyclopedia that happens to be online?

If it's the former, and WP really is just slightly better organized "crap off teh Intrawebs," and readers shouldn't expect tightly written, informative discussions of the subject of an article, then spoiler alerts belong in articles. It's the custom on the web and when you go to most websites, you're expecting, the material to be fannish and not very well organized.

On the other hand, I know of absolutely no encyclopedia that contains "spoiler alerts," because when you are reading an encyclopedia you expect to be fully informed about a topic. If you don't want to know the end, you don't read the article. Amazon.com and Yahoo! Movies are that-a-way. -->

In addition to the substantive advantages, eliminating "spoiler alerts" sends the right signal about what Wikipedia is: an encyclopedia, not a website. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 02:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * With that said, seeing that this is an encyclopedia that happens to be online, and not a fanforum or website, spoiler warnings seem awfully unencyclopedic. You wouldn't open up the World Book Encyclopedia (or insert encyclopedia of choice here) or any other professionaly published material and see one of these spoiler warnings before a section entitled "Plot summary" or at all.   Darth  Griz98  04:25, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * This is a false dilemma. Wikipedia is obviously more than an encyclopedia that happens to be online, but it does not follow that it has to be "better organized crap". Again, please name two major encyclopedia which name the spoiler of Fight Club without warning.
 * Amazon does not contain spoiler. (Don't know about Yahoo! Movies.) --87.189.124.195
 * More than an encyclopedia online? It would seem to be exactly an encyclopedia that happens to be online: the free encyclopedia anyone can edit, not the free encyclopedia and movie, game and book review site anyone can edit.  Amazon and Yahoo Movies don't contain spoilers precisely because they have different purposes than WP: you read those sites to determine if you want to see a movie; you read an encyclopedia because you simply want information about it.  Could you provide me an example of an encyclopedia that contains a spoiler warning before revealing the spoiler in Fight Club?  I'd be interested to see it. ObiterDicta ( pleadings • errata • appeals ) 14:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * What I meant is that it's more than a traditional encyclopedia that happens to be online.
 * Again, a spoiler warning does not prevent the inclusion of information. Please stop claiming so.
 * I don't use traditional encyclopedias as precedent, so I don't have to. --87.189.124.195

Spoiler warnings are infantile and need to go
Spoiler warnings are infantile and not worthy of an encyclopedia that wants to be taken seriously. We report the facts, and a summary of the most important ones belongs in the article's lead section, whether they "spoil" or not. The general disclaimer already contains "Wikipedia contains spoilers", and that is all that's needed in this regard. All arguments by Phil Sandifer in the original deletion request are convincing and to the point. AxelBoldt 04:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The vote is over, we are now collecting arguments. --87.189.124.195

iffy spoilers
I have ran a bot and have compiled a list of 4868 instances of iffy spoilers being used on wikipedia pages. These can be found at User:Eagle 101/iffyspoilers. The criteria for getting on this list was to have a spoiler come immediately before or after a section with the header of plot, plot summary, synopsis, overview, etc. These titles make it clear to the reader that guess what? the plot is going to be discussed. As such the spoiler tags on these articles are probably redundant. Removal of these probably would not be a bad idea. This counts for ~10% of all spoiler tags that we have in use. (we have approx 45250 +- 500 if I recall correctly). Again I suggest that at a bare minimum these tags can be removed, as they are superfluous to the existing headers. :) ——  Eagle 101 Need help? 05:34, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * This debate has been characterised by action rather than talking, which has not helped tempers. Rather than proposing making the change first, how about proposing a form of words for Spoiler warning which would legitimise this action? (If and when any action is approved, please remember the end spoiler warnings too; people concerned about "Wikipedia looking silly" have not apparently been concerned enough to avoid leaving unmatched end warnings in place.) Notinasnaid 06:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The list is there if anyone wants to do anything with it, to me it shows a fine example on how our guideline has mislead some of our editors to putting spoiler tags on very obvious locations. If the header says plot what do you expect to see there? :P In any case, I hope that the list is useful for debate as well as taking action when and if it is needed. ——  Eagle 101 Need help? 07:45, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Doc proposed a form of wording for spoiler which involved blanking it. I support this wording - David Gerard 09:46, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I do not support this. It feels like a fait accompli, since at a stroke this bypasses all other discussion, and also makes the guidline under discussion impossible to follow. Notinasnaid 09:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Bear in mind that some Plot sections are clearly "spoiler free" and can be easily read without problem, others are far too detailed and include many spoilers. My own view would be that a plot intoduction should be kept spoiler free. ::  Kevinalewis  : (Talk Page) /(Desk)  08:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keeping a section about the plot spoiler free is a contradiction to being an encyclopedia, which has a mission of informing people about stuff they look up. Kusma (talk) 10:17, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Also, many articles seem to have spoiler added to the plot / synopsis section as a matter of course, simply because it's a plot or synopsis section, which is absurd. Spoiler warnings are irrelevant in anything over ten years old anyway, redundant in sections called plot or synopsis, and used in place of original research in many video game articles. Guy (Help!) 11:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I can't tell if anyone else has voiced this opinion on this gigantic page, but I certainly do not agree with your position that "Spoiler warnings are irrelevant in anything over ten years old". I can't see why the age of the work should make any difference.  — The Storm Surfer 12:17, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Do you really beliebe that Iliad should have a spoiler warning (spoiler: the Greeks win). Or Jesus? (spoiler: he is resurrected). Kusma (talk) 12:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * It's hard to tell if you aren't merely trying to make my position look absurd, but I think that your examples are poor because the 'spoilers' you choose are widely believed to be historical events. (Using the Jesus article is particularly ridiculous since it presents its subject as a historical individual rather than a literary character from the very start.) — The Storm Surfer 13:56, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * And that there is one school of thought which holds that he never actually died to begin with. We could have a flame war over whether spoiler in that instance would violate NPOV guidelines! -- llywrch 23:02, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"Target Audience"??
Some editors here are clearly unhappy with the success of Wikipedia and would prefer it to be much smaller, e.g. User:Deckiller refers to "our target audience. I notice this isn't linked, presumably Deckiller couldn't find the page WP:Target audience but in fact it's there on the home page "The free encyclopedia anyone can edit". Presumably Deckiller wants this to be: "The free encyclopedia anyone can edit but only the educated elite should read". WP is more than an encyclopedia: no encyclopedia would have an article on every pokemon, every steam locomotive that ever ran on UK railways, or every US highway. WP is a resource that can grow up with the reader, a bit like a primitive version of A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer. Today's fanboys are tomorrow's avid readers of your articles on, er,  Final Fantasy.

Also, enough of this "real encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings". Paper encyclopedias are not designed for scrolling text, so spoiler warnings would be much less useful in them. PaddyLeahy 09:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * There's no difference between skipping text when reading online or offline. Actually, it is easier to put a paper on your offline book than to hide text on your monitor. Kusma (talk) 10:08, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, there is. Every one of our articles begins on the top of its own page. There is no chance of an accidental glimpse as you search for the beginning. Further, online skipping text has machine assistance by way of the search function. --Kizor 21:33, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Also, other mainstream online encyclopedias do not contain spoiler warnings either. Nor do online encyclopedias that concentrate on fictional topics: note that Anakin Skywalker and Spock do not contain a warning, although they contain major spoilers. Kusma (talk) 10:23, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Some TV encyclopedias also have sensible spoiler policies. See wikia:24:Wiki_24:Spoilers: they say "Spoiler warnings are NOT given for already aired episodes." Kusma (talk) 10:40, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * And Wiki 24 does not give spoiler warnings on any already aired episodes, even though the description might spoil the episode for people who haven't seen it yet. If we followed that standard, we should have a spoiler warning for any plot points of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows currently, but the spoiler warning would come off the day the book is published. But I don't think that's what any of the pro-spoiler-warning folks here are advocating. Chuck 14:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Please name two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias which name the plot twist of Fight Club without a warning. --87.189.124.195
 * Please name two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias which name the plot twist of Fight Club with a warning. Chuck 14:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Why should I, I don't claim that Wikipedia should be exactly as other encyclopedias. --87.189.124.195
 * OK, then, show me two examples of noteworthy encyclopedias which have articles on Fight Club. Chuck 17:24, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * In case I find none, should we delete Fight Club?
 * The implication of this thread is obvious: Other encyclopedias are different in many ways, so any argument in copy them religiously is bogus. --87.189.99.112

I agree with Paddy Leahy; there certainly is a difference between reading on screen and in print. And I would like to know what the heck the point of the whole discussion is. Deb 11:50, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * It is that Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia, and online encyclopedias do not contain spoiler warnings. Kusma (talk) 11:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * But Wikipedia's competitors also pale in comparison of their coverage of pop culture and current (and ongoing) entertainment. Sure, there's no warning about plot summaries surrounding Moby Dick or Henry V in E. Britannica, but there's also no coverage of, say, The Sixth Sense, Harry Potter, or 24. --Fl e x (talk/contribs) 12:30, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * As I've said elsewhere, every last 'edit this page' link is a breach of tradition, and the existence of Wikipedia is proof that we've built a good (or otherwise, depending on your opinion) resource not only on the basis on what is conventional, but what's good and what works. No other online encyclopedia has our resources, our breadth or our coverage. --Kizor 21:30, 18 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I am insulted by your comment, Paddy. First, I am an advocate of plain english, not that redundant, flowery, overly formal nonsense that is associated with the "educated elite". Why? So everyone can understand the material. That has nothing to do with spoiler warnings. Second, most of my editing is on pop culture; yes, I'm a mergist, but I'm not someone who wants it "much smaller" because I enjoy the idea of covering broader topics; however, that doesn't mean having an article on each video game weapon or level. Third, by "target audience", I am refering to those who want to learn about a topic. We are not an advertisement service; we are here to educate, and our target audience is supposed to be those who want to learn, not those interested in purchasing an item. Just because we cover more material than other encyclopedias doesn't mean the goal has changed; that goal is to inform. Also, making Wikipedia a site full of reviews, every detail, and user-sumbitted POV analysis would certainly alienate those who want a succinct overview of a topic from a neutral, unbiased, scholarly perspective; we're not here to mislead them with user-submitted POV reviews and every minor detail about a topic. Now, Paddy, you see why my comment several threads above was a tangent to this spoiler warning discussion, and why this entire thread was created out of a tangent. (Like I said in that thread, "That wasn't necessarily in response to the spoilers; rather, it was a response to us being deemed an entertainment forum or database in general. — Deckiller 01:44, 17 May 2007 (UTC)") So this thread, a stretch on a clear tangent, was just crafted as a personal attack against me? In the future, if you want to make a personal response to a tangent, please comment on my talkpage or via e-mail; don't start a thread and cleverly try to stretch it back into the discussion to disguise a mild attack. &mdash; Deckiller 17:17, 21 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Deckiller was kind enough to post this on my talk page so, as its a tangent, I'll reply on his PaddyLeahy 18:08, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Who cares vs who accepts
Perhaps not the best header name...but one thing that crossed my mind. I think a LOT of people come to Wikipedia and see the warnings, so they assume the warnings are the way it's done -- not that they want/feel the need for them, simply think "Ok, so WP has spoiler warnings". I know that's how I initially felt. I wonder if we got rid of most/all the warnings, would people in general still feel like they are "needed"? Then again, perhaps WP has become too popular that the number of people who think WP is "supposed" to have them outweigh those who'd come and not even think about it upon reading articles without the tag. Just a thought, and I know I probably don't make too much sense there. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 12:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

PLEASE STOP EDIT WARRING
There is a discussion above. When it reaches a consensus, that will be the time to roll out your opinions into the encyclopedia. AndyJones 13:02, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

See, , ,.

Here is another one: --87.189.124.195


 * The only one I see who is engaged in an edit war is you. A consensus has been retched that redundant tags and tags on classical/historical works are completely unnecessary and can be removed. --Farix (Talk) 13:04, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * So I revert back and forth all by myself? Ok, I promise that I will never do that again. --87.189.124.195


 * The IP caught me interest because he/she was replacing spoiler tags on nursery rhymes. I consider that vandalism and disruption - and will treat it as such, unless anyone can make a coherent case for how a spoiler tag on Little Red Riding Hood or Cinderella improves the encyclopedia.--Docg 13:06, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You are picking your examples. I reverted a large number of changes which are currently discussed here. Sadly, when dealing with people disrupting Wikipedia you don't always have the luxary of judging each change by its merit, so not all your changes might be wrong.
 * So let's make a deal: I remove all spoiler tag on nursery rhymes you can point out and you revert any spoiler-related changes to any other article pointed out above. Will that work for you? --87.189.124.195
 * Like I suggested at your old IP, I suggest again that you don'r make changes you don't agree with. Hipocrite - &laquo; Talk &raquo; 13:14, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Like I answered then, reverting disruptive edits is something I support very much. --87.189.124.195
 * It's your reverts that are disruptive. These editors have seen a consensus form over the remove of spoiler tags that are clearly redundant or are clearly inappropriate. --Farix (Talk) 13:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * So you say doing mass edits while a heated discussion about a directly related policy is ongoing is non-disruptive? Do you think the warnings are so destructive to the articles that removing them could not have waited until the storm is over? --87.189.124.195
 * What I'm saying is that these two usages of the spoiler tag now has a consensus. Other usages of the tags are still being debated. But that doesn't mean that we must wait for all points have been settled before act on any settled point. --Farix (Talk) 13:48, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * That was understood. I still would like to here anyone's opinion about whether the edits should have been done during a lively debate about a policy directly involving the edits. --87.189.124.195
 * What aspect of inappropriate or redundant spoiler tags is still being debated? --Farix (Talk) 14:03, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Please answer my questions: Is doing mass edits while a heated discussion about a directly related policy is ongoing is non-disruptive? Do you think the warnings are so destructive to the articles that removing them could not have waited until the storm is over? Do you think the edits should have been done during a lively debate about a policy directly involving the edits? And a new one: Do you think the edits are completely independent of the discussion? --87.189.124.195
 * Depends on what is being discussed. If it is on a point were a rough consensus has been reached, even though other aspects of the policy or guideline are still being discussed, then it's not disruptive. If it is on a point that is still hotly contested by several editors, then it would be disruptive. But again, these two points have not being hotly contested by several editors. --Farix (Talk) 14:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't see that you understand the point. I suggested (several time) that these changes should wait to avoid heating up this discussion. Your point does not address that AT ALL, so please stop bringing it up again. (Also, again, see above for more opinions about spoiler tags in plot sections.)  --87.189.124.195


 * Replacing spoiler tags which we should assume were placed earlier by other editors in a good faith effort to improve the encyclopedia. Are you suggesting that these editors who originally placed the spoiler tags were all disruptive vandals?  What I find disruptive (though obviously not vandalism) is that people are making sweeping changes in line with their interpretation of a guideline that is being hotly debated.  I think the best thing for the encyclopedia would be to effectively freeze all the spoiler tags for a few days rather than making hundreds (thousands?) of speedy edits and reverts in the same period.  I'm suggesting that those of us involved in this discussion about spoiler tags should voluntarily refrain from adding or removing them from article space for a while.  I think this will help keep everyone calm and civil, in addition to making things a whole lot easier to sort out when a consensus is reached. — The Storm Surfer 13:51, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I do think a rough consensus has been reached on these two usages of the spoiler tag. Enough so that it has now been included in the spoiler warning guideline. So it's not disruptive or vandalism for editors to act on this rough consensus by do mass edits. However, it is disruptive for another editor to go around and revert these edits crying that, "More discussion is needed!" --Farix (Talk) 14:03, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * So in conclusion, because your point of view is TRUE, you can ignore repeated request to postpone trivial edits, can stamp concerns about the timing as unecessary and just go on with whatever you were doing. Ah, it must be nice to live in such a simple world! --87.189.124.195


 * Thank you. I see this was added with this edit, what, three hours ago? So it seems a little brisk to be accusing people reverting based on what they understood to be the guideline of being disruptive, especially if edits are not referring to the updated guideline. So, does anyone dispute that a consensus was reached on these issues: "not in plot sections", "not in classic works" (whatever that means), "not where the subject of much external debate". I think it is important to be seen to be forming consensus properly, to avoid developing even more ill will than there already is. I also agree that putting off these edits may help to reduce the apparent tension here. Why, indeed, is there such a desperate hurry to do this? Notinasnaid 14:19, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Their case must be very weak if they use tactics like this.
 * I can't find the section of /Talk the edit comment is referring to. Could someone please point it out? Could someone please revert the change until it is pointed out?
 * This is clearly trying to deceptivly establish a policy which is widely contestet, so could someone please mass-revert the changes pointed out above? --87.189.124.195
 * This very talk page is where the consensus has been established. The only one who has been contesting that redundant and inappropriately used spoiler tags should be removed has been yourself. --Farix (Talk) 14:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * So that must be why you claimed that the disruptive changes have nothing to do with this discussion! Care to explain why you should be taken serious in the future?
 * (Also, please unignore section "iffy spoilers" for some other voices on this.) --87.189.124.195
 * Hi, still here. — The Storm Surfer 16:38, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Got to agree with the keepers
Spoiler warnings are as natural and normal to the online medium as links and back buttons. We might as well scrap wikilinks, external links, see also and infoboxes, and anything else which doesn't appear in any paper encyclopedia. The fact that they are sometimes used on ancient plays or works especially known for their twist ending isn't a reason to scrap them entirely. Just exercise editorial judgement.

I don't see how the spoiler tags induces rambling plot summaries and other fanstuff; you only have to look at the articles which don't use it to see that this is not the case; Super Mario Bros. (TV series), or Mega Man X (video game), for example. The deleters confirmation bias would seem to be at work here, we had plenty of great articles which used it without any problems.

The use of spoiler tags on a plot section may seem redundant, but not everyone is familar with the customs of Wikipedia. If you saw a section entitled 'plot' in a newspaper, or a press release, or a magazine, not everyone would magically know whether it contained spoilers. The presumption that they should is not one we are qualified to make. The same goes for the facile arguments that 'well, everybody knows it' or 'I enjoyed it even though I knew the ending'. Personally, I'd be surprised if even a tenth of the world's population knew the ending for The Empire Strikes Back, or any of the other 'obvious ones'.

The link to the disclaimer is obviously not adequate, since much (most?) of Wikipedia's traffic comes straight from search engines. I find the view that 'they should read the small print' rather distasteful and thoroughly unWikipedian. As are the endless comments above about how 'stupid' people are who don't know how Wikipedia works. Spoiler tags are simply a normal (and necessary) aspect of online life.-- Nydas (Talk) 14:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how the argument to delete the policy (and template) can possibly hold water. Killing the template *removes information*, and is a one-way (permanent) operation. Consider the four options: those that want warnings get them, those that do not want warnings get them, those that want warnings do not get them, and those that do not want warnings do not get them. Two of the cases are "happy" -- people get what they want. So consider the "unhappy" cases. If those that do not want warnings get them anyway, they can follow the guidelines at the end of WP:SW and turn them off -- one action and they'll never see them again. After taking that action, they will always be a "happy" case. However, if those that want warnings do not get them, they cannot unlearn the information they have read, and will continue to learn things they did not want to know without recourse every time they read a spoily article. I for one will be much less likely to read about books/movies/TV shows/games on WP if I know that half the time it will spoil the experience for me -- why drive away potential WP readers for the sake of "style"? 144.51.111.1 15:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Killing the template removes, in 99.9% of cases, original research. (Let me be clear: I'm not saying that "Macbeth dies" is original research; I'm saying "'Macbeth dies' is a spoiler" is original research.) As for "you can't unlearn it," that argument hardly applies only to plot spoilers.  Do we put warnings on articles on evolution, because the information therein may be upsetting to creationists, and once they read it they can't unlearn it? Chuck 15:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * OK, "original research" being WP-ese for "your unfounded opinion," I can basically agree with that. BUT, there are other cases where you pretty much have to make a decision on incomplete information, see WP:SENSE.  I find it disingenuous of some people on this page to suggest that "Bruce Willis is already dead" is manifestly not spoily -- would the same information on the day after the film's release have been "common knowledge" or "obvious"?  If you agree that it would not, then should the spoiler tag go away after some set time?  How long?  What's the threshold where "enough" people know it to make it un-spoily?  Yes, all those questions can only be answered by "original research".  But it's beside the point -- should we force the admittedly-small segment of WP readers who don't know it to choose between enjoying the movie as it was meant to be enjoyed or reading the WP article about it first?  I'm not denying that some degree of personal opinion is involved in deciding what is and is not spoily.  I'm not even denying that this aspect of the problem may detract from the overall encyclopedic nature of WP.  I'm saying obey WP:IAR -- if inserting a tiny bit of opinion ("original research") makes WP more enjoyable to more people, enjoyability ("improvement" per IAR) wins hands-down. 144.51.111.1 16:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Spoiler warnings are no more original research than any logical section grouping in a Wikipedia article. Should we scrap 'Early life' sections in biographies, for example? It's purely a question of style, and for an online encyclopedia, it's a basic requirement.-- Nydas (Talk) 17:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Many readers come to a Wikipedia article about a book or film because they are considering reading it or going to see it. They are looking for a review, which should never spoil the viewer/reader's enjoyment by giving away the facts which the author intended to come out only at a certain point near the end. In contrast an essay which analyzes the work will in fact give away the ending, unmask the villain, and reveal the gimmick. Spoiler warnings are extremely valuable in a review. They are not needed in an essay, if the reader is warned at the top (not in some distant unread policy page) that an essay is what he is reading. The pest who seeks to spoil another's enjoyment of a book or movie by revealing the ending is a classic comic figure in radio and TV shows going back to the golden age of radio and I Love Lucy. Spoilage is the intentional depriving of a reader or viewer seeing the storyline unfold as the author intended, with suspense about the outcome. There are jokes about someone seeing another reading a mystery novel and saying "The butler did it." It is a form of intellectual vandalism. Movie reviewers are careful not to similarly ruin the enjoyment of the work. Essayists are not.  Yes, one can watch a movie or read a book more than once, but the subsequent times are different and the first time is special. If a work has a "gimmick" as one critic in the Psycho article described that film, or in "Sixth Sense" or any other work of M. Night Shymalan, then revealing it to someone who thinks he is reading a review is as objectionable as the "SNAPES KILLS DUMBLEDORE."  If we function as a review, the a spoiler warning is highly appropriate. If we function as an essay, then a disclaimer at the top of every page is required for articles about fictional works. Edison 16:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia articles are neither reviews nor essays; they are (at least in the ideal) encyclopedia articles. As such, one would expect the full plot to be described, at least in a sufficiently detailed encyclopedia article on a work.  The "warning" you seek at the top of each page already exists, in the upper left, where the site logo says "Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia," which should alert readers to the fact that they are reading an encyclopedia, not a review site, nor an essay site. Chuck 16:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Jesus, this is getting old already. Saying "this is an encyclopedia and therefore there will be spoilers" is the bluntest of all possible instruments.  It does not address the argument that spoiler tags make WP more useful (and therefore better) by allowing for more precise isolation of spoily content.  If you think making WP more useful to more people is not a worthy goal, please defend that point of view. 144.51.111.1 16:42, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Making WP more useful is a worthy goal, but not the only goal of Wikipedia, and it must be balanced with other goals, such as, say, being an encyclopedia. If making WP more useful were the only goal we had, we would include things like reviews of restaurants and hotels and places of interest such as Wikitravel does, for those surely would also make Wikipedia more useful to readers.  But Wikitravel allows, even encourages original research, which is not appropriate for an encyclopedia, no matter how useful it would make it. Chuck 16:53, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Always remember, the readers are less important than the status of what they're reading. Applemask 16:53, 20 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Chuck beat me to the punch, I'll reiterated his point that Wikipedia is not a review site and anyone who comes to Wikipedia to reads an article for that propose of reading a review is coming here for the wrong reasons.


 * I'll also point out that Wikipedia is not censored, so we have absolutely no obligations to protect readers from spoilers. A spoiler warning is simply a courtesy, but it is a courtesy that we are not required to give. The problem comes when a small minority of editors treats the courtesy as an obligation. --Farix (Talk) 16:43, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * "I find it disingenuous of some people on this page to suggest that "Bruce Willis is already dead" is manifestly not spoily" - On that much we agree, and I'm disappointed to see people making that argument (along with its cousin, "well, I don't care if I know all about a movie going in, so no one else should either"), because it does not support the anti-spoiler-warning position. I do agree that such information is "spoilery."  My argument is that people who don't want to be spoiled for The Sixth Sense shouldn't read an encyclopedia article about The Sixth Sense.  No, wait - my argument is stronger than that.  It's not just that people who don't want to be spoiled shouldn't read the article; it's that people who don't want to be spoiled won't read the article.  For all the hand-wringing along the lines of "oh, those poor people who will have a movie ruined because Wikipedia spoiled it for them," is there one single example anywhere of someone who claims that a movie/book/etc. was ruined for them because they read an untagged Wikipedia article, not expecting to be spoiled, and were?  I haven't seen any.  OTOH, we have had several people on this page (allegedly arguing in support of spoiler warnings) say, "well, if we remove spoiler tags, I won't read articles on works I don't want to be spoiled for," to which I respond, "Yes!!  That's exactly what you should be doing!!  And you should be doing it now, even with spoiler warnings, since there's no guarantee that every article which ought to have a spoiler warning will have one!"  I wanted to remain unspoiled for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, so--I know this will surprise and astound some people--I didn't read the article on Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince until I had read the book (and I didn't read it until it came out in paperback, so I had to remain unspoiled longer than many).  I didn't load the article and scan it to see whether it had spoiler warnings, and then assume that sections of the article without spoiler warnings were safe for me to read--I didn't read the article, period, which is the common-sense thing to do if one wants to remain unspoiled. Chuck 16:48, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Why the IPs
I find it somewhat disturbing that the RfC was closed when the vast majority of 'keep' comments were unregistered IPs. Why are we particularly paying attention to these anons when trying to form policy? Not to argue the veracity of their arguments, just the impetus of these arguments. David Fuchs( talk / frog blast the vent core! ) 15:03, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Yeah I noticed that to - IPs or newly registered users - do they know that they're votes usually don't count? daniel  folsom  15:06, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Especially since some appear to only be making a point- 87.189.124.195, for instance, has only participated on this page and in adding spoilers to various articles. David Fuchs( talk / frog blast the vent core! ) 15:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * This is seems to be getting pretty Ad Hominem, but is easily foiled: I get a new IP address every time I login. --87.189.124.195
 * So in other words you still do nothing else but argue for spoilers. Your contribs suggest nothing to the contrary. David Fuchs( talk / frog blast the vent core! ) 15:28, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * No, in other words, you don't know what dynamic IP addresses are. Do I make the impression to be a newbie? --87.189.124.195
 * Yes, seeing as you do not create an account. David Fuchs( talk / frog blast the vent core! ) 15:34, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * If this is your entire definition of a newbie than I guess I am. --87.189.124.195
 * Whether you are or are not a newbie, there is no way for us to know that you are not. Your contribs are dedicated solely to this debate/subject, and you are an unregistered IP.  Everything we have to go on says that you are a newbie, and a single-purpose account at that.  You are asking us to take your word that you are not, and we simply can't because any newbie can read a few policies and claim to have been editing a while with different IP's than the one they are using now.  This is why we have registered accounts, to track edits that are done despite what IP is used.  This way, someone can see that you have been editing for a long time, and we can take you seriously.  But without that type of verification, we can't.  --&mdash; Δαίδαλος  Σ  Σ  16:19, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Whatever, just ignore my person, read my arguments and answer them. --87.189.99.112

I do not have an account because I don't feel the need to create one just to read articles, and I rarely if ever edit them. I would like to strongly suggest that the outcome of this debate has much greater impact on the silent majority (those who read WP articles but do not write/edit them) than on those who care enough to create and account and create/edit articles. 144.51.111.1 15:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I point to my little paragraph above. I think quite a lot of the silent majority only expect spoilers because they are here. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 15:55, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Here's the thing: we clearly cannot come to a consensus on who thinks one way or another. So see my little paragraph above -- without regard to how many people want to keep or want to delete, the damage done by deleting is manifestly much greater than the damage done by keeping, unless I have missed a significant argument pro-deletion.  All the pro-deletion arguments I have seen have leaned on either consensus or a "style"/"un-encyclopedic" issue, which all flies in the face of WP:IAR.144.51.111.1 16:29, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Wait a second - you want a consensus? How bout the delete votes nearly doubling the keep votes in the above vote. daniel  folsom  21:23, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * "The damage done" is purely your hypothetical personal estimation of the damage. We have yet to see a single instance of anyone reporting having a work ruined for them because they read an untagged spoiler in Wikipedia.  I assert that there would be no damage done, as people have the common sense (even with spoiler warnings!) not to read an article about a work they don't want spoiled.  Of course, neither of us has any evidence to back up our claims, but it is disingenuous to present your estimation of damage, with no evidentiary support therefor, as if it were established fact. Chuck 17:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh, come on, now. If someone has their enjoyment of a work ruined by Wikipedia, what do you think are the odds that they're going to write it down in some place you can reference? Ken Arromdee 17:57, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, if he became aware of a discussion on Wikipedia about whether Wikipedia should include spoiler warnings, I think the odds are quite high that he would report his story there, since he of all people should support the use of spoiler warnings. Yet here we are. Chuck 18:01, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I can be reasonably certain that most Wikipedia readers are not aware of this discussion. I myself am only here because I happened to be reading MfD when someone listed the guideline page.  — The Storm Surfer 18:10, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Come on. You want a report? That's happened to me, personally, several times just recently, the last time with Big Dumb Object revealing the point of Report on an unidentified space station. What reason would I, or anyone else, have to write it down? Additionally, for a subject as huge as this, there's been very few informing going on. I am only here because I happened to look deeper into the matter when I noticed that had changed. --Kizor 23:41, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

To correct a misnomer, this RfC has not been closed. Only the preceding MfD has been closed because it is no longer active, but people were still !voting under the impression that the guideline was up for deletion. --Farix (Talk) 16:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

The great thing about this not being a vote is that the anonymous users either have cogent arguments or don't, and there's no need to worry about who they are. — The Storm Surfer 17:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)