Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Wikipedia policies and guidelines/Wikipedia:Spoiler warning/Precedents

"But normal encyclopaedias ..."
There's one recurrent fallacy in the above discussion that needs clearing up right now. That is the compound fallacy of what "normal" or "traditional" encyclopaedias are and what they do, used as a basis for further arguments. The fallacy has been expressed in several ways: Traditional encyclopaedias don't have articles on films or other works of fiction. Traditional encyclopaedias might discuss Henry V or Moby Dick but won't have articles on 20th and 21st century works. Normal encyclopaedias don't discuss pop culture.

The difference between these encyclopaedias and Wikipedia is not that they are "traditional" and "normal" and we are not. Those adjectives are entirely the wrong distinction to be making. The difference is that they are proprietary, whereas Wikipedia is free content. Proprietary encyclopaedias can be as modern as Wikipedia, and cover the ground that Wikipedia covers.

Encyclopaedias such as Britannica and Encarta are proprietary encyclopaedias, but they are far from the being the only proprietary encyclopaedias in the world. Wikipedia is both a general-purpose and specialist encyclopaedia. As such, comparisons in this discussion should not be solely with the likes ofBritannica and Encarta. There are plenty of specialized proprietary encyclopaedias that do have articles on works of fiction, and on recent ones at that. There is no shortage of encyclopaedias of film that one can find listed in the catalogues of one's favourite library or bookstore, for example. There's even an encyclopaedia of popular culture.

I have a proprietary encyclopaedia lying open beside the keyboard as I type this. It is Science Fiction: The Illustrated Encyclopaedia (ISBN 0751302023). It has individual articles on The Uplift War, Hyperion, Neuromancer, The Difference Engine Queen of Angels, Red Mars, Feersum Endjinn, A Fire Upon the Deep, and quite a few other recent works of fiction.

It also has an article on Ender's Game, where the twist in the tale is an integral part of any analysis of that novel that needs expounding right at the start (as demonstrated by this article in Computer, this piece in the New York Times, and this article in Communications of the ACM all relating the novel to real life). Our article contains a spoiler warning. Clute's has none, and gives away the twist to the tale in the second sentence. Uncle G 20:44, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't know about anyone else, but I was under the impression that the argument was that "normal encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings" and Uncle G seems to have proven that correct. Axem Titanium 21:00, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * This is a compelling argument, and it has swayed my opinion somewhat. The argument "normal encyclopedias don't use spoiler warnings" has been used before, but it seemed irrelevant to me. Normal encyclopedias don't have such extensive links either. However, the comparison to specialized encyclopedias is better. Wikipedia is like all the specialized encyclopedias put together, and has features a general-use encyclopedia doesn't. So what is the precedent in an encyclopedia of film? I would imagine it is like your science fiction encyclopedia - no spoiler alerts. TK421 21:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * More to the point, how much stock should we put by "precedent"? 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. --Kizor 21:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I see your point, but there must be a limit somewhere. We can't be Fancruftpedia or Everyforumpedia, we must be an encyclopedia and it looks like the only difference between Wikipedia and other encyclopedias is the ability for anyone to change it (for better or for worse). Our motto is "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit", which implies that we do everything an encyclopedia does with the only difference being it's open. Thus, we should follow the example of professional encyclopedias rather than the decidedly unprofessional internet forum mentality. Axem Titanium 22:07, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Uncle G's comments is strongly convening me that spoiler tags should not be in Wikipedia articles. Of course I already knew that specialized media encyclopedias did not include any such "spoiler warnings." The thing that Uncle G's made me realizes is that spoiler warnings are a courtesy that is almost exclusive to the internet—and from what I understand, born from Usenet. You won't fine such courtesy warnings outside of the internet.


 * Somewhere around the house, I have a Star Trek Companion stuffed in a box, and I don't every recall coming across any spoiler warnings even though the books give details and trivial of every original series Star Trek episode. The publisher didn't include any warnings about plot details because they were being rude to people who may have seen most of the episodes, but not all of them. But they assumed that if you read the article about a particular episode, then you didn't care if you were going to be spoiled or not. The same philosophy goes for the set of Star Wars RPG sourcebooks that I own that are based on the novels. And that same philosophy also applies to Wikipedia articles on fictional works. --Farix (Talk) 22:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I find Uncle G's example quite compelling and illustrative of the issues at hand. JavaTenor 00:26, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * As do I, in defense of spoiler tags. There are general-purpose encyclopedias, which do not go into spoilery detail or do so only when necessary, and there are specialist encyclopedias, which can assume that its readers know or want to know the details. Wikipedia, can be (and is, and I say should be) both on fiction. This is entirely due to spoiler tags, and this seems to be the reason behind spoiler tags. We're not the Star Trek Companion, but neither are we Encyclopedia Britannica. Several people have advanced the opinion on this page that spoiler tags are not needed because spoilers are segregated to their own sections, but even if that was so, the spoiler tags are the cause of this segregation. End use of spoiler tags, and as soon as it can no longer be reasonably expected for an article on fiction to have its plot spoilers separate from the rest, Wikipedia's entire coverage of fiction becomes restricted to the specialist model. (That can't help cruft any, either!) --Kizor 01:32, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Spoiler warnings are a relic of Usenet. All articles on Wikipedia are expected to cover the material at the specialist level. In essence, Wikipedia is meant to be specialist on everything, not a general use encyclopedia. If we take that into consideration, then it becomes clear that spoiler warnings are being used as a crutch to avoid this process of specialization. Cruft is an entirely different issue pursued by an entirely different set of people. A specialist level of detail about a subject does not entail cruft in the least (see Characters of Final Fantasy VIII, for example). Axem Titanium 01:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I did not mean that specialism entails cruft. I aim to provide counter-examples by my own editing all the time. I meant (as a bit of a throw-away line, hence the exclamation mark) that specialism-only articles must attract at least as much cruft as general & specialism articles. For the record it's 5 AM in here, again, so my further responses until I rest will have to be sporadic at best. --Kizor 01:51, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I've now gone through WP:NOT, Encyclopedia, WP:CRUFT, the "writing about fiction" part of WP:MOS and Foundation issues, and still can't find where it says that Wikipedia must not be used as a general purpose encyclopedia. Update: Five Pillars says quite the opposite: "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia incorporating elements of general encyclopedias, specialized encyclopedias, and almanacs." I hate to quote the rules at people, but I can't see where you got the idea. --Kizor 02:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You also won't find spoiler warnings in any general encyclopedia either. But none of those things you cited also says that a spoiler warning is needed or required. I would like to point out No disclaimer templates. This guideline tells us not to use disclaimer templates on articles, which a spoiler warning templates are a form of disclaimer templates. --Farix (Talk) 03:05, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Did you happen to notice that No disclaimer templates explicitly allows spoiler warnings? Ken Arromdee 15:02, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I've always interpreted that to mean a specialized encyclopedia with a general encyclopedia's breadth of coverage. Axem Titanium 02:50, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually, normal encyclopedias don't provide plot summaries at all. So they are of mixed use here. The better statement than "normal encyclopedias don't have spoiler warnings" is probably "normal encyclopedias don't use neologisms in the course of their basic presentation." Phil Sandifer 04:19, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree with Phil (which does nto preclude wanting 99.9% of spoiler warnings out) ad I completely agree with Uncle G, as usual, and I have read most of those books, and the examples are sound. The fact that I cannot personally think of a single article in which a spoiler warning is appropriate does not mean they should never be used, but it is clear from looking at the lists of spoiler warnings that the vast majority - almost all - are either redundant (in a section called plot) or patently ludicrous (Three Little Pigs and Jack and the beanstalk being two particularly priceless gems here).  All of which adds nothing, so I should add an  tag I guess. Guy (Help!) 18:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * If someone Googles a movie and sees the Wikipedia article near the top and clicks on it looking for a REVIEW of the movie to decide whether to watch it, they are sure to be annoyed if they see a spoiler in the first couple of sentences, which would decrease their enjoyment of the work. Someone claimed that the word Encyclopedia" in the upper left hand part of the Wikipedia page was a sufficient disclaimer. I strongly disagree. It is in tiny type and in italics. Most online writings about a movie are reviews, and the user should be warned that this is not. Any fiction work with a "gimmick" or plot twist deserves a spoiler warning in some form, since users may come to it from a Google search and not be aware that Wikipedia claims to be an encyclopedia. I looked at Encyclopedia Americana for the article on the film Psycho to see how they handle the plot gimmick. Guess what? No article. Real encyclopedias probably mention many movies and books somewhere, but they do not imitate online databases whith the plethora of fan written articles that we do. So maybe someone's "Science Fiction Encyclopedia" contains unwarned spoilers; the user knows what he is reading, and if he has read a couple of the entries knows to expecet spoilage. People come to a Wikipedia article out of the blue and can reasonably expect it not to be spoilerpedia, at least without some prominent and unmissable warning. At the same time, I would hate to see articles of the type that might be in a real encyclopedia, such as an analysis of Hamlet, have "spoiler" warnings. I would restrict them to recent pop culture of movies and thriller novels. I can live with no warning on the article for the 1960 "Psycho" while having a small one on the recent "The Village." Edison 19:41, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I see that both Phil Sandifer and Edison are still repeating the fallacy. Proprietary encyclopaedias do discuss plots of works of fiction, and do have articles on movies and books. If one doesn't think that they do, then that is a result of one not being familiar with enough proprietary encyclopaedias. It is not the case in actual fact. And any editor who erroneously thinks that the word "encyclopaedia" is "in tiny type and in italics" when one does a Google Web search for something, needs to perform a Google Web search and remind themselves of what they actually see on the very search results page itself when a Wikipedia article is one of the results. Uncle G 00:36, 19 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Paper encyclopedias which do cover popular culture topics have no spoiler warnings because it's expected that only people who don't need or don't want to be spoiled will use them. Someone who doesn't know who Valen is and wants to find out by watching episodes just isn't in the target audience for a Babylon 5 encyclopedia in the first place; it's expected that anyone who reads the encyclopedia doesn't mind or already knows the spoilers.  Wikipedia is aimed at a *general* audience, and must cover a wide range of readers, both Babylon 5 fans who know very well who Valen is, and people new to Babylon 5.  It cannot limit its audience like the B5 encyclopedia does.  Ken Arromdee 15:23, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Other warnings
There are no profanity warnings. There are no sexually descriptive warnings. There are no violence warnings. There are no nudity warnings. But there are spoiler warnings. Things that are outright banned or restricted in many forms of media in many places... are not warned. Yet spoilers, something I don't think are banned or restricted in anything except Internet discussion... are warned. Can you understand the illogic here? I have seen the argument that spoilers are different - you can't forget spoilers. That's an outright lie. For a child to see violent content, it can give him or her nightmares, emotional trauma. Let's make it clear here: spoilers are objectionable, sexual/violent/profane content is objectionable. They are ultimately no different. It's time to adhere to the principle created by more "reputable" subjects of Wikipedia.--Teggles 05:06, 18 May 2007 (UTC)