G'day Steve,
On 6/10/06, Jesse W jessw@netwood.net wrote:
You would not see that in the Encyclopedia of Late 20th Century American Television? Really? Or do you mean in any "general" encyclopedia. Because certainly, Wikipedia reaches the level of a specialized encyclopedia in a number of areas, like television shows - but (I hope), we don't go too much beyond that.
I still find it hard to imagine a specialised encyclopaedia listing all the couch gags in Simpsons episodes, or detailed plot summaries with "quotes" for every episode of Futurama or "Clerks: The Animated Series" etc etc. If someone can prove me wrong, go for it.
While still at school, I ran across a /Star Trek: The Next Generation/ encyclopaedia (it was in the school library, believe it or not). It included descriptions of all characters and their history (that is, their real-world history[0] ... how the show's creators went about recruiting actors, how they'd originally envisioned the characters[1], etc.
There was also a detailed listing of all TNG episodes, with plot summary, credits, a very short review, interesting technical details, and occasionally a photograph. At the end was a detailed "making of" of /Generations/, since that film had just been released, or was about to be released, at the time of publication.
I think this qualifies as a specialist encyclopaedia, and I don't see a problem with Wikipedia including analogous content --- provided we keep in mind that a) it has to be relevant to people who don't already know heaps about TNG, and b) it has to stay neutral and not be packed with fan theories and other such crud.
[0] I think a lot of our fiction articles could be dramatically improved by taking a real-world approach: "here is what this fictional entity should look like to people who aren't wrapped up in the fictional universe". Our /Doctor Who/ articles largely get this right; our /Star Wars/ and particularly /Gundam/ articles often don't. As a Trekkie, I haven't bothered looking at our /Star Trek/ collection, for fear it would only depress me.
Compare [[Light saber]] with [[Dalek]]. Then choose any Gundam article at random, and marvel at the statistics presented therein, instantly forgetting any criticisms you may have had for [[Light saber]].
[1] There was a lot of emphasis on Captain Picard being French, and why he stayed that way even after Patrick Stewart, the most British British actor the Brits have produced, was cast to play him.