Do you now that according to The Independent we have "approved Wikipedia committee members"? The Independent managed to call an IP user so. [1] May anyone contact and correct them? http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/wikipedia-spr…

I'm really puzzled how they managed to get the description of the Wikimedia community so wrong, considering that talked to them on the phone about this on Friday afternoon and thought that I'd explained this to them. A bit of basic fact-checking should have shown up the non-existance of a "Wikipedia committee" (and, of course, the existence of the "online encyclopedia that anyone can edit" bit...).

On Sun, Aug 29, 2010 at 6:29 PM, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> wrote:

> I ask again: if the case came to you that one side was saying "we must > do this to the article because someone with a financial interest asked > us to" and the other was saying "we are an encyclopedia and this is an > NPOV issue", what would your thinking be on the matter?

Sure, there may be a financial interest, but there can be an altruistic motivation as well. I agree we are an encyclopedia and need to include the ending, but I'm not convinced that spoiler *notices* are a NPOV issue because NPOV applies to the article text, not to disclaimers. For both the Stig issue and this one, there is (or will be, depending on a court case) coverage of this in reliable sources, so presumably the articles now mention this in some fashion, and that will serve as a de facto spoiler warning within the text of the article (as long as it appears before the ending or identity is revealed). In both cases, there has been independent commentary and coverage of the "secrecy" aspect of this, so saying within the article that XYZ have objected to the ending/identity being reveled, is a requirement of NPOV.

Carcharoth wrote: You've noted that "requests from Wikipedia editors and readers to add spoiler notices wouldn't count," and this only accentuates the problem. How would providing special treatment to a representative of an article's subject constitute a neutral approach? You referred to this as a "BLP-like exception," but I see nothing analogous. We address legitimate complaints by ensuring that biographies of living persons comply with our normal content standards. We don't honor requests to include special text (such as a warning that the article includes material that its subject dislikes).

Reading the article as it appeared on 26 July 2010, [1] there is an entire section called "Identity of the murderer"... If I did not want to learn the identity of the murderer, I would have skipped over this section.* That's what I did for years before I became an editor. If I suspected a section would contain spoilers, I skipped it. When looking up books I plan to read, I still do this. That's one of the reasons for sections - they can allow readers to quickly find just the info they are looking for. I can look up Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows [2], and if I didn't want a spoiler but wanted to read about pricing problems, there is a section in the Table of Contents, right at the top, called "Price wars and other controversies". This allows me to bypass the "Synopsis" section, including the subsections "Plot introduction" and "Plot summary". Perhaps this is not the way everyone reads, but I think context clues can give their own warning to the reader. I'm also not sure if there are any articles out there that have spoilers under a section you might not expect them to be. For example, I wouldn't expect to find a spoiler under the "Release date" section. But I also can't think of a good reason why it would be there anyways, and it should probably be moved to the plot section(s). Just my two cents. :) -User:Avicennasis [1]

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Potter_and_the_Deathly_Hallows *A quick glance did not show this information to be listed in any other section, however I did not read the whole article word for word to double-check. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

I can't believe this idea is being seriously presented. We are an Encyclopedia. That is one of the Five Pillars ([[WP:5P]]). The job of a comprehensive encyclopedia is to facilitate access to information in an efficient manner. Putting extra barriers in front of that means you

looking at it as a comprehensive encyclopedia, which we are, but as TV

(or Playbill, in this case) which we are decidedly not. You want a

You want a hook? Go read a preview. You want to read an encyclopedic

about the subject/play/episode/whatever? Congratulations, you've come to

right place. We aren't here to protect you from the big bad world, we're here to

information. If that information is made harder to get, then someone

made a mistake. -Brock On Mon, Aug 30, 2010 at 8:58 AM, Carcharoth <carcharothwp(a)googlemail.com wrote: > That is very helpful. I wonder if there is room to suggest this in > some guideline somewhere on how editors should set up the titles of > sections in articles to aid not just readers reading through the > article from beginning to end, but to aid readers looking at the > contents and selecting (or omitting) bits they don't want to read. You > could even (though this is a bit silly) provide the option for people > to "hide" sections and then read the whole page and not have to beware > of scrolling down too far. It wouldn't be a default option, I don't > think, but people could have some optional overlay that would give > them the option to select (or omit) bits of the article to create a > customised article for them to read. > > Carcharoth > > On Mon, Aug 30, 2010 at 5:51 PM, Shane Simmons <avicennasis(a)gmail.com> > wrote: > >> Actually, I'd like to read the article about the play without finding > >> out the ending. Is that an unreasonable thing to ask? > > > > Reading the article as it appeared on 26 July 2010, [1] there is an > > entire section called "Identity of the murderer"... If I did not want > > to learn the identity of the murderer, I would have skipped over this > > section.* That's what I did for years before I became an editor. If I > > suspected a section would contain spoilers, I skipped it. When looking > > up books I plan to read, I still do this. > > > > That's one of the reasons for sections - they can allow readers to > > quickly find just the info they are looking for. I can look up Harry > > Potter and the Deathly Hallows [2], and if I didn't want a spoiler but > > wanted to read about pricing problems, there is a section in the Table > > of Contents, right at the top, called "Price wars and other > > controversies". This allows me to bypass the "Synopsis" section, > > including the subsections "Plot introduction" and "Plot summary". > > > > Perhaps this is not the way everyone reads, but I think context clues > > can give their own warning to the reader. > > > > I'm also not sure if there are any articles out there that have > > spoilers under a section you might not expect them to be. For example, > > I wouldn't expect to find a spoiler under the "Release date" section. > > But I also can't think of a good reason why it would be there anyways, > > and it should probably be moved to the plot section(s). > > > > Just my two cents. :) > > -User:Avicennasis > > > > [1] >

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On 30 August 2010 17:58, Carcharoth <carcharothwp(a)googlemail.com> wrote:

> You could even (though this is a bit silly) provide the option for people > to "hide" sections and then read the whole page and not have to beware > of scrolling down too far. It wouldn't be a default option, I don't > think, but people could have some optional overlay that would give > them the option to select (or omit) bits of the article to create a > customised article for them to read.

We already have something similar on the mobile site, for different reasons admittedly. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mousetrap I'm sure it would be easy enough to make an option or a gadget on the main site, if anyone really wanted it

Whether a part of an article is a spoiler or not (and it's certainly not

black & white issue) is an interesting bit of metadata to add. There's a variety of ways to display this information in an article -- collapsible paragraphs, a "spoiler warning" alert, white on white text, etc. Any of these display methods could have a "enough with the spoiler warnings" or "don't hide plot points from me anymore" -- that's just a UI point. Of course, it's a little late for that now. All that information was removed. Too bad.

How do you objectively and neutrally determine what is and isn't a spoiler?