Wikipedia talk:Television episodes/Archive 1

message: Note: a year-old discussion of this very topic can be found here. The situation has changed a bit since then; certianly we probably have a few thousand more episodes than we did then, but much of it is still relevent. I guess if anyone wants to reiterate or address points from that discussion here, cutting and pasting parts might be the way to go. Also note several people involved in that discussion are no longer active wikipedians. -R. fiend 17:44, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

message: My default inclusion criteria is and always has been "If a full-length article could reasonably be written about a topic without resorting to trivial, unverifiable, or unencyclopedic information, then it should have an article."  I have never written an article on a TV episode, but I do consider them to be encyclopedic.  Things to consider:
**1 Huge audience TV episodes are often watched by millions of people and, like 'em or not, are a part of our culture.
**2 Movie precedent We generally keep all but the most obscure theatrical movies.  Why should we allow a movie that's been seen by, say, 500,000 people but not a TV episode seen by 5 million?
**3 Natural extension of show main articles Obviously, when writing a quality article about a TV series, episode-guide information is very likely to be included.  However, unless a show has just a few episodes, keeping this in the main article is space-prohibitive.  If we have 400 articles on Star Trek episides, can you imagine what it would look like if all those episodes had even just a paragraph each in the Star Trek article?  It would be like a book!
**4 Information value Unlike an article on a garage band or forum member, TV episode articles appeal to readers and are a source of information which is actually useful to a sizeable number of people.  Imagine missing a favourite TV show and being able to find a synopsis almost instantly on WP, with nary a popup or Flash advert getting in the way.  Also, this information makes WP accessable to a broader readership base, who might not otherwise think of looking at an online encyclopedia.  Articles, ultimately, are for readers.
That sums up my feelings in the matter.  Please note that I'm generally discussing fictional TV here.  I don't necessarily think that game shows, newscasts, magazine shows, sportscasts, or shows like Trading Spaces should have per-episode articles.  I welcome any and all feedback whether you agree or disagree with me. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 11:48, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Of course, on-line, they'll only find it if they look for it. Better to have a biography of George Washington that no-one has to read if they don't want to, than not to have one that people might look for... Trollderella 20:57, 10 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Arguments for a generally inclusionist stance towards television episodes

message: Okay, I'll start this one.  SoCriteria to determine which episodes are notable enough for inclusionNme reasons that I would consider as indications that a single episode might be notable enough for its own article (most or all of these are subjective, and would depend on consensus of editors):
*People who do not regularly follow the series are aware of the episode. (e.g., "Who Shot J.R.?"
*The episode remains highly controversial among fans of the show after an extended period (years, probably) (e.g. Never Again on The X-files).
*The episode is controversial outside the show's fan base for some reason (e.g. Murphy Brown vs. Dan Quayle).
*The episode is widely remembered as an exemplar of the show, or as a particular high point or low point, years after it first aired, and preferably including people who are not part of the show's regular fan base (e.g., the death of Chuckles the Clown on The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
*The series had a very limited run (probably less than one year), but continues to have a significant cult following long after it left the air. (On the other hand, in that situation it might be reasonable simply to include episode summaries within the main series article.)
Those are off the top of my head. Brandon39 00:18, 21 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Absolutely on the reduncancy - no one in their right mind would advocate separating out first tier articles until it gets big enough, but that's the same with all articles. Trollderella 00:22, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Notability is always subjective - that's the problem. I don't entirely see why a policy is needed, especially as the "guidelines" on the others did not have enough support to make it policy. Trollderella 00:19, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, like everything else, TV programs are notable to some people, not to others. Trollderella 23:30, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

text: *That's ridiculous.  There's a better case for no TV episodes are worthy of articles than every episode.  Bear Sturgeon's Revelation in mind.  At most 10% of all TV episodes ever are worthy of articles; the actual number's probably three or four orders of magnitude lower. The Literate Engineer 05:14, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Is every primary school that was ever built worthy of inclusion by virtue of the fact that it was created? Is every person that was ever born worthy of inclusion by virtue of the fact that they lived? Where do you stop with an argument like that? Bandraoi 10:38, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Precisely.  Anything that exists or has existed deserves an article.  Trollderella's comment below is correct, except for the comment about original research--there is nothing wrong with including original research if it is indeed true, policy to the contrary notwithstanding.  Kurt Weber 13:31, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

text: You stop when you run out of verifiable, factual information that is not original research. For most people there is actually very little of that type of information. Trollderella 20:26, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: As pointed out elsewhere, we have for years been removing verifiable and factual information from the encyclopedia, by deleting articles on non-notable subjects and trimming text out of articles for the sake of readability and conciseness. What you are proposing is a radical overhaul of the Wikipedia project. Since our content is licensed under GFDL, you are free to start your own fork-wiki if you think Wikipedia's basic practices need a major revamp. Andrew Levine 02:00, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

text: Actually, I cannot find anything in the project policies to support your contention. It is true that people do delete articles for a range of reasons not supported by policy. That is a shame. I'm not proposing a radical overhaul, simply that we follow our own policies. Take a read - they're quite clear! Trollderella 04:40, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

text: While Sturgeon's Revelation is a universal truth, I'm not sure whether we can use it as a basis for developing criteria of worthiness.  After all, the same principle could be applied to novels, or albums, or any other artistic endeavor.  I don't see anyone saying that only 10% of works produced in those media are worthy of articles. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 05:22, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Notability Criteria

message: I would think that regardless of where one stands on the merits of individual episode articles in general--disregarding those who feel that there should be no episode summaries at all, I suppose--it should be possible to develop broad guidelines that can be used to help determine which series are more or less worthy of being developed down to the level of individual episode summaries. Some quick ideas that I had:
*Hour-long shows are more worthy of individual episode summaries than half-hour shows. Not the most intuitive idea for a guideline, perhaps, but episode length serves as a stand-in for many other qualities. Half-hour shows are usually comedies, which by nature are more ephemeral than dramas and depend a lot less on the details of the plot to make them what they are. No episode summary article will ever truly communicate the Chinese restaurant episode of Seinfeld, because the more descriptive you try to be, the more you just end up sucking the life out of it. Lastly, half-hour shows contain 22 minutes of content at most--there's just a lot less there to justify an entire article.
*Shows with stand-alone episodes are more worthy of individual episode summaries than shows that use story arcs. An episode of CSI is easy to summarize: a story is set up, developed, and resolved in one hour. By contrast, what do you do with an episode of ER that ties up a couple of loose ends from last season, drives this season's main dramatic arc forward slightly, tosses out a couple of inconsequential subplots, and introduces a minor character who will be crucial in setting up a major late-season storyline but whose significance won't be understood for another five weeks? These series are easier to handle by developing one article for each season, where plot summaries can be organized around the individual storylines rather than around the (almost arbitrary) time-based episode breaks.
Like most things on Wikipedia, these shouldn't be thought of as hard-and-fast rules but would be used to create a presumption that determines where the burden of proof, so to speak, lies in individual cases. Discussions about the merits of individual series and episodes would continue, of course, but guidelines would make it possible to say that, for example, fans of a particular half-hour comedy would have to shoot for a higher bar in demonstrating that their show is important/notable/popular/good/whatever enough to merit being broken down to the episode level, or that an individual episode is notable enough for its own article.--PHenry 14:10, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Series-level guidelines

message: I'm honestly trying to understand what people are afraid of. I think it is that they are worried that if you allow WP to develop a lot of detail on everything that's verifiable, then they either won't be able to find what they want, or they will loose control over what goes in. Frankly, I don't think either of them are realistic fears. Trollderella 19:13, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I was kind of middle of the road on this issue, but the more I read over this page and think about not only how wikipedia defines itself, but how different types of users define it, I'm coming closer to your way of thinking.  Considering that we're talking about episode information that will presumably be spread across seperate episode pages, there might be a lot that people would consider "noise", but it's not something that would be thrown in one's face like threads on a message board where seeing all the topics is unavoidable.  Main articles would link to season or episode articles... so you're right... what's the harm?  Though when considering this, one potential issue did spring to mind, which is searching.  Wikipedia's search mechanism is pretty pathetic right now.  Doing a search for something like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" brings the user to the Buffy article, but if anything goes wrong, that ridiculous list of close matches appears, and those are usually pretty lame.  If a user doesn't really know what they are searching for, having 144 episode articles, 50 character articles, and 7 season articles to sort through might be an arduous task.  A more robust search interface might remedy that a little (and I ask Santa every night for him to develop one), but yeah... it's just a suggestion for one possible drawback to such an inclusionist point-of-view.  But that doesn't mean I don't still agree with you. --NymphadoraTonks 20:36, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Trying to get inside the heads of people who want this

message: Just a quick guage of support, would those supporting a generally inclusionist stance be satisfied with a limit of one article per season and the development of a wiki-sister project for all television shows? Bandraoi 17:17, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: No! No more than people would be satisfied with a limit of one article per major scientific theory and a separate sister project for all scientific theories - there is no reason why we should not offer broad and deep coverage of all sectors of knowledge, regardless of our own predjudices! Trollderella 17:56, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I would also be unsatisfied with this approach, as I think it removes a lot of potentially useful content to no good purpose.  -Colin Kimbrell 21:30, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

text: I've edited the WP, mostly, to improve its coverage of the "hard sciences" and various topics in "serious" literature, because that's the sort of information I often find myself looking for.  Theoretical physics, for example, is a subject I love and to which I am happily devoting a career.  However, I'm also a Mary Prankster fan, and I've seen every episode of Futurama.  If I have time to kill, I might idly wander from Nambu-Goto action and D-brane over to, say, Ghost in the Shell and do a little copy-editing.  If I have more time than that, I can put real effort into a "trivial" topic, a TV show or a rock song, just because it helps me relax (and it may benefit somebody, somewhere down the line).  Having all our articles "under one roof" means that all the articles can benefit.  Anville 20:28, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: A wiki-television

message: Wikipedia is steadily headed towards a hell of excessive pop-culture cruft. Between articles on every episode of tv shoes and articles on every single your pop-music-flavor-of-the-week puts out, I doubt many grown persons are going to take Wikipeida seriously as a factual and reliable reference (very few do as it stands now). There has to be discresion. We don't have articles on every band that ever existed for a reason (and we have W:MUSIC to assist with that), and we shouldn't have articles for every song or for every TV episode. Something like W:MUSIC should be drawn up for television shows. I'd personally suggest that the only TV episodes that deserve articles are those of high historical importance; ones that attracted a significat mount of press and print coverage. For all others, tv.com is available, or a TVEpisodesWiki could be started. --FuriousFreddy 02:11, 6 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not sure why you feel that way. I think we have excessive coverage of nuclear physics, but it doesn't bother me, I just never type that into the search page. I agree with you that all articles, including those on pop-culture, need to be factual and reliable. Edit them mercilessly! Attracting significant press coverage is not important for inclusion, and tv.com is not a free content site. Trollderella 16:38, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

text: Not sure if it's of any importance to your discussion here, but since no one mentioned it I'd like to add: There is, in fact, a free content wiki dedicated solely to TV series, the TV IV. Just so you know... – Jondor 18:20, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

text: "I doubt many grown persons are going to take Wikipeida seriously as a factual and reliable reference" - I don't understand how having an article on a Star Trek episode or a Family Guy episode makes a lick of difference as to whether someone takes Wikipedia's article on Issac Newton seriously. If anything, the issue of anonymous IP users posting nonsense and vandalism is a far bigger issue. I don't think Jimbo ever intended this site to be just a storehouse of "academia" otherwise he would have banned pop-culture articles on Day 1. And I personally take offense at the inference that just because one is interested in a pop culture article, he or she isn't a "grown person". What on earth are you getting at with that remark? 23skidoo 18:25, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't mean to offend anyone, and of course grown persons are interested in pop culture. I never inferred that, if a person is interested in pop culture, they aren't grown. All I am saying is there should be some sort of boundary set, because this is supposed to be an encyclopedia. Encylclopedias aren't in-depth and exhaustive references on subjects--they provide succinct overviews on notable subjects, and are used as starting points for deeper research (unless an overview is all that was needed). I don't see how your average episode of, say, Scooby-Doo or Family Matters, is deserving of an article just because it exists. --FuriousFreddy 23:47, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have to say, I do see your point. But in the end it comes down to the fact that you're not comfortable with these articles "being around". Like I said, that's understandable. However, this does not imply that discretion is actually needed. Discretion would be needed if the average reader, an "outsider" (unlike any Wikipedia editor), was aware of these articles in the first place, and, on top of that, would disapprove of their sole existence in what he expects to be an encyclopedia (and  nothing but an encyclopedia). I'm not sure that's the case. – Jondor 00:35, 17 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not sure I see why the predjudices of a group about the academic credentials of pop-culture should mean that we institute sysyematic biases against those topics. We should cover verifiable, factual material in all fields, with breadth and depth. Trollderella 16:17, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

text: There are many things that different groups in the general population may or may not disaprove of. Coverage of sex, religious cults, evolution, tv sit coms, we get opposition to all of them. We should absolutely not cave to removing coverage of a topic because covering it might make members of some groups less likely to read WP. Trollderella 20:56, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: That sounds quite reasonable to me. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 01:14, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Astonishingly, I find myself agreeing with Radiant. Must remember to check with my brain-care specialist in the morning. Trollderella 01:17, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

text: The first qualm I have about this is that I don't think "good" and "long" can or should be equated to one another regarding articles, and the way you've presented this seems to imply that they are.  The Literate Engineer 01:53, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

text: This is pretty fundamentally similar to my earlier proposal, and it's certainly in line with policy. As such, it works for me. -Colin Kimbrell 22:15, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: There are plenty of people, such as myself who will only respect wikipedia more having the tolerance and enough of a neutral point of view to include less prejudicices on race, religion, morals, nationality, and culture than any other encyclopedia I have yet to come across. Banishing articles on TV episodes is essentially a form of cultural prejudice, no one is threatening to delete the Spanish opera Zarzuela. That's because opera is still viewed by some as culturally superior. These kind of prejudices should no longer operating wikipedia. Let people create and read what they want as long as it conforms to rules. -- Paxomen 16:43, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Discretion is needed

message: Most things that can actually be sourced from newspapers, books or especially peer reviewed journals are valid enough for wikipedia. The big difference between television and movies is that a movie that has controversy and an impact will have plenty of real, hard sources on those impacts. With a television show, the impact of an episode, and the significance of that episode will probably not reach a newspaper, and the amount of episodes that do get into hard sources will probably be small enough for a footnote on the main series page.  There are exceptions. Tons of episodes of Seinfeld, for some reason, are central in in-depth scholarly peer reveiwed cultural critiques. But most TV episodes significance amounts to original research. Wikipedia: No original research
Sources are a necessity for verifiability, but also for significance. If you can get a real source saying interesting things about a given episode, meaning not a short episode description in TV listings (which are frequently inaccurate to start with) then it is notable enough for me. 
Certainly many episodes are very influential and important, like Twilight Zone episodes that set out plot types that are frequently re-hashed in new movies and episodes of other shows. But if anyone wants to point out that significance, they should find a real article on the topic, or write a real article and submit it to a publisher, because just because something is cool and significant according to one person, doesn't mean that wikipedia should become a lazy persons' publisher.
This strategy excludes fanon (fan canon) opinions except where the fanon opinion has been written about by a reputable source. This may be slightly uncool to some, but it's a logical extension of other wikipedia rules, I think.
In conclusion, the idea is: If you can source a newspaper or magazine article or a peer reviewed source or cultural critique books that say something significant about an episode, then the episode can have it's article. This cuts down most television episode articles, but ignores the idea that many readers like comprehensive TV episode lists with plot descriptions. I'm not sure if I consider a fan-promotional book about a TV-series to be a valid source or not. Lotusduck 23:38, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The episodes themselves are sources, primary sources. Wikipedia:No original research specifically encourages basing articles on primary sources. It states that "research that consists of collecting and organizing information from existing primary and/or secondary sources is strongly encouraged." Pretty much all of our content on culture and media is based on primary sources because there is little secondary literature. Banning primary sources as valid references would force the elimination of much of the encyclopedia. - SimonP 00:03, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with Andrew: there's no reason why professional publications aimed at television fans should be less valid than, say, publications about a sports team or a celebrity. Also, although I understand the point about using secondary sources as a measure of significance, for plot summaries and many other observations about a film or television episode, the best source is going to be the film or episode itself, which, as Simon says, is the primary source.  —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 00:36, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  All Original Research? Hold episode articles to the same standard of having sources and verifibility 

message: Compiling all human knowledge includes compiling cultural knowledge. We must not make the mistake of elitism. Macbeth may be greater than Seinfeld on an artistic level, but in terms of cultural notability, both are above the bar. — Phil Welch Katefan's ridiculous poll 07:06, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Go for it. 

message: I think that an individual episode article for the large part is too fine-grained for an encyclopedia, on the basis that individual episodes are not by itself notable.  Season-by-season is a bit of a stretch, but will serve as a good compromise for the large part, especially when an episode synopsis is no more than a few paragraphs.  Indeed, I believe that episode synopses should only be several paragraphs, and 13 of these sections (assuming there are on average 13 episodes in a season) isn't too lengthy.  Even a 52-paragraph page on a 52-episode season would sound reasonable.
Individual episode articles, or articles representing story arcs (or other logical divisions of a series), should be filtered based on similar criteris regarding, say, singles and their relation to albums.  Among the criteria should be how the episode stands out in the series.  For example, if it had notable "mainstream" recognition, if it is the point in which the fan community believes the show to have jumped the shark (hold that thought: that's POV), and so on.
Then we ask ourselves article naming conventions: Season X in series Y, Episode Name (Series), Series Y season X, etc...
The problem is how we define cruft: A lot of editors are fans of a certain show, and may only be Wikipedians as they edit articles about the show, and believes that Wikipedia should be comprehensive with regards to a certain show.  It's a problem that extends not only to television shows, but to, say, List of professional wrestling match types, where we go into so much detail that there is a decision amongst the show's Wikipedian fans to split the article, much to the dismay of the Greater Wikipedia.
It's interesting to note that some subcommunities of the Wikipedian TV community will generally restrain themselves: the Pokémon community, for example, will have a page on every Pokémon, but will generally avoid having any more detail about episodes of the anime beyond a simple list.  And Pokémon certainly had lots more episodes to speak of compared to other shorter and less notable series which have individual episode articles.  It's sometimes a matter of "pushing your luck" in a subject... kelvSYC 03:34, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  kelvSYC's opinion 

message: I was doing a little digging and came across the following, from the earliest incarnation of Wikipedia:Importance:
::"Why shouldn't there be a page for every Simpsons character, and even a table listing every episode, all neatly crosslinked and introduced by a shorter central page like the above? Why shouldn't every episode name in the list link to a separate page for each of those episodes, with links to reviews and trivia? Why shouldn't each of the 100+ poker games I describe have its own page with rules, strategy, and opinions? Hard disks are cheap.
:I agree with this one completely. --Jimbo Wales"
Now, I know that Wikipedia is more than Jimbo, and his view may have changed since then, but I thought the perspective might be relevant to our discussion. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 05:28, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hehe, I love that on this whole page, the most relevent piece of information received the least attention. God, wouldn't want any power taken away from the behind-the-scene Wiki-bureaucrats now, would we? Wouldn't want to consider the fact that... uh oh... maybe... Wikipedia isn't like other encyclopedias? Good work Josiah Rowe, sorry that the voice of reason is so hard to get heard. Conor 10:42, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  A relevant quote from Jimbo 

message: Most of our discussions here have danced around the question of notability.  Specifically, is an individual episode of a television series notable?  Looking over the discussion, it seems clear to me that there is no real consensus on what "notable" means in this context.  Furthermore, I'm increasingly of the opinion that "notable" is inherently a POV criterion, and one that will always lend itself to argument and rancor.  What is notable to one editor is not notable to another, and although it may be possible to come to a majoritarian view on what's notable and what isn't, a true consensus seems out of reach.
So we should ask whether we want to include "notability" as a criterion in this context at all.  After all, Wikipedia:Notability has not been accepted as policy or a guideline, even though it's been under discussion since May 2005 (or since August 2004, if you include its prior incarnation at Wikipedia:Importance.)
There are two related questions that fall under the shadow of "notability": does information about an individual television episode belong in Wikipedia, and if it does, does it belong in its own article?  Let's take them in turn, and see what happens if we take notability out of the question.
It seems to me that the burden of proof lies on the deletionists to show that inclusion of information about television episodes does active harm to Wikipedia.  Their arguments seem to me to boil down to "(detailed discussion of) television just doesn't belong on Wikipedia".  Why not?  "Because it doesn't."  There are a few who admit that their arguments are based on a judgment of television's inferiority to other media, which seems to me to be contrary to the spirit of Wikipedia but at least has the benefit of honesty.  But I've not seen any responses to Trollderella's #Trying to get inside the heads of people who want this above.  Remember, Wikipedia is not paper, and the quality of the article on the Iliad is not harmed by the existence of one on City of Death.  If you take out the chimera "notability", the deletionist argument collapses entirely.
The question of whether television episodes belong in their own article, on the other hand, can survive the removal of "notability".  It's essentially an aesthetic judgment about how best to present information.  And that's why I think JYolkowski's proposal above has the best hope of achieving consensus: it accepts that (verifiable, NPOV, non-original research) information about all topics can, will, and should be added to Wikipedia, and the role of policy-making is to determine how best to present it.
Finally, a personal note.  I became an active Wikipedian by working on Doctor Who-related articles, and most of my work is still related to that WikiProject.  However, I also think that I've made some worthwhile contributions to more academic articles (and those are just from today), as well as creating an article or two that I feel adds to the sum total of Wikipedia.  I say this not to brag or justify myself, but because I think I'm a fairly typical Wikipedian.  Many — perhaps even most — Wikipedians join the project to contribute about something they love, which is not always going to be a subject of traditional academic interest.  But that doesn't mean that they have nothing of academic interest to offer.  If the Doctor Who content were not present on Wikipedia, I doubt that I would have contributed to the articles on Ancient Greek culture and other "academic" topics.  By the same token, if the encyclopedia were to adopt a strict policy against so-called "fancruft", I wager that many contributors who would otherwise have valuable contributions to make will simply never join the project.  I think that allowing articles on fannish subjects — including television episodes — is a small price to pay for making people with diverse interests feel welcome. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 06:36, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Notability 

message: More important than having many articles on TV episodes is having good articles on those TV episodes. If for a TV show, nobody can be bothered to write useful articles on the episodes (e.g. all we have is a list of stubs) then merging them to a list of Foo episodes, 3rd season would be useful. They can be broken out if/when someone wants to expand them. In practice, this probably boils down to hugely popular shows (e.g. Star Trek, Buffy) having articles on each episode, and relatively obscure shows having lists by season. Reasonable, no? Radiant_>|< 14:43, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, that's quite reasonable.  It may be my imagination, but I think I'm seeing a light at the end of this particular tunnel.  Things have been pretty quiet since I posted that Jimbo quote.  Is it fair to say that we now have a consensus that information about individual television episodes is not, by its nature, unworthy of inclusion in Wikipedia?  If we can get rough agreement on that, then we can focus on how that information should best be presented, probably starting with JYolkowski's and Radiant!'s similar notions.  Anyone disagree strongly? —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 18:09, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  To reiterate, 

message: Okay, it looks like everyone's more or less in agreement about the basics.  So, I've tried to summarize some of the points people have made at Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Television episodes#Proposal.  Please take a look and edit to make it better.  Thanks, JYolkowski // talk 03:43, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's an excellent start, JYolkowski, and you deserve credit for finding a relevant and applicable parallel guideline.  One question we should consider is whether we should define "enough information" more tightly — perhaps we should say "enough verifiable, non-original research information"?  (It's covered in the "content" section, but it's better to be redundant than to be unclear.  We don't want to encourage the addition of reams of trivia merely in order to justify article splitting.) —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 06:27, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Good idea... I updated it to state "independently verifiable" (in the interest of reading better), hope that's close enough to what you had in mind.  JYolkowski // talk 00:54, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Since no-one else's complained, I've updated the project page to include just the proposal.  If anyone objects, please edit it.  Thanks, JYolkowski // talk 21:44, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposal 

message: Hello...
On page Poltergeist is listed with a link to Poltergeist movie series. That is just a redirect page. The actual page is Poltergeist (film series). It would be a good idea to change it.
Lady Aleena | Talk 13:00, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Poltergiest on SonicMew's page 

message: I notice there is already an existing wiki on TV shows at http://tviv.org/wiki/Main_Page . This may satisfy opponents of TV shows inclusion in an encyclopedia and supporters of TV shows inclusion in a wiki. Are there any other sites? Links to any such sites could be included in this article.--Darrelljon 12:15, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The content contained in other sites shouldn't affect the content contained in our site. Another wiki containing information on television episodes doesn't remove from the need for Wikipedia to have information on television episodes. --Oldak Quill 14:44, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Existing Wiki TV Projects or websites 

message: 1. Since developing season articles isn't always parctical or handy, change Once there's enough independently verifiable information to do so, create articles on each season, or some other logical division, of the show. To:
*Once there's enough independently verifiable information to do so, create articles on the episode list, each season, or some other logical division, of the show. 
2. Define what's "enough independently verifiable information". Maybe with a parenthesis or something. Also I think that even if the plot summary is short, if there is a nice amount of cast, credits, trivia, quotes or "see also" info, pictures and a good infobox, the episode is ready to be an article.
--T-man, the wise 09:21, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  change proposals 

message: There is currently an active debate at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (television) about the naming of episode articles, such as when is it appropriate to use a suffix such as (<series name> episode), and whether or not WikiProjects should have the right to set guidelines for their particular shows.  Any interested editors are invited to comment, at Wikipedia_talk:Naming conventions (television)#Request for comment. Thanks. --Elonka 08:51, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  That is absolutely untrue.  See Wikipedia_talk:Naming conventions (television)#Summary of discussion.  Further, multiple people have called for a fresh poll, as I have supplied diffs of many times. --Elonka 09:41, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: *That is in fact false. You are misrepresenting people's views in those diffs, stating that they support your position when it is clear that they do not. And the summary is a clear indication of consensus, especially if you count the several people disagreeing with you that you left out of the summary. (Radiant) 09:46, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Radiant speaks the truth. -- Ned Scott 09:44, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Radiant does not speak the truth. Elonka is certainly not the "sole dissenter" to the (FYI) invisible consensus. MatthewFenton (talk • contribs • &site=en.wikipedia.org count • email) 10:15, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "Elonka is about the sole dissenter to this consensus." -- Ned Scott 10:26, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Request for comment - naming of episode articles

message: What's the correct way of handling the page histories when you move text from, say an LOE to an individual page. - Peregrine Fisher 22:47, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Right now it would be just to note where the original document was in the edit summary, but there will soon be a new feature in Wikipedia allowing edit histories to be duplicated. -- Ned Scott 23:45, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spinning off individual episodes 

message: Hello Administrators. WP:EPISODE provides guidance on quotations in television episode articles. A wikipedian is using this to justify deleting the quotes sections out of Simpsons episode articles. However, the wikipedian is not copying the content to wikiquote or providing a link. Would someone please tell me if I'm off-base by thinking this is inappropropriate? --Zegoma beach 19:36, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Episode - Quotes Deletion