Wikipedia talk:Notability (fiction)

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Glossary of terms For the purposes of discussions on this page, the following terms are taken to mean the following. This is just a glossary. Where any guideline and this conflict, please defer to the guideline or edit this glossary to bring them in line: Notability ("WP:N") refers to whether or not a topic is presumed to meet Wikipedia's content policies and may have its own standalone article. The term is not a reflection of a topic's importance or merit; rather it used in the sense that the topic has been noted in published commentary from reliable sources independent of the topic itself. General Notability Guideline ("GNG") refers to the inclusion criteria in WP:N itself, that may indicate the notability of any topic. Failure to fulfil the GNG may mean a topic is not notable. Subject-Specific Notability Guidelines ("SNGs) are notability guidelines such as Wikipedia:Notability (fiction) ("WP:FICT") and , Wikipedia:Notability (books) ("WP:BK") which apply the principles of notability to particular subject area. Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction) ("WP:WAF") is a style guideline that requires articles to describe fiction and fictional elements from the perspective of the real world, not from the perspective of the fiction itself. WP:PLOT is part of Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not, which says that "Wikipedia articles should not be plot-only description of fictional works" and requires articles to be improved to provide more balanced coverage that includes real-world context.

This page was nominated for deletion on 2 May 2012. The result of the discussion was keep.

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I noticed we have large groups of lists for fictional elements.

• List of fictional robots and androids

In my humble opinion, these types of lists aren't useful, informative, or encyclopedic. I understand that lists and articles have different criteria for notability, but I think lists of fictional "category X" should have specific rules.

One of the rules I propose is making sure it has its own article to prove it's noteworthy of having a list instead of just a category.

So for example, we wouldn't be able to have a List of fictional doomsday devices without Fictional doomsday device or History of doomsday devices in fiction. For those who want to make these list, it would also encourage to validate them by creating articles for them. This also discourages making these ambiguous lists related to fiction now that we have better criteria.

This also seems like a band-aid to a bigger issue: outdated, difficult to manage, category system.Blue Pumpkin Pie ^{Chat Contribs} 18:21, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I'll point to List of fictional badgers and its current AFD as a starting point for discussion that these lists need to have two things going for them to keep:

1. That either the list as a whole is sourced to appropriate GNG-type sourcing, or you can talk about the nature of fictional X (but not the entire set) with GNG-type sourcing. This latter is the case for the fictional badgers list as identified at the AFD. It would likely be the case for a "Fictional doomsday device" too without doing any research on that.
2. That the inclusion metrics for the list are either 1) that the entire list is sourced to one or more RS sources that cover the entire list (highly unlikely), 2) each item is a blue-link to a standalong article dedicated to the fictional item, or 3) the item is sourced to a third-party, independent RS that affirms the item should be on the list, avoiding WP:TRIVIA.

Without either, these are just random pop culture lists and need to be removed, they just simply aren't appropriate for WP. --Masem (t) 18:28, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

And to BPP's point, I wouldn't necessary expect that we need to have separate article on the fictional trope, just that we have in-depth coverage of that trope somewhere. If it is atop the list, that's as good as a standalone article. Ideally, I'd want to see the list attached to that unless for some reason SIZE issues come into play. --Masem (t) 18:30, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

There should be a real crackdown on both those and in "popular culture" articles. There are certainly a few examples where they make sense, but they're mostly just completely trivial. TTN (talk) 18:54, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I think WP:NOTESAL should be discussed here. If there are lists and sets discussed outside of Wikipedia, then a list can exist on Wikipedia. It doesn't matter if editors think the topic is trivial. That perception can exist with prose too, like toilet paper orientation, but sources exist. If a list article lacks sourcing from lists and sets, then WP:BEFORE should be performed and any potential sources put on the talk page. Of course clean-up through removing unsourced content can be appropriate, but it helps to replace it with some sourced content. Erik (talk | contrib) ^{(ping me)} 19:36, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

We sorta need a line that distiquishes between a topic that actually has gotten some level of "academic" discussion like the toilet paper orientation (making it appropriate for an article), verses some random list of X in popular culture which may often have sources in "listicle" article ("Top 10" lists) that give no "academic" element for inclusion. (I use "academic" loosely here, I don't expect journal articles, but I expect something more transformative on the whole of the topic from a reliable source). --Masem (t) 19:44, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Masem. There are so many ambiguous lists being created by random journalists that may have zero specialty in the topic. It has to be recognized by multiple recognized media outlets IMHO.Blue Pumpkin Pie ^{Chat Contribs} 19:49, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Also, because I brought this up in the Badgers AfD, that we should distinguish fiction from folklore/legend/mythology as that is cultural that wasn't explicitly known as fictitious.Blue Pumpkin Pie ^{Chat Contribs} 20:11, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

There is a weird line between the folklore and the popular culture factors, to the point I wouldn't necessary separate these elements in different lists (unless, after all inclusion metrics are met, there is a size issue), but I would make sure they were grouped clearly to distinguish folklore from pop culture. --Masem (t) 20:23, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I think that we need reasonable guidelines for pruning and improving these lists, for the simple reason that they make readers happy. There is anecdotal evidence that these lists offer serendipitous delight to readers, who are charmed by the discovery that they exist.

As a first step towards a guideline, I would suggest that to be included on a list like this, each item should be a significant character in the work or receive a reasonable amount of independent coverage, to be determined during the discussion of the guideline. (Another possibility is to only include items that are notable enough to have their own page.) Each item should be supported by a 2-3 sentence explanation of their significance within the work -- not just a bare listing of "x in an episode of y". If there isn't enough to say about that item to make 2-3 sentences, then it's not important enough to be included.

As an example, the List of fictional pigs should include Miss Piggy, Porky Pig, Babe, Piglet, and Wilbur from Charlotte's Web, and not the Peking Homunculus from a brief appearance in a Doctor Who story, or Little Cory from two episodes of Boy Meets World.

Just in the last 24 hours List of fictional badgers closed as no consensus and Centaurs in popular culture closed as keep, which strongly indicates that there is not currently a consensus to delete these articles en masse. If folks would like to get consensus on a new guideline, then it should probably be an RfC or some formal process, rather than a brief, unheralded conversation at the bottom of this page. -- Toughpigs (talk) 14:03, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I'm wondering if we should start deleting some of these. At least the more obvious ones that are invented topics.Blue Pumpkin Pie ^{Chat Contribs} 17:41, 25 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

No, too early. We should first establish the minimum expectations for these lists (previous section), make sure there's community consensus for those, and then give a time frame like 6 months or so for editors to clean up. THEN we can start a deletion spree as we have given editors fair warning throughout this. (Any such RFC and results would be posted to relevant wikiprojects and VP). --Masem (t) 17:44, 25 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Masem here. There's no huge rush and decency demands at least some prior warning before starting an enormous cleanup campaign. The voice of cynicism- and prior experience- says that no amount of prior warning will actually get the defenders of these lists to sort out any of the problems, or prevent them from complaining loud and long when they are nominated at AfD. But we should still behave properly. Reyk _YO! 07:20, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

True, but other editors who aren’t reflexively defending such lists would be far less likely to sympathetic to the defenders if they had fair waring and ample opportunity to improve the lists and chose not to as opposed to being seemingly blindsided.--69.157.252.96 (talk) 21:25, 17 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

This essay was created two years ago and seemingly has the same "status" (essay) as NFICTION. It is however not very well known; it is not linked from NFICTION, it is cited only in a dozen+ AfD discussions since its creation two years ago, and also seems much more inclusive than NFICTIION or GNG. Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Comics links to NFICTION not to NCOMIC. It seems clear that this essay has been created by one person (User:Etzedek24) with no input or recognition from the community (I only found this which does not constite any wide endorsment; I did not see any other discussion of this essay on any public project discussion space), and it can mislead good faithed editors who can cite it thinking that it is a community-endorsed viewpoint, rather than a view point of a single editor. Few months ago on its talk page an anon suggested it should be deleted/depreciated, and I concur (not to deletion, but to tagging it with {{Failed proposal}}, but how to go about it? RfC? Or would a discussion here be enough? PS. For now, should it be tagged with {{Proposal}}? An essay written by a single user should not give an appearance of a community-endorsed view, and clearly, an essay on notability template {{notability essay}} present there is not enough, since it is also present here, and this falsely suggests NCOMIC is equal to NFICTION (which is much better known and much more widely cited). -- _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 04:30, 4 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: Talk:J. K. Rowling#RFC on how to include her trans-related views (and backlash) in the lead

I am "advertising" this RfC more broadly to relevant pages because someone selectively notified three socio-political wikiprojects that are likely to vote-stack the RfC with a single viewpoint, and the article already has a long history of factional PoV editwarring.

Central matters in this discussion and the threads leading up to it are labeling of Rowling, labeling of commenters on Rowling, why Rowling is notable, what is due or undue in the lead section, and whether quasi-numeric claims like "many", "a few", etc. in this context are legitimate or an OR/WEASEL issue.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:37, 28 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The idea that WikiProject Feminism and WikiProject Women Writers are likely to vote-stack the RfC with a single socio-political viewpoint appears to come from a place of profound ignorance, and certainly the RfC in question has nothing to do with Notability.

But by all means, we do need fresh eyes on the lead of the article, which has seen so much whitewashing and FALSEBALANCE POV-based editing. Newimpartial (talk) 02:13, 28 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

In wikipedia about smurf list, numbering of episodes is quite disturbing, without any further explanation.

Why there are 75a and 75b for many seasons? Why there is 75th , 75a, and 75b episodes? What a and b or "75" alone means? No explanation at all! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Estatistics (talk • contribs) 09:53, 26 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There is a proposal to add guidance on adapted film/television characters to this page at WT:FILM#Survey. Comments are welcome, thanks. InfiniteNexus (talk) 15:48, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @Kung Fu Man. I saw your recent edit removing the word "merchandise" after my recent update. I definitely appreciate and agree with your edit summary indicating that merchandise alone doesn't indicate notability. My intention with that inclusion was around secondary sigcov in independent reliable sources about merchandise. For example, merchandise announcements or churnalism noting a cross-promotions and such would not qualify, but an article in a reliable source with an experienced journalist providing a few paragraphs reviewing a toy could qualify in many cases. What do you think the best way to reflect this in the text would be? —siroχo 06:53, 22 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The main problem is if the article is discussing the merchandise or the subject in question for the article in a significant manner within it, and in all honesty I have next to never seen that happen. In the few cases where merchandise has been brought up in regards to how a subject is viewed, it's mentioned in the context of articles discussing the subject where the merchandise is a lesser point overall. Do you have examples of articles focused on merchandise you think helps provide notability towards a fictional element?--Kung Fu Man (talk) 13:32, 22 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]