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User:Daniel Benfield/archive3

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Welcome to Daniel Benfield's third talk page archive

on Wikipedia. Yes, Wikipedia – that doesn't-cost-you-a-freakin'-penny encyclopedia that
would be better off having anybody who wants to edit it sign up.

Introduction

Ah, Season 2...well, at least I know how good it feels to be renewed. Cancellation looks to be an eternity away! Daniel Benfield (talk) 17:22, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Other Archives

This page is for archival purposes only. Please don't modify it. Subsequent comments should be made at the bottom of the main talk page, with no further comments made on this page. Thanks.

Messages

Categories

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So, just to clarify, the debut/ending cats should be for each run of a show? I am not so familiar with how this works with game shows, but most dramas/sitcoms have one run and are rarely revived the same way. That is where I am getting confused because the show wouldn't be debuting again, would it? BOVINEBOY2008 :) 19:34, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Please keep discussion on-topic and leave talk-content on other user's talk pages. Sottolacqua (talk) 14:48, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

The Price Is Right (U.S. game show) Merge Proposals

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I've proposed editing and merging One Bid, Showcase Showdown, and The Showcase into the respective sections of The Price Is Right (U.S. game show). Please feel free to comment here. Sottolacqua (talk) 15:54, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Daniel, I've left a fairly lengthy response to your most recent comments on that page. I apologize if it's a bit provocative, but it's intended as food for thought. JTRH (talk) 10:24, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

When a show "ends its run"

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Hi, Daniel. If you're going to take the position that the end date given for a TV series should be the air date of the last first-run episode, rather than the date that the show (including reruns) left the air, this raises a couple of problems:

First, in most cases, it's difficult to determine, and even more difficult to source, the exact air date of the last first-run ep. For example, in the Pyramid (game show) broadcast history article, you appear to have calculated June 5, 1981, as the last first-run air date of The $50,000 Pyramid because there were 95 episodes produced and that was the 95th weekday since the premiere. How do we know the show aired exactly 95 consecutive first-run episodes before going into reruns? There could quite possibly have been reruns at some point during those 95 days, and it can't be precisely determined whether all 95 produced episodes actually aired. Either one of those events would render the June 5 date inaccurate.
Second, if the article says the show "ended its run" on June 5, what do we call the episodes airing as reruns between June 5 and September 4? Do we not mention them? It is inaccurate to say that The $50,000 Pyramid left the air on June 5, because the show left the air on September 4.

Using the air date of the last aired episode (whether it was first-run or rerun) as the end date of the series eliminates both of these problems. It's also much easier to source, since the last air date is the one used in references (such as The Encyclopedia of TV Game $hows) and, if necessary, it can also be sourced by checking the TV listings of newspapers in the archives of just about any library. It's also, in my experience, the convention used by every other Wikipedian who works on those things. JTRH (talk) 18:53, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the response, but as with the current AfD discussion on The Price Is Right list and pricing games pages, citing fansites (however well-researched) and YouTube as sources on this is just asking for yet another debate and AfD nomination from editors like Sottolacqua and TenPoundHammer (and many others) as to whether those are reliable sources for Wikipedia purposes (and, as may be evident from my statements on those AfD's, I agree with them that all of this needs to be more reliably sourced if it's to be kept). It is much easier (and more accurate) for all concerned to limit this kind of information to published sources; documented start and end dates for every (yes, every) game show up to 1999 are in Schwartz, Wostbrock and Ryan, Encyclopedia of TV Game $hows, Checkmark Books, 3rd ed., 1999. It even breaks out multiple runs, host changes, and revivals. Some but not all of the show articles also mention time slots. Given that their last edition was published before WWtBaM and the other prime-time shows, I'm surprised they haven't come out with an updated edition, and I wish they would. JTRH (talk) 20:23, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Pricing game articles mass AfD results in Keep

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Hi, Daniel. A rush of Keep votes toward the end resulted in a no-consensus on the AfD, so no action gets taken (i.e., the articles stay). I'm still working on a list of brief descriptions on the List of Pricing Games page in the event that the individual articles get nominated separately, which could still happen.

I'd like to respond to some comments you left on TPIRFanSteve's page:

They apparently want "official", or at least reliable third-party, sources that discuss the games and their rules. But the show itself is unwilling to discuss the retired games

If the show itself is unwilling to discuss the retired games, and there is no reliable third-party source because no one else has discussed it, could that possibly be an indication that a pricing game that was played twice in 1977 is not important enough to be the subject of an encyclopedia article to be read by the general public?

(And really, "original research" seems to be kinda vague

No, it's not. If you write something (including an original idea or argument) that hasn't appeared anywhere else and you don't give verifiable sources for your information, it's original research. Writing a properly-sourced summary of something that's already appeared in other reliable sources is what Wikipedia is supposed to be about.

The Encyclopedia of TV Game Shows can be considered original research!)

The Encyclopedia of TV Game Shows is (a) written by people with recognized credentials in the field (the co-authors are a GSN executive, a former Goodson-Todman executive, and a talent agent who has represented many personalities in the game show field); (b) publicly sourced, meaning that the authors give you information allowing you to go back and check their sources if you want to, to be sure that they're accurately reporting what the sources said; (c) not self-published, which means it went through the process of fact-checking and quality control at a company whose professional responsibility is to do that, and (d) a widely recognized authority in the field, because of a, b and c. None of these things is true of the information on g-r.net, as much work as Steve's put into it (and as I've said repeatedly, I don't question the accuracy of his information, but the point is not accuracy, it's verifiability).

I would really like to see you and Steve copy all of the material that you've contributed here and take it off-Wiki, so that it doesn't get vaporized the next time someone decides to AfD all of it (and this was either the second or third time for most of this material). If this can be properly sourced, it'll be a great book and at least as informative as what Stan Blits put out. Thanks. Best, JTRH (talk) 14:50, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Roger Dobkowitz

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An article that you have been involved in editing, Roger Dobkowitz, has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Roger Dobkowitz. Thank you.
Please contact me if you're unsure why you received this message. Sottolacqua (talk) 14:51, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Outside of notifying you about the AFD's I've created lately, I have not posted anything to your talk page since 28 July 2009, when I asked you to stop adding random dashes, semicolons and other non-standard grammatical changes to articles.

The AFD's have nothing to do with you personally. You currently edit or have edited almost every game show article on Wikipedia, which is why you have shown up in the edit history of every game show-related article I've recently nominated for deletion. Your contributions are good-natured and made in good faith. You are taking an attempt to clean up unsourced trivia and non-notable pages as a personal attack, which is not what is happening.

Additionally, I have reverted edits you've made adding unsourced or unrelated information, trivia or anecdotes, such as in these edits: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]

If I was acting in bad faith, why would I invite you to participate in the AFD discussions for the two articles you edited? [7] [8] Sottolacqua (talk) 23:32, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Additionally, please do not add unrelated discussion material based on your assumption other editors are acting in bad faith as you did here, here and here to AFD discussions. Sottolacqua (talk) 23:36, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

re: Apologies...

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There is no personal bias against you as I stated in my earlier post. Sottolacqua (talk) 22:01, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Juvenile Jury

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Hi. Regarding your edit summary to the Juvenile Jury article; the reason I removed the flag icon is because it appears a new consensus was reached to remove the flag as they place unnecessary emphasis on nationality. This exact same rationale can be found at infobox page. Pinkadelica 21:44, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Pyramid set evolution

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Hi, Daniel. The set evolution section of the Pyramid (game show) broadcast history article really doesn't convey much without some illustrations of what you're describing. Do you know where to get some free-use screencaps of the show? JTRH (talk) 02:14, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Hi Daniel, I deleted the "Pyramid (game show)" example from frustum since it seems to be an obscure example that will hardly be helpful to readers. We cannot list every frustum-shaped object in the universe... All the best, --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 17:02, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your contributions, but per WP:TENSE, we use present tense for fictional topics. In the future, please do not convert plot summaries written in present tense to past tense. Thanks! — TAnthonyTalk 17:35, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

March 2010

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Please do not add or change content without citing verifiable and reliable sources, as you did to Our Little Genius. Before making any potentially controversial edits, it is recommended that you discuss them first on the article's talk page. Please review the guidelines at Wikipedia:Citing sources and take this opportunity to add references to the article. Thank you. Blueboy96 05:15, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Copyedit of Sábado Gigante

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Very nicely done! --Morenooso (talk) 21:57, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

"Episode status" of game shows

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[NOTE: Since the other pages' discussions on this have been archived or removed, here's the relevant links:

There you go. :]

Hi, Daniel. Since you've contributed a lot of the material in question, I wanted to give you a heads-up that I plan a major weed-whacking of the "episode status" sections of many of the game show articles. Here are my concerns:

(1) There's far too much unsourced speculation. For example, who "believes" that the tapes of almost every NBC game show prior to 1978 were wiped? Can the editor cite a source? I've read about the wiping on several occasions, both on the Web and in print, but there needs to be supporting evidence in the article. Otherwise, it's subjective POV. The limits of an individual Wikipedia editor's knowledge of the subject (mine, yours or anyone else's) aren't relevant to an encyclopedia article. (Someone knows for sure whether the tapes have been wiped, but whoever that is hasn't contributed to Wikipedia.)

(2) There's way too much about GSN reruns. Some of the articles have the dates and even times of day that individual seasons of shows were rerun. "The show has been rerun on GSN" is all the relevant information a viewer needs.

(3) People's private tape collections are neither verifiable nor encyclopedic. How does an editor know that someone has tapes of x number of episodes or air dates of a particular show? How do you verify that they got the air dates right? How do you know they're telling the truth? Furthermore, the fact that an individual owns a tape of a show really isn't relevant to an encyclopedia article on the show.

(4) There's a lot of unsourced original research and miscellaneous trivia all over the place. Not every detail is relevant, and if it can't be reliably sourced, it doesn't belong there even if it is relevant.

(5) Any game show clip on YouTube that wasn't posted there by the network or the production company is there in violation of copyright. Wikipedia legally cannot link to it.

I'd be happy to discuss this with you before I start cutting. Thanks for your consideration. Best, JTRH (talk) 23:12, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

My response here. Robert K S (talk) 00:04, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
Thanks to both of you for your constructive and carefully considered responses. The issue with YouTube, Daniel, is not relevance but legality. Wikipedia can't link to material which is posted in violation of copyright. It doesn't matter if it's the only evidence that Show A existed, or if a YT clip is the only existing copy of the only perfect game playing in the history of Show B. If someone other than the owner or distributor of the material posts it, it's a copyright violation and therefore illegal. CBS/Viacom/Paramount/whatever the corporation is called now is particularly stringent about that. They've demanded (and successfully enforced) the removal of all kinds of their material that was posted on YT by third parties. It's not a matter of editorial judgment, it's a matter of legal liability. JTRH (talk) 01:34, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
I agree with your suggestion about a forum for a discussion. Also, I have some new information posted on Sottolacqua's talk page. Let me know what you think. JTRH (talk) 19:34, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
Sottolacqua doesn't want to participate, so I reposted the new info on my own talk page. JTRH (talk) 19:50, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
Obtaining Fred Wostbrock's e-mail address was incredibly difficult: I Googled him and went to the first hit. Seriously. He's a talent agent with a large presence on the Web. JTRH (talk) 19:52, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Reverted edits

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An IP user has reverted you edits to The Money Maze here. I reverted him and warned him for vandalism, but he's contested it on my talk page. Because of your track record on WP, I've let your edits stand. I'm not interested in getting further involved here, so If you could discuss the issue on the article's talk page, and work it out there, I'd be grateful. Thanks. -BilCat (talk) 07:55, 5 July 2010 (UTC)