The Screening Room

4:00 PM

Questions were never for the asker alone (well, at least non-ID questions for that matter ;-)).

many do not. There's still an impulse in some folks (myself included) to want to choose any option other than "close and delete". To sift through the wreckage looking for anything that might be salvaged.

This is the impulse that is better redirected into just talking to the asker.

@TomCody well, heh... ID questions do throw a bit of a wrench into this. But even there, you should hope that they will be useful to someone

Worst-case, they should at least be useful to the person answering them, as odd as that may sound.

Tom Cody

@Shog9 Well, the hope ~~never dies~~ dies last.

@Shog9 Indeed, who doesn't love a nice quiz show.

Shog9

the best argument I've heard for these is that they help folks... "sharpen their saws" so to speak; keep lesser-known works in mind and those who are mindful of lesser-known works hanging around, both of which are useful when someone asks a real question about one of them.

Tom Cody

Well, interesting.

Shog9

If someone else eventually searches for "Movie about that guy who controlled minds via sumerian language NLP", so much the better... But even if that never happens, at least it isn't a complete waste of time.

Tom Cody

4:08 PM

Meh, the biggest problem for me is their viral nature. They simply get more and more in their relative amount. I wouldn't have a problem with steady ratio (maybe even up 20-30%), prefably the better precentage. But that's simply not to be expected when the site's image gets diluted into IdThisMovie.SE.

I'm completely with Mr. Cartaino there. But alas, I also guess that's a story for another day.

Shog9

Well, as you may have observed, I'm of the opinion that lackluster ID questions should just be unceremoniously deleted. So... Take that as you will.

just remember: infinite amount of on-topic crap.

Catija

Oh, I just remembered... I actually was trying to fix the question at issue when it was on M&TV... but someone from Sci-Fi had edited it here without fixing the title and, I, idiotically hit the "accept" button without improving the edit... so then I couldn't edit the question to give it a better title... and that's when I noticed the two upvotes.

Tom Cody

Well, I also tend to make less prisoners with ID closes recently.

Shog9

THE PLOT THICKENS!

@Catija another practical reason to edit BEFORE you migrate is that you don't necessarily have permission to do so afterwards.

I tend to forget this, as I've now had ALL THE PERMISSIONS for 4 years or something. But prior to that, it was an important concern for me, and I'd recommend others keep it in mind.

Catija

So, maybe the Meta question should be "if we approve an edit can you please not take away our editing ability for the duration of the time the edit is in limbo?"

Shog9

4:13 PM

@Catija complicated edge case, since someone else may be editing during that time.

Tom Cody

Though, I'd tackle the problem rather before asking than after, but that might be wishful thinking. But well, there is a little bit of initiative recently and I'm very glad I finally got that statistics question through. Now I just need to find the time for a "what now?" question.

Shog9

If we had merging support for edits, a lot of the complexity there could be fixed (er, replaced with other complexity)

Catija

@Shog9 True... though, I would think that someone with edit privileges should be able to approve an edit single-handedly, since they can make an edit that way.

Vogel612

better hide the complexity under the floorboard

@Catija sometimes it's helpful they can't.

Shog9

As it stands, when you're reviewing an edit you have a window of time where you're responsible for it - you can edit reasonably safely. Once you've finished the review, there's a very good chance someone else thinks they have that position and allowing you to keep editing would lead to more problems than it would solve.

Catija

4:15 PM

@Vogel612 All I have to do to get around the additional review requirement is to "approve and edit" and change one character...

Vogel612

true.

but don't tell the robo-reviewers

Shog9

@Catija you can, if you edit it. Your privilege is unfettered editing, not unfettered approving.

Tom Cody

@Catija Hmm, I'm not sure about that. It sounds reasonable, but I'd still rather have more than one person approve that thing.

Catija

@Shog9 But you get "unfettered approving" if you simply improve the edit along with approving it....

Tom Cody

We had some really stupid approved suggested edits here. Afterall, just hitting that approve button is so much easier than coming up with a reasonable edit yourself.

Vogel612

4:16 PM

or the reject button..

Shog9

@Catija right. Because otherwise it would fetter your editing

Heck, if you start editing before the suggestion shows up, your edit implicitly rejects it once submitted - the privileged editor always gets their way.

As soon as you're not editing, you stop wearing the editor hat.

(and yes, this all breaks down if you click the wrong button - too complicated otherwise)

Catija

@TomCody This is certainly true. And the usage does depend on the user. Someone approved an edit that wasn't even clearly made by the original user that significantly changed the question... that may have been on ELL, though... and they're in mod elections right now.

@Shog9 And mod edits win over privileged editors... @TomCody and I have little races sometimes to see who can edit the question first... and he usually beats me and then I can't even submit my edit.

Vogel612

@Catija no not really..

Shog9

@Catija that's nothing to do with mod privs, just speed ;-)

Vogel612

for equally privileged users, the fastest gun in the west wins

Shog9

4:19 PM

EDIT FASTER!

Tom Cody

@Catija Oh, you wouldn't believe. I mean, I can udnerstand plagiarism, not everyone is willing to check Wikipedia or IMDb for a tag wiki even if they should. But we had utter spam edits approved and things that were clearly comments/answers. And I'm speaking about high-rep valuable users doing that.

Catija

But I get that ugly orange bar at the top of the page and it won't let me submit...

Shog9

For bonus points, edit fast and then submit more fast edits within the grace period

Vogel612

@Shog9 Jamal is so damn good at that

Catija

@TomCody Wow... I guess my mindful hand wringing over the review queue is a rare trait, then.

Vogel612

4:21 PM

can we get some more white in here, btw?

Tom Cody

@Catija I don't know we were competing. If I knew that I'd be more than willing to let you prevail, so people wouldn't utter stupid complaints of me just editing everything willy nilly to see my name everywhere (because you, know, I don't really want to improve those posts). ;-)

Vogel612

@TomCody give it a rest, some people can't deal with the idea that nicely presented answers are better than the same answer as a single wall of text

Catija

@TomCody HA HA... I remember a couple of times where we've both edited stuff... there was even that one time where I fixed the stuff you usually fix and you fixed the stuff that I usually fix.

Shog9

Blast from the past:

0

Q: Can I prevent others from editing my question?

George Stocker edited my question, What unspecified functionality do you put in your software? where I specifically said that our software sending back stacktrace to one of our servers was a user-known public feature. He then modified the title of my post, along with the entire content, making i...

Complaining about others editing their confusing crap is a time-honored tradition.

Catija

@Vogel612 Oh, god... don't get me started on that... someone was in here the other day complaining that "why did you edit my question? your edits made absolutely no difference to it."... well, I suppose that's true if you don't think formatting is a difference.

Vogel612

4:23 PM

> How can I retaliate?
Can I file a complaint?

@Catija I know...

I had to dig a little, but I know

Tom Cody

Oh, I also remember this great thing where a user was robbed of his "personal style" (which was using stupid self-created abreviations and stuff).

Vogel612

there's that one person on MSE that rolls back edits capitalizing ` i `

Catija

@TomCody Oh, was that that crime procedural one? Where I asked them to use real words and everyone was telling me "that is a real word"?

Tom Cody

Also a pet peeve of mine (of which I admittedly have quite a few). But I love how the help-center puts it.

@Catija Ah, no, I'm speaking about a main meta quesiton. Was something with "interwebz" instead of "internet" and things like that.

Vogel612

@TomCody you cannot leave out the article

Catija

4:26 PM

@TomCody Ah. Yeah... super fun. I have a war on the abbreviation "sth" over on ELL.

Tom Cody

And I never ever stop to fix wrong whitespace around brackets and punctuation!

Vogel612

it's always "teh interwebz"

Catija

> Like Wikipedia, this site is collaboratively edited. If you are not comfortable with the idea of your posts being edited by other trusted users, this may not be the site for you.

Tom Cody

@Catija No, generally the reviewers are doing pretty good, as few of them as there might be overall.

Catija

@TomCody Ah, that's good to know, then.

Ugh. I'm trying to write my moderator statement for the ELL elections... It's not going well. I really don't like writing about myself.

Tom Cody

4:39 PM

@Catija Aaahh! Just don't forget the character limit. I planned a whole essay on pretty much everything until I realized that nomination was enough for like two paragraphs.

Catija

@TomCody Yeah, just realized I only have 350 characters left.

Vogel612

@Catija wait... how do you know how many you have left??

I didn't see anything like that when I wrote my nomination post.....

Catija

@Vogel612 There's a character count.

Vogel612

hmm. I might have overlooked that

Catija

I lied... I only have 240 left. :?

Tom Cody

4:41 PM

@Catija So I should rather go and remove all my remarks about you from the secret moderator chatroom.

Vogel612

I was very suprised to see "Your nomination is too long by 320 characters"

@TomCody shhhhhh

Catija

@TomCody Not likely. There's already 6 candidates (excluding myself) and two of the current mods are running... though one has been absent for months recently.

You can be sure that you'll be quite able to continue your complaints against my person in the privacy of the mod rooms.

Tom Cody

@Catija Oh, and he still runs. Hmm. We "lost" two moderators, too, here. But they didn't rerun either.

Catija

@TomCody She... but yes. She says that the things that have kept her from being on the site are going away now so she'll be back more... which sounds awfully convenient.

Help me @TomCody You're my only hope:

Tom Cody

5:05 PM

Sounds pretty good. If you're asking for shortening possibilities, maybe you could remove that part about the "stress of keeping the site clean and ultimate" job thing.

Just end the sentence with "pluses and minuses" and continue with the "I believe in communication" part (maybe even connecting the paragraphs).

Catija

I'm not trying to shorten it... I think that's all I want to write.

Tom Cody

You could also shorten the link to the main meta by using the non-footnote version. Could save a few characters. Or in emergency, just don't link to it, since the url could also be quite long.

@Catija Oh, right, I just saw the "characters left", I thought that was "characters too much". Then I don't really know why you called for my help, though.

Catija

@TomCody Just wanted to know what you thought of it.

Tom Cody

Oh, in this case, just click the submit button already!

Catija

@TomCody I did. :P

Ugh, we still haven't "decided" that MCU question on Meta... so I'm not sure what to do with this:

movies.stackexchange.com/review/suggested-edits/28218

Tom Cody

5:16 PM

Me neither, I opted to just "Skip" it like the coward I apparently am.

Catija

I wish the "other" option wasn't "causes harm".

Tom Cody

In the absense of a definite conclusion I'd say it's upto everyone what he does, even if that's a shitty conclusion.

Which isn't simplified by the fact that JoshDM's suggestion would result in the same policy as Dr. R. Dizzle's, but is completely differently voted (probably due to admittedly not so bad arguments).

Catija

5:33 PM

What's the order of operations for getting your max votes? Questions first and then answers?

Tom Cody

@Catija Something like that. You basically get more votes if you vote on questions, but once you reached a certain amount of daily votes on answer, voting on more questions won't gain you more votes. So you can't vote on 29 answers and then spend the rest on questions. So if you really really want that badge, voting on as many questions as possible first would be the safe bet.

Catija

Gotcha. Thanks @TomCody

Movie Reel

6:03 PM

0

Q: movie with 2 men in auto showroom

I saw a movie-scene on TV when I was a kid (the '80s). In it, two men were conversing in an auto showroom. One of them (might have been Gene Hackman) was standing on an empty revolving round platform, saying, "[Other character's first name], do you believe in a higher power?" (That might have bee...

identify-this-movie

Movie Reel

6:20 PM

0

Q: Horror movie in dollhouse

I can't remember much from this movie, but it has hanged dead people in it. There was a man and a woman who were running from something. It was a man who cuts in people. Then there was this scene when someone threw a knife at the woman. The knife pierced her ear and she had to rip off her ear or ...

identify-this-movie horror

steelerfan

@Catija I am asking you this question due to the mere fact that you are the only one in this room that I recognize at the moment. I asked yesterday, and got no response. I am getting an error message from THIS site when I am posting a web address link stating this site cannot perform the function. It only happens on my i-pad, and I guess I am getting down votes on my answers because of it. Can you please offer a suggestion? Have you ever seen an error message like this before on this site?

Tom Cody

@steelerfan You don't seem to get any downvotes, though.

@steelerfan You can also ask on Meta Stack Exchange if someone else has that problem. There is even a tag for the iOS app specifically (if it's that app you're using).

Catija

@steelerfan Can you give an answer you're specifically concerned by? I don't use the app to answer questions, I can't stand typing on the damned thing...

I agree, though, with Tom... I go to MSE to ask questions about the iOS App... I think I have three up right now... There's only one guy building it, though, so he's a bit overworked at times.

Also, is it a particular link or any link you try?

steelerfan

@Catija Will do...thanks.

@TomCody I guess I misunderstood your post yesterday when I asked the same question. I thought you said I received a down vote for that reason. My mistake.

Tom Cody

6:38 PM

Oh, I was talking about "markdown". That is the name for the specific markup language that SE uses. This is the thing that turns *italic* into italic, and [link](https://www.google.com) into link.

Catija

Markdown is magical... I like using the little buttons, though for links... I don't like inline links.

Also, some people call it "markup"... so that's fun.

Tom Cody

There's more information about that on the respective help center page.

Catija

@TomCody I want to go to the pahe!

Tom Cody

@Catija I think markup is the general name for this stuff and markdown the specific kind of markup language used (probably named exactly for the wordplay), in contrast to e.g. HTML markup.

Catija

@TomCody Ah. I never did understand it... I seem to see them used interchangeably, so I never noticed a difference.

steelerfan

6:43 PM

@TomCody Yes, markdown, my mistake. That is EXACTLY what it will not let me do....only on my i-pad. I will go and ask on Meta Stack Exchange...I am just afraid I will be treated like an idiot :(

Catija

It's so not fair that you can edit after that much time. :(

@steelerfan You want some help writing a question? I'm pretty well versed in "how to phrase your question on Meta so that they don't think you're stupid"... I took a 5 hour correspondence course in it.

(not really)

Richard

@Catija - Sorted.

Tom Cody

@steelerfan I don't think you will, if you explain your problem clearly and what you tried.

Catija

8

A: Markdown keyboard in iOS app

Post-beta? Kasra is such a pessimist. A formatting toolbar will be in the next build.

Do you see that markdown keyboard thingy?

@Richard HA - Did you decline it? I don't see it in the recent activity page.

Richard

@Catija - I declined it. The Avengers is part of the MCU, arguably the most important part of the MCU.

steelerfan

6:47 PM

@Catija Thank you SO much for your offer.... I will post my question when I get to work on a PC....My i-pad has a mind of it's own these days. I will post the question in the next 24 hours. Thanks again for your help.

Catija

@Richard Yeah... I declined it because it was still "undetermined", so it didn't make sense to start editing posts.

Tom Cody

@Richard Well, declined for a dubious reason currently debated on meta. But anyway, still valid overall, seeing that the discussion is undecided yet anyway.

@Richard Thanks for the comment of the day, though. I really like that comment and am very glad you do, too.

Richard

@TomCody - yw

Catija

@TomCody I wanna see. :(

Tom Cody

in Mos Eisley, 35 mins ago, by Richard

I'll be honest, if I'm gonna get slated for migrating what are (to my mind) perfectly good questions, I'll be reluctant to bother doing it again

Richard

6:51 PM

@TomCody - Yeah, but the question is stupid. Of course you should tag MCU films with an MCU tag.

Tom Cody

Well, which is exactly what I wanted to prevent. Meh, be it so.

Richard

in Mos Eisley, 23 mins ago, by Richard

I think I'll leave it for now. The OP has their answer and I've still not had a definitive confirmation of whether it'll get rejected again.

Tom Cody

@Richard Well, then provide your insight on the meta post. I'm sure pretty much here is stupid for you. Still our tagging doesn't really work that way to a large degree. And I'm glad we don't have butterbeer and r2-d2 tags, really.

Richard

in Mos Eisley, 24 mins ago, by Richard

I shall just leave it to rot and die

Catija

@Richard Not really. That's the tagging style that you guys are using on SF and that's fine but we don't use that many meta tags. We're more streamlined.

Tom Cody

6:54 PM

That being said, I think I have clarified that I wasn't really content with Shog9 rejecting it single-handedly. But at least now I know why he did so.

Richard

@TomCody - R2-D2 is a major film and TV character whose presence spans 9 feature films, four TV series and innumerable books and comics. He was even the co-star of his own show. He's deserving of a tag, especially since he was in several shows where none of the other SW cast were to be found, excepting his long-time companion; C3P0

Tom Cody

@Richard Well, sure. Like I said, different sites, different places, different questions, different answers, different tagging policies. It's pretty much that easy, really.

Richard

a Butterbeer tag is, however, just dumb

Tom Cody

@Richard Granted, you don't have that anymore anyway.

Movie Reel

0

Q: Dexter lock meaning in Dexter series

Every time the series started I remember wondering about the lock on Dexter's door. I was sure I had the same one in my garage so I went to check and it turned out to be a "Dexter" lock. Is there a specific meaning to this?

dexter

Tom Cody

7:08 PM

Oh, the votes on the MCU meta thing have quite shifted. I wonder there second vote came from, though.

Richard

@TomCody - I upvoted and downvoted accordingly.

Tom Cody

@Richard I know, still wonder who else chimed in on that old thing.

Movie Reel

0

Q: Why aren't episode titles put on the screen?

For the last few decades, it seems that most shows (dramas, not just comedies) don't put the episode titles on the screen. Does anyone know why not?

title

1

Q: Why did Hector kill Gustavo's partner?

In the flashback scene in Breaking Bad, where Gustavo comes to Don Eladio's mansion to offer business with his partner, why did Hector kill the young chemist?

breaking-bad

0

Q: Who exactly was Don Eladio within cartel?

Gustavo's revenge on Don Eladio must have meant more than just personal satisfaction for Gustavo. Was Don Eladio running the entire cartel or who was he in general? I assume if he wasn't the main guy, Gustavo would not be able to live normal life after taking out a high rank cartel member?

breaking-bad

Tom Cody

7:52 PM

Hmm, it seems the SciFi folks really tend to get attention of that MCU meta thing.

Mike Edenfield

yeah that was me, sorry.

Catija

@TomCody Great... let's just let all of the other sites decide how we want to run our site...

Mike Edenfield

I can tell you from experience that I consider myself an fan/expert/whatever on "the MCU" and that I would include all of the individual movies in there.

@Catija I do answer questions here you know :\

Catija

I know that some of them come here and all... and that makes them part of this site...

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield No need to be sorry, you're a user and you have all the right to voice your opinion on meta. It just came pretty surprising that this old thing suddenly got so many votes on that policy.

Mike Edenfield

7:53 PM

in fact that's why I supported using that tag.

because I only really know sci-fi or fantasy movies, I can highlight that tag and get all of the mcu-related questions at once.

makes it easy for me to find questions I am likely to know the answer to

Tom Cody

@Catija Well, if they are users here they are allowed to vote on meta. And they are valuable users here with some good contributions. If they are aware of our tagging policy in contrast to what they might be used to is a different matter, but well, they're part of our community and we're richer with them, so they are part of meta, too.

@MikeEdenfield Which still won't happen when users don't consistently use that tag, though.

Mike Edenfield

@TomCody no, but that's a problem with any tag.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield Sure.

Catija

Yeah... but by the same token, if we've decided not to use meta tags and then we make the exception for this one meta tag that a specific group wants... that seems like a poor stylistic choice.

Mike Edenfield

I wouldn't consider mcu a meta-tag any more than lord-of-the-rings or star-wars

Tom Cody

7:57 PM

@Catija Sure. But it's not as bad as using real meta shit tags, like vampires and sex. It's a franchise tag and those have always been difficult to decide.

Mike Edenfield

oh wait, you don't have a lotr tag :)

Catija

@MikeEdenfield But we don't tag every question about LOTR or Star Wars. It's not how we use tags.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield We do, but it uses proper articles, I think.

Mike Edenfield

there's also the issue, that may be unique to the MCU, that it's often hard to tell whether some aspect of one of those movies is related to the broader mythology or not unless you already know the answer.

Tom Cody

@Catija Uh, well, I think we do. But as I said, that also has to do with the fact that those are much more tightly coupled movie series, with the series title also being part of the movie title. That's a bit different from the quite losely coupled MCU.

Mike Edenfield

7:59 PM

you might ask a question about Captain America 2 that seems to be only about Captain America 2 and it turns out the answer is "yeah that's actually foreshadowing the Doctor Strange movie"

Catija

@TomCody We don't tag every Iron Man 3 question with the "iron man" tag.... we just tag with "iron-man-3"...

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield Tags depend on the question, though, not the answer.

@Catija Indeed. Don't know how that's related here, though.

Mike Edenfield

that's actually what I'm saying; those movies are closely related in more ways than are obvious, so not putting the tag on because you don't think the answer related to the MCU is just as iffy as the other way around

but I can't tag edit here yet so I'll leave it up to you guys :)

Catija

@TomCody You don't see how that's identical to tagging every LOTR question as LOTR or every HP question with HP? I was under the impression that the only reason we tag with HP and prisoner of azkaban is because tag length is too short to include both in the tag.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield As I said, it isn't about the answer or any answer I could possibly anticipate at all.

@MikeEdenfield Wut? Sure you can. Every 300 rep user can create tags.

Mike Edenfield

8:03 PM

I meant edit them into/out of questions on my own

and i really didn't mean to re-start a debate. I've wasted enough of my life on character tag debates on SF&F

"why does yoda get a tag and not chewbacca?" "because."

Catija

Tagging something MCU is identical to tagging every Hobbit/LOTR question with "middle earth" or something like that.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield I don't think so.

Mike Edenfield, Florida

3.5k 12 26

character plot-explanation avengers-age-of-ultron game-of-thrones marvel-cinematic-universe guardians-of-the-galaxy the-lord-of-the-rings

Mike Edenfield

yeah I need 10k for that IIRC

?

Catija

@MikeEdenfield You only need 2 k...

Mike Edenfield

I forget.

ah. well. I'll still leave it alone unless things change on meta

Tom Cody

8:05 PM

@MikeEdenfield That's only for the convenience inline tag editing. But that's only a UI thing.

@MikeEdenfield Well, things have just changed on meta. ;-)

Mike Edenfield

that's probably what I was thinking of.

totally unrelated: you really need a link to your main site in the chat description.

i dunno who did that on mos eisley but it's a godsend

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield I thught was somehow automatic. There's also that little icon, isn't that clickable?

Mike Edenfield

don't think so.

I believe keen manually added the link to the room description.

Richard

Bottom right

Mike Edenfield

well that's a silly place for it.

Richard

8:08 PM

@MikeEdenfield - 'tis a silly site.

Catija

@Richard No reason to go to Camelot, then.

Tom Cody

@Catija Afterall, if they want it or not, they are indeed active and appreciated users of this site.

Movie Reel

8:30 PM

0

Q: Man, left to die alone in the desert of SW America, vows to write a book about nylon and survives!

A man, is lured out into the desert and attacked by his wife's boyfriend and then left to die. He survives using available resources, vowing to "write a book about nylon" because of the nylon rope he uses in his quest to get help.

identify-this-movie

0

Q: Truck is inadvertently winched up into a tree

A young teacher working in Africa is to return home in the company of a young man sent to accompany her. She is beautiful. He is somewhat of doofus. At one point in the movie the truck gets stuck and the winch mounted on the front bumper of the truck is used to help free it BUT the winch keeps...

romantic-comedy

Catija

8:44 PM

@TomCody I'm trying not to respond in a way that looks like a five year old having a tantrum about not getting their way... And I'm not sure how to explain it.

If we follow the Sci-Fi methodology, we will have to come up with a term for every group of related works so that they can be tied together the same way MCU is. Them having their own term makes things simpler but what's the difference between connecting together every single MCU film and connecting every X-Men film, or every Superman film, or every Marvel film... Or every Tolkein-based story...

Tom Cody

@Catija And I try to welcome those users and show that I'm glad they contribute to our site, even if also being discontent with the outcome of that meta discussion possibly biased toward a tagging policy that isn't so much applied on our site. (And admittedly also simultaneously trying to be a little passive-agressive about the fact that they are so great contributers, active enough for proper meta voting, on a site they apparently don't appreciate much. ;-))

Catija

We don't tag every question about TNG as "Star Trek"... just like we don't tag every question about a specific Star Trek film with the "star trek" tag.

Tom Cody

But well, it is a borderline case, otherwise I wouldn't have asked that meta question. And the community has decided how it should be handled.

Catija

@TomCody How is MCU different than Star Trek?

Tom Cody

@Catija It's quite a bit more losely coupled (which would speak against a franchise tag).

It's not an easy matter to decide when to introduce a franchise tag and when not. That's the problem.

Catija

8:55 PM

@TomCody But the only time we have a franchise tag right now, that I'm aware of, is when the titles are too long to include the name of the franchise... and that's it. Technically The Hobbit and The Lord of The Rings films are in the same franchise... in much the same way of MCU but we don't have a tag for them.

If they all come here and vote that we should allow all ID questions without any requirements for quality are you going to abide by that, too?

Tom Cody

@Catija Also true. And I've given that as arguments in my meta question. If people don't care about that, they, well, don't care about it.

Catija

Or if they all vote that every question should have a genre tag?

Tom Cody

@Catija Well, it's an intricate matter. They are important users here, even if they might not be too well-versed in our policies or care much about the site. You neither can't nor want to just arbitrarily exclude a set of users from meta voting. That would be a very bad thing and wouldn't contribute to a good cooperation either.

Catija

@TomCody I'm not saying that they should be excluded... I'm saying that it seems unfair to turn this site into a Sci-Fi clone simply because they have more people who can come and turn the tables on Meta questions.

Particularly considering their regular bashing of our site and policies.

Tom Cody

@Catija Well, let's just hope they won't misuse that loop-hole to their own advantage. At the end of the day it's still up to reasonable policy judgement and that MCU tag thing is not as easy and definitely decidable without a meta discussion IMHO.

@Catija Well, those are supposedly just "well-meant jokes".

Catija

9:02 PM

@TomCody All jokes have a grain of truth.

Tom Cody

@Catija Indeed. And it's the non-jokes that are worse anyway and shed light on the real underlying attitude. But alas, accoridng to the main perpetrators I'm just unnecessarily sensitive. And making fun despite, upto because, the other party can't laugh doesn't seem to be trolling either. But well, I've debated about this shit enoguh for today.

Mike Edenfield

@Catija one difference is that the producers of the MCU works consider themselves to be part of a larger universe, so the works are written with that in mind; the producers of the X-Men films explicitly do not.

Catija

@MikeEdenfield And the producers of the Star Trek films didn't consider themselves the same people? Or the producers of the Tolkein films?

Mike Edenfield

I would argue that the hobbit films fall under the lord-of-the-rings banner; however, I say that from the perspective that the movies deviated from the books specifically to tie the 6 films together more, so that may not be a valid argument here.

Tom Cody

@Catija Well, a possible Star Trek tag is debatable too, actually. Franchise tags are a hot topic and it's not really clear or that consistent how they're used here.

Catija

9:09 PM

@MikeEdenfield If you think they all fall under the Lord of the Rings, that sounds like an even stronger argument... Don't forget, we primarily talk about the films here, not the books.

Tom Cody

But as long as we don't start to use author tags instead of works, we're still fine, I guess. But alas, don't get me started on the director tags. Problem of it's very own (where the best policy should be more apparent, though).

Mike Edenfield

@Catija True, which is why I think that's a weaker argument here. But at the same time, it's about the content of the movies. There were elements, particularly in Battle of the Five Armies, that were crafted specifically to link back to Lord of the Rings.

and that don't make much sense on their own.

Sauron has nothing at all to do with The Hobbit if you look at the story by itself; he was wedged in there to link the 6 movies together.

Tom Cody

I think it's still largely that big argument of using tags to classify the movie vs. tags to classify the question. Only the latter seems to be a valid and feasible tagging approach.

Mike Edenfield

To me it's about helping users find questions they want to and/or know how to answer. That's what tags were made for.

Catija

@MikeEdenfield The point is that we do not tag questions about The Hobbit with an LOTR tag... but if you think they're part of the same universe... and I agree with that... then we'd have to give it the same treatment at the MCU tag...

Mike Edenfield

9:12 PM

Well, I think you should, but that wasn't the meta question :)

Tom Cody

@Catija Oh, please don't ask that, the leads to a mess (if that MCU thing doesn't already). ;-)

Mike Edenfield

Of course, there's an even bigger question lurking here... TV universes.

what do you tag questions about Arrow or The Flash?

Catija

@MikeEdenfield Except Meta tags are specifically discouraged. If every tag also must have another tag, then that's probably a meta tag. So we either get rid of the title tags or we get rid of the universe tag.

Mike Edenfield

see, I think that's a misuse of the term "meta-tag".

to me a meta-tag is a tag that has nothing to do with the work in question.

Catija

@MikeEdenfield arrow... the-flash

Tom Cody

9:14 PM

@MikeEdenfield arrow or the-flash, obviously.

Mike Edenfield

like, science-fiction is a meta tag because it applies to any sci-fi work regardless of what work it is.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield To me it's one that has nothing to do with the question in question. But alas, I'm still not sure I really understood what that whole SE fuss about meta tags is really about.

Mike Edenfield

@TomCody as I understand it, meta tags tend to lead to people building complex tag-tree hierarchies to micro-organize everything.

Tom Cody

Uh, like franchise tags? ;-)

Mike Edenfield

so you try to get [tv] -> [tv-series] or [tv-mini-series] -> [tv-series-drama] or [tv-series-comedy]

Catija

9:17 PM

@MikeEdenfield How is this not a tag tree hierarchy???

Mike Edenfield

because the mcu tag can stand on it's own.

you are very unlikely to have a question that is just tagged [tv]

Catija

MCU -> the avengers -> The avengers united.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield Indeed it can. And those are actually the question that are about the intricacies of the MCU as a franchise. And those are exactly the questions that should have it (IHMO, of course).

Mike Edenfield

so the mcu tag and the iron-man tag aren't really parent/child.. they're siblings.

shrug

the other argument is, meta-tags are too broad to be meaningful. it's unlikely that someone is going to follow or ignore or subscribe to [tv-series]

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield Not so much either. There could be an Iron Man question that also is about the bigger picture of the MCU. It's just all about the question (what tags are for in the end) in contrast to about the movie itself.

Mike Edenfield

9:19 PM

as opposed to a Marvel fan who's likely to follow [mcu]

Catija

@MikeEdenfield And we have 2 questions currently tagged only MCU... and I'm not even sure that they're validly tagged that way.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield Why doesn't this guy follow iron-man if he's interested in his movies?

Catija

@TomCody Because he's too lazy to follow 18 different tags instead of only one.

Tom Cody

@Catija Oh, there are some very valid and good general MCU question. Definitely.

Mike Edenfield

@TomCody he probably would, though that means constantly updating my multiple tags every time a new movie comes out :)

I'd suspect we get more of the MCU questions on SF&F because its "comic booky".

Catija

9:20 PM

@TomCody With only an MCU tag and no other film-specific tags?

Mike Edenfield

so I fully admit i'm coming at it from the perspective of answering tons of mcu questions in the past few years.

Tom Cody

The problem is just that SE has no builtin tag hierarchy features. And until that we have to use the given 5 tag slots to describe the questions as best as possible.

Catija

I'm trying...

3

A: Can we group, constrain and add heirarchy to tags?

If I'm understanding your question correctly, this would be very useful on sites like Movies & TV (and probably Sci-Fi & Fantasy). Right now M&TV has very strict rules against using director, actor, and genre tags unless the question is actually about that director, actor or genre. With only fiv...

Mike Edenfield

if you don't have all that many "mythology-wide" mcu questions here then the tag's probably not much of a benefit.

oooo... "tag heirarchy" is even a bigger no-no than "meta-tag" :)

Tom Cody

@Catija No, there's also general question tags, like, say production or first-appearance and stuff.

Mike Edenfield

9:22 PM

usually the argument goes something like "man we have enough stupid arguments over tags now, and you want to make them more complicated?!" :)

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield There are quite a few though. And the MCU is an important matter in movie industry and history to warrant a tag on its own. It's not about abolishing the whole tag.

Mike Edenfield

ANYWAY wow I did not mean to start this debate up twice in one day.

tags: more heat than light.

Catija

@MikeEdenfield I agree it would overcomplicate things... but I see it as the sort of thing where someone creates a tag and someone edits the tag definition to include things like actor/director names, possibly genre, universe... etc.

Tom Cody

@MikeEdenfield Indeed. And this day wasn't short on stupid arguments anyway.

Catija

Particularly since, in their infinite wisdom, we're only allowed five tags with 25 characters each.

Tom Cody

9:25 PM

Is it just the flutes or does the soundtrack of Casualties of War really sound very similar to Once Upon a Time in America?

@Catija Oh god, the fucking 25 characters, heavens hear us! Won't anyone think about the children! \o/

But I guess it's one of those things that'll never change (like tag hierarchies).

Catija

Yeah.

Tom Cody

But well, I'll simply not edit that mcu tag out of or into any questions. Shall all the other users do what they want with that tag.

Catija

@TomCody But that's part of the problem... if we're going to say "it's been decided"... we can't just selectively decide to ignore it because we don't like the "decision".

Tom Cody

@Catija Oh, I have no obligation to edit anything. When disputes arise or things get flagged, I have the obligation to step in. But noone say I have to edit a question at all. And I'm not going back to edit all the old MCU questions.

Catija

@TomCody Then why even bother asking the question?

Tom Cody

9:36 PM

@Catija So that we have a policy. And I will apply that policy when necessary. But who says I should edit each and every question? I'm not the sites sole curator.

In addition to that, this answer has +3 currently.

But well, Sean Penn really knows how to play a disgusting asshole. I won't try to guess if that's due to great acting skills or some other reason, though. ;-)

Catija

@TomCody You could say the same thing about Nic Cage and crazy.

Tom Cody

9:56 PM

Sure. Or Scarlett Johansson and sexy. Oh, wait.

Catija

@TomCody Har har har...

Have you seen the convo in the other room?

Tom Cody

@Catija Which one?

Catija

@TomCody They're talking about religion in Sci-Fi... which I find exceedingly ironic... but it's getting a bit...

Doc's Reaction To Marty's "Heavy" - Back To The Future

►

Tom Cody

@Catija Ah that. Yeah, don't follow that much. But well, I'll be sure to keep away from that anyway. I'm not a big religion fan but I for certain had enough exhausting discussions for one day.

Catija

@TomCody Agreed. I'm going to sweat it all out at yoga. Have a good evening/night.

Tom Cody

10:06 PM

Good night. I hope tomorrow'll be a bit more relaxed day.

Tom Cody

10:24 PM

Oh, so it seems the soundtrack actually is from Morricone. Well, he already worked with DePalma on The Untouchables afterall.

Movie Reel

0

Q: "Royal Toilet", TV movie

I'm hoping someone can provide information on a movie I saw on TV some time ago. I haven't been able to conjure up anything via Google. As I recall: The movie was a comedy called "Royal Toilet", which I believe I saw on PBS sometime in the early 1980s. It took place in a European country (Denmar...

identify-this-movie comedy

-1

Q: A older movie about a female spy

It starts with her folding up a parachute and at one point she parachutes into this guys garden that she has to spy on and then she's on a boat with a creepy guy and she's looking for a golden dragon statue and it get dropped into the ocean and that's all I remember about it

identify-this-movie

Jimmy Hoffa

11:02 PM

@MikeEdenfield no, meta-tag's are about the question but not in fact what the question is about. Like if a question is really good and you tagged it good, people try to get wise and do stuff like this every once in a while like when they don't know they can star a question as favorite, they'll go around tagging questions they want to keep track of or they'll put clean-up on questions to maintain a backlog they can work through for close voting or editing etc

AKA, meta tags are crap

(this is my understanding anyhow)

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