Wikipedia ruins "The Mousetrap" by giving away the ending...., ...and gets a mention on French Radio tonight.... Options

[the fieryangel]

Wikipedia puts the ending of Agatha Christie's "The Mousetrap" on the play's article.... and the Christie heirs are pissed.

The issue is discussed ad naseum by the usual cast of Wikipediots...

Among the gems in the discussion :

It would seem best to me, in order to avoid controversy and still provide the requested information, to create a "Killer in Agatha Christie's 'The Mousetrap'" article, move the entire plot spoiler there and then reference it in the introduction to the article. In this way, the final wishes of the author are upheld (and a fundamental part of the play's structure) and Wikipedia gets to post everything just as before.--eleuthero (talk) 13:55, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

I disagree. We don't do that for other articles and we shouldn't do it for this one. If you don't want to know the plot, don't read the plot section of the article (or maybe don't read the article at all). --Two Bananas (talk) 14:55, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
This would just be another form of spoiler, and would still be covered by WP:SPOILER. If a section called "Identity of the murderer" isn't enough of a clue to the reader that the identity of the murderer is about to be revealed, an article entitled "Killer in Agatha Christie's 'The Mousetrap'" presumably wouldn't help them much either (and could even be worse, if they got there from a Google search and the one-paragraph article got straight to the point). I'm not sure how hiding the ending behind a link would uphold Christie's final wishes any more closely - the Telegraph article suggests that her grandson considers it a "pity" when any reference work includes the plot in its entirety. --McGeddon (talk) 14:59, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Or they could just not include the spoiler in the article...

[Cock-up-over-conspiracy]

God, that arsehole Garrett 'SarekOfVulcan' Fitzgerald has to chime in too with his illogic. I suppose he picked up on this from reading WR here.

These people have no spirit of fun at all. A consensus of arseholes is always going to be arseholery. No big surprise there.

I suppose his logic also determines that "if they did not want people outside the theater to find out the ending, they shouldn't have performed the play either".

I must check the Santa Claus and Tooth Fairy topics to make sure the child in Africa knows they DO NOT EXIST either!

No. There is no reason to treat this any differently than any other published work. If they didn't want people outside the theater to find out the ending, they shouldn't have published the play.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:58, 5 September 2010 (UTC

Of course, he misses the point too. Folks had been seeing the play for much longer than it was published (if it has been).

The whole thing is about a 'spirit of fun' that everyone entered into voluntarily for the sake of entertainment.

[SarekOfVulcan]

God, that arsehole Garrett 'SarekOfVulcan' Fitzgerald has to chime in too with his illogic. I suppose he picked up on this from reading WR here.

Unlike you, I _do_ have a life that doesn't involve posting here. :-)

http://www.facebook.com/#!/album.php?a...id=135705273259

ETA: Um, I suppose I should suggest _not_ scrolling to the bottom if you haven't read the Wikipedia article. :-)

This post has been edited by SarekOfVulcan:

[Cock-up-over-conspiracy]

Unlike you, I _do_ have a life that doesn't involve posting here. :-)

Sure, we know. Indeed, it is a wonder how you fit it all in ... and reading here!

I still think your, and much of the Wikipedia, sucks though.

This is a case where, if there was good editorial control, a sense of style and a spirit of fun could be entered into. It really is not necessary to spoil everything just because one can.

Looking at the topic, they even highlight that the identity of the murderer is included. Now that's just being insensitively churlish.

And insensitivity seems to be pretty much what others are accusing you of being over a period of years.

[EricBarbour]

And insensitivity seems to be pretty much what others are accusing you of being over a period of years.

It's hopeless. Sarek's such an arrogant twat, if he believed the sky was yellow, he'd probably buy
15 pairs of glasses with yellow lenses. Wear them every day, and accuse anyone who told him the
sky is blue of "incivility". He's the Perfect Wikipedia Douchebag, in other words. His delusions are
airtight and ironclad.

Damn glad he's in Maine, 3000 miles from me.

This post has been edited by EricBarbour:

[Cock-up-over-conspiracy]

No, it's not that it is hard. It is simply nonsensical. No audience should have public and notable information withdrawn from it.

Oh, for goodness sake ... it is a bit of fun, an Olde English tradition. It really is not going to kill the girl in Africa, for whom the Wikipedia is really all about, if she does not get to know. Must you spoil everything for everyone? Do you feel so much more superior for knowing it?

It's hopeless. Sarek's such an arrogant twat, if he believed the sky was yellow, he'd probably buy 15 pairs of glasses with yellow lenses. Wear them every day, and accuse anyone who told him the sky is blue of "incivility".

He's the Perfect Wikipedia Douchebag, in other words. His delusions are airtight and ironclad.

Part of my fear is that is dealing with such a disproportionately nerdie community, as one does on the Wikipedia, is that one is dealing with a disproportionately high number of individuals suffering from borderline personality disorders.

Or perhaps it is a question of having to spend time with too many individuals who spend so much time dealing with unfeeling software rather than human beings that they inevitably end up treating other human beings like software glitches. Discretion ... spirit of fun ... does not compute.

I don't know ... just send the Order's Most Worthy Matrons a whole load of Wikipedia hard core porn and links, and get him to justify pulling the wings off newcomers as a community leader rather than dealing with all the filth to them.

"Logic is the beginning of wisdom; not the end." -- Spock of Vulcan

This post has been edited by Cock-up-over-conspiracy:

[Cyclopia]

No, it's not that it is hard. It is simply nonsensical. No audience should have public and notable information withdrawn from it.

Oh, for goodness sake ... it is a bit of fun, an Olde English tradition. It really is not going to kill the girl in Africa, for whom the Wikipedia is really all about, if she does not get to know. Must you spoil everything for everyone? Do you feel so much more superior for knowing it?

I don't understand. Superior to who? I don't feel superior to anyone. I simply know that it is public and very notable knowledge, and it oughts to be reported in any encyclopedia. I would have been very much annoyed to read an encyclopedia article, read that it has a notable plot twist etc. and then having the twist not revealed. That would have been disrespectful towards the readers expecting a complete entry.

I live in Olde England, even if only since 18 months, and I understand the Olde English tradition. Still, we're not screaming the murder's name in front of the theater. You can simply not read the article, and be happy with that. I just finished to see The Prisoner 1967 series a couple weeks ago. Did I go to WP reading about it before seeing the end? No, of course, I just waited and enjoyed it, and then I was happy to see a complete entry on WP about it, to try to understand it (gee, talk about psychedelic ending).

[Somey]

I would have been very much annoyed to read an encyclopedia article, read that it has a notable plot twist etc. and then having the twist not revealed. That would have been disrespectful towards the readers expecting a complete entry.

First of all, that's a ludicrous assertion - the reader isn't going to feel disrespected because an encyclopedia entry fails to provide the twist ending to a whodunit. And if you put the spoiler in a rollup (or rather, rolldown) box, you're giving the reader the choice of whether or not he/she wants to read it - that's actually far more respectful than making an assumption one way or another.

In other words, you can safely assume that if someone goes to the WP article for The Mousetrap, he/she is going to want some general info on the play, how long it's been running, who wrote it and when, etc., and probably the essentials of the story (who the characters are, what's the setup, what the mystery they're trying to solve). But you can't assume the reader is going to want the article to spoil it for them.

This applies to the photo of the gangrenous leg, too. You talk about these things as though it would be "censorship" to put them in rolldown boxes, but how is that censorship? What it is, is serving the needs of a diverse readership. But Wikipedians never, ever, ever want to do that; they only want to serve their own needs, whatever those may be. Except that in this case, I can't see how even their own needs would be served by this - that's why it's "mystifying." At least with the gangrenous leg, the photo has some chock value in itself, and the reader therefore gets as clearer idea of how serious gangrene is. But with the Mousetrap spoiler, there's just no inherent value there whatsoever.

I realize that some of us have chuckled at WP'ers in the past for getting so worked up over the spoiler issue, so maybe we're being a bit hypocritical now for getting worked up over it ourselves... But in my case, the issue is unwillingness to make a simple compromise for the benefit of readers. What's more, it's one that you couldn't even make in a paper encyclopedia - the WP'ers are opposed to the use of something that, if used, would help to further prove the inherent superiority of data over paper as an information medium. So why are they so against it? Are they really that afraid that they're going to have to change half-a-million other articles to use rolldown boxes, just to be "consistent"? That's the only thing I can think of, and it's a pretty shitty excuse.

[Cyclopia]

I would have been very much annoyed to read an encyclopedia article, read that it has a notable plot twist etc. and then having the twist not revealed. That would have been disrespectful towards the readers expecting a complete entry.

First of all, that's a ludicrous assertion - the reader isn't going to feel disrespected because an encyclopedia entry fails to provide the twist ending to a whodunit.

I would. I would feel to be treated like a moron, and I would be feeling that an important piece of information is missing without reason.

And if you put the spoiler in a rollup (or rather, rolldown) box, you're giving the reader the choice of whether or not he/she wants to read it - that's actually far more respectful than making an assumption one way or another.

But this choice already exists: if you don't want to know, don't read the article. I don't know where you live, but here people are not compulsively obliged to read all the WP (maybe if it's what happens in your place, I understand the hatred you have for it (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/rolleyes.gif) )

In other words, you can safely assume that if someone goes to the WP article for The Mousetrap, he/she is going to want some general info on the play, how long it's been running, who wrote it and when, etc., and probably the essentials of the story (who the characters are, what's the setup, what the mystery they're trying to solve). But you can't assume the reader is going to want the article to spoil it for them.

Why? The ending is, if anything, the most notable feature of the play. It's only plain that I'd want it to be in open air in the article.

This applies to the photo of the gangrenous leg, too. You talk about these things as though it would be "censorship" to put them in rolldown boxes, but how is that censorship? What it is, is serving the needs of a diverse readership. But Wikipedians never, ever, ever want to do that; they only want to serve their own needs, whatever those may be. Except that in this case, I can't see how even their own needs would be served by this - that's why it's "mystifying." At least with the gangrenous leg, the photo has some chock value in itself, and the reader therefore gets as clearer idea of how serious gangrene is. But with the Mousetrap spoiler, there's just no inherent value there whatsoever.

The point is that you treat information like it had only some "external" value. Like it makes sense only because it is useful.

It has, of course, and a lot of it. But most importantly, information has value in itself. It's an end, not a mean. If I want to know how a Chaetognatha (T-H-L-K-D) looks like, I expect to see a picture of it. Not because I need to recognize arrow worms now or in the foreseeable future, but because it is an essential part of the information I was looking for.

Same for gangrene. It's not that I want the images because they can help the public realize that gangrene is serious. It's, much more simply, because these images are the answer to the question "how does gangrene actually looks like?" and there's no reason on earth to hide this, on an encyclopedic article on the subject.

I realize that some of us have chuckled at WP'ers in the past for getting so worked up over the spoiler issue, so maybe we're being a bit hypocritical now for getting worked up over it ourselves... But in my case, the issue is unwillingness to make a simple compromise for the benefit of readers. What's more, it's one that you couldn't even make in a paper encyclopedia - the WP'ers are opposed to the use of something that, if used, would help to further prove the inherent superiority of data over paper as an information medium. So why are they so against it? Are they really that afraid that they're going to have to change half-a-million other articles to use rolldown boxes, just to be "consistent"? That's the only thing I can think of, and it's a pretty shitty excuse.

No, I am afraid that instead of an encyclopedia providing information we become a neutered nanny thing.

(What happened with the bbcode?)

[Cock-up-over-conspiracy]

But this choice already exists: if you don't want to know, don't read the article.

Sure, the same goes for pictures of kids having sex or pedo cartoons. "We must document it!!!" ... and if people are offended by it ... then they just should not read the articles ???

Same for gangrene. It's not that I want the images because they can help the public realize that gangrene is serious. It's, much more simply, because these images are the answer to the question "how does gangrene actually looks like?"

The problem is, we all here have good insight into the minds that create the Wikipedia with none of the buy-in encouraging us to unquestionably believe in its tenents. As with a lot of nasty and self-made porno pictures (including the kiddie porn), I'd be more inclined to believe they are just placed their for puerile shock value. Like why does it need x 100 pictures of ejaculations?

Ditto with the spoiler issue. A large proportion of Wikipedian like spoiling things. They are senseless, conceited, puerile spoilers themselves. They are the site is too full of its own importance. They are young, immature, irresponsible, incapable of seeing a bigger picture. Many are actually vengeful, hateful, obsessive.

It is easy to argue that what is notable about The Mousetrap is that you are politely requested not to divulge the murderer at the end. The request is part of the performance and 'The Mousetrap Experience', its success or notability based on it. As far as I understand, it is a fairly mediocre piece of middle of the road theatre; in other words, not otherwise notable at all.

And so we have to ask whether the exposure is genuine (and I would argue there is no genuine need), or just some jerk off have a laugh cocking a snoot at a convention and using the Pee-dia to propel it to the top of Google.

Then you have the vocal minor that will fight against anything like sitewide spoilers because they know they are incapable of managing them due to the lack of consistent editorial overview ...

[Cyclopia]

But this choice already exists: if you don't want to know, don't read the article.

Sure, the same goes for pictures of kids having sex or pedo cartoons. "We must document it!!!" ... and if people are offended by it ... then they just should not read the articles ???

About kids having sex, I guess that stuff is illegal for good reasons (being the product of child abuse), so it's quite clearly fine not having it.

About cartoons depicting underage sex (like, say, a cartoon of Bart Simpson having sex), I have always been totally baffled by the fact that they are illegal in several jurisdictions. It is clearly a victimless crime (T-H-L-K-D). The reason for them being illegal seems to be based only on the mass hysteria around pedophilia. I mean, I understand the main reason to have pedo pics illegal is that of cutting down the market of such stuff that is inextricably related, obviously, to child abuse. But cartoons? Are we protecting Bart Simpson or Charlie Brown from pedophilia? It makes no sense.

(Depictions of real people with clearly recognizable faces would be another story).

So, for the second, yes: on an article about such cartoons, I would expect an image (victimless crime laws notwithstanding), and if people are offended by it, then they should just not read the articles.

The problem is, we all here have good insight into the minds that create the Wikipedia with none of the buy-in encouraging us to unquestionably believe in its tenents. As with a lot of nasty and self-made porno pictures (including the kiddie porn), I'd be more inclined to believe they are just placed their for puerile shock value. Like why does it need x 100 pictures of ejaculations?

There is a lot of people of course posting a lot of stuff for exhibitionist reasons, or even perhaps for shock value. But why should I care of people's intentions? I care of the result. If such behaviour leads to have multiple good quality images for a subject, that's only good.

Ditto with the spoiler issue. A large proportion of Wikipedian like spoiling things. They are senseless, conceited, puerile spoilers themselves. They are the site is too full of its own importance. They are young, immature, irresponsible, incapable of seeing a bigger picture. Many are actually vengeful, hateful, obsessive.

Funny, I'd say the same of many WR regulars (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/dry.gif) (perhaps because they were/are wikipedians for the most part?) I mean, it's them that consider posting doodled pictures of their interlocutors as reasonable dialogue.

Apart from that, I'd say that in this case it is people who wants stuff removed/hidden that doesn't see the big picture. They see the short-term, small advantage of making people less offended, and don't see the wider benefit that open, complete information gives to everyone. It is a much more subtle and much more difficult to quantify one, but it is a bigger one in my opinion. Of course, YMMV.

It is easy to argue that what is notable about The Mousetrap is that you are politely requested not to divulge the murderer at the end. The request is part of the performance and 'The Mousetrap Experience', its success or notability based on it. As far as I understand, it is a fairly mediocre piece of middle of the road theatre; in other words, not otherwise notable at all.

And so we have to ask whether the exposure is genuine (and I would argue there is no genuine need), or just some jerk off have a laugh cocking a snoot at a convention and using the Pee-dia to propel it to the top of Google.

I am honestly not sure to understand what you mean, sorry.

This post has been edited by Cyclopia:

[Cock-up-over-conspiracy]

Apart from that, I'd say that in this case it is people who wants stuff removed/hidden that doesn't see the big picture. They see the short-term, small advantage of making people less offended, and don't see the wider benefit that open, complete information gives to everyone.

Could I have a link to your homepage/blog so that I can know more about you, please? I find your position hard to understand without knowing more personal details.

if people are offended by it, then they should just not read the articles.

It is not just about taking personal offense. It is both about our collective crafting of society and a concern about how society is being crafted.

For sure, one can sit at home with headphones and blinkers on "not being offended". That does not stop society being made by others.

How old are you by the way and what positions of responsibility do you or have you occupied?

Thank you.

[Cyclopia]

Apart from that, I'd say that in this case it is people who wants stuff removed/hidden that doesn't see the big picture. They see the short-term, small advantage of making people less offended, and don't see the wider benefit that open, complete information gives to everyone.

Could I have a link to your homepage/blog so that I can know more about you, please? I find your position hard to understand without knowing more personal details.

if people are offended by it, then they should just not read the articles.

It is not just about taking personal offense. It is both about our collective crafting of society and a concern about how society is being crafted.

For sure, one can sit at home with headphones and blinkers on "not being offended". That does not stop society being made by others.

How old are you by the way and what positions of responsibility do you or have you occupied?

Thank you.

I am an Italian 29-years old postdoctoral biophysics researcher at the University of Cambridge, UK.
What about you?

(That said, what has my background to do with the discussion? Opinions are opinions, their validity doesn't change depending on who is saying them)

This post has been edited by Cyclopia: