Characters as spoilers

I thought we'd discussed this before, but couldn't find it in an admittedly very cursory search.

I recently stumbled upon a case where the listing of a character name in CK is a major spoiler for the book in question. Not linking, for obvious reasons, but, in essence, a character thought to be dead at the end of Book One re-appears 3/4 of the way through Book 2, in the plot and emotional climax of the book. For someone who hasn't read Book Two to stumble upon that name in CK would be a book-destroying spoiler. I'm strongly tempted to remove it, but wanted to check here first.

I don't see how the name is necessarily a spoiler. Books frequently enough include past experiences (in the timeline) that a dead character who's not revived or anything like that can continue to be a main character in the books following the death scene.

ETA: When a beloved character dies, I'm usually happy to see their name mentioned in later books. So I lean toward leaving the name in CK.

Since everyone sees what could or could not be a potential spoiler differently (I agree with Lorax here regarding character names), it's hard to create a good justification of keeping the name or removing the name.

I'd lean toward removal.

>1 lorax: I would move the spoiler character down on the list so that it's hidden behind the "(show all x items)" button.

I personally hate being spoiled, so I stay away from CK of books I want to read but haven't yet. I think there is an expectation that spoiling is a possibility when looking at CK.

Then there's the question of what constitutes a spoiler. Different people have different ideas about spoilers, and some things that are spoilers when a book first comes out are more-or-less general knowledge several decades and a few movie adaptations later. Your example seems fairly straightforward, and I was going to offer one I considered more complicated. However, I was going to offer an example from The Lord of the Rings and then realized it fits your exact description, so I can't be sure that's not what you're referencing.

None of this is to say that you shouldn't delete it if you want to, but if it's a popular book it might be added again.

Keep. Although moving to beneath the continuation button seems like a fair compromise. CK should be consistent a resource as we can manage, and providing they're actually present in the book for some significant action then they should be in the CK.

>1 lorax: Are you talking aboutHarrow the Ninth? If so here's my reasoning for adding the character in question:

the book has flashbacks

other characters who died in the first book reappear

knowing the character appears doesn't spoil how or why they reappear

I assumed I would be seeing them again after reading just a few chapters. When there's that big a show of removing a character from scenes where the audience knows they were present, it makes their return seem almost inevitable.

That being said, I understand your position, even though I don't share it, and would not add the character back if you chose to remove them.

How I wish we could use spoiler tags for characters! I don't know how it would work for character pages, but it's worth asking for when Tim and co. get ready to start on revamping work pages.

Someone who doesn't want to see spoilers shouldn't be looking at CK for that work.

>8 jjwilson61: True, but CK doesn't often contain things that are particularly spoiler-y so there's not really any reason to think there would be spoilers there.

I agree with >2 aspirit: and >7 amanda4242: . Books often include detailed flashbacks or other things that can include a character that may not be present in the current events. I'd vote for keeping it.

amanda4242: Got it in one.

For me, personally, knowing before I started that Character appeared in the book would have affected how I read it, since "When and how are they going to show up" would have been a major driving question. And yeah, other putatively-dead characters show up too, but they're far less important than the viewpoint character of Book One. They're below the fold, as it were, though, so I think you've convinced me to leave it.

Also, it occurs to me that at a code level it is possible to have spoiler warnings on CK - it's present on the "Last Words" field - so asking to allow us to turn it on for Characters as needed may not be totally crazy.

(And I so want to talk about the book! Too bad LT isn't a good place to actually do that.)

>11 lorax: knowing before I started that Character appeared in the book would have affected how I read it

I can see that. Even though I was convinced they would reappear, *knowing* it probably would have shifted more of my focus to that rather than on wtf was wrong with Harrow and how the Emperor Undying would die.

I actually debated over whether to add the character and eventually decided adding them below the fold was a good compromise. Perhaps if it doesn't prove possible to have spoiler tags for characters, we could simply put all spoiler-y characters below the fold and convince Tim to add text to the show more option saying that doing so may include spoilers.

I posted an RSI.

Would it be easy to code one entry in a CK field as a spoiler? Seeing as how "Last words" has its own field, would this mean a new/separate CK field for spoiler characters? How about just a new field for spoilers?

I like using lots of tags, but I try to avoid adding tags that would be spoilers. A dedicated field for spoilers would take care of that problem too.

>14 karenb: There are some people who will make two entries into "Last words" if the work has some sort of "ending after the ending" like a Conclusion or an Epilogue. From what I've seen both entries will then be hidden. So, it would seem that the field is just automatically coded as getting the Spoiler tags.

In that vain, I think the biggest obstacle for the idea of adding spoiler tags into the Character field is being able to select to hide entries individually while keeping others visible.

I'm not against it and think it could be a good solution to the problem. I think it's just one of the things that comes down to whether or not the admins are willing.

ETA: It just occurred to me: Would having some entries hidden from view effect the Related CK stats?

I suspect it's also a problem because characters show up more places on the site than last words. If I click on that character in common knowledge on the first book, should it show the second book as well?