Forum:Addition of 'Pricing' to the Magazine Infobox

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There has been a discussion between myself and User:The Librarian about whether or not to include Pricing in the Magazine Infobox. I feel that should we include pricing in the infobox it will set a precedent for the rest of the wiki (ie all the books, CDs, etc), and as price is very much a country specific sort of thing shouldn't be included. There exist such books as Howe's Transcendental Toybox which give lists of pricing of everything. Also on the Wookipedia Star Wars Insider and Memory Alpha Star Trek Magazine they also have magazines and infoboxes roughly the same as ours both without a pricing section. See also User talk:Tangerineduel for more of the discussion. --Tangerineduel 16:20, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

In favour of including pricing details

As a supporter of including the original price for commercially licenced merchandise (in the infoboxes), I would like to raise a number of additional points that I hope others will consider and voice an opinion on.

• Firstly, the world of Doctor Who is so enormously huge and beyond the confines of a television series, it is impossible to ignore a commercial element. The commercial world has dictated the BBC's budget commitment to the series. Merchandised books, videos, CD, DVD's, magazines/comics and toys are all driven by sales, some have flourished some have been abandoned as being unprofitable. Licensed rights to use characters and images (again financially influencial), have dictated the final form of the Who the public have had.

• But you don't need to know the actual price for learning how successful the certain product is. For readers on the TARDIS Index, the focus would be the amount sold rather than how much each was sold for (and no, I'm not, suggesting that we have a "Number Sold" section in the infobox). -<Azes13 20:03, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

• Just because others wiki's haven't included pricing details, does that mean TARDIS shouldn't!

• Presumably, other wikis don't have it for good reasons. Many are larger than the TARDIS index, so presumably there was someone who brought it up before and the fact that they don't include prices now would suggest that they had a good reason. -<Azes13 20:03, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

• Yes, there is Howe's Transcendental Toybox, aimed specifically at the collector, (I remember my joy at leafing through and finding things I hadn't got, a busy week for ebay!!). Is the arguement that as the information is out-there it doesn't need to be included? I would have thought that the whole point of a TARDIS wiki is to bring together all the information under one site, to use joined-up-writing (if thats the right phrase).
• How less significant is the price of a piece of merchandise than, the manufacturer for example. How many of us have not decided on one piece of merchandise over another, based on price? The magazine or the book? The commemorative stamped first cover, or the the new Doctor Who CD, the Gallifrey one, or Companions, Daleks what about all of them? Will I have enough left for the next DVD release?

• Well, I haven't. I just buy what's there and what I want. Obviously, the price does factor in my purchases, but the price is less important than whether the thing is interesting. -<Azes13 20:03, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

• As a public service, the BBC is committed to providing merchandise at `pocket-money-prices` as well as glossy coffee table books.

What children can afford will determine the wider cultural aspects of the series, playground behaviour, comics with free gifts, top trumps and Battles in Time to name a few of the current trends. Not to mention parents queing for the top toy for Christmas! Pricing would help reflect the target audience, remember they grow up, many wanting to recapture bits of their past, the Nostalgia effect. Even New Who knew that the theme tune, and TARDIS were iconic, as are Daleks and Cybermen.

• I think the product itself is what make it obvious that something is intended for children, rather than the price. Just because something is cheap doesn't mean its intended for children (and vice versa). -<Azes13 20:03, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

• I appreciate the remarks about country specific pricing, but as the price I was suggesting was the original price of the merchandise, it is unlikely to be the price people pay because of online ordering and commercial auction sites. So is relevant only as a point of interest to those seeking to place it in a wider context (including researchers and collectors).

• So you want to put information that's obsolete and would only be interesting for unusual historical circumstances? -<Azes13 20:03, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

It's still early days for the TARDIS wiki, its got thirty odd years to catch up on, lets have this discussion now rather than later. I'm hoping for some more comments and opinions. I'm not pursuaded yet by the argument for pricing ommisions! The Librarian 23:26, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, I interspersed my comments in there. In any case, the pricing doesn't seem like a really good idea. I'm not sure why you would need to know the price. If it's recent, then you could goes go to the store and and look at the little price tag, if it's old it's definitely not going to be sold for that price again.

Also, do the prices really change that much for the magazines? Like, can't you just put the price in the Doctor Who Magazine page? -<Azes13 20:03, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Archivist's notes

Pricing is not universally asserted in magazine articles. This proposal appears to have failed, in that it's not a standard feature of infoboxes. Prices are sometimes asserted within the body of articles, however. No decision appears to have been taken by the community over whether inclusion of the prices outside an infobox is a good idea.
czechout<staff /> ☎ ✍ 01:46: Wed 02 Nov 2011