Forum:Tardisode infoboxes and dab

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Now that {{Infobox Story}} has been established, I think the infobox for the Tardisodes need sorting out. Especially as they're not strictly BBC Wales TV stories, nor actually feature any Doctor or companion, unless you count Mickey in Tardisode 3.

Relatedly, what dab term should be used for them on the offchance there are images for this thing? First that comes to mind is (Tardisode), but that comes across as redundant. -- Tybort (talk page) 15:54, March 19, 2012 (UTC)

DAB wise I'd suggest (webcast). --Tangerineduel / talk 14:04, March 20, 2012 (UTC)

Well, of course they weren't webcasts, though. They're mobile phone content. I like TV story, because they are actually a part of a TV story. TV story doesn't, to me, mean "broadcast on BBC One". To me, it means anything directly related to a TV story, produced by the TV production crew. So Up All Night is a TV story, just like the prequels for series 6, just like the Tardisodes of series 2, just like The Infinite Quest, just like Dreamland, just like Meanwhile in the TARDIS.

As far as sorting out the infobox, what do you mean exactly? I can only imagine you mean that the prev/next chain needs to have the Tardisodes woven into them — that it should be New Earth followed by Tardisode 2, followed by Tooth and Claw followed by Tardisode 3 followed by School Reunion, etc.
czechout<staff /> ☎ ✍ 16:30: Tue 20 Mar 2012 

I think he also means what do we put in the fields for 'Doctor' and 'Companion', since in most stories they are not featured. Currently, we stated what Doctor/companion each Tardisode and Prequel is part of (For example Tardisode 1 would be Tenth Doctor and Rose) and then put (not featured). I think we should only state the Doctor/companion if they actually appear and strip out any Tardisode/prequel that states some along the lines of: X Doctor (not featured). MM/Want to talk? 17:18, March 20, 2012 (UTC)

Well, Tardisodes are production crew, you got me there, CzechOut. If we're using that flexible terminology (though I have no issue with Dreamland or The Infinite Quest, as as far as I can tell, they DID premiere on television, if not BBC One), should there be (or is there) some guideline on the wiki that says it?

To expand on what Mini-mitch was saying, I can maybe, maybe count Tardisodes 3 (where the Doctor and Rose are on the other side of a phone call), and 10 (which is about the Abzorbaloff finding the Doctor), but in the rest, the Doctor and his companions don't especially have anything to do with those mini-plots. The same seems to apply to at least The Impossible Astronaut and The Curse of the Black Spot's prequels (the following ones less so). Maybe change around the parameters on those pages to state the actual central characters in the mini-episodes (though of course Prequel (Let's Kill Hitler) and Prequel (The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe) DOES have the Doctor as the main character). -- Tybort (talk page) 17:41, March 20, 2012 (UTC)

I think maybe I didn't communicate one of the central goals of the {{Infobox Story}} project well enough. It's my fault for not writing the documentation pages quickly enough. But here's the deal.

It's now super-easy to convert a box from one that features the Doctor and companions to one that doesn't. All you do is strike the variables {{{doctor}}} and {{{companion}}}, and then add the variables {{{main character}}} and, if necessary, {{{featuring}}}. It used to be that you needed to whip out an entirely different infobox to accomplish this. But you don't need to anymore since they're all pointing to {{Infobox Story}}. Every infobox on every story page has the same possible variables as every other infobox. The same box that works on a BBV audio page works on a K9TV and a BFBS page and a BFA page.

As for whether these should have the dab term (TV story), again, it just seems the easiest and most natural thing to me. Moreover, I'm trying to future proof the dab terms as much as is possible by having everything under one dab term. How much longer do any of us reasonably expect there to be a meaningful distinction between TV and internet, anyway? I mean, you're already confidently calling Dreamland TV, but Red Button is actually just a part of the internet to which your digital cable box has access. Its content is on servers, so that you can access it on demand. Fine, you don't have complete on demand access — it's on a loop, so you can only join it in progress — but it's still not a "channel" in the sense that BBC One is. It's got much more in common with YouTube.

Likewise, Tangerineduel is calling the Tardisodes webcasts, because that was likely the place he encountered it, since he doesn't live in the mobile coverage area that premiered them.

Equally, if you never buy the DVDs, you might well be tempted to believe the Moffat-era "extras" aren't really a part of the series. But once you see them, you realise they obviously are. They're completely "proper" scenes from the television series.

So what I'm saying is that if it is absolutely a part of a particular series of televised DW, tied by production personnel, budget and/or a commonality of actors or situations, and is obviously non-interactive video entertainment — it should just be called a TV story, regardless of whether it was broadcast on a TV network. The method of delivery is an increasing irrelevancy to whether something is considered to be "on television". For the moment, sure, there are still things out there called "web series", as if that's a meaningful distinction from something that's broadcast on television. But every indication is that such a distinction won't last for long.
czechout<staff /> ☎ ✍ 20:01: Tue 20 Mar 2012 

Is it part enough that Series 2 should go in the Tardisodes' {{{season number}}} bit? -- Tybort (talk page) 22:15, March 20, 2012 (UTC)

just wondering, since there is such confusion between tv stories and video stories from other places such as dvd extras or webcasts or the mobile phone tardisodes, wouldn't it be easier to change the term from tv story to video story or something like that? it would then be less specific to cover these grey areas. is there any problem with this? Imamadmad ^{talk to me} 08:43, March 21, 2012 (UTC)

By video stories, do you mean Reeltime and BBV's semi-licenced stuff? T:DAB TERM says that they should be (RP video) and (BBV video). I think one of the admins used those terms rather than (video) because (video) or (video story) is incredibly vague. -- Tybort (talk page) 15:03, March 21, 2012 (UTC)

I went with webcasts as a dab because they're essentially 'internet broadcasts'. That's how they were accessed/broadcast originally.

Be it delivered by mobile or via watching it on the BBC's site they were internet broadcasts.

CzechOut's point is though more logically worked out, they were part of the TV stories in the same way the Prequels last year were.

Imamadmad, I'm against changing the dab term, as TV story is something everyone knows and understands. As Tybort says video story is a very vague term, made even more vague by the various spin-off media that was solely released on VHS (commonly referred to as 'video'). --Tangerineduel / talk 15:05, March 21, 2012 (UTC)