Forum:Quotes

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Are quotes in articles neccessary? Lots of articles, particularly about people, have quotes from them which don't really seem to do any good for the articles. So should they all be removed, or should any quotes (e.g, not like "one of the Dalek's most common war cries is "Exterminate!") on their own be kept in? ~ Ghelæ -talk-contribs 12:25, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Nope. We decided to just delete them (look at the bottom of Forum:Format for television story entries) since they were useless and encyclopedic. Azes13 15:35, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Alright then, I'll put something on the Manual of Style (if there isn't anything alreadythere about it) then get round to deleting quotes on individuals and episodes... in a bit. ~ Ghelæ -talk-contribs 15:39, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I strongly favor quotes, especially quotes at the head of an article. they sum up a character or a concept in a way that paragraphs of quote cannot, they can liven up an otherwise dry article and, of course, also, why go into linguistic gymnastics in order to not quote a source directly, rather than paraphrase? also, DOCTOR WHO has had great lines of dialogue. as for precedent, Wookieepedia uses quotes, more, in fact, they do so more than I would suggest doing. example entry from Wookieepedia Perhaps one line, three at most, at the heading of an article, only? --***Stardizzy*** 18:18, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps we can have quotes in moderation, i.e only for important charactors (e.g Davros, the Doctor, etc), however for minor charactors we have no quotes, and no quotes from charactors about places (e.g no quotes about Mondas or Mars)? ~ Ghelæ -talk-contribs 18:30, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

firstly, thank you for listening. I agree as far as places. As far as less significant characters, I really would like to have quotes for them as well. like when the Doctor sums up Reinette's achievements in a few lines ("writer, courtesan" and whatever else he said). frankly, I just want to quote some of the cracking dialogue in stories like "Ghost Light" and "The Girl in the Fireplace". not too proud to admit that. though I don't oppose it it might come down to more work to find quote for the major characters, actually, with the over-abundance of them.--***Stardizzy*** 19:06, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, you're welcome. Secondly, all of the episodes have some of the best quotes on Wikiquote and The Whoniverse, so perhaps links can be made to them. However, really some of the minor charactors are summed up well enough and have no need for a quote, and if they still have quotes, there needs to be a better way of formatting them. ~ Ghelæ -talk-contribs 19:12, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

ah, but they just categorize the WHO quotes on Wikiquote very broadly, according to Doctor. not by story. anyway, how would you suggest formatting the quotes in a new way?

--***Stardizzy*** 21:41, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

A New Idea

I've been thinking, and I've had an idea. If we had a quote template like on Wookieepedia, we could have quotes at the top of the articles for the characters, as long as they're descriptive. For example, on the Doctor's page, there would be:

"He's like fire and ice and rage. He's like the night, and the storm in the heart of the sun. He's ancient and forever. He burns at the center of time and he can see the turn of the universe. And... he's wonderful."

And for the Master:

"Weapon, after weapon, after weapon. All you do is talk, and talk, and talk. But over all these years... and all these disasters, I've always had the greatest secret of them all. I know you. Explode those ships, you kill yourself... that's the one thing you can never do."

How about it? (and no, I don't care that this is similar to other ideas mentioned above, it's an old topic, so just act like it's a new idea, but not sarcastically, if you get what I mean.) ~ Ghelæ -talk-contribs 20:28, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Nope, still not a big fan of it. The quotes just seem corny and they don't seem to work with the rest of the articles. <Azes13 14:13, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

You can put in the Eleventh Doctor page a quote: "amy pond, there is something you better understand about me, its importent, and one day your life may depend on it ,i am definitely a mad man with a box! hahah!!

I like this idea. Although I think it may be rather tricky on deciding which ones. --The Great and Grand Count Mall!^{(Bow down before me!)} 01:49, June 15, 2011 (UTC)

Revisiting the topic

I think we might need to revisit this topic to work out some form of policy for the quotes. I am in the camp of just removing them as un-encyclopaedic. However it seems that the quotes have made it onto many articles as a way to emphasise the article's subject. Some form of policy I think may be needed to set some boundaries for where quotes should go and what quotes should be on the articles. --Tangerineduel 14:51, April 10, 2010 (UTC)

I agree. I think quotes so only go on the main pages - such as The Doctor, Companions, The Master etc - stuff the a a major part of Doctor Who, Sarah Jane Adventure and Torchwood, and there should only be one quote at the the top of the page.... problem is.... people like to change the qoutes, put uneed spaces it as well. :S Mini-mitch 15:55, April 10, 2010 (UTC)

The more I think about this the more it seems like a good idea just to wipe out the quote concept completely and return to what we had before, quotes in moderation as part of the body of the article rather than as a heading to whichever article. It is actually in the Tardis:Manual of Style#Quotations (something everyone seems to have missed/ignored).

The issue with having quotes at the top of articles (or elsewhere) is that without encyclopaedic text to back up the quote/to justify the quote it's more a matter of opinion (as we've seen recently) for which quote is better suited for an article. --Tangerineduel 17:53, April 12, 2010 (UTC)

I think something needs to be done about the quotes because A)because have fights over what quotes to use B)Some editors put quotes on everything page C)some editors don't even know how to format the quote correctly - which results in reason A happen, again and again. Mini-mitch 14:25, April 16, 2010 (UTC)

Alrighty I've given the Manual of Style a bit of a re-write and a better example of how to use quotes in text body.

Quotes can still be used, but they need to be used within the text body, there isn't much encyclopaedic sense to having a quote at the top of every article.

So this means there should be no fights about the quote because it'll need to be used within the text body and have context, rather than just placed at the top of the article.

I couldn't find a good reason for the use of the quote template as it's pretty much totally used for placing quotes at the top of articles or under sub-headings of articles.

So anywhere that the Template:Quote is used should be removed. Where that quote is on in-universe articles the quote could be integrated (as long as it fits with the article) into the text body. All the TV story articles with a quote at the top will need to have the quotes removed. --Tangerineduel 15:43, April 16, 2010 (UTC)

I'll get started removing the quotes from the television articals. Mini-mitch 17:06, April 16, 2010 (UTC)

Hold on. Anywhere Template:Quote is used should be removed? Anywhere? Are you saying there's no place for the template at all on this wiki? I quite agree with top-of-article quote removal. That's fine. The quote template screws a bit with infoboxen and top-of-page templates anyway. But surely you're not saying there's something wrong with using the template to quote a behind-the-scenes person in the body of an article, or even highlighting a really important point in an in-universe article. There are surely times where you'd want to get the exact wording of something, and to highlight it by use of the formatting inherent in the quote template. You said you couldn't think of an appropriate use for it, but I use it with some frequency. For instance, I think my usage at Doctor Who Ongoing#Setting for the Tenth Doctor is quite appropriate. I've recently been thinking of upgrading Template:Quote to be more like wikipedia:Template:Cquote or the even more attractive wikipedia:Template:Rquote so it's got a bit of visual style. Even Wikipedia allows quote templates in this fashion, and if that's not an encyclopedia, I don't know what is. I know you say at the top of your response, above, that quotes can still be used, but then you do rather seem to contradict yourself at the end. I'm not sure if you're staying quotes can still be used but Template:Quote can't. If that's what you're saying, I vigorously protest. CzechOut ☎ | ✍ 16:57, April 19, 2010 (UTC)

Yes there are a some exceptions. (Anywhere was a slightly hasty turn of phrase) That article you mention is a correct usage.

The quote template is useful, certainly in the article you've mentioned in using it to quote for out-of-universe/behind the scenes sections.

The Manual of Style will be amended to reflect this. Though I was debating whether to re-name the quote template 'quotation', just to make sure no one tries to use it once more to put at the top of every article where anyone uttered a quote vaguely related to it. --Tangerineduel 17:39, April 19, 2010 (UTC)

I agree that the quote template should be used other wise they end up with a speak-mark two lines under the quote, and I think it looks much neater. Mini-mitch 18:45, April 19, 2010 (UTC)

I oppose a name change. In the first place, template names should carry as few letters as possible to clearly identify what they are. Any move to actually make a template name longer shouldn't be entered into lightly, cause the point is they save time. Also, I tend to think that templates which are copied from wikipedia should have the same wikipedia name. It helps people who have come to our project via wikipedia to make the transition more easily. This is why reflist, for instance, has the same name here as it does there. We could have given it the name "references" or "footnotes" or anything like that, but keeping ubiquitous wikipedia temps like these with the same name makes it simpler. Also, by unabashedly copying wikipedia, it makes it easier for us to go back to wikipedia and follow the development history of the template as it changes. This is how we discovered, for instance, that reflist had been upgraded, and how our core extension software is now outmoded.

I think your concerns will be addressed simply by keeping the MOS updated, making a bit of a splash with rapid removal of the undesired usages and being done with it. It's a shame that I can't login the bot, cause I could get rid of these things way quicker than manual editing allowed. Still, I guess manual editing might allow the opportunity to see if the quote might be better embedded elsewhere in the article. CzechOut ☎ | ✍ 22:19, April 19, 2010 (UTC)