b3nn3tt said:
The Heik said:
b3nn3tt said:
Spoilers are always spoilers. I think it's better to assume someone doesn't know than to assume they do. Even with 'famous' plot twists, there are bound to be people that don't know them, and it seems a bit of a dick move to spoil it for them because they 'should have seen it by now.'
I think it's especially unfair to spoil stuff on forums, when it's so very easy to just put spoiler tags around what you're writing. Regardless of how well-known you consider a spoiler to be, that's no guarantee that other posters actually know it. Spoiler tags are your friend.
eeehhh using spoiler tags can be a good thing for if you have just a spoiler or two, but I've been in conversations where a lot of concepts and events from multiple different works are fired off in rapid pace. If I'd used spoilers there'd either be a spoiler tag every other sentence which would absolutely ruin the discussion's cohesion, or I'd have to blanket the entire post and risk someone seeing the spoil'd information because they had no clue what I was spoiling. In either case, it wouldn't be conducive to discussion on a forum.
Also I don't see the point of spoilering specific threads that deal with one topic (ie discussing Batman's various relations with the villains in the franchise on a Batman thread). Yeah if you discuss one or two other recent works in relation to the thread's main topic a spoiler tag is usually a good idea, but thread titles exist for a reason. When you read something like "The ending of Mass Effect 3" in the title, you'd probably expect, and if you're not all that familiar with ME, then it's a safe bet that you shouldn't read the topic if you don't want to get spoil'd
But with threads that have titles that directly reference the ending of something, I would say that the title itself is acting as a spoiler warning. And when writing a large chunk of text, I agree that sticking a spoiler tag in the middle of every other sentence would interfere with your flow. But when I said spoiler tags, what I should have said was spoiler warnings. So if you're writing a paragraph that contains spoilers, just stick 'spoiler warning' at the start of it, so that people have the option to scroll past your post if they want to avoid spoilers. My main point was that I think people deserve a warning if there's a chance something is going to be spoiled for them.
That's a fair and honest point, and I agree on the principle of giving people a bit of a heads up. However we do run into the problem of exactly what is spoiler material. Technically any point made about any event in media, whether it be plot, visual, sound, or gameplay, exposes a facet of the product, so talking about anything in it would constitute as a spoiler. Boy would it be annoying for a thread to have each post prefaced with *SPOILERS*
We also run into the problem of what each person considers to be a spoiler. Best example is with Darth Vader. The Empire Strikes Back has been out since 1980, and with the crazy amount of releases, that little secret has been considered common knowledge for ages. But would a toddler know about it? Not likely, so it's usually get spoiler'd for them (but then again just about everything is spoiler'd for toddlers). However, in the amongst adults any nerd worth their salt is familiar with the twist, so saying spoilers to them is not only unnecessary but often a bit insulting. The same can be said of most internet forums. When they come to certain forums (such as the generally gaming/movie centric Escapist) they are expected to have at least a rudimentary level of knowledge on the common subjects that exist on that forum. And if they have less than what is needed, they'll usually do some research to get the necessary information. So how much credit do we give the forum community? If we simply assume that they're all complete idiots on the subject, then a lot of what will be said will feel like it's talking down to them. They've come to a specific forum, they should know the basic information about it. Otherwise, why would they be there? It really does come down to context of where it's said.
That's why I generally go with the 1 year rule. If someone hasn't played/watched/heard a product within a year of it's release, then it's usually a safe bet that they don't care and you can talk about it freely, as there exist a plethora of fast, easy, inexpensive, and legal ways to experience that product long before the 365 days are up. Before that time, by all means use a spoiler because there are always minor things that can get in the way, but a year is simply too much time for spoilering to be considered justified, especially in today's fast pace world. If someone can't find an hour or two a week to enjoy a game or a show or some music, they very clearly aren't trying.
However, I do stand by the "don't shout it form the rooftops" rule, because that's just being a dick.
