What if the burden of proof were based on the releaser of the information? I mean, how I read the current proposal is that if someone with ME (presumably including an actor) or someone with an airing network releases the information to any kind of publication, no matter how small, then that information can be discussed. So the question isn't "is this widely known?" which is subjective, but instead "did a member of this group of people intentionally release this information in such a way that it ended up in a publication of some kind?" which is objective.

I don't see any ambiguity there. And if someibe is unsure, I think going to spoilage lite, and asking there is a reasonable way to determine. Or backchannel Plei.

This is how spoiler confirmation was handled through large portions of S4...

Why is that point key?

It's key, because we're being told something isn't allowed that used to be allowed, and that really, is still allowed in some instances. We're free to discuss Christian Kane not being on the show. We're free to discuss AD and DB being on the show. How does discussion of new-person-on-the-show differ from those that are allowed? How does it spoil us more? How does discussion of the departures differ from those that are allowed?

And, you know what? Preferential voting is easy to understand.

Wow.

Now that we're done telling each other how the other one feels, can we toss it out the window? Because those points are just as valid as "It's no big deal not to discuss it."

You quoted me as saying:

people are highly unlikely to get a HSQ moment from these contracted regular cast changes

As that came across as telling you how you (or anyone feels), I apologize. I didn't mean to do that, and I can see where it reads as if I did.

I do think taking it as being told how you'll feel, seems to ignore the context of this proposal and ensuing conversation. I think it unlikely ita, because we are allowed to talk about them once the promos air, and because they will be evident in the credits long before they are evident in the episode. And when we post and watch, somebody is going to mention the opening credits.

Disagree with me. But when taking a point out of a particular context that I've stressed again and again, and equating it with preferential voting, your posts no longer read as a devil's advocate stance. I am very much talking from a place of inevitability, which, if I recall correctly, you said was your reason (at one point) for considering this proposal. If in choosing different reasons where, when, why and how I see it as inevitable, or speculating about a different result of that inevitability invalidates my opinion in your eyes, so be it.

I don't include departures in that, and I'm curious to know the vector you think would make those inevitable, barring "Charisma has a new series in the fall". Because if she's just staying home to play with her kid, and the Boston Herald interviews her about her SAHMness ... that's still inevitable? I don't think it's hardly inevitable.

Actually I've been told by one group of people who are already spoiled against their will that a new series doesn't mean someone can't be on A:ts, and I've been told by another group of people that a new series does in fact mean someone cannot be on A:ts, and I'd better not mention anyone's new series. So, I don't see why you're barring "Charisma has a new series." I am under the impression that I ought not mention if Charisma gets a series. That confusion is a big part of what I dislike about the current enforcement of the spoiler policy. It is being enforced at the whim of the most averse in the thread, at the time, sometimes with disregard for the actual policy's purpose.

I don't know what SAHMness means. I am also confused by your use of vector (which is my fault) so I'm not positive I'm going to respond to the question you've asked, but I'll try.

If you're asking why I think the spoiler policy needs to be adjusted (rather than just giving the elephant an exception), then my answer is that cast photos and promos generally show the cast. If I took Plei's recent post correctly, I've just learned that AD never was shown in a televised promo. I don't think I'd read that when I made my earlier comments. Still, even though he wasn't in a TV promo, last year, we certainly talked freely in NAFDA about seeing AD's Wesley, come the Fall. Ditto Fred, Gunn, Lorne, Connor and Cordy.

I think by allowing casting information from televised promos, but disallowing official announcements of the new cast line-up from the official website, press releases, and interviews with studio heads, writer/producers, and network suits ignores the reason we allow discussion of previews and promos in the first place. Isn't some of the reason we allow discussion of previews and promos because it's sanctioned by someone (the crack-smoking promo editors, no doubt) as "stuff we can know that won't spoil"?

I'm with you that the WB spoils Lorne's decapitation is bad spoilage - (very bad). I still think it's a red herring in this discussion, because the proposal is discussing casting changes among contracted regulars. Those announcements just tells us which actors are in the cast - something we always make some sort of post about, whenever we speculate (even unspoiled) on any series.

Why could we annouce Wash was going to be played by Alan Tudyk, but can't say Regular Y is going to be played by Howdy Doody?

I am also with you about during-the-season casting spoilers. They can reveal plot, because depending on the storyline a character is right in the middle of, learning the actor is suddenly no longer a contracted regular may very well tell us he'll be killed, etc.

An upcoming season is a blank slate, and learning so-and-so is coming or won't show up at all, doesn't tell us word one about how it will be addressed, and in the case of departures - whether it even will be addressed any more than it was in the prior - and by definition NAFDA-approved - season.

Plei, are you willing to be included in the proposal? That's all I'm kvetching about right now (well, that and DON'T use GoogleNews if you don't want to get more spoiled about what you think you know).

Make it clear. 'Sall I'm saying.

Well, all I'm saying right now.

I'll be saying something else as soon as I think of it.

If I took Plei's recent post correctly, I've just learned that AD never was shown in a televised promo.

Well, slight sarcasm and hyperbole on my part.

I've just never seen him in any of the "look at the shiny pretty people" shots that they did with DB, CC, and even, IIRC, VK.

Plei, are you willing to be included in the proposal? That's all I'm kvetching about right now (well, that and DON'T use GoogleNews if you don't want to get more spoiled about what you think you know).

Sure. Though vagued up to "when in doubt, ask a known Ho." or something.

There are plenty of us, after all. I was just the AtS Spoiler Fairy last season.

It looks like I upset you, Cindy, and I didn't mean to.

Cindy, I have no idea how you feel about preferential voting. All I'm referring to is the bit in that debate where people were told how to feel about it. And I apologise if I opened a wound.

The point I was going for was that it keeps (and those were just the two cites that popped up while I was at lunch, both from the same POV) being mentioned how other people feel. But I think we just have to take Elena/Jess/whoever's word for it, if they say they like/need/disdain the HSQ, and where they find the HSQ lives.

SAHM == Stay At Home Mom. And I have to admit, I'm confused by the idea that one person can be a regular on two shows at once, but there you go.

Vector == method. If I'm told that it will be inevitable that I find out that JAR has left the show before the show airs, I'd like to know how, is all. Since he can have his own show, not appear in the promos, have no mentions in the press, and still have his disappearance explained at 9:01 October 8th.

Which some people (not me, I don't care, I'd like the headstart on my handwringing e-mail campaign to ME) would consider ... being spoiled for a character's absence, that there's no way they'd have found out about it if it hadn't been discussed in thread.

The fact that I don't think a regular departure is a big deal isn't something I like to focus on in this discussion. Which is why I was harping, again, on the inevitability thing.

DB leaves the show? Probably inevitable. The rest? NSM.

I still think it's a red herring in this discussion

I don't mean it to be. I mean it to be a caution against casting a net too wide.

so-and-so is coming or won't show up at all, doesn't tell us word one about how it will be addressed

And I've never debated that. Just putting forward the POV that it negatively impacts some people's experience of the show.

Question - Did we kill Jim? Has Jim killed himself, for making this proposal?

Is Jim making a list and checking it twice, to decide which concerns he wants to address in the final language?

Has Jim set up his PC to block him from going to www.buffistas.org

Tune in for these, and other exciting developments in the next episode of Buffistas Screw in LightBulbs.

I mean, how I read the current proposal is that if someone with ME (presumably including an actor) or someone with an airing network releases the information to any kind of publication, no matter how small, then that information can be discussed.

That's not how I read it. I read it as, if the spoiler has been *promoted* not simply mentioned in an interview. In other words, if it is being used to sell next season on WB's website, etc. If billboards with the new cast spring up over LA and NYC. Things like that. Am I misreading it?

Also, I may well be obtuse, but I don't think that we need to specify checking the spoiler through a known ho. In fact, I'd say if the info on the spoiler was slim enough to warrant such a search, it's not widely known and therefore would not fall under this policy.

I'd like the headstart on my handwringing e-mail campaign to ME

You aren't considering the possibility that he's joining a show set in a universe where they've never invented the shirt, are you?