If the FAQ truly falls under grandfathering, we shouldn't be having this debate.

That's what we're trying to determine.

On the other hand, if the precedent falls under grandfathering, this debate is moot because the casting spoilers in question can be discussed right now in NAFDA threads.

This is not so clear, because the precedents don't, in my opinion, count as policy.

It was an unwritten exception, but a consistent exception nonetheless. Suddenly, this year, the exception no longer exists.

At the 2002 F2F Matt The Bruins Fan flipped over a chair in order to avoid a spoiler. As far as I know, he remained virginal until the new season. I have certainly made it into new seasons knowing much less than those around me. My recollection is not of this exception being unilateral.

My recollection is not of this exception being unilateral.

OK, I know I've been very obviously angry in all my posts tonight (and I just made a nonspoilery post in my livejournal trying to figure out why), but I promise the following question is not being asked in anger:

Could you please clarify? I really, honestly don't understand what you mean by "unilateral". Are you saying you don't think the exception I talked about existed, or that it wasn't consistently applied?

I don't think it was as consistently applied as you are asserting.

I stayed unspoiled between seasons. Other people stayed unspoiled between seasons. There was whitefonting between seasons on questionable matters.

OK, first of all, I want to apologize for going all hulk-smash in my earlier posts tonight. I think what happened is I was gone for 7 hours, came back to a lengthy discussion, and read a bunch of things that made me angry all at once without the breaks of going into Natter, Bitches, etc. that would've happened if I'd been following in real time. (And, I'm probably having anger-transferance issues from my job again. Ugh. I'm beginning to think I made a big mistake going back there.)

So, I'm very sorry for the tone I took, especially because I ended up screaming at people I like a lot and whose contributions to Buffistas I value very much. I hate my stupid volatile temper, I really do. I'm going to leave the posts as they stand, because I stand by my opinions, though I wish I'd expressed them more temperately.

Also, I don't think a decision about closing this thread should be made until tomorrow when there are more people around, because I think genuine substantive cases can be made for both a "letter of the law" and a precedent approach, and there's just not enough of us around right now to make the call.

WAIT

Sorry for shouting, but as my head hit the pillow (where it should be right now since it's 4:45 in the am) I got what is either a fucking brilliant idea or some kind of sleep deprivation brain fever.

We have some problems. Let me list them as I see them.

1) Some people who know the BCS want to discuss it more widely than they are able to in the Spoiler threads, or won't go discuss it in the spoiler threads because they are worried about further spoilage.

2) Some people who know the BCS and some people that don't would rather not have it discussed in the regular show threads because they worry about people getting spoiled.

3) The BCS may or may not be considered common knowledge, and there doesn't seem to be an agreed upon method to determine this.

4) The proposal as currently written may require a change in policy which
4a) is not permissible under our grandfather policy
4b) is not a change in policy, just a clarification of policy which is not covered by the grandfather clause
4c) is a change in policy, but the policy itself is not covered under the grandfather clause
4d) is going to be a bitch and a half to determine
4e) if you type 'policy' enough it doesn't even seem like a word - policy policy policy - weird.

So what I suggest, to neatly solve all of our problems 1-4e is that we circumvent the whole thing by creating a new thread.

Hear me out.

When the Torez spoiler came out we created a special thread for people that already knew that Riley was coming back and wanted to talk about it and/or didn't care about being spoiled and just wanted to know.

If we do that this time then the people who know and want to talk about it can do it in a thread where they will get new blood as people who want to discuss this topic without further spoilage and people who are intrigued by the hullaballo join in. Solving problem one and three.

And people who either know and don't want to talk about it or don't know and don't care to know or may or may not know but don't want suspicions confirmed can steer clear of the thread and still have the regular Angel thread for general show discussion. Solving problem two and three.

Thread creation is not a grandfatherable topic, thus neatly shutting down all of problem 4. And since the topic will still be spoilery only until either a promo airs - rendering it not a spoiler - or the episode(s) in question airs - also rendering it NAS - which will be two months or less - thread proliferation should not be an issue!

Okay, I know that it's not the proposal on the table, but the proposer (Jim) can change the proposal to whatever works best for him, right? It's all up to Jim.

So the proposal can be something like this -

Create a new thread for the purposes of discussion of the Big Spoiler which you may or may not already know. If you click on this link (and link it to a whitefonted post in spoilers light or another thread) you can see what the spoiler is. If you wish, instead, to have your spoiler suspicion confirmed, you can contact (Plei, Susan W, Sue, Ken, Kristen, any number of spoiled folk who don't mind confirming). This new thread will self-destruct once the spoiler is no longer a spoiler and discussion can be moved to the Angel show thread.

yes ___
no ___
abstain___

***

And if people still want the spoiler policy changed and/or clarified they can propose it on or after September 20th so we can avoid the whole grandfather issue.

Oh, please consider this. It just seems to so neatly solve all of our problems with a minimum of pain.

Well, hello. Hope all are well. I hope we're able to come to a good conclusion that allows us to enjoy our board. I'm also very sleepy, so forgive the sentimentality. I think quite a lot of you, so I hope we work it out well.

About precedent: I'll go ahead and be your example dog for this one, too. I think I stated it earlier, but in case: I was unhappy that we discussed the ASH/AA casting information at the time. I doubt I said anything because of the aforementioned latitude. In all fairness, I don't recall being unhappy about knowing about JAR, but that may have something to do with shirts. Or I may just not recall. I was not unhappy about SMG's S5 return or S7 departure info. It had relevance to the continuance of the show.

About spoiler discussion: Unfortunately, I can no longer be your example dog for the inevitability and widespreadedness arguments. Because of the context in this thread, I now know the spoiler. I think. But don't tell me.

About grandfathering: I dunno.

Okay, that's it for me for the moment. Let me apologize to those I'm disagreeing with. I really don't intend to be confrontational or to support subtle and incremental changes that are problematic. I do intend to discuss the issues, and I hope we're able to reach an acceptable standard.

This is going to have to be (at least) two posts. I hate that, because I feel they'll get skipped, and you'll miss my brilliance.

t /delusions of grandeur

Liese - clearly you are wrong and I am right. t /Giles But anyone who offers herself up as an 'example dog' is too cool for school, and not one Buffista should ever apologize for disagreeing with another Buffista.

Elena - I love you to pieces, particularly for graciously proposing a compromise after you'd been up all night. Feel free to hit me, but (to me) making another thread still ghettoizes discussion. However (as you'll see, after much thought - I woke up about when you made that post) - I would like Jim to make this proposal be thread-to-show specific. In other words, casting news about A:ts should not be allowed in Bitches, BtVS, etc.

I would like to say (cc: Plei, Jim) that perhaps this information, despite the fact that it's a NAFDA issue, should stay only in the Angel NAFDA thread (and for future situations, staying only in the specific NAFDA show thread to which it relates), and I'm basing this on a personal appeal (which is unfair). I don't want Elena and Trudy to avoid Bitches out of fear of spoilage. Less personally, I don't think anyone should have to unsubscribe from all NAFDA threads over the summer, to keep from spoiling for one NAFDA show. Some people purposefully spoil for one show and not another, and/or are accidentally spoiled for one show and not another. I think we should make this concession out of courtesey.

I will ask that the proposal be very clearly worded on which threads will allow the discussion and which will not should the proposal pass.

Yes this, and really, I think it should be show-to-thread specific.

Can anyone else on the pro-proposal side back me up on this, even if you don't agree it fits NAFDA principles, can you, would you please see the human side of this which has a very pretty face, as pretty as if Elena and Trudy mated and reproduced? Yes. Just that pretty! Princessy, even, with tiaras and whatnot. Also? Although I don't want a discussion ghettoized, I also don't want them ghettoized. They would choose to remove themselves from Angel NAFDA, once the promos aired, anyhow. They would not choose to remove themselves from all NAFDA threads, and shouldn't have to.

Grandfathering???

t opinion

This proposal is will not eliminate, nor will it make the definition of spoiler more narrow. This proposal acknowledges official cast announcements as a valid source of casting news, whether that news is disseminated via an offical electronic cast list, press release, or on an official, televised promos. At most, it broadens the the field of acceptable mediums of official casting news sources, recognizing that in the past, this between season casting news has been allowed.

Given that the proposal is not trying to eliminate a policy, open a thread that was previously consensed out, or even change the de facto spoiler policy evident in precedent - for seasons - but rather it is trying to reclaim it and adjust it so that official casting news sources are acknowledged as such, I think the attempts to squelch this discussion via the grandfather proposal are on a par with gerrymandering. t /opinion

**We have made changes to the FAQ since the grandfathering rule was voted in.**

On the basis of that precendent, I reject the charges that refining the definition of official news disregards the grandfather policy.

Laugh with me now, it'll help...

By saying a voted-in grandfather clause invalidates the time-honored ability to adapt the FAQ to board culture as need arises, you are flying in the face of the voted-in grandfather clause you are citing. The grandfather clause was developed and voted in, in order to protect time-honored traditions adopted prior to the time voting was instituted. The grandfather proposal was put in to ensure that non-voted in items weren't considered invalid, just because they weren't voted in. You're claiming our always previously available ability to change our FAQ is now unavailable because we voted in a grandfather clause. You are attempting to use a voted-in measure to keep the FAQ frozen (which has not historically been a static document) until such time as a voted-in measure expires, and you're telling us this on the basis of the results of a voted-in measure - the grandfather clause.

Whatcha got heah, is a paradox, my friends or possibly marzipan in my pieplate Bingo.

...

You know what, I'm just going to go for the hat trick and do this in three posts, thereby guaranteeing nobody will read this thing I've spent hours on.

**In edit, I have struck out my argument that we've changed the FAQ since May 22, 2003, because apparently I was talking out my tush. I can't find an example of any rule-based FAQ changes after that date (the date the grandfather ballot item was passed). If someone can, please let me know.**

I groan at the notion of another thread. Because (1) we already have two spoiler threads, which strikes me as faintly ridiculous; and (2) I'm against thread proliferation in general, and a thread that is set up for the purpose of specific speculation will, come the time, turn into a thread about general speculation or yet another Natter. (And the problem with yet another Natter is my thesis about the fracture of a large community into several not-entirely-mutually-intelligible smaller ones.)

I don't think thread creation willy-nilly is ever the answer, unless the thread is going to continue to have a purpose in more than 6 months. I don't see that being so in this circumstance.

The other possibility I can think of is to rework Spoilage Lite temporarily -- create a "safe link" to the first post after which no spoilers but the elephant one may be discussed. People who want to discuss [2nd thing], [3rd thing] and [guest star this] and [guest director that] without going whole hog to Spoilers will perhaps be inconvenienced, but we avoid creating a NAFDA fracture, avoid spoiling those who are still pure, and avoid making major changes to the FAQ or invoking Grandfather Whatever.

Actually, this still does not solve the question of "is an anti-spoiler a spoiler?" -- which I think remains at the crux of the discussion. That part, I think still need airing and/or voting. But what do people think of the above?