Whereas rather than compromise on one particular issue, I want to find the general principle that's liveable for the largest number of posters so that we don't have to have this same shouting match every year, assuming the universe is a just place and we have Jossverse shows on into the future.

I would say yes Katie. To all.

I'm not going to use circumlocution, and I'm going to discuss the three specific spoilers that I'm personally aware of for next season.

Damn, three?

THREE!?!?!?

I would say yes to everything Katie except:

Will it be okay to say that there was a possibility floated that Connor would return for an episode?

For this, I would say no. People could certainly speculate on if he might return and how that would happen but it wasn't ever in an official press release and it might never happen at all.

Does anyone remember what we did about Dawn? Did the WB show that in promos? Did we discuss the casting news?

Amend my answer to agree with Kristen's last paragraph.

Who decides this? You're spoiled on 3 things, I'm spoiled on two. I've been able to successfully avoid one of your spoilers. Who decides which casting spoilers are permitted and which are not?

First, I know of two major casting spoilers, not three. I have no idea where you found that third, but it wasn't in my posts. [edited to add that someone else clearly did know of three] I have been spoiled--against my desire--on several minor casting points, primarily because I was forced into Spoilage Lite. I consider all of those as verbotten, not only according to the current letter of the law, but also to the previous interpretation of the rules.

Second, have never offered myself up as the person who decides what can and cannot be discussed. I am simply presenting arguments in favor of Jim's proposal.

You want to be spoiled on a few things and I want to be spoiled on none.

Please do not assume to know what I do and do not want.

I don't want to spoil people like Katie and Liese who I believe are entirely unspoiled

Heh - I actually decided to just roll with the casting spoilers this year, because I wanted to be able to read end-of-season interviews and livejournals. I stopped as soon as it looked like anything plotty was showing up, though, so I don't know any of the specifics of how stuff's going to happen - just what the writers were already saying as of the end of S4.

I'm just more on the spoilerfree side of things. Plus my whole concept of what it means to not spoil others was formed on MBTV, which no one will be surprised to hear has a fairly hardcore opinion on the matter. (Or the Buffy boards did, anyway.) Discussion of Giles' departure in S6 was utterly verboten, for instance. That did limit discussion a little - I knew what was coming, so I could tell when people wanted to talk about it and couldn't - but on the other hand a bunch of people got to be surprised when he left, so.

Please do not assume to know what I do and do not want.

Burrell, do you WANT to discuss the casting news? In my vernacular you want to be spoiled on it.