Alias and Lost are supposed to be running back to back like the Showtime Sunday night shows, with Alias starting in January, so combining them seems reasonable to me.

Yeah, I think the great blessing of not pairing shows is that we could drop the *mutter hiss grumble* whitefont.

My personal preference for the ideal Laura board experience would lean toward a more general television thread than the specific. It is unlikely that I will be watching many of the discussed shows, but I enjoy reading the discussion and always enjoy the morning after banter in Natter for shows whether I follow them or not. There are a number of shows I never watched until after I had read discussion and knew the character names from Natter.

This is a restructuring of the board. One thread for these 4 shows because of the guilty pleasure, one thread for these 2 shows because they have well constructed characters, another thread for 3 shows that are arc driven. It would be most enjoyable for me to have either individual threads for shows or a general thread much like the literary or music threads. Strongly leaning toward the general.

I have no preference on the whitefont. It amuses me.

Lyra Jane, I like your ballot. I would go with "vote for 2 shows", and I don't know what percentage of the vote would be best. 1/3 seems too low, 1/2 seems too high. 40%? Something like that?

I'm not thrilled with the idea of combining show threads, but I don't feel too strongly about it.

40%? Something like that?

40% feels about right to me, too, though I do have a concern (possibly a paranoid one) that, if we put, say, six thread concepts on the ballot, each of them would get 16.66 percent of the vote, keeping us from starting any threads. If that happens but #1 passes, I would like to be able to hold a second vote as a run-off, after some discussion.

It would be most enjoyable for me to have either individual threads for shows or a general thread much like the literary or music threads. Strongly leaning toward the general.

Laura, I understand that, but it seems to me like we started this discussion because many people disliked the idea of a general TV thread because of whitefont/spoiler issues. I'm hoping we'll be able to have either completely individual threads, or combinations only of shows with no spoiler overlap. (Showtime Sundays, Alias/Lost).

I'm hoping we'll be able to have either completely individual threads, or combinations only of shows with no spoiler overlap. (Showtime Sundays, Alias/Lost).

This is sort of a lumpy and illogical way of dealing with the TV thread issue, and yet it's the most consistent with board culture. I do think inevitably we'll want some show threads to play with that are not white-font deserts. One way to avoid a General TV thread is to do this kind of lumping. We already have a sorta Sci-Fi channel thread with Box set. Having a JJ Abrams catchall thread would also probably work.

I do think it would be healthy for the board culture to have a focus for our interest and speculation, and I'd like to try something like this. It's limited and we could see how we like it. Also, see how well it sustains discussion. It would be a good experiment to see where we might go and how we might get there. And unlike a general TV thread it wouldn't open the floodgates wide to redefining the board.

I'm a little concerned about adding threads for shows that don't have a full order yet. I mean, Jack & Bobby has been picked up for a full 22 but, last I checked, Veronica Mars and Lost were both still waiting for a pickup on the back nine. And I don't think either is really a lock at this point.

As for lumping Lost and Alias together in a JJ thread, I don't think it's necessarily a bad idea. My concern, again, is what happens if Lost doesn't get picked up? Then we have a thread just for Alias and I've never felt like there was a huge amount of Alias dicussion, aside from the Watch and Eyeroll Posts.

I'm a little concerned about adding threads for shows that don't have a full order yet.

That's why the proposal says that if the show is canceled, the thread is closed. I would hope we would only use the "extraordinary circumstances" clause if there really was something special going on, on the level of an imminent movie. And even then, I hope we could close the thread until the movie was closer to a release date. (Not saying this is what we should do with Firefly -- jossverse programs are obviously a special case -- but it is a good step going forward.)

I'm not sure how we would handle a combined Alias/Lost thread if Lost was cancelled, but we could deal with that when the time came.

FWIW, I do think it might be worth thinking about waiting to start creating threads, since Alias is in a lot of ways on the bubble (which is why it's starting in January this year). Then again, although Lost may not be picked up for all 22, its ratings are pretty good. Then again again, this past two weeks have been basically all premiere all the time, and I tend to prefer to find out whether a show has legs (and consequently, whether those legs have any discussionworthiness in them.)

I find it's kind of hard to shut down a thread when a show is cancelled -- it seems there is always a little more discussion to be gotten out of the existing episodes. Anyway, the Firefly threads were kept alive long after cancellation, and before formal movie announcements, on the strength of unreleased episodes and DVDs. Is there a way to institute a thread Sudden Death on cancellation that doesn't make people go bananas?

Lots of shows seems perfectly able to fit within Natter without too much obtrusive whitefont. For years now a select few have been describing and/or mocking a number of Thursday night shows on Friday mornings, without comment from the peanut gallery. (ER and Without a Trace successfully; TAR and Survivor may be more disruptive.) So, I do think it's worth remembering that only Disrupt-o-matic shows really need separate threads.

Of which I think the OC should be one, even though 90% of the whitefont seems to be OMG!!TEHSETHISALLMINE!!1!!

Is there a way to institute a thread Sudden Death on cancellation that doesn't make people go bananas?

I'm not sure. But if we don't try to establish that policy, my fear is that we'll eventually get to a point where we have 50 threads for cancelled shows, and everything currently on the air is in Natter. The few posts generated by a show no longer in production could probably be swallowed by Natter, or another TV thread, relatively easily. Remember, we wouldn't be saying, "Don't talk about Alias," just "Alias doesn't get its own thread anymore." I think we could cope with that. (Disclaimer again, because I don't want anyone to feel like I want to get my grubby little hands on the Boxed Set, Firefly or Wonderfalls threads, let alone Buffy or Angel; this provision would apply to new threads only.)

Maybe we could add another item on the ballot, asking people if they want to wait to start the threads until after the November sweeps? I feel I've heard that from a few corners, and it might be a workable compromise.