Okay, maybe it just the terms "Boxed Set". If it is about medium, make it about medium.

Well, "media fandom" is a set of cultural practices, not "we are fans of televisions and radios" kind of media fandom. I think of Boxed Set as a broader-topic sister-thread to the Fanfic thread, rather than as a TV thread at all. This is my pet theory of Boxed Set, not the official rationale of the thread by any means, but the tenor and topics of the discussion in that thread are inevitably one or at most two steps behind the general fannish-blog pulse.

(Also, I think 'Boxed Set' made much more sense when we first coined the phrase for boxing together three shows, because sci-fi TV shows were just then all coming out with boxed sets -- because the companies realized they would sell, a la Firefly. Little did we realize that every Tom, Dick and M*A*S*H would end up with its own boxed sets!!)

Yes. Broadcast, Cable, Premium, DVD, 'Net, Theatre, Live Theatre... (Print)

These are the mediums.

Boxed Set has different aims and Natter, despite the search function, doesn't really work (especially because going forward and backward makes the search time out and you end up having to re-search between every post you read). Taking away our right to talk about HBO in Movies and saying no to a new thread is essentially saying that those of us interested in talking about Deadwood and The Wire and the like should have no voice here. I don't see any other way to read it.

Who's taking away your right to post in Movies? The categorician (or whatever) in me says it shouldn't happen there, but it's not like I'd agitate for it to stop.

You have no less voice than Project Runway or Alias or Hustle fans, Corwood. You have not been singled out for disenfranchisement.

I thought the concern over thread drift in Movies was the reason we're having this discussion.

I don't see that in my reread of Bureaucracy, Corwood. And there's nothing on the table to remove it.

I thought we established that the Deadwood talk in Movies was not more than a minor annoyance, and the denizens of the thread were fine with its continuing.

(especially because going forward and backward makes the search time out and you end up having to re-search between every post you read).

"Open in New Window" is your friend.

For the record, my way of tracking TV talk in Natter is to mark the first one I see, if I haven't watchted the show yet, and use that as my starting point for a threadsuck, and ^F or skim whitefont from there on once I've watched the episode in question.

I thought the concern over thread drift in Movies was the reason we're having this discussion.

Um, Corwood, you brought up that concern. Apart from a poster or two who said it was occasionally annoying but no big deal, I haven't seen any big movement to kick Deadwood out of Movies.

As one of the architects of the spillover of HBO into movies, I am firmly in favor of such an entity should our bloviation be offensive and/or annoying to moviegoers.

What I have seen strong objection to, and would agree with, is officially adding HBO to the purpose of the thread. So I think we can agree that that is off the table. But I don't think status quo is such a bad option here, personally.

Not that hearing from more frequent Movies denizens would be a bad thing, if only to clarify if there really is a problem here. And it doesn't address other premium channel shows, but then, the premium thread wouldn't address regular cable or broadcast shows that currently have no dedicated home. I'm not sure I see why premium channels need premium treatment.

On a lighter note, if you think searching Natter is a pain for Deadwood, try it with TAR, which isn't a searchable term. But it's pretty easy to scan for whitefont beginning around the time of the show's airing and continuing through the next morning.

(Also what Jon said about Open in New Tab/Window. It's hard to remember at first, but once you get in the habit it becomes pretty automatic.)