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::::::::I don't think the running jokes are particularly important or vital to the show. Out of the list that [[Special:Contributions/121.45.134.67|121.45.134.67]] writes, only "May's sense of direction and fastidiousness" stands out as being significant - and that is not a "running gag" as such - it is an important part of the relationship between the 3 presenters, and it's that relationship which is probably the single most important part of Top Gear's success and distinction. [[User:Halsteadk|Halsteadk]] ([[User talk:Halsteadk|talk]]) 22:35, 2 December 2008 (UTC)
::::::::I don't think the running jokes are particularly important or vital to the show. Out of the list that [[Special:Contributions/121.45.134.67|121.45.134.67]] writes, only "May's sense of direction and fastidiousness" stands out as being significant - and that is not a "running gag" as such - it is an important part of the relationship between the 3 presenters, and it's that relationship which is probably the single most important part of Top Gear's success and distinction. [[User:Halsteadk|Halsteadk]] ([[User talk:Halsteadk|talk]]) 22:35, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

:::::::::''I don't '''think''' the running jokes are particularly important or vital to the show.'' This is the problem. Some people think they're important, others don't. I suppose that until a writer from The Telegraph, or CNN or some other cite-able source says so, they're not important enough to include, regardless of whether they actually exist. Just found one, bear with me: "The world's most entertaining car show's popularity owes much to the relationship between its three presenters." [http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/story/0,26278,23773782-10229,00.html] The ridicule the hosts direct at one another is an important aspect of their (on-screen) relationship, "Hammond... is the butt of good-natured ribbing about his diminutive height by Clarkson and May," [http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,20457028-5001026,00.html] "... the irreverent tone often employed by the presenters, with such exchanges being typical of their style" [http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/ouch/200702/top_gear_trouble.html] and some of that ridicule takes the form of a running gag (teeth whitening etc). WPs own definition of a [[Running gag]], that "the humor in a running gag derives entirely from how often it is repeated", supports this notion, since many topics they use to poke fun at each other are brought up on a regular basis. As already stated, this is part of their relationship, which is important to the popularity of the show. In summary: ribbing (running gags) -> chemistry -> popularity. What have I missed? As for treating the Simpsons articles as the gold standard? Please. It was merely a convenient example that I'm sure most people are familiar with. BTW, since they've been 'covered to death' elsewhere, maybe the bulk of Simpsons content in WP should be removed and replaced with links to these definitive sources? [[Special:Contributions/121.45.134.67|121.45.134.67]] ([[User talk:121.45.134.67|talk]]) 17:05, 3 December 2008 (UTC)


== Unnecessary lists ==
== Unnecessary lists ==

Revision as of 17:05, 3 December 2008

Former good article nomineeTop Gear (2002 TV series) was a good articles nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There may be suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
January 29, 2007Peer reviewReviewed
March 30, 2007Good article nomineeNot listed
Current status: Former good article nominee


Criticism of the Criticism

I admit that it is a very controversial program, and is no doubt recipient of many complaints, although i do believe that the 'criticism' section is disproportionately long when you understand that, compared to the hundreds of millions of fans, the complainers are a rather small contingent. By all means, include it. But not that long! J. Thompson (talk) 20:27, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm cutting parts of the criticism section section and relocating them in other places, e.g. if hammond was criticised for something he said in series 2, episode 7, I'd move it from the criticism section to the section on that particular episode. Help would be appreciated, as the criticism is ridiculously long. TopGearFreak Talk 12:20, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've moved as much criticism as I can. How does the article measure up? Is it ready for re-nomination? TopGearFreak Talk 17:15, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nominated. TopGearFreak Talk 17:04, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Top Gear Dog

I know he's not a major part of the show, but he isn't mentioned once in this article. 'Top Gear Dog' actually even redirects here for absolutely no purpose.--Santahul 16:48, 8 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

He, is in fact, a she. And she doesn't get the resect she deserves. Emma368 (talk) 17:09, 6 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What respect (sic) is that? She's a DOG. She doesn't present. A present has to have one facility TGD does not: the power of speech. She lends a charming presence at times, but she's hardly the victim of disrespect you make her out to be. She's treated kindly, goes along for a ride occasionally, is seen but rarely, and that's it. Hardly worth the fuss of this morning.--Drmargi (talk) 03:38, 7 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, hey, hey! The Stig doesn't speak, either! And Emma368 is right, she doesn't get the respect she deserves. I'm going to make an article on her. TopGearFreak (talk) 16:18, 29 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You might want to do a little reading before you undertake that, and save yourself the effort. Drmargi (talk) 16:46, 29 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What do you mean? TopGearFreak Talk 18:54, 8 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Most Pirated Television Show?

The source is from 2004, and is based on only the editor of top gear magazine saying it. I am going to remove that statement, because it is not supported by the source given, and I couldn't find any new information that said it was the most pirated TV show in the world. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Theultimatejoeshmo (talk • contribs) 07:16, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Article title

I have read the above discussion on the article name change. While I do not forsee a name change,' (so do not reply with that in mind) I not not agree with the justification for nonconformance with WP:TV-NAME: "2002 TV series" does not necessarily imply that it ran for one year. Futher, "current format" does imply that someone looking for the article already has some familiarity with the subject, which is a hit against the hypothetical "first time reader" the articles are meant to be written for. 118.90.5.177 (talk) 23:54, 25 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The argument made was bogus - there's hardly any discussion at the "vote" pointed to, and the naming guideline certainly doesn't mandate the current title. I'm moving this again after the GA review has concluded. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:26, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Prostitute controversy

There's more controversey. Clarkson's comment about lorry drivers murduring prostitutes made in the last episode. Here's the relevant article since it should either be added to this article or Jeremy Clarkson's own article. Looneyman (talk) 22:38, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Done, I just cleaned it, but I think the critisism section is getting stupidly long now. Since every other word out of Clarkson's mouth is liable, this needs to be sorted before it starts filling up. Also, can an admin please archive the talk page? It's quite huge now, thank you! LicenseFee (talk) 20:20, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If the controversey section is getting so long, maybe it could be put into it's own article? Looneyman (talk) 20:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If anyone's willing to give it a go, I'm game. LicenseFee (talk) 20:28, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If I start creating a page in my own user subpag, you can help me fine tune it and get it ready for going live if you like. Looneyman (talk) 20:58, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Re. archiving talk page: done. I've set Miszabot to automatically archive it - will solve future problems. Also note that anyone can archive - you don't have to be a sysop :P. TalkIslander 23:11, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm trying to cut information out of the criticism page and paste it onto other parts of the article e.g. I put the bit about JC drink-driving in the Arctic into the separate arcticle about the Polar special, etc. Help would be appreciated. TopGearFreak Talk 19:59, 8 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There, the criticism section is about half as long as it used to be, so we don't really need that banner over the top any more. Could a)someone delete it and b)someone tell me if this article is ready to be re-nominated for good article status? TopGearFreak Talk 17:20, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well done! Looks lovely and clean. I'm just going to do some reorganising on the section now. I think that banner can be removed. LicenseFee (talk) 17:59, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done. May I suggest that if more incidents occur the critism is bung straight into the episode in question instead of the main page? That is, unless it is very, very major. LicenseFee (talk) 18:09, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Also guys, I've started creating a page on the Criticisms of Top gear in a user sub page. There's a link to it on my main page if anyone wants to help. Looneyman (talk) 22:59, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Archiving

I know there's a bot for this, but it was quite long and now there's a good article nomination it might be better for a clean slate. Anyway, archived! LicenseFee (talk) 17:37, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

First off, we have a bot set to do this now. Secondly... don't archive EVERYTHING - leave the latest few discussions. -mattbuck (Talk) 19:19, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Right, as someone has agreed with me, I've reverted you. As pointed out, even if we didn't have a bot, you never completely 'harvest' a page. I've moved the archived material back here, fixed the bot dialogue (a stupid mistake of mine meant that it wasn't archiving - it should now...), and standardised the archive box. I'll keep an eye on this page to check that it archives, but I no longer see any reason why it wouldn't. TalkIslander 20:53, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry! I did say previously that an admin would have to do it, because I wasn't sure, it was my first try and I tried to follow the rules on the archive wiki page... I'm really sorry, and I didn't think that bot was working! (Which it wasn't) Really sorry again. Urg. I fail at this.LicenseFee (talk) 22:46, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Seriously, don't be so hard on yourself. You made a mistake, and should be more careful in the future, but that's it. TalkIslander 22:56, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Cheers. LicenseFee (talk) 22:58, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Criticism article

Ok guys, after a few weeks of work, the critism section now has it's own article. If you want to help, the article is here. Looneyman (talk) 16:37, 18 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well done, sir! One small (uh...) criticism. The word criticism is both singular and plural, so the article should be CRITICISM of Top Gear, not Criticisms. Drmargi (talk) 20:13, 18 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Islander has correctedit for me. Thanks for telling me anyway. Looneyman (talk) 20:55, 18 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Excellent! Thanks for all the hard work. Drmargi (talk) 21:01, 18 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Top Gear (current format)/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Hi, I'll be reviewing this article. After a quick read I think it looks really good, although of course I may have some suggestions for improvement.

I usually do reviews in 3 stages:

  • coverage, structure and flow.
  • the nitty-gritty stuff including refs, style, copyediting and copyright status of images.
  • lead - once the main content is all OK.

Here my comments, excluding the lead. --Philcha (talk) 17:10, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Coverage

I see no glaring omissions, and I'm a fan.

Structure

The large-scale structure is good. A handful of items should probably be moved, I'll deal with that in the detailed review of sections.

The lead currently has some items not mention in the main text - see WP:LEAD

  • Viewing figures.
  • "most pirated"
  • "Series 12 began transmission on 2 November 2008..."
  • "Columnist A. A. Gill described the show as ...". It might be useful to retitle the "Criticism" section to "Praise and criticisms", put Gill's commnet (and any others) under a sub-heading "Praise" and then give the paras about "irresponsible driving", "too many supercars" and "environmental damage their own sub-headings.
  • "Groups such as the Environmental Investigation Agency have accused the BBC of allowing the Top Gear team to cause damage" - guess where this should go :-)
  • "NBC is holding the American version for broadcast in February or March, 2009, as a possible mid-season replacement" should be used to explain similar comments later in the article.

General comment re refs

I'm already finding lots of items that need refs, more relevant refs, more reliable refs, etc. Wikipedia's attitude about refs has hardened a lot in the last year. A dodgy ref invites someone - possibly an environmentalist critic of the programme - to slap {{fact}} or other "maintenance" tags on the article, and a GA can be delisted pretty quickly for that sort of thing. {{fact}} and other "maintenance" tags put articles into categories that attract grouches like a jam jar attracts wasps. After all the work you've put into the article and I'm putting into the review, we'd all be pretty upset if that happened.

Please ensure that all refs use Citation templates and that all URLs are accompanied by "accessdate" params (yyyy-mm-dd, incl leading 0s).

The link checker report on this artcile shows several dead or doubtful links, plus links for which some required information is missing (see Citation templates).

In the link checker's report, any code other than 200 is suspect. 301 or 302 may mean that the site's reorganised and has returned a new URL for the same content, or it may mean they've deleted the content and redirected to their home page. If you click the link in the report, it opens a scrollable pane that shows the content displayed by the redirected URL.

I use this link checker when preparing articles for review, and it's so useful that I keep a link to it on my User page.

If a web page that you really need has vanished, try Internet Archive's WayBackMachine. If you use items from this, the citations must have "archiveurl" and "archivedate" parameters. Citation templates provides instructions.

History

  • Ref(s) needed for story of the show's resurrection, incl Clarkson's pitch for revised format.
  • Ref(s) needed for venue. Dunsfold Aerodrome and Dunsfold Park are adverts and are not specifically relevant to Top Gear, but may be useful to show that it's in Waverley, Surrey. Dunsfold Aerodrome also break the browswer's "Back" button, number 1 in the 7 deadly web sins; if used, this link shoudl have a warning.
  • Ref(s) needed for all points in 2nd para (begins "The new series format incorporates a number of major changes from the old show ...").
  • I've copyedited "rejected by the community" (Enstone) to "rejected by West Oxfordshire council" because "community" is ambiguous in popular culture - could refer to forums, blogs, etc.
  • Ref(s) needed for "with a revamped studio set, a new car for the "Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car" segment, and the inclusion of one of Hammond's dogs, named "Top Gear Dog", in a few studio and film segments of that series".
  • Ref(s) needed for "the final episode of the series had 8 million viewers — BBC Two's highest ratings for a decade"
  • Ref(s) needed for "A special programme, Top Gear: Polar Special, was broadcast in the UK on 25 July 2007 ..." The ref given deals mainly with environmentalist criticisms - nothing about the trip, when it was made, when it was broadcast, etc.
  • Ref(s) needed for "On 9 September 2007, Top Gear participated in the 2007 Britcar 24-hour race at Silverstone ..."
  • I dont' see how http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/chrismoyles/galleries/2877/30/#gallery2877 supports "in Series 11 there will be a new "occasional regular host".
  • What does "trying to calm down the prog-rock side" mean? It may be what the guy saud, but it's media-speak, and a translation into English is needed (including by me!).
  • I think "The show has won several awards ..." would be better in the "Awards" section of the article.  Done Moved LicenseFee (talk) 19:22, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Broadcasts

  • This section and its subsections have hardly any refs, and need quite a few.
  • As the sub-heading "Episodes" has no content, I suggest retitling it "Regular Episodes", and moving it and its "Further info" line just above the para beginning "For their initial broadcasts, new episodes of Top Gear are shown in ..." Please comment!

Races

  • Whole section lacks good refs. Refs to other WP articles are not accepted. If these other articles have good and relevant refs, reproduce them here.
  • Some copyediting needed, I'll do this later.

Challenges

  • No refs at all in this section!

Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car

  • No refs at all in this section!

Power Laps

  • The ref Top Gear Power Laps in this section does not explain the rules.
  • Re the Bugatti Veyron's absence, the ref is dated 2006 - needs an update.
  • "Clarkson made an appeal to Veyron owners to let Top Gear borrow their car and allow The Stig to drive it around the track, offering up to £30 to do so" (2007) needs a ref.
  • "The Veyron is due is set a lap time around the track on the 23rd November 2008 edition" needs a ref.
  • "The car that recorded the fastest lap time on the Top Gear track was ..." needs a ref.
  • All other points in this section need refs.

The Cool Wall

  • No refs at all in this section!

Unusual reviews

  • All the items need refs.
  • Would it be possible to group them by sub-topic? E.g. "toughness", "off-road ability", etc. Even better might be use a sortable table so readers can order / group the tests according to what interests them, see Alexander_Alekhine#Summary_of_results_in_competitions for an example of how this looks to a reader. Help:Table#Sorting provides instructions. Suggested columns: date or series+episode; category; car tested; description (not sortable); result.
  • What about the results of these challenges, e.g. "pass" / "fail"? E.g. Clarkson lost the Challenger Tank vs Range Rover Sport test.
Taken all out - the information is already on list of Top Gear Episodes anyway.  Done LicenseFee (talk) 19:22, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough, and a nice selection of examples. A couple things about the sources, though:

Significant cars

  • Whole section needs refs.
  • In this section the table format wastes a lot of space and make an unnecessary "wall" between the reader and the next section. How about an "inline list", e.g.
    Ford Escort RS1800 (Series One, Episode Two)—Citroën DS (Series One, Episode Three)—Bentley T2 (Series Two, Episode One)—etc.?
  • Retitle "Significant older cars"?

Car of the Year

  • Whole section needs refs.
  • How about an "inline list" layout for this? The lsit will get longer as the series continues (as we all hope it will).

Ownership survey

  • Whole section needs refs.

Ending credits

  • The refs given describe the episodes named, but do not mention the joke names.
  • No refs for "Polar Special" or "America Challenge".

Soundtrack

  • Whole section needs refs.
  • I'd make the table float to the right of the text, to save screen space. It would then need a caption.

DVD and CD releases

  • Whole section needs refs.

Awards and nominations

  • Ref needed for " In the episode where the presenters showed the award to the studio audience, Clarkson joked that ..."
  • Other refs gone AWOL, see link checker report.
  • Refs needed for para beginning "Top Gear presenters have also announced on the show that they have won some slightly lower profile awards ..."

Criticism

  • Ref(s) needed for "not featuring enough "affordable" cars, ... turns it into a joke"
  • The ref for "causing ecological damage" covers only one case. There are already refs for such criticisms of e.g. the "Polar Expedition", and these should be included here too. Instead of a row of 5 or more separate refs after this phrase, you could bundle all the citations into one ref, see e.g. 4x#cite_note-4Xfulldefinition-1.
  • Ref(s) needed for "favouring performance over fuel efficiency and conservation".
  • "Clarkson voiced his opinion that the BBC did not take Top Gear seriously" (in the February 2006 issue of Top Gear Magazine) is not supported by the ref, which simply complains that the programme is pushed out of schedules by snooker and football.
  • The same ref does not support "despite Top Gear having considerably higher viewing figures" but says, "... there simply isn't enough space left for the sort of television programme normal people might actually want to watch."

Allegations of racism

  • The same ref that supports "BMW = Nazis" also supports alleged racist comments about various Orientals. Refs are hard enough to find, milk them!

Allegations of homophobia

Looks OK.

United States

  • No ref support "holding it as a spring/summer season replacement" - whatever that means.
Fixed. Found a ref and added it to the article. El Greco(talk) 17:19, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Australia

Looks OK.

Russia

Looks OK.

Discussion

"Groups such as the Environmental Investigation Agency have accused the BBC of allowing the Top Gear team to cause damage" - guess where this should go :-)
Just wanted to say, I did move that part to the criticisms page, but someone reverted it. TopGearFreak Talk 19:49, 23 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I meant the "Criticisms" section (or "Praise and criticisms") of this article. Once we get al th econten tin the right places, we can look at possible summarisation. --Philcha (talk) 22:11, 23 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm failing this article myself as a GA reviewer. It's been nearly a month and there's still a good deal of work to be done. Wizardman 02:28, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]


- - - - - please post review comments & responses above this line - - - - -

Running gags

A recent edit about running gags has been undone (not by me). Although poorly-written and unreferenced, it makes a valid point about the "Dacia Sandero", which has appeared in at least the last 2 seasons. Adequately referenced content about this would be welcome. --Philcha (talk) 12:52, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article already contains too many arbitrary lists of content. As a long-running, feature-centric show there is no way that all of these things can be represented adequately in an article which is supposed to concentrate on the show's real-world impact, its influences et cetera. If a particular running gag is so important that secondary sources flag it as being representative of the show, or if it otherwise affects the show's perception or influence, then that would be worth including. But simply listing them because they happened isn't appropriate. Good Articles can get away with stuff like this occasionally; Featured Articles can't. We should be aiming for FA. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:16, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"We should be aiming for FA"? Your only contributions in the last 500 have been the recent revert and attempt to rename the artcile which you promptly self-reverted.
Re "... the show's real-world impact, its influences et cetera ..." I was under the impression that the show is light entertainment. What impact and influences did you have in mind? --Philcha (talk) 14:28, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How many edits I have to the article is irrelevant to whether I am entitled to an opinion on it. I dare say that not having been deeply involved in its current state might make me more objective in its appraisal. As for its impact, it is one of the world's longest-running car shows and one of the most popular shows on BBC2 by some distance, so I dare say there may be something more important to write about it than a list of its most recent recurring jokes. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:07, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Running gags that last for a series or two should only really go in the appropriate series articles. They aren't notible enough to be in the main article. Looneyman (talk) 13:46, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Re "Running gags that last for a series or two ..." you may have a fair point. But we won't really know how enduring a feature they are without doing some research. --Philcha (talk) 14:28, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And until that "research" is done, it's just unsourced material. Removing unsourced material from an article is not, or at least should not be, controversial. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:07, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see there was an attempt to restore the "running gags" section under the premise of giving it a chance. It's been reverted again, a decision I'd support. Running gags are long-term in nature, not confined to a handful of episodes. While they've collected a few odds and ends under this title, they've missed the most important running gag of them all: "How hard can it be?" which speaks to how inappropriate this section is. Drmargi (talk) 17:41, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Look, it's simple. If anyone's confused about the Dacia Sandero, go to the relevent episode page on List of Top Gear episodes. And there your answer will be. We need to use the other pages for this type of material. This page should be about the Top Gear programme as a whole. If the joke wasn't carried from the beginning to the end, like for example the Stig's alienish habits, then it should be on the relevent series page. LicenseFee (talk) 17:46, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to add further weight to the arguments put forward by Drmargi, LicenseFee and Chris Cunningham - this sort of material is "fancruft" and has no place in this article. It is not a significant part of the show and is of no potential interest to anyone who has not watched the last 2 series. This article is NOT primarily written for the benefit and amusement of fans of the show. Philcha has clearly missed the point that a show of this worldwide popularity does have an impact and influence as well as pure entertainment value. Halsteadk (talk) 14:01, 28 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If anyone's confused about the Dacia Sandero, go to the relevent episode page on List of Top Gear episodes. How would they know to look there in the first place? As ever, The Simpsons have established a precedent with Recurring jokes in The Simpsons (specifically the Catchphrases section, which looks suspiciously like... a list!). Also The Simpsons opening sequence. 121.45.134.67 (talk) 13:28, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How would they know to go there in the first place?. Logic? If I wanted to know what American reference South Park was alluding to in the last episode which skipped over my British brain, I'd go to the episode list...LicenseFee (talk) 19:45, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Without a section like this, how would anyone know the Sandero thing was a running joke that ran for all of series 11 and spilled into series 12 without (knowing to) read the episode guides for both series? Consider a situation of a person who becomes interested in the show in three, five or twenty years (who has no idea of previous running jokes) and wants to know a bit of summary info without needing to click through 12+ pages of content to get it. 121.45.134.67 (talk) 22:22, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, but surely on that model we'd have to put every joke ever on Top Gear on the front page... and that would make the page stupidly long and then no one would ever read it. Sorry, am I being thick here? LicenseFee (talk) 11:05, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Not every joke ever, just the ones that can be classified as "running". I don't think there are that many: Hammond's teeth whitening, May's sense of direction and fastidiousness, Dacia Sandero, "Some say..." Stig intros, "How hard can it be?", etc. The problem is how to define what constitutes a running joke. How is it done for the Simpsons list? I don't have a particular interest in this section, but I'm trying to think impartially about the negative impact it's exclusion could have on TG content in the future (see my previous comment). 121.45.134.67 (talk) 11:21, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I find it difficult to believe that you're taking WP's treatment of The Simpsons articles as the gold standard to reach for here. While there are great Simpsons articles, that's mostly because the show is the most-discussed animated series in history, and every single aspect of it has been covered to death in reliable secondary sources. There are no such sources for the modern Top Gear; this means that all such lists read like Wikipedia's bad Simpsons articles - full of mindless, trivial fancruft to the exclusion of anything an outsider might understand or care about. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 21:05, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with thumperward. We need to avoid fancruft. Having a 'running joke' section is just asking for people to stick in any old fact that they saw on the television. The Simpsons is not God's article. If it was, then - surely - we need to adapt the episode lists and other tweaks. And also, there is a big difference in the fact that the simpsons is a comedy show - for comedy. Top Gear is, supposed, to be about cars. Hence the listing of featured cars. Comedy is not that integral to this page. Also, I doubt anyone will go to Wiki to know the entire episode. They could just watch the damn thing, after all. LicenseFee (talk) 21:09, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think the running jokes are particularly important or vital to the show. Out of the list that 121.45.134.67 writes, only "May's sense of direction and fastidiousness" stands out as being significant - and that is not a "running gag" as such - it is an important part of the relationship between the 3 presenters, and it's that relationship which is probably the single most important part of Top Gear's success and distinction. Halsteadk (talk) 22:35, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think the running jokes are particularly important or vital to the show. This is the problem. Some people think they're important, others don't. I suppose that until a writer from The Telegraph, or CNN or some other cite-able source says so, they're not important enough to include, regardless of whether they actually exist. Just found one, bear with me: "The world's most entertaining car show's popularity owes much to the relationship between its three presenters." [1] The ridicule the hosts direct at one another is an important aspect of their (on-screen) relationship, "Hammond... is the butt of good-natured ribbing about his diminutive height by Clarkson and May," [2] "... the irreverent tone often employed by the presenters, with such exchanges being typical of their style" [3] and some of that ridicule takes the form of a running gag (teeth whitening etc). WPs own definition of a Running gag, that "the humor in a running gag derives entirely from how often it is repeated", supports this notion, since many topics they use to poke fun at each other are brought up on a regular basis. As already stated, this is part of their relationship, which is important to the popularity of the show. In summary: ribbing (running gags) -> chemistry -> popularity. What have I missed? As for treating the Simpsons articles as the gold standard? Please. It was merely a convenient example that I'm sure most people are familiar with. BTW, since they've been 'covered to death' elsewhere, maybe the bulk of Simpsons content in WP should be removed and replaced with links to these definitive sources? 121.45.134.67 (talk) 17:05, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Unnecessary lists

Let's have a look at all the lists this article currently contains:

  1. "Unusual reviews": an arbitrary, user-selected list of various quirky car reviews. No analyses or comments from secondary sources.
  2. "Significant cars": an arbitrary, user-selected list of reviews of cars not recently released. No analyses or comments from secondary sources.
  3. "Car of the year": an information dump. No analyses or comments from secondary sources.
  4. "Ownership survey": an information dump. No analyses or comments from secondary sources.
  5. "Soundtrack": a phone poll James May did once. No analyses or comments from secondary sources.
  6. CD releases: a table of compact discs marketed by the BBC under the Top Gear brand. No actual tie-in from the show at all. No analyses or comments from secondary sources.
  7. DVD releases.

Of the seven lists or list-like tables in the article, only the last one could reasonably be expected to be found somewhere at the end of a normal TV programme article. This one is in the middle of the article.

Most of this information (especially the phone poll) is trivial reiteration of episode content. It could safely be removed and replaced with some prose summarising it, and indeed this would significantly improve some parts of the article - the quirky review style is indeed something which is picked up on by critics, and one of the main draws of the show. Currently, the article devotes one line to this general concept. For comparison, this is 50% of the space devoted to discussion of Hammond and Clarkson's one-upmanship on the Cool Wall.

Proposed solution: slap a {{prose}} tag on 1 and 2 until they can be referenced and rewritten, remove 3, 4 and 5 as trivia, split 6 to its own article and move 7 to the end of the article. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:37, 27 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Unusual reviews" section

An anon IP (good faith, not vandal) disagrees with the shortening of the "Unusual reviews" section that was agreed during the GA review. Please comment. --Philcha (talk) 11:07, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Since the Unusual reviews are effectively small challenges, why not move them into the Challenges article? I proposed that before but nobody commented. Looneyman (talk) 11:12, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't care if this section is broken off into it's on page, but I would like to see the contents retained. Yes, the information in this section can be found in the episode guides, but assuming this is sufficient is a bad idea. I think it's completely unnecessary that somebody unfamiliar with Top Gear should have to trawl through the quite large episode guides (12 series' and counting) to find some detail about one of the distinguishing aspects of the show. This POV is summed up well by Jonathonbarton in a previous discussion on the TG article layout (apologies for quoting such a large portion):

...the point that this article is the first Non-BBC, non Fansite hit (being 6th overall) on Google is significant. Also, Graham, I believe that a distinction needs to be made between the Intent of Wikipedia, and it's actual, real-world use. <snip> So long as the content is "editorially neutral", I see no problem with including as much detail as possible. Why? Well, anyone have any idea what Top Gear was like in 1977 when they perhaps did a bit about a Ford Cortina? I didn't think so. Me neither, though I'd LOVE to be able to come here and find out...I also believe that being able to come here in 20 years and learn about what Top Gear was like in the year 2002 will be equally fascinating (and, if you had your way) equally hard to find.

The (equally redundant) Races, Challenges, and Power Laps pages exist for similar reasons. I agree with Looneyman in that the Unusual Reviews are small challenges, and that this section should be moved to the Challenges page.121.45.134.67 (talk) 13:14, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nope. "Usefulness" is not the criterion we use for inclusion - there is no reason whatsoever to believe that the casual 2028 observer is going to be more interested in trivial regarding individual episode content than a wider overview of what the show was about, what critical acclaim it achieved and so on. We do not exist to catalogue popular culture; I find it very difficult to believe that there are no external Top Gear fansites which do this better. Some content simply doesn't belong here. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 08:52, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It's rash to guess what readers will or will not be interested in in 2028. For all we know Sun Microsystems may then be out of business or merged to the point of invisibility well before 2028, and all its products except Java (programming language) may be long forgotten. --Philcha (talk) 09:07, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If that were the case, then even if the current Sun article were frozen today it would provide an excellent historical guide to the subject. Note that it provides multitudes of reliable secondary sources and concentrates on establishing the importance of each area it covers; other than a large list of acquisitions it shies away from large data dumps of unestablished importance. We would do well to aim for that kid of coverage. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 12:40, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your "unestablished importance" highlights the fundamental issue - you appear unable to accept that what is important to you is unimportant to other people and vice versa. I've just looked at Sun Microsystems and have seen several items whose importance an alternate-universe version of you might dispute, if he worked for some other company or outside the computer industry. However I do not consider it reasonable for me to raise objections against these items, because someone with more knowledge of the subject has considered them worth including. I suggest you show similar consideration for items in articles in which you have little direct interest. --Philcha (talk) 13:16, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm going to ignore any other commentary on my character, as the number of edits I've made here, who I work for et cetera are of no relevance at all to whether my points are valid. There's no way of proving the negative that editors in the future will be less interested in historical impact, influences, relation to contemporary arts and such than they are in fancruft, but it's strongly suggested by our current content policies (especially the various sections of WP:NOT). As such, I'm going to keep working on splitting, rewriting or deleting inappropriate sections and hopefully expanding appropriate ones until this article would likely be assessed by an uninvolved editor as a good article. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:30, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Haven't you noticed that a GA review is in progress, and that it has raised several sourcing issues?
Re your suggestion that future editors will be interested in historical impact, influences, relation to contemporary arts, etc., it would be interesting if you could provide sources for items on these topics. I can even suggest some influences you might like to consider -On the Braden Beat, Braden's Week and That's Life! presented a similar combination of consumer affairs and humour, mainly anti-establishent, on UK TV in the 1960s and 1970s.
Re your comments about "fancruft", as I said, people who have a real interest in the subject are best qualified to judge. The two contributors to this discussion who actually are strongly interested in the subject of the article, Looneyman and 121.45.134.67, seemed to be reaching a consensus about what should be kept and what should be hived off. I suggest you should explain your proposals and for comments from them and from editors who have contributed. --Philcha (talk) 14:36, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • In my view, the unusual revies are more or less small challenges, as said above. There are enough of said challenges to warrant keeping, providing adequete sources are found for them. That's why I proposed that the section be moved to the challenges article and retitled to 'review challenges' rather than unusual reviews. That way, the problems of the main article are addressed whlie the information is kept in an appropriate topic for any curious or casual readers. Looneyman (talk) 15:18, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This sounds like the best suggestion put forward and I, as an AC with a very valuable vote, whole heartedly support it! :-) It's extremely ironic that these debates, can outlast the pages they're about. 121.45.134.67 (talk) 15:39, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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