Improving the organisation of TARDIS Guide

Website Meta Discussions
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Carrying on from the Ranges discussion, and some long discussions on the Discord, I think we may have come to a decision on this but I just want to ask for some feedback and help naming it :blush:

The Problem

We have had lots of feedback from users who are fairly new to Doctor Who that the site currently has a lot of stuff on it that they have no idea how it is placed in the Doctor Who Universe. They are asking for a way to hide certain ranges just for themselves so when they look at things like “New Releases” or “Upcoming” lists they can only see what they are interested in.

We also have veteran fans who want their statistics to accurately represent what they believe to be the full picture. So to 100% all visual stories (what we currently call “TV”) they don’t want to have to watch obscure YouTube videos or pay for BBV ramblings.

Also, some people are concerned that their “average rating” goes down the more they rate things like BBV!

This is all fair enough, and we can do this without affecting the experience of other users - I can add a setting for people to hide certain subsets of content and make it not affect statistics (split the stats out for them), and it does not have to affect people that don’t change that setting!

The problem is what to hide? If we make it too granular (by Publisher, for example) then it’s not useful to someone who doesn’t know their Candy Jar from their Penguin Group (there are 112 publishers, putting the task on a new visitor to pick and choose would be too much).

Also everyone has their own opinions as what ‘counts’ here. We are not going to get into discussions about canon or licensing.

So the decision we think we are going to go with is based on something objective that is based purely on the Characters and Locations. For example, if a story features River Song or Paradise Towers, it fits into our group to be included for everyone. If the story is so far removed from the TV show that there are no familiar characters or settings, then it can be optionally hidden by our users.

How we think we can do this

We have a filter field called “Range” and it’s supposed to be really wide-reaching - we already have separate filters for Sets, Publishers, Media, etc. so this is just for the general Range that the story fits into.

Here are the Ranges we should have, as I see it:

Doctor Who

This is why we’re all here, isn’t it? The guy that started it all. The biggest Range. Anything where The Doctor is the main focus of the story. Includes the TV show, books, Big Finish, BBC Audio, and more.

The Official Spin-off Ranges

This includes Torchwood, Sarah Jane Adventures, Class and K9 - these are based on the official Spin-off TV shows. It will also include Bernice Summerfield who, while never made into a TV show, has more stories than any other character after the Doctor (she is a special case, being so important to the DWU).

Faction Paradox

This is a unique case, similar to Bernice Summerfield - it’s a spin-off that isn’t really official Doctor Who (featuring in a Virgin New Adventure and then spinning off into its own thing) but is big enough and has enough history to deserve its own Range.

The Worlds of Doctor Who

Stories in the Worlds of Doctor Who section of the site will be any story that isn’t classed as “Doctor Who” or one of the spin-offs above, but does pass this following rule: Was the main character, organisation, or location a significant element of a licensed Doctor Who story?

Some examples include Candy Jar’s Lethbridge-Stewart range or Obverse’s Iris Wildthyme range:

Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart has appeared on TV: therefore his spin off range of books all count as being part of The Worlds of Doctor Who.

Iris Wildthyme appeared in the officially licensed BBC Books range.

Big Finish’s ever expanding audio ranges provide many more examples of stories which count as part of Worlds - the Countermeasures team from Remembrance of the Daleks; River Song’s continuing solo adventures; the extraordinary exploits of Jago and Litefoot; Lady Christina and Jenny’s various escapades.

In the book world, ranges based around characters such as Chris Cwej, Professor Travers and Erimem would all count.

Cutaway Comics releases based on Omega and Sutekh would also count. Cutaway Comics also have comics based on locations and races such as Paradise Towers and the Tharils. As these have featured in Doctor Who on screen, they also count as part of Worlds.

Then we come to everything else. These can be split into the following, first the easiest one:

Beyond the Whoniverse

These are stories that aren’t even trying to be Whoniverse stories, but they ended up on the site because they contain Doctor Who elements in cameo or reference - Thunderbirds episode that features a Dalek, X-Men, Stingray, stuff like that.

Big Finish’s Dorian Gray range is good case study for this.

Dorian appears in two licensed audios from the Bernice Summerfield and War Master ranges. Although these are officially licensed ‘Whoniverse’ stories, the Dorian Gray range is demonstrably not trying to fit into Doctor Who (and significantly doesn’t feature within Big Finish’s ‘Worlds of Doctor Who’ banner).

Untempered Whoniverse

This is a new idea for a name for everything in between - it is a DWU story that does not contain any recognisable characters or settings from the main show or main spin-offs, but nevertheless is included in the Whoniverse.

These are stories which will be included by default but people can opt to hide.

Graceless would be another example of this. Although the characters have featured in Main Range Doctor Who Big Finish stories, their spin off range is not categorised as a ‘world of Doctor Who’ by Big Finish and is demonstrably creating its own ‘universe’ for storytelling.

Senor 105 only features in non-BBC licensed Iris Wildthyme stories. His own range of stories is therefore Untempered Whoniverse.

Stories based around characters such as Giles from PROBE will now be categorised as Untempered Whoniverse. As they do not originate in Doctor Who stories, they are too far removed to be included in the Whoniverse section of the site.

I like the name Untempered Whoniverse because it suggests that these stories have broken free from the mould, they have their own rules, and their own set of characters and worlds. It’s also an interesting sounding word, with connections to Doctor Who. But we have a few other ideas for names for this, here are some logo ideas I put together and a poll to help decide on the name!

  • Untempered Whoniverse
  • Outer Whoniverse
  • Fringe Whoniverse

whoniverse-naming
whoniverse-naming816×730 56.4 KB

  • Untempered Whoniverse
  • Outer Whoniverse
  • Fringe Whoniverse
0 voters

(also let me know which icon you like best)

  • Spiral
  • Solar System
  • Galaxy
0 voters

We have a work in progress list of what is in which category, and will post it when we are ready to share, and have heard more feedback about this.

In Conclusion

Just to clarify if you don’t want to hide anything, this decision does not affect you! We are not taking anything away from you, and we are not trying to decide what is ‘canon’ here.

Nothing will change for most users. For users that untick either Untempered or Beyond, only the following will change:

  • Those stories will not show up under the “Latest Releases” homepage widget.
  • Reviews of those stories will not show up in “Latest Reviews” homepage widget
  • When viewing “All Stories” or “Future Releases”, the default view will not include those stories (although you can change the filter to include them, they are not hidden for good).
  • Searching will still find them, as will looking at places like Character pages.
  • When the Recommendation feature is finally released, it won’t recommend those stories.
  • The Randomiser won’t show those stories by default (you will be able to select the Range though)
  • Your stats pages will adjust to show fewer stories required to reach 100%. Also the “average rating” will be split into ranges, as well as an overall.
  • Certain badges going forward will be for certain sections of the site only.

We are open to discuss this, but think this is a good solution that solves the issues we have been facing. It will help make the site more useful for those who want to use the site in their own way. We feel that this is the best way for the site to continue to grow and deliver the user experience all of our members deserve.

Please let us know your feedback!

20 Likes
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I’m all for this! At the end of the day it’s optional so if you don’t want to use it you don’t have to - and BF is still very much included so no complaints here.

16 Likes
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This is a very logical and sensible way to go about it and allows for everyone to customise their experience in accordance with their interests. It’s a win-win situation!

16 Likes
4

Seems like a good solution to me!

9 Likes
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I like it 100% good shit

8 Likes
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I think this is a good idea, you don’t want overwhelm people or make them think “I’m not a big enough fan to be here.” Will new users be asked if they want to hide some of these ranges when they sign up?

11 Likes
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This is all marvellous. As ever, hugely impressed by your commitment to how clean, professional and accessible the site should be - as well as continuing to include all the weird, imperfect, barely licensed bits of Doctor Who that thrill nerds like me.

Unrelated, but I will also say that - as probably the biggest Thunderbirds defender on here - I don’t think it’d hurt the site to fold in the Gerry Anderson stuff (Stingray/Fireball XL5/Captain Scarlet) with Thunderbirds in a single “Supermarionation” or “TV Century 21” category. Their connection with Who is all through the lens of the TV21 comics, so it doesn’t seem arbitrary to group them together in the service of cleanliness, especially when fans of those franchises usually do that anyway. :)

I do wonder if “untempered”, though very cool, might be a little confusing/opaque for new users. But maybe rule of cool wins out?

13 Likes
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Yeah, untempered absolutely shouldn’t be the winner here. It’s not particularly intuitive at a glance, and that really should be the key.

5 Likes
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Even if it has a description underneath for what it means?

5 Likes
10

Don’t get me wrong. It sounds awesome. But awesomeness does not a useful name make. and if it’s a site based on utility/pragmatism, I do wonder if it’s the move.

Honestly, it’s the least popular by far, but I like “fringe”, it really encompasses the “underdog” nature of the stories in question.

4 Likes
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If the move here is making the site easier to navigate, it does admittedly feel strange to have users need to read a description when there are more intuitive names available.

5 Likes
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Though that’d help initially, the problem would be thereafter. It’s best with this sort of thing, I’d say, to think ‘will seeing this phrase in forum conversation or in a filter list without an attached description several weeks or months down the line still make immediate sense to a reader?’

4 Likes
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Totally agree. Hey, if we went for “outer” or “fringe”, we could always use the word “untempered” in a bit of flowery description to preserve the fun of the word. “This is the untempered and mysterious corner of the Whoniverse, connected only by a splinter of time…” or whatever you like.

9 Likes
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Hmm okay… even though Untempered is winning the vote, if you had to vote between one of these which would it be?

  • Fringe Whoniverse
  • Outer Whoniverse
0 voters
2 Likes
15

One more point I’ll say in favour of “fringe”; it’s distinct from “beyond the Whoniverse” in a way that I feel “outer” isn’t (sad as I am to lose the vague astronomy theme).

5 Likes
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Would this open the door to like, other loosely connected stuff from BF like Dorian to join the site?

4 Likes
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Dorian is already on the site

8 Likes
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Dorian is already on there but Sherlock’s not need my wholock fantasy on tardis guide but with Nic brigs holmes and Scottish menace 7

4 Likes
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I said like Dorian cause I knew it was :sob: I meant ranges like Dorian, that are already there

5 Likes
20

Sounds like a great Call to make, very nicely thought! I am all for it, you did it again, Shauny! (Now back to your Importing work :wink: /j /lh)

5 Likes