Slashdot Mirror


A New Replacement for TV Tome

Randall311 writes to tell us about, what the creators hope will be, a new replacement for the old TV Tome website, the TV IV Wiki. The once popular TV Tome website was absorbed by CNET in April of this year and most of the content was added to their TV.com website. Many users dislike the new format with vast amounts of flash, obnoxious ads, and missing content. So, if you liked the old TV Tome website perhaps this will allow the community to rebuild what it has lost.

16 of 196 comments (clear)

  1. Mirroring TV.com? by rteunissen · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What would be the legal status of mirroring most of the tv.com content to the new wiki? Considering that the content on tvtome.com was submitted by people from all over the world, could a former tvtome editor place his own text (now part of tv.com) on the wiki? Or can we just outright copy everything over and get a major headstart, the info on tv.com comes (mostly) from tv network's websites/public communication.

    1. Re:Mirroring TV.com? by tabkey12 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Probably not, as I'd be willing to bet that when you submitted that information you signed your copyright over to TVTome, agreed by you in the Terms & Conditions of the site. Sorry...

  2. Possible Problems with Wiki Medium? by Scoria · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This seems as though it would be an absolute haven for trolls looking to provide "unsolicited" spoilers. Have the individuals responsible for the TV IV Wiki taken any precautions against this?

    --
    Do you like German cars?
    1. Re:Possible Problems with Wiki Medium? by amodm · · Score: 5, Insightful

      IMHO in the long term, the positives of the wiki approach far outweigh the negatives.

      Look at wikipedia: some or the other time a page is spoiled, but its recovered very quickly and I believe its one of the most reliably informative sites on the net.

      The warning is there, because of the _potential_ of spoilers.

      One of the mechanisms in place is that no anonymous editing is allowed. People need to register to edit. That way, a spolier's account can be locked. For every spolier, a person would need to create an account. Its tedious in the least.

  3. Something Awful project by Idimmu+Xul · · Score: 5, Informative

    The TV IV stems from a forum on Something Awful so with all that goon power behind it I'm sure it will snowball shortly in to a quite concise database.

    The cookery forum offshoot, GBS Food is doing wonderfully since it's conception!

    --
    The problem with slashdot is that most of its users were bullied and stuffed into lockers as kids!
  4. Re:Poor resource by /ASCII · · Score: 5, Insightful

    TV Tome didn't always have thousands of programs, hopefully tviv will start catching up quickly. This is a bit like what happened with CDDB and FreeDB. Sure CDDB was a much better source for a while, but FreeDB quickly caught on and is new a perfectly viable source of CD information.

    And since both sites are free, your comment about getting what you pay for makes no sense whatsoever.

    --
    Try out fish, the friendly interactive shell.
  5. Re:Poor resource by tabkey12 · · Score: 3, Insightful
    The only appeal that this may have is that it is a wiki so users can update as they see fit. Unfortunately, most of the time, you get what you pay for.

    TV.com is free to use, and you can edit most of the information as if it was a wiki. It's the advertising and interface that sucks...

  6. Wiki mostly US-based? by rklrkl · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'm wondering if we're going to get coverage of non-US TV shows (TV Tome used to do so and tv.com doesn't seem to [or if it does, it's barely any])? For example, on the home page of the Wiki it says "Catch every episode of the longest-running sci-fi show on television on Sci-Fi". Nope, we're not talking about Doctor Who (which is the world record holder), but apparently Stargate SG-1!

  7. Wow, thought it was just me! by N8F8 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I used TVTome to regularly is was downright painfull when TV.com bought them out. Things that used to take three or four clicks were taking thirty clicks. Especially annoying is that their listings are alphabetic and paginated. So if you eant to find say, "lost" you have to page through a ton of pages to find it. Not to mention the cooler TVTome consent is gone - Bloopers and highlights.

    --
    "God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
  8. Why Creative Commons? by deminisma · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Seriously, could they have at least considered dual-licensing with the GFDL, so text could be borrowed from Wikipedia and vice-versa? This is a seriously counter-productive move considering that Wikipedia already has a wealth of information on television shows (see their pages on South Park for an excellent example).

  9. Re:Mirroring TV.com? Oops... by tabkey12 · · Score: 3, Informative
    Actually, looking at the terms, I may have made a mistake. TV.com is now part of the CNET network and so is governed by the CNET Networks Terms of Use.

    The Terms and Conditions states that you grant CNET Networks a licence to use your information any way they see fit, but the licence is nonexclusive. Therefore, the users who contributed the information at TVTome (or TV.com) could add that information to the TVIV Wiki too. However, proving who was the copyright holder of a paragraph, which was originally written by one person, then modified by, say three others, would probably make this too complicated to work on a large scale.

  10. epguides.com by Morinaka · · Score: 5, Informative

    If your just looking for episode listings and the episode names, http://www.epguides.com/ is pretty good. No flash ads or anything. It also links straight to the TV.com page when you click on the episode link. So that option is still available.

    --
    Rock is Dead! Long live Paper and Scissors!!
  11. Re:bahh.. by tomhudson · · Score: 3, Insightful
    How is this a troll?

    By 2000, tv viewing was down 27% in homes with a fucking DIAL-UP connection.

    My dogs watch more TV than me.

    I have watched a total of 2 hours of tv this summer (and that was a dvd). Better to get out of the house and visit friends and family, etc., than to waste time watching advertising and not-funny "comedies."

    Heck, even slashdot is better than the average TV fare.

  12. Multi-show sites like TV.com can never compete... by Tycoon+Guy · · Score: 3, Informative
    ... with show-specific fan sites. Why would you bother going to TV.com, where at most you'll find a one-paragraph description of episodes that you've already seen, when a show-specific site can offer so much more information?

    If I want to know about Desperate Housewives, I'll go to Get Desperate. For Lost, I visit Lost Media; for Family Guy, the Family Guy Files, and for CSI, CSI Files. I even still visit Crashdown, a Roswell fan site, even though that show was cancelled YEARS ago. Most of these sites are updated several times a day -- TV.com can never compete against that.

    What I would really like would be an index to the best show-specific fan sites on the internet, for every single show that's out there. TV.com should just switch to that!

  13. Cue William Shatner by WidescreenFreak · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I think that William Shatner's classic "Saturday Night Live" skit is more of what you're looking for.

    {Shatner at podium at a "Star Trek" convention}

    "Before I continue I just want to say ... Get a life! Would you, people? It's just a TV show! {points to geek with Spock ears} You! Have you even kissed a girl? {geek slowly lowers head} I didn't think so!"

    Even at that, you're still a pompous coward for posting AC. :P

    --
    The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
  14. Re:Poor resource by arodland · · Score: 4, Funny

    No, the Mozilla Browser is now the Mozilla browser, and Firefox is now Firefox (and not Firebird or Phoenix). Meanwhile, Internet Explorer is "The Internet". I hope this clears things up for you.