Board Thread:The Panopticon/@comment-24894325-20151119211902/@comment-5918438-20151230172032

Okay. I'm going to take this one message at a time.

Amorkuz wrote: Now I'm really mad at myself. Because I've noticed that The Diary of River Song doesn't have a dab term and correctly reconstructed the reason: it is not a story. Says on the cover, "Series 1". So for series/season, do we always go with series to have a consistent rule, rather than just following the rule of "whichever word happens to be used in a press release/statement"?

Amorkuz wrote: I like the idea of dropping dab terms for collections whenever possible. The rationale for always having dab terms for stories was that they often need disambiguation in non-obvious ways. But most collection titles disambiguate themselves, so to say. If it has "and other stories" or "Volume 01" or "Series 03" or "Box Set" at the end of the official BF release name, there is no chance of confusing them with anything. Someone suggested to rename UNIT: Extinction (audio anthology) into Extinction, so this should not be done IMHO. Because, as you can see, Extinction does require disambiguation already, but UNIT: Extinction never will. In short, collection names are much less likely to be literal and, hence, ambiguous than story names. I actually agree with this. The decision to dab all story titles only applies to stories, and for good reason. Now this is not to say we'll never disambiguate (we will, in any case there may be confusion), but, especially now you've made the case, I see no reason why we should "auto-dab" ranges, series or box sets. (Well, series titles will be standardised anyway. But ranges that need dabbing will be (range) and box sets that need dabing will be (box set).)

Amorkuz wrote: For instance, from the table above I think only the following already released titles may require a dab term:
 * 1) Dark Eyes
 * 2) The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield
 * 3) The Triumph of Sutekh
 * 4) Epoch
 * 5) Road Trip
 * 6) Legion
 * 7) New Frontiers
 * 8) Missing Persons
 * 9) Circular Time
 * 10) 100
 * 11) Forty-Five
 * 12) The Company of Friends
 * 1) Dark Eyes (range), to distinguish from Series 1 (Dark Eyes) (Dark Eyes (box set) will redirect to the series page)
 * 2) The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield (box set) (box set?) is volume 1 of The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield (range), and thus should redirect to series 1 (NABS), should it not?
 * 3) The Triumph of Sutekh shouldn't need dabbing, also it should redirect to series 2 (NABS). Wait...should we be calling these "volume" 1, 2, etc? I'm starting to think maybe we should follow their terminology. "Volume" if it says so, "Season" if it says that, and "Series" otherwise. But "Series [#]" should always redirect to the Volume/Season page? Should we just name them all "series"? I feel very stupid right now.
 * 4) Epoch (box set), definitely, because both the concept of an epoch and the Epoch exist in the DWU. And is that series 1 of "Bernice Summerfield - Box Sets"? It doesn't say so anywhere on the cover, so that may be something like "The Fourth Doctor Collection". Because Volume 01 of the New Adventures is also listed as "1" within the Benny - Box Sets "range". Also, it's listed together at Ranges with "Bernice Summerfield - Single Releases" and "Bernice Summerfield - Books". This whole Benny situation is confusing, because the ranges on the BF website are marketing. Remember, "Big Finish Bargains" and "Big Finish For Free!" are also listed on the same page. Anyway, Single Releases, Books, Box Sets and The New Adventures of... are what Big Finish lists as the Benny ranges. Bah! I'll need to get back to this.
 * 5) Road Trip needs no disambiguation. But is it a series within the "Box Sets" range, or more comparable to, say The Web of Fear within season 5—except range instead of season, box set instead of serial, and audio story instead of episode. Oh, also the stories have nothing to do with each other. Bad comparison. But what I mean to say is that perhaps the box sets here aren't series—just units, in this case box sets, without series. "02." Or does "xx." automatically mean series/season/volume in our eyes, especially if it contains further stories within? My guess is the only way to solve this would be to see if Big Finish has used the words series, season or volume in regards to any of these Benny box sets.
 * 6) Legion (box set). Same question as above, as to whether it's series 3 or release 3, and box sets are their own thing, sometimes belonging to ranges and sometimes not, but never connected to any series, or, themselves, series.
 * 7) New Frontiers. You know the drill. But no dab needed. Wait hold up! This box set has a singular cast. Oh, they all do. So production wise, they're all one production. That's really useful information. They're hiring the same cast to do several stories, but it's all one production, not multiple productions released as a series. The audio stories within these box sets are essentially episodes. Yes, from a narrative point of view, they're very much separate. But from a production point of view, as I'm sure is reflected in the hiring of actors and crew (they'll be hired for New Frontiers, not for each individual episode), this is one production, and one release. Which is very different from a typical season/series of Big Finish, which is multiple productions and releases within a span of time, to which you can subscribe. So yes, it's starting to seem to me that these box sets are concepts related to series, but they're their own thing. They do not belong within a series, either. They are units, singular releases, which then contain several stories, which are all commissioned together.
 * 8) Missing Persons. No dab. Note the wording in the synopsis (yes, curiously, box sets each have a synopsis, and further a summary of each story): "five-part box-set". So these are sort of like serials. I'm patting myself on the back right now...right typing. The audio stories within a box set are described by BF are "parts", at least here. Anyway, I also want to point out that, at least in this case, there are two directors listed for all 5 audio stories together. Yet another proof that a box set is a singular production.
 * 9) Circular Time (no dab, unless we decide that box sets need them after all, like serials). Okay, this is the first box set in the main range. This is much like the "and other stories" anthologies to come. And this is definitely not a series. "91." Same kind of numbering as the Benny box sets. A singular release, and singular production, with no series to speak of. Looking at the cast lists, you can clearly see that this anthology (comparable to a serial? i can't remember how much of old Who was shot in order) was produced in two parts: spring and autumn, summer and winter. Most of the guest actors appear in two stories, in that pattern, as separate characters. Considering the one director, I think it's probably safe to assume that one half was recorded on the 6th, with one set of actors, and the other, with the other set, on the 7th. It had a two-disc release, which is no different from any other single-story releases at the time. (Legion, on the other hand, recorded on three very distinct days, rather than two consecutive ones, had two directors, and has a three-disc release. This means Legion produced each of its audio stories separately, and released them all on separate discs within a box set, a terminology perhaps not used for DW main range anthologies.)
 * 10) 100 (anthology) or 100 (box set)—this must be dabbed because any number, such as 100, is always reserved for the year, by policy. If there is a 100 link, any user would reasonably assume that is a link to the year, and will link accordingly, perhaps without checking. Anyway, some things have changed since the last anthology release. There's much less overlap in the case (except the main cast of Doctor and companion, of course), with only one actor in common between two stories. This time, they're referred to as "four one-part stories", versus the Benny language of "five-part box-set". Also unlike Benny and like the previous DW anthology, it was recorded over two days. But this time, not two consecutive days. 25 June and 12 July. Still two discs, though.
 * 11) Forty-Five. No dab needed. I think it's safe to assume no one will think "Forty-Five", with capital letters, means 45. Although there should be a  once 45 exists, or perhaps straight away. Anyway, this is main range as well. Here, every single actor participates in more than one story. Two discs. One director. Recording dates not given for some reason.
 * 12) The Company of Friends. "Four one-part stories". Two consecutive recording days. One director. Pretty much no cast overlap. Two-disc release.

Anyway, I know I'm all over the place right now, but: for Benny, outside of the box sets there are, except for specials like Many Happy Returns, series. So instead of taking the BF website's "Bernice Summerfield - Box Sets", etc. names, we should just define it as the Bernice Summerfield (range), currently at Big Finish Bernice Summerfield series, and then further divide the range into series, with box sets and then special releases being their own thing at the bottom. Well, at the bottom before the prose stuff. We shouldn't consider Benny box sets to be series of "Bernice Summerfield - Box Sets". They are box sets. Singular releases within a non-numbered series of Bernice box sets, as part of the Bernice Summerfield range.

Amorkuz wrote: I'll address other points separately, but let me answer one question. The Companion Chronicles: The Specials is actually a collection of three stories previously available as free downloads for DWM and main range(?) subscribers. This is also my example of a 4-tier structure, because it is a release within a range that contains three parts, of which the first consists of 12 stories. We'll have to go over all the non-numbered releases later (ie. any BF release with no number at all, or marked as "0." at the top).