Forum:Quotes

Are quotes in articles neccessary? Lots of articles, particularly about people, have quotes from them which don't really seem to do any good for the articles. So should they all be removed, or should any quotes (e.g, not like "one of the Dalek's most common war cries is "Exterminate!") on their own be kept in? 12:25, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Nope. We decided to just delete them (look at the bottom of Forum:Format for television story entries) since they were useless and encyclopedic. Azes13 15:35, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Alright then, I'll put something on the Manual of Style (if there isn't anything alreadythere about it) then get round to deleting quotes on individuals and episodes... in a bit. 15:39, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I strongly favor quotes, especially quotes at the head of an article. they sum up a character or a concept in a way that paragraphs of quote cannot, they can liven up an otherwise dry article and, of course, also, why go into linguistic gymnastics in order to not quote a source directly, rather than paraphrase? also, DOCTOR WHO has had great lines of dialogue. as for precedent, Wookieepedia uses quotes, more, in fact, they do so more than I would suggest doing. example entry from Wookieepedia Perhaps one line, three at most, at the heading of an article, only? --***Stardizzy*** 18:18, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Perhaps we can have quotes in moderation, i.e only for important charactors (e.g Davros, the Doctor, etc), however for minor charactors we have no quotes, and no quotes from charactors about places (e.g no quotes about Mondas or Mars)? 18:30, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * firstly, thank you for listening. I agree as far as places. As far as less significant characters, I really would like to have quotes for them as well. like when the Doctor sums up Reinette's achievements in a few lines ("writer, courtesan" and whatever else he said). frankly, I just want to quote some of the cracking dialogue in stories like "Ghost Light" and "The Girl in the Fireplace". not too proud to admit that. though I don't oppose it it might come down to more work to find quote for the major characters, actually, with the over-abundance of them.--***Stardizzy*** 19:06, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Firstly, you're welcome. Secondly, all of the episodes have some of the best quotes on Wikiquote and The Whoniverse, so perhaps links can be made to them. However, really some of the minor charactors are summed up well enough and have no need for a quote, and if they still have quotes, there needs to be a better way of formatting them. 19:12, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * ah, but they just categorize the WHO quotes on Wikiquote very broadly, according to Doctor. not by story. anyway, how would you suggest formatting the quotes in a new way?

--***Stardizzy*** 21:41, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

A New Idea
I've been thinking, and I've had an idea. If we had a quote template like on Wookieepedia, we could have quotes at the top of the articles for the characters, as long as they're descriptive. For example, on the Doctor's page, there would be:


 * "He's like fire and ice and rage. He's like the night, and the storm in the heart of the sun. He's ancient and forever. He burns at the center of time and he can see the turn of the universe. And... he's wonderful."

And for the Master:


 * "Weapon, after weapon, after weapon. All you do is talk, and talk, and talk. But over all these years... and all these disasters, I've always had the greatest secret of them all. I know you. Explode those ships, you kill yourself... that's the one thing you can never do."

How about it? (and no, I don't care that this is similar to other ideas mentioned above, it's an old topic, so just act like it's a new idea, but not sarcastically, if you get what I mean.) 20:28, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Nope, still not a big fan of it. The quotes just seem corny and they don't seem to work with the rest of the articles. <Azes13 14:13, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

You can put in the Eleventh Doctor page a quote: "amy pond, there is something you better understand about me, its importent, and one day your life may depend on it ,i am definitely a mad man with a box! hahah!!

Revisiting the topic
I think we might need to revisit this topic to work out some form of policy for the quotes. I am in the camp of just removing them as un-encyclopaedic. However it seems that the quotes have made it onto many articles as a way to emphasise the article's subject. Some form of policy I think may be needed to set some boundaries for where quotes should go and what quotes should be on the articles. --Tangerineduel 14:51, April 10, 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree. I think quotes so only go on the main pages - such as The Doctor, Companions, The Master etc - stuff the a a major part of Doctor Who, Sarah Jane Adventure and Torchwood, and there should only be one quote at the the top of the page.... problem is.... people like to change the qoutes, put uneed spaces it as well. :S Mini-mitch 15:55, April 10, 2010 (UTC)


 * The more I think about this the more it seems like a good idea just to wipe out the quote concept completely and return to what we had before, quotes in moderation as part of the body of the article rather than as a heading to whichever article. It is actually in the Tardis:Manual of Style (something everyone seems to have missed/ignored).
 * The issue with having quotes at the top of articles (or elsewhere) is that without encyclopaedic text to back up the quote/to justify the quote it's more a matter of opinion (as we've seen recently) for which quote is better suited for an article. --Tangerineduel 17:53, April 12, 2010 (UTC)
 * I think something needs to be done about the quotes because A)because have fights over what quotes to use B)Some editors put quotes on everything page C)some editors don't even know how to format the quote correctly - which results in reason A happen, again and again. Mini-mitch 14:25, April 16, 2010 (UTC)