Forum:The Periodic Adventures of Señor 105

This wiki currently does not cover The Periodic Adventures of Señor 105, despite being a spinoff of Iris Wildthyme, because its creator, Cody Schell asked for it not to be covered. However, I've seen at least two users say that they believe this to be because he misunderstood the scope of this wiki. From what I've seen, I think this is the case and that the series should be both covered and valid. I think the ideal thing to do would be to get into contact with Schell and explain to him that this wiki covers things which are only narrowly tied to Doctor Who. Cgl1999 ☎  07:05, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Discussion
That could work. I do think this is the only time an entire series hasn't been covered due to apparent authorial intent and yet it failed none of T:VS... 07:15, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Well, except for R4. Previous discussion is Thread:117545 at User:SOTO/Forum Archive/The Panopticon I and also a deleted thread Forum:Inclusion debate:Señor 105. Thread is arguably precedent that this thread should be deleted as well - depending on how badly we mess up their SEO. We messed it up so bad in 2012 that Czech purged the thread so they didn't have a random wiki thread above their actual book. Najawin ☎  08:05, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I thought they said that it shouldn't be covered on this Wiki? That is not the same as "it's not set in the DWU"; and even if this is the case, we'd still end up covering it because it's still licensed. 08:09, 28 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Also Cody's views on the series won't be enough to prevent the series from being covered anyway, given we listen to individual authors; so if an author of a later book in the series did intend for it to be set in the DWU and it was licensed, we'd cover it.
 * Going by User talk:Tangerineduel/Archive 6, Blair Bidmead said: " I'm not particularly concerned whether the book is included in this wiki or not". Pretty neutral, admittedly, but it does show that at least Blair doesn't view coverage as a bad thing. 08:24, 28 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Also the interview that is cited on User:SOTO/Forum Archive/The Panopticon I, the one from Life on Magrs... yeah ngl I do not trust the accuracy of said interview given it is literally being conducted by Panda and Fester Cat, both very fictional characters.
 * Also from said interview, Cody says: "But generally, 105’s universe is his universe, and hers is hers." Isn't this just a non-literal description? Like that of that mention of Jago and Litefoot being "in a universe of their own" when Big Finish Productions made the Jago & Litefoot spin-off? Plus his mention of it not being a Doctor Who spin-off... isn't that because it isn't? Something can still be set in the same universe and not be a spin-off, surely? As an author myself I do understand the issue authors have with us calling their works Doctor Who spin-offs, as it implies their notability is solely definable by their connection to Who. (Glares at Doctor Who spin-offs.)
 * I dunno, all of these pieces of evidence don't seem watertight to me, as we're inferring that they mean more then they might, to fit into our rules. 08:31, 28 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Plus given the issue with SEO... there is nothing we can do about that! Señor 105 appears in many Iris Wildthyme stories, we can't just not give him a page because of something the author might've said a decade ago, that's not how Tardis:Valid sources works. 08:43, 28 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Also the quote about it existing on the Tardis Wiki doesn't seem to exist anymore. 08:57, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, what are the issues with SEO? Aquanafrahudy 📢  09:57, 28 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Our pages on the series — including the discussion (talk pages and forum threads etc) pages — were appearing as the top search result because of Fandom's dominance on SEO. 11:24, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

I will say that I personally think a topic this contentious and historical needs a bit longer of an opening statement. But generally I think this site is agree that it is a mistake to take every single use of the term "universe" so literally, as we then use the term in a non-literal sense and ignore other cases. For instance, Big Finish has often said phrases like "See Bernice Summerfield's further adventures in her own universe!" And yet we don't call her stories non-valid or an alternate timeline or the such. We simply understand that universe is a term used in several non-literal ways. "Universe" being used as a stand-in for "world" or "franchise" is not actual evidence of it not being DWU. Torchwood could easily be said to be "its own universe" - even having its own stand-alone continuity and world building.

But my biggest takeaway is that "This shouldn't be covered on Tardis Wiki" is not an actual statement of authorial intention. OS25🤙☎️ 21:15, 29 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Is there anyone currently active in the forums who would call themselves a "Señor 105 fan"? I know people will quickly call that I bias, but really I think it's an issue that so far everyone has been saying things like "as far as I know" or "based on what I've been told" etc. To actually understand the scope of covering this and wikifying on Tardis, I'd like to have someone who knows a lot about the series and can either tell us if including it on Tardis is a good idea or a disaster waiting to happen, plus if it matches with the content of the series, etc. OS25🤙☎️ 03:59, 30 June 2023 (UTC)


 * The issue of the term "universe" was discussed in Thread:117545. It had nothing to do with the series being ruled invalid. (I'm not sure why people are focusing on that.) That was due entirely to Quijano-Schell's statements about it not being appropriate for a DW wiki. You can read the closing post! Czech says:
 * You don't need to be familiar with our four little rules to opine that your work isn't connected enough to the DWU to be included on a Doctor Who wiki. And that's really enough to declare this thing invalid.
 * Fundamentally is this standard wrong? No. Authors don't have to deal with our validity rules. The rules are for our work, not for theirs. Is Czech correct in this specific instance in how he interprets Quijano-Schell's statements? This is perhaps less clear. But there's nothing fundamentally wrong with what Czech did here. Authors shouldn't be expected to understand our, at times Byzantine, validity procedures and the terminology we use to talk about them. It's our job to interpret their comments into our framework, not vice versa.


 * I am unconvinced as to Czech's decision, and I'm unconvinced with the quote User:PicassoAndPringles found, as it seems very similar to the Lawrence Miles quotes regarding Faction Paradox. But it's not abundantly clear to me that we can't use statements regarding status on the wiki to talk about validity.


 * (Part of the issue is that in being so expansive the wiki has probably done violence to the notion of any real "DWU" that any writer actually thinks about except for those who are aware of our validity rules in the first place. In a sense, "DWU", as the wiki uses the term, refers to the literary universe that we cover as valid. Which makes the entire affair come dangerously close to circularity.) Najawin ☎  07:00, 30 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I probably shouldn't have made this thread. Cgl1999 ☎  07:29, 30 June 2023 (UTC)


 * (Technically all inclusion debates should be made by people who have consumed the works in question, yes. But this is one that people have wanted to discuss for a while. It's just a weird one.) Najawin ☎  09:08, 30 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I have read several Señor 105 stories and I can not see any reason why not to cover them. Contradicts are no one used to invalidate Stories (and have not been for a very long time) and thus I can see no reason why we can not cover them. I can see no way they would mess up this wiki (other than giving us a bit of work) it would make our wiki more accurate, the only problem I can see is the statement by the author about it not being covered. If anyone has a way to contact them perhaps they should be asked once more as the statement is rather old and a new one may be of help. Anastasia Cousins ☎  09:36, 7 July 2023 (UTC)


 * Would you say the series reads as Who adjacent? I've even heard some people call Señor 105 a commentary/satire on the series? Would you say that's fair to argue? OS25🤙☎️ 16:43, 7 July 2023 (UTC)


 * You know, there might be a case for 4 by proxy through The Rise & Fall of Señor 105 here. Afraid I haven't read either, just throwing it into the mix. :) Aquanafrahudy  📢  13:04, 9 July 2023 (UTC)
 * my apologies for the delay of this reply but I would call it as much a satire of the series as Iris Wildthyme or Curse of Fatal Death, both things considered valid here on this wiki.in some places I can be more so but not by much in my opinion. Anastasia Cousins ☎  09:20, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


 * To clarify, the series being a slight satire or commentary is not a bad thing. I was asking because someone could easily say "well, this has nothing to do with Doctor Who!" when it seems to me that it has a great deal to do with the franchise. OS25🤙☎️ 15:11, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

I too have read most of the series in question. Setting aside my original comments in Thread:117545, I second Najawin's take that "it's not abundantly clear to me that we can't use statements regarding status on the wiki to talk about validity" (emphasis mine). But I think a holistic view of the evidence, especially evidence from the time of the series' release in 2012-14 rather than in the years afterward, points in the other direction. For instance, much has been made of the 2013 interview for its ambiguous line about universes, but no one seems to have commented on this bit:
 * Cody QS: From 105’s perspective, nothing interesting ever happens in England - No alien incursions or world-threatening crises. What he doesn’t realize is that there’s someone else who is taking care of all of those.
 * Fester: Ungow! Who do you mean?
 * Panda: He obviously is referring to ME!
 * Cody: Among others.

This is almost as clear-cut a Rule 4 statement as possible.

In that interview and elsewhere, Schell and other writers for the series provided ample points of comparison which tilt the scales in favour of validity. Schell clarifies that Señor 105 didn't debut in Doctor Who but is "an Obverse Books original character, like the Manleigh Halt Irregulars or Theo Possible". Philip Purser-Hallard, author of Horizon, or Señor 105 contra las Momias Locas de Odinhotep, similarly wrote that "Señor 105’s adventures […] have much the same status as my own City of the Saved" in their relation to Doctor Who. Each of these examples led their own spinoffs – The Casebook of the Manleigh Halt Irregulars, Entirely Possible, and The City of the Saved, respectively – which we cover in full as valid!

It's unquestionable to me that Señor 105 belongs on the same wiki, and should be treated the same way, as these series and Iris Wildthyme – which, per the age-old ruling that all post-Old Flames Iris stories be within our scope, Tardis Wiki definitionally is. – n8 (☎) 16:39, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


 * While we're at it, we should probably cover the 2013 interview for featuring licenced appearances of Panda and Fester Cat. If nobody has any objections, I think I'll go ahead and wikify it. :) Aquanafrahudy  📢  16:48, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure about that. Panda and Fester Cat are Paul Magrs' real-world toy and pet. It may not be fiction, and it certainly doesn't read to me as such. – n8 (☎) 17:05, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


 * Except that these are the specific fictionalised versions of Panda and Fester from Enter Wildthyme and the Story of Fester Cat respectively. And the bits by Fester and Panda stay true to their fictional counterparts. And it's licenced to use them. Aquanafrahudy  📢  17:12, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


 * I did consider covering that interview previously but I never got around to it after... the negative response I got about covering The Story of Fester Cat at all on the Wiki. I do think it has the fictionalised versions of Panda and Fester Cat, but I'm not sure if it passes rule four. It's an odd one, as it most of the Fester Cat stories. 17:27, 10 July 2023 (UTC)


 * I hope I'm not overstating my bounds here, but this corner of the wiki is actually under-covered, and I think discouraging people like Epsilon from being dedicated to wikifying Obverse stuff is bad for the health of the site. If people want to laugh at Tardis Wiki, let them, I don't care. OS25🤙☎️ 18:22, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Conclusion
Well — as some people have said, this could have used a sturdier opening post, but all the necessary facts have come to light in subsequent discussion, so I feel confident in closing this to declare that the Periodic Adventures of Señor 105 will henceforth be covered as a valid source.

Reexamination of the quotes not only from Cody Schell, but from other writers on the series, do very much make it clear that the series is intended to take place in the Doctor Who universe as per Rule 4. The claim that "generally, 105’s universe is his universe, and hers is hers" might perhaps be worrisome in isolation — though it's worth underlining the good points made throughout the thread about metaphorical use of "universe" in the general case — but the very same interview makes the purely metaphorical meaning of universe clear by alluding directly to the Doctor. The Señor protects Mexico, and the Doctor protects England, and their paths generally don't cross because of that (nor Iris's), but it's all the same Earth and the same broader universe, and that's sort of the joke. One is reminded of superhero fiction where Batman and Superman's respective comics, settings, and recurring casts seem to make up different "worlds" that sometimes crossover, but the idea is still that in nitty-gritty, practical terms it's all one shared fictional world.

And all this, before we remember that the legitimacy of the entire interview is somewhat up-in-the-air given that it is a work of fiction. (Whether it's a valid work of fiction or not is a little outside this thread's boundaries to decide, but it's certainly not neutral, straightforward non-fiction, and would probably warrant a page either way. Panda can't, in fact, talk.)

This is one half of the debate, and probably the most straightforward. The other issue was Schell's quote about it "not belonging on a Doctor Who Wiki". In the original decision, this was treated as a Rule 4 quote in its own right, under the reasoning that "you don't need to be familiar with our four little rules to opine that your work isn't connected enough to the DWU to be included on a Doctor Who wiki" and "that's really enough to declare this thing invalid".

User:Najawin argued: "Fundamentally is this standard wrong? No. Authors don't have to deal with our validity rules. The rules are for our work, not for theirs. Is Czech correct in this specific instance in how he interprets Quijano-Schell's statements? This is perhaps less clear. But there's nothing fundamentally wrong with what Czech did here. Authors shouldn't be expected to understand our, at times Byzantine, validity procedures and the terminology we use to talk about them. It's our job to interpret their comments into our framework, not vice versa."

- User:Najawin

I wouldn't say there's something fundamentally wrong — but there's something… somewhat wrong, in the sense that the quote could be relevant evidence under some circumstances, but was read much more categorically, much more literally, than a quote like that ought to be read. Let me explain.

Certainly "authors shouldn't be expected to understand our validity procedures and the terminology we use to talk about them" to provide usable Rule 4 quotes. But this only goes for actual Rule 4 quotes, i.e. ones that talk about the work's relationship to the DWU in and of itself. There's a level of meta that's introduced by talking about "whether it belongs on the Wiki", which throws everything into disarray. A statement like Schell's can only be interpreted as being about "whether the work is set in the DWU", i.e. what Rule 4 actually cares about, if the quoted writer understands the basic idea of "if it's set in the DWU it belongs on the Wiki".

The important thing there is that the sentence's plain-English meaning of "I don't think it belongs on the Wiki" is not in itself relevant — only the assumption, based on that quote, that they didn't in fact intend for it to be set in the DWU. Somebody telling us "I don't think this belongs on the Wiki" should never in itself be a reason to not cover something on the Wiki; it's orthogonal to T:VS! For example, maybe that person's thought-process when they say "I don't think it should be covered on the Wiki" is "my thing is licensed and it takes place in the DWU, sure, but if I were in charge of the Wiki we'd only cover Doctor Who and Torchwood, not weird spin-offs like my own thing". Who knows? And we wouldn't give a damn about that.

(I'm not necessarily sure Czech himself made this mistake, as such, but his quotes are certainly open to that reading, so forgive me if I'm belabouring the point.)

So, if we had no other Rule-4-adjacent quotes at all, would a quote like that be worth bringing up in a debate? Sure. It's better than nothing. But it's circumstantial at best. It's only worth anything to us on the assumption that the author understands the basics of how our inclusion policies operate, and that it's therefore indirectly talking about intent-to-be-DWU. But authors understanding our policies is a shaky assumption at best; so a quote of this type can and should be knocked right out of relevance if there are any other, more directly DWU-related quotes available.

And this time, there were.

As always, thanks to everyone who participated! Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 20:44, 6 August 2023 (UTC)