All The Tropes:What Goes Where On the Wiki

Here at TV Tropes we have plenty of different kinds of content. We point out patterns in a work, discuss patterns that may or may not be in that work, share our reactions to fictional happenings and take wild guesses at what happens next - among other things as explained in Not a Trope. It became clear early on that letting all this content mix together was not the best idea.

For this reason, we came up with different categories of articles, so that for a given work there'd be a separate article for each type of content. Later we implemented namespaces (see that page for a technical explanation) and a top-page banner system, so that it'd be easier to see right away which category an article belongs to.

Seeing as all this can get very confusing for new people, and in some cases even veteran tropers, here's a breakdown of what goes where on the wiki.

Tropes

These are recurring patterns, elements, techniques, and progressions that the creator unquestionably put into the work to add information of some nature or to elicit a particular response or reaction from the audience. In the case of video games and other interactive media, gameplay elements fall in this category as well.

Articles from this category:

Are found on the main namespace.
Have no banner at the top
Have open-to-editing example lists unless otherwise noted
Are listed and Pot Holed anywhere. If there are enough examples for a given objective trope, it might have its own subpage.
Have no identifying icon

YMMV

YMMV stands for "Your Mileage May Vary". There have been plenty of attempts to pin down what this class objectively is, but the definition in practice--and the reason the "YMMV" distinction exists in the first place--is simple: it's a YMMV item if editors, drive-by and otherwise, can't stop arguing about it. YMMV basically breaks down into 2 subcategories, which are

All Audience Reactions, without exception; and
Items that appear to have the semblance of an objective trope, except in practice they require a significant judgment call to decide whether, how and to what degree they exist in a work.

The crux of subcategory 2 is that it's impossible to say objectively whether something from it is actually present in the work; the author may have objectively intended to use it, but that's neither here nor there. We try not to take a stand on the Death of the Author issue, but even the most ardent intentionalist would concede that the author intending to have some pattern of fiction in their story doesn't mean the attempt worked.

In theory, Your Mileage May Vary on nearly all tropes. Who says that a Happy Ending is happy, for example? In practice, what we mean by a significant judgment call is exactly the duck test outlined above- an item falls under YMMV if people often disagree about it. Either we can figure this out from the definition, or a huge Natter infestation wherever the item is mentioned clues us in. Either way, it gets stamped with the "subjective" stamp and relegated to YMMV subpages, where the varying of mileage and resulting Natter will not get in the way of the objective tropes.

Articles from this category:

Are usually found on the main namespace, but particularly positive or negative ones are found on Sugar Wiki or Darth Wiki, respectively
Usually have the YMMV banner at the top or the Flame Bait banner for a few
Have open-to-editing example lists, though if these turn into wretched hives of Thread Mode they will likely be subjected to an Example Sectionectomy
Are not listed or Pot Holed in main pages or character sheets, unless they fall under one of the "Exceptions" below. Many have objective counterparts/relatives which can be used instead.
Are listed and Pot Holed in YMMV subpages, except those which are:
- Used or referred to In Universe--for example, if characters have the reaction to a Show Within a Show, or if a potential fan reaction is Discussed or Lampshaded. In-Universe examples should go on the main namespace or character sheet as appropriate, and should be sure to specify that they are being used In-Universe.
- Part of Darth Wiki and/or have the Flame Bait banner. They should have no examples at all outside their definition pages.
- Part of a group of specific items that go in their own namespaces/subpages, which link back to the main article via the buttons in the "Moments" section. These include: Moment of Awesome ("Medal" icon), Funny Moments ("Smiley" icon), Heartwarming Moments ("Heart" icon), Tear Jerker ("Tear" icon), Nightmare Fuel ("Moonface" icon), Fridge Logic, Fridge Brilliance and Fridge Horror ("Lightbulb" icon)
- Used on a creator page. Creator pages are not allowed to have YMMV items, and YMMV items found on creator pages should simply be deleted rather than moved.
Have the "scales" identifying icon or one of the specific icons listed above
On work and creator pages or character sheets they get marked with a red bullet point, to help people locate and remove them.

Trivia Trope

Facts that occur during or around the production of a work but are not elements written to tell the story. Casting choices not relevant to the story, who did what to whom on set, Throw It In, etc.

Articles from this category:

Are usually found on the Trivia namespace
Have the Trivia banner at the top
Have open-to-editing example lists, unless otherwise noted
Are not listed in main pages, character sheets or YMMV subpages--except when used or referred to In Universe (for example, with Conversational Troping, or in reference to a Show Within a Show), in which case they go on the main page.
Are pot holed anywhere, as long as you don't use this as a ploy to shoehorn Trivia examples where they don't belong; may be listed and Pot Holed in Trivia subpages
Have the "interrobang" identifying icon (looks like a fused exclamation point and question mark)

Administrivia / Wiki Tropes

Stuff related to the wiki or the Internet in general, this page included. The "tropes" part is only in the meta sense, if you consider TV Tropes a work of fiction.

Articles from this category:

Are usually found on the main namespace or administrivia namespace
Have no banner at the top
Usually have no in-article example lists
Are listed and Pot Holed anywhere, though the situation rarely calls for it

Just for Fun

Pages that basically play by their own rules. We keep them around, because... well they're fun.

Articles from this category:

Spread about evenly among the Main namespace, Sugar Wiki, Darth Wiki and Just for Fun namespace
Have the Just For Fun banner at the top (not used much currently, implementation pending)
Sometimes have open-to-editing example lists
Are listed or Pot Holed anywhere within the confines of good taste

Flame Bait

These have the Flame Bait banner, many of the ones on Darth Wiki have had their redirects from the Main wiki made members of the Permanent Red Link Club. The reason for this is they are used to complain, attract massive amounts of Natter and don't actually contribute anything to the wiki's mission. Do not pothole these anywhere, and no examples outside their main page (if the page accepts examples - some of them we don't want any examples of, please). The only exception to this is within trope or work descriptions (above the examples line).

Exceptions

Seeing as every self-respecting rule system needs exceptions, here's a few we made up just to confuse you:

If YMMV, Trivia, or Flame Bait items happen In Universe, are invoked, or are part of a Show Within a Show, we treat them like an objective trope. Make sure to explicitly mention the example is "In-Universe" or "Invoked". It turns off the YMMV flagger and makes sure it doesn't get moved by mistake. You can also use the [[invoked]] markup, which does the same without appearing in the text at all.
We're more lenient with links in image captions and page quotes on main pages. If a YMMV applies to the quote or image somehow, it's usually fine. Just make sure you aren't lapsing into gushing, complaining or Take That territory. Links and potholes in the descriptions and related tropes sections are also fine for YMMV and objective trope articles, as long as you keep the overall tone neutral. Not so much for descriptions of works.
Trivia entries can be listed as examples on pages that describe actors, writers, directors, musicians or other creators in general. These already contain mostly trivia information. There's no sense in splitting them. See also Creator Page Guidelines.
Certain YMMV or Trivia items may be split into their own subpage and namespace, if the work contains enough examples of them. These don't get the banners automatically, unlike the non-tropes with dedicated buttons.
Finally, certain namespaces that are just for fun also don't need to obey these rules. These include Fridge, Headscratchers, Wild Mass Guessing, Haiku Wiki, and Analysis. Same goes for the Discussions, Reviews and Live Blogs sections. This does not mean you can do whatever you please there.

NOTE: We've implemented an in-page notification system as well. At the moment it only works for items in the YMMV or Audience Reaction indexes and only within the examples section for pages with the "work", "creator" or "examples" type. If you see any link on a page that is preceded by a red bullet, that means it may not belong in the main article. It will also appear in a list over the editing box for that page. If you intend to help move such examples or remove potholes, please make sure they don't meet some of the criteria from the "Exceptions" section above.