As there is still a lot of confusion about this, please let us have a civil discussion how to deal with it and make a final decision. :)
I don't think the titles very accurate. The BBC as an entity and British TV as a whole doesn't particularly ever use episode titles. Some shows do, but more don't. I also don't know why we'd include episode titles that aren't featured anywhere on the episodes themselves. If another broadcaster is airing the episodes then this is were the alternate feature should be used, surely that's why there's an option to add a different episode title alongside the different airdate.
Regardless of what network or platform any show premieres on, the titles should always match with the first one used.
As Tom said, the alternate lists are there for the very purpose of using different episode titles if they do not match the originals.
Forgot to paste this, this was the argument made:
@CosmicHowl wrote:
The titles are from wowpresentsplus.com, which is the streaming service owned by World of Wonder, the production company that produces Drag Race and its franchises and they give titles to every Drag Race episode, not generic numbers. As they make the programme and release it on their streaming service at the same time as national broadcasters surely that information would take precedence?
@JuanArango wrote:
Forgot to paste this, this was the argument made:@CosmicHowl wrote:
The titles are from wowpresentsplus.com, which is the streaming service owned by World of Wonder, the production company that produces Drag Race and its franchises and they give titles to every Drag Race episode, not generic numbers. As they make the programme and release it on their streaming service at the same time as national broadcasters surely that information would take precedence?
But the UK show airs in a prime time slot each week, its advertised heavily and none of these episode titles are ever used on the episodes. I'm not saying don't display the information, I'm saying now we have the feature to show it correctly, to do that.
If BBC IPlayer suddenly added titles to every episode of Line of Duty even though none of the episodes ever aired with a title, would we suddenly go and change all those titles even if they aren't displayed during the episodes because the BBC produced the show (using this is an example, I'm assuming it's a BBC production)
@TomSouthwell wrote:
But the UK show airs in a prime time slot each week, its advertised heavily and none of these episode titles are ever used on the episodes. I'm not saying don't display the information, I'm saying now we have the feature to show it correctly, to do that.If BBC IPlayer suddenly added titles to every episode of Line of Duty even though none of the episodes ever aired with a title, would we suddenly go and change all those titles even if they aren't displayed during the episodes because the BBC produced the show (using this is an example, I'm assuming it's a BBC production)
The alternate lists currently do not allow this, because a streaming premiere can't be linked to a global web channel (which wow presents plus is).
So for now there is no way to use the alternate lists to show the episode names (as far as I know)
My 2 cents:
The fact that some countries deliberately not using episode titles for any show at all, even if those titles were given by the producers of the show, shouldn't be the reason for not using those titles if they exist. The world is much bigger than one country. So, if one of the entities, involved in the production of the show, has the titles for the episodes, those titles should be used, regardless of the decisions of the premiering network. Doesn't matter, if this entity is also a broadcaster/streamer or not. For example, if a production company issues a press release, which has episode titles, and later BBC or TVNZ strip those titles and use generic ones, we should ignore their habits and use the titles, given by the show's creative crew. Or like in the case of Drag Race, WoW Presents is a web channel, which belongs to the company, producing the show. And it also handles the world premiere. So I don't see any logical reason to ignore those titles in favor of generic placeholders.
However, if we talk about any third parties, for example, if Netflix or Amazon simply bought the rights for Line of Duty and assigned some episode titles to it, those titles should be ignored, since they were not assigned by one of the producing entries.
IMO this will be consistent with other rules we have for the co-produced shows. Since any of the producing entities could be the airdate owner, by the same logic any of the producing entities could be the provider of episode titles. And the source should be consistent within the season, of course.
For me it makes the most sense to use whatever they used the place it first aired.
For everything else on the site whatever was first goes, so it wouldn't make sense to stray from that just because "it looks prettier".
@Aidan wrote:
For me it makes the most sense to use whatever they used the place it first aired.For everything else on the site whatever was first goes, so it wouldn't make sense to stray from that just because "it looks prettier".
It doesn't "look prettier". Generic titles: a) redundant, they purely consist of duplicate information, already available on the episode page; b) in all other cases are considered a placeholder when the episode doesn't have an actual name. I don't see any practical use of them when the episode actually does have a name.
I'm agreeing with the Brits on here (so Tom and Tony)
@tnt wrote:
My 2 cents:
The fact that some countries deliberately not using episode titles for any show at all, even if those titles were given by the producers of the show, shouldn't be the reason for not using those titles if they exist. The world is much bigger than one country. So, if one of the entities, involved in the production of the show, has the titles for the episodes, those titles should be used, regardless of the decisions of the premiering network. Doesn't matter, if this entity is also a broadcaster/streamer or not. For example, if a production company issues a press release, which has episode titles, and later BBC or TVNZ strip those titles and use generic ones, we should ignore their habits and use the titles, given by the show's creative crew. Or like in the case of Drag Race, WoW Presents is a web channel, which belongs to the company, producing the show. And it also handles the world premiere. So I don't see any logical reason to ignore those titles in favor of generic placeholders.However, if we talk about any third parties, for example, if Netflix or Amazon simply bought the rights for Line of Duty and assigned some episode titles to it, those titles should be ignored, since they were not assigned by one of the producing entries.
IMO this will be consistent with other rules we have for the co-produced shows. Since any of the producing entities could be the airdate owner, by the same logic any of the producing entities could be the provider of episode titles. And the source should be consistent within the season, of course.
could not have said it any better, so i have to say I agree with tnt here :)
This isn't a case where some third party streamer is giving episode titles for the heck of it. The production company's own streaming service, which premiered the episodes at the same time, lists the episodes with titles. Given the option, I would much prefer episodes with titles that actually tell me something about the episode instead of a generic Episode 1 (I know it's episode 1!) :)
@tnt wrote:
My 2 cents:
The fact that some countries deliberately not using episode titles for any show at all, even if those titles were given by the producers of the show, shouldn't be the reason for not using those titles if they exist. The world is much bigger than one country. So, if one of the entities, involved in the production of the show, has the titles for the episodes, those titles should be used, regardless of the decisions of the premiering network. Doesn't matter, if this entity is also a broadcaster/streamer or not. For example, if a production company issues a press release, which has episode titles, and later BBC or TVNZ strip those titles and use generic ones, we should ignore their habits and use the titles, given by the show's creative crew. Or like in the case of Drag Race, WoW Presents is a web channel, which belongs to the company, producing the show. And it also handles the world premiere. So I don't see any logical reason to ignore those titles in favor of generic placeholders.However, if we talk about any third parties, for example, if Netflix or Amazon simply bought the rights for Line of Duty and assigned some episode titles to it, those titles should be ignored, since they were not assigned by one of the producing entries.
IMO this will be consistent with other rules we have for the co-produced shows. Since any of the producing entities could be the airdate owner, by the same logic any of the producing entities could be the provider of episode titles. And the source should be consistent within the season, of course.
I completely agree with this.
I'm not 100% sure UK drag race airs at the same time, just in the same way that we have a delay getting the Australian episodes by 12 hours or so.
Which I also guess is a point by itself. WOW obviously has a deal with the BBC as any international versions of the show don't air on WOW in the UK, they air on BBC Three first, with generic titles. None of the RP shows (even the US one to my knowledge) ever has a on-screen title presented.
@Nivekolsen what is your position, are you for the titles, assigned by the premiering network, even if they are generic, or the titles from any other official source if they make sense?
When we consider something the owner, we should use their titles, otherwise it's just going to cause confusion.
You can specify the title for an alternate episodes, so it seems logical to only put their alternate title there.
The only caveat is whether that still applies when there's no English titles, but that's stuff we've discussed separately.
@gazza911 wrote:
You can specify the title for an alternate episodes, so it seems logical to only put their alternate title there.
that's the thing, you can't. not for global web channels.
Drag Race UK is released online at the same time.
(Taken from World of Wonder website)
RuPaul’s Drag Race UK Series 2 today at 12PM PT/3PM ET on WOW Presents Plus worldwide (excluding UK and Canada) and exclusively in the UK on BBC Three.
12PM PT is 7PM GMT, which was when it became available on BBC iPlayer.
___
Drag Race Down Under has a delay.
RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under, streaming exclusively May 1st at 12AM PST/4PM AEST/6PM NZST on WOW Presents Plus worldwide (excluding Canada, UK, and Down Under), TVNZ in New Zealand, Stan in Australia, Crave in Canada, and BBC Three in the UK.
12AM PST is 7AM BST so BBC iPlayer aren't releasing it until 26 hours later.
In regards to being consistent, of the 13 RuPaul shows on TVMaze, only Drag Race UK and Drag Race Down Under have generic number titles. The WOW presents titles aren't particularly vague and even though they aren't written on screen when watching, they do highlight a certain task that is about to take place that week in the competition, ie. Snatch game, Rusical.
Other competitions shown on the BBC, like the Great British Sewing Bee has International week as an episode title on TVMaze, even though it's episode 4 on iPlayer, doesn't have any text titles and that title is only mentioned by the presenter. But it's an episode topic that gets repeated over the different seasons and is something fans look forward to/know to expect as part of the competition.