"Possible spoilers" in the title, and what to do about it

Question

I just came across this post on Sci-Fi (well, actually on the Hot Network Questions list):
In Game of Thrones season 2, why do they (possible spoilers)?

Someone edited the title because it contains possible spoilers (which is especially applicable since it shows up on the Hot Network Questions - admittedly "Game of Thrones" should probably be removed from the title, which may help the issue, unless there's easily identifiable content (e.g. names, places)).

On the other hand, this title is now largely useless (though you can still get to the question via search). Additionally, if this behaviour is popularized, you may just end up with a bunch of titles like:

• Who (possible spoilers)?
• What (possible spoilers)?
• In season 2, did (possible spoilers)?

I'm sure no-one can argue that that doesn't look particularly pretty and isn't particularly useful. Not to mention that this makes trying to use any of the question lists (and even, to some extent, Google) to find one of these questions much more difficult.

(I'm not really concerned with this question in particular, just the general practice of obscuring titles to avoid spoilers.)

Is the Stack Exchange model just not well-equipped to deal with this? Are there perhaps any easy solutions that would make it fit into the model (just brainstorming - perhaps a "Display spoilers in title" checkbox, and allow marking of titles / parts of titles as spoilers)?

You may be able to obscure the title to such an extent that it doesn't contain any spoilers any more (like making the above title "Why did they just walk away?"), but this seems like a non-solution, as that makes the title just as meaningless as it containing "(possible spoilers)".

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I asked this on here because it seems like it can show up on selective other (possibly future) sites as well (even though it only affects Sci-Fi and Movies and TV at present from what I can see, although more sites with this problem could be added), I don't really want to link my account to either of those, nor am I entirely sure where to draw the site Meta / global Meta line, and I feel that the site Meta might be a bit prejudice, while there's hopefully a more objective outlook here - understanding their point of view, but also understanding that, overall, it might lower site quality.

Yes, I did see this question, but that's not really the same thing (well, this may be considered a more general version of that) - that's just about Hot Network Questions, where this is about the title appearing anywhere, and Bill suggested a "no spoilers in titles" rule, which is largely what this question is all about (not the comment as such, but the practice of applying said 'rule').

Answer 1

I make a rather large distinction between major spoilers and everything else that might spoil some aspects of the future plot. Major spoiler would be something like Darth Vader being Luke's father or the final twist in The Sixth Sense. Age also plays a factor, the Star Wars spoiler I just mentioned is old enough and ingrained in popular culture that it doesn't count as a real spoiler anymore in my opinion.

Minor spoilers is everything else that gives away information about the future plot development that you otherwise wouldn't have. The reason I make this distinction is because it is practically impossible to avoid these kinds of spoilers if you read any site that covers this topic or talk to people about the series/movie/game that are further in the plot than you are.

The linked question is a good example of this kind of spoiler, the original title did spoil that a specific character is still alive in season 2 just by mentioning his name. This kind of spoiler is almost impossible to avoid unless we would make all GoT titles almost useless as you couldn't mention any character in the title anymore. All questions titles would have to be something like "Question about episode 4 in season 2" to avoid this problem entirely. I don't think that is realistic.

I expect that people are careful with major spoilers in places that are visible by casually browsing the site. Being spoilt that a major character dies in this episode just because I'm not in the US and see it a day later or so would be rather annoying.

But if your spoiler tolerance is that low that you don't want to know anything about the future plot you have to pretty much avoid the entire internet and other people until you're up-to-date. Someone that concerned about spoilers simply has to view or read new episodes or books the moment they're available, if you're a year behind it is almost inevitable that you'll encounter minor spoilers for anything popular.

So I'd avoid major spoilers in titles in general, but I wouldn't go too far with this. A certain amount of minor spoilers is inevitable and we shouldn't ruin our titles completely to avoid this.

Answer 2

Ah, this is an interesting one. My take:

If people genuinely don't want their next viewing of Game of Thrones to be spoiled, then why are they on the Internet doing Google searches for Game of Thrones?

Answer 3

I register in Meta just to comment on this. I think the best solution may be how the subreddit /r/gameofthrones deals with it. The thing is that people can post both content and question, so when they post question they post something like this in the title "Question regarding the Second book", and the rest in the body or content, so people that haven't read the second book wont even bother to enter.

I love Game Of Thrones (non book reader), and also like very much going to some Stack Exchange community including SciFi, but since people start asking question about the books I became very careful when reading a question, I first read the tag and if is not Game of Thrones or A Song of Fire and Ice, I check it.