User:A lad insane/Spoilers in edit summaries

I get it. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. That means there's going to be plot summaries of new movies (and books), which some editors will have not viewed yet. Which means spoilers. BUT editors don't have to go to those articles. They can just make their merry way along without even going anywhere close to these forbidden articles, and all is well. They don't have to read the articles, and they don't get the movie (or book) in question spoiled. It's simple!

But some editors like to think that they should put plot details in their edit summaries of movies that were just recently released. This can pop up in recent changes, and also in the watchlists of editors that watch these articles. This is difficult to avoid and can be an issue.

This essay was inspired by an edit summary written in December 2017 concerning Captain Phasma.

For example

(spoilers for The Empire Strikes Back contained within)

Imagine that Wikipedia existed when The Empire Strikes Back was new. Editors that have seen it are excitedly creating a plot summary. There's still something missing, though. It reads like this:

Plot

While Vader relentlessly pursues the small band of Luke's friends—Han Solo, Princess Leia Organa, and others—across the galaxy, Luke studies the Force under Jedi Master Yoda. When Vader captures Luke's friends, Luke must decide whether to complete his training and become a full Jedi Knight or to confront Vader and save them.

User:Plot twists for life sees the summary, but realizes what is missing. It didn't say who Luke's father is! He adds it, so it reads:

Plot

While Vader relentlessly pursues the small band of Luke's friends—Han Solo, Princess Leia Organa, and others—across the galaxy, Luke studies the Force under Jedi Master Yoda. When Vader captures Luke's friends, Luke must decide whether to complete his training and become a full Jedi Knight or to confront Vader and save them. He decides to confront Vader, and finds out that Vader is his father. He escapes after having his hand cut off by Vader's lightsaber.

He writes an edit summary that reads:
(The plot summary was missing the part about Vader being Luke's father. I added it.)

Now, User:Alex, who was planning to watch the movie in in a theater the next day with his wife and two children, had been patrolling Recent Changes. He saw this edit summary and the movie was spoiled. He hoped that it was false, but the next day, when he saw the movie, he found it was true.

He knew that Ben had good intentions by expanding the summary, but he really could have done without the plot summary. When he arrived back home, he left a message on Ben's talkpage telling him off for the summary. It wasn't very nice. This angered Ben, who responded equally uncivilly. A passing editor noticed this dispute, and decided that both editors needed to learn about civility. This editor leaves a message on ANI describing the conflict.

Possible solutions

There are several solutions to this problem:

Possible solution	Why and how it would work	Issue that would make it implausible to implement
All editors wishing to avoid spoilers from Wikipedia stay away from Wikipedia entirely. (this is what I usually do)	If you're not on Wikipedia, you can't see the spoilers! Problem solved!	Obvious reasons. Not being on Wikipedia means improving Wikipedia is impossible. Vandals run amok and Wikipedia's quality is lowered because of it.
All editors wishing to avoid spoilers from Wikipedia stay away from Recent Changes and their watchlist.	Lowered chance of encountering edit summaries with spoilers in them.	Decreased chance of catching vandalism in a timely manner. Vandals run amok and Wikipedia's quality is lowered.
All editors wishing to avoid spoilers from Wikipedia remove all mentions of the movie from their watchlist.	The watchlist will be safe! Editors can patrol their watchlist freely.	Doesn't address the problem of Recent Changes. Also, spoiler-containing edit summaries can pop up in unlikely places.
All editors wishing to avoid spoilers from Wikipedia stay away from Recent Changes.	Can't see the edits pop up, can't see spoilers.	Doesn't address the problem of the watchlist.
All editors wishing to avoid spoilers from Wikipedia perform a combination of the last two solutions.	Watchlist is safe and Recent Changes isn't an issue.	Decreased chance of catching vandalism in a timely manner. Vandals run amok and Wikipedia's quality is lowered.
All editors wishing to avoid spoilers from Wikipedia just continue editing and patrolling as normal.	Vandals are caught in a timely manner! Hooray!	Doesn't avoid the spoilers. Movie is spoiled.

HOWEVER: There is one more option.

Possible solution	Why and how it would work	Issue that would make it implausible to implement
People don't put spoilers in their edit summaries, and instead leave them to the actual edits.	The edit summaries don't have spoilers in them! Problem solved!	No problems! This solution is implementable!

How this works

User:Plot twists for life is about to publish his edit, but he re-reads it before saving and thinks to himself, "I haven't considered that some people haven't seen the movie yet. I should consider that." He deletes his edit summary and writes:
(Added missing plot detail.)

User:Alex is patrolling Recent Changes, and when he sees the edit summary and the name of the article, he decides not to investigate further, knowing that it probably involves a spoiler.

Instead of hating each other, the two editors don't even know each other's name. Maybe not ideal, but it's a whole lot better than them hating each other.

In other words

Please DO NOT write edit summaries containing spoilers. Editors shouldn't have to totally avoid Wikipedia to not have movies spoiled.