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Once upon a time, there was no such thing as a spoiler. When TV first started, it was broadcast live and wasn’t recorded. If the BBC wanted to repeat a programme, they’d have to get all the actors and production team to turn up again and repeat their performance, just like at the theatre. If you missed a programme, that was it, you’d missed it, so if someone at work started telling you what had happened, the idea that he or she might be ‘spoiling’ you would never occur to you.
Small wonder that a show like The Quatermass Experiment could literally empty streets in the UK.
Video created the TV spoiler
Then film and video started to be used to record TV programmes in advance of the transmission. This enabled the development of the ‘repeat’ (or the ‘re-run’ in the US) – a nifty way of filling the schedules with shows people might have missed and couldn’t record themselves, since no one at home had the same recording technology that the TV networks did. It was practically a public service, the repeat.
All the same, it might be months, years or precisely ‘never’ before a show you missed might be transmitted again, so the idea of the spoiler had yet to be born.
It wasn’t until the 80s and the arrival of home VHS systems that anyone felt able to say, “Hang on! Don’t tell me. I recorded that last night and haven’t watched it yet! Don’t spoil it!”
Nevertheless, it was a few years before VHS was ubiquitous enough that any real spoiler etiquette came into effect. Ask before revealing any plot details. Maybe hold off for a couple of days before discussing a show loudly with anyone else. Certainly don’t reveal what’s happened in a foreign TV show you might have seen before the episode has actually arrived in the UK.
Now, of course, we live in a world where a TV show broadcast in one country can be instantly available in another country even before it’s broadcast there. There aren’t even fixed schedules, necessarily, with TV shows released on the Internet as ‘boxsets’ – even though the age of DVD boxsets is almost over – and available for anyone to watch in one go, if they have the inclination. Not everyone may have access to a service, either, and even if they do, there may be parts of the service that other people don’t have access to: how many people not only have Amazon Prime, but have also invested in the additional Amazon Prime channel Starzplay so they can watch Counterpart, a show never shown on any other service or TV channel in the UK? I can’t imagine it’s a huge number.
A free for all?
All of which makes me wonder if there is a ‘spoiler etiquette’ any more. Some people, including the actors and production staff who have made a show, may indulge in ‘Live Tweeting’, for example, broadcasting to all and sundry their thoughts about what’s happening in the episode as it happens. There is some etiquette there, with most conscientiously include a hashtag with their Tweets so that others can ‘mute’ those thoughts, if they’re technologically sophisticated enough.
Nevertheless, there is a general adage that you shouldn’t go on either Twitter or Facebook after a show has finished, because your chances of avoiding spoilers will be almost zero and will rapidly decrease over the next day.
Media services are even worse, it turns out. One of the hazards I run into when doing The Daily News is that they’ll often want to discuss the latest episode of a popular show, often with a clickbait headline along the lines of ‘you’ll never believe who just died in XXXX’. It’s an attempt to avoid spoiling people, sure, but one that only works if you don’t then include a picture of the person in question with the headline. RSS feeds offer similar spoiler cloaking, but invariably also include the identity of said person and a photo in the first paragraph.
That, however, is not the worst I’ve seen recently. On Friday, for example, by about 2pm, there were services posting spoilers about the latest season of Marvel’s Daredevil without even trying to avoid spoiling the reader (Digital Spy, I’m thinking of you in particular). Given that season was 13 episodes and it went live at 8am, there’s no way anyone at all – other than journalists with access to previews – could have seen the final episode, and yet the spoilers were out there just nine hours before anyone could have actually seen the final episode.
And that was just the UK services – the US services started spoiling at the same time as the UK services. They were at least five hours behind and yet because Twitter UK was off spoiling, the US services had to be there, too, to avoid losing clicks.
Is the age of spoiler etiquette dead?
Etiquette, smetiquette
There is a little bit of exciting anthropology science dedicated to ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ politeness societies. England, India and Japan are examples of ‘negative politeness’ societies. That is, people are expected to demonstrate politeness to other people by not disrupting their life. Try to be quiet, try not to do anything that places a burden on someone else, try not to inconvenience them in any way and you’re demonstrating utmost politeness.
Meanwhile, most of the rest of the world, including the US – except maybe not New York – is an example of a ‘positive politeness’ society. That is, to show politeness, you have to show interest, strike up conversation and generally try to show respect and kindness. No “French exits” for positive politeness societies – say goodbye to everyone you’ve met at a party when you leave and thank them, and you’ll be considered so polite, they’ll think you’re Texan. Do that in the UK and people will wonder what you’re trying to sell.
I mention this because this week’s question, dear reader, asks you not only if there is a spoiler etiquette but if there’s any point having one. Are we in fact assuming we’re in a negative politeness culture when globalisation has turned the entire TV-viewing world in a positive politeness culture?
We’re in an age when TV plots can and will be splurged widely on the Internet even before anyone’s actually seen them, and not just in a small post on Ain’t It Cool News that you have to seek out. So is it now incumbent on the TV reader to actively avoid spoilers, while everyone else should just assume they can talk about any TV show at any time they like, unless asked not to? Should we turn off, tune off and drop out from all real-world and virtual conversations until we’ve seen a show we want to see?
Or should we still be acting like TV spoilers shouldn’t be discussed until everyone’s had a reasonable chance to watch a show? What do you think?
You can use <spoiler> tags in your answer, of course.
