16

This is the same issue that happened in SO with the programming tag. If the site is about science-fiction, what is the sci-fi tag for?

3
  • Well, at the time I posted, there were a few more, but right now the only ones with that tag are closed, rendering this question pointless :(
    – R. Martinho Fernandes
    Jan 13, 2011 at 3:30
  • Here's a link to a list of those questions: scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/sci-fi. Interesting that they're all closed.
    – Niall C.
    Jan 13, 2011 at 3:32
  • I (and perhaps others) have been removing the sci-fi tag whenever it appeared. Do we want to reconsider this now that we are SF&F? It would be a way for someone uninterested in sci-fi to hide all fantasy questions and vice-versa. However, probably 40% of questions would need the sci-fi tag and 40% of questions need the fantasy tag, which seems like too much noise. (Probably the fantasy tag should now die too).
    – Tony Meyer
    Feb 3, 2011 at 20:13

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
14

TL;DR: No.

I've seen the same thing happen other places (e.g. the diy tag on http://diy.stackexchange.com, so I think it's a natural tendency for people to create them.

That said, they don't provide any extra information about the questions with them, so it could probably be edited out without affecting the questions; after (I think) 24 hours, it won't be suggested as a tag. Then once we have moderators, it would probably be a good candidate for black-listing.

See also the SO blog post The Death of Meta Tags.

1
  • Since they were all closed, I edited them out, except for the one that was migrated to meta. I guess we'll need a mod to take that stub out.
    – R. Martinho Fernandes
    Jan 13, 2011 at 3:38
3

sci-fi as a tag could mean the subgenre of science-fiction known as sci-fi. From Wikipedia:

Forrest J Ackerman used the term sci-fi at UCLA in 1954. As science fiction entered popular culture, writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech "B-movies" and with low-quality pulp science fiction. By the 1970s, critics within the field such as Terry Carr and Damon Knight were using sci-fi to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction, and around 1978, Susan Wood and others introduced the pronunciation "skiffy". Peter Nicholls writes that "SF" (or "sf") is "the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers". David Langford's monthly fanzine Ansible includes a regular section "As Others See Us" which offers numerous examples of "sci-fi" being used in a pejorative sense by people outside the genre.

But a lot of visitors won't be aware of the distinction, so I think it's best to avoid it.

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .