Template talk:Infobox Episode

Standardizing VOD links to YouTube instead of blogs
I noticed that there isn't standard formatting for video links in the 'VOD' parameter. I think in this day and age, people expect video links involving youtube to go directly to a youtube URL. I would like to propose that a new infobox parameter be created for Geek & Sundry and critrole.com links called something like 'Website Video Link', and that the 'VOD' parameter be reserved solely for YouTube links. This also means the template documentation '|VOD= Link to video, preferably to G&S's website (Optional but desired)' should be changed (it seems outdated anyway given that it doesn't even reference critrole.com).

I wonder, was this blog link policy created due to Gunpowder Plot being split over two videos? If so, I don't think it should be a problem in that episode's infobox to list two VOD links to youtube instead of one.

Should this change be acceptable, I can programmatically add the to-be-named new blog video link parameter and change the VOD parameter to entirely youtube links, as well as fix the link formatting for 23 episodes (including Manifold_Morals) where it's supposed to be a bare url but is instead formatted as an external wikilink. SeiverEl (talk) 00:34, 22 November 2021 (UTC)


 * The reason it's done this way is because the YouTube videos can change, as we learned to our grief when about thirty of them were moved from G&S's channel to CR's. My understanding is that there have been other re-uploads as well. The CritRole page will presumably always point to the correct page. I'd also really rather not add yet another parameter to the Infobox:Episode template. Feel free to change the documentation to reflect that G&S is no longer current, though. Changing the link formatting is kind of "Sure, if you really want to..." because it was designed to accept either format, and it doesn't make any difference either way to the end user. LynnE216 (talk) 00:49, 22 November 2021 (UTC)
 * If the youtube links changed again, lots of other stuff would break too, right? We also link directly to videos throughout the articles with the citations to specific timecodes. I just would not expect a VOD link to require more clicks to get to the video itself, and the blog posts don't add much value on their own other than linking to the videos. In fact, I use Firefox and when I load the blogpost I can't see the embedded videos unless I load it in a private window (probably because of privacy settings etc), but the YouTube links load fine. Nor am I convinced that the blog posts are less likely to change; people change their blogging software (e.g. WordPress) very often, and that can mess up underlying URL structures. The only reason I can see keeping the blog links would be if we were helping G&S and critrole.com track clicks. SeiverEl (talk) 02:06, 23 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I have also long wondered about why VOD links go to the blog post rather than the video direct, especially since (as pointed out) we direct link at all other instances and if the video link changes, we're already changing the switcher for the module. I also agree we should NOT add another parameter because that also doesn't add any value either. But I would support changing the links in the existing VOD parameter to the video directly. "VOD" suggests that it's going to the video, not the blog. ~FreckledMcCree (Send me a message!) 17:34, 24 November 2021 (UTC)
 * It's happening. User:FreckledMcCree has something in the works to automatically populate the VOD field with the youtube link in the episode infobox using Module:Ep/YTURLSwitcher, but I think we need to manually change over all the blog links now to youtube links, which I would happily do via AutoWikiBrowser, and hopefully that would not interfere with this effort. SeiverEl (talk) 19:29, 9 January 2022 (UTC)