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Who Is Ted Cofell?[]

In the episode Day 1 10:00am-11:00am, Ted Cofell clearly tells Jack Bauer at one point, "This is not Cofell." What's this supposed to mean? Is he impersonating Ted Cofell, and if so why does everyone in the show mention him as having been the real Ted Cofell? Maybe this is needless nitpicking but is it possible that this was someone impersonating Ted Cofell? Or perhaps a really good fake idenitity (considering he has records and his own company)? -WarthogDemon 19:00, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

They explain it all in The House Special Subcommittee's Findings at CTU. I'd planned to revamp the entire article as soon as I get the chance. Ted Cofell died at the age of two. The man we see in the show was "Borvo Sobrinna", a serbian mole planted into Cofell's identity by the League of Communist Yugoslavia to infiltrate the U.S. financial community. --Proudhug 19:08, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
Should we put the Borvo Sobrinna sutff in the BGIN? William.Y.Fremont 15:56, January 30, 2011 (UTC)
I don't think that Cofell does say 'this is not Cofell'. For one thing, the subtitles on the UK DVD say 'speaks Serbian' when he says it. For a second, Jack says 'you speak Serbian?' directly after he says it. Thirdly, it sounds like 'disisno korfay', and Cofell then says 'you will pay...korfay...you will pay..' so I'm guessing korfay means pay in Serbian - it would make no sense for him to be saying 'you will pay...Cofell...you will pay'.
The stuff from Findings at CTU is interesting, I suppose that according to the proper rules we should move this page to Borvo Sobrinna, then the Ted Cofell page should read 'Ted Cofell was a baby who died at the age of 2', but I think that would be confusing to people, so I think it should go into the BGIN. How certain was it in Findings at CTU? Was it just suspected?--Acer4666 17:56, January 30, 2011 (UTC)
Wow. I have never read this, and never knew any of this. From the book, it's perfectly clear that Cofell's real name is Borvo Sobrinna. Drazen's group (or at least one of them) is labeled "Serbian 1389 Movement".
There are 2 schools of thought on how to proceed next.
1) We follow the "most commonly used name" precedent. This is the real reason why it's Kim Bauer and not Kimberly Bauer.
2) Or, essentially, every time we link to the man who is seen on-screen, it should go something like: [[Borvo Sobrinna]] (using the deep cover alias "[[Ted Cofell]]") said so-and-so etc. The only time it would then be permissible to link directly to "Ted Cofell" anymore is when we're just speaking about the name itself, such as: "Jack went to investigate Ted Cofell".
I'm uncertain which is best but I'm leaning in the direction of Alternative 2. I really want to see what Proudhug had planned. Blue Rook  talk  contribs 06:19, January 31, 2011 (UTC)
Hm, generally I begrudgingly accept non-contradictory EU information making up Day 1 characters' entire 1st paragraphs but I think this case is such an intrusion. As Borvo Sobrinna had spent so many years as Ted Cofell, and that legally and to most intents and purposes he was Ted Cofell - what is the situation if a character changed their name? Surely both names would link to 1 article, the title of which would be the name most associated with the character?
Therefore I suggest a third option: Create a page called 'Ted Cofell (EU)' or something, which is about the character from the book that died at 2. Do a redirect for 'Borvo Sobrinna' to this 'Ted Cofell (Day 1)' article, include a BGIN about Borvo Sobrinna (or work that into his early life), and have disambiguation links between the two ted cofell articles.
Also on a separate note about Proudhug - is he gone for good? It's been a while since his last activity--Acer4666 01:26, February 1, 2011 (UTC)
I think I prefer alternative 2, mostly because of the notoriety of the on-screen character (we don't get to see the real Ted Cofell, and he barely even lived). However, I don't know if a separate article about the real Ted Cofell, that died when he was 2 y/o, is in order. Thief12 02:42, February 1, 2011 (UTC)
Acer's idea is awesome: not to sound like a waffler against my own ideas, but I like the new option best of all three. However, I believe we are in luck! We don't actually need to choose any of these because disambiguation isn't necessary at all. I just checked again and realized that the infant who died is consistently referred to as "Theodore" Cofell. This is good news because we can redirect Borvo to the current Ted Cofell page on the "most commonly used name" precedent. Then, we make a page for Theodore Cofell because even though he isn't important, he still warrants an article (c'mon Thief you know better ;). Which means that nothing else needs to be redirected or moved. Makes sense?
And about Proudhug — I do not think that he is gone for good; he may turn up for a cameo appearance sometime randomly. At least this is what I hope. I asked him via email if he would please weigh in about the Wayne-Palmer-deceased-newspaper issue, but never got a reply. Blue Rook  talk  contribs 04:37, February 1, 2011 (UTC)
Excellent - we will still have to do disambiguation though, as the on screen Cofell was called 'Theodore' by Jack in his debrief in episode 14--Acer4666 08:47, February 1, 2011 (UTC)
And Kim has been called "Kimberly" too, but we don't move her page based on the "most commonly used name" precedent, which is why I brought this up. I'm not certain if you did not know what that precedent meant, or, if you understand it but think it won't apply in this case. Thoughts? Blue Rook  talk  contribs 09:05, February 1, 2011 (UTC)
Ah sorry yes, I meant we would still need disambiguation as in 'you may be looking for Theodore Cofell (Findings at CTU)' at the top of the page - I think I misunderstood you saying we wouldn't need disambiguation. No worries! I will let someone else to the editing on this as I don't have the findings at ctu book for the borvo sobrinna info--Acer4666 09:16, February 1, 2011 (UTC)
Hm having given this some thought, I think I understand the most commonly used name precedent - but I would think it applies just when deciding what to name a single character's page, as opposed to using it to disambiguate two characters. I don't think the Kimberly Bauer comparison is especially applicable, because of the crucial fact that there isn't another character on 24 with the name Kim Bauer and we're disambiguating them solely on the frequency of nickname usage. To demonstrate, imagine if someone watches episode 14 of series 1 out of the blue, and hears Jack mention Theodore Cofell. Then they come on here and do a search for Theodore Cofell, and get a page about the little baby dead age 2, instead of a disambiguation page asking which theodore cofell they mean.
This is a minor issue tho, and I'm not sure if the precedent has been discussed somewhere and set already. I wouldn't be against what you suggested for this case, I was just speculating in case there are other instances. That is a shame about proudhug - maybe because 24 on tv is over now, I hope he does return. I enjoy making the info about the old series as good as we can, even when there won't be new stuff to come!--Acer4666 17:54, February 1, 2011 (UTC)
Well, you're right when you say that precedent "applies just when deciding what to name a single character's page". We don't choose Kim over Kimberly for the other reasons you stated. We choose "Kim" because that is the most commonly-used name for the character. That choice wouldn't change if another "Kimberly Bauer" showed up.
Similarly, I didn't propose keeping "Ted Cofell" as the title for that character's name on account of a disambiguation issue. On the contrary, a disambiguation policy solved our quandary for us. It's just true that the terrorist supporter was most frequently identified as "Ted Cofell" overall. Problem solved, is what I mean. If that hypothetical person searches for "Theodore" they will be confused but only for a moment: the article for that baby will be very short, and links to the grown man will be at the top in a disambig note and at the bottom of the article body in the part where it is explained that his identity was stolen by Borvo's people. Blue Rook  talk  contribs 04:28, February 2, 2011 (UTC)
Just to let you know Blue Rook that I do now agree with you on this point, I just needed an example of this sort of thing occurring elsewhere on the wiki. I found my example: Max and Max (Day 4). Sort of like why we don't change all the crew members who were used as filler names to 'joe bloggs (crew)' and then make disambig pages for them all.--Acer4666 23:03, February 10, 2011 (UTC)
Out of curiosity, did you notice that from your experience with the wiki in general, or discovered it in Forum:Proposed_Exceptions? Either way, it's true that crew many times won't get "(crew)" disambiguation component in their title. But we haven't been consistent with it, which frankly, isn't a big deal at all. Many crew members whose names appeared as "filler" actually do have a tag. I think the important lesson is that it not mandatory for those instances to get "(crew)" if they just appeared in 1 list, and it's also not mandatory to change it back if they did.
Not to complicate things, but although your observation about the Maxes is correct, it doesn't technically apply to this particular situation with the Cofells. It would apply if Max Day 4 was actually referred to as Maximilian. The point I was making about the Cofell's is that, because the names weren't perfectly identical, there was no need to disambiguate with a parenthetical part. With the two Maxes, there was still an argument for parentheses. We can still put an italicized note on the Cofells' pages, of course. Blue Rook  talk  contribs 06:13, February 11, 2011 (UTC)
Ah it was just from roaming the site. Interesting forum topic, I think it is good to be able to use common sense a little bit when interpreting the policies. And yeah, the max thing isn't exactly the same situation, I just sort of see it as another example of using the notability of the character to define how we name it. I'm still of the opinion that if there was another Kimberly Bauer with the same amount of screen time but the kim/kimberly ratio reversed, I think we would maybe need disambiguation in the title :p But of course all this is purely academic! I'm slowly getting the hang of how the nitty gritty details of the site work!--Acer4666 18:09, February 11, 2011 (UTC)
Wow, I'm just seeing this now. I just randomly got curious and wondered how we handled the Ted Cofell situation, so I came to his page and was pleasantly surprised with how we did it. Then I was even more surprised to come to the Talk page and find out that it was only recently fully hashed out! I 100% agree with the way it was handled. Just another reason to be a proud member of this community.
And yes, I do plan to stick around, but even if I do disappear from time to time, I always seem to find my way back eventually. I'm still trying really hard not to hate the new Wikia layout. --proudhug 15:33, March 9, 2011 (UTC)
Glad you like it - I enjoy untangling all the disparate information we get about stuff and trying to stick it together into a comprehensive summary!
It's great that you're not gone for good, as I feel I've joined a bit late and missed out on the golden days haha. I can't really remember what the old layout was like, but I know how impossible it is when websites change their format and you can never really enjoy it like you used to. Good job the content here is still great!--Acer4666 15:49, March 9, 2011 (UTC)

Information[]

Should Ted Coffell being named on BAIN as the first victim killed on-screen by Jack Bauer with a name (on the show)? I think not, but I'm curious. --Station7 20:16, October 16, 2011 (UTC)

I don't have a strong opinion on it. If you placed it there, I would not remove it personally since it does seem kind of noteworthy; but also, I probably wouldn't restore it if someone else took it down. Blue Rook  talk  contribs 04:52, October 17, 2011 (UTC)

Speculation[]

At the B&IN, it says: Ted Cofell may have been named after production assistant Anne Cofell. That's speculation, unless a source can verify it! --Station7 16:20, November 14, 2011 (UTC)

In a perfect world, we'd have sources for all of those notes. But in reality we never will - and to be strict about it would mean we would require sources for Todd Wasserman (character), Nicole Burke (character), Sterling Rush (Day 5) etc. Cofell is an unusual surname, so I think it is worthy of a note mentioning the crew link--Acer4666 (talk) 18:23, November 14, 2011 (UTC)
I'm not talking about a perfect world, because I know there isn't one. It shouldn't being removed. It's speculation. Unless we use speculation on articles. --Station7 21:05, November 14, 2011 (UTC)

According to the speculation policy there is no major issue with pointing out a possible crew-name-connection. I believe it is permissible especially because the wording "may have been named" does not imply certainty. (Speculation is bad inside the iu article body, but in BGIN there is more freedom.) Blue Rook  talk  contribs 22:00, November 14, 2011 (UTC)

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