Viewer chiming in here.
Here's what I usually want to know before I'm watching a game video:
1) Do I know the game?
The game title obviously answers this question.
2) Do I have time to watch it now?
The length of the video obviously answers this question too.
I will watch any movies less than 5 minutes on the spot, whether I know the game or not. I will watch a movie less than 20 minutes right now if I'm fond of the game, definitely later if I at least know the game. If I really like the game, I will find some time over the next few weekends to watch >1 hour ones.
3) How much of the game will I see?
low%, 100%, quickest route, etc. is a good hint on that.
I'm a viewer, which means I like to "view" stuff. The more content that makes it into the video, the more entertained I will be. That includes limiting redundancy. For example, a fighting game always showcasing the same few combos will definitely lose entertainment points for me. Same for zipping-around or early level ending glitches. If I'm unfamiliar with the game, I will prefer watching runs from most content to lesser. If I'm familiar with the game, then I will gladly watch ALL of the non-obsolete runs.
A side point of my interest of watching TASes is to see games I simply will never have the time to play of finish. So, for example, me first watching a quickest route of Super Demo World would kinda defeat that purpose as the whole point of the hack is to create a lot of new levels that I will simply be unable to see otherwise (yes I could play it, no I don't have the time as I still have many unopened games waiting for their turn).
4) How faithful is the game to its intended gameplay?
Here comes the glitch-related part.
I like to watch "pure" gameplay. I also like to watch game-raping glitches, total control hacks and everything in between. But I WANT to know what I will be watching in advance. Hence, I find it very important that the level of "glitchiness" is hinted in the branch name.
The wonderful thing with glitches is that they are game-specific. Their effect, that is. The technical cause of glitches might very well fall into standard categories (buffer overflows, off-by-one errors, collision detection failures, etc.), but that is superfluous information to "hook" the viewer. These details belong in the description.
I see the level of "glitchiness" as game dependant and subjective. If I were to still give a scale, it would look like this:
- reactive: Plays exactly as expected by the game designers, without even knowing anything in advance. Does not really belong to this site, IMHO.
- (default): Plays as expected by the game designers, but with knowledge of the future. Mostly luck manipulation.
- (also in default): Uses only a few, easy to do glitches only, such as jumping on the side of bricks in SMB.
- low glitches: Uses non sequence or game breaking glitches. The game should still be completely recognizable. Includes actions that usually require a modified controller (L+R,U+D), or rapid sequences of frame-precise inputs (walking over pits in LttP).
- heavy glitches: Use sequence or game breaking glitches. Includes zipping around and early end of level triggers.
- total control: Puts data into the game RAM and jumps the execution pointer there somehow.
That's all what influences me into watching a movie.
Now, a few opinions on what others seem to consider important:
"How about World Records?": Simply sort the listings from the shortest to longest movies for a game and it will be made self evident. Or add an extra icon on these movies, the same way there are Moon/Star/Vault or Console Verified icons. Just make sure to remove it if it is no longer the "World Record". IMHO, triggering a game ending by manipulating the game's RAM should not really considered having "completed the game", but that's another can of worms.
"How about branches with different glitches?": Put the major distinctions is parentheses and the minor ones in the movie descriptions. So we will have "Super Metroid, low%, low glitch (X-Ray)" and "Super Metroid, low%, low glitch (Pause menu)" and the viewer will be just fine. On a related note, avoid mentions of UNUSED glitches ("No whatever") as it should be the default.
Finally, I don't see why there is a sudden need to be so strict and objective about branch names. Some subjectivity and context sensitivity should be enough.