View Full Version : Wikipedia Article Discussion
pclips
2007-02-12, 03:53 PM
The Wikipedia jihad against webcomics continues. Some agenda-driven boop deleted the Erfworld article (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log/delete&page=Erfworld) yesterday. This is a problem that at least 50 major webcomics have had to contend with this year alone.
I do not really know how to fight it. I'm sick of hearing about it, frankly. But I am going to fight for that article, somehow.
Is anyone here a Wikipedia admin or regular editor who can put in the request for undeletion and make the argument for notability? Primary arguments I see:
1. Featured on GiantITP, a site with massive importance to the comics world and better web traffic than Marvel.com (http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?f=555555&u=marvel.com&u=giantitp.com&u=&u=&u=&r=1y&y=r&z=1&h=300&w=500). GiantITP.com is among the top five most popular webcomic sites in the world, according to Alexa.
2. Written by the creator of another, syndicated comic (http://www.partiallyclips.com) which has passed the criteria for notability multiple times.
Oppolo
2007-02-12, 04:04 PM
Despite its placement on GiantITP, I'd have to agree with the wikipedia admin- Erfworld itself just isn't noteable enough yet... it's still too young. You wouldn't stick up any of Rich's alternative rules or the stories (And around and abouts, I have heard about those a lot more than Erfworld) just for their position on giantITP, you wouldn't for Erfworld either.
Give it to about strip 50 of Erfworld and it'll definately have gained notability- until then, relax!
Beleriphon
2007-02-12, 04:10 PM
Despite its placement on GiantITP, I'd have to agree with the wikipedia admin- Erfworld itself just isn't noteable enough yet... it's still too young. You wouldn't stick up any of Rich's alternative rules or the stories (And around and abouts, I have heard about those a lot more than Erfworld) just for their position on giantITP, you wouldn't for Erfworld either.
Give it to about strip 50 of Erfworld and it'll definately have gained notability- until then, relax!
Its not so much that, its that web comics as a whole tend to get deleted fairly regularly. There was an article that was deleted on the person who effectively created the concept of web comics, due to lack of notability on the subject of comics in general. It seems to be some kind of consesus ban on web comics in general.
As a fun anecdote all of the articles that had refences to types of cookies (say Oreo) were deleted because they referenced the company that makes them. Some yahoo with editorial privleges deleted them because they broke Wikipedia's rules about advertising. The addition or deletion of articles left to a group of people that may or may not have any idea about that subject, and unfortunately acedemics that are experts in particular areas don't contribute because any idiot with some spare time can edit anything they don't agree with away.
Brickwall
2007-02-12, 04:35 PM
While I agree that Erfworld -while popular, is still young- may not be qualified for Wikipedia yet, the webcomic jihad is pissing me off. If the guy who played Voldemort in the Harry Potter movies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Fiennes) can be on there, and nobody will ever EVER want to know about him, then many webcomics should be on there. Like Evil Inc. and the other Blank Label Comics webcomics, and certainly OoTS.
But Erfworld is not yet a 1-year-old. Give it time.
musicnerd
2007-02-12, 04:46 PM
Hey, Ralph Fiennes is a good actor! He has a Tony and was nominated for Oscars. I think Erfworld should have a page, too, of course :smallsmile:
pclips
2007-02-12, 04:50 PM
Despite its placement on GiantITP, I'd have to agree with the wikipedia admin- Erfworld itself just isn't noteable enough yet... it's still too young. You wouldn't stick up any of Rich's alternative rules or the stories (And around and abouts, I have heard about those a lot more than Erfworld) just for their position on giantITP, you wouldn't for Erfworld either.
Give it to about strip 50 of Erfworld and it'll definately have gained notability- until then, relax!
Wrong. If any webcomic is notable, Erfworld is notable. It's not particularly easy to separate the readership stats for Erfworld. But by the most conservative possible estimate*, the total number of people reading Erfworld would put it in the top tenth of one percent of all online comics titles.
Additionally, I did not start this project in a vacuum. My other work had already established notability. PartiallyClips easily passes every test ever proposed for a comic strip to have a Wikipedia article, including being actively published in print newspapers, being included in an anthology from a major publisher, and having its own book collection (which Erfworld will have later this year).
Wikipedia is experiencing a power play by a small handful of editors with an agenda. Nobody's arguing that a guy who played 6 tests of cricket for Australia between 1904 and 1911 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algy_Gehrs) is not notable enough for Wikipedia. But a comic with an active, engaged readership in the six figures can be insta-scrapped by a guy in Finland whose hobby is collecting insults from people whose articles he deleted (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Aaron_Brenneman).
I was once a great fan of Wikipedia. I donated money to them. But for about a year now, I have seen that it has some really serious problems, and not necessarily the ones everyone thinks. It's not that any bozo can add junk content, or vandalize an article. They have a handle on that. It's that any petty little troll can spend his/her days deleting real content for fun.
Half the webcomics world is fighting this battle, and as far as I can tell, we're losing. :smallfurious:
*(the average count of unique visitors to GiantITP on Erfworld update days vs. the same average count on non-update days before Erfworld)
mport2004
2007-02-12, 04:58 PM
Is there any thing we can do?
Corolinth
2007-02-12, 05:05 PM
From a glance, as a disinterested third party, this strikes me as an extension of the jihad that print comic writers and editors have been waging against webcomics since the rise of the internet. Essentially, a group of bitter monkeys are pissed off that webcomics are drawing more readers.
totalnerduk
2007-02-12, 05:20 PM
I objected and the article has been restored on the following proviso:
"If you can add citations from third party sources (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:RS) that indicate notability (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:N) than I'll move it back to mainspace. "
See here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Aaron_Brenneman#Erfworld) for the full complaint/answer.
Edit: Have added some more. Need assistance from the rest of you now.
Follow the link, follow the link it gives for the "restored" article, and add what the wikiman wants. Add it until all possibilities have been exhausted and we can have it restored.
Zavion
2007-02-12, 05:44 PM
Wikipedia is about the most retarded thing ever.
They go around saying "Such and such should not be here! It's not noteworthy!" When, in reality, depending on your point of view, nothing is really noteworthy.
Now, if you can agree that any game/comic/TV Show is noteworthy, then really there is no reason to discriminate on it against because it came from the internet.
If GitP isn't noteworthy, and by extention, Erfworld because it is a part of GitP, then, neither is Marvel, or any other article of that magnitude.
That should go towards any sort of unproven (to satisfaction) article or theory, and Wikipedia has plenty of those, which are by definition not noteworthy because they don't even exist.
If it's good for one half, it should be good for the other. I can't honestly argue that Erfworld is in any way 'notable', but they can't argue that half the articles they DO keep are either; and if all that 'trash' stays (and I know they want it to or it'd have been deleted too), then it should only be fair that this stays as well.
It's basically saying "These minor achievments that I appreciate are noteworthy, but your minor achievements that I don't really care about are not!". Either they all stay, or they all go.
Wikipedia is a joke, though.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-12, 05:46 PM
Is there any thing we can do?
Erfworld needs third party sources in order to be moved back out to where it belongs. There's a ton of reviews from other gamer sites out there, and frankly, Erfworld is a gamer-centric comic... so that's a peer review, IMO. So I guess what we could do is search for and organize all the sites reviewing and discussing Erfworld that pass the wikipedia standard for verifiability (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability).
Runolfr
2007-02-12, 05:49 PM
I don't know what their problem is. They have an article on the niche comic "Queen of Wands", but won't carry an article on "Evil, Inc."? I'm sure they have articles on subjects far more obscure and esoteric than web comics. It's a case of somebody being drunk with power.
:xykon: "Your comic is not worthy!"
Brickwall
2007-02-12, 06:14 PM
I don't know what their problem is. They have an article on the niche comic "Queen of Wands", but won't carry an article on "Evil, Inc."? I'm sure they have articles on subjects far more obscure and esoteric than web comics. It's a case of somebody being drunk with power.
:xykon: "Your comic is not worthy!"
They have a QOW article? Okay, now I can tell that there's a larger problem than I initially thought. I liked QOW, but Evil Inc. deserves an article far more than QOW.
pclips
2007-02-12, 06:32 PM
I objected and the article has been restored on the following proviso:
See here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Aaron_Brenneman#Erfworld) for the full complaint/answer.
Sure, let's start with a news article from Comixpedia (http://comixpedia.com/node/10133), the top news site for webcomics but itself a victim of (and fighter against) (http://altertainment.net/terrence_markswikipedia_and_you) the notability nabobs.
Then there was the glowing review (http://www.fleen.com/archives/2007/01/19/what-on-erf-do-you-mean-my-language/)by Fleen, a top webcomics review site also chopped out of Wikipedia by toxic scum like this guy.
But those won't fly with agenda-worms like this, who specifically attacked and killed those sources so they could not be cited in other notability fights.
So let's go to the sources Wikipedia deems notable. Here is a stellar review of Erfworld (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/index.php/2007/01/14/what-exactly-is-an-erf/)by highly-notable (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlock_Mercenary) webcomics creator Howard Tayler of Schlock Mercenary. Also worth noting is Howard's recent effort to fight the Wikipedia madness (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/index.php/2007/02/06/wikiwatch-the-madness-continues/) too.
Throw in a shout-out (http://www.applegeeks.com/blog/?p=1441)news post at Erfworld's launch from Wikipedia-notable (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applegeeks) comic AppleGeeks. And again (http://www.applegeeks.com/blog/?p=1515) for Hawk's cameo!
Now how about an acknowledgement (http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2007/01/17/i-pervade-more-media/) by Wikipedia-notable (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Coulton) musician Jonathan Coulton for Erfworld's reference to one of his songs?
Then how about the 1 (http://2007.arisia.org/2007Participants), 2 (http://homepage.mac.com/desmarais.org/marscon/), 3 (http://genericon.union.rpi.edu/guests.htm), 4 (http://www.wickedfaire.com/)...5 (http://www.katsucon.com/index.php?cat=prog&sub=webcomics) conventions in the last 6 weeks who have had me as a guest, in large part because I write Erfworld?
You should also mention my personal notability as a webcomics creator based on Wikipedia articles here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PartiallyClips) and here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attitude_3:_The_New_Subversive_Online_Cartoonists) .
There are lots of other links around the web to nice things people have expressed about Erfworld. Tons of them. Three months ago, searching "erfworld" on Google returned 4 links. Now Google estimates 187,000.
But the one cite which is most likely to impress them is probably this official blogger for Time magazine (http://time-blog.com/nerd_world/2007/01/webcomics_are_the_new_blogs_th_2.html). He is not only highly complimentary of both OOTS and Erfworld, but this is also written as part of a series taking note of the cultural significance of webcomics.
But.
Still.
The main reason Erfworld is notable is that it is HERE. You need to link the Alexa traffic graph for GiantITP.com (http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=giantitp.com). Or better yet, this one (http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?f=555555&u=giantitp.com&u=marvel.com&u=dccomics.com&u=visa.com&u=dallascowboys.com&r=6m&y=t&z=2&h=300&w=500), comparing GiantITP's numbers to some fun sites it gets more traffic than...Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Visa, and the Dallas Cowboys. Erfworld is not taking credit for that (though the rank has climbed since launch, and passed PvP today). But boop me in the boop if it doesn't indicate the notability of Erfworld that it is hosted here.
If you are a Wikipedian reading over this topic because you think the new Erf article is biased, please note:
I will, until given reason not to, retain my faith in humanity and pretend that since the article now easily meets WP:N and WP:RS it should not matter where the interference came from. Sure a biased party was related to the article being brought back, but it was brought back according to wikipedia's rules. After all, no proper channel was left to discuss the deletion in the first place. The only logical recourse is to discuss it elsewhere and recreate it with appropriate wikipedia criteria met.Thanks folks. Now, proceed to get offended at jaded and bitter discussion of personal opinions about Wikipedia that do not relate to the article in question.
ugh. Don't get me wrong, I generally love wikipedia and what it stands for, but what the hell is wrong with these people? The jihad on webcomics was burbling back when I was an active editor, and in the last few weeks it has gone insane, with some morons actively hunting down all webcomic articles and marking them for deletion. What is up with this?
Frankly I stopped worrying about wikipedia some time ago, after about the 30th edit to remove some utterly false comment based on urban legend some numpty kept insisting on adding to an article on biochemistry. It's fun for trivia but fairly useless for actual knowledge. One need only compare the article on some random pokemon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitmonchan) to the article on a major city in northern Japan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamagata%2C_Yamagata) to see my beef.
I wouldn't worry all that much about it, Rob. Let your fans keep creating articles, because you can be guaranteed we will... any fan of erfworld who see the article missing will almost certainly add their own, and in my experience people eventually get tired of deleting an article over and over and over again (in my opinion the continued recreation of an article by multiple users is a sign that the article should be there... it means many people are interested in its content. People who go around hunting for articles to delete, though, don't usually care about whether or not anyone actually wants the article on wikipedia. They are rules lawyers.)
edit: although your previous post should provide sufficient fuel to get the page back up.
Zavion
2007-02-12, 07:57 PM
Wikipedia's main failure is that it is editable by anybody that has a computer..
You stated there are handles on vandalism and abuse, but really, half of the stuff in there is un-monitored or only glanced at. I think that the person that creates something should have more control over what is said about his creation than some random 12 year old, but that's just me.
I've seen articles written about things that the very artist that created it came down and fixed, only to have some moron decide he was a quack and change it back; like the artist didn't know what he was talking about for his own creation.
There can be extensive pages on things that are speculation, entire pages on insignificant events that happened inside of significant events, and pages that are barely written at all, but still are there, but god-forbid there be a page about Erfworld.
Almost done writing up a new article, just a starter but chock-full of references. :p I will post it in here under a spoilertag once I am done, so that we have a backup.
pclips
2007-02-12, 08:14 PM
Almost done writing up a new article, just a starter but chock-full of references. :p I will post it in here under a spoilertag once I am done, so that we have a backup.
You're the best, Erk. :smallsmile:
totalnerduk
2007-02-12, 08:32 PM
Almost done writing up a new article, just a starter but chock-full of references. :p I will post it in here under a spoilertag once I am done, so that we have a backup.
Neat. Saves me having to put all of those references into the current one (which I was going to do tonight). Now I can go to sleep instead.
Although, I may just pop that list somewhere for safekeeping. Afterall, it mgiht be needed as a seperate reference.
Thanks :) it is really not much, I will try to add more, but it is strong on notability and outside sources. It will be hard to claim this is not a valid wiki article now. Needs real material like story and characters though
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erfworld
I wrote it so that if someone has a backup of the old wiki article the Recognition and Acclaim section can just be tacked on. I recommend keeping that link to the news article on GitP announcing erf's release too though.
{{Infobox Webcomic| <!-- Part of [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Webcomics]] -->
| title = Erfworld
| image =
| caption =
| author = Rob Balder
| url = [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0001.html ''Erfworld'']
| status = Updated twice weekly, on Tuesdays and Saturdays.
| began = [[2006]]
| ended =
| genre = [[fantasy]]
| ratings =
}}
Erfworld is a story-driven comic fantasy [[webcomic]] written by Rob Balder (the author of [[PartiallyClips]]) and illustrated by Jamie Noguchi. It is hosted on [[the order of the stick|Giant in the Playground Games]]<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/index.html#f4ajrwFnil3eXXfxy1o</ref>, the website famous for Rich Burlew's "The Order of the Stick".
Erfworld follows a [[graphic novel]] format, with a new "page" released every update. It setting is a predominately fantasy [[turn-based strategy]] with a surreal, reference-filled narrative.
==Recognition and Acclaim==
In its brief existance, Erfworld has been recognised and received acclaim from a wide variety of notable sources and webcomic authorities. Authors of other notable webcomics (not including Rob Balder and Rich Burlew) such as Howard Tayler of [[Schlock Mercenary]]<REF>http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/index.php/2007/01/14/what-exactly-is-an-erf/</REF> and [[Mohammad "Hawk" Haque]] of [[Applegeeks]]<ref>http://www.applegeeks.com/blog/?p=1441</ref> have posted reviews and comments about Erfworld, and it has been cited in numerous respected webcomic sites such as [[Comixpedia]]<ref>http://comixpedia.com/node/10133</ref> and [[Fleen]]<ref>http://www.fleen.com/archives/2007/01/19/what-on-erf-do-you-mean-my-language/</ref>, by outside authors such as [[Jonathan Coulton]] <ref>http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2007/01/17/i-pervade-more-media/</ref>, and perhaps most importantly by [[Time-Blog]] and [[Time magazine]] author/journalist [[Lev Grossman]] in his article ''Webcomics are the New Blogs''<ref>http://time-blog.com/nerd_world/2007/01/webcomics_are_the_new_blogs_th_2.html</ref>.
[[Category:2000s webcomics|Erfworld]]
[[Category:Fantasy webcomics|Erfworld]]
{{stub}}
totalnerduk
2007-02-12, 09:13 PM
Thanks :) it is really not much, I will try to add more, but it is strong on notability and outside sources. It will be hard to claim this is not a valid wiki article now. Needs real material like story and characters though
{{Infobox Webcomic| <!-- Part of [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Webcomics]] -->
| title = Erfworld
| image =
| caption =
| author = Rob Balder
| url = [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0001.html ''Erfworld'']
| status = Updated twice weekly, on Tuesdays and Saturdays.
| began = [[2006]]
| ended =
| genre = [[fantasy]]
| ratings =
}}
Erfworld is a story-driven comic fantasy [[webcomic]] written by Rob Balder (the author of [[PartiallyClips]]) and illustrated by Jamie Noguchi. It is hosted on [[the order of the stick|Giant in the Playground Games]]<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/index.html#f4ajrwFnil3eXXfxy1o</ref>, the website famous for Rich Burlew's "The Order of the Stick".
Erfworld follows a [[graphic novel]] format, with a new "page" released every update. It setting is a predominately fantasy [[turn-based strategy]] with a surreal, reference-filled narrative.
==Recognition and Acclaim==
In its brief existance, Erfworld has been recognised and received acclaim from a wide variety of notable sources and webcomic authorities. Authors of other notable webcomics (not including Rob Balder himself) such as Howard Tayler of [[Schlock Mercenary]]<REF>http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/index.php/2007/01/14/what-exactly-is-an-erf/</REF> and [[Mohammad "Hawk" Haque]] of [[Applegeeks]]<ref>http://www.applegeeks.com/blog/?p=1441</ref> have posted reviews and comments about Erfworld, and it has been cited in numerous respected webcomic sites such as [[Comixpedia]]<ref>http://comixpedia.com/node/10133</ref> and [[Fleen]]<ref>http://www.fleen.com/archives/2007/01/19/what-on-erf-do-you-mean-my-language/</ref>, by outside authors such as [[Jonathan Coulton]] <ref>http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2007/01/17/i-pervade-more-media/</ref>, and perhaps most importantly by [[Time-Blog]] and [[Time magazine]] author/journalist [[Lev Grossman]] in his article ''Webcomics are the New Blogs''<ref>http://time-blog.com/nerd_world/2007/01/webcomics_are_the_new_blogs_th_2.html</ref>.
[[Category:2000s webcomics|Erfworld]]
[[Category:Fantasy webcomics|Erfworld]]
{{stub}}
Well here's what I managed to do to the previous main article. We need somebody to combine the best of both....
{{Infobox Webcomic| <!-- Part of [[Wikipedia:WikisProject Webcomics]] -->
| title = Erfworld
| caption =
| author = Rob Balder (story), Jamie Noguchi (drawing)
| url = http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erflatest.html
| status = Updates two times a week
| began = 2006 [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0001.html]
| ended =
| genre = [[Fantasy]], [[Comedy]]
| ratings =
}}
'''Erfworld: The Battle for Gobwin Knob''' is a fantasy/comedy [[webcomic]] written by Rob Balder of [[PartiallyClips]] and [[illustrated]] by Jamie Noguchi. It updates on Tuesdays and Thursdays each week. Erfworld is published at Giant in the Playground ([http://www.giantitp.com]) which enjoys a massive amount of [[traffic]] <ref>{{cite news | title=Alexa.com's official graph showing the GITP's stats |url=http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=giantitp.com}}</ref> each day (possibly exceeding that of some traditional "print comic" websites, see graph in references section) alongside Rich Burlew's webcomic, [[The Order of the Stick]], and is released under a [[Creative Commons]] Attribution, Noncommercial, ShareAlike license[http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0001.html].
The comic's humor largely revolves around fantasy [[videogames]], [[roleplaying]] games, [[popular culture]] references, and historical references, with frequent puns and sight-gags, as well as letter changes in frequently used names (spidews, dwagons and twolls instead of spiders, [[dragons]] and [[trolls]], for example).
Although a very recent arrival on the webcomic "scene", Erfworld has already garnered critical acclaim <ref>{{cite news | title=Article citing the cultural importance of webcomics - praises Erfworld |url=http://time-blog.com/nerd_world/2007/01/webcomics_are_the_new_blogs_th_2.html }}</ref> from no less than Time magazine as well as other webcomic creators. <ref>{{cite news | title=Howard Taylor exhorts us all to give Erfworld a chance|url=http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/index.php/2007/01/14/what-exactly-is-an-erf/}}</ref>
===Characters===
{{spoilers}}
* '''Stanley the Tool, aka Lord Stanley The Plaid''': Overlord of the city of Gobwin Knob, and descendant of the nearly lost Plaid tribe, he is egotistical and has almost no tactical ability. He possesses the Arkenhammer, an ancient and mysterious tool of divine origin, resembling a toy hammer. Apparently other Arkentools exist, and Lord Stanley has declared an ongoing war as an effort to find them. Unfortunately, his inept handling of the war (particularly his promoting of only the handsomest men in his army) led to the loss of all the eleven cities he once owned, leaving only the capital (Gobwin Knob). He had Wanda summon "The perfect warlord" in an attempt to win the battle for Gobwin Knob, which yielded Parson Gotti.
:In his first meeting with Parson, Stanley declared himself a "[[tool (insult)|tool]]", due to Parson convincing him that the highest title where Parson comes from is "tool". Drawing a connection between this title and his search for the Arkentools, Stanley happily declared himself a tool.
* '''Wanda Firebaugh''': a Croakamancer (a [[necromancer]], and possibly a wielder of spells to "croak" enemies, like [[fireball]]s) serving Lord Stanley. She is very patient and formal, and highly skilled in [[strategy]], although Lord Stanley's shortsightedness and [[ego]] tend to ruin her plans. Wanda tends toward depression and a lack of hope, mostly due to her Lord's [[incompetence]].
:She is skilled at many magics, but has stated herself that only Croakamancy has any interest for her. She was the one who suggested using the [[warlord]] summoning spell, and cast the spell that drew Parson into Erfworld.
* '''Prince Ansom''': A handsome man and the commander in charge of King Slately's army, in opposition of the armies of Lord Stanley. He is a skilled tactician, but severely lacking in modesty. He appears to like Jillian Zamussels, but she is too proud to accept his proposal. His symbol appears to be a red [[radish]]. He carries the Arkenpliers, though he is not attuned to them, and thus can not use their special abilities.
* '''Jillian Zamussels''': A female barbarian and warlord, fighting for the army of Prince Ansom. She is very proud and independent, rarely follows orders and obviously likes slashing, chopping and destroying everything on her way along a mission. She has an [[Zanbato|unrealistically oversized sword]], recalling [[Final_Fantasy_weapons#Buster_Sword|similar weapons]] featured in [[Final Fantasy]] and other videogames.
* '''Parson Gotti''': Author of the webcomic [http://www.hamstard.com Hamstard], and an archetypical "hardcore" gamer who spends months at a time designing strategy games for his own amusement. He is overweight, slovenly and sarcastic but a gifted strategist and designer. He was summoned to Erfworld by Wanda on Lord Stanley's orders, called by a spell meant to summon "the ultimate warlord". Despite being a slovenly [[gamer]], Parson actually fulfills many of the requirements Lord Stanley asked for, such as: physical size, dietary and linguistic constraints, willingness to plan wars and "[kill] his foes for fun" (strategy gaming), and the desire to be summoned. Parson said he'd teleport into a fantasy world in a minute if he could, and was promptly summoned away.
:Parson stands roughly twice as tall as Wanda Firebaugh, making him nearly three times Stanley the Tool's height. This fulfils another of Stanley's requirements, in "make him big". Parson has also adapted surprisingly well to his circumstances, possibly believing that he's having a "Wizard of Oz" moment (or that he's in a [[coma]]) and thus is simply dreaming.
==Known Arkentools==
'''Arkenhammer''': Owned and attuned to Stanley the Plaid/Tool, the Arkenhammer has the power to control dwagons, and apparently can also turn nuts into birds.<br>
'''Arkenpliers''': Owned but not attuned to Prince Ansom, they apparently have the power to turn any "uncroaked" (presumably meaning "undead") enemy to dust.
==Trivia==
* The Titans of Ark, divine entities who forged Erfworld, are represented as giant [[Elvis Presley]]s.
* When Parson was originally summoned, the word "Plot" appeared as the sound of his teleportation.
* "Parson Gotti" is an anagram of "Protagonist."
===External Links===
* [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erflatest.html Erfworld]
* [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erfcast.html The main cast of characters]
==References==
<references/> [[Image:GiantitptrafficGraph.png|left|thumb|A graph that shows Giantitp.com collecting more traffic each day than some notable favourites.]]
[[Category: 2000s webcomics]]
[[Category: Fantasy webcomics]]
[[Category: Fantasy parodies]]
[[Category: Parody webcomics]]
{{webcomic-stub}}
Merged articles:
{{Infobox Webcomic| <!-- Part of [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Webcomics]] -->
| title = Erfworld
| image =
| caption =
| author = Rob Balder
| url = [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0001.html ''Erfworld'']
| status = Updated twice weekly, on Tuesdays and Saturdays.
| began = [[2006]]
| ended =
| genre = [[fantasy]],[[comedy]],[[parody]]
| ratings =
}}
'''Erfworld: The Battle for Gobwin Knob''' is a fantasy/comedy story-driven [[webcomic]] written by Rob Balder (the author of [[PartiallyClips]]) and illustrated by Jamie Noguchi. It is hosted on [[the order of the stick|Giant in the Playground Games]]<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/index.html#f4ajrwFnil3eXXfxy1o</ref>, the website famous for Rich Burlew's "The Order of the Stick".
Erfworld follows a [[graphic novel]] format, with a new "page" released every update. It setting is a predominately fantasy [[turn-based strategy]] with a surreal, reference-filled narrative. The comic's humor largely revolves around strategy-fantasy [[videogames]], [[roleplaying]] games, [[popular culture]] references, and historical references, with frequent puns and sight-gags, as well as letter changes in frequently used names (spidews, dwagons and twolls instead of spiders, [[dragons]] and [[trolls]], for example). It is very varied and often apparently random.
Erfworld's plot, setting, and characters are released under a a [[Creative Commons]] Attribution, Noncommercial, ShareAlike license<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=29092</ref>.
==Characters==
{{spoilers}}
* '''Stanley the Tool, aka Lord Stanley The Plaid''': Overlord of the city of Gobwin Knob, and descendant of the nearly lost Plaid tribe, he is egotistical and has almost no tactical ability. He possesses the Arkenhammer, an ancient and mysterious tool of divine origin, resembling a toy hammer. Lord Stanley has declared an ongoing war as an effort to find the other Arkentools. Unfortunately, his inept handling of the war (such as promoting of only the most handsome men to warlord status) led to the loss of all the eleven cities he once owned, leaving only the capital of Gobwin Knob. He had Wanda summon "The perfect warlord" in an attempt to win the battle for Gobwin Knob, which yielded Parson Gotti.
:In his first meeting with Parson, Stanley declared himself a "[[tool (insult)|tool]]", due to Parson convincing him that the highest title where Parson comes from is "tool". Drawing a connection between this title and his search for the Arkentools, Stanley happily declared himself a tool.
* '''Wanda Firebaugh''': a [[necromancer|Croakamancer]] serving Lord Stanley. She is very patient and formal, and highly skilled in [[strategy]], although Lord Stanley's shortsightedness and [[ego]] tend to ruin her plans. Wanda tends toward depression and a lack of hope, mostly due to her Lord's [[incompetence]].
:She is skilled at many types of magic, but has stated that only Croakamancy has any interest for her. She was the one who suggested using the [[warlord]] summoning spell, and cast the spell that drew Parson into Erfworld.
* '''Prince Ansom''': The commander in charge of King Slately's army, in opposition of the armies of Lord Stanley. He is a skilled leader, but severely lacking in modesty<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erfcast.html</ref>. He appears to be attracted to Jillian Zamussels. His symbol is a red [[radish]]-like vegetable. He carries the Arkenpliers, though he is not attuned to them, and thus can not use their special abilities.
* '''Jillian Zamussels''': A female barbarian and warlord, fighting for the army of Prince Ansom. She is very proud and independant, rarely follows orders, and prefers a frontal assault combat strategy. She has an [[Zanbato|unrealistically oversized sword]], recalling [[Final_Fantasy_weapons#Buster_Sword|similar weapons]] featured in [[Final Fantasy]] and other videogames.
* '''Parson Gotti''': Author of the webcomic [http://www.hamstard.com Hamstard] (a fictional comic created for use in Erfworld's backstory), and an archetypical "hardcore" gamer who spends months at a time designing strategy games for his own amusement. He is overweight, slovenly and sarcastic but a gifted strategist and designer. He was summoned to Erfworld by Wanda on Lord Stanley's orders, called by a spell meant to summon "the ultimate warlord". Despite being visually inappropriate, Parson actually fulfills many of the requirements Lord Stanley asked for, such as: physical size, metabolic and linguistic compatibility, willingness to plan wars and "[kill] his foes for fun" (strategy gaming), and the desire to be summoned. Parson said he'd teleport into a fantasy world in a minute if he could<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0016.html</ref>, and was promptly summoned away.
:Parson stands roughly twice as tall as Wanda Firebaugh, making him nearly three times Stanley the Tool's height. Parson has adapted well to his circumstances, believing that he's having a "Wizard of Oz" moment (or that he's in a [[coma]]) and thus is simply dreaming.
===Known Arkentools===
'''Arkenhammer''': Owned and attuned to Stanley the Plaid/Tool, the Arkenhammer has the power to control dwagons, and apparently can also turn nuts into [[pigeon]]s.<br>
'''Arkenpliers''': Owned but not attuned to Prince Ansom, they apparently have the power to turn any "uncroaked" (presumably meaning "undead") enemy to dust.
==Recognition and Acclaim==
In its brief existence, Erfworld has been recognised and received acclaim from a wide variety of notable sources and webcomic authorities. Authors of other notable webcomics (not including Rob Balder and Rich Burlew) such as Howard Tayler of [[Schlock Mercenary]]<REF>http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/index.php/2007/01/14/what-exactly-is-an-erf/</REF> and [[Mohammad "Hawk" Haque]] of [[Applegeeks]]<ref>http://www.applegeeks.com/blog/?p=1441</ref> have posted reviews and comments about Erfworld, and it has been cited in numerous respected webcomic sites such as [[Comixpedia]]<ref>http://comixpedia.com/node/10133</ref> and [[Fleen]]<ref>http://www.fleen.com/archives/2007/01/19/what-on-erf-do-you-mean-my-language/</ref>, by outside authors such as [[Jonathan Coulton]] <ref>http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2007/01/17/i-pervade-more-media/</ref>, and perhaps most importantly by [[Time-Blog]] and [[Time magazine]] author/journalist [[Lev Grossman]] in his article ''Webcomics are the New Blogs''<ref>http://time-blog.com/nerd_world/2007/01/webcomics_are_the_new_blogs_th_2.html</ref>.
==External Links==
* [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erflatest.html Erfworld]
* [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erfcast.html The main cast of characters]
==Trivia==
* "Parson Gotti" is an anagram of "Protagonist."
[[Category:2000s webcomics|Erfworld]]
[[Category:Fantasy webcomics|Erfworld]]
[[Category: Fantasy parodies|Erfworld]]
[[Category: Parody webcomics|Erfworld]]
Edit: updated, merge done a bit better. Edit2: again.
pclips
2007-02-12, 09:57 PM
Warms my heart, guys. Thank you.
You misspelled "existence" though, and I am on an open proxy barred from editing right now.
Curses! I am melting! Anathema to a teacher of English >.< Thanks for the heads-up, I am emberised by my speling errar.
I also forgot to add the references section.
{{Infobox Webcomic| <!-- Part of [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Webcomics]] -->
| title = Erfworld
| image =
| caption =
| author = Rob Balder
| url = [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0001.html ''Erfworld'']
| status = Updated twice weekly, on Tuesdays and Saturdays.
| began = [[2006]]
| ended =
| genre = [[fantasy]],[[comedy]],[[parody]]
| ratings =
}}
'''Erfworld: The Battle for Gobwin Knob''' is a fantasy/comedy story-driven [[webcomic]] written by Rob Balder (the author of [[PartiallyClips]]) and illustrated by Jamie Noguchi. It is hosted on [[the order of the stick|Giant in the Playground Games]]<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/index.html#f4ajrwFnil3eXXfxy1o</ref>, the website famous for Rich Burlew's "The Order of the Stick".
Erfworld follows a [[graphic novel]] format, with a new "page" released every update. It setting is a predominately fantasy [[turn-based strategy]] with a surreal, reference-filled narrative. The comic's humor largely revolves around strategy-fantasy [[videogames]], [[roleplaying]] games, [[popular culture]] references, and historical references, with frequent puns and sight-gags, as well as letter changes in frequently used names (spidews, dwagons and twolls instead of spiders, [[dragons]] and [[trolls]], for example). It is very varied and often apparently random.
Erfworld's plot, setting, and characters are released under a a [[Creative Commons]] Attribution, Noncommercial, ShareAlike license<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=29092</ref>.
==Characters==
{{spoilers}}
* '''Stanley the Tool, aka Lord Stanley The Plaid''': Overlord of the city of Gobwin Knob, and descendant of the nearly lost Plaid tribe, he is egotistical and has almost no tactical ability. He possesses the Arkenhammer, an ancient and mysterious tool of divine origin, resembling a toy hammer. Lord Stanley has declared an ongoing war as an effort to find the other Arkentools. Unfortunately, his inept handling of the war (such as promoting of only the most handsome men to warlord status) led to the loss of all the eleven cities he once owned, leaving only the capital of Gobwin Knob. He had Wanda summon "The perfect warlord" in an attempt to win the battle for Gobwin Knob, which yielded Parson Gotti.
:In his first meeting with Parson, Stanley declared himself a "[[tool (insult)|tool]]", due to Parson convincing him that the highest title where Parson comes from is "tool". Drawing a connection between this title and his search for the Arkentools, Stanley happily declared himself a tool.
* '''Wanda Firebaugh''': a [[necromancer|Croakamancer]] serving Lord Stanley. She is very patient and formal, and highly skilled in [[strategy]], although Lord Stanley's shortsightedness and [[ego]] tend to ruin her plans. Wanda tends toward depression and a lack of hope, mostly due to her Lord's [[incompetence]].
:She is skilled at many types of magic, but has stated that only Croakamancy has any interest for her. She was the one who suggested using the [[warlord]] summoning spell, and cast the spell that drew Parson into Erfworld.
* '''Prince Ansom''': The commander in charge of King Slately's army, in opposition of the armies of Lord Stanley. He is a skilled leader, but severely lacking in modesty<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erfcast.html</ref>. He appears to be attracted to Jillian Zamussels. His symbol is a red [[radish]]-like vegetable. He carries the Arkenpliers, though he is not attuned to them, and thus can not use their special abilities.
* '''Jillian Zamussels''': A female barbarian and warlord, fighting for the army of Prince Ansom. She is very proud and independant, rarely follows orders, and prefers a frontal assault combat strategy. She has an [[Zanbato|unrealistically oversized sword]], recalling [[Final_Fantasy_weapons#Buster_Sword|similar weapons]] featured in [[Final Fantasy]] and other videogames.
* '''Parson Gotti''': Author of the webcomic [http://www.hamstard.com Hamstard] (a fictional comic created for use in Erfworld's backstory), and an archetypical "hardcore" gamer who spends months at a time designing strategy games for his own amusement. He is overweight, slovenly and sarcastic but a gifted strategist and designer. He was summoned to Erfworld by Wanda on Lord Stanley's orders, called by a spell meant to summon "the ultimate warlord". Despite being visually inappropriate, Parson actually fulfills many of the requirements Lord Stanley asked for, such as: physical size, metabolic and linguistic compatibility, willingness to plan wars and "[kill] his foes for fun" (strategy gaming), and the desire to be summoned. Parson said he'd teleport into a fantasy world in a minute if he could<ref>http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0016.html</ref>, and was promptly summoned away.
:Parson stands roughly twice as tall as Wanda Firebaugh, making him nearly three times Stanley the Tool's height. Parson has adapted well to his circumstances, believing that he's having a "Wizard of Oz" moment (or that he's in a [[coma]]) and thus is simply dreaming.
===Known Arkentools===
'''Arkenhammer''': Owned and attuned to Stanley the Plaid/Tool, the Arkenhammer has the power to control dwagons, and apparently can also turn nuts into [[pigeon]]s.<br>
'''Arkenpliers''': Owned but not attuned to Prince Ansom, they apparently have the power to turn any "uncroaked" (presumably meaning "undead") enemy to dust.
==Recognition and Acclaim==
In its brief existence, Erfworld has been recognised and received acclaim from a wide variety of notable sources and webcomic authorities. Authors of other notable webcomics (not including Rob Balder and Rich Burlew) such as Howard Tayler of [[Schlock Mercenary]]<REF>http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/index.php/2007/01/14/what-exactly-is-an-erf/</REF> and [[Mohammad "Hawk" Haque]] of [[Applegeeks]]<ref>http://www.applegeeks.com/blog/?p=1441</ref> have posted reviews and comments about Erfworld, and it has been cited in numerous respected webcomic sites such as [[Comixpedia]]<ref>http://comixpedia.com/node/10133</ref> and [[Fleen]]<ref>http://www.fleen.com/archives/2007/01/19/what-on-erf-do-you-mean-my-language/</ref>, by outside authors such as [[Jonathan Coulton]] <ref>http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2007/01/17/i-pervade-more-media/</ref>, and perhaps most importantly by [[Time-Blog]] and [[Time magazine]] author/journalist [[Lev Grossman]] in his article ''Webcomics are the New Blogs''<ref>http://time-blog.com/nerd_world/2007/01/webcomics_are_the_new_blogs_th_2.html</ref>.
==References==
<div class="references-small" style="-moz-column-count:2; column-count:2;">
<references/>
</div>
==External Links==
* [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erflatest.html Erfworld]
* [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erfcast.html The main cast of characters]
==Trivia==
* "Parson Gotti" is an anagram of "Protagonist."
[[Category:2000s webcomics|Erfworld]]
[[Category:Fantasy webcomics|Erfworld]]
[[Category: Fantasy parodies|Erfworld]]
[[Category: Parody webcomics|Erfworld]]
It is a pretty decent list. If they speedy delete it, this is like totally going on my MySpace.
Lord Zentei
2007-02-12, 10:25 PM
Eh, this is the problem with Wikipedia. Any tool can amble along and play titan.
That's not really the problem with wikipedia, that is the advantage. The problem is that the rules that are being lawyered need heavy revision, and it suffers from big-headedness. Wikipedia is great, but its designers and authors need to keep in mind that by its very nature it can never be a primary reference, and stop trying to treat it like one.
But that's not the nature of this problem. This is just a small part of another idiotic internet feud, this one between a subset of wikipedians and the majority of the webcomic community.
The_Old_Fox
2007-02-12, 11:15 PM
"Wikipedia, keeping Encyclopedias in print since 2001."
Truthfully, for all of its promise Wikipedia doesn't deliver. Your problem, and as was also pointed out the problem of webcomics in general, is just one of many. Even though everyone can edit, few enough people actually do, and people are given free run for their personal crusades and agendas with very little repercussion. Individuals, corporations, and heck even governments are able to hide behind their computers and do whatever they want. As for really good writers, what does it benefit them to write an article? Some punk may vandalize it, or delete it for no good reason and the author gets minimal recognition and no money.
At best Wikipedia is springboard for research and information, at worst it is a bed of misinformation and the most petty of intrigues. And don't get me started on its supposed "neutrality".
Huh, I am ranting, must be because I am old.
In conclusion Erfworld and webcomics in general rock. :smallwink:
Lord Zentei
2007-02-13, 01:03 AM
That's not really the problem with wikipedia, that is the advantage. The problem is that the rules that are being lawyered need heavy revision, and it suffers from big-headedness. Wikipedia is great, but its designers and authors need to keep in mind that by its very nature it can never be a primary reference, and stop trying to treat it like one.
And there is that.
However, the fact that anyone can meander along and do as they wish to existing articles is precisely the issue. To allow this opens the possibility for abuse. To limit it is to abandon the wiki paradigm, at least to a degree.
But that's not the nature of this problem. This is just a small part of another idiotic internet feud, this one between a subset of wikipedians and the majority of the webcomic community.
It is a manifestation of the problem.
erewhon
2007-02-13, 01:30 AM
I really don't "get" all the downers on Wikipedia here. I can find hard references to stuff on there that astonishes me.
All the cultural crap is just that: Crap. Gun for the real content, like the tensile strength of vanadium. :)
Besides, it's hella cheaper than print encyclopedias. :)
erewhon: I spent a lot of time editing real articles about real subjects, including woodworking, Japanese food and local geography, and biochemistry. With the possible exception of woodworking, these are all things I flatter myself that I know quite a lot about. With the exception of woodworking, these are all things where I got utterly sick of reverting comments and added false "clarifications" by people who got their facts from the back of a crackerjack box, or were soapboxing for religious institutions or other groups (the latter are the worst, far worse than vandals. They go in and delete solid material because it is "perspective", or add a secondary "valid" opinion that has no references to compete with a well-referenced and backed up section. And I'm not just talking about hot topics like evolution or even scientific articles in general here).
Although I have fun reading about topics I don't understand on wikipedia, I would never believe any tensile strength of vanadium statistics from it, not even enough to write a science fiction novel. I have firsthand experience for how seriously screwed-up even hard-fact articles get.
Lord Zentei
2007-02-13, 03:12 AM
I really don't "get" all the downers on Wikipedia here. I can find hard references to stuff on there that astonishes me.
All the cultural crap is just that: Crap. Gun for the real content, like the tensile strength of vanadium. :)
Besides, it's hella cheaper than print encyclopedias. :)
Go to www.britannica.com (http://www.britannica.com) instead.
Though you need to subscribe to it, the short versions of the articles are available for free.
These free short articles don't always have the same amount of material as the larger wiki articles, but they sometimes do, and moreover, most wiki artilces are pretty brief. More importantly, Britannica is peer-reviewed by experts in the relevant fields, and are thus a hell of a lot more reliable.
And, of course, should you subscribe, you get a lot more material.
Renegade Paladin
2007-02-13, 05:00 AM
The Wikipedia jihad against webcomics continues. Some agenda-driven boop deleted the Erfworld article (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log/delete&page=Erfworld) yesterday. This is a problem that at least 50 major webcomics have had to contend with this year alone.
I do not really know how to fight it. I'm sick of hearing about it, frankly. But I am going to fight for that article, somehow.
Is anyone here a Wikipedia admin or regular editor who can put in the request for undeletion and make the argument for notability? Primary arguments I see:
1. Featured on GiantITP, a site with massive importance to the comics world and better web traffic than Marvel.com (http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?f=555555&u=marvel.com&u=giantitp.com&u=&u=&u=&r=1y&y=r&z=1&h=300&w=500). GiantITP.com is among the top five most popular webcomic sites in the world, according to Alexa.
2. Written by the creator of another, syndicated comic (http://www.partiallyclips.com) which has passed the criteria for notability multiple times.
Posting this thread was the worst mistake you could have made. Believe you me, they will take notice and start discounting any vote to keep that might possibly have resulted from you pointing out the deletion debate. The Wikipedia establishment hates what they see as outside interference, especially by the subjects of the articles.
That said, I'll go do my best. But no guarantees.
Edit: I see Brenneman went for the speedy deletion option instead. There's not much to be done in that case; it can be put up for Deletion Review, but the people who hang out there tend to be hellbent on making sure deleted stuff stays deleted.
And reposting the article was a mistake. It'll just be deleted again immediately and protected against recreation.
Ah, good old internet politics.
I will, until given reason not to, retain my faith in humanity and pretend that since the article now easily meets WP:N and WP:RS it should not matter where the interference came from. Sure a biased party was related to the article being brought back, but it was brought back according to wikipedia's rules. After all, no proper channel was left to discuss the deletion in the first place. The only logical recourse is to discuss it elsewhere and recreate it with appropriate wikipedia criteria met.
Boop me in the boop but wannabe-elitists annoy me. Not you, paladin.
The Giant
2007-02-13, 06:21 AM
$5 says this whole thing ends with someone deleting OOTS's Wikipedia article by the latest, "non-notability is contagious," thing that's been going on.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-13, 06:24 AM
Edit: I see Brenneman went for the speedy deletion option instead. There's not much to be done in that case; it can be put up for Deletion Review, but the people who hang out there tend to be hellbent on making sure deleted stuff stays deleted.
And reposting the article was a mistake. It'll just be deleted again immediately and protected against recreation.
Brenneman recreated the article himself at the request of Totalnerduk, and offered to move it back to the public when sources were added. So Erk added sources, and it was made public again. No one just reposted the article without asking, so there shouldn't be a problem this time. Unless someone again questions notability which with the sources now listed, I doubt they will. The issue should be resolved, and it was done entirely within the rules of Wikipedia.
$5 says this whole thing ends with someone deleting OOTS's Wikipedia article by the latest, "non-notability is contagious," thing that's been going on.
Non-Notability, a disease more contagious than vampirism, mummy-rot and lycanthropy combined. And you thought Notability was generally permanent (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:N)...
$5 says this whole thing ends with someone deleting OOTS's Wikipedia article by the latest, "non-notability is contagious," thing that's been going on.If that happens, I vote we delete the D&D articles, the final fantasy 6 articles, and the articles on snacking foods. We can progress from there. Finally, the cleanup wikipedia has been waiting for!
Then again, now that I think about it, given the latest attitudes on WP towards indiscriminate article deletion, that would go over well. We'd be getting their tough job done for them. Whatever happened to "when in doubt, articles should not be deleted"? Seems like a few of their admins have stopped doubting entirely.
(must... resist.... miko.... reference)
I read about this Wikipedia "crusade", a gross misuse of the term I know, against webcomics on Websnark some time ago. Frankly I'm amazed that this issue has not yet been corrected and has in fact gathered pace. At this point all I can suggest is that the webcomic community abandon Wikipedia for a specialised site such as Comixpedia... that is, a site not run by self-obsessed judgmental morons.
Fecking ridiculous
There are some users like this Brenneman admin and another one I just noticed, Oracle something, who are working hard to pick it up. Brenneman is not specifically against webcomics... he just loves to delete. His deletion record is huge, and he has a reputation for deleting articles just like Erfworld was deleted... without bothering to ask for discussion or to check to see if the article is noteworthy or to add tags saying "source this" etc... you know, the things that are considered part of polite society. The oracle dude publically admits that he doesn't like webcomic articles.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-13, 08:02 AM
(must... resist.... miko.... reference)
Quick! Someone do a fan-art of Wiko, a Paladin of Wikipedia Guard! :smalltongue:
Brickwall
2007-02-13, 10:30 AM
A wonderful comic artist puts this situation in the most humorous terms I've seen yet in this comic (http://www.joeandmonkey.com/index.php?comic=701). Honestly, I'd like to see if we could get away with it by saving copies of "important" articles, then banding together to delete the wikipedia versions. It'd be a good counterstrike.
storybookknight
2007-02-13, 02:06 PM
I like my friend's Wikipedia example better, where he has noted that Knuckles the Echidna's wikipedia entry is longer than European History's same article.
Uzraid
2007-02-13, 02:30 PM
Given the complexity that we've seen in the first 24 pages of Erfworld, I think the best solution would be a free-standing wiki for Erfworld (a la hrwiki.org). The downside is, I guess, that you'd get the same kind of bickering that exists in Forums, and that someone would have to host the thing. But the upside, in my view, would be huge.
Same goes for OOTS.
U
Larrin
2007-02-13, 04:16 PM
well i visited the wikipedia site and it looks well done and professional, far better than any number of non-threatened sites.....now we just need a wikipedia article documenting wikipedia's 'crusade' against web-comics!
.....but then again, why look for trouble.
pclips
2007-02-13, 04:28 PM
What's really funny to me is that the day this announcment came out, I got my Dragon magazine in the mail. Inside is a short article about Erfworld being on GITP, and being posted on Tuesdays and Thursdays. LMAO. Cracked me up, man. Keep up the good work, whatever day it comes out.
Someone please find a way to accurately cite this and add it to the notability cites.
The article is gone again, and someone needs to formally request deletion review.
There must be something which can be done about a rogue admin, also. Please, we really need a Wikipedia insider to set this right.
roadkiller
2007-02-13, 04:44 PM
It appears to still be there to me. I would suggest, though, that the various amusing references in the monsters (Gwiffons-Peeps etc) be put in also.
ikanreed
2007-02-13, 06:00 PM
Someone please find a way to accurately cite this and add it to the notability cites.
The article is gone again, and someone needs to formally request deletion review.
There must be something which can be done about a rogue admin, also. Please, we really need a Wikipedia insider to set this right.
Yes, this would be about as ideal as you can get. A review by a major magazine passes all of the web notability requirements.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-13, 06:04 PM
The article is gone again, and someone needs to formally request deletion review.
It looked like it was deleted again to me too :smalleek: , but it's back now. :smallsmile:
Mawhrin Skel
2007-02-13, 06:13 PM
Given the complexity that we've seen in the first 24 pages of Erfworld, I think the best solution would be a free-standing wiki for Erfworld (a la hrwiki.org). The downside is, I guess, that you'd get the same kind of bickering that exists in Forums, and that someone would have to host the thing. But the upside, in my view, would be huge.
Same goes for OOTS.
U
For hosting, http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Wikia is one free option. There are other sites that host wikis for free, with various pros and cons.
pclips
2007-02-13, 06:15 PM
For hosting, http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Wikia is one free option. There are other sites that host wikis for free, with various pros and cons.
Yeah we have a request in at Wikia for an Erfworld wiki.
The irony is, they have been debating its worthiness for a few weeks now. :smallmad:
totalnerduk
2007-02-13, 07:18 PM
Brenneman recreated the article himself at the request of Totalnerduk, and offered to move it back to the public when sources were added. So Erk added sources, and it was made public again. No one just reposted the article without asking, so there shouldn't be a problem this time... ...The issue should be resolved, and it was done entirely within the rules of Wikipedia.
It's simply a case of beaurocracy gone mad. I think we've successfully managed the re-insertion. The article confirms to the standards that were cited, so if it is ever re-deleted, we now have a valid case t take forward to the higher-ups at wikipedia - who as I understand it are concerned about the rogue-paladin style (rogue paladin as in Miko the Smitey, not the poster on the forum) of heavyhanded editing that some of their "trusted" staff have been wielding lately. It's getting them a bad rep, and they might end up banning or knocking down some of the repeat offenders if it continues. They're effectively calling wikipedia's objectivity into question by deleting what they have subjectively determined to be subjective content - think your way through that statement again and it should make sense.
It's make me laugh were it not for the fact that wikipedia, bad as it is, is still one of the foremost wiki's out there. They're one of the best of a really bad bunch when it all comes down to it. There's not much we can do except make a stand for those articles that we feel should not be abused as they are being.
Eldaran
2007-02-13, 07:29 PM
You should see what's happening at The Noob's AFD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/The_noob_%28Second_nomination%29).
Yeah we have a request in at Wikia for an Erfworld wiki.
The irony is, they have been debating its worthiness for a few weeks now. :smallmad:
:p it is really easy to set up your own wiki. I have two :) if you can't host it at gitp itself, why not put it up on www.erfworld.com and get some mileage out of the domain name?
You should see what's happening at The Noob's AFD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/The_noob_%28Second_nomination%29).
That's the guy, that netoracle bloke. All he really does is travel around nominating webcomic articles for deletion. He doesn't bother with {{source}} {{fact}} or {{or}} tags or anything, just tries to make enemies.
totalnerduk
2007-02-13, 07:46 PM
You should see what's happening at The Noob's AFD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/The_noob_%28Second_nomination%29).
I can't resist the opportunity to poke (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/The_noob_%28Second_nomination%29)angrily at somebody. Honestly. The fact that they feel they even need an AFD page for this is an indication of just how bombastic and overbearing the wikipedia community has become.
I despair of the entire human race.
Edit There should be a new word for high-handed morons with an admin account at wikipedia: wikiHitler.
Totalnerd, you make Godwin cry.
A quick look around the community last night and this morning has confirmed what I suspected. There are a small handful of agenda-driven editors, like Dragonfiend and NetOracle, nominating webcomics for deletion out of admitted agendas and bias. There are also a handful of admins who have stopped reading deletion nominations, and are just deleting things as they come up. Combined, this has resulted in the war on webcomics.
That means it is not that hard to fight. Look in the webcomic deletion topics and find the members who fight tooth-and-nail to have comics deleted, and follow their progress so you can work against their deletion attempts with proper channels: improving articles after deletion nomination, and placing tags. It is not an unwinnable battle, but it is really depressing. I mean, why would someone just decide they "hate webcomics"? Given that there are only about 50-100 articles on comics on WP and most of them are around 10kb in size, this is hardly busting the bank. /sigh/
Eldaran
2007-02-13, 08:28 PM
The problem doesn't lie with just the few malicious ones who put everything up for AfD, but the many other editors who go along with them because of some bizarre need for things like scientific journals discussing a webcomic. Seriously, their definitions of appropriate sources are ridiculous.
Kadasbrass
2007-02-13, 08:44 PM
GUComics (http://www.gucomics.com/) had their wikiapedia article deleted too
ikanreed
2007-02-13, 08:51 PM
The problem doesn't lie with just the few malicious ones who put everything up for AfD, but the many other editors who go along with them because of some bizarre need for things like scientific journals discussing a webcomic. Seriously, their definitions of appropriate sources are ridiculous.
Ah... no there I can provide some insights. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. It is supposed to reflect the sum of academic knowledge on subjects. Being a free encyclopedia many things end up on wikipedia that doesn't have academic validation. I doubt more than a couple thousand wikipedia articles actually have academic references sourced for it's content, but there's a reason that beleif exists. You won't find an erfworld article in britanica for at least 10 years unless Erfworld becomes literally the #1 most popular webcomic before then.
No. those kinds of things aren't required, but you're all overreacting to this whole thing.
TinSoldier
2007-02-13, 08:55 PM
A wonderful comic artist puts this situation in the most humorous terms I've seen yet in this comic (http://www.joeandmonkey.com/index.php?comic=701). Honestly, I'd like to see if we could get away with it by saving copies of "important" articles, then banding together to delete the wikipedia versions. It'd be a good counterstrike.That was a great comic, Brickwall!
I kind of understand the editors' "high-mindedness" in trying to keep a lot of random stuff off of Wikipedia but I agree that it is starting to seem a little over-zealous. I mean Wikipedia is supposed to be kinda like a real-world version of the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy -- a reference where you can find out about almost anything notable. These deletions seem to go against that grain.
I personally like Wikipedia very much. It is usually the second place I go after Google when I want to find something out. I also refer readers to an article on Ars Technica regarding Wikipedia: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20061127-8296.html
I notice that the Erfworld article is currently up as of writing this post.
Brickwall
2007-02-13, 09:04 PM
Wikipedia is a source for information. Erfworld has more readers than people who even know about these things (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wemic), if I had to guess. In fact, its readership is higher than the population of a town that has its own article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilman%2C_Taylor_County%2C_Wisconsin). It's significant, and obviously more important than at least one or both of the links above. That's why we think Wikipedia is being a group of bastards.
The Extinguisher
2007-02-13, 09:09 PM
What I don't get, being an encyclopedia, wouldn't they want entries on as much as possible. Wiki has an advantange to other encyclopedias being that they don't need to be re-published for major events and are not restricted to the amount of articles, so they can have less notable entries then say Encyclopedia Brittanica. I would think that that freedom would encourage posting of smaller articles, so they can collect as much knowledge as possible.
Also, can you honestly tell me Axel, Netherlands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axel_%28Netherlands%29) deserves an articles more than Erfworld.
Brickwall
2007-02-13, 09:25 PM
What I don't get, being an encyclopedia, wouldn't they want entries on as much as possible. Wiki has an advantange to other encyclopedias being that they don't need to be re-published for major events and are not restricted to the amount of articles, so they can have less notable entries then say Encyclopedia Brittanica. I would think that that freedom would encourage posting of smaller articles, so they can collect as much knowledge as possible.
Also, can you honestly tell me Axel, Netherlands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axel_%28Netherlands%29) deserves an articles more than Erfworld.
No, but more than the town I cited. Then again, Gez lives somewhere in the Netherlands, and I can't prove that you haven't just offended her.
GUComics had their wikiapedia article deleted tooMore, the article on the Web Cartoonist's Choice Awards has been deleted (by Brenneman again, after a very shortlived debate that began to settle on a "keep" resolution before being closed). I realise Wikipedia may not be biased specifically against webcomics... I suspect it is becoming biased against anything on the internet that is not Wikipedia, personally. Only a few months ago, I was having very little problem using reliable web sources for topics that only differ in that they were not in themselves about something on the internet.
Eldaran
2007-02-13, 09:57 PM
Ah... no there I can provide some insights. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. It is supposed to reflect the sum of academic knowledge on subjects. Being a free encyclopedia many things end up on wikipedia that doesn't have academic validation. I doubt more than a couple thousand wikipedia articles actually have academic references sourced for it's content, but there's a reason that beleif exists. You won't find an erfworld article in britanica for at least 10 years unless Erfworld becomes literally the #1 most popular webcomic before then.
No. those kinds of things aren't required, but you're all overreacting to this whole thing.
See this is what I'm talking about. Wikipedia is specifically not supposed to be limited to academic knowledge. If it was, it would be no different than any other encyclopedia. For subjects that would be referenced in peer-reviewed journals I can certainly see the need for those sort of sources. But there are certainly a number of things people are interested in, and should be included in a repository of knowledge, that don't fall within the narrow spectrum of things considered notable by these overzealous editors.
WarriorTribble
2007-02-13, 10:39 PM
It seemed wiki was always scraping by with cash, and according to a recent article (http://www.networkworld.com/community/?q=node/11376) they currently have enough cash run their servers for another 3-4 months only. I wonder if the deletes are an attempt to save bandwidth.
Or it could be some odd hazing I guess. You're not worthy till you survive a deletion.
Renegade Paladin
2007-02-13, 10:58 PM
Deleting doesn't really save server space, and for most articles it won't significantly affect bandwidth use.
When an article is deleted, it doesn't go away. The system just doesn't let us plebes see it. An admin can look at it and bring it back at any time. So all the information is still there. You're not saving server space by deleting something on the wiki.
KillerCardinal
2007-02-13, 11:08 PM
Deleting doesn't really save server space, and for most articles it won't significantly affect bandwidth use.
When an article is deleted, it doesn't go away. The system just doesn't let us plebes see it. An admin can look at it and bring it back at any time. So all the information is still there. You're not saving server space by deleting something on the wiki.
Even so, it could save bandwidth, since that measures what is transferred.
I don't really know anything about what their troubles might be, but I don't see how this would really help them anyway. Just thought I'd mention that though.
tomaO2
2007-02-13, 11:24 PM
Wikipidia is not perfect and it would be nice if they kept the article but, frankly I am suprised you expected them too. You know what they are like. Nor should anyone use this as an excuse to say "to hell with that site". It has problems but it's also a fantastic resourse. They have standards though and unfortunately webcomics generally don't fall into them. ESPECIALLY ones so young. Your not even sure your going to continue over the summer.
The reminder about the Websnark article is a good one. Eric is a wonderful writer and has a way of explaining these sorts of things so all can understand it.
If you havn't already PCclips, I STRONGLY suggest you read Eric's Wikipedia article http://www.websnark.com/archives/2006/10/time_for_the_ye.html (http://www.websnark.com/archives/2006/10/time_for_the_ye.html) so you can get a better understanding as to why Wikipedia does this. Ditto for anyone else confused by why this happened.
The only solution is keep going at it for a year or so and by that point you'll be established enough to keep it.
ikanreed
2007-02-13, 11:29 PM
It seemed wiki was always scraping by with cash, and according to a recent article (http://www.networkworld.com/community/?q=node/11376) they currently have enough cash run their servers for another 3-4 months only. I wonder if the deletes are an attempt to save bandwidth.
Or it could be some odd hazing I guess. You're not worthy till you survive a deletion.
That's not what deletions are for at all. Hard drive space is not at all the same as bandwidth. Deletions (originally before this nonsense made up notability crap came into play, a fairly recent development) were to prevent unmaintainable(as in you couldn't look up verified information) articles from cropping up.
The idea was that if there were no sources information could be backtracked through, you could put whatever the heck you wanted in, and unless someone who knew better stumbled on the article, you'd be lying to people.
Verifiabilty was always one of (as jimbo wales called it) the four pillars of wikipedia. It was signifigantly more objective than "notability" but now notability is some de facto standard.
Renegade Paladin
2007-02-13, 11:32 PM
Wikipidia is not perfect and it would be nice if they kept the article but, frankly I am suprised you expected them too. You know what they are like. Nor should anyone use this as an excuse to say "to hell with that site".
Oh, I'm not. I'm using the general craptasticness of their data as a reason to say "to hell with that site." But like it or not (and I don't), Wikipedia is one of the most popular sites in the world (5th most visited, I think) and is therefore important.
WarriorTribble
2007-02-13, 11:35 PM
...Yes I know the difference between the two one is storage the other is rate of transfer. It's safe to say more data equals more bandwidth used. I can only guess the rules have changed since wiki is no longer in a position where they desperatly need new articles.
ikanreed
2007-02-13, 11:46 PM
Oh, I'm not. I'm using the general craptasticness of their data as a reason to say "to hell with that site." But like it or not (and I don't), Wikipedia is one of the most popular sites in the world (5th most visited, I think) and is therefore important.
Craptasticness of their data, huh? I beleive there have been actual studies that show the error rate of wikipedia is not much higher than that of Brittanica(the most respected modern encyclopedia).
Edit so I don't needlessly double post
...Yes I know the difference between the two one is storage the other is rate of transfer. It's safe to say more data equals more bandwidth used. I can only guess the rules have changed since wiki is no longer in a position where they desperatly need new articles.
For articles that aren't looked up frequently, a deletion can require signifigantly more bandwidth because people who wouldn't normally look at the article will look at it as a part of the deletion process, and all the edits cause a high reload rate as people have to view->edit->view after edit at the very least. Anyone who'd look for the article anyways will still be using (perhaps more) bandwidth. I can assure you that the deletion of articles is not for technical reasons.
pclips
2007-02-14, 12:07 AM
If you havn't already PCclips, I STRONGLY suggest you read Eric's Wikipedia article http://www.websnark.com/archives/2006/10/time_for_the_ye.html (http://www.websnark.com/archives/2006/10/time_for_the_ye.html) so you can get a better understanding as to why Wikipedia does this. Ditto for anyone else confused by why this happened.
Get my name right. I hate that misspelling and I get it all the time.:smallannoyed:
Okay, I had already read the article, and even have discussed the topic with Eric Burns in person. I am extraordinarily well versed in the history of this idiotic debate, believe me.
The point you're missing is that Erfworld is notable, even by Wikipedia's ridonkulous standards. We have those multiple, independent, notable sources of publication they require. We don't need any better than just Time Magazine's official blog, and Dragon Magazine's February issue, but we have plenty more.
Erfworld should not have to prove its notability. Its noteworthiness should be bleeding obvious. It's here!
But it can prove it. It has proven it. It will continue to re-prove it. There was no case for a speedy delete. That's a guy acting on a personal agenda.
With the help of interested readers, we will continue to fight for the article's legitimate place on Wikipedia. I suspect the fight is not over, but I hope it is.
In the meantime I have gone from adoring Wikipedia and sending them money to spitting on the ground at the mention of the name.
It's getting messy around my computer desk.
Raistlin1040
2007-02-14, 12:14 AM
*grins* Wikipedia. Wikipedia!
All joking and wiki-worship aside, Erfworld will make it into an article in time. OotS didn't have an article in it's first 25 strips and neither did Ctrl+Alt+Del or PvP or Penny Arcade ect. Give it time. It'll happen
Beleriphon
2007-02-14, 12:16 AM
I've actually read the notability requirements. Batman doesn't meet them, at least as far as the personal history of fictional character goes. Who's with me and my attempts to get the article about Batman deleted? Yeah? No? Dang....
The Extinguisher
2007-02-14, 01:05 AM
I'll help, as long as we try and get the article on Wikipedia deleted. We'll hold them to thier crazy standerds.
Mawhrin Skel
2007-02-14, 01:06 AM
:p it is really easy to set up your own wiki. I have two :) if you can't host it at gitp itself, why not put it up on www.erfworld.com and get some mileage out of the domain name?
Hosting still needs to be paid for. Advertising is the obvious way to do it, which increases the workload for the admin.
If I were to start a wiki I hoped one day could be big, I'd probably start it somewhere like Wikia and then if it is successful move it. Not all free wiki services enable database dumps; IIRC Wikia does (at least Wikicities did).
Even so, it could save bandwidth, since that measures what is transferred.
If an article takes up significant bandwidth without excessive images, then it is getting lots of hits. If it is getting many hits, then many people are interested in its subject (or the search engine is booped). If many people are interested, then the subject is clearly notable.
Craptasticness of their data, huh? I beleive there have been actual studies that show the error rate of wikipedia is not much higher than that of Brittanica(the most respected modern encyclopedia).
There was a widely reported "study" published in the journal Nature, written not by scientists/statisticians but by journalists and that was not subjected to peer review. Britannica complained bitterly about it.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/12/16/wikipedia_britannica_science_comparison/
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/23/britannica_wikipedia_nature_study/
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/25/britannica_wikipedia_nature/
My personal opinion is that Wikipedia is a good reference (especially for any subject that could be described as "geeky"), but needs to be taken with a large pinch of salt. I link to its articles often, but I wouldn't recommend school children to read it, as they may lack the critical skills needed to work with it. The fact that some of my own edits survive scares me mightily :smalltongue: . Arguably its best asset is the linkage to sources that actually are expert and reliable.
TinSoldier
2007-02-14, 01:10 AM
Miko (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miko_Miyazaki) has her own article! Why not Erfworld! Jeez!
Uzraid
2007-02-14, 01:23 AM
Honestly, I think you should let Wikipedia and its editors go, er, boop themselves. Given the density of reference and texture of Erfworld (at a mere 24 pages), a standalone wiki is, in my opinion, the best way to catalog this extraordinary world. The Wikia site seems at least open to the possibility of hosting the comprehensive resource that would be needed to chronicle the development of Erfworld.
Seriously, Rob, let wiki have its fun. There's no way they'd be able to accept something adequately complete for Erfworld anyway.
'Course, that could be the wine talking.
Cheers.
U
Skel: I maintain a site at 95k on the alexa ratings, and the main traffic to my site is people downloading images... the bandwidth is about 50-100gb a month, if I recall correctly. I pay for it easily out of donations, and this is from 15 year old kids with no jobs. A wiki at erfworld.com could support itself very easily through donations or through erfworld merchandising.
Also, adminning advertisements is not hard... Jamie and Rob don't necessarily have to manage the webmaster end of things.
Rinion
2007-02-14, 02:23 AM
Interesting - I think Aaron Brenneman was also the guy who nominated my webcomic's article for deletion. It porbably didn't fit Wikipedia's requirements anyway, but no one had had a problem with it being there for several months. Until he came across it, of course.
Maybe he's got some kind of superiority complex?
I think we should start a webcomic wiki. Seriously. We can host it for free on Wikia. (There's already a wiki about comics, but only non-webcomic ones.) We can use the already-existing webcomic articles on Wikipedia, and then fill in the gaps with our own.
comixpedia, rinion. http://www.comixpedia.org/index.php/Main_Page
the issue here is not that there are not places that will talk about comics, but that a major, theoretically openly-editable source has somewhat arbitrarily started deciding that some very significant webcomics (and many other articles) are not in fact significant, and many people who share huge and important web communities are becoming pissed off at wikipedia - another huge and important web community. In a way, people are basically taking it as a sign of WP saying "Haha we are number one, screw you cuz you ain't notable to massive chunks of the rest of the internet. This is not entirely my own view, but I can see where people would feel that way.
WarriorTribble
2007-02-14, 02:54 AM
For articles that aren't looked up frequently, a deletion can require signifigantly more bandwidth because people who wouldn't normally look at the article will look at it as a part of the deletion process, and all the edits cause a high reload rate as people have to view->edit->view after edit at the very least. Anyone who'd look for the article anyways will still be using (perhaps more) bandwidth. I can assure you that the deletion of articles is not for technical reasons.True, although in the long run I think it'll use more to keep it up. Still it's probably more like an attempt to discourage new articles from being made.
OT: Hmm I see Pun-Pun is no more... sad.
Cybren
2007-02-14, 03:11 AM
no offense but erfworld isn't exactly notable, and i don't think "notability" is something it can siphon from Order of the Stick just by being on the same site. It's only got 25 pages. Yeah, the people who visit this site have heard of it. And then if they liked it they spread it around, but it's still only got 25 pages. If anything Erfworld is worthy of mention in an article on the order of the stick to give context to the nature of the website it's hosted on but, I think it's kind of soon for its own article.
Scientivore
2007-02-14, 03:22 AM
I was once a great fan of Wikipedia. I donated money to them. But for about a year now, I have seen that it has some really serious problems, and not necessarily the ones everyone thinks. It's not that any bozo can add junk content, or vandalize an article. They have a handle on that. It's that any petty little troll can spend his/her days deleting real content for fun.
Half the webcomics world is fighting this battle, and as far as I can tell, we're losing. :smallfurious:
I believe that the problem is even more intractable than that. I believe that the individuals involved are allowed to act as they do because they are serving (short-sighted) institutional needs. I haven't come up with a short explanation yet so I put my super-long theory (http://scientivore.deviantart.com/journal/11806420/) on deviantART, the one place where I happen to have a webjournal.
Cybren, in two months, Erfworld has garnered notice from about half a dozen major figures in webcomics: not only is it written by a well-known and syndicated author, it was started on a strong recommendation from Rich Burlew; Howard Tayler recommended it within the first few weeks of its creation; it has been favourably written-up by Lev Grossman; Hawk on Applegeeks made propz to it; it has been reviewed on Fleen... just about the only places that it hasn't been brought up yet are at the WCCA because it is too new, and websnark.
In Erfworld's case, the lack of time it has been around is actually a greater sign of its notability. In only two months it has attributed more solid notability indications than some webcomics ever manage in their lifetimes.
If you want a semi-objective judge of notability, that should satisfy most criteria. Just saying "It's new" is not enough to disclaim noteworthiness.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-14, 04:00 AM
Agreed. Part of the problem is, I think, Notability itself is a massively flawed concept that pretends to be objective, but is in fact completely subjective.
Under the current standards for notability, a major car crash in a rural area is something that is notable, but a web comic that 3 million people view everyday isn't, unless it is covered by some other form of media. So is a car wreck that people are going to forget about within days more worthy of a permanent article?
I think certain Wikipedia editors got ahold of this new Notability standard and have gone berzerk. Their arguments are entirely subjective, and their demands are basically: Research this or feel my Delete button's wrath!!! Or more typically: Feel my Delete Button's Wrath!!! Now go research this.
Wikipedia should be about collecting useful information, and what they need to be straining out of it is not stuff they consider unimportant (non-notable) but things that aren't true, can't be be verified, or could not concievably be useful to anyone, ever.
Regardless, Erfworld *SHOULD* be restored. It even meets Wikipedia's crazy standards for Notability. There is no well reasoned argument why it should not, and we just have to find someone with some clout to acknowledge this.
Renegade Paladin
2007-02-14, 04:22 AM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Turn_Signals_on_a_Land_Raider
Note the standards laid out by JzG: Top 5,000 on Alexa? And the original nomination was made on the Google test? That's just unreasonable.
And that's not even going into the fact that Alexa shouldn't be used to count anything anyway. The spyware (and don't kid yourselves; that's what it is) is blocked by any reasonable browser, that is to say not Internet Explorer (aka Internet Exploder aka Idiot Exploiter). Alexa doesn't count my presence on this website (or TSOALR, for that matter) because I have the presence of mind to use Firefox. There are millions upon millions of Internet users who use secure browsers. Therefore Alexa isn't much of a measure of anything, particularly for websites frequented by tech-savvy people.
Karellen
2007-02-14, 06:42 AM
I guess the thing about webcomics is that they're mostly interesting to people who read webcomics. That is to say, they're still, currently, a niche artform. Especially so because most webcomics tend to be concerned with a niche subjects and aimed at niche audiences. Which really shows in the written wikipedia articles, too.
This problem compounds with that the articles are written so as to interest only people who are already interested in the subject. This isn't only the problem with webcomic articles, but most other subjects that have less realworld presence than online presence. Take anime. When I check out an article of, say, Neon Genesis Evangelion, a series which actually has cultural significance, what I'd like to find is a detailed account of its influence to popular culture and anime, because that's what would interest the casual reader who wants to put the show into context. But in fact, a lot of what's to be found there is detailed plot synopsis, elaborate character profiles - basically, things that are of no significance to people who aren't fans. (Actually, nowadays it's a lot better than it used to be.)
There is merit in catering to information that's mostly relevant to fringe audiences, but I respect the notion that Wikipedia mostly tries to cater to subjects and presentations of subjects that are relevant to large audiences in an encyclopedic manner. An article that consists solely of a plot synopsis and character profiles isn't going to convince anyone of its significance to general audiences. Which, yes, makes for pretty arbitrary means of categorizing stuff, but the cultural meaningfulness can't be quantified numerically. On the whole, I am sympathetic of the notion that the vast majority of webcomics aren't actually culturally significant to the general population, and shouldn't have a major Wikipedia presence.
I happen to be a player of Go; ever hear about that? It's the oldest and the second-most played game in the world. Anyway, Wikipedia has an article on the game, but only pretty sporadic and short articles on famous professional players and whatnot, because - and it's as simple as this - it's information that's not relevant to anybody who isn't actively interested in the game. But there's a wiki called Sensei's Library, just for people who play the game, which is full of all kinds of background information, player profiles, esoteric knowledge anyone might be interested in. I think it's quite fair that none of this stuff is on Wikipedia.
As it is, webcomics are only sporadically relevant to mainstream culture; Penny Arcade is particularily notable, not just because it's read by tons of people, but because it's become an icon of gamer culture, specifically at a time when gaming has become mainstream. Similarily, Megatokyo is an icon of anime and manga at a time they became relatively mainstream. Most webcomics, though aren't like that, and critically, webcomics as an independent artform in general don't have mainstream awareness. There's no page called "List of Famous Fanfiction Writers" on Wikipedia, because that'd be just silly. That's what most people think about most pages on webcomics.
Erloas
2007-02-14, 09:52 AM
I don't really agree with Wikipedia's deletion campaign, for whatever reason it is. I'm sure it is a more significant cost to maintain then most people would assume. Sure any one article doesn't take up that much space or bandwidth, but when you have thousands of questionable relivent articles then that can have a measurable impact on costs.
I noticed there was an article on "meh" on wikipedia a few months ago (when it came up on the OOTS forum) and it doesn't seem to be there anymore. While it was handy to find information on the word and the fact that it seems to have came from a throw away line in a Simpson's episode and now has fairly wide spread use, it really is mostly irrelivent. It isn't the sort of thing that has any reason to be cataloged expect as useless trivia.
One other main point that has to be looked at is the image that Wikipedia has, and there is no way to qualify that. They have to keep credibility or they don't really have anything going for them. What is the point of a resource of information if they have no standards applied to that information, no one would allow it to be used in anything that a resource such as an encylopedia would normally be acceptable for. If Wikipedia carries 1000s of articles on every minor thing that ever happens on the net, within weeks or days of it happening and not having time to develope a real history or impact, then it strains the credibility of all their other information as well.
Erfworld is pretty good, and it does have a lot of readers. But if it had started completely on its own, on a site without a huge active fanbase already then it wouldn't have nearly as many readers as it does. People have mentioned it a lot because it was hear and easily noticed by people that probably wouldn't have found it for a long time if it where on its own. Its also hard to track the increase in readers to GiantITP in respect to the addition of Erfworld because there were other things going on at the time. Most significately is that OOTS has gone back to a very perdictable schedule, which it wasn't on for most of the summer, and that some of the best (and most fan active) comics from OOTS have been posted in the same time that Erfworld has been added to the site. Like the OOTS comics that had their discussion threads hit 60k views in 2-3 days, which is significatly more then the average comics. I'm just saying Erfworld's addition to GiantITP did not happen in a vacuum so its hard to say how many people are visiting because of Erfworld and how many would have been visiting anyway.
Erfworld is also still very new and still really hasn't proven itself. There are plenty of pretty good authors that release some books that aren't any good, so you can't just say because the author is good that everything they write is going to be good. (same can be said for actors/directors and movies, game developers and games, musicians and music, etc) Pclips and Jami may have success on their own outside of Erfworld but that doesn't guarentee anything at all about Erfworld.
I'm not saying I'm in favor of the deletion of Erfworld or any other webcomics, but I can see legitimate reasons why it is being done. (Even if its not actually being done in a legitimate way).
Lord Zentei
2007-02-14, 09:56 AM
Craptasticness of their data, huh? I beleive there have been actual studies that show the error rate of wikipedia is not much higher than that of Brittanica(the most respected modern encyclopedia).
The study you reference was biased. Not only did it only focus on the abstracts of Britannica's articles, and thus neglected to account for the full depth of Britannica, but it also failed to consider the import of the errors in question. That is, Britannica errors were minor, the Wiki errors were not.
WhiteNoise
2007-02-14, 10:27 AM
As is often the case Statistics and studies can be used to prove anything in this case that Wiki is as good as britannica, (a patent lie if ever i saw one)
but even above and beyond there does seem to be a general trend growing on wiki to delete first and ask questions later, AND YET ALSO as several posts have hilighted oddities that i cant see the objective reason for notability
Wemics as a case in point, im sure the great giant is only waiting to put them in an OotSas the race that is
1)Never used as a PC
2)Rarely encountered as an enemy
3)Almost totaly absent in the fiction of DnD worlds and in general,
In other words its a who what? race,
In fact i can almost see the Order going what are you? and them replying were Wemicks, come on we have our own Wiki page how can you not know about us?
But then a speech given about the Great Failure of Wikipedia seems to talk about an issue that might be relevant (only read part of the transcript alot of ranting but some thought out things in there)
As it stands let the dice roll Erfworld will stand on its own not even the ArkenDeletebutton can stop it
Lord Zentei
2007-02-14, 11:11 AM
The study you reference was biased. Not only did it only focus on the abstracts of Britannica's articles, and thus neglected to account for the full depth of Britannica, but it also failed to consider the import of the errors in question. That is, Britannica errors were minor, the Wiki errors were not.
And here is a reference for this fact:
Linka (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/23/britannica_wikipedia_nature_study/).
EDIT: and upon re-reading that article, it seems that the study even stitched together bits of Britannica articles and inserted their own material. Wow. :smalleek:
pclips
2007-02-14, 11:58 AM
http://www.archive.org/details/20060408-jscott-wikipedia explains, in one 40-minute lecture, everything that is going on (and going wrong) with Wikipedia. I believe every single word of it, because it fits beautifully with my own longterm observations, and because I find Jason Scott's other essays and lectures to be insightful, rational, well-considered, and accurate.
In this lecture, he touches on the great war between inclusionists and deletionists, how Wikipedia's own visionaries have consistently compromised their ideals and principles when those ideals did not work in real-world practice, and explains exactly how people like Aaron Brenneman are destroying Wikipedia from the inside (and the psychology which drives them).
He calls the notability requirement "the cancer of Wikipedia," and he is completely correct.
I have not been so blown away by 40 minutes on the Internet since the Spore demo. I'm going to be thinking about it for a long time.
Listen to this lecture if you are at all interested in what is really happening at Wikipedia.
This is sad. Obviously with enough time and growth Erfworld will get its Wikipedia page. What happened to "It's a comic for the long term"? What happened to "It's not about the jokes, the story needs time to develop?" What happened to "You can't compare Erfworld's 20 or so strips to OOTS's 400 + strips" and all the other cries that spring up every time someone criticizes anything.
I mean, yeah, I can see the comic improving slowly from the mess that it started with, and I can appreciate that somewhere in there there will in fact come out a good story eventually, but you are HALLUCINATING if you're trying to tell me that at 25 strips, Erfworld has achieved all the story and development and recognition it was going to achieve, and is now the equal to OOTS or PvP or Penny Arcade. I mean, seriously? Come on.
And here we have the author publicly flailing his arms and making a tizzy about how his 25-page couple-months-old comic is responsible for the traffic of giantitp.com, and how it's the top 1% of all websites or whatever and how iif any comic is notable this one is, just as notable the others who have years and hundreds of strips of history. What?? Honestly, all does for me is give me an insight into the author's personality more than anything.
The whole point behind Wikipedia is that you shouldn't need to fight for your own article. By making such a fuss and fighting it yourself and with your fans, you're essentially just proving their point for them. Maybe you should take a page from Rich Burlew and learn that ignoring criticism and keeping and quiet, strong front by saying little if anything, goes a lot longer ways than the displays you've treated us to here.
pclips
2007-02-14, 12:05 PM
This is sad. ...
You're simply wrong on all counts, Harr. And I don't have time to debate you. I'll summarize one more time.
1. Under Wikipedia's appalling (but established) criteria for notability, Erfworld passes every test.
2. Wikipedia has developed tremendously obtuse criteria, which need to be changed to reflect reality.
I REALLY enjoy your comic, but I pretty much agree with Harr. You are not acting cool, dude.
WhiteNoise
2007-02-14, 12:34 PM
how many times does the writer have to point it out
(perhaps a little bit of non standard text will help)
UNDER THEIR OWN CRITERIA IT IS NOTABLE
Karellen
2007-02-14, 12:40 PM
As far as being on Wikipedia goes, it seems to have become some sort of matter of vanity to webcomic authors, internet page admins, what have you - which, honestly, is definitely one of the things warping Wikipedia. Getting to Wikipedia shouldn't be regarded as some manner of definitional, universal acceptance of prominence. The Internet is not the world, much less is Wikipedia. Effort and work should be aimed at making webcomics more accepted among the general public, and oddly enough, Wikipedia is not the place to start.
pclips
2007-02-14, 01:10 PM
The deletion-monkey who killed the article seems to accept the cites put in by Erk and the other helpers from this thread. Thank you all for your help. :smallsmile:
Remaining stuff to be done would be just to add the Dragon magazine cite (I'll try and get a copy today so I can provide the info), and clean up the article to be "more encyclopedic."
I think what they mean by that is "more information on the background of the comic itself, the history of the project, the significant aspects of the project, etc." But those can be problematic.
For example, this is the first case of a major-traffic webcomic site adding a second webcomic to its line-up. That's a fact, and if more comics do it, maybe a piece of webcomics history. But I can't see a way to cite it. There's all kinds of backstory to the project, which Jamie and I have never talked about anywhere, so nobody even knows it but us. However, that stuff eventually will belong in the article about Erfworld, because it would be of interest to people who want to know about Erfworld, or webcomics creation/history in general.
So, I am going to unstick this thread, but please use it as a kind of second talk page for the Erfworld article. As I become aware of other cites, I will put them up here, where interested parties can decide to add them to the Wikipedia article. Thanks again for the help.
There are also a handful of admins who have stopped reading deletion nominations, and are just deleting things as they come up.
Ree-hee-heeally?
I suggest that the entry on "Wikipedia" be nominated for deletion. After all it's biased for itself and, like most webcomics, has an exclusively online presence (a big 'notability'-no-no)...
Darth Paradox
2007-02-14, 01:47 PM
I put in links to the Erfworld entry in the PartiallyClips and List of Webcomics entries. I don't know if it's appropriate to put a link in the OotS entry - I don't think so, but I could be wrong. GitP doesn't have its own WP entry anyway.
I suspect two links should be enough to satisfy the "links to" criterion.
Steward
2007-02-14, 02:09 PM
There are also a handful of admins who have stopped reading deletion nominations, and are just deleting things as they come up.
Did you just make that up?
(a big 'notability'-no-no)...
Where does it say that anywhere in the rules? Erfworld certainly does fit the criteria for notability as I can understand them from the page, and nothing about it being online disqualifies it from that. User Erk already listed a recognitions from third-party sources that indicate that Erfworld is being noticed within the webcomic community. I see no reason why it shouldn't have an article, just because it's online.
ikanreed
2007-02-14, 03:11 PM
The deletion-monkey who killed the article seems to accept the cites put in by Erk and the other helpers from this thread
*snip*
I know you're the writer of this webcomic, and all, but you shouldn't be so insulting to someone who just made a freaking mistake. Treating those you've had a minor disagreement with as some kind of enemy is just not right at all.
Whatever happened to taking the high road?
Brickwall
2007-02-14, 03:13 PM
Deletion-monkey is not an insult unless it's true, my friend.
ikanreed
2007-02-14, 03:14 PM
I put in links to the Erfworld entry in the PartiallyClips and List of Webcomics entries. I don't know if it's appropriate to put a link in the OotS entry - I don't think so, but I could be wrong. GitP doesn't have its own WP entry anyway.
I suspect two links should be enough to satisfy the "links to" criterion.
Sorry to double post. I was the one who put the non-linkedto template on the erfworld article. The point of that particular template is not to indicate that there's something wrong with the article, just that no one had though to link to it at that point. Not every maintainance template is about deleting things. I just want to help get this article up to snuff.
ikanreed
2007-02-14, 03:22 PM
Deletion-monkey is not an insult unless it's true, my friend.
Uh... you have that sentence backwards. You should really watch the effect those double negatives have on your meaning.
So you're saying this person is actually a monkey? Attaching a needlessly negative connotation to a word that is apt makes it an insult.
It'd be the difference between me saying "you're mistaken about your statement" and "you're stupidly mistaken about your statement".
I always feel troubled when people make a point of demonizing those they disagree with.
Karellen
2007-02-14, 03:51 PM
http://www.archive.org/details/20060408-jscott-wikipedia explains, in one 40-minute lecture, everything that is going on (and going wrong) with Wikipedia. I believe every single word of it, because it fits beautifully with my own longterm observations, and because I find Jason Scott's other essays and lectures to be insightful, rational, well-considered, and accurate.
I listened to article and it occured to me that at no point does he really argue whether he's for or against deleting articles - it's irrelevant to his point. It's the controversy between inclusionists and deletionists, the lack of efficient and unambiguous rules and the hazy, complex, byrocratical, inconsistent system of power that are the source of the problem, not really people wanting to delete stuff, since he really projects it as a reasonable point of view. On the whole, if anything, he's arguing that Wikipedia just plain can't work because humans, on the whole, have a power fetish, which really goes for... everybody involved with Wikipedia.
WhiteNoise
2007-02-14, 03:54 PM
i must admit when it comes to wiki im bipolar,
The emotional part of me that sees the stated goal of reference to sum of all knowledge is Inclusionist it says if you want a wiki page on your cat getting in a tree certainly after all the SUM OF ALL HUMAN KNOWLEDGE cannot be fettered or limited by what is considered relevant and notable, its all part of the SUM and therefore should all be in
the Logical Part of me says well anything deeply personal is more blog worthy than wiki worthy and if to make it usable people want to impose limits and filters i then become Deletionist but at that point to my mind DELETE HALF OF WIKIPEDIA! as half of it is on the surface, Biased, Non Objective, Non Noteworthy,
So i presume those who disagree with Pclips response to being deleted reinstated deleted etc are Deletionist who belive that things have to EARN a place in the sum of human knowledge,
But how do they explain the thing that bugs me about the whole matter, the half handed way its handled in that articles that fulfuill the criterion for being noteworthy (Erfworld due to being referenced and mentioned in print in Dragon as well as elsewhere) yet Knuckles the Echidna and random small town are not deleted,
surely we can all agree the system of admin review and deletion is a bad one and that Hit count over a year or two should be the criterion for deletion and not a whim of a person who by his biology cannot be totally impartial
Darth Paradox
2007-02-14, 03:56 PM
Sorry to double post. I was the one who put the non-linkedto template on the erfworld article. The point of that particular template is not to indicate that there's something wrong with the article, just that no one had though to link to it at that point. Not every maintainance template is about deleting things. I just want to help get this article up to snuff.
No, I agree. I was just noting that I'd changed it. I've since removed the template. If you hadn't had that template up, I wouldn't have noticed that it wasn't on the List of Webcomics, nor linked from the PClips article. So the template did its job. (I didn't know how those templates get set - whether they're automatic or not...)
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-14, 04:59 PM
http://www.archive.org/details/20060408-jscott-wikipedia explains, in one 40-minute lecture, everything that is going on (and going wrong) with Wikipedia.
Thanks for this! I haven't been following Wikipedia as closely, but this explains certain phenomenon I've observed there. I recommend everyone listen before the comment on how great or how terrible WP is. It's not a 'why Wikipedia is broken right now' as much as it is 'why Wikipedia's concept is causing problems for it now, and where it is heading.'
There are also a handful of admins who have stopped reading deletion nominations, and are just deleting things as they come up.Did you just make that up?
I wish I had, but it is the impression I get from events like this one (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review#Web_Cartoonist.27s_Choic e_Awards), where an article about something that has been featured in a New York Times article and on a major cable TV show was deleted and all deletion debate closed after a matter of a bit over a day from the references being posted. I was using hyperbole, I will admit: brenneman clearly read the log and just decided that despite a majority vote and references that met WP:N the article was still deletion-worthy, rather than deleting it out of hand. When I said what I did, I was still not 100% clear on how the deletion process worked.
Note that this is the article for the booping Web Cartoonists' Choice Awards. It's still down, incidentally.
I know you're the writer of this webcomic, and all, but you shouldn't be so insulting to someone who just made a freaking mistake. Treating those you've had a minor disagreement with as some kind of enemy is just not right at all.I agree with you on principle, and if this was a one-off I'd be on your side, but there are just too many people shooting first and asking questions later (quite literally!) to want to give them the benefit of the doubt. On WP I'll still [[WP:AGF|Assume Good Faith]]:smallwink:, but here I have to say after talking to some of these guys that I think - whether they admit it or not - they just don't like web-presence (note, not just webcomic) articles in general. Or they just love to follow rules rather than think about the meaning of the rules.
WhiteNoise
2007-02-14, 06:38 PM
but then following the letter of a rule rather than its spirit is the first recourse of someone formed by modern bureacracy the principle of
Just do whats written and noone can sue you
it reduces and biases against original thinking and acting on spirit and intention as if you get it wrong you just opened yourself up to law suit and claim, but by following the wording of the rules to the letter then only the person who wrote the rules is subject to legal procedures, also if as asserted there are Jerks on the inside trying to pull it down because they can (these people do exist you know) then they also would hide amongst the just doing my job people by doing the same thing,
To be honest i thank Pclips for this entire thread and his highlighting an issue that goes way beyond web comics but is still also about web comics, i had known and felt there was a fundamental flaw and risk inherent in Wikipedia's stated goal though now im alot more savy about it and how it came about,
Id like to be an optimisit and trust in peoples goodness and virtue but ultimatly id rather be a pessimist who is occasionally surprised than be constantly let down
pclips
2007-02-14, 07:13 PM
I know you're the writer of this webcomic, and all, but you shouldn't be so insulting to someone who just made a freaking mistake. Treating those you've had a minor disagreement with as some kind of enemy is just not right at all.
Whatever happened to taking the high road?
He did not make a mistake. He has deleted MANY webcomics articles, and even the article for the Webcomics Creators Choice Awards. He is driven by a vendetta against webcomics, and because he is an admin, he has gotten away with causing a MASSIVE amount of damage.
but then following the letter of a rule rather than its spirit is the first recourse of someone formed by modern bureacracy the principle of
Just do whats written and noone can sue you
An interesting observation, since Wikipedia asserts that it is not a bureaucracy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_is_not_a_bureaucracy#Wikipedia _is_not_a_bureaucracy). Heh.
taigen
2007-02-14, 09:49 PM
I think the point made in the audio link is very valid, and while he does focus on the controversy itself, its pretty clear he is against deletionism, as he is holding Wikipedia to its mission, ie the sum of all human knowledge. Just because Forbes magazine has not mentioned erfwords doesn't mean it doesn't exist... after all I am typeing on its forum so I am fairly certain I am in fact not halucinateing and in fact at the very site hosting it. The notability arguement is very flawed. I can see a very good reason to need citations and sources so that the wikipedia can stay factual, but to find something as unworthy to be in the sum of all human knowledge, just because its popular only in its own subculture, is completely wrong.
I have absolutely no interest in football... and I could have cared less about the results of the superbowl this year (or any years past or future). However, I am not going to go on a deletion spree of all football related entrys on wikipedia starting with the superbowl entry itself because 'it doesn't have impact on me'.
Its up to debate on whether certain adminitrators of Wiki are out to destroy it intentionally.. but some are perhaps just in their own ignorance.
Wikipedia may not be turning into usenet, but it is turning into a forum. Forums always hit certain problems.. and they are rather predictable and almost cliche. You will have the actual usefull posters, the flamers, the critics, the haters, the admins, the overzealous admins, and eventually it all falls apart unless the people who are takeing care of it do a very good job. The fact that this is a comic and has a special interest outside of the interaction of the webcommunity helps... but most communities based entirely around the interaction of its members (that includes game sites, clans, and things like wikipedia) eventually the incompatabilities between members and the disinterest of the people keeping it going eventually conspire to make the whole thing come crashing down. I have seen it over and over and I am sure I am not the only one.
Wikipedia's top admins need to take a good long look at the current version of peer review they have set up and then fix it. Admins that continually delete and target articles subjectively need to be shut down, and the whole idea of notabiliy needs to be reviewed.
One aspect of the current notability system I find fatally flawed is if they maintain that the system is completly objective, then every source of notability needs to be looked at from the standpoint that they are not notable until they are proven notable by the same system.
Lets look at this paradox:
The content itself has been the subject of multiple and non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the site itself.
This criterion includes published works in all forms, such as newspaper and magazine articles, books, television documentaries, and published reports by consumer watchdog organizations.[4] except for the following:
Media re-prints of press releases and advertising for the content or site.[5]
Trivial coverage, such as (1) newspaper articles that simply report the internet address, (2) newspaper articles that simply report the times at which such content is updated or made available, (3) a brief summary of the nature of the content or the publication of internet addresses and site or (4) content descriptions in internet directories or online stores.
The website or content has won a well-known and independent award from either a publication or organization.[6]
The content is distributed via a medium which is both well known and independent of the creators, either through an online newspaper or magazine, an online publisher, or an online broadcaster.[7]
-----
Now in order for this to be objective and not subjective, and going by the current precident where the administrators don't count any source that isn't itself notable, we have to assume that all sources are not notable until proven otherwise. Starting at a blank slate though, nothing is notable, and by this system nothing can become notable... because first it has to appear in a source that /is/ notable. Not even Time is notable, because you can't prove it notable until you prove any of the sources of its notability are notable, and to prove any of those sources notable, you have to prove its sources... etc. In essence, the whole system is flawed as an objective system. At some point, the admins just have to decide that 'this' or 'that' is notable, and from there decide that this things it references are too. Nevermind that Time is notable just because of its massive reader base, and its effect on the perceptions of many. That is not enough to make it notable by the definitions Wikipedia uses.
Nicely written, Taigen. That is one of the principles behind WP not being a bureaucracy, in theory: one should be able to say, at some point, "Well, the WCCA is one of the pinnacle awards of webcomics. Clearly it is notable, unless all of webcomics as a whole are not". However, lately the idea has focused on a handful of print sources being all that counts.
The Extinguisher
2007-02-15, 01:56 AM
I stil think we should put the Wikipedia article up for deletion.
When was the last time you have seen a mention of Wikipedia on anything notable, that wasn't, as they say, "trivial"
Renegade Paladin
2007-02-15, 04:56 AM
I stil think we should put the Wikipedia article up for deletion.
When was the last time you have seen a mention of Wikipedia on anything notable, that wasn't, as they say, "trivial"
Well, it made the front page of my local paper last December. The story was on how much it sucked. :smalltongue:
Tnetalque
2007-02-15, 05:16 AM
Ugh. The problem with wikipedia isn't so much that anyone can edit it but that there are tons of editors and people with mod-like powers that have huge agendas against/for certain articles. There was a huge debate over an article for the "musician" Jeffree Star - who I don't like at all, but I do realize he has got a lot of fans and has been featured in several magazines, and that there was a big common interest in an article about him.
So did some other people think, and we quoted the only counter-arguments, being "he's digusting" and "he's a media whore" (which he kind of is, but that's irrelevant), and kept debating over this. The older debates usually got deleted, and our quotings were claimed to be lies, and then the entire thing was locked from ever editing. I got tired of wikipedia by that time.
Scientivore
2007-02-15, 06:46 AM
One other main point that has to be looked at is the image that Wikipedia has, and there is no way to qualify that. They have to keep credibility or they don't really have anything going for them. What is the point of a resource of information if they have no standards applied to that information, no one would allow it to be used in anything that a resource such as an encylopedia would normally be acceptable for. If Wikipedia carries 1000s of articles on every minor thing that ever happens on the net, within weeks or days of it happening and not having time to develope a real history or impact, then it strains the credibility of all their other information as well.
I find it interesting that you did not articulate the mechanism by which insignificant (but true!) entries purportedly reduce Wikipedia's credibility. You simply stated it as a fact. Other people have given reasons that just don't make sense; for example, if the problem were the potential for errors to go unchecked on rarely-viewed pages, then the rational thing would be to direct the solution toward rarely-viewed pages. Since that's not what the notability criterion does, that's probably not the problem that they were really addressing.
(Side note: I don't even see the problem there. By what mechanism would rarely-viewed pages have a lower ratio of error correction to pageviews? Wouldn't an error on a frequently-viewed page be seen by more people before it could be corrected? Whose intellectual integrity are they worrying about, that they are concerned about the length of time that an error sits uncorrected on disk? OMG, is the Wikipedia database conscious now?!? :smalleek: )
At the risk of constructing a straw man, I suspect that the real reasoning is unspoken, unconscious and goes something like this: "Traditional encyclopedias are credible. Traditional encyclopedias apply standards of significance to their entries. Therefore, entries on trivial topics reduce credibility."
Regardless, it just doesn't make sense to me. "Credibility" means "believability". The believability of an information source is not based on the significance of the topics that it covers. Its believability is based on the consistently verifiable veracity of the information that it imparts. [1] So, when you say "credibility", I am certain that you must mean something else: I think that you mean "respectability".
I believe that Wikipedia (as an institution) is insecure about respect, so it is blindly aping the cultural traditions of encyclopedias. However, traditional encyclopedias have an entirely different cost structure. Their notability criteria are based on necessity: each entry must meet quite a high threshold of value creation in order to be economically justifiable.
With web publishing and user-created content, Wikipedia has a completely different economic model. So, its notability standards are a misapplied tradition, uprooted from objective reality and reconstructed on a foundation of whimsy.
That's still not the real problem. Institutions, like individuals, can possess unexamined false assumptions that cause self-limiting (or even self-destructive) behavior. Wikipedia, as an institution, appears to be utterly incompetent at coming to grips with those inevitable internal contradictions. That's the problem.
I believe that the "Wikipedia jihad against webcomics" is best understood as a neurotic attempt by Wikipedia's institutional metamind to resolve the cognitive dissonance caused by its notability criterion. Since (for whatever reason) it's not re-examining its assumptions, the only alternative is to eliminate its conscious awareness of the evidence that contradicts those assumptions. In practice, that means deleting entries about economically viable web presences of niche interest, since the existence of those businesses shines a spotlight on the gaping chasm beneath their notability criterion, where traditional encyclopedias have solid foundation.
[1] Please insert your own example of prominent historical claims that were significant, unverifiable and ultimately disastrously false. They tend to be emotionally loaded and I didn't want to distract from the topic at hand.
pclips
2007-02-15, 09:20 AM
That was a brilliant post, Scientivore. Insecurity drives the creation/continuation of the notability policy (and much of the other stuff listed under What Wikipedia is Not (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not), and motivates the deletionists to hack and slash real articles about subjects of real-world significance.
SteveMB
2007-02-15, 09:53 AM
Since (for whatever reason) it's not re-examining its assumptions, the only alternative is to eliminate its conscious awareness of the evidence that contradicts those assumptions.
So, has their AE-35 unit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001:_A_Space_Odyssey_%28film%29) failed yet...?
Be that as it may, there is no reason to lose control of ones emotions and act as if someone just defiled the mother of god. I my humble opinion :smallamused:
Lord Zentei
2007-02-15, 10:42 AM
Be that as it may, there is no reason to lose control of ones emotions and act as if someone just defiled the mother of god. I my humble opinion :smallamused:
Exaggerate, much?
"Lose control of one's emotions" and "defile the mother of god", wow.
pclips
2007-02-15, 11:47 AM
Be that as it may, there is no reason to lose control of ones emotions and act as if someone just defiled the mother of god. I my humble opinion :smallamused:
We fight for what we believe in. I believe webcomics are important, and that my work has value. I base those beliefs on objective criteria, though the amount I care about the matter is totally subjective and self-interested.
Every day, I see things happening which I disagree with...in politics, culture, the media, etc. I choose to fight only the battles that matter, the ones where fighting can potentially affect the outcome.
Wikipedia is failing because the system creates Aaron Brennemans, who destroy its value from the inside. I care about that. I'm disgusted. I'm sorry for Wikipedia's lost potential. But I can't fight that.
I can't even fight what the Aaron Brennemans are doing to webcomics, which is not just a crime and a shame, but hurts my own field.
But this one battle, where my own stuff is involved... That I can (and should, and did) fight, by putting out the call for help here.
If I weren't right about Erfworld being notable, there wouldn't have been so many people who were willing to spend their time and energy to respond to the attack, and they wouldn't have been able to make the case for notability by Wikipedia's ridonkulous standards.
Wikipedia matters, whether it ought to or not. It comes up in the first few results of most Google searches. I don't have the option to make believe I don't care about Wikipedia (http://www.halfpixel.com/2007/02/15/delete-wikipedia/). I had to fight.
If I got too much of a mad on while doing it...well, call me David Banner without the radiation. Not having the luxury of hulking out, I just "tool out" from time to time.
Remind me to put in the FAQ I am writing that Jamie is the nice one. Hating me and loving him is probably the way to go.
Jayabalard
2007-02-15, 12:13 PM
Wrong. If any webcomic is notable, Erfworld is notable. untrue. Some webcomics are certainly more or less notable than others, especially the ones that have an effect on the world outside of comics.
WhiteNoise
2007-02-15, 12:21 PM
as a wise man who taught me half of what i know about doing my current job told me
'Think Globally. Act Locally'
Example The President of the USA is a very powerful position and the person in that job has immense power in the world
as a brit i have no control over who that person is, but i should consider that and act to control who britains go to man the president deals with is.
thus by choosing a good leader locally, i can have a small effect globally, complaining about the president of the USA said carrots suck or whatever gets me nowhere, i dont have that power,
Same with Pclips, not being Jimbo W he has no power over Wikipedia as an entity and the overarching flaws and cracks that are being worked at by the vandals, BUT he does have the power to fight his corner, his turf Webcomics and just maybe with Pclips and those here fighting in webcomics and the pickled gerkin apprecaitors fighting their battle the war can be won, what matters is each little fight against injustice has to be fought when it happens
Lord Zentei
2007-02-15, 12:24 PM
untrue. Some webcomics are certainly more or less notable than others, especially the ones that have an effect on the world outside of comics.
And how, exactly, does this imply that Erfworld is not notable?
Jayabalard
2007-02-15, 12:34 PM
And how, exactly, does this imply that Erfworld is not notable?I made no claim about Erfworld's notability or lack thereof, only that that line of reasoning is false. The fact that some web comics are notable (ex: penny arcade which has the PA exp and Child's play charity, which are documented in mutliple sources) does not in any way mean that erfworld is or is not notable.
notability isn't popularity (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:N#Notability_is_not_popularity)
IMO: in the resubmitted article, few of the references are external to gitp, I'm not sure any of them qualify as significant, and as of now, they include no print sources. I honestly expect it to be nominated for deletion (not necessarily that it will be deleted again).
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-15, 12:34 PM
Be that as it may, there is no reason to lose control of ones emotions and act as if someone just defiled the mother of god. I my humble opinion :smallamused:
Studies* have shown that not losing control of your emotions is 98% easier when your livelihood and credibility are not in danger because of a delete happy monkey with a God-complex.
*that I just made up.
untrue. Some webcomics are certainly more or less notable than others, especially the ones that have an effect on the world outside of comics.
I think the original statement was made with Wikipedia's notability standards in mind. Whether a webcomic has an effect on the outside world or not does not make it notable per WP:N. This is one of the problems with WP:N.
Remind me to put in the FAQ I am writing that Jamie is the nice one. Hating me and loving him is probably the way to go.
Wow. When the Angry Zen Master is the nice one, you know you're in trouble. :smalltongue:
lared
2007-02-15, 12:35 PM
Setting aside the question of whether or not Erfworld should have a wikipedia article, I'm going to assert that wikipedia does, in fact, need notability guidelines. It has a valid purpose in preventing self-promotion. I could write an entry about myself that is as well-sourced as the average wiki article (and certainly better-sourced than the one on Erfworld), but that doesn't mean I should qualify for one.
I am a proponent for expanding the notion of notability to include what's commonly regarded as "cruft." But there does need to be a line, somewhere.
Jayabalard
2007-02-15, 12:38 PM
I think the original statement was made with Wikipedia's notability standards in mind. Whether a webcomic has an effect on the outside world or not does not make it notable per WP:N. This is one of the problems with WP:N.Those outside effects mean that it is much more likely to have in print references from significant sources, which does in fact make it notable per WP:N
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-15, 12:52 PM
Those outside effects mean that it is much more likely to have in print references from significant sources, which does in fact make it notable per WP:N
Yes, but the effects themselves do not indicate notability. Erfworld is all over the notability standards, having been published and reviewed in several independent publications despite it's short run. There aren't many webcomics that have WP:N's standards covered as well as Erfworld does.
So when someone says that "if any webcomic is notable (per WP:N) Erfworld is," can you see how that doesn't make Erfworld more cosmically significant than other webcomics, it means that if Erfworld fails WP:N then almost all other webcomics will have to fail as well by default?
Jayabalard
2007-02-15, 02:02 PM
I'm pretty sure that's why there's been such a big purge, since so many webcomics are not notable by WP:N.
If erfworld has indeed been "been published and reviewed in several independent publications", them they should be referenced in the wikipedia article... but of the 11 references, 4 are links to various points in gitp, 3 look like actual reviews but are blogs, and the rest appear to be fairly worthless as references (announcement of the site in 2 places, an anagram link, etc). None appear to be any sort of significant, permanent publication.
So I don't see the erfworld wiki article being all that good at covering WP:N, and certainly not better than most other webcomics.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-15, 02:22 PM
I'm pretty sure that's why there's been such a big purge, since so many webcomics are not notable by WP:N.
And that's why people are insisting this is an insane crusade/jihad. Why aren't webcomics considered 'notable' in a real world sense? What makes them less worthy of mention or discussion than for example, blogs, or editorials, or any other self published media that is not facing this kind of rampant censorship?
The WP:N is flawed, and it's being used by either unscrupulous or unthinking Wikipedians to do harm to the core of what Wikipedia represents itself as: a collection of human knowledge.
If erfworld has indeed been "been published and reviewed in several independent publications", them they should be referenced in the wikipedia article... but of the 11 references, 4 are links to various points in gitp, 3 look like actual reviews but are blogs, and the rest appear to be fairly worthless as references (announcement of the site in 2 places, an anagram link, etc). None appear to be any sort of significant, permanent publication.
So I don't see the erfworld wiki article being all that good at covering WP:N, and certainly not better than most other webcomics.
Whether or not those sources are cited in the article, they count for notability per WP:N. What's actually in the article doesn't make the subject itself notable. Otherwise any subject with a poorly sourced article or a stub would be in violation of notability. That's most of Wikipedia!
I wouldn't trust the article at the moment anyway.. it seems to be in a state of flux: vanishing and reverting to old versions. Right now I can't even see it, but the discussion page works. I'm not even sure this is over yet. :smalleek:
pclips
2007-02-15, 02:55 PM
notability isn't popularity (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:N#Notability_is_not_popularity)
This definition is precisely where Wikipedia fails. It does not just fail webcomics; it fails itself, its own stated principles. This statement is the cancer Jason Scott talks about.
A 17th Century poet is notable but not popular. Fine. Okay. Belongs in Wikipedia. Not saying otherwise.
But the logic following that example is the sickness I am talking about.
See, the 17th Century poet has now had as much as 400 years to gather printed references. To compare the notability of one 17th Century poet to another is a fairly easy exercise. Just research the available literature.
But is the same test applicable to differentiating a notable blog from a non-notable one? Or a website? Or a subscription music service? Or any other endeavor which depends on technology younger than 15 years old?
Absolutely not; such sources don't exist. Where new media is concerned, old media is hostile, blind, and lags behind.
Yet there are notable webcomics, and non-notable ones. I am not arguing for the total repeal of notability standards. I am saying two things:
1. The notability policy is bad. A bias toward print references is a laughably poor notability measure for any new-media phenomenon.
2. The existing bad policy is further being intentionally abused and misinterpreted in support of an editorial bias against new media. It is wielded by vigilantes like Aaron Brenneman, who are essentially picking up a microscope and swinging it like a club.
They must change the policies. Popularity may not equal notability, but wild popularity is at least evidence of notability. It must be considered in context.
The greatest 17th Century poet would not have been notable in a 17th Century Wikipedia, under equivalent policies. They'd have excluded or heavily discounted the medium he was actually published in (periodicals) and accepted only reference texts. He'd have been ridiculed as not being anything close to as significant as the greatest 16th Century poet. Look, the literature proves it! Wait a hundred years to be considered notable.
Except that he was more notable on a given day back then, when his poems were the talk of London society, than the guy who'd been dead for a century. There were simply more seekers of information interested in finding out about the new guy than the dead guy.
If the point of any reference is to compile information which is useful to those who would seek it, then the amount of interest in the subject matter among those using the reference must be a consideration.
And I'm not even going to start on the absurdity of trying to compare the notability of Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maciej_Kazimierz_Sarbiewski) to that of It's Walky! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_Walky) by using the same standards. The policy is just poisonously stupid, and needs to be changed.
IMO: in the resubmitted article, few of the references are external to gitp, I'm not sure any of them qualify as significant, and as of now, they include no print sources. I honestly expect it to be nominated for deletion (not necessarily that it will be deleted again).
So do I. That's why I didn't retire this thread. This fight is likely to go on for some time.
Karellen
2007-02-15, 03:29 PM
I don't think notability is a quality inherent in the work. It's something that comes from its reception and especially influence. 17th century poets are important because they were influental, and when they were not, they'll have been forgotten anyway. I find it a mite odd to declare a comic is notable after 25 pages. There are works that are "important" before they even get off the ground - the seventh Harry Potter, for instance. A new work will have to establish its notability in good time, though.
You said something about how the model of having a webcomic start next to another, more famous one might be a breakthrough for the media, but none of that has actually happened yet. Erfworld might well become important in time, but at this point, it's not. At this point the Wikipedia article doesn't have almost any information that would be of interest to a person who doesn't know about Erfworld, and very little that wasn't available from the forums and the cast page. What purpose does it serve?
How important is Wikipedia anyway? How many people are likely to find Erfworld through Wikipedia? And even if some did, is it entirely correct to view Wikipedia as a place of advertisement? I think being on Wikipedia is regarded more a sign of prestige than anything, and a vastly overrated one at that, particularily among webcomic artists.
Jayabalard
2007-02-15, 04:10 PM
Whether or not those sources are cited in the article, they count for notability per WP:N. What's actually in the article doesn't make the subject itself notable. Otherwise any subject with a poorly sourced article or a stub would be in violation of notability. That's most of Wikipedia!Actually, that's the reason it was eligible for speedy deletion: there was no assertion of notability. Including those references would cover that, so future delete attempts would happen through the regular deletion process rather than the speedy deletion process.
as for the notability of erfworld... /agree Karellen.
Skydiving_Ninja
2007-02-15, 04:17 PM
If Looking For Group has a wikipedia article I don't see why Erfworld shouldn't.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-15, 04:48 PM
Actually, that's the reason it was eligible for speedy deletion: there was no assertion of notability. Including those references would cover that, so future delete attempts would happen through the regular deletion process rather than the speedy deletion process.
as for the notability of erfworld... /agree Karellen.
Actually:
Sweet. Just two things: If I made it appear that an article has to meet the web criteria to avoid speedy deletion, that was not my intention. Something only has to make a reasoble claim to signifigance to elude instant death. Secondly, a copy-paste move isn't a good idea, it violates the GFDL for the article. When it was done, I'd have happily moved it back for you... We self righteous agenda-driven ****head goose****ers aim to please!
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Aaron_Brenneman
You don't even need "actual" notability to avoid a speedy delete. Just a reasonable claim of such.
Jayabalard
2007-02-15, 05:30 PM
I don't see a difference with Brenneman's statement and mine: "Actually, that's the reason it was eligible for speedy deletion: there was no assertion of notability." .... so I'm not sure what the actually is supposed to be refuting.
Sometime today (in the last 3 hours or so) a reference to the mention in dragon magazine was added to the articile... up until that point, nothing in in the article made a reasonable claim of notability (IMO).
We fight for what we believe in. I believe webcomics are important, and that my work has value. I base those beliefs on objective criteria, though the amount I care about the matter is totally subjective and self-interested.
Every day, I see things happening which I disagree with...in politics, culture, the media, etc. I choose to fight only the battles that matter, the ones where fighting can potentially affect the outcome.
Wikipedia is failing because the system creates Aaron Brennemans, who destroy its value from the inside. I care about that. I'm disgusted. I'm sorry for Wikipedia's lost potential. But I can't fight that.
I can't even fight what the Aaron Brennemans are doing to webcomics, which is not just a crime and a shame, but hurts my own field.
But this one battle, where my own stuff is involved... That I can (and should, and did) fight, by putting out the call for help here.
If I weren't right about Erfworld being notable, there wouldn't have been so many people who were willing to spend their time and energy to respond to the attack, and they wouldn't have been able to make the case for notability by Wikipedia's ridonkulous standards.
Wikipedia matters, whether it ought to or not. It comes up in the first few results of most Google searches. I don't have the option to make believe I don't care about Wikipedia (http://www.halfpixel.com/2007/02/15/delete-wikipedia/). I had to fight.
If I got too much of a mad on while doing it...well, call me David Banner without the radiation. Not having the luxury of hulking out, I just "tool out" from time to time.
Remind me to put in the FAQ I am writing that Jamie is the nice one. Hating me and loving him is probably the way to go.
That all nice and maybe true. But my point was that there was a more mature and calm way of fighting for what you belive in.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-15, 06:39 PM
Sometime today (in the last 3 hours or so) a reference to the mention in dragon magazine was added to the articile... up until that point, nothing in in the article made a reasonable claim of notability (IMO).
WP:N Notability is not Subjective (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability)
WP:N is not supposed to be your opinion, though. Or Aaron's opinion, or mine. The fact that it was hosted on Giant in the Playground was more than enough of a claim of significance. There was also mention in a Time magazine blog you seem to have missed. Just because it's a blog doesn't mean you get to automatically discount it.
Sage in the Playground
2007-02-15, 07:24 PM
We fight for what we believe in. I believe webcomics are important, and that my work has value. I base those beliefs on objective criteria, though the amount I care about the matter is totally subjective and self-interested.
Every day, I see things happening which I disagree with...in politics, culture, the media, etc. I choose to fight only the battles that matter, the ones where fighting can potentially affect the outcome.
Wikipedia is failing because the system creates Aaron Brennemans, who destroy its value from the inside. I care about that. I'm disgusted. I'm sorry for Wikipedia's lost potential. But I can't fight that.
I can't even fight what the Aaron Brennemans are doing to webcomics, which is not just a crime and a shame, but hurts my own field.
But this one battle, where my own stuff is involved... That I can (and should, and did) fight, by putting out the call for help here.
If I weren't right about Erfworld being notable, there wouldn't have been so many people who were willing to spend their time and energy to respond to the attack, and they wouldn't have been able to make the case for notability by Wikipedia's ridonkulous standards.
Wikipedia matters, whether it ought to or not. It comes up in the first few results of most Google searches. I don't have the option to make believe I don't care about Wikipedia (http://www.halfpixel.com/2007/02/15/delete-wikipedia/). I had to fight.
If I got too much of a mad on while doing it...well, call me David Banner without the radiation. Not having the luxury of hulking out, I just "tool out" from time to time.
Remind me to put in the FAQ I am writing that Jamie is the nice one. Hating me and loving him is probably the way to go.
If it helps, I like you.
TinSoldier
2007-02-15, 09:11 PM
Setting aside the question of whether or not Erfworld should have a wikipedia article, I'm going to assert that wikipedia does, in fact, need notability guidelines. It has a valid purpose in preventing self-promotion. I could write an entry about myself that is as well-sourced as the average wiki article (and certainly better-sourced than the one on Erfworld), but that doesn't mean I should qualify for one.
I am a proponent for expanding the notion of notability to include what's commonly regarded as "cruft." But there does need to be a line, somewhere.I don't think that very many people disagree with this. Of course Wikipedia needs to have guidelines to prevent noise and cruft.
I think the main point is that Erfworld, new as it is, is still notable for a webcomic for many of the reasons already cited in this thread.
For Wikipedia to have any credibility as a source, though, they have to have lower notability guidelines than say, Britannica, as well as their ability to add new content much more quickly than older and more established institutions.
I guess my point is while Wikipedia doesn't have to keep up with all of the fast changes made in new media, new media by itself is pretty notable and they have an opportunity and an obligation to try and keep up with the rapid changes that older encyclopedias cannot.
Wallyz
2007-02-15, 09:21 PM
Be that as it may, there is no reason to lose control of ones emotions and act as if someone just defiled the mother of god. I my humble opinion :smallamused:
God has no mother, Papist heretic!
Sage in the Playground
2007-02-15, 09:40 PM
No real world religion, please. Your joke was funny, and I don't want o see you get modded for it.
Shhalahr Windrider
2007-02-15, 11:21 PM
Wemics as a case in point, im sure the great giant is only waiting to put them in an OotSas the race that is
1)Never used as a PC
Actually, I DM a campaign that features a wemic PC (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=15594)...
2)Rarely encountered as an enemy
3)Almost totaly absent in the fiction of DnD worlds and in general,
These have thus far been true in my experience, however.
Though I have seen a fair amount of wemic art on niche "furry-type" sites. Too bad those versions don't rate a mention in the article.
I believe that the "Wikipedia jihad against webcomics" is best understood as a neurotic attempt by Wikipedia's institutional metamind to resolve the cognitive dissonance caused by its notability criterion. Since (for whatever reason) it's not re-examining its assumptions, the only alternative is to eliminate its conscious awareness of the evidence that contradicts those assumptions. In practice, that means deleting entries about economically viable web presences of niche interest, since the existence of those businesses shines a spotlight on the gaping chasm beneath their notability criterion, where traditional encyclopedias have solid foundation.
So, are you a psychologist, or do you just play one on TV? :smallwink:
Seriously, man. That's some insightful stuff.
ikanreed
2007-02-15, 11:29 PM
I think the original statement was made with Wikipedia's notability standards in mind. Whether a webcomic has an effect on the outside world or not does not make it notable per WP:N. This is one of the problems with WP:N.
No, that's not a problem with WP:N at all. That's one of the best things about WP:N that misunderstand. Notability was introduced so that articles that would never have sources to verify what they say.
If The Giant and pclips both died(let's hope that didn't happen) and a domain squatter aquired giantitp.com, what evidence could you point to that there ever was a Erfworld. (the answer in this case is an article in dragon magazine and a few online comic reviews.
That's the idea protected by WP:N. That there's always something that you can point to, that's trustworthy, that states there really was such a thing as X.
It's an extension of WP:V, and one that has been abused. The problem isn't "deletion monkeys" but rather people who simply don't get WP:N.
From what I've seen, pclips doesn't get this either.
tagline for this post for people too bored with my banter to read it:
"People cite policy they don't understand"
Logos7
2007-02-16, 12:45 AM
I Fail to see how If 'O RLY' passes the critieria, how erfworld doesn't
The First Thing it says is that it's a popular interent phenomeonon, and if all the orly's where to be gone tomarrow what would really be left besides a few bad memories, that one joke (in an entire game )and perhaps a few print outs from the virus original?
I think that if they agreed that Notability is Subjective the problem would go away, Communally subjective sure , lets get second oppions as apposed to people divining the one provable objective truth, thank god its for wiki and not a religion is all i can say
Logos
ikanreed
2007-02-16, 12:55 AM
I Fail to see how If 'O RLY' passes the critieria, how erfworld doesn't
The First Thing it says is that it's a popular interent phenomeonon, and if all the orly's where to be gone tomarrow what would really be left besides a few bad memories, that one joke (in an entire game )and perhaps a few print outs from the virus original?
I think that if they agreed that Notability is Subjective the problem would go away, Communally subjective sure , lets get second oppions as apposed to people divining the one provable objective truth, thank god its for wiki and not a religion is all i can say
Logos
Because, among other reasons, that article demonstrates that "O RLY" is documented in a newspaper.
Second... the fact that it nominated to be deleted should be a sign of how borderline it is. When using a comparison approach to demonstrate an assertion, you should choose an example that goes above and beyond the requirments to totally demonstrate what one means. That's a matter of high school level rhetoric.
Third, there's already a caveat that states that inclusion is not an indication of notability. For example, individual pokemon are allowed because of the extent of literature avaiable documenting all pokemon, not because "zubat" is particuarly notable on its own.
There's good reasons for most of the policies on wikipedia, and there's good exceptions for most of the policies on wikipedia.
And I know the majoriaty of my posts on giantitp forums is in this thread, because this is the kind of debate where I thrive.
No, that's not a problem with WP:N at all. That's one of the best things about WP:N that misunderstand. Notability was introduced so that articles that would never have sources to verify what they say.
If The Giant and pclips both died(let's hope that didn't happen) and a domain squatter aquired giantitp.com, what evidence could you point to that there ever was a Erfworld. (the answer in this case is an article in dragon magazine and a few online comic reviews.
That's the idea protected by WP:N. That there's always something that you can point to, that's trustworthy, that states there really was such a thing as X.But ikanreed, the problem with this is that it is only necessary for print articles. Wikipedia is not set in stone, it is constantly changing. If all the blogged reviews of Erfworld were deleted and GitP went off the air forever and Erfworld faded from all memory, the article could be edited or deleted without hesitation. The only arguments I have heard for major professional blogs not being included is that they are editable and changeable... but if the information were to change, why couldn't wikipedia change? That seems to be, indeed, Wikipedia's greatest strength... yet it is being squandered by a Britannia-like attitude. Gotta save paper!
Also, I don't understand your second and third sentences at all. They seem to be missing some grammar.
It's an extension of WP:V, and one that has been abused. The problem isn't "deletion monkeys" but rather people who simply don't get WP:N.
From what I've seen, pclips doesn't get this either.
tagline for this post for people too bored with my banter to read it:
"People cite policy they don't understand"I get WP:N just fine, but I still consider it deeply flawed. Scientivore did a better job explaining it than I could. In essense, Wikipedia's notability criteria are based on an antiquated system. Wikipedia is in itself a child of the overhyped information age, yet it is being limited to function only as its parents could. Why? Why should an instantly-updatable, utterly modern encyclopedia be forced to function exactly like a print one? Why is the blog of an expert in a non-scientific field not a valid source for information on that field? I am not saying there should be NO notability guidelines; I don't think many people are. We are saying the notability guidelines are arbitrary, and only work with very traditional topics: topics that would, in fact, be far better researched in a REAL encyclopedia, written by EXPERTS. The things wikipedia is good for - the things amateurs can write about, the things that can be researched online - these are being forced off wikipedia.
Does that make sense to anyone?
GeoffA
2007-02-16, 08:04 AM
Because, among other reasons, that article demonstrates that "O RLY" is documented in a newspaper.
I've been documented in a newspaper. I would readily admit that I don't deserve my own Wikipedia article.
Second... the fact that it nominated to be deleted should be a sign of how borderline it is. When using a comparison approach to demonstrate an assertion, you should choose an example that goes above and beyond the requirements to totally demonstrate what one means. That's a matter of high school level rhetoric.
Third, there's already a caveat that states that inclusion is not an indication of notability. For example, individual pokemon are allowed because of the extent of literature available documenting all pokemon, not because "zubat" is particularly notable on its own.
There's good reasons for most of the policies on wikipedia, and there's good exceptions for most of the policies on wikipedia.
I don't mean to put words into the original poster's mouth, but I think what is really riling people up in this discussion is that notability seems to be applied very unevenly. You admit that there are "good exceptions". There is the perception that a certain few editors seem to be using notability to specifically go after web comic entries. If notability were applied strictly then some of the web comics should go, but then so should a lot of other trivial entries in Wikipedia. If things like O RLY and random pokemons deserve an exception, why do they get to be "good exceptions" and not some webcomic?
And I know the majority of my posts on giantitp forums is in this thread, because this is the kind of debate where I thrive.
This seems to be the same reasoning that many Wikipedia editors use to discount people who show up specifically to argue against the deletion of their favorite entry. "All you do is show up here and talk about deleting webcomics. You're not really interested in Wikipedia as a whole; you're just trying to push your issue."
I'm not saying that we should ignore ikanreed. He's taken the time to write out his arguments reasonably clearly and this is clearly important to him. At the same time, I think Wikipedia should be more sympathetic to people who are most interested in (and likely most knowledgeable about) a particular topic up for deletion. If a certain Wikipedia editor says "I don't really know much about webcomics" then perhaps he should take the time to listen to those who do. If Pclips says "I have worked in webcomics for five years, I know a lot about them and I know a lot of people involved in webcomics" then he's probably got something worthwhile to add to the discussion. Perhaps he should not be talking quite so much about his own comic (there's an undeniable bias there), but in as much as the debate applies to webcomics as a whole, he's a good resource.
Renegade Paladin
2007-02-16, 09:00 AM
That's the thing, though: As an institution, Wikipedia hates experts. And your average expert will hate right back, because while at Wikipedia someone who is, say, a professor of medieval European history editing the article on the battle of Agincourt could very well run up against some guy named Bob who insists that the French employed chainsaw-wielding zombies in their assault on the English lines. And rather than this idiot getting laughed out of the place, the professor will be expected to talk to said idiot and reach some version of the article incorporating the chainsaw zombie theory as a compromise. Of course this is an extreme example, but Wikipedia values the opinions of people who know nothing about a subject far more highly than the knowledge of people who are expert in a given field.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-16, 01:33 PM
No, that's not a problem with WP:N at all. That's one of the best things about WP:N that misunderstand. Notability was introduced so that articles that would never have sources to verify what they say.
If The Giant and pclips both died(let's hope that didn't happen) and a domain squatter aquired giantitp.com, what evidence could you point to that there ever was a Erfworld. (the answer in this case is an article in dragon magazine and a few online comic reviews.
That's the idea protected by WP:N. That there's always something that you can point to, that's trustworthy, that states there really was such a thing as X.
It's an extension of WP:V, and one that has been abused. The problem isn't "deletion monkeys" but rather people who simply don't get WP:N.
From what I've seen, pclips doesn't get this either.
tagline for this post for people too bored with my banter to read it:
"People cite policy they don't understand"
If WP:N is abusable and often misunderstood (by your own admission), doesn't that mean it's a policy that should be rethought, or stated more clearly? You can blame one person for not getting WP:N, but when many people read it incorrectly and use it incorrectly, doesn't that imply a strong possibility that the policy itself is flawed?
atteSmythe
2007-02-16, 02:02 PM
Wait, wait. You have to 'assert notability?' Isn't that a little meta? Isn't creating the article in the first place an assertion that it's notable enough for inclusion?
If lack of assertion of notability is a criteria for speedy deletion, then that's really asinine. It just about completely precludes any community discussion that would lead to a discovery of whether the subject of the article is, in fact, notable.
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-16, 02:35 PM
Wait, wait. You have to 'assert notability?' Isn't that a little meta? Isn't creating the article in the first place an assertion that it's notable enough for inclusion?
If lack of assertion of notability is a criteria for speedy deletion, then that's really asinine. It just about completely precludes any community discussion that would lead to a discovery of whether the subject of the article is, in fact, notable.
Agree 100%. Asinine is exactly the right word.
The way it was told to me was that in order to avoid a speedy delete, like Erfworld got, an article has to make a 'reasonable claim to significance.' Having the article be about something or anything that exists, period, would seem to be a reasonable claim to significance, but I'm not a Wikipedia admin. Judging from their oh-so objective viewpoint there are apparently many truly insignificant webcomics out there. One of which is Erfworld. :smallamused:
Karellen
2007-02-16, 02:57 PM
A claim to significance, in my best observation, would be a reason why anyone at all should care or find this information even moderately interesting. Honestly, I think the current "reception" section is pathetic; it contains information that interests no one at all, and it completely misses the point, and if you guys want to talk about going by the letter of the law and not the spirit, well...
What went on, if I may be so bold as to guess, was that this guy who found the page comes in, sees barely any links to anything and no suggestion that there's anything particularily special about this webcomic (in which, one might argue, he may have been quite right), then maybe checked out the webpage, thought, "20 pages? Oh you've gotta be kidding-" and deletes it. I think something along the lines of, "new comic of Rob Balder, sister comic to the successful "Order of the Stick", well received among the webcomic community", and that's a claim for notability. All the claim the comic really has, anyway.
On why there are Pokémon articles, I think it's likely at one time or another actions will be taken against excessive anime fancruft; I don't think having all that is really in Wikipedia's best interest, it would all be best placed in a seperate Wikimedia anime wiki. Which, honestly, I think is what should be done webcomics too for the most part. It works perfectly well with Star Trek; a casual user checking out Star Trek from wikipedia would be interested in Star Trek's significance as a cultural phenomenon and what precisely is meant when somebody is compared to Kirk or Spock, as opposed to the detailed structural schematics on the Starship Enterprise. With the division to two different wikis for different userbase, as far as I can see, everyone's more or less happy.
atteSmythe
2007-02-16, 03:10 PM
What went on, if I may be so bold as to guess, was that this guy who found the page comes in, sees barely any links to anything and no suggestion that there's anything particularily special about this webcomic (in which, one might argue, he may have been quite right), then maybe checked out the webpage, thought, "20 pages? Oh you've gotta be kidding-" and deletes it.
Fair enough. I'm not even arguing that the initial article was good enough for inclusion...but CSD? Really? Isn't speedy deletion supposed to be reserved for vandalism, libel, profanity, and copyright infringement? Aren't articles supposed to be given the benefit of the doubt, with a deletion mark/discussion period to allow people to improve the article or argue for its inclusion? Regardless of the notability of Erfworld, that seems to me to be the crux of the issue.
As I've said on another wiki, any editor who can find no other solution to a problem than to delete dozens or hundreds of articles with which he or she finds fault shouldn't be editing.
Ahwell. My opinion, rantmode off.
Maurog
2007-02-16, 04:00 PM
I think there is too much discussion here over one trigger-happy idiot with access to tools more powerful than he should handle. Really, it's not about the rules and policies of WP (which should be followed by spirit, not by word anyway). It's not an act of terrorism that should be followed by swift reprimandment on other parties. It's also not about justifying the existence of your article by pointing out the flaws in others. It's about one stupid man who made one stupid mistake, and probably not even losing any sleep over it.
The new article is in and is grappled with more references than it needs, so it's gonna stay. Let it die, people.
ikanreed
2007-02-16, 04:06 PM
If WP:N is abusable and often misunderstood (by your own admission), doesn't that mean it's a policy that should be rethought, or stated more clearly? You can blame one person for not getting WP:N, but when many people read it incorrectly and use it incorrectly, doesn't that imply a strong possibility that the policy itself is flawed?
Yes. It does. So? I've been working on the matter slowly for a while now. In spite of what it says about itself, wikipedia is highly beurocratic and slow-moving.
The general notion among editors is that all kinds of mistakes are made, including deleting articles. If the subject really was very notable, the article will end up being recreated in better form.
The problem with working by consensus is that consensus takes a long time to form.
The truly astounding thing in my mind is that wikipedia could be total chaos. It's not. I'm not sure exactly how that happens.
ikanreed
2007-02-16, 04:08 PM
I think there is too much discussion here over one trigger-happy idiot with access to tools more powerful than he should handle. Really, it's not about the rules and policies of WP (which should be followed by spirit, not by word anyway). It's not an act of terrorism that should be followed by swift reprimandment on other parties. It's also not about justifying the existence of your article by pointing out the flaws in others. It's about one stupid man who made one stupid mistake, and probably not even losing any sleep over it.
The new article is in and is grappled with more references than it needs, so it's gonna stay. Let it die, people.
Double posting here, but this statement is awesome. It reflects a good deal of what I've been thinking about this issue.
Jayabalard
2007-02-16, 05:33 PM
WP:N Notability is not Subjective (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability)
WP:N is not supposed to be your opinion, though. Or Aaron's opinion, or mine. The fact that it was hosted on Giant in the Playground was more than enough of a claim of significance. There was also mention in a Time magazine blog you seem to have missed. Just because it's a blog doesn't mean you get to automatically discount it.I think that you need have misunderstood that section.
It's not subjective; which means that "I've never heard of this", "an interesting article", "topic deserves attention", "not famous enough", "very important issue", "popular", "I like it", "only of interest to [some group]", etc are not relevant when deciding notability.
On the other hand, evaluating whether something is notable based on sources that may or may not be sufficient to indicate notability, such as Blogs and interviews, does require a certain amount of judgment, which is why I said that "up until that point, [when a reference was added about how it was mentioned in Dragon magazine], nothing in in the article made a reasonable claim of notability (IMO)."
Personally I think that reference is more than sufficient to stop any further speedy deletion, and possibly good enough to keep it from being deleted even if it goes through the regular deletion process.
taigen
2007-02-18, 12:49 PM
Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy
Wikipedia is not a moot court, and although rules can make things easier, they are not the purpose of the community. Instruction creep should be avoided. A perceived procedural error made in posting anything, such as an idea or nomination, is not grounds for invalidating that post. Follow the spirit, not the letter, of any rules, policies and guidelines if you feel they conflict. Disagreements should be resolved through consensual discussion, rather than through tightly sticking to rules and procedures.
Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia
Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. This means that there is no practical limit to the number of topics we can cover, or the total amount of content, other than verifiability and the other points presented on this page.
These are their own words... as close as any words can be considered to be 'wikipedia's' that is.
I can't find a reference to it, but the founders own mission statements was to make wikipedia the 'sum of all human knowledge'
Human knowledge
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Human knowledge on a broad scale is the sum total of all thoughts, creations, and inventions of the human mind. It includes the collected discoveries of science, mathematics, literature, and the humanities. On a narrow sense, is the body of thoughts, beliefs and abilities any human being has as an individual, as opposed to the knowledge other kind of living beings have.
Now.. when I make a bit long column in a spreadsheet... and then put a sum function at the bottom... it doesn't just out of habit choose the cells it wants to add up... it actually grabs them all. If the size of the column approached infinity.. it still would not skip any it felts weren't important enough.
I do agree that notability =/= popularity. Something can be notable without being popular. The really old obscure works of literature that noone reads unless a professor assigns you to (ok thats a generalization and an opinion.. but meh) is not all that popular but it is notable. However... The works of Shakespere would not be notable if he never had become popular. Bob of Demark, the not so great playwright and collector of much rotten fruit may have been writeing plays around the same time as Shakespere... but hes not notable because he failed at life.
Thus, it should be a rather easy assertion to say the popularity -> notability. If something is popular.. people find it important to themselves.. importance to people is what notability is. If enough people find something notable... is it not in fact notable?
Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. Webcomics do exist. Webcomics are important to a significant group of people. This webcomic exists. This webcomic is important to a significant group of people.. therefore... this webcomic is notable. Dragon could go lay an egg... Time could stand still and the webcomic award could go polish itself and this webcomic would still be notable.. simply because... it is important to people.
To close a quote I find extremely humorous:
Bulletin boards, wikis and posts to Usenet
Main article: Wikipedia:Verifiability
Posts to bulletin boards, Usenet, and wikis, or comments on blogs, should not be used as sources. This is in part because we have no way of knowing who has written or posted them, and in part because there is no editorial oversight or third-party fact-checking. See self-published sources for exceptions.
Even wikipedia doesn't trust wikipedia...
----------------
Wikipedia Inspirational Poster:
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u186/auraethereal/wikipedia/wpoffice.jpg
Tokiko Mima
2007-02-20, 05:24 PM
Wikipedia is CRAZY!
Did you know that for all the bluster about Objectivity and Verifiability not Truth, they have a rule that based on a totally subjective judgement i.e.
If the rules prevent you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia...
allows you override them and do whatever you feel needs to be done?
Ignore all Rules
Meet WP:Ignore All Rules (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ignore_all_rules)
So, hey, I feel like Erfworld improves Wikipedia (and it does!) the rules compel me to repost Erfworld. It should be almost impossible going by that rule to delete any page someone might consider to be improving Wikipedia.
Kanthalion
2007-02-20, 11:32 PM
I don't know if it helps, but for my very first attempt at editing Wikipedia, I added a short reference to Erfword on the Leeroy Jenkins (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leeroy_Jenkins) page at Wikipedia.
Entertainer13
2007-02-21, 11:24 PM
Its kind of odd... what I always enjoyed about Wikipedia was the ability to find articles on obscure, pop culture things such as web comics. If I want to read about "relevant" or "noteable" things, I'll do what any good researcher does: use anything that isn't the internet.
Silverlocke980
2007-02-22, 12:38 AM
The problem is that Wikipedia can't figure out what the boop a "notability" limit is. Flintlocke's Adventures in Azeroth, which runs over the concept of notability with a truck, has been put up for deletion so many times it's hard to count.
Don't take it personally. Wikipedia kind of sucks.
(And I was one of its strongest supporters, once.)
Stormthorn
2007-02-23, 11:26 PM
That's the thing, though: As an institution, Wikipedia hates experts. And your average expert will hate right back, because while at Wikipedia someone who is, say, a professor of medieval European history editing the article on the battle of Agincourt could very well run up against some guy named Bob who insists that the French employed chainsaw-wielding zombies in their assault on the English lines. And rather than this idiot getting laughed out of the place, the professor will be expected to talk to said idiot and reach some version of the article incorporating the chainsaw zombie theory as a compromise. Of course this is an extreme example, but Wikipedia values the opinions of people who know nothing about a subject far more highly than the knowledge of people who are expert in a given field.
Experts can put their info in 'real' sources. Wikipedia is for people like me who care about something but are not notable enough to count for crap when it comes down to 'real' sources. Wikipedia is also for things like Erfworld that are not important enough in the eyes of many 'real' sources to warrent articles.
Experts can put their info in 'real' sources. Wikipedia is for people like me who care about something but are not notable enough to count for crap when it comes down to 'real' sources.I'd strongly disagree. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not some pop-culture reference book. The entire point of the site is that I don't have to dig out some "real source" from the library but can access it via the free Wikipedia.
Let's take an example - I have an interest in various periods of history and have reccently been reading up on the First Crusade. Now let's say that I, with my new found knowledge, go to edit the First Crusade page. However another user, who happens to have done a PhD in the logistics of the Crusade, disagrees with my edit and reverts it.
This is the Wikipedia policy of today: the changes that I make to the page, with my two books read on the subject, are every bit as valid as those from someone who has devoted their life to the field and has written a number of papers on the subject. This is nonsense.
Piedmon_Sama
2007-02-28, 09:14 PM
Its kind of odd... what I always enjoyed about Wikipedia was the ability to find articles on obscure, pop culture things such as web comics. If I want to read about "relevant" or "noteable" things, I'll do what any good researcher does: use anything that isn't the internet.
QFT. The only thing Wikipedia is useful for when you need to do serious research is provide references to (possibly) more respectable sources.
If I want to look up the powers of an obscure comic character or whether X happened in the Dragonball manga or anime exclusively, then Wikipedia is a GREAT resource.
SteveMB
2007-02-28, 09:58 PM
An article on the subject that appeared in Sunday's Washington Post by Timothy Noah (writer of the "Chatterbox" column in Slate): I'm Being Wiki-Whacked (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/23/AR2007022301738.html)
It's worth following the link and reading the whole thing if the subject interests you at all, but these two paragraphs get to the nub of it:
...But the terms of eviction from Wikipedia raise a larger issue than the bruised ego of one scribbler (or Jungian analyst or anime artist or Finnish security consultant). Why does Wikipedia have a "notability" standard at all?...
When people go to this much trouble to maintain a distinction rendered irrelevant by technological change, the search for an explanation usually leads to Thorstein Veblen's 1899 book, "The Theory of the Leisure Class." This extended sociological essay argues that the pursuit of status based on outmoded social codes takes precedence over, and frequently undermines, the rational pursuit of wealth and, more broadly, common sense. Hierarchical distinctions among people and things remain in force not because they retain practical value, but because they have become pleasurable in themselves. Wikipedia's stubborn enforcement of its notability standard suggests that Veblen was right. We limit entry to the club not because we need to, but because we want to.
pclips
2007-02-28, 10:58 PM
Thx Steve. I had read that article (on Slate, though) and noted the truth of that particular point. There's truly never been the slightest decent argument yet made for WP:N and it's destroying the place's potential, not to mention making thousands and thousands of Wikipedia haters, one deletion at a time.
Haarculaneaum
2007-02-28, 11:21 PM
I was the subject of this WP:N and it is consistently annoying.
I felt it both from an articles I created standpoint and ones written about me (I am a young & published poet &c). The very IDEA of Wikipedia ought to be one of inclusion. The only reason I can see for WP:N is to create an aura of exclusivity which, of course, works at destroying its supposed nature of egalitarianism.
Also, I tried to write an article about Rob but found my school's IP address is blocked from editing anything. This is most annoying because now I can no longer correct the its/it's errors rampant in WP without logging in -- which I am loathe to do on general principle (i.e. if anyone can edit anything, why do we need to log in?).
The pogrom against webcomics comes, in part, from the idea that webcomics aren't Literature. I tried to forward this argument here (in the OOTS forum) some months back and was generally shouted down for thinking such lofty thoughts. Perhaps the Wikitators think that if the webcomic community has no respect for itself, neither should they. Just a thought. We need to get some critical works published.
HAar
dauvis
2007-02-28, 11:30 PM
Here's a question I've been wondering... why is the notability argument only being applied to webcomics? It seems like every single open source project has a page. I don't know what constitutes notablity for open source but the same standard is not being applied as webcomics.
Then there are things like does every single pokemon need its own page? Maybe Pikachu in the context of pokemon is notable but does the one with a 5 second cameo need one? I didn't think that Wiki was supposed to be a fan site.
pclips
2007-03-01, 12:23 AM
Here's a question I've been wondering... why is the notability argument only being applied to webcomics? It seems like every single open source project has a page. I don't know what constitutes notablity for open source but the same standard is not being applied as webcomics.
Then there are things like does every single pokemon need its own page? Maybe Pikachu in the context of pokemon is notable but does the one with a 5 second cameo need one? I didn't think that Wiki was supposed to be a fan site.
See WP:N is like a dagger. Perfectly harmless sitting on a table. It takes someone with the intent to murder to pick it up and shove it into someone's back.
Right now, fewer than a half dozen editors are actively destroying webcomics articles, but it's like saying there are fewer than a half dozen assassins in your apartment building, and there's nothing you can do. Two of the worst have been at it for over a year (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Webcomics#Enforcement), and there is nothing that the community can or will do to stop them. (Brenneman is the one who speedy-deleted the original Erfworld article, and I have no civil words to describe him. And Dragonfiend is at least three or four times worse than him. She re-wrote the page on webcomics notability to turn it into more of a sword than a dagger. Like WP:N, Webcomics-bane. She's evil incarnate, trust me. And she covers her tracks like the master assassin she is.)
Webcomics is being singled out because there are people like that, who want to hurt webcomics. Just because nobody is deleting articles on, say, cricket players, doesn't mean you couldn't just walk in there and start doing it. Wikipedia is the free encyclopedia that anyone can destroy.
It's broken on a lot of levels. 1) policy, 2) abuse of policy, 3) lack of means to correct the abuse of policy. This is why I talk about suing Wikimedia Foundation. It would be a class action suit, on the part of every person or company who've had articles about what they do destroyed, when those things are provably notable by Wikipedia's slippery standards. I can think of a dozen webcomics alone which fit the bill.
It would seek damages incurred by problems 2 and 3, with the intent to make them change problem 1. Right now, it's a pipe dream in terms of pressing it myself (I'm not the right one to do it anyway, since my articles have been restored), but I wonder if I talk about it enough, maybe someone else will take the suggestion.
Anyway, deletionism is a dam that is holding back reality, and it will break at some point. I just wonder when and how. I hope it is soon. And I hope it hurts.
pclips
2007-03-01, 12:52 AM
Also, I really have to stop spinning my wheels on this topic. I admit I am powerless to change this situation, yet between here, PartiallyClips, my LJ, and conversations with practically everyone I know, I can't seem to drop my obsession with it. Yeah, deletionism is a horrible thing. But if I'm not careful, I am going to end up like Mort Sahl about the Warren Commission (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0756340/bio). :smalleek:
Scientivore
2007-03-01, 09:11 AM
I like you and I appreciate your passion. You even got me interested enough in the subject to make my own analysis; thank you for your compliment, by the way. As an aside to Shhalahr Windrider, I'm not a psychologist or anything like that. I'm just a knowledge-devourer, so I'm not qualified to provide therapy or conduct research.
I reiterate my conclusion: let's just leave them be and do our own thing. My reasoning is that the problem runs deeper in Wikipedia than we do.
There is some mental slight-of-hand in the idea that Wikipedia-the-repository belongs to everyone. I see that as a little white lie: it's true...technically...but it's not equally true of everyone. Since Wikipedia-the-metaperson is failing to root out internal inconsistencies between its philosophies and its instincts, the burden ultimately rests on those who can decide the criteria by which policies are chosen -- those with real meta-policy-making power -- who are its ego-equivalent.
You speak of lawsuits. There are different ways of framing such discussions and I believe that "ought" and "should" are evil words that hide "want" and "need". We need respect. We need shared experiences. We want and don't need to get self-consistency from Wikipedia. It's only one potential source (among many) of satisfaction of our ego needs. As Dr. Phil would say if he studied systems and complexity theory, "The bad news is that the only metaperson that we can control is us. The good news is that the only metaperson that we need to control is us."
It sucks that Wikipedia is dissing us with arbitrarily unfavorable treatment. It even hurts us, in the sense of not helping us as much as they seemed to promise that they would. It does not actually take away anything from us that was ever inside of our boundaries; the egalitarianism of Wikipedia was really always an illusion.
We can explain to them why this or that policy lacks objective grounding and appears to just be a symptom of unresolved emotional issues. We cannot force them to deal with their own anxieties about getting respect. People don't endure internal contradictions because they like it; it's just that they have to wait until they can deal with it before they will.
I think that we are awesome and cool and smart and funny and anyone who doesn't like us isn't worth paying any mind. What Wikipedia won't do for us, let's do for ourselves if we can. Some things maybe we can't do for ourselves, so we'll grieve the deaths of those dreams and then look forward to all the wonderful amazing fantastic incredible things that we can do.
Seriously, dude. Our future's so bright, we gotta wear shades. :smallcool:
Renegade Paladin
2007-03-01, 11:04 PM
This may interest some of you. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=36284)
NecroPaladin
2007-03-02, 12:01 AM
This may interest some of you. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=36284)
Damn Straight it will. And people ask me why I only trust those very close to me...
Shhalahr Windrider
2007-03-02, 09:23 AM
As an aside to Shhalahr Windrider, I'm not a psychologist or anything like that. I'm just a knowledge-devourer, so I'm not qualified to provide therapy or conduct research.
Ah, so you just play one on TV. :smallwink:
There is some mental slight-of-hand in the idea that Wikipedia-the-repository belongs to everyone. I see that as a little white lie: it's true...technically...but it's not equally true of everyone.
"Everyone on wikipedia is equal, but some are more equal than others."
How... Orwellian.
pclips
2007-03-02, 09:33 AM
How... Orwellian.
You know the aspect of Wikipedia which Orwell did not anticipate?
1984 was a warning against the use of technology by a central authority, right? But Wikipedia shows that if you put the ability to censor and hide and destroy truthful information into the hands of everybody, you get thousands of Little Brothers volunteering to become mini-fascists within their categories of agenda/interest.
Why does the idea that fascism lurks within each of us scare me more than the centralization of absolute power?
Telonius
2007-03-02, 09:54 AM
You know the aspect of Wikipedia which Orwell did not anticipate?
1984 was a warning against the use of technology by a central authority, right? But Wikipedia shows that if you put the ability to censor and hide and destroy truthful information into the hands of everybody, you get thousands of Little Brothers volunteering to become mini-fascists within their categories of agenda/interest.
Why does the idea that fascism lurks within each of us scare me more than the centralization of absolute power?
Don't feel too bad about it. The fact that fascism lurks within each of us (rulers included) is the reason that centralization is bad.
I don't know if that's optimistic or pessimistic.:smallconfused:
Logos7
2007-03-02, 10:02 AM
One can argue that Orwell thought exactly of that,
think of the children from the book, if their not a match up for lititle brother who only has power in relation to being little brother...
as for the metaperson talk , thats great and all. But if at the end of the day your anaylsis says shut up and stop crying, (which i think it does) it seems it stops being a critical anylsis and starts being an apologist shove to get over it.
quite frankly no one needs to be pushed anywhere and if nothing else i thank the people who have been posting here for giving me quick and easy and relevent links to read about wiki.
Why do i see a bunker and a luger in jimbo's future
Logos
Roethke
2007-03-02, 10:03 AM
You know the aspect of Wikipedia which Orwell did not anticipate?
1984 was a warning against the use of technology by a central authority, right? But Wikipedia shows that if you put the ability to censor and hide and destroy truthful information into the hands of everybody, you get thousands of Little Brothers volunteering to become mini-fascists within their categories of agenda/interest.
Why does the idea that fascism lurks within each of us scare me more than the centralization of absolute power?
Hey, I love Erfworld and OOTS, and think they certainly deserve mention in Wikipedia. I also don't really understand the animus against 'Fancruft' as the Wikieditors put it-- if someone wants to put in the work, as long as the quality and accuracy is maintained, doesn't seem like a big deal to me, and can be very useful, if I happen to be interested in the topic.
But Wiki-philosophy and disclaimers aside, try to keep a touch of perspective, folks, and avoid approaching Godwin. These are small-minded, Napoleon-complex ridden, annoying folks removing free advertising and information for a Webcomic. The first step down the road to fascism it is not.
PS- Oh, and keep up the good Erfworld work.
Shhalahr Windrider
2007-03-02, 11:06 AM
Why does the idea that fascism lurks within each of us scare me more than the centralization of absolute power?
I agree with Telonius that the potential for such viewpoints and impulses to exist within everyone speaks loudly against centralization of power. I also see why the existance of such impulses on the individual scale can be more frightening. It is generally agreed upon that such power plays are destructive and evil. Most people strive not to be destructive and evil. They wish to be the opposite. However, once you realize such evil could very well be in yourself, even through such a simple observation of the evil as a universal constant, you feel frightened to yourself. You feel you are supposed to be above such things. Other people do the evil. You fight against it, you don't participate in it. When the evil is being perpetrated by a large centralized authority, you can identify the evil in this external force. You are no longer threatened by yourself. Your identity as a good person is safe.
Additionally, you have to realize that you can always fight a large, monolithic, easily identifiable authority. The same cannot easily be said of human nature.
Regarding Orwell's works and what they predict:
I never read 1984. I will one day, but, as of now, I have yet to do so. The only Orwell with which I am familiar is Animal Farm, which is why I picked up on the "some are more equal than others" theme. I am certainly not familiar with how well they might have reflected universal impulses creating tyranny through popular concensus.
However, I do believe Ray Bradbury has picked up on such themes, particularly in Farenheit 451, though it also features as a theme in The Martian Chronicles. I have always been more concerned with a Bradburian future than Orwellian. (Of course, my lack of familiarity with Orwell compared to Bradbury may have something to do with that.) Unfortunately, now and then I see something in the news that seems to confirm Bradbury only had the years in his stories wrong and everything else was right.
Tokiko Mima
2007-03-02, 12:13 PM
You know the aspect of Wikipedia which Orwell did not anticipate?
1984 was a warning against the use of technology by a central authority, right? But Wikipedia shows that if you put the ability to censor and hide and destroy truthful information into the hands of everybody, you get thousands of Little Brothers volunteering to become mini-fascists within their categories of agenda/interest.
Why does the idea that fascism lurks within each of us scare me more than the centralization of absolute power?
Actually, if I recall correctly that theme was touched on. At one point, the protagonist notices the contrasts between the posters of the brave and bold blonde haired blue eyed men going off to the war, and the fact that all the men he sees around him are short, squatting, and constantly peering in all directions, like beetles.
What I took from that was a system like 1984 actually extracts out the non-fascists and sends them to War (1984) or bans them (Wikipedia) for not playing by their rules. It's actually a people filter/strainer.. only the most fascist and subservient get to go up the Wikipedia ladder, so it's not at all surprising that some of the most highly placed editors are the most fanatically fascist.
The Extinguisher
2007-03-02, 01:09 PM
One would think that the creation of a wikipedia article by someone other then those directly involved with a page in question (author, creator, etc) would proof it's known well enough to be made into a wikipedia article.
fangthane
2007-03-02, 01:26 PM
Shhalahr - If you haven't, I recommend reading Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World and possibly Brave New World Revisited (nonfiction written later, in regard to his predictions and the fact many were being realised sooner than he'd anticipated).
Bradbury was hardly alone in seeing the negative potential of society's future. Asimov, Heinlein, Huxley, Orwell and many others have had some keen insights into the best, and worst, of what we might have ahead.
Ruduen
2007-03-02, 01:41 PM
Did anybody else notice, though? The article has been recreated on the 14th, and is still up today.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erfworld
And since currently, my attention span isn't high enough to come up with a dignified response to these discussions, I'll leave it at that. I have read and done reports on both 1984 and Fahrenheit 451, and I do understand the points here, though. It is understandable that when everybody has the ability to print what they believe to be the truth, it can become lost or distorted through all of the changes that exist. Still, I think it's best to leave it up to the masses, as it is still an improvement to having a small group watch over everything. After all, the one person who deleted the article in the first place has been overruled by the many who recreated the topic.
Shhalahr Windrider
2007-03-02, 01:54 PM
After all, the one person who deleted the article in the first place has been overruled by the many who recreated the topic.
The problem is when the reverse happens.
The masses aren't always right.
Scientivore
2007-03-03, 01:15 AM
if at the end of the day your anaylsis says shut up and stop crying, (which i think it does) it seems it stops being a critical anylsis and starts being an apologist shove to get over it.
quite frankly no one needs to be pushed anywhere
I have failed to communicate my meaning to you. In fact, I went out of my way to not say the things that you think I said because they're disrespectful and violate boundaries.
If I had to summarize myself as briefly as possible, it would be like this: "I agree with your perception that their actions are unfair and hurtful. I empathize with the feelings of anger that you've expressed. I wouldn't presume to speak for you personally, of course; if you think that you need them, no one else could possibly be in a position to contradict that. I disagree with the perception that we as a community need them. I think that we want them as a means to fulfill needs that can be fulfilled other ways too. I also think that it would be quite useless for us to attempt to control them; in fact, I think that the crux of the problem is that they're not even in control of themselves. Since I don't see anything productive for me to do and I have only the most casual curiosity on the topic, this post has fulfilled my quota of interest in it. May you find the satisfaction that you seek."
Shhalahr Windrider
2007-03-05, 09:07 PM
This may interest some of you. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=36284)
For those not actively following that thread but interested in the subject nonetheless: it appears Jimbo Wales had now asked EssJay to resign.
Wikinews Article: http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Jimmy_Wales_asks_Wikipedian_to_resign_%22his_posit ions_of_trust%22_over_nonexistent_degrees
Probably best to discuss that particular detail in the thread linked to in the quote above. Y'know, to keep our subjects straight.
Hey, if any of you folks are still adding to the Erfworld article, that is great, but remember to limit how much you add :) the wiki article is supposed to be an informative basic overview of the subject, not the synopsis of all things Erf... you don't really need to talk about something just because it was funny in a comic (eg. that stanley's warlords have had targets as insignia). For those things we have this site... and the comic. Just a reminder... I will keep monitoring it and helpin out as I am getting kinda good at this stuff.
Logic
2007-03-06, 05:16 AM
Someone that has a wiki account please change this, whenever I read it, it makes me cringe.
Currently, it reads as this:
"Erfworld begins with a minor overview of its creation. It then skips ahead to the Battle of Warchalking, where the army of Stanley the Plaid is defeated[citation needed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citing_sources)]. Meanwhile, Prince Ansom and Jillian Zamussels plan their final assault on Gobwin Knob. Jillian is later captured.
The following day, Wanda summons in Parson Gotti, a human from the "Real World". Parson is made the warlord to defend Gobwin Knob, with the title "Lord Hamster".
Jillian is captured and tortured by Wanda."
Red and italicized are from my emphasis.
The last sentence implies Jillian being captured yet again. It should read more like "The captive Jillian is then tortured by Wanda"
Not quite sure why it bugs me so much, but it does.
Darth Paradox
2007-03-06, 01:35 PM
You don't have to have an account to edit it yourself, you know...
Shhalahr Windrider
2007-03-06, 04:51 PM
You can't if your IP address has been blocked.
EDIT:
I just noticed that Partially Clips' Wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PartiallyClips) currently includes an image of a comic based upon this thread's subject. (http://www.partiallyclips.com/index.php?id=1483) From the history page, that appears to be the work of one Trevor MacInnis.
Cute, Trevor.
Very cute. :biggrin:
PerpetualNewb
2007-03-11, 01:24 AM
And here we have another bit of proof that Wikipedia is pretty much worthless. I just checked Wiki to see if Erfworld still exists and it does. Not because it is notable. Not because it should be on Wiki. It is only there because the people who wanted it there had more collective time to waste on keeping it than those who didn't want it.
Maurog
2007-03-11, 02:02 AM
Roleplaying your nickname? Wikipedia is an encyclopedia - it is a dispenser of information for people. Ideally, you can ask it about anything at all, and find a brief summary of the subject, an extended summary of some aspects, and some links to various resources that deal with it in much greater detail.
The article is there because it contains facts. It wasn't removed because it contains enough sacrifices on the altar of WP:N idol references to reliable outside sources. The question you need to ask is - why wouldn't anything be on Wiki?
factotum
2007-03-11, 06:22 AM
Roleplaying your nickname? Wikipedia is an encyclopedia - it is a dispenser of information for people. Ideally, you can ask it about anything at all, and find a brief summary of the subject, an extended summary of some aspects, and some links to various resources that deal with it in much greater detail.
Shame we don't live in an ideal world, really. The democratisation of information represented by Wikipedia just proves that the group with the loudest voice gets their "facts" online, even if those facts are demonstrably false.
Don't get me wrong--if I ever need to find out about Klingon pronunciation or the history of the Star Wars universe Wikipedia would be my first port of call. I wouldn't go there for anything I deemed vital, though.
Maratanos
2007-03-11, 01:34 PM
This also may be of interest to some of you:
What Vandalism is (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:%28#Types_of_vandalism)
In my opinion, the use of a Speedy Delete tag on Erfworld classifies as abuse of tags... Unfortunately, I'm not bold enough to start calling an admin a vandal.
It is indeed one of the criteria for speedy deletion that the article establish notability, BUT (and this is key) ONLY if the speedy-deletion is uncontroversial.
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