Wikipedia deleting RPG articles

[Morrus]

Back 'em up on our wiki here just in case.

 

[Janx]

Back 'em up on our wiki here just in case.

that's actually a really good idea.

 

[tomBitonti]

Have to say, the "notability" guidelines are as clear as mud:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability

Also, the notability guidelines seem out of alignment with at least my perception of what sorts of information go on wikipedia. That is, following this guideline, many many pages detailing books of popular authors should not have their own pages.

Given that so many pages do not follow these rules, I call BS.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(books)

This page in a nutshell: A book is generally notable if it verifiably meets through reliable sources, one or more of the following criteria:

The book has been the subject[1] of multiple, non-trivial[2] published works whose sources are independent of the book itself.[3] This includes published works in all forms, such as newspaper articles, other books, television documentaries and reviews. Some of these works should contain sufficient critical commentary to allow the article to grow past a simple plot summary. This excludes media re-prints of press releases, flap copy, or other publications where the author, its publisher, agent, or other self-interested parties advertise or speak about the book.[4]
The book has won a major literary award.
The book has been considered by reliable sources to have made a significant contribution to a significant motion picture, or other art form, or event or political or religious movement.
The book is the subject of instruction at multiple elementary schools, secondary schools, colleges/universities or post-graduate programs in any particular country.[5]
The book's author is so historically significant that any of his or her written works may be considered notable. This does not simply mean that the book's author is him/herself notable by Wikipedia's standards; rather, the book's author is of exceptional significance and the author's life and body of written work would be a common subject of academic study.

Thx!

TomB

 

[Janx]

Have to say, the "notability" guidelines are as clear as mud:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability

Also, the notability guidelines seem out of alignment with at least my perception of what sorts of information go on wikipedia. That is, following this guideline, many many pages detailing books of popular authors should not have their own pages.

Given that so many pages do not follow these rules, I call BS.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(books)



Thx!

TomB

Personally, I would rather our planet had a reliable repository of knowledge and information, than have arguments over what counts as "notable" be a reason to exclude information.

Since wikipedia has allegedly presented itself as that repository, it seems that it should amend it's concept of what qualifies to be listed therein.

Given that the storage of text as data is virtually free, storing entries about books that only gamers may care about seems harmless. So long as the entries are factual, I don't see why a notability trait is required.

I imagine that may open the floodgates to self-published books or nutjob books, but the point of a repository of all knowledge is to identify and acknowledge all of man's works that future generations may themselves choose what is noteworthy and what is not.

It is not the repository's job to judge its contents, except on technical merit(facts, writing quality of the article).

 

[tomBitonti]

Personally, I would rather our planet had a reliable repository of knowledge and information, than have arguments over what counts as "notable" be a reason to exclude information.

Since wikipedia has allegedly presented itself as that repository, it seems that it should amend it's concept of what qualifies to be listed therein.

It is not the repository's job to judge its contents, except on technical merit(facts, writing quality of the article).

Agreed.

Not that some scoping mechanism wouldn't be useful. Information about Vecna is of interest to a very particular audience. I'm not sure I'd want to describe that audience, but there do seem to be folks who will know who Vecna is, and other folks who will not. Note that in this case the keyword "Vecna" is already obscure, so that narrows what folks will see the information sufficiently.

I get the feeling that some folks are peevishly removing content which they deem unfitting to the repository. Is this a correct impression? If so, while they may have some narrow point, their actions seem unwarranted.

Thx!

TomB

 

[Janx]

Agreed.

Not that some scoping mechanism wouldn't be useful. Information about Vecna is of interest to a very particular audience. I'm not sure I'd want to describe that audience, but there do seem to be folks who will know who Vecna is, and other folks who will not. Note that in this case the keyword "Vecna" is already obscure, so that narrows what folks will see the information sufficiently.

I get the feeling that some folks are peevishly removing content which they deem unfitting to the repository. Is this a correct impression? If so, while they may have some narrow point, their actions seem unwarranted.

Thx!

TomB

I'd have to go read more to see if I can more knowledgeably deduce their motive. At the simplest, they have chosen a target that they can single out to eliminate. They don't see value in the articles, and thus are convinced it is right to destroy them.

Given the breadth of Wikipedia's content, I should think it is chock full of articles that can be deemed obscure to a reasonably large (and ignorant) body of people. Obscurity probably isn't a useful test, and I think it would be harmful. The very value of a mega-repository is that it holds everything, especially the obscure stuff. In this way, obscure things are not lost, and are able to be discovered.

Consider the BBC's Doctor Who problem. Had they treated every show as worth retaining, regardless of how little apparent value it had now, they wouldn't be sitting at the 50th anniversary with lost episodes they can't recover.

I doubt Vecna articles are as valuable as Dr. Who episodes. But that isn't for me or any other human to decide with regards to inclusion in an knowledge repository.

The big problem with this kind of destruction effort is that collecting the data now, while it is fresh and known (principle creators are mostly still alive) is where more facts can be found. It's kind of like Wikipedia giving the stink eye to some authors who have actively updated information on their page (because it's not properly sourced). What better time to collect info, than from direct sources living in the time the data was invented. Better to document Vecna now, while some of the authors still live, than to wait 100 years for somebody to write about what they THINK Vecna was to this brief fad of role playing games.

 

[giant.robot]

I have long railed against Wikipedia deletionists and their absolutely ridiculous power trips. However looking over the linked Wikipedia articles I can say they're generally pretty bad. The Rick Loomis, Lord Soth, and Vecna articles need a serious rewrite. The Lord Soth and Vecna articles are written with different voices, one describing the character as if they were writing an in-universe biography and the other writing about a fictional character.

Compare the Vecna page to say...Aragorn's son Eldarion. The Eldarion article (a character appearing only in an appendix) is well sourced and categorized and looks and feels like an appropriate Wikipedia article. Eldarion is certainly not any more notable a character than Vecna but the Wikipedia entry is actually decent. Besides fighting deletionist policies on Wikipedia also consider contributing to Wikipedia and fix the articles to resemble something useful. If someone stumbled on the Vecna article they would be hard pressed to figure out what it was from the page's context. The same is not true for the Eldarion article.

It should be obvious that the Rick Loomis and Flying Buffalo articles are in similar shape. The Flying Buffalo page is at least formatted according to Wikipedia guidelines. The Rick Loomis entry is awful and really needs to be cleaned up.