about the 'No Negativity' rule

Well, this all depends on what people see the wiki as a tool for. As I've said in the past, if you're using the wiki to gather general information about a work (which is not our primary purpose and never really has been), subpages are a bit of a disservice, since they spread said information across multiple pages.

For reference, my post on the subject from about a year ago.

edited 15th May '12 11:29:49 AM by TotemicHero

I fail to see how that has to do with anything, Bound. If anything, it's the forums that are causing funding issues, not anything wiki-related.

That's a very interesting view into it. Thanks for the link.

The userbase will take from the wiki the uses they already see. They see lists and lists? They make lists and lists, or add to existent lists. If they saw lists with how the items are used, of why the items are used? Then they do lists with hows and whys, or contribute to existent lists of hows and whys.

You need to guide your userbase into what you want them to be.

If they start acting like jerks, ban them. If they start debating stuff senselessly and creating natter, ban them.

It's going to take effort, it's not going to work magically by itself, but it can be done. And it would be so great, and people would look at TV Tropes and say, "Wow, what an awesome site. I think I'll join too."

It'll do all sorts of good things for media, for how people see and consume media, it can change so many things, for the best.

Please tell me you can see this potential as well?

edited 15th May '12 11:34:05 AM by Mazz

No. That would be bad. Analysis on Main should be moved, not managed. Nobody is saying that the site shouldn't be improved, they are saying that wouldn't be an improvement.

edited 15th May '12 11:36:30 AM by rodneyAnonymous

Why wouldn't it be an improvement? And who is this "they"?

edit: oh, sneaky

That's why I'm saying that, in my proposition — which could be switched by a better one if one is suggested — Main is for the description of the work or trope, and the examples are moved to their own sections.

That would solve that problem and encourage people to make better examples, or improve the ones already there.

It'll make easier management too, because things won't be all lumped together, but there will be encouragement to visit those sections, as opposed to the current state, where the other tabs and such are distracted by all the text in the Main section.

edited 15th May '12 11:39:34 AM by Mazz

The site owner/administrator, a moderator, and several tropers.

The site owner/administrator and a moderator, okay, that makes. They are two people, but they are two very important people, hierarchically.

But who are these "several tropers"? You make it sound like there are dozens or hundreds of thousands of tropers saying:

"No, just keep the lists as they are, don't add anything to them, don't improve them!"

And I don't see or hear that beyond a scattered few individuals, a few dozens, at most.

edited 15th May '12 11:41:56 AM by Mazz

I feel like we've had this conversion before.

Cool, and what is your opinion?

"Several" means "a few" or "more than two but not many", not "hundreds of thousands".

edited 15th May '12 11:45:28 AM by rodneyAnonymous

Playing the devil's advocate here a bit, but I'm wondering if Mazz's experience with the wiki has been on work pages filled with Zero Context Examples and such. Pages written that way are not kosher and never have been. (I've cleaned up more than a few cases like that before, so I know they are out there.)

If his impression is that the majority of our pages are just bland lists of tropes, then I can see why he'd be saying what he is.

edited 15th May '12 11:45:17 AM by TotemicHero

Mazz, you're talking about separate issues. From a structural standpoint, a work's main article is where it cross-wicks with the trope pages that it contains. Only when it gets too large (technically, not visually — there's a hard limit on article sizes) does it need its primary tropes split off.

The link goes: Trope <-> Work <-> Trope. Anything that shoves those primary relationships off to the side in favor of texty stuff is counterproductive.

Second, nobody is saying, "Don't improve the lists." We have tens of thousands of edits every day (this is a WAG; Eddie would have exact numbers) and most of them are people adding a trope example to a work article or a work example to a trope article. Less often but no less passionately, people are adding new trope articles and work articles. They are actively working to improve the breadth and depth of the wiki.

You are proposing shoving all that to the side — the stuff that is the main purpose of the wiki as we define it — to turn us into something that we are not chartered to be. We've said no, we don't want to do that, but if you want to do it, go make an Analysis page.

Then you and Bound go off about how we're "ignoring the potential" of the wiki. And, by the way, calling our users idiots. So I have to wonder what exactly you expect us to say in response.

Edit: also this — examples should have descriptive text, just not so much that they obscure the purpose of the article or invite natter.

edited 15th May '12 11:46:35 AM by Fighteer

I'm not saying we should mess up the links.

Anyway, I don't know what else to say, then.

I'm not calling you idiots, but I can see now that this wiki and me (and apparently Bound By The Moon?) are not on the same page, and it saddens me to realize that this will never change.

It honestly saddens me to see that the wiki will never change, when it could have been so great, and to have one of the moderators mock me when I say that it could improve greatly.

You are cool, though, thanks for trying to see it from my point of view. Yes, that is part of what convinced me to discuss all this.

I don't wish to become involved in this discussion.

I want to say that the wiki is already great, just in the sense of "awesome" not "awe-inspiring". And that is, as it were, great.

edited 15th May '12 11:55:31 AM by Telcontar

In fairness, I also can get that if you just see an article full of Zero Context Examples and consider that representative of the wiki, you'd feel we are missing something, and you'd be right. Those should be expanded or removed as appropriate.

However, examples and descriptions need to obey the Cardinal Rule of TV Tropes writing: Clear > Concise > Witty. In short, make your point, make it clearly and as briefly as possible, and with those in mind, try to make it entertaining as well. And don't write examples that lead to natter or invite argument.

edited 15th May '12 11:56:34 AM by Fighteer

Right then, so you have a case of running into badly written pages.

As an example, I give you our page on the webcomic Selkie as a better example of what a work page should look like (I curate this one).

If you see any pages with bad examples and aren't familiar with the work, hit up the discussion for that page and see if you can find someone who knows about the work to fix the problems.

Edit: Fighteer is not a fighter, but a ninja!

edited 15th May '12 11:58:07 AM by TotemicHero

I think the best first step here is to make the Analysis page more prominent and obviously important. Right now, it looks like the least important tab on the page. It's far more important than Nightmare Fuel, Wild Mass Guessing, or Crowning Moment Of Awesome, yet it gets less pride of place.

I agree that analysis of tropes (and maybe works) is the logical next step with the available data. I don't necessarily agree that it should go in the same place as cataloging tropes, however. I'm not saying it's less important, just that the two don't necessarily mesh. And since trope lists go on main pages, analysis will have to go somewhere else.

Analyzing tropes is very much in line with this site's mission: it shouldn't just be what, when, and how, it should be why, as well.

So do it, dude. Click that Analysis tab and type to your heart's content.

Ta-da what? That's no different from what we're set up to do right now. We already have analysis as part of our mission.

All in good time. Just give me a few centuries, like I said.

This is a wiki. I'm one user. I'm not an admin. You are (three of you in this very thread, no less). You have the power (and responsibility) to corral your userbase into doing what you want them to do. I don't. The Analysis system is too broken for one person to fix. That's why I'm here.

We cannot force people into doing things they don't want to do, or else they will leave. And the Analysis thing isn't so important that it would justify this.

Bound, I'm afraid you have cause and effect very badly mixed up. I don't see the need for you to continue in this conversation if that's the best you can do. Accusing the site's administration of malfeasance because we don't do things the way you think we should is not an acceptable way to debate.

edited 15th May '12 12:45:45 PM by Fighteer

On the contrary, I think Analysis might actually be something we might want to consider more important. I think it's ultimately what this site mission actually is.

I think the part where the analysis tag is more towards the front was a good idea. I mean 'analysis' starts with an A so it goes first alphabetically anyway