It scared the bejeesus out of me the first time. Now that I expect it, It doesnt have the same effect, but its still freaky.
edited 20th Jul '11 9:40:20 AM by OmegaKross
Can't think of anything witty, so have this instead...What if we designated janitors to clean up examples? Not exactly an amin or a mod, but somebody to make sure the examples are apropos to the trope, like in this case?
edited 20th Jul '11 12:59:30 PM by TweedlyDee
I TELL YOU HWAT!^ Well . . .
That's Feo . . . He's a disgusting, mysoginistic, paedophilic asshat who moonlights as a shitty writer—Something AwfulI think its because the subpages are on the Darth Wiki.
Can't think of anything witty, so have this instead...I realize this thread is old, but I've been noticing the same types of issues mentioned here and seeing them so often has become a bit grating.
I think that basically hit the nail on the head. There's far too much 'hyping it up' and "X was so scary" going on and not enough of explaining the actual content.
- "This. Just...THIS"/"I was SOOOO creeped out by THIS"/"This scene."/etc. with a link to a video or a link to another page on the wiki.
- Links aren't good enough. Tell us what the heck you're talking about and don't expect people to just search through other pages or leave the site to figure it out.
- Overly-conversational sounding examples: "I thought X was so scary!" with a reply under it that "I know! And then when X happened, I totally FREAKED!"
- "When [short and vague description] happened I was so scared. It made me stay up late for weeks and I still think about it when X happens in real life."
- We aren't there to read all about you. We're there to read about the work. Tell us about the Nightmare Fuel and not just your reaction to it.
- "Anyone who isn't scared by [vague description] isn't a real person. I was so terrified. [Description of their life after seeing X.]"
- Basically a combination of the two problems above, but more annoying because now they're telling other people how to feel while still giving little information about what the heck they found so disturbing in the first place.
Even after reading all of these, I still haven't learned anything substantial about the works actual content.
Is this a problem? Should something be done about this? If so, what?
"With hard work and dedication, I will become a splendid ninja!"Even after the whole Nightmare Fuel rework it is a problem, IMO, and given that much of that kind of thing was before standards started getting tightened for certain tropes I think there's room for an argument to be made to wipe all the entries (not an Example Sectionectomy, mind you; new entries allowed afterward), and start afresh with some guidelines laid down to reduce the clutter. There's just too much crap in there to reasonably go through it all before the heat death of the universe, no matter how many tropers work on the problem.
(Mind you, the first point you bring up is covered under Weblinks Are Not Examples, the second under Conversation In The Main Page, the third by the "no first-person" policy, and the fourth... I'm sure something covers it, though I'm not sure what, off the top of my head.)
edited 6th Dec '12 7:17:19 PM by Nohbody
All your safe space are belong to TrumpDo you think there's any way to get rid of the mess without getting rid of everything else? That seems a bit drastic and should probably be a last resort. Perhaps if we started by cleaning up popular HONF pages people would get the idea and stop adding crappy examples.
"With hard work and dedication, I will become a splendid ninja!"Well, first of all there's no HONF any more. NF and Accidental NF are the options (HONF just redirects to NF, now).
As for wiping, I didn't mean it was an ideal response, but at least to me it looks to be the lesser evil, so to speak, compared to leaving that mess that encourages bad troping.
edited 6th Dec '12 9:43:18 PM by Nohbody
All your safe space are belong to TrumpPoint 4 is covered by Conversationin The Main Page, This Troper and How To Write An Example.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

I always thought that that Eileen head was one of those Nightmare Retardant things from Silent Hill.
Do not obey in advance.