Headscratchers Cleanup

The Headscratchers namespace is one of the oldest parts of the site, dating back to when they were called "It Just Bugs Me" and the site was a lot more lawless. Despite that a lot has changed since then, the only thing that's changed about Headscratchers is the namespace. This leaves a lot of glaring issues with the pages that can make it hard for any reader to get accurate, interesting, or thought-provoking answers from them.

We're here to change that.

Some recurring problems include:

• Repeated questions, and repeated answers.
• Tangents and debates that stray away from the original question. Often times these debates get bash-y toward the work or other tropers, get insanely nitpicky, or just have nothing to do with the actual topic.
• Bashing in general, and nitpicking in general.
• Repeated questions, and repeated answers.
• First-Person Writing
• Disorganization, overly long pages, and generally poor formatting.
• Repeated questions, and repeated answers.
• Natter
• Grammar issues

This thread is NOT going to be operating on a principal of "Cut whatever we don't like". Whenever possible we will re-write and re-arrange things to make things flow better, and removals should be discussed on-thread beforehand. If we can salvage it, we will. We're not here to have a crusade to remove any wit or disagreement from the namespace; we're here to make these pages shine and live up to our current standards, while still preserving the essence of Headscratchers pages.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jun 14th 2020 at 9:18:24 AM

Is natter allowed on headscratchers btw? I see that a lot

That's one of the issues we need to combat. Natter isn't allowed anywhere, but since Headscratchers blurs the line between "normal page" and "discussion page", a lot of people overlook the obvious natter problems these pages have.

I'm going to start cleaning up Headscratchers.Golden Sun. I've started trimming the first-person stuff, but I worry that I might be a bit lenient on the natter.

My main concern are all the pages in Headscratchers.Harry Potter, personally.

And remember, we should be discussing things first. While cleaning out first-person writing probably doesn't need thread consensus, cutting stuff does because people take their headscratchers more personally than other things on the site and we don't want to accidentally cut anything legit.

But yeah...those HP pages...oof. Not even sure where to begin but 75% of each page is natter and debate and other nonsense.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jun 14th 2020 at 9:17:31 AM

"Natter isnt allowed anywhere"

Ooooo boy, headscratcher pages are gonna be hard af to clean up then lol

I'm gonna start with GoAnimate.

Remember to bring things up for discussion before chopping away~

Oh shit, sorry.

Well, I mostly just deleted some natter and first person speak, but I will remember to do that.

Well... I already trimmed a bit of natter from this question on the Golden Sun page. The stuff I cut is in red.

Is there anything else here that needs to be cut?

By the way, I'm sticking with this page for now because I know a lot more about this series than I do about Harry Potter, so I have a better idea of what is and isn't relevant information.

Man, this whole fucking thing feels like a forum thread. Cut most of it, and the first person crap

The reason I want discussion here is because the difference between natter and actual answers can be hard to detect, so I just don't want to encourage accidental vandalism by people jumping the gun.

That said, your cut looks fine to me.

Anyway to get started on the Harry Potter cleanup thing I'll try and go through each of the pages and give my thoughts on every single folder on them. It's going to take a lot of time so bear with me as I can't even start it until after work tonight. Just know- these pages are a trip and part of me is almost excited to re-read them to make my analysis.

Just to start with, the first thing I do to clean any headscratchers page is folderize everything (one question per folder, further questions as part of the discussion for the first one can stay but other related questions should get their own folder) and example indentation (questions are one indent, everything else two).

Three indents is where I find most of the natter. On newer pages, it's not as much actual natter, so it can just be moved to two indents fine, but older pages are still terrible about it.

Just wanted to share my experience. Can't help much since I just started a new job, but I think the biggest problems will be the old pages like Harry Potter. I haven't seen too many natter and complaining problems on newer pages, though still plenty of example indentation problems and repeated questions.

EDIT: Oh, and I completely gave up on policing first person years ago. I nuke This Troper on sight, obviously, but it's really hard to clean a headscratchers page of first person.

Edited by Discar on Jun 15th 2020 at 9:10:08 AM

The First Person thing is honestly the last of my concerns; I think we should zap it as much as possible but not make it a priority.

Starting with Headscratchers.Harry Potter And The Philosophers Stone. Feel free to watch my slow Sanity Slippage unfold on HP Headscratchers 1.

Didn't even get halfway through and I need to stop for the night. If anyone else wants to jump in, by all means, go for it.

There are two headscratchers pages, Star Trek and The Last Jedi, on Overly Long Pages that might need looking at.

Taking a break from the Harry Potter thing to talk about Headscratchers.The Giver, which about halfway down the page suddenly becomes a debate over authors and symbolism and other nonsense like that rather than the actual book. There's also a debate over anti-utopias as well. I'm not done reading the whole page yet so there's probably more of this.

Headscratchers.The Rise Of Skywalker may need some clean up, as mentioned here.

I know there are at least a couple duplicates. I cleaned the MAJOR problems ("Why does this movie suck so much?") months ago, but haven't been keeping up with it since.

Did some cleaning for Headscratchers.The Rise Of Skywalker. Got some duplicates and example indentation.

Game Of Thrones Season Eight might need looking at, given the criticism and backlash the season got.

There's a page called Headscratchers.My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic Meta, which is what it sounds like- people asking questions about the meta. About the production, the creators, the merch, about real life.

Not kosher, right?

...I don't really see a problem with it? There is no ban on meta questions in Headscratchers, just on complaining questions.

"Meta" examples are generally discouraged on Moments pages, so why are they allowed on Headscratchers?