Jump to content

Does Community Content Belong on the Wiki?


ATMLVE

Recommended Posts

So to start off, @RightBigToeand myself are, by the numbers, the two biggest Dual Universe wiki contributors, and I am currently the administrator of the wiki. RightBigToe recently began adding organizations into the wiki as articles, a decision I disagreed with. Rather than repeat myself, I'll just post our conversation thus far. I will summarize after.

 

Quote

 

ATMLVE (instigating conversation after seeing articles created on CS and TU):

I have to say I am quite opposed to the idea of adding organizations to the wiki. A wiki is for information regarding the game, where people go to learn about it's mechanics and features. Organizations are created and run by players and as such, I feel they are out of place on a wiki as they can vanish and change. The community portal is the place for community items, not Gamepedia.

It would be completely unfair to delete the organization articles you created based on my opinion alone, even though I don't feel like they belong, so I'll leave the articles as they are for now and await your thoughts.


RightBigToe:

I agree that it is a slippery slope including pages about organizations, and that they can be difficult due to their often temporary nature and origin from the players as opposed to the developers. I disagree with saying that means they should not be included at all for several reasons, but most importantly because there is no true content in Dual Universe, but rather a series of tools for the players to create their dreams with.

I personally think that it would be a disservice to not at least considering including in the official database information about the top organizations and cities, their history and function, and how they interact together. While this may be difficult if not impossible to do for other games where there are multiple servers and single- & multi-player variations, the nature of Dual Universe as a single-shard universe where you will be able to find any of these groups, they become a critical component of the game.

I am more than open to debating this further, because I understand the difficulty with maintaining this information, maintaining a neutral point of view, and whether its even appropriate in the first place. I think it would be best to continue this discussion on a talk page, so let's use the Terran Union's.


ATMLVE:

I have a different idea. Why don't we go to the forums and talk about it there and see what the community says. We both have opposing opinions, but I want to be fair and respectful, and this is a great way to engage the community on a debatable topic. If they decide organizations have a place on the wiki, my opinion will be negated and the articles will of course stay, and you'll be free to make more and edit them as you see fit. But if the community decides they don't belong, then your opinion will be negated. How does that sound?

And just to clarify, I have no hostile intentions at all, no ill feelings! Thank you for contributing to the wiki! :)


RighBigToe:

My other point would be is that what harm does it do to have the pages here, especially at this point in the development of the game. I think it would be better to experiment with trying to incorporate player-created aspects of the game into the wiki during the alpha phase, and if it turns out to be too much or misleading or unhelpful (etc), then we can axe it at that point.

At the end of the day, I think it would severely limit the content of this wiki to only discuss developed content as opposed to player-created content. To clarify, the primary directive so to speak should be as a knowledge base for mechanisms, tools, and such, but that doesn't mean there can't be different sections of the wiki.


ATMLVE:

See I disagree, I would argue that because player made content is always subject to change, whereas the game's mechanics are more or less steadfast, it doesn't belong. A different section of the wiki would be alright, but making new articles is not a new section, it is simply mixing in dynamic, emergent, changing organizations that may be gone in a few weeks with the steadfast mechanics the developers have created.

The "harm" it does is add (in my opinion of course) irrelevant data in with useful information that people may be looking for.

 

To summarize, RightBigToe argues that large organizations are a big part of the game as it is in it's unreleased state, and as such belong on the wiki. I disagree, I think that they have no place on the wiki because they are player-made content; I do not believe community content of any kind belongs on the wiki, only information gathered by the community based upon steadfast mechanics and data released by Novaquark.

 

One of our opinions will have to be set aside, and I feel that it should be the majority opinion based on what the community thinks. Also, there is no animosity of any kind between us, it is simply a difference of opinions! I want this to be fair.

 

So what do you as the community think? Should community content, at least for now, be added to the wiki? What are your thoughts?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm more on RightBigToe's side. I don't see why you should limit wiki just pure game mechanics. If it is supposed to help players, especially new players then knowing about player created things like organisations, central player made locations or other things like player created events etc. is just as valid information. All those are definitely useful information for player entering the world, or even long term player who can't keep an eye on everything in-game alone. 

 

Isn't wiki community created content too and why should there be some other place to write general information on community created things in-game if there is already a wiki. Sure organisations have their own pages to market themselves, but wiki would have change to have other point of view than own marketing, also write down their history.

 

As for changing nature of organisations, it is true that one decision by one player could render wiki page obsolete, but does that mean it shouldn't have existed. Lot of things tend to change over time, sometimes unexpectedly. It just means people contributing to wiki need to be active for those parts of the wiki to be up to date and useful as more than historical achieve. I would also recommend highlighting date of information whenever writing something as being the current status. If you want to clarify different topics you can also classify/title wiki articles as information on the game itself (game mechanics etc.) and the world/player made content (orgs, places, events etc) so people know what they are reading, but I don't see any need for some completely separate place for that information.

 

Though I would be careful in writing about organisations for example before game comes out. They aren't really established until people get to create them in-game. At least I would separate pre launch info from what actually ends up happening.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, yamamushi said:

And people said I was wasting my time when I suggested making another wiki for this kind of stuff ...

 

Anyways, if you decide to actually go through with making another one, I've got http://dualuniverse.wiki and am willing to host one.

 

While this would be an idea, it's a disservice to the community to separate information to two websites just because it feels better.  Having a single source of useful information is better than multiple.  Wikis are designed to have disparate, changing, and adaptable information.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think we need to separate "essential game concepts" from organizations in the wiki. However, in a single shard universe, some player made content will be essential. For example, no guide to EVE Online would be complete without mentioning Jita and the vital role it plays in the game. Jita is only Jita because the players decided that it is, so that's definitely a function of player content, not the game. The content on the wiki should definitely include similar issues that are highly important to how we play the game.

 

However, adding articles about organizations themselves seems like a bad idea. Doing so will present a huge array of problems. Those articles will need to be updated constantly to represent changes in those orgs. Any org on the wiki would have a built-in advantage over everyone else simply on the basis of being more well known. By including an org you'd automatically offend any org that doesn't get included, and that could also spiral into a flame war on the wiki between orgs that hate each other.

 

Nevermind the fact that including orgs at this time seems really silly given that none of us have even played the game yet. We don't actually know what each org will be doing, who will be on who's side, and so on, because the game doesn't even exist yet. As of right now, all discussions about orgs and their function is entirely hypothetical and academic, so making a big deal about it seems incredibly arrogant.

 

So no, leave orgs off the wiki. Maybe include some player content later, but right now it's very premature. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

22 minutes ago, Vorengard said:

I think we need to separate "essential game concepts" from organizations in the wiki. However, in a single shard universe, some player made content will be essential. For example, no guide to EVE Online would be complete without mentioning Jita and the vital role it plays in the game. Jita is only Jita because the players decided that it is, so that's definitely a function of player content, not the game. The content on the wiki should definitely include similar issues that are highly important to how we play the game.

 

However, adding articles about organizations themselves seems like a bad idea. Doing so will present a huge array of problems. Those articles will need to be updated constantly to represent changes in those orgs. Any org on the wiki would have a built-in advantage over everyone else simply on the basis of being more well known. By including an org you'd automatically offend any org that doesn't get included, and that could also spiral into a flame war on the wiki between orgs that hate each other.

 

Nevermind the fact that including orgs at this time seems really silly given that none of us have even played the game yet. We don't actually know what each org will be doing, who will be on who's side, and so on, because the game doesn't even exist yet. As of right now, all discussions about orgs and their function is entirely hypothetical and academic, so making a big deal about it seems incredibly arrogant.

 

So no, leave orgs off the wiki. Maybe include some player content later, but right now it's very premature. 

 

More or less, this is essentially my point.  That there are some things that are important to playing the game because players make them that way.  With Dual Universe, in my opinion, its exacerbated because there is so little content developed, no empires no missions, etc.  As a result, the interactions between players become even more important and are virtually unavoidable. 

 

I agree that it is somewhat silly to specifically include organizations on the wiki in such an infant stage, but nothing on the wiki is real unchanging information, its all vague observations based on something someone said or showed once or twice.  My intent is not to have the wiki replicate the community page, but supplement the pure game mechanics & concepts with information about "important" player creations.  How you decide what is important is conjecture, but I vehemently disagree that it should be completely disallowed from being included on the wiki.  

 

To repeat my previous post, there is no sense in creating more sources of information for players it just makes things confusing unnecessarily.  It is not difficult to have different sections of a wiki are label them as such.  Its even easier to have a banner at the top of every page focused on player-created content as a disclaimer or equivalent.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Lethys said:

Wiki = game mechanics, gameplay and game specific information only. Orgs aren't one of that, so no

 

Where exactly does that definition come from and why should we care about it?

 

1 hour ago, RightBigToe said:

 

While this would be an idea, it's a disservice to the community to separate information to two websites just because it feels better.  Having a single source of useful information is better than multiple.  Wikis are designed to have disparate, changing, and adaptable information.

 

Exactly, if player finds one dual universe wiki all of the useful information that has been gathered should be there. There is no point in having multiple wikis/sites. That is just more work for people behind them and several sites to search for information when it could all be in one place.

 

Only reason to not have ie. orgs in there yet is because without the game they don't really exist and it might be better to just focus on things that are in the game, rather than things that have been discussed on the web. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Although I don't think organizations should be on the wiki per se, but I do think well established cities/fortifications should be.  This allows players to know where civilization is in the bigger picture.  

 

When the the game reaches a point with countless planets and exploration, it may seem daunting to find civilization and structure for new players.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, Hades said:

Although I don't think organizations should be on the wiki per se, but I do think well established cities/fortifications should be.  This allows players to know where civilization is in the bigger picture.  

 

When the the game reaches a point with countless planets and exploration, it may seem daunting to find civilization and structure for new players.

 

I agree with your argument, I just went a step further along that train of thought to think that if a major city is being discussed, it would be difficult to avoiding talking about who operates/owns the city, how the city is organized politically, etc.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm also supporting RightBigToes side. Unlike most MMOs where conventional wiki is enough,  Dual Universe is especially centered around player generated content, which should also have its place in the official wiki!

If you look at the design of the RDMS system it especially allows to build very unique social structures which would be worth a wiki article, just because of their complexity.

And organizations are not the only thing that will become relevant. Especially in context to the recent Devdiary I would include ship-designs(based on blueprints), cities, player-designed-machineries (e.g. Arcades, and other DPU based things...).

 

In short I think of it as the real world wikipedia: everything that is "relevant" for a player should be documented somewhere!

If it has no place in this wiki, I'd agree to yamamushi to create a separate wiki for that. (however not the optimal solution)

 

 

However I also agree with the concern that orgs will misuse the wiki for self advertising. To prevent that all orgs could be forced to use a universal "template" for the article. Thereby only neutral and fact-based information would be allowed, which would also be more easy to maintain.

The other topics in this "player generated content"-section should follow the same template...

This would actually create a lot more effort to maintain the information on the wiki, but I'm sure it would benefit in the long run. Also it would get more people involve to participate in the wiki, as they will want to create articles for their own content tere! ;)

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Why list orgs when we have the community portal which is going to be integrated into the game anyway? I mean there are 1500+ orgs, who decides which orgs make it into the list?

 

As a compromise i'd say big cities, places of interest, and general nice places to visit should be added to a separate section of the wiki so you can distinguish between the 2 easily. Even if you put a little history into the page about which org built/run/found the area then that's fine, it all adds to the player experience. And, as others have said, new players can find these places easily.

 

Also this would need some form of rules set to be able to add it to the list, like it's needs to be of a minimum size or a minimum number of player visits a day, I don't know just examples :)

 

If not then the list could be endless and very daunting for anyone let alone new players.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, Kael said:

Why list orgs when we have the community portal which is going to be integrated into the game anyway? I mean there are 1500+ orgs, who decides which orgs make it into the list?

 

As a compromise i'd say big cities, places of interest, and general nice places to visit should be added to a separate section of the wiki so you can distinguish between the 2 easily. Even if you put a little history into the page about which org built/run/found the area then that's fine, it all adds to the player experience. And, as others have said, new players can find these places easily.

 

Also this would need some form of rules set to be able to add it to the list, like it's needs to be of a minimum size or a minimum number of player visits a day, I don't know just examples :)

 

If not then the list could be endless and very daunting for anyone let alone new players.

 

I can get behind this. There is already a place for Orgs and that is the Community Portal.

 

Would like to see major cities/infrastructure put on the Wiki potentially, but it will need to meet certain criteria, which can't exactly be defined until we get a playable game. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So far it seems like the two sides are pretty close together on the issue. We all agree that obviously some player content will have to be on the wiki, like major cities and space stations, trade hubs, star gates, and so on; and even those most strongly in favor of adding orgs to the wiki can agree that it shouldn't be for advertising or propaganda purposes. So, to refocus the discussion, it seems like the largest issue is whether or not there should be biographies for individual organizations and players.

 

In relation to that issue, first I'd like to say that arguing for or against having multiple websites is a serious waste of time. There will be multiple websites, no matter what we say about it. That's not a bad thing at all. If you can't handle searching multiple websites for information, then you probably can't handle playing a game like DU, where virtually all of the game world is a PvP zone. What's most important here is that each website be clear and useful, and it's hard to accomplish either of those goals when you're attempting to do everything. So, the wiki should be focused on accomplishing a specific goal: being a central location for people to go to get a basic understanding of topics essential to playing the game.

 

So, to go back to the EVE example: If I were to write an EVE wiki, I would definitely include a page just about Jita, because it's the most important system in the game. I'd also probably include a page on suicide ganking and smartbombing on gates, because those are important things to look out for. These are player created activities and content, but they're essential parts of playing the game, so they would belong in a wiki. However, I wouldn't write an article about specific alliances, like Pandemic Legion for example, because you don't have to know who PL is to have fun in EVE. I wouldn't bother with keeping track of who's flying where, how many pilots they have, what systems they hold, their current tactics, and so on, because those things change all the time and aren't really essential to playing EVE. Furthermore, websites like Evewho and Dotlan do those jobs much better than I could with a wiki. So, players would come to my wiki to find out about how to play the game, but they'd go someplace else to find out about the other people playing the game.  

 

Similarly, a DU wiki should focus on explaining things like the building mechanics, how to set up a Territory Control Unit, how to find the best ores, or where the most important cities and space stations are. Leave the tracking of organizations to other websites that will do so more effectively. If new players want to figure out which organizations to join, they should be going to the community portal, or some other website dedicated to detailing orgs, and not the wiki. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Having player organizations on the gamepedia wiki is a pretty terrible idea.

 

The Gamepedia wiki should be for official information about the game and official lore, not every little tiny thing someone feels like putting on it. 

 

What's to stop people from putting every tiny construct them design on the wiki too, who's to say that a ship should or shouldn't be on the wiki in that case if we're going down the path of "well important player-created content should be there"? Who's to say when a city is big enough or important enough to warrant being put on the official wiki? Who's to say when a player is important enough to have their own wiki page? Where does it stop? 

 

 

5 hours ago, RightBigToe said:

 

While this would be an idea, it's a disservice to the community to separate information to two websites just because it feels better.  Having a single source of useful information is better than multiple.  Wikis are designed to have disparate, changing, and adaptable information.

 

The disservice to the community is trying to shove every minute player created detail into the wiki just because we can. Having a giant list of every organization there isn't useful to players, and it only serves to pull people away from the community page. It's going to turn into spam that nobody wants to curate or maintain. 

 

If you feel like every organization needs to be recorded somewhere, create a new site and start recording the history of the game that way. There are a handful of organizations out there that are already attempting to do this, are they doing a "disservice to the community" by wanting to make things their own way instead of trying to amalgamate everything into the gamepedia wiki? 

 

That argument could very well just be used to dissuade literally anyone from ever attempting to make an informative website around Dual Universe, "because it's on the gamepedia wiki" 

 

It's a disservice to the community to assume that every tiny detail about the game needs to be documented in one place when there are arguably much better ways of storing and organizing some information that won't lock people into the awful navigation that gamepedia limits users to. 

 

 

 

Keep the Gamepedia wiki for content that Novaquark creates. Simple.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Firstly, the main contributors to the wiki should and do have the most say, since they are the ones actually putting in their own time to create the content.  So hats off to you.

Secondly, mentioning orgs in a game wiki is a slippery slope, when does it stop being factual and accurate and start becoming just another form of advertising?  Even cities may not be there forever. Orgs come and go and constantly updating a wiki to remain up to date seems a tad unnecessary.  I am sure there will be another site dedicated to the current galactic/political map of the game.  

 

That said, org game mechanics should definitely be in the wiki, but mentioning specific orgs, I feel should not be.  This is my opinion and I don't hold it against others if they have a differing one ;) 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The wiki should be for two things:

  • game mechanics, information, data, etc....
  • player interaction mechanics (like @Vorengard posted above with his examples from EVE)

The wiki should not be for player information: information about specific players, orgs, or alliances. That stuff is for the community site, tools, or what have you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Orgs don't belong on the wiki, yet. 

 

Until the game launches, no orgs can really prove themselves or even demonstrate that they will survive more than a week in the game. Some might not even make it to launch. There is no point in cluttering up the wiki with potentially transient material.

 

That said, eventually after release some orgs will become very influential in the game, and that is important information. You can teach people every mechanic in EVE but they won't be able to properly navigate the game unless they have a basic understanding of who and what is where. So eventually, I think there should be some basic info on the wiki about the larger and more influential groups, but it should be separated from the mechanics and carefully curated. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, yamamushi said:

Having player organizations on the gamepedia wiki is a pretty terrible idea.

 

The Gamepedia wiki should be for official information about the game and official lore, not every little tiny thing someone feels like putting on it. 

 

What's to stop people from putting every tiny construct them design on the wiki too, who's to say that a ship should or shouldn't be on the wiki in that case if we're going down the path of "well important player-created content should be there"? Who's to say when a city is big enough or important enough to warrant being put on the official wiki? Who's to say when a player is important enough to have their own wiki page? Where does it stop? 

 

 

 

The disservice to the community is trying to shove every minute player created detail into the wiki just because we can. Having a giant list of every organization there isn't useful to players, and it only serves to pull people away from the community page. It's going to turn into spam that nobody wants to curate or maintain. 

 

If you feel like every organization needs to be recorded somewhere, create a new site and start recording the history of the game that way. There are a handful of organizations out there that are already attempting to do this, are they doing a "disservice to the community" by wanting to make things their own way instead of trying to amalgamate everything into the gamepedia wiki? 

 

That argument could very well just be used to dissuade literally anyone from ever attempting to make an informative website around Dual Universe, "because it's on the gamepedia wiki" 

 

It's a disservice to the community to assume that every tiny detail about the game needs to be documented in one place when there are arguably much better ways of storing and organizing some information that won't lock people into the awful navigation that gamepedia limits users to. 

 

 

 

Keep the Gamepedia wiki for content that Novaquark creates. Simple.

I mean, the wiki IS a community creation in and of itself.  The wiki creators would decide what is considered substantial enough to put in.  Putting major trade hubs on the wiki would help new players start out.  At least, those who seek out the information.

 

Sure they could just put NQ created content on the wiki, but... it'll be of little use to a new player.

 

Sure it would help a player learn what's required for mining, crafting, and the like... but it wouldn't tell players where they could find a major trade hub or a city to find other older players they could ask for directions.

 

I mean, I have no word from NQ on this, but I doubt there will be a global chat.  That would just seem ridiculous in my mind, far too much going on.  And as such, there's no guarantee the new player could get pointed in the right direction out of the gate.

 

Secondly, there is nothing stopping me from guiding a new player who spent hours mining and crafting for his first ship into an ambush.  If the sole direction comes from in game players, there can be abuse.

 

Granted, wikis can be edited by anyone afaik... and one way to limit what is put on the wiki is to have a set of guidelines for posting content not directly related to NQ.

 

I personally believe major cities and trade hubs should be posted to the wiki if they have thrived for more than a couple of months without incident.  Now this puts the wiki creators in a tough spot, as they have to know the state of every major hub on the wiki and take a hub down if it falls.

 

However, this is all without saying that perhaps this entire thing is a non-issue.  NQ might have a multimedia board that indicates and directs news players to major  hubs in the starter area.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

While I can't say I'm explicitly for or against having orgs on a wiki, I won't say that I'm against it. Later on in the evolution of the game and wiki, I'm sure there'll be a page about the effects of war with pictures of derelict ships and space debris that were never collected and images of such would be posted with a footnote on the orgs that fought, where it occurred, how many players, etc. Orgs, due to their ever changing nature, might not be the best for the wiki, but any time one comes up then perhaps a link to their community portal could be provided?

 

Then again that raises the exposure issue, some will get on the wiki and others will not. Perhaps it would be best to explicitly leave org names out of the wiki?

 

I'm not entirely against cities and especially megalopolises being listed on the wiki. Pictures of particular structures and other player made content can add a bit of flavor and give people ideas for what they can do in the game. Again, however, this raises the issue of exposure. A lot of people will want credit where credit is due, but then that can lead to fights as to who gets seen on the wiki.

 

As other folks have previously said, the wiki really should be for more permanent stuff, like a book that people can read to get a basic grasp on whats possible in the game alongside all the mechanics, requirements to do this and that and so forth...

 

Perhaps the player created content would be better left in the forums, community portal, and youtube?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...