The TF Wiki

[TheDirtyDigger]

The TF Wiki here!


Just thought I'd get the ball rolling properly on an ongoing discussion about one of my favourite TF resources. Personally I do find it informative and amusing.

Some simple questions for starters...

-Who uses it?
-How user friendly do you find it to be?
-Do you think it has enough information?
-It runs like other Wiki's where users may contribute to the masses of information contained. Someone like Gok (who has by my experience exhibited far and wide the most knowledgable and in-depth understanding of the often complex Transformer franchise) could contribute greatly to this vault of information. My question...who here does contribute/edit the TF Wiki when they have a free moment?


Thank you for sharing!

[Firecracker]

Where's FFN? He's our resident TF Wiki dude...

I'm always visiting to cross check things, kill time or to just have a laugh, some of the contributors humour is cracking.

[Paulbot]

I find it amusing and also useful for finding some of the more obscure things.

I also make some edits and was planning over summer on adding some pages on the TF fiction not already covered in it.

[Pulse]

The only times I use it are when there's something-TF on my mind & on 9 occasions out of 10, my questions get answered there .




reminds me of someone else who outright refused to use it...

[King Atlas]

I find the site informative and the captions hilarious hehe

[blackie]

usefull for most things

I find the site informative and the captions hilarious hehe

uncyclopedia still wins in my books

[GoktimusPrime]

Okay, I'm just gonna get this off my chest - here's what I dislike about TFwiki...

(i) The attempted humour is just not necessary. This is supposed to be a fan-maintained encyclopedia - it ought to be informative and factual, which it does achieve to some degree, but it's not meant to try and be entertaining. It's almost like TFwiki is trying to be the class clown all the time. I would much prefer it if it stuck to the facts and the captions were actually descriptive of what was being displayed in the images. And this is what you tend to get on a regular/normal wikia and other resource sites. I don't expect to look up a Dugong on wikipedia and see a caption mocking its reputation as the "ugliest animal in the world." All the try-hard humour just makes TFwiki look horrifically unprofessional. I can't take a wikia seriously when it doesn't seem to take itself seriously. It's like a teacher coming to class in a freakin' clown suit. (-_-) What is this, Patch Adams?

(ii) Many pages in TF wiki are loaded with personal opinionated bias. A true informative resource should be neutral/impartial and devoid of bias. The KISS Play page is a good example of this - it raves on about how KISS play is for pedophiles and how it's sexually perverted etc., then the page about the artist for KISS Play suggests that he's a pervert etc. (which is kinda like public defamation too). I'm not saying that KISS Play is or isn't perverted - that's a matter of personal opinion/perception... a kind of opinion which doesn't belong on TFwiki. And this is just one of many, many examples of personal bias.

(iii) There's a lot of information of TFwiki which is either incorrect or not entirely accurate and just missing. Afaik there's no TFwiki entry on Ono Kojin (Ōno Kōjin), who is the Takara toy designer who designed most G1 and G2 Transformers. All those G1 TFs you loved as a kid... he designed most of those.

(iv) "Why don't you edit it?" - yeah, I tried doing that when TFwiki first came out, but I found that most of my edits got re-edited so that the things I tried to change were unchanged (e.g.: trying to remove bias, forced humour, information accuracy etc). After that I just plain gave up all hope on TFwiki.

I only refer to TFwiki for things I cannot find anywhere else... which fortunately for me at least isn't much since I store lots of TF knowledge in my noggin' (the joys of being a walking TF encyclopedia )

[kup]

(iv) "Why don't you edit it?" - yeah, I tried doing that when TFwiki first came out, but I found that most of my edits got re-edited so that the things I tried to change were unchanged (e.g.: trying to remove bias, forced humour, information accuracy etc). After that I just plain gave up all hope on TFwiki.

I only refer to TFwiki for things I cannot find anywhere else... which fortunately for me at least isn't much since I store lots of TF knowledge in my noggin' (the joys of being a walking TF encyclopedia )

I can relate to that strongly. I tried to get involved in the spirit of contribution about a year ago but it seems that the 'owners' of the wiki articles do not like others adding to their pages. No reason given to why additions were removed, it just seemed that they didn't want to let others play without permission negating the whole point of the wiki.

Every change not made by the circle of 'frequent contributors' is either automatically deleted or the casual author has to 'fight' for the changes or additions he/she makes. It doesn't matter if the addition adds constructively to the page or not, it is automatically deleted without explanation.

Due to this I have found the wiki only good for finding stuff about fictional information such as Marvel comics/character stories. Anything else that is based in the real world such as toy lines, product history, etc I take it with a grain of salt.

At the end I have found it to be a resource of sorts but not one I can trust to be correct/unbiased.

[TheDirtyDigger]

Okay, I'm just gonna get this off my chest - here's what I dislike about TFwiki...

(i) The attempted humour is just not necessary. This is supposed to be a fan-maintained encyclopedia - it ought to be informative and factual, which it does achieve to some degree, but it's not meant to try and be entertaining. It's almost like TFwiki is trying to be the class clown all the time. I would much prefer it if it stuck to the facts and the captions were actually descriptive of what was being displayed in the images. And this is what you tend to get on a regular/normal wikia and other resource sites. I don't expect to look up a Dugong on wikipedia and see a caption mocking its reputation as the "ugliest animal in the world." All the try-hard humour just makes TFwiki look horrifically unprofessional. I can't take a wikia seriously when it doesn't seem to take itself seriously. It's like a teacher coming to class in a freakin' clown suit. (-_-) What is this, Patch Adams?

I can understand the point you're making there but I would say (and this is totally an estimation) that they are catering to the majority of folk who enjoy the humour. I personally find myself smiling or even giggling girlishly to some of the caption comments and I see most anything that makes me happy as a positive thing. That said, I'm not someone who takes the TF canon too seriously.

(ii) Many pages in TF wiki are loaded with personal opinionated bias. A true informative resource should be neutral/impartial and devoid of bias. The KISS Play page is a good example of this - it raves on about how KISS play is for pedophiles and how it's sexually perverted etc., then the page about the artist for KISS Play suggests that he's a pervert etc. (which is kinda like public defamation too). I'm not saying that KISS Play is or isn't perverted - that's a matter of personal opinion/perception... a kind of opinion which doesn't belong on TFwiki. And this is just one of many, many examples of personal bias.

I agree totally with 'A true informative resource should be neutral/impartial and devoid of bias' but it is more rare than common that we see this anywhere. Newspapers and journalism are filled with bias as are the standard articles in the Wikipedia, albeit much more subtly.

(iii) There's a lot of information of TFwiki which is either incorrect or not entirely accurate and just missing. Afaik there's no TFwiki entry on Ono Kojin (Ōno Kōjin), who is the Takara toy designer who designed most G1 and G2 Transformers. All those G1 TFs you loved as a kid... he designed most of those.

(iv) "Why don't you edit it?" - yeah, I tried doing that when TFwiki first came out, but I found that most of my edits got re-edited so that the things I tried to change were unchanged (e.g.: trying to remove bias, forced humour, information accuracy etc). After that I just plain gave up all hope on TFwiki.

I can relate to that strongly. I tried to get involved in the spirit of contribution about a year ago but it seems that the 'owners' of the wiki articles do not like others adding to their pages. No reason given to why additions were removed, it just seemed that they didn't want to let others play without permission negating the whole point of the wiki.

Every change not made by the circle of 'frequent contributors' is either automatically deleted or the casual author has to 'fight' for the changes or additions he/she makes. It doesn't matter if the addition adds constructively to the page or not, it is automatically deleted without explanation.

Kup...can we ask FFN why this is so? Hang on...I'll do it.

FFN...can you elaborate on this point for our benefit please?

Gok...If you produced an entry on Ono Kojin would they delete it?
As for editing the TFwiki I saw a couple of Shortpacked comics on two guys who keep re-editing each others entries. With such a strongly loved franchise with so many obsessive fanatics, fights over who's right or not are sure to crop up often.
Who has final say over what goes in or out?
How do we become this all powerful figure?

I only refer to TFwiki for things I cannot find anywhere else... which fortunately for me at least isn't much since I store lots of TF knowledge in my noggin' (the joys of being a walking TF encyclopedia )

Aha...if only I had a Gokbot with your knowledge firmly imprinted on it's hard drive next to me every time I had a TF related query. Sadly I don't so I'll have to rely on TFwiki and our forums for such.

[GoktimusPrime]

I can understand the point you're making there but I would say (and this is totally an estimation) that they are catering to the majority of folk who enjoy the humour. I personally find myself smiling or even giggling girlishly to some of the caption comments and I see most anything that makes me happy as a positive thing. That said, I'm not someone who takes the TF canon too seriously.

I like some of the humorous captions too... but just because it's funny doesn't mean that it's appropriate. Imagine if a news reporter were to describe Corey Delaney as a <Richard>-head. I would find it both funny and I would agree with the sentiment... but at the same time it would be grossly inappropriate to say something like that in a news report when you're supposed to be just presenting facts. It's not an issue of "is it funny?" but an issue of appropriateness. There's a time and place for humour and making a so-called Transformers encyclopedia just isn't one of them. It's almost as if TFwiki is trying to be both a TF wikipedia and uncyclopedia at the same time (which mixes as well as oil and water).

I agree totally with 'A true informative resource should be neutral/impartial and devoid of bias' but it is more rare than common that we see this anywhere. Newspapers and journalism are filled with bias as are the standard articles in the Wikipedia, albeit much more subtly.

That is true, but ten wrongs don't make a right. As I've mentioned on other threads, I dislike Wikipedia in general due to its open source nature - the fact that any schmuck can come and edit them. It's totally different from an actual encyclopedia or proper resource book/site where they are published by qualified experts. And as you've said, the bias is a lot more subtle on other wikis. TF wiki is by far the worst wikia I have ever come across in terms of blatant open bias and inappropriate use of humour. You look at any other wikia - Star Wars, Harry Potter, Dr. Who, G.I. Joe etc. (and of course, wikipedia), none of them have the kind of open bias and try-hard humour that TF wiki has.

Gok...If you produced an entry on Ono Kojin would they delete it?

Don't really know or care tbh... like I said, I've long given up hope on wikis, and especially Transformers wiki. There's an article on Ono Kojin on Wikipedia (here) which has basic information about his work on Microman, Diaclone and Transformers G1 (though nothing about his post-TF work). There's also a link to my English translation of the Transformers Generations interview with Ono.

I often tell my students to beware of Wikipedia and wikis and that if they are going to use a wiki as a source of information, to make sure that it can be backed up by at least two other separate sources. I would only recommend TFwiki as a final resort - i.e. if you cannot find the information anywhere else, and I will admit that TFwiki does contain some information which cannot be easily found anywhere else and it's good for that. But overall I am very unimpressed with it as a TF resource.