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Thread: The TF Wiki

  1. #11
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    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.
    That is good advice and not just for the TF wiki but wikis in general. They are afterall public edited articles and as a result each has their own quirks, attitudes and culture just like any other community. I have found that wikis are only good for absolute 'Black or white' facts such as 'When was such a toy released' or 'What date did WWII end', stuff like that. Anything that requires opinion or observation of sorts I cross reference unless they have included a concrete third party source stated in the article.

  2. #12
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    I've never gone back and checked changes I've made are still there.

    I can understand people reverting edits if you're taking our their jokes etc and spoiling their fun, but if you're adding valid updates and they are still being removed that's really bad form.

  3. #13
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    I find the use of jokes etc. to be bad form too in the context of a wikia. Could you imagine looking up Dugong on Encyclopedia Britannica and seeing an image with the caption "@$$face"? Sure, that would be funny but terribly inappropriate in that context/situation. Not even Star Wars Wikia refers to Ponda Baba or any other Aqualish in that way... as hilarious as it may be.

    Bumfaces ftw
    Last edited by GoktimusPrime; 17th November 2008 at 08:46 AM.

  4. #14
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    I use it here and there, mostly to check up on info from the Marvel comics and what not, it's a good back-up resource if I cannot find the information elsewhere. Some of the links they have in their articles are pretty cool as well.


    I do like the wikia though, and I think if it is used as a casual reference, and not as an encyclopaedia of sorts, it does it's job very well (and I must admit I do like most of the humour).
    Looking For: Wreckers Saga TPB Collection (with Requiem)

  5. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by i_amtrunks
    I do like the wikia though, and I think if it is used as a casual reference, and not as an encyclopaedia of sorts, it does it's job very well (and I must admit I do like most of the humour).
    Yeah, but the problem is that wikias are (in theory/principle) supposed to be open-source encyclopaedias. Therefore it ought to read more like an encylopaedia and in doing so, carry an 'academically' informative tone that is devoid of things like bias (and the use of humour often enforces biases too).

  6. #16
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    Quote Originally Posted by Paulbot View Post
    I've never gone back and checked changes I've made are still there.

    I can understand people reverting edits if you're taking our their jokes etc and spoiling their fun, but if you're adding valid updates and they are still being removed that's really bad form.
    I don't have as much of an issue with the jokes. My issue is when I try to add (as in not changing) to an article and my addition is deleted without any explanation whatsoever. My only successful contribution to the wiki was a single line that I had to fight for, I don't mind discussion and someone making comments on the validity of my addition but someone just coming along and deleting stuff without explanation is what I am complaining about. I only got feedback on why my line was deleted after I demanded one and even so the response was "I never heard of this so it must be wrong". At the end I managed to maintain my wiki addition but the attitude I encountered while doing so was something I did not appreciate. The attitude read as someone who is either over protective and defensive of the existing content or doesn't allow anyone else but 'the trusted circle' to edit it.

    If there is disagreement about a change or addition, that is cool and fine, deleting without any explanation is not.

    I am not really all that concerned with the wiki, I gave up on it ages ago as a fan wide community project, I just wanted to voice my concerns. After all, in these sorts of projects, criticism should be welcomed not rejected.
    Last edited by kup; 17th November 2008 at 10:54 AM.

  7. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by FFN View Post
    What's wrong with the wiki now?
    Ok, since this was asked in an earlier discussion...

    I find myself agreeing with Gok. Many times I found there's maybe a little too much humour. Now, I'm not a humourless person and I do laugh at a lot of the humour. But some of the captions have gone maybe a little far into bad taste territory without restraint. Good for long time fans who would get these jokes, but I can also see how off-putting it can be to potential fans who expect to learn more by reading these pages. Suggestion: maybe have 2 versions of each page. The search function can first take a visitor to a page with the humour. After reading through it, if the visitor decides he/she'd like the same page with just the facts and not the humour, they can click on a link at the the top or bottom of the page which takes them to such a page. This way maybe everybody will be happy?

    Quote Originally Posted by GoktimusPrime View Post
    (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 read the KISS Play pages without much prior knowledge of the series, and after reading them I found myself confused about which parts are facts and which parts are made up by the wiki writers. Now, if someone asks me about KISS Play, I'll still point them to the wiki pages (and I have, just a few days ago on this forum). However, I cannot take the information presented on these pages seriously, when obviously "some" of the wiki writers don't take themselves seriously. And I don't consider these pages as a "reliable" source.

    At the end of the day, it is entirely up to the wiki team to decide:
    - what they want TF Wiki to be and what they're trying to achieve
    - how seriously they want people to take them and how reliable a source they want to be
    - what type of audience they want (and what audience they are leaving out)
    - if they honestly want to encourage fans to contribute to these pages.

    If the wiki team finds that there's no need to change anything, and they're comfortable with what they want to be, it'll be fine by me though. We all know a lot of work, labour and love have been put into TF Wiki. I will still see it as a valuable source of information (with some flaws). I guess none of us can be perfect.

  8. #18
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    I agree about the tone of the articles, and I do think the snappy captions really set a poor tone - many pages read more as a blog or review than a dedicated reference.

    I also find some of the pictures could really use a caption explaining what they are (eg in the broad article on G1 Sideswipe we might see a IDW panel of Sideswipe, with no explanation of where it came from at all), and because of the snappy caption, the image is just sitting there, unexplained.


    Eagerly waiting for Masterpiece Meister

  9. #19
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    I feel that since the tfwiki.net was started up by a certain group of fans, they should have the right to administrate it how ever they wish (even if they *claim* to be accurate or welcome submissions), because they at least went to the trouble of creating such an extensive project. They have no obligation to maintain any level of accuracy or seriousness. If it was unreliable, fans would go to a TFs wiki that is reliable, or create one themselves - there doesn't have to be just one. But to keep the passion towards creating and maintaining the most comprehensive TFs wiki on the net, the people behind it need to make it fun to do. Transformers is just too huge a universe now to expect a small group of fans committed to a wiki project to be like mindless automatons in the ongoing construction of it. And if they refuse to accept help from verified corrections, then it is their loss. They are the 'owners' (administrators) of the site, which means they can adopt any content agenda they want.

    I do think they probably should have obvious disclaimers on the site, to make sure people don't take something serious that is just humour. But complaining about someone else's project because they have their own agenda (which is their right), is just wasting time and frustration.

    And starting up a topic just to bait a known critic of the tfwiki.net isn't a good idea either. We know it exists, and why people use it, and it gets talked about enough times in existing topics - we didn't need a whole new topic to encourage more debate on the issue.

  10. #20
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    Quote Originally Posted by griffin View Post

    And starting up a topic just to bait a known critic of the tfwiki.net isn't a good idea either. We know it exists, and why people use it, and it gets talked about enough times in existing topics - we didn't need a whole new topic to encourage more debate on the issue.
    Sorry Griff but that wasn't my intent at all. A lot of things have been alluded to in the past and even discouraged from being discussed. Instead of having people sniping at each other in random comments in various threads I felt it would be a lot better to discuss it openly as mature adults should do.
    For my own benefit I now understand Gok's and others valid criticisms of it and I think that others that administrate it can take these on board or ignore them but at least it has been articulated clearly and openly.

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