User talk:Minor Edits/Sandbox9

Original Research

I'm not clear about the meaning of "Original Research" in this context. The problem is, that there are next to no published works about Lore. Ingame books may be viewed as published works, but what about other ingame sources (dialogues, places where plants/creatures can be found, ...)? What would be an example of "Original Research" that wouldn't be using this sources in some way? We probably would need to find out what distinguishes some theory of Daedric language from compiling information about plants on Lore:Flora_A. I just think that both activities would be called "Original Research" by wikipedia standards.

Wikipedia:Wikipedia:No_original_research: This includes any analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to advance a position not advanced by the sources. - given that definition, many Lore articles would fall into being "Original Research" I think.

This are just some thoughts, I really like the proposal in general and could live with the current wording too. I just think the "No Original Research" rule can't be reasonably applied to wikis about games. --Alfwyn 15:42, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I admit that I'm pretty terrible for slipping in reasonable, purposefully unreferenced assumptions at the end of an article, especially concerning multiple possible outcomes of in-game events (e.g., "unknown what happened"). The wording of the section on "Original Research" could maybe be more lenient. --Legoless 20:22, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Sorry I didn't respond to this; I didn't notice it until now. And sorry that this response is so long-winded, but the issue requires some unpacking. Yes, there is a huge amount of original research in the Lore, but I think there's little reason to be concerned for the fate of the vast majority of it. The "original research" language came from Nephele's proposals, and I think it's safe to say that it's a "rule" which is easily and frequently broken. I believe it purposefully appears stricter than how it actually functions in practice in order to encourage people to keep their contributions within reason, much like how a speed "limit" functions in practice. Much of the original research that is already on the pages didn't follow the procedure for acceptance the guidelines outline (i.e., "ask first"), and in many cases a talk page discussion has never taken place, even after the fact. Rather, uncontroversial original research has usually been added then implicitly ratified by the gauntlet of time. Controversial or erroneous original research is, eventually, objected to and removed.

The original research rule seems designed to curtail this practice, as waiting for potentially inaccurate or unverifiable information to be noticed and/or removed by other editors can take days, months, and in some cases years. So the rule allows editors to justifiably remove controversial propositions, and then subject them to a talk page discussion if appropriate. I assume the concern here is that editors may apply the rule too strictly, and contributions qualifying as original research which were added in violation of the procedure outlined here may be removed without regard to the actual merits of the contribution. However, I don't think wiki contributors will find it necessary or useful to stand on ceremony in this matter. I think that, much like now, the hypothetical anon or regular user who adds some original research without prior discussion is only going to be interfered with if reviewing editors or subsequent readers have reason to doubt the substantive veracity of the claim(s) at issue. But basically, the rule does mean that it only takes one person to look at a piece of original research and think it dubious in order to take some statements off the page, thereby ensuring that only the most well-settled conclusions of the community remain on the pages for any significant time.

If you're looking for an example of what would be deemed original research, look to the Vivec page. When I spruced up that page, I "took some liberties" in a couple places. Even though I pointed out that I had done so on the talk page and encouraged others to change it if they disagreed or thought the statements inappropriate, ideally, under these guidelines, I should have kept it in a sandbox and gotten at least one person's input on the Vivec talk page before including that "original research", thus using the community as a filter between potentially controversial information and the page. That would be the most cordial, diplomatic, and safest approach to adding original research to the wiki. However, that's not to say that the way I actually did go about things was totally inappropriate, merely that I could've gone about it in a slightly better way. Long story short, I don't think you have to worry that anyone will wield the rule like a club to bash away at substantively positive contributions to the wiki. But if you're concerned that some editors in the future might misconstrue it and do exactly that, the language can certainly be softened as needed. Minor Edits 22:23, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Tweaking if/when the rule becomes a problem is good enough for me. And I did "hide" my rambling about what I perceive as slightly illogical here, because I don't want this proposal to meet the fate of the last one - just discussed to death. --Alfwyn 22:35, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Artifacts

Currently, I'm in the process of splitting up Lore:Artifacts into (overly?) detailed separate articles for each artifact (e.g., Lore:Umbra, Goldbrand). Although this project is currently a one man effort, I'm hoping to eventually convert the appendix article into an entire lore category similar to Lore:People A, etc. There was limited discussion on this matter here, but I didn't get any replies to my suggestion and no one has objected thus far. If the project is going to continue, it should probably be included on this policy under the "Understanding Lore Categories" section. --Legoless 20:22, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I was just thinking about this yesterday. I think it's likely worthwhile; we have a category for places and several for people, might as well have at least one for things. Probably best to bring it up on the UESPWiki Lore talk page or the CP, but as far as I'm concerned, you can change the proposal however you wish. Minor Edits 22:23, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I've been avoiding starting anything major until I had all the pages up, but that's proving impractical. I guess stubs can be created with the information already available; a lot of the Daedric Prince articles have pretty decent descriptions of artifacts already. If you'd like me to bring it up on the CP before we go ahead with ratifying the lore guidelines I'll try to throw a proposal together, but I'll probably be a while doing it in my own time if there's no rush. --Legoless 23:53, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

We've got all the time in the cyber world. Minor Edits 00:12, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't know how far along you are, but it occurred to me that conditioning the definition of "artifact" to make it a catch-all category would be appropriate. Like factions, the definition should say at the end "not covered in one of the other categories". Some literature, notably the Elder Scroll themselves, could be considered artifacts, but the lore library already has dibs on that stuff. Minor Edits 03:02, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

I've made a couple book artifact pages like Lore:Oghma Infinium and Lore:The Daggerfall Chronicles. It might be worth eventually converting Lore:Mysterium Xarxes to this format, as it has quite a bit of background and can certainly be considered an artifact. As a book article, it's limited to the (rather useless) two images within. As for the category, there are also a few pages like Lore:Ebony which are under an "Items" trail. I wouldn't call ebony an artifact, so maybe it would be better to have a Lore:Items category instead, which would include artifacts. --Legoless 23:36, 3 February 2012 (UTC)