User talk:Brightstar Shiner/Featured Article Cleanup

From Homestar Runner Wiki

When I'm done cleaning up all of the articles on this list, should we decide whether to record them or not? Or should I add more to the list and do them before we decide? If this ends up being just for the good of the wiki, I'm all for it, but I feel a tad overwhelmed by this list already. Should there be all emails, toons, characters, and subtitles on there too? Should we make a giant Spring Cleaning project and clean up every article on the wiki? As for the latter, that'd make for some serious edit conflicts if not properly organized. All I'm saying is, how far should we go with this? -Brightstar Shiner 23:22, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

My unprofessional recommendations: recording, should it happen, can happen in parallel from the cleanup duties. That is, the issue of recording should be settled here independently of whether or not we continue cleaning up other articles. That said, yes I think it's a good idea to clean up articles, but I personally haven't helped simply because I don't have a sense precisely for the grammatical changes (other than eliminating 2nd person) that you are making. I just haven't studied your edits in detail. I'm lazy. :) Anyway, I'm sure other people will slowly join the bandwagon, but for now, if you are feeling overwhelmed, take a break from doing the edits and come back to them when you are feeling refreshed! That's my two pence. --Stux 15:50, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I might just do that. Proofreading articles every day until who-knows-when gets a little pressing after a while. I notice grammatical errors everywhere (just this morning I noticed an improper use of neither/nor in a church bulletin) and can't help myself from correcting every single one, making my edits take longer and more of an effort than others who would just skim and fix anything they saw along the way. Since I'm going to Florida on Tuesday (Spring Break!) and not coming back until Friday, that's probably when I'll take my break. That and the fact that my laptop's too heavy to carry around the airport. ;-) -Brightstar Shiner 16:15, 18 March 2007 (UTC) P.S. I now have a special resentment towards this article because of how agonizingly long it took me to clean it up. Its mother was a hamster and its father smelt of elderberries (ever watch Monty Python?).

Yes, I've seen that movie. LOLOLLOL! Well, I only stay caught up with FAs, since I can't see any kind of order or theme in the other list. It may help organize the project if we organize the list, but we should remember that the whole reason the project started is so that more Spoken Articles could be made. Making FAs into SAs was a suggestion that eventually (now) became the main focus. But though it's an ongoing project, I think I can work faster than just one article per week. If we organize the other lists and perhaps make this project more well-known, it may not be such a pain anymore. — ^Sam_{Fisher (Come in, Lambert.)} 13:19, 18 March 2007

Umm... I've been working on it almost every day, Sam. Not 20 a day, but more like 3. Still, the SA project is on shaky ground at the moment and doesn't look like it's going to come into full effect as it stands right now. The main issue is the amount of MBs it would take up, potentially putting great strain on the server. How does Wikipedia have SAs without that happening? If we found out, we may be able to duplicate their methods. Lately I've been politely trying to get more people participating in this project so that I don't have to keep the ball rolling all by my lonesome. I'm not complaining, but I think the SA project will be able to go much farther if the interest level is raised a couple dozen notches. It seems that whenever a new email comes out, any potential helpers get dragged away. How could we generate more enthusiasm for this without making it seem like we're begging? -Brightstar Shiner 17:40, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I think Wikipedia has more server space. I mean, it's Wikipedia. Tons of people visit each day. They need it. Unlike us, where much less people visit. Bluebry 17:53, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

It's hard to say. There already isn't much interest in SAs, and without that project, ours is done for. We support SAs, so I guess the best we can do is gather other major users who also think they are worth having. But the server space concerns for SAs and lack of enthusiasm in both that and our cleanup project are weighing everything down. I hate to say this, but it would take a miracle for these projects to survive. — ^Sam_{Fisher (Come in, Lambert.)} 14:01, 18 March 2007

{reply for Bluebry after edit conflict} Yes, but why do they do it? What's their reason? Why do they spend time making the SAs when people could just use screen readers instead? I'm not being a smart alec here, just pondering. My current standpoint is this: Wikipedia can because they're so much bigger than us and can support the amount of MBs SAs require. We don't necessarily have to record, but we can use this as an excuse to do a big Spring Cleaning of our FAs. Once that's done, we'll look over the situation carefully and decide whether we should record or not. If so, we'll work out a way to record without presenting many problems, such as using a seperate server. If not, the wiki will still be a lot better from the amount of work the users will have put into correcting grammar and spelling in our main articles. Either way, if we can generate enough interest in the SA project, the wiki will be a better place because of our efforts. -Brightstar Shiner 18:08, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Brightstar: I think we should cleanup our articles. I mean, I cleared up a section (And by that I mean sentence) of Strong Bad after seeing the link here. Plus, they probably have more users who are able to record new versions of their pages. Plus, pretty much all of the edits there are vandalism anyway. ;-) Anyway, for a smaller community, it'd be easier to just have a screen reader, or whatever it's called. Plus, if it CAN read pretty much anything, a la a new version of a page, it can, well, read the new version of a page and any new pages. Bluebry 18:19, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

So we're going with the second option? Either way is fine with me. Wikipedia can do what it wants; I like this wiki much better and we don't have to copy everything they do. In the meantime, let's organize this list, add more to it, make it have an HRWiki: heading instead of being my subpage, and get going! We'll have to organize the cleaning though, lest numerous edit conflicts arise. I suggest reserving an item on the list so that nobody else takes it. If not followed through in three days, the spot's open again. Good deal? -Brightstar Shiner 18:42, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

This will take a lot of planning. We'll have to make a new template that indicates an article on the list is reserved for cleanup. And if we aren's sticking to cleaning FAs anymore, I suggest "HRWiki:Article Cleanup" or something to that effect, and FAs will just be a section. And also, rather than one big General Articles list, we should divide it into several smaller lists for articles of or relating to Characters, Places, Toons, etc. We should also devise some kind of system for determining which articles need cleanup (more than others, at least), similar to Wikipedia's quality scale or something. But again, without enough volunteers, we'll end up working by ourselves. — ^Sam_{Fisher (Come in, Lambert.)} 15:05, 18 March 2007

No quality scales. We need to instead individually determine whether an article is good or not. If one person disagrees with someone for some reason, there's always talk pages. But, scales don't work well for articles. I mean, what "Strong Bad gets a 9.6" on the top of Strong Bad? Basically, I think we should leave the quality up to the minds of the editors. Bluebry 19:10, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Not what I had in mind, but you do have a point regardless. No quality scale then. Anyway, I'll get to making the new page and sorting the list out. While I'm at it, any other ideas? — ^Sam_{Fisher (Come in, Lambert.)} 15:15, 18 March 2007

{reseting the indents} We can plan this thing just fine if we take some time to work it out. I've never made a template before, so someone else might want to do that (or I can try my luck at it, but it might not be pretty). Just for now to keep from overwhelming ourselves, let's keep to the FAs. Once those are done, Emails, Toons, Characters, Places, etc. that haven't been done already will be added. After that, HRWiki and Help pages. These can all be added at once, but that would make the page really long. If it's in the project's best interest though, we can do that. Priortizing will be a big part of the organization process. I'll go over to Wikipedia and look at their quality scale just to see if we can use any of the info there. As for the publicity, we desperately need to work on that. Three users can't pull this off. We need something. -Brightstar Shiner 19:20, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

When you say "FAs", what do you mean? When I've been saying it, I was only referring to FAs from 2007 and future FAs. When you say it, do you mean all FAs from '05 forward? It only takes one user to manage the former, but if our project is truly to span into the past as well as the present and future, I think it goes without saying that we could be in over our heads. I would sooner begin cleanup of character, toon, and place pages than go that far, but that's just me... — ^Sam_{Fisher (Come in, Lambert.)} 15:28, 18 March 2007

I meant all FAs. Since they're all already on the page and I've completed about a third of them, we're not really "in over our heads". As for future FAs, many of them will be Characters, Toons, Places, everything you mentioned. We'll be cleaning them before they even reach that status! New articles we won't worry about right now, such as the email that's probably coming out tommorrow. A lot of people see those, and when they add fun facts, they correct most of the grammar mistakes along the way. On a different note, I've been trying to find that quality scale on Wikipedia and it's giving me nothing! Can you provide a link? Also, can we please figure out a way to get interest for this page? I've got a few ideas, such as putting a message on RC or informing some sysops, but I'm really not sure at the moment. -Brightstar Shiner 19:36, 18 March 2007 (UTC)