Talk:@strongbadactual (Instagram)

From Homestar Runner Wiki

Contents 1 Move page over redirect 2 Coffee Town 3 Has he actually posted again? 4 Sub-pages

[edit] Move page over redirect

Our article about the currently active Twitter account is called @StrongBadActual, but this article is just called Instagram (much like @ronginald was just called Twitter when it was first created). This article should be moved to @strongbadactual (Instagram) (which apparently is already a redirect). We should then discuss whether we want to move @StrongBadActual to @StrongBadActual (Twitter) (also currently a redirect) or leave it where it is. — It's dot com 17:11, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

I agree with everything you just said. They should be consistent. I lean towards doing the same for the twitter page, but could probably be convinced otherwise as well. — Defender1031*Talk 17:27, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

DC, your suggestion makes sense :). To add to that, after both moves, @StrongBadActual can become a disambiguation page. --Stux 18:19, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

Ah! But if we do that, we need to change all existing links to @StrongBadActual point to the twitter disambiguation! That's something the bot can do, right? --Stux 18:26, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

I vote renaming the Instagram page, but not renaming the Twitter page (so the pages would be called @StrongBadActual and @strongbadactual (Instagram)). After all, the Twitter account seems to be the main account, and Instagram is more of a side thing. If someone searches for "@StrongBadActual" on the wiki, chances are that they're looking for the Twitter account (and even if they aren't, there's a link at the top of the page). Gfdgsgxgzgdrc 21:48, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

I understood that the "Twitter" page was moved only because there was more than one account that "Twitter" could refer to. Right now there are three. This is not the case for "Instagram" as far as I'm aware, so I don't see a need to move "Instagram" yet. The Knights Who Say Ni 20:14, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

Good point. But it's still good to be consistent, as discussed above. @StrongBadActual and Instagram are such different titles for such similar pages. Gfdgsgxgzgdrc 20:19, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

That wouldn't be unprecedented; consider Guitar and guitar being such similar titles for such different pages, and Pasta Salad and Fluffy Puff Translucent Dessert Related Substance being such different titles for two fairly similar pages. And I actually think that them being such similar pages is a reason for them to have such different titles; it would be far less confusing to differentiate between the two. It seems like this type of consistency is only important if the pages stem from the same source; like the SBCG4AP Episode Responses pages, and all the "@StrongBadActual Tweets in a certain year" pages. The Knights Who Say Ni 01:02, 14 August 2018 (UTC)

That Pasta Salad/Fluffy Puff Translucent Dessert Related Substance example wasn't great. Both of those foods have different names, while the social media accounts have the same name. If both of those foods have the same name (for example, "Fluffy Puff Salad"), their pages would probably be called [[Fluffy Puff Salad (pasta)]] and [[Fluffy Puff Salad (dessert)]] or something along those lines. Naming them, say, [[Fluffy Puff Salad]] and [[Fluffy Puff Dessert Food]] would be inconsistent. And in a way, these pages kind of do stem from the same source. They're practically the same account on two different websites. Gfdgsgxgzgdrc 01:42, 14 August 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I know it's not a good example. I said "fairly similar", in that it's a case of two pages of foods that appear in the H*R universe that are roughly the same length. Obviously you don't want two pages that are entirely similar, or they would get merged. And now that I've said that, I remember that College and School makes for a better example. And I won't be convinced with words like "in a way" and "kind of"; "two different websites" is more important. The Knights Who Say Ni 02:00, 14 August 2018 (UTC)

[edit] Coffee Town

How should we document this? It's not on the Instagram page. Gfdgsgxgzgdrc 06:36, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

It's official content, and 5 minutes long, so I say we give it its own page. Maybe [[Instagram Live Stream - Aug 24 2017]], or [[Coffee Town with Homestar & Mike - Episode 86]] or something like that. Gfdgsgxgzgdrc 04:10, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

It's official content that's been uploaded unofficially, so that blurs the line a bit; but yes, when it was live it was official content.

EDIT: That said, it seems to have been a preliminary test for their "Patreon-type deal" they mentioned on Twitter yesterday, so in the future this clip might/could cross over from the "obscure social media thing" into the "very important but no less obscure social media thing" category. -- ■■   PURPLE Φ ORNAMENT   ■■ 01:07, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

So if/when TBC do exclusive patreon type deals (if you're reading this, Matt and/or Mike, pls make exclusive stuff available to the public eventually. Like after a year or six months) do we record the transcripts of them like the DVD exclusive toons or leave them out? Guybrush20X6 13:32, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

The precedent here was set by TMBW when TMBG started doing something similar. The band made it clear that they wanted the exclusive content to be just that, a walled garden, and the wiki complied. Although I don't know, I must be thinking of some other band...

So I think the answer to that question is, it depends on TBCs' wishes. If they go out of their way to ask that people keep the content a secret, then we shouldn't document any of it. If they are fine with it (and the lack of concern over DVD content makes me think that is the case), then by all means we should. Now, that said, it might not be a bad idea for someone who opts in to the pay-plus dealie to keep a copy of the exclusive content offline either way if possible, but keep it to themselves unless/until TBC allows it to be made public. In case the content is otherwise lost to time.

And I also wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if they made the content available to the public weeks, days or even minutes later. Strong Bad claimed the extra content was "bonus crap like puppet video chats and livestreamed sloshy practice" and the like, which implies *here, now, and interactive*. If they release the content to YouTube immediately afterwards or use Periscope like they did last time, then it can be made available to the public but without the main perk of watching it live or being a part of it. -- ■■   PURPLE Φ ORNAMENT   ■■ 00:09, 3 November 2017 (UTC)

[edit] Has he actually posted again?

I haven't been able to check, but I did get a notification (a-this morning) that strong bad posted recently (as in close proximity to a-this morning). So here's the question... DID HE? --J∃ffJMan 13:35, 15 September 2022 (UTC)

He didn't. --64.5.144.1 15:05, 16 September 2022 (UTC)

He has now {Caleb Rentpayer music plays} --64.5.144.1 12:52, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

[edit] Sub-pages

Should we split this page into subpages for different years? Like we do for SB on Twitter? Maybe they would be called "@strongbadactual Instagram Posts 20X6" or some kinda variation of that. Just putting this out there. - HoveringSombrero (talk)

Maybe a good idea... I suspect this hasn't been done before because this is used so infrequently compared to the Twitter page, to the point where there were no posts at all in 2021 (heck, the most recent post even jokes "I dunno what else to do here"), but the page isn't going to get any shorter and I'm not sure kicking the can down the road will work forever. My biggest concern would be that about 100 pages link here and they would all have to be re-linked should the page be separated. Maybe something like breaking it up by decades (2015-2019, 2020-present) would be smoother? -- Bleu Ninja 22:00, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

I think down the road we could split this across years, but not evenly. The biggest reason for the lack of a split has been the lack of activity and intermittent activity of the account. If activity increases at a steady pace then we can look into a split. For now the page is "only" 30k in length, which is much shorter than the typical twitter year (2022 is, to date, 99k and 2021 was 129k). Now, the biggest issue will be linking. We can actually leverage the {{postref}} and {{prs}} templates for that and it's the main reason I've been trying to ensure consistent use of the template. My goal for twitter is to split it by month (hence the need for the date parameters even if seemingly unused). But we need to make sure entries use these templates for linking. (This search may help.) This also means that we can defer the split until it becomes necessary. --Stux 11:23, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Actually, we cannot make the move yet because the {{post}} template automatically links to instagram if it detects the page name "@strongbadactual (Instagram)", otherwise it links to twitter. Moving the content to another page now without fixing the template will break all the entries. I found out when exploring how to adapt the @ronginald page to use the template in its new format. --Stux 14:05, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

UPDATE: Please note that I've added support to handle instagram posts outside this page using the setTypeOverride parameter and the {{post-setTypeOverride}} template (you can use either-or). This is explained in documentation but an example can be seen here in this diff (and also here where the override replaced the site parameter). Please note that I chose to test setTypeOverride and I commented out the template. But an actively-updated page might make using the {{post-setTypeOverride}} template easier since the template can just be included above the first post (and the parameter doesn't need to be moved over to the latest post). Hope this helps! --Stux 12:24, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

Circling back to this since I've started getting the "This page is [x] kilobytes long" nag when editing. I'm not sure how big an issue this is (it's not like 41 kb is going to make me go over my ISP's bandwidth limit) but if pages-by-year would be too short then maybe a split to "2015-2019" and "2020-present"? And/or we could do a thing like the Weekly Fanstuff where it transcludes the most recent year onto the primary article page. -- Bleu Ninja 22:08, 8 December 2024 (UTC)

There are two limits in Mediawiki that need to be taken into account:

• The wikitext limit is a limit on the total size of the wiki text entered for a page. If memory serves, the default should be around 1MB. Typically these are reported in Special:LongPages.
• The more critical item is the "Post-expand include size". This refers to the total size of the HTML webpage after all templates have been transcluded. Depending on the complexity of the template, this can inflate the original wiki text size manyfold. This happened with the 2018 Tweets and is the reason I spun off the transcripts. I learned the hard way that adding new features to the template can inadvertently break pages.

So, given that this page is currently (at the time of writing) a "mere" 41k bytes long, the primary reason to split this page might be one of convenience and organization. That is, to keep things looking a little tidier. But compared to the typical twitter year, that isn't saying much. I also haven't tried to figure out what the "post-expand" size of this page is. But I'd say we still have quite a bit of time before a split becomes necessary for technical reasons.

I do like the idea of transcluding recent items on this page should the split ever happen. This would also be applicable to the new Bluesky page. --Stux 11:47, 9 December 2024 (UTC)