[WikiEN-l] (No subject)

[Geoffrey Burling]

On Thu May 11 22:20:12 UTC 2006, Steve Bennett stevage at gmail.com wrote:

> On 5/11/06, Geoff Burling <llywrch at rdrop.com> wrote:
> > Well, I guess it had to happen; but why did it need to involve one of my
> > favorite tv shows?
> >
> > I assume you are all familiar with the tv show "Lost", & perhaps with
> > Alternative reality games (ARG); if not, we have some articles on Wikipedia
> > that do a fair job in explaining them. One item to keep in mind is that
> > ARGs depend on the ability to seed clues around the internet to help
> > create their fictional world.

> Ok, given that this article [[Valenzetti]] doesn't seem to exist
> anymore on EN wikipedia, can you explain what all this was about?

What? Okay, fixed that.

Okay, call me a procedure fetishist, but following proper process does help build 
consensus & make everyone happy. I think I can undelete the article, seeing how I 
nominated it for deletion. It's not as if we have to send Wikipedia to the 
printer next week, & this one article is holding everything up.

And the amazing thing is that following process would have only required someone to 
count the votes, decide that there have been at most one or two arguments for 
keeping the article against 2 or 3 times as many votes for its deletion, & 
_then_ deleting it. 15-20 minutes of delay due to process, versus a moment's click 
of a button, & countless days of other Wikipedians complaining in anger over 
one act.

If people agree with me that we don't want these kinds of articles on Wikipedia, 
then let's discuss it, announce it & _then_ open fire on these submissions -- 
& not act like cowboys, shooting at every article we dislike & leaving them for 
God to sort out.

> I'm
> not familiar enough with lost, and haven't heard of "ARG"s to be able
> to make any sense of your post at all.

Well, sorry about that part, Steve. Lost is a television show about 40-odd 
people who crash-land on a mysterious island, increasingly known for frustrating its 
viewers with mixing reruns with new shows: it has gotten to the point where some of 
the show's die-hard fans are joking about how re-runs are being interrupted with 
previously untested episodes.

As a result, the PTB behind the show are trying to keep interest fired up in other 
ways, most notably with an Alternative reality game (ARG). An ARG is a combination 
of a treasure hunt & a murder mystery: someone is paid to scatter clues over the 
Internet & get players excited over what they might find. It can be a lot of fun, 
if you have the time & a fast connection to the Internet to partake; otherwise, 
it's a lot like listening to older relatives talk about their hardships during 
the Depression.

Because an ARG is like a scavanger hunt, the creators try to hide the treasures 
in all sorts of places -- making Wikipedia fair game. So the good articles, the 
bad, & those that have been on Cleanup for years will find pure fiction mixed 
in with them. If you think Wikipedia has a problem with credibility now, wait 
until we get a steady stream of entirely fictional entries.

I posted here to see if anyone else was concerned about this development -- & so far 
I have been disappointed with the response. If I had wanted to simply delete the 
article, I would have Been Bold & done so; I was hoping that at least one other 
person would admit that this is a problem that can only get worse before it 
gets better -- if it ever does.

Geoff

Geoff