[Jade Raven]

Silencer, on 07 February 2014 - 06:03 AM, said:

A lot of that depends on what the Wiki's focus is meant to be. Is an encyclopedia of events, only for those up-to-date with the latest of the latest book? Is it only for those so dedicated, that they are 100% up to date with both SE and ICE and the novellas, etc? Or is it for anyone, for those who want more information, or some explanations, or some form of quote-fu for their Facebook status? Or is it something in the middle?

In the spoiler topic Silencer raised a very good point. A point which I have never considered. What should the wiki be, or do, or provide? What is the end goal in other words.

So I put it those who are interested what do you think?

***********
But first, my own position:

In a nutshell I am trying to create something very similar in style to Wookieepedia, the Star Wars wiki. I have spent a lot of time browsing numerous wikis over the years and I have been thoroughly impressed by the robustness of its design while maintaining a simple layout. So when it came to working on the Malazan wiki this was what I was instinctively trying to recreate.

Wookieepedia is an encyclopedia of everything notable to do with Star Wars. Their editors' approach is to write articles as if they were writing encyclopedia entries. Within the main body text of an article the Star Wars universe that is being written about is assumed to be real. I find this creates very readable articles and a consistent way of getting to information.

[Defiance]

Ideally, the Malazan wiki should be a cohesive collection of articles that reflect the most up-to-date knowledge we have about the series.

It's too easy to get spoiled when perusing a wiki. If someone has questions in regards to a specific book, the forums are great for just that. While users can accidentally spoil things, it's a lot easier for us to guide people in the right direction than it is to ensure that no one is having their Malazan experience ruined by the contents of a static wiki page.

[Silencer]

Defiance, on 09 February 2014 - 09:55 PM, said:

Ideally, the Malazan wiki should be a cohesive collection of articles that reflect the most up-to-date knowledge we have about the series.

I agree with this.

Quote

It's too easy to get spoiled when perusing a wiki. If someone has questions in regards to a specific book, the forums are great for just that. While users can accidentally spoil things, it's a lot easier for us to guide people in the right direction than it is to ensure that no one is having their Malazan experience ruined by the contents of a static wiki page.

I actually think the 'ease' of avoiding spoilers is reversed, however. It's a lot harder to predict what random posts might be accidentally or unthinkingly left unspoiled in any give forum thread, let alone in replies to your own posts, than on a static page - which doesn't constantly have new replies being added by disparate users with different definitions of 'spoilers', but is merely edited every so often to reflect new information which can easily be 1) vetted for spoilers at posting and 2) edited to be spoiler-tagged by any passing wiki user.


Really, I think the wiki should be an encyclopedia of information on the series. With nice big spoiler tags on all major character deaths/turning points/surprises that readers might not want to have spoiled and serious ruin the books for them. But that second part belongs in the spoiler discussion thread. XD

[Egwene]

My requirements of a Malazan wiki would be that if I were a contestant on a Malazan quiz show, the wiki should have at least 90% of the answers to any question about the books, possibly more.

Edit: I mean questions about who is who, places, main events and so forth... not on which page Picker picked her nose.

This post has been edited by Egwene: 10 February 2014 - 09:23 AM