Dune Wiki talk:Administrators

And then there were three
As there are now three of us admins on this wiki (welcome JubalHarshaw! :-) ), I feel we should have some central place to discuss any admin-related topics that come up, and provide any necessary internal wiki procedures, if they're needed (right now I like the more informal concensus approach, but as the wiki grows further this might become more difficult).

I'll be chipping away at this section over the next few weeks, but I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts Mcada and JubalHarshaw, as I'm sure to miss some important points which you guys will come up with. Careax 16:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Vandals and spammers
One thing which probably does need discussing is our policy towards vandals and spammers. We've only had one so far, but I'm sure that will change over time. I can't remember that user's name or IP. But I think I have him/her a 6-month ban for spamming. We probably need some banning guidelines (e.g. offensive vandalism versus silly vandalism versus spamming), for consistency's sake.

Cheers, Careax 16:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi Careax, Mcada, thanks for the welcome and for the trust. I'm glad to be a part of the community here.


 * Ah, vandals. They're everywhere. When will people learn it's much more rewarding to create, rather than destroy. Any fool can destroy something.


 * I definitely agree we should discuss policy towards vandalism and spammers. I'm generally a live-and-let-live kind of guy, but when it comes to spammers, I'm very zero-tolerance. Vandalism is a bit different, many people try it just because they have a hard time with the whole "anyone can edit" concept, testing the boundaries so to speak. Having said that, I don't think we should have a whole lot of tolerance for it - Maybe an initial talk page warning, for a second offense go right to a ban? Maybe not a huge one, but at least a week. For a third offense, well, throw the book at 'em.


 * We'll need to define "silly" and "offensive" in this context ... as I find most vandalism "offensive" by its very nature. :)  JubalHarshaw 19:28, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Battlestar Wiki's approaches
I'm also an admin over at The Battlestar Wiki, which has experienced a lot of growth in the last several years. They base a lot of their policies on the Wikipedia equivalents, I'm posting links to them here so we can glance at them, see if there's anything we can use:


 * BSG Wiki blocking policy
 * BSG Wiki banning policy

JubalHarshaw 19:36, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Valdalism Guidelines cont...
Gents,

I also agree that formal guidelines should be put in place. I think JubalHarshaw's right, maybe a warning for first offence, three month ban for second, total ban for third? Regardless of how many offences, though, I don't think flaming them is particularly constructive. We can just keep it polite but firm.

JubalHardshaw, your Battlestar Wiki is very impressive. I've been reading it for some months now. It's certainly an honour to have you aboard here.

Careax, you keep coming up with excellent ideas. Keep up with the excellent work.

I will continue to try to improve articles any way I can. The last few days I've been delving deep into Dune and into the Dune Encyclopedia to try to flesh out some canon stuff that hasn't been touched on before. Hope you guys like it.

Cheer --Mcada 23:11, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi Mcada ... I've definitely been enjoying your latest adds. Keep up the great work.

As far as "my" Battlestar Wiki, I'm rather a latecomer over there, just recently made an admin. If it's anyone, it's Joe Beaudoin's, the head wikipedian/bureaucrat, but it's really been fleshed out by a cadre of very active and knowledgeable users and admins. I'll pass on the compliment. JubalHarshaw 18:59, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Canon discussion
Hi guys, sorry I've been out of the loop (work, family, holidays ...) ... I was reading on the Community Portal talk page about the idea for "original" and "extended"; I'm all for it. Was wondering if I should start making the changes required in templates, etc. JubalHarshaw 15:05, 31 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah, let's do it. It's been just over a week since I put that out there, and all three of us like it. I think that's long enough. Shame more people haven't joined the debate, but oh well. I would suggest a) a new template to replace "noncanon" called "extended", b) a new template called "original", and c) minor edits to the "mixed" template. How does that sound?


 * If you want to make the template changes JubalHarshaw, we can then start editing articles to call these new templates. Thanks for offering. :-)


 * For article editing I can start with the articles with a first letter of "A" in their title. JubalHarshaw, maybe you can start with the "J" articles. And Mcada, if you have some free time you can work on the "S" articles. Or if there's a better approach just let me know.


 * Hopefully these changes will ease the whole canon/non-canon debate. Cheers, Careax 16:37, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I've created "Expanded" (I feel it sounds better than Extended), "Original", and modified the "Mixed" template. Check "Recent changes" for other stuff I've modified. I'm just going to start at the top of the "All articles" page and work my way down. JubalHarshaw 17:13, 12 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Articles A-D updated. JubalHarshaw 19:32, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Articles D-G updated. JubalHarshaw 10:57, 13 February 2008 (EST)
 * Articles H-J updated. JubalHarshaw 18:43, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Articles J-P updated. JubalHarshaw 15:12, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Articles P-Z updated. JubalHarshaw 14:17, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Hey fellas, sorry I've been away from my beloved internet for a while. Would be more than happy to make changes from articles 'S' onward. Hope all's well --Mcada 06:20, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Wow! Great job on the A-D updates JH! I too have been pretty busy recently and haven't had much time to do much more than check in for vandalism. Mind if I cover the L through S articles? It might take me a while to get through them as I have a ton of stuff going on right now. But I want to contribute my share.


 * One other thing, one or two IP-based users have been contributing a lot of new material over the past month or two, which is great. However, they seem to be largely copying it from Wikipedia, so the context and layout isn't really consistent with the existing material. I need to go back and check the wiki guidelines and make sure it's clear enough (it might not be, which would be my fault). But aside from doing this and leaving polite messages on the IP discussion pages asking them to try to keep their content consistent with the wiki, do either of you have any other thoughts on how we can get these visitors to sign up and add more consistent material? Cheers, Careax 06:34, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Awesome work JH! Sorry I flaked out and didn't help more. I've had a bunch of stuff going on right now which has side-tracked me. Careax 18:32, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Art Usage
Outwarddoodles brought up a really good point on the community portal about art usage. Because of the limited artwork in Dune works - except the movie/miniseries - we're a bit constrained with art work. That in turn causes articles to look very "texty", especially for the later FH novels, where there are no real movie images we can use.

What do you guys think on this topic? I'm not really sure myself. If we open the artwork up to fan art does that contradict the current "original and official extended only" content policy?

If you have opinions please share them on the portal page. Thanks, Careax 16:37, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Long Time No Read
Hi guys. Just visiting the wiki again after a looooong time away. And got to say, I LOVE what you all have done with it! :-D It looks fantastic and has taken in some really good new sections and content. Awesome! --Careax 08:21, November 15, 2009 (UTC)