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For some time now, the Video games project and the Military history project have been cross listing their articles undergoing peer review in an effort to improve the quality of articles, as well as the copy editing skills of editors. The idea was first proposed by User:Krator as a way to better prepare articles for Featured article candidacy. After being approved by both projects, the idea was implemented under a trial period, and eventually approved as a standard practice.
New, cross listed military history articles are announced on the Video games project talk page, and listed on the Video games Peer review page under a special section. Video game editors are encouraged to leave any type of comments that come to mind. If you don't know anything about military history, that's perfectly fine because that's the point. An editor lacking knowledge about the particular topic can provide a helpful point of view as a general reader—the intended audience.
A peer review process such as this will not work if editors do not give as well as take.
Peer reviews are meant to examine not just the prose, but the sources and images used in the article.
Feedback can range from brief comments after skimming through a page to a full blown dissection of grammar, structure, and references. Either way, every bit helps.
Reviewing another editor's article can help sharpen your writing skills, which in turn can improve the articles you write.
Article importance is an assessment of a topic's importance in understanding a specific higher level topic. Assessments are maintained by WikiProjects and reflect the project's view of what is essential to understanding their scope. In the VG Project's case, all importance scales are in terms of understanding video games.
Recent discussions at the VG Project's talk page have called for revisions to the practice of assigning article importance. The discussion began in mid-November with the goal of clarifying what level of importance should be assigned to certain type of articles. It eventually expanded to creating a standardized table of importance to serve as a guide for current and future editors.
The discussion has focused on and shifted to several topics including flaws of previous practices, new ways to view assessment, other project practices to emulate, and specific articles which are exceptions to proposed guidelines. A brief pole and discussion determined most editors felt that the bulk of some topics—specifically individual video game, series, and character articles—were not essential to understanding video games, making them ineligible for top importance. The discussion then shifted to tweaking the wording and layout of the table.
The current proposed table is being discussed on the project's talk page, and the issue of whether some topics—specifically character articles—should be allowed to be rated importance has also been brought up. As always, member are encouraged to voice their opinions and engage in discussion to determine consensus so the new assessment scale can be implemented.
A search bar has been added to the archive box on the VG project talk page. Searching the discussion archives is now much easier.
Feature: Video game notability
Video game related articles fall under niche categories on Wikipedia: "Culture and the arts" and "Everyday life". Because of this, they are often required to demonstrate notability more than other topics. Wikipedia defines notability as "worthy of notice", and considers it distinct from fame, importance, and popularity. Though it is acknowledge to be related to fame and the like, it is important understand that being famous, important, or popular does not mean a video game article should be on Wikipedia.
Being notable means that a topic has "received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject." Wikipedia's policy also stipulates that this only presumes to "satisfy the inclusion criteria for a stand-alone article." This means that though an article may meet the criteria on paper, it is up to the community to decide if a topic truly is notable and/or violates other policies such as WP:NOT. In short, just because a video game, character, or related topic exists, does not mean it should also exist as a Wikipedia article.
Dealing with non-notable topics
Articles that do not meet the criteria are either deleted or merged into a relevant topic.
WP:Articles for deletion (AfD) handles the deletion of non-notable articles, among other types, and has an established process to begin discussions about reasons for deletion.
If an article is a subarticle of a larger topic, merging it into the larger topic article is a more desirable action. For example, the main character of a video may not be notable, but has received some mentions in reviews. It would benefit both topics, the character and its video game, to include the content into the article of the video game; essentially using a small, weaker article to strengthen a larger more notable article.
Things to remember
The best way to show notability is to provide reliable sources about the topic.
Notability is less about keeping articles out of Wikipedia and more about making sure readers are provided articles about significant, quality topics.
While you may think a topic is notable, others may disagree. Try to keep a clear perspective when assessing notability so discussions can reach a consensus.
AfD is more of a last resort and is not always the best course of action to take.
Consider starting a merger discussion first, as some editors may not fully understand why an article they started is not suitable for Wikipedia.
This issue we are trying a new type of newsletter feature: "Featured editor". This is a chance to learn more about the various editors who contribute to the Video games project as well as the roles they fill. If you enjoyed this new feature and would like to see similar interviews in future issues, please drop us a note at the VG newsletter talk page.
David Fuchs (also known as Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs), is a long time video games editor that has written a large number of the project's Featured articles. He has been ranked high on Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by featured article nominations, and has assisted in reviewing and editing more many. Recently David has begun to assist with image reviews for Featured article candidates, and branched out into other types of articles in addition to video games. He can normally been seen on the project's talk page offering advice and his input on the various discussion taking place there.
What drew you to Wikipedia, and what prompted you to begin editing?
I got involved due in part to (I believe, my memory is fuzzy) finding the site while doing research for Advanced Placement Europen History during high school. My earliest contributions (in December 2005) were creating topics based on what I learned, as well as creating an article for my high school with another friend. I soon became involved with editing topics related to Halo video game franchise, specifically the article on the parasitic Flood.
What got you involved in writing Featured articles?
I think for most editors it's a shiny accomplishment you are striving for, and natural for most editors to try and get an FA. I first nominated an article for FA in 2007, after about a year of inactivity onwiki; it didn't pass as it was poorly written and didn't follow our guidelines for writing about fiction; I also took a couple of tries to get my first video game FA (Halo 2).
What article(s) are you most proud of writing or exemplifies your best work?
I suppose Myst is a sort of accomplishment I can point to; I started work on the article on May 2 2008, when it looked like this, and submitted it to Featured Article Candidates one day later. I think that's some kind of record, but I dunno. In terms of being a good read or something I'm very happy with, however, I'd have to look at my more recent work, specifically Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Bone Wars.
How do you pick the articles you work on?
Whatever hits me. There's many articles I haven't gotten around to editing and improving as planned because another article has caught my fancy.
What advice would you give to editors seeking to write quality articles?
In the words of one of my favorite cartoon characters when I was a child, "We must do reeea-search!" Even in video games, online sources don't usually cut it. Even after getting an article to FA, make sure you continually trawl the internet and elsewhere for more information to add to the topic.
Note: This is an abridged version. To read the full interview, click here.
The VG Project Collaboration of the Week is a new effort to improve important video game articles of low quality. Every week, an article is random selected by AnomieBOT from the Stub-, Start-, and C-class categories that are rated either High- or Top-importance. Such topics can offer a reader a good deal of encyclopedic information about video games, but are often too underdeveloped or lacking the proper level of writing and sourcing to accomplish this.
All editors are welcome and encouraged to participate by offering their insights and suggestions. Having a pool of different editors, both old and new, will help maximize improvements to the articles as well as our editing skills.
History
Collaborative efforts have come and gone within the VG project several times before. The first such effort, the "Gaming collaboration of the week", began in October 2004 as a result of the several otherweekly collaborations popping up on Wikipedia. It proved to be quite successful at improving articles to meet Wikipedia's standard at the time, but the effort eventually saw less and less participation. A second effort, the "Improvement Drive", began in August 2005 with the intent of improving articles to FA-quality. However, few nominations and articles were selected. The decline in participation in the collaborations and peer reviews resulted in a third effort. It began in February 2006 as a workshop, but never got off the ground.
Numerous discussions have taken place on at WT:VG to jump start collaborations and improve the process to prevent its decline again. While previous collaborations selected any video game article, most editors felt focus should be on video game topics more encyclopedic in nature—topics that are also generally in poor shape because of lack of attention. A common problem mentioned was that previous nomination processes were lengthy and hindered participation. The current idea to automate the process was brought up by JohnnyMrNinja, which was further discussed to iron out the details.
Current collaboration
The current collaborative efforts began in mid-January 2009, and several articles have been improved by editors. The random choice is intended to minimize the selection process, which allows editors to focus on article improvement. Improvements include better organization of content, massaging and copy editing the prose, removing excess non-free images, and much more. The random choice is also meant to encourage participation from editors of varying interest and help prevent burnout. If the present selection is not to your liking, wait until next week. Editors are encouraged to add Template:Collab-gaming to their watchlist to see which article is selected. Recently selected articles are:
The WikiProject Video games Newsletter released its first issue a year ago. The newsletter is meant to help connect editors, keep them up-to-date with the activities of the VG project, and improve the knowledge of our members. We've compiled a list of questions to help gauge the effectiveness of the newsletter's first year.
Answers will be accepted for a three week period following the deliver of the March 2009 issue on Wednesday, April 1, 2009. Just to clarify, this is not an April Fools' Day gag, and we would really appreciate honest criticism. Information obtained from this poll is intend to alter the newsletter for the better. So don't feel you should hold back or give answers similar to everyone else.
The VG Barnstar is an award given to Wikipedians recognized for efforts and contributions to improve and develop video game related articles.
The VG Barnstar is one of many Wikipedia Barnstars designed to be given to editors that have helped further the overall quality of Wikipedia. It was created in February 2006 by Jacoplane—see past discussion for details—and has been given to numerous editors since. Sometimes editors with multiple Barnstars use an alternative way to display them: ribbons.
Barnstars are designed to be given by anyone, so don't be shy as everyone enjoys appreciation. If you have noticed or have been impressed with the work of an editor, feel free to let them know by placing {{subst:Barnstar VG|"message" ~~~~}} on their talk page. The template uses a parameter to include a message expressing the reasons behind the award.
Due to an apparent lack of interest, the WPVG Newsletter will be switching from a monthly publication schedule to a quarterly one. The next issue be delivered on July 1, 2009, and will pertain to the second quarter of the calendar year. If you have any comments regarding this, or suggestions to improve the newsletter, please post at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Newsletter.
Thanks for uploading File:Videogamer homepage.png. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).
Thanks for uploading File:Videogamer logo.png. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).
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Thanks for uploading Image:Videogamer homepage.jpg. The media description page currently specifies that it is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, it is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the media was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that media for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).
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