Submitted by Thibbs
As we look back over the last ten years of Wikipedia's organized effort at encyclopedic video game coverage, it is apparent that we have come a long way. Officially launched as WikiProject Computer and video games by User:Greyengine5 on 6 February 2004, things really began to take off in 2006, and the project saw its period of greatest departmental expansion between the dawn of 2007 (shortly before the project was rechristened WikiProject Video Games) and mid-2008. With most of the project's core guidelines in place by this point and only a few topic-specific departments left to be created, the project has grown in scope and discussion levels. With the modern-day emphasis on large, forum-style community discussion, we are today seeing something of a contraction of the project as some of the more specific task forces grow stale and fall into inactivity. In the meanwhile, the project's scope continues to expand up through the present day, at which time it oversees over 63,000 articles, files, categories, templates, and more. The current project represents a federated association of at least 16 different video-game-related former WikiProjects, and is one of Wikipedia's largest WikiProjects with over 400 active members. WP:VG comprises six departments and 32 task forces, and its talk page alone regularly sees over 3000 views per month.
For this article the WikiProject Video Games News Letter has asked for some reflection on the past ten years by a small number of the project's original founding members. Although many have retired and are no longer available for interview, a handful of brave editors who still maintain contact with Wikipedia have agreed to brief interviews, which are reproduced below. WolfenSilva joined Wikipedia in February 2004 and retired in December 2005. Frecklefoot joined Wikipedia in September 2002 and remains active today. Andrevan joined Wikipedia in June 2003 and became an administrator on September 2004. All three of these editors were among the active participants in the first year of WP:CVG's life.
WP:VG Newsletter - When did you first become involved in WP:VG and why?
WP:VG Newsletter - When did you first start gaming and what was your first game?
WP:VG Newsletter - What's your favorite game of all time?
WP:VG Newsletter - Do you have any memories of the original WP:VG? Can you give us any insights into the founding of the WikiProject? How did you become aware of it? Who were the notable WP:VG editors you remember from the earliest days?
WP:VG Newsletter - Along with Wikipedia in general, WP:VG was considerably less structured a decade ago. Do you think Wikipedia and WP:VG have drifted too far into the legalistic and rule-based or do you think the current level of regimentation is a boon?
WP:VG Newsletter - Where have you been most active in Wikipedia? What kinds of articles are you currently focusing on? Do you still contribute to WP:VG articles? Do you (still) play video games? Which games?
WP:VG Newsletter - Which aspects of WP:VG do you think have improved the most in the last 10 years? Are there any areas of coverage that you think are particularly lacking? Where would you like to see the efforts of WP:VG's editors concentrated?
WP:VG Newsletter - What advice would you give to a new member of WP:VG (or a new Wikipedia editor generally) today? How would this advice be different today than it would have been five or ten years ago?
WP:VG Newsletter - Over the last ten years what would you say has been the greatest challenge faced by WP:VG? What has been the greatest success? Are these successes or challenges reflective of Wikipedia's successes and challenges?
WP:VG Newsletter - There is some perennial grumbling at places like Wikipedia's Reliable Source Noticeboard that WikiProject-specific departments like WP:VG's Sources page constitute unhelpful decentralization of discussion and that different rules shouldn't apply to different parts of Wikipedia. Similar tension has cropped up from time to time between e.g. WP:VG's Manual of Style and Wikipedia's WP:MOS-JA over the topic of the standard use of Romaji in articles. Do you have any opinions on this issue? Should WP:VG's departments play a more subservient role in relation to Wikipedia or do they help by providing tailored guidance for gaming topics and by covering niche matters about which Wikipedia's policies are silent?
WP:VG Newsletter - Let's talk about the Sega Genesis, er... Mega Drive, um... Sega Megasis. Do we go with the more commonly-used name or the first name? Do we go by the greatest number of sales or by the greatest number of countries? The enormous and grueling debates over the proper name for this system have become
something of a joke in recent years, but the issue does highlight WP:VG's tendency toward inward-looking editing. Game topics popular in English-speaking countries tend to receive thorough coverage whereas game topics popular in non-English countries (with the possible exception of Japan) tend to receive little coverage. Is this a problem? Should WP:VG's coverage prioritize the most popular topics even if they are restricted to a narrow set of countries/languages or should it make efforts toward a broader universal perspective? If it should be more universal in scope, can you think of any good ways to boost coverage of non-English gaming topics?
WP:VG Newsletter - One of the hot-button questions in past ArbCom elections has been the diminishing role of Wikipedia's Civility policy just as Ignore All Rules has faded before it. For some the content-based edit history and the capacity of an editor to make positive contributions to the encyclopedia negates whatever uncivil behavior he engages in. We've seen civility problems become an issue at WP:VG in the last few years with similar resulting outcomes as in the greater community. Do you think this is healthy for the project? Should we be doing more to discourage incivility and to be more welcoming to our new recruits? Or should we strive to be less sensitive to the insensitivity of others?
WP:VG Newsletter - Can you remember any specific campaigns, project-wide drives, or other initiatives from the past that have been particularly effective at WP:VG? Have you ever worked on such a project? What worked and what didn't?
WP:VG Newsletter - Where do you see WP:VG or Wikipedia generally in another 10 years? Debates over the idea of collaborative encyclopedia building have raged back and forth in academia, but this is gradually settling down. Do you think the WP:VG side of Wikipedia will maintain the position in gaming culture it has today or is it likely to lose or gain stock among readers?
WP:VG Newsletter - Given WP:VG's size and the scope of responsibility for our few admins, do you think there should be further stratification within the regular rank and file WP:VGer? Some have suggested that an "Expert" classification should be implemented, for example, for editors who can furnish credentials relating to the gaming industry or for authors or journalists who have worked in the field. Is this a good idea or are we asking for trouble if we seek micro-hierarchies like this? How common was "expert editing" in the early days of the project and if it has increased in commonality, has this been a boon? Has it been essential?
WP:VG Newsletter - What do you say to Wikipedia's and WP:VG's naysayers? Wikipedia comes up often enough in online discussions forums, real-time chat, social networking posts, etc. There are inevitably those who will go to great lengths to point out its flaws. Does this prompt you to jump to its defense, do you just ignore these posts, or do you often agree with them and expand on their arguments? Do you think your arguments in this context have grown stronger over the last 10 years?
Submitted by Thibbs
As we look back over the last ten years of Wikipedia's organized effort at encyclopedic video game coverage, it is apparent that we have come a long way. Officially launched as WikiProject Computer and video games by User:Greyengine5 on 6 February 2004, things really began to take off in 2006, and the project saw its period of greatest departmental expansion between the dawn of 2007 (shortly before the project was rechristened WikiProject Video Games) and mid-2008. With most of the project's core guidelines in place by this point and only a few topic-specific departments left to be created, the project has grown in scope and discussion levels. With the modern-day emphasis on large, forum-style community discussion, we are today seeing something of a contraction of the project as some of the more specific task forces grow stale and fall into inactivity. In the meanwhile, the project's scope continues to expand up through the present day, at which time it oversees over 63,000 articles, files, categories, templates, and more. The current project represents a federated association of at least 16 different video-game-related former WikiProjects, and is one of Wikipedia's largest WikiProjects with over 400 active members. WP:VG comprises six departments and 32 task forces, and its talk page alone regularly sees over 3000 views per month.
For this article the WikiProject Video Games News Letter has asked for some reflection on the past ten years by a small number of the project's original founding members. Although many have retired and are no longer available for interview, a handful of brave editors who still maintain contact with Wikipedia have agreed to brief interviews, which are reproduced below. WolfenSilva joined Wikipedia in February 2004 and retired in December 2005. Frecklefoot joined Wikipedia in September 2002 and remains active today. Andrevan joined Wikipedia in June 2003 and became an administrator on September 2004. All three of these editors were among the active participants in the first year of WP:CVG's life.
WP:VG Newsletter - When did you first become involved in WP:VG and why?
WP:VG Newsletter - When did you first start gaming and what was your first game?
WP:VG Newsletter - What's your favorite game of all time?
WP:VG Newsletter - Do you have any memories of the original WP:VG? Can you give us any insights into the founding of the WikiProject? How did you become aware of it? Who were the notable WP:VG editors you remember from the earliest days?
WP:VG Newsletter - Along with Wikipedia in general, WP:VG was considerably less structured a decade ago. Do you think Wikipedia and WP:VG have drifted too far into the legalistic and rule-based or do you think the current level of regimentation is a boon?
WP:VG Newsletter - Where have you been most active in Wikipedia? What kinds of articles are you currently focusing on? Do you still contribute to WP:VG articles? Do you (still) play video games? Which games?
WP:VG Newsletter - Which aspects of WP:VG do you think have improved the most in the last 10 years? Are there any areas of coverage that you think are particularly lacking? Where would you like to see the efforts of WP:VG's editors concentrated?
WP:VG Newsletter - What advice would you give to a new member of WP:VG (or a new Wikipedia editor generally) today? How would this advice be different today than it would have been five or ten years ago?
WP:VG Newsletter - Over the last ten years what would you say has been the greatest challenge faced by WP:VG? What has been the greatest success? Are these successes or challenges reflective of Wikipedia's successes and challenges?
WP:VG Newsletter - There is some perennial grumbling at places like Wikipedia's Reliable Source Noticeboard that WikiProject-specific departments like WP:VG's Sources page constitute unhelpful decentralization of discussion and that different rules shouldn't apply to different parts of Wikipedia. Similar tension has cropped up from time to time between e.g. WP:VG's Manual of Style and Wikipedia's WP:MOS-JA over the topic of the standard use of Romaji in articles. Do you have any opinions on this issue? Should WP:VG's departments play a more subservient role in relation to Wikipedia or do they help by providing tailored guidance for gaming topics and by covering niche matters about which Wikipedia's policies are silent?
WP:VG Newsletter - Let's talk about the Sega Genesis, er... Mega Drive, um... Sega Megasis. Do we go with the more commonly-used name or the first name? Do we go by the greatest number of sales or by the greatest number of countries? The enormous and grueling debates over the proper name for this system have become
something of a joke in recent years, but the issue does highlight WP:VG's tendency toward inward-looking editing. Game topics popular in English-speaking countries tend to receive thorough coverage whereas game topics popular in non-English countries (with the possible exception of Japan) tend to receive little coverage. Is this a problem? Should WP:VG's coverage prioritize the most popular topics even if they are restricted to a narrow set of countries/languages or should it make efforts toward a broader universal perspective? If it should be more universal in scope, can you think of any good ways to boost coverage of non-English gaming topics?
WP:VG Newsletter - One of the hot-button questions in past ArbCom elections has been the diminishing role of Wikipedia's Civility policy just as Ignore All Rules has faded before it. For some the content-based edit history and the capacity of an editor to make positive contributions to the encyclopedia negates whatever uncivil behavior he engages in. We've seen civility problems become an issue at WP:VG in the last few years with similar resulting outcomes as in the greater community. Do you think this is healthy for the project? Should we be doing more to discourage incivility and to be more welcoming to our new recruits? Or should we strive to be less sensitive to the insensitivity of others?
WP:VG Newsletter - Can you remember any specific campaigns, project-wide drives, or other initiatives from the past that have been particularly effective at WP:VG? Have you ever worked on such a project? What worked and what didn't?
WP:VG Newsletter - Where do you see WP:VG or Wikipedia generally in another 10 years? Debates over the idea of collaborative encyclopedia building have raged back and forth in academia, but this is gradually settling down. Do you think the WP:VG side of Wikipedia will maintain the position in gaming culture it has today or is it likely to lose or gain stock among readers?
WP:VG Newsletter - Given WP:VG's size and the scope of responsibility for our few admins, do you think there should be further stratification within the regular rank and file WP:VGer? Some have suggested that an "Expert" classification should be implemented, for example, for editors who can furnish credentials relating to the gaming industry or for authors or journalists who have worked in the field. Is this a good idea or are we asking for trouble if we seek micro-hierarchies like this? How common was "expert editing" in the early days of the project and if it has increased in commonality, has this been a boon? Has it been essential?
WP:VG Newsletter - What do you say to Wikipedia's and WP:VG's naysayers? Wikipedia comes up often enough in online discussions forums, real-time chat, social networking posts, etc. There are inevitably those who will go to great lengths to point out its flaws. Does this prompt you to jump to its defense, do you just ignore these posts, or do you often agree with them and expand on their arguments? Do you think your arguments in this context have grown stronger over the last 10 years?