Birthright wiki

[Arjan]

The only "large scale" i have found so far is http://www.wowwiki.com/Main_Page

[akalars]

One way of organizing a wiki like this would be to have one “official” version of the world, and have things that are not part of that world as sub pages/categories. For instance the page called Haelyn would be the “official” version while “Some_Campaign_Name/Haelyn” or “Alternative/Haelyn” are the other versions. That would make it easy to distinguish what is the “official” version.

Locking pages is in my opinion not a god idea since it might discourage people from contributing if they meet pages they can not edit at every turn, but it might be necessary to lock some pages that are considered completed or that have become a part of a editing “war.” It is anyway important that we have the option to lock down certain pages, so we should be sure to chose a software that suports it.

Other wiki sites often have a talk page connected to each and every page so that changes can be suggested on that talk page and commented on before the main page is edited.

[Arjan]

Other wiki sites often have a talk page connected to each and every page so that changes can be suggested on that talk page and commented on before the main page is edited.

theres a connection script available for vBulletin which creates a new thread on the forum when a page is made and shares the registered users

[Arjan]

One way of organizing a wiki like this would be to have one “official” version of the world, and have things that are not part of that world as sub pages/categories. For instance the page called Haelyn would be the “official” version while “Some_Campaign_Name/Haelyn” or “Alternative/Haelyn” are the other versions. That would make it easy to distinguish what is the “official” version.

i was thinking about 3-4 different section
* original setting information (* depending if we may publish holding info etc)
* extended projects like the Atlas and BRCS 3.5e
* Homebrew
(* perhaps an section on PbEM's)

*all is in depending for what we may publish from WotC.
I have contacted good'ol Rich again to see whos the legal contact for us official sites. He going to find it out, until then well have to wait.

[Lee]

I would like to second the notion that one could post the "official" version of things, and then link to variations. In essence, each poster could say, "Well, in my campaign, it works like this ..."

Lee.

[geeman]

Well, so far this looks like it's about as close to a consensus as we could hope for. I guess that's not really surprising since the question is really whether or not we should have an additional BR resource and forum. The issue itself hasn't really been fleshed out entirely, but I think the BR community is pretty well informed about what this kind of effort would require. At least the responses so far seem to indicate that participants understand this isn't just a simple undertaking, so on the whole I'm pretty confident about the poll. In the long run I think it's a very good idea since it would both help the 3e BR design guys, provide a forum for their efforts and allow those who don't want to be formally involved in the project to still have a voice in its development.

That said, I am curious what the concerns are of the folks who have dissented in this poll. Pardon me if this takes the poll/thread a little further down the road than was intended, but why not have a wikibirthright site? From what I can tell there are a few issues.

First, there is the issue of the website itself. There are the typical problems with finding a webspace provider, address, etc. In this particular case there would appear to be some software that needs to get set up. I have contributed from time to time to various wikis and I can attest to the ease of that process. It's not as easy as, say, writing a post to a message board or composing email, but it's not substantially more difficult than that. The additional "difficulty" is really just a depth of utility. That is, the software allows one to create links, add graphics, etc. and one has to figure out how to do that. That's not really a "complexity" issue, per se, it's just a matter of travelling up the not-so-steep learning curve.

Second, there is the concern that a wikibirthright site might somehow replace or otherwise diminish the quality/content of a full-fledge BR update pdf. I think that is a pretty likely possibility, to be honest. A wiki site can be updated more quickly, easily and frequently than could a pdf, even a very diligently produced one with a full-time staff. A pdf has a certain "final product" feel to it, so replacing that pdf with a series of web pages might not strike some folks as a good alternative. Printing out articles that are constantly updated isn't very practical, and not everyone wants to game with a computer in front of them so they can refer to the campaign material on-line. That's especially problematic for those of us who don't necessarily take anything as cant and want to rule on things in our homebrews. To me, this is a "six of one, half-dozen of the other" kind of issue. I can see the argument both ways. Interactivity versus a finished product. The benefits and the defects of a wikibirthright site balance out in this regard, but others might not see it that way.

Third, there is the issue of copyright and what kinds of things can be allowed in a such a resource. WotC still owns the original materials and they could take issue with the production of material in a wiki site. On the whole, I think the combination of standard, fair-use rules and the birthright.net mandate to produce "official" material derivative of the original 2e texts should more than adequately cover this problem, but some guidelines for the production of articles would have to be hammered out and included in a set of conduct rules.

The last major problem I see is the issue of vandalism to the site itself. I'm sure that there is going to be some sort of vandalism to the site. Wiki software makes changing text easy to do by design and eventually one runs into a destructive person who derives pleasure from that kind of thing. However, it appears the wiki software is dynamic enough that it is difficult to be truly destructive in the long term. Articles can be quickly rebuilt and restored. Because of that a vandal has to be not just a jerk, but a dedicated jerk to have a lasting effect. Otherwise his vandalism will not outlast the contributions of those who participate on the site.

In order to deal with that issue a bit, however, I would suggest that (if the wiki software will allow it) a wikibirthright site should require a login for both those who submit and those who want to edit articles. Wikipedia apparently recently went to a login system for those who want to submit (but not edit) new articles so falacious or spurious articles are more difficult to submit. The process isn't any more difficult than signing up for any other login, and it would prevent the "casual vandal" (as opposed to someone who might actually hack the site) from deleting or altering text. That is somewhat against the "philosophy" of open information wiki sites, but I really don't think it's all that much a problem. Besides, in a smaller wiki the issue of a casual vandal deleting or altering text is more of a problem. A site like wikipedia is protected not just by the staff of that site, but by the number of contributors and the general nature of the topic. On a wiki site that has a smaller number of articles and many articles that might be more popular than others (an article on particular domain actions, for instance, would probably get more viewing than one on how to muster units of Vos varsk riders) the site becomes more vulnerable to anonymous vandalism. At least, such vandalism appears to have a more profound effect on such a wiki. A login requirement for both editors and contributors would not eliminate the issue, of course, but it would help deal with this problem.

What other problems can people foresee in the creation of a wikibirthright site?

Gary

[Caliene]

I am mostly familiar with the wiki's for the Paradox computer games. (Crusader Kings, EUII etc) These have areas for downloading finished products, beta's strategys, game mods help in game mods, etc. From what I understand, it is mostly clearing vandalism there too. It has not noticeably slowed down the forum, just made a neat place to find knowledge. Though it could be problematic, I think it would make a great centralised fund of knowledge that can be independent of the forum.( so there will be a backup if eitehr crashes) and discussed on the forum.
It might also contain a list of things taht are being done and subjects that are being discussed or have been discussed.

For instance, I can not find the maps of the City of Anuire, I have no exact idea of what is being done and I would like to do something.

Caliene

[Thomas_Percy]

I voted "no". Why?
Because I appreciate Brt-3,5-pdf made by this site staff and I don't want its creators abandon Brt-3,5-pdf project and do other things.

[Arjan]

I voted "no". Why?
Because I appreciate Brt-3,5-pdf made by this site staff and I don't want its creators abandon Brt-3,5-pdf project and do other things.

Sorry, but imo this has nothing to do with the other projects at all.

the reason why i came up with this idea was just to get people invloved who are NOT on these projects but want to contribute to this community.
Since this site is supposed to be from the community, why not let the whole community maintain it?

hopefully the barrier will be lower for people to add stuff to it instead of writing it up, sending it to me or another moderator or whatever. this simple doesnt work.

Perhaps members can think now, hey i am not a rule wizard but i can do some write ups on exsisting material. or just go over the writting material and correct pages or add little paragraphs etc.

[geeman]

In the long run, I think a wikibirthright site would have some sort of effect on the production of new 3e pdf documents. For instance, if we imagine the current on-going process of putting together the Atlas of Cerilia it seems as if a wikibirthright site that had such material dedicated to it would wind up affecting how a "finished product" would be developed in several ways. At what point would the wiki material be deemed "completed" enough to put into a pdf? When would the constantly changing wiki be altered signficantly enough to rate a new version of the pdf? Which would have priority (officially and in the minds of the community) the wiki or the pdf? Would a wiki eventually "take over" from the other? Picture the same process with the general game mechanical 3e update pdf. The issues remain pretty much the same.

That said, I honestly think a wiki would wind up being a much more positive than negative thing. Simply by virtue of the nature of the material, the fact that it would be more quickly (if sometimes roughly) available, and the fundamentally cool nature of the wiki system/process, such a forum would be an excellent resource. There are downsides here and there, but when it boils right down to it, there are more good things about a wiki than bad, so I'm all for it.

I've been working for a very long time on a pdf for all the awn/ersheghlien that I've written up over the years. If one imagines a wiki for that kind of material not only could anyone who wants to contribute a new character, the long wait in getting a "final version" of that material would be less of an issue since all of the character write ups would be around in one way or another on the site. They already exist in early drafts in the br.net and birthright-l archives, but second and third draft versions would be available and easily editted. Now, if I were the "master editor" of a pdf document that compiled all of those character descriptions, I can see where it might be problematic to have an unlimited number of contributors to a project that was, essentially, never really finished--but to a certain extent that's the case with any on-going piece of work. It's just another way (a more efficient way, at that) of engaging in the whole process. So on the whole, I can see the value of such a thing and would like to see it implemented even if it winds up creating a few weird issues regarding the production of "final" projects dedicated to the same material.

Gary