WikiTones

So, as Karbo said earlier, the disparity between the tones is getting a bit un-comfy. I was wondering if this was something we could manage somehow...?

While the balance between the light-hearted aspects and the heavy-hearted aspects are, in stories, firmly in control of the writers, there are ways of encouraging a particular way of dealing with the themes. The wiki, for instance, is usually the third source (The first source is Karbo's art, the second source is the writings of Frenchsnack /Timing /Ravana /Globfish).

So I believe the wiki's design and wording could have an influence on writers (if they read it). Keeping a consistent (or, at least, deliberate) tone in the wiki is a potential tool in order to alter the way Felarya looks to onlookers. Besides, the modular design which I've been nagging on and on about could use an alteration in tone.


Here's a few possibilities I thought of. What do you think of expecting the following of all articles?
Those are, again, just possibilities. I'm not saying we do that right now, I'm only spitballing in here.


-Articles should be limited to delivering information, even if that means missing on opportunities
-Articles should be funny whenever possible, so that all of Felarya is considered light-hearted
-Articles should attempt to be fertile and inspire possibilities, even if that means a loss of clarity
-Articles should be interesting to read (scary, epic, etc), even if the ideas don't inspire the same treatment
-Articles should help the reader's immersion, even if that detracts from their other purposes
-Articles should have whatever tone suits them best individually, no matter the tone of the rest of the wiki
-Articles should contain instructions for writers planning on using them
-Articles should be a pleasant read


Thank you for your time.

The idea of using writing to influence other people's thinking and, ultimately, their behavior is a pretty huge thing to think about, and I don't feel like it is always a definite "x tone inspires y thoughts" deal. Something so indefinite I think seems, to a lot of people, to not be that big an issue to think about. However, I get the significance of being aware of how something is written, even when meant to be informative, does impact how people respond to it, even if not always the same way for each person.

"-Articles should be limited to delivering information, even if that means missing on opportunities"

What kind of opportunities? For humor? For flavor? If you're talking about making the writing as bland and even-toned as possible so that the information conveyed is top priority, then...there's pros and cons to that. On one hand, if the writing is dedicated to delivering information in as efficient a way as possible, then ideally, that (ideally) means less reading to do overall individual subjects, with more ease-of-use, which is good because it will seem much less daunting to both people wanting to research specific things on the wiki and newbies looking to read up on their new favorite setting. On the other hand, individual ideas might lose some of their charm, and this kind of writing style will probably make it hard to throw references to other ideas around when writing specific articles, thus making it harder to see how certain ideas relate to each other. It could also potentially make reading through everything an incredibly boring process.

"-Articles should be funny whenever possible, so that all of Felarya is considered light-hearted"

On one hand, makes everything easier to read, even if it is longer. On the other, leaves less room for the integration of more serious, darker, or just neutral tones, which really shouldn't be ignored. I'm against this one.

"-Articles should attempt to be fertile and inspire possibilities, even if that means a loss of clarity"

Shady would have a cow. I don't think this would be the right way to go. With the proper creative mindset, a writer can come up with possibilities with very clear, well-defined outlines. There's no need to sacrifice clarity in what is, ostensibly, the only one-stop information database on all things Felarya.

"-Articles should be interesting to read (scary, epic, etc), even if the ideas don't inspire the same treatment"

I think articles can be interesting to read without having to be deliberately written to be such. What makes articles interesting is the wonder-filled concepts they describe as being everyday Felarya. The motivation to keep reading should stem from learning about the setting, I think.

"-Articles should help the reader's immersion, even if that detracts from their other purposes"

See above argument.

"-Articles should have whatever tone suits them best individually, no matter the tone of the rest of the wiki"

Like your first suggestion, this has pros and cons. On one hand, this kind of tone would give wikigoers a better understanding of how each idea fits a role in the setting as a whole, and make it easy to connect related elements of Felarya to each other. On the other hand, it wouldn't do anything to solve the so-called "schizophrenic" tones of Felarya, and it might cause some individual articles to be more difficult to understand than others.

"-Articles should contain instructions for writers planning on using them"

I don't know about this one. One on hand, discouraging misuse is a noble idea, but it could come with the side-effect of discouraging outside-the-box thinking. I'd hesitate to apply this idea.

"-Articles should be a pleasant read"

See argument from four suggestions ago.


These are my current thoughts on your suggestions. I hope this helps get the ball rolling.

I second Nyaha in pretty much everything he said. Tone was never the issue with the wiki. Tone was never the issue with stories either. You're barking up the wrong tree if you think having strict bullet points that articles must check will solve the problem, like not even close. The problem with the wiki, and I know I am the most broken of records, is a lack of crucial details. Like I keep saying, for a long time, we didn't know what Negav's technology level was, and yes, I know you are all sick of me using that example, but it's really the best one. For the longest time, and even to this day because the dA community rarely checks the forum or wiki, people think that Negav generally has high technology available, which we, on the forum, now know is false because of Karbo. However, when he came to edit the article, he stopped halfway through months ago and has not touched it since. Same with two Magiocrats he tried to flesh out. Gave them some info, stopped halfway through and hasn't looked back since. That shit seriously needs to stop. The one guideline the wiki should have, beside being informative of course, would be to actually finish an article before moving on to another. Otherwise all this will do is give the impression that Karbo doesn't give a damn about putting information that potential authors would need.