Guild Wars Wiki talk:Guild pages/draft 052508

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Contents 1 Purpose behind the suggested changes 2 Formatting 3 If "wiki article" status is what we want 4 Additional Section 5 Changes to the proposal 6 Deletion 7 Historical content 8 Current Version 8.1 20:15, June 11, 2008 9 Formatting issues revisited 9.1 Palette-based formatting? 10 Addition of Notable guild template 11 Help? 12 Getting this off the giant side track 12.1 Formatting/Customization 12.2 Required Content 12.3 Language 12.4 Changing the time given for guild clean-up 12.5 Inactive guilds and historical content 13 Changes made 14 Guild pages color customization: the final decision 15 Alternatives to formatting limitations 16 What about "side" content? 17 New section added 18 Newer section 19 Proposal for implementation

[edit] Purpose behind the suggested changes

While in the past, the guild pages have been low priority, not even wanted by many, now that the GWW mainspace content is, while not perfect, at least nearing completion and will not need much more than maintenance editing, more and more people are finding their way to the guild namespace. While some of the changes proposed may mean some fairly drastic changes to some existing guild pages, I believe they are necessary to keep the guild namespace from spinning out of control. I don't feel the language in the current policy is specific enough. To this end, I have added substance to the purpose/intent statement at the top, and primarily strengthened the enforceability by outlining the allowed content and the disallowed content, rather than categorically disallowed, and strongly discouraged. I also added tighter restrictions on following the formatting guidelines.

Finally, I added a requirement that guild mainpages be in English, with translations, or translated subpages. While I know this is an issue of contention, I feel it needs to be addressed, as it has come up numerous times. Since Emily's response to what was being done/said over a year ago is used as the basis for not doing so, I feel it's time to revisit the subject. I believe her intention was primarily focused on how non-English language pages and their editors were being talked to and treated.

Now, let the discussion begin :D -- Wynthyst 04:27, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I like the draft, but I would like to see some changes on the inactive guild pages deletion.. Checking all given contact methods is nearly impossible, especially for administrators. poke | talk 21:58, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Looks good to me too. --Kakarot 22:09, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Oppose. Am I misreading this: "...now that the GWW mainspace content is ... nearing completion and will not need much more than maintenance editing, more and more people are finding their way to the guild namespace." Or is this policy being suggested as a make work project for wiki editors. Because clearly this policy change would require more work from editors, sysops and guild page creators. I am against this as unnecessary and in many ways undesireable. Much of this has been expressed on the guild policy talk page where support for a change was lacking and now unfortunately we get to redo that discussion here. -- Inspired to ____ 23:54, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't feel that support was lacking for any of the changes proposed, and no, this is not just "make work project" In looking through guild pages, I find more and more are leaning towards using the Guild namespace as guild webpages, listing meeting times/notes, profiling member characters, using outrageous layouts, and altering templates. Also there seems to have been an increase in foreign language guild pages that are impossible to monitor unless there are sysops fluent in all languages, and that also do not provide usable information for other visitors since it's unreadable. I was simply pointing out that as the mainspace content becomes ever more complete, the creation of guild pages is on the rise, and without stronger, more enforceable language in our policy, we will end up with guild pages that are out of control. While implementing these changes WILL create work for editors of existing pages, I don't believe that is a sufficient reason to leave it unchanged when there seems to be areas of concern that have been brought up numerous times. -- Wynthyst 00:05, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

All of the things that editors on this wiki "are doing" indicates very clearly that there is "not" consensus for preventing them from doing it. In other words, if I do something you can assume that I want to be able to do it absent any clear evidence to the contrary. -- Inspired to ____ 00:08, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Guild:Soldiers Of Thunderstorm is a perfect example of excessive content, in text alone the page is 74kb and downloaded I'm getting 2.3mb - 2.8mb in size. --Kakarot 00:10, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Kakarot's example is just one of many guild pages that are moving more and more to the Guild webpage model, which was never the intent of the Guild namespace. As the current policy stands now, pages like that are difficult to enforce because of the ambiguity of the policy language. If there is such widespread want on the part of guild page creators/editors, they can feel free to propose a less restrictive policy, or voice their opposition to the more restrictive language in this one. -- Wynthyst 00:22, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Extreme example of the size question, but not sure of the benefit of "outlawing" it. First this is not an overall size issue because the easy answer for that guild is to just put move most to a subpage. Second, even at that size it loaded virtually immediately and the size argument used to limit user pages doesn't apply to guild pages. Finally, I would argue that the editor of that page is opposed to this change, but we can always ask. -- Inspired to ____ 00:27, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

My guess is that the editor of that page didn't bother to read the current policy, nor the formatting guidelines for guild pages as they currently stand. The simple fact that EVERYTHING about the page is in opposition to the current policy/guideline is exactly why this issue needs to be dealt with.-- Wynthyst 00:47, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Based on the current policy: "Guild pages should not use large or large numbers of images", the example I gave obviously exceeds this. You mentioned that the size argument for user pages doesn't apply to guild pages but since we are discussing a policy change that would change this I don't see why you brought it up. Guild pages are not supposed to be a guilds website, listing the entire backstory of a guild, listing a multitude of builds and listing complete profiles on the members is not what is supposed to be included on this wiki.
The editor of that guild page could very well be opposed to this change, in relation to the user page policy there have been people who wanted a higher limit as well as those who wanted a lower limit and possibly even those that wanted it removed completely but that doesn't necessarily mean that it shouldn't be included in this proposal. Also Wyn never gave an actual size limit just a more thorough listing on what is and what isn't meant to be included on a guild page. --Kakarot 00:50, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Despite a change proposal being written, the points that I raised before is still not addressed. We need to reach a consensus on how we should treat guild pages. Do we treat them as per mainspace articles and hold it strictly to policies on content and presentation? Or do we treat it as a variation of user pages and give more leeway to editors? The final answer to those questions is what will determine my stance.

If we want to make guild pages more like mainspace articles, then it means we have to make the policy stricter than it currently is. I would propose not allowing any image except a cape image, since a guild page is not meant to be customised or personalised by guild members. Also, subpages are strictly disallowed (unless they're templates), since they serve nothing but provide a workaround for guild members to customise or personalise their guild page. And yes, given the huge number of guild pages and clueless editors, this will create a lot of work.

Personally, if a formal stance could not be adopted, I would rather rewrite the policy such that it's less work for the editors and make it more aligned with current practice. Why? Because admittedly, guild pages are very trivial. In fact, I'd go so far as to say they're nothing more than a variation of user pages. The most frequent visitor to a guild page is the guild page editor himself/herself, and to a lesser extent, his/her guildies. It's only on rare occasions that "strangers" visit the guild page. The question is whether we serve that small subset of wiki users more by formalising all guild pages into a consistent (and boring?) structure and all text, or do we serve them more by showing them a "more real" side of a guild's members? Just how many players are actually more concerned with a guild's "philosophy" or "description" than how fun it may seem to join? -- ab.er.rant 02:23, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Formatting

Specifically, modifying page colors. I personally prefer that people don't modify the base colors of the page: the page background, the main text color, and link colors. These are things which should be determined by a user's CSS (default: monobook.css), because it's the user who is having to read it. I don't mind colored boxes to set off certain things, or colored text in some places to add a little flavor or highlight to certain information, but forcing a user to view the entirety of the informational content of a page in an entirely different contrast, not to mention the glaring disconnect between the "wiki navigation" and the page itself, is something that I find exceedingly bothersome.

I'd like to hear others' opinions on this matter, as I'm well aware not everyone shares my view in this regard, and this larger issue is a large part of what is leading to other, smaller issues. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 00:36, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the first example that you posted I find it completely hideous, but what is wrong with allowing guilds to use the background or tint colours from GWW:COLORS as these are not so offending to the reader, as they are far more subtle but only restricting them to the choice of 30 colours listed there or agreeing a new set of colours. For an example of this look here; its using the same background colour as the policy portal. -- Tomato 10:05, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps for guilds that strongly oppose this though, it should be allowed to have a main guild page which is all boring, miserable and looks like any other and then a subpage which shows it how it was 'intended to look' which may be flamboyant and over the top. -- Tomato 12:05, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

This is a special case of the bigger question raised at http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_Wiki_talk:Guild_pages#Change_proposal_survey: Are guild pages to be treated like articles or like user pages. --Xeeron 14:07, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Lol, it's like going to www.yahoo.com to see a clean page that says: if you want to make a search, follow this link. :) Dmitri Fatkin 06:11, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] If "wiki article" status is what we want

I think the current draft falls in the same problems the current policy falls. It tries too hard of being "all inclusive" while at the same time being too ambiguous and leaving room for people "making points" with guild articles. I would like to compare it with GWW:BUILDS, which is a policy that deals with a conflictive topic, but actually manages to work by being explicit on "what the covered articles are for, and what they are not for" and only that.
As of my concerns with this draft on its current state:

• Naming is a matter of GWW:NAMING and shouldn't be here besides a small note for reference.
• Formatting is a matter of GWW:GUILDS and shouldn't be discussed here. Even so, we should specify that guild pages "have" to follow the formatting guideline, (maybe a reword from "Guild pages should not deviate..." to "Guild pages cannot deviate...").
• The maintenance section is questionable if we want to give guild pages wiki-article status. I think we have proven ourselves capables of distinguish good-faith edits from vandalism in guild articles, and since we have no certain way to know which users are or aren't on a guild, it's not really enforceable.
• I would like to see a change in our deletion stance for guild articles. As it has been said over and over, guild articles are for "documenting" the existance of guilds, and thus i think it's work keeping no-longer existant guilds as a way of reference, even if the guild is not "important". In case of name conflicts, an archive system could be implemented when needed.

As i said in other talk page, in it's current state this just seems a minor reword, not really the policy change i would want to see if we really want to go that way.--Fighterdoken 02:12, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I disagree that formatting is solely a matter for GWW:GFORMAT. We've already had it brought up that the formatting page mentions that they are formatting guidelines; if we wish the formatting to be strict with the force of policy, it should be specified in policy. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 02:16, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, it has been discussed before, and i agree with the idea behind it, but i think it's enough for the policy to say "Guild articles cannot deviate from the formatting guideline", thus making the guideline enforceable as a whole, instead of making enforceable just those portions of formatting we actually decide to include in the policy.--Fighterdoken 02:31, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

It's confusing for people who are looking at the guidelines page, which says you don't need to follow them all the time. It'd be better to simply specify in policy. Not everyone looks at the policy page before the guideline page. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 03:03, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the only place i remember seeing that guidelines aren't to be followed all the time is in GWW:FORMAT (which is not a policy nor a guideline as far as i know). Even so, since policies take priority over guidelines, a policy stating that a certain guideline is NOT optional would make sense, and actually work as long as people who wants to enforce these things takes some time to keep users informed.

In any case, as you say, not everyone looks at the policy first so, even if you don't agree, it makes no sense to specify particular "do's" in there. Rewriting the guideline with a "enforceable" mentality, while at the same time writing a policy that is able to give such characteristic to the guideline could solve most of the problems (real and imaginaries) that we are having today.--Fighterdoken 03:34, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

The issue I have Fighter is not where they're specified, but the fact that the guidelines page specifically says that anything in guidelines doesn't necessarily need to be followed. Contradicting that in a policy, while it will indeed make the guideline "enforceable", also creates confusion because there are two pages that say whether or not it's enforceable, and new wiki users won't know which has precedence. I don't want a new wiki user to be confused and point to GWW:FORMAT and say "but there it says they're not strict rules!" It'd be better for them to not know the formatting requirements exist at all, be pointed to the policy page, see them there, and immediately understand that they are requirements. To put it simply, the base concept of a guideline is that it's supposed to not be strictly enforced, so things that should be strictly enforced don't belong in guidelines, they belong in policies. That's the entire reason we created "guidelines" in the first place, to differentiate them from policies - GWW:FORMAT used to be on policy pages and was separated to make that distinction. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 03:38, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I would like to point out as well that while GWW:NAMING covers mainspace article naming, it says nothing about guildspace articles. Thus, rather than rewriting GWW:NAMING I think that keeping the guildspace naming rules here is more appropriate (or at least more expedient). I'm of mixed opinion on the formatting issue, I would like the formatting to be specified, but I see Aiiane's point that only saying that they cannot deviate from GWW:GUILDS, leaves the area of confusion caused by the statement on GWW:FORMAT and the general idea that formatting guidelines are just that, guidelines. Though I do have to say that in mainspace articles, there really is no deviation from the agreed upon formatting anywhere, and when things are created that do, it doesn't take long for the community to bring them into line with what has become the accepted norm. I believe that if the guild namespace were treated more like the main namespace, the community would react in exactly the same way. I do understand that the guild pages are much more subjective in nature atm, only because the intent and purpose of guild pages has not been well defined within the policy as it stands. -- Wynthyst 03:59, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I am sorry to say this, Aiiane, but users get more confused when suddenly an admin or an user starts policing what for months has been considerated a "common practice" (as in, no-content guild articles), or what has been openly encouraged at times as a way to "reach a compromise" (as in "mid-level personalization as long as the information is still where it has to be"). Users may openly ignore things like policy or guidelines from time on time (mainly because of not knowing about them), but those who actually get "confused" by wording or the like can be counted with the fingers of a hand.

Regarding formatting, as Wyn says, we have proven already that we don't need policies to specify the formatting of pages (as shown by main namespace articles). What we do is creating policies when the content of the same has to be restricted (as GWW:BUILDS), which is something this policy can cover without putting his hands in "formatting" itself, but just on the idea that the formatting is a must, if we really feel like "enforcing, or else..." it. On the other hand, if we go by the same treatment main page articles go, we shouldn't even bother specifying it and just go "enforcing" the guideline as non-optional, same as a "weapon" article follows GWW:WEAPONS or is tagged for cleanup without right to complains.--Fighterdoken 06:47, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

The problem is, for mainspace articles there's typically a fixed set of information being conveyed, and that set of information varies little from article to article within the same category. Any skill page has pretty much the same layout, every location page has the same things in the same places, so formatting is really inherent in the content being presented, and no one feels they have "ownership" over that content.

Guild pages, on the other hand, vary from guild to guild. Some may not want to list an RP-oriented background, others might want to list PvP accomplishments but could care less about guild rules, et cetera. Furthermore, many visitors see the guild page as "their space" and want to embellish it, often without fully thinking through the effects of some of the modifications they make, such as accessibility. Again, I point you to the more garish examples of color choice or page contrast.

Take a look at GWW:GUIDE. Specifically, the following quotes: "These are not laws that bind editors of the wiki"...."such a regulation can easily be changed if any other form of formatting is deemed better by anyone". You're trying to use one policy (GWW:GUILD) to take what is called a guideline (GWW:GFORMAT) and turn it into a policy, while still trying to call it a guideline. Policies are enforced, guidelines are not. It's that simple. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 07:02, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I think i understand your point better, but this raises a question. How has GWW:GUILDS been able to be enforced up to now using {{guild cleanup}} if guidelines are not to be enforced?--Fighterdoken 07:13, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

The same way any guideline is - by asking people to change it if they don't have a good reason for deviating. GWW:GUILD's "strongly discouraged" section adds slightly more weight, but it's really still a gray area, hence the reason for the discussion going on with regards to the policy and this discussion here, because people disagree on it. Since it's not policy at the moment, there's no way anyone could force someone to follow it at the moment, and sysop intervention would be out of the question, it's simply a polite request and discussion that stems from that.

Ideally, one would attempt to propose a clarification of the policy, then act on it. In this case, Wynthyst did that, but no one seemed to pay attention (or attention slacked off), so she decided to simply go ahead and take some action and allow people to respond to it as they saw fit. That's a perfectly fine course of action; on Wikipedia it's generally referred to as "being bold" - make a change or take an action and then get feedback.

A lot of the action to date (at least with regards to {{guild cleanup}}) reflects a belief among at least a portion of the wiki populace that guild pages should be regulated more stringently than with just a guideline. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 07:23, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) And just in some defense of my recent tagging of no content guild pages, I don't see it in anyway harming the wiki to ask these guilds to either add appropriate content to their guild page, or have it deleted, since they are not adding any beneficial content as they stand. And yes, I know this isn't really the place for this, but I wasn't sure where would be better.-- Wynthyst 07:36, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Weird, i thought that the action to date in regards of that template reflected the fact that people thought the guideline "had" to be followed (even personalized pages still follow the format idea). Regarding Wyn's action, i actually thought it was more like w:WP:POINT since, after reviewing all the edits to make sure "no content" is actually "no content", i just realized that there is not uniformity on the criteria, which means that admins will have to go a couple of days reviewing several guild pages and deciding how many of them actually have "no content". This is just the same as that user who months ago went tagging build articles for deletion because his point of view was not shared on a discussion somewhere.

Back to the topic, there is something that the draft is doing right, and is taking out of the way the "good reasons" argument. Up to now, "just for the looks" was considerated a good enough reason for ignoring small breaches, but since the stance change suddendly and without discussion, it seems clear that there is no concensus on what "good reasons" stands for, and thus is better to remove such comment in order to avoid more problems. Even so, i still think this draft is too much of a reword and too litle of a real change. If, as you have said, the policy has to include what is to be enforced, then i would like to see actually more of the guideline copied here (general formatting diagram, location of templates, etc), otherwise problems will still arise from this.--Fighterdoken 07:49, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I have to go to sleep now or I'll be dead tired come tomorrow morning when I'm getting up for work, but I'll try to continue this discussion tomorrow. :) (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 07:52, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Since there weren't any recently-approved exceptions linked to that 'excellent reasons' statement, it's better to clarify that point, or to have it rephrased at all. My suggestion is to affirm a statement similar to this:

• Guild pages should not deviate from the style and formatting guideline for guild pages in formatting or content without excellent design-subsidiary or lore presentational reasons. However, such statement will require another guideline implemented:
  
• Guild pages should not contain lengthy member rosters, strategy tips or character builds. All such information should be listed on separate subpages. Dmitri Fatkin 08:52, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Additional Section

Ok, how about this, rather than just an Allowed Content section and a Disallowed Content section, we add a Required Content section that lists the items that are required on a guild page. These would include the infobox, and the alliance nav (if the guild is in an alliance), and the minimum content to make it usable, such as a minimum of a guild leader name, or one other guild contact method, whether it's an officer, forum, website etc.? -- Wynthyst 09:53, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Again this comes back to the conversation on customisation of templates; would we specify that they must use a guild infobox or just that they must represent this information clearly in a similar format of that to the guild infobox? And generally the ones who would spend that little bit more effort to customise their guild page, and to use a template other than the guild infobox would be aware of this and would follow this.

What would also happen to the guilds if they didn't have the leaders name or something yet everything else was there? Slap a guild clean-up template on with 7 days before deletion? Seems a little over extreme perhaps, but then again if they fail to follow the policy on just a tiny point like that they are still disobeying the policy and should be 'punished' accordingly no matter what the severity of their crime. -- Tomato 10:10, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

That goes back to the formatting issue, and I think I have made my opinion clear on that, I would rather see no customization of colors since the colors that are currently used in both the infobox and the alliance nav are colors that have been approved to represent guilds on the wiki (see GWW:COLORS). Since no other wiki article is allowed to deviate from the established templates for these items, I feel the same should apply to guild articles. -- Wynthyst 10:14, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable to me, as that would significantly help in clearing incomplete or abandoned articles. Though, the matter I'd like to precise is whether the guilds will be allowed to use a customized template gamma or not. Essentially, my point is that if it's not going to be implemented into the standard template, they should at least be granted a permission to substitute the original code. Dmitri Fatkin 10:15, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Again, that goes back to the formatting issue above, and how much leeway we want to give guilds in 'design'. I personally don't favor elaborate customization.-- Wynthyst 10:18, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

But what if they didn't deviate from the colour scheme? Look at this Guild:The Imperial Guards Alliance/alliance nav uses the colour scheme but is still a modified version of {{alliance nav}}, would that be acceptable by your reckoning? -- Tomato 10:20, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I guess since I don't understand why they did that, I would suggest that a note be placed on the guild's talk page asking for clarification of why it was modified. -- Wynthyst 10:24, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh it's my guild page I created it, look at the location of the links they are to subpages of our Alliance page following this Guild Wars Wiki:Formatting/Guilds#Large guilds rather than to the actual guild pages which would just redirect them back to the main page again -- Tomato 10:28, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, since the alliance page does not meet with guild page naming required by the current policy, it is imo in need of dismantling.-- Wynthyst 10:30, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Hmm? How do you mean and besides we are deviating lol. The point was what would we do about such templates which the guild may set up as they want to add another parameter or whatever. -- Tomato 10:34, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, the naming requirements for guild pages specifies "All guild pages must be named with the full name of the guild as displayed in-game" and "The Imperial Guards Alliance" is not a guild name that appears in game, but rather the entire alliance, it is not in compliance with naming format as the policy currently stands.-- Wynthyst 10:36, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) As for the additional parameters, no, I don't feel that the approved templates should be modified.-- Wynthyst 10:38, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Image:Guild The Imperial Guards Alliance guild rosta.jpg a guild that my secondary account holds, and has done since before that page was set up, I can even get you an invite to it if you really want... (dont ask about the pink cape >.<). But I'll think you will find that we are fine on naming, thank you ^_^ -- Tomato 10:46, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

But otherwise yes I like the idea of having a required section which goes back to what Aiiane? was saying, the rules need to be enforced in the policy not the formatting as they are more 'guidelines/help'. -- Tomato 10:46, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

You might find this conversation of interest to read too Guild Wars Wiki talk:Formatting/Guilds/Archive 1#.22This Guild article does not meet the standards set in our formatting section.22, talking about so called 'useless' pages and whether they should be marked for cleanup for having no content and missing out an ingame contact etc. -- Tomato 11:13, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Archive-related note: From my personal experience, I have to confirm that one week interval given upon the assignment of guild {{cleanup}} tag is not lengthy enough to let the primary article contributors fix possible deviations. I mean, the user(s) might be away from the game, being engaged in real life stuff, such as vacations. Therefore, 2 weeks is actually a more suitable and fair option. Dmitri Fatkin 12:08, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

That is more appropriate for discussion here, as this is not a discussion about the time line for guild clean up.-- Wynthyst 12:11, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Hmm... I just realised that the cleanup tag isn't even mentioned in policy or guideline. Since the inactive guild tag is mentioned, perhaps it deserves a mention as well, since we are hoping that new users would read this. -- ab.er.rant 15:13, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Changes to the proposal

Based on some of the discussion here I have made some changes to the proposal to better clarify some of the issues. I have also added clauses regarding the {{guild cleanup}} tag, and extended the clean up period to the suggested 14 days. -- Wynthyst 21:35, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Deletion

Separating it from the other discussions. How much opposition is there to the idea of not deleting anymore articles under the "inactive" status?. As far as i see it, it could prove to be "interesting" to keep the information of old guilds who are not anymore (even if they are not "certifiably important") as a way of reference for new guilds. By example, a guild who was just created named "Waka Waka" may decide to disband and recreate itself if they were to discover through the wiki that one year ago there was another guild with such name that was not famous for their member's behavior. And, even if they didn't, the wiki article could be used as reference for diferencing themself from the previous guild with the same name.--Fighterdoken 21:44, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I have no issue with retaining articles on guilds who are no longer active, but I do have an issue with retaining pages that have no useful information on them; the mere former existence of a name is not what I would consider to be useful information. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 21:46, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

This could also lead to naming conflicts if the 'inactive' guild has actually disbanded and been reformed in a new configuration.-- Wynthyst 21:57, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Currently-existing guilds have priority for page naming; inactive guild pages would only be allowed to remain until or unless someone else claimed ownership of the guild. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 21:59, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. And we could use subpages for archival purposes under the main guild name.

Also, since GWW:DELETE doesn't cover it, we may want to include in the draft "no content" as a reason for deletion also. Since in a thread above the issue of defining such content was raised, i think we could solve it by specifying what kind of content is "not enough". In this case, i would go for something along the lines of "A page that only contains the minimum formatting with no content, or only with content that doesn't reveal information about the guild" (ie. "We rock", "contact us in-game" (without providing also a mean for contacting). In this regard, let's just AGF and think that if a guild doesn't provide a contact nor recruiting status, is because they are not recruiting at all (as in "1-man guild").--Fighterdoken 22:08, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I think I have covered that with the changes I've made, but am open to whatever rewording works best for everyone.-- Wynthyst 22:11, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. I'd say that a means of contact should be part of the base requirements, since it makes maintaining pages much easier. It doesn't have to be an individual contact, but there should be some method of getting in touch with the guild beyond simply looking for their tag in random districts (which is just a tad bit inefficient). Even if it's just a website or the leader's IGN. I'd consider "base requirements" for a useful guild page to be:

• A correct guild name and tag (no illegal characters, within allowed lengths for each)
• A means of contacting the guild
• Either at least a couple of the following: territory, timezone, type, language, faction
• --- OR an alliance nav box for an existing alliance

Just my $0.02. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 22:15, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok, i made some [changes] as per this section. I am not entirely happy with the way i worded "Must containt information..." because i feel it could leave room for things like "name+tag+contact+We rockzorz!!!oneoneeleven" to be wiki-lawyered, but still. Didn't want to change the proposal either because i just realized this is proposed and not a draft XD.--Fighterdoken 22:49, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Isn't that redundant to 'Must contain the template {{guild infobox}}. This should contain a minimum of the guild leader, or other contact method, such as a website or forum.'? I can see this being expanded, but not necessarily duplicated.-- Wynthyst 23:13, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Nope, not redundant. There is a difference between including the template, and actually putting information on it. The "must have template" is there to make sure it's not replaced by personalized versions, as seen on guild pages these last days.--Fighterdoken 23:16, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes Fighter, but what Wyn is saying is that the line which states it has to have the template, also already states that the template needs to have contact info filled in. :P (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 23:17, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Doh!, i missed that, but it needs to be changed, because the template is not really all-inclusive for the contact methods we would be allowing here. :). After all, we could have a "in-game contact" different that the guild leader.--Fighterdoken 23:21, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I would also like to suggest that rather than archiving historical guild data if a new guild is created with that name that historical guild pages be moved to a page Guild:<Guild Name (Historical)> so that people would not have to go through the current guild's page to find the historical guild's information.-- Wynthyst 23:22, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Seems good enough. My sub-paging proposal was just an idea, but as long as the old content stays somewhere, i wouldn't complain.

(added) So, as the information requeriment was added, should the "This should contain a minimum of the guild leader, or other contact method, such as a website or forum." paragraph be removed, given that it doesn't cover all the contact posibilities, and that it may be information not available in a first instance as stated in a thread above?--Fighterdoken 23:24, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I would like to somehow set a minimum amount of infobox information to be included. I have incorporated your Historical guild suggestions. The other contact information stuff is still open for negotiations :P I would like to see it, but not in as redundant a form.-- Wynthyst 23:58, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Historical content

I'm thinking I would rather see the guild page moved to the historical page rather than just tagged, that might streamline the process.-- Wynthyst 00:00, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

That's exactly my point. I believe that when it comes to archiving, it's practical to keep the pages of only significantly-notable guilds, which were GvG'ing in top 20 or were mentioned some other way on the official Guild Wars website. In other words, such guilds must contain a history behind their tags. Dmitri Fatkin 11:20, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

As it stand now, all guilds that are marked inactive for 3 months, or are known to be disbanded would be moved to Historical status, not JUST the significantly-notable guilds.-- Wynthyst 11:23, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

To me, it doesn't sound as the right way to function. It worked fine as it was defined in the past, except that there weren't any actual historical guilds. Here are the examples of what could potentially be archived to that category in the future:
Guild:Black_Spectrum
Guild:Delta_Formation
Guild:Frozen_Agony
Guild:I_Agony_Realm_I
Guild:Virtual_Dragons
Guild:Xxx_The_Final_Thrust_Xxx
Guild:Scouts_Of_Tyria
Well, you pretty much catch the point. Otherwise, it's just more havoc and unneeded editing work. Dmitri Fatkin 11:37, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

It's not that much more editing work than deleting them for the same reasons as we do now.-- Wynthyst 11:46, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

There should be two different categories then: Historical Guilds and Notable Guilds. The second category should be used by ArenaNet-mentioned guilds, the guilds with gold/silver/bronze capes and should never be purged, no matter if the guild is active or not. Dmitri Fatkin 12:18, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Current Version

[edit] 20:15, June 11, 2008

I wasn't sure which section this would fit under since it addresses the entire policy proposal so I decided to create a new section for comments on the current version, and hopefully we will continue in a similar format for subsequent versions.

Anyway Wyn asked me to comment on this version so that's what I'll do. Firstly I'll say that I am somewhat happy with the current version although there are a few changes I think might be worth doing. I definitely like the addition of a Required content section as the templates mentioned have been one of the more disputed things as of late, however I think there should be an addition of the word default so that the points start off as "Must contain the default template..." as no matter if we do or if we don't allow customization of them the default template should be used. As I showed in my example guild infobox it is easy to include customization (in my example complete customization) without the need to use anything other than the default template.
On the section regarding Historical content I'm not entirely happy using the Historical guild template unless we create a new one to replace what that used to be for - inactive guilds that are of notable importance to the Guild Wars lore or guilds that have been around from before the game was even released. There is also another problem that comes up with keeping guild articles indefinitely and simply moving the article to a Guild:Guild Name (Historical) page and that is what happens regarding images used on the page especially when it comes to the guild cape. We could simply reupload it under a similar naming as the guild page including (historical) in the name but would that eventually cause unnecessary strain (for lack of a better word) on the servers, taking up so much space; I'm not entirely sure how much hard drive space is available so this may not cause any problem I just thought it would be best brought up now than later. Also would this be applied to any guild page including pages that have a serious lack of info or just those that have a reasonable amount and if it's the latter who decides what is too little?
I think that's about all the major issues/questions I have with the current version and if I think of anything else I will add it to this section. --Kakarot 02:16, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

On your first point, the formatting issues are still up in the air regarding the customization issue. I think there is more support for not allowing customization to the templates since the colors are designated to specify guild items (GWW:COLORS) But there has been some ideas of possibly changing the yellow to a more neutral color. Also the idea of creating a set of guild page color templates to be used for design using a specific choice of pallettes has also been suggested and is being looked at. This would eliminate the garish color schemes of some of the currently disputed guild pages. I would have no problem including the word default when specifying the templates that are required as it would probably clarify it better.

I believe Fighterdoken's intention was that any guild page that conformed to policy as far as minimum required content would be considered Historical after 3 months of inactivity, or if it was known to have been disbanded either through editor's notes or other means. The minimum required content is still under debate. This basically eliminates deletion of inactive guilds. -- Wynthyst 02:28, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah at this point I'd also have to say no to template customization or at least no to user based customization (as in whatever the person creating the guild article wants it to be). I wouldn't mind a few different options when using the default templates sortof like how the ArenaNet image template has variations in colour dependent on which image type it is used on or even how the Template:X-color has. Although I also don't have any problem keeping a single colour for guild articles either.

Another thing that I just thought of that could be mentioned is regarding changes to the font used on guild articles, as far as I am aware there hasn't been anyone that has used a font variation and maybe something else policy/guidelinewise already covers this but if not maybe we should include a line that disallows font changes as there really is no reason to change the font. God help us if someone creates a Wingdings page lol. --Kakarot 02:54, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Just as a note: but what if they will manage to agree it with the look of their page? :) The only reason I have personally gone with another set of guild space fonts is that I wanted to make it look as on the official Guild Wars website. Dmitri Fatkin 12:01, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

As Wyn said, my intention is to keep old guild pages (be it from disbanded, or no longer updated guilds) for reference only. This, of course, would mean we would have to rework both, {{historical guild}} and {{inactive guild}} templates to actually convey the new use we would be giving to them. And, since you bring it on the table, the rework in the historical guild tag could (if needed) be done in such way that actually differences those "guilds of notable importance" (as noted by the current policy) from the new "old guild" ones. In any case, i would prefer just putting all the guilds in the same sack if possible, to avoid drama.

Regarding "images" (and possibly, sub-pages), i think we could include a statement indicating that images wil not be kept for guilds considerated "old stuff" (maybe just the cape, if there is no support for an "all around image removal"). In any case, i am more worried about allowing the storage of the "written information about the guild". I don't really mind images (or other non-guild referencial content) staying or being deleted after a guild article gains the "historical content" status.

Regarding the personalization of infoboxes, i think this is something we should leave out of the policy for now, and discuss it as a separate topic in the respective talk pages. That way, if we want to allow a certain degree of personalization in the future (by example, colors), we can still do it just by modifying the infoboxes themselves and not the policy itself.--Fighterdoken 05:33, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I think that for now however we really do need to address the customization of infoboxes as it is at the heart of some of the current discussions. By using Kakarot's suggestion of including the descriptor 'default' in the clauses would indicate that guilds are not allowed to customize them, but would allow for future changes to the infobox.-- Wynthyst 09:29, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Wyn's last comment, adding in the word default would cover it for now while still allowing discussion in the future. Also on a side note, I tried to check using diffwith but what is the difference between your infobox and mine, I noticed yours uses vardefine but would that allow us to specify only specific colours or would it act more or less the same as the way I did mine? Although as you said that is a discussion that can be sorted out later I was just wondering.

As to images from historical guilds, keeping just the cape and reuploading it as Guild Guild Name cape (historical).jpg would be fine since the guild cape is the only image that really needs to be kept. As to the case regarding guilds of notable importance I would still like to keep a special tag for those guilds that actually started before the game was released; or have actually had an impact to the Guild Wars lore which should be covered by the before release reason.

In regard to Dmitri about fonts, I don't see that as a valid reason to change any font on a guild page since fonts can easily be modified using monobook.css and if it's to a font that you don't want the entire wiki to be in then it probably isn't a font that should be used on a guild page or allowed under policy anyway. Font changes can be done all you want on a guild website but since this is to document the guild it isn't necessary to allow font changes. --Kakarot 14:37, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I would be agreeable to an additional tag/category distinction for Notable guilds, ie those that have received Anet recognition or notable achievements. I don't however feel it should be limited to pvp achievements.-- Wynthyst 15:04, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) What I don't clearly understand is why:

• Profiles and images of members of the guild should be placed on user pages, and linked. Rather than:
  
• Profiles and images of members of the guild, as well as strategy tips or character builds should be placed under separate guild subpages, and linked.
  

This allows a highly-ordered consistency. Dmitri Fatkin 15:07, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

[1] (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 15:10, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I would have to disagree with that change Aii, I feel that the most appropriate place for member/character profiles is in userspace. The guild page should not be used as a roster, since membership changes, only limited lists of those officers/members to use as contacts for the guild.-- Wynthyst 15:14, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Same for me for the same reason as Wyn. --Kakarot 15:16, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Not everyone creates a user account Wynthyst. Furthermore, I don't envision the guilds that have their roster changing on a weekly basis creating profiles for all of their members. Subpaging keeps watchlists from being pinged, and an additional edit every week or so to a members subpage isn't going to spam RC or the like any more than it would in userspace. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 15:17, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

We will have to agree to disagree and let consensus take it's course.-- Wynthyst 15:20, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

What advantage does having that information in userspace give? Edit: In fact, how do you propose user pages be "linked" without having essentially a roster anyways? (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 15:23, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I understand what you are saying, I'm simply pointing out that if a guild wishes to maintain a full member profile page, it would be more appropriate on the guild's website, rather than their wiki page, and the members listed on the wiki page should be more confined to contacts only.-- Wynthyst 15:29, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Keep in mind that we're talking about a subpage here, not the main guild page. If you want, we could add some limitations, but I think that things like Guild:Soldiers_Of_Thunderstorm/Members are relevant to documenting a guild. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 15:32, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I have to agree with Aiiane here. If we directly allow guild pages to "link" from their main page, they will just start filling with links to all his rooster (and this probably may give grounds to the creation of userpages for non-existant users). I think it's better if we just limit the main page in a simmilar way to the idea behind the old wording (just mention the guild leader plus a couple selected officiers, not all of them), while also allowing the creation of subpages. That, or we could just simply not allow character bio's in the guild namespace, only referential information limited to guild leader plus a reduced (no more than 5) number of contacts listed (i actually like this last idea better). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Fighterdoken (talk • contribs) at 18:23, June 12, 2008 (UTC).

[edit] Formatting issues revisited

Since this discussion is getting lengthy, I decided to start a new section to try to tackle the formatting issues.

• How much customization do we want to allow
• Should we specify a color palette that is acceptable for guild pages, and provide a template for it,
• Should we allow changes to fonts.

I think those are the questions we have touched on in earlier sections. If I've missed anything, please add them.-- Wynthyst 15:25, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

My quick opinions: no to fonts, yes to a basic palette. See fg and bg for examples of palettes; my suggestion would be to allow guild pages to change either the background or the foreground color, but not both - they must either be black text on a bg-palette background, or fg-palette colored text on a white background. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 15:28, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Quick objections: just tested the basic font on my guild's space, and it looked ugly as hell, and where we're coming is basically: disallow font changes, disallow coloring, turn the whole thing into a ghetto for guilds lacking any grain of imagination or creativity. If that's what it's coming to - getting to my note about which page says "bye" to guild space first. On the contrary, it could be like:

a) allow the official Guild Wars website font, which is font-family: Verdana, Tahoma, Arial.

b) allow the basic customization of Guild and Alliance infoboxes, in accordance with the basic palette.
Well, sorta something like dat. Dmitri Fatkin 15:52, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

The palettes would not be for the infobox or alliance nav templates, but for the main content space as a background and foreground. As has been pointed out repeatedly, these pages are not intended as an expression of a guild's creativity, they are for the purposes of documenting the guild. If you don't like the default fonts, you are welcome to make changes to your monobook.css so you can view the wiki in whatever font you like better.-- Wynthyst 15:56, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Please don't be overdramatic; the default font does not look any "uglier" than any other wiki page, and this is definitely not a "ghetto". (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 15:57, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

It wasn't, until someone decided to go on a holy guild cleanup crusade. ;) Dmitri Fatkin 16:12, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

It still isn't, cleaning up pages that don't conform to policy, and making clarifying changes to policy are good things.-- Wynthyst 16:16, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

All I can say before going to the countryside is that I see nothing wrong with allowing the customization of guild pages. Especially taking into account that not all of Wiki visitors are registering in order to view the pages or specifying how they should appear in their browsers. The rest could only be a remix of the song I've been singing lately. ;) Dmitri Fatkin 16:24, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

The fact that not all users are registered has nothing to do with it. If they want to customize the view, they're always able to register an account. If not, they should be viewing pages in the same style as the rest of the wiki. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 16:28, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

(back on indents, since the discussion went to another place) I would prefer to not give personalization for the sake of consistency, but if it has to be, it seems fine to limit it to a pallete of colors, while also not allowing the change of font on size or type (because if we do, some pages will just be unreadable). In any case, we must note that the color pallete would need to be applicable also to the fonts, in order to allow the text being readable in cases where the background changes.--Fighterdoken 18:29, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Read my first entry in this section, specifically about limiting changing of colors to only background or foreground, not both. (Foreground = font color.) (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 18:35, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

To tell the truth, I'm incredibly amazed about how far it goes. We started with talking about permitting the customization of two specific templates and have finished with restricting the entire idea of customly-colored guild pages, along with severe language restrictions that will most-likely hammer dozens of existing foreign guild articles. I doubt that someone will be willing to translate all of those. Dmitri Fatkin 19:16, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

One of the main reasons for the language part is that if the guild article creator can't translate it into English (the language this wiki uses) then they most likely don't understand the policy/guidelines and could have the article deleted. --Kakarot 19:24, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Following that argument, I can assume that they probably don't understand what the Guild Wars EULA says also. Hope you see what I mean. If the policy needs to be changed, it has to simply clarify certain things, rather than introduce the new global rules which will make the existing community unhappy. Dmitri Fatkin 19:35, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

But that's for the game. Also isn't the User agreement viewed when creating an account in-game in the language of the country it was purchased? --Kakarot 19:41, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

"If the policy needs to be changed, it has to simply clarify certain things, rather than introduce the new global rules which will make the existing community unhappy." - You are not the entirety of the existing community, and a portion of the existing community is unhappy with the way things currently are. You may have started talking about just a template or two, but others have been working on making larger changes for much longer, even if they have not be expressed on this talk page. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 19:44, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

For Kakarot: It is, but that's Support's "game". You don't have to understand it in order to get prosecuted by its rules. Are we actually going that way? For Aiiane: That's exactly my point, and of course, I'm not everyone. Yet, people don't seem to be highly-interested in it. :( Dmitri Fatkin 19:53, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) @Dimitri - I would like to point out that the clause regarding using English for all main article information on guild pages was here from the very beginning of this proposal, based on many previous discussions that have been held here in the past year+. And many changes in policy on this or any wiki are going to introduce new global rules, that's the nature of change. The community is welcome and invited to participate in the discussion, just as you have been welcomed into this discussion and been listened to. You seem not to have noticed that each of your suggestions HAS been given thought, some have been included in the changes, some have not, that's the nature of consensus and compromise. Also, NOTHING has been decided yet, nor is this proposal anywhere near implementation.-- Wynthyst 20:35, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Heh, my actual name is Dmitri; no one's using that "i" for this name in Russian. Okay, and now to the topic: to be honest, I like the proposed draft even in its current state, it just makes me worried about those guilds which didn't provide any English information as of now. They have put time into describing their clans, and if the language change comes to effect, that would require the tagging of their guild pages. :( Dmitri Fatkin 20:54, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Implementation of any change will create work for editors and admins, as it does for any policy change, we have not determined how that will be accomplished yet, but I would suggest some kind of change notice tag along with a designated amount of time for changes to be made. No page is going to be deleted instantly due to changes in policy. The same would apply for a policy change to any other namespace. -- Wynthyst 20:58, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I know I personally would do my best to seek out a potential translator for any page with non-English content (even if the translator is not the actual maintainer of the page) before marking it for deletion. I have no wish to lose valuable content if it can be salvaged. :) (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 21:47, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Palette-based formatting?

I mentioned it above, but I'd like to get more feedback on this specific idea. Would it be acceptable to the interested parties here to have a coloring guideline based on a set of predefined color options? This would allow some freedom in customizing page looks, while at the same time enforcing a standard of quality to prevent extremely garish designs or designs that significantly alter the contrast values of a page. For example:

• Page authors may, if they wish, modify either the background color of a page or the foreground (text) color, but not both. Non-default colors must be chosen from either the foreground or background palettes corresponding to the element which is being changed.

My greatest concern with color customization is poor judgment displayed by some authors with regards to readability, and using a palette-based approach would minimize the potential issues in that regard since the palette would consist of colors that have been determined to be okay for readability ahead of time. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 20:25, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

I am not entirely happy with color personalization, but if we are going to allow it, then i would prefer that it is limited to a palette of colors for the same reasons you give. Of course, we would need to add the same palette of colors to the defaul infoboxes, but i think it could work.--Fighterdoken 20:45, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Um, this was just for background and page text. I really, really, really don't want to change infobox colors. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 20:48, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Neither do i, but design-wise, changing background/font colors and not changing the infobox colors may produce some... weird results. Unless we allow both, i think it would be better to not allow it at all. But in this i must note that i have not particular strong opinion, so if the palette of colors is chosen right as to combine with the current infobox colors, it may not be a big issue.--Fighterdoken 21:16, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Not sure if you've looked recently, but {{guild infobox}} and {{alliance nav}} have both been changed to a very neutral gray, which should combine fine with pretty much any color scheme. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 21:29, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Erh... nope, i didn't even knew they were changed. Did some test with a random page and your bg-color list and indeed there doesn't seem to be problems (on the other hand, i have no taste), so i wouldn't put objections now.--Fighterdoken 21:42, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah I agree with the more neutral colour, I don't really think there would be a problem really amongst colours clashing... and does it really matter if they do make a poor choice? If they wish to have a weird result that's their choice, and yeah as I suggested up above in Guild Wars Wiki talk:Guild pages/draft 052508#Formatting perhaps allowing the use of background colours from here GWW:COLORS#Page_Color_Schemes as the other background and tint colours from the profession section could be too 'strong'. Also these ones by Aiiane again [User:Aiiane/Sandbox/bg]] although perhaps could they be too strong and more subtle ones? -- Tomato 21:57, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree with a palette, I'm not sure I like the 'rainbow' palette Aiiane has presents, but I'm not sure I want to use the Page schemes from GWW:COLORS as they are on special pages already, I did a more white based set (not my best effort and not complete enough in the spectrum but to give an idea what I was thinking here.(edit) I also don't agree with customizing the infobox and alliance nav templates.-- Wynthyst 22:19, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Addition of Notable guild template

In response to the suggestion that an additional designation be made for those guilds that have been recognized for their achievements by Anet, I thought something like this could be placed on any guild page that has earned mention on Anet's Notable guild pages, to differentiate between them and Historical guilds. This would place that guild in Category:Notable guilds for easy identification.-- Wynthyst 11:57, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me, since that was more or less what Historical guilds was for before it was decided to change it. --Kakarot 13:19, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. Agreed ;) --SilentStorm 01:09, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I was thinking actually on not deriving too much from the current template we have. Something along the lines of >this<. But in any case, i could see this other "notable" version being used also for currently active pages, so is not a bad option either.--Fighterdoken 06:43, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Well Fighterdoken, my thoughts were that with the changes to the way 'Historical' was going to work, there would need to be changes made to the current Historical guild template, and yes, the Notable guild designation should be used for active guilds, in fact I've also posted the suggestion on the current guild format talk page, as I'd like to implement it as soon as enough people sign off on it. It would help with the current policy for people to be able to identify guilds requiring 'Historical status' if they become inactive. If this proposal gets enough approval to be implemented, I think it's necessary to have this second form of designating the Notable guilds since the function of Historical would change.-- Wynthyst 06:51, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, it's not a bad idea adding the "notable" status to currently active guild pages, but i would like it to be as clean as possible. We could try to merge your proposal (with special image + text) in both, the "historical" and "guild" templates. After all, i am not really sure if active notable guilds would be entirely happy with having to put yet another box at the top of their page.--Fighterdoken 06:55, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I guess I wouldn't mind if they even put it at the bottom of the page, or simply added the category, if they have already linked to the official website. I would just like to see some designation. I've been through some of the list, and so far have only come up with half a dozen that would currently qualify. -- Wynthyst 06:59, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Half a dozen is still better than zero :). I may try later to merge you idea for both, {{guild}} and {{historical guild}} and see if we can reach a compromise on this.

(added) How about something like this other as a way to merge both, {{notable guild}} and {{guild}} so it's less invasive? We could do the same for historical so, instead of having two or more tags at the top, we limit ourselves to just one. Image open to change i guess...--Fighterdoken 08:54, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I like that. I guess I'm kind of attached to the image :P Makes it seem more like a reward. There is also the option of making the box optional for the editor, either add the box, or add just the category. Though this option makes it so much less invasive/cluttering.-- Wynthyst 09:02, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

If we go this way, they can always use guild template the old way if they prefer and add the category manually, since we would be just using an aditional parameter. And in regards of policy wording, is just a matter of changing "have", "must", or "should" to "can". As long as we make clear that the "notable" category and tag selection is for notable guilds according to Anet (and only those), there shouldn't be problems.--Fighterdoken 09:08, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I don't believe anyone is going to have a problem with this. I had already created the {{notable guild}} template, if you want to copy your code over along with the usage. I had also posted about this on GWWT:GUILD to see if we could get it added to current practice and start using it now. Perhaps this discussion needs to be either copied there, or linked? -- Wynthyst 09:12, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Good point. Since this part is not really relevant to the draft, i left a message on the other talk page. In any case, i don't think this discussion should be moved, because random user would miss half of the information.--Fighterdoken 09:27, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I like Fighterdoken's version as well since as has been said it doesn't require yet another box added at the top. Also to make sure I'm reading it right regarding Wyn's last comment in this section do you mean that the guild still has to add the {{guild}} template (still a required template) but can choose to manually add the category for Notable guild instead of using the new notable version shown in Fighters example? If so I have no problem with that. --Kakarot 12:21, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, if we implement Fighterdoken's template, then I think I would just as soon have that rather than the standard {{guild}} template, since it will still only be one notice box at the top, but Anja pointed out that having the additional box should be 'optional' as long as they manually added the Notable category. And I wanted to indicate I agree. -- Wynthyst 12:41, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

That's what I meant, Fighterdoken's would replace the current guild template; that would also mean every present guild wouldn't need to be updated/modified unless they met the requirement for the notable guild parameter. --Kakarot 12:57, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Help?

I was thinking that this seems to be important, considering the attntion it is getting, so I should see what it's about. But I'm being attacked by walls of text. Some tak pity, and write a succinct summary of the issues? Backsword 06:28, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

To make it short, the proposed changes currently in discussion (and mostly with concensus over them) are:

• Making sure the default templates are used, no exeptions.
• Allowing a limited level of personalization on background and foreground colors for guild pages, but not allowing font changes (size/type).
• Being a little more explicit on the allowed/restricted content. Putting limits to the amount/type of images used.
• Adding minimum-content requeriments to guild pages, in order to avoid the creation of "formatting but blank" pages (which would be A1'ed if they were in the main namespace).
• Extending the category of "historical guilds" to all those created with content, but disbanded/inactive. The deletion of pages because of inactivity would be supressed. The creation of a "notable guilds" category was requested because of this.

I think those are all the issues currently covered.--Fighterdoken 06:49, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

There are a few more issues involved in the proposal, such as requiring primary information to be in English, but Fighterdoken has touched on the points we've been discussing, and as he says we seem to mostly have agreement on them, just working out the mechanical details.-- Wynthyst 06:53, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah I think that about covers the majority of the main points we have been discussing although in regards to the personalization I think it was either background or foreground colour would be allowed so one or the other not both. However you forgot one thing, Kakarot is supposed to get pie :P --Kakarot 12:21, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Since no one has seemed to agree on allowing color customization from the default templates, my viewpoint remains at the place of permitting the use of default-based custom infoboxes. Ironically, the whole idea of disallowing font changes has come later on, after the proposal to treat all guild articles in a strict wiki format & disallow anything custom-related. Then, why permit page-coloring at all? Dmitri Fatkin 15:36, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

For once, because it will happend anyways, so it's better if it is regulated instead of ignored (even though, i agree that it may be better a total prohibition, but a limit is not bad either). Also, as it was pointed in other thread above, the problem with used "custom" infoboxes is that they don't get up-to-date with changes made to the original infoboxes. We had this problem already when the alliance navbar was changed, and a couple of users protested when their "custom" templates were modified to fit with the new changes.--Fighterdoken 18:10, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

The later points all seem good, esp. the minimum req one (I thought we already had one!) but the first two seems like telling people how to present their guild. My initial reaction, not having seen the arguments, is that this is a Bad Idea(tm). Precendent is that it will cause conflict and drive people of the wiki. SO I'm wonder where the dicussion that led to this concept is? Backsword 08:05, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

It comes from treating the guild articles as wiki articles, rather than guild homepages. No other infobox templates or nav templates are customizable except in userspace. No other articles have garish color schemes and font changes, except in userspace. The guild pages are not meant to be super creative websites, they are suppose to document a guild and their achievements. At least that is the impression I have always gotten from various discussions regarding them. They are welcome to be as creative as they want on their websites, and link those websites here. Of the thousands of guild pages there are, this truly only affects maybe a couple of dozen tops, I don't see it as driving away huge numbers of people but I see the benefits of having easy to read, consistently presented information.-- Wynthyst 08:23, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) I don't think we can point a single place for where the first point was discussed. You may want to check Template talk:Guild#Remove The Box.3F, GWWT:GUILD#Change proposal survey, Guild talk:Soldiers Of Thunderstorm (where this finally exploded), Guild Wars Wiki talk:Formatting/Guilds#Customizable_colors and this whole page, but the discussion has been taking place also in other user's talk pages, several guild talk pages, and edit summaries XD. Also, please note that the current policy already denies the use of customized versions of {{guild}}, while also requesting "good reasons" for deriving from GWW:GUILDS (and is the poor wording of the "good reasons" what brought us here).

The second point derived after the first one, as a way to reach a compromise between "customization" and "no customization at all". And by the way, is there something in the wiki that doesn't cause drama and "zomg obbey me or i leave" shouts?. These changes are actually intended to clarify some things mostly, as a way to avoid the drama that follows when a user just doesn't understand the policy. And since we were on that, it kinda derived in the inclusion of certain topics that have been in the air for some time (like "language=english+any other", "nodelete of historic", etc).

Oh, and wyn brings up to the table something that has been in the air since eons. Guild articles on the wiki are for documenting the existence of the guild, and are not the personal guild webpage.--Fighterdoken 08:32, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

If guild articles are for documentation, why is Guild:War Machine a red link? Or Guild:Idiot Savants, or