Forum:The Chicken debate

Ten Forward → The Chicken debate (Reply | Watch)

Ok, this is getting silly, we have discussions going on all over the place about the merits of chicken and chicken related articles. Lets discuss the general problem here so we can come up with a solution to all related articles.

The issue, some feel chicken is to generic an item to merit an article here, it's meant to be given knowledge. However chicken is referenced in many forms throughout trek so others believe it's justified. Then of those who feel chicken has merit some would choose to have a single chicken article for all chicken related dishes whilst others would prefer individual articles for each dish.

My take, maybe it is mundane, but that’s no reason to go deleting stuff, if it has a legitimate reference it has a right to an article if someone can be bothered to write it. Other related references have individual articles, Whisky for example, why should chicken be any different. I think this whole debate springs from us getting a bit over protective with policy and issues of "real world" articles lately. -- 8of5 17:05, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

As for my part, I'll admit I sort of lazily started off in my "compromiser" mode, so now that I'm more focused on the real issues I've changed some of my votes: absent clear vandalism, true irrelevance, or duplication we should err on the side of openness, and better cases for deletion need to be made than "this is dumb and obvious". Obviously someone thought it was worth putting up, and maybe we should wait a while before judging its irrelevance. I have no idea of what memory resources we have available, nor what we are using, but I would like to know that to help judge just how necessary any "pruning" might be. Some people may have a beef with MA. I don't, nor do I care much about such "beef"s. This is a separate wiki, but we do complement each other and there is plenty of cross-linkage. We don't need to do something one way just because MA does it that way, but if its a sensible way don't knock it, either. (Now excuse me, I just found a box of my old FASA stuff, and have better things to contribute.)--Emperorkalan 17:31, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I've been here a while, but haven't really made many edits or taken part in the community's discussions very much. observations:

1. If you want to appear "welcoming" to new users, try starting some kind of dialogue (user talk:captainmike, or this page is actually a good example) before you nominate all the new articles created by said user for deletion. it seems really standoffish that you are inviting users to contribute, but then nominating for deletion when they do. try opening up and asking "why did you create this article?" before you start saying "this is worthless and doesn't belong". Assume good faith...
2. if you didn't want people to operate on the assumption that Memory Alpha-style content should be added here, you really shouldn't have ripped off their name. regardless, you are using a wikipedia-style interface, start to expect wikipedia-style contributions. -- Captain M.K.B. 18:00, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Mike, I don't know if in your observations you saw the mess a while ago with all the real world articles full of information utterly irrelevant to this site and created with justifications from little off beat references. The whole thing has heightened awareness of the relevancy of articles and made people a bit jumpier to stop things like that happening before they start. In a way it's good that we are tightening up on what we should and shouldn’t accept and getting some direction, but it has had the side effect of the jumpiness sometimes going a bit far and as you say being a bit stand-offish. I hope it will calm down over time.

As for the name, there was some debate when we changed it from the less catchy Non-canon Star Trek wiki to Memory Beta as to the implications of the name and relationship with Memory Alpha. It would be nice to think of us as working together, but we are separate entities with different priorities and approaches to things, and we should be, we deal with very different subjects. Sometimes we should follow MAs lead for good reason, others we don't and indeed shouldn't. But saying well that's how MA does it just can annoy, because, we aren’t MA.-- 8of5 21:45, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

"If you want to appear "welcoming" to new users, try starting some kind of dialogue (user talk:captainmike, or this page is actually a good example) before you nominate all the new articles created by said user for deletion." -- Here, would you like a tissue, "Captain"? Jesus, dude, I don't even know who the fuck you are, so let's put this poor-picked-on-me horseshit aside, okay? I nominated "chicken" to be deleted for exactly the reason I cited in the appropriate place (which is, in fact, "starting some kind of dialogue"). And I would have done the same no matter who wrote it. Hell, look at the edit history for The Battle of Betazed, and you'll notice that I deleted references that I listed, and later decided weren't significant enough to warrant their own articles. If you want to defend the articles, do that, but spare me the sniffling and the tears, please. --Seventy 01:34, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

I was referring to the fact that i created two additional articles and those were nominated for deletion, not the one you mentioned nominating.

Please clean up your language when you address me or I'll ask that you be banned from Memory Beta. I was just making a point, and I was doing so in an even tone, without using profanity. I'll thank you to take note of this if you choose to address me again. -- Captain M.K.B. 04:30, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

Personally, I think this wiki should concentrate on subjects that will be of importance to the people who come here for reference purposes. Nobody is going to come to a Star Trek wiki looking for information about poultry products or other Earth based food items. It's quite simply information that nobody will ever need or find useful. It's irrelevant, absurd, and it's a waste of time and wiki space. IMHO, it's barely a step above spamming. But hey, it's not my call to make, if you want to waste your time and efforts and the time of others on useless trivia, be my guest. --Turtletrekker 21:10, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

I never planned on coming here to decide which alchohol to buy, so lets delete whisky while we're at it. Heck, Saurian brandy isn't even a real thing, why do we need that? Come to think of it, Nanietta Bacco is a fictional character, Not even a Real Person! Nomination for deletion, anyone? - Lieutenant Ayala 22:39, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

Was there supposed to be a point to that? Because it's ridiculous and has nothing to do with what I said. There are more than enough fictional whiskeys to justify that article. Alien chickens? Not I know of. What's next? Recipes? (Now that I've given Captain Mike the idea, I'm sure he'll get right on that one...)Like Seventy said elsewhere, this site is not a dictionary, nor should it be. Anyway, this is ridiculous, and I'm not going to waste my time on this utter nonsense anymore. When there are still so many characters and topics of relelvance to choose from that still need to be written up or expanded upon, I see stuff like this as a waste. It smacks of people finding the site and saying, "Neat! I wanna play too!" but don't have anything relevant to contribute. Anyway, I've had fun here, and this place kept me from going insane when I was unemployed. I'm proud of what I've done here (pretty much single-handedly built the databases for DS9, New Frontier and Stargazer, while contributing the bulk of articles such as Spock, Q Lwaxana Troi and others), but it's obviously time for me to take a break. Stuff like this is too silly to get upset and argue over. I see this as an ominous sign of this wiki's future direction. I may be back, I may not. --Turtletrekker 23:40, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm afraid I have to agree with Turtletrekker on this one. Until recently there was a pleasent environment on this wiki, but of late things have started to have a nasty edge to them. Like Turtletrekker this place has kept me sane while I was unemployed for a time, but I can't abide by the atmosphere that has surrounded the place for the last couple of weeks.

You may say that because I am an admin I should strive to make sure that it doesn't happen, but to be honest I would rather not spend my time mediating petty squabbles. I wanted to improve the wiki back in the summer, but I can see that maybe my actions have caused this, and if so, then I apologise. Anyway, I must go, and say that it has been fun (most of the time). --The Doctor 23:47, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

• Picks mouth up from floor* well that's no fun at all, must be that bird flu, darn you evil chickens. I hope you guys don’t stay away, this place needs your level heads and ever excellent contributions, don’t let silly things like this get you down. -- 8of5 23:57, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

You guys are making mountains out of molehills. I have plenty of relevant topics besides chicken I could contribute to -- i was making lists of the ships mentioned in "The Wounded Sky" a decade or more before this site was even conceived of. Don't exclude me because I am interested in starships and food, and the rest of you are interested in topics you have arbitrarily deemed "more relevant" to Star Trek than my research. -- Captain M.K.B. 00:41, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

• By the way, i work in the food industry, and many of my coworkers have enjoyed checking what foods they make on a day-to-day basis have been mentioned on Star Trek, and when. They use MA (and MB) to check these things. So saying "nobody will use this wiki to research 'chicken in Star Trek'" is dead wrong -- because it has already been used like that. and i'm going to continue working towards the goal of having it be the best reference possible. -- Captain M.K.B. 01:42, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Ok I'm back, and I want to apologise from yesterday's ranting. After dealing with annoying customers, heavy snow, and no staff I was at the end of my tether after coming home from work and seeing the "debate" that was occuring.

However, I'd like to say that to Mike' that you aren't being excluded from the wiki in any way, shape, or form, and to be honest I do agree with creating some of the articles that you have created such as chicken etc. as a gateway of sorts. In my opinion if something is referenced in any Star Trek related media, then an article should be created to represent that media. Sure everybody knows what a chicken sandwich is (I presume), but perhaps they are looking for references to chicken sandwiches in Star Trek. I remember we had a similar argument some months ago in regards to the computer article, and it was decided it should serve as a gateway to all computer-related articles.

Again I must say to Mike that his (and anybodys) contributions are welcome to the wiki, and must apologise if he didn't feel welcomed to the wiki, but this wiki is still in a transitional state and I believe if we work together without sniping and arguing with each other, we can indeed carry on the excellent progress we made last year. Thank You (-: --The Doctor 23:30, 10 February 2007 (UTC)