Challenge: Challenges!

[cin1607]

cesperanza once said to me that the cold, wet nose test of any fan (using the analogy of an obviously healthy puppy is one with a cold, wet nose) is their enthusiastic attempts to pimp other people into their fandoms. I think the cold, wet nose test of any fandom is the number of challenges, in the forms of fests, exchanges, big bangs, battles or what have you, that the fandom hosts in an effort to enthusiastically encourage participation in the fandom.

So in an attempt gauge our respective fandoms' health, the challenge this week is to create a new page for your fandom called "List of __Challenges" where the blank space will obviously be your fandom's name, and then start compiling lists and links of your fandom's various challenge-type events. You may, if you have a lot, want to sort them by headers, like General Fests & Exchanges, Holiday Specific, Pairing Specific, or whatever you think is appropriate for your fandom. We'll use the Community Profile template for this, like we did for the Newsletters. We would also like you add the [[Category:Challenges]] just to be consistent.

A number of fandom pages on the wiki already have a paragraph or so about some of the challenges in the fandom. If that's the case, just add a line to that paragraph that says something along the lines of "For a more extensive list of challenges, fest and exchanges, see the [[List of__Challenges]]."

This is a big challenge! There's a lot to do. But you won't have to look too hard to find the fandom challenges. We're not far past the tons of holiday fests from the winter holidays and now I'm seeing people starting to get ready for their fandoms' big bang challenges. There's always something happening. So let's see if we can round them up and give them a central home.

Comments

[aethel]

I was on the wiki and noticed that someone has already risen to the challenge challenge, so yay! But current practice on the wiki is to put lists into subpages and not into top-level pages with the word "list" in the title. Since we don't have fandom categories, top-level, fandom-specific lists will get lost.

Also I'm not sure that the community template would be useful for a list page, since none of the fields would be applicable. I don't think any of the existing templates would fit, really. /o\

o.O

[elke_tanzer]

OK, now I'm confused, again...

I like the idea of this challenges challenge, but I want to be sure I understand how and where I'm supposed to put the information I'm gathering about a particular fandom or two of mine in the wiki, and I have to admit I'm baffled (again).

Help, anyone?

Re: o.O

[ratcreature]

Generally lists of stuff in a fandom is put on a subpage of the fandom. No "list" in the title.
Like:
http://fanlore.org/wiki/Harry_Potter/Fests_%26_Exchanges lists Harry Potter Fests And Exchanges.
http://fanlore.org/wiki/Blake%27s_7/Fanzines lists Blake's 7 Fanzines
http://fanlore.org/wiki/Merlin_%28BBC%29/Communities lists Merlin Communities

Re: o.O

[aethel]

BTW, more discussion about how to organize challenge pages and other confusing things is here.

Re: o.O

[cesperanza]

Just to say--I obviously started that page to try to be part of this week's fanlore challenge. MY question was I don't understand how to use the template Cin suggests--"Community Profile" doesn't seem useful for a list of challenges? (Or did I misunderstand the challenge entirely?)

Re: o.O

[cin1607]

Sorry! I didn't mean to use the template for the page. Just for the communities you were listing on the page. My fault!

I don't have a set template for the page itself (other than the uniform titles suggested in committee), because I figured every fandom would organize things a little differently. Some might have more several different pairing specific challenges and would want to list them by pairing, or some might have more character specific fests or what have you. So I didn't expect a uniform outline on the page itself.

Re: o.O

[cesperanza]

OK, got it--so if I list McShep Match, and create a *separate* page for McShep match, then that page would use the community template. Gotcha! It does sound like you meant to use it on the "List of" page, which--it does seem weird to have a page that says List of. Should it just be SGA Challenges maybe? *ponders*

Re: o.O

[cin1607]

"List of..." was born in committee and then suddenly developed a life of its own. *g* SGA Challenges is less cumbersome, yes.

[cesperanza]

This! I did as was asked, but yeah--I don't think it works per se--either to call it "List" in the title OR the community template. So maybe we ought to cancel this and rethink?

[cesperanza]

OR--replying to myself--maybe don't make a list of challenges, but add the challenges themselves as pages if they don't exist? When it started, what its for, who's in it? Dunno--just a thought.

[cin1607]

Ultimately, we want that, too, right? Much like we did the other week with the newsletters. But if you've got a fandom out there that has a fairly complete community subpage with challenge communities already listed, yeah, create pages for the communities. :)

I don't want to check anyone's activity on a challenge of any kind just because they're worried about not doing it right, or not doing enough. Plug in whatever you think will contribute.

[cin1607]

Like I said in a comment somewhere else here, I care less about structure than I do just having the information. If you'd rather create subpages or work with existing ones, that had been my original thought, too, and I'm good with that. :)

[cin1607]

Gah. I'm behind. What I get for working for a living. Pfft. *g*

Ok, this challenge morphed a bit for me in the last wiki committee meeting when I brought it up, so I'm going to yell for my fellow members to come and help me explain all of this. As far as the community templates, I hadn't meant to use those as templates for the pages. The pages will be pretty simple lists of whatever challenges, fest and exchanges go on in any fandom. The community template was for the individual challenge/fest/exchange communities. I should have worded that better and I apologize.

[ratcreature]

I have to admit that I don't get why we need extra pages listing challenges in any but the largest fandoms (like HP). In many fandoms the challenge comms are listed on the page that lists other communities in a subsection because there aren't more than a dozen or so around, e.g. on the Merlin community list page.

[cin1607]

That had been the original challenge, but it was suggested in committee that it would be better to create separate pages, rather than subpages, and if we're going to do it for the larger fandoms, we should be consistent.

Personally, I have to admit that I care less about structure than I do about just getting the information in the wiki. For smaller fandoms that have community subpages, I have no problem with continuing that. Or just creating subpages for the smaller fandoms. But when I see a dozen challenge communities, I think that's a lot. I think anything over five is awesome. Maybe I'm not ambitious enough. :)

[ratcreature]

But just five links is not a lot of content on a page. Other lists are hundreds of entries long before we split them into further pages. Unless you mean to bundle the actual challenge articles so that instead of five stub pages you'd have one challenge list page with five subsections.

[meri_oddities]

For a smaller fandom, that's a really good idea. Then you could link it back to the main fandom page. Maybe as a sub-page, if it's a small fandom or an article if it's a bigger fandom with just a few challenges.

[msilverstar]

That's depressing for shrinking fandoms though :-(

[cin1607]

I'm sorry! :( But if you list what you do have going and active, then maybe more people will find out about it and come and play. Create a page for the communities you do have and talk them up. :)