TvTropes: Headscratchers
You doubt the validity of my Word of God usage? Fine. I’m not even responsible for the first couple uses, but it usually makes a good shorthand for noting when I’ve edited things. Here, though, I’ll back myself up.
* I always took it that the dark gods somehow played off from the light gods [snip]
Dunno who thought this up. An interesting concept, but not one in actual use. They are, indeed, misreading into things. The fact that we have a matching number on each side and only four primary gods is a legacy effect of early worldbuilding anyway.
* Has there ever been an explanation why there’s no hedgehogs in the comic? [snip]
The actual reason is that we wanted to do different species and avoid the tired standards of the style.
And while I’m here, I’ll back the other ones up.
Besides, they’ve pointed out both in-strip and by Word of God that it’s not the actual 40K universe [snip]
This. As many times as is nessecery to get it through people’s heads.
By Word of God, they’re still not gonna try publishing it, though. If Sega’s lawyers don’t murder them, GW’s will.
This one is the only one that I dispute, but it may have been an old quotable stance of one of the others. In recent terms though, we’re actually just too unmotivated to do the groundwork and foot the bills involved in putting together a book for an uncertain return. The idea was thrown about a couple years back but didn’t hold traction.
Next time on “Silv’ comments TvTropes Pages”. the WMG Page! Keep that hilarity going, because on the mark or not it’s fun to watch you go.
Wow, the authors read their own TV Tropes pages.
They even link to it on their main page. ;)
I have a policy against adding tropes myself, since that seems somewhat purpose defeating, but we enjoy keeping tabs on it.
FWIW as a non-staffer who keeps a loose eye on TVT policy, in general it’s just the subjective tropes (YMMV material) where the creator is discouraged from adding material. For stuff where there’s a clear “it is” or “it isn’t”, it’s pretty much a free-fire area. “Document it” is the overriding goal, not “X gets credit for Y”.
Now, I can understand not actively editing because it takes time to do stuff even if you don’t get sucked into a random wiki walk. Lord knows I’ve done that more than a few times. :p
It’s really more of a preferance thing for me. I’d rather let other people find things themselves, and keep myself to just clarifying points. Partly to keep from getting suckered in too deep, mostly to get an idea how well what I (or we) intended to get across actually did and where things may have missed their mark. Proved remarkably handy more than a couple times, most memorably for myself with Wildfire. The huge spray of theories after her first appearance was funny, but also marked a severe lack of focus,so we wrote the truck mini-arc and segued that in. Worked a treat for character definition.
Fair enough. Editing isn’t the be-all and end-all of TVT, of course, and your free time is yours to do with as you wish.
(Admittedly, my own “do as you wish” includes not regularly watching or editing the EN page. :P )
On the other hand, in the link to the EN page on TVT, it would be appreciated if you could change it from /Main/ExterminatusNow to /Webcomic/ExterminatusNow. “Main” or “Webcomic” the link follower will still make it to the right page, but Main is just a redirect link.
Ah, yes, the sorting got refined again somewhen. I’ll see to it when I get out of work.
Wow, so it WAS one of you on there. I thought it was just some guy pretending to be the authors, thats usually how one of these things go.
the real head scratcher is why anyone bothers with tvtropes.com.
To paraphrase – give an infinite supply of monkeys and infinite amount of time with internet access and a course book from an extra credits media studies course, and they’ll come up with tv tropes.
Just For Fun, basically.
I find TVTropes rather fascinating. Nerds like analysing shit. I mean, if you want to just be a passive consumer of the creative output of other people, that’s fine too. (What’s the trope for trading smug, derogatory snarks, guys? -(Lampshading))
It was pleasing to see just how many tropes we subverted, lampshaded, or parodied, even before becoming aware of the idea of tropes.
It is also a great way to discover some pretty cool things- books, movies, tv shows, and webcomics… such as this one, for instance.
It’s how I got here.
Oh, that too. TVTropes is our top referrer by far.
@Virus
You misunderstand my venom – it’s directed at tvtropes rather than you guys
your point about being original vs a passive consumer is basically what I’m saying about tvtropes – instead of trying be creative with language people fall back on ready made quotes like “jumping the shark” while whoever contributes to tvtropes just keeps on splitting a human hair into infinity.
But haven’t we just said we contribute to TVTropes? So it’s directed at some of us after all.
In the end, who cares? Tropers obviously derive some enjoyment or satisfaction from cataloguing these things, so more power to em. The real head scratcher is why anyone bothers expending venom on people just doing a harmless thing they enjoy.
Because everyone knows that when someone is WRONG on the internet, you have to spend inordinate amounts of time lambasting them for not understanding The Truth(tm).
(Obligatory link: https://xkcd.com/386/ )
@Virus
but as you’re asking –
Let me start with the minor crime first. The content on tvtropes, given that anything it had to say about TV was exhausted a while back, isn’t about tv, but all forms of media. That of itself isn’t a crime – but at least give each content type it’s own url or something, but naaahhhh can’t be bothered.
Secondly, to read tvtropes requires you to know tvtropes as it only ever self-links to previous defintions making it useful only as a resource for understanding itself – were it a physical entity it would be a black hole – gone beyond critical mass and collapsed into implosion.
But that’s not the annoying thing, the annoying thing is its willfully done – tvtropes is hoping to be a meme factory. It wants to be /b/ but for language. This isn’t a phenomenon limited to tvtropes:
http://blog.dictionary.com/starbucks-trenta/
Unlike the “Mc” prefix which people apply to other words to suggest shoddy, cheap and in someway dehumanising (McJob, McCar, McHouse) which derived from McDonalds, and simply “came about” (ie it’s spontaneous and its author is uncredited), but is widely used due the easy recognition of the core idea. Starbucks on the other hand
http://nathanwmorris.com/how-starbucks-used-proprietary-language-to-build-an-empire/
http://blog.seattlepi.com/thebigblog/2012/05/09/how-starbucks-shamed-you-into-speaking-its-language/
Don’t get me wrong I love slang and memes, but because of their spontaneity and often very funny insight.
Anyways probably a bit late to mention this – but I’m a long time reader of EN so I don’t hold you contributing to tvtropes against you :).
unlike /b/, tvtropes is a index of memes.
oh and as a side note.., in that last link, it claims that the store will correct customers on the terminology by attempted humiliation…. I have seen that occur in Manhattan but not in other parts of NYC because the rest of NYC customers would treat their employees like shit if they did. I have no idea how others of the world would react. I did not know that people from Seattle were willing to change their slang via humiliation.
Regarding the name “TV Tropes”. Yes, it’s known to not be an accurate description of the wiki. Fast Eddie (the admin, for those not aware) did start making moves to rename it Media Tropes, but the users that bothered to comment on the change in the forums said, in general, that they preferred it as-is, “artifact title” or not. (mediatropes.org is used for file serving purposes now, IIRC)
As for the rest of it, not going to bother. I really couldn’t give two squirts of warm urine about whether or not you like TVT or think it’s the Antichrist, nor have I the ambition to try to change your view of the wiki.
An INaccurate description, rather.