Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Old Man Murray Deleted From Wikipedia

By John Walker on March 2nd, 2011 at 10:40 pm.

Or there will be trouble.

When Rock, Paper, Shotgun is asked to name its games writing influences, only a few names come up. They include Amiga Power, Your Sinclair, early Gamer, and perhaps most noticeably, Old Man Murray. The influence that site had on games writing has influenced just about everything else anyone’s enjoyed since. RPS writers lived and breathed OMM at the time. Every time I read the archives I’m reminded how poor a job I’m doing, and what it is I should be striving for. Not to mention that it was written by Erik Wolpaw and Chet Faliszek, who now work at Valve, penning mighty words and ideas for the likes of Left 4 Dead and Portal. And today their entry has been deleted from Wikipedia, on the grounds that it’s “not notable”. We’d like to object.

And we’re not objecting on the grounds that our own site was described by Wikipedia editors as being, “generally trivial, tangential, or otherwise not substantial enough to grant notability.” We’re objecting because one of the finest sources of games writing of all time is being ignored for extremely spurious reasons.

The criteria for an article on a website on Wikipedia are detailed here. The crux is, it has to have been written about elsewhere in a “non-trivial” way. Which gives a lot of room for interpretation.

It demonstrates one of the key flaws in Wikipedia’s criteria for inclusion: the dependence upon secondary sources beyond an object itself. It’s obviously a system that often works – if something is notable, it’ll likely have been mentioned by other sources thought to be notable. The issue starts when something was notable in an online form, but in the past. There aren’t so many contemporary pieces being written about a website that ended in… oh, hang on, I can’t check Wikipedia. I’ll just email one of the site’s writers, the notable writer behind Portal and Portal 2, Erik Wolpaw.

“The last news post is dated 01-31-2002. That sounds about right. Though now that Serious Sam 3 just got announced, it might be time to update again.”

Thanks.

And it’s even harder when the primary purpose of a site is humour. Humour – an extremely serious business – is all too often not taken seriously.

But like so many of the disputes that rear up on the encyclopaedia, this could be a personal matter. The initiative to have the entry deleted was started by user “SchuminWeb“, one Ben Schumin. He’s a fan of the defunct comedy cartoon website, Homestar Runner, which has an entry on Wikipedia that he links to. It is claimed in the discussion page on Wikipedia that Schumin has a long-running dispute with OMM. Chet Faliszek expresses his confusion about the matter here, saying he remembers helping Schumin set up his site back in the day. So what does Schumin have specifically against Old Man Murray? We’ve contacted him to find out. (Edit: Oh, he seems to have deleted my question, which seems a bit rude.)

Edit: While Schumin is declining to give a reason behind his choosing Old Man Murray (and only a week before, Portal Of Evil) for deletion, it’s hard to understand how this didn’t mean the Conflict Of Interest rule didn’t prevent his nominating.

Meanwhile, there’s a lot of anger about the decision – a lot of it unsavoury – all over the place.

You can read the deleted Old Man Murray Wikipedia article thanks to the Wayback Machine. Amazingly, references to Old Man Murray, even without a link, have been removed from Erik Wolpaw’s own Wikipedia entry. (It has since been restored. And it seems someone also tried to do the same to Mark Laidlaw’s page.)

For a primer in why we care about OMM, here’s a guide the late Kieron Gillen has put together:

1: The Crate Review System

The shame of many developers,

2. Death Of Adventure Games

The first people to use that puzzle as an example of how the genre was fucking apeshit.

3. Serious Sam: The Interview

The popularisation of Serious Sam.

4. Drakan Week Official Response.

Basically, every internet kid who is snarky is pretending to be pretending to be pretending to be people who were OMM.

5. 5 would be this

Go find your own favourite. Along with AP2, it’s one of the most entertaining and inspiring sources of writing on the internet. Which seems pretty bloody notable to us.

If you’re a developer or games journalist who was inspired by Old Man Murray, or perhaps you threatened to sue them, we’d really love to hear from you. Please email me at john@rockpapershotgun.com with your stories.

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294 Comments »

  1. 02/03/2011 at 22:43 Novotny says:

    I applaud your efforts here, having noted earlier the activity on twitter.
    Wouldn’t you guys credit Zzap64! as influential too? And Big K was the first place I ever had a letter printed. I am so very old.

    • 03/03/2011 at 02:24 bascule42 says:

      Let’s not forget Crash.

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:36 Novotny says:

      Indeed. I think the hairy snappers of RPS are probably too young to have sampled that first wave of games journalism, which danced hand-in-hand with the birth of British bedroom games coding. The Rev Stu would still sing of it, I’m sure. It’s quite beside the point of this little campaign, though.

    • 03/03/2011 at 19:07 Temple to Tei says:

      Controversy? Again?!?! Can’t we all just get along?
      I still have the Crash issue with the spoof Your Sinclair issue in it.
      Now THERE was a flame war before your fancy internets.

      Oh and Lunar Jetman had the funniest line ever which I try to use and nobody else likes:
      ‘It all began when I was born, aged about eight…’

    • 03/03/2011 at 20:57 Novotny says:

      Oh, I didn’t mean to seem to be flaming. I just think RPS has older relatives than it has mentioned, and in much the same way that they are admirably trying to save the references to OMM, I just like to reference these older publications too, as they meant an awful lot to me at the time. Admittedly though: where do you stop? I’m sure someone could eloquently argue that some of the titles I mentioned owe a lot to earlier still works.

      Anyways: back to Minecraft for me, where I have a lawn to keep people off ;)

  2. 02/03/2011 at 22:44 Decimae says:

    Ah. The notability fight spreads from programming languages to gaming journalists. I find it to be rather ridiculous; if the article is obviously not made by affiliates of the subject discussed then it’s notable enough for wikipedia.

  3. 02/03/2011 at 22:46 MikoSquiz says:

    Wikipedia deletionists are the lowest form of life known to man. Pond scum, the lot of them.

  4. 02/03/2011 at 22:46 shoptroll says:

    I stopped caring about Wikipedia after witnessing moderators wrecking the Overclocked Remixes articles for being “non-notable”. Their review process is absolutely terrible.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:14 Foo says:

      I had the same reaction when the article on Q3 mod CPMA was deleted, after hundreds of edits had made it into a damn-near perfect entry. It’s like the wiki equivalent of someone griefing a minecraft construction that you’ve been working on all day, only to find that person is buds with the server admin, and you’re boned.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:59 megalomania says:

      @Foo
      It was deleted in 2006 and recreated in 2007… time to move on?

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:02 Foo says:

      Haven’t bothered making a significant edit since that time. That article really tied the room together, man.

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:39 12kill4 says:

      +1 for Foo

    • 03/03/2011 at 02:19 Psychochild says:

      Same thing happened with DKP (Dragon Kill Points for people who didn’t play EQ/WoW). Useful concept for MMO designers, even thought it was “not notable” enough for Wikipedia. We defeated a deletion attempt twice, only for it to succeed the third time under a rushed deletion vote.

      Yes, it was eventually put back into Wikipedia. But, like Foo, it taught me a lesson: any effort you put into an article can be wiped out if some asshat thinks that article isn’t worthy. I’ll spend my time doing something more useful, thanks.

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:29 noethis says:

      Oh, hey there Foo!

      -wviperw

  5. 02/03/2011 at 22:49 geldonyetich says:

    I was first awoken to Wikipedia’s odd habits of deleting things as “not notable” when they removed the entry on BYOND, the free-to-use platform behind Space Station 13 and a web portal populated by thousands. It was then that I decided Wikipedia probably doesn’t deserve a donation from me, ever.

  6. 02/03/2011 at 22:51 Torgen says:

    Wow, OMM defined “gonzo journalism” for online entertainment (meaning GOOD writing with attitude, not nerdrage that tries to pass itself off as “edgy”.)

    It would be interesting to list how many memes OMM started. The “crate system” of reviews probably would top the list.

  7. 02/03/2011 at 22:54 Cugel says:

    Isn’t the whole basic concept of Wikipedia, the thing that sets it apart from regular, centralised encyclopedias, that you can have articles on pretty much anything?

    I concur with the vitriol displayed above towards the deletionists (nice phrase by the way), may their blight be swept from the Earth.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:00 shoptroll says:

      At some point Wikipedia decided it needed to be taken seriously and shoved its collective head up its own arse and started promoting people as curators for policing the content. It’s been on a downward spiral ever since.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:14 megalomania says:

      Not true shoptroll. Wikipedia is, and always has been, self-policing with regard to content. There are no curators. The admins’ job is merely to use powers (deletion, protection, etc.) which it would be silly to give to everyone when there is a consensus amongst editors to do so.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:26 Nathan says:

      Whilst that would ideally be true, and quite removed from any aspect of this story, it quite definitely is not true that the opinions of, say, some random anonymous contributor would be given equal weight with those of a long-standing admin.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:49 FriendlyFire says:

      Despite the fact the admin might be entirely ignorant in the subject matter at hand.

      This is a big part of why Wikipedia isn’t what it could’ve been. People with power often shouldn’t have said power.

    • 03/03/2011 at 11:15 Archonsod says:

      No, the main difference between Wikipedia and a normal encyclopaedia is Wikipedia is the encyclopaedia anyone can edit while say Brittania is the encyclopaedia only highly qualified, professional researchers can edit.

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:55 JFS says:

      And that’s why Wikipedia has collectively been known to suck arse since the dawning of mankind.

  8. 02/03/2011 at 22:57 KaL_YoshiKa says:

    Hey just a thought,

    All the computers in Postal 2 feature a screen capture of Old Man Murray as the image on the monitors. Given that Postal 2 is notorious and notable – wouldn’t the website being featured prominently through out in itself be notable?

    But yeah, what the hell – Old Man Murray is often cited by most reviewers everywhere as one of their more important influences.

  9. 02/03/2011 at 22:59 Lambchops says:

    Ah, good old yester year game journalism (I am aware that calling 10 years ago yester year is pushing it a bit). I feel inclined to mention Digitiser at this point. If only because Digi would probably want to rub the fact it still has a Wiki article in Old Man Murray’s face.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digitiser

    Anyway, boo to Wiki page deletion. The joy of wikipedia is surely that it contains a ludicrous amount of frivolous info that nonetheless is important to somebody.

    • 03/03/2011 at 09:52 rivalin says:

      Ah Digitiser! What better example of an obscure yet at the same time incredibly notable publication is there. Yet if an uninformed editor from Oklahoma (no offence to Oklahoma, just picking it as a far away place) they’d probably think it was the most irrelevant subject of an article ever, I mean, Teletext, what even is that?

      Compound that with the frankly staggering an completely unprofessional behaviour of, I would say the majority of the sort of people who become administrators on wikipedia, and you can see how we end up with preposterous situations like this where an utterly biased admin can abuse his power and still be supported unquestioningly by other admins.

  10. 02/03/2011 at 23:02 Hoaxfish says:

    I follow about 4 or 5 “popular” sites, which wikipedia deems “non-notable”. Most of the editors of wikipedia are non-notable… and the ones that are, are apparently completely power-mad.

    They’re a bit like Apple…it’s a weird technology cult

    Then again, didn’t Jimbo Wales delete his ex-girlfriend’s article after he decided she was non-notable (of course, she had one in the first place because he found her notable).

  11. 02/03/2011 at 23:06 Kirrus says:

    I have twice defended a computer-security article on there from deletion, and delitionists is a nice way of talking about the cliques there. People who have no clue about the subject matter at all argue for the articles deletion, and with a tech-specific article, it’s almost impossible to defend. I think we got lucky both times, with an admin who had half a clue.

    I wish you luck with this, but truly, don’t hold your breath :(

  12. 02/03/2011 at 23:08 Phydaux says:

    We’ve contacted him to find out.

    John’s question on SchuminWeb’s talk page was very polite, the response from SchuminWeb is “Not dignifying this with a response”. He deleted John’s comment from his talk page.
    This kind of person does not deserve the right to administrate Wikipedia.

  13. 02/03/2011 at 23:10 shoptroll says:

    So I looked at the edit history on Wolpaw’s page. The link to the OMM entry was removed over a week before the actual OMM entry was pulled. Pretty clear the editor had no intention of letting the OMM entry survive no matter what else happened.

    However, I noticed on his talk page…

    “If I made an action that you disagree with: If you are writing to comment on an action that you disagree with, first just fix it, and then tell me what you fixed and why you fixed it. This permission also includes reverting administrative actions that I have made. I won’t wheel war with you if you revert an administrative action. Just make sure you tell me that you did”

    IMHO, someone with wikipedia access should restore the OMM article

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:32 Nathan says:

      No. Whilst this user nominated the article for deletion and started the conversation, it would have been another administrator (in this case, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Lifebaka ), independent of Schumin, who would have read through the arguments presented in the discussion and thereby made the decision whether or not to delete the page.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:47 Josh04 says:

      Although, lifebaka was apparently unable to read the references given – assume he made his mind up on the testimony of others that they were unsuitable?

      “I’ll re-evaluate it later this evening (EST). I am not currently on a network that lets me view most of the sources, unfortunately. Expect four to five hours delay before my next response.”

  14. 02/03/2011 at 23:11 Robin says:

    I remember first getting into OMM (probably via Portal of Evil, Voodoo Extreme and/or Seanbaby – there really wasn’t a lot of internet back then) circa 2000-2001. People writing rude funny things about games and making other-than-bitterly-defensive critiques about their absurdities were mindblowing novelties.

    The amount of noteworthy computer games, things that existed offline from around 1987-1997, and cultural reference points and communities that have emerged online in the past decade (“Urrngh forum cruft!”- a fat idiot with an imaginary internet sherriff’s badge) that aren’t represented on Wikipedia is terrifyingly stupid.

  15. 02/03/2011 at 23:13 DaFishes says:

    This is typical on Wikipedia. It’s basically a testicle waving contest to get any content to stick.

  16. 02/03/2011 at 23:14 Masem says:

    As an admin on WP and knee deep in notability issues, I believe this was a gross mistake (at worst, the article should have been merged to Chet’s article).

    I am going to do my best to rectify the situation. This doesn’t mean I can’t simply undelete and go “tada”, but I will be working on gaining consensus to reverse it.

    That said, if you have any sources that point to the industry’s take on OMM , please let me know. The more the better.

  17. 02/03/2011 at 23:14 Devilturnip says:

    Article deletion for notability never made since to me. The biggest advantage an online encyclopedia has over its book-based equivalent is that there is no space limitation. Notability guidelines seem to be hellbent on emulating that limitation, for ineffable reasons. The reasoning simply cannot be effed.

    I think my video tomorrow will be about this. I can’t overstress how important Old Man Murray was and still is to me.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:30 megalomania says:

      The reasoning for notability isn’t to do with space, it’s to do with sourcing. Wikipedia has space for an article on my Auntie Margaret. Maybe only a few people will read it, but why not have it, right? But to extract information about my Auntie Margaret from a community of anonymous or pseudonymous editors that we can have any sort of confidence is true, we have to insist that it cites other reliable sources. Problem is, nobody has ever published any reliable sources on my Auntie Margaret. There’s a minimum threshold of published, external sources of information about a topic that needs to exist for there to be the possibility of writing a viable article about that topic. That threshold is the notability threshold.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:37 CMaster says:

      @Megalomania
      That’s not true. I’ve seen plenty of stuff which can be referenced and sources (and often is) trimmed right down or deleted on the grounds that it isn’t notable enough.
      Notability and verifiability are different issues and indeed, different WP policies.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:44 Devilturnip says:

      @megalomania
      It’s clear your fighting for your home team here, so there’s not much point in arguing with you. Old Man Murray is not your auntie. If the notability guidelines allow such an important part of game journalism history to be removed, then nothing in game journalism should be notable. Wikipedia notability policies destroy useful content, and further degrade the site’s reputation.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:54 megalomania says:

      @CMaster
      I’d like to see an example of that.

      @Devilturnip
      I don’t think OMM is non-notable, and I’m not claiming that AfDs always pan out the way they should. I was merely contending the implication that the notability guidelines don’t serve a purpose.

      Fighting for my home team? I guess… I edit articles on the obscurities of eastern European prehistoric archaeology when I have the time, and I think that’s a worthwhile endeavour. I’m arguing for the position I agree with, why would I do otherwise? If you want to pretend instead that I have some vested interest and use that as an excuse not to engage with my arguments then I can’t stop you. But for the record I’m not a particular seasoned editor and definitely not an admin. Or much of a deletionist as it goes.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:02 CMaster says:

      @Megalomania
      It would be hard, as said articles that I know have been deleted and their AFD’s probably also long gone. Equally, just reading the policies should make it clear that sources alone aren’t enough. Notability is another criteria (somewhat necessarily woolly) that articles must meet as well as being verifiable. Also, wikipedia policies on what counts as a suitable source often mean that minutiae of one field can remain, while much more significant elements of others get removed.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:32 megalomania says:

      AfDs are never deleted. You can find them linked from the page of the deleted article, or search for them here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Archived_deletion_discussions

      I’m not claiming verifiability and notability aren’t separate policies, I’m saying one leads to the other. Sources, which are required for verifiability, are the only way you can establish notability.

    • 03/03/2011 at 03:03 DrGonzo says:

      And they are saying decent referencing does not equal notability. It’s a simple argument, and you don’t seem to be acknowledging it.

      I can’t see how someone could defend such a policy. Notability is completely subjective.

    • 03/03/2011 at 21:33 jmzero says:

      @Megalomania

      I suppose you could perhaps say that the policies are sane, and this is just an unfortunate happening… but surely you have to agree that what actually happened here is ridiculous? A guy with an axe to grind got a page deleted because he didn’t like it – and he managed to do so even with the scrutiny of people who should be preventing this kind of crap.

      And shouldn’t the presence of a lot of “meatpuppets” in a discussion thread at least hint that there might be something to be reviewed? The ridiculous deletion candidates people bring up (my cat, some church barbeque) are unlikely to get that kind of support or interest (and if they do maybe there’s something to them).

      And pretending that this process would have went the same for someone who didn’t have an established WP editing history is ridiculous. Stupid. Sure he didn’t use his magic admin powers, but that’s hardly the only weight he has, hardly the only way he’s different from, say, me.

      I could demonstrate this by trying to get half the pages on his “favorite list” deleted – but if I did that people would complain that there’s a conflict of interest (because I think he’s a douche, and because I’m sure someone’s already trying). And when I do it, suddenly it wouldn’t matter that nobody cares about some local politician, and it wouldn’t matter that the only thing supporting a page on some stupid society is links to that society’s web pages. There’s no way this deletion would have happened without someone with a history behind it – arguments be damned.

      Do you honestly, really doubt that?

  18. 02/03/2011 at 23:19 rocketman71 says:

    That Schumin guy is pathethic. Just read his reasoning.

    You can’t?. Oh, sorry, I meant his lack of reasoning other than “delete, delete, DELETE!”.

    • 03/03/2011 at 05:02 Kaira- says:

      Oh, you think you have a source of some sort? I’m sorry, it’s irrelevant. What, it’s Gabe Newell? Nevermind, irrelevant. RockPaperShotgun? Irrelevant. Anything? Irrelevant, biased, WP:COI, WP:GoChockeOnAMillionDicks.

  19. 02/03/2011 at 23:19 Robert says:

    Wikipedia is ruled by a clique of supermoderators. Those so-called super-users are defined by amount of edits, not the quality of it.

    Ever since the the clique started to claim control, and argue against onetime (or a handful of) contributors, it went into a downward spiral. The strength of wikipedia should be the fact that you can have experts in a certain field contributing to mondial knowledge.

    “We’re talking about a page that’s effectively been dead for ten years here..”(from a discussion on Schumin’s page)

    Because James Joyce doesn’t update his webpage anymore means he is non-notable?

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:26 megalomania says:

      How do you decide who’s an expert? The core of Wikipedia is that anyone can edit, and “anyone” includes a lot of very very crazy people. The only feasible way of ensuring its content remains halfway usable is insisting that it can be no more than a summary of other published reliable sources. That’s why articles which become the primary source on a topic are inappropriate.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:01 Starky says:

      This is the internet though, a shifting mass, things which were vastly important in their day vanish utterly, things that discussed them vanish and eventually all you have left is the Wiki entry and a half dozen dead links.

      It’s the entire sodding reason efforts like the Archive.org exist because people began to realize that swaths of vastly important (socially, historically, culturally) stuff was literally vanishing from existence.

      Hell I see Wiki itself imploding anyway in a few years unless it vastly improves it’s act.

      The problem with Wikipedia is that people who are entirely ignorant of the subject, the relevance it did have are looking at those articles, doing a half-arsed google search for information and then deciding they should be deleted.

      It is the reason experts don’t bother with Wikipedia any more.
      I remember reading an article/blog (i forget which and can’t find the damn thing – again the internet is a black hole) about a Engineering PhD. with multiple papers in respected journals and publications, working on cutting edge advancements in robotics and control systems getting “corrected” on Wikipedia.

      Literally he was correcting things and then having his edits reverted by college level (or below) users using 30-40 year old source material as evidence. Old no longer correct evidence which college still teaches students, because with engineering you learn the old “close enough” (easy) methods – such as Newtonian physics, even if we know them to be not strictly correct.

      Needless to say he gave up trying.

      There have been dozens of examples of this over the years – I remember a call a few years ago for Wiki to start giving preferred treatment to accredited and verifiable experts, but they refused. Wanting to leave it “Open”.

      Instead they decided to recruit an army of idiots to administrate their site – because for every decent knowledgeable admin on wiki there are 10 self-important know it alls, who’ll wade into subjects they are utterly ignorant about and make choices based upon ignorance.

      There is a reason almost every single University, College, or education facility of any worth tells it’s students to avoid Wikipedia like it is the plague.
      The only think Wikipedia is useful for is a quick and dirty overview and maybe if you are lucky some links to some REAL sources.

      The more subjective the subject (the more it leans on expert knowledge) the worse Wikipedia gets – some of it’s historical articles are chronically incorrect and pretty damned revisionist – especially in favour of America.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:06 CMaster says:

      @ Starky

      At university level, any encyclopaedia would be considered an unacceptable reference.
      Wiki’s actually one of the better ones out there, helped by being free. Its use is to get an overview of a subject quickly, not to be taken at its word or used as a source for anything. Again, true of all encyclopaedias.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:30 Starky says:

      Of course you couldn’t cite a encyclopedia, but I’m not taking abut using it as a source itself.

      As I’ve said with factual subjects wiki is pretty damned good, but it’s strength was always having information on things that and subjects you could find no where else, the obscure and the niche.

      Obviously there is a limit, people starting pages about their cat and such – but Wikipedia has many, many times taken it’s notability guidelines WAY too far (most notably in cases like this where clearly subject matter ignorant admin wade in and stamp down), destroying (hyperbole sure, but what would be an internet rant without some hyperbole? Meat without gravy) its greatest strength.

      Then again, maybe I am bitter because I’ve had plenty of articles I wrote deleted for lack of notoriety (though 90% of my work is still up and readable today, and I’ve not touched wiki in almost 3 years as a contributor/editor).

    • 03/03/2011 at 11:35 Robert says:

      “How do you decide who’s an expert? The core of Wikipedia is that anyone can edit, and “anyone” includes a lot of very very crazy people. The only feasible way of ensuring its content remains halfway usable is insisting that it can be no more than a summary of other published reliable sources. That’s why articles which become the primary source on a topic are inappropriate.”

      The problem is that ‘other published reliable sources” became a subject of discussion, even aside the whole notability issue. By raising the opinions of some over those of others it is no longer really true that “The core of Wikipedia is that anyone can edit”

  20. 02/03/2011 at 23:19 Muzman says:

    OMM, in their never ending rage at mainstream gaming tendencies (which Yahtzee has kinda taken over railing against) were also one of the first places to seek out and promote indie gaming. And this was before all the good development platforms existed and they were even harder to make.

    Notability Nazis are tedious though. Wikipedia used to be much more fun.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:33 CMaster says:

      Honestly, Yahtzee is shit at railing against mainstream gaming trends. Sure, he whinges, but he plays stuff with so little variety, dislikes anything that goes against his idea of what a genre “should” be and actually goes out and tries games with new ideas basically never. Occasionally you’ll see him do a column with “maybe somebody should try it like this” when it’s been tried like that several times before.

      He’s entertaining, sure (although the misogyny and homophobia were going a bit too far of late) but he’s not at all well informed about games, and is as much stuck in his own rut about games as the developers he rails against.

  21. 02/03/2011 at 23:23 megalomania says:

    Well I guess I’m going to be the guy defending Wikipedia here. The notability policies are absolutely crucial. Yes they sometimes misfire. Yes there are lots of overzealous deletionists. But you simply would not believe the flood of completely trivial and downright false information that gets added to Wikipedia every day. Strict adherence to notability and sourcing is, with no exaggeration, the only thing that stops it becoming completely useless as a serious encyclopaedia. Some topics are harder to source properly than others – websites being top of the list – but if the topic is truly notable and you have a bit of perseverance then it will get through. I simply cannot stand people who make one attempt at editing and then go off in a huff denouncing the entire project.

    That last part is not necessarily directed at you, John, I obviously don’t know how much experience you have with Wikipedia, I can just see where the comment thread is going. Instead of bitching about the Wikipedia cabal let’s be productive. This post constitutes reliable external coverage which very well might be enough to get the article recreated and improved so it isn’t deleted again.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:35 Legionary says:

      Sorry, but this is just silly but I disagree with you. Wikipedia is not a print encyclopaedia. It does not need to remove pages; it does not become more difficult to find information if the number of articles increases. Each page is separate. Having an article about OMM does not make it harder to find an article about nuclear fission.

      Edit: sorry, I am in a bad mood and shouldn’t have posted in such a dismissive tone.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:42 Nathan says:

      You don’t think Wikipedia needs ever remove pages?

      Whilst deletionism can and does go to far, inclusionism is also the path of madness. I’m quite sure that I exist and there are some primary citable sources out there providing evidence of this, but were Wikipedia to suddenly have a page for every provable person, every building and every school fete on the planet, it would become entirely unusable.
      Surely noone can doubt that the dozens of these articles created each day need to be deleted from non-notability, despite the freedoms afforded by an electronic format? The question then just becomes one of where you the line is drawn between notable and non-notable content – at the moment, it’s defined in such a way that various classes of articles are possibly at a disadvantage because they aren’t frequently discussed by contemporary sources that are available online, and Old Man Murray is clearly, for the moment, on the wrong side of this line.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:50 Kieron Gillen says:

      I admit, when they’ve dismissed Wired, Kotaku and PC Gamer as reasonable sources – and people like Gabe Newell, I have to wonder what they would accept.
      KG

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:12 megalomania says:

      @KG
      To be fair to the admin who reviewed that monstrous AfD and decided to delete, those sources weren’t actually in the article, and the few constructive comments in which they were offered were swamped by unhelpful harangues and personal insults from a horde of newly-registered meatpuppets.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:13 ShawnClapper says:

      Wouldn’t this just make it so over time historical items become less notable as they fade into obscurity, although during their time they may have been very notable. How do you keep historical entries on a site that constantly deletes things after the public looses interest?

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:18 Muzman says:

      Some notability policy is crucial. The ones people wave around here are completely ridiculous and effectively undermine the entire project. Ten years after his death, wikipedia would have deleted jesus since no notable writing would have existed (and when writing does show up wouldn’t it be nice to have a contemporary record as well to compare it to? Oh, only if it’s ‘notable’).
      It’s a completely ball/gonad-less appeal to mainstream authority. Wikipedia ceded its ability to have any authority of its own to the “established” media. A media which of course cared little about the ‘net ten years ago. This sort of thing will damage wikipedia’s strength as a source as surely as any slew of badly written pokemon pages.

      At the time everyone knew about OMM in the PC scene. Every update was passed around the thousands of gaming sites that sprang up and died in the dot com boom. That period was real, but deserves no record because no external record exists to confirm it. Boneheaded doesn’t even begin to describe it.

      Think about this: there’s an entry on wikipedia for Small Wonder, a TV show notable only for being shit. It’s only there because it exists. That is the basic reason it passes muster. It existed. That bricks and mortar journal of record TV Week probably wrote about it too (at the behest of the people who made it). Hurray for the vitality and definitiveness of wikipedia.
      See, it isn’t that people can’t say “it’s the policy!” It’s that the policy is an ass.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:20 safetydank says:

      I AM NOT A MEAT PUPPET. I AM A HUMAN BEING!

    • 03/03/2011 at 02:21 Urthman says:

      megalomania, I agree. I think my posting history demonstrates pretty conclusively that I am the biggest Old Man Murray fanboy on this site. But this is a non-issue.

      As long as the actual Old Man Murray website is still on the internet, worrying about whether there is a Wikipedia article about Old Man Murray is pointless. Who needs a Wikipedia article about OMM when you can just link to the real thing? For instance, here are the top 10 OMM articles that John forgot to link to:

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/longreviews/56.html
      The problem with making a dark and disturbing version of Alice in Wonderland is that it’s pretty dark and disturbing to begin with, which gives it little training wheels that help cultural firebrands ride it into geniusdom once every eighteen months or so.

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/longreviews/726.html
      (Trespasser Hype Review) “You hear people say, ‘We create worlds,’ states Rich Flier. “Well, we’re really creating one.”
      “Get ready to stack crates…” Chet

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/news/news6.html
      (scroll down to Acting!) Likewise, story lovers should just accept the fact that non-interactive media such as books, television, movies, and, in case all of those somehow disappear, plays, have stories and dialogue pretty much covered. Games are something else altogether…Note to super-smart adventure gamers who never fail to mention that they’re too smart to for TV but will gladly spend two hundred excruciating hours wringing any itty-bitty bit of plot out of Jane Jensen’s latest crappy opus: Watch some television, they put stories on there now.

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/news/news3.html
      (scroll to I Like Girls) First of all, God forbid someone uses sex to sell a product. Unless of course that product is Salon itself, which advertises as one of its subscription services
      Premium-only galleries of erotic art and photography in Salon Sex. Maybe Au’s real problem is that E3 hasn’t thought up a decent leftist euphemism for porn that won’t taint the thrill of blood rushing to his penis by making him feel as if he’s experiencing the unsophisticated boner of the common man.

      (then scroll to Black and White) “If it’s your job to pan this week’s Army Men game, and the only bad thing you can think to say about it is that it’s racist, you’re simply convincing me that it just might be the greatest game ever. Which means you’re not doing your job.”

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/longreviews/46.html
      (Rune Review) Here’s a depressing rundown of the levels you’ll death-march through: Nali village, cave, cave, cave, cave, dark castle, lava cave, lava dungeon, lava waterfall, lava sewer, cave, dungeon, sewer, Nali village, dungeon, cave, sewer, cave, Nali cave, tall cave with the ceiling removed, cave, dungeon, cave. I think I forgot a sewer in the middle there.

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/longreviews/51.html
      (Rune Review Rebuttal in which the rave reviews from other game sites change OMM’s mind)
      This next review is from a German site…All I know is that they gave Rune the special award pictured below. I believe it is their coveted 85 Award, which is metric for 100. I’ll say this about Germany’s rating system: It scares me that the Germans have no word for gameplay.

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/news/news5.html
      (scroll down to Advice for Gamers) Women have a way of sarcastically calling you “Hero of Might and Magic” that not only strips the words of all their mighty magical heroism but actually makes the phrase surprisingly emasculating.

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/news/news11.html
      (scroll to “Make Fun Of The Newest Daikatana Screenshot Week”) If it was my job to get people excited about Daikatana by releasing screenshots, and I released that screenshot, I’d lose my job.

      http://www.oldmanmurray.com/news/news4.html
      (scroll to Giants, As It Refers To Lips) The fact that Giants espouses a dangerous ideology that Jonah Falcon finds morally repugnant ultimately only costs it one half of one star. In other words, if Borislav Herak’s Bosnian Rape Camp Superchamp is stable and lets you save anywhere, there’s still a good chance Jonah might give it a 4.5.

    • 03/03/2011 at 09:39 battles_atlas says:

      @ Megalomania

      If you’re trying to convince people that wikipedia hasn’t become the plaything for an elitist clique of suited trolls, then chucking around terms like ‘meatpuppets’ is somewhat detrimental to your case.

  22. 02/03/2011 at 23:26 Starky says:

    Wiki is a joke – at least when it was open, and crazy and wild in the starting days it was a joke that we all could enjoy – with entries on wonderful and obscure things.

    you could spend hours on Wiki just following links and learning the most random of things – it had the same effect that reading TV tropes did – you’d go for one article and 3 hours later and on your 50th article you’d finally stop.

    Then it tried to get all serious, tried to claim it could compete with the printed encyclopedias (you know those ones written and sourced by experts in the field, peer reviewed and expertly edited)… started getting all edit and delete happy, and it now basically sucks balls.

    The only thing it is useful for is looing up pages on 100% factual subjects – mathematics, physics and such, well documented things that cannot be disputed.

    On anything even partly subjective (history, the arts, literature, media) it is a steaming pile of…

    Wiki is a joke, and the joke isn’t funny any more.

    • 02/03/2011 at 23:41 Thants says:

      I await your link to a better online encyclopedia.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:11 mwoody says:

      I await your link to a better print encyclopedia, for that matter.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:13 Starky says:

      There is no better online encyclopedia – but just because Wikipedia is the only one doesn’t make it good.

      It could have been, and I was a very enthusiastic user and editor back in the day with hundreds of subject creations and thousands upon thousands of edits – most of which are still there today.

      Still I became increasingly frustrated with it seeing day upon day correct and factual information been edited away in favour of old and incorrect information.

      It’s a bit better these days in Science and technology, though I’d argue that is almost utterly thanks to the vast increase in online publication of scientific papers (thus easily citable, and by citable I mean googleable sources).

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:25 Cradok says:

      Eeh, Wookiepedia is even further up itself that Wikipedia. No sense of fun or joy about anything, despite the fact that it’s based on, let’s be fair here, kitsch space opera.

      No, the best wiki on the web is http://www.tfwiki.net. Fully aware of just how silly its subject matter is, yet a scarily concise compilation of everything and anything that has ever had ‘Transformers’ on it.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:33 CMaster says:

      Is Britannica any better? I have to say that while I liked Britannica when I last used it, that was 10 years ago or so on DVD. Certainly it seemed to have a lot less breadth and no more depth than wiki.

      I do feel that wikipedia’s mathematics articles fail somewhat. I’m a trained scientist with a fair bit of mathematical talent – and I don’t have a clue what most maths articles on wiki are banging on about – even when it’s a subject I already have some inkling about.

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:48 Josh04 says:

      As a Maths student, I can say that most wikipedia articles on maths topics are from my point of view – which is not perhaps the most helpful point of view for understanding what it means, or what use it is to you as a scientist :P

    • 03/03/2011 at 00:52 Starky says:

      Brit is better as a general primer and leaping off point. I’ll agree it is no deeper, and doesn’t nave near as much information per subject.
      But what it does have is much, much clearer read on most subjects – as you mention yourself wikipedia, even for people knowledgeable on the subject can be horridly written at times.

      Oft-times I find myself looking over articles (like you especially pages on maths, and electronics) and scratching my head at WTF it means. Even when I KNOW what it means.

      It isn’t that it is is wrong, but that it is so poorly presented – a quick and obvious example (to anyone who’s done any Electronics theory) would be http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohm%27s_law
      A quick scan and I don’t see anything that really pops out as flat out wrong, no blatant misinformation… but it is pretty damn poor.

      I really think wiki needs to rethink its layout designs – the first half of the article should be filled with simple concepts a basic explanation maybe 1-2 simple working examples then some history.
      The more advanced aspects should be last.
      There is also a LOT of useless information contained within the article that only serves to confuse the subject, which could easily be cut down, and links used instead.

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:03 megalomania says:

      @Starky
      You know, there’s an edit button…

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:49 Starky says:

      I know well, as I’ve mentioned here I have over 100 articles (mostly in audio/electrical and electronics), and thousands of edits under my belt, but I flat out quit 2 and a bit years ago – a combination of real life and realizing that editing wiki was like trying to ski uphill.
      That and it was a bit of an addiction… almost as bad as smoking.
      Wiki is too much of a sprawling beast to try and wrangle, which is both good and bad in many ways.

      I think a main problem is actually a limitation with the wiki software – and what you can do with it. It needs serious updating to allow for more palatable formatting.

    • 03/03/2011 at 07:16 Bret says:

      Ski?

      It’s worse than that.

      But you know what the man says. Some motherfuckers are always trying to ice-skate uphill.

    • 03/03/2011 at 14:29 JWilkinson says:

      @Megalomaniac

      “You know, there’s an edit button…”

      Yeah, but why would anyone want to edit the encyclopedia – or put in any real effort when doing so – if their changes could be reverted or deleted? It’s fun to feel like you’re contributing to the great sum of human knowledge. Considerably less fun to see a lot of work get deleted because of a trigger-happy admin, whether that’s immediately or – in the case of the OMM article – several years on.

    • 03/03/2011 at 20:39 Dances to Podcasts says:

      Several reference to Wikipedia vs Brittanica and no one linked to this yet?

      http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v438/n7070/full/438900a.html

    • 04/03/2011 at 22:25 Zyrxil says:

      @Starky
      You know, there’s an edit button…

      Are you not getting the point? Of course people edit and contribute to articles, but it’s easier to destroy than to create, and Wikipedia admins are seemingly got their “good editor” reputations by deleting deleting and deleting some more instead of doing making ‘real’ contributions. Whatever good they may have done by providing order is massively outweighed by the fact that they have made the entirely completely toxic and actively hostile to new editors.

      The fact that “Wikilawyering” is a term speaks volumes on how badly the rules created to support Wikipedia have turned on it. And even though Wikilawyering is supposedly frowned upon, the very act of bringing in one of the length WP rule articles is equivalent to intimidating someone with legalese without providing them with supporting council in the form of their own Wikilawyer. The Deletionists spend their time familiarizing themselves with rules so they can get rid of whatever they want; real contributors spend their time either actually contributing or working at their day job, so they invariably lose a rules fight.

      The point again? People contribute, they get deleted after a while, they stop contributing. Inevitably all that will be left is 90% deletionists correcting each other over the letter of the law, instead of maintaining the spirit of the project.

  23. 02/03/2011 at 23:26 CMaster says:

    Wikipedia’s been going this way for a long while.
    You ever heard someone saying “Ha, Wikipedia? I can’t take seriously a site that has details on the history of Superman.” Well a few years ago, Wikipedia took that to heart. The trend started to delete as many articles about minor but interesting content, and trim the detail from huge numbers of other articles as well. It doesn’t help that the best way to become and admin is to support deletions of articles and that’s all a lot of admins ever do.

    I still find the site useful, and it’s scientific coverage has improved a lot over the past 3-4 years. I just hate the general attitude amongst the “higher ups” and this constant need to prune information that isn’t “serious enough”.

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:00 Starky says:

      I find the quality of Wikipedia’s scientific coverage though is simply a direct result of a lot of scientific papers, publications and journals going online.
      Especially from some of the larger universities.

      Basically it is easy for even the laziest and ignorant of people to quickly google and check now – which means it is easier for knowledgeable wiki editors to battle the tide of half-knowledgeable editors.

      A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, especially when it comes to wikipedia editors.

  24. 02/03/2011 at 23:27 Legionary says:

    Wikipedia is broken. Its community leadership is self-perpetuating; it has gradually refined into an atmosphere hostile to would-be editors. It’s useful for many things, but it is absolutely dire on any cultural phenomenon as the deletionists have free reign to delete as they please.

  25. 02/03/2011 at 23:32 leeder krenon says:

    Just stick with the YS influences. Good enough for me.

  26. 02/03/2011 at 23:35 Overlai says:

    As someone who hangs with Erik during Valve playtests and was hugely inspired by OMM this is a travesty.

  27. 02/03/2011 at 23:37 mod the world says:

    Heh, i guess the wikipage about RPS is also going to be deleted soon. Not enough references for this unnotable blog.

  28. 02/03/2011 at 23:41 Fillem says:

    Their E3 write-ups were hilarious and scary. There seemed to be a whole other world there, filled with obscure booths and games.

    I miss them, I do.
    One of the few gaming sites I read regularly back in the day.

  29. 02/03/2011 at 23:42 mrjackspade says:

    Ridiculous. Schuminn is a douchebag, and the editing process appears to be dominated by a bunch of arrogant, pedantic, ‘holier-than-thou’, cliquey admin-monkeys.

    While Wikipedia is great for mainstream topics, it’s sad when the smaller articles and records are fiddled and destroyed by small people with big grudges.

  30. 02/03/2011 at 23:45 Worm says:

    YOU’RE ALL STEALING MY OUTRAGE! GIVE IT BACK! I WANT MY EXCLUSIVE OUTRAGE BACK.

  31. 02/03/2011 at 23:55 Electric Dragon says:

    Here is a link to a very recent mention in the Metro newspaper:

    “Much as Old Man Murray used to count the seconds until a crate would appear in a game…”

  32. 02/03/2011 at 23:55 rei says:

    bluesnews.com fell victim to this as well. After more than 15 years I think if any gaming site is considered “notable”, Blue’s would have to be as well.

  33. 02/03/2011 at 23:56 Andy`` says:

    Angry people (people who are angry by nature, or people who have become angry over time due to influence) shouldn’t be website administrators, or should take a break now and then. Something I found out once. When their comments seem to show anger and they have to go around “proving things” that really need serious discussion, then you know: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ron_Ritzman#And_this_is_why_one_.21vote_is_still_a_valid_AFD

    Why isn’t the precedent to call for a rewrite first and delete later/investigate why the rewrite (after the first deletion) didn’t happen/allow people familiar with the subject to do the defining research as to whether a subject is notable or not if its missing information and thus marked for deletion.

    And after the first deletion (marked by Schumin, deleted by another admin), when someone offered to rewrite it, it was reopened by the deleting admin and apparently they were given SEVEN HOURS to make the necessary changes before it was marked for deletion again by Schumin.

    Seven hours, which in my timezone (that of Britainland) is 23:04 to 06:02. Do they expect everybody to be awake/American all the time?

    Something is seriously wrong with their system.

    And there’s a half-life/seven hour war reference in there somewhere

  34. 02/03/2011 at 23:58 JP says:

    Quick examples of things that have wikipedia pages:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombocom
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magikarp (extensive!)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WTF_%28album%29

    No OMM love though huh?

  35. 03/03/2011 at 00:00 Devilturnip says:

    They are clearly not following their own guidelines. According to Wikipedia:Notability:

    For articles of unclear notability, deletion should be a last resort.

    At the very least, notability is unclear. And deletion was clearly not the last resort in this case.

  36. 03/03/2011 at 00:09 mwoody says:

    Homestar Runner is defunct?

  37. 03/03/2011 at 00:25 James G says:

    I recall when Within a Deep Forest was up for deletion on account of non-notability there was a call for print references. I added a complete reference to a PC Gamer article, which was dismissed by one twit of an administrator as ‘made up.’ No you utter cock, it wasn’t and the full issue and page number made it possible to check. If you can’t be arsed, or are confounded by limitations of geography (the issue was still on the shelf) then don’t accuse me of lying you self important eedjit. The article was deleted, and only reappeared much later as part of Nifflas entry (which would have been a sensible solution the first time.)

  38. 03/03/2011 at 00:31 Cradok says:

    Wikipedia started to go downhill for me when someone decided that ‘Trivia’ was an anathema, and I’ve seen many articles scrubbed because they didn’t meet some random admin’s idea of ‘notable’. I don’t think that we need pages for, as examples, every Pokémon or every episode of Star Trek, but there’s nothing wrong with having even a ‘stub’ on something if that’s all that’s needed.

  39. 03/03/2011 at 00:37 UW says:

    This is really odd. I read a lot of online articles on various subjects and have found myself linked to OMM literally dozens of times. I can’t imagine that it would even be possible to have any interest in games and read about them in any sort of depth and NOT come across the site, or at least references to it.

    That said – the article could have been better written and sourced. Perhaps the thing to do here would be to take the collective initiative and create a new, more informed and well-sourced article and submit it to Wikipedia. It is open, after all.

  40. 03/03/2011 at 00:39 patricij says:

    Reminds me of the naked selling WP scandal…and I think the last financial crisis showed the proponents of naked selling are big fat greedy liars.. Same shit, different day all over again, abuse of power is too sweet to pass on for many, I guess

  41. 03/03/2011 at 00:40 Blake says:

    You know whats funny? RockPaperShotgun is considered a reliable source in Wikipedia. You just wrote an article all about Old Man Murray. Thus, he is now one step closer to being notable for an article. I guess you can give yourself a pat on the back.

  42. 03/03/2011 at 00:44 kwyjibo says:

    This is not a first for Wikipedia, the deletion of “important” topics has been brought up before in the MUD space. Read these pieces, one from Raph Koster, the other featuring Richard Bartle.

    http://www.raphkoster.com/2009/01/05/losing-mud-history/
    http://www.next-gen.biz/features/can-games-survive-history%E2%80%AD

    But I find it hard to blame Wikipedia. Why should Wikipedia give a shit about these things if others don’t? They look to academia, they look to the press, and they see that no one of worth has ever written, recorded or archived them in any sort of way. They look at us not giving a shit.

    Not giving a shit, that is, until the thing is deleted, and we get luminaries telling us why we should have. Maybe you should step up to the plate a bit earlier next time. And get the thing published in something other than your twitter feed.

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:11 Starky says:

      That is true of almost anything though – especially online, where things exist in their own bubble. There are hundreds of thousands of important things on the net and in real life that media and/or publications never gave a crap about.

      Still the point is that in it’s day OOM -was- important was linked, and “published” in important sources – but like much of the net those sources have gone.
      this is simply because it is how the internet works, you don’t write about things on the internet, or publish things on the internet – you LINK to things on the internet…

      Just look at the Sunday papers here on RPS, could those be used as a source for articles or subjects that were maybe in some what important in their internet 5 minutes? What about if the links were printed in the a guardian gaming supplement?

      Of course the problem with OOM is that it was never hugely notable (as in famous) but it was HUGELY influential on a good number of people who became very important in the gaming industry. It was also very, very influential to PC gaming as a whole, in ways no one at the time could really understand or fathom (thus write about).

  43. 03/03/2011 at 00:45 JackShandy says:

    Everyone, it’s Old Man Murray quote time!

    “In a perfect world, we’d all lie blind and motionless in stacked coffins filled with pudding. It would be dark and warm and nobody would have to compete with anybody and also the government would pay for the pudding.”

  44. 03/03/2011 at 00:47 Frank says:

    Games need their own wiki…but Giant Bomb already has one, with categories like
    * Games
    * Franchises
    * Characters
    * Platforms
    * People
    * Companies
    * Objects
    * Concepts
    * Locations
    * Accessories
    So **PC games** need their own wiki. Get on that RPS.

  45. 03/03/2011 at 01:02 Walsh says:

    How about if you search fucking wikipedia for Old Man Murray, it’s mentioned in a dozen other articles. How’s that for fucking notable.

    Fucking wikipedia.

  46. 03/03/2011 at 01:04 Daedalus207 says:

    The last time I was involved in a discussion involving inappropriate Wikipedia deletionism, someone pointed out that Wikipedia has a disturbingly long “List of catgirls,” which is apparently more notable than I would have expected.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_catgirls

  47. 03/03/2011 at 01:06 oceanclub says:

    I long ago gave up on editing Wikpedia; for a normal person, with a job, wife, hobbies and a cat, you simply cannot win when you get into an edit-war with a single-minded zealot who focuses on one bugbear with a laser-like mind and is willing to spend hours in their encrusted underwear opposing you.

    P.

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:15 Starky says:

      Ditto – though replace wife and cat with girlfriend (though she’s starting to drop hints… about the M word…) and dog in my case.

    • 03/03/2011 at 01:21 oceanclub says:

      Having Googled the chap in question, he unfortunately does entirely fit my stereotype of the above person. You can smell the Cheetos from here.

      P.

    • 03/03/2011 at 02:02 Starky says:

      Can I have a mountain dew?

      I wanna cast a spell…

      I bet he was the kind of kid who would play D&D and then stop the game half way through to argue the finer points of one of the obscure rules.

      [Edit] Oh god I went to his website, he wasn’t just that kind of kid, he still IS that kind of kid.

      He’s the kind of guy that goes to Games Workshop to play Warhammer fantasy in the store and argues with the 12 year olds and the staff over the rules.

      [Note: there was a time long ago when I was that 12 year old kid getting argued at - which was probably a good thing given that I quit warhammer a few years later and unknowingly saved myself thousands of pounds in later life.]

  48. 03/03/2011 at 01:10 shoptroll says:

    Here’s a search on Slashdot for Old Man Murray: http://slashdot.org/index2.pl?fhfilter=Old+Man+Murray

    About 4 articles linking to OMM’s stuff, 4 articles referencing them and 1 more which seems like an anomaly (or it was name dropped in the comments I guess)

  49. 03/03/2011 at 01:19 DJ Phantoon says:

    Beethoven has been dead for centuries! He is no longer relevant oh wait.

    I think the only system as poor at peer review as this is Blizzard’s GM system.

  50. 03/03/2011 at 01:43 muted says:

    god, this brings back some memories… I remember when gamespot sent them review PCs to review games on…

    but really, who goes around deleting content? this guy must have a bone to pick

  51. 03/03/2011 at 01:46 Fwiffo says:

    If I was an editor on wikipedia, I’d only restrict myself to subject matter that I had at least a decent working knowledge of. Also nice to see the place holding its admins to the high standards of neutrality it prizes for its articles.
    Also also, look up wikigroaning!

  52. 03/03/2011 at 01:52 pipman3000 says:

    oh my god ben schumin is still mad at chet what is wrong with him? or his he mad at erik or that other guy with the mohawk whose name i forgot i think it was uhh shaun wolfgang or something. why is he mad at OMM?

  53. 03/03/2011 at 01:59 Ergonomic Cat says:

    I posted on the unprotected version of Schuminn’s page. We’ll see what happens.

  54. 03/03/2011 at 02:30 bascule42 says:

    My God, reading that (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Old_Man_Murray_%282nd_nomination%29#Old_Man_Murray) is like reading the bits Iain M Banks cut out of Excession just before the Interesting times Gang turned up and kicked all the other Minds out.

    SchuminWeb, Wisdom Like Silence?

    Is there an Interesting Times Gang for Wikipedia?

    • 03/03/2011 at 05:21 Kaira- says:

      Reading through that link felt pretty much the same as hitting my head to brick wall with rusty spikes.
      “Irrelevant source” my ass, if you pardon my French.

      And I haven’t even heard of OMM before yesterday.

  55. 03/03/2011 at 02:32 frenz0rz says:

    Bloody hell. There are people who actually volunteer to delete things from history?!

    How terrifyingly Orwellian.

    • 03/03/2011 at 02:55 Muzman says:

      Any rule based system will attract certain people who gain some perverse pleasure in enforcing these rules with almost maniacal obsessivness. A lot of the time it seems for no greater purpose than “they are the rules”. Often they put so much effort into this that they become indispensable to the system they are working for.

      In the old days these folks were mostly confined to the public service, town councils, community groups, sporting clubs etc. Now they have Wikipedia too.

  56. 03/03/2011 at 02:47 Jetsetlemming says:

    People who take “wikipedia” seriously are the worst. As far as I’m concerned there should be limits to how long you can edit/view the site before it kicks you off, for your own sake.
    About a year ago, on the article on Crucifixion, there was a section called “In Anime”, talking about how the Sailor Moon girls were in a cross pose in some episode or another, complete with a picture from Neon Genesis Evanglion.
    When it was suggested in the article’s comments that perhaps japanese cartoons weren’t really a good addition to a page on a ritualistic execution style that had given birth to a major world religion, one editor in particular was FURIOUS at the implication, constantly putting it back, even adding to it, and defaming every single person who wasn’t on his side. He saw those who would disagree about the importance of anime in crucifixion to be part of a conspiracy whose purpose was not perhaps adding a bit of decency to an article on crucifixion, but instead trolls from the Something Awful forums who were singularly focused on attacking him and all he held dear (such as cartoons of schoolgirls being crucified). At one point the article’s talk page had a box at the top telling people not to engage in personal attacks, and especially not to accuse anyone of serious illnesses such as Asperger’s syndrome. I guess the calls of “Sperg!” hit a bit too close to home.
    Eventually it was spun off to an article, “Crucifixion in Art”, and that wiki editor’s contributions to it led to over half the fucking thing’s length being, again, japanese fucking cartoons. Finally however, in the end, he lost and anime disappeared forever from the article on crucifixion.
    A very rare, fleeting victory for common sense on a website dominated by spergin dudes with no hobbies but animated child pornography and being rules lawyers and self proclaimed victims on a website whose stated purpose is education and more and more seems to be instead for scum self gratification.

    • 03/03/2011 at 02:53 Rhin says:

      Filed under the category of “scum self-gratification”:

      See if you can search on wikipedia for “schuminweb” and count the number of articles Schumin has inserted “External links” to his personal web page on.

      The mere thought that an admin with noted personal history and conflict of interest can nominate for a deletion, and that other admins who admit that they aren’t familiar with the subject matter chime in, is nauseating.

    • 03/03/2011 at 12:38 7rigger says:

      After you mentioned, I had to go and look and…

      You’ll be pleased to know that the ‘Crucifixion in the Arts’ entry still contains details about sailor moon, filed now under the ‘Graphic Novel’ section. No victory will last long with this crowd running WP.

    • 03/03/2011 at 14:39 CMaster says:

      And here we see a prime example of the “deletionist” attitude.
      Someone who doesn’t really know much about a subject (Animé), derides said subject as “animated child pornography” and gets very angry about it’s inclusion and how stupid it is, while seemingly supporting the inclusion of their specialist subject (video games journalism, OMM).

      That said, a section on the depiction of crucifixion in media doesn’t feel like a very useful addition to the original article, and the animé references do come across as inappropriate and unnecessary. But you see the core idea where deletionism comes from – “having stuff I think is unimportant on wikipedia undermines the project as a whole. Therefore stuff that I’ve never heard of/don’t care for should be removed.” Equally, decency isn’t something a good encyclopedia should give a shit about. Accuracy (verifiability in wikipedia’s case) and coverage are.

  57. 03/03/2011 at 02:58 Tagert says:

    The thing I find interesting about this is that I fully expect the article to return – And very soon after there will be a ‘Old Man Murray Deletion Debacle’ topic in the article, discussing how it was almost deleted.

  58. 03/03/2011 at 03:28 obo says:

    Articles deleted by SchuminWeb on Deletionpedia:
    http://www.google.com/search?q=schuminweb+site:deletionpedia.dbatley.com

    960+ results.

    Examples of articles deleted by SchuminWeb that now have articles on Wikipedia:
    http://deletionpedia.dbatley.com/w/index.php?title=Tabitha's_Secret_(deleted_02_Jul_2008_at_04:40)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabitha's_Secret

    Schumin deleted it in June 2008. It was reposted; Schumin tried again to delete it in August 2008, where it was voted to be kept. The deleted article has the same information and lack of attribution as the kept article.

    http://deletionpedia.dbatley.com/w/index.php?title=Angelle_Brooks_(deleted_18_Jul_2008_at_03:05)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angelle_Brooks

    Schumin deleted it in June 2008. It was restored Feb. 25, 2011.

    http://deletionpedia.dbatley.com/w/index.php?title=1949_World_Ice_Hockey_Championships_(deleted_24_May_2008_at_02:01)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1949_World_Ice_Hockey_Championships

    Schumin deleted it one day after it was created, May 2008. It was restored April 2009.

    http://deletionpedia.dbatley.com/w/index.php?title=Indian_Omelette
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Omelette

    Schumin deleted it in Sept. 2008 with the reason “can’t even verify such a thing exists.” It was restored Jan. 2009.

  59. 03/03/2011 at 03:33 obo says:

    And, of course:
    http://twitter.com/SchuminWeb/status/43143325208948736

    wherein he elevates the discussion by staying away from ad hominem name-calling

  60. 03/03/2011 at 03:33 Tei says:

    Wikipedia has changed to this, and I have see this thing repeat a lot of times, always in the most ignorant way. The people that admin game articles have absolute no idea of video games and will delete everything than can’t be linked to a scholar reference. This is designed so the wikipedia is not a collection of internet culture, but the result is that almost all digital culture will be deleted.

    For the most part we have “lost” wikipedia.

  61. 03/03/2011 at 03:38 MadTinkerer says:

    Wikipedia is fantastic for referencing purely objective things, like math, science, and programming. For anything subjective it’s borderline useless.
    Ever since Kris Straub successfully got Checkerboard Nightmare deleted from Wikipedia (that’s his own comic: he was doing it to expose how broken Wikipedia’s process is), Wikipedia has been proven to be deeply flawed. I’m surprised that a website that hasn’t been updated for nearly nine years (OMM) hadn’t been deleted years ago.

  62. 03/03/2011 at 03:39 MountainDont says:

    Well, the review has been rejected (did anyone think a Wikipedia admin would reverse his own opinion?):
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Lifebaka#Old_Man_Murray …and it’s already being voted against in the Deletion Review: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2011_March_3#Old_Man_Murray So it looks like that’s it, the assburgers win, lead by [NO INSULTS FFS! - Ed].

  63. 03/03/2011 at 05:38 Masem says:

    Those of you reading this, the best thing you can do right now is *NOT* comment on the deletion review. The more the topic is meat-puppeted (comments by different users from offsite in reply to a specific user’s request), the more likely they will ignore comments about this.

    I have a logic to my review process here.

    • 03/03/2011 at 06:29 X_kot says:

      I respect your desire to work within the confines of WP’s internal bureaucracy, Masem, and I will refrain from posting any further (I’m Sir Gareth), but winning this case without addressing administrative abuse of powers will be a hollow victory.

    • 03/03/2011 at 06:33 Tannhauser says:

      Part of Wikipedia’s downfall this, the only way to combat super-users is to be one. If you show up out of the blue in a discussion, you are a “meatpuppet.” Despite the fact that external sites are the way any normal person is going to discover these sorts of issue. The simple fact that you haven’t dedicated your free time to Wikipedia makes your contributions worthless in the eyes of the people who have control over the content, regardless of worth.

      Not to mention the entire rule-lawyer attitude that seems to have pervaded Wikipedia. It is a nightmare to try to correct even factually incorrect data if the article is being watched by a super-user. They can always justify it and “prove” that your contributions lacked merit too by citing this or that.

    • 03/03/2011 at 06:50 X_kot says:

      *sigh* Where’s my whiskey at?…

    • 03/03/2011 at 09:00 Muzman says:

      I considered dusting off my account for a few words, but I realised everything I’d have to say could be deflected with “we are executing policy. You are arguing that the policy is wrong. Please read the guidelines, and the guidelines for the guidelines, and the guidelines for changing the guidelines and also take note of ‘what wikipedia is not’ (bullet point one: ‘A place where you ask what Wikipedia is’). If you are still unhappy, please file a complaint with issue resolution. Fill out one of these and join that cue over there.”
      Points to any brave souls willing to go the distance.

      The larger problem I see, above Schumin seemingly making mendacious edits, is that there’s no assesment of whether a deletion nomination is warranted in the first place. The adjudication merely proceeds on the case of who files it and accepts whatever defense is offered (and no one may be around to do it, there being no guarantee the admin is going to do the legwork themselves in the absence of such).

      There needs to be a new policy to guard against mendacious deletion. If deletion truly is the last resort (as the guidelines claim) then anyone nominating an article for deletion should first have to ‘prove exhaustion’ of all other methods to fix or improve the article before any nomination can proceed. Failure to do this means the article stands, regardless of any ostensible flaws. As it stands it’s too easy for drive by bureaucrats to go around effectively botting things into the bin before anyone has a chance to defend or repair them.

    • 03/03/2011 at 09:52 megalomania says:

      Don’t get overexcited. SPAs/meatpuppets aren’t ignored a priori. They’re just ignored 99% of the time because they don’t take the time to understand the way in which decisions are made on Wikipedia and the criteria on which they are decided (which really just takes a matter of minutes, not days, trust me). Imagine if a lawyer stood up in court and shouting things like, “My client is clearly innocent! He is one of the most innocent people in the world! The plaintiff has an obvious bias against my client! The judge knows nothing about armed robbery, how can he ever decide whether my client is guilty or not? This whole court shows how the legal system was fundamentally broken compared to some golden age of justice I heard on the grapevine existed at one time.”
      In an AfD (Article for Deletion), don’t:
      - nakedly assert that the topic is notable/not notable
      - personally attack the nominator or people , even if they deserve it
      - rail against the injustice of Wikipedia or its policies, they actually make a great deal of sense if you take some time to look into them properly and they’re not changing any time soon
      Do:
      - read the policies on notability and verifiability first
      - look for sources and provide links to them
      - discuss why the sources you have find meet general and specific (e.g. for video games) guidelines for reliable sources, and how they establish the notability of the topic
      If you follow these instructions your arguments will be considered at an AfD, even if you have no other edits.

      Although realising the unlikelihood that this will happen, I’ll just echo Masem: stay out of it, the only way the deletion is getting overturned is by the reasoned arguments of people who have some experience on Wikipedia and don’t think it’s a fundamentally broken system.

    • 03/03/2011 at 09:58 Kieron Gillen says:

      I actually got my used-once Wikipedia account* out and was going to post in the debate, but I realise i haven’t time today to figure it out properly. The comment about “giving in to trolls” was somewhat frustrating. With the greatest of respect and a moment of total ego, RPS contains some of the foremost writers on games the medium has ever seen. If we say it’s notable to gaming history, it is.
      I’d have phrased less monstrously, of course. Point being: a bad deletion attracting outside coverage is to do with people being expert in a medium. The editors aren’t.
      Another useful reference as pointed to me from here…
      http://twitter.com/#!/quimicefa/statuses/43246584619745280
      This book:
      http://www.casadellibro.com/libro-mondo-pixel-vol1/1202306/2900001256942
      Article about Old Man Murray.
      KG
      *Used to post information about Consolevania, ironically enough.

    • 03/03/2011 at 12:45 Voidy says:

      Masem:
      Those of you reading this, the best thing you can do right now is *NOT* comment on the deletion review.

      Megalomania:
      SPAs/meatpuppets aren’t ignored a priori. They’re just ignored 99% of the time [..] Although realising the unlikelihood that this will happen, I’ll just echo Masem: stay out of it

      Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit
      Editors of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia use “meat puppet” to deprecate contributions from a new community member if the new member was (apparently) recruited by an existing member only to back up the recruiting member’s position.

      I hereby urge RPS authors and all RPS readers to ignore Megalomania as an obvious meatpuppet acting on behalf of Masem and ignore Masem as an obvious meatpuppet acting on behalf of Megalomania. They basically argue the same points and ask you the same thing: to stay the hell out of the free-as-in-speech community project; no further proof is necessary. The assumption that each of them may be doing this of their own volition and therefore may not deserve to be named ‘meatpuppet’ is too bloody hard to wrap my head around.

    • 03/03/2011 at 13:46 Masem says:

      I understand the larger issue of Schumin and OMM and a likely history in the OMM days.

      The point to understand is that Schumin did not abuse his admin powers in any step here. Nominating an article for deletion can be done by any user (even non-registered ones, I think). John Q Smith could have done the same thing and we’d be on the same boat. I don’t disagree that how fast Schumin went to remove all OMM links as soon as the article was deleted the first time somewhat iffy (but again, not wrong, and not an abuse of admin powers). So while the history between Schumin and OMM is there, our hands are tied from doing anything about it.

      The crux of this deletion, and why I stepped in, is that the outright deletion of the article based on the number and array of sources did not support outright deletion, at best keep no consensus, at worst redirect to a section on Erik Wolpaw’s article. OMM is a likely search term, there is no need to wipe it out from WP. Thus the review is based on looking at the closing admin’s reasoning and seeing if it was the best solution based on the evidence given. As it currently states, there’s a trend that it was the wrong decision, but we’ll see.

      The reason I’m cautioning people from jumping in is that when there are internal or external campaigns to try to alter standard op on WP, this usually results in positions favored by these additional users to be considered in a negative light. Trying to bring up the Schuman/OMM conflict will not help this cause at this time, nor will say “but of course OMM is notable”; but adding statements that point to flaws in the closing arguments are appreciated.

    • 03/03/2011 at 14:57 Masem says:

      Also to comment on the term meatpuppet:

      Wikipedia’s decision process is not a democracy. We don’t work on the total number of votes in the system (ie we often call any call to oppose or support a viewpoint as “!voting”) but instead consider the strengths and weaknesses of an argument.

      There is nothing wrong in general with an anon user coming on and contributing productively to an ongoing discussion. We want that, in fact.

      We do, however, have problems when a mass number of users that haven’t otherwise participated in the discussion enjoin it and basically say the same thing as to weight the volume of text in favor of a specific point. Such additions add little, and can make the discussion more hostile to those on the opposing viewpoint if its a heated topic. This is why we tag “new” users to a discussion, because if they haven’t shown interest in the area before, why are they suddenly interested now?

      9 times out of then, this is because, internally or externally, someone has canvassed a notice to encourage people to jump in to try to swing the discussion. When its internal, it’s rather easy to chase down by looking at contribution histories. When its from an external site (technically, this article on RPS would be an example of such), it is more difficult to trace down without some Google sleuthing. We, unfortunately, do call this “meatpuppetry” for simplicity’s sake, and it is not meant as a slur on any specific person involved but on the action itself, trying to get other users to support your side without “revealing” that interaction.

      Now, that said, people immediately calling out others as meatpuppets is not civil unless you have proof (there are channels for this on WP proper). But when we’re talking about the action in general, it is not mean to be a slight to anyone that may want to join in. But if you join in and repeat what several others have already said, it’s difficult not to see this action as such.

      Again, why I caution: don’t jump into this without having a well-thought out reason (most offered on this discussion area are not that type), otherwise it will likely be that your comment will be trivialized as meatpuppetry.

    • 03/03/2011 at 17:27 Consumatopia says:

      Note the contrast between Masem’s last two posts. Commenting on the Schumin/OMM conflict is unwelcome. But labelling outsiders “meatpuppets” is totally cool. Certainly, doing so didn’t cause people to ignore what Schumin had to say. Ad hominem against insiders is forbidden, against outsiders is not only permitted, but built into the very infrastructure of Wikipedia itself.

      I wish you wikipedians luck in rectifying this particular error. But you should just admit that it’s a community of insiders. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that–any source of knowledge is ultimately going to have to make subjective judgment calls where others will disagree. It’s just a matter of admitting to what everybody already knows.

    • 03/03/2011 at 17:31 Consumatopia says:

      Also, the key to remember is the Wikipedia is a community of insiders, and so when Wikipedia fails, it’s the insiders who failed. Not me.

      Good luck, insiders.

    • 03/03/2011 at 18:40 Nick says:

      So, its not open at all, not allowed to be edited by anyone, just those who have deemed themselves worthy somehow? What a crock of shit. What it looks like to someone who merely reads wikipedia is a bunch of sad little men flexing the only power they have in the world. The fact someone like HalfShadow is a senior editor or something is just absurd, who is actually in charge of all this? Because people like that should not have any power over anything.

    • 03/03/2011 at 19:37 Deano2099 says:

      “The reason I’m cautioning people from jumping in is that when there are internal or external campaigns to try to alter standard op on WP, this usually results in positions favored by these additional users to be considered in a negative light.”

      See I know you’re trying to help but you’re failing to realise the rank hippocracy you’re highlighting here.

      Your initial position is that the choices regarding deletion and such are a matter of policy, and that people arguing against the deletion by saying policy is wrong, or by simply saying they think the article is notable, will not help. They won’t help as the decision will be based only on the rational arguments given.

      That’s perfectly fine and how things should be. So if you want to say to people “don’t waste your time as you’ll be dismissed as meatpuppets and won’t affect the debate then that’s fair enough”

      But what you’re actually asserting is that people doing that could harm the process, because it would cast legitimate comments in a negative light. Do you not see the issue here? On the one-hand you’re asserting that the admins will make an objective decision based purely on the arguments given and on wikipedia policy. Then on the other hand you’re saying not to piss them off as it might bias them against us.

      By all means ignore ‘meatpuppetry’ if that’s policy (though I’d suggest you call it something less inflammatory), but why on earth should meatpuppetry reflect negatively on a side of the argument? Sure I get that it will annoy the admins by creating more work for them to go through, but that won’t ultimately affect the notability of the article will it? But if it will affect the choice made then clearly admins are making the decision on more than just what is strictly notable.

  64. 03/03/2011 at 06:10 Yosharian says:

    I just looked over the discussion page at wikipedia, it’s fucking disgusting. I never saw a more idiotic and closed-minded bunch of morons on the fucking net. It beggars belief that these idiots are in charge of anything at wikipedia.

  65. 03/03/2011 at 06:50 Hybrid says:

    The more I think about this, the more frustrated I become…

  66. 03/03/2011 at 06:51 dadioflex says:

    See, all that tilting at Fox’s windmills was a massive waste of time. THIS is a serious topic where RPS can have a material effect and very likely a positive outcome.

    I revisited OMM almost daily for at least three years after they stopped posting, just in case…. and I was last back there about a month ago just catching up with some memories.

    • 03/03/2011 at 07:26 Towercap says:

      I’m interested in both stories.
      Also, the FOX reporting was not a waste of time — RPS obviously made enough noise to garner a response from the authors of the original story. If anything, that should serve to show that MSM cannot pull off cheap shots on account of the video game industry.

  67. 03/03/2011 at 07:15 Phillip Culliton says:

    Short form of my original comment: Schumin needs to stop being an admin.

    Addendum to the short form: I’ve read all of the discussions related to this, and it strikes me that a handful of people who seem to either a) have an agenda or b) have no idea what they’re talking about are deciding what information I should have access to. Err… that’s great. Wikipedia sucks as an encyclopedia but is GREAT as a first point of reference on a trail to more in-depth sources. Don’t remove stuff just because you think no one cares about it, all right?

  68. 03/03/2011 at 07:54 Jimmy Z says:

    Careful now, don’t stir the hornet’s nest or you might find Rock, Paper & Shotgun’s page deleted next. It has two shouty boxes in it already! Be wary of the wrath of the assburgers!
    –
    On a serious note, this is absolutely fucking ridiculous. Even though I’m personally not familiar with OMM, it should be blindingly obvious to anyone, just based on all the sources pasted on the Wikipedia talk page alone, that we’re talking about an important piece of game journalism history here, that definitely deserves a Wikipedia article. Especially since there are already tons of articles on WP on subjects far more obscure, poorly referenced and of absolutely no fucking significance at all.

    What a fucking disgrace and reading all those smug self-important fucks congratulate each other for defending their precious circle jerk arena against “non notable” subjects positively makes my blood boil.

  69. 03/03/2011 at 07:54 Risingson says:

    I said it before a dozen times and I say it now: the GK3 puzzle rant is one of the Godwins of the adventure genre: don’t blame the entire genre for a puzzle that lacks context in a game. Or don’t blame the entire genre for a design flaw in a game.

    • 03/03/2011 at 09:53 phlebas says:

      Much as I absolutely agree and would be quite happy for that article never to be quoted in my hearing again – ‘Not notable’?????

  70. 03/03/2011 at 08:02 Dreamhacker says:

    I’m not sure you can do much about deletionists. Once they make up their mind about deleting something, they will go to extreme lengths of stupidity to defend the deletion.

  71. 03/03/2011 at 08:02 Harkkum says:

    …and there I was thinking that the Finnish version of Wikipedia was filled with bickering and ignorance. This non-notability criteria they have has proven out to be a bit too powerful a tool for them to handle. I am eagerly anticipating them to remove entries such as “love”, “happiness” &c. as there hardly can be any evidence from such that cannot be called irrelevant.

    For offly long time now, Wikipedia has had a strange policy of accepting a monolith truth on matters that hardly fall under such category. It all reminds me from the eloquent argument by B. Russell on the nature of yellow (or ostensive concepts in general, I guess): although yellow as a colour can be depicted using a graph showing its wave length it hardly tells anything from the colour yellow as such. This all would, according to Wikipedia, be mere hearsay as colour yellow can only be scientifically proven to denote those very wave lenghts.

    I do hope that one day Wikipedia can lose its stigma of being the playground of the-not-so-witty-I-know-it-alls and leap back to being a discussive forum where verisimilitude to truth is found not in the heads of few but in the discussion of many. ‘Till then, bring on the Book BBQ, El Presidente!

  72. 03/03/2011 at 08:04 Ice-Fyre says:

    The people need to rise up (Egypt style!) and stop this crap. The admin on wiki are as useful as our MP’s tbh

  73. 03/03/2011 at 08:25 Robin says:

    Regardless of megalomania’s talk of ‘persistence’, once something is rejected once from Wikipedia, it’s near impossible to ever get it in there, irrespective of how well it fits their arbitrary rules.

    Missing in action:

    Canabalt
    David McCandless
    RLLMUK Forum (of course the US equivalent NEOGAF is fine)
    Blue’s News

    It just isn’t possible to get a consistent historical perspective on games from Wikipedia when huge pieces of the foundations are missing.

    • 03/03/2011 at 10:10 oceanclub says:

      WHAT? You’re serious? They deleted an article on David McCandless? I remember this guy from games magazines in my childhood; he’s still around after 30-ish years.

    • 03/03/2011 at 13:28 shoptroll says:

      Blue’s News is a funny case because it looks like it was removed back in 2008, yet it’s listed as reputable source in the Video Games/Sources page. This goes back to one of the core problems with Wikipedia currently: too many cooks in the kitchen creating a problem of the left hand not knowing what the right is doing.

  74. 03/03/2011 at 08:29 Hybrid says:

    An admin that has a fan art page dedicated to himself… ugh, makes me sick.

  75. 03/03/2011 at 09:30 faelnor says:

    The problem here is that a normal person, after marking the article for deletion and reading the amount of feedback, would try as much as possible to gather all sides of the argument and encourage kindly the opposite side to provide an unique and large list of quotes and links that might justify the inclusion.

    It seems to me that such content was provided, although a bit on the trifle side (see point 2 below), but wasn’t allowed much time to be gathered and considered in a composed and fair manner because of the lack of tact and one-sided decisions of wikipedia admins (point 1).

    So there are two problems here :

    1. Personal problems of narrow-minded wikipedia admins resorting to speedy deletion while there is a whole wikipedia arsenal to encourage improving the contents or providing sources. Especially funny when the said admin pretends to be an “inclusionist”.
    There may also be lack of fairness due to an ongoing feud/agenda between the deleting admin with OMM but this remains to be proven.

    2. The fact that large paradigm changes in videogaming website networks and fast evolution of game journalism since the late 90′s led to everyone being deeply influenced by their writing but without stating it loudly. Every self-respecting PC gamer knows OMM and how influencial they have been but since it wasn’t published like AP, relevant and extremely notable discussions about OMM articles probably found their place in the private sphere of game reviewers (forums, comments, chat, etc.) rather than the front page of wired.

    I think now is the time for game journalists to claim their origins by establishing OMM’s notability and giving a huge middle finger to that despicable electronic old man (without flexibility).

  76. 03/03/2011 at 09:30 Tokjos says:

    According to his userpage on wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:SchuminWeb) he is both an “Inclusionist” and an “Exclusionist”. Does it mean he can’t decide what he believes, or that he’s accepted that he is an hypocrite?

    • 03/03/2011 at 09:34 faelnor says:

      No it’s wikipedia’s stupid way of saying that he’s both in favour of keeping articles when in doubt but to exclude content that doesn’t comply with wp policies from these articles.

      Basically it doesn’t mean anything, but it neatly shows how dumb it is to try to solve the inclusion/deletion gordian knot using fixed and universal rules. AND IN THE GAME

  77. 03/03/2011 at 09:31 clive dunn says:

    Just for clarification, WIKIPEDIA IS DEAD.
    Or rather,, Wikipedia is a zombie. Just a walking corpse that everyone with any sense stopped trusting a long time ago. It’s a crying shame because it could have been fantastic but as with most human endevours it was corrupted beyond the point of redemption.
    R.I.P

  78. 03/03/2011 at 09:44 Jacques says:

    What I find scary, is that on his user page, Schumin says he’s got an interest in web design.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:SchuminWeb I guess he never bothered taking that interest to his own personal site.

    With all the drama that went on recently with MUD’s getting deleted for not being “notorious” enough, and all the current nonsense, wouldn’t it make sense to leave Wikipedia to it’s bullshit and strike out and make a new wiki site, that documents gaming’s history?

  79. 03/03/2011 at 09:46 7rigger says:

    I’ve learned a lot about wikipedia this morning. Unfortunately it’s all disappointing.

    In my opinion deleting pages from what could be an infinite repository of knowledge is just silly, but it’s not my site or decision.

    And I never read OMM, but I distinctly remember reading articles elsewhere, especially the Start-To-Crate one. I think it may have been in PC Zone

  80. 03/03/2011 at 09:58 roosten says:

    Looking through the various articles concerning this deletion on Wikipedia itself just made me sad, and reminded me why I stopped editing there. Apparently as long as your interlocutors are new, they can be dismissed out of hand as ‘meatpuppets’. The sheer arrogance of that position, and of some of the administrators involved in this deletion, truly dismays me.

  81. 03/03/2011 at 10:03 mrjackspade says:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2011_March_3#Old_Man_Murray

    Starting to look promising – a lot of more established editors are throwing their weight into this argument and someone’s finally formally cited this page as supporting evidence.

    It’s all nice and civilised but I’d much rather we got OMM back in a public lynching of the dude with an abnormally high BMI and a grudge who started it all off in the first place.

    • 03/03/2011 at 12:38 Teddy Leach says:

      They keep using bizarre acronyms. It’s quite scary. Like watching a cult meeting.

    • 03/03/2011 at 14:13 bascule42 says:

      Now that looks like the Interesting Times Gang.

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:58 shoptroll says:

      The amount of jargon and inside baseball I’ve seen on display while wading through this entire debacle has been fascinating and at the same time absolutely mind numbing. I totally get the need to have all these policies and procedures to keep vandalism out and prevent people from putting absolute drivel in the Wiki. But there comes a point where the terminology and number of policies in place almost require a week long training session to fully make sense. Which is extremely off putting to the casual observer or user.

  82. 03/03/2011 at 10:30 Nick says:

    I find this meatpuppet term extremely annoying. Who the fuck do they think they are exactly?

    • 03/03/2011 at 10:35 oceanclub says:

      “Who the fuck do they think they are exactly?”

      A self-perpetuating clique?

      P.

    • 03/03/2011 at 10:36 7rigger says:

      After following the link mrjackspade left, I was amazed to find out how much they used this term. Do they realize how it makes them sound? I understand they they should not listen to everyone, as it would be impossible, and that they need verifiable sources for arguments left…

      But dismissing people as ‘Meatpuppets’? It’s quite clearly being used as a derogatory slur for anyone that they see as an outsider. I think this may stop my habit of slipping into a Wikicoma on quiet nights, now that I know how they truly think of me.

      *edit*

      oceanclub got it spot on :)

    • 03/03/2011 at 10:45 Nick says:

      Especially as one of the biggest offenders seems to be the guy with admin rights… is there somewhere we can complain about improper admin conduct? I’m actually genuinly disgusted.

    • 03/03/2011 at 11:55 safetydank says:

      The hypocrisy on display is stunning. The wikipedia page describing the term Meat puppet notes that it is “pejorative” term used in a “deprecating” manner. And yet it gets bandied about freely between calls for civility on the page.

      That very page had a much better definition of meat puppet – “a person who disagrees with you”.

      And digging into the posting histories of Schumin’s biggest Wikipedia cheerleader “HalfShadow” is disturbing to say the least.

      He fits the clinical definition of psychopath. Literally.

    • 03/03/2011 at 12:19 mrjackspade says:

      Halfshadow: “Actually, given the manner of her death, it’s most likely she did. C*ck, too.”

      WTF? Is this talking about what I think it’s talking about?

    • 03/03/2011 at 13:53 Kadayi says:

      Admin abuse and contempt is an age old story.

  83. 03/03/2011 at 11:14 wayreth says:

    In all reality, if this isn’t reversed in 24 hours… well then wikipedia has made a huge mistake they will never actually be held accountable for.

  84. 03/03/2011 at 11:19 bonjovi says:

    Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

    Wish Wiki would go back to the original style.

  85. 03/03/2011 at 11:28 Devenger says:

    Best of luck to those trying to resolve this error. We can hope that this incident makes the site notable with less of a doubt. If the worst comes to the worst, perhaps the escalation of this conflict will actually become notable in its own right… so if people don’t stop trying, it’s bound to work eventually (else Wikipedia has been completely compromised by its own administration, which is… possible, I suppose).

    Also, I am disappointed that the link to AvCP is broken. I really wanted to catch them all.

  86. 03/03/2011 at 11:30 Wilson says:

    The meatpuppet thing is extremely sad. Surely the way to deal with a rush of people from outside sites is just to refer them to the proper procedures and take on whatever relevant information they do bring. I read one person on that deletion thread doing that, but it was mixed with others putting across thoughtless dismissal and even one person suggesting that they had to leave the thread deleted now or it would be a victory for outsiders coming in and commenting (he called them trolls). It’s disappointing that some contributors to something aiming to be an unbiased source of information could have fallen prey to such a basic prejudice as fear/dislike of outsiders. Don’t they have any pride?

    • 03/03/2011 at 12:14 detyfus says:

      As Lore Sjöberg says, in Wired so you know it’s true:

      It will help to familiarize yourself with some of the common terms used on Wikipedia:
      meat puppet: A person who disagrees with you.
      non-notable: A subject you’re not interested in.
      vandalism: An edit you didn’t make.
      neutral point of view: Your point of view.
      consensus: A mythical state of utopian human evolution. Many scholars of Wikipedian theology theorize that if consensus is ever reached, Wikipedia will spontaneously disappear.

      http://www.wired.com/software/webservices/commentary/alttext/2006/04/70670

    • 03/03/2011 at 12:16 safetydank says:

      Navigating Wikipedia legalese is like a hazing procedure for the regulars. They’re not there to make the process accessible to outsiders, they are cementing their internal power structure. Using the us-and-them terminology of “meatpuppets” differentiates the editors from the unwashed masses.

      For a site founded on the premise that anybody can edit anything it is profoundly sad to see admin rights concentrated in the hands of an insular minority.

      It’s not a systemic problem yet, and Wikipedia’s still the best we have. But these abusive admins have no oversight and are running Wikipedia as a personal fiefdom to grind their axes, and that is not cool.

      As far as I’m concerned these admins can go WP:CHOKEONABUCKETOFDICKS.

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:12 D says:

      ^ NSFW and is indeed what it says.

      Edit: Well I guess, technically it’s more of a basket..

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:23 Eclectic says:

      detyfus’ comment should be deleted as the source he cited is not notable. Try using a more accepted secondary source instead, like this one.

      http://www.economist.com/node/10789354

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:41 safetydank says:

      It’s okay, they’re just yams. Mostly.

    • 03/03/2011 at 20:33 El Stevo says:

      Oh, they are not yams. The following link is technically safe for work, but is still rather revolting.
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hk5NA9E9QeE

  87. 03/03/2011 at 11:50 Kdansky says:

    The thing that shocks me is that Kotaku, Gabe Newell and PC Gamer are apparently not trustworthy sources. If it’s not on wired (the only tech-magazine mentioned), then it doesn’t exist. Also “the page is not online anymore” is a great reason! The Romans are dead, the second world war has ended and we don’t need articles for anything past the second of march 2011, right?

  88. 03/03/2011 at 12:18 Teddy Leach says:

    Nothing is notable. Everything must be deleted.

    What gets me is that there are thousands of pages dedicated to incredibly obscure albums by incredibly obscure musicians, and yet they never seem to get deleted. Just hit the ‘random article’ button a few times. You’ll be amazed at the stuff on there.

  89. 03/03/2011 at 12:55 utharda says:

    F wikipedia. Especally F Jimmy “can I borrow a fiver” Wales. Also F all those little twits who get their joy from being wikipedia nazi’s. I haven’t used wikipedia in years, precisley because of the editors. When I want to find something out, I use the modern encylopedia… its called google.

    Sorry, its a sore spot, and its still before 7 am here.

  90. 03/03/2011 at 13:02 Gary W says:

    Why does it matter if an oldmanmurray article is being deleted from Wikipedia (a site I’ve never heard of)?

    If you like oldmanmurray, then tell your kids about it. They’ll probably look it over, and hate it instantly — as the younger generation should. However, if the writing has any merit, then it’ll persist in spite of the absence of some pompous encyclopedia entries.

    Personally, I prefer the articles of the late H.L. Mencken to anything Erik wrote, good though it was. Remember him?

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:23 Phillip Culliton says:

      Heh, apparently I missed the irony. Err, thanks Kieron.

      Edited to add:

      a) That’s some nice irony, Gary!

      b) Given what I’ve read in the Wiki discussions on Wikipedia itself, I thought someone had decided to come here and say precisely what the Wiki people have been saying over there, so the irony wasn’t as dissonant for me as it might have been. I think the upshot of this is I should stop reading the Wiki discussions.

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:34 Kieron Gillen says:

      (Phil – you may have missed a little irony in Gary’s post, btw)

      KG

  91. 03/03/2011 at 14:02 Coins says:

    Sweet heavens, those wiki admins are more bone-headed and oblivious than my local government clerk.

  92. 03/03/2011 at 14:12 wisnoskij says:

    Sounds like typical Wikipedia stuff to me. If it does not matter to the normal wikipedia editor then it is not worthy of inclusion.

  93. 03/03/2011 at 14:16 MuffinHunter says:

    Not that Wikipedia editors’ double standards are news to people, but if the Orange Smoothie Productions (OSP) article that I started is still up years later, there’s absolutely no basis for taking down the OMM article.

  94. 03/03/2011 at 14:24 bascule42 says:

    You know that bit on Star Wars with BK tells Luke “you’ve just entered a larger world”?….well, reading all this about how wikiP is managed and the “debates” with a certain person and his smaller orbital bodies, has been the opposite of that. It’s like some greasy guy has put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Do you wanna see some puppies”…I always thought of wikiP as a good start to finding info…And now I find It’s tainted, soiled, a thin layer of skin with rot and maggots infesting the undersurface. I never knew. I. Never. Knew.

  95. 03/03/2011 at 15:00 7rigger says:

    @CMaster
    I personally am not for deleting information, but appending it to documents relating to other matters is more what I’m getting at. Why couldn’t it have had it’s own article?

    The references on the wiki page lead to a book that states “the continued figuring of anime in terms of Judaeo-Christian theological tradition is deeply problematic”

    And then it’s rammed into an article about Crucifixion in the Arts? Couldn’t he read his own reference and simly create a page for it? It has notable references.

    *edit* Not a reply fail, my fail. Remember to actually click the ‘reply’ button Dave!

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:15 CMaster says:

      I was referring to Jetsetlemming’s post, not yours 7rigger (I didn’t see you calling an entire media form child pornography anywhere). As said, I don’t think that the said example was one that merited inclusion, or that the behaviour (as described) of the editor in question was at all reasonable. Merely that JSL was espousing the general attitude that leads to all these deletions.
      I also recognise that notability is a necessary criteria to prevent wikipedia becoming nothing other than a hive of self and corporate promotion. I just feel that the bar is set rather unfairly by editors prejudice, combine with the fact that deleting articles is one of the best ways to get yourself promoted in wiki’s hierarchy. (see admins in OMM’s article dismissing Kotaku, PCGamer, etc as “just some unreliable blogs”). This sense that some people have that if Wikipedia covers things that aren’t “important” then it undermines the project.
      Personally, I find the project more useful when it does cover all sorts of fields with lots and lots of articles. 1950s comic books may not be especially important in most senses – neither is say the mass of distant stars or the historial farming technqiues in eastern russia. But I like being able to get an overview of things like this when I want. When people start pruning stuff like that as non-notable, it frustrates me as it takes away something I’d like to read, even though I don’t care about it. The people who removed it seem to feel that because they don’t care about it, then it shouldn’t be on there.

      Edit: I’m also not that fussed about OMM having an article, certainly not outraged at it’s deletion. I just think it’s a typical example of the nature of wikipedia – there’s enough material easily found that references OMM out there to make it clear it isn’t a self promotion thing. Therefore what good does it do to delete the article?

    • 03/03/2011 at 15:59 7rigger says:

      Ah, ok. Got my knickers in a twist over nothing then :p

      I have discovered an evil, ugly side to my quiet Wikicoma’s though. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to space out at an article again without thinking about meatpuppets.

      Who am I kidding? Of course I will. I’m a geek :)

  96. 03/03/2011 at 15:50 crainey92 says:

    Although I havn’t personaly read OMM I can only guess that it’s very notable if RPS is inspired by his work therefore I would come to the assumption that it was bloody good and defintely noteable. I love how RPS stands up for what is right, well done noble gentlemen.

  97. 03/03/2011 at 15:52 itsallcrap says:

    The Your Sinclair site linked is just a fan site, of course.

    For YS as recalled by the generally excellent J Nash, see YS2/100:

    http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/ap2/ys2/

  98. 03/03/2011 at 15:53 Kid_A says:

    “To put this in perspective, everyone who’s voted “keep” (the legitimate votes, anyway), is voting not to delete an article about a site that (and let’s face facts here) has been dead for nine years. I have no idea why the site even still exists.”

    Right, so anything that’s been dead for 9 years shouldn’t have an article on it?
    Goodbye, everything that happened more than 9 years ago. Crap, there goes the First Gulf War. Shit, goodbye Cuban Missile Crisis. Roman Empire? Fuck, not notable, sorry.

  99. 03/03/2011 at 16:36 sexyresults says:

    Upon seeing the link to RPS here’s what one of these Wikipedia fucking animals had to say
    “Oh golly, a site I’ve never heard of before today has their collective panties in a bunch, so I guess we’d better rethink the whole thing. Cripes… HalfShadow 00:55, 3 March 2011 (UTC)”

    • 03/03/2011 at 16:39 sexyresults says:

      Clearly reveling in their win. It has been reviewed a second time and it stays deleted.
      After someone pointed out his conflict of interest he came up with this pearler
      “Actually, it’s my dick that’s huge, not my CoI. Thanks, though. HalfShadow 01:11, 3 March 2011 (UTC)”

  100. 03/03/2011 at 16:46 RevStu says:

    The equation when it comes to Wikipedia is simple: do you care more about the thing you’re trying to achieve than the ranked armies of deletionists and destructionists do about flexing their own power? The chances are that you don’t, so by far the best thing to do is turn the other cheek, because it’s only your own life you’ll be wasting. Fucking up Wikipedia IS their life.

  101. 03/03/2011 at 16:52 sexyresults says:

    It was nominated for deletion by the same guy who made this page

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpinnWebe

    Seriously, how is that more notable then OMM?

  102. 03/03/2011 at 17:09 Lobosolitario says:

    Just checked out our media archives, and Old Man Murray has been mentioned in the following publications:

    The Toronto Star – 4 January 2007
    Montreal Gazette – 8 April 2006
    The Edmonton Journal – 3 March 2006
    The Edmonton Journal – 24 February 2006
    Xbox Nation – 1 November 2004
    Sunday Herald Sun – 17 June 2001
    The Guardian – 18 January 2001
    Computer Gaming World (via ZDWire) – 1 July 2000

    I can’t provide full articles, as it’s all copyrighted material, but if anyone else would like to go hunt these down, they should all be valid sources.

    • 03/03/2011 at 18:16 Andy`` says:

      Out of boredom started looking through a few of these to see what was internet-facing (a couple of them are, though behind paywalls, which aren’t too expensive but might require alot of reading), didn’t get through the full list but while struggling to find anything to do with the Xbox Nation reference, I accidently stumbled upon this:
      http://somethingnicejim.nfshost.com/rapidfish/oldmanmurray/index.html

      It’s someone’s (personal) archive of a Gamers.com (Ziff Davies) interview in (probably) ~2002, and a GameSpot article Chet and Erik wrote in 1999, that have since disappeared off the internet (or at least I haven’t been able to locate them on archive.org or the original sites yet).

      Probably not viable source data for whatever reason, but fun to read having never seen them before :)

  103. 03/03/2011 at 17:19 theblazeuk says:

    Anyone else notice that neither Gamespy or IGN have what these idiots would refer to as ‘notable’ references?

    Lets take this the other way – I vote we begin a purge of all pages with uncitable references on wiki. Anything that doesn’t have a link to an active online page, let’s BURN IT. Doesn’t matter if there’s a physical reference – if you can’t prove it with a link then IT MUST GO.

  104. 03/03/2011 at 17:28 JFS says:

    Let’s find out where Schumin and this HalfShadow guy live and bombard their houses/rooms/dens with poo! It’s the only reasonable thing to do know. Or maybe post them down on /b/ (I know you go straight to hell for suggesting that) and see what happens.

    • 03/03/2011 at 17:51 Teddy Leach says:

      Let’s be honest, /b/ probably already know about it. I’d check, but I don’t want to be exposed to pictures of the result of a shotgun blast to the head. Again.

    • 03/03/2011 at 17:55 shoptroll says:

      ED already had an article on Schumin long before this incident. Probably stemming from the earlier PoE incidents. So if ED knows, then /b/ probably already knows as well.

      EDIT: Also, harassing the admin who noted this for deletion isn’t the right move. Let the Wikipedians fight this out on the review page, but we should try and spread word to try and find sources linking back to OMM so that someone can solidify that article to the point where this won’t happen again.

    • 03/03/2011 at 18:04 JFS says:

      Yeah, you’re both right, I suppose. Shoptroll, I didn’t mean to do this for real, I know that flaming single persons for this is bad (and useless) behaviour. Sorry if I didn’t make that clear :)

    • 03/03/2011 at 18:08 Teddy Leach says:

      We know we’d never go to those lengths, even against idiots like Schumin. However, it seems pretty inevitable that /b/ will get their hands on it sooner or later. It’s already out of our hands. Looking at the deletion discussion though, it seems that the vast majority are in favour of overturning the deletion decision.

  105. 03/03/2011 at 18:59 haircute says:

    RPS! Thank you for this. I wish I would have saw this story much sooner. OMM has been a constant in my life for over a decade now. When ever I’m feeling blue I load up OMM. Nothing cheers me up faster than reading a Marvin post for the 1000th time. ERIK AND CHET IF YOU SEE THIS PLEASE GO BACK TO THAT SITE AND WORK ON IT LEAVE VALVE PLEASE WE NEED YOU SO BAD RIGHT NOW

  106. 03/03/2011 at 19:09 Torgen says:

    I’ll be writing the Wikipedia founder, noting that for thousands of people now, any appeal he makes for donations will immediately bring this charade to mind. I don’t know of anyone who will be willing to fund the activities of such broken people as these.

  107. 03/03/2011 at 19:17 Consumatopia says:

    I guess the real lesson is that gaming journalists should start writing incestuous articles about other gaming journalism/humour web sites. Seriously–you guys are collectively making future gaming history.

  108. 03/03/2011 at 19:19 oceanclub says:

    I quite enjoyed this Slashdot comment on the entire saga (snippet follows, go to the link for the whole thing:

    http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2021158&op=Reply&threshold=0&commentsort=0&mode=thread&pid=35371390

    “Secondly, it’s actually quite an interesting read because the Schumin guy who nominated for deletion, is evidently really, really, pathetic. And not in a kind of sad and disappointing, move along cowboy way, but actually to a degree that’s almost gripping. This article highlights an almost iconic exemplar of the form of pathetic, to the degree that it’s actually compelling.

    To whit, and as best as I can tell from summaries, a man who is mocked – for being pathetic no less – by a popular gaming culture website waits a DECADE for revenge, whilst the world moves on around him, and the revengee behind the site goes on to pen dialogue for a video game that many people rightly consider one of the genuinely enduring classics of the new age.

    This ‘revenge’, and I use the term loosely, is a heartfelt, but misguided attempt to remove all evidence of revengee’s classic projects from Wikipedia, which is petty to an alarming degree, but also absorbingly impotent. Seriously, I would be amazed if anyone involved in the original site gave one flying fuck, because they’re probably too busy banging hookers on their jetskies right now. On a lake of money.

    And after literally waiting until he thought this site had decayed into irrelevancy and finallly making his move, he discovers that half the internet still cares, the whole thing goes Barbara Streisand, and we just get to see what a massive, unerring loser at the peak of his skills really looks like. ”

    P.

    • 03/03/2011 at 19:30 mrjackspade says:

      Oh my days….that is quite brilliant. I think I may have to copy that for future reference.

    • 03/03/2011 at 19:33 Temple to Tei says:

      Indeed quite a writer.

      [Edit] And wow. Now had time to click the writer of that little piece. He does not speak much but when he does he seems a sensible fellow. Even comments on release day DLC only this would be FOR THE LAST FUCKING DRAGON AGE.

    • 03/03/2011 at 20:23 Kadayi says:

      Sublime

    • 03/03/2011 at 20:53 Buckermann says:

      “Seriously, I would be amazed if anyone involved in the original site gave one flying fuck, because they’re probably too busy banging hookers on their jetskies right now. On a lake of money”

      I… I want to become a game writer mommy!

    • 03/03/2011 at 21:41 boldoran says:

      I haven’t laughed that hard for a week. Thanks

  109. 03/03/2011 at 19:23 RiptoR says:

    Seems like someone already moved the old page to his personal (work-in-progress) pages on wiki and updated it extensively with the links provided in the deletion discussions:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:OverlordQ/Old_Man_Murray

  110. 03/03/2011 at 19:42 haircute says:

    So, after reading the comments and following links it appears that this little admin fellow was kicked around by the grumps over at poe-news for years before he gained some power and then struck back at Chet in the lamest way possible. I love this. I absolutely love this.

  111. 03/03/2011 at 20:02 Teddy Leach says:

    The sheer amount of hideously, hilariously, broken bureaucracy on display over here is staggering: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2011_March_3#Old_Man_Murray

  112. 03/03/2011 at 20:18 Reapy says:

    This whole undeletion process seems sort of like the idea of having been unlawfully fired from an employer, then sueing for your job back… at the end of the day, do you really want to be around all those asswads.

    Any sane individual would take note of the easily found references to OMM (which btw if you google it’s like the 6th entry, and having that high a page rank on google is almost proof of notability due to the nature of google’s algorithms) on major game sites, in addition to generating many front page stories by it being deleted on major gaming sites. This sane individual would then only have to take a moment to understand that the small block of text about OMM is quite notable to a large amount of individuals and just simply undo the delete and move on in the world.

    But no, instead this carries on and they site half made up policies like they are some overly complex wow guild, attempting to make clear arguments by citing inane WP jargon while themselves committing a large amount of logical fallacies in their own arguments.

    I saw people up above in this thread talking about how ‘meatpuppets’ somehow sound like untrained lawyers to the ‘judge’ that are the admins, but honestly the way you guys have represented yourselves, it more looks like to me the judge got his law degree by paying a guy 50 dollars in a back alley to print off his graduation certificate.

    There are certain communities that house, ahh, how do I call them, i don’t even know. Sort of these insane individuals almost. They usually have a lot to say about things, and most of the time their insane writings are almost always negative and critical. Their writing style often seems somewhat academic, and a lot of times the first 4 paragraphs of their point make a lot of sense. Then always, but always their logic takes some sort of hard turn off a cliff of insanity. In my head I quote the office space guy “It’s a JUMP, to CONCLUSIONS mat…. GET IT? Cause you JUMP, to Conclusions!”, like the author just takes all this information and makes some huge logical leap in the middle of some sane points and expects you to be on board with them. Nuts.

    Anyway those types of people worm their way into communities, and I know most anywhere you go you can find one or two of them, often very vocal, but ultimately crazy, and many times people just don’t shut them up and attempt to address their insanity each and every time it is brought up.

    Glancing around through this whole issue here, I can obviously see that the original admin driving this is one of those types of people, and the more I look around wikipedia, I see that somehow it is like they have created a hot bed of these types of people and given them admin power. I honestly haven’t seen such a large gathering of these personalities ever, its like turning a corner and finding 50 giant squid having a tea party.

    At the end of the day, I really wonder if it is worth all the time to continual validate all these insane individuals by playing by their insane rules, to spend your time and effort to enhance their insane site?

    I really don’t think it is worth it. Old man murry’s influence is known among lots of people as proven by the response to the deletion, and their influence in games journalism touches on, and will continue to inspire current and future game journalists no matter what wikipedia chooses include or exclude on their site. Maybe if they are lucky, when wikipedia inevitably implodes, on the next site we can maybe see if we can delete the wikipedia entry for being non notable.

    • 03/03/2011 at 21:27 Sassenach says:

      This episode has put me off of Wikipedia far more effectively then years of university professors telling me that it was the devil did. Which implies a disturbing lack of judgement.

    • 04/03/2011 at 00:21 JFS says:

      “I honestly haven’t seen such a large gathering of these personalities ever, its like turning a corner and finding 50 giant squid having a tea party.”

      I love you, man.

  113. 03/03/2011 at 22:00 Wyatt says:

    Yeah, this is about what you should expect from Wikipedia. Hosoe Shinji’s article was deleted too and he’s got more composition credits than Shimomura Yoko and Mitsuda Yasunori. People need to face the fact that Wikipedia is actively hostile to anything that the “not a cabal” of admins doesn’t like.

  114. 03/03/2011 at 22:16 Vandell says:

    I just don’t see the ‘harm’ in keeping it up. Don’t know why they would WANT to remove information from the ‘net.

  115. 03/03/2011 at 22:19 oceanclub says:

    There’s at least two examples of Wikpedians (gmaxwell and reyk) on that page openly admitting that, hey, it doesn’t matter whether or not the article actually merits deletion. Rather, we Wikipedians should hold together and endorse the deletion, merited or not, or otherwise we will have to suffer the ignominy of having non-Wikipedians – people who, you know, might actually have a clue what they’re talking about – coming here and interrupting our cosy consensus with crazy stuff like “facts” and “sources”. Quelle horreur (waves scented hankie).

    P.

    • 03/03/2011 at 22:38 shoptroll says:

      From what I can tell, you’re pretty much damned if you do or damned if you don’t. The reason I don’t like things like AFD on Wikipedia or other wikis is that you run into the Arthur Dent problem: “The paper work was filed in a cabinet of the sub-sub-basement of City Hall a month ago” (paraphrase of course, don’t revoke my towel). It’s not clear at all on the wikipedia front page where you’re supposed to go to see if anything you think is worthwhile is going to be deleted. This in turn, means a number of people don’t know about any discussion over the articles until it’s posted on external sites as happened in this case.

      At which point you get a flock of people heading over to chime in which apparently certain demographics of the Wikipedia community don’t take kindly to for some reason. Sudden outbreaks of common sense I guess are hard to swallow?

    • 03/03/2011 at 22:41 Teddy Leach says:

      Mmm, I noticed that.

  116. 03/03/2011 at 22:35 Tagert says:

    Looks like the decision to delete it has been overturned!

    See the last comment.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2011_March_3#Old_Man_Murray

    • 03/03/2011 at 22:42 Teddy Leach says:

      The page is back. Victory!

    • 03/03/2011 at 22:50 Hybrid says:

      The page is back! Spread the news!

      But it looks like someone is still a bit unhappy… “Oh goody. I can’t wait to see what happens next when the drooling masses on the internet note one of their “pet” articles is getting deleted. HalfShadow 22:41, 3 March 2011 (UTC)”

    • 03/03/2011 at 22:57 shoptroll says:

      Hooray for cooler heads prevailing.

      Good work Masem for getting the ball rolling on correcting this within the system!

    • 03/03/2011 at 23:04 scwilko says:

      Before the victory gloating begins, it should be noted that the two editors most responsible for the article’s recreation, OverlordQ, who rewrote the article to properly assert notability, and Masem, who drove the deletion review discussion per Wikipedia’s guidelines and policies, are both Wikipedia admins, as were many of those involved in the behind-the-scenes discussion endorsing the same. In general, the system works, despite the occasional lapses and unrepresentative personal horror stories I’ve seen posted here the last couple of days.

      You may now gloat at will.

    • 03/03/2011 at 23:35 Kadayi says:

      Of course this invariable means the dude will be out to delete everything related to this in 10 years time…

  117. 03/03/2011 at 22:37 Temple to Tei says:

    To be fair to the wiki dweeb this thing he started is producing a lot of good writing.
    At his expense sure, but still good.
    It is almost like Old Man Murray inspired people or something.
    “..finding 50 giant squid having a tea party.” Indeed.

  118. 03/03/2011 at 23:00 rocketman71 says:

    Justice at last!!!
    But yeah, I now view Wikipedia in quite a different light after poking the innards. I certainly hope there’s not many SchuminWebs and HalfShadows as editors out there.

    Now, about that RPS wikipedia entry.. And where the hell is Blue’s News?.

    • 03/03/2011 at 23:07 shoptroll says:

      Blue’s entry was wiped a couple years ago following a second attempt to get it deleted.

      It really ought to be on there as it’s probably one of the oldest continually running gaming blogs/news sites.

  119. 03/03/2011 at 23:05 mrjackspade says:

    Halfshadow is a disgusting person. Been reading up about his posts on the old Portal of Evil. Let’s just say that perverted rape fetishist is being nice.

  120. 04/03/2011 at 00:04 sendmark says:

    yeah this whole thing has really turned me off wikipedia. Nerds and their feeble powertrips.

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