User:MuppetArchives/Current Events 33 (2010)

Archive of Current events.

Picture complaint
Hey folks -- We got a complaint from Paul Rudolph today about using one of his photos on the Tricycles page. Rudolph is a music coordinator on Sesame, and Leslie Carrara-Rudolph's husband. He's posted a bunch of behind the scenes pictures on his Facebook account which he'd rather we didn't post on the wiki. I apologized and took the pics down -- if there are any others on the wiki, we should take them down too. Obviously, if somebody doesn't want us to use their pics, we won't -- it doesn't happen often, but when it does, we're respectful and apologetic about it.

So -- just a heads-up for folks to keep an eye out for any pics that may come from that source. -- Danny (talk ) 23:11, February 2, 2010 (UTC)


 * On my talk page, I've noted that these pics (if they're the ones I presume they are), come from the Muppet Newsflash Twitpic account; they didn't note the source. --  Zanimum 00:22, February 3, 2010 (UTC)


 * This might be a good reason to avoid using images from Muppet NewsFlash, then (twitter or website) unless we know where Greg got them. Of course it can happen to any of us (since here we don't always check), but Greg has a history of not sourcing things and sometimes outright plagiarism (though it's mostly improved), so unless it's in the context of an interview or images supplied to him by Henson (or even then), they're best avoided (and for that matter, anyone's personal Facebook unless they've been asked or it's clear that they don't mind; just the way we've stayed away from puppet builders' portfolio sites). -- Andrew Leal (talk ) 00:38, February 3, 2010 (UTC)


 * Actually, I'm comfortable with how we currently grab pictures from almost everywhere. There's a general principle of "it's better to ask forgiveness than to ask permission" which has served us very well.


 * Right now, we've got more than 52,000 pictures on the wiki -- that's an average of 2.5 pictures per page. As a comparison, Marvel Database has a little over 1 pic per page, Memory Alpha has .7, and Wookieepedia has .5 pictures per page. I'm pretty sure we have more pictures than any other wiki on Wikia, which means that our wiki is more beautiful and more fun and just all-round better than anybody else's.


 * I think the key to doing that is that we don't care about licensing or sources; we just grab pictures from everywhere and hope for the best. The downside is that about once a year somebody complains; the upside is that we build the world's most beautiful wiki. I think that works out in the long run. So I didn't want to make a big deal about this one -- just wanted to put Paul Rudolph's site in the same bucket as Michael Schupbach's -- individual dude who doesn't want us to use his pics. -- Danny (talk ) 02:26, February 3, 2010 (UTC)

New Create Page
Hi, guys -- Here's a heads-up on a new little feature that's on the wiki. We're making a change to the Create Page process, trying to make it easier for people who haven't made new pages before.

If you click the "Create a new article" link in the sidebar, you'll get a little pop-up window that asks for the name of the article you want to create, and then offers you a choice between a "standard layout" and a blank page. The standard layout has an image placeholder and two section headings. The pop-up also comes up when you click on a red link.

A couple things for the more experienced types: Creating a new page by typing it into the browser bar is unchanged. Also, if you use the pop-up and want the blank page to be the default instead of the standard layout, you can select that in your preferences, under the Editing tab.

So -- this is actually brand new and isn't on most wikis yet; I'm testing it on Muppet for a couple days first. :) It's going to go live for all the wikis on Monday. There's one bug that needs to get fixed -- it shouldn't give you the pop-up when you click on a redlink category, but it does right now. That should be fixed soon.

Anyway -- new thing on the site, and we're guinea pigs, hooray. Let me know if you've noticed any problems with it; I'm trying to catch any bugs before the sitewide launch. Thanks! -- Danny (talk ) 22:12, January 28, 2010 (UTC)


 * One possible annoyance already: it can't distinguish between types of pages, so the same pop-up appears when you're editing a blank talk page or user's talk page. It's definitely a given that talk pages won't require that layout. Is there a way to tailor it for newbies (so instead of an article layout type, it shows a heading and an active talkbox, say, or something)? Otherwise, I'd suggest considering disabling it for talkpages, if that's possible, since I can imagine certain users might want to keep the preference when creating articles but find it a nuisance when trying to ask someone a question. -- Andrew Leal (talk ) 22:36, January 28, 2010 (UTC)


 * Ah, good point! That's why I'm using us as the guinea pigs -- you always find things when it's live on a site. I've asked for it to be turned off for Category pages; I'll do the same for Talk and User talk. -- Danny (talk ) 22:43, January 28, 2010 (UTC)

Preview of The Adventures of Kami and Big Bird
Found this sample video of The Adventures of Kami and Big Bird and had to share my findings with everyone again. Although I was hoping this is not the final version because Big Bird has a different voice in this animated series. However it is good to see a clip of this. - Steven 07:50, January 20, 2010 (UTC)