User talk:Shinyang-i

A little help

Hello Shinyang,

Not sure who or where I should be asking for help for specific Korean entertainment-related editing. I was hoping you'd be able to offer some guidance? Aside from talk pages on the individual pages, is there a place for general assistance that I could utilize?

Also, I know there's not really a cut and dried standard for some things, but I'm kind of discouraged lately with spending a lot of time on edits only to have them reverted for no reason. An example is the use of tables for group member info. I've used tables, but since they were reverted to prose I stopped as I'm now uncertain if it's standard.

Sorry to disturb, but any assistance is appreciated. Thank you.

Betsuni (talk) 14:23, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Hi, @Betsuni:. You're not disturbing me at all. I'm happy when any editor asks another for help! I do it constantly! ^_^ I wish I had one good place to point you to. Because Wikipedia encompasses such a huge variety of types of articles and types of subjects, the best practices are spread out all over the place. And in my opinion, things are not always organized so well. One of the things I've come to realize is that when people work on kpop articles, they usually look at other kpop articles for guidance. This is probably the same in any field. But actually, that isn't necessarily the best way to go about things, even though it might seem that way. Like you experienced with the member tables - they were present on many, many kpop articles but nothing like that has ever been recommended by any Wikipedia guidelines.

I'm the type that has no problem reading a zillion "how-to" pages, but that's not gonna work for everyone. So what I highly recommend for every editor is to look at other similar types of articles that have reached Good Article or Featured Article status, because those articles, kpop or not, have been done the "right" way. Right now I'm working on some discographies, so I went to the WikiProject Discographies, and I looked at those that had reached "FL" (featured list) status. First I looked for any kpop artists on that list (there was only one) and I used that a ton to get ideas about the Wikipedia-preferred way of doing things. (And trust me, some things are not the way I'd personally do them if it were my website, but it's not my website so I just suck it up since they aren't things that are a really big deal.) Since Wikipedia articles constantly change, you can go to an article's talk page, and often there is a link on it somewhere to see what the article looked like at the time it became a good/featured article/list. That's been super helpful to me. Since that time I've looked at other featured discographies outside kpop for more help, and now I'm getting ready to ask some other editors for help on some issues I still haven't resolved. So overall, one of the best things that can help is, if you're working on a biography article, is to look at good/featured biography articles, kpop or not. None of them have tables, for instance. That's one way I knew that, despite the prevalence on kpop articles, tables were probably not a good thing. (And I also tried using them and saw how restrictive they were.) If you're working on an album article, look at other album articles that have reached GA status. And so on.

The biggest problems I see across kpop articles are 1) the lack of interest in putting real content in articles and focusing only on, say, perceived accomplishments (usually slapped in a table). 2) The desire to create quantity over quality - make, say, a separate article for every single song by an artist but never make any of the articles more than a few sentences long (and a bunch of tables) and/or a virtual copy of the also-crappy album article. 3) The desire to use Wikipedia to actively promote kpop; WP is not for promoting anything. 4) The desire to replicate the same information in a hundred different places (usually in the form of big-ass tables, ha ha) 5) Disregard for or lack of understanding of Wikipedia's notability requirements (that's not a guideline; it is a non-negotiable requirement) 6) The feeling that kpop is fundamentally and vitally different than other topics, and thus no rules should have to be followed. (I can elaborate at length if you have questions about specifics, ha ha.) Overall, if your article sounds or looks remotely like an Allkpop article, its style and tone are totally wrong for an encyclopedia. And if your article is written in a way that necessitates the reader already know a bunch of cute kpop lingo or know how the Korean entertainment industry works, its style and tone are wrong. Every country and industry has its own unique characteristics, but I could go read a good Wilkipedia article about, say, a Bollywood star and still understand it fully, though I know nothing about Bollywood and the artidle didn't teach me lingo/details about Bollywood. Kpop is simple stuff and an article about a group can be explained quite easily without teaching the reader all kinds of cute language and stuff.

So, if you're wanting to work on, say, biographical articles, I'd look at Good Article-status kpop biographies and non-kpop bios as well. Don't simply look at any kpop article and think it's necessarily the "right" way. Off the top of my head, there's Big Bang, G-Dragon, and Jay Park. You can find tables of how many articles are at each level of "goodness" at various Wikiprojects, such as WP:BIO, WP:MUSICIAN, WP:KOREA, WP:POPMUSIC, and then look through the lists. For album articles, go to WP:ALBUMS, and so on. And also just ask ask ask - that's what I do! If you add something and it gets removed or reverted, read the edit summary - it often tells you why it was removed, and follow up (nicely) with the editor who removed it if you need more info. (A LOT of the time it's because info is unsourced; a song's Gaon chart position, a person's birthday, all of that needs reliable sources and will be removed without it.) And go check the relevant Wikiproject guidelines, as a lot of times you'll see your error on your own then. It's all part of a learning process. I haaaate it when my changes get reverted and I've gotten mad, but then I suck it up and learn from it, ha ha. Oh also, regarding idol group members, you can check out the member section of Apink; none of the members need their own article, but the group article contains biographical info about each member beyond what a table would allow. You can discuss their background, role within the group, solo activities, and such. The quantity of info on the Apink article per member is about right, too. Everything must be reliably sourced (no Allkpop, no Soompi, no wordpress blogs, etc - those are all fan sites), which is hard with kpop because little reliable info about many idol group members is ever released publicly. It should be devoid of extensive trivial detail (such as mentioning every single selca someone posted on their twitter or what someone was wearing or what the daily teaser photos looked like before a song's release), which sometimes is just trial and error and takes time to get a feel for (and of course is somewhat subjective). And info should be mostly independent of the group's agency.

I guess I've run out of things to say, but I really encourage you to stick with it. I warn you that it takes a lot more time to make a good article than people usually think. Even these discographies - which should be so easy - are taking me forever! It can take hours and hours to try to verify one piece of information, sometimes. When I see my efforts to "clean up" messes on kpop articles constantly undone, I get really really discouraged. But ask ask ask for help, read other Good or Featured Articles, and so on. I'm always here, so feel free to come to me with specific questions, and I can at least point a finger in the right direction, hopefully. :) Good luck! Shinyang-i (talk) 12:13, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Wow, thank you for the long explanation! Yes it's extremely frustrating to spend hours verifying info only to have it reverted on you. I've only recently found ...and funny enough it was reverted by you..haha...several groups where I inserted tables since I thought it was easier to view simple info at a glance. But I do agree that it's restrictive when you want to elaborate on each member.

Yes,I just found the entry on Papaya members where I had spent a lot of time verifying their birthdays (info is sparse on older groups) only to have them removed by you. But okay, if you feel it's irrelevant for groups than so be it. Since birthdays are included for solo artists, I would have thought it to be a pertinent piece of information for group members as well.

I got no problem with using reliable sources and have since stopped using Allkpop, Soompi. I found a Wiki page where some of you were discussing reliable Kpop sources and I started to use those. I have attempted to look and learn from previously edited entries which I thought were better established but I guess I've been looking at the wrong ones. It's surprising that some of the entries for even the larger, more well-known groups are filled with unreliable/no references. For example, I took one look at the BabyVox page and rolled my eyes.

Anyways, thanks for the assistance and the tips.

Betsuni (talk) 18:06, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

Hi again Betsuni. I can't say that I remember the Papaya incident specifically ^^, but it was based on precedence. (I do remember, however, voting to keep the Papaya article when it was nominated for deletion.) Look outside kpop articles (at "Good Article" status works, not any old crap article ha ha) and you don't see group members' birthdays on a group article. That level of detail is generally reserved for notable individuals, meaning they have their own articles, whether they're part of a group or not. So it's not that it's irrelevant for group members, it's irrelevant for non-notable individuals. If a group member is notable, he/she has (or could have) their own article and it includes their birthday. If a group member is not notable, they don't have their own article and their birthday is not needed on Wikipedia. This is not my opinion, this is the standard observed across Wikipedia. I personally have stopped caring so much about them if they are reliably sourced and are included in prose about the member (not inserted into a list or table). The whole table thing was just....it was not just restrictive, it was utterly and totally anti-Wikipedia. Wikipedia isn't for "quick reference", it's for reading. I think so many kpop fans have spent so much time looking at horribly-done agency websites, where the entire essence of a real human being is squeezed in to a cheap, half-untrue "profile", that they've forgotten what a biography actually is. Really, tables are usually for things, not people. If the members are sooooo important as many editors claim they are, treat them like people and write about them, don't just list their "vital stats" in a stupid table. It's their accomplishments that merit discussion on Wikipedia, not the press release version of the personal details their agencies felt like releasing. Papaya's birthdays are a hundred times less important than what Papaya actually did.

I'm glad you've been giving better sources a try. Sources are so frustrating! You are absolutely correct that there are still a ton of kpop articles out there filled with crap or no references. Baby Vox...yeah I remember editing that. It was a hot mess and I made it a tiny bit better...maybe? but ... yeah. Hot mess. I give a lot more leeway toward unsourced old material as long as it's not harmful, because I know very well how hard it is to find Korean info even a few years old. There are very, very few editors who actually work to improve existing articles and anything older than 2010-ish. Mostly people create new lists of worthless crap and new articles about non-notable groups and individuals and questionably-notable albums and songs. If they are obsessed with said artist, they cram every time the artist took a dump into the article (source: Twitter). Otherwise, they scribble down a few words and then make another new article. Kpop is one area that is very, very damaged by systemic bias (preference for new stuff).

Anyway, what kind of articles have you been wanting to work on? I'm doing work on Shinhwa stuff, so if you're editing old groups, I might run across stuff and be able to shoot stuff your way. Just holler! ^^ Shinyang-i (talk) 05:44, 31 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes. After perusing your comments, I understand better and have to agree about the structure of group pages. It actually became clear after you said 'Wiki is for reading' and not for 'quick reference'. Ironically enough, I actually go to Wiki for reading sometimes.

Well that would be my aim more or less..to update the pre-2010 artists since those are the ones I have more experience and knowledge.

I don't have a set list per se. I've looked into and am still researching the lesser known groups like M.I.L.K., TTMA, Papaya, Blackbeat, LUV, SWi.T. Toya. However, I'm somewhat confused since most of them were popular at the time of their debut but with only 1 or at most 2 albums. Once that fizzled, they either disbanded or disappeared into thin air. Where do you draw the line for notability for these? It would be sad if I expanded on them only to find them deleted one day because they lacked notability. That is one of the most frustrating things I've experienced on Wiki and made me go on hiatus a few times...having my hard work either reverted/entirely deleted.

I might or might not do the more popular groups like Shinhwa, SES, since most of these are so popular, I'm sure a lot of other people have and will try their hands on it. I would like to concentrate on the smaller, lesser known ones in order for Wiki to have a more fuller picture of K-pop.

Betsuni (talk) 18:15, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

When it comes to deletion of articles, there's always an open discussion on which anyone can comment regarding the proposed deletion. It can be really hard for someone not familiar with older stuff to know if it's notable or not, since too many of those types of articles have no/scant sources, so they might AFD it. I've been vocal about not deleting older groups, so far successfully, and there haven't been any lately. So I wouldn't sweat it too much. Notability is not temporary; just because someone's not famous anymore doesn't mean their notability from when they were famous evaporates. But, you're right, it really can be hard to judge 10-15 years later when all the available info has been lost in the internet or yesteryear and is in Korean. If nothing else, the RIAK charts can help show chart activity 1999-2008, which is indicative (though not proof) of notability. These days, articles get made for groups the day they debut (which drives me crazy), and while those often do get deleted (and re-created later), a group with just one successful album is notable. So there should be no problem with older groups if they had even a single hit album. :)

As I dig through the web for old Shinhwa info, I will drop a link to articles I run across articles about other older groups on your talk page, if you like. I'd really love to see those articles beefed up and am really excited you're looking to do that. Are you familiar with archiving articles at archive.org or webcitation.org? I highly, highly recommend doing it for every single source, especially the older stuff! I'll also finish making a little directory of the RIAK archives, too, so you can access that.

It's been nice chatting with you. Keep in touch!! Shinyang-i (talk) 21:44, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Shinyang-i. You have new messages at RoySmith's talk page.
Message added 02:18, 2 April 2015 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 02:18, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Unclear citation style?

Hi, I saw the notes you left on Apink_discography. I get the part about Gaon chart link and will work on fixing that. But I don't really understand about unclear citation style. What is it mean? How do you usually fix that? Thanks Sonflower0210 (talk) 07:37, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

@Sonflower0210: What I intended by that note was the Gaon thing. Maybe it's not the right tag exactly, so I apologize for any confusion. :) Things are cited but the citations go to a general page, not specific charts. Like, there are good refs for the sales but none for the chart placements. Almost all the kpop discogs are like that, and I started to tag them all but then ran out of energy, ha ha. Just remove the tag when you get specific chart links up. Also, I highly recommend archiving all your chart and sales links because Gaon's always rearranging their site, removing some info, etc. Holler if you're not familiar with how to do that. Shinyang-i (talk) 07:46, 12 April 2015 (UTC)