FAQ Phrasing brainstorming session - 2013-02-02 – Conversation in Maid Café (メイド喫茶)

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 20:09

We've gathered here today, for the second brainstorming session of Anime and Manga

I'd like to ask to keep chitchat to a minimum, since the conversation is bookmarked and logged.

We'll discuss the following things, in order:

Krazer

@JNat We were joking that you got delayed over "some silly megaman related thing"

Madara Uchiha

1. What should the phrasing of our FAQ page be

2. What should the phrasing of our /about page sections be

3. Status of the cartoon question

4. Anything else you'd like to bring up in that time.

Let's begin.

As moderators, we have control over the first section of our FAQ page. What do you think we should put there, and how should we rephrase it?

Krazer

@MadaraUchiha What about site promotion?

Madara Uchiha

@Krazer Falls into 4.

Krazer

Please continue.

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 20:13

The point is to have a concise paragraph that describes our site, the mentality of it, and what (and who) we find welcome here.

The current paragraph reads: Anime and Manga - Stack Exchange is for anime and manga fans.

Which isn't nearly adequate.

What do you think we should have instead?

(It usually works better if more than one of us is talking)

JNat

I was reading through this post

2

Q: What should our FAQ contain?

We should start thinking about the FAQ for the site. Some of the point I think we should agree on: What kinds of questions are good ontopic questions on this site? Where is the line drawn between ontopic and offtopic? Probably there are more, we should discuss.

discussion

but it is not what we're looking for

Logan M

@MadaraUchiha lol. I guess we want to append something like "We welcome questions about ..." and some description of what's on-topic and off-topic. I'm just looking at a couple of other faq pages to see what they're doing.

Krazer

@LoganM I think it we should also include a short bit or link about resource requests to

Mysticial

And we definitely should list a few examples of good questions.

Ideally from a wide range if question types.

Madara Uchiha

@Mysticial I don't know, other FAQs I've seen don't have example questions.

JNat

Feb 2, 2013 20:21

@MadaraUchiha I was thinking the same

Mysticial

hmm...

Veger

@Mysticial Example questions are quite specific and such a list needs to be kept up-to-date.

JNat

on the other hand, boardgames.stackexchange.com/faq

Madara Uchiha

And I tend to agree, just because these questions are good, doesn't mean the user's is bad, he might get confused about whether his question falls into the correct category.

Mysticial

We welcome questions about:
1. Plot in X Anime.
2. Character(s) in X Anime.
3. add more?

Logan M

Feb 2, 2013 20:23

@MadaraUchiha Physics does have a few examples, but none of the other sites I've seen do: physics.stackexchange.com/faq

Veger

Other sites have a list describing a broad range of topics showing what the site is about

Madara Uchiha

@JNat That FAQ paragraph isn't well built.

It should be small and concise, if you need to scroll for it, it's probably isn't that great.

Krazer

@LoganM that's because the laws of physics are constant

JNat

@MadaraUchiha ok

Veger

@Mysticial Something like that indeed, but anime -> anime and manga

JNat

Feb 2, 2013 20:25

I think the FAQ from SF&F looks good

Madara Uchiha

Well, we also accept question about anime and manga in general

JNat

scifi.stackexchange.com/faq

kuwaly

If we have a list of topics then it may close of room for things that are on-topic that we haven't thought of yet. Maybe we should try to be very general.

Mysticial

We don't want questions about:
1. What is your favorite Anime/Manga?
2. What is the best to get/see/view X?
3. Anything possibly illegal.

Madara Uchiha

We need to think about that too

Veger

Feb 2, 2013 20:25

@Mysticial 3. Identify the name of the anime/manga that has X, Y and Z

kuwaly

@Veger aren't we allowing identify?

Mysticial

@kuwaly He's replaying to my first list. The "allowed" list.

Veger

@kuwaly yes we are, it was an addition to the list of allowed questions :)

kuwaly

makes more sense now

For allowed:

terminology

tropes

Logan M

I guess for the allowed list, we also want to have something about what sort of anime-production questions are allowed.

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 20:27

Science Fiction and Fantasy's looks good, very close to what we're gonna need too.

JNat

@MadaraUchiha indeed

Madara Uchiha

Remember we don't want to stretch it too long

No more than 5-7 items.

kuwaly

maybe generalize terminology/tropes/similar things into one umbrella idea

Mysticial

Agreed. SciFi is essentially the same as us except with a different genre.

We can pretty much just borrow (steal) that FAQ and adapt it for ourselves.

Krazer

@kuwaly Historical or societal context of a work?

kuwaly

Feb 2, 2013 20:29

@Krazer I don't know if terminology would fit under that

Mysticial

@Krazer That's the second bullet on the SciFi FAQ.

Krazer

@Mysticial I know.

Veger

@Mysticial He started borrowing (stealing) already ;)

Krazer

@kuwaly I think it could fall under "societal context"

kuwaly

Must go, good luck

Veger

Feb 2, 2013 20:31

When reading the SF&F faq, the allowed list is good enough for us I suppose. Or is it missing something?

(maybe rephrase a little)

Madara Uchiha

I believe we can pretty much take it whole, and make small adjustments

Mysticial

I'd say we take SciFi's allowed list. And further more we allow questions about terminology and tropes.

Logan M

@Krazer I don't know if it works as written, but we are allowing questions about both the cultural impact of series and cultural origins for ideas from anime/manga. It would be questions like: anime.stackexchange.com/questions/541/…

JNat

@MadaraUchiha the second point on the off-topic part needs to be modified

Mysticial

This phrase is the bane of all the FAQs:

> practical, answerable questions based on actual problems that you face

Krazer

Feb 2, 2013 20:33

@Mysticial I had to know if Pokemon were edible.

3

Logan M

@Mysticial I don't think any of us face problems watching anime. So I don't know how we're supposed to interpret that.

Mysticial

@Krazer Yeah, and I happen to be able to shoot railguns and I don't know where all the power comes from.

Madara Uchiha

We can try and deal with that later, but for now, let's focus on the paragraph we can edit

Mysticial

I believe there was a meta.SO post challenging that phrase for sites like SciFi.

But anyway, are we mostly agreed upon the "allowed" list?

JNat

@MadaraUchiha I think we can start by picking each line from SF&F and seeing if they fit us, or need modifications

Mysticial

Feb 2, 2013 20:35

SciFi + a few more. I don't see anything on their list that we wouldn't want on ours.

Madara Uchiha

@JNat I'll try and get their source in Markdown, so we can edit it more freely than trying to reconstruct it

JNat

@MadaraUchiha yeah

Veger

@MadaraUchiha It is only a bullet list and a 'tag link', easier to recreate than to ask for... Unless you want to say hi to our neighbors :)

Madara Uchiha

@Veger We'll try both

Mysticial

@Veger It's easy for them since they can ping each other via the Teacher's Lounge.

Veger

Feb 2, 2013 20:38

ok, fine by me

next is "not allowed" list?

number 2 and 3 of the SF&F faq seems applicable to me

Mysticial

We may want to make a brief mention of the list questions.

Veger

the others (1 & 4) not so much

Madara Uchiha

Hold on, let's wrap up the welcomed list

Mysticial

Welcome list:
1 - 5: SciFi's list
6: Questions about terminlogy
7: Questions about tropes
8: ???

Logan M

We need to mention what sort of questions about the anime industry are allowed

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 20:41

Here's what I currently have:

Krazer

@Mysticial Questions about anime/manga staff like directors, animators, writers, manga artists, and voice actors, but not how to draw, make or write anime/manga

Madara Uchiha

Anime and Manga - Stack Exchange is a Q&A site for enthusiastic anime and manga fans. This includes questions about:

- Plot, character, or setting explanations
- Historical or societal context of an anime or manga
- Anime and manga identification
- Tropes, terminology and other general anime and manga related information.

JNat

and the conclusions of our discussion on the lists

Madara Uchiha

Anything else we'd like to add?

Logan M

@MadaraUchiha Did we drop the stuff about "Franchise/series reading or viewing order" and "Behind-the-scenes and fandom information"?

JNat

Feb 2, 2013 20:43

something like "lists, as long as they comply to these rules (link to meta post)"

Madara Uchiha

@LoganM Well, reading order isn't exactly relevant on anime/manga (is it?)

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha Oh yes it is: Think Haruhi...

JNat

@MadaraUchiha may be, if timelines are mixed up

Madara Uchiha

Also, behind-the-scenes was declared rather off-topic

Veger

@Krazer yes, we had some of these questions and they got closed

Logan M

Feb 2, 2013 20:44

I would think questions like anime.stackexchange.com/questions/2089/… would count for that.

JNat

@LoganM yeah

Madara Uchiha

@Mysticial, @LoganM, point taken. Added.

How about the behind the scenes one?

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha We have a few of those already.

JNat

@MadaraUchiha aren't we going to mention that some list questions are allowed?

Mysticial

Most of the "Why was it done like this?" questions.

I asked one myself and I got a good answer.

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 20:46

@JNat No, since we're discussing on-topic vs off-topic here.

JNat

@MadaraUchiha ok

Madara Uchiha

@Mysticial So... anime-production and manga-production?

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha Yeah

Krazer

@MadaraUchiha the spirited away no-face question is a behind the scenes one I think they are on topic

Veger

@MadaraUchiha we should exclude cosplay and conference questions, I suppose

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 20:47

Wouldn't that open the door for questions regarding the actual creation (drawing, etc?)

Mysticial

I agree they can be slippery slopes without references though.

@MadaraUchiha Then explicitly add those to the not allowed list.

Madara Uchiha

Alright

Mysticial

Questions about why X author did Y are fine. Questions about how to do X Anime/Manga are not.

And that includes fan-art.

Since we've already decided that we will not allow questions on how to do doujinshi and cosplays and such.

Madara Uchiha

Okay

I currently have this: Anime and Manga - Stack Exchange is a Q&A site for enthusiastic anime and manga fans. This includes questions about:

- Plot, character, or setting explanations
- Historical or societal context of an anime or manga
- [Anime and manga identification][1]
- Franchise/series reading or viewing order
- [Anime][2] and [manga][3] production
- Tropes, terminology and other general anime and manga related information.

Mysticial

I think this specific "No" can be wrapped up as: All the "How to" questions are not allowed.

@MadaraUchiha Looks good.

Krazer

Feb 2, 2013 20:52

@MadaraUchiha What anime/manga staff questions?

Mysticial

@Krazer That falls under production.

Logan M

@MadaraUchiha That looks good. I can't think of any questions we have right now which don't fall into one of those.

looper

@MadaraUchiha looks good, indeed

Logan M

I'm not actually sure what the "behind the scenes" is referring to, but I don't think we have any questions that would only fall in that category anyway.

Krazer

@MadaraUchiha What about legal issues with anime and manga?

Mysticial

Feb 2, 2013 20:54

@Krazer That's production.

Veger

@Krazer I suppose that falls under "not allowed"

Logan M

@Krazer Questions about fansubs, piracy, etc should be explicitly in the not allowed list

Mysticial

@Veger That's slightly different. We want to disallow questions about "where to get X"? Those are the legal slippery slopes.

Madara Uchiha

@LoganM Alright, moving on to the not allowed

Krazer

@MadaraUchiha questions about the japanese language usage in anime/manga

Veger

Feb 2, 2013 20:56

@Mysticial I would say not allowed (instead of 'slippery slopes'), they either are referring to illegal versions or are shopping lists

Mysticial

The SciFi list again is a good start. But we want to change the 2nd bullet since we have our own rules for "list" questions.

Logan M

@Krazer Ah we should probably have that in allowed (with a link to the meta question about it)

Mysticial

@Veger They are not allowed partially because they are legal slippery slopes. We should phrase it as "Questions about where to get/download/see X as well as anything that is a legal slippery slope is not allowed."

Lemme check how Super User phrases their policy on piracy related stuff.

They don't even mention it in their FAQ.

Nor does SciFi.

Krazer

@Mysticial What If I have a question about who owns what between a manga artist and it's publisher?

Logan M

@Mysticial From Arqade: gaming.stackexchange.com/faq prohibits "Piracy, and support with pirated games."

Mysticial

Feb 2, 2013 21:00

But I do believe we need to explicitly put it in our "disallowed" list since well... the majority of the Type B fanbase gets their Anime via torrents and such...

@LoganM ooh... nice find

Krazer

@LoganM but emulator questions are allowed

Mysticial

@Krazer That's under "production" for the allowed list. That's not a legal question. I think it's actually a list question that passes the 4 rules.

@Krazer Emulators are not illegal. But they are off-topic anyways. (for our site)

Madara Uchiha

What I currently have:

## What about other questions regarding anime and manga?
Not all questions have a home on Stack Exchange. Please note the following types of questions are off-topic here:

- Questions about the Japanese language, should be on **[Japanese Language and Usage][4]**
- Questions calling for a list of works, authors, …: What are all the anime that feature X? What are all the manga by Y? **[This post will help you understand which list questions are acceptable and which are not.][5]**

Veger

@MadaraUchiha - Questions about cosplay, anime conferences, etc.

@MadaraUchiha Questions about obtaining (illegal) anime/manga or when they air

Logan M

@MadaraUchiha I thought we were allowing some questions about Japanese language, as long as it's still anime-dependent: meta.anime.stackexchange.com/questions/69/…

Krazer

Feb 2, 2013 21:06

@Mysticial But if I have a question about if an artist can make a doujinshi for Comiket about a work they had a part in (like Ume Aoki did) ... would that still be a production question?

Mysticial

Here's my list:

Not Allowed:
- Facts easily found on a reference site: Who played X in Y?
- Reading or viewing recommendations: I liked X, what should I watch next?
- Genre classification: Is X Anime?
- Questions about where to obtain Anime/Manga as well any legal slippery-slope.

Also not allowed:
- Questions about the Japanese language belong on [japanese.se].
- Questions about Anime-related games belong on [gaming.se].
- Questions about cosplay, conventions.
- Questions about how to make Anime/Manga/Doujinshi, etc...

@Krazer That sounds a bit non-constructive given the speculative nature of the question.

That said, many of the questions we have right now are already speculative. So I'm contradicting myself.

Logan M

@Mysticial For "Questions about Anime-related games", I think you should change to "Questions about gameplay of Anime-related games"

Mysticial

@LoganM yes, agreed.

Veger

@LoganM Other (non-gameplay) questions about Anime-related games are allowed? I would think that any game question is off-topic?

Logan M

We had this discussion about anime.stackexchange.com/questions/507/…, and the consensus was that for these types of games, it's okay to ask about the story if it's still related to the overall plot, but not okay to ask about gameplay.

Krazer

Feb 2, 2013 21:11

what about questions about anime/manga model building? e.g. features of certain mechs

Mysticial

@Veger "What are all the games related to X Anime?" Is a list question that passes the 4 rules.

Logan M

@Krazer Now we're getting really niche. I don't think we need them here, but I don't really care.

Krazer

@Mysticial and conversely "what anime are related to x games"

Madara Uchiha

## What about other questions regarding anime and manga?
Not all questions have a home on Stack Exchange. Please note the following types of questions are off-topic here:

- Questions about the Japanese language, should be on **[Japanese Language and Usage][4]**
- Questions about the game-play of anime and manga games, should be on **[Arqade][5]**
- Questions calling for a list of works, authors, …: *What are all the anime that feature X? What are all the manga by Y?* **[This post will help you understand which list questions are acceptable and which are not.][6]**

JNat

@Krazer has this ever been debated?

Krazer

Feb 2, 2013 21:14

@JNat Someone bought it up briefly in another chatroom

Madara Uchiha

@Krazer I'd argue it's graphic design

JNat

@Krazer I think it is worthy of discussion

Logan M

@JNat We haven't had any questions on model building. In fact, we really haven't had any on merchandise at all.

Mysticial

@LoganM "Merchandise" is a keyword here.

JNat

@LoganM and if we are to had that to the list of allowed questions, we should specify that shopping questions are not allowed

like where to find x

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 21:16

@JNat Shopping questions? I think those are actually pretty valid questions.

"Where can I legally purchase Naruto in Israel?"

Mysticial

@JNat That's already under my list. But it was limited to Anime/Manga. We could rephrase to generalize to all merchandise.

Madara Uchiha

There aren't a lot of places, and I think it's fine.

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha "Too Localized" :P

Sorry, I just had to say that. :)

Madara Uchiha

@Mysticial 7 million people live in Israel

It's not (contrary to popular believe) some isolated island.

JNat

@MadaraUchiha SF&F's policy on shopping questions" Shopping questions are discouraged when it's a matter of comparing products or suppliers."

Mysticial

Feb 2, 2013 21:18

That's a slippery slope. I'm not sure whether we want a gazillion questions about "Where do I legally buy X in Y country?"

Krazer

@Mysticial A lot series is banned in certain countries for certain reasons (like China)... it might fall under societal issues

Mysticial

Let's see what does Super User say about shopping questions.

They disallow it - all of it.

@Krazer Which would be a "legal slippery-slope".

JNat

see this

that one is allowed, but the mod stated what I wrote above in a comment

Logan M

@Mysticial To make it clear, what I'm asking about isn't necessarily where to buy things, but questions like "Do any officially produced wall scrolls exist of nanoha?"

Mysticial

@LoganM Hmm... good point. I'd argue that might actually be on-topic. Since I have in fact been searching for Nanoha wall-scrolls.

Veger

Feb 2, 2013 21:21

@Mysticial Especially as these questions tend to become outdated (fast)

Madara Uchiha

Questions asking "why did the author do it this way?"

JNat

@MadaraUchiha that was decided NC, I think

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha We already have those. And we are allowing them.

JNat

10

Q: "Why did they write it that way?" questions should be off-topic

A question I just stumbled upon, Why are there ending of the series Death Note so different in manga and anime?, is an example of the generic question type: "Why did they change X?" or "Why did they write it that way?". The only person that can answer these questions are the writers, resulting i...

discussion questions acceptable-questions

Mysticial

They can be answered with either good speculation or a citation of the Author's words.

@JNat Don't forget that our early private beta decisions are not binding. We will overturn them if needed.

JNat

Feb 2, 2013 21:23

@Mysticial yeah, of course

I was just bringing up was had already been said

Madara Uchiha

Okay then, we'll allow those for now, but again they're a Pandora's box those questions.

Mysticial

Our early private-beta decisions rule out a very large portion of good questions.

Madara Uchiha

What about "Why did the author stop producing anime X?" questions?

JNat

@MadaraUchiha don't they somewhat fall into the same category?

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha Same category. Many of them can be answered with a good citation.

I'd say allow since they are actually useful questions.

If I'm watching/reading a series, and it stops. I want to know why.

Veger

Feb 2, 2013 21:25

@Mysticial Assuming the reason is known... Otherwise it will become a debate

Mysticial

Even if there's no official answer, I want to know the educated speculations.

JNat

@Mysticial but we should link it to some meta post on how to answer that, or people may post opinions and the like

Logan M

The problem with these questions isn't what they're asking, but how they are phrased. Rather than asking "Why did they write it that way?" and making the question about the author, you should ask "Why did this happen?" and make it a question about the material.

Mysticial

@JNat Yes, we should make a set of rules on asking an answering these - just as we did for the list questions.

JNat

@LoganM good point

@Mysticial exactly

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 21:27

Okay then

Okay

Here's what I have:

Anime and Manga - Stack Exchange is a Q&A site for enthusiastic anime and manga fans. This includes questions about:

- Plot, character, or setting explanations
- Historical or societal context of an anime or manga
- [Anime and manga identification][1]
- Franchise/series reading or viewing order
- [Anime][2] and [manga][3] production
- Tropes, terminology and other general anime and manga related information.

## What about other questions regarding anime and manga?
Not all questions have a home on Stack Exchange. Please note the following types of questions are off-topic here:

JNat

@MadaraUchiha seems good to me

Mysticial

"Not all questions have a home on Stack Exchange" -> "Not all questions have a home on Anime and Manga"

JNat

@Mysticial well spoted

Krazer

Sounds good

Mysticial

Otherwise, I think we're good to go.

Veger

Feb 2, 2013 21:29

yep

Mysticial

Once we have rules on the "production" category, we'll link to it. This includes the the "Why did they do this?" question we were just discussing.

Madara Uchiha

We also need a FAQ page regarding the off-topic vs on-topic

We'll leave it for another day though

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha Wait... isn't that what we just did?

Madara Uchiha

@Mysticial a meta FAQ page

With much higher detail

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha ah - everything in more detail. yes

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 21:31

Okay I saved

Have a look

Mysticial

The entire "What kind of questions should I not ask here?" section is not editable right?

Veger

"This post will help you understand which list questions are acceptable and which are not." is a bit descriptive/long (maybe too bold?)

Madara Uchiha

@Mysticial No, it isn't, sadly

Mysticial

@Veger agreed - needs to be de-emphasized.

Veger

Maybe change to 'More information about list questions is available in this post'?

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 21:34

@Veger Agreed and done

Mysticial

@MadaraUchiha Is it cached? I still see the bold.

Madara Uchiha

@Mysticial Probably

Mysticial

So are we done?

Madara Uchiha

I suppose we are

The /about page will contain mostly the same things

Unless someone wants to add something

We can edit all sorta stuff in there, so ask

Mysticial

I don't have anything in mind.

Madara Uchiha

Feb 2, 2013 21:39

Alright then

user58512

hello are you guys busy

Madara Uchiha

Bookmark ends here.

FAQ Phrasing brainstorming session - 2013-02-02

Maid Café (メイド喫茶)

Participants