The Factory Floor - 2014-09-30

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5:08 AM

Now let's hope more people show up. Let's go internet spamming! (jk)

2 hours later…

6:41 AM

Public Beta - woohoo!

2

githubphagocyte

Yay!

7:24 AM

0

Q: Bring your posts for editing

Editing is an important part of getting questions and answers in the best condition they can be. If I see a post with some typos, or that could be worded more clearly, I edit it. However, there are two things slowing down this process of improving posts: People who are happy to edit won't notic...

8:15 AM

I'm still thinking about that tectonics question... there's got to be an easy experiment you can do... oil on a baloon? ice on a pond?

Started spreading the word a bit: giantitp.com/forums/…

5

So how often do sites not make it past private beta?

not a clue

generally I don't worry about what others do and just do the best I can :)

2

I just wondered. I do think we did great though, hopefully we can keep it up.

And you're getting start a lot more now, TimB

:D

hey hwalu

I've participated in one other beta "Gamification" and that didn't make it out of private

8:28 AM

gamification is back on the table, currently committed to it. Though I'm kinda doubtful

Your experience doens't make me anymore hopeful.

githubphagocyte

I committed to the Computer Graphics private beta and that didn't make it to public either

Yeah I'm following it again, when it was around last time I was thinking about implementing a game system, now I have and want to make it better. We'll see, it seems to have had quite a slow uptake. Last time it was dropped because of lack of experts, which is a shame given SE are pretty much THE experts!

There were loads of interesting questions about virtual currencies and farming reputation

0

Q: Time to spread the word

We're in public beta, now we need to let people know that we are here. To get things started I've done a post for the GitP Worldbuilding forum: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?374474-Worldbuilding-Stack-Exchange I had a quick read of the forum rules there and it seems that post sh...

3

8:50 AM

Feeds is getting stars, is it happy?

githubphagocyte

Feeds has earned them :)

He's certainly very faithful.

Ok, from now on, I'm going to use ballon whale as the universal interjection for this site. Please don't be offended if I call you one, I have to try it out somewhere. ;)

3

@DonyorM This pleases me.

@BESW I'm glad.

Even if you are a balloon whale.

:D

Better a balloon whale than an owlephant.

2

8:56 AM

We need to make graphics for these.

The owlephant is a D&D monster with various iterations over time, from the imposing...

user image

...to the uncanny:

user image

I see, uhhh, the first is better I think.

Owlbears and owlephants are a running joke in RPG.SE chat, where such references are always relephant.

Does the balloon whale exist elsewhere too?

I don't have much table-top RPG experience

Although there are precedents for similar creatures--in Clarke's 2061 for example--our specific iteration is to the best of my knowledge unique.

8:59 AM

good, unique things are better

Although there is the Skywhale.

Yes, but I imagine that would be slightly different, cousins

it is slightly different.

Aye.

9:17 AM

0

Q: Imaginary chat tags

Now that we are in public beta we are open for anyone to find us through search engines or links or browsing. With this in mind, and thinking about new users, I wanted to raise a discussion about the chat tags. I'm not familiar with tags in chat so I don't know their purpose. They don't seem to ...

9:34 AM

1

A: Imaginary chat tags

Nearly any tag that would be appropriate for a site-wide chat room would be far, far too broad and useless as an actual tag for questions on the site. We should not compromise the integrity of the main-site sorting system for the sake of the chat; the chat system is a tertiary function in the Sta...

9:48 AM

tags

I see zero questions tagged tags

making-up-tags-about-tags

testing

test-successful

test-again

meta-has-tags

balloon-whales

10:00 AM

Looks like the no one's lost permissions but they've been split out a bit

We've lost a few, for example me and you lost moderator tools

Not a big deal but they were kinda fun

reading chat help: "we hear there are some pretty amazing easter eggs in chat" O.o

@DonyorM Try putting "easter egg" in the chat search.

Aside from that, a few of the SE sites have easter eggs or bonus features in chats associated with them, like the dice client in RPG.SE chats.

I see

Thanks.

mythic-creatures

10:31 AM

When new people come in asking questions we need to be very supportive/guide them towards good questions. We've had two weeks practice remember!

how is open beta goin?

10:48 AM

@Fulli Quiet so far, not surprising though. 'tis not like we had a horde clamoring at the door to come in.

2 hours later…

12:23 PM

My privs have got downgraded :( they doubled the requirements for everything

not that I was really using them for anything

Now I'm 20 points short of casting close votes. Hmm.

githubphagocyte

12:43 PM

At the same voting rates as the last two weeks, you should get the same privileges again within the next two weeks.

If you took less than two weeks to get them first time round, and voting rates increase with new users, it could take much less...

indeed

well, not likely in my case as I rep-cap a lot, but for a lot of people yeah

Well, I guess we now just have to wait for the site numbers to increase :-)

yeah, spread the word and hope it generates enough interest

I've already seen a few new questions posted today from people with 1 rep though - which is a good sign

2

as it means they are coming here fresh

Yes, althought the question about cat people and dog people influencing each other kind of many we want to laugh and point.

yeah, the examples...could be better...I guess the poster is going for humour

12:58 PM

Yeah, I'm trying to think of a way to salvage it... I get what the OP is talking about but...

or making a cutsey game

See my comment above "we need to be very supportive/guide them towards good questions. We've had two weeks practice remember!"

Well, the answer is pretty much like any other cultural influence.

leave it be, just don't upvote it - someone will answer and it will fall off the front page

Since at that level of technology I would assume that they could be compared to how instant media has transformed the world.

12:59 PM

editing questions should be refinement/clarification - not rewriting them completely

Having said that the solid core question one is good

Well, we know what the question is asking.

@Liath Yeah I agree, I liked the solid core one.

Jury's out on the one with the big hole

I've posted a commend requesting a definition of how the races interact with a reason why, and a smiley face :-)

1:04 PM

good comment

He is also new to SE in general.

got 21 points on german SE, thats about it

worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/622/… Answer isn't good, but I don't want to make them feel bad.

it's a terrible answer

lets hope they improve it :)

I want to downvote it :-/

1:19 PM

I think we need to be careful about downvotes, lets give new members the chance to improve them first

That's not to say don't downvote me if I talk rubbish - but let's guide new users towards good answers rather than simply dismissing them :) Particularly people new to SE in general

I'm not going to down-vote their first answer, what do you take me for >.>

2

a big meanie

Stephen and his music world question on the other hand is someone @TimB and myself know, and is just being lazy.

VTC too broad :P

Pity - I want to know where that question is going!

If he decides to put some effort into it, it could be a good question.

It probably comes from his love of playing bards.

1:24 PM

Is it just me or does the chat link keep appearing and disappearing from the sidebar since we went into beta? :(

Just you I think, but I'll keep an eye on it

githubphagocyte

@Liath which link do you mean?

Its there in meta, but not in regualar.

githubphagocyte

There's a chat link in the Stack Exchange drop down box at the top left of the page, but I haven't seen a chat link in the right hand panel on main in any site for a while.

1:37 PM

I think it's in some questions but not the home page and not every question

@githubphagocyte the "X people chatting" control

The dogs and cats question has got a reasonable answer - could do with a summary "this is how it relates to your planets" but it's pretty good :)

It is better now that there is a description of the interactions, certainly.

Michael Kjörling

@Mourdos It is a lot better IMO after the edit.

githubphagocyte

@Liath ah I see - you are talking about the chat side panel

@MichaelKjörling Yep. As I said about 2 seconds before :P

githubphagocyte

in that case it may be because you are also in another chat room

Michael Kjörling

1:40 PM

And yes, especially with newcomers to SE, it's almost always better to leave a comment first and suggest some specific improvements they can make, then come back to it some time later and vote on it at that point.

yeah, answer is improving a lot

Michael Kjörling

@Mourdos What do you take me for? ;)

I've held off on upvoting for now as it's still not great but they said they would come back to it again

Michael Kjörling

@TimB Yes, if we know the poster intends to come back to it later it might be worthwhile to hold off voting. It's certainly worthwhile to hold off downvoting on a SE newcomer's first post on the site when they say they intend to come back and edit it later.

I really want an answer there that talks about more than one type of interaction, but I'm too lazy and not knowledgeable enough about it to talk about the effects of media and tourism upon a culture, nor about how a rigid hierarchical society (cats) and a fairly free and loose society (dogs) would interact. It could go so far as to cause rebellion or attempts at planetry enslavement.

1:42 PM

original was downvotable...it's now upgraded to novotable....hopefully next edit be upvotable

Surely dogs would be heirarchical and cats anarchistic?

2

And how instant communications can lead to a rapid exchange of ideas as opposed to simply rumor and such

I don't know, I kind of see cats running gladiatorial combat with the mice on the planet.

and sitting around on cushions as their slaves do all the work.

githubphagocyte

@Liath I see a list of other chat rooms I'm in just below the avatars on the right. If I exit the other chat rooms then the list disappears. If I then refresh the chat page the link to other available chat rooms reappears.

businesscat.happyjar.com

Good answer in underground castles... experienced SE user though

hmm, I wonder if the area 51 thing has a daily graph option

rather than just showing the averages

Michael Kjörling

1:53 PM

@TimB Dogs aren't as strictly hieraical as wolves (to the extent that you can say that wolves are -- it's like saying a human family is hierarical because parents have the final say over their childen), but on the other hand dogs are neotonal wolves.

@MichaelKjörling True, however they are considerably more so than cats

Not sure what you mean by neotonal tho

Michael Kjörling

@TimB Neotenal, sorry. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoteny

yeah, dogs are basically wolves frozen in puppy state

thus, not hierarchical?

well they are, humans are pack leaders they are puppies. Puppies do what pack leaders say

they form heriarchy amongst themselves too

2:05 PM

Ha!

but a world of puppies would be fairly flat, hierarchical wise

You've obviously not met my sister's beagle!

I can see a world of cats being a very tall structure

poor training trumps genetics ;)

Dogs are totally hierarchical. My family has three and there is a pecking order. Who gets to eat first, who has first dibs on treats and water. Its pretty obvious in a house with more than one dog.

Michael Kjörling

2:06 PM

@Mourdos Feral dogs don't generally form packs the way wolves do.

@Vulcronos Yep, very much so

I was more thinking because they wouldn't care about being in charge

rather than because it was a pack

Michael Kjörling

I'm not really in a place where I can dig up references, but basically, feral dogs form acquaintances, wolves form packs. There is a marked difference between the two.

Having grown up in neighbourhoods with feral dogs, there is definitely a pecking order, but not necessarily the strict leader/minion dynamic probably implied by "pack." It's more like a street gang, really. And sometimes they adopt a wild pig as a member of the group.

Michael Kjörling

Within a wolf pack the structure resembles a human family more than a human workplace, with the parents fairly naturally at the "top".

2:09 PM

I now have an image of the democratic council of the dog world standing in front of the great kennel hall to welcome the queen of the cats in her cushioned carriage, who is wrinkling her nose as she absentmindedly scratches a half dead slave to watch him squirm.

Michael Kjörling

A pack is a family group.

@Mourdos Lol. Nice.

Michael Kjörling

This sounds like it could make a decent question on Pets rather than Worldbuilding, though ;)

Of course, in the context of the question, dogs and cats were probably just used to exemplify rather different cultures and species :)

indeed

@TimB I think they were surprised how much harder a hound was to train than a rabbit!

2:20 PM

There are some good new questions out there. Public beta is going to be fun. Wish I had time to answer some stuff now.

But there are also the standard balloon whales that just haven't read the faq and just ask a completely open ended question. But then again, it can be hard to ask good questions on this site.

yep

I'm going to start holding off for a while to let other people reply then I'll just fill in anything that I notice isn't covered

Mmm. I have concerns about the site's ability to fit into the SE ethos, but it's a much better fit than scifi.se (due to being about actionable practices), and that monstrosity got through.

lol

I think we need to worry more about the WB ethos and what works for this site than worry too much about the SE ethos (obviously learning from what has gone before - just not being ruled by it)

SE actually seems to be pretty flex. From what the community managers have said, if you can get something to work well, then they'll let it go. But if it doesn't work (turns into Yahoo answers or has no activity), they will just close it down.

0

Q: Solving the difficulties of a world based on harmonics

If you were to do a plane or world where music interacts with everything and instruments are essentially able to influence reality based on how they are played, what would be the practical difficulties? Where might such a world fall apart, and what would you suggest as caveats to prevent that ...

magic fantasy-based harmonics music

its been edited

much more specific now

I started a re-open vote

2:28 PM

The issue, as I see it, is that the SE system is designed to support a fairly specific paradigm. While redefining the context of the paradigm is often successful, speculative and brainstorming type topics often aren't just a matter of re-framing.

We seem to be doing fairly well over here so far

The only way Worldbuilding can really succeed, I suspect, is to crack down hard on "research" and "speculation" questions which don't provide an actionable context.

2

githubphagocyte

Here's hoping the high meta activity is maintained in public beta

yep. I expect we'll see a frequent cycle of closing questions, they get edited then re-opened

Otherwise we run into the "anything is on topic if I'm building a world related to it" problem. By requiring actionable contexts, we re-define those questions so worldbuilding experts are better suited to answer them than, say, biologists or historians.

2:31 PM

I think one of the keys for a question to be on topic is that something has to be different than the real world. Otherwise it should just go on one of the entirely factual sites

(I'm well aware that by this criterion, the only question I've asked so far should be closed.)

@Vulcronos I disagree. Plenty of good questions do not have anything different from the real world

githubphagocyte

@TimB You beat me to it

@TimB What sort of questions are you thinking of?

githubphagocyte

I think it's difficult to use "the real world" in such an exclusion. Does that mean Earth, or the current laws of physics, or our galaxy...?

2:33 PM

21

Q: How quickly and accurately did news travel in rural medieval Europe?

I'd like to have a realistic idea of how, and how accurately, ordinary people in a rural low-tech setting should expect to hear news from outside their own communities, and it seems that looking to our own world's history might be helpful. In medieval Europe, if you didn't personally travel (whi...

history communication

githubphagocyte

17

Q: What would a planet spinning fast enough to allow geostationary orbit near the surface look like?

From an answer to a previous question of mine: A planet spinning fast enough to allow geostationary orbit near the surface would result in odd side effects. Any object at rest on the equator would be moving at speed near to orbital speed. It would have weight but much less than similar objec...

planets science-based biology geography climate

3

Q: Life on an Earth-like planet with solid core?

How big a difference does the Earth's liquid outer core and mantle make for the evolution of complex life? If all of Earth's parameters would be the same, but it had a solid interior just like Mars, would we still have an atmosphere, liquid water, and a moon? How much weaker would our magnetic ...

science-based planets habitable life

Hahaha.

Aye, it's not about the world being different but about the building of the world. Which is a subtle nuance but an important one: even if I'm designing a totally contemporary, realistic, true-to-life setting for my game, I'm going to be making design choices which support the kind of story I want to tell: that's worldbuilding.

5

2

Q: Would there be any reason to bore a tunnel entirely through a world?

I am looking to have a Tunnel drilled through a world and deal with the physics of What happens in the centre of a planet, what happens with the heat at the core and whether it is faster to travel through a planet. However I'm interested in a reason for doing this? Obviously with any form of su...

etc

2:34 PM

The act of worldbuilding has meta-level purpose behind it.

githubphagocyte

@BESW That sums it up really well.

The "why am I making this world?" element --the actionable context-- is what lets us separates good answers from bad, what makes a question more than a request for idle armchair thought experiments.

2

githubphagocyte

We appear to have 31 new users since going public. They won't all become active users but it's nice to see...

3

That makes sense

@githubphagocyte Thanks. The relationship between worldbuilding, storytelling, and purpose, is something very closely connected to many parts of my life (role-playing games, graphic design work, religion, education and training), so... I think about it a lot.

Speaking of RPGs, I've got another session of the Wild West mining town game in the morning so I should go to bed.

githubphagocyte

2:47 PM

Sleep is a great place for world building...

(The town rabbi is going to have a vision in which he walks the sephirot. I'm eager to see how it turns out.)

goodnight

ttfn

[waves]

What do people think about worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/625/… after the edit?

2:55 PM

I think it's much better now, there's enough to build on

I started both the close and the reopen votes :)

underground defences and tunnel through the world have both had over 500 views...

2

Nice!

edited your question Liath, trying to make the title clearer

2

Thanks for the new title @TimB, much better

3:33 PM

Who's going wild with the stars?

2

Dunno :)

We have 2 questions with over 600 views

if they keep going up at this rate I'm going to start a meta post sweepstake for which breaks 1000 first

:-)

post a question, with a "for-fun" tag, everyone entering posts a guess for total views on both questions at a certain date and places a 50 rep bounty on the question...at that time the winner gets awarded all the placed rep

Hi rep sweepstakes

xD

3:43 PM

It's a massive subversion of the bounty system :D

I have 400 Amazon EC2 instances that say my answer will be correct. ;)

lol

400? seems excessive

600 + 400 = 1000

If they each run for under a minute the cost would be insignificant

ahh

I realized that that doesn't give enough options anyway, that's why I changed it to guess the combined total number of views

Yeah

Anyway, I have been thinking of a question and wanted to run it by you all to see if it was worth asking.
I am working on a fantasy world where I tie each race to a particular aspect of the world. In my case, I am struggling to find a classic fantasy race to tie to water. Purely aquatic species such as mermaids are not allowed. Is asking for race suggestions on topic?

3:57 PM

Hmmm

Just use Nereids and be done with it :)

the question's borderline, might be worth starting a meta discussion. I can see arguments both ways

@TimB What do you think makes it borderline?

4:42 PM

hello world builders!

5:09 PM

@Vulcronos The question seems to be suited to either mythology (if old world) or RPG (if using a specific game system) stack exchange. I think on balance it probably is on topic but something feels a bit off and I can't put my finger on what

Wow...887 views....are we on the "hot topics" page or something?

@TimB I am creating my own fantasy world and trying to pick and choose what races to include. Dwarves are obviously earth. Just struggling with water. There isn't a specific gaming system I am using and I don't care about myths. I want to see if there is a race that modern readers would associate with water before creating my own.

That makes sense

post it, see what happens :)

@TimB Will do.

1 hour later…

githubphagocyte

6:20 PM

borderline questions are exactly what we need...

@githubphagocyte Yeah, I thought of this question after your magnetic shield one then we went public before I had time to nail it down :p

githubphagocyte

@Vulcronos now that we're public we can still test the borders - that process will be going on even after we graduate to a full site.

@githubphagocyte True. It was just annoying.

githubphagocyte

Will you still post the question?

My first thought was pirates...

I know that's not really a species/race but it's what came to mind

Yes

It is my plan

I am just at work now

When I get some down time it will go up.

githubphagocyte

6:30 PM

I think specifying whether you want them to be associated with deep ocean, surface ocean, or just water generally (rivers/rain) will help make it narrow enough.

I am

I specifically want them to be a combo of surface ocean/rivers. They control the element of water still live on land.

Because my idea is they are the trading faction of my world

githubphagocyte

Ah that makes sense

They use their water affinity to monopolize ocean going trade

7:18 PM

0

Q: The first few things to note down about an imaginary culture

When I want to populate a fantasy world with different regions and their cultures, I have problems knowing where to start. Recently I used a quick-and-dirty technique that I could call "cultural mash-up". I note down that a particular area is a (-n unlikely) mix of e.g. renaissance Italy and me...

culture government

hmm, on topic - maybe too broad?

but he's asking for starting points not the world-on-a-stick

so maybe not too broad eitheR?

7:44 PM

I think asking for a framework and key points to focus on when creating a culture is just barely not too broad.

githubphagocyte

It sounds like seeking advice on how to do the work, rather than asking for the creative work to be done by us, so that sounds on topic to me. As for too broad I don't know. I'd like to see this accepted - it doesn't suggest a string of other questions that would be too broad if we allow this one. Seems like a useful reference question to have on the site.

3 hours later…

10:32 PM

And it's on 1k views already....

10:44 PM

Dang

No rep farming

BTW, just posted my question from earlier:
http://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/667/what-fantasy-race-has-an-affinity-for-water

We will see if I kept it on topic/not too broad.

Its actually my first question on any stack exchange site :p

11:08 PM

I've reached my daily vote limit :o

You overachiever

I hit the rep cap about 10 hours ago :p

If only I had that issue :)

3 answers got me 200 rep

210 actually if it wasn't capped

so my other 2 or 3 answers/questions got me nothing today

it happens :)

Nice. Glad to see someone else enjoying the site as well.

11:22 PM

I mostly answer for the sake of answering, reputation is a by product

some really interesting questions here

There are.

On my question I saw you upvote ivy_lnxy answer

While I don't think we need to close it for links only

I thought we might ask him to give more descriptive link titles

The name of the race is yours

honestly I think he's fine in this case (and I did the same in my answer)

oh I see what you mean

hmm, yeah

But in addition to copywrite concerns:
an invitation for downvotes

more from star wars
aren't very descriptive

this is very true

Even if your link goes down I can search for sirens

11:24 PM

mine still have the name of the thing even if you remove the link

I can't search for an invitation for downvotes

his falls at the link only hurdle cos if you remove the markup it's meaningless

Yeah

very good point

left a comment

Thanks

11:27 PM

right, bedtime

goodnight

Night

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