Talk:Old Man Murray

Time to Crate
For what it's worth, "Time to crate" is not just a "for example" as noted in the article. It was the high point of OMM and is the article that everyone in the industry remembers and cites. If only there were a verifiable source. Tempshill (talk) 18:00, 5 July 2009 (UTC)


 * The Gabriel Knight "death of adventure games" theme was also fairly popular, although oddly the current revision of the article only alludes to it; the theme pops up in Wikipedia's own article on Gabriel Knight 3, and is mentioned for example in this article from Gamasutra circa 2007. "Famously, Old Man Murray’s Erik Wolpaw referred to one of the title’s puzzles as “genuinely deranged”." -Ashley Pomeroy (talk) 19:18, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Propose a recent media coverage/controversy section
Considering the amount of attention this page's erroneous, possibly malicious deletion has attracted, wouldn't it be an idea to link back to some of those articles? — Preceding unsigned comment added by AnonyGnome (talk • contribs) 06:16, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Provided that they're reliable sites, like Rock, Paper, Shotgun. Yes. If you need any help with which sites are considered reliable and which are not, have a look at WP:VG/RS or drop the links here and I'll go through them. - X201 (talk) 09:04, 4 March 2011 (UTC)


 * BoingBoing covered it today. Waitak (talk) 12:56, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Slashdot discussion here. 46.116.176.5 (talk) 13:07, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

This actually would be a bad idea here. Unless there's better documentation on the grudge between the parties involved, the dispute has nothing to do with OMM itself as a website. If anything, this scenario would be info for a page (if there was one) about criticism of WP, but I can't seem to find a good point for it. --M ASEM (t) 13:21, 4 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Rock, Paper, Shotgun have published another article on OMM. The best way to describe it is that its a meta reference. - X201 (talk) 14:21, 4 March 2011 (UTC)


 * The best thing to do is take that article, and any other articles from RS's that, while discussing the notability issue here, give commentary on their impressions of OMM, and make a "Legacy" section, providing selected dropquotes from the RPS article and others. --M ASEM (t) 14:38, 4 March 2011 (UTC)


 * The new article, at the very least, obviously requires some mention, as it's an excellent explanation of OMM's ongoing importance in game journalism and the industry as a whole, the whole sorry tie-died wikiadmin circle-jerk mess that resulted in its deletion should probably end up on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notability_in_Wikipedia#Controversy, i suppose, rather than being completely swept under the carpet.
 * In the revision history for this article, I added a section on the controversy. Perhaps that content could be added into the section you linked to above? --Omnitographer (talk) 03:22, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
 * As I mention above, the issue of the deletion of this article is not significant to the topic of Old Man Murray the website. It may be something with controversy of Wikipedia, with Chet or Erik and their past and/or ongoing feud, but not to this article.  Now, all these sources that came about due to this that provide commentary on OMM and its legacy, like the RPS article today, all should be included in the legacy section.  But we shouldn't mention anything about this deletion issue here. --M ASEM  (t) 03:27, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Deletionists make me angry. Keep this page up! -Eagleapex (talk) 15:10, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * How did this article actually get deleted in the first place? The AFD page was 90% Keep. What admin/editor completely fell asleep on that one? 71.237.250.168 (talk) 04:12, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * "Consensus" can have special meaning for special people on wikipedia, alas. 121.45.228.201 (talk) 04:34, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

"The Notability of Old Man Murray"
10 seconds of Google searching has come up with sources that I believe meet WP:RS, but as one of the un-initiated, I don't know what to do with them. Someone more experienced will have to deal with putting them to good use.

The first is a article entitled "Interaction and Narrative" by Michael Mateas (see: http://users.soe.ucsc.edu/~michaelm/publications.html for bona fides) and Andrew Stern at UCSC which Google Scholar indicates is formally cited by 8 other papers, and is casually mentioned by 101 articles. The article is part of the following publication: The Game Design Reader: A Rules of Play Anthology, edited by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman, pages 642-669, Boston, MA, USA: MIT Press. 2005

The second is The Designer's Notebook: Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! VI By Ernest Adams, published in Gamasutra June 3, 2005 (http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20050603/adams_01.shtml)see bottom of page 4.

The third is "bloggers such as ... “Old Man Murray” are among the most respected commentators and journalists." from "Critical education in an interactive age", author Kurt D. Squire (http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=author%3AKurt+author%3AD+author%3ASquire&btnG=Search&as_sdt=0%2C5&as_ylo=&as_vis=0), University of Wisconsin-Madison, published in 'Mirror Reflections: Popular Culture and Education" (Peter Lang, 2008). Seems to have several citations. (I am not an expert citations researcher).

The fourth is from gamecareerguide.com (which has some 70+ academic citations). The article "10 Trends in Game Design) cites Old Man Murray's Crate System (citation 15). (http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/647/10_trends_in_game_.php?print=1)

So there are four references from sources that I believe should pass muster. It took me less than one minute to find them, and perhaps 15 minutes to copy and paste them here. I am sure I could find more with a moderate investment of time should more be needed to establish notability.

I hope that the community can put these references to good use.

Rock Paper Shotgun have published an article with many quotes from industry stalwarts; there's some material there that could benefit the article:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/03/04/the-remarkable-notability-of-old-man-murray/

Paul Moloney (talk) 14:25, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I've thrown it in as yet another citation for the site's influence on the video games industry. It's probably not the best place for it, and someone could probably come up with a better use for it, but at least it's on the article. Delusibeta (talk) 15:41, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The Brian Lee O'Malley quote is of particular interest, as it shows influence outside of gaming/internet circles. 97.120.237.30 (talk) 17:48, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

If it happened it is notable. OMM happened and had a big influence on the gaming industry as it is today, if at least in an indirect manner. I thought Wikipedia was founded exactly to record history and knowledge, whatever it is, not just a selective outtake dictated by the views of the admins at the time. ChromeBallz (talk)
 * If it happened actually has nothing to do with notability, it's the influence part that's important. Even though the phraseology of Wikipedia is "the sum of all human knowledge", it's really the sum of all important and notable knowledge. Old Man Murray is important because of its influence on gaming as a whole, not just because it existed. Silver  seren C 23:08, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I beg to differ - If something happened it is a part of history AND human knowledge. Wikipedia is one of the few instances where the paradigm of "history is written by the victors" can be sidestepped. Pretending OMM never happened is bad practice for anyone who respects knowledge - Knowledge knows no grades or scores, and right now i'm getting really scared that Wikipedia, the very champion of this philosophy, is degrading into a community where knowledge can only exist as long as the admins allow it. I shouldn't have to elaborate on the term 'slippery slope'. ChromeBallz (talk) 20:42, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The standards for notability are far too malleable to mean anything. Notability is conferred over time, not by an arbitrary system of determining "influence." Wikipedia should err on the side of caution, adding any suggested article to the site and letting notability reveal itself by what is maintained and referred to over the years. Server space is not at a premium, so no real degradation of the service is inflicted by this, and it removes the inevitable capriciousness of "delete" nominations and votes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ToutSuite  (talk • contribs)  02:24, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Let's try to keep this talk page focused on improving the article. The notability guidelines are what they are – they've been developed by hundreds if not thousands of editors and have had widespread consensus for years. If you feel like you have some new insight on the matter the place to raise it is Wikipedia talk:Notability, not here. — Joseph Roe Tk • Cb, 08:43, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Joseph, you do realize notability is a guideline? You understand what the word guideline means? There is very little consensus about notability. Most of the recent deletionist scandals all occurred because of abuse by admins due to the overzealous application of the dubious notability guidelines. 96.255.227.52 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 17:47, 13 March 2011 (UTC).

Status
Listed as a Start, but considering the amount of effort put in over the past 48 hours and how far the people making it have come, it definitely reads more like a C on its way to a B these days. 216.41.16.82 (talk) 18:37, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

bn
Oxford Capacity Analysis —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.48.13.234 (talk) 23:53, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

New Sections
Adam.Wasserman (talk) 02:48, 14 March 2011 (UTC) Again please excuse any newbie errors I may have made in editing the main article. I decided to show initiative andtry and figure out for myself how to add the citations I found. I hope I did a decent job, apologies if I muffed it in any way.

Adam.Wasserman (talk) 20:45, 13 March 2011 (UTC) Please excuse any newbie-type errors I might make. I have never participated in a discussion page before.


 * They look good. The only thing I want to note is that the links need to be turned into actual references and not just in-prose links to sources. Silver  seren C 02:51, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Just saying something was cited in something else is poor writing, though the sources appear good. I've taken a major step to group the "Start to Crate" and the "Death of Ad. Games" commentary together to incorporate these new sources  too. --M ASEM  (t) 03:26, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Past tense in lede
The lede can use some clarity as it uses the past tense when describing the site while the website still seems to be a live link. Is the tense used because it was an active page that has subsequently become an archive? —Ost (talk) 19:05, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Old Man Murray is no longer active and has had no activity for several years. Since 2003, I believe. While the website itself still works, there has been no new news reports or any other significant activity since then, which is why it is referred to in the past tense. Silver  seren C 20:31, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks; that is what I thought. It should be made clear in the lede; it is still a website, but it was written and updated. —Ost (talk) 21:14, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Start date?
There is no mention of when OMM began; I would expect a History section, but failing there should be at least an indication of the start year. Languagehat (talk) 17:43, 22 May 2016 (UTC)