User talk:Kameejl/test

I've found Manual of Style (infoboxes) and thought it might be a good idea to compare the infoboxes guideline of Media and journalism infoboxes and see if other guidelines have information on line breaks/comma separation (the album, song and this infobox is part of Media and journalism).

Explicit use of line break (per infobox guidelines):
 * Infobox Film
 * director, producer, writer, narrator, starring, music, cinematography, editing, distributor, released, language, preceded_by, followed_by


 * Infobox Radio Show
 * presenter, starring, announcer, creator, writer, director, producer, executive_producer


 * Infobox Television
 * show_name_2, genre, creator, developer, presenter, starring, judges, voices

Implicit use of line break (per infobox example):
 * Infobox Broadcast
 * station_slogan, founded (date), callsign_meaning, former_callsigns, former_affiliations, effective_radiated_power


 * Infobox Newspaper
 * price


 * Infobox TV channel
 * picture format


 * Infobox Musical artist (as for now)
 * Genre, associated_acts

Explicit use of comma (per infobox guidelines):
 * Infobox Album
 * Director, Genre, Producer


 * Infobox Musical artist
 * Years_active, labels

Implicit use of comma (per infobox example):
 * Infobox Musical artist
 * Occupation


 * Infobox Single
 * Format, Label

I also scanned through the Person infobox templates and haven't found any implicit or explicit use of commas. Except for album and musical artist no comma separator is prescribed (in all the templates I analysed). Looking through all those infoboxes makes me think comma use is rather rare.

I think if an infobox gets too long because a section gets to many entries (e.g. a band having 20 associated acts) then the section probably contains information that is far to detailed or not notable enough to be in the infobox; information that should be featured in the article body only. The best way to deal with an infobox with too many entries in not to separate the entries with commas - as this will bearly reduce the height - but to move the less notable entries to an article section. In the infobox can feature (more) or (see below) to link to the additional, more detailed content.

It might be desirable to have a maximum of entries for each section (f.e. associated acts, members, occupation). For example, if

This solution will:
 * Reduce infobox height
 * Encourage editors to write content, focus more on the body of an article


 * Reduce the amount of information in an infobox that isn't featured in the article
 * An infobox should only contain redundant information, information already featured in the article


 * Remove less important information from the infobox
 * Details don't need to be in the infobox, as it is a quick overview.

Two examples are Massacre (band) and Dog Eat Dog (band).

Kameejl (Talk) 13:30, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

For all I care this "aim for generality" guideline could be removed. Being as general is possible may get rid of some genre problems but brings along other problems: If a genre is notable enough to have its own article on wikipedia, its notable enough to be in the infobox. Kameejl (Talk) 00:38, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Other categorization problems: What's the most general form of lets say grindcore? Hardcore punk? Death metal? Heavy metal? Metal? Punk? Rock? "Popular music"?
 * Infobox would be less useful: If you look around on websites like www.allmusic.com, www.rockdetector.com, www.metal-archives.com, www.metal-observer.com you'll notice that detailed genre information is displayed in band/album profiles. That's not because it is pretty but because it is useful and interesting information.


 * Aiming for generality makes the genre label in the infobox useless as 80% will have rock or pop infoe

I'd like to have groove metal in the Pantera infobox, nut we should look at sources. Is groove metal a genre generaly attributed to Pantera? Allmusic states: "there was no greater metal band during the early to mid-'90s than Pantera, who inspired a legion of rabid fans and whose oft-termed "groove metal" style bucked all prevailing trends of the day".

For all I care this "aim for generality" guideline could be removed or altered to reflect common practice. Being as general is possible may get rid of some genre problems but brings along other problems:
 * Other categorization problems: What's the most general form of lets say grindcore? Would it be hardcore punk? Death metal? Heavy metal? Metal? Punk? Rock? "Popular music"? Where do we draw the line? It's clear f.e. "death metal influenced progressive symphonic black metal" is too specific. But "heavy metal" is too general in many cases. Is grindcore general enough? Is jazz-fusion general enough? Is death metal general enough?
 * Infobox would be less useful: If you look around on websites like www.allmusic.com, www.rockdetector.com, www.metal-archives.com, www.metal-observer.com you'll notice that detailed genre information is displayed in band/album profiles. That's not because it is pretty but because it is useful and interesting information.

We should be realistic and look at sources. If a band is labeled melodic death metal by the majority of the press then it's realistic to have MDM in the infobox. If a genre is notable enough to have its own article on wikipedia, its notable enough to be in the infobox. Kameejl (Talk) 14:07, 24 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Aiming for generality makes the genre label in the infobox useless as 80% will have rock or pop infoe