[game_preservation] The role of comment/opinion on referencing game history articles/things

[Andrew Armstrong]

Ahh, neat comments on your project Cast-Offs there! I see what you mean 
about praise versus comments.

On 12/02/2010 04:22, Melanie Swalwell wrote:

> I think your question goes to deeper issues on doing game history, 

> certainly methodological ones, but also the fact that users and fans 

> are the keepers of much knowledge on game history (i.e. rather than 

> institutions).  For me, asking for contributions from people is one of 

> the most important ways -- often the only way -- to fill in some of 

> the 'gaps'.  It's something I'm very keen on.  Eg. I did a pilot 

> project in 2007 to map the local early software scene in New Zealand, 

> and built a database and solicited for contributions.  Asking people 

> what they did and what they know is *the* only way to find out about 

> this material.  In a (planned) Australian game history and 

> preservation project, we plan to expand this into a Popular Memory 

> Archive.  It will help to document the games as understood through 

> experience, rather than simply as artefact.

>

> If you're interested, the Early NZ Software Database is here: 

> http://nztronix.org.nz/main.php

Absolutely, soliciting these kinds of comments is partially why I 
brought it up - it's a larger issue of "historians don't know everything 
to start with" (even the most reliably informed ones), and thus things 
might be comments more then actual facts.


> Your question was about commenting on references, though.  Don't forum 

> discussions capture the type of commentary you're envisaging?  

> Wouldn't linking a forum thread (say) to a particular entry in a 

> bibliographic database achieve this?


Forum feedback, or moderated commented discussion would be somewhat 
suitable - of course email feedback/form feedback too, as such. I always 
am wary thinking about having, say, if we did get this kind of thing 
activated (even if it was only of minor use and updated not hugely), 
that if such unmoderated comments were shown with the articles 
information that it'd be both good and bad - if someone badmouths 
something, or praises it and that is actually wrong, you'd need to start 
deleting items (or posting to the effect that they are wrong) and it 
gets really complex! :)

Possibly if the forum/feedback area was entirely separate from the main 
entries and that amendments and comments had to be basically added by 
the entry writers - after some discussion with whoever brought up the 
feedback (such as "That thing got this date of release wrong!!11!" and 
having to check that was the case, since even dates of release are not 
concrete).

Thanks for your thoughts, lots to think about, and I think the NZ 
database system of contribution is something at least worth doing after 
moderation - typically if it is articles (which will be the first thing 
to concentrate on, since Google isn't all knowing), then these are 
typically easier to accept submissions of compared to software, which 
might make it easier.

Andrew