dvgrn wrote: November 5th, 2024, 9:13 am
confocaloid wrote: November 5th, 2024, 5:10 am
Imagine the link is removed. Does the same text still make sense? Does it read the same way?
[...]
Why should we have to bother imagining that a link is removed? In each case, the link is right there. It's supposed to be there. It conveys very useful information -- just by its presence, without anyone having to click it. The existence of the link reliably conveys a key fact: "
this set of words is a defined term elsewhere on the LifeWiki".
[...]
In the case of the wiki page
"Period-36 glider gun", the hyperlinks do not convey any "key fact" other than that there is a linked page (which might be a redirect). All mentioned usernames in the linked edit are forum usernames. It is inconsistent and arbitrary to use quotes for some usernames but not all of them, and it is inconsistent and arbitrary to use the label "forum user" for some but not all of them. That does not depend on presence of hyperlinks at all; the negative impression and consequences of such inconsistencies remains the same.
In the case of the wiki page
"Period-49 glider gun (April 2023)", the hyperlink in the sentence "The gun uses two [[
p49 pi-heptomino hassler]]s." fails to convey the intended information.
That link misleads the reader into believing[1] that "p49 pi-heptomino hassler" is a notable type of hassler oscillators, and that the linked page will list multiple known examples of "p49 pi-heptomino hasslers" which are considered noteworthy enough for inclusion. Then the claim "The gun uses two p49 pi-heptomino hasslers" reads as a claim that the gun uses two different hassler oscillators of that type (which is false, because the gun actually uses two instances of the same hassler oscillator).
Following the link again contradicts the likely intuitive meaning of the sentence; instead of listing multiple known examples of "p49 pi-heptomino hassler", the page only talks about one specific example, without any justification of this.
[1]: it is reasonable to expect that the reader of the page about a p49 glider gun is already familiar with the ideas/concepts of a "hassler oscillator", a "pi-heptomino hassler" as a specific kind of hassler oscillator, and the abbreviation "p49" meaning "period-49".
I think both the linking page and the linked page need to be changed. The linking page should be reworded to directly and clearly say that the gun uses
two instances of the same hassler oscillator. The linked page should be either rewritten to become a list of all noteworthy examples of "p49 pi-heptomino hassler", or else renamed so that the pagename clearly implies that the page is about a single specific oscillator.
dvgrn wrote: November 5th, 2024, 9:13 am[...]
In
the article with the edit you're objecting to, we'd have
"forum user Adam P. Goucher", "forum user iNoMed", "forum user David Raucci", "forum user James Pascua", "forum user BlinkerSpawn", "forum user ElijahKen", "forum user Period1GliderGun" ...
[...]
That is incorrect. Three out of names you mentioned aren't forum usernames, so "forum user" should not be used for those. The other four usernames all unambiguously read as usernames even without quote marks and prefixing them with labels.
dvgrn wrote: November 5th, 2024, 9:13 am
[...]
We already have good consistency in this article. It's just that the consistent rule that the article is following is
"
every first use of a user identifier should either have a link to the relevant LifeWiki user article, if one exists -- or it should be preceded by the words 'forum user' if the information in question is coming from the forums."
My point is that your proposed "rule" is a bad rule. It leads to negative consequences for the wiki articles.
By reading articles trying to follow your "rule", a reader is likely to get wrong impression about the local community.
I think labels such as "forum user" should be discarded entirely. Especially when not applied consistently, this carries a negative connotation, creating an impression that people here somehow discriminate each other into "forum users" and community members.