Forums / Site-Related

After I realized how dumb my previous thread was, I have come up with a better idea: The “Is it a meme” checklist.

I thought that when creating an entry, there should be a checklist that you have to fill out. It would look something like this:

Does your entry have at least three paragraphs? (Yes/No)
Has your entry already been made? (Yes/No)
Does your entry contain any explicit content? (Yes/No)
Is your entry neat and easy to read? (Yes/No)
Did you explain the meme? (Yes/No)
Does your entry have any examples? (Yes/No)
Name some sites this meme is used on: ______________________________

If they filled out all the correct things, then the meme would be uploaded to the public. If they did not fill all of the correct things, then the entry would have to be reviewed by moderators to see if it will be public.

Only problem with this is that anyone who knows or who can guess the correct answers can still go off and create a poorly written entry.

On the plus side, if they lie about not meeting certain criteria, this makes deadpooling and potential banning much easier.

I don’t know.

You know, when they added the page that confronts you before you make a meme entry, I thought we got rid of that problem of crappy entries…

…but no… there are still idiots/trolls. (We can’t know for sure what they are because of Poe’s law.)

This would probably just serve as a botheration, particularly to those more savvy entry creators that would have to bypass this checklist. In addition, please explain how, in practicality, every entry submitted would be able to conform to all of these standards.

The reason I’m skeptical about the prospect of this idea being efficacious is that new members interested in presenting legitimate entries could potentially be abashed about the checklist. In the same light as restraining new members from contributing for a set period of time, this deprecates new member contribution, something the site wants to avoid. It makes the older members appear to be pompous and grandiloquent.

I personally think that the only problem is that people get too worked up over the Deadpool section of entries, because most of them were submitted by brand new members. Give the entry moderators time to do their jobs and there is no need for a system like this. Nobody is forcing anybody to comment on or even look at deadpooled entries anyway. How direct limitations on newer members are is irrelevant: they are still limitations.

Also, we already have a page that users must proceed through before creating an entry. Quite a similar (and possibly redundant) function, this would be.

• Users could easily lie. Even a sheep can guess the correct answers on that checklist, bypassing it is just too easy. It wouldn’t help.
• Please describe the criteria for “easy to read” and “explaining the meme”. All those factors are opinion based and differ per individual, and impossible to leave to an automated system.
• Sometimes you want to just launch an entry and leave the work for later, even mods and staff have those moments. No way all the entries we launch meet those criteria. Everyone would suffer from such a checklist.
• If they don’t meet the criteria yet still submit their entry, do they make a target for a ban? Would you want to punish users for trying to contribute to the community? That’s just rough man.
• Sure they can try to do some more work first, but we all know not everyone is willing to do that chore. We lose a potentially good entry with this, there are no winners.
• We don’t force you to look at newly submitted entries or deadpooled entries! The only person you’re bothering with looking at them is yourself!
• + Add an Entry Click it. As you can see, we already have a much simpler version of what you’re requesting here.

If they don’t meet the criteria yet still submit their entry, do they make a target for a ban? Would you want to punish users for trying to contribute to the community? That’s just rough man.

This.

I think being less strict about entries relative to the user is a good idea, especially in context with the meme (too little information) or the user (at least they started it up, and perhaps included good, difficult to find information, even if the entry is not amazing).

I made a thread a while ago similar to this in that i stated what i thought should be included in entries, albeit not in the form of a checklist – but more as a general guideline; i think it’s also pretty fair to both regular users as well as more serious writers. It’s possibly outdated and few people noticed it, but there it is.

This isn’t an “is it a meme” checklist, rather a “is this a decent entry” checklist. Plus, it’s all in the rules. You should know what to do.

Mister J raises a good point. The objective of the site is to document memes, and a well-written entry concerning a topic that is not a meme still focuses on a topic that is not a meme. If the topic of an entry is not a meme, the entry is deadpooled. As has been said earlier, the checklist is quite easy to pass, and will likely prove to be rankling in time.

Like I said earlier, limiting brand new members is not good, because it is apparent that your suggestion would act as a provisional vehicle to prevent low-quality entries…often associated with new members. Those who joined the site earlier cannot act with such elitism; it is discrepant to the objective of the site.