Infosphere:Conference Table/Old format

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Article introductions
Several articles, especially episode articles, commentary, comics and the game articles don't have an introduction to what the article is about. It would be nice if we could have some introductions, even if it would just a bit of a repeat of what was in the infobox, e.g.;
 * Space Pilot 3000 is the first episode of season 1 and was aired 28 March, 1999.

Some articles may have longer introductions, if there is something special to mention, e.g. Futurama Returns was read aloud at Comic-Con. Indeed, that whole article only hints at it was read aloud, not really mentioned anywhere in the article. --SvipTalk 13:43, 5 July 2008 (CEST)
 * Yup, that sounds fair enough. Especially for the longer ones. - Quolnok 13:55, 5 July 2008 (CEST)

get used to it ,you cant stop me

Image standards and choices
I have been dealing with a lot of thoughts regarding the images on our wiki, both legally, picking and standards.

First of all, licencing. I think we need a standard box on every image page (could use one of those MediaWiki: messages to add it), stating the usage, the licence and whatnot about the image. I know we have our disclaimer page, but it would be neater for legal reasons to have it on the image page. Now I know, we have not yet have any legal issues regarding our images yet, but it is better to beat the competition before they reaches us.

Then is picking. A good example of what I am worried about is the Dr. John A. Zoidberg article. I don't like the choice of picture for this article, especially because Zoidberg is only drawn with teeth in 3 episodes, making the picture giving a misrepresentation of him. Another example is Kif Kroker, no where else do we use the design sketch for characters in their infobox, however, speaking of design sketches, I think they should be supplied in every article they are available (so, at least all main characters and major secondary characters). Then comes a third example, a bit different, as to supply my thoughts, the Zapp Brannigan article. While the picture is not extremely bad, I think we can actually provide a better picture. I am speaking of the picture where he says "I am the man with no name", cause the facial expression and line sums the Zapp Brannigan character up quite well. And it omits having Kif in the picture.

Standards is basically a relying on the picking, plus some more technical issues. I propose that for every character article, where an image can be provided, it must have been taken from the show or film (depending on where the character is). If a design sketch is available for a character, it must be provided in the article, but only as an image within the article, to give air to the article, and avoid give the reader the feeling that it is not just text. While content is good, images helps. And lastly, this is not a standard, but rather an encouragement, if you see an image for a character, and think it can be done better, don't hesitate, don't go silent, provide arguments in its talk page, be either the image's talk page or the character article's talk page.

There was probably more I wanted to add, but I forget now. But I guess this is enough to get some discussion started. --SvipTalk 22:36, 16 November 2008 (UTC)


 * A lot of those early pics were uploaded by myself (at the time, there were no other users who could get screenshots of DVD's...) and I tried to use the following standards:


 * A full-screen image (I think the first Zapp pic was a cropped close-up)
 * As soon after the character first appeared as possible (keeping the first criterion in mind)
 * The Character depicted should, if possible, be the only character on screen
 * Fairly representative of the character (keeping the first two criteria in mind)
 * So that's where we get a lot of the primary and secondary character pics. But I'm all for updating them. Especially if it'll look better in the long run. Especially, as you note, the teeth thing. Zoidberg shouldn't have teeth (I didn't even notice them in the pic, so good observation), so it should really be updated. And Zapp's should have Kiff removed. I think I picked that image because it was so boastful that it was perfect, but it does have another character in the image, so it's not ideal. And now that nearly all of our members can provide screenshots, there's no reason they can't be updated. As for the character design sketches, they actually used to be on several pages, but they were deemed unsuitable for the main image, and they just went away. I'm sure they're still in the database, and they'd be fine lower down the page, but they just weren't good main images (as you pointed out for Kif). --Buddy 23:18, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Tenth Anniversary?
It is soon getting the 28th of March. And while we can all start debating when Futurama really started, 28 March is a safe bet, cause that would mark the airing of the first episode of Futurama on air. In such an occasion, and our ca. 1% way to the year 3000 since then, I think we should celebrate it with a Main Page redrawing and keep it on for a week, specifically the one in which the 28th of March falls.

Exactly how remains sketchy, but we still have a month's planning. --SvipTalk 10:30, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
 * At the very least we can change the tags to something. - Quolnok 11:00, 25 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Like "My God, a percentage of a million years!" ? --SvipTalk 11:15, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I would also like to add, that the new CSS design is planned to be released upon the anniversary. --SvipTalk 17:51, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

So, are we or any other Futurama sites planning anything? --Buddy 04:35, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

New Futurama shirt!
Thinkgeek.com has just released a new shirt for all the nerdlingers of the world! --Buddy 00:49, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Okay, nobody seemed to care last time, but I just noticed that Amazon has loads of shirts. Including the Bender one from my profile pic. And a lot of other cool stuff. I just ordered the Futurama coasters. And there are nifty keychains, too. Go buy some merch! --Buddy 01:04, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

New CSS!
It has crossed my mind occasionally in the past since we got the new skin that it could be even better. And finally I have taken steps in that direction. You can see the new code at User:Svip/monobook.css, which - if you want to use it - can "transclude" to your own  User:/monobook.css  page with using, that way, when I update it, yours will be updated as well. However, it will also mean you may spot oddities at time.

I present to you my first screenshot of the progress. Oh and, don't mind all my tabs. It's the design that is in focus. A note, if you will, when you select the search field, its background lights up (to indicate focus, obviously). --SvipTalk 13:57, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Not sure I like the orangey colour, but it probably looks better in practice. We could also use maybe a semi-tranparent PNG for the BG of the search field, and then an opaque or less-transparent one when it's got focus. There's a similar thing in some elements of Vista which I like. Just a suggestion... And since alpha-channel PNG's default to grey in older browsers, it would degrade nicely (i.e., text would still be readable) --Buddy 19:36, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Here is a new screenshot. Still working on it. --SvipTalk 22:42, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * And yet another! I think we're getting there.  Opinions? --SvipTalk 01:02, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
 * The colours don't have quite enough contrast, particularly the links in the left box and the visited links in the sidebar. - Quolnok 02:14, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
 * The front page was a quick fix. And the sidebar is still an issue I am having some trouble getting around.  But browsing articles (I just went through random ones), I am very pleased with my new scheme.  I will not say it's done, but it's certainly getting there. --SvipTalk 02:19, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

There's parts about the CSS I like and parts I don't like. For example. I like the way the overall colour scheme is going. I like the little orange bits at the top of the active tab. It reminds me of... well, I forget. Windows or Firefox or someone has orange bits on the active tabs. Kind of a nice visual cue. I really like the semi-transparency and rounded corners of the left menus. Still not sure if the colour of the search box fits in, but I could get used to it. As for what I don't like: The hues seem to be a bit off. There's straight blue and then shades of cyan, they don't really match. And after seeing the page in its darker form, hitting "edit" and being hit with a bright white text box is a little off-putting. And a suggestion: the menu headers on the left sort of blend into the background. I suggest giving them their own bg image. I have an idea for it but I'm not sure I can articulate it: A rectangle of a different shade from the menus below, square on all corners except the upper-right, which would be rounded to the same radius as the menu boxes. The colour should be just enough to bump up the contrast between header and background to make it a bit more legible. Otherwise, as I said, I really like the direction this is going. Maybe we should change the background into the full-screen light rays from the end of ItWGY. The flat colour below the fold is boring, design-wise. Tiling backgrounds can be annoying, but maybe we can come up with something... --Buddy 15:51, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
 * So... to summarise:
 * Backgrounds behind menu-headers, change its font colour or alternative changing the entire background of the site all together.
 * Do something about the issue of the text edit field.
 * On the latter, here, I will have to say, I kept myself off it, because of the fact that most people like to edit black on white. White on black is not good for editing in my book, perhaps a similar colour scheme as to the rest of the site?
 * Anyway, I have been thinking about changing the background image all together. I originally thought the opening thingie was cool, but changing it to that "round one from ItWGY may provide more difficulties than what is good.  Alternatively, we could come up with a simple background like Wikipedia and keep it a blue shade (preferable darker than the current one).  Maybe a miniature version of the current one. --SvipTalk 16:49, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I have listened to your prayers and updated a few things.
 * First of all, the textarea have now been given a dark blue background and white text. It works nice on the eyes, and it remains obvious that it is a textarea editing field.
 * Then I reduced the size of the body background, lowered its contrast and made it "blur" over into a darker blue, which I then changed the background colour to.
 * As a result of this, the transparent menus have been removed as well. As the menus, links and text, are easy to make out on the new blue background.
 * There are of course minor tweaks remaining to be done. Oh yeah, and I finally updated the footer.  In order to see this again, simply replace your monobook.css with    again. --SvipTalk 18:02, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Looking nicer, some of the minor tweaks include the donation box on the main page and the green on red of the comparison pages.. I'll create a new infosphere image for the lower sidebar. - Quolnok 10:55, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I like the new textbox colours. They're perfect. I'm still not sure about this orangey colour that seems to be spreading, but it might be my crappy monitor. The black on the left might be a bit too dark, but I like it. Because I like black. Hey, mabe use the centered light rays from ItWGY, and see if they can center directly behind the Infosphere logo. That might be interesting. --Buddy 22:50, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, my issue with the rays were that they would be unconvincing continuing down the page... though, I like the idea of the centred rays behind the sphere. --SvipTalk 23:39, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I already did! --SvipTalk 23:04, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

One more thing
Wellsir, I like it in general. I just have one last suggestion: Change the colours of the boxes on the main page. I recommend using an eyedropper tool to get the colours from the crew portrait. I suggest Fry-orange for the left one (with an appropriate border), and Leela-purple for the right one. Then, a Bender-grey/blue for the lower one. The bottomest one is probably fine. --Buddy 02:04, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I shall look into that, maybe create a "faux Monobook.css" for myself again while working on it, since the images of Fry, Bender and Hypnotoad would have to be retouched. Something I think Quolnok is capable.
 * By the way, Buddy, since you are so glad for CSS3 effects, perhaps you'd like this one. --SvipTalk 21:58, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Alas, I am not running the 3.1 Firefox. But yes, as a master of CSS, I know of many of the proposed css3 features. Rounded corners, I must admit, are among the most exciting. Box shadows, I'm afraid, will be overused. I'm just hoping for gradients. If SVG gets more support, gradients will become common. --Buddy 04:02, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Oh boy! Let's make another new way to make browsers different to one another, that'll be nice. Let's make web developers have to compensate for even more quirks and flaws in pretty web design that someone came up with and didn't test completely in the first place. Sorry, been doing a little too much CSS at work lately. - Quolnok 12:09, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Actually, support for all standards is getting pretty consistent. You only have to worry about quirks if you're supporting older browsers. I personally don't care about older browsers, but that's because I'm not selling a product. If fancy stuff gets put into the w3c standards, it'll be supported. At least by the browsers I give a crap about. Personally, I just design to standards and anyone who can't see it properly needs to upgrade or to crap with them. Meh. Then again, I'm kind of a crotchety old fart. --Buddy 01:13, 17 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, now I have created that thing you suggest for the main page (you can see the CSS at User:Svip/monobook.css), is that sort of the colours you wanted? --SvipTalk 14:26, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes! But now that I see it in action, maybe the grey is too bland on that lower one. Perhaps a green that matches the hypnotoad a little better? Then we could (after the appropriate alterations) put the background pics back in and they'd kinda match their characters/colours. Hypnotoad is really the only one that works in the lower one because of its width. Or the Slurm Queen. Something similarly wide, rather than tall. The upper two boxes are perfect, IMO. And I know Bender was in the right one, but maybe Leela should be slapped in there? I don't know... But it's lookin' good. :D --Buddy 01:13, 17 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Y'know, I think I'll probably like Fry better in the red. I've also been considering the posibility of rotating characters in the boxes every hour or so. Bender is a slightly blueish grey, so the blue made some sense for him when it was pale; still looks goo with the dark version though. Also, I'm sure there's a lying down Bender pic somewhere. - Quolnok 11:07, 17 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Yep, I prefer Fry in red. User:Quolnok/monobook.css. - Quolnok 11:54, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

New redirect rule
If you are linking to an article that do not exist, but its content exists in another article as a subsection, don't fix your link, instead, create the page as a redirect instead.

e.g. The Monks of Shubah only exists within the Religion article, but instead of changing a link to them from The Monks of Shubah to The Monks of Shubah, simply created the The Monks of Shubah as a redirect to this subsection.

Reason? There are plenty of cases where we would like to get certain parts of a group article or similar out of it, e.g. like we got Donbot out of the Robot Mafia article. But if pages link to the Robot Mafia article, rather than the Donbot article, when they mean him, it becomes a pickle fixing all these links, that would be required to be fixed. There will be exceptions to this rule, but right now I cannot think of any. --SvipTalk 16:19, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * So, to clarify: You're saying, while a character or item may have little information about them and thus is part of another article, they should all still get their own pages which redirect to their subsection. This way, if more information is created and they are moved to their own page, the links will already point there (the links won't have to be changed at all!). Sounds like a good idea to me. --Buddy 16:00, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Precisely, and when the Neutral war machine lies in ruins, I will be a hero again! --SvipTalk 20:31, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Types of characters; splitting secondary characters into 3
I know I am bringing this up again, but a concern have been raising in my mind, as have been pointed out by the last time we ran this around here. The issue was that with my new specification of naming Steve Castle a secondary character, because of his importance in "Future Stock", despite only appearing once, this may spark a lot of subjective opinions on who is secondary and who is tertiary.

Therefore I am suggestion splitting secondary characters up in 3:
 * Major secondary characters
 * Major secondary characters are characters that are pretty close to actually being primary characters, but for a specific number of reasons aren't. Examples of these characters include Zapp Brannigan, Kif Kroker and Mom.


 * One-time secondary characters
 * One-time secondary characters are characters playing a major importance in one single episode/film/comic, but either unknown later or not appearing at all (possibly because of death). Examples these characters include Steve Castle, The Zookeeper and Nudar.


 * Secondary characters
 * The ungrouped mass.

Discuss. --SvipTalk 16:56, 6 March 2009 (UTC) if you wsere worth the trouble, i would destroy you, i am many

Sarcastic laughter...
Yes, I searched the transcripts this time. I can't find it. I'm looking for the episode where Fry laughs sarcastically. And I can't remember what it was about, or I'd know the episode. Something is funny, but not, and Fry does that sarcastic "Hahahaha". Anyone know that one? --Buddy 15:56, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Safety dance conversation with That Guy in Future Stock? Can't think of any other options right now. - Quolnok 17:12, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Wait, I think I remembered... It was The Farnsworth Parabox, when Leela 1 and Fry 1 were talking about their relationship. Leela 1 said something about one of here excuses and said it was funny... then Fry A said something like "Yeah, funny. Right Leela? HAHAHAHA!" ... At least, I think that's the one. Anyone know where I can view this ep (or at least the clip) online? --Buddy 17:39, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Maybe it was "I, Roommate", where Fry "laughs" along with Bender when Leela have convinced him to move out. --SvipTalk 20:30, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * No, it was definitely the Parabox. I don't know how to link to specific lines like you guys do, or I'd show you. Just go to the transcript and Ctrl+F for "Funny"... I think there's a couple uses of the word, but you'll find it. Now I just need a clip. Is Futurama on Hulu? --Buddy 22:44, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Hmm, seems to be quite a few clips there, but not the one I want. Anyone tell me how to make my own clips? Everyone else seems to be able to do it... --Buddy 22:48, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Avidemux is a brilliant application to cut out specific clips of video streams. It is pretty simple and straight forward. --SvipTalk 22:54, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

New CSS launched!
We are proud to present our new redesign of our wiki, and we hope you will enjoy it as much as we will. However, should some parts of the old design still remain in the new look, we encourage you to report them here. --SvipTalk 00:13, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
 * But the history it is still unreadable! - Quolnok 05:31, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Nevermind, fixed it myself. - Quolnok 05:56, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
 * In Firefox the file upload dialogue can't be styled. We need to do something about it because it currently is shown in the standard style, with the only change being white text. Therefore the entered text isn't visible . - Quolnok 07:08, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Inline episode/film/comic references
I think I have brought this up before, but I am going to do it again, cause apparently I did not make myself clear the previous time. Whenever mentioning an episode, film or reference within a context, can we please not use the, and  templates? I still urge you to use them in appearances lists, infoboxes, overviews, among other things. But the whole line of brackets and icons doesn't really go well inline.

Therefore, I am recommending, that when mentioning an episode or comic, put it in quotation marks like this; "Space Pilot 3000" or "Monkey Sea, Monkey Doom!". It should be apparent by the context that we are speaking of an episode and/or comic. If you really which to distinguish yourself between the two, use phrases like in the episode "Space Pilot 3000" or in the comic "Monkey Sea, Monkey Doom!".

As for films, keep them just italic, e.g. Bender's Big Score. The reason? Simply because it looks better inline. If you are not convinced, try using the differences inline sometime. But, don't write links to episodes/comics without the quotations or films without the italics, unless you are mentioning them in "vague" format, e.g. "in the first episode". --SvipTalk 15:56, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
 * hehe. whoops, shall do from now on--My leg feels funny! 20:44, 15 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Also, the icons should be changed to some hue of cyan to match the new colour scheme a little better. --Buddy 22:39, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Done. See All My Circuits for an example.  If they still appear in red, do a refresh.  Your browser is caching! --SvipTalk 14:58, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Bender's Big Score on UMD?
I just obtained a link to an Amazon page for Bender's Big Score on UMD (for those not in the know, UMD is the format the PSP uses), which have apparently been released (at least they claim to have 3 new or used copies in stock). This made me think of the fact that Volume One was released on VHS and VCD. However, we never mention these "lesser" known media. So the real issue is, should we make room for "other media"? Obviously keeping DVD in focus. --SvipTalk 20:40, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Another terrible Sony-proprietary format! Why do people support these?! --Buddy 04:06, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Hey, Blu Ray isn't proprietary (or bad, just slightly unneeded). UMD on the other hand - I have five discs, all games, for PSP. This is the only place anyone will ever get to use the discs making them very niche. Nonetheless, I might be tempted to pick up an ItWGY UMD if it comes out here for cheap. Oh, and yes these most definitely deserve a mention. Our merchandise section is very incomplete. - Quolnok 11:34, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I didn't say it was "bad", I just hate Sony and I'll never buy anything with the "Sony" label on it. And yes, other companies can make players now, but with sony technology, of which Sony still gets a portion of the money. Bleh. Stupid Sony. But I'm done ranting now. You know how some people have an irrational hatred of Ford or Pepsi or Microsoft? I'm that way with Sony. The end. --Buddy 22:42, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Characters in the sidebar?
Okay, this one is pretty simple, I am just thinking that it might be a good idea to have a link to a list of characters, perhaps just Category:Characters, if anything. I think list of characters redirects there, anyway. So pretty much just whether it should be before episodes or after. --SvipTalk 14:16, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Go with after Episodes (and subitems) - Quolnok 10:29, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

I:I, captains
I've been trying to get into it various times, but it just doesn't work: I:I. Either it's my computer or something's wrong. Can anyone shed some light on it? Chris of the Futurama2 19:05, 17 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Apparently the huge amount of examples tore the server a new one. So, I stripped the documentations of examples. --SvipTalk 19:28, 17 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, at least it's fixed. Thanks. Chris of the Futurama2 19:31, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

"You heard him! Pay the man!"
Anyone know what episode was thst from? It's been driving me nuts, because I think that was a case that had just finished. I thought it was from Time Keeps on Slippin', but I couldn't find it in the transcripts. It went something like this:

Bender: (To Leela) You heard him! Pay the man! One of the robot hookers: Bender, honey, we love you! Bender: You know it!

Anyone? Chris of the Futurama2 20:34, 18 March 2009 (UTC)
 * It's from "Put Your Head on My Shoulder": line 121. Remember, our guide to search, also provide a Google link for searching our templates. --SvipTalk 20:38, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Also, it's funnier than that, because Bender actually says "Shut up, baby, I know it!" &mdash; Comedy gold! --Buddy 22:44, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I know! 23:11, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Fan related... stuff
On the Internets, there are several Futurama related stuff. Or rather, people talking about it. Our wiki is about the show, but can't we have articles about stuff that is also about Futurama? I mean, why do we not have a PEEL article? Or something about the Futurama Madhouse? Hell, we could even have an article about ourselves. Wikipedia has that. --SvipTalk 22:49, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Figure a good way to do it, and I don't see why not. Maybe its own namespace? Or just category... We already have merchandise, which is not strictly about the show. Might as well have notes about sites, and even have fancy wikipedia charts comparing the contents of fansites (like, this one has wallpapers, that one has audio clips, etc.). I recommend moving The Infosphere to Infosphere (I mean, we don't have the Brainspawn, or the Hypnotoad, do we? Then, create the The Infosphere article about The Infosphere in the place where Infosphere used to be. I seem to have gotten a little carried away... --Buddy 05:30, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, but I think it would be wiser if Infosphere or The Infosphere were either disambigious pages, as to link to each article, sort of like the Joe article. The issue is, should it then be Infosphere (memory bank) or The Infosphere? --SvipTalk 15:16, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm good with it the way it is now, with Infosphere going to the in-universe article, and the parenthetical Infosphere (website) leading to the other one. It's better that we give priority to in-universe things. So, unless there isn't a good reason not to change it, I don't see why it couldn't stay the same. Quadruple negative! --Buddy 04:39, 23 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Indeed. I think right now we have the following priority list:
 * Primary characters > Episodes > Comics > Secondary/Tertiary characters > Items/places/etc. > Merchandise/Fan stuff > Other
 * Whatever Other could be, I don't know. --SvipTalk 13:54, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Needing Image Template
I've noticed that many pages don't have a lead image. If we create a "needs image" template (using the 'Awaitong Screenie.jpg' image) then it might become clear which pages need images and we would be able to upload one for them.-- Neutral President [ U | T | C ]''' - I have no strong feelings one way or the other. 00:36, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I suppose, though I feel the number is not as high as you claim. And it is basically a notice for editors, and I think most of our editors realise it. --SvipTalk 01:11, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Most of the articles have Image:AwaitingScreenie.jpg and Image:No Character Image.png in place of the images, and they only link to these and images, although, there are some others like Trials that have no images. 01:36, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

If I didn't already mention this very thing somewhere, I was totally thinking it last week. I was going to start taking screenshots of needed stuff, and then noticed that the practice of putting the placeholder image up has fallen out of... well, practice. It's much easier to go on a screenshot-spree when there's a handy list of images that are needed, and it's also easier to put the image on the page, what with these fancy new templates everywhere, when there's a simple placeholder to replace. --Buddy 05:36, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I know I still throw it on articles I can't be bothered capping. Yes we should still have this in use to find the pages without images. - Quolnok 06:20, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * This had me thinking though, I was considering making my bot swoop around articles and detect most likely articles to lack images (which would be articles with infoboxes, but without an image). In addition, since our 'do not crop images for character' policy, it could also swoop around images and detect whether they have been cropped (simply by taking their resolution and calculating whether it is within a usual 4:3 or 16:9 format), in addition, I think a category for 'character images' would soon be in order. --SvipTalk 14:37, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Anything that would make it easier for someone to mass-upload needed screenshots would please me. --Buddy 04:42, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Trial infobox
I tried to do an infobox for TV shows (like Futurama and All My Circuits), and it didn't go well since I did it in the playground, but I think it'd be better to do an infobox on trials, but I don't know how to do it. I'll show you my example and maybe someone will make it? Here:


 * I suppose, there are actually quite a bit of trial articles anyway. I mean, even the game has its own infobox!  Let me get on it... --SvipTalk 23:03, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Cool.
 * Done: --SvipTalk 23:17, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Cool. Now just to put them in.

Donations for new server
Our current host is great. Don't get me wrong. And we are not paying a penny for it, so it's like Wikia without the ads (and all the other crap). But there is one hitch, it's run by one guy, and that guy is not me. Occasionally, some of his actions would lay the webserver down and it just needs to be rebooted. And rebooting it is snappy, like that. Only problem is; I cannot reboot it, and he isn't always there. Which is why it was down once for 12 hours at least.

And that's not good. Therefore I am suggesting we purchase our own dedicated virtual machine (same setup as now), but our own, with no other things running and just this website. My friend would also prefer it this way, because his other stuff isn't critical to be up 24/7, ours is.

So that's the idea (I'll give you the details on the server when I can finally obtain them). But here's the hitch; servers costs money, and I do not have the currency, therefore I am suggestion we made a call for donations in the sitenotice, like Wikipedia does from time to time. I shall look into what at least one year of this setup will cost, and then ask our readers and contributors for it. It is of course not required to donate, but it would certainly be appreciated.

In addition, I think we should ask for the same curtsey that Wikipedia grants its donators; the ability to be listed (if they want to). But that is more of beauty thing. I'll keep you posted, once I get the details on the server, I will prepare the sitenotice. --SvipTalk 11:36, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * If we must, we must. We certainly wouldn't be the only wiki doing this. - Quolnok 12:09, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Might also want to put out a call to the other Nerdlingers at PEEL and other fansites. As someone who paid out of my own pocket for the first few years of this site's life, and had a donation link on the bottom since the beginning, I don't hold out much hope. You wanna know how much was actually donated to the server costs of the site? Zero. And lots of it. I am torn as to whether or not I would donate, being so spurned previously. It's like, nobody ever did it for me, so why should I? But on the other hand, if it means the difference between life and death for my precious Infosphere, I guess I must... --Buddy 01:42, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * If it makes it any better, you are donating to me. And didn't I donate a lot of my effort for this wiki? --SvipTalk 01:45, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Time is money. So sure. --Buddy 23:25, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Do we get one of those cool money-thermometers? --Buddy 23:26, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I was think we should! Though, it'll probably be a "manual" setting.  But let's see what I brew up. --SvipTalk 23:27, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Donations: break
I have set up our donation campaign, as well as a site notice, which you have hopefully noticed by now. If you have any suggestions to change of the language, either do it yourself or tell me. --SvipTalk 17:46, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Season 6 (hypothetically)
Call me sentimental, call me what you want, but hear me out. The Future of Futurama is at stakes during these weeks. A question on everyone's lips; why is it taking so long to come to a decision? I mean, yes or no already! This Saturday, the 28th, it will be 10 years ago "Space Pilot 3000" aired for the first time. And I find it difficult to believe that Matt Groening or David X. Cohen have not mentioned this to the people at FOX. Indeed, it is more likely than not for them to have recommended announcing season 6 on this specific day, and keep the standard reply "it's in talks" until then.

Of course; I can be entirely wrong. But that's beside the point when it is announced. If season 6 does come, it will be important for the Infosphere to manage. Interest for Futurama will grow - undoubtedly - and therefore this can be our "claim to fame", so our updates need to be snappy and en par with the news.

While Wikia's Futurama Wiki cannot be considered a "serious" alternative in my eyes, it still ranks better on Google, and therefore it gets higher props. Luckily, however, Wikipedia is willing to link to our wiki rather than theirs, and that is our card (e.g. try googling for 'my three suns', an article we have been linked from Wikipedia for quite a while, we are just below Wikipedia).

But this it not about beating Wikia, this is about pleasing the fanbase, the casual fans and the rest. If our information is not more snappy than Wikipedia's, they may not have reason to seek to our articles. So, here's to hoping. --SvipTalk 14:44, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

moving "the"
whatever has "the" at the start i'm moving to a name without "the". ok?--My leg feels funny! 01:59, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * There are certain articles that should not be moved, such as articles of things that has "The" in the name, such as "The Farnsworth Parabox". --SvipTalk 02:08, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
 * i took that into account. i think i'm done doing them all--My leg feels funny! 02:16, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

New Server!
You know, scrap what I said about donations (though, I wouldn't mind some). I went ahead and purchased the server, I am right now in the mist of configuring so it will ready to transfer from this server to the other. When exactly it will be up and running remains sketchy, since I need to get certain things working to keep the speed and whatnot of our current setup. However, I presume it should be fast, and could be ready before the week is out.

I'll keep you posted. --SvipTalk 23:09, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Wow, cool. Where's it located? When you say "purchased" you mean like, for really? Or is it an annual thing? I'd feel bad not donating at least something. Slap together one of those Wikipedia money-mometers and we can have a funds-drive! --Buddy 00:22, 1 April 2009 (UTC)


 * We might just do that anyway. It is located on hexonet in Germany, and it is somewhat an "annual" thing, since it has a monthly fee.  But I have complete control over it as if it were my own machine.  I will keep you posted. --SvipTalk 00:54, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Cool, not too expensive right? This should be a nice change. - Quolnok 13:16, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

As promised, here are some details about the server.
 * Cost
 * 28 EUR per month


 * CPU
 * 1500MHz


 * HD
 * 45GB


 * Traffic (monthly)
 * 1000GB


 * RAM
 * 1024MB (can be extended to 1536MB)

Since it is a Virtual Machine, there is no creation fee. So all there is to pay is 28 Euros per month. But then we ought to give the site a run for its money! --SvipTalk 13:30, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Your &euro;28.00 is equal to my $37.70 (as of today's conversion rate). --Buddy 22:11, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Pink Koala
I don't want to be a total asshat here. But look at that user page. It's like they just copy/paste a bunch of pointless crap and don't even worry about formatting (half of it renders as malformed code!). I know a user page is supposed to be personal, but... I don't know, it's like they're using it as a myspace page with quizzes and email forwards and stupid crap like that. I feel like just deleting it now, but I wanna know what everyone else thinks. I've left several warnings on the talk page, but they're ignored. I also feel like, if it comes back after removal, a user ban is in order. From what I can tell, the user's actual contributions have been negligible anyway... Thoughts? --Buddy 22:04, 2 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Hm, well, a ban would be a bit too much, I say; we empty the page if no reactions are made or any fix are done by the member itself, within a fairly reasonable amount of time. If the member continues to pursue its content, we can then ban them. --SvipTalk 22:24, 2 April 2009 (UTC)
 * fair enough, its pisses me off too. clear the page. seems to be the only thing they edit these days...--My leg feels funny! 20:54, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I'd say it's fair, so long as we ask them about it first. Also, don't go straight to a permanent ban. - Quolnok 08:16, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh, Buttocks
Not only was the titles changed because of the server mishap, but some pics have been altered, like those unused files, and "Channel âˆš2 News" pics. Maybe we should, like, keep track of the altered artticles or something, so we can tell what pics and stuff have been altered.
 * Yeah, unfortunately, all articles with special characters in their title have had this issue, the simple task is just to move them, so report them as they come. However, pictures cannot be moved, so the recommended version is to reupload them on the new name.  And if you can just use the former images, that would be fine. --SvipTalk 01:44, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, I just checked the "All pages" page, and it seems that are there only:

7Ã‚Â¹Ã‚Â¹ 7Â¹Â¹ Clerk Bender Bending RodrÃƒÂ­guez Bender Bending RodrÃ­Â­guez Channel Ã¢Ë†Å¡2 News Worms of ColÃ³n ÃŽÂ kea Robot î kea Robot Could be more.

Star Trek category?
we do seem to have a lot of Star Trek articles, and they keep growing by the week. It would be easier, as i am making the Star Trek connections page, that we have somewhere i (and everyone else) can access all of the articles. i'll make it now. suggestions?--My leg feels funny! 20:58, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I was thinking the same thing -- I'm on it. --SvipTalk 21:01, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
 * if there are any more, you can put them in, but i think that's it--My leg feels funny! 21:10, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Do tinfoil hats really work?
heh. --Buddy 00:35, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Main Page suggestions
it looks great though, but i think i we had some things like "featured image of the fortnight", a "did-you-know" section or "user of the month". i think if these got up and running and people nominated for then and stuff it would be really cool. the "index" should also be updated with more characters and stuff--My leg feels funny! 09:18, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Seeing as there are five or six active members, the "Member of the month" thing would last half a year at best. But I do like the "Did you know?" thing. We could put little tidbits of trivia in there, of course with links to full articles. In fact, what might be even better is a JS cycling thing that's random every time you load the page. We could probably create a hundred or so of them... --Buddy 21:26, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
 * fair enough about the user of the month, but if someone could get the did you know up and running, i'd help with it. how about image of the fortnight?--My leg feels funny! 22:08, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

We're on Wikipedia!
Nothing much, but apparently we have an article on Wikipedia now:. Currently its content is mostly copied from our own article, The Infosphere (website), but then again, now Buddy13 is mentioned in a Wikipedia article.

And it hasn't been scheduled for deletion, hm hm. I even took the liberty of creating a template to link to our wiki in a swoop from Futurama related articles on Wikipedia:. --SvipTalk 14:10, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Now I feel bad for not fixing up the text. Had I known that it would be copied to Wikipedia, I'd've been on it like white on me. --Buddy 17:15, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Now you got two articles to fix. In the words of Fry; 'fix it, fix it, fix it, fix it, fix it'! --SvipTalk 17:46, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Surprise!!! It was I! I was waiting if anyone would notice. Sorry for the copying of work. I'm crappy at making articles.

IP edits
I am bringing this up once more, as I fear we may again be loosing potentially good edits from visitors who just wish to apply a quick edit to our wiki.

Obviously, we should, as before, take some measurements against potentially bad edits, while most of them will be easily disregarded by the software anyway, I feel a the bot may be able to keep an eye on the recent changes now and then. --SvipTalk 15:14, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
 * yeah i think average people should be able to edit the wiki, we can always handles trolls and whatnot.--My leg feels funny! 21:48, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

How are we going to do it? CAPTCHA's, or a bot that reverts any massively significant change (e.g., blanking or replacing with spam)? Or maybe just require CAPTCHA as an additional step for a large edit, but let smaller edits go by? Is that last one possible, cuz that would be great. --Buddy 02:36, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Ironically, that is how the CAPTCHA extension we previously had worked. Whenever an edit were big, added many external links, created a new page and stuff like that, a CAPTCHA would be asked for the user.  But for the common minor edits, no CAPTCHA was initiated.  When I get around to this, I am going to look into upgrading the software as well as all of the extensions. --SvipTalk 09:45, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Yep, open it up again and hopefully they'll behave themselves this time. - Quolnok 11:36, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I have opened for IP edits. In addition, we are now running on 1.14.0 and I upgraded the extensions as well. Let's see what happens. --SvipTalk 14:48, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Notability
Wikipedia has a notability requirement, but as a rule, we shouldn't. The problem is... I can sense that there is a certain limit on notability that please like Wookiepedia and Memory Alpha does not have. I mean, think about it, Coolio was a guest star on Futurama twice... surely he deserves an article, albeit short, but he is certainly worth it.

And for that reason, I think we should go back to the deep down simplified; "if it is related to official Futurama work, then there can be an article". --SvipTalk 15:17, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
 * This has been my belief from the beginning. Minutiae is our bread and butter here. The whole point is to be as detailed as possible about anything and everything Futurama. I figure that, as we write articles, just about every noun (especially Proper Nouns) (and even some verbs) should be a link. Eventually there will be enough to fill up the "Wanted Pages" list, and we start creating them. In fact, when I first started, the Wanted Pages list was my main way of choosing what pages to work on next. A lot of these minor articles are going to be stubs at first, but surely we can fill them in (alternatively, we could just classify them as "minor" and forgo the "stub" markings. I mean, if we've written all there is and it's still short, what more can we do? --Buddy 02:43, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Stubs and minor articles are in my book two different things. A stub is an article that could possibly be longer.  A minor article is an article that may not be able to be much longer.  But this is also a reason I proposed the redirect rule, cause most of the stuff we could (and should) have articles about.  But even guest stars needs an article.
 * Imagine this; a reader wants to know what it was Coolio did on the show, cause he knows Coolio did something, but not entirely sure what, then bam! There is an article, and everything is clear.  It works for mostly any subject Futurama touches.  Just like the French article, sure we mention French when it is appropriate in articles, but what if you wanted an overview from the "French perspective"?  Well, now you can. --SvipTalk 09:54, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Originally if it was very small we attempted to put it in a shared article, but there was only a hundred-odd articles back then and we still hadn't completed the episodes. I'm still fairly sure we should avoid fanfics/fanart but everything else can have a place. - Quolnok 12:09, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
 * This is why I specified the statement, "if it is related to official Futurama work, it can have an article". That includes episodes, comics, the game, merchandise and other work by people officially recognised by Futurama.  The last may require individual consideration. --SvipTalk 12:25, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Reception and production
Two things. I realise we have a production article, but we do not have sections on production in episode articles or film articles where it may be appropriate to have some discussion about the production of a film or episode. This section should most serve as its own section, rather than being inside Additional Info.

In addition, what we do not have is a 'reception' section, something Wikipedia has, this would give the readers a view about the average reception of an episode, film or comic. If a section gets big enough, it may be preferable to move it out of the Additional Info and into its own section. --SvipTalk 20:16, 12 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I love the idea of having "reception" on each episode. It'd be great to call out what things were great and what things didn't quite work. And what the hell is wrong with "That's Lobstertainment!". I mean, I can't stand that episode, but it's got some of the funniest Bender moments ever. I can't figure out why I don't like it. --Buddy 02:45, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Hey, why not? So long as it doesn't turn into purely whoever wrote the section's personal opinion, it'll make a good addition. - Quolnok 12:12, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Star Wars
agin i will make another category, except this time for Star Wars. and off i go!--My leg feels funny! 21:48, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

two things
why do Star Trek, Star Wars and Simpsons all have to have "Connections" after their name? it looks stupid and i think it would be better if they were just called by their name minus the "connections".

and also the external links are green now. i don't really like that, its better as orange or whatever it was before.--My leg feels funny! 01:18, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Hm, as for the first thing, I have to agree, I was thinking the same thing. But mainly the article are about connections, so many a slight rephrasing in the introduction would make it work.
 * As for the new colour for the external links, it was because I wanted the links to be obvious that they were not like the other links. But I cannot settle on a colour. :( --SvipTalk 01:22, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Funny, I have orange still, with a green arrow thing.
 * Actually, I like the greenish yellow. - Quolnok 11:09, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Oh, it was my monobook. I, too, like the green links, and the green boxes on the templates. Nice touch.

Do you have the time?
I'm sorry, I know I'll seem, too, like a noob, but when it's 08:00 Eastern Daylight Time for me, it's 00:00 here. What does it use?
 * Well, when most of us sign our name the time that appears is in UTC, but has previously had other time zones based on where the server was located. The time zone in the recent changes can be set through your preferences page, which reminds me I need to reset that one of mine to/from daylight savings. - Quolnok 10:10, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Animatics
It is a well established fact that there exists animatics for Futurama, yet we have no real articles on this subject. I propose we create yet another namespace, "Animatic:" for episodes with animatics.

Since not every episode has it, or rather, very few does, I propose that we omit the navigations, and just have a complete list in the infobox. will also get a new parameter called "hasanimatic", which is simply a boolean value.

Speaking of the episode infobox, I also propose that we add a "hasnocommentary" parameter, since I am not sure Volume Five will include new commentaries, if every released.

And of course, I shall introduce a template for citing animatics. --SvipTalk 12:47, 19 April 2009 (UTC)
 * This falls into the "official Futurama productions" category, so yes we can have something for them. - Quolnok 13:02, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I'll get around to doing Hell is Other Robots animatic as I think i'm the only one with that dvd. i'll wait until some of the other ones are finished--My leg feels funny! 23:47, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
 * And I can do Bender's Game Part 1 animatic. Hey--why isn't there the films in the infobox?
 * Most likely because while there are animatics for the part ones of BWaBB, BG and ItWGY, he's secretly planing to do a section for storyboards and the boxes label these three as "storyboard animatics". I think they are closer to animatic than storyboard, however. Oh, and as they are for the episodes rather than the films, these will be linked to from the episode articles infobox and the disc features section, but not the film infobox. - Quolnok 05:59, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

WTF?
sometimes when i click on a link this message pops up:
 * "Fejl: Serveren stak mig i ryggen og skred. 0"

what is that?!?!?!--My leg feels funny! 23:47, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
 * here is a screenshot of it . it does nothing at all, it just pops up and you press okay and everything is fine. i just don't get it!--My leg feels funny! 00:31, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, Svip handles the server, so the error (which should probably not be seen publicly) is in Danish. "Error: Server stuck me in the back and slide. 0", clearly a direct translation is not the way to go, not via google anyway. - Quolnok 06:22, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Oh man, it is part of a script I wrote some time ago, which usually works. The message was originally for debugging, and the number at the end should be the interesting part.  Anyway, I have removed it from the Common.js file now, so you should be able to cache refresh a fresh script.
 * And for the record, the message means "Error: The server stabbed me in the back and fled." --SvipTalk 08:24, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

With the CSS again!
Lookit! With the illegible! Oh noes! --Buddy 07:32, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Fixed all but the border. - Quolnok 08:45, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Looks great now, with the border just the way it is. --Buddy 16:22, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Something I'ma work on.
Am I the only one that's bothered by how blurry-looking the Infosphere in the corner looks? I'm sure it's just a matter of the resizing process or something simple like that. So, just as I did for the Crew Portrait, I think I'll trace the Infosphere in SVG. That should give us a nice, sharp, clean image to use. It'll be spiffy. Though, with all that surface detail, it'll take a little longer, but we'll see what I can do.

Tangent: Now that we've got spiffier wiki stuff that handles SVG files, should I upload my files in their SVG format? For example, the DOOP logo, the Slurm logos, the Planet Express logo and the Earth flag. Are they good in PNG? --Buddy 07:32, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Top corner or bottom corner? I'm guessing top, but it isn't that blurry to me. If the SVG is better quality, go for it. - Quolnok 08:06, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I was referring to top corner. Bottom corner is still missing its left half, though... --Buddy 08:14, 27 April 2009 (UTC)
 * ...no, it isn't. Perhaps you have a lower darkness setting on your monitor than I have on mine. Or you need a cache refresh. - Quolnok 08:48, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Strange happenings
Well, you may first of all have noticed that the link to Special:Upload has suddenly changed. Indeed, we are secretly working on getting the wiki developed into several languages - crazy stuff. One of the tasks include having a combined location for images. You can still upload images, but you'll have to create an account on pool:.

Using regular uploading still works, but it won't create the image across the wikis. Therefore the pool option will be recommended. And another thing, keep in mind that we are going to make a shared log in system for every wiki, so you will be able to combine your accounts on all the wikis. --SvipTalk 01:20, 6 May 2009 (UTC)