User talk:TheTechnician27

Issues micro templates

Hello! I'm glad that you're enthusiastic about editing and trying something new, but creating templates for simple sentences is clearly over the top. Templates should be used in moderation (like anything in this life really) and using them to such extent requires any contributor (old or new) to at least remember them all. May I suggest that this is impossible and it will only scare people off? Besides no one will go through all the games to even apply these new templates, too much work. (I reverted the changes) --Ngng (talk) 17:11, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

Windows PCSX2 guide

Hi again. I have moved your unfinished guide to this page where you can finish it at your leisure (and replace the original afterwards). It's better to have an obsolete but still somewhat helpful guide than a page perpetually under construction. I myself will never find the time and desire to delve into it like I did before. Good luck. --Ngng (talk) 17:44, 8 March 2022 (UTC)

123

Hi. If you want to do some drastic changes (i.e. remove all games' descriptions), can you discuss them prior to do it? We can use PM system for instance. Thanks. --Ngng (talk) 07:00, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Hi, Ngng. I actually was about to speak for myself, but fobes beat me to the punch. There are a couple things I'd like to clarify: the first is that I did write those game descriptions myself, attempting to make them concise but still useful. The other concerns copyright. To address the box art first, that's a bit different. Although their usage exists within a legal grey area, what constitutes "minimal usage" in terms of image resolution is vague, we use them solely in an educational capacity, we use them only on the article where they're relevant, they are not used for profit, there is no adequate substitute, and in general, Wikipedia airs on the extremely safe side when it comes to copyright. I think they're perfectly fine. On the other hand, the game descriptions unequivocally do not fall under fair use or any other legal justification. 1) The length of time the material has been here for does not make a difference. 2) You did provide proper credit, and you were clearly trying to do the right thing, but attribution is not a magic wand that resolves copyright infringement. 3) In November 2015 when these descriptions were ripped, verbatim and in their entirety, from GameFAQs, the website was owned by CBS Interactive, and the website clearly displayed "Copyright CBS Interactive. All rights reserved." This unambiguously means that we did not have legal permission to use them. 4) Since that time, this material has never been released under a compatible license, and the intellectual property is currently owned by the same company who owns Fandom, again all rights reserved. 5) An adequate substitute does exist, namely writing one's own description. 6) At the bottom of the wiki, we advise: "Content is available under CC-BY-NC-SA unless otherwise noted." However, we fail to note that distinction either for the box art or for the game descriptions, neither of which are compatible with said license. 7) A perceived drop in quality (highly debatable) does not justify the unlicensed use of copyrighted content. 8) I find it a touch ironic that my actual, original writing is "AI generated 3 sentences from Wikipedia" when it seems, to my untrained eye, that at at least one point you directly, without attribution, and verbatim plagiarized Wikipedia for a game description. Compare the relevant PCSX2 wiki revision with the corresponding Wikipedia article a few weeks prior. I respect how much work you've put into the wiki over the years, and like you, I'm just trying to make it better.

PS: For some reason when I try to write on your talk page, the Cloudflare check shows up before I'm redirected to a blank source, so I'm trying here and pinging Fobes. TheTechnician27 (talk) 10:25, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

So I did some digging regarding the copyright status because you mentioned you got written permission, and this is what I came up with. I can believe that you got this permission, although 1) we still don't distinguish that the GameFAQs material isn't under a CC-BY-NC-SA license, and 2) I still think it's better to have our own descriptions, especially for the ones that are so long that they detract from the readability of the wiki. TheTechnician27 (talk) 12:40, 15 March 2024 (UTC)