User:IWander/Style guide

This is just a draft for now. If I forgot to put something on here or if you feel like something else should be added, feel free to yell at me on my Talk Page. Most of the stuff here was written by AntiGravityMaster on the Villainous wiki, I'm just lazy and these are the points I wanted to make anyway.

Language

 * This wiki uses Standard American English (center, flavor, color, instead of centre, flavour, colour). There are a few exceptions to this:
 * "Epilogue", "Monologue", "Dialogue" etc. should be preferred over "Epilog", "Monolog", "Dialog"
 * In this wiki, the use of the singular "they" is accepted. This is not used in most contexts but it is still worthy of note. (See: Wobbly Ape)
 * The serial comma, also known as the "oxford comma", should always be used.
 * Example: Bring John, a dancer, and a clown to the party).
 * The tense used in the wiki should be the Present tense, unless, of course, one is referring to a dead or no longer existing subject.
 * Under no circumstances should multiple periods ever be grouped together, except in the case of making an ellipsis (...).


 * A period should not go inside the quotation marks of a title, nor should any other punctuation that is not actually a part of the title.
 * Good: The first level of LittleBigPlanet is "Introduction".
 * Bad: The first level of LittleBigPlanet is "Introduction."


 * When quoting something, the period at the end of a quote serves to both end the quote and the sentence.
 * One should only use a single exclamation point and/or question mark. Additionally, exclamation points should always go after question marks.

Article Content

 * Articles should be written in an unbiased, encyclopedic tone. Avoid casual, conversational language (slang) or styling.


 * The first instance of the name of an article within the article itself should be bolded.
 * Categories should be in alphabetical order.
 * Use the templates to tag an article as a Stub, for clean-up, etc.
 * The only exception to this is for the category "Content-less Music Pages".
 * If the subject of an article appears in more than one game, the only game category they should be in is the game where they were introduced.

"LittleBigPlanet"
This is confusing.
 * Do not abbreviate LittleBigPlanet as LBP, unless it is being used in a quote. (Example: "As an old man once said, 'LBP stands for LittleBigPlanet and lower-back-pain! Those are things I have.'")


 * If referring to the series itself, do not put LittleBigPlanet in italics. LittleBigPlanet is the first game.
 * As well as that, do not refer to LitlleBigPlanet as anything besides LittleBigPlanet, such as LittleBigPlanet 1 or LBP1.


 * If you refer to any LittleBigPlanet as "Little Big Planet" we are going to publicly execute you.

How to Reference
Before worrying about how the references should be formatted, it should be known that things that are somewhat likely to be deleted (tweets, blog posts, etc.) should be ran through a page saving website. Although there are many methods of doing this, the currently accepted one to use in this wiki is the WayBackMachine. (Videos and Flash Player media cannot be archived through the WayBackMachine, so archiving a link on YouTube isn't necessary.)

Your reference likely won't be changed if you use something else but it's preferred to use that. If you're debating whether or not to run something through it, run it through it. Better safe than sorry.

Format
Use MLA format for your references. If you do not know how to format it, there are plenty of free generators online, such as CitationMachine. Currently, most of the references on the wiki are simple links. If you see it formatted wrong, please correct it.

Reliability
Please refer on reliable websites or people to reference. You can make your own judgements. Watch out for bias.

Admins
If you have doubts on anything, just ask the admins. We don't bite!

Nelmamoohead (bureaucrat)

Jack Busstein (admin)

LittleBigEater (admin)

iWander (admin)