UDWiki talk:Project Timeline

About Project Timeline

Project Timeline is a community project which aims to fully document the notable history of the game Urban Dead.

The project's roots began in February, 2011 during an Open Discussion named Project ?, which itself was a project aimed at steering the wiki towards an information rich resource. An Urban Dead timeline was one item which gained some interest during discussion. Over the course of a year, the project was developed and tested and eventually brought to fruition as a community project.

Community Involvement

Project Timeline is a community project and thus its scope depends heavily on community input. Much of the history of Urban Dead is unorganized or unrecorded and at times heavily biased and POV. Contributors to the project are encouraged to research all aspects of the game's history and make neutral and objective contributions.

Structure

The project is currently divided into seven parts; the main graphical timeline, the survivor timeline, the zombie timeline, the PKer timeline, the Malton timeline, the Monroeville timeline and the Borehamewood timeline. Each individual timeline serves as a portal into the history of the notable events which helped to shape the game while the graphical timeline serves as a summary of these events.

The individual timeline pages are structured by year and each year is divided into notable events or summary of long term events. Each events section should thoroughly describe that point in the game's history.

The graphical timeline briefly summarizes these events chronologically. Each event should be linked to an internal reference. These summaries should be kept neutral and brief.

Project Resources

Many resources exist to help record the game's history.

• The Wiki
  • The history of many groups and events have been documented on the wiki
• Forums
  • Groups are usually willing to discuss their history
• Players
  • Past and future interviews with players help narrow down specifics

Differences in Opinion

Due to the nature of the project, differences in opinions will arise and should be sorted via discussion and consensus. Use of the talk pages is encouraged in these situations. Please prepare to provide references to any contribution added to project pages if the need arises.

General Discussion

Might have to use a smaller font size. Especially around the perma death city times. --Rosslessness^{Want a Location Image?} 19:31, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah I agree. I want to make it as easy to update for editors as possible, too. Still in the very earliest stages.~ 19:39, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Game Updates, Historical events, anything else? --Rosslessness^{Want a Location Image?} 19:41, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

How's that. As far as entires, I'm thinking major game updates (I'm not sure all the minor ones like server downtime need to be included), the impact on the game of the updates, historical events. ~ 19:43, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, wirecutters did more than junkyards, but throw it together in rough and we can review it afterwards. let me know if you get stuck on MV or BHW. --Rosslessness^{Want a Location Image?} 19:45, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah I'm sure I'll need help with a lot due to my relative newness to the game and the general lackadaisical way in which details of certain events are chronicaled on the wiki. Once the outline is there, anyone is free to edit this page to add details. I'll throw on some updating instructions, some NPOV statements and permission for others to edit. ~ 19:55, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Frankly anyone who uses the phrase lackadaisical is fine in my book. --Rosslessness^{Want a Location Image?} 19:56, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Heh, well sometimes the word lazy just isn't descriptive enough. ~ 20:04, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Quite. If you're bored, swing by Developing Guides. --Rosslessness^{Want a Location Image?} 20:10, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah I read the guide and will post commentary probably later this evening. I have to step out now. So far its looking good as a guide, though. ~ 20:19, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Wow, I like. I really like. 20:49, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

The font size is not too small is it? I've previewed it at 75% and it looks better but it also forces sentences into many more lines than I'd like. ~ 21:22, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Looks fine as is, to me. 21:23, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

It's about time someone gets around to do this. The state of the history pages always bothered me back in my day (as in, there's no place where you can go to get an unbiased History of Malton,) and I'm very glad that someone's fixing this up. Won't be able to contribute, but massive props regardless. Linkthewindow  Talk  07:13, 25 April 2012 (BST)

come back link. we miss ya.--User:Sexualharrison13:18, 25 April 2012

Timeline, anyone? ᚱᛁᚹᛖᚾᚨᚾᛏ 05:23, 27 April 2012 (BST)

Nice find. Mine's purdier. I also find Zombie Renaissance quite enlightening. I'm hoping to find time this weekend to put another dent in this thing. ~ _{06:18, 27 April 2012 (UTC)}

I like Timeline more because for all its blandness it's more simple, has less going on at once and doesn't have.. tiny tiny writing : ( D^ANCED^ANCER^EVOLUTION (TALK | CONTRIBS) 03:20, 21 May 2012 (BST)

I made the text 10% larger. Better? Worse? I'm viewing from a tiny cell phone screen right now so it's hard to tell onmy end. When (if) thisproject is completed, it will be much more than a graphical timeline. Think of it as a single depository for all of Urban Dead's notable history. The graphical timeline can be adjusted if its too confusing or something or I can link to theother timeline if we want something parallel that is easier on the eyes. ~ _{16:08, 21 May 2012 (UTC)}

To me, that change made the page way easier to read (for reference, I'm on a laptop screen). Thanks! Bob Moncrief 16:59, 21 May 2012 (BST)

Group inclusion

Should we be including group formation in the timeline? --  AHLGTG THE END IS NIGH! 17:50, 18 April 2012 (BST)

Though I am slightly biased, I'd say we include the more notable ones. -- Cheese 18:20, 18 April 2012 (BST)

I say we don't include any of the active ones, but include only the ones that have passed Historical voting. Otherwise, we'll be cluttering up this page when folks come en mass claiming their currently active group is notable enough for the timeline. Alternatively, we can have a vote to include active groups. Say,2/3 majority yay votes will place said active group on this timeline. --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 18:48, 18 April 2012 (BST)

don't want to bog it down with unecessary voting procedures. Also don't want to exclude current groups. Historical groups isn't a good quantifyer for this project. Of corse there will be overlap. Sorry for the brevity. Will expand more on this later. ~ _{19:50, 18 April 2012 (UTC)}

This certainly seems like something that can be handled with objective criteria - Did the group have such an effect on the game that removing them would have altered the history of the game? If so, we put them on, or something to that effect.--Shortround }.{ My Contributions 19:59, 18 April 2012 (BST)

Was thinking more alnog the lines of "can a neutral contribution of signifcant length be composed for inclusion on one of the six pages linked at the top of the main project page". I haven't begun on those yet. This will all begin to make more sense soon. I haven't read through all of the randoms archives yet but it seems they had a role in a few of the mall tours and big bash perhaps. ~ _{20:14, 18 April 2012 (UTC)}

I've added a project scope above which will hopefully begin to answer some of these questions. Currently, I am working backwards to help orient myself with some of the early game history. The grphical timeline is more or less a summary of the articles which will be written about the game history. Hopefully work will beign on those soon. I'll bring this to community projects now so we all can begin contributing to it. Please continue using this section with any input or questions. ~ _{06:26, 19 April 2012 (UTC)}

I did a bunch of research on the oldest groups in Malton which can be found at Brainstock (old and new versions) after somebody piqued my interest. This may also be of interest to your project. ᚱᛁᚹᛖᚾᚨᚾᛏ 07:08, 19 April 2012 (BST)

Bless you, Rev. That's digital gold right thar. ~ _{07:27, 19 April 2012 (UTC)}

It would be If his numbers were accurate. That'd be from roughly the first month of group tracking(11/25/05) iirc. You'll notice groups like DHPD that were in fact around before 2006. --Karek^{maps 2.0?!} 08:44, 19 April 2012 (BST)

You also might want to include such notable going-ons as Operation Windmill Scrotum(I know, they can't all be winners but it was in external news) and some of the more relevant gems from this category. --Karek^{maps 2.0?!} 08:49, 19 April 2012 (BST)

And at the risk of replying to myself again, check out the yahoo news groups for the really early stuff. That was pretty much the first game organization location long long ago. --Karek^{maps 2.0?!} 09:08, 19 April 2012 (BST)

At the considerable risk at speaking up to my wiki elders (as I'm merely an old wiki-troll at this point)... one other consideration would be how you want to define "groups". Maybe I've missed it at this early hour, but some institutions like say, the Dulston Alliance, are loose coalitions which have operated as a collective entity in the past. Not everyone is reflected on the stats page given that they keep their individual group tags, but it's a DEM-like situation. As an aside, purely for Revenant's entertainment, I would note that the Dulston Alliance was itself founded February 27th, 2006 and spearheaded largely by the group Dead vs. Blue (which had formed earlier the same month, around February 6th if I'm not mistaken). --Ottari ^{DA PDA NW} Read the Dispatch! 09:24, 19 April 2012 (BST)

@Karek, glad to see some of those notable events categorized despite not passing through historical event voting. I have looked through the yahoo mailing lists but aaaaaaaa! The spam hurt my eyes. I hope nobody is still subscribe to those lists. I'm sure its all still there just have to figure out a way of sorting out the spam. @Ottari, you've brought a good point. My thinking is that groups don't necessarily need to be defined here (don't want to open that can back up). Organizations like DEM, DA, Ministry of the Dead and PKA are, essentially still groups of people working in concert. For the purpose of the timeline, I'd say the best way to handle it is to list the under groups but with different flavor. "The survivor coalition the Dulston Alliance was formed" instead of "The survivor group the Dulston Alliance was formed". ~ _{15:41, 19 April 2012 (UTC)}

Makes sense, as that's mostly how the community outside of those groups has viewed it when they aren't harping on them about zerging. Also no, no one really still uses the yahoo lists since the wiki, various forums, and twitter but, I believe you can manage the view of them better by logging in. Not sure though, it's been a looooong time since I've been to one of those. It'd be best if resenz was still around(and/or the ud board hadn't gone on a binge) but, that's unfortunately not the case. --Karek^{maps 2.0?!} 15:51, 19 April 2012 (BST)

-Ok I'm sorta new here but has there been any new progress on the time line. Just wondering. --Alpha131 20:04, 12 May 2012 (BST)

Yes, but its sort of slow going. I have a Word doc sitting on my desktop I've been updating with tidbits and trying to get things in chronological order. TBH I've not touched it in probably ten days or so. Hopefully I'll have something to add shortly. ~ _{21:58, 12 May 2012 (UTC)}

Just noticed that Axes High was listed as being added both in August and October of 2005. Which is more accurate? -Dray 18:45, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for catching that. Axes High's wiki page claims August 25th, 2005 as their official founding date with their first successful campaign taking place in October. Some dates were taken from resenz but its possible that some of those dates were inacurrate. Looks like both dates were inadvertently used there. Unfortunately dates for the earlier events are harder to pin down. ~ _{19:14, 12 February 2013 (UTC)}

Being Ross

With my specialist subject being the perma death cities, I'm going to bow out of the Malton timeline. Feel free to use me to referee any disputes. --Ross^lessness 17:24, 19 April 2012 (BST)

You know what must be done. ~ _{03:11, 20 April 2012 (UTC)}

Why didn't we...

...just begin this from an already existing project of the past? --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 22:35, 12 May 2012 (BST)

Considering that template looks more like a lame attempt to poke fun at Amazing after he was banned, I'd say this project has a different scope entirely. I'm tempted to put it up for deletion. ~ _{04:00, 13 May 2012 (UTC)}

So I've...

...gone ahead and added a bunch of information from Urban Dead Timeline and the news archives. Over the next few days I'll probably add info from Historical Events and History. Please correct any mistakes I've made (and I'm sure there will be some) and add more at your leisure! Bob Moncrief 01:38, 16 May 2012 (BST)

Also, a question: should the various said to have taken place pre-July 2005 be included in this timeline? Or is it only for events actually having taken place in-game? Would love some input. Bob Moncrief 20:33, 16 May 2012 (BST)

Thanks much, Bob. I don't think pre-game backend meta stuff is really all too necessary for the timeline. Game launch is a pretty good starting point. ~ _{07:07, 19 May 2012 (UTC)}

Makes sense, thanks! I've created a userpage to sort and store the pre-outbreak info in case it's needed sometime. Bob Moncrief 18:08, 19 May 2012 (BST)

	OBJECTION!
	This user has an objection.

Um...Bob...You should probably double check to make sure groups in Category:Historical Groups have indeed pass historical voting. There are quite a few groups that slap that Historical template up on their page because they deemed themselves historical, when there's no record of them passing historical voting... --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 00:43, 20 May 2012 (BST)

Right, everything is up to code. The only one that slapped the Historical template on their page without taking it to voting first was Undead University. --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 01:02, 20 May 2012 (BST)

Thanks so much, I really should have double-checked that. Bob Moncrief 01:13, 20 May 2012 (BST)

It isn't prerequisite that a group be voted historical to be included on the timeline. ~ _{04:20, 20 May 2012 (UTC)}

Aye, but if we were to include every single group in here, the timeline would become quite cluttered. Best to stick with historical and well known groups the community deems as deserving a spot on the timeline, as to not clutter the place up, I think. But hey, your project. I'm just giving you my thoughts. --•▬ ▬••▬ • •••• •▬ ▬•▬• ▬•▬ ^{#nerftemplatedsigs} 05:14, 20 May 2012 (BST)

Nah its fine. I just really don't want to get in the mindset of Historical status only for inclusion here. Its mostly common sense based and most of the past groups that deserve recognition here were voted on already. Its the still active groups with lots of history I don't want to exclude or the less recognized yet still worthy. Of course, not every group is gonna cut mustard for a timeline mention. ~ _{05:37, 20 May 2012 (UTC)}

I started adding some stuff as well, like dates and maybe some events if I can dig them up. If anything I do is not up to par, just give a yell ;) -- Johnny Twotoes 18:51, 25 July 2012 (BST)