Talk:Alone in the Universe

Reception

I assume nobody has any objection to me removing a review from a one-paragraph section in an obscure magazine for British truckers. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:26, 19 December 2015 (UTC)

Hello Scjessy. I would object as I consider the source to be equally as valid as some of the more higher profile sources usually cited. There is some history to this viewpoint which you may not be aware of. I first used Trucking as a source for additional/varied critical review/reception content for albums back on 5 March 2015 when I used Trucking in the article of Elbow's The Take Off and Landing of Everything. That content was removed by Richard3120 and so I entered into discussion with him. We agreed (in a very civil exchange) that the subject of such a non-genre publication being a viable source should be discussed on the Wikipedia Albums project page. This happened, and in short, no objection was raised, so Trucking was accepted, and Richard3120 revered his deletion. Have to say, I was not confident this positive and supporting opinion would be reached, as despite knowing that the truck magazines actually outsell many of the equivalent music magazines and that truck drivers are in fact a captive audience for music etc. In preparation of anticipated "you're kidding" type feedback I took the pre-emptive step of contacting the industry magazine editors for an opinion on the subject to hopefully garner support my argument. Not only did I receive this support from them, but I was also put in direct contact with some of the PR/marketing people/agencies that supply the magazine reviewers with review samples. I then contacted these, and to my surprise, response was amazing; they whole-heartedly support and recognize reviews in the truck magazines (and other more non-mainstream sources), seeing these as very valuable and reliable, and in fact equal to mainstream in some cases. They were all happy to put their supporting comments in writing for me (and Wiki editors), and I offered these to Richard3120. Ultimately they were not necessary as no objections were recorded on the Wikipedia Albums project page. I assumed this 'no objections' meant the subject was closed and such as source would be considered acceptable. Of course, can you (all other Wiki editors) be expected to read the Wikipedia Albums project page as a matter of course? Of course not! So you probably don't even know this discussion occurred. I say I assume the matter would now be closed because if it remains open to revisiting and re-discussing, then pretty much every decision ever reached on Wiki could then be questioned again and re-visited, making the process near-pointless in the first place! Thinking I may be correct and a decision made stays made (unless there's a significant change somewhere), I'll revert your edit with a truck magazine being consider a viable source. Of course, I remain happy to discuss the subject, and if necessary can revisit the topic of supplying comment/viewpoint from the industry that supplies the material for review. Sorry if this Talk is a tad long and maybe rambles in places, but I see a lot of antagonism on Wiki, most of which is brought about simply because people can't or won't just take some time out to explain in a civilized manner, their viewpoint. I hope I've achieved that here. Look forward to your comments/feedback.Wolpat (talk) 12:11, 20 December 2015 (UTC)

There are several points I would like to make as a rebuttal:

• I have read the review in Trucking (source). The entire review consists of a single paragraph, of which only a single sentence refers to the album: "When a band of ELO's calibre re-emerges after so long in the wilderness, the results are often varied, and all too often, horrendous. While not necessarily horrendous, AITU hardly recaptures ELO's glory days, sounding empty, under-produced, and more like a collection of 1970s B-sides." This is more of a "throwaway comment" than a review. While I have no doubt Trucking is a fine magazine, the quality of the "review" is atrocious.
• While it is true WikiProjects are helpful when it comes to unifying the style and approach to articles within their topic, the content of a particular article is discussed on that article's talk page. Any consensus for inclusion or exclusion must happen that way, because (as you state) editors cannot be expected to be familiar with other talk pages.
• Even if we include the discussion, which you did not link to, of the WikiProject as part of the process here, consensus can change. You should not expect editors on one part of Wikipedia to automatically agree with decisions made on another part.
• You really shouldn't have reverted my edit until I had responded to your comment. That way lies article instability.

Given the poor quality of the review, I will be expecting you to self-revert your edit and allow other editors to weigh in with their impressions of the quality of the content you want to see in the article. If we don't hear from anyone in a day or so, I shall seek a third opinion. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:01, 20 December 2015 (UTC)

Hello Scjessey. Thank you for a swift and civil response to my initial comments. I'm not sure I'd agree the review in Trucking is atrocious, and for what it's worth, having listened to the album, I'd have to say it's not too far wide of the mark. But that's an irrelevance. More relevant is (I think/hope), that from my interaction with the previously mentioned marketing/pr-types, some of them actually quite like a more succinct one-liner Trucking-style review, with others actually more interested in the star rating than any words. Either way, I note your comments, especially the first two points. I should apologize for not linking to the discussion I mentioned, but at the time I did not know how to do that (still don't...), and didn't have the free time to learn (still don't..., this thing called Xmas is all-consuming). I'm guessing from your Wiki footprint that you're more than capable of locating the mentioned discussion if you wish to, but if you wish me to, I will take the time out to learn and link to it. I clearly have a lot to learn regarding the inner workings of Wiki, but I am learning, and hope to continue to learn and aim to become a regular and consistent contributor to something I firmly believe in.

But back to the subject at hand... I am sorry, but I don't think I should revert my edit, and it is my belief that the original content should remain in place until any discussion on its inclusion is complete. That said, if there is any Wiki rule/policy which dictates it should be removed, I will happily comply and revert it immediately.

I'm looking forward to further discussion on the overall subject, and am interested to read what other editors think here. To fight my corner I would like the opportunity to present the comments of those that are subject matter experts and so will source their views/opinions again to throw into the mix. Although quite how I'll achieve that I'm not yet sure. I'll go off and learn about doing that, as I will need to learn about third opinion if we fail to reach a mutually agreeable decision. Finally (for now), I fully appreciate Christmas is arriving and so am not expecting even near-immediate responses from you or anybody else, and also ask for a little grace with my response times. Thanks.Wolpat (talk) 10:49, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

The reason I requested that you self-revert was not based on policy, so you have no obligation to do as I asked. My reason was purely because I consider the review to be substandard and to the detriment of the article. Since you think it is okay, this would constitute a content dispute. As I mention on my user page, I'm of the "if in doubt, leave it out" school. -- Scjessey (talk) 11:33, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Hello Scjessey. Thanks for the above. Understood. I look forward to the next steps as they develop. Potentially a lot of fuss over such (in the big scheme of things) a few words, but also great that two individuals can be so passionate about them. I'm not sure I can link directly to it, but have you seen the deletion (and subsequent prompt revert) of the text we are discussing. Done by a random IP address, and the only edit this 'person' has ever carried out on Wiki. It appears to be quite difficult to deal with such random acts that undermine what Wiki is all about, but in your capacity as a seasoned user (and an unbiased one I'm sure...), I wonder if you had any thoughts on the issue? Early Christmas wishes to you and yours. My visits to Wiki will be spasmodic over the holidays.Wolpat (talk) 08:54, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

I assume you are referring to this IP edit. I did indeed see it and despite it supporting my position I'm glad it was reverted because it violates the WP:BRD process we are following here. One of the reasons I publish my IP address in a userbox on my user page is to make sure the actions of a drive-by IP editor are not confused with my own edits. Returning to the discussion above, I actually asked Richard3120 if he would like to weigh in, since you referred to him earlier, but he doesn't seem interested. I thought I'd wait until after the Christmas period before seeking a third opinion. Enjoy the festivities. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:02, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Hi guys - apologies for not replying earlier but a combination of flying back to the UK along with the usual Christmas rush has meant I didn't have time to get round to this. I think WikiProject Albums has a list of what they consider to be "accepted" sources for critical review: people do put forward candidates for inclusion on the list so perhaps this discussion should be put to the project's home page. I don't personally have strong feelings against Trucking but I would imagine other members if the project may feel the same as Scjessey and I wouldn't like to act as the sole arbiter for its inclusion, it should be done by consensus. Merry Christmas. Richard3120 (talk) 18:20, 24 December 2015 (UTC) Richard3120 (talk) 18:20, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

RfC: Studio Album Chronology

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

With only five individual editors expressing opinions, any closing statement must first acknowledge that the discussion below can at best be described as a limited consensus. Limited consensus, "...cannot override community consensus on a wider scale." In this case, that would be template-level and project level consensus. The controlling template states: In general, all albums and EPs should be placed in a single, chronological chain in order of release date.... Exceptions may be appropriate for artists with very complex discographies which may warrant more than one chain. The possible cut-off for what counts as "very complex discographies" has remained ill-defined under the relevant WIkiProject but the discussion below does not support a finding that ELO's discography requires such multiple chronologies. The consensus is therefore to reduce the infobox to one studio album chronology. (non-admin closure) Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 05:02, 18 July 2017 (UTC)

---

I noticed that this page (in fact, all of the ELO pages) contains two chronologies, one of which is a studio album chronology. The main chronology contains all that, plus compilations and live albums, so is it really necessary? Besides, if a reader really feels the need for separate lists for studio, compilation and live albums, he can easily access the band discography. Really only 5% of album pages have more than one chronology, and they're only really necessary for collaborations. So, is everyone fine with me re-removing that extra chronology, or will my edit get reverted again? Liam Gibson (talk) 16:05, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

• My vote would be to keep the "regular" chronology and delete the one with the compilations. But, some artist pages do the opposite. I really think it depends on the type of artist. Some of the newer pop and hip-hop artists, they live by the EP and mixtape, and only have one or two actual albums. Whereas a band like Kiss has 20+ albums, and hundreds of other various releases. That could be a mess trying to track 100 a chronology.

So, while I vote to delete the "other" list, I am not knowledgeable enough on ELO to know which one is best. Kellymoat (talk) 16:34, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

• I brought this issue up, but the editor who added the redundant chronologies would not budge in his decision, saying that it was a normal Wikipedia preference (total BS). It should only have a "main chronology". If anyone wants to see the "studio album chronology", they only need to scroll down to the navbox.--Ilovetopaint (talk) 21:56, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

As note in the edit summary, we should wait for a consensus to be reached. A few hours isn't enough time for input.Kellymoat (talk) 22:34, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

• I see no point in having multiple chronologies in one infobox but a studio album chronology can be helpful for artists with a large discography. There can be so many run of the mill compilations that I wouldn't want to navigate through those in the chronology section of the infobox (if I did I could just go to their NAVBOX) and would prefer to scroll through the significant releases. The norm would be as suggested above, but exceptions can be allowed should there be consensus do so through discussion on the artist's talk page. This is basically what it says in Template:Infobox album#Chronology. Articles for the Rolling Stones albums appear to be set up this way. --Starcheerspeaksnewslostwars^{Talk to me} 04:34, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

The navbox already lets you navigate through the studio album chronology. But it doesn't let you navigate through the "everything" chronology.--Ilovetopaint (talk) 05:03, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

A good point's been brought up—dozens of useless compilations can make navigating a discography rather difficult. However, it's doubtless a good number of these were released with limited availability, so I'm pretty sure they wouldn't need to be included in the chronology (although they would fit in an "Other compilation" section in the artist discography, which I've seen happen before). Maybe if a few of these irrelevant releases were sifted out, we could take off the studio album chronology as well with no harm done. Best, Liam Gibson (talk) 06:48, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

But cherry picking which releases are significant and which are not -- that defeats the purpose of having all releases included, and it will always offend someone because their favorite was left all the list. One way around it (if we decide to do all albums instead of just studio albums) would be to decide on "official" releases, which would be greatest hits or live albums that count towards their record contract. So, that rules out the things from Rhino or those 20th Century Masters type of releases. Kellymoat (talk) 13:26, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Yes, that's just what I meant. I also think that out-of-print releases, limited availability releases (i.e. only sold via website or at a concert), and re-issues might be taken off the chronology on the album infobox. However, they could still be included in the Electric Light Orchestra Discography, clearing up any debate or offended fans as to whether they are and should be on Wikipedia.

• Update. In fact, at the aforementioned discography, the compilations (stacking up to a grand total of 40) have already been "cherry picked", divided into Charted and certified albums, and those which aren't. If we removed those that aren't from the infobox chronologies, but kept the charted and certified ones, it might make a cleaner and more representative chronology. Best, Liam Gibson (talk) 14:10, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Which is why I vote to have just the studio albums in the infobox. Kellymoat (talk) 15:23, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

• Remove extra chronologies They don't serve the purpose of an infobox and add clutter. Those more familiar with ELO should decide which one goes, but I lean towards not duplicating information already in the artist's navbox. —Ojorojo (talk) 20:07, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.