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From Encyclopedia Dramatica

THE YOUTUBE

IMPROVEMENT

DRIVE

Welcome.
The original ED Improvement Drive was a great success. ED stepped up efforts to maintain a high level of quality content as well as trim the fat from many of the popular categories. Unfortunately, the YouTube category has become the equivalent of the DeviantART category. We have too many crappy stubs that are simply lacking lulz and articles which have maintained archive value but which have become stagnant and due to lack of maintenance/upkeep. Newer EDitors must be educated in what we desire in a YouTube related article. This page will function in an advisory capacity in the interests of maintaining the category.

What We Do Not Want

It's important to remember that ED provides factual information about people, events, memes, etc. "Lies," as such, are only okay if they are exaggerations of the truth, or obvious fabrications. Although we do not care about NPOV here (that's more a TOW thing), if you are trying to give your article an "edge" by cramming misused or overused words like aspie, pedophile, and nigger in them, then you are a poor EDitor. The issue here is not the offensiveness of the words, it is you substituting them for your lack of creativity. ED is not Hitler's Uncyclopedia - we want articles that are clear and concise with harsh and snarky satire, not forced or shallow tripe. We do not care about some nobody who blocked you on the tubes, nor do we want your shitty attack article on them. We want lulz and articles with wide appeal. The ratio of poorly written, in utero, and unfunny semi-stubs to solid articles and stubs with potential that are created on any given day is already 10-1 and we have to flush most of them. Do not flood us with more.

In accordance with the Original Improvement Drive:

• Avoid Exhibits A, B, C and D.

ED:101, ED:LULZ, ED:ABOUT, and ED:CRAP are required reading for new users.

Misues of Templates

We have also seen massive abuse of certain templates in recent months as well. The {{spoiler}} template has been misused in the same manner as the {{fact}} and {{warning}} templates (both of which are now deleted because of it). Please exercise discretion.

Misuse of Memes

This is an enormous problem right now and the YouTube category is no exception. This has the adverse affect of both debasing the sacred memes whilst making the articles seem forced and cheap. We do not want people writing as if our audience is a bunch of meme-addicted channers.

A good way to avoid misuse is to pipe to memes.

For Example:

• [[Over 9000|Many people]] feel like [[IMMA CHARGIN MAH LAZER|masturbating]] after watching LisaNova's videos.
  Nobody feels like that after watching a Gimmeabreakman video. This makes Victor sad.

This technique of piping to memes stops articles being filled with meme references, whilst linking readers to those precious memes.

Avoid Unecessary Piping

Although good use of piping is one of the primary lulz generators in any article, we often see unimaginative or monotonous piping used in many articles. Try and be as creative as you can and search out appropriate articles to pipe to. Remember, excessive piping does ! = funny.

Go Easy On The Embeds

Dumping a shitload of embeds onto a page does not = an article. When embedding videos, have a few sentences describing what readers should expect if they watch the video, or offer a critique of the video and/or state its relevance to related drama. You know what the video is about already, the reader often does not. Do you actually want the readers to even watch the video? Or are you just interested in bulking out your article? When it's the latter, you're not fooling anyone. {{ytplus}} is an easy template to use if you cannot think of a few descriptive sentences - read about how to use it in ED:101. See more in the section on Maintaining Active Mirrors.

NEWS:

• We now allows users to embed video from over 40 other websites, not just YouTube. Please read more at UPGRADE: 2009 page.
• Template {{frame}} is handy for creating a box to put a video in (or picture for that matter). It looks much better than just a plane embed and you can include captions if you like as well.

• Use the {{fv}} template to create tabbed collections of videos. This saves a shitload of space on most articles. You can even include captions along with the videos. Please see this page for full instructions on use.

Previous Video  |  Next Video

Articles For Reference

As a reminder of what is expected, here is a quick list of some good YouTube related articles:

• Renetto
• TheAmazingAtheist
• CaseyNunez
• HellionExciter
• Bravesgirl5
• FilthyWhore
• PeppermintPatti
• Vloggerheads

It may be difficult for you to create an article as high quality as these simply because you do not have as much to work with, but keep in mind that these are what you should be striving for.

Maintaining Active Mirrors

Probably our biggest problem.
Videos are taken down or removed all the time and uers must start maintaining active mirrors in the interests of preserving lulz. The lack of active mirrors is one of the reasons we are now forced to trim the fat from the YouTube category and we need you to restore broken embeds and external links. When readers see an article in which every embed is a broken link, this looks bad and it reflects poorly on ED. We need you to help restore these embeds and/or external links. ED does not actively encourage any user to violate copyright laws and/or any website's TOS, but it helps if users maintain backups of critical videos at the very least. For convenience sake, here is a rapidshare of a good program to use called Nuclear Coffee VideoGet 2.0. If a video cannot stay up as a result of a very determined YouTuber, then rapidshare the videos so as to at least maintain access to them for the readers. If you embed any important video, GET AN FLV BACKUP AT THE SAME TIME.

• If an article has very few active mirrors please tag it with the {{ytid3}} template.

Patrolling Templates

{{improve}}

For user talk pages. Basically, {{dummies}} but for YouTube specifically.

{{ytid}}

To tag articles, old or new, that have potential but which are significantly failing at the moment. Should only be used by sysops as an alternative to {{deathnotice}}. Important: You must TIMESTAMP the template by putting the prefix text "subst:" into the template - {{subst:ytid}}
(Add tagged articles to the Tagged for Deletion Page).

{{ytid2}}

An alternative to the {{userspace}} for moving a failing YouTube article to someone's userspace. Usage: {{ytid2|ARTICLE NAME}} (for user talk pages). Start articles in your userspace first - do so by searching "user:*YOURUSERNAME*/*ARTICLE TITLE*", then click "edit this page", then save. That's it.

{{ytid3}}

For pages which have a lot of broken embeds or external links:

Start Using These More

• {{youtube2}} - For channel links. Usage: {{youtube2|CHANNEL NAME|DISPLAY NAME}}.
• {{youtube}} - For video links. Click the link for instructions.
• {{frame}} - For putting a box around your videos.
• {{fv}} - For tabbed video galleries. See the page for instructions.

Current and Future Initiatives

The YouTube Portal

The YouTube Portal is now up and running. Please go to the People page to add a someone/an article to the list. If you wish to suggest an article for featuring on the Portal please drop a note on the Portal talk page.

Needed Articles

You can list prospective articles or find subjects for potential articles listed here. It will replace the section on the Encyclopedia Dramatica:Needed page.

A Final Note

To put it simply, this is our mandate. We appreciate all the hard work every user has put into every article. We really do. But it is now necessary for the good of the site to direct efforts towards improving the category. If some shitty stub or an article you've made major contribs to gets flushed, well that's just tough shit then. Before attempting to recreate a previously deleted page you must ask a sysop to review it to see if it's good enough to come back.

“	Ours is not to reason why, ours is but to do and die.	„
—some English faggot

Useful Links

Policy This article defines official ED Policy.

• ED:101 - How 2 EDit for Dummies.
• When is it crap? - Tips to avoid writing poor articles.
• Maintaining a Good Joke:Word Count Ratio - Tips on keeping a healthy amount of lulz in your article.
• The Style Guide - For general tips on writing articles.
• ED General disclaimer