Uncyclopedia:Pee Review/vortex
vortex[edit source]
Well I wrote some news, did some salvaging and linkage and now I'm finally producing my first encyclopedia page. I'm learning more by the day with formatting. I'm a classic edit-to-death type of person but I think I have a weiner here. When writing news, I couldn't help but notice the lack of common scientific terms that I couldn't link to and redirects that should exist but don't. Example "canine" redirecting to "dog". I'm still pretty noob so I could use some mechanical guidance. As far as the writing, I plan on tackling the numerous holes in "large words" and hope to be able to link some of them to incredibly simple terms. Like "excrement" redirecting to "shit" --DrStrange 20:51, 19 November 2008 (UTC)
DrStrange 20:51, 19 November 2008 (UTC)
- Err... sure it's not gonna explode?
Could I get a real review from someone who's watched documentaries before? Perhaps that person will look at wiki:vortex and realize I'm not making up smoke ring for a lack of ideas --DrStrange 11:36, 20 November 2008 (UTC)
| Humour: | 6.5 | I gave you a six-point-five out of ten because this article is very nearly average. You have a good thing going here, but I feel as if you don't take advantage of it. I would like to see more actual jokes in the article. Your problem is that you focus so much on serious background information that your jokes that it gets in the way of the funny parts. In some sections, I failed to see a single joke. Now, I'm not trying to be mean, I like the idea, but you aren't spending enough time on humor. You veer into boredom. That led me to being distracted by all the pretty pictures, and that led me to clicking a link, hoping I might find something more interesting. Not really, but this is the fundamental problem of the article. You veer into boredom. To solve this, add some jokes! Uncyclopedia is a humor website. Your exposition is very good, and if you add some jokes into it (in context, of course), the exposition is hilarious. Here, an example: "It's no mystery that the Bermuda Triangle phenomenon is nothing more than a hydraulic vortex with mega-vorticity that destroys boats and planes while leaving no trace. The wreckage of it's helpless victims are never found because the vortex has sucked the debris down to the event horizon, which in this case would be the earth's core. You can add to this. There is a good joke hiding in there. Here, let me try: "It's no mystery that the Bermuda Triangle phenomenon is nothing more than a hydraulic vortex with mega-vorticity that destroys boats and planes while leaving no trace. The wreckage of it's helpless victims are never found because the vortex has sucked the debris down to the event horizon, which in this case would be the earth's core. Thus does nature dispose of its undesirable parts, being cruise liners filled with rich, arrogant, big shots and their snooty massage therapists. See? It adds to the concept, and (maybe) is funnier. This is what you need to do to fix this article. |
| Concept: | 6.5 | I give you 4/5 for your basic idea, which I gather is that vortexes are everywhere, and they are ever-so-subtly linked to toilets and human excrement. I give you 2.5/5 for your execution. My advice on fixing this score is to clarify your concept some. I might be wrong about what your article is about; I had to read between the lines. If your article is, in fact, linking vortexes to yuky doodys and other refuse, you need to make that more obvious. I feel as if I needed to make a greater effort than necessary to understand what this article was about, which is not good. Clarity, please. |
| Prose and formatting: | 5.5 | 2.5/5 points for your prose, and 3/5 points for your formatting. On the subject of formatting, your problem lies mainly with your images. I'll discuss that issue in the "images" section. There are some other formatting gaffes, like the fact that the article is mainly just a list, albeit a nicely fleshed-out list. I would either add more content to the sections you have, or consider eliminating a few sections, like the bird vortices one. Also, try making a few of your sections like the last one, I liked that section a lot. In addition, the article could use a proofread, for little things like its/it's confusions. |
| Images: | 8 | I like the images themselves, and the captions are probably some of the best lines in the article. So your problem is with the formatting. You have a lot of images (I wouldn't go so far as to say too many), and not enough writing to fit them all in. As a result, the formatting can get ugly. Here is what I suggest: With the first pic, I would align it to the center. Being the way it is, the bullet points of the list are not where they need to be, which is as far left as they can go. Centering it is better than aligning right, because you want the table of contents where it is. For the second image, try shrinking it a few pixels so that the horizontal line of the next section goes under it. For the third pic, you may want to align it on the right. It's not awful where it is, but I feel that re-aligning it would help. The fourth pic could use a wee bit of shrinkage, like the second pic. The fifth pic might benefit some by it being longer, but if you can't get it that way, don't bother. The last pic is perfectly placed. |
| Miscellaneous: | 6.6 | Avg'd your score, via {{Pee}}: {{pee|7|6.5|5.5|8}}. |
| Final Score: | 33.1 | I like the concept of the article, it just needs a bit of work to make it betterer. Clarity is your focus. |
| Reviewer: | • • • Necropaxx (T) {~} 18:39, Nov 24 | |
Thanks for the in-depth criticism, I appreciate it.
Weeks later, it's easier to see the mistakes I made with vortex.
There's clearly two philosophies at work at Uncyclopedia, "too serious" and "not serious enough". My personal opinion is that too many entries get far too silly either prematurely or overall. That's just not funny to me. Typical examples are screwy dates; "Joe Blow was born in year X and did Y 300 years before he was born......in the same paragraph......har....deee.......harr..............har. Blatantly overt contradictions like that are similar to Star Trek jokes........dangerous ground.
Obviously, vortex was far too serious in it's structure and that's because I let the "real" Wiki page dictate too much for me. As a result, clarity and flow were compromised by trying to adhere to an unnecessary structure that became an obstacle. I like the joke you suggested for "Bermuda Triangle", I'm surprised that I didn't go there myself. I wrote "event horizon at the earth's core" as the relatively covert, scientific joke in that section and wandered off after that. Abnormality and Grey Area were better jobs IMO at placing more overt jokes. Paleolithic Age is more of a return to serious, heavy subjects like Vortex. I did a Wiki influenced, reality based structure that starts a little slow and becomes sillier, in increments, while bordering on reality at the incredibly silly end. I used war-of-the-sexes humor/T&A to hold reader interest and lure people to the bottom this time. You might find it too much like Vortex but I'm happy with it. (I'm actually having difficulty getting the "smegma and crackers" part out of my head.....bleah)
I'm a big Python fan so I have this thing about building a foundation of authority or seriousness to create humorous opportunities. A little too much on vortex, I agree, but I wish more humor on this site would make a better than zero effort to create a reasonable level of seriousness in situations that call for it. I suppose to some extent I'm always going to be doing writing that's funnier to eggheads than Joe six-pack but I'm totally qualified to bridge the gap. I'm the High School dropout that everyone mistakes for a college graduate. I find scientific absurdity funny. I recently read a page that I absolutely loved, it dragged me in and made me read every word.......no overt schlock humor......Wikipoleonic Complex. It's fucking genius because it's too close to reality. I'd nominate it for something but I know the majority would probably poo-poo on it being anything more than middle-of-the-road article.
I know what you mean about stopping on a page and going WTF? I spend time hitting the random page button occasionally and a lot of stuff just doesn't interest me but I'm happy when I find something funny.--docstrnge34@yahoo.com 09:25, 2 December 2008 (UTC)