Atari 7800 on Wikipedia

[Lendorien]

I had reason to jump onto Wikipedia today and my searches eventually took me to the 7800 page. What I found was terrible. I'm wondering if any other Atari 7800 fans (and wikipedians) would be willing to help fix up the article. It would be ideal if we could get it up to a state where it was able to be listed as a GOOD article.

 

The article is here: Atari 7800 on Wikipedia.

 

Ideally, we'd want to use the SNES as a template guide. The SNES article is a featured one and what to look for in an article.

 

Among issues with the article currently are:

 

• Complete reorganization of info is needed. The article jumps around all over the place with various sections appearing in completely illogical places. - I've actually done this, though it still needs work to tie sections together and move information around to fit into proper sections.
  
• General rewrite needed to remove the article's fan tone.
  
• General rewrite of history section is needed to segue better and to provide more information. It's rather vague in places and doesn't cover some of the turmoil cause by the Tramiel buyout.
  
• General rewrite of tech section needed.
  
• Lack of sourcing - Article desperately needs sourcing. I know a lot of technical documents are actually available, some from Curt Vendel's Atari museum website and other places like on Atariage where various scanned tech documents have been archived. We need Atariage members to find it and source the article better. Other sourcing such as newspaper articles, etc are needed as well.
  
• Technical infoboxes needed in the tech sections. The SNES article does this well and can be used as a template.
  

 

Other suggestions? Help me out here. Wikipedia is the first place that people go to for information these days. It'd be nice is this fine system was better represented there.

Edited December 22, 2010 by Lendorien

[Metal Ghost]

Wow, this is a great idea and a good project for the community to rally around. I agree that Wikipedia is often the 1st place that people go to gain information about something.

 

Count me in. I don't have a lot of resource materials at the ready, but I consider myself a decent write and am getting some books on loan from the library from which to reference. Sounds like I'll have a good project to do during breaks from family and gaming this holiday!

[high voltage]

Revisions, it should be mentioned that in Europe the 7800 came with built-in Asteroids

[DracIsBack]

A number of people from this forum have contributed extensively to the article and enhanced it significantly throughout the years. Is there room for improvement? Of course. But be careful about insulting previous work ...

Edited December 25, 2010 by DracIsBack

[Lendorien]

A number of people from this forum have contributed extensively to the article and enhanced it significantly throughout the years. Is there room for improvement? Of course. But be careful about insulting previous work ...

 

The article is poor by Wikipedia article standards. I'm just trying to see that the 7800 is represented in an article that will get notice on Wikipedia for being among the better ones on the site. The previous work by other people has done a lot, certainly, but the article still needs work. Stating the fact that it does shouldn't be taken as some sort of insult.

 

Perhaps I should have picked my wording more carefully (When I said GOOD, I meant, Good Status in wikipedia standards terms), but I didn't mean any piss anyone off. Anyone who has seen my interactions on Atariage in the past two years would know that I don't operate that way. I'm a straight shooter, but I don't go out of my way to antagonize people.

 

I would ask that you step back for a moment, take a deep breath and assume my good faith in this matter. Thanks.

Edited December 25, 2010 by Lendorien

[kool kitty89]

As a general response:

There's a ton of new information that Curt Vendel and Marty Goldberg (wgungfu) have uncovered/compiled that should eventually be added, but from what I understand, that's not going to happen until said information is actually published on one of their websites or their books are completed and printed.

A lot of this has already come out on the Atariage forums, but that's not a valid source (I actually cited Curt's 7800 sales thread at one point -for the 3.77 million US sales figure, but that got ripped down -it turned out that Marty was the one to actually edit it off interestingly enough -both of them police the Atari wikipedia articles to a fair extent iirc)

 

So the article (and others) should get notable expansions and revisions later on, but some of that isn't happening until other things happen first. (namely publication of the revised history of Atari)

 

 

[*]General rewrite needed to remove the article's fan tone.

As it is, it doesn't seem bad at all in that respect... the better portions read a bit like some of the Atarimuseum stuff and indeed, some stuff on the Atari wikipedia articles are block quotes from curt's site. However, it should be noted that, while one of the better online Atari resources, Curt's site does need to be updated in several areas (I think he's been meaning to do that for a while but there's been delays), so there's a good amount missing out of more recently compiled information. (including more details on the Warner sale, GCC conflicts, Atari Corp management in general, bringing Mike Katz in, etc)

 

[*]General rewrite of history section is needed to segue better and to provide more information. It's rather vague in places and doesn't cover some of the turmoil cause by the Tramiel buyout.

You mean the mess largely created by the Warner sellout. Jack certainly had an impact on what happened with the former Atari Inc consumer holdings at TTL (which was then renamed Atari Corp), not least of which being tunnel vision on the ST contributing to some Atari Inc projects getting overlooked more than they should have, but in any case, a huge chunk of the problems in moving on to Atari Corp was Warner's fault... let alone their decision to dump Atari Inc when James Morgan's reformation of the company was extremely promising.

 

In short: Warner started looking for buyers to liquidated Atari Inc's holdings without notifying anyone at Atari Inc, not any general staff, not upper management, not even James Morgan himself until minute before he had to sign the contract liquidating Atari's consumer assets (selling them to Trammel Technology Ltd -TTL- which then became Atari Corp).

But here's the kicker: not only did they not notify anyone, but the deal coincided with 4th of July vacation, so stuff coming back from vacation were utterly dumbfounded and it was an total mess: Tramiel didn't lay off ANYONE... Atari Inc. laid off ALL Atari Inc staff and it was up to Tramiel to recruit them to his totally separate company... unfortunately Warner's shit planning didn't help the situation at all and the whole thing was a rushed mess.

 

Given what Curt and mart have said on the Topic, Atari Inc probably could have been rather well off under Morgan had things kept going as they were in early/mid 1984, but regardless, the transition of Atari consumer operations to Atari Corp/TTL could have been FAR smoother had Warner made reasonable provisions for such.

 

One interesting coincidence is that the Amiga deal also fell through about the same time: just a couple days before (or maybe just 1 day) the Warner/Tramiel sale, Amiga lied and claimed that they couldn't get Lorraine workin and the LSI chip runs had not been functional and included a return of Atari's $50k loan with interest to close the contract (which was not technically possible in the nature of the contract, but it ended up getting fudged as such). Mind you, Amiga was already running late with the deadline for delivering the LSI chips to Atari. (iirc it was supposed to be September 29)

 

Of course Atari Corp later sued and won damages over that debacle. (as Atari Inc probably would have done had Morgan stayed on)

[Mord]

The article is poor by Wikipedia article standards.

 

You're talking about a standard that has managed to validate itself as a source of info all the same.

 

There have been cases where someone writes a Wikipedia entry, some other website writes up an article based on that wikipedia entry, then the wikipedia entry gets updated using that website as a reference to itself.

[Underball]

Does anyone really cite wikipedia as a reliable or accurate source of info for anything, really?

 

Its a nice idea on paper, but in practice wikipedia is largely a collection of inaccurate self promotion pieces that could double as satire.

[Metal Ghost]

Does anyone really cite wikipedia as a reliable or accurate source of info for anything, really?

 

Its a nice idea on paper, but in practice wikipedia is largely a collection of inaccurate self promotion pieces that could double as satire.

 

 

Whether or not anyone actually cites Wikipedia as source material is not the only point. It happens to typically be the first source of information for 10s of millions of people who are looking to find out something about, well, just about anything. Whether we think it should be used for that purpose is besides the point.....it simply is. As a community of fans for one of the subjects being discussed on Wiki, it's up to us to police what's being said.

 

Kudos to Lendorien for bringing this up and getting people involved.

[+Stephen]

I think this just about sums it up.

[kool kitty89]

Does anyone really cite wikipedia as a reliable or accurate source of info for anything, really?

 

Its a nice idea on paper, but in practice wikipedia is largely a collection of inaccurate self promotion pieces that could double as satire.

Yes, it's inconsistent, but the better managed articles are great and often more accurate and detailed that what you can easily find elsewhere on the web. That's the case for most of the atari related stuff as Curt and Marty police those (and some related ones) personally as I mentioned above.

However, the articles are going to stay vague or open ended in some areas until the new info is actually published. (forums are not viable sources for wiki... at least not for articles with good management -Marty took down one of my edits to the 7800 article a while back because of that)

 

 

 

I think I already outlined most of the other issues above though.

 

 

 

 

 

Edit: I just remembered Marty wrote the 7800 Retroinspection article in Retrogramer a few months back, so that would be a possible published resource for updated info on the 7800 article.

Edited December 28, 2010 by kool kitty89

[Retro Rogue]

The article is poor by Wikipedia article standards. I'm just trying to see that the 7800 is represented in an article that will get notice on Wikipedia for being among the better ones on the site. The previous work by other people has done a lot, certainly, but the article still needs work. Stating the fact that it does shouldn't be taken as some sort of insult.

 

None taken. Lot of good reworkings. I did have to revert your edit to the opening paragraph though as it introduced some inaccuracies. You had edited to say Atari Corporation had released it in 1984 and re-released it in 1986. They did not, Atari Corporation didn't exist yet during the '84 launch. Atari Inc. is the company that released it in 1984. Two separate companies.

 

Likewise the correction for your opening statement under Cancelled peripherals. Jack did not purchase Atari, he purchased the Atari Consumer Division from Atari Inc.

 

 

Count me in. I don't have a lot of resource materials at the ready, but I consider myself a decent write and am getting some books on loan from the library from which to reference. Sounds like I'll have a good project to do during breaks from family and gaming this holiday!

 

Unfortunately, I had to revert the single edit you did - the 5200 was the original intended successor of the 2600, which was then cancelled and replaced by the 7800. The original sentence you tried to change was correct.

 

Likewise both the 5200 and 7800 were placed as high end complimentary consoles to the 2600, rather than direct replacements.

 

 

Edit: I just remembered Marty wrote the 7800 Retroinspection article in Retrogramer a few months back, so that would be a possible published resource for updated info on the 7800 article.

 

Yes, RetroGamer can be used as a reference there. The catch is, you can't self reference - so you won't see me adding any references to my article. That doesn't mean you guys can't do that though. Templates for citing from various sources are located here. You generally put the filled in template in between ref tags.

 

 

Does anyone really cite wikipedia as a reliable or accurate source of info for anything, really?

 

Its a nice idea on paper, but in practice wikipedia is largely a collection of inaccurate self promotion pieces that could double as satire.

 

 

Unfortunately, it seems the general public is clueless as to what constitutes a reliable article on Wikipedia - your statement being a bit of a missleading example of that. Most articles are works in progress, which means little actual reliable references and accuracy is up in the air. The ones that are not are the ones labled as Good Articles (GA) or Featured Articles (FA). You'll find these labled at the top of the article's discussion page. Meeting those two standards are what the goals are of all articles on Wikipedia. GA and FA articles mean that said article has gone through a rigorous peer review for conformity to guidelines (include having plenty of citable references and that all references meet reliability guidelines), clarity, and accuracy. In fact articles with FA status have gone through two sets of those, as you have to reach GA before you hit FA. You'll see a marked difference of articles that have gone through these processes vs. ones that haven't. For example, Pong, Defender, and Space Invaders are examples of three articles I've helped to bring to GA status (with Space Invaders actually hitting FA status). Contrast the content and layout with those with something like Omgpop, Pitfall!, Kaboom!, Scramble, or some of the articles you had in mind when you wrote that comment.

 

The guidelines on reliable sources are pretty cut and dry - first and foremost they have to demonstrate some sort of editorial oversight. I.E. some demonstrable responsible editorship that does quality control (content review) of the material they put out. This usually includes magazines, newspapers, etc. and precludes fan sites, blogs, and discussion forums. Exceptions would be say fan sites that have been cited by sources that are considered reliable - such as how Curt's Atari Museum site has been used (cited) as a reference in newspapers, magazines, other publications, and even TV shows.

 

The whole idea is that articles that reach GA and FA status can be considered reliable themselves, because they themselves are full of sources (references and citations) that the reader can also check and site.

 

There are also various projects across Wikipedia, which are mini governing bodies (I use the word mini loosely as some of these can have several hundred people involved) consisting of fellow wikipedia editors that guide the development of articles in a specific interest group. That includes setting up guidelines specific to that groupings of articles. So for example, all the video game articles fall under WikiProject Video Games and their guidelines for article content are here.

Edited January 7, 2011 by wgungfu

[DracIsBack]

At first, i was a little taken aback as a number of us have contributed to this extensively through the years. Reading through though, it does seem crisper now. Good job! Now I need to add back in that reference to the origins of the 7800's name that was previously removed and a few other goodies from the 7800 25th anniversary reunion.

 

Speaking of RetroGamer, I'm finally getting my copy.

Edited January 7, 2011 by DracIsBack

[jsoper]

Likewise both the 5200 and 7800 were placed as high end complimentary consoles to the 2600, rather than direct replacements.

Complementary. These consoles are rude and don't compliment anyone. Heck, they even call some Berzerk players "chicken"

[spiffyone]

Count me in. I don't have a lot of resource materials at the ready, but I consider myself a decent write and am getting some books on loan from the library from which to reference. Sounds like I'll have a good project to do during breaks from family and gaming this holiday!

 

Unfortunately, I had to revert the single edit you did - the 5200 was the original intended successor of the 2600, which was then cancelled and replaced by the 7800. The original sentence you tried to change was correct.

 

Likewise both the 5200 and 7800 were placed as high end complimentary consoles to the 2600, rather than direct replacements.

 

I think I've gone back and forth with you on this on wiki, but the statement that they were not meant as "direct replacements" and rather "high end complimentary" consoles doesn't really hold water, despite what that one article you've linked to in the 7800 page leads you to think.

 

The fact was that 5200 is listed as a successor model to the 2600. The fact was that the hardware used in the 5200 was a reconfiguration of the hardware used in the 400/800 line, which in the wiki article for the 5200 and 400/800 computers states was developed with the original intention of being a replacement/successor for the then aging 2600 game console. So then, if 5200 is using similar hardware to the hardware that was originally intended to be the replacement model console, and the 5200 was released, and the PR states that it was intended for consumers who wanted to step up to a superior experience, what is it? A replacement for those looking to step up. I think that's pretty clear.

 

7800 like-wise was intended to succeed 5200.

 

This "high end complimentary" business is posited simply because, what? 2600 was kept alive? So what? NES was kept alive by Nintendo up until late '94/early '95 in the US, and Famicom up to 2000 or so in Japan, well after the launch of SNES/Famicom, and even up to or after the launch of N64. That did not mean that SNES was not a successor and, yes, intended replacement for that venerable NES/Famicom console, or that N64 a successor/replacement for SNES. Nintendo wanted NES owners who wanted to step up past NES technology to buy their successor model (SNES) and not Sega's MegaDrive/Genesis or NEC's TG-16/PC Engine. Atari likewise wanted those tiring of their 2600 to step up to 5200 and not a competitor's console that had more power. It's pretty clear what the intention is there.

 

If that's not a successor/replacement model, then what is? Was 2600 kept alive? Of course! It was still selling, still making money. But Atari was succeeding it with another high end model intended to replace 2600 for those not satisfied with and/or grown tired of the 2600.

 

That's my issue with the wikipedia section as a whole. I can understand the clear need to site sources. I can understand that that's what you in particular are driving at as you police that section. But, c'mon...there's gotta be room for simple common sense.

 

I mean...hell, 2600, 5200, 7800. The numbers get larger, lol

 

Seriously though, I think you've done a heckuva job on the wikis. I like the fact that the Atari pages aren't the ever changing chaos filled arenas that are the Nintendo and Sega console pages.

[Retro Rogue]

I think I've gone back and forth with you on this on wiki, but the statement that they were not meant as "direct replacements" and rather "high end complimentary" consoles doesn't really hold water, despite what that one article you've linked to in the 7800 page leads you to think.

 

I linked to a direct interview on the 5200 page, not sure what you mean.

 

A replacement for those looking to step up. I think that's pretty clear.

 

No, as stated it's not - because of how it's being directly presented and quoted. Per the article which, directly quotes Michael Moore, then president of Consumer Division:

 

"We have created two home game systems in the same spirit in which an automobile manufacturer builds different models to suit different tastes. The Atari 5200 was created for those players who demand state-of-the-art video game technology."

His usage of the analogy goes out of the way to assure people that it's not a replacement but rather simply a different "model" for people who have a different taste. As does the assurance in the next paragraph to assure people it's not a replacement, i.e. the 2600 will continue on:

 

"We will continue to support the VCS - the most popular home video game system in the world - with fantastic new games, as well as comprehensive service."

 

There was specifically a power struggle going on internally during that time both in management, and engineering, on not replacing the 2600 or pomoting that it was a directy replacement. Kassar of all people was always fearfull of not undercutting 2600 sales - the golden goose of Atari Consumer at the time.

 

 

This "high end complimentary" business is posited simply because, what? 2600 was kept alive?

 

Nope. Because of their direct stated intent, their internal discussions on it and what they didn't want the 5200 to do (which included carefull planning to not present it as a replacement - hence the quote in the article), and the actual direct 2600 replacement projects in development at the time that were cancelled. There's a reason it was simply regurgitated PCS hardware inside instead of the original 2600 replacement hardware that Bristow originally designed, which is stuff I all covered in the 5200 Retroinspection in RetroGamer this past year.

 

That's my issue with the wikipedia section as a whole. I can understand the clear need to site sources. I can understand that that's what you in particular are driving at as you police that section. But, c'mon...there's gotta be room for simple common sense.

 

Again, you may firmly believe it as so, but that doesn't make it fact. We (myself and Curt) prefer to go by actual Atari sources vs. surmising.

 

Seriously though, I think you've done a heckuva job on the wikis. I like the fact that the Atari pages aren't the ever changing chaos filled arenas that are the Nintendo and Sega console pages.

 

I appreciate the compliment, and I appreciate what you were trying to do, as well as what everyone else looks to do with the edits and are currently doing.

[Metal Ghost]

For anyone who doesn't think that Wikipedia is consequential: http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/01/13/5831299-53-percent-of-americans-use-wikipedia

 

In a nutshell, the article reports that 53% of Americans turn to the on-line encyclopedia for information, up from 36% 3 years ago.

 

Just thought it was an interesting reference point.