Forum:SH:Video Partnership with Star Wars Explained

This page is an archive of a community-wide discussion. This page is no longer live. Further comments or questions on this topic should be made in a new Senate Hall page rather than here so that this page is preserved as a historic record. EcksBot (talk) 21:09, February 1, 2018 (UTC)

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I have an exciting announcement about Featured Videos on Wookieepedia. FANDOM has partnered with a great YouTube channel called Star Wars Explained to use its videos on Wookieepedia. These videos will live on some of the biggest pages, Canon and Legends, across the wiki.

This is a big opportunity for Wookieepedia. Like we've explained with Wiki Modernization, Featured Videos are being used to reduce the number of overall ads per page. Pages with a Featured Video will have even fewer ads on them. So if you're concerned about the number of ads per page, then just know that most of Wookieepedia's highest traffic pages will have a significantly reduced number of ads. That’s a much-improved user experience.

Plus, they're just well-made videos in general and a partnership between Wookieepedia and Star Wars Explained will bring even more readers and potential contributors to the site.

Let me know if you have any questions! - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 18:31, June 19, 2017 (UTC)

• Nice, love his channel. Will there be any calaborations between him and Wook proper, or just through FANDOM? - AV-6R7^{Crew Pit} 19:00, June 19, 2017 (UTC)
  • What kinds of collaboration were you thinking? - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 19:37, June 19, 2017 (UTC)
    • Perhaps things like interviews, fact videos, etc. - AV-6R7^{Crew Pit} 20:00, June 19, 2017 (UTC)
      • I saw some of the videos that he has, and I saw this timeline Legend/Canon, but from Legends it doesnt conver too much the Old Republic era, maybe some collaboration to make this era more known (for example SWTOR video game)--DarthRuiz30 (talk) 20:29, June 19, 2017 (UTC)
        • Fact videos or interviews could be interesting, if there's a place for them to live on the wiki or on FANDOM News and Stories. In regards to SWTOR, speaking strictly in terms of this partnership, very few of the top pages on Wookieepedia are related to SWTOR. The ones that are—Revan, Satele Shan, Bastila Shan, and Darth Malgus all come to mind—have videos that we'll be using. The Malgus video is already live. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 19:20, June 20, 2017 (UTC)
          • The partnership will focus on top pages for the moment only?--DarthRuiz30 (talk) 19:25, June 20, 2017 (UTC)
            • Yes. My team has to make slight tweaks to the videos to remove YouTube-specific elements, so right now we're using our resources where they will be the most effective. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 19:34, June 20, 2017 (UTC)
              • Sounds good, I take my back with previous comment it does looks good. Asked my little brother about what he thought about the Malgus video and finded useful and informative. --DarthRuiz30 (talk) 19:43, June 20, 2017 (UTC)
                • That's great! - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 19:44, June 20, 2017 (UTC)
• Sounds good, although I never like SW Explained or the videos that appear on certain pages, if it helps wookieepedia those are great news and happy to hear them--DarthRuiz30 (talk) 19:38, June 19, 2017 (UTC)
• Would it be possible to have him do a "Wookieepedia Explained" video or series at some point giving tutorials about some of the basics of editing here? It might give people more confidence to become new users and could be a handy place to direct new users who haven't grasped some of our rules or policies yet. Ayrehead02 (talk) 08:58, June 21, 2017 (UTC)
  • I second Ayrehead's opinion that a Wook tutorial video would be helpful. I remember joining the Wook and being overwhelmed by the editing, structure, policies, and format of the whole site. I feel like a lot of people want to contribute but simply don't know how or are too afraid of "screwing up," like I was. With that said, the Star Wars Explained partnership is wonderful. I've been using him for info more times than I'd like to admit. Commander Boots 11:00, June 22, 2017 (UTC)
    • I'm not sure if he's the guy to go to for better how-to edit videos (unless he wishes to host Fandom created ones), but I would love to see Alex and Molly do a Wookieepedia Explained (history, what it is, how it works). Heck, that video could be displayed on the Main page itself! --ChristopherLeeGallant (talk) 21:31, June 26, 2017 (UTC)

List of SWE video pages

Here's the full list of pages with Star Wars Explained videos. If anymore are added, I'll update this list. The total number of pages right now is 173.

Disabling These Videos

• Is there a way to disable these videos or make them less prominent so those who don't want to view them are not automatically presented/auto play those videos? —Unsigned comment by 45.47.2.129 (talk • contribs)
  • No, but you can go into the settings on the video player and disable autoplay. The autoplay disable toggle lasts for 2 weeks at a time. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 03:05, July 4, 2017 (UTC)
    • Ah ok because they're not really useful and quite annoying. I'm coming to wookiepieda to read up on something not to be presented a video. Maybe, is there a way to move them to a less prominent spot and also take away the function where if the user scrolls down, the video does not follow? While I appreciate the work that went into those videos, they really don't add much to the article that isn't already written there. It feels way too forced and in your face being on top, following people as they scroll, and on autoplay. —Unsigned comment by 45.47.2.129 (talk • contribs)
      • No, there's no way to do that. That's okay if you don't want to watch a video, though, you can disable the autoplay. But for the thousands of readers who do want to see a video rather than read a long article, the videos are there for them. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 14:28, July 4, 2017 (UTC)
        • The videos also don't appear in the Monobook skin, which you can enable through your preferences page. - AV-6R7^{Crew Pit} 17:14, July 4, 2017 (UTC)
          • Not everyone likes monobook skin. I would like an option to disable the videos since they're kind of annoying--201.142.244.249 19:32, July 6, 2017 (UTC)
            • You can disable them on your end using the following CSS snippet:

              #article-video, .featured-video__attribution-container { display: none; }
              

              If you create an account, you can add this to Special:MyPage/wikia.css; alternatively there are ways to add custom CSS in your browser. 1358 ^(Talk) 20:00, July 6, 2017 (UTC)
              • Seeing as Wikia insists on autoplaying these videos (we all know autoplay video/audio is the worst thing on the internet), simply hiding the video with CSS isn't enough as the audio will just play in the background. However, you can add this piece of JavaScript to Special:MyPage/wikia.js and that should take care of it. 1358 ^(Talk) 20:13, September 7, 2017 (UTC)
                • We don't have auto-sound. If you're seeing that, please report it. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 20:17, September 7, 2017 (UTC)
                  • Note that to use the fix above you'll need to enable personnel javascript in your preferences. Ayrehead02 (talk) 21:56, September 11, 2017 (UTC)
• It appears Wikia changed the class used for the featured video wrapper, so you'll probably need to update your personal JS page with this piece of code instead. 1358 ^(Talk) 16:01, November 17, 2017 (UTC)

Update: 7/6/2017

Hey guys, here's an update on the videos:

1. Seven more videos have been added. You can find them on Chirrut Îmwe, Darth Vader's castle, First Order, Galactic Empire, Kylo Ren, Luke Skywalker, and Phoenix Squadron.
2. Alex is indeed interested in making a Wookieepedia Explained video, and I'll collaborate with him on that. More info to come.
3. Pages that have these videos now have fewer advertisements on them, which was one of the goals (ad reduction) of Wiki Modernization.

- Brandon Rhea^(talk) 19:27, July 6, 2017 (UTC)

• Any update on the Wookieepedia Explained video? I'm seriously super excited for that one. MasterFred^(Whatever) 06:43, August 13, 2017 (UTC)
  • Any chance that this could be added at the top of the page for Zare Leonis? ProfessorTofty (talk) 15:41, August 16, 2017 (UTC)
    • @Fred: no update yet, there were a bunch of videos Alex needed to get through first. @Tofty: not at the moment, we've discovered that there's a limit to the number of videos that can be added to an individual wiki and we've hit it with Wookieepedia. An increase will go live soon, at which point we can add the Zare Leonis one. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 17:19, August 16, 2017 (UTC)
      • Ah, I see. Okay, looking forward to it then. ProfessorTofty (talk) 18:34, August 16, 2017 (UTC)
        • So how soon is "soon"? It's been nearly two months. ProfessorTofty (talk) 14:19, October 12, 2017 (UTC)
          • A lot of this comes down to my schedule as well, and I'll be honest and say that this is not high on my list of priorities. I have an outline nearly ready to go for Alex to write a script based on, though, and I hope to get that to him in the next week or so. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 15:06, October 12, 2017 (UTC)
            • Ah, that makes sense. Well, no worries, then. Whenever you have the chance. ProfessorTofty (talk) 19:29, October 13, 2017 (UTC)