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Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

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Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#241

Post by andrepd »

> The Wikipedia Mods view themselves as "journalists" and trying to do the "morally ideological" thing by only allowing certain posts on there

I don't know any of the people in this post, since I firmly believe that not having twitter, instagram, or tiktok is the #1 thing anyone can do to improve their mental well-being. From this sentence alone however, I can exactly establish what kind of person this is. The persecution complex, the "journalist" as an insult, it's all there.

> I know that as of now, GingerBill follows: Matt Walsh, Tucker Carlson, Jordan Peterson, The Babylon Bee, Dave Rubin, Tim Pool and Libs of TikTok.

Nailed it.

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#242

Post by andrepd »

embedding-shape wrote: post #231
amiga386 wrote: post #218

I am a terminally-online person, and I do program. I am not interested in neolanguages. This article is literally the first time I've heard of Odin (the language), and I only clicked it because I thought it was about the Norse god, not some invented language. There are various bounds for notability in Wikipedia, and no matter how much of a fan of the new thing you are, you are encouraged to root around for sources. H…

> I am a terminally-online person, and I do program. I am not interested in neolanguages. I wouldn't say I'm terminally-online, but I do program, passing interest in neolanguages. I've heard about Odin, because I also do 3D VFX and simulations, particularly fire and fluid simulations, and JangaFX kind of infamously hit the 3D simulation scene with EmberGen which kind of did what many thought was short of impossible,…

> If building a world-class (almost revolutionary) product with your own programming language doesn't count as "making your thing notable", maybe it's time to revisit what notable means? JangaFX/EmberGen been covered A LOT in its niche, but because it's a niche, somehow that doesn't seem to count for Wikipedia as "notable".

Please RTFA and address the rebukes to this very point that are presented herein... -.- "Usage of Odin in a world-class product" is enough to count as notable, but how to establish this fact is the problem; a tweet by the CEO is not enough to establish this, secondary reporting by a reliable and archived source would.

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#243

Post by JBits »

baranul wrote: post #137
JBits wrote: post #41

It is disappointing to see that the v programming language has a Wikipedia article given it's history of being essentially fraudulent.

This type of odd vitriol against vlang, when the language has nothing to do with Wikipedia's processes, is both misplaced and demonstrates succumbing to excessive fanaticism from competitor propaganda. The origins of this strange sentiment, appears to partially come from Odin's creator, making the situation a bit of poetic justice. We are here to witness vlang's creator having a Wikipedia page, while Odin's creator s…

While perhaps this is on me for not stating my position while repeating Bill's comment, I think you are unfairly assuming bad faith.

You are wrong to state that I am motivated by fanatism or jealousy.

I have no involvement whatever with Odin and am in agreement with the parent article (though I think it's personal criticisms veer a bit too far). The creator of Odin using Odin at jangafx is not an appropriate source in my view.

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#244

Post by ozgrakkurt »

lvoudour wrote: post #127

I have never been a wikipedia contributor (let alone a mod), but their points seem fair. Maybe not fair for the particular case, but fair for the general case. People who ridicule wikipedia policies should at least acknowledge that the modern internet is a very low trust society with millions of bad actors trying to push their agenda at the expense of others. And now with AI bots running amok the headache increases t…

But is trusting the CEO worse than trusting newspapers?

Argument of Casey was that it is not.

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#245

Post by amiga386 »

embedding-shape wrote: post #231
amiga386 wrote: post #218

I am a terminally-online person, and I do program. I am not interested in neolanguages. This article is literally the first time I've heard of Odin (the language), and I only clicked it because I thought it was about the Norse god, not some invented language. There are various bounds for notability in Wikipedia, and no matter how much of a fan of the new thing you are, you are encouraged to root around for sources. H…

> I am a terminally-online person, and I do program. I am not interested in neolanguages. I wouldn't say I'm terminally-online, but I do program, passing interest in neolanguages. I've heard about Odin, because I also do 3D VFX and simulations, particularly fire and fluid simulations, and JangaFX kind of infamously hit the 3D simulation scene with EmberGen which kind of did what many thought was short of impossible,…

So Odin is a proprietary language used by a startup company that makes graphical effect tools, one of which is popular with vfx artists? I can see why Wikipedia's washing its hands of it.

> If building a world-class (almost revolutionary) product with your own programming language doesn't count as "making your thing notable"

Notability is not transitive. If you make a notable thing using a non-notable thing, it doesn't make the non-notable thing notable unless somehow the notable thing sparks a wave of public interest and thus reporting on the non-notable thing.

Also EmberGen doesn't seem terribly notable either.

How many SIGGRAPH papers go in-depth into EmberGen? As far as I can tell: zero. A Google Scholar search shows a single paper where EmberGen is not just a passing mention, and it's in a journal with low reach: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=%22e... -- also somewhat damning in its conclusion that EmberGen is faster than Blender, but if you need "precise artistic control", keep using Blender.

Has EmberGen won the Academy Scientific and Technical award, like, say, Houdini, Renderman, After Effects or Dragonframe? No it hasn't.

Wikipedia doesn't even have an article on Houdini's HScript.

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#246

Post by conartist6 »

add-sub-mul-div wrote: post #74
conartist6 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno I just find it silly because they're making such a Thing out of it that soon there's just gonna be a Wikipedia page on Odingate as it is rapidly becoming a notable public event of its own. Then that page will have to link to a page on Odin anyway

If the language is too irrelevant to be of interest then why would any bickering about it be notable? There must be thousands of topics people whine about for not making the notability threshold.

Well Jimmy Wales is a kinda notable dude to be bickering directly about it with other internet-famous public figures.

Second, any serious observer of the programming languages would conclude that Odin is in the top 2-3 contenders for the long-term replacement of C. Even if it never attains the goal of supplanting C, I'd argue its historical importance (within its field) is already on par with Betamax or HD-DVD (adjusted for time inflation).

Finally the field of programmers who are able to work on programming languages they made as their full-time profession is extremely rarified, maybe 10-20 individuals at any given time. It is the ultimate measure of having made it -- what we all dream of. At that point you're practically royalty to programmers, and many will know you by name. That is the level of fame (for there is no other accurate word for it) that gingerbill has attained in this community. This dude is a hall-of-famer. Already. Without a single story written about him in a newspaper!

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#247

Post by DiogenesKynikos »

lvoudour wrote: post #127

I have never been a wikipedia contributor (let alone a mod), but their points seem fair. Maybe not fair for the particular case, but fair for the general case. People who ridicule wikipedia policies should at least acknowledge that the modern internet is a very low trust society with millions of bad actors trying to push their agenda at the expense of others. And now with AI bots running amok the headache increases t…

Wikipedia's core policy is verifiability, not truth. If you put a factual statement into an article, you're required to have a written source that Wikipedia can cite. "Someone who says they're the CEO said so on the talk page" doesn't cut it. If the CEO really wants to get this info into Wikipedia, they can go give an interview to a reputable newspaper, news website, magazine, etc., and then Wikipedia can cite that.

Which brings me to the second policy: notability. If JangaFX is really notable enough to have a Wikipedia page, then surely there will be plenty of coverage of it in secondary sources, so Wikipedia won't have to rely on talk-page statements by random editors claiming to be the CEO.

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#248

Post by andrepd »

NordStreamYacht wrote: post #132
shevy-java wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This could be automatic. I noticed this myself because I corrected both typos in english and german wikipedia; sometimes they are reverted, sometimes not. There seems no logic in it, so I assumed that in some cases this must have been automatic wiki bots reverting something.

This was like 10 years ago. Long before the real invasion of the bots. I don't even remember the username or password of my account any more.

Anti-vandalism bots have been used for much longer than 10 years lol

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#249

Post by DiogenesKynikos »

embedding-shape wrote: post #221
stymaar wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, how are we supposed to know that JangaFX is a real company, and its CEO a real person? Creating fake companies and persona is not particularly high effort today, if that's all it takes for a pet project to be featured on Wikipedia, it's going to end up full of crap real quick.

How do you YCombinator is a real company unless you met pg? Look at it being well known with real useable products, might be something to try to look for...

Because plenty of secondary sources have covered it.

Wikipedia's philosophy is that it summarizes reliable secondary sources. You're asking for Wikipedia to change its fundamental philosophy so that editors go out and gather primary evidence themselves, debate it, and then deduce what's true by themselves. That would work if Wikipedia were edited by a select group of highly qualified people you can trust, but it's not. It's edited by literally anyone who signs up. So the rules are strict: find a secondary source, or else don't include the info.

Re: Odin, Wikipedia and engagement farming

#250

Post by CM30 »

I do feel they've got a good point about notable sources in 2026. Wikipedia seems to have reliable source rules straight out of the 80s or 90s. In the internet era, the most reliable sources aren't usually old school journalists or media outlets, they're enthusiasts and specialists publications dedicated to the topic.

For example, they still seem reluctant to allow Serebii.net as a source for Pokemon info, despite the site being A: credited by all the news outlets Wikipedia does consider reliable and B: being reliable and long-term enough that the Pokemon Company themselves uses it as a source, and has the founder do AMAs/interviews at official events.

And it's a big problem with any topic (games and media, programming languages and frameworks, internet happenings in general) where internet blogs and YouTube channels are the main authority.

The most reliable source about a topic nowadays might not use their real name when writing. They might not have a journalism degree, or work for a mainstream media outlet. They might not have an academic background.

But Wikipedia struggles to deal with that. Their rules are too outdated to deal with the changing information landscape.

Do I feel like Odin in particular is being hit hard by this? Maybe, maybe not. I've not personally come across Odin when looking for programming languages or frameworks to learn. I haven't seen it discussed much on social media, on YouTube, or on Hacker News.

However, the issue still stands. If the 'wrong' sources are the ones covering it, then their notability and popularity is treated as irrelevant, and the language as not worth covering.

Wikipedia needs to figure out a new system for this. Maybe some sort of trust system where a source that's treated as reliable by enough existing 'reliable' sources is taken seriously in its own right. If a blog is treated as a reliable source by the New York Times on multiple occasions, then it doesn't seem like a stretch to say it's basically equivalent to the author writing for the newspaper.

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