HRFWiki:Fanstuff Guidelines

From Homestar Runner Fanstuff Wiki

This is an official policy page for the Homestar Runner Fanstuff Wiki. The rules and guidelines on this page should be followed at all times except where explicitly stated within the policy. More specific information about where this policy applies are listed under the appropriate headers. Disregarding official policies may warrant your account being blocked.

On this page are the rules of the Homestar Runner Fanstuff Wiki. Although the page is called "Fanstuff Guidelines" for familiarity, they are much more than guidelines: if you break any of the rules you will likely be reverted/warned/banned depending on the rule you break and how many times you break it. They are here for the sake of the community: following them will make the site a better place.

General

These rules apply to all pages on the wiki, including fanstuff, talk pages and user pages.

• Only use words/themes/etc. that would be considered appropriate to be on the official Homestar Runner site. Small exceptions may be granted on a case-by-case basis; however, a sysop should always be consulted before doing so. You aren't allowed to link to inappropriate content either.
• Although this is a wiki and everybody can edit everything, that doesn't give you the right to walk all over somebody else's content. Generally speaking, you shouldn't edit somebody else's fanstuff / user page / etc. unless making small corrections such as spelling, grammar or formatting.
• Don't copy somebody else's work without asking them first and attributing them correctly. Failure to do so will simply lead to people getting angry and annoyed.
• Subpages are important and they keep everything organized.

Say, for example, you have a fanstuff called Generic User Fan Fiction, and you have different pages for every different chapter, then each chapter page must be a subpage of it - so Chapter 5 should be called something like Generic User Fan Fiction/Chapter 5, and not called Chapter 5.

• Don't insult other users, either directly or indirectly. This includes being a jerk in general. This is very straight-forward and any infractions of this rule will be treated seriously.
• Don't revert wars. Notify a sysop of the issue instead of reverting a page back and forth three million times.
• If you are under thirteen, don't give any identifying information about yourself. Identifying information includes your surname, your phone number, your home address, your email address, your date of birth, or the name of your school. Giving your first name, your age, your general location, or including your email address when you sign up is fine. You also cannot post a photograph of yourself.
  
  The Knowledge Base has a similar policy that may contain additional information: see HRWiki:Youth protection.

Fanstuff

• If your fanstuff is not based around Homestar Runner (the website, not the character), don't put it on this wiki. Don't just try and slot a few Homestar characters in either: people are not stupid and this will be noticed and your fanstuff will likely be deleted.
  • As part of this, don't upload large amounts of non-related images. There are plenty of image hosting services out there.
• Interactive games are allowed, but the major portion of the "playing" must be done on a single page. This is to avoid Recent Changes being flooded with tons of subpages.
• There are no restrictions on the type of fanstuff you can create (keeping the other rules in mind). Doesn't fall under an existing category? Put it on the Miscellaneous page. We encourage all types of creativity, from writing to animation to drawing to things in real-life.
  • Similarly, don't worry if your fanstuff is similar to somebody else's. Even if there are 17 Homsar email shows, go right ahead: if your fanstuff is good it will stand out and people will read it.

Miscellaneous

• Users may have one signature only, located at User:Username/sig. This signature should be kept short and simple: creativity is encouraged but there's no need to include as many different colours as possible. Your signature must link to your userpage and may also link to your talk page and one other page of your choice only.
  • Your signature must include your username or something similar to it. You are allowed to abbreviate, make minor alterations to, and add additional words and symbols next to your name, but it must be easy to tell it's still you.

Related Policies

A lot of the guidelines above are intentionally non-specific, however there are several policy pages that provide more detail for many of them. These policy pages are just as important as the guidelines, so make sure you read them all thoroughly!

• HRFWiki:Appropriate Content - swear words and mature themes that are/are not allowed to be used in fanstuffs and on the wiki in general.
• HRFWiki:Needs More Homsar - why your fanstuff has to be based in the Homestar Runner universe with Homestar Runner characters and what will happen if it isn't.
• HRFWiki:Personal Pages - the sort of stuff that should go in your user space, as well as more detailed rules about your signature and non-Homestar-related images that you upload.
• HRFWiki:Fanstuff Organization - the Fanstuff Wiki can be a big and confusing place, especially if you've never used a wiki before: this page explains where you put your fanstuff, as well a general list of what type of fanstuff is allowed.