If there was a NeoLemmix Wiki...

[GigaLem]

EDIT by namida: A wiki has been created at https://wiki.neolemmix.com/


Given the history NeoLemmix had on this website I had this thought about if there was a way of compiling this info into a wikipedia page of our own.

Here's is what I'd propose for such a thing

Avoid making it on Fandom
Fandom is the worst place to host it on, Ads are everywhere, the website is a ram hog, it tries to force personalization on select pages. And it isn't safe from scummy corporate practices and edits. If we're looking for alternatives suggest any, because so far Miraheze comes to mind

Archive every format and build
Oldest Format and its lemmix players, Obsolete NL tools, older historically important level packs built on it, Old Format and New Format Revisions. Tutorials for each version. Document levels, scrapped mechanics, tools, and then some. If we need to make topics searching for lost builds then so be it.

Document its history
This Involves talking about events with the community, Talking about the contests, feature votes, feature culls, developer's commentaries.

Document forks and clones
Superlemmix, Lix, Lemmini, SuperLemmini, and even the original Lemmix. As well as older clones, document and archive their history as its part of the website's history.

No Generative AI
I know this is point of contention but we shouldn't use this as a shortcut to make such a thing, Don't data scrape for assets, and don't rely on something that could potentially give misinformation. NeoLemmix wasn't built by machines and nor was this website. We do a lot of writing anyway, level designers and programmers are artists in a way, if the tools made to put together a level pack or put together sets and the like are made with human hands, The wiki should also be coded and crafted by human hands too. I'm sorry if this upsets anyone, but as an artist myself, I stand against generative AI replacing the work and jobs given to people wanting to survive in this world.

[namida]

If there's a desire for one, I can set one up hosted on the same server as Lemmings Forums using MediaWiki or any similar software. Makes more sense to do that than use a third party service full of ads.

However, I do want to be clear that I'm not likely to contribute much content-wise (I might write up some articles on file formats but that's probably about it). I'll handle the technical stuff and it will be up to the community to write the articles (and to make decisions on the general formatting, what to cover, etc).

I also have no issue with AI being used as long as it's being proofread, fact checked and edited by a human rather than just blindly copy pasted. (In other words: Use it as one of many tools; not as the sole source of content.) Of course, ultimately that too is a decision for the community to make, and this statement is just my own input on it (rather than an actual ruling).

[Silken Healer]

Perhaps it would be more in scope of what you want to make locked threads on the forums and/or some general documentation or writings of NeoLemmix. I remember seeing a NeoLemmix manual at one point, I'm not sure if that's still up to date? There's ways to make your own proper wikis, but they require hosting. Prehaps if such a wiki were to exist Namida could host it on the same servers as Lemmings Forums (as I was writing this Namida posted, yes he could)? Or, as you said, we could use Miraheze.

Avoid making it on Fandom

Funnily enough, there already exists a Lemmings Wiki on Fandom: https://lemmings.fandom.com/wiki/Lemmings.

No Generative AI
I know this is point of contention but we shouldn't use this as a shortcut to make such a thing, Don't data scrape for assets, and don't rely on something that could potentially give misinformation. NeoLemmix wasn't built by machines and nor was this website. We do a lot of writing anyway, level designers and programmers are artists in a way, if the tools made to put together a level pack or put together sets and the like are made with human hands, The wiki should also be coded and crafted by human hands too. I'm sorry if this upsets anyone, but as an artist myself, I stand against generative AI replacing the work and jobs given to people wanting to survive in this world.

Just because you've jumped on the generative AI hate bandwagon doesn't mean no one else is allowed to enjoy reap the benefits from it. It really annoys me how people just like to hate on new technology all the time. You're entire argument is appeal to nature/tradition/popularity. Just because this website/Neolemmix/level packs were made without AI, we "already do a lot of writing," "they were made with human hands" or "they replace jobs" says nothing inherently about whether using generative AI is good/ok or not. Jobs being replaced and chores and manual labour being automated and reduced is just the natural progression of human society. Everything in life has pros and cons and is a trade-off. Self-service kiosks at McDonalds "replace jobs," but that's just a trade-off, we wouldn't want to get rid of them all because of all the convenience they provide. And this argument has nothing to do with anything anyway because if a NeoLemmix wiki were to exist, it wouldn't be a job. The misinformation aspect can easily be solved by a human proof-reading it.

I agree with Namida's opinion on generative AI that he posted.

It wouldn't be up to you anyway if such a wiki were to exist, it would be up democracy or whoever pays for the hosting of the Wiki. 

[namida]

So... was there much interest in actually making this happen, or was it more just a case of "fun to discuss the idea"? As mentioned, I am happy to handle the hosting / setup / technical maintenance for this if there's interest. (I would want to see at least a few people who want to contribute to it (rather than just want it to exist) who are interested.)

[WillLem]

I would want to see at least a few people who want to contribute to it

I'd be happy to write/proofread for it, sure. It's a good idea, and at least if Forum members are contributing/looking after it, we can ensure it's a good quality Wiki page for NL.

[IchoTolot]

@Silken, please be a bit more civil in your tone and not just jump at a person for having a different viewpoint. I get where your point comes from but maybe be a bit more careful in future posts.
Everything is still fine though! 

To quickly elaborate my stand on the topic of AI - even if it goes a bit further than the wiki.
If it sends the discussion too far off topic we could split it up.

Stance on generative AI:

My point on generative AI is to use it as an ally, but be very careful with it.
I haven't used it a lot, but as my job is in the field of computer science we are discovering its uses in our field and how we can improve our work with it.
We are also aware of instances where AI was used without regards for safety/correctness or its learing algorithm even cannibalizing itself. So I saw the dangers!

Like a research paper that was accepted by a reviewer which included AI generated pictures under those one of a mouse with giant genitals. - It went through a peer review!

Also, if AI was used to add a few lines of code to the engine you would not even have the chance to notice it. I can tell you: A ton of programmers use AI from time to time to assist them in formalizing code chunks. You can't blindly use it there either as you still need to test and complie the program anyway - it often mostly helps with syntax.

AI and the wiki:

For a wiki I wouldn't mind it helping us in providing some examples for paragraphs. Never just copy the text though! There lies disaster!
Forming sentences can be hard and having it spit out some ideas can help a lot in the writing process.
Again, we should still write the text ourselves and only use it for assistance - not just mindlessly copying text!

AI and art in general:

Example: If a user wants to make an AI generated tileset it is their decision to make it and ours to use it.
Point about taking Art from others here: It is not like we haven't taken sprites from other stuff ourselves as well: Sonic, Lemmings itself, .... you can extend the list yourself and I would say like 80% of tilesets fall into that category.
Should we remove all Sonic tilesets from NL because of this? I think not.

Especially for music I don't see the big difference here between taking remixes of old video game music and something like an AI altered song.
You don't simply throw somthing at an algorithm and it comes out perfectly. It can take a lot of work to tell an AI exactly what it needs to do.

If the AI thing to remove lyrics/change the voice is unethical so should be the remix in my opinion.
In both the AI variant and the remix work was indeed put in - in both cases human work included! In both cases a human makes art using programs and algorithms.
In most remix cases I highly doubt an official licence from the publisher was aquired before making it! So the playing field is even there.

So what's left is the intend.
Another example: A person wanting to make a lyric free version of a song as it has a nice melody I would not call malicious. An AI algorithm to filter out voices I would not call harmful. Even more when it is used on an old obscure song.
If the AI algorithm to change the voice is used to deceive people instead -like laying words in the artist mouth without highlighting the use of AI- then it turns bad.

I am even a fan of things like "what if band X sang song Y" with the help of AI - often even there you would need to help the AI with your own singing to make it work. The channel "ThereIRuinedIt" explained his working process quite well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vh4ErO-i5o
Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ThereIRuinedIt/videos

An algorithm to simply slobber up all art on the internet without permission to create blatant copies is a completely different case though and I would agree with GigaLem there! There the intent is malicious!

So I would say I stand in the middle position here by saying that using AI as a tool is OK as long as you are indeed careful with it, double check the outcome and not blindly copy it and your intend is not malicious.
As a result, I would not object its assistance in the creation of a wiki by principle.

[namida]

Yeah, if we want to have the AI debate in general, let's make a seperate topic for that and keep this one more to the wiki idea (with any discussion of AI being solely about whether its use is allowed in writing the wiki - which really, for the reasons Icho explained, is going to be a defacto "yes" anyway; we aren't even going to know if an otherwise-good entry had assistance from AI).

(Also, FWIW, I didn't feel Silken's post was overly rude. The first line maybe a little bit, but the rest was all very much in the correct "attack the idea, not the poster" spirit.)

Anyway, it does indeed seem like there's at least some interest in the wiki so... yeah, sure, I'll spin one up at some point and we'll see where it goes. If it doesn't really go anywhere, we can always nuke it later.

[namida]

Alright, I've set up a wiki at: https://wiki.neolemmix.com/

Registration is required to edit pages, but not to simply view them.

It needs a logo - feel free to send me any suggestions. Otherwise - for all technical issues (including if there are additional addons / etc that people think should be installed, or if we get spam problems), let me know. For content, it's up to you guys.

[GigaLem]

Alright, I've set up a wiki at: https://wiki.neolemmix.com/

Registration is required to edit pages, but not to simply view them.

It needs a logo - feel free to send me any suggestions. Otherwise - for all technical issues (including if there are additional addons / etc that people think should be installed, or if we get spam problems), let me know. For content, it's up to you guys.

My idea is pretty simple, the Basic "NL" from the Neolemmix title graphic, and the word Wiki underneath the big letters

[GigaLem]

I'd hate to double post but should there be another board for discussing things to do with the Wiki? Like there would be Threads on searching for older NeoLemmix Builds, Old Players, Obsolete Tools and how to use them should one get curious. As well as discussions on parts of the wiki and how to go about documenting it.

[Silken Healer]

Otherwise - for all technical issues (including if there are additional addons / etc that people think should be installed, or if we get spam problems), let me know.

How do I get infoboxes? Do you need to install anything extra to get infoboxes?


When I try to upload an image I get an error

It needs a logo - feel free to send me any suggestions

When we get a logo, can you make it the favicon as well please?

[namida]

Infoboxes I believe are usually done via templates / transclusion. The templates themself have to be created.

I've fixed the image upload issue, as well as an intermittent login issue.

[WillLem]

If we're going to use the NL menu logo, let's make it this version with improvements to the hair:



(Also, if you want to use this for any updates to 12.14 please do go ahead!)

[Silken Healer]

Infoboxes I believe are usually done via templates / transclusion. The templates themself have to be created.

Do you have to do that/know how to do that/anyone know how to do that?

I've made my own infobox in HTML as the wiki source code seems to support that at that for a temporary solution.

[namida]

It's a standard MediaWiki feature I think. Check how Wikipedia or any other major wiki does it.