Help:Community guidelines

Hello! The following article contains the rules for the Goosebumps Wiki.

Goosebumps Wiki Rules

 * 1) Explain what you're doing. When editing articles, it is important to inform others about what you are doing.
 * 2) Before making a large or potentially controversial edit, discuss your decision with an admin, in the forums, or on the talk page for the article that you're editing.
 * 3) When saving your edit, try to write a summary about what you've changed.
 * 4) Repeatedly making controversial edits without explaining yourself can result in a ban.
 * 5) Watch your profanity! Since Goosebumps is a franchise designed for all ages, please do not swear on articles or their talk pages. In addition, do not swear at other users.
 * 6) Exception #1: If you are quoting something, profanity can be acceptable in some cases. However, considered if the quote is absolutely necessary for the article. If you use profanity, you will likely need to mark the article as mature.
 * 7) How do I become an admin or apply for another right? For the time being, you cannot apply for a right.
 * 8) If the Apply for a Right program relaunches, please see this post.
 * 9) Before applying, you must consistently make meaningful edits for a considerable amount of time. The current admins can deny granting a user rights if they believe that the user isn't fit for the right that they have applied for.
 * 10) Don't make pages you don't intend to edit. If you want to create a page, please do! ...However, when you create a page, don't simply write a sentence and move on to another page. Add as much meaningful information as you can.
 * 11) In addition to this, don't create a page for something that doesn't need a page. Please do not create pages for background characters/creatures without any significant information about the character.
 * 12) How much should I write? Only add useful information to an article. Before publishing, ask yourself this; would you want to read your own writing?
 * 13) The typical length for the summary of a Goosebumps book should be between 4,000 characters and 9,000 characters. Use a website such as WordCounter.net to make sure you didn't write too much!
 * 14) How should I cite information? Citation is not required in most instances. You only need to cite your sources if the claim that you make cannot be easily confirmed.
 * 15) If another user asks you to cite your source, and you cannot, the information that you are unable to cite may be removed.
 * 16) No speculation! Don't insert opinions/ideas into articles. Only include information that can be confirmed. If you have an interesting theory about a book, feel free to discuss your theory on a talk page or in the forums.
 * 17) Example of speculation 1: "This character probably wasn't Included because the author wanted to save time." This is speculation because it makes an assumption about the author.
 * 18) Example of speculation 2: "Fans hate this book." Don't speak on behalf of all fans. However, you could say; "This book isn't very popular, as the book has a 1.5 on GoodReads."
 * 19) Example of speculation 3: Personal ideas or things that you thought up.
 * 20) Try not to spoil books randomly! Don't spoil books if you don't need to. There are instances where spoilers are fine, but try to be mindful of all readers.
 * 21) Don't spoil a book at the beginning of a summary; save spoilers for the end of the summary.
 * 22) Avoid putting spoilers into the "Trivia" section.

Image Rules
(The rules in this section do not usually apply to Real Life pages.)
 * 1) What images should I use? All of the images that you add to articles should come from an official Goosebumps product. In addition, all images should be of reasonable quality (if possible).
 * 2) Acceptable sources: Book covers, TV show screenshots, movie screenshots, video game screenshots, and official Goosebumps merchandise.
 * 3) Unacceptable sources: Fanart, miscellaneous images, and profane images.

Formatting Rules
(The rules in this section are strongly held guidelines and not bannable offences.)
 * 1) Italics! The names of series, books, TV episodes, video games, and movies must always be italicized.
 * 2) When italicizing a link in the source editor, try to do it like this: Night of the Living Dummy, and not like this: Night of the Living Dummy
 * 3) Arranging articles: Look at how other pages are arranged and try to arrange new pages in a similar style.
 * 4) Sections like "Physical appearance" and "Personality" on character pages should always be sub-sections under the "General information" section.
 * 5) On book pages, the "Trivia" section should come after the page's galleries. On television episode pages, the "Trivia" section is placed above the galleries.

General Rules
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, is the largest and most successful wiki. This section lists some of the overarching guidelines that have helped make Wikipedia a success.
 * 1) Be civil to other users at all times.
 * 2) When in doubt, take it to the talk page. We have all the time in the world. Mutual respect is the guiding behavioral principle of Wikia and, although everyone knows that their writing may be edited mercilessly, it is easier to accept changes if the reasons for them are understood. If you discuss changes on the article's talk (or discussion) page before you make them, you should reach consensus faster and happier.
 * 3) Respect copyright. Wikia uses the GNU Free Documentation License. Everything you contribute must be compatible with that license.
 * 4) Decent edit summaries and clear and transparent explanations are universally appreciated. Other editors need to understand your process, and it also helps you yourself to understand what you did after a long leave of absence from an article. Please state what you changed and why. If the explanation is too long, add more on the discussion page.
 * 5) Assume good faith; in other words, try to consider that the person on the other end of the discussion is a thinking, rational being who is trying to positively contribute to the project — unless, and only unless, you have firm, solid, and objective proof to the contrary. Merely disagreeing with you is no such proof.
 * 6) Particularly, don't revert good faith edits. Reverting is too powerful sometimes. Don't succumb to the temptation, unless you're reverting very obvious vandalism (like "LALALALAL*&*@#@THIS_SUX0RZ", or someone changing "1+2=3" to "1+2=17") . If you really can't stand something, revert once, with an edit summary something like "(rv) I disagree strongly, I'll explain why in talk." and immediately take it to talk.
 * 7) No personal attacks. Don't write that user such and so is an idiot, or insult him/her (even if (s)he is an idiot). Instead, explain what they did wrong, why it is wrong, and how to fix it. If possible, fix it yourself (but see above).
 * 8) Be graceful: Be liberal in what you accept, be conservative in what you do. Try to accommodate other people's quirks the best you can, but try to be as polite, solid, and straightforward as possible yourself.
 * 9) Sign your posts on talk pages using ~, which gets replaced by your username and timestamp when you hit Save. But don't sign on mainspace articles.
 * 10) Use the preview button; it helps prevents edit conflicts and mistakes.

It's important to have fun... but try to make sure those around you have fun too!