Talk:Cortana/Cortana Letters

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Articles for deletion This article was nominated for deletion on 2006-06-10. The result of the discussion was keep.
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Contents

Possible Addition

In the lines referencing the 'slavishly loyal and humorless AI,' could it be talking about Guilty Spark 343? It is partially his fault Cortana couldn't remain in Halo's main CPU, and why she's stuck with the Gravemind now.

In 'Referential Importance', it appears more likely that the 3rd letter was refering to ELIZA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ELIZA) than any 'I love bees.' site, at least from what the quoted text is describing.

Wikiproject cleanup

Barring complaints, I'm going to start fixing this article. Main problem: It's basically a listing of the Cortana Letters followed by original research about them. How to fix this? Start the article with a summary of the letters, their history, etc. End it with the current state of the letters in the community. This will likely take the article to near-stub lengths once it's through, but everything will at least be up to Wiki standards.Gspawn 15:30, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Things to consider/do:
-Make the letters' importance clear early on,
-Hack off huge portions, replace any necessary bits with brief Wiki passages.
-Keep literary references. Some bits (The Hollow Man) aren't original research, they're elements that are clear-cut "source material". Similarly, the writings of William Blake are clear influences admitted by Bungie (and mentioned in Marathon). Clearly acceptable here. Except, of course, to cut down research and leave only the references.
-There is a recent-ish Bungie quote that the Cortana letters should basically no longer be considered canon due to the evolution of the series (or something like that). This quote needs to be found as it will be crucial to the end of the article (something like how they've clearly been overanalyzed, and now even Bungie notes the changing nature of the series has made the letters nearly obsolete).
-And I think I've deleted all spoilers from the article- other than vague references to "events in Halo" and the general facts like Chief and Cortana sharing armor (which should be non-spoilers), I think everything is out.
Needs plenty of work (formatting help, anyone?) but at least now it looks like a real Wiki article. Gspawn 16:33, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

ARG?

Were the Cortana Letters an Alternate Reality Game? I never thought about it before, but the way Bungie responded to and interacted with fans (the "players") through the sending of the letters (the "game") makes me inclined to say yes. Anyone agree? Gspawn 16:47, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree, Bungie have been known to muck around with ARGs in the past. It's all just part of 7he 7ru7h...El Oscuro 18:01, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Deletions

Given that Bungie Studios has a known affinity for the number seven, the fact that the trailer featuring a line from the Cortana Letters appears almost exactly seven years later may be relevant.

Talking to myself, methinks- As much as I'm sure Bungie would like to take credit for that one, suggesting Bungie somehow planned for three Halo games which would be in development long enough to put a trailer out 7 years after the first is a bit of a stretch (as this line seems to do). The "may" is also a concern, because bits like that were what drove this page to a deletion consideration. Unless there's significant evidence to warrant conclusion, deleting. 69.176.36.71 21:22, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Additional Notes

I would like to mention that the first E-Mail was sent from an IP address ending in 49, which is 7X7. This means they used the 49th computer to send the E-Mail. There are also 2 references to the letters in the Halo 3 trailer, which I noticed instantly. First, there is the reference to Cortana being a sword; "I am your shield, I am your sword". Then at the end of the trailer she says "This is the way the world ends". However, the emphasis on this is not on the "This", which is the word in capitals in the letter. This suggests that Bungie wish to disguise this. I would like to point out that on Bungie's website, the summary of the game says at the end "THIS is the way the world ends", which is what is in the letter. I'm not sure what this means exactly, except that someone, possibly the Administrator of the Bungie website, is condoning the Cortana letters, and may be involved in their sending in the first place. All this suggests that it was more than just the one person doing it, as the further sending of E-Mails suggests.

Ummm... nice thinking, but there are many problems. First-off, the lone employee mostly responsible for the letters already ponied up and told his tale, as can be seen on the linked Marathon pages. Secondly, the "49" thing is about as old as the letters, again covered. Thirdly, where does your theory go? So multiple people worked on the letters- they were finished being written years ago. Those other people may all be gone from Bungie too, or if they're still there, they weren't the primary architect and are most likely therefore paying a rather simple homage. SSSssssoooo...??? Gspawn 14:15, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyright issues

Reading this article, it looks like the letters form the bulk of the article and worse still, are quoted in their entirety. I strongly suspect that neither Bungie nor Nathan Bitner (whosoever holds the copyright) has licensed the letters under a Free license or into the public domain. The letters need to be removed or at least cut down significantly - let's let the fan sites assume the legal risk, not Wikipedia. --Gwern (contribs) 02:02, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Done and removed. — TKD::Talk 02:40, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Good. I'm not sure whether the analysis had to go, though. A lot of it is obviously valid, but I'm not sure there exist any reliable sources for any sort of critical analysis - our section might've been as good as it got. Following the guidelines and policies is nice, but not when it is to the detriment of the goal of informing the reader. --Gwern (contribs) 04:31, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Well, verifiability and no original research are paramount and their spirit is non-negotiable; I think I do remember IGN or someone similar analyzing the Halo 3 trailer in light of the Cortana Letters, but that needs to be sourced. I'm sure that some of it is not unfounded and that some of it can be sourced. But a lot of times this fan analysis, however plausible, turns out to be contradicted anyway. The stuff is in the article history, so you're more than welcome to pull it out if you can find a source. But in cases like this, I've found it easier to work from the sources and build the article back up, rather than to try to find sources for existing information. That way, you don't go on wild goose chases for things that ultimately can't be cited. There have been a couple of articles over the years about the symbolism of Halo; more may come of it as Halo 3 develops. If I can find that trailer analysis video, I'll be sure to add it, and then we can add parts back in. But, as I said, given our policiers and that it's easier to do research when you're not driven to looking for predicded conclusions, I think gutting that section might be best for now. I did something similar with The Ark (Halo) a couple of weeks or so ago; it was 95% original research, so I merged it into Halo universe for now and redirected. None of these Halo universe articles wil really be stable anyway until after Halo 3 has come and gone and we know how things fit together. In that sense, there's no need to rush, since we'll be rewriting these things anyway after launch day. — TKD::Talk 05:36, 31 October 2006 (UTC)


CC license?

I'm taking a look at Jenova's recent addition. I'm not sure what to make of it. We can't include it as GFDL stuff because as written, the license doesn't allow derivatives (the "intact" clause), so so far as I know, it has to still be under fair use. Can we still use it under fair use? --Gwern (contribs) 02:42 27 November 2006 (GMT)

Not if the entire letters are included in their entirety. An external link to the letters should suffice. Wikipedia is not the place for entire source works, regardless of copyright status, and the fair use criteria apply as well. — TKD::Talk 06:33, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

cc: copyright issues

There are none, it is spelled out in plain simple English, that so long as the copyright notice is included, "you may duplicate, transmit, and save this document." We are not violating the copyright, because the notice is included, and as the article does not claim authorship, we credit the copyright holders, it is in concurrence with the copyright. Also, aside from the fact that without the letters in the article, the article itself would have little else aside from speculation, they are pertinent; it would be like reading an article about a quote without the quote itself present in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jenova1 (talk • contribs)

That's not quite enough. The GFDL requires permission for modification as well. Besides, we don't include entire source works on Wikipedia, regardless of copyright status. — TKD::Talk 06:30, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Of course, this simply means that we can only include a little of the Letters - I believe the rough generally accepted criterion is something like no more than 1/3 of the article can be material used under fair use, or half the original source. --Gwern (contribs) 18:53 27 November 2006 (GMT)

Recent Developments

This section claims that at this stage (1999) "Halo: Combat Evolved was a real-time strategy game being developed for the Macintosh platform, and the Master Chief character didn't exist yet..." - however this, by my understanding, was not the case. By this stage in development Halo had long since moved to a 3rd person shooter style and the main protragonist was indeed the Master Chief (or at least a character of similar design). This is based on the information from the "Evolution of Halo" videos bungie made available http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Tqrfy4SR7I