Talk:Something Positive

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Does anyone know where to find a good picture of the S*P logo? (The yellow frowny face with the words "S*P" in front.) It would work really well to put into the article. Bbhtryoink 19:47, 4 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Choo-Choo Bear

Also, somebody really should make an article for Choo-Choo Bear. Anyone up for it? Bbhtryoink 19:52, 4 Jul 2004 (UTC)

As regards chemotherapy, it's not just for cancer and I don't believe anyone's ever stated in the comic that Choo-Choo Bear as having cancer. -Fuzzy 17:10, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Check the first 2 months of the strip when PeeJee and Jhim go to the shelter and find Choo-Choo Bear. The woman at the shelter says that he has a weird form of cancer that makes him a boneless kitty, adn that the chemo made him lose his hair.--Parcequilfaut 00:41, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Isn't it just a rip-off of the 'Top Cat' character?

It wasn't cancer that made him boneless. he suffers from a rare disorder of bonelessness... : ) 82.93.133.130 07:51, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removal of Gia

I'm curious as to the reason for removing Gia from the relationships category. She's referenced in the strip as a prior relationship of Davan, not to mention that it's part of the opening gag. She's had recurring appearances, and some mention of the character and the name change seems apropos, although there shouldn't be any more people confused as to the name difference, as it's been fixed in prior strips AFAIK. -Fuzzy 16:12, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC

Frankly, I agree. Jonhansen 23:51, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spoiler warning

I think a spoiler warning would be a good idea above the character details. Unfortunately, I don't know how to do it myself.129.67.62.85 02:42, 13 January 2006 (UTC)ARF

Good idea. Done. -Tim Rhymeless (Er...let's shimmy) 10:53, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jason's Math History

Jason's mathematical abilities were first quantified (with a mathematical formula) in the said flashback, however his degree in calculus was used on June 6, 2003 (obscenely) and beginning college at the age of 15 was mentioned on October 11, 2002. Also, on July 10, 2003, he got into a geek contest with Branwen, claiming to have taught his high school class. - 29 January 2006 ______________________________________________________________________________________________________


Roses death

http://somethingpositive.net/sp10092004.shtml

[edit] Memorable quotes

The memorable quotes section needs to go. Who has declared these memorable? The writers of this article? That's a POV. Also, I don't really see what the appeal is to people other than SP fans... and Wikipedia is not a fan site. --W.marsh 16:30, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Based on that logic, what is the appeal of this article to other than S*P fans? Nothing much. For that matter, haven't those same writers decided everything that is to be in the article, by way of writing it in the first place? I agree that striking the word "Memorable" is reasonable, and nothing more. RGTraynor 14:26, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
The article is useful to people who aren't S*P fans yet I think. I used the wikipedia article when I started to read the S*P to help me remember who is who in the largish cast. I am a bit sceptical to the idea of a memorable quotes section on the grounds that it misrepresents the humour in the comics. If the humour of S*P mostly consisted of funny quotes of the "stand alone"-type i.e. quotes that are understandable, meaningful and funny even when taken out of context a funny quotes section would be a very good way to present how the humour works in S*P to someone who hasn't read it. However, the humour mostly consists mostly of witty dialogue which is funny in the situation, not somehting that is meant to be taken out of context and still be funny. We could provide a few examples of the dialogue to explain how the humor works, quotes of what a single character says outside the situation would misrepresent the humour. -Sensemaker

Memorable Quotes are found on other Wiki Pages. If you are saying the word Memorable should be removed then you may have a point. But Quotes themselves show the strips humor and are factual.

______________________

Speaking of Quotes, how about adding Jason's, "I bukkake for Justice!", which he says when he's role playing as The Flash? That always stuck with me. --Gero 15:32, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The salary incident.

Excuse me, but my section on Randy's challenge was deleted, and by the way it was deleted (a "minor" mark and a revert), it seemed to have been considered vandalism. I feel that this really does deserve a section, since Milholland is somewhat notorious in the webcomic community for it, and he's alluded to it in the comic itself a few times since. Twin Bird 21:40, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

I agree whole-heartedly. The event was famous in the world of webcomics and self-publishing, and deserves to be recorded. The entry should be re-inserted. --Ryan! 08:19, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

The entry under consideration:

Pay my salary.
In May 2004, in response to complaints about his lack of updates, Milholland posted an angry rant ending with "...if you don't like it, pay my fucking salary," not expecting to be taken literally. However, within a few days, he had received donations totalling to a year's salary; he quit his job (although Davan remained in a similar job until September of 2005), and updates increased in frequency. He has stated that he does not hope to recreate the event, and that it makes him uncomfortable when less popular comics try to mimic it.[citation needed]
I definately agree it should be put back. It was a large turning point for the comic in that Randy was able to generate a hideously large amount of money (if I'm remembering correctly, somewhere in the area of $30,000 before he stopped counting, though I'll dig up an exact figure) over the course of a few short days. I can dig up citation from the site itself... I believe it's directly in the site FAQ. I'll also check a few other sources if the site isn't good enough.
I might add and expand on that entry of yours and re-add it soon, when I get the time. Lankybugger 19:46, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Here we are: Q: Did you really ask your readers to give you a year's salary?
A: Okay, here's the story about the notorious donation drive. In January of 2003, I got it in my head that if I asked my readers to donate a year's salary, I'd quit my day job and work on the comic. I'd offer a free section of the site and oh, it would be glorious!

It didn't work. No biggie. It didn't hurt me, either. I endeed up unemployed for a little while, but was able to survive thanks to reader kindness.

Flash forward to May of 2004. A reader pissed me off because he was mad I didn't update as often as I once did and there were errors in the comic at time. Mind you, by this point in time, the comic was taking over forty hours a week of my time AND I still had a full-time day job. So I blew up in a rant on the front page. Amongst my furious, blind ragings, I dared my readers to put their money where there mouth is and give me a salary so I could just stay home and work on the comic full time. My reasoning was more to shut people up. Instead, I got $4,000 in a day. By a month's time, I had my salary matched. I promptly gave notice at my old job.
Q: How do you feel about the other comics that tried donation drives right after yours ended?
A: Uncomfortable. Here's the thing - a little over 1% of my actual audience donated. The average donation was $5. Now, for a comic like Goats, which has a considerable audience, a donation drive has the chance to be successful because, again, around 1% of the audience being kind is still a lot of people. When you have a smaller webcomic trying the same thing, the turn out is a lot different. They might get 20% of their audience donating, but if that's only 80 people, it doesn't take you very far.
That's the actual text from the Something Positive FAQ, which you can find here: http://www.somethingpositive.net/faq.shtml. I'd rewrite that portion but I'm about to leave the house. Lankybugger 22:54, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Time for a Kharisma update!

I justed wanted to point out that the Kharisma portion should probably be rewritten to reflect her recently burned face... I'd do it myself because I have little love for the character, but I think I might demonstrate a bunch of non-neutral point of view leanings if I wrote it myself and I'm about to go out anyways. Lankybugger 22:52, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Silas

I noticed the section on Silas mentioned his being run over, but (quite rightly) left details of life or death vague until all the facts were in. However, the cast page ( http://www.somethingpositive.net/cast.shtml ) now lists Silas among the characters seen only in flashbacks ). This is usually a pretty good indicator as to whether or not the character survived. Do the rest of you reckon there's a toe tag with Silas's name on it? Phil Smith 00:05, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nerdrotica external website

There's a small spoof r*k*milholland-created website for Nerdrotica at http://www.nerdrotica.com - is this significant enough to warrant putting in the "external links" section?

Good question. I find it funny...and it is someithing positive related. 67.191.168.50 02:13, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pee Jee's attraction to Davan

"It is also hinted in some strips that she is developing feelings for Davan." - Suggest this phrase be modified to be more ambiguous. Do we have absolute proof that Pee Jee is romantically interested in Davan? Given recent events (PeeJee's illness, etc.), there is evidence suggesting this, but it seems less certain than say, Kim's attraction to Kestrel.

Absolute proof of a hint is almost an oxymoron. —Tamfang 18:27, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
This is original research/idle speculation and not encyclopedic. Not to mention way too trivial for an encyclopedia to be covering in the first place. If the character ever professes an attraction or whatever, then mention that briefly. DreamGuy 23:06, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

9/11 has been referenced once in the strip, in this comic. http://www.somethingpositive.net/sp03132006.shtml

[edit] dating

Anyone know why the strips are (at least recently) consistently backdated? For example, the Halloween story ends with a strip dated "October 19"; the commentary below it is dated "October 31" and concludes, "Have a happy Halloween. Be safe. Be well. And I'll see you all tomorrow with a new comic" — implying, at least to me, that the strip dated "October 21" was to be posted on November 1. —Tamfang 08:53, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I always asumed he got behind sometime ago and planned to catch up eventually.
Ivvan Cain 16:06, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article is pretty long...

Anyone else think it would be better to move some of the irregular characters to a seperate article? Especially characters like Jesus-Mickey, Linzie, Mr. Sanderson, and The Canadian Trap Door Gator.

I can't really see any information that should be cut. Actually I think the story of Milholland asking for his readers to match his salary and the comic awards Something Positive has won should be added.
Ivvan Cain

I'd say a huge chunk of this could be deleted or just the entire article, all these articles on obscure webcomics seem kind of unnecessary to me, and they are probably all written by the writers of the comics themselves or their small fanbase. There are really hardly any well known webcomics period, let alone ones popular enough to get their own Wiki article (in my opinion). I mean outside the small niche groups of people who read these things... who really cares? --Krakko 04:11, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
Well, Something Positive isn't exactly an obscure webcomic, but, yes, lots and lots of this article could be deleted for not being encyclopedic at all. We don't need long details about every minor character that ever showed up. We don't need fan speculation about if so and so has feelings for so and so in full spoilery details with direct links to specific comic panels. People need to get that we are making an encyclopedia and not some fan project. I think many of the people contributing here would be better off creating their own fan site or wiki devoted to the comic instead of throwing all this crap in here. DreamGuy 23:03, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
I found this article useful for remembering who is who in the largish cast. The cast section of the actual webcomic is much shorter and incomplete. That said, you may very well ask yourself if an almost complete list of the cast with longish descriptions of the characters is encyclopedic. -Sensemaker
The original poster mentioned moving "some of the irregular characters to a seperate article" - this would probably be the best course of action. Krakko's opinion about webcomics being too obscure is moot - Something Positive, and other webcomics, have obviously passed Wikipedia's guidelines for notability. If it were otherwise, the articles wouldn't still exist. In my opinion, then, all articles that qualify to remain on Wikipedia should be treated equally - whether something is more "obscure" than others or not. We don't have the space issues of an ink-and-paper encyclopedia, and thus don't have the same necessity to give certain articles more or less space.
In the interest of treating all articles with equal respect, then, it seems standard in both comic strips, television series, and anything else with a high number of characters to diverge the characters (at least the supporting cast) into a separate article. Now, if this practice is being weeded out, and I'm not aware, I would suggest seeing how that's dealt with before simply purging parts of this article. --Adam the Alien 18:43, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
As far as I know, putting the cast in a separate article is still practiced. I agree that it should be considered before just purging parts of the article. -Sensemaker
On side note to Krakko, regarding obscurity - Wikipedia is used more often, from my observation, to quickly and easily look up more obscure things that regular encyclopedias would not contain or that would be otherwise hard to find information about (whether that's a specific species of animal, an old movie, a science term or webcomics). --Adam the Alien 18:47, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
Agreed, at least that is the way I and people I know use wikipedia. Still, as far as I know there is no wiki guideline that acknowledges that wikipedia should have a different standard from other encyclopedias. -Sensemaker
Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not talks about the fact that Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. As said there, this doesn't mean that everything should be accepted without standards, no. However, as this comic (and webcomics as a whole) have been accepted under the standards of inclusion, Krakko's assertion that the article should be hacked away at or deleted because it (and webcomics as a whole) are obscure...just doesn't make any sense. --Adam the Alien 20:18, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
I just did a mass shortening of the entire cast list; it was needlessly long and rambling, and just lengthened the page to ridiculous lengths. It should still be in-depth (nearly every other webcomic's entry has lists like that- to pass it off as 'unimportant' is pretty stupid considering this is Wikipedia and all), but it had tons of useless information and generally unimportant thoughts. I would also suggest that certain characters be removed as they are not and were never important (Silas, Jesus-Mickey especially)-- I mean, who needs the Canadian Trap Door Gator here??--User:Jabroniville 18:47, 9 Aug 2007 (UTC)
I somewhat agree, in that they were never all that important as characters. They might be more at home under the section about running gags. --Adam the Alien 20:18, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I've been thinking; should we cut away some more of the chaff from the cast page? Most of the major characters are fine the way they are (aside from some clean-ups to make the paragraphs shorter), but the "Former Relationships" section could be easily cleaned. I haven't read a reference to Belinda in years (and she only appeared in three or four strips, tops), and Marisol, Gia & Celie don't seen to require the space they take up. I recommend just one paragraph/section here that mentions them all with commas and brackets explaining who they were (ie. Marisol [mentioned only once]; Gia [she appeared in the first strip, and was unfaithful to Davan in the past. Is now married with children], stuff like that), rather than their own bullet-points, but I want everyone else's opinions first. --User:Jabroniville 18:47, 9 Aug 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Second lost boy?

I was hoping the wiki page would answer my question, and since it doesn't, I'll ask here... maybe something was left out of the page. This scene mentions a boy the McIntyres lost ("almost another one" I assume is the crippled sister). Is this a reference to Davan moving to Boston or is there another sibling that I missed? Did Davan have a stillborn sibling?? 82.93.133.130 08:00, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

It's mentioned in this strip that Fred was married before, and lost his wife and son at the same time. According to the FAQ, Randy sometimes get emails asking if Davan was named after him. Stilgar135 15:08, 6 December 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Too much attention to Kharisma

Isn't the section on Kharisma kind of bloated? It's even longer than Davan's now! Can't we cut out some parts?Spiteful Crow 19:20, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

-Agreed. I cleaned up alot of the pointless dialogue (alot of it seemed to be added on with each new updated comic during her arc, so there was a lot of duplicated points), but I think what's left is pretty important (though the dates of strips are probably better left as footnotes- I'm not sure how to do that). After all, she's arguably gone through more changes than any other character, especially recently. Jabroniville 1:01, 20 May 2007

[edit] We should say more about the humour of the comic

Currently the article mentions the humour under the running gags humour which isn't a very good description of the humour of Something Positive. The humour is arguably the most important reason for people to read it. Also it is a fairly peculiar type of witty, absurdish humour. In my opinion we need to write something about the humour of Something Positive. -Sensemaker

[edit] This Article needs cleaning up

Seriously, have we forgotten we're on wikipedia here? This article is filled with POV.

"Probably the most common type of joke in the comic is one person stating their opinion, and then being rebutted by a main cast member in crude, vulgar fashion."

"Even with its fixture in time, the comic does not make an effort to connect with everyday life."

This is an encyclopedia, not a forum for lame criticism of the subject matter. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.7.11.98 (talk) 16:52, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

-- Somebody suggested that the type of humor in the comic be commented on, so I did. Even the fans of the strip acknowledge the 'witty retort' nature of the strip's humor, so I felt it important to mention. It might, however, be better placed in the "running gags" section if people prefer it that way. The other comment was ugly, so it was altered. - Jabroniville. Jabroniville 1:01, 7 Oct 2007

I suggested we describe the type of humour in the comics, not comment on it. Current description, while not entirely wrong, misrepresents the humour. -Sensemaker

[edit] Pepito's Native Tongue

I'm pretty certain that Pepito's original language was Portuguese, not Spanish. If I recall correctly, after Randy got email telling him he didn't get the phrasing quite right on a particular comic, he started going out of his way to make it the most horribly incorrect Portuguese possible. Perhaps I'll dig up a reference to this when I have the free time... —Preceding unsigned comment added by AdamRoach (talk • contribs) 04:43, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, correct Castilian is horribly incorrect Portuguese. ;) I dimly remember noticing that some of Pepito's balloons were in unidiomatic Spanish. – Any chance you could find us an example of Pepito speaking Portuguese or, anyway, a language that's more Portuguese than Castilian? —Tamfang (talk) 18:47, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Article Rearrangement

I am moving the Setting and Storyline section to go after the character list, becuase that section is written based on the assumption that you know who the characters are. For people who've never read the comic before or, like me, haven't read it since 2004, it's confusing and less useful than it could be.

If somebody wishes to revert this and move the Setting and Storyline section back up to the top, they really ought to also clean it up so that it's accessable to the general public rather than the privileged few who already know the Setting and Storyline. Sleepsong (talk) 18:24, 12 May 2008 (UTC)