Lexicon!

[hawhaw1267]

BAM...right over my head.
But I will observe and enjoy...and if I understand what in God's name is going on...then I will join you on the next round

[AHMETxRock]

WTF? A spot on the forums for Edminister to rule by himself? HAVE I LOST MY BID FOR ELECTION?!?!?!?

This looks like fun, however. I will not let the fact that I have lost to you affect my outlook on my participation. Verily, I shall also participate, if you would allow me.

[Edminster]

A first-turn example entry, assuming we are doing an SMBC Forum Lexicon:

The Ascendency and Return of office30

Can you tell me the meaning of "comes" and "line." in german please? I couln't translte it online...

office30 first appeared on the Forums as a simple spambot. Through some bizarre glitch in programming, instead of hawking random services he began taking an actual interest in the lives and interests of the <<Regulars>>. This lead to widespread acceptance and, eventually, veneration.

On Thursday 16 February in the year 2006 CE, office30 Ascended above the ken of mortals, becoming One with the Forums. All of this occurred within five minutes of his first post, leading to a new World Record in Ascendance.

It was prophesied that he would return in a new form, and some scholars claim that this became a reality when Office31 mysteriously appeared. Further research into these claims is unfortunately not possible, because the great <<Server Rebalancing>> destroyed many of the records pertaining to this enigmatic figure.

Author's Commentary:
The furthest that we are able to conclude is that Office31 was in fact inspired by the Words and Spirit of Office30, but was not in fact the prophesied reincarnation. However, there still remains a surprising number of devotees to the Preachings of Office31, despite the surviving evidence to the contrary.

This would be a new topic in this forum, and people would debate the merits of the entry by replying to it. Through comments and new 'facts' being uncovered, the entry would then be filled out much further than it currently is, until it actually resembles a well-written encyclopedia entry. The words represented <<like this>> reference entries that have yet to be written. When the game hits the letter 'R', the entry for 'Regulars' must be written (but not by the person who referenced it).

Simple, yes?

[Oldrac the Chitinous]

What's the significance of the alphabetical order? It seems like it'll cause us to end up with a inordinate amount of entries at the end of the alphabet.

[AHMETxRock]

The point is that it is going to be extremely superfluous, and all over the place. The combined humor and intellectual prowess he hopes for us to exert on such a project can create a very large complex project. It will be amusing, and hopefully everyone will take the effort to follow the rules. The fact we need to actually base some articles on facts mentioned on others urges us to do as good of a job that we can. We will attempt to make every single made up joke fact humorous so that other hilarious articles can use ours and continue it. This has awesome potential. I just want to stress that everyone should give it alot of effort and try to save their rebellion for being original instead of breaking the rules of this game.

[Edminster]

What's the significance of the alphabetical order? It seems like it'll cause us to end up with a inordinate amount of entries at the end of the alphabet.

I think I need to refine the rules a bit. After the first turn, you still have to link to two separate articles, but only one of them must be unwritten. The other must link to an already-written entry. You can also cite phantom entries from earlier in the alphabet than you are currently positioned. For example, if you are on the letter 'O', you can still cite an entry on 'Gun Conjecture, The'. That way there is a head start when we hit Lexicon Iteration 2.

Or we could go by the strict rules that say that there can never be more phantom entries for a letter than there are players, but that seems a bit straitjacket for a game where many of the people will drop in and out as it progresses. Another way I was thinking of doing it was to have two teams of people working from opposite ends of the Alphabet. That could work, too.

[Lethal Interjection]

The Gun Conjecture... Fantastic. I had mostly forgotten about that. I love this idea.
Granted, I feel it might be somewhat inclusive. But it shouldn't be too bad, and I'm guessing that those who haven't been here for long will simply have to use more fiction than non (so, something like the Gun Conjecture should probably be written by someone who was actually here at the time).

Also, it would probably be a good idea to have multiple threads for this, wouldn't it? It might make it difficult when we move on to new topics, but we may just have to cross that bridge when we come to it. I was thinking, perhaps, 8-10 (my first thought was the phone number pad system), so that the one thread doesn't become a complete mess of references.
And we need to figure out how to link directly to posts (not threads). I know there is a way (I think it is through the search function), but we'll have to make that clear to all (and as mod, you'll probably have to do some fixing).

[Edminster]

I think you miss the main point. Every single entry will have its very own thread. I'm envisioning this subforum to have well over 100 topics by the end of this thing.

[Lethal Interjection]

I think you miss the main point. Every single entry will have its very own thread. I'm envisioning this subforum to have well over 100 topics by the end of this thing.

Okay, fair enough. I have no problem with that. It'll be a little unwieldy (or a lot to read), but at least it will make further commentary easier.

[Edminster]

So, you're in? I should probably make a list of all the people who have expressed interest so far. I'll edit it in to the OP, because it's definitely not long enough.

[Lethal Interjection]

Oh, most definitely. I was in before, for the most part.
But now that we have an idea (and I've seen your sample), I'm understanding the idea and I can definitely get behind that.

[Edminster]

Jawesome. I'm thinking of setting a start date for this Sunday, since I'm headed out of town most of the weekend. So far the most popular topic is a comprehensive history of the Forum, so I'm going to go ahead and write an introductory post for that now to save time.

[mountainmage]

For the record, I voted for the the first 3 options.

[Sahan]

I express interest, just so you know, I voted option 1 and 3.

[Edminster]

In writing the Introduction I thought it would be a good idea to make it clear that you can only cite phantom entries in the main entry itself, not in the comments that they spawn. Partly because the rules say so, partly because it's easier for me to consolidate phantoms that way.