Collaboration & Continuity Guide

This Guide is designed to help you fit your articles and developments into the Progressive Earth in a seamless and flowing manner, so that what you write can be considered a part of this world, to be referred to by others and integrated into World History.

Background Reading
As well as reading and abiding by the Policy of History you should also read around your subject area before you start to create. You don't need to read the whole Wiki through, but if you decide to write an event into the history of an existing civillisation, you need at the very least to know the 'story so far' about that civilisation, including where they come from, who they are, and what the situation is now. If you are introducing something new to a culture, you should consider whether that culture has experienced anything similar in their past, what they use instead, and the ramifactions of whatever it is you are introducing. If what you plan to do has parallels in real-life, then research what this lead to in our own Earth's history, and see what was required for it to work - are there inherent flaws?

Scope and Range
Make sure that there isn't already an article on what you wish to write, and that your article won't be overstepping its bounds and talking in-depth about topics that should be discussed seperately. A short peice on the ramifications of an event will be enough - don't start writing history from then onwards. An article about a tribe or culture should suffice as an introduction and summary, devoted to describing who they are, with references to major events in their history. Timelines should be seperate pages, and although a list of major achieivements would be relevant on the front page, in-depth descriptions of inventions and achievements should be discussed seperately. If a culture is sufficiently large, main articles on the Government and Politics, Geography, History etc should be created to expand on the summaries on the introduction page.

Collaboration and Polite Use
If you wish to use another user's culture, people or characters in your own article, please ask permission. Even if you consider the usage to be fairly minor, the creator may not agree with what you are doing, and seeing as you intend to use their work, it is good to have their support. DO NOT decide to radically alter history without first consulting those who will be affected. If you want to write about a war between two civilisations, make sure the creators of both civilisations are okay with it, and if something is going to be a defining moment in world history, then make sure you have a consensus support to create it. DO NOT edit a culture or event without the permission of the creator, beyond tidying it up and 'tweaking' it to allow references to other articles. Make sure that what you are creating fits in with the world around you. We don't want inexplicable anachronisms. Artistic license is granted, but you REALLY have to justify something and make it clearly plausible if you are coming up with something radical. For example: Early development of steam power would be possible (Our Greeks did it) but it will necessary for you to go into depth about the development, and how it affects the world. Generally, make sure there is consensus about your plan before you implement it.

Stress on Geography
If you are creating a new tribe or civilisation somewhere in the world, make sure that:


 * a) You have justification for a settlement occurring there. (resources such as arable land, running water etc.)
 * b) There is sufficient plausibility in your development story, and the time-frame is believable.
 * c) No previous culture occupies the territory you are claiming, or is overly dominant in the area, to the extent that it would reasonably prevent your tribe or civilisation developing seperately.
 * d) The area is accessible enough for humans at that level of development to reach it.

Also, make sure that significant local features are mentioned or referred to. If an area is rich in a certain resource, that resource will have an effect on any culture settling there.

Links and Categorisation
Link your work! - Your article is no good if it's just a dead end. Find all those relevant articles you read at the start and link your expansions into them - keeping to the original context as much as possible. And do the same the other way around. Link your article to other relevant articles as you find them, providing good context and a sense of continuity to the project. Put all your articles in the relevant Progressive Earth categories and sub-categories, not the general Constructed World categories. If a culture or theme becomes sufficiently big, it will require sub-categories of its own, to contain all the pages with information about that culture or civilisation. Of course we must abide by the Conworld policies on categorisation, so discussions should be held before new categories are created.