Talk:Legion Publication History

Superboy era?

Like the page - should be very useful. Just wanted to know where you would be including Superboy/Superboy and the LSH items? Should there be a group of items between the Action era and LSH v2? I know this is a work in progress, and I dont want to nitpick - just wondering.

Yes, that should be in there. Actually, it is, but I forgot the closing "==" so it did not take in the navigation menu. I noticed the series went 1, 2, 4, 5, and, being late for work at that point I quickly went in and renumbered without actually reading to understand why that happened... becasue I left out 3. D'OH! Thanks for the catch! =)

I am a tad concerned that the page is rather on the longish side, but it only takes a few seconds to load on my home PC, where I'm at 36k dialup, so I'm hoping it will be okay. Other realities will, of course, be much shorter. It could be argued, I guess, that this list will eventually duplicate the Pre-Crisis issues subcatagory when that is finished, which was another fear I had that I might get flammed on, but I felt strngly that this list gives a good one page reference point for visitors and casual fans to navigate to other parts of the wiki from.Duke 11:20, 31 August 2006 (PDT)

I'm not as concerned about the length as I am about how people will find it. Where were you envisioning it linking from? --Gopher 14:47, 31 August 2006 (PDT)

There's a link for it in the Pre-Crisis catagory, right next to "list of Pre-Crisis members." Is that what you mean? So, if someone clicks on the Pre-Crisis link in the "eras" box to the right, the list comes up along with all the other Pre-Crisis items to look at. Should the list live or be linked from somewhere else?.Duke 16:22, 31 August 2006 (PDT)

Cover images?

I added a row of cover images at the beginning of 1961. As we add more images, we could do the same for all the other issues you have listed. Would you be interested in this or something similar with a different presentation? Since the page is so lengthy, the images would break up the page visually a bit. It doesn't add much to the "heft" of the page either. --Gopher 14:59, 1 September 2006 (PDT)

I think covers is a fine idea. My only concern would be adding to the load time for the page, but if you say that's not an issue I trust your judgement. FWIW, on my Word version of this list, I have cover images running down the right side of the page. I don't use every single cover, just one representative of the era about where the image falls on the list. That might be an idea, but I have no clue how to make a column in a wiki layout.Duke 13:03, 2 September 2006 (PDT)

Well, given the sheer amount of data for the page, a few more lines for each year would be a drop in the bucket, so the load time for the code itself should be negligible. The user's browser will need some extra time to actually load the images, but its hard to know exactly how much more time that will be. We can at least try it with the images we have so far, which I would guess is only about 40+.

As for the two column structure, the method for doing that would add a lot of extra code, a little more to almost every line. For a page this big, I wouldn't recommend it. We might want to consider splitting this into two pages, say one from the beginning to the end of the Action period, if that's roughly half. Once all the links and formatting are added for the entire page, and we add in what images we have, we will be able to tell exactly how big this monster really is. --Gopher 13:49, 2 September 2006 (PDT)

Collectibles?

Why is this under the subject of "Collectibles"? This looks like a chronological publishing history of the Legion, not a list of Legion-related items to collect (posters, action figures, calendars, etc.) -- Omnicom 21:48, 2 September 2006 (PDT)

I'm not married to the "collectibles" designation. I chose it to try and avoid conflict because I had already been accused of not adding anything of value to the wiki with AR entries. Therefore, I conciously steered away from calling it a story list, or anything like that, for fear of touching any hot buttons. Also, it has seemed to me that some of the wiki architects are focused on refering to everything in continuity, as if it really happened, instead of from the viewpoint of how the actual publishing history.

I'm sort of hoping there's room enough for both viewpoints here, I guess.

However, that said, it is a list of collectibles. It includes all Legion related comics, including elseworlds and AR, and all Legion merchandise that I know of. This preboot era list is light on merchandise until the late '70s, or so, because all I know of prior to that is the '64 foldee card and the slurpee cups.Duke 14:53, 3 September 2006 (PDT)

I agree with Omnicom on this - "collectibles" are items other than the actual comics/magazines/TPBs/etc themselves (like the stuff he said, along with other merchandise such as flight rings, giveaways, sticker sheets, etc). Sticking stuff under non-intiuitive titling is more likely to cause problems than most other stuff. Plus, the page is HUGE - it needs broken up anyway (Tip: if you get a message saying the text of a page is over 30-40kb while editing a non-User:X/Y page, it's too big. This is verging on 100kb). - Reboot (SoM) talk page 17:40, 3 September 2006 (PDT)

As noted, I would have called it a story list, but was afraid you'd make me take out the AR books and other minor appearances. I have got the distinct impression based on the tone of your poses to me that the Legion Wiki is not a collaberative effort. It's to be your way or the highway. At least, that's how I'm feeling. Still, I'll pick my battles. By all means, change the topic to whatever description makes you happiest. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Duke (talk • contribs) . Please sign on talk pages with - ~~~~

See, this is why I waited until someone else (Omnicom) brought it up and waited days before replying to this. Because every time I say anything to you, I get accused of playing the dictator. Others actually talk back and say "wait a minute" if they disagree (which I'm fine with, and indeed sometimes look for), you sulk, talk about "[my] way or the highway" and threaten to quit.

For the record, I'm not an overlord. The only guy that can say "my way or the highway" and mean it is LL/Scott. It's his website, I'm just the janitor trying to keep things tidy. - Reboot (SoM) talk page 14:58, 6 September 2006 (PDT)

Merchandise can be broken into a different list, although I had hoped to create one place were one could find ALL legion related items produced during that era. And really, it's all "merchandise" isn't it? What is a comic book it not collectible merchandise?```` —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Duke (talk • contribs) . Please sign on talk pages with - ~~~~

Reading material. A comic book is collectable (adjective). It is not A collectible (noun). Subtle difference. - Reboot (SoM) talk page 14:58, 6 September 2006 (PDT)

Where does the "series" thing come from?

Duke, where does your 1st/2nd/3rd/4th/5th series thing come from? It looks totally arbitrary and doesn't seem to conform to any well-known conventions for naming series. The only one that is well known has to do with the volume number which relates specifically and only to the series named "Legion of Super-Heroes". -- Omnicom 21:52, 2 September 2006 (PDT)

Stripped it out. It's already listed chronologically, and the TOC automatically numbers (if you want a 1./etc on the titles themselves, go to Special:Preferences and tick "Auto-number headings" under "Misc." - Reboot (SoM) talk page 17:30, 3 September 2006 (PDT)

The "well-known convention" I know interprets Adventure Comics #300-380 as the first Legion series. I've never head anyone, online or off, say any different, so I'm taken abakc that you would call it "arbitrary." Legion of Super-Heroes (volume 2) may be the first time new stories appeared under the Legion masthead, but it was the fourth title to headline the Legion as a regular recurring feature.

As for how to break up the list, the page can be divided any way you like, by series, by titles (same thing, I think), by decade, or by what shade of pink Cosmic Boy's costume was that year. No bigs to me.

My PC, and my browser, came over on the Mayflower. I have not had an issue editing any subsection.```` —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Duke (talk • contribs) . Please sign on talk pages with - ~~~~

It's the first series, not the First Series [to be titled LSH]. Given that it's sorted chronologically, disambiguation is redundant. The only thing I know of that uses the (Xth Series) notation is the Help File, which uses it as a proxy for volume number (and a way to thus exclude the reprint LSHv1 from it's series numbering). - Reboot (SoM) talk page 14:46, 6 September 2006 (PDT)

Page Title Change?

I've moved all of the non-comics merchandise from the Pre-Crisis era to another list. I'd like to now change the name of this page to "List of stories/Pre-Crisis" but I am not sure how without going through the whole move page redirect thing. Is that the only way?

I could also move the really AR stuff to another list in the new Miscellany catagory. "List of miscellany comics/Pre-Crisis" or "List of AR items/Pre-Crisis" ?? Not sure.

I think we'd also have to settle on how minor something has to be to move to the miscllany list. For example, I think Elastic Lad stories, minor appearances, Mon-El cameos, etc. should remain. Letters page only mentions, text only references to characters, planets and races, could move, I think. I'd hate to do that on one level because I like to be able to see on one list what was popular as far as cross-overs and whatnot during a particular era when other things were happening.

I would resist moving Elseworlds stuff since, again, I like seeing a list of what was published when. I'd rather let that stuff live in two places.

I see nothing wrong with having one large list of everything in each era, and then smaller lists elsewhere broken down in various ways.

Let me know your opinions.

OK, now that I've lost everything I just wrote in an inadvertant cut-and-paste accident, let's see if I can recreate my thoughts on this and the above subjects.

1. I like the idea of a List of Appearances page, but since it seems to be too big, that suggests a List of 1958 Appearances page, a List of 1987 Appearances page, etc. We'd have a List of Pre-Crisis Appearances page (with lists of 1953-1986 appearances), etc. This would be a chronological listing of published comics from the perspective of a fan purchasing things off the newsstand. This way you can leave in all of the letters column stuff, appearances of Legion-related alien races (Durlans, Dominators, etc.), crossovers, etc., and you'll still have relatively small pages since there's only one year's worth of stuff.

1a. I also like the idea of a Marvel Chronology Project type page with a chronological listing of appearances from the perspective of a DC Universe (Multiverse, Omniverse, etc.) observer from the dawn of time to the end of time.

2. I also like the idea of a List of Legion-Related Collectibles page, broken out by date, type of collectible (subsections for posters, action figures, DVDs, stickers, etc.) or broken out into individual pages (List of Legion-Related Posters, List of Legion-Related Action Figures, etc.).

3. I think that anything other than the DC Comics should not be on the List of Appearances page. Leave Superboy's Legion (Elseworlds) but not normalman and the Legion of Superfluous Heroes, or the Simpsons comic cover with the Adventure 247 parody.

4. As for the conventions of series etc. above, maybe you just read different Legion forums or message boards than I do. I've heard people try to retroactively rename volumes or series as things like "series 1 (or volume 1) is Adventure Comics, series 2/volume 2 is Action, Superboy, and Superboy and the Legion, etc.". Can you point to some places where your series convention names are in use?

-- Omnicom 21:23, 4 September 2006 (PDT)

Formatting questions

1. Do we need to retain a Part 1/Part 2 for the Adventure and S/LSH eras? I know it was there originally to break it up.

2. Would the covers look better next to the issue entries? I don't know how to format that to make it look right, even as a suggestion. -- Omnicom 06:40, 7 September 2006 (PDT)

I have reformatted a few examples to show ways that we could do this. Duke suggested having the cover images run down the left side when I first proposed adding them to the page. At the time, I countered that this would make the page much larger, although in practice, by removing the bulleting, its not too much different in size. The main difference is that editing the page is kind of a pain, and it very easy to mess up and get a distorted looking section. However, once we get this page built correctly, I dont anticipate it having too many additional changes.

Years 1950-1960 are an example of the most visually pleasing way to do this. However, we can avoid the complications of using table structure by using the format I used in Years 1961, 1962(pre Adv 300) and 1962 (post Adv 300). These sections retain the bulleting, and position the cover image next to the title, under the title or over the title, to give the group some ideas for discussion. Quite frankly, the table section looks much better. We could also color the year banners to match the Era or Series coloring scheme.

I'm happy to go through and reformat the entire page with the table structure, but for anyone who wants to make updates, you'll need to learn a bit of Wiki code for tables. Any thoughts? --Gopher 16:38, 7 September 2006 (PDT)

By the way, I made the year a sub-heading so the text would be larger, but we dont have to use this format. Disadvantage is that the Table of Contents will list every year, advantage is that each year is easily editable by itself, which will be very helpful if we move to the table format. We can switch back to just a bolded Year if people dont like it as is. Also, adding the table format did not increase the size of the page significantly. I added links to five years worth of entries in the Superboy era, which added about 1K, but the table formatting only added about 200 bytes. Given that this entire page is still 20% smaller than one cover graphic, I think we're OK. --Gopher 21:04, 7 September 2006 (PDT)

I really, REALLY like the formating, with the table, highlighted years, and covers next to the stories. I think it looks just FANTASTIC! Kudos!! Here are a few questions, thoughts, and suggestions, for all to weigh in on:

1. This list has transmogrified a bit from what I originally envisioned, which was something in the wiki to mimic my own list of all things Legion, listed chronologically. I think patterns emerge that are not otherwise immediatly evident when everything is on one list, but I can certainly see now how what I was imagining may not quite work in the Wiki world. I thank both Mike & Craig for not immediatly blasting me for adding something to the wiki, but giving thoughtful, helpful suggestions on how to make what I posted work best for the most users of this site.

2. I have already moved merchandise/collectibles to another list. Seeing what Craig has done, I think this list works best as a story list, and agree with Mike that really AR stuff, i.e. parodies, easter eggs, most cameos, most letter col mentions, offhand refrences in another series of a flght ring of a 30th century race, and early ads, can all be moved to a different list. The question is what to call it? "List of AR comic books/Pre-Crisis" perhaps? Any thoughts? I'll work on moving AR stuff off-list over the weekend, if there is no objection.

The beauty of the wiki is that we can have 20 different pages that have overlapping information but approach it in different ways. I've been meaning to create a page specifically for cameos which would include those one or two panels that show, mention or refer to the Legionnaires. I was envisioning this in more of a narrative format, that talks about Mort Weisinger and the whole Superman Family concept and how cameos poped up a lot as the Legion got underway. I think a page specifically listing just reprints would also be useful for someone looking for that kind of information. A page addressing all Twice-Told Tales (and there's a good page name) would be interesting. We already have the page with the merchadise list, but who's to say that someone wont come along in the future and make a page specifically about Legion action figures with picture of each one? Mike has suggested in the past that we create a page about the Imperial Guard and other alternate versions of the Legion. All of these pages can link to the other topics, and there's no reason why there cant be another more list-oriented page that has limited amounts of data on everything I have mentioned above. If every one of those pages was simply a list, it would be kind of boring, but if each page takes on its own flavor and personality, it becomes more interesting. That's not to say that many of these pages might not start out simply as lists.

I have plans underway for an Early Legion continuity page that discusses the theory of Supergirl being inducted before Superboy, tracing the references that support this and listing the proposed issue order that results. Its also planned to include a general discussion about the long path the Legion took to getting its own series in Adv 300. Its current structure includes mention of what I consider to be the key cameos and other appearances. I'd love to have a link that says something like "For a more in-depth discussion of Legion Cameos, click here." --Gopher 15:24, 8 September 2006 (PDT)

3. Of course, there is always debate about what is and is not AR. For my money, and appearance by a Legion member, or a character tied directly to the Legion mythos, belongs on the main list if that appearance, even if it's only a panel or two, is relative to the plot of that story. Thus, I'd suggest keeping on the main list a lot of those early Mon-El cameos. I'd like to keep Elastic Lad and Insect Queen appearances, there are only a few, but move the ones where sombody else uses the formula or magic ring. Your thoughts?

I personallly like having the cameos inlcuded in the list, but only cameos of actual Legion characters, as you describe above. Having a separate AR list would be useful, which could also include some of the same cameos, etc we have in the main list.

4. There is an agrument to be made, I think, for whether the story list and the Pre-Crisis issues list(s) dulplicate each other. I woudl submit that there is a value in having both. Some folks may want to search by title, other chronologically. Also, with the story list, users can browse all plots, major happenings on one page before deciding what they'd like to read more on.

Check out Chronology/Post-Zero Hour and others like it. I think these provide a nice alternative to the chronological publication list that prompted this discussion. There has not yet been one created for the Pre-Crisis era.

5. I'll have to learn more wiki code to edit the tables. I only ever got so far on my list, and never added much after 1999, or so, and will want to edit things as I get to them. You'll note a lor of issues just say "plot," or "plot unknown." Can anyone point be to a good place to learn what I'll need to know?

The following link - Basics of Wiki Editing - leads to a good general page about Wiki editing. For tables code specifically, try Editing Tables. You can link to the first site from the top of the Main Page in our own Legion Wiki.

I've been meaning to create a page something like "Top 10 tips for new contributors", or something like that, to point out a few things like that.

6. I think sectioning off the list by year instead of by era, or series, as I originally had it, is a good idea.

7. With the proposed changes, does it make sense to change the name of this page to "List of stories/Pre-Crisis" ? I know that's probably a pain to change the name again. I apologize for the trouble.

What about something like "DC Publication list/Pre-Crisis"? To me that includes Amazing World of DC Comics and a few others that List of Stories would not. Again, I like having a pretty all-inclusive list for anything I consider "official" Legion material, although I admit that there are as many viewpoints on what is official as there are Legion fans. I'd say just include what you feel should be there, and if someone suggests a change, like Mike's merchandise suggestion, make the change if you agree. 6 months from now, someone new might just go into the page and change it to suit their own view, and then the discussion will start all over again.

Nothing happens until someone makes a change, and if a lot of people express an opinion, it probably means that that addition has meaning for a lot of people. Chances are, it will eventually lead to something valuable to the wiki, even if it has to go through many changes to get there. At present we have so few people contributing that its not hard to throw an idea out get everyone's opinion. However, when there are 100 people contributing on a regular basis, that wont be possible. The sysops will primarily make sure that what people do agrees with the basic structure and conventions, and contributors will occassionally have conflicts on what they see as "right". The more material we get posted, the more coherent the pattern will be for what fits and what needs adjusting.

8. It occurs to me now that it's not a bad idea to discuss some ideas first before posting. So we have a designated place for that, or just use my own talk page?

Your own talk page, someone else's if you want to ask them a question, or any discussion page that relates to your topic. But in a lot of cases, having that first stab at the pages concept is necessary for the discussion to demonstrate what you are talking about. As long as you are open to your page changing or even going away, it doesn't hurt to build it first. Something else you can do is make the page a suborinate to your own User page (like my own [[User:Craigopher/sandbox]] page. That keeps it from "counting" in the larger interface, although it will show up in Recent Changes. You can create it as a User page, then link to it in a discussion somewhere else, or even start the discussion on that page. If the idea develops, simply copy the code into the real page, and if not, just empty out all code and remove the link to it.