Help:Ask the Staff

Can't find something you're looking for in the Help Guide? Why not ask the staff? The questions and their answers below hope to aid any reader, editor, and staff member in learning their way around the wiki, and also to enhance any ambiguity present on the Help Guide's navigational front page. Future questions will be added as appropriate.

What is Zelda Wiki's attitude towards Japanese translated material in articles and titles?
Zelda Wiki is, at heart, an English wiki based in the United States of America that reflects the information, images, and content of the official English releases of The Legend of Zelda series. That being said, we place a strong priority on any translations made by Nintendo of America and the English games in general, not only because this wiki is solely directed towards the English fanbase, but all topics covered in this wiki are directly inspired, in name and in design, by the English versions of the games.

Japanese translations are only used when an English equivalent is not available. Otherwise, the Japanese translations are added to articles as embellishment or as trivia factoids. Simply put, because we direct our wiki towards English players throughout the world, we take priority in using names, events, places, locations, etc. that appear in the English versions of the games. For more information, look to the Localization Standards section of the Help Guide's coverage of the wiki's Quality Standards.

My theory keeps getting reverted! Why?
Zelda Wiki maintains a very strict theory policy that states that all theories found in articles must have (1) received legitimate community support, and/or (2) the theory is reasonably referenced by some relevant medium (in-game evidence, developer quotes, text dumps, etc). All theory is subject to this scrutiny, and if it does not pass the community or evidential test, it is simply removed. By nature, the Zelda series is famous for its encouragement of theoretical speculation, however, as a wiki, we can only yield to theories that have some basis in fact, or are generally accepted. ''For more information on this topic, visit the Theoretical Standards section of our Help Guide's coverage of the wiki's Quality Standards.

I am contributing to Zelda Wiki from the United Kingdom. What is expected of my contributions?
Fabulous! Zelda Wiki is always excited to welcome international and global contributions, since the majority of our editing force resides in the United States. The only guideline to follow is to contribute in American English, as that is not only the language this wiki was founded upon, but we maintain that a consistent dialect wiki-wide helps to increase readability and credibility. This goes for any other strain of the English language. Please be sure to convert to American English when contributing to Zelda Wiki. For more information on this topic, look to Localization Standards and/or Article Formatting sections of the Help Guide's coverage of the wiki's Quality Standards.

I am the webmaster of a Zelda fansite. How do I apply to be a Mastermind?
This is a topic rarely discussed on the wiki itself, simply because it pertains more to websites, affiliations, and ownership. At Zelda Wiki, we offer two types of affiliation: the simple link exchange and the Mastermind partnership. The Masterminds and Zelda Wiki co-exist in a symbiotic relationship in which both sites aid the other via several avenues; the webmasters of the respective Mastermind sites hold ownership stake in the wiki and work alongside the administrators, on and off-wiki, towards ensuring that this wiki is the utmost source for Zelda information on the web today. The full process as to how to apply, the vetting process, and how to contact the staff here pertaining to affiliation is enumerated in great detail on our Becoming Part of Zelda Wiki page.

What is Zelda Wiki's GNU Free Documentation License all about?
Zelda Wiki's GNU Free Documentation License is the policy under which we can upload images, content, and other media to this wiki. Easily put, the license allows for the free distribution of all material written and uploaded on this wiki with other wikis or sites operating under the same license, as long as the material is credited to all previous contributors. The GFDL also requires us to log any and all changes made to any piece of contributed material; GFDL is not compatible with Wikia and Wikipedia's Creative Commons Attribute Share-Alike license, and thus, any material taken from those sites must be routinely sourced and used only for non-profitable purposes. For more information on this topic, see the full text of the GNU Free Documentation License here on Zelda Wiki.