This page should serve as a complete guide to creating, or adding information to, album or song pages. Once you've read all the information here you should have all the guidance you need to start adding content!
Eligibility for a page[]
Whilst we are open to creating pages for all Christian artists on the wiki, an album or song is required to be somewhat notable to have a page on the Wiki. This is to prevent every album and song in existence getting a three-sentence-long page (which makes it more difficult to find the pages you actually want to look for!)
Whilst Wikipedia has a whole suite of pages dedicated to notability, on this Wiki the criteria for creating a page is simply down to the character count of the page. The logic for this is that, as everything on the site requires a reference, albums or songs for which there isn't a reasonable amount of information won't make this count.
The minumum character count required for a page is 2,000 characters for a song and 2,500 characters for an album. This is the count of the source code, including references, categories, tables and so on, so it isn't as daunting as it first sounds. The reason for the higher count for albums is that a complete album track table can fill 500-1000 characters on its own.
For the sake of transparency, not every album or song currently on the Wiki adheres to these limits - this is something that will be worked on over the coming weeks and months. Be reassured that if your page doesn't quite reach the limit, it won't be deleted - instead we will encourage the Wiki's userbase to add more information so that it reaches the limit.
As with all pages on the Wiki, please do check that an album/song doesn't already exist on the site before creating the page; this can be done by a simple search of the artist's name to see if anything comes up.
Sections[]
As albums are all notable for slightly different things, there are no 'required' headers on the site. Here are a few suggestions which might be useful for you to consider:
Background and release[]
This section can contain any information related to the history behind the song/album, any inspiration, and anyone who was involved in creating the song/album, as well as when it was released (and, if applicable, when it was re-released). If the artist went on tour to promote their album, it might be useful to include this here - or equally it could go under its own heading if you feel it should! On a similar note, 'background' and 'release' can also be split up if they are both of sufficient length.
Composition and lyrics[]
This section can contain the general genre of the music, or the theme of its lyrics. Please try and find these descriptions from other sites (e.g. review sites or sites which describe the music in detail) as opposed to coming up with them yourself. If necessary, you can reference the lyrics and make some specific statements about these, provided no un-evidences inferences are made. Please avoid including all of a song's lyrics on its page - there are a number of of existing sites which are more suited to this.
Singles[]
For an album, you can include a section which discusses the singles that were relased from the album (either pre- or post-release) and the dates they were released.
Commercial performance[]
If a song or album reached a particular chart, or was nominated for a particular award, this can be included here. If the streaming/download figures of the music are known, this might also be a good place to put these.
Impact[]
Of course, for Christian music, there is a fair chance that the most important 'reach' of the song/album isn't that of the charts. If there are any particular stories relating to the impact of the music on people's lives, this can be placed under a header such as this.
Track listing[]
Generally one for albums - you can create a simple table with a track number, song title and length. You could also include the writers and producers of each song - this can generally be found by looking up the song on Spotify, right-clicking and selecting 'View Credits'.
Infobox[]
In general, it's really useful to have an infobox on the top-right of your page. This can be added by clicking on 'INSERT', selecting 'Infobox' and then choosing either 'Info Box - Album' or 'Info Box - Song'.
When adding information to an infobox, you will have the opportunity to upload a cover image. It is generally considered fair use under copyright law to use a low-resolution version of an album/song cover on a site such as this - we recommend shrinking the image down to 300x300px before uploading it. Under the 'Licensing' dropdown, make sure to choose 'Album Cover' under the 'Fair Use' heading.
Categories[]
It would be really good if you could add a couple of categories to your article:
- The 'Albums' or 'Songs' category
- An 'artist albums/songs' category - for example, if you have made a page for an album by NEEDTOBREATHE, you could add it to the 'NEEDTOBREATHE albums' page.
If there are any other categories you think a page could reasonably be added to, go ahead and add them!
References[]
Previously, references have generally been discouraged on this site. However, references are very useful on user-generated sites for a number of reasons:
- References provide evidence that the information on the site is correct, increasing the reliability of the site as a whole
- If a page has enough good quality references, it may be possible to prove that an album/song is notable enough for a Wikipedia page
- Linking to interesting articles about an album/song allows a reader to learn more about them than the summary given in the articles on this site
To add a reference to a page, move your cursor to the end of the statement requiring the reference, press the book icon in the top corner, and press 'Basic'. You can then copy and paste the URL of the site into the box, and then rename the reference in the form Website Name - Page Name (for example, Cross Rhythms - An Interview with Chris Tomlin). At the end of the page, include a header with the title 'References', press 'insert' and then 'References List' for the list of references to occur.
There are a few different types of sources:
News/Magazine Articles[]
These are the best references to use, as they are unconnected to the artist of the album/songin question (and affiliated with a company as opposed to an individual), meaning information included in them is likely to be more reliable. These may not always be the easiest to find for musicians, as the first page of Google is usually filled with Wikipedia pages and links to buy their albums, so here are a few tips to help you find some:
- Search through Cross Rhythms' Music Articles; these go back to the early 1990s so they include articles for most reasonably well-known musicians
- For information on a particular album, a Google search of '[Artist Name] [Album Name] interview' (for example, 'Needtobreathe out of body interview') will bring up articles relating to that album, if there are any
- Searching in the 'News' section of Google can also bring up articles relating to artists
Primary sources unconnected to the artist[]
These are websites containing primary information, however are not managed by the artist or their agent. Examples of these sources include the chart history of an artist on a particular chart, or the website of a church the artist works at.
These sources can often be used to complement the information found in articles; for example, you may include a reference to an article describing the release of an album, and then a reference to the Billboard chart history of the artist to include where the album peaked.
Primary sources connected to the artist[]
These sources are those which an artist directly influences; for example, their official website, Spotify profile or social media profiles. In general, these sources should only be used for facts that can't be disputed (for example, a song/album release date is such fact, but an artist saying, for example, that their album is a 'million-selling album' isn't enough to warrant such a statement being included on their page).
Things to avoid using as references[]
In general, we would discourage using any community-created sites (e.g. Wikipedia, last.fm, forums, other Fandom sites) as references. This is because, as anyone can contribute to them, we can't guarantee what they say is correct (it probably is, but I could quite easily slip an incorrect fact into a last.fm profile and lead people to believe it is true). These sites can of course still be useful for helping us find other sources which confirm the information they say, so no need to avoid them completely!
Examples[]
Here are some examples of good articles to help you get started:
- For an album: TAYA (album)
- For a song: God, Turn It Around
Go ahead and get creating!