hiya trainers! an important bulbanews post is down below!↓
The Pokémon Company issues brief public statement in response to recent online discussions of potential IP infringement by developers of Palworld - Published January 24, 2024, 11:11 PM PST, Archaic, Bulbanews
'The Pokémon Company have released a brief public statement in response to inquiries they have receive relating to potential intellectual property infringement by another game developer. Though the statement names no names, it quite clearly refers to Palworld, the so-called "Pokémon with Guns" game, which has been in the news recently both for its strong initial sales, the public statements of the studio's CEO in support of generative AI, and the similarities many of the game's "Pals" have to different kinds of Pokémon.
The statement, in both Japanese and English, has been reproduced in full below.' [note: japanese text has been removed from this post for space concerns]
Inquiries Regarding Other Companies’ Games
We have received many inquiries regarding another company’s game released in January 2024. We have not granted any permission for the use of Pokémon intellectual property or assets in that game. We intend to investigate and take appropriate measures to address any acts that infringe on intellectual property rights related to the Pokémon. We will continue to cherish and nurture each and every Pokémon and its world, and work to bring the world together through Pokémon in the future.
Opinion: Scarlet and Violet are Pokémon's Queerest Games Yet (Bulbanews)
Hi it's Lisia here!! The following is an opinion piece from one of our staff members, Torchic W. Pip!! Blanc and I both loved this and like... we had to share it here LOL.
Pokémon was my queer awakening. I had silly little crushes on male and female characters alike, and I resonated with many of the designs of the series’s more gender nonconforming designs. Pokémon has always had a wink and a nod to queerness: Jessie and James’s genderbending antics, Beauty Nova in X and Y, Blanche from Pokémon GO… the list goes on. But with Scarlet and Violet, queerness shines bright as celestial stars.
“But wait!” you might say. “Scarlet and Violet has no canonical gay or trans characters! How can this thesis make sense?” Well, queer representation need not be explicit to be impactful. Sometimes, the stories queer people resonate with most are told through metaphor, from the misfits in Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer to X-Men to Luca and Gwen Stacy. The roots of this trace back to a history of censorship. LGBTQ+ stories have been historically censored, such as with the Hays Code. Queer people have long been unable to see stories with explicitly queer characters, so they instead turned to metaphors and symbolism. Gender nonconformity is also nothing new to the scene of video games. Metroid, Legend of Zelda, Final Fantasy, and Guilty Gear are just some of the games that play with our expectations of gender. It’s also nothing new to Pokémon. East Asian media tends to depict transness and gender nonconformity differently from the West, but for more on that, I'll direct you to this video.
Even before the release of Scarlet and Violet, gender nonconformity shined through. Take a character like Grusha, for example, who many mistook for a girl when he was first introduced. It goes a little deeper than that, though. “Grusha” is Russian for “pear”, but it’s also a diminutive for the name “Agrafena”... a female Russian name. Whether or not it was intentional, it does add an extra layer of nonconformity to Grusha. Another character with some queercoded elements is Iono: Her color palette evokes the colours of the trans flag, and her Magnemite headpieces evoke an explicitly genderless Pokémon. Baggy clothes are common among many transgender people. Her friend Bellibolt is a frog, and many frogs in real life can change their sex. In Japanese, she speaks with a Bokukko speech pattern (a girl using the masculine “boku”), which is often used for plucky characters, but also nonconforming characters. All of Iono’s names across translations evoke themes of questions. On top of all that… well, the Vtubing scene is, from personal experience, very queer. All of my friends who watch VTubers are queer in some way. More seriously, creating a persona where you can let your true self shine in a way that regular society won't allow you to... that's pretty queer.
With the release of the games, we’ve seen a wide array of characters—Rika, Saguaro, Penny, and all of the leaders of Team Star, among others—showcase a wide range of gender expressions, either in their appearances, their personalities, or their hobbies. And all of these characters are seen as heroes, as role models.
As with games before, there are two characters with queer subtext in their relationship. Hassel and Brassius have been seen by many as being in a gay relationship, bonding over a love of art, supporting each other in dark times, and giving each other pet names. Even if it's not outright stated that they're in a romantic relationship, their care for each other is a beautiful thing. Many gay coded relationships are often of younger men or women, and while these relationships are important, it's also important for older gay couples to receive some of the spotlight. After all, queer people have always existed, and it's important to remember our past and honor those who came before us, who helped paved the path to acceptance.
For the first time in a mainline game, the player character can choose any clothes, hair style, and so on regardless of gender. While the player can still only choose between being referred to by masculine or feminine terms, this is a step in the right direction, and it opens the door for many opportunities never seen before. Boys can be feminine, girls can be masculine, and both can be anywhere in between. The world of gender expression is as big as the open world of Paldea.
But back to Team Star. The whole Team Star path is one big, queer metaphor. Think about it: kids are bullied for how they dress or act, these misfits band together and retaliate against their bullies, finding a sort of family in each other, villains who turn out to be just the opposite… It’s a story that, in some way or form, can resonate with many kids who have, sadly, dealt with homophobia or transphobia in school. The path is a story about righting what’s wrong, about making the world a more accepting place.
Scarlet and Violet is a game about shining bright in the sky with other stars, about being your true self. Its themes are deeply resonant with the queer experience. At the end of the Team Star path, you battle Penny, whose ace Pokémon is trans flag-coloured Sylveon, and as she Terastilizes her partner, she says, “Shine bright like the starry sky and become who you really want to be!” So shine bright, trainers, and be your true self.
Oh, and of course, Quaquaval is the queer icon of all time.
[Torchic W. Pip is a Bulbanews writer with a focus on music, merchandise, and spin-off games. They're also a fanfiction author and moderator of the Writer's Workshop subforum. Outside of writing, Torchic is studying music theory and linguistics, and his favorite games are X/Y and Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire.]
guess what??? bulbapedia had its 50,000th wiki article created a bit ago, and to celebrate we made a news article celebrating bulbapedia! i'm actually in it, soo... take a look if you'd like!! (this was written by our twitter admin and my overlord wyndoncalling)
Celebrating 50k Bulbapedia articles with our favourite wiki pages!
As one of the world's largest media franchises, Pokémon is monolithic to say the least. Documenting every facet of this gargantuan IP is a task perhaps only the most dedicated and/or foolhardy would embark on, yet that's exactly what our Bulbapedia team and thousands of selfless contributors have done over eighteen long years! With Pokémon now encompassing nine generations of main series games along with dozens of spin-offs, mobile games, movies, anime and manga series, merchandise and much more, the wiki itself has grown in tandem - we recently hit a whopping 50,000 articles!
To celebrate, we've compiled a list from across the Bulbagarden team of our favourite wiki articles. For our non-wiki team members, these might simply be pages that they enjoy reading and help inform their work in other aspects of the site. For wiki Staff, these could instead be pages that they've sunk many productive hours into. Read on for an eclectic collection of articles detailing some of the most obscure corners of the Pokémon franchise!
Credits to Staff artist Sirius for the awesome header image!
WyndonCalling (Social Media) - Tall grass
On the one hand, I think it's faintly hilarious that anyone would go into such detail for a mundane and omnipresent mechanic of the main series games; the tall grass that awaits the player on every starting route just feels so self-explanatory in function. On the other hand, I think it speaks volumes about the commitment and mentality of the Bulbapedia team and contributors that no scrap of information is left undocumented - on the tall grass page you'll find the basic details about how it works, but also variations such as tall grass and seaweed, animations of the Cut mechanic, in-battle effects, and more. Who knew that simple grass could be so fascinating in a world with flame-throwing dragons and electric mice?
Runner-up - List of Pokémon by base stats
As the Admin of the Bulbagarden Twitter account, I'm always on the hunt for interesting trivia to share; having the base stats of all Pokémon in one, sortable place makes it so much easier to make fun comparisons between species (did you know that Krabby has more Attack than Eternatus?).
Maverick Nate - Bulbapedia - Coin (TCG) (and its three subpages: Gens 1-4, Gens 5-6, and Gens 7-8)
This page is what I consider my best accomplishment during my 10 years as Bulbapedia's TCG Leader. There is an incredible amount of research, time, (and personal financial investment) baked into the article, and it always gives me a swell of pride when I update it with fresh images of newly acquired coins. There are over 700 different coins documented here, and I still fondly remember the long-night research sessions I would have with my best friend when we would do things like watch countless YouTube openings to figure out release information, check out endless eBay and Yahoo Auctions listings for never-before-seen coins, hold up physical coins to a spotlight trying to determine the Holofoil pattern. Our other friends would poke fun at us for researching in the field, (which was just our excuse to go shopping for newly released TCG products with new coins or hitting up garage sales and card shops on the off chance they had old ones). All of those years of effort produced what is now considered the definitive list of all coins in existence for coin enthusiasts. Whenever I see people online referencing it and using it for their own collections, I just have to smile, knowing that my favorite article is helping people all around the globe.
Wowy (Bulbapedia) - Red (Masters)
This page is just an example for all the character pages for Pokémon Masters. As one of the main editors covering Pokémon Masters when the game was first released, I feel very content to see many other editors who have taken the mantle to make Bulbapedia's coverage of the game quite comprehensive! I also enjoy the gallery section at the bottom because there are some sweet artwork pieces that come out of the game / the PMEX Twitter.
Runner Up - Face board
An article that was initially written for fun ended up being moved from the userpage to the main Bulbapedia page. Like the tall grass page, it's a niche page that showcases how much we like to document every minor and obscure detail in the franchise (albeit there is still so much to cover)!
Lisia (Social Media) (omg HIIII that's me!!!!) (姉ちゃん見て見て、あたしテレビだ。。) - Pokémon world in relation to the real world
This is a very extensive page, and it's very useful for a lot of different things! I use it for worldbuilding for fanfiction and roleplay stuff usually, but it's fun to look at just in general as well! I remember looking at the page first like... years ago, and it blew my mind to see that the Pokémon world was actually based off of real locations! It's something that I'd call a huge resource for anyone who creates Pokémon fanworks, especially written ones!
Runner Up - Lisia (i had to LOL)
Maybe it's a little... self-serving? But I really like this article of my personal namesake; she's my favorite character after all! She's a relatively minor character within the whole of Pokémon so there's not a whole lot of information about her, so I like reading all the stuff there is about her! It makes me happy that people have put work into articles about everyone, because well... in a way I wouldn't be me without it. I should probably contribute to it sometime!
Orchid (Forums) - Pokémon food
I picked this article because it is astoundingly comprehensive on its topic, and offers a lot of really interesting insight into the Pokémon universe as a whole. From Poffins, to prey, to parasites, to Slowpoke Tails... it's all here! It's amazing how having all this information in one place puts into perspective just how much there is to cover on what, at a glance, might seem like such a simple subject. I find myself coming back here every now and then just out of curiosity (or perhaps to settle a debate about what an Aerodactyl really eats).
Runner-up - Twerp
This page is silly and I love it. I've even shown this one to friends and family who are fellow Pokémon fans, and they've gotten just as much of a kick out of it as I have! But as amusing of a read as it may be, what I love most about this page is the fact that even a short and lighthearted bit of terminology like this is documented thoroughly here, just like anything else would be. All across Bulbapedia, you can find so much care and detail put into the littlest of things, and that does bring a smile to my face
DapperCody (Multimedia) - Ash Ketchum
Like many people, I grew up watching the Pokémon anime as a youngster. I enjoy Ash's article because it is comprehensive account of the quarter century that he has graced our screens - looking it over is very nostalgic. The history section with photos is fantastic, and I love being able to see all the Pokémon he has ever owned or used and their current status. It also has an extensive trivia section like all my favorite articles do. I've fallen down the anime rabbit hole on Bulbapedia numerous times, and Ash's page is a great place to start.
Runner Up - Ash's Noctowl
See all of the above, but from a different perspective. Pages for individual Pokémon from the anime are fantastic to get a glimpse into all the highlights from their time in the spotlight, and what better example of this than my personal favorite, Noctowl? The move history is really neat, especially the fact that it designates the moves recently used (and the illegal ones when applicable). Did you know Noctowl was the first Shiny Pokémon in the anime?
bthrussellUK (Bulbapedia) - Pokémon Battle Chess
I really love this article because I think it’s an example of what Bulbapedia is great at; taking obscure Pokémon topics (especially outside of Japan) and saving them from being lost to the sands of time. The original Pokémon Battle Chess website has been taken offline, so without articles like this one, the game would be forgotten. Instead, because it’s here, I decided to find and buy a copy of both Pokémon Battle Chess BW Version and Pokémon Battle Chess and use them to help expand the gameplay section of the article. They're actually pretty fun games! Now I just need a copy of Pokémon Battle Chess W…
Runner Up - Pokémon games
It looks like it's just a really long list... and it is! But for me it's a really great reminder of how massive Pokémon is, how many games have been released in the last 26 years, and how many different platforms Pokémon games have released on. Ever heard of the Advanced Pico Beena or the iQue Player?
Whether they're popular or niche, wide-ranging or obscure, we hope you've enjoyed our short tour of our favourite Bulbapedia articles! Do you have your own? Are you tickled by the trivia on a given page? You can let us know on our forums or Discord server - or even start editing yourself!
The wiki can never have too many contributors, and if your love of Pokémon is as deep as ours we'd be delighted to have you with us for the next 50,000 articles!
(lisia note: thank you for reading!!!!!!!!!! hopefully you enjoyed it!)
bulbagarden is holding a staff drive and YOU!!! are invited to apply!!
so we're looking for helpers in four different positions:
☆forums staff
☆bulbapedia staff
☆newswriting staff
☆discord staff
and the link is down below! to apply you just need to fill out a form about your experiences and etc and why you think you'd be someone who could help us!!
We interviewed our Bulbapedia staff friends here at Bulbagarden about their jobs! So here is the interview if you're interested~~it's very very interesting!!
"Bulbapedia was founded in late 2004 by a team of staff from the Bulbagarden Pokémon forums, with the bold ambition of creating a comprehensive resource maintained by the community, for the community. It was formally unveiled to the public in February 2005; at least 21 new articles were created within the first 24 hours of operations, and within three months 1,000 articles had been compiled. With close to 50,000 articles as of late 2022, Bulbapedia alone makes Bulbagarden one of the world's most visited Pokémon websites. Given the franchise hadn't existed for even a full decade at launch, it's fair to say that even the brave initial scope pales in comparison to the humongous scale of modern Pokémon media!
Bulbapedia may seem monolithic at times, but the wiki's success rests upon the efforts of everyday contributors and especially the team of Researchers, Poké Maniacs and Super Nerds that run the site and manage those contributions. In this article we'll be speaking with some of those (very human) Admins and figuring out what makes both them and Bulbapedia tick, covering their day-to-day priorities as well as their future plans. Whether you're a seasoned wiki editor or have never so much as thought about getting involved, we hope you'll find it enlightening!
Please introduce yourself - what is your role with Bulbapedia, and how long have you been on the team?
Hello! I'm bthrussellUK, and I'm a Junior Administrator on Bulbapedia. I joined the team in March 2022, and first contributed to the wiki in October 2019.
Heya, I'm Spriteit, one of the Australian team members; I've been a part of the Bulba team since 2011. After being temporarily added to the team to assist with the release of Black and White, I recently moved up to being a member of the Editorial Board in 2021. I was an expat from Wikimon and general Wikipedia editing and I found Bulbapedia. My first big job was changing all the Japanese names of the Gen 5 starters to their English ones and it's what piqued interest in promoting me to staff.
Salutations, I am Frozen Fennec, an Admin on Bulbapedia. I have been with the team since 2020 when I was invited to join the team as a Junior Admin - I was promoted to Admin status later that year.
Hello! The name's ht14 (pronounced h-t-fourteen); most folks here call me ht! I have been on staff with Bulbagarden since 2009, mostly serving on the Archives (our image repository) and have been a staff member on Bulbapedia since 2020. I tend to focus on trying to keep things organized on the Archives and work on rather niche Pokémon-related topics, whether it be the Pokémon Adventures/PokeSpe manga, Pokémon Masters, or some of the Japan-exclusive arcade games (e.g., Battrio, Mezastar). In general though, I bounce around quite a bit between a variety of projects, so you may see me in many places on Bulbapedia.
First off, how does Bulbapedia work? Who puts the information up there, and how do they get it?
bthrussellUK: Bulbapedia, like the rest of Bulbagarden, is run by volunteers! Anyone can edit the wiki, and it has grown into what it is today thanks to the efforts of hundreds of editors who have made thousands of edits. All contributions are welcome, even if it's just fixing spelling errors. Because the Pokémon franchise is massive, it does attract a lot of rumours and speculation so we try to stick to official sources for our information, and like Wikipedia, we encourage referencing wherever possible.
Spriteit: Users are the main method here, we have a lot of people new to the site who are unsure how they can contribute. We have categories of pages with incomplete information, but in general most users find a niche they may be interested in such as Pokemon Go, Masters or Unite, or a particular little project such as updating learnsets with new games or the move lists, and they go from there. As for how they get it, the tireless work of game dumpers on Twitter that they put up for the public to access is a huge benefit to everyone. When people come with questions, watching Let's Play videos on Youtube can always help confirm info. However, other research methods come down to playing/reading/watching whatever section you're editing.
Frozen Fennec: Fans of the series add new pages, info, images, and the such to Bulbapedia. The information comes from various sources from voice actors, to internal game data, to old or new news articles about various content in the series.
ht14: I believe Bulbapedia works when it's online! Haha, just kidding. But seriously, pretty much anyone with an account with Bulbapedia puts information up (that also could potentially include you, the reader!).
What’s a typical day’s work for a member of the Bulbapedia Staff?
bthrussellUK: Wake up. Coffee. Hours of existential dread... Then just getting stuck in! A big part of being a staff member is answering editors' questions and helping them so that they can get on with editing and improving the wiki. Other than that, we are editors ourselves, so we too are at the coalface making changes to the wiki so that it continues to be a great resource for Pokémon fans.
Spriteit: You primarily find me trying to respond to questions on the Discord, there's generally a scroll through the day’s recent changes to check edits that look odd or on pages that are of particular interest to me. As for the work I generally do, it's primarily grunt work; recently I went through all the existing learnset pages and ensured the move data was correct with a bunch of regular expressions I wrote. I also have historically gone through and updated the TCG pages with the new legality data with every rotation. Otherwise I also work to create basic templates that may be needed, as well as upgrading old templates to new styles.
Frozen Fennec: Generally I check Recent Changes maybe twice a day and help point users in the right direction if they seem to be having trouble getting the right idea of how to make edits (usually just reminding people to use Show Preview for articles to make sure the edit will not cause issues and to avoid making a lot of multiple edits to a page.) If I’ve come across information about beta content or other miscellaneous unknown data, I usually try to figure out where it will fit on Bulbapedia.
ht14: It honestly depends! We do sometimes have other things that may take priority, but there are many days in which we edit much like the average user on the wiki (adding quotes, fixing typos, etc.), and there are other days in which we go on Discord or the talkpages on Bulbapedia with users and staff to discuss a variety of topics about improving the wiki.
That’s a typical day - what's it like in the run-up to a major release? What do you do when new information is flying all over the place?
bthrussellUK: No idea, I'm looking forward to finding out. :)
Spriteit: Stressful to say the least - in the run-up I try my best to pre-emptively work on projects that we can do beforehand and preparing the data we already have. Once we get learnset data I generally work on creating the new templates for those and then distributing that to the appropriate Pokémon pages. I also monitor social media sites to add what data I can from users, though this is admittedly hard to balance in the rush of information that comes with everyone wanting to help.
Frozen Fennec: It can be a little stressful as a lot of information or misinformation might be floating around and it can take a couple of weeks both pre-release and post-release to make sure the information is accurate for the game in question. I generally try to filter out information from dubious sources known to promote misinformation; it can lead one to end up trying to verify game data that never existed.
ht14: One of the things we’ve done is to try to prep our templates and files to standardize for the newest release. It does admittedly get a bit chaotic at times, but the earlier the heavy lifting is done the more manageable it becomes upon release. We do our best to ensure we get the info from reliable sources and filter past a lot of rumors that come by, regardless of how seemingly accurate that information may seem.
What warrants a page on Bulbapedia? What level of depth is too deep?
bthrussellUK: Pokémon has been around since 1996 and is the largest media franchise in the world. From video games to airplanes, x-ray machines to vinyl records, and trading cards to macaroni & cheese, Pokémon has done it all, and while the wiki is pretty comprehensive, it certainly doesn't have everything! It can be a bit of a balancing act, but in general we try to stick to things that are official and approved by The Pokémon Company, or are major elements of the wider community. We want the wiki to be as complete as possible, but we're not likely to add a list of every store in the world that sells Pokémon cards...
Spriteit: I'd argue this is a question of perspective. A lot of information could be used to create pages - however, I think one of our biggest issues is completing pages and sections and it's why our coverage isn't as in-depth as we'd like. For example, the Mystery Dungeon community have voiced an issue that we don't have enough information on our pages about the games, and while we'd love to have more, it's a huge undertaking from our end to go through and not just find that information, but add it to Bulbapedia between other projects and real life commitments. If in doubt we always recommend creating pages within your userspace and going from there.
Frozen Fennec: If there’s more than three sentences of information and potentially a screenshot, logo, book/manga cover, etc. I feel it potentially warrants an article. When making new pages though, it is almost ALWAYS recommended you do it in your own userspace first, seeking out new potential information and checking with staff to make sure the article is of good enough quality to be added to the mainspace. I consider anything that goes into incredibly minute detail that adds nothing to the article to be "too deep" or "too superfluous”. For instance, noting how and when a character appears is fine but recording every single frame they appeared in and what pose they were in would be something that gets removed soon after.
ht14: We are quite open to development of new pages on the wiki. Although we have over 47,000 articles, we do acknowledge that there is still a whole slew of information out there that has yet to be covered. That said, we do hope to create articles that have a reasonable amount of content. As others have mentioned, if you are able to write out a few sentences and provide an image, chances are that it is relevant and could be a new article, but we highly recommend that you create it on your userspace first and bring it to the attention of staff members. As far as depth is concerned it definitely varies, but bear in mind the audience who may be reading the article or section of the article - it's helpful to be detailed and yet succinct.
How often is the information on Bulbapedia incorrect? How do you go about correcting these instances?
bthrussellUK: Never. How very dare you! :p In all seriousness, at time of writing Bulbapedia has 47,814 articles. That is a lot of ground to cover, so while our Admin team is good it's likely that there are inaccuracies. That's either through editing mistakes, or often because Pokémon is ever growing and changing. An article that said there are 151 Pokémon would have once been correct, but things have changed a lot since then. That is why this is a wiki - anyone can edit it, so if they spot a mistake, they can fix it!
Spriteit: More often than we'd all like. Usually the truth is in the weeds, and inconsistencies across pages where information is displayed is the worst culprit. For example, a given rival’s team is usually displayed in (at least) three locations; the location page, the rival page and the walkthrough page. If one of these pages is edited there's no guarantee the other pages are correct and errors can then persist. Other issues emerge from fandom rumours - occasionally we'll have a well meaning user add incorrect info and it will go unnoticed, even if the information is somewhat benign it can proliferate into becoming a perceived truth.
Frozen Fennec: It varies, sometimes it can be information that was thought true by a majority of people at the time with little to no sources before it gets challenged by a PokeTuber or DidYouKnowGaming-type channel, after which the information is usually quickly corrected. In more recent times, we have cracked down on disinformation and have begun requiring sources for the more obscure details that might show up in the character infobox or trivia section of an article.
ht14: More than I would like to admit. It can be a source of frustration at times, but it is occasionally fun to do some detective work to uncover the actual truth. Sometimes, these errors come from an earnest user who may have quickly read a part of a section and may have misinterpreted what was said and was eager to change it without understanding the entire context.
We definitely sourced things in the past, but over the past five years or so we’ve been much more intentional with sourcing our material on the wiki directly. As a scientist, this gives me a lot of comfort and assurance that we are doing our best to be as accurate as we can with what we know.
What’s the one thing you think people don’t realise or understand about Bulbapedia?
bthrussellUK: This server ain't free. Everyone hates ads. Ads suck, and we spend more time than we'd like trying to ensure that they're appropriate for our users. But running a website this big costs big bucks; the Bulbagarden Archives alone hosts over 200,000 images. To pay for that there either has to be a fee to enter, or ads. And thus, ads.
Spriteit: So many things - the first is that everyone on staff is a volunteer, they have families, jobs and lives outside of Bulbapedia. We have to prioritise our time within our means and sometimes that means we aren't able to give Bulbapedia the love it needs, but that doesn't mean we don't love it as much as you do. The second is that we have just a single technician who services not only the whole of Bulbapedia, but the majority of the Bulbagarden network, as well as working for the overarching server company. They do what they can but there are certain things that take priority over others, and, like the staff, they aren’t available 24/7 either.
Frozen Fennec: I feel some people (not many even at that) don't realize that when new information drops or a new game is released that not every aspect of it will be IMMEDIATELY added to Bulbapedia, people have lives and it takes time to add things like screenshots, movepools, character story segments, etc. Some users will also tell others to add content without contributing themselves, and are then surprised when the information hasn’t been added a week later. If one has the information, screenshots, and whatnot, they are always welcome to make an account and help add the content to Bulbapedia; more editors are always welcome to join in, helping make the information more accurate and up to date.
ht14: Believe it or not, we don't know everything. We're also not perfect. As great as our staff is and as comprehensive as we try to be in our projects, there are bound to be blind spots (I don't know much about the Pokémon RéBURST manga or the PokéPark games, for instance). That’s also why it's really important that users respectfully bring issues and gaps to our attention so that we can be made aware.
Is there anything you would like to change, or are changing, about Bulbapedia? Where does the future lie?
bthrussellUK: It's been a little while since the help resources, especially for new users, have been updated. That’s the next project I’d like to work on, so that people who want to help make the wiki even better have everything they need to get started. As for the future, I think we have an exciting project in the pipeline that has the potential to make Bulbapedia even more useful (ooo cryptic).
Spriteit: I'd personally like to see the timeliness of responses and decisions improve. Due to an increasing amount of people using their phones to access information, we're trying to move towards CSS styles as opposed to the way we've currently been building templates, as well as keep future designs with mobile appearance in mind. As for future projects, there's one or two in the pipeline that will hopefully make our lives a bit easier in the future. There are a few other large long term projects we're working on but there's no saying when these will be started, let alone completed.
Frozen Fennec: I can’t think of much I would like to change about Bulbapedia, perhaps some old and untouched articles getting much-needed updates but otherwise things are going as well as they can be. I hope in the future we will have more editors, better ways to get information and pages out sooner, and more people looking towards Bulbapedia for accurate information about the franchise.
ht14: Sorry, this information is confidential. We are often thinking about new templates and new ways to better present the information that we have with the reader in mind. Keep your eyes peeled!
How can anyone reading this help contribute to Bulbapedia, or even join the Staff team one day?
bthrussellUK: Hit the edit button! Don't be shy! If you have knowledge that is missing, add it! Bulbapedia is a community resource, for the community, by the community. People around the world come to Bulbapedia for Pokémon knowledge and we need your help keeping it up to date. Anyone can become a staff member; regularly contribute to the wiki, make valuable improvements and follow the code of conduct, and you too could be promoted!
Spriteit: Saying where you get information from if you're adding something controversial or not easily reliable, assisting with semi-large scale projects, having technical knowledge of how things work is a huge help as well. Don't get discouraged, sticking around, helping out with tasks big and small. Taking on personal projects and following them through. We did have a staff drive last year and over half of the applicants didn't have an account, so that's also a good starting step.
Frozen Fennec: By helping with adding new and accurate information. As for potentially becoming staff, we have a staff drive every year and I’d recommend checking that out; being polite and helpful also goes a long way when being considered for staff.
ht14: You reading this is already a huge help! Our Getting started page is a great starting point. In brief though, we have many wanted articles and images to go along with them and given that there are so many articles out there, there is bound to be some niche that you can uniquely fill to assist. Alternatively, if you find stub articles, see how you can improve on the pages there. I encourage you to edit not with the intent of being on staff, but with the intent on improving the wiki. Consider that all of us who are editing with good conduct have a passion for Pokémon and a desire to help share information.
And with that, we'll let our hardworking Admins get back to the Bulbapedia coalface! We hope you've learned at least a little bit about how our wiki operates, the challenges we sometimes face, and the ways in which you can make a difference. If you have any further questions about it, please get in touch via our Discord or Twitter account - or leave a comment under this article!"
If you have any questions, you can talk to me at the Tumblr too~~ I hope you had fun reading this, I actually learned some things from this believe it or not!!! (thanks to WyndonCalling for making this and to bthrussell, ht14, spriteit, and my very cool friend Lunie for giving answers!!!)
Bulbapedia was founded in late 2004 by a team of staff from the Bulbagarden Pokémon forums, with the bold ambition of creating a comprehensi
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