What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Talk with others about anything shrine-related, be it presentation, content or something else.
Chibi
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What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Chibi »

Perhaps "incomplete" is not the right word, but I can't think of anything else that fits my description.

So, guys, I have two kinds of shrines that I wanted to talk about: the first are shrines that are put online early but with some sections still missing; the second are character/relationship (or even series) shrines who only concentrate on one media of what they're shrining.

As for the first kinds of shrines, what do you think? I remember back in the old internet days (I'm talking early 2000 here, that's when I started making sites), it was pretty normal for a site to open without having all the sections available. The webmasters would update frequently and add the section as time went by. Personally, I think that's really fun. It makes visitors come back for more and creates a sense of "community" about your site, because you know people are visiting it and look forward to more content. And, why not, I think it might also be a way to drive you (the webmaster) to work on your site and add more stuff. Overall, I think it's quite fun to add stuff as time goes by and it has its advantages. I've thought of this question because nowadays when we put online a shrine, it's usually already complete, but I find it really hard to find the drive I need to work on my sites when they're just sitting there on my computer. Does this happen to you guys too? Do you like shrines that are already complete or do you like coming back for more?

Also, relevant to this topic, what do you think of shrines that are not up to date to the latest chapter/episode of the series they're from? Do you think they're incomplete? Do you think a shrine should be put online when the series is finished so that it can have as much info as possible? I've always postponed my Chuck&Blair shrine because I wanted Gossip Girl to finish first, so that I'd have all the complete information. The downside of this is that it might take a while before you put the shrine up and that the series might go on for God knows how long and it might be hard to re-read it/re-watch it in order to take notes for your shrine. What do you think?

Now, for the second type of shrine, I'll give you an example so I can show you what I mean. Take Sakura Kinomoto. She appears both in Card Captor Sakura and Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle. Do you think a shrine to her should include information on both series to be considered "complete", or would it be okay for you if the shrine was dedicated only to her as she appears in CCS or TRC? I'll give you another example: Kai Hiwatari from Beyblade. I'm slowly making progress on my shrine to this character, but I decided to focus on the anime of Beyblade rather than the manga (I really don't have time at the moment to read it and I want to put Kai's shrine online asap). The same thing could be applied to Pokemon shrines: if I was to make a shrine to Blue/Green (aka Gary), but only considered the games of Pokemon, do you think the shrine would be "incomplete" because there is no mention of him in the manga or anime? Do you think it's okay to "sacrifice" one media in order to have the shrine up? Do you think a shrine "suffers" from not considering every media there is? Or are you totally cool with it? Personally, I have two different views depending on whether I'm the shrine-visitor or the shrine-maker: as a visitor, I don't really mind, I think everybody should focus on whatever they want to focus; as a shrine-maker, I become a real perfectionist and feel the need to include absolutely everything from every media, otherwise I feel people are not going to consider my shrine "complete" and I want my shrines to be the go-to place for a certain character or pairing. Do you feel the same? (Perhaps I won't feel so bad about this once I hear your opinion, haha!)

So... let the discussion begin! :)
Destinie
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Destinie »

The first type of shrine used to be something I did a lot. I remember my first big shrine way back when (2000-ish) was online for a really long time but I never really finished the content. It was more about having the site online than having the content filled up. Because, as you said, people may come by and expect to see more content. And I was OK with that and am still OK with visiting shrines that have "Coming Soon" pages.

However, my standards for my own sites have changed drastically. Now I will not put a site online unless the content is all ready and I will update it periodically with New!~ pages or layouts here and there. (Content and code is a different story, however. Sometimes I have a site online that still requires code tweaks but will be active for a long time before I go in and change things.) I think there's a reason for this. I think that I do this because I set aside a large chunk of time to work on sites rather than being able to work on them a little bit at a time. My energy and ability to work on certain things comes in spurts.

I also think a complete shrine is a relative concept. I think there's always going to be more things that you can talk about. In reference to your second kind of shrine: I think the best thing to do is create and objective for that site. So you could shrine Sakura only from the manga version of Card Captor Sakura and write all about that and still consider it complete if you finish your set objective. (For me, I have been working on a shrine to Saint Tail from the manga, only. I will touch on the anime but it isn't necessary for the purpose of the site.) People may always want to see more, and if they do, it might make more sense to engage those who are currently visiting your site.

Great discussion! :)
nyxmidnight
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by nyxmidnight »

I agree with Destinie for the second type of shrines. For example, my Dojima shrine (HEE!) only touches upon the vanilla version of the game, because I don't have the time to sink into a play of Golden (it took me 250 hours to finish P4) and the anime didn't catch my attention. Does it make it not as complete as possible? Sure. Does it make my interpretation and information about him wrong or invalid? Not at all! Beside, if you don't rein in the scope of your shrine for something, it can easily balloon into something huge, especially for more popular series. I think watching the P4 anime, getting the drama CD translations, playing a long RPG and getting the artbooks is a lot for Persona 4 already; I dare not imagine the amount of work for someone shrining a major character for say, Bleach.
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Todd
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Todd »

We started touching on this in the Series Site discussion; I'm glad you started a separate discussion on it.

I think my Tidus site is one like you're referring to. I am updating it regularly with new content (info, analysis, and media). Yesterday, I added a new page discussing Tidus' relationship with his mother. I don't have any coming soon pages, though, because I don't like linking to content I don't have up, but in my head and in an outline I made for my computer, I know there are sections that need to be added before I'd ever consider this shrine "complete."

I've made sites both ways. Building the site offline and having everything written before uploading it is beneficial, particularly if you just finished a game or manga, or whatever, and the subject is fresh on your mind and likely won't be in the future. If it's one of your absolute favorite games, though, and you know you're going to think about it and possibly replay the game regularly, it could be cool to add content slowly, like I'm doing with Tidus. I think in those situations, for me, I like to have at least the basic content written. I discuss the character, his major relationships, the game... Anything I add after the site is up will be considered "extra." I don't want anything to be OBVIOUSLY missing. If I never touched the site again, the visitor should have the sense the site is complete, even if it doesn't meet my personal standards. I hope that makes sense.
Mikari
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Mikari »

I usually have all the sections finished on character shrines before I open, but I might still add more later if I get new ideas or some new media comes up. I used to update as I went along in my fansites of the distant past because they were fandom centric, so I would add chapters and pictures as I went along. I did that with Endless though the story is finished now. For a while Snow and I did update every now and then on Black Ring as more episodes and manga became available, which led to a fun theories section that was written before certain things were revealed and later updated with reactions to the events.

I don't mind if people have coming soon pages, everyone has their own pace and style and I'm pretty open to that. I also think it's ok to pick one or some versions of a character to shrine. I too have versions of characters that I prefer or are more available to me. They may be the same as yours, which means I get to see a site about what I like, or different from yours, which means I get to learn something about another version of the character or relationship, so it feels like a win either way.
Crystal
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Crystal »

My views on this have changed a lot over the years. I used to open shrines with lots of missing pages with the hope that I'd go back and finish it, but with that it ended up that the shrine would never be finished (my Shiki and Ike shrines are perfect examples of this) and oftentimes closed. I think only one shrine I uploaded partially finished ever was finished eventually (though technically there is one page I still need to "finish").

Nowadays I like to make sure that all the sections I want are completed with nothing coming soon. That way there I can leave it static without ever having to feel bad. But the thing with that too is I can also visit again sometime later and add content and it'll still be awesome (if that makes any sense at all). Because of this though some shrines never make it online, but I still prefer it this way. If it takes too long to finish the shrine maybe I shouldn't be working on it to begin with.

All that's really left now are the "complete" shrines that really need to be revamped/rewritten because the style and writing is dated, which I'm hoping to be able to do something about at some point *coughdatacough*.
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Aku
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Aku »

First, I just want to say that I love how the discussion we had on Series Shrines morphed into a new discussion. :)

To touch on the second part first--I think people should create shrines at the level they wish. Whether that's just for FFX Yuna, or both FFX & FFX-2 Yuna, that is completely fine and I don't see one being more complete than the other. So long as you set it up to your visitors what your shrine entails, it really isn't a big deal. I think it's just a matter of what that person wants to discuss. :yay:

As for the first part, it's something I'm really interested in looking into doing in the future, but I think if I do I will need to change some aspects of my current approach to shrining. Like Chibi mentioned, it can be hard to get motivated at times to finish sections when it isn't online for anyone to see. Back then, I would put sites online before anything was finished, and then work on them as I went. In a way, having people visit and expect something when they come back was a bit more motivating than just trying to finish it all on my own. It also helped that shrines I worked back then were also sometimes very contributer-based, and having visitors come and send information or fan-made things my way helped the site grow, and motivated me to work harder too.

At the same time, my way of shrining nowadays has changed dramatically. I really kind of think of my recent shrines like a book--I want it to tell a story all the way through and drive my ideas home until the end. So that being said, it's difficult to set it up so that a shrine is an ever-growing WIP. But I don't think any way is "wrong". Surely there are many processes of shrining that we haven't even though of before!
Chibi
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Chibi »

It's funny you guys keep mentioning the Series shrines discussion, because I haven't read that one yet, so I had no idea that this subject had kinda been touched upon already. It was just something that popped into my head and I wanted to make a discussion out of it. XD

@ nyxmidnight: You mentioned the amount of work a person has to do to shrine a character from a huge series. This is something I wonder about too sometimes. How do they do it? How do they even approach shrining a character from such a big series? I don't think I would feel motivated enough to do it.

@ Aku: The whole "shrine is like a book" comparison is really interesting! Also, it's interesting to know that it's something you're thinking of doing in the future! You said you'd probably have to change some aspects of the way you approach shrining. I think that's really interesting. I can't think of other ways of shrining right now, but I'd love to hear some. :D
dubiousdisc
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by dubiousdisc »

We went on a tangent touching these very questions in the series fansites thread, which is why we were thinking you just went and opened a new thread to discuss that other thing better! So it was all a coincidence, haha :B

Anyway!

As for what concerns your first question, I wouldn't spit on either - if it's incomplete, yay, there will be more, hopefully! If it's complete, yay, a full fansite! This as a viewer. As an owner, I wouldn't publish a site that doesn't have everything important in place. I might add something more later, although that's becoming harder since as of lately my sites have become very linear so it's not always easy to expand on things.

On sites that are not up to date, that doesn't bother me at all. I'm glad there is a site at all! Personally I'm a bit intimidated by making a site for something that's still ongoing because I fear that I won't be able to stay on top of things - I mean, I HAVEN'T PLAYED SKYRIM SINCE IT CAME OUT IN 2011, how am I supposed to keep up with something that comes out weekly or monthly?! And then what if people contact me and are all, why don't you update...I've had bad experiences with fans being too demanding and I would like to keep this hobby as low-pressure as possible. This is just me though.

I think that a site focusing on a single version of something is just as complete as a site touching each version. I admire people who can deal with the latter because it's a hell of a massive work, though. Denise's Copy Cat for example is about EVERY version of Mewtwo, and there's so much to say that the site revamp has been going on behind the scenes since FUCKING 2012 and she's still not done!!!! I really can't blame anyone for not having the time or just for not wanting to undertake such a massive project.
Eimii
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Re: What do you think of "incomplete" shrines?

Post by Eimii »

For me i have found myself guilty of the first one. Sometimes i put up the basic layout with the intent of getting back to it and never do. Or i make the fanlisting and then slap a "coming soon" on the shrine section. Writing has always been the harder part of shrining for me so sometimes i put it off. ;.; When i see other sites with incomplete sections im a little bummed but it'll keep me coming back...plus who knows...maybe the owner is like me?
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