Tag excerpts are very useful. They provide a brief “elevator pitch” for a tag, explaining the meaning for those unfamiliar with a series. At least as important, excerpts and wikis can also help clarify the usage of tags, particularly those that tend to be used incorrectly, e.g. frozen, aliens, or humans.
As of this post, though, nearly 400 tags lack both tag wikis and tag excerpts! A query (updated only once a week) to show how many can be found here. I know that somewhere here we have an expert for every tag, whether they have 2 reputation or 200,000: someone who can provide a well-written, original tag excerpt or tag wiki for a tag that was previously forlorn and undescribed.
There are benefits to editing tag wikis:
- If you have less than 20,000 reputation, as do most people on this site, and you create a tag wiki (which requires approval), you will get a nice shiny +2 reputation. What’s more, tag wikis and tag excerpts count as separate posts.
- If you have more than 20,000 reputation, you can edit tag wikis freely. You might also progress toward any of several badges.
Questions and answers are the lifeblood of this site, but the little things that hang around the periphery are important too! This month, in the spirit of Answer the Unanswered Questions, let’s try to provide tag excerpts (and when needed, wikis) for as many of those blank tags as we can.
Guidelines for writing tag wiki excerpts are here. And, although it is not mentioned there, a tag wiki and excerpt should be original: no Wikipedia lifting!
