The central distinction

Zwikipedia brings together imagined settings, real-world work, and the records that connect them. Those materials can share a page design without sharing the same kind of truth claim. An article’s classification therefore needs more than a single undifferentiated label.

A category helps readers discover a topic. A content type explains what kind of article they are reading. A perspective or continuity explains the world or evidentiary frame within which a statement is meaningful. A source tells the reader what supports the statement. A link between two articles describes a relationship; it should not erase the distinctions between them.

Core contexts

Real World

Technical decisions, development history, the making of fictional material, and other documented real-world subjects. For example, a page explaining how an article was drafted is not itself an in-universe history.

Crossroads

Clint’s fictional continuity, which can develop its own interpretations, character histories, locations, and connections. Crossroads is a subject and continuity, not a universal ancestor in the site's navigation. A global breadcrumb should begin with Home → Articles → [title] rather than automatically passing through Crossroads.

Behind the Curtain

A reader-facing way to explore sources, authorial choices, and creative context without silently rewriting the fictional page as a making-of article. These notes are not an automatic grant of source-canon authority.

Source and Other Worlds

Independent works, original sources, and outside fictional continuities must be identified with their own authorship and context. They are not limited to Clint’s work or John Conroe’s Demon Accords. For example, Markus Matthews is the source author whose canon informs A Bounty of Dad Jokes; that credit is distinct from Clint’s fan-fiction interpretation and Zwikipedia’s editorial account. Other works, including Professor Croft and The Dresden Files, likewise retain their respective source authorship and canon. A claim attributed to an outside work cannot automatically be upgraded into Clint’s interpretation, or vice versa.

Canon is contextual

Suppose an article describes the band Sisters Erie within Crossroads. A separate Real World article, Creating Sisters Erie, can document the music, illustrations, design decisions, and creative process behind that interpretation. The second article explains the first; it does not cause every creative decision to become part of an originating author’s source canon. In-universe descriptions of Crossroads belong to the subject article; real-world explanations of its creation are a different editorial perspective.

Likewise, a crossover accepted in Crossroads does not establish that the source author has accepted the crossover in the other direction. The relationship may be valid one way without becoming a reciprocal canonical claim. An in-universe article and its preview must preserve that reading frame: out-of-universe explanations, disclaimers, or editorial continuity warnings remain behind deliberately opened details or links, apart from the specifically permitted footer treatment.

Zwikipedia’s editorial independence does not imply endorsement by third-party rights holders. Necessary contextual disclosure remains available through deliberately opened details or links, with only the specifically permitted footer treatment exposed by default. In-universe reading must not be interrupted by a warning or explanation of interpretive status.

Categories are not universes

A musical work might belong in a music category while describing Crossroads continuity. A process record might belong in a technical category while explaining how that music was made. Some articles could legitimately have multiple categories, but the category system should not pretend that every article belongs to exactly one universe or that one universe contains the whole site.

Counts should consequently be explicit. Total article records, published articles, articles with categories, and category assignments are different measurements. A displayed mismatch is a prompt to inspect data and query definitions, not proof that any particular thirteen articles have vanished.

Links carry meaning

Related links can identify an artist and song, a fictional place and institution, an original source and interpretation, or a fictional article and its Behind the Curtain companion. Labels should explain the relationship where needed. Relatedness alone must not be taken as evidence of a shared canonical timeline.

Reader experience

The site should remain recognizably Zwikipedia in its navigation and design. Keep continuity, source posture, and editorial type accurate in the underlying metadata without turning them into unsolicited out-of-universe labels in an in-universe article. A clear title, an in-universe-appropriate preview, useful subject detail, and related reading preserve the reading frame; creation explanations and disclaimers require deliberate reader interaction, apart from the specifically permitted footer treatment.

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