I've reverted the link back into policy, but I'm quite curious... what policy is that essay supposed to contradict? Jclemens (talk) 04:50, 26 October 2013 (UTC)
The essay says, at least in part, that only random collections of data should be considered "indiscriminate". For instance, an article titled List of some things that contained the list "Bill, 7, Orange, pedometer, three ring notebook, The Magna Carta, Jerome Lester Horowitz" or "paper clip, bleach, chewing gum, magnifying glass" would be disallowed under WP:INDISCRIMINATE. But articles such as List of green postage stamps and so on wouldn't, since it was "assembled with thought", that is, a logical filter (postage stamp, green) was applied to the class "all things". This is a simplification of a long essay but gets at the essence I think.
This does contradict the policy, which is not necessarily a deal-killer since it's allowed to offer competing perspectives. The question is, is the essay worthwhile and well written enough to include. I don't think it's especially well-written (it could be shorter), and I don't think it's particularly worthwhile since I don't think that List of green postage stamps and so forth would be useful. Herostratus (talk) 00:57, 27 October 2013 (UTC)
It is not clear to me that a list of green postage stamps would violate INDISCRIMINATE simply for being what it is. A stand alone list of green postage stamps would violate LISTN if green postage stamps are not notable as a group. James500 (talk) 12:17, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
delete link to DISCRIMINATE. We should not have an essay, a rather poorly written one at that, here to explain what indiscriminate means. We should, rather, agree what it means and make it part of policy.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 23:48, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
keep link to DISCRIMINATE. Not all essays are merely opinions: some are meant to explain parts of policy that would become bewildering and confusing is fully described in a single page. The essay helps clarifying and narrowing down one of the most vague, misunderstood and poorly quoted of our policies. Improving the essay is welcome. --cyclopiaspeak!23:59, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
I disagree. As far as I can tell, it's the only essay link on that page from within the content sections (vs in the essays list at the bottom); this gives it too much prominence. I'd suggest we remove the link, those who want to improve the essay can try to get it turned into a guideline.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:02, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
Delete link. Low quality, which can be fixed, and heavily biased toward one interpretation of the policy, which can not. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:35, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
Have to agree with deletion, if mostly to avoid linking to essays on a key policy page, but also agree its only considering one aspect of indiscriminate (the idea of a random collection), as lists with non-random inclusion but that can grow large (eg "people from New York") are also indiscriminate, a fact not covered there. --MASEM (t) 00:59, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
@Masem:, that's not a correct interpretation, as far as I know. Large lists have not been considered inappropriate by consensus. We have List of people, for example. Large lists are often just split and become lists of lists (per WP:SALAT). I personally think that WP:IINFO in itself is very problematic, because it is extremly vague as it is worded and it is frustratingly prone as being used as a jolly for every kind of personal dislike: the reasonings often go like "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, so this policy justifies that I want to discriminate out X". It needs to make clear-cut what it means -however (in my very personal opinion) many resist any attempt at clarifying it because they want that jolly. --cyclopiaspeak!09:47, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
Well, I mean, the "List of people from X"-type lists nearly are always limited to blue-linked names, which removes the indiscriminate nature, compared to the option that as long as you can verify that a person is from the place that they should be included. A similarly long list that is a problem is list of minor planets, which is basically a massive data table with currently potentially over 300,000 entries with almost no notable entries. A list with a huge number of potential elements because the inclusion metrics are too broad is indiscriminate. (This list is better suited on a sister project, but there's no reason we can't have List of notable minor planets to capture those with blue links.) Mind you, there is no hardset rule here when the line is crossed, or as easy to read/inteprete as with the examples in that essay. But there is that line. --MASEM (t) 14:16, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
A list that is primarily data from 300,000+, primarily non-notable elements in a tertiary summary work is a problem. We are not trying to replicate data sources, but summarize them. This type of list is indiscriminate as it say "oh, include everything" without considering the encyclopedia's tertiary nature, the same reason that "List of people from X" will include the requirement that the people must be notable, to avoid indiscriminate inclusion that still otherwise meets WP:V. --MASEM (t) 14:52, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
I disagree it is a problem. It is actually exactly intended to be a merge target for non-notable minor planets, by the way. In any case this is creeping off topic.--cyclopiaspeak!14:54, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
No, it is relevant, not so much the specific list, but understanding that an indiscriminate one is not only what is presently defined at that essay, but also includes lists that extremely high numbers of possible non-notable elements (people, minor planets, etc.), and we take steps to introduce additional criteria to manage this. This is the same issue with the list of unusual deaths that was brought up at VPP - it's potentially an infinitely long list in part that the word "unusual" can have numerous meanings, so we avoid that by introducing criteria to make the list manageable. (And if you need a landing page for redirects of minor planets, a single "list of notable minor planets" with links to the JPL database would achieve the same thing. ) --MASEM (t) 15:07, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
Comment There seems to be some confusion here. "Discriminate" does not mean "notable" -- all other policies and guidelines are still in effect.--Paul McDonald (talk) 00:47, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
Keep the link, because otherwise we will get people coming to Afd and saying things to the effect of "this article is indiscriminate because I don't like it". James500 (talk) 05:14, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
Since we seem to be voting, I'm obviously in the keep camp, but I disagree that this essay deals with a particular interpretation of policy. It actually deals with proper English use of 'discriminate' and 'indiscriminate', and that sad fact is that the way Wikipedia editors who prefer deletion of what they consider to be trivia cite this policy is diametrically opposed to what the English words discriminate and indiscriminate mean. Policy cannot be changed by simply ignoring the plain meaning of the underlying words and pretending that a prohibition in indiscriminate information is a general prohibition on overly discriminate information. They are two extremes of the same problem, perhaps, but to pretend that well-organized trivia (i.e. it has a unifying theme, and is not indiscriminate in its scope) is indiscriminate is an abuse of the English language. If there is to be a WP:NOT#TRIVIA, then someone needs to draft it and get consensus on it, because indiscriminate != overly focused. Jclemens (talk) 05:53, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
Remove link. The point that this essay appears to be making is that "(in)discriminate" refers merely to the absence or presence of a guiding criterion in the selection of material within a set of contents. While that is indeed one logically possible application of the term, it is by no means the only possible such application, and most crucially, it is definitely not the one meant in this policy – because, evidently, all the examples of things to avoid that are actually listed in the policy would still qualify as "discriminate" under this narrow definition. The sense of (in)discriminate that is operative in this policy is therefore situated on a different level: it refers to the presence or absence of consideration of principles such as manageability, size and encyclopedic appropriateness in determining the selection criteria themselves (i.e. selecting which sets of content we want, not merely selecting what items are part of any arbitrary set of contents). In that sense, the essay does contradict the policy and is not helpful. Fut.Perf.☼07:46, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
The four examples given in INDISCRIMINATE are indiscriminate. They have been lumped together at random. It is not possible to deduce any general principle from those four examples. They should be placed in separate sections. James500 (talk) 08:07, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
INDISCRIMINATE cannot possibly refer to "encyclopedic appropriateness" because the whole point of NOT is to provide a non-circular definition of "unencyclopedic". It would be meaningless to go to Afd and say "this article is unencyclopedic because it is indiscriminate because it is unencyclopedic".
comment the essay should be removed because it does NOT cover the full scope of INDISCRIMINATE, plain and simple. For example, a list of countries beginning with the letter A would be "discriminate" per this list, but per my definition, it would certainly not be. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 06:02, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
but per my definition, - That is the problem of this afterbirth of policy. Everybody seems to have their own interpretation of what it means, and this intepretation is often found to overlap significantly with WP:UNENCYC or WP:IDONTLIKEIT, or both. This is a recurrent problem here. We need some consensus to clarify and narrow down what WP:IINFO means (if anything). Simply using it as a basket for "everything people think is inappropriate" is not a solution. On one hand, WP:IAR already covers decisions away from policy that meet consensus nonetheless. On the other, if there is novel set of things where editors agree it should not be in the 'pedia, WP:NOT can be amended to include it explicitly.--cyclopiaspeak!12:44, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
well, we're talking about an essay here which represents one person's opinion of the meaning of discriminate. I'm happy to have this link at the bottom of the page, but putting it right next to the guideline elevates it to a status it doesn't deserve as this discussion illustrates. Don't you realize the hypocrisy of your statement above + wanting to keep a link to *one* definition of indiscriminate?--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 13:35, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
No, I don't see any hypocrisy. I want to keep the link exactly because it helped narrow the meaning of WP:IINFO to a clear-cut, well-defined scenario, instead of leaving the can of worms open. Other definitions can be possible, and we're here to discuss this, but one clear cut, narrow definition must be. However, if there are multiple cases that are not covered here and that people want to cover in WP:NOT, the best course of action would perhaps be, instead of keeping IINFO vague, to (1)agree that IINFO refers to this scenario (2)add other cases under further, new subsections, discussing them one by one.--cyclopiaspeak!14:32, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
Admittedly I was a primary contributor, but others have contributed. So it's not "one person's opinion" -- and, it's based on the definition in Wiktionary. Plus, just because few people contribute to an article does not mean that it goes against consensus. But if you have a better definition, let's have it--don't be shy.--Paul McDonald (talk) 14:26, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
If you read my !vote, that is what I proposed. There is clearly no consensus for Paul's definition, so pending consensus, we should remove the link, hash out what we mean, and make what we mean part of the policy, and hold an RFC to solidify the consensus. Paul has more or less admitted that he wrote that article to combat abuses of WP:IINFO, in other words, because WP:ILIKEIT, and as it stands now it is clearly way too inclusive. The reason a list of Countries starting with the letter A is indiscriminate is the same reason a list of actors whose middle name starts with W is indiscriminate - it's a trivial association, even if it can be objectively determined. Worse is a trivial association that cannot be objectively determined. Rather than disputing this essay, let's just agree to remove the link for now and work together on a better definition of indiscriminate that we can all agree with.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 14:56, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
I would agree that IINFO could use a guideline to explain what is meant by IINFO via casebook examples (in the manner of how WP:NFC is a guideline and casebook for how WP:NFCC applies). This is what DISCRIMINATE can be turned into after gaining consensus for a rewrite. --MASEM (t) 15:08, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
I !voted yes above, because of it being an essay on a policy page. It has potential to be a guideline but until it is, we should avoid linking to it from policy to give the appearance of being a vetted essay. (The essay is not wrong but just too narrowly focused on one form.) --MASEM (t) 15:19, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
Remember, it's not "paul's definition" -- it's from Wiktionary. And it does have consensus there (and has probably been changed by consensus, so there should be some inclusion). But it's not the "Paulmcdonald" show here, I just opened the can of beans.--Paul McDonald (talk) 16:38, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
For one, Wiktionary is a separate project so what they say has no weight here. That said, I'm personally not saying it is "wrong", but that it only presents on facet of what it means to be indiscriminate/discriminate with information on an encyclopedia. Hence my suggestion of making it the guideline casebook to support the policy page, adding more cases and discussion of what discriminate means, and then gaining global consensus to make it a guideline here. --MASEM (t) 16:44, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
A stand alone list of Countries starting with the letter A and any list of actors whose middle name starts with W are both already covered by LISTN, which does not need to be duplicated here. INDISCRIMINATE does not need to include every possible objection that could be taken against an article. We have other policies and guidelines for that. James500 (talk) 01:36, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
LISTN by no means prevents a list of countries that start with A. (As one of the authors of that, it is very difficult to define notability as applied to list, and as such , LISTN is not as strong as you think). Add to that that a list of countries is "of course" going to be notable, so there's "no question" that a list of countries starting with A will also be notable. But it is indiscriminate, which LISTN does not cover. --MASEM (t) 01:40, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
I think that it is inconceivable that the sources necessary to satisfy LISTN would exist in such a case. Perhaps I should emphasise that I am talking about a stand alone list of countries whose names start with A. Such a list would require sources that discuss such countries as a group (eg sources that say things like "countries that begin with A are better than other countries"). It would not be sufficient to produce sources that discuss all countries as a group. I am not talking about an alphabetical list of all countries, which would be perfectly appropriate. James500 (talk) 02:28, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
here's an example that would pass muster under listn - list of products and celebrities with the letter Z in their name: [1] - a reliable source, a nice fully printed newspaper, has written a whole article on the phenomenon. Using some people's definition of WP:IINFO, this list is also discriminate - its pretty objectively determined and not a random assortment because they all have Z in their name! But by my definition of indiscriminate, it fails miserably. We need to draft a new essay that lays out what we mean by discriminate and indiscriminate and then turn it into a guideline. Until then this essay should go as it is far too permissive and restricts indiscriminate far too much, such that we'd have to use iAR to delete the list of things with Z in their name. (Fwiw, Colonel warden has recently started List of bizarre buildings as another textbook example of indiscriminate lists.)Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 02:06, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
I am afraid that your source is largely illegible on the device that I am using, so I can't comment, at the moment, on what it establishes the notability of. James500 (talk) 02:52, 8 November 2013 (UTC) I can barely read your source, but isn't it really about products whose names deliberately replace the letter "s" with the letter "z" because the people marketing them believe that their target audience consider illiteracy to be "cool" (in scare quotes)? It is not actually about every product whose name includes the letter "z" is it? That is not, to my mind, a manifestly innappropriate topic. I can imagine there being people who care enormously about that kind of behaviour. James500 (talk) 03:55, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Yes, you could potentially have an article about the trend of words that have replaced 's' with 'z' but I think that would make an indiscriminate list have a separate stand alone list of such words. This is classic tvtropes material - indeed, they have an article on same: [2]. But we are not TV Tropes (even though there's a terribly incomplete effort at List of film cliches...--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:27, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Whilst we could in principle have NOTTVTROPES as a policy, it would have, on the face of it, nothing to do with INDISCRIMINATE. "Indiscriminate" is not a synonym for "unencyclopedic", and it would be useless if it was. James500 (talk) 08:31, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Obiwan has it right here. Basically - LISTN is about notability through sources and makes no effort to consider a discriminate list any further; basically if there are sources that talk about the list or elements of the list, it is difficult to claim the list fails LISTN. But WP:NOT still overrides LISTN, and that's where having better guidance on what we consider indiscriminate would be needed. --MASEM (t) 03:23, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Given that I was one of those involved in writing it and aware of the difficulty of trying to refine anything stronger, I can tell you this is what it means. The appropriateness of a list is subject to a lot of subjective merits and LISTN could not push anything strong than saying "you really should try to show that the list itself is a notable list, but there's other reasons to have a stand-alone list" without stepping on toes. That's the same when it comes to IINFO/DISCRIMINATE - that also remains a subjective measure. --MASEM (t) 15:20, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Yes, but it gives those that drafted it an authority on what it is supposed to mean, and does not let others try to usurp that definition, as you're suggesting. --MASEM (t) 04:25, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
Then why is there discussion? Clearly we don't all agree on what that "literal rule" even is and there's a wide span. As for giving an authority, it is an essay in Wikispace and anyone can edit and/or create opposition to it.--Paul McDonald (talk) 12:58, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
This is somewhat diverant from the DISCRIMINATE essay; it is about James500 interpretation of guideline WP:LISTN which does not follow from how it was written or presently used. --MASEM (t) 15:28, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
Relevance of US carriers distributing a certain mobile phone
I'm raising this issue since this is a pet peeve of mine and I don't think there's any formal argument to fight it. It's very often that American editors tend to add mention of what carriers in their country have a certain mobile phone in their offering. Now, unless, of course, the device is designed for a particular carrier, I find this largely inappropriate. The English Wikipedia is as close to a universal Wikipedia as it gets, and the US is only 4% of the world population, meaning that to 96% of Wikipedia's potential target, that information is completely irrelevant. I've managed to remove that kind of "information" from most articles, but other editors have manifested encountering opposition in doing so. It would be good to have a readily available argument in the form of a guideline to present when approaching this situation. Any comments are welcome. --uKER (talk) 21:17, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
"the territories or retailers that a certain product is available from (unless there are significant, encyclopedic details about the release; i.e. exclusivity, special versions, notable delays, etc.)"? ViperSnake151 Talk 21:26, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, I'd generally agree that information is unnecessary unless tied-to-carrier details were commented on by third-parties (eg iPhone and its original AT&T requirements). --MASEM (t) 21:32, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Agreed, carriers should be listed only when there's a significant impact on the product article is talking about, like being exclusive etc. -- Dsimic (talk) 21:39, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
Proposed wording
I'll word this proposal as an extension of the existing WP:NOTCATALOG wording (additions are bolded)
Product pricing or availability information should not be included in an article unless they can be sourcedand there is a justified reason for their mention. In general, if mainstream media sources (not just product reviews) provide commentary on these details instead of just passing mention, this is an indication that its price or how it is being distributed may have encyclopedic significance. Prices listed by individual vendors and retailers, on the other hand, can vary widely from place to place and over time. Wikipedia is not a price comparison service to be used to compare the prices of competing products, or the prices of a single product from different vendors.
Support Looking good to me, maybe with these small changes for additional clarity (underlined):
Product pricing or availability information should not be included in an article unless they can be sourcedand there is a justified reason for their mention. In general, if mainstream media sources (not just product reviews) provide commentary on these details instead of just passing mention, this is an indication that its price or how it is being distributed may have encyclopedic significance. Prices listed by individual vendors and retailers, or product availability through various supply chains — on the other hand — can vary widely from place to place and over time. Wikipedia is not a price comparison service to be used to compare the prices of competing products, or the prices and availability of a single product from different vendors or retailers.
Comment generally, the only mention of price I ever see is the MSRP, the price suggested by the manufacturer. usually, at least on computer hardware articles, the vast majority of sources are computer-specific blogs and reviews. stuff like that almost never grabs any sort of media attention, but the wiki would be sorely remiss to exclude articles on such products. see AMD Radeon Rx 200 Series for an example. the wording could cause problems, and IAR is great in theory, but i'd rather not have to apply it to a whole genre of articles. -- Aunva6talk - contribs08:54, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
Comment I personally have no problem with the inclusion of launch-time MSRPs. Maybe the proposal should contemplate those. --uKER (talk) 19:35, 16 November 2013 (UTC)
Oppose Instruction creep. Wikipedia policies are not a place to enshrine "pet peeves." Our editors are capable of deciding what is important and what isn't without such detailed prescriptions. In particular, choice of specific vendor-carrier relations are an important part of business strategy in the U.S. at least, and are go far beyond mere "where to buy it" catalog significance.--agr (talk) 18:45, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
Comment: I don't know what the "instruction creep" thing was. Sounded a lot like a personal attack to me even when I have never ever seen your username before. Anyway, yes, I did mention carrier exclusivity obviously makes it worth mentioning. --uKER (talk) 19:28, 16 November 2013 (UTC)
Oppose sometimes the best way of clarifying the nature of a product is to give some indication of the pricing. It's certainly more objective than trying to use a word such as "luxury" or vague phrases. A product review is an excellent source for pricing when one is needed. it could be argued that such information is easy to find on the web--but although it may be easy now, it will not be easy in later decades, and we are writing a permanent encyclopedia. The need for giving pricing is particularly strong for non-consumer products where the information may be difficult to find., and even a less definitive source than a review would be helpful For example, I often want to include pricing in articles on journals, because it rather basic to understanding its role without knowing whether it costs $200 a year, or $20,000. DGG ( talk ) 01:25, 17 November 2013 (UTC)
Be aware: the issues about pricing are existing guidance in NOT; that's not what is being changed. Not that what you're saying is what I think is limited by NOT, as a rough idea of nominal pricing can be useful information. --MASEM (t) 05:54, 17 November 2013 (UTC)
Like Masem said, and as it was previously explained to aunva6 some posts earlier, this discussion is not about pricing issues. I think it's widely accepted that MSRP at launch is fine in the articles. This is about mentioning what US carriers distribute a certain device. --uKER (talk) 21:21, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
Comment When you say "what US carriers distribute a certain device", it sounds like you are talking about cell phones, and clearly we don't need to say what US carriers distribute a certain cell phone. But what about products like Raspberry Pi? On that page the facts that it is distributed by Newark, Farnell), Egoman, etc. is useful information. Does the proposed wording forbid that?
Comment I'd say here "useful" and "encyclopedic" don't meet. Wikipedia is not where you should look when trying to find out where to buy something. BTW, just checked the Raspberry Pi article and those are manufacturers, not distributors. No issue there. --uKER (talk) 22:36, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
Comment Speaking about Raspberry Pi, its distribution / market penetration could be attributed as being quite significant, as one of the project goals is to make the device available everywhere etc. -- Dsimic (talk) 22:43, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
If the idea is to reflect market penetration, you could add a statement like "the device has been made available in N amount of countries" or whatever. No need to say "it is sold by Costco, ToysRUs, Walmart and Target". --uKER (talk) 16:05, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
Just like with cell phones and carriers, for a physical product made by company A and sold though companies B and C, noting who makes the product is clearly appropriate, but noting whom sells the product is likely unnecessary unless the exclusivity of that product to certain retailers is an element of note. --MASEM (t) 23:10, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
Sometimes availability information is important, as in the period when the iphone was available from only a single carrier in the US. When it became available through additional one, it was important news, and even general news outlets carried it in detail. Similarly when it first became available from a pay-as-you-go distributor. DGG ( talk ) 19:10, 25 November 2013 (UTC)
That makes sense to me. Though, I'd say that's already covered by the proposed language: "... should not be included in an article unless they can be sourced and there is a justified reason for their mention..." — Dsimic (talk) 21:32, 25 November 2013 (UTC)
Essays in userspace
At one time, this page stated, "Personal essays on topics relating to Wikipedia are welcome in your user namespace or on the Meta-wiki." This sentence was removed on October 15 with the explanation "fmt, rm, org"[3] What is the current policy regarding such essays? Smell the virtue (talk) 01:08, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
AFAIA the policy and guidelines around essays has not changed and that sentence should be restored. It's possible I missed something though. Thryduulf (talk) 09:53, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
Continued from the discussion above; extracted into a separate section to gain more attention.
That was a good point, as not all "cookbook-style" content is bad by default, it's up to how such content is presented. What follows is going to be somewhat off-topic, but what about links to HOWTOs in "External links" sections? Alinoli and I touched that in a discussion on my talk page, but while I recall reading somewehere a guideline against those (and seeing such links deleted numerous times), I seem unable to find that guideline again. Any insights would be appreciated! — Dsimic (talk) 00:10, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
Given what you stated about a guideline advising against it and people deleting such links, I'm not sure about your proposal, Dsimic. Anyone else have any thoughts on Dsimic's proposal? Flyer22 (talk) 00:26, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
I'm not sure either, so I'd look at that more as a request for comments, rather than as a proposal. :) The trouble is I seem to be unable to find again that guideline explicitly advising against HOWTOs as external links; on the other side, editors are deleting such links, and I can provide examples if required. — Dsimic (talk) 00:35, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
I see no problem that HOWTO links as EL or even as references can be included as long as these are from reliable sources and meet all other normal EL type requirements. NOT@HOWTO says we shouldn't include the content, but there's no reason not to point to good HOWTOs that would help the reader learn more. --MASEM (t) 00:45, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
I agree on that, but then we should update WP:LINKSTOAVOID and WP:NOTHOWTO so inclusion of HOWTOs as external links is explicitly described as allowed – as far as they comply with other notability and content quality requirements, of course. Seems that current rules in that specific area are confusing the editors, and who knows how many good external links have been deleted due to that. :) — Dsimic (talk) 01:15, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
I'm with Dsimic, asking for comments.
I see some editors inserting links to how-to guides.
Is there a guideline or policy or even an essay that encourages such links, or are these editors mis-interpreting WP:ELYES as encouragement to link to how-to sites, because it encourages links to all kinds of "content that cannot be integrated into Wikipedia", and how-to guides are one such kind of content?
I see other editors deleting those links to how-to guides ([4]), as if there is some policy or guideline against such links.
Is there such a guideline or policy or even an essay that discourages such links, or are these editors mis-remembering the prohibition against how-to content in WP:NOTHOWTO?
Either way, if there is some other guideline or policy or essay on Wikipedia that mentions links in Wikipedia articles that lead to how-to guidelines on some other site, I think this WP:NOTHOWTO policy should directly link to it.
Well, I would expect the includion of HOWTO ELs to be based on the reliability of the source. I would not include ELs to ehow.com, for example. On the other hand, if an established professor has included a how-to with course materials, that would seem to be reasonable. --MASEM (t) 04:17, 7 January 2014 (UTC)
That sounds totally reasonable, but again, I've seen quite good HOWTOs deleted from external links. Having that in mind, I'd say that WP:LINKSTOAVOID, WP:NOTHOWTO and WP:ELYES (or only some of these three) should be expanded to explicitly describe usage of HOWTOs as external links, as it seems there's currently a confusion leading to editors allowing no HOWTOs there. I can draft a proposal, if such addition to these guidelines sounds good. Thoughts? — Dsimic (talk) 14:32, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
Good plan. It's heartening to see progress in discussion about the proper place for links to Howtos, and proper qualifications for those links, and getting various policies/guidelines/essays harmonized where possible. --Lexein (talk) 11:28, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
Thanks. Let's try to get more opinions before we dive into changing the actual guidelines, as such changes require detailed discussion and a clear consensus to be reached first. — Dsimic (talk) 15:02, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
Not sure what we're waiting on. What should I do "to get more opinions"? Honestly, I'm a little surprised that we haven't yet found a policy or guideline that forbids such links, and I'm starting to suspect there isn't one.
Perhaps we could add an extra sentence for clarification -- at the end of the "Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, textbook, or scientific journal" section -- that says something like
WP: reliable sources that happen to be scientific journals, textbooks, instruction manuals, etc. often make excellent citations in support of WP: verifiability, and sometimes make good external links in support of WP: notability.
Basically, any changes to Wikipedia guidelines require a broader consensus, meaning that a broader editing audience is supposed to discuss them first. Otherwise, such changes are getting reverted quickly, leading to "only a small group of editors was deciding on that" conclusions etc.
Everything looks like a clear case for extending the guideline in a way you drafted it, but let's try first to attract more editors here by placing an RFC tag, if you agree. — Dsimic (talk) 22:18, 17 January 2014 (UTC)
I can't see any compelling reason to altogether prohibit the inclusion, in the external links section of an article, of a link to a "how to" guide that is a reliable source. James500 (talk) 00:17, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
Question: How is an editor with no particular subject expertise supposed to determine whether a how-to is good, bad, or even dangerous? "Now children, place your uranium hexifluoride into your high-speed centrifuge..." --Guy Macon (talk) 00:51, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
You start with asking if the external HOWTO is considered a reliable source for the subject matter. --MASEM (t) 00:57, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
Reply to Guy Macon: :Editors should have sufficient subject expertise. Competence should be required. As for links to things that are dangerous, isn't that covered by the general disclaimer? And how is it worse than allowing incompetent editors to write wrong information in articles in the first place because they can't distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources? James500 (talk) 01:07, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
@Guy Macon: Well, if an editor can't see the difference between bad and good HOWTOs for an article, then he/she also can't see the difference between good and bad sources/references; thus, such an editor—sorry, but—can't edit that particular article (WP:CIR in effect). As simple as that; for example, I wouldn't touch rocket surgery articles (especially not the HOWTOs), as I have no clue about that matter. — Dsimic (talk) 01:39, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
This user just deleted something important in an “in a blunt world such details are not needed”-style. May an admin undo the vandalism and block this user? Thank you. --MathLine (talk) 10:52, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
Please read WP:BRD, to which I referred you in my note on your talk page explaining my edit. You made a BOLD change; I reverted it, and invited you to propose it on this talk page, because I think such a change to this important policy needs to be discussed to establish that there is a consensus for it. That is not vandalism. JohnCD (talk) 11:33, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
@MathLine: Yeah, that wasn't a vandalism. Just as JohnCD described, almost all changes to these policies require previous discussion on relevant talk pages. Regarding your edit to this policy, I agree that such a line probably should be added to address various algorithms and pseudo-code examples, but there's no need for restricting it to a certain class of algorithms; however, that requires discussion first, and can be added only if a consensus is reached. — Dsimic (talk) 21:00, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
Isn't the "various algorithms and pseudo-code examples" aspect already covered by the "Describing to the reader how people or things use or do something is encyclopedic; instructing the reader in the imperative mood about how to use or do something is not." line?
That should pretty much cover it, though a longer chunk of pseudo-code (or a longer algorithm description) could be interpreted by someone as instructing the readers in an imperative mood. However, adding more language to address that specific thing is bordering with having too detailed rules. — Dsimic (talk) 23:04, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
Although I pretty much agree with all of the above, I am going to play Devil's Advocate here for a moment. Consider the question "will running a microwave oven damage it?" Now I happen to know the answer to this is no, having designed microwave ovens in the past. I sometimes hear claims that the very early Amanna RadarRanges were somehow different and could be damaged by running empty, but I do not buy it. The first home Radarange was released in 1967, a bunch of them are still working, and nowhere can I find instruction on how to repair the claimed damage. Ii is hard to believe that more than a tiny percentage of them have never been run empty in nearly 50 years of service.
Ah, but what do (some) reliable(?) sources say?
Help, It's Broken!: A Fix-It Bible for the Repair Impaired says "Never test an empty microwave, or you might damage the magnetron..."[5]
One Research Engineer claims "In fact, the empty chamber of a microwave oven is very much like the secondary coil of a Tesla Coil. The only major difference is the operating frequency. RF energy is injected into the resonator, and the output voltage rises and rises until finally the conductors get hot (or until finally an electric arc breaks out somewhere.) Tesla coil secondaries do this. Microwave ovens do this too. With nothing in the oven chamber, either the metal walls and glass parts get very hot..."[6] Of course if you actually try it the walls and glass stay cool (clean the interior first; a few crumbs are enough the cause a burning smell).
The Complete Household Handbook: The Best Ways to Clean, Maintain & Organize Your Home from the Good Housekeeping Institute says "Never operate an empty microwave — you can damage it."[7]
This page from Purdue University says "Never operate an empty microwave. If you want to practice using it, place a cup of water inside to absorb the microwave energy."[8]
Plus of course I can dig up dozens of user manuals that say the same thing.
BTW, I can answer all of the above myself (Devil's Advocate, remember?); those really aren't reliable sources for the question we are asking. Manufacturers instructions tell fibs ("100% cotton; hand-wash only, do not bleach. Do not dry clean." "Contents: one soccer ball. WARNING: Choking Hazard") and people are predisposed to pass on warnings that are actually urban myths; see http://www.snopes.com/info/top25uls.asp for many examples. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:36, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
Hmmm... While heading into that direction, how can we be sure we're all not inside the Matrix? Any red pills around? — Dsimic (talk) 04:28, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
There are various arguments for and against spread over all these deletion discussions, so it would be better to have a centralized discussion here. I think that a list that includes every event held at a particular place is indiscriminate in the same vain as a "summary-only description" or "excessive listing" as mentioned at WP:INDISCRIMINATE. While these lists are specific in scope, the individual entries often have no relation to each other, and constitute therefore an indiscriminate collection of data. "Merely being true, or even verifiable, does not automatically make something suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia." If the WP community agrees to allow these lists, then there will be a list of events for every arena, stadium, club, venue, park, and plaza in the world (for which there is an article). That is definitely indiscriminate info! BTW, an exception would be list of events that are limited to only notable events (like Events at Madison Square Garden). -- P 1 9 9✉02:13, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
Strongly agree that such lists are not notable. they are just sprawling. all large entertainment venues hold concerts, all large stadiums hold various professional and international sporting events. these just become sprawling lists of the 10s of 1000s such venues in the world. LibStar (talk) 02:58, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
Agree such lists are inappropriate. The reverse sorting, that is if one has a notable event that tours (like certain rock shows, etc.) a list of places it was it is reasonable, but that's because we're starting that the event is notable and most locations of most of these events are notable by default. The reverse, all events held at notable locations, doesnt make all the events notable. --MASEM (t) 05:20, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
well said by Masem. A list of Coldplay tours makes much more sense. Also some stadiums have annual recurring major sporting events like finals, this would constantly be added to a list of events. LibStar (talk) 05:25, 9 January 2014 (UTC)
Agree that such lists should be removed, or at least severely restricted. National-level events, such as a Republican or Democratic National Convention, international-level events such as a World Cup final, and major historical events like the Ibrox collapse would qualify as a sufficiently-discriminated list, but every concert tour and annual football match does not need coverage. --Eggishorn(talk)(contrib)00:08, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
If I wanted to research the history of a notable venue (lets say, after is closes or is destroyed or even when active), would not such a list be very useful? Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:24, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
Strongly oppose any attempt to put a spin on INDISCRIMINATE, or to blatantly twist its wording. These lists are not summaries of works and they are not collections of statistics. Whether they are suitable has absolutely nothing to do with INDISCRIMINATE. The relevant guideline is likely to be LISTN. James500 (talk) 04:20, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
These types of lists overlap with several parts of NOT and clearly are indiscriminate if every event that occurs at a notable area is listed. This would include thing like RV, home and car shows, which certainly are not notable and would be akin to historical program listings for broadcast stations. --MASEM (t) 04:27, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
They might overlap with parts of NOT, but INDISCRIMINATE isn't one of them. I suggest you either identify the other criteria you have in mind or propose a new criteria. James500 (talk) 05:13, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
Your strong objections are rooted in preferring process to product. You say you object to "twisting" a guideline when it really doesn't matter. There isn't (or shouldn't) be a reliance on precedent and stare decisis in AfD discussions. In other words, it is more important to talk about whether these lists belong than to debate what sub-clause of which guideline covers the situation correctly. So the question: "Are these lists suitable?" is a more informative and productive one to answer than: "What is the policy that exactly fits the suitability of these lists?"--Eggishorn(talk)(contrib)05:52, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
No, my objections are based on a perception that any inventive interpretation of INDISCRIMINATE could rapidly snowball into "X is indiscriminate because I don't like it". James500 (talk) 06:13, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
I see, but that is not what your original objection said. That said, the exact same objection applies to all AfD discussions that cite anything less than exactly-quoted policy. Is there a reason you think these lists should be retained in the encyclopedia? Do you think they add to anything other than the byte count? --Eggishorn(talk)(contrib)06:20, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
No one is citing "we don't like these type of lists" as a reason to include this here. Most arenas and venues are notable, but not all events are notable, and ergo, listing out every event at every venue is indiscriminate. --MASEM (t) 06:36, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
As "WP:indiscriminate" means "there is no easy way to assess whether an item belongs to the topic or not", your ergo doesn't follow. We do include non-notable details in Wikipedia if they are relevant to the topic; and we do exclude things that are notable; so WP:NOT has nothing to do with notability. The reason we list things in WP:NOT, so that we avoid keeping them, is because we think doing that is better for the project. So, what are the purported benefits of excluding lists like this? All I see are complaints that it would violate this or that unrelated guideline; but those are not valid reasons to exclude content. What is it that you see as an improvement when deleting such content? Diego (talk) 17:50, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
For the average reader, the fact that event X was held at an arena on a specific date is unlikely to be of any future value - there are exceptional cases for certain, but the majority of the event occurrences have very little future relevance akin to while we don't keep old programming guides for TV and radio stations and thus keeping this data for purposes of having this data on en.wiki is pointless (However if one wants to build out the full schedules, this is prime data for wikisource to hold) However, when events are notable or significant, keeping those in a paragraph or two or in a list (depending on how many) does help to give the reader of the type of events that the venue has drawn, and thus much more tertiary and appropriate for WP. Notability is importance to make sure these lists which can be indiscriminate, are not presented as such, and that is used all the time across WP to meet WP:NOT's indiscriminate guidance. --MASEM (t) 18:02, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
This talk page is not an AfD debate. It is a forum for proposing changes to the wording of WP:NOT. So, what changes, if any, are proposed? James500 (talk) 06:43, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
I would suggest that we discuss changing the policy to do one of two things, without preconceptions about which way the decision will go: we need to either explicitly indicate that articles of this sort are acceptable for major facilities, or explicitly say they are not permitted. This is the matter we need to discuss, not where to put the guideline or policy. INDISCRIMINATE is not a good fit for this one way or another in its present form. Personally, I fell they ought to be included, but it does need to be discussed , and for us to have a community decision. This is what the actual question is. We sometimes decide these things by accumulating afd conclusions, but the amount of work involved in this sort of articles is sufficiently great that people should have a guideline to rely on. DGG ( talk ) 20:19, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
Well put, DGG. Maybe my original comments here were not clear enough. I didn't start this to have an AfD discussion but to propose to amend WP:NOT to include (all-inclusive) lists of events. -- P 1 9 9✉03:10, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
We could as well expand WP:NOT to include "Wikipedia is not useful", now that we are at it. I can't think of a reason why these lists should be removed once they have been written if they are accurate, and the proposal doesn't provide any; it's worded as a Just does not belong without any reason supporting the deletion, other than the widespread dislike of tabulated information that plagues Wikipedia (the dislike, not the content).
WP:NOT was created to avoid the project become everything2 or DMOZ. But these are not your regular "list of all ISP providers in Indiana". The lists are finite, relatively short and with a clear inclusion criterion, so they don't match in any way what INDISCRIMINATE is about.
The proposal, and those supporting it, should try to explain what benefit they want to achieve for excluding these lists from the project. If it's only for cleanup, I shall remember that Wikipedia is not paper is also part of WP:NOT, and perfection is not required. There are many ways to handle low-to-average quality content; but hiding it under a red link is the least indicated, as it prevents any possible improvement. Diego (talk) 07:35, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
I have a convention center near me. The center is notable by WP standards (there's history to its design, construction, impact, etc.) but its also a "small" venue in the sense that it is off the beaten path when it comes to various shows and the like. As such, it typically has 2-3 "events" per week, some of these are famous bands/musicians on tour (roughly once or twice a month), but these are non-notable non-named tours, the other events typically are things like RV/Home/Auto shows (venues for commercial marketing) or regional "common interest" shows (classic car meetings, etc.) Of the 100-some events per year this place has done for the last 15 years, maybe 1 or 2 a year could be even considered notable. A listing of these events would clearly be completely indiscriminate since most of the events would not even have links; it becomes a historic program schedule with no merits on its own. I realize that other much larger venues don't have the same issue but if you only did it for your Madison Square Gardens, that would be a systematic bias. It is much better to stay that for notable touring events (like major music artist tours) that listing what venues they performed at would be more useful since this allows the reader to judge the geographic appearances and the relative nature of the venues. Note that in articles on venues that if there were any major events that significantly involved the venue or by which the venue itself became famous for (such as a musician later putting out a retail CD of their live performance at that venue) , that's something to include in prose on the event article, but all the nitty gritty event lists fails WP:NOT. --MASEM (t) 14:54, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
Also to note: it would not be an issue if such lists (events by venue) were strictly limited to only blue-linked notable events which by definition makes these discriminate lists; the problem I see with that immediately is that you will get editors that favor certain shows/artists will try to justify including an appearance by that even if the show isn't notable (big musicians do often tour without making a major "tour" event), and so there would be infighting to keep such. As some of the AFDs listed have pointed out, retaining the most notable shows as examples of what the venue hosts seems appropriate. --MASEM (t) 15:01, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
If there's nothing to say about the events being held at the venue, like in your small convention center example, when taking its events as a group the list will fail notability, which in Wikipedia means "having something worthwhile to write about the topic"; also there probably would not be any reliable information from third parties. In such case, I see no reason to expand NOT to cover that case that is already excluded. But this proposal is akin to saying "even if there is ample coverage of each event held at the venue, as is the case for major concert halls and stadiums where each event has been announced in the press and even got some reviews, the list should be deleted from Wikipedia as "not encyclopedic". I honestly can't see how doing that would provide any benefit for the project. Diego (talk) 17:42, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
If you only do it for "major arenas" (which I do agree will have more coverage of their events but in a primary manner, reporting that the event is going/has happened), you are creating a systematic bias. You either have to allow these lists for all arenas or for none. And this creates the problem of what happens for minor but notable arenas. Hence why it is better to better to place discriminate limits on the lists or simply summarize the types of events the arenas hold than to catalog every single event. --MASEM (t) 18:02, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
The only bias would be that found in reliable sources as "minor arenas" would have less coverage - which is not a problem that should concern us, as we are expected to cover topics in proportion to their relative coverage. Again, I fail to see why including that exceptional case of a minor arena with ample coverage in RSs should be considered a problem, or why it would require that we remove all lists for major and minor arenas as a measure of "fairness". Diego (talk) 22:56, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
How would you propose to separate major and minor arenas, then? There's no bright line, and as such, you're implicitly creating systematic bias - that's a textbook case of it. It's better to simply avoiding having these full lists for any type of notable arena and keep the events listed to those that are considered notable, taking the bias out of the question entirely. --MASEM (t) 23:01, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
But you wouldn't do it for "major arenas" only, you would do it for "arenas with significant coverage in the media". Since when is it bias to follow the sources? Diego (talk) 06:38, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
Small arenas get coverage in third-party sources all the time (the local newspaper), even if it is reporting that the local knitting chapter is getting together for an event there (as an example). This metric doesn't limit what arenas would be covered. --MASEM (t) 06:44, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
Strong oppose These are eminently discriminate lists -I don't know what Masem thinks the word "indiscriminate" means but there are extremly clear, objective criteria that allow inclusion of events in the lists, and each entry is, for most notable venius, most likely sourceable from and verifiable from multiple RS. The arguments against the lists are only thinly veiled variants of the circular WP:UNENCYC/WP:IDONTLIKEIT arguments. If we want to amend/create some guideline on what could or could not be included on the lists, fine, but this has nothing to do with WP:NOT. --cyclopiaspeak!15:03, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
Indiscriminate works a couple different ways. The way that comes into play here is that, while the inclusion metric itself may be discriminating, it can be capable of generating a list that is excessively large and without much offpage linkage, making it numerically indiscriminate (you're providing a boatload of details for the reader to take in but without much care as why they need to know.) As I've suggested, a list of notable events in a notable arena would be better since now every entry will have linkage that one can learn more (and this is comparable to how universally "List of people from X" are limited to blue-linked names), but not every event in such places. --MASEM (t) 15:22, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
If your only issue is with non-notable events then, as already suggested above, it's all about creating a proper guideline on what to include in such lists. You're welcome to do so and I could even mostly agree with you, but such a guideline has nothing to do with extending WP:NOT. Also, pondering "why they need to know" is not our job. Our job is to report and condense verifiable, reliable information about notable topics. The list of events that took place in a notable venue is an example of such information. --cyclopiaspeak!15:44, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
Basically, if one considers that the list of events in a venue is one step away from radio programming (#4 under WP:NOTDIR), then what is being suggested already fits there ("mention of major events, promotions or historically significant program lists and schedules may be acceptable.") #4 would just need to be modified to include venue in addition to radio/television stations. --MASEM (t) 16:04, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
Oppose Instruction creep in basic universal policy is far from helpful; turning this policy into a ridiculously long list, just to, for example, impose governance on the extremely few articles that are 'lists of events at notable venues' is bad policy practice. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:51, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
Oppose start an RfC if you wish, but this is clearly the wrong place for it. This belongs as a list inclusion question and has nothing to do with NOT. Hobit (talk) 01:11, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
Masem, I hope you'll understand that I simply disagree with that. A) I don't think it's indiscriminate and B) I don't think WP:NOT is the right place to address this. We have entire guidelines on lists and that's the place for this. It's otherwise way too specific for a high-level policy like this. So even if I granted you that it is indiscriminate (and I understand why you think that) this is, IMO, the wrong place for it to be. Hobit (talk) 15:33, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
Again, a historical listing of events at a given venue is comparable to historical programming guides, which are listed here. Thus it is applies at WP:NOT. When it comes to saying "list of notable events at a venue" (which is comparable to historical notable program schedules as given in NOT), I agree that is where list guidance comes into play to determinte hot notability/sourcing interact to put discriminating limits on the list. But WP:NOT already has language that is only one step away from saying that a full list of all events at a venue is inappropriate. --MASEM (t) 15:46, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
Strongly support and not because of "indiscriminate"; but because they fail the purpose test. These are exactly the type of non-encyclopaedic list that the guidelines were drafted to avoid. Having some notable events or names in a list does not make the list notable. Having chunks of non-notable events serves neither the informational, the navigational nor the developmental purposes of lists. See Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lists#Purposes of lists. And just because a person or band is notable does not make their every appearance notable. Notability is not transferred. Notable events for venues are listed in their articles, if a venue is so famous that the list of independently notable events there needs to be spun off, that is fine. However, that is not what these lists are. --Bejnar (talk) 04:29, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
There is clearly no consensus on this, in fact, probably more opposition than support. So I'll move to close the discussion. But this will leave WP open to every list of events for every arena, stadium, club, venue, park, and plaza in the world, and even aggregate lists. If List of events at Tele2 Arena is acceptable, then as per the reasoning used in this discussion, so is List of events at Stockholm Globe City, List of events in Stockholm, and even List of events in Sweden. Without clear guidelines, we will continue to nominate articles for deletion on an individual basis. -- P 1 9 9✉18:09, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
I will point out again that technically, such lists are already covered under NOTDIR "Directories, directory entries, electronic program guide, or a resource for conducting business. For example, an article on a radio station should not list upcoming events, current promotions, current schedules, etc., although mention of major events, promotions or historically significant program lists and schedules may be acceptable". As I've said, if the lists are limited to notable events at a location, that's reasonable, but a list without any further discrimination is not. Thus this advice is already there. The one list in the AFD list above that was kept is one that does employ the proper discrimination on what to include, I believe. --MASEM (t) 18:21, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
EVENT's not the right place, that's a notability guideline. LIST is not the right place, as that's too broad. Again, we have the language already in NOT regarding Directories, etc. It simply doesn't include the explicit language of events at venues, but this is not a massive leap from the "current schedules of radio stations". --MASEM (t) 23:56, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I totally agree with you, Masem, that's why I held the discussion here. But whether the discussion is held here or on other talk pages, is ultimately irrelevant: there clearly is no consensus, even in the interpretation of WP:NOT. So I see no purpose to pursue this discussion or opening a new one elsewhere. Like I said above, we'll need to nominate pages for deletion on an individual basis. Thanks for your support. -- P 1 9 9✉15:19, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
A summary sentence for "original thought"
The bullet points for "WP is not a publisher of original thought" might be summarized in an analogy, added as a summary sentence for the "No original thoughts" idea:
“
The policy "no original thought" is analogous to the use of Wikipedia:Alternative text for images. A browser that provides no visible image can yet convey an editor's description of that image. Editing Wikipedia article content is a translation service.
”
The image is the verifiable, reliable, authoritative, published information. The alt= field is the article's idealized content, a definitive description, the editors choice of words.
Any picture contains endless amounts of descriptions but is worth, say 7000 words, for an application. The strength of the analogy is in the obviousness of the contents of the image verses what may be said, dishonestly outside of, or with bias inside of, those brute, graphic facts. The weakness is that it tempts takes on subjects off topic from the summary it intends to make. The endlessness touches upon notability and due weight and neutrality. Worth touches upon article size and style.
But to leave "No original thought!" hanging there without some kind of summary, some kind of support, seems dismissive of the fact that "there are no rules", and of the fact that the idea "no original thought" sounds, and sometimes is, practically absurd on the surface of things. The alt= field too, like WP:NOR, is forgotten, left unused, hidden and perhaps abused because misunderstood. The idea "no original thought" is misinterpreted at times as a straightjacket, and at time it is, but its true value, one of selfless service of translation for the sake of the reader, is very close to alt text for images. — CpiralCpiral19:55, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
Are you trying to say that WP:NOTORIGINALTHOUGHT should indicate in express words that it does not prohibit the inclusion of an original description of an image in the alternative text field for that image, provided that the description is obviously correct, on grounds that such a description is analogous to translating a foreign language source into English (something that is presently allowed)? James500 (talk) 06:32, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
Well, yes, if I get your meaning. But it's not expressly, but by subtle analogy; not alt text, but article content; a foreign language? Yes, if you could be referring to text (literary theory), where "text" could be buildings on a street. I specified the pronoun in the proposed summary, now "Editing Wikipedia is a translation service." Perhaps my expectations of our audience are too great? Too little? — CpiralCpiral09:11, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
There is a minimal amount of original thought that is needed to properly summarize other sources, there's no question - how to paraphrase, how to judge which viewpoints to cover, the ordering of information, etc. This is similar to the alt text analogy - knowing how to describe an image without introducing interpretation. A good editor knows where that line of minimal OR and original though extends to and where we expect the editor to use sources to back up all other claims, but I don't think the alt text analogy goes into this area as you suggest, at least based on what our alt text guidelines say. --MASEM (t) 07:06, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
I'm glad you see my point, but "our alt text guideline"? I got mine from Help:Files. I still see a niche here in exactly that spot, in this area, for us, so I hope you'll reconsider... perhaps reword the proposed summary. Could there possibly be something to take away from WP:NOTORIGINALTHOUGHT, a kind of summary containing a type of single reason, in this case, being in the form of an analogy that might be easy for even a new and rebellious editor to take to heart? — CpiralCpiral09:11, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
The alt text guideline is at WP:ALT. And that's clear that we avoid "original research" that otherwise isn't related to the summarizing of sources. --MASEM (t) 15:31, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
Prohibition of all speculation
DJ Sasso reverted a clarification claiming that the distinction is clear. Unfortunately that's not what a dictionary says; googling "speculation" returns "the forming of a theory or conjecture without firm evidence" as the first result. Someone not using his real name (talk) 22:08, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
The section in question is specifically related to speculations and rumors about new products. So scientific theories are safe. Unfortunately the word "speculation has many more meanings, and the one you cited is not for the context we discuss ("speculations about a product"). (And I am sure you don't want to apply this policy to the word "speculation" in the meaning "risky business in expectation of high gain" :-) Staszek Lem (talk) 22:51, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
In that case, the last sentence should be incorporated in the previous ones. It certainly gives me the impression to want to expand the scope of the prohibition beyond product announcements, particularly because "and rumours" in the bolded part isn't clearly subordinated to product announcements.
“
Wikipedia is not a collection of product announcements and rumors. Although Wikipedia includes up-to-date knowledge about newly revealed products, short articles that consist only of product announcement information are not appropriate. Until such time that more encyclopedic knowledge about the product can be verified, product announcements should be merged to a larger topic (such as an article about the creator(s), a series of products, or a previous product) if applicable. Speculation and rumor, even from reliable sources, are not appropriate encyclopedic content.
”
Highlighted above the problematic sentence. I suggest instead:
“
Wikipedia is not a collection of product announcements and rumors about them. Although Wikipedia includes up-to-date knowledge about newly revealed products, it must not contain articles that consist mainly of announcement information about upcoming products coupled with pundits' speculation about possible features. Until such time that more encyclopedic knowledge about the product can be verified, product announcements should be merged to a larger topic (such as an article about the creator(s), a series of products, or a previous product) if applicable.
”
I've changed "are not appropriate" to "it must not contain" because the terminal clause was getting to hard to parse with the context addition. I've also removed "short" because one can certainly find upcoming products for which the rumor mill has produced a substantial amount of speculation, but that fact alone doesn't seem to make them more desirable here. Someone not using his real name (talk) 23:32, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I have to disagree with the hard change. I've actually seen fair discussion and inclusion of what expert analysts say might happen in a few months to years down the road for various things, and in most cases, the distinction from fact to "Speculation" is made by saying "Analysis John Q Smith stated that by...", particularly if the analysis is something other sources have tagged as well. Mind you, when and where to include this varies, and there's no hard fast rule when it applies or not, but I think we have to be careful with outright making such forbidden. --MASEM (t) 23:54, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
If the intent of that sentence is to prohibit all (even reliably sourced) speculation about anything (rather than just about upcoming products) then quantum gravity and quite a few other articles would be out of Wikipedia's scope, which is clearly not desirable. Someone not using his real name (talk) 23:58, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I realize that the start of the sentence goes "..it must not contain articles that consist mainly..." but I will tell you that will be read "speculation is never allowed". If anything, to be consistent with all of our other policies which are descriptive, the "must" should be a "should", so that it isn't a hardline to remove anything speculative but clearly point out that too much speculation is bad. --MASEM (t) 00:17, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
I disagree with the change in wording, I don't think WP should cater to any rumors. But that said, this could be very tricky because certain rumors can get very notable if repeated enough (especially in the media). If notorious rumors are included in an article, they need to be clearly identified as such. As for speculation (in the sense of "ideas or guesses about something that is not known" - Merriam-Webster), almost all of it has no place in WP, not just products, but often it can be removed applying WP:NOTCRYSTALBALL or WP:OR. On the other hand, I do agree with the position that scientific hypothesis is not the same as speculation, and is therefore definitely suitable for WP. -- P 1 9 9✉15:38, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
Except your (and other Wikipedians') clear-cut distinction between speculation and scientific hypothesis isn't supported in the real world (i.e. by reliable sources). Quote from [9] "many researchers who study the nature of scientific knowledge have found that the word hypothesis can take on at least six different meanings in science, ranging from a well-informed speculation to a somewhat informed speculation to purely guessing." This broad WP:CRYSTAL wording allows any wikipediot with an agenda to delete conjectural material he doesn't like, even when well sourced. One can delete the Church-Turing thesis under the current wording of WP:CRYSTAL as just (well-informed) speculation. Someone not using his real name (talk) 15:56, 28 January 2014 (UTC)
Please clarify WP:IINFO, perhaps with more/better examples, so it is a more useful guideline. Is it WP:IINFO sufficient grounds to delete a list of every known object in the universe? What about a List of dogs killed by coyotes? It spells out lyrics databases and such, that is helpful, but it could be much more helpful as to what makes a list indiscriminate. How about, List of elementary schools in Canada, would that be covered or not? Chrisrus (talk) 07:01, 28 January 2014 (UTC)
It is impossible for WP:NOT, in any particular section like IINFO or otherwise, to list all the cases that are considered inappropriate under that. That is, NOT is not fully inclusive of what types of things WP should not be. Instead, editors are expected to judge from the casebook examples given - these being cases reviewed and judged in the past - and how that applies to specific lists and articles, via consensus discussion. So the state of "list of elementary schools in canada", that's probably indiscriminate since 1) elementary schools are not considered notable/always appropriate for stand-alone articles in the first place and 2) this would be better served by categories for the fraction of elementary schools that are notable. --MASEM (t) 07:05, 28 January 2014 (UTC)
You are absolutely right when you said "It is impossible......should not be." Rest assured this is understood.
The point is to clarify the meaning of IINFO.
That's very good: you've taken an example, List of elementary schools in Canada, to illustrate the point IINFO makes: when the items are not themselves notable, famous, important, or of interest to experts, that kind of thing is not suitable. Let's add what you've written here, from "...probably indiscriminate since....notable". That would be helpful. IINFO isn't as clear as you've been here as to its main point. Guidelines should have clear points. Chrisrus (talk) 07:28, 28 January 2014 (UTC)
That's why we have things like WP:SAL and WP:LISTN that give more detailed advice applied to list-type articles. I don't think we can list that here. Note that a list of schools is more like a directory, and up there, we have the link to WP:SAL for more advice. Basically, we have lots of advice around WP about what is indiscriminate, beyond here, but it is inappropriate to spell that all out in here. --MASEM (t) 07:31, 28 January 2014 (UTC)
There is absolutely nothing wrong with the list of minor planets (which I assume is what the expression "LOMP" in the heading of this section refers to). It is an excellent and eminently useful list of exceptionally important objects. It is one of the most important lists that we have. We should get it up to featured list status and put it on the main page.
INDISCRIMINATE has no application to the type of lists to which Chrisrus refers. It is a narrowly worded policy that applies to four or five specific situations. James500 (talk) 08:54, 28 January 2014 (UTC)
There is no consensus that anything other than the examples given fall within INDISCRIMINATE. The opening paragraph does not say any such thing. It does not say that the examples given are not exhaustive. James500 (talk) 00:59, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
List of minor planetsdoes fail IINFO. There's no discrimination in copying the JPL database to WP format for a list exceeding 100,000+ items, when 90% of the planets on the list are not notable. The information is verifable but not a summary of the topic. It would be akin to listing every verified person living in New York City in List of people from New York City. List of notable minor planets is much more appropriate for a list. --MASEM (t) 16:02, 28 January 2014 (UTC)
The list of minor planets is clearly discriminate. The quantity of numbered minor planets is smaller than the number of people in New York by an order of magnitude and much smaller than the number of people in the world (which would be the correct comparison). Plus which, human beings don't last for billions of years and are not typically the size of Mount Everest. So there is no comparison. James500 (talk) 00:59, 29 January 2014 (UTC) And a list of people from New York would be covered by NOTGENEALOGY (ie we don't reproduce the register of births, but it is a specific prohibition). James500 (talk) 01:16, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
Yes, it is indiscriminate, for Wikipedia. It pretty much wikified raw data, and that's not the purpose we serve. That's what you can do on Wikisource (where raw, verified data can be put) and leaving the more notable planets to the List of notable minor planets. --MASEM (t) 01:46, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
I am under the impression that in this case "raw data" would mean the various measurements taken with the telescope which then have to be processed in some way to determine that the thing observed is a minor planet and not something else (or several something elses). I am not sure that the JPL database qualifies for wikisource. If they update the entries it might be disallowed as an evolving work (although I suppose you could argue that the new version was a new work). I was under the impression that wikisource is for whole published works, not raw data. James500 (talk) 04:24, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
Adding about new unannounced trains
With reference to the edits at Thoothukudi railway station and Aruppukkottai railway station, i was removing some contents like "Demand for new trains, Extension of trains, etc.," on the basis of WP:NOTTIMETABLE, WP:NOTGUIDE and WP:CRYSTAL. These kind of information is present in quite a lot of articles related to transport of India articles particulary Indian Railways the most, since almost every city/town has its own demand of introduction of new trains/buses or construction of new lines, these are either speculative and unconfirmed. Those demands may or may not happen or even keep lingering for a indefinite period of time. Hence a concrete decision can be made on adding/removal of such informations in future. --βα£α(ᶀᶅᶖᵵᵶ) 03:11, 9 February 2014 (UTC)
An article on a movie before release.
Writing an article on a movie before its release is not a WP:promotion on Wikipedia? Their either should be some notability guideline beside press release/conference or reprint of press release/conference by some other sources or they should not have a place on Wikipedia until they receive substantial coverage. There are tons of article out there and increasing. See Category:Upcoming films. I recently {{prod}} such an article Kamisama no Karute 2 and the {{prod}} tag was removed by the creator of the article quoting, articles on upcoming films are allowed if they have started production. Really? Should not it be included somewhere into WP:Promotion section? Actually I'm all confused with Wikipedia policy and guidelines. Enlighten me, someone please. AnupMehra✈20:02, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
If all the movie article is sourced to is press releases and primary data like cast and release date, that would fail the general notability guideline and should be deleted. I do know that the film project guidelines say that about upcoming films as the start of production removes the issue of WP:CRYSTAL, but there still need to be proper sources for the film. --MASEM (t) 20:21, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
Not all but almost movies specially upcoming movies articles are supported by the press release/conference sources and reprint of the same. What is interesting is that, maximum number of these are created by established users. I wonder if this is exactly what WP:ENC is all about. I'm interested to know why it could not be included somewhere in the WP:NOT or WP:Notability_(films) page. I'm not sure if I'm at the right place to discuss this. AnupMehra✈09:09, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Articles on in-production movies are certainly not inherently promotional, any more than coverage of any kind of entertainment product is. While I share a concern about basing articles only on press releases, the question I have is whether your concern is primarily about accuracy, or about establishing notability. If you are concerned about accuracy, I find myself less than convinced that this is a pressing matter - a press release is unlikely to contain factually dubious information. If, on the other hand, you are concerned about the notability of in-production films, then I think this discussion could be productive - press releases almost assuredly will fudge the importance of a production. VanIsaacWSVexcontribs13:49, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
I'm concerned about notability of the subjects being flooded these days on Wikipedia. Do they really build Wikipedia as Encyclopedia? It is general that all movies about to release are informed to public through press releases/conferences and are covered by the various other media sources by reprint of the same. Almost all media sources (online or offline) have their own section on Entertainment, and they do there regularly update to inform readers about movies, artists, upcoming movies, etc. Should they be considered as secondary, independent, reliable sources? Are these articles really in accordance with WP:42? As WP:NF says, Press releases, even if they are reprinted by sources unrelated to the production, are not considered independent. In my personal opinion, only films which has been the subject of discussion among various sources even after release date and are recipient of well recognized award/prizes should only be included and rest should be discarded as WP:NOT. Upcoming movies are subject of discussion in the media houses till they do not get released in theaters and partially proportional to the sum of money a production house spend on advertisement/promotion. By writing articles on them, is not Wikipedia doing the same, WP:Promotion? None of the media sources discuss the movie after one week of release except earnings. I'm curious, What Wikipedia is going to be within next 5 years? An another IMDb? AnupMehra✈14:47, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
"Independent" is the key word to judge promotion, and for that purpose, sites like Variety and Hollywood Report are "independent" from any of the movie production studios as to not consider promotional. On the other hand, if, say, Fox News (which up the chain is owned by 21st Century Fox) has a significant story about a upcoming movie by 21st Century Fox, there is the question how independent they are and that would likely be considered promotional. --MASEM (t) 14:52, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
WP:Notability (films) says, Press releases, even if they are reprinted by sources unrelated to the production, are not considered independent. Hence neither Variety nor Hollywood or any other source reprinting the press release/conferences should be considered independent. The key point is, it is obvious that every movie would be covered by media houses before release. So, this is the reason Wikipedia should have an article on them. My question is, Is not Wikipedia acting like a media house? LA Times says, ABCD is a good movie. We do write, ABCD is considered/rated a good movie by LA Times.<ref>LA Times</ref> Do anybody see a difference? At least I do not. AnupMehra✈15:01, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
If Variety (for example) reprints a press release, then no, that press release is still not independent. But if Variety focuses a story on an upcoming, as-yet unreleased movie, then yes, that is independent. Resolute15:05, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Having Wikipedia articles about upcoming films is not promotional. Such articles need to be based on secondary sources per the general notability guidelines. In addition, they need to be written per Wikipedia's NPOV policy, so to this end, we would avoid puffery and report only basic information of interest, which would be the cast and crew and production details. We explicitly avoid statements like the director saying, "You're in for a treat!" In addition, the guideline about press releases is misconstrued. What does not count is if the press release is reprinted word for word somewhere else. If Variety reports on an upcoming film and bases its information on the press release from the studio, then that is appropriate. It shows that an independent source considers the film notable for reporting. The reprint guideline is based on a lack of assertion that there is any importance outside of what the studio says. Some films barely get any coverage until they are released, while other films will have a lot of coverage leading up to the release. Films with little coverage should be simple in content, and films with much coverage should be well-detailed. Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me)15:49, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Hello @Erik: Correct me if I am getting it wrong. Taking into consideration your comment, should Wikipedia have an article on every single movie that have earlier been released (before foundation of Wikipedia) and all which are about to release? Because I do not know a single movie(more fluently about Indian films) which does not have coverage at least 3 times in a single newspaper. So, 10 different national/local newspapers/magazines publish review of the movie, and this is exactly what automatically makes it notable as per WP:GNG? I guess, WP:FN needs a revision. AnupMehra✈17:10, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Local papers are not sufficient for considering coverage. We would expect reviews from publications that are designed to meet a regional/national (or larger) audience to be more appropriate, while those only sourced to local sources to be inappropriate. --MASEM (t) 17:20, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
@Anupmehra: There is an entire universe of released films that do not warrant articles on Wikipedia. They tend to be direct-to-video in nature and obscure in the context of secondary sources' coverage about film. They often come up at AfD, usually because filmmakers try to have an article on Wikipedia, even though there is zero or barely any secondary coverage. I cannot comment much about Indian films since I am not familiar with which Indian sources are reliable or not. Wikipedia does not include films here because it was well-known to feature something. It includes films because other sources have covered them. It can seem like a rather low bar, but it is a bar nonetheless, and we do exclude a good number of films. But approximate to the level of that bar, we will have pretty simple articles where we report the cast, the crew, the plot summary, and the handful of mainstream reviews that went out of their way to critique the film. Like they say, Wikipedia is not paper, so we will report on far more films than any normal encyclopedia, though we definitely report on less films than databases like IMDb or British Film Institute. Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me)17:45, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
@Masem:WP:NEWSORG doesn't differentiate between local and national newspaper. It actually doesn't say a word related to local newspaper. It just mentions newspapers. Hence, local papers are not sufficient for considering coverage, is not valid. It appears mere a personal opinion. AnupMehra✈18:06, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
This is exactly what I'm concerned about. There is an entire universe of released and upcoming movies. In the Indian context, each have at least 10 times mention (mostly reviews) in different national newspapers and magazines. If this is what makes it suitable for inclusion on Wikipedia. IMDb would not be longer called a film database but Wikipedia. I feel there's something wrong. Film reviews should not be considered a reliable source no matter what source does publish it. It is obvious that they'll publish reviews taking into consideration their huge daily subscribers who reads reviews before booking a movie ticket. AnupMehra✈18:06, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
NEWSORG may not mention this, but this is standard in notability discussions. Of course local papers will cover local events or films or plays or the like, because that's their purpose for the most part when they know their readership is will be only to the local area. As such the idea of such papers being truly "independent" of these local things is questioned. Hence why if a topic is only covered by local papers, that's not notable for WP. --MASEM (t) 18:17, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
May I have a link to that notability discussion? Local newspapers do cover events of national importance and all what attracts readers like movies, gossips related to games, films, etc. I find only difference, that is they are published and distributed locally. AnupMehra✈18:25, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
(edit conflict) The nutshell at WP:N states, "Wikipedia articles cover notable topics—those that have gained sufficiently significant attention by the world at large and over a period of time..." So local newspapers may or may not be representing the attention of the world-at-large. Unscintillating (talk) 21:03, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
I'd share here an example, an upcoming movie Ebn-E-Batuta is being promoted on Wikipedia by its Director and Producer registering user accounts. One can visit to User_talk:Varunmiddha{director of the movie) to see number of {{prod}}/{{csd}} and disruptive warning tags. There's a redirect Gurdev_K._Aneja(producer of the movie) to Ebn-E-Batuta movie. Another article Hera Pheri 4, a upcoming movie series of Hera Pheri. Hera Pheri-3 has not been released yet and here we have an article on Hera Pheri 4. I'm just sick and tired of these articles. Aggressive view is, Wikipedia is not an Encyclopedia anymore. AnupMehra✈20:50, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
If people involved with a movie are trying to build the article for it, that's a conflict of interest and there's different ways of dealing with it, that's not an issue with notability. --MASEM (t) 21:51, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
That was just an example to show an article on a movie pre-release often serves the purpose of WP:Advertisement. I'm actually concerned about all these, Category:Upcoming_films, Category:Upcoming_television_films. Have a look there to see how many of them actually does pass WP:42. I'm concerned about the way notability is being determined, really using reviews of the movies? Every movies gets its review published in the respective nation's multiple newspapers. If it is the appropriate criteria, then what is the difference between IMDb and Wikipedia. Anyone? AnupMehra✈21:59, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia, as long as there's a reasonable claim of notability made for a movie, there's no reason we can't include it. We do have to avoid where only primary sourcing is used or where there is COI issues in play, but if there are reviews at a national level in the film's country of origin, then there's no reason not to include it. --MASEM (t) 22:15, 3 February 2014 (UTC)
One simple and straight question to everyone reading this. Should film reviews be considered a reliable source and hence should be used establishing notability of a particular movie? AnupMehra✈06:20, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
It depends. A film review by a national critic will likely help for notability; a film review from a critic from a local-only work not so much. There's no easy yes/no here. --MASEM (t) 06:27, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
Okay, a national and a local critic. A critic related to national newspaper is a national critic and local, a local critic. Is it a correct assumption to define? I'm not sure about other countries, but at least here in India, almost every movies get its reviews publish in the various national news papers. AnupMehra✈06:33, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
If there are multiple reviews from a national paper for a film, then a standalone article makes sense. --MASEM (t) 19:04, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
The only restriction I know of that is consistently applied in using local reviews is for local authors, because such reviews tend to be indiscriminate; any local person who writes a book will normally get some kind of notice there if he send them any publicity material about it. This would probably apply to local artists, and performers, and film-makers also, on the same grounds. It usually does apply to local businesses as well, for the same reason. They're basically noticing the local connection, not the person or the work or the business. When there is no such connection, the question is whether such papers are reliable enough that that selection of even nationally released material without a local connection is adequately discriminating to show notability, rather than just random or idiosyncratic. I think that would have to be argued in each case; the problem arises because google will harvest all such local material, and people trying to write article on things that are intrinsically insignificant will find them. (they'll no longer be in google news after the first 30 days, but they're still usually findable in the main google.) My own view is that I would tend to be very inclusive for films by established directors or with established performers even in the absence of reviews. (The reason for a separate article rather merging, as we can do with authors, is that there is usually no one place to merge it.) DGG ( talk ) 18:53, 7 February 2014 (UTC)
Well, then Wikipedia is going to be an Internet Movie Database at least having a standalone article on each and every Indian film (tell me an Indian movie name, I'll give you link to 10 reviews published in 10 national news papers). No wonder I see Bollywood producers using Wikipedia now a days. They just come, create and either retire or get blocked after mainspace establishment. We are here to establish notability. Anupmehra -Let's talk!11:43, 12 February 2014 (UTC)
We aren't limited by space, so as long as there are national reviews, there's no reason not to have an article. Mind you, Conflict of Interest is a separate concern - if these people are adding details on the films they create themselves, that needs to be cautioned against, but see WP:COI for details. --MASEM (t) 15:20, 12 February 2014 (UTC)
I'm being mis-understood here, perhaps. I'm saying, There's something wrong with definition of RS in terms of NF. And I'm not particularly concerned about COI, but very likely about PROMOTION. People always want to know about upcoming movies, newspapers publish it on every weekend. Hence, Media and Wikipedia serves the purpose. The same newspapers do not give a word to the same movie after the date of release. What Wikipedia considering a RS is really a RS, and should be used to determine notability? It is very general that a newspaper would let their readers know the upcoming movie details, should they visit cinema hall or not, rating/stars etc, it is all very general not significant coverage to make it notable. Anupmehra -Let's talk!14:15, 15 February 2014 (UTC)
Just saying that movie is playing at a given theater, or even scheduled to start showing in general - that's primary sourcing, and not sufficient to sustain an article. Now, we we are talking reviews, we're not talking about a couple lines, we're talking a reasonably in-depth review as to make that review a secondary source. So part of it is the type of article that the paper is reporting, as well. It's not as cut and dry as just what the source is. --MASEM (t) 14:55, 15 February 2014 (UTC)
Pre-release information
I'm concerned about potential breaches of WP:NOT#ADVERTISING because of the practices of certain industries. There are certainly more articles like it, but the issue at hand is the article Firefly Online. The article is not blatant spam, but risks being so because it is not yet released and all sources rely on what the publisher has chosen to reveal. Not knowing what exactly to do, I have nominated it for deletion. Perhaps the discussion belongs here too. -- Ohc ¡digame!04:59, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
If all the additional sources were doing was regurgitation the press release (which does happen), yes, I agree this is a promotional issue. But when these reliable sources at least try to provide some analysis and transformation, that moves it to a case where the RS are showing more than just an interest as a future title. Mind you, if there is a larger scope where the announcement and pre-release information can be made until more sourcing shows up, that's where such aught to go, simply to avoid the issue altogether. --MASEM (t) 06:34, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
And as a practical example; my favorite video game developer (Harmonix) just announced a new game, Chroma. There's a combination of unfiltered press reports [10] and first-hand impressions [11] out there, but the articles are brief and short. I could easily justify a GNG-compliant article right now, but this is all we know at the present (as well as alpha-signups). So instead, I salted the article at Chroma (video game), updated the disambiguation page, and added a paragraph of relavant information at the developer's page. However, if someone else made the article, the fact there are first hand impressions and that identify the importance of this game (in this case, the concept of a music-driven FPS) would push it past the PROMOTIONAL issue. --MASEM (t) 17:29, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
Petitioning sites are regarded as not a great primary resource for information. Some petitioning sites are even blocked. This is a good step to preserve quality on Wikipedia. Indeed, there is a risk that petitioning sites inflate their the amount of signatures. However, I would stand up for a group of petitioning sites. The reason is that the media attention is often short-lived, when it comes to public petitions. If Wikipedia can only rely on media coverage on the petition, it can often not mention the amount of signatures of the petition. Here, I appeal to accuracy. Quality of Wikipedia would increase when the accuracy improves. But, we have to be aware of the risks of inflation. So it is always necessary to only word it along the lines of "according to Petition site X, the petition had nnnn signatures as of (Date)" and only allow this for petitioning sites that are considered reliable. Which means, that reliable media is refering to these petitions and that (we on) Wikipedia consider that the petitioning site is reliable enough to read the the amount signatures.
For example, media does quote from petitioning sites like Change.org. Change.org is a site that enables people to start their own petitions. They have Community guidelines that stress that spam-like behavior is unacceptable. They also moderate stating "Once a petition or “Reason For Signing” is flagged we will review and potentially remove it from the site." Since the creator of the petition can not twist the voting, and that the petition is governed for spam, creates the impression that the amount of signatures on petitions of Change.org is reliable. Therefore it may be possible to refer to a petition on Change.org, to read the amount of signatures. Until now this is not possible since any petitioning site is not allowed, missing out on accuracy. We could change this, but we much first establish that Change.org is a reliable source for only reading the number of signatures. Indeed, we need to decide this per individual petitioning site since it can not be safely assumed that all petitioning sites are reliable. Can I get some support for this proposal? Timelezz (talk) 16:45, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
If the proposal is to declare that articles may say things like "according to Petition site X, the petition had nnnn signatures as of (Date)", no, I'm afraid there won't be support. If a reliable secondary source cares to explain the significance of a petition, it may be useful to mention the secondary source. However, having editors pick petitions from websites is simple WP:OR because the petition may be worthless. Johnuniq (talk) 09:01, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
Well, the issue is that a reliable secondary source cares to tell what the number of signatures is. But it does not care to update this information since it is not longer 'top news'. If information from reliable sources is seen as reliable. When the reliable source derived its information from a petitioning site, I do not see any valid reason why it is not acceptable to quote updated information from the petitioning site. The reliable sources, already demonstrated that it is a reliable to quote. That's why we call the reliable source, reliable to begin with. Or... we should not quote any information which a reliable source derived from any petition. Saying that a source is reliable because a reliable source says so, and is only limited reliable as long as the reliable sources are quoting from it, very much looks like a double standard to me. (if you can still follow me). Timelezz (talk) 15:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
I have to agree that a petitioning site is not really a good source of information if that's the primarily place for information from - it is, for all practical reasons, a SPS. A comparable example we deal with at the video game project are Kickstarter projects. The project information at Kickstarter is presumably accurate and most correct, but just because it appears at Kickstarter gives it no measure of importance. Thus, before we even document a Kickstarter, we look for secondary sources that go "hey, this is a kickstarter of interest". Once we have that we allow ourselves to use the Kickstarter page to fill out other details, but not before. --MASEM (t) 15:31, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
To add specific to the petition case - once you have shown secondary/independent sources have identified the petition but might not follow it to the conclusion , it is fair to use #s from the petition sites once it is completed to conclude how many people signed it, for example. But you have to have have other sources touch on that before before this can be done to take away the SPS issue. --MASEM (t) 15:45, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
As you know, this rarely happens as the media does only reports current events, and is not concerned with being accurate about the final amount of signatures on closure. Timelezz (talk) 15:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
I guess what I'm saying is if you have a petition, and a source like CNN goes "here a detailed overview of this current petition which has X million signatures at this time" (marking the petition's importance) but no one says anything after the fact, it is reasonable to source the petition on its closure for having so many signatures at the end of the day as long as the other sources that mention the signature are included. That way we're using SPS appropriately. --MASEM (t) 16:09, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
That is what I would like indeed. Amended with the BBC source to indicate the petition's importance, I want to source the petition on its closure. But currently the reference to the petition is removed for being a violation with reliable secondary source. How can I prove it is not in violation? Timelezz (talk) 17:24, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
I don't know how it can be said in policy terms. The existence of the BBC source gets over the SPS of the petition site issue, and thus the judicious use of petition site date becomes reasonably appropriate. That's the core argument we're saying here. If you're having problems with other editors removing it, you may want to point them to this discussion. --MASEM (t) 22:36, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
Yes, indeed. The issue I deal with is somewhat similar. A BBC reports about the number of signatures of the petition, which gives it a measure of importance. But as time continues Wikipedia is inaccurate as the petition is counting. But for some reason the number of petition signatures is only 'reliable' when BBC copied it. I argue that once a reliable source like BBC found the petition reliable enough to copy the amount of signatures, we can see this petition as reliable and are thus allowed to refer to this petition directly and update the number of signatures, in order to increase Wikipedia's accuracy. But only AFTER reliable sources have quoted or paraphrased the petition. In this case the amount of signatures doubled! But under current rules, we are not allowed to mention this. Which is a problem of accuracy. Timelezz (talk) 15:49, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
A report from the BBC or the like should give the date so that an intelligent reader might reasonably conclude that the number is a minimum, and, the greater the time since the date, the more it may have grown. — Robert Greer (talk) 22:20, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
Not all articles have intro sections
I made this edit because, for example, disease articles are not advised to have introductory sections. I went ahead and was bold, but I wonder if someone might disagree with this rationale and why. The former revision implicitly made an invalid assumption about all Wikipedia articles, in my opinion. Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 19:51, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
Unless "intro section" means something that I am unaware of in this context, most Wikipedia articles don't have introduction sections; the WP:Lead is for such material. But then again, the text you altered uses the words "introductory language," "the lead" and "initial sections." Flyer22 (talk) 20:01, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
Ah yes, I was imprecise. A more accurate title to this thread could be "Not all articles have initial sections that are supposed to be as accessible as the lead". Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 21:09, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
Maybe "background" or "introductory" is the wording your going for? It's a fair edit, just precision might help. --MASEM (t) 22:19, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
WP:MTAA is good overview guidance in this area. My view is that one should always strive to make the first sections of an article as accessible as they reasonably can be. An article may not need an introduction, if the material is all quite straightforward. But if there is material that would be likely to be hard to understand for the kind of person who has been reading articles that link to the article, then some kind of introductory gloss may be a good idea, often in its own section because the lead may already have more than enough to cover in its regulation four paragraphs. Jheald (talk) 22:37, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
Sister projects
The rationale for this recent edit is manifestly invalid. Wiktionary and Wikinfo are already mentioned in exactly the same way above and below on the page. There are only two acceptable options here. Either Wikiversity has to go in, or both Wiktionary and Wikinfo have to come out. Anything else is absurd. (Although perhaps Wikinfo should come out regardless since it isn't a sister project). James500 (talk) 16:29, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
Actually, what is 'absurd' is suggesting that Wikiversity is a random dumping ground for "your own thoughts and analyses or to publish new information". That isn't what it claims to be at all - and we would be doing Wikiversity no favours to suggest otherwise. The link to Wiktionary seems legitimate to me, in that it is there for the specific purpose of directing those who want to write dictionary definitions to the appropriate place. As for Wikinfo, it appears to be on its last legs (the last new article was created over 6 months ago [12]), and should probably be removed. I see no reason to clutter the page with unnecessary or misleading comments about other Wikis. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:52, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
This is completely fair. As best as I can tell, there are no sister projects that really are there for original research in a broad sense, so pointing to any as a counter-option to en.wiki is not sound advice and should be removed. --MASEM (t) 16:56, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
In all fairness, Wikiversity does allow original research (including personal essays). This has reached the point where they are publishing what purports to be a peer reviewed journal which is cited in some of our articles. It should be mentioned in this context, even if there are limits to the type of research it publishes. It is important to make it clear that some articles that are sent to AfD on grounds of OR are elligible to be exported. I get the impression that many users !voting at AfD simply do not realise this. And I agree that the reference to Wikinfo should probably come out. James500 (talk) 17:05, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
Nope. The page is entitled 'What Wikipedia is not', and should stay on topic. What Wikiversity accepts as content is entirely beside the point. (And incidentally, there is no way whatsoever that Wikipedia will ever endorse Wikiversity 'peer review' as having any validity as far as we understand the term - it would be grossly misleading to imply otherwise). AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:20, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
As for Wikipedia citing Wikiversity articles, since that is clearly a violation of policy, I would be grateful if you could indicate where this is occurring AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:24, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
See v:Wikiversity Journal. Each article in the journal identifies the Wikipedia article(s) in which it is cited. The peer review seems to have been outsourced in some cases to a company called Enago who profess to be experts. I was under the impression that this was authorised by the WMF or whoever is in charge, since it says that funds have been made available to hire them. James500 (talk) 17:34, 30 March 2014 (UTC) And what our sister projects accept is very relevant to this policy and that is why Wiktionary is (quite correctly) mentioned. James500 (talk) 17:47, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
The WMF does not determine Wikipedia rules regarding reliable sourcing - accordingly, whether they have funded Wikiversity 'peer review' or not is of no relevance to us. And where can I find this 'identification' of Wikipedia articles being inappropriately cited? Looking at articles in the 'Wikiversity Journal of Medicine' I can see no obvious indication. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:45, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
The original proposal was that the reference to Wikinfo in WP:NOT should be replaced with a reference to Wikiversity. I still think that this is absolutely necessary. James500 (talk) 21:41, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
If you could come up with a proposal for a brief revision that made it clear what Wikiversity would actually accept (which is a lot more specific than your original edit seemed to suggest), we could consider it - though we need to avoid going into too much detail about something that is clearly off-topic. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:27, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
My original issue stands - we should not be saying any other Foundation sister project is immediately accepting of original research that en.wiki does not allow, and should not give that impression here (Which the original edit did suggest) --MASEM (t) 22:36, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
That's still opening a dangerous door for people that assume "oh, it doesn't work here, let me take it there". I'd rather not give any recommend course of action to avoid unintentionally damaging other projects. --MASEM (t) 23:05, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
If there is a place to mention Wikiversity, it would be at "Not a Textbook", not here. But this is a policy page, not a page to advertize other sister projects. --MASEM (t) 23:45, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
The Wiktionary mention is fine as it is a very straightforward statement of the fact that they define words while this project does not. Make a proposal because this edit is not satisfactory as it attempts to sum up whatever Wikiversity's content policies are in a few words. Essentially it is not the business of this page to tell people where free websites are available for them to publish their views. By contrast, people are occasionally surprised by the fact that an article focused on defining a word is not acceptable at Wikipedia. Johnuniq (talk) 00:21, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Make a proposal? You know perfectly well that I have made a new proposal to include the following words: "Original research which meets the guidelines of this policy is permitted on Wikiversity". It is right above on this talk page. To be honest, the arguments that have been made against the inclusion of those words are manifest nonsense. The idea that there is some difference in principle between them and the inclusion of references to wiktionary is preposterous. To paraphrase your own words, people are very often surprised by the fact that original research (and especially original synthesis) is not acceptable at Wikipedia. We delete a lot of it, and a huge amount remains. The only difference there could be is hostility towards the publication of original research by Wikiversity and an absence of similar hostility towards the publication of definitions by Wiktionary. James500 (talk) 07:10, 31 March 2014 (UTC) We have an extremely serious problem with original research and unreferenced content in general on Wikipedia. The inclusion of the proposed words in this policy will help that material to go away to the place where it belongs. It will thus benefit Wikipedia. There is therefore an extremely compelling reason to add those words and no reason whatsoever not to add them. James500 (talk) 07:21, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Edit request
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Argh. I just created an account, apparently it takes 4 days to be autoconfirmed....
Anybody feel like helping me out with a stupid April Fool's joke?
I just thought it would be funny if (for today) the list would also say: "Wikipedia is a scene, not a goddamn arms race" as the last item under the heading "Community"? It would really make my day if someone could, it wouldn't be nearly as amusing if I did this on April 5th. (To anybody who doesn't get this, it's a Fall out boy referenceBreathe Carolina10 (talk) 22:00, 1 April 2014 (UTC)
I would like to update this page to reflect the exception to this rule for child protection purposes. See the page Wikipedia: Child Protectoon Wikipedia's policy to delete any statements in an article which express (whether properly sourced and cited or not) any view that inappropriate relationships between adults and children can be harmless to the children involved.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Child_protection
I'm not sure it's needed to be honest, the child protection policy expressly overrides others and repeating elsewhere could lead to inconsistencies. And anyway your phrasing isn't quite correct, it is permissible to report (with sources) inappropriate comments made by others where this is relevant to the article and clearly not in Wikipedia's voice (your wording would prohibit this). Thryduulf (talk) 11:33, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Is there somewhere that "repeating [rules] elsewhere could lead to inconsistencies" is codified on Wikipedia? I've been desperately looking for somewhere this obvious principle might be at a WP: shortcut. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 05:12, 14 April 2014 (UTC)
RfC: Should the reference to Wikinfo be replaced with a reference to Wikiversity?
Closing per a WP:ANRFC request. There is a clear consensus to remove the Wikinfo link from the "Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought" section, but there is no consensus to add a link to Wikiversity. ArmbrustTheHomunculus11:24, 16 May 2014 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Do you support the following changes to the section headed "Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought": (a) insert, at the end of criterion 1, the words "(Original research which meets the guidelines of Wikiversity's original research policy is permitted on Wikiversity)"; (b) delete the words "There is a Wikipedia fork at Wikinfo that encourages personal opinions in articles" where those words appear at the end of criterion 3. James500 (talk) 10:31, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Survey: Support (a) inclusion of Wikiversity
Support (a) inclusion of Wikiversity as proposer. This change is obvious and should not be controversial. I've explained my reasoning in the section headed "Sister projects" above on this talk page. Upon reflection, I now have no opinion about (b) inclusion of Wikinfo. James500 (talk) 15:23, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Support (a). It's a sister project, and I don't see any actual evidence for the concern Carolmooredc raises below. Masem's point isn't entirely meritless, but our policy does need to tell people this isn't the place for that, and directing them a specific sister project for this is likely to be more productive than telling them to shut up. AndyTheGrump's objection seems to be based on a non-existent conflict with Wikiverisity policy, and seems to assume that our wording here somehow couldn't be updated if their policies did change.
Survey: Oppose (a) inclusion of Wikiversity
Oppose inclusion of Wikiversity - We are not in the position to tell people where to take original research/thought in a policy page, so including anything like this is bad. MASEM (t) 14:57, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Oppose Most people don't know about or visit Wikiversity. All many may remember is "Wikipedia allows original research" which they may argue for, despite WP:OR policy page, because they know they read it somewhere. Just confuses the issue. Carolmooredc (Talkie-Talkie)22:01, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Oppose. This page is about Wikipedia, not Wikiversity - and it is up to Wikiversity, not Wikipedia to determine what content they accept. AndyTheGrump (talk) 23:22, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Support removing of Wikiinfo. We are not in the position to tell people where to take original research/thought in a policy page, so including anything like this is bad. MASEM (t) 14:57, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Supportwikinfo.wikia.com/wiki/Wikinfo_Wiki isn't a part of Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Foundation and should not be mentioned at all. Just confuses people. Carolmooredc (Talkie-Talkie)22:01, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Support removal of Wikinfo. It isn't part of Wikimedia Foundation and should not be mentioned at all (there are 1000s of sites where people can post their opinions, why promote this one?). -- P 1 9 9✉22:51, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Support (b) per WP:EL (its reasoning, anyway, even if it was intented to cover article content). To agree with the above: It does confuse people into thinking its a WMF project, it does seem to be mostly inactive, and it is just one irrelevant site among many that doesn't deserve special treatment here. Furthermore: I think it may have been added back when the idea that WP content could be repurposed was a "gee whiz" concept, but this is no longer true. Every other Ynandex/Google/Bing search anyone does brings up hits at WP-ripoff sites. It's not novel, it's tiresome. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 05:06, 14 April 2014 (UTC)
Support This is about English Wikipedia. I would be wrong to try to give guidance or make policies about wikis other than that. North8000 (talk) 23:27, 20 April 2014 (UTC)
Survey: Oppose (b) removal of Wikinfo
Oppose (b) as personal opinions in encyclopaedia articles are not what Wikiversity is about and yet it is what some people are looking for. That Wikinfo isn't a sister project is not really relevant to this page. Thryduulf (talk) 12:02, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
It is appropriate to mention sister projects in WP:NOT because we should have a policy of exporting out of scope content to them and this is the logical place to put it. James500 (talk) 22:14, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
It is suggested above that people might misconstrue the proposed addition and get it into their heads that Wikipedia publishes original research. That could only happen if they were illiterate or exceptionally stupid or completely senile. I think it is very unlikely to actually happen. And why hasn't it already happened with the references to Wikinfo, Wiktionary, Wikisource, Wikinews, Wikiquote, Wikibooks and Wikivoyage already in NOT? There is no evidence that it has. James500 (talk) 22:23, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought is the only section regarding an actual editing policy so the possibility of confusion arises there more than elsewhere. However, saying confusion assumes good faith.
Unfortunately I’ve seen editors argue vociferously for putting in obvious original research and synthesis and this plays into their hands. They might argue yes, it’s allowed, see WP:WHATISNOT if you don't believe me. And some other editors (especially less experienced ones) will just drop it at that point, not wanting to visit the page and/or get into a fight. Why give aggressive editors an excuse when it's not really important to note who DOES publish original research? (Unless it's a way to get them to peddle their stuff elsewhere, and I may keep that in mind since I'm sure Wikiversity articles come up very low on the search engines.)
It is suggested above that the proposed addition would amount to Wikipedia determining what content Wikiversity must accept. There is absolutely no way that the proposed addition could have that effect. James500 (talk) 23:37, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The main purpose of that is for that editor to be able to cite any link which starts with WP: in his arguments at WT:MOS. See previous discussion as well! (wonder if we should add WP:NOT#STYLEGUIDE) ... Shyamal (talk) 11:42, 18 April 2014 (UTC)
It's all part of SMC's campaign to restrict what can be written about on Wikipedia, see discussion above (no detail permitted beyond what an educated layman would know basically). If you want to know where, if anywhere, the change was agreed, you will have to ask him Jimfbleak - talk to me?11:46, 18 April 2014 (UTC)
So the edit should be reverted as unnecessary complexity? Obviously NOTFIELDGUIDE has to be removed as that will soon be a failed proposal, but I also see no reason for any of the others. Johnuniq (talk) 11:59, 18 April 2014 (UTC)
Wow, that was some really hateful, bad-faith-assumptive, paranoid nonsense. You should be ashamed. The point of the edit was to clean up the inconsistent mess there, so that any anchor someone is genuinely liable to expect to be there will actually be there, while not promoting mangled ones with doubled #'s that no one would actually use except as a typo they should fix, nor lower case ones that no one uses except Mama meta modal who was just blocked as a sockpuppet. It looks pointy and asinine anyway, BTW. And immediately after I was reverted, guess what happened? People started adding more anchors to that section because – imagine that – ones they're looking for are missing. Duh. If you think an edit isn't helpful, fine, WP:BRD exists for a reason. Keep your personally vindictive, persecution-fanatasy-fuelled assumptions about my motives to yourself. But never mind, I'll leave you to your regularly scheduled turf warring. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:07, 27 April 2014 (UTC)
Sorry, I realise you would never, ever sink as low as ad hominem attacks. The whole point of my comment was to avoid making it look like a personal vendetta. that obviously worked well. Jimfbleak - talk to me?18:11, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
3. Field guides. Wikipedia articles do not exist to help readers locate, identify or evaluate anything. Consequently, some types of textual and other information, primarily intended to assist distinguishing or appraising things, are not appropriate in the encyclopedia. Examples include bird silhouettes, types of defects in antiques, the values fetched at auction for collectibles, animal track shapes and patterns, identifying marks on product lines, points of distinction between similar coins, and many other sorts of detail that do not aid an overall understanding of an encyclopedia topic, except where they pertain to notable individual examples that are the subjects of their own articles or article sections. If the principal utility of the information is in-hand in the field, be it a meadow or a swap meet, it probably does not belong in a Wikipedia article.
Rarely have I seen such a bizarre attempt to suppress information from an encyclopaedia. Basically you are saying that we are allowed by you to describe common bluebell, but it's forbidden to say how it differs from Spanish bluebell. We can describe meteor, but you don't want the article corrupted by explaining the difference from meteorite. Absolute nonsense. Jimfbleak - talk to me?11:45, 14 April 2014 (UTC)
I don't think that is what SMC is proposing. Mind you, we would not have direct advice for the reader to differentiate between the common and Spanish bluebell, but we would have information about their respective appearances so the reader could figure that out if they put them side by side. I think what SMC would be getting at is that for an article like Angraecum, where there's a couple dozen specific varieties, we would not document the specific differences between these as they are otherwise nonnotable on their own. --MASEM (t) 14:45, 14 April 2014 (UTC)
Oppose I would agree with non-notable, like your example, but all species are notable by definition. The third para of the description of the Hyacinthoides_non-scripta GA explains how it differs from Hyacinthoides hispanica. As I understand SMC, he is saying that para shouldn't be there at all, because we shouldn't mention the Spanish species. Even if your interpretation is correct, you are saying that you should put the descriptions sequentially and let the reader play "spot the difference", instead of providing properly sourced text saying how the species differ Jimfbleak - talk to me?15:00, 14 April 2014 (UTC)
Well, a field guide, more traditionally, is going to guide the user in a manner like 20 questions to figure out what the item they are seeing is, and that's not a good encyclopedic article. On the other hand, how two near-relative species differ visually and by any other manner is fair game when presented in encyclopedic context. It's the approach in how the content is organized, and not so much the context, that I think this is stressing. --MASEM (t) 01:25, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
Oppose I hate to be contrarian in a good faith attempt to add to this page, but the information listed here is great content for our articles. More often than not our editors drop the ball when writing about antiques and collectibles topics. Articles on these subjects absolutely should be getting into these details and specifics. As a collector myself, I oftentimes turn to Wikipedia for research, fully expecting to find this sort of information. Many times I leave feeling disappointed because we don't have a strong editing base in the field. The project as a whole should be working 180 degrees in the other direction, towards the inclusion of details that appeal to both the experts, collectors, and specialists, as well as novices. ThemFromSpace01:14, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
No, not really. We're supposed to be summarizing, not detailing, information, as an encyclopedia, providing a first pass of information so that those that need to learn more know where to look. Notable details and variations should be documented if they are well sourced and mentioned in secondary or third-party sources, but fine details that would only cater to a collector or an expect and only sourced to primary works should be left out - though external links and references to such information is always appropriate. --MASEM (t) 01:33, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
Well, not every sentence of our articles should be written specifically to an amateur who has little understanding of the subject. It is only natural for article content to broaden out into other areas of interest, and just the same to deepen into a more specialized nature. Our articles should be incorporating the best aspects of both the Brittanica Micropaedia and Macropaedia. We should introduce a topic for an amateur so he knows what it is about and, to the best of our ability, we should write clearly so that everybody can understand our content. But by no means should we limit ourselves to a broad overview if our content policies (reliable sources, verifiability, etc) would allow a more in-depth view of a topic. In general, the more in-depth we get the more we will serve our readers, as long as we don't confuse them or wander into the realm of meaningless trivia. ThemFromSpace02:03, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
They don't, however. That's why we're not guidebooks, textbooks, and a number of other highly detailed works - that's what other Foundation sister projects can handle. There is a line, and it's not easy to say where it is, but if we take, for example, WP:NOT#PLOT as a starting point, where if one starts to rely too much on the primary work and not from secondary/third-party sources for the bulk of the article, that's an issue. That idea can expand to areas that field guides would apply; if you're basically adding details only present in the primary sourcing and not noted by others, that's probably an issue then. That's why we put a lot of emphasis on summarizing what secondary sources says about topics, as that guides how deep we can really get into a subject. --MASEM (t) 02:10, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
Not correct. You draw the wrong message from NOT guidebook and NOT textbook. The guidance against trying to be a guidebook or textbook is more accurately style guidance, about how content is presented. It's not intended as a limitation on scope, ie what facts can be presented. Jheald (talk) 11:58, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
Comment based on the timing, it would seem like the aim of this extra bit of instruction is to be able to cite this as yet another argument against WikiProjects and any other groups of enthusiasts (chess enthusiasts, astronomers, bird, plant, fish ...) who add content following the styles followed in specialist "guide books". Note that the proposer's main activity is in WP:MOS debates. Shyamal (talk) 05:14, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
And we're an encyclopedia, not enthusiasts' guides. There is an appropriate balance of material for inclusion here to work for all readers. From an encyclopedia standpoint, there is nothing wrong with linking to guide books if a reader needs further information beyond a high -level overview. And there's nothing wrong with suggesting improvements to a policy or guideline after a specific debate. --MASEM (t) 05:19, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
Actually, we need such rules and already have them, and if people in these areas don't believe that the intent of WP:NOT covers these areas, then we need to add such to be clear. --MASEM (t) 05:54, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
And what happened to WP:No censorship? We are apparently OK with bums, boobs and other wobbly bits, but not coins or plant varieties. Life would be a lot simpler if we just let SMC decide what should be in the in his encyclopaedia, how it should be formatted, what variety of English is allowed, what uniform you should wear while editing... Jimfbleak - talk to me?09:21, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
Observation: Nice assumption of bad faith, and lies about my editing patterns. In over 8 years of editing I have fewer than 8,000 edits to the entire "Wikipedia talk" namespace, where about 98% of MOS discussion are held (the rest mostly being in article talk-space RM discussions), vs. over 30,000 in articles, and 8,700 in template and template talk (i.e. I've spent more time working on template code than I have fighting voer MOS matters!)[14] Mine is a higher rate of article writing than yours, Shyamal (about 34,000 in over 11 years),[15] even with me taking off almost an entire year, twice, and despite the large amounts of time I've spent on templates, and on the Wikipedia namespce itself working directly on projectpage wording itself of all kinds, in wikiprojects, in essays, you name it. This month I've been somewhat focused on MOS stuff because other people (Casliber, Andrewa, you, etc.) reopened a dormant style dispute issue, turning it into yet another bitchfight, and I have the will to see this finally resolved even it it take another month, too. Since everywhere I turn around I run into you making yet another angsty bird-capitalization-related argument against me in discussions that aren't even about birds in particular, who is it again who is devoting too much time to MOS disputes, "based on the timing"? Where was your participation on this or any other relevant page a month ago? The month before that? Last year? I note that you've showed up here to argue against me on personal aspersion-casting grounds instead of logical ones, after I reverted and criticized at WT:AT your attempts at making sweeping changes to both MOS and NC guideline subpages without discussions, that would have sharply POV-forkrf them into direct conflict with MOS proper. And after I argued against your defense of "bird caps" at WT:MOS This new discussion, here at WT:NOT, isn't even an MOS-related discussion at all, it's an article content discussion. Care to rethink and try again? Not everything is about you and your insistence on capitalizing bird names. The only vague relation that has to this discussion is that various specialist cadres, including birders, have collective tendencies to both over-capitalize to write in field guide style. If I suggest that poorly tended lawns including yours need trimming because their weeds infest other people's yards, and you also know that I think the rusting, broken car in your driveway is a neighborhood eyesore, that doesn't mean that the lawn discussion is about your car. You cannot assume that all coincidence is correlation much less causation simply because some completely different things happen to displease you in similar ways. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 02:37, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
Oppose. Sorry to contribute to what might appear to be a pile on, but my rationale is different to those presented above - redundancy. It seems to me that much of what you want to prohibit would fall foul of WP:NOTHOWTO, while the majority of what else would be caught by your proposal should not be excluded wholesale (or even at all in some cases). For example, if there is coverage of types of damage to a type of antique in reliable sources other than auction guides then it is not unlikely encyclopaedic information we should include - but the tone and context of how it is presented in the article are as (or maybe more) important in determining it's encyclopaedicness. Thryduulf (talk) 10:18, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
Oppose The proposal is too all-encompassing and would just be another thing to argue about. The existing "NOT" points are based on experience from dealing with problematic content over an extended period. Before adding more, specific examples of discussions on related issues needs to be examined, and those discussions would need to support the proposal because editing policy happens after community consensus, not as a means of imposing a point of view. Johnuniq (talk) 12:07, 18 April 2014 (UTC)
Response: Ironically, the really bizarre straw man arguments like We can describe meteor, but you don't want the article corrupted by explaining the difference from meteorite and no reason to make a rule to oppose encyclopedia enthusiasts actually help speak for me as to the reasoning failures going on that make clarity on this matter increasingly important. It's noteworthy that half of the editors responding here in opposition, using ad hominem and straw man debate-clouding tactics, are those engaged with (and enraged at) me in MOS disputes that aren't going their way elsewhere (note: WP:NOT is about content, not style). The other half of the opposes are calmly and rationally either pointing out redundancies with wording we already have or are concerned about possible over-breadth (I did say this was just a first attempt and expected it to be narrowed, remember?). I'm actually swayed for now by the redundancy and overbreadth concerns with my wording (but some of them are contradictory - I can't be both redundant and overbroad on the same point!). Obviously it would be better to propose alternative wording that gets at what I'm trying to get at rather than just "oppose" voting, but whatever. I'm patient, and I have a long history of being right about these things, just before my time. It doesn't matter to me whose proposal and wording resolves the issue in the long run. I've planted the seed, and I confidently predict that field-guide-related material will work its way in here in due course, as the problems related to "field guide style" become clearer.
Because WP expands constantly and most articles that need to be written do get written, while those that are needed but don't exist yet are increasingly likely to be those that are very difficult to research, the urge to work on massaging all sorts of easy-to-find but non-encyclopedic trivia into extant articles sharply rises. It's therefore a statistical certainty that various entire classes of articles will be affected this way, because they're already the subject of field guides that collect such trivia and serve as sources to plunder for it with very little effort but (among fanciers of whatever the topic is) a strong can't-see-the-forest-for-the-trees sense of self-righteous entitlement to do so. Some respondents here have a fantasy that this is all about them. It's not, any more than the WP:SSF essay is. It's about an overall rising tide of point of view, writing style, and documentary intent that are non-encyclopedic, coming from a wide range of intensely focused, even myopic, editing camps. They range all over the map from, yes, some biology sub-disciplines, to collecting, to sports enclaves, to fiction fandom, to government/NGO/public service topics, and many, many more. — SMcCandlish ☺☏¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 02:37, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
Oppose. From WP:5: "WP is an encyclopedia. It combines many features of general and specialized encyclopedias, almanacs, and gazetteers." Per "almanac" and "gazeteer", comprehensive collation of detailed information is absolutely within our charter, explicitly including coverage in depth of "specialized" areas that can be as minority-interest as people like (so long as they can be reliably sourced). WP:GUIDE started out to steer people away from first-person itinerary recommendations and subjective restaurant reviews, not as a limit on objective information. Jheald (talk) 11:50, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
Oppose. Don't really agree with "Wikipedia articles do not exist to help readers locate, identify or evaluate anything". We do lots of stuff like this, like for instance show little homunculi with the team home/away uniforms in soccer team articles etc. that would possibly come under fire if the entire paragraph were adopted. This would cause needless contention as I don't see any great harm with stuff like this provided it doesn't get out hand. It's true that way too much detail on certain things might be a problem. Is it? Or is this just a solution looking for a problem? Herostratus (talk) 18:32, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
Comment Only this morning did I see an infobox with displaying fields |telephone= or something to that effect. What a load of codswallop! Contact email addresses, telephone and fax numbers certainly have no business being in the article, even if it's restricted to the infobox. -- Ohc ¡digame!13:10, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
Why? If the information is encyclopaedically relevant then it should be in the article. It wont be in all cases, but off the top of my head something like Childline should absolutely have the phone number in the article. Thryduulf (talk) 14:11, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
As soon as you give weight to including that for something where it might actually deserve it, people will assume that every business with contact info should have that. We also have the issue of the phone number possibly changing on us. A link to the website is very neutral for all, and that should of course should have all appropriate and up to date contact info, and that avoids us giving the wrong information or giving weight to include this for one organization over another. --MASEM (t) 15:01, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
