Wikipedia talk:Stand-alone lists

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Notability of lists

Can someone explain how notability for lists work. Does a list have to be notable? Does every item on the list have to be notable? Does the list itself have to be notable? Or is there really no guidlines on notability of lists? SunCreator (talk) 10:46, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Sadly, there is no consensus yet as to how exactly notability affects lists. Some lists are deleted because of failing notability guidelines, while others are generally kept inspite of obviously violating those same rules. What can be said though is that if a list meets the GNG, it is fairly safe from deletion. As for the list itmes, not every item on a list has to be notable. Due weight determines content, not notability. Goodraise 12:08, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. I also asked at the Village pump. SunCreator (talk) 19:11, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

It's very clear. Wikipedia lists are lists of links to articles. Articles must be on notable subjects. Therefore the items in a list must be notable subjects, even if an article hasn't been written for those subjects yet. If there is no evidence of notability of an item in a list, it should be removed. If there are no notable items in a whole list, the list article should be removed. There may be some exceptions for very specific types of list, but on this whole this is true of most lists of simple concepts, such as lists of buildings, people, animals, etc. Ryan Paddy (talk) 00:17, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

I think this should be made more explicit in this guideline. As it stands now, this guideline says that list definitions should be based on reliable sources, but that is not explicit enough about its notability. I dispute Masem's revert of my edit[1]. I don't think this guideline can be silent on WP:Source list. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:31, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

It is not clear at all! Or are you (GavinRyan) saying that lists of songs can only include notable songs? See e.g. Aesop Rock discography or do we need to take away the former members from the List of Slipknot band members since they might not be notable (just assuming that they are not. maybe they are??) or take away all non notable episodes from the Veronica Mars (season 3). The policies are not clear, they can be read either way and should be clarified. (all my three examples above are Featured Lists just to make sure they are actually lists and that they have some kind of consensus on what should be in them). --Stefan ^talk 14:48, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

It is very clear that consensus has asserted that individual elements of a list do not need to be notable, if it is necessary to include the elements to complete the encyclopedic summary of the overall topic. We are more than just an encyclopedia. --MASEM (t) 14:57, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Agree that consensus is quite clear, but if you read the policies it is not that clear and they should be made more clear. --Stefan ^talk 15:03, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

To clarify what the rationale for list inclusion actually is, I propose the following wording:

"The potential for creating lists is infinite. The number of possible lists is limited only by our collective imagination. To keep the system of lists useful, we must provide a defintion for their subject matter from a reliable souce. Inclusion of material on a list should be based on what reliable sources say, not on what an editor interprets the source to be saying".

I think there has to be some external validation of what a list should contain, whether that comes in the form of a defintion, or a citation showing how the content of list has been derived. Pretending that lists exist for the own sake is a self-referencing argument that is not a valid substitute for a proper rationale for a list's existence. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:08, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Stefan - I think the general rule is that lists should contain items that are notable, because Wikipedia is not a directory and Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. For this reason, a list of people/organisations/products who meet some generic criteria, like List of search engines, where the list has the potential to be long and contain many entries that are unlikely to be what the reader is looking for, should only contain notable items in order to maintain focus and create a discriminating collection of information.

As I said there are exceptions for certain types of list, and perhaps the lists you've linked to are examples of those. I think that what defines the lists you've mentioned is a combination of the notability of the parent topic, and the suitability of the number and level of detail of the items to be presented as a list on Wikipedia. For example, the band Slipknot is sufficiently notable that its article could mention all of its members. Because that list of members is of some length and detail, but still not overlong for presentation on Wikipedia, it is best presented as a stand-alone list that includes items that are verifiable but not independently notable, rather than being part of the band's main article. This doesn't make the list a directory, nor a indiscriminate collection of information. By comparison, a list of something generic and unbounded like List of guitarists needs to be limited to notable items, and should not contain non-notable guitarists from Slipknot, or else it would become an indiscriminate directory.

I agree that there needs to be more clarity in this guideline regarding whether any given type of list should contain only notable items. Some discussion will be required to identify exactly what defines the lists that are exceptions to this rule, and how to phrase it, and we should do so with WP:NOT in mind. Ryan Paddy (talk) 00:37, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

• There is a list at featured list candidates that is very relevant to this discussion. List of forty-plus point games by Kobe Bryant is about a notable person and the listed items are verifiable, but the issue being discussed at the FLC is that there is nothing especially notable about 40 points (e.g. "why not 30 points or 50 points instead?"). Is such a list appropriate? Dabomb87 (talk) 01:45, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

In answer to Ryan Paddy, there definitely needs to be more clarity about notability, but I would have thought that it is the defintion of what a list contains that needs to be externally validated, rather the elements which the list contains. My thoughts on this issue are as follows:

1. Lists without a definition fail WP:NOT;
2. Lists without an externally validated definition fail WP:N;
3. No matter how skillfully the elements of an undefined list are arranged, the are for all intents and purposes a synthesis, because an undefined list involves collecting and organizing material based on an editor's original understanding of the subject, not in a way that has been externally validated or defined.

The example given by Dabomb87 provides a useful starting point. Whether or not the games listed in this list article are themselves notable or not, I could not say, but I would have thought they can be verified. The issue I am concerned about is the lack of an externally validated defintion for the list. As Dabomb87 points out, why not 30 or 50 points instead? In fairness, the answer to this question is provided in the list article itself: "The number of forty-plus point games players accumulate over their careers is often reported in media". I could accept this as a valid defintion, except that the that mass attribution implicit in this statement is not externally sourced. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:46, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I think we are getting somewhere, I agree that lists should be notable and externally defined in some way, i.e. the forty-plus games, might not be a notable list, this also means that the list items does not need to be notable. All this works for me, I think the 'not a directory' can be worked around just by stating that the 'defintion of what a list contains' should be notable and externally validated. With that definition I think we can delete the directory listings but still keep 'good' lists like discography and band members. On the other hand, can I use a telephone book as a source and therefore say that wikipedia should keep lists of all persons in a town :-), that would go against 'not a directory' big time, this needs some more work, but I think the direction is good. --Stefan ^talk 01:24, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

If that is the case, we should drop the sentence "The potential for creating lists is infinite. The number of possible lists is limited only by our collective imagination" and substitute it for something along these lines that is more in tune with existing policy:

In any encyclopedia, information cannot be included solely for being true or useful. Lists, whether they are embedded lists or stand-alone lists, are encyclopedic content, and they are equally subject to Wikipedia's content policies. To provide a verifiable rationale for inclusion, we must provide a defintion for their subject matter from a reliable souce. Inclusion of material in a list should be based on what reliable sources say, not on original research.

If anyone has any better wording, please jump in. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 10:18, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Lists, more than anything else, need to satisfy WP's goal for being non-indiscriminate. This means both in topic (is the grouping itself indiscriminate, like "List of people with "e" in their name") and the contents ("list of people living in New York City") needs to show this. To that end, most lists on WP can fall into two broad classifications (or both in rare cases):

• Source-defined lists are ones where one or more sources explicitly spell out every element that falls into the list with multiple sources likely used to address changes and updates over time. A team roster, for example, etc. where you can find one article and use that as the primary source for the list. Here, because the list is explicitly defined, the elements themselves are discriminate, and thus we need to only question "is this list topic discriminate".
• Membership-defined lists are the more common ones that I can envision. Here, it is usually the case that the membership potential for the list is infinite, or at least certainly indiscriminate, and thus the list is defined with some metric for inclusion, and it is through reasonable justifiation (within the bounds of allowable WP:OR/WP:SYNTH) verification to meet that metric that we include items on the list. Now we have two issues, of course: is the list topic itself indiscriminate, and is the metric for inclusion sufficiently indiscriminate? Take the case of the Kobe 40-pt game list. It's metric is certainly discriminate - while there is no source that likely confirms in one block those are all the games, the metric is clearly met through a source for each resulting game. The question instead fell to if the topic itself was discriminate (questioning "why 40 points? why not 50 pts?", and "why just Kobe?")

The reason to consider how the lists can be formed is that when we then consider the application of notability:

• Source-defined lists likely only need to show the list's topic or topic it supports is notable (and of course discriminate). Individual elements, as already discriminated by the finite listing, need not be notable, though more than likely for these lists, that will have already been shown for most of the elements.
• Membership-defined lists are the ones where the topic is likely notable but no entries are specifically notable. Because of this, both notability and discrimination need to be taken into account: is the list topic or topic it supports notable, and is the grouping a discriminate aspect of that topic? Presuming the first two questions are "yes", then one can then quibble about the membership metric itself, but that will not affect the existence of the list.

So considering these, there are two key metrics for stand-alone lists that need to be considered in the first place to determine if they are viable:

• Notability of the list topic or topic it supports - are we listing something that has no notable topic connected to it just because we can make a list?
• The lack of indiscriminate nature of the list towards the list's topic - is this a necessary aspect of the topic to be listing for our coverage?

And those lead to the third question

• The lack of indiscriminate nature in the membership of the list? - If not already fully defined out by sources, are we cutting too large a swath of representative elements to complete the list to become indiscriminate?

Mind you, nearly all this is subjective, but most have a "know it when I see it"-type answer. --MASEM (t) 14:55, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

That is why we need some form of external source to validate the existence of list, otherwise there is no rationale for inclusion. A list without a defintion is a collection of of loosely associated topics and fails WP:NOT#DIR. A list without a defintion is like a ship without a captain, and a list without a verfiable defintion is like a ship without a navigator. In order to make lists useful to the readers, they need to have a defintion, and to comply with Wikipedia's content polices, that definition needs to be verified by a reliable source. I have added wording to this effect[2] now that these issues have been clarified. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:33, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

A list needs a definition to avoid indiscriminate info, that's fine, but as I've outlined above, the definition could be a single source that explicitly lists these, or could be from many sources that assert explicit membership in the list class, but in this case it is not the list itself as being sourced. One example of the latter is List of commercial failures in video gaming; there is no single source that can define that as a list topic (though there is the consideration that there are commercial failures in video game industry via sources), but it a list that can be populated by many sources that assert the entries within it as "commercial failures" (thus avoiding any subjective inclusion on this list). Again, we need a well-defined list inclusion metric to avoid indiscriminate inclusion, but that definition need not be sourced itself. --MASEM (t) 20:33, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Seconded. As long as there's a sufficiently objective way to define how the list is populated, there should be no requirement that we may only copy lists that other people have created.--Father Goose (talk) 07:46, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

So we are agreed (a) a list needs a defintion, and (b) the definition needs to be sourced. Now we just need to agree whether the defintion needs to come from one or more (1) reliable sources, or (2) questionable sources. Which would you choose? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:36, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

If I had my druthers, I'd settle the matter through consensus, on a list-by-list basis, in a way that is consistent with our existing policies (primarily WP:V and WP:OR). I also agree with the general principle that we don't do "lists of anything and everything" (WP:NOTDIR), though the specifics of that policy don't quite accurately capture what we do and don't accept, and why.

These words you keep suggesting, "a definition for their subject matter", are too vague for me to embrace. Can you point to a specific list you'd want to get rid of or otherwise reform, and why?--Father Goose (talk) 09:34, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

If you go to Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Lists/archive and examine all the lists that have been deleted, you will see that none of them have a verifiable defintion that provides a rationale for inclusion in Wikipedia. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of monsters might be a good starting point. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:36, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Logic fallacy. Yes, many lists where the definition is not defined by a source are listed there, but that does not imply that "lists without a source definition are deleted". There's also lists there that I see that would have sourced definitions that are deleted too. The most common reason behind the list deletions (on a spot check) is indiscriminate collections (whether single-sourced, built from a multitude of sources, or such not sourced well at all). If the list contents are not explicitly outlined by one or a handful of sources, and instead built up from individual sources that assert membership into the list, then we need to assure that the list concept itself is not indiscriminate, which can be supported with sources. (eg in the commercial failures of video gaming above, the idea that there are commercial video game failures, and about what %ages of games do fail, etc. are described in the lede as to justify the significance of the list). Another example is that list of 40-pt games by Kobe Bryant, which had two problems: the 40-pt was an arbitrary barrier, and limiting it to just Kobe's games was also arbitrary; it seemed before closure that a better list, based on a list of X-pt games by a single player in the NBA (where X-pt was shown by sources to be a significant milestone for a player) would be a more appropriate list. Would this list be sourced to a single source? Doubtful based on how the Kobe list had to be sourced, but it would still be possible to demonstrate the inclusion of each individual game via a source. --MASEM (t) 14:44, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

I fail to see any fallacy, logical or otherise. If a list is not defined, surely there is no evidence to disprove the accusation that its content is an indiscriminate collection of loosely assoicatied topics as you describe? The point I am making is that a list cannot be defined by its name alone, as that would be self-referencing. A defintion has to be explicity stated and it needs to be verifiable. You have seen my comments at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of forty-plus point games by Kobe Bryant/archive1, so you should know this article did not get promoted to Featured list status because its defintion could not be verified. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:38, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

That list failed not because the list lacked a source definition, but instead it failed because it was considered the definition was indiscriminate. Now, one reason for its indiscriminate nature was the fact that the 40-pt cutoff seemed arbitrary and that itself was not backed by sources - what is the significance of a single player making 40 pts within a game?

Wikipedia editors can come to a consensus to create a list topic that itself may not be defined explicitly in a source, but has a hard definition that requirements membership by a source, as long as the topic and list itself are not indiscriminate themselves; those last parts will be subject to the consensus of the community, and as you've pointed out, several do end up in the pile of deleted lists from AFD. But not all such lists are deleted, which means that as long as the list definition is clear and discriminate and proving membership in the list can be asserted by sources, there is allowances for lists where the definition is not explicitly defined in a source. That's the benefit of community-driven editing in Wikipedia. --MASEM (t) 17:08, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

No, the nominaiton was declined because it lacked a verifiable definition. If a 40-pt cutoff seemed arbitrary, it was because it did not have any external validation, it was plucked out of the air. All content in Wikipedia should be verfiable, and lists are not exempt from this requirement, or any other Wikipedia content policy. This is why lists should have a verifiable definition as WP:V is consensus. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:57, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

The last statement made by the closer stated: "the concept of a list with a seemingly "arbitrary" inclusion criteria does not have consensus" as the reason to close. Nothing exacting verification, though having a source to help assure that 40-pt wasn't arbitrary would have been helpful, but this was also on top of the fact of why it was simply limited to Kobe. We need a clear list definition and if it does bring in some "level" like 40-pt games, that likely needs to have some justification (itself through verification), but the implication you're asking for is that the entire definition of the list be defined by sources is excessive and beyond practice. For example, while overly indiscriminate, a "List of NBA games played by Kobe Bryant" would not need a sourced definition of what a "NBA game" is, as that's rather obvious. Unfortunately, this is tying a lot to the same arguments you're using on the climate change naming issues, and there is a lot of things I just need to defer to what others have said there about the ability of WP editors to do a limited but reasonable amount of synthesis to construct meaningful articles titles, or in this case, list definitions, to proceed forward, instead of having to have sources for these. --MASEM (t) 14:55, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

By what metric is this requirement "excessive and beyond practice"? We know that lists are governed by Wikipedia's content policies like any other type of article. I think you have to agree that in the above example, the 40-pt cut off may not be arbitary in the sense that an editor chose it in good faith, but the editor's opinions that 40-pts was the right choice of number were not verifiable.
For a list to have a verifiable definition is not rocket science, and is certainly not beyond practise. The fact that reliable sources are required by all of Wikipedia's content polices applies to lists articles as well as standalone lists. If a list has a name that defines it, then getting verification of that definition is simply best practices as set out in WP:BURDEN. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:47, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

I think there is a fundamental misunderstanding here. List articles are not standard articles. Lists are navigational helps, just like categories, navboxes or infoboxes. Therefore their existence and structure is not a matter of the list already existing somewhere else, it is a matter of our internal editorial judgement. Therefore I agree with Masem, that the implication you're asking for is that the entire definition of the list be defined by sources is excessive and beyond practice. Therefore, given a definition X for a list, and given an item I, if there are sources that confirm that I satisfies X and if I is notable, no problem. --Cyclopia^talk 17:59, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

This guideline clearly states the opposite: Stand-alone lists are Wikipedia articles; thus, they are equally subject to Wikipedia's content policies, such as verifiability, no original research and neutral point of view. They are navigational aids, but this doesn't mean that they are exempt from the original research policy, notability guidelines, etc. ThemFromSpace 02:11, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Notability is not a content guideline (in fact, it specifically notes it does not guide article content). Furthermore, notability only guides topics, not articles. That still means that lists should be present to support notable if they themselves are not notable, and not simply indiscriminate inclusion. --MASEM (t) 02:25, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

I am not arguing for stand-alone lists to contain OR, inverifiable or non-neutral information, or anything against policy. But this doesn't change the fact that lists are navigational aids, and we're not required that other similar navigational aids already exist elsewhere, as Gavin Collins seems to imply. --Cyclopia^talk 09:26, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

FYI, there is currently an RFC on the notability of lists at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Inclusion criteria for Lists. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 12:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

New type of list selection criteria

I would like to add additional type of list selection criteria. I want to add the text below as second in the list:

Every entry meets a threshold were there exist at least one source that confirms some level of notability. The threshold is lighter then notability criteria and the listed entries may not be entitled an own article in English Wikipedia.

I want to adapt this on List of participants of the Gaza flotilla. Text twaekings? comments? support? --Kslotte (talk) 10:28, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

I am punting for a requirement that all list entries be significant where that is defined by consensus by the list article editors. In many cases, significant will be defined to be notable which immediately takes care of navigation lists.

non-standalone lists, and this project page

Almost all the rules for lists should apply regardless of whether the list is stand-alone or in-article. The exceptions being how WP:N is incorporated, and the need for pre-amble. I propose (as a very long term proposal - and solely for debate at this time) that this article should be reworked into a guideline for lists generally, with a section (probably quite small) dealing with the specific concerns of stand-alone lists (aka list articles). ‒ Jaymax✍ 03:28, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Actually, having gotten myself confused between this article and it's more generically focused sibling, scratch that - it's more of a rebalancing I'm thinking of. ‒ Jaymax✍ 07:01, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Usability issues of Lead section

Input from a regular user of wikipedia about usability of these lists.

First, without wikipedia, life would suck, and finding entertaining entertainment downright medieval.

That said, I find the current iteration of TV episode lists to have decreased in usability.

My biggest complaint is that the lead sections are way too long. When I go to a page entitled "List of The Simpsons Episodes," I want to see a list of all Simpsons episodes, 'and nothing else.' I recognize that a brief statement regarding list organization may be appropriate, but I find it frustrating to have to scroll below the fold to find contents (my display resolution is 1280 x 800).

I remember a time when there was scarcely a paragraph in front of the contents, and those were, in fact, better old days.

$0.02, Ericfive (talk) 02:24, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

All lists are also articles, and all articles must include a WP:LEAD section that introduces the article and summarises itsmost important aspects. As that page says (emphasis added by myself)

The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article. It should define the topic, establish context, explain why the subject is interesting or notable, and summarize the most important points—including any notable controversies.

This means that there shouldn't really be anything in the main body of the article that isn't mentioned even briefly in the Lede, and there shouldn't be anything in the Lede that isn't covered in further detail in the main body. Many articles and lists fail to do this correctly, but more so in the past than is current practice, in my experience.

I think a lede section of 2 to 3 paragraphs for a list of episodes is a decent size, and good practice. It's not desirable to go to such a page and see a list of episodes and nothing else. It sounds like the lists you go to are of TV shows you're already familiar with. Well that's fine, so you don't need to read the introduction, and just want to get into the nitty-gritty of the page. But what if another reader of the page clicked Special:Random or clicked the link from an external site, or clicks through from what would initially seem a totally unrelated article, and does not actually have any knowledge of the series in question? Rather than directing them away from the page to another, and another, and another, there is information to provide enough context that if they find this page interesting after they've read it, they can go to one of the other pages (main series, a season page, character list or character page). In no way is it better to have no information on a page other than a table.

If the lede is so undesirable to you, is it really that hard to press the "PG DN" button on your keyboard, scroll the wheel on your mouse, or just click on the first section in the contents box? Matthewedwards :  Chat  04:38, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Sectional List Anchors Merely Geeky Usability Issue

It's been a while since I was an HTML developer so forgive me if I forget my terminology.

Used to be that lists that were separated into anchored sections had the convention of ~/List_of_x#sensible_name.

Now it appears to be, at least for TV episodes (my main exposure to Lists), ~/List_of_TV_Show_Episodes#Season_2:year1.i.don't.know.what.this.info.is.year2.

The problem is, I cannot type the URL for one show, then just change the show name and season number.

To make matters worse, the scheme used for those inner numbers is not documented anywhere I can find, so I can't even easily adapt.

Now, there may be a good reason for the new change, but in terms of usability for this merely geeky dude, it's not a helpful change.

$0.025, Ericfive (talk) 02:35, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

I used to spend a lot of time going around and removing the 2002–2003 part of ~/List_of_TV_Show_Episodes#Season_2 url. There's no need for it. The tables say what dates the episodes aired, as well as the oft-used Series overview section. It's also the stylistic choice of Wikipedia:WikiProject Television not to include the date ranges in the headings. It appears that I might have to go around and remove them again. FWIW, I don't recall seeing any Featured list episodes lists with the date ranges. Matthewedwards :  Chat  04:22, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Reverted undiscussed guideline status change

I have reverted this edit [3] by User:DCGeist from May 26, 2010 which resulted in an undiscussed change of this longstanding style guideline into a content guideline. Based on the edit summary, as well as this discussion I think this may have been an inadvertent mistake while attempting to rename this style guideline [4] with even the {{List navbox}} navigation template still linking to this page as a "style guideline". The relabeling this "style guideline" as a "content guideline" has resulted in this style guideline being misused as a reason to remove content from articles, directly conflicting with the WP:NNC section of the Notability guideline itself. --Tothwolf (talk) 08:54, 12 October 2010 (UTC)