Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

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The policy section of the village pump is used to discuss existing and proposed policies and guidelines.
If you want to propose something new other than a policy or guideline, use the proposals section.

Please see this FAQ page for a list of frequent proposals and the responses to them.

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Proposed change to banning policy

I have just noticed a puzzling formulation in Wikipedia:Banning policy, one that (I checked) was introduced in the very first version of the policy, few years back - but one that also seems contrary to our goal of building an encyclopedia. The formulation is: Any edits made in defiance of a ban may be reverted to enforce the ban, regardless of the merits of the edits themselves. In other words, this can be used (and I have seen this used in such a way) to justify reverting completly innocent edits such as Manual of Style changes (typo fixes, punctuation), addition of interlinks, or fixing of obvious errors. I think it is common sense that non controversial, innocent edits by banned editors should not be reverted just because they were carried out by a banned editor (or usually a suspected or confirmed sock of one). Of course, just be clear, if such a sock makes controversial edits, they should be reverted immediately and the block extended. But the idea that we should put enforcing our bans to the letter over the spirit of building an encyclopedia is just plain wrong. Feel free to comment at the policy talk page.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 12:15, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

I have changed the above heading from blocking to banning, because this is what it is about. The two terms are not synonymous. Waltham, The Duke of 20:13, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

They may be reverted, it doesn't force anyone to perform those reversions, it could be a bit clearer on that --Enric Naval (talk) 18:19, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Piotrus. What troubles me about this section is that I've seen people who believe that all edits by a sock of a banned user should be reverted immediately, as it is too much trouble to check and see which edits are good and which are bad. This is not a constructive activity. I've even seen an instance where a perfectly acceptable article was deleted, after multiple edits by other editors were made, because the originating author was a sock. This in particular is indefensible and unjustifiable. If someone is too lazy to actually look at edits before reverting/deleting them, than find someone who isn't. Due to the wording of the policy, the people doing this are fully within their rights, and I simply do not agree that this should be universally permissible, let alone encouraged. I will admit that this is sometimes necessary, in situations where a large number of edits were made, and there is little chance, due to the nature of the sock, that there were any good edits. However, in many cases the application of blanket reversion is extreme, and it is an activity with the potential for mass disruption, not to mention unnecessary duplication of effort. In my view if an edit is good, who made it is utterly immaterial. The purpose of banning, in my interpretation, is to relieve the Wikipedia community of an editor whose editing, for whatever reason, has been determined to be a consistent net negative to the extent that there is no logical purpose for allowing their continued participation in the project. If they edit constructively while banned, reversion of those edits to "enforce" the ban is a net negative, and is thus utterly at odds for the original reason for banning them.--Dycedarg ж 21:01, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

I realize it's being a bit dickish to the banned user to revert even their innocent, good-faith changes, but this rule was created because some banned users were continuing to edit anyway, and after a certain point, we just have to give them the cold shoulder. Allowing those changes to stick gives them the satisfaction they need to continue editing, and they really aren't supposed to continue. Users are not banned lightly, and they aren't banned in ignorance of that rule, but rather with a clear awareness of it. Mangojuice^talk 15:55, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Banned means banned. Not "banned when you are not nice". Everything by banned users should go. Dsmdgold (talk) 19:20, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

One reason – not the only one – why such reversions are permitted by the banning policy is that in some cases the banned editor will continue to make superficially constructive edits as part of a pattern of stalking or harrassment. Continuing to conspicuously edit pages that are watched by a former adversary can be a way to stir the pot even after a ban—particularly if well-meaning editors jump in with 'Why are you reverting those apparently-reasonable minor edits?'. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 19:29, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Banning means the person is not welcome to edit here, so the rules makes a lot of sense to me. _{1 != 2} 19:52, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

As we're here to write an encyclopedia, an edit that advances the encyclopedia should stay, regardless of who makes it. A good quality edit by VoB should be kept in preference to a poor quality edit from me, for example. If not, then we're asserting that some other consideration should come ahead of writing the encyclopedia. --SSBohio 03:33, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I couldn't put it better myself. If it serves the interests of the encyclopedia, then it doesn't matter who made it. It improves the project; in my opinion, reverting a good edit is a much more serious offense than breaking a ban to make a good-faith edit that isn't controversial or otherwise in obvious bad faith. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 03:56, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Reverting the edits of the banned user doesn't bother me, but insisting that nobody else is even allowed to re-make the same edits if that other (non-banned) user finds them worthwhile, as is sometimes loudly argued (complete with threats of blocks against that latter user) does. *Dan T.* (talk) 04:07, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

The point of the policy, as I understand it, is basically an extension of WP:Deny recognition. If they think they can contribute, they may think they're pulling their weight and should be allowed to stay or they may think they can get the last word in indirectly through another editor or otherwise disrupt the project. Repeating the edit may be tossing them a bone instead of a steak dinner, but it's still feeding a troll.Somedumbyankee (talk) 04:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

So, someone on some kind of ban reverts libel on a BLP subject, someone else restores it with an "OH NOES TEH BANNED UZER" edit summary, and we leave it there? Placing our community problems above furthering project seems kind of backwards to me. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 04:20, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

The policy addresses that specific issue: "When reverting edits, care should be taken not to reinstate material that may be in violation of core policies such as Neutrality, Verifiability, and Biographies of Living Persons." As for backwards, without the community, there is no project. The vicious circle adds that without the project, there is no community. There has to be some sort of balance, and shunning and denying any access to banned users conserves the community at an acceptable loss to the project.Somedumbyankee (talk) 05:11, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Of course there's a project without the community. If we shut down editing tommorow and made wikipedia read-only it would continue to be a useful resource for years to come. The same cannot be said the other way around.--Phoenix-wiki 19:38, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Rollback for stewards

Hi, I am a steward and I am taking care about some articles on en.wp. As a steward, I am admin on every project. Besides privileges in which I am not interested at en.wp (blocking user, deleting and undeleting pages...), I've got "rollback" button. My question is: may I use it? It would help me in keeping consistent articles about I am taking care. --millosh (talk (meta:)) 08:03, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

I see no reason why not. : - ) --MZMcBride (talk) 08:08, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Definitely read Wikipedia:Rollback feature if you haven't already--people here feel very strongly that rollback should only be used to revert vandalism or your own edits. Darkspots (talk) 13:33, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely, though I'd expect you to only be using it for vandalism cleanup. EVula // talk // ☯ // 13:36, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Of course, it is only about vandalism cleanup. For a long time my contribution to en.wp is related just to taking care about a small group of articles for which I suppose that no one else takes care. In my feed reader I usually see bot edits, nonsenses and vandalisms. At the contrast, I am taking care about Template:Case table, where I have to check every addition of the new case or "case"; and if it is not a grammatical case, I am always giving rationale on talk page. --millosh (talk (meta:)) 08:43, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for trust. --millosh (talk (meta:)) 08:43, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

I have, actually, already made two rollback edits (I'm a steward as well) in response to vandalism-en emails on OTRS. I assumed there would be no problems if I used the tool only in clear vandalism cases. :) --Filip (§) 09:37, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Same for me. If there are no objections I would use it to revert vandalism that I come across. Thanks, --Thogo (Talk) 12:37, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Especially considering we're handing out the rollback right like candy to most users who have need/want of it, that sounds quite acceptable to me. If any of you stewards would prefer to avoid using it "as an admin," I suppose you could explicitly get your account flagged for rollback via Wikipedia:Rollback feature#How to apply for rollback. – Luna Santin (talk) 22:57, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Given the level of trust it takes to be a steward, I would have no issue handing out local rollback to them, with my nice notification message to only use it on vandalism. MBisanz ^talk 04:25, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

A new site idea

There are so many people complaining about the no original research rule or about no forum or other things. Why dont somebody makes a mirror of wikipedia where all those things will be allowed?

When deleting a post you could say: go on wikimirror and post it there.

You will make free publicity this way.

How about this business idea?

How about somebody do it? Or even wikipedia do it? Raffethefirst (talk) 10:43, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

I guess the answer is, we are interested in building an encyclopedia, and don't have time to create a companion site that provides other services that many websites already provide. We could pick one other site with forums, etc., and direct everyone there, but that wouldn't be fair to all the other websites. I don't see how sending people to other sites gains us publicity. I presume you are aware that there are many mirror sites of Wikipedia, and also many sites that use the Wiki software (and therefore can look and work the same way) but have completely different content and rules. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 13:52, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

when I said you will make free publicity I mean you will do it for that site.

wikipedia should do it - it will have the advantage of the wikipedia brand and it should be done with commercials or something. It wont be an encyclopedia but an alternative for lot of people.

directing all unhappy users to a single place will be much nicer than saying you search the net there are lot of solutions for what you want to say.

Saying: go there. is a wikipedia where you can do that, will sound very good.

Users will be happy, wikipedia will be happy.Raffethefirst (talk) 15:12, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

You might want to read Wikipedia:Alternative outlets, where we often point people to. Regarding whether such an "alternative project" should be run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who runs Wikipedia and owns the "brand"), I think you'd have to ask them directly. --B. Wolterding (talk) 15:55, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

If I want to read Alternative outlets?
when a new user cames in, he usually wants to add personal research and such things. They dont know about Alternative outlets.
I am an casual wikipedia user for... few months and this is first time I hear this. And it is discouraging when your newly created page is deleted and you are (if) told that there are alternatives... if you will be provided a link or - better - your page will be just moved to this section, you will be very happy. First you wont know what has happen then in a week or two you will understand.
I dont spent much time here but I am sure wikipedia will be everything you want if such a place will exist.
Why not wikipedia be more than an encyclopedia? If people want more, why not to give them. This is an opportunity in the market.
You - the old one here - think about this and do what you have to do to ensure this if you find it a good thing. Raffethefirst (talk) 16:41, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Because we aren't here to give them more. We're here to provide people with an encyclopedia. If you're looking for someone to publish your research, you're in the wrong place, because that isn't what Wikipedia is about. Everything here has to be verifiable in secondary, reliable sources. One of the foundational ideas of the project is that anyone can edit it. Allowing original research woulr equire us to only expert users with credentials to edit; after all, for obvious reasons, we can't just some guy's essay, since it could be vastly incorrect, and only someone else familiar with the subject material is able to point that out. Everything has to be verifiable, and original research doesn't allow that. Otherwise we would just become a rumor mill with nothing useful. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 20:01, 30 May 2008 (UTC)9

Indeed, there are thousands of scientific articles where you can publish original research, free of charge; if the quality of your aruments is of sufficient value. If you want to publish original research, try there. Arnoutf (talk) 20:24, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia should continue to be what it is. No changes here. Is good how it is now.
Is just that there is a demand for something else.
Wikipedia should make a brother site where to redirect all unhappy users - making them happy and also becoming more popular.
Yahoo is a mail provider but is also a search tool. Everybody is expanding and diversifying where there is a market. There is such a NONO in the atmosphere in wikipedia... I think I will leave now. is making me sick. Raffethefirst (talk) 20:22, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Making users happy is not necessarily Wikipedias aim. (btw Yahoo is a search engine which has diversified into the e-mail business). Not everybody is diversifying where there is a market regardless of principle... First of all there are nowadays things like corporate responsibily limiting companies to expand into e.g. weapons, or unethical trade; secondly most companies do a SWOT analysis and only diversify based on that. Original research is not a strength of Wikipedia, so no reason to go there. Innovations for OR have been forthcoming, e.g. as Plos. Arnoutf (talk) 20:28, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

This is a solution to transform the NONO atmosphere int a YESYES_WELCOME atmosphere and also increase wikipedias users and whatever advantages they might get. And sure there are advantages if the users are happy. I came here so rarely because the conversations here make me run and only came back after a long brake.
And is not only about original research. Think at all the reasons why you delete pages. Users are making pages for their business - this I imagine - and there are also lot of other reasons that makes users unhappy.
Wikipedia should allow all this under a separate site but put some small links in pages where those are connected like in philosophy page to have a link to the other site where are listed all original research in philosophy. Also users should be allowed to have more liberty in building their own userpages - in this new site. I think this will be used by lot of people because of the ease and complexity of self design that is possible.

In wikipedia is a war now: the guardians that will delete everything that dont respect the rules [you are so sad people... :)...] and the hordes of freestylers users that are keen for freedom... You will solve this war implementing this new site - area or whatever you want to call it.Raffethefirst (talk) 14:37, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

By now you understand that there are other appropriate sites on the internet, and yes, we do refer users to those sites sometimes. Your remaining argument is that Wikipedia should be running such an alternate site. But why? That's not what we're here for. Let it be done by people who are keen and dedicated to that idea. As for complaining "the guardians will delete everything that doesn't respect the rules", take a look at any message board that is not monitored (i.e. it has been abandoned by the people who set it up). It decays until it contains nothing but spam for porn sites! So of course any website with an aim, has to be maintained to keep it on track. --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 16:06, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

> But why?
Because users will be happy and therefore wikipedia will be more happy.
3 times already said.
> That's not what we're here for.
Who are "we"? You mean you - the guardians? Wikipedia will still be the same so you will still have plenty of things to delete - dont worry.
I am talking about a different site. DIFFERENT
I dont know why I insist into this problem since I only get NONO_CANTDO. I think I wont argue you guys until got a positive response :). Raffethefirst (talk) 16:20, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

But you are right: I should have talked from the beginning with the ones that own the site - the foundation... I will address them. I hoped you will see the opportunity to solve much of your problems and do it yourself and spare me of doing it... but you - NONO_CANTDO... Raffethefirst (talk) 16:29, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

So, because the volunteers who maintain Wikipedia won't help you set up a site that has nothing to do with the goals of Wikipedia but nevertheless will enjoy the reputation and prestige of being associated with it, you are entitled to accuse those volunteers of being negative, sad little people that make you sick? Gee, thanks! Darkspots (talk) 16:43, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

> won't help you set up a site
me? help me to setup a site? It was an idea to improve the quality of life on wikipedia for all users new or volunteers.
> that has nothing to do with the goals of Wikipedia
what is so bad in extending an encyclopedia into something else? And it wont affect it at all as an encyclopedia. Different name, different look... It only has to be connected by a small link in all pages giving thus more options and informations. And all pages that fit that place should be send there or told to be moved there - not DELETED.
Yes I accuse you because you did not understand that this is not for me as I understand it from your tone. This is an improvement suggestion to witch you only could say: you must read chapter 17 rule 12. NOT ALLOWED. Please follow the rules.
Which of you did provided an argument that this is a bad idea? Lets see:
- we are interested in building an encyclopedia - translation : I did not understand that the encyclopedia wont change at all by doing this but we must follow the rules
- You might want to read Wikipedia:Alternative outlets, where we often point people to. - translation: I have no arguments but we have rules that you should read first.
- Because we aren't here to give them more - translation: why not letting them feel miserable when we delete their pages?
- If you're looking for someone to publish your research, you're in the wrong place, because that isn't what Wikipedia is about. - translation: If you want to put here some original research you will have to deal with me.
- and so on.
NOT 1 argument why not. The idea is how you dont have to worry about original research. But you did not even get that through you mind entirely. "What? somebody said original research? let me handle it." So I guess is my imagination that you are negative and sad people. And the part when you make me sick is just my stomach that cant take too much NONO for free. Please ignore that. Raffethefirst (talk) 17:10, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

I like the original poster's idea. I will now leave and ponder the exact reasons why and come back later tonight and expound on it. Thanks all, JeanLatore (talk) 17:16, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Can somebody tell me how can I address the Founders or the Foundation to tell them about this idea? I should make a new thread in foundation page? Or an email or something else? Raffethefirst (talk) 17:29, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

[1] x42bn6 Talk Mess 17:46, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Raffethefirst (talk) 17:48, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

It is extremely difficult to pull a coherent point out of your prose. What you really fail to realize is that people volunteer their time here to create en encyclopedia because they want to see an encyclopedia get paid. As editors here, we don't get paid money for what we do. If you were to install MediaWiki on some other webserver and say "This is just like Wikipedia except we allow anything", you're perfectly free to. Nothing is going to stop you. But most of the people here aren't going to help you because that's not what most of us want to volunteer our time to. As a community, we've decided that we don't want OR here, and everything has to be verifiable in reliable sources. I certainly wouldn't want to contribute time to improving an encyclopedia where some random Joe's opinion about quantum mechanics gets the same level of attention as Schrodinger. As nice as it would be to not have to worry about OR, I just don't think its feasible to get people to go there from here. In fact, personally, I think we need more verfiability in general, not less, so it is very unlikely for me to go there and contribute. Basically, all you would have there are the OR and POV pushers, and you'll end up with a lot of needless drama and POV/edit wars. It's really doomed from the start, and I really don't think that the Foundation is going to be interested in providing hosting for your project, but the contact information you seek can be found here. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 17:51, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Why I put this initiative here? I imagined (dont know why as I had some previous unpleasant experiences) that it will find supporters and they will take care of it like improving it and informing the responsible people...
I agree that my ideas were not very coherent as they came on the way.
Let me sumarise them.
- a different site. (this mean that what current volunteers do wont be changed at all)
- where users could do pages that will be allowed to include almost all that they want (no porn or horrible things.)
- They could have pages with their theories here.
- pages about themselfs where they could put pictures with their family or things that they like, songs, videos and be able to arrange those as they want.
- pages where they could advertise their little companies
- those pages should be somehow connected to the relevant wikipedia pages. by very small links maybe. Thus Joe wont wont get the same level of attention as Schrodinger. If somebody will like to see (amuse) the original research thories that exist in one domain they will click that little link. And I am sure there will also be some good stuff.

Maybe somebody else will dare to think at some other things here?

Advantages:
- all pages that usually are deleted will be moved or directed there. thus users will be happy and wont feel that they had a bad experience while trying to contribute to wikipedia.
- the administrators wont have so much work as users will agree more easily to have their page moved to another section of wikipedia in stead of being deleted or they will do it themselfs from the begining.
- the enciclopedia will remain the same and there will be more happy users that will join and contribute to it.
- the number of users will drastically increase and I am sure this is something the founders want.

Disadvantages: I cant figure one.

Please take this idea and analise it slow... slow... maybe you will find something usefull in it.Raffethefirst (talk) 18:23, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Do you want to host this yourself? If not, and you want the Foundation to pick up the bill, there's an obvious financial disadvantage. You'll also be competing with other, similar, more accepted and more widely used projects and initiatives that do similar things (Wikinfo, PLOS, etc) to what you describe. If you're going to do it as a wiki, you'll have to find people to contribute if you want it to do anything. That means publicity, advertising, etc. It also means establishing policy for the wiki and possible legal representation/advicey for when the articles with libel and defamation get moved to your site. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 18:39, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

If you plan on copying content from Wikipedia, there are also licensing considerations. The GFDL requires that you retain the names of the top 5 contributors at the very least, so simply copying the text out of the current revision doesn't work; you'll have to get database dumps for the content if you want to move it to another wiki, and that's a performance disadvantage for us here. Some editors dual-license with a Creative Commons license, so you'll also have master what that means in terms of copying and re-use of their content. It also means that you have to check every principal contributor of the article you want to copy to find out whether or not this is something you need to pay attention to. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 18:39, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Me and my friend had an idea like yours, actually, a mirror of wikipeodia but with more focus on sex and pornography, and greater coverage of U.S. Census-designated places that are more like a town than a neighbourhood. Our policies would be the same, except it would take two admins to block a user, IPs could edit freely, and the "no personal attacks" would be loosened, and the "no legal threats" policy done away with entirely. Let people bluster all they want, but the proof is in the summons and complaint. JeanLatore (talk) 00:12, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I personally dont agree having pornography on wikipedia or in any related sites (related by brand). My proposal is to extend somehow what is wikipedia but to keep it nice. I answered to you so my idea dont be confused.
Having sex, drugs and party might be great but I am talking about something constructive here - or at least this is how I see it. Raffethefirst (talk) 05:54, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

So - thanks but NOCANTDO :). This is just my personal answer - is not an answer citing the wikipedia rules. Raffethefirst (talk) 05:57, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I have mail them and who will guess what was the answer?
"all changes to the way Wikipedia works come from its community of editors."
How about this? So I was right to came and tell you about this idea. You are the one that must do it.
But I guess with your negativism the project has no chances - right?
The only serious counter argument was who will pay for it. Why do you care? They said that if you want something to be changed - they will do it.
So please thing again at advantages and disavantages - viewed from your place as editors. Raffethefirst (talk) 06:09, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

The reason people use Wikipedia as an information source is that it is (at least somewhat) reliable. Nobody would use this thing you describe. Ilkali (talk) 06:28, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree that it wont be a place where people will go to search informations.

But is not this the main goal. The main goal is not to have (so many) unhappy users on one side and stress and lot of work as a volunteer - the other side.

And I am sure we will discover many useful things inside.

Now lets establish first if what I consider is true:

are there lot of users that are unhappy and is the job as a volunteer hard and stressful because the users being unhappy try to revenge somehow? Raffethefirst (talk) 07:12, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I think I notice two issues emerging here.

• You are advocating another version of wikipedia that allows editors to contribute more freely than Wikipedia. I think all contributors to this debate think there is no problem, but seriously doubt whether it should be Wikipedia foundation who hosts that site
• You say more freedom would make editors less stressed and more happy with such a project. Nevertheless you do not advocate complete freedom (e.g. limiting pornography). In my opinion such limitation will always create unhappy editors, and limiting that will ask for a well balanced set of inclusion/exclusion criteria, and a body of editors who check against these limits. Setting that limit will always be somewhat arbitrary.

Wikipedia does this using several guidelines that try to achieve balance in the project. Not only the original research but also the notability (the major filter against spam and personal interest edits overwhelming the project), neutral point of view (an edit needs to address the issue from as neutral a point of view as possible) and censorship (this is actually a guideline protecting editors from the whims of other editors (as long as something is notable, no original research and does not violate a neutral point of view - I agree strong conditions) edits cannot be removed because of dislike of other editors). Arnoutf (talk) 09:53, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Hey, man, Arnoutf, I like your comment! I think I totally understand what those points are, finally... (oh and I'm high as hell right now), but anyway, I would just like to add that NPOV applies to Article Creation as well, and can be used as a basis to delete an entire article, not just a non-neutral edit in an existing article. That is because some topics are inherently NPOV and thus even constructive edits to them are tainted. (attack articles, et al.) Plus, i am having a hard time taking the OP seriously. JeanLatore (talk) 15:34, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

One more thing to mention is our guideline about biographies of living people. Careful enforcement of BLP issues is necessary to avoid a ton of legal liability--as well as embarassing and annoying a lot of people--and I seriously doubt a site more casual about BLP would be of any interest to the foundation. Darkspots (talk) 11:18, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

If people don't use it to find information, there'll be no incentive for people to post information there. Nobody would use the thing. Ilkali (talk) 11:09, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

> "but seriously doubt whether it should be Wikipedia foundation who hosts that site".
What is the reason for that?
Here is the reason why it should be:
There are lot of other alternatives but the users dont want them. they want to be part of wikipedia. And it will also be good for wikipedia to have as an encyclopedia links from its pages to the original research area. It will be very constructive I think. It will be a respectable encyclopedia but closer to the people. Having a link to this area wont decrease the respect that now exists.
> "You say more freedom would make editors less stressed and more happy with such a project"
Having this new site will make the existing wikipedia editors much happier.
I did not imagined what will be the situation of the editors of the other site...
You see - this idea is just getting shape for me also. I am especting help to build this idea.

Main idea is to allow pages with almost everything, pages with original research, pages with companies, pages with song formations and what ever else users do and you delete them.

But not on wikipedia - but somewhere else.
But not to far away from wikipedia so the users dont feel they are being fooled.
There must be connections between those two. You as editors here will direct all appropriate content there and will exist links in pages from here to there so an original research page to be in a very small degree connected to its main article in wikipedia.

This is how you solve much of this problem - unhappy users and busy wikipedia editors.
This will produce a growing number of active users also.

Now - how is this going to take shape - how this nea site should be organised, about editors and stuff I dont have many ideas. You should give it a try and think about it as you are more experimented into those.

> "If people don't use it to find information, there'll be no incentive for people to post information there"
You are wrong. This will give them hope and will be something more nice than having their ideas deleted. You say to them: we have this area where you can post original research and it will be connected to the main article. We respect your opinions and they wont be deleted.
They will be very happy with theat. Raffethefirst (talk) 11:16, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

> "I seriously doubt a site more casual about BLP would be of any interest to the foundation."
I agree on this.
How about users be allowed to make only pages about things they own?
Not allowed to make pages like : "My opinion on Bush".
But allowed to make pages like: "My theory", "My personal page", "My business", "MY...".
There will be dummies - empty pages or just title of pages - of all wikipedia pages and they will have the possibility to link their pages to those.
Internally all the pages from this new site will be displayed on a new page (X).
And in philosophy area of wikipedia should be this small link to this (X) page with all the links. Raffethefirst (talk) 11:33, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

A few comments

> "There are lot of other alternatives but the users dont want them. they want to be part of wikipedia." - Well there are a lot of alternatives for me engaging in sports. But I don't want them as I want to be part of my national Olympic team...... That is of course MY problem, not of my national Olympic team. You just can't always get what you want.

> "And it will also be good for wikipedia to have as an encyclopedia links from its pages to the original research area." Why would that be good for Wikipedia. Original research without any quality check would allow all kinds of fringe theories being posted. I truly do not see how Wikipedia can benefit from that.

> "It will be a respectable encyclopedia but closer to the people." Again, without strict quality control that respectibality cannot be taken for granted; neither can it be enforced. Putting strict quality control into place means removal of lots of stuff, ie this is what the current Wikipedia does. Anyway an encyclopedia closer to the people is not necessarily a good thing as such an encyclopedia would be filled with "everybody knows", "I learned this from a men in a bar", facts and other strongly sourced information.

>"You as editors here will direct all appropriate content there and will exist links in pages from here to there so an original research page to be in a very small degree connected to its main article in wikipedia." and then "and busy wikipedia editors". First of all, the use of "will" sound like an obligation to current editors to move the content. Moving content will always be more work compared to deletion, so setting up a guideline for content moving will only result in more busy editors; and will increase one of the problem you observe. As this side-project will not be the aim of most frequent editors; I think that idea is not realistic. Arnoutf (talk) 12:19, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

> "You just can't always get what you want"
Is not about making them a gift - is about solving a problem. they will be happy and thus wikipedia will be happy.
> "Original research without any quality check would allow all kinds of fringe theories being posted. I truly do not see how Wikipedia can benefit from that."
Well - look in my user page. I have some ai projects listed.
If in wikipedia main article of ai porjects will be this small link to original research there will be MUCH MORE of what I got in my list.
If you will take the time to look at the items in my list you will find very interesting projects taht are running and will help people (not all of course but some).
This small link will not affect the existing wikipedia. You will stil have your standards here. Or even better as you will have more time to do useful things.
When clicking this link you will be presented an disclaimer saying that the information that are posted here are "not notable" or "original research" and is the users choice to view them.
> "Moving content will always be more work compared to deletion"
I dont think so. It could be the same procedure. You apply a flag on the db to an page and a cron will move it to the other DB.
How you delete it the same will be to move it. Or you could continue with the deletion policy and present the user the choice to move himself to the other site.
> "I think that idea is not realistic"
What would have you said if somebody would have presented you the present wikipedia project? Raffethefirst (talk) 13:42, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Re solving problem - What is the problem exactly? Unhappy editors leave or conform to project standards. Either way, problem solved.

Re Original research. I am pretty sure your page does not list "random bits" of ideas from unqualified people. So some level of quality control needs to be enforced there as well. How will that be organised (WP Original research is an obvious, and objective way)

Re more work: I really do not see how moving could be not more work/simpler than the following: Opening edit view on a page. Selecting the text that does not qualify to Wiki standards. Push delete button on your keyboard. Type in a summary like "remove OR". Push "Save page" button. Perhaps you can elaborate on that.

Re "not realistic". You have interpreted that out of context. I do not say your project is not realistic. I only say that involving Wikipedia editors who do not care about the side project to engage in moving actions is not realistic. Arnoutf (talk) 14:06, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

> "What is the problem exactly?"
unhappy USERS that are not contributing to wikipedia because they feel miserably when their pages are deleted. They also do things to revenge (I imagine this) and keep the editors busy.
> "So some level of quality control needs to be enforced there as well."
Negative on that :). All what they want to say in their pages is allowed on the subject as long is not offensive.
If one will say that "I think I made a robot from 2 coins that is thinking", he should be allowed.
When clicking on the link from wikipedia ai page to this area you will be presented all the links to all the pages that users build as original research and they connected to wikipedia ai.
There will be categories in this list like... hm... the users will vote marks to those articles and so they will fit into one category or another. Or just listed in other order... or we will find a criteria to sort somehow the links.
This is important if you want to amuse yourself or to see something serious without having to guess.
Those questions will be answered by making annalise's... asking people... I am sure we will find a way to this.
> Re more work:
What you have described dont apply to this idea. This only works on full pages. You put a message on a page that if the content wont change, it will be moved to the other section.
For text inside articles just use delete as before.
> Re "not realistic".
I dont know the numbers of pages deleted. This mean unhappy users.
I dont know how much of the all unhappy users will be made happy by this project.
If this is an important percent it will be a good thing to do and the editors will have to "leave or conform to project standards" to quote you on that.
You can imagine the conflicts you have now will be diminished with that percent of unhappy users that transform themself into happy users. Raffethefirst (talk) 14:54, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I disagree:

• We do not need edits from editors who are unhappy to conform to the rules, so only happy they are out. Vandals are dealt with on a daily basis by using rollback functions. Disappointed editors are likely only small part of all vandalism.
• Assuming you operation would be a success. How would someone going to your site on a heavily debated issue like say "creationism" makes sense of the several thousands of opinions there? Data wihout management is not information; and this will be a major challenge for your project.
• Ok for full pages something maybe possible (through automated bots). However, your claim is that you don't want unhappy editors. In my experience editors are very often very unhappy if sections are removed from existing articles. Actually most edit wars-page protection and editors being punished are the result of such "in article" deletion and not of the article for deletion procedure, which is transparent, clear and obvious in its effect. So in my opinion your proposal only covers one source of unhappiness, and in my opinion a minor source. I think limiting to full-pages goes against your main aim, allowing editors to place stuff not allowed on Wikipedia elsewhere. But that is an issue for the spin-off project to consider.

In brief, I do not think your project will fly. Of course you are welcome to try; but am not convinced this should through a formal combination with Wikipedia. Arnoutf (talk) 15:12, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I went into this quest assuming that most of the trouble or a big part are made by users that had pages deleted and they want to revenge. I thought there might be a reason for vandalism.
I think here should be done some researches and if what I think is true then this kind of project might be a solution.
> "and this will be a major challenge for your project" a challenge indeed - but nothing more.
"in article" wars could also have as a partial solution this site.
When you delete a part of an article that view disappear and only the enemy's one is visible. This sure is a reason for war. But if you will say: you might be right, but the majority has the other opinion. We will keep here the majority opinion bat you are free to add this section to the other site. Thus they will be presented with an option. An option is much better than no option. Raffethefirst (talk) 15:34, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

All those I have said are only valid in a combination with wikipedia because as I said before there are alternatives but they want to be here not there. This site must be somehow closer to wikipedia that the other ones. Raffethefirst (talk) 15:34, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I was impressed by the length of this thread until I realised that most of it is the OP's lengthy replies to various comments, not the comments themselves. In any case my stance has switched to mild oppose, and I have one next question for the OP: What are the technical and logistical requirements of this plan? JeanLatore (talk) 15:56, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

The only time anything is oversighted (i.e, other people can't see it) is when it is libel or otherwise could cause legal issues for the Foundation. Everything else is easy to get a hold of, especially if we're talking about revisions to an article rather than outright deletion. With regards to that, stuff that is deleted here isn't deleted because a minority viewpoint. Stuff is deleted here because it isn't notable or verifiable. That's really all it boils down to. It has nothing to do with majority / minority opinions. It has to do with "Can we be sure that this is true, or at least can be verified by looking at some source somewhere?" Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 23:30, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Interesting question. I would say... 10 million $, a team of 100 programmers at minimum, 10 - 20 trucks of beer and one or 2 of whiskey... In 5 years I think is doable.

now seriously: how should I know to answer that? Raffethefirst (talk) 18:50, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Because you're the only one who is seriously advocating doing this. Our rules exist for a reason. Everyone has decided collectively that they want these rules to exist. By extension, editors who aren't willing to abide by the rules aren't particularly welcome; ones that shun them repeatedly are liable to get blocked and/or banned. It doesn't make much sense for Wikipedia editors who support the current set of rules (which is what the majority of the editors believe produces the best encyclopedia) to support some other project that allows rampant OR ("I build a robot out of two coins that is thinking" being allowed is an excellent example of that particular failure). It just doesn't make sense. Wikipedia supports verfiability above everything else. What you propose is throwing that out the window, stepping on it, and allowing anyone and everyone without any kind of editorial control to put whatever crackpot unverifiable fringe theories that they want to on. Having this atrocity of an encyclopedia linked to Wikipedia in any way, shape or form, is an absolutely terrible idea and will only damage what reputation we have. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 23:30, 1 June 2008 (UTC)`

Proposed Notability Guideline for Places and Transportation

There is a proposed guideline for assessing notability of places and transportation which hasn't yet (to my knowledge) been listed here to gather consensus. It has become clear that this guideline needs to be finalized soon, as it seems that User:FritzpollBot will not reach a consensus on whether to start adding stubs for all inhabited places in the world until that guideline is official. The discussion at WP:Village pump (proposals) is just going to go in circles until a community-wide consensus is reached on the guideline. I believe that this page is the correct forum for talking about the guideline. If I am wrong, please move my comments to the correct forum and let me know. Thank you.--Aervanath's signature is boring 20:18, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Had a quick look, and the proposed guideline is in its details (IMHO) too much US-specific for project wide application. So I would not support it as is. Arnoutf (talk) 20:33, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, any discussion here or at the proposed guideline page is likely to be superceded by the community discussion about FritzpollBot, anyway.--Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 12:20, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Sister sites for well-researched miscellany

A search for all Wikipedia entries containing "Enterprise episode" reveals a jumbled mess: a separate entry for nearly every episode of the TV show, inconsistently including (Enterprise episode) or a variation thereof for the sake of disambiguation -- perhaps extinction and Extinction (Star Trek: Enterprise) coexisting in the same directory space is indicative of a much larger problem. It's great that Wikipedia provides information like this in a convenient place, but when it goes against the site's own policies, and when a more specialized wiki exists just to cater to this topic, why not remove the offending sites from Wikipedia and redirect instead to the specialized wiki? --38.100.221.66 (talk) 22:15, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Because we can't be sure of the content or policies on those other specialized Wikis not controlled by the Wikimedia Foundation. For example, Memory Alpha (pretty much the accepted Wiki for ST content) could change its policies tomorrow to not allow edits from the outside, and then start changing crap randomly. Generally, in the case of television episodes, we provide an external link. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 23:38, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

With regards to the INDISCRIMINATE accusation, there's content guidelines for episodes at EPISODE. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 23:38, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

They don't violate Wikipedia's own policies. Wikipedia is not paper, articles should be verifiable, contain no original research, and be written from a neutral point of view. The phrase "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information" is not meant to be applied to any article you personally don't like. I'm sure Memory Alpha goes into more detail than Wikipedia, but how does Extinction (Star Trek: Enterprise) turn Wikipedia into a an "indiscriminate collection of information" but the extinction article does not? What were you looking for when you searched for "Enterprise episode"? --Pixelface (talk) 20:48, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Inconsistency with articles about retailers

I am somewhat confused as to what articles about retailers should be called on Wikipedia, and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (companies) didn't really answer my question, so I'll post it here.

Some retailers (e.g. Tesco) have only their names as their article titles, whereas others have various different things in brackets after their names (e.g. Iceland (supermarket) and Argos (retailer)). Shouldn't there only be one way of doing things, and do some of these articles need renaming? It Is Me Here (talk) 14:26, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

As for Tesco, it's best not to use any parenthetical if there is no other topic with the same title: obviously Iceland (supermarket) and Iceland are distinct topics. But for those with parentheticals, there is some value to having them be consistent if it's possible. I don't like (supermarket) as it's a bit too specific -- that could just be (store)... (retailer) could work, but something about calling a supermarket a "retailer" strikes me as wrong somehow. Mangojuice^talk 15:39, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Calling Tesco or Iceland a 'store' would violate WP:ENGVAR. Algebraist 22:52, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, a Tesco store would be a place where Tescos store things. DuncanHill (talk) 22:54, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I think that would be a Tesco warehouse. A Tesco store would be a place where Tescos are stored. Algebraist 22:57, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Isn't English fun? DuncanHill (talk) 23:07, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

As Mango mentioned, it's common practice to avoid parentheticals in article titles unless they're specifically needed. I also agree there's some advantage to uniformity, though. Seems "store" is out, but what about "retailer"? – Luna Santin (talk) 23:06, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

'Retailer' sounds reasonable. Any idea how much work this would entail? Algebraist 23:17, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

According to AWB, we have 582 pages in Category:Supermarkets by country, 79 of which have some parenthetical or other. A fair number of those parentheticals are a country name, a few are cities or state/provinces, but the majority look to be some variety of (store), (supermarket), (supermarket chain), and so on. – Luna Santin (talk) 03:23, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm with Mangojuice: calling a supermarket a "retailer" seems slightly wrong. I can't quite put my finger on it, but I think that in UK English "retailer" has some connotations that it might not have in US English. Bluap (talk) 12:39, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm surprised no-one's linked this, but the parentheticals are not actually meant to be taken as part of the actual title, but as a means of disambiguating them from other possible uses of the name - as mentioned above, there is already Iceland (the country) and Argos (the Greek city), but the majority of people who recognise the name "Tesco" would be thinking, first and foremost, of the chain of supermarkets, hence the lack of a parenthetical. Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 07:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

the "table of contents" of many articles break contents down into a single "part"

I learned in grammar school that one of the most basic rules of creating an outline is something like:

if you are going to create an indented sub-topic, you must create at least two sub-topics.

I think the idea is that in creating an indented sub-topic, you are breaking an idea into its component parts; but if a concept only has one part, then that part must be the whole concept. In that case, creating a sub-topic is misleading and not justified.

I think this is relevant in wikipedia because the tables of contents in many articles are in outline form, and so should follow the rules for outlining.

By the way, it bothers me that I have edited pages here on wikipedia at least twice in the past to make this suggestion and my edits were deleted. Please don't delete my request; instead justify your reasons for not implementing it if that is what you are going to do. What I would like to see is a generally available discusssion about this very non-trivial subject.

Please note that outlining is an important process: useful for organizing ideas before writing any complicated document, and probably useful for almost any planning. Wikipedia arguably is a very powerful standard setter, and as such may have a profound (in this case negative, I think) effect on the ability of many whom wikipedia influences to outline, write, think and plan.

Allow me to introduce an example below of what I mean:

From the "Quantum" article in wikipedia:

Contents [hide] 1 Development of quantum theory

    1.1 The quantum black-body radiation formula 

2 Beyond electromagnetic radiation

    2.1 The birthday of quantum mechanics 

3 See also 4 References 5 Notes

Above, "1 Development of quantum theory" is broken down (or outlined) into one component part. It seems to me that for this to adhere to the basic rule for outlining I am requesting that it must be either broken down into more than one part, or that "1.1 The quantum black-body radiation formula" should be "demoted" to a lower level, i.e. 1.1 would be demoted to replace "2 Beyond electromagnetic radiation" and "2 Beyond electromagnetic radiation" would be renumbered as "3 Beyond electromagnetic radiation" with remaining entries renumbered sequentially.

Another way of saying this is: Surely there is more than one part to item number 1 "the development of quantum theory"; if not, then I think "1.1 The quantum black-body radiation formula" should join the line above it or replace the line above it.

Summary: though it will be expensive in terms of person-hours, I think wikipedia should adopt a standard (which, considering wikipedia's considerable and growing influence will set a nearly universal standard) of not allowing solitary sub-topics in outlines (i.e. table of contents, etc). This would not be a new standard, it would merely be following long established rules of language (and thought).

69.225.94.162 (talk) 04:27, 3 June 2008 (UTC) Joe Cash email: joecash@sol.csustan.edu —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.225.94.162 (talk) 01:28, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree in principle, and if you want to make such edits, then please do so. In addition, you could find the WP page outlining the policy about headers — wherever it might exist — and present your idea as an edit to that page; then see if it flies. Sincerely, GeorgeLouis (talk) 07:25, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

• I agree, with one provision: sometimes a section will have a lead/introduction, and then a subsection. This mught be legitimate style, but still render a TOC as you described?  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 05:11, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Israeli News Agency

I wanted to add a link for a speech made by the Israeli prime minister, citing the Israeli News Agency, but the system said that particular source was "blacklisted." How can that be? How can a source be "blacklisted"? Questioningly, GeorgeLouis (talk) 07:22, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Assuming the url is israelnewsagency[dot]com, it's listed on the spam blacklist at meta (see m:Spam blacklist). The associated log entry mentions this request. – Luna Santin (talk) 10:06, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, that's a pretty damning indictment. Is there a page that gives the actual rules and regulations for putting a source on this list, or is each item handled more or less on a case by case basis? Sincerely, GeorgeLouis (talk) 20:29, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

A blacklisted link typically means that it's been inappropriately added to articles at an excessive rate (i.e. "spammed"), and someone's made a request to blacklist it to prevent further occurrences. You may want to request that just the link to the speech be added to MediaWiki:Spam-whitelist so you can use it in the article. Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 06:57, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Use of images in educational multimedia

Hi there, I create and deliver video conferences about palaeontology here at the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Canada. I would like to use some illustrations fromm Wikipedia pages, but I am unclear as to whether I need to aknowledge the creator of the image as part of the multimedia I am making and using. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.213.123.54 (talk) 15:52, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi; images on Wikipedia are supposed to conform to the image use policy, which -- apart from the odd "fair use" image, which is a special case people are always talking about -- should all be usable for such a purpose. If you look at the image's own page (e.g. Image:Bpi01.jpg or Image:Pohlsepia mazonensis.jpg, you can see commentary below on the copyright and licensing status of each one. Some are public-domain, some require attribution, and you might like to avoid the "fair use" ones altogether for safety's sake. :-) You might also like to browse through Wikimedia Commons for images. --_{tiny plastic} Grey Knight ⊖ 12:16, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Date links suck.

Hi,

I dislike date links. I think they should be excised from Wikipedia because they make articles harder to read.

I understand the main reason to keep them is to preserve autoformatting.

How would I propose that date links be invisible when reading the article? So a wikilink for 30 June 1944 would simply appear in the browser thus:

30 June 1944

Tempshill (talk) 18:03, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

P.S. I know date links in general are a longstanding point of contention and irritation. I just don't know where to make the proposal. Over at the Manual of Style (dates and numbers) link there's just a large intimidating longstanding flame war about something I don't even know what they're arguing about. Tempshill (talk) 18:07, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Would you like a javascript tool to make them invisible to you? — CharlotteWebb 18:15, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

I can't speak for Tempshill, but I believe he or she is asking for a change in policy whereby the links would not be visible to the researcher (most of our visitors). Perhaps the Javascript tool should instead make them VISIBLE. I agree that highlighting the dates in blue is really silly and makes WP look like a conclave of nerds rather than serious writers and editors. Sincerely, GeorgeLouis (talk) 20:34, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

You say "sincerely" as if I might otherwise doubt the sincerity of your comment . In any case I do not understand why a casual reader would consider blue, clickable links to June 4, 2008 any nerdier than blue, clickable links to any other topic. Sincerely. — CharlotteWebb 13:46, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree 99% that date links suck. However there are a few cases where they are useful to readers, e.g. in Guns, Germs, and Steel "trying into explain why, for example, in 1492 Eurasia was almost entirely populated by settled societies with governments, literacy, iron technology and standing armies while the other continents were almost entirely populated by stone age tribes of hunter-gatherers" provides an opportunity to remind readers of Columbus' voyage across the Atlantic, which effectively started modern European colonialism - which is very relevant to the theme of the book. I can also think of a few day-month dates that might usefully be wikilinked: 1 January, 1 April, 25 December, etc.

I think what's needed is:

• A flexible policy based on whether the value of a date is significant to the reader, which generally depends on the context.
• A mechanism for formatting dates (e.g. dd-mm-yyyy vs mm-dd-yyyy) without wikilinking. But IMO it must also be one that's easy for editors to use - unlike e.g. the requirement to use ISO format (yyyy-mm-dd) for accessdate in "cite web". That's a matter for the techies to resolve. Philcha (talk) 21:39, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

One thing that bugs me is overprecision about dates--which I think is related to the aesthetics of the blue date link. I have removed day or month information from dates to get rid of the wikilink--for example, who cares when in 1988 a particular book was released? I'd be very much in favor of a software solution to make date linking invisible. Darkspots (talk) 21:57, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

If we can verify the exact date of book publication (or any other event) the relevant articles should include the date in some form or fashion. The other obvious advantage of wiki-linking dates is that a list of referring pages makes it easier to add births, deaths, and other cataclysmic events to our day/month/year articles. I would support a "software solution" in the form of a "[x] Suppress links to day/month/year articles" (replacing them by "plain text") in Special:Preferences as long as it is unchecked (keeping status quo) by default. Failing that (I doubt the devs would consider this a high-priority issue — bigger fish to fry, you know...) I have offered to create a javascript tool to do pretty much the same thing, for users who do not wish to see (or, worse, accidentally click on) links to day/month/year articles. Blurring chronological information, i.e. changing a known and undisputed exact date to an approximate time-span (solely to avoid formatting it as a date), is disruptive and downright harmful. Please do not do this. — CharlotteWebb 13:46, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

When you have a series of events--let's say a list of novels written by an author in a biography of the author--and some of the dates have day, month, year, some have month, year, and some have only the year, that date link really stands out and looks ugly. I'm not talking about changing the date of a battle or an election from a day to a year. but in that list of books, making all the past dates have the same level of precision--like month, year--helps a lot. When reading a biography, do you really care on what date in May 1988, say, an author had a book published? Not really. You want to know the chronological order in which things happened, you want to know about what was happening in history at that moment. Now there are no doubt countless exceptions to this--Van Gogh scholars care deeply what happened on each date of the last years of his life, as a random example. In a more general way, if an author has multiple works published every month, obviously more specific dates would be in order. But unnecessary precision is no service to our readers. I wouldn't change a date just to get rid of a link, but it's definitely one of a lot of considerations. I try to edit in every situation with an eye to what's going to make the encyclopedia better. Darkspots (talk) 16:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I see what you mean but the exact date (if known) should at least be mentioned in the article about each book (if the article exists). If the article about the book doesn't exist yet (and we are unwilling to create it at the moment) but the exact date of publication is verifiable and undisputed, it should be mentioned somewhere in the list as the book title should probably redirect to the list (which may itself be a sub-section of the author's biography), and the list is a logical starting point for anyone aspiring to create articles about these particular books.

Of course this is something that applies broadly to all topics and types of verifiable information — somebody somewhere will be looking for it, so if we have it, it should be available without having to dig through old revisions.

Back on topic, I'm willing to acknowledge that there are several users who do not like to see links to day/month/year articles for whatever reason I will not speculate. But I would like to know whether they would prefer that any sort of automatic de-linking of dates is done only for themselves and others sharing this sentiment, or for everyone reading the content. I would be amenable only to the former option. — CharlotteWebb 17:07, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree that the articles for the books themselves should have the exact date, in this little example. Darkspots (talk) 17:11, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Could you add nowiki tags to the date to make it not get autoformatted? It seems to me these are more useful by default than not; in the instances where you just have a list of chronological events, you could put tags around it so it wouldn't get linked. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 16:32, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Or just not use any brackets, perhaps. — CharlotteWebb 17:07, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

There are quite a few users that are unhappy with:

• mandatory date links. This is due to a bad software design that combines two entirely independent functions: (a) hyperlinks to date articles; and (b) formatting of dates. The cure is worse than the disease. Very few people have the disease but we are all forced to take the medicine. If you want a plain date, just take the square brackets out.
• the use of the Manual of Style (dates and numbers) talk pages for a war over binary prefixes. The policy page is defunct because you cannot read it and assume that it is policy. The binary prefix warriors decided that policy pages can contain proposals.

I would recommend that you take this issue to Manual of Style (dates and numbers), but like you, I am avoiding it and regard it as unserviceable for those of us outside that would prefer to remain unaffected by that war. Lightmouse (talk) 16:50, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

• Yup, the autodud system certainly does suck. All of our attempts to get the developers at Bugzilla to decouple autoformatting from linking have met a dead end. Brion Viber there doesn't seem at all keen to push things forward, despite a petition I organised more than a year ago with nearly 90 WPian signatories (I'm quite sure I could raise many hundreds now). See HERE (Comment 35 ff.
• But the main point I have to make here is that autodud is not mandatory. See MOSNUM , which says "A combination of a day number and a month can be autoformatted by adding square brackets". I'm unsure how that can be contrued as compulsion. I encourage people not to use autodud at all. TONY (talk) 02:58, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for correcting my statement and pointing out the exact wording of the guideline. Links to dates are not mandatory. Lightmouse (talk) 09:07, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

But but by not linking, and in the current arrangement therefore disabling autoformatting, it gives the outward appearance of "This is the US Wikipedia. US date format rules!". Perhaps a Wikipedia International English Edition might solve it. I don't like being the doom monger, but its little things like this that I believe will eventually lead to a WP schism. There are international differences on date formats and it may have a massive amount of "I don't like it" in it but users should be able to come to Wikipedia and see something as simple as a date in the format that they want to see it in. A simple cookie and a some coding and people could have dates that are blue, black, pink or whatever colour they want and in the format that they want. The autolinking should be kept and should be mandatory but it should also have the ability for users to select the date appearance they want. It could even be made to work for IP users, with a splash screen allowing a user to set preferences (cookie) on their browser's first visit to WP and reading the preferences from the cookie on subsequent visits. I hope both sides of this debate can unite behind a common flag of getting a proper working solution implemented by the devs. - X201 (talk) 10:10, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

The same issue applies to spelling. There is US spelling and non-US spelling. We solved that without autoformatting of 'color' into 'colour'. Lightmouse (talk) 10:17, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Post On Bugzilla

Wouldn't it be great if we could search within our own contributions (or whatever, (or changes)) for say, all things we replaced with "{{main|". Please post this on bugzilla since I don't have an account, thanks!68.148.164.166 (talk) 19:17, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

WP:FICT RFC for global consensus

I have created a RFC for gaining global consensus of the updated Notability (fiction) guideline. Input and comments are appreciated. --MASEM 22:51, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

"Mahatma" (Great-Souled) or his name?

The Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi page is again beset with arguments about whether or not its name should be Mahatma Gandhi instead. Since this seems to happen from time to time, I thought I'd bring it up at the Village Pump.

"Mahatma" ("Great Souled") is a honorific, which was first applied to Gandhi around 1915, when he was 46 years old. He himself always signed his name M. K. Gandhi. My understanding of WP:NAMEPEOPLE is that it is very clear on "qualifiers" (which include honorifics). It says unambiguously (off the bat): "Do not have additional qualifiers (such as "King", "Saint", "Dr.", "(person)", "(ship)"), except when this is the simplest and most NPOV way to deal with disambiguation." Since there is no other person with the same name (Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi), the "Mahatma" is not needed for disambiguation. In addition, WP:NC says, "When in doubt, consult a standard mainstream reference work." There are no more standard tertiary sources than the following below and they are all agreed on the name.

1. Encyclopaedia Britannica: (Signed article by B. R. Nanda, Former Director, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi.) "Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, born Oct. 2, 1869, Porbandar, India, died Jan. 30, 1948, Delhi, byname Mahatma (“Great-Souled”) Gandhi leader of the Indian nationalist movement against British rule, considered to be the father of his country."
2. Encyclopedia Encarta: Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand (1869-1948), Indian nationalist leader, who established his country's freedom through a nonviolent revolution.
3. Columbia Encyclopedia: Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand, 1869–1948, Indian political and spiritual leader, b. Porbandar.
4. World Book Encyclopedia. Signed article by Iyer, Raghavan. Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand. The World Book Encyclopedia, Millennium 2000 Edition. World Book, Inc., Chicago, 2000.
5. Webster's Collegiate Encyclopedia: Main Entry: Gandhi, Mohandas K(aramchand) Pronunciation Guide. Variant(s): known as Mahatma Gandhi Date: (1869-1948). Preeminent leader of Indian nationalism and prophet of nonviolence in the 20th cent.
6. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Signed article. Judith M. Brown, (Beit Professor of Commonwealth History, University of Oxford), Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand [Mahatma Gandhi] (1869–1948)’, first published Sept 2004, 6400 words.

My understanding, therefore, is that the name should remain "Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi." Please advise. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 02:48, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

The only credible argument I could make against you is that the person is more widely-known by the name "Mahatma Gandhi" in the English-speaking world, many of whom are unaware that "Mahatma" is an honorific and not a first name; for this reason, many artists such as Jewel (singer) and Madonna (entertainer) are listed by their stage names, and Lewis Carroll is listed under his pen name, although none of these are their legal names. Nevertheless, I support your position, partly because of precedent in other encyclopedias, and partly because "Mahatma Gandhi" does not clearly refer to a single person. Dcoetzee 19:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Ratification vote on {{C-Class}} started

Hi. The ratification vote to add {{C-Class}} to the assessment scale has started. The poll will run for two weeks, until 0300 UTC June 18, 2008, and you can find the poll here, where we ask for your comment.

On behalf of the Version 1.0 Editorial Team, Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 03:10, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

intent of editor

so if we all can edit, is it important to try to keep the orinigal intent of the previous editor esp. if he is the article creator? like tailor your eidts to capture the intent? JeanLatore (talk) 03:13, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

No, Wikipedia has an overarching set of editorial guidelines and policies that all articles should be tailored to conform towards, and on substantive issues this will generally take preferences over the intent of any one contributor. (Though there are some purely stylistic issues where the policy is simply to follow the original author, such as whether to use British or American spelling of words.) See Wikipedia:Key policies and guidelines and Wikipedia:Manual of Style. Since you talk about "intent", you might also look at WP:NPOV for a discussion of how topics should be presented. Dragons flight (talk) 03:22, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

But even a regional-variation-of English choice by the originator of the article can be overridden if the topic of the article suggests that it should be written in another regional variation. I point this out to highlight that no original intention by the article's creator overrides what is best for the article itself. Darkspots (talk) 12:42, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Nope. It's important to form communal consensus around the way in which an article should be presented and what facts it should include, but no author has priority over any other. Dcoetzee 03:23, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

"If you don't want your writing to be edited mercilessly by others, do not submit it". Mr.Z-man 03:25, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

The previous editor does not WP:OWN the article, so you can meddle with the intent as long as neutrality and the intent of the sources used are maintained. The only time you'd want to be sure to maintain original intent is if you're marking an edit as minor.Somedumbyankee (talk) 03:26, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

There are editors who start articles as they are very good in identifying blank spots in the encyclopedia. Often these blind spots relate to their own hobbies. This may easily lead to a biased point of view. That makes the original editor still a very valuable contributor, but his intent may need to be modified to provide high quality content. Arnoutf (talk) 06:22, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

New global userright

I have started a centralized discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Administrators#New_global_userright on how our local policy should reflect changes to the global user rights policies at Meta. Please feel free to stop by and comment. MBisanz ^talk 22:26, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

make stub templates more useful with suggested content

Stub templates would be more useful if they suggested subject-related content. For example, if I create a page for Joe Blow that says "Joe Blow once played national football", someone else might tag it with football-bio-stub. If I click on the link, it might suggest that I add some details like date-of-birth, nationality, what countries he played for on what dates, and what, if anything, made him a notable player. Even better would be if there were an associated infobox and/or ProfessionalAthleteData, with a nice form to prompt for the data. --BobBagwill (talk) 23:47, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Might be workable by linking to a relevant wikiproject, perhaps? – Luna Santin (talk) 02:27, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

• I agree more generally that it would be great to be more specific. I think any criticism on an article via a template should be accompanied by a linked-to talk page section which details the complaints. I hate seeing tagged articles when it is totally unclear what the problem is.  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 05:04, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

If there were some way to find "ex-stubs" in a given stub category, then you could look at what kind of expansions people have done to them. I don't see a way to easily do that though. Wikiprojects who have an interest in a given stub category might put some sort of "expansion tips" in the category's headnote, maybe? --_{tiny plastic} Grey Knight ⊖ 14:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

• I agree with Luna Santin that the relevant WikiProjects will probably have informations on infoboxes/resources/style guides etc. available. So actually, flipping over to the talk page and clicking on the WikiProject banner will be the best alternative. Of course one could somehow add this to the stub template line, but would that really be necessary? --B. Wolterding (talk) 14:58, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Proxy votes/meatpuppetry

Would "proxy votes" be considered a form of meatpuppetry? Specifically, established User X is going to be away for a few days, and gives permission to established User Y to vote on his behalf in exactly the same way as User Y, since they know that they agree on everything. — Omegatron (talk) 03:17, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

That assumes that discussions are votes, which in most situations they're not. That said, if a given user's absence is particularly important to the discussion, it may be worth making a note of it. – Luna Santin (talk) 03:50, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Well yeah. I already mentioned "we don't make decisions with votes" a few million times, but it falls on deaf ears. — Omegatron (talk) 03:52, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Does X allow Y to sign in as X ? Or does Y mention that X has the same opinion? The first seems problematic to me, the second should be allowed but ignored...  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 05:02, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

No sharing of accounts; just saying "I'm going to be away for a few days, you have permission to double-vote with my username next to yours in each of the votes you propose." — Omegatron (talk) 23:06, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I can't really think of any situation where an admin or crat would take such a proxy vote seriously. Resolute 03:05, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, this is similar to Wikipedia:Delegable proxy, a failed proposal. The talk page there should give you some things to read on the subject. "Meatpuppetry" was mentioned a few times, right enough. --_{tiny plastic} Grey Knight ⊖ 14:46, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Interesting.  :) — Omegatron (talk) 23:06, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Banning solves false flag related NPOV disputes?

I've notived that a huge number of editors has been topic-banned in the wake of an ArbCom case, even though the ArbCom did not give a single verdict on any specific behaviour by anyone. I myself have been topic-banned, ironically, after issuing a warning myself: {{Uw-9/11}}

Now I am interested to know whether there is only a small kernel of wikipedia editors and admins who happen to be interested in September 11, and favor banning other editors, or whether this approach of solving POV conflicts by banning one side of it, is supported by the community at large?

In my perception, edit conflicts are arising between two point of views, whereas those that are doing the banning seem to think that their POV is the truth and therefore the NPOV form that articles should have, and they call the editors to be banned "POV-pushers", whereas in my opinion, most of them are only trying to restore NPOV: make sure that multiple POV's get fair treatment.

For instance: would citing the 9/11 Commission Report likely be POV-pushing? Would factual descriptions of actions of government officials be POV-pushing? Would mentioning the opinions of prominent international polititians be?

If wikipedia is locking out so many editors, it really amounts to locking oneself in.

It's not just the subject of 9/11 which is at stake for me. I can live with the English language Wikipedia being inadequate on such a sensitive subject (other languages seem to have less problems here). Everyone has the freedom to his or her own beliefs. When a vast majority of editors is unable to detect false flag operations, so be it.

What concerns me, is that the same mechanisms seem to be at work all over wikipedia. Wikipedia is valuable to me because of the NPOV policy: the reader is likely to be presented multiple viewpoints on a given subject, which the rest of the web often fails to do. If we loose our understanding of true NPOV, than Wikipedia sinks back in the background noise of the web. I'd hate that !

 — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 05:00, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Anyone interested in the discussion about this user's Arbcom-related ban should read Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement/Archive20#Xiutwel. I see nothing wrong with this approach, when extreme amounts of disruption, as cited in the Arbcom case, require it. Mangojuice^talk 16:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Is it really within our behavioral guidelines to issue preemptive warnings like {{uw-9/11}}? "Hi. You haven't done anything yet, but I'm going to assume you're likely to be bad" seems rather bitey and not assuming good faith to me. Anomie⚔ 00:51, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Sourcing Adjudication Board

This is a follow-up to the recently archived discussion WP:Village pump (policy)/Archive_47#Sourcing_Adjudication_Board regarding the Sourcing Ajudication Board that ArbCom intends to set up as a part of its ruling in the ongoing case Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Homeopathy/Proposed decision.

To remind those who missed the original discussion, ArbCom plans to appoint the Sourcing Ajudication Board with broad jurisdiction over all sourcing disputes on Wikipedia.

The ArbCom now expaneded the language of the proposed decision (now in the voting stage) to include the following:

"Expedited sanctions

2) Upon receipt of a finding of inappropriate conduct from the Sourcing Adjudication Board, the Committee shall, without opening a case, issue appropriate sanctions (up to and including a ban from the project) against those editors named by the Board as having substantially violated sourcing policy."

There is an ongoing discussion of the SAB proposal at Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Homeopathy/Proposed decision. Nsk92 (talk) 07:43, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Attribution has been marked as a guideline

Wikipedia:Attribution (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change (more information). -- VeblenBot (talk) 18:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Attribution/Header has been marked as a guideline

Wikipedia:Attribution/Header (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change (more information). -- VeblenBot (talk) 18:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Template messages/Wikipedia namespace no longer marked as a policy

Wikipedia:Template messages/Wikipedia namespace (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has been edited so that it is no longer marked as a policy. It was previously marked as a policy. This is an automated notice of the change (more information). -- VeblenBot (talk) 18:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

starred Language

Why is there a language starred in the language box? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.1.129.29 (talk) 20:57, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Featured article in the "starred" language sister project Arnoutf (talk) 21:29, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

It means that article is a Featured Article on the corresponding-language Wikipedia version. --_{tiny plastic} Grey Knight ⊖ 15:51, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Is there an echo in here? --_{tiny plastic} Grey Knight ⊖ 15:52, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Please Post On Bugzilla, Thanks!

I would be great if we could click on the version instead of having to have to click on the 2 radio buttons just to get to the later version. Please post this on bugzilla, because I don't have an account, thanks!68.148.164.166 (talk) 02:22, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Clicking on the time/date stamp to the right of the radio buttons brings up that version. You don't get the comparison chart, because you need to specify 2 versions to be compared. Is this what you're looking for? --A Knight Who Says Ni (talk) 04:45, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Notability

I honestly don't think this is necessary, nor any of it's associated other pages. If content complies WP:V, WP:OR, WP:NPOV and WP:NOT then surely it should be included? I'd like to know what other people think.--Phoenix-wiki 13:38, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

No, we have our standards for a reason. We're an encyclopedia not a directory of everything that has been mentioned ever. Al Tally ^talk 14:09, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Of course we're not, which is what WP:NOT is for. While wikipedia discriminates against such things as opinion columns and speculation, the policy associated with wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information does not discriminate against notability. The policy lists specific things that articles cannot be - none of these taboos mention that non-notable aren't allowed, although non-notable articles must still establish importance or the topic's "claim to fame".--Phoenix-wiki 14:20, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. (BTW, V, OR and NPOV (bar POVFORK) are content criterion, so they can't render N redundant anyway). Orderinchaos 14:14, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Unreferenced articles can be deleted, and I don't see the problem. Why should we keep out stuff like Garage bands? In practice, it would be very difficult to make the article verifiable, but if someone manages it, there's nothing wrong with letting it sit unviewed. Saying that something "does not belong" is not a reasoned argument; what are the costs and benefits?--Phoenix-wiki 14:20, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

None of the three are in fact deletion criteria - if they're being used as such, they're being used improperly. An article which can pass WP:N but which may have problems in *all* of the other three would always be kept providing there was no outright consensus to delete, but with a recommendation to fix urgently. If the problems are so major as to cause major concern (eg BLP) it's usual to stub the article. Orderinchaos 14:26, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

They aren't common deletion criteria at AFD, but take a look at the new sourcing adjudication board proposal, and new page patrol. Unreferenced material may be removed per WP:V, and I for one am prepared to do this. (See also:[2])--Phoenix-wiki 14:33, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Phoenix, this page is for discussing policy. "Notability" has never been policy and by the grace of G-wd never will be . — CharlotteWebb 14:42, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Lol Well It might as well be a policy, and the only other place this fits is misc, which isn't exactly where it fits, though according to that narration at the top, this is for guidelines too ;-)--Phoenix-wiki 14:45, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually, since the deletion policy says a topic not meeting the notability guidelines is a reason for deletion, the notability guidelines are often treated like policy — somehow ABOVE WP:V, WP:NOR, and WP:NPOV. Mentions of "notability" have been creeping into WP:NOT, another policy. An essay, WP:ATA, is cited whenever anyone gives their personal opinion that something is notable. But that's all "nn" ever was — an opinion in AFD debates. And "nn" was flipped and turned into WP:NN in a horribly misguided move. Now, I've argued to delete because I thought something was non-notable too, but that's just my personal opinion...out of billions.

I think many of the current notability guidelines need to be deleted or re-started from scratch. The problem though with guidelines is that once created, they're rarely deleted. So I guess I would support marking them rejected or historical, and at least disputed. I suppose one could even create a competing guideline about the "presumed" notability across an entire group of subjects — although creating parallel guidelines is discouraged. Some topics are generally considered to be notable by default — mountains and cities for example. If editors want to say that a topic needs outside coverage before a topic can have an article, that's fine I guess — but coverage does not make something worthy of notice. WP:N should be deleted. I can understand why coverage would be a good idea for biographies of living people, bands, and some other topics, but "notability" has become a black hole that no topic can escape.

What started as an excuse to get rid of articles on garage bands and people/websites nobody cared about has transformed into Frankenstein's monster. Is Frankenstein's monster notable? This isn't the Notability Project anyone can edit. And I've seen no evidence that other encyclopedias use "notability" as their criteria for inclusion. The Wikimedia Foundation's vision statement is "the sum of all knowledge", not "the sum of all knowledge that's worthy of notice." — and who exactly is it supposed to be "worthy of notice" to anyway? The notability guidelines are a prime example of how inventing new rules you think everyone else should follow is actually detrimental to Wikipedia. If it's common practice for people to argue to delete an article because they think a topic is non-notable, fine, tell people that. If it's common practice for people to argue to keep an article if it cites a lot of outside coverage, fine, tell people that. But don't create a new round hoop while thousands of square articles are laying around and say "These square articles don't fit through this new hoop I invented!" Wikipedia was not paper and Wikipedia was not a bureaucracy, LONG before Wikipedia mutated into the Notability Project.

Do I think Project Chanology is worthy of notice? No. Do I think the article should be deleted? No. I'm sure someone else thinks it's worthy of notice. Do I think every topic in Encyclopedia Brittanica is worthy of notice? No, and it doesn't have to be. Is there some way to quantify the "value" of attention? The DGAF scale? Is the thinking that because certain sources have "noted" a topic, then the topic must be "note-able"? Does a source writing about a topic mean they think the topic is worthy of notice, or that they have a mortgage payment this month? The notability guidelines are, for the most part, broken. And I blame Radiant! for starting this mess, by tagging WP:N as a guideline after 16 days. I can understand that "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information." But the notability guidelines are not what keeps Wikipedia from becoming an indiscriminate collection of information. No, what keeps Wikipedia from becoming an indiscriminate collection of information are editors. Editors are trusted to use their judgement to evaluate whether an article is neutral or not. Do editors have to provide outside evidence that an article is neutral? No. So why can't editors use their judgement to evaluate whether a topic is "notable" or not? Even better, remove the whole question of "notability" from the equation. What does "notability" have to do with encyclopedia articles? --Pixelface (talk) 19:51, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Hear hear!--Phoenix-wiki 20:07, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Notability guidelines might as well be policy, unfortunately. Hopefully one day we'll see them gone. While it isn't an opinion held by many editors, I would rather see a low-quality article with a few sources on an obscure subject than no article at all. I think that it'll be gone eventually once Wikipedia is mature enough. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 20:32, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Interesting. The reason I created this thread was to get rid of it in the very near future (The next month or so).--Phoenix-wiki 20:49, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

If you believe that we do not need notability, try doing some new page patrol. Notability provides us with a way to delete the tripe. Maybe we don't technically need notability due to our other, more important policies. However, 'notability' is easy to judge- it can be quickly judged, and the crap can be deleted. Our other policies require a little thought, and we just don't have that time, nor can we afford for the piles and piles and piles of rubbish to stay lying around while we all argue about whether it is technically verifiable. I just don't think that removing notability is, at this time, a good idea. It would create far more problems than it would solve. J Milburn (talk) 21:10, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

There's no speedy deletion criteria for being non-notable, and the usual crap falls under WP:NOT, the rest of the non-notable stuff, why not keep it if it's verified etc?--Phoenix-wiki 21:40, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Something could easily be verifiable without being notable - a minor mention, a mention in a minor publication, or a mention in a source that is reliable for what it is cited for but not reliable to establish that it's worth reading. Almost every person, thing, and business establishment has been mentioned in the paper - who hasn't had their name in the paper? So with a verifiability standard alone, nearly everything in the world could be the subject for an article here. That would be nice but it's not going to happen, and if it did it would be a much very different project than Wikipedia. With the number of volunteer editors we have, we simply can't write a good article and keep enough interest to maintain it, about everything in the world. If we try, coverage will be spotty and uneven, we will have lots of bad articles, and visitors will have a lot of junk to wade through before they find anything useful to read. That's one of the main argument for notability, in my mind. Also, being forced to explain why something is notable helps article creation - it makes editors cut to the chase and state, concisely, why something matters. Practically, more power to you if you want to make a change but it seems very unlikely that enough people could be convinced to do away with the notability requirement. Wikidemo (talk) 21:14, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

You seem to be confused here. We want to let the previously non-notable things in, and not bother with notability at all. WP:NOT keeps out most of the crap. We're not saying to go out there and launch a drive to create the articles (I persoanlly think we should get our topics up to scratch first, they're a disgrace), but if some random new editor creates a verifiable, neutral article about their pet dog, why would we delete it? In practice, it would be very difficult to make the article verifiable. But if someone manages it, there's nothing wrong with letting it sit unviewed.--Phoenix-wiki 21:40, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I couldn't get behind articles for pet dogs and I suspect most people couldn't either. --Pixelface (talk) 21:57, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

They would be almost impossible to reference, but if they were good and verifiable, why not?--Phoenix-wiki 22:01, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia is whatever its users want it to be. If you think that the notability guidelines are no longer supported by the community, then start a discussion to abandon them. But from what I've seen, they're pretty well accepted and I don't think you'll be able to convince enough people to abandon them, but you're free to try. Considering we have WP:IAR, whether WP:N is policy or guideline is mostly irrelevant. Mr.Z-man 21:58, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Flagged revision talk

Now that flagged revisions are available on all projects, we need to figure out what en-wiki is going to do with them. Many people have made their opinions known in smaller discussions or on the mailing lists, but for an issue this big I think we need to set up one big centralized discussion page for everyone in the project to give their two cents, possibly set up in a way that lets us tally support for each of a few different setups. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 16:09, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

You mean like Wikipedia:Flagged revisions? Bluap (talk) 16:57, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

That page is an example of a collection of small conversations. I think to reach a final conclusion we'll need a more formalized process of arranging the various proposals and have a pre-determined way of deciding on which we have consensus. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 17:36, 6 June 2008 (UTC)