User:Freshgavin/Sandbox/Project Owarai style guidelines

Universal rules

• Sign all comments with ~~~~.
• Insert a useful description into the edit summary wherever possible.
• Update the tasks list when upgrading/downgrading an article's status.

What an owarai article SHOULD BE

• Accessible. All articles on Wikipedia are aimed at readers from all sorts of backgrounds, and it is especially important with a little-known subject such as owarai to present articles in a simple and easy-to-understand manner. As much as possible, articles about geinin should be no different than other articles of a biographical nature, and articles about kombi and groups should be generally biographical as well. Content such as a person's owarai history, notable achievements, background, and current media activities are all considered biographical information.
• Verifiable. Tangible content that is universally considered to be true, is undisputed, and has been noted in reliable, respected media is welcome content in all owarai articles.
• Notable. Content about significant events (from a general readers perspective), and important, interesting information is good content. Because owarai is generally unknown to most readers of Wikipedia, much of the information that an owarai fan would consider notable is in fact, non-notable most readers, and thus the inclusion of such content should be considered carefully.
• Interesting. Owarai is an interesting topic for many readers interested in Japanese subjects. Owarai articles should reflect the differences and features of owarai that would appeal to an interested reader.

What an owarai article IS NOT

• News or fancruft. The articles are not places to overload with exact details of the everyday lives of geinin. Overloading articles makes them boring, and difficult to approach for mildly interested readers. Recent news, minor events, small humorous television happenings and the like should not be included in the articles as they are of little importance to the quality of the article (indeed, they degrade it), they are usually of interest for a very short length of time, and simply because they are generally un-encyclopedic.
• Lists. Articles are not the place to make endless lists of comedians and groups, quotes and gags, small achievements and historical points, or information of any kind that merely serves to increase the length of articles that would do much better with the addition of notable information. Articles with short example lists (for example, the geinin list in owarai#Owarai geinin) should not be regularly maintained and should be kept as small as possible. A comprehensive list such as the List of Japanese comedians should be regularly maintained and expanded, as there shouldn't be much bias as to what is included (within reason).
• POV. Articles should not express an author's beliefs and speculation, even if they equal those of many people. Beliefs, judgement, and assessment are only to be included when they are generally accepted or are considered verifiable, and are not disputed.
• Disputable. Minor disputable or semantic points should be avoided, for the simple fact that doing eliminates edit wars and helps to ensure an NPOV article.
• A direct translation. Much of the information for owarai articles is taken from Japanese sources (especially the Japanese Wikipedia) but it must be stressed that the JA and EN Wikipedias promote completely different article writing styles and JA Wikipedia articles should not be used as examples of style. The JA Wikipedia tends to focus much more on numeric facts and lists than EN, which likes to spread facts out in a more essay-ish, book style. Articles should be divided into logical, sequential sections (where applicable), and all sections should be linked grammatically so that the titles are a mere convenient redundancy for those readers who are scanning for information.

  An example geinin article in JA had the following sections: (short) Intro, History, Episodes, Appearances, Productions, External links. In EN, the Intro should be the most important and carefully worded section, and it should expand in size proportionally with the length of the rest of the article. Episodes is not to be included because EN discourages the inclusion of minor events that wouldn't appear in person's History. Lists of Productions can be included when they are notable, but all too frequently this list is longer than the rest of the article, and thus seems to serve only to boast about the person, rather than informing the interested reader. Lists such as these should be included sparingly, and in as non-timely a manner as possible. For kombi or groups, the Members section should not be included unless it is of an exceptionally large, or constantly changing subscription. All info about the members can normally be included in the Intro, and more specific information about individuals should be included in the individual's page.

  You should use other biographical articles—many of which have been nominated for FA—as examples when creating articles of a biographical nature.

• Incomplete. Partial, un-edited, copy-pasted, un-thought-out, and un-wikified articles should not be uploaded to the article namespace and should instead be edited in ones sandbox before creation. An article can be listed under tasks while it is still in the sandbox, and it will be created in the namespace after it has been cleaned up, copyedited, and/or revised. By doing this, there will be a steady and controlled flow of new article information, and the article namespace won't be polluted with half-written, or poorly worded articles.