Hello, welcome to your New Page Patrol School page! Please make sure you have this page added to your watchlist. Your NPP School page has been specifically designed according to you and what you have requested instruction in - for that reason, please be as specific as possible when under my instruction, so that I know the best ways to help you (and do not be afraid to let me know if you think something isn't working).
Make sure you read through Wikipedia:Notability as that's the knowledge which most of the questions I ask you and tasks you do will revolve around.
- How to use this page
This page will be built up over your time in the School, with new sections being added as you complete old ones. Each section will end with a task, written in bold type - this might just ask a question, or it might require you to go and do something. You can answer a question by typing the answer below the task; if you have to do something, you will need to provide diffs to demonstrate that you have completed the task. Some sections will have more than one task, sometimes additional tasks may be added to a section as you complete them. Please always sign your responses with ~~~~ as you would on a talk page.
Notability edit
PART 1
Questions edit
- Question 1
In your own words, how is notability defined on Wikipedia?
On Wikipedia, notability is a test used by editors to judge whether a given topic explains its section. Macy Sinrich 10:09, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
- That's correct, but let's probe a bit further. What is the main thing that we are measuring when we assess notability? signed, Rosguill talk 18:23, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
- Question 2
Would step by step instructions on how to "Change a car tire" be considered a notable topic in Wikipedia? Why or why not?
I personally think that that would not be relevant to Wikipedia, because wikipedia articles are more educationally based. Step by step instructions on how to "Change a car tire" would be relevant to wikihow.com Macy Sinrich 10:09, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
, the specific policy relevant to this question is WP:NOTMANUAL. signed, Rosguill talk 18:23, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
- Question 3
What are the differences between the WP:GNG and the subject-specific notability guidelines? How do we determine which one to use when patrolling an article?
For WP:GNG, it includes "Significant coverage "addresses the topic directly and in detail, so that no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention, but it does not need to be the main topic of the source material.
"Reliablility" means that sources need editorial integrity to allow verifiable evaluation of notability, per the reliable source guideline. Sources may encompass published works in all forms and media, and in any language. Availability of secondary sources covering the subject is a good test for notability.
"Sources" should be secondary sources, as those provide the most objective evidence of notability. There is no fixed number of sources required since sources vary in quality and depth of coverage, but multiple sources are generally expected. Sources do not have to be available online or written in English. Multiple publications from the same author or organization are usually regarded as a single source for the purposes of establishing notability. "Independent of the subject" excludes works produced by the article's subject or someone affiliated with it. For example, advertising, press releases, autobiographies, and the subject's website are not considered independent.
"Presumability" means that significant coverage in reliable sources creates an assumption, not a guarantee, that a subject merits its own article. A more in-depth discussion might conclude that the topic actually should not have a stand-alone article—perhaps because it violates what Wikipedia is not, particularly the rule that Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information.
Subject-specific guidelines are used in which case the article is in these categories,
- Academics
- Astronomical objects
- Books * Events
- Films * Geographic features
- Music * Numbers
- Organizations and companies
- People * Sports and athletes
- Web content
We can determine which one to use by identifying the article itself, is it pertaining to a specific entity? is it credible? If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject, General notability guidelines are presumably suitable for a stand-alone article or list. The subject-specificity guideline is independent from the other subject-specific notability guidelines, such as WP:BIO, WP:MUSIC, WP:AUTH, etc., and is explicitly listed as an alternative to the general notability guideline. It is possible for an article not to be notable under the provisions of this guideline but to be notable in some other way under the general notability guideline or one of the other subject-specific notability guidelines. Macy Sinrich 10:09, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
the first part of your answer is a decent description of GNG, but I want to stress that GNG applies to all articles (it's not clear from your answer whether you thought this was the case). SNGs come in a few different flavors, but they're primarily either applying additional constraints to how we should assess GNG, or more frequently giving us heuristics that we can use as shortcuts to assess whether it is likely that GNG is met. We'll examine SNGs a lot more in the next few exercises. signed, Rosguill talk 18:23, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
On hold edit
MacySinrich, since you haven't edited this in quite some time, I'm going to go ahead and remove you from my active students list. If at any point you want to continue with this course, feel free to let me know and we can continue. signed, Rosguill talk 19:41, 17 April 2020 (UTC)