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Notability vs. Wikipedia mission statement

"Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing."

Discuss. I'll keep a safe distance. Tymime (talk) 20:15, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

That's a Jimmy Wales quote from 2004, not our mission statement. Our actual mission statement is the five pillars, and it states Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. Click on that, and it'll tell you to see also: Notability. --Explodicle (T/C) 20:28, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Our "actual" mission statement does not exist. Five pillars is a valuable summary, but it isn't a mission statement. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:09, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

It is NOTABLE that Jimmy Wales speaks of "all human knowledge," which militates against the subjective, wholesale deletion of information due to an editor's notion of "notability." The definition of "notability" is "1. The state or quality of being eminent or worthy of notice. 2. A prominent or notable person[1]. This is implies a higher threshold than "all human knowledge."--Drboisclair (talk) 14:34, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia doesn't have a mission statement, but Wikimedia does.

• meta:Mission statement
• meta:Vision statement

I recommend reading everything within 3degrees of Template:Wikipedia principles, and a heaping handful of useressays, starting with User:Antandrus/observations on Wikipedia behavior.

Regarding notability, read meta:Incrementalism, and then the rest of its sidebar. -- Quiddity (talk) 23:30, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Language, again

Resurrecting a dialog from half a year ago or so, seeking to codify:

Notability is language-agnostic

As English is the lingua franca of the Internet, English Wikipedia holds a special position and plays a unique and inclusive role in furthering human knowledge and understanding. Notability is not a function of language. A topic is notable for inclusion in English Wikipedia as long as there are reputable sources which are verifiable in the language of a community of interest.

I thought I would keep it as succinct as possible. I fervently believe that EN WP has a unique mission and responsibility. I should mention that indeterminate phrases such as "noticed to a significant degree" and "world at large" (a more effective mass-mentality topic-limiting diptych would be a true challenge to formulate) as currently appear on the project page effectively enforce anglo-centricism given the manner in which editors tend to quantify notability, that is, English-language Google matches, and not through any real research—indeed, contending that Google matches constitute research.  PЄTЄRS VЄСRUМВА ►talk  21:30, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Suggestion: Strike the first 2 grandiose sentences and the "English" qualifier in the 4th (I believe most of the other 'pedias theoretically are also agnostic). --Cybercobra (talk) 22:05, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I think that a simpler approach is to modify the existing definition of "Reliable" under WP:GNG to say "Sources may encompass published works in all forms and media, and in any language."

I've not actually encountered editors claiming that non-English sources didn't "count" towards notability, but if this is a problem, it can be addressed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:35, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

From following this page for a few years, my impression is that once or twice a year someone comes here complaining that someone else at an AfD argued that evidence of notability had to be based in sources written in English. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:53, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

We need to be clear that something notable but only can be shown that in reliable sources in a different language is still notable, but it is necessary that we have an assured translation of those sources that the article is saying what that article is saying. Babelfished translations are not suitable for this purpose. Bu this is primarily a function of RS, though notability should be clear we are language-agnostic. --MASEM (t) 02:56, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't think that we need to worry about that detail. RSN does, but this isn't RSN. For notability purposes, I suspect that even a Babelfished translation would frequently be adequate, since all that AfD needs to know is, "Is this entire article about ____?" WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:51, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Notability requires reliable sources. Reliable, foreign language sources require a reliable translate, which Babelfish or Google Translate is not. That's not to say that the benefit of the doubt regarding notability can't be obtained this way: for example, the primary Japanese video game magazine Famitsu is a reliable source there, so we can presume that if there's an article that when automatically translated implies something is notable, it likely is - but editors should be prepared if they only use foreign language sources in an article to defend its translation and notability from that.

But yes, we shouldn't have to say anything about this here in N, it's an RS issue. --MASEM (t) 15:10, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

In the absence of any objections to the general notion, I have added "and in any language" to the WP:GNG, as proposed above. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:47, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

That's more than fair. I still do think that some of the grandiose (thanks to who used that description) verbiage originally referred to needs to be toned down a bit as in this case statement of lofty purpose may be taken out of context. Rather than significance to the world at large, if we'd like to still a bit of grandiosity, we can note that "Wikipedia serves a global community." To the comments regarding AfD, there is one going on the periphery of an area of my interest, however, the language of sources is not at issue there.

  I have, however, noted that in historical topics involving conflict—and what is a good deal of history, if not the history of conflict— that language is sometimes invoked in a manner that less reliable English source > trumps > more reliable non-English source, so "in any language" per the above places all sources on an equal footing. Per the AfD comment, equal footing will serve to keep future discussions on content and not "mine" is intrinsically more worthy than "yours" because "mine" is in English. Thanks to all for their comments!  PЄTЄRS VЄСRUМВА ►talk  15:04, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Once you've agreed that an article should exist, WP:N is done, and the relevant advice is at WP:NONENG. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:32, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps the "preference" for English language sources needs to be reworded somewhat as:

• topic covered in English means topic in mainstream
• English is neutral non-nationalistic language
• English account is NPOV, as mainstream source is assumed to be reliable
• English account is reliable by inference only > trumps non-English source (all such sources being easily denouncable as partisan based on historical conflict)

This is why I believe equal footing needs to be stated with more clarity than non-English will do if we can't find anything else.  PЄTЄRS VЄСRUМВА ►talk  03:45, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

None of those considerations really apply to this page. This page does not permit any source to "trump" any other: Either the aggregated mass of sources indicates enough quality and attention, or it doesn't. There is no question of choosing one source over another.

If your concern is about something other than "Should Wikipedia have a separate article on this subject?" -- e.g., "Should I use a Chinese or English source to support this sentence?" then you should present your concerns at WT:V. It does not matter how cogent your arguments may be: Discussion at this page does not result in changes at that page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:34, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Where exactly did the "World at large" stuff get consensus?

[2] was the change to the nutshell, previous changes to the guideline itself occurred earlier. That's a massive change and I generally follow both the changes on the talk page and read all the edit summaries of the guideline page. I certainly missed this. Was this a BRD change or was there an actual discussion? Hobit (talk) 01:14, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I suggest asking User:FT2 directly. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:11, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Just to note that FT2 did several edits (this is the last version before this string. However, again, this being from 2010, I'm not seeing how the words "world at all" is a radical change, particularly as footnote 3 is still present. As I've tried to state above, WP has a very implicit (not written down) concept that very localized topics, even if meeting the GNG and getting passed NTEMP/BLP1E, shouldn't be covered, as a necessary factor of avoiding indiscriminate information. --MASEM (t) 13:04, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

"By the world at large" goes even further than #Adding something about global vs local coverage, which did not gain consensus. Maurreen (talk) 14:02, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Tangentially, but perhaps not, see also below ("Language, again")  PЄTЄRS VЄСRUМВА ►talk  21:30, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Here, you seem to support "world at large" criteria. Below, you seem to be against it. Maurreen (talk) 21:59, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I've changed the footnote. Interest is not the same as notability, and many things are notable, according to even the strictest interpretation of this guideline, that are not "of interest to the world at large". For example, the Bakersfield Blaze minor-league baseball team, is not of interest outside the United States, yet they get significant coverage in Bakersfield, and also Dallas as an affiliate of the Major League team there. I don't think there's much interest in Asia, Africa, or Europe, yet notability is clear.  — Joshua Scott (LiberalFascist) 05:33, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

The page has a few other references to the world, or world at large. I support deleting them. Any objections? Maurreen (talk) 05:45, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Support.  — Joshua Scott (LiberalFascist) 06:10, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I support that. —chaos5023 (talk) 06:28, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done  — Joshua Scott (LiberalFascist) 19:29, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't object to the changes related to this, but "world at large" was meant to indicate e.g., "sources that don't have a conflict of interest" or "attention from someone that is not part of that organization", not "geographically diverse sources". WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:00, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Isn't that covered by "reliable"? If not, maybe "independent" could be used. Maurreen (talk) 22:33, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

No, it's not the same. Reliability necessarily includes how you use the source. A self-published source may be highly reliable for certain things ("The BLP says her birthday is...", "The company issued a press release that said..."), but it is absolutely worthless for demonstrating notability.

The "world at large" language was intended to recommend independent, third-party sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Say "independent" or "third-party" then. "World at large" is vague, and maybe a little too strict. Arskwad (talk) 21:05, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I think that "independent" or "third-party" would have been a much better word choice. The "world at large" language could have reasonably been interpreted as a geographic consideration, and that was never the intent. I'm not sure if it's really important to include it now; I just didn't want someone to read this discussion in the archives, years from now, and think that a geographic interpretation was intended. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:24, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Multiple sources

Does this guideline mean multiple as two or more or three or more? I've seen people going by both. Joe Chill (talk) 22:15, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Taking both the connotation and denotation of "multiple" into account, I interpret it as meaning that two sources establish notability somewhat shakily and three sources establish it solidly. —chaos5023 (talk) 22:25, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

It depends on the source. Three weak sources (e.g., two paragraphs in articles mostly about something else in small-town newspapers) aren't as valuable as two really stellar sources (e.g., book-length scholarly works dedicated entirely to the subject).

Editors must use their best judgment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:39, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

2 minimum, exact case-by-case determination by consensus; IMO. --Cybercobra (talk) 01:08, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

third party sources

Thought this quote from Jimbo Wales was interesting. [3]

I think that "If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it." is a good policy. To take the example of a popular book that receives no reviews, what kind of encyclopedia article could you write about it? You could write an original review, but that isn't an encyclopedia article. You could write a plot summary, but that isn't an encyclopedia article. You could do some kind of original research, but that wouldn't be an encyclopedia article.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 09:04, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

This reflects current policy. Is there anything else we can do to make this more clear? (Note, I cross-posted this at WT:V.) Arskwad (talk) 16:17, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

The line is exactly listed in WP:V, and WP:N asserts a stronger version that requires independent (ego, third-party) secondary sources. (and the last line also asserts WP:NOT#PLOT too) It's an affirmation of what we already have. --MASEM (t) 16:32, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I should make my point more clear. This is already policy. But it's somewhat buried. Is there anything we can do to make it more prominent? Arskwad (talk) 16:35, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I can see a lede-level sentence or two in WP:N to re-iterate the bolded section above - that WP:V sets one level for article allowance, while WP:N is aimed to provide a further goal, so that it's clear we're extended the verification requirements. --MASEM (t) 16:39, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Why don't we just add that sentence ("If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it", which is taken from WP:BURDEN) to the lead, or to WP:NRVE? WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:54, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Here's what I would add; first paragraph, in bold:

--MASEM (t) 21:53, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

That would basically work for me.

Technically, I believe that WP:V requires "material" or "information" to be attributable, not "articles". Also, I'm not sure that explicitly attributing this requirement to WP:V is necessary here; omitting it would keep 12 possibly superfluous words off the page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:17, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

In the absence of any objections, I've added most of this. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:47, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Not sure about that. It could be read by someone trying to manipulate the system to exclude any primary sources and require everything to use third-party sources.陣内_Jinnai 23:01, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The bulk of it, about third-party sources, is already listed out in WP:V for a while. We've not had a problem with that (that is, there's a few that come to deny any first-party sources are acceptable, but a gently push to WP:PSTS helps to explain that.) This is basically saying that WP:V requires more than just first party, and WP:N looks for more than just reiteration by asking for secondary sources. --MASEM (t) 23:44, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

First, I think that you've confused primary source with self-published, and they're not the same. A peer-reviewed report on an experiment in a scientific journal is a primary source, but it is definitely not self-published. Similarly, all eyewitness journalism is a primary source, but definitely not self-published and (depending on the details) sometimes appropriately described as independent and third-party.

(Only) for the purposes of WP:N, we already require exclusive use of third-party sources. We have explicitly declared (for years now) that non-third-party sources don't count towards notability. For example, a company's own website is not proof of notability. (It can be used to support individual statements in an article about the company, but not to prove that Wikipedia should have an article about the company.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:07, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

This is a useful and accurate addition. But you left out the reference to verifiability, while still saying "notability further extends" it. Might want to re-add the first part about verifiability and explain how notability is connected to it. To tweak Masem's language a bit, "Wikipedia's policy on verification requires articles to be attributable to third-party sources; if no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article for it. Wikipedia's concept of notability restates this requirement, so that third-party sources can verify that a topic is important." Something to that effect. Too often, notability becomes a subjective test amounting to "I like it"/"I don't like it". Arskwad (talk) 21:04, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

That was obviously insufficient editing on my part. I'm trying to avoid tying the concept to WP:V, because we don't want to deal with confusion about the different standards ("But RSN said that it's verifiable, so it obviously gets a separate article...")

I've had another go at it; does it seem improved to you? (Feel free to WP:BOLDly improve it if you're still dissatisfied.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:46, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

It is very important to note that notability is not the same concept as verifiability (otherwise WP:V and WP:N become interchangable, WP:N is policy, and a whole mess of worms). Instead WP:N extends on concept whereas WP:V requires third-party sources, WP:N looks for secondary sources to avoid indiscriminate coverage. It's important to make this distinction. --MASEM (t) 23:37, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Re that edit that got reverted just now, if another run at it were taken, I would suggest a language tweak in that WP uses verifiability in regard to inclusion of information, not topics. —chaos5023 (talk) 00:08, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

The line " if no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article for it." is pretty much straight out of WP:V, and what started this discussion: V already excludes articles without 3rd party sources, WP:N goes a step further to require articles to demonstrate notability to be included. It's not about information (here, certainly on WP:V, thought). --MASEM (t) 02:23, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

I thought your edit was constructive, Masem. It's worth documenting the relationship between verifiability and notability. Instead of "Wikipedia's concept of notability applies this basic standard to the subjects of articles, to avoid indiscriminate inclusion of topics", maybe try "Wikipedia's concept of notability requires verifiable evidence from third-parties to limit articles of subjective importance." Arskwad (talk) 16:17, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

On topic

How do you define "on a topic"? I started working on trying to clean up an article today - Robert L. FitzPatrick and there's a multitude of media sources that quote him for a sentence or two. You'd think this would speak to notability - but I can't find any 3rd party sources that say anything about him other than that he's the founder and president of his "Pyramid Scheme Alert". Every source that was originally used in the article as source for info on him, had been published by him. Notable or not?--Insider201283 (talk) 00:07, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Not, probably.

Think of it this way: What could you write, if you were strictly limited to independent reliable sources? If the answer doesn't sound like something that has even the smallest likelihood of a decent article -- if your sources allow you only to create a doomed permastub, because all they tell you is, "Well, he runs a tiny business, and he once said ____ to a reporter" -- then I suggest not creating a separate article (especially for a BLP).

If you decide against a separate article, then you might consider using those same sources to expand relevant articles like pyramid scheme. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:14, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I mustn't have explained properly. There are a multitude of RS third party sources that mention and quote the guy. Dozens. They just don't actually say anything much about him. Everything about him that was in article was from his own sources, such as his CV, which is a SPS and considered RS for info about him. --Insider201283 (talk) 00:11, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

It sounds like the media coverage is made up of passing mentions / trivial coverage, but I would say yes, notable; the weight of coverage is a continuum, not yes/no, so enough passing mentions arguably add up to notability — what it boils down to being that all these media sources thought this guy was worth quoting. I don't think consensus on this is clear, but reportedly AfDs have been resolved keep on this basis. It sounds like the trouble there is going to be more WP:V, finding material to write the article based on. —chaos5023 (talk) 00:14, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

WP:N is a little unclear on what defines "significant coverage". In one part it suggests there must be at least one significant source on the subject, in another it suggests trivial coverage from multiple sources suffices. I think the latter would be fine if the multiple sources cover multiple different subjects surrounding the topic, but not if all the sources are effectively covering the same "trivial" thing. --Insider201283 (talk) 01:17, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Demo album debate

This just won't lie down so I have started a user talkpage User talk:Jubileeclipman/Demo album where we might have a centralised discussion about it and possibly create a properly sourced article about "Demo albums" in the process. (Presently, Demo album is a redirect to Demo (music)). Any thought welcome (including suggestions for dealing with this in a different manner—I created the page to help diffuse tension at Talk:The Roxx Regime Demos (following several AfD debates citing WP:NALBUMS's previous advice on "demos") but userspace might not be the best place to hold such important discussions, now I think about it --Jubilee♫clipman 23:04, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

without verifiable evidence of notability

A recent edit by Arskwad introduced this underlined text into the lead: "Wikipedia's concept of notability applies this standard to the subjects of articles, to avoid indiscriminate inclusion of topics without verifiable evidence of notability." That's not quite right although I'm not sure what to do about it. First, there is a risk of confusing the reader by mixing these two concepts: (1) the assertion that information must be verifiable, so a topic without reliable sources should not be the subject of an article; and (2) the new assertion that notability should be verifiable. I would love (2) but it's simply not possible because "notability" is a judgment call based on whether sufficient coverage by independent reliable sources has occurred. No reliable source is going to say "topic X is notable and warrants an article on Wikipedia". Johnuniq (talk) 08:11, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

My understanding of it is that it's not notability itself that must be verifiable, but the evidence that judgments of notability are based on, i.e. coverage by multiple independent third party sources. —chaos5023 (talk) 10:18, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

The language inserted suggests (rightly) that if you're stating something is notable, you've got sources for that, whether the start of coverage by the GNG or a reliable source to assert one of the sub-notability guideline criteria; how well this validation of notable meets the appropriate guideline is still up in the air and subject to consensus. For example, stating an actor won a notable award but providing no evidence of such, and this being the actor's only claim to fame, would run afoul of this. The change does not (should not? if the language's off) say that we need a source that directly claims a topic notable; if it does, we need to tighten the language. --MASEM (t) 12:57, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

I can see (and agree with) the point made by chaos5023. I guess it doesn't matter if I'm the only one who finds the wording a bit off, but I think something like "without verifiable evidence that the topic meets this notability guideline" would be better (although more clumsy). Johnuniq (talk) 02:53, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I've reverted back to Masem's wording, which I find clearer, and much closer to the long term established consensus position. . V is a much more basic principle than N, and should not be confused with it. I may try some wording myself. We can choose whatever criteria we want for notability, and the relationship between the various guidelines is not settled. I agree that some argument for whatever we choose must be there, but whether it need be an external source n the usual sense i let alone multiple external sources is not all that obvious. A single reliable listing that someone is an Olympic athlete, for example, is irrefutable evidence of notability--since we have decided that this participation is a sufficient criterion. Prior attempts to merge V and N in a single guideline have been explicitly rejected, and if this is to be done it would need a very much more extensive discussion than here. DGG ( talk ) 05:20, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I was trying to summarize the point in "notability requires verifiable evidence". The lead gets confusing with all the talk of "worthy of notice", which is really subjective and misleading. But adding "notability requires verifiable evidence" to the lead helps get rid of that confusion, and also summarizes what's actually in the guideline a lot better. Can we find a wording that works? Because right now, the emphasis is on "worthy of notice" rather than "verifiable evidence", which causes a lot of confusion. Arskwad (talk) 06:46, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

But that's what notability means; noteworthy. Confusion about notability has to do with different people's interpretations of sources. It's supposed to be subjective. Abductive (reasoning) 08:07, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

As an IP, I ran into a lot of problems with this. "Well I think it's worthy because I noticed it!" I'm not the only one. Arguing about worthiness is annoying and even kind of insulting. A lot of that goes away if people just focus on evidence. Arskwad (talk) 15:00, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

The wording in WP:GNG, I think is very clear and superior to making a muddle of the concepts of notability and verifiability in the lede. To restate when Johnuniq wrote above: Verifiability is editors looking at what the non-Wikipedia world has recorded about content proposed to appear in the Wikipedia. Notability is editors using our general and our subject-specific criteria to determine if the topic merits a stand-alone article. patsw (talk) 01:58, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

General standards

Considering tightening or loosening of inclusion standards, my general preference is for consistency. For example, any decision that WP should no longer function as a gazetteer (and lose articles about very small communities) should be accompanied by a decision to no longer function as an almanac (and lose articles such as those on years and numbers). Maurreen (talk) 15:52, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Given WP, whether for good or bad, is at the top of everyone's search engine, it's inevitable that WP will be looked to in order to be that gazetteer or almanac. And while I have my doubts that an election in a town of 237 is "notable," it is notable to the participants. It is more worthwhile to err on the side of what small communities find notable—which in the end makes WP more inclusive and interesting—than to spend the time I've seen arguing over what is "large" enough to "merit" notability, whether towns and numbers of people, Google hits on a topic, etc. Reflecting what I've seen develop in corporate life, there are too many people active on WP who believe that saying "NO" to something (that is, an action which stops forward progress) is a substantive act of contribution.  PЄTЄRS VЄСRUМВА ►talk  17:02, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

That's a poor argument. There are a lot of things that I can expect to be "notable" among a relatively small group - or even a hugh, million+ group, that aren't Wikipedia-notable here due to the fact that there's significant coverage of it. The idea of WP's notability, as long as we're going to us it, is that because of the coverage, we're assured of a good encyclopedic article at the end of the day. Just because we end up at the top search result is not a good reason to keep articles. Now, no one is talking of dismissing mention of these settlements altogether and instead actually making this more like a gazetteer - listing such places, coordinates and critical numbers in appropriate tables, but otherwise not dedicating articles to a place that can't be expanded encyclopedically. --MASEM (t) 17:26, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Counterargument to needing a large body of info to regonize it as notable is that a lot of species and celestial bodies are not really notable to a large population, but are encyclopedic. There is the possibility, I would say even the probability, that many might only ever get 1 RS in-depth analysis of them for the foreseeable future and yet since we aren't a paper encyclopedia why should they be removed when it would probably harm our goal (this is assuming their is no valid merge target)?陣内_Jinnai 20:14, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose It is our policy that this is not a parliament and you are not empowered to pass laws or otherwise dictate guidelines for other editors. Our policies represent the body of established custom and practise. The way to influence this is to work upon the detailed content and outcomes. Discussions of this sort are therefore improper and creepy. Colonel Warden (talk) 08:34, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Notability of small settlements

Here are four articles I found through Special:Random:

• Eliksem
• Bărboieni
• Nieuwlande_(Zeeland)
• Meolo

These are broadly representative of thousands of articles which have been created on small settlements. Most do not meet WP:NOTABILITY, because of a lack of significant coverage. I think it's necessary to redirect and merge all these small settlement articles into larger pieces, and for there to be a statement in this policy that all communes/villages/regions do not automatically have notability unless they meet WP:NOTABILITY. Claritas (talk) 19:00, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

People have tried to do something about small but government-recognized settlements and villages and have been unsuccessful, based on the presumption that notability would eventually be met. It would be great to be able to do something about these but I don't see that happening easily. --MASEM (t) 19:29, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Many editors (myself included) are of the opinion that localities have Inherent/de facto notability, and AfD history/precedent mostly supports this; see Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Common_outcomes#Geography_and_astronomy. --Cybercobra (talk) 19:43, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Why are localities inherently notable if they don't meet WP:NOTABILITY ? Claritas (talk) 19:50, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Claritas, it's not clear whether you've searched for sources. Maurreen (talk) 21:55, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

In some cases, merging permastubs into a higher level article would be appropriate. But where there are more developed and well-sourced articles in other languages, I'd prefer to err on the side of eventualism and tag the article as needing expansion by translation from other languages. older ≠ wiser 22:14, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

(EC) It is unfortunately pretty much as Masem said, and to a degree Cybercobra. There are many editors who feel that pretty much any settlement, locality, poodunk village is notable irregardless of whether there is any significant coverage at all, so long as it can be reasonably shown to exist. Much as with high schools, all guidelines and policies regarding what Wikipedia is not, notability, and existence alone not making it notability are thrown out the window for these items, and all attempts to change it are usually met by points to Common outcomes (i.e. consensus can't change because consensus says this despite this specifically saying not to use it that way). At best, a talk page discussion or being bold may result in merging to a large locality, but it is often undone and you find yourself being insulted and attacked for daring it. -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 22:16, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

The spirit of a rule overcomes its specific wording. Wich is the idea that explains why is there a "Notability" guideline to begin with? It is there to prevent the using of Wikipedia as a free-advertisment tool, to promote things that nobody have actually taken interest in (such as garage bands, home-made software, personal webpages, etc.) A thing that does not apply to geographic locations: they do not need to generate anyone's interest, or to be "sold" in any way to the public. They simply exist. State recognition is enough to determine notability. MBelgrano (talk) 23:04, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

A lot of things simply exist and can be verified as such, including probably every adult citizen in a first-world country. The point is that WP is not to be indiscriminate, and the question of having every small settlement (compared to large cities, towns, and so forth) questions that. The argument comes back "well, there will be sources about the settlement if we wait long enough", and that argument is getting rather tired. There's no reason we can't have a list of settlements of a specific area if at the present time we can only cite their name, geographic location, and population - we're not disservicing their existance, just the need to have an article on them. --MASEM (t) 23:52, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Some editors are devoted to keeping every article about some dot on a map or line in a directory covering a spot where three houses once existed, even if there has never been any significant coverage. Good luck in applying the general notability guide of "significant coverage in multiple reliable and independent sources" to these beloved entries. Edison (talk) 00:20, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I never thought we'd be able to get the various sports projects to at least *think* about dropping ATH for something more specific, but that's changed (see NSPORT), so there's always a chance to do better here. Also, people have put forward the idea of a "WikiAtlas" or "Wikigazetteer" where an article on each would make sense, while WP would be about the more more ntable ones. --MASEM (t)

Claritas,

Have you actually looked for sources -- a really thorough search? For myself, I can't imagine a town, no matter how small, being founded/officially incorporated, and officials appointed or elected to run it for years on end, without anyone (e.g., the nearest newspaper) "noticing" it. It's usually possible to produce decent sources even for long-abandoned "ghost towns", if you look for them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:50, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

This is a perennial misunderstanding of the function of an encyclopedia. The reason for the inclusion of all populated places is to fufill the "gazetteer" facet of Wikipedia. The alternative is worse; imagine a user trying to research the history of the Hundred Years' War. They run into a name of a town which they do not recognize, and wonder where it is (or was). Without the little stub, they may waste time delving into primary sources. A little stub article on Wikipedia will help them. The mere fact that the article is a stub may satisfy them, since it may confirm that the town is insignificant. Or they may discover that the town has changed its name, a very useful piece of information. Abductive (reasoning) 05:38, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

The functionality of a stub can be replaced using redirects and entries in tables. We don't have to rid mention of these small towns, just group them instead of separate articles. --MASEM (t) 05:41, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Why bother? The redirects will still be there, the tables will discourage article expansion where it is warranted, and the amount of work required is astronomical. Look at http://www.city-data.com for thousands of articles on small towns in the US. The user interest is there, on the Long Tail. Abductive (reasoning) 05:47, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

For one, the fact that we have all these articles (and not summarized as tables) is always a stumbling point when trying to explain notability for other topics and why we're not indiscriminate, when they turn it around and say "but we have articles on every small village and town". Again, I point out that WP:ATHLETE was a similar "taken for granted" situation but has since changed, so I can see a similar move for this. Redirects do not discourage article creation when there is enough information, and the table is still a useful point to organize the information (we should have these tables regardless of the articles or redirects). As many of these small articles were created from bots importing data from existing sources, the tables can be made in the same fashion for minimal work. --MASEM (t) 05:55, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Take the example of the tiny town of Cabery, Illinois. As small as it is, there is plenty of information in the article, including photos. It straddles two counties, complicating building any table, and city-data's article on it has even more information. At the bottom of the city-data article is a list of Cabery's presence on "top lists". Out of thousands of towns in the US, Cabery is

No. 12 on the list of "Top 101 cities with largest percentage of males in occupations: Legal occupations:"

No. 22 on the list of "Top 101 cities with largest percentage of males in occupations: Agricultural workers including supervisors"

No. 24 on the list of "Top 101 cities with largest percentage of females working in industry: Wood products"

No. 26 on the list of "Top 101 cities with largest percentage of females in occupations: Financial managers"

No. 36 on the list of "Top 101 cities with largest percentage of females working in industry: Farm supplies merchant wholesalers"

No. 38 on the list of "Top 101 cities with largest percentage of males working in industry: Truck transportation" Abductive (reasoning) 06:07, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Side consideration: A town of 263 people is going to skew any facts about that town in those lists; it's like saying a pinch batter that only safely hit once at his only time at bat for a season has the highest batting average of the league for that season. It's a statistic skew resulting from sample size. The city-data lists are only going methodically through the data, they aren't making a difference between a 10M+ metropolis and a 200+ town.

All the info about the town is taken from US census data, and the way that section is presented makes it look like one of the bot runs that created the article; in fact, checking now, it is definitely an article from User:Ram-Man, who employed automated edits and bots to create these articles. Is there anything that distinguishes this town from any other small town in the US, moreso than any other small village or settlement in the world? Not really, thus one can consider it an indiscriminate article, appropriate for a gazetteer but not for an encyclopedia. --MASEM (t) 15:21, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

It's not a matter of being indiscriminate; it's a matter of at which point to discriminate.

Also, the WP:GNG point does not hold unless enough search has been made. Maurreen (talk) 15:40, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Also, the gazetteer function of WP was included in the first version of WP:5P. Maurreen (talk) 15:46, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

The fact there's a handful of people that say "why do we have an article on every settlement?" begs the question if including every settlement is still being discriminating or not. Also, yes, we incorporate elements of gazetteers within WP, which certainly means that for notable locations and geographic features we should be providing coordinates and other datum of that nature, but it is not that "we are a gazetteer". It is knowing what elements work in the context of an encyclopedia that is important. Thus, again, I point that we can make tables and lists of small settlements that are otherwise non-notable with the necessary gazetteer functions, have the city-data.com and other pertinent links, and the like, without losing any information while improving WP's discriminate nature of such topics. Or, as I've noted, there's enough motivation that a WikiGazetteer could be a very useful article which actually would be a gazetteer, and as a sister project, could be used easily to connect information. --MASEM (t) 15:55, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Masem: Wikipedia is contains only those elements of a gazetteer or almanac that are notable. I can't see how every settlement can be notable if it has not actually been "noted" in accordance with WP:GNG, and crystal ball gazing is not a valid counter argument in favour of the inclusion of those that are not. The idea that Wikipedia should have an article on every settlement is in direct conflict with WP:NOT ("information cannot be included solely for being true or useful"), and those editors that claim that settlements are inherently notable are suffering from a bout of Emperor's New Clothes syndrome. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:23, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I generally agree that Wikipedia should not have articles about settlements that no one has ever written about (except perhaps a government entity that is required to write about it by law).

However, my question still stands: Does anyone actually know that no sources exist for these settlements? So far, the complaint seems to that no editor has already WP:CITEd independent sources -- which tells us nothing at all about whether sources exist. Without actually searching for them, I strongly suspect that sources exist. I have never yet encountered a settlement whose location, founding, and government structure has not been described in the local newspaper. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:05, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

As far as looking for such sources: WhatamIdoing has made the point twice, I have made the point twice, and no one has responded to the point. Maurreen (talk) 23:08, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

WP's approach is that those seeking to retain information need to show the availability of sources. You cannot prove the absence of sources, only the existance. --MASEM (t) 23:13, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Local papers are not sufficient for notability. Again, take the same idea that every adult citizen in more first-world countries can be verified, and similarly, with a narrow sources, can likely have more information about them, yet we don't do that. --MASEM (t) 23:12, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I think WP:NTEMP makes it clear that routine news stories are not evidence of notability, and Masem makes a perfectly valid point that news reported by local news sources even less so. The argument in favour of including articles on every settlement, as far as I can see, is based on the idea that, at the very least, settlements can meet the requirements of WP:BURDEN because they likely or not to have been the subject of coverage in tertiary sources, such as travel guides. However, being verfiable is still not sufficient rationale for inclusion and this approach still conflicts with WP:NOT#TRAVEL. The acid test is whether or not an article about a particular settlement is encyclopedic or not depends on whether it has been the subject of significant coverage from secondary sources. Trival coverage or mentions in passing are not evidence of notability, so simply labeling a topic "inherently notable" when coverage is trivial or thin just won't wash. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:38, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

The discussion is not about whether to retain specific articles, which is what Masem implied. This discussion is about a class of articles. The burden is on people who want to change a practice or policy.

If local sources are not sufficient -- where is that rule? Maurreen (talk) 07:00, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

The requirements for a topic to have its own standalone article are clearly set out in WP:N. If a settlement is not notable, then a standalone article about it is not appropriate at this time. There are no blanket exemptions from the requirements of this guideline for any class of topic, as notability cannot be inherited nor is it inherent in the absence of verifiable evidence. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 07:18, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

This would require a rewrite of the WP:Five pillars. Why aren't you guys commenting at AfDs where the real consensus is built? Right now the WP:ARS is running the show at several important AfDs. Abductive (reasoning) 18:36, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

None of this changes the basic fact: If you have not looked for sources, you cannot know whether they exist. It's not good enough to say, "Heavens! An {{unref}}'d article about a place I've never heard of! Obviously it's not notable, because WP:IDONTKNOWIT!" WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:55, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Its not down to me to prove every settlement that comes up for deletion is notable. Its down to the creators of these articles to provide evidence of notability in accordance with W:N, otherwise we will end up with the situation that one trivial mention in passing = one article. Personally, I think it better to have an article about one notable topic than 100,000 stubs about points on a map, for it is the context in the form of commentary, criticism and analysis obtained from significant coverage that provide information to the reader, not just raw data. Stubs don't provide context, hence that is why there is no rationale for the creation of thousands of stubs that are not encyclopaedic. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 03:45, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Populated places have context; they are in a particular location and they have people living there. They are embedded in higher level political entities such as townships, counties, provinces and countries, and the stubs usually spell all that out. I've created two stubs on populated places, Aïn Oussera and Pichari. Aïn Oussera has 134,174 people living there, but sources are impossible to find. Conversly, Pichari is quite small, but there are plenty more sources for it. Should either be deleted? What would their AfD nominations say? Abductive (reasoning) 08:19, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Populated places may well have context to those who live there, but those that don't (e.g. the readers - rememember them?), context can only be obtained from signficant coverage. Surely Abductive can to engage his critical faculties for a moment by questioning the rationale for creating articles that are comprised soley of trivial coverage and mere mentions in passing?
Notability is more than just a set of inclusion criteria, it is also a quality check. There are loads of sites which act as mirrors for geographic data, telephone directories, real estate records and government registers, but their rationale for the inclusion of this data is to get advertising revenue without having make any effort to provide context to the reader. By contrast, Wikipedia's rationale is to provide coverage of notable topics, and if these settlements have not been noted, then I don't see the point of having articles about them in accordance with WP:NOTTRAVEL. I think I am right in my thinking on this issue, because the same applies to the next level up or down: we don't need articles about every star in the sky or street in a town either, unless of course a particular star or street is notable. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 10:08, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I tend to take a statistical look at things. At one time, I felt as you do; that these stub articles are valueless. However, I could not find any consistent way to distinguish the rare populated place that truly has no secondary sources from the vast majority that do. The only times I have succeeded in getting articles on populated places deleted is when I could demonstrate that they failed WP:V. In addition, the consensus on this issue is entrenched and there is no possibility of prevailing. One reason for this is that there are no editors who hate towns and villages in real life. Your energies would be better spent on getting these sorts (examples) of articles on small town newspapers deleted. Or small town libraries. Or small town mayors. Abductive (reasoning) 19:31, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Entrenched doesn't mean its impossible to change particularly when the allowance for this articles is not documented in policy or the like and goes against everything else we have. Heck, I though WP:ATH was entrenched but we actually got a guideline that's shaping up to be a decent replace (it's not perfect yet, but its a start). The way to go about this is to set up an RFC which to my awareness hasn't been done in the last several years, and debate on this point. I have a feeling the entrenched viewpoint is only shared by a minority of editors and consensus is different for that. --MASEM (t) 19:35, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Everything is handled by a minority of editors. This is the 80-20 rule in action. Consensus is developed in AfDs, not on these talk pages. The tiny number of editors in the ARS stonewalls every AfD they can, and if they can prevent Croatia–Mongolia relations from being deleted I assure you they can prevent articles on small towns from being deleted. Any effort to get these stubs deleted will be seen as evidence that "deletionists" have battery acid instead of blood coursing through their veins. Abductive (reasoning) 21:02, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, in minority here, I'm even restricting myself to thsoe that are relatively regular participants on Wikipedia: space pages. But regardless: ARS cannot control this work. If there is an RFC to assert that human settlements have no special metric in regards to notability, and it results in this becoming a guideline (er, a lack of guideline if shown to be true, or established in a guideline if shown that consensus wants to keep these) then ARS has to play by those rules too. I don't think anyone here in this discussion is proposing this as a mass deletion campaign (in fact, every page affected would become a redirect which is not deletion) nor doing this for the purpose of being a deletionist, but only to help normalize the impact of notability on the rest of the work. --MASEM (t) 21:12, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Gavin, this may surprise you, but there's no equivalent of WP:BURDEN in WP:N: It is therefore not entirely "down to the creators of these articles" to prove notability. The basic rules work like this:

1. If you honestly believe it likely that sufficient, suitable sources exist, then trying to get the article deleted on the grounds that no such sources have already been WP:CITEd is WP:POINTy.
   • NB: Deletion processes are WP:NOTCLEANUP. You should never nom an article for which you, personally, are convinced that sufficient, suitable sources exist -- no matter why or how you have come to that conclusion.
2. If you believe that sources probably don't exist, you can freely send it off for deletion.
   • NB: There is no rule that requires the nominator to search for sources. Your belief can be based on prior knowledge of the field, or experience with similar articles, or any other non-pointy/non-hypocritical/non-deceptive source.
3. Every single editor who responds to the AfD should start with an effort to find sources (or to identify indications that sufficient, suitable sources very likely exist).

Note that in #3, I've written "every single editor", not "only those editors who created the article." WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:43, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I think the point Gavin's trying to make specifically in regard to these articles is that the reason for keeping them is always met by the claim "sources may not exist now but they will" that is part of the general current rationale to keep these articles. For any other topic at AFD, that logic will unlikely keep the article barring special circumstances. (And note that its note that the sources needed to be had during AFD, just that they have been identified at minimum). So it is still a matter of burden on those who believe an article should be kept when an article's notability is brought up in question at AFD to find source; saying "Keep, I know sources exists but can't demonstrate them" would normally be a weak and ignored argument. But for some reason, these settlement articles get a free pass for that. --MASEM (t) 21:52, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I think we all agree that WP:ATA#Crystal is a transparently rubbish argument to put forward at WP:AFD. A variant put forward by Maurreen is that, if sources have not been found just yet, its because editors are just not trying hard enough to find them. WhatamIdoing more or less adds a scientific twist to this argument: if you believe that sources can be found, then this is a valid belief, because it can be inferred from the laws of statistics and the balance of probabilities that settlement must be noted at sometime. Playing devil's advocate for a minute (or WhatamIdoing's case, a silver tongued devil :p), it can be argued that any editor who nominates an article about a populated settlement for deletion is simply trying to prove a point, because they have ignored "science" (aka laws of statistics/balance of probabilities). I don't subscribe to these views myself, because it implies that, if sources can can always be found, then we just need a more up to date version of a crystal ball that can crunch numbers. The problem is, crystal balls of any sort are in short supply when I last time looked, and can't be had for ready money in any market. It seems to me that these arguments put editors who don't already own a crystal ball (whether old fashioned or new statistical model) at a distinct disadvantage to everyone else, and I don't think this makes sense.
I think there is equivalent of WP:BURDEN in WP:N, and that is the requirement for verfiable evidence. There have been several attempts to water down WP:NRVE and I predict it will come under repeated attack in the future from those who believe in inherent notability (aka "science", "fate" or "truth") and crystal balls in various form factors. I put it to you again that this section needs to be strengthened along the lines of "Verifiable evidence cannot be infered, nor can it be seen through a crystal ball, nor is it inherited in the absence of significant coverage". --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 04:35, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

In general, I support strengthening NRVE, but verifiable evidence can, in some limited instances, be inferred. For example, if a rare disease is named at OMIM or on the ICD-10 code list, I infer that suitable sources about this disease exist -- because it is, in practice, impossible to get a disease listed in either of these indices unless there have been a handful of high-quality papers describing, defining, and discussing the disease in significant detail. Consequently, I don't need to see the actual publications: I know, without searching or citing them, that sources exist for every single disease defined by the WHO.

In the relevant context, the critical difference between BURDEN and NRVE is the actor: BURDEN is a method of forcing the specific person who wants to add information to name sources. NRVE is not limited this way: topics are included if (as far as any editor can tell) sources exist. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:06, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that's often a reason that an article is kept, that there's an inference and good faith understanding that source may exist in the near future for a topic. But now we're back at this point: no one has shown it to be universally true that reliable independent sources will exist for every settlement in the world. I can understand something like a new disease that has just been revealed by a reliable organization, but that's because that's usually a global issue compared to a few hundred/thousand people. --MASEM (t) 05:15, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Masem that no one has shown it to be universally true that reliable independent sources will exist for every settlement in the world. However, WhatamIdoing's suggestion that verifiable evidence can, in some limited instances, be inferred in the absence of significant coverage is merely another way of saying WP:IKNOWIT, but with an expert twist. If only enough editors who are medical experts attest to the notability of disease, or mathematicans calculate the statistical probability that sources must almost certainly exist, then all of the arguments set out in WP:ATA no longer appear to be debunked, but gain a new lease of life because expert editors have an inside understanding of what is the "truth", which because they are "experts", whose opinions trascend verifiability.
Again, I don't buy into this approach. I would much rather read one article that contains significant coverage from external sources than read 100,000 stubs that have none, even if talk page of each stub had a 100,000 opinions of expert editors saying that the topic is important in the absence of significant coverage. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:31, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

No: I gave an example of a method for determining that sources with significant coverage definitely exist, without actually seeing the sources myself. There is no "absence of significant coverage" in my example; there is only an absence of me personally and directly finding and reading the extant sources.

Please remember that WP:N is about whether sufficient, suitable sources exist, anywhere in the world. Whether any editor has actually found or cited these sources is actually irrelevant. If sources exist, and we delete the article because one or more editors didn't happen to find them, then we've screwed up. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:03, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Notability is about significant coverage as a result of those sources, not just that sources exist - otherwise, again, we're back to verifiability as the only inclusion metric. Census results and other pure factual datum are not significant coverage - that's just routine coverage. And yes, I'm not doubting the existence of those sources, but that there are sources that go into more depth about why including the town is maintain WP's discriminate coverage of human knowledge. --MASEM (t) 01:08, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

We agree: I have repeatedly said that the reliable sources must be "sufficient"; we all agree that trivial coverage is insufficient. (We also agree that trivial coverage is not the only reason that coverage might be declared insufficient.) The difference between Gavin's position and mine is that he apparently thinks they need to be already named in the article, or at least produced on demand at some deletion-as-cleanup process; by contrast, I (and this page, and the community in general) am content under circumstances that allow us to be confident that the necessary level of sources actually exists, even if individual, specific sources are not yet named. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:20, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

That's not true. Mind you, I'm not as extreme as what you're suggesting, but to show notability at AFD, I want to know if there are named sources that have been identified, but I don't expect them yet to have been incorporated in the article; this follows the model of WP:V in that we seek verifiability, not verification - does the source exist as opposed to do we have the source in our hands? Obviously, if such sources are never incorporated in an article after some time, off to AFD again. What the argument has been here for settlements et al is that there are bound to be appropriate sources in the future that go into detail, and that's just not been shown true. It is better expand these articles only once sources have been identified, and not until that point. --MASEM (t) 01:26, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

No: AfD is not clean up. Ever. The fact that extant sources have not been incorporated, even "after some time", is not—and has never been—a valid reason for deletion. Please go look at the deletion policy. You will not find a single sentence that says anything like "I waited a long time, and nobody's improved the references named in this article, even though I know that plenty of excellent sources exist."

(I agree, of course, that sources must exist (somewhere in the world) right now, for any subject to have notability right now.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:36, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

The issue of sending an article that has been associated with sources but not included off to AFD is a side-issue; you're right there's no language to support that idea, but the point is that anyone can challenge notability of a topic at any time and the best way to prevent it is to put sources into place, even if they are bare links in the article. But again, not relevant to this point; the issue is if someone claims sources but never explicitly spells them out, subsequent AFDs should less and less accept this as an argument to keep. This is what happens with settlement articles. --MASEM (t) 01:46, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it's a side issue. Certainly "I know that plenty of great sources exist, but I refuse to add them, and I want someone else to add them right now" is pretty much the definition of a bad-faith nomination for deletion. I agree that if someone claims sources exist, and none are ever produced, that the credibility of this assertion will eventually and rightly decline.

However, if the sources do actually exist, and the article gets deleted because editors didn't find them (whether through laziness or bad faith or simple ignorance), then we have actually made a mistake in deleting the article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:25, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Trying to clarify: Gavin Collins said, "A variant put forward by Maurreen is that, if sources have not been found just yet, its because editors are just not trying hard enough to find them."

Actually, what I've been trying to put forward is a challenge to the apparent assumption by the "deletion" side of this discussion. That side appears to assume that the communities do not meet WP:GNG. For the specific communities that were used as the initial examples, as far as I can tell, most of us are operating on assumption. We haven't investigated these communities. Some people expect these and many other small communities would fail GNG; some people expect they'd pass with enough research.

The "deletion" side wants to change policy, practice or both -- but has given little or no evidence that there is a discrepancy between GNG and practice about small communities.

I will grant that small communities in less-developed areas are likely to have little or no coverage, and thus likely to fail GNG. But those communities are also less likely to be included in WP.

Some small communities might have little or no coverage in online sources but have better coverage in paper sources, which we're unlikely to find without significant effort. Maurreen (talk) 07:02, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose Checking the first of these places Eliksem, we see that it was the site of the battle and there are hundreds of sources about this and other aspects of the place. There's no case to answer here. Further strictures would be WP:DISRUPTIVE, adding no value to the project and generating conflict which would hurt it. Colonel Warden (talk) 08:26, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

• • Colonel Warden, it's not clear what you're opposing. Maurreen (talk)

• I oppose the Notability of small settlements proposal by User:Claritas. Colonel Warden (talk) 11:30, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

In answer to Maurreen, nomination for deletion is just one of many disputes that can arise over articles about settlements. Disputes about content, article names, and minor disagreements regarding categorisation and disambiguation are bound to arise from time, for as long as there are editors with different opinions, there will be editorial disputes. The problem with stubs that contain little or no coverage is that it is impossible to resolve these disputes by refering to content policy, becasue significant coverage provides the traction for editorial disputes to be resolved. If a settlement is not the subject of significant coverage, then it is hard to understand what is the rationale for inclusion as a standalone article is, especially if there are disputes with unsourced content or original research thrown in. It seems to me that whilst the Battle of Elixheim is notable, the town itself may not be if it has only been mentioned in passing. Topics that are not important in themselves could in theory be deleted under WP:CSD#A7, and although this does not apply to settlements at this time, topics that do not indicate why its subject is important or significant are legitimate deletion targets. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 09:02, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Gavin Collins, I don't think we're understanding each other. But I think I'll give up on this point. Maurreen (talk) 09:07, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Overlap and confusion... don't know where to discuss

I am not sure if this is an AfD issue, a CfD issue, or something else... so I figured I would raise it here and get some advice.

We have several dab/list articles and a category that all try to organize "Masonic buildings". There seems to be a significant overlap and duplication (but not complete overlap and duplication) between these pages, and a lot of confusion as to scope. see: List of Masonic Buildings, Masonic Temple, Masonic Lodge (disambiguation), Category:Masonic buildings (this isn't a complete list... but it will give you an idea of what I am dealing with).

Here is the problem... we have confusion between projects over what the purpose of the various pages, the scope of the various pages and the notability of the buildings listed.

Many of the buildings listed are on the National Register of Historic Places, so to some extent they are notable. The editors who are working on the NRHP project are (slowly) trying to create articles for all of the buildings listed (but there are still a lot of red links). That project views these pages as dab pages for their project (for example to disambiguate between the various buildings listed as "Masonic Temple (Anytown, State)" on the NRHP).

Unfortunately this causes confusion at the Freemasonry project. There is no guidance as to what constitutes a "Masonic building", a "Masonic Temple", a "Masonic Hall" etc. Many of these buildings are no longer connected to Freemasonry. They may have been originally built by the Freemasons, or at one time used by the Freemasons, but are now used for something completely different (in one case, a building listed as "Mason Building" by the NRHP is now a Hyatt hotel!)

From the perspective of Freemasonry, these are list articles... and few of the buildings listed are notable. Every small city in America (indeed most town of any size) has or had a building that is or was used as a Masonic Temple. Those of us at the FM project do understand that the buildings are notable due to their being registered by the NRHP... but they are not notable to our project. On the other hand, there are buildings that are notable to our project that are not on the NRHP. When we wish to add buildings that we consider notable, the folks at the NRHP project object... and when they add pages, we object.

I think part of the problem is that there is no clear criteria for inclusion. What makes a building "Masonic"... Is it a building that is currently used by the Freemasons? Is it a building that was originally built by the Freemasons? Do we include buildings that were originally built as something else, and subsequently used by the Freemasons... and often are now once again used for something else? What about a retirement center, school or museum that was sponsored and built by the Freemasons, but where they never actually met? Is it any building that is associated in any way with the Freemasons?

Finally... I am concerned about the amount of (erratic) duplication between these articles, lists, and dab pages, and between them and the cat.

I have tried trimming, I have tried Prodding, I have tried merging... I can not seem to bring any order to the chaos... I need advice... should any of these articles be sent to AfD... should they be renamed and refocused? What do you do when different projects have very different ideas about the purpose and scope of a page? Blueboar (talk) 18:14, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

And if this isn't the right place to ask... could you point me to the right place? Thanks. Blueboar (talk) 18:22, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Just food for thought -- maybe there could be more-clearly distinguished titles, such as "Buildings important to Freemasonry" and "Historic Masonic buildings". Maurreen (talk) 18:28, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Maurreen makes a good point. On the ghost RFC we had a while back, editor Ludwigs2 made another excellent point about cats you might find usefull. "Categories are not labels we apply to topics because we believe they deserve to be labeled that way. Categories are labels we apply to topics because they are helpful to the reader" If you accept his position, as several did at the RFC, you dont have to worry about whether the buildings are Masonic or not, just if some readers by consider them as such and therefore find the cats useful. Not saying this necessarily applies to your concern, but it may save you a lot of work if you take the same approach to the Masonic cats. . FeydHuxtable (talk) 18:33, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice. Not sure if it helps all that much, but it is appreciated :>) I think part of the solution will be for the participants in the NRPH project and those in the Freemasonry project to outline their different concepts of what these lists/dab pages/ etc are for. Just agreeing on purpose and scope is a bit of a dilemma.

It gets really confusing in situations like Masonic Temple (Billings, Montana), where there are two buildings known as the Masonic Temple... one is a historic building listed on the NRPH (and so notable), but no longer used by the Masons. The other is the current building that is used by the Masons (but which is not notable). Clarifying which one goes on which list (if at all) is hard. Blueboar (talk) 20:21, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I'd pick either of the relevant projects' talk pages (here or here), leaning towards whichever is more active and/or whichever you're less involved in, with an invitation to all editors on the other project's page to join the discussion.

One question I would ask them both is: "Are we trying to provide information primarily to non-Masons about architecture, or a handy way for Masons visiting a given town to find the nearest active organization?" WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:53, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

these lists are not about architecture or about where to find an active lodge. To be on the NRHP, a building just needs to be old and historic in nature. The only reason why these buildings are called "Masonic Temple" on the NRHP is that the locals call it by that name. Yes, some were purpose built, with architectural interest and significance... but others were originally built as private houses, or bland commercial buildings... the only reason they are called "Masonic Temple" is that they were at one point purchased by the local Masonic Lodge and the lodge met there for enough years that the local community continued to call the building "the Masonic Temple" (or "Masonic Hall" etc.) after the lodge closed down or moved elsewhere. Today it may look like any other old farm house, or a typical small town commercial building... it may have even been renovated extensively and no longer have any historic architectural significance.

But I agree that the next step is discussion between projects. Thanks for the input. Blueboar (talk) 01:26, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

That's your purpose for these lists and cats. I think you need to find out what their purposes are. I am not convinced that they will agree with you. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:38, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes. That is the heart of the debate... two different projects with very different ideas about what these lists, cats, dab pages etc. are supposed to be. Compounded by over-duplication of how the information is organized. In some ways the issue actually comes down a simple question... is the word "Masonic" intended as a noun or an adjective in these pages? Again, thanks for the input. Blueboar (talk) 11:53, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

It is actually quite common to have significant overlap, see WP:CLT for discussion. This overlap is generally regarded as a good thing on balance, though this perspective is not unanimously held. According to WP:Categorization, lists should be used when the determination of which cat to apply to an article would be controversial, for the simple mechanistic reason that lists can be annotated and referenced, whereas categories cannot. Note also the guidance on the use of subcategories, which may be helpful in addressing this case. One might have Category:Masonic architecture, Category:Buildings used as Masonic temples, Category:Buildings used as Masonic halls, all of which could be made subcategories of Category:Masonic buildings simply by so tagging their category pages. Note also that it is quite routine to put a description of the categoric criteria as text on the category page. This can be remarkably effective in preventing disputes. You might wish to seek further input on Wikipedia talk:Categorization. Cheers LeadSongDog come howl! 17:33, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

WP:Notability is hampering usability of WP

I just posted a note on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Malamanteau#The_real_discussion_is_about_.22WP:Notable.22 and wanted to bring up the discussion here.

In my experience as an occasional user, but still strongly in support of Wikipedia - WP:NOTABLE has become the hammer most frequently used to prevent articles from being available from the service, articles I would want here. It causes innumerable arguments, and significant headache for both editors and admins.

The 25ish pages of talk and BBCAmerica article over Malamanteau is a symptom of this issue. Frankly, as an information source, Wikipedia can do a lot better than being just articles notable enough to be in a classical encyclopedia. Here's a copy in broad strokes solution I proposed - I'm interested if this has been discussed, or if I'm way off the mark.

""" There is an easy solution that maintains the notability of published articles, yet allows for other articles to be created and used. I've been saying this literally for years now. Simply allow all articles except trash and spam (create clear policies for exclusion, not article inclusion here), but put the non notable (new) ones in a different, lower class or harder-to-access category. Perhaps login- only to access them, with a bit Red banner warning at the top, or a different tab to click to see them. As things/articles become "notable" BY QUANTITATIVE METRICS (read: no human decisions) have the software automatically graduate articles into the mainstream encyclopedia and search results. """

Would this work? It would seem to me removing WP:NOTABLE and replacing it with both exclusion policies and fully automated article graduation would eliminate a huge amount of human time and wrangling, plus provide more data and articles in Wikipedia, and result in better articles graduating into the mainstream article set, because each was edited and proven before inclusion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jmd2121 (talk • contribs) 00:19, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Kinda all falls down around "quantitative metrics", doesn't it? Since there's very little that could mean other than web traffic statistics, which are ever so gameable. —chaos5023 (talk) 00:31, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

yeah, a fully automated solution would be hard, but not impossible. I don't have a fully formed solution for how this would be done without gaming it, however, the premise doesn't depend on this. Articles could just as easily graduate with a member or admin vote the same way articles are removed now by WP:NOTABLEJmd2121 (talk) 03:15, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Remember, if its not notable but verifiable, that information can be put into a larger notable topic (in this case, for Malamanteau, xkcd) with redirects directly to that information. There's no need to complicate the idea of classes of articles to account for this. --MASEM (t) 00:49, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

I'll echo Masem's point, there's no gate to information appearing in the Wikipedia if it can be verified, and be written neutrally and well. Notability is our term of art of decide if the topic merits its own article. I'll offer the observation that the lack of objective data and the abundance of opinion make deciding the the threshold criteria for a neologism always contentious. I hope no one minds that I corrected the spelling for this section's header. patsw (talk) 01:43, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

True, in many cases redirects work, like for this word - probably the best solution.(Ironic though that page still has not been fixed to provide any real information) However, in many cases, there is no larger topic that exists. For example small companies, 10s of thousands of them- their existence is verifiable, but "Dawn's Beauty Salon" on the corner of downtown ExampleTown, USA is an example of something WP could have a page for, but doesn't. It would be really, really useful to have addresses and hours for state licensed businesses. In fact, Dawn or anyone else can not get correct and accurate information about her small business into WP in any way. WP:NOTABLE hammer crushes those attempts. Individual people are another example - many people want pages about themselves, but simply are rejected because they are not notable. Again, facts about people are verifiable information about a subject people are interested in, but the WP:NOTABLE hammer prevents them from appearing in WP. Neologism are a third example, and I'm sure other people could come up with many other examples. No, this would not look the same as Britannica having every neologism, person, and business cataloged. But why not? What I don't understand is the systemic, ingrained and consistent push towards parsimony on WP pages, like there is some kind of limit. I could understand given where computing power and storage were 10-20 years ago, but I think the benefits far, far outweigh the costs to allow many more pages. When appropriate, editors will organize thing in the right place, for sure - not everything needs a page. Here's the thing I see: WP could be cataloging so much more, and doing it so much better (for example, using semantic structure for "list of" articles) but it seems to have stopped at the "we're an encyclopedia" idea many years ago trying to be only the electronic kind of thing dead tree publishers made for hundreds of years. (and thank you for the correction)Jmd2121 (talk) 03:15, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

WP is not an indiscriminate collection of information. Could we include every business? Sure, but at some point we're need to remember we're not a web directory, we're an education reference material; stuff like that is not important. Thus, we do have cases where something is not notable but verifiable doesn't fit into a larger topic, which usually is the case when something is indiscriminate. --MASEM (t) 04:47, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

That sort of kicks the can down the road for us to decide what is "discriminate" and what is "indiscriminate". There's a image I have of "discriminating" deletionists behind a velvet rope saying "You are trying to sneak that one in, eh? ... No way." making up what constitutes what is indiscriminate as its goes. I think there is a growing set of expectations by users of the Wikipeda and editors of the Wikipedia about what should be included, and the reasons for excluding content should be based on articuable and principled criteria, merely saying "that's not encylopedic", or "that's not notable" is going to be seen as arrogance. patsw (talk) 15:55, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

When WP first started, it was definitely an "include everything except for nonsense" attitude. That quickly shifted, and with the introduction of notability, the prevailing attitude is now exclusionary, only including things when they have proven themselves extraordinary beyond other similar topics (that is, that's our discrimination in practice) - this being through recognition in secondary sources. Now, I have suggested before an idea of a tighter inclusion principle, where we include elements of certain topic classes that meet specific guidelines, allowing for GNG to catch anything that doesn't fall into those bins but still makes for a good encyclopedic article, but that didn't fly. But there's also the points Whatamidoing outlines below, particularly with the page to editor ratio, of why we need to be discriminate and thus highly selection and exclusionary about what is included. --MASEM (t) 17:47, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

The page to editor ratio is a symptom, not a problem. The problem(s) might be:

1. the initial investment in time and energy to overcome rule creep is preventing people from making positive contributions.
2. the minority (editors) are advancing their own interests above the interests of the majority (readers).

Could we agree that these theoretical problems must be avoided or solved? Then we must also decide whether we currently have these problems. I believe that we do have these problems to some degree and that we need to improve.
41.18.92.181 (talk) 07:43, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia's "parsimony" have three important effects that have nothing to do with the size of the computing resources:

1. It preserves Wikipedia's character as an encyclopedia. For example, most Wikipedians think that this is a scholarly endeavor, not an advertising medium or a telephone directory.
2. It permits us to meet the standards we've decreed at WP:V about independent reliable sources, rather than relying entirely on self-published/marketing materials.
3. It makes it (barely) possible for our limited volunteer resources to (almost) keep up with basic maintenance.
   To give you some perspective, the United States has more than 30 million for-profit small businesses -- one business for about every eleven residents (including children). Last month, Wikipedia had 50,000 active editors in the US (minimum of one edit, at any point during the month). That ratio is more than 600 US small businesses per US editor. There simply aren't—and never will be—enough volunteers to support an article for even a small fraction of these businesses. (Wikipedia barely manages basic maintenance, like vandalism reversion, when we have a ratio of 50 articles per active editor.)
   Given this fundamental reality, limiting article creation to what some people might call "important" subjects, and "encyclopedic" subjects, helps focus our volunteers on what we think is most important (verifiable facts on encyclopedic subjects) rather than being divided across whatever happened to appeal to someone once upon a time.
   Yes, it's true that "just one more" article won't materially harm Wikipedia, but Wikipedia is not magically immune from the very real, very practical effects of the Tragedy of the commons. Excluding tiny businesses of no importance to anyone outside their hometown (and perhaps not even enough to merit media attention in their hometown) is one way that we can postpone the destruction of the whole. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:18, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

The tragedy of the commons might well be relevant, but we haven't solved that problem with the current guidelines. I believe that we must be careful to avoid having Protectors Of The Common, ie. landlords, police or gangs, who sometime agree on territory and sometimes go to war, but always believe that they must control access to the commons, lest the unwashed masses come in and destroy it. It should be easy for the common person to be involved in non-destructive use of the common.
There are thousands of articles on wikipedia that I am unlikely to read, because the subject lies outside my field of interest, but I love the idea that I could read them, if I wanted to. Unfortunately I cannot monitor AfD to determine what articles I might want to read in the future, let alone decide for somebody else what they might want to read in the future. I cannot think of a better system than what currently exists, but I do wish that editors would be more patient and lenient, before deciding that an article doesn't make the grade. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.18.92.181 (talk) 15:43, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

Well put by WhatamIdoing. Maurreen (talk) 17:27, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

I have never seen a commons grow at the rate the Wikipedia has. It isn't limited in the sense a lifeboat or a commons are. The analogy I would prefer is the Cathedral and the Bazaar, and we are are bazaar of contributors and readers. If a flood of small business articles appeared I wouldn't use the "no importance to anyone outside their hometown" as a reason to delete, but some objective criteria of sales, number of employees, etc. and apply it neutrally. patsw (talk) 00:37, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia's current growth rate, as measured by mere number of articles, appears to be between 1% and 2% each month. This is not actually a spectacularly high growth rate. Perhaps you haven't looked at the stats for a couple of years? WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:22, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

Nightmare Legacy

There is a discussion at Talk:Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy about the notability of said documentary and whether or not it needs its own article, or if it can survive at A Nightmare on Elm Street (franchise)#Documentary. Additional opinions are requested.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 23:27, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

This isn't the place for this sort of thing. And if you don't think something is notable, you can send it to an AFD, not post all over the place like you are doing here. Dream Focus 08:04, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

Change in wording to clarify

• "'Significant coverage' means that sources address the subject directly in detail, and no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention but it need not be the main topic of the source material."

or

• "'Significant coverage' means that sources address the subject directly in detail, so no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention but it need not be the main topic of the source material." This wording better defines what significant means. What do people think? --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 08:45, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

Agree. I made the edit[4]. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:40, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

I support this change. I'd also support a change that takes a baby step in the direction of defining "significant coverage" as containing enough information that editors could write more than ten sentences (that is, not merely a doomed permastub) from (specifically) independent sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:41, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

adding support. This makes it more clearer... Arskwad (talk) 16:10, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

AfD Pseudoscholarship

This discussion may interest editors with an interest in WP:N Anthony (talk) 18:53, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

SNG for bilateral relations articles

An editor has started a centralised discussion over at the village pump with a view to possibly creating a SNG, making a minor ammendement to this guideline or other wise creaing a special guideline. Contributions from regulars here are of course welcome! FeydHuxtable (talk) 19:43, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

nutshell and "worthy of notice"

"Wikipedia covers notable topics - those that are "worthy of notice" and have been "noticed" to a significant degree"

This statement does not tell me anything... At best it's a meaningless semantic exercise. In practice it's actually confusing to IPs and new users and causes them to argue about what is or is not worthy... and we all know how those discussions go... "it's worthy, no it's not, it's worthy, no it's not"...

I would like to rewrite it. But if there is no agreement to improve it then I would remove it completely. it is unclear... Arskwad (talk) 16:15, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

It is clear. "Notice" is three concepts:

• It is not that the subject or the advocate of the topic wants to be noticed.
• It is not that the editor has noticed the subject or is his/her/its advocate.
• It is that the editor has noticed that others have noticed the subject.

It someone has better wording for the nutshell, please share it here. The underlying concept is sound. It relates to WP:COI and WP:NOR. patsw (talk) 12:36, 21 May 2010 (UTC)

To what would you like to change it? --Explodicle (T/C) 17:43, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

I can live with that it has to with editors noticing that others have noticed the subject.... but "worthy of notice" sounds like it has to do with arguments about how great something is... which is already a problem considering people argue about whether they think something is notable or important... too many discussions go "he has the biggest grindcore blog in the scene!"... That's what worthy means to a lot of people and what notability means... I would drop the opening sentence and say... "Wikipedia covers topics that have verifiable evidence of notability." that uses the words in the guieline already and also fits with the idea that we notice what other people have noticed... Arskwad (talk) 17:56, 21 May 2010 (UTC)

I think some editors interpret "worthy of notice" as meaning "some sourceshould have noticed this, so even though I'm pretty certain no source actually did take notice, it gets an article (which I'll write from self-published sources)." I might update the nutshell to say something like "Wikipedia covers notable topics - those that are "worthy of notice" and have been "noticed" to a significant degree by independent sources". WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:37, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

The concepts of notability and verifiability are separate. Contributors to the text of this guideline are careful not to blur the two. Notability is our term of art for editors to decide if a proposed topic merits being its own article, or if the proposed article's content belongs to another (or several other) articles. The process is partially objective (see WP:GNG and WP:SNG which discuss third-party sourcing) and partially determined by editorial consensus. There is no verifiable external source to inform Wikipedia editors that a proposed topic for an article is going to merit its own article according the Wikipedia's criteria. That's the internal task performed by editors. patsw (talk) 02:56, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

I am ok with WhatamIdoing's wording... really i like my wording better but the really confusing ppart is "worthy of notice". (like i could post a link to a blog and show that "hey it's worthy of notice!"") just removing "worthy of notice" would be an improvement... talking about "notability requires verifiable evidence" right in the nutshell would make things very clear but whatamidoing describes almost the same thing by talking about independent sources. Arskwad (talk) 15:53, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

I think both Arskwad's and Whatamidoing's wording are an improvment over the current text. --Explodicle (T/C) 17:25, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

I've made my suggested change as less confusing than the previous version, but I'd be happy to continue discussing alternatives. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:11, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

I support your version for the sake of consensus.. only possible problm i might see is that some people don't like having a standard of independent sources in which case i'd try verifiable evidence as a softer requirement (right in the guideline)... either wording would be an improvement.. go ahead and let's try your version. Arskwad (talk) 20:39, 22 May 2010 (UTC)

I oppose the change. In any case, it doesn't change the reality: there is no external independent source to verify that our internal editorial process of determining if a topic merits its own article has been conducted so as to yield the verifiable result. patsw (talk) 18:50, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

Which change do you oppose? Do you oppose removing the words "worthy of notice" from the nutshell, or the proposed addition of the term "verifiable"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:57, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

I think the terms "worthy", "merit" and "suitable" are not relevant; far better to be non-judgemental about a topic. Far better wording would be "If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject, this provides evidence that it can meet the requirements of Wikipedia's content policies that apply to all stand-alone articles". WP:N exists as an inclusion criteria because, where there is significant coverage from reliable independent sources, then that is evidence that an article topic can satisfy Wikipedia's content principles, which is the strongest form of external validation by which editors can ascertain whether or not to have a stand-alone article on that topic. On the other hand, "suitability" suggests the following:

I think the use of the phrase "it is presumed to be a suitable article topic." is awful! For starters, it is too judgemental. We have been down this path before, describing the inclusion criteria for an article as being based on "importance", and now we are using an equally judgemental term "suitability". Also, it is a very old fashioned turn of phrase. Describing an article as worthy for inclusion on the basis of "suitablity" sounds like we are selecting a husband for a Jane Austen character. Has he article got "means" to impress its readers? Is the article written in a "cultured" style? Is the article's tone "pleasant" and without any pride and prejudice? Was it first drafted in tastefully coloured ink using a sharp quill? I think we should revert to my earlier version be restored or otherwise we will have to resort to pistols at dawn. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 23:24, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

Gavin, I'm disappointed with your recent change. You know perfectly well (or ought to, after the number of times it's been discussed and rejected on this page) that your interest in firmly connecting WP:N to the content policies has been consistently opposed by multiple editors for multiple reasons. I've reverted it: your suggested nutshell misleads readers about this page's current contents and the community's actual views on this subject—about which, in particular, let me say that no matter how sensible your notion is, the fact remains that the community does not choose to subordinate notability to verifiability.

I am sympathetic to your concerns about the word "suitable", but I don't see any easy solutions. Some synonyms (e.g., "appropriate") might actually be worse. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:16, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

If WP:N is not based on content policy, then what is it based upon? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:34, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

WP:N is an inclusion policy that, in the case of the GNG, happens to align with content policy because we have chosen one aspect of inclusion to be significant coverage in secondary sources. But notability does not always need to come as a product of content policy, only that the resultant article should eventually meet content policy. --MASEM (t) 06:38, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Point taken. Perhaps another way of making the link clear is that notability provides evidence that having a standalone article about a particular topic does not imediately conflict with Wikipedia's content policies, rather than meeting all of their requirements over time. However, one thing is for sure, notability does not indicate whether a topic is "suitable" or any other term that acts as a proxy for subjective importance. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 12:23, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Gavin, do you believe that "notability" has an meaning in the Wikipedia context apart from being a placeholder for "Wikipedia editors deciding if a topic should have its own article"? And if you do, what does it mean? patsw (talk) 17:03, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Also, notability does not "provide evidence" of anything. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:29, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

SlimVirgin's edits make the following changes:

1. removal of independence (i.e., we now misleadingly summarize this page as accepting self-published sources as proof of notability);
2. conflation of inclusion of a subject (somewhere in the encyclopedia) with a separate page;
3. removal of the notion of presumption (now telling readers that all notable topics are actually entitled to a separate page, no matter what the consensus at AfD is)

I don't think that this is an improvement. Does anyone else? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:29, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Here's my edit. Independent and secondary seemed repetitive. Could there be a secondary source on a person or event that wasn't independent of it? I'm not sure I follow your second two points and I didn't understand the "presumed" issue. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 17:34, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

I prefer the words from whatamidoing because i think it's better to make small and gradual changes based on careful discussino... but i can live with slim virgin's wording... would prefer to use the word "independent" one more time because that's the wording in the guideline... also a "secondary" source would not be independent if we used it to write an article about itself... like an article about an journal article written from the journal article itself... or an article about an author written from tat author's work in secondary sources.. but i think very few people argue about this Arskwad (talk) 18:36, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

It wouldn't be a secondary source in an article about itself. It would be a primary source in an article about itself. If we write "independent secondary source," it will make people think these are two separate kinds of sources. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 18:40, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

To expand on that slightly: sources aren't primary or secondary in a vacuum, they're primary or secondary in relation to particular topics. —chaos5023 (talk) 18:42, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

It is possible, depending on how you use primary and secondary, to consider something like a director's commentary on a movie to be a dependent secondary source - evaluating the primary source but having some invested connection to it to make it difficult to use as a key indicator of wider notability (but otherwise a great source for information). --MASEM (t) 18:47, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

A director's commentary on a movie would be a primary source of material on that movie, assuming the director had worked on the movie. Secondary means independent, one step removed. You can't have an involved, independent source. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 18:50, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Again, it depends on how you use the words primary and secondary. Some take it (as shown in the footnotes of the PSTS page) that a secondary source is one that transforms information from a primary source; in this case, the director commenting on the film is transforming what we saw on the screen to what they had to do or what was written or envisioned, or the like. That's why this is a dependent secondary source in that manner. --MASEM (t) 18:54, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

The actual main body text of WP:PSTS on what primary and secondary mean clearly indicate that material from a director of a movie is a primary source regarding that movie. I'd also say that WP:PSTS documents all this thoroughly enough that it's supportible to use "secondary" as necessarily implying "independent". Definitely calls for a wikilink though. —chaos5023 (talk) 18:55, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

This isn't the place to discuss it, but Masem a secondary source doesn't necessarily transform anything. A primary source is involved; a secondary source is one step removed. That's the basic definition. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 19:02, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

I could still call a director's commentary, made 20 years after the film, "one step removed". PSTS is not exact, it leaves open where the line is drawn exactly between primary and secondary sources, and because of that, removing "independent" does weaken the statement even though we already have secondary. Regardless of anything else, mentioning "independent" emphasizes that we are looking for coverage that is not related to the original authors or the like, a key factor for being "worthy of note", even if this is duplication of the "secondary" statement. --MASEM (t) 20:30, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

A director's commentary about his own film is a primary source of information about that film, no matter when it's made. But regardless, if it's the word "independent" that matters to you, then just say that alone. Bt if it's secondary sources you want to highlight, then that's enough. My objection is only to using both words, because it will cause confusion about sourcing that will spread elsewhere. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 20:38, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Or we could write "secondary (independent) sources". That avoids the confusion, but includes both words. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 20:40, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Ok, let me give a different example of why it's important to note both. Even if we start with "one step removed" for secondary, it is possible to have dependent secondary sources. For example, if CBS News reports on the success of an episode of CSI (which is produced in part by CBS), that's a secondary source but not independent; yes, likely CBS news editors are nowhere close to the editors of CSI (thus one step removed), but CBS as the parent company has some vested interest in CSI and CBS news, and thus we cannot assume it independent. We have to be aware of media ties-ins and the like for such cases; of course, if the same information is parroted by an Assoc. Press or non-CBS source, that's fine, that's an independent secondary source that collaborates from the dependent source and leads to supporting notability. So again, it is important to use both words separately in the statement. --MASEM (t) 20:44, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

In that case, it might be better to leave independent out for the reasons you cite, as well as the reason I cited. A topic is deemed worthy of inclusion if it complies with WP:NOT and has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources. You seem to be trying to add another layer to that, saying in effect that some reliable secondary sources don't count. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 21:09, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, there are times that secondary sources for a topic would not help towards demonstrating notability. That should be pretty clear why "independent" is a necessary word here. --MASEM (t) 21:13, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

It does seem to me that independence is the important thing, and if one of the words has to go it should be secondary. If there's anything that has consensus, I'd think "self-promotion does not demonstrate notability" would have to be it. —chaos5023 (talk) 21:20, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

i dont' mind both but if i had to pick one to keep it would be "independent" just because it's easier to understand for most people Arskwad (talk) 21:38, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree that independence matters, but I suppose I'm arguing that if a source really is a secondary source, and not something else masquerading as one, it will be independent. I don't want to split hairs, and I really don't want to be difficult. My only concern is not to introduce confusion that will impact V, NOR, and BLP, which are the policies I watch most.

Masem, can you give a real example of when reliable secondary sources have not helped toward demonstrating notability, because not independent enough, so that I can see where you're coming from? SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 21:39, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

I can't point out any, only that I'm pretty sure its obvious there are dependent secondary sources that we need to avoid as sole justification of notability. --MASEM (t) 23:38, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

i can admit that I am splitting hairs... we might have opposite goals... Slim virgin wants to make this as similar as possible with the words in other guidelines... I'm more worried about making it clear... making it consistant with what outsiders would understand in the wold outside wiki... After all notability is a pretty commonly cited and commonly misunderstood guideline.. the avg person doesn't understand technical language like primary vs secondary but they do understand independent... But i agree they mean almost the same thing if you get right down to it... I just ran into some confusion about what notabillity means and I think a lot of other users do too at first. Arskwad (talk) 04:45, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Break

1. Sure: Systematic reviews are generally taken to be secondary sources under Wikipedia's definition, and they can be conducted by the same researchers who wrote all of the original papers. Biographers can write about their ancestors. Financial analysts can write about companies they invest in. Professional activists sometimes write excellent treatises on the state of knowledge in their area of interest. Some of the best religious historians subscribe to the religion they study. Physicians and other health professionals sometimes write about the diseases that affect themselves or their families—not merely first-hand, personal experiences, but scholarly works, literature reviews, and chapters in medical textbooks. None of these people would be considered (entirely) independent.
   Additionally, most editors easily grasp the notion of independence, which means that identifying that as a key point is practical.
2. You said, "A topic is deemed appropriate for inclusion if..." This page only cares about one particular type of inclusion: inclusion of a topic on a separate, stand-alone page. A notable topic (one that fully meets your "if" clause) may be more appropriate for inclusion as one part of another larger topic (i.e., not as a separate article). Since we spend so much time explaining WP:NNC, we need to keep the language of this page focused strictly on the concept of a stand-along article, not on general inclusion of information (in any fashion) in the encyclopedia.
   As an example, Use of antibiotics to treat middle ear infections meets your two criteria: There are hundreds of high-quality sources, and it's not banned by NOT. However, the community doesn't actually want that article. That topic is not "deemed appropriate" for its own article. Instead, the information is deemed appropriate for inclusion in other articles.
3. Complying with WP:N and NOT does not automatically or irrevocably entitle an article to a separate page. If it did, then WP:MERGErs of notable topics (e.g., a biography of a business owner, and an article about the business) would be pretty much prohibited.
   Instead, meeting notability and NOT gives you a presumption, or a reasonable hope, that your new article would be accepted as a stand-alone article at an AfD. (Similarly, not meeting one of them gives you a good indication that the AfD will close as delete or merge). There's no guarantee, no certainty, no entitlement: The community will do whatever it chooses at AfD. The community certainly makes inexplicable choices on occasion (e.g., once deciding to keep an article whose properly sourced content cannot be extended beyond, "This is an Asian word for thin gruel made out of rice. See also: Gruel.") This page does not intend to tell editors that a compliant subject will be accepted as a stand-alone page; we only want to tell them that compliant subjects have good odds, and non-compliant subjects have poor odds, of being kept as a stand-alone page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:13, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, that's a lot to read. In brief, I don't agree with your analysis of secondary sources. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 20:01, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

As said elsewhere, you hold tightly to a definition of "secondary source" that is not commonplace, and not supported by a reliable source.

An example of a reliable secondary source that is not good enough because it is not independent is an autobiography. Another is a book, covering the history of a school, funded and published by the school, written and edited by staff of the school, with regard to a covered historical event within the school. A company annual report, where it comments on company activity, is also a reliable but non-independent secondary source. These sources are all reliable, and all secondary sources ("a document or recording that relates or discusses information originally presented elsewhere"), and none justify a standalone article. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:48, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

An autobiography of X (that is, a book about X written by X) is a primary source of material about X, not a secondary source. Why would you call it a secondary source, or did I misunderstand? SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 17:27, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

An autobiography can be a secondary source. For example, a later autobiography may make commentary on earlier biographies. An autobiography may be written with all material cited to previously published material. Though many are, not every autobiography is a first hand telling of the memory of the author. However, no autobiography is independent of the subject, and I think we agree that no autobiography is per se evidence of notability. So, it makes sense to say that we require an independent source to justify a stand alone article. And this is not theoretical. Very frequently we delete things because there are no independent sources, not because the sources aren't reliable, or don't provide commentary. Perhaps you don't see this much, because these things are quickly and efficiently deleted, but the guideline is important for the education of the good faith COI contributor who just saw his work deleted. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:10, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

Or package inserts for medications. They summarize and analyze multiple published experiments, so it would be pretty silly to call them primary sources. Also, they're primarily written by lawyers and regulatory experts, not by the people who did the studies, which is certainly "one step removed". But there's no chance of them being truly independent, because they're published by someone who is trying to turn a profit on it. The major rationale for government regulation is that no drug manufacturer can be considered a truly impartial, independent source of information about the risks and benefits of a medication.

And, yes, I agree that SV's simple definition of secondary sources is not accepted by the community. It has the virtue of being quickly grasped by new editors, and it heads in the right direction, but it is incomplete. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:05, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

There's no sense in a small number of editors making up its own definitions. These terms are used in a certain way in the academic world, so we should try to stick to that usage. It varies a little between subjects, but what's being suggested here is something I don't recognize at all. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 17:32, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

SV, I agree that we should normally use "secondary source" and similar terms in their standard meanings. I (and apparently other editors) believe that this goal will require you to change your personal definition of these terms, not me (or them).

Our current encyclopedia article says, at Secondary sources#In_science_and_medicine, that a meta-analysis is a secondary source.

I say, if every single study in the meta-analysis involves papers published by the person doing the meta-analysis, and if producing the "right" results has the potential for making the person wealthy or famous, then that meta-analysis, although it is clearly a secondary source according to the standard definition, is not an independent source.

To give an example, there's a fairly prolific author in Egypt who has decided that vasectomies cause a particular medical problem. Nobody except this guy has written about this. The fact that he writes about this, and analyzes his previous reports in papers that are defined in the relevant academic field as being secondary sources, is not evidence that his theory of post-vasectomy syndrome is a notable subject. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:48, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

I am not sure why SlimVirgin has always opposed the idea that our policies and guidelines should say that sources should be independent. In an earlier discussion on the issue, he opposed the idea that

Articles should be based upon reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking, accuracy and indpedence.

Independence means that a source is free from pressures associated with a strong connection to the subject matter (such as, but not limited to family relationships, close political affiliation, business dealings or other benefical interest) that may compromise, or can reasonably be expected to compromise, the sources reputation for reliablity.

It seems to me that if a source is not independent, then its not reliable, and as such, must be taken with a pinch of salt. I don't mean to disparage SlimVirgin here, but if offered a choice between an independent source, and a dependent/affiliated source, which would you prefer to rely on and why? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:23, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

1. Self-published and other non-independent sources (e.g., biography about a great-grandparent) are widely accepted as reliable for some purposes. For example, www.coca-cola.com is a self-published, non-independent source that will be accepted as reliable for statements like "Coca-Cola, Inc. is a company with headquarters in the US" or "Coca-Cola makes and sells soft drinks."
2. Self-published and other non-independent sources should not be accepted as proof of notability, ever. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:35, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Material published by Coca Cola is not what's meant by self-published. Just about everything is self-published according to that definition, including The New York Times. Self-published means by one person or a very small unprofessional group with no professional oversight. You're mixing up a self-published source with a primary one. It isn't helpful to make up new definitions of terms to fit this one policy, because it will put it out of sink with other pages and common usage. SlimVirgin ^{talk contribs} 17:47, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

I think you need to read a basic definition of wikt:self-publishing. The size of the publisher doesn't figure into it at all. Self-publication is all about whether the author is also the publisher. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:31, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

Discussion drift

Dicussion drift alert: This is supposed to be about deciding if a subject should be its own article and not forking the discussion of what are reliable sources patsw (talk) 17:02, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

What? I thought this was about whether the nutshell should be clear about sources that attest to notability being required to be independent? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:59, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

really I started the discussion... not that i own it but it was more just to get rid of the subjective wording of worthiness.. The whole secondary vs independent thing came up afterwards... in this guideline it uses both words... I prefer independent because it's more clear to the average reader... plus it's what we say in the guideline... "If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject..." i wouldn't go to war over this... but I think independent is what this guideline has said for a long time Arskwad (talk) 03:55, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

The nutshell does say independent. I think SV was saying that there is no need to say it twice. This version repeated the word. A nutshell should only say the same thing once. It is still a little wordy to me, with the first sentence acting as a nutshell for the rest. In its entirety, what wording would you prefer? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:39, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

You're right: The repetition is probably unnecessary. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:38, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

Part of discussion is also to clarify if, when you squeeze in a shortened version of WP:GNG by dropping "...a presumption, not a guarantee, that a subject is suitable for inclusion...", into the nutshell, you are minimizing that item's impact. The bold thing to do is concede that actual nutshell of this Notability guideline is the whole text of the GNG itself, and just drop the nutshell from the guideline. patsw (talk) 17:14, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

There's more on this page than just the GNG: There's also NRVE, NNC, NTEMP, and more. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:38, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

That's why I think an attempt to triage the nutshell of the guideline will be contentious because there will always be someone who thinks an aspect not in the nutshell, but in the guideline, needs to be added into the nutshell. patsw (talk) 23:03, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

Celebrity abuse

Please take this sort of discussion to another forum.

I am appalled at the relative importance attached to celebrities. I spent a good chunk of this afternoon pruning the article for Beyoncé_Knowles from 110K to 93K, and in my opinion, it could stand to be pruned another 50% or more. Michael_Jackson has almost as much coverage as World_War_II.

The argument made in favor of heavy celebrity coverage is that a lot of people consider them important. However, I would argue that their importance is a manufactured phenomenon. It is as if their publicists were trying to game Wikipedia's notability policy. I believe the abuses of the notability policy with respect to celebrities are so pervasive that they deserve a special section in the Wikipedia Project.

The "Star Suckers" documentary (currently available on YouTube) covers celebrity abuse of (and by) the media in great detail. Humans are hardwired to be fascinated by important people, and this tendency is exploited to make money while distracting people from issues that they should be paying a great deal more attention to. I see that Wikipedians have fallen prey to these same forces.

Abuses include but are not limited to excessive, over-the-top, fawning WP:POV; manufactured controversies; planted stories; sources that exist only to create media coverage of celebrities; etc. I believe that virtually every People Magazine, E! Weekly, Access Hollywood, and so on, reference should be purged from Wikipedia; fundamentally, they are not WP:RS.

I would like to see acknowledgement of this problem in a special page of the Wikipedia Project. I am willing to draft my proposed WP:Celebrity_Abuse article, going into these issues in more detail. Jeremystalked (talk) 03:55, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

You're likely in the wrong place to address this. Once notable, content on celebrity articles are guided by other policies and guidelines. --MASEM (t) 04:35, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

(ec)

I think you are talking about a problem due to the bias of the sort of people who have time and inclination to add material to Wikipedia. There are lots of teenagers and undergraduates, and not as many specialists. This is not the fault of the teenagers and undergraduates; they are welcome, and doing a tremendous job, and are not well enough recognised in terms of their remuneration. However, what can we do to better entice, encourage and keep the specialists?

Certainly, it is not a problem to panic over. I lurk with many specialist pages on my watchlist. Some of them were stubs. Occasionally, a wave of friendly people come by and in a flurry of activity all sorts of improvements happen, and then I notice a gold star is pinned at the top. I look at some of the specific additions, and where I am familiar with the subject area, I have always found myself impressed with the quality of the reference and the depth of penetration of the sourcing into the specific field. What really impresses me is that these articles are only improving with time.

World_War_II has been pretty good for a long time, and continues to incrementally improve. Looking at the last 100 edits, I see small improvements, and am unconcerned about style changes which may matter to someone else, and am unconcerned about the short lived vandalism or other "good faith" edits. But the trend is definitely positive, and I take comfort in that. Like you, I have little interest in Beyoncé_Knowles, but I am content to not worry, because the rate of advance in the quality of coverage of Beyoncé does not detract from the rate of advance in the quality of coverage of WWII. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:39, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

This really isn't the place for soapboxing. Whether you agree with the "importance" some folks attribute to celebrities or not, it is what it is. You can't force editors here to stop editing topics that interest then, and its just a simple fact that many folks (particular those in America and English) take a great interest in the lives of celebrities, rightly or wrongly). Wikipedia is made up of editors of all shapes, sizes, and lives. Some choose to edit articles on celebrities, some choose to edit topics on media, some on history, some on companies, etc etc etc. Some come here to vandalize, promote themselves, etc. When there is a clear and obvious attempt by someone to promote (or a representative) themselves, their company, their product, their website, etc, then they are dealt with per policy, starting with the appropriate warnings and ending in indef blocking, if need be. The content of Wikipedia articles is grounded in what is covered by reliable sources, and our content guidelines. While you may feel that People et al are not reliable sources, the Wikipedia community, and the world in general, seems to disagree with you. If you want to challenge a source, we do have a reliable sources noticeboard, but I'd recommend reading WP:RS first. If you want to look down on your fellow editors for editing in certain topic areas, that's certainly your choice, however I'd be more careful about throwing rocks when living in glass houses.[5][6][7]-- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 05:24, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Some context: AmnaFinotera is currently revenge-editing several pages I've contributed to, due to the attention I paid to her precious Beyonce page, and is knowingly and willfully instigating conflict as part of her revenge-editing strategy.Jeremystalked (talk) 05:33, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Will you stop with the bad faith BS already? I could care less about Beyonce (Never even edited at the article[8] or even looked at it). You brought attention to yourself posting your rant above. I was curious who posted, took a look, and saw that in addition to the clean up of the Beyonce article, you created an article on Electronic harassment and filled it with links to your own site, then added links to that same site to other articles. I figured you just made a new editor error and cleaned it up for you, so now I'm somehow out for "revenge?" *insert eye rolls* Gravy... -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 05:37, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Speaking of "glass houses"... you revenge-edited my user talk page[9] even though you considered my edits to your user talk page to be vandalism. It's pretty obvious what your motivations for editing the pages I've edited are. It's not "BS" to point this out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeremystalked (talk • contribs) 06:00, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

"Notability is not temporary"

I think this is the most misinterpreted of all Wikipedia guidelines. As a phrase it is ambiguous: it can be taken to mean either "Temporary things are not notable" or "Notability is not a temporary thing", which are polar opposites, and the section discusses several different concepts without clearly distinguishing between them. I propose that we replace this heading with "Notability and time" (or similar) and then discuss the interaction between notability and time in this section as follows:

1. Duration of coverage: A brief duration of coverage of a topic in reliable sources does not automatically confer notability; persistence of coverage in reliable sources makes notability more likely
2. Notability is like a ratchet: Topics not now notable may later become so, but not the reverse. Notability does not decay over time - a lack of current coverage does not mean a topic is non-notable
3. Judgements change: Topics once thought to be notable may later be judged to not be so, and vice versa
4. Avoid speculation about future notability: Speculation about the future notability of subjects should be avoided, but future topics may be notable now based on coverage in existing reliable sources

Thoughts? Fences&Windows 17:35, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

I think the time dimension is misleading, and the only things these have in common is the reference to time, and even then, time is only being used as an analogy:

1. The idea that notability is not temporary is another way of say routine coverage does not constitute evidence of notability, but significant coverage does;
2. Significant coverage can be sourced from any century, but trivia is never allowable as evidence of notability;
3. Editors opinions may change, or conflict, which why we seek reliable secondary sources as evidence of notability;
4. Evidence that a topic is notable must be verifiable and in the absence of significant coverage, there is no evidence, only hearsay or speculation.

However, I agree that WP:NTEMP is not clearly understood, as a search through the archives will show. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:49, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

I have not noticed confusion over the point, but I accept that it occurs so some clarification is desirable. However, please do not change the heading because it is useful to have a catchphrase (particularly such a well known one), and it can't be helped if some people never read the section and draw an incorrect conclusion from the perfectly clear "notability is not temporary" heading.

Re point 4 from Fences&Windows: That point can be stated much more strongly. We acknowledge that a current event may become notable in the future, but per WP:CRYSTAL that is not relevant because future notability is unknown, and per WP:NOTNEWS we do not necessarily cover events that are currently the focus of media attention.

Re point 4 from Gavin Collins: Wasn't there a disagreement about that wording recently? I have a feeling that consensus did not want to associate the concepts of "notability" and "verifiability". Johnuniq (talk) 01:58, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

I think the consensus shifted a bit from considering big-N and big-V as unrelated or perhaps better expressed as uncorrelated to considering (or requiring) verifiability a necessary precondition for notability. This implies that the AFD trigger can be pulled for any article where one editor merely asserts the topic merits inclusion in the Wikipedia and an another editor challenges the notability claims when they appear without verification, at least as we define these words. Also, the above text by Fences and windows reads more like an essay than a guideline. patsw (talk) 03:53, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

In answer to Johnuniq, the concepts of "notability" and "verifiability" are closely linked, but not by the dimension of time as Fences and windows is suggesting. By virtue of WP:BURDEN ("If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it"), WP:V is an exclusion criteria for article topics, whereas WP:GNG is a set of inclusion criteria, both of which are based on third party sources, the absence of which will trigger an AFD as Patsw describes. In order to write an article about a particular topic, there needs to be significant coverage rather than mentions in passing or news reports written as a matter of record only. Although WP:NTEMP seems to be about the time dimension, its focus is really about significant coverage, which is unlikely to be created in a short period of time. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:21, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

Clarification: my comments are not the suggested new wording, they are bullet points summarising my interpretation of the most important points currently covered in this section. If a heading or phrase is memorable but ambiguous, we absolutely must change it. Another problem with using this heading is that aside from the first sentence of the section, none of the rest of the content addresses the issue of whether notability is temporary or not - it brings in WP:NOTNEWS and its supplement WP:EVENT, WP:CRYSTAL, and (though unlinked) Wikipedia:Consensus#Consensus can change. Re Johnuniq's point about current events, WP:EVENT makes clear that we can have articles about current events, but that we shouldn't always. Gavin collins, I don't think I was referring to WP:V at all in my comments: WP:V is about facts being verified; WP:N is about independent reliable sources giving a topic sufficient coverage. And referring to WP:V as exclusionary and WP:GNG as inclusionary is just semantics and misses the actual distinction: WP:V guides what you should include within an article; WP:N guides what articles we should have. Fences&Windows 16:27, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

That is a common misconception. WP:V may be a content policy, but it WP:BURDEN ("If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it") is very definitely an exclusion criteria as well. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:30, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

Completely unverifiable topics cannot have articles. Of course, but what useful point are you actually making? You're still playing at semantics. As for misconceptions, I think you need to remove the plank from thine own eye as you always seem to misinterpret policies and guidelines whenever you discuss them. Fences&Windows 13:56, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

Semantics are important. In this case WP:NTEMP is addressing the requirement in WP:GNG for signficant coverage. My criticism of your bullet points is that there is a heavy emphasis on time, rather than significant coverage. Sorry if that annoys you, but there we have it. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:02, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm glad we're away from your red herring about verifiability, but now you're chucking in another red herring. WP:NTEMP is not about 'significant coverage' - that's what WP:GNG is about. Why would we reiterate WP:GNG in WP:NTEMP? WP:NTEMP is about the interaction of time and level of coverage: past coverage, brief spikes in coverage, future coverage, changes in coverage and changes in editorial assessment of coverage. My bullet points discuss what WP:NTEMP discusses, nothing more and nothing less. News stories that are deleted do often have significant coverage, so saying WP:NOTNEWS and the second part of WP:NTEMP are only about avoiding subjects without significant coverage is plain wrong (in case you'd not noticed, WP:NOTNEWS and WP:GNG collide, and WP:NTEMP and WP:EVENT are both attempts to reconcile notability guidelines with WP:NOTNEWS). "Not temporary" is a statement that coverage does not need to be current for a topic to be notable, in effect saying "Once notable, always notable". That point isn't captured by WP:GNG. Fences&Windows 17:42, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

I would have to disagree with you: News stories that are deleted don't contain significant coverage. It is routine, trivial or unsunstantiated (op-ed) news coveage that on its own is not evidence of notability because it lack in depth coverage, criticism or analysis that are the building blocks used in writing encyclopedic articles. It is significant coverage that distinguishes a notable topic from one that fails WP:NOTNEWS (" routine news reporting on things like announcements, sports, or celebrities is not a sufficient basis for inclusion in the encyclopedia"). I think your bullet points are too focused on time, not significant coverage, and perhaps point suggest that rewrite is about due. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 10:23, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't think that's true. The primary meaning of 'significant coverage' on Wikipedia is 'lots of words written'. A sentence is basically never deemed to be significant coverage. A full broadsheet page is almost always significant coverage (assuming the entire page deals with the subject). WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:41, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Fences, I think that you're on to something. Consider this case:

We would normally consider "John Smith" to be notable if multiple sources -- let's say a national newspaper -- wrote several long, detailed articles about him over the space of several years. Upon his death, they printed a front-page obituary. (Perhaps Smith was a politician or the head of the nation's largest employer.) Notable, right?

Does it matter if those were written five centuries ago, and not even a single word has been published since?

IMO "John Smith" is not notable, because attention has not continued. His five or ten years of fame is, in fact, a "brief duration" relative to the time span involved. Five years' attention out of the five hundred available years is the equivalent of a few days' attention this year.

Also -- and perhaps this should be explained here -- when dealing with history, elderly sources are apparently considered primary sources for information about their time period. A newspaper article published last week might be considered a secondary source for Wikipedia's purposes, but the same type of article, published five hundred years ago, is a primary source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:41, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

The test for "attention has not continued" has never been, is not, and never will be a test for inclusion of topics in the Wikipedia. Knowledge is not dependent on "attention has not continued." Who are you, or who am I to calibrate the "attention paid"? Willy Loman should have his article in the Wikipedia in perpetuity. Also, the point about secondary sources decaying into primary sources with the passage of time is incorrect. patsw (talk) 03:20, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

• If "attention has not continued" has never been a factor, then how do you explain away the long-standing line about "a short burst of news reports"? That sure looks to me like a statement that if attention has not continued, then notability is disproven.
• If no single human on the planet knows that John Smith even existed five centuries ago before an editor found a stack of antique newspapers in an archive vault somewhere and wrote an article, was Smith's existence actually part of human knowledge? Can something be "known to humans" if zero actual humans know it?
• I think you need to go read about primary sources -- the real-world definition, not the Wikipedia concept. Please pay particular attention to Primary source#Classifying sources and to the definition at the end of this section that runs "something that was created ... during the time period being studied". I think you will find that sources definitely do "decay" with age, especially according to historians. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:16, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

In answer to WhatamIdoing,

1. a short burst of news reports does not constitute significant coverage, but that does not mean a long burst of routine news reports constitutes evidence of notability either. The same applies to mentions in passing, and trivial coverage: the dimension of time is a bit of a red hearing. Surely you must agree with Patsw that continuous attention is not a factor in determining a topics notability? Rather it is quality of coverage that counts;
2. Notability is not affected by the passing of time. If a topic has received significant coverage 500 or 5,000 years ago, then there is going to be sufficient content to write an encyclopaedic article about it;
3. Secondary sources do not decay; rather it is their reliability that is brought into question. For instance, the work of Herodotus has been labeled 'The Father of Lies' due to his tendency to report fanciful information, yet it is interesting and therefore worth citing, even it has to taken with a pinch of salt.

My criticism of your bullet points is that there is a heavy emphasis on time, rather than significant coverage which is timeless as Patsw suggests. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:33, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Time, when considering coverage, is important. Coverage that occurs near the time of the "event" (which could be the entire life of a person or the like) is likely going to be more primary than secondary - hence the caution that short bursts of news reports aren't usually going to make a topic notable - but as we get farther and farther from that "event", it is more likely sources will be more and more secondary as they will be some steps removed, in time, from the "event" to consider analysis and critical thought of that part (eg things like retrospectives, biographies, etc.) It is still possible that report, several years after an event, can be routine/trivial/a primary source and thus insufficient as evidence for notability, only that it is usually less likely so than for a report published immediately following it. --MASEM (t) 13:23, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

I would have thought that Deepwater Horizon oil spill would have been identified as a highly notable event from day one (11 killed, with a massive oil spill), simply because significant coverage would have been given to such a serious accident from outset. On the contrary, I don't think the incidence of significant coverage is any way related to time: there is certainly no policy in Wikipedia that says it is. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:19, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

If the event did not have any long-lasting impact (in the case of the oil spill, if it was only the case the platform exploded and lives were lost but no oil leak) it's newsworthy but not notable; it could go into Wikinews, or if there was an article about oil platform incidents, it could go there, but that would be an example of a burst of news coverage without follow-up. Only because they have been unable to contain the oil leak - and the ecological and economical impact that has , has the incident gained notability - both elements that took time to develop after the incident. But again, that's when the coverage shifted from primary to secondary, and thus became notable. --MASEM (t) 16:44, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Longlasting or short term coverage does not enter into it. It is whether a topic receives significant coverage in the form of commentary, crticism or analysis that is the key to notability. You are right in saying that routine news coverage is better suited to Wikinews, but there is no such thing as a shift in coverage from primary to secondary sources. What you would be seeing is a shift from routine news reports to significant coverage in the form of in depth coverage. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:02, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

That's still a shift from primary to secondary coverage. Events that never become notable but are widely reported are only covered by primary sources - news reports that are simply reiterating the facts and providing no new analysis or information (not, these may not be routine news reports as one would associate with sports, the stock market, or the weather). If the event is significant, then news reports and other references will appear to include analysis and criticism, the needed secondary sources. This was the case with the Balloon boy incident article, where it was created as a missing boy aboard a balloon on day one (based on wide coverage in many primary sources simply reporting the facts), but by day three, it was revealed as hoax, and articles criticizing the press' gullibility appeared (secondary), at which point this became notable. This is why our primary/secondary definitions are very weak - they capture the core of primary and secondary but leave a huge hole for things like newsreports - routine and non-routine - without an easy way of classifying them when it comes to verifiability and notability evaluation. --MASEM (t) 12:50, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Its not a "shift" at all in fairness. Coverage is either significant or its not, and that is for all time: if there is no commentary, criticism or analysis, then the coverage is just not significant. The primary/secondary definitions in Wikipedia:No original research#Primary, secondary and tertiary sources is very clear, and shifting is not mentioned there. As you can see from the last section of Balloon boy hoax, there has indeed been some in depth coverage of this news story that demonstrates it is more than routine. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:10, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Significant coverage can only come from secondary sources - otherwise any story that is simply widely repeated in many newspapers without analysis is suddenly notable. This is why there's a problem with primary and secondary definitions, because they leave a gap where simply re-iterative news stories fall in (they should be considered as primary to prevent them from being considered as part of notability, but not to reduce verifyability). As for the Balloon boy hoax (yes, thanks for the right link, it probably needs to be changed), now it has sources, but I watched it develop in real-time (the event occurring on Oct 15 2010), which you can see in part through the AFD when the article was created on the day of the event - at that point, it was widely covered but not significantly. The significant coverage part, the part about the media's gulability, took some days to come about, during the course of the AFD, making the event switch from non-notable to notable during that time. That specific page is why WP:EVENT was revitalized and eventually passed as a notability guideline, particularly to advise the "wait and see" approach with events to assure they are notable. --MASEM (t) 13:28, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Again, I would challenge your interpretion. A reliable reliable secondary source are second-hand accounts, often making analytic or evaluative claims contained in commentary, criticism and analysis. Routine news reports do not carry such in depth coverage. There is no problem with primary and secondary definitions (in fact they are well spelled out). I think what you are confused with is the fact that a newspaper can be both a primary source or a secondary source, depending on the depth of coverage. We have had this disagreement before regarding newspaper reports about ficitonal topics: without significant coverage, they are a secondary sources at all. This is why various notability guidelines disallow other forms of routine coverage as evidence notability, such as flap copy, capsule reviews and press releases that do not contain significant coverage. There is nothing in any policy that says we must "wait and see" if coverage is significant or not - time just does enter into it. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:52, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

This reminds me of an AFD I was involved where a wait and see approach was adopted and then when the second AFD was launched used as an example of 'notability not being temporary'. IN other words becasue it passed AFD once it should pass it again, despite the fact that the reason it was passed was no longer valid (a potential politician who lost). It did fail its second AFD (and so was deleted) but non the less the argument 'notability not being temporary' can (and at least has attmepted to) be abused.Slatersteven (talk) 13:57, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

To Gavin: if you stick by the present (non-footnote) defs for primary and secondary, then we're shifting the distinction to what is "routine". Some consider that when news coverage will assuredly happen because it is a regular event, like a sporting event, weather, or stock market report. Others consider routine as simply an interesting single-occurrence news story propagated through AP or the like across multiple newspapers. It's still vague enough to cause disagreements as to what sourcing is necessary to establish notability. End of the day: we're looking for topics that we can example on more than just the facts, meaning we're looking for analysis and synthesis from appropriate experts on the material. By simply tuning our definition of secondary to be based on sources that transform primary information into analysis and synthesis, suddenly notability evaluation becomes very simple with fewer questions asked. Nothing about routine, nothing about bursts of news reports, etc. It seems to be a significant improvement that would strength notability without weakening any aspect of verification or avoiding original research.

To Slatersteven: passing an AFD once is not a guarentee of being considered notable forever, otherwise we'd have language that prevents an article that was kept through an AFD from ever going to AFD again. I've outlined elsewhere that the determination of notability within WP is fickle and subject to short swings and a longer tail change over time (even though the actual value of notability of the topic outside of WP may not have changed); something that barely passes AFD one week because its notability was contested may not survive an attempt a week later, and the only way to avoid this is to boost the demonstration of notability well beyond this fuzzy area. --MASEM (t) 14:10, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I think I am agreeing with Masem. We need to ditch the reference to "Temporary" which naturally suggest that notability has a temporal dimension, and focus on what WP:GNG says otherwise, we are going to repeat this debate over and over. Its the absence of significant coverage from reliable sources that results in deletion of topics, not the passing of time, but at AFD, refering to WP:NTEMP is a short hand way of saying there is no signficiant coverage at this time.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:41, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Do sources decay over time?

By putting so much weight on time with respect to the distinction between primary and secondary sources we're left with the bizarre interpretation that no secondary sources whatsoever exist now for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill because a insignificant amount of time has passed since the start of the incident. Many editors, including myself, would hold that secondary sources spring into existence when they are non-participants and without a conflict of interest in what they create content for. Correctable errors can be made about topics that seem initially to merit both a biographical article and an event article, and later they subsequently merge. What is repugnant is that there's some sort "attention is being paid" meter running and when it dips below an arbitrary level, the article ought to be deleted solely for that reason according to this guideline. AFD's do deal with (and ought to deal with) the extent and quality of coverage by non-participant/non-COI sources. According to the advocates of the consideration of the decay of secondary sources into primary sources to be an AFD trigger -- eventually, the decay will consume the entire Wikipedia and anything without the "fresh" (i.e. un-decayed) secondary sources will be deleted. patsw (talk) 18:03, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

• This section is currently full of falsehoods and does not represent our general consensus or practise. This may be observed at any time by reading the main page. This always contains a section entitled, In the news. For example, currently this leads with "In tennis, the French Open concludes with Francesca Schiavone defeating Samantha Stosur in the women's singles final...". This demonstrates that the guidance given about "sports coverage" is false. This may also be seen by the recent AFD for Armando Galarraga's near-perfect game - a snow keep. I shall therefore tag this section to indicate its dubious and disputed status. Colonel Warden (talk) 20:24, 6 June 2010 (UTC)
  • See my comment below, you are misinterpreting what these sections imply towards NTEMP (which is nothing). --MASEM (t) 21:35, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

• Sources cannot decay. Only WP's perception of what's needed for a notable topic can (and to that point, what to call a secondary vs primary source since our definitions are so vague). --MASEM (t) 21:35, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Patsw, your assertion that secondary sources cannot be written about current events is false. The difference is that after a sufficiently long period of time, they quit being considered secondary sources, and are re-classified as primary sources. The distinction is not sharp, and context -- issues like the age of the source and how you use it -- matters.

Consider the meaning of this sentence from ISBN 0521391202, about books of history: "The same chronicle can be a primary source for the period contemporary with the author, a secondary source for earlier material derived from previous works, but also a primary source when these earlier works have not survived."

That last half-sentence means: If you write a secondary source, and the sources you used are lost, then your secondary source is now the primary source. Historians, in particular, use primary source to mean "the furthest source back in the chain", even if it's not merely third-hand, but reporting reports of reports of reports of ancient documents. Ancient documents, no matter what their contents, are primary sources because "they are as near to truly original documents as they can now secure". Basically everything written by Josephus, for example, would have been a secondary source at the time, and is now considered a primary source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:15, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

As a point that may clarify something: the 'sufficiently long period of time' necessary to turn a secondary source into a primary source is probably longer than Wikipedia's expected lifespan. Within the field of history (the people that invented this whole distinction between primary and secondary sources), a 2,000-year-old history book is basically always considered a primary source according to modern academics, but a 200-year-old history book is generally not. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:22, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

I really don't think is true for determining notability, and thus not true in general. Yes, I can see a situation where the original source disappears forever (Library of Alexandria fire, and all that) but if someone has written a comprehensive secondary source about that primary work, the secondary source remains a secondary source for that primary work; the notability of the original work has not been lost even if the work itself has. There are means of a third-party recounting the information of a primary source, but that itself is a primary source too if it doesn't further engage in any transformation on the matters at all. --MASEM (t) 00:25, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Let me suggest that you go find a historian -- a professor at the local university, maybe? -- and ask him/her whether or not Pliny's encyclopedia (written in the first century CE) is generally considered a primary source by historians. A good deal of Pliny's encyclopedia transforms previous sources, but it is routinely treated as a primary source by historians -- and there is no doubt in my mind that if it had been published last year, instead of two millenia ago, that it would be classified primarily as a secondary or (in parts) tertiary source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:24, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Granted: we are talking about the situation well before history was routinely recorded on a book written near that event. While it would technically be secondary/tertiary, because of the length of time between then and now, and what we consider satisfactory tracking of history, I can certain see why it probably would be considered primary, in the sense that the distance removed between the topic and the author isn't very large (relatively). The thing is, that's a very unique situation; in the lifetime of WP, that work would have always likely been considered primary. It would be very difficult for a work published in the last century or two that is currently considered to be secondary to ever transform in to a primary work, within a hypothetical lifespan of Wikipedia itself. The depreciation of a work is a rare exception and not a rule to base notability issues on. --MASEM (t) 05:34, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

This is all very dependent on the exact question.

If Pliny's is the oldest available source on a subject described within, it is very likely that a historian will use it as a primary source for his treatise. Even if older source fragments exist, he might still use it as a primary source.

If the subject of the treatise was the scholarship of the peoples of the 1st century CE, then Pliny's would only be a primary source.

If the subject of the treatise was worker efficiency in a particular mine, and Pliny made some reference to the methods of mining used there, then use of Pliny' commentary would be as a secondary source. But WhatamIdoing is not wrong. If there were no other source for that mine, then Pliny's secondary source commentary would be a primary source of the treatise. The primary source can be the secondary source, but i would call extended analysis flawed.

When it comes to WP:N, the source is (can be called) a secondary source with respect to any subject describe, and as such it supports a claim that the subject is worthy of coverage within Wikipedia.

No, sources don't decay, beyond their unreliability being discovered. What changes is how they are used. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:47, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I think we're on the same page now. The basic definition of a primary source as being "very close to the event" is an unavoidably relative statement. If I wrote a book about a 1609 event in 1610, then my book would be considered "very close to the event" by a reader in 2010; if I write a book about a 2009 event in 2010, it might not. The critical calculation is not merely the absolute distance between the event and my book, but the relative distance between the event, my book, and the person reading my book.

And, yes, I agree that if Wikipedia declares my 2010 book to be a secondary source, then that's likely to remain true (unless Wikipedia's definitions change) for decades to come. "Won't happen in Wikipedia's lifetime" is not, however, the same as "a rare exception" or "not true in general": Every single secondary source ever written has the potential to be a primary source -- so long as it outlasts its own sources. We should no more say that it doesn't happen than we should say that Plutonium-244 (with a half-life measured in millions of years) doesn't decay at all.

Finally, I think we need to take a page from RSN: It's not just the source itself; it's how you use it. No source is reliable for every possible use (e.g., a science book is an unreliable source of information about potery), and no source is secondary for every possible use (e.g., textbooks are primary sources for their dates of publication). WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:58, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

We're on the same page if we think that "very close to the event" refers to participation and conflict of interest, and not to time in the sense of waiting days, months, and years before "secondary source" content can come into existence. patsw (talk) 17:45, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I think "very close to the event" means refers to the fact that a primary source tends to describe events in more or less barebone detail, rather than comment, criticise or analyse them from a wider perspective. Whilst a primary source offers "an insider's view of an event, a period of history, a work of art, a political decision", it does not provide context to the reader that would enable them to appreciate its significance. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:11, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I think that "very close to the event" means exactly what it says: very close to the event -- not "very close to the event in this particular way, but not in this other way", but very close to the event, full stop.

It is possible to write a secondary source despite having a conflict of interest or being a participant (e.g., a meta-analysis of data previously published by you or that includes yourself or a family member as a participant in the trial; practically every major report ever published by a pharmaceutical manufacturer); similarly, it is possible for your work to be considered "very close to the event" even if you didn't participate and have no conflict of interest (just about anything written about the 9/11 terrorist attacks on September 11th).

(Classifying a typical news report as a secondary source is one example of Wikipedia rejecting the standard definitions in favor of its own made-up WikiSecondary system: Academic databases that are devoted exclusively to primary sources, like this one, have a lot of newspaper archives in them.)

"Very close to the event" means "very close to the event", in any sense. Academicians don't limit this consideration to a single type of being "very close to the event", and neither should we. It is possible for a given source to be very close when considering one aspect (e.g., the author was writing as events were unfolding) and not close at all in others (e.g., the author was completely unaffected by the events s/he described). There's no perfect bright line between primary and secondary sources, and I think we need to assume that editors are able to make complex judgments about these things, instead of issuing overly simplistic rules. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:32, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I think your interpretation is correct, but I think it is a mistake. The term "close to the event" is a term that can be interpreted as being temporal, yet time is not a dimension measured or defined in any Wikipedia policy. What is defined in policy as being "close to the event" is the term as used in its relational sense. An author is a primary source for a work in fiction, or a vendor's product description in commerce, i.e. they have a close relationship to the subject matter, but not in terms of time. There is a bright line between primary and secondary source in terms of the relationship between being the creator of narrative, an idea or a product; but a a commentator who is once removed is not as "close". --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:48, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I agree that there are circumstances in which time is basically irrelevant. There are also circumstances in which time is quite relevant.

I think we would be wrong to tell editors that they must utterly ignore the age of the source, and equally wrong to tell them that they must give time more weight than other factors. Figuring out whether a given source is a primary source requires judgment, not just ticking off a couple of boxes in a checklist.

This is, I think, another example of Wikipedia unaccountably shying away from the word "independent". Being close to the event in relational/conflict-of-interest sense tells us whether or not a source is independent. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:00, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Exactly. I must admit that time should have bearing on notability, but there are clearly examples where a catastrophic event, such as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, will become the subject of significant coverage almost instantly. For this reason, most editors assume that a major news topic would become notable over a short time. However, the opposite may be the case: within a short period of time, it is unlikely that there would be sufficient coverage to provide evidence of notability unless a breaking news story develops into something more significant. However, these are sweeping genrealisations that don't hold up to close examination, and don't provide any useful guidance. I think we should rewrite WP:NTEMP so that its focus is directed towards significant coverage, which is defined in policy, rather than trying to link notability to the passing of time which, in the absence of significant coverage, has no impact. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:52, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

With all this mutual agreement around... Do it! --SmokeyJoe (talk) 09:42, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

Proposal

If Smokey Joe is right, then this might prove to be suitable wording:

Notability is not temporary: once a topic has been the subject of significant coverage in accordance with the the general notability guideline, it does not need to have ongoing coverage.

However, Wikipedia is not a news source: it takes more than just rountine news reports about a single event or topic to constitute significant coverage. For example, routine news coverage such as public announcements, sports coverage, and tabloid journalism is not a sufficient basis for a topic to have its own stand-alone article. The Wikimedia project Wikinews covers topics of present news coverage. For guidelines on whether an event is notable, see Wikipedia: Notability (events).

In particular, if reliable sources cover the person only in the context of a single event, and if that person otherwise remains, or is likely to remain, a low-profile individual, we should generally avoid having an article on them.

I think this shifts the focus towards signficant coverage away from any implied temporal dimension. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 10:20, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

I suggest "should generally avoid having an article on them" be replaced with "should generally avoid having a biographical article on that individual" to avoid an ambiguity about the antecedent of "them". patsw (talk) 11:58, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

Should there be something that reiterates the burst of news idea, that is something like "a large number of news reports that provide no critical analysis of the event is not considered significant coverage" (reword as needed) ? --MASEM (t) 12:14, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

I think these are good suggestions which have been integrated into the proposed rewrite as follows:

Notability is not temporary: once a topic has been the subject of "significant coverage" in accordance with the the general notability guideline, it does not need to have ongoing coverage.

However, Wikipedia is not a news source: it takes more than just routine news reports about a single event or topic to constitute significant coverage. For example, routine news coverage such as press releases, public announcements, sports coverage, and tabloid journalism is not significant coverage. Even a large number of news reports that provide no critical analysis of the event is not considered significant coverage. The Wikimedia project Wikinews covers topics of present news coverage. For guidelines on whether an event is notable, see Wikipedia: Notability (events).

In particular, if reliable sources cover the person only in the context of a single event, and if that person otherwise remains, or is likely to remain, a low-profile individual, we should generally avoid having a biographical article on that individual.

If this can be improved upon, et us know. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:19, 9 June 2010 (UTC)