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Wikipedia has many comparison pages (e.g. of software programs that perform a specific task) that often only point out basic objective facts about the compared things that turn out to be relatively minor.
Often however decisions are made more on based on popularity (since it is very strongly related to quality and growth potential) or based on a comprehensive quality assessment made by an authoritative reviewer.
So I propose to have a policy that recommends that comparison pages include such data, citing the most recent and authoritative versions of it.
Practical examples could be sales, market share, number of users, website search engine rankings, review scores at popular sites, adoption by high profile adopters (e.g. Linux distributions for open source software), date of the latest release of the product, benchmark results.
While this data is subject to change, it can still be very useful to have it all collected and I think Wikipedia is the best place for it, provided that "as of" annotations and disclaimers are properly added.
BTW, is this the correct place to write this? If not, which is the correct one? 192.167.204.15 ( talk) 19:00, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Here's an idea: Create a tool which models editing clusters. In other words, create a tool which records every edit made by ever user and creates a correlation between their edits and the edits made be every other user (# of correlations generated = userbase^2, for each edit to the same article between two users, add 1 to the correlation for those users), possibly even a secondary layer which correlates these clusters, with even higher order editing clusters (clusters of clusters). Then you generate results of the most common "editing clusters" (tendency for the same users to gather around the same types of articles) and this can help identify:
It would be a logical, effective way of addressing it rather than the current system, which is horrible. So horrible that we have to rely on granting administrators the power to secretly make alternate accounts for arbitrary reasons, liberally use checkuser, and collude on off-wiki IRCs, as if they were some kind of secret police. Granted, I'm not opposing these things -- they're clearly necessary ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 23:05, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
In plain English, please. "A generous lower bound" could've been easily been stated without invoking mathematics as "A generous underestimate." You said it would be "6,000,000 times more expensive." Are you actually suggesting that it would require a hard drive the size of 216 billion terabytes and\or that it would cost well over 6 million dollars to purchase the necessary resources? ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 15:58, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
In the course of my Wiki career, I have bought a couple of tomes on obscure subjects in order to help me write an article. I know a number of other Wikipedians who have done the same.
It occurs to me that it might be useful to have a page devoted to requests for information from particular books, because there might already be users out there who have the book who can verify the information sought without the user having to buy the book himself. Any comments? Gatoclass ( talk) 00:39, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
These contain important numerical data relating to the elements and can be edited even by anonymous users. There is always the risk of some "prankster" slightly changing the atomic masses of a few elements for example. How well can this be detected and corrected? I know it can happen as I just checked the last 50 edits of carbon's infobox and found most to be vandalism or nonconstructive. Assuming we generally have the correct numbers in these infoboxes in the first place, a legitimate need to edit them should be a rare occurrence. To me it would seem that the merits of locking down these boxes from anonymous edits (prevention of hard-to-detect vandalism) would always outweigh the slower pace of editing them due to some version of a lock down. The reason why I am posting this is because I noticed some discrepancies between the numbers listed on the actual infoboxes and the numbers that should have been there according to the reference pages for the infoboxes.
If I understand, there is currently no policy or precedent for locking down non-controversial pages due to a standard vandalism threat. What I would like to discuss is if there should be consideration given for how static the infoboxes' contents are. The values on these boxes are fairly black and white: the boiling point of oxygen at a given pressure has a correct value which isn't going to be changing anytime soon. It is very easy to hide fake data in these tables since no one would notice a change of 254.4 to 254.3. Even values that are completely off from the real value are hard to detect if one does not know what range of values to be expecting for a given property. What good arguments can be made for keeping the chemical element infoboxes open for everyone to edit other than it's the status quo? Do you think the infoboxes will be of better quality being open for everyone to edit or locked down given that they are practically complete? Dwr12 ( talk) 08:30, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
Sarcasticidealist, it is possible, even likely, that every contribution you ever make to Wikipedia will be destroyed by troll mobs or random vandals. Don't worry about it too much. And stop thinking about what you're doing. It tends to stand in the way of making constructive contributions to Wikipedia. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 08:54, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:External links#Issues with inclusion or exclusion of map service links on the external links guideline for keeping external map service links in Wikipedia articles or not. More comments from people would be appreciated to find community consensus. -- Para ( talk) 17:05, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
While it's not currently possible to move/rename images, Betacommand has a bot that can perform the function for us the hard way.
Requests for image movement should be placed at the bottom of Wikipedia talk:Image renaming. Admins are automatically authorized for the use of this tool, and non-admins may be added by having an admin list you at the bottom of Wikipedia:Image renaming, which also includes instructions on using the tool.
There is no "Requests for" process involved, you just need to have a reasonably good edit history.
Related pages can be found in Category:Image renaming ~Kylu ( u| t) 06:17, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
I was reading "No sex please, we're Wikipedians" and "Deletion Policy" categories above (contents in WP:VPP). I think the issue is whether to censor or not.
Censorship is something tricky, if not actually outright dangerous in a free society, for it might make it less free or not free anymore.
Freedom is and ideal welcomed in a civilized society; if used rightly, it encourages many good things, specially happyness. So i support good freedom.
Certainly freedom can be something like in the jungle, where animals are in complete natural freedom, which includes things like killing and maiming at will.
The question is then where to draw a line, if one has to be drawn.
An encyclopedia, is a compendium of knowledge -literally, to circle the knowledge, to gather it all- so basically the more things you add to it the better. In a cosmic view theres no need to censor to fill that definition. But the enciclopedia is mainly by and for humans (some extraterrestrial beings might be using it as well but thats another topic) so we have some main issues: storage, the larger status quo that restricts the free flow of information, the human mind itself (for information is a factor in the behavior of people and their reactions).
So basically the information provided has to fit in the container that will carry it (wikipedia servers), comply with the laws of the land where the servers are located (mainly USA i believe) and make the most powerful people content (which would be the people involved that has the most power to administer the topic or wikipedia at the time -including owners, administrators, users, local authorities).
So censorship has to be carried trying to balance out those main issues (and maybe others i cant think of right now). So, if there are too many topics, some have to be deleted -for space; which one becomes the question. Some people might put the formula for some super ultrasecret medicine and wikipedia might be coerced into deleting and banning. Or some information migth be used to be able to bypass some law. Maybe some information might be used to or make the effect of trigger harming instincts in some people (psychos, terrorists, stupids). Also, peoples cultures might be offended by some content they deem inappropriate and want to get it delete it ("oh, that word is so ugly it shouldnt be here", "oh, naked people!", "oh, mating humans!").
Everything that means more knowledge is a legitimate part of an encyclopedia. I think the goal is to know everything. But as mere material earthly mortals, we have to draw a line between good and evil. That is we have to censor stuff out. Now for wikipedia that might mean not getting information in an evil way but get it if in the process of getting it nothing is like harmed more than just causing envious feelings or similar stuff. For the users it means not using the information in evil/stupid ways. But we live in a life where there are more shades than light and darkness. So its virtually impossible to have a perfect process. Some people might hurt themselves with seemingly inocuos information (how to make a tomato salad). I dont know if that means information shouldnt be available.
But i tend to lean in the availability of all information. Just because someone gets angry or annoyed or ashamed or blushed or something doesnt mean information shouldnt be available. People have different beliefs. Some for instance, believe sexuality is something if in public view immoral and call it pornography, others believe is something sacred so for them pornography wouldnt be but sacred images. For others is just a pattern of instinctual/ biological processes in living beings.
Some people go delete some content in pages because thats how they think it is. Some others add gibberish that might mean actually something. Many add unreferenced opinions or definitions. Maybe a nobel prize winner is one of them. Or a president. For me, it should be a different version of each page updated. No deletions ever. Pure and simple. If storage possible. Or, go first and ban movies like Saw, Hostel. Ban also eisntein physics because it caused the atomic bomb to kill thousands of people and we are still in who knows when we blow the whole planet apart. And also Nobel because he introduced explosives. And ban the chinese, they made possible the infamous bullets. Ban cars because thieves get away too fast and thousands die horribly disfigured each year in car crashes. Ban also computers because they might facilitate the work of terrorists and, who knows, one day they might take over and want to exterminate the human race. -- WonderingAngel-aesc78 ( talk) 12:10, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
Well we do some kinds of things that fall short of outright censorship while addressing the same concerns. For example, the popular List of sex positions has only drawings instead of any pictures. Check out the thing on top of Rorschach inkblot test which, as it says, may invalidate the test for you if you do look at it. There are a lot of things like that around. MilesAgain ( talk) 16:17, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
I read through most of it. My response: Inclusionism is evil. However, censorship is more evil. Wikipedia would be better with more naked people and random offensive expletives, because it would scare away oversensitive people who would want to ban things for the sake of their own personal preferences.
To some degree, WP:CENSORED should apply to both articles and users, not just articles. Basically, if you're not infringing on anyone else's right to make a constructive edits, you should be able to say, believe, and do whatever you want. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 19:26, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
I agree with your point, Mwalcoff. I think the term "vetted" is more accurate when it comes to stopping non-encyclopedic stuff from getting through. The word "censorship" tends to connote the idea that certain OPINIONS aren't allowed. For this reason, I'm OK with the language and I think it's annoying when people say it doesn't apply to user comments and user pages, because it does. If I don't have freedom of opinion on here, true open-source collaboration can't work. That freedom ends when it comes to me being disrespectful or disruptive. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 00:32, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
note - I originally posting this hypothesis on my talk page for an initial round of comments and discussion prior to moving it here.
Is there no leeway for cases of artist that are popular in new online media formats like YouTube.com? While they may not be reviewed in any traditional media channels, would the fact that their art [music/film/etc] has been viewed by millions viewers (independently tracked by the site) not make them notable simply based on that popularity? What if they had 10 million viewers? 100 million? When might we have to acknowledge this artist, or at least their art, as notable, regardless of receiving any traditional sources?
It seems that Wikipedia's two most important policies are notability and verifiability. Can a case be made that this example might prove both, albeit not in the currently defined framework?
I also am a little confused where the line is drawn on what is trivial or significant where artists are concerned. Historically, Musicians' and Authors' work is more notable than themselves as a person. So, for example, if a musician releases a hit song and it is reviewed heavily but, for whatever reason, the artist's life is not explored in the press. Does that make only the song notable? Can a song be notable and not the artist that made it so?
Thoughts? - Operknockity ( talk) 06:42, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
A reoccurring claim in these discussions is that notability is not a policy but a guideline and that 'the lack of demonstrated notability is not a criteria for speedy deletion, nor is there any deadline to improve such articles, though good faith improvements are expected as part of the editing process.' [ref Wikipedia:Notability (fiction)#Dealing with non-notable fictional topics ] However, in practice I am seeing section A7 of the criteria for speedy deletion based on grounds of reliable source when A7 actualy only requires you 'indicate why its subject is important or significant'. - Operknockity ( talk) 14:33, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Would it be an idea to throw WP:N at the "policy" vote ? Cause whatever you may call it, it sure ain't a guideline anymore. We throw away 1000s of articles a day that don't pass WP:N, and on the HELPDESK, I think it's the most quoted "policy/guideline/procedure" of them all. As such I assert that it is no longer a guideline, but a policy. Calling it anything else would be "truthiness" instead of truth. -- TheDJ ( talk • contribs) 16:04, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
"Notability" has eroded on Wikipedia in recent years. Now, you have folks like Geo Swan above who support cruft. No, cruft is important -- we just shouldn't have any policy against it, except on controversial topics. Rite. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 22:47, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Operknockity, in response to your original question (my mind glazed over about halfway through this thread, so my apologies if this has been stated already)... Manymany views on YouTube or the like could pass notability, but the problem you have is that you still need verifiability and reliable sources. The scant info found in YouTube itself does not qualify. So you need other sources to write an article. An article saying only [Title] is a popular video featuring a song by [Artist]. It can only be found on YouTube, should be deleted. Once you have reliable sources to report other important info, you will probably meet notability requirements too. - Freekee ( talk) 04:50, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Just a thought. Should references be able to be seen without having to log-in to any external source? I have just removed a reference from Ken Bruce as on trying to verify it I needed to log in (and presumably acquire) an id from the referring pages. In my view this isn't very "free", but what do others think? 217.42.254.177 ( talk) 19:07, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
I would, Puchiko. In one article, a person used a Korean newspaper that isn't published in English or archived online. It is not possible to follow verify a source if your source is somewhere hidden in the mountains of Shangri-la. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 14:47, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
Have a look at the first three words of Cheerleading. I have several issues with what is happening there:
I bring this up here because I've seen this in at least one other article ( Association football), where the statement that it "is the most popular sport in the world" is referenced five times. The main questions I ask are: how many references are needed, and, isn't this bad style? ALTON .ıl 00:21, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm asking this in a few places at once, but I'm not sure where to go with it so....
"Reasons for deletion include, but are not limited to" ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 00:36, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Why am I receiving what I consider to be banner ads/spam at the top of the regular Wikipedia page telling me that "Bay area Wikipedians may be interested in the wikimedia-sf mailing list." That really creeps me out because it means that even though I am signed in Wikipedia is stalking my current IP address. I thought that if I was signed in my privacy was protected. Besides when I went there it is just an advertisement message board for businesses like party planners and architects and I thought that Wikipedia was about NO advertising! Saudade7 05:12, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
This is certainly not advertising for party planners or architects. Though I admit, it can make for confusing reading if you don't know what it's all about. It's the archives of a mailing list for Wikipedia/Wikimedia people in the San Francisco area, and among the discussions raised is who the Wikimedia Foundation should hire for party planning, etc.-- Pharos ( talk) 05:34, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (policy). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.
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Wikipedia has many comparison pages (e.g. of software programs that perform a specific task) that often only point out basic objective facts about the compared things that turn out to be relatively minor.
Often however decisions are made more on based on popularity (since it is very strongly related to quality and growth potential) or based on a comprehensive quality assessment made by an authoritative reviewer.
So I propose to have a policy that recommends that comparison pages include such data, citing the most recent and authoritative versions of it.
Practical examples could be sales, market share, number of users, website search engine rankings, review scores at popular sites, adoption by high profile adopters (e.g. Linux distributions for open source software), date of the latest release of the product, benchmark results.
While this data is subject to change, it can still be very useful to have it all collected and I think Wikipedia is the best place for it, provided that "as of" annotations and disclaimers are properly added.
BTW, is this the correct place to write this? If not, which is the correct one? 192.167.204.15 ( talk) 19:00, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Here's an idea: Create a tool which models editing clusters. In other words, create a tool which records every edit made by ever user and creates a correlation between their edits and the edits made be every other user (# of correlations generated = userbase^2, for each edit to the same article between two users, add 1 to the correlation for those users), possibly even a secondary layer which correlates these clusters, with even higher order editing clusters (clusters of clusters). Then you generate results of the most common "editing clusters" (tendency for the same users to gather around the same types of articles) and this can help identify:
It would be a logical, effective way of addressing it rather than the current system, which is horrible. So horrible that we have to rely on granting administrators the power to secretly make alternate accounts for arbitrary reasons, liberally use checkuser, and collude on off-wiki IRCs, as if they were some kind of secret police. Granted, I'm not opposing these things -- they're clearly necessary ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 23:05, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
In plain English, please. "A generous lower bound" could've been easily been stated without invoking mathematics as "A generous underestimate." You said it would be "6,000,000 times more expensive." Are you actually suggesting that it would require a hard drive the size of 216 billion terabytes and\or that it would cost well over 6 million dollars to purchase the necessary resources? ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 15:58, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
In the course of my Wiki career, I have bought a couple of tomes on obscure subjects in order to help me write an article. I know a number of other Wikipedians who have done the same.
It occurs to me that it might be useful to have a page devoted to requests for information from particular books, because there might already be users out there who have the book who can verify the information sought without the user having to buy the book himself. Any comments? Gatoclass ( talk) 00:39, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
These contain important numerical data relating to the elements and can be edited even by anonymous users. There is always the risk of some "prankster" slightly changing the atomic masses of a few elements for example. How well can this be detected and corrected? I know it can happen as I just checked the last 50 edits of carbon's infobox and found most to be vandalism or nonconstructive. Assuming we generally have the correct numbers in these infoboxes in the first place, a legitimate need to edit them should be a rare occurrence. To me it would seem that the merits of locking down these boxes from anonymous edits (prevention of hard-to-detect vandalism) would always outweigh the slower pace of editing them due to some version of a lock down. The reason why I am posting this is because I noticed some discrepancies between the numbers listed on the actual infoboxes and the numbers that should have been there according to the reference pages for the infoboxes.
If I understand, there is currently no policy or precedent for locking down non-controversial pages due to a standard vandalism threat. What I would like to discuss is if there should be consideration given for how static the infoboxes' contents are. The values on these boxes are fairly black and white: the boiling point of oxygen at a given pressure has a correct value which isn't going to be changing anytime soon. It is very easy to hide fake data in these tables since no one would notice a change of 254.4 to 254.3. Even values that are completely off from the real value are hard to detect if one does not know what range of values to be expecting for a given property. What good arguments can be made for keeping the chemical element infoboxes open for everyone to edit other than it's the status quo? Do you think the infoboxes will be of better quality being open for everyone to edit or locked down given that they are practically complete? Dwr12 ( talk) 08:30, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
Sarcasticidealist, it is possible, even likely, that every contribution you ever make to Wikipedia will be destroyed by troll mobs or random vandals. Don't worry about it too much. And stop thinking about what you're doing. It tends to stand in the way of making constructive contributions to Wikipedia. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 08:54, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:External links#Issues with inclusion or exclusion of map service links on the external links guideline for keeping external map service links in Wikipedia articles or not. More comments from people would be appreciated to find community consensus. -- Para ( talk) 17:05, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
While it's not currently possible to move/rename images, Betacommand has a bot that can perform the function for us the hard way.
Requests for image movement should be placed at the bottom of Wikipedia talk:Image renaming. Admins are automatically authorized for the use of this tool, and non-admins may be added by having an admin list you at the bottom of Wikipedia:Image renaming, which also includes instructions on using the tool.
There is no "Requests for" process involved, you just need to have a reasonably good edit history.
Related pages can be found in Category:Image renaming ~Kylu ( u| t) 06:17, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
I was reading "No sex please, we're Wikipedians" and "Deletion Policy" categories above (contents in WP:VPP). I think the issue is whether to censor or not.
Censorship is something tricky, if not actually outright dangerous in a free society, for it might make it less free or not free anymore.
Freedom is and ideal welcomed in a civilized society; if used rightly, it encourages many good things, specially happyness. So i support good freedom.
Certainly freedom can be something like in the jungle, where animals are in complete natural freedom, which includes things like killing and maiming at will.
The question is then where to draw a line, if one has to be drawn.
An encyclopedia, is a compendium of knowledge -literally, to circle the knowledge, to gather it all- so basically the more things you add to it the better. In a cosmic view theres no need to censor to fill that definition. But the enciclopedia is mainly by and for humans (some extraterrestrial beings might be using it as well but thats another topic) so we have some main issues: storage, the larger status quo that restricts the free flow of information, the human mind itself (for information is a factor in the behavior of people and their reactions).
So basically the information provided has to fit in the container that will carry it (wikipedia servers), comply with the laws of the land where the servers are located (mainly USA i believe) and make the most powerful people content (which would be the people involved that has the most power to administer the topic or wikipedia at the time -including owners, administrators, users, local authorities).
So censorship has to be carried trying to balance out those main issues (and maybe others i cant think of right now). So, if there are too many topics, some have to be deleted -for space; which one becomes the question. Some people might put the formula for some super ultrasecret medicine and wikipedia might be coerced into deleting and banning. Or some information migth be used to be able to bypass some law. Maybe some information might be used to or make the effect of trigger harming instincts in some people (psychos, terrorists, stupids). Also, peoples cultures might be offended by some content they deem inappropriate and want to get it delete it ("oh, that word is so ugly it shouldnt be here", "oh, naked people!", "oh, mating humans!").
Everything that means more knowledge is a legitimate part of an encyclopedia. I think the goal is to know everything. But as mere material earthly mortals, we have to draw a line between good and evil. That is we have to censor stuff out. Now for wikipedia that might mean not getting information in an evil way but get it if in the process of getting it nothing is like harmed more than just causing envious feelings or similar stuff. For the users it means not using the information in evil/stupid ways. But we live in a life where there are more shades than light and darkness. So its virtually impossible to have a perfect process. Some people might hurt themselves with seemingly inocuos information (how to make a tomato salad). I dont know if that means information shouldnt be available.
But i tend to lean in the availability of all information. Just because someone gets angry or annoyed or ashamed or blushed or something doesnt mean information shouldnt be available. People have different beliefs. Some for instance, believe sexuality is something if in public view immoral and call it pornography, others believe is something sacred so for them pornography wouldnt be but sacred images. For others is just a pattern of instinctual/ biological processes in living beings.
Some people go delete some content in pages because thats how they think it is. Some others add gibberish that might mean actually something. Many add unreferenced opinions or definitions. Maybe a nobel prize winner is one of them. Or a president. For me, it should be a different version of each page updated. No deletions ever. Pure and simple. If storage possible. Or, go first and ban movies like Saw, Hostel. Ban also eisntein physics because it caused the atomic bomb to kill thousands of people and we are still in who knows when we blow the whole planet apart. And also Nobel because he introduced explosives. And ban the chinese, they made possible the infamous bullets. Ban cars because thieves get away too fast and thousands die horribly disfigured each year in car crashes. Ban also computers because they might facilitate the work of terrorists and, who knows, one day they might take over and want to exterminate the human race. -- WonderingAngel-aesc78 ( talk) 12:10, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
Well we do some kinds of things that fall short of outright censorship while addressing the same concerns. For example, the popular List of sex positions has only drawings instead of any pictures. Check out the thing on top of Rorschach inkblot test which, as it says, may invalidate the test for you if you do look at it. There are a lot of things like that around. MilesAgain ( talk) 16:17, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
I read through most of it. My response: Inclusionism is evil. However, censorship is more evil. Wikipedia would be better with more naked people and random offensive expletives, because it would scare away oversensitive people who would want to ban things for the sake of their own personal preferences.
To some degree, WP:CENSORED should apply to both articles and users, not just articles. Basically, if you're not infringing on anyone else's right to make a constructive edits, you should be able to say, believe, and do whatever you want. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 19:26, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
I agree with your point, Mwalcoff. I think the term "vetted" is more accurate when it comes to stopping non-encyclopedic stuff from getting through. The word "censorship" tends to connote the idea that certain OPINIONS aren't allowed. For this reason, I'm OK with the language and I think it's annoying when people say it doesn't apply to user comments and user pages, because it does. If I don't have freedom of opinion on here, true open-source collaboration can't work. That freedom ends when it comes to me being disrespectful or disruptive. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 00:32, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
note - I originally posting this hypothesis on my talk page for an initial round of comments and discussion prior to moving it here.
Is there no leeway for cases of artist that are popular in new online media formats like YouTube.com? While they may not be reviewed in any traditional media channels, would the fact that their art [music/film/etc] has been viewed by millions viewers (independently tracked by the site) not make them notable simply based on that popularity? What if they had 10 million viewers? 100 million? When might we have to acknowledge this artist, or at least their art, as notable, regardless of receiving any traditional sources?
It seems that Wikipedia's two most important policies are notability and verifiability. Can a case be made that this example might prove both, albeit not in the currently defined framework?
I also am a little confused where the line is drawn on what is trivial or significant where artists are concerned. Historically, Musicians' and Authors' work is more notable than themselves as a person. So, for example, if a musician releases a hit song and it is reviewed heavily but, for whatever reason, the artist's life is not explored in the press. Does that make only the song notable? Can a song be notable and not the artist that made it so?
Thoughts? - Operknockity ( talk) 06:42, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
A reoccurring claim in these discussions is that notability is not a policy but a guideline and that 'the lack of demonstrated notability is not a criteria for speedy deletion, nor is there any deadline to improve such articles, though good faith improvements are expected as part of the editing process.' [ref Wikipedia:Notability (fiction)#Dealing with non-notable fictional topics ] However, in practice I am seeing section A7 of the criteria for speedy deletion based on grounds of reliable source when A7 actualy only requires you 'indicate why its subject is important or significant'. - Operknockity ( talk) 14:33, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Would it be an idea to throw WP:N at the "policy" vote ? Cause whatever you may call it, it sure ain't a guideline anymore. We throw away 1000s of articles a day that don't pass WP:N, and on the HELPDESK, I think it's the most quoted "policy/guideline/procedure" of them all. As such I assert that it is no longer a guideline, but a policy. Calling it anything else would be "truthiness" instead of truth. -- TheDJ ( talk • contribs) 16:04, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
"Notability" has eroded on Wikipedia in recent years. Now, you have folks like Geo Swan above who support cruft. No, cruft is important -- we just shouldn't have any policy against it, except on controversial topics. Rite. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 22:47, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Operknockity, in response to your original question (my mind glazed over about halfway through this thread, so my apologies if this has been stated already)... Manymany views on YouTube or the like could pass notability, but the problem you have is that you still need verifiability and reliable sources. The scant info found in YouTube itself does not qualify. So you need other sources to write an article. An article saying only [Title] is a popular video featuring a song by [Artist]. It can only be found on YouTube, should be deleted. Once you have reliable sources to report other important info, you will probably meet notability requirements too. - Freekee ( talk) 04:50, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Just a thought. Should references be able to be seen without having to log-in to any external source? I have just removed a reference from Ken Bruce as on trying to verify it I needed to log in (and presumably acquire) an id from the referring pages. In my view this isn't very "free", but what do others think? 217.42.254.177 ( talk) 19:07, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
I would, Puchiko. In one article, a person used a Korean newspaper that isn't published in English or archived online. It is not possible to follow verify a source if your source is somewhere hidden in the mountains of Shangri-la. ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 14:47, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
Have a look at the first three words of Cheerleading. I have several issues with what is happening there:
I bring this up here because I've seen this in at least one other article ( Association football), where the statement that it "is the most popular sport in the world" is referenced five times. The main questions I ask are: how many references are needed, and, isn't this bad style? ALTON .ıl 00:21, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm asking this in a few places at once, but I'm not sure where to go with it so....
"Reasons for deletion include, but are not limited to" ☯ Zenwhat ( talk) 00:36, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Why am I receiving what I consider to be banner ads/spam at the top of the regular Wikipedia page telling me that "Bay area Wikipedians may be interested in the wikimedia-sf mailing list." That really creeps me out because it means that even though I am signed in Wikipedia is stalking my current IP address. I thought that if I was signed in my privacy was protected. Besides when I went there it is just an advertisement message board for businesses like party planners and architects and I thought that Wikipedia was about NO advertising! Saudade7 05:12, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
This is certainly not advertising for party planners or architects. Though I admit, it can make for confusing reading if you don't know what it's all about. It's the archives of a mailing list for Wikipedia/Wikimedia people in the San Francisco area, and among the discussions raised is who the Wikimedia Foundation should hire for party planning, etc.-- Pharos ( talk) 05:34, 4 February 2008 (UTC)