Template talk:People from place list criteria

Criteria not in line with guidance

The template says: Only people who already have a Wikipedia article may appear here. This establishes notability., and then links to Wikipedia:Stand-alone list and Wikipedia:LISTCRITERIA, but none of the list criteria say that establishing notability criteria is about just only Wikipedia articles. In fact, WP:CSC says red links are allowed. See Template:List entries are all notable for a good example. Establishing a list based on "Wikipedia articles only" violates WP:SELFREF, WP:CIRCULAR, MOS:OVERLINK, and is not encyclopedic since it doesn't allow other notable entries such as redlinks, redirects, or other plain text notable mentions. We need to make the template fall in line with guidance. Huggums537 (talk) 16:57, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

@Huggums537: Thanks for bringing this up: it's a worthwhile discussion to have. A few points:

• This is a new template: probably very few people are following the Talk page. Can we move the discussion to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Lists so we can get a consensus on the list criteria? May I copy our discussion over there?
• I created {{People from place list criteria}} by copying the list criteria out of the HTML comments in the corresponding list pages. For example, open List of people from Chicago for editing. The template doesn't establish the list criteria, but brings it to the Talk page so that more people can notice them.
• The comments on the Talk pages seem to be put in place by several editors many years ago:
  • The criteria for List of people from Chicago was established in 2012 by Dkriegls
  • The criteria for List of people from Portland, Oregon was established in 2008 by EncMstr
  • The criteria for List of people from Tucson, Arizona was established in 2014 by Onel5969
• I believe that the criteria is thus stable and is supported by (implicit) consensus. I can't find any centralized discussion, however, so it's worthwhile to discuss now.
• I believe the relevant guideline is WP:LISTPEOPLE. That guideline says that a list of people must only include notable people. A person who has a Wikipedia article must be notable (because of WP:BASIC). The list criteria in {{People from place list criteria}} thus follows the guideline.
• One point which might be confusing: WP:LISTCRITERIA do not specify exactly which list criteria should be used. Editors can decide to use more restrictive list criteria than those specified at WP:LISTCRITERIA, as long as they are unambiguous and objective. The editors who placed the list criteria in the comments appear to have decided to be stricter: to allow only blue-links in these list articles, rather than simply any notable person.
• I don't believe that WP:SELFREF is violated here. WP:SELFREF discourages linking or mentioning Wikipedia in the articles. The {{People from place list criteria}} is put on the Talk page to avoid this.
• I don't think that MOS:OVERLINK is violated here. WP:OVERLINK discourages linking to common terms. These lists contain names of people who are not commonly known (unlike "inch" or "August").
• You bring up an interesting point about WP:CIRCULAR. Is relying on the existence of a WP article for notability the same as using WP as a source? I'm thinking not (because it isn't a citation), but I'm not 100% sure and I'm curious what other editors think.

Thanks again for raising the issue, it's very helpful! — hike395 (talk) 01:55, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

I guess some suggestions I would have to start off with is to link to the actual relevant guidance in the template so adding LISTPEOPLE to the template would be good. The main problem I have with the template is that the only option it offers is the stricter, and more contentious option of Wikipedia articles only rather than also allowing the option for the more accepted and common criteria listed in the guidance about notability. I guess my issues about using just Wikipedia articles only for lists of people are with the actual guidance itself so yeah please copy the discussion to the list project. The reason I say SELFREF is violated is because we use links as references so telling people to strictly use Wikipedia links to the exclusion of all other references is a massive self reference. For example, you could provide a notable text entry to a list with some references to establish notability of the entry, but a Wikipedia articles only list prevents other mentions other than exclusive Wikipedia self references. I brought up CIRCULAR for similar reasons. My pointing to OVERLINK was meant to point to something more like MOS:SEAOFBLUE, and Wikipedia:Blue Sea with a sea of blue because using just blue links from Wikipedia is something just like that if notable redlinks or notable text entries are not allowed. Huggums537 (talk) 05:33, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

I think this is a very worthwhile discussion to be had, but I also agree that it is more pertinent to have it on the talkpage of the lists project. If you do move it there, please ping me. Onel5969 ^{TT me} 10:25, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

Discussion continued here — hike395 (talk) 13:28, 17 August 2022 (UTC)