User:Jeff02/What WikiProjects are not

WikiProjects are useful tools where editors with related interests can come together to share ideas and work, and perhaps most importantly, WikiProjects serve as a great vehicle for acheiving consensus. Occasionally however, WikiProjects can be abused. We all know that there are several things that Wikipedia is not; it should also be pointed out that there are several things that WikiProjects are not.

WikiProjects are not bureaucracies

This may seem obvious at first, after all, Wikipedia itself is not a bureaucracy. It is however, fairly easy to forget this and make a project into a bureaucracy anyway. A project's members should not create rules that all members are expected to adhere to. Such rules fall strictly within the scope of Wikipedia's policies. A Wikiproject can create project-specific guidelines, but these guidelines can be ignored in some cases if a good enough reason to do so exists. WikiProjects should be open to new ideas and not make it too difficult for someone to propose changes to the project's guidelines. Essentially, everyone's opinion in a WikiProject, even those of newer members, should be given equal weight. This leads us to the next section:

WikiProjects are not governed

No individual person "leads" a project. WikiProjects are simply groups of editors who work together, not organizations that work under a leader. Everyone has the equal right to make changes to how the project operates, but for major changes, it's better to get the group to come to a consensus on that change.

WikiProjects are not battlegrounds

This is another thing that Wikipedia isn't that also applies to WikiProjects. WikiProjects are supposed to be places of collaboration. As part of Wikipedia, editors are expected to be civil while participating in discussions on a WikiProject's talk page. Discussions on a WikiProject's talk page are supposed to be focused on improving articles or improving the functions of the project. If some members decide to argue with other posts instead of replying to them constructively then the discussion will not make any progress. Examples of this would be pointing out about falsities in the details of a post without responding to its main point or attacking someone personally when you disagree with them.

WikiProjects are not walled gardens

A walled garden is a place on a wiki that is in some way hidden from the rest of the wiki (such as a group of pages with no incoming or outgoing links). Discussions that affect a WikiProject should operate should be open to all of that project's members. A form of walled garden can sometimes be formed off wiki, such as through IRC channels. Even if a project invites all members to participate in off-wiki discussions, not everyone will do so. It's best to keep all discussions related to Wikipedia on Wikipedia, however sometimes it's more convenient to hold discussions off-wiki. In this case, if an apparent consensus is reached in an off-wiki discussion, the same discussion needs to be opened up on-wiki to get the real consensus. While off-wiki discussions can help speed up the process of consensus-building, it is important to make sure that everyone is given the chance to voice their opinion. This can only be done on-wiki.

WikiProjects are not in control of other WikiProjects

Sometimes a WikiProject's scope completely covers the scope of another WikiProject. While it's a good idea for such WikiProjects to work together and coordinate their standards or other requirements they might have for their articles, the project with the wider scope (the "parent project") does not completely own the other project (the "child project"). The parent project should not decide how the child project operates, or take over the functions of the project. Discussions that directly affect the child project should only be held on that project's talk page, not the talk page of the parent project. In the case that a discussion affects multiple child projects, the discussion can be held at the parent project's talk page but the child projects must be notified. Failing to do either of these would give the appearance of a walled garden.

When trying to give articles a consistent appearance, if the child project's standards conflict with the parent project's standards, a discussion should take place between members of the two projects to reach a solution. No project's standards immediately trump those of another project. Just like members of WikiProjects need to work together through consensus, so should entire WikiProjects.