Wikipedia talk:If it ain't broke, don't fix it

Misleading?

A good point, but I think this is misleading. Every now and then, you see people opposing proposals per "If it ain't broke, don't fix it". I mean, proposals are for improvement, even if it is not broken, it is a fix. Every wikimedia project is actually the way it is today because of fixes/improvements that were done even when "it isn't broken". I think this should be clarified. Rehman 12:42, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. Regards, Sun Creator^(talk) 15:56, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

Seconded. Bumm13 (talk) 04:17, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Foolish Phrase

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it" has always been a foolish phrase used by the short-sighted. The correct phrase should be "If it ain't broke, improve it", and is always the correct one to use. There is no such thing as perfect, and as such, there is always room for improvement. Continual improvement is what leads to progress. - KitchM (talk) 13:57, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

Effort spent re-inventing the wheel could be put to better use finding a way to circumvent the limitations of the speed of light, reversing entropy, or finding ways to improve microprocessor efficiency beyond the nanometre level. Hence, not fixing things that "ain't broke" is beneficial from a labour allocation perspective, and this definitely applies to the expansion and improvement of Wikipedia articles. --benlisquare_T•C•E 17:05, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

Not really. It only promotes a bad mindset. That's actually one of the major reasons the world is in the mess its in currently. The world is falling apart because of bad work product.

So many people make the shortsighted mistake of equating "reinventing the wheel" with the first bad phrase. The sayings are non sequitur.

Your comments also seem to imply there isn't enough manpower to go around, when the reverse is actually the case. We simple need better management and more people engaged in fixing bad work.

Seeing the big picture forces us to realize that everything is not an emergency, and in point of fact, most things are not. Therefore we really need people to do the job correctly the first time. Working the job until it is right is the only way to get the correct results. Everything else represents unsound thinking, bad training and sloppy workmanship.

If you want a phrase to hang your hat on, then one should choose "A job worth doing is a job worth doing well". - KitchM (talk) 19:49, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

Can we make this a pillar?

Seriously though, I freaking love it. --Endercase (talk) 16:15, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

You're joking, right? Bumm13 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 04:17, 28 September 2017‎ (UTC)

Links to redirects that are not broken, etc.

This brief essay commands or advises ME not to do some kinds of things. Can anything here (and at WP:NOTBROKEN) be construed to mandate, urge, or even justify anyone to generally undo all such "pointless" changes? (I think not, and people really have not been doing that.) Some might do it leaving edit comments resembling "Unexplained removal of spaces; unexplained change of redirect per WP:NOTBROKEN." I try to be sensible with link changes (leaving "redirects with possibilities", etc.). Most commonly, the article was renamed (moved). The essay also says "... if something is slightly broken in a way that you care about, and fixing it improves the encyclopedia a little, then feel free to fix it." If my "fix" didn't "fix" anything (by someone else's measure), but didn't break it either, then "unfixing" it back to its prior non-broken state would be a real waste (the only real waste). A renamed article and especially a renamed template is a valid [if weak] reason for a change (it's "slightly broken" - a pointless redirect confuses and sets a bad example for editors, and consumes a bit of resources), and those kinds of changes should be preserved, even if other things are reverted for actual [weak] reasons. -A876 (talk) 05:27, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

Isn't this opinion policy essay in direct conflict with BE BOLD editing?

The whole notion of the Be Bold policy to make improvements when you can, and if it doesnt improve the article and/or wikipedia as a whole, then the edit would inherently be reverted (in good faith) by another editor, thus starting the WP:CYCLE/discussion on a talk page to come to a consensus. The main point being that we need editors to be bold and make changes to have an ever growing and improving encyclopedia, why not try and improve ('Fix') something even it it isn't broken when you could revert at the click of a button. This seems to validate the notion that mediocrity and settling is fine on Wikipedia? MaximusEditor (talk) 20:22, 13 November 2023 (UTC)