Wikipedia talk:Notability/Archive 56

Archive 50

←

Archive 54

Archive 55

Archive 56

Archive 57

Archive 58

→

Archive 60

Renaming Notability

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

tl;dr: I propose we rename Notability to "Inclusion" without material changes to the General Notability guideline or specific notability guidelines.

How many editors reading this have found themselves writing or reading something like the following?

• "On Wikipedia the term notable means something specific..."
• ""Notable" is a term of art on wikipedia. It doesn't mean merely "worthy of note" or "important"..."
• "... it's not the same as the dictionary definition"

Raise your hand if you've seen anything like the above more than once. Keep your hand up if you've lost track of the number of times you've seen something like it in deletion debates, talk pages or noticeboards. We've had the same problem in nearly every deletion debate which hinges upon notability and we have had this problem for years (verging on a decade).

It sucks. Repeatedly redefining the term nearly every time it is noted to a new editor wastes time, complicates discussion by prompting semantic arguments and adds unnecessary boilerplate to many conversations. It especially sucks because the term "notability" itself is meant to be descriptive and informative. No other guideline or policy generates as much confusion merely by invoking a term which should ease understanding.

Take a look at the text of the notability guideline as it exists right now. What is the only word in the lede which is superfluous? Literally the only word which--if excised carefully--would not change the meaning or force of the guideline. I'll give you a hint: it's the word that does not appear in the text of the general notability guideline, which reads:

• "If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject, it is presumed to be suitable for a stand-alone article or list."

Both the lede and the nutshell for the notability guideline expend more than a few words to introduce the concept of notability then pull us back from the common connotation (and denotation!) to what we really mean. Normally we want to change guidelines or policies if practice drifts away from our stated description. In this case practice is unfortunately perfectly in sync with our guideline. Both the text of the notability guideline and the way it is used on Wikipedia invoke and then disclaim the term "notable" in favor of our actual guidance for inclusion, the general and specific notability guidelines.

Instead of going another decade repeatedly explaining that "notable doesn't mean "notable"" let's do something smarter. I propose we rename notability (along with all sibling and subordinate pages) to "inclusion". The meaning and purpose of all such guidelines will remain the same (and they'll still be guidelines). Notability becomes Inclusion, GNG -> GIG, etc. No other changes.

Why is this awesome?

• As I mentioned above it will greatly simplify (at a minimum) the verbiage in WP:N. Look just at the lede of that guideline and you'll see how much effort is spent working around the word notable. Let's remove all that and let the guideline say what we mean.
• It won't stop people from claiming someone should be included because they're "notable" (or some other phrase which roughly means important/significant/famous) but it will stop our guidance from setting people up to fail. Words matter. We can all tell ourselves "well, objectively it's the guideline that matters, not the word we use for it" but how convincing is that after nearly 10 years of having that guideline misinterpreted based on its title alone?
• It will move us away from the notability wars. We no longer regularly delete things which have sources but aren't "important" as we did in 2004-2007 and while the notion of "notability" was in flux for a long time we've basically settled on guidance for inclusion that does not rely on that word in any way. Look at the historical discussions in the sidebar for a sense of the mood prior to the adoption of "notability". We were basically picking between "notability", "importance", "significance" and "fame and importance". Good on us for picking the least bad term but it's time to move on.
• It gives us a vocabulary to talk about inclusion of subjects that isn't pejorative. Previous discussions have given short shrift to this, but I think it is important. I've talked to a number of people with deleted articles, people at editathons who wanted to make articles on subjects they felt were noteworthy and people who aren't editors but are otherwise interested in certain articles being included on wikipedia. In almost all cases the word "notability" is at best a stumbling block and more commonly a reason for them to reject our capacity for including or excluding an article as a whole. I'm not endorsing Timothy Noah's whole take here but read the penultimate paragraph (of the first page). This is not an uncommon sentiment. We can't stop people from feeling upset that they don't get an article but we can stop them from feeling needlessly upset that they're "not notable".

Past arguments against renaming

The list below was compiled by reading through the discussions I've linked in the sidebar. It's explicitly not comprehensive but I want to try to flesh out what I felt were the most common and well supported arguments and make the best case for them.

• "Inclusion" does not cover other requirements for inclusion, e.g. copyvio, verifiability, spam, etc. This argument has been, by far, the most commonly held position against renaming and the most vociferously argued. WP:NOT and WP:V are content policies which directly determine what is included on wikipedia. Notability is a guideline which describes roughly how we judge a subject will have a successful article. Simply, even if a subject is "worthy of note" we may not have an article on them if such an article cannot meet our core content policies. Renaming notability to inclusion may lead editors or readers astray if it suggests that meeting such a guideline means an article would be included, rather than meaning it is merely "notable".
• Renaming the guideline won't prevent wikilawyering over it. Related, fights over inclusion are often about actually being included in the encyclopedia and don't turn on the name. A person whose biography is up for deletion is unlikely to be mollified by hearing that they don't meet the guidelines for inclusion vs. "they're not notable". Their big concern is not the passing injury of being referred to as non-notable but the fact that they don't have an entry. Likewise, renaming the guideline won't stop people from making unsupported arguments for inclusion.
• We've been calling it "notability" for a while now and were referring to the general concept as "notability" before the guideline existed. Wikipedia will, by its very nature, have terms which have a specific local meaning to the community and it isn't necessarily valuable to refactor those terms so that they meet outside expectations which we cannot control. We even have an article on the subject as complaints about the term (though more commonly the general concept) have spread beyond the community.
• Describing subjects or referring to extant articles becomes more complicated with a term like "inclusion". Rather than saying "so and so is notable so they can be on this list" we need another term. Also, "notable" has the benefit of being an adverb intimately connected with the noun "notability".

I'd like to address each of these in turn.

First, while "notability" is not the only guideline or policy on what sort of articles we have it is the only inclusion guideline. In almost every discussion it was pointed out that calling it "inclusion" would somehow lead people to believe that NOT/SPAM/COPYVIO don't also determine when we have an article. I find this argument needlessly pedantic and dependent on the sort of hidebound interpretation of policy which we should discourage. Since we're being pedantic, policies such as NOT, SPAM and COPYVIO are exclusionary: they describe what Wikipedia is NOT or things wikipedia can't contain. They do not describe things wikipedia should contain--what the notability guideline does now and what a renamed (but otherwise unchanged) guideline would continue to do. Even the language of WP:V, which describes things wikipedia should include has this to say under a section on notability "If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it.". That is explicitly exclusionary. Renaming what is already our guidance for inclusion to "inclusion" doesn't step on the toes of the spirit or letter of that policy under any reasonable interpretation.

Changing the name won't stop people from arguing over the concept. That's certainly true. Names matter, but they aren't magic. It also won't stop arguments from article subjects or editors interested in a topic from claiming that a standard which doesn't look like our current notability guidelines should be used when deciding on an article's fate. However, we can do our part to not actively mislead people by using a term with a perfectly reasonably connotation in a narrow and contrary fashion. As mentioned above, nearly every explanation of "notability" to a new editor or an outsider starts with some boilerplate about how notable doesn't really mean "notable." That's not just a function of outsiders not understanding the community. It's way too common to be that. At a minimum the term itself is not helpful. I defy anyone to produce an example where someone's intuitive understanding of the word "notable" helped them to better understand our notability guidelines.

The term "notability" is pretty common on wikipedia, especially in deletion debates. Policies and guidelines should be descriptive, so that's potentially a good reason to not change the name. But I'd argue the term notability is a historical artifact from our initial discussions on the subject. Even though it's nominally a term of art, it stems from our then desire to limit articles to "important" or "significant" ones, "notable" just being the term we landed on. Once we start naming guidelines after it and it becomes a useful shorthand, the term can take on a life of its own. We're no longer certain that practice drives the name or that naming shapes practice. Arguably it's both. In my opinion that means we should be respectful of common use but not needlessly deferential. For an analogy, take a look at Wikipedia:Non-free content, which used to be called "Fair Use" (see rename discussion). It's not a perfect parallel because fair use is itself a term of art with important and germane meaning that we didn't want to convey, but we took a pretty commonly used shorthand and moved a policy page to a more clear name. For our purposes we should note that the move to "Non-free content" came well after the policy change expanding beyond fair use.

Finally, while "notable" is grammatically very convenient we should consider if that helps or hurts our attempts to be clear when discussing inclusion. "Inclusion" describes our guidance, not a specific subject. We have the current notability regime because those are our editorial practices, not as a comment on stuff that does or doesn't have an article. "So and so isn't notable" isn't a super great speech pattern to have or promote. As mentioned above, that phrase or similar ones won't melt away but we shouldn't keep a guideline name that causes problems simply because it's handy to use.

Previous discussions

Unlike many perennial proposals, relatively few discussions on renaming notability which received significant attention from the community resulted in a strong consensus either way. Most of the proposed name changes were derailed during the discussion or plagued by problems which don't relate to naming. Frustratingly, the most well attended debates were those most marred by unnecessary problems or forks. Notably (lol):

• Many of the rename attempts were sidelined by discussions over whether or not to elevate notability to a policy, dissolve it entirely or replace it with materially different proposed guidelines.
• Some discussions focused a lot on whether or not a renaming would impact the relationship between SNGs and the GNG. This mattered a lot because the actual relationship was in flux during the time period of many discussions. It is not in flux now.
• Some suggested names were lengthy and/or unwieldy such as "Article Inclusion Criteria" or "Inclusion Guideline", causing people to oppose a rename on the pretty reasonable basis that such names were a mouthful.

As with any discussion, I can't (and shouldn't) limit the scope of comments or interest but I would urge everyone involved to please consider the value or harm from only renaming the guideline and not spin this out into unrelated issues. If you are concerned that renaming notability will ipso facto materially impact policies or guidelines then a discussion of that is perfectly germane, but I would like to see a vibrant community discussion on the merits of renaming rather than a proxy fight over inclusion writ large as we have seen in the past. Protonk (talk) 14:43, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

Comments

Supporting

• I'm the proposer, so I support this. And because this isn't a vote, I can post here! Protonk (talk) 14:44, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
• Support: I'm all for it; I would love to get all the time back, over the years, that I've wasted in addressing bruised egos and hurt feelings over the premise that "not notable" = "You/your beloved subject is unimportant and worthless." Ravenswing 16:41, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
• I think using the term "Wikipedia's standards for inclusion" or something similar would be less confusing for new editors, as in the real world, notability generally is based on specific accomplishments or impact on events. However as this requires the context of a value framework, and this is difficult to establish by consensus in a widely diverse editing community, Wikipedia instead substitutes the judgment of reliable, independent, non-promotional, third party sources with editorial control. Although I appreciate it's probably unlikely to happen at this juncture, I think the simplest way to get editors to use a term emphasizing Wikipedia's standards in contrast to the conventional definition of notability would be to rename this guideline. isaacl (talk) 17:08, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
• Support, essentially per Ravenswing. Ironholds (talk) 20:13, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
• Strong Support per WP:BITE - Protonk's analysis of how this affects newcomers is spot-on: a decision criterion responsible for deleting a large amount of the content new editors want to create, should not be named with a word that creates confusion and makes their contributions look irrelevant or unwanted. I beg all editors to take into account that the target audience for policies and guidelines are newcomers, not experienced editors who are already familiar with the basic principles; the nuances of how we want to name things should take a back seat and be secundary to how newcomers perceive them.

- Nevertheless, I see a flaw in how the RfC has been crafted - by making a concrete suggestion for Inclusion as the target name, the success of the whole proposal stands on that particular possibility, so that it will succeed or fail on the merits of that word, and not on the problems with the current name. I'm afraid that with a classic "Support/Oppose" RfC it will be impossible to gain consensus for a single given name.

- Rather, I'd want to ask those editors opposing Inclusion so far to think whether their opposition is to any name change or just to the suggested one. Please assume for a second that the guideline had a different name, and consider whether you would support the name Notability above all the other alternatives suggested at the "Other" section or if the flaws would make you think twice about adopting it.

- Maybe even if Inclusion doesn't succeed, we can open the dialog to new possibilities and find a better solution. To that end, I'd like to see this discussion scope expanded so that various alternate proposals are compiled and their relative merits weighted, in view of starting later a straw-poll to choose the preferred name, of which Notability would be just one more possibility. Maybe it could even be structured in two phases - a qualifying round to determine a set with the few options with the most support, and a final one between two or three finalists to settle the definite preferred name. Diego (talk) 21:51, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

@Diego Moya: I'm not opposed to a different word. Any single word that doesn't suffer from the same problems as "notability" is a step up. I wanted to put forward a specific name because many past discussions have bogged down due to multiple names being proposed and forking the dispute. Protonk (talk) 23:52, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

• Protonk, I agree with your approach. The main choice here seems to be between a word connoting a subject's intrinsic importance (notability, significance, prominence) and a word connoting its fitness for some purpose, in this case a Wikipedia article (inclusion, eligiblity, suitability), but a debate between all six or more options would be impossible to close. Instead, for the moment we can focus on jumping from a specific word in one category (notability) to a specific word in another (inclusion). Later, if we want to swap words within the same category, we can certainly discuss that separately. —Neil P. Quinn (talk) 02:46, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

• Support notwithstanding an alternative suggestion—The proposer's arguments are very compelling. I'm not 100% satisfied on the suggested nomenclature, though I can support it (and so I am). In my own conversations, I often find myself using the word "eligible" for "notable", ergo suggesting that people think of it as the "Eligibility" guideline. It's less judgmental, and it implies the same threshold for inclusion that may or may not be reached by a given subject in a way that "Inclusion" doesn't quite. That said, I absolutely see a conversation about "Here's how why you might not be Included" going much better with the uninitiated than the "Here's why you aren't Notable". So if there's any agreement around "Eligibility" I would be thrilled, but in the meantime "Inclusion" is an improvement on the status quo. WWB (talk) 02:23, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Support: "Inclusion criteria" is a lot more clear, and makes it sound less like a super-exclusive cool kids club. You could use terms such as "General inclusion criteria" and "Inclusion criteria for [subject] articles" in documentation rather than "notability" guideline. ViperSnake151  Talk  03:41, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Added Support—I could certainly support "Inclusion criteria". Similar to how "Reliable sources" became "Identifying reliable sources" (at least as I recall it). WWB (talk) 05:15, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

"Inclusion guidelines" has been rejected many times before because it sets a dangerous precedence on how new readers will interprete the SNGs as implied automatic inclusion guidelines. They are not, they are criteria that lend to allowing an article to be created so it can be expended based on the presumption of sources to be coming, but does not assure inclusion when all is said and done. --MASEM (t) 05:32, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

• Support better than what we have now --Guerillero | My Talk 06:31, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Support per others. I wouldn't mind "eligibility" as well, but the case made here for "inclusion" is very strong. — This, that and the other (talk) 09:39, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Support I've been in support of renaming the guidelines for some time as it is far more descriptive of what these guidelines actually are. They don't determine whether something is notability (notability being a very subjective term), they provide a set of criteria on which we determine if a subject may be included in the encyclopedia and that is how we've been using the guideline for years. "Notability" has become a bit of jargon when we means "worthy of inclusion". The new terminology will also stear us away from arguements such as, "This was on a best seller, how is it not notable?" "This sold X units, it must be notable." Or, "This was in the top 5 of some popular poll, so it should be notable." —Farix (t | c) 12:31, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

  It seems that the main argument against renaming the page to use "inclusion" can be just as confusing as "notability". That isn't much of an argument in my opinion and does no address the need to use a more descriptive terminology of what these guidelines actually do. If you want a less ambiguous name than "Wikipedia:Inclusion", I would recommend "Wikipedia:Inclusion standards for stand-alone articles" with redirects WP:INCLUSION and WP:ISSA. —Farix (t | c) 14:39, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

• Support. I do not think this will increase any tendency towards either inclusion or exclusion, or cause a change in what gets accepted--it should be neutral that way. What it will do is make it much easier to discuss it. This will be especially true with newcomers. At present, it takes a ridiculous amount of explanation at AfC or AfD or OTRS to explain to people why they can not have articles, because they naturally confuse notability with importance. It is extremely difficult to tell someone that they or their organization is not important without insulting them--I've learned how to do it most of the time, but it's often tricky. They understandably do not see why we have our own special definition of a common english word, and use it to reject them. On the other hand, they all do understand that we like any other publication or site have our own standards of what we want to include--they may be unhappy with the result, but they are likely to accept it. There is also the advantage that using the term "inclusion" links this guideline with the fundamental policy on which it is based, WP:NOT, which is often a much firmer basis for argument and discussion. DGG ( talk ) 01:31, 1 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support. Renaming is essential. Indeed, the word "notability" is sometimes misleading. For example, one may bring Barack Obama to WP:AfD and argue he's not more notable than other US Presidents. If "notability" didn't appear in the entire guideline, things would be different.--180.172.239.231 (talk) 07:20, 1 September 2014 (UTC)
• Strong Support I would be happy with an a name other than inclusion criteria as well. Those in the oppose camp have definitely made strong arguments against inclusion criteria. I don't have a preference overall as to what word we use, so long as it is something that causes less confusion than "notable". This is a very real problem that we need to solve. See my anecdotal experience and explanation under #Is_this_really_a_problem_that_needs_solving.3F. Zell Faze (talk) 21:37, 1 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support. It had never occurred to me to question the word "notability", just as you wouldn't usually question whether "cat" is the right word for feline house pets. But now that it's brought up, I like this idea. The core purpose of these guidelines isn't to define what's notable or important (which is pretty darn subjective), it's to define what should be included in Wikipedia. We've successfully used the word "notability" for the second concept for many years, but I suspect it's still confusing to outsiders. True, saying "inclusion guideline" does little to communicate what exactly the guideline is. But sometimes the guideline can't easily be summed up in a couple words, and it ends up being misleading to try (that seems to be the case with titling this page "notability"). "Inclusion" might not be ideal. For example, I'd like it if the name distinguished between the criteria for including articles and the criteria for including facts within articles. "Eligibility" might better convey that, and has the side benefit of a nice adjective form similar to "notable". But limiting the discussion to the choice in front of us, I strongly support "inclusion" over "notability". —Neil P. Quinn (talk) 03:20, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support I was very skeptical when I saw that someone was proposing a name change, but I think this would actually be better. I believe it would be significantly clearer to new people, and would reduce confusion. Also, as a point of fact, inclusion is a common word for this concept across many similar sites, which means that it would be clearer to people who have experience at other projects. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:56, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support Current terminology confuses nearly every new editor that touches it, creating a severe pain point at AfC, etc. --j⚛e decker^talk 04:58, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support anything to reduce our collective obsession with arcane terminology. --NYKevin 22:16, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
• Strong Support: I typically use the phrase "inclusion criteria" when pointing to notability guidelines from AfC, because I think it's clearer. The difference between real-world importance and notability is particularly challenging for novice editors, and the terminology makes it *much* harder to explain/understand Wikipedia's standards.

What would particularly help novices, I believe, is finding terminology that could be used throughout the encyclopedia, that readers would encounter before becoming editors. (That's based on accepted social theory of how we learn to do things from watching others & participating in low-stakes events.) Emphasizing WP:NOT & its link with "inclusion" (as User:DGG suggests above) would be one way to do that.

For communicating with non- and new-Wikipedians our current terminology does seem to be a big problem. For example, in my academic research about Wikipedia, I've shown that newcomers have problems understanding notability in the context of AfD. (e.g. `Why just because it is a small team and not major does it not deserve it’s own page on here?'. Novices’ confusion seems not merely *about* the notability criteria, but rather that such criteria exist -- i.e. that there *are* minimal standards." Using a phrase such as "inclusion criteria" would stress that there are such criteria. (More on my research, see a summary page on meta; and specifically page 7 of this research paper; or email/ping me for more.) Jodi.a.schneider (talk) 14:09, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

• Support; "inclusion" makes more sense to a nonspecialist and is much more descriptive of how we use the policy/guidelines. Andrew Gray (talk) 17:47, 18 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support: Per others, I agree that it's essential. Romtam^TalkToMe 00:42, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support: "Inclusion" as a description of Wikipedia inclusion standards for article acceptance is in every way superior to any word based on the verb "to note" "Inclusion" describes exactly what the article is for. "Notability" is imprecise and open to several different interpretations with regards to how standards of article creation are defined. Matthewhburch (talk) 18:27, 20 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support: So often when "notability" is mentioned in deletion discussions, some newbie comes along and presents reasons why it would be notable, but which has nothing to do with Wikipedia's definition. The effort to clarify "notability" could probably be measured in man-decades to man-centuries. -- intgr [talk] 19:52, 21 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support - occasionally people get upset when we explain they're not notable. Explaining they don't don't fit with our inclusion criteria (or something) is possibly marginally better. PhilKnight (talk) 00:52, 30 September 2014 (UTC)
• Support, even though it doesn't look like this will pass. "Notability" is vague, and it's not obviously a project-specific thing; as Phil observes, "you're not notable" can sound like an affront. When I'm working with a newbie, I always say "X passes/doesn't pass our inclusion standards", because anyone can understand what an inclusion standard is, and aside from the occasional person who thinks we accept everything, nobody's going to be surprised that we have inclusion standards. Nyttend (talk) 17:01, 2 October 2014 (UTC)
• Support Notability is just much too confusing where it matters most -- the high profile AfD, where tons of editors, many with little knowledge of the intricacies of the policy, gather and make systematically important decisions. Alanscottwalker (talk) 02:11, 3 October 2014 (UTC)
• Support. Inclusion is a much better term. It signifies what is appropriate for Inclusion on this site. Notability as a definition suggests individual editors are attempting to use their opinions to argue what is notable, rather than use site policies and guidelines to determine what is appropriate for Inclusion on this encyclopedia website. Inclusion makes much more sense for new users, seasoned editors, and administrators, alike. Therefore I Strongly Support use of the word Inclusion and not Notability. — Cirt (talk) 23:14, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

Opposing

• Inclusion is far too strong a concept, because that basically goes against the idea that there are cases were a topic might be notable but we don't include (see discussion in previous section about "presumption" of notability for example, and that there are more things we include that are not notable but include because they help with navigation or other facets (such as the concept that every named geographic place should have an article as so we can act as a gazetteer). Notability is a stable term that describes the process exactly. --MASEM (t) 15:35, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
  • In practice "inclusion" is what the notability guideline governs. There are exceptions, as with any guideline but I think the overwhelming discourse on what we should include that isn't explicitly excluded by NOT is notability. If you were asked by a new editor whether or not an article they want to write would be included in wikipedia, would you mention the exceptions you presented above without prompting? Protonk (talk) 16:05, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
    • It is that in practice and it is very easy to tell new editors that for all purposes, notability is our inclusion guideline. But there are so many little gotchas when you get into the weeds of it, and with the number of people that want to game keeping or deleting on wording and the like when it comes to AFD (this being the most often reason for AFD nominations), calling this "inclusion" would be ultimately disruptive even if the intent is otherwise to keep the practice the same. It's likely because 99% of the cases of what is determined to be notable is what ends up being included that makes it seem like these are equivalent concepts, but they aren't. --MASEM (t) 16:12, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
    • "But there are so many little gotchas when you get into the weeds of it..." I'll agree, but those gotchas exist regardless of the name of the guideline. How does the name "notability" diminish their effect but "inclusion" magnify it? Protonk (talk) 16:38, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
      • Inclusion implies an automatic criteria. "We include a topic because of *this*,", whereas notability requires more careful thought and maps to the fact we do not have inherited notability (or inclusion in this case). --MASEM (t) 16:43, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
        • "Inherited notability" is a terrible name for the concept it describes, BTW - it would imply that we decide whether to split a topic based on the stand-alone worthiness of each subtopic, when in fact the splits are created based on the availability of independent coverage for each part. Again, we face the problem that the way we use the word "notability" is largely unrelated to its common English meaning. Unless we find a different word to describe the way we decide that a topic is defined with enough precision for an article, we're condemned to performing mental gymnastics replacing "notable" with "covered by independent sources" each time it appears in conversation; and newcomers are condemned to misunderstand what we're talking about. Diego (talk) 22:06, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
          • Well, it's still based on the idea that we don't have stand alone articles just because they fall into a certain classification; it may be the case that obviously we will include a topic of a certain category, such as a US president, but this is not because, directly, they were the president, but because there's a gazillion sources for each of these people by the nature of being president. It is a very subtle but important thing to keep in mind. Better wording is always an improvement, but "inherit notability" does capture the concept. --MASEM (t) 22:32, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
            • There are a zillion better names that would describe that concept that don't tie it to "fame and importance", which is what "inherited notability" wrongly does. A US president without an article would not have it because no one bothered to write about his mandate, not because the "US president" position is important but that particular president was not. Diego (talk) 22:42, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

(BTW, remember that WP:INHERITED is not policy - even if "inherited notability" would be precisely described by those words, it's not a concept sanctioned by policy and thus is not helpful as the basis for decisions of articles existence). Diego (talk) 22:45, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose We have multiple inclusion criteria including verifiability, notability and licensing. The two concepts should not be confused. I have read your counterargument but I am not convinced. Chillum 15:41, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
• While I understand how the term "Notability" can occasionally cause confusion, it is less confusing than the term "Inclusion" would be. "Inclusion" involves concepts that are far beyond the scope of "Notability"... Inclusion involves concepts like relevance (Should we include a specific bit of information in a specific article... if so how?) and Due Weight (does including a specific bit of information in a specific article give it undue weight). To keep the concepts distinct, It helps to use two distinct terms... Using "Notability" when discussing whether a topic should have an article devoted to it... and using "Inclusion" when discussing whether some bit of information should be mentioned in a given context. Blueboar (talk) 17:17, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

Note we already use the term WP:NOTEWORTHY and "noteworthyness" to describe whether a statement, concept, or fact is worthy of being included in the appropriate article(s). EllenCT (talk) 23:29, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose only this word, not the concept of a rename I believe a renaming of notability is in order, badly, but I'm not sure I'm so happy with this word. --Jayron32 23:23, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
  • @Jayron32: I'm not opposed to different terms, so long as we move away from notability. I proposed a single term (perhaps foolishly) because previous discussions had gotten forked quickly over calling it this that and the other thing and I wanted to establish a sense of the community on a rename. Perhaps I could've proposed a two step RfC w/ consensus for a new name as step one and choosing one as step two, but I kinda hate two step RfCs. :) Protonk (talk) 13:54, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose per Blueboar, since inclusion would appear to govern (but not govern) what material goes in an article. Also, we'd still have to keep explaining to newbies that their articles don't meet the inclusion standards, which I think many would find hurtful anyway. Then, what's the adjective form of inclusion – worthy of inclusion? that's quite a mouthful. Lastly, I don't really care. It's always been notability, let's keep it that way. BethNaught (talk) 07:56, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose simply "inclusion". "Inclusion" would be too easily readable as referring to content within an article. Unavoidably, we cannot expect people to even read whole sentences, such as the couple as Wikipedia:Notability#Notability_guidelines_do_not_apply_to_content_within_an_article. (I blame this dumbing down of general comprehension of project space on the proliferation of bright blue shortcuts that litter every section - people are starting to think in 1-2 word phrases). A rename is a good idea, but anything less that "Article inclusion" or "Topic inclusion" is not good enough for the reason just given and due to it being a near meaningless change at the expense of consistency-over-time. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:09, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose  Good names are foundational to clear thinking.  WP:Inclusion is a misdirected word that overlaps with the idea of the inclusion of topics in the encyclopedia.  WP:Stand-alone topics or WP:Article topics would be more precise.  An attempt to avoid deprecation is WP:N Article topics.  P.S. I support a follow-up to select a name for another RfC.  Unscintillating (talk) 13:17, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

For proof that WP:INCLUSION would be deeply confounded, I cite footnote 1 of WP:V, "the threshold for inclusion is verifiability..."  Unscintillating (talk) 15:55, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

I think that this is almost an argument in favor: the very first requirement for something to be included, whether as a stand-alone article or as part of another, is that the material must be verifiable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:08, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose with alternative name I propose significant coverage (adjective significantly covered). It's already used in the general notability guideline, and it illustrates the main point of the guideline more clearly to new editors. My only concern about this name is that it might not work well with subject-specific guidelines that refer to significant designations, honors, or awards. Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 20:30, 31 August 2014 (UTC) notedness (refer to #Alternative proposal: "Notedness" or similar) Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 19:20, 1 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose per Masem. There are things that we exclude despite passing N and things that we include regardless of whether they pass N. Also, changing the term of art that represents this guideline to yet another real word like "inclusion" with what would seem to be many common sense applications here would just alter the content of misunderstandings as to its usage but not reduce their frequency. postdlf (talk) 20:57, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose "Inclusion" isn't right because there are multiple requirements for inclusion; notability is only one of them. After looking at other names that have been suggested (topicality? really???), my conclusion is a paraphrase of Churchill's supposed remark about democracy: Notability is the worst possible name for this criterion, except for all the others that have been suggested. --MelanieN (talk) 22:24, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Do you have an explanation why? In this guideline, topic is used more than notable and note combined. So, something with topic in it is just more what this guideline is about. No one is insisting on that form of topic, though. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 23:53, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

"Topic", to most people, means the subject of a discussion or essay. "Topicality", to most people, means nothing at all. --MelanieN (talk) 23:57, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

P.S. Meaning of Topicality, according to Wikipedia: "Topicality is a stock issue in policy debate which pertains to whether or not the plan affirms the resolution as worded." Everybody got that? --MelanieN (talk) 00:01, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Well here it will be topic of an article, which is in keeping with the meaning you asrcibe, and yes notability is also a word with colloquial meaning, but, here as a title, it is used as an artifice. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:12, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

WP:TOPICALITY brings to mind either WP:Recentism or WP:In the news, since the common usage of the word refers to the quality of being relevant to current events. isaacl (talk) 02:17, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose I agree that perhaps we should use the word notability less in favor of the word inclusion but telling a new editor their draft isn't worthy of inclusion is not so different from telling them the subject isn't notable. Chris Troutman (talk) 23:33, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose- what we currently call notability is not the only requirement for inclusion. Reyk _YO! 23:40, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose - Ultimately, we have to call it something, and it's not going to match the vernacular meaning of the word we use exactly. I remain unconvinced that "inclusion" describes this concept better. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 00:47, 1 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Pointless exercise, and it would be perplexing and in no way an improvement to say "This person fails to satisfy Wikipedia inclusion" in place of "this person fails to satisfy Wikipedia notability." This is change for the sake of change. Edison (talk) 14:43, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  However, saying "this article fails to satisfy Wikipedia inclusion criteria" or "this person is not eligible for an article" would be great improvements, as they're self-explanatory and understanding them doesn't depend on reading some specific crafted meaning from the nuances of the guideline - these sentences correspond to their meanings in common English in a way that "this topic is not (Wikipedia-)notable" does not. Diego (talk) 15:48, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  No, it's actually worse because it gives no information why the inclusion was denied, and it makes us sound more bitey because there's no reason given (yes, I'm sure there would be links to the guideline but I'm considering what is said without reading that). At least "this topic's not notable" will give people something to build on , even if they don't bother to read the notability guidelines. --MASEM (t) 15:51, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  It does give information why it was denied - namely, that it doesn't comply with the rules for creating articles about topics. What doesn't provide information is calling the article "not notable", which doesn't provide a valid reason (topics being "English-notable", i.e. famous is not the reason to delete them) but appears to do so, creating a confusion that would be avoided by providing the real reason ("it needs to be covered by reliable sources"), explanation that needs to be added anyway. Diego (talk) 15:59, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  No, because why the article wasn't include remains fully vague if we say "it fails our inclusion guides", which they would then have to go and look up to understand. When we start with "it's not notable", with the understanding that our version of notability is more narrower than the common English word, it at least is a point to start discussion, and while newer editors trying to defend the article might through out things like "he's an important person" or the like, we 1) would be able to explain that we need specific types of sourcing and 2) they might highlight key aspects that can be used by others to find sourcing to help the newer editor. You can't do that if you just say it fails our inclusion guidelines as there's zero understand of why. --MASEM (t) 16:13, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  But at least they would go read the policy. Right now they just assume they know what it means. Zell Faze (talk) 00:26, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

  I have to agree with Masem here. Saying "It does not meet our inclusion criteria" or "It is not eligible" conveys no information at all other than that we don't want it here. Saying "The subject does not meet our notability requirements" does indeed convey they we require a certain level of coverage for a person to have an encyclopedic article. Making the terminology more vague solves nothing and creates new problems. Chillum 16:21, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  (edit conflict) Masem, you're conflating two separate concerns in your arguments, and your argument becomes mixed up because of that. First there's the information that is conveyed by the name of the guideline; the goal at this point should be to inform the editor that there's some standard that has not been met, but not what is the nature of that standard - as you and others have pointed out, it's impossible to do that at this point. But that's that's also true of the word "notable"; using it will do nothing to inform the editor about what are the actual criteria.

  The second part is where you explain the gist of the guideline, which necessarily requires expanding with at least a whole sentence or prompting the editor to read the guideline - and this is better done if you avoid the idea of the topic being "notable" in the English sense. You can highlight key aspects of the guideline that relate to the existing sources without mentioning the "N" word - with the key point to highlight being the reliability of the references, not the importance of the topic. The name "notability" leads to the second idea and not the first, so the name only serves as a red herring that misleads the newcomer, as fame and importance have actually very little to do with the topic deserving an article.

  The fact that you can't explain with a single word what the guideline is about is actually a good thing, because at least with "inclusion criteria" there's the chance that you don't create the wrong impression and there's no misunderstanding that you later have to dispel (such as the "he's an important person", which is made only because the name "notability" prompted it). If you instead say "this does not comply with the rules for inclusion", you'll be prompting instead the question "what are the rules for inclusion?", which puts them in the right mindset instead of leading them to a battleground mentality from the start. Diego (talk) 16:38, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  I cannot agree that using a less specific term is somehow less confrontational. Using the word "notability" does not cause a misunderstanding or misinform in any way. Just because their are different standards of notability does not mean the term is confusing in any way. We always link to the policy anyways. Using a vague term only serves to keep the new user in the dark about what the issue is.

  The term is not just for new users but also for regular users explaining at AfD what the problem with the article is. Right now we can say it does not meet our notability standards and everyone knows what the problem is. If we are to say "It is not eligible" or "does not meet our inclusion criteria" then it could be any number of issues and nobody knows what the problem is. Chillum 16:46, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  "Using the word "notability" does not cause a misunderstanding or misinform in any way." Please see the evidence above - the whole reason this request exist is because it does.

  Regular editors shouldn't care about the name of the guideline - they already should be aware of what the criteria for stand-alone articles are. If the guideline was renamed to "eligible", "article arrangement" or "inclusion criteria" there would be a short period where they would be confused at most once - and it would be dispelled as soon as they followed the link and see "oh, it's Notability that has been renamed". Not a compelling reason to keep a word that is biting newcomers throughout the project for years, IMHO. In fact, I'd expect experienced editors to keep using the old term for quite a while (and it wouldn't be a problem if there were no newcomers around), but at least it would not be the official name of the guideline. Diego (talk) 17:02, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

  I have participated in enough AfDs to know that there is not a significant problem with people getting confused due to the term "notability". The definition of the word is not contrary to our policy about it. Our criteria for notability are well within the accepted meaning of the word. The suggested rename to a non-informative term will only serve to deny information the new users. Chillum 17:08, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose. I help at #wikipedia-en-help ^connect and I can say that changing the name to "Inclusion criteria" will cause so many problems with people thinking their draft should be on Wikipedia simply because it it notable. There are other inclusion criterion. Cheers, Thanks, L235-Talk Ping when replying 01:23, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose The OED entries for notable include: "worthy or deserving of attention; noteworthy; significant in size or amount; remarkable; easily noted; attracting notice; able to be noted or observed; noticeable; noteworthy or significant facts or things". These definitions seem reasonably close to our usage. In any case, I don't see how the proposal would work in practise. Currently, if someone says that we should delete something because it's not notable, we understand them to mean that it hasn't been noticed or is not deserving of attention. If they were instead to say that we should delete something because we shouldn't include it, that's more of a circular argument and so would require additional language to say why we shouldn't include it. Andrew (talk) 08:18, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

But the guideline is not about notable in colloquial use, it's about quality of sourcing to demonstrate attention in the appropriate format and form (authority and depth). And discussions will work just like WP:AT discussions work: 'does (or doesn't) meet the AT criteria because . . .'. Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:14, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose Euphemism is nearly always bad, and euphemism at the cost of clarity is worse still. "Notable" isn't perfect, but at least gives a helpful hint towards the reason something might be deleted. By contrast, "inclusion" tells us nothing at all. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 15:26, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. To me, "inclusion" means "can be in an article". So, for example, Carl Steuernagel deserves inclusion in the article on the Cologne sewerage system, but perhaps not an article of his own (although he has one on the German Wikipedia). Abductive (reasoning) 23:41, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose the alternative word "inclusion" for the same reasons as Postdlf. The way "notability" is used on Wikipedia does diverge somewhat from common usage of the term and I appreciate the suggestion that it ought to be renamed. For one thing, the fact that the extent of literature and media in different countries may be vastly different imposes a serious "Wikipedia notability" disadvantage on subjects in developing countries. For instance, differing levels of coverage result in villages in Europe being more "notable" than larger towns in Africa, even though common use of the word "notability" would realize that this result is blatantly biased. I am not against a renaming of the guideline, but since there is much more to the inclusion policies than what the GNG gives I oppose this renaming. Sjakkalle (Check!) 11:35, 3 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. I am unsure why it is felt that notability is not an appropriate word to describe the notability aspect of our inclusion criteria. The nutshell sums it up quite nicely: "Wikipedia articles cover notable topics—those that have gained sufficiently significant attention by the world at large and over a period of time." Some topics are felt to have inherent notability, while others require reliable sources, but in all cases it is the topic's notability that decides if it warrants a stand alone article on Wikipedia. The word itself defines what it means: a topic worthy of notice (such that it warrants a Wikipedia article). SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 16:45, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose for two principal reasons. First, notability is of course only one aspect of 'inclusion' and it is important to maintain a clear distinction between the two concepts. Second, notability as a title is a word that means something; inclusion is not (Andrew Lenehan essentially makes this point, better than me, above). --Mkativerata (talk) 21:56, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I don't see how this clarifies anything; notability means a specific thing and inclusion does not mean that. As others have said, notability is only one of several inclusion criteria, so it is improper to conflate the two. And, frankly, I am not even sure I agree with the idea that notability is a term of art in Wikipedia. The plain meaning of notability still completely applies to the concept. If I get a papercut I've suffered blood loss; if the standard for getting a blood transfusion is the loss of more than 3 pints of blood, that doesn't mean that anything above 3 pints of blood loss is "transfusability" or something like that, it's just a specific degree of blood loss. Among the other inclusion criteria, a subject has to have a sufficient level of notability in order to get an article on Wikipedia.0x0077BE [^talk/_contrib] 00:31, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. Notability is a fine word for this, one that well conveys what this inclusion criterion is about. My own desktop reference (Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary) gives two meanings of notable as an adjective: "a: worthy of note, remarkable, b: distinguished, prominent" (and a third meaning that is archaic). This might be disambiguated with a longer title such as

Worthiness of being noted in Wikipedia by virtue of being prominently noted in the world at large.

Or not: the degree of prominence needed to pass the GNG is actually rather slight. Short titles cannot be expected to express much nuance unambiguously: most words in my dictionary have multiple meanings. Note however that my dictionary gives notableness as the noun for the property of being notable. It gives only one definition of notability: a noun meaning "a notable or prominent person". I think it is only in this regard that our usage is a "term of art", and it lends an appropriate connotation to the term because it is clearly about extrinsic notice rather than intrinsic worth.

When one is trying to get something noticed in the world at large and is told that it is beneath our notice, it hurts. It would hurt no less, and engender no less argument, if we used a different word, even an uninformative one. ~ Ningauble (talk) 14:07, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose The name is in use for more than 10 years now and more less doing fine (at least in my experience). To rename it there needs to be significant improvement being somewhat obvious to all/most. That however I don't see that all.--Kmhkmh (talk) 17:54, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
• Massive oppose for the simple reason that WP:BIO begins with a dictionary definition of notability drawn from Encarta, and the wording of WP:N (and not just the title) indicates that it is enough for a topic to be "worthy of notice" within the ordinary meaning of that expression. James500 (talk) 22:56, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. It's been fairly well established that any of the so-far proposed names would confuse newbies; what we need to do is to avoid confusing established editors. I see no evidence that such a change would fail to confuse established editors. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 22:10, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose because notability isn't Wikipedia's inclusion guideline. We can and do delete pages regularly for violating WP:NOT, WP:BLP, WP:OR, WP:POVFORK and doubtless others. Renaming the guideline to "inclusion" would imply that meeting it is sufficient for a topic to have an article, which isn't true at all (and I have occasionally seen arguments along these lines at AfD). The OP claims this view is pedantic, but goes on to draw what seems to me to be a much more pedantic distinction between "exclusionary" and inclusionary criteria. WP:N, WP:NOT, WP:BLP etc are all standards for getting rid of undesirable articles. The fact that one of them is phrased as "all article subjects must be X" rather than "article subjects must not be Y" makes very little difference. The distinguishing point about notability is that it excludes articles based on the perceived importance of the topic, and it needs a name that conveys that. Hut 8.5 21:46, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Look, I hate to say, "No, because we've always done it this way," but I see obvious benefits to maintaining the status quo, and as other users have convincingly argued, there's simply no way to communicate this concept in such a way that some new users won't be confused. I appreciate that this is a thoughtful proposal intending to make Wikipedia a more welcoming place, but I'm not convinced the actual benefits would justify the effort it would take to implement it. --BDD (talk) 13:24, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose "Inclusion" has as many problems as "Notability", and maybe more; see the comments of editor Hut 8.5 above. There is no benefit to the change, and a distinct downside in that all of the guidelines would have to be rewritten, with concomitant argumentation. --Bejnar (talk) 17:43, 23 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I interact with new editors regularly at the Teahouse and at AfD. While it is true that new editors often misunderstand "notability", it is fairly easy to explain it. It is one of the core concepts which has enabled us to build this successful encyclopedia. I see no compelling argument for a change in terminology. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:27, 26 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose - Wikipedia doesn't redefine the word "notability", we simply define it more specifically than usual. When used in everyday sentences, the meaning of the word "notability" is usually quite subjective and context-dependent. What is notable to one person is not notable to another. What is notable to you today may not be notable to you tomorrow. When used as the inclusion criteria for Wikipedia, the subjective nature of the word is not suitable for us; we need a strict definition, so that our inclusion criteria doesn't change from person to person, or day to day. So, the meaning of the word is the same, but we strictly define what we consider notable and what we consider non-notable. ‑Scottywong| talk _ 22:07, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

• @Scottywong: based on your wording, I believe you are dissatisfied with Notability being used as the title of this article. That would put you in the supporting group, I think? By opposing, you support continuing to use Notability. Matthewhburch (talk) 22:14, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

• No, I'm in the right section, you misunderstood my comments. I reject the notion that Wikipedia "redefines" the word "notability", or that Wikipedians are forced to say things like "notability is not the same as notability". I don't believe that those statements are true, therefore there is no reason to use a different word. We're not redefining the word; the word still has the same meaning, it is simply more strictly defined than normal. ‑Scottywong| gossip _ 23:06, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

• Ah, I'm not sure I understand. When you said "What is notable to one person is not notable to another." it seemed to be a critique of the appropriateness of Notability, since Wikipedia is supposed to be based to a large degree on consensus, and Notability is inherently a word with a low degree of consensus. I can't say I understand your logic, but I'll trust you know what you're trying to say. Matthewhburch (talk) 23:17, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose - I oppose any changes to "notability". NickGibson3900 ^Talk 00:26, 27 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. There might be a better name - for sure notability gets confused here and there - but Inclusion is not it. Notability is one of several Inclusion criteria, i.e., Notability is a subset of Inclusion, so renaming is likely to cause more confusion. - Nabla (talk) 16:28, 28 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose - My first inclination was to say Oppose because the proposer's argument was too long, difficult to read. However, having read it, it confuses notability, which is one inclusion criterion, with inclusion in general. Robert McClenon (talk) 14:11, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose - Concur with Robert McClenon's analysis. --Coolcaesar (talk) 19:42, 5 October 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose I disagree with the premise that on-wiki use of notability is in opposition to its dictionary definition, it's just that we have to hyper-refine that definition for our purposes (a point made by Scottywong above and likely others). Still, I appreciate the well-written and balanced RfC statement. benmoore 10:41, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

If you interpret the word by its meaning in English of remarkable, it runs contrary to both WP:NOTPAPER (covering all kind of obscure topics to any depth, without arbitrary limits of size or popularity) and the prime directive itself as the sum of all knowledge that can be written in encyclopedic format.

Don't forget that WP:N is a *style guideline* for the structure of the encylcopedia and its purpose is how to lay out content in pages, not to define the topics that are worthy of coverage; the ultimate goal of the guideline is to ensure that new pages correspond to concepts that have been well defined by reliable sources.

Anything that exists is worthy of coverage in Wikipedia, if we can write neutral and verifiable descriptions of it; but we only create pages per WP:N for things that go well together, when there's enough related content to fill a page. That purpose isn't in any way a refinement of the idea of celebrity and prominence. Diego (talk) 11:32, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Right, I'm not claiming that we employ the dictionary definition of notability on-wiki, just that the meaning of the word on and off-wiki are broadly aligned—at least more so than is implied in the opening of this RfC. We can't just say "we're an encyclopaedia and cover notable/important/interesting/well-covered things" and allow the chosen word to be open to interpretation, so instead under a banner of "notability" we've set out our very clear and specific criteria. I don't beleive even with these refinements there's no conceivable link to some dictionary definition like the state or quality of being eminent or worthy of notice. benmoore 11:58, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

The point there is that we don't cover notable things only. The first two of the five pillars are the ones describing our core content strategy, and none of them mention "noteworthiness" as significant; neutrality, accuracy and encyclopedic tone are way more important than the relevancy of the content. We certainly can try to match the meaning of "notable" to the content of the guideline to some degree, I'm not denying that, but the content of the Notability guideline does not define the scope of the encyclopedia, only its structure.

The problem with excluding topics because they fail WP:N is that notability should not be used to exclude topics, only particular pages; the topics themselves can and should refactored into other pages. In deletion discussions this difference is too often applied the wrong way, with people being told that their writing should be removed on the basis of notability, when WP:N explicitly states that it's not a reason to delete content but pages. Tying this explanation to the concept of the content being "worthy of notice" will necessarily convey the wrong idea. Diego (talk) 12:42, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

I must stress I'm not claiming that we should or currently do employ the dictionary definition of notability on-wiki. I think largely we're in agreement here but there's some crossed wires. Maybe Scottywong's oppose and the ensuing discussion above makes the point more clearly. benmoore 15:12, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose - per Hut 8.5 and others, who point out that "Notability" is but one of several hurdles to clear, whereas if an article passed a criterion called "Inclusion" how on earth could we explain that it still couldn't be included for some other reason?: Noyster (talk), 13:51, 6 October 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose - It's a different part of speech. Rather than assessing the condition of something, it defines an action by an editor or by Wikipedia (editor-focus rather than subject-focus). There's likely something better out there than "notable" / "notability" but "inclusion" isn't it. --— Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 18:01, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

Oppose: We already have enough trouble with editors that believe that passing the GNG is an automatic free-pass to a standalone article. Naming it the "inclusion" guideline will only aggravate that problem.—Kww(talk) 17:17, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Other

While I oppose renaming this, I can support a separate guideline or perhaps policy (have to think on that if it should be that strong) where we describe our inclusion approach. This would include that the main factor for more articles will be notability, but can also point to cases that fall outside of that (eg geographic places, navigation pages, etc.) and perhaps better describe how we can also purposely exclude material due to BLP, NOT, etc. --MASEM (t) 15:50, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

• But that doesn't at all address the issue at hand: that many editors -- even a number of experienced ones -- bristle at the suggestion that their article "isn't notable." We don't need more explanations or descriptions; we already have those in profusion. Ravenswing 16:43, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Which is true too. Less is better sometimes. But there's a larger aspect here that's been in my head for a while and simply haven't had a way to verbalize it well, that our basic inclusion guideline for a topic is if there is demonstration that it has or will likely meet all of our main content policies - NOT, V, NOR, NPOV, BLP, and probably a few others. Meeting NOT and BLP requires different aspects, but to meet V and NOR and NPOV, this generally requires a good amount of sourcing from independent, third-party sources that present the material in secondary fashion (not just raw data or accounts, but establishing its content to the world at large). (This is a stronger statement than the GNG presently is). Sometimes that can be shown by simply looking at how the article article exists - an article dozens of independent, third-party, secondary sources that make of the majority the citations will likely never be in question of whether we should include it. But then it takes time to get all those sources, and to make WP a cooperative effort, we have allowances for articles in progress (within the scope of no deadlines), which are the GNG itself that asks if the topic has some degree of sourced notability (which can allow an article to be build even if you have a few sources) and the SNG (based on even just one primary source to prove the SNG is met). This structure better represents practice, but I am no wordsmith and it sounds a lot more complex than I have it in my head. If we had some WP-level page, "How do we decide what is included in WP", that broke out how the core policies are used, and how the GNG and the SNGs are used, and other facets, that would help establish better where notability fits in the picture and that we are really looking for sourced notability, given that sourcing is one of WP's top priorities. If that can be explained as our inclusion process, then notability is a test under it. --MASEM (t) 17:03, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Nitpick: articles are usually not notable, their topics are. — Keφr 17:06, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
• New suggestion: As it appears you are looking for one word: Topicality. Its about appropraite topics for articles right, so about topics, one word: topicality. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:42, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
  • This is not bad; not sure on it yet, but not a bad idea. --MASEM (t) 18:25, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
    • The word topical means pertaining to a locality or topic of the day - i.e. limited or temporary in scope. This meaning is the opposite of what we intend and so would cause worse confusion. Andrew (talk) 08:27, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
      • I like this general direction, but I think we need more words to make it sound natural. How about Wikipedia:Article topics? That would go with Wikipedia:Article titles. — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 11:27, 18 September 2014 (UTC)
• . . . or we could go with a unique word that captures the decision making process for inclusion but which is unique enough that it's not used in many different ways in colloquial in a good/bad way (like 'of note' etc.) or in wiki process (like, 'include' etc), and in that case, how about WP:CRITERION - (also checking whether this is a red link WP:TOPICALITY) Alanscottwalker (talk) 19:01, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

• One other thing I will add about why "inclusion" is not good even though it is mechanically the same idea as notability: Our article evaluation process is not based on the incoming end (at creation), save for a few CSD items, but at a point afterwards - we're evaluating the suitability of the topic after the article has been created. As such all topics are "included" by default because we have no limits on article creation. But the retention of those topics is a different matter. We'd like to have editors think about the end goal of showing enough to retain an article before going off to creating it, but that's impossible to stop as long as we allow auto confirmed editors to create new articles (Please note: I am not saying we should stop this practice, just that's the way it is). So we should not have editors thinking about "inclusion" but rather how well it meets our standards for what should remain in WP if an editor evaluates an article. Hence why I'm not thrilled with the work "inclusion" because it does not reflect our article development approach. --MASEM (t) 18:25, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

Yeah... things would be a lot easier if more people took the time to question whether a topic really should have an article... before they started to write the article. (Unfortunately, human nature is such that this isn't very realistic). Blueboar (talk) 19:45, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

All the more reason to adapt the guideline to how people will find it for the first time, instead of trying to adapt people to the way the guideline is named. ;-) Diego (talk) 21:55, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

• Now that we have set the tone for alternate names, I want to propose a name that highlights the outcome and the reason why the guideline exists, rather than the main decision criterion: Wikipedia:ARRANGEMENT (I would had preferred WP:STRUCTURE, but that's already taken for the internal composition of articles).

The idea is to put emphasis on the benefit provided by following this guideline - if we use this name when explaining the reasons for deleting a new article, we're not telling the newcomer that their topic is not "worthy" or "notable"; rather we explain that we think a stand-alone article is not the best way to cover that topic in the encyclopedia.

The GNG criteria thus would mean that, if a topic is covered by several independent sources, we presume it to be well-defined enough so that a neutral and well-structured article may be written. This still recognizes that content which is verifiable by RSs but doesn't meet the GNG could be covered as part of a larger topic at a different article.

I believe the section WP:PAGEDECIDE is consistent with this interpretation of the guideline, in that the ultimate reason to create an article is editors deciding that doing so is the best structure; and that we can override that decision and merge it, even if the topic is well defined by RSs as defined by the GNG.

Barring the above, my second-best name for the guideline would be Wikipedia:Stand-alone articles, as this exactly defines what the guideline is about, with no ambiguity nor possibility of confusion. Diego (talk) 21:17, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

• For that matter, if you can't find an existing word that adequately conveys your meaning, invent one. ‑‑Mandruss (talk) 21:28, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

• Wikipediable? (WPable for short?) Stanning (talk) 13:02, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

• WP:N currently notes 105 instances of "notability" or "notable", whereas it only mentions "inclusion" four times. This leads me to believe that all of this will involve more than a simple change of the title, so I am curious to how this page might be rewritten. Location (talk) 22:43, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

Making up a word that is not clear on its meaning in English is not going to solve the problem of the bitey-ness that this originally posted (given that the issue there was that "notability" is not the same here as in the English langauage). --MASEM (t) 14:26, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

If we find a single word as the name that describes the purpose of the guideline, it might be as simple as replacing each appearance of "notability" with the new word. "Topicality", as suggested by Alanscottwalker would fit very well in the current text; though I think something like "article-ability" would more precisely describe the concept that is being defined in this guideline (in fact much better than "notability", IMHO). Diego (talk) 22:56, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

@Diego Moya: The nutshell currently reflects our prime objective (i.e. "Wikipedia articles cover notable topics..."), so I don't think we can dispense with some reference to topics being worthy of note. As I see it, inclusion of a topic is dependent upon editors being able to show to others (WP:V) that reliable secondary sources independent of the topic (WP:RS) have found the topic worthy of note (WP:N). All points are important, but some are easier to define. -Location (talk) 00:01, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Well, one could rewrite your comment without 'note': The nutshell currently reflects our prime objective (i.e. "Wikipedia articles cover [] topics [] that have gained sufficiently significant attention by the world"), so I don't think we can dispense with some reference to topics being worthy of attention. As I see it, inclusion of a topic is dependent upon editors being able to show to others (WP:V) that reliable secondary sources independent of the topic (WP:RS) have found the topic worthy of attention (WP:~). Now, of course no one is suggesting we eliminate 'note' and its forms altogther but it's rather easy to do. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:29, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

• • @Location: the notability guideline (and others dependent on it) would require a rewrite, but I believe it is possible (easily) to do so without altering the meaning of the guideline. In fact, as I surmise above the guideline would benefit greatly from such a rewrite. It's not as simple as a find and replace but it shouldn't be hard. I'll take a crack at rewriting it this weekend to show what I mean. Protonk (talk) 23:39, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Location, please see Protonk's analysis at the first section of the RfC proposal - the nutshell and introduction don't properly represent the actual criterion - if we abide by their actual words, we couldn't cover obscure, specialized topics like rare mathematics theorems or historical characters. "Reliable secondary sources independent of the topic", the actual criterion, is quite different than "significant attention by the world at large". I'm now realizing that the common English word that means the same as the effective criterion as written in the GNG is COVERAGE: the topics that can have articles are those covered by reliable sources, which is independent of those topics being worthy of that coverage (what notability literally means). I like it better than the current name as it avoids the implicit value judgement, being merely descriptive of a verifiable fact. Diego (talk) 00:17, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
    • Except that "coverage" alone is too loose a word in principle - eg we don't cover routine news even though it might get wide coverage. This is the problem - we've set "notability" as a specific concept on WP that no other english word simply captures without turning the concept one way or another, even if no functional change to the principle of notability is made.
    • Understanding that people are upset that they they they have a notable topic that we don't accept, it may be better to say that we do use notability but principles like WP:V and WP:NOR are overarching principles of WP, we evaluate notability based on sources instead of "apparent" notability that might exist by fame or word of mouth. --MASEM (t) 00:24, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
      • Not covering routine news doesn't have anything to do with notability - we don't cover them because of WP:NOT (created to exclude notable content that editors thought couldn't be maintained), but all sorts of routine events excluded by WP:INDISCRIMINATE or WP:EVENT could easily pass the WP:GNG and thus be considered notable; they're excluded for other reasons, not lack of coverage/notability. "Coverage" (or more precisely, "significant coverage") is exactly how "notability" is used at WP, as long as it's the right kind of coverage (in-depth and from reliable sources). Diego (talk) 00:58, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
        • No, NOT is not sufficient, which is why we have to talk about enduring coverage here. And while I will agree it is fundamentally the same, the wording is very influential to discussion - not just here but throughout other policies and guidelines. (eg "non-free" vs "fair use" at NFC for example). I'm all for finding a better word or language but we have to be careful of how it will be taken. --MASEM (t) 01:04, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
          • Another thought to consider: if there is no English word that "simply captures" the meaning, then what obstacle is there to change the word we use? We should be eager to change it to one that doesn't create the deep misunderstandings in editors reading the guideline for the first time that notability creates. I agree that the wording is very influential, but the current word is influencing it in all the wrong directions. Choosing a word directly related to the sources covering the topic, and not the inherent worthiness of such topic, can only be a step in the good direction. Diego (talk) 01:11, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
          • What Diego Moya says above is critical to me. There's no single word that's going to capture the essence of the GNG + SNGs. We've tried with "notable" and it doesn't work. It just doesn't. We can talk about potential misreading of the guideline in a narrow way should it be named something like inclusion but it's not even close to the level of misreading we get from the word notable alone. Most of the misreading exists without people reading the guideline at all, because the name either rankles or gives people the impression that it encapsulates the requirement through its vernacular meaning alone. We should obviously be wary of potentially leading people in the wrong direction but we also should be frank about just how bad the current name does on that score. Or at the very least, let's frame it this way: "inclusion" could cause someone who reads and understands the inclusion guideline to believe it is the only guidance we offer on what articles wikipedia contains. "Notability" does more damage than that without anyone reading the policy in question. Protonk (talk) 03:35, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
            • Here's the thing - the concepts of what notability is (ignoring the word, just the processes and practice) is complicated and filled with various nuances. It is not simple, and I dare think that there is a single word in the English language that captures the bulk of those concepts without stepping on the toes of other parts of the process. Editors are told to read this before creating new articles, and it's not an obscure guideline in the rundown basement somewhere. I can appreciate that we shouldn't bite new editors, but at the same time, we need to expect them to do some basic reading and understanding of how all WP policies and guidelines work, and that includes understanding what we call "notability" and how that differences from a more layman's version of the term. This will not change even with this proposal - they will still need to read and learn what ever already exists for notability. So irregardless, new editors that jump right in and create articles without reading in either situation will still have the same reaction when their article is deleted, whether we say "not notable" or "fails inclusion" or "not enough coverage". We need the word that captures the concept best, and really, this is still "notability" because while it is not the same meaning as in English, it's close enough to be accurate. --MASEM (t) 05:30, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
              • I disagree that the term "notability" is close enough; notability in the real world is judged differently than on Wikipedia, as I described above, and so it is confusing to use the word differently in Wikipedia discussions. In addition, the real world commonly considers some subjects inherently notable, but Wikipedia does not. (I wasn't sure if by "inherit notability", you were referring to inherent notability?) isaacl (talk) 07:01, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
                • Our use of "notability" is not that far off from the English language version of the word "the state or quality of being notable; distinction; prominence." Our application narrows it only because we put huge weight in sourcing, and thust we evaluate "the quality of being notable" by the amount of significant coverage it gets. I do recognize that some take "notability" here as linguistically synonym with "inclusion" or the like, but the right application of this guideline is our version of notability that is refined by WP policies. --MASEM (t) 14:21, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• This entire discussion is flawed by dividing the responses by the posters initial view of the proposal. All this support oppose neutral nonsense is anti consensus and instead an unfettered discussion should have informed whether to go to refined discussion around the text for an RFC. That off my chest, I have been using the term inclusion criteria for years and it works well to explain to a noob why we can't host their article. I'm therefore broadly in favour of this change. Spartaz ^Humbug! 11:55, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
• Some comments on the idea that inclusion would lead people to believe that it governs article content:
• I won't rehash my objections from the nom or elsewhere except to say that extant confusion over the guideline matters and should be weighed against possible confusion following a rewrite:
• The notability guideline as it is written right now disclaims governance over article content three times.
  • Once in the nutshell "The notability guideline does not determine the content of articles..."
  • Once in the lede "They do not limit the content of an article or list"
  • Once in a section devoted to the concept "The criteria applied to article creation/retention are not the same as those applied to article content."
• If the current name so clearly eschews this confusion, why is so much of the guideline devoted to addressing it? I realize that the argument isn't that no confusion exists about notability <-> content, but I think we can get caught up in the logic behind why a rename would increase this confusion and forget that we may be increasing it from a lot to a little more than a lot and not from zero. Protonk (talk) 17:41, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Consider another problem here. "Notability" is used for us as an adjective, a quality about the coverage a topic recieves. "Inclusion" is a verb or verb form, talking about the process of evaluating an article's appropriateness for WP. Renaming this to "inclusion" is not going to remember people using the quality of notability as a reason to delete. Eg we'd only be changed from "This article should not be included because it is not notable" ("notable" being linked) vs "This article should not be included because it is not notable" ("included" being linked), the reasoning is still the same, and you are still going to confuse new editors. If there is to be a naming change, it has to focus on an adjective that describes the quality of the topic, and not the process of evaluating a topic. --MASEM (t) 19:24, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
    • It may be the case that we have to settle on a title which can operate as an adjective and a noun (e.g. WWB's suggestion of "eligibility/eligible"). I'm not opposed to that and I'm not wedded to "inclusion". Protonk (talk) 20:54, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
      • Hm. Something with eligible, seems promising (eg 'Article Topic Eligibility' or 'Eligible Topic', etc.) Alanscottwalker (talk)
        • I've come to like Eligible a lot more than inclusion (and both a lot more than notable). Zell Faze (talk) 22:53, 4 September 2014 (UTC)
          • Wikipedia:Eligibility for a standalone article? The shortcut WP:ESA is taken, but it has few links, and the traffic to it is quite low, so it could be repurposed (and it looks like a typo anyway). Or we could take WP:ELISA: much more catchy. — Keφr 17:06, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
• Here's another well meaning new editor who took away the wrong meaning from "notability". Protonk (talk) 00:52, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

Defining criteria before deciding on a word

It occurs to me that the various proposals for alternate names are clustered around some common themes. Maybe we could explore in more depth the ramifications of each one, to see what words fit each theme and what are their undertones, before committing to any particular word?

Criteria of the proposals made so far:

• Structure of the content within the encyclopedia. It includes the proposals:
  • Inclusion (indicates whether to have an article or not)
  • Arrangement (focus on the purpose of the guideline - arranging content in articles)
  • Stand-alone articles (plain, descriptive name of what the guideline is about)

• Decision process
  • Criterion (highlights that the guideline defines a decision process)
  • Topicability (examining whether the content is a well-defined topic or not)

• Coverage in external sources
  • Notability (the current name falls under this criterion - it makes emphasis in looking at the external world to make the decision whether to have an article - by finding topics worthy of notice)
  • Coverage (emphasis on having received notice, whether they're worthy of not)

I hope this small analysis makes sense and helps us to find what several proposals have in common, so that we can discuss what criteria would make more sense and what we want to emphasize as the name of the guideline. Diego (talk) 22:27, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

"Topicality" is not a good choice of words to represent this guideline, as its commonly-used definition is "the quality or state of being topical", which in turn is defined as "relating to current news or events; dealing with things that are important, popular, etc., right now".

I don't feel a strong need to try to boil down the guideline to a single word. However, as an alternative to "standards for inclusion", I think "standards of significance" may be useful, as it is applicable from two directions: is a topic sufficiently significant to warrant inclusion in Wikipedia, and is there significant coverage in independent, non-promotional, reliable, third-party sources with editorial control such that a reasonably informative article can be written? isaacl (talk) 06:51, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Well "topic" is used 51 times on this page, so if not the other forms of that word then WP:TOPIC can be usurped. Alanscottwalker (talk) 08:54, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

WP:TOPIC is not a suitable title. Wikipedia editors should be expected to be able to work with meaningful titles of at least a couple of words. "Usurp" is a Wikipedia jargon word not used correctly here, and best never used. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:12, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Well, apart from your irrelevant commentary on "usurp", more words is just more to agree on, but in general I have no opposition to more words. However, you have not explained why "wikipedia:topic" is not a good title, other than it being only one word. If we wanted more words, we could go with, topic criteria Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:31, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Personally, I don't feel "Topic" is sufficiently descriptive as a title for this page. "Determining topic significance" or "Determining topic suitability" would be better. isaacl (talk) 11:39, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

Well, it's not about us determining "significance" -- "suitability" is closer to what we are determining but does not significantly add, as a title, to determining topics or topic determination Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:51, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

"Wikipedia:Topic" is not a good title because it is too short, is conveys insufficient information for the intended audience (new editors). Like your use of "usurp" I think it shows that you are not thinking in terms of the intended audience of new editors. "Topic criteria" is also too short. It begs "for what". "Topic inclusion criteria" might work. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:13, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

OK. But Wikipedia has a plethora of short titles, which are rather just concepts. Moreover, no matter how long we make the title, in ordinary everyday work it will be shortened. And at any rate, if someone says to a new editor or some help page has on it WP:TOPIC: guides how we choose appropriate article topics, they will certainly understand why it is called topic. (As an aside, your Article Topic suggestion is certainly better than your last suggestion) Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:28, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

(ec) You compliment "WP:Article Topic" as a title suggestion? I suggest "WP:Article inclusion criteria" or "WP:Topic inclusion criteria". The word "inclusion" is very good, just not sufficient. Article=Topic for most purposes. "Criteria" captures the content of the guideline well. (I don't get the post of isaacl, 06:51, 31 August 2014). --SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:43, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

You're right I mistakenly elided your suggestions. However, I would note, the guide is also about exclusion (and in fact that is how it functions in most practice because theoretically and practically any article may be included at any moment). Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:01, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

The guide is not so much about exclusion as that it is fairly comprehensive about what is included. For specific exclusions, it points to WP:NOT. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:25, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

If you can further pinpoint the area of confusion, I can try to clarify further. In general, though, I agree with you that I don't believe this guideline needs to have a single word title. I suggested "Standards for inclusion" earlier; "Standards of significance" may also be workable, since encyclopedias seek to cover significant topics. isaacl (talk) 02:10, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

I like those two suggestions. Zell Faze (talk) 23:03, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

One problem with the definitions... "Inclusion" means more than just whether to have an article or not... it can also refer to whether to include specific facts and opinions within an article... this latter issue is not within the scope of our current Notability guidelines. As for Smoeky's suggestion of "Topic inclusion criteria"... a topic can be included in Wikipedia without rating its own article (ie it can be discussed in some related article).
I have said this before... but I think an easy solution to what we are talking about would be to make the distinction between a topic/subject being NOTABLE and the topic/subject being NOTE WORTHY. The first is a somewhat ridged standard... it means the topic/subject rates having its own article devoted to it. The second is a much looser standard... it means the topic/subject rates being discussed somewhere in Wikipedia (but not necessarily in its own stand alone article). I tend to be boarderline deletionist when it comes to NOTABILITY... but an Inclusionist when it comes to NOTE WORTHINESS. Blueboar (talk) 12:36, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

But different forms of "note" is the problem - we would rather not make people split hairs (or skulls :) ) over such things. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:52, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

But using different forms of "note" is better than using one confusing form of "Include". This discussion started with the valid concern that people get upset and confused when they are told that their favorite topic is not NOTABLE enough for Wikipedia. However, if you explain the difference between NOTABLE and NOTE WORTHY, and tell them that their topic might well be NOTE WORTHY enough to be discussed as a section of some related article, they tend to be a lot less upset (Oh... you mean I can write about my favorite subject... I just have to do so in some related article? I can live with that.)

A better explanation of the concept of NOTE WORTHINESS would also encourage more "merge" proposals at AfD, and is in line with our WP:PRESERVE policy. Blueboar (talk) 13:03, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

I have some sympathy with your first sentence, but it also supports changing the current name, that uses the confusing note forms. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:40, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

I don't see how it's better. Like I said to Masem above, the worst case scenario is that someone reads this guideline and infers from the title that it is our only guidance for inclusion. right now, people misinterpret the guideline without reading it because the title invites them to do so. Also, the conversation disabusing someone of the hypothetical misunderstanding you propose is much easier to have than explaining that "notable" means something specific and unique to wikipedia. Everyone comes to a deletion discussion with a ready interpretation of the word "notable". How is it better to let that extant interpretation be wrong than to let a potential reading of the guideline cause them to...do what, exactly? Propose a census designated place for deletion because it doesn't meet the guideline for inclusion? And as I said in the nom, the GNG + SNGs are practically our guidance for inclusion. They offer widely used tests by which editors determine the suitability of most articles for inclusion. There are exceptions, but I think we're really overstating the potential confusion caused by this and downplaying the very real and very common confusion created by the title for the guideline as it is right now. Protonk (talk) 13:51, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

I am sympathetic to the confusion over the various forms of "note"... but I don't think there is a better term. Certainly "inclusion" isn't better. The various forms of "Note" may not be perfect, but they work... in part because there are various forms of "note" that we can use to clarify the subtle distinctions that we are talking about. Blueboar (talk) 14:03, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

We can just as well rewrite the specific guidelines to change the word to inclusion of ... and so on. The point of this proposal is not to change policy, but to change wording to better explain policy. I agree it might be beneficial to unpack the various elements that make up the concepts of encyclopedic inclusion/notability, but I don;t think this is immediately practical. Any change here, or indeed any explicit statement of it, would change the balance of what we actually do, probably radically and unpredictably. I, like some others of us, would in fact like to change the balance of what we include, but I don't want to do it by trying to manipulate fundamental concepts in a way that I hope will have the desired effects; the only fair way of doing it is to get explicit agreement of what we actually want to change. If we wait for this before making the change of a word, we be be arguing here for a very long time. I've always disliked tinkering with the fundamentals rules in order to do something specific -- it reminds me of the introduction of "superprotection" in order to get a single particular edit to stick. DGG ( talk ) 01:46, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Is this really a problem that needs solving?

I'm not convinced that "notability" is a problem concept. IMO it comes much closer to the "significant coverage from independent reliable sources" requirement than any other term so far proposed. And I'm not convinced that explaining it to people is that hard. Personally I start my explanation with the following, which I keep handy in my sandbox for easy use: "Wikipedia is not just another website; it is an international encyclopedia. As such, it has standards for what kind of subjects can have articles here. The subjects have to be "notable", which basically means famous. And there is a very specific definition of what makes a subject "notable" enough for an article: It has to have received significant coverage from independent reliable sources." Is that so hard to understand? Is it so burdensome to have to repeat something like that, or rather copy it from wherever you have it stashed? --MelanieN (talk) 01:06, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

That was a point I made above: even if we made this "inclusion", editors will still be using "not notable, delete" language to nominate and !vote in AFDs. New users will still ignore advice to read these guidelines before creating new articles to understand the nuances of notability/"significant coverage from independent reliable sources" that we expect. It's a feel-good solution that introduces potentially different problems without affecting the main issues. And addressing those main issues is not a simple task nor something we actually can change in some cases (we can't force behavior of new users). --MASEM (t) 01:11, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

As Protonk alluded to above, the key issue is that unaware editors think they already know what is meant when someone says a given topic lacks notability, and so they don't bother to read this guideline. With a title term such as "Standards of inclusion", editors must read the guideline in order to know what it says; they can't make any assumptions solely based on the name. (Personally, I care more about what editors use to describe this guideline than the actual name, but I appreciate that the most straightforward way to get editors to use a term with more clarity is to change the name of this article.) isaacl (talk) 02:20, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

First off, the third sentence in your explanation is wrong. Notability as we use it on wikipedia doesn't basically mean famous. Many notable subjects aren't famous and some famous subjects (for varying definitions of fame) aren't notable. Second, it is a big problem. It's very easy to internalize a concept like notability if you're invested in the encyclopedia and you have some domain specific expertise. It's also very hard, once you've established those things, to imagine approaching the subject without them. For people whose first contact with the "project" is a deletion debate, the confusion is widespread. When we see editors misunderstand or complain about notability we're often also seeing them when they're upset about us deleting an article on a subject they care deeply about. That means some of their frustration is about the deletion itself. But it doesn't mean that the confusion or bitterness engendered by the term is missing or necessary. I recommend you read that Timothy Noah post I linked in the nom. Those feelings, specifically the frustration about the term "notable" and the apparent arrogance of our deciding what is "worthy of note" are not rare. We can dismiss Noah as a guy who was pissed he didn't rate an article who also happened to be given some column inches to rage about it. I certainly did in 2007. But it's not uncommon. And frankly, it's not necessary. We are bound to piss off people by having editorial standards which exclude certain subjects. We are not likewise bound to rub salt in the wound by justifying it in a needlessly dismissive manner. And it is needless. We don't just cover famous subjects or important subjects or significant subjects. We cover subjects which have received sufficient coverage in reliable sources to write a neutral and verifiable article. That's it. Protonk (talk) 13:11, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

The Slate essay is exactly the problem we're talking about. Tim appeared to have read some of WP:N and other policies, but didn't spend time understanding why we have WP:N, and it is to prevent, in a world where most people that have any type of secondary education, or groups thereof, could have articles that meet V, NOR, NPOV, etc., but the reason we don't have them is that they fail IINFO, and makes it far too easy for WP to be driven by self-promotion/COI issues. This is not a consideration that can be compressed down into a single word. I believe Tim's aware that WP:N is our inclusion guideline, but he doesn't understand what the difference is between the sourcing of his article and the others given in tht, and then compares deletion promptly to censorship. Doesn't matter if we name it "inclusion" or "notability", that attitude will always persist with readers that do not spend time to understand WP's nuances, hence making the effort to change it futile. --MASEM (t) 13:40, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

The problem is "you are not notable" is not what we mean, we mean 'there are insufficient quality reliable sources to create an encyclopedic article topic about.' In fact, it is certain that someone has taken note of the subject and perhaps many, many, many, many, many someones but not in the forms and formats we want. But I don't see 'you should not be included' (subtext, 'you are excluded') as a solution to the Protonk's misunderstanding/injury concern , when what we mean is, 'there are insufficient reliable sources on which we think an encyclopedic article topic can be created and should be included.' Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:06, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

• It isn't a problem that needs solving. Newbies will still be ignorant of and confused by our inclusion/notability/whatever guidelines, and bloggers will still be butthurt they don't get a Wikipedia article. For all the confusion among regulars from a change, which will take oh so long to percolate into the vernacular, not to mention all those essays, advice pages and so on needing to be changed, and all the old discussions which will become confusing to post-switchover editors, changing the name is more trouble than it's worth. BethNaught (talk) 13:25, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

• I think there is a problem... but it isn't the problem being discussed. I think the real problem is that we keep thinking in dualistic terms ... DELETE vs KEEP. We forget that there is almost always a third option... MERGE. This option should be used more often. Blueboar (talk) 14:06, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

I think that just because we have a more specific meaning of notability that does not mean we should switch to a more vague term. It is still a more correct word than "inclusion" which simply muddies the waters by being non-specific. Chillum 15:08, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

There is definitely a problem here to be addressed. Just two days ago I was talking to a business owner who has been in the business they are in for a number of years. They've done some pretty unique things and to anyone in the industry (and arguably outside of it as well) are notable nevertheless, they do not meet English Wikipedia's General Notability Guideline and therefore aren't "notable" enough for an article. She had a very hard time understanding this, and I think we spoke for maybe 15 minutes with me trying to convey that our definition of notable is different than that used elsewhere. Because we use the word notable it just didn't go through to her. In the end I just gave up and told her that it is pretty unlikely that any Wikipedian is going to find her business "notable". She told me she'd just write the article herself and I advised her to not do so because of her conflict of interest, something she had a much easier time understanding. People definitely get hung up on the word notable. As noted in other places in this discussion, people think they understand what the word means and don't realize (or in some cases are unable to realize) that we have redefined the word to mean something completely different than their understanding. I'm not set on any particular phrasing for a new name, but its definitely a problem that I have run into more times than I can count. (Glad I saw this RFC, given that I was literally just complaining about this issue to my room mates mere days ago.) Zell Faze (talk) 21:33, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

The way to better explain it is that because the word "notable" (English language definition) is very subjective (what's notable to one is not to another), we employ a metric based on sourcing that makes the evaluation of notability a semi-objective test and assures we will have articles that meet the core content policies in regards to sourcing. That's a point that seems to get lost here, is that "notable" by itself is very subjective and why we've come to adopt something that helps better in the process decision making. --MASEM (t) 21:44, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Alternate proposal - Develop guideline (Policy?) on what are considered appropriate stand-out main space articles

I dare not try to name it now, but the idea based on some of the supports (that they want to be able to point a new editor where we explain what we include) would be solved better without "disrupting" (for lack of a better word) the current consensus on notability's place on WP. The idea for this would not just be about inclusion, but other factors, outlining how some topics would be immediately disallowed per NOT or NPOV or BLP, how some articles can be spun out (per summary style), how we have outlines and navigation lists, etc. and of course at the core that for most articles we are looking for topics that demonstrate notability with minimum requirements of the GNG or the SNGs. Key is to focus on the core policies that we expect all content should meet (NOT, V, NOR, NPOV) and this, by necessity, will exclude some topics. This would be like an inclusion guideline, but as I've noted before, as we assess articles for appropriateness after they are created, "inclusion" is the wrong word, but we can describe this as a process page than a qualification page (as "notability" implies).

This new page would split off a few sections from WP:N currently to help simplify it. There also might be elements of AFD and BEFORE that could be brought into that (that deletion should be last resorts), etc. Yes, this makes a new guideline, but this also seems to be the simplest solution to address the newbie biting the supporters point out without any other massive change of process. --MASEM (t) 02:00, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

To add, a few more examples of what can be included would be pointing to OUTCOMES, as well as a reminder IAR applies as well. What this does to is help establish that notability is a cog in a larger machine and not an end to itself for notability, but by far one of our larger goals. --MASEM (t) 02:06, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Masem, I would suggest that you start by writing a WP:Essay. That would allow everyone else to really see what you are trying to say... if people agree with the general thrust of what you are talking about, it can be worked on... gain consensus, and eventually be promoted to guideline status. Blueboar (talk) 13:50, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

This is my attempt at a start. It likely needs wordsmithing to heck. I might be missing a few cases on either side. But the point is that I feel this shows that notability is but a cog in the system - maybe the biggest one but it doesn't function alone. --MASEM (t) 16:33, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Notable is right, the policy is (guidelines are) wrong

We want to cover all notable topics. The difficulty was defining notability. The notability guidelines are recognised as a proxy for notability - that's why they are guidelines.

Treating the guidelines as holy writ has resulted in a lot of suitable content being deleted. It should be borne in mind that the guidelines were partly written to deal with cranks and bad faith editors.

Instead of being more polite about rejecting it, we should be examining ways to be more welcoming to legitimate content.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 17:32, 1 September 2014 (UTC).

I agree it is in doubt more about the spirit/intention/function of the guideline rather than an overly literal reading to exclude material in a concrete case seems ok otherwise (than failing a strict literal reading of the guideline).--Kmhkmh (talk) 18:27, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

I think most everyone (well, established editors) recognize notability is a guideline, and thus AFDs that come from notability issues are handled well. It also provides a semi-objective manner to evaluate "importance" that still has wiggle room while avoiding pure promotional interests. --MASEM (t) 17:34, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Masem Sure they are "handled well", but that doesn't mean we are not deleting worthwhile content. In many cases well researched, reasonably written, thoroughly referenced material is deleted, which, if it were in an article with broader scope, would be kept. It seems to me that deleting material simply because of the way it is presented is a capital mistake, and one we should try to remedy. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 16:07, 2 September 2014 (UTC).

I am sure there are cases of an AFD where there is a possible merge topic but no one suggested it and thus the content deleted. But I have not seen that - of all the AFD cases I can remember, a merge target (if it existed) was offered early on, and unless the AFD was closed as "keep", merge and direct were the outcomes there. People are not forgetting that merging is better than deletion, it is just usually the case the nominator does not recognize that (And that's why we have the discussion so the options can be identified) --MASEM (t) 16:36, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Blueboar Blueboar mentions below the concept of an entire article devoted to them which ties in with my assertions above. If WP were paper, then the idea of an entire article might be something that we should worry about, as it is articles can be merged and split, articles can be big or small, the key thing we should be worrying about is having the encyclopaedic material present in accessible form.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 16:11, 2 September 2014 (UTC).

• The implementation of "notability" in the GNG is absurd. The actual arguments in AfD are about the exact meaning of the key qualifiers "substantial coverage", "reliable source", and "independent" By manipulating these, in any borderline case or whenever there is prejudice for or against a particular article, one can get whatever result corresponds to one's overall evaluation of whether an article should be in WP. Many of us, myself included, have learned how to take the same facts, & use them to support very different conclusions. In consequence , the actual result really depends on the intensity of the push for or against it, which has nothing much to do with whether we should actually include something. The main reason we keep using this is that we have learned to argue under it--and--more important--our opinions about what should be included are so different that if we tried to adopt objective standards, it would be difficult to find agreement. Personally, I'd be willing to replace the GNG with almost any objective standard for a each of the various class of articles that would lessen disputation and give more consistent results. The only reason for continuing to call any of this "notability" is because it perpetuates what some of us think a desirable conclusion--desirable because some of us are more concerned about getting what we want in specific cases than in acting rationally. The virtue of changing the wording to "inclusion" is that it forces us to actually say what we mean. Apparently there's a considerable number of people here who do not want to do this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DGG (talk • contribs)
  • My impression is a bit different: that people often cling to the "topical" notability criteria (some of which are mere essays, and even themselves only claim likelihood of probability, rather than establishing it for sure) and disregard GNG's "substantial coverage in reliable sources" (or, in fact, any verifiability problems) completely. I agree that the GNG's subjectivity is problematic, but I would rather have it addressed by refining those terms ("substantial coverage" and "reliable source") in specific circumstances rather than abandoning them completely; i.e. WP:MEDRS rather than, say, WP:ACADEMIC. Also, having a organised record of discussions regarding specific sources would be useful. Which can be done today, and you need not change any policy. — Keφr 07:15, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

Alternative proposal: "Notedness" or similar

After going through the guideline, I realized that renaming it "significant coverage" would be confusing, because that is one part of this guideline (along with reliable sourcing, etc.). But I am still opposed to the name "inclusion". Perhaps new editors will understand that this is not our only rule about what can be included on Wikipedia. But, like "notability", it doesn't help them understand what this rule covers or what it's about.

The main problem with "notability" is that, in its usual sense (not the one we have here), it refers to the worthiness of note a subject has. This is subjective, and I often find in AFC drafts, "This person is notable for XYZ" (search it!). What we really need is for the subject to actually have received note. That is, it must be noted, not simply notable, hence "notedness". It's not a particularly elegant term, but I am interested in other proposals that maintain the adjective form as "noted". Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 19:21, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

As I keep pointing out... most topics are worthy of being noted somewhere in Wikipedia... however, only some of them are worthy of having an entire article devoted to them. If, instead of simply saying "DELETE - Not notable" people at AFD discussions were to say: "Not notable enough for an article... Merge into related article X", I think 99% of editors would get it. The problem isn't in the words we use... but how we use them. The problem is that we use the word Notable in a dualistic, Delete or Keep context... but if we used it in a more flexible context the word "Notable" is fine. Blueboar (talk) 20:36, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

That, I think, still doesn't solve the problem. New editors still won't understand what it is if someone says "not notable enough for a separate article," because the meaning we have conflicts with the usual understanding ("worthy" of note by whoever's standard). We could, however, say that it's "not noted enough for a separate article" (that is, not significantly covered) but still noted somewhere (that is, verifiable). Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 21:29, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

"Notedness" has the same problem, because it speaks nothing of the quality of the sources. A local band will certainly have notedness in very local sources, but that doesn't work for inclusion on WP. With more self-publishing on the Internet, fans of works will claim that some topics are noted all over the place by SPS but those sources fail RS inclusion. It remains the same issue. --MASEM (t) 21:47, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps "significant note" (noun) and "significantly noted" (adjective)? Allow me to preempt some objections to this new proposal by stating that any term we use will require some explanation to new contributors (example: just what exactly is a reliable source?). However, "significant note" reduces the amount of explanation because all we have to do is define "significant". (Also, I think this is better than "significant coverage" [as I proposed earlier] because it doesn't conflate the "significant coverage" part of the GNG with the entire guideline, and it works better with the SSGs that refer to honors and designations rather than coverage.) Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 22:34, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

I am beginning to think that the real issue here is that we are trying to come up with a noun to describe a concept that is best described in the form of a question: "Should Wikipedia have an article on this topic?"... so perhaps we should not be so subtle, and simply state the question... WP:Should Wikipedia have an article on this topic??. We can then use terms like "inclusion" "notability" "note worthiness" etc. to answer that question. Blueboar (talk) 12:47, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

What a lot of this boils down to is trying to find a word or very short phrase that can fill this blank: "This topic should not have a standalone article because it is ____" to provide the most descriptive reason when explaining this to new users. One singular existing English word is not going to cut it; "notable" gets us closest but it is not perfect. Also, the idea of answering the question "Should Wikipedia have an article on this topic" is basically the same idea of making a separate page about what we include, with notability (as it is currently give) one of the primary criteria. It still helps towards the problem because you can point new editors to that higher page and then they can see why we have inclusion guidelines like this and why notability is defined as it is. We are still never going to a single existing English word that fully encapsulates the process, and there will still be editors that will not bother to read these even when pointed to them. --MASEM (t) 13:31, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

But... "what we include" is just about everything... The question not being addressed is HOW we should include it. "Include" is not the same as "have an article on it". We can include topics in Wikipedia without having an article about them (by including them in articles on related topics). Blueboar (talk) 13:42, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Right, we have to have clear language that this larger page is when we decide to have a full topic. Someone made a point earlier that "inclusion" is heavily used to describe content inclusion that we should be going out of our way to describe when a standalone page is merited, we have to figure the best phrasing for that; my suggestion on a separate page to do that is basically documenting what happens between AFD, notability, and other pages for considering the appropriateness of a stand-alone page that is not clear unless you've spent time on WP. --MASEM (t) 13:47, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

In terms of readability, though, it often makes sense to have a page on each member of a set, where the vast majority of them are notable. For example members of a team, holders of a post, rulers of a territory.

And of course page needn't mean "article", it might well be a redirect.

IMHO it is a flaw that we loose content in AfD's which might later be used in the target page of a redirect.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 16:17, 2 September 2014 (UTC).

Redirects are cheap and so if there's one topic out of a set of X (where the set is notable as well), there's no reason not to just redirect. That's not always possible but should be done in cases where it can be. --MASEM (t) 16:32, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

I think we're concentrating too much on words ending in "ity"; we can still make a page describe an "ity" kind of a concept while using a plain English title for it. I've suggested Wikipedia:Article topics above, and if two words is one too many, how about Wikipedia:Topics? (That currently redirects to Portal:Contents/Lists, but I don't think that would be missed all that much.) — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 11:51, 18 September 2014 (UTC)

I like the word "independence". Independence more clearly describes what Notability fails to cleanly describe as it is used by Wikipedia. Also, by telling a editor that their article fails an independence standard, you are creating a clear path to explaining that they can place their dependent data into an already existing independent article. "I'm sorry, but I believe your article fails the Independence test because <whatever>. However, I see no reason why it could not be included as a dependent subsection in the following independent articles <here> <here> or maybe <here>." Matthewhburch (talk) 19:07, 20 September 2014 (UTC)

After some discussion below and some consideration over the last day, I think I've settled on "Encyclopedic Suitability" as the best potential replacement that I can think of. I know I saw it while reading through some of the guidelines, but it wasn't a title. I think is should be the title here. I'm sure it's possible to turn "Your article doesn't meet Encyclopedic Suitability guidelines" into an insult like "Your article isn't notable" but I can't imagine how off the top of my head. It's also a far more precise term than Notability, and uses only one more word. I still like a lot of different alternatives to Notability but if I had a choice, I'd choose "Encyclopedic Suitability" over everything else I've seen or thought of to date. Matthewhburch (talk) 15:54, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

Let's cleanly collect potential new titles

A nice, clean list of possible alternatives will make it easier for people to see what options are available to us.

I suggest the following Rules:

• Hard limit each person to a maximum of two suggestions.
• Soft limit each suggestion to four words. If you have a longer phrase that you feel really pops, feel free to add it.
• Do not comment on either your or other people's suggestions. This is just a collection of potential names, not a debate.
• No profanity, sexually explicit material, or gibberish.

Begin List

• Encyclopedic Suitability
• Standalone Article Standards
• Notability
• Notedness

End List Matthewhburch (talk) 15:26, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

Notability / inclusion of what?

The nutshell says: "The notability guideline does not determine the content of articles, but only whether the topic should have its own article." The body says: "A topic is presumed to merit an article if..."

So, this policy is about notability / inclusion of articles. I think that there should be a policy about the notability / inclusion of content.

So I think that the policy should be named "Article notability" (since "Article inclusion" is ambiguous). --NaBUru38 (talk) 19:06, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Well, we do have content policies and guidelines... Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 19:50, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

I think "article notability" has the same problems as just "notability". Notability, strictly, applies to subjects, not articles themselves, and this name seems to give the idea that articles are notable (...?). Plus, as I've said, "notability" in the general sense of the term means "worthy of note," and whose standard of worth is being applied isn't a part of that meaning. This proposal was raised because it can be hard to explain to new editors that, "No, notability means something different on Wikipedia than usual." Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 19:50, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

I don't think word "notable" means something different on Wikipedia than it does elsewhere... it's just that we use it as a shorthand for what is notable enough to have its own article. There are lots and lots of notable topics that are not notable enough for an article.

What we need to get across in this guideline (and our other notability guidelines) is this: being deemed "not notable enough for an article" does not mean we think the topic is completely non-notable... its simply that we think they are not notable enough for an article. More importantly, being deemed "not-notable-enough-for-an-article" does not mean a topic is barred from Wikipedia... in most cases it can and should be discussed on Wikipedia. It's just that the proper place to discuss it is in the context of some related article. This is why I keep suggesting that we use the term "Noteworthy"... it is a term that is intentionally related to "notable"... but different enough that it will distinguish the two levels of inclusion... Notable can continue to be short hand for "Notable enough to have its own article" while "Noteworthy" could be used as shorthand for "Not notable enough to have an article, but notable enough to be mentioned in a related article". Blueboar (talk) 12:34, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps one thing that would help is to have in the lead that a topic deemed not notable may still be appropriate to include on Wikipedia in the context of another article, and later expanding on this and adding that redirects are cheap, etc, as to make it clear (Which it isn't right now) that not being notable doesn't mean you can never have the topic mentioned in WP. --MASEM (t) 14:29, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

That would definitely help. Blueboar (talk) 20:43, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

There are no such things as notable topics that are not notable enough for an article, because notability precisely implies that a subject should have its own article. We already have other rules (like WP:NOT) that determine if information belongs in a related article.

While reforming how we think of "not*" may be a good idea, I don't think this falls within the scope of this RfC. The original proposal is to rename Notability to "Inclusion" without material changes to the General Notability [sic] guideline or specific notability guidelines [emphasis added]. It was also noted that Many of the rename attempts were sidelined by discussions over whether or not to elevate notability to a policy, dissolve it entirely or replace it with materially different proposed guidelines. I think that's what's happening here.

If you're interested in changing "not*" to mean something else entirely, then maybe we should move away from "note" to something else. "Articleworthiness"? Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 21:55, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Sure there are things that that may be "notable (by English definiton) topics that are not notable enough (by WP standards) for an article". Mind you, if we write this into the language of WP:N, we'd avoid the double use of the word that's meant in two different context in the same sentence. And actually there's very little advice, save for on WP:N, about dealing with topics that fall through WP:N but do meet WP:V and the other core content guidelines. We have that advice here ("what to do with topics that are not notable") but it's hidden in the body of the text. There is no reason why, in the context of this RFC which is about making WP:N less bitey to newcomers, about having this included in the lead to help out. --MASEM (t) 22:43, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Not exactly that they are not notable enough; they may be extremely notable in terms of the interest peopletake in them, but unless they publish their interesti nthe right kind of sources, it won't meet our requirements. It's not a question of degree; things that are just barely notable in the ordinary meaning of the word, or even things that almost everyone but a few fanswould consider totally unimportant, may still have the right sources to meet WP:N. Thereis of course a considerable correlation between the two meanings, but it's notpositions along a single axis. DGG ( talk ) 03:36, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Right, because "interesting" and "noted" are not related. It's not enough for a subject to be interesting to people. It must have been noted. (In that sense, we are requiring notedness rather than notability: we require someone to have already taken note of it, not merely to be something that a person is able to take note of.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:09, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

"There are no such things as notable topics that are not notable enough for an article, because notability precisely implies that a subject should have its own article. "

Anon126, that's the very reason why we are proposing to rename WP:Notability to something else: because article notability is just one of many kinds of notability in Wikipedia. --NaBUru38 (talk) 20:51, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

To editor NaBUru38: Oh, sorry, then I suppose I misunderstood you. Perhaps, then, we should say that a subject is not "article-notable"? Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 18:06, 21 September 2014 (UTC)

Alternate proposal - keep "Notability", but change "notable" to "noted"

The problems of misunderstanding and biting newbies typically come for the use of language in the form of "this topic is not notable". We could avoid that language without renaming the policy if we changed the adjective form instead. Instead of approaching new editors with a value judgement equivalent to "this is not worthy of notice", we could instead use the factual assertion that "this has not received notice", all without changing the base concept.

The policy currently states "Article and list topics must be notable, or 'worthy of notice'." We can replace it with "Article and list topics must be noted, or 'having received coverage'". Changing "notable" with "noted" [alternative proposal: noticed] throughout the policy would have a much smaller impact in the current text and practices than a full renaming. It also would make the text more in line with current practice, which is not just requiring that the topic is worthy of notice, but that it has actually been noticed. Diego (talk) 12:49, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

TL-DR version = We need a significant change developed in small steps, not a small change.

While this would be a real improvement over what exists, it's still not a fix. Most of the negative associations new editors develop with this term are due to poor wording from reviewers. If the guideline changes only a little bit, even if it makes sense, then nothing will actually change. You don't change the course of a stream with a pebble. Reviewers will keep saying what they are in the habit of saying. New editors will keep getting irritated by the inappropriate word choices of reviewers. The bastardized English word, notability, that Wikipedia uses to describe a component of encyclopedic suitability is still a poor term to describe a concept which could be far more clearly and precisely explained in very few words. One large problem here is that the editor community has driven itself into a rut on this topic. When someone does try to make something happen, the proponent for change frequently tries to move too fast and/or do too much in a single step. Those habitually opposed to change wind up the wall-of-text defense, and the change attempt runs straight into the tar pit of TL-DR and dies. This then gives more ammunition to the opposition on the next go-around. In short, after reviewing the past history of this page, it seems clear that it will not be possible to change this article significantly without a series of RfC's specifically designed to be as terse and to the point as possible, to prevent wall-of-text argument collapses. Here's an example of how they might be broken down.

• RfC 1: Determine if the community believes there to be a problem. Does this article need to change? Briefly explain the arguments. Don't offer suggestions as to a solution. A lot of people opposing in this RfC were in opposition because they did not like the proposed alternative.
• RfC 2: If there is agreement to make a change, define the solution in broad strokes. Should we change the title and cherry pick fixes related to the title, or do a more substantial article revamp? Again, no details yet! This would be a broad strokes planning RfC!
• RfC 3+: Start discussing individual elements of change, as defined by the broad strokes planning. Collect article title options, and vote on them to winnow them down to a few, then create a vote. If a more systematic overhaul is decided on, discuss the overall structure of page elements in a separate RfC.
  • In general, because of how central this topic is to the heart of Wikipedia, the RfCs, especially on core topics, need to be kept to a tight scope. If you compare the number in agreement above to the number opposed, the number appears, at first, to be substantially more prone towards opposition. If you actually read the opposition statements, however, you will see that many of these people opposing would have supported change in a more tightly scoped RfC purely asking if change is needed, like I suggest for "RfC 1", above. Remember, each vote of opposition moved to support has the same impact as two new votes for support! I would do this myself, but I simply do not have the time for a project like this. Additionally, and perhaps more importantly, I don't value diplomacy very highly when I see that it's being used to cloud issues as opposed to solving problems, which makes this particular discussion very difficult for me. I had to read this response four times to get rid of blunt statements, which might be taken badly. I suspect I was still sufficiently blunt that some folks might be a bit irritated here. Deal with it. I have the best intentions of Wikipedia in mind, and think it would be best served with less diplomatic fluff and more straight talk. Matthewhburch (talk) 17:59, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

That's not going to work. It has been a perennial proposal to try to change the function of WP:N on WP and it doesn't go forward because how it is works. Notability does create heated discussions at times when it comes up, but heated discussion are not necessarily a sign of failure as long as discussion remains civil and no one edit wars, and we learn and improve the guidelines based on lessons learned. Additionally, from my experience, you can't just throw out "something's wrong with this policy, let's brainstorm how to change it". The community works much better when there is a very specific identified problem or a very specific change that is desired to be made (in this case, the naming of this page) than very open ended discussion. Further, there is no bastardization of the word "notability". It still means, on en.wiki, what is means in the real world: "worthy of note". We only have added tests to semi-objectively show that the topic is worthy of note through sources. --MASEM (t) 18:09, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

The fact there are repeated discussions going back for years regarding a core component of what defines Wikipedia is a clear sign of a structural failure within Wikipedia. There is absolutely zero possibility you will ever get me to budge from that statement. I will clarify and simplify my stance here, with the following sentence. Accepting unnecessary dissent is the same as accepting failure. There is more than one way to define this element of Wikipedia, even if more than one word is required, so insisting that nothing should change in the face of clear dissent over years is clearly an acceptance of failure. Additionally, at the risk of being considered blunt, your experience in how to action change must be extremely limited. This is not intended as an insult, it is intended to make it clear that I recognize that you have no idea what you are talking about, and I'm calling you on it. Almost anyone with any real world experience with changing how things work in a complex environment with many involved persons understands that, in the absence of a single person with near-dictatorial powers in the organization, you must agree that there is a problem first. Then you can start to define the problem, and develop a strategy to deal with it. Then you break the broad-strokes solutions down into manageable bits. Sometimes this takes years to plan and implement. Matthewhburch (talk) 18:39, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

I didn't say the arguments were ones of dissent. Cases of AFD or similar "deletion" discussions over notability where the notability framework is put into question is very exceptional. Nearly all participants at AFDs are aware of notability, so it is a question if the evaluation of the sources meets the baseline of the GNG or a subject-specific guideline - these can get heated but that is all healthy discussion. Where the issues about the notability framework (which is what you are commenting on) come up nearly always involve newer editors that learn the subtlies of what notability means on en.wiki once it's explained to them; they will get upset but that's because of a combination of not RTFM and the terse manner other editors describe the problem with their article. The framework is readily accepted. As I said before, the primarily issue from the RFC above is one that is certainly corrected by behavior changes - by being more verbose and carefully explaining the lack of notability, and guiding newer editors to review our guidelines and policies. The problem is not with the framework , save for exceptional few editors that have always disliked the consensus that it has received. --MASEM (t) 18:57, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

Masem, you say, paraphrased, that there is a problem with how editors use terminology around "Notability" and other words with the same root (notable, noteworthy). We both agree on the root cause of the problem, the word Notability. Where we don't agree is that I see a problem that should be fixed so that Wikipedia will be a better place. You see a problem to be ignored, and I simply cannot understand why. Matthewhburch (talk) 10:54, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

No, the cause of the problem is how notability is explained to newbies who haven't read the guidelines (like I at least did). WP:WTF? OMG! TMD TLA. ARG! is important to remember and we all need to put effort into explaining ourselves clearly when newbies are around. There is no problem with notability, the problem is with the way newbies perceive it, which can be changed by making the manual more prominent and by giving kinder explanations. Though I do wish they'd just RTFM. BethNaught (talk) 11:00, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

I am baffled by your response, which can basically be boiled down to: "No, I agree, but maybe we can fix it a different way." It seems as if we agree that problem is the usage of terms using the same root word as "Notability." You say that the problem is "the way newbies perceive it." I say that in any written response, it is the person writing who has the responsibility to make themselves understood to the person who will be reading. Blaming poor documentation on the reader is absurd. Being afraid of change is absurd. Understanding that there is a clear, easily documented syntax problem in a critical document describing a process, and yet ignoring the potential to fix that problem is not appropriate to any organization, let alone an organization devoted to collecting encyclopedic knowledge. Matthewhburch (talk) 17:11, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Beth did not say the documention was poor, just that it is not as pervasive as it should be. That's a behavior problem on experienced editors that can spew out the abbreviations like GNG and the like but forget to link them and/or spell out more specific reasons so that it is clear that there is a document newer editors should be reading to understand why their article may be rejected. --MASEM (t) 17:23, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

If there is a problem with miscomprehension or unintentional misuse of a document, the document is the source of the problem, provided that the reader is moderately educated. This is an ironclad fact, and has been since roughly the same time that humans developed academic standards for writing. Saying that human nature is a problem is a valid point, but human nature is outside our scope. The poor word choice, "Notability," as used on this page, clearly and demonstrably does nothing to mitigate the behavior issues that we can all point to. If we fix the documentation, the behavioral problems (at least the unintentional ones) will fix themselves. Saying that the base cause of the issues with Notability is human nature is all well and good, but Wikipedia does not edit human nature. We need to stay within our scope, and our scope is the words within Wikipedia. Matthewhburch (talk) 18:07, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

But we haven't said it's miscomprehension, it is the lack of awareness this page exists - either because the new editors did not read up on guidelines and policy before creating the article, or because experienced editors forget to direct editors to this page when they discuss it at AFD. Nearly every case where a new editor has been directed to this page having not read it before, they understand the issues and work towards the proper ways to resolve it, showing that it is not miscomprehension of the page. It keeps coming back to behavior issues. --MASEM (t) 18:31, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Again, bluntly, fixing people's behavior issues is not within the scope of Wikipedia. Stop using behavioral arguments to argue against change here. It's a transparent evasion tactic - if you blame that which Wikipedia cannot fix, you can then make an illogical statement sound plausible when you say that no improvement is needed. If you understand the limits of Wikipedia's scope here, stop trying to play clever mental games and let's figure out how to mitigate clearly documented behavioral issues by improving this article. If you do not abandon behavioral arguments which Wikipedia's scope cannot address as a reasoning for doing nothing to fix this page, Masem, then it will force me to believe you are not acting in good faith, for whatever reason. Matthewhburch (talk) 20:14, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Actually, yes, behavior issues is within the scope of WP (One of the core policies is WP:CIVIL, all about behavior), particularly if it is something under our control. We cannot "stop" new editors from creating articles without reading notability guidelines but we can make sure they are aware of them if their article comes under scrutiny, and that's by making sure that the behavior of experienced editors at AFD is aimed to be helpful by linking and guiding towards the guideline, than biting the newbie with the terse "it's non-notable". We can also see how to make notability more visible to newer editors (the AFC process attempts to do this too). We are never going to be able to force a new editor to read a specific policy before making a new article, but we can do everything within our power to help the editor understand problems with the article after it is created and implore them to read the guidelines to understand. Again: nearly every time I've seen this happen with a new editor, they are clear on notability (though might argue on the semi-objective aspects of it, but that's fine), showing that understanding of this guideline is there. --MASEM (t) 00:33, 2 October 2014 (UTC)

Stop comparing apples to oranges. You know as well as I do that WP:CIVIL has nothing to do with this discussion. Most cases of "Notability" related Wikipedia failures are based around statements that are made in a civil manner. The problem lies in people using civil, yet poor phrasing of arguments, whether intentionally or not. You can't stop that behavior. You can't just wave your arms and declare that everyone must hold themselves to a higher standard of English (at least not with any real hope for success.) What you can do is look to see if there is anything at a deeper level that you can fix - the root cause of the problem. It's abundantly clear that people are using phrasing that angers newbies because Wikipedia is still using the word "Notability", which lends itself to negative connotations when article notability is challenged. The disruption in the community caused by grammatically and structurally challenged usage of words sharing the same root as "Notability" would not exist if we did not use the word Notability. Notability is the root of the problem. The behavioral issues surrounding the use of the word "Notability" only exist because we're using the term "Notability." Matthewhburch (talk) 14:55, 2 October 2014 (UTC)

"The problem lies in people using civil, yet poor phrasing of arguments, whether intentionally or not. You can't stop that behavior." Yes we can - we won't stop it 100% obviously, but we can remind editors that use terse bitey responses about AFDs that they need more reasons than that. That, and the lack of editors taking the time to read policy, is the root cause of the problem, not what this policy is named; I can assure you that if this was something like "inclusion" with otherwise no change in how it was used, new editors will still get angry when their articles are targeted for deletion. It's because they want instant gratification and don't bother to read policy/guideline before being aware there might be problems. --MASEM (t) 15:22, 2 October 2014 (UTC)

Masem, you refuse to acknowledge that it is possible to address some highly repetitive problematic behavioral issues in a meaningful fashion by changing this page so that it will be much more difficult to generate emotionally charged statements during debate on Wikipedia content. I must regretfully say that it's clear to me that you are not acting in good faith. Perhaps it's only that you refuse to admit that someone else might actually be right, even if they don't agree with you. Perhaps you had something to do with writing this article at some point in the distant past. Maybe you simply revel in schadenfreude and are defending the failure of this page, so that it will continue to generate amusement for you. I'm sure you and I will discuss this again here off and on until consensus is reached to fix this page, but I'm not going to dry to draw you out into another long discussion to prove that you are not acting in good faith. There's no longer any need to do so, the proof is right here. There's always room for improvement. Matthewhburch (talk) 21:30, 2 October 2014 (UTC)

Matthewhburch, that is a gross misjudgement. To the contrary, you appear to be unable to see that Masem is arguing in good faith and is doing their best to respond to your comments civilly and carefully, whereas you have been attacking them and accusing them of playing games, wilfully attempting to undermine the project. You need to realise that just because someone disagrees with you it doesn't mean they're evil or stupid. I respect Masem and I think many others do and your rants will not change that. I ask that you strike your accusations of bad faith and schadenfreude. BethNaught (talk) 21:50, 2 October 2014 (UTC)

BethNaught, I'm afraid I would be lying if I said I changed my mind about my assessment of Masem's activities on this page. My accusations of schadenfreude are supported clearly in admissions by Masem himself in another part of this page's talk section (below, just do a find for the term.) If is also clearly bad faith when you consistently base all arguments on behavior of editors which Wikipedia has no way to directly, effectively control, and refuse to admit that it's possible to improve the page in such a way that these behaviors can be indirectly addressed. For me to rescind my statement that Masem is not acting in good faith here would be for me to no longer be acting in good faith. I would be clearly stating a falsehood. Matthewhburch (talk) 03:06, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

The fact you think I have bad faith in my arguments here tells me that trying to argue this with you any more is not going to go anywhere. You haven't attempted to counter the reasons why there doesn't need to be any change beyond attacking me. --MASEM (t) 06:15, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

We never were having an argument, Masem, you were just sticking your fingers in your ears and saying "no" over and over again, and occasionally blaming all the problems this page causes within the new editor community on human behavior which Wikipedia cannot address with any hope of success. There is always room for improvement. Matthewhburch (talk) 19:33, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

And you've completely missed my argument where a large component of the issue is due to experienced editors acting too blunt towards new users. That's why it is behaviorial on them to address before trying to fix a guideline that actually has worked for years. This is why this argument is going nowhere, you are not listening to what has been said. --20:14, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

I have not missed this point at all, Masem. I clearly see your point. I also clearly see that your point of argument is something almost completely outside the scope of Wikipedia to handle. It is obvious that most "Notability" related issues could be prevented if Wikipedia could force every user to be polite, well versed in English language usage, and careful to avoid unintended insults. It is not possible for Wikipedia to effectively moderate behaviors to the degree that would be necessary to avoid problems. To try to bring it into clearer perspective here, if you look at a problem and see two ways to make it less bad, where one is to change the world, and the other is to change a word, the logical choice is to change the word. Changing the world can come later. Using the false argument that we have to change the world to fix this page is absurd, and that is what your behavioral arguments boil down to. Matthewhburch (talk) 02:45, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

@Masem: @Matthewhburch: No one and nothing is benefiting by the two of you going back and forth and flooding this page with wall after wall of text. Masem, your persistent and futile need to get the last word in is not accomplishing anything but drawing this out. Disengage and ignore him. Matthewhburch, you really need to get some actual experience editing articles before you can start telling everyone else how things should be done here, and even then once you've voiced your opinion you don't accomplish anything by repeating it, particularly when you tend to insult those who disagree with you. That will just get read as arrogance.

Both of you need to take a LONG break from this page and go do something constructive. postdlf (talk) 03:53, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

@Postdlf:One does not need to be an experienced Wikipedia editor to detect someone who is being evasive in a written argument. I can only hope that, after having been called out here, Masem will choose to be more intellectually honest in his future discussions on this page. I'll be sure to pop by now and then and make sure of that - at least until the page is improved or replaced. Matthewhburch (talk) 14:32, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

You can't exactly let a near-personal attack go unanswered, however, particularly when they grossly misstep your position. I've tried to disengage but there's some things that you cannot let unchallenged. --MASEM (t) 05:29, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

After looking at the latest developments, I concur fully with Postdlf and BethNaught. Kudos to Masem for taking the time and effort to point out exactly what's wrong with Matthewhburch's positions. Although, as I implied way below, Matthewhburch's attack on the long-established and easy-to-comprehend Notability guideline is looking more and more quixotic as it becomes clear he's avoiding a nasty confrontation with the real elephant in the room, which is Wikipedia:No original research, not Wikipedia:Notability. What is the point of attacking a guideline that is ultimately irrelevant and immaterial to the inclusion of a proposed article that would have been deleted anyway for violating WP:NOR? --Coolcaesar (talk) 06:02, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

It's quite amazing how clear a problem can be, and people still don't see it. The article was deleted, with my agreement, because it had not been published anywhere else before. This makes it, in the eyes of Wikipedia, a topic that does not meet notability standards, despite the concept itself being clearly notable by English standards. Lack of independent publication also predisposes an article towards being original research, even if the article is an "English notable" simple offshoot of existing science and engineering. If you do not see the connection there, I'll make it easy for you. For the article which introduced me to "Wikipedia's Notability" to be added as a standalone article, it needs to be published, which I am attending to. After publication, I'll need to watch for follow up validation articles. Once a couple of those exist, then the article that was deleted will have a place as a standalone, even if the scientific community chooses to alter the name of the methodology. At that point it will be neither unpublished, nor original research, since it will have been vetted by the scientific community.

• It takes many months, if not years, especially as a layman, to get something published in a credible scientific journal, especially one of the free ones with standing in the scientific community. I have put the Wikipedia article that was deleted on hold, pending journal publication and follow-up independent publications. That article is still available for view, archived on my user page. If you would care to argue nuts and bolts of the idea itself, feel free to comment on my talk page. If you think you can put a hole in the science, feel free to try. If you read the article and understand it, I think you might have some understanding why I reacted very negatively to a statement that it was not notable in the English sense of the word. This page is not the place to discuss that article though, I will ignore further attempts to discuss the merits of that particular article on this page. However, if you wish to continue discussing your confusion about how "Wikipedia Notability" and "Original Research" can be related, that discussion does have a place here. Matthewhburch (talk) 11:44, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

Does someone has an opinion on the short-term proposal to change "notable" to "noted" (or "noticed")? I'd take a small change that gains consensus over a series of long-term ones that don't have a chance in hell. Diego (talk) 21:52, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

• I find this linguistically odd: notability and notable form a pair, while noted --> notability but not the other way round. I think the effort to make this small social change would be huge and would not necessarily even work. I think the status quo isn't so bad; what is needed is greater prominence of notability guidelines so that newbies could be reasonably expected to read them, and gentler explaining when they fail to do so. BethNaught (talk) 22:04, 30 September 2014 (UTC)
• "Noted" is a worse option, because it implies that it has to have sources. Given our subject-specific guidelines, that sorta belies how they work - from those guidelines we're not included a topic because they are "noted" but because they have the potential to be noted - that is, they have notability ("worthy of note") (and that gets into all the presumption aspects of notability but that's not the issue here). So going to "noted" or "noticed" is too strict a change. --MASEM (t) 05:38, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

I had thought of that, but I believe the benefits of using a non-judgemental terms would outweigh the small advantage of precision concerning an edge case, that of articles kept without actual evidence of having received coverage; in particular because current practice is to challenge those except for some few outlier classes of articles, and subject-specific guidelines are also worded in terms of information that is verifiable and comes from independent sources. Diego (talk) 13:37, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

The so-called "edge cases" are huge here in 10,000s of articles (any named location, secondary schools and pro athletes to name a few). --MASEM (t) 15:15, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Also, keep in mind: just being verifiable and from an independent source does not make a topic "noted" or "worthy of note" by the English definition (much less our use of the word). --MASEM (t) 15:17, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

It does not? The GNG says topics are presumed notable when they do. Ok, there are also other surnames to "verifiable and independent" like "significant coverage" and "secondary source", but those are precisely the parts that are not indispensable per subject-specific guidelines. Or are you thinking of something else?

As for the thousands of articles notable for other than the GNG, those have been already written and shouldn't affect newcomers - except for athletes, but those should be directed to read Wikipedia:Notability (sports). Diego (talk) 15:33, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Verified and independent are two of four qualities; you need secondary sources, and you need significant coverage. They are four different aspects of sourcing, and not synomous. And newcomers will still be affected by subject-specific notability guidelines, if they write about new topics that meet them. --MASEM (t) 15:46, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, but secondary and significant coverage are not requirements for guidelines like WP:NGEO, WP:NACADEMICS, WP:BAND, WP:NASTRO... The only common denominator of all WP:N guidelines is that the content is verifiable and the entity providing the data is not connected to the topic being covered; that pretty much coincides with it "being noticed". Specific guidelines are indeed concerned with the topic being worthy of notice, but the GNG does not. Diego (talk) 16:01, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Okay, yes I see what you're saying, and this is my point: if we take a pro athlete that meets NSPORT but only because they have played a game (affirmed in verified, independent sources), they have not necessarily been "noted" but we are saying they are likely "worthy of note" once more sourcing comes out. This is why "noted" is bad because it is counter to our presumption approach which is meant to be more open to topic inclusion. --MASEM (t) 16:06, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Do articles for athletes who have played a single game get their own articles? I thought they would be merged/redirected to the article about their team or league, mainly because there wouldn't be much to write about them. I can't think of an article that could survive AfD when the topic has not been noted by independent parties, and I'm an inclusionist. Diego (talk) 16:19, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

I've been that road many many times and the sports notability guidelines are very hard to get away from "played one pro game == presumed notable", on the basis that reaching pro they must have sources about their past career, per the logic there. That's a different discussion altogether, but its also not isolated to just that; the subject-specific guidelines allow for reasonable criteria that by meeting some merit-based achievement, we presume notability going forward allowing an article to be created on only one or a few sources. --MASEM (t) 16:29, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

I often wish we had never come up with the idea of "presumtion"... and certainly we can not use it as another word for "inherently notable". For example.... I think a presumption that there will be reliable sources about a pro sports figure (even one game wonders) is realistic for modern sports figures... but as we have seen, it becomes far more problematic as you go back in time. Modern players usually have worked their way up through a set system... collegiate athletics or minor leagues of some sort... playing for teams and leagues that themselves get a reasonable amount of media coverage. However, that was not always the case in the past. At minimum our various sports related notability guidelines need to take this into account. The likelihood of sources is very different between modern players and those of yesteryear. Blueboar (talk) 19:48, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

If anyone's interested, I've written an essay that essentially advocates for changing the language of non-notability to "does not meet notability guidelines". Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 17:06, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

People's definition of "notable" or "notability" in regards to content

People keep removing portions of content. Recently, someone removed content for not being "notable". Have they mistaken it for undue weight or something like that? WP:notability discusses only topics, not content. If they want to remove parts, just say "not worthy inclusion". I mean, what is wrong with repeatedly reading the guideline? --George Ho (talk) 05:42, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

In that specific diff, I think they are not using "notable" as in regards to the quality of having a stand-alone article, but as one would normally use the word if this wasn't WP. I think long-term editors are used to the idea that if if one is questioning the existing of an article, WP:N applies, but if talking about specific portions of text, this is where things like WP:UNDUE and content-derived guidelines/policy come into play. --MASEM (t) 06:10, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Couldn't they just cite any other guideline or policy than this guideline? Why not including "This guideline regards to topics only. For content, use other guidelines, like WP:NPOV"? --George Ho (talk) 07:01, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps we should include a link to the Wikipedia:Relevance of content essay? Blueboar (talk) 13:31, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

I put it in See also section. There is no room at the top of the page. --George Ho (talk) 15:01, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

@George Ho: I don't see where you have previously discussed the edit you have a question about with the editor who made it, before coming to this guideline page. Can you link to the talk page thread where you did so? postdlf (talk) 16:45, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

• Yeah, I'm with Postdlf. Why are you asking us what someone else's motivations are, instead of asking him or her? Ravenswing 16:57, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

I've done that a moment ago, so I'm awaiting his/her response. --George Ho (talk) 23:39, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

• The WP:NPOV core content policy uses the term "prominence".  Unscintillating (talk) 17:35, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Somewhere to ask about whether an article's subject is notable?

Hello all, is there somewhere I can ask for feedback about the notability of an article without having to put it through AfD? I am currently working on the article Sleaford and one of the residents listed on there is Joseph Hayat, but I am not sure whether he is notable enough; certainly, there is coverage in the media, but I would be keen to see what other editors think. Thanks, --Noswall59 (talk) 15:01, 2 December 2014 (UTC).

We used to have a noticeboard but it was too inactive, so shut down. If the topic might meet one of the subject specific guidelines, (possibly WP:BIO here) asking at that talk page might help, alternatively if there is a WikiProject that the person would fall into, that would be good too.

--MASEM (t) 15:11, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Okay, cheers, --Noswall59 (talk) 15:24, 2 December 2014 (UTC).

Simplify terminology - "Cross Categorization" & "Intersection"

Anyone ever noticed that what we're calling a "cross categorization" on this page and at WP:NOT is basically the same thing as what we're calling an "intersection" at Wikipedia:Overcategorization. Aren't these two things basically the same. Can we harmonize the language to make things simpler? NickCT (talk) 18:30, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Other wiki-languages

If the notability of a subject is proved in one of the languages (for example english wikipedia), does it mean that it can have article in the Arabic wikipedia? Mhhossein (talk) 13:15, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Not necessarily... the various language Wikipedias are independent of each other, and each has its own set of policies and guidelines set by their communities. So the fact that a topic or subject is deemed "worthy of an article" at one WP does not mean it will be considered "worthy of an article" over at another WP. That said, the notability guidelines here at the English version do tend to be stricter than those in other versions... so there is a good chance that if a topic has an article here at the English version, it will probably pass muster at one of the other versions as well (I would not say the same going the other way). Blueboar (talk) 19:25, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Another question

I declined to approve the AfC nomination of Draft:The Sala House on the grounds that the subject was not notable. I have been asked to reconsider this. I see that the house featured in the February 1986 edition of the Architectural Review so it might be considered notable. However the article reads like an estate agent's listing, and having a Wikipedia article might elevate the sale price if the present owner wants to sell! What do others think? Cwmhiraeth (talk) 09:34, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

The tone of an article has nothing to do with the subject's notability. And it's not only absurd that a rational person would pay more for a house just because someone wrote a WP article about it rather than because it was featured in Architectural Review (and 1986, not 1896), but it's also absurd that we would decline an article just to prevent anyone indirectly benefiting from it. Perhaps AFC is not the proper task for you if you think these issues somehow impact notability. Just judge the sources and the depth of the subject's coverage in them.

On the merits, I see what looks like five reliable sources cited. Is it your opinion that the coverage in these is not significant? It appears that most if not all of these are actually about the house itself, or at least describe it in some detail, judging from how they are used in the draft. Why do you nevertheless think GNG is not satisfied here? postdlf (talk) 15:21, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

As Postdlf said, notability based primarily on the availability and coverage of sourcing, not the content of the article itself. I agree that there are problems with the language and tone, but that's fixable, while the notability is established by a number of sources that themselves are not just directory listings (eg Arch Review). --MASEM (t) 16:47, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Agree... we should have an article on this house (just not the version that has been drafted). It sounds like all the concerns could easily be resolved with a simple re-write. Blueboar (talk) 17:00, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

I find your responses interesting. I wondered if sources like the Architectural Review were paid by the contributors to get their houses featured, and were therefore not independent sources. Anyway, if someone else wants to accept this nomination, they are welcome to do so. The comment on the price was merely a passing thought. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 18:03, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Whether sources are the type that accept "paid for" plugs is an important question from notability's standpoint since these are not then "independent" sources. However, reviewing the details of Architectural Review (being a century-old publication), I very much we can make that assertion, compared to, say, if it was a website that is only a few years old. I think we're okay with that sourcing backing. But the text definitely needs to read less like an ad for certain. --MASEM (t) 18:26, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

You shouldn't be rejecting sources you're not familiar with (or that I presume you didn't even look at) on the basis of unfounded suspicion. You should have done some research into it, or even just asked someone else, before you considered yourself in a position to make a judgment. So was that it, your assumption about the independence of the sources was why you thought it failed GNG? postdlf (talk) 19:22, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

There is a current backlog of 2665 articles at AfC so I doubt most get the sort of detailed scrutiny you describe. I started from a position of scepticism that a modest dwelling house built in 1986 could be worth including in an encyclopedia. And I think you are being a bit hard on me. When the nominator queried my rejection, I did follow the matter up by asking here. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 20:49, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

In re the original post, I think that the principles at Wikipedia:We don't care what happens to your website apply. It just doesn't matter if the price gets jacked up due to being "notable", or dropped down due to expected problems with Wikipedia-related trespassers. It's just not our concern. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:01, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

I have rewritten the draft attempting to address everyone's concerns. Please let me know what you think.Ekyono (talk) 01:28, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Historical Buildings

Is being on the National Register of Historic Places in itself reason for the retention of an article about a building that is otherwise not notable? My particular question has to do with an elementary school building, and elementary schools are not themselves considered notable. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:48, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

I would think inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places indicates that there is some notable history written about the building. - Location (talk) 20:35, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

In that case, maybe the article needs a stub tag attached to indicate that the history of the building requires expansion. The school is not notable, but the school building is notable. Robert McClenon (talk) 20:37, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Exactly... focus the article more on the historic building, and less on the educational organization that uses it. If you go to the NRHP website, they often have PDF files of the original nomination documentation... those documents can be used to help fill out the article, and will explain what makes the building notable. Blueboar (talk) 12:23, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

In the article about a high school (which is notable), there was a list of feeder schools. Two of them were blue-linked. I nominated one for deletion at AFD. The historic one now has two stub tags. I am not planning to work on that article, but Wikipedia has no deadline to the expansion of stubs that appear to be notable. In this case, the school (an educational institution with students and a principal) is not notable, but the schoolhouse (a building) may be notable. Thank you. Robert McClenon (talk) 14:48, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

ORG needs more views

We've got a discussion at WT:ORG that needs more eyes on it. Those familiar who've been through this in the past will remember that CORP has an explanation of the limitations of local sources; see WP:AUD for the text.

(The problem, for those who haven't been through this before, is that a lot of small-town newspapers will review every single restaurant in town, but that doesn't mean that every restaurant in a small town deserves a Wikipedia article. In practice, if you show up at AFD with a claim that WhatamIdoing's Gas Station and Hot Dog Stand is notable because it got an article in both of the tiny-circulation local weekly newspapers, the !votes are all delete, delete, delete, delete, and stop begging your next-door neighbor to run articles about your small business in his little newspaper. As will be obvious on the talk page, I don't support removing this text, because it accurately describes the actual requirements imposed by the community for getting an article about a small business or local organization kept at AFD. But if other people think that we should remove this, then, as usual, I'm willing to go along.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:41, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

I have nothing against advertising discussions to others as the more views the merrier, but I consider this post to be in violation of the Wikipedia:Canvassing given that the content is i) clearly biased in favour of one viewpoint and ii) the user has not disclosed this notification at WT:ORG. I'm currently deciding what further action, if any, to take. CT Cooper · talk 19:16, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

CT, it is only suggested not required that the notifying editors mention the notices on the discussion page. The notice above describes the discussion issues as he understands the notifying editors understands them, but does not engage in overt advocacy, either. Perhaps we should assume good faith, and ask WAID to reword his notice in a more neutral manner. WAID? I for one will be participating in the discussion at WP:ORG. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:38, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

The lack of notification was a more trivial concern, and I am not disputing that she was acting with good intentions overall, but I think I was fair in finding it suspicious given other observed behaviour at WT:ORG. My primary complaint was that the message made points which had been shown to be factually inaccurate in the discussion, and was obviously intended to sway the discussion in a certain direction by making out that those wanting reform were either stupid or ignorant, which is clearly not allowed as per WP:CANVASS. The last sentence does little to mitigate the overt advocacy of the rest of the paragraph. I raised it with her back in October and she has regretfully refused to acknowledge the violation. I have decided not to take any further action primarily as the canvassing failed, given that the discussion resulted in a clear mandate for reform and demonstrated that WP:ORG as it is now does not have consensus. I'm currently making the presumption that it won't happen again, but if it does happen again I will be taking far stronger action next time round. CT Cooper · talk 00:22, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

I haven't looked at this page for over a month, but since you accuse of me of "factually inaccurate" statements, then I invite you to name them. Perhaps, for example, you believe that every single small-town restaurant does deserve a Wikipedia article? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:48, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

A lot of allegedly factual claims about local sources made in order to defend the current guideline have been thoroughly debunked by myself and other editors. There are too many to list here and I'm not starting a parallel discussions on this talk page. I will speak for myself on what I believe, thank you, but since what someone believes is a matter of opinion, not fact, its besides the point anyway. CT Cooper · talk 18:02, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Biblical verses, any presumption against their notability?

Pardon my asking this question, but I can't find any guidance about criteria for the notability of Biblical verses.

Currently, WP has relatively few articles on verses. However, there are numerous verses that have been discussed in detail (separate even from neighboring verses) in reliable sources. So, I'd like some background about biblical verses before I start creating new articles.

Context: I will teach a Hebrew Bible course at a public university (Spring 2015) and I'm considering whether to assign students to create/improve WP articles. If there's no blanket policy against verses, it looks like many Biblical verses would be a plausible entry point for my students. Thanks! HG | Talk 01:21, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

As long as the verse is discussed in reliable secondary sources, I imagine you would be OK. Not sure if this is helpful: Category:Hebrew Bible verses - Location (talk) 01:48, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't think really need a special notability guideline, as long as the verse can be discussed more than just from the "faith" aspect. That is, I know that I could go to plenty of biblical works to get a faith-based discussion of a passage, but we would like more than just re-analyzing the phrase from the standpoint of faith (As we are not a teaching guide, even if a faith-based teaching guide). But that said, I see, for example, many of the verses in Matthew 5 are discussed in a manner of how the verse likely was written or to be applied to in a historical sense, which is what we do want to see. Basically, we are not a textbook (WP:NOT#TEXTBOOK) but if the verse can be talked more than just the faith/religious sense but in the actual theological/historical sense, then we should be good for it. (And this applies to any religious work like the Bible). --MASEM (t) 01:59, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

I agree with the other commentators... many bible verses are notable, but this does not mean that every verse is notable. Some are, some are not. The way we know which is which is that the notable ones have been discussed by reliable sources. One word of caution... various biblical passages have been quoted to justify all sorts of bad things through the centuries (slavery comes to mind). Be neutral in discussing this... it's OK to mention that a passage has been interpreted as meaning X, but attribute such interpretations to those who made (or currently make) the interpretation... don't say "this means X" in Wikipedia's voice. Blueboar (talk) 12:17, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes, not every verse is notable, but there's historical-critical analysis (and debate) on numerous verses on their own terms, often focused on the underlying source (JEDP etc) or key words. I would not ask students to write up the Jewish or Christian exegesis of a verse, though that could go in an article. Certainly I agree on the NPOV voice, which is hopefully a major learning outcome for the course. HG | Talk 02:57, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

HG, I think you should contact Wikipedia:Education program for ideas. In general, many students find writing an entire article to be a difficult and dispute-ridden process. A more manageable task might be this:

1. ask them to find and read an existing Wikipedia article about a Bible verse/section (they can write you a brief evaluation of the article's strengths and weaknesses),
2. identify one aspect of that Bible verse/section that isn't covered in the article (give them a checklist, like linguistics, history, past or present cultural references, etc.),
3. find and read one scholarly secondary source that deals with that missing item, and finally
4. add just one paragraph to supply the missing information.

Someone who is active in WP:WikiProject Judaism might be able to help you come up with ideas or find a 'standard' outline for what a decent encyclopedia article on that subject should usually cover. Good luck, WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:09, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing, thanks, these are excellent suggestions and consistent with concerns raised at the Wikipedia:Education program. Perhaps the order would be: they'd outline 1-2 reliable sources, see which points are missing from the correlative article, bring these points up on the Talk page with suggested edits, and then add maybe one sentence or two at a time with proper refs. I doubt that most students can fully evaluate an article; but perhaps they can check sources and look for signs of POV. Your idea about talking to users in WP:Judaism makes sense -- and a key point raised by SandyGeorgia -- but I do wonder if there are enough active editors for discussion. Anyway, it'll be a small class of ~14 students and I would probably have them work in pairs or teams, so I can do quality control or take part in Notability discussions (hence this thread). Thanks! HG | Talk 02:57, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Follow-up question. I did chance upon an AfD for a Biblical verse. The debate was less about WP:N and more about whether the content on the verse should be subsumed under a larger unit, e.g., a story or group of verses. In the end, the verse article was kept. But I was surprised by users ready to delete it, regardless of Reliable Sources and sufficient Notability. Is there any way to generate a list of AfDs for a given category (e.g., Bible_verses)? Or to search AfDs for those deleted due to Notability? Thanks! HG | Talk 03:11, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

FYI here's the AfD debate I found on Genesis 1:2 [[1]], which does mention Notability, one user refers to the verse as having only "inherited notability" from the broader context. (I disagree, as did the AfD discussion.) The decision to keep seemed to be based partly (largely) on the showing of several reliable sources on that specific verse. HG | Talk 12:42, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Pardon me if this is annoying. I just found extensive discussions in 2005, a big VfD, and this archived debate: [[2]], too. It is frustrating because it doesn't seem that all this conversation led to any recorded policy (or recorded decision to treat verses like any other potential article topic). HG | Talk 13:03, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

A factor beyond that is that notability policy has significantly changed since 2005. The standards were a great deal looser then, and VfD discussions routinely kept articles with "Seems notable," "Sources might exist" and other such now-discredited rationales. I wouldn't place any reliance on a nine-year-old VfD myself. Ravenswing 15:34, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

I think the AFD responses in that confirm with what we've said above: as long as you have sources that discuss the verse specifically, in any manner beyond its use for preaching, so if backed by historians, linguists (in regards to translations), scholarly theological studies or the like, then the article on the verse should be okay. A verse which is just discussed within the context of preaching the religion it is from would not be appropriate WP material, though this can be included as part of larger context as to the importance of the verse to the faith. --MASEM (t) 15:49, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

User:Masem, this response of yours shows up as +666 on my watchlist. It's a sign, clearly. doktorb _words^deeds 20:14, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Absolutely not intentional. :) --MASEM (t) 20:19, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Masem, the problem with that standard is that I sort of suspect that there isn't a single sentence in the entire Hebrew Bible that can't boast at least one source each about linguistics (for translation) and scholarly theological studies—not even excepting long sections of who begat whom.

I think that a more useful consideration would be to "meditate on" (weak pun intended) WP:WHYN. (Also, writing an entire article is likely to be too difficult for most students, not to mention discouraging. Isn't it something like 80% of all new articles get deleted—and often within mere minutes of creation?) WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:25, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Lede is too long

@Doncram:: The new paragraph in the intro causes a rather long lede, please find a better solution, e.g., the numbered list in the intro could be merged into the first "GNG" section. –Be..anyone (talk) 05:21, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Another problem with the lead is where it says

A topic is presumed to merit an article if:

1. It meets either the general notability guideline below or the criteria outlined in a subject-specific guideline listed in the box on the right.

We are supposed to avoid referring to images as being on the left or right (WP:MOSIM). The same should probably apply to boxes, for people reading with voice software. We could refer to the box by its title. Plus the box doesn't even appear in the mobile view. We shouldn't have important information in a box that doesn't appear for many readers. What I would suggest is a separate section on subject-specific guidelines, to come immediately after "1. General notability guideline". That would have the additional benefit of shortening the lead. For people who can see the box on the right, that's fine, but it shouldn't be crucial to message. – Margin1522 (talk) 05:38, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Notability for entertainers

Hi, I would like to ask on how to determine the notability for entertainers. Please kindly referred me to the right forum if this question doesn't belong here.

According to WP:ENT:
"Actors, voice actors, comedians, opinion makers, models, and celebrities:
1. Has had significant roles in multiple notable films, television shows, stage performances, or other productions,..."

I'm a bit confused about what "significant roles" mean here. Is that mean lead actor/actress only? or it can also be supporting roles. Some US TV show like How I Met Your Mother or Criminal Minds don't have a single lead actor. If they're appeared on the movie poster or participating in the promotion, is it mean that they have "significant roles" in the production? I think usually those who appear on the poster are main roles, but not all main roles appear on the poster. So how to determine if the roles are significant or not? Thank you. Sonflower0210 (talk) 11:53, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

No, significant is not limited to just the lead parts. There are many notable actors who have never had a lead role in their entire career, but who are notable for their many supporting roles. There are "character actors" who are notable for the volume of their work more than any individual role.

It really comes down to sources... if there are reliable independent sources that actually discuss the actor and/or his work (ie something more than just a quick passing reference, or a simple cast list) we can say he is notable. Blueboar (talk) 13:51, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Local (county level) politicians in the US

Are county level politicians usually considered notable or not?... The question relates to a recently created article on Jake Shade, a county commissioner in Maryland. I am not sure whether the subject passes our guideline for politicians or not. Please note that the article was just created today, so I am reluctant to jump right in and nominate it for deletion (at least not yet). I am asking more so I can advise the article creator on what our standards are... so he/she can try to improve the article (if possible). Blueboar (talk) 14:06, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

No, not without passing WP:GNG. The specific guideline is WP:POLITICIAN, and limits notability-by-position to statewide offices and higher. Even then, that guideline is on the Wikipedia:Notability (people) page which says that the specific categories listed there are not prescriptive, per Wikipedia:Notability (people)#Additional criteria: "People are likely to be notable if they meet any of the following standards. Failure to meet these criteria is not conclusive proof that a subject should not be included; conversely, meeting one or more does not guarantee that a subject should be included." I express no specific opinion about Jake Shade, except to note that I'd find it surprising if there weren't at least a few articles in local or regional newspapers about him and his candidacy which would be enough to serve as reliable sources to at least support a stub about him. Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 15:33, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

OK... that's what I thought. I will try to work with the article creator based on that. Thanks. Blueboar (talk) 15:48, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

@Blueboar: Also take a look at WP:POLOUTCOMES. I kind of suspect that this person would not be notable at AfD because of being elected to office with 13,000 votes. County level offices normally aren't, and neither are city council members in smaller cities. His best bet is probably to have attracted at least statewide attention as a promising young politician. It also needs better sources. Facebook and college newspapers aren't considered reliable sources. (The college papers could stay, but they won't count toward notability.) I'd suggest looking for stories in major regional newspapers. – Margin1522 (talk) 00:34, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Yup. That matches my take as well. Don't know if the sources exist, but we do need to at least give it a try before we jump on a new article. thanks. Blueboar (talk) 01:26, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 21 February 2015

please publish article about the military award - right of line award. history, criteria, privileges and qualifications.08:27, 21 February 2015 (UTC)49.150.242.211 (talk) 49.150.242.211 (talk) 08:27, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

please create article about military award - right of line award, it's history, criteria, privileges and qualifications.49.150.242.211 (talk) 08:30, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Not done: this is the talk page for discussing improvements to the page Wikipedia:Notability. Please make your request at the talk page for the article concerned. Stickee (talk) 09:24, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Artworks

Do we have a specific notability guide for paintings, or artworks in general? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:35, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

No we don't - we'd expect the GNG should apply to these. --MASEM (t) 13:07, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

A short burst of sources is not enough

This follows my thinking at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kirby Delauter.

It has always been the case that a short burst of newspaper sources is not enough to demonstrate Wikipedia-Notability, but I don't see anything written in the guideline documenting this. It is implied. Secondary sources need to be removed from the the event by both time and distance. An event one day, covered across the country, even with genuine commentary, for no more than a week, fails to be sufficiently removed in time from the event. I think something covering this needs to be in the guideline. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:39, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Agree. I would say that on-going coverage in independent secondary sources is the difference between mere "notoriety" and true "notability". Blueboar (talk) 11:42, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

You are looking for WP:NEVENT (we are looking for enduring coverage, not a brief burst) and WP:BLP1E (we should not have an article for a person noted for only one event) --MASEM (t) 16:23, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

BLP1E is far narrower than that simplistic summary, and the subject is a public figure here (however local). WP:NOTNEWS is probably more on point, and provides a substantive deletion argument in this case. postdlf (talk) 16:39, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 31 March 2015

TheObeshow (talk) 11:27, 31 March 2015 (UTC)

 Not done as you have not requested a change. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. --I am k6ka ^{Talk to me!} _{See what I have done} 11:33, 31 March 2015 (UTC)

Erika Csiszer

Noted Presenter on multiple shows Telemundo Television also guest appearances on other numerous shows. Un Nueva Dia, TYM, Regular Hostess
Presented by Garrion Davis
<ref>Telemundo Television </ref>

Sorry, but we cannot figure out from what you've said what it is that you want or are suggesting. If you're requesting an edit be made at an article, place that request on the talk page of that article. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 14:39, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Notability based on how many non-English WP articles exist

A new notion of notability had crept into a guideline.

The guideline: Recent years.

The test:

"Births [and deaths] are only to be included if there are Wikipedia articles in at least ten languages about the individual in question."

I started conversation on the guideline page here. Where I note concerns. I think, though this is not "article" notability, but rather "mention of person" notability, this issue has to be looked at in light of the core notability concepts of the project.

Would we say, for example, that an "article" is only notable for English WP purposes if the article also exists in 9 other-language WPs? That's in essence the test applied by the guideline, to "individual" notability.

Also, on the 2015 page an editor deleted Al Rosen, the former major league baseball MVP, on the basis of this guideline. While people are included who are clearly less notable by other WP standards (let alone by common sense standards, such as English WP reader interest). But I've gotten nowhere in that conversation, with the editor. He responds "[Rosen] might be notable in the US but is not internationally which is the basis for inclusion in this article. Others listed may be less well known in the US but given that they have articles in at least 9 non-English languages the indication is that they are in fact internationally notable." That second conversation can be found here. --Epeefleche (talk) 10:38, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

The problem is that the notability guidelines here on en.wiki are not the same on other wikis; it is not a universal standard. Even considering policies like WP:V and WP:NOR, those aren't common. I will say that if there are 9 other-language wiki articles out there about a topic (particularly if they cut across a wide range of regions), there is a good chance of sourcing to be found to meet the GNG requirements on WP, but that's not assured to simply say the topic is notable.

On the latter bit - we do consider the issues of notability at local levels - a politician in a small town may be notable in the town but not to the rest of the world. However, when you start talking about persons that are notable at a regional or national level, then we consider that notable for the world.

But to add, lists like the above can use guidelines that are beyond notability for inclusion, WP:N does not extend to them since we don't cover article content, though WP:N may be used as justification (as usually done in lists of people from a certain play, limiting it only to notable ones). --MASEM (t) 13:25, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

Right. We should probably try to limit the discussion to the pg pointed to, so as not to trifurcate it.

But to answer narrowly a couple of points ...

I've looked through a number of the foreign language articles used to assert notability for this purpose, per that guideline. Some are 1 sentence only. Some lack any refs whatsoever. Others use English language refs, exclusively. The existence of the article does not indicate anything more, by itself, than that one editor had interest in creating it.

As you say, other wikipedias do not have the same criteria that this one has.

One problem, as is coming out in that discussion, is that a US-based athlete, with 58,000 views the day he died, had his entry deleted under the rule this month. While a Russian and a German, with under 500 views each, qualified for inclusion.

But best for us to keep discussion there, I think. Epeefleche (talk) 13:58, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

This notability guideline for the existance of a Wikipedia article has nothing to do with the "importance/relevance/???" guideline for what should be included in a Wikipedia article. I'm not going to close this section, but I think it should be closed. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:18, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

Of course the two are related. Both guidelines grapple with the same core question: "For inclusion (in one case of a wp article, in the other of referencing the wp article in another wp article), what sort of criteria should we consider as deeming the subject sufficiently notable for inclusion?" It is axiomatic that there is a benefit to Wikipedia applying consistent principles across the Project. I recognize that you have 1 view. And have deleted reference to some of the articles that I point to as being of notable subjects. But that's not a good reason to squelch discussion. We need more eyes on the above-pointed-to approach, not fewer. Epeefleche (talk) 21:13, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

The apparently now inactive Wrad posted a draft 2009-01-05, edited it with zero contributions from anybody else, but some discussions on the talk page, and promoted it to a guideline eight days later. No RfC, no consensus determined by an uninvolved third party, a pure hoax, just blank it, user-fy it, stamp it as historic, AfD it, or find a new purpose for the page, e.g., "guideline sandbox". –Be..anyone (talk) 09:33, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

• I have made some bold changes... there are many things in that "guideline" that run counter to our other notability guidelines. Further review is definitely needed. Blueboar (talk) 09:50, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Well, my changes were reverted (with the justification that there was "consensus" for the old language.) My guess is that there was a local consensus (ie agreement by a few editors working on the page)... but that consensus runs counter to much wider consensus as reflected in other policies and guidelines. It definitely needs a wider audience.Blueboar (talk) 10:06, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Blueboar, we've seen this kind of thing before: a local consensus that purports to have project-wide authority. A small group of editors (heaven forbid, one editor acting in isolation) should not have the authority to decide a guideline of project-wide impact unless there has been a widely advertised discussion and request for comment on point. Some of the most contentious guidelines now in existence were "adopted" in this manner, it ain't right, and everyone knows it. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:54, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

• "Births [and deaths] are only to be included if there are Wikipedia articles in at least ten languages about the individual in question." As far as I could understand, apparently this sentence refers to inclusion of birth and death dates, not to article's existence (otherwise, I don't understand the use of the word "birth" instead of "individual", "person", "subject" or similar). Really weird, anyway. Cavarrone 07:26, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
• My take would be to strike the phrase. Quite aside from that Wikipedia itself cannot be used as a source, and quite aside from the aforementioned problems with this "consensus," this would be very easy to game. Someone using Google Translate to churn out stubs could throw up articles on other Wikipedias in five minutes flat. Ravenswing 07:48, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
• As the primary editor of the guideline page in question, I want to go on record as saying that I do not like, and never have liked, this particular part of the guideline. It was made in a desperate attempt to stop edit wars on recent years pages and is a grossly inadequate measure for notability. The guideline was made, like everything else on Wikipedia, to be changed and improved by the community, not to rule and reign with an iron fist. I have long been bothered by how this guideline has been used. At the time, the "community" involved, the group of people who cared, was extremely small and was not getting along very well. Glad to see some other people are joining in. That being said, deleting the whole page will do nothing more than bring us back to the problem we had before the creation of the guideline: unending edit wars over what properly belongs on recent year pages. (User:Dirtlawyer1 User:Blueboar User:Be..anyone) Wrad (talk) 17:49, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

If you or anybody else still wants this page as a guideline start an RFC or any other procedure resulting in a consensus determined by a neutral contributor. Just adding the tag after about a week was too far on the BOLD side. I can't tell how things were handled in 2009, but vaguely recall that "consensus" was already more than only "create project page, discuss for a week, tag as guideline" in 2006. –Be..anyone (talk) 22:52, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

For all of the righteous anger you are mustering now, the fact is that nobody really cared about this for half a decade. That was the entire problem from the start. Apathy. No one cared. I'm not really even sure we didn't have an RfC, and no one showed up. I cared, and I did the best I could. Don't judge me. Wrad (talk) 00:23, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

I'd try something like {{cent}} to attract attention for an RFC. It happens all the time that folks aren't interested in a proposal, maybe they don't see a problem, or there actually is no problem, or the solution is too convoluted, or individual decisions per page are better than yet another global rule. –Be..anyone (talk) 01:21, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Reliability vs. bias

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

The consensus is, as far as I can ascertain it, the traditional Wikipedia fudge. There are precedents for this in treatment of other government-controlled news organisations and other news sources with a long history of ideological bias (e.g RT, the Daily Mail). In general they are sources to be treated with caution and the default should be not to include: they may be acceptable, subject to prior consensus, for uncontroversial facts or as a reflection of the views of the government in question, but are rarely, if ever, appropriate for contentious claims where the ideology of the source may be in conflict with neutrality. It's especially important where the subject is a living person. It is wiser, overall, to avoid using these sources: genuinely significant information will generally be available from a less biased source and claims which are uncorroborated - especially if they have failed active attempts at corroboration - should be clearly identified by attribution and certainly not treated as fact. Guy (Help!) 07:38, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

---

In the Ahmad Keshvari deletion discussion, some folks seem to be suggesting that if Iranian media are generally deemed unreliable due to their strict control by the Iranian theocracy, it will entail an unacceptable systemic bias against Iranian subjects (such as "Ahmad Keshvari"). Is this the consensus-based view on Wikipedia? When faced with having to choose between reliability and the freedom from systemic bias, should we sacrifice the former for the sake of the latter?--Anders Feder (talk) 15:57, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

In considering a country where the media is controlled by the state, the issue of the true independence of the sources will be doubt. That's where judgement is needed if this is specifically a case where there is a drive to promote the person (or any topic) with false notability, or simply that it happens to be a notable person/topic that is otherwise covered in a normal manner by sources where there's some doubt to their larger purpose. This AFD seems to be the later - there's nothing that seems particularly forced about this pilot getting coverage to bring up the independence question. Yes, it would be nice to get non-Iranian sources but that's not required at all, and the breadth (in both scope and timing) of the sources used does not suggest some purposely planned action to elevate this pilot to this level. On the other hand, if it were the case of a person where all the sources about the person were from media of a similarly-run country and all within a few days, without the person having made any major news, that's highly suspect. I do not think we can have any immediate ruling out of a topic that is only covered by a media under a strong gov't control, it does raise issues but that's how consensus should evaluate it. --MASEM (t) 16:07, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't particularly disagree that some "judgement is needed", but how does that judgement get made? In the case of Iran, it has long claimed to have sent monkeys into space[3], and Iranian media have mirrored these claims, but media outside Iran have had great difficulty corroborating them[4]. The pattern with regards to "Ahmad Keshvari" is similar - an exemplary act of bravery and patriotism is presented to the domestic audience, but independent confirmation of its veracity is hard to come by due to the very media controls the Iranian government has itself imposed.--Anders Feder (talk) 17:15, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

• Reliability prevails: We have a fully-acknowledged and built in bias to not include material which is not based on reliable sources. On occasion that results in material being excluded which is Unquestionably True and Vitally Important. To move away from that is to invite chaos since it results in editors having the ability to decide inclusion on the basis of what they believe to be good and important enough. Verifiability, which requires reliable sources, sets the threshold for what's good enough and to move away from it would be madness — and the chaos would be particularly profound in controversial areas such as the Middle East. Whether government-dominated (or other-dominated) sources are or are not reliable and, if so, for what is a different issue, and one that can be worked out on a case-by-case basis. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 18:22, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

@user:TransporterMan as the following discussions The bad conclusion based on the wrong assumption and Clarification of The claim show, this proposal wants to ban all of the Iranian media because some of them are not reliable in some of the cases. For examples, a magazine about lifestyle or fauna of Iran is not reliable because it can not criticize the leader! WP:VALID, WP:UNDUE and some other policies and guidelines can solve the problems without banning all of the Iranian media. --Seyyed(t-c) 11:21, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

• There’s presumably nothing stopping foreign media under freer governments from covering the same subjects. —174.141.182.82 (talk) 21:21, 10 February 2015 (UTC)
• Reliability We need to have verifiable sources, and unfortunately government controlled media are notoriously unreliable. We are concerned with Verifiability not truth, and like others have said, if it truly is notable, it will most likely be covered by outside media that is more reliable. If making things verifiable means there is a built-in bias towards government controlled media then so be it. -War wizard90 (talk) 03:42, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

@User:War wizard90, As I mentioned below and Anders Feder clarified, the proposal covers all of the Iranian media not just those run by the government. In addition, it does not distinct propaganda and criticism. It bans all of the Iranian media even those criticize the government or cover the issues neutrally!--Seyyed(t-c) 20:02, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Please share with us some of the media which freely criticize the clerical leadership of Iran (as opposed to its low-ranking ministers) or cover issues neutrally, so as to inform the discussion.--Anders Feder (talk) 20:23, 26 February 2015 (UTC)=

You want to ban all of the Iranian media because they cannot criticize the Supreme leader! Can we consider all of the France'media unreliable because they can not publish something about denial of Holocaust due to their law !!!--Seyyed(t-c) 03:54, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

In addition, is it logical to ban a magazine which relates to Iran's Fauna because it can not criticize the leader!--Seyyed(t-c) 04:47, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

What are the sources, which would be suppressed by France's holocaust denial law, that you consider to be reliable?--Anders Feder (talk) 16:34, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

• Reliability and verifiability trump almost everything. Sometimes that will result in material being excluded that normally would get in. But the integrity of the project would be gravely undermined if we weaken these standards for adding material to articles and or establishing notability. That said, in very rare cases, if we are talking only about establishing WP:N as opposed to the actual material in the article, and the subject is so obviously notable that it could not be denied by anyone with more than two brain cells firing off at the same time, I might give it a pass under IAR and common sense. But that would only apply to Notability. Any content not covered by BLUE would still need reliable independent sources. -Ad Orientem (talk) 00:20, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

• I agree with Ad Orientem... It would be very unlikely that Iranian media would be the only sources to discuss a notable subject... but in the rare situations where that was the case, I would argue that the Iranian coverage does count somewhat towards establishing notability (the coverage would, at a minimum, establish that the subject is notable in Iran).

We should be very cautious about what information we support with such sources (but remember that even the most biased sources are reliable in very limited situations... there is no such thing as a 100% unreliable source). I think there is very little we cold use the sources for in an article other than establishing notability... but their existence would indicate that we probably should have an article. Blueboar (talk) 17:14, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

• Unavoidable features - I think it preferable to have simple system without exemptions, and see no feasible way in general to run an exemption system since I see no way to clearly determine a situation fits the basis mentioned. Having 'notable' driven simply by what is being seen a lot in publications is not only definite and simple, it also fundamentally *is* the reality that people experience -- the things unseen by them just never will exist as much. Also, I am thinking the case is wider than mentioned and doubt it's resolvable. Yes, I think here is geographic bias to the levels of coverage, but that it exists even if the governments are not tightly controlling the media -- for example, recently noted were the sheer amount of coverage attacks in Paris got versus the attacks in Nigeria. Some of that is simply differences in distance, fame, or simply the amount of infrastructure to get transmissions from the area. Some is that governments affect coverage -- but think it is most or all spin it or adjust coverage up and down, the Paris politicians pushed for more attention snd the Nigerians did not -- and that the media themselves also try to serve their base. While different nations offer some variation in coverage and nature -- the BBC does not match Fox or MSNBC -- anything not appearing in majore channels will be both hard to verify as real and hard or readers to accept as real or notable. Markbassett (talk) 05:34, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

• False dichotomy: No source is completely unbiased. While we try to use sources that at least make an effort at strict neutrality, heavily-biased sources can be used so long they are handled accordingly. I would have a hard time justifying completely excluding a claim from a state-run press, but I would always want to see the statement attributed and the bias of the source noted.—Kww(talk) 14:46, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

This is not an issue of bias. This is reliability vs systematic bias. They are two different things. The issue being discussed here, concerns reliability. Mbcap (talk) 01:07, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

• Reliability everytime. I cannot see how we can just discount one of the five pillars, WP:NPOV which says, "representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic." The key word here is reliable and unfortunately this is something that is lacking in Iranian media. If we had reliable Iranian media sources and they were biased, we could use them according to WP:BIASED. However we do not have reliable Iranian media sources so we cannot use it even on the basis of WP:BIASED. Mbcap (talk) 01:07, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

I am seeing a flawed argument here... that a source should be considered unreliable because it is biased. That simply isn't true. Again, there is no such thing as a completely unreliable source. Even the most biased of sources can be reliable in some situations. The reliability of any source depends on the specifics of what we are trying to say in any given article... on how we phrase the information that we take from the source.

Because Iranian media is biased, it would be inappropriate to phrase the information as if it were accepted fact... instead we need to hedge our language, and present the information as attributed opinion. Instead of writing "X occurred <cite Iranian media>" we should write "According to Iranian media, X occurred <cite Iranian media>" (or something similar). ANY source is reliable in the context of verifying what that source says (it's opinion).

Now, I have not addressed the question of whether mentioning the source's opinion in the first place would give UNDUE WEIGHT to that opinion... but that is a separate issue, unrelated to the issue of reliability. Blueboar (talk) 14:10, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

This is not an issue of bias. We are talking about reliability. A source can of course be biased because it is allowed under WP:BIASED but it has to be reliable. I think the poster is saying that because not a lot of verifiabily reliable sources exist for Iran, is there a systematic bias being introduced against Iran. Mbcap (talk) 14:21, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

OK... so what makes the source unreliable? So far, the argument has been that it is unreliable because it is biased (and my point is simply that this is a flawed argument). Blueboar (talk) 14:31, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

According to WP:SOURCE, the most reliable sources are those which "have a professional structure in place for checking or analyzing facts, legal issues, evidence, and arguments." Media in countries like Iran have quite the opposite - they have a structure in place, imposed on them by the state, for hamstringing fact-checking, analysis etc.[5][6][7] The most trivial of matters (such as the weather) may be accurately reported on in those media. But almost everything of any interest to Wikipedia is also something which is likely to be affected by the country's media controls. WP:INTEXT is not applicable to notability, because notability does not concern how an article is phrased, but rather whether the subject can reliably be verified to warrant an article on Wikipedia in the first place.--Anders Feder (talk) 10:23, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

The bad conclusion based on the wrong assumption The question is based on a prejudice which should be check before making decision. It is strange that some persons think all of the Iranian media are [[controlled by the government! If so, how can you explain the controversies and clashes among them as well as between the media and the government. In addition, when we clarify the source for the reader, they can judge about it. Even if some Iranian media promote the government viewpoint, omitting or neglecting that viewpoint will lead to the violation of WP:NPOV. --Seyyed(t-c) 14:05, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Your understanding of WP:NPOV is obviously completely misguided. NPOV specifically limits itself to "significant views that have been published by reliable sources". It has never meant "anything goes" or that reliability should put aside for the sake of factual relativism. See particularly WP:GEVAL, and WP:NPOV#Controversial_subjects for examples.--Anders Feder (talk) 14:59, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

• False dichotomy: someone's Reliability is someone Else's Bias, & vise verse. Just try to realize it. I'm not supporting anything here, I don’t know what the first source of this discussion is, but I just see a false dichotomy. I just want to point out that Generalizing like this just leads you guys to false decisions making. It is better to talk about every situation by itself in details & no hurry in making a general decision on before. Hope you guys get my real meaning, wish you all happiness... KhabarNegar ^Talk 14:56, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

See the above. All views are not equally valid, and never have been. Though many obviously have an interest in having them presented as such.--Anders Feder (talk) 15:07, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

A fact to falsify the assumption To show how the basic assumption is wrong, I just mention one case for those who look for truth. During the third round of the Iranian presidential election debates, 2013 in the state television which is completely control by the government, the candidates had a surprisingly controversial positions about one of the most important issue, the Iran's nuclear program. They openly criticized the Iranian negotiators and Ahmadinejad, who was the President at that time. They disclosed many facts about the former events.[8][9] Now, do you think we should neglect this event in the related article just because it is published by the state television[10]!!!--Seyyed(t-c) 15:03, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

This discussion is about the use of unreliable sources. Your links point to a telegram by the Associated Press and an article by the Washington Post, neither of which are unreliable, so the point you are raising has no relevance here.--Anders Feder (talk) 15:35, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

@Anders Feder} You have not got the issue. I mean this case clearly shows your basic assumption that Iranian media are generally deemed unreliable due to their strict control by the Iranian theocracy is wrong. So there is no contradiction between Reliability vs. bias. As you can see in this case which is exclusively broadcast by the Iranian state television and then the other media covered it, there is some kind of freedom of speech at least in some occasions. Therefor, we can not conclude that the Iranian media necessarily promote governmental propaganda. --Seyyed(t-c) 15:48, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Are you saying that because other media covered something which was shown in Iranian state television, it follows that Iranian state television is reliable? Please elaborate on how that would be the case.--Anders Feder (talk) 15:57, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

No, I mean the Iranian media even those controlled by the state are not so censored. "Strict control by the Iranian theocracy" It is a myth. Of course, there are some kinds of censorship but we should not exaggerate it.--Seyyed(t-c) 16:32, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

It isn't a myth, and there is no reason to think that it is. Other media have covered North Korean television too[11], but what does that tell us about whether it is controlled by the state?--Anders Feder (talk) 16:40, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

As I showed in the above case, even the Iran's TV which is clearly controlled by the government has freedom to some extent. Of course, the non-governmental press have more freedom. I eager to know how do you interpret the open criticism of the governmental policies by the candidates in that case.--Seyyed(t-c) 17:11, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Where did you show that Iran's TV "has freedom to some extent"?--Anders Feder (talk) 17:17, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

I guess you do not pay attention to me. There should be some extent of freedom which lets the Presidential candidates criticize the Iran's Nuclear program policy in the government's TV. Is it clear?--Seyyed(t-c) 17:46, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

No it isn't. Were any of these candidates contradicting the Supreme Leader of Iran?--Anders Feder (talk) 18:08, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Has a candidate from the two major party of the US already criticized the US constitution during presidential campaign? I accept there is some restrictions but it is not so harsh that you has described it as "strict control by the Iranian theocracy". We want to refer to the Iranian media in the issues they can and usually have covered, not the issues they can not cover. --Seyyed(t-c) 18:42, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Let me check with you the result of your suggestion. According to you we should not refer to Iranian media even if they criticize the government's policies as I mentioned above!!!--Seyyed(t-c) 18:45, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Absolutely - why should we cite any unreliable source just because they criticize the Iranian government? There are all sorts of unreliable far-right or ultra-Zionist sources criticizing the Iranian government. Should we pull them in as references too because we otherwise might create a bias against them?--Anders Feder (talk) 18:59, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Lets not take away attention from the real issue of unreliability that is churned out of Iran. When you run stories about aliens controlling US government or sending monkeys to space or inventing a time machine, you really have to take that source with a pinch of salt. By the way the time machine that was invented in Iran was compact so you could carry it with you, in case you were wondering. Now honestly, you tell me, if they make up stuff like that, what is stopping them from rehashing protoplasmic unverifiable nonsense. Academic freedom is severely restricted across the board in Iran. Read this letter to the "supreme leader" Ali of Iran[12], showing how academics and students are imprisoned. Also read this[13] which details the atrocious academic freedom further. Sources can be biased all day and as long as they are reliable, we can use them. However, WP:RS states that a source must be reliable and we simply cannot ignore all rules on this one. This is an encyclopaedia, not onion news. Mbcap (talk) 18:55, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

The suggestion is too general and including all of the Iranian media whether run by state or not. In addition, it contains every issue from any viewpoint. You want to ban all of the Iranian media because some of them are unreliable or covered something which is not endorsed by the western media such as sending monkey to the space. This suggestion is a kind of censorship to punish censorship!!! --Seyyed(t-c) 19:04, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

It is interesting that you chose to ignore the story about building a time machine or that US government is controlled by Aliens. This was reported by Fars news agency which claims to be completely independent but which is called a semi-official news agency by reuters. Did you read the human rights watch report and letter documenting the lack of academic freedom and the imprisonment of University academics and students. Mbcap (talk) 19:13, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

@User:Mbcap, WP:VALID clarifies that we should not cover such strange ideas without need to consider all(!) of the Iranian media as unreliable sources. There is also some strange claims in the western media, but we do not disqualify all of them. --Seyyed(t-c) 19:15, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Clarification of The claim @User:Anders Feder, As I understand, you want to disqualify all of the Iranian media because some of them promote the government's propaganda or they can not cover some issues due to censorship. Am I right?--Seyyed(t-c) 19:20, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

No, that is not correct. "Some of them" is not an expression I am operating with. That is a term you have introduced. I consider practically all media which are subject to Iranian media laws unreliable. The same goes for media under North Korean law, Belarusian law, Syrian law etc.--Anders Feder (talk) 19:26, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

All of the Iranian media are "subject to Iranian media laws" and your proposal is a kind of censorship and completely against WP:NPOV. The Iranian media law forbids covering some issues but does not enforce to propagate anything. So all of the Iranian media are reliable, except they violate a policy or guideline. For example, making strange claim (WP:VALID), covering small minority viewpoint (WP:UNDUE) or violating copyright. Therefor there is not any general rule as you want, but we should check them case by case.--Seyyed(t-c) 19:36, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Nonsense. As I've already explained above, your understanding of NPOV is completely wrong.--Anders Feder (talk) 19:41, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

But your understanding of censorship is completely correct. --Seyyed(t-c) 19:44, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Good to see you that you are conceding that you are wrong.--Anders Feder (talk) 19:54, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Not at all. I mean you want to distort the policies so that you can censor wikipedia.--Seyyed(t-c) 04:04, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

When there is a talking about Iran or Iranian issues, we all are talking about a more than 70 million people population, The problem here is that you guys (foreigners) just generalize anything, and react and judge about a country just like when you judging about a small group of people or community! This is simply wrong. I see someone told & talked about the invention of a time machine, you know what! I just see this time machine news from a foreign source, then checked & see this is also mentioned in a website in Iran, then it is not something people care about here! But you guys just realize with yourself that all the media here are talking about that... No! Nobody cares about an interview on a website, maybe you foreigners care, yes, you guys care I'm afraid... Make everything short by saying that any time you wanted to judge, Just try to feel that way you are talking about a nation, about 70 million people. Not just a website or a small group, This way you can have a better understanding about the whole world, as I said it’s better not to generalize and make fixed ideas in this regards, and it is better to see any issue and situation separately and in details, Do not generalize. Regards,KhabarNegar ^Talk 20:59, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

No, the problem is not "us foreigners". The problem is people who don't understand what Wikipedia is. Wikipedia is (or rather, is intended to be) an encyclopedia consisting of reliable information. You may not like reliable information very much, and prefer to go by unreliable information in your daily life. That's great. Good for you. Keep doing it, for as long as you want. Just do not bring that information into Wikipedia. It's pretty simple and has nothing to with what 70 million people in Iran may or may not feel. It has to do with what Wikipedia is. Namely an encyclopedia. Not a temple to mediocrity, where we all get to present our favorite worldviews as if they were equally valid to all others.--Anders Feder (talk) 21:17, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Fox News Channel controversies, CNN controversies, Can I suggest banning the media of the entire nation? No!... It is EASY. Every "single" situation can & should discuss in detail separately, you never can generalize it... I think sorry, simply you don't desire to realize the change in your way of believing. I will say good day to you sir, KhabarNegar ^Talk 08:02, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

What does Fox News and CNN have to with torture and executions of dissidents?--Anders Feder (talk) 16:24, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Can you read and understand the English language?! Good Bye man, have fun! KhabarNegar ^Talk 19:58, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

• I believe banning the media of an entire country will create a severe systemic bias, especially in the cases of notability. But, before providing supporting evidences for my abstract statement, let me ask a more concrete question about your statement about "strict control by the Iranian theocracy" and your deduction about unreliability of the media based on it. Consider Iranian Students News Agency, can you elaborate on why you think this news agency is unreliable? Taha (talk) 21:50, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

For the same reasons that any other source under severe media control laws ought to be considered unreliable: it's freedom to perform the most crucial journalistic tasks, such as fact-checking and reporting truthfully without fear of retribution, is greatly impeded. According to Slate Magazine, ISNA's former director was "hauled into court on numerous occasions", once merely for reporting on Shirin Ebadi, the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize winner. The government also "no longer allows ISNA to cover the arrests of activists, students, or dissident journalists."[14]--Anders Feder (talk) 22:14, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Well, here is the simple logical flaw in your argument: "Not being allowed to publish on some subjects does not imply that the agency publishes false news." Hope it helps. Taha (talk) 23:12, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

It obviously doesn't help in any way or form. "Always having published made-up stories in the past does not imply that all stories published by The Onion are false" would not have been helpful either.--Anders Feder (talk) 23:20, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

@Anders Feder: Dude, the examples are not the same: my example was to show that in order to show that an agency is unreliable, you need to provide evidence of falsification by the agency. Again, let me help you by repeating that to support your argument you need to provide concrete evidences of news falsification by Iranian Students News Agency.

BTW, I suspect that our discussion is a clear example of WP:DONTGETIT and I am not here to discuss things forever. Taha (talk) 23:53, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

@طاها: Do I really? Please direct me to this page that says that I need to "provide concrete evidences of news falsification" by anything. It must be one of the many policies I've never come across yet. (BTW: If you suspect your behavior is an example of WP:DONTGETIT no one are requiring you to discuss anything forever.)--Anders Feder (talk) 00:02, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

@Anders Feder: As a practice, let me first explain where I got my statement and I will ask you to provide yours: Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) is a news agency (surprise!) and usually does not publish op-ed pieces. Thus, given the first paragraph of WP:NEWSORG plus one of the items there that states Whether a specific news story is reliable for a specific fact or statement in a Wikipedia article should be assessed on a case-by-case basis. it is crystal clear that in order to disprove reliability of ISNA, you need to provide concrete evidences of falsification. Now, your turn: please enlighten me how the fact that ISNA cannot report on some topics, makes its news on other topics false. Taha (talk) 00:23, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

It's as crystal clear as a piece of mud. There is nothing in the wording "should be assessed on a case-by-case basis" that suggests that I "need to provide concrete evidences of falsification" any more that someone would need to do so for some blog that someone set up and called their "news agency". Particularly in a country where people routinely wind up getting killed or tortured for cross-checking other bloggers' stories.--Anders Feder (talk) 00:59, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

@Anders Feder: I am done. Good luck finding another user to argue with. Taha (talk) 01:04, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Likewise.--Anders Feder (talk) 01:19, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Media control in Iran is not as bad as it is advertised. The so called theocratic regime tolerates criticism towards pretty much anything including the executive branch of the government. There are a few items in the taboo region of the media mainly the supreme leader and religious values. Other than that, it is relatively open. If you are looking to save journalism you might want to focus on here. Cheers.--Kazemita1 (talk) 07:22, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Don't try to disrupt the discussion with whataboutery please. Does censorship in Turkey make censorship in Iran better? As for the taboos of the supreme leader and religious values, which of those do these fall into: journalist given 6 months jail and 74 lashes for criticizing conservatives[15], newspaper closed for publishing an opinion disputing the legality of a certain detention[16], woman arrested for describing her previous arrest online[17], newspaper suspended for commemorating Hussein-Ali Montazeri's death[18], journalist jailed 6 years for "anti-government publicity"[19], filmmaker jailed 5 years for "anti-government propaganda"[20], newspaper suspended for publishing information "likely to disturb public opinion"[21], website blocked for publishing letter criticizing nuclear policy[22], etc., etc., etc.--Anders Feder (talk) 16:08, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Anders Feder; I read your case and also read through some of the subsequent debates with your opponents. You seem so adamant to discredit all Iranian news agencies based on a series of allegations some of which despite seeming to be at least partially compelling, but are still debatable at a more fundamental level. As a person well familiar with Iranian and Islamic culture in particular and being a critique of Western Orientalist cultural biases on general, I hope to point out some of the flaws in your arguments which I think generally reflect some of the political/cultural biases of the Orientalist, Euro-centric discourse.

* First, you argue that Iranian media are not reliable for they "are controlled by the government and the theocracy." As for the merits of this above claim, first, if it is the government regulation and oversight of the Iranian media that you are objecting to, then I think that is not whatsoever a practice confined to Iran. Ofcom for example is the British media regulation office, a government approved body, that claims "to represent the interests of citizens" and has a wide range of authorities over the British media. But that apparently has never been thought as discrediting the credibility of British media despite the fact British mainstream media are known to closely conform to the key policies of the British government. So the fact that a government controls or regulates its media is neither exclusive to Iran, nor does it, in and of itself, automatically undermine the credibility of media in any given country.

* As for your argument from ownership. Government ownership is not, in and of itself, a factor in deciding a news agency's credibility or lack thereof. BBC is a very influential media company which is funded by the British government, but despite that it is considered reliable by the Wikipedia standards.

* Your allegations of false/inaccurate reporting. Even given the veracity of your particular charges (which is debatable), they are hardly adequate to indicate a general trend of inaccurate reporting with a news agency. Moreoever, in comparison to the record of some of the Western media, I can argue that even a stronger case can be made against their reliability at least in covering certain fields, yet despite that these media sources are considered "most reliable" according to Wikipedia. A prime example is the notorious Iraqi WMD allegations that were uncritically picked up and propagated by some of the most influential Western media sources, and the repercussions as we know was a catastrophic war imposed on people of Iraq and also overwhelming financial costs inflicted on American and British taxpayers. Despite grave consequences of such a diabolical case of vehement public agitation by the Western media under a false pretext for war, it seems that nobody has effectively yet questioned the credibility of such sources as Foxnews, CBS or BBC at least for their reporting on Mid East, Iraq, Islam or Western governments' foreign policy!

* The other problem with your "control" argument is that you completely ignore the fact that indeed all media are in one way or another "controlled". The "villain" however is not just the "bad" governments that may manipulate the media for their political aims, but also even more critically the corporations that own some of the most powerful media companies in the world (example) and can use (as have used) them for advancing their 'financial' interests. Read Corporate media for this thesis.

Alright, I'm done for now. This turned out already too lengthy and so far I have only addressed the flaws in your arguments on the political side of things. I leave the cultural critique for later after a consensus on the above points is reached. Maybe I can hope the outcome of this exchange can be used to update the Wikipedia Systematic Bias. Thanks! — Strivingsoul (talk) 20:36, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

If "Western Orientalist cultural biases" is a bias against sources which likely have been coerced with various forms of torture and intimidation into representing the world untruthfully, then that is exactly the bias Wikipedia should have. The comparison with BBC and Ofcom is hilarious - UK does not have an ultra-authoritarian clerical leadership like Iran's that can arbitrarily direct what its national media should and should not report. But it would be entertaining to see your arguments that it does.--Anders Feder (talk) 14:35, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Until 1 March 1990, section 2 of the Official Secrets Act 1911 allowed them to suppress any official information whatsoever, regardless of its character. It was said that gardener at Hampton Court Palace could be prosecuted if he gave away information about watering begonias (HC Deb 19 Jan 1979). There are and have been plenty of other laws restricting freedom of information and expression in Britain to, unless I am mistaken, a greater extent than it is or has been restricted in the US. James500 (talk) 17:04, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

• Yes, there is a general problem Anent which see Wikipedia:Source pH as an essay. Someday Wikipedia will actually have to understand why so many RS discussions seem to fall into this issue. Collect (talk) 15:31, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Please read the Clarification of the claim. As Andres Feders said above he means "practically all media which are subject to Iranian media laws unreliable" which means an Iranian magazine about life style or fauna is unreliable because it can not criticize the leader!!!--Seyyed(t-c) 03:28, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Regarding fauna, one of the Islamic Republic of Iran's foremost authorities is its founder, Ruhollah Khomeini, who writes: "Dog and pig, unless they live in water, are impure, as are their hairs, their bones, their claws, and their excrements; on the other hand, sea dogs and pigs are pure."[23] Additionally, "... a container which has been licked by a dog or been used to give a dog his food or drink in, before being twice washed in water, must be rubbed first with earth. If a pig has used it, the dish must be washed seven times in succession but it need not be rubbed with earth."[24] Further, animals that eat human excrement are impure, but can be purified by keeping them from eating human excrement for certain number of days (40 days for a camel, 20 days for cattle, 10 days for sheep, 7 or 5 for a turkey, and 3 for a chicken).[25] "... fish, on the other hand, is never impure, even if found dead in the water, for its blood does not spurt."[26] Should we use this as a source in zoology articles on Wikipedia? If no, you could be sentenced to death for "insults against the memory of Imam Khomeini,"[27] as could any Iranian zoologist disputing the wisdom of the quoted.--Anders Feder (talk) 13:56, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

@User:Anders Feder What you have mentioned from Ruhollah Khomeini is related to Islamic Law (Najis) and as I know there is a consensus among all Muslims about it. You have confused yourself by mixing the unrelated issues. No one wants to add such texts in zoology articles. Such texts can be used in the Islam-related articles such as Animals in Islam. In addition, this case is not restricted to Islam or Iran. There are similar issues in the other religions, as well. Although you think these are factious ideas and do not believe in them, but you can understand when we speak about a technical magazine of Iran's Fauna, we do not want to mix it with religious aspect of the issue. Unless, you want to divert the discussion so that the people be confused.--Seyyed(t-c) 16:02, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

I haven't confused anything. It's the Iranian authorities that confuse religion and science: "Another characteristic that sets Iran’s educational system apart is the regular intrusion of religious learning. Topics about religion, Islamic history, ethical principles, religious practices, and topics related to religious and Islamic thought are not presented only in books on religion or the Koran. The social studies, history, Farsi and sciences textbooks discuss religious, Islamic, and political-ideological issues either directly, by insinuation, or by using metaphors. / An important result of this approach is the large-scale blending of religious beliefs with scientific and secular knowledge. The “sacred” is mixed with the “profane” in the curriculum persistently. The coexistence of these two signifies a belief in the connection and unity of different fields of knowledge."[28]--Anders Feder (talk) 16:27, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

To name all the media of a country unreliable is itself a biased idea. It needs one by one survey of all the articles and news of all the newspapers and magazins to judge with such a assurance. Have you done such a survey? The sources to which you are referencing should be studied. You are confusing the matters under the discussion.Salman mahdi (talk) 12:05, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Does it? Have you done a "one by one" survey of all WP:SELFPUBLISHED sources? If you haven't, or don't know of someone who has, then why do you think we have a guideline against using them?--Anders Feder (talk) 16:30, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

@User:Anders Feder, First, as I know there is no any relation between Sharia law and zoology, neither in Iran nor any other country. Halal foods does not relate to zoology. Zoologists have not reliability to discuss about Sharia, aw well. Second, I can make the same argument about the western culture. Humanism, liberalism and secularism make a dominant discourse in western countries, so that you can find it every where. Not only, in the philosophical texts, but even in the scientific texts. As Michel Foucault as well as the other post structuralists show in their works, the neutral objectivity in scientific researches can not be reached. Of course, wikipedia, has its own philosophical foundations , particularly Perspectivism. We are here to work based on wikipedia's approach not our own approach. We do not want to propagate religious ideas, but as I understand wikipedia, it is important to narrate the issues from religious viewpoint as well as secular, regarding to their weights. For example, we should narrate creationism as well as Darwinism. Your approach leads to removing creationism , completely. --Seyyed(t-c) 17:53, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Where in any writings on the foundations of Wikipedia have you come to the conclusion that one of them is perspectivism? That is just really wrong. There is nothing in Wikipedia's policies to suggest that scientific findings, for instance, should be regarded merely as a perspective. And, yes, humanism, liberalism and secularism is certainly influential in Western countries - that is why academics and reporters don't get randomly persecuted just for saying the truth.--Anders Feder (talk) 21:08, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

We are not here to discuss whether modern civilization has killed more people through imperialism, modern ideologies, ethnic cleansing, synthetic drugs, etc or the former ones. We also do not want to discuss about the possibility of the relation between science and truth. We want to discuss the issues based on the Wikipedia policies and guidelines. The WP:DUE shows a kind of Perspectivism. However, WP:VALID and WP:IMPARTIAL restrict it to some extent. Finally, WP:NPOV#Bias in sources shows clearly that your understanding is wrong in wikipedia.--Seyyed(t-c) 03:56, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

WP:NPOV#Bias in sources has nothing whatsoever to do with my understanding. If you want to discuss policies and guidelines, why do you begin blabbering about Nietzsche and Foucault?--Anders Feder (talk) 17:11, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

Meta-comment: I'm going to ask everyone here to be very careful to avoid actual or implied accusations of personal bias. If you want to do that, go over to ANI or COIN, but it has no place here where we are supposed to assume good faith. Indeed, while I disagree with Anders Feder on the general issue, I see no reason to believe that he did not make the proposal in good faith and, frankly, it was not a off-the-wall totally illogical idea, just not a good one in my opinion. We don't need to be discussing editors here, just ideas. Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 14:52, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

@user:Anders Feder. I'm totally against the idea of "Iranian media are generally unreliable". This attitude towards "Iranian Media", as a whole, is the same as some peoples' towards "The West", as a whole. my opinion is well-discssed by Taha: removing all Iranian media for the sake of systemic bias prevention would make a systemic bias itself. we should evaluate Iranian sources on a case-by-case basis. By the way, no one is really interested in your/others off-topic information/personal opinion. Amirreza ^talk 22:48, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

@Amirreza: By the way, no one is interested in your "off-topic information/personal opinion" either. I am not surprised you aren't able to counter the points raised.--Anders Feder (talk) 22:59, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

@user:Anders Feder. My argument was not "off-topic". I ignore your personal attack, however, I will assume the right to post a grievance if you continue this unconstructive behavior of commenting on editors. Amirreza ^talk 23:20, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm looking forward to it.--Anders Feder (talk) 23:24, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Reliability underlies NPOV which is a pillar. Everything else is secondary. Unless you manage to change the pillar, this discussion is pointless.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:43, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Bosstopher: You are raising the argument that Iranian state sources should not be held to the same standards of WP:RELIABILITY as all other sources lest it would entail a systemic bias against Iran. You are entitled to that view, but the overwhelming consensus is against it.--Anders Feder (talk) 17:08, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for linking that, it was an interesting read. Based on what I said I have to say I partially agree with Seyyed on this. Magazines and papers on zoology and the like published in Iran, should not be considered unreliable just because of political repression in the press. Iran is currently one of the top 10 ranked countries for STEM cell research [isg-mit.org/projects-storage/StemCell/stem_cell_iran.pdf] and high ranking internationally in other scientific sectors. The idea that all scientific papers coming out of the country should be disregarded just because a bunch of Ayatollahs with political influence spend too much time pondering over whether or not touching animals in certain place is Najis, quite frankly seems silly.Bosstopher (talk) 12:40, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Any evidence that the 895+ cases of political imprisonment registered by the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran last year[29] were due to the convicted individuals having "touched animals in certain place" is welcome on the RfC. To the extent that any vitally important stem cell research comes out of Iran, it will almost always be covered by external, reliable sources.--Anders Feder (talk) 14:53, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

@Anders Feder: I've copied the discussion to the RfC, because we were getting off topic from the original deletion discussion. My comment about touching animals was meant to be a response to a comment you made above where you said Iranian publications about Fauna should be disregarded because Ruhollah Khomeini's opinion on what is Najis. I also hardly see what relevance high political imprisonment rates has to do with the quality of scientific research coming out of Iran.Bosstopher (talk) 15:36, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Immediate merges as a solution to articles?

What is our policy / practice / best practice for the situation where one editor is against an article and so decides, unilaterally and without discussion, to redirect it or merge and redirect it, to another article?

I'm seeing a lot of this lately. A few examples [30], [31], [32] & [33]

We are supposed to be a collegiate project. We are supposed to work by group consensus. AfD et al generate list indexes so that those who wish to monitor what's going on can see them pass by. PROD allows time for some chance of a response. Even CSD isn't immediate. Most things here grind imponderably slowly, so why is this loophole for immediate single-opinion removal sanctioned?

What are the conditions when it might be appropriate to act in this way, as opposed to the visible routes? Andy Dingley (talk) 23:28, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Redirects are supposed to be expanded into articles, unilateral merges are not supposed to bypass PROD or AfD. You owe me € 0,02. Be..anyone (talk) 06:09, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

See MERGEINIT which is part of WP:MERGING, an information page (which is a little more than an essay, but a little less than a guideline and claims some degree of community consensus), which says that BOLD mergers are acceptable if the editor feels that the need is "obvious," with the next step up from that being a local discussion, then up from that a listing at Proposed mergers. I don't remember where I saw it (based on my editing habits, it was probably somewhere at the Village Pump), but there was a recent discussion about either specifically allowing or prohibiting — I don't remember which — nominations at AFD when the nominator only nominated it to propose merger or nom'ed it for deletion but also proposed merger as an alternative, but I don't think that the discussion ended up going anywhere, but the fact that it happened, along with MERGEING, suggests that AFD is not generally regarded as the normal way to propose mergers. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 14:49, 24 February 2015 (UTC) (PS: If this is a collegiate project does that mean that I'm not supposed to be editing here, since I graduated from college over 30 years ago? .)

No objections against the BOLD clause on this information page from my side, I know that BOLD and IAR are policies. And the last thing this wiki needs are more bureaucratic guidelines, style manuals, or any other instruction creep. But it should be really obvious, as in, nobody in possession of their marbles has a snownall's chance in hell to contest the undiscussed unilateral merge successfully. –Be..anyone (talk) 16:21, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

I couldn't agree more as to the probable intended meaning of obvious, but so long as we have anything short of a policy which absolutely prohibits redirects and mergers without some kind of discussion first (a policy which I would oppose, by the way: we need more housekeeping, not less, and redirects and mergers are not always controversial), then obviousness will always be in the eye of the beholder. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 18:05, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

WP:MERGEINIT gives this useful example, "This might be appropriate and easy where, for example, there are two stubs with nearly the same title with slightly different spellings. " Now that's obviously sensible and few would question it. The problem is that there are merges instead that are simple deletions by stealth. Look at my first example, Two Weeks with the Queen. This was taken to AfD to resolve the issue more clearly, where it was both expanded for sourcing and closed as a resounding keep with the remarkable comment, "I suggest you don't renominate this judging by the comments below ". The original merger, unsurprisingly, sent it to an immediate second AfD. Where it collected a comment by an admin familiar with the book who had also been one of the few against keeping it the first time, " You don't get to just keep relisting pages you don't like until those who disagree aren't paying attention and the discussion is ended.". Firstly, thanks to Lankiveil for displaying an even-handedness that's getting rare these days. Their comment highlights the problem here: We also have to guard against the persistent and unrepresentative, because WP is often weak against the truly dedicated edit warrior. There is a theme developing where deletion by merge is simply becoming a short-cut to sneaking articles away when no-one is looking. That is no part of WP:MERGEINIT.

Hi Andy, I really appreciate the nice comment! For my own two cents, I don't have any problem with the actions taken by anyone up until the second nomination; boldly redirecting and then reverting, followed by a discussion, strikes me as the sort of thing that we should be doing. My only problem is that the discussion reached a conclusion, and was then extended on what I consider to be very thin grounds, based on a technicality. At some point, everyone sometimes need to realises that their view is not always the consensus view, and walk away. Now, in theory one might use WP:PM for this purpose, but they'd have to get around all the tumbleweed to do that. AFD is for better or worse where people comes, so it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that we should propose binding merges or redirects there. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 10:52, 27 February 2015 (UTC).

'Collegiate' BTW is from the root from collegium or 'partnership'. We're supposed to work here in the same way as the Fellows of a college are (also supposed) to operate: as a self-organising collaboration with minimal hierarchy and a respect for all viewpoints. Some however would prefer a magisterium of proper deference to those arbiters of all content decisions, the admins. Andy Dingley (talk) 03:30, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Those examples you've given are perfect examples of where immediate redirection is the best choice. If someone wishes to come along later and provide third-party reliable sourcing for the articles, the material is still there for them to do so.—Kww(talk) 14:55, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

And one more word: BOLD redirects or mergers are just like any other BOLD editing here. If someone opposes it, they're free to revert and once that happens, the proper solution is to discuss, not re-revert. If discussion between the two editors in dispute is fruitless, then move on to the steps described in MERGEINIT, or nominate it for deletion at AFD. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 14:59, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

There were also other options. The Gleitzman novel had never been tagged for notability, so the editor could have done that. Or better yet check whether it was notable himself. It survived the AfD discussion rather easily, so if the editor had checked it probably would have been easy to find those book reviews and add them to the article. Instead he just glanced at what was in the article, decided it was unsatisfactory, and redirected, as 1 of 50 other things he did that day.

Also it's considered good practice when making a bold redirect to leave a note at the destination article so that other editors know that the redirected article existed. That wasn't done either. As it happens we were lucky that someone was watching. It could have just vanished with nobody being aware that it ever existed. – Margin1522 (talk) 16:13, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Options is exactly the right word. While virtually all that you say is best practices, editors almost always have the right to just do the minimum that's actually required. Unless they uniformly or consistently fail to follow best practices, which may show that they're not really editing in the best interest of the encyclopedia, then they're not really subject to any effective criticism merely because an occasional act does the minimum rather than the best. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 18:05, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

This is true. About merge proposals and AfD, I think that discussion may have been this RfC. Basically I think it comes down to having good judgment, and you can do it if you are Andy. I would have tagged it myself. – Margin1522 (talk) 23:25, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Which Andy? The problem here is largely one of judgement: these one-act deletions-by-redirect are unreviewed and secretive (unlike almost anything else at WP). They rely on the judgement of a single editor. As Two Weeks with the Queen shows, this article began as an unclear article on a notable topic, although this notability was strong and hinted at fairly clearly, even if not sourced in the article. Poor judgement though vanished it. With the slightest review at AfD (never a good place, but often the last chance) the appropriate sources were added. This should have happened as part of WP:BEFORE the redirection, but poor judgement had skipped that part. The second ridiculous AfD, even after very clear sources had been addded, is just a typical behavioural problem.

WP needs practices that are robust against individual poor judgements. AfD helps to do that. Single-editor deletions-by-redirect do not. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:03, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia even more desperately needs editors capable of understanding the difference between redirection and deletion. Any editor can undo a redirect, and, if the material being restored meets our fundamental policies and guidelines, can do so without any negative repercussions. That's not true of deletions. Now, it's quite true that this was a disruptive edit, because the material being restored did not meet our guidelines and policies. Had the editor that performed the reversion shown any grasp of our fundamental policies, he could have added the sources necessary to do so on the spot. Unfortunately, he apparently considered it to be an opportunity to attack other editors.—Kww(talk) 00:11, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Redirects have two purposes: placeholders for future articles, and as a navigation aid where a subject does not justify a separate article. I see no problem with any of the four redirections you identify above. All four articles read as personal essays drawn from observation of the subject, probably the worst form of fancruft on Wikipedia. Guy (Help!) 08:34, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

I wonder why I wasn't notified of this discussion of my actions? For the benefit of those confused by the partial and partisan explanation given above, the first AfD of Two Weeks with the Queen had no deletion rationale (being made, pointedly, by someone who objected to its redirection; and who then immediately !voted "keep"), and so was obviously ("easily", as it's described above) kept, on that basis alone. Note the paucity of discussion of the topic's notability by most commenters in that debate. The second AfD, which did have a deletion rationale, was thus closed out-of-process. A good lesson learned: next time I want to keep an article of dubious notability, I'll AfD it with no rationale. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:49, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

Notice: RFC at WikiProject Film

There is a discussion at WT:FILM#RfC: Do list items need their own WP article in order to be sourced in list articles? which is about this page and could potentially lead to changes to it. —174.141.182.82 (talk) 11:28, 17 April 2015 (UTC)