Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Policies

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WP:RFC/POLICIES

This page is to request comment on policy or guideline topics. That applies both to disputes about any current policy or guideline, and any new proposals or amendments to those. Further, policy matters are also discussed at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy).

Requests for comment on Policy, guideline, and proposal issues
Please help out by providing comment on another dispute listed here
  • List newer entries on top, stating briefly and neutrally what the debate is about.
  • Provide a link to the relevant section on the article's talk page.
  • Sign entries with the date only, by using five tildes: ~~~~~.
  • Do not continue the debate here, or make personal comments on this page.


  • Reference Desk Talk Page There is a major dispute going on there. People are deleting things written by other users, there are edit wars, people are telling other people to leave Wikipedia and people are starting to leave Wikipedia. Some people are even going away to Wikiversity. Please, comment there! It's a dispute about what is the Reference Desk and how the Wikipedia pillars apply to the Reference Desk. A.Z. 16:52, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Image:FBISeal.png According to the United States Code, Title 18, Section 709, (and this does apply; Wikipedia's servers are in the US state of Florida) unauthorized use of the FBI seal, the words “Federal Bureau of Investigation,” the initials “FBI,” or any imitation “in a manner reasonably calculated to convey the impression that such [activity]...is approved, endorsed, or authorized by the Federal Bureau of Investigation” is prohibited. Especially on the template Template:User FBI (which you'll have to look at a past version of) this is conveyed. 00:47, 3 April 2007 (UTC)


  • Wikipedia:Scope: Requesting commentary about ensuring that information in articles remains within the scope of the article content. --Wasted Sapience 12:20, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Disambiguation: I cut down the list of Ohio townships on Franklin Township to just a link to Franklin Township, Ohio, thinking to make the page less cluttered and easier to use somewhat as a directory. Another editor disagreed, saying "is there a point to forcing readers to go to a second disambiguation page?" I don't know the proper policy on this. Would there please be somewhat of discussion on the Franklin Township talk page? 13:25, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
  • User:Jayron32/Guide to reviewing Good Articles. A draft proposal for more extensive guidance to editors wishing to review Good Articles candidates. Please make any changes as you see fit, and leave any comments you have on the talk page. I propose a goal of having the draft finalized within 2 weeks from today (by April 13) and moved to the GA project by that date. Thank you all for your attention to this. --Jayron32|talk|contribs 16:12, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Chemical compounds: Wikipedia has hundreds, if not thousands, of articles on chemical compounds, generally found in the many subcategories of Category:Chemical compounds by element. Unfortunately, many of these are permanent stubs and low on content, such as those listed here. Wikipedia:Chemical compounds has been created to discuss what to do with all this. Deletion is arguably a waste, but perhaps some articles can be combined into lists for greater comprehensiveness. Please join the discussion on Wikipedia talk:Chemical compounds. 16:25, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Unprotection of WP:RS (and perhaps others): Page was protected along with WP:ATT on the basis of "stability" which is not a recognized reason for page protection at WP:PROT; a later reason that editwarring is immiment was brought up to preserve the protection, but there is no actual evidence of editwarring; rather, there is broad consensus to restore material that was deleted without consensus before the protection - even the person who reverted that restoration immediately before the block agrees with the consensus and said they did the revert for the "stability" rationale. Others, at both WP:RS talk and in a related, larger thread at WP:ATT talk, challege the blocks as unilateral (cf. Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources#PLEASE - NO CHANGES RIGHT NOW), without consensus and against policy and process, and that disputes about the future of WP:ATT have nothing to do with whether the policies and guidelines that were melded to create WP:ATT, and which have been restored to active status, need to be protected from editing. Probably due to concerns about corewarring, WP:RFPP have been reluctant to get involved. The issues raised also extend to the protection of WP:V and WP:NOR. So, broader community input is sought on whether any of these page protections should remain, and whether WP:RS in particular should be unprotected immediately. 03:29, 24 March 2007 (UTC) Update: The protection is also thwarting application of the proper merge tags to the various original policy pages, as discussed at WP:ATT talk and at at WP:RS talk. 18:19, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Protection of WP:ATT without {{Protected}} tag. Short version: Article was protected pending outcome of a poll. Req. made at WP:RFPP to tag the article with {{Protected}}, which is not only normal but highly appropriate in this case because WP:ATT is heavily disputed as to its status and as to its particulars (and {{Protected}} specifically references dispute as the defensible rationale for the protection under WP:PROT). An RFPP admin responded by doing the requested tagging. A party to the disputes at WP:ATT removed the tag. RFPP admin replaced it, dispute participant removed it again, and replaced it with a POV statement of the situation that is strongly disagreed with by other parties to the debates. Should the {{Protected}} tag be restored, and debate partcipants reminded to leave the article alone while it is protected, since the purpose of page protection is not to create an admins-only editing environment? The relevant RFPP material is here — 22:17, 23 March 2007 (UTC) Update: The {{Protected}} tag was put back on this one (for the third time). 01:37, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
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