Wikipedia talk:Notability/Archive 14

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Contents

Why change?

Here are my summary thoughts on why the change is a good idea:

  • The previous notability guideline was controversial and has been disputed for a long time
  • Discussion here (including the March straw poll) showed a sharp divide with a general consensus for change.
  • The guideline was gradually being deprecated
  • The guideline did a poor job of coexisting with the subject specific guidelines and the structure was confusing. There was no real guidance on whether someone who met one of the criteria at (say) WP:BIO but did not meet WP:N should be included. Discussion at AfD was often similarly confused – some argue WP:PROF, some argue WP:N etc.
  • The guideline did not reflect the reality at AfD. If there is truly one primary criterion, why does the discussion not begin and end with a demand for proof of significant coverage in multiple nontrivial sources.
  • The concept of notability inherently has a subjective element. This reality is reflected in the subject specific guidelines and at AfD. Refusal to recognize the subjective aspect of notability resulted in a guideline that was confusing, controversial, too rigid and often ignored.
  • A process of looking first at WP:N, then at the subject specific guideline (if applicable) and lastly at the individual merits of the actual article is a better one and more accurately reflects the reality on the ground.--Kubigula (talk) 20:57, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
  • The notability guideline is disputed by people who refuse to have any notability inclusion requirement at all, who seek to gut the concept entirely, and there is no consensus for that.
  • "Consensus for change" or "Poll to rebuild" does not mean change it into this. Please explain what was wrong with the previous version.
  • Is there any evidence that the guideline was being deprecated? Looking at the AfDs for May 11, [1], there are a huge number of references to notability--almost every discussion has them--and several to Wikipedia:Notability specifically, and that is in just one day, so saying it was being deprecated is utterly false.
  • What is wrong with requiring the sufficient sourcing per this guideline for all articles? Why is the solution to non-co-existing subject-specific guidelines to eviscerate this guideline?
  • If this guideline did not reflect the reality at AfD, can you give some examples of articles that were kept despite there being no indication of the the sufficient sourcing of this guideline, or deleted despite the existence of such sources? As above, it is not necessary that every commenter say "Why look, there are not multiple non-trivial independent reliable published sources." "I agree, sir, there are not multiple non-trivial independent reliable published sources."
  • The purpose here is to remove the subjective element for the purposes of a guideline. The subjective element is only in trying to anticipate whether a topic will meet these sourcing requirements, which can be added here--there is a good spot for it; there is no subjective element being the subject element inherent in WP:NPOV and WP:RS in determining whether a topic actually meets these sourcing requirements.
  • Again, is there any example of an article that should be included that does not meet these sourcing requirements? Is there any example of an article kept that does not meet these requirements? —Centrx→talk • 14:41, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
Looking through the page of AfDs you cited, it strikes me how rarely WP:N is cited by itself. In the substantive arguments, there is almost always a reference to another policy or guideline to support the position. Personally, I had stopped citing N as the sole basis for arguing deletion. Most of the reason that I went ahead and implemented the proposal when I did was because the disputed guideline tag had been reinserted for the second time in several days, and I honestly thought it might just stick. You may think the guideline was doing just fine, but I saw lots of writing on the wall that the patient was in trouble.--Kubigula (talk) 15:12, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't see any reason to believe that just because people don't say "WP:N" or "Wikipedia:Notability" does not mean they do not refer to this page. People cite "WP:BIO" because the alternative is to say "the notability guidelines on persons". The alternative for this page is simply saying "notability", which is quite simple and easier to type than even [[WP:N]]. The subject-specific guidelines are referred to more than "WP:N" simply because the special links are abbreviations. "notability" and consideration of the non-triviality and independence of sourcing pervades AfD discussions. —Centrx→talk • 21:34, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
OK, but I don't see any real reason to believe they are referring to this page either. We have many various notability guidelines that they could be referring to (or some mental blend of some or all of them), but I think it's just as likely many are refering to notability in the dictionary sense. Also, discussion of sources does quite rightly pervade AfD, but so do the attributes from BIO, CORP etc, and not just as some meaningless list of things that may possibly suggest notability, but not really unless there is signficant coverage in multiple sources.--Kubigula (talk) 01:51, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
In that case, you simply have no evidence either way and your point is still moot. Anyway, people are linking to Wikipedia:Notability specifically, just not as many as the people who link to WP:BIO, who are linking to it because it is a useful abbreviation, not because they have read it and are referring to the guideline specifically. —Centrx→talk • 16:45, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
One more point - the new version is also more consistent with the concept of notability in WP:CSD, particularly A7 and the accompanying template, {{Nn-warn}} - the "no assertion of notability" criterion for speedy deletion. Clearly, when we say that the article does not assert notability (or "the importance or significance") of a subject, we don't mean that the article has not asserted the presence of significant coverage in reliable sources. We mean there is no assertion of some objective measure of notability such as the ones contained in the subject specific guidelines. Thus, this guideline is more consistent by explicitely recognizing the validity of measuring notability by sources or the other various indicators contained in the SSGs. As a side note, we probably should remove (or change) "importance" from A7 and nn-warn as we prominently say notability is distinct from importance here.--Kubigula (talk) 03:58, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't know what you mean here. The previous version specifically referred to sources, and the "assertion" requirement is above what is necessary for a topic to be notable. For the CSD, a topic must first be non-notable and then in addition there must be no assertion. An article that contains no assertion of notable may still be on a notable topic. —Centrx→talk • 16:45, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Objective/Subjective again

In order to (hopefully) put to rest the objective/subjective issue and to further draw out the theme that runs through the various notability guidelines, I propose changing the second paragraph to the following:

  • Notability is an inherently subjective concept. However, for a subject to be sufficiently notable for an article in Wikipedia, it must have an objective and verifiable sign of notability. Receiving significant coverage in reliable and independent sources or meeting one of the agreed subject specific criteria are sufficient signs to create a presumption of notability. The table to the right lists the guidelines in specific fields where editors have reached, or are working towards, consensus regarding objective standards for general classes of topics.

While many/most of us seem to agree that notability is inherently subjective, it's important to note (and a common theme), that any article must contain some objective way to measure or test notability - an award, a listing on a major stock exchange, substantive coverage in reliable sources etc.--Kubigula (talk) 04:34, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I think that is a reasonable way to address the subjectivity issue. Notability is subjective, and trying to deny this with source counting has been rejected (what constitutes an acceptable source to count is subjective anyway). But stating that there must be objective evidence, not just "I know it" or "I like it", is appropriate. Dhaluza 09:27, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
  • This is just opening up a festering wound. We can't cure the problem and more text just obscures the purpose of the guideline. Notability is what it is and any other word seems to have the same problems. I think that this just ends up being more bloat. --Kevin Murray 13:55, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
    • Kevin, I think you should look at this with an open mind. You may think (or hope) that this is nearing a conclusion, but there is more ground to cover. Although I think we may have made progress on subjectivity and source counting, the current definition of Notability appears to be a dead end. If we acknowledge that secondary sources are not appropriate (or necessary) for every possible subject under the sun, and remove this, what's left? All we would have is a redundant restatement of WP:V. The concept of requiring "objective proof of notability" is something that makes this guideline relevant instead of redundant. Dhaluza 00:51, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Secondary sources are essential in judging notability

Secondary sources may “strongly preferred” for wikipedia, but for measuring notability, secondary sources are essential. A long list of reliable primary sources, as per Fuhghettaboutit “the mortgage on my house”; “its chain of title back to the 1800s”, is not a test of notability. Primary sources include reports, especially automatic and routine reports, that list facts without commentary, analysis or alternative perspective. They are almost always co-temporary (at the same time). They include government reports, official documents and even wire reports when they are purely reporting an event. “Secondary sources”, unlike “reliable”, “independent” or “third party” excludes these sources. Only by insisting on secondary sources can you insist that somebody was writing intellectually about the subject, and not just making a purely derivative work. --SmokeyJoe 21:33, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

I think that you are correct since we are not discussing inclusion of information, but seeking a surrogate measurement of notability (third party recognition). The exceptions that I can think of are inclusion in a primary source which demonstrates or proves qualification under another guideline. For example a sports roster that proves that Joe Jones was a member of the 1938 Yankees and thus qualifies under BIO. This is not specifically pertinent to WP:N, but is pertinent to the subject specific pages. --Kevin Murray 21:49, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
I think you are both correct. Smokey's point is correct as to the "general notability" test. However, you may be able to show meeting a subject specific guideline using a reliable primary source. That's why I chose "objective evidence" as the term that best seems to fit both this guideline and the others.--Kubigula (talk) 22:19, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure. Notability is an innnate characteristic of the subject, and there are obviously degrees of it, and it is up to us at WP where to set the limit is all the different subject areas of encyclopedic importance. To demonstrate N we need sources, and usually this means secondary sources, but a clear reliable primary source is really enough. To write an article, however, we need secondary sources in almost all cases, to avoid OR. Actually, I don't think there's anything wrong with OR, except that it wouldn't work here, because accepting OR requires someone to judge the quality of it, and WP has been basically set up to not do that. But this does not affect N. N depends upon sources in only one way: we need some method to find out who qualifies. DGG 03:13, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
DGG says: “Notability is an innate characteristic of the subject”. “Notability” in real world usage is different to what this guideline is talking about. That’s why I suggested “sufficiently” notable, and am happy with the wording “presumed to be notable”. Absolute notability is such a low threshold that it is absurd. Defining a wikipedia-threshold-notability using secondary sources seems completely workable. Does anyone have examples of desirable articles for which secondary sources don’t exist? The fact that WP:NOR calls for secondary sourcing means that WP:N is not much of an extension beyond WP:NOR. I don’t understand your last three sentences. Could you rephrase? --SmokeyJoe 03:41, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
  • DGG, there is a differnce between performing primary research and citing primary sources. I think that an article which meets a subject specific guideline could be built on only primary sources, without doing primary research. --Kevin Murray 03:55, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Kevin, I agree with you almost completely here, depending on the subject. Controversial matters where value judgments are involved is the time when secondary sources are needed, for he only way of avoiding incessant edit wars and ensuring some degree of objectivity is to stick with quoting what other people say. DGG 04:14, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Smoky, Absolute N is not a hopelessly low bar , because we can set the threshold field by field. We can set the N at whatever level we want, based on what we want the encyclopedia to be.DGG 04:53, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Just to raise the issue again, despite the fact that some contributers openly object to this, the consensus opinion is that articles on major geographic features and populated places are kept, and often these are based on primary sources. There are other exceptions, for example for reference materials which do not typically have secondary sources. So if this guideline is worded to require secondary sources, the exceptions must be acknowledged too. Frankly I think it is better not to do this because of bloat.Dhaluza 10:55, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
It seems to me that we are better off not trying to discuss primary or secondary sources at this guideline. --Kevin Murray 14:07, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Agreed. --badlydrawnjeff talk 15:00, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Well, OTOH, if we remove the secondary source requirement from the current version, what are we left with? Secondary sourcing is a good idea, but not universally applicable. It works well for fictional and social topics, but not so well for physical and technical subjects. I think we had a breakthrough with "objective evidence of notability". That's something that seems workable. It just doesn't have to be limited to secondary sources for all topics. Dhaluza 23:27, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
I have trouble believing that the rivers and populated places you have in mind don’t have secondary sources. You might have to go to a library to find them. Personally, I’d be happy to wait indefinitely for someone to find those sure-to-exist secondary sources, as per that official policy ‎Wikipedia:Editing policy, and I’d prefer WP:N to be a preference, not “considered a standard that all users should follow” (ie an Essay, not a Guideline), but I seemed alone there. --SmokeyJoe 08:00, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Most probably do have accessible secondary sources, but they may not be accessible to the author at the time. But that should not stop an editor from fixing a redlink, or expanding a stub, as long as they at least have accessible primary resources. In the U.S. we have the U.S. Board on Geographic Names who maintain a comprehensive database, the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS). This is primary source data, but it gives the listed places official recognition, which should be sufficient for notability purposes. If a place is not listed, it's probably not notable, unless there are other suitable secondary sources to support it. Any place that is listed is at least worthy of a redirect article.
Let me explain how this works in practice. Let's say I start writing a well researched article on a town with multiple secondary sources. In describing the geography of the town, I wikilink references to the mountains and other settlements around the town, the river that runs through it, the valley it lies in that drains to the river, the main road that runs along the river, etc. Some of these turn up red, so I check the GNIS for the official name, and create a stub using the limited primary source data there. I look up the topo map, and add a description of the surrounding settlements and other geographic features, and wikilink them to create a comprehensive stub. Some of these links turn up red, and the process continues until it's time to go to bed. Then in the morning I wake up and find some sharp shooter has come along overnight and proded these stubs as non-notable because no secondary sources were cited.
These stubs are is completely acceptable under WP:V because the articles' content is verifiable. Having incomplete stubs is also in keeping with WP:EP as you correctly point out. It is also supported by the WP:BTW guideline and WP:RED MoS. But it apparently runs afoul of staunch supporters of the secondary source absolute requirement club. 09:16, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Does anyone have examples of desirable articles for which secondary sources don’t exist? Yes, if you review the archives, we have discussed geographical articles based on U.S. Census Bureau census designated places. There are thousands of these articles which were extensively discussed before finally being comprehensively created by consensus. So, not to rehash this again, how about some more specific examples. Two of the wikiprojects I work on use primary references extensively:
  • Wikipedia:WikiProject Pennsylvania is documenting rivers and streams from List of Pennsylvania rivers. Some of these may seem trivial, and they don't fit the current definition of Notability. But deleting them as non-notable would be wrong--if all the available content is trivial, the article should just be merged up to the river they are a tributary of, leaving a redirect. How would you define notability for a stream anyway? Who writes secondary references about streams, and how do you find them?
  • Wikipedia:WikiProject Airports documents airports. There are over 10,000 operating public use airports in the U.S. now, and thousands more that are closed but of historical significance. Public use airports are notable both as significant man-made geographic features, and for their importance in transportation and commerce. But these articles are predominantly created from primary references like the FAA airport database and self-published material. Again, who writes secondary sources on airports, and how do you define a notable or non-notable public use airport?
Dhaluza 00:29, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
I think this is being made more complicated that it needs to be. If there are no secondary sources which report on a place, it has obviously not been considered "worth of notice". On the airports, there are plenty of secondary sources which report on them including local news media, travel magazines, airline magazines, government reports, pilots' and other trade magazines, and so forth. On the rivers, there are similarly plenty of secondary sources such as environmental advocacy groups, outdoors and other special interest magazines, news media, hiking and other "nature" group publications, etc. For census designated places, it would be hard pressed to imagine there are not at least a handful of histories that cover facts and notable events. (Even the smallest hamlets generally have verifiable material available, conveniently compiled by area and regional historical societies and museums.) If there is simply no secondary material (which would be a very rare thing), then it simply is not noteworthy, as it has not been noticed and reported. Just my two cents. Vassyana 00:43, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Yes, but this sets an impossible standard for people trying to make good faith contributions toward comprehensive coverage of a subject area--you didn't say how to find out if these references exist. And what harm is done if substantial primary source articles are created awaiting secondary sourcing? The effect of this guideline is to allow these to be deleted, which is counter-productive.
Also using secondary sourcing to determine what to include or not sets a completely arbitrary threshold. Are we only to cover streams that we happen to find secondary sources on? So if some journalist writes about his fishing trip on a particular backwater stream, that makes it notable; but if we have maps and guides and other objective data, but no subjective judgment from someone with press credentials (but no expert knowledge) we must remain silent?Dhaluza 01:17, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
I think people can figure out how to find references - how about going to the library? No harm is done with the creation of articles awaiting secondary sourcing - many articles appropriately survive AfD because AfD spurs people to find those sources, and in my experience the ones that don't survive tend not to have any secondary sources.
I don't see how secondary sourcing is an arbitrary standard - it seems the only consistent standard, instead of the subject specific guidelines which have no consistency in relation to each other. UnitedStatesian 01:41, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
It's a logical test, but it's still arbitrary because notability is not something that has an absolute measure. Substanial coverage in reliable sources is a good proxy, but for some topics google hits would be a better measure, or how many times a particular page is read or edited etc. Between human interest stories and local news, it really is a crapshoot about what may happen to have coverage in reliable stories. Given enough resources, I'm fairly confident I could dredge up some coverage of just about any organization and a lot more people than we would typically think of as notable. I know I have some clippings in a box that I could use to write an article about myself that would probably meet WP:N, though I don't think I am notable in any real sense of the word.
I do agree with you that there ought to be more consistency among the subject specific guidelines, and I'm hoping we can move to that once we get a better handle on notability here.--Kubigula (talk) 02:23, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
I know how to find references, but I don't know how to find out if references exist. My local library is very limited in scope. The point of WP is that this is a collaborative project, where we combine all of our resources. So if I start an article with a primary source, you can add your secondary source to it, and we get something even better. But geographic articles, for one, survive AfD without secondary sources, so this does not support your point. Availability of secondary sourcing is arbitrary on many levels. There are many biases in media, including political and economic, as well as simple random variation, which affect the creation, distribution, retention and access to sources. Dhaluza 09:54, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm big on consistency, and I think simplifying the guidelines is a good way to get consistency within subjects by reducing the arbitrary nature of many present decisions. But I cannot find a logical basis for comparing different subjects. It depends on what one is interested in, and what one expects others to be interested in, and there isn't the least agreement here. I seriously do not think it is a practical goal. DGG 02:29, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Sure. I think the major point I have come to accept is that notability is not a "one size fits all" concept. The sources test works well in most situations, but the SSGs serve a critical function in setting objective standards for specific subjects. Consistency of coverage and AfD precedent do matter, and the SSGs allow us a way to ensure some respect for both. The SSGs serve the desire for consistency by not having the fate of articles entirely dependant on who happens to go to AfD and how much effort they are willing to put in to find sources.--Kubigula (talk) 16:50, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Projects relying on primary sources

An example of an entire project which relies on primary sources is Category:Bus routes. While I would oppose the inclusion of this type of trivia, others disagree. It seems that we should reconcile practice to policy or policy to practice. Should this type of information go or stay? --Kevin Murray 14:38, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Personally I think Wikipedia:WikiProject buses' stated goal "to cover bus routes in major cities and their history, including as streetcar lines" is probably something that falls outside the scope of Wikipedia. In fact I think you can reasonably argue that such a project violates the "Not a travel guide" section of WP:NOT#IINFO, and that listings of specific bus routes are better suited to the Wikitravel site then here. So if it were up to me I'd move all such bus route articles that didn't have actual encyclopedic content to Wikitravel. Dugwiki 17:08, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Agreed. I'm surprised to see bus routes on WP as I would have assumed this would be covered by NOT a directory and NOT a travel guide, unless it is some kind of historically significant bus route. I hate to say it (no-one likes CREEP and bloat), but I think "places" (towns, roads, schools) will eventually have to get treated in their own subject specific guideline, so we can develop some kind of uniform treatment. I see there is already a proposal for Highways, so perhaps we should consider expanding that to cover the (IMO) inevitable guideline on places.--Kubigula (talk) 17:23, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
I think that the right number of guidelines is no more and no less than is absolutely needed. I think that we should consider revamping so that we include broad categories such as: Organizations, People, Physical Objects, Creative Works, Geography, and Science. Buildings and roads can go under physical objects. Schools, religions, and governments are all organizations. Books, movies, plays, fiction, software, website, art, songs, symphonies etc are Creative Works. Is a statue a creative work or an object -- fine tuning. --Kevin Murray 17:44, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
There have been articles exclusively about obsolete and defunct bus routes of the 19th century. These do not belong in a travel guide for the obvious reason that you can no longer travel on them. There are probably similar articles about trains, passenger airlines, clipper ship routes and trolleys that no longer run. They, like roads, have their fans who show up to vote Keep in AFDs sometimes as a result of canvassing on the project info page , newsletters, or IRC channel notifications. Often the references are to roadmaps, old schedules or other primary sources, or to personal websites of fans. Yet they get kept. If there were guidelines arguing against such articles, it would be something to cite in AFDs. That said, it has proved pretty easy for a very few editors to object to a guideline, then label it rejected due to lack of consensus. Edison 17:52, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I know that the logistics are difficult due the "Ilikeit" and voting aspect of AfD, but if the route historic or not does not meet this guideline and no other guideline is pertinent, then the article should be deleted. These seem to be cases where a larger topic is warranted such as "History of London Bus Routes." I agree that any guideline will be controlled by the "Ilikeit" crowd and thus be more inclusive than reasonable. --Kevin Murray 18:17, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Notice too that in my reply above I never referred to notability. Rather, I said that most of the bus route articles probably violate WP:NOT, which is policy. So it's not even really a matter of notability, per se, but that these articles are acting mainly as a de facto travel guide and street map. Dugwiki 19:18, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
So, Dugwiki, are you going to tackle the AfDs on all of these articles? UnitedStatesian 01:43, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
I wasn't planning to personally tag all the articles, no. I'm too lazy. :) But hey, if someone else feels passionate enough about it to tag them then I'd probably support the notion. Dugwiki 16:38, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
I would love to get rid of them, primarily on grounds of a bad example for other subjects, and an excellent illustration of what an encyclopedia should not be. But instead of deleting, which I agree is asking for trouble--and I personally don't want to get involved in the kind of fight that it will prove to be--we could merge them into articles for the city or the area. However, whether they are current or historic make no difference towards N. Combining them, (quite possibly without redirects--as who would use them) will allow for the historical aspects and be much quicker than AfDs. (I think this is one of the many special cases where articles we would never try to insert now were started in earlier days, and possibly the community might want to keep them as an exception. Merging is working nicely for elementary schools, a similar situation. It can start slowly as a test. DGG 02:24, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Alright, let's merge away then. (As much as I get called a deletionist, and somewhat tongue-in-cheek agree on my userpage, I generally prefer merging if there's a suitable parent or combination article.) Let's just put a bit about the public transit service in a city into the city article, and leave it at that. Anyone looking for a detailed transit schedule or map can look at the city's website, and the city will keep it updated and accurate much better than we will anyway. Seraphimblade Talk to me 02:34, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
This is an interesting concept. If an article has trivial content, and is merged to another article, the remaining redirect must meet a much lower standard for deletion. However if it has a non-trivial edit history, it probably will be kept. But this can also be a test of sorts for notability. If the article were merged, and the remaining redirect would not be necessary, it's probably not notable. Dhaluza 03:05, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
For most cities, there already is a page for the public transit system, as there usually is enough to be said about its overall history, and that would be the place. (Parallel to school districts). The bus route articles sometimes give a block by block account of the trip, and getting rid of that excessive detail might also be a good precedent I can see people looking up an elementary school by name, I cannot see people coming here and looking up a bus route by number. . There probably should be a specialized wiki that can accumulate all of this without giving us a bad name. WikiLocal?DGG 05:17, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
In the zeal of striving for quality, I cannot agree that specialized Wikis or pruning (deleting or blanket merging) is the answer. I see that as fragmenting the spirit of Wikipedia that is inclusive and not a conventional encyclopedia. I think of the reasonable possibility that traffic to Wikipedia would go down noticably because people who look for specialized information (encyclopedic to some, maybe not to others) would have to look somewhere else. The best solution I see is to revisit User:Mangoe/Wikipedia is not a timetable, see how that applies to transit modes other than trains, and then make that a guideline. I agree with that essay (at first glance), and also that secondary sources should support the primary sources, but sometimes not many secondary sources have been published for subjects that are notable, and those that do may mention the subject in a tangential way. Tinlinkin 19:04, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
The issue over train stations seems to be analogous to the issue with schools. They are man-made geographic features, so meeting WP:V is usually trivial. Whether they should have a separate article, or be part of a broader or group article is an editorial decision based on available content. Trying to judge relative notability and deleting some random examples is pointless. It's better to leave the redirect link anyway to avoid creation of redundant content. Blanket merging is problematic because an editor needs to make an intelligent decision on how and where to merge the content. But we don't need another WP:CREEPy guideline like WP:Schools.
  • Do you mean like:

Why do you say that everything in there relies on primary sources? I see many secondary sources in Grand Concourse buses and Madison and Fifth Avenues buses. --NE2 19:03, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

This is a downright concerning discussion. Here, we have editors who are willing to AFD or merge the hundreds of bus articles- which are part of an established WikiProject- without any input from the WikiProject, and without any discussion whatsoever. Who knows when these people will get the nerve to do the same to highways? --Rschen7754 (talk - contribs) 03:43, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

I can't speak for everyone above, but I don't recall saying that I wouldn't listen to input from the Bus Route Wikiproject. Not to mention that putting something on AFD implies that it would be discussed first (officially notifying people of a problem and discussing things before deletion is the whole point of placing things on AFD). Certainly the Bus WP is welcome to chime in here too if they haven't already done so. On the flip side, I should point out that just because something is part of a project doesn't mean it always follows policy. It doesn't happen often, but on rare occasion I've seen things overturned in AFD and CFD that were set up by a Wikiproject. Wikiprojects aren't always infallible, after all. Dugwiki 21:51, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
Then why not notify them of this discussion? Or highways, which is clearly next on the hit parade. I only found out about this discussion when someone pointed me to it. --Rschen7754 (talk - contribs) 06:25, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Conversely, a topic may be covered in multiple sources and still be only of purely local or temporary interest.

I removed this sentence from the guideline because it has been orphaned in the revision process. The guideline does not address notability in terms of local or temporary interest. I have no objection to working it back in, as long as it does not detract from the main point or cause excessive bloat. Dhaluza 11:12, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure that the inclusion of this concept is relevant. If a topic is notable, the location and scope of its effects are not relevant to its notability. Mother Theresa was notable; her effect was localized but her fame was global. Whether or not she deserved more recognition than her peers is moot; because she was noticed, she is notable. --Kevin Murray 17:06, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
I had put that it here to address the two most common exceptions I see to the general presumption - news items and purely local interest stories. Murder victims are likely to get substantial coverage in multiple reliable sources and high school productions can as well. The former is better covered in Wikinews and the latter is better not covered. A presumption is rebuttable, and I think it adds to the guideline to give some indication of what might rebut the presumption.--Kubigula (talk) 19:02, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
I see your concerns as completely answered by requiring sources that are both (1) secondary and (2) independent. The news items that are an initial burst, coming immediately with the event, and purely reporting, are not secondary sources and are (should be) excluded from demonstrating notability. High school productions are very hard pushed to receive independent secondary coverage. Information about the event, such as a “what’s on this weekend”, is primary. Anything published by the school, participants or parents is not independent. --SmokeyJoe 21:48, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

I've moved this paragraph back to the talk page for further discussion:

Although coverage in multiple sources creates a presumption of notability, some topics may have such coverage yet still be of purely temporary or local interest. For example, some news stories may be better suited for Wikinews, and certain local events may be of too narrow an interest despite some media coverage.

While this is a noble attempt to give context to the concept, it is still out of place in the current version of this guideline. Notability is defined in terms of secondary references, without addressing localization. If the definition is correct, then local interest is irrelevant to notability. If this is relevant, then the definition is not correct. Also, there is no definition of what local interest is. For example a local interest story in New York City may only affect 1 million people--does that make it not notable? Dhaluza 23:35, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

I thought this was useful to help define the limits of the sources test - i.e. show some scenarios where the presumption might fail. However, I acknowledge that it does create more definitional issues.--Kubigula (talk) 01:36, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
But, given a PC game covered in two different magazines. Both essentially saying that the game is an unremarkable example of it's genre. This would suffice to pass WP:Note, despite that the sources use assert non-notability of the subject. Taemyr 05:11, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
You mean like the markedly mediocre Iridion 3D? Nifboy 05:18, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
I was trying to make the point that the existence of verifiable sources is no guarantee of notability. Iridion 3D is perhaps better used as an example of the fact that a good article can be written despite lack of notability. Taemyr 07:00, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Uncle G Essay

Uncle G keeps restoring the link to his user space essay which others have removed. Rather than start an edit war, though, I would like to start a discussion. I think this is really poor form, and I hope he removes it himself. Otherwise I hope someone else removes it. Many people have contributed to the discussion on this guideline, and it would be inappropriate for all of us to collect our arguments in an essay and link it from the guideline. There are also other user essays on notability, and we shouldn't link to all of them either. So this is really a case of all or none, and I vote for none. Dhaluza 12:36, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Uncle G's essay has played a rather unique role in this guideline's development. I don't really understand the reasons for its removal. -- Visviva 12:44, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
This is not a call for all or none, this is a call for quality. Unlike most people's essays on whatever topic, Uncle G's treatise on notability is enlightening and has been influential in shaping this page. >Radiant< 13:29, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
UncleG's essay was the basis for the version that was soundly rejected here. It's his essay that ultimately caused the backlash and replacement, so Isee no need to link to it and muddy the waters. --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:31, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
That's odd, since the current version of the page appears still to echo Uncle G's "Primary Notability Criterion" (which, if I'm not mistaken, was original with User:Uncle G/On notability). -- Visviva 13:58, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
The current version is extremely different than Uncle G's, losing the "multiple," "non-trivial" designations, among other things. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:01, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
So what? Many editors, myself included, have found the essay, and the link useful. If you don't find it useful, don't use it, and don't click on the link. What is the harm of having the link on this page? UnitedStatesian 14:02, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Because the link is misleading, and has been found, by consensus, to not accurately describe notability. See the March archives. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:04, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Well, if consensus had found it to accurately describe notability, it would be a guideline. But there's no reason why a guideline can't link to a good essay. >Radiant< 14:10, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
The link is not misleading: it takes you exactly to the page it purports to take you. Once there, you see an essay, which is just that: an essay, one man's opinion to be used or not used as each individual editor who reads it sees fit. You still haven't explained the harm in leaving the link on the page (and if that harm is stated in the March archives perhaps do us all a favor and restate that harm here, as well as explain why the link stayed on the page for two more months). UnitedStatesian 14:13, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Yes, it's so very different now that we say "significant" instead of "non-trivial" and have to click on the footnote to learn that sources does actually mean more than one. I'm sure there are a number of non-trivial (oops! I mean significant) differences... but it seems clear that there is still a strong genetic relationship between that page and this one. -- Visviva 14:17, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
  • As Visviva noted the bit about "multiple" sources was delegated to a footnote. In an attempt to clarify the guideline I moved this to the main text, only to be reverted within minutes by Jeff. Interesting. >Radiant< 15:08, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
    • I reverted nothing. --badlydrawnjeff talk 15:16, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
      • Oh excuse me, I meant "twisted my writing to mean the inverse of what they originally stated". >Radiant< 15:20, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
  • The essay is a very useful way of thinking about notability. It also has the huge advantage of just considering notability as meaning "what is appropriate for an encyclopedia?" rather than quibbling about which word to use. Friday (talk) 15:13, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I can see the essay as being an interesting archive if it is marked as historical or the text is modified to appear less actionable. As it is now it seems confusing to link to contradictory materials. Another option would be for Uncle G to update his essay to parallel the new guideline. --Kevin Murray 15:24, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
    • Dude, it's an essay in his userspace. There's really no need for compulsive taggery over either. >Radiant< 15:29, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I have no problem with anyone writing whatever they want in their space, but to link it from a guideline as though it has special weight without explanation is confusing. --Kevin Murray 15:41, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Compromise? Uncle G’s essay is highly relevant, and is possibly uniquely so. A problem is that it is in user space, where it may be considered his. I suggest that Uncle G move his essay to project space, where it may (or may not) be integrated with other essays, and perhaps Uncle G might like to keep a copy of the current version. If he doesn’t consent, then I suggest copying his essay into project space. In either case, the project space essay can link back to the user space essay, and the guideline itself will contain no direct links to user space. --SmokeyJoe 01:03, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Joe, I'm happy with the current solution which is to give an explanation along with the link, which makes it clear that it is an opinion. --Kevin Murray 01:08, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see any cogent argument for keeping the user space link beyond WP:ILIKEIT. Is it appropriate to link to a non-consensus based document from what should be a consensus based guideline? Dhaluza 01:25, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Liking it is a pretty decent reason for keeping it in. Friday (talk) 01:31, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
It's in a see also section and it's an essay and it's a user essay and all of that is self-evident so I find all objections on those bases unconvincing. The fact that it's been quite influential historically is a reason for keeping it. Can you point to another user essay that is linked to in just under five hundred pages. It should stay. Parenthetically, and on a concededly irrelevant, Ilikeit basis, it also gets some things right that the current page doesn't in my opinion, but I'm not traveling any further down that road, because I'll only find: here be demons.--Fuhghettaboutit 01:45, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I should also point out that linking a page from a guideline, or indeed from anywhere else, dose not in anyway give "special weight" to a page. For starters because pages don't have weight. WP:BURO, and all that. >Radiant< 07:10, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
    • Okay, we have a WP:LAME edit war coming on. Despite evidence to the contrary, a user who doesn't like the link removes a statement that it was important to writing this guideline, replacing it by a statement that it is merely a random opinion. That's hardly helpful. >Radiant< 07:16, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
      • I could not find any evidence that your statement is correct. It may be your recollection, and it may even be true, but until you provide some objective evidence to support it, it is only an unverifiable opinion. Dhaluza 10:04, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
        • [2] HAND. >Radiant< 10:39, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
          • Oft cited, yes, "formed the basis" still not supported. Dhaluza 11:14, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
            • You could call it "instrumental in writing the current version" if you like. Note the substantial similarities between the wording of this page and the wording of Uncle's page. Note how several people suggested replacing the old version with his version entirely, which in the end was compromised upon. >Radiant< 11:16, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

The appearance (at least to me) is that it summarizes the arguments of those who support a notability guideline, in the same way that Non-notability/Essay summarizes the arguments of those opposed. They appear to be opposing opinion pieces. As such, those supporting notability should have the opportunity to work on the pro-notability essay, just as those opposing notability can work on the anti-notability essay. I agree that it should be copied to project space. Eterry 04:54, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Objective evidence section

I created the evidence section as a way to try to tie all the guidelines together and to address Centrx's point about needing a rationale for this guideline. I know it may be opening a can of worms as to the whole subjective/objective issue, but I believe we all agree that some objective evidence of notability is necessary - I can't just say I am the greatest badmington player in the world, I must get some award, be covered in some badmington magazines etc, before my badmington prowess is notable. This section takes the place of the previous rationale section and I incorporated the permanence section to address some of the bloat concerns. The popularity section seemed unnecessary in that this concept is already covered here and in ILIKEIT.--Kubigula (talk) 20:57, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

I think the "objective evidence of notability" concept is a real breakthrough. I think trying to define notability in terms of some arbitrary sourcing criteria is problematic, as it is impossible to cover all the bases. It's also redundant to WP:V and this is one of the main objections to WP:N that is hard to counter. But requiring some objective evidence allows for flexibility in handling different types of subjects under one umbrella, and it is not redundant. Dhaluza 23:44, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
I'm glad you said that, because I really think this concept is the essence of the notability guidelines. It still requires us to draw some arbitrary and subjective lines - what evidence is enough for what topic - but I find it's a useful way to consider notability across topics and subjects.--Kubigula (talk) 01:36, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
I like the "objective evidence" clause as well--it puts the ball in the court of community consensus rather than some (more)wikilawyer-able number (or pseudo-number like "multiple"). It encompasses the spirit of "non-trivial coverage" without needing a lengthy explanation of what, exactly, such a phrase means... — Scientizzle 04:53, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps objective evidence may prove that some subjects are notable, and listing examples of such proof might be helpful. However, notability remains a subjective concept, and each determination of non-notability should be the result of careful analysis and thought. I don't think we want to give the impression that we're using a litmus test. Thus, I propose changing this paragraph to the following.

  • Notability is an inherently subjective concept, but it may sometimes be possible to show an objective and verifiable sign of notability. Substantial coverage in reliable sources constitutes such evidence, as do peer recognition and the other factors listed in the subject specific guidelines. Failure to meet a specific criterion does not create a presumption of non-notability. Eterry 07:01, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
I disagree. Every article must have some objective evidence of notability. It's not enough for our editors to like the subject or think it's important or for the subject to think itself important. Ultimately, there must be some evidence that third parties or peers think the subject is important or significant. So, I think notability is largely a litmus test - you have to draw lines somewhere.--Kubigula (talk) 14:04, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

General notability...

I think we need have a more descriptive name for the sources test; it makes it hard to reference the section if we don't say what it is. It went from a "criterion" to a "presumption" (my word), then "guideline", then "criteria", before settling in its current state. All these words are more or less synonymous, so I don't have a strong settled preference. I see the options as the "General notability..." criterion, guideline, measure, presumption, standard, or test. I think I like "test" the best, as it is the most succinct and descriptive. However, "criterion" would be the most consistent with the other notability guidelines. As I said, I don't have a huge preference, so long as we pick something.--Kubigula (talk) 15:03, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I like "guideline." It matches exactly what this page is. I think "test," like "criterion," will strike some as too absoulte, more policy than guideline. UnitedStatesian 15:22, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
Good point. You can't really argue against it being a "general notability guideline", and that's definitely a plus given the history. I will make the change unless objections or other views emerge.--Kubigula (talk) 02:19, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
I went ahead and added it. UnitedStatesian 15:18, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Some Subjects are inherently Notable

  1. Some subjects are inherently notable. ie they are part of human knowledge. Ie all species of life, proven scientific theories, aspects of pop culture. Common sense is needed for this.
  2. Some are talked about by many people. They may not though be discussed by the mass media. The burden should only be to show that a mass of people are aware of the subject. This should include blogs. Ie if blogs talk about some subject, that can indicate that people are quite aware of it. (I am not saying that we trust bob's blog necessarily for information about some new company, just that it be one of several pieces of evidence that this new company is notable.) Similarly if some subject appears on many commercial websites then it is evidence that many people are aware of it. Heliumballoon 22:20, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
But just because a subject is inherently notable or widely known doesn't mean that it is possible to write an appropriately encyclopedic article on the subject. To do that, multiple reliable sources are needed; when these do not exist, no acceptable Wikipedia article can be written. -- Visviva 22:32, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
I agree with you. However over zealous deletionists sometimes will delete an article if its notability is based on blogs etc even if its content is based on reliable sources. Heliumballoon 23:07, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
Are those reliable sources cited in those deleted articles? I would love to see some examples of those AfD discussions if you can provide them. UnitedStatesian 23:30, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
I would love to provide it but the article has already been deleted. Again let me stress that the content of the article at the time of deletion was only based on reliable sources. Its notability came from blogs and commercial websites and one article. Heliumballoon 02:11, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
You should at least be able to provide the name of the article. If there was a deletion discussion, that is archived; and the contents of the article are viewable by any administrator. —Centrx→talk • 05:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
One that comes to mind is Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/ADERANT. Maybe not the perfect example, but an article that was verifiable after clean-up, but the 19 notability references were dismissed as not good enough because they were related to company press releases republished by reputable sources. An example of a short-circuited deletion process, that went from prod to AfD without applying a notability tag, and a delete result without a clear consensus either way. Also an example of WP:BIAS against private companies vs. public companies, by basing notability on press coverage. Dhaluza 13:22, 2 June 2007 (UTC)
I almost agree with that. There are classes of subjects where we presume notability based on attributes other than the one in this particular guideline - this is necessary in order to have comprehensive and coherent coverage and respect for AfD precedent (note that Uncle G's essay recognizes this too). These classes of subjects are set out in the subject specific guidelines, WP:BIO, WP:CORP etc. At some point, we will probably need to revisit the structure of the SSGs, but I'm waiting to be sure this page is stable first.--Kubigula (talk) 22:48, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
That's not a notability issue; it an issue of what constitutes a reliable source and how that works with verifiability (see Wikipedia:Verifiability#Self-published sources (online and paper) for a specific statement about blogs). So under what circumstances is or should a blog be acceptable as a source? I strongly disagee that "The burden should only be to show that a mass of people are aware of the subject." This is an encyclopedia, a tertiary source. Nothing belongs here that is not directly sourced with reliable material, by definition.--Fuhghettaboutit 23:41, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
True enough. I was not advocating a "mass of people" test; I was saying that "inherent notability" criteria are more the purview of the subject specfic guidelines. If one can make an argument for the inherent notability of a general class of subjects, the argument should be made there. If the argument is that high levels of blog discussion alone create a presumption of notability, then I can't agree. This is really no different than saying that lots of people in my office/school (etc) are talking about x, so x must be notable.--Kubigula (talk) 00:16, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
I should have been more clear. I was responding to the original post!:-)--Fuhghettaboutit 00:20, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
"The burden should only be to show that a mass of people are aware of the subject." - for notability purposes only. The actual source of what is on the page needs to from reliable sources. (eg If a new gadget is discussed on many blogs then that establishes notability. What is said about the gadget must come from reliable sources though.) It is common sense that if many different blogs are talking about something then it is notable in the sense that people pay attention to it and should be included in wikipedia. Heliumballoon 02:16, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, but the ramblings of a small number of conspiracy theorists do not add up to notability. Notability in my view is really an extension of the official policy Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not, specifically the clauses about "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information," "Wikipedia is not a blog," "Wikipedia is not a directory," and "Wikipedia is not a soapbox." If your pet article was deleted because it was non-notable, POV, and violated "What Wikipedia is not," TOO BAD. Go learn how to find reliable sources. For an example of how to prove that a subject is notable, see Roger J. Traynor (I looked up almost all those sources). --Coolcaesar 05:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
Reliable sources (as in reliable ones) are indistinguishable from notability. People blog about anything and everything, from their dogs to their spouses to their halfass theories. All this information is self-published and is not editorially controlled, fact-checked, or peer reviewed, so it is not reliable. That doesn't necessarily mean it's not right, it may be. But it's not reliable. On the other hand, when multiple sources who exercise these processes decide a subject is important enough to spend time on, then we have verifiable, reliable information to base an article on. We also know at this point that it is notable, because publications which are sifted to have crap removed have actually chosen to investigate and write. We don't need an article on every blogosphere fad that comes and goes. We might, however, find it appropriate to have articles on a few. What reliable sources write on will determine which, if any, those are. Seraphimblade Talk to me 05:59, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I think a quick way to sum up a central point in this thread is that blogs and forum posts aren't usually considered reliable sources because there's not necessarily any sort of reliable fact checking or verification process at such sites (see WP:SPS). Thus a large number of blog posts does not necessarily mean that any of them individually or in combination form a reliable source. Dugwiki 15:38, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Precisely. The random ramblings of a mob do not necessarily add up to a conversation. --Coolcaesar 17:29, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
On the other hand, there are some blogs with enough power in certain industries to confer some level of notability, in my opinion. In the Web 2.0 space, for example, getting a mention on Michael Arrington's TechCrunch is A Big Deal. Not sure how that sort of thing could be quantified, of course. JavaTenor 01:21, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
There are also blogs done by people who primarily post and summarize documents about a topic, and this can be the major reference on a subject. Example: Open Access news blog (btw, the guy who runs it is on the wikimedia foundation advisory board) This can be shown by the extent to which they are used by other sources. But how to show notability in an industrial segment dependent entirely of blogs is a difficult question.
Not really entirely sure it's necessary. Reliable means more than "Getting mentioned on it is A Big Deal", it also means that the source is editorially-controlled or fact-checked—basically that it's not just someone (or a group of someones) publishing whatever they want, it's subject to oversight and control. Getting a front-page story on Slashdot or Digg may be a Big Deal in some circles, but that doesn't mean we can accept that story as reliable. On the other hand, getting mentioned in an obscure but highly-regarded peer reviewed journal is probably not a Big Deal to very many people, but it is a reliable source. Seraphimblade Talk to me 02:03, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

We need to change this regarding crime coverage

Crime, especially murder, gets news coverage. Several independent reliable sources will often be found discussing a murder victim, the murder, and (if caught) the culprit. These will usually occur in bursts: once when the crime is discovered, again when the culprit is caught, and, yet again at trial. Barring appeals, retrials, release of the prisoner, or his execution, usually nothing more is heard about the matter. If coverage on several tv news stations and an article (or a few) in the local big-circulation daily is sufficient to establish notability, then WP = WikiPoliceblotter. This notability will overwhelming be for US crimes, because in many countries victims, defendants, and witnesses, especially murder cases, are not named in their media. At AfD we run in to this argument "the victim/purp meets the notability guideline and notability never expires..." And, you know what, that's true. But it's true of nearly any victim/criminal in a murder scenario (which, unfortunately, the US has c. 15,000 of per annum). I think a special addition along these lines is necessary:

For persons whose primary notability is their being the victim of, witness to, or alleged perpetrator of a criminal act, notability requires either (a) extensive or sustained coverage of the crime or such persons by reliable sources outside of the geographic area impacted by the crime, or (b) a notable book or film has been made about the crime or persons. Coverage typical of crimes in general or unsolved crimes in general, such as inclusion of the crime in a segment of local news (print, radio, or television) or inclusion on a nationwide crime solvers show, does not provide sufficient basis for notability.

Any thoughts? Carlossuarez46 06:08, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Sources all covering the same news story at the same time are not truly "independent" sources. With crime, for example, they are usually all getting their information straight from the police department. So, "independence" needs to be explicitly stronger. Also, see WP:NOT#INDISCRIMINATE: "News reports". —Centrx→talk • 06:21, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
As Centrx said, that's already pretty well covered in WP:NOT. News-type stuff should go to Wikinews, not Wikipedia. Of course, some events which make a lot of headlines also will be of lasting enough importance and significance for encyclopedia coverage, but except in a few exceptional cases (such as the Virginia Tech massacre, 9/11, the Olympics, or a Presidential election), that probably won't be immediately clear. We can certainly wait to have an article until it becomes clear if the event is a flash in the pan or an event which will be studied and researched for years to come. Also, as Centrx said, even multiple newspapers reporting on an event immediately after it happens are probably not independent of one another. They're probably presenting the exact same story in slightly different ways, especially with the existence of wire services like the Associated Press. If people want to write about every kind of breaking news the moment it happens, Wikinews is probably a better project for them than Wikipedia. For us, though, we should generally wait, and carefully evaluate whether it really merits an article at all. Seraphimblade Talk to me 11:40, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
Yes, but this shows why defining Notability in terms of multiple secondary sources does not work universally. Every major sporting event between two big city teams gets independent coverage in their respective big city newspapers, and the wire services create independent stories picked up by the rest. So the recent Red Sox/Yankees series played in New York generated numerous independent by-line stories in the NYT, NYP, NYDN, and BH, plus wire service reports by AP, UPI & Reuters writers. But there is nothing to make this series any more notable than the hundreds of others over the years. So multiple secondary sources doesn't work in this case. Dhaluza 12:54, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
That's the difference between necessary and sufficient. An article's subject must not be original research to be included, but we don't include everything that's not original research. It must not be a POV fork, but we don't include everything that's not a POV fork. It must be verifiable, but we don't include everything verifiable. Those are all examples of necessary but not sufficient conditions. In the same way, multiple nontrivial independent reliable sources is a necessary condition, not a sufficient one. Or in other words, an article subject which lacks multiple nontrivial independent reliable sources is certainly inappropriate for inclusion, but a subject which has been covered by multiple nontrivial independent reliable sources is not necessarily appropriate for inclusion. (It's passed one step on the way there, but there are many others. If it still fails NOT, NOR, etc., it's still inappropriate.) Seraphimblade Talk to me 13:25, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
To further reply to the sports match worry, note that most sporting matches do not receive extended coverage in multiple cities. They only normally receive limited cotemporaneous coverage. For example, if Boston and New York have a baseball game on a given day, each city's papers will publish individual articles about that game, but those articles will normally only be published within a two or three day time frame of the game itself. This is an example of what Note 3 means when it says that "Several journals simultaneously publishing articles about an occurrence, does not always constitute multiple works, especially when the authors are relying on the same sources, and merely restating the same information...." Multiple newspaper sources should be independently published over a longer course of time to avoid having seperate articles about very short term, temporary news stories. (At one point this language was included in the main notability criteria itself, but the language was later moved to Note 3.) Dugwiki 16:05, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I mentioned the Yankees/Red Sox example because it specifically is not covered by Note 3. I listed the independent news sources that had one or more different reporters generating unique coverage over a period of several days leading up to the series, and continuing after. Also there is no need for a story to run over an extended period; for example, the 2006 New York City plane crash only really ran for a few news cycles. Dhaluza 00:52, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
If the coverage you're talking about only spans a few days, then it would be covered by Note 3, even if it's covered by ten different papers in that same brief time span. On the other hand, if it generated independently published analysis over the course of more than just a few days, then it probably is minimally notable and could feasibly handle its own article. Note that more than a few days coverage is definitely unusual for a single sporting event, so if the specific series you're talking about was talked about for a few weeks then it could reasonably be considered minimally notable enough for an article. Dugwiki 16:31, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
The requirement for secondary sources is a solution for this sort of thing. The difference between secondary and primary sources lies in the nature of the coverage. If the news coverage is repetition of facts, then it is a primary source. If there is analysis (comparisons, criticisms, historical perspectives, etc), then it is a secondary source. A news “report” is almost always a primary source. An “editorial” is almost always a secondary report. I came to accept criticism of insisting on secondary sources, and to see sense in allowing for other objective evidence for notability. But perhaps it needs to be noted that “a burst of news coverage does not provide object evidence of notability”. --SmokeyJoe 00:49, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
(outdent) I disagree with the supposition that several sources working from the same material are not independent; otherwise, all coverage of even 9-11 that relies on US government or NYC government info are not "independent". Hogwash. I am willing to believe that the LA Times, and the various LA tv stations (excluding KTLA which is co-owned by or with the Times), are independent; as would be true in most US metropolitan areas. That aside, this guideline seems to imply that necessary = sufficient; the first paragraph states "A subject is presumed to be notable if it meets the general notability guideline below, or if it meets an accepted subject specific standard listed in the table to the right". So, if a person or crime fits any of the requirements below it is presumed notable; what can overcome the presumption is left to the imagination, but when something meets the enumerated requirements in the guideline, unless we want to treat the whole guideline as a nullity, it ought not be deleted unless some presumption-busting argument can be made (left to the imagination, I suppose, or we can try to resurrect the "no media are independent if their sources coincide" theory). We should be a little more clear about what's notable (this is the notability guideline after all), or do we need to have a special notability for crime/victims/purps like we do for porn stars, professors, bands and the like? Carlossuarez46 17:16, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
I did previously attempt to address this very issue, as well as give some guidance on what might defeat the presumption, but it was removed. Ultimately these kinds of issues are probably best addressed in the subject specific guidelines.--Kubigula (talk) 20:08, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
So we'll need a criminal/victim version of WP:MUSIC, WP:PROF, WP:PORN BIO, it seems. I'll propose something shortly along the lines I outlined above. Carlossuarez46 21:45, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't know that a whole new guideline is needed. This could probably be addressed as an item in BIO.--Kubigula (talk) 23:06, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Kubigula ... it's probably better to propose this as an addition to WP:BIO, though I'd think that "inclusion on a nationwide crime solvers show" would be a sufficient basis to argue notability in many cases. -- Black Falcon (Talk) 00:20, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I appreciate the agreement. As I thought about it some more, it occurs to me that this issue can go beyond biography articles - events, places etc can also become a fleeting news focus without any enduring notability. Centrx properly points out that this issue is pretty well covered by WP:NOT. However, the issue comes up often enough that it might be worth briefly addressing here as well.--Kubigula (talk) 04:01, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
(to Carlossuarez46) Though I'm not sure I like stating the standard as a rebuttable presumption, the fact that something is presumed notable doesn't mean that deprecates or overrules another guideline or policy. The same argument you make can be made for words: they are notable and multiple reliable sources are easily found. This does not mean that Wikipedia is not a dictionary is any less true or should not be followed. Seraphimblade said it well above; it is the difference between necessary and sufficient.--Fuhghettaboutit 23:20, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
I read the presumed as applying to both the general standard and the specific ones. We should first decide what we want to say and then word in in a less ambiguous way. The relationship of the general and the specific standards are frequently an issue, and it seems to be decided on an ad hoc basis. Once we get the main rule worded right, then is the time for the exceptions and special cases. My understanding is that the special rules are for situations where either there may not be two conventional sources about the person as sometimes with creative professionals, or where it may be easier just to show membership in a class, as with professional athletes, and know that the sources will be there. (just two cases, there are others.).

(Personally, I'd go with either wording as a base for the special provisions, but I think such things as the news problem fit better when applied to both the general and the special.)DGG 04:12, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree with DGG. I would add that I think the special rules are also valuable in terms of ensuring some uniformity in coverage and as a way to capture AfD precedent (which may be two ways of saying basically the same thing). Once the general guideline is stable, we can hopefully do a bit more to tie in the special guidelines and address exceptions. We seem to have reached a relative level of stability here, but comments from all sides of the notability ideological divide make me wonder how close we actually are to long term stability.--Kubigula (talk) 05:01, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I agree that the specific case should be addressed at WP:BIO, but the general cases of crimes and sports, and creative professionals needs to be addressed here. Lack of multiple secondary sources is not necessarily grounds for deletion, and availability of them is not necessarily grounds for inclusion.
Also on the specific case of crimes, I remember an AfD discussion a while back (but not the specific one or the result) where someone argued that a person executed for murder was not notable. This seems over-the-top to me. Anyone convicted and executed in the US has sustained secondary source media coverage at least statewide, and mountains of primary court records, through several appeals to higher courts that drag on for years, followed by mandatory review by the Governor. So notability should not be an issue for these cases. Dhaluza 10:31, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Look for example at the Afd going on now for the murder of Rachel Moran, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Rachel Moran; quite a number of editors expressed that it's a keeper per WP:N, which I think rightly or wrongly gets read in isolation especially when notability is an element of whether something ought to be kept or not. The argument about words being notable is an interesting one, but ultimately falls in front of WP:NOT a dictionary. WP is a repository for events -like wars, olympic games, and oh, yes, murders and other crimes - however, so an event and its principals that is/are notable under WP:N should be kept, but in the context of run-of-the-mill (sorry for the callousness of that) murders, that would make this into a crime story rather than an encyclopedia. Certain crimes are sensational: the Manson murders, the Lindbergh baby kidnapping, Jack the Ripper's murders, are clearly keepers; but does every murder, victim, and defendant that has a few independent sources merit keeping, I think not. Take for example, Skylar Deleon, who gets some press in LA (local to the crime) in part because he was once a child-actor appearing on one episode of Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, in part because he's good looking (my POV), in part because one of the alleged conspirators is named John Fitzgerald Kennedy (a name sure to garner attention), in part because of the nature of the offense charged. Why his current article has "sources", none of them are what WP would term WP:RS, but thosse wouldn't be hard to find as his trial approaches and his wife's sentencing is delayed without reason; see LA Times (credited to staff writers), Orange County Register (credited to staff) and many other articles from these "local papers", Monterey Herald (from AP feed), London Times (credited to staff). So does he get kept (assuming that being on one episode of a tv show does not of itself confer notability - I hope not)? He has sources in California in England. Because his wife is mentioned in virtually all these, does she get an article too? And what about their JFK, him too, so we can have John Fitzgerald Kennedy (murder defendant) as an article, too? Carlossuarez46 04:51, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
Actually, Wikinews is a repository of events of all kinds. Wikipedia is a general-purpose encyclopedia. World War II is historically and culturally notable, and belongs in an encyclopedia (because it's historically significant) but not Wikinews (it's not news). A gang shooting in LA that receives some local press belongs on Wikinews (it's a news story) but not Wikipedia (it's not historically significant). The war in Iraq would belong on both (it's a historically significant event and is currently in the news). We don't need an article on everything that makes a newspaper. That's exactly what Wikinews is there for, it's not what we're here for. Seraphimblade Talk to me 03:57, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) It seems that we have general agreement that the news coverage exception ought to be addressed here. Accordingly, I seperated out a new section, incorporating some of the previous text and the relevant section from WP:NOT. I know you folks don't need any encouragement, but feel free to chop away if you think it can be said better.--Kubigula (talk) 04:10, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Looks good. We may want to add a note that this is even more true for criminal victims than it is for other forms of people who are briefly in the news. JoshuaZ 13:49, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
The new section looks pretty good far as I can tell. I would agree with it's main point that a short burst of news activity does not necessarily imply sufficient notability, but that once sufficient notability is established it generally doesn't expire (ie old topics shouldn't be deleted simply because nobody has discussed them recently). Dugwiki 16:51, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Looks good. Let's see how it plays out in AfD's (a run of the criminal sort has been making its way through) without necessarily a specific notice re: crime victims and if the general wording is sufficient to sustain the point, no specifics need be added; if not, we can revisit this issue. Carlossuarez46 20:33, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Funny thing is that I saw the new section cited at AfD within about four hours[3]. Personally, I think the issues are framed about right and the discussion is mostly constructive - though I disclose that I took a position in this particular AfD.--Kubigula (talk) 20:57, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Notability *Abolish It*

Wikipedia is an experiment.

The results are still pending, the jury is still out of sorts, we're all waiting for the other shoe to drop a dime and the cat is not yet out of the bag, lady.

One thing, however, is absolutely and unambiguously clear: Wikipedia:Notability is not needed.

Wikipedia is great for breadth, but has yet to realize its honorable aspirations regarding quality. The vast majority of articles do not meet the standard of "good" or "featured". Nevertheless, just like the web itself, Wikipedia is pretty good at providing links to even the most obscure topics. Wikipedia, please, accept this humble and respectful admonition: play to your strengths.

Don't get me wrong, you do very well to purge the vainglorious and frivolous crap from your midst. You don't need the patina of "notability" to justify that. Both "Wikipedia:Verifiability" and "Wikipedia:Consensus" do just dandy by themselves, thank you very much.

Moreover, when you presume to judge "notability" as an adjunct to "verifiability" you do the following strategically ill-advised things:

  • set yourself up for open ridicule in the popular media;
  • set yourself up for wasted effort when some obscure "non-notable" topic is eventually mentioned by an obviously notable figure; and
  • ironically, you encourage a subtle form of original research in the ensuing debates over notability.

I don't particularly know (or care) who Spottie Dottie is. I would imagine I am in the majority on that particular viewpoint. I would, however, be interested if Tony Blair dressed up in a Spottie Dottie costume for a press conference. I would, however, be interested if Spottie Dottie appeared as a punchline to a joke in a literary work or television show or comic strip, where such punchline depended on an obscure reference to a little-known (but nonetheless verifiable) cartoon character. Are these things likely to happen? Probably not. Should that remote probability preclude a Wikipedia article? No. WP:NOT#CBALL.

If it's not entirely unverifiable, not entirely vanity, and not entirely incomprehensible crap, why bother with it. So far I've not seen a single justification that could not be more consistently advanced by reliance on WP:VER. I don't expect to. This message is for those who haven't already made up their mind to support this embarrassingly irrelevant policy.

Respectfully submitted. dr.ef.tymac 16:40, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

You should familiarize yourself with the substantial reasons for having standards for inclusion before making such blanket statements. —Centrx→talk • 16:41, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I agree, you should; and after having familiarized yourself, you should be able to understand the critical deficiencies, and address them directly. As I said, however, the message is not intended for minds that have already settled. dr.ef.tymac 16:43, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
There are lot of broad characterizations in your message, but to respond to the three specific points:
  • What the news media thinks is not relevant to our decision-making on how to build an encyclopedia. Also, the Slate article itself is based on its own misconceptions of notability. The news media ridicules us for open editing as a wiki too, and a lot of other stupid things.
  • There is greater wasted effort in keeping around unverifiable articles that no one wants to maintain. Articles that no one edits or reads, or for which there is not even the possibility of creating a legitimate article, are articles that invariably have libellous vandalism that goes unseen for weeks. Articles that are only edited by fans or haters of some topic are not going to be a neutral article. See the Rationale section of the guideline, which has since been mauled out of it but which you can read at [4]. The general concept of notability follows directly from fundamental policies, and this argument against it would apply for not having Wikipedia:Verifiability too.
  • If you mean by finding sources and deciding between them, if that is a form of original research, that is inherent in writing any article. —Centrx→talk • 17:05, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
I concur with Centrx. The guy from Slate may think it's OK to have articles about his cleaning lady and mailman, but that's not the kind of project I want to work on.--Kubigula (talk) 19:07, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Here's one problem with the position that verifiability is enough. My house, my ownership of my house, the mortgage on my house— its chain of title back to the 1800s—is verifiable through reliable sources. The same is true of the 1/16 mile residential street it sits on. I can also produce multiple reliable sources verifying the existence of the crappy Chinese restaurant around the corner.--Fuhghettaboutit 19:20, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
To the honorable Fuhghettaboutit. Thank you for reinforcing my original point with additional examples. It would be a trivial matter to dispense with the "this is my (house/pet/neighbor/recently-removed tooth)" article on the grounds of vanity, and equally trivial to reach consensus for removal on that basis alone. WP contributors have demonstrated an almost vehement collective fervor against allowing individuals (even highly accredited ones) from anything resembling "self-promotion" of any sort (which, incidentally, already has a stand-alone guideline Wikipedia:Conflict of interest). As far as restaurant reviews go, hmmmm ... now where do I remember seeing that before?
To the honorable Centrx, yes my overview was rather broad, (partially for purposes of dramatization) but every assertion I have made I am willing to either: 1) rigorously substantiate with observations; or 2) recant, if someone can demonstrate a compelling and novel counter-argument -- I've yet to see one. They may be out there though, so I'm not claiming "absolute truth" here. I would like to address some points you made, however, even though I readily concede I am not out to change your mind. As previously mentioned, this is for those who wish to see with fresh eyes.
Centrx said:
What the news media thinks is not relevant to our decision-making on how to build an encyclopedia
... this is an astonishing claim, especially since:
  • a substantial plurality of WP articles rely primarily on "news media" sources to satisfy WP:VER;
  • some WP contributors themselves are self-described members of the news media (reporters, columnists, administrative staff) whose credibility and coherence does not simply "evaporate" once they log off of WP;
  • even if these considerations carry only partial weight and are not dispositive, it seems "dubious" at best to suggest such views are entirely "not relevant" (!!);
  • yes, I know, you are distinguishing between "substantation" within WP and "decision-making" about the structure of WP itself. I respect your distinction, but do not find it compelling. "Growth through open collaboration" is the ethos, vitality, and sine qua non of the great WP experiment. I know of no WP policy that expressly regards individuals from certain professions as having less credibility. Period. It is precisely that openness and non-discrimination (and again breadth) that put WP on the map.
  • furthermore, the "structure vs content" distinction seems *very* tenuous here, we're not talking about relative positioning of articles in a listing, or how to rank for prominence and relative importance ... we're talking about what gets to remain in WP and what gets obliterated without a trace if that is not a matter of content, I don't know what is.
Yes, I agree that the media has advanced some pretty shaky critiques against WP, but since you disfavor "broad generalizations" ... let us not assume that all critique is without merit, just because some of it is. This particular critique does, unfortunately, have some credibility, and that credibility is only enhanced if we disregard entire categories of public discourse about Wikipedia structure as simply "not relevant".
Centrx said:
The general concept of notability follows directly from fundamental policies, and this argument against it would apply for not having Wikipedia:Verifiability too.
Respectfully, you seem to be suggesting that "notability" is entirely derivative of other, more expansive policies ... that is precisely my point. I struck out the last part because that's simply not logically correct. (See e.g., Association fallacy). That's like saying: "removing a bad tooth would apply to removing the entire mouth, as well, since the tooth is a part of the mouth." Moreover, not a single participant in this discussion has yet suggested getting rid of any core policy. (See also, Strawman).
Centrx said:
There is greater wasted effort in keeping around unverifiable articles that no one wants to maintain.
Yet no one (that I am aware of) has formulated a 100% fool-proof predictor for determining in advance which articles will gain enough momentum to rise to the level of "well-maintained article" or "good article" or "featured article" status, in fact very few ever do reach "good" or "featured" (back to my point about "breadth" over "quality"). Additionally, every single deficiency you mentioned in the subsequent sentences is already adequately handled by core policy (!)
  • fancruft and hate -> WP:NPOV
  • never be a legitimate article -> WP:NOT
  • libel and slander -> WP:LIVING, WP:NOT
  • no one edits it or reads it -> WP:NOT#CBALL (also, this is not a sufficient basis for deleting an article anyway, even if you assume WP:NOTE is flawless and gets enforced perfectly and serves an indispensible purpose).
Centrx said:
If you mean by finding sources and deciding between them, if that is a form of original research, that is inherent in writing any article.
Nope. That's already covered by WP:VER and WP:RS (or WP:ATT if you prefer). I'm talking about the de-facto norm of inherently subjective speculation, guessing, handicapping, conjecture and wishy-washy personal dice-tossing that seems to characterize nearly every major deletion discussion whose resolution hinges solely or primarily on WP:NOTE.
Case in point:
Let's consider James Kim. Do you remember some of the rancor, vitriol, and speculation that arose when that article got tagged for deletion under WP:NOTE, despite the fact that it had even become a major national news item at the time? People were dismissing this very unfortunate circumstance as yet another example of 15 minutes of fame, and adding all sorts of other personal jabs that arguably even distorted the already flawed spirit of WP:NOTE itself.
Well, wouldn't you know it, the very subject that was disputed as being "non-notable" (by many) seemed to be very relevant to others outside WP, at least if the 2007 Pulitzer Prize is something you can consider "relevant" ... a prize, I might add, that is not just awarded by "some guy" from Slate magazine (which is just one of several credible sources that has either directly or indirectly asserted flaws inherent in WP:NOTE, in both its philosophy and application).
I wasn't being dismissive when I said I hadn't seen a compelling counter-argument to support WP:NOTE, nor was I being glib when I suggested I probably won't see one. I'd really like to. So far no one's mentioned anything I havent already seen before. If someone can, I wholeheartedly welcome it. It would help to deflect some of the mounting and very legitimate criticism and ridicule that gets leveled against WP in general (and by extension, me specifically, as a volunteer contributor to WP) simply because this policy seems to be supported by nothing more rigorous than tradition and momentum. Regards. dr.ef.tymac 22:48, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Notability is a great way to bully new editors into not contributing! -- Sy / (talk) 22:40, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Points by Kevin Murray

James Kim does not seem notable in the conventional sense. His death and the award winning coverage of it do seem notable, thus in practice he is notable as a search topic. The article is really a pretty pathetic effort to build-up a non-entity into a subject of interest. This project is not a monument to deaths tragic or heroic. This is a pretty poor example if you are trying to build a case for the failure of WP:N. --Kevin Murray 23:03, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Please do not take this the wrong way: I am almost stupefied by how everything you have just said exactly reinforces my point ... I'm assuming that you've actually read what's been written.
I'll repeat:
  • WP is on the map because of its breadth ... moreso than its quality;
  • breadth is a critical contributor to the strength and prominence of WP;
  • the very fact that a "conventional notion of notability" (whatever that means) can be directly and thoroughly discredited by relation to the most prestigious award in journalism is the absolute pinnacle of examples for why "conventional notions of notability" are inherently flawed;
  • all it takes is one mention by a notable figure or prestigious organization to render the irrelevant topical;
  • no one can predict which obscure topics will later become topical, the best we can do is identify vanity, conflicts of interest, and other issues already covered by core policy;
  • do you have substantiation for your claim of "non-entity" ? or is that WP:OR? ... are you guessing that no one now or in the future will ever want to research a primary named person in pulizter prize winning journalism? Surely, this is not what you're saying?!
  • let's stipulate that the James Kim article is *pure crap* ... you've already admitted that the article is notable at least as a search topic. Bingo, WP:NOTE has just been rendered irrelevant and the question is now one of "quality" ... not one of "inclusion vs deletion".
Regards. dr.ef.tymac 23:31, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Sadly, there just isn't time to read your manifesto. I suggest that you restate your argument in a more succinct fashion. Regardless, I maintain that there will be obscure examples supporting any argument, and the Kim situation is not a compelling reason to dismiss the notability infrastructure. For the majority of cases this concept works well. My objection is to the plethora of special case guidelines which are emerging. Sorry. --Kevin Murray 23:47, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
@ Kevin Murray: Sadly indeed. I even condensed the entire argument to seven bullet points (above). I don't know how much more succinct one can get. At least you admit you didn't read it. I'll give you that much. I respect that you are a busy person, a volunteer, and you sincerely want to help improve WP. So do I.
Especially sad is that these "special case" provisos are (IMO) guaranteed to proliferate precisely because of the blatantly obvious flaws ... at least obvious when you step back and look beyond WP tradition and institutional momentum.
Like I said from the beginning, I'm not out to change settled minds, but rather to give some perspective for those who are willing to consider (and actually read) why there are some in the established media who laugh up their sleeves at WP. It is, in fact, very sad. These problems could be fixed. dr.ef.tymac 00:03, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, I didn't realize the bullet points were a summation of your entire argument. I thank you for doing this. I'll comment in-line in italics.

  • WP is on the map because of its breadth ... more so than its quality;
I see this as an intermediate step but not a goal.
Not a goal? Do you have a cite to established policy or guidelines or statements by the WM Foundation to back that statement up? I definitely have some to refute it. (See bullet list below).
  • breadth is a critical contributor to the strength and prominence of WP;
A blessing and a curse, which should be tempered. If the quality suffers to the point of non-credibility the project will fail.
First off, if you're saying "lack of credibility" harms Wikipedia, you are vociferously agreeing with me. That credibility is already under (justifiable) attack precisely because of the vagaries and sloppiness in the application of the ill-defined WP:N.
Secondly, you're calling "breadth" a curse for an *Encyclopedia*? C'mon now. Is this a joke? If you are serious, can you please reconcile this curse you allude to with the following?
  • we strive to collect the sum of human knowledge ... [5]
  • we're providing access to the sum of human knowledge ... Jimmy_Wales#Wikipedia_and_Wikimedia_Foundation
  • our success ... entirely a function of our open community ... User:Jimbo Wales/Statement of principles
  • the openness and viral nature of it, are fundamental to the long-term success ... (Ibid.)
  • there is no practical limit to the number of topics we can cover, or the total amount of content ... WP:NOT(core policy)

If, by saying it should be "tempered", you mean it should not contain clearly frivolous crap like "my pet gerbil named foxy" , or "my house and the claim of title traced back to 1807" ... then you're showing signs of not having completely read what you're responding to, and I won't repeat myself, except to say *core policy already addresses that problem (and others like it) more directly, more credibly and more succinctly*. dr.ef.tymac 03:00, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

  • the very fact that a "conventional notion of notability" (whatever that means) can be directly and thoroughly discredited by relation to the most prestigious award in journalism is the absolute pinnacle of examples for why "conventional notions of notability" are inherently flawed;
Notability is a surrogate word for the concept of encyclopedic suitability, and we define it by trying to use somewhat objective criteria such as being noticed by credible third party writers. It seems that you focus to much on the conventional definition of notability rather than how we use it here.
I'm focusing directly on your responses and your wording. I still don't know what you meant by "notable in the conventional sense" (terms that "you" introduced, not me) nor who this "we" is (as if there is some monolithic establishment in lock-step agreement, instead of many individuals attempting to hammer out understanding on a case-by-case basis).
"Noticed by credible third-party writers" ... hmmmm ... you mean like stuff written about in ohh, Newspaper articles, covered in ... say ... the national news media and referenced in ... uhh Pulizter prize winning journalism? Is that what "we" are using all these fancy "surrogate words" to define? Do those kind of references meet your notion of "Encyclopedic suitability"? If so, that's funny, I thought I saw that covered already in WP:RS and WP:V. Why use the surrogate when the real thing is readily available?
  • all it takes is one mention by a notable figure or prestigious organization to render the irrelevant topical;
No you clearly are misinterpreting the guideline. The coverage must be significant; of course this is subjective, but I trust our editors to collectively interpret this in a productive manner.
Huh?! "clearly misinterpreting?" "of course this is subjective?" How many sides of this issue are you trying to take at once? Aren't you the one who just said there are "somewhat objective criteria such as being noticed by credible third parties?"
How is that *not* a definition of "topical"? Are you saying that some unknown chap from Tanzania who develops a cure for AIDS and wins the Nobel Prize for medicine would still require review by "our editors" (of whom I am a member) to see if he yet "passes the test of notability" (however you define it, conventional or otherwise)? Is there *any* definition of "topical content" that can unambiguously and unconditionally withstand scrutiny under (your reading of) WP:N in advance? Even if you are saying such a case would still require review, how is that any different from WP:CONSENSUS?
Moreover, I never said that "topical" is universally equivalent to "encyclopedic". In fact, there are plenty of subjects that will never make the front page of the New York Times (not topical), but are still suitable for inclusion in an Encyclopedia. You don't believe me? Go read Semicolon. Wait, let me guess, you're gonna go tag that for deletion under WP:N?
  • no one can predict which obscure topics will later become topical, the best we can do is identify vanity, conflicts of interest, and other issues already covered by core policy;
This concept is specifically covered in guideline: notability is permanent, but the lack thereof may change with time.
Ok, more signs that you haven't read all that you're responding to. No problem I respect you have time constraints.
  • do you have substantiation for your claim of "non-entity" ? or is that WP:OR? ... are you guessing that no one now or in the future will ever want to research a primary named person in Pulitzer prize winning journalism? Surely, this is not what you're saying?!
Beating a dead horse
I'll take that as a non-response. Too bad, "yes" or "no" would have sufficed.
  • let's stipulate that the James Kim article is *pure crap* ... you've already admitted that the article is notable at least as a search topic. Bingo, WP:NOTE has just been rendered irrelevant and the question is now one of "quality" ... not one of "inclusion vs. deletion".
No gee-whiz here; this is more anomaly than example. The notable person is the winner of the award; more precisely Kim should redirect to a article about the journalist, or alternatively it can grow into its own article if the inclusion makes the article on the main topic unwieldy.

--Kevin Murray 00:45, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it is an anomaly, because it is a stunning example of how some touchy-feely speculation on "non-notability" by volunteer editors was absolutely trounced by something none of them saw coming, a Pulitzer. It's stunning because even despite all this there are some who still seem to maintain that James Kim is not "notable" (even though you yourself admitted it's at least a relevant search term) and there are a lot of subjects that will never get this level of presitigous recognition (even if "only" as a primary person in pulitzer prize winning newspaper coverage) and are still "notable" no matter whose definition of that word you want to apply. (See e.g., Semicolon).
You seem to be implying James Kim does not merit a stand-alone article. You gonna go tag it for AfD? Please don't. It'll be great fodder for another WP-ridicule piece by the mainstream press. :/
Then again, I guess you could really prove me wrong with a successful AfD on Semicolon. dr.ef.tymac 03:00, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, we're probably have to agree to disagree and move on. Cheers! --Kevin Murray 03:32, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh well. Reasonable people don't always see eye to eye on everything. I'm still willing to consider any specific references to policy or guidelines you may have as substantiation though, in case there actually is something out there that I haven't seen yet, by way of counter-argument. Regards. dr.ef.tymac 03:55, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Seraphimblade takes a slice

Dreftymac, here's how notability works with policy. We must have independent and reliable sources to ensure that the information in an article is verifiable, to ensure that the article will be neutral (since primary sources may be incomplete, biased, difficult to interpret properly, or all of the above, and the same may well occur if only one independent source is available or the independent mentions are trivial), and to ensure that any conclusions drawn are those of independent reliable observers, not our own. Notability (in terms of requiring substantial independent source material to be available) is critical to enforcing core policies. Seraphimblade Talk to me 11:42, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
Notability (in terms of *requiring* substantial independent source material to be available) is critical to enforcing core policies
You're a well-informed WP contributor who has a wide range of experience and a broad foundation upon which to base your perspectives, therefore I will presume the superfluous parts of your response are merely a result of not having had an opportunity to read all of what you are responding to -- and not the result of gaps in your understanding of the core issues.
Because of your considerable experience, your response is all the more disconcerting. I would have anticipated something far more compelling. As far as I can tell, the following is a reasonable good-faith restatement of what you've asserted so far:
  • 1) WP critically depends on WP:RS, WP:V, and WP:NOR.
  • 2) some sources may be incomplete, if so, this is a deficiency.
  • 3) some sources may be biased, if so, this is a deficiency.
  • 4) some sources may be difficult to properly interpret, if so, this must be addressed.
  • 5) some proposed article subjects (or article contents) may suffer from: a) trivial or incidental mention in sources; or b) mention in very few sources -- if so, this is a deficiency.
  • 6) conclusions forwarded by WP contributors must be demonstrably attributable to sources to ensure they are not solely personally derived.
First, and most importantly, not a *single* assertion above has been contested by me or any other participant to this discussion. Indeed, if this is the crux of your view on WP:N, then we can call it a day simply by replacing the WP:N policy page with this list. Secondly, you left some assertions out, that I will add to the list (to actually *help* bolster your apparent viewpoint).
Dreftymac adds for the benefit of Seraphimblade ...
  • 7) some proposed article content may be: a) patently frivolous; b) self-promotional, self-serving, or vain; c) pet-theories advanced by cranks and "self-publishers"; or d) otherwise inconsistent with the goals of an Encyclopedia (either as traditionally defined, or as defined by directive of the Wikimedia Foundation) -- if so, this is a *critical* deficiency, and warrants immediate removal of the offending content, absent an extraordinary justification to the contrary.
Now I will consider your 6) items, and even add number 7) on your behalf. Strikingly, there is not a *single* issue here that cannot be credibly resolved by a coherent and good-faith application of WP policy *without* direct reliance on the terms and principles enumerated in (the ever-growing, ever-mutating) WP:N.
Let me repeat. The current terms of WP:N are *at best* entirely redundant to these considerations!
For example, if (2) "incomplete" is the problem, then WP:OR requires complete substantiation, and the disputed content fails on that basis alone; if (3) is the problem, WP:NPOV (which is non-negotiable [6]) applies; If (4) is a problem because of technical sophistication, then WP:N is irrelevant and the problem calls for substantive review by contributors with the requisite knowledge and experience, and editorial review for accessibility to a general audience. If (4) is a problem because the source appears to be jibberish or nonsense, then WP:NOT and WP:Vandalism cover that as well. If (6) is the problem, again, WP:OR, WP:RS, WP:V, WP:NOT, WP:COI handle that. As far as (7a -7d) WP:NPOV, WP:NOT and WP:COI (as well as WP:LIVING and others) thoroughly and capably dispatch *all* of these scenarios.
That leaves us with only 5a and 5b remaining, which are discussed below.
Yeah, so what ... who cares if WP:N is a tad superfluous?
Well, frankly, perhaps no one really cares, at least among WP contributors with sufficient experience and credibility to *do* something about it ... but that still leaves the following problems wide out in the open:
* Deletion under WP:N (alone) is routinely inconsistent with the stated objective of a "world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge." [7]
* Deletion reviews under WP:N routinely interject precisely the kind of "unsourced" (and unsourcable) conclusion and conjecture ostensibly disfavored by WP:OR, WP:NPOV and WP:NOT#CBALL.
* Deletion under WP:N invariably invites "wrong guesses" about which articles will later become high-profile due to unforseeable circumstances, and those "wrong guesses" are a detriment to WP credibility -- as well as the impetus for justifiable concern and even ridicule among those who question the consistency and neutrality of the project as a whole.
In principle WP:N is a tad superfluous. In practice it is a widely-recognized basis for arbitrary and contradictory outcomes that undermine the credibility of WP.
Let's revisit 5a and 5b ... again with reference to James Kim. First, I will readily admit the article seems to be bit of a "memorial" ... (and, ironically, wouldn't ya know it, that's already covered by WP:MEMORIAL?!) ...
I won't recount any of the aspersions cast against that man in the WP:N AfD. It's enough to recall that some asserted 5a applied here (trivial) despite that the incident later became a national story. Additionally, if we consider 5b (too few sources) then the AfD on Mr. Kim should have evaporated on contact. Also, for some matters, (such as demonstrating proof of death by citing a death certificate) the "too few sources" critique has shaky merit to begin with.
Even if we assume that WP:N is absolutely essential to the implementation and interpretation of WP core policy, in practical application, it invites the absolute worst variant of speculation, kibbitzing and second-guessing one can find on WP. Self-serving sillyness and vanity "MySpace-type" pages are easily eradicated through application of core policy alone. Even if you assert that contributor review should have more leeway in removing content, WP:CONSENSUS provides that leeway, and without giving implicit license for personal gambles and (wrong) guesses about which subjects "matter" to the rest of the world.
Anyway, as I said from the outset, this is not an effort to change minds, but to share a different perspective and to give people a chance to forward credible non-rehashed counter-arguments, assuming any are out there. Thanks for your response and best regards. dr.ef.tymac 15:43, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Uh, I found the James Kim article really interesting. I hadn't heard about the news story, but I like wikipedia because I can come here and look up all those unusual things that may not be found elsewhere. ColtsScore 05:06, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you ColtsScore, in fact I consider that an essential element of what makes WP so prominent. We have a "featured article" about Iridion 3D, and yet there are some people out there who would say this article should have been deleted as "not notable" ... and they would cite this guideline as support. I think that goes against the grain and the strengths of WP. dr.ef.tymac 14:48, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Notability Should Be Removed

I agree that the criterion of notability should be removed.

I'm not familiar with the history of this debate, since I'm only an occasional contributor to Wikipedia. However, after reading the Notability page, this talk page, and the essays for and against the guideline, and after looking at several debates on deletion of articles, I'm deeply disturbed by the direction in which Wikipedia is moving.

There were 122 articles nominated for deletion on May 27th. Notability/Historical/Arguments states, 'Articles are deleted daily on grounds of notability, and this has been common practice for over a year now. For some reason, "non-notable" articles (or sections of articles - which is less visible, because no formal process exists there) are being removed with zeal lately.'

The notability criterion degrades Wikipedia by allowing deletion of high-quality, neutral, verifiable articles which meet all of the core policies. Indeed, it seems to exist solely to allow editors to delete articles which, in their opinion, should not be in Wikipedia, but which they cannot justify deleting under the core policies.

Even if notability is accepted as a criterion, no article should be deleted on this basis without extended, thoughtful analysis and debate. With 122 nominations on a single day, such analysis clearly is not taking place.

The process of deleting articles as non-notable is heavily biased against occasional editors. Indeed, Wikipedia as a whole is becoming increasingly hostile towards those who wish to contribute but cannot make a major time commitment. This discourages new editors and reduces the motivation of existing editors outside the core group. Why should they write an article if it may be deleted without any notification to them, based solely on a criterion which is not supported by consensus? If they want the chance to defend their article, they must log into Wikipedia on a regular basis -- something which is not practical for the vast majority of people, especially those in the Third World.

I assume everyone here has read Non-notability/Essay and Notability/Historical/Arguments, so I won't repeat those points. I would, however, like to elaborate on some of them.

There is an implicit assumption that any article can be deleted unless it is defended by someone who is always on the watch for attempts to delete it -- in other words, a core editor with a commitment to that particular topic. Unmaintained articles can be deleted simply because no one is defending them. This is an unstated policy; as far as I know, there is no guideline that articles must be maintained, yet some editors believe this should be the case and are enforcing it. If articles will be removed because they are unmaintained, a new policy should be debated and instituted. This should not be done by stealth.

Hence, use of notability as a criterion is elitist. It carries the implicit assumption that the opinions of those who contribute frequently carry greater weight than the opinions of those who contribute less frequently. Notability is creating an elite group of editors who are not administrators but who have the de facto ability (by taking advantage of the notability guideline) to delete the neutral, verifiable articles of other editors.

This guideline, more than any other factor, discourages new contributors. The concept that an encyclopedia should delete articles simply because they are non-notable is counterintuitive. I doubt you'll find many people outside the core group of editors who agree with this concept; most are likely to be shocked by it. (You can see this reaction on the talk pages of articles nominated for deletion as non-notable.) Encyclopedias should be encyclopedic. Wikipedia should include everything, save only those items which belong in another section of Wikimedia (covered by WP:NOT). An article without enough information is a stub, waiting to be expanded. Eventually someone will expand it. Newcomers are much more likely to expand an existing article than to create a new one.

The same names frequently appear on the nominations for deletion. Evidently some editors spend a great deal of time and effort to delete others' articles. I'm sure they believe they are improving Wikipedia by doing so. The appearance, however, is that core editors delete the articles of occasional contributors, even if those articles are neutral and verifiable.

The notability criterion is also discriminatory. People with primary languages other than English (especially those which don't use the Latin alphabet) face a high likelihood that their articles will disappear. This is particularly ironic since these are among the more valuable contributions to Wikipedia.

Historical articles and older articles are more likely than others to face deletion. Articles on events in the distant past which are not well known, even if they are historically quite significant, are likely to use offline sources, so a Google search may turn up little or nothing. Editors who are not interested in history, or that area of history, are unlikely to know anything about the subject, and may therefore conclude that it is not notable.

As articles become older, they are likely to become unmaintained (which does not mean useless or irrelevent), and links to online sources may go bad. Hosting companies may vanish, communities disappear, and in a few decades a search will result in no hits. At this point, the Wikipedia article may be the last website discussing the subject. According to the notability guidelines, the article should not be deleted, because notability, once gained, is not lost. However, guidelines mean little, and an editor who frequently deletes articles based on web searches is likely to delete the article with no analysis and no regret. Information has been destroyed, and a historical record has been lost.

Some may argue that the article should be deleted because no other information can be found on the subject. It no longer has working links. This argument is logically valid, and horrifying. It can only stand up if the process (notability) is more important than the results (collection and preservation of knowledge). In other scholarly endeavors, rare knowledge is treasured. In Wikipedia, it is destroyed.

The reasons cited for nominating articles for deletion are, frankly, frivolous. The most common reason given is lack of results from a Google search. This cannot be considered careful analysis by any stretch of the imagination. The Google search may not have been thorough, and may not have been well executed. Google may not have found all sources, and indeed doesn't search everything on the Internet. It may not find sources in other languages, and especially those in other alphabets. Furthermore, online sources should not be given preference over offline sources. Many sources are not online and may never be online. Online sources are not necessarily more reliable than offline sources; an argument could be made that offline references are usually more reliable than online ones. Online references are, however, quicker and easier to locate, so those who are not inclined to do much research (or who are looking for justification to delete a page) usually rely on them exclusively.

The assumption that a subject which is noteworthy has been noted is especially shortsighted. According to the guideline, "notable" means "worthy of note." Many things which are worthy of note have not been noted by the general public. The desire to have a quick and easy way to determine that an article can be deleted does not show thoroughness; it shows laziness.

Wikipedia should not be a compendium of pop culture, but the notability guideline may turn it into one. Eterry 06:37, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

  • I congratulate you on your excellent and well-thought-out comments above, but frankly I disagree with you. More articles are now being deleted because more articles are being created. It is probably true that many articles which are deleted are created by new or occasional contributors; they tend to be the least familiar with what articles are needed or appropriate for Wikipedia. Many of them are deleted for notability, but partly that is a convenience; many articles which are deleted for notability could just as easily be deleted for lack of good sources (for example: band articles, which frequently have no source other than the band's website.) I also believe that Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, which means to me that multiple editors must agree that the information could be valuable. Do you want an article on my cat Penny (cat)? Or my dog Bowser (dog)? (I made him up, but you would never know.) Clearly not. A line must be drawn somewhere as to what is encyclopedaic information and what is trivia, or information of such transient or minor interest that it is not wanted. It is also true that each article in Wikipedia is an additional burden of maintenance - updating, vandalism removal, maintaining links. If I change the name of the president of Harvard to "Brian Youmans", it will be corrected in a few minutes, but what if I make myself the principal of a random high school? Or an elementary school? The answer of course is that no one will notice the change for weeks or months. An article which is not watched IS a liability to Wikipedia, because it can be changed with impunity; it is the equivalent of a vacant building, ready to be vandalized or used for unsavory purposes. To sum up: I believe that a notability guideline is useful, and the ability to delete articles for reasons of notability is an essential tool in creating a better Wikipedia. Brianyoumans 22:16, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I see no problem with an article on your cat or dog, as long as it isn't original content and you can make it truly neutral and verifiable. I doubt if you can meet those standards, but if you somehow manage it, good for you. I see no need to exclude trivia. More to the point, I believe that the great majority of editors are opposed to excluding non-notable material.

I agree that new contributors are unlikely to be familiar with Wikipedia's guidelines. I don't remember any mention of them in the signup process. The guidelines, and discussions on the guidelines, should be given more visibility.

The strongest argument I've seen for notability is that unmaintained articles will be vandalized. However, notability addresses this indirectly at best. It is a backdoor approach. If it is necessary to require that articles be maintained, this should be addressed directly, in a separate guideline. (I don't think you're claiming that all notable articles are maintained. Clearly some are not.)

You indicate that using notability as a ground for deleting articles is a convenience. I agree. However, deleting articles should not be convenient. If an article violates a core policy, it should be deleted on those grounds. The article's maintainers are likely to understand the core policies (which are clear and objective) and realize that the deletion is justified. They may not like it, but they will understand it. They are not likely to understand the notability guideline, because it is counterintuitive and is unlikely to be accepted by someone who is not familiar with the history and philosophy of Wikipedia (i.e. someone who is not a core editor). The use of the notability guideline to delete articles almost always creates bad feelings and often drives away new editors. It should never be used when a core policy can be used instead.

My central point is that there is not a consensus that the notability guideline should exist. Perhaps there is a consensus among core editors (though I doubt it), but not among the community as a whole. In fact, I believe there would be a consensus that the notability guideline should be removed, if non-core editors were aware of it.

The current discussion is a good example. How many editors know that it is taking place? It isn't easy to find, at least for those not very familiar with the pages on Wikipedia guidelines. I see no mention of it at Village pump (policy), and even if it were mentioned there, the Village Pump itself is not prominent or well known.

The guidelines are crucial, and discussions on the guidelines are also crucial. There should be an automatic listing of guidelines which are under discussion (i.e. which have the underdiscussion tag), either at Village pump (policy) or somewhere else, and that page should be prominently placed so that all editors are aware of it. Eterry 04:37, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I am also for removal of notability

  • Just because something can't be found in an encyclopedia it doesn't mean it doesn't exist
  • In some caes it isn't possible or practical for an item to be published
  • In even more cases people just wouldn't publish the article in their publication as they wouldn't make money from it
  • Some open source programs are small but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be allowed on wikipedia because they are not "notable"
  • Heaps of things wouldn't be notable

Mrtechguy 10:38, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree. The notability guidelines are too keenly enforced and put a harsh limit on the usefulness of Wikipedia. Of course there are limits, but at the moment, the standards are set far too high. JMalky 10:43, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Jreferee tries to make sense of it all

Wikipedia:Notability addresses coverage by sources and Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not addresses importance conveyed by sources. As I see it, a major problem is that the common person understands the term "Notability" to mean importance, no matter how clear this guideline states that "Wikipedia notability" means coverage by sources, not importance conveyed by sources. Wikipedia:Notability and Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not should be refocused to minimize any perceived overlap between the two. The article inclusion assistance provided by these two should be distinct: 1. coverage by sources and 2. importance conveyed by sources. The analysis should be something like, even if there is sufficient coverage by reliable sources Wikipedia:Notability, do these reliable source include enough importance for the topic to overcome Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not? In other words, just because Wikipedia can have an article on the topic (e.g. Wikipedia:Notability), should we (e.g., Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not)? A problem with this is that Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not not only addresses importance, but it serves as a catch-all for, well, everything Wikipedia is not. In any event, the first change that I would urge is to change the name of this guideline from notability to something like Wikipedia:Source Coverage. Until this guideline's name is changed, the Wikipedia:Notability means importance vs. Wikipedia:Notability means sufficient coverage by reliable sources debate will continue. -- Jreferee 21:22, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree. Notability does, sort of, mean importance, though "significance" would probably be a better word. My understanding is that we avoid the word "importance", because that has too strong a connotation, which could be used to drive out a lot of content. Coverage by sources is the best general evidence of the notability/significance/importance of a subject, but notability itself is a concept distinct from sourcing. If notability only meant that multiple sources are required, then we should simply amend our existing sources policy to include this requirement.--Kubigula (talk) 03:21, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
The text of WP:N states: "A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject," so I do not see Wikipedia process as notability itself as a concept distinct from sourcing. That's pretty much my point in a nut shell. It is not whether I subjectively think a topic is important enough to include in Wikipedia, but whether reliable secondary sources think a topic is important enough to include a threshold amount of content in their publications. That's what the written WP:N process says to me. If reliable secondary sources think a topic is important enough to include in their publications (as evidence by them covering the topic in their publication beyond Wikipedia's "Significant coverage" threshold amount), then that topic (article) should not deleted from Wikipedia because it is not Wikipedia notable. It might be deleted because it falls under "What Wikipedia is not" or the emerging "BLP" deletion criteria, but it should not deleted from Wikipedia because of the Wikipedia Notability guideline. sources policy may be used to determine what is and is not a reliable secondary source. sources policy does not address the Wikipedia's "Significant coverage" threshold, which is covered by WP:N. There is overlap in the processes, so there may be more than one view on what process covers what issue. -- Jreferee 16:31, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
True enough. I was addressing more the entire WP notability scheme, including PROF, BIO, BOOKS etc, which are incoporated here by reference. They all require some verifiable written evidence or attribute of notability. Significant coverage is the general threshold, but there are subject specific thresholds as well, which may be more, less, or slightly different than significant coverage in multiple sources.--Kubigula (talk) 18:00, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
The guideline states "A topic is presumed to be notable if...", but it goes out of its way not state the converse, "At topic is presumed not to be notable unless...", but that's how WP:N seems to be interpreted in most of the afd discussions. I think we are all lousy at judging notability outside our own narrow fields, and wikipedia editors are not evenly representative of the population as a whole. If the author of a neutral article written in reasonably good faith asserts the notability of the subject matter, that assertion should be left unchallenged by anyone except a subject matter expert. It is silly for us to have people who have never set foot in an art gallery arguing the notability of some local artist, but that's what we do all the time. Capmango 18:31, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Notability makes wiki a more useful reference tool, imagine a student researching an Essay on John Smith the english settler, now imagine if every john smith who is or has ever lived had an entry how would you every find the one specific and notable john smith from the hoards of un notables?
  • Notability means something is of worth to the culture of humanity and might be of interest to any person on the planet, I stubbed by left toe this morning so i had a limp for a few hours thats notable to me my wife and at best my friends, but not of any value to anyone else in any meaningful way.
  • Its stops a the spread of an already western bias, if every school, social club or person has an article how soon would you see all those on american compared to all those on africans? or essential when would the half the worlds population living on less that a dollar a day get there articles? when there rich enough to own a computer?
  • Bias would also be a problem since wiki is already under attack from rightwings groups for its liberal bias, and articles are created on the priorities of editors more articles would be created for Liberal issues etc
  • It provides a safe guard against malice, i could write that my next door neighbour is gay, not outlandish enough to flag and vandalism, source it to a ten year old copy of the local paper, my neighbour doesn't own a PC or use the net so he himself would never know but then if some incident occurs and a reporter (as they increasingly do) use wiki has his only research this lie would then spread further.
  • It makes wiki a place of education not gossip and shows it has its priorities straight. as Colbert mockingly said an encyclopedia that has a longer article on truthiness than lutherans has its priorities straight. i feel that Colbert mocking wiki for these flaws (which removing notability would only see multiply) is much more damaging than some little know weblog Sherzo 06:34, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Um from what I can tell, the only real reason why Timothy Noah is 'mocking' us is because he got pissed when his article nearly got deleted Nil Einne 19:59, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Benefit of the Doubt

Here is a statement to consider: The author of an article generally has a better idea of the notability of the subject than the rest of us do. The policy should be this: If an article is posted in good faith, does not have huge COI problems, is not obvious spam, it should be kept. If it makes no assertion of notability, it should be tagged so the author is informed of the necessary of notability. At that point, the author either realizes that the suject is not notable, and volunteers for deletion, or the author puts in an assertion of notability.

Once notability has been asserted, only a subject matter expert should challenge it. The decision that something is not notable should be made by someone who understands the specific area as well as the author does. I admit the price we probably pay is a few more pages covering artists who just got their first gallery showing and bands whose popularity does not spread more than 10 miles from their house, but right now we are both alienating a lot of potential contributors and deleting a lot of perfectly notable articles that really should just be cleaned up.

Right now, we have notability police on a rampage, biting newbies left and right and blankly asserting that something is not notable just because they haven't heard of it and/or can't find it on Google. There's an afd for a band that toured America and Europe for 10 years and has put out three albums on a notable indie label, reviews of concerts in major music publications in the U.S. and Europe, and the consensus on afd is to delete the page because the band never had a hit record. The situation is even worse in areas where there are no clear criteria like WP:MUSIC. We wikipedia editors don't evenly represent the population as a whole, and most of us would have no idea what (for example) makes a New York socialite notable or not notable. Capmango 18:16, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

"Run by experts" editing is five blocks down and take a right at Citizendium (and indeed, from what I've glanced at it, they do handle deletion in a matter similar to that). This, however, is the "encyclopedia anyone can edit", and part of editing is cutting, or proposing that a given page be cut entirely. Even if we had a way to actually verify who is a subject-matter expert, they need only source an article well (which any expert should easily be able to do on a genuinely notable topic within the field), and then no one is likely to even want to propose it be deleted, nor are they likely to succeed at it if they do. And if those sources just aren't there, then we should not have that article. We work from sources, end of story. Seraphimblade Talk to me 21:07, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
So what I hear you saying is, "The way we do it is the way we do it, and if you have a problem with that, you should take a hike." Okay, fair enough. And that might even be fine if your final black-and-white statement were true in practice but it is not. Editors in afd discussions are constantly rejecting sources because they personally aren't familiar with them (particularly if the source is offline), or saying things along the lines of "I don't care how many sources talk about X, X is just not notable". I dunno about your statement on subject matter experts, though. It's very common to tag an article as needing input from a subject matter expert; we're happy to look to experts to add to an article, I don't see the problem looking to an expert to help decide to delete one. Capmango 19:19, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
I disagree with your statement. In my experience, the original author of an article often (not always, and not most the vast majority (replacing most with stronger word) of the time, but more than a little) has a poorer idea of the notability of a subject than the rest of us do. Many editors have a sense of possessiveness and inclusiveness about certain subjects. I'm not saying that all are like this, but there are more than a few who have a sense of myopia about the things that really interest them, even if they can be neutral about other things. FrozenPurpleCube 15:18, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
I don't think you do disagree with my statement. I said an authors "generally" have a better idea of the notability than the rest of us, and you said that authors "more than a little" (but not most of the time) have a poorer idea. I agree with you, which is why I didn't say that the author should be the last word on notability. What I'm trying to say is that controversies over notability should be debated by people (like subject matter experts and presumably the author) who have a reasonable level of familiarity with the subject of the article in question. Capmango 19:29, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
Nope, I strongly disagree with saying that they generally have a better idea. Most of the time they don't either. Sorry, I guess I was just trying to be too diplomatic and spoke too softly. I have modified my statement accordingly. I had a longer reply to your further statements, but I suppose that the best way to put it is: In my experiences, enough people who have asserted their expertise on a given subject have been mistaken that I can't stand by your position as it's expressed. And this doesn't just apply to the notability of a given subject. I've seen rather hostile reactions come from experts when improvement to an article to make it more accessible is suggested. Perhaps your experiences have been different. Mine haven't been conducive to trusting the experts. FrozenPurpleCube 02:34, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
Let's define things a little more precisely. By "idea of notability", we may mean "opinion of the degree of notability," or we may mean "awareness of relevant information about the notability." I was more talking about the second of those, I think you may be talking about the first. I agree that an author who is close to the subject may have a lack of objectivity about the notability of his/her subject. But those of us who are in theory more objective are also generally less informed. The ideal arbiter in a case like this is someone who has the objectivity of an outsider and the subject-matter awareness of an insider. We have too many discussions in afd where an author establishes notability of his/her through references to outside sources, and we all say, "gee, I never heard of that source, so I'll assume it is neither reliable nor independent and I reject it". Capmango 21:51, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
Well, in the absence of people who are both fully-informed and fully-neutral on a subject, I'm afraid I must choose in favor of asking those who claim to know better to make their case. FrozenPurpleCube 00:06, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Point system for article inclusion NOT notability alone.

Hello all,

Countries such as Canada, Australia, have a well defined point system to decide whether a person is eligible to receive Permanent Residency or not. If a similar point system can be devised for inclusion/deletion of articles it will reduce the energy spent on discussion and help in quick decision making. Notability as such can remain one of the point scorer for an article. If every university article on a subject carries 5 points, and an wikipedia super-editor approval carries another 10 points etc. We simply need to set a inclusion threshold for articles, instead of ambiguous and contradicting guidelines which I believe currently is frustrating editors and giving undue advantage to deletionists.

Instead of random discussions on topics, if the criteria of inclusion can be defined in a checklist/objective manner, a lot of voluntary manpower can be put to better use. Amit 07:35, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

  • We've seen that suggestion before, but it really doesn't work because it widens the scope for argument (about which point values to ascribe to which criteria, and about how much an article conforms to the criteria). m:instruction creep. >Radiant< 13:01, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
  • The alternative is that we get a certain amount of "argument creep" because we count on people to use their sense. This makes highly active AFDs way less useful. Everyone who can type shows up instead of just those who can make a coherent argument. But, I can't see there's much to be done about this- what you describe above doesn't seem realistic to me. Even if standards could be that well defined, we'd still get people arguing between "this source is an insignificant mention of the subject- it doesn't count for a point" and "insignificant doesn't mean anything to me. Of course we give it a point." I can't see how it would help. Friday (talk) 14:59, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
  • It would be difficult to maintain an up-to-date hard point ranking for reliable sources (as well as controversial). Setting up a Wikipedia super-editor/not superior-editor class system over article content seems to go against the flow of how Wikipedia operates (e.g., everyone's delete/keep content opinion receives equal consideration). For me, WP:N indicates whether we can have an article on a topic (sufficient source content) and WP:NOT and WP:BLP indicate whether we should have an article on a topic (WP:NOT sufficient source importance and WP:BLP privacy). -- Jreferee 16:47, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
  • I just don't see how this would work in practice. It's better to actually look at an article-"Seven sources cited, well that's good, ah, but on looking at them, three only name-drop the subject and four don't mention it at all, that's bad. Better keep looking, hrm, can't find anything more...this one better get prodded." Or, alternatively, "Not a single source cited, and this sounds like total BS...well I'll be damned, a quick look turns up tons of reliable source material, guess it's not. I'll throw some of those sources in." Or "This is a dictionary definition, but it's a good one and Wiktionary doesn't have it yet. I'll put it up for transwiki." Or "This doesn't really work as a standalone article, but it's got some useful stuff. I'll merge it to a parent topic and do a redirect." It takes actual thought, not just a point score. Seraphimblade Talk to me 20:16, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
  • That's pretty much my thought process as well, Seraphimblade. -- Jreferee 00:00, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Seraphimblade/Jrefree, I agree with what you said, and also believe that you experienced wikipedians are "eligible" to make those decisions. What I do want to lay stress on is "It is easier to prove something NOT notable as compared to being notable, becuase and ONLY becuase content creators spend more energy than those who delete it.". Seraphimblade & Jreferee are perhaps experienced wikipeidians and I would not have an issue if decide that a particular article is not notable. But what I do find it problematic is the situation "when an article or content within an article is considered "not notable" because, the deletionist hasn't heard of the subject". New editors to wikipedians often confuse "popularity" with "notability" and this is frustration for the content creators.

I believe their needs to be an eligibility criteria for either the editors or the inclusion/deletion of articles which can be "quantified" easily without ambiguity. Perhaps "point system" is not the best way to go about it. I guess I need to think more. Does the majority here feel that changing the phylosophy of wikipedia from "Anyone can edit the wikipedia" to

    • "Everyone ELIGIBLE can edit wikipedia", is a step in the right direction ?
    • Eligibility can be being "notable" as a user.
    • Notability of a user can be...
      • Number of edits in "article talk pages".
      • Number of support nominations from "notable users".
      • Number of points accumulated by a user by editing "current wiki articles".
      • Number of notable "references" about the user.(Perhaps this will be invasion of privacy! cancelled).

Amit 08:59, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Everyone eligible can edit Wikipedia; people are eligible as long as they aren't blocked for vandalism or other bad behavior, and as long as they don't edit from open proxies, and as long as they aren't prevented from editing by the Great Firewall. Pretty much covers it. >Radiant< 11:07, 11 June 2007 (UTC)