Wikipedia talk:Red link

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[edit] POV text

I moved the following POV text posted by Information-Ecologist from the article to here. It presents one person's viewpoint and does not belong in the actual article. -- Cyrius 04:21, Mar 26, 2004 (UTC)

Clicking on a "red" link - in truth, more of an orange red, not to be confused with a bluish red followed link - leads the Wikipedian to an Edit page for a new definition of the word or phrase in red. This provides little of value to the person who reaches the page, and contributors are generally discouraged from making use of red links.

[edit] Value of alternative construction

The lack of value of red links - combined with the value of exploring definitions that have not yet been created in Wikipedia - has led to an ad hoc implementation at collective intelligence agency and information ecology of a proposed alternative construction of the red link as a search link, as in the following example: information habitat - created with the following code:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?search=information+habitat&go=Go information habitat]

The code has the effect of directing one to Wikipedia's search page for the words contained in the link, arguably the optimal place within Wikipedia from which to explore the use or meaning of the words.

This would appear to offer substantially more of value both to those who are browsing Wikipedia and to contributors to Wikipedian definitions. The value of this alternative construction is that it leads to a search of Wikipedia's body of knowledge rather than to a relatively worthless ghost page.

But red links allow the _creation_ of new knowledge - it is through a red link that a new page is made. Your proposal would cause the encyclopedia to stagnate as no new pages could be made. Secretlondon 20:26, 26 Mar 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Red links invite contribution

MediaWiki by default ships with the behaviour that a Go search on a term that does not exist simply says "There is no such article" and returns a list of search results. Note that this is different than the behaviour of WikiMedia projects, as a result of changing MediaWiki:Nogomatch to include a red link to a page with the same name as the search terms. This seems to have been done to increase, rather than decrease, the ability of people to create new articles.

But if so why does MW ship without this useful feature? Well, according to MW developer Brion, (as quoted at m:Create_page_after_search_not_found), this is because:

...[T]raditionally wikis are an exploratory medium; you find pages through links from other pages or RecentChanges. creation of new pages is something that's to be done in context, by editing a page to create a link.

Clearly Wikism (and MW's model) is pro-redlink. Anti-redlink policy and practice is unWikian. The whole notion of Wikism is to empower and encourage the user to contribute. Bringing a user to a dead page via the advance warning of a redlink can encourage contribution. Eliminating redlinks reduces ability and tendency for new contribution.

It would be very easy for Wiki software to simply not activate dead links (i.e. don't link red links at all). But on the contrary, it does, for this very reason.

- Keith D. Tyler 20:06, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussions from Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context

Discussions moved from Wikipedia talk:Only make links that are relevant to the context.

[edit] Red links

I filed myself as an opponent of this guideline above, but only because the guideline for some reason discourages the creation of red links.

1. Red links shouldn't be part of this guideline. This guideline is about "Only make links that are relevant to the context". If someone thinks there's a problem with creating red links, make it a separate guideline.

2. Red links are great. They are a hook that new Wikipedians often use to start their very first article. The "Most requested articles" list serves the same purpose. They remind us this is a work in progress.

Also, the example about the link to "United States" isn't a good one; I'll try improving it now.

Tempshill 20:07, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

I have the opposite opinion to Tempshill other than perhaps agreeing that redlinks could be it's own separate guideline. For me ...
  • 1. Redlinks make any article look clumsy and unfinished.
  • 2. Editors and contributors who are interested in a primary article monitor that article and go back and forth into the original to link and pipelink to relevant subsidiary articles that they either write or find.
  • 3. This back and forth step can not be understated because it (a) seeks constant monitoring of the primary article and (b) removes the compulsion for contributors especially new contributors to write small stub like responses to redlinks that are often either poorly named (through lack of research) or previously written under another name - thus disjointing the encyclopaedia. For example if I link this paragraph: Sydney; Australia was favoured to be the host of the 2000, Olympic Games during the last year of the second millenium or if you prefer the first year of the third millenium - I set up a number of valid and invalid links that confuse poor punctuation (let's face it there is plenty of that through wiki, through commonwealth versus non-commonwealth spelling, and topic conjuction in one form versus another form somewhere on wiki.
  • 4. Timing is the issue - redlinks are okay for a week or two - maybe a month - but many contributors start an article add redlinks and then for months never come back - nor will they.
  • 5. For those of us that remove what otherwise appear to be valid future links - but are currently redlinks we should (and do in my case) check to see when the redlinks were created and if they are older than a few weeks then remove, or if they are trivial then remove them at any time.VirtualSteve 04:44, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
This is your opinion. This is not policy. There is a fundamental difference. Ambi 05:22, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
  • What in heavens name is wrong now Ambi. Did I say it was policy? This Wikitalk page is an opinion page. Have a look at the top of the page it says exactly that it is a collection of opinions. Can you please stop pointing your gun at every one that has a different opinion than you - better still seeing you nominate yourself as an administrator can you please tell me who I complain to about your fair policing and the steps for formulating that complaint - by return message please? VirtualSteve 06:45, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree with Tempshill. Redlinks are great for encouraging creation of useful articles. ··gracefool |☺ 07:17, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Redlinks that have been created through a genuine inability to find an already existing article are a sign that a redirect should probably be created (and the red link pointed to the correct place), not that the term should not be linked. --Martyman-(talk) 07:23, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
    • Unless there's no article on the subject... ··gracefool |☺ 07:36, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree that red links are largely tangential to this guideline. I think we need a guideline that talks about not creating spurious and stupid links - let's talk about how we can make this guideline into that, not get rid of it. Oh, and Nandesuka, Ambi is female. Deco 08:24, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
    • Oh, and if anyone wants my opinion on red links: in an encyclopedia of this size they're often a sign that you screwed up a link (not so in smaller pedias). My advice: if you see a red link, double and triple check for an article on the topic using search. This may lead to the creation of a redirect. If you don't find it, go ahead and leave the red link as long as it satisfies Only make links that are relevant to the context. Deco 08:28, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Some well-targeted redlinks are good for the encyclopedia. Spam-like lists of redlinks to trivial topics that will never develop into acceptable articles are bad. When in doubt, I prefer the conservative approach - leave your list on your userpage until you're ready to actually write the article. I think the existing paragraph does a good job of guiding new users through the thinking about what is and is not generally considered to be appropriate. Rossami (talk) 15:49, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Per Deco—whichever way this goes, the revert-warring on this page is not productive; I agree the current wording is not optimal, and open to misinterpretation, but a compromise version of this could work. Mindspillage (spill yours?) 22:57, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
    • Clearly there is no consensus on it, so it should not be included with the rest of the page which is agreed on. ··gracefool |☺ 03:10, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
      • A point of procedure - we are discussing a long-established clause which has had wide acceptance in the past. It has been part of this page since the second edit. (Personally, I thought the bullet was stronger with the Heinlein example but that's a minor point.) In such a long-standing case, it is not the responsibility of the defenders of the status quo to show that consensus still exists. Rather, it is incumbent on those attempting to change the page to show that consensus has changed. Rossami (talk) 04:54, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I concur with Rossami; a red link or two is not going to bring the world to an end, but a metric ton of them generally is a leading indicator of a poorly structured article. Nandesuka 03:50, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

I propose a rephrasing of the paragraph on red links.

Like the guideline says, if a term is relevant to the article context, it should be defined as a link. In my opinion, that guideline should be followed regardless of whether the link becomes red or not, or we'll be generating a lot of extra work of retroactively linking necessary terms. I also believe that correctly placed red links encourages people to expand and improve Wikipedia, which to me is more important than the negative impact they have on the reading experience, which can be solved later (a future feature of Wikipedia could be a user setting that converts all red links into ordinary text, for example).

I agree, however, that extra care should be taken when you notice that one of your links becomes red, and that you perform additional checks - there might be a reason why the term has no article, or the article might go under a different name. This is what I'd like the paragraph on red links to explain.

Wintran 22:04, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

We clearly disagree about the importance of the reading experience. But reasonable people can disagree. I'd ask you to reconsider your thought about "a future feature of Wikipedia [that would] convert all redlinks into ordinary text". Such a setting would defeat the statement immediately before it that redlinks encourage people to expand Wikipedia. If we ever allow redlinks to not show, it will be far more difficult for people to find and expand the desired article. I do not see us ever enabling such a function. Rossami (talk) 02:16, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
Regarding the future feature, my thought was that it would be a user preference that each registered user can change on their own. Per default it would display red links as it does today. This option would allow people who find red links distracting, or who only use Wikipedia for reading, to hide them when they're logged in. I haven't really thought about this feature in detail but I don't think such optional individual preferences would cause any harm, as long as the default value remains the same.
Btw, I just noticed that there already exists a similar preference under the Misc tab called Format broken links, that allows you to display red links like this: red link? instead of red link. I can't say I'm certain that my feature is needed now that I found that.
I still wish to see the red links paragraph rephrased to encourage people to create correct links even if they become red (just be more careful and recheck that they are correct). Otherwise, like I said, I'm afraid it'll generate too much extra work and slow down the growth of Wikipedia. Wintran 11:33, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
  • As far as I'm concerned, red links shouldn't be part of this guideline, per the first reason given by Tempshill above. It has nothing to do with the scope of this guideline (the relation between "links" and "context"). Whether, after putting a link, it colours "red" or "blue" has nothing to do with context. --Francis Schonken 22:32, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
I've added a brief addendum to this section. I do think there is a pretty strong consensus that red links to topics that clearly deserve articles are desirable, but that massive numbers of links or those to topics unlikely to ever have articles are not bery helpful. I do also agree that this isn't really a context issue, and that this rule might be better incorporated into Wikipedia:Manual of Style (links), which at the moment is completely missing a discussion of red links. - SimonP 22:15, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
I agree. Let's get this out of this article - I doubt even the supporters of this clause would be upset to see it move from one guideline page to another. Also see my brief discussion above of "in a Wikipedia of this size..." Deco 23:37, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Forgive me for not reading through all of the opinions, but let me just tell you mine: I am generally pro-redlink, as long as they aren't to overdone in an article (a few redlinks are okay, they are rather positive, as Tempshill states in his point #2). I want to add, however, that in lists, for example lists of languages or language families or presidents of certain states, redlinks should be kept a) to remind the reader that there is some work that could be done and b) to become blue in future, when someone creates that article, who does not know of the redlink in the original list. — N-true 16:44, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Redlinks useful?

The recent edits to this guidance by SimonP are a result of a disagreement he had with me, where I citied WP:CONTEXT as a reason to remove redlinks from multiple articles on 5/31. We had a discussion about this on my talk page, but now that his changes here to this article have been reverted, I'm wondering how valid his points are. While I know that this is not the way it is currently stated in the guidance, is the following considered a valid and supportable point of view here at Wikipedia?

What should not be linked - Redlinks (links that go nowhere), unless you're prepared to promptly turn those links into real ones yourself by writing the articles. It's usually better to resist linking these items until you get around to writing an article on each one.

Thanks, -- Argon233 T C @ ∉  20:17, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely not. There are many legitimate and immediately relevant topics that don't have articles. One that often comes up for me is well-known researchers in a narrow field. It's far better to leave in a link that encourages useful expansion than to delete them unilaterally. There was some discussion about redlinks farther up the page that shows a clear lack of consensus. Deco 20:24, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
And I think the quoted section is very supportable. It is not, however, an absolute rule. That's why the line says "usually better" and why it clearly says at the top of the page that this guideline is in dynamic tension with the Build the web guideline. Some redlinks are good for the project. Carefully targetted redlinks on specialized topics can be a way to entice the specialists to fill in a blank space in our coverage. On the other hand, lots of redlinks that have little chance of being filled in anytime soon are a distraction to our readers. They can actually get in the way of understanding and usability. Striking the right balance requires editorial judgment and discretion. Cooperative editing and consensus-seeking will generally lead us to the right balance. Rossami (talk) 20:57, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
Well said. Deco 00:29, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't agree. I think all relevant links should be created and encouraged, regardless of if they become red or not. If a reader finds them disturbing this could be solved with a simple user preference, as opposed to retroactively having to add links that were previously red once they're turned into real links, which means a lot of extra work. Red links also inspires expansion of Wikipedia. See my comments at Red links above for more. Wintran 09:26, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
Unfortunately, under the current mediawiki software, it can not be solved through our existing user preferences. You can either turn them all on or all off. And I don't foresee us ever putting such a user preference in place because if we did, it would defeat your stated purpose. Readers who can't see the red link can't be inspired by them to expand Wikipedia.
No one is arguing against the addition of "relevant links". The challenge is how to define "relevant" in the context of the particular article. Rossami (talk) 13:19, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
True, and I agree that extra care should be taken to ensure that links that become red really are relevant, such a checking that other articles don't already cover the subject. The reason I don't like the quote in Argon233's message is because I find it misleading - If the red link really is relevant, and don't overlap with an existing article, it shouldn't matter whether the current user is planning to start the article or if someone else eventuelly starts it a few years later, the link should be created in either case.
If registered users are disturbed by the visuals of red links, they can switch link format to questionmarks instead of whole red words (found at My preferences/Misc), but I agree that a feature to completely hide them might be bad. Wintran 13:19, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Redlinks are a signal that articles need to be created, especially when you come across a redlink to a TV show, movie, or book (as examples I most frequently encounter). If the redlink is to something so obscure that it's doubtful an article will be created ... well to be honest that's a POV judgement call and deleting the redlink, to be honest, would violate WP:NPOV. I think redlinks are fine, so long as articles don't become overlinked, for which there is already another rule in place. 23skidoo 23:44, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
I largely agree with you, except that that's a misapplication of NPOV. It's possible to use links in a POV way - for example, refusing to link articles that contradict your viewpoint - but edits that aim to remove information that isn't notable in the opinion of that editor are not POV edits, no more than removing a diatribe on George Bush's cat from George Bush is. Deco 02:50, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] warning not to arbitrarily remove red links

I think it would be useful to have somewhere in the lead, bold text that states do not arbitrarily remove red links just because the article doesn't exist. The reason being that several times I've run across editors just removing clearly important red links. In the most recent case, I pointed the editor toward this page, but then he cited part 2 of "dealing with existing red links" which says to remove broken links. Apparently, "broken" link can be easily confused with "red" link. --C S (Talk) 21:04, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I agree 100%. It should also be indicated clearly in this article that just because a red link exists it doesn't always mean the subject is not notable enough to warrant a Wikipedia article. I've seen this excuse used by some "redlink removers" and I even saw someone today using the "if kept, remove redlinks" argument in an AFD discussion. The "broken link" line should be changed to indicate that this could also mean someone mispelled the Wikilink. Is there a particular reason why this isn't an official policy or guideline page? 23skidoo 15:09, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
    • Ok, how about adding or changing the lead to include something like

      Removal of red links for nonexistent topics should not be done without careful consideration of their importance or relevance.

      The rest of the page could use some reworking, as people apparently find it confusing, but cleaning up the lead is a good start.--C S (Talk) 01:13, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

I think it would also be good to make a brief mention that some WikiProjects, such as mathematics, extensively use red links. For example, Mathbot keeps track of Most_wanted_redlinks in mathematics articles, in addition to other lists of red links. --C S (Talk) 01:17, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

I've created a nutshell tag stating: "Create red links to needed, unwritten topics. Removal of red links for nonexistent topics should not be done without careful consideration of their importance or relevance." I believe this is a good "in a nutshell" of the current content, which should be useful. Additionally, what is the status of this page anyway? The history is rather confusing. Is it a guideline? --C S (Talk) 00:13, 20 February 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Removal of deleted article links

Let's say an article goes up on AfD, gets mixed support, but ultimately is chosen to be deleted. Does this mean that all references to this page should be changed from links to regular text? This is assuming, of course, that the referral pages are not high-profile pages, and they each already have multiple other red links. What is everyone's opinion on this?

And a second question: does your opinion on this change if consensus makes clear during AfD discussion that the page should be resubmitted for review after a better case for inclusion can be made? I'm asking these questions because I want to get a feel for people's opinions over here. Obviously, some sort of guideline on this very issue should be created, though it is so far unclear as to what that guideline should say. — Eric Herboso 13:01, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I am quoting below a commemt made by User:Ceyockey on my talk page, in reference to a specific instance of the above.
The reason why I have removed wikilinks like this is to help to prevent a cycle of quick re-creation/deletion/re-creation of articles that have undergone an AFD action. I only mean this to be a speed bump and add the reference to the AFD action in a comment which is readily apparent when an editor goes to create a link. Most editors when seeing a red-link and having some information will create a stub and won't know that the article has previously been deleted; this very often leads to frustration on the part of the editor. If only they could see upfront that the article had been deleted and, more importantly, why it had been deleted, the new article creation could anticipate and avoid the previous characteristics that led to deletion ... or so one hopes. It's a good faith attempt to reduce frustration on the parts of editor and administrator alike. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 02:45, 27 March 2007 (UTC) [Originally left at Eric Herboso's talk page.]
I feel that while it is desirable to have new editors know that such an article should not yet be made, it is nevertheless important to keep links up (unless it is a highly public place, like the front page). By keeping links available, you don't lose information later on, if the article is reinstated and stays in place. Further, it becomes easy to show that an article is needed, and will be a good reason to bring up the case before AfD again.
Keep in mind that AfD's decision is based on many factors, but one important one is whether or not Wikipedia itself has many references to that topic. Referring links are a good source of which articles are highly needed. Removing red links will completely remove this avenue of reinstatement as an article as a vehicle for change. (A mixed metaphor, but only barely.) I strongly suggest that an addition to Wikipedia:Red link be made, stating that red links to AfD articles should be removed if AfD used speedy delete or consensus showed that the article will never be allowed in the encyclopedia. For any other situation, red links should be left, or redirects should be made to the appropriate area. In the absence of any further comment, I will make this change myself. — Eric Herboso 19:42, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

I've put in the relevant content that was discussed above on Red link. Not many participated in the discussion, but I went ahead with being bold and changed it to reflect the position I feel makes the most logical sense. The change was made here. For reference, the content is as follows:

  1. The link is broken and no longer leads to an article (perhaps because the underlying article was deleted). In such a case, the link usually needs to be removed or renamed to point to an existing article. If the article was deleted, there are many appropriate ways to deal with the resultant red links depending on what reason was given at Articles for deletion.
    1. If the article was speedily deleted, then the red links should be changed to ordinary text.
    2. If the article was deleted by near unanimous consensus for reasons of an unencyclopedic nature, then the red links may be changed to ordinary text.
    3. If the article was deleted due to lack of sources, non-notability, or any reason which may admit the article to be resubmitted at a later date, the red links should be left alone.

Please leave a comment if you disagree with this change. — Eric Herboso 13:43, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with this change. Articles deleted for non-notability are usually spam and vanity articles. Redlinks to non-notable topics should be removed from other articles as well. We don't need unimportant information spammed into other articles. --Dragonfiend 16:18, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Then what if we specify degrees of non-notability? If it is clearly spam or vanity articles, then of course there is no reason to leave red links. I am only advocating leaving red links in cases where the non-notability charge may not apply in the future. After all, it is notoriously difficult to replace lost links once they are gone. And what harm is there in having red links to articles that are legitimately linked to? Of course, if it is just link spam, then they of course should be deleted. But many articles removed by AfD are not just spam or vanity, but are legitimate topics that just don't quite meet the criteria needed for their own encyclopedia page yet.
What if we change the text to read: "If the article was deleted due to lack of sources, non-notability, or any reason which may admit the article to be resubmitted at a later date, and if the article was not created as spam or vanity, then the red links should be left alone."? Would this change adequately fix what your objection was against? — Eric Herboso 02:44, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Non-notable information doesn't belong in an encyclopedia, whether as entire articles, or as information in other articles, whether accompanied by red links or not. --Dragonfiend 06:11, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
If all articles that are deleted for non-notability were permenantly deleted, then I might agree with you. But many articles have been deleted on that basis only to be readmitted later on. Consider schools, for example. Of course, the vast majority of non-notable deleted articles are vanity or spam articles. But not all of them are. Some are genuine articles that just don't quite pass the notability guidelines. In these articles, it is useful to retain the redlinks, so that you can use the What links here function to gauge how much demand there is for the article over time. Surely you must admit that there is a category of articles that, while non-notable for inclusion as an article, are nonetheless notable enough to mention many times over in the wikipedia -- shouldn't these deserve redlinkage? — Eric Herboso 04:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see any consensus here for Eric's addition. One puzzling thing is that the various criteria appear to contradict each other. An article could be speedy-deleted due to no assertion of notability, but criterion 1 appears to say remove the red link while criterion 3 says keep it. Also, one thing that makes me a bit leery myself is that I see articles speedy-deleted all the time for inane reasons. I can see someone going to undo the red links only to run into resistance by people who know the red links are to a notable topic. Such a person would argue, well this page on red links says I should remove the links, whereas everyone else would argue this topic is important, it's not our problem that some admin deleted a badly written article or whatever on the topic. In other words, I think being overly-prescriptive is bad. We certainly don't want people going around removing red links against the consensus of people who are doing a good job of maintaining articles (including whatever red links they include). Since I don't see anybody besides Eric supporting this addition, I am going to remove it for now until there is a clear consensus for it. --C S (talk) 07:10, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with Ceyockey, and some of the other views expressed here. Ceyockey explains that he or she removes links to articles that failed {{afd}} to discourage people from recreating them. I've had articles I started get a speedy deletion notice, because an article with that title had recently been deleted, only to have the closing admin recognize that the article I drafted from scratch was a perfectly valid article, that didn't share any of the weaknesses that got the original article deleted. IIRC I wasn't aware that articles with those names had been deleted. IIRC I had merely come across a gap in the wikipedia's coverage, and filled it.
User:C S notes that they have seen valid articles speedy deleted for inane reasons. I would say that this problem is not confined to speedy deletion. The criteria for deletion in WP:DEL are routinely ignored in the deletion fora. Just last week I participated in an {{afd}} on an article whose current content was almost certainly vanity, or a hoax, and which was entirely unreferenced -- but when my google search showed that a perfectly valid article could be written on that topic, and I rewrote it, with references, so it covered non-vanity, non-hoax material, several wikipedians who had originally spoken for deletion criticized me for fixing the article. They claimed that by fixing it I was "encouraging vandalism". Geo Swan (talk) 16:03, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't think topic and article name is the same. In the case you describe, Red Mercury (Movie) was created about a hoax or non-notable 2008 movie. You changed it to be about a notable 2005 movie during the AfD. That's another topic, even if the movie has the same name and could be in an article of the same name. If the non-notable 2008 movie had been deleted (without turning it into the notable movie) then redlinks referring to the 2008 movie (determined from context of the redlink) could be deleted while redlinks with the same name but referring to the 2005 movie could be kept. The situation is probably more common with bios. By the way, I had not seen the movie article and AfD before now but here are some thoughts: I think it was a good initiative to make an article about the 2005 movie, but I think you confused the AfD by turning the debated movie article into another movie. You could have created the 2005 movie as "Red Mercury (2005 film)]], and possibly moved it later if the 2008 film was deleted. Or you could have said something like "delete, with no prejudice against later creating an article about the 2005 movie, and keep redlinks referring to the 2005 movie". PrimeHunter (talk) 17:41, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rewording of "When to create red links"

I was hoping to reword the paragraph on "When to create red links".

I think the text can be easily mis-interpreted and from reading the discussion above it seems like more people are of the opinion it is okay to err in favor of create red links.

Especially the wording here: "Do not create links for subsidiary topics that result in red links (links that go nowhere) to articles that will never be created, such as the titles of book chapters. Do create red links to articles you intend to create or technical terms that need to be explained."

I was involved in a discussion recently where I felt that it left a lot of room for debate based on whether the page would be created, and by who. Also I could see how someone might read it simply as "Do not create links for subsidiary topics that result in red links." Also it seems to indicate that one should only create a red link, if they intend to create that article themselves.

Perhaps wording the paragraph in a positive tone would be more straight forward.

When to create red links

Only make links that are relevant to the context.

Create a red link when an article does not exist for a distinct topic (e.g a famous person, notable event, technical term, etc.). Try to avoid creating red links for subsidiary topics where an individual article does not need to be created (e.g. the titles of book chapters).

Ar-wiki 16:10, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree the your new wording is better. --C S (Talk) 13:09, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Red links in {{For}} templates

Is it ok to create a {{for}} template directing to a page with a red link? I don't believe so, but a fellow Wikipedian seems to disagree. He claims that there will be an article there, but the red link has been present for over two months now, and reverts the page when I remove it. –Crashintome4196 02:18, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Specifically to which article are you referring? I'm generally in favor of keeping red links that at least point to something significant, whether or not the article exists yet. But I'd still like to see the case in point. Ar-wiki 12:03, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
If it's a legitimate article, can't you just create a stub? — Eric Herboso 13:46, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New "red" links

I just noticed that something changed in the software so that red links have now become black with a little red question mark after. Could someone point me to the discussion regarding this? I find it a most annoying change. RookwoodDept. of Mysteries 23:56, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] See also links

Some editors place redlinks in a "See also" section at the end. I don't think it makes sense to ask readers to also see something that does not exist. I have deleted several such links, for example today here. I have not found mention of this practice. I suggest saying that redlinks should not be used as "See also" links. PrimeHunter 11:10, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I reluctantly agree that red links in see also sections are not appropriate. But I think just removing them is not very good. I've myself done this because I was too busy to write a short sentence including a red link. Particularly for less mainstream topics, removing an important red link, I feel, can be very disastrous, outweighing any benefit in making the page look nicer. Of course, we don't want the see also section cluttered up with nonexistent articles either. So here is my proposal: rather than just deleting red links from "see also", move them to the talk page, especially if they seem important and relevant. For clearly frivolous links, this would not be necessary. But I suggest just applying the same usual criteria for removing a red link that is in the text to deciding whether a red "see also" link should be moved to the talk page or simply deleted. --C S (Talk) 18:25, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
I routinely remove red links from "see also" listings, as they are very misleading. "See also" is clearly an invitation to see another article for further information, but the reader just ends up being informed that no such article exists. I cannot see any logical reason for red links in "see also" listings. There must be a better way of highlighting the fact that an article is needed, for example by stating somewhere in the article something like: "Conventional ship and boat rudders include the fully balanced rudder, semi-balanced rudder, and spade rudder".--Shantavira|feed me 19:29, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
But you didn't do that. You just routinely removed redlinks in Rudder because you have determined that they are misleading. In fact they mislead no-one. they are red links because the page is absent. A redlink creates an entry in Wanted Pages. They are informative by being red.
You could also have migrated them to the talk page, which would have been helpful. Just tidying up the chairs does not make the room look better. Fiddle Faddle 23:10, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
"Very disastrous"? Please, enough with the hyperbole. I agree with talk-paging as a valid strategy, but it is just as practical and less talk-page-disruptive (and I mean that in the vernacular sense, not the WP:DE sense) to simply <!--comment them out-->.

[edit] Business people

Is there a policy on business people? What I mean is, major office holders in a moderate sized company, who are unlikely to be notable otherwise. I believe the correct policy should be to name them (because their names are relevant) but not redlink them, because the chances of accidentally linking to the wrong person (i.e. someone notable with the same name) are greater than the chances of them becoming notable. And if they do become notable then it is a simple matter to go back and fix the links.

For instance People Telecom: four officers are named and linked. Three are redlinks, while the fourth links to a different John Stanton, giving an inappropriate link. (They may be the same person, but I think it is extremely unlikely). Of course I could go and create a link to John Stanton (Australian businessman), but I don't see the point. I then followed a few of the links at other Category:Internet service providers of Australia, and found that quite a few others (such as Bigpond, Connect.com.au, DART Internet) had a similar problem (redlinks to officers without pages, or blue links to someone else with the same name).

So I'd like to suggest that business people be explicitly mentioned in the guidelines. The guidelines already suggests to not redlink "a celebrity's romantic interest (who is not a celebrity in his or her own right)", but I think a business person is a much better example (they are far less likely to become notable than a celebrity's romantic interest). Peter Ballard 02:12, 19 June 2007 (UTC)


I'm not sure there's a notability guideline on business people, which is what you seem to be asking for. I think rather than be too specific in this page, it's best to just say, look there are various notability guidelines for different topics (like WP:BAND), and if you're going to create lots of red lnks to that type of thing, please do it in accordance to said notability guideline. My reasoning is that this page itself should not be setting out notability guidelines. I suspect, very much, that your opinion business people (while perfectly agreeable and reasonable) may differ from some non-minor number of persons. Thus it's best to just redirect people to places where these things are discussed fully and hammered out. The love interest that is not a celebrity, is, at this point, pretty established, which makes it a "safe" example. --C S (talk) 23:11, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
Point taken. In that case, I'd like the page to point more explicitly to the Notability guidelines, say something like, "In all cases, only redlink people who you think will satisfy WP:Notability guidelines". I'd then like to add the point I made, something like: "In the case of non-notable people, a redlink can more harm than good, because there is a good chance it may end up pointing to a different person of the same name". Peter Ballard (talk) 12:21, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
Hi Peter, thanks for your response. By the way, I don't think it's too difficult to start a notability guideline proposal on business people (if one really doesn't exist); of course, it could take a while to get fleshed out and accepted. Yes, that note on the notability guidelines would be a good idea! People spend a lot of time on those and probably the only reason this page doesn't mention them is that it was written before these notability issues became such a hotly debated issue. The other point you make sounds good too. Why not go ahead and add them? We can work out how to reword the points and clean up this page too. This page could use some substantial cleanup; it's getting a little less cohesive as points are repeated in various spots. While people seem to agree on the major points, the typical contribution (and I'm guilty of this too) seems to be to drop in and add or change a part of it without regard for the whole content. --C S (talk) 13:05, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
Oh, I'm leaving town shortly for a distant land (business rather than pleasure). I'll be gone for more than a week. --C S 13:07, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

One bit, can you please discuss and make a allowance for needed redlinks, even if you don,t want them. Can I recommend you use the start point of this for discussion. If you think you can alter major edits or minor ones, think again please do so only in the sandbox for practice and first use only not second use. No first use of advert is allowed anyway. What are blue links and can you please explain the use and the meaning of blue and red links. I need you to raise awareness of the major changes to this page please do so now. Don,t try to do or make any edits in the sandbox or if you are going to use this page for editing the first time or the so called preview either. Follow all the rules and explain to me about the use of original research and why and also about the links. Bye bye from for now —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Fairycart (talk • contribs).

[edit] Names

What is the policy towards red-linking names? Is there a different rule for linking people than for linking other stuff? I'm specifically interested in what to do with cast & crew lists on film articles, personnel lists on albums etc. These are people who are potentially famous / notable but for whom no article currently exists.

I noticed, for example, that many East Asian film articles contain a cast list where every actor is linked, but only some of those actors have articles. Some of these red-linked people may be very famous in their native country, and becoming more well known in the west, and as such could well eventually get their own articles.

Should the reds be unlinked for the sake of tidyness, or should they be linked to encourage people to write articles on them? Gram123 09:25, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

You should red link the names for which you want people to write articles. You should not be too liberal in doing this. In other words, don't speculate on whether they could become famous. One helpful tool is using "what links here" after say, clicking on a red link in a preview, to see if other articles mention that person. Personally, I find a list of red links as you describe pretty useless, as I know not all of those people could be famous. On the other hand, if I see a cast list, with only a few red links, I pay more attention, as that indicates to me that someone has carefully thought out who should have articles.
As for redlinking people versus other topics, I think there is really only one difference: WP:BLP. If a person is marginally notable, you ought to be careful in encouraging people to create an article on him/her, especially if the claim to notability is based somewhat on something potentially libelous. The official policy seems to be that if a marginally notable person requests his/her bio removed, Wikipedia will honor that request. So keep that in mind. --C S 06:11, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
My opinion (and possibly I am advocating a change of policy here) is that you should only redlink a person if you know the person is notable and deserves an article. When you redlink every person involved in a given movie, company or other project, my observation is that a fair percentage end up linking to a different person of the same name (see my comments in the section above, #Business people). In other words, indiscriminate redlinking of people does more harm than good - the chance of a misleading link (to a different person of the same name) is greater than the chance of the "right" article eventually being created. Peter Ballard (talk) 10:58, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] MoS designation

Since when was this designated part of the Manual of Style? In one skimming of it, I've found more than a dozen things to fix, just from a grammar, spelling, English language parseability and basic logic standpoint, much less delving deeper into whether it actually meshes well with extant, well-developed guidelines, and has consensus buy-in. I challenge this page's designation as a guideline at all, much less part of the MoS (but not so much as to slap a {{Disputedtag}} tag on it yet; the deficiencies can probably be rectified rather quickly if someone who cares about this page will bother). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:42, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

UnitedStatesian added {{guideline}} [1] and quickly changed it to {{style-guide}} 30 April 2007.[2] I haven't seen a proposal or discussion about it. PrimeHunter 16:30, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
I asked the same thing, more or less above. Anyway, from experience, I don't think the intent of this page (especially the nutshell) is contrary to the overall consensus on Wikipedia. I would urge that people work on improving this page and give it some kind of semi-official status as it is very useful to point people toward. Perhaps the folks that worked on the original guideline(s) and split off this page could be bugged to come take a look. --C S 06:36, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Disambiguation

I note no policy on red links and disambiguation messages at the top of pages. Take Cladistics. Should there be a link to the journal article? Do we have an established consensus on this matter? If so it should be added to appropriate guideline pages. If not, I would be in favour of not having such links, and I imagine others would agree. Richard001 10:39, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't think there should ever be redlinks in a Wikipedia:Hatnote like the one added to cladistics in [3]. PrimeHunter 16:29, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
There are cases where redlinks in hatnotes are very much necessary. For example, the scientifically exact dab for any taxon is "<term> (<organism>)". Sometimes, one finds e.g. "<term> (genus)"; this was used initially but in many cases is ambiguous itself (Hovever, there is at least one case where it is indeed correct, involving homonymy of two different Linnean ranks in the same order). If you care to know why this is so, see Homonym (biology) and browse the Nomenclator Zoologicus.
To cut a long story short, having the redlink around will prevent use of the deprecated dab format. This holds true for any case of improper or outdated dabs.
The cladistics example - it is merely useful because the occasional mis-link to the article (instead of the journal) occurs, and having the dab will help sort that out. Remove it if you really can't live with it. Dysmorodrepanis 20:17, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
You make a good case, but are you extending this to all red links that could possibly have an article? I'd rather see an article created than removal of hatnotes, but it's rather annoying for the reader to be offered a link to an article that doesn't exist (it's kind of like saying "Would you like to come through this door instead?", and holding open a door blocked by a brick wall). Then again, it could serve as a motivation for the annoyed to create such articles (as I have done in this case). Richard001 23:09, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Thanks for pointing this out! I feel that there should be red links. It is frustrating to not be able to find what you want, especially for users who are not familiar with Wikipedia. So going to an article that you think is right, and finding a line at the top that points you to what you actually want is great, even if the link says that an article has not yet been written on that subject. — Reinyday, 05:28, 3 November 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Reinyday (talk • contribs)

[edit] red links only for article YOU intend to create?

An anon made some substantial changes whose net effect was to claim that red links should only be made if you intend to immediately create those articles. Since that pretty much goes against what I would think is the philosophy of the page and all the discussion I've seen on this matter, I've reverted it. --C S 05:58, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree with your revert, C S. — Eric Herboso 05:51, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] geopolitical red links

I just noticed when I added a statement about "what links here" in relation to red links, that a similar statement in the context of geopolitical links was inserted above. This seems out of place. I agree with what it says, but perhaps a short list of essential red link topics (such as geographical, etc.) would be better. --C S (talk) 23:04, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Recent addition by Phil Sandifer

I'm a little disturbed the recent edit by Phil [4]:

In general, red links should not be removed if they link to something that could plausibly sustain an article. Although large masses of red links can be aesthetically unsatisfying, it is better for them to become blue links than for them to disappear entirely.

It seems to suggest one should never delete red links. I know that's not what he means, but it gives that impression, IMHO. The first sentence is fine, but the second is too strong, I think. There is already plenty written on when it's good to remove or keep a red link. There's no need to write something that suggests that it's better to turn a red link blue on a topic that shouldn't have an article than remove it. --C S (talk) 23:15, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] status of this guideline?

This seems like a reasonable guideline, and it self-describes as a "style guideline", but it's not linked from the MOS -- is it not part of the MOS? why not? --Lquilter (talk) 17:50, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

It is part of the MOS, but is a SubArticle several levels down:
MOS ==> MOS (Links) ==> Red link

UnitedStatesian (talk) 22:12, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] (not yet written)

Was there some option that I may have changed inadvertently in my preferences or something that makes it say "(not yet written)" whenever I hover my mouse pointer over a red link? I just started noticing it recently and didn't know if it shows up for everyone else too. Seems kinda redundant to me. For An Angel (talk) 18:21, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I also saw it. First it was on redlinked articles but not userpages. Later userpages also had the text. And now it has disappeared on both. I don't know where it's controlled. The Spanish Wikipedia still has it (with the English text). The Italian Wikipedia had it earlier (with an Italian text) but now it's gone there. I don't edit or have accounts at those Wikipedias. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:32, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
I just looked at the Spanish Wikipedia again and it had disappeared. Things change quickly. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:35, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
Huh... that's weird! At least I know now that it wasn't something I did! For An Angel (talk) 02:11, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
During the last few minutes I have seen it be there, go away and come back on this page. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:45, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
[5] says it's a new feature and the text comes from MediaWiki:Red-link-title. PrimeHunter (talk) 04:13, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] New addition

Following comments I made above at #Business people, which got one positive comment (and no negative ones), I've added the following paragraph:

There is another reason not to create a red link to a non-notable person: it can end up being a link to a different person of the same name.

Peter Ballard (talk) 05:01, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Someone has decided to remove all red links

I was really surprised when user:Beeblbrox said he wanted to remove all red links from Wikipedia. Please help him or her: user talk:Beeblbrox. Michael Hardy (talk) 04:30, 2 April 2008 (UTC)