Wikipedia talk:Relevance of content/Content policy analysis

To start things off, how would you propose fixing the current AfD system?

23:50, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

I added this section, but now I'm not sure it still belongs here, according to the brief description at the top of the page. So feel free to remove it.

00:11, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that's not the same subject. It's an active issue but out of the scope of this discussion.--Father Goose 00:26, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

(heading from Newbyguesses' edit comment)

Don't worry, I'm not actually seeking to fix all these things, just to a) get a sense of what policies on Wikipedia are off-the-mark, so that we can try to avoid those pitfalls when crafting WP:ROC, and b) see what everyone's overall views on content retention are, so as to have a better idea of where our common ground is, again for the purpose of shaping ROC. I think a couple of days of discussing the overall issues will help to give us a good baseline for what ROC should do, and not do.

A related goal of mine is to find some kind of home for "in popular culture" information. ROC in its current form argues against all but the most significant instances; if longer lists are to be moved out into their own articles, is there some means by which we can save them?--Father Goose 04:48, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Separately, I don't see that we need to touch upon external links or footnotes policies; do they affect content much? BLP does have bearing on content, though, to be sure.--Father Goose 04:58, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah I was gonna say, some of those new sections aren't relevant to the content issue. But don't feel bad, I made the same mistake too, see above.

Equazcion (Talk • Contribs)

05:08, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I mistook the intent here. If, for now, we only list policies directly impinging on "the relevance of content", that is a sensible idea. But I still dont see much good news. 4 instance, Wikipedia:Notability has – These guidelines pertain to the suitability of article topics but do not directly limit the content of articles. And what good is that to thispage? The question of notability itself, at that page, is being scrutinized for its relation to WP:V, and WP:RS, which are both undergoing some sort of convoluted discussions on the talkpages currently. Now, to my mind, that makes those pages directly involved with this one, though it may be through the clouded prism of the Notability family of guidelines. So, what do we do, when every talkpage I look at has - "Yes, but what about guidelineX, which says etc." (And that has been going on, for about a GB of stuff in the archives, for the last couple of months or so.) ((Oh, and external links seems to be at the centre of the problem, maybe))Newbyguesses - Talk 05:24, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Well if article topics are limited, then the articles on the topics outside those limits will not be allowed to exist. So notability does end up limiting content -- entire articles full of content.

The problem of the same basic discussion going on at multiple pages where people constantly refer back, from guideline to guideline, is a problem I've experienced myself, with template talk:trivia and wp:trivia, so I hear you on that; and I have no idea what to do about it. Perhaps a discussion outside those talk pages is in order, for instance here, so that we can look at a group of guidelines and determine what needs to be done about them in a collective sense, rather than individually (maybe that's the whole point of this page). And if not here, then maybe village pump is the place to do that.

As for external links, I still don't see what affect they would have on content, so I don't see how they could possibly be at the center of the problem.

Equazcion (Talk • Contribs)

06:14, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

DGG suggested on my talk page that he wants to start up a centralized discussion of all of this, so I'll wait on what he pitches tomorrow. That was partly what I was seeking to do here, to get a sense of how WP:ROC will be meshing with these other policies, so as to better know how to shape it. I don't intend to take on site-wide policy reform.--Father Goose 06:28, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, we can continue the discussion here, and on usertalkpages, good idea. What I had meant to say, concerning external links, is that seems to be central to the problems on those pages, which makes it ours, thankfully, only to a limited extent. Newbyguesses - Talk 06:32, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Messy, messy situation with REF versus Harvard referencing, and confusion with Wikipedia:Footnotes material.

I personally favor Harvard referencing, but I think I am in the real minority. Articles should be consistent, but I don't have a problem with WP using both. However, we need to make clear that when using REF one cannot use ibid or op cit - some people do and this leads to disaster as soon as someone else edits and adds new sources. Slrubenstein | Talk 10:22, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Which ones can never be used?

Probably page-protected - most policypages seem to be protected from editing, because it is so difficult to keep in step.

This guideline should say something, a little, about lists. Those other pages that will deal with lists, including any proposed guideline that gets up, have the main content of the advice on lists. This guideline should refer appropriately to the list guideline(s). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Newbyguesses (talk • contribs) 00:44, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Do you mean WP:ROC should say something about lists? I agree, I just don't know what it should say yet. Ideally, some kind of list content guidance will emerge elsewhere on Wikipedia, and ROC can reference that. User:Sidatio/Conversations/On_list_guidelines appears to be the most active discussion on that subject.--Father Goose 03:38, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Sure, that's what I mean, though I did Forget to sign. (Thankyou, SineBot.) But the discussion you refer to, at the userpage, has got me confused, as have th other ones I mentioned above. And I will try to keep on topic , on the topic of thispage. Lists are a lesser issue here. Newbyguesses - Talk 04:06, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, it looks like this discussion, or part of it, has now shifted to User:DGG/unified. I don't mind where it's being held, just as long as we're having it. You should add a thread about the "lists" issue to Wikipedia talk:Relevance of content (I did once before, at Wikipedia talk:Relevance of content/Archive 1#Relevance of lists, but It Was Not Being Permitted at that time).--Father Goose 05:39, 3 September 2007 (UTC)