[WikiEN-l] Defeat: Notability is Policy

[Steven Walling]

Get over it. Nobility has been being used as (effective) policy for many
months, if not years. Of course deleting any article is going to get
emotional, people are invested in article's they write. But that level of
emotion doesn't negate the fact that we just simply can't include every
possible topic under the sun and still produce an accurate and reliable
encyclopedia. Space is not the issue, quality is. The breadth has to stop
somewhere, so we can get to depth.

And the WP:V addition is a fabulous idea. I've always operated that way, and
it is (to me) the core reason we need notability: we can't be accurate on a
subject if there aren't reliable sources available. If accuracy is literally
impossible, then we shouldn't have an article on it.

On Feb 1, 2008 3:30 PM, Philip Sandifer <snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:

> Those of you who have been following the strange life of "notability"
> on Wikipedia as it evolved from a series of debates on VfD about
> deletion philosophy to an ill-defined word used to bite newbies, and
> then to a series of ill-defined guidelines used to bite newbies will
> be saddened to know that the last firewall on this issue has now been
> breached, and notability has been enshrined at the level of policy
> instead of guideline.
>
> Despite a number of objections, consensus seems to be forming on WP:V
> to include the line "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found
> for an article topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it." in
> the policy. This line may be familiar in its more-cited form, "A topic
> is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in
> reliable sources that are independent of the subject," from WP:N.
>
> So there you go. The process that is most often used to generate bad
> press, hurt feelings, and upset newbie contributors is now enshrined
> as policy.
>
> Go us?
>
> -Phil
>
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