Magnus Manske wrote:
Das Beispiel zeigt aber einmal mehr, dass aus "Ein Satz zu einer Person geringer Relevanz" ein brauchbarer Artikel werden kann. Ob das nun innerhalb von ein paar Stunden, Tagen, Wochen oder Monaten passiert, ist nur von geringer Relevanz (pardon).
This is correct, and would be a valid argument if it was only about one article. But the person who wrote a short stub requires lots of other people to extend the article, and do we have enough "other people" to do this? The stub creator, relieved of the burden to create a full article, is encouraged to go on to create more stubs, which require even more "other people" to enhance them into full articles. These "other people" are the true wikipedians who put a lot of time and energy into writing full articles, but are they happy in the long run to be servants of these masters who just create more stubs?
We should be more friendly to newcomers, but this also requires the newcomers to be friendly in return by learning how to write full articles. Often when I try to help newcomers (in the Swedish Wikipedia), they turn into freeloaders (Trittbrettfahrer) who ask for more of my help instead of becoming independent and helpful wikipedians. Trying to assist newcomers is often a non-rewarding experience.
I think we should see this exchange of friendliness as a bank account. You get an initial loan, but they you have to pay back. However, it is not obvious to a newcomer what their balance is. Could the mentor program make this more obvious, more clear?