On 17/05/06, Steve Bennett <stevage(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Hi all,
There is a basic problem that Jimbo has referred to, whereby unsourced
information is unattractive to Wikipedia because it brings down the
overall standard of quality. However, in an article of low quality,
any information that is probably accurate seems to me to have some
value. Moreover, I notice that at [[Template:Grading scheme]] we have
the beginnings of a system for designating that articles are in
particular "grades" or "classes" of quality.
Could we have some policy/guideline that says that contributions must
respect the norms of th e class of article that the contributions are
made to? This defines an absolute minimum for the article, and for
additions made to it, to prevent situations where someone deletes a
slab of useful but slightly POV material from a near-stub - in this
case, surely the goal of having useful information outweighs the goal
of having NPOV information.
For example: (going by the established grading scheme)
"Stub" class:
Must sufficiently define topic to allow further expansion. Must not be
libelleous or blatantly and deliberately POV. Must not violate
copyright.
I'd write this as:
"Must define topic far enough to allow for further expansion, without
containing libel or obvious bias or overemphasis of opinion. Must not
infringe copyrights."
Same stuff, different wording, but the key is in the simplicity of the
first few words. We might want to ponder over what "sufficiently
define[d]" or "far enough" are, though...I've also expanded the
"POV"
bit, because I'm sick of the three-letter acronyms being sloshed about
like booze at a party. New users *don't know what* "POV editing" is,
and shouldn't have to - we shouldn't be afraid to use real words;
words which describe the problem better. We're a knowledge base, for
fuck's sake, not a government agency.
"Start" class:
Information must in all likelihood have been published somewhere, even
if a source is not immediately known.
At least one reference would be nice, even if it's a generic source
for the whole stub or whatever.
"B" class:
Must have basic wiki formatting. Contribution of slabs of unformatted
text are not acceptable.
Yup.
Given such a system, it would be a lot clearer exactly
what is and
isn't "acceptable" for a given article. An article in violation of
this system would have two choices: chop out the offending material,
or downgrade in classification. It would seem to me to avoid a lot of
the awkward choices we currently have to make about leaving unsourced,
unformatted or POV material in an article, knowing that it violates
various guidelines or policies.
On the whole, I like the idea of some sort of rating system, but I do
fear it would add to the administrivia. Question is, can we afford not
to review our work? Answer: no.
Rob Church