I am not sure if you were replying to me, for such was not my meaning--my meaning was that some information beyond directory information is necessary to justify an encyclopedia article--any encyclopedia article, and it might be possible to specify what counted as directory information only, thus indicating that in addition to such information, something more notable/interesting is needed.
I see this as a clarification of the generic meaning of N.-- as an alternate way of expressing it. I discuss it with schools because they seem to be the main subject of disputed criteria controversy on the en WP at the moment, but there are other subjects to which it equally applies.
I see two difficulties with this approach 1/ at the beginning of WP, the decision was deliberately taken to include certain categories of what amounts to directory information, such as the towns entered from gazetteers, or numbered roads. 2/ directory information can often be the start of a more substantial article, and it is perhaps more realistic to accept starting this way--to which I answer that most often it never does get properly expanded.
On 1/30/07, Patrick Hall <pathall @gmail.com> wrote:
Hi,
The task of eliminating particular "non-notable" topics from WP seems to me impossible. After all, for any given topic that one contributor may consider obviously notable, someone, somewhere, considers it a waste of time. (Anarchists might think all articles about politics are pointless, or something.)
What might be possible, on the other hand, would be to allow users to filter out content that they personally regard as non-notable.
So, those who think Elementary Schools are unimportant could say "filter out all changes that match *Elementary School* in the title," or "hide all articles with the category "Pokemon Cards".
(I don't know anything about the implementation details, perhaps it would be computationally too demanding. But it must be at least possible, since we can already filter out bots, minor changes, etc...)
To me, the idea of going to great efforts to *prevent* people from writing about particular topics is a waste of time better spent working on topics one is enthusiastic or knowledgeable about. Particular obsessions seems unreasonable to me; in an encyclopedia that contains 1.5 million articles, surely there are *dozens* of topics that any one particular user will find pointless?
-Pat User:Babbage
-- Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. -pkd
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