[WikiEN-l] Re: HOWTOs/Recipes/Instructions and other imperativecontent

[Erik Moeller]

Jimmy-

> I don't buy the argument that recipes are inherently POV.  First of
> all, it's a bit odd to think of a recipe as potentially biased, isn't
> it?  I suppose it's possible for one to be biased about a recipe "This
> is the only proper way to boil an egg".  But it's also entirely
> possible to be NPOV, by giving alternate methods in the same article
> or in different articles.

Well, Jimbo, there are more complicated recipes than boiling eggs ;-). And  
the more complicated it is, the more annoying it will be when you're  
trying to follow it and have to deal with separating the points of view.  
Worst of all, these POVs will become inconsistent with one another, so you  
have to follow who is saying what in order to produce something edible.  
The egg faction argues .. the milk advocates claim .. but the water  
admirers feel ..

I agree with the notion that recipes should be either on Wikibooks, or on  
a separate project. What's wrong with that? It's not like content moved to  
Wikibooks is somehow lost to the project. We can still link to it.

If someone wants to write an NPOV article *about* a certain recipe, its  
history, the different variants etc., than that may have a place in  
Wikipedia. But the two are fundamentally different.

I believe Wikibooks also needs more mothers.

Regards,

Erik