JAY JG wrote:
James, is it only in my mind that [[Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not]] states "Wikipedia is not a general knowledge base, that is, it is not an indiscriminate collection of items of information. That something is 100% true does not mean it is suitable for inclusion in an encyclopedia."? Did I just imagine that it says "Subjects of encyclopedia articles must have a claim to fame besides being fondly remembered by their friends and relatives." and "Biography articles should only be for people with some sort of notoriety or achievement"? What are these and similar statements, if not notability policies?
This section of _What Wikipedia is not_ IMO doesn't imply anything specifically about "notability". This is the complete list of examples it gives:
While there is a continuing debate about the encyclopedic merits of several classes of entries, current consensus is that Wikipedia articles are not:
- *Lists of Frequently Asked Questions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FAQ*. Wikipedia articles should not list FAQs. Instead, format the information provided as neutral prose within the appropriate article(s). You may want to consider contributing FAQ lists to Wikibooks http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikibooks.
- *Lists or repositories of loosely associated topics* such as quotations, aphorisms or persons. If you want to enter lists of quotations, put them into our sister project Wikiquote http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikiquote. Of course, there is nothing wrong with having lists if their entries are famous /because/ they are associated with or significantly contributed to the list topic. Wikipedia also includes reference tables and tabular information for quick reference.
- *Travel guides*. An article on Paris http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris should mention landmarks such as the Eiffel Tower http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eiffel_Tower and the Louvre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louvre, but not the telephone number or street address of your favorite hotel or the price of a /café au lait/ on the Champs-Elysées http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champs-Elys%E9es. Such details are, however, very welcome at Wikitravel http://wikitravel.org/ (/http://wikitravel.org//), but note that due to license incompatibility you cannot copy content wholesale unless you are the copyright holder.
- *Memorials*. It's always sad when people die, but Wikipedia is not the place to honor them. Subjects of encyclopedia articles must have a claim to fame besides being fondly remembered by their friends and relatives.
- *News reports*. Wikipedia should not offer first-hand news reports on breaking stories (however, our sister project Wikinews http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikinews does exactly that). Wikipedia does have many /encyclopedia articles/ on topics of historical significance that are currently in the news, and can be significantly more up-to-date than most reference sources since we can incorporate new developments and facts as they are made known. See current events http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Current_events for examples.
- *Genealogical entries*, or *phonebook entries*. Biography articles should only be for people with some sort of notoriety or achievement. One measure of achievement is whether someone has been featured in several external sources (on or off-line). Minor characters may be mentioned within other articles (e.g. Ronald Gay in Persecution of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and the transgendered http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_gays%2C_lesbians%2C_bisexuals%2C_and_the_transgendered). See m:Wikipeople http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipeople for a proposed genealogical/biographical dictionary project.
- *Directories http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directory, directory entries*, or a *resource for conducting business*. For example, an article on a radio station generally shouldn't list upcoming events, current promotions, phone numbers, etc (although mention of major events or promotions may be acceptable). Furthermore, the Talk pages associated with an article are for talking about the article, not for conducting the business of the topic of the article.
This guideline seems more like a restriction against database dumps and articles containing non-encyclopedic content such as phone numbers to me. It's about what _types_ of information should be in Wikipedia, not whether the information needs to be "notable". (the memorial and genealogical entries points do mention notability, but the threshold is so low that I suspect it's not applicable to many of the cases where people have argued that articles they think are non-notable should be deleted. Every single prof at my university would pass, for example. And they're specific to people in any case, so it's no help with the disputes over schools).
Perhaps it's time we actually started a page on notability policy so that something more definitive could be worked out rather than relying on these subjective attempts to figure out what other policies imply? That would still leave lots of openeings for subjectivity when determining whether any particular article is notable, but at least there wouldn't be so much argument over "non-notable articles must be purged, inclusionist scum!"/"Anything verifiable deserves an encyclopedia article, deletionist scum!"