The point of Wikipedia is being an encyclopedia and stuff that's popular today should be covered. I personally don't care for Star Wars and Pokemon, but others obviously do. None of us are in the position to determine what people will care for in 100 years. For all we know Pokemon will remembered as the rage of the early 21st century. We simply can't know yet. And take a look at Doctor Who. It first aired in the 1960s which means the whole thing is nearly 50 years old. Well on its way to the 100 year guideline.
My point. Just because it's a piece of pop culture you don't care about doesn't mean it should be shunned from Wikipedia. We should try to be concise and make things into summary articles, instead of scores of stubs, but moving stuff off-wiki or deleting it altogether isn't an option.
Mgm
On 5/6/06, charles matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com wrote:
"Cheney Shill" wrote
Besides, the real point of my recommendation in this context regarding pop-culture items (Pokemon, pop-stars, etc.) is to give them a holding place outside the encyclopedia itself that is still part of Wiki until
we
have better knowledge about where on the crap continuum they belong.
I don't know that there is much to say on this topic, that has not already been said often before.
What we know works is to look at
- articles that contain reference infomation, in the sense that some class
of people are going to want to refer to it
- and which can be categorised clearly
- and which meet some minimum standards of writing.
We have never succeeded in defining encyclopedic knowledge more directly: notability is just a minefield, and everyone knows examples from popular culture where the stuff that has the high profile is the trash and the neglected or 'cult' is going to be what lasts. Everyone is entitled to the mental shift that designates Star Wars backstory pages as off-wiki as far as they are concerned. Why should we believe that finally drawing the line on inclusion is going to be possible? It's a theoretical issue for academics, really.
Charles
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