[WikiEN-l] Why infoboxes are good

[Luna]

On Thu, Jan 29, 2009 at 2:48 AM, Mark Gallagher <mark at formonelane.net>wrote:

> As a reader, it's cool to quickly find the national motto of Burundi or the
> height of Centrepoint Tower without having to read through paragraphs of
> text.  I love infoboxes!  But also as a reader, it's distracting to have a
> professional wrestler's "coach" or actress's bust size floating in the
> corner of the screen.  I hate infoboxes!  I guess you can break that down to
> say: it's nice when there is a consensus view of what a given infobox should
> say; it's less nice when the people who populate the infoboxes have
> different interests and values from you.
>

A point well taken. :) Any band article with an infobox tends to attract
small-time battles over the specific list of genres to include, too, I've
noticed -- these people never seem to bother with the prose, I suppose
because they might then have to cite references from time to time.

Thinking specifically of articles about nations, some of our larger
infoboxes manage to get a bit overwhelming. Purely in the interest of
brainstorming and discussion, is this good or bad? If it is bad, is there
something we could do about it? Break the main infobox down a bit, put
smaller infoboxes in major sections of the article? Put some information
into split articles (say, all but basic economic info to an infobox on the
[[Economy of Foo]] article)? Before we break out the torches and pitchforks,
I wouldn't call these serious proposals, just looking for ideas.

-Luna