[Wikipedia-l] A Three Way Split

[Daniel Mayer]

On Wednesday 18 September 2002 09:59 pm, you wrote:
> Both. I think that articles (and collections of
> articles on related topics) will evolve in this
> direction naturally. General articles will serve as
> broad introductions to a given topic and also provide
> a jumping-off point to more detailed and specific
> treatments.
>
> Stephen Gilbert

I agree - this is exactly what is being done for the country and state 
articles. I also try to encapsulate the essence of a subject by always 
writing a good definition and have that serve as the introductory paragraph. 

That way if the reader /only/ reads the first paragraph then they will still 
get a good idea of what the subject /is/. Intro paragraphs are also great 
places to entice the reader into reading more. This does lead to some minor 
redundancy between the body and the intro though. But since only the most 
important facts are supposed to be stated in the intro this is hardly a 
liability. See  http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)