'Request an article' Wizard: sketching out
Paging Sdkb & Ghost In The Machine, and anyone else who would like to feed into this. From a discussion here about the lack of visibility of the Request an article invitation, Ghost proposed a Wizard to make that function more accessible. This is the sketching out of such a Wizard. I've started us off, and am tagging wherever I'm just sharing my own thoughts on a thing. (Feel free to lift this whole thing and put it somewhere else if that's useful.) -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 11:05, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Aims
If we could make it be a welcoming and simple one-stop shop, then:
- we make Wikipedia easier for everyone to use
- we might get some new articles that actually belong here
- we might convert a passer-by into an editor
Why is it important that Wikipedia have an article on this topic?
- @BessieMaelstrom: thanks for starting this! One thing I think might be useful is a field just asking "why is it important that Wikipedia have an article on this topic?" This wouldn't be so much for establishing notability as offering the requester a chance to make their case as to why it's worth editors' time to make it. ((u|Sdkb)) talk 19:52, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- @Sdkb: Absolutely. It will help people to consider not only the thing they are proposing, but also what Wikipedia is. Also, thanks for moving this to the Talk page. I've brought the other sections here too, where I'd started talking about them, and left the main page blank for us to sketch out the shape of it as we go. Have added the new question to the top. I feel it could be useful to give a sentence or two of examples for how one might answer that initial question. It could certainly say that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, which means it aims to be a summary of knowledge. Maybe we could be a bit more helpful, and break it down? Something like: "In what field of knowledge does your topic lie, and what is its significance within that field?" -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 21:58, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Does your proposed subject already exist here?
- Is it fair to say that most things are either already mentioned here somewhere, or that several of their subject family trees are here but don't quite reach them yet? I wonder if this could be "Where does that thing currently / nearly exist here?" Maybe this is a multi-button option:
- it's already within other articles to the extent that it really ought to have its own one
- it isn't in any existing articles but there are some appropriate places where it could be
- it isn't in any existing articles because it hasn't yet reached enough of that kind of notability. (Where do we describe how to determine that? Presume it's the same kind of WP:V but is there a lesser requirement?) -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 11:05, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- We'll want a search box here that opens in a new window, so it doesn't take the user away from the wizard. The search should also include draftspace, since if there's already a draft on the topic, they'll want to know. ((u|Sdkb)) talk 22:41, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- Agree. Shall we start putting these things into the sketch? Then we could add branching options. I'm interested in seeing if this Wizard can be a useful conduit for those who might add their Topic to an existing article instead of requesting a new one. If I think of my own field of theatre writing: a play that has no article of its own could well be placed in the article of the playwright, and that kind of thing must be true in other fields? Branching off those questions will continue to lead the proposer down a useful path of 'why does it belong?', I think. --BessieMaelstrom (talk) 23:22, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- Yeah, definitely, go ahead; I think this is the kind of thing where the hard part isn't so much achieving consensus as just getting it built. For design, we should maybe look at how things like Wikipedia:Article_wizard/Content work. ((u|Sdkb)) talk 23:49, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Simple understanding of WP:N
- Notable vs Included vs Belonging. Although we pay due regard to the logical processes, we pay scant regard to the desire to be included where we feel we already belong, and the notion of encyclopedic knowledge does little to disuade us that our missing subjects are part of what constitutes a comprehensive knowledge in those areas. WP:WHATISTOBEDONE says:
When you wonder what should or should not be in an article, ask yourself what a reader would expect to find under the same heading in an encyclopedia.
The problem is, very few people own a hard copy encyclopedia these days. In fact, many people likely consider Wikipedia itself to be what an encyclopedia is, and further, expect to find themselves or their thing in it. This creates an awkward circle of self-determination that is founded on wanting our thing to be included where we feel we belong. For all that we have multiple explanations around this, including what Wikipedia is not, I've yet to see anywhere that says "Just because your thing is not in here yet, doesn't mean it isn't part of its family trees out there in the world". Does that make sense? And is there a simple way we could address that here? -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 11:05, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- We can potentially borrow language from Help:Introduction to editing with Wiki Markup/5. ((u|Sdkb)) talk 22:43, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- Sdkb, What about "An article should only be published if its subject is notable enough". ((31))((25A (talk))) 16:59, 30 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- @3125A: New editors don't know what "notable" means in the WP context, so I think we need to give the basic outline of GNG. The text from the help page is
Is the topic notable? Topics need to be sufficiently important to be included in Wikipedia. This means that the subject must have received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject, such as newspapers, magazines, scholarly journal articles, and books.
((u|Sdkb)) talk 19:51, 30 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- Sdkb, then how about "An article should only be published if its subject has received enough coverage in sources such as daily newspapers that are not dependent of the subject (for example a website about the subject) that it is deemed popular and/or important." That sounds pretty good since that basically sums up the definition of "notable", right? Also, we could link to a WP:N itself for the reader to get more understanding later. ((31))((25A (talk))) 23:20, 31 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Simple understanding of WP:V
- I'm not sure how much this is needed. Notability applies to the subject whereas verifiability applies to information, and if you're just requesting an article, you're not actually adding information on it. ((u|Sdkb)) talk 22:44, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- Agree. Although... could this Wizard find a halfway place, where the proposer could include any major sources of information they know of, to save a bit of time? Or would that just not really save any time? I suppose there's a line, isn't there, where you start actually writing the thing yourself. -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 23:46, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- A big question is how the list of requested articles is going to be displayed; that will affect how much information we can ask people to give, since there will need to be a place to put it. My general view is that we'll want to keep the process extremely simple — unlike the Article wizard, where they're preparing to build something, here they're just adding a listing. For things like references, maybe ask them at the end as an optional step, kinda like how the upload wizard at commons asks you to optionally add wikidata after you've uploaded the image itself. ((u|Sdkb)) talk 23:53, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- BessieMaelstrom, that's a confusing choice though. I mean, do we really need that? I don't think so. Why not put it in the understanding of WP:N? I can't think of a better way. Perhaps A tip for later: Include sources in the article to establish a sense of popularity. Or maybe something else. Or maybe put it in a new subsection in the Thanks for playing section which would remind the reader of anything they need to do after they are done with the wisard. ((31))((25A (talk))) 23:27, 31 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Choose topic
- Ref the lists of requested articles that just sit there forever: with a few more layers, I think this option could lead people down paths where their subject belongs in an existing article. We don't do nearly enough emphasising that right now, but I suspect that a lot of the proposed subjects could actually be included in that way - and then we are encouraging actual editing, too. -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 11:05, 26 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Description
Links to sources
- This should be in the Thanks for playing section, as I said earlier. However, perhaps maybe we won't need it at all because this is about telling the reader about if you should publish an article not advice for after publishing the article, right? But perhaps we could make that happen. ((31))((25A (talk))) 23:30, 31 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Telling pertinent Wikipedia projects about your request?
- First, check that the article you're looking for doesn't already exist:
- Search Wikipedia (or use a search engine) for existing articles. If an article exists, but not at the title you expected, you can create a redirect.
- Check your spelling.
- Articles generally use the most common name for the subject. This may not be the official name, scientific name, or another name you have in mind.
- Next, be sure the article is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia. Articles must be about notable topics: those that have received significant coverage in independent, reliable sources. We have a fairly precise definition of what is considered a "reliable source", as well as detailed inclusion guidelines.
- Next, search the existing article requests to make sure your subject is not already listed:
- Now choose an appropriate general topic area below, choose the best sub-topic that fits your subject, and use that link to go to its page. Add your request there by clicking "edit" at the appropriate heading. Give a brief description, with links if possible, for the proposed topic, to aid others in understanding your request.
I've made a stab at it. Far easier to refine something of substance than work from nothing, I find, so even if we change everything I've posted, at least we now have something to say no to. I didn't even attempt to make it look pretty, obviously. -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 15:49, 27 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- BessieMaelstrom, I've made it look a little bit more beautiful by adding a button for the request. Hope you like it. ((31))((25A (talk))) 17:08, 30 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- Nice button! —- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 17:21, 30 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- 3125A - I just wanted to say that the outline here isn't a visual one, it's just a template for the structure of how the questions etc might go. It's not intended to be in any way visual. Your button is lovely, but this isn't at all how any of it would eventually look. We're just talking about what the content might be. And some of it isn't even actual content, eg: "Thanks for playing". That's just a placemarker for something that would be far more appropriate than that. -- BessieMaelstrom (talk) 11:55, 3 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]