Wikipedia talk:What Wikipedia is not and Alice, Texas: Difference between pages

Revision as of 09:42, 19 April 2003

Revision as of 19:48, 12 May 2007

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{{Infobox City |

I just added a new entry on What Wikipedia is not. The entry is concerned with the habit of some, to do wholesale copy-and-paste jobs of public ___domain source material (i.e. entire books, laws, etc.). One of the worst (or best?) examples is the [[The Origin of Species]] article that has each entire chapter in its own subpage! This would be a real nice, cool and useful thing, ''if'' the entire planet couldn't edit the text and therefore ''change'' what Darwin said. This type of use (misuse?) of public ___domain text is, for practical reasons, useless. It would be nice if there was a way to submit such text into a central repository, under our control, so that articles that need to can link to the text and the text will be at a stable IP, and be formatted and presented in a consistant way. However, this should ''not'' be a wiki (although there should be a way to edit the text for typos -- but that would require a formal review). This is probably something that would be better done on Nupedia. [[user:maveric149|maveric149]]

official_name = City of Alice |

nickname = The Hub City |

image_skyline = Alice_towers.jpg |

image_caption = |

image_flag = |

image_seal = |

image_map = |

map_caption = |

|subdivision_type = [[Countries of the world|Country]]

|subdivision_type1 = [[Political divisions of the United States|State]]

|subdivision_type2 = [[Counties of the United States|County]]

|subdivision_name = [[United States]]

|subdivision_name1 = [[Texas]]

|subdivision_name2 = [[Jim Wells County, Texas|Jim Wells County]] |

leader_title = [[Mayor]] |

leader_name = Grace Saenz-Lopez |

area_note = |

area_magnitude = |

area_total = |

area_land = |

area_water = |

population_as_of = [[2000 U.S. Census]]|

population_note = |

|population_total = 19,010|

|population_urban = |

|population_metro = |

timezone = [[Central Standard Time|CST]] |

utc_offset = |

timezone_DST = |

utc_offset_DST = |

latitude = |

longitude = |

website = [http://www.alicetx.org/] |

footnotes = |

}}

'''Alice''' is a city in [[Jim Wells County, Texas|Jim Wells County]], [[Texas]], [[United States]]. The population was 19,010 at the 2000 census. It is the [[county seat]] of [[Jim Wells County, Texas|Jim Wells County]]{{GR|6}}. Alice was established in [[1888]]. First it was called ''Bandana'', then ''Kleberg'' and finally Alice after ''Alice Gertrudis King'' the daughter of [[Richard King (Texas)|Richard King]], who established the [[King Ranch]].

:I'd agree in general (though it's not a universal view around here), but I would argue that there are some exceptions where the entire text of a primary source does belong here, where the material is a) short, and b) important. For instance, I would argue that the entirety of the US Declaration Of Independence is acceptable, as might be the text of Jabberwocky, or an image of the Mona Lisa. I would agree that there does need to be some way to lock such primary texts. Otherwise, while somebody should be storing important primary sources (and whilst cooperation with such projects is an excellent idea) I don't see that Wikipedia is the place for it.

==Culture==

My main exception to the copy/paste practice is the fact that primary sources of historical documents and other works should not be editable by the general public ''if'' those documents are being presented as the original text. I agree that short and highly relevent documents should be in an encyclopida -- It is just not possible to protect what the original authors said if the text is editable in the wiki way. It would be great, if we had a place to "upload" such text, link to it in an article, and have it displayed in a non-editable, text-box (all it would be in edit mode is the URL to the text file -- just as it now is with images). [[user:maveric149|maveric149]]

Alice has long been recognized as [http://www.tejanorootshalloffame.org/birthplace.html "The Birthplace of Tejano"] dating back to the mid 1940's when Armando Marroquin, Sr. of Alice and partner Paco Bentacourt of San Benito, Texas launched what was to be the first home based recording company to record [[Tejano]] artists exclusively. Ideal Records, which was based in Alice, the heart of South Texas and under the direction of Marroquin became the perfect vehicle for Tejano groups and artists to get their music to the public. Marroquin, who also owned and operated a jukebox company, insured that Ideal recordings would be distributed throughout South Texas. The songs recorded, which were contributed by Tejano and Mexican composers became very popular through jukeboxes placed in restaurants, cantinas or any other establishment that would have them, and the then very scarce Spanish language radio programs.

==Geography==

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[[Image:TXMap-doton-Alice.PNG|right|Location of Alice, Texas]]

Discussion copied from: [[Talk:Listing of noted atheists]]

Alice is located at {{coor dms|27|45|2|N|98|4|14|W|city}} (27.750652, -98.070460){{GR|1}}.

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Who cares about these people being atheists? I find it of little encyclopedic value to have this list around; same for the other lists of noted (religion x)s. These lists would only be useful if they contained people who are actively proclaiming their opinion on this topic, and are known for that. Not just a bunch of actors that happen to share some opinion. We might just as well make a list of noted people that have a [[hamster]] as a pet... [[user:jheijmans|jheijmans]]

According to the [[United States Census Bureau]], the city has a total area of 31.9 [[km²]] (12.3 [[square mile|mi²]]). 30.8 km² (11.9 mi²) of it is land and 1.0 km² (0.4 mi²) of it (3.25%) is water. The largest body of water in the city limits is [[Lake Findley]], a [[reservoir (water)|reservoir]] north of the city center.

I am tempted to agree. Does anybody want to argue the case for listing everyone who might happen to be an atheist here? --[[user:Robert Merkel|Robert Merkel]]

==Demographics==

These types of lists aren't really useful. Although I wouldn't like to see lists of noted persons in certain professions go away.

As of the [[census]]{{GR|2}} of 2000, there were 19,010 people, 6,400 households, and 4,915 families residing in the city. The [[population density]] was 616.8/km² (1,597.4/mi²). There were 6,998 housing units at an average density of 227.1/km² (588.0/mi²). The racial makeup of the city was 77.44% [[White (U.S. Census)|White]], 0.86% [[African American (U.S. Census)|African American]], 0.53% [[Native American (U.S. Census)|Native American]], 0.75% [[Asian (U.S. Census)|Asian]], 0.08% [[Pacific Islander (U.S. Census)|Pacific Islander]], 17.92% from [[Race (United States Census)|other races]], and 2.41% from two or more races. [[Hispanic (U.S. Census)|Hispanic]] or [[Latino (U.S. Census)|Latino]] of any race were 78.05% of the population.

Religious affiliation seems peripheral in importance to me (but then, so does sexual orientation. See: [[Famous gay lesbian or bisexual people]]). --[[user:maveric149|maveric149]]

There were 6,400 households out of which 39.0% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 54.5% were [[Marriage|married couples]] living together, 17.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 23.2% were non-families. 20.9% of all households were made up of individuals and 10.8% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.92 and the average family size was 3.39.

I also would tend to agree; a listing of people whose atheistic beliefs are ''relevant'' to what they've accomplished in life and how they present themselves would be interesting, but a mish-mash of people who happen to be atheists and also happen to be somewhat famous? Maybe someone might like it, but I don't really care. (On the other hand, I'm not a ''militant'' atheist. The kind of people who want to see Christmas Day removed as a national holiday might think otherwise.) --[[user:Brion VIBBER|Brion VIBBER]]

In the city the population was spread out with 30.3% under the age of 18, 9.3% from 18 to 24, 26.2% from 25 to 44, 20.5% from 45 to 64, and 13.7% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33 years. For every 100 females there were 91.0 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 85.8 males.

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The median income for a household in the city was $30,365, and the median income for a family was $34,276. Males had a median income of $32,409 versus $17,101 for females. The [[per capita income]] for the city was $13,118. About 17.9% of families and 21.9% of the population were below the [[poverty line]], including 28.4% of those under age 18 and 20.2% of those age 65 or over.

These lists are useful as an expression of support or community for minorities or out-groups. Many adolescents find these especially useful - "Gee, I always thought I was the only 'X'!"

==Education==

I think these lists are a valuable service in this regard, and we can´t make any case against them that outweighs this value. Again - if you don't like these lists, don't read them! :-)

The City of Alice is served by the [[Alice Independent School District]].

==Alice Notable People==

:I've made that exact same argument in the past, but these things are getting less and less useful.

Nobel Prize Winner [[Robert F. Curl Jr.]] was born on August 23, 1933 in Alice, Texas.

[[Canadian Football League]](CFL) Player [[Chris Brazzell]] played on the Alice Coyotes Football team. He was drafted to the NFL in 1998 to the New York Jets and was the 174th overall pick in the 6th round. He was released from the Jets and was picked up by the [[Dallas Cowboys]]. He played for the Cowboys 1999-2000 but was released August 2001. He has since played for CFL teams such as the [[Edmonton Eskimos]], [[B.C. Lions]], [[Hamilton Tiger-Cats]], and currently plays for the [[Winnipeg Blue Bombers]].

:The debate is on whether we should list *all* 'X's, or whether we should restrict the list to people whose X'ism is part of the reason they are encyclopedia-worthy.For instance, [[Bob Hawke]] was agnostic, and worthy of an encyclopedia article here, but does he warrant an appearance on a list of noted agnostics? I would argue not. --[[user:Robert Merkel|Robert Merkel]]

==External links==

I'd say this is pretty simple: People who like these lists can make them. People who don't like these lists can ignore them - it's not like the lists are hurting anything. I think we need to be very wary of judging what "we" consider to be "encyclopedia worthy". Personally, I'd remove all articles on video and computer games, rap music, US counties, and I'd seriously consider removing everything on professional sports. Fortunately, my opinion on these things isn't important. Live and let live. Work on the subjects you like. :-)

*'''[http://www.aliceechonews.com The Alice Echo News Journal - Pulitzer-Prize winning newspaper serving Jim Wells County for over 100 years]'''

{{Mapit-US-cityscale|27.750652|-98.07046}}

{{Texas}}

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[[Category:Cities in Texas]]

:Indeed. I'm certainly not arguing against the existence of the list, just for some judicial trimming to make it an ''interesting and informative'' list. Expressions of support for out-groups are lovely and wonderful, but they're advocacy, which isn't really the mission of an ''encyclopedia''. All-inclusive lists of famous people who were/are/might have been atheists for the purpose of making dejected teenages feel better can be found in warmer, fuzzier places that are specifically pro-atheism -- [http://www.celebatheists.com/], [http://www.visi.com/~markg/atheists.html], [http://www.wonderfulatheistsofcfl.org/Quotes.htm], [http://www.secularism.org.uk/famous.htm], [http://pages.ivillage.com/sarah1klein/atheism/id3.html] were the first five that came up in a google search for "famous atheists".

[[Category:Jim Wells County, Texas]]

[[Category:County seats in Texas]]

[[Category:Micropolitan areas of Texas]]

[[de:Alice (Texas)]]

:Want to include some links to advocacy sites at the bottom of an article about people who are noted ''for being'' atheists? Fine by me! What to have "a partial list of persons believed to be atheists"? What's the point? --[[user:Brion VIBBER|Brion VIBBER]]

[[lmo:Alice, Texas]]

The point is to have a partial list of persons believed to be atheists, of course! (what Wikipedia article can claim to be "complete"?) (and the same for lists of other types of persons 'X')(Though I'd like a slightly more rigorous standard than "believed to be")

[[Sturgeon's Law]] says "90% of everything is crap".

''90% of Wikipedia is crap.''

'However', one person's crap is another person's fertilizer. We do NOT all agree on *which* 90%! As I said above, I detest a lot of what I see on Wikipedia. However, I understand very well that *somebody* likes it (and "somebody" is generally at least several thousand people, I'd guess). I think when we work on Wikipedia, we should confine ourselves to 1)writing what we believe to be true 2)correcting what we believe to be false 3)making things more NPOV. I *don't* think we should be in the business of judging what others might find useful or interesting.

:To say "People who like these lists can make them. People who don't like these lists can ignore them." misses the point. The point is that no encyclopedia or almanac for that matter would simply list noted persons of any faith just because they happen to be a member of that faith (or anti-faith as in this case). This would be the true even if they were like wikipedia and did't have paper contraints; because such lists are ''inherently'' non-neutral propoganda designed to make other people with similar views feel good about themselves (and wikipedia is attempting to be a neutral encyclopedia that has some almanac type information -- such as valid lists of noted professionals who are famous ''because'' they advanced their profession). Think of the hideous hugeness a Christian list might become (or the inevitable controversy over who is "really" a Christian rubbish). Brion is right, if there is to be such as list it must be short and informative and, as Robert said, the people listed should be famous ''in relation to'', at least, being X faith -- just because they were otherwise famous ''and'' a member of X faith doesn't count. The problem with having these lists is that they can never be said to be nearly complete, are oftentimes difficult to verify, many people change their faith several times during their lives and others only pretended to be faithful or are not considered to have belonged to a certain faith by some groups. In addition, having "Listing of X faith" encourages the creation of other such meaningless lists and brings down the average quality of wikipedia. I'm starting to see a strong consensus here that this page in its current form is not informative and should either be fixed or remain in the deletion queue for final review. I don't see any reason why this page shouldn't be copied over to the meta though. Hard drive space is cheap, but wikipedia's strived for reputation for NPOV content is a very important goal -- these faith and related lists are more proselytizing propoganda than anything else -- this also goes for [[Famous gay lesbian or bisexual people]] too (I'm both atheist and gay BTW). --[[user:maveric149|maveric149]]

I agree that these lists should go. If there is any justification to keeping them, it would be only after they are trimmed down to include only people who are famous because of their affiliation. In other words, a list of famous atheists should only include people who contributed to atheism and are famous for doing so (Madeleine Murray O'Hare comes to mind). In that case, the list could be appended to the Atheism article. I feel the same way about the list of famous gay people, Jews, Prussians, Canadians, etc. Oh, and I am very much opposed to the list of "Beautiful Italians," which puts these lists to shame. [[user:Danny|Danny]]

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End Listing of noted atheists discussion

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Is it fair to say that the collection of pages on the Simpsons, Star Wars, Atlas Shrugged and the like violate convention #7 (on encomia/fan pages). I appreciate that some people consider these books/shows very important, or like them very, very much, but I hardly think that an encyclopedia is the place for such pages. While I think the question of what knowledge is relevant and important enough to warrant inclusion in Wikipedia is a difficult one, I think these pages clearly don't deserve inclusion; if the authors wish to create detailed pages on the Star Wars universe, they are perfectly capable of creating such pages in hundreds of other places around the Web.

Has this been discusssed elsewhere?

[[User:Graft|Graft]] 08:21 Jul 25, 2002 (PDT)

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There appears to be a typo in item 9. The final phrase reads, "or significantly contributed ''too'' the list topic" (emphasis added). I believe it should read "to the list topic", i.e. change 'too' to 'to'. I would have [[wikipedia:Be bold in updating pages|boldy]] updated the page itself, but it appears to be a protected page.

Hope this helps, Jim DLH (who is not yet a Wikipedian, but may become one soon).

:Typo fixed. Locking of the help/documentation/policy pages is a bit controversial; to stimulate discussion, I've unprotected this one. --[[User:Brion VIBBER|Brion]] 05:27 Sep 23, 2002 (UTC)

While I do believe that significant changes to this page should be discussed first, I think that this is a pretty safe one to unblock.

I agree with you, Brion.

— [[User:Toby Bartels|Toby]] 11:09 Sep 24, 2002 (UTC)

On the mailing list, I said I whip up some boiler plate notices asking people to discuss major changes to the policy pages, and then unlock them all, and there were no objections. I'll do that within the next day or so. --[[User:Stephen Gilbert|Stephen Gilbert]] 12:00 Sep 24, 2002 (UTC)

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Golly! Brion has just unlocked the page and a nonsysop makes an edit that wasn't discussed first.

I agreed with the sentiment, but the example didn't seem appropriate, so I rewrote it.

Since my change was a weakening of something that was never discussed first, I feel justified in doing it without discussing it first ^_^.

However, I do think that we should now discuss the total change ([[User:DW|DW]]'s + mine) and see if we agree with ''that''.

I don't anticipate controversy, but it should still be discussed, you know.

— [[User:Toby Bartels|Toby]] 12:41 Sep 24, 2002 (UTC)

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All "'''List of...'''" pages annoy me. Like they do many here. However, Wikipedia has the potential of being larger in scope than any previous "'''encylopedic'''" (is that a word?) human endeavor. A "list of atheists" can fit here because nobody has to buy this journal, this book, this volume, this collection. Why not let it ride? Let "'''our'''" (man, how easily we perceive this as ''ours'') readers read what they want. There is no limitation (someone must be buying the server space for this stuff [damn, that's ''spooky''--will this all expire?]). Why complain?

[[User:Arthur3030|Arthur]] 02:07 Jan 26, 2003 (UTC)

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I think "List of" pages are useful, not only as a way to create a link to new articles but to give people some thinking points to start off their own articles. -- [[User:Zoe|Zoe]]

:I agree with that. As an article to themselves, I don't like them. Wikipedia is not an almanac. On the other hand, I got some decent articles out of the list of people on American postage stamps, while Zoe did a great job of turning the Academy Award winners into articles. [[User:Danny|Danny]] 02:17 Jan 26, 2003 (UTC)

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I'm having a hard time parsing item 2. In the first sentence, I don't think that the part starting with "that" adds anything useful, and it sure is hard to understand. Also, what does "as in the case of biographies" have to do with anything? --GG

Also, item 4 needs some bold. --GG

:The page is now unprotected. Do whatever editing you think is needed making sure not to change the meaning. But don't worry too much about that - somebody will fix it if you do. --[[User:Maveric149|mav]]

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Anyone notice how 67.122.115.150 has been busy plugging albums and videos in the various "Years in Music" and "Years in Movies" entries on here? I know that there's a statement on how Wikipedia is not meant to be a place for advertising, but methinks we may need to have a more direct and prominent statement, especially concerning things like this. While 67.122.115.150's actions don't exactly violate Wikipedia, they ''do'' toe the line and make me wonder if we won't be seeing an increase of subtle advertising tactics like this guy is embarking on. -- [[User:Modemac|Modemac]]

: Have you tried [[User talk:67.122.115.150]]? --[[User:Eloquence|Eloquence]] 16:45 Feb 1, 2003 (UTC)

: He's gone now, and when he comes back he'll have a different IP address. -- [[User:Modemac|Modemac]]

== Wikipedia is not future history ==

Wikipedia is not a repository of predictions of what will happen in years to come. (the exception being if such predictions are well-known, such as Nostradamus, Asimov, Jules Verne etc; and even then these should not be intermingled with history articles since they are parts of works of fiction). Should we add a new entry or file under "9: Personal essays"? -- [[User:Tarquin|Tarquin]] 22:16 Feb 5, 2003 (UTC)

: I think 9 is sufficient. We do not want to deter people from putting valid, properly attributed predictions into articles. --[[User:Eloquence|Eloquence]] 22:22 Feb 5, 2003 (UTC)

I think certain things such as solar and lunar eclipses are ok for the near future. No need to go decades into the future, though. -- [[User:Stephen Gilbert|Stephen Gilbert]] 23:32 Feb 5, 2003 (UTC)

Indeed. And things like "Turkey's entry into the EU due to be reviewed" -- things we're sure or fairly sure will happen. My point was things like "2005: Oil Wars", "2010: aliens land" etc. -- [[User:Tarquin|Tarquin]] 23:46 Feb 5, 2003 (UTC)

:Yeah, I think those smell like personal essays... or at least the beginnings of them. -- [[User:Stephen Gilbert|Stephen Gilbert]] 00:00 Feb 6, 2003 (UTC)

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Moved from the [[Wikipedia:Village pump|Village pump]]:

OPINIONS ON WIKIPEDIA 2/24/03

Also, someone mentioned I could not express opinions on Wikipedia (e.g., looking for feedback on my dream file/web browser concept), even on the "Discuss this page" item. Is this true? It seems to me Wikipedia would otherwise (if it did allow opinions at least on the DiscussThisPage pages) to be a potentially incredible way to store discussions in that it would not get in the way of the "facts" which would be limited to the main documents (though obviously "facts" can be opinions too, it's largely about the tone in which they're worded), but they would have the advantage of being automatically categorized and allow people familiar and interested in a certain subject to know exactly where to look (like Usenet groups, but more accessible to anyone and even more hierarchically specifiable).

:Feel free to express opinions on talk pages and on your user page - there is no rule against that. But articles must be [[NPOV]]. ---[[User:Maveric149|mav]]

::Thanks, the npov article was helpful...By talk pages I assume you mean the pages under "DiscussThisPage"?

::Is there a place to navigate only the discussion pages?

::: No. Should there be?

::So are user pages are totally unrestricted then as to content?

::: No. You should still consider [[wikipedia:wikipetiquette|wikipetiquette]], make [[wikipedia:no personal attacks|no personal attacks]], and avoid breaching copyright or the law. But they are less restrictive.

::Also, I was just wondering, can people post advertisements in the talk pages? (e.g., under the computer OS page, could Microsoft theoretically be allowed to point out under "DiscussThisPage" that they can purchase the newest Windows software at their website)

::: Personally, I would remove such adverts on sight.

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Since Wikipedia is open to contributions from all comers, what is to prevent its being taken over by commercial interests wishing to promote their products?

:Primarily, it's against the rules of contribution - [[wikipedia is not]] a place for advertising, and most advertising is not [[wikipedia:neutral point of view]]. The various checks and balances against vandalism have always worked to date (see [[wikipedia:Our responses to our critics|Our responses to our critics]]). If companies want to contribute to writing factual, balanced, informative articles, so much the better. [[User:MyRedDice|Martin]]

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Do we have a policy on users who merely spend their time adding weblinks to one company, presumably in an attempt at promotion? For example, [[user:203.35.82.3]] has added lots of e-text external links to the same company - how to handle this? [[User:MyRedDice|Martin]]

:In this case, I think the links should be replaced with links to a non-commercial source (e.g. Gutenberg) ASAP, but they're OK for the time being. What would be a reason for banning is if he replaced links to non-commercial sources with commercial ones. --[[User:Eloquence|Eloquence]] 19:00 Feb 27, 2003 (UTC)

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: "Wikipedia is not a genealogical or biographical dictionary"

I'd just like to check. Is being killed by having an aeroplane crash into your office window an "achievement" within the context of wikipedia? [[User:MyRedDice|Martin]]

: It's a matter of opinion. Every wikipedia user will have their own opinion about what's worthy of an article. Provided they are based on solid facts that can be verified elsewhere, I see no problem with such articles (see discussion about [[Sir Mildred Pierce]]). [[User:(|(]] 22:30 Mar 2, 2003 (UTC)

There is discussion about The Cunctator's recent change to this entry on [[WikiEN-L]].

I'll try to divert it here.

-- [[User:Toby Bartels|Toby]] 19:46 Mar 3, 2003 (UTC)

: I actually quite like the idea of requiring that there be at least a few '''published''' articles, documentaries, etc, ec, about someone before they are worthy of inclusion. [[Luke Rhinehart]] is an obscure author who's had several book reviews and a couple of documentaries. [[Brandon Teena]] is a dead person who inspired a film.

Meanwhile, [[Ben Hajioff]]'s exposure is limited to liner notes on a compilation CD. That's not noteworthy. Mind you, I'd put the bar higher than requiring a single article - I'd like to see subjects of articles have a ''range'' of sources available, so that we can use all of them to guard against bias and achieve a rounded picture. [[User:MyRedDice|Martin]]

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It seems to me that even if something's on the summary edit, it should still be on the complete list.

This is especially true when the complete list has more detailed explanations.

-- [[User:Toby Bartels|Toby]] 23:53 Mar 10, 2003 (UTC)

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== [[Wikipedia]] should not be the [[United Nations]]==

[[National]] and [[International]](Empty, as of 19 April 2003) are [[Social]] and [[Political]] boundaries.

Whereas, Wikipedia is a [[Community]] or [[Virtual Community]].

[[Morality]] unites Communities whilst

[[Ethics]] unites Societies.

I think that division of the [[World]] along the lines of British [[Political Economy]] is too [[Empirical]]([[Empiricism]]).

Am I wrong? afterall [[Wikipedia is not a soapbox]]

-- JW

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