Wikipedia:WikiProject Usability/Readability guidelines: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 02:51, 26 August 2022

Revision as of 15:12, 29 August 2022

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Unfortunately, some fringe editors try to use the argument that readability applies to article length, and they do it as part of their [[WP:IDONTLIKEIT|"I don't like it"]] attempts to get rid of content (and whole articles if they can get away with it) they don't agree with. Article length is determined by many factors, especially complexity, notability, controversiality, and the sheer amount of RS coverage. Some topics are not worthy of a long article, and others are worthy of a large mother article and many daughter sub-articles.

They also conflate the issue with "accessibility", which does related to article length (see WP:NOTPAPER). We do not delete content because an article is "too long". Instead, we split/fork off (see [[Wikipedia:Summary style]]) content that creates an undue weight problem for a mere aspect of the whole topic.

Some topics lend themselves to easy reading, like reading a novella, and are accessible to even grade school readers. People will often sit down and read the whole article. Other topics are more accessible to university graduates, and yet others are so long and complicated that they are only of interest to researchers seeking information, facts, historical context, and opinions/reception, and such articles are definitely not "easy reading". They are best used to find information by searching for specific words and phrases on the page. Few people sit down and read them from top to bottom, sometimes 50-80 printed pages, maybe more. Their readability can be perfect, but their sheer length and complexity make them harder to read as one readsthan a novel. That's okay.

We simply have myriad types of articles, and we should not dumb down a complex and long topic to read like a short novella read by fourth graders. "Readability" applies to the things mentioned in the lead quote above and does not refer to article length.