Wikipedia:Old news
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It is common during an ongoing event for editors to create an article based on contemporary, primary-source news reports. These are typically then added to as the event goes on with additional information, also sourced to news reports. This process of steady addition typically continues until the event ends or is no longer considered news-worthy. Without subsequent attention from editors in the years after the event, the article will remain in this condition.
Why is this bad?
[edit]This has some undesirable effects:
- The resulting article does not sufficiently summarise what actually happened, instead taking the form of a timeline. The effect was described by De Causa as "like looking at tree rings rather than the tree".
- Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, which means that we summarise what secondary sources say about the topics we write about. We should avoid carrying out original research by piecing together our own narrative from primary sources that may well not reflect accurately what secondary sources end up saying about the event - Wikipedia is not a news-media outlet.
- Undue focus may be given to aspects of the event that seemed important at the time, but did which subsequent analysis did not find important enough to focus on or even mention.
- The articles are likely to include excessive citations, since multiple primary sources may be needed to support the same statement that one secondary source may support. They are also likely to be excessively long in proportion to the actual importance of the event as they may focus on minutiae that secondary sources ignore.
Whilst this is, to an extent, understandable whilst the event is continuing and in the period immediately following that, after a period of time has elapsed, and as secondary sources become available, the article should be re-written to reflect what those secondary sources say about the event. If no secondary sourcing becomes available, the article may be merged, redirected, or deleted as it relates to an event that lacked lasting impact.
When does an event become "old news"?
[edit]The amount of time that should pass before starting this process depends on the event. Some events may have largely passed out of the news but may still be continuing (e.g., the HIV/AIDS epidemic), in which case the point where the event ceased to be regularly reported in the news may be hard to identify. However, the below table can act as a very rough guide on this:
| Time elapsed since event | What to do |
|---|---|
| > 10 years | This event is now historical. Use of contemporaneous reportage should be minimised. |
| > 5 years | At least one secondary source should have emerged by now if this event had lasting impact. |
| > 2 years | The process of checking for the emergence of secondary sourcing should begin, and primary sources should be replace with secondary sourcing as it emerges. Depending on the event, if secondary sourcing has not emerged and appears unlikely that it ever will emerge, deletion/merging/redirection may be considered. |
| < 2 years | It may still be too early to expect the emergence of secondary sourcing. |
How to fix this
[edit]Articles and article-sections where this is an issue may be tagged using the "old news" template so that editors know this is a potential issue with the page, the resulting tag at the top of the page/section will look like this:
 | This article may be excessively based on contemporary reporting. |
If a page is tagged with this, as secondary sources become available, primary sources should be removed and replaced by secondary sources where they say the same thing. The content should be re-written into a summary of the events. Aspects of the event may be merged into paragraphs and sections by theme where appropriate, rather than in a day-by-day, minute-by-minute chronological format. If no secondary sources emerge, then the event may not have had a lasting impact and should be considered for deletion/merging/redirection.