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Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3

Compliments

"We feel this is a case of a vocal minority overriding the interests of a scattered majority." -- That's very well-said.

Equazcion • argue/improves • 23:39, 10/17/2007

As a very broad concept, including the influences of classical traditional culture as well is an integral part of the encyclopedia. Though in some respects it overlaps with trivia, this is not necessarily the case, and i think we would do well to keep the two as separate as possible. DGG (talk) 01:03, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree that as subjects, the two are not the same (except when editors add pop-culture references to Trivia sections, which is common). But the problems inherent with each type of content tend to be very similar (poor sourcing, organization, and relevance), and as a result, the way editors respond to them is similar as well, so I think "how to maintain" both of them can be usefully discussed at the same time.--Father Goose 21:07, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Question

I've recently started another project proposal at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#People and places. I note that there already are in several articles about locations, companies, and schools sections about "Notable residents", "Notable alumni" and whatever. While they do not bear the exact name "Trivia", many people would find much of that information trivial. I was wondering if there are any other subheading which don't have the potentially negative connotations of "Trivia" out there which the rest of you think might be useful. John Carter 13:56, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Subheading for those sections? Or for this project? Not sure what you're asking here.--Father Goose
Subheadings which could be used to separate out items of "trivia" from the Trivia section into some other section, maybe like those mentioned above or others. I think "Errata" is used once in a while too to point out mistakes in filming, printing, and whatever. But, basically, I personally do think that calling something "trivia" could be counted as being OR (who said it's "trivial"?) and/or NPOV (as it states something which the sources might not, specifically, calling something "trivial"), and think that removal of that specific section title wherever possible is a good idea. John Carter 21:11, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, a more accurate and neutral title would be "miscellanea", but even if we renamed all the Trivia sections on Wikipedia to that, it wouldn't change how people respond to them -- as a place to put unsorted, often unsourced information. I support retaining the information in preference to deleting it, when it's verifiable and seemingly relevant. Sourcing and integrating it is better still, when that is doable. That's the real solution; just changing the section title will probably not change the behavior of those who add "miscellanea" or those who remove it.
There are plenty of cases where entries in a "trivia" section can be regrouped into a new section and/or more specific list (including "popular culture" lists). "Goofs" sections would be great to see on Wikipedia -- I'd love it if Wikipedia could duplicate all of IDMB's functionality, and more. And a list of goofs certainly belongs under its own heading, not "Miscellanea".
I really think the way to secure a place for miscellanea, pop culture, and other villified forms of information is to more aggressively maintain such information -- with an inclusionist's eye.--Father Goose 22:32, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

For your consideration: the "scattered majority" = silent majority/unspoken masses?

On the project page in the "principle" sub-heading it states "We feel this is a case of a vocal minority overriding the interests of a scattered majority." I wanted to expand on this point and make editors aware that any poll or discussion on wikipedia is biased towards the more hardcore editors and excludes the large majority of world wide readers that most likely love the trivia and IPC sections. The casual users of wikipedia don't even have user names, and those that do have user names don't participate in discussions or polls, they just occasionally add a sentence or correct spelling and grammar. In polling or statistical analysis, having a representative sample population is the most important requirement. Anyway, I feel this point is important enough to include on the project page but I don't want the project page to turn into a discussion. Should I draw the line here or are there any ideas on how to succintly add this point to the project page? Perhaps expand the sentence I quoted above or create a new sub-heading called points to ponder or for your consideration. I just feel trivia and IPC is a victim of this bias. Thanks. Ozmaweezer 12:48, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

If you could produce any evidence, other than your own personal opinions, I have no doubt that policy and guidelines would be adjusted almost immediately. To date, however, all you seem to have pointed to in this matter is your own personal opinion. Certainly, you can be and are encouraged to try to propose changes to existing policies and guidelines, just like anyone else can. However, whatever anyone believes that the majority of editors think, wikipedia still has its own principles, which include building an encyclopedia. To the best of my knowledge, there are no other extant encyclopediae out there which regularly have trivia sections. On that basis, I believe that it is more than reasonable to say that it would be at least somewhat going against wikipedia's central principles to incorporate into itself something completely unique among encyclopediae. Having said all that, of course, if you were to want to pose changes to any existing guidelines or policies, you are clearly free to do so. Personally, I think making such points as you have above on the appropriate guideline or policy pages would be more productive than continuing to make such points here, particularly when there hasn't yet even been established consensus among the members of this project that your recent additions are really the beliefs of the members of the project, rather than just your own personal opinion. John Carter 13:01, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Ah, but you see my point about "representative statistical sample populations" and it being a possible problem for all discussions and polls, including the trivia one in wikipedia, right? One that should be taken into consideration when making decisions. I think you're correct in everything you state. I would like this project to rationally and intelligently come up with a more inclusive wikipedia trivia policy and then make it a proposal and eventually have it adopted. I'm willing to abide by the outcome. I can't argue your point about no encyclopdia in the known universe includes trivia and I think I'll add that to the "cons" section. But can we get back to the topic proposed here. How do I include this idea on the "project page?" The idea about "sample populations" and trivia. Thanks Ozmaweezer 13:20, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Yes. However, simply saying that the results can't necessarily be trusted doesn't mean that the opposite of the results should be considered true either, which at least somewhat seems to be your contention. Without any evidence to support it, all that can be is an opinion. And, personally, I think that the only way that anyone can say that a given project has certain goals is to verify that the members of that project themselves say that that project has goals. Probably the best way to determine that is to poll the membership and see if they agree. If they do, I am sure that at least some of them will produce their own proposed phrasings of the idea. John Carter 13:26, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
I get the feeling people visit a page and read the trivia section and laugh and follow a few of the links to other wiki articles and have some fun. They tell a few friends to check it out. Then they go back a month later and the whole section is gone, albeit because of zero sourcing. This has happended to me anyway. I guess that's all I'm trying to say. Ozmaweezer 14:55, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Consider "poor sample population" when interpreting the poll

You're right, my opinion comes into play when I assume A) there is a vast silent majority, and B) this silent majority loves the trivia/IPC sections. Unfortunately, I'm not independantly wealthy nor do I have the time to somehow prove the existance of nor poll this hypothetical majority to show they are in favor of the trivia/IPC Sections. I just want to suggest that we take this possibility into consideration when making any decisions regarding trivia. I think we can make an "educated guess" about the overall consensus about trivia in wikipedia rather than letting some "vocal minority" subset of the population concentrate the authority. Again, however, back to my original point at the top of this thread, does anyone see this idea as important enough to integrate into the sentence referenced above on the "project page?" I feel this was the original flaw in the poll cited on the project page which I believe too hastily steered wikipedia towards being a bit too aggressively anti-trivia with a 62% majority (I would hypothesize that 62% or more of total wikipedia readers support trivia sections). I like the idea of the project page being a short summary of the current state of trivia, without it becoming a discussion. Until now, all these arguments have gotten lost in meandering discussions and archive pages. With this project page editors can be more informed, and thus I would like to mention the flaw in wikipedia "sample populations" on the project page. Any suggestions or ideas? Thanks Ozmaweezer 15:24, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Update: How about I add it into the paragraph describing the poll in the "links" section? Ozmaweezer 15:32, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Maybe the best thing to do would be to wait until other members respond with their suggestions? I hope you do realize that any changes you make to the main project page, particulrly quotes without sources cited, can and maybe, in some cases, should be reverted, particularly if they convey only the opinion of some individual members of the project. It's not like the page has to be fully laid out in the next four hours or something. In a case like this, when several people are already invovled, it is probably a much better idea to get the opinions of all parties involved rather than acting unilaterally and possibly rashly. John Carter 15:52, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Any precedant or support for a "super poll?"

Does wikipedia ever mass canvass every single user and do a community wide poll? Perhaps that would help with alerting all editors about trivia. The problems I see right away are as follows:A) people might vote to opppose just out of spite for being canvassed, B) the poll would have to take place over at least one to three months otherwise it would be biased towards hardcore editors who log in multiple times a day versus casual editors who might log in once every three months or less, C) it would need to provide the editor with a quick summary (see sub page) so that they could be well informed about all the subtle nuances before they vote from the gut. This succint summary should include a discussion of not voting out of spite as well. Just a thought. Ozmaweezer 13:12, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Considering that those "hard core" editors are also probably the bigger donors to wikipedia, it makes sense that wikipedia would follow the examples of National Public Radio and PBS in catering to the audience which donates money to their effort. Also, the "hard core" editors are probably the ones who are most actively contributing to the content, although there are exceptions of editors who write an article out before they submit it. I also think you might be interested in the official policy of wikipedia at Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, and many trivia sections almost explicitly are indiscriminate collections of information, and Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not a democracy, which your request for a vote by all editors would seem to be at least potentially opposed to. On that basis, collecting the viewpoints of all editors would probably be both extremely labourious and practically useless, as many editors are not particularly familiar with how to write articles and ultimately create content which, because of their failure to adhere to guidelines and policy, makes their content unfit for inclusion. That is one of the reasons why it is the case that those people who you call "hard core" editors, who also tend to be the ones who know most about how wikipedia does and does not work, tend to be the ones who write guidelines and policy. John Carter 15:14, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Do you have any bases, whatsoever, for these accusations about users who donate money having more of a voice? It's painfully absurd and is about the farthest from the truth as you can get. -- Ned Scott 07:02, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
If that particularly phrasing was used, I wholeheartedly apologize. What I meant to say was that it seems to me much more likely that what might be called the "committed" editor, who regularly edits articles, will be more likely to make individual monetary donations than the less committed editor. Certainly, what evidence both of the networks mentioned above have clearly indicates that the more regular users of their media are much more likely to donate money as individuals than the less regular user of their media. This doesn't take into account corporate donations, etc., but specifically refers to indivuals alone. And, basically, I think I've more or less heard that at least once on just about every local PBS and NPR pledge drive, although in neither case can I point out specific sources they themselves cited, other than saying things like "Our own research indicates..." John Carter 17:58, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Curious

The front page here mentions a poll I closed and notes I was not was not working on behalf of any known Wikipedia process. Could someone perhaps outline what exactly is meant by that, so that I can work out if I need to take offence or not. :) Thanks, "closing" editor, Hiding Talk 19:47, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

I think this one goes to Ozmaweezer, who made the statement in question. John Carter 19:54, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
I took that as a direct quote from somewhere inside archive 7 or 8 of the trivia discussion. I'll try to find a link to it. Ozmaweezer 12:12, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I hate being a rat but here is the link where I lifted the quote. Ozmaweezer 15:00, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Um, you haven't actually explained why you chose to quote it, why you didn't provide a link to the original discussion, why you didn't also quote the rebuttal, and what your purpose is. All I can see is an attempt to besmirch something using a blatantly false statement. Hiding Talk 10:25, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I deleted the inflammatory portion of the quote. Are you ok with it now (see subpage)? I never meant to offend you by quoting it. I did provide a link to the original discussion, but admittedly it's a link to 8 pages of rambling archived discussion. I didn't quote the rebuttal because, for me personally, it didn't make much sense. I chose to quote it just to centralize and condense all the past arguments for and against trivia in this never ending (hopefully this project will end it) trivia debate. My purpose was just to create a quick summary editors should read before they join this discussion page. I never meant to besmirch anyone or anything. Sorry. The whole subpage is just a collection of quotes from all the past trivia debates. More importantly, would you guys mind if I relocate this thread under the "scattered majority?" thread dealing with the aforementioned poll? Thanks. Ozmaweezer 15:14, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Discussion of the first point in "Cons" about the trivia section "eventually becoming a gargantuan list of facts."

I feel this point about the trivia section becoming too big is a possibility. However, I believe that over time any given trivia/IPC section would eventually reach a point of exponential decline, threshold, happy medium, or endpoint. The trivia section would grow rapidly at first, slow down, and then come to point of relative stability. Would that really be so bad? Just a thought I wanted to put out there. Ozmaweezer 13:37, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, in fact, I think it has already been proven in some cases not to be just a possibility, but to actually happen fairly regularly. Also, there is the question of how late in the process the decline or whatever would be reached. Certainly, and particularly regarding articles that are closely related to pop culture, everyone will want to see their own individual piece of trivia included. So, basically, if we allowed this, I am personally certain that in about 10 years the George Washington article's trivia section would include separate statements about every street, school, and building with his name. Granted, in this case, that material could be split off into a farily long article on its own, but would still be problematic and probably a violation of the guideline of WP:Undue weight. Again, aside from the possible violations of WP:OR and WP:POV, the question phrased was "would that really be so bad?" This seems to be taking as a given that it is in fact acceptable for some reason, and to date we have only had unsubstantiated allegations that there is any substantive call for such sections in the first place. The more reasonable question is, "Are such sections good in the first place?" and there has yet to be any evidence put forward that it is. I think that we have to consider, objectively, what would be the best possible way to include such information, rather than take as a given that a "Trivia" section is the best way to go. John Carter 13:51, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
What usually seems to happen is that crap and cruft builds up, somebody sternly removes the obscure and uncited, then the crap and cruft builds up again, until the editor(s) trying to keep things down give up and cease monitoring the article. The junk then accretes until some new editor stumbles on it and gives it a quick purge. For example: I've given up on keeping worthless trivia out of the Jeffrey Dahmer article a long time ago. Still, as a Milwaukeean I feel an obscure need to keep the rest of the article not too mediocre. --Orange Mike 16:00, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Considering the notoriety of that subject, I offer my thanks and regards to you for succeeding in keeping that article in reasonable shape. And I do think "notorious" cases like that one might be among the biggest "garbage collectors" we have. John Carter 16:06, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Our motto here should be: "Delete the bad in order to preserve the good."
If a trivia section only contained appropriate, referenced, notable facts - then it would be unlikely to grow too big. If it did, get big (and yet still contain only facts that meet the criteria for acceptability) then the standard expedient is to fork off a separate article for it all to collect in. In that regard, there is no special problem here.
What is special is this horrible tendancy for these sections to grow large numbers of unreferenced entries that need to be purged on a regular basis. Even that wouldn't be so terrible for our editors to maintain because it's nowhere near as bad as the growth of vandalism. What absolutely sucks is that on far too many occasions, the person who added an unsourced trivia item winds up being either very persistant or very angry at the editor who is merely following the rule. You have revert wars, major flame-fests and so forth. Having a clear policy that unsourced trivia should be deleted on sight - just like vandalism - would give editors the power they need to keep the article clean. That in turn would enable one to maintain a trivia section - capturing only appropriate, sourced and notable information and ruthlessly weeding out the rest.
Having a policy to encourage editors vigorously clean out the crap would allow trivia sections to be preserved. If this group winds up insisting on keeping all of the cruft "just in case it turns out to be true" then that will bring a large number of vocal, hard-core, deletionists down on trivia sections and result in all of them (including the sourced/appropriate/notable ones) being annihilated. Having tough standards - stating them clearly and meaning it - is the only thing that will make this work. This group has to stop talking about how to "preserve" trivia (implying "mostly unsourced trivia") and start talking about how to sanitize the good, sourced facts by vigorously erasing the cruft.
I've said it before, and it bears repeating, the project page for this group needs to say, clearly and up-front: "It is the policy of this project to delete unsourced trivia material on sight."
SteveBaker 13:01, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm still not quite sure, but I think this project is about coming up with ways to handle trivia sections (preserve them, find citations to support them, keep the information easily accessible if it is deleted, maintain them, etc.) This is a bit of a think tank to think outside the box. If you do delete unsourced trivia on sight, you should provide a link to it so editors can have more of a chance to source it. However, we should keep to the subject of this thread which is the argument against trivia that it eventually becomes a gargantuan list of facts. I think that is an exaggeration since I state above I believe it would eventually reach a point of relative stability. Ozmaweezer 15:53, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
Out of curiosity, the evidence others have seen indicates that your belief seems to be in error, and that, while eventually they will reach a point of relative stability, that point is often after only a very large number of such points is added. Do you have any specific evidence to support your belief? John Carter 16:12, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Discussion of the con about trivia being a constant source of aggravation for editors

While there should be a reasonable expectation that editing and article maintenance should be efficient and productive, something being difficult is not a reason to exclude it. So, editing trivia is problematic for all the stated reasons in the "cons" section of the sub page, but hopefully we'll come up with some better guidelines here to help this current conundrum. Who ever said wikipedia should be easy? Ozmaweezer 13:00, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Discussion of trivia not complying with the manual of style

What exactly does trivia violate in the manual of style? Articles should avoid bullet point lists of information? Could we post some links to the non-compliances here? ThanksOzmaweezer 13:02, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Discussion of con about trivia/IPC being unsourced

Granted, most trivia/IPC lists I have seen don't even have one footnote, reference, or source. However, that doesn't mean they can't be sourced, right? Television episodes, music records, etc seem fairly easy to source. Ozmaweezer 13:05, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Possibly. However, policy and guidelines do dictate that unsourced content should be removed. Removal does not imply that it cannot be added again, but it does mean that it should be removed if it isn't sourced. While it might be possible for individuals to add such sourcing after the fact, and I honestly encourage people to do so, it might well be a problem that sources for specific points cannot be found in the references checked. If that is the case, and certain content can't be verified, then that content could and eventually should be removed, although it could be readded if it is adequately sourced. Also, I can easily imagine a case when someone says "I have a source, I just can't find it right now" advocating on that basis for several years that the content in question be allowed to remain. Unfortunately, as I have found out elsewhere, there are editors out there who will say "my sources say (this)" and then the sources are checked and they say nothing of the kind. To prevent these possibly willfully dishonest editors from keeping their at best poorly sourced information in articles, these policies and guidelines were created, so that the person looking to remove unsourced content isn't looked on as the "bad guy" for trying to ensure that the content is verifiable. However, clearly, such content can be added back, if adequate sourcing is provided. Creating such policies is the only way I can think of to both assume good faith and ensure the integrity of the content. John Carter 17:26, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Should we eventually have a conclusions/consensus/take away section on the project page?

I think it would be good if this project eventually came up with a short list of our conclusions assuming this discussion ever ends. It seems impossible that we would all ever agree on anything but that is what we should aim for I suppose. Perhaps, 200 years from now future editors will look back on us as idealistic trivia proponent heroes of wikipedia (assuming we're trivia proponents). I'll start a Proposed list of this projects conclusions with a sub sub heading here. Though I dare not put forth a proposal for fear of endless discussion.

This project's temporary proposals for conclusions/consensus/take away/recommendations

Ozmaweezer 13:59, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Fun quotes so as not to get to "heavy" or "heady" while discussing trivia

Feel free to add your thoughts here. Ozmaweezer 14:03, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

  • Some editors look at wikipedia the way it is and ask why. Other editors dream of wikipedia the way it isn't and ask why not.
  • To trivia, or not to trivia? That is the question.
  • Trivia: to condone or to condemn?
  • You may lose a battle (for trivia), and still win the war (for trivia).
  • In wikipedia we trust. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ozmaweezer (talk • contribs) 11:47, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Overzealous editors: the fundamental problem for trivia/IPC sections?

If you read the trivia-template (people "assume" it is an "anti-trivia" template), it simply states trivia lists should be avoided and an attempt should be made to incorporate/integrate the trivia into the text of the article. This should be sufficient, but it seems editors are reading into it. They insert their own anti-trivia bias and read "between the lines." Maybe the real problem isn't so much the policy and guidelines/the manual of style as it is editors who I would unfortunately have to classify as vandals. I think wholesale removal of trivia sections as a "popculture-ectomy" and not first discussing it on the articles discussion tab and posting a link to the section, is vandalism. If it is eventually removed, a link to the history page containing the trivia should be provided on the discussion tab of that article, and if this is not done, that too is vandalism in my opinion. I guess what I'm trying to say is the current trivia policy should be OK, but because of overly aggressive anti-trivia "deletionist" editors the policy is not OK, and thus, needs to be re-written and the new policy should be widely disseminated somehow. Also, I think it is unfortunately assumed all wikipedia templates should be posted for a month or a year and eventually the problem should be resolved (the offending material, or the trivia, should be taken care of) and the template can then be removed. Templates seem to make editors anxious and they want to clear the article of the template, so they remove the entire trivia section, which they feel authorizes them to remove the template. Can some templates last for the lifetime of the article, i.e. forever? Perhaps, the trivia template should state, this template and this trivia section is "permanent." Ozmaweezer 14:43, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

There are also the facts that many/most of these trivia sections are generally unsourced, and policy states that unsourced information should be removed, and can be removed immediately. That does not necessarily have anything to do with any objection to trivia, but rather with an objection to what is often an entire section of an article which is completely unsourced. I wonder how much of your own perceptions of this issue is colored by your own obviously pro-trivia bias. And, no, templates indicating that content or structure of an article is flawed are by definition not supposed to stay "forever" under any circumstances. Those templates are placed only when the article is in some way failing to abide by style guidelines, and they are explicitly placed to indicate that the section needs work. I cannot imagine anyone would say that any article can or should be necessarily marked as requiring cleanup or other work to improve it "forever". John Carter 15:20, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I see. Would you agree it would be nice/considerate if the "deletionist" editor would mention this on the article's talk page and provide a link? Perhaps a new trivia template should be created that asks for the unsourced items to be sourced (I'm sure a template like this exists already not specific to trivia but unsourced items in general)? Perhaps trivia sections should have two templates: A) the template requesting "sources" and B) the template about avoiding trivia? I am pro trivia to some extent (I understand all the nuances involved here). However, I am trying to be "agnositic" and "open minded" while discussing all this (I try anyway). Ozmaweezer 15:35, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Please try to avoid tagging people who do things you personally disagree with with labels which may not actually be appropriate, like calling anyone who removes unsourced information "deletionist", particularly as in wikipedia that term is generally used to refer to people who believe in deleting articles, not unsourced information, which is supposed to be removed by policy. There already are templates which are used to indicate articles require sources, and considering that trivia sections are not universally welcome in any event, it wouldn't make any sense to create a new template specifically for such sections. And, you are once again operating on the assumption that these "trivia" sections are a fait accompli, which is from all the evidence I have ever seen far from being universally accepted. I personally think it would make a good deal more sense to try to establish, one way or another, whether such sections should exist as such at all before talking about developing specific templates for them. And, yes, while it would be "nice" for editors to explain everything they do in detail, not everyone does. There are already existing guidelines for explaining changing content, but they are, like all guidelines, not universally followed. This can be particularly problematic when dealing with articles or content relating to living persons, as any unsourced or poorly sourced content on such subjects is supposed to be removed immediately. While one could indicate on the talk page that "I removed the statement that (pop idol) is heavily into beastiality because it is unsourced", BLP guidelines indicate such content isn't even supposed to be mentioned on talk pages if unsourced, and so explaining how it was removed could be problematic. And, yes, if a substantial amount of trivia, including such a statement, were added by one party at one time or over time, it certainly would to me make sense to remove all such content added by that person, particularly if they are all unreferenced. John Carter 15:49, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
All apologies. For purposes of this discussion page, could you suggest an acceptable short hand term for editors I have prior referred to as "deletionists" and "inclusionists." Maybe I'll post that on the project sub page or put it in bold somewhere on this discussion page for others to use. Perhaps you could define the terms also since there seems to be editors that are black and white, and a lot of shades of gray in between. Back to the start of this thread, I do get the sense that this whole project could be avoided if editors weren't so overzealous with removing trivia. If they would be more polite, and provide a link on the article's talk page that would go a long way in appeasing me. Plus, you're right about discussing the existance of trivia versus new templates. I just want to put it out there though, eh? I just feel that a new template could possibly help in editors being more cautious before removing trivia. Ozmaweezer 16:08, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
If the editors who added the content in the first place were more cautious and followed policy and guidelines better, there would be no cause to remove it in the first place, would there? Has it occurred to you that maybe trying to address that, the fundamental problem, might be more effective than trying to tell people how to respond to a problem which they did not themselves create and are trying to correct, according to their own existing interpretations of policy and guidelines? I would also question whether someone who continues to use the word "overzealous" to describe the actions of others is really trying that hard to be objective. Lastly, all that is happening when trivia is removed is that it is removed. It could be added again later, provided it is added in accord with guidelines and policy. Don't you think that addressing the more essential points of making such content compliant with wikipedia rules might be of more significance than continuing to brand those who act in a way you personally dislike with perjorative names? John Carter 16:23, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
almost. If the editors who added the content did it right, there would be no good cause to remove it in the first place. But some of the people trying to delete this material are deleting content regardless of notability and sourcing; when even the most reputable academic sources are added, they deny first their importance and then their relevance. When 80% of the items are from major works, some people move to delete on the basis of finding one or two unimportant ones. And some people openly say that no article or section dealing with popular culture can possibly be any good, and that their intent is to delete them all. If they are sections, they try to split them off, and then try to delete the articles as unable to stand on their own; if they are separate, they merge them, and then remove the individual items. Systematic attack can destroy even a good article-- it happens in many types of subject. If one removes all the minor but interesting content, and then attacks sources on each of the remaining ones, the result is an article that shows no importance.
And it is very hard to prevent deletion at afd. I have a fairly good idea of where to find material, and it would take me several full days of work in an excellent library to fully source one of the longer sections or articles. Good research on dispersed subjects is not easy. But even without a helper program I could nominate an article in about two minutes--maybe five minutes if I wrote a non-boilerplate reason. and then if I lost, I could nominate it again in a month. There's an element of chance--about half the rescuable articles are kept each round--after 4 rounds, I will have gotten rid of 94% of the articles. Both the WP rules that permit repeated nominations and the 2nd law of thermodynamics make it much easier to delete than to write or defend. You say "it can always be reinstated"--but that is much harder. That's the nature of building things, as compared to destroying. It is much easier to keep and work on rather than remove and start all over.
Back this spring, when it was intensifying, once i saw that both good and bad articles were being indiscriminately nominated with identical reasons, I suggested separately on and off wiki to each of the leading deletionists whether we could work to a common goal, and nominate only the poorer ones so the others could be improved. One even said yes--but when I suggested that the way to do this was a moratorium of further deletions while articles were sourced, he never replied, and continued the pattern.
This is why I feel so strongly. I didn't use the word overzealous, but I think it a very mild descriptor. I fully accept your own good intentions--but some of the people involved here are deliberately destroying a major section of wikipedia. I will tell you quite frankly that at one point this summer I almost gave up, and accepted that we would have a wikipedia that not only contained very little content on serious matters, but also on many of the interesting things that belong in encyclopedias but cannot be sourced easily from google. But then some new people joined. That's always been the salvation of Wikipedia.
I am not really an inclusionist--what i care about is not primarily inclusion, but having good articles. But the way to get there is to improve everything that is possible to improve, and remove only the totally unimprovable. There's certainly enough of it--my deletion log shows that I personally delete more than a dozen articles a day, just incidentally, without even making a point of it. Perhaps I mange to rescue 1 or 2 a day--as I said, it's much harder. I have accomplished very little positive here--I came to write articles on missing topics and improve the 90% of articles here that need it. But I do what is most needed, and what has been needed is rescue. I don't even know or care all that much about popular culture--most of what I do know, I seem to have learned from Wikipedia. I want others to have the same opportunity. So, instead of trying to remove material, you and all the other skeptics should try to source it. If you too will improve 1 a day, we'll have a much better encyclopedia. DGG (talk) 05:29, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
Trivia type information is valuable to some people. Even though it can be added again, finding a source (or requesting that someone else find a source) for an existing fact is better than deleting, because if it is added at a later date by someone else, the chances of getting a citation then are just as good as the first time it was added, and we know how that went. I personally do not scour history pages for deleted content, or at least, not often, and I think editors do a disservice to Wikipedia by deleting sourcable content because of an inflated sense of relevance. Perhaps if we were able to come up with an adequate definition of trivia and how it can be indirectly relevant but still valuable to the subject at hand, maybe then we could move forward with a clearer direction. --Nick Penguin 06:05, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
For me the best thing to do with trivia is work out how to incorporate it into the article. FOr instance, a lot of trivia sections seem to contain items on how article subject was mentioned in this work. To my mind those snippets are better worked into an Influence section than a trivia one, simply because it is more informative and treats the information better, more respectfully, even. I think by labelling the information as trivia at the first step, people are, to a certain extent, already labelling the information as being of little consequence. So that's why I stand behind the guidance, but not the deletion of the material. Ideally the material was not supposed to be simply deleted anyway, but removed to the talk page where it could be discussed and sourced, and where it could still be openly seen. I think trying to define trivia is perhaps a slight misdirection, rather we should better define the information and its relation to the article. A lot of this stuff is not trivial, so I don't think it should be labelled as such. The other battering ram sometimes used is "in popular culture". Again, people attempt to portray this as having little value, but were it reworked as "article subject as viewed in the late 20th century", for a perhaps too pompous example, it suddenly seems more important and worthy of respect. So I think the issue isn't how to stop people deleting trivial information, it's getting them to respect the value of important facts. Start treating the items we are discussing here as something other than trivialities, and it will encourage others to do likewise. Hiding Talk 11:41, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I do like the idea of using Influence as a heading for some of these items, as it more clearly asserts both the connection to the main subject and does so in a fairly reasonable manner. John Carter 17:51, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I too have been trying to find a good word for this, and I think "Influence" is the best one so far. I think we should adopt it, and that we should begin by figuring out how to divide this project accordingly to emphasise that they are different problems. the overlap , of course, is that people continue to but utterly trivial items in the popular culture/influence sections or articles, but thats just the same as for foolish edits anywhere else. DGG (talk) 02:35, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Offhand, I'm not sure "influence" is right. I think it's appropriate to mention the scene in The 39 Steps that takes place on the Forth Rail Bridge in the Forth Rail Bridge article. But it doesn't make sense to describe the bridge as "influencing" the movie. How about... "Cultural impact"?--Father Goose 03:28, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Now we're getting somewhere. I like the sound of "influence" as a section heading and "cultural impact" is a close second. I too believe the heading "trivia" is part of the problem only because it has now become a habit for many editors to remove the "trivia" sections as a reflex response. It would help to change the whole dynamic of this debate by changing "trivia" to "influence." This would also aid us in spreading the word about the new attitude towards "trivia/influence." It would kind of be a wake up call to zombie editors (overzeaolous editors being the original subject of this thread) and they might snap out of it and leave the "trivia" sections in peace, or at least try to source them rather than remove them. However, "influence" seems to replace "In popular culture" better than "trivia" as a fact fits better in "trivia" than in "IPC" or "influence." Perhaps "trivia" and "IPC" could be combined into a section heading titled "Did you know?" That seems kind of sophisticated, encyclopedic, fun, and enjoyable. Ozmaweezer 05:14, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
I would be in favor of adding "influence" to the first point in the "past proposals" section of this projects subpage so these ideas don't get lost in this discussion. Anyone care to do the honors? Ozmaweezer 05:42, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Another one that came to me is "cultural presence". I don't think there's a single name that's perfect for each IPC heading. We have many options. I personally don't mind "In popular culture", but it has a lowbrow quality that doesn't win much respect.--Father Goose 08:11, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps it would be useful to brainstorm a general list of section headings into which editors could easily relocate facts found in a trivia section. It seems like this is the inherent difficulty with trivia type facts, because at first glance the collection of "random" facts appear to have no home other than the trivia section itself. The current suggestions are good for some types of facts (ie, references of a particular work in culture) but I think it would be useful to find new catchalls for other types of facts, like notable scenes/sections, character traits, miscellaneous achievements, minor historical notes, $article_subject in other mediums, etc. --Nick Penguin 22:42, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
I proposed the last idea above myself some time ago. I also agree that we are probably best served by trying to formulate as many "acceptable" headings as possible, so that the content isn't removed. Maybe we could have some editors go through the various articles with trivia sections and see what kinds of data are included, so that we would have a better idea as to what kind of alternate headings would be advisable. John Carter 22:47, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps something like this might be in order. I'm not very experienced at creating tables, and maybe the article types are a little vague/missing, but if we can fill this up with suggestions it would be a valuable contribution to WP:HTRIV. --Nick Penguin 01:38, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Article type Suggested headings
All-purpose headings:
Biographical:
Books:
Historical:
Geography:
Movies:
Music:
Sports:
TV Shows:
More section headings might be a good idea but I think "Influence" and "Trivia" are enough. Aren't they? NickPenguin, have you see the ideas on this project's subpage in "past proposals?" Ozmaweezer 13:28, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I've taken a look at the "past proposals" section, but I didn't see anything that was explicitly related to this suggestion. Even if I had, I still would have made this suggestion. Certainly "Influence" and "Trivia" would be enough if and only if all trivia section were filled with "Influence" type facts. However the truth is that trivia sections are aggregates for all kinds of tangentally related knowledge, and specific articles demand specific solutions that are relevant in presenting that article's content in a useful way. An "Influence" section will probably not be warranted in an article about small town with some "famous" residents and three stop signs, because "influence" doesn't really mean anything in that context. Thus I think a non-exhaustive, genre based list of suggested headings would be useful, because it would give editors some ideas on how to related trivia type facts to one another, and then integrate them into the larger article. --Nick Penguin 16:04, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Again, the biggest problem with an explicitly-titled "Trivia" section is that giving any section such a name is almost certainly a violation of WP:OR and WP:NPOV policies. We can't really say that anything which probably explicitly violates policy is acceptable anywhere, even in headings. John Carter 16:11, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Certainly there is a thin line to be walked between WP:OR and just naming a collection of facts. People always need to be careful when they modify articles, but I'm not sure if the potential for violating OR would be enough to warrant not making such a list. I don't think taking several similar sentences and putting them under a heading like "Musical Collaborations" or "Awards and Nominations" (the latter which is suggested in WP:HTRIV#Trivia and lists, incidentally) constitutes a violation of OR. As long as we are careful about what sorts of section headings we suggest, we should be in the clear. --Nick Penguin 17:20, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

(reset indent) I just renamed a Trivia section to "In popular culture": [1]. Despite what we've been discussing above, I didn't think any name ("Cultural presence", "Influence", etc.) worked better than regular old "In popular culture". Fancier names might be more appropriate in other cases.

In general, I don't have a problem with the name "Trivia". Renaming such sections "Miscellanea" won't change what they are or how people will treat them. Some trivia sections are more accurately "pop culture" sections, and should be renamed, and a few are even more specific, like "goofs" or "notable alumni". But aside from that, we just need to defend the "rightness" of documenting a subject's (verifiable) presence in popular culture.--Father Goose 22:21, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

That is true, some trivia sections are just IPC sections waiting to be found and labeled. But for very long trivia sections, some facts would work better in a new, more narrowly defined section, partly because the creation of a really good section will encourage editors to add more to it. That is why I think a chart like this would be useful, because it would give people some ideas on how turn some random facts into the groundwork for a really good article. Here's version 1.1 of the chart, with some of the suggestions I had in mind. Perhaps others could suggest more/criticize current suggestions? --Nick Penguin 08:03, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
Article type Suggested headings
All-purpose headings: Trivia; In popular culture; Influence; Featured in film/video games/television/radio etc.; Awards/Records/Nominations; Quotes; Critical response;
Biographical: Personal life; Early life; Activism/Charity/Business work; Alternate career; Personality/Character;
Books: Plot; Characters;
Geography: Local culture; Notable features; Demographics;
Movies/TV Shows: Consistency Errors; Cast members; Later work of the cast; Sound track/Music featured in the film;
Music (artists): Collaborations; Featured in film; Important performances;
Music (albums/songs): Remixes/Alternate versions/Covers; Samples; Featured artists/Personnel
Sports: Statistics/Records;
Video Games Gameplay; Characters; Easter eggs;
These are all good ideas. Just to clarify my last comment. I feel "Influence" is an excellent substitute for "In popular culture" and "Trivia" is a catch all for everything else. The chart above would help to divide up "Trivia" in some articles I suppose. Ozmaweezer 13:36, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

Any objections to starting a heading called "What's the purpose of this wikiproject?"

The following sections of this discussion all seem to question what the purpose of this project is. Any objections to moving them all as subheadings under a new heading called "What's the purpose of this wikiproject?"

  • Restructure
  • Good luck
  • Any place to register opposition
  • Two projects?
  • Trivia sections

I like the overriding goal of figuring out "how to maintain" trivia sections. Ozmaweezer 13:40, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Fine by me.--Father Goose 18:18, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
I would only agree to that overriding goal if the word "trivia" were substituted, because if we used the statement directly above, it could very easily be stated it would seem to be very likely that our primary goal would be to contravene policy and guidelines, and that is something no WikiProject should ever make a goal of. John Carter 16:15, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I suspect that you have misread Ozmaweezer's post, like I did at first. He's not proposing such a heading for the project page -- he's just proposing collecting some of the above discussion threads into one parent section on this page.--Father Goose 19:44, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
Done. I reorganized the threads mentioned above under the new heading. Ozmaweezer 05:35, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

MfD Result Notice

This page was the subject of an MfD discussion closed on 23 October 2007. The result was Keep, although this in no way prejudices a decision to merge, redirect, reform, or delete the project that may develop at this talk page. Xoloz 15:17, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Yay! Ozmaweezer 05:35, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

What's the purpose of this project?

Two projects?

Wait, I just noticed, shouldn't this just be a part of Wikipedia:WikiProject Trivia Cleanup? -- Ned Scott 00:28, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I think of that project as more narrowly focused on immediate improvements. It also to a certain extent has had a rather deletionsist orientation--at least in the past.DGG (talk) 01:03, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
That might be true, but in the past we've usually discouraged having "forked" projects, and I think many people might view this project as such. -- Ned Scott 01:32, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
I have to agree. This seems like another version of Trivia Cleanup, although cleverly worded to make it sound like the opposite (I fell for it at first). I don't see the need for this as a separate project.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 01:47, 10/18/2007
Trivia Cleanup doesn't seem that active these days, and there probably wouldn't be a lot of resistance to expanding on how to keep "good trivia", etc. It might be easier than we think to just integrate into the existing project. -- Ned Scott 01:52, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
I agree with DGG, Trivia Cleanup's goals are different from this projects, and their memberlist is both long and a year old. I'm not sure if everyone who is a member of that project would have the same outlook on Trivia as expressed this project's current wording. Perhaps it would be better to begin fresh discussion here, link this project page on the talk page of Trivia Cleanup and see who supports what. --Nick Penguin 02:52, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
This project's page can be summed up as "follow the trivia guideline". There's an emphasis on not deleting trivia sections as a remedy, but even that is already stated in the trivia guideline, and doesn't make it different enough to warrant another project. If there needs to be more of an emphasis on not deleting sections outright, that can be worked into the current trivia cleanup project. This page is written as some kind of activist campaign ("we feel... etc") but really all it does is maintain the status quo. As far as I can tell this isn't even a project -- it's just a reminder of what not to do.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 02:57, 10/18/2007
My intention is for the project's overall goal to be "maintenance of trivia and pop culture information for inclusionists". The maintenance consists of normal trivia cleanup (reorganize, integrate where appropriate, remove unverifiable material), but makes explicit that primary sourcing is "verifiable" -- an important point that is usually ignored, resulting in the deletion of a lot of worthwhile material. The maintenance also consists of making sure that such compliant material does not get deleted. The exact means to achieve this is not yet specified. The ways in which we are losing this material is plain, however: individual acts of "trivia removal", mis-tuned policies that clip the nail too short (primarily WP:N), and a deletion process (AfD) that is basically just a popularity contest that permits articles to be nominated endlessly until a hanging jury shows up. To truly counter the arbitrary removal of trivia and pop culture info on Wikipedia, we'll have to find ways to counter these forces.--Father Goose 07:01, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Actually, a better summary for the project's aim is right in the lead: "preserve "Trivia" and "In popular culture"-type information in Wikipedia". That's a very different goal from what the Trivia Cleanup project embraces. However, one of the means to preserve the information is to improve it, via cleanup, so as to improve its acceptance. There are many other tasks we will have to tackle as well to succeed with the overall goal.--Father Goose 07:14, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Trivia sections

So what does this mean for trivia sections as permanent entities in articles? Are we still agreeing that all trivia/pop-culture sections should be considered temporary? This is a bit ambiguous right now.

Equazcion • argue/improves • 00:30, 10/18/2007
I've clarified this somewhat. Now the question is, why do we need another project if all we're doing is advocating the implementation of the trivia guideline? This page basically says "follow the trivia guideline". That's it -- and I see no potential for specific tasks for changing articles, at least none outside of those that would already fall under the scope of the trivia cleanup project. If anyone would care to enlighten me on what the point of this is, please do.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 02:38, 10/18/2007

I disagree with merging or deleting this new project. Too many people are interpreting the very reasonable intent of minimizing trivia to mean they should just go in an delete it. I regard many articles in Wikipedia as in a process of growth. Some articles need their trivia sections, some don't. But good faith dictates to me that, if I can't integrate the trivia into the article myself, then I should leave it alone...the fault lying with me, not the article. If we aren't careful, new editors and people with limited skills (like me) are going to end up frustrated and leaving if there isn't some tolerance and leeway granted.84.151.231.26 03:04, 18 October 2007 (UTC)panthera_germanicus

Making sure people know what not to do is important, but that's not what WikiProjects are for. There are other ways to tell people how to handle certain editing tasks. The trivia guideline or the existing trivia cleanup project may need rewording, but a separate project is not warranted for this purpose.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 03:06, 10/18/2007

Any place to register opposition?

Is there anyplace I can go to register opposition to all the unsourced fancruft this project will eventually come to stand for? --Orange Mike 03:20, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I think you just did. But I fail to see the logic of your reasoning.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 03:24, 10/18/2007
I'm probably just a cynic, but I've yet to see one of these articles/sections that didn't degenerate into "Oh, look, there's a WHATEVER in that video!" or "This obscure punk band sings about WHOEVER in their new single!" Sadly, this is true even on topics where I give a darn. Opening the door, I have observed, leads (seemingly inevitably) to fancruftery and sourcelessness. I fear this is inherent in the Wiki process.--Orange Mike 04:09, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Are you saying that you'd like to see all "trivia" sections and "in pop culture" sections deleted outright? Because that's the only thing this project is against. If you actually read the wording of this thing it's pretty benign, unless, of course, you're a radical right-wing trivia section obliterationist. It upholds what's said already in the trivia guideline. It does nothing beyond that.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 04:14, 10/18/2007
I did say I'm a cynic about this. Yes, in the long run, I fear that outright banning of such things is the only way out. I hope you guys prove me wrong; I honestly do. But... I fear I'll prove to be right. --Orange Mike 04:25, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Well then I'd expect to hear more from you over at the trivia guideline's talk page. That would be the place to voice a concern like this. This project is just an implementation of what's stated in the guideline. Arguing that all trivia sections should be deleted outright is basically an argument against the guideline, which won't do you much good to voice here.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 04:31, 10/18/2007
Unsourced material is not supported by this project, nor by Wikipedia in general. Sourced "fancruft" has a place somewhere. As the project outline states, this place should not be somewhere that distracts from our less-crufty coverage of topics -- but it should not be "in oblivion" either.--Father Goose 07:25, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
So can we say - right there on the project page: "It is the policy of this project to delete unsourced trivia material on sight." ? If the answer is "Yes" - then there is hope that this project can be made useful. If the answer is "No" or in some way equivocal - then this is a terrible idea. Notice that I said "trivia material" not "trivia sections" - I'm not advocating deleting entire sections (unless they become empty) - I'm advocating deletion of individual bullet items that don't meet the standard of being referenced and notable (and the rewriting of the merely badly written). I am NOT a deletionist - I have on my User: page a user box that identifies me as a member of meta:Association of Wikipedians Who Dislike Making Broad Judgments About the Worthiness of a General Category of Article, and Who Are in Favor of the Deletion of Some Particularly Bad Articles, but That Doesn't Mean They Are Deletionists. We are faced with three alternative future scenarios:
  1. A future in which there are trivia sections where they are appropriate - and their content is well written, fully referenced and fully notable. Trivia that doesn't meet that standard is treated as junk and deleted on sight.
  2. A future that looks like the situation right now where trivia sections are dumping grounds for badly written, 99% unreferenced and 1% notable statements - many of which are false.
  3. A future where there are no longer any trivia sections.
I prefer (1) - but if that's not possible, I'd greatly prefer (3) than (2). So unless this project is in favor of cleaning up (2) to get to (1) - then it's gotta be (3). Sadly, I don't see a way to get to (1) - and I fear we are heading to (3) - but anything is better than (2) - which is most certainly where we are now.
The problem for editors who (like me) don't mind sourced/notable trivia is that it's hard to prove a negative. Suppose someone writes the following in a trivia section in a Star Wars article:
  • Following the release of Star Wars ep 1, a group of teenagers from Dexter, New Mexico recognised the face of Darth Vader in the bark of a 75 year old Oak tree and burned it to the ground.
  • Since Star Wars movies started being made with CGI, in every case where a vehicle was destroyed, it is just possible to see that the pilot escapes - even though in some cases the graphic of the pilot is just a single pixel.
No references are given in either case.
So what do we do with that? We can't prove that they are not true. By their very nature, they are suprising little facts - unsurprising things such as "The Director ate lunch while working without a break on day 27 of the shoot" isn't going to be there - neither are things that most people already know. So by definition, hardly any editors will know 'off the top of their heads' whether these things are true or not. We're given no evidence that these statements are true. So do you delete them or not?
In my view, we MUST delete rather than trusting that they are "probably" right but merely unsourced. We simply cannot have bold, bare-faced lies, urban legends or any other kind of falsehood in our articles - and it does happen - and it does happen A LOT. We are better off with less truth than a small amount of untruth. It's not enough to stick a template on there saying "This is a trivia section - it's probably full of lies." because that drags all trivia sections into doubt - and that's quite contrary to the project's goal to preserve the good ones.
(Incidentally - the first claim above is false, the second is true - but you'll never be able to prove it because it's not written down anywhere and there is no way to tell whether a single pixel black dot is a pilot or the ships' toilet. However, I spoke to one of the animators of Ep.II and he assures me that they are required by Lucas to always animate the pilot ejecting just in time. Sadly, although it's a great bit of trivia - it's got to go because you have no way to know whether I'm telling the truth or not and I can't prove it.)
So do we have the courage of our convictions? Will we say - right there on the project page: "It is the policy of this project to delete unsourced trivia material on sight." ? That is the first challenge for this project IMHO.
SteveBaker 22:26, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
You make a really good case. However, aren't there existing policies or guidelines to the effect of tagging something as needing a citation, and then, if within a week (my own arbitrary time period) removing it if it doesn't have a reference? I would think that would be acceptable except in cases where WP:BLP is relevant. In those cases, yes, burn any potentially negative trivia out immediately. And, let's be honest, just about every fact, let alone unproven comment, is seen as being negative by somebody, so that probably means any trivia anywhere. John Carter 22:33, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Yep - there are indeed policies like that. I just want to make sure this project affirms them by saying so clearly and unequivocably on it's project page. And sure - it's OK to tag them, wait a week and nuke them - but most people tag and then never come back to finish the job - leaving an article that's not only full of unreferenced junk but also a bunch of annoying little tags that distract from the good parts of the article. I just want to see this stated, clearly in the intro. If everyone agrees that this is the right thing to do, there should be no problem whatever with saying that. (However - I suspect that at least a couple of people here are secretly just trying to preserve trivia...no matter what - even if unsourced...and those people will have trouble agreeing to such a statement - which is why I would like to insist upon it, just to keep people honest and so that we can point to it in the times of grief that are sure to come.) SteveBaker 22:47, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
I agree to your proposal wholeheartedly. And, for what it's worth, when I tag things as unsourced, I do follow up on it. It is my hope that the other individuals involved here agree as well. I would very much welcome seeing them all say as much below, however. John Carter 23:04, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
You're not necessarily "obligated" to follow up on your own fact tags, and you're not a terrible human being if you don't. Fact tags are date-stamped for a reason -- so that one editor can tag things, and upon coming across them, other editors can decide whether they've been given sufficient time. Of course it doesn't hurt to follow-up on your own tagging, but, just saying.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 03:17, 10/19/2007
This is a very rational and reasonable discussion. It is mentioned above how editors above tag items as unsourced and then follow up in a week and delete the unsourced info while others never follow up. I never see trivia sections with the citations template. I would like to see that. I only see trivia sections with the trivia template. I guess I would like to see 1 week expanded into 1 year for trivia sections. It has been mentioned in the past as a pro and a con that trivia sections encourage casual editors to add a quick note. This should be taken into consideration as "casual" editors definatly don't get things done in 1 week. Also, I would like to see a link posted on the article's talk page rather than just a deletion of possible valuable, admittedly unsourced, information. Ozmaweezer 12:33, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with anything more than a 1 week rule. If the original author is an active Wikipedian who is ever likely to follow up - then one week is plenty. If that person was just someone who popped up from nowhere and added a bullet item then even a year isn't enough. We can't have falsehoods littering our articles for long periods of time with editors of serious articles being unable to clean them out without waiting an entire year. That's completely unacceptable. Please note that this kind of information isn't supposed to be added AT ALL without references being included from the get-go. Allowing a week for someone to fix their mistake is plenty. In any case, deleting an unreferenced trivia item does not prevent the original author from adding it back in when they finally track down whatever source they have for it. SteveBaker 12:36, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I agree with the above comment wholeheartedly. What we all seem to be conflicted about are the trivia sections. I'm just trying to come up with some compromises. Since trivia sections seem to be a bit of a conundrum (see all the links to all the archives of discussion on the subpage) I feel one compromise would be for the trivia sections to be given a bit more leeway and lattitude (simply because of all the disagreements). It has been proposed as both a pro and a con that casual editors jot down a quick note (obviously unsourced and in complete violation of wiki policy). Since both sides of the trivia discussion recognize this fact (hence it being a pro and a con), it seems obvious casual editors don't source so we have to source for them....or some other compromise. Ozmaweezer 13:16, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
The existing compromise is that such the editor who removes such content is supposed to note that fact on the talk page, preferably with an indication as to what the removed content was, unless it clearly violated biographies of living persons rules. Unfortunately, like everywhere else in wikipedia, enforcement of such conduct is all but impossible. John Carter 13:33, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
Is this existing compromise a guideline? Does it have a source somewhere? Ozmaweezer 14:20, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
It is basically contained in the style guideline Wikipedia:Citing sources#Dealing with citation problems, although it could be a bit clearer there. John Carter 14:25, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
It's hard to compel an editor to act a certain way, unless they're acting disruptively. Mass removals of content without good explanation is disruptive; deleting a trivia section from a single article is not right, IMO, but an editor would still be in his right to do so (and I would be in my right to oppose him).--Father Goose 22:28, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
And I would join you in the opposition, provided BLP concerns were not involved or sufficient warning of needing sourcing were already given. Having said that, removing the content to talk pages is a perfectly acceptable action, until sourcing takes place. I suppose in the event we ever see such removal, maybe we could just go back in the history and add the content to the talk page, indicating that it needs sourcing. Not the best possible alternative, but maybe the best realistic one. John Carter 22:36, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I am deeply concerned about taking a "1 week stance" on trivia sections. If we did that, then everything but the most recent additions to CAT:TRIVIA should be deleted immediately (unless it has a citation, which is infrequent). I can see how this would be an easy solution, but I fail to see how it is a better solution than just integrating the trivia section. Once integrated, then each individual fact stands up on it's own against the citation/removal test, and I think the merit of each individual fact should be considered individually, not in some categorical way often implied in talk of the "average trivia section". --Nick Penguin 23:51, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I think I was the first person to mention 7 days. When I did that, it was in reference to my existing actions on all unsourced content in articles, not specifically referring to trivia sections. Actually, I don't think I have deleted anything from a trivia section yet. I hope no one is actively thinking of trying to delete them all now on that basis. But it might be a good idea to have various individuals go through the articles in the Category:Articles with trivia sections to see if they can provide any sources for any content in those articles which don't have them yet. Alternately, maybe we could have some individuals start to move some trivia into other sections so that they won't be quite so vulnerable, or make a list of all the extant trivia sections possibly with current content, for the purposes of being able to recover it later. John Carter 23:56, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
Whoopse, perhaps I misread the previous comments in the thread. But even still, I do think that in some sense the trivia problem transcends the citation problem, because (at least in the context I'm thinking of) the problem with trivia sections has to do with the way it presents a set of disorganized facts (ie, the problem addressed in Wikipedia:Trivia_sections), and this is different from the notability/reliability/truth value of the sentences in that section, which I think is dealt with in different guidelines.--Nick Penguin 00:07, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Good Luck!

Oddly enough, the things you propose doing are exactly what I tend to do, and yet I have been considered a 'deletionist' for it... Ah well, I suppose some people see with higher contrast than others. Skittle 16:49, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, either the purpose of this project is misunderstood (perhaps the overview needs some rewriting), or that inclusionists and deletionists are far more aligned on this matter than is usually perceived to be the case -- with a "fringe" on either side attracting all the attention.--Father Goose 17:20, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
My final comment was supposed to indicate that, yes, the wiki-editing world does not really split into deletionists and inclusionists, unless one ignores what people say, think and do. A few people seem to perceive a huge difference between two homogenous camps, one aimed at populating wikipedia with everything that can possibly be written, the other aimed at removing everything except for a few dry sentences about maths. Needless to say, this is a rather odd perception :) Skittle 17:31, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Actually, there are few people who cannot agree with the principles of this Wiki-association: meta:Association of Wikipedians Who Dislike Making Broad Judgments About the Worthiness of a General Category of Article, and Who Are in Favor of the Deletion of Some Particularly Bad Articles, but That Doesn't Mean They Are Deletionists SteveBaker 03:42, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Restructure

I've moved a lot of the material Ozmaweezer added relating to general discussion of trivia to a /Discussion subpage so as to separate the project's tasks from general debate over trivia and popular culture in general. I hope this step meets with approval.

I've also outlined what tasks are probably the most useful we could try to accomplish at this time (cleanup, rescue, salvage, etc.) I added a cautionary note to the "list of deleted trivia sections" Ozmaweezer started to make it clear that we are not here to do battle, but to improve the encyclopedia.--Father Goose 21:23, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Hey, could you provide a link to the discussion subpage here and on the project page. Thanks. Ozmaweezer 10:01, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Here it is. Please read this succint summary of the trivia debate in order to be a well informed editor. Thanks Ozmaweezer 12:11, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Purpose of this succint summary of the trivia debate/sub page

I think it's important to maintain this sub page to keep points/counterpoints form being lost in meandering discussions about trivia and constantly re-treading old ground. Also, please provide descriptive headings on this discussion page to keep all the different topics discussed seperate and visible. Thanks Ozmaweezer 14:14, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Purpose of this project discussion

I started the council proposal for some kind of direct link from wikipedia articles to the trivia section or to be blunt, to just allow the trivia sections. I just want to voice my opinion that this project should narrow it's focus to Trivia/IPC "sections" inside articles and not IPC "articles" themselves. I don't quite agree with the "scope" section of the project page. I don't think this project should be about taking any action or editing any articles. There is already a project for handling trivia sections. I think we should focus on hashing out some new policy or guidelines for handling trivia. I agree with all the "goals" on the project page. I don't think the "article improvement" section under "active tasks" belongs on this project page either. Taking any action will distract us from coming to a consensus about trivia/IPC. Ozmaweezer 11:40, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
The purpose of WikiProjects is to improve articles in some specific area or way. If we did nothing but what you propose, the concerns raised by SMcCandlish and others in the MfD would be valid, and we would get shut down regardless of how the "voting" went there.
The way to overcome the "anti-trivia movement", to the extent that there is one, is by legitimizing trivia. We'll never be able to get trivia accepted whenever it fails to meet the three key points I outlined in the "principles" section: verifiable, neutral, and well-organized. If we can't get it compliant with that, we'll never win any policy battle. If, on the other hand, we work to bring trivia and IPC material up to that standard, the anti-trivia crowd will be on far shakier ground when trying to delete it -- and will probably have far less motivation to delete it as well.
Stuff gets done on Wikipedia a certain way because of how people do things, not because of policies. The policies reflect working practices, and when they don't, they get changed or rejected. So what we've got to do is establish "good trivia" as a working practice.
As for whether this project should address trivia and popular culture jointly, or both trivia/IPC sections and articles remains to be seen. Regarding the latter, IPC articles almost always start out as IPC sections, then get split out according to summary style conventions, whereupon they get deleted for not meeting notability criteria. So if you really want to protect IPC sections, you have to protect IPC articles as well (which are just grown-up IPC sections). The loss of the articles is more disastrous than the loss of the articles, because deleted articles are gone, not just relegated to a page history.--Father Goose 03:45, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
Now I see the light! Ozmaweezer 05:29, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
For once I was blind, but now I can see! Ozmaweezer 14:42, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Edit the following "pro:"

I would like to see a slight edit/clarification of the following "pro" on the subpage:

  • Help demonstrate the interconnectedness of varied subjects and expose readers to those subjects.

I would like to have it read:

  • Help demonstrate the interconnectedness of varied subjects by way of internal links to other articles and expose readers to those subjects.

That's just my opinion. Ozmaweezer 05:50, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Add the following proposal

Another suggestion is I would like to add another proposal to the list of "past proposals" on the subpage. My new proposal is to change the trivia template to read "This trivia section needs cleaning up." Ozmaweezer 05:55, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Go right ahead and implement both suggestions. You don't have to get clearance from anyone to make any changes to nearly any part of Wikipedia. If we happen to disagree with the changes, we can always undo them and/or discuss them (see WP:BRD for a great overview of this approach).--Father Goose 08:26, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Oh, but in the case of the trivia template, be aware of how contentious every change to it has been. Then make the change anyway. Like I said, people can always undo it... and maybe, just maybe, they won't.--Father Goose 08:28, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Discussion of the "con" about trivia/IPC sections being inappropriate to an encyclopedia

I agree most encyclopedias don't have trivia sections in their articles. Although, I have a feeling if I went to the library and looked hard enough I might find something analgous in some encyclopedia somewhere. The point is most encyclopedias don't have articles on "The Big Lebowski," "Kim Kardashian," or "Tila Tequila" either. So, should we eliminate all articles that aren't in other encyclopedias too? It just seems like a poor argument. Ozmaweezer 14:42, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Actually, the specific encyclopedias for films, etc., probably would have articles on many of these subjects. I have in front of me right now the Biographical Encyclopedia of Scientists. And, guess what? No trivia sections in any of the entries. John Carter 15:06, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
I think we all agree Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia however it is still an encyclopedia and the content should be encyclopedic in nature. It is true that much of what is currently found in trivia sections is unencyclopedic and that this is a big "con" associated with having the sections at all, it takes a lot of hard work and constant maintenance to keep a trivia section in good encyclopedic condition. Stardust8212 15:57, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
As a bit of an aside to John's point, last night while I was reflecting on the trivia problem and browsing some examples, I noticed that trivia sections are most likely to occur in articles in the arts, humanities, biography and specific locations, while they are least likely to occur in pure science and math articles. I think the reason for this is that the former more directly include the more "human" aspect of the subject, while the latter tend to be a little more objective/removed from the subject in that regard. Perhaps some of the disagreement with the existence of trivia/IPC sections has to do with an argument that runs like this (forgive me for putting words in the mouths of others): "Some specific types of articles get along find without trivia sections, and since every article is supposed to be fundamentally the same (in that it adequately describes a subject), then no articles should have a trivia section." --Nick Penguin 16:20, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
I can think of very few articles were a true trivia section or article is really the best solution--possibly some popular culture subjects or memes where the entire subject is trivial but nonethless noteworthy for WP purposes. Certainly not one called by that name. Cultural influences -- that's another matter. DGG (talk) 07:51, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
It can take a lot of hard work and maintenance to keep any article in good encyclopedic condition, trivia section or no. But I guess this is especially true of trivia sections, since it's easy to tack on any fact, usually unsourced. With any luck, this WikiProject will minimize that drawback and highlight the advantages of trivia and IPC sections.--Father Goose 21:16, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm speaking mostly from my work with episode articles where the popular culture references grow without end or citation (I add them when I find them but they're few and far between) for example: [2]. Just in general the trivia type sections require a lot more babysitting, just my experience perhaps. Stardust8212 23:09, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
the episode articles need a great deal of babysitting in general. If you've been working with them you know that better than I. And this is also true with a good many of the subjects where trivia sections are much used--other edits there are also often quite problematic. there's a lot of lazy editing in WP, and this is just the tip of the iceberg. it's a good place to start fixing, ofcourse, since its so conspicuous. DGG (talk) 08:38, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Maybe, the episode articles should be locked or at least the "trivia" section should be locked and the template should ask editors to submit ideas on the discussion page. This is one of the "past proposals" on this project's subpage. Ozmaweezer 13:31, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
So far as I remember, articles have to be locked by an administrator and they really only do that in articles which have an active "edit war" ongoing. I doubt very seriously we would find an admin willing to lock an article simply because it has an extant trivia section. The fact that that trivia section will also be, probably, unreferenced, and that we would thus be often asking an admin to lock an article for the purpose of retaining unsourced material in it, makes such a proposal inherently problematic. John Carter 14:40, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
(edit conflict)This is essentially page protection and as I understand it most administrators are uncomfortable protecting any page for long periods of time because it goes against the idea of an encyclopedia that anyone can edit. I think that particular proposal is not really a long term solution to the problem. And DGG, I agree, this is just a part of the problem but I think it is a good place to start. Stardust8212 14:48, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
right, this is page protection,and, speaking as an admin, this is not a remotely possible solution--it is very much against the rules for this to be done in order to prevent people from working with a section or an article--any one of us who tried it would not be an admin much longer. The last person who tried this sort of thing --in his case to remove sections and then lock the articles--is now up for removal of the admin status at the Arbitration Commission. The only method that will work is persistent efforts at consensus, and explanations of what we are trying to do. DGG (talk) 07:51, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
It just seems that an article about an episode can only have so much written about it. At some point it would be done. I guess locking it would go against the idea of an encyclopedia anyone can edit but it would help control the trivia section. Ozmaweezer 13:33, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
The problem, of course is that "when it is done" is open to question. It could well be that the person who as his or her first professional job provided the voice for Snowball in a given episode of The Simpsons winds up winning the best actor Academy Award some years later. At that point, adding a mention regarding that episode being the first professional appearance of someone who was honestly a nonentity at the time the show was made would be notable and justify inclusion of that information in the article. We can't predict the future, and locking any article on the basis of saying "it's done" is pretty much both a violation of wikipedia's being something everyone can edit and a serious impediment to making required changes later. John Carter 13:42, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

IPC Afd

I just thought that you should be notified with the new Afd. I believe you should have an IPC Afd box in your main page. --Lenticel (talk) 06:43, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up. I'll add it to the "Article improvement" section.--Father Goose 07:40, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Merge?

Is there some compelling reason to have both Wikipedia:WikiProject Trivia and Popular Culture and Wikipedia:WikiProject Trivia Cleanup? I remain highly skeptical; the latter sounds like a good task force of the former, despite pre-dating it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:16, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm partly in agreement, but there's a political element that makes me feel that the projects work better separately. That element is the deletionist/inclusionist divide, where we focus more on improving content, and they focus more on improving presentation. Our respective approaches are hopefully complementary, though there is some tension between the attitudes of the respective projects and/or its members. I personally would prefer keeping the two separate while the "trivia schism" remains active on Wikipedia -- they have their focus, we have ours, and hopefully Wikipedia benefits from both. Were it not for that schism, yes, it would be logical to merge the two projects.--Father Goose (talk) 22:08, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
Keeping the two groups separate maintains the "political" schism. I think merge would be helpful. / edg ☺ ☭ 02:34, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure it would be a "merge" so much as a "takeover". There doesn't seem to be much activity on Wikipedia:WikiProject Trivia Cleanup, and since the description on their project page is quite bare, there would be a significant import of values from this project to that; I don't know how all the people on the (very long) memberlist would feel about that. But you could certainly tag the projects with a merge template, put the discussion on the Trivia Cleanup talk page and see what kind of a stir it generates. --NickPenguin(contribs) 04:02, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
We're not especially active here either so far; a small number of articles actually worked on via this project, by only a couple of editors. The trivia issue (like many, I suppose) is one people like to posture about a lot, but not actually work on much. I think trying to merge the projects would stir up a shitstorm of posturing and leave behind a single, even more inactive project.
Heh, I just got a mental image of proposing to merge the Protestant and Catholic churches. "Redundant." "POV fork."--Father Goose (talk) 07:14, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
Posturing aside, most projects have fewer "active" members than their membership lists would indicate. Merging these projects would concentrate the productive members into one project, and have the added benefit of creating an initiative to resolve policy conflicts, instead of polarizing them.
Example: a few paragraphs up someone said (in so many words) we focus on content, they focus on presentation. No one in this group replied to provide a different perspective, or expressed reservations about possibly portraying this group as more substantial in purpose than that group. The schism only gets worse with the two groups separate. / edg ☺ ☭ 09:29, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
I prefer peace to war, which is how things are with the projects separate. Addressing policy conflicts should take place on policy pages, not within a WikiProject, where hopefully people get some useful work done instead of fighting. Your views on the matter are well-meant but unconstructive.--Father Goose (talk) 20:34, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
I oppose the merge. Keep them separate for now. I'm not an "active member" because I don't think there is anything "active" to do. Except maybe remove all the trivia templates from all the articles and let the trivia sections grow and flourish and run free in their natural habitat. Ozmaweezer (talk) 11:15, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Oppose I am an active member of WikiProject Trivia Cleanup and I oppose merging the project with Wikiproject Trivia and Popular Culture for two main reasons:
  1. The scopes of the projects are different. Wikiproject Trivia and Popular Culture mostly deals with the deletions of articles that are entirely trivia and popular culture while Wikiproject Trivia Cleanup deals with individual sections.
  2. The beliefs of the projects are different. It seems that the two projects have different beliefs about how to handle trivia. Wikiproject Trivia and Popular Culture seems to oppose the removal of trivia sections and wishes to include these in Wikipedia while Wikiproject Trivia Cleanup supports integrating the trivia into the article. If Wikiproject Trivia Cleanup were merged with Wikiproject Trivia and Popular Culture it would be at odds with the project.

The first line of Wikipedia:WikiProject Trivia and Popular Culture says:

"This WikiProject aims to preserve "Trivia" and "In popular culture"-type information in Wikipedia in a manner that does not compromise Wikipedia's core principles or its quality."

The first lines of Wikipedia: WikiProject Trivia Cleanup are:

"This project deals with trivia sections on articles, and cleaning them up. Many articles on Wikipedia have too much trivia, and need to be shortened (or just removed altogether). This project focuses on finding, tagging and cleaning articles with too much trivia."

It is clear to see that these projects have very different core beliefs and are not compatable with one another. The members from the two projects would be at war and Wikipedia needs peace.

For these reasons I oppose the merger. The two projects are different, their goeals are not the same, and Wikiproject Trivia and Popular Culture does not support cleaning up or integrating trivia, but Wikiproject Trivia Cleanup does. I see no reason to merge these projects. Johnred32 (talk) 21:59, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Two words, man "Yin" and "Yang" Two opposing yet complementing forces working together in harmony.DocRocktopus (talk) 05:53, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I've ominated Frogs in popular culture for deletion here. You can move anything you think is worthy of keeping into the Frog article--Phoenix-wiki talk · contribs 18:01, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Or you can vote to keep the article. Either-or.
Equazcion • argue/improves • 18:12, 12/19/2007

Thanks for the courtsey notice. --NickPenguin(contribs) 18:29, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Deletion sorting

For a little while I was maintaining Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Popular culture to keep track of voting trends. I will move closed discussions linked from this page there, and I guess we'll cross post new AfDs as they come up. –Pomte 11:56, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Admin noticeboard

There's thread discussion "In popular culture" sections in articles there. Anyone interested to take a look? Aditya(talk • contribs) 04:38, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Going on the offensive

I noticed that since the inception of this project, there are only "defensive" movements such as Afd saving and cleanup. Although your work is commendable, I think that you need to do "offensive" movements as well which means improving articles to GA/FA articles rather than just keeping deletionists at bay. I suggest that you improve Cultural depictions of spiders which is a failed GA nom. There are a lot of refs there so it is easy for you to get started. Cheers!--Lenticel (talk) 12:55, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Steve Biko

The above article is currently a nominee for inclusion in the next release version of wikipedia. I regret to say that I have yet to pass it into inclusion based on the great length of the trivia/pop culture section. The article is about an extremely significant figure, but right now the amount of coverage it gives to popular culture is at best poorly explained, and at worst a possible violation of WP:Undue weight. If editors with this project would be interested in perhaps addressing these issues on the above article, I believe all parties involved would be very appreciative. Thank you. John Carter (talk) 00:49, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I have removed items from the IPC list that were only passing mentions/references of Biko, and the current version of the list now only contains major tributes or media where Biko is a predominant feature. Hope this helps. --NickPenguin(contribs) 04:35, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Userbox

Before discovering this project, I made a userbox describing my views on this subject.

This user likes "Trivia" and "In popular culture" information, and supports their inclusion.

This is the code: {{User:ErgoSum88/trivia}}

Feel free to post this on your userpage! ErgoSum88 (talk) 06:59, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


Sigh...

If anyone is interested, you might want to read this. Its just me expressing my views about this very subject, trivia and other assorted "cruft." Pass it around, tell your friends... or not. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 09:50, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Awesome. Aditya(talk • contribs) 10:48, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
Nice rant. Don't get too discouraged; it's my sense that the inclusionist and deletionist extremes are being shot down, and an inclusive-yet-maintainable path is emerging. It's taking a lot of work and teeth-gnashing, but we're getting there.
I was initially discouraged with the outcome of this project's first AfD (Veni, vidi, vici in popular culture), but subsequent ones have gone well. I think most !voters at AfD are not extremists, and will respond positively when they see a marginal article being watered and fed.--Father Goose (talk) 21:09, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
In hindsight, the VVVIPC article was perhaps not the best collection of content to take a stand with, but subsequent articles have been about much more concrete subjects. --NickPenguin(contribs) 22:29, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
From a brief browse of IPC AfDs, it seems that keep is more of a trend than last year. If so, I will want to make an effort to bring back certain deleted articles that I worked on. –Pomte 23:34, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
A major reason for the shift is because a whole bunch of last year IPC AfDs were tainted by a whole host of now blocked sock accounts. Also, EXCELLENT rant! Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 07:22, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks guys, I was just feeling discouraged a little after seeing some of the drama that goes on here behind the scenes. Like I said, for many years I've come here to look up articles about trivial info that you can't find anywhere else... thats what so great about this place! It makes me sad to see of this effort being wasted because a few people don't think it belongs here. Which is why I only create or work on articles about topics I know for sure will not be deleted, and I wont add information unless I can provide a source. I know if someone came along and tried to delete something I worked on for days and days I would be really pissed. The problem is, with a lot of these TV and video game articles... there are no good sources. Policy says that works of fiction can be sourced from the primary source, such as the show or game itself, as long as you are not providing any interpretation of the plot. But it seems to me that nobody knows this or they choose to ignore it because they consider it cruft. Eh... ::shrug:: --ErgoSum88 (talk) 04:03, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I just came across an article today, I guess I'm not the only person who has noticed this. Check this out: The battle for Wikipedia's soul --ErgoSum88 (talk) 04:54, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Check out all the articles cited in Deletionism and inclusionism in Wikipedia -- they're all good reads. This is a rare case where the press has a better perspective on Wikipedia than Wikipedia itself does.--Father Goose (talk) 10:13, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
Ergosum (good rant btw) -the other issue I have is when folks complain this stuff can't be referenced. It very often can and there is loads of scholarly material out there, unfortunately often not accessible directly online. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:29, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

555 (telephone number)

Here's one to ruminate on - this is potentially a very good article and there would be loads of material in TV and film about phone numbers. May need a rename to Phone numbers in film and television or Fictional phone numbers or... as it becomes generalised once the article gets underway. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:33, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Good find, I'm going to post it on the main page for improvement. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 21:05, 12 April 2008 (UTC)
It's in better shape than some articles. I don't think it's in immediate danger of being deleted, at least, and article rescue is this project's highest-priority job (in my view). I added an anecdote about Michael Moore to it though, and while I was at it, Hornymanatee.com to Fictitious domain name. Whee!--Father Goose (talk) 21:57, 12 April 2008 (UTC)
It may not be as bad as the other articles, but you know how it goes around here. Everything could use some improvement. Some of the references cited are not inline, and I counted three "citation needed" tags. I think this one would be easy to improve, it seems to be a well-known phenomenon. When I have time, I will attempt to clean it up. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 23:47, 12 April 2008 (UTC)
I tried to clean up some grammar. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 07:10, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Note

Hi fellow members! Just so you're aware, a discussion regarding our project is going on here. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 06:35, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Assessment

Hey guys will you do an assessment drive in the future? That way you'll know the number and quality of articles within your scope.--Lenticel (talk) 22:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Step 1 would probably involve coming to some sort of consensus about what falls under this project's scope. Certainly all the [Foobar in popular culture] articles, but there seems to be a lack of clarity on more general pop-culture related articles, like catch-phrases/slang. --NickPenguin(contribs) 22:25, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
There would also be the question of how many pieces of "trivia" being included in an article would be enough to qualify, whether articles which are in the process of losing "trivia" sections in favor of integration into text, and so on. God knows I'm probably the biggest assessment nut on the planet, but I'd want some fairly clear guidelines for what does and does not qualify for inclusion before I would think about tagging and assessing. John Carter (talk) 22:27, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Add some tentative instructions to the project page, then pick up a shovel and start digging.--Father Goose (talk) 22:46, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Category:Articles with trivia sections seems more like a long term, general maintenance goal since it generally only involves formatting. Articles needing improvement are in Category:In popular culture, but also in the very large Category:Popular culture. Right now this group seems more focused on the Foo in popular culture articles, but there is a much larger base of articles that concern popular culture. Certainly some of those categories need to fill up a bit. Also, apparently there is Wikipedia:WikiProject Internet culture, so there may be some overlap between the two projects. --NickPenguin(contribs) 02:53, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
There's also the problem regarding the image that will be used for the banner.--Lenticel (talk) 21:48, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
That's true, we'd have to try and think of some universal (and simple) popular culture symbol. In another train of thought, is this group concerned with every article with an IPC section? If so, digging wouldn't be too hard, we could get a bot to do the digging for us. --NickPenguin(contribs) 00:36, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
I would personally steer clear of those with short IPC sections, unless they haven't been tagged or assessed by anyone yet. Otherwise, those sections as sections are always at least potentially going to be moved or removed, and the latter would basically make the presence of the banner irrelevant. John Carter (talk) 00:56, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
If there an easy method of discovering articles with IPC sections over a certain length, or generating a list with all the articles with IPC sections? That would be a good start if the tags should be added manually. --NickPenguin(contribs) 01:40, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Project scope

(following from discussion above) Okay, so what articles (or sections?) are in this project's scope? It was initially conceived as a way to preserve and improve trivia and "in popular culture"-type information. Should it handle "popular culture" topics in general?

Personally, I think not; TV, comic books, and so on, are pop-culture subjects, but they have their own wikiprojects already, and those subjects are "the thing" as opposed to "the thing's influence on other things".

We can definitely consider all articles from Category:In popular culture to be in our purview. An article like Interweb is probably as well, because most of it is concerned with the term's use... in popular culture.

So, what about "In popular culture" sections? They're pretty clearly a part of our mission, but I'm not sure how we should respond, as a project, to them. I've dealt with a few on my own, such as Redshirt (character)#References and parodies (I pared it back to the most "notable" instances (whatever that means), improved the writing, and sorted it). We can't flatly insist that people keep such sections intact in articles about non-pop culture subjects. They often have their place in such articles, in moderation, but the point is to preserve the information, for us not to apply political pressure over what should be an editorial decision.

They're easy enough to deal with when they get spun out into independent articles; improve them to the point where they offer coherent, sourced information, and the general community tends to accept them. We need to develop working methods for IPC sections that the community will generally accept as well. We don't want to claim IPC sections as our "turf" within articles that others are trying to improve according to their sensibilities. Will improved writing, sourcing, and organization of such sections be enough in such cases? I'm wary of the "pare back" solution; there's an arbitrary quality as to whether the appearance of the World Trade Center in The Simpsons might be "notable" but its appearance in Trading Places might not.

Much food in popular culture for thought.--Father Goose (talk) 05:10, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Well the "pop culture" part is easy. Whats harder is defining what is "trivia." As far as I know there aren't any articles with "trivia" in the title. I say any obscure topics that somewhat relate to popular culture (such as 555 (phone number)) would probably qualify... as well as other obscure articles that are not already under another project's scope that do not directly relate to pop culture. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 07:20, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
The "trivia" portion of the project is generally specific to trivia sections, as true trivia articles (i.e., That 70s show trivia) do not exist on Wikipedia, and shouldn't. However, there hasn't been much project-coordinated work on trivia sections as yet.
An article like 555 matches the scope I outlined above pretty well, because it's an article about the subject's impact on, and presence in, many pop-culture works. PEnnsylvania 6-5000, by contrast, is a pretty straightforward article on a thing which has a pop-culture presence, though a fairly finite one. It contains some "in popular culture" information, but the article itself probably does not fall under our auspices. (Purview... auspices... I need a thesaurusectomy.)--Father Goose (talk) 09:20, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
Right, I don't think anyone wants to see whole articles on Star Wars Trivia. We deal with trivia sections and try to improve them, and I think in our case "trivia" should also include articles about obscure facts such as PEnnsylvania 6-5000, with or without pop culture references. I don't think we should limit our definiton of trivia to trivia sections within articles about pop culture. I was also thinking of maybe trivia books? Category:Trivia books or even Category:Popular culture books? I know there is already a book project but I think their scope is large enough to include other projects, after all, I see plenty of articles with 2, 3, or even 10 projects attached. Or what about Mike the Headless Chicken? An interesting bit of trivia not necessarily related to popular culture. Just my suggestions. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 10:26, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
I don't know if there's some misunderstanding here about trivia sections; I consider all trivia and IPC sections within our scope, not just those within articles about "pop culture" topics.
But overall, I'd like to be unambitious in terms of the scope of this project, at least initially. There's more work to do with trivia sections alone that we'll probably ever get done, and a really good fixup of an IPC article is hours of work by itself -- and there are hundreds of IPC articles (and thousands of sections). Don't get me wrong, I like Mike, but if we expand our scope to include any article that has any kind of quirky information, I no longer know what our scope is.--Father Goose (talk) 20:57, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
Yeah I hear you. There more I look at this place the more hopeless I feel. We really don't have enough active members to really get anything accomplished. I would like to include articles that have "quirky information" but as you say, its hard enough just keeping up with the articles nominated for deletion. I'm having serious doubts about even getting enough people together to create a banner for this project and the other duties that go along with tagging pages. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 05:18, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Actually, I've been pretty encouraged lately. We've had a surge in active membership in the last few weeks, and our work on IPC articles in the last few months has been enough to shift the trend away from deletion. We've been able to establish methods to improve such articles and demonstrate that they can be "encyclopedic" instead of unredeemable. Tagging all the pages in Category:In popular culture (for starters, anyway) may help to attract more dedicated editors to the project. Finish your work on the banner.
Contrast this with the state of affairs of about a year ago, when something like 100 IPC articles were deleted in a binge, partly due to the "!votes" of sock-puppeteers. We're slowly turning the tide of apathy and prejudice toward these articles.--Father Goose (talk) 07:03, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Ohhh, alright. I'll make some more graphics. What do you think about the T&PC thing? I mean we can always change it later if things "split" like you said. I kinda wanted to keep it simple, not too whimsical or colorful, which seems to be the norm with project logos. And another thing, I've been meaning to ask... whats with the !vote thing? Is that some inside joke because they're not really votes in principle but really are votes in practice? Thats what I assumed but I wasn't sure. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 07:21, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

The icon's fine. Yes, you guessed right about "!vote"; they're not supposed to be votes but more often than not they are treated like votes. '!' means not in programming contexts, in case you didn't know (though it sounds like you do).--Father Goose (talk) 09:40, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, are these types of articles automatically within the scope of the Wikiproject?

  1. X in IPC
  2. X in fiction
  3. Cultural depictions of X
  4. X in mythology (not sure on this one)

--Lenticel (talk) 09:13, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well the first two are right. I dunno about the second two. There is already a WP:WikiProject Culture, but I must say they are bordering on inactive. The last discussion was from 2007 and the only new member since last year joined in March. If they are going inactive then I suppose culture could be part of our scope, but unless we get more members I don't see us needing any more projects than what we already have on our plate. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 09:22, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
I hope we get at least cultural depictions of X as I am more comfortable editing these articles and they have a broader scope than IPC's.--Lenticel (talk) 09:34, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
Well nobody is going to stop you from improving them. As far as being under the scope of this project, it depends on whether or not you consider "cultural depictions" to be part of "popular culture." Most people would assume that popular culture is trivial (tv, movies) while "real" culture is stuff like fine art, mythology, and fiction. However, fiction would seem to fall under both categories as tv and movies are also works of fiction. If the "cultural" depiction includes any of works of fiction I suppose it could fall under our scope and be tagged with one of our banners if few or no other projects are claiming it. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 11:23, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
I'd say the "cultural depictions" articles are within our scope. Sometimes the only difference between popular culture and "high culture" is the passage of time.--Father Goose (talk) 10:55, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

How about Foobar in fiction, or some other medium? There's a few of these articles in CAT:In popular culture, like List of books set in New York City and List of films and television shows set in Liverpool. Some of these kinds of articles have content that are usually found in an IPC article, but they may be too long for merging and such. Wold they come under our scope? --NickPenguin(contribs) 01:29, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd say so.--Father Goose (talk) 03:50, 3 May 2008 (UTC)
Sounds good, I'll go back and assess the rest when I get a chance this week. --NickPenguin(contribs) 21:08, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Project Graphic

I think a simple graphic of an old style TV set or perhaps a microphone would do. As far as the scope of our project, I think a lot of "internet memes" are a target for deletion, and obviously any article with "in popular culture" in the title or a header named as such is a target. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 01:04, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Maybe two pictures for the banner would work best, showing some memorabilia (buttons, posters, toys, whatever) of a pair of big names, like Elvis, Marilyn, and the like? Does anyone have any such items that could be photographed for such pictures? John Carter (talk) 01:12, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
I was just thinking, maybe you could do an image with "IPC" with the letters made up of different images (I might be a lampstand, P be a phone etc.). I was thinking of making the image a collage as this will represent what Pop culture is--Lenticel (talk) 03:21, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Not a bad idea Lenticel, but I'm not sure how effective it would be with such a small graphic. Anyway, wouldn't TPC be better? As in "Trivia and Popular Culture" or even T&PC which is my usual shorthand for this project. (Also I made this conversation a seperate thread, since this discussion has turned from assesment to the project graphic.) --ErgoSum88 (talk) 04:06, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
I'm ok with TPC rather than IPC if that would represent the project better. Well, should the image as letters are too unwieldy then you could do a TPC or T&PC image where each letter is made up of a crazy font (crazier than Comic San serif).--Lenticel (talk) 07:05, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I browsed through the clipart catergory over on the commons, and I didn't find much. These are alright, but if anyone wants to take a shot at adding the letters T&PC or modifying them in other ways feel free. I'll see what I can do, I have GIMP and some moderate editing skills. After we round up some candidates I guess we can vote on the ones we like. If anyone finds more just add them to this gallery so we can keep them all together. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 07:28, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

I did a quick n' dirty mockup of a possible icon ("Multimedia icon", the 8th in the gallery below). I don't think we have to get too fancy. I'm not too sold on the idea of using letters in the icon either; the "trivia" and "popular culture" aspects of the project may yet split, and "TPC" has no particular established meaning (except Transaction Processing Performance Council, maybe).--Father Goose (talk) 10:27, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
Perhaps you should add something in the icon that represents the visual arts, books and comics. Perhaps a pen or paintbrush will do. I hope this wouldn't clutter the image.--Lenticel (talk) 10:36, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
It does get harder to visually balance it with each added element. The icon's not super-important either way. Perhaps what we could do is merge my idea with Ergo's and put "T&PC" over the three items.--Father Goose (talk) 11:27, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
The shortcut is WP:WPTPC, and I already made a little icon with letters in it... so... too late! --ErgoSum88 (talk) 11:02, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
  • How about a different font? It can easily be changed and possibly made a light shade of gray so it doesn't stick out so much. Or, I can just make the TV screen blank, no big deal. I just want to get something going so we can at least have a banner. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 18:56, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Use any icon, or even none at all. We can change it later. Oh wait! I just remembered a "Trivial Pursuit" icon I created months ago for possible use in the {{trivia}} template. (added above)--Father Goose (talk) 00:25, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
I find the Trivial Pursuit icon most appropriate as it's not specific to a medium. –Pomte 22:40, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Good articles

Dear fellow members, I propose we attempt to get more good and featured "in popular culture" articles. To be coordinated, why not focus on these two first? Classical elements in popular culture and Godzilla in popular culture. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 22:47, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

At a minimum, we could do the necessary maintenance to restore Cultural depictions of Joan of Arc to WP:FL.--Father Goose (talk) 04:59, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
May I re-suggest Cultural depictions of spiders that I posted a while ago?--Lenticel (talk) 03:01, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
Well, I suggested the two above, because I did about as much as I could with them at the time and hope that someone is able to take them to the next level. I made 29 edits to Classical elements in popular culture and 23 edits to Godzilla in popular culture. I will see if I can do anything further on the spider article, though. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 04:57, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
I already nominated Cultural depiction of spiders for GA. Hopefully it passes this time. Perhaps you should study Champagne in popular culture to see if you get some ideas off it. I believe the article is a very good example as some IPC deletionists even voted keep.--Lenticel (talk) 10:33, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
I am trying to look for some commentary about some of the material to make the article less in-universe, as well as doing some copyediting. Found a nice bit in Robert Graves :) Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:46, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
UPDATE: The article has passed GA status.--Lenticel (talk) 13:51, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
I'm happy to read that. Bravo! Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 17:57, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Problem with your basic philosophy

"If material is verifiable, neutral, and well-organized, we feel deleting it is an inappropriate act". "any information that is compliant with core policies and well-organized improves the value of Wikipedia overall".

I understand this viewpoint, but I believe it is not in keeping with the overall goal of having Wikipedia be an encylopedia. Encyclopedia articles are meant to be a summary of the available knowledge on a particular topic. What you're suggesting implies that Wikipedia should be able to contain every bit of data that exists on a topic. So, our WWII article, or one of them, could contain a list of every one of the millions of soldiers that served in that war. Military records exist to verify this, and the list could be organized in some efficient manner. There are gigabytes of research data which exist on various scientific topics, these could be organized and dumped into some group of Wikipedia articles.

There are two problems with this. First, while Wikipedia is not paper, it is still limited in size. Allowing vast volumes of data to be dumped into it, as long as said data is verifiable and organized, would make Wikipedia's search and category system unworkable, and make the database ridiculously large in size.

Second, the inclusion of any information, as long as it's verifiable and well organized, is a problem, because the vast majority of data that exists on most any topic is simply uninteresting. "George Washington had wooden teeth" (assuming it's true) is trivia, but may be interesting enough trivia to be contained in our article on George Washington. On the other hand, suppose an autopsy was done after Washington's death and the size and weight and appearance of all of his internal organs were noted. "Washington's spleen weighed 4 ounces and was 2 inches across and 1/2 an inch in width" is what I call Less-than-trivia; assuming it were true, it would still be completely and totally uninteresting and would have no place in our article on him.

And forking this content off onto an article called George Washington's spleen is no better. There are endless millions of articles which could be written on verifiable but utterly uninteresting topics, and allowing these articles takes us from being an encylopedia to being something else.

It's my belief that the only way to properly handle trivia is to require it to not only be verifiable, neutral and well-organized, but interesting as well. This rules out George Washington's spleen content, as well as "a painting of George Washington appeared in episode 2945 of the Simpsons, it could clearly be seen on the wall behind Homer for several seconds while he was drinking beer before he passed out". --Xyzzyplugh (talk) 09:15, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm, I don't think anyone is advocating the wholesale inclusion of mundane facts about every concieveable object under the sun. We simply exist to balance the scales, to provide the voice of reason that might otherwise be ignored because information is considered "trivial" by some. As anyone knows, triviality is a subjective abstract concept. I agree there are plenty of articles which probably don't belong here, and there is plenty of information within article that probably doesn't belong there either. All we're doing is working to fix these problems when we can, without going around and just removing and deleting everything, which is the easy way to fix it. Um, yeah. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 09:31, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
As a practical matter, you are right. But over time, I feel that Wikipedia will be able to delve into greater and greater levels of detail (through subarticles), to the point where it could easily contain 1000 times the amount of information it does today. Read the main article, then the subarticle, then the sub-subarticle, depending on how much detail you're interested in on a given subject. If there's verifiable information available about all the ins and outs of George Washington's anatomy, then, sure, we should have an article about it. Nothing specific would need to be said about his spleen unless it was unusual, however.
It's also conceivable we might some day have a series of articles on every single company that served in WWII (including a list of soldiers that served in that company). It'd be an exhaustive level of detail, to be sure... but an interesting and encyclopedic story could be told about every single one of them and their role in the war. I salivate over the prospect of our being able to achieve that level of detail some day. What an extraordinary source of information Wikipedia could be -- provided arbitrary hard limits are not unthinkingly imposed.
Some people find exhaustive detail about fictional subjects interesting. If it's, say, The Tick, I love it; if it's Everybody Loves Raymond, I don't. But we shouldn't democratize "interesting" (unfortunately, that's exactly what AfD tends to do); if we did, articles like clubsuit would get purged from the encyclopedia. As far as I'm concerned, if someone has added it to the encyclopedia, someone finds it interesting. On that basis, (many) thousands of people find the pop-cultural presence of all sorts of subjects interesting. So as long as we can make sure such information is verifiable, neutral, and well-organized... yes, I think the encyclopedia is better for having an article about it. I don't want obscure information to crowd out the most basic information, but given the overall organizational style of Wikipedia (short, discrete articles interlinking with dozens of other articles), there's no reason why the encyclopedia couldn't cover every crazy topic and subtopic in the universe as long as it can be covered with sufficient scholastic rigor.--Father Goose (talk) 10:32, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Hahaha, clubsuit!? After reading that excuse for a stub, I have no more idea of what a clubsuit is than I did five minutes ago. I find it hilarious that most people would find an article such as this "encyclopedic" however insignificant it may be. The problem is, its not popular. The more popular trivial articles are big targets because more people are seeing them. Ones like clubsuit are so trivial they completely fall under the radar. I also find it dubious that articles can be nominated for deletion over and over, to no end. Donkey punch has been nominated five times... shouldn't there be a point where we stop and say, ok this article stays? --ErgoSum88 (talk) 19:08, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
What's trivial about clubsuit, or did you mean something other than trivial? There's a definition and even an interesting result involving the controversial continuum hypothesis. To understand it, you'd have to understand the terms in the definition, but that's not the article's fault. I'm under the impression that anything to do with combinatorics is interesting (really, take a course on it if you can afford to). –Pomte 19:22, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
My point was, to most people, an article like clubsuit would be trivial. I'm not exactly uneducated, but Clubsuit was total greek to me... and I'm sure the majority of people have no interest or use for clubsuit. Does that mean it doesn't belong here? Some us like to pick on "pop culture trivia" as opposed to regular old "intellectual trivia." In my view, they are both just as bad. Just because there is some obscure mathematical theorem doesn't mean it belongs on wikipedia any more than say, Homer Simpson making fun of a mathematical theorem in Season 4 Episode 12. As they say, this isn't an indicriminate collection of information. Thats all I was sayin. If we can tolerate Clubsuit then I don't see why we can't tolerate Classical elements in popular culture. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 21:17, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
I think the only way what you're suggesting becomes workable is if we can truly have subarticles, that is, articles which exist only as a subset of the main article and which are basically invisible to the rest of the encylopedia. If we could have a George Washington's spleen or George Washington's autopsy results article, and it existed in some subspace beneath George Washington and wasn't linked to elsewhere or indexed by the search engine (or if subarticles were purposely listed at the end of search results), then it becomes harmless. "Articles" which consist merely of data which is interesting to almost no one could then exist in such a fashion.
However, if they're given the same weight as regular articles, then they clog up our disambiguation pages and categories and appear in the search engine results. Disambiguation pages cease to be functional if they're filled with dozens or hundreds of articles which virtually no one would ever care about. Categories become unusable if they contain an overly large number of articles no one cares about.
On the other hand, there would then still exist the problem of who is going to maintain all those articles. Since the beginning of Wikipedia, the number of articles, number of readers, and number of hardcore editors have all gone up at somewhat the same rate. This is no longer going to continue, though. Pretty much everyone who could be reading Wikipedia is already reading it, and it's doubtful that our number of experienced editors will continue to climb. So, at the moment, we have 5,000 experienced editors watching over 2 million articles, keeping them wikified and making sure they follow our various policies. This is workable. If we allow the creation of endless numbers of articles on uninteresting/non-notable topics, we eventually end up with 5,000 editors trying to watch over 200 million articles, and this is not workable. It may be that we must be limited in size simply due to the limit in the number of experienced editors we have. --Xyzzyplugh (talk) 19:57, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Why on earth should George Washington's autopsy be invisible if it's a legitimate (if obscure) article? Why should it not show up in search results? Why should it not be linked to from George Washington or at the very least, a subarticle on George Washington? If you're reading about any other subject (except maybe Autopsies of famous people), you'll remain unaware that the article exists. As for "clogging up" the search results -- Wikipedia's search engine is utter crap, so if it's clogged up, that's not because we have too many articles. Wikipedia's category implementation is even more primitive, but it will not remain so forever. And disambiguation pages can be sorted according to importance, or structured in the main/subarticle style as well. Our organizational system is still extremely primitive, at least in terms of software, yet it still functions despite the huge amount of information we already have.
All of this is like complaining about a library that has too many books. Maintenance is the most valid of the concerns you raise -- although with flagged revisions on the horizon, I think the unwatched-and-vandalized article phenomenon will become a non-issue in the near future. And I don't believe for a microsecond that our number of experienced editors will not continue to climb. 5,000? That's less than a millionth of the world's population, and about a hundred-thousandth of the world's English-speaking population. Wikipedia is still in diapers. It could very plausibly be two magnitudes larger in our lifetimes, in terms of total information, and be just as usable as it is now. In fact, with badly-needed software improvements, it could be far more usable than it is now. I see no forthcoming apocalypse of "too much information".--Father Goose (talk) 01:32, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
For what it's worth "trivia" and "popular culture" are consistent with hundreds if not thousands of published encyclopedias. See here and here. Thus, per our First pillar, "trivia" and "popular culture" are consistent with specialized encyclopedias. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 05:36, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
"...complaining about a library that has too many books..." Classic. My thoughts exactly. --ErgoSum88 (talk) 06:06, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Sources

Not sure what kind of Roman history related "in popular culture" articles we have, but I just noticed a great source: see here. Perhaps we should set up a section of the project that lists any books or articles that actually have "in popular culture" in the title so we know to refer to them when writing/revising articles? See also here. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 05:17, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Niice. I'll add that first one to the project page, where Claudius and Augustus are already listed as cleanup candidates (there's a Nero IPC article as well... and no doubt several more).--Father Goose (talk) 09:07, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
Another source to keep on hand is a lecture we had on campus to indicate yet again that "popular culture" is taken seriously by scholars: "The Center for the Study of Religion presents the first lecture in this year's series, Through A Glass, Darkly: Public Interest in the Occult: Christopher Partridge of Lancaster University, U.K., 'Occulture, Popular Culture and the Appeal of The DaVinci Code' on Thursday, September 27, 2007 at 4:30 pm in 090 Science and Engineering Library on The Ohio State University campus; refreshments will be served; all are welcome; Professor Partridge is the author of The Re-Enchantment of the West: Alternative Spiritualities, Sacralization, Popular Culture and Occulture, and the editor of The Encyclopedia of New Religions." Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 18:03, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
Also, if we have any kinds of articles on Native Americans in Popular Culture, we can use the following as a source: "Brad F. Raley, "Review of ‘Injuns!’: Native Americans in the Movies," The Historian 70.1 (Spring 2008): 100-101. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 23:06, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
On campus we frequently have academic talks that can be used to demonstrate the scholarly nature of some popular culture subjects. Please consider:
Jim, Genova will be giving a talk Friday for the French and Italian Department in Jennings Hall (060) from 3:00 to 4:30. The information below is from their website. May 02, 2008: From Mandabi to Bamako: Re-Thinking African Cinema in the Context of Third Cinema Jim Genova 3:00 pm - 4:30 pm, Jennings Hall Room 0060
The Lusophone Globalicities Working Group of The OSU Institute for Collaborative Research and Public Humanities in conjunction with the Departments of African American and African Studies, Spanish and Portuguese, and Theatre, the Centers for Folklore Studies and Latin American Studies, and the School of Music are pleased to present "From Revolution to Resistance: Aesthetics of Resistance in Brazilian Film/Media/Music Video from the 1960s to the Present" by Robert Stam Cinema Studies New York University 3:30 pm Friday, May 2 255 Hagerty Hall PLEASE NOTE: Following the lecture and discussion, Professor Stam will lead a 45-minute workshop/discussion "TRANSNATIONAL TRAFFIC: THE MULTICULTURAL DEBATES IN BRAZIL, FRANCE, AND THE US " related to his current book projects. Winner of Woodrow Wilson Fellowship; Regents Fellowship (University of California at Berkeley); NDEA Fellowship; NYU Presidential Fellowship for Junior Faculty; Rockefeller Fellowship; Fulbright Lectureship; and Guggenheim Fellowship. Author, Flagging Patriotism: Crises of Narcissism and Anti-Americanism (Routledge, 2006); Francois Truffaut and Friends: Modernism, Sexuality, and Film Adaptation (Rutgers, 2006); Literature through Film: Realism, Magic and the Art of Adaptation (Blackwell, 2005); Literature and Film: A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Adaptation (Blackwell, 2005); Companion to Literature and Film (Blackwell, 2004); Film Theory: An Introduction (Blackwell, 2000); Tropical Multiculturalism: A Comparative History of Race in Brazilian Cinema and Culture (Duke, 1997); Reflexivity in Film and Literature (UMI Press, 1985); Brazilian Cinema (Associated University Presses, 1982); O Espetáculo Interrompido (The Interrupted Spectacle) in Portuguese (Paze e Terra, 1981); Subversive Pleasures: Bakhtin, Cultural Criticism and Film(Johns Hopkins, 1989); New Vocabularies in Film Semiotics: Structuralism, Post-Structuralism and Beyond (Routledge); and Bakhtin (Attica). Coauthor (with Ella Shohat), Multiculturalism, Postcoloniality, and Transnational Media (Rutgers, 2000) and Unthinking Eurocentrism: Multiculturalism and the Media (Routledge, 1994). Coeditor (with Toby Miller), A Companion to Film Theory (Blackwell, 1999) and Film and Theory: An Anthology (Blackwell, 2000). Lectures and papers at Yale University; University of Wisconsin (Milwaukee); University of Iowa; University of California (Berkeley); and Syracuse University. Works translated into and published in: French, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Italian, Greek, Farsi, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, and Hebrew. Lusophone Globalicities: An Interdisciplinary Collaborative Research Project is a working group whose purpose is to enhance understanding of cultural texts and dynamics that have resulted from the centuries-long networks of exchange among and beyond Portuguese-speaking regions in Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas. It is interested in what this inquiry teaches about present-day cultural and political realities in the Lusophone world, as well as the role of Lusophone societies in the global milieu. Issues to be explored include domestic and transnational negotiations between high and low culture, and the impact of audiovisual culture (e.g., music, television, cinema) and diverse forms of expressive culture (e.g., folklore and folk life, religious and ritual traditions, festival practices) on contemporary national and global politics, economic systems, and discourses of identity. For more information, you can visit the groups page ( http://sppo.osu.edu/portuguese/lusoglobe/default .cfm),
Graduate Students--You are warmly invited to the following talk! From 3:30-5:00 pm on Friday, 2 May 2008 (Denney 311), Professor Journet will speak on "Literate Arts in Convergence Culture: LOST as Transmedia Narrative" This presentation will examine the television show LOST as an example of what Henry Jenkins (2006) calls "convergence culture": a phenomenon characterized not only by "media convergence" (flow of media over multiple platforms and the resulting migratory behavior of media audiences), but also "participatory culture" (interaction between consumers and producers) and "collective intelligence" (collaborative pooling of resources and skills). Convergence culture, Jenkins argues, creates new forms of "transmedia storytelling," in which the narrative experience is so large it flows over multiple media and so complex readers/consumers must work together in "knowledge communities" to understand its full detail and coherence. LOST is not only a television show but also a complex multimodal and multimedia "text" for those viewers willing to follow its story over multiple platforms: e.g., pod-casts, websites, 800-numbers, novels and games. These new "migratory" demands create literate challenges for participants that are both connected to and different from the ways we read and write about established narrative genres, such as novels. That is, responding to LOST requires much the same kind of interpretive work used with other types of imaginative literature: e.g., close reading, identifying intertextual references, debating authorial intention, and related critical activities. But it also calls upon new literate challenges: e.g., moving among multiple media, discerning how narrative is shaped by media and mode, retrieving and sharing information and analyses in virtual environments, and building interpretations collaboratively in communities of participants. LOST, as an early attempt to construct a transmedia story, points to the new sorts of narrative experiences we may expect to find in convergence culture. As both a text to be read and a prompt for viewer and reader response, LOST suggests the kinds of interactive, collaborative, and participatory literate practices that media convergence may promote.
Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 17:59, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

New Star Wars Encyclopedia On The Way?

Hey, a new source will be coming out that you may want to check out. See here. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 15:30, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

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