Forum:CT Archive/Citation for Real World FAs

I wrote this up back when I nominated Shadows of the Empire (soundtrack) for FA, but after much time, bickering, and gnashing of teeth, it finally squeezed through. But now, with another article, the same thing's happening, so for this and for OOU articles in the future, I propose the following amendment to the current rules and policy.

And just to get this out of the way first: Yes, we are not Wikipedia. Duh.

Now, this concerns all potential OOU (and even some IU) Featured Articles. The issue regards sourcing (or citing, or whatever you wish to call it). Aside from a few articles before the FA reform, Wookieepedia only has two real world FAs. Other than that, all of our current FAs are about fictional subjects, and our requirements seem to work rather well. However, when it comes to real subjects, our rules, when interpreted in a certain manner, seem to not fit very well at all.

The problem stems from a strict interpretation of the rules, which while usually appropriate for IU content, doesn't apply as well to OOU. Since most of our articles (and practically all FAs) are about fictional subjects and are written in an IU perspective, we don't name book or game titles in the main text. Therefore, this problem doesn't occur (except perhaps within a BTS section). Also, it generally goes that every bit of text in an FA is in fact sourced. But what about a real world article? Now, call me crazy, but I would say that an OOU FA here might have more in common with a Wikipedia FA than one of ours about a fictional character. Without a doubt, it should have to fit in with all of our FA requirements. But what works for fiction doesn't always work for non-fiction. So I propose that we tweak FA Rule 11 and expand WP:Sourcing to better fit real world articles.

This is the current Rule 11:

"…be completely referenced for all available material and sources. See Sourcing for more information."

I suggest we change it to this:

"…be referenced for all available material and sources where appropriate. See Sourcing for more information."

Then, we add this section to WP:Sourcing, borrowing some wording from Wikipedia:

All in-universe content from more than one source (aside from introductions) must be completely cited with inline references.

Out-of-universe content can be supported with references in two ways: the provision of general references—books or other sources that support a significant amount of the material in the article—and inline citations, that is, references within the text, which provide source information for specific statements. Inline citations are needed for statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, including contentious material about living persons, and for all quotations.

Hopefully, this would cover the extreme situations that have proven problematic and would allow for a little common sense instead of blindly following the rules just because "them's the rules." Frankly, most of our OOU coverage sucks, and we should be encouraging more FAs, not holding them back with rules meant to apply to fiction. -- Ozzel 19:26, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Support

 * 1) Ozzel 19:26, 30 November 2007 (UTC)