Template talk:Essays on building Wikipedia

Criteria for inclusion
I'd like to propose a criteria that each essay in this nav box should meet before being included:
 * At least 2 different authors editing the essay or...
 * some semblance of consensus on the article's talk page that it is worthy of addition to this navbox

This will avoid any issues with undue weight being implied by presense in this navbox of an essay that is the opinion of a single editor and not really shared by anyone else. Yes the essay tag warns readers of this but this is a widely used nav box on a number of very good essays so a little extra proceedure here is prudent I think. Thoughts?--RadioFan (talk) 17:51, 31 March 2010 (UTC)


 * For the record, the essay that prompted your decision to propose criteria for inclusion (which is wise, in my opinion) was co-authored by two editors (the two that responded first on the MfD) while it was still in my user space. ɳorɑfʈ  Talk! 18:04, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh, and one more thing: WP:UNDUE is about NPOV. I fail to see how it relates here. Can you take a quick look at the policy and tell me which part of it applies in this case? ɳorɑfʈ  Talk! 18:10, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * More from a 50k ft point of view. An essay with a single author reflects only a single point of view.--RadioFan (talk) 18:32, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
 * While I have no problem with criteria for inclusion in a template that is getting crowded, I think that your statement "An essay with a single author reflects only a single point of view," may make some people think that a single point of view is somehow a minority, or not consensus. If I write an essay tomorrow on why Wikipedia should always be free, it would reflect a single point of view, but it would be a single point of view shared by millions of people. A single point of view does not reflect a level of consensus, nor a level of no consensus, just because it is a single point of view. What you're essentially proposing is that an essay be "seconded" to go on the template, and I think that's a good idea. But rather than say "two people have to edit," why not just have people propose on this page, and then second on this page? Then intentions would be clear. Otherwise you'll have someone write an essay, then someone else will come along and fix the spelling and the author will be slapping it onto the template, because it has been edited by two people. ɳorɑfʈ  Talk! 18:57, 31 March 2010 (UTC)


 * interesting, must comment! Does inclusion in a template indicate that consensus supports the idea in the essay, or simply that an essay exists? Hmmmm.... probably yes and now all at the same time.  Other ideas?--Paul McDonald (talk) 18:46, 31 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I've started a new discussion on a criteria for inclusion below. -- &oelig; &trade; 02:31, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Submission
Hey gang! Please check out Quote your own essay as a potential essay to include on this template.--Paul McDonald (talk) 17:06, 14 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Gonna be bold and just add it.--Paul McDonald (talk) 23:59, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Template is getting too big
Instead of including every single possible essay on this list, we should strive to avoid unnecessary complexity and clutter so that readers are much more easily able to find worthwhile reading material, and not put off by the disarray of having too much to choose from. Furthermore, our readers should be directed to the most pertinent material first if they are to become quality editors in the future. Towards that end I propose that only the most important and widely read essays be included in this template. I think the best way (at first) of choosing which essays to include would be to use the essay's page-view or traffic statistics. For newly created essays that don't have wide enough exposure yet but are nevertheless important and of high-quality, these could possibly be grouped together in their own section within this template titled "New essays" or perhaps even their own separate template. Comments? -- &oelig; &trade; 02:31, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
 * You know there's already an essay ranking system over at WP:WikiProject Essays? Why not use that? Every essay is rank-ordered by a formula using pageview, number of watchers and incoming links. ɳorɑfʈ  Talk! 07:40, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Also, the other currently existing essay templates are listed at WikiProject Essays/Templates, which might help steer ideas. -- Quiddity (talk) 21:38, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Split?

 * Another option is to split the current template into separate templates, based on the topic of the essay. This was done with civility and notability essays, and should also be done with article building and deletion related essays.--SGCM (talk)  14:36, 12 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Mhm. We probably need to complete the split of notability essays, from this one into notessays (partially done, but much overlap/inconsistency remains) . (Done)
 * Alternatively, we could go the mergist route, and use Navbox with collapsible groups to create an all-in-one-place solution... See link below to discussion/example.
 * But we should also consider some sort of consistent meta-footer (to contain the "About essays" section, which most of these essay-navboxes have with varying content; and to contain links to "the other essay navboxes" so that they're cohesively grouped). -- Quiddity (talk) 23:04, 12 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I've started a thread at WT:WikiProject Essays, to discuss whether we want to disperse or aggregate. -- Quiddity (talk) 02:17, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

Ready to Merge and Replace this template
Continuing from the thread above...

Please see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Essays, regarding the new(ish) Template:Wikipedia essays, that we're planning to completely replace this template (Using a bot-run, and then redirects).

Last week I replaced all project-space instances (31 transclusions) of Humorous essays with, without feedback, so I'm hoping the other 3 will go just as smoothly. Let us know there, soonish, if you have any comments/concerns. Thanks. –Quiddity (talk) 05:56, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

propose to restore essay on sham consensus
I propose to restore the essay on a sham consensus. It links to several related essays that are not in the template and has the more encompassing scope. It mainly provides a definition to ease communication and finding it should be easy. I'll wait a week for any response. Nick Levinson (talk) 17:27, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Done. Nick Levinson (talk) 15:23, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

propose to restore essay on minors and persons judged incompetent
I propose to restore the essay on minors and persons judged incompetent. It is about being legally cautious with respect to people who have much less ability to protect their own legally recognized interests than other people have. It is useful for prudent editing and finding it should be easy. I'll wait a week for any response. Nick Levinson (talk) 17:36, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Done. Nick Levinson (talk) 15:26, 28 October 2013 (UTC)