User:Masem/Inclusion Guideline

Rationale
Per Wikipedia's mission statement, Wikipedia aims to a combination of general and specific encyclopedias and other references work, covering a broad range (but not fully or indiscriminately inclusive) of human knowledge. As such, we should seek to include any topics that, through consensus, are determined to be part of Wikipedia's broad scope.

At the same time, another of Wikipedia's goals is to become a reliable and verifiable reference source. Policies such as Verification, No original research, Neutral point-of-view, and What Wikipedia is not, aim to outline approaches to articles and topics that do not meet Wikipedia's mission.

There are times where meeting both the broad coverage and the verification goals for Wikipedia conflict, particularly in the area of references and sources. As such we need to consider two aspects for any topic: whether the topic should be included in Wikipedia, and to what level of detail that we can cover that topic. This inclusion guideline aims to describe the first aspect, while other core policies are left to describe the second.

Inclusion Criteria
A topic should be included in Wikipedia if it meets one of the two following standards:
 * 1) The topic meets the general notability guideline, stating that the topic has significant coverage in reliable secondary sources.
 * 2) The topic meets one of the field-specific inclusion sub-guidelines.

Topics that do not meet either criteria are not restricted from Wikipedia, but instead should be part of the coverage of a larger topic that does meet the inclusion guidelines. However, the depth of coverage of such topics should be limited as to not outweight the coverage of the main topic. Such topics should also meet all other Wikipedia policies.

Organization and presentation of included topics
Once a topic has meet either criteria above, it should be included in some manner in Wikipedia. However, the content of its coverage, including its depth of coverage, will be limited by the topic's ability to meet four key Wikipedia policies:
 * Verifiability - Is the topic backed by multiple independent third-party sources?
 * No original research - Can the discussion of the topic use only sourced analysis and synthesis provided from the above sources?
 * Neutral point-of-view - Can the topic be written in a manner to avoid editor bias and opinion being introduced into the work?
 * What Wikipedia is not - Does the topic avoid areas that Wikipedia does not strive to be, such as being a textbook or guidebook?

If a topic is able to meet all such policies, we generally allow for such topics to have their own article. Topics that meet the inclusion guidelines through the general notability guideline almost always meet all four policies, and thus will merit their own article. However, there are several topics which often fail one or more of these guidelines. Often topics deemed to be included by a inclusion sub-guideline will only have primary, first-party sources or limited coverage. We do not discourage the coverage of these topics in Wikipedia, but recognize that a complete article is inappropriate for such topics in order to maintain Wikipedia's mission. In this case, there are two major options that can be done:
 * Incorporate the topic into the body of an article of an appropriate larger topic that has merited an article.
 * Incorporate the topic into a list of table of similarly related topics that may or may not lack the ability for an article as support for a larger topic.

For example, the inclusion subguideline for athletes allows for the inclusion of any medal winner from the Olympics. However, the coverage for medal winner from small nations may not have any sources beyond his or her medal win to associate with the topic. In such a case, that person may be covered in one of several places: a section in the coverage of the country itself, as part of a list of notable people from that country, or as part of a list of Olympics winners.

Even if a topic merits an article, editors are encouraged to avoid creating a new article if the topic can be appropriately described as part of a larger topic.

If a topic appropriate for inclusion is covered in a different article, redirects and anchors are highly encouraged to help users find the appropriate coverage of these topics. This also allows for future expansion of a topic if it later can be shown to meet the required policies (such as by gaining coverage from reliable third-party sources).

Inclusion sub-guidelines
Inclusion sub-guidelines serve to define the broad coverage that Wikipedia seeks to be. Because of Wikipedia's numerous fields, singular inclusion guidelines cannot work for all fields, and thus these sub-guidelines are necessary to describe specific criteria for such fields.

However, care must be used to avoid creating walled gardens with such inclusion sub-guidelines. It is entirely possible for a few editors to come to broad inclusion terms for a small field, extending well past what is normally accepted for other fields. It is necessary that such inclusion sub-guidelines must be presented to the Wikipedia community at large to gain consensus prior to implementing them. These sub-guidelines should be written as broadly as possible to avoid creating too many criteria; instead of attempting to create a new sub-guideline, it is often better to attempt to find where additional criteria can be added to existing ones.

While inclusion sub-guidelines are aimed to define the appropriate coverage to meet Wikipedia's broadness, they also must be written to consider the likelihood of included topics for meeting Wikipedia's core policies. A criteria for inclusion does not have to provide topics that only meet the core policies, but a significant fraction of such topics should be able to merit their own article or have shown the likelihood to do so, based on editor experience in the past. Sub-guideline criteria should not lead to the inclusion of topics which, in general, are difficult to source or meet other Wikipedia policies and for the vast majority would not merit an article. For example, an inclusion sub-guideline on persons should not suggest that any living person should be included, as the majority of living persons have little information that can be sourced with analysis and third-parties, and nor is Wikipedia meant to be a directory of this nature.

Inclusion sub-guidelines should also avoid the inclusion of topics that cannot easily be covered in a larger topic or a list or table of similar topics when such topics fail to merit an article. Such include sub-guidelines should consider the type of lists of tables that may be created based on the given criteria to make sure that such lists also meet all of Wikipedia's core policies, particularly what Wikipedia is not. An inclusion guideline that allows for any tourist location in a major city, often where such locations gain minimal analysis from third-parties, may lead to the creation of an article that is a list of tourist attractions in the city, which violates the fact that Wikipedia is not a travel guide.