Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Inclusion criteria for Lists

Consensus Summary of RFC (proposed)
As compliled by User:Shooterwalker in collaboration with many RFC participants. The process of closing this RFC is being discussed at the talk page.

''Disclaimer: This RFC focuses on stand-alone lists. Other topics such as lists within articles and articles about real world lists came up, but did not receive the same attention or priority. Future RFCs may be designed to discuss these or other issues.''

Stand-alone list policy

 * Wikipedia policies and guidelines apply to stand alone lists.

Notability of stand-alone lists

 * Notability applies to stand-alone lists, but is just one guideline that affects inclusion.
 * WP:N states that the notability of an article's topic should be established through reference to reliable sources (that address the topic directly and in detail). For a stand-alone list, such notability should be established at the list article itself (in a lede paragraph). If a list is a legitimate sub-article (spun out from an existing article) the notability established at the parent article may sometimes carry over to the spun-out list (it is never wrong to re-establish notability at the list, but it is not always necessity).

Topic and scope of a stand-alone list

 * "List of..." is irrelevant. A stand-alone list by any other name is still a stand-alone list.
 * Notability should be established for the topic of a stand-alone list.
 * The topic of a stand-alone list is the group of things. For "list of foos", the topic is "foos" as a group / set / class of things.

Notability of items within a stand-alone list

 * The question of the topic's notability is distinct from the issue of whether the items listed must be notable or not. It is recognized that a list's topic may be deemed notable, even if it includes non-notable items (Example: "List of  episodes", where the notability of the TV show has been established). It is also recognized that a list's topic may be deemed non-notable, even if every item listed is individually notable ("List of US Presidents who have eaten eggs" for example.)

Categories and stand-alone lists

 * Not every category with multiple verifiable entries should have a stand-alone list article. Just because there is a category of articles that all meet policy, it does not mean that it is appropriate to organize them into some combination to create a stand-alone list.
 * Existence of a category is not relevant to deciding whether or not to create a stand-alone list. Some topics are suitable for either stand-alone lists or categories, let alone both or neither.

Articles and spin-out lists

 * Not every topic that is appropriate for an article is also appropriate for a stand-alone list. If foo represents a good article (or potentially good article), it does not mean that it is appropriate to create list of foos or list of examples of foos.
 * Editors should seek to include the stand-alone list contents within a larger article before creating a new stand-alone list article, as per WP:SPINOUT. This may require trimming of existing information in the main article or list to meet the article size limit. Creation of a new stand-alone list should only be considered after exhausting such options.

Next steps

 * 1) Close this RFC as yielding a consensus on these principles.
 * 2) Document these principles at appropriate guideline/policy pages.
 * 3) Refine or expand these principles over time.

RFC: Inclusion criteria of "List of X"
By what criteria do we judge the inclusion of list articles? M ASEM (t) 15:36, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

This has probably been a long-time coming issue but is reaching a head at WP:N (see WT:N and WT:N as background reading), thus this may be a highly contentious issue.

There are numerous articles that are generally are titled "List of X" (but may take several other forms) where X is some topic or combination of topics. There is an issue how to judge the inclusion standards for such lists. There's probably several other facets here but the two main sides are:
 * One side considers that such "List of X" articles can only be included when "List of X" is shown to be notable topic itself - that it, the list has been published completely elsewhere and has received coverage. Such would be true of lists that fall out of AFI 100 Years… series. Lists where "List of X" are not notable should thus be deleted, generally believed because they consist of original research since "List of X" is not a published topic and thus synthesis.
 * The other side considers that "List of X" articles do not fall under normal notability rules but some other metrics to judge inclusion. There are several possible results but they include concepts of whether "X" is a notable topic itself, and if the list is avoiding indiscriminate information to state. This gives a wider breadth of what type of list articles are kept, though still providing a metric for when they are not.  One such list that led to the current WP:N discussion was List of Masonic buildings, which is an example where this list would likely be kept by these other standards.

For example results of how lists have been dealt with in the past, I point to WikiProject Deletion sorting/Lists for several examples. I do note that the majority of lists are deleted, so its clear that we have applied some standard for these, but it is otherwise unwritten or unclear (otherwise we wouldn't be at this point). While one can make certain assumptions from these AFD, it can go several ways depending on how one favors the results, and thus we need to seek a strong consensus on the issue.

Thus, this RFC seeks to gain input on how to handle lists. I recommend those interested purpose policy/guideline-type language or approaches that would be included in one of several places, not limited to WP:N or WP:SAL, and to allow comments to support/oppose such. We will then get an uninvolved admin to decide the consensus, leading to its implementation. --M ASEM (t) 15:36, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Clarification
Clarification: The issue being discussed here is the inclusion of list articles in Wikipedia, not the inclusion of individual items within a list. Blueboar (talk) 16:23, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Clarification: For the purpose of this RFC is it extremely important that there is a clarity of terms. When refering the topic (or subject) of a list article, you are describing the general subject matter content contained in the list (i.e. What the list is about).  Topic does not mean the list article title.  If you are refering to the title of the article use the term List Title not topic.  These are distinct elements of an article and should not be confused in this discussion.--Mike Cline (talk) 21:38, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Mike... It may be helpful to give an example of how the list's Title is not the same as the list's Topic. I am not sure that everyone understands the difference (and I am not sure that my understanding of the difference matches your's) Blueboar (talk) 21:50, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Indeed. Article Titles and article topics (subjects) are distinct elements of an article. Good article titles convey the article subject concisely.  In fact, the Article Title may reflect the article subject with precision.  In other cases, especially with lists and the like the title may not be an exact replication of the article topic.  It is not hard to find an example.  List of birds.  The title is List of birds, the article topic is the Order level taxonomy of birds which has been compiled as a list and complies with our list naming conventions.  Another example chosen at random List of longest undammed rivers.  The topic is Longest Undammed Rivers, the title is List of ... I raise this point of clarification because it is extremely important as to whether notability standards are being applied to topics or titles.--Mike Cline (talk) 22:04, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the clarification... our understandings are essentially the same (I would have said the topics were "birds" and "undammed rivers", but we are effectively saying the same thing.)  Blueboar (talk) 22:15, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Your comments point to an important and I think critical element of this discussion. And that is the element of inclusion criteria which I believe is part and parcel of the Article topic. Lets take Undammed Rivers.  There may be 10,000s of these, but clearly there is some notability around the Longest.  A list article whose topic was the Shortest undammed rivers would probably not pass notability muster as any short undammed river would fit the bill.  There would literally no inclusion criteria other than the river was undammed (which most are).  The birds list is the same.  The list is not about all birds, it is about the identification of birds by order level taxonomy.  Very discriminate and notable.  In fact a much more precise title would be List of birds by taxonomic order.  --Mike Cline (talk) 22:41, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: User:Masem
List inclusion is guided by avoidance of indiscriminate information. This is, in part, related to notability. There are three likely means by which lists are kept: In general, our inclusion guidance for lists is based on how discriminating the information it contains. If it is far too broad or far too trivial, we generally delete such lists. Notability of the list, the topics, or the elements, help to assure the discriminate nature of these lists but is not an assurance that the list itself is appropriate for Wikipedia. Nor does failing to meet one of these three methods imply the list will be deleted, but it is a very rare case that such lists are kept. --M ASEM (t) 15:36, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) "List of X" is a notable topic in of itself (as the case with the AFI lists).
 * 2) "List of X" is not notable, but "X" is a notable topic itself.  Such lists still require discriminating inclusion requirements. While "people" are notable, "List of people" is far far too indiscriminate.
 * 3) "List of X" nor X is notable, but the elements of the list are individually so.  These form more of our navigational lists (List of people from New York City and the like).  Again, like the second case, there are means for such lists to be far too indiscriminate.

Support (Masem's proposal)

 * 1) -- Cycl o pia  talk  00:26, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Well put, and a reasonable part of a way forward in this area. Jclemens (talk) 23:09, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Correct statement of present policy, and a good way to continue.    DGG ( talk ) 02:11, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Masem's proposal)

 * 1) This is an example of circular reasoning: "Only a discriminate list would be notable. The fact that indiscriminate lists aren't notable is proof of this"'. What is lacking in this argument is verifable evidence of notability. If Masem is suggesting that lists should be exempt from WP:N, then he should say so explicity, rather than employ a logical fallacy to advance a bogus argument. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:15, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * That's only necessary if one presumes WP:N applies to any article in mainspace. WP:N is but one of our inclusion guidelines so there's no need to make exceptions for it. --M ASEM  (t) 17:22, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * So which one of our inclusion guidelines are lists exempt from? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:56, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * There are no exceptions required. This all follows from WP:LISTPURP. It's also well-established that we have not fully documented all inclusion guidelines for WP, so its highly presumptuous that we must make an exception for lists. WP:N is not the whole of our inclusion allowances. --M ASEM (t) 18:47, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:LISTPURP is a manual of style, not an inclusion guideline. So I will ask you again, which one of our inclusion guidelines are lists exempt from? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 19:17, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Masem... you state that "WP:N is but one of our inclusion guidelines"... true... but don't we have to comply with all the inclusion guidelines at the same time?... your comment indicates that you think it is OK to pick and choose between inclusion guidelines. Blueboar (talk) 20:08, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, inclusion guidelines are not a series of gates that have to be met, but instead only need one gate to be passed, because we have a large number of different types of articles, lists, disambig pages, summary style spinoff, etc. --M ASEM (t) 20:19, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * From my understanding of WP:N, the notability of the topic needs to be established in all of those article types... the differences are more in where and how this is done. Blueboar (talk) 21:32, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:N is only a guideline and not a requirement for inclusion of a topic on WP. It is by far one of the best ways to assure that consensus will keep your topic as an article, but it is not universally required - otherwise it would be policy. --M ASEM  (t) 21:50, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Yet WP:N states "Article topics must be notable, or 'worthy of notice'"... Even if it is "only a guideline", this seems very clear that this is not an option.  Blueboar (talk) 22:23, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Guidelines are still subject to common sense exceptions; but more importantly, here, lists are not the same as topical articles which WP:N applies to. --M ASEM (t) 22:38, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Of course, this also begs a question: "are lists considered as articles"? which may be something others can comment on. I know how certain contributors already think on this point, but it would help to clarify the relationship between lists and inclusion and notability. --M ASEM  (t) 23:06, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If you are inferring that list are exempt from WP:N because they are not articles, that is a category mistake. List articles are articles, and are defined as such in WP:LIST. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 07:34, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) (3) is just a bit too restrictive. There are valid spin-out list articles which would be excluded. The proposal is otherwise fine. --Cyber cobra  (talk) 00:29, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Can you give an example of what would be restricted? I note this is not meant to be fully inclusive of what list articles are kept because there are other reasons but I can't imagine what other types there would be. --M ASEM  (t) 00:41, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Unfortunately #3 is troublesome at the moment, as pointed out by Blueboar. I'd be happy to consider if it were reworded to include Masem's clarifications below. FWIW I don't really see the need for #1 anyway: this is really about "list articles" as a separate construction from "regular articles". If a real-world list is notable then it should be treated as an article-worthy subject in itself; it's not a "list article" as Wikipedia understands it. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:32, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Given that after time and comments I'll likely refine this set in a new proposal, what exactly did I clarify about #3 below that you be better with? --M ASEM (t) 13:03, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Don't think this really gets at the issue or represents practice. #1 is definitely a great place to start. But we often delete lists that support a notable article, or delete lists of verifiable entries in a category. I think Masem tries to address this by talking about "indiscriminate". But it's a loaded term. A lot of people understand what indiscriminate means, but a lot of people don't, and that's where the argument lies. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:14, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) I don't think this is helpful. It fails to get at what it is that makes a particular collection of otherwise notable elements (i.e., a list) notable. --Orlady (talk) 21:21, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) These criteria are extremely lax and self referential. We can't define notability based on notability, it needs to be based on evidence.  ALR (talk) 22:14, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) On number 1, the AFI lists should not be used as an example. They are a pretty unique exception in that AFI releases their lists into the public domain (as is acknowledged by them on many of the article talk pages). Most lists that would meet this criteria are subject to copyright and would be ineleigible for reproduction within an article. Such lists may be sufficiently notable to have an article written about them, but they should not be reproduced as stand alone lists as defined by MOS:LIST due to copyright. A better example under definition 1 would be The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time where we publish an excerpt from that copyrighted list, but not the list in its entirety, under Fair Use. The majority of cases where "List of X" is actually notable would be the latter rather than the former.  Jim Miller  See me 18:30, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Masem's proposal)
I have a real problem with #3... "List of US Presidents who have eaten eggs" will be populated entirely with notable items (US Presidents), the criteria for inclusion in the list is clear (must be US President and must have eaten eggs), the list is not indescriminant... but I doubt anyone would argue that this list would be worth keeping. I would contend that the reason for this is because the topic of "US Presidents who have eaten eggs" is not considered notable. Blueboar (talk) 16:37, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Lists can be overly discriminate too. That would be a trivial list. There is a double-ended range for the #3 condition between too broad and too tight, and probably an aspect of correlation without causation. --M ASEM  (t) 17:11, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Can you give me an example of a list that falls in the middle? I can not think of any example where a list should be kept purely because it is populated by notable items.  Can you?  Blueboar (talk) 17:21, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * List of people from New York City and its like. Note that we don't have the tighter List of people from Queens ( it redirects to a category), nor do we have the broader List of people from the United States. --M ASEM  (t) 17:27, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The thing is... I suspect the reason for this is that we can establish that the topic of "People from New York City" is a notable topic in its own right (there are books and other sources about "New Yorkers" as a group... and about being from New York as a concept), while the topic of "People from Queens" is not (are there books about Queens residents as a group or being from Queens as a concept). What is amusing is that I could probably establish notability for a List of people from Forest Hills... which is a section of Queens. Blueboar (talk) 19:54, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Wouldn't this preclude articles such as List of Stingray episodes, where the series is notable but the episodes are not? Because these are at present encouraged by WP:MOSTV as a better alternative to lots of very small articles or one stupidly big one on the series. Alzarian16 (talk) 17:20, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Is this directed at me or Masem? Blueboar (talk) 17:23, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry, should have been clearer. It was intended for Masem, but if you can answer it you're welcome to. Alzarian16 (talk) 17:25, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, as Stingray is a notable show, a list of its episodes would fall under number 2. This is not meant to limit such lists that are well established in this manner. --M ASEM  (t) 17:27, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Ah, OK. I thought number 2 meant that the list items (in this case the episodes) had to be notable in their own right. Alzarian16 (talk) 17:45, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Nah, that's #3 where the case that notable list elements support the inclusion of an other non-notable topic, but with the concerns Bluebore's mentioned above. --M ASEM (t) 18:48, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Looking at this again, I've just realised I said something completely different to what I meant to. What I was trying to say (I will get this right) was that I thought Stingray episodes had to be notable, as that was the topic of the list. Sorry! Alzarian16 (talk) 06:12, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Is there not an opportunity here for Wikipedia to implement its own 'like/vote up' system for community members to review pages and negate the 'notability' grey area. With a voting system it would take a minimum of X community votes to be classed as a notable page. Just a thought --Rupertb77 (talk) 08:57, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm afraid such a proposal is too easy to manipulate. Manipulation/ballot stuffing is one of the reasons discussions like WP:AFD are not determined by pure vote counting. Sjakkalle (Check!)  09:04, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: User:Sjakkalle
An article with the title "List of X" is very rarely about the list itself. It is therefore very rare that a list itself will be the subject of coverage in reliable sources. The topic of a "list of X" article is much closer to "X" than it is "list of X", as a rule "X" should be a notable topic. The title "list of ..." is simply an aid to tell readers that the bulk of the article is in list form. When determining whether or not a list should be included, one should keep the guidelines in WP:LIST in mind. Hence, a list should either serve an informational, navigational, or developmental purpose. In addition the criteria for inclusion on the list should be reasonably well-defined.

For some examples: Sjakkalle (Check!)  15:58, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * List of Oslo metro stations and List of London Underground stations are good lists because they present basic data in a clear, concise, and accessible form [Informational], and make it easy to access articles on the stations [navigational]. The criteria for inclusion on the list are well-defined, and the subway stations are notable topics.
 * "List of automobile model and marque oddities", deleted after this AFD was a poor list because "automobile and mark oddities" was not a well-defined, let alone notable, topic.

Support (Sjakkalle's proposal)

 * 1) Avoids being pedantically restrictive while still offering useful guidelines. --Cyber cobra  (talk) 00:20, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) -- Cycl o pia  talk  00:29, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Correct, although not in and of itself a sufficiently robust clarification. Jclemens (talk) 23:08, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Sjakkalle's proposal)

 * 1)  Which lists are useful, informational or well defined is a matter of opinion, and is not a valid inclusion criteria. Most books about notable topics contain lists of some sort, such as a table of contents, numbered or bulleted items, or a general index. However, the idea behind this proposal that one book = one list is too broad in terms of inclusion criteria. Lists without evidence of notablity provide little or no context to the reader and place undue weight on minutae that are incidental or trivial in comparison with a book's over-arching subject matter. What a list needs is evidence that it is notable in its own right in the form of commentary or analysis of its content or its defintion in order to provide context to the reader and integrate its content within the coverage of its over arching subject matter. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:49, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You are entitled to your opinion of course, but WP:UNDUE is part of the WP:NPOV policy. How did that get into this discussion? Sjakkalle (Check!)  09:13, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:UNDUE gets into the discussion because all our policies and guidelines interact with each other. WP:N relates to the note worthiness of an entire topic within Wikipedia... WP:UNDUE relates (in part) to the note worthiness of specific views and statements, (or in the case of a list, specific entries) within the context of the topic. Blueboar (talk) 14:48, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Disagree with your reasoning (my proposal below should indicate why), although I have to say that I agree that both the articles you listed as being encyclopedic are so.  These lists would have no problem being subjected to a notability test, as a glance through any tourbook would prove.  Them  From  Space  04:56, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) If WP:LIST were adequate to tell if a list were appropriate or now, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:34, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) I don't think this adequately guards against overly narrow lists, e.g., people born in Hamburg who play both violin and flute.  Something about the list itself must be noteworthy.  RJC  TalkContribs 14:12, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) Really vague because it rests on WP:LIST, which doesn't even give guidance on whether a list should be in an article or standing alone. Every article is informative in some way. Every article helps people navigate in some way. There has to be something more specific or else we are just going to argue about how informative the list is which is like arguing about how lovely the curtains are. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:20, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 5) The proposal seems sensible, but (1) serving an informational, navigational, or developmental purpose and (2) having reasonably well-defined inclusion criteria are not a sufficient basis for determining that a list is appropriate for inclusion. --Orlady (talk) 21:25, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 6) Oppose, mostly because I think an RfC should be feeding into potential changes to guidelines and policy, not referencing them as a starting position.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 07:02, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: User:Blueboar
WP:N needs to clarify how it should be applied to list articles. WP:N states that the notability of an article's topic should be established through reference to reliable sources. In an article entitled "List of foo", the topic of the list article is "foo". Thus, the notability of "foo" should be established through reference to reliable sources. For a stand-alone list, such notability should be established at the list article itself (in a lede paragraph). If a list is a legitimate sub-article (spun out from an existing article) the notability established at the parent article may sometimes carry over to the spun-out list (it is never wrong to re-establish notability at the list, but it is not always necessity).

The question of the topic's notability is distinct from the issue of whether the items listed must be notable or not. It is recognized that a list's topic may be deemed notable, even if it includes non-notable items (Example: "List of  episodes", where the notability of the TV show has been established). It is also recognized that a list's topic may be deemed non-notable, even if every item listed is individually notable ("List of US Presidents who have eaten eggs" for example.)

Support (Blueboar's proposal)

 * 1) Avoids being pedantically restrictive while still offering useful guidelines. --Cyber cobra  (talk) 00:19, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Pretty good. The distinction between the list article's title and topic is especially pertinent. Sjakkalle (Check!)  06:17, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Support, so long as by "spun out" lists we are referring the material that could in principle be part of the original article but considerations of readability and file size suggest leaving out.  Full "biographies" of every fictional character on a television show shouldn't be allowed to masquerade as lists, but List of birds should be able to piggy-back on the notability of birds without having to establish that there is anything special about a list of birds.  I also like that the wording relies upon common sense rather than attempting to define an unproblematic bright-line rule.  RJC  TalkContribs 14:26, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Exactly... the topic of List of birds is "birds" ... and the establishment of the notability of "birds" at the article on Birds is transferable (as opposed to inherited) to the list. I would even say that the topic of List of South American birds is "birds" (the sub-division of zoological topics by continent being both reasonable and normal), although you could probably establish that "South American birds" is a notable topic in and of itself. That said... The topic of List of birds seen in Star Trek is more than just "birds".  It is not logical or normal to subdivide the topic of birds by TV show appearance, so doing so results in a new topic.  And the notability of that topic would have to be established on its own. Blueboar (talk) 15:49, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) I think I can agree with that. "List of X" is essentially equivalent to an article entitled "X" that contains a list of all X, so in both cases the requirement is the same: X has to be notable.  Sandstein   17:06, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Support --Polaron | Talk 17:18, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Sounds reasonable. Davewild (talk) 18:28, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) Support, an list of X is merely a different format of an article about x. If there are multiple notable x's, a list will usually be appropriate and desirable.    DGG ( talk ) 02:24, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 5) Support as a starting point, in the interest of building a consensus. Wish more people were trying to build a consensus instead of trying to get their way. Let's spin this out as a guideline and hammer out any specific tweaks using WP:BRD. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:31, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 6) Support - and point out that even if notability for X is automatically applied to "spun out" 'list of instances of X' (which I think it should) OTHER policy, particularly WP:NOT which overrides WP:N would be properly deployed to prevent/delete 'pointless' lists (just as it presumably prevents other articles which might squeeze through a technical reading of WP:N)
 * 7) Support, Thanks for writing this.  I think it is time we had this discussion.  The thoughtful among us (i.e. us policy wonks) have probably mostly come to similar conclusions as Blueboar, but when it comes to someone's pet list coming up at AfD, the lack of written instruction in this area often gives lists a full pass on questions WP:N, no matter how obscure or unnotable the topic. Gigs (talk) 16:47, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Blueboar's proposal)

 * 1) The idea that "notability established at the parent article may sometimes carry over to the spun-out" has been dissected, discredited, & debunked by WP:NOTINHERITED, so I think this approach runs against general consensus. Personally, I don't see how it could work, since it can be argued that notability carries over to just about everything eventually - see Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:12, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * that's not what "not inherited" means--it means the notability of a particular subject does not necessarily carry over to everything related to it (children, etc. of BLP subjects are the usual examples, hence the guideline name). A list of notable things would be more, not less important than an individual one of them.   DGG ( talk ) 03:27, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Unfortunately the "spin-out" part causes major headaches right now, primarily (indeed almost exclusively) when dealing with fictional content. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:36, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Let me clarify... as I see it, in a legitimately "spun-out" sub-article, the topic of the sub-article is considered the same as the topic of the main article it was spun out of. ie... notability isn't being inherited between topics... the two articles have the same topic.  Whether the topic of a specific list is the same as the topic of the main article depends on the specific article and list.  That would be an issue to consider on the talk page (or at AfD) if there were disputes.   Blueboar (talk) 14:24, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Refactoring !vote for the sake of consensus. See above. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:31, 31 August 2010 (UTC) Sounds like you're saying that any good article foo can be turned into list of foos or list of examples of foo. Maybe that's not your intention but that's the outcome if we follow your proposal. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:22, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think it is more the other way around... Any good List of foos can be turned into an article on Foos. Now, if Foo already exists, then the notability of Foo has (presumably} been established, and there is no need to re-establish notability at the list article. Blueboar (talk) 16:01, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Right. If you establish foo is appropriate, then list of foos is inherently appropriate. I don't think that's always the case, because I don't think every article should have a supporting list. Shooterwalker (talk) 16:07, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, you are confusing the topic with the title. Some topics lend themselves to being presented in list format, others do not... But the topic of every list article could be presented in text format.   Essentially what I am saying is that every List of foo is an article (or sub-article) on the topic of "Foo"... it is simply an article that is being presented in list format instead of text format.  Blueboar (talk) 16:15, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm reading it again and trying to understand it. "...the notability established at the parent article may sometimes carry over to the spun-out list..." I'd actually agree with that sentiment. The key word is sometimes. I'm looking for more clarity because "sometimes" will likely lead us back to old debates. (Situations where people argue about whether this is one of those "sometimes" where article "foo" does/does not support "list of foos", or situations where there is no "foo" article but people still think there should be a "list of foos".)Shooterwalker (talk) 01:25, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You are essentially pointing out that my proposal does not resolve every notability debate, and that is true. It was not intended to do so.  We are probably always going to have debates over whether spin-off articles travel too far from the parent's topic to be considered the same topic... thankfully we have AfD to answer this.  Essentially, my proposal is to clarify that list articles are a form of article... one in listified format as opposed to sentence/paragraph format.  We allow for the fact that some articles need to be divided up into smaller sub-articles (if, for example, the parent is overly long)... sometimes, the division is done in a way that the topic of sub-article remains the same as the parent (and there seems to be consensus that when this is true, the notability of the parent can be transferred to the sub-article) and sometimes the division is done is a way that changes the topic (and when that happens, there is consensus that we must establish that the changed topic is notable).  And yes, sometimes we end up with a debate (that's why we have AfD).  What I am trying to do with my proposal is say that articles written in list format should be treated the same way as articles written in sentence/paragraph format... they should be treated as articles. Blueboar (talk) 03:24, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that thoughtful explanation. It's not ideal but I admit it's better than what we have now. I might reconsider my position as the RFC comes to a close. In fact, if I lose track of time, drop me a message on my talk page. Any idea when this RFC is wrapping up? Shooterwalker (talk) 22:59, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) The proper way for determining the notability of stand-alone lists is assertaining whether the list itself is notable, not the topic of the list. Also per Shooterwalker above.  Them  From  Space  02:35, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No... as WP:LIST states: Lists are articles. WP:N says we must establish that the topic of an article is notable... The topic of an article can not be the article itself. Blueboar (talk) 03:24, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Article topics and article titles are one and the same. In "list of X" articles the list is the topic. If we wanted to write an article about the broader topic X we could write one entitled X. These would would be two completely different articles with two completely different subjects. The article on X will explain how X has made a significant impact in the world and the article on the list of X will explain why the list of X has made a significant impact in the world.  Them From  Space  05:24, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree ... put this into reality and you will see what I mean... in what way has the list of birds made a significant impact on the world? No, in List of birds the topic of the article is "birds" not the list itself. Blueboar (talk) 12:45, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I strongly concur with Blueboar on this. There is a simple test here. If we renamed List of Birds to Birds (and Bird existed as an article about the animal class as it does today) what would change.  Would the content of List of Birds and Birds be any different.  Absolutely not!--Mike Cline (talk) 13:29, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Blueboar and Mike are wrong on this issue. A list topic defines which items are in the list - it is the definition that is the topic. Mike's example is too trite to be taken seriously: List of birds (which is really a "List of living orders and families of birds") is not the same as Birds (which is about living and long dead species of bird). For example Prehistoric birds are various taxa of birds that became extinct before recorded history, or more precisely, before they could be studied alive by bird scientists. These are distinct topics, in the same way that List of birds is different from Lists of birds by region, even though they share the same subject matter and they (should) exactly same elements (presumably that would be....Birds). Blueboar and Mike Cline are both making the same fundamental category mistake based on circular reasoning, but hopefully they are intelligent enough to retract their statements. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:06, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No... we are both too intelligent to do something that sophomoric. Blueboar (talk) 00:50, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * One cannot help but think of John Irving’s novel The World According to Garp, except that in Gavin’s case, it’s the world according to Gavin. Anyone who disagrees with Gavin’s position on anything is obviously not intelligent--a property of the mind including related abilities, such as the capacities for abstract thought, understanding, communication, reasoning, learning, learning from past experiences, planning, and problem solving. Since, as far as I can tell, the lack of intelligence is Stupidity, I am a bit offended as I don’t consider myself stupid. (although I have made some really dumb decisions in 62 years of life on this planet).  Is Gavin saying that Blueboar and I are too stupid to participate in this discussion?  It is an interesting question as when I remember creating my account for WP, there wasn’t an Are you stupid, if so, don’t apply question during the process.  Maybe there should be if we believe in The World According to Gavin--Mike Cline (talk) 01:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I see that you are doubters, so maybe if I explain the flaw in your logic. In what way has the list of birds made a significant impact on the world? If a reliable source has commented on it, or published the list, then that is significant impact in accordance with WP:N. Are "birds" the topic of the List of birds? No, the topic is made up of those birds which fit the definition of the list. A list is a type of set, i.e. a list is a is a collection of distinct objects, considered as an object (or topic) in its own right. Blueboar's argument to the contrary is based on circular reasoning: "The list is about birds. The fact that the list contains nothing but birds is proof of this."  In the "Twilight Zone" of sophistry, circular reasoning can go unchallenged. In the "World according to Rules of Logic", circular reasoning is understood to be a logical fallacy. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 07:08, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Blueboar's proposal)

 * Question: How would this version effect lists like List of people of the Three Kingdoms or List of Scientologists? My feeling is that it would indicate that such Lists are non-notable, because, while Three Kingdoms and Scientology are notable, people associated with a period or religion is not a notable topic.  Additionally, how does it effect Pokémon episodes removed from rotation?  While I accept that, as subparts of a whole, episode lists are themselves acceptable lists, I believe that applying arbitrary criteria to a notable list can easily result in a non-notable one, like here.  If this proposal is intended to render all such lists deletable as non-notable, then I support this proposal.  Qwyrxian (talk) 02:25, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I would have to answer with the unsatisfying: "it depends"... the answer depends on whether these lists are viewed as legitimately spun-out sub-articles or are viewed as Stand-Alone lists. If they are seen as sub-articles (ie if we can legitimately say that the topic of the list is the same as the topic of the article) then notability is established at the main article and carries over to the sub-article (it isn't a case of inherited notability... as we are saying that the topic is the same in both the article and the list).  If we consider them stand-alone lists then notability would need to be established at the list article itself.  I don't know enough about the topics of Three Kingdoms or Pokemon to know whether they qualify as sub-articles or stand-alone articles (and if the latter, whether we could establish notability as a stand-alone topic).  I know do enough about Scientology and Scientologists to say that we could probably establish reliability even if it was considered a Stand-alone list. Blueboar (talk) 14:19, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Question: Would you be willing to reconsider your statement that "notability established at the parent article may sometimes carry over to the spun-out", as this seems to run contrary to the consensus view that notability is not inherited between article topics? If not, can you explain why you think notability is inherited in this way? I know its a pain to have to cite sources that demonsrate notability for a list topoic, but I am hoping you will agree it is necessary in order to demonstrate that a list is not primarary (original) research that has been made up because it was thought to be a good idea at the time. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:01, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "notability established at the parent article may sometimes carry over to the spun-out" must be true if we are enforcing WP:SIZE at at the policy level and accept that WP:N does not limit coverage of a topic. Otherwise, either WP:SIZE is wrong and we have to change that, or WP:N is wrong and we have to change that.  I don't see either case happening. --M ASEM  (t) 12:41, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * And we need to be absolutely careful on misapplication of "notability is not inherited". Not inherited means that that if a man is notable, his wife is not immediately so. It does not mean that a list that is part of a topic is trying to be notable because the topic is notable; it is part of that coverage, just as I would expect that, if known, the name of the notable person's wife would be fully acceptable within coverage of the topic of that man.  --M ASEM  (t) 12:44, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think you are reading too much into WP:SIZE by ignoring WP:AVOIDSPLIT and WP:WITHIN. Whether notability is inherited by a list from a related article is the question Blueboar needs to work out for himself. If he believes it does, I hope he can explain why a wife does not inherit notability from her husband, whereas a standalone list of their children does. Needless to say, I think notability can't be inherited at all, and that is the consensus view at this time. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:54, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, it doesn't work that way. You are arguing a case where if I were to have a notable topic with 200k of information - working on the assumption all that information is appropriate and relevant and necessary to include, but otherwise difficult to show notability of the subtopics - to work into this idea of "not inherited" and spinouts and all that.  Notability cannot be used to limit the coverage of a topic, and the only barrier to keeping all that information in one article is SIZE.  We have to accept that spinouts - very commonly lists - are going to have to be made for notable topics, and thus realize notability does not apply to the list itself, in order to work practically. Otherwise, you are basically saying:  you can include only so much information on a topic, which makes no sense in a paperless work.  --M ASEM  (t) 14:23, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I definitely don't believe notability is inherited... However, I do believe that when an article is split because of WP:SIZE, notability can be transferred. I say "can be" rather than "is"... because a lot depends on how you split the original article.  Let us start with a notable topic... X.  I assume that the notability of the topic (x) is established in that article.  Now, let us assume that the article would be overly long if we included a list of Xs... so we split off a sub-article: List of Xs. The article and the list share the same topic (x). I see no reason why we need to re-establish that the topic (x) is notable (there is nothing wrong with doing so, but I don't think it should be required).  Now, List of Xs may itself be overly long... if so, we split that up as well... into several sub-lists organized in a standard and non-controversial fashion (what that is depends on the topic area... alphabetical order... historical era... zoological classification... etc.).  Again, we have not changed the topic, so no need to re-establish that the topic (x) is notable.  However, we must be careful... If we split List of Xs up in ways that are non-standard, we can actually end up creating a different topic... one that is related to x but is not the same as x.  That's where WP:NOT comes in... When this occurs, we must establish that the new, related topic is notable, because notability is not inherited between topics. Blueboar (talk) 15:06, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The problem is what is standard or non-standard is a purely a matter of opinion, whereas notability is a presumption based on verifiable evidence. Going back a bit, if you believe that notability is not inherited, then I don't see how it can be "transfered" either, because inheritence is merely the mechanism by which notability is deemed to have been "transfered" or "passed" from one topic to another without verifiable evidence.
 * Then you go on to say that notability does not need to be re-established, which is another way of saying that list does not have to be noted in order to be notable. I perceive a lot of conflict in your views, and I wonder if you could comment on that as well. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:21, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that "standard" vs. "non-standard" is sometimes difficult to define. But I think some ways of breaking an article up are clearly acceptable and non-controversial.  To me, the difference between transferred notability and inherited notability is whether the split results in a change of topic.  If you split one article (or list) into two articles with the exact same topic as the original, then the notability of the original (before the split) transfers to the two new articles.  If the split results in two articles with related topics that are not exactly the same, then one of them (if not both) is trying to inherit notability from the original... which is improper.
 * Does splitting a list up by alphabetical breakdown (with A-M in one article and N-Z in another) change the topic? I don't think it does. However breaking the same list up in some other way very well might change the topic. In which case we need to establish that the new topic is notable. The key is whether the topic changed. Blueboar (talk) 16:42, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Let's take a specific example. Does List of Wilts & Dorset bus routes need to show notability following its split from Wilts & Dorset? This came about following a talk page discussion in which we got a consensus to split under WP:SIZE. Alzarian16 (talk) 16:52, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * My view is the whole list is primary (original) research, but maybe Blueboar can explain why this list topic came about, and how it should be split into yet more unverifiable topics, provided of course that they are "acceptable". My theory is a that it is "proper" topic because there is always spare notability available for "transfer" from Kevin Bacon. I think this one is clearly a "Twilight Zone" topic. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 20:49, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Well using my concept of "did the topic change" as a guide... I would agree with you. Wilts & Dorset is an article about a bus company... while List of Wilts & Dorset bus routes is an article about bus routes. They are definitely related topics but they are not identical.  Thus, I would say that the notability established at the article on the company does not transfer to the list of bus routes.  It would be a case of inherited notability (and Notability is not inherited). Blueboar (talk) 21:15, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think what is missing is a lack of notability, not a lack of "transferability". I think if you can call a spade a spade, then what you mean by "transferability" is actually whether a topic is more or less likely to be notable in the long run. My opinion is that the only rationale for inclusion of a list in Wikipedia is whether or not it is notable at this time, but I think your view is similar, except with a longer time frame. This is not an unreasonable view, and the one taken my most participants in AFD debates: it is very unlikely that a topic will be deleted if the participants think a list will be notable in the future. I guess that is why the contributors to List of Masonic buildings continue to work on the list despite the fact it is not a verifiable topic; like like Wilkins Micawber, they are in perpetual hope that "something will turn up". Is this what you mean by "transferability", i.e that sources are likely to turn up if the list topic is credible? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 23:17, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * In answer to the OR point, all the current routes can be sourced to the company's site, and all the former routes can be cited to Buses Magazine which invariably comments on the withdrawal of routes, so verifiability shouldn't be an issue. In answer to why it was created, it's because the page Wilts & Dorset used to look like this. Alzarian16 (talk) 09:50, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: Gavin Collins
List articles are not exempt in any way, and should be treated the same as all mainspace content. The knock out proof that lists should not be exempted content policy or from the notability guideline can be clealry understood from looking at List of characters in Heroes; it is clear that lists have the potential to become standalone articles in everything but name.

If a list article of this size (33,000+ words) can be created, then clearly it should not be treated differently from the rest of Wikipedia. Like other mainspace content, this list should demonstrate that is notable and complies with content policy. If lists are treated as a "special case", then be allowable to create lists that comprise only of unsourced content, original research and coverage that gives undue weight to incidental, trivial or excessive detail. List topics are essentially directories of organised infomation, and to demonstrate they are compatible with Wikipedia's content policies, evidence of notability is required.

The proposal re the Notability of list articles is a new section should be added to WP:N is as follows:


 * "The potential for creating lists is infinite. The number of possible lists is limited only by our collective imagination. Wikipedia is more than just an organised list or directory of everything that exists or has existed. Lists, whether they are embedded lists or stand-alone list articles, are encyclopedic content that should provide the reader with enough context to understand their subject matter.


 * In order to provide context, a list topic has to have been noted by reliable source. Context may come in the form of list defintion, or commentary about the list itself. Inclusion of material on a list should be based on what reliable sources have to say about it, not on what an editor belives the list should be about."

I hope you will support this proposal in outline at least, or else we are doomed to see Wikipedia filled with Wookipedia type lists be that are exempted from its existing policies and guidelines. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 19:14, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Questions (Gavin Collins's proposal)
Gavin. Please clarify. When you say list topic above are you refering to the literal List Title or the topic of the list as noted in the clarification at the top of the RFC. It is an important distinction that we understand exactly which article element you are referring to.--Mike Cline (talk) 22:47, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * From my knowledge of the take of Gavin in list AfD's, I think the point is that he refuses such a distinction. -- Cycl o pia talk  00:27, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * When I refer to a list topic, I am referring the unique set of inclusion criteria that define its subject matter (i.e. the scope of the list) in accordance with WP:LISTS. If there is a definition provided in the leading paragraph, then the list topic has been defined explicitly. In the absence of an explicit definition, the list topic is more uncertain, but common sense suggests it is possible to infer that the list title might be synonymous with the subject matter of the list. However, that may not hold true in all cases, e.g. List of people from the Isle of Wight is not a list of every person from the island as the title infers, only those listed in Wikipedia. I hope that clarifies this point. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:55, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Support (Gavin Collins's proposal)

 * Support makes sense.  Them From  Space  04:23, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Absolutely. Gradually the distinction between lists and articles has been blurred (for instance, featured lists are now required to provide a reasonable degree of context), and there's more of a pushback against indiscriminate inclusion of fictional content (by far the biggest problem with lists right now) than ever. Allowing lists to short-circuit the GNG causes more trouble than it's worth. A simple rule such as "would this article be notable if you chopped List of off the title" would probably be a good idea. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:23, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Chris, you've actually hit upon an idea I have been thinking about for a while, which is this (I may actually add it to my proposal when before I finish it). If you think of Prose and List(ing) as complimentary writing styles, each best suited to the presentation of different types of content.  Other than purely navigational lists, we could stop thinking about lists as a class of article all together. Our naming convention would not demand that an article on the Bird orders present in Zanzibar be entitled List of bird orders in Zanzibar. Most of the article would be in the List style because of nature of the content, but that is a readabiliy, editorial decision, not an inclusion one. If indeed the article subject: Bird orders present in Zanzibar was notable, then the fact that the article was written in List style is irrelevant. A great many of our current lists could easily have List of removed from their titles and this whole idea that "List of.."" must be part of the notability issue would go away.  Thanks for thinking like this.--Mike Cline (talk) 15:16, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Mike, interesting you mention this, several years ago when I was very active in the WikiProject Agriculture, we discussed removing "list of" from the names of all the breeds of livestock. We couldn't get any outside discussion though, even after posting on the guideline pages several times and had only a few people on the project involved so we deferred making the radical change (In other words, it was obvious I was going to have to do and it I never got the time).  We always thought though that Breeds of cattle or maybe even Cattle breeds would be far superior to List of breeds of cattle.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 23:49, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure about this one. I think it's a good starting point. But I feel like it might be too stringent or too loose. If no one else can come up with anything then we might want to start here and improve it using the WP:BRD process (assuming Gavin would give up WP:OWNership). Shooterwalker (talk) 15:28, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support. Makes absolute sense. We need a "strong" notability guideline to ensure that WP contains good quality lists, and yes, to weed out those lists that have OR, SYNTH, UNDUE or OVERCAT problems. I also support ThemFromSpace's proposal below. Zunaid 17:52, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I find this makes sense, list articles should be expected to apply the same degree of rigour as any other article. ALR (talk) 22:13, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support. There are far too many lists that escape the notability guideline by compiling a vast amount of NN information relating back to an article that does comply with the guideline. We need to consider these articles on their own merits. — Chromancertalk/cont 23:47, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support. This makes sense to me - a list is a type of article, and it should follow the same inclusion criteria that other articles do.  If the list itself has been the subject of significant reliable independent coverage, then let's have an article on it; if other sources aren't interested in classifying the information in this way, then we shouldn't do so. Karanacs (talk) 19:39, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Gavin Collins's proposal)

 * 1) Much too stringent & restrictive. --Cyber cobra (talk) 00:27, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Totally misses the point of lists, which are navigational aids and a tool to structure information, not topics. -- Cycl o pia talk  00:28, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think you are mixing list articles (which are mainspace content) up with categories (which are navigational aids and a tool to structure information). --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:24, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Historically, there has been consensus that lists and categories are not mutually exclusive. I think it's fair to point out that the status quo is that lists are a separate kind of page from articles and that they do aid in navigation, as Cyclopia says. Your proposal would remove that distinction. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:26, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Q.E.D., Gavin, you miss the point of lists. Lists are mostly navigational aids and/or a tool to structure information, sometimes used also to put together things that are notable and related as a whole but not as single items. That they belong in main namespace doesn't change this fact. -- Cycl o pia talk  16:22, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * That this is the status quo is not being challenged to my knowledge. What is being proposed is that this distinction be abolished. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 16:05, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) or else we are doomed... sounds like scaremongering. Proposal needs to distinguish between the list article's title and topic. Sjakkalle (Check!)  07:26, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Striking for the time being, the clarification time stamped at 06:55, 20 August 2010 is an improvement. Sjakkalle (Check!)  07:49, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Unstriking. "List topic" would be fine if it were explicitly referred to the list's topic, rather than the list as a topic. Given Gavin's commentary below, I am afraid he means the latter. That puts an enormous number of useful navigational lists, even featured lists, in jeopardy. Sjakkalle (Check!)  06:33, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) List of characters in Heroes is certainly something to be avoided, but I think it is best dealt with by imposing the content guidelines regarding lists.  Saying "List of X" must itself be notable, not just "X" seems to be too big a hammer for too small a nail.  I don't think it is good to treat lists like normal articles (they are navigation aids, like categories and templates, WP:CLS, but I agree that where a topic entitled "List of X" begins to look like a normal article that it should be treated like one rather than like a list.  RJC  TalkContribs 14:18, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) On two counts.  1) this proposal as worded: In order to provide context, a list topic has to have been noted by reliable source. Context may come in the form of list defintion, or commentary about the list itself. Inclusion of material on a list should be based on what reliable sources have to say about it, not on what an editor belives the list should be about. still puts the burden on reliable sources having commented on List of Foo.  Although there is a distinction between topic and title acknowledged by proposer, the use of List topic in the proposal is misleading, as the proposal and proposer really mean List title.  Even if the topic of Foo was eminently notable, if in fact that no one has ever written about a List of Foo, this wording would beg against inclusion.  2) This proposal, as well as many of the comments by the proposer in the RFC refer to the terminology List definition.  This is a completely made up term and as far as I can tell has not been part of WP guidelines in the past.  Why introduce it now?  Standalone lists have one unique element that normal articles don’t—inclusion criteria.  The description of list content as laid out by editors in the lead which includes verifiable inclusion criteria establishes the List Topic (subject) which should be notable.  The last line of the proposal above: not on what an editor belives the list should be about is the key to the real motivation about this list definition terminology.  If any editor desired to compile a list of otherwise notable entries together in a List of Notable Subject but no one had ever actually put that kind of list together before, this proposal would not allow it.  If adopted it would allow elimination of 90% or more of our current family of lists.--Mike Cline (talk) 14:43, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You are mistaken, that is not what I am saying at all. The list title is not the same as the list topic, in the same way that Mike (the name) is seperate from Mike (the person). However, in the absence of an explicit definition of the list topic, we can infer the topic of a list is the same as, or synonymous to, the list title. A good analogy to this is we infer that Mike (the name) is the same as, or synonymous to Mike (the person). I think your opposition to this proposal is fatally flawed. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 09:04, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) I don't understand this proposal. Most seem to agree that notability must be a part of the list inclusion criteria, but this proposal does not make clear what exactly has to be notable about a "list of X".  Sandstein   17:09, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) There are many valid lists that will be stricken by this. A list-type article is a goodway to consolidate several minor topics that have no individual notability but have notability as a complete set. --Polaron | Talk 17:21, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Too restrictive. Davewild (talk) 18:30, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) Far too narrow and restrictive. Jclemens (talk) 22:47, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 5) Agree with Mike here. Alzarian16 (talk) 05:35, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 6) Completely ignores the utility of lists as navigational aids and complements to the category system.  (Not surprising, I suppose, since Gavin seems to hate lists and would presumably like to ban as many as possible.  He actually once argued that if a source names a series of chemicals in prose, that it's a NOR violation to name exactly the same chemicals, in the same order, but formatted as a legible bulleted list instead of presenting the names in complete sentences.)  WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:23, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If a list is truely useful, then it will be notable for that reason. If a source names a series of chemicals in prose, but does not publish them as a list, then it was not worth the effort. Why should there be lists in Wikipedia that are not useful in the real world? It seems that WhatamIdoing answer to this question is based on the mistaken belief primary (original) research is allowable in Wikipedia if it seemed like a good idea at the time. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 10:37, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:USEFUL is an argument against keeping pages merely because they're useful. Additionally, there are zero reliable sources that will tell you whether a Wikipedia page is useful to readers, and WP:Notability requires verifiable evidence.  So, no, the mere fact that a list is truly useful does not mean that it is notable for its usefulness.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:40, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You are quite right: if a topic is notable, the only presumption this truly supports is that the topic has been "noted" in some way. Whether a list is useful, important or has some other characteristic that makes it stand apart is a matter of opinion. Having said that, evidence of notability could be used support such an opinion, if only because other editors can review the evidence might come to the same conclusion. But in the absence of any evidence, there is no support for such a claim what so ever. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:39, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, but the fact that there is no evidence or support for such a claim does not mean that the community will permit the list to be deleted. "Usefulness" (i.e., helping the reader find an article when the reader isn't sure what keywords to search on) is something we determine with our own Best Editorial Judgment, not through reliable sources.  Where "useful" lists are concerned, the community says that source-based notability is not always important.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:06, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Nonetheless, I think we are agreed that evidence is key. Best Editorial Judgment at WP:AFD is based on the expectation that evidence of notability will or will not be forthcoming at some point in the future, for there is no other metric for inclusion based on evidence, all other measures being based on hearsay. WP:USEFUL is not based on evidence, it is a matter of opinion, and therefore is not a valid inclusion criteria, even in AFD debates. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 09:36, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
 * That's still not true. Absolutely true that having sources is the best defense only because it is one of the few ways to sway consensus, but consensus may still come to a conclusion without sourcing evidence, using human intuition and common sense instead. We are not a court of law, which is why we don't operate in a mechanical, objective style. --M ASEM (t) 12:10, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Oppose "List of" is not a topic, it's just an article format. It's confusing formatting an article with the notability of the subject covered.The subject covered in List of X is not List of X, but X, written isn such a way as to highlight the individual notable examples, not the general characteristics. I am unable to think of any actual object of this proposed definition which could be handled that way, and I far as I can tell one principal  effect of it --and, on the basis of other arguments-- the principal intended effect-- is to remove combination articles on fictional characters with the ultimate purpose of decreasing the overall Wikipedia coverage of fictional characters and fiction generally.  . Such proposals having failed at every possible venue, and proposals quite the opposite having been prevented by persistent stonewalling, we therefore see   this attempt at remaking Wikipedia to fulfill an individual's bias about coverage. (To forestall a possible question, I am no longer assuming good faith in these attempts to destroy as much of the coverage as possible of what is personally deemed an unworthy topic area--fiction in all its forms. The effects on other subjects may be intended, or may be peripheral, but are in any case as bad an idea as the main target.)   DGG ( talk ) 03:36, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The idea that "List of" is not a topic is a commonly held misconception. If DGG can remember studying Set theory at school, he might recall that although set is a collection of distinct objects, it is onsidered as an object in its own right. A list is set of topics, but it is a distinct topic in its own right. Perhaps DGG needs to do a research and confirm this for himself. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:41, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Oppose because while I totally agree that list-based pages should be treated exactly like other mainspace pages (except perhaps as where exempted otherwise in policy eg WP:NOT - but I'm not really sure that exemption is reqd), I regard Gavin's take on this as fundamentally flawed - A "list of instances of X" article is about X, in exactly the same way a "collection of facts about X" article is about X.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 07:07, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Gavin Collins's proposal)
I agree with most of this... but near the end it confuses the issue of notability as it relates to the list's topic with the issue of whether the items listed are notable. These are two distinct issues that should not be mixed. Blueboar (talk) 20:02, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If I understand you correctly, the notability of the items in a list has nothing to do with the notability of the list itself, and if so I agree with you on this point. If what you says is true, that some part of the proposal is confusing, I will happily alter it in order to clarify this point, but you will have to give me a hint as to the form of wording you have in mind. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:19, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

While I am obviously horrendously distraught over Thumperward opposing my proposal further up, I think his comment: "would this article be notable if you chopped List of off the title?" is a good rule-of-thumb to go by. It provides a reasonable guideline saying that a list should cover a notable topic for it to be inclusion worthy. I will need to think through whether there are any major exceptions to such a rule. Sjakkalle (Check!)  09:11, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I would even follow up to say, on that chop rule-of-thumb, that if "X would be included" as opposed to "X is notable", only because WP:N is not the only means we judge article inclusion on WP - it just happens to be the only written-down means and the one that is easiest to apply all the time, everything else is a mish-mash of what consensus allows for at such discussions (AFD most notably). --M ASEM (t) 13:01, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If WP:N is "the only written-down" guideline, then it is the consensus. I don't agree with you that AfD disucusion can be interpretted in the way you say. If "consensus drives guidelines", then WP:N has already been changed or altered to reflect that consensus. What Masem is not acknowledging is that the only alternative to notability is subjective importance.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:07, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Did I say WP:N didn't have consensus? No.  I am saying that there is more consensus than just what is written in WP:N, but no one has really been able to capture it otherwise.  That consensus explains the AFDs that are kept despite failing WP:N or whatever else.  That's what we are trying to do here with lists. This is a prime example of subjective consensus driving Wikipedia content, not hard objective determination without considering any other input. --M ASEM  (t) 13:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The problem is that there is no evidence to support this, just hearsay. All of the change I have ever seen to the inclusion guidelines has taken place before or after discussion on the guideline talk pages, which is what you would expect - consensus about article inclusion would be arrived at in the appropriate venue. There are no direct links between topic inclusion and article deletion - they are two seperate processes conducted in seperate venues. You can infer that there are links (everything is linked to everything else), but AFD is too far removed from talk discussions that deal with policy and guideline directly to support your view that there is a strong link between them. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:47, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, AFD is central to determining this. But as a more concrete example, I will point to the unwritten consensus that every populated place is notable. I agree with you on that such places shouldn't be the case, but it is a unwritten accepted fact that such places are notable (there's WP:OUTCOMES that articulates this but that page is far from formalized policy), thus we must learn to live with that or present new arguments to challenge it and gain consensus for that change. --M ASEM (t) 16:59, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * That is just it, it is not a central venue at all, and the opinions expressed in those discussions are too diffused to be accepted as consensus. In addition to which, there are just too many exceptions to AFD results to be used as a source for establishing precedent. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:22, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry you feel that way, but that is a fact of life on Wikipedia. Consensus on inclusion is nearly always driven by discussions that start at AFD. And yes, it is inconsistent but somethings patterns form. That is what leads to WP:OUTCOMES, that is what leads to WP:N in the first place, that is what leads to the SNGs, etc. It is a matter of being patient and understanding that on any open wiki, consensus is going to drive the policy and guidelines for its developed, and not the other way around. Ignoring consensus is equivalent of swimming against a tidal wave. --M ASEM  (t) 12:50, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree, and if you don't mind me saying so, I think you overrate WP:OUTCOMES, which is little more than an essay that does not cite any particular AfD or set of AfDs; rather it is a set of very general generalisations with no particular source to verify them.
 * There is nothing in any policy or guideline (not even in WP:OUTCOMES) to suggest that consensus is driven by AfD discussions as you suggest. Quite the opposite is true: WP:OUTCOMES actually cites WP:N, not the other way around. I agree with you that consensus drives policy and guidelines, but that is why our existing policies and guidelines already reflect consensus.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:38, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You're missing the point. When there is a pattern of results from AFD that starts to become inconsistent with policy and guidelines, either a change to existing policy or guideline or a new one is made because of those results (though usually following an RFC to confirm that that pattern is the appropriate reflection of consensus).  It doesn't matter where that change ends up, it is important to recognize that AFD is usually where the spark is that leads to new inclusion metrics. Note, though that it is not the case that "one AFD kept despite failing a given p/g" means that we rush off to change that affected p/g to match the AFD result; it requires a pattern and it requires additional consensus discussion to affirm that pattern. It is not the exceptional cases of AFD that we worry about. --M ASEM  (t) 13:46, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * There is no pattern, and no precendent can be formed from AFD disucussions for the simple reason that there are too many exceptions. The spark for new inclusion metrics is the discussion page of a particular policy or guideline, whereas AFD is where we go to delete articles if they fail these policies and guidelines, not to bring it back in. What you are attempting to describe is the scenario of the tail wagging the dog. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:09, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes there are. That's how all of our inclusion metrics came about is based on what happened at AFD. Heck, I watched WP:NEVENT birthed by the AFD from Balloon boy hoax. Did the AFD immediately create NEVENT? No, but it led to editors involved in trying to help event articles determine how to judge their inclusion based on the arguments from the balloon boy case, and create NEVENT and eventually polling the community to gain consensus.    AFD is one of the few places where the wide community practices of specific policy and guideline are put into practical application, instead of theoretical like RFCs. This entire RFC is based on at least one AFD result, so to question AFD as a source of consensus is illogical.  AFDs are consensus. --M ASEM  (t) 14:27, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think WP:EVENT is just a rehash of WP:NTEMP. You might think it was derived form AFD disucssions, but WP:EVENT does not contain any new principle or guidance that had not already been established elsewhere. I think we will have to agree to disagree on this issue, for I see no evidence, but more importantly, I do not see particular AFD discussions being cited in policies or guidelines by name. I can't say for sure why that is, but I suspect that on their own, or even in groups, AFD discussions are just to varied and complex to be interpreted without a pinch of salt. What you are liable to intepret from the babble ain't necessarily so. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:49, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You can chose to ignore it, but that is consensus. To put a towel over your head and say it doesn't exists because you can't see it is not going to be an acceptable argument for it when the rest of the community knows it exists. Again, I am not say that a single AFD result is going to change guidelines and policies (the balloon boy hoax was one of those "last straws" that drove editors to create it based on numerous previous AFD), because on average they are unpredictable.  But it is clearly obvious patterns form and inclusion or exclusion guidelines made from that.  Lists at AFD fall easily into that form, and why we are here discussing this. --M ASEM  (t) 15:05, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not ignoring what your interpretation of what you think consensus to be, Masem. I am merely explaining why your interpretation may be mistaken. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:32, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not ignoring what your interpretation of what you think consensus to be, Masem. I am merely explaining why your interpretation may be mistaken. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:32, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: User:Themfromspace
Stand-alone lists are Wikipedia articles; thus, they are equally subject to Wikipedia's content policies, such as verifiability, no original research and neutral point of view. The previous is taken word-for-word from the lede of our guideline for stand-alone lists. The key point here is that stand-alone lists must have a reason to stand alone. Even if we "spin out" an article, we must show that the restricted topic of the spin-out is in itself a proper encyclopedia article. In determing whether we should have an article on a given topic, the default guideline is the general notability guideline (assuming the article meets less stringent policies such as verifiability). There is no reason why list articles should be exempt from the same notability guidelines that other articles are subjected to.

The subject matter of these lists is the list itself, and not the topic of the list. So an article titled list of X would have to both verify that the contents of the list belong on the list, and demonstrate notability that the list itself has received significant commentary from third-party sources. I don't see why some editors are treating this idea as the deletionist kiss of death since showing a list's notability isn't that hard to do. Many of our lists meet this bar and while taking a quick browse through Category:Featured lists I haven't found any lists in there that aren't notable as lists. What this provision does do is highly discourage creating lists from one's head, a behaviour which amounts to original research. The proper way to go about creating these is to first find a notable list and then write an article about it, describing its significance in the world. The wrong way to go about creating lists is to think of a topic and list all of the items that one thinks fit in the list without using any publications to back up the material. This method of editing leads to long sprawling lists created through original research. Writing about lists once their notability has been established leads to precise and verifiable lists that benefit the reader immensely.

In a nutshell, stand alone lists are Wikipedia articles and they are not exempt from the same notability guidelines that other articles must meet. These guidelines ensure that what we write about has importance in the real world and they prevent Wikipedia from becoming a dumping ground for every topic under the sun. Applying these guidelines to lists would do a great job at fighting listcruft and will save AfD patrollers many a headache since the worst of the lists would be discouraged from the get-go.  Them From  Space  04:51, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Support (Themfromspace's proposal)

 * 1) This completely reflects what existing policies and guideline have to say about lists: Wikipedia was never intended to be a depository for listcruft. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 05:54, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Indeed. It's time that we stopped treating articles which begin with "List of" differently from other articles. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:39, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Very lucid argument. This closely reflects how I see it and reflects where a lot of lists go wrong and end up deleted. At the very least I think it is an excellent starting point. Shooterwalker (talk) 16:11, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) Support. Makes absolute sense. We need a "strong" notability guideline to ensure that WP contains good quality lists, and yes, to weed out those lists that have OR, SYNTH, UNDUE or OVERCAT problems. I also support Gavin Collins' proposal above. Zunaid 17:54, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 5) This works for me, List articles should apply the same rigour to their existence as any other article. ALR (talk) 22:11, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 6) Support. Lists are articles, let's treat them as such in terms of the GNG. Karanacs (talk) 19:43, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Themfromspace's proposal)

 * 1) I strongly disagree that the topic of "List of X" is the list itself. "List of Quercus species" is not an article about the list of oak species. It is a list about oak species, and people looking at the list are searching for the botanical information, not information about the list itself. The case is synonymous for at least 90%+ of our list articles. Sjakkalle (Check!)  06:15, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * With that said, I more or less agree that choosing list topics which are the product of pure fantasy ("List of symbols that are both country codes and chemical symbols" is a case in point), tend to be trivial and should be avoided. This tends to be problem with "List of X that are Y" articles. Sjakkalle (Check!)  07:58, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I actually think we're talking about the same thing but we're getting stuck in the language. All that Themfromspace is saying is that we have sources that discuss Oak as a definition, making the article notable. And we also have sources that discuss all the different kinds of List of Quercus species, making the list appropriate. (Not just some editor cherrypicking from a variety of sources that say "X is a country code", "X is a chemical symbol", "Y is code for the chemical element yessium, not to be confused with the code for yesville"...) Shooterwalker (talk) 16:18, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The proposal contains the language: "The subject matter of these lists is the list itself, and not the topic of the list." I don't think this is a mere language issue, but a real substantial issue. As I have stated several times in this discussion, I disagree with that idea so strongly that I need to oppose the proposal. Sjakkalle (Check!)  10:31, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) The burden of notability for a standalone list that is not purely navigational is on the subject (topic) of the list as defined in the lead. The burden of notability cannot be on the list title List of … as the List of construct is a WP convention that allows consistency of content in a very large online encyclopedia.  Authors of reliable sources do not follow WP naming constructs so their lists can be named anything they want.  Reliable sources, especially in the non-fiction side of things contain countless lists of stuff.  I am looking at a reliable source which contains a list entitled: Known Nez Perce Casualties, 1877.  If I chose to create an article List of Known Nez Perce Casualties in the Nez Perce War of 1877 those editors wanting to put the burden of notability on the List title could argue there is no source that has ever published a list by that name.  If I chose to name the article Known Nez Perce Casualties, 1877 that argument would be off the table.  The next move would be to state that Known Nez Perce Casualties, 1877 violates our list and article naming convention but that puts an unrealistic burden on outside sources to comply with WP conventions.--Mike Cline (talk) 08:05, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * An argument can quite readily be made that the casualties in a war are a distinct subject. Indeed, war monuments exist specifically to list the dead, so it could be argued that the lists in question are "real-world lists" which can be treated as valid topics of discussion. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:38, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No one is saying that the title has to be exact, and if someone argued that the list and article in your example don't mesh then I hope they'd get roundly laughed down. Karanacs (talk) 19:45, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) I don't think that this distinguishes between lists that are navigational aids and lists that are actually cruftalicious articles masquerading as lists.  Only the latter are the problem, while the former should not be cramped by the solution we light upon regarding the latter.   RJC  TalkContribs 14:21, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) I disagree. To rephrase a comment I made above: "List of X" is essentially equivalent to an article about "X" containing a list of all X, so in both cases the requirement should be the same: "X" has to be notable, but not necessarily "list of X".   Sandstein   17:11, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Basically agree with Sandstein. Davewild (talk) 18:32, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) Again, misses the point that "list of X" != "X". Jclemens (talk) 22:50, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 5) Oppose per my opposition to Gavin's proposal above.  While I totally agree that list-based pages should be treated exactly like other mainspace pages, this analysis of what that means is flawed - A "list of instances of X" article is about X, in exactly the same way a "collection of facts about X" article is about X. And so to treat a list article 'identically' to a collection of facts article, requires that we address the notability of X, NOT the notability of "List of X".  ‒ Jaymax✍ 07:10, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Principle 1 by User:Shooterwalker

 * Not every category with multiple verifiable entries should have a stand-alone list article. Just because there is a category of articles that all meet policy, it does not mean that it is appropriate to organize them into some combination to create a list. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:07, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Support (Shooterwalker's proposal)

 * Support as proposer. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:07, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support in a way. Well yes, but I cannot really see how a principle like that helps us any more than "not every topic deserves an article". All but the most radically inclusionist people understand that. Sjakkalle (Check!)  15:47, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes this only scratches the surface. But sometimes it's good to start with the obvious and work our way down. Shooterwalker (talk) 16:09, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Of course lists and categories don't overlap completely. They have different purposes and goals and are backed up through different guidelines.  Them From  Space  22:21, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Makes sense. Alzarian16 (talk) 05:39, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Shooterwalker's proposal)

 * 1) Again, overly negative way to put a statement. Jclemens (talk) 23:06, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Principle 2 by User:Shooterwalker

 * Not every topic that is appropriate for an article is also appropriate for a list. If foo represents a good article (or potentially good article), it does not mean that it is appropriate to create list of foos or list of examples of foos. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:07, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Support ('s proposal)

 * Support as proposer. Trying to drill down and figure out where we all agree. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:07, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support in a way. Well yes, but I cannot really see how a principle like that helps us any more than "not every topic deserves an article". All but the most radically inclusionist people understand that. Sjakkalle (Check!)  15:47, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support in a way, it is true that not every topic should be listified... but every listified topic could be re-worked as a text article. Blueboar (talk) 16:22, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support common sense.  Them From  Space  02:26, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support - covered by WP:NOT policy ‒ Jaymax✍ 07:12, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Oppose ('s proposal)

 * 1) This is a pointlessly negative way to put an intuitive statement. Jclemens (talk) 22:51, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: User:Mike Cline
I apologize for the WP:TLDR nature of this position, but the details are important.

List Glossary: The purposes of Lists:
 * List Title: Metadata that provides a unique identifier within WP and concisely conveys the subject of list. List titles are constructed typically as: List of X (List of Lakes in Montana), …ography of X (Discography of Jane Doe),  or noun of X (Birds of Foobahland) and other variations.
 * List Subject: (or List Topic): What are the list contents all about? As the above titles suggest, the lists are about Lakes in Montana, the recordings of Jane Doe, the Birds in Foobahland, etc.
 * List Lead: Prose that establishes both the subject of the list and inclusion criteria for list entries.
 * List inclusion criteria: Specific, verifiable criteria that establishes the boundaries of list entries. Inclusion criteria are directly related to and expand understanding of the List subject.
 * List Entry: An item in the list. Generally reflected as a bullet paragraph, numbered paragraph or row in a table.
 * 1) Navigational – they provide enhanced and annotated navigation for WP content related to complex and/or voluminous subjects.
 * 2) Developmental – they provide an excellent means for structuring content around complex and voluminous subjects to allow the identification of content gaps for editors to work on.
 * 3) Informational – they allow for organization of voluminous, but otherwise notable information on complex subjects unsuitable for coverage via prose.
 * 4) Standalone lists allow for voluminous information, perfectly suitable for a main article as an embedded list to be linked instead of embedded.  Summary style articles benefit significantly from standalone lists.  In many cases, maximum article size would preclude the inclusion of a significant amount of otherwise notable content if we did not embrace Summary Style and the complimentary articles that make that style work.

Notability and Lists: The title of a list (or any article title for that matter) need not have been published verbatim, literally or obtusely by a reliable source to be a valid title of a list article. The phrase List of  is an artificial WP construct. Reliable sources in the real-world are not burdened by the way WP choses to name its list articles. Article titles are governed by a naming convention policy WP:Article titles that addresses all the compromises—technical and otherwise necessary to create unique article titles required by an online encyclopedia. Article titles should not be subject to notability requirements because of a variety of reasons, mostly importantly because it puts an undue burden on article naming—which must remain unique in the online environment. Geographical features—rivers, lakes, mountains, etc. are generally considered notable. There are 1005 Willow Creeks in the U.S. and I suspect it would be impossible to find a reliable source to support Willow Creek, Jefferson County, Montana literally. It is the subject of the list article that requires notability, not the organizational construct of arranging sets of logically related data into a useful form that enhances understanding of complex subjects, ie. Lists.

For purely navigational lists (ie. Lists of lists, outlines, etc.), notability is a moot point. For standalone lists that are clearly related to and expand information on other subjects within WP I see notability and lists in these constructs: Ideally, any non-navigational standalone list could be included as an embedded list in a main article if there were no article size limitations and readability was not a consideration. (IMHO, this is a prima facie test for whether or not a standalone list is encyclopedic in WP terms.)
 * 1) List of Foo, where Foo is a discrete and notable subject and has article in WP, the key element of this type of list is the list inclusion criteria that establishes a discriminate and verifiable set of criteria for list entries. List entries for this type of list must verifiably meet inclusion criteria either because the entry itself is 1) notable (has a WP article) and that article confirms inclusion criteria or 2) is reliably sourced to demonstrate that it meets inclusion criteria.
 * 2) List of Foos of Foobah, where both Foo and Foobah are discrete, notable and related subjects, have articles in WP, the key element of this type of list is the list inclusion criteria that establishes a discriminate, encyclopedic relationship between the two notable subjects and verifiable set of criteria for list entries. List entries for this type of list must verifiably meet inclusion criteria either because the entry itself is 1) notable (has a WP article) and that article confirms inclusion criteria or 2) is reliably sourced to demonstrate that it meets inclusion criteria.

So how might a proposed Lists and Notability policy read. With the exception of navigational lists (see below), standalone lists and articles must meet the same notability standards. The topic (subject) of a standalone list as described in the lead must meet WP:GNG (or subject specific notability) guidelines. List style articles contain a unique element of their lead—discriminate inclusion criteria—which helps in establishing notability of the list topic and prevents indiscriminate inclusion of non related content. List style articles are useful for expanding otherwise notable content unsuitable for prose style writing and to deal with article size limitations on complex and voluminous subjects. The phrase List of ... is a naming convention that identifies the article as a list style article, but is not part and parcel of the List topic and should not be factored into the notability assessment of the article topic. Prima facie evidence that a List Topic is most likely suitable for standalone list is that the same material could be included as an embedded list under an appropriate section heading that would enhance a related article and not be challenged except on the basis of article size and readability.
 * Proposal 1:

Navigational Lists-provide enhanced and annotated navigation for WP content related to complex and/or voluminous subjects. These are essentially lists of lists, outlines and collections of links of closely related WP content. Annotated navigational lists provide a very useful alternative to categories for complex and voluminous subjects. WP:CLN Navigational lists are not subject to notability requirements, but instead to editorial discretion and consensus on their individual utility for navigation around complex and voluminous topics. (similar to navigation templates WP:NAV). As mentioned in a comment above, we could easily improve this List of … inclusion situation if we abandoned the naming convention List of .... If we recognized and agreed that both Prose style and List(ing) style of writing content are worthy of an encyclopedia, then the assessment of any article’s notability regardless of style would be much easier. The only unique difference between styles is that the list style demands discriminate inclusion criteria in the lead. List of Birds of Zanzibar would become Birds of Zanzibar, etc. For navigational lists, the use of the phrase List of … would be appropriate, but restricted to those types of lists. For navigational lists that stray closer to informational list style articles, editors would have to remain vigilant that notability requirements were not being ignored. There are a sufficient number of standalone lists in WP today that do not contain the phase List of … so that this is not a radical idea.
 * Proposal 2 - Eliminate Lists as a class of article (except for navigational lists) and recognize List(ing) as a complimentary writing style for encyclopedic content not suitable for prose.

Support (Mike Cline's proposal)

 * 1) Finally, a proposal that focuses on what lists are for, rather than trying to focus on what sort of lists should be excluded from Wikipedia. Jclemens (talk) 22:58, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Sort of support. Proposal 1 is too complex and lends itself a little to WP:OR issues. Proposal 2, on the other hand, makes a lot of sense - but it only solves half of the problem. We would still need to decide which of the lists not dealt with by this would be deemed acceptable. But it has potential, possibly as an add-on to another proposal. Alzarian16 (talk) 05:43, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Mike Cline's proposal)

 * Too complicated. And from what I can understand, it makes a huge exception for navigational aids, with no guideline on how to avoid bad lists. Just because you have a notable article it does not make it appropriate to have a supplementary stand-alone list. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:06, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I question whether we should have navigational lists and "lists of lists" in article space... I agree that they are useful, but I think they should be located in non-article space. Blueboar (talk) 18:14, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Incidentally, List of lists redirects to Portal:Contents/Lists. Nifboy (talk) 22:22, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * This is hugely overengineered. I work in information management and find this too complex to worry about on a day to day basis.  ALR (talk) 22:09, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * This is encouraging lists created through original research.  Them From  Space  22:19, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Mike is forgetting that every list can be sliced and diced into small sub-lists. The only way to tell which ones are encyclopaedic is to see if that sub-set is notable. Taking his example, the List of birds of Zanzibar might not be notable, whereas List of birds of Tanzania might be. The only way to tell whether a list is encyclopaedic is notability, since the only other alternative is subjective importance, which is not supported by any policy or guideline. There is no middle way as he has infered. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:30, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * That's an unnecessarily narrow approach that misses much of the point of list organization. If we can compile a list of birds occurring in Zanzibar from multiple reliable sources, then the mere fact that Wikipedia contributors might be the first to do so (let's assume) should not require the deletion of that list, any more than we should be prevented from combining information from certain references on Zanzibar in its article that has not yet been combined elsewhere.  We have not invented the approach of listing what birds can be found where, bird distribution is verifiable and notable information generally, all individual bird species are notable, and Zanzibar, to continue with your example, is itself notable, and is a large region that was once a separate state, consisting of a series of islands, so a list of birds of Zanzibar is presumptively a reasonable grouping of information and an encyclopedic topic even if (let's assume) no other source has taken the time to publish a list of birds of Zanzibar.  If it turns out that all birds found in Tanzania as a whole are also present in Zanzibar, however, then it wouldn't make much sense to maintain a separate list.  That's the analysis I think would be necessary in determining whether we should have a list of birds of Zanzibar.  The only benefit to the rule you propose is that it removes the need to do all that thinking and work, at the expense of a vast array of potential content that is in no way deficient under core policies.  postdlf (talk) 15:53, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Since WP is basically a work built on subjective importance of topics and detail based on consensus, as opposed to what a commercial, professional work may be with a narrow focus, this is an invalid reason. Even notability is far from an objective measure of inclusion. --M ASEM  (t) 15:56, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Mike Cline's proposal)
TLDR, sorry. Nutshell?  Sandstein  17:12, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I didn't read it all myself, but I understand the gist of Mike Cline's proposal -- & agree with it: the criteria for establishing notability for a list cannot be usefully summarized in a single sentence or two. Doing so will either create a simplistic criterion that will lead us to deleting notable list articles, or a vague one which will not help us determine which are notable & which are not. We have to define our assumptions (as he did), then logically precede from there (which means lots & lots of words), & arrive at a conclusion (he has provided two). -- llywrch (talk) 04:34, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Re This is encouraging lists created through original research. by ThemFromSpace. How so?  If the list topic is notable and supported by reliable sources, where does the original research come from?  How do we discourage OR for regular articles other than our policy against it?  No policy or guideline is going to prevent an editor from adding OR content to articles or lists.--Mike Cline (talk) 15:01, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Whatever the fate of this proposal, I'd like to keep the "glossary" around (except I'd change "List inclusion criteria" to "List selection criteria", to match existing usage and avoid confusion about whether the question is whether the whole list should be included in Wikipedia, or which entries should be included in the list). WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:33, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * On the contrary, we should get rid of the glossary. The idea that List Subject is the list's contents runs contrary to set theory - see The Treachery of Images. Mike's defintion is fatally flawed. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:14, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * None of us are set theorists, so we're good. Most people here view lists as a format for presenting and organizing information pertaining to notable subjects, not as subjects themselves that must be notable in that format.  I've phrased it that lists should always be "tethered to notability", which I think reflects the diversity of how lists relate to non-list article topics and comports to practice well.  And it doesn't prevent us from being the first ones to compile an encyclopedic, verifiable, NPOV list from multiple sources.  There are a lot of ways that a list can be validly tethered.  postdlf (talk) 14:38, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You don't have to be a set theorist to understand that a list has topic just like an article, and when your read a list like the List of Heroes characters, proof of the pudding is that there is little or no difference between a topic in a list and a topic in standalone article other than formating. I think you are mixing up categries with lists: a category does not need to have a definition; rather it is defined by the topic make up the category. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:13, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * List of Heroes characters has substantive content for all the characters that editors have determined do not merit their own articles, so it's been merged in/developed in the list because editors determined that's the best place for it. But I don't think that's particularly relevant to either of our perspectives or arguments. Both of us would agree that if Heroes were not notable, then a list of characters from Heroes would probably have no place on Wikipedia.  Both of us would also agree that if whether a fictional character was actually in Heroes was unverifiable (e.g., if the show was still in development, its characters may be merely speculative) that this list would have no place in Wikipedia. Where we seem to disagree is that you, as best as I can tell from your comments here, would argue that the list of characters would be inappropriate solely if (somehow, let's assume) no reliable sources had documented characters from Heroes collectively, i.e., as a list (or single topic, if you care about those words so much) of "characters from Heroes".  But I, and many others here, would find the list appropriate as long as we could compile it from separate sources all documenting that a character was featured in Heroes; that they are characters in Heroes is verifiable, and the painfully obvious inclusion criteria is neither POV nor OR.  Editors could quibble about what characters are worth mentioning in the list, but that's not an issue that would be resolved by a "notability of the list" approach.  The decision to split it off into a separate list, rather than maintain it within Heroes (TV series), would be justified by consensual editorial judgment that such a level of detail was appropriate for Heroes as a topic, and for the individual characters as subtopics.  Again, a "notability of the list" requirement would have no bearing on what level of detail is appropriate to the topic of Heroes and individual characters appearing therein. Finally, sound editorial judgment would logically conclude that the most sensible way to group this content would be by their shared (and most defining) characteristic of being characters from Heroes.  I see this as no different than the judgment required to place information under the appropriate heading within a single article; should Sylar be discussed/compiled into a "characters" article section/separate list, or an "episode" article section/separate list?  And this last judgment seems to be all that a "notability of the list" requirement would unreasonably and arbitrarily restrain, at least as pertains to this kind of split-off list. Compilation of different sources and article subtopic split-offs are by no means particular to lists, so that same kind of cramped analysis would presumably also prevent a split-off article on Transportation of FOO from article on notable place FOO, if say books had discussed its ferries, other books had discussed its airports, and other books had discussed its subway, but no books had discussed FOO's ferries, airports, and subway together.  Under your analysis, "transportation of FOO" should then be deleted as a non-notable article topic, should it not?  Even though if everything were kept in a single article, all of that material would indisputably go into a "transportation" section, and even if it were indisputable that there was enough reliably sourced content for the article section to be split off into a separate article. And so I, and most others here, have pragmatically rejected that approach as completely nonconstructive, poorly targeted at the problems it purports to address, and in no way compelled by or in reasonable furtherance of the goals of WP:V, WP:OR, WP:N, or WP:NPOV.  postdlf (talk) 16:17, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I can see where you are coming from, but what you are arguing is essentially that WP:NNC works backwards: once the content of a list is shown to be notable, then the notability guideline does not govern whether or not that topic should have its own standalone article or list. However, this argument is fatally flawed.
 * What you describe seems intutative, but it is based on a category mistake. It is both intuative and useful to categorise a topic in a certain way (e.g. Category:Masonic buildings) because categories are an aid to navigation and help structure Wikipedia. However, it is a mistake to assume or infer that a category is notable in the absence of verifable evidence, and it is a mistake to assume that a list based on such a category is notable as well.
 * This principle is touched upon in WP:WITHIN: if the only information in an article is referenced from another Wikipedia article, then that is a good reason not to create separate standalone article.
 * The knockout proof of this is List of Masonic buildings, which I think is based on the category of the same name. Many of the buildings in the list are notable, but the category is not. The reason is there is no source that has defined what a Masonic building is, let alone defined what should go into a list of Masonic buildings, nor has a list of Masonic buildings ever been published. Does this category include Masonic schools or Masonic hospitals? In the absence of any reliable sources, it is just not possible to provide a working defintion for the list nor a rationale for inclusion in Wikipedia at this time. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 18:00, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Notwithstanding that WP:WITHIN is an essay, that would be in direct conflict with policy on WP:SIZE and WP:SS; there is going to be content that is split out logically into a separate article that would otherwise should be included in a larger article, but cannot because of the 100k limit we put on articles. I'd argue most lists that this RFC is discussing would fall into that pattern.  As for the Masonic building, Blueboar actually gave a fair assessment (over at WT:N) as to what the term entails.  Is it sourced yet? No, but we assume good faith that based on what he's stated and that what can be found through quick Google search (including books and scholar), a more exact definition can eventually be added to the article and thus avoiding that issue.  So there's no claim to "just not possible to provide a working definition" because clearly there is; you just have to look past the black and white text that the page only currently shows. --M ASEM  (t) 18:10, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not making a "category mistake"; I'm dismissing the category you insist upon as irrelevant and incoherent in addressing the issues of list inclusion. Is List of films: U-V-W notable?  That's simply not a meaningful way to address whether such a list should exist on Wikipedia.  Lists are encyclopedic, or not, for other reasons. While insisting on the notability of a list qua list would no doubt result in the deletion of List of Masonic buildings (as apparently no one has ever published such a thing), that criteria is not targeted to the actual problems with the list as you have identified it (and I will assume you are right, I don't know).  The problem is that it's not verifiable or NPOV whether a particular building is a "Masonic building."  Whether a reliable source had already compiled a list of Masonic buildings would obviously help address that, but it's not the only way that problem could be resolved; we do not require that a reliable source has already compiled a list of people from the Isle of Wight for it to be verifiable that certain people are from the Isle of Wight.  postdlf (talk) 18:30, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Gavin, the glossary above doesn't say that the list subject is equal to the list contents. The statement is "What are the list contents all about?", not "What are the list contents?".  A "List of US presidents" is all about the US presidents (=list subject); its contents should be George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, etc. (=list contents).  WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:48, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * In answer to Postdlf, we do require a reliable source to have already compiled such a list or otherwise...it is just a non-notable category.
 * In answer to WhatamIdoing, that is too trite an example. When you say US presidents=list subject, you are omitting some important information that is usually accepted by convention, and is therefore not stated in the title. For instance the List of US presidents is really a List of all US presidents, but all is omitted by convention. Likewise when we refer to US presidents, we also exclude Confederate presidents by convention, even though the Confederacy was based in the US. President of the United States is not the list topic in this case; rather, the list topic is the definition of which presidents should be included (or excluded) in the list, even if this is not stated explicitly. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, "we" don't. You want it to be a requirement, but it isn't.  And you still have completely failed to address why that would be a good, coherent, or meaningful requirement in all circumstances.  You've repeated yourself so much, without applying your abstractions to particular examples, that all you've established as a real consequence of not requiring a list to be notable is that you get to shout to the heavens that it's "not a notable list."  I can live with that shame.  Seriously, after all these posts, you've completely failed to advance your argument beyond "lists must themselves be notable" and completely failed to explain why any of the hypothetical lists I have proposed or discussed would be bad apart from being, in the abstract, "not notable." Incidentally, that the president of the Confederate States of America was not a president of the United States isn't a peculiarity of this list or based on some kind of special pleading or "convention", but rather integral to the list's organizing topic of president of the United States because he was never elected to or served in that office (incidentally, Jefferson Davis was the only Confederate president; there wasn't more than one). Put another way, no reliable source claims that Jefferson Davis was a president of the United States. It's simply that fact alone that dictates his omission from a list of presidents of the United States, not "convention." So I don't understand what you were trying to claim there at all. postdlf (talk) 22:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * John Hanson makes a better example than Jefferson Davis: He really was the first "President of the United States of America" -- just not under the present system.  That's why the list has a section that defines its selection criteria.  The list's subject is actually closer to "all US presidents sworn into office under the present Constitution" -- but it's not necessary to change the title of the page to provide this level of detail   WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:04, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * In answer to Postdlf, some editors think notability is important because it provides verifable evidence to support the presumption that a topic is encyclopaedic. I can understand why you and Mike assert that lists are not distinct topics in their own right, because then there is no need to provide verifiable evidence at all, and contributing to Wikipedia would be so much easier and straightforward. Why should editors have to go to the extra effort of providing a definition for a list or cite sources for that definition? If you do not think this is worthwhile, then I can't change your point of view, as I agree that citing sources is not only an inconvenience, but it is also onerous. To be honest, I must admit having had an really good idea for a useful list myself, but was put off creating it because I could not find a verifiable source to support it, so I know where you are coming from. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:51, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP only requires verifiability, not verification (WP:V). Not everything needs a source if is intuitively obvious, common sense, or can be reasonably synthesized without bias from other sources. And its been well established that editors have to include some unbiased synthesis in the first place to group and summarize content into articles; lists would fall into the same area. --M ASEM  (t) 12:54, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The problem is that the source for the definition of List of Masonic buildings has been challenged, and its subject matter is not verifiable, let alone verified. Should this list include only Masonic temples, or can Masonic lodges be included? Should Masonic schools and hospitals be included, even if they are no longer under by Masonic control? I think you will agree that these answers can only be provided by reliable sources who know what they are talking about; common sense does not stretch that far, alas.  Common sense on its own can't be used to work out what buildings are included or not included with the scope of this list topic in the absence of reliable sources. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:13, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Of course it's being challenged, that's likely while the discussion at WP:N started, and I can discussion is still there (including an ANI report from it). Does that invalidate any possibility of the acceptance of "List of Masonic buildings" once a clear definition based on verifiable evidence is observed? No, absolutely not.  It may result the list does become unnecessary, but to presume that just because the definition is being challenged now means there is no chance for future improvement is completely illogical and not an acknowledge of either good faith or WP being a work in progress. --M ASEM  (t) 22:07, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I would argue that if no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it at this time. I am not saying that Masem is wrong about the list, but at the moment it conflicts with one (if not more) core content policies, and I don't see how its existence can be justified if that is the case. Having said that, I doubt very much that the contributors would allow it to be deleted at WP:AFD, but whether article ownership serves any useful purpose in this context is questionable. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 04:30, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Which content policies is this conflicting with?
 * WP:NOT, specifically WP:NOT - no, as this is far from a directory of "all" masonic buildings. It is a discriminate list. So not a NOT issue.
 * WP:V - Sources are provided from third parties. Not a verifiability issue.
 * WP:OR - Excluding your contention that it is improper to use OR to assemble a list topic list like, the qualification of these buildings as masonic is certainly far from OR. Not a problem for that specific aspect.
 * WP:NPOV - I see nothing biased about this list. Not a bias problem.
 * These leaves two issues: one, whether the list or the topic of the list is notable (that is being addressed here), and the issue of the definition of Masonic buildings, which is being addressed on that page. So outside of this RFC issue, it's being corrected.
 * But more worrisome is your contention that an article that fails a content p/g should be deleted. That is never the case outside of outright copyright problems or BLP. If an article is failing content issues, is improved to overcome that.  If it is really an inclusion issue, then separate the content from the inclusion aspects and deal with that in the right process, but lumping the content problems into that is never appropriate. --M ASEM  (t) 04:53, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure it's productive to talk about "List of Masonic Buildings" because it is such a borderline case. The "close" on that AFD was the worst kind of "no consensus". In good faith, Masem can argue that it proves that the guideline needs to be written in a way that protects this list, whereas Gavin can honestly believe it will be deleted once it's clearer that it will never meet our guidelines even in WP:POTENTIAL. There will never be agreement here. What we really ought to do is discuss the clearly bad cases and good cases and start there. Look for entire categories of lists that have been deleted, and look for specific featured lists to try to develop our policy. Maybe it would help if we created a WP:OUTCOMES page for lists? Shooterwalker (talk) 14:06, 25 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I understand and appreciate Mike's effort to find a reasonable solution, nut nonetheless I do not think this is actually a good idea, because of one point that was overlooked. It can be beneficial to treat the same subject in more than one way--in particular, for a subject that contains discussion of many individual examples, there is an advantage in writing it as a sortable list, and there is also an advantage in writing about almost anything in prose. They are read differently, and serve different needs. An encyclopedia  partakes of the nature of an almanac, and almanacs have always done topics as lists whenever possible. There is of course one conceivable way to harmonize this--to have the articles contain two parts. -- an article on, say , Operatic singers, including a list of the notable ones. The problem is that in other than very small cases this becomes really unwieldy and very hard to edit. Better to have both ways, separating out the general discussion. (And of course having a category, for those who merely want an alphabetical list of names without the identifying features lists can provide.). I will mention that as a devoted reader of almanacs and technical handbooks since my childhood, I have a personal preference for the list method of presentation for anything that will fit--and the computer  facility irtue of being sortable makes this all the stronger.    DGG ( talk ) 03:57, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by Fetchcomms
If the topic of the list, such as a list of presidents of some nation or a list of TV shows of some series, is notable (that is, the primary topic has received significant coverage in reliable, third-party sources), then the list is appropriate.

A "List of association football players who use Facebook", for example, would not be appropriate because the topic of the list ("football players using Facebook") has not been significantly discussed on its own in external sources. However, a "List of accolades received by X movie" would be acceptable, as the movie and the awards have been discussed together significantly in external sources. For a "List of members of X society", in which not each member has their own article, but the society does and is notable, and there is significant coverage about the society and its members, then that would be appropriate. For a "List of articles by X journal", that would not be appropriate as the individual publications have not received coverage and the page would be a listing of all these titles.

For cases like "List of fictional Americans", this list should instead be "List of notable fictional Americans", "notable" meaning "has their own Wikipedia article". For a "List of days in 2011", this would be purely a navigational aid, and is easily replaced by categories. The list is not needed and can be deleted because the category namespace does the same navigational job.  — fetch ·  comms   16:52, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Fetchcomms' proposal)

 * 1) Problem here is with the last sentence. As discussed in summary point 2.1 below, it is not always easy to tell what is purely navigational and what isn't. The example given could be said to add content to the encyclopedia, so not eligible for deletion under this system. This would lead to interminable AfDs about whether a list was navigational or not. Alzarian16 (talk) 12:02, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * This is the whole "outline" debate and I'd think that's for another RfC.  — fetch ·  comms   19:28, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Same as Blueboar's proposal (above) - this is based on the fallacy that notability is inherited.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:32, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * So having a list of members of X society in which both the members and the society have received significant coverage in reliable sources means that the members are notable only because the group is? That makes no sense. Notability = significant coverage in reliable sources. If the topic of a list has received said coverage, is it not notable? A "List of CEOs who have gone camping" is not reasonable, as camping and CEOs may be notable, but "CEOs going camping" is not. But a "List of hybrid production vehicles" would be notable, because the subject (hybrid vehicles) has been covered in reliable sources, as have the individual members of the list. I'm not sure I understand where the inherited notability part is coming from.  — fetch ·  comms   19:28, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It makes a lot of sense, becase there are a lot of nonsensical lists which notable topics can be grouped into. What is needed is evidence that the list topic (which defines its content) is itself notable. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:02, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) "Navigational lists" can provide far more information than a category.  Consider a list of articles for a technical subject:  The cat gives you nothing more than the current name of the article; the list could give you enough information to make it possible to figure out which one(s) you want to click on.  Some of the ways to do this include providing relevant dates, organizing the list with subsections, naming synonyms, linking images... List of cutaneous conditions is a IMO navigational list, and it provides far more information than the match category structures.   WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:55, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Fetchcomms' proposal)
Need some clarification on the last sentence. Does that mean the list should be deleted because it duplicates the category, or is it OK to have both? Alzarian16 (talk) 06:34, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The list is not needed and can be deleted because the category namespace does the same navigational job.  — fetch ·  comms   18:08, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: User:Sandstein
This aims to summarize the salient point of some of the proposals above.

Standalone lists of the type "List of X" are kept if either of the following is true:
 * "List of X" (the list as such) is notable, or
 * "X" (the list topic) is notable.

The above also applies to lists that are distributed across several pages for size reasons (e.g., "List of X: A-E", "List of X: F-K" etc.)

Support (Sandstein's proposal)

 * 1) As proposer,  Sandstein   17:31, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Succinct and sensible. Jclemens (talk) 23:05, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Sandstein's proposal)

 * 1) The way I'm reading this, it would allow for a list article on every notable subject. This is out of the question; not every notable subject needs a list devoted to it. We should only create list articles if the list itself has significance.  Them  From  Space  02:32, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) Per Shooterwalker below. The purpose of this RfC is to iron out the edge cases and areas of continued dispute which cause problems in notability discussions regarding lists. This short proposal leaves wide open the possibility that because casino is a notable subject that list of casinos is too. (note that I plucked that example from this air; I am not at all surprised, looking at the resulting blue link, to find an impossibly broad and laughably incomplete list which is of little use to anyone.) Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 19:05, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Great example Chris. You've referenced a list List of casinos that has actually not described the list topic as a notable one. Some casinos are notable, but not all (We have dozens here in Bozeman), yet no threshold of inclusion has been established in the lead.  This is not a problem with a guideline that says the List topic should be notable, it is a problem with the editors who have created this list by failing to include descrete inclusion criteria.--Mike Cline (talk) 22:56, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Indeed, it is not presently as valid list. However, under Sandstein's stripped-down proposal above, this would be a valid list. I'm not arguing that it is now, but rather pointing out that this is a flaw in the proposal in question. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 01:53, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) Same as Blueboar's proposal (above) - this is based on the fallacy that notability is inherited.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:35, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Can we get a real rationale other than WP:VAGUEWAVE? Nothing about Sandstein's proposal violates NOTINHERITED as written. Jclemens (talk) 00:37, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Sandstein's proposal)
This is a shorter version of Blueboar's proposal above, based on the following idea: "List of X" is essentially equivalent to an article entitled "X" that contains a list of all X. So in both cases the inclusion requirement ought to be the same: X has to be notable.  Sandstein  17:32, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I like that this is simple and to the point. But no. Every article X should not necessarily have a list of X's to go with it. Some, but not all. Not even most. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:09, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

This is pretty close, the point that notability standards may apply to the list topic, as opposed to the list itself, is an important one. There should be a caveat that the list needs to serve some useful informational, navigational or developmental purpose. For example, while bus driver is a notable occupation, I am sceptical to a "List of bus drivers", because the information would be a collection of mostly obscure people, where I cannot see any informational, navigational, or developmental purpose. Sjakkalle (Check!)  12:21, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Request for clarification: So the people who are opposing this are stating that just because the topic is notable is not sufficient, there also needs to be some sort of reason for the list itself?  Active  Banana   (  bananaphone  23:59, 23 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Would you vote to delete List of Nobel laureates affiliated with Princeton University? Sandman888 (talk) Latest PR 11:22, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal/Question by: User:Shooterwalker
I see a lot of people talking about the "navigational aid" thing. Basically, a list of notable entries organized in some useful way. A category is basically a list of notable entries, but it's alphabetized, with limited information. Would this issue go away if we had some kind of "dynamic category" or "rich category" concept?

With consensus, specific categories would be promoted into a rich category. This would transform a basic category page into a table with multiple columns for additional information/navigation. (For example Category:Space adventure films would become more like List of films about outer space.) Entries would be automatically added or deleted from the list as people tag the articles with the relevant category, and people could amend the table of entries with relevant navigational aids (e.g.: sort by year, sort by director).

Obviously this "rich category" concept doesn't exist yet. But I'm asking if in some alternate or future version of Wikipedia, maybe such a concept would make a lot of this debate into a non-issue. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:25, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Shooterwalker's proposal)
I think you are confusing Lists with Categories. Lists are mainspace pages, subject to content policy and the notability guideline. Categories are not part of mainspace, although definitions and even content supported citations are occasionally added to them. Usually if a category is notable (e.g. Aves which is the category of Birds)), then it is likely that it will have its own stand alone article or list.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:43, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: Orlady
Continue to use the perfectly good criteria that now exist at WP:NOT, particularly WP:NOTDIR (Wikipedia articles are not lists or repositories of loosely associated topics and Wikipedia articles are not non-encyclopedic cross-categorizations), and WP:Stand-alone lists. These criteria work very well 99.9% of the time, and no policy will magically solve the issues regarding that other 0.1%. --Orlady (talk) 19:23, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Support (Orlady's proposal)

 * 1) There will always be disagreement over the details, but what we already have in WP:NOT and WP:STAND is pretty good at defining the proper scope of lists.  Them  From  Space  22:17, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) There will be disagreement, as Themfromspace points out, because it is not possible to prove that list for its own sake fails WP:NOT. For example, it is the generally held consensus that telephone directories fail this policy, but opponents to this proposal are basically arguing that every list but a telephone directory do not. Perhaps we need to have a seperate policy guidline on this issue just to hammer home its logic, and so that editors can't game the system by claiming that it does not apply to list lists without evidence of notability.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:50, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose (Orlady's proposal)

 * 1) My impression of recent difficulties is that "non-encyclopedic cross-characterization" is a term fraught with divergent interpretations. Jclemens (talk) 23:03, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) There is a conflict that has to be resolved. That is not to say that the consensus may result in the cited policies being affirmed as the working consensus. If so, we need to reflect that in necessary areas.  But to say "hey, they work" and ignore current problems is not helpful.  As to whether I agree wiht those existing policies working, no I don't believe they reflect consensus today. --M ASEM  (t) 23:25, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Although this is bit of Can't we all just get along which is a pretty good way to build an encyclopedia, I have to object on two points.  1) It does not solve the List of ... issue where a handful of editors are insisting that notability of list style articles be judged on reliable coverage of The List itself, not the list topic (subject). and 2) WP:NOT, especially Directory and Indiscriminate are so widely abused and painted with a broad brush as rationales for deletion that they present more of a problem than a solution.  For those that don't like lists, everything is a directory and indiscriminate, regardless of the facts.--Mike Cline (talk) 13:41, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Orlady's proposal)
I believe there is a saying in law that "bad cases make bad precedent," and I think the same thing could be said regarding Wikipedia policy. This discussion appears to be inspired by a bad case, namely List of Masonic buildings. The problems with that list stem not from any problems with current Wikipedia policy, but rather from a chronic inability to satisfactorily define "Masonic" and "Masonic building". No policy can magically resolve that kind of problem. --Orlady (talk) 19:23, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Discussion leading to this on the Notability talk page weren't explicitly driven by the example that you raise, although clearly it has been drawn in.  As observed on that page this particular example isn't a particularly valuable one to work on the basis of and I'm pretty disappointed that despite that observation it was used as an example in raising this discussion.
 * What this example does do is illustrate what probably doesn't justify a list article; essentially undefined topic and no clear inclusion criteria.
 * Notwithstanding that the specific example does illustrate a need for something a little more rigorous around notability criteria than presently exists.
 * ALR (talk) 22:06, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * There's been a long long issue on lists among others that has been slowly brewing for 2 years or more. Stated policy does not jive with consensus per a large body of recent AFDs, among other places, and thus we need to air it out.  List of Masonic buildings is a problem not because of the definition of terms but whether it should be included or not. It is but one example of the type of lists that there is conflicting guidance between policy and consensus over. --M ASEM  (t) 23:23, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It's a nice thought. But we know that the path through existing policy leads us back to the same old fights. It would be nice to offer at least some clarity about some of the common WP:NOT's when applied to lists, namely cross-categorizations, directories, and indiscriminate topics. Shooterwalker (talk) 01:19, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Reading Orlady's comments above touches on a question that I have reading all of these proposals: what are the precedents from AfD which should be used here? I was tempted to present my own proposal here, but to do what I consider would be a satisfactory job I would have go back thru the archives of AfD & find all of the list articles nominated & figure out what was the consensus the keep & delete decisions indicated. (The alternative would to be gaze at my navel for a while & set forth a lot of theoretical musings that not only no one would want to read but would not help anyone.) Does anyone have the time & interest to do such a research project? -- llywrch (talk) 04:48, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Orlady, I believe that the saying is actually "Hard cases make bad law". That is, you get a particularly awful circumstance, and then you try to write a law (or policy, or guideline) to "fix" the awful circumstance -- and the ultimate result is a bigger mess, rather than an improvement.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:59, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * In answer to Orlady, I think the truth is no contributor to the List of Masonic buildings is willing to admit that it fails WP:NOT, even though there is no evidence of notability. Likewise, none of the contributors would want to admit that the topic was was made up one day, and that if fails WP:NOT, even though its subject matter has never been the subject of published research in the real world. You can understand why - its human nature: like the culling of baby seals, no editor would want to admit having done it. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:07, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually three editors on that page are quite happy to conclude that it's non-compliant, one now refuses to engage with any request to substantiate his position that obvious is an adequate criterion for inclusion and Orlady takes the view that it's an unencyclopedic article.
 * It suffered the same fate that many AfDs for Masonic items suffer; most of the keep votes were not supported by adequate arguments for retention.
 * fwiw many of the entries aren't even buildings where Lodges meet.
 * ALR (talk) 12:52, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by: User:Alzarian16
(This one is very different to the proposals put forward so far, so may go on a while, for which I apologise.)

Ignoring for a moment the (sometimes tricky) distinction between content lists and navigational lists, I see two key issues at work here:


 * There are valid concerns by many users regarding lists which contain WP:OR and WP:SYNTH issues but which would not be banned under the more lenient guidelines proposed.
 * The stricter guidelines proposed so far would, while removing these lists, also remove large numers of lists with no such issues.

The discusssions above and below show that traditional notability guidelines may not always work in determining what is a valid list, but subjecive measures are not an acceptable substitute. It's my opinion that WP:V needs to be at the heart of any new guideline to prevent the problems caused by OR-laden POV lists. As such, I'm thinking that we could try a set of guidelines something like this:


 * The inclusion of any item on a list must be justified by a reference to a reliable source.
 * Reliable sources must show that the topic X in a "List of X" or the topic "Y of X" in a "List of Y of X" is notable.
 * Any additional information given (i.e. in content lists) must be verifiable.
 * Lists that consist of links with no content information should either be deleted or expanded to include relevant content information.
 * Where possible, content lists should use an alternative name construct such as Aesop Rock discography.

This should prevent the problems noted, and may even help solve some WP:Listcruft issues, without damaging lists as a valid article type. I don't expect to get a consensus, but it may help to make us think differently about the role and nature of lists on Wikipedia. I'll be interested to see what the objections are. Alzarian16 (talk) 12:21, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Support (Alzarian16's proposal)

 * 1) These five bullets track very well with the majority of positions already stated in the RFC.  The key position in this list is that the List topic, not the List title must be notable as supported by sources.  The list naming shift is also a good idea.  The other three are just good article policy which we attempt to follow today.  No content links can easily be expanded by simply transfering the relevant content from the lead in the linked article.--Mike Cline (talk) 12:54, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) The closest thing I've seen to a reflection of the majority position. Where both make good sense, I agree that we shouldn't encourage "List of", but we've got to remember that in some cases it's desirable to use it. Using the plural alone (President of the United States vs Presidents of the United States) doesn't sit quite right with me. --WFC-- 23:20, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Agree with the both Mike and WFC here. Blueboar (talk) 23:33, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) This seems like a very good summation of all the generally accepted points of the above and below proposals w.r.t to lists.  Obviously there's cases of lists themselves being notable like the example of Nixon's Enemies List that would follow from the GNG, but most other lists would follow these based on past consensus. --M ASEM  (t) 15:52, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments (Alzarian16's proposal)
Not sure what you mean. Can you explain what a list topic is? Mike and I have divergent views on this this issue. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 22:22, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Here's a simple multiple choice question that will attempt to address your question in a pedantic sort of manner.
 * ''Given the discussion in this RFC, identify the phrases below which represent generic WP List Article Titles that contain the List Topic in bold face.
 * A. List of U.S. Presidents
 * B. List of U.S. Presidents
 * C. List of Common Geometric Shapes
 * D. List of Common Geometric Shapes

Of course the answer, and even one that most fourth graders who reviewed this RFC would agree with is: A. and D. Would you chose B. and C. instead?--Mike Cline (talk) 03:10, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I didn't use the phrase "list topic" in the proposal, because I saw there were disagreements about its meaning. That's why bullet point 2 uses all that "Y of X" stuff. For the record I'm inclined to agree more with Mike's view. Alzarian16 (talk) 09:11, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The problem with what you are saying is that it is a necessary to establish the notability of Nixon's Enemies before it can be presumed that Nixon's Enemies List is notable. The problem I have with this is that the category of Nixon's Enemies does not exist, yet the list is notable in its own right. I can't put my finger on it on the moment, but I suspect your proposal is flawed. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 09:59, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm glad you raised that, because it's an issue I hadn't considered before. I think the problem is that the article isn't a list as such, but more a traditional article about a real-life list, so wouldn't come under a new guideline but would instead be covered by WP:GNG (which it passes). Perhaps wording to that effect should appear in the new guideline to avoid confusion. Alzarian16 (talk) 10:05, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that the article is not a list as such, because it goes into a lot of detail about the document itself on a page by page basis (including pictures), so creating a seperate list article would be redundant in this context. However, if a seperate list was to be created, it would be notable in its own right, as the list topic (the definition for inclusion or criteria for selection as an "enemy of Nixon") has been commented on and analysed seperately from the document itself.
 * I think that the flaw in your proposal is not just that it is based on the idea that notability is inherited between a list and a related or over arching topic, but also that a list must inherit notability in this way. By contrast, I would argue that a list can be notable in its own right, and that lists don't or don't have to inherit notability at all. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 10:35, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * So you're saying that if we had List of Nixon's enemies instead of Nixon's Enemies List it wouldn't be notable under my system? That's why I suggest renaming content lists where possible, so they can be assessed as articles instead of lists. This one's in effect had that treatment already. Alzarian16 (talk) 18:40, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, on the contrary, the title of of the article or list is of no significance in this context. "Nixon's Enemies List" is synonymous with "List of Nixon's enemies", so there is not point to have seperate articles, because no matter what the title is, the topic is still notable. I have no problem with renaming content lists, but their topic or subject matter has to be notable. The point I was making was that Nixon's Enemies does not exist as a topic, nor is it notable, yet the Nixon's enemies list is notable in its own right. This conflicts with your assertion that Reliable sources must show that the topic X in a "List of X" or the topic "Y of X" in a "List of Y of X" is notable, because, simply put, "List of X" does not inherit notability from X. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:51, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "Nixon's Enemy List" is not at all synonymous with "". Nixon's Enemies List is about a specific real document, Charles Colson's actual list of what he considered to be such people, and subsequent discussion based on it. A list of Nixon's enemies, an article that I would not support making on grounds of excessive diffuseness in multiple ways, would be a list of everyone whom a reliable source could be found to indicate was an enemy of Richard Nixon, undoubtedly a very much broader group. We are not here discussing lists like the existing article, Nixon's Enemies List an unquestionably notable and appropriate historicl topic. We are concerned with Lists based upon multiple reliable sources, prepared by collection the information in them. As far as I can tell, everyone except Gavin supports at least the possibility of such articles.    DGG ( talk ) 04:38, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The previously mentioned RSs to justify X being notable emnough to justify inclusion of X in List of X's in Y, is always sufficiently met   by X being the subject of a Wikipedia article or obviously qualified for one, though a lesser degree of notability or importance might often be considered sufficient, as by being notable enough for a article section.  If it's challenged whether a member of X is notable, the article or section on x should be discussed. If it is challenged whether x is in fact an example of X, or an example of an X that is a Y,  it should be discussed on the list talk page. It is necessary to have  sources for it, but that shouldn't challenghed if obvious from the article on x. It is not necessary to show that an example x is notable because it is a member of Y, just that it is a significant member.  List of Characters who have two heads   requires showing X is a notable or significant character, and that it has two heads.     DGG ( talk ) 04:38, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

This is not yet another in a long series of proposal sections.
Instead, it's several things to consider: Uncle G (talk) 15:26, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Sometimes the world outwith Wikipedia has gone to great lengths to make and study such lists:
 * (2nd discussion) (3rd discussion)
 * Set complements are a problem and a bad idea for lists:
 * Lists made to disprove or invalidate the list inclusion criterion itself are poor ideas for lists:
 * Lists are sometimes created to replace categories:
 * Sometimes the idea is sound, but the standalone nature and the title are poorly chosen:
 * Sometimes it's difficult to provide any context to the list:
 * The "Further reading" parts of articles are lists:
 * Lists of words are, of course, dictionaries:
 * Making lists of occurrences of a thing in film and television doesn't magically create an encyclopaedia article about the thing, even if the list is some 90KiB long:
 * (2nd discussion) (3rd discussion)
 * (2nd discussion) (3rd discussion)
 * User:Uncle G/Cargo cult encyclopaedia article writing
 * Sometimes a bare list is no substitute for an article with discussion, because it is impossible to have a neutral list:
 * The "Further reading" parts of articles are lists:
 * Lists of words are, of course, dictionaries:
 * Making lists of occurrences of a thing in film and television doesn't magically create an encyclopaedia article about the thing, even if the list is some 90KiB long:
 * (2nd discussion) (3rd discussion)
 * (2nd discussion) (3rd discussion)
 * User:Uncle G/Cargo cult encyclopaedia article writing
 * Sometimes a bare list is no substitute for an article with discussion, because it is impossible to have a neutral list:
 * (2nd discussion) (3rd discussion)
 * User:Uncle G/Cargo cult encyclopaedia article writing
 * Sometimes a bare list is no substitute for an article with discussion, because it is impossible to have a neutral list:

Ill-defined titles of list articles, and "open" or "closed" lists
One of the most important aspects of lists is that of establishing their names or titles. If the name of a list just cannot be fully agreed upon, it is almost impossible to create a viable list. One of the worst cases in Wikipedia history is that of the ill-famed "List of unusual place names" (in one of its many different guises). The trouble was that nobody could agree to the most suitable name. It pays to take a look at the history around the period of February/March 2006 of the present remnant of the article Place names considered unusual, to see what utter convulsions this list went through. Name changes included "List of interesting or unusual place names", "Unusual place names" and various other names.

But it wasn't just the title of the list, it was also the subject of the items the list included which caused no end of bother. Comments such as "I don't find (such and such) unusual" abounded, the item being reverted at the same time.

However, perhaps the most important consideration in creating a list article should be whether the list is at all practible and whether it can be maintained easily, and one of the most important aspects must be whether it is an "open" list or a "closed" list. By "open" I mean: can it be added to infinitely (which was of course one of problems of the above-mentioned list) or has it a natural limit as to the number of items included as in the "closed" variety. For example, it would be almost impossible to limit a list of phrasal verbs because of the almost infinite numbers of phrasal verbs possible, whereas a list of prepositions has a natural limit and is easy to maintain. "Open" lists are almost impossible to maintain whereas "closed" lists tend to be natural list material.

So, perhaps apart from notability, etc., it is these aspects which should also be considered in creating a list. Dieter Simon (talk) 00:50, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think the distinctions made between practicable/impracticable, maintainable/unmaintainable, open/closed are purely matters of opinion, not fact, and fall into the discredited realm of inclusion criteria based on subjective importance. The only alternative to subjective importance is inclusion based on evidence of notability, which is superior to subjective importance because it is the only set of inclusion criteria based on Wikipedia's content policies. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:15, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * How do you decide what verifiable facts are worthy of inclusion within an article? Or what belongs in the article's lead?  Or when an article is too long and subsections should be split off into separate articles?  Are those somehow objective decisions? postdlf (talk) 16:27, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, they are subjective editorial decisions... but those subjective decisions should be based upon the objective criteria that are outlined in our policies and guidelines. For example, if a verifiable fact is only mentioned by one or two sources, mentioning it may give a particular viewpoint undue weight.  Blueboar (talk) 16:40, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If you find yourself using the words "may give", then it isn't very objective. All of our policies and guidelines call for some editorial discretion and judgment in their application ("drive safely"); you'd be hard pressed to find many that are truly clear cut and objective ("drive no faster than 45 mph").  Pretending it is or can be otherwise just serves to cloud the fact that our interpretations of policies are just that, interpretations, rather than objective facts. A further note on Gavin Collins' comment above: fact and opinion are a false dichotomy.  Facts can't enforce or explain themselves, and opinions tied to explanations become arguments for building and establishing consensus.  Unelaborated opinions (i.e., naked votes) aren't worth very much in determining a proper course, but arguments (i.e., !votes) ground preferred outcomes in applications of principle and pragmatic consequences, and persuade other editors.  Hence, WP:CONSENSUS determines how things are run in Wikipedia; WP:TRUTH does not.  postdlf (talk) 17:12, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Reply to Gavin: Objective? Subjectivity? Did you actually look at the history of the list I was talking about? Take another look at the period of the first part of 2006. There was no objectivity about the list and never could be, because the list was totally unclear in its intentions, and especially in the title of the article. One minute it was "interesting" kinds of placenames, another time it was "unusual" names; then they wer "considered" unusual/interesting and then they were definitely so. Whatever it was for one side of the opinion-holders, it was an entirely different thing for the other side.


 * Don't forget, lists can be very misleading, especially in those I considered where their titles are ill-defined. There is no objectivity about them if people aren't sure what exactly the list is about. The name of the list was subjective from the very beginning. No matter how many guides and manuals you are consulting, where people think their choices of inclusions are valid in the context of the text of the list, they will go ahead and 'shove'em in'.


 * The point about an "open" of "closed" list, too, is a very valid one. It will determine the length of the list. A "closed" list is very easily dealt with, in that it only has a finite number of items that can be included naturally and it cannot be added to ad infinitum. With an "open" list, however, unless you determine very precisely what can be included, and how many can be included from the very beginning (which will very easily lead to edit wars) unless you are very precise in the direction your list should go, it will cause problems.


 * So, how do you determine what is notable, or what indeed is subjective, among village names such as Fucking in Austria and Dresden in Staffordshire, between Pratt's Bottom in Kent and Pease Pottage in West Sussex? Well, in the end the list as such was chucked out, as you can see, because nobody could do anything with it.
 * Your aspect of subjectivity isn't at all as clear cut as you are making out. Are you saying the list on the whole was subjective or the choices of items were? Because the list in itself isn't subjective at all, only the choice of its title, of its name was, and of course the items themselves. And yes, it was a matter of opinion, but then the whole list consisted of nothing but of the opinions of individiuals. Isn't that the case with a lot of lists? Lists, especially when they are infinite in their inclusions and depend on the opinions of their editors. Dieter Simon (talk) 23:10, 22 August 2010 (UTC)Dieter Simon (talk) 23:32, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Just to make it clear again which article I was talking about it is Place names considered unusual, see history 2006 Dieter Simon (talk) 00:48, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not claiming that the idea behind notability is anything but subjective, because it is a matter of opinion, not fact, that a topic is notable. However, if there is verifiable evidence of notability, then that opinion is not formed in a vacuum and can be checked by other editors to see if it supports such a claim. If a list is supported by evidence of notability, then we can presume it is notable, and make other value judgements about it as well. But in the absence of any evidence, we are wholly reliant on editorial opinion as to whether a list has subjective importance or not. Such subjective measures as practicable/impracticable, maintainable/unmaintainable, open/closed can easily be ascribed to any topic, depending on who you ask. Evidence of notability does not eliminate the need for subjective opinion, but it does act as a useful inclusion criteria because it acts as a check on lists that are unverifiable, or based on original (primary) research, or have been created purely to push a particular point of view. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 22:37, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

List of telling examples
In the pages of rule making above, I saw it said that our featured lists would pass inspection. I like to verify such assertions and so took a look myself. Almost immediately, I found cause for concern. There are some other examples of peculiar lists which may help us and so, following Uncle G's excellent example, here they are:


 * Aesop Rock discography - this is a featured list even though it seems to have few of the virtues which are advocated above. The vetting seemed perfunctory and seems to throw doubt upon the quality of the process.  It may be that articles of this sort escape the usual list-hate by avoiding the title List of ... and using the latinate word discography instead.  I recently challenged another discography on the grounds that it was an indiscriminate catalog.  I still think I had a point but the opera fans aren't buying it.  It is interesting to find that even hip-hop and rap are able to claim inherent notability too.
 * List of Texan survivors of the Battle of the Alamo - this is another featured list. It is related to List of Alamo defenders which is not featured.  The notability of the Alamo is not in doubt and there are numerous references to survivors out there.  What seems interesting about this case is that it casts its net very wide to include non-combatants and people who left the battle in various ways before the end.  There also seems scope to nitpick about the term Texan, given that other terms such as Texian and Tejano were used at the time.  I suppose that this list is protected by an informal don't mess with Texas rule.
 * List of minor planets: 123001–124000. This is one of the numerous sublists of List of minor planets.  It is a favourite example of mine because it includes minor planet #123456.  Several of these lists have been taken to AFD and, in my experience, they all survive.  See, for example, Articles for deletion/List of asteroids/7201–7300.  These lists seem good extreme examples because the total number of entries is quite enormous now - about two hundred thousand floating rocks and counting.  The rocks are spotted by robot telescopes such as LINEAR which then catalog them.  The catalog is then converted to a wikipedia article by a script.  The process seems to have broken down though as we're about 30,000 rocks behind - the last list seems to be List of minor planets: 213001–214000.
 * List of fictional Scots. I created this list myself recently.  It was quickly sent to AFD and the discussion was quite interesting as it went on for weeks without being closed - it seemed that admins didn't want to touch it.  This is not surprising as the discussion was quite intense and was eventually closed without consensus.  Compare this case with Aesop Rock discography above.  It seems that if your topic is a discography then you can have featured status without any difficulty.  If your topic concerns fiction then you will have to fight like a tiger just to keep it from being deleted.  The quality of the sourcing and notability of the topic seems quite irrelevant.  It seems apparent that fictional topics are a battleground which will bring out partisans to fight along the lines of their prejudices and tastes.
 * List of bow tie wearers. Four times at AFD and twice at DRV.  Are there any lists which are more contentious than this?

I may add more examples here as they occur to me as there seems to be no end of interminable or wacky lists.

Colonel Warden (talk) 09:45, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Colonel Warden mentions List of animals with fraudulent diplomas, but only links to it as "wacky." This is good example of a list that survived an interesting AfD. None of the animals on the list is individually notable, but the phenomenon that the article describes (that is, people obtaining degrees/diplomas for pets in order to demonstrate that an educational institution is a fraud) is widely documented in news media -- and even has helped to win lawsuits. One interesting aspect of this AfD is that the article existed without challenge for a long time when it was entitled "Colby Nolan" and contained an embedded list of other animals with diplomas, but only was taken to AfD when someone renamed it as a "List of..." --Orlady (talk) 16:46, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Summarizing the RFC
OK, we have something like 10 or 11 proposals to consider... I think it will help to to do some summarizing... to see where we agree and disagree and if there are any common trends. I can identify a few ... There seems to be a strong consensus that there is a need to clarify the issue of notability as it relates to list articles. There seems to be weaker consensus that lists are articles, and should be subject to our various policies and guidelines as such. However, there seems to be some disagreement as to how to apply our policies and guidelines. Underlying this disagreement is a disagreement over the meaning of the term "topic", especially as it relates to lists. Can anyone else identify areas where we agree or disagree? Blueboar (talk) 13:57, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I would summarize the major issues raised in this RFC as follows (in order of importance)
 * Does the burden of notability for a list style article fall on List of .....X (where some editors claim the list itself is the list topic) or on List of ....X (where X is the list topic, even if it is X and Y)?
 * Are purely navigational lists (indexes, outlines, lists of other WP lists) subject to the same notability burdens as a content oriented list?
 * Is the WP artificial naming construct: List of ... a hinderance to establishing notability of a list topic as it is a burden not imposed on the authors of reliable sources to use List of ...  when compiling complex and voluminous material? And should this naming construct be abandoned or less of a requirement for list style articles?
 * Are List style articles complimentary to or duplicative of categories?
 * These are essentially Yes/No questions, that once resolved would allow us to modify our guidelines accordingly with the appropriate details to make the policy clear and operational.--Mike Cline (talk) 15:09, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Good summary. So good that I think we should discuss them in depth... I am going to take each question and set up a sub-thread for discussion (so that we can see if there is any consensus. Blueboar (talk) 15:41, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure the summary points below (as yes/no questions) take adequate account of lists whose inclusion criteria include customary numerical, temporal or geographical criteria for inclusion, sub-division, or sort order. These presumably count as content-oriented but one might want to permit these (even if the sub-division is not notable) while believing that generally "List of x" should be notable. In these cases the additional criteria may serve to prevent the list becoming too long or to make it easier to find items in the list. I am thinking of things like lists of cities limited by population size or lists of people per century, per continent, or per country. --Boson (talk) 16:31, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Summary Point 1: Burden of notability

 * I think the burden falls on establishing that X is a notable list topic. The idea that the topic of a list is the list itself is nonsensical to me. Blueboar (talk) 15:43, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Inclusion of "List of X" is tied to the notability of "X"; there are also cases of lists where it is "List of Y of X" (like TV episode lists), in such cases, as long as Y is not an indiscriminate/uncorrelated factor of X, the notability of X is sufficient to allow for inclusion. --M ASEM (t) 16:03, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * re: Y of X... this is where it gets tricky... I could not support without clarification as to what is an "indiscriminate/uncorrelated factor". As soon as you start tack on Y you are essentially creating a sub-topic under the topic of X.  This is what gets abused so frequently.  Remember, notability is not inherited, so the sub-topic needs to stay very close to the parent topic for us to say that notability is transferred from one to the other.  I think it is safer to say that the notability of a sub-topic needs to be established.  Blueboar (talk) 16:22, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Y of X is generally the case of where summary style starts to take over. If, without SIZE limits, one would expect Y to be covered in X (in a manner otherwise consistent with all other policy and guidelines), but cannot be included due to our size limit, it seems there is no issue of "List of Y of X" to exist separately as long as it is a list with the same level of detail of content and application of other policies as if it were embedded.  EG, a list of episodes of a TV show would be part of the coverage of that show if the article could go on for several several pages; instead consensus is to split these out to a separate list to avoid that size issue.  (Thare a lot of bad "List of Y of X" articles out there, but that's not to say there aren't some good ones too). --M ASEM  (t) 16:29, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Don't overthink this one guys. If a list topic is X of Y then the burden of notability is on X of Y.  X of Y implies that a notable relationship between X and Y exist, supported by reliable sources.  i.e. Birds of Yellowstone National Park is notable whilst Birds of 15th Street is probably not. The burden of notability is on the list topic as described in the lead (whatever it is whether it is X, X of Y or Y of X. --Mike Cline (talk) 17:28, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * See, that's a nice simple rule of thumb, but it leaves out several types of lists that are normally accepted where the "List of Y of X" or "Y of X" is not notable, but X, an already large topic, is. These often end up from fiction (episodes and character lists), but I don't think the problem is limited there. This is why it's important there's an aspect of Summary Style here.  This is not to dismiss the simple rule of thumb, but realize it doesn't cover the entire picture right. --M ASEM  (t) 17:51, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The bird example is a helpful one, at least in some contexts. We shouldn't have a List of birds on 15th Street because it's not a sensible way to organize birds; individual streets have absolutely no bearing on bird ranges, and I would presume that no sources could be found studying birds by street.  But what about a List of birds in FOO park?  I've seen guides to birds for individual parks (like Central Park in NYC); depending on the park, it may have a large habitat and be a prime bird watching site.  So generally, lists of birds by park can make sense.  So as long as FOO park itself merits an article, and is of sufficient size that it makes sense to talk about wildlife found there (i.e., it's not a 10 foot bare patch of grass in a traffic circle), we should be able to put together a list of birds in FOO park from separate sources even if no reliable source has ever compiled such a list for that particular park.  Someone else might be able to put together a more concise principle from what I just said, or to poke holes in it if there's something I haven't thought through.  postdlf (talk) 14:16, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If there are published sources that talk about "birds in Foo Park" then the topic is notable... if there are no published sources that talk about "birds in Foo Park", then the topic is not notable (see the side discussion below on how WP:NOR relates to WP:N... if there is no source that discusses "birds in Foo Park, then the topic is based on original research). Blueboar (talk) 17:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Something doesn't become original research just because it's been combined from multiple sources; if that were true, we'd be unable to combine any references in any single articles that other references had not already combined. If Source X expressly says Bird 1 is found in FOO park, and Source Y says Bird 2 is found in FOO park, I have not violated WP:OR by saying that both Bird 1 and Bird 2 can be found in FOO park even if no single source has said both birds can be found in FOO park.  postdlf (talk) 17:34, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If I could be so bold as to correct Postdlf, you are ignoring the fact that the list topic itself has not been verified. Since the list topic defines whether or not Bird 1 and Bird 2 should feature in it, the list topic needs to be defined first, not after the fact. At first sight, the scenario he describes appears to be Chicken or the egg dilemma, but it is not. In Wikipedia, it is necessary to determine whether the list topic is notable before content is added because WP:NNC does not work backwards. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:47, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Your comment just repeats your opinion, disagreed with by most here, that lists themselves need to be notable even when they are indisputably verifiable, NPOV subtopics of notable subjects, and/or navigational subgroupings of notable subjects. We get that.  What no one gets is why you insist on that, other than it would help you delete your pet peeve List of Masonic buildings (which you think is not verifiable or NPOV, so your notable list shibboleth is really beside the point, a back door to deleting that list so you don't have to establish a consensus on the harder points).  You haven't explained the problem with proceeding as I have explained above, using that example.  Or at least you haven't explained the problem beyond stating that it fails the test you insist upon, abstracted or disregarding any practical consequences that I can determine.  Why should we delete non-notable lists?  Because the lists aren't notable.
 * In this particular hypothetical, the list topic is clearly defined even though no single source has itself published such a list. Bird species are notable.  Foo park is notable.  Those are givens in this hypothetical.  And we can find multiple reliable sources, each separately stating that a given bird is found in FOO park.  Whether a bird is found somewhere, such as to be meaningfully included in a list regarding that place, is criteria well established elsewhere; it is not reinvented in each instance, so we can be confident that we are not committing some kind of OR synthesis.  There may be a valid argument that FOO park is not a meaningful bird habitat, but that would be an argument specific to FOO park, not an a priori argument against trying this kind of endeavor from a straightforward compilation of information from multiple sources.  Or go back to the List of birds from Zanzibar example for an easier hypothetical. Or we can go back to the List of people from Rancho Cucamonga, California, or List of people from the Isle of Wight.  The places are notable, the included people are notable, it's verifiable whether someone is from those places, and we have a million lists regarding people from FOO, so such lists would not be inventing inclusion criteria.  Can you explain why such lists should be impermissible, assuming they were first compiled on Wikipedia?  Assuming everything I've said about those lists is true, how are they flawed?  postdlf (talk) 14:04, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think you are ignoring the point that WP:NOTINHERITED applies to list topics as well article topics. Just because the Queen is notable, that does not mean that a List of Buckingham Palace residents is notable. But even if she was not notable, the list would be notable if it has been commented on in its own right. You have not explained how a list topic (i.e. the criteria or definition that determines what is in the list) can be notable if it has not actually been "noted". --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:43, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * My last question immediately above was not a rhetorical one; I expected you to answer it if you were going to bother replying. Yet again, you have completely failed to engage with any of the hypotheticals above and elsewhere in this sprawling circuitous page, and the very real problems they pose for your view; you've just repeated your opinion, with a different acronym spat out, that lists must be notable as lists, without explaining why lists that do not meet that little test are inherently bad.  So that completely fails as a reply. Requiring that a list is itself notable is not required to ensure that lists are verifiable, as a list can be compiled from multiple sources that have not themselves compiled the list, and a list is not unbound by notability concerns just because the list itself is not notable, if it is a subtopic of a notable topic or lists notable topics by a shared encyclopedic characteristic.  You have not addressed any of that, so I wonder why anyone should bother to communicate with you on these issues, or consider your opinion, when you blithely ignore critiques and problems posed.  I'm straining to see what has been contributed by you here beyond your first assertion that lists themselves should be notable as lists.  If that doesn't change, I suggest everyone just click their mental ignore button regarding your comments here. You do not have a sensible, or consensus-supported, interpretation of WP:NOTINHERITED, as has been pointed out in other comments here, and I fear that you are unable to distinguish between the actual guideline of a policy and how you would like that guideline applied.  We can both agree that NOTINHERITED means that just because the Queen is notable, her home is not necessarily notable or her hairdresser is not necessarily notable.  We can both agree also that NOTINHERITED further means that if Buckingham Palace is notable, then its residents are not automatically notable.  BUT, who resided in Buckingham Palace may be verifiable and encyclopedic in furtherance of coverage of that topic, particularly if most or all of those residents are independently notable.  I don't know that you disagree with that, at least when the list is kept within the parent topic article, which makes your disagreement with the next point indefensible: If that list of residents is verifiable and encyclopedic but too large for the single Buckingham Palace article, then it should be split off into a separate list of residents, regardless of whether that verifiable and encyclopedic information has never been compiled into a single list before.  The simple fact that your approach is completely blind to all of that is why it has been rejected as destructive, unworkable, contrary to practice, and in no way compelled by the text or purpose behind any current policy or guideline.  If you don't have anything qualitatively different to contribute, then good day, sir.  But if you want to continue to disagree, but actually explain why in concrete terms, and actually engage with the points that people are making beyond repeating the opinion that they're wrong, then please do so.  postdlf (talk) 15:18, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps I should go back to the List of people from the Isle of Wight to illustrate the the problems which your example creates. The list has the following problems:
 * The list topic itself is not verifiable, i.e. there is no reliable source cited which explains, defines or provides a set of inclusion criteria for which people should be (or not) in the list, and so explain what the list is about;
 * The list is not notable, i.e. no reliable source has commented on the list in any way.
 * Which parent topic this list seeks to serve is a mystery to me: I doubt very much that a list of people from the Isle of Wight serves any encycylopedic purpose; in fact WP:TRIVIA advises that "Sections with lists of miscellaneous information (such as "trivia" sections) should be avoided as an article develops." In my view, this list fits that description perfectly, but oranganising trivia into a list is not a valid criteria for its inclusion in Wikipedia.
 * In short there is no rationale for inclusion, because it is a classic example of a list article that fails WP:NOT and WP:NOT. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:51, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Isle of Wight is verifiable and notable. There are also notable people who are from the Isle of Wight.  And whether someone is "from" the Isle of Wight is verifiable, and the inclusion criteria is the same as any other List of people from FOO article.  It's not invented specifically for List of people from the Isle of Wight or in any way peculiar to the topic.  We verify each entry's inclusion in the list by providing a citation supporting that entry's inclusion.  In the case of "people from FOO" lists, "from" can mean different connections to the place, such as born there, lived there, went to school there, and so we further annotate the list to explain that.  And such a list would be limited to people who merit articles because there is no encyclopedic merit to listing non-notable people in this instance (other lists may differ, if completion is a worthy goal).  Again, this is common and uncontroversial practice on Wikipedia, not in any way peculiar to this particular list.  It is simply an obvious permutation of an established way of indexing/listing.
 * That is your preferred criteria, not actual observed or required criteria, nor good or workable criteria. Isle of Wight is notable, and there are notable people from there.  The list thus indexes information pertaining to the notable topics of the place and the biographies, just as many other lists do.  That no one has commented "on the list" is irrelevant because the list is just an index of content we have that fits the inclusion criteria; we might as well ask whether anyone has commented on the article of Isle of Wight.  So when I (and most others) say "I don't care whether anyone has commented on the list", I mean it.  I don't care.  I'm not pretending that a list is really itself notable as a list in the way you mean.  I instead don't care because that's not a relevant or useful criterion.  So complaining that something fails that criterion really doesn't matter to someone who doesn't use that criterion. Calling compilations of people by place of origin "trivia" accomplishes nothing except to tell us you don't like it; it's certainly not objectively true that it's trivia, and it isn't reasonably characterized as "miscellaneous information".  There has instead been a strong consensus among editors for many years that place of origin is one of the most defining biographical facts about a person, and encyclopedic information about a place; I see that expressed all the time in WP:CFD discussions, among other places (and category deletion criteria are far more stringent than deletion criteria for lists in practice).  So no one I've seen but you (maybe one or two others) would think this list fails WP:NOT and WP:NOT.  Trying to frame your opinion as fact ("this fails WP:FOO" rather than "I think this fails WP:FOO because...") doesn't make it any more true or convincing.  postdlf (talk) 16:57, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * As I have said before, your argument that List of people from the Isle of Wight is a notable topic is based on circular reasoning: "The List of people from the Isle of Wight is a notable topic. The fact that the list contains only people that are notable proves this". I am sorry to say this (no insult intended), but in the absence of any verifiable evidence that the list topic is itself notable rather than its contents, your argument is a logical fallacy known as Begging the question. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 22:01, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Your reply is, as I have said before, more sophistry that fails to respond to, or properly characterize, what I actually said. I said good day, sir.  postdlf (talk) 22:35, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Maybe it is, but then again maybe it is not. Even if you disagree with my analysis, you have to concede that a lack of reliable sourcing for the list topic (its definition) is problematic. I can't prove that the list topic fails WP:BURDEN, but there are no sources to prove it passes either. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 22:47, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Remember, it's "verifiability" not "verified". It appears common sense is clear in this case that the list is verifiable, and that you're the only one having the problem with the lack of presence of sources. --M ASEM  (t) 22:55, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Asked and answered. postdlf (talk) 22:58, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The list topic is not verifiable. There is no sourced definition, not even a vague one. Without a definition from a reliable source, how do you know what items should or should not be in the list? Simply put, if the people in the list are presumed to be notable, on what basis can we presume the list to be notable? I am not sure I follow your argument. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 04:38, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "How do you know what items should or should not be in the list?" You are telling us that "List of people from the Isle of Wight" (even by name alone) has such a confusing definition that we need a source to tell us what to include or what not to include?  Do you see how absurd it is when we don't take even a basic amount of common sense in considering these types of lists? --M ASEM  (t) 05:00, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It is not absurd, because it can be implied from the title that all people from the Isle of Wight could be included, but that is not the case. It is supposed to be a list of notable people from the Isle of Wight, but this is not made clear in either the title or the definition. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 05:07, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Fixed. But again, limiting a List of people from FOO to people with articles or who should have articles is not a problem unique to that list.  It's purely a matter of style convention that list titles do not include words like "notable" or "famous" even though lists are usually restricted to such examples.  That List of people from the Isle of Wight should not duplicate the phone book is not a difficult conclusion to reach, or to enforce. And I don't see how that's any different, or more difficult to address, than the article title Isle of Wight making someone think that all information, opinions, or claims about the Isle of Wight could be included.  It's not titled Summary of encyclopedic, NPOV, and verifiable information on the Isle of Wight that a consensus of editors agrees belongs.  I've seen non-notable people added to place articles just as frequently as to separate list articles (and just as frequently removed).  postdlf (talk) 14:15, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Whether the List of people from the Isle of Wight should not duplicate the phone book but contain only notable people who were born there, or who have adopted the island as their residence is a matter of opinion, which is why the list topic that defines its content should be lifted from a reliable source. You have added the definition based on what you think it is, and that is original research. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:22, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Whether the List of people from the Isle of Wight should not duplicate the phone book but contain only notable people who were born there, or who have adopted the island as their residence is a matter of opinion, which is why the list topic that defines its content should be lifted from a reliable source. You have added the definition based on what you think it is, and that is original research. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:22, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Whether the List of people from the Isle of Wight should not duplicate the phone book but contain only notable people who were born there, or who have adopted the island as their residence is a matter of opinion, which is why the list topic that defines its content should be lifted from a reliable source. You have added the definition based on what you think it is, and that is original research. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:22, 26 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The Burden of Notability is on X (the list topic) not List of X (the list title(any rewording of list policy in WP:N or WP:SAL must be unequivocal on this.)--Mike Cline (talk) 16:11, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It depends on the list. First, obviously the contents of all lists should be verifiable.  But that doesn't mean that a list of 100 items organized around a single shared characteristic can't be verified by 100 separate sources verifying that each exhibits that characteristic.  Second, in no way should a list be completely untethered from notability requirements.  But that doesn't mean that all the entries of a list must themselves merit articles, or that the list itself should have been notable somehow.  It would be silly to delete a verifiable list of notable entries (say, a list of notable people from a particular county or small town) just because Wikipedia contributors were the first to take the time to put it together. Regarding the notability of the entries of the list, it depends on the list.  A list that organizes people by their country, state, or city of origin should in all likelihood only contain entries that merit articles, for obvious reasons.  Other lists may arguably have entries that are at least of second-order notability, such as a list of songs by subject matter, where at least the album on which the song was recorded should be notable.  Finally, other lists may contain non-notable entries if the list is capable of being complete and we have an encyclopedic interest in completing the list.  We could play semantic games and invent names for these different kinds of lists, but I don't know that the boundaries would be meaningful, and I don't have much faith in precise magic words that would absolve of us of the responsibility for exercising case-by-case judgment. Regarding the notability of the organizing concept of the list (i.e., the list itself), it again depends on the list.  For lists that consist entirely of notable entries, we have no reason not to be flexible and tolerant; such lists simply index article topics by shared facts and characteristics.  We can declare that we don't like trivia, and avoid lists based entirely on superficial coincidence or entirely commonplace things, but what is trivia is not always agreed upon.  A good guiding principle might be whether the organizing fact is significant to the articles' subject or is itself notable, but I don't know how much that can always carry the day. It gets more complicated when lists start intersecting different facts; we call intersections we don't like "unencyclopedic cross-categorizations."  We call intersections we like "sublists."  The intersected facts may meaningfully relate to each other.  One fact may be a reasonable, though arbitrary, way of breaking the other fact into manageable chunks.  Or the facts may be completely unrelated and an unreasonable method of subgrouping, and the list therefore appropriate for deletion.  It really depends on the list. One final general observation: the more acronym-laden guidelines we write over the years, the more people lazily fall back on insisting that "violates WP:FOO" is an argument rather than an unelaborated opinion.  In any event, you still need to do the work of applying the guideline or policy to the content at hand.  Writing more prescriptive guidelines doesn't necessarily help with that.  postdlf (talk) 20:07, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No matter how carefully & intelligently we try to write our guidelines, Postdlf, we will always encounter cases were someone uses the "violates WP:FOO" argument. Sometimes it is because a given case does fall squarely under WP:FOO, but far more often it is because people confuse Wikipedia guidelines & policy with the legal restrictions commonly encountered in the Real World(tm). Maybe this could be avoided if we permitted very severe sanctions for people who can't explain in their own words what a given guideline or policy meant when they invoke the "violates WP:FOO" argument, but I know this would only result in more fighting over content & wikilawyering. -- llywrch (talk) 00:25, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree almost entirely with postdlf, except to add that concentrating on notability is mistaken - what matters is the appopriateness of a list article on this topic. Sometimes a list is simply a poor form of arranging the information, sometimes it is an appropriate form, sometimes the information does not "deserve" to be organized (which is really what "notability of a list" means). TheGrappler (talk) 21:31, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Only because I am unclear on what you mean by appropriateness, please either point me to the guideline that establishes the standards for appropriateness and how they are judged or spell them out here. I am unsure as to how I would evaluate a list topic as appropriate without knowing what the standards of appropriateness are.  Notability is addressed by coverage of a topic in reliable sources.  How is appropriateness addressed?--Mike Cline (talk) 22:25, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:CLT is a good start. Some information is more appropriately presented as a list than as a category - e.g. individual items in the list may not be notable enough for separate articles; many individual items are notable but currently redlinked (so wouldn't show in a category); membership of individual items in the category is disputed or nuanced and it is preferable to annotate the details rather than just display a binary categorization. Sometime information may be appropriately presented in both forms, with the list article serving as an annotated version of the category (and hence not redundant) or just one which is capable of non-alphabetical ordering (a current flaw of categories is that they can't show chronological order). Sometimes categories are preferable without lists e.g. if the list page would be likely to be large and unmaintable, or would fail to add any editorial value. This is just the start of course, as all we've talked about so far is whether category or list or both is appropriate, and not whether the information should be presented in any of these forms at all; clearly if it is a form of presentation that has itself been subject to notable commentary (e.g. List of U.S. Presidents by height order) then that passes the test. But there are other lists such as List of hospitals in Oregon that may serve more as a useful navigational aid, or as a means of presenting and breaking down information, than as a response to summarizing critical commentary. I'm not sure I explained that very well, but bottom line is for the Oregon hospitals page, the order is is irrelevant, and it isn't a response to media argument about the relevance or comparative merits of hospitals in Oregon. That list nevertheless seems worth keeping because it collates information about reasonably noteworthy things (hospitals) in a well-defined and reasonable geographical area (a list of hospitals for the entire world or country would be unfeasibly large and should be broken into sublists, one for individual towns with one or two hospitals in would be pointlessly finely granulated; granularity is an important aspect often discussed at WP:CFD but also relevant to assessing appropriateness of list articles). But we also have articles about things where individual items are not deemed notable enough for an article, yet the concept of the list as a whole is (hence List of minor planets: 25001–26000). Questions of granularity, navigability and maintainability all need to be weighed up, and things like the current state of the community's ability to cope with the page are often deemed relevant too. For instance Miscellany for deletion/List of people by name - deemed to big for the community to handle - and this debate for List of gay, lesbian or bisexual people almost went the same way. Ultimately we have a strong LGBT project and in the end List of gay, lesbian or bisexual people: A became a featured list! But had it remained in as poor a state as the List of People by Name, it would have gone too. List of vegetarians has been through a number of AFDs, been deleted, and come back again, and the question of notability has never been an important one in those AFDs - the question was whether it was presenting useful information, whether it was well-referenced (or referencable at all, since some sources were deemed conflicting), and if it was maintainable - as well as the question of how well-defined it is, since large sections of the world's population are vegetarian for religious or cultural reasons. These are questions of appropriateness, not notability, and I think the community has shown at AFD that it is generally quite pragmatic about how it treats lists. Lists that are clearly of no practical use, aren't maintainable, or of entirely trivial things, tend to be deleted. Sometimes it seems that the community balances one concern against another (e.g. a list that's useful but has maintainability issues, in which case it seems to be more likely to be deleted if there are BLP issues; or a list that is of notable things, but is too long to be useful, may end up being broken down into sublists e.g. by letter or by country). I've tried to include what I've gleaned from observing 5+ years of list-related AFDs. But I haven't seen in one place a coherent list of all the things that people have historically weighted up about lists; I'm not sure whether one is needed but certainly decisions have not always been very consistent. Aside from general principles, much seems to rest on the quality of the list under debate - well-referenced ones which add extensive annotated information tend to stay - rather than considering how good a list could become after editorial improvement. That's not necessarily a bad thing though; it seems to be related to a pragmatic belief that the fact a list is bloated and of low-quality indicates that the community is not currently able to maintain it. I've seen an awful lot of comments in List AFDs to the tune of "delete, but if someone can find a bot to automate maintenance, or it can be shown it's possible to start it from scratch with good sourcing, I'd keep it next time" - more so than for other types of AFD. TheGrappler (talk) 00:53, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * More "list of X" than "X". I think people must find a way to WP:verify notability of the list in third-party sources. But I might be open to a different standard that rests more on "X" if we had some other standard to prevent every article from having a duplicate list. For example, the notability of virgins does not automatically mean we should have a list of virgins article. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:05, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that we should not have a List of virgins ... but the reason for this has little to do with the notability of the topic... the topic of "virgins" does not really lend itself to listifying, and it would be near impossible to verify that the items (people) listed fit the topic.  However, the topic (virgins) is still notable.  Blueboar (talk) 23:54, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, an restrained list of virgins would be overwhelmed by those who are presently children or died at that age and those who joined religious orders requiring celibacy (such as Catholic priests and nuns). Virginity is simply not remarkable, except maybe in certain contexts.  If we could think of some kind of coherent inclusion criteria, something like "notable people who are or were virgins despite living into adulthood and not joining a religious order..." (ick, don't quote me on this).  I wouldn't bother trying, but I can't say it's philosophically impossible to make some kind of valid list out of it.  postdlf (talk) 14:27, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Is there a consensus emerging here?. List of virgins is inappropriate, despite the notability of virgins. I'm open to a guideline as to why. The obvious stuff applies: WP:IINFO, WP:NOTDIR, unencyclopedic cross-categorization, and even the fact that it hasn't been covered by third-party sources. Admittedly, it sounds like I'm throwing the kitchen sink at this list, but it's also because I'm trying to get at a common sense idea that most reasonable Wikipedians would agree with. The list would be "overwhelmed", and the list "does not really lend itself to listifying". These are the kinds of sentiments that I think a good guideline would describe if we could just put our heads together. Shooterwalker (talk) 22:50, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't say that was a bad list because of any of the reasons you've listed; it's certainly not an unencyclopedic cross-categorization because it's not a cross-categorization (just a categorization), and it doesn't violate NOTDIR because it's not reasonably characterized as a directory of virgins (whatever that would be...sounds like some kind of fraternity target list). Nothing at WP:IINFO is relevant either.  It was deleted at Articles for deletion/List of virgins because a consensus of editors determined that its organizing concept was ultimately not verifiable (reliable sources apparently could not establish that the list's entries were, in fact, virgins, or merely claimed to be) or NPOV (editors could not agree on a workable definition of virginity).  My comments above were made before I read that AFD, as would I suspect most of the comments about that list here, because everyone is using that list as a poster child for their own pet criteria regardless of why it was actually deleted.  I think the only principle that could be extracted from it is, while concept FOO may itself be notable and merit an article, if the application of FOO in many or all instances is not verifiable, POV, or otherwise controversial, then an accompanying list of FOO may in turn be unverifiable and POV.  But that sounds so obvious, it's probably already written down somewhere.  postdlf (talk) 23:42, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I would agree with your reasoning. There are a lot of reasons to delete that list. But really it does come down to community consensus that it's inappropriate, even though we haven't actually written down a clear guideline in one central location. I know what you said sounds obvious, but I think that's actually a great place for a guideline to start. For example, "List of foos is an appropriate list if there are third-party sources about foos, and the criteria for inclusion in the list is clear and indisputable." No one would dispute who is or is not a Japanese painter, but you might dispute who is a virgin, so forget that. I say that as a starting point of course. Shooterwalker (talk) 00:13, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think the "notability of the list" is a coherent way to approach lists generally. It would potentially exclude many valid lists just because Wikipedia contributors were the first one to combine separate sources together, even where such combining did not violate WP:OR or WP:NPOV. I agree with your virgin example; similarly, cycling does not mean we should have a list of people who ride bicycles, or eating --> list of people who eat.  We agree on that, of course.  Some facts are just too mundane to be worth documenting; there's no utility in it from either the perspective of the list entry (the individual doing X) or the list's organizing concept (X). But those are easy cases, and there are certainly much more narrow groupings of virgins and cyclists that might merit lists. And there are also valid lists that may be formed out of facts that are common (in that they may be true of many nonnotable people, for example) but that are significant to many subjects; this is how I'd view the List of people from FOO lists. Wikipedia may be the first to bother compiling, for example, a List of people from Rancho Cucamonga, California. The list is almost entirely limited to notable entries (a few could be pruned).  Let's also pretend the list is sourced (it isn't). It is verifiable whether people came from Rancho Cucamonga, and not OR to compile those connections together in one place. All settlements are notable, and we can limit such a list to only notable entries...and it's verifiable, significant, relevant, encyclopedic, whatever, for someone to be from a particular place (or for that place to have people from it). But could you say the list itself is notable, if it's been first compiled here?  That's simply not a useful approach because it asks the wrong question and it would have unwanted consequences. postdlf (talk) 00:17, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Shooterwalker – I am always intrigued by arguments that our guidelines and polices must prevent something (the proliferation) of articles instead of establishing reliable and consistent inclusion criteria. Purely for the sake of hypothetical argument, if every notable article of X, had a corresponding notable List of Xs and there was no doubt that the List of Xs was appropriate for WP, would you still argue that we shouldn’t have a list of X for every article X. (I realize this is hypothetical, and highly unlikely to be the real world case).  But shouldn’t we be establishing sound inclusion criteria and not be worrying about the volume of content that might be allowed by that criteria.--Mike Cline (talk) 00:16, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I guess my goal here is twofold. One is to describe the way things are, and the other is to describe how things should be. That's what is meant when we say that guidelines are developed by the community to describe best practice. Not just any old practice, but best practice. In ordinary practice, we delete a lot of lists. Virgin is a suitable article, but list of virgins is unacceptable as a list. That's ordinary practice, and it hasn't been described adequately because we waste a lot of time arguing about why that list is unacceptable. That waste goes both ways, spending time trying to delete lists that really should stick around (the "don't we already have a category for this" non-argument) or discussing lists at AFD that should really have no compelling reason to keep (the "we keep any list where we can verify a few entries" or "we can keep any list that helps people navigate to articles" non-argument).
 * Ideally, we'd even describe best practice. But as of yet I don't think we even have a guideline that clearly states what we do ordinarily. People throw around words like "indiscriminate" or "unencyclopedic cross categorization" which are documented in WP:NOT. But sometimes they apply and sometimes they don't, and sometimes we keep and sometimes we delete. There are always going to be arguments. But you can't deny that "delete: indiscriminate" is thrown around just as much as "keep: discriminate". Half of people make up the definition of these as they go. That's because we haven't documented them.
 * So, to answer your question more directly, inclusion criteria is a big fuzzy line. On one side of the line, we include. On the other side, we exclude. The line is fuzzy, and we have to discuss a lot of stuff around that line. But we shouldn't draw a line so fuzzy so as to include or exclude virtually everything. Right now the line is very fuzzy. And a lot of the proposals I've seen above seem like they either give pretense to delete everything or keep everything. Shooterwalker (talk) 01:09, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Personally, I'd like to see as many lists possible deleted--I think the category system does a good job of providing a nice navigation framework. Nonetheless, I am aware that this does not match current consensus, so I have an alternative idea. The burden of Notability of "List of X" lies upon establishing that X is notable. Furthermore I propose that stand-alone lists may only exist if 1) those lists could reasonably be contained within a specific, non-list article, but isn't because of article-length considerations and 2) those lists would meet the requirements of WP:NPOV, WP:OR, and, most importantly, WP:DUE, within that article. This means, for instance, that while "List of People from City X" could be a separate list, the only people that could appear on the list are those who are verifiably a part of the list and are notable enough for inclusion (a lower standard than WP:N, but a higher standard than "anyone I can think of"). This would, for example, eliminate lists like List of people of Korean descent, as there is no article into which that list could be placed (unlike "List of people from location X, which has a clear article). Also, it would eliminate lists like List of high schools in California, because such a list would have undue weight in that article. Instead, those people and schools would have category tags which would indicate their inclusion into such groups.Qwyrxian (talk) 01:18, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Your WP:DUE logic is flawed because DUE is an NPOV precept--ie. giving due wieght within an article to different POVs. A List of high schools in California is not a POV.  DUE/UNDUE propose is not to restrict the inclusion of neutral content, but instead to allow for a balance between POVs.  Therefore your logic that the material in a standalone list might not be suitable for the article, thus the standalone list should not be allowed is based on an improper interpretation of DUE unless the list indeed is a POV (unfortunately this misinterpretation of DUE happens all the time).--Mike Cline (talk) 13:09, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Your whole comment is flawed from start to finish. The different and complementary capabilities and uses of lists verses categories has been discussed ad nauseum in many forums, and is already a guideline.  That you want to delete a large quantity of articles is simply not a valid or relevant motivation here.  Proposing a guideline on the sole basis that it will accomplish said deletion has no merit.  Can you come up with any intrinsic benefit to the criteria you propose, other than it would help delete lists you do not like? I will disagree with Mike Cline in part; WP:UNDUE is at least in part about not overemphasizing certain information within an article beyond its relative significance to the subject ("Undue weight applies to more than just viewpoints. An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject.").  Which is not to say it has any relevance to lists as you claim.  Your proposed guideline nonsensically asks that we pretend that a separate list is instead not separate, just so we can then claim that it skews the article of which it is not a part too much towards coverage of one subtopic.  That little game wouldn't even work in most cases to delete the lists you want to delete, because if we imagined that the list of high schools were rolled back into Education in California, so would also a list of public school districts in California, list of private schools, list of universities, etc., etc.  So there would be no UNDUE problem with the list of high schools in your little thought game.  postdlf (talk) 15:09, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Incidentally, the most obvious parent for list of people of Korean descent would be Korean diaspora. postdlf (talk) (14:16, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Postdlf - I will concede that DUE does in part address relative significance of content within a given article. The only real problem is that relative significance is vague and subject to so much interpretation as to be a not very useful criteria because the solution to content that is not relatively significant is to delete it or spin it out (changes all the other relative significance in the article), add more significant content to balance the relativity.  Problematic in real interpretation and too often used as an unreasoned weapon for deletion.--Mike Cline (talk) 16:01, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree with Qwyrxian. We don't have to have lists based on non-notable topics that give undue weight to content that fails WP:NOT, such as trivia, plot summaries and lists of people with are somehow related to a notable topic. These are the principles behind WP:AVOIDSPLIT and WP:WITHIN: if a topic or sub-topic is not notable in its own right, then we can summarise, rather than expand upon, that topic. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 22:11, 24 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Personally I'm not a fan of list articles, most of the navigation value can be gained and more easily maintained through the use of categories and templates. With that in mind I believe there should be a fairly rigorous burden of notability in the same way as any other article is required to meet.  There should be two aspects, the topic of the list itself and the inclusion criteria.  Blueboar suggested a derived notability from an existing article, which I could agree with although would suggest that the list should stand alone so should restate the notability rationale, however if no article X exists then I would question whither List of X should exist.  Inclusion criteria should be pretty clear from that but it's useful to be able to clearly state them in the body.  A little more difficult where the list is X/Y but it should still be possible to frame the notability and inclusion.  The threshold probably is the need for any Original Research or Synthesis where there is a need to combone X and Y.  ALR (talk) 07:50, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * ALR raises a very good point here... with "X of Y" articles (and especially lists) we do need to be alert to synthesis and other forms of OR. Not only do we need to establish that "X of Y" is notable... we need to establish that it is not original. Blueboar (talk) 14:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I've got to be picky here. If X of Y is notable (ie. supported by reliable sources) how can it possibly be OR? I am not saying that if sources are combined to support X of Y in a SYN way that its not OR, but neither is it notable.  However, if a source or multiple sources state X of Y, then X of Y is notable but it could not possibly be OR.--Mike Cline (talk) 14:40, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * That's the point, exactly... this is one area where WP:N and WP:NOR overlap. If the topic is based on OR, I don't see how it could be considered notable. Indeed, I see WP:N as being a summation of all our core policies... as they are applied at the macro scale... as applied to entire topics.   Blueboar (talk) 16:46, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Remember, we require topics to be notable to avoid indiscriminate. One measurement of notability is the WP:GNG, which is what does embed a lot of other policy to avoid unverified, biased, or original claims of notability. That's fine, but that doesn't encompass notable topics 100%.  A topic that everyone by consensus knows should be included because it otherwise meets all other policies and supports Wikipedia's goals but simply can't be shown to meet the GNG will still be included.  This is why notability and its subsequent ideas are all guidelines - generally applicable across the work of WP but with common sense application and exception (not as hard nosed as some are trying to press it as). --M ASEM  (t) 17:22, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Mike, that is exactly the point. At the moment we don't require a burden of evidence to establish notability of any list topic.  Personally I would say we need to be recommending that, there is no adequate reason that List articles shouldn't be held to the same standard of evidence as any other article.  In the main single topic lists probably could establish notability, but there are many that appear to be very weak on the evidence front.  If we're going to require a burden of evidence to establish notability then we also need to close the potential loophole.  We can deal with that by requiring all article topics to demonstrate adequate notability, whether by reference to a parent article in summary form, or independently, particularly if no potential parent article exists.
 * ALR (talk) 20:26, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I more or less agree with Postdlf's viewpoints and elaborations here. In general, the notability requirements relate to the subject of the list rather than the list itself, but lists come in many forms and it does depend on the list as well. Thinking about this some more, the list's topic is subject to the same notability criteria as the topic of other articles, and the mantra that some people are trying to exempt list articles from notability requirements seems like a red herring. Sjakkalle (Check!)  09:36, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Fundamental Issue in this RFC This is one of the fundamental issues that lead to this RFC and must not be discounted in the resolution of this RFC.--Mike Cline (talk) 14:45, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The answer to the fundamental question is already given by WP:NOTINHERITED - every topic (including list topics) have to stand on their own (notable) feet, and can't rely on a close relationship or association with another topic - that would be hearsay. Since a list topic uniquely defines what is in the list, that means its subject matter is distinct from related topics featured in other articles and lists, e.g. List of people from the Isle of Wight is a different topic with different focus and content from say, Isle of Wight. The idea that lists topics are not distinct in their own right is based on circular reasoning: "the List of people from the Isle of Wight is a notable, because it contains only notable people from a notable location. The fact its subject matter is notable proves that". What is need to break out of this circular argument is verifiable evidence that list topic is itself notable, not just that a related article or the list components are notable. We can infer or imagine that the list is notable, but such guess work can lead to a category mistake. The reality is that there aren't any reliable sources to prove that it is. The burden of notability falls on the list topic itself. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:00, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Gavin, most if not all the positions above agree that the List Topic should be notable. I do. However, you continue however to confuse the List Topic with the List Title and apparently refuse to make that distinction in your positions. If you believe the the entire phase List of X (i.e. the List Title) needs to be notable in its own right, please say so clearly.  Don't obscure the discussion by refering to List Topic when in fact you are refering to the List Title.  You are entitled to your position just as all other editors are in this RFC, just be clear about what it is.--Mike Cline (talk) 17:35, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Let's avoid all the sophistry and get down to brass tacks: if List of people from the Isle of Wight only contains notable people and each entry is completely verified, why is it a bad list for Wikipedia to have? Even assuming that such a list has never been published before anywhere else, the concept of organizing people by place of origin or residence did not originate here, or from the flip side, Wikipedia contributors did not invent the concept of listing the notable people from a given place. So applying those organizational concepts directly to a notable place to organize notable people is in no way OR even if that particular application was done here first. So why is this a list that Wikipedia should not have? Put yet another way...I would expect any article on a place to have information on what notable people came from there, and many such place articles do have sections on notable residents/natives. Nothing in our policies, or common sense, would prevent us from being the first ones to compile that information from different reliable sources into Isle of Wight, just as we might use one book for its history section, and another for its transportation section.  If that list of people is sufficiently long, then it would be a burden to the main topic article of Isle of Wight to maintain within that article, and should be split off into a separate list. Put yet another way...  We have lists of people for organizing and indexing biographical articles, i.e., notable people.  The only way to tackle such a voluminous subject is through sublists.  One of the most sensible ways to group such sublists of people is by their place of origin.  Gavin, your approach to these lists just isn't useful or relevant to these issues.  postdlf (talk) 17:52, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I partially agree with both Gavin and Postdlf. Postdlf is right about about some navigational lists: If you have a bunch of notable people from a notable geographical region, it usually makes sense to organize them into a list of people from that region. The problem is what happens when people take notable people and organize them into a much more novel category. List of virgins is a good example of a list that was deleted despite the fact that there were many entries that were individually notable, and despite the fact that the topic virgin is notable. So for those kinds of navigational lists, I tend to agree with Gavin.
 * It's clear that we *are* talking about two different kinds of lists though. The "informational list" will compile detailed information that does not appear anywhere else in the encyclopedia (such as a List of Mad Men episodes), whereas the "navigational list" will compile a directory of notable Wikipedia articles (such as List of jazz albums). The "informational list" can be thought of as a merge of non-notable material that somehow survives when it hangs together, which is tricky. The "navigational list" is just as tricky. Some ways of organizing notable articles are appropriate and some just aren't.
 * It might help to discuss both separately. Navigational lists are compilations where many of the entries are notable, whereas informational lists are compilations where most of the entries are not notable. We delete and keep navigational lists. We also delete and keep informational lists. I know some people want us to treat all lists equally, but the only way we can reach a consensus is if we at least try to talk about them separately. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:14, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * This appears to be a constructive way of looking at things, but it is still based on measures of subjective importance such as "navigational" and "informational", which are a matters of opinion only, as there is no evidence to support such views. I put it to Shooterwalk that if a list is really useful, then surely a reliable source would have gone to the effort of defining or publishing such a list to let everyone else know what a good idea it is? The example of List of Masonic buildings is claimed to be both "navigational" and "informational", but there is no evidence to suggest that Masonic building is a verifiable, let alone notable topic, so its hard to argue that the list serves any useful purpose either. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 18:57, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * See my comments immediately above re: your list of people from the Isle of Wight example for a rebuttal to the notion that a list need specifically have been published elsewhere before it can be compiled here. Your "masonic building" is more about an editor disagreement over whether the organizing concept is coherent and verifiable; it's not a disagreement inherent to lists as a method of information presentation.  postdlf (talk) 19:24, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think the distinction is that clear between navigational and informational. As my comment above summarized, something like list of people of Isle of Wight is both a navigational article, in that it organizes articles on notable people by place of origin, and an informational article, in that it lists out all the notable people from the Isle of Wight.  A list of virgins could similarly be viewed as informational relative to the topic of virginity.  So I'm skeptical of using some form of list taxonomy because it tends to break down in this manner.  But the navigational utility, or informational utility, of a list could be used to evaluate whether it should be kept, as complementary criteria.  A list could do one or both well.
 * Nor do I think we can try and use the results of AFDs to light the path, because there's nothing guaranteeing their consistency, and attempts to extricate workable general principles will just engender more argument. If we actually look at Articles for deletion/List of virgins, the reasons for deletion were that virginity is an unverifiable claim, making the list a proxy for "list of people who claim to be virgins", and there was no agreed upon definition of virginity; commenters pointed to the list being plagued by continuing POV problems and intractable arguments.  So it's not a result that has relevance for the "notability of lists" shibboleth; it was not deleted because participants believed "list of virgins" is not notable.  It was deleted because of non-list specific policies and guidelines.  postdlf (talk) 19:15, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * And more specifically, all evaluations are done on a subjective measure, since that is how all of WP's policies are handled. We are building a work that is based on the subjective summary of knowledge that consensus believes is proper for a work that hasn't otherwise been seen in the world before.  --M ASEM  (t) 19:18, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Looking at Articles for deletion/List of virgins, it was not deleted because participants believed "list of virgins" is not notable, as Postdlf says. Rather it deleted because there was no verifiabe evidence that it was notable. Have you ever come across a single notable topic being nominated for deletion, let alone deleted? I have not. At the end of the day, all AfD evaluations are done on a subjective measure, but if there is evidence that a topic is notable, it is a racing certainty it will be kept. Just becase one editor says that a topic is "navigational" or "informational", that statement of opinion is no protection against deletion, whereas verifiable evidence is. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:24, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If I have "ever seen a notable topic nominated for deletion"? Yes, plenty of times, and I have seen you vote to delete them. For an example, which I've mentioned several times before: Ellen Hambro has a biography in a general purpose paper encyclopedia (which make up Wikipedia's core content), and yet you argued that the biography was a violation of WP:NOTNEWS and WP:NOTDIR and voted to delete her Wikipedia biography when it was brought up on AFD. Sjakkalle (Check!)  11:50, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * We will have to agree to disagree. The article is comprised of rountine news reports and civil service press releases, so the evidence is weighted towards WP:N. She is not really relevant to this discussion, so if Sjakkalle has a grievance, I would ask him to bring it to my talk page where we can clear the air. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 12:55, 23 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I would think that the list itself would have to be notable. However, there can be and reasonably is a reasonable amount of leeway here. A volume of bibliography on a given subject would be reasonably an indication of notability for a bibliographical list on that topic. A dictionary of national biography would be basis for a list of people from that country. A volume about significant Masonic buildings, discussing a number of them, would be a basis for a list of Masonic buildings. And so on. I hope that makes some sense. John Carter (talk) 19:02, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The list itself has to be notable to have an article on it. The list article and the general article on the topic are two different articles with two different article subjects. Both are welcome if their respective subjects meet our inclusion guidelines (including notability). I explained my reasoning in my proposal so I don't see a need to reiterate it here.  Them From  Space  19:53, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "The list itself has to be notable to have an article on it" This simply does not make sense... the list is an article... so what you are saying is the article itself must be notable to have an article on it.   Blueboar (talk) 22:52, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * No, proper list articles are more than just a list, they also include encyclopedic commentary on the list. If there can be no encyclopedic prose that describes why a list is notable then we shouldn't have a stand-alone article devoted to the list. Take 500 home run club for example. The subject of the article is the collection of individuals to have hit 500 home runs (ie: the list of individuals to hit 500 home runs). It is this collection of individuals that must be notable, not just the concept of a home run. This particular list has a clearly-defined criteria for inclusion that nobody can argue over once they have been presented the facts in reliable sources. It also meets our notability guidelines as this collection of individuals is notable within baseball. All stand-alone list articles should meet these basic standards of verifiability, discrimination, and notability.  Them  From  Space  23:11, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * But you still seem to be saying an article must be notable to have an article on it. Perhaps I do not understand what you mean by "the list itself".  Blueboar (talk) 23:18, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * That example is not consistent with your reasoning, but does follow what others have said. That is, I see nothing on the page that makes the topic "500 home run club" or the list itself a notable topic on its own.  But, as you clearly indicate, all the members of the list are notable, and there's clearly something from secondary sources that hitting 500 HRs is an indicator of likely being in the Hall of Fame.  Would anyone else in this discussion argue for deletion of that list? Heck no. It is clear that "list of MLB players that have hit over 500 home runs" is a notable aspect of MLB's coverage, and the list is well defined and certainly far from indiscriminate. The approach that that list takes - a short intro to recap the topic and the definition of the grouping of the list before providing the details, and sourcing each entry - is the typical approach used for most "List of X" on WP, just maybe not as refined in the text and sourcing as this one.  Thus, if you think this list is ok, clearly you're accepting that in "List of X" only "X" must be notable. --M ASEM  (t) 23:27, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I am implying that at all. This list is acceptable because the list of people itself meets WP:N and not the general topic of home runs. The list has been presented before  and the placement of individuals on the list is subject to much commentary . Therefore, the list itself meets our notability guidelines and (unsurprisingly) this makes for a great article.  Them  From  Space  23:56, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Are you saying that List of US Presidents who like broccoli is notable because all the people listed are notable? If so, I would very much disagree. Blueboar (talk) 01:00, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The notability of a list's entries can't carry the day when the organizing concept of the list simply isn't encyclopedic; "liking broccoli" would be unverifiable in most cases, and at best trivia that has no bearing on the office. Of course, the only U.S. president for whom broccoli was in any way significant was George H. W. Bush, who caused a media kerfuffle when he said he didn't like it...and it's not even significant enough to be mentioned in his article even though the incident was arguably notable.  postdlf (talk) 14:30, 25 August 2010 (UTC)


 * "List of Y of Z where D" - Burden for notability falls only on (Y of Z) alternately called X - There may be additional constraints coming from WP:NOT on top of notability. The the act of compiling a list, a the determination of the scope of the list, are excluded from WP:N in precisely the same way they are excluded for articles. If a topic-thing is notable, then a list of those topic-things is intrinsically notable.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 04:42, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Summary Point 2: Navigational Lists

 * It depends... See summary point 2.1   Blueboar (talk) 15:51, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Since people don't seem to like my idea of moving "purely navigational" lists to project space (below)... I must change my opinion to a firmer: Yes. Anything in article space is an article... we can not choose which articles we should apply our policy and guidelines to.  They apply to all articles. Blueboar (talk) 22:45, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Except for disambiguation pages... -- Quiddity (talk) 22:54, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes... I agree that disambiguation pages are uniquely different. Blueboar (talk) 01:53, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * And lists of lists. (eg Lists of countries and territories)... :) -- Quiddity (talk) 04:33, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree there... I think our policies and guidelines should apply to lists of lists. We would need to establish that the topic of the list of lists is notable. Blueboar (talk) 14:24, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * But it's fundamentally impossible for Lists of films or Lists of countries and territories or any of the others, to meet WP:Featured list criteria. They're not referenced (and generally cannot be) because their scope is always "what Wikipedia currently contains on this topic". Hence, they could be thought of as "navigational". -- Quiddity (talk) 21:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I haven't found a standard here that works. Because almost any list has a navigational component. It's too wide an exception. Even Articles for deletion/Lists of county names in the U.S. in use with only one county had some navigational benefit. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:10, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The emphasis on notability is largely irrelevant to such items and we should use similar judgment to Portals, our other main form of navigation-only page; this is independent of a change in namespace - which may also be a good idea! I do think the comments above haven't spotted how very restrictive this proposal is: indexes, outlines and lists of lists pages are rather a very peculiar subset of lists. I think that the test for identifying such a scenario that I proposed below - are the items in this list Wikipedia pages, or the subjects of Wikipedia pages? - is a pretty solid one. In such cases, notability appears to me to usually no longer be relevant. E.g. Korea is a notable topic. But it's absurd to pose the question, "is the Index of Korea-related articles notable?" That is basically an organized collection of Wikipedia articles for purely navigational purposes and as such it makes no sense to judge it on notability (as much as arguing over whether Portal:Korea is notable). Organized navigational collections of internal links are not going to pass any recognizable "notability" standard; however they may or may not pass standards for navigability or usefulness - which is exactly how we treat Portals. It's worth bearing in mind how Portals came about in the first place - if I recall correctly, the Cricket WikiProject created a page in article-space that served as a very pretty navigational center for accessing cricket-related articles. People sussed that it couldn't really be judged by the criteria that are usually used to assess articles - either in terms of quality (could such a page ever be an FA?) or existence (how does a navigational page on cricket pass notability?). But since it was too good an idea to just summarily delete, "Portal" space was created and such navigational pages were moved there. Indexes, outlines and lists of lists seem to me to replicate the original problem posed by that cricket navigation page - they're more structured than what we currently include in portal-space, but also rather less aesthetically appealing. Either we accept that such pages belong in article space (in which case we assess them on some other measure of worth e.g. useful navigability, like we do for portals when we delete portals that don't have a coherent topic or a topic with too few articles to need one); we move such pages to portal space (in which case we have to accept a wider definition of "Portal" that is more organized but rather less flashy); or we create a new namespace (perhaps the "Index:" namespace would be appropriate). We need a reasonable form of making such judgments; the obsession with demonstrating notability or not feels like an exercise in measuring volume using a thermometer... TheGrappler (talk) 23:53, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:USEFUL is not a valid criteria for inclusion on its own. Nor is it a valid criteria for justifying directories of stuff that exists (e.g. List of Masonic buildings), nor for unverifiable content, nor for POV pushing (e.g. "List of countries subjugated by Hitler"), nor does it justify link farms that are collections of internal links (e.g. Index of Korea-related articles), nor should it be used as an excuse for primary (original) research (e.g.List of management consulting firms). Portals are not mainspace pages, but lists are, and as such are subject to policies and guidelines, like every other mainspace page. Being useful is not a is not a free pass for inclusion. If a list has any navigational merit, it will have been published and commented upon, but if not, then it has not served any useful purpose in the real world, and won't serve any useful purpose in Wikipedia either. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 19:05, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Korea and Management consulting are the subject of articles, and the related lists you point to primarily contain blue links (the latter list entirely), so clearly both lists are clearly based around notable subjects. Index of Korea-related articles is in no way prohibited by WP:LINKFARM, which expressly permits "lists to assist with article organization and navigation."  Whether the list of management consulting firms is verifiable or predicated on OR has nothing to do with its format as a stand-alone list, as is true of the list of Masonic buildings you so hate.  No one is going to claim that a list can validly consist of original research, POV-pushing, or unverifiable, though obviously people may disagree as to whether a list is those things.  So your objections are all rather beside the point.  postdlf (talk) 21:52, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * They are only beside the point if you think these topics are notable in their own right. I would maintain they are not notable, because a list cannot be presumed to be notable if it has not been actually been "noted". Once your realise that none of the lists have been noted in any way, the problems with them (failing WP:NOT) become clear.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 22:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Suggestion (call it point 2.1): Moving purely navigational lists out of article space

 * I think this would resolve some of the ambiguity over what a legitimate "list" actually is. Content lists would belong in article space... navigational lists would belong in "organizational space". Blueboar (talk) 16:34, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Actually, what I disagree with is the "purely navigational" terminology. I do agree that we should not have "purely navigational" lists in article space, but I believe that it is a misconception to label lists like List of high schools in California as "purely navigational." That list has a well-defined and finite scope, all list elements are notable, and both the list topic (high schools in California) and variants of the list itself have been published by reliable sources. That list has informational value independent of its function as a navigational tool. Moreover, lists such as that one have the potential to be expanded to become more substantial articles. For example, in their present form List of cities in Delaware and List of cities in Idaho likely would be considered to be "purely navigational" lists, but the potential exists for them to be expanded to look more like List of municipalities in Tennessee. --Orlady (talk) 17:49, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If the argument can be made that a particular list is more than purely navigational, that is fine... In which case the list is subject to all the policies and guidelines that relate to articles... for example, you would need to establish (through reference to reliable sources) that the topic of the list is notable. My suggestion relates to lists that are purely navigational. Blueboar (talk) 18:32, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Can you provide examples of some lists in article space that you deem to be "purely navigational" ? --Orlady (talk) 19:25, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Why yes! User:Quiddity/Navigational pages RfC is something I've been working on for months. It's an attempt at an overview of this exact issue.
 * For a specific example:
 * Lists of mathematics topics was a Featured List from October 2005 – 31 December 2007 (until someone tried to use reverse psychology with that list as the crux of a lever... Long story). However, it's just a "list of lists" (See Category:Lists of lists). The title itself would never have notability, and it's not a split out. It's more of a "navigational page".


 * The pages that keep getting argued over are: Lists of lists, Indexes, BasicTopic-Outlines, and Glossaries. Some of them have been argued over, prolifically, for years.
 * HTH. -- Quiddity (talk) 21:03, 21 August 2010 (UTC) 04:16, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Another example would be any of the year articles, e.g. 1957. A significant share of Wikipedia users look for information by first going to a given date or year & following the links from there. Year articles aren't explicitly lists, but they are composed of lists of events, births & deaths, & some Wikipedians have wanted to delete them because they had no other content & likely would never contain anything more than these three lists & some nav boxes. -- llywrch (talk) 00:47, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Year articles are included in the RfC draft. I've moved the examples up a bit. User:Quiddity/Navigational pages RfC. Take a look; It's wildly complicated but fairly complete. (Plus, I'm not very familiar with the year article dispute, and the RfC could benefit from any input on that). -- Quiddity (talk) 04:16, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose, this solves absolutely nothing and just raises more questions than it answers. And it just makes article editing more difficult by dividing into two spaces what had been done in one for many years now.  A point I often make at CFD about why sometimes information would be better off only in list form than category form is that category tags burden every article that is entered into the category, but a wikilink in a list article does not in any burden the article that is linked to.  In other words, lists can be ignored.  Which is not an argument for making lists a free-for-all (they're not at present anyway), it's just to say that anyone can already pretend a list is in another world (i.e., namespace) by just not paying attention to it. Anyway, people already have a lot more leeway in making their own completely arbitrary and trivial list in another namespace if they want: in their own userspace.  postdlf (talk) 19:05, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose If we expect a non-registered average reader to use the list, it should not be in any other space besides mainspace. Burying navlists in Wikipedia is the wrong solution. --M ASEM  (t) 19:40, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Special:PrefixIndex/Portal:Contents Uncle G (talk) 22:02, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose on the whole - the reasoning of Orlady is correct, most supposedly navigational lists actually add "content value" that e.g. a category or navbox can't.... however I agree with Quiddity that certain specialized pages are by nature navigational if they are essentially lists of Wikipedia pages. This is a fine distinction - are the items in the list Wikipedia pages or the subjects of the linked Wikipedia pages? - but would include most of our "list of lists" (as Quiddity pointed out) and the "index"/directory articles that WikiProject Index are producing (e.g. Index of religion-related articles and Index of Korea-related articles), and my opinion is that these belong in Portal-space not article-space. TheGrappler (talk) 22:53, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Bad idea in execution. But it's a decent idea. I think we could achieve the same thing by enriching the (talk) 23:12, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Cannot see that this solves anything, and adds another layer of complexity. In addition to the navigational aspect, good lists also have an informational purpose and as such belong in mainspace. I would not want to move the informative List of London Underground stations to another namespace. Sjakkalle (Check!)  10:38, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Amending, since I noticed the caveat "pure navigational". However, a clear demarcation between "purely navigational" and "mostly navigational" does not exist. Sjakkalle (Check!)  12:54, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Orlady is absolutely correct about the difficulties of determining what constitutes "purely navigational". A case could be made for branding List of Arsenal F.C. players as navigational, but it's also an FL which adds content value to the encyclopedia. Alzarian16 (talk) 11:59, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support as the only alternative would be merger or deletion. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:21, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Support as a longterm goal. This makes great sense, but only if we narrowly construe what a "purely navigational" list is. I think that our outlines and lists-of-lists would benefit from this as they are not standard encyclopedia articles that present a topic and explore it in detail.  Unlike regular stand-alone lists, these don't have to have notable topics or encyclopedic content within them. But I don't think the WP space is the proper place to host them: perhaps some sort of a new "glossary" namespace would work?  Them  From  Space  20:04, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose based on my thinking as follows. Every list is effectively "List of instances of X where D", X being the topic and D being a discriminator.  Assuming the topic X is notable, the discriminator D should be left to the article editors to agree via consensus.  If, for a given list article, the editors agree that D = notable (that is: that the instance of X be notable to be included in the list) then hey presto, you've got a Navigation list article within the model for lists generally.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 03:40, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Summary Point 3: "List of..." Titles

 * Not sure on this one, but leaning towards: Yes. Certainly stand alone list articles could almost always do without the "List of". Blueboar (talk) 16:00, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It would help, more than likely, for those looking at a very high level to evaluate whether we should have an article, but that really is ignoring the content for that evaluation. It belies the fact that the title of articles is only a necessary construct for navigation and searching, as the contents define the appropriateness of the article. Will it help? Yes, but I believe it is a placebo and more needs to be said about the overall issue. --M ASEM (t) 16:06, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Abandon List of as a required naming convention for list style articles. Its use should not be prohibited, but it should not be a required element of a list style article title. (Not followed 100% today anyway). The only change in policy here is to reword the titling sentences in WP:SAL to better reflect the idea that List of is not a required part of the article title.--Mike Cline (talk) 16:08, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I strongly support the idea of abandoning "List of" as a mandatory naming convention. In fact, I don't believe it is a mandatory naming convention, but there would be value in clarifying that it is a an appropriate but nonmandatory way to title a list. --Orlady (talk) 17:33, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "List of..." should always be available as a title, and preferred in many instances, but not mandatory. Not all lists can or should be made into substantive articles; some will never be anything more than a series of wikilinks.  These should clearly be identified as List of X.  And many substantive topics will be too large as an article to have a list of all examples/iterations of it in the same article, so there may be X and List of X.  postdlf (talk) 19:11, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * There are plenty of WP:Featured lists that don't use the word "List" in their title. E.g. 2008 Summer Olympics medal table, Districts of Sri Lanka, Timeline of prehistoric Scotland, Extreme points of Sweden, United States congressional delegations from Utah, Davy Medal, Territorial evolution of Canada, and hundreds more. The "List of" convention, is primarily useful to alert the reader as to what to expect when they click on a link. -- Quiddity (talk) 21:10, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * As Quiddity points out this is alredy the case. Sometimes "List of" is useful from a "principle of least astonishment" perspective (e.g. when clicking on a link) and it should be available as an option. TheGrappler (talk) 22:53, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think it makes it clear what's a list. Not that it needs to be a hard standard. And yes, the content for lists and articles is substantially different. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:16, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "List of ..."-titles are not causing any more trouble than people want them to. They are not inherently troublesome except with people who judge articles by their title instead of their content. Sjakkalle (Check!)  09:40, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Whether you call a list a "Collection of.." or some other name, it still has to establish notability in its own right. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:23, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think that the "List of" naming convention is meant to provide a standard alternative when splitting articles (e.g., Cutaneous conditions and List of cutaneous conditions). It's probably also meant to reduce needless inconsistencies ("List of", "Names of", "Examples of", "Types of"...).  I don't see any particular need to strictly enforce the convention, but I don't think that it's a bad approach.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:35, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "List of" is great for media lists, because having lists named "Kirby video games" could easily be confused with "Kirby (series)". It should be an option, but it should definitely not be required. Nomader (Talk) 01:40, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Per others, shouldn't be mandatory, normally very useful and helpful to WP readers, not a problem in-and-of-itself and the focus for us here should be on content. ‒ Jaymax✍ 03:45, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually - having read some other comments, and thinking about what I wrote down below, I now think that "List of" should be discouraged for the following reasons: If a list article can be titled eg: "Cattle Breeds", and there is not already a 'parent' "Cattle Breeds" article, then excluding the words "List of" supports and promotes additional general content about "Cattle Breeds" (perhaps classes of traits, or historical background about when groups of lines were split or something, to also be included, to make for a better article over time. Secondly, this approach then leaves free the title "List of Cattle Breeds" for the time, should it ever arise, when the list needs to be split out from the general article for WP:SIZE reasons.  The article List_of_Smithsonian_Museums is a good example where the title "List of" could actually prevent the article reaching it's eventual full potential - despite having been given 'Featured list' status.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 06:41, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Summary Point 4: Lists and categories
--Mike Cline (talk) 22:26, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Complementary - List style articles should be considered complimentary to categories as per WP:CLN and any argument to the contrary in a deletion discussion should be discounted as uninformed of WP norms. (no policy change required other than to highlight in WP:ATA). --Mike Cline (talk) 15:59, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Unclear... The problem is that this depends on the specific list. Some are complementary to categories and others are duplicative.  I do think that we should eliminate any duplication.  I think we should keep the complementary ones, but not in article space (see Summary Point 2.1). Blueboar (talk) 16:07, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Complementary - Some lists cannot easily be categories, some categories cannot easily become lists; on the other hand, there are some lists and categories that work interchangeably but work well in both formats and thus we use both. Both systems need to exist. --M ASEM (t) 16:09, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It depends, for the reasons given by Masem. --Orlady (talk) 17:02, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It depends. In most circumstances, lists can provide annotation and multiple ways of organization that categories cannot.  And most lists would make awful categories, in part because of the inability of categories to directly annotate or source an article's inclusion, so there certainly should not be any movement to replace lists en masse with categories.  postdlf (talk) 19:14, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It depends, and moreover for those lists where the benefit of list versus or in addition to a category is strong, this should be taken as a valid rationale for the existence of a list - too much of the WP:AFD discussion is about notability. Lists are about arrangements of information (for a variety of purposes - to compare/contrast similar things; to navigate between articles; to put related things in an informative order) and the usefulness/appropriateness/practicality of such arrangements is more often illuminating than stressing over the "notability" of a list, a concept that is usually poorly defined. TheGrappler (talk) 22:58, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Duplicative in many cases but not all cases. I appreciate the "navigational aid" argument, which is why I think it would be fine to have a list of links in certain cases. But not every category should be a list. And not every list makes sense as a category either. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:20, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Duplicative and certainly less easily maintainable. ALR (talk) 07:41, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Complementary when well done, duplicative when poorly done. Lists consisting of nothing else than bare blue links sorted in alphabetical order are duplicative with categories. However, most reasonably good lists add things (sorting, annotations, information, links to uncreated articles we should have) which a category cannot do, and those are definitely complementary. Sjakkalle (Check!)  09:42, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Both. If a list isn't notable, it is a mere duplicate or shadow category. If a category is notable, a list could be created and sourced, whereas categories are not designed to hold content, citations or other presentational items such as navigation templates.--Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:27, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Depends. Some categories are good as lists, and some aren't. We need to judge these individually rather than as a group. Alzarian16 (talk) 19:58, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Clarification of the Question: I formulated this question when Blueboar first posited a summary of the proposals.  From the responses to it (which are entirely reasonable), I realize I didn’t phrase the question with enough precision to solicit the expected pro/con positions on this policy question (one of the pitfalls of brevity).  So here is the same question as asked above with more meaning attached to the words: Complementary and Duplicative.
 * Lists and Categories are complementary—As a matter of policy, lists that duplicate categories and categories that duplicate lists are permitted in WP. The general argument that a List is duplicative of a category is not a valid position in a debate, without specific rationale relative to the specific list/category duplication.
 * Lists and Categories are duplicative—As a matter of policy, lists that duplicate categories and categories that duplicate lists are not permitted in WP. The general argument that a list is duplicative of a category is a valid position in a debate and requires no additional rationale to support it.
 * If lists and categories are, as a matter of policy, complementary, that policy should be explicit that complementary does not mean: for every category there should be or can be a list, and editors must demonstrate the complementary nature of list/category intersections on a case by case basis if that duplicity is brought into question.
 * Heavily overlapping List articles do two things that categories do not:
 * They allow linking to articles that do not yet exist. A long-lived example is List of lighthouses in the United States, which has been used to marshal redlinks to very many lighthouse articles yet to be written.


 * They allow inclusion of detail beyond the names of the things listed. This is one of the few justifications for the lists of asteroids.
 * In practice I suspect that list articles tend to be shadowed by categories even where it seems obvious that some list article should exist. Mangoe (talk) 20:40, 23 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Complementary. Even if a list provides exactly the same limited information that the cat does (which IMO would be a shame, as so much more could be done), some readers will be more comfortable with clicking on a list than on a cat.  WP:CLN has it right.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:30, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * When WP:CLN says that lists and categories complement each other, it is not a prescription to have a category for every list and vice-versa. Lists and categories are two different methods of organizing material, each with their proper place on the encyclopeida. When a topic's subject meets our guidelines for both lists and categories the existance of one isn't a reason to delete the other. On the other hand, when a topic's subject is appropriate only for a list and not a category (or vice-versa) then we shouldn't have both.  Them  From  Space  20:18, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Do tables of contents and indexes overlap - of course they do - but the purposes are different. In the absence of a technological solution that allows categories to be used to maintain presentable, annotatable, and sub-hierarchies beyond the category, navigation pages, there's no getting away from using navigation lists that largely duplicate categories.   ‒ Jaymax✍ 03:51, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Summary Point 5: Lists that organize notable articles

 * IMO, these lists resemble categories more than they resemble articles. This is a tricky topic and I have no answer. If all of the entries are notable, it does not necessarily mean that the list itself is appropriate. We have an article for virgin, but we strongly deleted the list of virgins. (And would not even consider list of Japanese virgins.) Meanwhile, we have a list of Japanese artists, but no article on Japanese artist. Hopefully some other editors can discuss this sanely and rationally. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:52, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * They fail WP:LINKFARM if they are not notable in their own right. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 19:07, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Your argument betrays your position. You contend that List of Japanese Artists (the list title) is not notable.  Yet there is an article Japanese Art which contains a section on Japanese Artists.  Are you arguing that because nobody has published a list entited exactly List of Japanese Artists that the List Topic of Japanese Artists is not notable and worthy of WP?  Applying the notability burden to the List Title and not the List Topic is extremely restrictive and would eliminate a great many lists in WP.  Is that your intention?--Mike Cline (talk) 19:37, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * These are good to have but there does need to be consideration of indiscrimination. As two of the examples give (virgins and Nobel Prize) it is possible construct a list that incorporates notable topics and likely sourcing but to create a POV framepoint.  The case of teleporting characters seems more like "ok, that's nice, but why?" and goes back to the above points that we're still looking for something notable, and while the concept of teleportation is, not the cross-categorization of characters with that ability. Fine as a category, not as a list.  The other three keeps are all strong indications of a notable "X" topic for list of X, and with discriminate membership inclusion and without creating an implicit POV or other issue. --M ASEM  (t) 14:11, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Before I read the AFD, I had presumed the main problem with the virgins list was a lack of meaningful threshold for inclusion, i.e., that it was indiscriminate. Sure, it could easily be limited to only non-notable entries, but for how many of those would it be significant, and how meaningful would it be to group people who were virgins simply because they are very young or died very young with those who were virgins because they joined a religious order, those who were virgins because they were seriously deformed or disabled in some way, those who were virgins because they simply viewed themselves as asexual?  So I imagined the list as overloaded with priests and children (I'll refrain from making a tasteless joke).  Virginity is simply too common a phenomenon, and it's not an established way of organizing people outside of high school. So maybe we can extrapolate some criteria for consideration: 1) are there many different ways, reasons, causes for an entry satisfying a list's inclusion criteria, such that comparison and grouping is not meaningful?  2) is the list's organizing concept commonplace and mundane or a condition that tends for many or most entries to be transient?  3) is the list just an obvious permutation of a well-established method of classification, or is it sui generis?  Just some thoughts, I don't know how helpful these are in the abstract.  postdlf (talk) 14:27, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * List of virgins has, as I see it, two major problems that are specific to that list. One - it is highly transient; people can be added and removed from it every day (possibly). Most other lists of people with a shared characteristics (eg list of people from (place name)) can have people added, but rarely removed because that's a fixed characteristic, and removal only happens if there's a notability issue or the information proven false.  Being a virgin, not so much.  Secondly, we are forced to rely on claims that come from the person themselves - either in the form of self-published sources or from interviews or the like where that person claims that. Unless we want medical doctors to make certain assessments, there is no way to validate that claim.  And as a weak third reason, "virgin" is a loaded term, if you're coming from a high-school perspective.  I could see a "List of celibate people"  as a better list, as it is less exacting a term (it is like a philosophy or a religion, as opposed to a strict physical aspect, and thus we can rely on people asserting this themselves), and often something that secondary sources will relate about a person.  Basically, it comes down to, for me, the indiscriminate nature of "list of virgins" encompasses - even only using bluelinked names, it is still highly indiscriminate with a difficult means of assuring membership to the list. --M ASEM  (t) 15:17, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * This comes down to WP:NOT - and I feel there's room for something to be added there around indiscriminate listing - I don't think this is a Notability issue per se - I think the case can be made that a list of notable people who share a notable characteristic is inherently Notable - but that may not mean that the list is sufficiently discriminate. It seems to me, considering what Masem said above, that a list of significant virgins, where the discriminator significant is decided by consensus of the article editors could easily pass muster, providing that it was tight enough to avoid being an indiscriminate collection (eg: (1) dead, and (2) (alleged) virginity impacted persons life) ‒ Jaymax✍ 04:05, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Summary Point 6: Lists that go into details not covered anywhere else

 * IMO, these lists resemble true articles, which makes them easier to apply the general notability guideline. I believe this is the easier case. If none of the entries in the list are separately notable, we might still have a list of these entries *if* the collective topic of the list is covered by reliable third-party sources. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:52, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If they are not notable, then they are likely to be listcruft. If they are not verifiable, they are probably original (primary) research. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 19:09, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Most case of the kept lists are lists that would otherwise be covered in the main (implied) topic, but have been brought out to a list for two reasons: 1) WP:SS and WP:SIZE issues, and 2) They are a level of detail that is not necessary to understanding the topic at the core generic reader level but are non-trivial details that a more advanced researcher may need. These lists would be expected inclusion at the main topic otherwise (relative to all equivalent examples for that field) per WP's consensus.  If the list wouldn't normally be included (as the case of Six Feet Under deaths) or would lead to indiscriminate or arbitrary inclusion (EndWar list), then we don't have a separate list to begin with. --M ASEM  (t) 14:04, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * What I find interesting about this set of lists, is that none of them is a case of instances of an already wiki'd notable topic. Each one marries two distinct notable subjects together (Y of Z) which is quite distinct from the discriminator (X where D) aspect I push elsewhere.  I struggle to see how a list of locations in a fictional work, is different to a list of characters in a fictional work.  I think that only where the topic X=(Y of Z) is notable in it's own right, should such lists exist standalone - which is consistent with requiring X to be notable when we have talked about 'List of X' - eg: I'm sure there is plenty to support 'Hurt Locker accolades' being a notable topic in it's own right - Google: accolades hurt locker would tend to support that.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 04:33, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Defining a list's topic
I think we all agree that inclusion in Wikipedia is based on whether the topic of an article is notable. The problem with lists is that there can be debate as to exactly what the topic of the list is. I have been thinking about this, and want to offer my thoughts. A list is compilation of people, places and things that share some common attribute. I think that it is this common attribute that should be considered the topic of the list. If I am correct, then to establish that the topic of the list is notable, we need to establish that the common attribute is notable. The lede of the article should identify what the common attribute is, and this should reflected in the article title. Now, sometimes things will have more than one common attribute. If all are notable, we can clearly say that the topic is notable... it does not really matter which we focus on. The disputes arise when one attribute is considered notable and the other(s) is(are) not. This is when we need to clearly identify which attribute is being used as the basis for the list. This should be done in the lede, and reflected in the title. Does this thinking help clarify the issues we have been discussing about? Blueboar (talk) 15:02, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "Sharing a common attribute" is categorisation. Where did you get this defintion of a topic from? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:50, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It's my own... I am presenting it not as a definition, but as a new way for us to think about how we establish notability when it comes to list articles. That in lists the topic should be seen as being the same as the attribute shared by the items on the list.  So... in order to say that the topic is notable, we need to demonstrate that the common attribute is notable. Blueboar (talk) 17:19, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Very well, but is difficult to discern if what you speak of is notability of lists; rather is the idea based an exemption from notability for lists? The reason I ask is, if a list has not been "noted" in accordance with WP:N, then it is not notable. If we are to imagine that a list can be included in Wikipedia in the absence of verfiable evidence of notability, then that is an argument in favour of inclusion based on subjective importance. I think we have to be clear which direction you are heading with this idea of "Sharing a common attribute" : if it is an exemption you are proposing, then spit it out and say so. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 18:38, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Please stop calling it an "exception", because right now, as Blueboar talks about it, it is common practice and thus appropriate to define in that manner. Notability is not a requirement as it is only a guideline, so talking about exceptions is forcing an issue that isn't there. --M ASEM (t) 19:24, 30 August 2010 (UTC)


 * This exchange reminds me of If it looks like a duck. Gavin thinks the duck is List of X, while common practice and I suspect the great majority of community thinks the duck is: List of X where X defines the list topic. Blueboar got the duck right above. Are we going to be forced to eat Gavin's duck?--Mike Cline (talk) 19:48, 30 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I am not proposing an exemption to notability for list articles... but I think I am proposing (or at least exploring) a new understanding of how notability should be assessed in List articles. Blueboar (talk) 20:16, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I have to take this statement with a pinch of salt. When we first discussed Breaking the deadlock, I issued a challenge: If there is any editor here who believes that list topics should be exempt from WP:N, then they should put forward a proposal now, rather than infer that they exempt by other means.
 * So far, Masem has put forward a proposal that lists are not articles, and therefore inclusion is determined by whether a list is discriminate or indiscriminate.
 * Mike thinks lists are like articles, except that their subject matter comes from another article topic: "List of X" is about topic "X".
 * Blueboar thinks lists are like articles, but their subject matter comes from an attribute which they share with a group or category of topics.
 * Other variants are that lists are not articles, they are simply a spin-out or continuation of a notable over arching article topic.
 * I must congratulate all of you for your originality and creativeness. However, what makes me take these with a pinch of salt is the one unifying characteristic of all these proposals: is that verifiable evidence of notability has been omitted. How can a lists be notable if it has not been "noted" in accordance with WP:N?. It seems to me that a lot of effort and imagination has been expended to avoid having to answer this question directly and truthfully. If what you seek is exempt lists from WP:N, why not say so? This is what should have been proposed openly and explicity from the onset: that each of you wants an exemption from WP:N, but none of is prepared to say this; instead you have gone around and around in circles to avoid the obvious. Can you not see that the Emperor has no clothes? Each of your proposals is an exemption in all but name.  --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:06, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You are blindingly ignoring that the majority agrees that in "List of X" articles, "X" is most likely the topic, and that topic should be notable. In this approach, lists and other spinouts where the main topic is still "X" fit perfectly fine into the WP:N framework. We still need a second half of the equation, that of indiscriminate coverage, but the route to meet the notability guidelines has been outlined clearly by Blueboar and others. --M ASEM  (t) 21:29, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * "Blueboar thinks lists are like articles, but their subject matter comes from an attribute which they share with a group or category of topics." Please do not put words in my mouth... this isn't what I said or think. Let me try again... I do think that WP:N applies to list articles.  I do think that for a list article to comply with WP:N, we need to establish (through reliable sources) that the topic of the list is notable.  What I am suggesting with this thread is that in order to discern the notability of the topic, we need be clear as to what the topic actually is... and a good way to do this is to examine at what the common attributes of the items listed (or the items that could potentially be listed) are.  If all the common attributes are note worthy, then the list's topic is likely to be notable.  If none of the common attributes are note worthy, then there is a strong likelihood that we do not have a notable topic.  If the list has some common attributes that are note worthy and others that are not, then we need to double check to make sure that the topic of the list is focused on the note worthy aspects.  If not, it may be that the list is focused on the wrong attribute, and a shift of topic and renaming would resolve the problem... or it may be that there is article or list that covers the notable attribute, and the list should be merged... or there may be some other way to resolve the issue.  It may turn out that there is no good solution... but at least we know where the problem lies. Blueboar (talk) 22:37, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Blueboar, that is very far removed from notability based on verifiable evidence. Everything has a "common attributes", and what is "worthy" or "unworthy" are also measures of subjective importance, surely you must know this by now? Lets call a spade a spade, and refer to your proposal as what it is: inclusion based categorisation, not notability. How can a topic be notable if it has not been "noted"? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 23:02, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I used note worthy to not confuse the issue by using the term Notability... but to my mind, note worthiness is similar to notable... and is determined in the same way WP:UNDUE is determined.  Note worthiness, in other words, is determined by discussion in reliable sources. Blueboar (talk) 23:17, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It is not similar, Blueboar. If a topic is notable, it will have been the subject of significant coverage that address the topic directly. What you are suggesting is that coverage that addresses another topic (i.e. a proxy, or a related topic, but one with "common attributes") that provides notability for a list. It is similar to inherited notability, except that notability is not so much transmitted, but it is inferred. What you are suggesting is notability is a bit like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game: if a list is worthy, it passes the six degrees test. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 23:27, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I see nothing wrong with Blueboar's reasoning and its application to the summarized majority position for this (on the talk page). It seems extremely intuitive that the common, defined element of a list is what we want to make sure is note worthy (aka notable) as to be part of the coverage that we have on that topic.  We then need to make sure that that common characteristic is not indiscrimiante or would be including details we wouldn't otherwise include in the normal coverage of that topic. --M ASEM  (t) 23:31, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry Masem, but your idea of "discriminate" and "indiscriminate" lists has been rejected; in any case, it is based on circular reasoning, so it is intellectually flawed.
 * To get back to Blueboar's proposal, you are ignoring what I have said about the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon test. The idea that notability can be transferred by way of "common attributes" is a notability fallacy. Taking the example of "List of Masonic buildings", we know that both Freemasons and Buildings are notable, so does that mean the list is notable too? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:39, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not saying that notability can be transferred by way of common attributes... I am saying that the way to identify the topic is to look at the common attributes. Blueboar (talk) 13:10, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * So what are the common attributes for the "List of Masonic buildings"? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:37, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I strongly suggest we discontinue discussion using "List of Masonic buildings" as an example. There are clear other problems going on with it (infighting between wikiprojects) that exactly what that list is for is difficult to assess, and thus is difficult to discuss properly in context here. --M ASEM  (t) 13:49, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * If the idea of "common attribute" is merely an abstraction, and can't be applied to list topics that have "problems" or are "complicated", then I think we can consider this discussion to be over, in the sense that this approach is a dead end. Whilst inclusion based on "common attribute" sounds reasonable as in a vague and abstract way, it is actually a reworking of WP:IKNOWIT, for if no clear answer as to what a "common attribute", then what hope is there of applying it to list topics if such a concept cannot be explained.
 * I don't believe that "common attribute" has anything to with notability at all, because it would be impracticle to provide evidence that a topic has any attributes, let alone common ones. It is one thing to demonstrate that a list is notable in its own right, but to provide evidence that it has an attribute in common with another topic, let a lone a group or category of topics, would be a very onerous requirement. It is one thing to say that Freemasons and Buildings share a common attribute, but it entirely to provide proof to that effect, especially if not such relationship has been studied or "noted" by a reliable source in the real world. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:10, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Without re-arguing the debates at List of Masonic buildings, I think I can neutrally use it as an example of what I am talking about... I can identify three common attributes among the items or potential items listed at that article... two are obvious from the title, one is not: 1) all the items listed are buildings,  2) all the items listed are (arguably) connected to Freemasonry in some way,  3) all (or most) of the items listed are on historic/landmark registries.  Now, which of these should be the focus of the article topic?  Which of these is a note-worthy attribute. We don't consider all buildings to be inherently notable, so that is not a good choice on its own.  While Freemasonry is notable, not everything connected to Freemasonry is notable (because notability is not inherited), so for this to a good choice for the topic we would have to have sources that establish that this particular connection is notable. So there is potential for a good topic there... but only if it can be substantiated.  Being on a historic/landmark registry is notable.  This is be a good choice for a list topic... and, as it turns out we already have list articles covering this topic (and they already list these buildings). Does this help you understand my thinking? Blueboar (talk) 14:22, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think what you are trying to do is write a list defintion with the aid of synthesis by combining material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources. I can understand why you would want to do that: in the absence of a reliable source to define the list topic, it is easier to make one up. From a real world perpective, this a is a valid approach, but in the context of Wikipedia, this approach is prohibited by WP:NOT. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:51, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You do realize that we "[combine] material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources" for every single article, yes? Of course, that conclusion needs to be obvious and not biased otherwise that is a problem but summarizing sources requires us to do exactly this, and that's the acceptable type of synthesis needed for an encyclopedic work. --M ASEM  (t) 15:09, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Gavin, read what I wrote... I said you need sources to show that the common attribute is notable. I agree that these would have to show that the attribute under consideration was not Synthetic (or some other form of Original Research). Blueboar (talk) 15:17, 31 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Isn't this discussion already covered in Summary Point 1: Burden of notability? There's a consensus there. (My !vote should probably changed based on my new understanding of the issue.) Shooterwalker (talk) 15:34, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The argument does not stack up. In the absence of any sources to show that "Masonic building" exists as a published topic (I presume it is a category of building, like Olympic stadium), the only way to show that it ought to exist is through synthesis: If one reliable source says A is Masonic Temple, and another reliable source says B is a Masonic Hospital, do not join A and B together to imply a conclusion C ("Masonic buildings are a recgonised category of building") that is not mentioned by either of the sources. Presumably, synthesis does not apply to the List of Masonic Buildings, because in Blueboar's analysis, sources A and B provide evidence that the topic has "common attributes". --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:36, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Gavin, I agree with every one of your points, but I don't see your points as negating my concept. You, on the other hand, obviously do think your points negate my concept.  So, obviously we have a disconnect somewhere.  This may be due to my not explaining my concept clearly enough, or it may be that you are seeing something in it that I do not see or intend (I suspect it is actually a bit of both).  I will have to think on this further. Blueboar (talk) 16:59, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Then you have to come up with a way of negating your own concept. The way to negating "notability" is to say that it does not matter what a commentator in reliable secondary source has to say about a list topic - that I will freely concede. If it does not matter, then notability is secondary to what a majority of editor think or want. So if I can't negate your concept, then explain what can so it is transparent to everyone.
 * Just so you know where I stand, I will put a proposal at WT:N that everyone can understand can be refuted and why. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 21:52, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think I see where we are disconnecting... I am looking at commonality as a way to identify what the topic is (or what the topic should be), not as a way to assess whether that topic is, or is not notable. That would still be established through reliable sources.  Does this clarify? Blueboar (talk) 01:28, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I see commonality as an excuse or a justification for primary (original) research: if a subjective measure such as commonality superceds evidence of notability as the basic metric for inclusion, then it becomes possible to make up stuff that seem like a good idea such as "List of Masonic Buildings" that has never been published in the real world.
 * In what way do reliable sources establish commonality if there are no sources about this topic? You need to clarify. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 09:43, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You don't need reliable sources to see a commonality and to think about it... your concern comes into play at the next step... you need reliable sources to write about it. Blueboar (talk) 12:51, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Are you trying to say that WP:NNC works in reverse: once you have identified some notable content, then by default you must have a notable list? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:04, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * No. I am not talking about notability at all.  I am saying that before you look at whether a topic is notable or not, you need to determine what the potential topics actually are.  I am talking about how to determine what the potential topics are, so that you can then apply WP:N, WP:OR, and all our other policies and guidelines to see which one will make a good list article. Blueboar (talk) 13:24, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Could you illustrate how you would identify how whether or not "List of Masonic Buildings" is a topic in the absence of verifiable evidence of notability? --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:31, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You continue to miss my point... The existence of a topic does not depend on whether it is notable. If there are buildings that can be described as being "Masonic", then the topic of "Masonic buildings" exists.  It may not be a notable topic, but it exists.  It may rely on Original research to discuss this topic, but the topic exists.
 * Now, when we look at a list of things, we can identify commonalities, even if these commonalities are not notable. In the case of "Masonic buildings" we can identify that a) all the items on the list are buildings, and b) they are arguably "Masonic" (this depends on one's definition of that term)... both attributes are potential topics... as is the combination of the two... whether any of these potential topics qualifies for an article in Wikipedia is a different question. Blueboar (talk) 14:44, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not missing your point in fairness. The existence of the topic in Wikipedia is dependent on notability. "Masonic buildings" exists only as a category, but it does not exist a notable topic, and if we accept your earlier statement, nothing has been published about this category to suggest it exists as a topic of study in the real world either.
 * Where we may be misunderstanding each other is whether there is on the amount of evidence needed to to support claim that it exists. If a one or more buildings are classified as being as a Masonic building, that is not evidence that Masonic building is a sufficiently notable category to justify its existence as the subject of a standalone article. For it to be a notable category, there has to be more than just a mention in passing contained in the coverage of another topic like Masonic Temple.
 * For "Masonic buildings" to exists as a topic, it has to be the subject of signficant coverage in accordance with WP:GNG. In the absence of such coverage, we cannot infer that this category exists: that would be an example of WP:ATA. Even if you could prove that Masonic buildings exists as a category, WP:ITEXISTS is not a valid criteria for inclusion of an article about "Masonic buildings" on its own. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:10, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * No... the inclusion of a topic in Wikipedia is dependent on notability. The existence of a topic (whether in or out of Wikipedia) is not dependent on notability. Blueboar (talk) 15:24, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That might be true in the real world. But in Wikipedia, if no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it. Existence, from a mainspace persective, must be supported by evidence. The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—whether readers can check that material in Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 15:42, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You are mixing up "what can be included" with "what exists". I am saying we need to look at what exists before we can look at what can be included. I am discussing the process, not the end result.  Blueboar (talk) 15:53, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * On the contrary, I am attempting to be clear, because the two linked. "Existence" is a relative term: what exists in the real world can be determined first hand, but in Wikipedia, nothing exists except those topics that have been noted by reliable sources. For example, in order to demonstrate that you are not adding original research, you must be able to cite reliable published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and that directly support the material as presented. This applies to both the article content (WP:OR) and to the existence of topics (WP:NOT). Editors can't just make up topics because they know something exists as a fact - they have to provide evidence that it is existence is a fact.
 * In the case of the List of Masonic buildings, there is no evidence to to suggest that the list exists in the real world, because there are no sources that are directly related to the list topic (i.e. there is no sourced definition), nor are their any sources that directly support the list as it is presented (i.e. there are no sources which have published its content in a list form).
 * I think our discussion has turned full circle. Trying to infer that the list topic exists in the absence of any evidence is a matter of opinion, not fact. At this point, I think you need to acknowledge that your "process" is defective, in the sense that inference in the absence of evidence is guesswork, and can lead directly to a category mistake. In this case, the category mistake is to infer the list is notable based on WP:ITEXISTS, knowing full well that the list has never been publsihed anywhere else other than within Wikipedia. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:29, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It seems to me there is a semantic disconnect here around the definition of topic. There is the real-word definition, and then the WP acceptable definition.  In one sense a topic is anything that can be described, in another, a topic is something that passes WP:N and WP:NOT.  I think you both agree that IRL:TOPIC is a superset of WP:TOPIC.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 17:28, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

List of Y of Z where D (sorted/grouped by S)
I'm dumping this here, because my just-added replies to the questions above came well after the debate, and might be missed. Likewise my recent talk page ponderings.

X=Y of Z - X must be notable - In many cases that means that an article for X should exist, but it may not. Sometimes, a notable topic's article may start out with just a list of the instances of X - that should be no problem, because the list itself is effectively just a sub-topic within the new article about notable topic X. It can however lead to cases where an article is titled "list of Y of Z" where perhaps it might better have been just called "Y of Z" - which would allow and encourage a broader range of scope for the initial article on the topic of X (=Y of Z)
 * I now think "List of" should be discouraged except for when it disambiguates from an existing article on topic X or the topic X is a non-wiki-editor list (ie: notable, external RS master sourced list) and the common term used to describe it is "List of ..." rather than (say) "Register of" ‒ Jaymax✍ 06:42, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

D is a discriminator of list scope, and like all article scope is agreed through consensus by the article editors - lists have the advantage of tighter structure than more freeform article elements, and so it is often both easier to establish consensus, and to set it once, and not revisit every time an additional entry is made.

Navigation lists are basically lists where the discriminator is that the list ITEM also be notable.

Note that pretty much all of this applies equally to in-article lists, and stand-alone lists, of instances of X. (The exception being that there will be cases where article with notable topic X includes a list of instances of non-notable related thing W for some oddball reason) ‒ Jaymax✍ 05:01, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Also, WP:NOT needs some brief expansion to clarify what is already there but a fraction indirectly, which is that lists must not be indiscriminate, even if they're a list of notable cases of a notable topic (eg: "list of notable people" would be insufficiently discriminate per WP:NOT). ‒ Jaymax✍ 05:05, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

I added "grouped/sorted by S" because of comments from the AfD discussion mentioned by Sandman888 on the talk page - there could be cases where it is quite appropriate to present the same list on more than one page (eg: List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation) given the lack of a dynamic table sorting system (AFAIK) in WP. ‒ Jaymax✍ 10:02, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
 * It is difficult to follow your algebraic discussion without an example. Could you run through it again using List of Masonic buildings to demonstrate why you mean by "X=Y of Z - X must be notable". --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:00, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Y=Building notable; of Z=Masons notable; but X=Y+Z=Masonic Buildings not notable (as evidenced yet, elsewhere there are suggestions that notability of X is being worked on). I would rather see the article titled Masonic Buildings (rather than "List of Masonic buildings") and then establish notability (if possible) for the topic X - the list would then be a sub-topic within the article - but would be the primary content for the article (this is actually the case regardless of the article title of course, which is a bit of a red-herring) there would then need to be a discriminator D=something so that not every mason-related building on the planet was listed - That discriminator should be left to the article editors to develop objective criteria for, to avoid having to debate each and every entry in the list.  With regards to this specific article, my (very limited) understanding is that the notability or otherwise of X="Masonic Buildings" has yet to be established, but is a work-in-progress, that might yet succeed. The key point being I don't think the fact that its primary content is a list is relevant to notability - the notability of X=topic, is what concerns me.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 17:08, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The discriminator you speak of is whether a list has any notability, for in the absence of any reliable sources, there is no way of knowing whether any other criteria is anything other editorial opinion.
 * The problem I see with your notation is that it is still unclear what you are refering to. It difficult to know whether X is a notable list topic or just a category from which you are infering notability is inherited from, and I think the distinction needs to be made clear:
 * X is a category, of stuff that editors believe are connected in some way that makes them distinct from other categories of stuff, e.g. "Masonic Buildings";
 * $$x_1$$ is an item that editors believe is a member category X, e.g $$x_1$$ could be the Freemasons' Hall, London;
 * "List of x's" = ($$x_1$$, $$x_2$$, ....$$x_n$$) where n is the number of items in the list;
 * Although a list may change, the lists members are known ($$x_1$$ to $$x_n$$) at a point in time;
 * "List of x's" is a verifiable topic in its own right, i.e. the list of items ($$x_1$$ to $$x_n$$) was published at a point in time, and could be notable if that list has been "noted" in accordance with WP:N.
 * There seems to be some sort of fallacy going around that "List of X" (what ever that means) is not a topic in its own right, but is some sort of sub-topic of a notable category that "inherits" notability (not possible). However, we know that not every list is a member of a notable category, so lets forget the idea that the notability of categories and lists are related in any way for once and for all.
 * For notability purposes, "List of x's" is not dependent on, or related to, the category it is a member of, nor can the the list inherit notability from the cateogory (or vice versa).
 * I hope this makes things clearer. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:36, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * "List of X" (what ever that means) - Gavin, you've long since lost the argument, and you're just going in circles. Sorry.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 23:21, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * On the contrary, I have not "lost" the argument, for this marks the point at which lists have been described as content pages in their own right and are therefore subject to WP:N. This not a new or novel idea, I think you have to agree, for it is is based firmly within the existing framework of policies and guidelines in which lists are acknowledged to be content pages, no different from ordinary article pages.
 * The idea that a list inherits notability or receives in indirectly from another topic does not make sense. I would love to see a firm proposal that is not based on the the fallacy of WP:NOTINHERITED, but I have yet to see on put forward. The true discriminator of whether a list is encyclopaedic is notability based on the ability to verify that the list has been published and commented on by reliable secondary source.
 * Not surprisingly, it is that same evidence of notability that demonstrates that the list is not
 * original (primary) research (i.e. it has been madeup because it seemed like a good idea at the time);
 * a directory of stuff with no encyclopaedic purpose.
 * On the contrary, verifiable evidence of notability demonstrates that a list is useful, encyclopaedic and is the subject of reliable sources, rather than mere hearsay.
 * What your example reveals is that inclusion based on "List of X" would lead to unpublished, encyclopaedic articles such as List of buildings, because the inclusion of list topics based on categorisation of other Wikipedia lists is too broad to be meaningful. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 23:58, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * First, WP:NOTINHERITED is an essay, and thus does not necessarily reflect WP consensus. Since few else have spoken up for your arguments, it would appear that it doesn't have strong consensus when applied to lists. Trying to justify a rationale in light of that doesn't seem to be a good use of anyone's time.
 * The point that's been made, however, is that notability can still be applied to a list ("X" needs to be a notable topic for "List of X", for example). But that's only half the argument because as you've clearly stated, List of buildings could be a viable, near-infinite list if we only used that aspect alone.  It's been said several times that there's still a factor of what type of discrimination the list is defining tied with the notability of the topic. Just because "X" is a notable topic does not mean "List of X" is a good list, and certainly less so for "List of Y of X"-type ones.  But, if we can envision that "List of X" or "List of Y of X" can be included in the coverage of topic X ignoring the artificial barriers created by the electronic format of WP, then it is likely going to be appropriate to be kept. Are there hard and fast rules for this decision? Hell no. It's what consensus, however finicky the collective may be, wants. I trust that the consensus nowadays is not going to regress to pre-2006 levels in terms of extremely loose inclusion - we've matured past that point; but at the same time we still don't know what the shape of the final work should be, and thus we need to let consensus decide exactly what is appropriate, such as for lists.  That's why I think most are comfortable asserting that for "List of X", "X" needs to be notable, as that seems a reflection of community consensus. --M ASEM  (t) 00:24, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You are quite right that WP:NOTINHERITED is just an essay, but it is highly relevant to these discussions: it highlights the fact that it is a fallacy that notability can be transferred from topic to topic in the absence of any verifiable evidence. The idea that "List of X" is notable if topic X is notable is based on this fallacy. I can agree with you that many editors don't like the notability guideline, or may even believe that notability can be inherited, but that does not mean that Wikipeidia's policies and guidelines should be based on a fallacy. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 06:56, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * But even NOTINHERITED does not say "notability is not inherited", it says "notability is usually not inherited". Ergo, it is not a fallacy. But again, it comes down to what the consensus position has been shown here: "list of X" is not (always) a new topic that needs its notability demonstrated, but instead that for a "List of X", its topic is "X" for which notability should be shown; there is no need to beg the question of inherited notability here. --M ASEM  (t) 12:55, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I hope we are all agreed that for a Stand Alone List (a List of X where there is no article that focuses on the topic of X), we must establish notability in the lede. Does everyone agree with this?
 * If so, then the debates are only discussing non-SALs (list articles where an article on the topic of X already exists). Presumably, the notability of the topic has been properly established at that article. And so, we are essentially arguing about whether we should re-establish the notability of the topic in the lede of the list article.  My question is: Why not?.  Blueboar (talk) 13:56, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There is no difference between a "SAL" or a "non-SAL" list, as both are mainspace content pages. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:22, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Next Steps
Somewhere above, Blueboar asks the question where do we go next so I thought I’d revisit the original purpose of the RFC: What should the inclusion criteria be for Standalone Lists? A lot of the discussion on this page and the talk page addressed that question by various means of applying a Notability burden on Stand-alone lists. Consensus on exactly where that burden is placed on a Stand-alone list article—title, topic, lead (inclusion criteria) and/or list entries--is not uniform (but definitely leaning oneway), but there is reasonable consensus that a Stand-alone list (with the exception of purely navigational lists) does incur some notability burden. Currently WP:SAL does not address any notability burden for lists other than list entries so it is a prime place for some policy clarification. WP:N also does not specifically address notability burdens for lists (other than in WP:BIO), so it might also be an appropriate place for some policy clarification. All the references to WP:NOT, WP:INHERIT, et al in this discussion make for interesting reading, but are unlikely candidates for any policy clarifications re Stand Alone lists. Bearing in mind that:
 * WP:SAL already states: Stand-alone lists are Wikipedia articles; thus, they are equally subject to Wikipedia's content policies, such as verifiability, no original research and neutral point of view.,
 * that it is a given that list style articles serve a variety of purposes—navigation, development and information,
 * and that the only real decision needing to be made is generically, where and when is a notability burden is placed on a Standalone List.

Our job then is to craft some minimalist wording in either WP:N and/or WP:SAL that would address when and where a notability burden is placed on a Standalone List. We all know how to establish notability WP:GNG, but the issue in this RFC has essentially been when and where is that established for a Standalone List. Does anyone disagree with this way forward?--Mike Cline (talk) 15:37, 8 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure if there is significant need to change WP:N; we possibly could change, within the first para of the lead from Article topics must be notable, or "worthy of notice." to Topics of articles, lists, and other non-navigational content in Wikipedia main space should be notable, or "worthy of notice."., leaving the question of how to evaluate the topic of a list to SAL.
 * At SAL, I would say we need a new second level header under "Appropriate topic for lists", which addresses what the topic is and notability as based on this RFC:
 * Stand alone lists should have a demonstrated notable topic. This may be the list itself, such as AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies, or it may be the topic of the list, such as List of awards and nominations received by Pearl Jam (in which Pearl Jam is a notable topic). Such lists still need to comply with other content policies, particularly on avoiding indiscriminate collection of information; just because a list may have a notable topic does not mean that the list is necessarily discriminating. --M ASEM  (t) 15:52, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I would have to stop you there for a moment, and take a step back. The answer to "when is evidence of notabiltiy required?" is always, and "where is evidence of notability required?" is for any list in a standalone page. Any alternative to this intepretation would represent a de facto exemption from the notability requirement. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 16:19, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I think adding some kind of note to WP:N makes more sense than WP:SAL. Just because SAL isn't cited or read very much and even people who do readit will often argue that it isn't really common practice. Putting a note in WP:N will fit more with what we're talking about. (Assuming we know what that note should be.) Finding a consensus on the location should be easy, right? Shooterwalker (talk) 19:42, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I think WP:SAL is a problematical content guideline. Although it mentions Wikipedia's content policies, it does not provide any guidance as to how they actually apply to lists. For instance, the guideline mentions WP:V and WP:OR, but ignores the requirement that a list should have been published by a reliable source, rather than made up because it was thought to be a good idea at the time. I would suggest that it needs to be clear on these issues. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 11:30, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
 * This RFC has shown that "the requirement that a list should have been published by a reliable source" is far from the majority consensus on the issue. --M ASEM (t) 12:45, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
 * We should leave this to an independent admin. We know where this discussion leads: nowhere. Shooterwalker (talk) 14:58, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
 * While I suspect you are right, can we conduct a quick, single issue poll (see below), to see if there's been any movement, or perhaps others watching the debate.

Single issue poll
Please indicate which of these two statements best represents your opinion wrt list articles. If you feel the need to add an additional option, please do so only if it is substantially distinct from those presented.

"A list should have been published (or referenced) by a reliable source" "Editors may compile a list, providing the entries are instances of a notable topic, and the list is not indiscriminate"
 * 1)  ‒ Jaymax✍ 11:03, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) This comes closer to my view.  postdlf (talk) 14:30, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) Amen--Mike Cline (talk) 14:36, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) Seems to follow wide consensus. --M ASEM  (t) 16:24, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * 5) Just as we currently do, & have always had consensus for    DGG ( talk ) 21:31, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
 * question how are you defining "notable topic"? Something that if you put double brackets around provides a blue link? Active Banana   ( bananaphone  18:24, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That the topic would pass WP:N - there is no requirement that an article actually already exists. ‒ Jaymax✍ 22:42, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Option C... None of the above or perhaps a mix of both... We need to demonstrate through reference to reliable sources that the topic is notable, but we also need to support inclusion of the items listed... which is also done through reference to reliable sources... sources that state that the item falls within the topic. Blueboar (talk) 15:24, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Blueboar - You are just restating Option B. We all know that NOTABILITY is demonstrated by reliable sources.  Option B says ... instances of a notable topic.  Why is Option C any different?--Mike Cline (talk) 15:55, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I believe in very clear and strictly applied inclusion criteria for lists. The way I see it, the first and foremost criteria for inclusion in any list is a published source that explicitly links the item to the topic of the list.  To my mind that comes close to (but is not quite the same as) saying that the list itself must be published.  We don't need one single published list... but we do need publication. Blueboar (talk) 17:30, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That's a verifiability issue, and while I too would prefer that option B state that each entry's inclusion in a list must be verifiable, that's not the dividing point above. Maybe option B should just be rephrased to say that "Lists compiled from multiple reliable sources are permissible even if no reliable source has itself compiled such a list."  Phrasing it in that way would avoid the need to bring in any other content policy and issue; we wouldn't take that statement to mean such a list could violate BLP for failure to spell that out, any more than it could V or OR.  postdlf (talk) 17:42, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The problem is that sometimes it isn't appropriate or permissible to compile a list from multiple sources. We recently discussed a good example on WP:NORN: List of wars between democracies... where different sources used differing definitions of the term "democracy" (and differing definitions of "war").  While each item (a war) could be cited to a source that said it was a war between democracies... because the sources disagreed on the the definitions of the basic terminology of the topic, it was synthetic for us to combine sources to form a list.  In other words... while it may be generally OK to use multiple sources, there are exceptions when you get to specifics. Blueboar (talk) 18:27, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Saying that it is permissible doesn't guarantee that it's always valid, and I fully agree with your example of when it's not. Though lists can tolerate a degree of difference between sources, because we can annotate why each source stated what it did when the reasons differ or the application is controversial, at least as long as there is a clear concept at the list's head notwithstanding disagreement in applications.  List of sovereign states might be a good example of this.  The underlying point from that might be that we should be careful in drawing too firm a line regarding what lists are not permitted, because it often requires a case-by-case discussion and experience with whether or not it's workable.  postdlf (talk) 18:47, 14 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm in the "none of the above" crowd. To me, you don't need to verify notability of the topic as a list. But you should have to verify notability of the topic as a group or set of discriminate things: some third-party should have talked about Japanese painters, Presidents with facial hair, or Episodes of 30 Rock as a *group*. (Or else we delete them, or summarize and merge them somewhere else.) Shooterwalker (talk) 20:42, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I would agree with you about presidents with facial hair, because it's not a fact that has any obvious relationship to the subject of presidents. But I don't understand why your other examples would require special pleading of some kind (though I don't doubt there is significant coverage of each as a group), given that those are just permutations of well-established and obvious classifications: artists by nationality and television episodes by series.  postdlf (talk) 21:12, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * You're right that it's kind of a moot issue. They're well-established and obvious classes of things -- which is why a few third-party sources have covered them as a class. We'd almost always keep "painters by nationality" because it's almost always a certainty that it's a notable and discriminate topic covered in reliable sources.
 * That said, I also see room here for a navigational exception. Even if I don't personally agree with it, I can't deny that we do it often, and we're in support of it. If you have several notable articles about different Japanese painters, it's totally unoriginal to say "hey, look! i made a list of all the articles on japanese painters." Painters who have depicted the immaculate conception would be a more original observation, though, and in need of sources. Shooterwalker (talk) 22:14, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That's basically the bottom line with the navigational lists (I think of them more as indexes of articles), and you seem to get exactly why it's not OR even if we're the first ones to compile such a list. Though I don't think it's so much a matter of making an original observation as an inobvious one.  Painters by subject matter isn't all that original generally, and though no one may have ever compiled a list of people who painted the Immaculate Conception, it's not all that inobvious given that (to my surprise) it is a well established subject matter in art; see Immaculate Conception for how common a theme it has been...I'm shocked to discover it could be "depicted", though I guess you have to take the artist's word for it that it's going on. ; )  Though with such a list, you would have to wonder if it would be best conceived as a list of painters rather than a list of works depicting that subject matter, that was simply sorted or sortable by artist.  And objections would be raised that this is what Commons is for, and blah blah blah.  It's always more complicated than we'd like.  postdlf (talk) 22:22, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, exactly. I'm willing to compromise on pure indexes so long as the index isn't something novel or clever. (Like, notable painters in Japan.) You could practically list off the top of your head discriminate and unoriginal ways to organize stuff, such as list of X's by geography. If it's novel or clever, you have to prove that it's unoriginal by finding third-party sources that have already covered it, even if it's just a bunch of links to notable articles (like, U.S. Presidents with facial hair, U.S. Presidents with nicknames, U.S. Presidents who have been accused of being born outside the United States). Even list of people who have painted the immaculate conception would be nonobvious, but I'm positive that third-party sources exist to talk about this kind of thing since it's such an important theme in art. Shooterwalker (talk) 22:34, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * But defining something as "novel or clever" is just as subjective as current standards. Active Banana   ( bananaphone  22:44, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Maybe I'm using the wrong word. But this isn't really subjective. Summarizing involves no original research. Analyzing does. But to your point, it's why I recommended outlining certain types of list topics that are unoriginal, such as "... by geography". Shooterwalker (talk) 22:49, 14 September 2010 (UTC)


 * It's consistent with how WP:OR is written. And there's no way to write out reasoned editorial judgment from these issues because we don't just copy single sources; we compile their facts and reorganize them for both lists and articles. Deciding whether a group of subjects belong in a list organized by a particular fact is ultimately no different in kind from deciding whether a group of facts from different sources belong together in a particular article or under a single article section header. We would not require any judgment specific to Foo City in determining that Foo City's subway, road system, and buses comprise a "transportation of Foo City" subtopic or split off article, even if no single source has written comprehensively about transportation in Foo City. It would not be a novel judgment to determine that those are all transportation-related because that is a standard way to conceptualize them. By contrast, combining Foo City's roadways, skyscrapers, and riverfront into "feng shui of Foo City" would be novel (and OR without reliable sources establishing that specific subtopic) because that's not a standard feature of city articles, nor a standard way to combine those elements. So it is with articles, so it is with lists: painters grouped by nationality is standard, so we don't need to prove each such grouping's validity every time a new permutation is compiled; painters grouped by shoe size is not, so a list of painters with size 10 feet would need some special pleading to justify it. postdlf (talk) 23:27, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * List of Presidents from Southern States -require sources or not? Active Banana   ( bananaphone  23:49, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, all lists require sources to verify each entry's inclusion in the list and to verify the definition (what's a president, what's a southern state), just so we're clear that's not what we're talking about. That aside, it may not be the best hypothetical you chose, as with only 44 presidents, we don't need to divide Lists of Presidents of the United States by place of birth, List of residences of Presidents of the United States, List of Presidents of the United States by place of primary affiliation into sublists by region.  But you can still apply my analysis above to your hypothetical and tell me how you think it comes out.  It should be clear from a study of the topic that grouping U.S. presidents by place of origin is a standard way to group and analyze them.  postdlf (talk) 00:11, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

For the purposes of the above (re Blueboar, Postdlf) by discriminate I mean things such as entries must be sourced (like all article content should be), and subject to objective and consistent criteria for inclusion. I think it is self-evident that the source must identify the entry as an instance of the class of items being listed, but that could be explicit. Does that help? ‒ Jaymax✍ 22:42, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Nixon's Enemies List does not have objective and consistent criteria for inclusion, yet I think you would agree, it is a notable list. Active Banana is right: "discriminate" or "indiscriminate" are measures of subjective importance, and are terms not defined anywhere in any policy or guideline. Arguably, all lists are discriminate, because the information contained in them is organised into columns. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 08:26, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think Nixon's Enemies List is a "list article" (at least not in the way we have been using the term)... It isn't a list of items meeting a notable topic... it is an article about a notable list (that contains examples form that list... essentially quoting). Blueboar (talk) 13:15, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I had never heard of Nixon's Enemies List until I read WP:NOT, where it is described as a list. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 13:59, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps Nixon's Enemies List is not a list article, but Master list of Nixon's political opponents seems to fit the bill.  RJC  TalkContribs 14:06, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
 * In both cases, the blatant, unavoidable, objective discriminating criteria for wiki editors to include an entry in the article list is that the entry appears on the singular, sourced, 3rd party master list. This subthread is a nonsense.  ‒ Jaymax✍ 14:38, 15 September 2010 (UTC)