Wikipedia talk:Notability (geographic features)

A way to fix geoland?
On one hand, this SNG greenlights millions of future permastubs which don't have sourcing to make a real article and which aren't a real article. On the other hand, Wikipedia (IMO rightly so) tilts the scale towards geographic articles because it is a highly enclyclopedic area and there is no consensus for and resistance to totally eliminating this tilt. Elsewhere I proposed a new type of article where these could be grouped, but this post is about having separate articles on these.

IMO one can often find an answer by putting common sense / general consensus into words. For example, regarding the millions of settlements in China and India which don't have an article. More specifically, I'm talking about ones which meet this SNG but can't demonstrably meet GNG. If someone started a pattern of creating permastubs on all of these (even if not mass creation per se), I don't think that that is wanted. But if somebody created a more substantial article with several sources and substantial unique content on one of these settlements, but which does not have full GNG sources, I think that most people would be happy that the SNG allowed it in. They also don't want to do anything that would enable a deletion-fest on existing articles.

What if we put this into words in this SNG? That using this SNG for new article requires meeting all of the current SNG criteria plus having several sources and substantial unique prose content?

Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 16:37, 15 January 2024 (UTC)


 * But the SNG is flawed. Legally recognised is not standard that can be used. As per last year's attempt to clean up the SNG, it is different per country (even if they have one). The original SNG was US biased, based on the fact that settlements in a census are Legally recognised, but most other places are not. A question from an editor before Christmas was should they create Sri Lankan villages based on a census, but Sri Lankan government census only legally recognise the region. Davidstewartharvey (talk) 16:48, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
 * IMO this modification of the SNG would solve that. If they want to use the SNG way in, besides meeting the existing SNG criteria, a new article would need to have multiple sources and substantial content. North8000 (talk) 18:39, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
 * But was the failure of the RFC last time being editors worrying that multiple sources and substantial content was too much like GNG. Davidstewartharvey (talk) 21:10, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
 * The last time IMO the problem was that the proposal essentially WAS GNG and also applied to existing articles. My idea is more lenient than that in both areas.  A major GEO editor (who creates high quality substantial articles and whose opinion I consider valuable) flatly opposed it. IMO many of their articles would not pass GNG, but all of them would pass under my idea. North8000 (talk) 21:39, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
 * The problem is that NGEO simply requires WP:V that it is or was a populated place. Many permastubs don't even get there. I don't think anything really needs fixing. SportingFlyer  T · C  15:53, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
 * There lies the problem. Because a census has a "place", editors take GEOLAND and state its a legalised populated place, and is verified by the census. Against GNG it would fail. Census data can only be legally recognised place in the US where it is stated in law. As per the thread above "Do my articles pass notability guidelines?" Sri Lanka only legally recognises the district not the village. That's why GEOLAND is flawed. Davidstewartharvey (talk) 16:12, 17 January 2024 (UTC)


 * Keep in mind that Wikipedia functions as a comprehensive gazetteer. Check out WP:5P1, one of Wikipedia's core pillars, where it states, "Wikipedia combines many features of general and specialized encyclopedias, almanacs, and gazetteers" (bold emphasis mine). I prefer things the way they presently are. Having a comprehensive encyclopedia regarding geographic information is superior compared to having an incomplete online encyclopedia based upon whether or not certain articles are considered by some to be subjectively a "real article" or not. If you don't like "permastubs", then don't read them. North America1000 14:26, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
 * I mostly agree with the first half of your post.   It's something that I basically already stated in my OP.  But there is a problem or at least an ambiguity.  There are millions of settlements and entities that qualify under this SNG which don't have articles which do not demonstratively qualify under GNG and many of which couldn't qualify under GNG. Again, setting aside the possibility of mass creation...should we welcome creation these as articles even if stubs or likely permastubs?
 * Maybe the answer is as you imply, "yes" and we should just clarify that.
 * Or maybe it is as I proposed here to add a criteria that there be multiple references with content beyond "it exists"
 * Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 16:03, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Is there enough information in the article to verify the settlement as a "legally recognised" populated place? That's all we need. (Legally recognised is in quotes because it's doing the job of "distinct hamlet, not neighbourhood" here.) SportingFlyer  T · C  16:09, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
 * To answer the question in your first sentence, for my example/question, the answer is "yes", there is enough information in the article to verify the settlement as a "legally recognized" populated place, and meet the other SNG criteria (not a neighborhood or abstract district) . North8000 (talk) 16:25, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia does not, in fact, function as a gazetteer. It has features of a gazetteer, which is the only thing you are demonstrating by that reference to WP:5P. FOARP (talk) 10:30, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * "Keep in mind that Wikipedia functions as a comprehensive gazetteer." Keep in mind that this isn't true. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 16:07, 5 April 2024 (UTC)


 * But what exactly is being fixed here? GEOLAND or the SNG? It seems the conversations about this have no resolution as there's no exact uniform definition for a populated place. If there's documentation of the place from the respective authoritative entity and can be verified, I would say that's a good start. The focus shouldn't be if they end up as perma-stubs. – The Grid  ( talk )  17:27, 17 January 2024 (UTC)


 * The presenting problem with the guidelines is the irony that, however much one may want WP to function as a gazetteer (and on top of the dispute over that, it also seems to me that we do disagree on what information a gazetteer ought to contain), the official gazetteers are not reliable enough or get baldly misinterpreted. In GNIS and GNS, we've been over and over this: they are derived partly from the interpretations of maps and partly from certain other sources, and those maps and sources were frequently misinterpreted or were outright incorrect (the latter especially in GNS). I'm also concerned about the indexes of old commercial maps being used in the same manner, as for instance we see old commercial US maps being used as sources for the population of places, when it's not clear where they got that information. Census data tends to be somewhat better by its nature but we keep having similar issues with interpretation. It seems to me that we need to spell out that gazetteers and maps are at best reliable sources for names and locations, but are not reliable for the character or notability of a place. Mangoe (talk) 23:11, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
 * What this guideline needs to say, in express words, is "villages are presumed to merit an article". Villages generally satisfy GNG, and that includes villages in India, a country that, amongst other sources, has more than 146,000 registered newspapers and periodicals, and that number is still increasing. (In 2010 there were more than 55,000 newspapers in local languages (out of a total of 62,000), of which more than 44,000 had a circulation of less than 10,000, and about half their content was local, according to Knowledge at Wharton.) Further, the number of villages in India is not "millions". There were less than 665,000 villages in the census of 2019. James500 (talk) 05:40, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
 * As stated, "millions" referred to ones that meet NGEO in China and India combined. North8000 (talk) 18:47, 26 January 2024 (UTC)


 * Really, the way to fix this remains the same as it's always been: A distinction between having information about something on Wikipedia, and having a standalone article on that thing. Even a gazetteer normally wouldn't devote a full page to just providing coordinates and population of a place where there's really nothing else to be said about it. So what really should be done is to roll up those types of "articles" into lists (in the US, that would look like List of populated places in Example County, Somestate, and generally other countries would have similar administrative divisions), with basic census information on the non-notable ones and of course standard wikilinks in addition to that for an actual article on the notable ones. I would generally tend to agree that we should have information available about verifiable populated places, but we shouldn't pretend that a few census factoids makes it an "article" or worth presenting as such. Seraphimblade Talk to me 10:53, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * +1 Donald Albury 12:51, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Agree 200%. But we need to think about how to make that happen. The most viable way would be to accept a new norm where once someone has has enough info to create what is now a geoland compliant stub, it gets an entry in a table in an list-type article as   describes.   The new norm is that we need a different term than (or a different meaning for) "list of......" because often it can't purport to be a full list.  For example, if there are 100,000 towns in in the XYZ province of China, and for 100 of them an editor has put enough together to have a barely geoland-compliant stub, then that article will have 100 entries and not purport to be a list of (the 100,000) towns in the XYZ province of China.  (Side note; I don't think there's a tidy way to go one level down from province, e.g. prefecture).  North8000 (talk) 15:30, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * What functional difference would bundling them into a list make? It seems like an arbitrary stylistic/navigational choice to me. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 15:41, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It makes quite a lot of practical difference. The first is that list inclusion criteria discussed on a talk page is a lot easier to arrive at: "Don't include something here just based on (questionable source X), it must at least be cross-referenced with (better source Y) and show up there with A and B as characteristics." Doing that on a list's talk page is going to be a far smoother process than hashing stuff like that out at AfD, which is what happens (or fails to happen) when they're all separate. And the lists will have more watchers than forlorn permastubs that may have only been edited by a bot, which both makes enforcing something like that easier, and also watching for sneak vandalism like changing numbers in a way that doesn't match the source. It also in the end makes updates easier to coordinate and do, when something like a new census comes out. Volunteer time and attention is a finite resource, and a lot less of it would be consumed maintaining one list than hundreds of separate things in which almost no one takes any sustained interest. It's more or less the same reason we have notability inclusion cutoffs for, well, anything. And then it eliminates the tangential issue of notability that often tangles up and derails those discussions, since notability does not matter for something going into an existing article. Seraphimblade Talk to me 18:30, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Strong agreement with Seraphimblade's comments. The whole point of having an article is to provide readers with information in context (see WP:PAGEDECIDE). To be blunt, some editors like to make thousands of permastubs to satisfy some personal urge or goal, and are forgetting that we are building an encyclopedia to be of service for readers. I think lists of settlements more likely to be useful to our readers than reading a one-sentence article out of context. — hike395 (talk) 18:42, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Seconded. THe blurb in NGEO It is advised to include identifiable minor geographic features within articles for larger features must be rephrased in stronger language and a section with advice must be added: with particular examples of cities and rivulets. WP:RIVERS/WP:LAKES must be notified; I am sure they have ideas on what/how to do about this. Also, a strong recommendation must be given about merging of existing nanosubs, to prevent edit wars when someone starts merging and "owners" start reverting (been there). With a special mention about Category:Antarctica: Long time ago a HUGE USGS database on Antarctica was dumped in Wikipedia (I myself am guilty of wikifying of quite a few of them cold stubs, such as Gillick Rock and the likes:-). Over later years editors did a great and surely painful job of merging them into larger features.- Altenmann >talk 19:54, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * But how would it be easier? It seems to me that right now we have an entrenched disagreement between editors who think that the verifiable existence of a populated place is sufficient for inclusion, and editors who would prefer something more towards the GNG (or at least multiple sources). Wouldn't that just reappear in the form of debates about list inclusion criteria?
 * Usually when we talk about notability it's a question of inclusion, full stop. Like if a company fails WP:NCORP, it's not because we'd prefer it as an entry in List of spammy startups, it's because we don't want it included at all. Something that seems quite unique to the reoccurring complaints about GEOLAND is that there is that practically nobody says we shouldn't have coverage of all populated places in some form; it's the specific form of "standalone article" that is objected to. I can see that the list model has advantages, but it also has obvious disadvantages: difficulty of maintaining stable links to specific places, added complexity when linking to Wikidata and other structured data sources, ambiguity in where a place should appear (e.g. should Birstall, West Yorkshire be in Districts of Batley, Towns in Kirklees, or Towns in West Yorkshire? Local people will have strong feelings about each!), etc. Unless the inclusion criteria are different it's basically a coin flip of one imperfect content model (standalone articles) vs. another imperfect content model (lists). Only we've already chosen one, and the cost in volunteer time of moving to the other would be immense. That's what I meant above when I asked about a functional difference: how would moving to the list model change the inclusion criteria? –&#8239;Joe (talk) 07:49, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * A place can appear in multiple lists, with links to the other lists as well. And I disagree that notability usually == inclusion; a nontrivial proportion of the AfDs I come across close as redirect, and some of those that don't only close otherwise because the subject is mentioned in multiple equally plausible pages. It's not like deletion discussions are advocating removing the article and erasing all info surrounding links to the subject in other pages. JoelleJay (talk) 15:52, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Actually that outcome is so common that XfDcloser has a function to automatically remove list entries that link to a deleted article. Because the majority of lists that have explicit inclusion criteria exclude entries that are not individually notable. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 16:50, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Singular links in lists with no other info, yes, but not ones where the link is within prose context. JoelleJay (talk) 16:54, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * No no, it'll also remove those. Anything with a bullet in front of it, I believe. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 17:02, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * "practically nobody says we shouldn't have coverage of all populated places in some form" thats not true, we can't even get consensus on whether we should have coverage of all legally recognized populated places (an order of magnitude smaller than all populated places). I don't actually think I've ever come across anyone who says that we should have "coverage of all populated places in some form" are you such a person? Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 16:00, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I am paraphrasing the guideline we're talking about (which I agree with and which has long-standing consensus behind it): Populated, legally recognized places are typically presumed to be notable. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 16:27, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * "practically nobody says we shouldn't have coverage of all populated places in some form" does not paraphrase that sentence... populated places =/= Populated, legally recognized places... And "typically presumed to be notable" means that typically they are but sometimes they aren't. That is not a competent paraphrase, its a completely different point. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 19:02, 7 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Oh dear, I'm not a competent paraphraser in Horse Eye's Back's book? Whatever shall I do? –&#8239;Joe (talk) 10:17, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Please do not mock me, WP:CIVILITY is expected to be maintained. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 16:26, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Ahahaha – read back the comments I have made here, and the way you have responded to them, please, then talk to me about civility. I'm not going to respond to you further on this issue. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 15:53, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I have read the comments again, now we can talk about civility. Per aspersions I am requesting that you provide diffs which support your claims of incivility comparable to . Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 15:56, 9 April 2024 (UTC)


 * 100,000 towns in in the XYZ province of China - not that bad: common sense advices to merge into the lowest subdivision; in this case, see, e.g., Dongzhi County- Altenmann >talk 19:54, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I took one dive into China geographical hierarchy seeking such a solution. Maybe not deep enough of a dive, but it seemed that there was no consistent hierarchy between towns and provinces. But I could be wrong. Or maybe we don't need a consistent hierarchy, since, as described it's unlikely that they could be considered to be a full listing anyway. I think that the main way that Wikipedia is searched anyway is the search tool and a search for the specific town would find it wherever it is.North8000 (talk) 20:19, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Altenmann@North8000 or, delimit inclusion to township-level divisions only. The towns appear to be the closest in equivalence to towns of other countries. Even county-level cities and counties tend to be oversized: the ancient Confucian village of Qufu is now a 600,000+ CLC, but it was likely that it amalgamated with other divisions, just like the current practice of turning prefectures into a prefecture-level city. So I think township-level divisions should also treat the same recognition in GEOLAND. But all village-level divisions must be deleted from enwiki, and should be merged as listings in township-level divisions. The huge quantity of township-level divisions is natural for a country with more than a billion inhabitants and has complexity in hierarchy of local government units. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 23:53, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Joe another difference is the format of what we are...an enclyclopedia built up of articles, by the common meaning of "articles". (using a bit of hyperbole to keep this simple):  Scattering factoids and calling each one of them an "article" really isn't that. And reversing the "functional difference" question,  given the argument towards not doing that, why structure a factoid as an article when it could just as well be a line in a table? Sincerely, <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 20:29, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The most compelling reason is that we already do structure them as articles, so switching to a list model would be enormously time-consuming. There should be very clear and very strong advantages to the list model to justify making that change, and I've never seen anyone offer anything more than e.g. marginal (and hypothetical) improvements in maintainability. The problem with 'why not?' questions is they are so easily reversed. Why bother structuring things into a table when you could just put all the information you have on one place in one place? It ends up just being about what you subjectively feel is the default, 'cleaner' option.
 * I've never thought about how the word 'article' changes expectations, but I think you might be on to something there. I wonder how much of this debate we would have been spared if (like most encyclopaedias and gazetteers) we called them 'entries' from the start? –&#8239;Joe (talk) 07:54, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, going 100% on your last idea would mean fundamentally changing what Wikipedia is and how it is organized. But if you are talking about settlements that meet NGeo, that is the status quo except that we do call them articles. <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 14:26, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It's not a suggestion. It's an observation that if some people (like you) understand the word "article" to imply a certain length and/or depth of coverage, and others (like me), just see it as equivalent to an entry in an average paper encyclopaedia, which looking at examples on my shelf range from one sentence to several pages, that would go a long way to explaining why debates around GEOLAND and stubs in general are so intractable. I've long noticed that these tend to devolve into a camp that intuitively dislikes stubs and a camp that can't see the issue with them; the lack of a definition of "article" in current policy might be part of the reason why. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 16:56, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * We have a perfectly good definition of what makes a subject appropriate for an article. The issues often come about when we try not to follow that. Seraphimblade Talk to me 20:10, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't think that's quite the same thing. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 10:12, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I agree with North8000 that this would mean fundamentally changing what Wikipedia is and how it is organized. We are not a gazetteer, and I think you know that even if you've conveniently forgotten. If that is too time consuming we can just delete them without creating a list... That would save time if thats what you want. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 14:38, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I believe Wikipedia is a gazetteer. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 16:31, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Can you point to any policy stating it is? All of this is "gazetteer" stuff is coming from part of one sentence in an essay that says it has aspects of a gazetteer, not that it is one... JoelleJay (talk) 16:52, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's a point of fact, either way. In my opinion Wikipedia should be a gazetteer and has de facto operated as one for a very long time. The essay links above offers a brief explanation why, but it does need to be fleshed out. I do respect that others think differently and I don't think any progress is going to be made by one side yelling "Wikipedia is a gazetteer!" and the other yelling back "No, it just has elements of one!" –&#8239;Joe (talk) 17:01, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * We don't need to yell, we already have consensus that Wikipedia isn't a gazetteer it just has elements of one. If you want to change that consensus this is not the venue. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 18:55, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * And agreement on that wording has conclusively resolved any and all disputes about gazetteer-like content on geographic places, right? –&#8239;Joe (talk) 10:06, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The only issues seem to come from people who deny the existence and/or validity of such a consensus, as you just did. Long term such WP:IDNHT would be an individual behavioral issue and would be addressed through individual behavioral remedies. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 16:22, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * "This is an essay." Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 18:55, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * WP:Wikipedia is not a gazetteer. FOARP (talk) 16:26, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * +2. There is no reason to have standalone articles on topics with such meager information when they can easily be covered in an umbrella article. JoelleJay (talk) 02:35, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

As an overview of this thread:
 * 1) My original proposal was to say that for new articles, the article has to have a teeny bit more in it than a geostub.
 * 2) Seraphimblade brought up the idea of list articles for places, which could be a hybrid of links to those that have real articles (presumably with more content than a geostub) and a list entry for those that don't
 * 3) Some folks are discussing various general issues with NGEO and also regarding bein/not being/ partially being gazetteer

IMO we really shouldn't try to tackle #3 in this thread. So we have two ideas. BTW they can coexist. <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 14:59, 7 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Well, if you really want to go somewhere with this, I'd suggest that the number of recent failed proposals to either tighten GEOLAND or institute minimum sourcing requirements for new articles is a strong indicator that #1 is not going to find consensus. The idea of bundling geostubs into lists is the only suggestion I've heard from the anti-stub crowd that sounds like it has a cat's chance in hell. The challenge is to present a strong, positive argument for doing so that does not rely on passive reasoning (i.e. "there's no reason for...") or an intuitive dislike of short articles that all Wikipedians demonstrably do not share. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 17:10, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Taking the last big proposal as an example, it was basically saying that articles in the discussed area had to meet GNG. That would been a huge change. I don't think that failure of a huge change proposal indicates that a much smaller change like #1 would fail. Sincerely, <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 18:45, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * This discussion already mntions a strong positive agrument: it is very convenient to have these small things in context, keeping in mind there is close to no other information about these obscure villages. It is good both for villages themselves and upper level subdivisions as well. - Altenmann >talk 18:50, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Right. The question is whether the community will agree that that's a strong enough reason to start merging hundreds of thousands of articles. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 10:10, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I just don't believe this is going to happen. Nobody is going to take on the work of doing that merging, and if anyone tries people will come in behind them and demerge it (as has happened with Lugnut's Turkish village article-spam which was merged after we had an ANI discussion and multiple AFDs but apparently those count for nothing).
 * Deleting or improving these articles is the only workable option. Failing to do either just means seeing the problem continue to get worse, and articles about places that we have nothing to say about at all, and which may well not exist, continue to proliferate. FOARP (talk) 11:52, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * just don't believe this is going to happen -if you think that merging hundreds of thousands is a tough job, think about hundreds of thousands of AfDs to process (unless you want leave the status quo). And I am pretty sure that there will be a strong opposition to group AfD nominations. But I dont think there are really no hundreds of thousands, so merging is a feasible solution. As you know, there is a way how a man can eat an elephant.- Altenmann >talk 16:19, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Mass deletion was what we did with C46’s fake Iranian village articles, and there were tens of thousands of those. In contrast merging on Lugnuts’s Turkish village stubs took longer and just ended up being undone making the whole process pointless. FOARP (talk) 16:31, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

We can partially try out Seraphimblade's idea (#2) idea without any guideline changes. This type of article exists already. (e.g List of cities in Iowa ). Start these for the provinces in China. When one gets too big divide it up by smaller divisions. The only change is that we need to accept and make it a norm that these do not attempt to be a complete list. Start a tradition that when the only content of a geostub fits nicely into a line in the table, than that's a better way to cover it. <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 17:08, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I kind of like the idea of doing a trial run on something like that. If nothing else, we could set that up as a standard for new place articles. In the meantime, there's no deadline for changing anything existing, so I think the concerns by on that aren't that big of a deal. If someone doesn't want to participate in doing the merges, it's not like anyone will force them to, so they can be gotten to as they're gotten to. Anyone who doesn't think it's worth their time to do can just, well&mdash;not do it. Seraphimblade Talk to me 23:48, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * You absolutely need to get a prior consensus for this, whether or not it involves a change to the guideline; these are not obvious and uncontroversial merges. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 07:35, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Even when you get a prior consensus for merging (as happened with the Turkish villages - see these discussions: 1 2 3) what then happens is that consensus is simply ignored so long as the articles can still be easily re-created, which they can because the redirect is still there. What's the point? FOARP (talk) 08:02, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, I think you know my answer to that question: there is no point. Putting aside the question of whether geostubs are a problem that needs to be solved in the first place, if there's a group of good-faith editors that are convinced that a certain type of content is useful and a group of good-faith editors that are convinced that it isn't, the latter is always going to face a steep uphill battle, because Wikipedia is deliberately set up to make it easier to create content than to remove it. We've seen this with portals, with the reference desk, with outlines, with infoboxes, with schools... the list goes on. But judging from the tone of this talk page over the last year, a good number of people are not ready to move on from the geostub issue to problems that are easier to fix, so here we are again. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 08:46, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Mostly I'm remembering that we did actually manage to delete the C46 Iranian "village" articles in spite of there being tens of thousands of them. I don't think it's wrong to advocate that as a broader solution to large sets of articles sourced only to a single source, and I think people will adopt something like it when the problem becomes bad enough. FOARP (talk) 08:52, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The latter currently enjoys consensus... On wikipedia the uphill battle is generally choosing to fight against widespread and longstanding consensus. You're acting like we don't already have a consensus here and there is an open question between two groups of editors not a closed question with one group doing their best imitation of an ostrich. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 15:45, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Any changes in merging is not an inherent part of such a trial run. IMO no changes in policies guidelines or are needed. The only change is some nuances....that we need to acknowledge that these are expected to be only a partial listing. Sometimes only 1% complete. And we should probably organize it a bit here. My ideas
 * OK to start an area that will eventually get too big. (e.g. a province) And when it gets too big, divide into a lower level division
 * Probably best not to use the word "list" e..g. call it "Cities and towns in XYZ province (China)" because it does not purport to be a complete list. But regarding wp:notability, still treat it as a list article.
 * No big data dumps into lists.This is for where the editor has least done what's needed for a valid geostub and put it individually into a row in table in the article.
 * Table form, e.g. like current practice at List of cities in Iowa
 * <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 12:49, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * No changes in policies guidelines or are needed. The only change is some nuances - One of the nuances I was suggesting is to put a stronger wording on the advice about merging, with explanative section -- What it you opinion about this? I am asking that if there is a preliminary agreement, I can put it to RFC for policy update. - Altenmann >talk 16:47, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * in XYZ province (China) -- beg to disagree. It is a too large subivision, with literally thousands of populated places, even if we don't have info for all of them. If you take minimal subdivision, you will not need separate articles for lists and have built-in lists. - Altenmann >talk 16:47, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * One more remark, about table format. I dont think it is a good idea. Suppose you found a sentence-worth info for some of the places. To add it into the table, you need something like "Comment" column. But then line widths in the table become irregular, decreasing readability and waste of screen space. It is OK to relatively short lists, but for longer ones, scrolling them is a nightmare. - Altenmann >talk 16:58, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * On your first point, I agree but that should probably handled separately. Would probably be hard to write, had to pass, and right now there is no target for many of those merges. On your second point....I realized that...actually tens of thousands. I was just throwing it out there as just a practical way to get started on a small scale.     I was thinking that for a long time under "This is for where the editor has least done what's needed for a valid geostub and put it individually into a row in table in the article. " it would just be dozens, of the 10's of thousands of possibilities.  And after that it could get divided up. On your last point, what would suggest.  Probably should have a way to gracefully fit geostub type data.   Sincerely,<b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 18:04, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Plaskett, California
Would this be inherently notable? I do not see it listed as CDP at the Census bureau. Graywalls (talk) 13:35, 15 February 2024 (UTC) https://tigerweb.geo.census.gov/tigerwebmain/Files/bas24/tigerweb_bas24_cdp_ca.html not listed as CDP. Graywalls (talk) 01:42, 16 February 2024 (UTC)


 * I don't see any indication of official or legal recognition, or of any significant coverage by reliable sources. Most of the article is about the general area rather than the community itself. Donald Albury 17:49, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Comment - Google Maps shows Plaskett, California here and Wikidata shows GeoNames ID, GNIS Feature ID (Unincorporated Place) as well as other identifies. The article has been around since 2009‎ and has 18 sources. It is also listed as an unincorporated community for Monterey County, California. It seems like this citation means it is a legally recognized place.
 * Greg Henderson (talk) 18:17, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
 * GNIS is not legal recognition. It is nothing more than a database of place names (many of which are based on dubious evidence). older ≠ wiser 18:33, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, then what is a legal source and how do you find it? Greg Henderson (talk) 18:38, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Incorporated municipalities (and former incorporated municipalities) qualify, but then, just about all of them (at least in English-speaking countries) will have enough reliable sources in English available to easily establish notability. Local government entities in non-English-speaking places may require more effort to find reliable sources, but we will presume such sources exist for entities that are defined and recognized by the relevant government, subject to discussion. Census tracts, most taxing districts, and such, do not qualify as exempt from the general notability rules. There is some dispute on whether Census-designated places in the U.S. qualify (I have seen an article about a CDP deleted as "non-notable"). As the guideline says, populated places without legal recognition are subject to the GNG. Donald Albury 18:59, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
 * There is no single authoritative source and previous discussions here have shown there is no agreement as to what "legally recognized" means in the context of this guideline. older ≠ wiser 18:59, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Looking at GNIS map sources, it looks as though this was a 4th class post office, which are generally not notable of themselves. At present there's nothing there but the campground and the nearby school. The text really doesn't describe a settlement, so there's a good chance this would not survive AfD. Mangoe (talk) 21:33, 15 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Whatever it is, the article is of interest in the history of Big Sur and as a target for redirects from Plaskett Creek (ha! two or them :-) and two Plaskett Camping places), Plaskett Ridge (two of them as well), Plaskett Rock, Plaskett Creek State Park. Requires cleanup from original research, though, but expansion seems also possible. But I did fail to find a solid ref for a place called simply "Plackett" (alhtough I did see that the campground is called simply "Plackett" ) - Altenmann >talk 00:06, 16 February 2024 (UTC)
 * And any information worth retaining can be placed in some higher level article. Having redirects pointing to it is not a criteria for retaining an article. Donald Albury 01:54, 16 February 2024 (UTC)

Based on the feedback here, I have boldly redirected the article to Monterey County, California. Graywalls (talk) 07:33, 16 February 2024 (UTC)


 * Based on GEOLAND, as it is not in the US Census (Legally recognised settlement are only recorded in the US census, it is written into law unlike elsewhere in the world) so notability reverts to GNG. Looking at the article does it meet it? Don think it does, so would redirect the article to Monterey County, California as per User:Graywalls Davidstewartharvey (talk) 08:58, 16 February 2024 (UTC)
 * In the U.S., aside from metropolitan and micropolitan statistical areas, which are defined by the Office of Management and Budget, and census-designated places, the places reported on by the Census Bureau are legally defined elsewhere, i.e., states and territories, counties and county equivalents, some minor civil divisions (such as towns in New England), and incorporated municipalities. Entities below the state/territory level are legally defined by the states/territories, not by the Census Bureau. Those places have officially established boundaries. Any place in the U.S. that does not belong to one of those categories does not, in my opinion, qualify as a legally or officially recognized place. Donald Albury 19:24, 16 February 2024 (UTC)
 * This is a good point, to be added to the guideline, to the definition of "official recognition": existence of the officially established boundaries. And distinction must be drawn between officia'ly recognized places and traditional, historical regions, which may not necessarily be strictly delineated. In some cases the delineation may be implied but hardly found now, e.g., for historical homesteads. (I believe that "Plackett homestead" may be cobbled up from available books, to replace the discussed hapless article). - Altenmann >talk 19:40, 16 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Strictly speaking, I don't think census-defined places are "legally defined". These are statistical entities created to provide a means of presenting data for the areas. These CDPs are generally created in conjunction with state and local authorities, but the names and boundaries are somewhat arbitrarily defined. older ≠ wiser 20:02, 16 February 2024 (UTC)

IMO though a combination of factors, it shouldn't be a separate article. And agree that per the factors discussed above Ngeo does not confer wp:notability. <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 19:57, 16 February 2024 (UTC)

Generally it sould also be in the primary division system. For example if there is a set of lines on a map which is an irrigation district which encompasses portions of 4 towns, the irrigation district is not greenlighted by the SNG. <b style="color: #0000cc;">North8000</b> (talk) 12:26, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Lucia, California
I also feel Lucia, California lacks notability. There's considerable contents, but they're just things nearby and nothing specifically addressing this place in depth to demonstrate WP:GNG is met. Graywalls (talk) 00:39, 17 February 2024 (UTC)

Papua New Guinean LLGs
Are Papua Mew Guinean local-level governments, like Wewak Urban LLG in East Sepik Province, deserving articles per both WP:GNG and WP:GEOLAND? They appear to be similar to the Philippine barangays. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 22:36, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If you look in items in Districts of East Sepik Province, you will see they contain lists of wards, i.e., some nontrivial information.

Wewak Urban LLG is unique in this respect in that it contains a single item, namely the town of Wewak, So I think Wewak Urban LLG may be copied/redirected to Wewak, the rest let them be. - Altenmann >talk 00:30, 5 April 2024 (UTC)


 * @Altenmann the town of Wewak does seem to overlap two LLG's (?). Wewak is also included in Wewak Rural LLG. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 01:38, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Why is GNIS different?
So, it's now mostly accepted, at least amongst people who frequent this page, that GNIS shouldn't be the only source cited for GEO articles and if it is the only source available then probably the article shouldn't exist as an article. This was achieved mostly through the trench-warfare of continually pointing out the massive mistakes that are on GNIS ("Monkey Box", LOL - though that should have been straight-deleted) until people gave in, and was confirmed in an RSN discussion.

GNS has also been generally accepted as a bad source, mostly just by association with GNIS since it comes ultimately from the same source, with this again being confirmed in an RSN discussion.

The thing is there is absolutely no reason at all to dismiss the accuracy of the official gazetteer of the United States of America whilst assuming that, for example, the gazetteer of, for example, Poland, remains a valid source for basing an entire article on. It's not like we haven't seen systematic errors in other gazetteers (in the case of Poland, the issue is that a whole load of former state assets - state farms/factories and the like - were added to their gazetteer as "settlements").

I just don't get it. FOARP (talk) 08:20, 30 April 2024 (UTC)


 * One possible edit to the guideline is The Geographic Names Information System, the GEOnet Names Server, do not satisfy the "legal recognition" requirement and are also unreliable for "populated place" designation. We could possibly also remove the links to RSN. — hike395 (talk) 11:36, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't see that. The issues with GNIS, in particular, have to do with its methodology and the peculiarities of its classification of entries, and how the latter have been misinterpreted in WP. Similar publications/databases from other countries are going to have different issues— or maybe similar ones, because mass stub creation has led to mass errors and mass cleanups, the latter frequently opposed on various principles. Mangoe (talk) 16:46, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure the issues with GNIS really are all that specific to how the USGS did it. "Populated place" is a concept not so different from eg "settlement" in Polish, which ultimately just indicates that someone may have lived there, once. We've also seen places that are manifestly just train stations labelled as "villages" in Russia.
 * My honest view is that we dismiss GNIS because it is the gazetteer which we are most familiar with and thus have fully explored the flaws of. We are still assuming that other national gazetteers are good when they may well just have exactly the same issues as GNIS. FOARP (talk) 21:07, 30 April 2024 (UTC)


 * When you say "there is absolutely no reason at all to dismiss the accuracy" of GNIS and GNS: "dismiss" is your word. What we have said is that there enough issues that the translation of "populated place" to "unincorporated community" (which is a WP neologism/euphemism anyway) has to be verified. Part of this is due to errors in the GNIS compilation itself, but the largest part is that "populated place" in practice covers too many kinds of things, and one has to go outside of GNIS to find out what sort of thing it actually is, even if one were to keep the article. As far as the accuracy of names and locations is concerned, we've never found reason to doubt the former, that being its purpose after all. We have found some location errors, but these either result from ambiguities in the maps themselves, or on rare occasions, from simple data entry typos. We've also found that geophysical feature entries are generally well-classified. But that "what is it really?" question means that, yes, articles on settlements shouldn't be written with GNIS as a sole source. Since that is almost entirely water over the dam at this point, it has meant that when discussing one of these essentially sole-sourced articles, the fact of a GNIS entry isn't enough, as has been explained over and over. In reality, what I've found in going over the articles for many states is that the ate of problems varies a great deal. In some of the upper midwest and plains states, there is recognizably a town for most "communities"; in California and Arizona there were many problems. Right now, going through Indiana, I'm finding that most settlements can be verified from maps, and I don't put those up for consideration.


 * The issues with GNS are quite different. We've found many countries in which there simply isn't anything where GNS says there should be something. These problems tuned up first: I an across them in Somalia. It appears that in many areas GNS just didn't have good information to work from. Mangoe (talk) 16:46, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Don't forget that GNS is based on many sources, including local gazetteers. Military maps are also heavily-relied on source. I remember reading about US troops having problems with the wrong names for villages in Afghanistan and non-existent villages being on their maps and thinking "LOL, this is because of GNS, right?" FOARP (talk) 21:12, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Two other things to add: unincorporated communities are U.S.-centric. Most settlements in say Europe will be "incorporated" somehow. Also, for places like Somalia, the GNS is generally accurate but can be very imprecise, especially where it was digitised from paper maps. SportingFlyer  T · C  21:13, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * FYI In Russia there are inter-settlement territory, a concept introduced in 2019, kinda unincorporated areas with low population density. - Altenmann >talk 21:20, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Unincorporated communities are a bit of a red herring. Most of what are called "unincorporated communities" in the US here on Wikipedia are also incorporated "somehow" -- i.e., they are governed as part of a larger administrative unit, such as a town/township or county or county-equivalent. There is little practical difference between this and various small settlements elsewhere. The term is meant to indicate these communities are not incorporated as a separate municipal organization. older ≠ wiser 21:32, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Of course, in that case, the smaller units with no sourcing other than the local gazetteer would be mentioned in the article about the more notable higher-order unit. FOARP (talk) 13:23, 1 May 2024 (UTC)
 * "Unincorporated communities" in the U.S., other than Census-designated places, do not have any defined boundaries, and so there are no reliable sources for area, population, etc. Yes, they are usually in a wider entity such as a county, parish, or borough, but some unincorporated communities span two or more such entities (Melrose, Florida spreads into four different counties, for example). Donald Albury 16:49, 1 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Case in point: I am still not clear where Gorgas, Alabama actually is, and I created that article. It had an entire book written about it so I have to assume it's notable, but these "unincorporated communities" seem capable of shifting location over time, have no actual centre. This recent comment on the talk page indicates there are two places called Gorgas, neighbouring each other, but it would be great to get more sourcing to confirm this. FOARP (talk) 09:32, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, I completely agree that unincorporated communities can be difficult to describe and to source. However, my point about them being a red herring is that the same issues apply to small settlements throughout the world and are not in any way unique to the US, apart from the Hypostasis of the descriptive term "unincorporated community" into some sort of actual thing. older ≠ wiser 11:16, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Entirely agree on this: small settlements or apparent-settlements exist the world over and this is not just a US issue. They can be very hard to describe and we have made the issue worse by trying to cram them in to the mould of a particular terminology. FOARP (talk) 13:00, 2 May 2024 (UTC)

What other national gazetteers are we using, anyway?
Most of my participation in this has been with US locations and with places where there is no obvious national mapping authority. I've come across issues with articles taken from UK OS maps, where people have taken labels and assumed they were towns/villages. But what about other countries? Mangoe (talk) 02:23, 2 May 2024 (UTC)


 * Polish settlement articles are based on TERYT. The Russian articles are usually based on the Federal State Statistics Service database. Hungarian articles are based on the Gazetteer of Hungary published by the Hungarian statistics office. Pretty much every country has a mass of "village" articles where the national gazetteer or a gazetteer-like-database is the source.
 * I think it's important to recognise that more-or-less exactly the same thing that was done in the US based on GNIS was done also in every other country with a comprehensive GNIS-style online database. Typically gazetteers include a "populated place"-like designation that has been translated as "village" when this may not be accurate (e.g., in Polish "village" would be wieś, but there is another designation osada, or "settlement", that we have also often translated as "village"). Similarly, many Turkish "village" articles have been generated about places designated as mahalle (or "neighbourhood"). FOARP (talk) 07:32, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Looking back over our Talk archives for GNIS-like sources or gazetteers in non-US countries:
 * Poland Registr TERYT
 * Azerbajani government geographic directory
 * Turkish local government directory
 * unknown source Iranian census for abadi (perhaps knows the source?)
 * Turkish statistical database
 * Philippine census
 * — hike395 (talk) 07:38, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * The source for the Iranian abadi was the Iranian census and is a shining example of why it's just totally wrong to take censuses/gazetteers as a list of "legally-recognised populated places" (a concept that exists only on Wikipedia). I think everyone on here is familiar with the story but - briefly for anyone who isn't - abadi are just places where the census was counted and can be literally anything, including pumps/shops/petrol stations/bridges/factories/farms etc. FOARP (talk) 08:55, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what you mean by . If you mean the automated creation of articles for US places, Rambot used Census data, which is entwined with GNIS as a source. And Rambot was limited to incorporated places (places with officially recognized municipal governments) and CDPs, which with some exceptions are generally well-established localities. Apart from some small number of CDPs, most of the Rambot-generated articles were for valid places that could pass notability criteria (even though some of these have seen little improvement over the past nearly 20 years). Some editors later harvested additional categories of places from GNIS, and to my knowledge this was done manually, although there may have been some usage of tools that resembled bot-like behavior. These later additions were often problematic. I guess my point is that use of a national gazetteer is not in itself problematic, but rather indiscriminate usage without good understanding of the data. older ≠ wiser 10:32, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Rambot wasn't the only bot operating. The Polish articles were mostly created by Kotbot, directly transposing poorly-validated information from PL Wiki on to EN Wiki. FOARP (talk) 10:34, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I was referring only to the creation of articles on US places based directly or indirectly on GNIS data. older ≠ wiser 11:01, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * That's fine, but I am not referring specifically to Rambot, but instead to the mass-created stub-articles that cite only GNIS and no other source. I don't actually object to Rambot specifically, though Rambot's work did inspire a lot of bad stub-creation. I don't object specifically to bot-creation, but to mechanistic article-creation in which no checking takes place. FOARP (talk) 13:04, 2 May 2024 (UTC)

Notability of Category 2 listings in New Zealand
This guideline states that nationally protected buildings with more than just mere statistics are presumed notable. Would this apply to category 2 heritage listings in NZ? See List of category 2 historic places in Auckland and List of category 1 historic places in Auckland for comparison. Abydocomist (talk) 07:34, 24 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Looking at as an example, it looks like only statistics are available. However, I'm not sure how to parse the guideline --- does the "and" bind more tightly than the "or"? i.e., does "more than mere statistics" apply to all official historical features, or just the ones  that are not "cultural heritage" or "national heritage"? I'm not sure. — hike395 (talk) 11:32, 24 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Some like those would obviously not meet notability (based on the heritage listing alone), but others like:, do have more than just mere statistics written about them. Abydocomist (talk) 19:14, 24 May 2024 (UTC)