Wikipedia talk:One sentence does not an article make

This idea goes against many years of precedent, policy, and all-around enthusiasm for creating stubs. A one-sentence article may certainly be helpful; and more importantly, it is certainly not complete -- just like Wikipedia itself. Of course these short articles should be expanded, but that goes without saying for almost all content here -- the answer is not deletion. Just give it time. -- phoebe / (talk) 05:36, 10 April 2008 (UTC)


 * A one sentence "article" is almost invariably empty. The purpose of an article of any length is to say something. That's why one-sentence articles should go (oh, what policy does this go against? Interested minds want to know!). While it can be argued that some two-sentence "articles" could be interpreted as stubs, in most cases, more information is needed than can be incorporated into two sentences for it to be a viable stub. B.Wind (talk) 03:14, 11 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Once, long ago (2001-2004) the kind of articles you are talking about were known as sub-stubs, and they were accepted as part of the natural evolution of an article. They have subsequently gone out of fashion. Anyway, you might be interested in an older page on the subject, particularly in all the ways to fix them besides deletion. -- phoebe / (talk) 21:52, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

This essay goes completely against the collaborative spirit of Wikipedia. There is nothing wrong with a one-sentence stub, if the one sentence is an accurate reflection of the topic. Short stubs provide material for others to expand. Espresso Addict (talk) 11:19, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I strongly disagree with your initial premise: one sentence "articles" that say nothing of substance do not improve Wikipedia (in many cases, redlinks actually say more). It doesn't take much for someone with something encyclopedic to write about a topic to write more than two sentences about it. B.Wind (talk) 01:36, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Where is the threshold?
So what is it about a three sentence article that makes it illuminating and encyclopedic where a two sentence article is doomed to be incomplete? Protonk (talk) 19:04, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually, there is nothing magic about three sentences except that it much more likely to contain encyclopedic content and context than one or two sentences. Three sentences, properly written, could be sufficient for a stub... even though there are many longer articles that say practically nothing. B.Wind (talk) 01:30, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand this page.
A guideline against beginning an article as a single sentence would make sense. However, that's already available at WP:BEEF, and gives the same message as this in an entirely more positive and less derisory light. This page goes against WP:DEMOLISH, WP:DEADLINE, WP:CHILL and, perhaps most importantly, WP:POTENTIAL and WP:CHANCE, all of which are more optimistic, commonsensical approaches to this topic. My opposition to this is partly, I suppose, caused by my opposition to essays in the Wikipedia namespace, but this goes beyond any uncertainty I've felt for other, similar pages. Can someone give me one good reason why I shouldn't nominate this for deletion/userfication? Thanks. — Hysteria18 (Talk • Contributions) 20:19, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Because WP:IDONTLIKEIT is not a valid reason for deletion; the other five really don't apply because this essay says, basically, if an article is worth having in Wikipedia, it must have substance and adequate content for it to be encyclopedic. None of the pages you have stated (all of which are essays that you claim that you oppose, by the way) pertain here. Now, is there a good reason to delete this and not some of the nonsensical one- or two-sentences essays that litter Wikipedia space? Oh, that's claiming WP:IDONTLIKEIT, too, I suppose - not to mention WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. Lack of understanding the contents or message of an essay is no reason to delete; lack of compliance with Wikipedia policies and/or guidelines is. B.Wind (talk) 16:16, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
 * First, I'd rather you didn't say that I "claim to oppose" essays. I quite obviously do, or I wouldn't have said it. If I had my way, I'd userfy anything carrying the essay tag, and the fact that they're the only thing I can use to justify my uncertainty about this page is one of my main problems with them. Second, I don't really think I've failed to understand the contents or the message of this essay, though if you think I have, I'll ask you to elaborate. Thirdly, though I could never fully prove it without potentially violating WP:CANVAS, I think the demographics of posters on this talk page (four who oppose this essay; none, despite the creator, who support it) shows that this isn't a case of WP:IDONTLIKEIT on my part, rather a case of WP:ILIKEIT on your part. Finally, I regret to say this, but I'm not going to be nominating this for anything in the near future, unless Wikipedia's virtually non-existent policies on essays are amended in the near future to prevent them from accomodating nonsense like this in the Wikipedia namespace; as such, I doubt I'll be willing to continue this discussion past this point, unless you provide a stunningly compelling argument that changes my viewpoint completely. Thanks. — Hysteria18 (Talk • Contributions) 22:03, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Propose deletion
Propose deletion of this guideline per many reasons listed above. Should be replaced with common sense instead. Just ask yourself if the short article adds value or not as a stub or otherwise. If it doesn't then speedy delete. Daniel.Cardenas (talk) 00:17, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Agree to delete. Someone might mistake this essay for a Wikipolicy.  The position is absurd & anti-wiki to the extreme.  Even the author's own one-sentence example provides valuable insight yet is not a dictionary definition either.  Articles should be as long as they need to be, but no more.  If that length is just one sentence, so be it.  Additionally, the article creator may only have one sentence of information, and needs others to contribute their knowledge, as though this were say, I don't know, a wiki or something.  This essay's author is a language snob, not helping.  Let's delete.Ace Frahm (talk) 17:57, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I oppose deletion. WP:IDONTLIKEIT is not a legitimate argument. Furthermore, what does the presence literary speech or lack thereof have to do with whether something is good or not? Methinks somebody here is merely being whiny. Tharthandorf Aquanashi (talk) 00:42, 3 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete The problem with this essay is summed up by the contradiction between its lead and the nutshell precis of it. The lead (and the essay) treats "one sentence" as some sort of boundary, beyond which it is impossible to expand the article. The precis, correctly, qualifies this as "that cannot be expanded".
 * If a topic cannot support any more than one sentence, then delete it. But if the current state of an article is only one sentence, then that's an opportunity for expansion.
 * Somehow this boundary is also seen as only coming into being when that first sentence is written. A redlink can be expanded, it implies, but a one sentence stub somehow becomes a limitation which can't be taken further. That's against everything we do. Andy Dingley (talk) 12:55, 6 November 2019 (UTC)

Conflicted...
I have contributed to this essay, and I do sympathize with its message of "Write a paragraph or just leave it as a redlink", but...It can be argued that a single sentence may still leave you further along than nothing. Take this (fictional) one sentence article: "Hans Brillig (1910-1944) was a Finnish film director, best known for his film Truth (1943)." If you come across the name Hans Brillig in an article about WW II or about Scandinavian artists, or see his name in a quote box, and you click on the blue link, you do get something. You know that he was Finnish, that he was a filmmaker, that he died during WW II (possibly a death related to the war). If there was no article, you wouldn't know if he was a Danish 11th century philosopher or a Swedish 20th century novelist. OnBeyondZebrax • TALK 20:42, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Pedantic botanical note
The essay is illustrated by a picture of a Knautia macedonica inflorescence, with the caption "A single flower ...". But that "flower" is in fact a pseudanthium, composed of muliple flowers. It would be better to use some image of a single flower. Maproom (talk) 08:37, 12 March 2024 (UTC)