Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Doctor Who/Assessment

Importance
Here are my suggestions on what the importance could be for this project. - LA @ 22:39, 29 March 2008 (UTC) -
 * Low
 * Actors and other personnel - there are two other projects that we share those with: WikiProject Actors and Filmmakers and WikiProject Biography
 * Any article with questionable canonicity and anything not mentioned below.


 * Mid
 * Serials and episodes
 * Recurring characters


 * High
 * Multi-serial (ie. Trial of a Time Lord) and multi-episode articles including episode lists
 * The Doctor's by regeneration articles
 * Companions from Doctor Who and regular characters from the spin-off television series


 * Top
 * Doctor Who
 * Spin-off television series
 * Torchwood
 * The Sarah Jane Adventures
 * K-9
 * Characters
 * Doctor
 * Jack Harkness
 * Sarah Jane Smith
 * K-9

-
 * Looks sensible to me. Please read my enquiry below. Would it be possible to change the wording on the Importance Scale table in order to move it away from a continent-based system and make it more reflective of your list? Or is the table an umbrella Wikipedia one and not one specific to Doctor Who? I'm new to assessing articles. Wolf of Fenric (talk) 22:56, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The table is a template for general assessment of articles. We can discuss it here, and put more specificity on the main page as we get things down pat. - LA @ 23:04, 29 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I see, thank you for clearing that up. May I suggest then that regular characters, (so as you say, the various Doctors and companions), be classed as 'High' and recurring characters, (such as Sergeant Benton, Alpha Centauri, Jackie Tyler and Francine Jones), be classed as 'Mid'? Daleks should be 'High' because of their impact on the audience, as should Cybermen. Although the Master is a recurring character, I could see an argument for him receiving 'High' status as a major villain who has had a similar impact on the audience's psyche for decades now. Wolf of Fenric (talk) 23:18, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The Daleks, Cybermen, and the Master are all recurring characters, so Mid would do fine for them in my opinion. Also, just because an article is FA or GA doesn't mean that it is Top or even High importance. - LA @ 08:08, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I'd put Dalek and TARDIS on Top for the sole fact they're the two instantly recognisable things from Doctor Who (hell, the Patent Office ruled in favour of the BBC regarding image rights for police boxes). I would've rather preferred for companions to be classed as "Mid", as it allows major characters which branch out all over the franchise (Jack, Sarah Jane, K-9, and (may be arguable) Martha) to be classed as more important. Sceptre (talk) 21:45, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I was thinking of putting Jack, Sarah, and K-9 in Top since they are the leads in their respective series. For the TARDIS, I would prefer High, but I can see where Top would be all right. The Daleks, on the other hand, well, I can't see how they are more important than a Doctor by regeneration or Companion would be. They are recurring at best, so Mid works for them. - LA @ 08:00, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Daleks are one of the most enduring aspects of Doctor Who - their iconic nature has earnt them appearances outside of Doctor Who in such things as a Kit Kat advert, stage plays, Coupling and Looney Tunes: Back in Action. The Daleks have been central to a wave of merchandise - toys, comics, a single, computer games, etc.. They were also the villains in the two Doctor Who movies, Dr. Who and the Daleks and Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 AD. Catherine Tate has said in an interview that having not watched Doctor Who before appearing in it, she assumed the Daleks were always the baddies, which demonstrates their impact on the cultural psyche. Therefore, I think they should be rated highly on the importance scale. Wolf of Fenric (talk) 15:23, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Enquiry
Why is the importance criteria based on continents? Would contexts not be better?

For instance, Professor Edward Travers is only notable in the context of Doctor Who, irrespective of whether he has been seen by audiences in Europe and North America, for example. By contrast, Doctor Who itself has a place in the context of Britain's culture and characters such as the Fourth Doctor have iconic statuses, for example in the case of the Fourth Doctor one warranting his appearance on The Simpsons. Therefore, would it not be better to judge articles' importance based on the number of contexts or fields of interest they are significant within rather than on the origin locations of the sources that render them notable? Wolf of Fenric (talk) 22:49, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Is "Doctor (Doctor Who)" really an A-class article?
As it stands currently, the article does not meet good article standards than it is for Featured Article Candidate. Most of the article is disjointed, with tendency towards summarising episodic events, and its information is primarily drawn from its editors personal conclusions as opposed to interviews with the series creators, or by critics and commentators. It really should be demoted to B-class. A-class implies its making the transition from GA to FA! ~ZytheTalk to me! 23:30, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I am not really into the Featured article/Good article area. Since another project had classed it A, that is how I classed it when I was doing a quick pass. I reassessed it as B for now. It may have been made an A since it was a candidate to be a feature article, but I don't know the rational behind the other project's assessor. - LA @ 08:06, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Now of course, we need a better example of an A-class article for the assessment page. "List of Torchwood episodes" could be whipped up to featured list quality, but it might be misleading to present it as an "A-class article". History of Doctor Who isn't too bad, but again relies on trusting its editors rather than its sources, although The Handbook is cited frequently enough for it to qualify as A-class in my opinion.~ZytheTalk to me! 12:26, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

✅ - LA @ 18:50, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Let's play...
Beat the 'bot. In about two days, the bot will run again. I would like to have all of the articles assessed by that time. There are currently 568 Unassessed-Class Doctor Who articles and 906 Unknown-importance Doctor Who articles. So, if these are divided amongst us, that is a little over 100 Class articles, and a little over 150 importance articles each. I think that it is possible to get this done. What say you? :) - LA @ 00:45, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: I have a feeling that all of the unassessed class articles are all importance=Low, so that should make things easier. - LA @ 00:48, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Update: There are currently 221 Unassessed-Class Doctor Who articles and 366 Unknown-importance Doctor Who articles.--Wiggs (talk) 14:20, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Update: 97 81 for both Unassessed-Class Doctor Who articles and Unknown-importance Doctor Who articles. - LA @ 17:38, 3 April 2008 (UTC) updated 18:18, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Ambiguous Cases
During my article grading, I have come across some ambiguous... erm... things. Articles like the Sonic screwdriver: is it a recurring character, a regular character, or "anything not mentioned above"? Do aliens like the Sea Devils, who only appeared on TV twice, count as Low or Mid Importance? Therefore, I think that any ambiguous cases should be reported here, after [[WP:BOLD|being bold and going ahead and grading. Any comments? - Weebiloobil (talk) 19:11, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Sea Devils have appeared twice therefore they are mid importance, Sonic Screwdrivers have appeared in so many episodes throughout the series over many years, personally I'd class this as high importance.--Wiggs (talk) 22:22, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Both of those, Sea devils Mid, sonic screwdriver Low. IMO. - LA @ 11:23, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

People of Doctor Who
Please remember that the people who make Doctor Who are not one of our priorities. They might get a paragraph about their Doctor Who work, but after that is done, we just need to monitor that paragraph. They are Low importance as they have more than likely done other non-Whovian work. Our priorities should be the actual television series and lead characters. Once they are all Featured Articles, then work on the Companions and regular characters, then work on the serials and episodes, then alien races, then the technology, then everything else (including that paragraph for the people of Doctor Who). - LA @ 17:36, 3 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I'd question this. We claim Sydney Newman as one of our Featured Articles, and I think that he's far more important in the history of Doctor Who than the High-ranked Astrid Peth.  I'd suggest this ranking for behind-the-scenes staff:


 * High importance
 * Producers (executive producers in the modern series) who shaped the programme on a long-term basis and whose contribution to Doctor Who is a major part of their life. Examples: Verity Lambert, Barry Letts, John Nathan-Turner, Russell T. Davies.


 * Mid-importance
 * Writers and script editors who made especially noteworthy contributions to the series. Examples: David Whitaker (screenwriter), Robert Holmes (scriptwriter), Terrance Dicks, Steven Moffat


 * Low importance
 * Other writers, producers and production staff. Examples: Pip and Jane Baker, Innes Lloyd, Mike Tucker

It's worth remembering that just because a subject comes also under the purview of another WikiProject, that doesn't mean that it's unimportant for us. We aren't just in the business of covering the fictional world of Doctor Who, we also need to cover the creation of the television programme Doctor Who. And that means covering the people who make it.

(Incidentally, is there a reason that Douglas Adams isn't part of our project? His contribution is surely at least as important as that of Kylie Minogue.) —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 20:42, 3 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I'd be happy to follow this system and think the case put forward above is resonable and correct, if we do go ahead with this system then we'd have to make sure writers, producers, directers and anyone who participated in the makeing of the show is put under the scope of the Doctor Who wikiproject.--Wiggs (talk) 21:19, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Once all of the current unassessed class and unknown importance articles are done, we can go back over the system. We can also then go through each and every article to find those that we haven't already caught including red links (which would be listed under class=Needed). There are less than 75 articles left to get assessed, so let's do this final push and get them done, please. - LA @ 22:09, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Is it time to address this yet, or is there still assessment work to be done? —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 02:42, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
 * As all of the preliminary assessments are complete, I say, give it a whirl.
 * Here is why I initially had people rated as low importance. It was quick and easy to figure out who was real and who wasn't in the first few words of the article. I haven't been watching all that long, so I don't know who is who (forgive the punishness of that) in this. So fine tune away. - LA @ 07:14, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

ALL articles with WikiProject Doctor Who template have been assessed
That is right...Unassessed-Class Doctor Who articles and Unknown-importance Doctor Who articles are empty. Thank you Amxitsa, Wiggstar69, and Weebiloobil who helped assess the articles. - LA @ 23:44, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Assessment ranking
I'm concerned that the importance ranking currently employed displays an excessive in-universe bias by ranking fictional characters consistently high and actors consistently low. Similarly, the canonical/non-canonical split becomes strange and problematic - I am hard pressed to see why the article on Damaged Goods is of low importance, despite being Russell T. Davies's first Doctor Who work, or Timewyrm: Genesis, the first officially licensed Doctor Who story after cancellation, is low, while the canonical but utterly unremarkable The Awakening is considered medium importance.

Similarly, even if his Doctor Who work is only part of his article, it does not make sense to me that Tom Baker is of low importance while Grace Holloway, who appears in exactly one story, is of high importance. No reckoning of the most important topics to thorough coverage of Doctor Who would make that division unless it were primarily focusing on Doctor Who from an in-universe perspective.

I think the importance scale needs a dramatic re-evaluation. Phil Sandifer (talk) 14:57, 26 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Unless someone gives a persuasive reason why I shouldn't, I'm going to alter the assessment criteria and start reassessing some articles from an out-of-universe perspective. Phil Sandifer (talk) 04:49, 30 April 2008 (UTC)


 * The assessment criteria was written to make it easy to quickly assess the articles. If I saw a wp bio banner, it meant that it was an article about a real person, so low was given. I am a in-universe type of person, so I am sorry that my bias leaked through. I just don't bother much with the people behind the scenes with the exception of filmographies to see what else they did and any awards given to them. If the person is still alive, the less said the better to keep the BLP happy. The further the article delves, the more chance it will bump into the BLP and need to be pruned of information that is against policy. Personally, I won't work on living people articles, except lists therein, just to keep myself away from the BLP. - LA @ 08:29, 30 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I sympathize with you on BLPs, though I don't think minimalism is a necessity as such. But regardless, given that we ought to study Doctor Who as a cultural object from a real-world perspective, would you object to rethinking these rankings? I think in many cases they're accurate - most non-canon stuff is less important than most canon stuff. But I think a lot of characters and television episodes need to go down to low and medium importance, while select non-canon things and fundamental production things (the ten actors playing The Doctor, Barry Letts, John Nathan-Turner, and a few others in those veins) need to be moved up. I'd guess we're looking at, at most, 20% of the rankings needing to change. Phil Sandifer (talk) 14:42, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Let's address one thing at a time. How do you feel about the following? - LA @ 15:06, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Doctor Who creator = Top
 * Other producers by years put into the series (we may need to list them here to figure that out)
 * Actor importance = Character importance (All Doctor and Companion actors high)
 * I think some degree of discretion needs to go on within this - I think there are distinctions to be made with producers beyond time served, for instance, and I think script editors need to be considered with equal height at times. I have no idea how long Verity Lambert served, but can't imagine her not being put on equal importance with Newman - her influence on the show was far greater, after all. Similarly, I think that companions need to be split from medium to top - Grace from the TV movie is not the same importance as Sarah Jane Smith. Actors and actresses should usually go with the role, though I could justify Sarah Jane Smith at top and Sladen at high better than both at one or the other. That's most because of the existence of two Sarah Jane spin-offs, though. I think there's splitting to be done with Doctors too - the Fourth Doctor is without question more culturally significant than any of the others, and should go top. The others should go high. Tom Baker should probably be high, not top.  Phil Sandifer (talk) 17:45, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * To clarify further, here, off the top of my head, are the top-importance Doctor Who articles. My inclination is that there should be few of them - it's a somewhat narrow area, and it has a rapid drop-off in importance as you move to individual books, episodes, etc. So: Doctor Who, Torchwood, Sarah Jane Adventures, TARDIS, Dalek, Fourth Doctor, The Doctor, Sarah Jane Smith. Phil Sandifer (talk) 17:50, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I am not sure that we should have one regeneration of the Doctor listed as any more important than any other regeneration. Its almost like "in a fight" Doctor x would beat Doctor y. And when I think of Doctor Who, the fourth Doctor is not what immediately springs to mind, more like the tenth Doctor and Rose Tyler together.
 * So, in my mind, the top importance should be the television series article and its spin-off televisions series, the lead characters of each series, the TARDIS, and the series creator.
 * High importance, the regenerations of the Doctor, the companions of the Doctor, the companions of the companions in the spin -off television series, the actors who portray them, multipart episodes/serials, and any leading producers of the various series.
 * Medium importance, all other characters, actors, and behind the scenes people and television episodes.
 * Low importance, everything else.
 * That's my opinion anyway. - LA @ 22:37, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
 * PS. I left you a message on your talk page once upon a time about something else, did you ever read it?


 * I think the "who would win in a fight" analogy is misguided - I think it's pretty clear that the 4th Doctor is the most culturally significant - consider the proposed plot of Dark Dimension, or what version of the Doctor cameoed on The Simpsons. He was the Doctor for seven years including the most highly-rated years of the series. I am also skeptical that multi-part is a useful way of delineating importance of various stories - Dalek and Rose are both single-part, but clearly of higher importance than the multi-part Frontios. Similarly, the "everything else" category ignores things like Timewyrm: Genesis and The Eight Doctors which are clearly of higher importance than other books in each of those series. I think, rather than hard and fast rules, a level of discretion and idiosyncratic decision-making is necessary here.


 * As for the message on my talk page, I'm sure I read it, but I don't remember it or what it was about. Phil Sandifer (talk) 04:38, 3 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I think that trying to distinguish the Doctors by importance would be more trouble than it's worth. (I still remember the Pertwee vs. McCoy arguments on rec.arts.drwho back in the '90s.)  But I agree that there's a difference in importance between, say, Rose Tyler and Dodo Chaplet, and it's foolish to try to fit everything that shares a category into the same level of importance.  Some companions, producers, actors, serials, books, etc. are more important than others.  The challenge is to make some sort of rubric that gauges that importance.  I know in my gut, for example, that Ian Chesterton is more important than Adam Mitchell, and John Nathan-Turner is more important than John Wiles, but how do we describe that?  Should we even try, or is it better just to trust our instincts and argue questionable assessments on a case-by-case basis? —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 07:09, 3 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I am a big fan of instincts. Phil Sandifer (talk) 04:29, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Hello
I've not contributed to the project for a while, but I have done a lot of work on Doctor Who articles in the past, and just happened to look at the Talk page of one of them, Verity Lambert. Now, I know I am biased as I wrote most of the article, but how can anyone possibly justify her having a "Low" importance rating... for Doctor Who!!! An absurd situation. I have read the above messages and am relieved to see this nonsense is under discussion, but what's the state of play currently? Angmering (talk) 06:47, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The article assessment criterion for improtance says this for low importance : Actors and other personnel - there are two other projects that we share those with: WikiProject Actors and Filmmakers and WikiProject Biography; Any article with questionable canonicity (books and audio plays) and anything not mentioned above. As such, Verity Lambert conforms to this, but, as seen above, there is a large discussion over where producers fit in, and whether the rankings need to be changed. However, for the meantime, until there is concensus otherwise, she remains low - Weebiloobil (talk) 06:59, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I was under the impression &mdash; and it may have changed, so forgive me &mdash; that Wikipedia prioritised real world content over in-universe material? Angmering (talk) 10:01, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
 * It is, generally, the case that Wikipedia should focus on real world content. However, this is the Doctor Who WikiProject, and as such, we focus on the programme. The background stuff, like the cast and crew, is important, but not as important as the programme itself - thus, the programme elements (such as the characters, episodes) gain a higher importance. If you feel this could be changed, then feel free to post a comment at the WikiProject page. I daresy that others have more wisdom than myself - Weebiloobil (talk) 13:41, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I think they should have equal importance, really. You can't have one without the other. Although I think generally speaking our behind-the-scenes articles are miles ahead of those for any other show, and most films, anyway, partly because there's so much excellent research material available. Angmering (talk) 15:07, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

C-class and updating
Now we have the new C-class, is it time to back over the B- and Start-class articles to re-assess them? - Weebiloobil (talk) 16:54, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, good point. Although I think more Start-class articles can be upgraded than B-class downgraded. I will try to help with it. --SoWhy Talk 10:45, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Minor update: I went through all articles in Start-Class-Category from A to O and re-assessed a bunch of them. I will go through the rest of them these days.  So # Why  10:31, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I completed looking through all(!) Start-class articles and have re-assessed 300+ to C-class. I really have too much time on my hands...^^  So # Why  21:36, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Changes
The lovely people at the 1.0 editorial team were kind enough to leave a message to us; however, it's on the project talk page, not here. Have a free link - Weebiloobil (talk) 19:34, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Why are there two categories for unassessed artciles?
According to conventions I have seen the proper category name is Category:Unassessed-Class Doctor Who articles not Category:Unassessed Doctor Who articles. The template should be putting articles in the first not the second. LA @ 05:55, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Images
Just a quick question - with the Project Banner for images, do we put it on the Image page itself, or the Image talk page? Once I know, I can start adding the template to just about every Doctor Who picture. Thanks - weebiloobil (talk) 19:16, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Does your WikiProject care about talk pages of redirects?
Does your project care about what happens to the talk pages of articles that have been replaced with redirects? If so, please provide your input at User:Mikaey/Request for Input/ListasBot 3. Thanks, Matt (talk) 01:44, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Notification regarding Wikipedia-Books
As detailed in last week's Signpost, WikiProject Wikipedia books is undertaking a cleanup all Wikipedia books. Particularly, the saved book template has been updated to allow editors to specify the default covers of the books. Title, subtitle, cover-image, and cover-color can all be specified, and an HTML preview of the cover will be generated and shown on the book's page (an example of such a cover is found on the right). Ideally, all books in Category:Book-Class Doctor Who articles should have covers.

If you need help with the saved book template, or have any questions about books in general, see Help:Books, Books, and WikiProject Wikipedia-Books, or ask me on my talk page. Also feel free to join WikiProject Wikipedia-Books, as we need all the help we can get.

This message was delivered by User:EarwigBot, at 01:39, 2 April 2010 (UTC), on behalf of Headbomb. Headbomb probably isn't watching this page, so if you want him to reply here, just leave him a message on his talk page. Earwig Bot ( owner &bull;  talk ) 01:39, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Nicholas Courtney
In viewing the article in the wake of his death, I noticed it was ranked as "Low importance" on the assessment scale. I hope no one minds, but I arbitrarily changed it to "Mid" based on the criteria presented here (actually, I initially moved it to "High" but it looks like that may be more for character pages than actor pages; certainly however the article on the actor should rank at least on the same level as John Barrowman). I'm aware I bypassed the committee on this, but I acted under WP:BOLD. Certainly should anyone disagree with the action they're free to downgrade Mr. Courtney's article. 23skidoo (talk) 16:44, 23 February 2011 (UTC)