Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Somerset/Assessment

Importance Scale
I've made some major revisions to the Importance Scale based on discussions at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Somerset & adapted from WikiProject UK geography/Assessment. Further edits & comments welcome.&mdash; Rod talk 17:40, 10 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks Rod. I do however feel that some of these items should be upgraded within the scope of Somerset, as opposed to within the scope of the UK. Anything which is of national (or greater) significance should be top importance (Nationally significant buildings, National Parks, National Trails, World Heritage sites) and High Importance would include 'Buildings significant to the whole county' or some such - I'm not sure how to word it, but hopefully you will get my drift. Derek Andrews (talk) 18:49, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I think I get your drift, but would worry that putting too much into top the category would loose its significance as the key articles for this wikiproject. I try to envisage it as a pyramid (which I can't draw in a text based talk page), with a very few key articles in the top category, a few more in high & then larger numbers in mid & the majority in low. This would help to identify those articles where most benefit (in project objectives terms) would be gained - perhaps these could do with a revisit as well?&mdash; Rod talk 19:15, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I take your point, but I really don't think it would place too much burden on the top category. One National Park, one National Trail and one UNESCO site as far as I can see. I don't actually think there are any Nationally Significant buildings, (though that could use some definition) but a few buildings that are significant within the county beyond the rest of the Grade I buildings. Alternatively maybe the latter could be pushed down the list given their huge numbers? Derek Andrews (talk) 20:38, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
 * For reference, here are the number of articles by importance: top=5, high=20, mid=233, low=1539, n/a=99. Derek Andrews (talk) 20:44, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
 * OK as you suggest the changes only include half a dozen articles go for it. I'm not sure on "Nationally Significant buildings" I took it from WPUKGEO (but must admit I think I put it there as a bit of a fudge when we couldn't come up with good definitions - the possible candidates which come to my mind are Glastonbury Tor, Clifton Suspension Bridge, Tarr Steps and possibly Wells Cathedral - which started this discussion - along with some in Bath eg the Abbey, Royal Crescent, Pulteney Bridge, Roman Baths (Bath) etc, but others may have other suggestions. The numbers are as currently classified but this may change when we start to apply those we are clarifying now (but probably not that much).&mdash; Rod talk 21:05, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
 * A few other areas & articles have just come to mind (from recent edits on my watchlist) which might not be covered by the list we currently have which people might want to think about where they fit eg Bath Stone, Hamstone etc; Glastonbury Festival, West Country Carnival (& other "social events"); Recreation Ground (Bath); Somerset Light Infantry (& other organisations); RNAS Yeovilton (HMS Heron) (& other military sites); Scrumpy and Western; Low Ham Roman Villa; Athelney Abbey; Monmouth Rebellion; Bath brick; Flag of Somerset; Bridgwater Times (& other media article) - I'm sure other can think of other examples which may be difficult to classify...&mdash; Rod talk 21:36, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Fundamentally flawed
This scale is fundamentally flawed because it fails to recognise that some articles should be short. For example the article about Jacob Rees-Mogg was labelled "start class" but it is as long as it reasonably should be. Indeed it was also tagged as possibly not notable until I removed that tag as per the talk page. Making the article more detailed would make it worse, as the extra information could only be unencyclopedic trivia. This is similar to the problem with stub notices, which are thoughtlessly applied to every short article, even though a high proportion of short articles are as long as the topic warrants, and probably contain all the verifiable encyclopedic information on their low-importance subjects. Honbicot (talk) 01:17, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your comments, however the assessment system of stub, start etc doesn't come from this wikiproject but is standard across wikipedia see Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment if you feel it should be changed that is the place to debate it rather than discussing at length on this single project.&mdash; Rod talk 08:02, 11 May 2009 (UTC)