Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spaceflight/Assessment/ImportanceV2Draft

Importance scale
The articles are rated for their importance to spaceflight. When making importance assessments, it may be helpful to ask, "How important would it be for the topic of spaceflight to include this article in an abridged version of the encyclopedia?"

Three different ways of expressing the priority of articles are currently used.


 * 1) The importance, significance and depth of the topic within its particular field or subject.
 * 2) The extent of the topic's impact, usually in the sense of "impact beyond its particular field", but it is also used to express global impact, and impact through history.
 * 3) The bottom line: how important is it for an encyclopedia to have an article on the given topic?

These are often different ways of saying the same thing, but the current WP 1.0 summary table mixes the three approaches: Top priority is described using method 3, High and Mid priority using method 1, and Low priority using method 2.

The table below of possible spaceflight importance levels provides more detail on the meaning of the individual levels, as well as examples.

A few ideas
Here are a few ideas I have had while working on assessment: These are just my first thoughts on the current guidelines, so any thoughts on these might be good before they are implemented--Cincotta1 (talk) 02:40, 15 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Overall, I agree with the sentiment that started this discussion, that it should be made clear the examples in the table are flexible and exceptions exist
 * I disagree with the comment appended to the (none) section and think it should be removed, if an article is not relevant enough to the project to need an assessment rating, it is probably not within the scope of the project.
 * The hardline that professional astronauts who have not been on a flight are low should be changed. At least there should be a distinction between astronauts who resigned and/or been discharged before their first flight (e.g. Mars Rafikov) from those who are still active and are either waiting on a pending flight or in training (e.g. Thomas Pesquet).
 * The unique v non-unique line for satellites seems unclear. I found that low importance satellites were typically those that were part of a larger fleet, used a bus that was produced and used for several similar satellites, occupied a commercial orbit slot or similar things.
 * On top of cancellations, launch failures that did not have a significant historical impact were also typically given low importance
 * One of the first places I had trouble assessing when I started was launch vehicles because they are not included in the assessment scheme. For the most part historically significant and active launch vehicles were already assessed. I still do not have a satisfactory scheme, but here's what I did:
 * If it was the primary vehicle used for high profile programs it was at least high importance Saturn V for Apollo, Atlas-Agena for Mariner etc.
 * The line between mid and low was unclear and was based on a gut feeling on total number of flights and time from first flight to last, was it a long running launch vehicle? and did it fly a lot?
 * When stages and components came up, I typically gave them low importance. However, it was ignoring the historical importance of individual stages that started this discussion, so this point may need to be rethought
 * Obviously, the scheme cannot cover all possible subjects an editor might encounter, so it might be a good idea to include suggestions or strategies to use when unsure what importance to give an article. The three numbered questions at the top are helpful and I also relied a lot on precedents set by similar articles that were already assessed.
 * I'm a contributor to this project as well as Rocketry. I've done more than half of the space rocket engine articles, and now I've been working on commercial communication networks like Ekspress (satellite constellation) and JSAT (satellite constellation), which included writing quite a few articles on satellites. From that perspective, some things are of certain historical importance, but are usually constrained by the reality of information availability. Let me make a series of things that I've experienced:
 * Rocket engine or launch vehicles might not seem that significant because it was seldom mentioned, but be important none the less. Let's take the S1.5400 rocket engine, for example. It was the first staged cycle rocket engine, and it was oxidizer rich, a feat that the American scientists considered impossible until they learned about the NK-33 in 1980s. Not only that, but it powered the Blok-L, which sent the first Soviet probes to the Moon, Venus and Mars. Yet, history has relegated it to a completely unknown development. The really poor quality of the Molniya (rocket) article doesn't help. But it should be at least Medium, if not High. I would assign a High importance in Rocketry and at least a Medium to High in Spaceflight. Not because of the technological breakthrough, but because it enabled the first interplanetary probes. But may be the technological breakthrough is important.
 * On the one hand, I understand that if I write an article I can't really asses it for anything other than low importance. On the other hand, the writer is probably one of the persons with the most information to describe the importance. For this reason, I would propose that when assessing importance a small notice on the Talk page be put so you can get opinions from the most knowledgeable. Or make a discussion section for this.
 * Regarding commercial satellites and series, there are things that are important from a technology point of view, like the KAUR-4 the implementation of electric propulsion for station keeping, or ABS-3A and Eutelsat 115 West B the first satellites to intentionally use electric propulsion for GTO circularization.
 * Then you have cases like the Superbird-A2 failure, where it was just after the development of the supersynchronous orbit for GSO insertion and they failed to take into consideration the gravity effects of the Moon and it expended all its propellant. Or PAS-22, which was stranded in a useless insertion orbit and actually went around the Moon and was successfully put into service. Or AEHF-1, which demonstrated for the first time circularization from GTO by electrical propulsion when its Liquid Apogee Engine failed.
 * I don't know how to articulate all this data that I've stated before. But I know that there should be some way of determining articles worth mentioning. Like making an List of Medium importance and High importance in Spaceflight. And letting the TalkPage be the place for proposing an entry. That should help determining the importance. In fact, It could be implemented like a Timeline.
 * Then you have the case of ARSAT 1, the first communication satellite made in Argentina. From Spaceflight point of view, it is just another note. From Argentina's technological history is quite an important event. I would guess that it is a matter of scoping. A clear scoping that importance should be assessed on the merits within the field, and other considerations should be asses for different projects.
 * Just my thoughts – Baldusi (talk) 18:22, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Working on incorporating both your guys' thoughts. I think eliminating the columns does a big part in that. The columns limits the number of categories to really top categories like astronauts, launch vehicles, etc. If we cut them out, we can just put in examples as we see fit (including putting rocket stages in low importance for example). If you guys have some time to work out some of the details and formatting there I would appreciate it. Then if we just put a little blurb at the beginning saying they are guidelines and not requirements, and therefore flexible, I think we will be fine. Possibly also put in that the importance rating is mostly for editors to know where to focus their efforts if they want to make a large impact. Let me know your thoughts and if this direction makes sense. Thanks! Kees08 (talk) 04:03, 14 September 2016 (UTC)