I think Charles is right about this. There is a common conception, or
misconception, that stubship or start-class-ship is just a way station on
the way to articlehood. But some articles are probably destined to remain
short, or at least, can remain short without their
shortness reflecting poorly on the project. I don't know if there are any
statistics, but I am sure that the Britannica (for example) has at least as
many one- or two- or three-paragraph articles as lengthier ones.
It may be that the wording of the stub template fosters this reading. "This
article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it." Often, of
course, but perhaps not always.
Newyorkbrad
On Mon, Feb 14, 2011 at 4:23 AM, Charles Matthews <
charles.r.matthews(a)ntlworld.com> wrote:
On 14/02/2011 03:35, Ian Woollard wrote:
I think you can't take the simple percentages
of articles, a lot of
the most important and well visited articles are pretty well sorted,
whereas the stubs are mostly articles few people go to.
While this discussion is
worth having, I wish to record a view, now long
held, by means of a metaphor. Wikipedia is an omelette, not scrambled
eggs. Because of the intrinsic use of of hypertext, taking WP to be (in
the large) a collection of articles is always a distortion. If the "few
people" who go to a stub are just those who would refer to a
corresponding footnote in a book, the system as a whole is functioning
as it should.
Charles
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