On Feb 24, 2007, at 8:52 PM, William Pietri wrote:
Suppose we create a scale that runs from -10 to 10. At 10 are
things we
obviously have to have in the encyclopedia, like [[Oxygen]] or
[[France]]. At -10 we have things like [[The 237th raindrop that just
hit the puddle outside my bathroom window]]. Let's further suppose
that
0 is the current point where something is just as likely to be kept
as not.
If I understand rightly, you're saying that around zero, we're
unpredictable. We might keep a -2 one time and delete a 2 other times,
yes? And that although on a long time-scale that may work out
adequately
for our readers, for those who peek inside the process see that
area of
the scale as messy and chaotic, and judge us by that?
If so, how far up and down the scale do your concerns go?
It's tough to say, mostly because I have trouble conceiving of
notability as a linear thing. But I'd say -2/2 is a good bet, and we
can peak out around -4/4. I'll also note, that gap has been
expanding, and if you go all the way out to where notability tagging
is happening you get solidly out to the -4/4, -5/5 range. ([[Timothy
Noah]] and [[Oni Press]] being two recent egregious examples of bad
notability tagging.) Obviously notability tagging is a less
destructive practice than deletion, but it does still fall into the
larger problem of making our criteria look byzantine and impenetrable
- in fact, possibly even moreso, as a notability tag stays visible
for longer than five days.
-Phil