2008/10/16 Marc Riddell
<michaeldavid86(a)comcast.net>et>:
> It just happened again. I went in and edited a biography article, made some
> corrections as to the Date of Birth, and left the month and day unlinked but
> linked the year. One minute later someone else came in and de-linked the
> year with the edit comments, "(unlink yob per WP:MOSNUM)". Is this the
> present policy? And if so, how came we change it?
>
> Marc Riddell
on 10/16/08 9:16 PM, geni at geniice(a)gmail.com wrote:
Yes it is present MOS and you change it in the normal manner. However
this would what be the third time the debate has happened in a few
months so I doubt you would get very far. See for the most part what
happened in the year of someone's birth is of little interest unless
the event dirrectly impacted them. You might be able to make a case
for the years where they did whatever makes the noteable but even then
a case could be made that you would do better linking to say 1860s in
engineering.
Thanks for your thoughts, geni. Although I see value in linking the years,
what, in the end, I am REALLY looking for is some consistency. I still do
not understand fully much of the decision-making process that goes into
matters such as deciding on a specific format policy. But what I do see
throughout the encyclopedia is an arbitrariness in form and structure that
greatly detracts from the professionalism of the Project. A reader is coming
to the encyclopedia looking for information on a particular subject. That
information should be presented in a consistent, reliable, familiar form.
This form becomes the "signature" of the encyclopedia. As the Wikipedia
Project matures, it is important that the decision-making processes
regarding such basic issues as its very form and structure mature as well.
Be healthy,
Marc Riddell