[WikiEN-l] Re: The proliferation of article series boxes, and other sundries

Sun May 2 16:10:02 UTC 2004

Hi!

On Fri, 30 Apr 2004 17:48:50 +0100, Timwi wrote:

>I quite agree with some of the sentiments brought up that an 
>article on a Belgian mathematician would look rather silly if it had a 
>list of all mathematicians as well as another list of all famous 
>Belgians in it. But who's doing that, anyway? Nobody is seriously 
>considering creating such boxes because by all measurements of common 
>sense they would be way too large and there would be way too many of 
>them. By contrast, the boxes on things like [[Greater Cleveland]] are 
>perfectly fine.

Unfortunalely, relying on common sense might be asking a wee bit too much. It
usually is.

Right now the argument often goes that well, right now, there is only one box
or two, so who'd mind. Problem is, if some of those boxes stay, others will be
created simply because putting *this* box in means that the relation of the
article to *that* is drowned. So *that* needs another box as well. See the
discussion about [[Heteronormativity]] again. Two already turned up, two more
would be definitely needed, if they'd stay, and maybe even three. Not
desirable.

Also, it is extremly optimistic to assume that people won't create boxes for
rather obscure series. After all, they created lists. Now the lists become
ignored (or at least that is feared) so everybody will run to create a box out
of the list. Anybody can check how many "List of"s the Wikipedia has? And
imagine that, say, half of them become boxes. 

Also, even if people would only create boxes on "relevant" subjects - well,
who will decide what is relevant? Somebody interested in history of
mathematics will consider a list of all famous mathematicians very relevant,
and a Belgian person might feel that most people just undervalue their
country, and that therefore the list is sorely needed. Then the links to the
lists get drowend by whatever box in *whatever* article - and boom, the box is
dropped into any article that previously had links to lists. Which in turn
will lead to more boxes, because other people will feel the new box drowns
their link to the list. Which will get droppen into every ... I think you get
the idea.

Let's keep this the Wikipedia, not the Box-o-pedia.

Alex
-- 
If you don't go over the top, 
you can't see what's on the other side. 
        --- Jim Steinman ---

Alex' Assorted Homepages: www.alexsite.de