[WikiEN-l] Culture glut

Fri Mar 11 02:36:51 UTC 2005

On Thu, 10 Mar 2005 20:18:58 -0500, Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:
> I have a strong bias to admit. I can't stand the "In popular culture"
> heading that certain articles have, which  which become a hodgepodge
> list for every time a major historical event or theme is mentioned in
> a TV show, movie, Japanese cartoon, video game, rock song, or science
> fiction novel.

I strongly agree with this and the rest of what you've entered here.  

I don't feel that they are ALL bad or should always go, but they can,
and are, overused.  The rule of thumb to be used is "Is this fact
notable enough to be in this article?"  In the example of nuclear
weapons, for example, listing every movie, book, or whatnot that ever
mentioned one is clearly going beyond the bounds of notability. 
Listing examples of them that had SIGNIFICANT effect on the popular
knowledge or opinion would be a different manner, and quite
acceptable.

Meanwhile, in an article about something much more obscure, mentioning
a cultural reference might be much more valuable, since it may be one
of the few ways in which a member of the general public has heard of
the topic.  E.g. in the article on the [[Toyota 2000GT]], a rare 1960s
Japanese sports car, the fact that one appeared in a James Bond movie
may be quite relevant, since it's the only place that most of us are
likely to have seen one.

In a sense, this is a special case of a meta-problem: trivia.  The
extent that Wikipedia articles should include trivia - and how this
should be done - isn't properly defined.

-Matt (User:Morven)