[WikiEN-l] Template asymmetry

Wed May 4 22:32:17 UTC 2005

Today I dealt with three very questionable templates:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Unencyclopedic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Nonnotable
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Vanity

(Template:Vanity was OK in its intention, but it was improperly placed 
on article pages.)

The problem with templates is that it is very easy to create them, and 
very hard to get rid of them. Virtually all problem templates I've seen 
have survived being listed on "Templates for deletion" because, usually, 
there are multiple passionate fans -- the people who have been using the 
template and who don't want to modify their existing workflows.

This has led to an abundance of pastel colored boxes, as every editor 
seems to want a template to call their own.

I believe we have to treat new templates in the same way we treat new 
policy proposals. We can keep them around as proposals, but before we 
actually *use* them, there has to be a consensus to do so.

That way, we fix the current asymmetry: We make it harder to *adopt* 
templates; then it doesn't matter so much that it's hard to *delete* them.

In practice, I suggest putting the

{{Proposed template}}

tag on top of dubious templates which do not yet have community support. 
That effectively locks the template from being used until the discussion 
page shows that people agree on what to do with it.

Hopefully, this will help to stem the tide of questionable templates.

All best,

Erik