Wikipedia talk:Let the dust settle

Case examples

This is trying to address two type of articles based on current events:

1. Current events which are historical but with rapidly changing details
2. Current events that appear in the news, but once the story has settled, is not as notable as originally thought.

This proposal/essay is mainly targeted at the latter case, but some of the reasoning may also be applied to the former. Regards, MartinRe 10:17, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Historial with changing sources

A recent example of this was 2006 Java earthquake where much of the earlier edits were to update a constantly changing casuality figure. In my view, wikipedia was not designed to be a tickertape of breaking news, wikinews would be better suited to this, and wikipedia could easily have simply stated "casualty reports are still coming in" with a wikinews infobox. I also noticed that in the first few days, sources that were cited often changed in place, leaving wikipedia out of step with unverifable information until it caught up. I don't believe an encyclopedia should be in the business of tracking breaking news, when wiknews is better suited for that. Once the news has settled down, wikipedia can include figures, but it shouldn't have to track a rapidly moving target. Regards, MartinRe 23:14, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Your comments on this matter is totally appropriate. For these types of news or events involving high casuality rates which is most likely to increase, it would be much better to take a general view on this. Also, bear in mind that this is NOT the only appropriate example of this occuring in this project. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 20:34, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Historial events in progress

During the world cup final, the article 2006 FIFA World Cup knockout stage was being updated on a minute by minute basis following each penalty kick. While keeping wikipedia up to date is good, doing so to that extent is too fine grained. (Chances are that anyone interested into kick by kick action is watching it) In any case, most people would expect to go to a sports website for minute by minute commentary, not a encyclopedia. For the sake of a few minutes, it would have been a lot more efficent to wait until it was finished, and then add the details in one edit. Regards, MartinRe 17:55, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Current events that settled into less notable cases

The example brought to mind is Mohammed Abdul Kahar and its afd. As it stands today the story can be summerised as "police raid house, nothing found. One injured, two arrested and later released without charge". Approaching being worth an article in itself (more news-like, imo), but yet one of those arrested had a mini-bio on wikipedia within a day of appearing on the news, with all the related speculation that is rife in any breaking news story. The event itself has an article but if the details as shown in the summary above were all known at the beginning, would it have been notable enough to create an article? Maybe/maybe not, but because it was currently significant, it was assumed to become historically significant, but wikipedia is not a crystal ball, so articles should not be created about something that may be notable, especially about people as per WP:BLP Regards, MartinRe 23:14, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

This is increasingly looking like a bad example, as while much of the orignal speculation wasn't borne out, it has gained notability in other ways, due to the reaction. So, in this case, writing based on a crystal ball was half-right, it was notable, but not for reasons the crystal ball saw. Regards, MartinRe 10:30, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

How could this policy be enforced?

I think the proposal certainly has merits and your 2006 Java earthquake example was dead on, but I don't see the feasibility in enforcing this policy. An extreme solution would a "Let the dust settle" edit block on a breaking new event.Agne27 04:49, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I was aiming more towards a guideline rather than policy, so enforcement (for want of a better word) would be more in the line of a reminder to editors as to why it may be a bad idea to track breaking news too closely. I certainly don't forcee any blocking if someone insists on doing so, but my hope was that the existance of such a guideline, with all the reasoning in one place, would persuade some editors to follow it when it was pointed out to them, and even if only a small number do so, it's a step in the right direction. Regards, MartinRe 12:35, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

• I agree with Agne27 - this is wishful thinking and not really viable as a proposal. Part of it is redundant with the long policy list given and with "Wikipedia is not Wikinews", the other part is the sheer impossibility of prohibiting people from writing about current events. One of Wikipedia's strengths in comparison to other encyclopedias is its ongoing, accurate and up-to-date information on present events. >Radiant< 01:10, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree that having up to date information is a wikipedia advantage, but I have also seen that attempts to track breaking news stories too closely results in inserting inaccurate information, or tabloid speculation, both of which which often ends up out out date, and sometimes remain incorrect if the story drops out of editors spotlights. There is no intention to stop people writing about current affairs, what this is intended to be is a reminder to check the depth of the water before diving in straight in. Take a step back, take a breath, and take measured action is better in my view than hasty action and subsequent correction. Regards, MartinRe 12:34, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

• Having an "In the News" section on the main page encourages the addition of news articles. While I think we get a lot of ones we are better off without, we can't even transwiki articles to Wikinews because it uses a different license. We will get a bunch of unneeded articles, we will end up prod/AFDing a bunch of them. So be it. You might want a talk page template and/or to adjust the current event/news template to have an editorial reminder that this is an encyclopedia and only encyclopedic content should be here. I wouldn't go further; so I wouldn't make this a policy. GRBerry 16:19, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I never intended it as a policy, more a guidleine, a reminder to editors as why breaking news stories don't always belong in an encyclopedia. Proddding/afding articles after the event is less then ideal, and if some of those articles are about real, living people, "so be it" doesn't really cut it. If possible, it is better not to make mistakes in the first place, then to make them and correct them later, and if the price for not making mistakes about real people is to have a little patience, then I think it is worth it. Regards, MartinRe 12:34, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Great!

This seems like a great idea. It is true that once the 15 minutes of fame are over, most things fade into non-notability. Who remembers that one chemical fire in Romulus in August '05? Does anybody care? I think not. ~ Flameviper 16:53, 3 October 2006 (UTC)