dKosopedia talk:Policies and Guidelines
From dKosopedia
dKosopedia is owned by Daily Kos. While part of the WikiVerse, it is not supported by and has no real ties the Wikipedia Foundation. As private property, it reflects dKos' purpose and point of view, which is US politics in general, and the promotion of Democrats and the politics of the Democratic Party in particular. This happy embrace of a point of view (POV) absolutely separates us from Wikipedia, which has a neutral point of view policy (NPOV). This is not the only place where we diverge from its practices, but we otherwise do follow Wikipedia's policies and guidelines.
We are not in competition with Wikipedia: rather, we supplement it. We leave it to Wikipedia to be comprehensive; when it has (or should have) an article on any given topic, we discourage duplication here (the off-topic rule). When Wikipedia's NPOV policies inhibit a full discussion of the Democratic point of view, however, a parallel article is encouraged, with reference made to the Wikipedia original.
While we have an actively anti-Republican point of view, we do insist on a neutral tone when expressing this. Politely phrased disparagement in grammatically-complete sentences is far more devastating than any flame or rant.
Settled discussion points
Language.
- In theory, dKosopedia would welcome articles in languages other than English. Unfortunately, until as such time we have the adequate resources to ensure the enforcement of other policies regarding article content, we must insist that all articles be done in English. This does not prohibit the use of material in other languages, but a translation should be provided.
Deletion policies.
- See Candidates For Deletion/deletion policies (Active debate open on point 4). This is the "death sentence" rule for current-event articles that lack the quality to survive history.
Off-topic articles
- There is clear agreement that some articles do not belong here. There remains some question of just how far this policy should be extended, and some further discussion is in order. See dKosopedia:Off-topic articles. Probably decided.
Articles on Democratic policy
A real problem with policy articles is finding the appropriate name space, as well as proper categorization. Much of what is present in the Table of Contents is not particularly intuitive when it comes to what's inside the article. Much of the name space is more suited to a bloggish causerie, and not an encyclopedia article (the same can be said for many of the articles themselves).
A second problem is just finding the articles in the first place. In some aspects, a wiki is not the most intuitive of software (finding templates, for example).
Jbet777's organization of the Hawaii articles is instructive, however. Just click through all the categories in Hawaii, and you'll get an outline how any state's articles should be organized. National-scope articles, tho, are more difficult, in that they really lack an intuitive organizing center (typing "Hawaii" is a highly intuitive first step for a newcomer looking for something on Hawaii). Getting thus up to a national level, tho', presents problems.
One thought is to start creating or revising those articles with obvious and intuitive one or two word titles, such as Health care, Corruption, Elections, Republicans, Campaign reform, etc, as portal articles that would point the user to any number of additional articles. This is not a one-editor project, however; it requires mass cooperation, and our corps of faithful is perhaps too small.
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