Misplaced Pages

The intent and probable effect of this addition is twofold:

1. To establish, by clear inference, that RfC on main page items are indeed permitted and operative.
2. To specify how main page items are to be handled in these cases.

Survey

• Neutral Oppose. Herostratus' wall-of-text below has convinced me that RfCs and DYK noms are very different types of discussion, so his suspending one discussion to open another wasn't (or shouldn't have been) as counter-productive as it first appeared to me. That said, I don't think it's an ideal situation, and shouldn't be explicitly endorsed by the guidelines (per WP:BEANS). And given that, as far as I'm aware, there's only ever been one such RfC in the history of Misplaced Pages, the proposed rule doesn't seem necessary at this point. These RfCs ought to be sufficiently rare that the validity of each can be discussed individually. So, in short, I'm voting for status quo – RfCs on main page items should be neither explicitly allowed nor forbidden.DoctorKubla (talk) 07:27, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

• The first six options were presented when this process was opened on June 3, 2013 at 17:17 UTC. Further proposals may be added as this process is underway, they should be timestamped when added so that it is clear they came later and may not have been seen by early participants.

Option one:Make the ref desk work like an actual reference desk

The reference desk will cease providing direct answers of any kind. Discussions will be kept brief and stricly limited in scope. It will only provide direction to appropriate resources such as pertinent Misplaced Pages articles the sources used by them, and other reliable sources. The reference desk will be kept in compliance with the principle that Misplaced Pages is not a forum or a social network. Comments which are general discussion of topics or speculation will be removed. A standardized question process such as is used at real reference desks may be developed to make it possible for almost any Wikipedian to competently assist those posing questions.

Endorsements of option one

1. This would be my preferred option. After seeing how the refdesk regulars are reacting to any and all attempts at reform option two is now my first choice, but I still endorse this idea should that not happen. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:22, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

• Biographies (bio)
• Economy, trade, and companies (econ)
• History and geography (hist)
• Language and linguistics (lang)
• Maths, science, and technology (sci)
• Media, the arts, and architecture (media)
• Politics, government, and law (pol)
• Religion and philosophy (reli)
• Society, sports, and culture (soc)

• Misplaced Pages style and naming (style)
• Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines (policy)
• WikiProjects and collaborations (proj)
• Misplaced Pages technical issues and templates (tech)
• Misplaced Pages proposals (prop)
• Unsorted

• Add the tag {{rfc|xxx}} at the top of a talk page section, where "xxx" is the category abbreviation. The different category abbreviations that should be used with {{rfc}} are listed above in parenthesis. Multiple categories are separated by a vertical pipe. For example, {{rfc|xxx|yyy}}, where "xxx" is the first category and "yyy" is the second category.