Misplaced Pages talk:Content forks

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Examples?

Some examples, could be hypothetical, of improper content forking would be useful. I'm still not sure when an article could be considered a legitimate spin-off piece and when this is to be avoided. Liz 15:36, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

What do you think about Hebrew Bible, Tanakh and Old Testament? Cesiumfrog (talk) 22:45, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

Obligatory thread - making POVFORK less anti-AGF

This is an apparently obligatory thread requested via revert to my edit by Flyer22 (talk · contribs). Does anyone object/agree with my edit, and if so, please explain why. --slakr 10:15, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Like I stated I would, I alerted WP:Manual of Style to this matter. Flyer22 (talk) 17:09, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

hmm... *scratches head* ...the MOS people? Does it have application to them somehow? I mean, I could be missing something, but it would of course help if I knew why you, personally, objected to the edit and felt the need to revert it (apart from it just being an edit to a guideline). Do you feel it doesn't clearly reflect consensus or something? --slakr 17:50, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Forking is related to WP:Manual of Style, and I couldn't think of a better and more appropriate place to get various comments on this matter. But, alas, none of them have weighed in here on this matter yet. As for your edit, I personally dislike when one editor significantly changes a longstanding guideline or policy without discussion, especially if the change is spurred on by some recent Misplaced Pages experience the editor had and he or she is looking to make the guideline or policy conform to his or her personal view. Such changes are usually reverted, as it is in this case. What benefit is there to your change? Flyer22 (talk) 19:15, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Changes to guidelines don't inherently require a discussion beforehand, but WP:VPP is probably the better venue for canvassing this. I'd have thought to post something there had I felt that this changed the guideline in a controversial or truly significant way (I would still like to know why you feel it does, though). What benefit is there? Apart from eliminating the redundant, confusing sorta-sentence starting with, "Instead, apply Misplaced Pages's policy that requires a," simply read the edit and its summary again. The change encourages harmony with the assumption of good faith guideline so that a fork that someone believes violates the neutral point of view policy can be discussed and consensus built without it becoming a referendum on the motivations of the forker(s) and a difficult-to-actually-prove accusation of bad faith, thereby also reducing veiled personal attacks, as it encourages commenting on the content instead of the contributor. On a related note, I find it's a good rule of thumb to assume good faith and comment on the content—not the contributor's possible motives or bias—when a credible editor makes a change to a guideline, too. --slakr 04:54, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Significantly changing a longstanding Misplaced Pages policy or guideline without discussion is not something I believe in, especially when it concerns a policy (though I know that Misplaced Pages:Content forking is a guideline), as is obvious by my above commentary. Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines should be based on WP:Consensus, as even the "Changes to guidelines don't inherently require a discussion beforehand" link you showcased reflects, and that there is no objection to an edit does not always equate to "WP:Consensus"; sometimes such changes are accidentally overlooked. I suggest directing people at WP:VPP to weigh in on this matter. As for a "good rule of thumb to assume good faith and comment on the content—not the contributor's possible motives or bias," I've seen enough cases where an editor is in a content dispute and then comes to a policy or guideline and changes it to suit their argument in that content dispute; so, yes, their motives and bias are relevant in those cases. I'm not stating that something like that is what brought on your desired change to this guideline; I'm only stating why motives and bias very much matter to me when it comes to changing policies and guidelines. Flyer22 (talk) 20:45, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

Notability standards for WP:SPLIT

I have started a discussion about notability standards for WP:SPLITs at Wikipedia_talk:Notability#Notability_standards_for_WP:SPLIT.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 05:40, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

jghcjchggf — Preceding unsigned comment added by 115.115.227.146 (talk) 08:41, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Template POV fork

This is my first time seeing a POV forked template, any feedback there would be appreciated since TFD is usually a pretty inactive place.AioftheStorm (talk) 17:24, 23 July 2014 (UTC)

Several large POV forks were recently created. Should we merge them?

The content of these sections is largely identical, with some minor variation:

Also, there are several duplicated paragraphs in these sections:

Multiple paragraphs about hydroelectricity have also been duplicated:

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Jarble (talk • contribs)

Hello Jarble, thank you for posting this here. I would support you with this effort, and it should be sooner than later, it is hard to merge articles, once each copy had a life of its own. — Sebastian 07:08, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Jarble and SebastianHelm (Sebastian), articles sharing one or more paragraphs is normal and accepted on Misplaced Pages; Jarble, you know this, and the Related articles section of the WP:Content fork guideline is clear about this. Duplicate paragraphs do not make content fork violations unless there are articles that are pretty much the same thing and have duplicated paragraphs. Flyer22 (talk) 07:17, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, Flyer22, I admit that I did not check the facts and compare the articles; I just assumed they were just wholesale forked. This was rash, and I'm sorry for that. — Sebastian 07:22, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Distinction between acceptable and unacceptable forks

The article seems to make the distinction between acceptable and unacceptable forks as follows:

Size of smaller text	Copied text	Condensed text
Whole article	unacceptable	(not possible)
Section	NOT COVERED	acceptable

What about the NOT COVERED quadrant? I feel an uncondensed copy of text introduces the same problems, whether it is copied to an article of its own or to a section within another article. Can we clarify that in this guideline? — Sebastian 07:08, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

I addressed this in the #Several large POV forks were recently created. Should we merge them? section above. Sections are not yet explicitly covered in the WP:Content fork guideline because it is perfectly acceptable for articles to share one or more paragraphs, especially if WP:Copying within Misplaced Pages is followed. By what the WP:Copying within Misplaced Pages and WP:Summary style guidelines state, Misplaced Pages accepts and/or encourages such copying. The Related articles section of the WP:Content fork guideline addresses the fact that "distinct but related topics may well contain a significant amount of information in common with one another."

Since this page does not get a lot of traffic/does not have a lot of WP:Watchers, I will alert Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style to this discussion. Flyer22 (talk) 07:29, 25 February 2015 (UTC)