Deletionism and inclusionism on Wikipedia

Deletionism and inclusionism are opposing philosophies that largely developed within the community of volunteer editors of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia site's community. The terms reflect differing opinions on the appropriate scope of the encyclopedia and corresponding tendencies either to delete or to include a given encyclopedia article.[1]

Deletionists are proponents of selective coverage and removal of articles seen as poorly defended. Deletionist viewpoints are commonly motivated by a desire that Wikipedia be focused on and cover significant topics—along with the desire to place a firm cap upon proliferation of promotional use (seen as abuse of the website), trivia, and articles which are,, of no general interest, lack suitable source material for high-quality coverage, are too short or otherwise unacceptably poor in quality,[2][3] or may cause maintenance overload to the community.

Inclusionists are proponents of broad retention, including retention of "harmless" articles and articles otherwise deemed substandard to allow for future improvement. Inclusionist viewpoints are commonly motivated by a desire to keep Wikipedia broad in coverage with a much lower entry barrier for topics covered—along with the belief that it is impossible to tell what knowledge might be "useful" or productive, that content often starts poor and is improved if time is allowed, that there is effectively no incremental cost of coverage, that arbitrary lines in the sand are unhelpful and may prove divisive, and that goodwill requires avoiding arbitrary deletion of others' work. Some extend this to include allowing a wider range of sources such as notable blogs and other websites.[2][4]

To the extent that an official stance existed as of 2010, it was that "There is no practical limit to the number of topics it can cover" but "there is an important distinction between what can be done, and what should be done", the latter being the subject of the policy "What Wikipedia is not". The policy concludes "Consequently, this policy is not a free pass for inclusion".[5]

Background

Because of concerns about vandalism and appropriateness of content, most wikis require policies regarding inclusion.[6] Wikipedia has developed spaces for policy and conflict resolution regarding the disputes for individual articles.[7] These debates, which can be initiated by anyone,[8][9] take place on an "Articles for deletion" page[10] (often referred to by editors as AfD). Much discussion concerns not only the content of each article in question, but also "differing perspectives on how to edit an ideal encyclopedia."[11]

Criticism

Documentarian Jason Scott has noted the large amount of wasted effort that goes into deletion debates.[20] Deletion debates may contribute to community disintegration,[2] restriction of information,[21] or a decrease in the rate of article creation that suggests a decrease in passion and motivation amongst editors.[22] Being explicitly called an inclusionist or deletionist can sidetrack the issue from the actual debate.[19] Nevertheless, some have observed that the interaction between the two groups may actually result in an enhancement of overall quality of content.[23]

Startup accelerator and angel investor

Scholarly research

At the 2005 Digital Arts and Culture Conference, the two groups were discussed as examples among "Eventualism" and "Immediatism" in a successful large-scale architecture of participation.[11] The existence of these groups was mentioned in a study by the Harvard Business School which reviewed the deletion debate over an article on Enterprise 2.0.[8]

The Institut national de recherche pédagogique (National Institute for Educational Research) in France, in case studies of Wikipedia, reported that while it was difficult to measure the influence of the groups as of April 2006, their existence is indicative of Wikipedia's internal dynamics consisting of multiple identities,[26] and may play progressively increasing roles.[27]

In the Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, a study of Wikipedia's social dynamics called inclusionism and deletionism the two most prominent associations within Wikipedia. They observe that users in the same role (administrator, etc.) may hold different perspectives, and that "the diversity of member [information quality] preferences and the low cost of forming or switching associations may encourage schism in an existing association or evolution of new groups."

On German Wikipedia

Since the communities of different language versions of Wikipedia set their own notability standards, they have in some cases diverged substantially. Writing for Die Zeit, Kai Biermann describes the German Wikipedia as being dominated by "exclusionists", whereas he calls the English Wikipedia "inclusionist";[30] although c't author Torsten Kleinz commented that the English Wikipedia has for several years required users to have registered accounts to create articles, which German Wikipedia does not.[31] A debate in late 2009 over inclusion of several articles led to criticism in the German blogosphere of such vehemence and volume that the German Wikimedia held a meeting with several bloggers and German Wikipedia administrators regarding the German Wikipedia's notability criteria, and issued a press statement.[30]

See also

• Deletion of articles on Wikipedia
• Digital preservation
• Lumpers and splitters
• Systemic bias in Wikipedia

Further reading

External links

At Wikimedia Meta-Wiki Miscellaneous

• Conflicting Wikipedia Philosophies
• Deletionism
• Exclusionism
• Inclusionism
• Similar concepts: Immediatism and Eventualism
• Keep history, an essay related to Wikimedia
• Association of Deletionist Wikipedians
• Association of Inclusionist Wikipedians

• , a Wikipedia policy cited by deletionists
• , a Wikipedia policy cited by inclusionsists
• Watching Wikipedia's Extinction Event From A Distance