Wikipedia:Recentism
It has been suggested that the documentation that occurs during a "recentist news frenzy" provides an in-depth look that some may be interested in. For example, the Terri Schiavo article (and its sister articles at Category:Terri Schiavo) provide a case study outlook into how the state and federal governments legally interact, insight into motivations for politicians to intervene in court cases, and some nuances of end-of-life issues.
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Suggestions for dealing with recentism
- The "ten-year test" is one simple thought experiment which may be helpful: "In ten years will this addition still appear relevant? If I am devoting more time to it than other topics on the page, will it appear more relevant than what is already here?" For example, in 2004 devoting more time on George W. Bush's page to the ongoing election rather than his previous one may have seemed logical. However, in ten years, when neither event is fresh, readers will benefit from a similar level of detail in both articles.
- Sometimes side articles like 2004 U.S. election voting controversies and 2004 U.S. presidential election controversy and irregularities can be created to help to stabilize content on the main article, in this example, the U.S. presidential election, 2004 article. A compelling reason for creating side articles is that various editors will continue to add the same details of current events to the main article unless there is another place for the rapid influx of information to be recorded.
- After "recentist" articles have calmed down, the instigating news story has dropped from the Main Page and the front pages of newspapers, and the number of edits per day has dropped to a reasonable minimum, concerned Wikipedians ought to initiate comprehensive rewrites. Most articles can be condensed to keep only the most important information, the wider notable effects of an event, and links to major issues to which the article is related. Much of the timeline content and day-to-day updates with minor details can safely be excised.
- Add up-to-the-minute information to Wikinews. Unlike Wikipedia, the Wikinews project was founded to provide in-depth "news article"-like coverage of current events. Bear in mind, however, that Wikinews material cannot usually be incorporated into Wikipedia later, due to license incompatibility; also that the English Wikipedia has generally shown more success than the English Wikinews in covering current events.
- Some editors employ the recentism tag {{Recentism}} at the top of articles to warn the reader that the content may be imbalanced towards recent perspectives on the article topic. This practice is the subject of some internal debate, since some other wikipedians think putting tags on articles makes them ugly. The tag looks like this:
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This article or section may be slanted towards recent events. Please try to keep recent events in historical perspective. |
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- Just wait and see. Editors writing today do not have an historical perspective on events that are going on today, and should not pretend to. It is perfectly fine to write about ongoing events with an eye towards benefiting future readers, but without attempting to prejudge what will be regarded as historically important ten (or 100) years from now.
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See also
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