User:ElijahPepe/Use of the draft namespace in future events
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The use of the draft namespace is often left ambiguous when used with topics that have not occurred yet. This essay establishes my personal rationale towards the issue.
Motivation
[edit]In recent years, there has been an increase in drafts—both in the draftspace and userspace—wherein the topic of the article has not occurred. This is separate from an upcoming event, where the events of a topic have occurred, although the topic itself may not have been released or may not have happened yet. For example, a draft about an upcoming film is a technically distinct draft than one about the death of a notable figure when no such death has occurred.
Rationale
[edit]Per Wikipedia:Drafts, Drafts are not indexed by most search engines including Google
, although search engines that do not honor robots.txt may index drafts. Search engines that do not honor robots.txt are irrelevant towards this essay. The draft namespace incubates several types of articles, including templates. Drafts may be created in the user namespace; for the purpose of this essay, the distinction between draftspace drafts and userspace drafts is unclear. In technical terms, there is no distinction between either entity on Wikipedia, as both qualify as drafts. This is seen in an an RfC regarding the applicability of the notability guidelines to drafts. However, one's expectation of an article in userspace may change, barring the AfC submission template.
The distinction between a draft and a mainspace article is much more clear. Although the editing policy applies to both types of articles, the standards to which both must follow are drastically different, in order to ensure drafts can become full-fledged articles. In draftspace, there is an expectation that a draft will become an article;[a] this axiom forms the basis for deleting old drafts. The expectation that a draftspace draft will become an article requires veracity towards the topic itself. For instance, a draft about the death of a well-known figure should contain a source adhering to the title; otherwise, such an article is ambiguous in meaning and would not be suitable for mainspace in its form.
The policy that Wikipedia is not a crystal ball establishes that scheduled or expected future events [can be created] only if the event is notable and almost certain to take place
. The verbage that an event meets this criteria if it is both "notable" and "almost certain to take place" does not account for events that will certainly occur, but information regarding their topic is unknown. A presidential election, as a biannual or quadrennial event, meets this criteria, as reliable sources will have covered the topic ahead of its occurrence.
See also
[edit]Notes
[edit]- ^ This expectation does not inherently apply to userspace, as previously mentioned.