Memory Alpha:Policies and guidelines

About → Policies and guidelines

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Memory Alpha has some policies that have been proposed by the administrators and generally accepted by the members. Please read through the policies below to familiarize yourself with our common practices and rules. If you have any questions, suggestions, or complaints, please post them on the talk page.

The policy changes page contains information about all new suggestions and clarifications incorporated into our policies. Add that page to your watchlist to be kept up-to-date.

General policies

Remember that above all else, Memory Alpha is an encyclopedia. Like the television shows and films, it is primarily family oriented. It is a community that is solely devoted to the development of the Star Trek reference database; it is not a chat room or discussion forum. The talk pages are specifically for discussing the writing of articles, and nothing else.

The following are general policies concerning the overall goals and functions of Memory Alpha:

• Editing policy: A guide on how to edit articles, and how to style them.
• Naming conventions: How to name new articles.
• Disambiguation: For potential article title conflicts.
• Image use policy: On the rules for uploading images.
• Copyrights: That unavoidable legalese...
• Etiquette: Useful advice for when disagreements arise.
• Deletion policy: For when deleting pages becomes necessary.
• Canon policy: What we accept, and what we don't accept.
• Spoiler policy: Let the reader beware!
• Redirect: On the rules for using redirects.
• Category policy: Guidelines on the use and creation of categories.
• Bot policy: Bots on Memory Alpha

See also: Most common Memory Alpha faux pas for some useful information for newcomers, and Policy changes for a link to what might recently have been discussed or updated.

Enforcement

For day-to-day operations on Memory Alpha, enforcement can be handled by the general membership. Simply pointing out each other's mistakes (politely, of course) is generally sufficient.

For problem cases, the administrators may intervene and enforce a policy, or temporarily lock a page to let things cool down. In extreme and unusual cases, these administrators will step in to ban a user who has proven to be unusually disruptive.

See also: Bans and blocks, Protection policy

Specific guidelines

General guidelines

• Contribute what you know or are willing to learn about (and create stubs responsibly)
• Be bold in updating pages
• Strive for community solutions
• Build the web
• Make omissions explicit
• What links here?

Behavior guidelines

• Sign your posts on talk pages
• No personal attacks (and move personal debates to email)
• Log in before making drastic changes to existing articles
• Username
• Bans and blocks
• Don't protect pages unless necessary
• Be considerate to new members

Content guidelines

• Perfection is not required
• Define and describe
• Establish context (instead of presuming too much knowledge)
• Explain jargon
• Deal appropriately with patent nonsense
• Use the correct point of view
• Check your facts
• Cite your sources (and use proper references)
• Make articles useful for readers (and consider the audience in writing)
• Avoid blanket statements
• Inform and entertain
• Describe external links
• Don't use external links where we'll want Memory Alpha links
• Avoid and fix stub articles
• Use category sort keys
• Use templates when appropriate.

Style guidelines

• Manual of Style
• Don't include copies of primary sources
• Avoid making your articles orphans
• Always fill summary field
• Follow highlighting conventions
• Balance parts of a page
• Do not use subpages
• Consider writing articles in news style

Miscellaneous

• Your user page
• Dealing with vandalism
• Editing the main page
• Editing MediaWiki namespace text
• The Babel Project