Wikipedia:Editing policy: Difference between revisions
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{{redirects here|Wikipedia:Editing guidelines|editing guidelines that are not part of this policy|Wikipedia:List of guidelines#Editing}}
{{Short description|Wikipedia policy}}
{{redirects here|Wikipedia:Editing|basic information about how to edit Wikipedia|Help:Editing}}
{{redirects here|WP:EP|the education program|Wikipedia:Education program|extended confirmed protection|WP:ECP}}
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==Adding information to Wikipedia==
{{See also|Wikipedia:Plagiarism#Copying material from free sources}}
Wikipedia ''[[WP:What Wikipedia is not#Encyclopedic content|summarizes]]'' accepted knowledge. As a rule, the more accepted knowledge it
Wikipedia respects others' copyright. Although content must be backed by reliable sources, [[WP:Copying text from other sources|avoid copying]] or [[WP:Close paraphrasing|closely paraphrasing]] a copyrighted source. You should read the source, understand it, and then express what it says [[WP:Verifiability#Copyright and plagiarism|in your own words]]. An exception exists for the often necessary use of short quotations; they must be enclosed in quotations marks, accompanied by an inline reference to the source, and usually attributed to the author. (See the [[Wikipedia:Non-free content|fair use doctrine]] which allows limited quoting without permission.)
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{{policy shortcut|WP:IMPERFECT|WP:PERFECTION|WP:NOTPERFECT}}
''Perfection is not required'': [[WP:Wikipedia is a work in progress|Wikipedia is a work in progress]]. Collaborative editing means that incomplete or poorly written first drafts can evolve over time into [[WP:Featured articles|excellent articles]]. Even poor articles, if they can be improved, are welcome. For instance, one person may start an article with an overview of a subject or a few random facts. Another may help standardize the article's formatting or have additional facts and figures or a graphic to add. Yet another may bring better [[Wikipedia:Neutral point of view#Due and undue weight|balance]] to the views represented in the article and perform fact-checking and [[WP:Citing sources|sourcing]] to existing content. At any point during this process, the article may become disorganized or contain substandard writing.
=== Neutrality in articles of living or recently deceased persons ===
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=={{Anchor|Try to fix problems: preserve information|Preserve content}} Try to fix problems==
<!-- This Anchor tag
{{Anchor|How to handle problematic material|Handling problematic material|Fix problems: preserve information|Remove libel, nonsense, and copyright violations|Handling material that violates policy}}
{{Policy shortcut|WP:PRESERVE|WP:HANDLE|WP:FIXTHEPROBLEM}}
{{redirect|WP:PRESERVE|the Manual of Style section on preserving formatting|MOS:RETAIN}}
Great Wikipedia articles come from a succession of editors' efforts. Rather than remove imperfect content outright, '''fix problems if you can, [[WP:Template index/Cleanup|tag]] or excise them if you can't'''.
As explained [[#Wikipedia is a work in progress: perfection is not required|above]], Wikipedia is a work in progress and perfection is not required.
If you think an article needs to be rewritten or changed substantially, [[WP:Be bold|go ahead and do so]], but it is best to [[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#How to use article talk pages|leave a comment]] about why you made the changes on the [[Help:Talk pages|article's talk page]].
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===Problems that may justify removal===
{{Policy shortcut|WP:CANTFIX|WP:WONTWORK|WP:DON'T PRESERVE}}
{{Anchor|REMOVE}}Several of our core policies discuss situations when it ''might'' be more appropriate to remove information from an article rather than preserve it.
*[[Wikipedia:Verifiability|Verifiability]] discusses handling unsourced and contentious material *[[Wikipedia:No original research|No original research]] discusses the need to remove original research *[[Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not|What Wikipedia is not]] describes material that is fundamentally inappropriate for Wikipedia *[[Wikipedia:Undue weight|Undue weight]] discusses how to balance material that gives undue weight to a particular viewpoint, which might include removal of trivia, tiny minority viewpoints, or material that cannot be supported with high-quality sources Also, redundancy within an article should be kept to a minimum (except in the [[Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section|lead]], which is meant to be a summary of the entire article, and so is intentionally duplicative). [[WP:Libel|Libel]], [[WP:Patent nonsense|nonsense]], and [[WP:vandalism|vandalism]] should be completely removed, as should material that [[Wikipedia:Copyright violations|violates copyright]] and material for which no reliable source that supports it has ever been [[Wikipedia:Published|published]].
Special care needs to be taken with [[Wikipedia:biographies of living people|biographies of living people]], especially when it comes to handling unsourced or poorly sourced claims about the subject.
==Talking and editing==
{{policy shortcut|WP:EPTALK}}
{{seealso|WP:PGCHANGE|label 1 = Policies and guidelines § Content changes}}
''[[Wikipedia:Be bold|Be bold in updating articles]], especially for [[Help:Minor edit|minor changes]], fixing problems, and changes that you believe are [[wikipedia:Likely to be challenged|unlikely to be controversial]].'' Previous authors do not need to be consulted before making changes. [[WP:Ownership of content|Nobody owns articles]], so if you see an improvement you can make, make it.
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===Be cautious with major changes: discuss===
{{policy shortcut|WP:CAUTIOUS}}
''Be cautious about making a major change to an article.'' Prevent [[WP:Edit warring|edit warring]] by discussing such edits first on the [[Help:Talk pages|article's talk page]].
===But – Wikipedia is not a discussion forum===
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* [[Help:Edit conflict|Edit conflicts]]: how to deal with an edit conflict
* [[Wikipedia:There is no deadline|There is no deadline]]: various points of view on what this lack of a deadline means
* [[Wikipedia:Template index/User talk namespace/Multi-level templates#Blanking/Removal of content]] (warning templates)
{{Wikipedia principles}}
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