Wikipedia talk:Article size

“ Articles are like grass, they need to be trimmed periodically, so that new grass can grow – yet we save the old grass by planting it into different areas. ”

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• Wikipedia talk:Article size/Archive1, 39 kb

50 to 110 kb long-article breakup proposals

Hi, in the past I've broken up four over the limit pages. People seem to be fairly happy about the change after it is done, e.g.:

• Thermodynamics
• Entropy
• Love
• Gravitation.

Moreover, for comparison, I have both the computer versions of Encarta and Britannica and they break their articles up into sections of 2-4 pages long; then you click along if you want to read step-by-step through the article or click on related topics (usually as side links or bottom links). Now, a few articles in Wikipedia are growing without limit. Some of these are very tension-thick articles.

Long article examples

Here are a few current examples:

• Entropy - 41 kb (13 printed pages); feels about right, but getting tight around the belt.
• Caffeine - 52 kb (14 printed pages); feels ok, most of the page is references.
• Photon - 67 kb (15 printed pages); feels like a heavy read for one sitting; could use some trimming?

Article is too long

• Evolution - 92 kb (27 printed pages); feels way over the limit; I don't even want to attempt to contribute to this page because it's so big. (one of the Wikipedia's top 500 longest articles as well as one of the top 100 most edited articles).

90 kb article

Call to trim

Call to trim (part 2)

Evolution of the evolution article

• George W. Bush - 96 kb (most visited article)

Most articles over 100 kb are lists (Wikipedia’s longest article is 270 kb). A related website with ridiculously long pages is MySpace.com. We do not want to turn into a MySpace.

Page tension issues

To compound this problem, many editors in Wikipedia are very "attached" to certain pages and are not favorable towards the idea of breaking up their lovely work. This compounds the issue. An example is the evolution page; I brought up this point but there was resistance, i.e. one editor said “that’s being working on”. Big articles tend to stagnate in growth. Everyone, for example, loves contributing to stubbies or even better yet "starting a new article". Typically, if you find a long page put a long page "tag" at the top of the article:

Many editors, however, will remove these unpleasant looking headers, because they are so attached to their beautiful articles. This is another tension issue. Once the page is split up, however, things are again peaceful, and the talk page tensions subside.

Readibility and tension spans

I do a lot of website design and I have read many articles on recommendations of page-length and the psychological reasons behind them. Here's an example from WebStyleGuide.com:

Page length

Determining the proper length for any Web page requires balancing four factors:

1. The relation between page and screen size
2. The content of your documents
3. Whether the reader is expected to browse the content online or to print or download the documents for later reading
4. The bandwidth available to your audience

Researchers have noted the disorientation that results from scrolling on computer screens. The reader's loss of context is particularly troublesome when such basic navigational elements as document titles, site identifiers, and links to other site pages disappear off-screen while scrolling. This disorientation effect argues for the creation of navigational Web pages (especially home pages and menus) that contain no more than one or two screens' worth of information and that feature local navigational links at the beginning and end of the page layout. Long Web pages require the user to remember too much information that scrolls off the screen; users easily lose their sense of context when the navigational buttons or major links are not visible.

There is also the problem for those with dial-up (I use high speed and dial-up), and for those who use hand-helds, and for those who use laptops with a cellular connection, etc. If a page gets so long that it deters editors, we can only image how it will deter readers.

Mandatory breakup proposals

In conclusion, I propose the following:

• Any article 12-15 pages printed (or 50-70 kb) is call for strongly recommended article breakup.
• Any article over 15 printed pages (or 70 kb) is call for mandatory article breakup.

I may possibly plan to assemble the Wikipedia:WikiProject Extra-Long Article Committee project page. If you would like to join, please leave your name and comment there. I will need at least three administrators to back up the project by stopping reverts:

Breakup committee members

If you are sick of seeing long bulky articles, would like to help break up some long articles, and would like to join the break up committee please leave your name below. Thanks and comments are welcome: --Sadi Carnot 09:39, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Members

1. Sadi Carnot (talk · contribs) – experience breaking up four over the limit articles (likes trimming science articles)
2. Samsara (talk • contribs) – admin who started the Wikipedia:WikiProject Modular Articles.

Discussion

Note:Up to second note copied from discussion at WP:ANI

Good idea, in theory. But I don't really like the fact that you seem to think that instead of establishing a consensus that a page should be broken up, it is better to recruit some admins to prevent people from reverting such a thing. If this idea is implemented well, there should be absolutely no need of admins. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 00:43, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

No, my plan is that:

First, an editor tries to establish consensus: the issue is brought up on the talk page, and it is suggested that the regulars break up the article into subtopics, with short summary paragraphs (w/ main article attachments), see thermodynamics as an example, so that the main page gets below a certain limit.

Second, if plan #1 stifles out in argument and indecision to act, for a number of consecutive weeks, than an breakup arbitration committee notice is placed on the talk page, putting an ultimatum deadline, such that either the regulars break up the page to below a certain limit by that date or an external breakup committee, enforced by a team of administrators, will do so.

Without a group project such as this, then Wikipedia talkpages and articles will become like Congress: lots of arguing but little action. This will need to be a team action if it is to be successful. Here is a recent example in which I placed a "long article" tag on a page but it was quickly reverted; for this situation I would have needed administrative assistance. --Sadi Carnot 01:16, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:WikiProject Modular Articles here. I've been meaning to do this for weeks. Will you help? Many thanks. - Samsara (talk • contribs) 00:46, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, we seem to be on the same page; I would be glad to help with this, especially with the science-related articles, time permitting. We just need a bigger team. If we can get at least three core administrators, to help with the potential revert wars erupting between seasoned page editors connected to those pages, then I can scavenger up more regular editors to join the team who also like to see smaller articles. For now, I added your name here. I'll wait till the group gets up to about 10 people. --Sadi Carnot 01:16, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

I'd hope we wouldn't need to push decisions down anyone's throat, and that administrators will support what is reasonable without being associated with the project. - Samsara (talk • contribs) 02:03, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

That would be a worst case scenario. Ideally, if an article “breakup team” existed, then the mere placement of a "talk page notice" would be enough to compel the regulars to break up the page on their own. When one works on a page for more than a month, then article beer goggles tend to develop, wherein the page seems perfectly fine no matter how long it gets. Presently, the “32 kb warning” tag that pops up on long pages is completely useless, because editors will unconsciously justify their “unique” long pages for so and so reason, and argumentitively attack anyone who questions them about page length. ---Sadi Carnot 02:22, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

My problem still exists. A breakup committee should not have the power to decree that a page will be broken up by the involved editors, or someone else will come and do it for them, with admins preventing any reversion of changes. With the exception of the fact that they are openly acknowledging that they have that power, that is called a cabal, and it is bad. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 03:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Well what alternatives do you recommend? Should we let bloated 100 kb page articles linger around for months or years on end because of a few hard-minded editors; while, in the mean time, hundreds of thousands of readers get turned off and give up reading or better yet can’t load the page in the first place because they have dialup or are using a Blackberry, etc.? I don’t see what harm can come from this. We open up some new pages, cut and paste, everyone does some cleanup work, and than instead of having one 100 kb page, we now have, for example, three 33 kb pages. The process takes a day or two. It’s not that complicated. But a project team is needed for a “pressure-effect” and administrators may be needed to give user warnings to seasoned editors. In the end, everyone is happy. I am certainly open for other ideas? --Sadi Carnot 03:43, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Um... The current method of establishing consensus before changing anything seems to work just fine. Obviously, the "few die-hard editors" think there is a good reason why their page should be 100 kb long. Why is this committee assumed to know better than the editors who have actually worked on the article? -Amarkov ^blah_edits 04:25, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

On another note, this discussion should be somewhere else, but I don't know where would make sense. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 04:36, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Copied from ANI.-Amarkov ^blah_edits 04:46, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Note:Above discussion copied from WP:ANI

I don't see a serious problem with long articles per se. The technical reasons have all but gone - I know of no browser that cannot handle long pages. Loading times via dialup are problematic, but that cuts both ways. In much of the world, phone access is metered, and I'd rather download a few longish articles and go offline for reading than downloading a short one and then notice that I have to go online again and again to get sub-articles. Lack of structure and fluff are problems, but not necessarily connected to article length alone. Calling all long articles "bloated" is wrong - some are long for a reason. Breaking up an article for no other reason but length is a bad idea. If there are no identifiable subtopics that can be summarized and off-loaded, then the topic may justy be inherently rich and complex. --Stephan Schulz 12:29, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Breaking up articles because they are long is sometimes a good idea, since people don't have infinite attention spans. The problem is more that the proposal means that once an article gets to a certain size, it MUST be split up, or a big scary committee will come and break it up, with no possibility for dispute, as there will be admins to prevent reversion. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 02:59, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Essentially, the long and the short of the problem is this:

"Wikipedia is now a top-12 website in the world with almost two million articles. That people read these articles is obvious. How much of each article the average person reads, however, is not so obvious. The average person stops reading, of course, when his or her reading tension span is broken. In this direction, Wikipedia articles are now only broken up when more than 50% of “editors” feel they are too long. The real question is, at what point do more than 50% of “readers” feel an article is too long? Hence, the famous motto “ignore all rules”, with respect to article size, is presently favored towards the editors rather than the readers."

With more than one-thousand administrators at Wikipedia, I don’t see why a non-optimal situation like this should exist? --Sadi Carnot 09:52, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

64kb extra-long article proposals

I would also like to recommend implementing the use of “long-page warning” banners unique to each category of long page, e.g. 32-63kb (extra-long), 64-96kb (super-long), etc. Presently, the only warning pages have is the following, which pops up for pages longer than 32kb when users click on the edit button:

Note: This page is XY kilobytes long. It may be appropriate to split this article into smaller, more specific articles. See Wikipedia:Article size.

Now, for articles in the range of 32-64kb, I will admit, there is room for some gray area as to article. For articles more than 64kb, i.e. twice the recommended maximal size, however, I would recommend that we code a page such that “readers” (not editors), in a quick and easy manner, can cast their vote as to whether or not they feel an article is to long, such as:

Note: This page over 64 kilobytes long. It is strongly recommended that this article be split into smaller, more specific articles. See Wikipedia:Article size. If you feel that this article is too long click YES if not click NO.

In this manner we can collect data as to which articles readers feel are getting too long. Editors, conversely, usually have a thorough knowledge of the topics they edit and may never potentially feel that an article is too long. Please comment. Thanks: --Sadi Carnot 00:42, 5 December 2006 (UTC)