Wikipedia:Three sources
 | This is an essay on notability. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: If you were sent here from a link in a WP:AfD, WP:AfC, or similar discussion, please consider it a request to post two or three, but no more, of what you consider to be the best sources for the page under discussion. |
You are probably here because one or more other Wikipedia editors are considering whether an article or draft that you created should be part of Wikipedia or not.
The problem with many references
[edit]You may have included a long list of references in the article, perhaps to enable the reader to verify what you've written. When evaluating the article for notability, it can take a long time for reviewers to follow each link to see whether they provide reliable, independent, secondary, in-depth coverage about the subject. Reviewers are volunteers, and slogging through dozens of references isn't much fun. They generally are, however, willing to look at a few sources in detail if somebody else (i.e. you) does the footwork to figure out which ones are the best.
How to help the reviewers
[edit]When given this offer, your best strategy is to take it. Don't look at this as, That person wants to delete this and they're busting my chops. Think of it instead as, That generous volunteer wants to help me get the article kept, and I just need to do a bit of work to make their task easy.
- Look over WP:RS and WP:SIGCOV to understand what counts as a reliable source with significant coverage of the article's topic.
- If people have been claiming that your article doesn't meet some particular guideline (e.g. WP:NBIO, WP:NCORP, WP:GNG, etc.), read the relevant page and understand the specific criteria.
- Look over your list of sources and find the three that best meet WP:RS, WP:SIGCOV, and whatever other guidelines people are asking the article to meet.
- Be honest with yourself about how good these three sources are. If they're not good sources, people will figure that out quickly and reject them. Then you've lost your chance.
- Ask yourself, in each case: is coverage of the subject significant, is it independent of the subject, and is the source reliable?
- If you haven't found three good references, look for more sources that you could add which do meet those criteria.
- Keep it to no more than three. Three good sources should be enough to convince anybody. If somebody agrees to look at three, and you give them more than three, they're likely not to look at any of them. That may not be fair, but it's reality. Remember, we are all volunteers here at Wikipedia.
How to highlight the best three sources
[edit]If you are here because your article has been nominated for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion (AfD) then you can respond on the discussion page that you think the article should be kept and list the three best sources in your comment, perhaps explaining why you think they are reliable, independent, secondary and in-depth.
If you are here because your draft has been declined, you can communicate with reviewers on the draft's talk page. Create a new heading == Three best sources == and list your best sources there. You can then re-submit the draft for review.
See also
[edit]- Wikipedia:Writing Wikipedia articles backward, a better approach for you to adopt in future
- Wikipedia:Multiple sources, an essay which explains how many good sources you need to show notability