ChinaTravelGuide:Policies and guidelines

From ChinaTravelGuide

ChinaTravelGuide has developed some policies by the administrators and generally accepted by the members. These policies are generally similar to what've already widely accepted in Wikipedia. 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.

Contents 1 Policies 1.1 Global 1.2 Behavioral 1.3 Content and style 1.4 Deletion 1.5 Enforcing policies 1.6 Legal and copyright 2 Guidelines 2.1 General 2.2 Content 2.3 Classification 2.4 Editing 2.5 Discussion 2.6 Behavior 2.7 Style guidelines

Policies

Global

Ignore all rules

Every policy, guideline or any other rule may be ignored if it hinders improving ChinaTravelGuide.

Behavioral

Bots

Programs that update pages automatically in a useful and harmless way may be welcome, if their owners seek approval first and go to great lengths to stop them from running amok or being a drain on resources.

Civility

Being rude, insensitive or petty makes people upset and stops ChinaTravelGuide from working well. Try to discourage others from being uncivil, and be careful to avoid offending people unintentionally. Mediation is available if needed.

Editing policy

Improve pages wherever you can, and don't worry about leaving them imperfect. Avoid making large deletions without discussing on the talk page first.

No legal threats

Use dispute resolution rather than legal threats, for everyone's sake. We respond quickly to complaints of defamation or copyright infringement. If you do take legal action, please refrain from editing until it is resolved.

No personal attacks

Do not make personal attacks anywhere in ChinaTravelGuide. Comment on content, not on the contributor. Personal attacks damage the community and deter users. Nobody likes abuse.

Ownership of articles

You agreed to allow others to modify your work. So let them.

Sock puppetry

Do not use multiple accounts to create the illusion of greater support for an issue, to mislead others, or to circumvent a block; nor ask your friends to create accounts to support you or anyone.

Three-revert rule

Do not revert any single page in whole or in part more than three times in 24 hours. (Otherwise an administrator may block your account).

Username

Choose a neutral username that you'll be happy with. You can usually change your name if you need to by asking, but you can't delete it.

Vandalism

Vandalism is any addition, deletion, or change to content made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of the encyclopedia. It is, and needs to be, removed from the encyclopedia.

Wheel war

Do not repeat an administrative action when you know that another administrator opposes it. (Applies to sysops only)

Content and style

Attack pages

A ChinaTravelGuide article, page, category, redirect or image created for the sole purpose of disparaging its subject is an attack page. These pages are subject to being deleted by any administrator at any time.

Naming conventions

Generally, article naming should give priority to what the majority of English speakers worldwide would most easily recognize, with a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, while at the same time making linking to those articles easy and second nature.

Neutral point of view

Articles, including reader-facing templates, categories and portals, should be written from a Neutral Point of View.

What ChinaTravelGuide is not

ChinaTravelGuide is first and foremost an online travel guide and review. Please avoid the temptation to use ChinaTravelGuide for other purposes.

Deletion

Category deletion policy

Deleting categories follows roughly the same process as articles, except that it's on a different page. Categories that don't conform to naming conventions can be "speedily renamed".

Criteria for speedy deletion

Articles, images, categories etc. may be "speedily deleted" if they clearly fall within certain categories, which generally boil down to pages lacking content, or disruptive pages. Anything potentially controversial should go through the deletion process instead.

Deletion policy

Deleting articles requires an administrator and generally follows a consensus-forming process. Most potentially controversial deletions require a three-step process and a waiting period of a week.

Oversight

Page revisions can be deleted for legal reasons.

Proposed deletion

As a shortcut around AfD for uncontroversial deletions, an article can be proposed for deletion, though once only. If no one contests the proposal within five days, the article may be deleted by an administrator.

Enforcing policies

Banning policy

Extremely disruptive users may be banned from ChinaTravelGuide. Please respect these bans, don't bait banned users and don't help them out. Bans can be appealed to Jimbo Wales or the Arbitration Committee, depending on the nature of the ban.

Blocking policy

Disruptive users can be blocked from editing for short or long amounts of time.

Consensus

Most editing decisions are made by a continually evolving rough consensus among editors.

Protection policy

Pages can be protected against vandals or during fierce content disputes. Protected pages can, but in general shouldn't, be edited by administrators. Also, pages undergoing frequent vandalism can be semi-protected to block edits by very new or unregistered users.

Resolving disputes

The first step to resolving any dispute is to talk to those who disagree with you. If that fails, there are more structured forms of discussion available.

Legal and copyright

Copyrights

Material which infringes other copyrights must not be added. The legalities of copyright and "fair use" are quite complex.

Copyright violations

ChinaTravelGuide has no tolerance for copyright violations in our encyclopedia, and we actively strive to find and remove any violations.

Non-free content criteria

The cases in which you can declare an image "fair use" are quite narrow. You must specify the exact use of the image, and only use the image in that one context.

Image use policy

Generally avoid uploading nonfree images; fully describe images' sources and copyright details on their description pages, and try to make images as useful and reusable as possible.

Libel

It is ChinaTravelGuide policy to delete libellous revisions from the page history. If you believe you have been defamed, please contact us.

Reusing ChinaTravelGuide content

ChinaTravelGuide material may be freely used under the GFDL, which means you must credit authors, relicense the material under GFDL and allow free access to it.

Text of the GNU Free Documentation License

This is the license under which all contributions to ChinaTravelGuide are released. Any re-use of the work must also be released under GFDL.

Guidelines

General

Article size

Article size is limited by technical issues and considerations of readability and organization. It's useful to split long articles and combine small pages.

Be bold in updating pages

Wikis develop faster when people fix problems, correct grammar, add facts, make sure the language is precise, and so on. We expect everyone to be bold. It's okay.

Build consensus

It is assumed that editors working toward consensus are pursuing a consensus that is consistent with ChinaTravelGuide's basic policies and principles - especially the neutral point of view (NPOV).

Build the web

Connect relevant topics throughout an article since all articles in the encyclopedia are nodes in a hypertext system.

Provide an edit summary

Providing an edit summary, even if the edit is minor, makes ChinaTravelGuide work better by quickly explaining to other users what your change was about.

For other useful tips, see avoiding common mistakes.

Content

Disambiguation

If an article's name is very similar to another, make a note at the top. If many articles share a name, create a disambiguation page.

Guide to writing better articles

Patent nonsense

Patent nonsense (Text or random characters that have no assignable meaning at all and completely and irredeemably confused texts) should be dealt with appropriately.

Spoiler

ChinaTravelGuide contains spoilers. There is generally no need to warn readers of this.

Guidelines for using Talk pages

Avoid inappropriate expressions

Classification

Subpages

Don't use slashes (/) in the names of articles to create subpages.

Choosing appropriate grouping technique(s)

Categories, lists, and series boxes

By grouping technique

Lists

Categories, and other articles in Category:ChinaTravelGuide categorization

Series boxes (or navigational templates)

Namespaces

Editing

Build the web

Link articles sideways to neighbours, and upwards to categories and contexts to create a useful web of information.

Edit summary

Always type at least a brief summary of the change that you made in the Edit Summary box. Avoid misleading summaries.

Discussion

Talk page guidelines

Sign your posts on talk pages

Sign all your posts on ChinaTravelGuide talk pages by typing ~~~~ to be accountable and to help others understand the conversation.

Discuss and draft graphical layout overhauls

When redesigning a few select pages, such as the Community Portal, take your time and get consensus before implementing a new design.

Behavior

Assume good faith

Unless there is strong evidence to the contrary, assume that people who work on the project are trying to help it, not hurt it.

Don't disrupt ChinaTravelGuide to illustrate a point

By all means state your point. But don't spam ChinaTravelGuide, disingenously nominate articles for deletion, push rules to their limits or otherwise create work for other people just to "prove your point".

Etiquette

Contributors have different views, perspectives, and backgrounds, sometimes varying widely. Treating others with respect is key to collaborating effectively in building an encyclopedia.

Please do not bite the newcomers

Many new contributors lack knowledge about ChinaTravelGuide policies. But always understand that new contributors are prospective "members" and are therefore our most valuable resource.

Profanity

Words and images that might be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by other ChinaTravelGuide readers should be used if and only if their omission would cause the article to be less informative, relevant, or accurate, and no equally suitable alternatives are available.

User page

Use your user page to add information about yourself or to help you to use ChinaTravelGuide more effectively.

Style guidelines

Manual of style

Manual of style (disambiguation pages)

Guide to writing better articles