Star Trek Expanded Universe:Patent nonsense

This page is considered an official policy on Star Trek Expanded Universe. It has wide acceptance among editors and is considered a standard that everyone should follow. Except for minor edits, please make use of the discussion page to propose changes to this policy.

Patent nonsense is text that has no practical meaning whatsoever. Even if it might have some apparent meaning, it is still so completely confusing and disorganized that no one can possibly make sense out of it.

One should not confuse patent nonsense with:

• Poorly written articles. Poorly written articles may need a lot of work to bring them up to quality standards, but they are not patent nonsense. Allow them to stay in the database and list them on pages needing attention.
• Immature fragments or stubs. Sometimes a stub covers the subject poorly and seems to make little or no sense, but it is probably not patent nonsense.
• Trolling. Occasionally, Trek-hating "trolls" post insulting messages to the members. Although not desirable, this is not patent nonsense.

Patent nonsense is generally:

• Vandalism. Examples of vandalism generally include what the vandal thinks are humorous messages, or partially on-topic article fragments that distort the meaning of the subject. See: Dealing with vandalism.
• Non-wikified articles. A good sign of patent nonsense is an article that is completely unformatted and contains no links to other pages.
• Childish entries. Articles that are completely disorganized, of an immature writing level, and say a lot without covering more than the basics of the subject are probably patent nonsense.
• Completely off-topic articles. If the article has absolutely nothing to do with the title's subject, it's probably patent nonsense. (Be careful, though — sometimes this might be an innocent mistake on the author's part.)

Dealing with patent nonsense

If you believe a page is patent nonsense, list it on pages for immediate deletion. Administrators may simply delete the article immediately.

However, if you think the article is worth saving, try "wikifying" it first, and list it on pages needing attention. After that, if others think the page still doesn't belong, the matter can be discussed on votes for deletion or on the article's talk page.

External link

• Wikipedia:Patent nonsense