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Wikipedia:Kittens

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A litter of kittens who thankfully haven't been left on someone's doorstep

The creation of multiple stub articles in the space of a few minutes can be likened to a litter of kittens being brought into the world, and then being left on a doorstep in hopes that they will be cared for. To carry the analogy further, while kittens are cute, fewer people wish to take on the responsibility of taking care of a fully grown cat. Hence, persons are encouraged to take reasonable steps in controlling the growth of the cat population.

What separates a "kitten" article from a stub is that kittens are created in litters so large that it appears unlikely that the initiator of the article intends to do any further work on any of the individual articles. Opinions differ as to the value of mass-produced articles, although in the case of topics that are not inherently notable, and which do not meet general notability guidelines, many of the kitten articles are nominated for deletion, and eventually removed from Wikipedia, i.e. euthanized. Hence, people who wish to take credit for the mass creation of numerous articles but who do not wish to be burdened with developing any of the articles so created, are encouraged to follow the recommendations of Wikipedia:Starting an article.

Examples

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  • "Nation X - Nation Y relations" articles [1] produced in late 2008 and 2009 by a user later blocked indefinitely. Many of these, if not most, were deleted in the months that followed.