Wikipedia:Standards/Proposal guideline

The Proposal

A succinct exposition of the proposal, typically a few sentences and/or a few bullet points. Specify at least

1. The scope of the proposal (articles, categories, templates, images, redirects, other proposals, etc),
2. Whether it is intended to apply to the whole Wikipedia or is intended largely for e.g. one or more Wikiprojects.
3. Its intended deployments (e.g. a new speedy-deletion proposal, new naming convention, new blocking policy, new notability criterion, etc).

Rationale

A standalone descripion of why this new proposal is needed. Bear m:instruction creep in mind and be clear why any such creep should be tolerated. Be as clear and succinct as possible.

• Reason 1
• Reason 2

...

Related existing policies, guidelines and proposals

A list of the existing policies, guidelines and proposals that this proposal intends to replace or complement etc, as well as succinct reasons why the prevailing documents should be so replaced or updated. It is possible that there may be no entries here.

• This proposal
  • Is in need of an update.
• That proposal
  • Doesn't deal with the issue that this proposal does.

...

Proposed by

Please add your signature here using four tildes (~~~~) by way of indicating your proponency of this proposal. This is not a vote in any sense; this merely avoids later conflicts of interest. Please do NOT sign here to indicate your support of this propsal; use the talk page instead.

Consultation

Editors visiting this proposal page are encouraged to sign under the route they followed here. Please remove those which are inappropriate, especially from among the Village Pump options.

Other (please specify)

User:Gray-Porpise 13:26, 5 June 2006 (UTC) (Google search)

Voting

There is currently no voting taking place on this proposal. Votes cast will be removed on sight. Please use the talk page for discussion of both the proposal and any proposed voting.

If and only if in the discussion there is a move toward holding a poll of some sort, text should be placed here for discussion prior to the start of voting.

Once voting has begun, the text here should be moved to a subpage e.g. /Poll structure and replaced with the appropriately titled sections.

Structure of poll

See Wikipedia:Survey guidelines and Wikipedia:How to hold a consensus vote. If there are more than two options, approval voting is generally preferred. Clearly specify the type of poll and options to be considered; discussion on both of these will be necessary.

This will be a ([[insert type of poll]]) poll.

The options will be:

1. Option
2. Option
3. Option

...

Editors are invited to vote for (only one/more than one) option.

• The poll will run until (insert time and date stamp). Polls should generally run for at least several days — reach agreement on this before opening the poll.

Status of poll

Indicate what effect the outcome of the poll is intended to have. Likely choices are:

1. Establishment/rejection of the proposal as official policy (only in a support/oppose poll);
2. Establishment/rejection of the proposal as a guideline either for a Wikiproject or for the Wikipedia community at large (only in a support/oppose poll);
3. Adoption of one option if one reaches consensus as official policy;
4. Adoption of one option if one reaches consensus as a guideline either for a Wikiproject or for the Wikipedia community at large;
5. The informing of further discussion — this is only a straw poll.

There are other possible effects.

It is sometimes useful to specify percentage thresholds and/or quora for polls. This should only be done if necessary, and with careful regard to Wikipedia:How to hold a consensus vote.

Alternative proposals

Provide links here to subpages that contain proposals intended as alternatives to this one.

• Alternative Proposal 1
• Alternative Proposal 2

...

Note that there may not be any alternative proposals in the case of a multi-way vote if one is held. Generally speaking, alternative options should not be added to proposals on an ad-hoc basis (without discussion) and certainly not after commencement of any voting. If such options are felt to be useful, use a subpage. Rewording a proposal is of course acceptable, but do try to retain the proposers' intent; if you disagree with the intent take it to discussion, vote against it or create a better proposal.

If this is itself an alternative proposal, please link to the other alternatives in this section. Openness is an important part of the discussion process.