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Importance Ratings

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Please keep this list at the top of the page, and edit it in place as the ratings scheme changes. Last Update: 2007-01-21 (out of date as of 2007-02-07)

  • Mid
    • Articles on people that have limited international significance, but are considered important at a national level (e.g. lessor heads of state Alejandro M. Sinibaldi)
    • Significant natural disasters (e.g. Hurricane Stan
    • Articles on internal political topics (e.g. Departments of Honduras or List of political parties in Honduras
    • Aticles on entertainment and sports that are internationally notable.
    • Major Rivers, mountains, and other significant geologic or geographic features.
    • Indigenous languages
  • Low - Most articles on:
    • Entertainment topics
    • Sports (people, teams, and events)
    • Labor unions
    • Flora and Fauna (should these be removed from the project altogether?)
    • Small(er) cities and towns
    • Transportation disasters

Ideas for Rating Importance

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I am a fan of focusing efforts based on importance. There are enough casual participants in wikipedia that someone ensure that all of the low priority topics are represented by stubs. Any support or suggestions for changes to the above? Srice13 00:10, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The suggested breakdown looks to be just about right. And agree that it would be a good approach to identify the "top" articles first, then work your way down the scale- at 4500+ potential existing articles in scope, it'd be a monster effort to go about tagging and classifying them all up front.--cjllw | TALK 07:27, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I also agree that this general scheme looks sound. At first, I didn't think that Somoza and Sandino should go in Top rather than High, but they would certainly be among the highest of the High, and I suppose that Top would be an underused classification if the most important figures weren't included. I notice, though, that you haven't classified these articles yet. As for other possible Top candidates, what do you think of Oscar Romero, Jacobo Arbenz, and Jose Figueres? Oscar Arias, Efrain Rios Montt, and Jose Santos Zelaya?
GroggyDice - Thanks for the feedback. The choice of where to draw the line is a tough one, and I don't proclaim to have any of (let alone all of) the answers. Please feel free to modify, dispute, disagree with, etc. any of what I have proposed (or implemented through a mass tagging excersize). I am fully in support of consensus, especially in a WikiProject which is by definition a collaberative process run by equals.
In contemplating the line between top and mid as it relates to people, I suppose another way to state my view would be to say that the level of influence of the individual on the lives of others should be the prime measure. Influence could be viewed as increasing if it spans long periods of time (e.g. Somoza and Figueres), crosses international boundaries (e.g. Figueres and Arias), the adoption of their ideas / ideals make them as important or more important after their death (e.g. Sandino). It would be easy to add all of the above to the top category, I am supportive of doing just that. Srice13 03:55, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Also, since much of my focus is on Sandinistas and Contras and the region's civil wars of the 1980s, perhaps you might want to explicitly state some standards for rating rebel movements and leaders.
Better yet, perhaps you could state them? I'm sure the project would benefit greatly from your understanding. I am not very close to, and have not read much on that time period (the majority of my readings on Nicaragua to date end around 1980). Given a lack of detailed knowledge, I would end up relying on the articles themselves to tell me if the subject was important. That process is of course fundamentaly flawed, since many stubs barely have enough information to demonstrate notability.Srice13 03:55, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I do disagree with some of the classifications you've made, though I'm not planning to reclassify them according to my own preferences. I would have classed Adolfo Calero and Ana Maria as Mid rather than Low, and Jose Dolores Estrada (president) as Mid or even Low rather than High, since he was only acting president of Nicaragua for a week. --Groggy Dice T | C 01:58, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Please feel free to modify, change, or throw out any of what I have done. I am no expert, just a wikipedian with a nice combination of interest and time. Perhaps we an agree that if something seems off by a category it probably is and should be moved. If something seems off by more than 2 categories, it should be discussed. As for the specific examples: I was not familiar with Calero and Maria, so I probably did not give them the proper credit. JDE recieved high marks becuase of the notion that Heads of State are important. As I mentioned above, I am eager to find consensus. My category break down at the start of this section was a proposal to start a discussion. I'm glad the discussion has started Srice13 03:55, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Most of the articles have been tagged and given an initial rating as of 2007-02-07. SRICE13 (TALK | EDITS)

Ongoing Importance Ratings

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To All Members of WP:CAmerica - Project members will join, take a wiki-break, and leave the project over time. At the same time, new articles will be added; political, environmental and geological events will change the way a subject is perceived, and the priorities of the project shift. For these reasons, I would encourage the team to try to maintain the list at the top of this page. An up to date ratings guide will be a useful mechanism for educating new team members and explaining importance rating rationale to non-member editors. SRICE13 (TALK | EDITS) 17:28, 7 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Assessment Revisions

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Thanks for all the hard work you've done classing all the articles. Of course, no one is going to agree with all 4,000 of your ratings. As you've said, we should "feel free" to reclassify, but I still thought I would list the ratings I plan to change, to allow at least a brief time for anyone who disagrees to comment.

Another general observation: in theory the number of articles in the categories should form a pyramid ratio, but the number of articles in High is almost as great as the number in Mid. This suggests that maybe there is a flaw in the criteria, or in its application. The easiest way I can think of to reduce the number of Highs would be to downgrade provinces from High to Mid. Another thing that might help bring the numbers in line is to question whether the various figurehead heads of state should automatically be rated High. Or possibly, some Lows should be made Mids (or Highs to Tops).

  • Managua Low>Mid. To put it on par with other capitals. According to the system above, capitals should actually be High.
  • Edgar Chamorro High>Mid or Low. He wasn't the FDN's leader, was ultimately booted from the Contras, had little notability outside the Contras. Why rate him so high?
  • Dollar Diplomacy High>Mid. Why is DD High when Monroe Doctrine and Good Neighbor policy are Mid? Why not consider them roughly equal in importance?
  • The Freedom Fighter's Manual Mid>Low. An ineffectual manual only cited to illustrate how harebrained some of the CIA's schemes were- this was no Psychological Operations in Guerrilla Warfare.
  • Daniel Ortega Low>High or Top. You were probably just drowsy when you rated him. As a former and current head of state, he would be High, and I don't see why he should be lower than Violeta Chamorro, a Top.
  • Rigoberto López Pérez High>Mid. Is one assassination enough to sustain a High rating, especially since it just hastened what would have happened anyway (Somoza Garcia being replaced by his sons)?
  • Democratic Party (Nicaragua) Low>Mid. Why rate it lower than the Legitimists, and why so low when they were historically important?
  • YATAMA Low>Mid. Why is this ex-rebel group/political party rated Low, when many more obscure parties are Mid?
  • Big stick Diplomacy High>Mid. Why High when Roosevelt Corollary, Monroe, Good Neighbor are Mid?
  • Awas Tingni Mid>Low. I presume you bumped this up because of the land rights case mentioned in the article, but is that significant enough to make this village more important than Leon and Granada (that vied to be Nicaragua's capital), other towns that have their claims to fame?
  • Military of Honduras High>Mid. Most other "Military of..." articles are Mid.
  • Military of Guatemala High>Mid. Ditto.
  • Military of Belize High>Mid. Ditto.
  • Military of El Salvador Low>Mid. Ditto.
  • Chimaltenango (department) Mid>High. Standardize with other department ratings.
  • Chiquimula (department) Mid>High. Ditto.
  • El Progreso (department) Mid>High. Ditto.
  • Guatemala (department) Mid>High. Ditto.
  • Usulután Department Mid>High. Ditto.
  • Huehuetenango (department) Mid>High. Ditto.
  • Cabañas Department Low>High. Ditto.
  • Óscar Romero Mid>High. I already suggested this super-martyr as a possible Top, so Mid is definitely too low for me.
  • Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front Mid>High. Rebel greup/main opposition party only Mid? By comparison, Contras is Top and Nicaraguan Democratic Force is High, so I'd bump them up.
  • Cayetano Carpio Mid>High. Key figure in FMLN.
  • Nationalist Republican Alliance Mid>High. Dominant Salvadoran party, High would match your rating for Nicaragua's Constitutionalist Liberal Party.
  • Popular Action (El Salvador) Low>Mid. Harmonize with other party ratings.
  • Ana María Low>Mid. As discussed in above section.
  • Adolfo Calero Low>Mid or High. I'd settle for Mid, but if Enrique Bermudez and Aristides Sanchez rate a High, so should he.
  • José Dolores Estrada (president) High>Mid. Above, you said you rated him High as a head of state, but he seems to me a clear "lessor head of state" very analogous to your Sinibaldi example.
  • Rosendo Chamorro High>Mid. Ditto.
  • Francisco Urcuyo Maliaños High>Mid. Ditto, though his actions may have allowed for a more complete Sandinista victory.
  • Tomás Borge Mid>High. Last surviving founder of FSLN, Interior Minister.
  • Costa Rican Renovation Party Low>Mid. Harmonize with other parties.
  • Esquipulas Peace Agreement Mid>High. Ended three civil wars, eventually.
  • Contras B>Start. I generally concentrated more on the importance than the quality ratings, but I think the article is in terrible shape, and I have to consider an article about rebels that doesn't say anything about the course of the war to be lacking something basic.

Here are some other ratings I question, but probably don't care enough about to change.

Also, there are various CentAm-related articles that have escaped the dragnet by not falling into any of the country-based categories. Some, like Ben Linder, could probably be slotted into a CentAm category. But then there is the Iran-Contra Affair category, which can't be swallowed whole because it includes people who were only involved on the Iran side, but also includes many of the CIA agents and others who were involved with Nicaragua. Reagan Doctrine is another ambiguously related article. Do we want to bring them into the project somehow and banner them, or let them be? --Groggy Dice T | C 07:01, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Since there has been no objection to my proposed reassessments, I've gone ahead with a few of them: Rosendo Chamorro, Jose Dolores Estrada (president), Francisco Urcuyo, and Daniel Ortega. I'm going to hold off on the others a bit, in case there are howls of protest- I don't want to overinterpret silence for a sweeping mandate. I picked the first three, because knocking them down to Mid is in line with the stated criteria, that "lessor heads of state" fit into Mid rather than High. (Although this was not followed in the actual assessment, even for the example given, Sinibaldi.) As for Ortega, I considered waiting in case someone felt he should be High instead of Top, but decided to go ahead since his current rating is so ridiculous.

Another case where practice has diverged from the guidelines is with capitals. Supposedly they were to be High, but they have actually been rated Mid, and most every other city and town Low. I propose bumping up capitals to High, and raising province capitals to Mid. Note that in theory "major cities" are to be High as well as capitols, so this seems in keeping with the original intent. Also, swelling the Mid ranks with department capitals would help with the High-Mid parity problem I talked about. --Groggy Dice T | C 22:32, 14 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

First let me say Thank You for reviewing those assessments. My pass at the ratings was performed rather quickly and I clearly introduced many inconsistencies in the process. Daniel Ortega is a perfect example of a clear error on my part. I apologize for not responding to your original post; I didn't catch the changes to this page until today.
I think your logic regarding the pyramid structure is right on the mark. A more reasonable distribution might look like:
Top = 1% (43 articles)
High = 10% (430 articles)
Mid = 20% (860 articles)
Low = 69% (2981 articles)
(Note:I plucked those ratios out of the air and don't have a strong opinion as to whether the numbers are too high of too low for each category).
I definitely like your logic regarding moving provincial capitals to mid, and de-emphasizing specific lesser leaders. My knowledge of the importance of specific individuals is somewhat limited, so I appreciate having someone else review and revise.
As for your ideas regarding US policy towards the region: What if we create a category (e.g. Central American International Politics or US Central American Foreign Relations or some better / shorter name) that was a subcategory under Category:Central America? This could facilitate making a distiction between articles that are important to understanding Central America, and those that are not. Along similar lines, I found (while making a first pass at assessments) Category:Banana Wars to be too broad for our purposes. SRICE13 (TALK | EDITS) 00:07, 15 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

FL and List Class articles

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Why are FL and List class articles not showing up in the assessment table? Does anyone know how to fix this? Rlendog (talk) 03:47, 6 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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