Talk:Georgetown, Massachusetts

this looks like a copyright violation http://www.georgetownhistoricalsociety.com/history.html

Good catch. I've blanked that section of the article. -- Merope ^Talk 20:04, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Inclusion of non-notable subjects

Sapasquale and 7minutematch, stop trying to include lists of small retail stores, municipal parks, and high school teachers on this page. That sort of thing belongs on Georgetown's own special wiki, not on Wikipedia. --Nucleusboy 02:02, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

'Kay, seriously, read WP:NOTABLE and take a good, hard look at whether Scotty's Mobil station or The Soccer Shoppe are really notable. Additionally, please recognize that Wikipedia is not a collection of random information. --Nucleusboy 03:36, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Well since you don't live near this town and don't have any frame of reference to judge it, you are really not the one to decide if it is notable are you? I didn't think so. Scotty's Mobile is at the corner of our largest intersection and is considered a landmark for direction purposes etc. The Soccer Shoppe is important because most or all of Georgetown kids up to the age of 14 play soccer and go to the Soccer Shoppe for all equipment and uniform needs. There is a lot more random information on wikipedia than FACTS that we are putting in about our town. If residents saw it they would agree and applaud what we have done. If non-residents saw it they would see the make up of our town and what things are like. I suggest you start using your time more efficiently. Thanks. Turkeydaybusted 03:44, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia's standards by which article content is judged are in the global context, not the context of a midsized town. Wikipedia is not a directory; if some of these establishments were known in the surrounding area, or if some of the high school's sports teams had won several state championships, then they might be deserving of inclusion. If people added every coffee shop in New York to its article, it would obviously be a poor decision, even if the inhabitants of New York might find it useful. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not the Yellow Pages. --Nucleusboy 03:56, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Please refrain from deleting this page a whole. If you have specific problems with the page, Nucleusboy, I'd be happy to address them. Until that point, stop removing everything added to the page. As a town administer, everything in Georgetown, MA is relevant to me, as well as to the citizens I serve. As a alleged "administer" of Wikipedia, I would think you would understand the relevance of our postings. I would remove anything incorrect about the town, however, since everything on the page is factual, relevant, and applicable, I ask you to leave it alone. Next time you're in Georgetown, MA, be sure to stop by Town Hall. I'd love to discuss the matter further. 7minutematch 04:00, 6 November 2007 (UTC)7minutematch

Yes, I do have specific problems with this page: the inclusion of many small businesses that are nearly (if not completely) unknown outside of one town, and aren't integral to that town itself. Whether or not these lists are relevent to the town 'administer' is unimportant; whether or not they are factual is unimportant. Their relevance and applicability are definitely open to dispute. Just to clear things up: I am not an admin. I am a regular user who happens to patrol the Recent Changes.--Nucleusboy 04:07, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Oh so are you paid for this? I was under the impression that it was a volunteer site running off donations. And who are you to decide what is important and what is not? Turkeydaybusted 04:10, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

??

Of course I'm not paid for this. I'm volunteering my time and effort. As for who I am to decide what is important, I'm not exactly making the decisions here; Wikipedia has established policies on what constitutes relevance to an article, which I have indicated in previous messages. Conversely, who are you to decide what is important? The only way to decide is to objectively apply Wikipedia policy.--Nucleusboy 04:16, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

The Wikipedia policy is also based upon common sense. This is not a directory, it's a simple inclusion of the important aspects of the town. Please stop hassling the people who have contributed their TIME AND EFFORT in making this wikipedia page an accurate representation of what Georgetown, Massachusetts really. Move on. Select a different page to dispute, hassle, and delete 'Ad infinitum,' it would be much appreciated.

Also, I only included my position as town administer as a point of reference. You haven't the need to point out that it doesn't qualify me in any way.

Thank you, and I hope in the future we won't need to nitpick over Wikipedia articles in the future.

I think your time would be better spent monitoring the Chris Benoit page, a much more controversial topic.

7minutematch 04:25, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

As far as my ability to rate importance: I have the right to put this information down because it is true and it is real to a lot of people. It is IMPORTANT to people from Georgetown and it would be IMPORTANT to someone who wanted to learn more than spit out demographics of our town. And since it is a smaller town it is a lot easier to identify smaller businesses and landmarks since everything has a purpose. If I was dealing with a larger town/city it would be a lot harder to justify this, i.e. New York containing 8.5 million people, probably a lot of coffee shops. So I am asking you nicely to leave our article alone and move along to the other modifications you make. With people dying by the minute in Darfar and soldiers fighting everyday in Iraq, isn't there a better way to spend time than erasing meaningful information on a small town? Turkeydaybusted 04:30, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

dear nucleusboy, i would like to respectfully ask you to leave the information posted on this article alone. Everything posted is relevant and important to this town's history, economy, and citizens as well as the entire surrounding area's citizens and economy. I really do appreciate what you do for wikipedia because I personally hate it when I try to look something up on a wikipedia article and I find nothing but innacuracies and things that aren't relevant to the article but everything in this article is completely factual and relevent to this town's (which the article is essentially about) culture. And what good is having a wikipedia article for a town if correct information cannot even be posted about it on the article. Thank you for your time. [sapasquale]

Nucleusboy, I have been a georgetown resident my whole life. I have lived the georgetown experience, we all have, and all of what has been written is important to everyone in the town. I feel because you do not live in georgetown, you will never know the majesty that is our great town. we are simple people with big dreams and even bigger hearts. we walk our streets as equals and as brothers. we brought this town to its glory days. we are georgetown. I respect what you are trying to do, but i am afraid you are wrong about the people who have put this all together. My blood lies in georgetown, and together we will stand strong against anyone. God bless Georgetown, for Georgetown is surely blessing the world. Let the information stand, because i want my children to know what my town was all about, even all the little things. Wikipedia is blessed having Georgetown's history bestowed upon it. Let Georgetown Reign! --degenerationcam-- —Preceding unsigned comment added by Degenerationcam (talk • contribs) 05:20, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

I can also say that I've lived in Georgetown my whole life. What these people have done is something that people form Georgetown can appreciate. We're a small town and everything on there is fact. Everything that has been called notable is indeed notable. I understand that you are trying to protect this website, but wikipedia can't be used for research because bigger issues have so many inaccurate facts. This is one article out of many that is 100% factual. There are so many people who are excited about this website and it has been the highlight of their day. I think this means a lot to people. I know that some people have been able to take this website and send it to others and say, "that's where I'm from." People from Georgetown take pride in their town and this honestly is something that is great for our town. Don't mess with what's on there because it means so much to so many people. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.15.230.109 (talk) 02:19, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not for all the little things. The Rabun County, Georgia article, for example, does not cover nearly the depth of information that the Foxfire books do. —C.Fred (talk) 12:46, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Outside view

This list of "notable" places is clearly inappropriate per Wikipedia policy. There is no need for links or listings of every business in town or "stand out" high school athletes. The Wikipedia standard is that if these places/people have their own article on here somewhere, then they should be included in a list of notable things from a town. None of these have an article as far as I can tell so, therefore, it is unnecessary to have these lists. They should be removed. Metros 11:05, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

RfC: How much detail should a City article have?

Should city articles include local businesses, points of interest, restaurants, etc?

• No An article should include anything notable from an outside perspective. It should have include a directory, though, which is what this article appears to include right now. Metros 11:05, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
• Not generally. There should not be a list-style dump of all businesses (Wikipedia is not a directory). However, if the business is notable in its own right—if it warrants its own article—then it should be mentioned in the article. Major landmarks should also be included, even if they don't quite muster an article but can still be verified. However, exactingly detailed lists of businesses shouldn't be included. (Looking at the current article, the athletics section needs pared down and moved to the article on the high schoo.) —C.Fred (talk) 12:44, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

when it comes to the lists of athletes on the article, many of them have links posted to a page dedicated to them because they are NCAA athletes which is quite an accomplishment. I dont believe that just because they don't have their own wikipedia article means that they don't deserve to be mentioned in an article about georgetown because they are an integral part of georgetown and they represent our community all accross the country wherever they play. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.119.26.25 (talk) 16:20, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Just having a profile on an NCAA website doesn't mean you're notable. There are millions of student athletes out there at these colleges. We don't need to list every single NCAA athlete on their hometown's page. I'm an NCAA athlete and I know I'm not notable despite the fact my college has a profile about me. Just because your town is proud of them and they represent the community does not mean they're notable. Metros 20:19, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

when it comes to determining whether or not these things are "notable" you have to consider that this is an article about the town of Georgetown. Therefore, if these things are notable to the town of Georgetown and surrounding area, I see no reason why they should be excluded because they are in fact notable to the people of Georgetown and the area surrounding the town. I'm sure there are wikipedia's of other towns in the U.S. that have things listed that I don't know about, but that doesn't mean that they are not notable. If they are well known and factual to the town (which this article is about) I see no reason why they should be excluded from an article about the town. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.119.26.25 (talk) 21:45, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

That's great if you want to put that kind of stuff on your town's website. But it's not for a Wikipedia article. You have to follow Wikipedia standards of notability on a Wikipedia article. We have standards so we know what is notable in your town is the same as notable in another town. Metros 21:51, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

So, using the 'these things are notable to Georgetown' argument, I deserve personal mention on Lisgar Collegiate Institute because a good portion of the school (which is large enough to be a small town) and many people in the surrounding area know who I am. There are probably two hundred students in the school that could use this logic to get themselves on the page. The result: a huge, useless list of people that the rest of the world doesn't care about. If some of the athletes have been the subjects of newspaper articles or television interviews, they might deserve inclusion (heck, they'd deserve their own article). Simply put, there is a misunderstanding here of what makes a subject relevant on Wikipedia. --Nucleusboy 21:56, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

While I understand Wikipedia has policies set up on how articles should be written and formatted, I look at this case in a different light. I think most would agree that the general public goes to Wikipedia to find information, usually information they don't know. At the same time Wikipedia is run and edited by the people which allows a great amount of freedom. So if it is run for the people, by the people, what damage is being done by giving more information than necessary on a town. Personally I am sick of going to town article pages and seeing the same thing. A generic picture of a church or landmark followed by a small paragraph on demographics that no one is going to remember. So while our Georgetown modifications may not follow Wikipedia guidelines exactly, they would enlighten someone who came upon the article. In fact I would encourage Wikipedia to do more stuff like this and have the town articles contain more specialized information. Some may call this "useless", I think its another great way to learn about the world around us. The fact is no one is going to find a Georgetown website on the internet, Wikipedia is the premiere source for finding this sort of information. Nucleusboy I don't your reasoning behind your student argument. We did not put "students of the month" or random people on here, and the athletes will have put up are kids that have and will suprise some people coming out of a small town. If you feel you deserve mention on your school article then put yourself on there, but make it for a purpose not just because "people know you." We have not put ourselves on here and if we did it would be wrong. We are not using Wikipedia to try and get our names out there or just pile on useless information, we are trying to put up things that affect us and could interest other people. So please just look at our intent and not judge our content. I understand some of it does not meet Wikipedia standards but what harm will be done by keeping it up there. Some people from our town have seen what we did and they were excited to see so much information about our town somewhere on the internet. Please take all of this into consideration. Thank you. Turkeydaybusted 23:13, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Do you have a point as to why this should stay aside from "we think it's interesting"? Any policy that supports you adding this information in? As you stated yourself, it breaks a lot of Wikipedia policies. Until policies change, this information should be removed. Metros 23:40, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Although it is debatable as to whether or not some of the information follows wikipedia standards, you can't deny that the information given truly does paint a more accurate description of a small town. Obviously the type of information given wouldn't be economical if we were to do it for a big city because there is much more to a big city. But in Georgetown, this is all there is to know and why shouldn't people who want to know more about the town be able to have this information available to them. I think the wikipedia policy needs to be applied on a case by case basis because an article on a small town is obviously different than an article on somewhere like New York City. Lastly, with more than 2 MILLION articles on wikipedia, I don't see why a few bullets on one single article for small town need to be deleted to nothing demographics. I ask that everyone consider this these points when deciding whether or not the article is wikipedia kosher. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sapasquale (talk • contribs) 23:49, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

I would also point out that this has already been discussed before on Wikipedia; the essay is located at WP:HARMLESS. The salient point is that the information needs to be verifiable to be included. If it can't be backed up by a reliable, independent source, it ought not be in the encyclopedia. And yes, I'd take an axe to my own hometown's article, too; it suffers from a minor case of list bloat currently. —C.Fred (talk) 23:59, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

In addition to Turkeybusted finding these things "interesting," I think anyone interested in this particular town would also find it interesting. If you're problem with the wiki is the listing of each, then a simple paragraph can be written to include the information. Nucleusboy mentioned the issue that if everyone listed theyre favorite coffee shop on New York City's wikipedia, there would be serious problems. I wholeheartedly agree. However, this is not New York City, and Georgetown does not have an Empire State Building or other numerous historical sites to speak of. It has important small town establishments worthy of note to both the residents of Georgetown and any and all parties interested in this town. Wikipedia's policy on "notability" is based in the essence of common sense. It makes no sense to limit a small towns profile to a simple demographis box concerned only with population and marriage statistics. As far as the athletes go, nearly all of them has vast pages dedicated to them online, which can be sourced and noted to them. Also to Nucleusboy, just because people "know" you at Lisgar doesn't make you notable. However, through the athletic achievements of these men and women listed online, they have been famous both in, and more importantly, outside Georgetown, Massachusetts. I see no problem in including more information about a town, especially one with a page that was almost bare 24 hours ago. I will personally change, update, and revise the information on the wikipedia article, I just feel at this point this discussion has gotten out of hand due to the incessant nitpicking and annoying qualities of a few users concerned less with the overall educational content of Wikipedia and more with acting as big brother.

7minutematch 23:56, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

So, NAPA Auto Parts and Tidd's Junkyard are encyclopedia-worthy, to cite two entries? The policies on notability exist for a reason, and aren't scalable-down. This appears to be towncruft, and no matter how important the local CVS drugstore is in Georgetown, it needs to justify its entry like anything else. "Big Mike" - educational? The movie entry - sure, it's probably notable, perhaps minus the cast list. There's no big brother here, all local geographic entries have to abide by the same rules. Take a look at other towns in [[Category:Towns in Massachusetts]] for comparison. Acroterion _(talk) 05:13, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

The majority of the landmarks mentioned in the article are sourced and have notability. Places such as CVS and Tidd's Junkyard I agree may require an edit or removal, however they do no warrant a deletion of the entire page, which user Nucleusboy took upon himself to carry out. The article probably does require editing, but not without carefully going through each point. Most of the places, people, and landmarks mentioned are fine by Wikipedia's standards on notability. How does one go about removing the lock on the page to work on editing the smaller problems with the article? 7minutematch 14:51, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

I indented your comment above to preserve the thread. Nucleusboy didn't, in fact "delete the page". He did approximately what I, myself would suggest - remove everything from Athletics to Notable Residents. The whole Athletics section has far more to do with Georgetown Junior-Senior High School - which doesn't have a page, but certainly can under WP's notability standards for high schools. I'd caution that even high school articles don't have lists of coaches or players, and pictures are limited in size for bandwidth considerations. Acroterion _(talk) 15:44, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

So if we create a Georgetown high school or school system page we can put some of these things on here? Because otherwise it sounds like the page is going to be stripped of basically everything and brought down to the stub that is was before. While these notability policies have been brought up constantly, what is the point of having a page about a town if the only information on it is demographics no one is going to remember? Each town page is almost the same and those type of boring articles drag down the site. I don't understand how so much attention can be paid to our article while many longer and more relevant articles are probably being mis-used. Leaving this article, minus some edits, alone is not going to spark a riot where everyone adds "uncessary" information to all Wikipedia articles. Really, where is the fire here because there is no way it can be with an article about Georgetown. Turkeydaybusted 16:10, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, do a high school article. And expand the Georgetown article with solid content, not lists of stuff and commonplace items. In reviewing the article, I have a question - where does everybody in Georgetown work? What is the basis of the local economy? That's the kind of thing you see in encyclopedias. Every town has schools, fire stations, churches and stores. Every town in Massachusetts with more than fifty people seems to have a Dunkin Donuts - it'd be almost notable if Georgetown didn't have one of those. In order for the article to be unprotected, a consensus must be reached on actions - which must conform to Wikipedia requirements. I don't think we're quite there yet. How about starting with the creation of Georgetown Junior-Senior High School and moving some of the content there (please, no lists of coaches)? The Framingham High School article is a pretty good model; I'd suggest you steal the formatting from there to begin with. Acroterion _(talk) 16:21, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

(responding to RfC). The best place for lots of "point of interest" information, is to put it on the appropriate page at Wikitravel. See wikitravel:Georgetown, Massachusetts. There's no page there at the moment, but it's easy enough to make one. --Elonka 00:44, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Article unprotected

The article has been unprotected apparently. I have removed the non-notable information per our discussions here. Please only add back anything if you have sources to prove its notability. Metros 20:30, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

I've left a note on Sapasquale (talk · contribs)'s talk page [1] to the same effect. Acroterion _(talk) 21:01, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

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