 | This page documents an English Wikipedia content guideline. Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page. |
 | Made up article notability in a nutshell: Resist the temptation to write about the new, great thing you, your friends, or some website just thought up. |
| Notability |
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| General notability guideline |
| Subject-specific guidelines |
| See also |
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Wikipedia is not for things that you and/or your friends made up. If you have invented something in school, the lab, your garage, or the pub, and it has not yet been featured in reliable sources, do not write about it on Wikipedia. Write about it on your own website, blog or social media instead.
Sometimes an editor is tempted to write an article about an idea that they or their friends have come up with, such as a new ball game, a new word or phrase, a film you uploaded to YouTube, or a new language. It's natural to want to tell the world, and Wikipedia seems like a great way to do that.
There are several things wrong with doing this:
Of course, everything in Wikipedia was made up or discovered by someone at some point in time, so how can your idea join them? Essentially, you have to persuade others that it's important first – and those people have to think it's sufficiently important to write books, newspaper or magazine articles, or academic papers about (not just mentioning) your idea. Such resources are considered reliable, and therefore the subject can become eligible for Wikipedia. It is important that someone else other than the originator of the idea does the writing, as notability can be conferred only through independent attention; see Wikipedia:Notability. Advice on how one can obtain this kind of independent attention is beyond the scope of Wikipedia, and as such seeking notability lies in the hands of the individual.
Citing one's own book/academic paper/etc. may still be done after such independent attention has been garnered; however, it must be done in a neutral manner, and not in a style which suggests vanity.
As an example, consider the history of the game Scrabble. It was originally invented by Alfred Mosher Butts in 1938. At first, he made only a few copies to give or sell to his friends, and contacted several game manufacturers, all of whom turned him down. Therefore, had Wikipedia been around in 1938, it could not have had an article on Scrabble. Even though Butts had invented a game that would eventually become a worldwide bestseller, at the time it was known only to a few people and little or nothing had been written about it. However, he was not disheartened: he kept promoting his idea until several years later it was bought by a games manufacturer, sold in many stores, and became widely known and widely written about. This is the point at which Wikipedia could have had an article about it, as opposed to when it was first invented.
In August 2006, a Wikipedia article on the iPhone was deleted after discussion. At that point, little was known about the product outside Apple Inc. and it could not have had a Wikipedia article. Following the product's launch and mass-media coverage in January 2007, the article was recreated and has been improved ever since. See Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a crystal ball.
Do not write about your own ideas and inventions on Wikipedia if you cannot cite reliable sources to show that they are notable and verifiable. For a full discussion of what counts as a reliable source, see Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources. In particular, remember that people writing in blogs or posting on discussion forums are not considered reliable.
Even if your ideas and inventions are notable and there are good sources to cite, it is often a bad idea to write about them yourself. Why? Because you have a conflict of interest (COI). The COI guideline applies to you and limits your ability to edit out any negative material that others may, with reliable sources, add later on. We have something called the "Law of Unintended Consequences" that will always apply to you. Read it carefully, because ignoring it can have serious repercussions for you, your family, your business, and your future in the real world. An article about yourself, your invention, or your business is not necessarily a good thing. Editing here is not a game, so do it carefully. Wikipedia is not a free web hosting service. Everything you do here is recorded for posterity and is publicly available information, too.
If you cannot cite reliable sources, please write about your invention somewhere else. You could use your own website, one of the many social networking sites, or any of various alternative outlets which may have more flexible rules than Wikipedia on what content can be included.
