SmallBusiness:Policies and guidelines

SmallBusiness.com: The free small business resource

The user-contributed content areas (sometimes referred to as SmallbusinessWiki) of Smallbusiness.com have the following goals:

The goal of Smallbusiness.com is to create a reliable and free resource to help current and potential small business owners, managers and employees find and share the information they need to operate and grow their businesses.

Smallbusiness.com has some policies and guidelines that help us to work toward that goal. Some of these policies are still evolving, while others are long settled and largely uncontroversial.

Contents 1 Key policies 1.1 Style Manual 1.2 How are policies enforced? 1.3 Restricted features 2 Types of guidelines 2.1 Behavior guidelines 2.2 Content guidelines 2.3 Style guidelines 3 Source

Key policies

You don't need to read every Wikipedia policy before you contribute! However, the following policies are key to a productive Wikipedia experience, and the sooner you get to grips with them, the better.

1. Smallbusiness.com is a reference guide and encyclopedia. Its goals go no further.
2. Avoid bias. Articles should be written from a neutral point of view, representing differing views on a subject factually and objectively.
3. Don't infringe copyrights. SmallbusinessWiki is a free reference and encyclopedia licensed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. Submitting work which infringes copyright threatens our objective to build a truly free reference and encyclopedia that anyone can redistribute, and could lead to legal problems. See SmallbusinessWiki copyrights for more information.
4. Respect other contributors. SmallbusinessWiki contributors come from many different backgrounds, and have widely different views. Treating others with respect is key to collaborating effectively in building this reference.

Style Manual

On issues related to style, refer to the SmallbusinessWiki:Manual of style

How are policies enforced?

You are a Smallbusiness.com editor. Smallbusiness.com lacks an editor-in-chief or a central, top-down mechanism whereby the day-to-day progress on the encyclopedia is monitored and approved. Instead, active participants make copyedits and corrections to the content and format problems they see. So the participants are both writers and editors.

Most policies and guidelines are thus enforced by individual users editing pages, and discussing matters with each other. Some policies are also enforced by temporary blocks (notably as a mechanism for dealing with vandalism) by Administrators. In extreme cases the Arbitration Committee may make a ruling to deal with highly disruptive situations, as part of the general dispute resolution procedure.

Restricted features

Some features of the software which could potentially be misused, such as deleting pages and locking pages from editing, are restricted to Administrators, who are experienced and trusted members of the community. Policies particularly relevant to Administrators include:

• Blocking policy (Blocking users to deal with vandalism or to enforce decisions of the administrator)

Types of guidelines

In addition to the generally accepted policies listed above, the following guidelines have been suggested by various participants:

Behavior guidelines

• Sign your posts on talk pages
• Avoid profanity
• No personal attacks (and move personal debates to email)
• No legal threats
• Be accountable
• No offensive usernames
• Don't bite the newcomers
• Don't create articles about yourself
• Three revert rule (Revert wars are considered harmful)
• Use your user pages appropriately
• General Talk page guidelines

Content guidelines

• Explain jargon
• State the obvious
• Cite sources: point the reader to authoritative references (and list them properly)
• Verifiability: ensure information cited is verifiable if needed (this does not mean it is "official", rather it refers to others' ability to confirm it exists and is as stated)
• Avoid statements that will date quickly
• Stay on topic
• Make articles useful for readers (and consider the audience in writing)
• Check your facts
• Guidelines for using Talk pages
• Avoid self-references
• Avoid inappropriate expressions

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Style guidelines

• Manual of style
• Don't include copies of primary sources
• Consider the context when making links
• Use subheadings sparingly
• Don't use line breaks
• Do not use subpages

Source

Material for the original entry of this item came from this Wikipedia entry