Wikipedia:WikiProject Television/Television stations task force/Standards
Naming conventions
Broadcasting naming conventions have their own guideline page, which covers the vast majority of articles in the project scope.
Notability
...[M]ost television stations that produce original content should be presumed notable for Wikipedia purposes.
While television channel and station articles, like all articles on Wikipedia, must meet the general notability guideline, in general, any television station which produces original content and is licensed by a national government (e.g., the FCC in the United States) is presumed to be notable. Details can be found at WP:BROADCAST and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Common outcomes#Broadcast media.
Translator stations
A minor translator station which only relays the national signal of their network or an associated regional station without local deviation (for instance, a translator of the Trinity Broadcasting Network) should be redirected to the service it rebroadcasts. These are also used by television stations in geographically large markets, such as Salt Lake City, Utah, which have population centers far from the reach of the main transmitters.
In the latter case, if the service rebroadcast is another local station, there should be a list, such as that at KSL-TV#Translators.
...[A] station which was formerly an originating station in its own right, but which now exists only as a rebroadcaster of another service, is treated as an originating station because of its history.
If a translator has a history of carrying different networks and of different uses, it may merit an article. This also applies to full-service satellite stations, such as KRMZ, that once were standalone television stations but now rebroadcast other services.
Article components
A good television station or channel article should include the following:
- An infobox
- A good introduction
- History of the station
- Kind of programming aired, with an emphasis on original programming
- For broadcast television stations (where relevant), information on local news programming
- For broadcast television stations, any technical information (subchannels, etc.)
- are there any original shows that the station shows?
- Other relevant and verifiable facts about the station, while avoiding lists of miscellany
- A link to the station's website, if applicable
Infobox
There are two types of infoboxes that articles in the project use.
{{Infobox television station}} is generally used in North American countries, as well as Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Japan, Mexico, the Philippines and some other countries. The articles that use this infobox:
- Generally concern local television stations serving specific local areas
- Are often in countries with television systems patterned off the American model
- Are traditionally TVS articles, especially those in North America
{{Infobox television channel}} is used by articles on networks of stations, pay television services around the world, and services that are nationally or regionally broadcast on digital terrestrial television platforms, such as Freeview in the United Kingdom. The articles that use this infobox:
- Generally concern services far larger in scope than a subregion or local market
- May not be broadcast terrestrially at all
- Typically have little or no local content
- Have traditionally not been seen as part of TVS, though some of them have long been tagged into the project
Consult the infobox pages for documentation and examples.
Categorization
There are a variety of categories in the project scope, generally classifiable as one of the following:
- By geographic area: Category:Television stations in Lubbock, Texas, Category:Television stations in Indiana, Category:Television channels in Bangladesh
- By year of establishment or disestablishment: Category:Television channels and stations established in 1968, Category:Television channels and stations disestablished in 1999
- By network affiliation or service rebroadcast: Category:NBC network affiliates, Category:Canal 5 (Mexico) transmitters
- By ownership: Category:Sinclair Broadcast Group, Category:CBS Television Stations
- By genre of programming: Category:Children's television channels in Turkey
- By language: Category:French-language television stations
Categories should be defining characteristics for the articles placed into them.
Some groupings formerly handled by categories, particularly stations by virtual and physical channel number, are now handled in lists, such as Channel 12 virtual TV stations in Mexico and Channel 26 TV stations in Canada.