Many editors and WikiProjects are consistently looking after the good quality and suitable content of the many articles existing in Wikipedia, making a wonderful work. However, once an article has been edited to its best, time, new facts and discoveries may turn the content inaccurate and in some few cases totally obsolete. New articles may as well show lack of information regarding important updates or be plainly based in outdated knowledge.
A good encyclopedic article should be updated and relying on the latest information available, this is what WikiProject Update Watch editors are trying to help with.
What we do
We:
Identify articles with outdated information or missing newly available information
Alert the authors or recent editors and help them to identify the information that must be updated, providing reliable sources if possible
Identify obsolete articles and propose them for deletion if updating is not possible
Scope and Cooperation
All articles may fall under the scope WikiProject Update Watch. Therefore, editors will be sharing editorial revisions with other WikiProjects. At all times is endorsed mutual understanding, support and cooperation with an open attitude. Participants of more than one Project may find useful to obtain a recognition of cooperation between projects shown by inclusion in the {{Cooperation Shell Banner}} at the project's page. The cooperation banner of WikiProject Update Watch is {{WikiProject Update Watch CoopBanner}}
Updated information sometimes may create debate, at all times NPOV must be reminded and kept. When finding situations in which an article is supported by a WikiProject or editors who seem to be acting with lack of neutrality or actively promoting interests, avoid unnecessary debate, request the opinion of other participants of WP:UPDATE. You may also follow available Wikipedia:Mediation policies. See also Accuracy dispute.
=== Differences with [[Category:Wikipedia articles in need of updating]] and [[Category:Articles with obsolete information]]===
While Wikipedia already has a category for articles in need of updating, it basically refers and deals with articles chronologically outdated, see Updating Information. The category of articles with obsolete information refers to articles in dispute following an editor's report of factual inaccuracy based on outdated references.
Editors acting on behalf of WikiProject Update Watch, may of course tag articles for any of the above reasons, but what we are trying to identify, are articles not covered by other categories, articles which are missing newly available information for adding content and accuracy i.e. and article about vaccination methods which fails to include "pressure powder injections". Also we identify articles which have an outdated content because of historical or other facts which have turned that subject obsolete, i.e. "Rhodesian economy" or articles which contain information or sources outdated at the light of new discoveries or newly accepted knowledge which can be adequately sourced i.e. an article describing hydrogen-cell driven engines referencing the dangers of manipulation (which are outdated by new procedures).
The occasional overlapping of categories, if any, do not constitute redundancy but complementation and if so occurs it will only help Wikipedia 's reliability.
Guidelines and Strategy
Once you have located an article with outdated content or sources, or missing newly available information, please follow these steps:
at the top of the article or at the outdated section. These will yield :
This Wikipedia page needs to be updated. Please help update this Wikipedia page to reflect recent events or newly available information. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page.
3. At the article's talk page place {{UpdateWatch}} , it will yield:
This Wikipedia page needs to be updated. Please help update this Wikipedia page to reflect recent events or newly available information. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page.
4. Always when suitable, inform about the tag and describe which content makes the tag necessary. If possible refer to new sources that may have the updated information.
5. Keep the article under watch and when the article is updated, remove all tags. You can also place at the talk page:
Help article editors to become informed and to integrate newly available information.
You can also go to {{Outdated articles/sources}}, choose an article and see how you can help to update its content or sources.
If you want to help right now, click Give me an article to check! and you will be carried to different articles each click, please check for eventual need for updates and tag if suitable