GoArch:External links
 | This page documents an Archive policy. It describes a widely accepted standard that all editors should normally follow. To propose changes, use this sub-page. |
The point of a wiki is to maintain the lattice by creating an ever-expanding network of interlinked articles. Don't create links to external pages as part of the article text—more than likely, we'll want to have an article on that subject right here on the Archive. Internal links to non-existent articles are perfectly all right—in fact, they're encouraged (under the appropriate circumstances, of course).
For example, don't write something like this: "The D'ni Restoration Council was founded by Richard Watson"—note the external link to another page. While Tweek's Beneath website is an excellent resource, we should prioritize linking to our own article about Richard Watson first.
Instead, external links should go in a separate section of the article (at the bottom of the page), where these links can be listed for further reading. In this case, the external link to Beneath should be placed at the bottom of our article.
Related to this, readers don't always have the time to conduct their own in-depth research on a specific subject. Websites can often take a long time to load, and even longer to evaluate their content. As such, providing a plain link like this...
... is often not useful, because the reader has no idea just what the linked website is about. Who maintains it? What is its focus? How good is it?
Instead, provide a short description about the link to assist the reader in evaluating it, like this:
- Beneath - Tweek's D'ni archive site, which features collections of D'ni and DRC-related content that is no longer available in its original location.
Additionally, if the external link is to a specific page that requires special software to interpret (for example, a PDF document), it is useful to add a note to that effect.
Content in this section is based on policies created by Memory Alpha. In accordance with Memory Alpha's licensing terms, the material on this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Non-Commercial license.
