This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
This page in a nutshell: There is nothing wrong with occasionally doing other things than writing the encyclopedia, and the community spirit is a positive thing. |
Some people think that user categories that serve no real collaborative purpose, games, images of Wikipedians, WikiLove pages, et cetera, need to be deleted because they are not useful when building the encyclopedia. They often cite pages such as WP:MYSPACE and WP:ENC.
Some of the rationales for keeping such pages is that, more than just an encyclopedia, Wikipedia is a community. A community likes to have fun at times, and, at other times, it's 100% serious. Such pages are helpful in helping users feel better when contributing to the encyclopedia. Just because it's a page that isn't serious doesn't mean it hurts the community. In fact, it very often helps by taking away the stress.
“ | Anything that builds a spirit of friendliness and co-operation and helps people get to know each other as human beings seems to me a good thing. |
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