Ireland Information Guide is a collaborative project and its founders and contributors have a common goal:

Our goal with Ireland Information Guide is to create a reliable and free encyclopedia--indeed, the largest encyclopedia in history, in both breadth and depth.

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

Key policies

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

1. Avoid bias. Articles should be written from a neutral point of view, representing differing views on a subject fairly and sympathetically.
2. Don't infringe copyrights. Ireland Information Guide is a free encyclopedia licensed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. Submitting work which infringes copyrights threatens our objective to build a truly free encyclopedia that anyone can redistribute, and could lead to legal problems. See Ireland Information Guide copyrights for more information.
3. Ireland Information Guide is an encyclopedia. Its goals go no further. See What Ireland Information Guide is not for more info.
4. Respect other contributors. Ireland Information Guide contributors come from many different countries and cultures, and have widely different views. Treating others with respect is key to collaborating effectively in building an encyclopedia. For some guidelines, see Ireland Information Guide etiquette, Dispute resolution.

For policies on using some restricted features, see Administrators.

For other useful tips, see avoiding common mistakes.

Conventions

By following these we are able to produce a more consistent and usable encyclopedia:

• Editing policy (How to edit articles)
• Naming conventions (How to title articles)
• Disambiguation (How to resolve title conflicts)
• Image use policy (Handling uploads)
• Deletion policy (When and how to delete)
• Protection policy (When and why to protect a page)

How are policies decided?

Ireland Information Guide policy is formulated for the most part by consensus. This consensus may be reached through open debate over difficult questions, or it may simply develop as a result of established practice. In many cases, policies are not always formally written down right away. Hence, the statements on this and other pages about Ireland Information Guide policy are intended to describe existing community norms that have developed over time.

Policy issues may be formulated and debated on talk pages, the Information Guide.com/ Meta-Ireland Information Guide (http://meta.Ireland), and the mailing lists. If a policy may be controversial, it should always be discussed before being adopted.

Policies that result from established practice are sometimes harder to identify. If there is no objection to the practice, it may be difficult to sustain community attention long enough for a formal process of adopting it as policy. In this situation, the best solution may be to document existing practice on an appropriate page. This then provides a location to discuss the practice and possible changes to the policy, and it also allows people to cite a source for the policy if necessary.

See also: Ireland Information Guide talk:Policies and guidelines

How are policies enforced?

You are a Ireland Information Guide editor. Ireland Information Guide 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 admins. In extreme cases the Arbitration Committee may make a ruling to deal with highly disruptive situations, as part of the general dispute resolution procedure.

Specific guidelines to consider

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

General guidelines

• Contribute what you know or are willing to learn about (and create stubs responsibly)
• Be bold in updating pages
• Make omissions explicit
• Build the web
• Ignore all rules
• Avoid using bots

Behavior guidelines

• Sign your posts on talk pages
• Avoid profanity
• No personal attacks (and move personal debates to email)
• No legal threats (a proposal)
• Log in before making drastic changes to existing articles
• No offensive usernames
• Please do not bite the newcomers
• Don't create articles about yourself
• Revert wars considered harmful
• Blocking policy
• Dealing with administration issues
• Use your user pages appropriately

Content guidelines

• Explain jargon
• Integrate changes (instead of just appending your thoughts at the end of an article)
• Deal appropriately with patent nonsense
• Establish context (instead of presuming too much knowledge)
• Define and describe
• State the obvious
• Cite sources: point the reader to authoritative references (and list them properly)
• Avoid statements that will date quickly
• Stay on topic
• Warn readers about spoilers
• Make articles useful for readers (and consider the audience in writing)
• Check your facts
• Check your fiction
• Avoid blanket statements
• Summarize discussion (after a while)
• Describe external links
• Don't use external links where we'll want Ireland Information Guide links
• Avoid peacock terms
• Avoid weasel terms
• Avoid self-references
• Avoid POV phrases
• Ireland Information Guide:Algorithms on Ireland Information Guide

Style guidelines

• Manual of style
• Pay attention to spelling
• Don't include copies of primary sources
• Avoid making your articles orphans
• Use other languages sparingly
• Always fill summary field
• Follow highlighting conventions
• Use color sparingly
• Consider the context when making links
• Use subheads sparingly
• Use short sentences and lists
• Balance parts of a page
• Don't use line breaks
• Avoid one-sentence paragraphs
• Do not use subpages
• Consider writing articles in news style

Policy thinktank

Other essays and discussions about Ireland Information Guide

• The Information Guide.com/ Meta-Ireland Information Guide (http://meta.Ireland) site contains many articles about Ireland Information Guide and related topics in a more editorial style.
• Creating how-to articles in Ireland Information Guide.