- DIY guide to improving articles. -- (WT-en) Sapphire • (Talk) • 02:47, 6 May 2007 (EDT)
Minor Corrections
[edit]I'd like to begin by commending the author for the comprehensive work done regarding the information about Nairobi.
However, I noted some two errors, & I'd like to be as brief as possible.
Under "See", you have written "Kenyatta Conference Centre", instead of Kenyatta Conference International Center
Under "Buy" you have written "The three primary supermarkets in Nairobi are Tusky's, Uchumi, Naivas and Nakumatt." but you have listed four (4) supermarkets, Tusky's, Uchumi, Naivas and Nakumatt.
Please check on these.
Kind regards.
East Indian
[edit]What is meant by the term "East Indians"? Can the lemma be linked to, please?149.172.102.77 13:37, 5 May 2015 (UTC)
Advise of not brushing your teeth with tap water is a bit extreme
[edit]I think that the advise of refraining to use tap water for brushing ones teeth and only use bottled water is a bit extreme. Literally everyone uses tap water to brush their teeth in Nairobi. It should be perfectly okay. Also very commendable work for the authors as this is a very good and accurate article. —The preceding comment was added by Jon Jonathan (talk • contribs)
- And the best thing is that like with all our articles, you or anyone else can help out making the article even better. ϒpsilon (talk) 19:03, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
- True. But what are the risks of tap water? For example, if you can get bacterial infections or parasites from drinking the water, you can get the same things from brushing your teeth with it. I don't know if that's the case in Nairobi, but I've been to places where it was and actually did get a load of parasitical worms precisely from brushing my teeth with unboiled well water in one of them. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:45, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
- Using bottled water to drink an brush teeth is a wise decision anywhere. Many countries provide safe water from the public water supply. But when you are staying somewhere you probably do not know what has happened to that water once it has left the public water pipe. It might sit in a tank on the roof in the hot sun. Or old pipework etc. So don't take the risk. Bottled water is cheap just about everywhere. It is best to think of any water that does not come from a bottle as poison. Don't let it get into your mouth/body when washing/showering.Davidbstanley (talk) 22:13, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
- OK, I really couldn't disagree more with this. The international bottled water trade is the biggest ripoff of consumers and causes grave damage to the environment, in several ways: By depriving locals of a good natural water supply, by creating tons and tons of plastic waste, and by using fossil fuels to transport it. In places with perfectly safe municipal water systems, the water quality is often better than that of bottled water, and much bottled water comes from municipal water systems, anyway. I definitely understand that there are certain places where the water is quite safe but tastes strange, and if there is good local mineral water there, it makes sense to drink it, but advising people to always use bottled water to brush their teeth is in my opinion highly irresponsible. Sorry if this comes across to you as personal; it isn't, but I feel strongly that decreasing the overuse of bottled water is a simple way that everyone can help the environment. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:37, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
- I have to agree with Ikan Kekek here; in some places bottled water is actually less safe than water from municipal water supplies. True, horrible stories like what happened in Flint do happen even in high income countries, but they are such a big shock precisely because tap water is usually safe. That being said, some low income countries sadly have problems with keeping tap water up to a safe standard. But drinking bottled water "just 'cause" is neither good for the health of anybody nor for the economy. By the way, are there reliable studies about the effects plastic bottles have on the water stored in it? Especially if a lot of UV radiation hits those bottles. Hobbitschuster (talk) 23:13, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
Supermarkets and shopping malls
[edit]Do we need such long lists of these? Maybe we should focus on a selection of each that are most relevant to travellers. Ground Zero (talk) 13:10, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
- Good point. There are loads of supermarkets in New York City. Can you imagine if we tried to list a lot of them? Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:20, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
- I'll wait a few days for comments, and if there are no objections, I'll start cutting the list down. Ground Zero (talk) 01:18, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
- Since there were no objections, and because many supermarkets are listed in the shopping mall entries, I have removed the list. Travellers will have no trouble finding a supermarket at one of the malls listed if they need one. This list is too detailed and unnecessary. Ground Zero (talk) 18:36, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
- I'll wait a few days for comments, and if there are no objections, I'll start cutting the list down. Ground Zero (talk) 01:18, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
in the malls in Kenya there are only overseas owned supermarkets (high prices). and all the malls are out of the city center. there are Local supermarkets not on the list. which any one in down town Nairobi would use. same old story you have not been to Nairobi. so the supermarkets which are Local and in the city center will be put pack on the list - unsigned
- I'm glad that you've decided to discuss this. Decisions in Wikivoyage are made by consensus, not by one person claiming to know what is right. Two of us have expressed the view that there are too many supermarkets listed here. Supermarkets are of use to travellers, but listing every supermarket is going too far. Listing every pharmacy, gas station, corner shop would make this article not useful for travellers. What is the best way to determine which supermarkets (4 or 5 maximum) should be included. And if any are going to be added back in, they should be formatted like all of the other entities in the article, i.e. following Wikivoyage:Time and date formatting. Ground Zero (talk) 20:27, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
you better delete most pages for kenya then and all the countries in east and southern Africa as there all the same most of the towns were put in by me. same for most of south east Asia. most of the low cost hotels were also put in by me. this site is not for only upmarket tourists. I don't think you have been to africa
Hotels
[edit]There are also a lot of hotel listings. An easy way to trim them down would be to comment out any listings that have no contact information (address, phone, website). Any objections? Ground Zero (talk) 01:18, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
Time formatting
[edit]It is easiest for readers if we use one time format per article, rather than changing from one format to another to another through an article. There are two used in Wikivoyage -- a 12-hour format (e.g. 9AM-noon, 2PM-6PM), and a 24-hour format (e.g. 09:00-13:00 and 14:00-18:00), and we try to use the format that is used in the country the article is about. This is set out in our style guide, WV:tdf. Ground Zero (talk) 11:43, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
Safari provider
[edit]Safaris are a major reason for tourism in Kenya. In this respect, we should allow the listing of safari providers with their headquarters in Nairobi, but not international safari providers. These can advertise elsewhere. --DocWoKav (talk) 07:01, 23 September 2020 (UTC)
- Yes, and not on Wikivoyage. Agreed on all counts. Ikan Kekek (talk) 10:06, 23 September 2020 (UTC)
- @ Ikan Kekek & The dog2. The safari provider you deleted seems to have headquarter in Nairobi. So no need to delete.--DocWoKav (talk) 12:07, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
- The provider was deleted for touting. We allow listings of safari providers, but advertising is not allowed regardless of whether it's a local or foreign safari provider. The dog2 (talk) 15:10, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
- Precisely. Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:05, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
Upgrade to Guide?
[edit]This is a well-developed article which meets many of the criteria for guide status; see Wikivoyage:Guide articles. Is something specific missing? /Yvwv (talk) 14:13, 4 February 2022 (UTC)
- Many listings need coords. / SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 20:25, 4 February 2022 (UTC)
Wikimania
[edit]Is Wikimania an event worth mentioning in this article? I think it is. User:Sdkb strongly disagrees. What do others think? Ground Zero (talk) 10:37, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- I strongly agree with mentioning it – a sizable portion of our readers come from other WMF projects who will be interested in Wikimania 2025. There is no violation of our policy on touting nor is this promotional. //shb (t | c | m) 10:51, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- Still, is the lead really the place for this? For those who happen to plan a visit to Nairobi, Events (to be added to Do) seems to be the correct place for it. If we want greater visibility, it should be something sitenotice-like, which clearly is separate from the article content. –LPfi (talk) 11:47, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- I would put it in the lead because it will be of interest to many readers, but putting it in Do would be alright, too. Deleting it is the wrong move, I believe. Ground Zero (talk) 12:41, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- Agreed – all I care about is if it's mentioned somewhere, don't really have strong feelings for where. //shb (t | c | m) 20:35, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- It should be mentioned, but in the an article for a capital city, I do think it would be kind of dopey to mention it before the last sentence of the lede if it's mentioned in that section. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:46, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- Agreed – all I care about is if it's mentioned somewhere, don't really have strong feelings for where. //shb (t | c | m) 20:35, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- I would put it in the lead because it will be of interest to many readers, but putting it in Do would be alright, too. Deleting it is the wrong move, I believe. Ground Zero (talk) 12:41, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- Still, is the lead really the place for this? For those who happen to plan a visit to Nairobi, Events (to be added to Do) seems to be the correct place for it. If we want greater visibility, it should be something sitenotice-like, which clearly is separate from the article content. –LPfi (talk) 11:47, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- There are two potential arguments for listing Wikimania, and I think it's worth considering them separately.
- The first argument is that Wikimania is a significant event, and should be included in its own right. Under this argument, we'd include a similarly significant event even if it had no connection to the WMF. Wikimanias in recent years have had less than 1,000 in-person attendees, and while I'm no expert on Nairobi's conference landscape, I'd be rather surprised if a 1,000-person conference counted as exceptionally significant for a city of 4.4 million people (if you present me with evidence that it is one of the largest events in the city of the year I'd change my view). I don't buy the "will be of interest to many readers" postulation — the page has enough views that mathematically that doesn't work, and Wikimania scholarships were just sent out but I don't see the pageviews bump I would expect were that to be the case.
- The second argument is that we should give Wikimania special prominence because it's a Foundation event, even though it wouldn't normally qualify as significant enough to mention. To me, this is the very definition of a failure to WV:Put the traveller first. When we say that Wikivoyage is
written for the benefit of travellers
, the implicit contrast is with writing for ourselves as editors. In other words, putting them first means putting ourselves second. Giving special prominence to events just because they are relevant for ourselves as editors is by definition promotional. You might argue that it's good promotion, but even so, it still breaks the fundamental promise we make to readers that we are going to write for travellers (not for Wikimedia editors). And that could cause readers to trust us less more broadly — e.g. will we give unfair attention to more "nerdy" destinations like libraries or events like eclipses just because they're of greater interest to editors than to an average traveler? This is a path we don't want to go down — self-promotion is still promotion and we should avoid it just as we avoid touting non-WMF events.
- Sdkb talk 04:21, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- I agree on the first, but I think Wikimania may still be special enough to be mentioned in Events (number of participants does not tell everything). For the second argument: I think site notices are exempted from the TTCF rule, so we can advertise our events in that kind of notices. As they are clearly separated from article contents, I don't think they affect readers' trust in us. Too many such notices make the site less attractive, but I don't see a risk of our putting up too many of these. (For adding too many "nerdy" things, one can argue that we don't primarily target the "normal" traveller, but that's a separate discussion.) –LPfi (talk) 08:33, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- By site notice, are we talking about a Central Notice banner? (just so we're on the same page here) //shb (t | c | m) 09:01, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- No, I don't think those are for individual pages – but something that looks similar, so that it isn't confused with normal travel guide content. –LPfi (talk) 09:26, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- Right, good to know that's not what you meant (I assumed so too, but wanted to double check). //shb (t | c | m) 09:39, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- No, I don't think those are for individual pages – but something that looks similar, so that it isn't confused with normal travel guide content. –LPfi (talk) 09:26, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah, a notice banner I think would be fine, in that there's a clear editorial separation from the travel guide content. Sdkb talk 14:33, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- By site notice, are we talking about a Central Notice banner? (just so we're on the same page here) //shb (t | c | m) 09:01, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
- I agree on the first, but I think Wikimania may still be special enough to be mentioned in Events (number of participants does not tell everything). For the second argument: I think site notices are exempted from the TTCF rule, so we can advertise our events in that kind of notices. As they are clearly separated from article contents, I don't think they affect readers' trust in us. Too many such notices make the site less attractive, but I don't see a risk of our putting up too many of these. (For adding too many "nerdy" things, one can argue that we don't primarily target the "normal" traveller, but that's a separate discussion.) –LPfi (talk) 08:33, 21 March 2025 (UTC)