Scope Of The Guide
This article is intended to provide guidance on whether a particular article is suitable for inclusion into the guide. If you are unsure about the interpretation of this you could either mail us or leave Comments.
The purpose of these guidelines is not to stifle creativity but rather to ensure that the Oxford Guide does not become cluttered with information that is best kept elsewhere, such as on a general community site like Wikipedia.
Geographical scope
Obviously the guide should be about things to do within Oxford City. However, locations outside the City may be okay as long as they don't stray too far and don't belong better on another wiki. For example, we have articles on places in Kidlington, but Witney, Didcot or Aylesbury are probably too far away.
Other scopes
Apart from geography, the other general rule that applies is whether you can draw a direct link to Oxford in what you are discussing, and the article contains information specific to Oxford. For example, an alumnus of a College is probably a permissible article, if the article discusses that person in relation to Oxford. Otherwise, a link to elsewhere (for example Wikipedia) is likely to be better. If there is a small amount of Oxford-specific information that isn't covered in the external link, you can make a stub page with this information plus the external link. Or you could put this information in the context of the referring page. This rule is not a hard and fast one, as sometimes it may be considered useful to maintain nodes such as alumni nodes even though there is no Oxford-specific content in them. Use your judgement, but choose in preference to link externally.
Anything that is more removed from this general idea should not be created within the Oxford Guide. So, for example, links within the text of such an "edge" node as discussed above should not be internal ones unless they are directly connected with Oxford in some other way.
An example of a node which is at the edge of the guide is William Of Ockham, which contains several external links.
If in doubt, consider that the primary focus of the guide is to provide practical information about things to do in the City, not a general reference, and think about whether your proposed article would fit in, say, a published guide book.
General notes
Related to all this is the rule of thumb that making external links to articles is better than copying large blocks of texts from other sources if possible, even if the licence permits that. Often a stub node with just a single external link will be appropriate, and a few Oxford-specific notes.