This is a personal project that runs concurrent with the Wikipedia:Vital articles project. That project selects what its members consider to be the most important Wikipedia articles and sorts them into different rankings.
My project focuses solely on articles of people or groups of people. In order to feature on this list, the Wikipedia article in question must be about a specific real individual (no mythological figures). Level 1 is the listing of 50 people whose contributions to world history are so substantial that everyone alive should at least have some general knowledge about who they are. Level 2 contains 500 biographies of individuals whose contributions to world history are essential that they feature most often on Wikipedia pages. Level 3 contains 5,000 biographies.
Decisions as to where a biography goes are made based on a determination of historical vitality, which involves judging a person's influence, the prominence of their thought or ideas, and the pervasiveness of their name or beliefs in popular culture. Other factors, such as historical rankings or pageviews, are sometimes taken into account.
If you have any suggestions on how this list could be changed, feel free to leave them on the talk page.
I have finished Level 1 and Level 2. Level 3 is in the works. This is the page for Level 2.
Please visit this page's talk page to view the change log.
Level 1 | Top 100 | Level 2 | Level 3 |