Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Archive 45

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents

Non-Admin Closures

There seems to be a growing spat of non-admin AfD closures, and I'm finding it very disconcerting. If closing an AfD were a simple thing, it wouldn't be something admins are primarily supposed to do. I've disagree with two closings of AfDs I personally nominated that were closed by a non-admin. One, I felt needed admin closure as it was a contentious issue with ample discussion and needed more than just someone counting comments as votes. The second was closed after only three days with no other explanation than keep.

I've always felt it weird that non-admins could close an AfD, but it didn't bother me too much because most editors were extremely judicious about it and mostly kept it to withdrawals. Now, however, it seems people are starting to do it as though they are admins and making it part of their regular Wiki-activities and this does not sit well with me. This has caused me to wonder two things: Are any admins keeping an eye on these non-admin closures to give oversight and to reverse when an AfD was closed improperly? Should non-admins even be allowed to close an AfD except in the case of a withdrawal of an AfD one made? Collectonian (talk) 19:02, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Deletion process#Non-administrators closing discussions and its Talk page archives where this has been endlessly discussed. No, non-admins should not be closing discussions that are in any way controversial. And if they do, it is entirely appropriate for any editor (admin or not) to re-open the discussion. Just make a note in the discussion that it was inappropriately closed and administratively reopened as such-and-such times. Rossami (talk) 19:57, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
I've left a note there, but after having yet another AfD closed by a non-admin after less than 24 hours of discussion, I'm wondering if it is time to bring the issue up for RfC or to a noticeboard to put a stop to non-admin closures all together, except for withdrawals. Collectonian (talk) 03:33, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
I've disagreed with Rossami before and will continue to do so, on whether non-admins can ever close controversial discussions - there is no need to get into that here; however, I entirely agree that there is nothing to prevent a non-admin from reverting a non-admin close (even though this is not explicit anywhere, it probably should be). The note in the discussion is important, one recent discussion over at MfD was closed and re-opened several times without any annotation to that effect - very problematic. I have a real problem with anyone, admin included, speedy closing a discussion without explaining the rationale.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 05:46, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

I think it's fine in the case of withdrawals, no delete votes after 5 days, AND THOSE ONLY. The reason for this is that unless there is a knowledgeable editor to keep these in check, bad things happen. In this case, the user blatantly ignored the speedy deletion rules and felt that it was perfectly alright to do so. If it hadn't been taken to DRV and subsequently overturned, it would have stayed that way. Celarnor Talk to me 18:27, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

New project

I am working on creating a new project on Wikipedia:Articles for restoration (obviously I have not yet created the page) that would serve as kind of the reverse purpose or continuation of this project. So, long as articles that are kept after an AfD can be renominated for deletion following "consensus can change" rationales, we must be able to have new discussions for restoring deleted articles as well as consensus can certainly change that the article should be kept. And rather than force editors to start from scratch if consensus does change that the article should be restored, we would have a venue by which we can restore a deleted version of the article along with everyone's deleted contribs. Whereas deletion review focuses on reconsidering bad closures or when the AfD process is compromised, Articles for restoration would focus just on the articles' merits. Anyway, as the project would be related to and an extension of this project, I thought I should allow for some community discussion here first. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 16:03, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

The Deletion Review process already covers that scenario. Deletion Review specifically allows reconsideration whenever there is evidence discovered that was not considered in the deletion discussion. Usually, that's evidence that existed but was not found by the discussion participants but sometimes it's new evidence - a subject who was not notable before but has since done something to achieve notability, for example. An entirely new process would seem to be an example of instruction creep. Rossami (talk) 21:14, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
The idea is to separate the relatively routine requests for recreation of improved articles from the challenges to AfD decisions, which are usually much more controversial. DGG (talk) 17:52, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
The observation rather than force editors to start from scratch if consensus does change that the article should be restored does have merit; but then again, you can always pick up the deleted text from the Wayback Machine, and often from all the Wikipedia mirrors who haven't deleted the article yet. And any article can be recreated - you can avoid speedy deletion of these articles by putting an "under construction" tag on the article, and then adding sufficient reliable primary sources and explanation of notability into your article during those first few hours of re-creation that it is obvious the article's topic is now worthy of inclusion. (I did this with Order of Nine Angles, which had already been deleted, DRVed, recreated and speedied. It is now a very good, nearly undeleteable article.) My problem with an AfR is that could effectively nullify the AfD process. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 14:28, 4 April 2008 (UTC)
More so than anything else, there are several serious problems with AfD that somehow need to be reformed: 1) we have over two hundred "in popular culture" related deletions that were achieved in part due to widespread sockpuppetry; 2) it's allegedly a discussion and not a vote and yet most AfDs look like a list of deletes and keeps with some stunned or offended by anyone who engages them in actual discussion and with some closures clearly sizing up the number of deletes versus keeps rather than say how the article developed as the discussion progressed, which of course means any initial pile on deletes should have far less relevance than later discussion that acknolwedges changes to the article during the AfD; 3) a week long discussion in which sometimes only a half dozen or so accounts participate really shouldn't lay down the verdict on an article that may have been around for months and which dozens or more editors may have contributed to (not to mention that something which does not have a deadline being pounced on in an AfD seems odd); 4) articles that are not hoaxes, libel, or copy vio and for which a redirect location exists should never be deleted as it is important for any potential RfA that the community at large including non-admins can see as much of their contribution history as possible; 5) some accounts do nothing more than "vote" not discuss in AfDs and it is hard to assess their actual knowledge of what goes into making good articles without them having ever really contributed to article development; etc. An Articles for restoration project may be a way to address some of these serious and detrimental problems with a currently terribly flawed system. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 00:38, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
Your numbered points, above, 1 2 and 5, are actually abuses of the AfD process which need to be rectified at DRV. They will typically happen with borderline articles, I find. Where there is an AfD with a bunch of commentless votes, a good administrator will discount those entirely: the only "votes" that matter are ones that address the rules. So, for example, if I say "delete - this subject is not notable", and you respond "comment - I have added references that pass WP:RS which demonstrate its notability", my vote is discarded because you have addressed its point. Or, at least, that's how it usually is. If there are true sockpuppets, tell an admin - socks are supposed to be punished. How does an AfR process address this better than the DRV process? The DRV guys seem to be one step up in the hierarchy, compared to the peanut gallery in AfD. :-) AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 15:45, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
Hello! Just to clarify to those with whom I have discussed AfDs today (sorry for copy and pasting, but my one hand is still injured), going with my AfD participation for today, in the instances in which I argued to delete (Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/W.I.T.C.H. The Movie: The Ultimate War, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Funeral For My Chemical Valentine, and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alhaji sani labaran), I provided evidence that I conducted a search for sources on multiple venues and made efforts to still do whatever I could to improve the article just in the off-chance that during the AfDs sources are indeed found and the article now has a start on being improved. In other words, I did not just throw down another repetitive “vote.” In cases where others already provided appropriate policy shortcuts like WP:HOAX, I did not merely repeat what they wrote. Once somebody has already provided a policy or guideline reason for deletion or keeping, there is no need to restate it as anyone reading the discussion should see it. After all, in a discussion, not a vote, the participants should advance new arguments and ideas as the discussion progresses. Now in the two instances (you read right, so far I argued to delete three articles today versus only two keeps) in which I argued to keep, consider them successively. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Melting of Maggie Bean was nominated as a non-notable book with four rapid delete votes claiming “no coverage” in secondary sources. Despite such assertions, KittyRainbow and I found SEVERAL sources including ones in which the article was given high reviews (Five Stars, Gold Award). I in turn used these sources to drastically revise the article by adding new sections and multiple references to an article only created four days ago anyway. And that is just with two of us conducting source searches in one day! So, here is an instance where you have a nom plus four delete votes with false claims and no evidence that searches for sources were even done to substantiate those claims only to have myself and another find a slew of sources with which I was able to significantly improve a four day old article. It frustrates me to no end to see so much of that in AfDs, i.e. editors just posting repetitive and false claims that could outnumber those keep arguments from editors who actually went out and found sources and spent time revising the article under question. Now, anyone approaching AfDs as a discussion would revisit his or her initial post taking into account the article’s development, but a minority of participants in AfDs ever do that. But my larger concern is still, why wouldn’t the nominators or initial delete voters just do what KittyRainbow and I did, i.e. look for sources and improve the article accordingly? Think how much would be accomplished, because then instead of KittyRainbow and I doing it here, we could be doing it to another article(s) without having to also post keep rationales in the AfD. The other AfD I argued to keep (Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1349 Woking Squadron) was based on the First pillar and I offered some suggestions after checking the web to see if sources suggest legitimacy of the topic. Anyway, I hope that helps illustrate where I am coming from. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 03:20, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Le: Yup, that's exactly what people are supposed to do. I am happy to meet an inclusionist with your attitude. I can't speak for other noms, but in my case, I've only nominated for deletion articles which are blatant spam. Now, other noms might just see other less-spammy articles, see a complete lack of sources, see that the article was only written by one person, and so on - and say "well, it's obviously spam or otherwise not notable, let's get rid of it." An article should have good referencing from reliable sources demonstrating the article's notability before anyone nominates it for AfD. If it has no references, no sources, no encyclopedic style, a lot of the time an editor will give up rather than waste his time attempting to fix the article. And well he should - most of those articles are blatant junk. You'll find a few bad articles worth improving - okay, improve them! The ideal contribution for an inclusionist editor is attempting to fix articles when they come up as AfDs or prods. If you truly can fix them, then you're doing what you stand for, and improving our content in general. Good for you! But it's perhaps too much to expect non-inclusionists to volunteer to fix articles that even the article creator has never included any sources or notability for. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 21:04, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for the nice reply. As you can see here and here, just as surely as I am willing to go after accounts that use sockpuppetry to get an article deleted (and in the past couple of weeks, we have determined several such sock farms), I absolutely am also willing to argue against and identify those accounts attempting to create nonsense articles as well or compromise an AfD in any fashion. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 21:09, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I checked the reference you give. An article was deleted after allegedly being voted against by sockpuppets. That, coincidentally, is what happened at the Order of Nine Angles AfD - a sokpuppet actually nominated the article. Unfortunately, Order of Nine Angles at the time was still unworthy of inclusion in Wikipedia - it failed WP:N and WP:RS and WP:NPOV and WP:OR, for example. I see that the DRV result was a restoration of the article to your (or someone's) user space, where the article can stay until it's been improved and placed back into Wikipedia - whereupon, if the article has been improved sufficiently to meet inclusion criteria, it can stay. This is a good way of doing things, I think - if an article deserves future re-creation, put it in the hands of the user who wants re-creation, and if he ever does fix the article, he can put it back into Wikipedia. If an AfR process simply re-instates articles without putting the onus on an author to fix them, then we'll be left with the same old content we've just deleted under AfD. I like to see the onus placed on the author to re-create and meet Wikipedia criteria. The fact that the DRV process puts this in the hands of more experienced, regular users, makes the whole thing better, I think. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 14:36, 4 April 2008 (UTC)
I see that the DRV result was a restoration of the article to your (or someone's) user space, where the article can stay until it's been improved and placed back into Wikipedia - It can stay as long as it's actively worked on. MfD routinely deletes articles sitting in userspace that have no sign of active improvement. Just to clarify.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 15:22, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Withdraw AFD

I'd like to withdraw the AFD for this page. How do I do that? NTAC (talk) 09:49, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Blanking the deletion discussion and removing the AfD template is definitely not the way to go about it. All you needed to do was add the statement to the AfD discussion that you'd like to withdraw your deletion nomination. (I've restored previous contents of the page and added your statement back in.--Fabrictramp (talk) 14:38, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Afd failings

Afd is not a substitute for {{cleanup}}, nor for {{tooshort}}, {{notability}}, {{npov}}, {{unencyclopedic}} etc. I see all these things raised without first attempting to raise the appropriate tag on the articles page. Note the above 'Withdraw AFD' section, a typical example of an Afd that is then withdrawn because the article has been WP:HEY, such things should not come to Afd, they waste many editors time and such things should, in my opinion, be made a clear requirement in this articles page. SunCreator (talk) 17:32, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

See WP:DEL#Alternatives_to_deletion 'If the page can be improved, this should be solved through regular editing, rather than deletion'. SunCreator (talk) 17:59, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I couldn't agree more strongly. For the AfDs of Nomophobia, Katutura Community Radio, and The Keltic Dreams (which I addinged sources to and the nomination was subsequently withdrawn), all it takes is a simple search on google to provide more than enough sources to assert notability. Because Wikipedia is always changing, AfDs should be based on the subject of the article, not its current state. Celarnor Talk to me 18:08, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I'm going to alter the Afd article a little to encourage a bit more thought before raising an Afd. SunCreator (talk) 18:19, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Done a few minor things, hopefully the extra clarity in the article will cause less false Afd's being raised. SunCreator (talk) 18:41, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
At the same time, you must admit that poor or unencyclopedic articles can sit here forever without any improvement. No matter what flags have been put on an article. Submitting an article to AfD, when the notability is in question because there are no sources, is the best way of forcing the issue and getting the article either fixed or removed. You would not believe how many hoaxes there are on Wikipedia, and flagging them doesn't help. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 21:07, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • If you come across something with questionable notability, your first action should be to try to improve it, not try to delete it. If it can't be improved, then delete it. All that is being asked is that people put in a little effort instead "Oh, the article doesn't cite sources. Delete it." What should happen is "Oh, this article doesn't cite sources. I'll have a look on google news.", followed either by "Not a lot in the way of sources for this subject", or "Wow, I found a lot of sources. Good thing I didn't nominate this for deletion. I'll add those in now." Hoaxes, if they are hoaxes, wouldn't be shot down in an AfD. If they are hoaxes, then they should be speedily deleted. If its status is a hoax is debatable, do some research. If it turns out to not be a hoax, insert your improvements and move on. If you still think it's a hoax, nominate it for AfD, presenting your findings, and let some other people see if they can prove it isn't a hoax. If they can't, then it gets deleted. Asking people to actually do research before throwing something at AfD will only result in a better overall encyclopedia. Celarnor Talk to me 21:33, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
    One clarification only. Hoaxes are not speedy-deletable except in extremely rare and patently obvious cases (at which point, you're really applying WP:IAR, not WP:CSD). Far too many pages are initially tagged as hoaxes but turned out to be poorly written stubs about real though obscure topics. The AFD process reduces our problem with false positives. See Wikipedia:Don't create hoaxes#Dealing with hoaxes for more. Hoaxes definitely should be deleted, just not speedily.
CSD G1 provides for the deletion of obvious hoaxes. Thus, you're not implementing IAR at all. The deleting admin is perfectly in line with policy. AfD does not need to see biographies about living people that live in other solar systems, dogs that developed the ability to speak Mandarin, or Hitler's secret space battleship. You see new page creations of this type all the time; just watch huggle for a few hours, and you'll find that these "rare" patently obvious cases are the norm and not the exception. Of course, for those that aren't obvious hoaxes (the AfD A Legand of Zelda movie that was an April Fools joke comes to mind), an AfD is the appropriate course of action. I just want to make sure no one gets the wrong idea and start nominating G1 material to AfD; more often than not, the result is someone from AfD tags it and it gets speedily deleted anyway, but it still wastes time that should be spent improving articles. Celarnor Talk to me 02:54, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Agreed. If after checking, an article is not notable to WP:N, or still looks like a hoax etc then raise an Afd, the problem comes when simple things like adding {{notability}} to the article doesn't happen(at any time) and little or no effort is made by the nominator to find notability by looking on Google or checking with the contributors to the article. The lazy way is to create an Afd, without bothering to make any effort. That laziness is inappropriate in my opinion and I believe it violated some guideline the name of which currently escapes me. SunCreator (talk) 22:59, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I've said this before: I think we should use AfD as we do "redirects for discussion". Merge, delete, keep, are all valid, and I think we should also have "expedited cleanup" where the article needs to be seriously fixed in a set period or it's treated as delete. We have too many articles which are "keep and cleanup" without being cleaned up. Guy (Help!) 22:14, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • There are indeed a lot of articles that require cleanup. Assessments shows that around 67% are Stubs, however WP:DEADLINE says There is no deadline. It certainly doesn't help here if those 67% or so of articles requiring attention come through the Afd process, even if 0.01% of them came to Afd it would just swamp the whole system. SunCreator (talk) 22:43, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • An interesting idea, but doing so would make the "This was deleted before" argument between completely and almost totally invalid. Timeframes would be much more a focus in DRV, as "I didn't have time to improve the article because I didn't know it was up for deletion" would become a much more valid point. Essentially, "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit" would become "the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, but you have to come back at least once every five days". It's much better the other way; people improve what they improve when they can, and if there are sources that show something can be improved, it doesn't get deleted because it can be improved. Wikipedia is not working toward a deadline every 5 days. Regarding RfDs, redirects are, well, redirects. It's not the same thing at all. Celarnor Talk to me 22:53, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Actually I don't think either of those is a big problem. A sourced article on a subject that was previously deleted as unsourced, is fine. A new article on something thatw as deleted as non-notable, but which fails WP:CSD#G4, will still be deleted if it does not have evidence of notability. And "please restore, I have sources and will fix" has always been an acceptable request at DRV, in my view. Even if we userfy rather than simply deleting. I'd also be interested in seeing if we can work up a triage system: obvious keeps, obvious deletes, and ones which may or may not be worth having. Guy (Help!) 15:32, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

One of the failing of AfD is it is only for binding deletions of articles. This is a problem when disputed and controversial mergers are being discussed. I think that as a last resort AfD should not solely be for deletions there should also be a kind AfM as well for merging articles.--Lucy-marie (talk) 00:22, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

I disagree very strongly on this last point. Mergers and other editorial disputes need to be resolved through the normal editing, discussion and conflict resolution processes used everywhere else in the project. Deletions get special treatment only because they involve the removal of pagehistory - an act that can only be undone through use of admin-powers and that can only be effectively reviewed by admins. Mergers and other changes to content which do not affect the pagehistory can be reviewed and if necessary undone by any editor. Rossami (talk) 02:31, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
Part of the problem with AfDs are that so many have had serious issues within the discussions, consider all the disruption caused in numerous AfDs by these nearly thirty accounts confirmed as socks within the last week. These sock accounts were usually on the deletion side of the discussions. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 03:10, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
I hope those socks' arguments were taken for what they are, whether or not anyone saw their sockiness. After all, an AfD isn't a vote, it's a debate, and you don't even need sockpuppets to participate in an AfD. One good, uncounterable argument, for deletion or retention, is all that is needed. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 14:52, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
As you can see here, they may have influenced at least some participants in discussions. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 16:29, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Just want to throw something out there: does anyone feel that part of the problem is that there is a disconnect between different editors' interpretation of WP:RS, WP:OR, and WP:N? I generally limit myself to garage-band AfDs, but I do find that some people (sometimes connected personally with the article topic, but also some very productive regular editors) put forward sources that, to me personally, don't remotely establish notability and aren't remotely reliable sources - blogs, webzines, and so on. I'd personally like to see a lot more print sources instead of the easy internet sources; and maybe I'm also fixated on having external sources which actually assert the notability of the topic. I am a deletionist, but you won't see me AfDing articles on e.g. minor 17th-century Sufi poets; my real desire is that the article establish the topic's notability, and uses good sources, like what you'd expect from a real encyclopedia. And that any article, even one created today, has at least one or two real sources backing up everything that's said in the article, so that the casual reader can tell the article was researched, isn't a hoax, isn't a vanity article, and so on. Otherwise, the casual reader may form the impression that Wikipedia is just a posting board that anyone can use to promote their own garage band or latest release through Lulu Press - which is happening right now. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 14:50, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
Most of the sources I put forward when people are using AfD as cleanup are print sources derived from a ProQuest subscription. However, since other people don't have the same subscription and I can't link to an abstract, my sources are often shot down as unverifiable. To me, it would seem that print sources, unless you can find an internet presence of the paper, are no longer considered valid sources simply because other editors can't click on them, which I find greatly disturbing. This may also explain the prominence of webzines and blogs being cited (although I think that blogs of notable people such as Ann Coulter and blogs maintained by journalists and teams of journalists (such as IGN) are citable with the same reliability as print sources. Celarnor Talk to me 15:21, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure how your source of ProQuest can be shot down. My understanding is you only have to cite where the evidence for verifiability is WP:V, and if necessary you could provide page, edition etc. If someone doesn't have the book or magazine then to me that's not your problem, you can't expect everyone to have every book. I hope you reconsider using all sources you have that you can verify exist. SunCreator (talk) 16:19, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
You'd be surprised how often I get comments like "The refs make a big difference. Onne thing really concerns me, though, and that is the fact that the (whatever newspaper) articles are behind a membership wall, which makes them a little tough to verify." Celarnor Talk to me 17:18, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
I wouldn't worry about it. There might even be another person on wiki that subscribes anyway. Most subscription magazine/books type things have circulation of 5,000+ otherwise they wouldn't be viable. And another thing, anyone questioning it should assume good faith, so we work from an assumption that most people are trying to help the project, not hurt it. In short a reference is welcome and meets WP:V. SunCreator (talk) 18:06, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
Wow, same here. Print sources (of decent quality, of course) should definitely be considered top-level. That certainly is disturbing. Internet sources, even articles from net portals of newspapers, disappear with regularity. And it says something about how serious Wikipedia is about being an encyclopedia. AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 16:29, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Indeed, I have now been in a AFD where editors in good standing have, in all seriousness, called a subject "not notable" even though it is covered in a separate article in a general purpose print encyclopedia, something I would consider the strictest possible definition for "encyclopedic". Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:10, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict)I can well believe it "not notable print encyclopedia" articles being nomincated Sjakkalle, as least in your example the nominator defined a valid reason, which you can quickly challenge. It not always the case and some nominations can be vague, those are difficult to deal with, because to know the Afd is a keep you have to check every possible reason it could be a valid Afd and that takes much longer to research and longer to reply to. SunCreator (talk) 13:11, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Indeed. Many responders seem to be quite lazy and frivolous. For example, see Goofing off where most early respondents addressed the subject in the manner of giggling schoolchildren. I searched and immediately found a huge body of scholarly research upon the topic. My impression is that too many respondents are influenced by the title of an article and can't see beyond this to the topic which the title represents. There is a bias against plain English and a preference for prententious jargon. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:32, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
When someone adds a print source to an article, we assume that they have seen it and can verify (on request) what it contains. So I believe an editor who adds such a source should expect to answer questions about its contents. For instance, to give examples of the exact language that it uses to evaluate the subject of an article. An 'inaccessible' source had better be accessible at least to the submitter. EdJohnston (talk) 12:49, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
Such sources are most often required to establish notability in AFD discussions. In such cases, it is enough to establish that the topic is worthy of notice without going into the details of what has been said. Abstracts and extracts are adequate for this. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:58, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
Well, in my case I see now that I had access to the online version because of a subscription, and that others may not have that. But I am still astounded that people will judge "Lotto" to be "not notable" when Store norske leksikon has an article on it, describing the rules, history, size, and use of profits. When that article goes (and that includes being redirected), I will know that AFD has gone haywire. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:59, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
Whether a source can be used without seeing it depends on what its used for. It certainly cant be used that way for proving contradicted points, or negative things about a living person. It can be used for notability, if it can be shown that thee is substantial coverage. Sometimes the is shown by extent of pages. But the existence of a book or article devoted to a subject is usually at least partial indication of notability, and a library catalog is enough evidence it exists. I wouldn't necessarily say the same about Amazon. If we required seeing the book, it would curt off many topics for most contributors. But google Books is pretty much equalizing things for pre-1920/1900 subjects,--
As another complication, we commonly use abstracts of magazine articles. These again may not give full or in-context information. But if we stopped doing this, a great many of our contributors couldn't work on any subject involving the academic world. some of us with access offer copies on a limited basis, but there is no way I could offer to do it generally for all of the people in wikipedia. (in fact, they're probably about to change the US copyright law to require that people go through their own library, not directly to another library.)DGG (talk) 00:01, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Closing AfD

Lately I've run across a couple closed but unsuccessful AfD's that have been moved back to the talk pages of the corresponding articles and then transcluded to the AfD Log (see this AfD log and the article talk pages Talk:Abraham a Sancta Clara and Talk:George Walton Academy). I'd like to raise this as a bad practice because it means that the relevant deletion log becomes categorized under the articles assessment rating. This is a completely unnecessary headache as there really in no reason that the entire talk page needs to be transcluded. Moving the discussion to a subpage of the talk and transcluding both to the talk and to the AfD log would make sense. As for these two articles, I've temporarily fixed the banners (encased in noinclude tags) but it still stands out as a bad practice. Does anyone have any input on how to prevent this? Adam McCormick (talk) 17:33, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, that predates me. :) Have you run across any more current than 2005? If not, it might not be an active concern in terms of prevention. You might want to talk to the admin who did it on those two pages at User talk:SimonP to find out more about it. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 18:10, 12 April 2008 (UTC)
Those were just the ones that happened to catch my attention, if it's not common it's not a big deal, I just happened across those two on the same page after one turned up in a category I work in. Thank you for responding nonetheless. Adam McCormick (talk) 03:08, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
The process of VfDs used to involve discussion on a single page. When the discussion was completed, the text would be copy-pasted onto the article's Talk page as an archive. We did not then have the process of separate discussion pages and transclusions. There are lots of those out there. I don't know why anyone would have bothered with the hybrid approach that you've discovered here but the datestamps indicate that it happened about when the process was being changed so I'm not surprised that there were some mistakes made at the time. It's never been worth the effort to clean them up but if the tagging really bothers you that much, just fix them as you find them. Don't worry about it being accepted practice anymore. Rossami (talk) 15:44, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the informed and well-worded response. I'm just glad the process has changed. Adam McCormick (talk) 04:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Help, please, with AfD red link

I opened the AfD, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Holy Family (prayer), and it clearly exists, but the AfD box on the article, The Holy Family (prayer) shows a red link. What's wrong? Aleta Sing 22:24, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

looks like someone has fixed it. Maybe the database was slow in updating? AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 00:25, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
It still shows red for me. (I specifically mean where it says "this article's entry" in the AfD notice box on the article. If you click on it, it takes you directly into editing the AfD page.) Aleta Sing 00:33, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
It does not anymore for me, but did when it was first reported above. Perhaps this is an issue of the local internet cache. SunCreator (talk) 00:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The Economist on "deletionism"

http://www.economist.com/printedition/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10789354

As usual, I ask all AFD participants to please conduct themselves as if they are in the public eye and every cough and fart will be quoted out of context by the general media ... - David Gerard (talk) 21:17, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

  • What's quite amusing is that they cite the difference in cover between the Solidarity movement and Pokémon as being down to inclusionism vs. deletionism, but the trivia being deleted is not, as far as I can tell, biographies of dull-but-worthy Communist-era activists, the crap that's being deleted is actually a lot more like the Pokémon. Cause of the week seems to be the absurdly inflated in-universe articles on minor D&D characters; I don't see how keeping those would encourage the authors to go on to write about the tens of thousands of important missing subjects. What people actually want to wrtite about is their garage band, their favourite website, themselves, and of course Jimbo getting caught with his trousers down. Guy (Help!) 21:49, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
  • David's admonition that we should always be professional in our discussions is always good advice. But I didn't see anything in that article that Wikipedians should be ashamed of. To be quite blunt, the Economist article came across as sour grapes by someone whose pet article got deleted. Rossami (talk) 00:15, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
    • Seriously. And I like the ridiculous idea that its the "deletionists" who tend to wikilawyer. Yea right. Eusebeus (talk) 01:09, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
  • No, I think it's that the project is generating enough interest now as a social experiment that some news organizations look in from time to time, that's all. This is a big thing here now, so it gets covered, as opposed to pinpoint topics like the images on Muhammad debates, which used to be about all we'd get coverage of. We went from THE scandal, to the Essjay scandal, to the images, which was progress ,because at least the third showed we had a 'better' side, to this, which is far more about the internal workings. Oddly, I must've missed the article in print, in this week's issue. I'll go look. ThuranX (talk) 01:10, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
  • I read it on the way home this evening. It seemed a bit dated - you won't find good articles on Pokemon if you look currently. My impression was that the main source was the author who has been working on a book about Wikipedia. Anyway, its points are good ones. The Economist is one of the best English-language newspapers - famous for its informative and well-written style. Any criticism it makes should be taken seriously.
I am myself an AFD regular. When I first encountered Wikipedia, I happened to read an interesting article that was being proposed for deletion and I was outraged at the proposed destruction of knowledge. Since then I have been checking the proposals daily and my imression is that the mechanism is poor. Few discussions seem to engage more than 10 editors and lately AFDs have been cycling round two or three times to try to attract comment. It seems that many of the participants see the process as an extension of Speedy Deletion and they consequently have a bias towards deletion. Nominators rarely seem to make a proper effort to search for sources and it is often easy to shoot them down just by making a simple Google search. Material which is out of Google's reach is tough to save because it seems that almost nobody is prepared to exert themselves enough to research paper sources. I occasionally go look in a book or magazine myself but the effort involved is so disproportionate that I only save it for last ditch defences.
So, by being so dependent upon Google searches, Wikipedia is effectively becoming an extension of Google. The Economist makes the point that Google is now entering the field with its Knol idea. It will be interesting to see the balance of power in another 5 years time...
Colonel Warden (talk) 22:08, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
  • BTW, as a fresh example of deletionism in action, I offer Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Unsolved murders in the United Kingdom. This seems like quite a good topic to me - the sort of material that The Economist might put into its Christmas issue or a special feature on forensics/policing. And yet we have a horde of deletionists wanting to destroy this article on a variety of specious grounds - that the article is hard to maintain; that other countries might want one too; that the murdered people don't deserve such fame. I am quite amazed at the negative and hateful attitude on display in this discussion. These are the instincts of petty bureaucrats not of inquiring minds. Tsk. Colonel Warden (talk) 22:19, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
Uh... I noticed that the closing admin said "this article can be improved, let's keep it." So... who is working on improving the article? Nobody. Absolutely nobody. If you want to keep such an article so badly, you should contribute to its improvement. Will it sit there in the same condition for another year before someone else comes by and takes it to AfD yet again? AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 21:14, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
One good point is "To create a new article on Wikipedia and be sure that it will survive, you need to be able to write a “deletionist-proof” entry and ensure that you have enough online backing (such as Google matches) to convince the increasingly picky Wikipedia people of its importance. This raises the threshold for writing articles so high that very few people actually do it." I have multiple times now seen a day or two old stub nominated for deletion only to have myself and/or others rapidly improve it during the ultimately unnecessary AfD. One error though: "“regular” deletion, which means the entry is removed after five days if nobody objects"--I wish!  :) Obviously articles are (many times unfortunately) deleted even when there are objections. Anyway, have you checked out the comments? Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 21:55, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Somebody edited Unsolved murders in the United Kingdom just the other day. If the article had been deleted, they would have either given up or had to start from scratch again. Deletion would clearly have been an act of mindless destruction in this case. Colonel Warden (talk) 22:15, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I agree with the Colonel above that the mechanism is poor. It almost seems purposeful the way that the Articles for Deletion page takes 3 links from the main page: Community Portal--->Quick Directory--->Articles for deletion (way down the list), then they are separated by day for some strange reason. It'd be better if they were all listed on one page, at least as an option. Plus, 5 days is entirely too short of a time to discuss these things. It should be changed to 2 weeks or so. Deletion in general is often a case of mindless destruction; many of these articles could clearly be spruced up rather than deleted. And that's what should happen. OptimistBen (talk) 05:57, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
The fact that "many of these articles can be spruced up rather than deleted" is the reason that "If an article can be fixed or improved through the normal editing processes, then it isn't a good candidate for deletion. Unfortunately, many people still seem to hold the view that AfD is some kind of forced cleanup mechanism rather than something to be used to determine whether or not something is verifiable/notable enough to deserve an article. Celarnor Talk to me 06:05, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Yeah. I'm not sure what the solution is; I'd hope that with more people, the results would be more reasonable. More people would keep track of them if the AfD link was displayed more prominently. Also, more inclusionists need to keep track of AfDs. The people who do track AfDs seem to be generally more deletionist. Also, there is trouble with the notability guideline: some organizations which are important receive a relatively small amount of third-party coverage because they are in unexciting areas; the attention just isn't uploaded on the WWW. Just because there's not a huge amount of Google hits for something doesn't mean it's not notable. Note CRU Group, an article I recently recreated -- it's highly important in the fertilizer industry, but you have to dig rather deep to find substantial third-party coverage. To me the fact that it was founded in 1969, publishes an academic journal, and hosts leading conferences seems notable, but apparently [not to others. Incidentally, how would I find the AfD for this? I looked through the achive and it's not on the day of that log. The archives need to be fixed so that they are searchable; putting them all on one page would allow me to use CTRL-F at least. OptimistBen (talk) 06:29, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Taking a look at the log indicated, it was deleted by WP:PROD instead of WP:AFD. If it's cached, the PROD tag might be there. Otherwise, taking it to WP:DRV gets it undeleted in a hurry. As far as including all the AfD's on a single page, I'd really hesitate to do that. It already takes a while for a single AfD log page to load, simply due to the size of the pages. Including more would be a very bad idea. Maybe someone can write a tool to do it. Searching for "Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/<page name>" should work most of the time, at least. Cheers. --lifebaka (Talk - Contribs) 15:25, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
How do I find old PRODs? I want to see what that page looked like. I searched for PROD CRU; nothing. And aren't they just sneaky ways to delete articles? I doesn't seem like many people even browse through them. OptimistBen (talk) 17:43, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Where are all the AfDs

I know that the list of AfDs is way smaller than it should be. What's the deal? To make things easier, we need to structure at least one AfD that is unorganized -- one that lists all AfDs, so I can just use a CTRL-F to find the one I'm looking for. Also, I'm looking for this page. It's not in the organization category of AfDs, and it's not on the disambig page for CRU. OptimistBen (talk) 18:44, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

afd error

So i just tried to afd an article using twinkle. It did everything but create the AFD page. Just a redlink on the log. What's the best way to fix it?--Cube lurker (talk) 02:07, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

  • It can be fixed by going to the article and clicking on "preloaded debate" in the template, which links to a page with the template, and the instructions for completing it. --Snigbrook (talk) 02:12, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Tools

Can someone point me to any tools / scripts to make admin closing of AfDs a bit easier? I'm definitely spoiled by Twinkle and Friendly. :)--Fabrictramp (talk) 21:58, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I found one. Thanks.--Fabrictramp (talk) 23:34, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Discussion notice

There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Biographies of living persons#Reversing the AFD default for BLPs about changing how AFD results are evaluated when the subject of an article is a living person. GRBerry 19:13, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Sinebot

I was just wondering if all AFD topics should be in the [[Category:Non-talk pages that are automatically signed]] so that when someone adds a comment e.g. here. [1] then they would be automatically signed :). This might be able to be added in the template or something. What do you other guys think? ·Add§hore· Talk/Cont 20:26, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Discussion versus vote

Dear fellow editors, I am increasingly seeing a real split among editors referring in Deletion review and even within AfDs about AfDs being "a discussion and not a vote", but also citing the "vote tally" or approaching the AfD as one would approach a vote. Now, if it is indeed a discussion and not a vote, then why do so many AfDs look like a vote, i.e. just a list of "deletes" and "keeps" with little actual discussion (interaction among the participants)? I have noticed quite a few AfDs where there may be the nomination followed by several rapid delete stances, but then the article is improved drastically and those editors never return to the discussion to comment one way or the other on the article's improvements/developments during the discussion, i.e. many seem to just go down the daily AfD list leaving deletes (or sometimes keeps) and then moving on without actually discussing the article. In other instances, such as here, some editors vehemently resist the AfD being a discussion rather than just a list of "votes" and aggresively criticize any who do attempt to discuss the article under question or who challenge others' arguments. So, I'm just curious on what the actual consensus is with regards to AfD? Are we supposed to engage each other in discussion, even if it's a spirited discussion/debate, and make attempts to resolve issues the nominator had as the discussion progressed and discuss those efforts during the AfD or is it really more of a vote? I guess I'm asking if there's a "right" way to approach these things? Thanks! Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 00:49, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

  • If you really believe AFD is a discussion and not a vote, you would accept that the lists of Columbine and Virginia Tech victims violated Wikipedia policy re:NOT#MEMORIAL and the admins were correct in closing them as delete, regardless of how the actual "!vote" went. KleenupKrew (talk) 01:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
    • I found the keep arguments far more compelling and that they successfully refuted any claims about the articles being a memorial. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 01:02, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
      • And obviously the closing admins disagreed. KleenupKrew (talk) 01:05, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
        • One closing admin did, but other admins and editors disagreed with that closure as is playing at on Deletion review. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 01:13, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
  • 2005 called and wants its thread back. Eusebeus (talk) 16:16, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Discussing is good...but taking it too far isn't. Questioning *every* person who disagrees with you, even if they've said the same thing as those above, is rarely going to help your cause, and will probably give you less chance of convincing the closer that your side of the debate is the "right" one, if you will. My advice, Le Grand Roi, is to seriously consider if it's worth taking up a point with each commenter (or voter, or whatever...) who disagrees with you (obviously, discussion with the first view "votes" should take place), and to think about how this will look to someone who's grumpy, in a hurry, and generally not as passionate as you are (and there are a few too many of those around, unfortunately...don't ever let them tell you that discussing is bad, just remember that there IS a limit). dihydrogen monoxide (H2O) 10:46, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the reply and advice. I will definitely reflect on it. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 17:21, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

My own understanding, from the 100 or so AfDs I've started and others I've voted in, is that AfD is indeed meant to be a discussion. The nom provides a rationale for deleting; people either agree or disagree; there is supposed to be proper reference to Wikipedia guidelines; points should be made as to whether or not the article meets the guidelines; maybe the quality of sources (or complete lack thereof) should be mentioned; and so on.

If, say, there is an article sent to AfD for having a non-notable subject, and then Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles not only finds proof of notability but also adds that proof to the article with references, a good voter should either change his vote to keep, or provide some other reason for maintaining his delete vote (say, he feels the sources you added are insignificant, or don't otherwise satisfy WP:RS, or whatever). But some voters don't come back. Well, a good closing admin should take into account that the reason for their delete votes has since been addressed, and discount their votes.

Ideally, I think there should be a consensus; and really, if all editors agreed on their interpretations of Wikipedia guidelines, and if no editors had ulterior motives for participating in AfD discussions (as we so often see in the case of biographical or business articles), there would be consensus. So, failing consensus, I think a closing admin should be examining the arguments given for either side, seeing which arguments are the best, and closing based on that.

Really, Large King of Orange Gourdlike Squash, it should generally work out that way. If it doesn't, and you're concerned Wikipedia is losing content, remember we're getting something like 5000 new articles a day and only 100 a day are going to AfD. It will all work out in the end. The best to do is just add sources and improve articles - and not be afraid to take an unfavourable result to DRV, where the real pros hang out. :-) AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 21:29, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Plus, in the case of e.g. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ernie (Family Guy), where external sources apparently were found but the article was still deleted - would you consider asking the closing admin what his reasoning was? If there were indeed third-party sources added to the article to assert notability, I can see your concern in the article's deletion - and in any case, I get really steamed when a closing admin closes without a proper explanation. He's expected to take the time to read the arguments pro and con; why, then, can't he take the time to put the reason for the closing decision in the AfD, so we can all know? I'm anti-pop-culture and a deletionist, and even I think that AfD result fails the smell test (I haven't figured out how to find the article to see how good it was before deletion). AllGloryToTheHypnotoad (talk) 21:43, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

JG-E

I'm the creator of JG-E. It has been put under the articles of deletion. Well I just wanted to say that I am in favor of deleting this page. I don't even need it. It's very unreasonable so I suggest you just delete it. I will even speedy delete it myself. Anfish (talk) 21:33, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Been deleted. Tagged the redirect at JG-E for speedy. --lifebaka (Talk - Contribs) 23:20, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Templates for single use accounts

Are there templates we can add in to an AfD to indicate that an editor has not commented outside of an AfD, or that an editor has not commented outside of the article and AfD in question? Is the use of these templates encouraged/discouraged? Many thanks, Gazimoff WriteRead 12:21, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

The only one of which I am aware is {{spa}}, which produces this (which I'll tag myself with for example purposes). UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 13:03, 29 April 2008 (UTC) — Ultraexactzz (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
I've seen users take offense about being tagged in this manner, especially if they feel strongly about the topic. In many cases, such accounts will be obvious without being tagged, so sometimes it's not worth the hassle. Often, a larger notice at the top of the page is more useful than individual tags. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 13:08, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

What happened to alternative AfD interfaces

Whatever happened to alternative AfD interfaces, such as User:Dragons flight/AFD summary or User:ArkyBot/AFD summary/all? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:53, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Bots playing up, I'm guessing. There is a new alternative one, I think, but I've got no idea where... dihydrogen monoxide (H2O) 11:07, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

In the meantime, the AfD pages are huge, making them virtually inaccessbile for dial up connections, and something about these pages in particular seems to cause my poor computer to grind along very slowly. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 14:51, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

I might recommend looking at User:ST47/AfDC, which shows the total (and open) cases by category. It's not good for linking to each debate, but the category pages are just lists of debates, so it's better for browsing topic areas and items of interest. Should probably work for low-bandwidth users, at least in the absence of the other trackers. UltraExactZZ Claims ~ Evidence 14:59, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Redirect

There seems to be a systemic issue with editors suggesting "Delete" when they mean redirect. I think this may sometimes affect outcomes. For example, look at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Force_lightning. Some editors said redirect, some said delete, a couple said keep. It was non-admin closed as delete. Why delete a term that users might search on? It doesn't meet any reasons for deleting a redirect given at Wikipedia:Redirects_for_discussion. The closing editor stated that the commenters had "determined that the content should not even be merged". I think that editor was led astray by the "Delete" opinions from editors that most likely would have been happy with a redirect. I believe that Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion#How_to_discuss_an_AfD needs to make the options available more clear. It should describe options of "Keep", "Delete", and "Redirect", and state when each option is suitable. It's sometimes said that AfD is not the place for redirect discussions, however if articles are being deleted that should have been redirected then it's clear that in practice redirect decisions are taking place in AfDs, so the options available should clearly reflect the real practice, by clearly defining terms to avoid ambiguity. Otherwise misunderstandings like the one above will continue to take place. Ryan Paddy (talk) 23:01, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I've added a suggestion to this effect:

If you think the article should be disambiguation page, or a redirect to another article, then recommend "Disambiguation" or "Redirect". Do not recommend deletion in such cases, because deleted pages cannot be redirects or disambiguation pages.

I think there is a lot of miscommunication going on around this at the moment and a little more clarity would make AfD discussions easier to read and decide on. Ryan Paddy (talk) 00:04, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Diana Mercado

Hvrhon (talk) 01:56, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand why you would consider removing this article. Diana Mercado is a great singing talent and she has proved this by reaching the semi-finals on a nationally televised singing contest.

I wrote this biography to enlighten her fans on her background and her climb to stardom.

That's just it though - making the semis on a television program isn't enough for notability. Now, if she would have WON the show, that's entirely different. As of yet though, she hasn't done anything of note. ArcAngel (talk) 13:09, 8 May 2008 (UTC)