Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2008 April 9

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was delete, since Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Toilet closed as a snowball delete, it's expected that these will likely be deleted for the same reasons as it was. Acalamari 18:12, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:Uw-toilet1 (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Template:Uw-toilet2 (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

These two warning templates are basically incivil versions of {{uw-vandalism1}} and {{uw-vandalism2}} created for the use of one editor (see also Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Toilet for the MfD on Wikipedia:Toilet). Kralizec! (talk) 22:24, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

• Delete as uncivil and insulting; and assuming WP:Toilet gets deleted, as it looks very likely to, they're entirely unnecessary anyway. Terraxos (talk) 02:38, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
• Delete Pointless template, and certainly agree with Terraxos about insulting, which is unacceptable for a lvl1 or any template for that matter. ^Khukri 07:11, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was keep Woohookitty^Woohoo! 09:14, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:Wikia (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

This template was nominated for deletion nearly a year ago. That nomination used the rationale that it violated the external links guideline. While I think many of the posts made by the original nominator were valid, I think the larger issue is that this template is being used to promote a commercial enterprise that is not hosted under the Wikimedia Foundation. Wikipedia and Wikia are supposed to be separate. Wikipedia contains no advertising, thus it would innapropriate to advertise any wikis sponsored by Wikia. This template comes close to, if not actually becoming a quick and simple way of adding spam links to articles. WP:EL#Links normally to be avoided has been considerably expanded since the original nomination and I feel this also warrants reconsideration for deletion. Points to consider are:

2. Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research. Since any wiki linked to is invariably going to be fancruft based on primary sources and original research, this point applies to the template being inappropriate.

4. Links mainly intended to promote a website. Naturally, as Wikia is a commercial enterprise and linking to it is automatically free advertising.

12. Links to open wikis, except those with a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors. This is debatable, and was a point of contention in the previous nomination, but it is a valid point that very few Wikia wiki's have an active userbase.

Also see [1] and [2].

— Eleven Special (talk) 14:52, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

• Comment I agree that there is an obvious conflict-of-interest. And the template doesn't seem to get used very much - less than 1000 usages, by my count. But since it just does what one could write into an article anyway, it seems harmless. Just let it wither on the vine. Colonel Warden (talk) 17:47, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep, as long as links to Wikia are not blacklisted, I don't see anything wrong with having a template to link to the site. I think this is an acceptable external link template because Wikia is well-known and covers many subjects better than Wikipedia does — like on Wookieepedia, WoWWiki, Memory Alpha, Marvel Database Project, GuildWiki, and Muppet Wiki for example.
• Regarding the "points to consider", if links to sites that have factually inaccurate material are not allowed, then there shouldn't be any wikilinks on Wikipedia itself. There is no reason to believe the content on Wikia is any less reliable than the content on Wikipedia. People link to Wikia because certain editors refuse to allow certain information on Wikipedia — not as advertising for Wikia. Is it a.dvertising if a film article links to the Internet Movie Database? Wikia is part of the interwiki map and certain wikis on Wikia have a substantial number of editors so I don't think the criteria against open wikis applies.
• And I cannot take any nominator seriously if they use the word "fancruft". You complain about "fancruft" on Wikipedia and then when people are given an alternate outlet to put this "fancruft", you complain about that too. If editors didn't call certain information on Wikipedia "fancruft", perhaps there would be no need to go to Wikia to find it. --Pixelface (talk) 19:18, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • My point is, if the statement that Wikia Inc. and Wikipedia are not interelated, interdependent, connected companies is not a lie, then this template should not exist. Eleven Special (talk) 20:16, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
    • I wouldn't necessarily call them "interrelated, interdependent, connected companies", although I could be wrong. If there are Wikia employees adding {{wikia}} templates to articles, or say, trying to delete content off Wikipedia like Star Trek character articles or World of Warcraft character articles in order to drive traffic to Wikia — I think that would be a conflict of interest — but I've seen no evidence of that. Other editors should be able to link to the site, just like they can link to any number of commercial sites that are considered acceptable external links. If the template is deleted, people would still link to the site. Or do you want to disallow that too? --Pixelface (talk) 19:12, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep - I share the nominator's concern that these can be potentially misleading (if anyone sees one of them and assumes Wikia is officially related to Wikipedia, which it is not), but ultimately, they're just external link templates and are as acceptable as any other. I supported deletion of the previous Wikia template, which was considerably more obtrusive, and seemed to me to promote links to Wikia sites above all others; but these templates are much smaller and so don't seem so much like free advertising. As long as they stay that way, under the external links policy, they can be kept. Terraxos (talk) 02:37, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep - Wikia wikis provide lots of information on topics Wikipedia does not over (e.g. more detailed articles on characters, larger plot analysis, more in-universe stuff, etc.). Also, Wikia wikis are all licensed under free licenses. A lot of the content you won't find anywhere else because not all sites have such in-depth info that a wiki can handle. They are very useful. Also, very few Wikia wikis have "original research"; much of it is based on info directly from a TV show / video game, making it entirely true.--Whiteplan (talk) 16:47, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
  • This not a question of whether or not it's usefull, it's a question of whether or not it is appropriate to use Wikimedia Foundation resources and Wikipedia template-space to promote Jimbo and Angela's for profit enterprise. Eleven Special (talk) 17:12, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep This TfD isn't going to stop people from linking to Wikia. {{sww}}, linking to Wookiepedia, has 278 transclusions. WP:EL allows linking to open wikis that have "a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors". There is no conflict of interest here, since there are similar external link templates such as the Internet Movie Database ({{imdb title}}), Wikitravel and ({{Wikitravel}}), and Project Gutenberg ({{Gutenberg}}). If there is not going to be a change in linking to Wikia, then there might as well be a template to standardize links across Wikipedia. --Phirazo 01:48, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep - My narrow use of and encounters with this template lead to in-universe perspectives/info. that are inappropriate for Wikipedia (the Memory Alpha and Wookieepedia templates, specifically); there's no conflict of interest, but rather the linked material complements the real-world perspective Wikipedia's articles are supposed to present. If the nominator wants to delete specific templates that call upon this Wikia thing -- e.g. for the eemivfanencyclopedia at Wikia -- as not having a substantial editor base, then go for it. --EEMIV (talk) 04:30, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep Almost every single external link is going to expose the reader to something that Wikipedia doesn't agree with, so what? That's why it's called an external link, it's taking the reader away from Wikipedia per their will. Hopefully though the trade off is that the external link gives the reader more information about the subject that linked them there. In the case of a Wikia dedicated to a particular subject the chances of that are far greater than a normal external link which might not give more than a passing mention of what the reader was looking for. Any link to any site can be abused, removing all the links to a particular type of site wholesale is not the answer. That's about as smart as banning the ownership of firearms for everyone just because one dude in Omaha killed someone in cold blood. If a link is spam remove it, if it's not leave it. There's no catch all button for abuse of a legitimate template, there never will be. If you can't possibly keep up with it the hard way then you really can't complain. --AeronPrometheus (talk) 18:53, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep. Making it easier to format links to a particular external domain is not in itself endorsement of the site in question. Were it to be the case that Wikia in itself (as opposed to the rather more fuzzy "wikis which aren't stable or reliable") were to be considered an inappropriate site to link to then so be it, but that's not currently the case. The template isn't special-cased by making it float like the sistersites templates, either. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 19:14, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep. The issue can't be whether it's appropriate to use WP resources to promote a commercial site, as that would ban probably a majority of external links, including some that we can probably all agree to be useful and worth including (e.g. IMDB). Regardless, it's hardly a use of WMF's resources--it's a simple, unobtrusive text link (someone mentioned the previous template being fancier above, which was probably worth deleting). In the interest of promoting access for as many people to as much information as possible, I find it hard to support removing this template, and having personally found it useful, I support a keep vote. cluth (talk) 09:35, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep, and refusing to state the obvious reasons. Dorftrottel (bait) 19:30, April 16, 2008
• Keep - This is used in many articles, and very useful. There is no reason why it should be deleted. C Teng 02:33, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep Very Useful. --SkyWalker (talk) 05:37, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was keep Woohookitty^Woohoo! 09:16, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:Emmerdale episodes (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Since when do we need a template to list the episode count of a television series? The exact same text can just be placed in the one article that uses this template. Completely unnecessary.. Collectonian (talk) 14:51, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

• Comment As the template creator, I think it'd be a little bias of me to vote. However, we do have templates for the likes of Good article tracking and for versions of software (which are incremented when new versions are released). Templates for this do help to prevent the main article's history contained to actual content edits (as often these templates are updated daily), else you tend to get the bulk of article edits (of this kind) being just to update a single number. Bungle ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:07, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep It seems to be used solely to keep the infobox of the Emmerdale article up-to-date - possibly not the most useful thing but certainly not problematic. Having it in the article itself would result in a profusion of minor edits to the article which would create accountability issues for those watching the Emmerdale page. As such I think splitting is an appropriate use. Orderinchaos 16:56, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

How is that a problem? Do any other soap opera articles use a template? If it is a major problem, why aren't other series doing it, like Y&R which has nearly 9000 episodes and is also updated daily. As it is, in having this in the template, it is hiding edits to the article which means anyone who doesn't realize it is using a template will not be aware of changes. Collectonian (talk) 18:44, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

• Keep, it's a harmless infobox template for the Emmerdale article, about an ongoing soap opera with thousands of episodes. If some editor is not using edit summaries and just updating the number of episodes, it's a good idea to make the number of episodes a separate template instead of making editors examine the diffs on the main article. And I think the link to edit the template from the infobox is pretty slick. --Pixelface (talk) 18:21, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

This isn't a problem with other soap opera articles nor any other television series. I have quite a few still airing series on my watchlist. Its one blip a day to update the episode count. Not a huge deal. The use of a template in this way is hiding the edits being made to an article. I don't think that it is an appropriate use of a template. Anyone can change the episode count without any one who has the main article on their watch list being made aware. Indeed, this template is currently embroiled in an edit war that has made its way to AN/I. That sort of thing should be not be hidden.Collectonian (talk) 18:44, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was no consensus Woohookitty^Woohoo! 09:18, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:Outlaw Star (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Unnecessary template for typical series article with only two lists. Other two lists are for the writers of the manga, which aren't needed in the template at all and should be included in and wikified in all three articles. Series is complete with only 26 episodes and 3 manga volumes, so should not be expanding in number of articles. Collectonian (talk) 00:42, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

• Keep. It's neater than copying to all articles (DRY), and if everything is complete as you say, then it's not a maintenance burden either... --Gwern (contribs) 20:50 9 April 2008 (GMT)
• Delete - There's not enough there there to warrant a navigation temple. And as the nominator says, the links are already there in the articles. —Quasirandom (talk) 04:06, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep (as creator) - I think that grouping all the (admittedly few) related links into one place could be potentially helpful for anyone not wanting to scroll through all the text to find related articles - or those that missed the links when reading the article - and the template is more attractive/usable than a "See also" section. Whilst all the links are in the main article it would seem unlikely that all the links would naturally appear in some of the other articles incorporated into the template. Guest9999 (talk) 09:20, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Delete First, there are only three articles on the topic of Outlaw Star. Second, the manga author or the series musician who has worked on other projects should not be in the template. And finally, the three articles already interlink with each other rendering the nav template redundant and necessary. --Farix (Talk) 13:26, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Notable authors, creators and other related people are often included in templates for the work with which they are associated: J. K. Rowling is in Template:Harrypotter, Quentin Tarantino is in Template:Kill Bill, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant are in Template:Theofficeuk, Eiichiro Oda is in Template:One Piece general. Guest9999 (talk) 10:06, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.