Common End, Colkirk ( talk| | history| logs| links| watch) ( XfD| restore)

Requesting the outcome be changed from delete to merge (with the edit history retained). The consensus seemed to favor merging better than deleting. Sebwite ( talk) 19:37, 3 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• As the instructions on the deletion review page indicate, many issues can be resolved by asking the deleting/closing administrator for an explanation and/or to reconsider his/her decision. While not strictly mandatory, this should normally be done first. Did you try, and if not, was there some special reason? Stifle ( talk) 20:04, 3 July 2009 (UTC) reply
  • Endorse closure by default due to nominator's failure to respond to a reasonable query. Stifle ( talk) 20:38, 5 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• Overturn to no consensus. Two deletes, two keeps and four merges is not a delete consensus, and in the absence of socking, it's considerably outside admin discretion to interpret it as one. Sorry, Fritzpoll, but as I've said before at DRV: implement the consensus, and if you don't like the consensus, then !vote. Don't close.— S Marshall ^Talk/ _Cont 20:08, 3 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• Overturn to no consensus per that being the consensus. ChildofMidnight ( talk) 21:15, 3 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• Comment - my comment in the previous AfD in the log was that there wasn't anything to merge - that is still the case with this article. So closing to merge seemed pointless, as was commented on within the debate - as I have said to you before, S Marshall, I'm meant to read the arguments at AfD to judge the consensus action. The consensus is that the article shouldn't exist in its standalone form - per the multitude of merge comments, and the non-policy/guideline based arguments by those arguing for retention. If preferable, a redirect can be set up to the proposed merge target, which may better fit the consensus. If people want these closed on the basis of votes, they should change our various guidances for administrators in these situations, not try to overturn these principles via DRV. Fritzpoll ( talk) 11:39, 4 July 2009 (UTC) reply

  Additionally, as I have said repeatedly, I am a reasonable guy - I'm sure I could have solved this via discussion with the nominator rather than ending up here - but that's just a procedural/courtesy point Fritzpoll ( talk) 11:40, 4 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• "Merge" is a keep outcome. It seems very perverse, to me, to count a "merge" as a "delete".— S Marshall ^Talk/ _Cont 09:50, 5 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• It's an interesting question - I think of merge as meaning "we don't want this to be a standalone article". Now, normally, this means transplanting the material to a new article and redirecting from the old article, primarily for navigational and GFDL reasons. In this particular case, however, there was no material to be merged that required history attribution, since the article was simply a one sentence statement. So here, I simply deleted the article, on the basis of the merges intending "no standalone article" - what I should have done is to place a redirect there immediately as the final step of my "virtual merge". The effect would be the same, but would have been less controversial (with hindsight) - If I undeleted and simply redirected, thus completing the merge to the extent that it ever could be, would that be satisfactory? Or would it be ok simply to setup a new redirect at the current location, since there is no material to merge? Fritzpoll ( talk) 11:28, 5 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• I believe that such a redirect would not be ok, as it would fail the test of least astonishment. As you note, there was only one sentence in the article, and a factually incorrect one at that, meaning that there is no material to put in the target article, so you'd end up with the situation of having a redirect from Common End, Colkirk to Colkirk but with nothing in the article at which a reader would arrive to explain why they were there. ClickRick ( talk) 11:42, 5 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• I agree that merging is a problem. Personally, I agree that "merge" makes no sense at all as an outcome, but this isn't the place for that discussion; the AfD is finished and I don't see grounds to re-fight it. I do think the closing admin's role is to implement the consensus, and I don't see how a "delete" consensus emerges from that discussion. Therefore, my position (as I explained earlier) is that "no consensus" would be the correct outcome, and I'd just add that "no consensus" does not prevent an early re-listing that might result in a more intelligent consensus.— S Marshall ^Talk/ _Cont 16:00, 5 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• Comment (as the proposer of the AfD): there was no edit history to speak of. Specifically, there was the creator of the article (who unsurprisingly voted Keep in the AfD on the basis of WP:ITEXISTS) and me, when I had added an infobox as one step towards adding something notable to the article about the place. ClickRick ( talk) 13:49, 4 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• Endorse. S.Marshall is right when he says "Two deletes, two keeps and four merges is not a delete consensus". Indeed it isn't. What it is is a vote count. In particular it's a flawed vote count because a) it takes no account of the opening argument, b) it ignores the fact that the two Keeps are on the same WP:ITEXISTS "argument", and c) all but one of the Merges were given without any indication that the contributor had even looked at the article in question, and none had given any indication as to what single notable sentence could possibly go into the target article. The closing admin made a decision, and while it would be presumptuous of me to say exactly what basis that decision was made on it appears that the strengths of the various arguments were taken into account rather than simply counting votes. Which is exactly as it should be. ClickRick ( talk) 23:15, 6 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• Weak endorse; would have fully endorsed "redirect, history available for merging"; disagree with no consensus due to clear consensus against a standalone article. I understand and agree with Fritzpoll's reasoning process, but I'm not 100% comfortable with the last step from redirect to delete, although requiring WP:RFD is excessive. Comparing this to the adjacent WP:Articles for deletion/Common End, Fulmodeston, the major difference (Thryduulf's recommendation, keep versus redirect) is insufficient to turn the outcome. Flatscan ( talk) 04:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply
  • Recall that merge !votes count against deletion, since merge can be accomplished by normal editing actions. Hence the vote count consensus is against deletion, but there is no vote count consensus at the AfD about what to do with the article. — Charles Stewart (talk) 08:29, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply
    • I am aware that merge recommendations are sometimes counted as keeps since they require that the page history be kept. I favor recognizing a distinction based on whether a standalone article remains, and I find Fritzpoll's reasoning to be more compelling here. Flatscan ( talk) 04:30, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• Overturn: consensus against deletion, no consensus for action to take — Per Rividian's essay, Wikipedia:Notability (geography):Populated, legally-recognized places are, by a very large consensus, considered notable, even if the population is very low.; this essay has been influential in many AfDs. My preference would be for merge into Colkirk. — Charles Stewart (talk) 08:29, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply
  • Note 1: those arguments risk turning into a re-run of the AfD, which is not the point of a DRV.
  • Note 2: the place in question consists of 7 houses and is, as far as I can determine from the Royal Mail website, a road.
  • Note 3: the place in question is smaller than a census unit (in this case, the civil parish of Colkirk in which it appears to be is the smallest unit of population for which census data is published). Rividian's essay would class this place as "Populated places without legal recognition".
  • Note 4: you're saying to merge but can you find even as much as a single worthy sentence to insert into Colkirk beyond stating that WP:ITEXISTS??
  • ClickRick ( talk) 08:47, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply
    • I'm not saying to merge, I'm saying there's no consensus about which action to take. I'm not an admin, I make no judgements about the contents of an article which I can't see, but only about the relationship of the AfD discussion to the close, and the arguments made in this DRV. IMO, the merge arguments were strongest: the delete case you are making here is better grounded than the one you made at the AfD, but, as you say, DRV is not AfD part 2. The issue against a merge is that you don't think the redirect would be worthwhile. Is that an issue for you? — Charles Stewart (talk) 10:59, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply
      • Helpful hint: In the heading of this page, where there are all the links underneath the title of the article under DRV, you will see a link that says "cache". Clicking that link will show you the contents of the article at the time of deletion Fritzpoll ( talk) 11:01, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply
        • Indeed it is helpful, thankyou. When I used to be active on DRV, back in 20005, Google cache generally was useless. — Charles Stewart (talk) 07:59, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply
      • To Charles: As I said to S.Marshall above, a redirect would fail the test of least astonishment unless someone can come up with even a single worthy sentence to put into the target article, and no-one in the AfD and no-one in this DRV has done that. — ClickRick ( talk) 11:16, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply
        • • I think we can find enough content to justify nontrivial Common End content at the Falkirk article, though Isee now that the original article was quite worthless, contentwise. — Charles Stewart (talk) 07:59, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply
            • Falkirk Colkirk. ClickRick ( talk) 08:29, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply
              • Err, quite. Fixed below. — Charles Stewart (talk) 09:35, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• Endorse Closing admins are invited to consider more than the mere vote count, which explains, as S.Marshall will recall, why we changed the terminology from VfD to AfD. It is regrettable indeed that editors are still bean counting rather than considering the reasons provided for closing a debate which, in this case, are perfectly reasonable and in process. Eusebeus ( talk) 13:26, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• I'm afraid I still don't understand how closing in disregard of the consensus is "in process". Perhaps you could enlighten me on this point?— S Marshall ^Talk/ _Cont 21:17, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• I suspect that we are all at odds on the definition of consensus. I follow the guidance at the deletion guideline for admins page, which tells me, broadly speaking to assess argument rather than count heads. I know from your participation here and your recent RfA that you aren't happy with this - the reasons you have for this are reasonable, but I think that you need to set up the RfC that you promised in an earlier DRV of mine, otherwise we're going to do this again and again :) I admit that there seems to be a split, and a perception that admins are substituting their opinion for the community's (rightly or wrongly), but DRV is not a place where you're going to settle it. This comment has no bearing on this DRV, per se, so if you want to discuss this with me on my talkpage, you are most welcome - I wouldn't mind the philosophical discussion, and you may even convince me. Fritzpoll ( talk) 21:38, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• I'm reluctant to set up that RFC at a time when it would seem to be about a particular issue or a particular admin, for reasons I think you'll acknowledge. Trouble is, I'm too active at DRV.  :)

  Very happy to take the rest of it to your talk page, Fritzpoll, and thanks for the invitation.— S Marshall ^Talk/ _Cont 21:47, 7 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• Proposal — I'd be happy with the DRV to keep the article deleted —even though I continue to think that the AfD was badly closed, failing to take proper account of the merge opinions— provided there is no prejudice about creating a redirect once adequate coverage of Common End exists at the Falkirk Colkirk article. Is this an acceptable compromise for everybody? — Charles Stewart (talk) 07:59, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply

• I don't think that's a problem, as it wouldn't be the same article - you can make a redirect now if you really wanted to :) Fritzpoll ( talk) 08:07, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply
• As long as you meant Colkirk and not Falkirk. I've said all along that it was simply the lack of anything notable to say about Common End which prompted the AfD in the first place, so if anything is found to warrant inclusion in WP in accordance with WP policies then I'd be happy to see it added, either as a section in Colkirk (with a redirect) or, if there is enough material to warrant it, its own article. ClickRick ( talk) 08:29, 8 July 2009 (UTC) reply