List of This Morning presenters and reporters ( talk| | history| logs| links| watch) ( XfD| restore)

This was proposed for merging into This Morning (TV programme)#Presenters, but the article was deleted anyway. Per WP:MAD, the page should have been redirected rather than deleted. GeoffreyT2000 ( talk) 03:41, 5 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• Closer's comment: This was not previously discussed with me. The AfD nominator, Corkythehornetfan, wrote: " I've tried merging before, but it doesn't work. This is why I nominated if for deletion. ... It's either delete (which is what I'd like to see happen), or protect the page " This is why I understood this to be a nomination for deletion, not merging. Because nobody opposed the deletion request, I granted it. If there are substantial new reasons for keeping the article (such as sources showing notability of this particular topic), I'm not opposed to somebody else restoring the article. Sandstein 07:23, 5 February 2019 (UTC) reply
• Undelete. There was no rationale to delete. There was a request to protect the redirect. However, AfD is not articles for discussion, or proposals to merge, or requests for page protection. That was not a valid AfD. It should have been speedily closed. There was a recent discussion in this at Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_deletion#Has_AFD_become_"Articles_for_Discussion"_?. — SmokeyJoe ( talk) 12:50, 5 February 2019 (UTC) reply
• Meh. This was a redirect long ago ( deleted revision here) which got overwritten. I've gone ahead and re-created the redirect, and protected the page. If people want to continue to dissect the AfD close, you can do that, but this seems like the obvious endpoint, so I'm saving some time. -- RoySmith (talk) 17:27, 5 February 2019 (UTC) reply

PS, I have no strong opinion on whether the remaining history should be restored under the redirect I created. Given that there's no strong reason to delete it ( WP:BLP, WP:COPYVIO, etc), I have no objection to it being restored, but neither can I get too excited about it if it's not. -- RoySmith (talk) 23:20, 10 February 2019 (UTC) reply

People in control of the process (i.e. admins) are not too worried about the details of the process being adhered to? This goes to the old question: Is Wikipedia a community run project, or an Administrator run project? -- SmokeyJoe ( talk) 23:58, 10 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• Does anyone actually want to merge some more content from the deleted page? If so I don't see any harm in restoring the edit history, if not then there's nothing to discuss. The AfD participants did outline reasons for the deletion of the article instead of a merge, so I don't see anything wrong with the close. Hut 8.5 22:30, 5 February 2019 (UTC) reply
  • "The AfD participants did outline reasons for the deletion"? Did they? Corkythehornetfan 08:13, 21 July 2016 (UTC) said "I suggest this article 'be merged into ...". Noyster, 12:18, 7 August 2016 (UTC) said "Looks to me like a merge proposal..." Corkythehornetfan 04:53, 10 August 2016 (UTC) said "@Noyster: I've tried merging before, but it doesn't work. This is why I nominated if for deletion." This is a rationale for semiprotection, and Corky has jumped to deletion without justification. I read zero rationales supporting deletion versus redirection with semiprotection. I read repeated reference to "merge" which demands careful consideration of WP:MAD before deleting any history. I think the history should be undeleted as a cautious precaution, and I think that AfD nominations that open with "I suggest this article 'be merged" should be speedy closed as not a deletion nomination, after noting that the rest of the nomination doesn't contain a deletion rationale. -- SmokeyJoe ( talk) 03:34, 6 February 2019 (UTC) reply
    • I was referring to the statement by the nominator that the content is already present in prose form at the target, which would mean there wasn't anything useful to merge. That statement isn't entirely true, as the deleted page also included a comprehensive list of everybody who has ever presented the programme (even briefly), as well as every reporter the programme has ever had, but I suspect that information wasn't considered worth retaining. The page consisted almost entirely of names and dates and there won't be any attribution issues. Unless you think that further information should be merged, or the page should continue to exist as a standalone article, then this discussion is entirely academic and there's no need to have it. Hut 8.5 07:50, 6 February 2019 (UTC) reply
      • I think that the information and attribution requirements probably aren’t important, but more important is that there was no good reason to delete. Deleting everything for which there is no need to have it is not a viable way to run AfD. There was no reason to delete, there was no consensus to delete, so don’t delete. — SmokeyJoe ( talk) 10:37, 6 February 2019 (UTC) reply
• Restore the article's history under a redirect to This Morning (TV programme)#Presenters. No compelling reason (such as copyright violation or BLP violation) was advanced in the AfD about why the article should have been deleted instead of redirected with the history preserved under the redirect per WP:PRESERVE. Hut 8.5 notes that "the deleted page also included a comprehensive list of everybody who has ever presented the programme (even briefly), as well as every reporter the programme has ever had". This is useful information for editors interested in contributing to topics related to This Morning (TV programme). These editors can use the material for a selective merge to This Morning (TV programme)#Presenters or to contribute to articles of people affiliated with This Morning. Absent a compelling reason to delete the article's history, it should be retained so that non-admin editors have access to the material. I agree with SmokeyJoe, "There was no reason to delete, there was no consensus to delete, so don’t delete."

  Cunard ( talk) 04:42, 10 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• The reason there was no consensus to delete is that neither of the AfD participants advanced a policy-based argument for deletion.

  The AfD nominator wrote, "The only people who edit this page are the I.P.s and they seem to not be able to abide by Wikipedia's guidelines". This is a WP:VAGUEWAVE to WP:NOTTVGUIDE that fails to explain how the list violates that policy or how the IPs' edits are violating that policy. Even if the IPs' edits were violating policy, that would still not be a policy-based argument for deletion.

  The AfD nominator wrote, "There is no sense in having this article when it's already in a different style format at the parent article". This does not explain why deletion is preferable to merging.

  The AfD participant wrote, "The redirection was announced on the article talk page and no-one stepped up to object or discuss, they just kept on reverting the redirect - so support delete". This does not explain what policy or guideline the article is violating. This is not a policy-based argument for deletion either.

  In the absence of a consensus to delete owing to a lack of policy-based arguments from any of the AfD participants, a close as WP:SOFTDELETE, "no consensus", or a redirect to This Morning (TV programme)#Presenters would have been preferable to "delete".

  Cunard ( talk) 02:11, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• I respectfully disagree with my friends SmokeyJoe and Cunard on this point. When I look at that AfD, what I see is that there were two participants (Corkythehornetfan and Noyster), who discussed the matter and then unanimously agreed to delete. It seems a bit hard on Sandstein to say that there was "no consensus to delete". In the circumstances, I feel it would have been administrative overreach not to delete.

  The reason to delete was frustration with the difficulty of maintaining the list, which isn't something we normally give much weight to, so I can see the case for reversing the outcome (although I'm leery of the word "overturn" in this case because it contains implied criticism of the closer that I feel is inappropriate).

  This Morning is a completely vapid, vacuous piece of daytime TV fluff that's of very little importance and I can't imagine why an encyclopaedist would want to work on this considering how many serious and important topics still don't have articles, but if someone really has nothing better to do with their time than to work on it, then we should of course permit creation of a list (which could reasonably be semi-protected from the outset).

  I can't see any procedural reason to undelete the history. A list of This Morning personnel doesn't contain enough creativity to be copyrightable and anything that isn't such a list doesn't belong on the page.— S Marshall T/ C 00:34, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• S'pose. The end all bold bit is a bit hard to follow. Did User:Noyster check the history and affirm that there were no attribution requirements. A temp undelete to allow User:Northamerica1000 to check for this fair concern seems pretty easy. -- SmokeyJoe ( talk) 01:23, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• Nb. I only performed deletion sorting and relisting for the AfD discussion. I did not contribute to the discussion itself. I may not become involved in this matter. Perhaps you meant to ping a different user? North America ¹⁰⁰⁰ 02:07, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• Sorry User:Northamerica1000, I meant User:GeoffreyT2000, the nominator of this DRV who raised the valid issue. — SmokeyJoe ( talk) 02:59, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• That is a good point. The AfD nominator wrote, "I've tried merging before, but it doesn't work. This is why I nominated if for deletion." That a merge previously happened is a procedural reason the article's history should be retained to comply with Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia#Attribution is required for copyright.

  Cunard ( talk) 02:11, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• Hi S Marshall. It is good to see you back at WP:DRV as I haven't seen your thoughtful comments here in a while. I have expanded my statement above about why I find "no consensus" in the AfD. Putting aside procedural issues, the question I ask is: Does restoring the history under a protected redirect benefit or harm Wikipedia? No one has explained how there is a harm. There is a clear benefit: respecting a reasonable request from a good faith established editor, GeoffreyT2000, who thinks there is value in retaining the revisions and history. If DRV refuses to restore the history, GeoffreyT2000 is denied the opportunity to review and possibly reuse the content as he sees fit.

  Cunard ( talk) 02:11, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply

• Is this moot? A light but unopposed delete, the redirect has been restored, am I missing something or are we done here? SportingFlyer T· C 07:24, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply
  • Yes, SportingFlyer, you have missed that this is about the deleted history behind the redirect. Was it used? Could it be used? Did the authors of the redirect target read the deleted article and then continue to edit the target article? — SmokeyJoe ( talk) 22:00, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply
    • But this was not a merge request, in spite of the awkward article nomination. I don't see any problem here, but I also don't understand the motivations for taking this to DRV in the first place. If the nominator is looking for the history of the article, I think granting access would be reasonable. SportingFlyer T· C 22:20, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply
      • I read it as a request to enforce a merge, or a smerge, and maybe just a request to endorse a redirect. Awkward nomination, yes. I agree that access to the history should be allowed. I suspect it would have been given with a polite request, or a WP:REFUND request. I support undeletion of the history, with semi-protection of the redirect to satisfy the underlying problem. The gist of the close is certainly correct. -- SmokeyJoe ( talk) 23:47, 11 February 2019 (UTC) reply