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I'd like to propose a change in Wikipedia's policy.
Sometimes a new editor can put hours, and sometimes even days, into researching sources, checking for the sources' reliability, writing the main content of the article in the most professional way they know how, and tediously inputting the Wiki markup language so that everything falls into place, only to have their hard work deleted completely five days later because the entire article itself is something that Wikipedia isn't, instead of being transferred to the most appropriate wiki. This can discourage many authors, and may lead them to say "Ah, screw this. I don't care anymore." The last thing we want is to scare potential editors away.
My proposition is this: If a good faith article has obviously been worked hard on (signs include a large amount of content, plenty of sources, however unreliable, and professional style of writing), rather than just apparently thrown together in a matter of minutes (an hour at max), should never ever be completely deleted, but rather transwikied. This will ensure that the author's hard work does not go to waste, and will encourage them to continue their editing. Effortless articles can still be deleted, but deleting articles that the author went to great lengths to create will only encourage them to retire from editing.
Please discuss. Dstebbins ( talk) 15:49, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
There is a proposed new guideline at Wikipedia:Guide to image deletion gathering together image deletion processes currently spread through other pages. Please provide feedback if interested. Thank you. -- Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:01, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
I suggest modifying the proposed deletion section to require that some explanation be given for the removal of the PROD tag, especially in the case of an anonymous IP editor. Given the high rate of vandalism perpetrated by IP editors, there is no way to know whether they actually disagree with the deletion of the article or are simply vandalizing, or if they simply do not understand the process. It seems like a waste of the community's time and resources to go through an AFD on the basis of possible vandalism. It seems reasonable to require at least a basic explanation. Otto4711 ( talk) 08:05, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
Just checking, can article redirects be prodded? I have a fairly large number of questionable cross namespace redirects and the rate of 4 a day at RFD is getting a bit slow. MBisanz talk 16:53, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
I can't see the harm in allowing prods for redirects, the people who patrol the prod nominations would pick up any bad ones, and anyone who misses the prod and find the redirect deleted would be free to recreate it. Plus, when the prod expires, the admin does not HAVE to delete it, he can decline it. OK, so there would not be quite as much scrutiny as with an article, but then there's a lot let loss if some get deleted. Remember a prod is contestable at any point even after deletion.--
Scott MacDonald (
talk)
01:31, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
Are these votes on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Texas Railroad Museum (2nd nomination) valid? The nominator said there are no reliable sources, and I took a look and agreed. If it had been taken to DRV, the no consensus probably would have been upheld. If the votes are valid, how long does one need to wait? -- NE2 03:31, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
I hope the question is in ther right place: A friend of mine who had an academic position got an article written on him by a student of his. After a clear non-notability AfD discussion it was deleted, but the archived page is easily googled. My friend is a bit embarrased by this and prefers the whole story disappear, and blanking will just leave it on google. 2 questions: Is this grounds for a deletion request (it not a severe "emotional distress" case)? Second, assuming a no, is "courtesy blanking" (using Template:Afd-privacy) an act a friend can do, or am I ethically expected to ask a 3rd party to do it? DGtal ( talk) 21:10, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
I recently changed the policy to some disagree. I was reverted citing a "legal issue of copyright and libel". The thing is, Wikipedia has never been sued, and AFDs usually end quickly. On Wikipedia we err on the side of group consensus in major things like deletions. Speedy deletions are intended to be uncontroversial, and if they aren't, then clearly the libel or copyright is not so obvious.
An example is Simple Green. I helped to write this article and added a couple references. It was recently deleted, carte blanche, by [User talk:Akradecki]], an admin who seems to abuse speedy deletions to destroy articles, citing "copyvio" when in fact there is no copyright violation. A user disagreed with Akradecki, who directed that user to Deletion review, but the user said he was too tired/busy to write up the report. This is not uncommon.
The legal issue is bogus. A week, usually two days, is not going to matter in terms of legal liability. We need to err on the side of group consensus in deletions. II | ( t - c) 22:11, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
Of course, it's really up to the admin to decide what is "a fair bit". It's also up to the deleting admin whether or not to userfy, or which version to userfy. So the "regular users" are really left at nothing when they decide whether the article could be recovered, based on the past versions and history -- since the past versions and history aren't available. And when a user goes to appeal at deletion review, they appeal to a very small, busy audience, most likely with no experience with the article. If people at deletion review are lucky enough to be admins, so they can look at the article, they probably also have a bias for the "common practice" of deleting articles which have "a fair bit" of copyright violation. The admins will state their opinions that the article was "90%" copyright -- based on the one version they glanced at, most likely. Of course these statements cannot be verified by regular users. What an interesting process. II | ( t - c) 23:01, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
Can someone remind me whether deletion of a page automatically causes it to be removed from watchlists? If not, then it seems we can make a slight improvement to the process, by saying that when a deletion comes up for review, the page is temporarily recreated (and re-deleted) with an edit summary informing those watching it that a review is in progress. (And similarly for the AfD entry, so that those who are watching that are informed of the review as well.)-- Kotniski ( talk) 23:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
It's amazing how much discussion can pile up when you take a weekend off... I'm late to the discussion and don't have anything useful to add to the comments above about copyrights. But the rule for all other speedy-deletions is quite clear and has been since the speedy-deletion was first proposed. If a speedy-deletion is disputed in good-faith, the page is to be immediately restored and sent to discussion for the community's decision. This was an essential condition that the community placed upon the speedy-deletion process when it was first approved. That requirement has been often overlooked but never revoked.
Some notes about that requirement:
I hope that little tidbit of history helps. Rossami (talk) 02:36, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
Rossami, this change is not what I intended, but I can definitely see that my change could have been clearer. What I think the policy should say is that good faith requests for restoration of CSD's should almost always be honored without question, but that even apparently good faith requests for restoration of BLP/Copyvio/other important classes of deleted materials should be discussed. The deletion of those items may not be controversial in any sense (excluding the article author's desire to not have the article deleted), but the restoration may be. Contrast that with your average A7 band deletion, a restoration of which would probably never be controversial. I just wanted to make that clear without saying that requests to restore a G10/G11 page are bad faith requests. Thoughts? Protonk ( talk) 02:51, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
I know that it has been almost two years since I checked the deletion log statistics, but last time I looked we were doing about an order of magnitude more undeletions every day than we were even having cases filed at DRV (closer to two orders of magnitude more undeletions than DRV determined undeletions). What I've never known is what fraction of undeletions were of admins reversing their own deletion versus somebody elses. But I can guarantee you that most undeletions do not happen through DRV. GRBerry 21:00, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
In light of the discussion at WP:CLN it is apparent that lists and categories complement each other on Wikipedia, and are often used to do many of the same things. There is much overlap and duplication between them, and that's good. It is not good when deletion discussions involving them are not handled by the same people. Which is occuring now.
When somebody has a problem with a category they don't like, they come to category-for-deletion WP:CFD, because the criteria are not the the same as for articles (we also have separate deletion discussion boards as you see in WP:XFD, eight in all, for other things). However, when people want to delete a list article ( list of ships, List of trees, List of birds), which is essentialy the same thing as a category, but in list-form, they go to the article deletion discussion page, WP:AFD. That's not good, because the criteria for notable articles are not the same as those for list-articles. The latter only need a header paragraph to explain themselves (see WP:LIST), and then elements which are individually notable. As in List of birds. But other kinds of wiki-articles normally put up for deletion have more stringent notability requirements, and their verifiability methods are not of the same type (a list article many only have hyperlinked elements and nothing else).
All this produces very WP:LAME edit wars, as you see on the WP:DRV page. For example, List of bow tie wearers has been up for deletion 4 times, and has only survived by now having many, many in-article cites, which makes it look very much unlike List of birds. All that because nay-sayers demanded article criteria for what is essentially a category in list-form. You can see much the same type of problem with List of notable people who wore the bowler hat, which is now up for deletion review on WP:DRV on the grounds that some people are arguing that the existence of the list itself needs defending as a point of WP:V, when in fact, this is really a "what categories are natural?" discussion.
Comments? I'm going to repost this around on the several TALK pages which deal with this matter. S B H arris 01:25, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
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. |
Archive 10 | ← | Archive 15 | Archive 16 | Archive 17 | Archive 18 | Archive 19 | Archive 20 |
I'd like to propose a change in Wikipedia's policy.
Sometimes a new editor can put hours, and sometimes even days, into researching sources, checking for the sources' reliability, writing the main content of the article in the most professional way they know how, and tediously inputting the Wiki markup language so that everything falls into place, only to have their hard work deleted completely five days later because the entire article itself is something that Wikipedia isn't, instead of being transferred to the most appropriate wiki. This can discourage many authors, and may lead them to say "Ah, screw this. I don't care anymore." The last thing we want is to scare potential editors away.
My proposition is this: If a good faith article has obviously been worked hard on (signs include a large amount of content, plenty of sources, however unreliable, and professional style of writing), rather than just apparently thrown together in a matter of minutes (an hour at max), should never ever be completely deleted, but rather transwikied. This will ensure that the author's hard work does not go to waste, and will encourage them to continue their editing. Effortless articles can still be deleted, but deleting articles that the author went to great lengths to create will only encourage them to retire from editing.
Please discuss. Dstebbins ( talk) 15:49, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
There is a proposed new guideline at Wikipedia:Guide to image deletion gathering together image deletion processes currently spread through other pages. Please provide feedback if interested. Thank you. -- Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:01, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
I suggest modifying the proposed deletion section to require that some explanation be given for the removal of the PROD tag, especially in the case of an anonymous IP editor. Given the high rate of vandalism perpetrated by IP editors, there is no way to know whether they actually disagree with the deletion of the article or are simply vandalizing, or if they simply do not understand the process. It seems like a waste of the community's time and resources to go through an AFD on the basis of possible vandalism. It seems reasonable to require at least a basic explanation. Otto4711 ( talk) 08:05, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
Just checking, can article redirects be prodded? I have a fairly large number of questionable cross namespace redirects and the rate of 4 a day at RFD is getting a bit slow. MBisanz talk 16:53, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
I can't see the harm in allowing prods for redirects, the people who patrol the prod nominations would pick up any bad ones, and anyone who misses the prod and find the redirect deleted would be free to recreate it. Plus, when the prod expires, the admin does not HAVE to delete it, he can decline it. OK, so there would not be quite as much scrutiny as with an article, but then there's a lot let loss if some get deleted. Remember a prod is contestable at any point even after deletion.--
Scott MacDonald (
talk)
01:31, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
Are these votes on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Texas Railroad Museum (2nd nomination) valid? The nominator said there are no reliable sources, and I took a look and agreed. If it had been taken to DRV, the no consensus probably would have been upheld. If the votes are valid, how long does one need to wait? -- NE2 03:31, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
I hope the question is in ther right place: A friend of mine who had an academic position got an article written on him by a student of his. After a clear non-notability AfD discussion it was deleted, but the archived page is easily googled. My friend is a bit embarrased by this and prefers the whole story disappear, and blanking will just leave it on google. 2 questions: Is this grounds for a deletion request (it not a severe "emotional distress" case)? Second, assuming a no, is "courtesy blanking" (using Template:Afd-privacy) an act a friend can do, or am I ethically expected to ask a 3rd party to do it? DGtal ( talk) 21:10, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
I recently changed the policy to some disagree. I was reverted citing a "legal issue of copyright and libel". The thing is, Wikipedia has never been sued, and AFDs usually end quickly. On Wikipedia we err on the side of group consensus in major things like deletions. Speedy deletions are intended to be uncontroversial, and if they aren't, then clearly the libel or copyright is not so obvious.
An example is Simple Green. I helped to write this article and added a couple references. It was recently deleted, carte blanche, by [User talk:Akradecki]], an admin who seems to abuse speedy deletions to destroy articles, citing "copyvio" when in fact there is no copyright violation. A user disagreed with Akradecki, who directed that user to Deletion review, but the user said he was too tired/busy to write up the report. This is not uncommon.
The legal issue is bogus. A week, usually two days, is not going to matter in terms of legal liability. We need to err on the side of group consensus in deletions. II | ( t - c) 22:11, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
Of course, it's really up to the admin to decide what is "a fair bit". It's also up to the deleting admin whether or not to userfy, or which version to userfy. So the "regular users" are really left at nothing when they decide whether the article could be recovered, based on the past versions and history -- since the past versions and history aren't available. And when a user goes to appeal at deletion review, they appeal to a very small, busy audience, most likely with no experience with the article. If people at deletion review are lucky enough to be admins, so they can look at the article, they probably also have a bias for the "common practice" of deleting articles which have "a fair bit" of copyright violation. The admins will state their opinions that the article was "90%" copyright -- based on the one version they glanced at, most likely. Of course these statements cannot be verified by regular users. What an interesting process. II | ( t - c) 23:01, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
Can someone remind me whether deletion of a page automatically causes it to be removed from watchlists? If not, then it seems we can make a slight improvement to the process, by saying that when a deletion comes up for review, the page is temporarily recreated (and re-deleted) with an edit summary informing those watching it that a review is in progress. (And similarly for the AfD entry, so that those who are watching that are informed of the review as well.)-- Kotniski ( talk) 23:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
It's amazing how much discussion can pile up when you take a weekend off... I'm late to the discussion and don't have anything useful to add to the comments above about copyrights. But the rule for all other speedy-deletions is quite clear and has been since the speedy-deletion was first proposed. If a speedy-deletion is disputed in good-faith, the page is to be immediately restored and sent to discussion for the community's decision. This was an essential condition that the community placed upon the speedy-deletion process when it was first approved. That requirement has been often overlooked but never revoked.
Some notes about that requirement:
I hope that little tidbit of history helps. Rossami (talk) 02:36, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
Rossami, this change is not what I intended, but I can definitely see that my change could have been clearer. What I think the policy should say is that good faith requests for restoration of CSD's should almost always be honored without question, but that even apparently good faith requests for restoration of BLP/Copyvio/other important classes of deleted materials should be discussed. The deletion of those items may not be controversial in any sense (excluding the article author's desire to not have the article deleted), but the restoration may be. Contrast that with your average A7 band deletion, a restoration of which would probably never be controversial. I just wanted to make that clear without saying that requests to restore a G10/G11 page are bad faith requests. Thoughts? Protonk ( talk) 02:51, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
I know that it has been almost two years since I checked the deletion log statistics, but last time I looked we were doing about an order of magnitude more undeletions every day than we were even having cases filed at DRV (closer to two orders of magnitude more undeletions than DRV determined undeletions). What I've never known is what fraction of undeletions were of admins reversing their own deletion versus somebody elses. But I can guarantee you that most undeletions do not happen through DRV. GRBerry 21:00, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
In light of the discussion at WP:CLN it is apparent that lists and categories complement each other on Wikipedia, and are often used to do many of the same things. There is much overlap and duplication between them, and that's good. It is not good when deletion discussions involving them are not handled by the same people. Which is occuring now.
When somebody has a problem with a category they don't like, they come to category-for-deletion WP:CFD, because the criteria are not the the same as for articles (we also have separate deletion discussion boards as you see in WP:XFD, eight in all, for other things). However, when people want to delete a list article ( list of ships, List of trees, List of birds), which is essentialy the same thing as a category, but in list-form, they go to the article deletion discussion page, WP:AFD. That's not good, because the criteria for notable articles are not the same as those for list-articles. The latter only need a header paragraph to explain themselves (see WP:LIST), and then elements which are individually notable. As in List of birds. But other kinds of wiki-articles normally put up for deletion have more stringent notability requirements, and their verifiability methods are not of the same type (a list article many only have hyperlinked elements and nothing else).
All this produces very WP:LAME edit wars, as you see on the WP:DRV page. For example, List of bow tie wearers has been up for deletion 4 times, and has only survived by now having many, many in-article cites, which makes it look very much unlike List of birds. All that because nay-sayers demanded article criteria for what is essentially a category in list-form. You can see much the same type of problem with List of notable people who wore the bowler hat, which is now up for deletion review on WP:DRV on the grounds that some people are arguing that the existence of the list itself needs defending as a point of WP:V, when in fact, this is really a "what categories are natural?" discussion.
Comments? I'm going to repost this around on the several TALK pages which deal with this matter. S B H arris 01:25, 27 November 2008 (UTC)