Once upon a time, lots of people voted on wikipedia:votes for deletion by saying "delete, unencyclopedic". Then, one day, Oliver Pereira "started a campaign" to try and eliminate usage of the word, and encourage more specific (he would say, more meaningful) alternatives. Below is the archive of that discussion.
When describing material on Vfd, is the word "unencyclopedic" useful or useless? Contributors weigh in.
moved from VfD
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copied from User talk:Oliver Pereira
Re: "unencyclopedic". I rather like that term, and I believe I use it in the following (not necessarily distinct) non-tautological ways:
I suppose I could use the longer phrases...
Cheers, Cyan 03:37, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)
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Whilst I understand your concerns Oliver, I have no problem with "unencyclopedic" being given as the reason for listing a page. The aim is to give a brief description on why you are listing something here, not a 500 word essay on the meaning of unencyclopedic and how such a term may be applied to the article in question. Everyone knows what it means. If others wish to point out why something should be included, then they can do that, but 'unencyclopedic' is a great way of putting across what is wrong with an article in a single word, and possibly a more diplomatic way of saying what you really think of an article. As for Jake's comment on "the snooker player incident" – I fail to see what the problem is here. The whole point of VfD is that it prevents mistaken deletions taking place. It gives people a week to point out that in fact someone is famous. You can't expect all Wikipedians to be familiar with every sporting hero or otherwise 'famous' person. Rick hadn't heard of him - fair enough – it wasn't deleted, so what's the problem? It was perfectly valid for Rick to list the page here as at the time the 37 word 'article' gave no indication that this person was "encyclopedic". Angela 21:02, Sep 30, 2003 (UTC)
I don't see what the problem is with unencyclopædic. It is a perfectly straight-forward term with an obvious meaning - does this belong in an encyclopædia? The implicit questions raised by the term are:
The issue is perfectly clear and an obvious reference point for deciding what should and what should not be in an encyclopædia. FearÉIREANN 22:12, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
How about simply "unencyclopedic, reason why"? Best of both worlds :) Dysprosia 03:51, 1 Oct 2003 (UTC)
Yep, the best of the world of redundancy coupled with the best of the world of rational discourse. :) But still, even the best of the world of redundancy is still redundant, so best to leave it out, I think. Angela says, "The aim is to give a brief description on why you are listing something here," and I entirely agree. My point is that the word "unencyclopedic" is not such a description. It gives no further information than that already conveyed by the fact that something is being listed on Vfd in the first place: that it doesn't belong in an encyclopaedia. I think it is only courteous for people to say why they think that. After all, others might disagree, and they frequently do. What we should aim for is a consensus on what should and should not be deleted, and there is no hope of any consensus being formed if people won't even say what their problems with articles are. (Sorry for dragging this up again after a week, but I took a break from the Wikipedia, and I have to have my say!) -- Oliver P. 07:05, 8 Oct 2003 (UTC)
See also: User:Cyan/Unencyclopedic for Cyan's POV on the matter, and User talk:Cyan/Unencyclopedic for a related discussion between The Cunctator and Cyan
See also What Wikipedia is not
Once upon a time, lots of people voted on wikipedia:votes for deletion by saying "delete, unencyclopedic". Then, one day, Oliver Pereira "started a campaign" to try and eliminate usage of the word, and encourage more specific (he would say, more meaningful) alternatives. Below is the archive of that discussion.
When describing material on Vfd, is the word "unencyclopedic" useful or useless? Contributors weigh in.
moved from VfD
end of moved text
copied from User talk:Oliver Pereira
Re: "unencyclopedic". I rather like that term, and I believe I use it in the following (not necessarily distinct) non-tautological ways:
I suppose I could use the longer phrases...
Cheers, Cyan 03:37, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)
end of copied text
Whilst I understand your concerns Oliver, I have no problem with "unencyclopedic" being given as the reason for listing a page. The aim is to give a brief description on why you are listing something here, not a 500 word essay on the meaning of unencyclopedic and how such a term may be applied to the article in question. Everyone knows what it means. If others wish to point out why something should be included, then they can do that, but 'unencyclopedic' is a great way of putting across what is wrong with an article in a single word, and possibly a more diplomatic way of saying what you really think of an article. As for Jake's comment on "the snooker player incident" – I fail to see what the problem is here. The whole point of VfD is that it prevents mistaken deletions taking place. It gives people a week to point out that in fact someone is famous. You can't expect all Wikipedians to be familiar with every sporting hero or otherwise 'famous' person. Rick hadn't heard of him - fair enough – it wasn't deleted, so what's the problem? It was perfectly valid for Rick to list the page here as at the time the 37 word 'article' gave no indication that this person was "encyclopedic". Angela 21:02, Sep 30, 2003 (UTC)
I don't see what the problem is with unencyclopædic. It is a perfectly straight-forward term with an obvious meaning - does this belong in an encyclopædia? The implicit questions raised by the term are:
The issue is perfectly clear and an obvious reference point for deciding what should and what should not be in an encyclopædia. FearÉIREANN 22:12, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
How about simply "unencyclopedic, reason why"? Best of both worlds :) Dysprosia 03:51, 1 Oct 2003 (UTC)
Yep, the best of the world of redundancy coupled with the best of the world of rational discourse. :) But still, even the best of the world of redundancy is still redundant, so best to leave it out, I think. Angela says, "The aim is to give a brief description on why you are listing something here," and I entirely agree. My point is that the word "unencyclopedic" is not such a description. It gives no further information than that already conveyed by the fact that something is being listed on Vfd in the first place: that it doesn't belong in an encyclopaedia. I think it is only courteous for people to say why they think that. After all, others might disagree, and they frequently do. What we should aim for is a consensus on what should and should not be deleted, and there is no hope of any consensus being formed if people won't even say what their problems with articles are. (Sorry for dragging this up again after a week, but I took a break from the Wikipedia, and I have to have my say!) -- Oliver P. 07:05, 8 Oct 2003 (UTC)
See also: User:Cyan/Unencyclopedic for Cyan's POV on the matter, and User talk:Cyan/Unencyclopedic for a related discussion between The Cunctator and Cyan
See also What Wikipedia is not