Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion
Read this before proposing new or expanded criteria
Contributors frequently propose new (or expansions of existing) criteria for speedy deletion. Please bear in mind that CSD criteria require careful wording, and in particular, need to be
If you do have a proposal that you believe passes these guidelines, please feel free to propose it on this discussion page. Be prepared to offer evidence of these points and to refine your criterion if necessary. Consider explaining how it meets these criteria when you propose it. Do not, on the other hand, add it unilaterally to the CSD page. |
Celebrity Cricket League and G4
Reason G4 is being used to repeatedly delete articles about the 'Celebrity Cricket League', which is into its second season at various locations around India. This seems a bit bizarre and technically incorrect. I'm wondering how to resolve the situation. The original AfD discussion took place in June 2011, when the League was a new thing. An article named 'Celebrity Cricket League 2012' was deleted after a second AfD on 14 January 2012.
I put an article called 'Celebrity Cricket League' through AfC last week. There is plenty of news coverage about the event, it evidently passed WP:GNG. I was surprised when it was deleted on 22 January for reason G4. Surely we're not saying because something was not notable in June 2011 it can never be notable? Is there an appeal process? Sionk (talk) 16:52, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
- Do you think there is anything new here in this article that wasn't in there at the AfD? It appears the article was deleted because the subject wasn't notable enough—is there evidence that it is notable that wasn't in the article before the AfD or at the AfD itself? If not, I don't see why G4 doesn't apply. Yes there is an appeal process: deletion review. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 06:13, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
Content forks created to evade protected pages
Yesterday, I speedy deleted a content fork article that was blatantly created to evade protection on an article under an edit dispute. This scenario seems to be not explicitly addressed on CSD, so I cited WP:IAR/CSD G3 instead. I know this case may seen rare, but should we add a new rule for this, or this seems too instruction creep?
- G13. Content forks blatantly created to evade protected pages under editing disputes.
Note that this suggestion would be under the "General" section instead of the "Article" section of CSD because editing disputes and full protection also happens on templates, portals, and other namespaces. Thanks. Zzyzx11 (talk) 18:57, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
- I don't see any IAR here. Blatantly creating a fork to evade a protection and thus dispute resolution sounds like a clear-cut case of vandalism to me, so G3 already covers that imho. Regards SoWhy 19:20, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
- Most of the time, content forks can be deleted under A10, IMO. I suspect that cases outside the article namespace are rare. - Eureka Lott 19:27, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
I would imagine the titles of most of these would be sufficiently similar that redirection and protection would be a plausible alternate to deletion. In the cases where deletion must occur, it would probably be covered by the existing CSDs anyway. —Scott5114↗ [EXACT CHANGE ONLY] 02:46, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Agreed with the above, content forks are redirected and protected as standard procedure. No need for a new CSD. Jclemens (talk) 04:15, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- A content fork that is "blatantly created to evade" a Wikipedia policy is already speedy-deletable under criterion G3 (vandalism), though a redirect back to the original article is often the better solution. Regardless, there is no need for a new criterion. Rossami (talk) 18:30, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
Speedy delete for redirects to pages that don't cover the topic
These are pretty common and a total pain - the option is to go through the process of creating an article, or the whole deletion rigmarole. Proposal allow speedy deletion when article redirected to contains no (or very limited) coverage of the topic being redirected. A red link is better.
An examples included http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alusuisse&oldid=223495873 , http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=GE_Jenbacher&oldid=289055786 - they redirected to pages that tell nothing about 100+ year old companies (now fixed), also see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lawson_Mardon_Group&action=historysubmit&diff=476480632&oldid=275489130 - the only clue to why it was created is in the edit summary - these are complete unhelpful, and a facility should exist for speedy deletion.
eg "R4 - redirect to article with no relevant content, and no significant content in page history" (ie never had any text in it)
would someone help with this . thanks.Mddkpp (talk) 17:41, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- The problem with that is, sometimes a term is well-known enough that it would make a plausible search term but does not meet Wikipedia's notability or verifiability guidelines to make it onto the target page. Also, "no (or very limited) coverage" is an overly broad definition. Articles on non-notable songs are regularly redirected to the article on the album, even if the album article only mentions the song once in a track listing. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 18:27, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- I'm not talking about non-notability issues - what I'm talking about is people who create redirects to articles that don't cover the subject. eg see Lawson_Mardon_Group - it's not even in the text on the target page/
- The example of say a redirect from a song on an album to a page on the album that contains a track listing is a valid redirect as far as I'm concerned - that helps people when the search - as you know.
- It's crap like Lawson_Mardon_Group I want to get rid off not useful stuff.Mddkpp (talk) 19:53, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- No, this should not be a speedy. Redirects that are not obvious to an outsider, or even not mentioned on the target page, still may be of value to readers. A discussion is the more appropriate venue to hash out why that redirect exists, what utility it might serve, etc. Jclemens (talk) 21:22, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- In addition to what Jclemens said, the target page may have a history that would need to analyzed to determine what is limited, hardly easy to define. Not sure if you are actually familiar with WP:RFD, that page also contains useful considerations about whether or not to delete a redirect.-Tikiwont (talk) 21:29, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Another possible issue could relate to removal of relevant info from the article via vandalism. For example someone once removed a section about the fictional character Danzo Shimura from the Naruto Character list and it was not detected for nine months. He was mentioned in a few other sections but if for example he was not someone could mistakenly delete the Danzo redirect thinking that it had no relevance to the list. A few years back there was also a removal of the section of another character from the series Neji Hyuga and that could have created problems for Neji which at that time was a redirect to the chaacters section on the list.--70.24.208.34 (talk) 02:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
- In addition to what Jclemens said, the target page may have a history that would need to analyzed to determine what is limited, hardly easy to define. Not sure if you are actually familiar with WP:RFD, that page also contains useful considerations about whether or not to delete a redirect.-Tikiwont (talk) 21:29, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- No, this should not be a speedy. Redirects that are not obvious to an outsider, or even not mentioned on the target page, still may be of value to readers. A discussion is the more appropriate venue to hash out why that redirect exists, what utility it might serve, etc. Jclemens (talk) 21:22, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
Proposal to prevent SEO spamming of Wikipedia
You should add that user pages which are excessively linked to by blogs and appear to exist solely to be used for search engine spamming in user talk space such as this page should be treated as WP:BLP issues and deleted on that basis [1]. Many SEO groups who promote deragatory content can and do use wikipedia user pages which are not normally visible to search engines and can link to them through SEO. Any user talk page which appears in googles listing should be treated as BLP and deleted to protect the user and wikipedia, and to prevent misuse of the site for spamdexing. This page has 181 links from external sources whose sole purpose is to promote derogatory content and is exposing an innocent user of wikipedia by promoting this page above even facebook entries. 69.171.160.168 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 16:51, 16 February 2012 (UTC).
- Please clarify what are you talking about. The example you cite (User talk:Werdna) has a normal and legitimate number of inbound and outbound links. I find none promoting obviously derogatory content or affecting this user. [2]
Note: Even if there were illicit inbound links from outside Wikipedia, that would not be a reason to delete a Wikipedia page. There is nothing stopping malicious users from linking to your (or my) page either. Deleting the target page punishes the victim, not the troublemaker. If a user did feel so affected, however, he/she can request help - there is no need for a new CSD criterion. Rossami (talk) 18:27, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
- This is (see ANI) almost certainly a sock of Jeffrey Vernon Merkey. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 19:24, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
Does an aticle have to be tagged to be deleted?
Hi there, new admin here, probably a stupid question - does an article have to have been tagged as a CSD candidate before being deleted, or can I delete ones I come across if they meet the criteria? GiantSnowman 14:14, 17 February 2012 (UTC)
- You may speedy-delete an article that clearly meets the CSD criterion but, especially as a new admin, it is often a very good idea to tag it and let a second person verify and confirm your tagging. Patently obvious vandalism should be immediately deleted but some of the other cases are ... not so clear all the time. Rossami (talk) 14:24, 17 February 2012 (UTC)
- Just as I thought, thanks - the only ones I've done so far have been deleting recreated articles created by a blocked user who is now creating sockpuupets. I will tag any I see until I get more confident. Thanks, GiantSnowman 14:26, 17 February 2012 (UTC)
- No one would object if you zapped a copyvio on sight either, but otherwise what Rossami says. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 14:30, 17 February 2012 (UTC)
- Rossami is correct. If you are sure it should be deleted, do it but leave the user who created the page a message explaining why you did it. If you are not sure, tag it and notify the user instead. Regards SoWhy 17:50, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Meanwhile, if you do delete without a prior tagging (or where the user was never warned by the tagger, or were warned but you delete on a different basis) be aware of the
(BASIS)-deletion-warn
, warning series. See Wikipedia:Template messages/User talk namespace#deletions. Cheers.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 18:35, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
New proposal - lack of inline referencing
Lack of inline referencing is a bit of a proxy indication of whether an article is speedily deleted. There are exceptions of course, such as new disambiguation pages. At present we keep unreferenced articles, except for BLPs which go off to become a BLPPROD. I would like to see a harder line taken on all articles that need references. The onus should be on the article creator to supply sources otherwise we will carry on with keeping unsourced articles cluttering up maintenance pages and dragging the quality of WP down - not to mention the time wasted by editors in fixing it all up.
I would like to propose a new criteria whereby if any new(update) article does not have any inline referencing it can be deleted.
I am surprised that WP decided on the BLPPROD procedure after the Seigenthaler incident rather than creating the speedy deletion criteria that I am proposing. We have to be especially vigilant with BLPs. They are common new pages and if not referenced the contents is harder to verify. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 23:41, 17 February 2012 (UTC)
- This has been proposed often before and always rejected. There is no requirement in policy that articles must have inline references - they are only required for quotes and things that are challenged or likely to be challenged. So, since there is not even a rule that inline references must be included, it would be strange to delete articles for not following that nonexistent rule. — Carl (CBM · talk) 00:00, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Yeah, this is entirely a non-starter for the reason listed immediately above. Jclemens (talk) 00:02, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Ok what about any sort of reference? -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 00:05, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- No references but benign -> BLPPROD. Contentious/negative without impeccable references -> G10. No references, benign, without any assertion of importance -> A7. Blatantly promotional -> G11. What else is really needed there? Jclemens (talk) 00:09, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- No references. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 00:28, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- You can PROD it. →Στc. 00:33, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Then it gets removed, it goes to AfD as a contested PROD, and then it gets deleted. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 06:50, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- And the problem with this is...? Jclemens (talk) 06:54, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- A waste of time, the quality of new articles remains low, and the reputation of WP suffers. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 06:59, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- So are you suggesting that articles that start out like this or a large number of the pages listed here should be speedily deleted? →Στc. 07:16, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- For the first example that you give: yes, and for the second: no. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 07:29, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Could you explain why? This has no references. Wouldn't it fall under the criterion you proposed, or is that article only a false positive? →Στc. 07:47, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I only checked some of the links on the template that you gave as an example. The ones that I checked had refs. Mari Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic has no refs so it should be deleted. Alternatively it could be sent out of article namespace to user or project namespace. Obviously it is an article that WP should have but it needs refs. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 08:01, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- It's an article WP should have, and you want to delete it. →Στc. 21:27, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Don't twist your words or my words. What WP "should" have is up to the WP community. I believe that WP should have articles on notable topics (and therefore verifiable with sources). -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 22:36, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- It's an article WP should have, and you want to delete it. →Στc. 21:27, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I only checked some of the links on the template that you gave as an example. The ones that I checked had refs. Mari Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic has no refs so it should be deleted. Alternatively it could be sent out of article namespace to user or project namespace. Obviously it is an article that WP should have but it needs refs. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 08:01, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Could you explain why? This has no references. Wouldn't it fall under the criterion you proposed, or is that article only a false positive? →Στc. 07:47, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- For the first example that you give: yes, and for the second: no. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 07:29, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- So are you suggesting that articles that start out like this or a large number of the pages listed here should be speedily deleted? →Στc. 07:16, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- A waste of time, the quality of new articles remains low, and the reputation of WP suffers. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 06:59, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- And the problem with this is...? Jclemens (talk) 06:54, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Then it gets removed, it goes to AfD as a contested PROD, and then it gets deleted. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 06:50, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- You can PROD it. →Στc. 00:33, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- No references. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 00:28, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- No references but benign -> BLPPROD. Contentious/negative without impeccable references -> G10. No references, benign, without any assertion of importance -> A7. Blatantly promotional -> G11. What else is really needed there? Jclemens (talk) 00:09, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Ok what about any sort of reference? -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 00:05, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I've noticed that the people who prod and speedy can't tell parenthetical or within text, "As Johnson says in his Dictionary...;" and have great trouble with general references already; resulting in inappropriate and rude deletions. I wouldn't trust them with carte blanche. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:38, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- This is a very bad idea for many reasons. At the top of this page are several general principles that all speedy deletion criteria should meet, one of which is that everything (or almost everything) that can be deleted under the criterion should be deleted. That isn't the case here: an article which is sent to AfD lacking sources is not going to be deleted for that reason if someone can find a source. There is no policy or guideline which specifies that articles lacking sources should be deleted. If the article cannot be sourced that's a different matter, but the question of whether sources exist on a certain topic is too subjective for speedy deletion. We only bypass this principle in the case of BLP PROD because many editors believe those articles are actually harmful, that's not the case here. I should also point out that this proposal would result in the more-or-less immediate deletion of 230,000 articles, the vast majority of which are encyclopedic. (For comparison we only deleted about 260,000 articles in the whole of 2011 and the most frequently used deletion reason accounted for about 70,000 of them.) Hut 8.5 11:48, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I only meant the proposal to apply to new articles in the same way as BLPPROD. The existence of the 230,000 unreffed articles is another reason for my proposal. Note that some of them date back to 2006 and every subsequent month adds another couple of thousand articles. The rationale of my proposal is to avoid the waste of time with PRODs and AfDs. We should make the article creator responsible for supplying refs. Editors are busy enough running around fixing up stuff that is already on WP without having to sort out the daily flood of new articles. I could paraphrase Thomas Watson of IBM and say "I don't think there is a need for more than 4 million articles on WP".joke -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 19:51, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- AfDs and PRODs are not a "waste of time" in this case. This proposal would make sense if being unsourced was a reason for deleting something and AfDs of unsourced articles always resulted in deletion. However being unsourced isn't a reason for deleting something and these AfDs do not always result in deletion. Deletion is for problems which cannot be fixed at all or which would require a complete rewrite to fix. Being unsourced is in the vast majority of cases a fixable problem and in any case we don't delete articles with fixable problems just because no-one has bothered to fix them yet. Hut 8.5 21:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I did not imply that PRODs and AfDs were always a waste of time. Sure, being unsourced may be fixable but the onus should be on the editor who created the article - not on everyone else. Alternatively the new article can be shoved into project namespace so everyone can work on it. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 22:32, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Being unsourced is, in the vast majority of cases, a fixable problem (and in any case it would have to be an unfixable problem in the vast majority of cases to justify a speedy deletion criterion). The fact that an article has a problem isn't a reason to delete it, even if the creator should have created the article without this problem. This isn't merely an issue with sourcing: we don't delete articles which are uncategorised, don't have links to other articles or which have NPOV problems etc, even though the processes which deal with such articles are usually heavily backlogged. Fixable issues are only considered justification for deletion when the article is being actively harmful, such as in the case of problematic BLP content, and content which is merely unsourced doesn't fall into this category. Hut 8.5 22:53, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Yes, it may be a fixable problem but the onus should be on the editor who created the article. They wrote it so they must have sources so they should add them to the article. Your comments about uncategorised, orphan, NPOV articles is a red herring. My proposal is specifically for new articles. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 23:04, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- How are they red herrings, exactly? If an editor creates a (new) article which has NPOV problems, isn't categorised, isn't wikified, or is an orphan, then surely by your reasoning we ought to delete the page - after all the editor who created the page should fix the problems themselves and deleting new pages with these problems would help people trying to clear backlogs. Yes editors are expected to include references when they create articles but that doesn't mean that if they don't do so the page should be deleted. This is a wiki. Pages are not expected to be perfect and if a page has a problem which needs fixing then fix it. If it can't be fixed or we cannot wait for it to be fixed, then - and only then - can the page be deleted. What you're proposing here is a fundamental shift in that longstanding principle. Hut 8.5 00:51, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- Yes, it may be a fixable problem but the onus should be on the editor who created the article. They wrote it so they must have sources so they should add them to the article. Your comments about uncategorised, orphan, NPOV articles is a red herring. My proposal is specifically for new articles. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 23:04, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Being unsourced is, in the vast majority of cases, a fixable problem (and in any case it would have to be an unfixable problem in the vast majority of cases to justify a speedy deletion criterion). The fact that an article has a problem isn't a reason to delete it, even if the creator should have created the article without this problem. This isn't merely an issue with sourcing: we don't delete articles which are uncategorised, don't have links to other articles or which have NPOV problems etc, even though the processes which deal with such articles are usually heavily backlogged. Fixable issues are only considered justification for deletion when the article is being actively harmful, such as in the case of problematic BLP content, and content which is merely unsourced doesn't fall into this category. Hut 8.5 22:53, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I did not imply that PRODs and AfDs were always a waste of time. Sure, being unsourced may be fixable but the onus should be on the editor who created the article - not on everyone else. Alternatively the new article can be shoved into project namespace so everyone can work on it. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 22:32, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- AfDs and PRODs are not a "waste of time" in this case. This proposal would make sense if being unsourced was a reason for deleting something and AfDs of unsourced articles always resulted in deletion. However being unsourced isn't a reason for deleting something and these AfDs do not always result in deletion. Deletion is for problems which cannot be fixed at all or which would require a complete rewrite to fix. Being unsourced is in the vast majority of cases a fixable problem and in any case we don't delete articles with fixable problems just because no-one has bothered to fix them yet. Hut 8.5 21:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I only meant the proposal to apply to new articles in the same way as BLPPROD. The existence of the 230,000 unreffed articles is another reason for my proposal. Note that some of them date back to 2006 and every subsequent month adds another couple of thousand articles. The rationale of my proposal is to avoid the waste of time with PRODs and AfDs. We should make the article creator responsible for supplying refs. Editors are busy enough running around fixing up stuff that is already on WP without having to sort out the daily flood of new articles. I could paraphrase Thomas Watson of IBM and say "I don't think there is a need for more than 4 million articles on WP".joke -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 19:51, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- What Hut said. There is a vast difference between being sourced and being sourcable. Failure of the latter is a reason to delete, failure of the former is evidence of need to improve the article.
By the way, thank you for striking the part of the proposal that explicitly required all sources be included in-line in the first version. The choice of putting sources as in-line links versus links at the bottom versus within the text itself is purely a style choice and has nothing to do with the reliability of the source or trustworthiness of the content. Requiring new users (and even experienced editors) to become expert at the arcane formatting of in-line links is an unreasonable standard. Some editors find that format very easy, others would rather poke their eyes out than deal with that trivia. The power of a wiki is that volunteers can all contribute what they like, knowing that other editors with different expertise and preferences will continue to help move the page forward. Rossami (talk) 17:43, 18 February 2012 (UTC) - Why does the deletion of articles for lack of references (as opposed to BLP or copyvio problems) have to be speedy? I have seen no reasons for speed, and if the intent is to encourage sourcing then ample time should be allowed. WP:PROD seems quite adequate. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:07, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- As I stated in the intro: to improve WP, to stop time wasting, and to avoid another Seigenthaler incident. PRODs take too long. By the time we get around to deleting an expired PROD a dodgy WP article would have made news all round the world. And come to think of it why should we clutter article namespace with PRODs? Why not shift them to user or project namespace where thay can be worked on at leisure? -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 20:20, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- So if the article on coal balls was created in the state it currently is, but without references, you would speedy it under the pretext of preventing another Seigenthaler incident? →Στc. 21:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- That is an unreasonable and hypothetical question so I will not grace it with a direct answer. If such a long and detailed article was created without references, and in the unlikely event that it did happen it would be a suspected copyvio or it will go to AfD, tagged with a stack of maint templates, hang around for many years and eventually it might become a respectable article. With my proposal the onus is put on the author to give sources. A much better idea all round. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 21:38, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- So if the article on coal balls was created in the state it currently is, but without references, you would speedy it under the pretext of preventing another Seigenthaler incident? →Στc. 21:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Piling on, per what so many others have said, this is not a necessary or desirable criterion and contrary to the purpose of speedy deletion, which is to remove irredeemably bad articles, not ones that just need a bit of work. AsI explained to the user making this proposal just a week or so ago, perfection is not required at the instant an article is created, and many fine articles started out as unreferenced sub-stubs. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:17, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Yeah, bring it on!! I like a bit of the old argie-bargie!! What I am suggesting is a method to remove the bad articles. We will not improve WP if we only remove the "irredeemably bad articles". As for the Gajendra Ahire article which I had twice put up for a speedy, it is now sitting around as a BLPPROD. It is the very thing that supports my proposal. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 20:29, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I fail to see how that supports your case; your new CSD template could have been remoed just as easily as the other two. Oh, and I've had to remove the BLPprod, as it contains one reliable source. Nolelover Talk·Contribs 20:52, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- But the speedy template will have to be removed by an administrator. And if the article does not have any references the admin will have to delete the article. One less poor quality article that all other editors don't have to deal with. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 21:04, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- No, actually, any editor in good standing other than the primary author can remove a speedy deletion tag. Jclemens (talk) 21:10, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Ah. Ok. Didn't know that. But an editor of good standing would not remove a speedy tag if there is justification. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 21:25, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) So you're proposing new rules for this new criteria as well? Nolelover Talk·Contribs 21:11, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Not sure what you mean. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 21:25, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I was referring to the rule that any editor can remove the speedy tag except for the creator, which I guess you were unaware of. Nolelover Talk·Contribs 21:34, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I think Alan meant is that noone will remove it if it's correct - that's most likely true but not the point. The point is: both speedy criteria and BLP-PROD can be removed by editors if they believe that they do not apply.
That said, one should keep in mind that removing BLPs without sources is exactly why BLP-PROD was created in the first place - as a compromise and explicitly not as a speedy criterion. Since there was never any consensus to speedy delete BLPs without sources, proposing to delete any article without sources is unlikely to gain consensus - as this discussion shows. Regards SoWhy 21:37, 18 February 2012 (UTC)- Consensus can change. Consensus is only a snapshot at one point in time by one group of people. I have yet to see an argument against my opinion that my proposal will improve WP. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 22:32, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I didn't realize you were still waiting for that, so here goes: many good articles would be lost, edit wars would occur between overzealous taggers and others who invoke IAR and common sense, and newbies would be lost (not the newbies who spam their company info over and over, but the good-faith newbies who have always believed that if they post a one line stub on a new medical condition, someone somewhere will add to it). Nolelover Talk·Contribs 23:06, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I have been busy fighting spurious and fallacious arguments! What you mention happens anyway. I would argue that my proposal will drive away bad editors and bring in new ones - ones who see that WP is making attempts to become more robust and more accurate. There are sufficient warnings and sufficient methods for an editor to create a decent article so there is absolutely no reason for some of the rubbish that we see at WP:NPP. An editor can create an off-line draft, a user namespace draft or use WP:AFC. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 23:17, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I didn't realize you were still waiting for that, so here goes: many good articles would be lost, edit wars would occur between overzealous taggers and others who invoke IAR and common sense, and newbies would be lost (not the newbies who spam their company info over and over, but the good-faith newbies who have always believed that if they post a one line stub on a new medical condition, someone somewhere will add to it). Nolelover Talk·Contribs 23:06, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Consensus can change. Consensus is only a snapshot at one point in time by one group of people. I have yet to see an argument against my opinion that my proposal will improve WP. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 22:32, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I think Alan meant is that noone will remove it if it's correct - that's most likely true but not the point. The point is: both speedy criteria and BLP-PROD can be removed by editors if they believe that they do not apply.
- I was referring to the rule that any editor can remove the speedy tag except for the creator, which I guess you were unaware of. Nolelover Talk·Contribs 21:34, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Not sure what you mean. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 21:25, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- No, actually, any editor in good standing other than the primary author can remove a speedy deletion tag. Jclemens (talk) 21:10, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- But the speedy template will have to be removed by an administrator. And if the article does not have any references the admin will have to delete the article. One less poor quality article that all other editors don't have to deal with. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 21:04, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- I fail to see how that supports your case; your new CSD template could have been remoed just as easily as the other two. Oh, and I've had to remove the BLPprod, as it contains one reliable source. Nolelover Talk·Contribs 20:52, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Yeah, bring it on!! I like a bit of the old argie-bargie!! What I am suggesting is a method to remove the bad articles. We will not improve WP if we only remove the "irredeemably bad articles". As for the Gajendra Ahire article which I had twice put up for a speedy, it is now sitting around as a BLPPROD. It is the very thing that supports my proposal. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 20:29, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
You don't seem to even realize that what you are proposing is a radical departure from traditional purpose of speedy deletion. Look at the top of this page, point #2 for new CSD proposals: "it must be the case that almost all articles that could be deleted using the rule, should be deleted, according to consensus. CSD criteria should cover only situations where there is a strong precedent for deletion." Many unreferenced articles get improved during the course of an AFD and are kept, so there is no such precedent that would justify overturning the fundamental purpose of speedy deletion, which is to quickly remove hopeless articles. The other processes for more marginal or debatable cases deliberately take longer so that articles are given a fair chance at being improved up to WP minimum standards. You would need a much bigger forum than this talk page to affect such a substantial change to the purpose of CSD, which it is now clear you have an rather incomplete understanding of anyway. Your proposal has clearly been rejected, I suggest you find a better use for your time and/or come back with a proposal more in line with what CSD is intended for. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:28, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Less of the patronising tone please. I realise that I am suggesting a departure from what is "traditional" (BTW I dont know of any traditions in real life that needs to be kept). Whether it is radical is a matter of opinion. I am tiring of the beating my head against a cyber brick wall. I seems impossible to change the status quo in order to improve WP. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 23:43, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- This isn't a case of institutional inertia blocking a new idea, it is a case of a proposal so grossly out of line with what CSD is intended for that literally nobody has as yet shown the slightest agreement with either the proposal itself or the stated reasoning behind it. Things can and do change here, but if you want to make a change as fundamental as this one you need a very compelling, quantifiable reason to do so. Not seeing that here, and apparently neither is anyone else. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:54, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Re:Your cmt right above Beeblebrox's outdent: Sorry, but I simply don't agree with you (and given that not even BLP's were allowed to be speedied, I don't think many others do either) so I'll close with this: "bad editors" are not the ones creating one line stubs on topics that cannot be deleted via another CSD category. I agree with you about the...err..."trash" at NPP, but your proposal would simply remove many of the few decent ones submitted there. Nolelover Talk·Contribs 00:00, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- (In response to Alan's response to me above) Yes, consensus can change but (and that's the important part) you need to make a convincing argument why it should. And that would have to be one that would not only convince everyone who previously opposed speedy-deleting BLPs without references but also those who supported it limited to BLPs only. So far I (and apparently almost everyone else here) does not think your argument is solid enough. I understand that you believe it to be convincing but since you don't seem to have convinced anyone with it, you might want to reconsider whether it's really as convincing as you think it is. I'm happy to change my mind when someone shows me that my ideas are stupid (and I assume most people here think the same) but so far I have to agree that your proposal will be more harmful than good to the project. Regards SoWhy 09:41, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- Re:Your cmt right above Beeblebrox's outdent: Sorry, but I simply don't agree with you (and given that not even BLP's were allowed to be speedied, I don't think many others do either) so I'll close with this: "bad editors" are not the ones creating one line stubs on topics that cannot be deleted via another CSD category. I agree with you about the...err..."trash" at NPP, but your proposal would simply remove many of the few decent ones submitted there. Nolelover Talk·Contribs 00:00, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- This isn't a case of institutional inertia blocking a new idea, it is a case of a proposal so grossly out of line with what CSD is intended for that literally nobody has as yet shown the slightest agreement with either the proposal itself or the stated reasoning behind it. Things can and do change here, but if you want to make a change as fundamental as this one you need a very compelling, quantifiable reason to do so. Not seeing that here, and apparently neither is anyone else. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:54, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
- Oppose the problem in the Seigenthaler incident was that someone introduced false information into the pedia. Some people have jumped from that to the assumption that reducing the amount of unreferenced information will protect us from having false information in the pedia. There is an alternative theory that the more bitey we make our processes the more retaliation we can expect. My preference is that we keep our systems as non-bitey as possible, and that we focus on problematic areas such as contentious BLP statements, death anomalies and information sourced from partisan sources. If we really want to reduce levels of vandalism in the pedia all we need do is introduce flagged revisions and at least make sure that every edit by a newbie or IP is looked at at least once..... ϢereSpielChequers 17:48, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- Another question. If the intent is force editors to cite sources from the start, are there possibly other ways of doing that short of threatening speedy deletion? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:34, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
- {{unreferenced}} doesn't "force" it but points put the problem. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:34, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
- Oppose It is a bad idea is as well stated by Hut and Rossami. It is not a good idea to chastise new editors by immediately deleting their work. Far better is to advise them on the importance of verification and to allow the Afd process to work, if appropriate. I have been looking at the list of unreferenced articles from October 2006. Of the first six that I looked at, five had good, easily found, references. (I admit that I avoided looking at the song titles and the Lusophony Games.) One article was more difficult, and I had to add a brief "History" section to get a reference that would apply well. But, if we have outstanding unreferenced articles from October 2006 for which it is easy to find appropriate citations, then finding those citations must not be a priority for Wikipedia editors. If any of you believe that this is a problem, I suggest that you fix a couple of those unreferenced articles. Many hands make light work. --Bejnar (talk) 08:36, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
A question about G7
G7 currently reads:
G7. Author requests deletion. If requested in good faith and provided that the only substantial content to the page and to the associated talk page was added by its author. (For redirects created as a result of a pagemove, the mover must also have been the only substantive contributor to the pages prior to the move.) Note that this does not apply to user talk pages, which are not deleted except under very exceptional circumstances: see WP:DELTALK. If the sole author blanks a page other than a userspace page or category page, this can be taken as a deletion request.
However, as a former new-page patroller with about two years of experience, I can tell you that this is almost never the case. In those years that I was a new page patroller, I think I didn't encounter a single instance where the blanking of the page appeared to be a deletion request. In fact, when they did blank the page, it seemed to be for the opposite reason: they wanted to save the article by removing the CSD tag (by blanking). So why can blanking by the sole author be considered a deletion request? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 08:18, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- Well, I've certainly marked articles as G7 in the past where it was clear that the reason for the blanking was that the creator wanted the article deleted. Indeed, it isn't a rare occurrence, and many new users seem to think that by blanking the article they are actually deleting it. It's not difficult to find cases where blanking is done to try and get the article deleted, after a few minutes searching I found Freedom, Inc from a couple of days ago. - Kingpin13 (talk) 08:56, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- But usually when this happens, it was already tagged under a different CSD tag, right? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 09:19, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- Not always but often, yes. But in most of those cases, it's usually correct to assume that they wanted to delete the article because they felt intimidated by the deletion tag or because they were informed that their page is not within our guidelines and they wanted to do the right thing. For me it's a part of AGF to assume the latter if I have no reason to believe otherwise. Regards SoWhy 09:30, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- But usually when this happens, it was already tagged under a different CSD tag, right? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 09:19, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- I suspect that many editors understand that there is a difference between blanking a tag and blanking the whole page. Blanking the very work you are trying to save seems like a very odd error to me. I've deleted lots of G7s and I've never had an editor come to me and say they just blanked it so they could start again and they didn't meant to get it deleted. I have declined a G7 where the author blanked, someone tagged it G7, the author then replaced that with a revised version of the article and the tagger restored the G7 tag. But thankfully such incidents seem rare and are best dealt with by declining the speedy. ϢereSpielChequers 19:22, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
- When a blanked page is tagged G7, the reinstatement of the article in a "revised" version is a strong assertion against the G7 speedy, though other criteria might still apply. However, we need to wait for the article creator to reinstate the article after the G7 tagging to see that indeed G7 does apply. If no action follows the G7 tagging, then it's a clear-cut G7. Otherwise, nothing prevents the article creator from resurrecting the article, and since no talk page message is issued for a G7 speedy, the creator might not even know that someone manually deleted his article. -- Blanchardb -Me•MyEars•MyMouth- timed 15:00, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
F7
- Non-free images or media that have been identified as being replaceable by a free image and tagged with {{di-replaceable fair use}} may be deleted after two days, if no justification is given for the claim of irreplaceability. If the replaceability is disputed, the nominator should not be the one deleting the image.
What number of days is an appropriate delay if a justification is given for the claim of irreplaceability and the replaceability is disputed? If the answer is still two days, I suggest writing this more clearly as:
- Non-free images or media that have been identified as being replaceable by a free image and tagged with {{di-replaceable fair use}} may be deleted after two days. If the replaceability is disputed, or if justification is given for the claim of irreplaceability, the nominator should not be the one deleting the image.
If the answer is seven days, I suggest writing this more clearly as:
- Non-free images or media that have been identified as being replaceable by a free image and tagged with {{di-replaceable fair use}} may be deleted after two days, if no justification is given for the claim of irreplaceability. Otherwise they may be deleted after seven days. If the replaceability is disputed, the nominator should not be the one deleting the image.
Regards, Martin (talk) 20:20, 22 February 2012 (UTC)