Wikipedia:Deletion policy/Reducing VfD load

Proposal

We've been discussing this for a long time, and it seems there is some sensible action that can be taken on the basis of it. First, there has been some effort to make inexperienced users more aware of our processes, such as the alternatives to VfD. This is laudable and I hope it shall continue. Second, a number of people have indicated that adding a few criteria for speedy deletion may be useful for alleviating VfD load. A proposal to do just that is under review at Wikipedia:Criteria_for_speedy_deletion/Proposal, and will be up for a vote soon. Thanks for participating, and feel free to add more comments below. Radiant_>|< 17:18, Jun 23, 2005 (UTC)

Discussion

The Votes for Deletion pages have steadily increased in size over the past year, and are likely to continue growing along with Wikipedia as a whole. Since VfD is an important process in Wikipedia, it is useful for people to keep track of it. This, of course, becomes progressively harder as VfD grows. Therefore it would be beneficial to attempt to reduce its size. I have put up some proposals for discussion below; feel free to add more, and give your comments. Please bear in mind that this is not a vote.

Votes for Deletion has tripled in size in the past year, and there is no reason to suppose it will shrink back again. Because deletion of an article is a drastic measure, it is important to be able to get feedback from as many people as possible, to ensure that no article is deleted without consensus. However, the sheer size of each day's VfD page makes it impractical for people to join the debate.

Looking over VfD nominations of the past couple of weeks, it is obvious that about two-thirds of them are not controversial - they are deleted after a number of unanimous votes. It seems, then, that most nominations are made appropriately, and require no debate. On the other hand, there is a significant number of disputed nominations that do need discussion to establish consensus.

Radiant_* 11:46, May 23, 2005 (UTC)

When I first started clearing out VfD/Old last summer there were some 25 to 30 listings per day. Today there are often more than a hundred. This rate of growth is clearly unsustainable. - SimonP 16:23, May 23, 2005 (UTC)

The number of Wikipedia users has also grown substantially since then. If VfD nominations are still being voted on by neither too many people nor too few to create a good consensus, as I believe they are, and closed discussions are dealt with in timely fashion, as I believe they are, then the page's growth is anything but unsustainable. NatusRoma 00:57, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The number of administrators participating in VfD, then, has not grown at the same rate. There is currently an 11-day backlog of discussions that should be closed – not what I would call timely. Either we need more administrators closing out discussions (and more non-administrators closing out non-deletion decisions), fewer articles on VfD to begin with, or a combination of both. AиDя01DTALKEMAIL 01:31, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Deletion policy/Reducing VfD load/Analysis for some statistics. (For purposes of comparison, User:Johnleemk/VfD statistics has statistics collected about six months ago.)

On the reasonable assumptions that the proposal has some sort of conceptual integrity, and that the comments, however well intentioned and important, distract from grasping that, i've extracted a copy of the current version for those who would like it as an intro to the discussion. IMO, it would be

• very foolish to comment without reading the previous comments on the same point, and
• only slightly less foolish to put off for very long reading the whole discussion, but

IMO the value i find in starting out by reading the uncommented version may not be a unique product of my compulsive mind.
--Jerzy·t 11:49, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Current Proposal

(Please make comments below at #Proposal and Comments)

Okay. Judging from the discussion (which has been largely archived on the talk page), we have a couple of workable proposals here. I've listed them here, so that we can see if we can reword them into a widely acceptable form, and propose them as policy.

Please add, reword and comment to the other copy of the proposals below.

It seems obvious that not everybody will agree to the proposals. Some of them have already been disputed on the talk page. Please bear in mind that this is not yet a proposal. Some of it may turn into a proposal, at which point you're welcome to vote against if that's your opinion. This page exists to turn suggestions into a workable proposal; as such, comments unrelated to that will likely be archived on the talk page.

Speedy deletion

Suggested additions to 'speedy deletion' criteria. This is not a vote! This is an attempt to reword the below into a form that would be widely acceptable. If that works out, a vote may be called at some later point.

1. Any article consisting of one sentence or less. Arguably, even if the topic is noteworthy, the article could as easily be started from scratch as from the single sentence. withdrawn
2. Any article in several areas, that does not assert its subject's notability.
   1. Any article about a person, that does not assert that person's notability.
   2. Any article about a band, that does not assert that band's notability.
   3. Any article about a website, that does not assert that website's notability.

   Former pt 3 Fanfic (since it's vanity)

3. Attack pages (it is already current practice to delete them as either vandalism, or CSD #1)
4. Extremely short articles that are totally redundant and trivial (otherwise follow one of the substub guidelines)
5. Any article has no content beyond that in a sisterproject (particularly, Wiktionary)
6. Any article that has been on Pages needing Translation for two weeks, and not translated
7. Any anticle that is a fork with no new content. // Recreated material during a VfD vote
8. Illegal content

Procedure

Suggested modifications to existing VFD procedure

1. A VFD nomination that gets no votes at all may be considered to have consensus to delete since the nomination is a vote to delete
2. Speedy merge: a short article on VFD can be merged somewhere appropriate, then removed from VFD

Wikipedia:Countdown deletion

An alternative method that could exist side-by-side with VFD

1. Articles that are vanity or advertising can be marked as such with {{Speedy-cleanup}}, and if not improved within a set period, they can be speedy deleted.

Template proposal

{{Subst:Speedy-cleanup|1}} This article will become a canidate for speedy deletion 14 days after December 27, 2024. The problem that was identified is, {{{1}}}}. Once the problem is addressed this warning text can be removed. Do not remove this text without fixing the listed problem.

The template would include the category Pending speedy deletion.

Recommendations

Behavioral suggestions that should receive more attention (some effort is already being made to bring make these more visible on a variety of pages)

1. Consider merging etc before nominating anything for VFD
2. Check Google before speedying anything or listing it on VFD
3. Check for copyvio before speedying anything or listing it on VFD
4. Creating guidelines like WP:MUSIC and WP:BIO for other areas - such as websites
5. Create more content. Fix bad articles. Create missing ones. VfD is only a "burden" for those who spend their lives working it.

Proposal and Comments

Okay. Judging from the discussion (which has been largely archived on the talk page), we have a couple of workable proposals here. I've listed them here, so that we can see if we can reword them into a widely acceptable form, and propose them as policy.

Please add, reword and comment to (this copy of) the proposals below.

It seems obvious that not everybody will agree to the proposals. Some of them have already been disputed on the talk page. Please bear in mind that this is not yet a proposal. Some of it may turn into a proposal, at which point you're welcome to vote against if that's your opinion. This page exists to turn suggestions into a workable proposal; as such, comments unrelated to that will likely be archived on the talk page.

Speedy deletion

Suggested additions to 'speedy deletion' criteria. This is not a vote! This is an attempt to reword the below into a form that would be widely acceptable. If that works out, a vote may be called at some later point.

• I am loath to consider any expansion of CSD, since abuses are so hard to detect and since there is such pressure on even the most conscientious speedy deleter to bend the criteria in the direction of deletion, in order to stem the crap-flood. While they do IMO deserve individual attention as possible new CSDs, i'd like to hear how much support there might be for

• moving all 8 (or 10) current speedy points to a more mergist-oriented heading that would get these types (including any article-title redirects they may leave behind) out of the article namespace without making them in practice unreviewable,
• tinkering with that approach until it's clear whether this proposal's potential for consensus is improved or impaired by its introduction to the proposal, and
• if "speedy merge" (or whatever mergist alternative emerges) still seems worth discussing, taking up discussion of which of these currently proposed speedy additions are not adequately replaced by the mergist alternative, and therefore need to be returned to the speedy heading.

--Jerzy·t 12:44, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

1. Any article consisting of one sentence or less. Arguably, even if the topic is noteworthy, the article could as easily be started from scratch as from the single sentence. Withdrawn, because of significant opposition. Moved to talk page. Radiant_>|< 13:08, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
2. Any article in several areas, that does not assert its subject's notability.
   • We'll never get agreement on notability speedies. - Tony Sidaway
     • A bigger problem, I think, would be that once people catch on, they'll just write "Joe Smith is a notable high school student from Peoria, who is notable because he likes to watch 10-hour marathons of Dragon Ball Z" - then we're back to asking what constitutes notability. -- BD2412 ^talk 00:13, 2005 Jun 8 (UTC)
       • If they were that well-informed about wikipedia they probably wouldn't be bothering. Kappa 00:16, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • I agree with Kappa here. The vast majority of such articles are from people who know nothing of wikipedia and just want to have their names in an encyclopedia. Those who are aware enough of the rules to try to get through such loopholes will be few and far between. Besides, someone saying they are notable simply for being a high school student is such an obviously illegitimate claim to fame that it not even a assertion of real notability at all, and hence could still be deletable under these rules. -R. fiend 04:03, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • Concur with Kappa. Btw, how is this wording? Maybe we should avoid the term 'notability' since it's a controversial one? Radiant_>|< 07:32, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
   • Concur w/ Kappa and R. fiend. And regarding Tony's point, we seem to have a lot of agreement on deleting for non-notability via the standard process, so I think it's an idea worth considering. I would tend to approve the "does not assert notability" addition. Soundguy99 16:31, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Well remember that we're talking about speedy deletions here, not general deletion criteria. There is substantial support, but not consensus for non-notability as a deletion criterion. In the circumstances, expecting to get consensus on the same grounds for the principle of speedying, which doesn't even involve discussion and therefore involves no formal scrutiny, is a pipe dream in my view. A concrete example: someone listed a certain Nicholas Humphrey on VfD a couple of months ago. The article was a good stub but the nominator didn't think that being a professor was notable enough (and arguably that's a consensus view). However listing it on VfD was the right thing to do here because actually Nick Humphrey is one of the most famous academics in Britain and possibly among the top five most famous evolutionary psychologists in the world. Since the article here arguably didn't "assert notability" in the eyes of the nominator, under the proposed rules he could have just speedied the article and unless some eagle-eye was scanning the crap in the deletion logs the article would have been lost. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 11:21, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
       • You are absolutely right about Humphrey. However, this is not the intent of the proposal, so obviously it needs rewording (and I hope that's possible). The way I understand it is this: Humphrey article at the point of its VFD does assert notability by "Dr. Humphrey currently holds a School Professorship" (Whether or not that's sufficient notability may be up to VFD). What this is intended to solve is articles such as "Anthony James Cartwright (born November 27, 1970) is an English Computer Expert. He was born in Bridlington England." Radiant_>|< 12:00, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)
         • Trouble is that there are people doing RC right now who would deny that a professorship is notable. I have some sympathy with that point of view. So I'm against that as a speedy criterion because notability is something that arises from discussion. I just don't see a way around this. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 12:37, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

   • Hmmmmmm. . . . . Tony makes a good point. I'm thinking that the only way this will be acceptable is if we find some way to reword this to make it clear that we are only attempting to speedy the most blatant non-notable vanity cases. As in, professors are arguably notable enough that their articles must go through the standard VfD process, but 99.7% of student articles could fairly be considered speedy candidates. Soundguy99 15:30, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

   • I think it's possible to get a consensus if worded correctly. Being a professor (even claiming to be a professor) is a claim of notability (and if questioned is a matter for VfD, in fact we already have a specific policy for professors). Claiming to be the best swimmer in your high school is not. Some of the most blatant articles of the latter sort are speedied on occasion by stretching some of the criteria, and I see no problem with that. If someone wants to cry foul and insist that "Jim Plibble is an awesome dude!" be VfUed then let them waste everybody's time with it. There's no reason it should to stay around for a couple weeks. I would have no problem deleting such an article as vandalism or something if I were an admin, and I bet we can get a consensus that articles of that caliber should be. -R. fiend 16:06, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Attempted wording #1... An article about a person that does not assert that person's importance or significance - people such as professors or actors are individually important in society; people such as students and bakers are not, or at least not for the reason of being a student or baker. If the assertion is disputed or controversial, it may be taken to VFD but not speedied. Radiant_>|< 08:54, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
     • Good try. Let me see if I can critique it in the hope of pointing us towards a refinement. In the above you list students and bakers, professors and actors. Where does a teacher come in? A headmaster or school principal? A superintendent of schools? A town mayor? We could just pop them all on VfD and sort it out by discussion, as we do now, and I expect that two professors out of three and nine principals out of ten would be deleted after discussion. But the question here is how do we let the administrator know which biographical articles are speediable and which should go to VfD. I'd love to see someone have a good go at that. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 12:32, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
       • At some point I think we have to rely on the common sense of admins after we've given them strong guidelines. Is there anyone notable just for being a mayor? Of course, so being a mayor is at least a claim of notability. (As it is, I would think most mayors should go to VfD, though obviously mayors of important cities should not.) Is there anyone notable just for being a student? No. If there are notable students they are notable for other reasons. If all the vanity article states is that the subject is a student and another mundane fact or two then no claim of notability is made. It can be speedied. The trickier points, I think are very dubious claims of notability. For example "David Terrence is a math teacher at Scoopville High" makes no claim of notability. "David Terrence is a math teacher at Scoopville High who is an expert on logarithms" makes a very dubious claim, but a claim nevertheless. While I really think the first should be speediable, the second should perhaps go to VfD just to err on the side of caution. Another one is the current VfD at Sequanne McCargo, a student who "is famousfor being the most misbehaved person in history." Again, a very dubious claim. While I think this should be speediable (particularly after getting 0 google hits, and that its probably an attack page) if someone wants to argue that it is a claim of notability and VfD it instead then I'll give in, if we can get a consensus and the no claims cases. -R. fiend 14:21, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • Verifiability is, as always, an issue. Being the most misbehaved person in history is by definition unverifiable. Calling yourself an 'expert' on something is somewhat doubtful. If David Terrence had won the Matt O'Matic award for logarithmology, or had written a book on it, that wouold be a far stronger claim to notability. Compare "John Doe is good at chess" (no claim) vs. "John Doe has won the Albuquerque chess championship" (is a claim). Radiant_>|< 14:44, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
       • Attempted wording #2... An article about a person that does not assert that person's importance or significance can be speedy deleted. People who are clearly noteable like US presidents or those who run fortune 500 companies are encylopedic and should not be speedy deleted; people who claim notability like being a student or future inventor are not encylopedic may be speedy deleted. If the assertion is disputed or controversial, it should be tagged {{Speedy-cleanup}} to see if notability can be established by expansion before being speedy deleted. Vegaswikian 18:05, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • I see three things wrong with it... first, avoid the words 'notable' and 'encyclopedic' as they're very controversial; second, 'fortune 500' is a bad example since many people don't know what that means. And third, it assumes that the 'speedy cleanup' proposal actually passes; if not, the last sentence is meaningless. Radiant_>|< 13:11, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)

   • I've taken the liberty of grouping all three notability cases as subcases of a single point (and of construing the existing comments as addressing all three). I have no objection to just putting it back, if there's harm to it that i am missing.

   --Jerzy·t 12:04, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

   1. Any article about a person, that does not assert that person's notability.
   2. Any article about a band, that does not assert that band's notability.
   3. Any article about a website, that does not assert that website's notability.
   • How do we determine whether an article ascribes notability? I would rather not have every article in the Wikipedia declare the subject is notable. That would seem redundant and boring to have every article start that way "the notable blah blah", as the existence of the article means that the subject is notable enough already to bother describing. - Mysidia 06:57, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • You misunderstand, the article needn't use the word "notable" to make it clear that the subject is, in fact, notable. "Dwight Eisenhower was the 34th President of the USA" clearly claims notability without having to say "Eisenhower was the notable 34th President..." While articles like "Arnie Pants is an 8th grade student at Rockville Middle School. He will someday make computers and start his own billion dollar company" does not. The latter, in my opinion, should be speedily deleted. -R. fiend 16:12, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
3. Attack pages (it is already current practice to delete them as either vandalism, or CSD #1)
4. Extremely short articles that are totally redundant and trivial (otherwise follow one of the substub guidelines)
5. Any article has no content beyond that in a sisterproject (particularly, Wiktionary)
6. Any article that has been on Requests for Translation for two weeks, and not translated
   • Translation, should go on VfD. And two weeks just isn't long enough. - Tony Sidaway

   • That should be Pages needing translation into English. Two weeks is normally more than long enough, no-hopers currently get sent to VfD after 7 days. Physchim62

   Fair enough. But seven days sounds absurdly short, given how time-consuming a task translation can be. I suspect that those of us capable of doing a decent translation also tend to have busy lives. Given the rarity of untranslated articles on VfD, however, I don't see how a change in policy towards this niche could reduce VfD size significantly. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 13:12, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

   Don't worry, it works, and it keep two or three articles a day off VfD :) Physchim62 14:08, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

   • • Sorry, but 7 days is ridiculously short; 14 days has been the proposed time corridor, as outlined on the appropriate page Lectonar 14:15, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • I think that, if we are going to allow speedy deletion of non-translated articles, we should restrict it to the uncontroversial cases. How about a rule like:

   Any article that (1) has been listed on Wikipedia:Pages needing translation for at least fourteen days, and (2) has not been (partially or completely) translated, unless someone has objected to its speedy deletion on Wikipedia:Pages needing translation.

   In other cases, the article should still go to VfD if someone wants to delete it, in my opinion. Sietse 11:58, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

7. Recreated material during a VfD vote
   • I have noticed that sometimes an article is recreated in a different place while it is being voted on Votes for Deletion. Just like in case of attack pages, it seems that these articles do get speedily deleted, but it is worth including among the criteria. - Mike Rosoft 16:28, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • I always kill forks on sight, whether a VfD is ongoing or not. The earlier you delete such a duplication the better. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 04:13, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • It may be useful to reword CSD policy to reflect actual practice. Radiant_>|< 10:15, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
8. Illegal content
   • Seeing the page of User:Again, I propose another speedy deletion criterion: promotion of illegal activities, or any other material in breach of law (excluding copyright violations). - Mike Rosoft 03:16, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Obviously we already delete illegal stuff on sight. Defamatory content may be summarily deleted also. No policy change is needed for this. And again this isn't a category of deletions that would reduce VfD load. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 04:11, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • It may be useful to reword CSD policy to reflect actual practice. Obviously, real world law trumps wikipedia law. Radiant_>|< 10:15, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
9. Dummy point 9 7 8 10, keep it last but edit if numbered proposals are added: gives warning when numbering within section gets broken by uninformed use of #/*/: markup.

   • • Oh, so There really is no rule ten? Bonzer!--Tony Sidaway|Talk 11:46, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
       • Oh, and i forgot that there's a Bruces sketch other than Bruce's sketch. I'm so ashamed. --Jerzy·t 12:44, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Sorry if this is a hopeless mess and entirely incorrectly placed. I have used this system for about 10 hours and frankly trying to add sensible comments into this gloop is distinctly incomprehensible. As a newcomer then,

I welcome articles which are only 1 sentence long, particularly where they invite additional information to be added. It seems to me that this is how your encyclopedia works. It has to attract information wherever it can. I understand if you have resource problems which compel you to limit the number of entries, but otherwise surely the whole point is that users will govern the direction and speed of growth. Someone like me passing through is unlikely to add anything even if specifically in his area of expertise unless there is an invitation to do so.

In my own case I was looking at an article on Hastings, which is where I live. I corrected some of it. I created a stub for Fairlight which was already referenced on the page but only with a disambiguation link. I turned it into two sentences which did not materially add to the content, but furthered what I understood to be your policy of expanding stubs towards articledom. Someone who actually lives there might now take the stub and expand it into something worthwhile. This seems a low probability as other larger towns still have poor descriptions, but it will certainly not happen without the existence of the stub. The question is do you want to create a database about towns of less then 500 population? The issue does not seem to me a question of the triviality of existing content but rather of potential content.

I imagine the main article on Hastings is now pretty safe but I can plainly see how it has grown out of an amalgam of a History book and borough self-publicity. Would it be appropriate or not to create a new stub acknowledging the existence of the other town of Hastings in Canada, which i have occasionally come across doing web searches? Then perhaps someone might add a write-up for it. Do you want this?

Noteable entities. It seems ridiculous for an encyclopedia to state explicitly that its entries are worthy of being entries. This seems exactly the same problem as the stubs. If the content demonstrates that the subject is not worth having, then delete it. But a stub entry on the lines 'albert Einstein was a great friend of my grandfather. He was once a patent clerk and wished he had been a locksmith' is on the face of it pretty worthless untill it is realised who is being talked about. Surely an entry must explicitly demonstrate its unworthyness of being included.

I can see you have problems with malicious entries. If you do not have resources to enable you to to check pages then ok, you will have to use arbitrary methods of deletion. You must though allow topics to re-start so they have a chance to be properly developed if an author comes along who knows the topic.

Anyone who reads this, do please let me know if I just wasted my time or where I went wrong. Sandpiper 09:40, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

You definitely did not waste your time. You are joining a long-running debate over the best way to write an open-source encyclopedia. I think the answer to your implied question is ultimately based on your assumptions about the reader experience. Will future reader/editors be more likely to make good contributions on new topics if they see a blue link or a red link? The blue link can lead you to the assumption that a quality article on this topic already exists. The informed reader/editor that we need may never click through the blue link to see that the article is a one-line sub-stub that adds no information. A red link, on the other hand, takes you to a page that explicitly says "Wikipedia does not yet have a page called ABC. To start the page, begin typing in the box below...." That seems like a pretty clear invitation for content to me. (And I've now exposed my own bias in this debate.) But there are people who believe that this is somehow intimidating and that other readers will edit more freely if there is at least something already on the page.

The problem with your comment about self-evidently worthless contributions is that it is rarely self-evident. These situations often require a great deal of knowledge and experience - more than can reasonably be expected of any one person. That's why the community tends to encourage discussion and concensus. Together, we are much smarter than any of us individually. (That's not always true but it's true far more often than not in our situation and under our cultural controls.) Hope that helps. Rossami (talk) 13:31, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Hi rossami. Seems I did manage to post this in vaguely the right place even if I have little idea about formatting. Thanks for reply. Seems to me the 'red link' faction might have unrealistically high expectations. If you want to make a distinction between red and blue links that red ones need a world expert to write them, and blue ones are 'finished', then I think the system would grind to a halt. A blue link is not a finished work, otherwise why do you allow people to edit it? I think that a total tyro will still not know what is expected if he is faced with an invitation to write an article, and indeed is just as likely to write a one line definition anyway. On the other hand, someone with experience is more likely to check links about subjects he knows just to check what is there already.

yes, I understand this problem about whether it is evident that something is self-evidently worthless. My point was that unless it really is self-evident that it is worthless, then it should not be deleted. Any article should be given the benefit of the doubt until proven worthless. And like I said, it also depends on your available resources and your ambition.Sandpiper 23:11, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Procedure

Suggested modifications to existing VFD procedure

1. A VFD nomination that gets no votes at all may be considered to have consensus to delete since the nomination is a vote to delete
   • VfD nomination with no votes--no change. if I closed this I'd assume it's to be deleted, I know of no reason why a closer would disagree but leave it up to discretion of closer - Tony Sidaway
     • Yes, there is one vote from the person making the nomination. Just the act of making the nomination for delteion is a vote to delete. Vegaswikian 20:07, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
       • Personally I think any VfD that doesn't get at least 3 votes (nominator +2) should be relisted as not having a quorum (though 2 should be the minimum if the vote is unanimous: 2 deletes or a keep and a withdrawal). This is probably a separate issue however. -R. fiend 04:15, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • Does that ever happen? But in any case, there should be a quorum. I'd rather see a minimum of 5 delete votes than one of none. CalJW 05:39, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
           • Right now, I generally skip any article where the vote is clear, even if there are only 2. So now we would need to count the votes to see if we neeed to add to the VfD load? Given the number of people who watch the VfD, I'm not convinced that silence means the lack of a quorum. And the VfD page has a delay in showing the latest votes, so you would actually need to edit to see if there were enough votes. Vegaswikian 06:34, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
             • I'd say the only clear result from a mere 2 votes is if they are unanimous. That is to say, I don't think 1 vote should ever constitute a consensus. If someone nominates an article and the only other vote is keep I don't think it should be deleted, but I don't think it should be "consensus: keep" or "no consensus: default to keep" with the discussion closed for 3 months either, or that it should be seen to have "survived VfD". Likewise I don't think a single delete vote should mean deletion, even though 100% is obviously a "rough consensus". I don't think silence on any vote can be read as anything other than people haven't looked into that particular article for some reason, and they should be encouraged to with another round. This won't lighten VfD (it may even very slightly add to it) but I think it's the only fair way. Mind you, I don't know how often this happens, but it seems rare. And if later votes are sometimes delayed, then the edit option has to be used for any close votes anyway. -R. fiend 07:00, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
               • In my experience, this is very rare but it does occur. Personally, I believe that "silence implies agreement". The VfD pages get excellent coverage with a good critical mass of informed editors who regularly scan the list. If no one chooses to dispute the nomination, that's a pretty good indicator that the community supported the nomination. Frankly, I can not think of any example where a bad decision was made that traced back to "lack of quorum". Rememeber that even with a bare nomination, you always have a minimum of 2 opinions on the article - the nominator and the closing admin. I think the quorum proposal is unnecessary and the proposal to relist is unproductive. Our past attempts at using relisting have generally been a failure. It clogs up VfD but gets no more votes (or no different votes) than the first time. Rossami (talk) 13:31, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
                 • With a bare nomination, you have a minimum of THREE opinions, not two. The nominator, the closing admin, and the person who posted the article in the first place. Sometimes we discount the opinion of the author, but the very existence of the article is evidence of an opinion to have an article on the topic. Unfocused 12:44, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
               • I prefer a set minimum number of actual votes. I often decline to vote on articles regarding topics with which I am unfamiliar - say, the notability of a particular Pokemon, or a computer operating system. Not my thing, that. I can imagine others doing the same. I'd suggest nominator +2 - it's really not much of a hurdle to overcome, as long as users can either determine the appropriateness of the article themselves, or can contact other users who are able to do so. Actually, I'd like to see a sort of central message-board where users can post what their areas of interest/knowledge are, so they can readily be solicited to opine on vfd's in those areas. -- BD2412 ^talk 00:35, 2005 Jun 13 (UTC)
                 • See Wikipedia:Wikipedians by fields of interest Hiding 15:06, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
                   • D'oh!!! Well thanks for pointing that out for me. :-) -- BD2412 ^talk 04:40, 2005 Jun 23 (UTC)
                 • I don't know, as some of the nominators, especially the ones doing janitor work on requests for translation and other similar pages don't necessarily intend a deletion in the first place; I for once would prefer a larger number of delete votes (at least 5, IMHO) Lectonar 14:09, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • I really don't think "nominator's vote only" can count as a quorum unless it is a self-nom - the fact that somebody went to the effort of creating the article ought to be counted as an implicit vote to keep. Also, unless a page is created by an anon, I think it should be incorporated into the procedure to leave a message on the creator's talk-page - this ought to help prevent VfDs going completely unnoticed! --131.111.8.97 20:03, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Let us assume that there exists a 'continuum of care' for articles people create:

   • Very High - They love the article more than they love their dog.
   • High - They care quite a bit about the article they have created.
   • Medium - They would be slightly hurt were it to be deleted.
   • Low - They could care less.

   It seems absurb to suggest that anyone in the first three categories would:

   • Firstly fail to put the page on their watch list. (Who cares about vandals, anyway.)
   • Secondly fail to refer to the page again. (Who cares if anyone has added anything good.)
   • And finally fail to speak out during VfD. (Surely someone else will back me up.)

   Thus in the absence of the nominator specifically voting abstain I would strongly support deleting articles with no votes. I routinely fail to vote delete in the absence of keep votes based upon the assumption that this was how it worked anyway. There are enough articles with zealots/sock puppets defending them for us to worry too much about something that no one is defending. ILoveTheSmellOfVfDInTheMorning Aaron Brenneman 8 July 2005 05:37 (UTC)

   • Although I'm sure there are people who keep an eye out for bad faith VFDs, as well as what one might call "difference of opinion" VFDs (people who feel Wikipedia should be different than it is so, say, entertainment-related articles must because they aren't scholarly enough, or whatever). I feel there needs to be a quorum of at least 3 votes within the time period, otherwise the VFD fails and needs to be resubmitted. I've missed entire days worth of VFD because of internet problems at my end and Wikipedia problems at your end. With the huge number of VFDs per day it is easier than you think for one to slip under the radar. I'd rather have an unworthy article spend a few more days on the server than have a worthy one deleted because someone didn't like it. (In the case of obvious nonsense, illegal etc. articles, they are already covered under the various speedy and copyvio rules.) 23skidoo 00:30, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • "A VFD nomination that gets no votes at all may be considered to have consensus to delete since the nomination is a vote to delete" Remember that sometimes admins put improperly speedy tagged articles articles on VFD to get concensus. Those should definitely not default to delete. - Mgm|^(talk) 10:40, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)
       • As a purely practical matter, anyone making that kind of procedural nomination who does not agree that the article should be deleted must either explicitly disagree with the procedural nomination by voting "keep" or should explicitly abstain. I can't think of any situations, though, where such a purely procedural nomination ended up with only the nominator's vote. And, as always, VfD closers have an obligation to carefully evaluate the comments. As several people have said, "Despite the name, Votes for deletion is not really about votes". Rossami (talk) 16:16, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
2. Speedy merge: a short article on VFD can be merged somewhere appropriate, then removed from VFD
   • Just because something could be merged somewhere, doesn't mean it should. I'd prefer to keep the discussion open in case a solid case is made that deletion or a separate article would be the better solution. Basically I don't want a vanity article VfDed, then merged somewhere (like the guy's hometown or TV show he was an extra in) and removed from VfD without a vote. -R. fiend 04:15, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Absolutely not. Merging is a form of deletion. This would give far too much power to the deletionists, and override consensus. CalJW 05:39, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
       • Merging is actually a form of keep since the information is retained. If the information were deleted it would no longer be available. Vegaswikian 06:31, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • Exactly. Some people regard merge votes as keep votes (which is another problem). -R. fiend 06:45, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
           • Interesting point, R.Fiend. What would you propose to be done against that? Radiant_>|< 07:32, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
             • • I think the closing admin has to look at what the people are voting for. While a merge vote is not a delete, it's not a keep either. When an admin rules that a merge is the same as a keep vote because the information (or at least a substantial part of it) is kept, they fail to see that if the voters simply wanted the article kept they would have voted keep (few admins do this, but I have seen it). In cases where the voting is evenly divided between keep, delete, and merge, for example, the admin should see that while 2/3 (generally a "rough consensus", and as close to one as we'll get in such a case) want the article not to be deleted outright (the keeps and the merges) still 2/3 do not want it to have its own article either (the deletes and the merges). If the merge votes generally agree on where it should be merged such a merge generally remains the best solution in this case. It should also be noted that when someone votes merge, they do not necessarily want a cut-and-paste job done either. There are more elegant ways of merging, and sometimes the loss of bits of subtrivial information that finds its way into these articles is necessary and beneficial. -R. fiend 15:15, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
               • I think you're being far too easy in assuming that 2/3 is a consensus. In my experience this is a rock-bottom minimum value used only by some VfD closers. When I close I expect more like 75% and in some conditions even higher for a delete. A merge where there is a substantial history to the article, in my view, is always a keep vote, because all the original material and editing history is retained and the merge can be undone by someone being bold. I would never delete or merge an article just because merges plus deletes came to a consensus figure. The default verdict is "no consensus" and the article is kept. Someone who wants to merge can do so. I sometimes do that myself after closing. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 12:55, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • No comment on the proposal above but to answer CalJW's misconception, merging is always a form of keep. Merging does not destroy page history. Merging can be reversed by any editor (though such reversals should be thoroughly discussed on the article's Talk page). Merging can be performed by any editor at any time and does not require admin rights. Merging is most definitely not a form of deletion. Disputed merges get discussed on the respective article pages and are inappropriate for VfD. Rossami (talk) 13:31, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
           • Perhaps we should come up with a new term meaning "merge the useful content to another article but delete the original article before recreating it as a redirect" - Merlete? Delerge? (I am only half joking, that being the second half). Seriously, why not create a shorthand to describe that option? -- BD2412 ^talk 00:43, 2005 Jun 13 (UTC)
             • I think the answer to your question is "the GFDL". -- Jonel 00:51, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
               • You can't delete the original article while merging content because this destroys the edit history needed for attribution per the GFDL. Now if it was to become common practice to add those histories to talk pages, we could kill off a lot more useless redirects from such merges. - Mgm|^(talk) 10:53, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)
                 • Does that mean it's possible to move a history to a talk page? Hiding 12:45, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
                   • Technically, yes, but not sure if it's worth the hassle. (Delete talk page. Move main page to talk page. Delete talk page once more. Undelete talk page, including ALL of the history, which should be both. Delete redirect to talk page. Done). Radiant_>|< 12:53, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)
                     • Ah, it's an admin trick. That is complicated. Is there not a way to uncomplicate it, if keeping the history is a requirement of the GFDL? I would imagine eventually redirects come up on WP:VfD. Hiding 13:47, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Countdown deletion

An alternative method that could exist side-by-side with VFD

1. Articles that are vanity or advertising can be marked as such with {{Speedy-cleanup}}, and if not improved within a set period, they can be speedy deleted.

• I like this one - I assume the template will include a datestamp which specifies the cleanup deadline? -- BD2412 ^talk 00:16, 2005 Jun 8 (UTC)
• I'm for it as long as it is not mistaken for the cleanup notice attached to articles that some editors feel need to be improved, but otherwise aren't "worthy" of VFD.23skidoo 00:32, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• I think this is an awful idea. It's like saying to a volunteer staff of editors "You will have this done when I say you must have it done!" The authoritarian attitude that underlies this proposal will do far more damage to Wikipedia than this proposal could ever prevent. That's not the Wiki way, if you ask me. Further, who is to decide just how much improvement is necessary before speedy deletion? One single administrator? Even if it has to be a different person than the nominator, I could easily imagine a pair teaming up to delete articles that wouldn't fail VfD. --Unfocused 04:25, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • That's why the wording should say anyone can remove the notice after addressing the problem listed. It means that any user can update and change the status. Yes, someone could add another notice if the fix was weak or if they see another problem. But I suspect that one or two notices would get most articles past consideration for VfD. Vegaswikian 07:07, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Good idea. If this were a vote I'd support. Howabout1 ^{Talk to me!} 03:21, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)

Recommendations

Behavioral suggestions that should receive more attention (some effort is already being made to bring make these more visible on a variety of pages)

1. Consider merging etc before nominating anything for VFD
   • Merging is a form of deletion and should not be encouraged. CalJW 05:40, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Whereever did you get that idea? Merge is obviously a form of keep, since the information is kept. This is clearly explained in the VFD guide. Radiant_>|< 07:32, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)
       • I'm not CalJW, but this misunderstanding seems to come from not knowing that a properly-performed merge leaves a redirect in place, which leaves the history intact, or suspecting that some people who are merging don't do proper merges. --Unfocused 14:35, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Merging is always a form of "keep". See above. Rossami (talk) 13:31, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • Especially when something falls under the merge guidelines on WP:FICT. -- Jonel 00:49, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
2. Check Google before speedying anything or listing it on VFD
   • And what does this actually prove? That something on google may or may not be about what's in the article? Vegaswikian 20:10, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • The onus for establishing notability should be on the author of an article, not the reader. --Xcali 21:31, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • Yes, but it always comes up in VfD. At the very least, we should include google results in the VfD nomination, thus giving our arguments for deletion more support. If it is notable, the google results will show it, someone will fix it up, and we'll get a consensus keep. --Scimitar 22:44, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • You can't really make this a rule. Some articles have titles which are very difficult to search for on Google since they are common phrases.—Wahoofive (talk) 22:52, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • I'd like to add that some topics (e.g. pop-culture, internet related things) are more Google-friendly than others (e.g. villages in low-tech countries, esoteric 18th century religious theories). That being said, Google should be pretty much an automatic test for band vanity, independent films, and anyone whose claim to fame is internet related. -- BD2412 ^talk 00:22, 2005 Jun 8 (UTC)
   • I agree with alot of the above comments here. It reminds me of confusion created when an obvious vanity article about some intern was on VfD. Someone then googled the name and found the guy was a member of the European Parliament and added that to the article. Of course, it was a different guy with the same name, but it caused alot of confusion for those of us who hadn't examined the edit history. It screwed up the voting until someone noticed what happened. A better solution would have been to delete the obvious vanity and write a separate article about the Parliament guy. I can see this sort of thing happening again with articles like "Alan James is the awesomest kid at Kumquat High". We don't need someone to google the name and add that he directed films in the 1930s. It should just be deleted. The director is a separate article. -R. fiend 04:28, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
   • I agree with this suggestion. It shouldn't be a consideration in actually deleting, but it should be a consideration before nominating. I can't see how not being google friendly would harm an article, because checking google would only stop people listing things that are google friendly and so reveal their notability. Anything not google friendly presumably gets listed already, along with google friendly stuff. Hiding 14:37, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • I agree with Hiding. Google-testing doesn't always prove anything one way or another about a given article, but there are many times that articles get nominated, the nominator says "hoax" or "nonsense" or "what is this?" or "i've never heard of this, it can't be notable" or something of the sort, and a quick Google search gives good results about the topic. Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Cortez_peters is one of my "favorite" nominations - could anyone think that it was a probable hoax after looking at this Google search? If the article title is not Google-friendly, then go ahead and list it. If you find another entity than the one the article is about that should be at that title, be bold and rewrite the article (even as a stub). -- Jonel 00:41, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
3. Check for copyvio before speedying anything or listing it on VFD
   • Based on how fast some copyvio tags show up, it would appear that there are some bots searching for this already. Is the average user going to be able to find something that the bots miss, or are there no bots running? Vegaswikian 22:26, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • I can't speak for anyone else, but I'm checking for copyvio the old fashioned way. --Xcali 23:09, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
       • Researching in the Library of Congress? ;-) —Wahoofive (talk) 23:22, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
         • OK, maybe not quite that old fashioned. --Xcali 23:53, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • Several copyvios a week get posted to Wikipedia:Pages needing translation into English. Physchim62 23:30, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
4. Creating guidelines like WP:MUSIC and WP:BIO for other areas - such as websites

• Yes, this is a good idea. It might be an idea if all projects had one, for starters. Hiding 15:21, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• This is a good suggestion, but how does it ease the burden on VfD? With music vanity, for example, one still has to take it to VfD and list it as not meeting the criteria established at WP:MUSIC. --Tabor 00:46, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• You might be able to Speedy articles that fall short of the criteria. That would help. However I'm not sure how much support something like that would get except in some kind of countdown system. Vegaswikian 03:44, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

1. Create more content. Fix bad articles. Create missing ones. VfD is only a "burden" for those who spend their lives working it.
   • Most of this is irrelevant to VfD. VfD is filled with articles that can't be "fixed" except through deletion. When you have an encyclopedia that anyone can edit you get tons of crap which needs to be gotten rid of. If it weren't for VfD and CSD wikipedia would have ceased to be viable long ago. -R. fiend 19:09, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
     • As someone who spends far more of my life on VfD than I should, it's clear to me that many articles can be fixed without using VfD. I am very appreciative of those that make an attempt to clean-up, expand, verify, or otherwise fix those articles that can be fixed. The ones that truly can't be fixed, properly merged, or redirected (like all the friggin' vanities...) should go to VfD. -- Jonel 00:49, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Presumably by "articles that can't be "fixed" except through deletion" you mean "articles that shouldn't be there in the first place", and I agree with you that there are a lot of vanity articles and a few articles put there for advertising or to argue some kind of point of view. Those articles, well I don't like to be negative here but I think they should be scrutinized, so VfD is working as intended and doesn't need fixing.

The idea that the writer of the article should have the onus of convincing the person deciding whether to list for deletion, I tend to regard as an excuse for extreme laziness in cleanup. A google search costs little and would save much wasted discussion and not a little embarrassment. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 11:10, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Two users working in tandem since June 14 (Bloghate and 70.19.111.5) are adding to the load by putting VfD notices on more than 10 bios in the past 24 hours--they seem to target notable bloggers, such as Joi Ito, Anil Dash, and Hossein Derakshan, rather than obscure ones. Could we limit the number of VfD nominations in 24 hours from any single account? User:Betsythedevine

A month ago, one editor decided to list lots of school articles for deletion. He got through more than fifty VfDs in three days, over half of those on the third day. A subsequent RfC was somewhat contentious for various reasons--many editors perceived the RfC to have been brought in bad faith--but the consensus on his actions nevertheless seemed to be that putting VfDs out at this rate wasn't a productive use of his time. None of the VfDs was successful in deleting the relevant article. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 13:02, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• • No, we can't limit that. First, present software doesn't allow that, and second, it may well be a good faith effort to get rid of a number of related articles perceived as unencyclopedic. If someone's VFD behavior borders on vandalism (as has been alleged for Bloghate), we have existing mechanisms to deal with that - i.e. WP:RFC. Radiant_>|< 13:24, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)

I agree with this. The rate of ten per day does not seem excessive to me, though thirty per day (the rate that prompted me to try to get the abovementioned editor to stop) almost certainly is. But putting a hard figure on it ignores the possibility that for operational reasons there sometimes may be a valid reason for putting large amounts of VfDs up at short notice (I can't think of one, but I don't rule it out). --Tony Sidaway|Talk 13:34, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Agree w/Radiant_>|< and Tony Sidaway|Talk. I've seen many instances where multiple nominations resulted from the editor who discovered one article "following" the creator around (via user contribtuions or "what links here") and discovered a whole slew of deletable articles. Also, while some wholesale nominations may be bad faith/disrupting Wikipedia to make a point, it's entirely possible that the nominator may honestly feel that a group of articles are non-encyclopedic - not to comment on the specific example of the blogger nominations (I have not yet seen those VfD's or articles), but there are some editors who genuinely feel that bloggers must be very, very, very, very notable to be included here. In fact, although I'm going out on a limb here, I'd guess that wholesale nominations of similar articles can lead to some much-needed discussions and creation of guidelines (i.e. WP:MUSIC and WP:BIO). Soundguy99 15:29, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

OK, you've convinced me that limiting VfD to ten per day isn't a good addition to VfD policy. Thanks for the thoughtful and informative responses to my suggestion. User:Betsythedevine

Comments

• I would like to see all VFD (and CFD, etc) articles on one page, with one-line comment to them, like:
  

xyz (article about xyz)

This would allow me quickly pick up articles I may have some knowledge. Pavel Vozenilek 23:26, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Maybe we could try to make more use of existing templates like {{explain significance}} and {{cleanup context}} to test for borderline vanity before articles are tagged for VfD or Speedy. Maybe prevent articles from being VfD'ed for vanity unless they've spent a week with one of those tags. (Ok, so this might just transfer the workload from VfD to Cleanup without reducing it at all, but unless we try we'll never know.) — P Ingerson (talk) 00:54, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • Well, I looked at one article out of 534 in Category:Wikipedia articles needing context and it had the tag applied on May 2. There was one edit after that and the context still appears to be missing. So 6 weeks later, the problem is still not addressed. The problem with these cleanup categories is that not every editor has the knowledge to fix the problem. If I put an article in this category because it is about xyz school and it is not clear which of the 75 xyz schools the article is about, not too many editors can fix the problem. If the various cleanup and stub categories received attention, then they could be of greater benefit in avoiding VfD votes. In looking at one stub type, I was able to reduce the category by about 150 articles (out of about 600 at the start). Some were in the wrong place and at the other extreme, there were 4 page stubs. Vegaswikian 02:44, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Revisiting Preliminary Deletion

PD was my brainchild, and received a majority support when put up for a vote not too long ago, in those halcyon days when the whole of VfD was shorter than Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Log/2005 June 24. I'm not necessarily asking to revive it, but it may help to give some pointers on what and what not to do. It seems absurd to imagine just six months ago getting 76 new nominations to VfD a day was incomprehensible, but it's a fact. I don't think PD is too relevant to our situation now, but it, along with other failed proposals like Managed Deletion and Categorized Deletion shouldn't be ignored completely when considering possible revisions of the VfD system, which, for all its changes, is still running on the unscaleable system we were using six months ago. Johnleemk | Talk 30 June 2005 12:12 (UTC)

• I think that's a good idea. The present CSD proposal includes a mechanism somewhat similar to this. The proposal as a whole should give us a good idea what people want and not want, and their arguments. In the light of that, if we think it useful, we can give thought and discussion to a PD-mechanism. Radiant_>|< July 8, 2005 10:11 (UTC)
  • I concur; would someone think it possible to have something like categorised deletion with a committee of sorts (to quench the outcry) to review the vfd-proposal before admitting it to the vote, where you apply specialists to the task of deleting things which not everyone could immediately recognise as a hoax or vanity (e.g. music, physics, artist, writers...)? Lectonar 13:30, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

Proposal: Stubs for deletion

Since the current system, with all pages in the article namespace being listed for deletion on the one page is thought to be becoming unmanageable, this proposal tackles that concern by splitting the Votes for deletion page in two, with any articles of three paragraphs or less listed on Stubs for deletion and those over the three paragraph limit on WP:AFD|Articles for deletion]]. The Stubs for deletion page could then feasibly be operated on the basis that pages would be allowed to be merged on the first day of listing and removed if so merged. All stubs not so merged would then be voted on for deletion for four more days.

Thoughts? Hiding 07:45, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

• I like the idea very much, in principle.... some ideas:

1. not all articles under 3 paragraphs are necessarily stubs (I don't know, couldn't we name it Short articles for deletion to forego the discussion to be expected
2. it's easier to vote delete than to apply a merge as you proposed; I've seen many merge votes, but seldom someone was bold enough to do it (myself included); this is strange, because the mergers usually aren't contested and are easy to close Lectonar 13:21, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

• • Ta.
  • I'm not overfussed on the name.
    • Then have a look at Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting/Criteria; I just wanted to forestall the oncoming debate; and sorry if it didn't come over like it is: I like your proposal very much :) Lectonar 05:51, 12 July 2005 (UTC)
  • I've been puzzled by the inability to merge an article once it's on VfD, since a lot of times a consensus builds to merge. It seems expedient to allow a one day grace where articles may be merged. Hiding 15:18, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

    The objection to actually carrying out the merge during the debate is a relatively recent objection. The problem was that several articles were "merged" but later data (or votes) led to an overwhelming "delete" decision. This created a huge amount of work for the closing admin who not only had to delete the offending article but also had to find and reverse all the merger activity. The general concensus was that it's better to wait until the 5 days have run out and be sure that the concensus is really to merge.

    It was most seriously a problem when a partisan in the discussion (often the article's original author) prematurely "decided" that concensus to merge had been reached and attempted to game the system in order to prevent the deletion from occurring. The counter-argument is that some people were more willing to vote "merge" when they saw it done (and sometimes changed their votes to an unambiguous "delete" when they saw that it could not be done well). Personally, I've been wondering whether the times when this rule is beneficial are outweighed by the times when it's a burden on the discussion. Rossami (talk) 17:24, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

    • But that does not prevent any editor in any vote from saving the text on their computer and then adding the text to the target article after the vote is closed out. Vegaswikian 18:48, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
  • I think many editors expect the admin to do a bulk merge of the articles at the end leaving cleanup for someone else. Vegaswikian 18:48, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

Proposal: VfD categories

Not to be confused with Categories for Deletion. I have experienced that factuality disputes seldom can be resolved on VfD, which mostly deals with vanity, advertising, unencyclopedic articles and the likes of it. For example, from the Norse mythology pages I am contributing to, we have a few "bogus deities:" Brono, Geirrendour and Laga, who de facto does not appear in the source material for Norse mythology. We have resolved this in a satisfactory way I think, but consider that I were to VfD Brono:

People would then do a Google search and find 20,900 hits, including sites such as Encyclopedia Mythica and godchecker.com, who says Brono is a Norse god; thus keep. What would be needed is time to discuss the matter with people knowledgeable of mythology, but since VfD features some one hundred articles per day, it does not give those people the chance to catch any form of discussion. Therefore, what I believe is needed when it comes to factuality disputes are categorized VfD's. If Olaus Wolfenbach, "a composer from Bern," had 58 seemingly plausible hits on Google, I wouldn't know how to confirm his existence or non-existence, people knowledgeable of classical music might, though, and if there was a specific {{VfD-music}}, they might actually find the discussion. --Salleman 18:57, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

• I suppose that if someone created a few categories that could be added on a VfD that would list articles that are associated with speicific topics, it could draw the attention of expert editors. However, wouldn't a better soluion be to be able to search on VfD and an exiting category? I'm woried that adding this type of classification would be complicated. It could also have the reverse effect of notifying editors in certain areas of aticles being considered for deletion. If they have fixed positions, delete or keep, then they will have an easy way to find these articles and jump in and cast their standard vote. Vegaswikian 20:20, 16 July 2005 (UTC)
• Categorisation in some fashion seems a good idea to me. I, for example, know nothing about the groups and webcomics that often come up on Afd and I never vote on any of them but sometimes waste time looking at the article because its title seems like something I might know about. So a handful of categories like those and a few others would reduce the workload (schools and people are usually, but not invariably, identifiable from their name). Dlyons493 Talk 21:33, 2 October 2005 (UTC)