Wikipedia:Village pump (policy): Difference between revisions

There is a tagging dispute currently at DRN in which a {{notability}} tag was applied to an article after an AFD was closed as No Consensus. (I will not mediate any tagging dispute, because I think that the purpose of dispute resolution should be to improve the article, but that is not the point.) The editors appear to be "dug in" on both sides, with some saying that the No Consensus close meant that there are questions about the notability of the subject, and some saying that the No Consensus close meant that there was not a consensus to delete the article. I think that the issue is really a policy question, which is whether No Consensus at AFD is a reason for tagging the article. Comments? Robert McClenon (talk) 20:59, 12 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No Consensus means that there was not a consensus to delete the article. Since the only real point of a notability tag is to stimulate an Afd, & there shouldn't be another right now, it should be removed. Johnbod (talk) 04:01, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I have to disagree, the fact that that it was no-consensus clearly means there are doubts that it is notable (assuming that's why an article was at risk of deletion). So its ongoing inclusion makes sense until more sources are added. Nosebagbear (talk) 11:54, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Precisely. The purpose of tagging articles is to encourage people to fix potential issues. An AfD closing as 'no consensus' is clear evidence that a significant proportion of people think there are issues. The fix is to improve the article, not pretend there isn't a problem. AndyTheGrump (talk) 12:18, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

How do you fix notability, which is supposed to be unrelated to the current state of the article, by editing the article? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 13:19, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I consider the tag to be an appeal for editors to demonstrate notability in the article sourcing, rather than a proclamation that the subject is not notable. If the latter was the case, there would be no reason for the tag since the tagger could instead just PROD or AfD it. JoelleJay (talk) 16:50, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Assuming there was a discussion prior to the AfD, querying notability, then that would have been the time to tag, not after gng was discussed in an AfD. The discussion can continue with a view to resolution without the tag. Selfstudier (talk) 12:32, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I always find a post-AfD notability tag pointy. AfD is where we debate notability. If you still think it's not notable, you can initiate a DRV or renominate it at some point. Otherwise, what, are we supposed to have articles tagged forever? (I supported deletion btw). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 13:19, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Continued presence of notability tag can be 3 things:

1. An impetus to get the article improved
2. A visible indicator that there is an unresolved question/dispute over wp:notability
3. A precursor to AFD.

After a no-consensus AFD, with #3 temporarily off the table, you still have #1 & #2. IMO a recent no-consensus AFD should not preclude notability tagging. On #1, while in the ethereal sense notability relates to the topic/title, in reality it can be improved by including more (suitable) sources. Adding such sources (or failure to be able to do so after an effort) is also a way to resolve #2. North8000 (talk) 13:49, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Additional note: The language right at Template:Notability make clear that the tag can be removed if you are certain that enough in-depth, independent sources have been published about the subject to overcome any notability issues and that The template must not be re-added. In other words, once someone feels notability has been addressed, the notability tag is done. The next step, if you don't think they've been addressed, is to AfD, request merge, etc. This is in line with my understanding of what this tag is for. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 14:15, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Those template notes sound like good guidance for most situations but probably not for when there is a dispute. Because basically says that if one person says it's not needed and takes it off, it can't be put back. North8000 (talk) 14:33, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that's what it says, and that's the way it should be. We shouldn't be having disputes over notability tags, and it's built into the documentation of the tag. The dispute is over notability, and one side of that dispute has a way to escalate: merge, afd, etc. Insisting on tagging because you didn't get your way isn't ok. Like it or not "no consensus" defaults to keep; if you still don't think it's notable, you can renominate, go to DRV, or find something else to do (like improving the article, removing low quality sources, removing unsourced/promotional content, stubifying if necessary, etc.). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 14:58, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Many good & valid points there but I still stick with my view on categorical exclusion of the tag as outlined above. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 15:19, 13 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• I advocate for even more use of {{Notability}} for articles that are still sitting in the WP:NPP queue. But I think that as soon as an article is nominated for deletion, the tag becomes pointless. I usually remove this tag as soon as an article gets nominated for deletion. I don't wait for the AfD result. Post-AfD, if the close was no consensus, {{More citations needed}} may be more appropriate, notability discussion can continue in the talk page, or a second AfD nomination can be done. MarioGom (talk) 18:54, 14 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  "More citations needed" would not be more appropriate. The purpose of this tag is described as the following: This template indicates that the article needs additional inline citations. This is not the issue with the article - the article does not make statements that require additional inline citations. The disputed article discusses a subject which may not be notable enough to be included on Wikipedia. Those are two different issues. BeŻet (talk) 09:52, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• The template should not be restored once it is removed. As Rhododendrites points out, improvement of the article is never an option, as notability is not affected by referencing or the state of the article. The template must not be re-added. Doing so is disruptive and a block should be considered. Our means of resolving notability issues is AfD, and that should be considered final. The use of this tag to obstruct an article is deplored. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:17, 14 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I have a proposal for change here: replacing the link to Help:Maintenance template removal with Template:Notability#Removing this tag Hawkeye7 (discuss) 18:27, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  That doesn't seem necessary, as the help page already has a section about notability tags. The issue is, the help page straight up mischaracterizes the template. The template doesn't say, and doesn't require, adding citations to reliable sources (because notability doesn't require adding citations). All you have to do is read Wikipedia:Notability and Template:Notability to see that perspective doesn't follow from anything else. The template is an expression of doubt that such sources exist. To overcome it, you have to feel sufficiently confident they exist. Ideally, yes, you add them to the article, but we have other templates for insufficient citations ({{Refimprove}}, etc.). If you think the current citations are sufficient, you can just remove the tag. In a typical situation, though, you need to be careful when you do that, because the person who doesn't think it's notable can't restore the tags and has no other option but to escalate. We have a formal process for that. (Of course that's a typical case rather than someone making a point by adding it after an AfD was closed instead of following standard procedure for contesting a close or renominating). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 23:56, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• I closed the DRN case about the tagging dispute that prompted this inquiry. I was probably too polite in closing the dispute, and not sufficiently sarcastic, because I am in general disgusted by tagging disputes. Thank you for your comments. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:53, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• If an article is sent to AFD on notability grounds and survives the discussion, it should not continue to be tagged for notability. The AFD settles the notability issue. It makes no difference that the close was no consensus. A no consensus defaults to keep and means a substantial number of participants agreed it was, in fact, notable and presented rationales for that acceptable to the closer (if the keep rationales were not acceptable the close cannot possibly be no consensus). Those who disagree don't get to put a permanent "badge of shame" on the article. If you think the closer was in error then DRV is the correct route. If you think the participants were in error, then a subsequent renomination is possible. SpinningSpark 14:47, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  SpinningSpark's summary makes sense but is dependent on "a substantial number of participants", which seems a long way from where AfD is these days, with substantial numbers of cases rattling around for multiple relists with little to no participation. AllyD (talk) 16:00, 11 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  But another common reason for NC is the assertions that sources must exist for one reason or another but that they would be hard to find. This doesn't actually establish notability, it establishes a presumption of notability that can still be rebutted if it's actually determined those sources do not exist. A no-consensus close can also happen despite weak keep arguments if a large enough numerical majority develops. Finally, guidelines on notability can change, e.g. WP:NSPORTS2022, which should absolutely permit tagging of articles that no longer meet presumption of GNG. JoelleJay (talk) 16:45, 11 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• I largely agree with Spinning Spark. The badge of shame isn't helpful in general. If it's survived AfD, it's probably not among our most pressing articles wrt notability. Hobit (talk) 15:33, 11 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

RFC to clarify that notable geographical topics do not need to have stand-alone articles. See Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)#Drafting of stand-alone page criteria for WP:NGEO, based on feedback at recent RfC. Previous proposal, withdrawn to reword it: Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#RfC_on_the_addition_of_a_stand-alone_page_creation_criteria_to_the_geography_notability_guideline

Background

Wikipedia has many very short geographical article stubs. This proposal is to add a section to WP:NGEO that will clarify, in line with the existing WP:NOPAGE guideline, that information on notable geographical topics may sometimes be best included in parent articles. The draft wording of the addition to WP:NGEO is given below:

RFC

Should the following section be added to WP:Notability (geographic features)? — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 10:34, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

== Whether to create standalone pages ==

As stated in WP:NOPAGE, "Sometimes, understanding [of a notable topic] is best achieved by presenting the material on a dedicated standalone page, but it is not required that we do so. There are other times when it is better to cover notable topics, that clearly should be included in Wikipedia, as part of a larger page about a broader topic, with more context." For example, a majority of a river's tributaries may meet the notability criteria defined in this guideline, but there is little to be said about most of them. In this case, we may include a list of tributaries in the river's article, with standalone articles for some tributaries and redirect articles pointing to the list entries for other tributaries. A similar approach may be followed for hamlets or neighborhoods in a municipality, stations on a railway line, and other geographical features.

Merging a short stub about a notable topic into a parent article may improve the reader experience if it presents the topic in a broader context, as long as a redirect from the stub title is maintained, with suitable categories to assist navigation. The redirect target may be an entry in a stand-alone list or an entry in a list or sub-section within the parent article. The information may be formatted as a sortable table, a bulleted list, paragraphs, or sub-sections depending on the type of content. The redirect should point to the position in the parent article that holds the merged content, which may be identified by an {{anchor}} template. Maximum care should be taken to preserve the information that was part of the stub. Examples: MacDonald River (Côte-Nord)#Lakes and Alachua County, Florida#Historic communities in Alachua County.

It is important to follow the process described at Wikipedia:Merging when merging articles, with particular care to publicising controversial proposals at relevant WikiProjects. A merge does not preclude expanding the redirect back into a standalone page if more information comes to light.

— Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 10:34, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Survey NGEO

• Yes, as proposer Before outlining my vote, I will first mention some important aspects of Wikipedia policies and guidelines for context. Firstly, notability is not the same as stand-alone page creation criteria. From Wikipedia:Notability: [Presumption of notability] is not a guarantee that a topic will necessarily be handled as a separate, stand-alone page. Editors may use their discretion to merge or group two or more related topics into a single article. From Wikipedia:Notability#Whether_to_create_standalone_pages: Sometimes, understanding is best achieved by presenting the material on a dedicated standalone page, but it is not required that we do so. There are other times when it is better to cover notable topics, that clearly should be included in Wikipedia, as part of a larger page about a broader topic, with more context. A decision to cover a notable topic only as part of a broader page does not in any way disparage the importance of the topic. Secondly, there is no strong community consensus or policy argument against the existence of stubs, although guidelines support their existence if and when they are capable of expansion (WP:AVOIDSPLIT: If only a few sentences could be written and supported by sources about the subject, that subject does not qualify for a separate article, but should instead be merged into an article about a larger topic or relevant list., WP:STUB: A stub is an article that, although providing some useful information, lacks the breadth of coverage expected from an encyclopedia, and that is capable of expansion. bolding my own). Finally, WP:NGEO currently presumes all legally recognized places to be notable. This means that there are hundreds of thousands of articles (mostly stubs) that can be created off of a single source.
  I will now provide some arguments for why I think having specific criteria for stand-alone geo pages would be useful. To begin with, the ratio of active geo editors to geo pages is almost negligibly small. This means that not only do geo editors need to patrol many articles for them to be kept up to date or prevent misinformation, but also that large-scale misinformation campaigns or long-standing mistakes are unlikely to be caught in a timely manner (the Abadi mistranslation issue being a particularly notable mistake requiring over 13,000 page deletions). Thus, there are practical issues for the community when it comes to managing the geo pages effectively based on the current NGEO guideline. Secondly, geography stubs are unlikely to be of much use to our readers in an encyclopedic manner. Confirming that a town exists or finding out there is a town in Turkey called Afşar gives our readers very little information. Having some criteria for when to merge geostubs into their parent article or some list article could greatly improve the context and breadth of information that readers receive, without removing the information that is currently accessible as a geostub article. Finally, having more guidance on when and how to create separate articles for geographical features would be useful to new editors who don't have the experience to understand the unspoken nuances in the notability guidelines or community expectations.
  In conclusion, I think having a separate section of NGEO outlining criteria for when and how to create stand-alone pages for geographic features would be of significant benefit to the community in the future. — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 10:34, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Support the principal - but the proposed language is TLDR… can we summarize? Blueboar (talk) 12:44, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Blueboar open to suggestions :) — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 20:06, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Support nothing new here. The proposal only collects existing information from other pages and adds it for user convenience. I have merged several geo stubs myself, following existing rules listed above. Venkat TL (talk) 12:54, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose because it does not add anything to the global policies. This proposal seems to be motivated by the existence of many articles about geographical features that could be merged. It's not that I am against the objective of merging in this case—I trust that the editors know what they are doing, but the policy is independent of this particular situation and it should remain neutral, even within the particular domain of geographical features. The policy says that stand alone articles, even stand alone stubs, that are forked content are fine. It depends on the situation. How to organize a topic into many articles is not fixed by the policy. It should remain like that. (See comments and discussions). Dominic Mayers (talk) 13:30, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Support This is good guidance that represents current best practices, though I agree with the commenter below that it could be a bit more concise. Reywas92^Talk 19:45, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment. The sentence The information may be formatted as a sortable table, a bulleted list, paragraphs or sub-sections depending on the type of content is missing a comma after the word "or"; WP:NGEO is written with oxford commas.— Ⓜ️hawk10 (talk) 21:51, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Fixed, thanks Mhawk10 :) — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 22:38, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Support. Consistent with other guidelines and just reiterates what is already encouraged. JoelleJay (talk) 02:05, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose. After thinking about this more, I can't support the text because it's rather imprecise. A quick search through all of the Hamlets of Canada's territories (See: 1, 2, 3), appear to be either substantial articles or stubs where I get something out of it that is more than "X exists". I fear that the example using Hamlets will encourage inappropriate mergers of articles both where standalone stubs do a fine job covering the topic and where more-than-stubs may be pressured to be merged into county-level articles. On top of that, ordinary railroad stations need to pass WP:GEOFEAT#2 (require significant in-depth coverage by reliable, third-party sources to establish notability) or WP:GEOFEAT#3 (notable under Wikipedia's WP:GNG), each of which should make it more than reasonable that the article be expanded rather than lazily upmerged. The only real area where geostubs can actually have very little more published information than X exists and still be worthy of including in the encyclopedia (per WP:NGEO) is the clade of Populated, legally recognized places. If the proposal were going to simply give merging advice for those sorts of items, I might feel differently, but the proposal goes far beyond that limited scope in its merge recommendations. For the reason that I believe that the implementation of this language would be more likely to encourage editors to upmerge stubs to a parent rather than to expand existing stubs, I must oppose. — Ⓜ️hawk10 (talk) 02:25, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Support, with no objection to concision or other wording tweaks suggested. Wikipedia articles should help readers first and foremost, and placing topics of which there is very little to say within a wider contextual framework does this. (Reducing editor burden for maintaining multiple pages is a plus.) While the proposed text does not create new policy, it usefully points out an application of existing policy. I am specifically inclined to support here as this practice reflects the current consensus of WP:PHILIPPINES, which after numerous AfDs and some discussion has agreed that barangays are not always best covered on standalone pages (ie. the "hamlets or neighborhoods in a municipality" example mentioned). CMD (talk) 02:28, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose The proposed verbiage does not say anything useful as it's a vague case-by-case evaluation rather than some specific guidance. And its bias against specific articles about particular places is foolish. It is generally best to have tight articles about particular places because:
  1. The scope of the topic is more likely to be clear when it's a particular place rather than an arbitrary assortment
  2. The name of a particular place is more likely to be clear and unambiguous
  3. The coordinates of a particular place are more likely to be clear and exact
  4. A picture of a particular place will be easier to agree upon

See also WP:CREEP and the KISS principle.

Andrew🐉(talk) 09:56, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Andrew, I'd appreciate some clarification on your arguments.

1. What do you mean by "arbitrary assortment".
2. I'm not entirely sure what names have to do with coverage of a notable location. Perhaps an example would be useful in this point.
3. Wikipedia is not a database so being against merging (for example) for the purpose of coordinate collection seems counterintuitive to me. Additionally, with the hundreds of thousands of geostubs that have never been checked by other editors (NPP will tend to check that it's sourced correctly and passes NGEO rather than fix coordinates), I actually believe the opposite is an issue. Having hundreds of thousands of articles with negligible oversight means coordinates, if wrong, will stay on the mainpage for years on end.
4. Why are pictures a key determinant when choosing to merge/create or not to merge/create articles? If they aren't, I fail to see the relevance of this point.
5. In regards to creep, I strongly disagree my proposal would result in creep. Which of the criteria in the CREEP page do you think the proposal fails? Because in my mind there (I) is a very real problem of an unsustainable and overwhelming amount of geostubs with little to no context that no one can or bothers to patrol for accuracy of information, (II) the proposal would clarify how NOPAGE applies to NGEO in a way that will result in more constructive discussions on geo content curation, (III) this RfC would satisfy the consensus requirement if passed (taking into account that NOPAGE is already strongly-supported policy and the proposal doesn't create new rules but rather clarifies the relation of NGEO to NOPAGE). — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 13:40, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
   • A good example of an "arbitrary assortment" is Alachua County, Florida#Historic communities in Alachua County. This details information about a random assortment of places in an arbitrary way while not doing the same for other places in the county such as Hogtown or Lochloosa. Such chaotic clutter does not seem helpful to the reader. It is much simpler and straightforward if there's a separate page for each place. These pages will have a natural title and the coordinates, pictures and other content will likewise cohere in a commonsense way. The proposed text provides no clear guidance about this and so has no value; it's just superfluous verbiage which will make writers less likely to read any of the existing guidance per WP:TLDR. This is the key point of WP:CREEP, "...bloated pages that new editors find intimidating and experienced editors ignore". Andrew🐉(talk) 07:46, 18 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

     I agree that Alachua County might not be the best example. I think a good example would be something like New York City#Boroughs (assuming they didn't have their own pages). The mix of images, maps, and brief descriptions follows what I'd say would be close to ideal for describing subdivisions of a populated place (I don't see coordinate information as strictly necessary encyclopedic content). What type of guidance would you hope the guideline have if the proposal is updated, Andrew? — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 08:29, 18 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

     • Coordinates are expected in geographical topics and seem fairly fundamental. They support useful features such as the Special:Nearby function. If multiple places were forced together into arbitrary assortments then this would break that function. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:53, 19 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose, per Andrew Davidson. Unfortunately vague text that lacks specificity, and which isn't likely to be of much help in real, contentious, situations. MichaelMaggs (talk) 10:16, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose. (1) As others have already said, this adds nothing useful to policy and is TLDS where a simple link to WP:NOPAGE would do. (2) It is a solution in search of a problem. I pay particular attention to GEOLAND articles nominated for deletion and I have rarely, if ever, seen opposition to merging a stubby village article when a suitable target exists. Much more often the problem is stubby village articles get nominated for deletion instead of doing the work of merging. The proposer has not given a single example of where a one line "it exists" page has been kept standalone rather than merged because of a misunderstanding of guidlelines. (3) The text as well as being overlong is factually wrong in a number of places. For instance, it is not true that "a majority of a river's tributaries may meet the notability criteria". Just the opposite in fact, the majority of named streams are entirely non-notable. Besides which, the guideline already gives the similar example of river islands as possible candidates for merging. The guideline also already has guidance on merging populated places. SpinningSpark 14:55, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Support: hamlets or neighborhoods in a municipality, stations on a railway line cause significant problems, particularly in New Page Patrol. How do these one-line articles get notability? Just because they exist? Not on your nelly. Merging into a parent article is a proper solution. --Whiteguru (talk) 21:06, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  @Whiteguru: The guideline already recommends merging for one-line articles that "cannot be developed using known sources". Nobody (mostly) is arguing against that. The question here is whether this monstrous verbiage of an inaccurate addition is going to help. Also, can you please open a thread in the discussion section explaining why this is such a huge problem in NPP. To me it looks like tag with "notability" or "suggested merge" and job done. SpinningSpark 07:35, 18 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Support, while I agree that it is redundant to already existing policies and guidelines, sometimes (as is the case in this field) it is necessary to be redundant in order to highlight the fact that geographic articles do not enjoy a privileged states with regard to various PAGs on article creation, notability, and the like. I like the addition because it brings into highlight what should be best practices that years have history have taught are not usually followed in this realm. --Jayron32 14:43, 20 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose There is nothing here that isn't already covered in WP:FAILN. There are adequate procedures to discern which geographical topics are likely to be notable, and most neighborhoods and rivers are not notable enough even to be mentioned, let alone described, in an associated article. Case in point, not all of the lakes of MacDonald_River_(Côte-Nord) are covered in that section, just the ones where nontrivial information is available (and Lake Larry should also have its own subsection as it is associated with a national park).
  On the other hand, ghost towns in the United States are usually notable if there is evidence that it was ever a legally recognized place, and this is implicity recognized in the current wording of NGEO, so the bullets in Alachua_County,_Florida, should be split finto their own articles, as is done for the vast majority of US counties. It is not clear that the content in the examples given was merged from elsewhere, or that they reflect an established practice.
  Lastly, in some countries, very small communities are not called hamlets; for example, villages in Myanmar are below the usual cutoff of legal recognition for that country, and instead each township of Myanmar has a list of villages. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 15:14, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Good thoughts there but oppose IMO it is long essay-like advice / opinion which really doesn't add anything. Also the example given is non-typical of geo articles in an important way. For the example, the next level up (river vs. tributary) is invariably more real-world notable/ recognizable and also unique (a tributary goes only to one river). Regarding an inhabited place that passes NGEO, the next level up (e.g. a township or a country) is usually more abstract, often less real-world notable, and often not unique. For example, a small town may straddle the border between multiple townships or counties. A much better idea would be to prohibit mass-creation from mere database entries. A proposal for that a few months ago IMHO passed but in reality faded awary and got a stale no-consensus close. If an editor is going to spend real time creating a short geo article IMO that carries some weight and less likel to be any big problem compared to being just one of a set of 1,000 mass creations. North8000 (talk) 15:59, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@North8000: Re "A much better idea would be to prohibit mass-creation from mere database entries." I thought that this was already deprecated for many years. A 2009 discussion closed with a requirement that such activity required a bot approval Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 66#Proposal: Any large-scale semi-/automated article creation task require BRFA. This should still be in force unless something radical has changed that I'm not aware of. This is certainly not the only place this issue has been discussed. In particular, there have been many discussions around mass-creation of GEO stubs from the GNIS database (which has resulted in a large number of inaccurate stubs). Another one that proved controversial was mass creation of astronomical objects from databases, the vast majority of which are permanently non-notable. SpinningSpark 15:37, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Spinningspark: Hopefully that history (that I was unaware of) is in force. But a recent happening made me think otherwise. A few months ago we had a major proposal / discussion with lots of comments on adding wording discouraging mass creation of articles. This was not mentioned. (I ran out of wiki-minutes looking for it) It got forgotten. I thought it was a "pass" and asked for a close and the close was "no consensus" . North8000 (talk) 16:05, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I found it. July 2021 at wp:Notability. A previous restriction on mass creation by bots was mentioned. North8000 (talk) 16:24, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@North8000: Yes, it is actually written into policy at WP:MASSCREATE, probably as a result of the above linked discussion. Note that bot approval is required for bot-like editing using semi-automated tools like AutoWikiBrowser as well as genuine bots. Approval is never given without a community discussion supporting it for things that are not purely uncontroversial maintenance. SpinningSpark 08:04, 3 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose. There's nothing wrong with the proposed language, but experience suggests that adding this as a section of a Notability Guideline (cue theme music) will inevitably lead to it be turned into an all-caps shortcut and taken to unwise extremes. Merging is sometimes appropriate, and vastly better for the health of project than deletion. But it often has significant downsides both for user experience and article improvement. To take the proposer's example of Afşar: as a reader, even the existing two-sentence stub gives me easy access to information about the village's location and population that I would have a hard time finding if it were buried in a list. And as to article improvement, tr:Afşar, Bolu, while still quite minimal, has considerably more content than the English article. So the English article is capable of being expanded -- which would be unlikely to happen if the existing information were merged into a list of settlements. Good merging requires balancing these considerations, and even small amendments to guidelines can easily upset that balance. I think the existing policies provide sufficient guidance. It would not be an improvement to have something that editors could casually cite as authority, AFD-style ("Merging 500 stubs into a single list per WP:GEOMERGE"). -- Visviva (talk) 17:38, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak oppose. If there is consensus for the spirit of the proposal, please, make it more concise, and more reliant on other existing guidelines such as WP:NOPAGE. All the subject-specific notability guidelines and other notability-related guidelines are already complex enough, and sometimes ambiguous or contradictory. MarioGom (talk) 20:04, 16 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose adding this lengthy "Whether to create standalone pages" addition to Wikipedia:Notability (geographic features) (NGEO). There's ambiguity in the paragraph using terms such as what is "best" and "better", and it comes across as more of an opinion essay. Since NGEO is an official guideline page, this essay-like opinion would simply introduce more instruction creep into the process, and merges can still continue without the addition. Also opposing per the rationale presented by Visviva, because this type of instruction could then lead to an unfortunate predicament in which users merge and redirect stub articles that are actually expandable, but have not been expanded, as well as having a potential for being taken to unwise extremes, preventing article from being expanded. For example, let's say that user A merges and redirects, then user B comes along, restores the article and then expands it, and then User A blanks and redirects again, simply citing the all-caps shortcut on the NGEO page and leaving an edit summary stating, "no, this article is not allowed". This is inevitably the sort of thing that would eventually occur. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 19:15, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Discussions

• I don't like survey in a RfC that are not complementary to a discussion. The most important in a RfC is the arguments, the discussion. The consensus is best obtained through a discussion. A survey is only there to help. It does not replace the discussion. Besides, in some RfCs, the outcome is more nuanced than a support or a reject. Dominic Mayers (talk) 13:57, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Dominic Mayers calling the section "Survey" is commonplace on wiki, in my experience, and does not impede discussion. — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 14:20, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Perhaps it's only a question of terminology, but a separate section where people summarize their position is useful and is best kept separated from the discussion section. Dominic Mayers (talk) 14:25, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Perhaps a simpler paragraph that simply says that the global policies Wikipedia:Summary style, Wikipedia:Content forking, Wikipedia:Article size, and Wikipedia:Merging, as summarized in WP:PAGEDECIDE, apply to geographic features as well would be more appropriate. My understanding is that a group of editors consider that a lot of small articles should be merged into larger articles. There is nothing wrong with that, especially if it is does not create a polemic. However, I don't see that we should duplicate what is already written in the policies to support that. It is paradoxical that the goal is to keep Wikipedia simple, but it accomplishes that by making its policy more complex with duplication. Dominic Mayers (talk) 13:57, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• If the intention is to discourage systematically content forking in the context of articles on geographical features, then this is not the same as the global policy. It should not be presented as an application of this global policy. It becomes then a specific policy for articles on geographical features. Some rational that is specific to articles on geographical features would have to be given to justify this more specific policy. I have not seen this rational. Dominic Mayers (talk) 20:23, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  What? I'm so confused as to what you interpret the proposed addition's impact/relation with content forking is, Dominic Mayers. — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 21:25, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I don't know what confuses you. I don't see this in a complicated manner. When a topic is divided into many articles, this is content forking. It's natural and some times necessary, especially in large topics. There is nothing pejorative in the concept of content forking. It should not be confused with POV forking. Dominic Mayers (talk) 21:42, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I understand what forking is, Dominic Mayers, I'm just confused as to what exactly in the proposed wording discourages systematically content forking as well as what "systemic content forking" is. You say "the global policy", but that may refer to any sections of the policies and guidelines. Perhaps rewording your initial comment to be less vague would be helpful in that regard. — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 22:42, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I agree that the proposed wording does not discourage forking. In fact, it seems to repeat what the global policy says regarding forking and the global policy does not discourage forking. It's just that you described separately, in your comment, a problematic situation which requires merging as a solution. I agree that the situation is confusing, but this is because there is no connection between the objective that you describe and the policy: the policy does not encourage merging (nor discourage it) and merging seems to be your goal. Dominic Mayers (talk) 23:04, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Dominic Mayers I personally do believe that the addition to NGEO encourages more frequent and widespread merging of geographic articles in cases where it makes sense. At the very least it clarifies it as a valid editorial decision so voting to keep a geostub in an AFD "per NGEO" demands a conversation on whether merging or keeping the stand-alone article is the best way to preserve the content, which would be a massive improvement over the current state of affairs where the de facto assumption is all articles that pass NGEO deserve their own pages. In the sense of PAGs not encouraging merging, the PAGs encourage editorial decisions that benefit our mission, our readers, and our ability as editors to continue our work on the wiki sustainably. When taking decisions regarding how to present content to our readers, I think guidelines that acknowledge the existence of merging as an option are helpful to the community, which is why I proposed the addition of the section to NGEO. — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 23:30, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  If you give the impression that a different policy is needed, when it's not the case, then you weaken your position: only a few people are here to discuss what you propose, the wording, etc. whereas the global policy has the support of the community at large. Unless you need to have a specific policy adapted to articles on geographical features, I don't see what is the purpose here. As a minimum, make it clear that you refer to the global policy. I still do not see the point of repeating it, but there will be no harm. What is clear is that, if you need a support from the community for merging many articles and the existing policy is sufficient, then the best way is to discuss the specific of the situation in the light of this policy, not confuse this with a discussion of the policy for the sake of improving it. Dominic Mayers (talk) 23:56, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Dominic Mayers I'm not proposing entirely new policy but rather an addition to NGEO that brings it closer in alignment to NOPAGE, which is part of WP:N. The issue is that sometimes when you propose merging articles based on NOPAGE, editors will reply they believe the article should be kept separate based on NGEO (see one of the AFDs I started in line with WP:BLAR), completely ignoring NOPAGE. That is why specific guidance on the NGEO guideline would be beneficial. I'm happy to discuss this in more detail on my talk page if you wish to have a conversation about it, as we are taking up quite a bit of space here. — Ixtal ^{( T / C )} ⁂ Join WP:FINANCE! 13:52, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  We are not taking too much space here at all. We are discussing exactly what needs to be discussed. Yes, I would support a clarification that passing the notability requirement is not at all a sufficient criterion for a stand alone page. That seems to be your main point. In fact, if it is not already clarified at the global policy level, it should be. You could then refer to that clarification, which is or would be provided at the global level. I suggest that you limit the proposal to that. Just have this single main point. Dominic Mayers (talk) 14:33, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• The proposal states For example, a majority of a river's tributaries may meet the notability criteria defined in this guideline, but there is little to be said about most of them. If this is an accurate description of the situation, the guideline is problematic: it's weird that it classifies as notable geographical features about which there is little to be said. Perhaps this is the real issue at stake here. Stubs are a different thing. We create a stub when we are pretty sure there is enough to be said about the subject. If we have many stubs with little to be said on the subject and the guideline supports that, it's a problem with the guideline. I admit that I do not know much about the history of the guideline. I was summoned at random by a bot to give my comment. If this has been discussed before and the guideline remained like that, then perhaps not enough people were involved in that previous discussion or the sentence above is not an accurate description of the situation. Dominic Mayers (talk) 12:54, 17 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  As I pointed out in my !vote, this is completely inaccurate. The guideline supports no such thing, it says "named natural features are often notable". It does not say they are always notable, and then goes on to give named river islands as candidates for merging into the river article. It is obvious to anyone reading the guideline that river tributaries will fall under the same principle. There is no need for this lengthy addition to the guideline to explicitly state that. SpinningSpark 07:44, 18 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I have been participating in AfDs more, and have seen things that I feel need to be addressed. Three AfDs have spurred me to propose new reforms to this community process:

• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Marina Ovsyannikova - I !voted to delete and redirect the article in question. If you read the AfD, you will see that there are many "keep" !votes, many of them using arguments we should avoid using in deletion discussions, mainly based on personal point of view. Those !votes all came from IPs and accounts whose only purpose was to "save" the subjects article. Ultimately, the article was kept, even though it wasn't because of the SPAs. As someone who rarely gets over the past, I felt that things had to change in AfDs.

• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Let me solo her1 - While patrolling recent changes, I came across this article again, which had been nominated for deletion by a new user. I commented on the AfD because I got suspicious of the fact that newly registered users were able to find a Wikipedia process that I feel can only be found by new accounts when they are pointed to them. Haleth wrote an amazing "keep" opinion, mentioned that they share my concerns about the nominator potentially being a single-purpose account, and said,

  PS: On a side note, why do we even allow random editors below autoconfirmed or extended confirmed status the capability to conduct drive-by AfD nominations, especially when this is a topic area is notorious for rampant bad faith actions from block evading sockpuppets?

• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Victoria Asher - I did not participate in this one, but it reinforces why I think the AfD process should be reformed. In fact, Deepfriedokra protected the page due to the problems I have addressed.

I am thankful that us experienced Wikipedians know about the policies and guidelines, and resist ineffective outside pressure. As ScottishFinnishRadish said when an IP confronted him about his nomination of Victoria Asher for deletion,

melecie covered the rest pretty well. My actions have nothing to do with Asher, and everything to do with how we ascertain notability on Wikipedia.

Now, for my actual reforms:

• !votes that are based on certain arguments to avoid in deletion discussions, such as arguments without arguments and personal point of view, can and should be "thrown out" (removed), which should be followed with a message to the !voter explaining why. We should make a warning template for that purpose.

• !votes from identified single-purpose accounts/IPs should be removed because they will never affect consensus and constitute disruptive editing (this is the reason DFO gave to protect Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Victoria Asher). I know that there are some AfDs that have gotten public attention, so people come to the discussion and push their POVs, a form of advocacy. I also think this constitutes meatpuppetry because it involves recruiting people for disruptive purposes. Meatpuppetry is not allowed because it is a form of sockpuppetry. To prevent bad-faith editors from trying to alter consensus, all AfDs should be pending changes protected (preferably by a bot), allowing IPs and newly registered users to participate while their !vote is reviewed. A pending changes reviewer will be able to take a look at the user's activities on WP and decide if the !vote should be accepted or "rejected".

Let me know if you have other ideas dedicated to stopping bad faith editing on Articles for Deletion. --LPS and MLP Fan (Littlest Pet Shop and My Little Pony Fan) 22:06, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I have not participated at AfD in a long time. Too contentious. --Deepfriedokra (talk) 22:19, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Okay. PackMecEng (talk) 22:32, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Concern .....simply not the place for content editors Moxy- 19:49, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think the percentage of AfDs that have these issues is pretty small, and generally closers are more than willing to discount obvious meat and sock violations. It's also not too difficult to get protection if it's needed.

The only issue I had with how the Asher AfD went was that someone restored a number of obvious meat !votes I had removed after the page was semi'd. Even that didn't effect the outcome, though. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 22:35, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Pinging Graeme Bartlett, as I mentioned them. [1] and [2] are the removal and restoration. Since AfDs are not votes, but discussions on how policy applies, being unfamiliar enough that you don't know where to contribute seems like it should be disqualifying. There should be a fair amount of leeway for removing non-constructive obvious meat-puppet contributions from discussions. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 22:51, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Votes should not be removed because they are poorly formatted or obviously due to canvassing. There is a danger that deleting comments is removing valid votes, and mainly because the remover disagrees. Someone who does not like the comments should instead add a comment about them. Later the closer should consider what they say. If their argument is valid, then it should be considered. And if out of policy then it can be ignored. We have two important things here: an encyclopedia that we are trying to build, and people who want something. The purpose is not to serve the bureaucracy. In the case of Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Victoria_Asher the page should not have been semi protected, as it resulted in votes going on the talk page, making it even more difficult for the closer, than if they had gone on the main page. And once someone put a vote in the wrong place, others followed the wrong example. Most of these votes are not bad faith and are not actually disruptive if they are voting to keep. Disruptive votes from actual socks or trouble makes are much more likely to be delete votes. You are right be be suspicious of delete nominations from a SPA. But they can be speedily kept if obviously bad faith. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 23:27, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Most of these votes are not bad faith and are not actually disruptive if they are voting to keep. Disruptive votes from actual socks or trouble makes are much more likely to be delete votes. You are right be be suspicious of delete nominations from a SPA.

?? I see way more SPA keep !votes trying to promote non-notable subjects than I see !votes for delete driven by off-wiki disputes. Most of those keeps are from COI/UPE/agenda-based accounts and are inherently disruptive. JoelleJay (talk) 06:07, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Graeme Bartlett: I hope you are having a good day and I apologize for not replying sooner. Why do you think that votes from people who came to an AfD with an agenda are good faith? Even though ignorance of the law may excuse when dealing with newcomers, bad faith is evident if they come with an agenda. I don't think that single-purpose editors will follow Wikipedia rules (this is why I do not like them). If you look at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Marina Ovsyannikova, there is a single-purpose account who !voted keep, HansClumsy. That account was blocked for making disruptive edits, such as removing the AfD tag of the article, assuming bad faith from other editors, and bothering an admin, Ponyo, over the matter. Their talk page contains proof that canvassed SPAs may have more bad-faith intentions than just attempting to alter the result of an AfD. This AfD had lots of people who came with the intent of having it kept, so it means that it must have been shared online. This makes HansClumsy and the other SPAs and IPs who came to the discussion guilty of a form of sockpuppetry, meatpuppetry. However, I don't think blocking them for meatpuppetry would do much because it's not likely that they would come back after fulfilling their purpose. (pinging ScottishFinnishRadish as they pinged Graeme to the discussion) LPS and MLP Fan (Littlest Pet Shop and My Little Pony Fan) 13:51, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't it more likely that the many editors who came to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Marina Ovsyannikova saw her action in the main headlines of most Western news outlets, came to Wikipedia to see if there was any further information about her, and saw that her article was nominated for deletion? "It means that it must have been shared online" and the subsequent accusations of sockpuppetry and meatpuppetry are themselves assumptions of bad faith. Phil Bridger (talk) 16:55, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

These kinds of proposals come up fairly frequently, but fail to find consensus for a change. That's not to say you can't try again, but you may want to dig through the various village pump and AfD archives to see where they went wrong. I agree that canvassing and meat puppetry are nontrivial problems for AfD. Ideally, closers don't give them much weight, but that's not actually consistent practice. Ultimately, even though it's a !vote, few closers are willing to close against the majority (and go through the inevitable challenges, allegations of supervoting, and DRVs). Only when abuse is egregious and obvious, or when comments are way off the mark, is it uncontroversial to discount them. But it's not clear what a better system would be. We could semi-protect AfDs (or even ECP) by default, but what about new users who bring lots of good sources to the debate -- ok to relegate them to the talk page? What about article creators who are not yet autoconfirmed or extended confirmed? How would we create an exception to them? Canvassing, meat puppetry, etc. can be really hard to prove, so it would also be hard to build rules around degree of certainty... — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 00:01, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• It's really the job of the closer to disregard weak votes, but the closer should not be mandated to do certain things because it doesn't leave room for compelling arguments and other context specific things. If you feel the closer didn't do the right thing ask them about it, and if they don't give a reasonable reply, see WP:DRV. -- GreenC 00:24, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• There was just a similar issue at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Coco Bandicoot. Half of the redirect votes were either just WP:PERNOM or WP:JUSTAVOTE. Then when I brought up new sourcing, most of those still in favor of a redirect didn't actually give a reason for their stance, while another editor voted keep based on that sourcing. Hence, I think this discussion should have at least been relisted. I don't think consensus was clear based on the new sourcing I provided. MoonJet (talk) 04:14, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Feel free to take any of these to WP:DELREV. That's what it's for. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 04:19, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Number 2 is a non-starter, IMO. When we say Wikipedia is the encyclopedia anyone can edit, we really mean it. If someone without an account comes across an article with an AfD banner at the top and follows the link to the discussion, they should be welcome to engage in that discussion (though if their arguments are not compatible with policy, they should be disregarded).
  Number 1 is a recipe for strife. It sounds reasonable on the surface, but the big question is who decides which arguments to strike as non-policy-based? And what happens when editors inevitably disagree about it? Are we going to have sub-discussions to form consensus about whether a particular comment should be struck? That sounds like a nightmarish fractal of infinite bureaucracy. As others have said, it's up to the closer to judge the strength and policy-compliance of each argument. Colin M (talk) 17:43, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  @Colin M: I understand your concerns. I think I should clarify what I said in my reforms (pinging Rhododendrites as they expressed a similar concern). I suggested that AfDs should be given pending changes protection in order to allow IPs and newly registered users to participate. After reading my statement again, I think it could be interpreted as shutting them out of the process.

  To answer the big question, experienced users, preferably people active in AfDs, should be able to decide which arguments are non-policy-based. However, some arguments that can be struck out are blatantly non compliant with policy. Anyone with some experience will be able to cross those out. For example, if a slew of newly registered users came to an AfD of a non-notable band in order to !vote "keep" with reasons along the lines of WP:ILIKEIT, anyone can strike out their votes because they obviously do not use any policies/guidelines and they could have found the AfD because they were told to (canvassing/meatpuppetry). I don't believe that any reasonable editor would disagree with restoring those kinds of !votes, but like you said, the closer will be the ultimate judge of deciding which !votes get counted.

  Thank you for participating in this discussion. LPS and MLP Fan (Littlest Pet Shop and My Little Pony Fan) 21:31, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Thanks for clarifying. I misinterpreted "!votes from identified single-purpose accounts/IPs should be removed" as (single-purpose accounts)/(IPs), rather than single-purpose (accounts/IPs). Still, I disagree with using PCP in this way for the same reason I disagree with reform #1. Colin M (talk) 16:22, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Perhaps the !votes of editors who support redirecting and deletion at the same time - which may not be technically possible and is certainly not compliant with policy - should be "thrown out" (removed), which should be followed with a message to the !voter explaining why. That seems reasonable. Newimpartial (talk) 18:11, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  It's merge and delete that are incompatible without effort (see WP:MAD), not redirect and delete, but they should obviously be done in the reverse order. Phil Bridger (talk) 18:36, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  In what situation is "delete and redirect" more compliant with policy than "merge and redirect"? Newimpartial (talk) 22:13, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  When there's no mergeable content. This happens often when the existing content is riddled with copyright infringements, or isn't sourceable. Or the best target for the redirect is unrelated to the subject except for having a similar name. Reyk _YO! 22:27, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Actually, COPYVIO was the one limit case where I already saw the potential benefit of a page delete before recreating the page as a redirect. And I suppose where the best redirect target isn't related to the content at AfD, that might also mandate a page delete in some cases.

  But where content "isn't sourceable" (the much more common scenario), what problem is there in retaining it in the page history? I get that "merge and redirect" doesn't apply where there is literally no content to merge, but that doesn't mandate a "delete" (which always means a page delete, no?). Newimpartial (talk) 12:55, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  My comment was simply to point out that deleting and redirecting does not violate any policy, if that is the outcome of a discussion. Deleting and merging does unless a lot of care is taken (per WP:MAD) to avoid a copyright violation. Phil Bridger (talk) 16:38, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  While "delete and redirect" may not necessarily violate policy, there ought to be a good reason for the page history to be deleted (such as COPYVIO, or COI editing, or if the page history concerns a different topic entirely). For the vast majority of AfDs that result in a redirect, the page history should be retained, and any DUE, permissible content should be merged to the redirect target per WP:PRESERVE. Newimpartial (talk) 20:08, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I think we agree about that issue. Phil Bridger (talk) 20:19, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• AFD as presently constituted does far more harm than good to the project (the presence of bad content being far less of a problem than the absence of good content; after all these years we still have amazingly little good content, and most of what we have grew slowly from bad content). AFD has been a source of massive toxicity for many years. It would be impossible to tally the damage it has caused or to number the editors it has driven away. I myself can only stand a few days in that atmosphere every few years. Unfortunately, a significant amount of that toxicity can be attributed to people using the WP:ATA essay/wishlist as if it were policy. Low-effort !votes and comments based on handwaving invocations of WP:ATA, or (to get to the nub of the problem) that place the onus on the article's creators/defenders rather than the nom, should be given no weight. (For that matter, IMO, deletion arguments not based on the purposes of the encyclopedia should be given very little weight, recognizing that the notability guidelines are merely a means to an end and applying them indiscriminately can do enormous damage.) In any event, this proposal would take things in exactly the wrong direction. -- Visviva (talk) 02:55, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Either a sock/meatpuppet vote is clear enough that someone should label it as such, and therefore will be obvious to the closer (it would usually be obvious even without the post) or it's not clear, in which case we risk removing viable !votes. Thus too, blatant ILIKEIT/IDONTLIKEIT votes. Labelling is also better than deletion because it avoids the risk of GF errors, or at least helps get more eyes on doing such. I've never known an AfD get the wrong result by a clear issue with such, and this proposal is not designed for the less than clear examples. There are reasons non-AC users should participate in AfDs, but I grant that the use-cases for a non-AC user needing to nominate an article would also usually make it easy for them to find another editor to request it for them. Nosebagbear (talk) 10:02, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

One idea is wording at the AFD that urges and creates an expectation that arguments should be made based on the guidelines/policies involved in the nomination criteria. For example, if nominated based on notability that arguments be in terms of GNG and/or relevant SNG guideline. And maybe to go further to say that closes take into account only such arguments. North8000 (talk) 16:33, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• If it were up to me, all XfD discussions would automatically be semi-protected. There is virtually nothing of use that IPs and newbies can offer in such discussions. I realize that some IPs are longstanding contributors, but this will encourage registration in order to better insure that the IPs we deal with are consistently the same editors. BD2412 T 18:25, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  This is absurd. Usually when an XfD is being brigaded/canvassed offsite, those doing so register accounts anyways in an effort to be taken more seriously. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 19:05, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Semi-protection extends to excluding registered accounts as long as they are less than four days old and have fewer than ten edits. Perhaps we need another intermediate level of protection for a somewhat longer period (figuring that a relisted AfD will run for about two weeks), and requiring somewhat more previous editing. BD2412 T 19:32, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  @BD2412 and Jéské Couriano: Thanks for participating in the discussion. I agree with BD's idea, though I also think that we should allow IPs and newly registered accounts to participate as well. This is why I suggested that pending changes protection be applied to AfDs. Note that I did not say XfDs because AfDs are about articles, so they serve the most interest to the public. Requiring previous experience will help weed out !voters who came for a reason unrelated to Wikipedia maintenance, but how difficult would that be to enforce? LPS and MLP Fan (Littlest Pet Shop and My Little Pony Fan) 21:59, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  CRASHlock actually is not an option here (and if it were I'd stop participating in AfDs altogether). The install used by en.wp limits it to mainspace specifically. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 20:40, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  @Jéské Couriano: This is not true. Notwithstanding policy considerations, PC may be applied to pages in Wikipedia space (and that includes AfDs), as evidenced by this list. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Agree with BD2412 - excellent idea that will prove beneficial in getting more IPs to register. Atsme 💬 📧 13:43, 19 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

A Few Comments

I started one of the discussions about Articles for Deletion in asking about a particular abuse that I see (moving the article to draft space to defeat the AFD). I will also comment on a few of the points in this thread and offer another suggestion.

I strongly disagree with any rule that !votes should be removed or deleted. It is the job of the closer to decide what !votes should be discounted, so that the removal of material before the close is pseudo-closing, which we should not do. Purely disruptive material is of course a special case. It can be redacted as RD3, and so can instead be blanked without redaction. But the original issue was the deletion of stupid !votes, not disruptive material. Leave the stupid stuff on the record. Maybe it should be stricken, but not removed. Robert McClenon (talk) 05:43, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

On the one hand, I agree that AFDs should be semi-protected. One editor asks about article creators who are not yet auto-confirmed. Article creators must be auto-confirmed. The rare exception would be an editor who submits a draft that is approved by a reviewer before the editor has four days and ten edits. An admin should confirm them; it won't happen that often. If we do semi-protect AFDs, we should also specify that talk page requests will be ignored. On the other hand, if we do not routinely semi-protect AFDs, we should have a guideline about the occasional semi-protection of AFDs, and it should specify that talk page requests are ignored. Robert McClenon (talk) 05:43, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

General Sanctions

There are a few editors who either disrupt AFDs, or inject a toxic atmosphere into AFD discussions. Such editors should be sanctioned. The community has a mixed record about disciplining editors who disrupt the AFD process. I would suggest that we ask the community to impose Community General Sanctions, authorizing expedited administrative action, for editors whose participation in AFDs (whether to Keep or to Delete, or simply to insult other editors) is disruptive. The Manual of Style already has ArbCom sanctions. Deletion is a process that is disrupted often enough that expedited administrative action should be authorized. Robert McClenon (talk) 05:43, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• I think I could support some form of this -- it seems like every couple weeks there is another huge thread on AN/I about someone (or multiple someones) being extremely rude on AfD. Of course, the sanctions themselves would have to be crafted rather carefully. jp×g 07:02, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I absolutely support this as an effective way to reform AfD. LPS and MLP Fan (Littlest Pet Shop and My Little Pony Fan) 20:29, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I can support general sanctions for XfDs in general - not just AfD - and I say this knowing full well I've had previous interactions on XfDs that would have led me to getting sanctions were they in place at that point. To me, the points that need to be addressed are both the rudeness and repeatedly bringing up points that have already been dispensed with by multiple XfD commentors, which often results in rudeness (either from the IDHT user or the frustrated people having to reply to the same points over and over). —Jéské Couriano v^_^v ^{a little blue Bori} 20:46, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Robert McClenon: Would you be willing to provide examples of times when the community has failed to protect Wikipedia against future disruption by failing to sanction a particular editor (or set of editors) relating to AfD behavior? I recall there was some ANI thread a few months back regarding the Article Rescue Squadron, but I'm generally not familiar with the history here. — Ⓜ️hawk10 (talk) 20:53, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Every ARS thread before the last one. Levivich 01:03, 29 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. No biting new article creators with awareness notices during the deletion discussion at AFD. Or after deletion of their article.Lurking shadow (talk) 18:01, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Support with caveats. No editors with less than X edits and x appearances at AfD should receive GS notice and must be handled through normal administrative channels. I'm not sure what those numbers should be, but the intent would be that only experienced editors should be subject to GS on this topic area. We need to cut down on the bad behavior and bickering between long-standing editors, not give every editor a hammer to wield against passionate newbies.

There is continual problems and confusion over the use of WP:NCHESS at Afd and in the used for justification for reams of badly sources chess bios. As far as a I know it is not policy, except it seems to be continually used as though it is policy, for example at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alexander Bagrationi (chess). scope_creep^Talk 19:26, 5 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• It doesn't supersede WP:GNG, which it clearly states, so it's a benchmark for likely notability. Though I see that discussion has devolved into arguing its compatibility to NSPORT, which is a contentious SNG that divides the community. Meeting WP:GNG should always be the goal because outside narrow exceptions GNG must be eventually met. NPROF with looser/different standards and NCORP with stricter standards would be examples of actually deviating from GNG.Slywriter (talk) 19:53, 5 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• The key to understanding how our various Subject Notability Guidelines (SNGs) and our General Notability Guideline (GNG) work in tandem is to understand the word “presumed”… it means that if the article topic meets the SNG criteria, it is highly likely that there will be reliable sources to also pass GNG.

  However, this is not guaranteed. It means we give the article a “benefit of the doubt” at AFD… we hesitate, and conduct a thorough search for those presumed sources BEFORE deleting (and ideally before nominating). It does NOT mean we can not delete if it turns out those sources don’t actually exist. Blueboar (talk) 20:15, 5 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Well, NCHESS isn't even an SNG, so this is ultimately irrelevant. JoelleJay (talk) 21:31, 5 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Though even giving it the credit of a half step below a SNG (for ease of discussion), the key statement from Blueboar is "benefit of doubt". Reading the AfD that benefit of doubt has been questioned and sourcing should be provided as part of a valid keep rationale.Slywriter (talk) 22:51, 5 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  As discussed elsewhere, even WP:N isn't a policy. It is a guideline, and WP:GNG is the most commonly used and probably most useful guideline to help us determine what is encyclopedically worthy of attention. It and several WP:SNG's have broad community support and longstanding consensus. In the case of WP:NCHESS, it has not achieved broad community consensus. Probably because it is a niche topic. However, this has been developed by subject matter experts, as to which topics are likely worthy of attention for a specialized encyclopedia, so if the topic meets one of the criteria it seems reasonable to give that some weight. That said, NCHESS subjects itself to GNG, so if for instance the topic fails WP:V or WP:NOTDICTIONARY, it would seem reasonable that these issues would supersede any criteria of NCHESS. 78.26 _{(spin me / revolutions)} 02:32, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I agree with everything else you said, but I think it's important to note that a big reason we don't just take a project's assessment of notability PPV as the final word is because oftentimes, particularly in niche topics where most articles will be biographies, the project develops lower and lower standards for both acceptable predictive accuracy and what counts as GNG in general. See, for example, all the sports projects whose notability guidelines were pared down or deleted after the WP:NSPORTS2022 consensus. JoelleJay (talk) 18:24, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• It's not a guideline, but it's also not a huge reach. The most inclusive of the components is the claim that GMs are notable. Fewer than 2000 GM titles have ever been issued, and it's one of the most played games in the world. The big problems for sourcing are (a) the GMs who haven't been particularly active in the last 15 years of internet coverage, and (b) most GMs do not live in English-speaking countries (and many of those other countries don't use a Latin script, making searching difficult). This all makes WP:BEFORE challenging. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 03:06, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• No it's not a wikipedia policy, it was developed by consensus of participants of WP:CHESS. Still I'm concerned about the recent deletionism trend towards chess players. Alexander Bagrationi is a Grandmaster with several sources to back him up. (Haven't worked out how his name is written in Hebrew yet). MaxBrowne2 (talk) 14:20, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  @MaxBrowne2 I did search his name in Hebrew (based on how it appeared on one Hebrew site mentioning him), but that returned exclusively mirrors of the original site and a few things on a member of the Bagrationi dynasty. The search in Cyrillic was similarly unfruitful, yielding just the unreliable SPS mentioned in the AfD. JoelleJay (talk) 21:12, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• WP:CHESS is not the only WikiProject to have its own internal notability guide, and it does state that it is subservient to the GNG. It's not a policy or guideline but it doesn't claim to be.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 15:14, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• TLDR it is an WP:ESSAY. WP:SNGs must have project-wide consensus and are never hosted on a WikiProject. This is just some guidance on the Chess project. As an essay, it really means nothing policy-wise, and is subservient to WP:GNG and other relevant policy or guideline criterium. -Indy beetle (talk) 20:57, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• That seems to be pretty clear. I'm was worried about the fantastic number of chess grandmasters that are being created and referenced to Chessgames database statistics and Chess.com blogs. I think now, I see there is only 2000 of them, so potentially they are all notable, then. I must assume that they will be updated to proper book references at some point in the future, as they GMs, there must be real coverage somewhere. Thanks for the comments. Its opened my mind somewhat to new possibilities and less of a targeting of chess articles and GM article at article review. scope_creep^Talk 10:38, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Anyone meeting WP:NCHESS#1 or #2 will certainly be notable: it's just a matter of getting ahold of the sources, which may be in any language and not available on the internet. — Bilorv (talk) 17:28, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I searched for Alexander/Aaron Bagrationi in English, cyrillic, and Hebrew and found almost nothing (but did discover he wiki has a very well-developed article on the Bagrationi dynasty). The number of GMs is also skyrocketing, to the point that many (including Bagrationi) have too low an Elo to even enter some elite tournaments. That suggests the designation is not as selective as it once was and that coverage of chess is not so widespread as to justify presumption of notability for each GM. JoelleJay (talk) 17:59, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  There are always going to be GMs that aren't as good as other GMs, and elite tournaments with strict requirements. Some tournaments wind up being largely for the top 20 people in the world, so I wouldn't say not being able to enter some tournaments is an issue. Rating and tournament success also isn't everything. GMs are more likely to get book deals, more likely to be invited to give lectures, more likely to be invited commentators now that such a thing exists...
  Pre-1980s, when FIDE tweaked the rules a bit, the title did mean more and there were fewer, but it's still pretty elite. There is an unofficial title of "super GM" which, I think, generally refers to people >2700 FIDE. They're going to wind up being more notable because they attain some kind of celebrity. There's plenty of funny business, too. There's a lot of money involved even for those who pursue it on the up-and-up due to the cost of tournaments, coaches, and travel, and lots of stories about tournament directors taking payoffs, tournaments held just to get someone a GM norm (there are legitimate ways to do this, but also not-so-legitimate ways), etc. When there's some sort of national pride on the line, you might imagine government pressure to have the most GMs, have the strongest GMs, have the highest ratings, etc. Relevant. But there's funny business and better/worse players at the top level of basically any sport/game, so I'd be wary of making generalizations. It may be worth some research. Could start with GMs from the English-speaking world to start out, to get a clearer sense of how much coverage GMs get? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 20:43, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The following list consists of articles that should either be prodded or taken to AfD, and was produced by reviewing a small number of the articles created by banned sockmaster BlackJack. By reviewing the creations of editors like BlackJack lists this size or longer can be produced every day for years, and this is something that neither AfD nor Prod can handle - and the third option, silently redirecting, is not an option for many of these articles,^[a] and is opposed by some editors.

The existence of mass produced stubs that fail our notability guidelines is a problem that needs to be resolved to improve Wikipedia, but our current processes cannot handle that problem.

I believe that moving to user space or draft space all articles that do not include any sources that a reasonable editor could believe meets the requirements of WP:GNG would reduce the scale of the problem to one that can be handled through our normal processes, but based on the discussion above such a proposal would be rejected by the community. Instead, I open this discussion to find an alternative; a different process that would allow us to address the problem without overwhelming our existing processes.

BilledMammal (talk) 06:24, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I agree there's a larger issue with mass stubs being created on articles that (used to) meet WP:NSPORT based on database entries, that probably don't have significant coverage since the people only played a couple games. It's an issue with football and other sport articles too. Changing WP:NSPORT was the first step but dealing with the massive amount of stubs already created is a hard issue. However if the articles are so noncontroversial to delete, then a mass AfD should work. Tbh since the articles here are sourced and of dead people I don't think it's that big of an issue that the articles exist, beyond WP:NOTDATABASE. There are mass BLP creations that are more of an issue. Galobtter (pingó mió) 07:07, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

A few mass AFD's have been tried, though smaller than the list above, but they have all been rejected as WP:TRAINWRECKS. Unfortunately, that is also not an option. BilledMammal (talk) 07:30, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There are a number of problems with the articles which have bee PRODed and, I'm afraid, that articles like these often take a long time to work up - and there aren't that many of us working on cricket articles in the sort of way that they need to be worked on. There are almost certainly people on these lists who are clearly going to turn out to be notable for other stuff - as soon as someone turns out to be an MCC member, for example, you can be reasonably certain that there's stuff written about them somewhere. In other cases there will almost always be sensible redirects which can be employed - in some cases you'll find short biographies on those redirect options and a fairly significant number of articles have already been redirected in similar ways without all the drama associated with this process.

I feel at this point that it's also really, really important to point out that the RfC proposals which were accepted to have "passed" specifically included a grandfather clause "so that if passed, there is not a sudden rush for AFD" (proposal 3, this RfC). That seems to have been conveniently ignored - it was discussed a little in the wall of text, but no conclusions about it were drawn and it could be considered to be a significant flaw in the RfC that it was never returned to.

I would also suggest that there is little if any issue with verifiability at all and that, to my knowledge, anyone who played for either Kent or Nottinghamshire from 1806 onward is likely to have some form of sourcing available if you know where to look (or, in Kent cases, to have already been redirected somewhere sensible or still being worked through): I don't know as much about the sourcing for other counties; that may exist, but just rushing in in such a way - 29 PRODs and an AfD on BlackJack's talk page in half an hour - means that it'll be almost impossible to suitably challenge all of these. So, thanks for that. Blue Square Thing (talk) 07:47, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

e2a (apologies) - there's at least one chap on that list above with a Wisden obituary. Yes, it's a short article - because no one's found time to add to it. Time. But you don't get a Wisden obit without having done something - yet there are no GNG sources here? Bit of a no ball there maybe? Blue Square Thing (talk) 07:50, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, this is not helpful. 35+prods in double-quick time. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 07:59, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think this makes it clear why we need an alternative process - if you don't think prod can handle 30 nominations a day, then the 120 that some editors are proposing above is clearly impossible, and that 120 only addresses the unsourced articles, not the non-notable ones. Do you have any suggestions? BilledMammal (talk) 09:18, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Could you not just nominate them for deletion at a slow rate? Will take a while but it allows a proper discussion to take place for each one. NemesisAT (talk) 09:36, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Unfortunately that's not practical. The two areas I have been looking at recently - the 1908 Olympics and articles created by BlackJack - I estimate have 2000 articles between them that need to be taken through deletion discussions. At a slow rate of twenty per day this will take a hundred days to get through, and these just make a small fraction of the articles that we need to go through. BilledMammal (talk) 09:51, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That refers to BLPs doesn't it? And fails to address the grandfathering which was part of what was discussed in the RfC wall of text and which was never removed from the proposal that was deemed to pass. As Galobtter says above, these are not that big a deal - but people need time to work through lists and then redirect as appropriate (such as, for example, discussed at Talk:List of English cricketers (1826–1840) and the linked discussions). Blue Square Thing (talk) 09:39, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No, that discussion refers to unsourced articles in general. As for grandfathering/moratorium, I think that should be a separate discussion, either as a new proposal or as a request for clarification on the closers talk page - lets keep this discussion on topic. BilledMammal (talk) 10:06, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah I have a suggestion: build an encyclopedia, you know, actually create articles or look to expand them. You seem to be one of many users who contribute virtually nothing beyond policy and bureaucracy. StickyWicket (talk) 21:33, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment. As an alternative to user space and draft space, which both have issues, what about moving the articles to sub-pages on the relevant Wikiprojects? For example, all of the above articles could be moved to Wikipedia:WikiProject Cricket, where they won't be lost, and where editors who are interested in developing articles on cricketers know where to find them. BilledMammal (talk) 10:25, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Having gotten through the first 22 of the list above, there's two that have very limited prose sources that I can find in a very short period of time. There are maybe another 2 or 3 where the sourcing is pretty weak. The others all have an appropriate level of sourcing that is similar to recent keeps at AfD. It helps that they all played for either Nottinghamshire or Middlesex - I didn't realise that most Middlesex chaps have prose sourcing on CricInfo. Some of them are obviously really quite notable - international amateur footballers, for example, and at least two who died in WWI and so will appear in various books about that (Wisden published one for the 2014 anniversary for example, and there's Final Wicket: Test and First Class Cricketers Killed in the Great War by Nigel McCrery which I think deals with every known WW1 death). Once I'm through further I can show what I've found, but none of what I've uncovered was difficult to find from sources I already knew about. Blue Square Thing (talk) 11:04, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Just got one who got a knighthood. I don't know if that's notable of course, but it seems like it might be to me. For the avoidance of doubt, I wouldn't have created those articles in that way without much better sourcing, but they were and it was deemed, at the time, acceptable. Not sure I've found any that come close to failing V or OR yet btw - and not close to failing either Blue Square Thing (talk) 11:50, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

And please don't assume that a reference to CricInfo is simply a database reference. Some have long prose sections as well - often the contents of a Wisden obituary. Blue Square Thing (talk) 11:55, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hopefully you can find GNG compliant sourcing for at least some of them, though I'm not seeing any yet - of the few that have prose at CricInfo most are clearly not WP:SIGCOV - even the George Hart one you link above is mostly statistics and commentary on the club. Meanwhile, Trent Bridge is not an independent source for Nottingham players, and the Nottinghamshire role of honour is sourced to family members, so it isn't independent either; this is likely to be a discussion for WP:AFD, which is part of the issue.

To return to that issue, I mention WP:V and WP:OR as it would be best if we devise a solution that addresses articles that have no sources, as well as articles that are under sourced; what do you think of the proposal to move such articles to WikiProject space? It has the advantage of giving WikiProjects as much time as they need to find suitable sources for the article. BilledMammal (talk) 12:08, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

New page patrol and Articles for Creation help filter out very poorly sourced or unsourced articles. The newly created articles above do appear to have a source (albeit from a database) so these pass WP:OR and WP:V. I don't think there's any pressing need to remove articles from mainspace if they at least pass WP:V, these articles have been here since 2017 after all. The number of unsourced articles should be ever-decreasing as they are PRODed and nominated for deletion over time.

An article is most likely to be improved if it is left in mainspace, where readers can find it. Moving to draft, user, or project space will inevitably lead to these articles being forgotten about and never improved. NemesisAT (talk) 12:20, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Here's your list. I don't recall who wrote the NCCC profiles, but I'm pretty certain they're based (at least) on the work of Peter Wynne-Thomas who is, lets say, a pretty reliable source. I'm fairly certain there's an old journal of the ACS magazine where he rips BlackJack's research efforts to pieces as well, so it's sort of fitting (tbf, several people did, but I think Wynne-Thomas was one of them). You can try and argue that it's not independent if you want, but given the other sources listed in that obit it's clear that there are non-web sources as well and Wynne-Thomas didn't get the BEM for nothing.

Some of them already clearly have prose sources btw. I'll prioritise the BLPs of course, but I do have to go to work this week as well, so 100 articles like this is probably a months work at least, more likely two. Unless you simply want them churned through, which was pretty much the problem in the first place. Blue Square Thing (talk) 12:31, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

See here for discussion of your sources. To return to the topic of how to deal with the huge numbers of articles that warrant being taken through deletion processes; do you have any suggestions, or thoughts on what I proposed above? BilledMammal (talk) 12:42, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. As NemesisAT says above, the best way for articles such as these to be improved is in mainspace and, as others have said, these articles really aren't an obvious priority. Mainspace is also the best place for people to consider whether articles need to be redirected or not. I'd suggest that at least 75% can be improved significantly, some obviously so. The other 25% or so, there's a case for a hard look to be had. Fwiw I'm fairly certain that I argued at the time many of these articles were created that there was no need to create a short article on every cricketer and that we should focus on producing articles on people who were obviously more notable. But at the time that was against the perceived wisdom. Blue Square Thing (talk) 13:58, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, BlackJack went rogue and began granting first-class status to teams/matches which were never first-class, and subsequently created dozens of articles on cricketers who weren't first-class; don't worry, I successfully had them all PRODed about 2 years ago, and I think I got them all! Then of course there was all that business with him and Daft. StickyWicket (talk) 21:38, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There's a few good doable steps that could be taken some of which would be no big deal:

• Establish the expectation that providing wp:notability-related sourcing (and thus determining whether or not it exists) is the job of the 1,000,000 editors, not the 30 NPP'ers or researchers at AFD. Otrherwise the math is horrendous. Each of the million editors can create a non-notable stub in minutes and then 30 NPP'ers are supposed to "prove a negative" that wp:notability-suitable sources don't exist before doing something with the article.
• For new articles dependent on sourcing to meet wp:notability (i.e. not explicitly satisfying a SNG criteria) if the article does not have such sourcing, it gets moved to draft.
• Modify wp:before accordingly.

Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 12:56, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There's just not a great way to deal with this stuff, for reasons mostly listed above. They're lazy articles on borderline-notable-at-best subjects that add nothing beyond what you could find in a database, but also aren't making outrageous unsourced claims or promoting some product. In short, it's hard to make a case for urgency. The big issue I wanted to bring up is just: have we figured out how to stop these from being created yet? I know one prolific stub-creator has been sanctioned, and the person who created these is blocked, for for other reasons. AFAIK the intersection of policies and guidelines dealing with mass creation (MASSCREATE/MEATBOT) still fail to address this effectively, despite a few people adamantly saying it does. That needs to be the priority, at which point it would be easier to make a decision about what to do with all the stubs created up to that point. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 13:15, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

One crisis is that NPP is drowning partially due to the "need to prove a negative" math imbalance problem discussed, or demoralization from the criticisms for not having made that thorough search through non-english articles in non-english character sets. From what I've seen, the big numbers aren't rogue stub creators, they are "hobbyists". One hobby might be to create an article for each train station along a 20 station rail line. Another might make one for every sports player that they run across. Another might make a "stats only" article for each season of a particular sports team. Another will create a stats-only article for the playoff for each season of the league that they are in. Another might make a permastub of the water commission for each of the 20 districts in a particular state in Uganda. Another might pick a bunch of road intersections and make an article for each one, consisting of all of the businesses near that intersection. Another might make a stats-only article for each election that was held in a particular area. Another common one is promotional for an non-notable individual, collecting "references" that mention their name (county birth records, posts by their employer of position changes etc.) The common thread is that none have independent in-depth coverage of the topic in the references given in the article, and where there is not clear compliance with an SNG which would bypass the need for such sources. IMO the items I proposed would help much. North8000 (talk) 15:45, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

As long as Wikipedia is to remain "The encyclopedia anyone can edit" there will be no stopping this stuff. To make the ends meet, we need to either qualify the motto as we have, for instance, by not directly accepting articles from IP editors, or we need to stop worrying so much about this pollution. I personally feel that deletion discussions are harmful and divisive for the community and I would prefer we didn't have them, if possible. One can dream. ~Kvng (talk) 17:44, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Framed in those terms, I have a hard time seeing what the crisis is. That "pollution" is the stuff Wikipedia was built from, and those "hobbyists" are the people who built it. The project's ongoing decline is the result of being starved of that work and those workers; the least we can do is to avoid making that starvation even worse. That said, I do think that the age of bulk creation (say >50 articles/day) should certainly be over and should only be allowed, if at all, with prior community agreement. -- Visviva (talk) 19:16, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It is accurately described as "pollution" if your goal is to produce a "finished" encyclopedia. I prefer to view Wikipedia as an ongoing project. ~Kvng (talk) 19:29, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Kvng: We haven't directly accepted articles from IP editors for many years now. Certainly not since when I registered, May 2009. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:14, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Redrose64: Right, sorry, I meant non-autoconfirmed, see WP:ACTRIAL etc. ~Kvng (talk) 21:19, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Two things that should happen:
  • We probably need to update instructions at RFC such that when the result is the potential deletion/redirecting/draftification of a large number of articles, the fate of those articles should be determined as part of the rFC.eg should a granfathering period be used before such changes occur as to give editors time to repair them. This is often overlooked and creates confusion when one editor races off to perform the RFC without clear consensus along this path.
  • We should be seeking to redirect as much as possible to maintain search terms and leave the prior article text available to future editors that may discover new sources to improve. --Masem (t) 19:44, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  "Redirects are cheap" and it's a great solution, but we have a contingent of editors who will argue that redirection is a "back door to deletion"; this argument is happening right now at ANI. Levivich 21:49, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There are certainly articles on the list that BM put forward that I would think are redirect candidtes - one was already on my radar, but only about 10 of those articles were anywhere near my radar. In purely cricket terms - as the articles identified are all cricketers - redirection is certainly something that the cricket wiki project tends to do these days. Blue Square Thing (talk) 22:41, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

We really need to trout those that claim redirection is a backdoor to deletion. It is the most civil and most non-admin way of simply removing text of poor articles that can be reversed by any editor and keeps the topic as a search term. --Masem (t) 22:46, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There is currently a massive discussion at ANI which is fundamentally about the issue of short stubs with database-only sources. A significant topic in the ANI is the refusal by one editor to recognise redirect as an ATD at AFD. I completely agree with Masem that we should seek to redirect all such articles. The one condition must be at least one WP:RS in the article which satisfies WP:V – failing that, it's a PROD or an AFD. That is because an article doesn't need notability to be redirected but it does need verification. I suggest a category approach to the volume problem (see below). NGS ^{Shakin' All Over} 13:53, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Something I mentioned below but want to emphasize here is that we should consider how article creation intersects with WP:BURDEN. If an editor adds unsourced text and I object to it, I can reasonably remove it if they refuse to produce sources; they cannot demand that I do a source search for them. This is reasonable and necessary - someone has to do the hard work of finding sources, and naturally it ought to be the person who wants text included, since they have the strongest motivation to do so. Yet if they add an entirely unsourced stub, and I object to all the text on it, what is my recourse? I can remove unsourced text... unless I get to the point where the resulting article is blank. In the situation where the uncited text is the entire article, does WP:BEFORE mean that WP:BURDEN is inverted and suddenly the obligation is on me search for sources before uncited removing text, even if the original creator made not the slightest effort to search for sources themselves? --Aquillion (talk) 19:51, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

We need to think outside the box

This discussion, and the one about draftspace above, highlights a gap in our system: we don’t really have a good system for drawing attention to existing articles (some years old) that we WANT to keep, but are NOT (currently) up to our minimum standards. Articles that have potential to be fixed… and might be, if only people knew that they needed fixing.

We need to brainstorm and come up with something new… Something that will highlight these articles and encourage editors to actually work on them. Ideas? Blueboar (talk) 18:52, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• To start us off on thinking outside the box… Perhaps we could have a section for this on the WP main page - sort of an opposite to our Featured Article - where we point editors to (say) the “Today’s list of 10 Articles most needing improvement”. Blueboar (talk) 18:52, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  @Blueboar Perhaps we could move Wikipedia:Community portal/Open tasks to the bottom of the main page? Or a condensed version of it. I'm not sure if that proposal would be able to gain consensus among MP regulars who want to see it highlight the best of Wikipedia for readers, but then again we've always been upfront about our shortcomings. Might be worth proposing in an RFC. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 19:58, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I'd be in favour of something like this. But never mind pointing editors to something: our target should be recruiting people as editors. — Bilorv (talk) 17:39, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Let's look where the actual crisis is. The system that Wikipedia HAS for that (New Page Patrol) is drowning and demoralized, with a balance tipper being issues described here. North8000 (talk) 19:03, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Except I think there's a difference between new pages and old pages that are in need of attention. I think all the discussion about new page patrol in this discussion is a red herring. Our focus here should be on old pages, not new pages. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 19:13, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah… I am really talking about drawing more attention to OLDER Pages that need fixing. We HAVE a system for improving new pages (AFC, NPP, Draftspace, etc) - which, while it might not work perfectly, is at least a system. We don’t really have any system to find and fix problematic older pages other than deletion (and that isn’t always the best option). Blueboar (talk) 19:36, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The maintenance categories were intended to be that system for finding and fixing problematic older pages. The pages get tagged with a template saying what needs to be fixed about them ({{copyedit}}, or {{unsourced}} for example), and get sorted into appropriate categories which are broken down by month so people can fix the oldest first. The pages are also categorized in normal ways so people particularly interested in, say, Iran, can find articles that are in both Category:Iran and Category:All articles lacking sources. The Wikipedia:Task Center exists, and Wikipedia:Community portal/Open tasks is in the community portal in the left sidebar and displays an ever changing list of articles in selected maintenance categories to try to encourage people to work on these older articles in need of maintenance. Wikipedia:WikiProject Unreferenced articles exists, to encourage people to try to fix such articles. Wikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors exists also, to encourage people to try to fix articles with those problems. I don't think it's accurate to say that "we don't really have any system to find and fix problematic older pages." I think it's more accurate to say that the system we have is - - suboptimal. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 19:50, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Part of the problem is that those projects are just so darned big; and I know stuff - and where sources are - for a much smaller subset of articles. I could, for example, look at all cricket related articles which are classed as stubs, but there are more than 33,000 of them - and some of them really aren't stubs. Now, there are things that I can do, because I know my limitations, but I'm not sure there's a simple way of solving this. Blue Square Thing (talk) 22:41, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Blue Square Thing, look at https://bambots.brucemyers.com/cwb/bycat/Cricket.html and pick your favorite kind of editing. Do you like style editing? There's 55 cricket-related articles tagged for style work. Do you like adding the first source to an unref'd page? 171 candidates await your attention. Do you like de-peacocking pages? Check out the seven articles, and then maybe expand your goal to include the 21 tagged for promotionalism. If you want to solve a backlog, there are some manageable subsets available. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:40, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

We already have several wikiprojects targeting neglected articles: WP:AFI, WP:ORPHAN, WP:RESCUE. I guess we need to think even further outside the box. ~Kvng (talk) 19:43, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There's also the huge cue on articles tagged for notability. There's the asymmetry at the root of it again. Quick and easy for each of the 1,000,000 editors to create, more work for a scarcer volunteer to notability source or see if sourcing is available. North8000 (talk) 20:16, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The asymmetry is only a problem if we have a deadline. Without a deadline the tags are potentially useful information and a warning to the reader. But, whether we have a deadline is also something that's argued about. ~Kvng (talk) 23:23, 6 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that these WikiProjects all select from the same insular cohort of people—the Wikipedians who spend their time making and improving content, who are unable to produce more hours in the day just because more things are asked of them. We need to target new people by highlighting neglected articles. Anybody who has been here for a while has 0 shortage of tasks they know that they could usefully do. And yet the general public are unaware we are slowly dying under the weight of the tasks we need to do with the small size of the community we have to do it. — Bilorv (talk) 17:38, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with needing to find new people to join the Wikipedia community whose talents and motivation are well-suited for backlogged tasks, as I discussed earlier. isaacl (talk) 01:03, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• A version of SuggestBot? ie the bot suggests, say, 10 old unsourced articles based on one's editing profile and language skills on the talk pages of all active editors with Wikipedia Library access; preferably on an opt-out basis so that editors don't have to opt in to get the message once but can opt out if they don't want continued suggestions. Espresso Addict (talk) 05:44, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Where this whole discussion is going wrong is the premise that unsourced articles are intrinsically problematic. They are not. It is unsourced problematic articles that are intrinsically problematic. SpinningSpark 07:32, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Exactly, the problems are the problems. There are however many Wikipedians who are content or prefer to solve problems by moving a whole class of contributions outside the scope of the project (through deletion or tightened acceptance criteria). This seems to me to be at odds with our stated "encyclopedia anyone can edit" mission. ~Kvng (talk) 18:42, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Sorry, this makes no sense. How would one know an article is not problematic when it has no sources? (Obviously not referring to proofing or layout issues). Unsourced articles are just anonymous postings on the internet. With the same baggage of associated problems. 64.18.11.64 (talk) 01:43, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  It sometimes happens that editors actually know things. We hear the news, we read books, we remember things we learned in the past, and when we see that same information in Wikipedia, we know whether it's correct. As an example, we don't happen to have an article on Christmas candy, and yet I'm pretty sure that if someone wrote a few general sentences – Christmas candy is sold for the Christmas holiday; sometimes it's homemade; candy canes are one iconic type – I would be able to figure out whether it was seriously problematic even if no sources were listed on the page. I could even, if I were concerned about something in the article, take my concerns to my favorite web search engine and do a quick little WP:BEFORE-like search. Good editors don't always need to have all the sources served up to them on a silver candy dish.

  To put it another way, the word verifiable means that someone other than the author is able to verify the material through any method. It doesn't mean that the material is already cited in the article (although that's the best system). The capital of France is Paris, and that information is verifiable even if there are no little blue clicky numbers on the page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:57, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  On Wikipedia, verifiability means that. See WP:BURDEN, which says The burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and Any material lacking an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports the material may be removed and should not be restored without an inline citation to a reliable source. BilledMammal (talk) 03:04, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Yes, if – and only if – the material is challenged (=your second quotation), Wikipedia:Likely to be challenged, a direct quotation, or contentious matter about BLPs, then an inline citation is required. See WP:MINREF.

  But think the absence of a little blue clicky number, even for material that we require to be cited, does not mean that the material cannot be verified in a published, reliable source; it only means that the material has not yet been cited. If uncited material were "by definition" also unverifiable, then we would never add {{fact}} tags; we would only remove uncited material as being a violation of WP:V.

  @BilledMammal, I invite you to finish your first incomplete sentence with the definition given in the policy: "In the English Wikipedia, verifiability means other people using the encyclopedia can check that the information comes from a reliable source."

  Note the absence of any specific required method in that definition. If you "can check that the information comes from a reliable source" by remembering that your geography textbook told you that the capital of France is called Paris, or if you "can check that the information comes from a reliable source" by taking a quick trip to your favorite web search engine, then you actually "can check that the information comes from a reliable source". If you "can check", the material is verifiable even if uncited. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:59, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  All editors think they know something. How is a reader to tell? Research the so-called "article" themselves to find the sources that verify the editors' presumed knowledge? Wikipedia may be unserious as well as unreliable. 64.18.11.64 (talk) 11:36, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Most readers will trust the competence of Wikipedia editors to have identified and tagged or removed problems in articles. Remember that WP:V applies to any material challenged or likely to be challenged. It does not apply to everything (see WP:BLUE). ~Kvng (talk) 13:17, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Can we not engage in fantasies or wishful thinking. How does anyone know that readers "trust the competence of Wikipedia editors"? Why would anyone trust Wikipedia editors? Are they an enlightened class of beings that can do no wrong? Is it because they can spout admonitions regarding policies they themselves have put in place? Wikipedia can put a million policies and guidelines in place, and it will not make any difference if the contributions cannot be proven to be based on fact. 50.75.226.250 (talk) 14:55, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  There has been research into the question of reader trust, e.g., m:Research:The role of citations in how readers evaluate Wikipedia articles. In general, citations don't seem to make much difference, especially for people who are just looking up something quickly. It might be useful here to remember than only 3 out of every 1,000 page views result in someone clicking on a (=one) reference. If memory serves, the median citation gets clicked on once every four months.

  Like any other information-oriented site, trust is highest when the content aligns with your expectations/POV. (To address this, we have a fair bit of "Although the government of Grand Fenwick claims they were only trying to install indoor plumbing, scholars agree that..." content. This helps people get past their POV by acknowledging that X is the common view even if the common view is wrong, a Lie-to-children, etc.)

  Also, specifically for Wikipedia, trust tends to be higher among readers who haven't fully grasped that anyone can edit most pages. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:16, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  The research involved 1419 participants, of whom only about a third participated fully. This from an average daily readership of dozens and dozens of millions of unique users. It was undertaken at the behest and direction of WMF, not an uninvolved third party. Without knowing & evaluating the sampling methods used (if any), afaic the results are not in any way indicative. The first and last statements above:

  1. In general, citations don't seem to make much difference, especially for people who are just looking up something quickly.

  2. Also, specifically for Wikipedia, trust tends to be higher among readers who haven't fully grasped that anyone can edit most pages.

  As should be expected, people would tend to trust something they already think trustworthy. Why look up citations? Wikipedia has published this article, which means it is true, right? 50.75.226.250 (talk) 16:04, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I believe you will find that the abbreviation e.g. means "for example" and not "to name the only research ever done on this question in the history of Wikipedia's existence". Perhaps if you read more of it, you would find the answers to your questions. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:10, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Realistically, if you want to draw attention to poorly cited/written articles, then a rolling contest, similar to how WP:WOMRED works might be clever. Drives to improve articles by category, rather than creating new articles. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 08:34, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• What about the following proposal? It would shift the workload of finding sources away from the tiny number of New Page Patrollers and onto the much larger number of editors creating articles, which should address the concerns of NPP, as well as ensuring that the problem of unsourced and under-sourced articles does not become larger than it currently is.
  1. All new articles must include sources that a reasonable editor could believe demonstrate compliance with GNG or a relevant SNG. New articles that fail to do so are moved to draft space or user space.

BilledMammal (talk) 11:06, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

We basically have this requirement at WP:AFC and it does reduce reviewer workload. The problem is that many of the editors creating new articles are new to Wikipedia and can't clear that hurdle to the satisfaction of experienced editors (AfC reviewers). After a few attempts they end up abandoning their draft (and probably Wikipedia too). The abandoned drafts are deleted 6-months later per WP:G13. It is a process that, in the end, deletes reasonable starts on articles on notable subjects and drives away potential new Wikipedia editors in the process. ~Kvng (talk) 14:36, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I suggest creation of categories by subject for batches of old stubs needing review due to lack of sources. Any confirmed editor could add a batch like BM's list above to the appropriate category (e.g., cricket or football or Olympics). This is easily done with a tool like AWB. In due course, any confirmed editor could review the individual entries for redirect or AFD or expansion. I think this would be a practical solution for non-urgent cases like the BM list in which all the article subjects are (I believe) long dead, but clearly we still need immediate action for individual articles which have a BLP concern. For new articles without sources, they should be tagged for a week and then straight to PROD – if the creator doesn't respond in a week, it is their loss. NGS ^{Shakin' All Over} 13:56, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@No Great Shaker, you can't send unsourced articles to PROD without doing WP:BEFORE. Who do you suggest would do that? ~Kvng (talk) 14:41, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This a good example of where we all fall down. We need an extra condition that articles without ANY sources can be deleted, via either PROD or AFD, if they have have been tagged with Unreferenced for seven days and the creator has not responded. The onus for sourcing such articles (remember, these are NEW articles) is on the article creator. We are supposed to be thinking outside the box so saying that we can't send it to PROD or AFD without BEFORE is inside the box, is out of scope and completely misses the point. NGS ^{Shakin' All Over} 18:56, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Too far outside the "encyclopedia anyone can edit" box for me. I would oppose such a proposal per WP:NODEADLINES and WP:DEMOLISH. ~Kvng (talk) 13:20, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• You can't send unsourced articles to PROD without doing WP:BEFORE - this is untrue (we have a huge discussion on ANI right now where there's a clear lack of consensus supporting that position.) BEFORE applies to AFD, not to prod, which is a more lightweight process; doing such a search before prodding an article is not and has never been a requirement. Editors might choose to do so if they wish, but removals (whether trimming text or removing entire stubs and articles) are also part of Wikipedia's maintenance and its status as an encyclopedia anyone can edit. I would strenuously oppose any suggestion that would make BEFORE a hard requirement for prodding - that is too much red tape to place on a process that is vital to Wikipedia's quality. --Aquillion (talk) 19:08, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Up until 2013 we had a line of manually-curated requested redlinks that displayed at the top of Special:Recentchanges, initially directly in MediaWiki:Recentchangestext and later in Template:Recent changes article requests. What little expertise in template hackery I could ever claim to have is a decade and a half out of date, but perhaps someone less incompetent could generate lists of unreferenced article titles to be displayed via gadget atop one's watchlist? —Cryptic 18:31, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  That's a good idea. Some kind of banner type thing that displays on the watchlist that provides a list of 3-5 random articles from maintenance categories. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 18:47, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

We need to think outside the box... section 2

The key question to ask when trying to get people to do a task is what motivates them? Regarding sifting through a backlog of unsourced articles, I believe the most likely volunteers are ones with a strong interest in the subject area, or in documenting historical events. It might be helpful to start initiatives to reach out to historical societies, librarian associations, university history departments, or other similar organizations to find appropriate people who could help with Wikipedia. As others have suggested, perhaps newly-retired persons in these groups would be a good source of new editors, as they would be free of career concerns that might make them more likely to spend leisure research time on areas more directly related to their work. There can also be initiatives to reach out to the professional or credible amateur historians in specific topic areas (sports leagues, industries, and so forth) and find if they or anyone their suggest might be interested in working on Wikipedia articles. Current editors too can think about who they know that would make good Wikipedia editors. (For example, if you're a frequent contributor to the candle power forum, you might know some other contributors there who could be a good fit.)

Regarding trying to limit the problem at the source—that is, article creation time, I once wrote that the most valuable asset of Wikipedia editors is time. We need to encourage new editors to learn of the importance of respecting the time of others. An editor might start out not providing citations for their contributions, but they should be progressing to a stage where they do locate appropriate sources and cite them, to help save everyone time. When Wikipedia was starting out and everyone knew each other, a stub creator could still build rapport with another editor who would add citations. With its current community size, though, editors need to be more mindful of not adding to someone else's list of tasks, when they can learn how to do various fundamental tasks themselves. isaacl (talk) 03:00, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The new editors I've met who have specific expertise/knowledge and have tried to contribute that have uniformly been driven away by the AFC/NPP process. Academics in a topic get accused of being paid editors, or having COI, or not dotting some particular i, and they just walk away because Wikipedia is not important to them. Espresso Addict (talk) 11:00, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That's part of why I think targeted initiatives could be useful: we would seek out editors who have a high drive to ensure that history is documented accurately, and help them understand from the outset the expectations of the English Wikipedia community. (My proposal was in response to the question about going through the backlog of unsourced articles, so the article creation and new page patrol processes are not specifically related to that problem, but I agree they are generally relevant for recruiting.) isaacl (talk) 14:06, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Wikipedia is already outside the box. That box was called Nupedia. This was quite conventional, requiring credentialled experts and careful reviews before publication. The consequence was that little got done and so this box was discarded. Wikipedia introduced radical, box-breaking ideas:

1. anyone can edit
2. be bold
3. ignore all rules
4. the content is free

Of course, the price of this diversity, openness and freedom is that Wikipedia's content may be unreliable or flaky and that's why every single page carries a disclaimer: "WIKIPEDIA MAKES NO GUARANTEE OF VALIDITY". Naturally, control freaks, pedants and perfectionists can't stand this and so they keep trying to put Wikipedia back in the box. But every time this is tried, it fails again – see Citizendium, Scholarpedia, &c.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

— George Santayana

Andrew🐉(talk) 08:16, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That is self-serving sloganeering. For over 2 decades before Wikipedia came into being, such purported "freedoms" were available to users of bulletin board systems, many of whom were completely unmoderated. And quite a few were devoted to non-technical subjects. As an early user, I can attest that a big difference in my experience was that participants did not have the narcissistic attitude that many views at VPP display, imo. I don't remember anyone crowing about how "free" and "open" and "groundbreaking" everything was. Well, the technology companies did, as was to be expected. And the media. Also to be expected. 64.18.11.64 (talk) 11:56, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• These are not empty slogans; they are fundamental policies. 64.18.11.64 demonstrates the reality of the first one by posting as an anonymous IP and expecting to be taken seriously in a discussion of the project's governance. Andrew🐉(talk) 08:02, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Perhaps posting as "Andrew" (?) or as any of the other quirky handles will make one be taken seriously? And why would that be so? How about discussing the argument instead of the handle/IP that posted it? That would hint one is not self-involved, and therefore capable of seriousness. Neither is the argument one of governance, which is a derivative issue. Instead it is about this: encyclopedias should deal in verifiable facts and nothing else. Once this simple principle is accepted, the governance to put into practice is also simple. Otherwise, all these "governance" discussions are a way to bypass it by endless exceptions and procedural proposals and counter-proposals by a miniscule, obsessing minority. In the meantime, unverified and potentially unreliable or biased or false or hurtful items may proliferate thanks to Wikipedia. 66.108.237.136 (talk) 12:53, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Andrew is entirely right in that the policy of letting everything in and checking through it later was the one and only strategy that allowed an encyclopaedia to be built explosively fast. Everything else failed. Maybe there are other strategies that would have worked, but nobody has found them so far. What we don't need is another mass-deletion disaster like the introduction of G13 caused. SpinningSpark 14:02, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Anything that lacks quality control can be built explosively fast. How is this a new situation? 50.75.226.250 (talk) 15:03, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Because against all expectations and common sense, and unlike buildings and bridges, it actually worked and did not collapse. And we are still the only ones doing it. SpinningSpark 15:37, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Longevity in Wikipedia's case may only indicate it was lucky and/or adaptable. It says nothing about value. The "luck" part stems from the fact that people love to expound on topics that interest them. When it is done at no/minimal cost, and with little repercussion when they include their POV in it, this is an added bonus. And this is not even considering other, self-promoting reasons. By targeting that type of editor (a limitless supply), all Wikipedia has to do is adapt. The "adaptability" part comes into play by designing PAGs that basically seek to accommodate the "lucky" part, rather than getting it right. That is why you have pillar-policies like WP:V that wobble, accepting information that is not verified. Instead editors are coddled by prodding and implied assurances that somebody will fix it in the glorious future awaiting all published, but unverified information. Seems like a great recipe for mediocrity. I believe that this is borne out by the fact that this discussion is taking place. 50.75.226.250 (talk) 16:35, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Isaacl, What's the difference between what your proposing here and WikiProjects? Some have tried to take subject-matter angle on reducing AfC backlog. Submissions have been categorized by subject. I'm not sure how successful it has been. We still have a backlog. The categorization is additional work. ~Kvng (talk) 16:18, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

WikiProjects generally don't try to recruit people to become part of the Wikipedia community. I'm suggesting we need to find people whose personal motivation and skill set are well-suited for looking for appropriate sources for unsourced articles, and get them to become Wikipedia editors, rather than hoping we can convert existing Wikipedia editors into ones who like to work on the unsourced article backlog. isaacl (talk) 20:06, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Keep everything - I trust this has been proposed before but if we're going outside the box, let's put it on the table. Let's stop deleting stuff. We spend too much time and goodwill between editors in deletion discussions. We repel new editors by deleting or rejecting their contributions. We don't delete stuff because we're short on storage space; We delete it because we don't think it is ready for readers to see. Let's keep everything but make the good stuff easy to find and hide the crap. We can use Wikiproject quality ratings, ORES, or presence of certain tags or tag density to distinguish crap from good. We can configure the Wikimedia search engine and robots.txt to hide the crap. ~Kvng (talk) 13:32, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I don't want to keep everything, or even to keep everything that isn't an attack page, copyvio, etc.

That said, maybe we need to get some agreement on what the purpose of AFC and NPP is. If you think that patrolling an article via NPP means "This doesn't appear to qualify for speedy deletion", then you will get different (and faster) results than if you think that the same action means "This is a non-embarrassing article on a notable subject that almost certainly won't be deleted or even complained about." WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:24, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

What do you see as the crucial difference between deleted and not readily accessible. I understood the argument for deleting stuff was to improve the quality of the encyclopedia. If nobody that matters sees low-quality stuff, what's the harm in retaining it? ~Kvng (talk) 15:38, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I am doubtful that deleting pages improves the quality of the encyclopedia. I think that mistakes "reduced risk of my friend asking me why Wikipedia has such lousy articles" for "improving what's here". For myself, I'm not really fussed about readers stumbling across a low-quality encyclopedia article. Especially for obscure subjects, a sub-stub might be the best information available to them, and "Alice wrote The Sun is Really Big in 2002" might be all the reader wanted to know.

However, I do think that Wikipedia needs to remain an encyclopedia. I don't object if it is a somewhat odd encyclopedia, but it should not be something else entirely (e.g., a travel itinerary, an instruction manual, or a sales brochure). When people publish hopelessly unencyclopedic pages here, we should delete (or transwiki and then delete) those pages.

As for hiding the lousy-but-encyclopedic pages: If you want them to stop being lousy pages, then you shouldn't hide them (in Draft: or otherwise). The research is clear that visibility leads to improvements. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:40, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. That's a new perspective for me and makes me wonder how many different perspectives there are. We can't make everyone happy if everyone has a different vision. ~Kvng (talk) 18:03, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that there needs to be something that distinguishes Wikipedia from an open web host that anyone can edit. Without any structure, there's little reason to go to Wikipedia versus other sites that come up in a web search. isaacl (talk) 20:15, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This is getting pretty broad like "what is Wikipedia" .....vs the "everything"/ zero-selectivity option which is called the internet. The answer/ distinction is in the "should this article exist?" (= "what is Wikipedia?) policies and guidelines, especially wp:not, 5P and WP:notability. Although there are issues with those criteria and the execution of them I think that overall they are a pretty good answer to the question. So if there is an unsourced stub 'of a suitable topic I don't consider that to be a problem. If the system for assuring that articles in Wikipedia are "of a suitable topic" (New Page Patrol) starts breaking (which it is) then we do have a problem. North8000 (talk) 16:10, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It sort of reminds me of someone who wants to smoke in the non-smoking section because it isn't smelly. So I want my writing to be elevated by being in the selective Wikipedia, but it shouldn't be selective about including my writing.  :-) North8000 (talk) 16:16, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In my opinion, we need a bulletin board, or a shared collaborative space for identifying articles in need of improvement, in the context of being a collaborative group effort, and which brings its information to the editors, rather than waiting until editors come by to visit the bulletin board on their own. Sm8900 (talk) 19:19, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Sm8900: There is WP:TAFI, maybe that wikiproject could be more active? I used to contribute there quite frequently. There's a process for selecting articles: page views, low quality, general interest to readers, etc. At the very least looking at the successful TAFI noms is something that could be a starting point. Clovermoss (talk) 11:49, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Clovermoss, that sounds like a a good idea, actually. would you be willing to work together, and to be in contact, to explore ways to utilize that? please feel free to let me know. thanks! Sm8900 (talk) 13:24, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Sm8900: Sure, anytime! Clovermoss (talk) 14:23, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• My opinion is that this is best settled via our consensus-building process; and our consensus-building process works best when we avoid placing too much weight on one default outcome (after all, if we place too much weight on one default outcome, then people whose edits are favored by that outcome are incentivized to just roll forwards with controversial changes and accomplish them via WP:FAITACCOMPLI while ignoring objections.) Maintaining that balance helps keep new page patrolling from being overwhelmed, too. Based on that it should be roughly as easy to remove or object to a new article as it is to create it; and if someone can easily create a large number of similar stubs, it should be roughly as easy to raise objections to them and remove them. I also... thought we had settled these rancorous inclusionism-vs-deletionism debates long ago by having a rigorously-defined set of notability guidelines, so I'm curious why they're flaring back up. It might be worth tracing things back to that and trying to solve the underlying dispute (much like how the original dispute was ultimately solved by reaching a firm consensus that notability was required coupled with a rigorous definition of what it is.) That said, when there's a large number of similar articles created at once, we do have the existing solution of using a single AFD to cover all of them - though such AFDs are often naturally going to be difficult to reach a consensus on, they do exist for situations where the problem is obvious. --Aquillion (talk) 19:19, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Also, belatedly, I think that part of the problem here is that the interpretation of WP:BEFORE some people are pushing for here (especially if it applies to PROD) essentially inverts WP:BURDEN - an editor can create a hundred stubs with no citations, and without even making any effort to search for citations, then demand that other people search for citations before even suggesting that the articles might be deleted. That's inappropriate and is what has lead to WP:NPP getting so overloaded - everyone likes creating articles, nobody likes the work of citing them, but pushing that work onto other people results in a flood of uncited articles that never get cited. We need to follow WP:BURDEN and make a hard rule that if you've added any text - included creating an article - you have the responsibility to cite it; you cannot demand that other people search for sources before removing it. I've created a discussion for a relatively narrow proposal related to this here, but I think we might want to reconsider WP:BEFORE and generally downgrade it to a suggestion rather than a requirement, while emphasizing the fact that an article's creator should, ideally, include sources, and have the burden of doing so if there's a dispute over their addition. --Aquillion (talk) 19:44, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Ultimately the bottom line of this problem (if we agree that it is a problem) is simply that newbies are incompetent article creators, it takes far more experience than autoconfirmed to create a decent article. If we're really serious about solving this we should require extended confirmed before allowing article creation. Autoconfirmed is not an effective barrier against SPAs creating their vanispamcruftisement articles. Imho ACTRIAL was good but too timid. "Anyone can edit", but article creation is an order of magnitude more complex than fixing typos. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 20:27, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

IMO it's not that broad. Article creation instructions just need these first steps defined:

• Step 1: Think of a topic / title
• Step 2: Find 1 or 2 independent sources that cover it it depth

North8000 (talk) 21:10, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• I don't think we need to even do that. While I believe (as I said above) that the WP:BURDEN is on an article's creator or people who want to retain it to find sources for it, keep in mind that even WP:V only requires sources for material that is challenged or which is likely to be challenged. I think that that cautious wording in policies is generally good, outside of a few red-line ones like WP:3RR or WP:BLP, which isn't called for here; the real problem is that some policies, especially WP:BEFORE, were written without that level of caution. What we should do instead is adjust BEFORE and perhaps even PROD to reflect WP:BURDEN, specifically:

• Make the requirement to do a source search in BURDEN a suggestion, not a hard requirement. People reading too much into that and attaching too much importance to it is at the root of many of the current rancor. It is a good thing to do but it's unreasonable to place the burden for such a source-search on the people who want to remove something, especially when there's no such hard requirement for the person who added it or the people who want to retain it; the ultimate burden of searching for sources lies on people who want to add or retain something, not on people who want to remove it. Emphasizing that will ultimately lead to more people participating in the process by aligning what people are encouraged to do with what they have an actual motivation to do as volunteers.
• Make it so if an entirely unsourced article is WP:PRODed or redirected, anyone who removes the prod or reverts the redirect must add at least one source. (And a deprod which does not add a source to a totally unsourced article would be invalid, so their deprod may be reverted.) I don't think that that is an onerous requirement - it can be literally any source, they just need to do that bare minimum. It would not totally resolve everything but it would encourage the people who want to retain articles (and who therefore have a motivation to put some effort into searching for sources) to actually do so.

With these changes we could still allow newbies to create unsourced stubs and limit WP:BITEing them to merely sometimes having their edits undone. I don't think that having an unsourced edit undone when someone challenges it is a particularly harsh thing to happen. That way they will slowly learn that they need to add sources, but will still be able to participate with uncontroversial additions initially. --Aquillion (talk) 04:30, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

As long as the article titles / topics made it through a proper NPP, everything beyond that is just article building/improvement yet to be done. So IMO the only crisis is that NPP is collapsing. One one of the reasons for the NPP issue is related to this discussion. The core of the math is that about 10 NPP'ers need to manually review about 500 articles per day. And a big contributing math problem relating to this discussion is the burden being on those ten people do to GNG source searches instead of on the million editors that create the articles. Note that this relates to notability sourcing, not simply sourcing. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:24, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

What about problematic articles that existed prior to the creation of NPP? They never got the kind of initial NPP review you are talking about! Is there a way to better highlight these older articles so they get the attention they need? Blueboar (talk) 14:56, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• The problem is that notability searching requires knowledge of our notability and WP:RS policies. A requirement of "at least one source, of any type, at all" is not that onerous and can easily be done by any user, but requiring "sufficient sources that pass WP:RS to satisfy the WP:GNG or the topic-specific WP:NOTABILITY guideline" is a much more serious change. I suppose it could still be part of what I outlined above - ie. if an article was never reviewed, a source that someone is willing to assert passes RS and which satisfies the GNG must be found if the article is challenged before a prod can be removed or an article turned back from a redirect, so the requirements only come into play if someone challenges it. But to avoid time-consuming debates for every single article and putting too much weight on PROD or redirects, I would say that the simple assertion that a source passes those things would be sufficient (and if someone constantly makes assertions that are plainly absurd when removing prods or de-redirecting articles, then they can get dragged to ANI or whatever, but hopefully that wouldn't happen much. And it wouldn't be for borderline cases, it would just be for if someone is plainly, repeatedly, and intentionally using sources that they themselves cannot in good faith think are sufficient.) That would keep the policy lightweight, and avoid onerous requirements for situations where there is no dispute, while shifting the WP:BURDEN to people who want to create or retain text so more people than just NPPers are searching for sources. --Aquillion (talk) 15:54, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• I think that "Find 1 or 2 independent sources that cover the topic in depth" doesn't require specialized knowledge and 99% of the time would satisfy or self-screen for wp:notability. And make this particular thing a "soft" expectation ("This is what Wikipedia editors do when creating a new article") and not a structural change. North8000 (talk) 14:11, 10 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

We need to think outside the box... section 3

I have an out of the box idea that may or may not be useful. I think something that has always been a "win" for Wikipedia as a whole is that its meant to be a crowdsourced encyclopedia. While that's true, our reader-to-editor ratio is terrible and not great for the long-term viability of the website. I'm not saying this as an "end to Wikipedia" essay or claiming that I can somehow fix all of Wikipedia's problems with one idea, but I had an idea that might lead to some editor engagement and help with our backlog of 450,000+ citations needed tags at Category:Articles with unsourced statements. Basically, I was thinking of something along the lines of 1Lib1Ref, but beyond libranians. The "average potential Wikipedian" as it were. The phrase citation needed is already an Internet meme, used outside of contexts related to Wikipedia, and learning how to cite a sentence is one of the lower barrier to entry backlogs. If we could get 0.1% of the people who read Wikipedia on any given day (228+ million, assuming each pageview is someone unique, which is likely a flawed assumption [5] but still we have a massive readership to editorship ratio) that would be 228,000 citation needed tags dealt with. I think that the potential that is there compared to trying to constantly reach out to the 4,700 people who make more than 100 edits a month [6] would be a more realistic way of dealing with backlogs like this. Clovermoss (talk) 16:37, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Clovermoss, I agree… The question is: Can we find a better way to encourage that 0.1% of readers to get involved and do this? Blueboar (talk) 16:55, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Blueboar: There's a lot of potential ways. Reaching out to people who are more involved in general community outreach, like Bluerasberry, would likely be a good idea. The impression I recieved from #1Lib1Ref is that part of what made it successful was the social media hashtag. People like recieving validation and being a part of something greater. Editing Wikipedia fits with what a lot of people consider to be within the spirit of volunteerism. Maybe we could do something like a banner on the main page eventually, if there's actually a solid plan for something like this to happen. People get banners asking them for financial donations, why not something that asks them for 15 minutes of their time? Clovermoss (talk) 17:08, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Clovermoss: thanks for pinging me. I do not have solutions but I can present new options for discussion.

For anyone interested in off-wiki outreach, I recommend talking by voice or video to other wiki editors. This is a bit unusual in wiki culture and many people have never had an off-wiki conversation with other editors, but individuals and groups are friendly.

Anyone can join Wikimedia NYC online meetups - Wikipedia:Meetup/NYC. These include discussions about editing. For anyone who only wants to talk about organizing in the United States, there are monthly meta:WALRUS meetups. If any somewhat experienced wiki editor wants to chat with me then I would do so, and I am especially interested in talking with anyone who would agree to a video recorded and public chat about nearly anything wiki. I wish more groups would organize live conversations because I feel there are limits to what we can plan only with text posts on wiki.

Besides talks, if anyone is feeling bold and brave enough to ask the Wikimedia Foundation for money, then I would support your request to meta:grants:start. Money does not solve all problems but the WMF does offer a lot and much of it goes unused for lack of applications. US$2000 requests are relatively easy for individuals; requests of $100,000 are relatively easy for any group that overcomes the challenge of getting about 5 experienced wiki editors or an established organization to agree to a project.

I know those are not solutions to the problem, but I think that voice conversation and money are the most certain foundations to addressing the big problems. I know there is a wiki community taboo on looking at money but when judging the efficacy of outreach, I think budget transparency should be a norm. Bluerasberry (talk) 17:19, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Bluerasberry: I've gotten to the point where I'd feel comfortable talking about Wikipedia with someone, but I'm not quite sure I'd agree to a recorded public chat. Maybe someday in the future. That's the sort of step I could never quite take a step back from. I have a visible scar on my face, for one thing, which can make me more easily identifiable. Apart from that, I don't want to worry about potential real-life stalkers. I like to think that humanity as a whole is good, but some people take advantage of people's kindness and openness. But I like talking to people and I'd be willing to have a conversation with you. In regards to funding, I'm not quite so ambitious to ask anyone for money. This is like the very early stages of something that might be an idea to change things. Clovermoss (talk) 17:54, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Clovermoss: Stalking is a real and valid concern. I and many other wiki editors who have done off-wiki organizing have been the subjects of doxxing and harassment. That is an unfortunate reality, and it is also unfortunate that as a community we have no way to track how often harassment happens or for delivering peer to peer victim support. A consequence of this is that people who do outreach tend to be people who have higher tolerance for off-wiki hostility. In your case if you want to privately chat about anything without recording, then I would talk to you. Information that I might be able to share could be about 1) wiki community organization in the meta:Wikimedia movement affiliates program 2) off-wiki institutional partnerships, like with meta:Wikimedians in Residence Exchange Network sponsors, or 3) Wikimedia Foundation grants at meta:start:grants. Bluerasberry (talk) 18:30, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Bluerasberry: That sounds great. I still don't think I'd apply for funding, but it's likely a good idea to learn more about this stuff in general and what exactly the process for making larger changes might involve. For privately contacting me, you can email me through Special:Email if you want. I have an email address specifically for my Wikipedia activities.

My concerns mainly relate to being a younger person in general. I'm 19 (almost 20) now, but back when I started editing I was 16. So I'm used to being somewhat close-to-my-chest about anything that could be considered personal information, even if I've been less careful about that since I've become an adult. Publicly recorded chats are still a bit much for me, but maybe one day I'd be comfortable with it. It's nice to know that the concern at the back of my head isn't entirely wrong and comes from somewhere, at least. Clovermoss (talk) 19:00, 13 June 2022 (UTC), edited 20:47, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

There are some news sites that require you to take a quiz before you can read their full articl. We could put up that barrier for Wikipedia readers. Show them an unsourced statement and a few web or other reference search results and ask them to choose one or none of the above. We can't use this information to directly improve the articles but it may give established editors a leg up. Or maybe not - a trial could tell us. Anyway, I agree with @North8000 that adding references is too far up the learning curve for most readers. If there's any chance of this type of crowdsourcing working, it has to be dumbed way down. ~Kvng (talk) 21:00, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That feels more intrusive than I would like it to be. The idea is for it to be voluntary but with increased awareness, not "do this or you can't read articles the way you want to." I was thinking something more along the lines of a banner (like the ones that ask people to donate if you're not logged in) that mentions that Wikipedia has x unsourced statements, we need people like you to fix them! That banner would have a link to a "start page" as suggested by North8000 to resources that could help them do that. I don't think that the process nessecarily has to be "dumbed down". I was able to figure out how to use citeweb at 16, maybe I'm an outlier but I have more confidence in the general ability of people who use the Internet on a frequent basis to attempt verification of unsourced statements. Clovermoss (talk) 21:08, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

You are right, it doesn't need to be dumbed down. It just need instructions / navigation specialized to the task at hand. North8000 (talk) 02:33, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

So, regarding "anyone can edit" on a complexity/wiki-knowledge-required scale of "1" to "100" , the main text editing method had a difficulty level of "2" but to successfully deal with the other aspects of basic editing in Wikipedia you needed a level of "40". So, what was the plan? Make a dumbed down text editor that lowers the "2" to a "1" whereupon they immediately crash into the unchanged "40". North8000 (talk) 17:35, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@North8000:

I don't think adding a reference is that hard on the wiki-knowledge required scale of 1 to 100. I was able to do so with no instructions on my 7th edit [7] (although I was wrong about removing inaccesible/dead URLs and could've cited more reliable sources but I replaced a MySpace blog one so that's better than nothing, I guess). Even without Visual Editor, Source Editor has the {{cite web}} template. It's fairly easy for anyone to learn how to fill that in. But there are instructions available for people who would find them helpful, such as the video linked above. Clovermoss (talk) 17:41, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

OK, try a test. Take a friend who hasn't edited Wikipedia, point to an unsourced sentence and say "fix that" and don't tell them anything else. And see what happens. North8000 (talk) 18:02, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@North8000: I could try to do this in real-life, but I'd need some time. I'll let you know what happens if I do. I will say that I've seen many IPs add references when prompted to do so and many editors take to editing skills faster than one might expect (see Miren Basaras, an article started by a new editor). I don't think the barrier to entry is so high that it's impossible, even if we have survivorship bias. Otherwise edit-a-thons would never be a thing. Clovermoss (talk) 18:09, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

But I also see that I kind of missed the overall point that you were trying to get across. We don't nessecarily need to convert everyone who adds a reference to being a long-term editor, I was just trying to make a point about how a greater volume of people doing a casual edit could make a substantial impact. We could also have something like tagged edits for newcomers who add a citation through whatever banner prompts them to do so, if this ever became a thing. There could be linked resources like a Wikipedia:A primer for newcomers and the Teahouse for people who want to get more involved. Clovermoss (talk) 18:03, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This is what I mean by "tagged edits" [8]. If we ever did something like this that had an impact like this on a massive scale, this could help with minimizing the less helpful edits made and fix them. Clovermoss (talk) 18:11, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Step one in that test would be learning "what's wrong with the current state" after that the wiki-requirements for sourcing to fix it. And then figuring out and learning the current referencing scheme used at the article. (God help them if it's a 2 layer plan with sfns.) (or being confident enough to "violate" it.) and then what's going to steer them to the particular helpful tools that you describe? :-) North8000 (talk) 18:14, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@North8000: I'm not talking articles that need more references in general, but snippets of text with citation needed next to them. I'm not suggesting people mess with the general structure of articles and try to figure out sfn from nowhere. God help anyone who tries. You can see examples of what I'm talking about at Wikipedia:Citation Hunt. I think a small, identifiable task like that with clear instructions is something that newbies can realistically do. Clovermoss (talk) 18:19, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

If you had a "starting point" page for newbies for that particular task and something that would get them to it, that I think that it would be doable. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 19:21, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think even adding a bare <ref>url</ref> to an RS with no other formatting would be better than nothing. JoelleJay (talk) 05:40, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, it is. Unsourced material is worse than nothing at all. It has to be re-researched and completely rewritten. You cannot simply add references, because you cannot be sure it is not a copyright violation. If you're lucky, it will be, and a search engine match may then give you a source. But unsourced material always has to be thrown away. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 06:23, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I often check a stack of articles, based on a bot-driven thematic list of articles which have had maintenance tags added in the previous week. It is a mix of biographical, places, sport seasons, etc. My focus is on those with referencing issues, usually on the places, sometimes on some of the older biographies. Often the articles are longstanding stubs of the form <Blahtown> is a town on the River <Blah>. Its main industry was <whatever> which closed in 1950. Now it is a dormitory town for <Bigblah>., all unsourced. While it is right that someone has tagged it, it is often easily remedied by referencing without discarding the prior wordings, but even in their unsourced stub state I don't see these as "worse than nothing at all". It would be good to achieve durable engagement of the original editor, so that they build on their original contribution, see how it can be enhanced, and the Page Curation messages are a step in that direction. AllyD (talk) 07:27, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Hawkeye7: I wouldn't say it always have to thrown away, for reasons like AllyD have stated. I will say that this is an angle I didn't really consider. Copyright violations could definitely be an issue, but they can also be an issue in cited text (someone copy and pastes something, but adds a ref – that's still a copyright violation). It's definitely possible that people would search for the entire sentence itself, instead of key words that could verify the content. This could lead to issues with circular referencing if people cite Wikipedia mirrors. My method of searching also involves stuff like quotation marks for keywords in a search because Google will only show you results that have that text if you do that. You can also remove certain websites from search results for unreliable sources you don't want to see. But I don't think my approach is nessecarily the typical one. This is something to keep in mind and plan for.

I will say that Wikipedia has also been around awhile and there's plenty of resources that people could potentially learn from to see how it works. There's this video [9] that has been watched 270,000 times and is more accurate than a lot of the stuff I've seen about Wikipedia editing. But it goes it gives a brief overview of stuff like core content policies, vandalism, page protection, article tags, etc. I'm giving this as an example that people are capable of learning what we're about as a community, not that I'd point that them to that specifically. Clovermoss (talk) 15:25, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Although I appreciate the concern regarding unacceptable uses of copyrighted material, the presence of citations is no guarantee that an editor hasn't copied another source that they haven't cited. Thus any suspect text ought to be evaluated, whether or not it is cited. isaacl (talk) 00:04, 15 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think reader-to-editor ratio is as important as article-to-editor ratio. (More readers don't make the site's encyclopedia content harder to maintain, but more articles do.) I think targeted recruitment offers the best chance for success. Start with considering if anyone you know personally would be a suitable Wikipedia editor, and expand outwards to those who you might meet in relevant groups, associations, and the like. isaacl (talk) 02:54, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I don't nessecarily disagree with that. I think we should reach out to more people in general, especially experts. It doesn't have to be one option over another, we can do both. Maybe not everyone will stick around, but it'd fit in with our philosophy of "anyone can edit" and maybe more people would stay after getting a taste of it. We have millions of readers. The potential of a wider audience is something to at least consider imo. Our editorship base doesn't have to be drastically skewed like it is right now. Clovermoss (talk) 03:14, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Recruiting readers to become editors is a time-honoured practice on Wikipedia, from allowing non-logged in editing (which in spite of its potential pitfalls, eliminates the biggest barrier to someone making an edit), to encouraging the creation of links to non-existent articles, to the creation of stubs, to many of the components of the main page. I don't have an issue with looking for even more ways to appeal to readers. It is, though, a well we've gone to many times. I think we need to look for different pools of potential editors, and in places that can help maximize success. isaacl (talk) 03:24, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for clarifying. That's an interesting point. I still think that the potential impact of appealing to more readers is something that is worthwhile to focus on, but I don't doubt that it's something that's been attempted many times. I doubt I'd be much more successful. Hopefully I would be, but I might be biased in my optimism. Clovermoss (talk) 15:33, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Given that I imagine virtually every single editor started as a reader, and I assume unrecruited readers remain by the far the largest source of editors, I say more power to you and anyone else who wants to try to convert more readers. I'm just trying to think of a way to filter those readers into subsets that offer a higher chance of becoming successful Wikipedia editors, even if just for a short period of time. isaacl (talk) 23:57, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This is related to some of the ongoing issues about unsourced or poorly sourced pages. This is specifically about unsourced BLPs in draft space. Biographies of living persons in article space must be properly sourced. There is a special procedure, BLPPROD, for the deletion of unsourced BLPs from article space. There is also a guideline for AFC reviewers that a BLP must have footnotes (not just general references). However, I don't see a guideline that says that draft BLPs must have sources. At Miscellany for Deletion, unsourced draft BLPs are often deleted as unsourced BLPs. That is, there isn't a written guideline, but some of the editors at MFD treat the requirement for sourcing of draft BLPs as an unwritten guideline. I will comment that a draft BLP cannot be required to have references from the time it is created, because the references are usually added after the text is written, but a rule of reason can be used that a draft BLP that is not actively being edited should have references.

So I have two questions. First, should there be a guideline providing for the deletion of unsourced BLPs in draft space and user space? Second, should New Page reviewers be asked not to draftify unsourced BLPs? Unsourced articles should be draftified. That is the primary purpose of draftification. Should New Page reviewers be instructed that unsourced BLPs should be instead tagged for deletion, either via BLPPROD, which is what it is for, or via A7 when that is appropriate? Robert McClenon (talk) 20:07, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I'm on the "just delete them" side. BLPs of all stripes collect people who edit with a POV like moths to a flame, so it's much better to get rid of any of them that don't have sources. A draft without any obvious promotion or negative information that's not sourced can probably stay as a draft if someone is working on it, but I'd cut the six month timer down to three months or one month before deletion. If there's an unsourced BLP in mainspace, just BLPPROD or A7. G10 for any page that is primarily unsourced or poorly sourced negative information should be fine too. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 20:24, 8 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

User:ScottishFinnishRadish Unsourced BLPs in draft space or user space are only deleted if they are sent to MFD. Are you recommending any other procedure to delete them?

You have answered my question about unsourced BLPs in article space. They can always be tagged for BLPPROD, and some of them can be tagged for A7 (or G10). Robert McClenon (talk) 01:58, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

As BLP applies to all pages, unsourced material should not remain in drafts. I don't think this is actual practice, at least for neutral/positive content.Slywriter (talk) 02:18, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The BLP policy states in particular that it also applies in user and user talk space. I think that a non-contentious addition should be made to add draft space. (The BLP policy precedes draft space, and an update is in order.) I agree that unsourced BLPs may be nominated for deletion at MFD. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:27, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think this is all making a mountain out of a mole hill. Dozens of completely unsourced (likely autobiographical) drafts on wannabe actors, singers, social activists, etc are handled through g13 daily without any issue from waiting around 6 months. When you add userspace stuff to the mix that isn't marked for afc the daily creation rate probably doubles and those just sit around forever. It's been this way for years and the sky hasn't fallen. To cite just one example Shravangodaraosian is a completely unsourced BLP, but since it's not indexed I see little benefit to deleting. There's enough makework around here as is, any actually damaging examples are already covered by G3, G10, G11. Just not sure what problem we're trying to solve here. 74.73.224.126 (talk) 02:44, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The BLP policy applies to all pages, per the BLP policy: This policy applies to any living person mentioned in a BLP, whether or not that person is the subject of the article, and to material about living persons in other articles and on other pages, including talk pages. with the footnote Manning naming dispute, 16 October 2013: "The biographies of living persons policy applies to all references to living persons throughout Wikipedia, including the titles of articles and pages and all other portions of any page." ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 13:57, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No change to the policy is needed, it already says BLP applies to all material about living persons anywhere on Wikipedia, including talk pages, edit summaries, user pages, images, categories, lists, article titles and drafts. IMO it should probably just state that BLP applies everywhere, no exceptions to stay concise, but that's not a change worth fighting over. The key is contentiousness, and with very few exceptions the draft and userspace stuff is not contentious. In the rare case a sentence or two is contentious they can always be removed. Attack pages and general vandalism can already be speedily deleted. 74.73.224.126 (talk) 14:42, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

If I saw any unsourced or poorly sourced negative BLP in draftspace I would probably try a CSD for it. And as it stands, I think there's a six month wait after the last on draft articles before deletion, for BLPs I think lowering that wouldn't be a bad thing. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 14:02, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That would require a lot of extra work to triage drafts as either containing or not containing BLP information, and drafts may also grow to include some when they did not do so initially. Then you also have to consider that many userspace drafts are not tagged as such and the workload is even larger just to find them in the first place, not worth the bother IMO. 74.73.224.126 (talk) 14:50, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• I'm tending to align with the IP; I think it would be difficult to generate a workable rule -- that is communicable to new editors -- that allows some wiggle room for absent sourcing while an editor is working on the draft. Robert McClenon, can you give a few examples of drafts that can't be deleted under either WP:G11 or WP:G10 that are causing a problem? Are we talking completely unsourced or sourced to unreliable sources such as Facebook or IMDb? Espresso Addict (talk) 10:58, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • User:Espresso Addict - I am not asking about any particular problematical drafts. I am asking from the standpoint of an editor at MFD, where really bad drafts go. Unsourced BLPs that get nominated for any reason get deleted as unsourced draft BLPs. A lot of drafts also get nominated for notability reasons, but notability does not apply to drafts, and the nominator may be told to stop ragpicking. I just want to be sure that we are in agreement on what should be deleted at MFD. Robert McClenon (talk) 13:56, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    The question here is what precisely constitutes a "really bad" draft (in whatever namespace). I just clicked on Special:Random/Draft a bunch of times and ran across exactly one that was kind of okish, all the others were bad to varying degrees. And yes there were some unsourced BLPs in the mix, my last hit was Draft:Aminah Rahman, which is about the same quality as the userspace blp I linked to earlier. But despite the low quality I don't think that any of them need to be promptly deleted. So could you please provide an example of something either draft or userspace that is ineligible for CSD, but needs to be deleted at MFD. Because my initial thought is just to leave all of them alone unless someone is somehow gaming the system. 74.73.224.126 (talk) 14:27, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• We need to remember the purpose of Draftspace: to be a holding pen, where we can work on potential articles (drafts) and get them up to minimum standards before they go live. Thus, drafts do not need sources NOW… they need sources SOON (ie before they can be moved to MAINSPACE.) Blueboar (talk) 11:11, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Not necessarily. If they have negative unsourced information in them, that information needs to be removed, or the article deleted. There is no wiggle room on that. Black Kite (talk) 14:32, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• This, although I would emphasize the negative aspect (which is often forgotten when discussing BLP.) BLP calls for high-quality sources for anything related to living people, but the "delete it now, do not pass go, this overrides everything else" rules only apply to BLP-sensitive stuff, ie. things with the potential to harm the reputation of a living person. "X is an author who was born in year X and lives in state Y" should have a source eventually but does not require immediate deletion; "X is a neo-Nazi who..." obviously requires a citation or immediate deletion. So whether unsourced BLP drafts must be tagged for immediate deletion depends on the possibility of them harming their subject. --Aquillion (talk) 22:03, 9 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  I'm pretty sure that the rule is about unsourced matter that is "contentious, whether positive, negative, or neutral", without a focus on exclusively negative information. Among other benefits, that saves editors from arguing over whether "He's probably gay" is negative. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:55, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• As Blueboar said, this misses the purpose of draft space. Draft space is intended to be a safe space to develop content which doesn't meet mainspace standards. That includes sources. It's fine for someone to write a draft article and not put the sources in on day one, and we shouldn't penalise that by deleting the draft. If the draft isn't worked on then it will be deleted after six months anyway under G13. Policy already allows for actual BLP violations to be removed in draft space. Drafts are not reader-facing and aren't indexed in search engines to the potential for harm is minimal. Hut 8.5 11:51, 10 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Are we discussing the removal of specific (harmful) content, or the full deletion of the draft article? There is a difference. Blueboar (talk) 12:19, 10 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

At some point I foresee a future where all articles on Wikipedia that have been around for a while are well-sourced. In fact, if you look at my homepage, you'll see a "poem" there about that future which uses the analogy of articles to sandcastles on a beach. I view having all articles sources as mostly a good thing, but I worry that anything which raises the bar for being able to contribute to Wikipedia will interfere with our ability to recruit new editors (sending them "farther down the beach"). So I have more mixed feelings than most about this.

What I'd like to do is find a good way to get there that doesn't involve deleting notable topics. As an inclusionist I don't want to see notable topics disappearing--I'd rather have them unsourced than gone (for a random example, I don't see the benefit of deleting [10]). There are about 142,000 articles that are tagged as unsourced at the moment. A drive to source them all seems somewhat hopeless given current editor numbers. But yet we did a fairly nice job sourcing BLPs once up on a time. That was done with a "source these or they will be deleted" deadline, which motivated the inclusionists, but not so much others. I'd like to propose the (very rough and not fully thought out) idea that we try to motivate the folks that want these articles sourced. And that is that if we can get the unsourced articles down to zero (or maybe 100 or something else very small?) that were created before some date (Say June 1 2022), then we add a rule that all new articles must be sourced within 90 days or they get sent to draft. All that would be left would be to clean up the articles from June 1st 2022 until the drive had finished--at the least a finite and (largely) a non-increasing set. There would have to be an understanding that good-faith contributors wouldn't PROD/AfD/etc. these articles without a serious attempt at WP:BEFORE. But given that, I think we could manage such a change in a year, maybe less.

I realize the idea is rough in its presentation. And, as I say, I bring it forward with some trepidation. But I think it is where we are going and probably where we should be going. So I'd like to get there with as little pain (i.e. deletion of notable topics) as possible. Thoughts? Hobit (talk) 15:56, 11 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia is not necessary. It is convenient. Knowledge will not disappear because 100 or 1000000 Wikipedia articles are deleted, even if they are sourced. Obviously. Because Wikipedia is a tertiary information provider. Readers (who don't care about the labels Wikipedians make for themselves) will find it elsewhere, if acquiring such knowledge is valuable to them. In the case of unsourced items, we are not discussing knowledge. Knowledge involves facts, and facts need to be unambiguously shown to be so by easily accessible proof. Anything else is an opinion. Notability (not synonymous with popularity) should be factual, and this requires sources and a rationale to prove it. Imo, the phrase "notable unsourced articles" is an oxymoron, and guilty of demoting notability to POV.

But this is not meant to be negative: Wikipedia can become necessary and indispensable. The first step would be to only present information that is properly sourced. 161.221.13.10 (talk) 22:08, 11 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It may be worth considering, if your proposed principles would lead to Wikipedia never having existed or never growing beyond the Britannica-1911 mirror that it was in the early 2000s, that perhaps those principles are also unsuitable for guiding Wikipedia today. -- Visviva (talk) 00:28, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The dichotomy between growth and quality may be a false one. But it is appealing to those who just want to post something on the internet (call it an "article") while avoiding the responsibility of backing it up. It is an easy thing to do, and one often can get away with it. So what exactly has Wikipedia grown into? Since it has undoubtedly grown. It is impossible to have it both ways. One can have a smaller encyclopedia based on facts, or the present gargantuan edifice, inevitably and rather hypocritically accompanied by occasional sterile discussion about the absence of sources. 64.18.11.70 (talk) 02:46, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

there is no replacement for a wikipedia article once it is deleted. none. with that said, not every topic or item that we cover here is vital to world knowledge. I agree that some entries could be deleted. however, if an entry actually does have value, or validity, or serves some useful purpose, then there is little point to saying that "other sources/publications/media outlets will continue to exist." of course they will, but almost all sources of information will eventually change, dissipate, go out of date, or archive older items and articles, that is except for Wikipedia. Sm8900 (talk) 14:10, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I am hoping the above is supposed to be humorous. Apart from the idea that Wikipedia is somehow immune to entropy ("almost all sources of information will eventually change, dissipate, go out of date, or archive older items and articles, that is except for Wikipedia"), there is the fantastic statement of Wikipedia being a repository of original (and unique) research ("there is no replacement for a wikipedia article once it is deleted. none.") It is probably worse that I draw attention to this; it is not a good joke at all. 50.75.226.250 (talk) 17:02, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

that is entirely an arbitrary meaning that you are imposing. I meant there is no replacement for a wikipedia article as a reference source. unless you think an article on golf balls that appeared in the Sunday New York Times magazine in year X is somehow superior as a reference over an easily-accesible wikipedia article on golf balls.

as far as other sources dissipating, while wikipedia does not. I would invite you to visit today's website for the New York Times, CBS News, the BBC, the WSJ, ABC News, Atlantic Monthly. all of these sites--- all of them--- have articles displayed prominently today, which will be moved unceremoniously to an archive page, once they are no longer part of that publication's current issue, or a news outlets' set of current coverage for the current week. wikipedia by its nature has a topical strcuture which obviously would be based on data, and would not changed based on parameters used by media publications such as "publication date." that is simply what i meant. Sm8900 (talk) 17:39, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

What has accessibility to do with "superiority" as a reference? Wikipedia entries don't become superior just because they are easily accessible, and they reference nothing but the editors' POV unless shown to be factual by proper sourcing.

The comparison with news media is disingenuous. Wikipedia is not a news medium. And yet it employs archives of its reader-facing activities anyway. Just look at the main page. 98.7.221.81 (talk) 12:50, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That's mostly not true. Inaccessible sources are automatically inferior to accessible sources for some purposes. The book you can't read does you no good at all, especially if you need information urgently.

You seem to be confusing (again? still?) uncited content with bad content. If you were to blank all the sources from WP:Today's Featured Article, the article would not suddenly represent "nothing but the editors' POV". It is common for substubs to be both NPOV and entirely unsourced. Good luck finding anyone who thinks that Geriatric sexology has POV problems. Its three generic sentences might be pointless, but they don't manage to provide enough content that anyone could reasonably disagree with them.

OTOH, it's possible to properly source every sentence in an article and still have the article represent the editors' own POV. It may surprise you, but sometimes the editors' own POVs are not significantly different from NPOV. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:05, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The only information that is automatically inferior is incorrect information, and the fact that information may be accessible does not make it automatically superior. When it is bad information, it may not only be useless but harmful. If one has no way of knowing whether they are getting correct information, urgently or not, it is walking blind in a minefield. Afaik not what Wikipedia purports to be. Disseminate knowledge, not probable knowledge presented as knowledge (there is knowledge about probable knowledge, that's not the point here).

The question remains: if an article has no sources how can one know that the content is good? And why bring FAs into it? They are proof of Wikipedia's shortcomings. In a proper encyclopedia any one article could/would be an FA (or GA). They would not need special qualifications and procedures to achieve the status.

Nobody disputes that heavily sourced articles can be unbalanced and biased. To be able to make that determination, sources have to exist first. Unsourced articles cannot even provide that determination; they are beyond useless in this respect. Readers should be provided with NPOV. Whether editors' POV coincides with NPOV is irrelevant and useless information, this is not about the editors. The wikitext-plus-the-supporting-references will tell the story. 4.30.91.142 (talk) 21:04, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Even if an article has sources, how does one know that the content is good? The cited sources could all be garbage, or they could say the opposite of what the article says.

It is simply not true that you cannot determine whether an article is unbalanced and biased unless that article already contains citations. Unsourced articles can be determined to be biased. Watch Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as attack pages for a while and see if you can figure out whether or not the unsourced pages are biased. Or try a simple thought experiment. Imagine that you find an article about Joe Film with these contents:

"Joe Film is the best actor in the history of the universe. He has appeared as the most important actor in every important film produced since he was 16 years old. It is only through unremitting corruption and flagrant anti-Joe bias that he has not been given every single award at the Oscars for the last 22 years."

This article stub is completely unsourced. Are you able to make the determination that this hypothetical article is not NPOV, or do you still cling to your assertion above that "sources have to exist first" and you "cannot even provide that determination" about unsourced articles?

If you are interested in the question of how people decide whether to trust content, then I regret to tell you that, among Wikipedia's readers, the presence or absence of sources appears to make little to no difference. Humans mostly decide that an article is NPOV if it confirms their pre-existing knowledge and agrees with, or at least acknowledges, their beliefs and preconceptions. There has been substantial research on this subject, and if you are actually interested in knowing more about it, I suggest that you read up on it, rather than trying to trigger Cunningham's Law by loudly declaiming false statements here. Some of the best work has been done in the area of how people decide whether to trust something they read about vaccines, so you might start at scholar.google.com with that question. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:43, 21 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

You misunderstand. Why would anyone bother with an unsourced article? It is a waste of time trying to somehow divine if it is this or that or not. As a reader, I just want the info, I don't want to do the editors' job. If I know the subject, I have no use for Wikipedia. If I don't, I want verifiable proof that the information provided is correct. This requires sources. Whether the info is complete or neutrally presented are next steps for further discussion. As for the audience's beliefs and biases, they are irrelevant. They come here for knowledge on the subject. It should be provided neutrally based on verifiable facts. That is an encyclopedia's business. Readers can stay with their biases regardless, that is their business. 98.7.221.81 (talk) 13:21, 21 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This is a nice idea, but I'm not sure it's a great use of the editor community's energy. There's nothing wrong with a cleanup drive, but having done some article rescues over the years, I am pretty tired of being pressed into service to meet the demands of the deletionist wrecking crew. It's a lot more work, and a lot less enjoyable, and ultimately less beneficial to the project, to improve a random article than to improve an article in an area I'm familiar with.

As long as we're opining: If unreferenced articles are a disservice to the reader (as many have claimed, with a noticeable lack of supporting data), then the problem isn't really the comparatively small number of unreferenced articles. Rather, since the content would disserve the reader just as much if it were merged into a larger article that did have some sources, the problem is really the vast amount of unreferenced (or improperly referenced) content. And that's a problem that nearly every article suffers from, and will always suffer from as long as the article continues to grow and evolve, and can realistically be combated only by having a robust editor community in the relevant topic area. (Side note: we could solve the problem tomorrow by stripping out every sentence that doesn't have an accompanying inline citation; of course this would make Wikipedia functionally useless to the reader, which raises some questions about that whole "disservice to the reader" business.)

If we want more high-quality referenced content, we need more people. And anything that interferes with that -- for example by raising the project's real or perceived barriers, er sorry, "minimum standards" -- is only going to continue making things worse over the long haul. -- Visviva (talk) 00:28, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I get your issue with being pushed by the wrecking crew. This is why I've tried to make it so that those who really want to see every article have references would be the ones who get rewarded by getting what they want (sourcing requirements on new articles). But it sounds like we aren't there yet. I think we'll get to the point something like this proposal works out in a few years... Hobit (talk) 16:39, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@visviva seems totally correct to me. well said. Sm8900 (talk) 14:08, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I agree completely with the points raised by Hobit in their initial note above. Sm8900 (talk) 14:07, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, I think this topic dovetails nicely with the larger topic above on this page, in the section Dealing with large numbers of articles that fail WP:N, WP:V, or WP:OR. thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 14:47, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The idea that data is needed to show that unreferenced articles are indeed a disservice is peculiar. Unreferenced articles are opinions. As far as anyone can tell, fiction unless proven factual by references. If the objective is knowledge dissemination, usable info based on fact, then anything that does not include factual references is a disservice. Merging unreferenced articles is a different topic, and ruminating about article quality and the need for additional or further (better) references is presently irrelevant. In order to examine references for validity, reliability, topicality, source-text integrity etc. they must first exist.

Maybe Wikipedia will become an encyclopedia in the future. Right now, it may more accurately be described as a topic/stub aggregator. 64.18.11.70 (talk) 15:41, 19 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Ouch! Mccapra (talk) 16:35, 19 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

"Unreferenced articles are opinions": I invite the IP to improve the articles on Fact and Opinion, and then come back to these discussions with a better understanding of these words. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:07, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Well, fact and opinion exist independently of Wikipedia. They are not what Wikipedia says they are, especially when the issue is Wikipedia's own processes. If "fact" and "opinion" articles on Wikipedia are supported by verifiable references in a rounded, impartial, unbiased presentation, they are factual. Facts have no other quality, any one fact resides everywhere and anytime. Its appearance in Wikipedia as an article or in an article, desirable as it may be, is incidental. 4.30.91.142 (talk) 21:20, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

And yet I find zero reliable sources that say facts are only factual when they are supported by references. Hmm, maybe your assertion that citations magically turn opinions into facts is not a fact? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:45, 21 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I can't find the suggestion that citations magically turn opinions into facts anywhere in this discussion. I can find assertions that facts can be proven so by proper citations. And the further assertion, that in an anonymously edited internet site, that is the only way facts may begin to be ascertained. 98.7.221.81 (talk) 13:32, 21 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

What is the point of having a WP article if it doesn't have references? If I go on here to look something up, I want to see that the statements made about it are directly supported in a way that has the potential for validation. If they are not cited, your suggestion seems to be that readers should just google those facts to find out themselves if they're verifiable...which completely obviates the purpose of the article existing on Wikipedia. Why would a reader try to source each statement themselves instead of just...googling the subject directly and finding a better resource than WP? Readers aren't the ones who should be investigating existential origins of facts; they come here in the hope a subject has been adequately, verifiably summarized such that they don't have to curate and synthesize references themselves. An unsourced article just creates a giant extra step if a reader actually wants to be informed, and is literally no better than coming across a factoid on a forum. JoelleJay (talk) 00:32, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In 99.7% of page views, nobody clicks on any references in the article. Perhaps that's because approximately 99.7% of the time, readers don't actually need the references. Our typical reader, at least in developed countries, is looking for "What's that guy's name? It's on the tip of my tongue... Oh, right, the Wikipedia article reminded me!"

If the answer were important, I'd suggest that the reader not rely exclusively on Wikipedia, even if the material is a victim of citation overkill. When it isn't important – well, then it doesn't matter?

Notice that I'm not saying that anything should be unsourced in the mainspace. I'm only saying that uncited facts are still facts, and not opinions. The IP, on the other hand, says that "Unreferenced articles are opinions". Given a choice between:

• It's a fact
• Add a citation, and it's still a fact

vs

• It's an opinion
• Add a citation, and now it's a fact

I pick the one in which facts are facts. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:32, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• As an inclusionist I don't want to see notable topics disappearing ... Well, as a "deletionist" (or so I've been called) I also don't want to see notable topics being deleted. That's not the point. Our only proof a subject meets a notability guideline is that sources back it up. When those sources cannot be found, there is no notable topic which can be saved. -Indy beetle (talk) 17:14, 14 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Yep. But some of our unsourced articles are on notable topics. I believe others on this page in various places have indicated they'd rather just delete those than have them around. Hobit (talk) 00:35, 15 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• All thoughts and recommendations are welcome, and I highly recommend that any editor who believes unsourced articles are notable to get busy sourcing them because we are swamped with a 14k+/- backlog at NPP. Keep an eye on draftified articles and clean them up, or become an NPP reviewer where you can help fix the problems we encounter on a daily basis. I'm of the mind that unsourced articles in mainspace defy our core content policies, and not be INDEXED. It basically suggests that we eliminate NPP which is our first line of defense in protecting WP from global garbage. The state of unsourced articles is an automatic fail of WP:V, WP:GNG, and potentially WP:OR and WP:NOT. I can relate to some of what the proposal suggests as I'm a bit of an inclusionist myself (& article rescue member), but I also realize the need for CSD, PROD, AfD, merges & redirects. I'm also quite certain this proposal would open our doors to spamming, uncontrollable numbers of BOT submissions and the like, but on the other hand, I imagine UPE/PE would love it – they'll get paid for doing less work. Having said that, imagine what would happen to WP's reputation as an encyclopedia if we allowed unsourced articles into mainspace? Atsme 💬 📧 12:11, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Atsme, I'm sure this has been pointed out to you already, but "unsourced" does not mean "unverifiable". Unverifiable means that no source can be found. Similarly notability is determined by the existence of sources, not whether they're cited. Our policy is and always has been that lack of citations is a fixable problem, not a breach of any core content policies, and not a reason for deletion. Hobit's proposal isn't to "allow unsourced articles into mainspace" (because we already do), it's to remove unsourced articles from mainspace after a set amount of time, if we can get the existing backlog of unsourced articles down.
    It wouldn't really affect NPP because NPP isn't there to filter articles based on the presence or absence of citations; it's a rough triage for major problems like copyvios, attack pages, UPE or lack of notability. And if you're worried about the NPP backlog (I'll panic when it hits 24k again), surely the first thing you should do is stop giving yourself extra work by making it "unsourced pages patrol" too? – Joe (talk) 18:23, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    How does one access notability without sources? If there are no sources in the article, the reviewer has to do a time-consuming search to make that judgement. This most certainly does affect NPP. The creator of an article should be the one to show the subject is notable by providing sources. An un/undersourced article would not be accepted at AFC. Why should there be lower standards if AFC is bypassed? MB 18:59, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Yes, the reviewer does. There's no getting around that. Being able to quickly check notability by searching for sources is a basic skill required for pretty much all maintenance work in mainspace and quite frankly, if you're not willing or able to do it, you shouldn't be reviewing new pages. The same goes for AfC. – Joe (talk) 19:24, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    I think that was pretty condescending. I didn't say anything about not being willing to do it. I said it takes time, which is why the backlog is 14,000, and at present, climbing again. There is a problem; articles are being Indexed after 90 days without being reviewed and there are not enough active reviewers to keep up. People are suggesting solutions. Asking the article creator to provide sources does not seem unreasonable to me. It makes the article better (e.g. it won't get tagged as unreferenced) and it "greases" the review process. MB 21:42, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Our policies around unsourced content haven't changed for years. They were the same when the NPP backlog was 24,000 and they were the same when it was zero. It's completely irrelevant. – Joe (talk) 13:14, 19 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Joe, please help us here - to what policies are you referring: WP:V and its subsection WP:BURDEN, or WP:BLP which not only includes unsourced but also unreliably sourced? Burden states: Any material lacking an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports the material may be removed and should not be restored without an inline citation to a reliable source. Whether and how quickly material should be initially removed for not having an inline citation to a reliable source depends on the material and the overall state of the article. We also have WP:OR which states: Any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be supported by a reliable source. Material for which no reliable source can be found is considered original research. The only way you can show your edit is not original research is to cite a reliable published source that contains the same material. Refer back to BURDEN. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it appears that your reliance on keeping unsourced stubs/articles is dependent on footnote (a) in WP:OR: By "exists", the community means that the reliable source must have been published and still exist—somewhere in the world, in any language, whether or not it is reachable online—even if no source is currently named in the article. Articles that currently name zero references of any type may be fully compliant with this policy—so long as there is a reasonable expectation that every bit of material is supported by a published, reliable source. Joe, do you have a link to that community discussion? MB were you aware of that footnote? It contradicts our core content policies and GNG guidelines. Think about how many articles have been deleted because of sourcing or lack of sourcing. That footnote is a disaster, and I believe it needs to be revisited. Atsme 💬 📧 14:54, 19 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Haven't you and I talked about this very recently on another page? The fact that you "may" (an optional behavior) remove unsourced material does not mean that the unsourced material is unverifiable.

    Let's try this again, from the very first sentence of WP:V: In the English Wikipedia, verifiability means other people using the encyclopedia can check that the information comes from a reliable source.

    Have you thought about that sentence yet?

    1. I take the words "verifiability means" as indicating that whatever follows is the definition of verifiability. If something meets the following definition, then it is verifiable. Do you agree, or do you have a different idea about that?
    2. I notice that the definition given for whether something is verifiable (assuming we agree on point #1) is other people using the encyclopedia can check that the information comes from a reliable source. I understand the "other people using the encyclopedia" bit to mean "some, but not all, humans, except for the editor who added whichever information we're talking about". The minimum standard would be two humans, namely whoever added the information plus one other human. It would not necessarily include any human who needed/wanted to check, but it must be possible for someone who is "other" to do this. Do you agree, or do you have a different idea?
    3. The next word in the definition is "can". This means that it's theoretically possible, not that it's ever been done in any particular case. Do you agree, or do you think that the word "can" means something else?
    4. The next phrase is check that. These words mean that must be possible (see #3) for someone to see/look up/figure out/investigate/determine/double-check to satisfy themselves that a particular condition is true. If you "can" find out whether or not this condition is true, then the information is verifiable. If you "cannot" find out whether or not this condition is true, then the information is not verifiable.
    5. The particular condition in question is: the information comes from a reliable source. "Information" is understood broadly, and it might have been somewhat more expansive to say "material", but if it's in the article, it's likely covered. A source – though not ever defined in the policy – is whatever person/place/thing an editor got some information from. A reliable source – also not actually defined in any policy; we provide information on how to identify them, but not what they are, in a dictionary-type sense – is the subset of sources that editors accept as being reliable for the particular information.
    6. I hope you have agreed with me so far, because that is the end of the definition, and now we are going to get into what the definition does not say. Notice the complete and utter absence of any prescribed methodology for doing that checking. Notice the absence of words like "can check that the information comes from a reliable source that is cited in a little blue clicky number at the end of the sentence". Those words aren't there, because the definition of what "other people can check" is not limited to cited sources. Some "other people can check" some information by visiting their favorite web search engine, such as books[.]google[.]com. If "other people can use a web search" and this would determine that the information came from a reliable source, then that information  is verifiable, even if it's not cited. Sometimes "other people can check" information by going to a library. Or picking up a textbook for the class they're taking. Or

    Now, I know: it's inconvenient to have to do the checking yourself. It's much easier to say "Ooops, if there's no little blue clicky number, then it's a policy violation!" It's also much easier to assume that if the material is cited to an unreliable source, or to a source that doesn't verify it (sometimes as a result of vandalism or poor editing, the wrong source ends up at the end of a sentence), then the material can't be verified. But the actual definition doesn't support that POV, and neither does the community.

    There are multiple reasons why nobody supports that, but I'll give you just two. Here they are:

    • Only stupid people think that a sentence like "The capital of France is Paris" "can't" be "checked" in "a reliable source" unless there is a little blue clicky number at the end of the sentence, and that it magically transforms into checkable material if you add a ref tag. Wikipedia editors do not appreciate rules that treat them like imbeciles.
    • Even short, simple sentences can contain a lot of information. A philosopher would tell you that that six-word sentence contains at least the following claims:
      • France has a capital.
      • France has only one capital ("the" capital).
      • This capital belongs to or is otherwise "of" France.
      • The capital currently exists ("is").
      • The capital's name or identity is Paris.
        • Good luck trying to find reliable sources that directly support all of those claims. I'm not sure that it can be done, even for so simple and obvious a sentence. And yet nobody (nobody sensible, anyway) wants or expects a reliable source to support every single little word in the sentence; we only want to be certain that there are reliable sources, somewhere in the world, even if uncited in the article, that make the capital of France = Paris connection.

    I really think that this continued pushing for people to conflate presently uncited with unverifiable is both bad for the encyclopedia and becoming disruptive. You either need to get the policy's definition changed, or you need to quit trying to pretend that the policy's definition doesn't disagree with your POV. There's a definition of verifiability in the policy's very first sentence. The definition is not the same as "cited". The presence or absence of citations is so irrelevant that they definition doesn't even mention citations. Citations are therefore not what makes information verifiable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:52, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    What on Earth is time consuming about performing a search to see whether a subject has coverage in books or academic papers? In most cases it takes seconds, not even minutes. Phil Bridger (talk) 19:42, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    If only it were that simple, Joe. I'm definitely not trying to add extra work to our timesheets while struggling with a 14k+/- backlog, and that doesn't count AfC's backlog. Please rest assured that I am aware of WP:V, particularly with the clearly stated, unambiguous WP:BURDEN, and the many issues (potential or existing) that are associated with unsourced articles in mainspace. Very little of our wokeness has prepared NPP or AfC for a potential onslaught of the bot-created article brigade. The team at NPP is too busy trying to find solutions for the relentless archaic issues we deal with day-to-day, and quite frankly, some of the comments I've been reading here are rather discouraging, but that's expected from those of us at NPP/AfC who have skin in the game. Atsme 💬 📧 19:46, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Maybe it would help if you stopped talking about "the team at NPP" and "those of us at NPP/AfC" as if you are a separate species. We are all, first and foremost, supposed to be here to build an encyclopedia collaboratively, which involves helping those who know less about policies and guidelines than us, rather than to pick holes in what people have created. Phil Bridger (talk) 19:52, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Maybe it would help if you requested the reviewer right and did some reviews. MB 21:44, 18 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    How the heck did you end up claiming that referring to the group working on doing a particular task a "team" amounts to claim of being like a separate species? And NPP people aren't trying to "pick holes", they are just trying to do the job properly. The way the math works, each of the 10 most active reviewers has to manually review about 50 articles per day in their volunteered wiki-minutes just to avoid NPP sinking deeper into backlog. I'm probably typical where if the article passes the "should it be an article?" criteria (wp:not and notability) and it has lots of flaws in it, I pass it and thank or compliment the creator for the work that they did do and move on. North8000 (talk) 14:25, 19 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Referring to some people as being on the team necessarily involves Othering everyone else, no?

    I think what Phil's saying is that different people might have different expectations from NPP. Phil seems to be thinking about a basic notability check: "Yup, I see that name in a bunch of articles at news.google.com, so probably notable.  Pass. Next!" Atsme seems to be talking about a far more extensive process. Even ignoring Atsme's wildly unrepresentative belief that BURDEN's permission to optionally remove some uncited information means that all uncited information is somehow a policy violation, this version wouldn't even consider whether any of the information is cited. It's like a WP:BEFORE check, or the sort of quick check you'd do if you were thinking about starting an article, not a line-by-line evaluation of existing content. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:02, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    I'd like to add: I don't share Phil's view. Why? Well, the last time I read the directions, which apparently was around 2015, the purpose of NPP, was to get identify candidates for speedy deletion.

    Note: just to identify and tag CSD candidates.

    Only to identify and tag CSD candidates.

    You could do more while you were there, and most people did, but that was the agreed-upon primary purpose. The most complicated task in the list was spotting copyvios. The [Mark this page as patrolled] button could have been renamed [Does not appear to qualify for speedy deletion] (and maybe it should have been).

    It appears that "get rid of pages that no editor could ever wish to keep" changed to "make sure everything belongs". This is where the prove-a-negative thing crept in, and where patrollers were being asked to do more than spot the worst of the worst. This is also where the idea of patrollers and a cleanup/quality-control crew got started. The expected workload went from:

    • Tag copyvios and other CSD candidates (everything else you do is gravy)

    to

    • Deal with everything that doesn't belong, no matter why someone thinks it doesn't belong (CSD + notability + blatant promotionalism + subtle promotionalism + hemi-demi-semi-duplicative articles that should be merged + everybody knows that every article on that subject from that country is written by undisclosed paid editors + the WikiProject decided last month that these lists are INDISCRIMINATE but those lists are okay + that editor's username is a little like one of the authors cited in this article + this is clearly notable but it's completely unsourced + everything that anyone could complain about)
    • Maintain high standards for article quality, especially so that nobody using Google will see new pages that are unsourced or otherwise might embarrass editors who have higher than average quality standards (because nobody wants to be the guy who let Google customers see that. We're all united in our real goal of protecting Google's customers from incomplete pages, right?)

    and, now, as of this edit by @Barkeep49 last January, the NPPer is additionally meant to:

    • Nurture new editors, without mentoring them

    I think this is unreasonable. NPP shouldn't be expected to do everything. We need someone to do everything, but I think we should go back to the system in which NPP exists to identify CSD, and nothing else is actually their problem. We stop telling NPP to protect Google's customers from bad grammar, unsourced articles, and so forth. We just ask NPP to try to prevent CSD-worthy problems from persisting in the English Wikipedia. Everything else is someone else's problem and is to be done on someone else's deadline. And maybe we rename that button to be clear about what 'mark as patrolled' really means. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:58, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with narrowing it to the essentials. And I think that the reviewers that get any quantity of articles done (of the ~700 per day that need manual review) are already doing that. But the "essentials" include dealing with "do wikipedia policies/guidelines allow this article (topic) to exist as a separate article? And a large amount where the answer is "no" are not speedy-able. North8000 (talk) 21:53, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Why does that question have to be NPP's problem? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:47, 21 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I'm open to other wording. But I think it is a core expectation that new page patrollers be able to adequately respond to newer users. What is routine for us can be WP:BITEY for new editors and making sure that balance is struck is, for me, a core part of the NPP job. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:03, 21 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Barkeep49, I think that this is a manageable set of tasks for NPP:

• decide whether each new page is CSD-worthy
• be nice to new folks if you have to send their page to CSD

If this was all that NPP was asked to do, then I think they could manage it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:00, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That is certainly a more managable set of tasks. But I think sending stuff to search engines which do not meet our notability guidelines has harms for us as a project and can harm the article's subjects. Doing some screen for notability has been a part of the NPP tasks from the moment an editor put the idea onwiki and removing it altogether is a bigger leap than I would make in narrowing what's expected. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 23:59, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

How does allowing a search engine to index a non-notable subject, between the day it is determined not to be CSD-worthy and the day it is deleted or merged away for being non-notable, actually harm Wikipedia?

I can imagine harms from an article about a non-notable subject having been created (e.g., waste of the community's time at AFD), but tell me how Wikipedia gets hurt if Google knows about its existence. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:39, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Here is an example that I am thinking of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_undeletion/Archive_373#Autistic_Women_%26_Nonbinary_Network

However, if you search the organization's name, most of the results are from the organization's website/social media profiles, or simply contain a trivial mention! Feel free to correct me if this is untrue. That page was restored without any sources cited as examples. Yleventa2 (talk) 21:35, 11 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

WP:PROD is by design easy to contest. You simply have to disagree, and you don't have to state your reasons why.

If you disagree with the disagreeing, and still think the article should be deleted, WP:AFD is there for you. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:39, 11 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think we should make it a little harder to contest; contesting prods inappropriately is just as problematic as inappropriate AfD nominations, but as a community we focus on the latter, not the former. To contest prods, I think we should implement a requirement similar to WP:BEFORE, where editors are required to provide sources that address the concerns and demonstrate that there is a chance for the article to survive at AfD.

This is already partially covered by policies around disruptive editing, but I think it would be beneficial to make it clear what the expectations are. BilledMammal (talk) 02:55, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It's easy to see people contesting the contested eg. no way that source you gave would be sufficient to survive at AfD. Then what? You get into out of band disputes and no formal way to resolve it. Plus, a single source is usually not enough to survive at AfD it's more complicated. -- GreenC 03:05, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, in some cases this would just turn what is supposed to be a low-overhead way of avoiding AFD into a low-participation pre-AFD dispute, Meters (talk) 03:09, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Ideally, the editor contesting deletion would demonstrate that the article met WP:GNG, but even if they only find one source that counts towards GNG then I think it is enough to demonstrate that it is possible additional sources exist, and a wider discussion at AfD is worthwhile.

As for disputes about whether the source counts towards GNG; those would still be resolved at AfD. This proposal would act similar to WP:BEFORE; it just makes the expectations for removing a prod clear, and if an editor consistently fails to meet those expectations then it becomes a behavioural issue. It wouldn't allow editors to reinstate the prod. BilledMammal (talk) 03:22, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

If PROD required a single source with no subjective interpretation, it might work, but as soon you allow for subjective interpretation about the source, there will be pre-AfD disputes. Both sides will game it. If no subjective interpretation, the contestant can pick any source from the article it would prove nothing other than to add some bureaucratic overhead. -- GreenC 03:34, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I would suggest the wording Editors contesting a prod are required to ensure that the article includes at least one reference that a reasonable editor could believe meets the requirements of WP:GNG.

It won't cause pre-AfD disputes, because the line If anybody objects to the deletion the proposal is aborted and may not be re-proposed would still be policy; if the prod is contested, it is contested. It doesn't matter whether the contesting editor has met the requirement, as the prod may not be reinstated. Instead, consistently failing to meet this requirement is a behavioural problem.

I see this as similar to WP:BEFORE; it doesn't matter whether the nominating editor has met the requirements of WP:BEFORE, as the discussion cannot be closed prematurely on that basis. What WP:BEFORE does it make it easier to identify when an editor is being disruptive and address that disruption, and what I propose here is intended to have the same effect. BilledMammal (talk) 03:49, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This all seems too WP:BLOATy for my taste. Prod is supposed to be simple and low-overhead. If anyone feels that a prod should not have been removed than they can start an afd (or in some cases an rfd as proded articles are regularly redirected). Ideally prod removal should be well explained as that can help to avoid wasting time with unnecessary afds, but the last thing we should be doing is adding a whole bunch of required hoops to jump through for a process that is by design as simple as practical. If someone has a habit of botlike prod removals that's already a behavioral issue under existing policy that can be handled through established procedures. 74.73.224.126 (talk) 04:06, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Who is the reasonable editor that decides it could meet GNG? Not trying to be difficult it is a conflict trap. -- GreenC 04:22, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It is related to this. The intent is to prevent this becoming a trap; if the belief that the source counts towards WP:GNG is reasonable, then the editor has meet the requirement, even if the eventual consensus is that it does not. It should only affect two types of editors; those with WP:CIR issues, and those who remove the prod while knowing that they have not met the requirement. BilledMammal (talk) 04:36, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

PROD is fine as is. Don't fuck with it. If you have an issue with an unsourced article that you think is not notable, and don't want to deal with the possibility that someone disagrees with you, send it straight to WP:AFD. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 05:24, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Not a good idea. Wikipedia as an institution doesn't do reasonable. Not only does this place have a sizeable global community that would make that tricky in the first place, but the dramaboards by their very nature turn any remotely regular participants into wikilawyers. There's always going to be some kind of "this specific circumstance is not technically covered" loophole that will be openly brandished, or "my belief was reasonable because...", or "these other people did it and were not sanctioned so sanctioning me would be unfair", etc. 74.73.224.126 (talk) 14:58, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

If an editor contests lots of PRODs inappropriately, we should deal with that editor, not destroy a perfectly fine lightweight process by introducing additional rules. —Kusma (talk) 07:50, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In every case that i can remember, even when PRODs are being removed disruptively there has never been a consensus at ANI to sanction that editor in any way "because they don't have to provide a rationale". Which is ridiculous, really - would it really be too difficult to at least require a rationale for removing a PROD? The other problem is that it's not easy to track removed PRODs, unless I'm missing an easy way of doing it. Black Kite (talk) 08:54, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

You mean like you just did? "Not too difficult" falls a long way short of a proper rationale for such a sweeping change. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 09:18, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Not really. We have sanctioned editors in the past for repeatedly failing to use edit summaries when making major changes, and IMO removing a deletion tag is a major change. If you don't explain why you've removed it, others are going to think that you don't have a good reason, even if you do. It's simple courtesy to other editors. Black Kite (talk) 09:22, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

If an editor unprods every article, they will get sanctioned and/or reverted. If an editor unprods five articles, the worst thing that can happen is five AfDs. And "I am fairly sure there are sources" is a pretty universal deprod rationale that we could just assume as the default when editors don't say anything. —Kusma (talk) 09:24, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

PROD is intentionally easy to remove. I don't see that it's a helpful way forward to demand sourcing to stop an article being deleted without a discussion. The cycle of - PROD, remove, AfD - works very well. I think if you are particularly worried about an item having the PROD removed, you can simply skip that and go to AfD. Obviously it's better to have the sourcing, but PROD is supposed to be non-controversial Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 09:25, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that PROD is purely a process intended for totally non-controversial deletions, the definition of "non-controversial" in this case meaning simply that no one will contest it. It doesn't matter whether the reason for contesting is an elaborate one embedded in policy and good reason; or if it's someone kicking a stone and proclaiming "I refute your PROD thus". No one is harmed by a contested PROD, not least Wikipedia.--WaltCip-(talk) 14:36, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I do spurts of WP:PRODPATROLING and can report that editor's egos are are frequently hurt when I contest a PROD. Also, in my assessment, there are many PRODs that are potentially controversial (many don't consider WP:ATD, for instance). WP:PRODPATROL is not consistently staffed so we have periods where we're deleting stuff through PROD that wouldn't be deleted at WP:AFD. ~Kvng (talk) 14:56, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hence the importance of tagging articles with Wikiproject tags so they get flagged in WP:AALERTS. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:57, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That might help get a few more eyes but they probably don't know much about PROD or AfD and are likely to do bad DEPRODs because of their affinity for the topic area. What we really need is editors with AfD experience watching for bad PRODs. WP:PRODPATROL is the venue we've created for this but it is not well staffed I assume because it's often contentious and thankless task due to the chaff you get from editors who are sure WP:DEMOLISH is the way to go with underdeveloped material on the encyclopedia and the ensuing time you get to spend in one of Wikipedia's unhappy places, AfD, doing followup. ~Kvng (talk) 19:01, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Perhaps we could advise (not require, but at least advise/encourage) that people who contest PRODs participate in any follow-up AfDs. I AfD'd a deprodded article as the deprodder asserted "sources will be easy to find" and, low and behold this was incorrect. I dropped a notice for the deprodder at their talk page but they gave no input. The user in question is all around productive and not a disruptive person, but it did feel like an abuse of process to contest a bunch of PRODS (this was one in a series) and then not show up at the AfD. -Indy beetle (talk) 07:06, 19 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  There was an article I deprodded not too long back where I didn't know whether the subject was notable or not, don't have specialist in the topic area and did not have time to participate in any follow-up AfD. I did so because the article suggested the topic might be notable but sources would likely take some finding (they could be quite old and there would likely be a lot of irrelevant results from simple google searches) so I felt that it should be actively considered at AfD where it was more likely that those familiar with the topic area and finding those type of sources would be aware of the nomination. AfD would also enable the active consideration of a merge and/or redirect, where again those familiar with the topic area are best placed to know the best target. Thryduulf (talk) 08:44, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose. PROD is heavily and indiscriminately over applied currently and it is unreasonable to make them harder to remove than to apply. BEFORE is utterly toothless and largely ignored by the heaviest users of PROD so comparisons are not appropriate - they wouldn't be appropriate anyway: Sourcing an article is something that takes time and effort, AfDs and PRODs are done with half a thought and a button click. Artw (talk) 22:18, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose - if the supporters of this and similar proposals were not so often the very same editors who escalate their perceived requirements for WP:GNG sourcing, and Notability in general, beyond what policy actually requires I might have some sympathy for this proposal. As things actually are, I have none. I have also seen articles PRODded which would have been helpful as redirects - this is one of the salient advantages of the AfD process, and ought not to be circumvented. Newimpartial (talk) 22:51, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose – Time and time again, users sometimes go on drive-by prodding sprees, rapdily proposing dozens of articles for deletion at a time with a verbatim copy/paste deletion rationale for each article, to the point that at times, the rationale does not even match the content or topical focus of articles (e.g. citing WP:NALBUM for a biographical article). If this proposal were to go into effect, then conversely, there should then also be a requirement that Prods require enough solid evidence for their placement. Indeed, unfortunately, Prods are sometimes heavily and indiscriminately over applied, and at times, WP:BEFORE searches are obviously not being performed. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 19:42, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi all, apologies if this is the wrong place to post this, please do point me to the right place if this is inappropriate. There is some debate in AfD recently regarding the discographies of a number of Indian singers, and I've found it hard to work out from existing policies WP:NLIST WP:NOT WP:INDISCRIMINATE how to assess the notability of these articles. This deletion discussion has had a lot of discussion, and while I'm inclined to believe deserves to be deleted, I'm unsure on what grounds we can assess whether discographies deserve their own pages. Neha Kakkar seems a relatively reputable Indian artist, but also has recorded a reported 50,000 songs. I'm not sure trying to document all that is particularly worthwhile, and WP:BEFORE doesn't seem to cover well what to do here. Some discographies like Eminem singles discography seem intuitively notable to me given all the secondary media discussing Eminem's life and how that links into the songs he's written. But I don't like the idea of trying to record 50,000 songs written anyone, Eminem included if he had written that many.

What's the right approach here?

Several of these deletion discussions are live right now:

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of songs recorded by Lata Mangeshkar Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Bengali songs recorded by Shreya Ghoshal Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of songs recorded by Neha Kakkar

Not trying to canvass votes on these discussions, but I think there's room for WP:NLIST to be much more explicit about discographies/filmographies. What does it mean for an artist's discography to have been significantly discussed? What would that look like? BrigadierG (talk) 15:50, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Aside from the fact that the whole area of guidance regarding of lists in Wikipedia needs work..... Discographies of notable musicians seem to usually be given a pass as a sort of "sub article" to the musician's article. North8000 (talk) 16:45, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I reckon that if the discography is small, it can go in the musician's article. But if it makes the article too large, then split it off. The style of the music probably does not play a part. More important is the reliable sources. One extra concern that I have is the styling, if unusual formatting or fonts are used, then a link to the official web site, or image of the listing on the original media would be good. The discography could be a good target for redirects of non-notable albums and pieces. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 02:38, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia has a general list problem, which isn't limited to discographies. It doesn't help in this case that a group of editors have decided to attempt to impose a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS (that NOT doesn't apply). Lists of songs should only be included when there is something to be said about the topic more than a mere "Here's a list of songs by X", and more than a copy-paste of the biography of the artist. For ex, List of songs recorded by the Beatles has detailed context about the songwriting and the evolution of the group's musical style. That, or when a reasonable amount of them are independently notable and the list can have a navigational function. I think the guidance at WP:CSC should be more thoroughly enforced, particularly for "complete lists of every item that is verifiably a member of the group". RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 17:49, 16 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Sometimes discography articles, and other types of articles, are created from page WP:SPLITS, into separate sub articles per WP:SIZERULE, part of the Wikipedia:Article size guideline page, to shorten the length of the main topical page. Unfortunately, sometimes users don't realize this, and then nominate them for deletion based upon rationales such as WP:NLIST, not realizing that it's a simple page split. Then users at AfD have to spend time explaining that page splits are allowed, that the precepts at WP:SPLIT and Wikipedia:Article size were decided upon via consensus, and that WP:NLIST does not automatically override sub articles that have been created via page splitting.