Wikipedia talk:Votes for deletion

See also: Wikipedia utilities/Old Page titles to be deleted talk and Wikipedia:Utilities

/Archive 1

This page grows too large too fast. I propose that we reduce the waiting period from 7 to 5 days. If there are no objections, I will change the text accordingly. --Eloquence 07:05 25 May 2003 (UTC)

• We currently have a rather long list due to the discussion about Internet Humour. I think length will go down as soon as that issue is settled out. -- JeLuF 08:52 25 May 2003 (UTC)

Last time it went over 32 KB, Tarquin suggested we split off the copyright violations from everything else. I think that's a great idea. As traffic on this site continues to grow, VFD will inevitably get longer. Splitting is the obvious scalable solution. I'll even go so far as to create a tempting broken link: Wikipedia:Suspected copyright violations[?]. -- Tim Starling 14:30 25 May 2003 (UTC)

I don't think that's a good solution. Yet another page to check .. --Eloquence 14:36 25 May 2003 (UTC)

We could just tell everyone using browsers which limit length to 32 KB to get lost ;) I think 7 days is too long, so I'm fine with this change in the short term. But it's only a 30% saving, and you can't remove entries with active debate (which often seem to be the reason for going over the limit). Perhaps we need a software solution. -- Tim Starling 14:50 25 May 2003 (UTC)

Yes, having [[Category:Deletion]] on the page, the discusison on the talk page, and the list of pages to be deleted auto-generated from the "what links here" of the category page would probably work best. However, category support is not there yet, so for the time being, we'll have to work with this solution. --Eloquence 14:53 25 May 2003 (UTC)

software solution discussed at meta:deletion management redesign... Martin

Keep it at 7 days, i say. the problem lies in the page-size, not in the process. so don't change the process to address the page-size issue. the page-size issue has come about because a few discussions have been animated. those discussions should be moved to the discussion page of said article. that should solve the problem. i am going to give it a try. Kingturtle 16:13 25 May 2003 (UTC)

a better solution is for us to be more diligent

keep it at 7 days, but move the cp to another page. These rarely trigger discussion anyway. Ant

Why is the Votes for Deletion page stretched out all the way across the page so that it overlaps the right margin? -- Zoe

Looks fine on my browser (Mozilla). Maybe it's just a browser issue? Sometimes that happens with really long lines of fixed-width text, but I don't see any of that in there... -- Wapcaplet 01:08 30 May 2003 (UTC)

EDIT: Whoops. Found it! The offending link is Anthony_Hancock_Paintings_and_Sculptures:_A_Retrospective_Exhibition, which, since it is indented many times, runs off the right margin. -- Wapcaplet 01:10 30 May 2003 (UTC)

---

Users of this page may be interested in Wikipedia:Delete test and welcome, which I just created following its proposal on the mailing list. Martin 20:27 31 May 2003 (UTC)

---

We need to clean this out. I will work on it, but it is a bit much for one person. So lets weed through all the stuff that has been here for more than 1 week. If it is agreed to be deleted, delete it (and remove from this page. If not, move the discussion to Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/archive[?]. Thanks. MB 20:46 6 Jun 2003 (UTC)

a better option would be to move the discussion to the talk page of the relevant article. Martin 00:36 7 Jun 2003 (UTC)

---

"Mangled character" problems? I didn't touch the Spearman's Ï?[?] entry on any of my edits. Was my browser somehow converting a character on it's own? Have we discovered a bug? I'm using Opera btw. Wondering simply, -- Infrogmation 22:30 13 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Yeah, it's the browser/editor kind of thing, the usual. Anthere always mangles 212's name, Jtdirl's Safari mangles Vangazi[?], your Opera mangles the Spearman's Ï?[?] (it's not right where you just put it here, either). The joys of browser compatability. :p -- John Owens 22:40 13 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I wonder why I mess 212 name but not Vangazi ? Btw, thanks for always cleaning behind me John. I will leave a mess in less than 2 hours in wikimoney. :-)User:Anthere

And 142.177.98.227's manages to hit all three of the above, *sigh*.... -- John Owens 22:45 13 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Neither "Vangazi" or "Spearman's Ï?" are valid ISO-88519-1. The former is, as far as I can tell, Windows-1252, while the latter is probably supposed to be UTF-8. This site should switch to UTF-8 and those problems would not occur. -- Timwi 09:40 18 Jun 2003 (UTC)

No. Actually it would be worse. Browsers not supporting utf will just destroy every special characters, instead of these three. I leave very ugly trails behind me on meta, and I cannot edit pages in french with accents. That is quite a trouble for me not to be able to write in my language :-)

John's patience is admirable, but maybe should should move those links to a new page, placing a Wikilink on the deletion page, just for now. We'll delete that page if necessary after the matter is closed. --Menchi 04:38 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)

---

Since this is a very high traffic page, it can be difficult to track changes back to contributors. If you're wondering why the intro changed, here's the diff, by GrahamN: (The reason for this page is to make decisions democratic, not to "draw sysops' attention" to problems.) (/w/wiki.phtml?title=Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion&diff=1054839&oldid=1054819) -- Tim Starling 14:49 18 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Also [1] (/w/wiki.phtml?title=Wikipedia:Votes_for_undeletion&diff=1054901&oldid=1054877) on Wikipedia:Votes for undeletion. -- Tim Starling 14:56 18 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Er, oh. Was there some sort of procedure I was supposed to go through? I thought Wikipedia: xxx pages worked the same as any other article. Sorry if I have transgressed. GrahamN 15:03 18 Jun 2003 (UTC)

In an ideal world, I'd like to see contributors to an entry or set of entries to come to a consensus about deletion before listing a page here... but even I don't do that, so I can't really ask others to do so... :-( Martin 15:27 18 Jun 2003 (UTC)

---

How long do we wait before del copyvio? They all are so obvious, and they're added mostly by experimental Anon newbies. --Menchi 16:16 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I personally have deleted them on contact. They are a violation of our rules, and there really can't be any arguing regarding deletion, so there is technically no reason to post them here and wait a week. MB 16:58 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Yes there is: on a couple of occasions I've known things which appeared to be copyright infringements actually be posted here by their original authors, and they've been fine for us to keep. It doesn't happen very often, admittedly, but it does happen. I doubt we have anything to lose by waiting a week before deletion. --Camembert

And on several occasions I have added public domain material that had also been copied to a third party's Web site, and then accused of violating that third party's (non-existent) copyright on the material. Just because material can be found elsewhere on the Web does not automagically mean it is protected by copyright. The Copyright Cops need to perform due diligence before making accusations and summarily executing articles. --the Epopt 18:01 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

It is not out of the question that a lawsuit would be brought against wikipedia for a user uploading a copyrighted file. A week may make a difference. In compairison, Napster was shut down for the illegal activity of it's users. The copyrighted images I have deleted were uploaded by User:Arpingstone to prove a point, who said "my pics are copyright so in a few days I will have to have them deleted". See Talk:Finch for more information. MB 19:57 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

That possibility has been discussed at length and generally believed to be a straw man to not be anything we need worry about. If Jimbo were notified of a violation and acted immediately (within a few hours) he and his project would be held harmless under the "safe harbor" provisions of the DMCA. We are not obliged to proactively seek out violations -- only to not commit them. --the Epopt 20:09 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

This is not straw man. Please see definition of straw man. However, I am glad to hear that there is such a special case in the DMCA. Thanks. MB 21:02 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Another reason for not being too hasty is that gives interested readers a chance to replace the article with non-violating work... immediate deletions would require the article to be started again from scratch which is less likely to happen. Pete 20:22 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

"Experimental anon newbies" sometimes turn out to be highly qualified authors submitting their own work which they have already submitted elsewhere. I've personally confirmed two cases of this by emailling the author. -- Tim Starling 01:05 1 Jul 2003 (UTC)

---

Regarding my deletion of the images on Talk:Finch. I realize now that I should have posted them on Votes for deletion first, even though they would have obviously been deleted anyhow. I was being a bit paranoid. I will list ANYTHING here in the future. MB 21:23 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

---

Someone please remove the requests that were already fulfilled or destroyed... Ilyanep 00:28 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

---

Does anyone else get annoyed by micro-stub ""articles"" like this Antitussive, which keep appearing. The problem with them is they contain valid information, so cant really be deleted. But are little better than useless, and dont do Wikipedia's reputation much good.

Wouldn't it be an idea, to arange the software, so that any page had to be at least, say 200 bytes long, before the contributor would be allowed to post it. Ensuring at least a paragraph of information. I personally think that single sentence stubs should be deleted on sight.

What does anyone else think? G-Man 22:06 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Stubs are an important part of wikipedia. They provide users the motivation to research and/or write a new article. I have turned many stubs into worth while articles myself, and I know that many others have done the same. Besides, why should we discourage contributions? MB 23:19 2 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Good stubs are an important part of Wikipedia, I agree. It's questionable, however, whether single sentence stubs qualify — it's often not clear that a single sentence stub is any kind of improvement over no article at all. Wikipedia:The perfect stub article recommends that even a stub should be at least two useful sentences long, "And if you don't know enough about a topic to write two good sentences, consider not writing a stub."
(Incidentally, Antitussive is perhaps not a good example to use for this discussion; its status is complicated by the fact that it's a mere dictionary definition.) —Paul A 01:52 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

---

I agree, I dont object to stubs per-se, I've created/expanded a fair few of them myself. What I was objecting to was things like this.

For example, something like this:

---

George Bloggs

George Bloggs was an Irish Poet.

---

I am forever seeing things like this appearing on the new pages feature, and get very annoyed with it, cause I'm not sure what to do with them. Personally I think they shoud be deleted and the link left open. G-Man 20:24 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)