Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2012 July 2

(XfD)

Bit of an odd one. I'm not disputing that the consensus of the discussion was to delete, I'm disputing that the correct process was followed and, as such, I think the CfD should be overturned and the deletions undone. The main reason why the I think it should be overturned is that none of the pages up for deletion were tagged, so no one who had these pages on their watchlists were aware of the discussion until the pages were actually deleted. In addition, very few of the pages up for deletion were even listed at the CfD and the discussion only talked about "Old Fooian" redirects, yet many "former students" and "alumni" redirects were deleted as well. Jenks24 (talk) 09:56, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment from closer: Thanks for the notice. I have no idea why categories that were not listed at the nom are being deleted, pursuant to that discussion, if that is the case. I don't see that close supporting that. The redirects should have been undone, first, or the renaming mandated by the close. For the categories that were nominated, I just wonder how wide the problem is? The close allowed for separate consideration for two categories that were exempted at the time; if there are an additional one or two than those could be discussed individually or if there is a need, to recreate them? Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:33, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I have taken the liberty of soliciting background from Mike Selinker and Brownhaired Girl, who were most involved in the discussion. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:54, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• Neutral. I was the nominator of nearly all of a long series of CfDs which eventually renamed all such categories in the UK to "People educated at Foo". The creation of redirects from the old category names was a little ad hoc, and included some which were agreed to be clearly inappropriate; the consensus was that nearly all of the rest were just clutter.
  I was not the nominator at this CfD, and had not spotted that the redirects had not been tagged. Ordinarily, that would lead me to say "overturn", but in this case I will stay neutral because I wonder what purpose would be served by overturning the CfD. I note that although the editors who supported "Old Fooian" categories were watching CfD v closely at the time, none of them objected to the removal of the redirects, so I don't see them as having been deprived of a chance to air their views. Categories are watchlisted by very few people, and category redirects by even fewer, so tagging the redirects would have alerted v few people. I personally took great care to fix all incoming links to the category redirects after the relevant CfDs closed, so it is most unlikely that any editor would have stumbled on the redirects accidentally.
  I do agree that the redirects not listed at CFD should be treated as speedy deletions (i.e. subject to speedy restoration), and I agree that the CfD itself was deficient. However, WP:NOTBUREAUCRACY ... and I do wonder what would be the purpose of another CfD. Tagging and nominating that many redirects is a big job, as is undeleting them before CfD and then deleting them again if that is consensus. So, does the DRV nominator really really want to have the substantive discussion CfD discussion all over again? If he really does, then I won't stand in his way. But is the nominator really sure that a new CfD, or a relisting of the old one, will serve any useful purpose? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 16:40, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Well, I would prefer to just restore the Australian ones that were on my watchlist. But when I brought this up at WT:CFD I was (quite rightly) told that that was not the correct location to discuss restoring pages. So I brought it here, the correct place. I regularly use the Australian ones and they are helpful to the work I do here (unable to prove this, though, because HotCat is so nifty). To be honest, I know little of the English ones and never use them, so if people want them deleted I wouldn't object, but I thought it only fair to list all of them here. Jenks24 (talk) 08:50, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Nominator's comment. When I proposed the original discussion, I believed the categories didn't need to be tagged because the creation of the redirects was a consequence of the close to rename those selfsame categories, which had all been properly tagged once. This was a discussion over the proper method of cleaning up the indisputable rename discussions, not a new discussion. As I note in my original nomination, "This isn't a normal CfD nomination, but rather more of a followup to several closed nominations. I'm not sure why we have these redirects. As we've deprecated the 'Old Fooian' concept throughout hundreds of categories, we have neither been consistently making redirects nor consistently not making redirects." The result of the CfD discussion was simply to change the process of the close from "make a redirect, sometimes" to "don't ever make a redirect, and remove the ones we did make after a couple months." Like BHG, I think it is bureaucratic to insist on a renomination. It is so much effort for what will almost certainly be, after much gnashing of teeth, the same result.--Mike Selinker (talk) 17:15, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't mean to be bureaucratic, but what other option did I have if I wanted the deletions overturned? If I just undeleted them, surely they could be speedy deleted as G4? Jenks24 (talk) 09:17, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• The discussion could just have easily been a talk page discussion, since it was more a question of housekeeping than anything. So tagging shouldn't be an issue here. If anything, MS did more process than was likely necessary. (For which I think he deserves kudos.) Anyway, as for the close itself, Endorse, except the disambigation ones. I think there was probably enough commentary regarding the dabs that they could be kept. But clear consensus that the standard redirects should be deleted. - jc37 17:54, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Agreed that the disambiguation ones might be worth another discussion.--Mike Selinker (talk) 20:12, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • No objection, but unless I am missing something the Disambigs in the nom have not been deleted or renamed, so isn't that part kind of a dead letter or still falls under the future consensus part of the close? Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:27, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • The close doesn't make any distinction between the types, but I think the discussion led to some ambiguity about what we should do with those. If this gets ratified, I'll nominate the disambiguation categories again, and tag them.--Mike Selinker (talk) 01:31, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Process is important. It helps level the playing field for those who have a minor voice against those who have been here for years and developed working relationships to where there is some effort to support one another's common vision of how things should be. Another reason process is important is it keeps a check on those who regularly work a notice board, deletion area, etc. to help ensure that their quality doesn't diminish to where they routinely start cutting corners. Overturning the complex CfD and undoing the deletions would be a tool to help right any wrongs and send a message that improvement is needed, even if it resulted in the same outcome. However, it doesn't seem like CfD's general quality is diminishing. Plus, we're not talking about categories. Instead, we're addressing redirects in Category space to other categories, where some may have been removed via uncontroversial maintenance. Those who had these pages on their watchlists haven't stepped forward to say they've been wronged. I think this DRV request was fine because it allowed Mike a central place to explain his efforts and others outside of CfD to review it. I don't think there's any reason to go beyond that. Endorse -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 08:21, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I am someone who has these pages on my watchlist and I am saying I have been wronged. If I had been aware that these category redirects were at CfD (say through my watchlist), I would definitely have voted keep, at least for the Australian ones that were on my watchlist. Jenks24 (talk) 08:50, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • I understand and empathize with where you're coming from, Jenks. But your request still comes across as bureaucratic to me. You want a minor thing (a few "Former students at" category redirects, I presume), but your approach is to call into question a major thing (the deletion of hundreds of redirects) on a technicality which I think I've at least suggested a rationale for. Come at it from another direction (say, "I would like to recreate the 'Former students at' redirects for Australia only, which weren't even in Mike's original nomination"), and I think you'd get a different result. At the very least, you wouldn't have your request caught up in the vast well of dislike for the "Old (X)" categories, which I will definitely oppose the redirects for. That's just my take, though. I certainly respect your right to bring this up here, and I hope you feel you get a reasonable hearing.--Mike Selinker (talk) 09:39, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • I think he has now clearly expressed his interest in the Australian "Former" categories, so I support that overturn, or recreation of those or even performimg an addendum on my close if we can get agreement here on the proper wording of an addendum. If it's the form used on his articles in that area of the world, at least that's a discussion that should be allowed to occur, elsewhere. (and perhaps someway should also be discussed to navigate among these different ways of referring to a similar thing in different countries). The question is if there are others reasonably probably like him. If I am not mistaken all the others are British or Irish and seem to not be used? Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:20, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • No, Mike, I want all the Australian redirects undeleted, which includes quite a few of the "Old Fooian" variety. I still think that undeleting them all would be the right thing to do (to give them a "fair hearing"), but because of we aren't a bureaucracy and I would probably not be interested in voting keep at a CfD for the British and Indian ones, I am happy for this DRV to focus only on the Australian ones. Also, to clarify, I would prefer they be undeleted rather than recreated to preserve the history. I realise that, even if we only focus on the Australian ones, there are still a large number of pages and I would be willing to do the undeletions myself should the consensus arrive at that, rather than making the DRV closer do them. Jenks24 (talk) 13:06, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
          • Ah, my mistake. Well okay, then I guess I endorse the close of my own nomination, if that's something people at DRV can do. There was clear consensus on the nomination against all "Old (X)" redirects, and the fact that some of them weren't in the nomination does not render the consensus against the format moot. But I appreciate Jenks's willingness to discuss it.--Mike Selinker (talk) 14:06, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• I think it obvious that this needed a much wider discussion. Personally I would restore the redirects in all cases where it is not confusing, but it is impossible to watch everything and CfD has small body of regulars only. Until we find some way of attracting attention to the miscellaneous XfDs, something like this needed a RfC. I consider it incorrect to call it a mere technical followup of the decision to rename the categories. Removing an access point is even more of a change than the renaming. DGG ( talk ) 20:48, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ethereal being (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (XfD|restore)

The debate plainly suggests that there was no consensus. Thus, I don't really feel that the administrator interpreted the discussion properly. Analyzing his notes and bringing here a brief of my clarifications (made in his talk page): The article is plenty of reliable sources supporting strictly each of its parts and as well the whole article; indeed there is no room in that article to OR or synth. Another of his notes was that claiming the article as pre-covered and biased; reply: As many editors clarified in the Afd, actually, in essence the article is a collection presented in the way of different historical views from reliable sources of supposed entities, which display similar qualities (i.e. ethereal: as this common adjective is grammatically defined in ordinary dictionaries; e.g. Webster, 2-Education.yahoo, Thesaurus, etc. - per WP:BLUE). In this perfect sense, there is not another article on this topic; the article is unique and valuable (remembering that its brother article "Non-physical being" is an empty stub).

Besides, keeping in mind that: 1-the reasons for deletion (listed in WP:DEL-REASON) are not applicable to the deletion of the article (thus for this controversy happened the Afd); 2-Experienced editors, in fair number, defended the "keep vote" addressing the article as very good or else could it have some improvement; 3-Debate was recurrently marked by improper subjects brought up to it; non-academic reasoning; several shallow claims of policies (such as OR or synth without presenting factual evidence to support them): thus not a case was made as matter of fact. Indeed the debate remained usually at far distance of a high level discussion, in which, I speculate that may have prevented many editors from joining the discussion. But, in spite of this, it was settled anyway a clear non-consensus and therefore the expected would be the status quo applied, aka Keep. Excalibursword (talk) 03:16, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• Good close Deletion review isn't here to rehash the AfD. Your arguments were rejected, and Jimbo himself used the same deletion rationale to suggest what he would vote [[1]]. Consensus isn't a vote, it doesn't matter how many agree if there reasons just aren't strong enough WP:CONSENSUS. The arguments for Synth (or more correctly, making an article out of a disparate collection of other topics) were presented in the AfD, I suggest you read it more closely. There seems to be nothing wrong with the close except you don't like it. IRWolfie- (talk) 09:08, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Golly, that whole debate was a complicated mess. I've plunged in, read the whole thing, and resurfaced to say that at first glance, I'm thinking that Fram probably closed it correctly. I do agree with those who say that there's an article to be written about incorporeal entities, but I see a consensus to WP:TNT this one and start afresh. I also recognise that some rather experienced editors were overruled in this, and I'd like to point out that this isn't unusual. I think that Fram's close was towards the bolder end of the permissible spectrum. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, and in this case we got a decision rather than a compromise. But I'm not going to add a word in bold quite yet because I think I need to re-read it all before I feel confident in what I'm saying.—S Marshall T/C 11:32, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• After thinking about it some more, I'm happy with endorse: this was within Fram's discretion.—S Marshall T/C 19:50, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• Endorse per my comments at User_talk:Fram#Review. - jc37 17:58, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Endorse Reading (most) of the AfD, the debate seems to come down to two arguments: keep because it's notable, and delete because it's an unsalvageable mess. The editors arguing for keep did not seem to present any response to the argument that the article was a WP:SYNTH, other than that the article could be improved to remove essay-like qualities (I have not read the article)- but I understand that there's a major question about source misrepresentation and that is unacceptable. While AfD is not cleanup, AfD can be used to delete content deemed "unfixable." OSborn ^arf_contribs. 05:27, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment - For background, there's a draft at User:Aleister Wilson/ethereal being, which says ethereal beings are mystic entities that usually are not made of ordinary matter. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 08:39, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment The reason why "Keep editors" aren’t usually arguing against editor’s claims of synth or OR, is because those claims are shallow, so inconsistent. Meaning that the latter ones just claim it; therefore there isn’t any solid case and no challenges in the article. This makes sense because the article is very well founded in good sources, whichever can be easily verified just inspecting the regular article’s release on which was built the debate. Excalibursword (talk) 13:51, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Endorse. I also agree with the original assessment of the article by Friday (talk) back in January 2011 when he pulled it out of article space. A taxonomy derived from original research is always going to present problems. The least of which arise when subsequent editors disagree with the original author's idea of what constitutes an ethereal being. - LuckyLouie (talk) 20:44, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment For the record, user LuckyLouie also took part of the Afd debate. Excalibursword (talk) 12:43, 4 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• temporarily restored for discussion at Deletion Review DGG ( talk ) 20:54, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Zeta Delta Xi (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (restore)

Speedy deletion (A7: Article about a group or club, which does not indicate the importance or significance of the subject) was performed outside of the criteria established for such deletions. Article plainly contains statements intended to establish significance. There is no indication of falsified content or intent to mislead (credibility not in question). Admin may be conflating credibility with creditability, which is explicitly proscribed as a consideration vis-à-vis the cited tag.

The criteria established for the application of A7 are further elaborated in a direct appeal to the deleting admin. Patronanejo (talk) 02:26, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• Cached version not showing up. Going to need a temp. restore... Hobit (talk) 03:31, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  Done. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 03:45, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• I have informed User:Evilphoenix, as the admin who declined the initial speedy deletion request in 2005 of this review. My involvement started at Wikipedia:Help desk#Zeta Delta Xi, followed by Wikipedia:Help desk#Restoration of Article Zeta Delta Xi and User talk:Dru of Id#Restoration of Article Zeta Delta Xi. While I consider User:SarekOfVulcan fair, and our interactions all positive, I do not see where he has disclosed his possible COI. Dru of Id (talk) 06:37, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • No COI involved -- I was never a member of any fraternity at Brown, and while I don't remember the details of this from my time at Brown, I'm quite pleased that they bucked the national organization in this way. I'm just not convinced that it show the kind of importance that would earn them an article. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 12:39, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Is there any reason why we shouldn't send this to AfD for a full discussion? I feel that part of DRV's role is to provide FairProcess to good faith users on request, and this is a good example of when that's appropriate.—S Marshall T/C 11:36, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• I think the A7 is probably acceptable (I'm not seeing a whole lot of assertion of notability) but per S Marshall would prefer to see an AfD given a good faith contesting of an A7 that's not 100% clear-cut. Hobit (talk) 12:51, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Overturn. I do not see A7 as acceptable at all. The article very clearly indicates the importance of the topic (the events of 1982 to 1987 particularly). References are deficient and notability may be in question but these are not relevant to speedy deletion. Thincat (talk) 12:57, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • That's the problem with A7: assertion of notability is in the eye of the beholder. I'd have sent to AfD instead of tagging for speedy, but I'm really conservative on speedies. Hobit (talk) 13:00, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• While I see no intentional breach, I see "took a stand in gender non-discrimination against a national (albeit, parent) organization" as a credible claim of importance, although not backed by independent sourcing online. I see no sources online that could be used to establish notability, and believe userfication to be the likely outcome, but visibility at AfD may get offline sources included by others who might not otherwise know of the need. Dru of Id (talk) 16:14, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thing is, I don't see "took a stand against parent organization" as being a credible claim of importance, unless it's followed by "leading to changes in the organization's policy."--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:49, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Overturn to List There does seem to be something about the allegedly notable events in the online Brown Encyclopedia, which appears to be used elsewhere on the project as an RS (but the dates are off?). At any rate, a place to discuss should be granted. Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:36, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• List at AfD - I'm neutral (read that as don't care) whether A7 was appropriate or not. The point of CSD and speedy deletions (and PROD, for that matter) is only to spare the unnecessary listings at AfD. So, >shrugs< - Another 7 days of discussion in this case shouldn't be a problem. - jc37 20:23, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
• Overturn. CSDs are restricted by design to those narrow situations where consensus exists that every reasonable editor will look at the page (and its history) and conclude that the page must be deleted. By definition, if a prior editor considered and rejected speedy-deletion, then there is not the required unanimity to apply CSD. (There are some exceptions such as for undiscovered copyright violations but those do not apply to this case.) Rossami (talk) 23:14, 2 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  Thanks, Rossami -- I had missed that speedy decline in the ancient history. Overturning. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 13:44, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

• Overturn and list arguably the article does make some claim of notability, if not in clear terms. It remains to be seen if it meets WP:GNG OSborn ^arf_contribs. 02:30, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]