User talk:DGG

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About: Smartkarma page deletion

Hi DGG, You recently deleted our page "Smartkarma" - this article was well researched and not advatorial. We are wondering why you've still deleted this. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ragkap (talk • contribs) 05:39, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

About: your eloquent summary of what does and does not improves this project

Hi DGG, or if I may be so bold, David,
You wrote at WP:AN/I Archive691: <block quote>There is more than one valid way of working here. Some people prefer to create only high quality articles, even though they may do very few of them. Some prefer to create many verifiable articles of clear notability even though they may not be of initially high quality. As this is a communal project, I think every individual person is fully entitled to do whichever they prefer, and the thing to do about people who prefer otherwise than oneself is to let them work their way, while you work yours. The only choice which is not productive is to argue about how to do it, rather than going ahead in the way that one finds suitable.</block quote> Many editors include a statement about their attitudes to editing on their user pages. I am not one of them, that is until I came across what you wrote. I would really like to include this on my user page. While I can add anything at all I like to my user page subject to WP:USER PAGE, I nevertheless ask for your permission to add the quote. OK with you? I'm fine if you decline this.
--Shirt58 (talk) 12:37, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Of course. DGG ( talk ) 21:04, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

where is the "like" button? RobLab (talk) 01:42, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

I'm sure I've seen you reference this essay

WP:TALKINGSOFASTNOBODYCANHEARYOU. Is my memory that faulty? I can't find it, and it's possible the syntax isn't precise. Did you use this a sort of irony? I seem to remember you used the link to represent bullying behaviors. I'm seeing one such user who seems to be wanting to turn the entire AfD process on its head by using such a technique. BusterD (talk) 11:48, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

I have sometimes used pseudo-links like these as a statement for their own sake, without writing an actual essay. I remember saying something like this, but I can't find it. I think this one was TALKINGSOMUCH... -- but I can't find it either. As for the problem, I've commented pretty extensively at AN/I: [1], and will comment at the RfC also, But please don't confuse the reasonable message, with which I am in agreement -- that Deletion Policy is overbalanced towards deletion, and one step towards rebalancing it would be to require some version of WP:BEFORE -- with the unreasonable way it is being over-expressed. DGG ( talk ) 23:23, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, David. I was a debater in school before "talking so fast" became the current style. I feel anything which games the system deserves appropriate response in order to keep the system sound. I appreciate your valid concern about deletion procedures being over-weighted toward one outcome. Thanks for your valuable comments in those forums. Be well. BusterD (talk) 23:37, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Ah yes, I had forgotten that context. And so was I, in college--a very valuable experience, especially in facilitating the sort of intercampus experiences only the athletic teams otherwise gave occasion for. But the stimulus is interesting: if I take a turn at NPP, the amount of junk turns me for a while into a deletionist before I catch myself and stop being so unfriendly to all the newcomers. If I take a look at AfD, the number of unwarranted nominations makes me inclined to give a similarly snappy and unjust response to all of them, with the less than rational thought that if I argue against all of them, maybe there's a chance the good ones will make it. Several good inclusionists have run into trouble here falling into such temptation. DGG ( talk ) 23:58, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

basic rules about professors

All full professors at major research universities have sufficiently demonstrated that they are recognized experts in their subject to meet WP:PROF,and that WP:PROF is an alternative to WP:GNG. This is not a formal rule, but almost all AfD have had this result, except in fields where people here have doubts about the rigor, such as Education. (Major: in the US, Research Extensive in the Carnegie Classification + schools of similar rank; elsewhere, similar level). The rationale for this is that this is the basis on which people are promoted to such rank at such universities, and their judgment is more reliable than ours.)

For those at lower level institutions, this is not automatic, and the judgment goes by individual cases; the rationale is that in such institutions people are often promoted to this rank based on lesser accomplishments or for other qualities than being a recognized expert in their subject.

For Associate professors, automatic notability is not generally accepted, but is determined case by case. AfD results vary, but imho are usually reasonable. Personally, I think it could be extended to them on similar grounds, but this has not had consensus. ("Associate" = the US rank, and corresponding ranks elsewhere)

For Assistant professors, and corresponding ranks outside the US, it similarly goes case by case, and almost all AfD results have been "not notable". I agree with this.

Additionally, in the humanities most full professors in the highest level universities-- ,-- have written two or more books that have reviews in RSs for notability, and thus meet WP:AUTHOR. In the very highest level universities, this applies to Associate professors also. In other fields, where tenure usually depends on articles, not books, this doesn't work as frequently, but it sometimes does. Similarly, in the fine arts, many people at various academic levels will qualify by WP:CREATIVE.

For that matter, if one argued on the basis of the GNG, we could find for almost anyone who has published one or more important papers that the 2 or more of the papers referencing them contain substantial discussions of their work. This would require examining the actual papers, as the mere fact of being cited does not necessarily or even usually mean there is substantial discussion of the work. If I really tried, I could probably find this for many people even at the post-doctoral level. As this result is contradictory to most people's intuitive feelings on the appropriate contents of an encyclopedia (as distinct from a faculty directory), it shows imo the uselessness of the GNG in this subject. Before the WP:PROF standard became accepted, I did use it when it matched my intuitive view. If we return to GNG-worship, I will go back to using it.

Where the GNG is used here appropriately , is for people at any level whose work happens to strike the fancy of newspaper writers. I don't consider most such people notable as academics, but since the public will read the news accounts and want some objective information, it's reasonable to have the articles here. (I have sometimes objected to isolated news accounts as being based on PR if it seems really counter-intuitive). DGG ( talk ) 17:39, Apr 24. 2012

Admin review

Which brings me to my pother point. When I was a new admin, I half expected someone would be assigned to follow me around for some time, just to make sure I was understanding the rules correctly. Either that didn't happen, or they were very, very quiet. (I'm even more surprised it isn't SOP at OTRS, but that’s a different issue.) I think we should have a more formal review system for new admins. I know there's the ability to check with someone else, but I'd like to see something more formal.

Having made my point, I'm not sure it belongs on the thread at this time, because my suggestion isn't going to help the problems that are being discussed at the moment, so maybe I'll think some more on it, and formalize a proposal later. Maybe after getting some thoughts from people like you.--SPhilbrick(Talk) 22:26, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

You are quite correct--I was oversimplifying. Sensible new admins do only the ones that are totally obvious while they are starting--it must be very discouraging to have people revert your first admin actions, and I've seen that happen. And it is true that I will make a point of checking speedy nominations others have thought it wise to pass by, and AfDs that people don't seem to want to close; I know some others do just the same, which is how we keep long lags from developing. But I had in mind also a few long term admins who actually do decide almost all equivocal cases as delete. To expand on what you have said , in a direction of my own,

I have occasionally checked a new admin's deletions if I think from the RfA there is likely to be some problems, and I suppose others do similarly. But I do not know if any people systematically reviews the admin logs the way people do new pages--if anyone does, I've noticed no sign of it. The only thing I've seen checked systematically is the very long-standing page protections. It might be a good thing to do. The AfD closes are very visible, the prods have been checked by several people before they get to the top of the list, but speedies and blocks and unblocka and protections and unprotections don't get looked at, unless someone suspects a problem. I have sometimes thought of doing it, but I have always stopped, because, to be frank about it, I don't want to see the errors. I can't pass over a clear error I do see, and I am fully aware that some admins use the tools beyond the proper limits. Some of these are my friends, & I can mention it to them from time to time quietly. But for obvious reasons most of the ones I would disagree with are by people I often disagree with, with whom relations are often not all that friendly. I don't want to spend all my time quarreling and navigating sticky situations; though I may get the errors corrected, it is not likely to improve mutual relations. (I am also aware that I too make both errors and borderline interpretations, & I suppose I even sometimes interpret things the way I would like them to be, & if I have any enemies here, I do not really want to encourage them to audit me with the utmost possible rigidity. I expect I could be able to very well support my interpretations, but as Samuel Johnson put it, nobody however conscious of their innocence wants to every day have to defend themselves on a capital charge before a jury.

When I started here, I wondered how a system with a thousand equally powerful admins who could all revert each other could possibly exist. I soon learnt the subtleties of wheel warring--there were some major arb com cases on it during my first year here which pretty much defined the limits. But more important, I also learned that even the more quarrelsome spirits here understood the virtues of mutual forbearance--and that even the most self-sufficient people do not really want to look publicly foolish. Our balance is I think over-inclined to protecting the guilty if they are popular enough, but it is not as bad as it could be, or as it often is in human societies. DGG ( talk ) 03:25, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

I smiled at your closing comment. I had the same, thought, although for the project as a whole, rather than just the admin function. I'm more recent to the project because, when I first heard about it, a few years before actually joining, I thought about the model and decided it couldn't possibly work. Oddly, I still feel that way, intellectually. If there were no such thing as Wikipedia, and I heard a proposal to create, my instinct is that it will fail miserably. I actually can't quite put my finger on why it hasn't failed.SPhilbrick(Talk) 12:52, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Deletion review response thank you / Tutoring newbies on how to do online research

I left a thank you for your response — and unrelated question(s) — here. Another thing that maybe we agree on is the importance of knowing how to do research. I really like Wikipedia's Search Engine usage guidelines and tutorial, and have tried to link to them from Wikipedia:Article titles — because I think it's important to research usage when deciding the best article title, best category title, or the most appropriate term to use — but my attempts to link to this have been repeatedly reverted by people who think they own anything related to the MoS. Likewise, for the same reason, I have been unable to add links from Wikipedia:Article titles to the regional MoS guides. The article on category naming conventions also does not explain how to search existing categories or link to the above article on how to use search engines to research the best category title, either. Maybe you have some advice or ideas on this? LittleBen (talk) 13:51, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

I discovered in my first year here that there were some parts of Wikipedia where despite my interest in the subject, for one or another reason I was unlikely to be very effective. Prominent among these were the MOS and categorization. I am a little concerned with article titles, and in that field, fundamentally I disagree with you -- I think the best article title should be the clearest and fairest, and counting ghits or the equivalent is usually irrelevant. And to the extent I understand categorization debates the problem there is often finding a sufficiently clear wording to encompass the desired set of article. I think the MOS is a little more rational than it was 4 years ago; if I were doing it, I'd limit to to pure matters of style, which does not include choice between article titles, just such matters as whether to use singular or plurals. But in questions like this , your opinion is as valid as mine, and there is no point in arguing the issue here--neither of us is "right". DGG ( talk ) 23:56, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

My main question was aimed at getting your opinion on "Tutoring newbies on how to do online research". You don't seem to have answered this, but maybe this is something that Kudpung is more interested in than you are. My comment on article titles was related to this: there seem to be many people creating new articles without adequately researching if there is an existing article on the subject already. Part of the problem is that Wikipedia Search, by default, only shows if there is an article title that is an exact match to the search term; it does not show if there is a category that matches the search term. If it did, it would be far easier to find related material. It is difficult to work out how to search categories. Terminology (e.g. article titles and category titles) is often inconsistent for this reason. Just one example: There are Web browser engine and List of web browser engines articles, but there are nine Comparison of layout engines (XXX) articles, and the category is Category:Layout engines. I don't understand your reference to counting ghits, and don't understand how my viewpoint disagrees with yours. LittleBen (talk) 02:25, 23 July 2012 (UTC)

Incidentally, I got another response on the Deletion review thread that pointed me to a discussion here that may interest you. LittleBen (talk) 02:23, 23 July 2012 (UTC)

I apologize for not covering everything. The WP search function is not the problem; if it does not find an article, it suggests searching for the term. Perhaps the page could be revised to suggest that first, rather than as an alternative to making an article. I think there has been some previous debate on whether it should initially search for the term rather than the article. I also have seen it said that by the standards of other search engines, it could use some sophistication. About 1/3 of people come here from Google etc., and though those search engines rank article titles at the top, they also include articles with the term anywhere. But the Google search engine is, deliberately, getting dumber and dumber; it is no longer possible to use the "+" character as an intersection, and Google Scholar has removed the limit to subject field possibility in advanced search.

Many apparently duplicate articles are created deliberately as a POV fork, others in the mistaken belief that WP includes essays on very specific term-paper type topics. Many are simply naive, as when someone submits a two sentence article on something where we have extensive coverage.

I think teaching people to search properly is a part of research, but the main result of its failure is not the duplicate articles, but the unreferenced articles. Way back when Google was new and exciting, we librarians used to impress the students by showing we could use it more effectively than they could. (The secret is partially cleverness and experience in selecting search terms, but mainly just persistence--something like 90% of users stop at the first page of results--I will if necessary scan through even a few thousand. I have found that people learn by experience better than didactic instruction, provided they are alert enough to pay attention to what experience shows them. Certainly we should do a better job teaching beginners, but the way I think works best is to show them one at a time how to do better. A person learns best when one individual person shows them how to fix their errors and misconceptions, and this is not done by templates. Besides Kudpung & myself, very few NPPatrollers or even admins take the trouble and patience. It's too much for a few people--we need everyone who is able to do it. We progress not by discussing how to work, but by working. DGG ( talk ) 03:38, 23 July 2012 (UTC)

I agree that we progress not by discussing how to work, but by working. You seem to be better at that (more productive) than I am ;-) But sometimes it's more scalable if we offer others the opportunity of learning how to do the work (not specifically thinking of Tom Sawyer ;-). Thanks and best regards. LittleBen (talk) 04:23, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

FYI - user warnings

[2] As suggested. :) I think our next step is making sure that the code is correct, and then we can start implementing. Steven Walling (WMF) • talk 17:48, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Agreed. It was suggested by several people at Wikimania that we quickly make similar changes in level 4 and 4im, and then consider whether to combine levels--that part would need an rfc. The easiest way to go now would probably be to go to three levels, by combining 2/3 , to avoid having to rewrite the level 1 warnings. DGG ( talk ) 21:54, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Library portal

I just accepted the AfC submission for the Library portal article now in mainspace. Since I noticed in the past that you're a librarian, posting this article here for your perusal, if you have the time or interest in checking it out, improving it, making any corrections, etc. Regards, Northamerica1000^(talk) 05:17, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for referring this to me. As you realised, this required subject knowledge. It's a valid topic, but even after your cleanup, still needed extensive further editing for conciseness and removal or original research; there were obvious indications of the origin of this as an essay or term paper. I did one round; I will do another later. DGG ( talk ) 07:25, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for checking it out, and for the improvements. Northamerica1000^(talk) 08:32, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Bibliography of Encyclopedias

You are invited to join in a discussion at User talk:Dr. Blofeld#Bibliography of encyclopedias over my plans to develop a comprehensive set of bibliographies of encyclopedias and dictionaries by topic. I hope you see the potential of such a project and understand that while highly ambitious it will be drawn up gradually over time.♦ Dr. Blofeld 19:58, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

Rising above the mediocre

What you said here was very interesting. "I do not think a community editing project where anyone can edit will ever rise above mediocre quality. Our goal should be to not come below it--above is unreachable. The greater the degree of summarization, the more skilled the writing must be. Even among the scholarly societies, many more are capable of specialized writing than of general introductions."

I would agree personally with that. Summarising a comprehensive subject is difficult, as it involves both a comprehensive knowledge of the subject itself (rare), and good communication skills (less rare, but not frequent). But it surprised me you say that because you seem to be one of the main defenders of the Wikipedia 'ideology', i.e. the idea of 'epistemic egalitarianism', the idea that a 17 year old has as much to contribute as a professor etc. Do you see any conflict between the view you expressed above, and your belief or faith in Wikipedia? Interesting Hestiaea (talk) 08:26, 1 December 2012 (UTC)

I wouldn't call it by such monumental terms as "faith and belief"; my hope and expectation for Wikipedia is that it will be a good and useful general encyclopedia. Some aspects of it are already very good, and can be excellent: comprehensive scope, up-to-date coverage. Some will be very good, and are quite good already: accuracy, referencing and cross-linking. Some will I hope become good, though they have problems at present: freedom from advertising and bias. Some will never rise above mediocre: the quality of the writing, including their detailed style. Some of all this is characteristic of a large scale community project: comprehensiveness, timeliness, lack or bias, linking. Some are special features of the people gathered here and they way they work: objectivity , accuracy, referencing.

The intention was for WP to be at the level of the average college student. Many 17 year olds are at that level, some considerably younger in fields with no special academic pre-requisites. Certainly the high school and junior high school Wpedians I have known in Wp circles have been working at a mature level. I learned this freedom from agist bias from my parents, who treated their children as rational beings who would learn more if given the opportunity. Here, we give them that chance. Children should be treated as adults as soon as they're ready, when it does not risk their safety. This is a very safe place, compared to others on the web. And it does not affect our own safety, because when there are errors, there are thousands of people to fix them.

As I said elsewhere, there still remains the need for an encyclopedia of higher academic quality. Most high school students would not be able to participate significantly, but neither would most adults. And a great many of those with advanced subject degrees I have known in my career would not have the necessary skill at comprehensive comprehensible writing. Scholars too need to be edited, and complicated works do best with skilled organization. It can be more efficient to have questions settled by editorial ukase. But not always: as you know, I joined WP and Citizendium at the same time, resolved to go with the one that made more progress. DGG ( talk ) 16:18, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! BTW I wasn't aware of your involvement with Citizendium.

I don't altogether agree with your comment about academic quality. I don't think articles in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy would be suitable for WP. What is needed is well-summarised and well-explained articles on difficult or general subjects that would be accessible to anyone of high school age (15-18) and above. The Wikipedia article on Being and the corresponding SEP article [3] are both unreadable but for different reasons. The WP article, as you will appreciate, is a rambling dog's breakfast of uncited original research (plus some glaring factual errors). The SEP article looks pretty accurate to me but just goes off into the clouds ("Anti-Meinongian First-Order View") once it gets going. The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy is better for a general audience but is incomplete. Hestiaea (talk) 09:15, 8 December 2012 (UTC)

Milking the bull

In working upon this topic, I observed that you had a particular interest in list of proverbial phrases. When I get a moment, I plan to make some bold edits there as it seems to have gone quiet. Just letting you know in advance... Warden (talk) 14:12, 23 February 2013 (UTC)~~

we perhaps should talk first. The main thing I think it needs is citations. I could put in a few dozen/hundred quickly. then of course it needs articles on all or most of them--that part I do not want to do. DGG ( talk ) 15:51, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

Quick question: Outlines

In my work on public relations I came across this article Outline of public relations, which seems like a massively extended See also section of the PR article. Should I AfD it as a fork? CorporateM (Talk) 15:33, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

It's intended as such, essentially as a table of contents, like Outline of physical science, and many others: see WikiProject Outlines and Portal:Contents/Outlines. They are more systematically arranged than th text format of a general article, which requires reading, not scanning, to find specific topics. They are more article oriented than Portals -- see Portal:Philosophy, but more general than Indexes & Lists such as Index of standards articles or Glossaries, such as Glossary of US mortgage terminology . There's also a combination page type: Portal:Contents/History and events-- click "see in all page types".

It's a good question whether we need all of these systems of organization. We've tried others: a systematic organization based on List of Dewey Decimal classes or Library of Congress Classification or Wikipedia:Outline of Roget's Thesaurus, and yet others have been proposed. I think the overlap more than they ought to, but we'll never get agreement on which to concentrate on. Personally, I very much like the Outline of... structure, and would support it over the others. I believe that's the current tendency, also. Ideally everything would be indexed according to the two library systems also, because they're familiar--not that they're any good--especially LC, which was designed to match the structure of a US university curriculum in the first decade of he 20th century. There is no viable one dimensional way to organize knowledge--the alternative is some sort of Faceted classification, whose construction and use can get really complicated. There's even a totally different approach--to have no classification or indexing of any sort, but rely on free text implemented as we implement the see alsos, and the hyperlinks, as anything anyone thinks related, with no systematic organization. Or the extreme of having everything be a free text search.

Perhaps however you are asking whether every item on that particular outline you mentioned belongs--that's for discussion on its talk page, or whether other things should be added, in which case boldly add them. Or whether the whole outline is biased in some way, in which case, discuss it. Only if it is irretrievably biased or confusing should it be deleted.

Categories are a necessary complement--they are self-populating, but eliminate the possibility of saying anything about the individual items. I use them very heavily for what I do, which is, upon finding a problem article, finding others that are likely to have a similar problem. They should also do very well for finding term paper topics. They will be more effective as subject guides when we implement category intersection in a simply and obvious manner. (And there's the related Series Boxes, those colored boxes at the bottom. I dislike them--they're visually awful, and are used frequently to express or dispute a POV. But they do serve nicely to indicate missing articles.

Quick question, long answer. See chapter 17 of Wikipedia the missing manual for a longer one, oriented towards categories. DGG ( talk ) 18:29, 16 April 2013 (UTC) .

Library resources box

DGG, I and I expect others would appreciate your continued attention at the talk around user:JohnMarkOckerbloom's Template:Library resources box. There is a deletion discussion about this at Wikipedia:Templates_for_discussion/Log/2013_April_30#Template:Library_resources_box. There was an article about this template in The Signpost in March, and some external press in other places.

This seems like a big issue which could set a precedent for how the Wikipedia community interacts with libraries. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:24, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

category intersects

Since you've mentioned wikidata many time, I thought you'd be interested in this: Wikipedia_talk:Category_intersection#A_working_category_intersection_today. We could use it as a band-aid while waiting for wikidata to spin up. Also w.r.t your votes - I think that whether we use the proposal i made above, or wikidata, simplifying the categories *beforehand* will actually make things easier. None of the categories i've proposed deleting could not be recreated through an intersect - but for now they serve to ghettoize and are against the guidance for ethnic cats.

Anyway, regardless of what you decide on the CFD votes, I'd really appreciate your input and help on the cat intersect proposal. cheers --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 05:25, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I have almost always supported ethnic subcategories. People look for articles in these fields, often to find subjects for school papers. I in general agree with maintaining the categories in the meanwhile, but I'm not sure its worth arguing about them for the present, considering the degree of opposition. As I said there is that intersection will remove the entire need for the discussions.What we need most to keep are the categories from which the intersections will be constructed. (Defining and organizing the root data is a harder problem--I find some of the current Wikidata proposals a little too casual. Adding data fields as one thinks of them is not as good as a systematic ontology.) DGG ( talk ) 15:02, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Quick question

I noticed you (and other admins) often tag pages for speedy deletion, even though you can delete them yourselves. Is this out of personal preference for wanting review by another admin or is there some guideline or unspoken rule that calls for review by at least two different people? Ramaksoud2000 ^{(Talk to me)} 00:36, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Most of us think it better that two people see the article. I am capable of mistakes, and I know I occasionally make them, because people are not at all reluctant to tell me--sometimes I will have missed something, or not understood, or just gone too quickly. Even for the utterly obvious, there's the possibility of carelessness or sleepiness, or just frustration at having been seeing so many totally unsatisfactory articles. I doubt anything requiring human judgment can be done at less than 1% error. I've deleted over 12,000 articles over the 7 years I've been doing this. and that would have been 120 wrong deletions, and potentially 120 good editors lost to WP. But with someone else checking, that makes it only 1 or 2 in the whole time.

In fact, I've argued that this should be absolutely required, but there are cases where one must act immediately, and it's been difficult to specify exactly the exceptions. DGG ( talk ) 00:48, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Oh ok, thanks. I agree with you. I was just curious. Ramaksoud2000 ^{(Talk to me)} 01:47, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) I appreciate that there are times when you must act immediately, such as WP:ATTACK and WP:OUTING and possibly other situations. Do the admins have a tool that makes it easy for admins to "delete (or WP:REVDELETE) now, and list the page for review by another administrator ASAP" and if they do, to most admins who make "unilateral deletions" use this tool? davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 18:04, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) There is no rule that admins can't delete anything on sight, but tagging and leaving for a second admin to delete is a good, unwritten practice that most seem to observe. Most of us will of course delete blatant COPYVIO, attack, and vandal pages immediately and some other cases of obvious nonsense. However, admins don't actually make many mistakes with their deletions, so 'delete and review later' by another admin would be redundant. I've deleted around 3,000 pages and only restored 20, and those were userfications. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 19:15, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

I define 1% as "many" if one thinks of the cumulative effect over the years. If everyone who had a reasonable case stayed and complained, yes it would work, but most don't. There's also the definition of "error"-- does it mean an article that would pass AfD, or an article that with enough work might possibly pass AfD, an article to which the speedy criteria did not apply, but would end up deleted anyway The 1% is for the first two classes; for the third, it's more like 5%. In any case the error rate will depend on the type of speedys. I tend to look at the ones that have been passed over for a few hours. I only really know about my own errors, and of course my rate may be unusually high because I may be unusually incompetent. Some years ago I did intend to audit speedies--the reactions I received from admins involved in the ones I challenged persuaded me it was not the route to effectiveness here, and tolerating injustice in this was the way to be more useful overall. (There was 1, & only 1, admin who did change their practice in response to my comments.) I think I will decide the same about the G13 AfCs. DGG ( talk ) 20:57, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

SIgns of promotionalism

For anyone watching, there are some internal signs of promotional-style biographies for businessmen that are almost always copyvio as well (besides the obvious giveaway of a statement of how important the company is, and especially a statement of how important their duties were in previous positions in the firm.)

Headings that use <big> instead of our formatting

Placing the education at the end, with a final sentence of about spouse and children.

Not giving the positions in chronological order, and often not including earlier positions except the one just before coming to the firm.

The corresponding signs for academics are slightly different, depending on whether they're done by a central office or by the individual. For senior administrators they characteristically include multiple junior executive positions and in-university awards. For any faculty, if the individual wrote it, it will often includes full details of all publications however minor; if the central office, it will omit most exact titles, especially for journal articles. DGG ( talk ) 01:39, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Local interest topics again

Hi DGG, a while back I asked you for your position on local interest topics. I think you may have forgotten about it. Could you see if you can find the time to give it another swing? Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 09:32, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

As before, the problem is maintaining them free from promotionalism. The more local the organization, the more likely it is that any available sources will be essentially press releases. for example, I've got this problem in my own neighborhood, Boerum Hill: there are a number of interesting creative projects of various genres, as well as some fascinating stores, all with good coverage in the fairly respectable local paper, but that paper will essentially write an article on anything in the general area, and will say more or less what the proprietors tell it. (The paper's political coverage I do trust, and i could use it to justify articles on every city councilman and community board member in the Brooklyn, not to mention the losing candidates, but I don't want to push it against the consensus they aren't notable ) So Iwait until the NYTimes or at least New York covers something in a substantial way--New York may be a bit of a tabloid sometimes, but it isn't a PR outlet. I love local journalism. I even read it when I don't know the area--it shows the way people live, in all their variety. If we could maintain the articles, I might want to do it.

The best hope for this is a local wiki. The attempts at a local wiki in NYC haven't really taken off--there are insufficient people in any one neighborhood who understand, and the ones that exist tend to be dominated by the real estate agents and local attorneys. Or possibly something built around Open Street Maps--that sort of a geographical interface makes sense. Or a combined wiki, Wikipedia Two, still maintaining NPOV and sourcing, but not requiring notability and not all that strict on promotionalism.

actually, I'd like a three way split, WP, the general encyclopedia; WP 2 for local content, and WP+, for academically reviewed material. Citizendium offered promise for that third part, but it 's manner or working drove off too many of the good people. I in fact joined it as one of the original group of expert editors, but I didn't get along with Larry, and if you didn't support him, there was no place for you there. DGG ( talk ) 06:22, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your responses. Reading what you say, and thinking about my own experiences, the problem here is that local newspapers are reliable on some subjects, but aren't necessarily reliable on all subjects. Because of that, we have no objective measure on how useful inclusion in a local newspaper is as a measure for inclusion in Wikipedia, and some organisations and individuals will take advantage off that to inject their self-promotion in to Wikipedia, so you prefer to rely on other sources that make it easier to draw a clear line. Is that roughly it, or am I just filling in my own perspective? Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 09:50, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I prefer to rely on other methods than using the GNG to make it possible to draw a clear line. Decisions under the GNG come down to the details of what counts as reliable especially with respect to the key words "substantial" and "independent." Depending on what one wants to include or exclude, questions of what is a RS for notability purposes can often be rationally argued either way. But I've learned to work with the GNG, since it is unfortunately still the rule and likely to remain so.

And our key problem now is dealing with promotionalism. It's hard enough to deal with it in articles on major organizations--our standards for what we've accepted before were incredibly lax, and probably 90% of the articles on commercial and non-commercial organizations need to be rewritten. I'm reluctant to start including any thing that would add to the problem. DGG ( talk ) 00:43, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Edit description

Thanks for your edit description here, it's much nicer and more informative than the usual form message that gets left. --TKK ^{bark !} 00:32, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Anthologies

G'day DGG,

Thanks for your comment We normally accept inclusion in anthologies as notability [4], which as well as being a welcome contribution to that particular discussion interests me more generally.

I agree we should, but is this documented anywhere? I can't find any explicit mention in guidelines or policies or help pages, but perhaps I'm just looking in the wrong places.

Or, are there other notability discussions where inclusion in anthologies has been cited as evidence? I don't lurk on AfD currently (I used to but WP:RM seemed to have a greater need) so I'd have missed them.

Any help appreciated. I'm vaguely thinking of proposing some sort of tweak to notability guidelines to better cover hymnists, and don't want to be reinventing the wheel and/or generating useless instruction creep. Andrewa (talk) 03:55, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

we've routinely used this for poets and writers of short stories, and for short stories themselves-- see for example Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mouse (short story), where it was used in a negative sense, deleted for not being in anthologies. I don't know we've used it in this context before. There was an explicit guideline once somewhere; I typically have the sort of memory that always remembers if I've seen something, but not necessarily where or when. Actually, I consider this an exceedingly broad criterion, but so is NBOOK, and in consequence NAUTHOR. . DGG ( talk ) 04:54, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

I have now come to interpret this as not in standard anthologies, which is much less broad - DGG

Notability

Hi DGG, You've nominated several of my articles for deletion or speedy deletion. I'm always careful to write neutrally and cite everything that I write. Obviously, I think the topics that I choose are notable, but you disagree with me on some points. I find the notability guidelines to be somewhat vague, so if a topic has enough information written about it in newspapers, magazines, or similar media to create a short article, then I go ahead and create one. Is there some other measure or guideline that you're using to determine notability? Are there a certain number of sources that you look for, or does a magazine need a certain amount of circulation? Guidance is appreciated. Thanks, HtownCat (talk) 17:52, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

I rather expected to hear from you, and I've delayed nominating further articles until I could see your response. There are two separate but linked problems in articles about organizations, their leaders, and their products: notability and promotionalism:

The basic problem of promotionalism is that WP is addressed to the potential readers, giving them the information they might want to know upon seeing mention of a subject (for example, at the most basic, where is that company and what does the company do?, or which organization is that & what do they advocate? ). A promotional article is addressed to a prospective user or purchaser or supporter: This is what we do, and here is why it is valuable that you buy our products or support our endeavors. Encyclopedia articles are characterised by plain description, promotional ones by praise, or the sort of detail one would need only if one is considering a purchase. Promotional articles are intended to give a favorable image of the company, such as describing its ostensible social purposes or community contributions.

the basic problem of notability is deciding whether something is worth describing in an encyclopedia at all. It doesn't correspond to importance in the world, but to whether it should be included in WP--we can;t after all judge the world, but we must decide what we want to put in our encyclopedia. . In a few cases we go by a general decision--for example, the decision that all named populated places are appropriate for articles. In some others, we go by outside evaluation: for example, that a holder of a distinguished professorship at a major university is notable, or someone chosen to compete in the Olympics. In many cases, there are no such firm standards, and we go by the WP:GNG, the general notability guideline, which requires substantial coverage by multiple independent third party reliable sources. (some people say this is the only real standard, and everything else is just an assumption of what will meet it). the key words there are "substantial" , "independent" , and "reliable." A substantial source is more than a product listing, or a mention of an event taking place, but a significant discussion, such as a full product review. How substantial it must be is of course a matter of judgment, which is decided by consensus at WP:AFD. An independent source is one not derived from the subject--not the subject's web page of product literature, or what its principals write, or the press releases the put out. A reliable source is one using editorial judgment, rather than simply publishing press releases or gossip. Again, these terms are matters of judgement to be decided at consensus.

In all but extreme cases. nobody can predict accurately how consensus will go--I will nominate an article for deletion if I think there is a substantial probability that it will not be considered suitable, --but even after 7 dears of experience at it , sometimes I am wrong, either because I made a misjudgment or because the community wishes to interpret things differently. The community decides, and another administrator judges what the community has decided. Guidelines are necessarily subject to interpretation, and what really matters is how the community decides to interpret them--after all, we make our own rules collectively, and we can decide how we want to use them , and if we want to make exceptions. The best way of learning this is to observe afd discussions on similar topics, to see what arguments succeed, and what the practical standards are.

Some things are deleted immediately, by the concurrence of two administrators, rather than an AfD. One relevant example is blatant promotionalism, which is an article so much devoted to advertising or promoting something that there appears no way to fix it without rewriting. (As an admin, I have the technical ability to do it without concurrence, but I rarely use it unless there is some immediate hazard, such as libel or copyvio) . We also immediately remove articles on people or companies where it seems obvious on the face of it there is no possible indication of any importance or significance, --a much less demanding standard than actual notability,. Again, normally two admins will concur in this. If such deletions are seriously disputed in good faith, most admins will reverse the decision and send the article to AfD for a community opinion.

I said there was a connection between the two: A key reason we have a notability standard is that for most things that are not notable, there is nothing much to say except directory information or promotion. It is critical to WP that it not become a mere directory or a place for advertisement--we want to provide information that people can trust, so we require sources and objectivity and some degree of significance. There are many other places on the web for advertising, and google does very nicely as a web directory.

There are additionally some factors that can affect how people here view an article. We tend to regard an attempt to write simultaneous articles about a borderline notable company, its products, and its executives likely to be an attempt at promotion--it is much better to have one strong article. Also , it is considered possible that someone writing articles about a wide range of barely notable subjects may be doing so as a paid editor. We do not absolutely prohibit this (though many people here would like to do so), but we strongly discourage it, because it is extremely difficult to be objective about what one writes with such a strong conflict of interest. If by any chance you are such an editor, I can explain to you how best to deal with it so as to get the articles accepted--I am one of the relatively few admins here who are willing to assist paid editors who come here openly in good faith and are willing to learn our standards. 'DGG (at NYPL) (talk) 21:29, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

Thank you so much for your detailed response. If I am not completely sure whether a subject is notable, should I submit it to Wikipedia:WikiProject_Articles_for_creation?

I really thought I was careful about keeping promotionalism out of my articles. I would like to improve them, if given the chance. Is there a way that I can edit the deleted articles and then submit them for approval to be posted? I've read something about restoring articles to a userspace, but I'm not sure what the procedure is for that. I absolutely do want to contribute quality articles and nothing that other editors might view as promotional. Thanks for your help. HtownCat (talk) 20:02, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

I will take a look next week. You should first check if there are good references providing substantial coverage from 3rd party independent published reliable sources, because otherwise a rewrite is useless. DGG ( talk ) 04:19, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Library holdings

Hello DGG! Thank you for your note at my talk page, I appreciate the feedback. I will look at those articles you listed this weekend and do some cleanup on them. I'll also try to be more mindful of promotionalism in the future. I'm curious about your technique of judging notability by library holdings, as in the Jedediah Bila AfD - it seems useful especially for pre-internet authors. Do you use Worldcat to find that information? How many libraries do you think are necessary for notability? --Cerebellum (talk) 01:51, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

I use WorldCat most of the time. But WorldCat requires interpretation for 5 factors: First, it covers mainly US and Canadian libraries, with a lesser coverage for the UK and Australia and New Zealand, a very scanty coverage of Western Europe, and little else, so it requires careful interpretation when used elsewhere. Second, it covers almost entirely English language books, for in the US only the largest academic libraries buy anything else. Third, it covers current holdings, so what libraries had 50 years ago is not represented, so for older books of shorter spans of interest such as popular fiction it requires correction also. Fourth, how many titles count for a book to be likely notable depends on the type of book-- mainstream novels and important nonfiction are much more represented than esoteric subjects. I go by the experience of having looked for many books of all sorts, and one can do the equivalent by comparison with books known to be notable. (I have sometimes used comparisons to say that a work is or is not a major work in a field) As a fifth factor: editions must be combined to get a true picture, and the way libraries report holdings this is not always easy. As a result I usually report holdings as approximate figures. For major current works in popular interest academic subjects like economics, a notable book would have at least several hundred. For experimental fiction that fits no standard genre, only a few dozen libraries might buy it, but it can be just as important. For fan-oriented books on games, libraries usually buy very little, because they get outdated very quickly. For some of the kinkier sexual topics, libraries don't buy at all. A scattering of small libraries often indicates author gift copies.

The official WP standard is book reviews. But library holding correlate nicely with book reviews, because libraries buy largely on the basis of such reviews, especially for public libraries.

Outside the US, holdings can be gotten from the catalogs listed at WP:Booksources But none have nearly the depth of coverage in their own countries that WorldCat does in the US. -- but there is the very powerful consolidated search facility of Karlsruher Virtueller Katalog at [5]. DGG ( talk ) 03:41, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

WP: Exhibitions

In light of the increase in GLAM projects internationally, I'd like to start a new WikiProject, WP:Exhibitions to help coordinate activities around major museum and gallery exhibitions. If you are interested in the project, please contact me here or on my talk page. I'm hoping to establish guidelines for creating, editing, and tagging articles on major exhibitions and to begin improving articles in this area of Wikipedia. OR drohowa (talk) 19:42, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

See conversation at User talk:OR drohowa#WP:Exhibitions for my convo with JohnBod on this Project. Hoping for more responses also on the various other WikiProjects I posted on asking for comments/support.. OR drohowa (talk) 18:25, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for the effort you put into the close at WT:MOS#Bird common name capitalisation. There were a lot of words to read and to write. Keep up the good work. SchreiberBike talk 03:57, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Indeed. It was a sprawling debate that'd been going on in multiple forums for so long it's hard to get a complete sense of it without a lot of reading. Thanks for putting in the time and thinking it through.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  04:00, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Hear, hear! A very generous donation of time to get your mind round a long-long-long meandering debate with loads of distractions, and very brave to tackle one where people feel so strongly. I think you did an excellent job. --Stfg (talk) 10:14, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Right, you're off my Xmas card li- As much as I hate the result, I appreciate with the time and effort put in to possibly one of the most detailed closing rationales I have read. Despite apparent appearances to the contrary, I do support the idea of a global Manual of Style and conformity and am content to abide by the decision. Agree with the idea of some sort of bot to enact this. Cheers, Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 10:28, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

I would have preferred a different outcome, but your arguments were really well-done and respectful to all positions. Kudos for you. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:26, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

• Thank you, DGG. You've put a very contentious issue to rest, and probably for good. As ever, I'm flattered when people think I'm you. --BDD (talk) 16:16, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

A very most excellent example of gentle mop-wielding, though I am sure that some members of the species Gallus domesticus minoris will consider that the end of the Wikipedia is nigh. Guy (Help!) 19:41, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Ditto, I just wanted to thank you as well although I followed the discussion from a distance (I think it had more than enough active participants). Admins can get a lot of flack but when one takes on settling such a sprawling debate, knowing that no matter what one decides, there will be some very unhappy editors, I can only say thanks. And providing such a thoughtful rationale (rather than a sentence-long decision), is admirable and helps the decision "stick"...ambiguity would have only resulted in further challenges to your decision. Instead, if individuals do want to overturn this decision, they know that the burden of providing evidence resides with those wishing to change the status quo, and there has to be a substantial case to do so. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 19:14, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

I am hoping that you won't need to clarify that the consensus finding doesn't only apply to birds, but you might; there's a (smaller and quieter) camp who want to always capitalize moths/butterflies and dragonflies, and another in favor of doing the same with common names of British (and I think Australian) plants. The debate may have focused on birds, but that focus should be scene as license to capitalize non-bird species common names.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  08:39, 5 May 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Jews_and_Communism_(2nd_nomination)

You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Jews_and_Communism_(2nd_nomination). Thanks. MarkBernstein (talk) 21:59, 9 May 2014 (UTC)Template:Z48

the opposition to this and the other parallel "Jews in .." articles that were deleted is so opposite to everything I hold important in the world, including the idea of a NPOV encyclopedia, that I can only with difficulty participate in these discussions. I have elsewhere ascribed it to the desire to hide the significance of Jews in the world to avoid arousing the anti-Semites. It is not possible to logically argue against fear and irrationality. DGG ( talk ) 02:30, 10 May 2014 (UTC)

I don't think I did justice to your very acute wake-up comments at the AfD, particularly striking because, in the drift towards uniformity, you took a stand marked by complete independence of judgement. Deeply appreciated. When I read, particularly,

There is no reason why anyone--in particular any Jew --should find anything shameful about the association of Jews and Communism in Russia, except the inability to foresee the future.

I thought of Vasily Grossman's outstanding Life and Fate, which manages, other than the direct horror of the context, to write astonishing vignettes that embrace all the complexities of identities, Kalmuck/Tartar Jewish swept up in the Communist cause, with, among comrades, the various prejudices, ethnic/antisemitic, coming to the surface, only to be talked out. 2% of the officer class of the Soviet forces that effectively won WW2, despite our films and lore, were Jewish. The great vice of superficial eyes is to judge with the facile wisdom of hindsight while ignoring the hard and sometimes tragic options fronting real people in earlier generations (it's true, for me, also of 1948). After the trench warfare attritions and military command's quasi genocidal military tactics in WW1, choosing to be Communist was one of the few ostensibly rational or ethical options left, something events in Italy and Germany in the succeeding decade could only reinforce. Thanks, anyway, and sorry for this soapy intrusion.Nishidani (talk) 16:16, 11 May 2014 (UTC)

You may appreciate in connection with the novel the edition of his wartime notebooks,A Writer at War : a Soviet Journalist with the Red Army, 1941-1945 edited and translated by Antony Beevor and Luba Vinogradova. For another account of the appeal & disappointment of Communism, see the final volume of Victor Klemperer's diary, The Lesser Evil DGG ( talk ) 19:47, 11 May 2014 (UTC)

Questionable notability page for WikiProject:Women Artists

Hi! Here you go Wikipedia:WikiProject_Women_artists/Notability_concerns. SarahStierch (talk) 19:21, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

Hey!

Hi, David,
It was a pleasure to meet you, face-to-face, and hear your presentation. Are your slides posted on the Wikiconference page? I'm really interested in the stats you shared about the state of AfC in 2007 vs. 2013. I think it's so important to be aware of the changes occurring on Wikipedia as it evolves over time in order to gain an accurate long-term view of where things are headed. Thanks again! Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 22:03, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Review

Hi DGG, if it isn't a bother, could you take a quick look and review - Robert E. Olds, Joseph P. Cotton, Marcus M. Haskell, Osgood T. Hadley and Henry A. Hammel These are my first five article creations, I'm in the process of creating rest of the missing Civil War recipients of the Medal of Honor. There seems to be quite a backlog at New Page Patrol. Regards,  NQ  talk 22:19, 9 August 2014 (UTC)

1 point: in addition to saying in a general note that the material is copied from the US govt site, it's best to indicate by quotation marks exactly what has been copied--is it just the quotation in the box? then add it in the footnote there. DGG ( talk ) 02:28, 10 August 2014 (UTC)

Only the MOH citation is copied verbatim from the Public domain material. The general note added is a template {{ACMH}} . I am not sure there is a parameter to include exactly which portion is copied.  NQ  talk 02:40, 10 August 2014 (UTC)

I will find a way to do it. DGG ( talk ) 02:51, 10 August 2014 (UTC)

Detecting copyvio

My approach to copyright is not to rely on google, but to check the person's web site, and any other posssible relevant external link or reference. In particular, many universities use noindex on the web sites, or on the portions of it which is a people directory. DGG ( talk ) 16:42, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Removing copyvio

The choice of which way to solve problems of copyvio is not purely a question of administrator idiosyncrasy, but involves many factors.

The general principles are found in both WP :COPYRIGHT and WP:Deletion Policy and its subpages. First, Deletion policy is that "Reasons for deletion [are] subject to the condition that improvement or deletion of an offending section, if practical, is preferable to deletion of an entire page)" and "If editing can improve the page, this should be done rather than deleting the page" Section 3.1 for copyright violations says "remove the violation if possible, or edit the page to replace its entire content with {{subst:copyvio|url=address of copied material}}. For blatant, whole-page copyright violation, you can simply tag it for speedy deletion with {{db-copyvio|url=...}} after checking that there are no non-copyvio versions in the page history." Second, with respect to copyvio, WP:CSD says it applies to "Text pages that contain copyrighted material with no credible assertion of public domain, fair use, or a compatible free license, where there is no non-infringing content on the page worth saving. Only if the history is unsalvageably corrupted should it be deleted in its entirety; earlier versions without infringement should be retained. For equivocal cases which do not meet speedy deletion criteria (such as where there is a dubious assertion of permission, where free-content edits overlie the infringement, or where there is only partial infringement or close paraphrasing), the article or the appropriate section should be blanked with {{subst:Copyvio}}, and the page should be listed at Wikipedia:Copyright problems. " Third, at WP:COPYVIO, it says "Handling of suspected violations of copyright policy depends on the particulars of a given case" It then says "If you have strong reason to suspect ... some, but not all, of the content of a page appears to be a copyright infringement, then the infringing content should be removed, and a note to that effect should be made on the discussion page, along with the original source, if known. "and " If all of the content [is]... a copyright infringement or removing the problem text is not an option because it would render the article unreadable, if an older non-infringing version of the page exists, you should revert the page to that version. If there is no such older version, you may be able to re-write the page from scratch, but failing that, the page will normally need to be deleted. "Fourth, looking at WPRevision Deletion, one of the permitted uses is for "Blatant copyright violations that can be redacted without removing attribution to non-infringing contributors. If redacting a revision would remove any contributor's attribution, this criterion cannot be used. Best practices for copyrighted text removal can be found at Wikipedia:Copyright problems and should take precedence over this criterion." The word "Blatent" is obviously open to interpretation, but a small paragraph copied from the persons website is not "blatant".

:I interpret this as follows:

I. removing a whole article because a nonessential part is copyright is not supported by policy. None the less, policies have some flexibility, and admins sometimes do that, and I have done something a little like it on occasion, based on the phrase in G12 "when there is no non-infringing content worth saving". If the articles is inherently promotional, I generally delete saying both G11 and G12, and I think of "entirely promotional" in a more more flexible way when there is significant copyvio. For articles, I'll sometimes do the same with A7/G12. For draft where A7 does not apply, and which the person has been repeatedly submitting without improvement, I'll try to find some reason. I will be more flexible in helping those.

II. As a general rule there is no reason to revision-delete, as long as the copyvio text is removed from the current version. It is not even permitted unless the violation was "blatant".

Basic cleanup steps for professors (and much of it applies to all bios)

Basic cleanup steps for professors (and much of it applies to all bios):

1. Remove all "Professor", "Prof.", "Doctor" and "Dr.", Ph.D, or M.D except in the lede sentence or as actual titles of positions or degrees. For every use of first name alone, substitute the last name. For every use of full first and last name, substitute the last name, except in the lede sentence or if needed to avoid confusion.
2. Then, for every use of the name more than once a paragraph at the most, substitute "he" "she" or the equivalent.
3. remove all adjectives of praise: famous, renowned, prestigious, world-wide, transformative, seminal, ground-breaking, etc. referring to either people or institutions or discoveries; even "well-known". In all of these, nothing needs to be substituted.
4. Consider replacing "expert" with "specialist". Replace "across" with "in" or, if documented, "throughhout" Remove all similar jargon. "
5. "best-selling" etc. needs to be justified by specificity and a third party quotation. Just remove all these throughout the entire article, or add a {{Fact}} "First" similarly needs a third party source.
6. Move the most important factor of notability to the very first phrase of the first sentence where nobody can miss it: not "A.B., an expert in something, who has taught at Wherever for 23 years, is the Distinguished Professor of" , to "X, the Distinguished Professor of ... at Wherever, is a specialist in something....
7. Remove complicated sentences of birth place and date to the section of biography. The lede sentence should just have the dates, eg: "(born 1945)"
8. If they have written books and work in the humanities or history or Law, or any field where books are the main factor of notability, remove journal article section entirely. If there's a section on conferences, etc., remove it in all cases.
9. The list of degrees received and dates is critical information. It goes in a section labeled ==Biography==, right after the lede paragraph. If you find it at the end, the article was unmistakably written by a press agent, and will need careful checking for copyvio.
10. In fact, the likelihood of copyvio is so great that I usually prefer to rearrange or alter most of the text.
11. Books need to be sourced to Worldcat, not Amazon or the publisher. Bio facts are sourced to the person's official page at the university. These should all be formatted as references, so there will be a conventional reference list DGG ( talk ) 20:16, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) Just noticed this useful list. One comment (in case you've got this chunk of text ready to paste in elsewhere in future): in point 7, about dates, I think the standard format for the lead sentence is "(born 1948)" not "(b. 1948)". Your point 6, about moving the main claim to notability to the very start of the article, is really important - so many poor articles start by telling you the subject's parentage or other irrelevancies so that you have to plod through a lot of verbiage to find any assertion of notability. PamD 14:07, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

fixed, though perhaps even just the date is clear enough for everybody. thanks. (as for 7, press agents writing an academic cv tend not to realise what are the key factors. Hidden in the last paragraph among society memberships, will sometimes be "National Academy of Sciences". DGG ( talk ) 21:06, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

General advice, repeated here so it will be visible:

Please don't be deterred by the bureaucracy here. This is after all a very large enterprise, with thousand of people working independently at the same time with almost no formal coordination, almost no supervision, and very little training. to help deal with it, a number of formal conventions have been established. Unfortunately, the sort of people that like to work here are exactly the sort of people who are not very skilled at drawing up formal conventions or procedures, and the net result is a mass of partially contradictory instructions and rules, some important, some not; some enforced, some not. The response to a rule that has proven impractical is usually to add several supplementary rules, rather that to revise the original, and after 11 years, it produces quite a jumble.

Some of us find it fun to manipulate the rules to get a reasonable result. But the true purpose of working here is to build an encyclopedia, and I will normally try to get to a reasonable result as directly as possible. Some people though insist on their interpretation of the rules regardless of the result, and I have also become rather experienced at countering them in their own frame of reference when necessary. As I'm pretty much an inclusionist on most topics, I tend to concentrate at AfD and AfC.

My advice is to concentrate on providing good sourced articles. If you want to learn process, don't be afraid of making errors. There's no other way to do it, because you need to learn not the letter or the rules, but the way we use the and the accepted boundaries. DGG ( talk ) 17:53, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Kilroy was here —ATinySliver/^ATalkPage 19:44, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Several ongoing discussions could use your input:journals

Hi David, please see Talk:Academic journal#"Usually" peer-reviewed? (triggered by Template talk:Infobox journal#"peer reviewed"), Talk:Predatory open access publishing, and Wikipedia talk:Identifying reliable sources#List of scammy academic journals. Thanks! --Randykitty (talk) 12:43, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Congrats

Congratulations on your election to the Arbcom, DGG. Well deserved. - NQ (talk) 02:52, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Indeed, welcome aboard. NativeForeigner ^Talk 03:04, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

"a Checkuser, which I am not" - Well, you will be soon. Congrats! Altamel (talk) 05:42, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Mazel tov! HG | Talk 07:21, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm not sure whether to congratulate or console you, but I am glad that you were elected. Thank you for volunteering for this difficult, yet critical, work to keep the project running. -- Avi (talk) 07:52, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

I came also for congratulations! So far arbitration was (for me at least) a synonym for waste of time, and ideally it shouldn't even be needed, - let's work on that ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:07, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

thank you for doing so, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 10:12, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

Well done - highest number of positive votes shows your wide-spread respect. PamD 10:15, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

• It's going to suck you absolutely dry for contributing anywhere else, but I can't think of any one more suited to the task of Arbitrator. Thank you for running for election and thank you in advance for all the good work you will be doing there. Warmest regards, --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:41, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
• Coming off my wikibreak to say congrats. I'm confident you will do good things. I'm also confident that Kudpung is correct; it will be an all-consuming and thankless task for the next two years, but my impression is that you were ready for a new challenge, and I know you are fully capable of handling it. Farmer Brown 2¢ 12:30, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
• Congratulations and good luck. You're one of the people on Wikipedia I have always respected greatly, and hope the other great work I've seen you do translates well to ArbCom. Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 12:35, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
• Take it easy, please. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:33, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
• Congratulations DGG :) –Davey2010 • (talk) 14:56, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
• Congratulations DGG .Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 18:13, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
• Wishing you all the best during your time on ArbCom. Sydney Poore/FloNight♥♥♥♥ 21:26, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
• Another voice to applaud your success in the recent popularity contest. I hope you find your new role satisfying and may it bring you contentment. Dolescum (talk) 16:16, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
• And another - it seems to be less of a nightmare job than in the past, but take it easy. Johnbod (talk) 05:03, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
• So cool. Congratulations. JSFarman (talk) 04:49, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
• Congrats my friend and mentor. I totally missed the elections or you could totally have counted on me for a Support. Happy HOlidays StarM 01:31, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

If it is permitted, and I know some initiation ceremonies by definition require an oath of secrecy, it might be nice if you can tell us what all is involved in the formal initiation ceremony. John Carter (talk) 00:14, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Where should I aim the magnetic pulse field at to help jump start the Inductor? /silly Hasteur (talk) 00:19, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

• Congratulations and best wishes. - - MrBill3 (talk) 18:12, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

A beer for you!

Congrats on winning the Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2014. Bearian (talk) 20:41, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Ditto! --EEMIV (talk) 18:31, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

A cup of coffee for you!

Thanks for an amusing article. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 19:32, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

thanks; but which? DGG ( talk ) 22:52, 30 December 2014 (UTC)

Clarification Requested on Copy and Paste Articles

To what degree is it permitted to create an article that is entirely, or very near so, a direct copy and paste from a single source now in the public domain? -Ad Orientem (talk) 02:26, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

As I understand it, it is permitted, but it has to be specified exactly what part is taken from the source, and future edits must keep this distinct. Some of our templates, say "some or all" has been taken from particular source. In my opinion, this is inadequate attribution. Exact quotation marks or some other equally clear indication is needed. There are I believe several thousand articles in this unsatisfactory sate, and as editing continues over the years, the result is very confusing both in terms of attribution and in terms of keeping material up to date and not based upon totally outdated views. This has bothered me since I've come here, but it hasn't bothered enough others to make any progress.

The real problem is not just attribution; the more insidious problem is accuracy. The article you cite on Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine (1524 – 1574) shows this. The source, the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia is accurate as a summary for the facts as known at the time, but was never known for balance in its coverage, or for NPOV interpretation, and lacks adequate explanation of what to them was fundamental (That does not mean I do not think highly of it for many purposes--I even own a printed set.) The knowledge of sources, the interpretations of scholars, the interest in particular aspects, will be very different on every topic, no matter how old, from the state of things 100 years ago; even when religious orientation is irrelevant, cultural bias is usually present. (I do not know enough about this particular topic to give a detailed critique, because my own knowledge of the period in France is based primarily upon historical fiction, whose biases can be very similar to that of outdated histories.) DGG ( talk ) 05:44, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for that summary. It confirms most of my concerns and adds a couple. I am unsure how much I can correct, but I will work on it a bit and add some tags as needed. -Ad Orientem (talk) 17:15, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

AfC

I expect you've noticed how I have practically stopped participating in discussions on reform of AfC. I've done a lot for that project, such as coaxing the 'draft' mainspace into existence and getting a set of competency criteria established for reviewers, and vetting 100s of G13, etc., but there comes a time when I lose interest in projects that have become basically a lot of talk with nobody listening. In contrast, there's nothing wrong with the NPP system, in fact it's a brilliant piece of engineering. The only downside to NPP is that in spite of being by far the most important new-article filter of all, totally ironically it has no recommended levels of experience for patrollers at all, no work group, no mother project, and no interaction whatsoever between the individual patrollers. That's why it's often called the lonliest maintenance corner of Wikipedia - and that's why the qualty of rewiewing there is pretty awful, and has a backlog of over ten thousand pages.

So at NPP we're still stuck with a lovely suite of tools and very few users with sufficient clue to use them. AfC on the other hand, although it has the 'Draft' namspace, has an incomprehensible mess of script which is a constant work in progress, a permanent stream of questions from users who don't know how to use it, raw newbies just hovering with their mouses over AFC Particip to add themselves as soon as their count reaches the magical 500, and programmers plying and vying for recognition of the best script; add to that some who with the best will in the world can't discuss things calmly.

The best solution would be to scrap AfC completely (you and I have discussed this before), merge AfC drafts into the New Pages Feed, add the AfC Helper Script's essential features to the Curation Toolbar, and create a software defined new user group for the reviewers. I've had several real life discussions at various venues with senior Foundation staff who all agree in principle that it is technically feasible and that it might ultimately be the best solution rather than reinventing a wheel for AfC. Ironically again, probably because there is no collaborative project surrounding NPP, it doesn't play silly stick-and-carrot games of backlog drives with users MMORPGing for barnstars and baubles. Such initiatives IMHO only invite more of the wrong people and reduce the quality even further.

Perhaps if my dream were to come true, some of the more reasonable AfC reviewers would migrate to NPP, and that would be a net positiver all round. I think I'm going to draft up a major RfC and challenge the broad community once and for all to offer their thoughts. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk)

Of course it is feasible--we did most of it for years; it's just redefining the group. Do you see any continuing need for Draft space? Perhaps it can be a place not for new submissions, but to which articles. including some new submissions, can be moved for improvement. I'd suggest not a broad afc to gather opinions, but a focussed one on doing the change. I think AfC as it exists has very few supporters. DGG ( talk ) 03:28, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

I think the only supporters of AfC are the 'programmers' who use it as their playground. Just to underline my comment above, hardly had I spoken, than we get this. I do think there is a very pertinent need for the 'draft' namespace. Although the vast majority of AfC submissions are junk, as you have seen more than anyone, there are some rare rescuable items among them; it's also the destination for articles created using the Wizard - where I believe most of the drafts come from now. The draft namespace alows IPs and and editors who are not sure of themselves to create an article that will be kind of 'peer reviewed' before going live. You've got mail. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 06:12, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

so would you then continue to feed the Article Wizard articles into AfC? If we do, and use it for peer review before going live, we will have precisely the current problems. I don't think the "vast majority" are unsuitable--tho perhaps one could say "unnecessary" I estimate that at least half would survive Speedy, and half of these AfD , even on first submission. That's a 25% yield. When we were using NP as the only route, we rejected about 1/2, either at speedy or prod or afd. The difference is that because of the desire to use WP for promotionalism, we're getting more useless promotional articles, because more people know about us. Their number will only increase in the future. (& they're encouraged because a certain number do manage to survive afd , often erratically ) If we raise our standards a little we can keep them out, but somewhere we will still have to do the work of keeping them out. DGG ( talk ) 09:35, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Abandoned AfC drafts

I spent some time going through G13 eligible drafts today and was a bit disturbed at how many of them are notable (well over half). Since you are one of the few people who regularly work in that area, I thought I would ask you if this was normal or if the obviously non-notable stuff has largely been deleted already creating a biased sample in the remaining material. --ThaddeusB (talk) 21:23, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

It depends wether you mean clearly notable, or just notable enough to be likely to be found notable at AfD. And notability is not always the problem: there are those which are notable, but are so promotional that it would be more trouble to rewrite than the importance would justify. Then there are copyvios. Then there are the substantial number that have already been moved into mainspace. Looked at from the goal of rescuing everything possible, then there are probably well over half that could be turned into some sort of passable article; but there are probably only 1/4 that are passable as they stand or with minor fixes.

In the past, I accepted about 20% and postponed another 20%, in order to make reasonably certain nothing I passed would be rejected. (and so far, I think essentially nothing has been, except when I've missed an occasional duplicate under another name, & a few copyvios I didn't catch.) Now I'm trying to accept a somewhat larger amount. The main group that I don't want to accept but I don't want to se rejected are ones which look like they need careful checking for copypaste from sources I do not have available, or unreferenced articles on geography or the like which probably could be verified, but not easily. Some of these are detailed articles on narrow subjects, some are suspicious because of the manner of referring or indentation or line-width.

However, I rarely go thru a daily list unselectively. Each time I do this, I tend to be looking for something--often a topic I recognize. I also work on the lists of those declined for some particular reason. Sometimes I look primarily for things to speedy as G11 (I'm not sure anyone else is doing that in particular). I almost always skip athletes and popular entertainers unless I notice something obvious one way or another, as other people have a more reliable sense of importance here. I try to select ones that I more easily can handle among the people likely to be working on this: for example, book authors whose importance isn't obvious, or subjects that should be checked in other language wikipedias I can decipher. This sort of patrol of new submissions, either AfC or NPP, tends to become dull, and I try to vary it.

I'll try to take a look at what you worked on today--you could take a look at mine if you like. The move log is the place to look. But incidentally, I see I have been deleting many more articles and drafts than you--but then I sometimes want to conscious clear away the rubbish even if it will be deleted by G13 a little later on. Concentrating on NPP/AfC has been making me cynical, perhaps unduly cynical. DGG ( talk ) 23:58, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

My sample size was small, so I may have just had an unusually good sample, hence the question. I was mostly disturbed by CCDC47 which was essentially declined because the references weren't quite right and then untouched for the 6 months. CBS Watch was indeed unacceptable as it was written - an addition to being promotional-ish, the bad paragraph was actually a copyvio too. It was easy enough to fix though. The other two I delayed deletion on are (obviously) unacceptable as is, despite being notable. (And one of the deletes was notable, but a duplicate article.) ... I normally work the back of the AfC pending submissions. I'd say over half of those are acceptable-enough as is, but I'm easier on submissions than most. I always figured the oldest one were the toughest calls on average and the real acceptance rate was much lower because of obviously bad stuff being rejected quickly. (Although maybe not, I am always mystified at how many copyvios sit around for a month+, and usually they are not hard to spot - over half of promotional sounding stuff is copyvio too.) Thus, I was surprised I didn't see a lower average quality carried through to G13 candidates. --ThaddeusB (talk) 05:08, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Yes, the oldest are those that are tough either because reviews don't feel comfortable either accepting or declining, or because they take some specialized knowledge. The problem with delayed deletion is it comes back again after 6 months--I used to do this a lot, but now I try do it only when I'm feeling really rushed, like tonight. So details tomorrow. DGG ( talk ) 05:14, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

== Redlink == Can you peek at my notes about "personal names" linking at the WP:Redlink article. It still is confusing to understand. I am not sure if I am interpreting it correctly. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 07:02, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

I am going to take a stab at rewording it. It still reads that we should not have red linked names.

Wikia licensing

Whoa. Surprised I haven't run into a copy/paste from Wikia before (re: Maritz, Inc. v. Cybergold, Inc.). It's really ok for Wikipedia purposes, though? Their licensing default looks to require attribution, which seems a problem unless we're going to put the whole article in quotes and cite Wikia as a source. I understand that's a different issue from a copyvio, but still seems problematic, no? --— Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 14:27, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

I think the {{Wikia content}} should work and the docs include some suggestion on how to use the template. Ravensfire (talk) 14:34, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Even if the source is PD there is an attribution problem. In principle everything can be attributed properly by keeping the edit history, but in practice it will soon be unclear to the reader what part comes from where. This confuses the page history of all the EB and Catholic Encyclopedia and similar entries, and confuses it in a worse way, because the original source is out of date almost completely, and it is not easy to tell what may have been added by uptodate sources. (In my opinion adding that material was a serious mistake made in the early days of WP, when the expected level of accuracy for articles was much lower) There needs to be serious work done in rewriting every one of those articles, for there is no topic whatsoever where additional material is not known since then and anything implying a judgement has to be rewritten, Back in the first years of the twentieth century, it was seen as ... or it could be summarized as .....We also have scientific material from 10 or 15 year old US Dept of Agriculture publications, which now has a similar problem.

I personally do not add such material without using quotes. (They should normally have a beginning and quote on each paragraph, with an ending quote on the final one.) But I am not about to take on personally the correction of widespread sloppy practice. DGG ( talk ) 00:01, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Kirkus is no longer an RS?

After seeing your comment that Kirkus is no longer RS, I took a look at the noticeboard and saw this discussion: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_180#Kirkus_Reviews. It's saying that "Kirkus Indie" is paid, but regular Kirkus reviews are not paid. Are you referring to this discussion or something different? WhisperToMe (talk) 16:41, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

yes. as a result of that decision, I no longer trust it for anything at all. I think that's the general view of most librarians I know. DGG (at NYPL) -- reply here 21:01, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

I see. Obviously any "Kirkus Indie" review is non-RS. Do you think they are secretly paying for reviews on the "non-Indie" side? If so, how should the community handle this? Does it need to get any substantiation/proof that something untoward is going on? Have librarians written about the issue? WhisperToMe (talk) 22:23, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

no it's more that any publication that takes paid reviews is ipso facto non-reliable on any part of the site. this is similar to the way a newspaper that publishes advertorials tends to forfeit some of its reputation. There are indeed a few well-documetned exceptions: the NYT, WSJ, & Forbes all publish directory information on companies as well as genuine news. (I wonder how many of our articles use their directory information as evidence towards notability , btw.) So I agree this may be too harsh a judgement, but it is none the less the usual impression, which I share. DGG ( talk ) 00:33, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

I wonder if a good way to deal with it is to consider Kirkus post-2009 a "less reliable" source. It can still be used, but if a particular book has a lot of different reviews and editors are trying to figure which ones make the cut, then perhaps Kirkus would not be used. WhisperToMe (talk) 00:55, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

yes, that's one reasonable way to look at it. Another is that it adds to notability if there are some there borderline sources also. DGG ( talk ) 17:37, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Great! That works well :) WhisperToMe (talk) 23:08, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

combined <ref> for multiple citations

• WP:Citation overkill#Citation merging
• WP:CITEBUNDLE

FYI --Jeremyb (talk) 20:17, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

I had never noticed it here, but it's a fairly frequent technique in academic writing. I do not see how it is easily compatible with using wikidata for references. There would appear to be two directions: either to make a hack that would be able to parse such references, or deprecate this referencing technique and convert the existing ones manually, which will be easy enough, if someone can figure out how to find them. DGG ( talk ) 00:58, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

Any <ref> that has bullets (unordered list), multiple CS1 templates, or multiple bare external links should be suspect. (but if a single CS1 generates multiple external links that's ok. e.g. url && archive-url) Anyway, if there's a discussion started I'd like a pointer to it. Thanks --Jeremyb (talk) 05:57, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

I need some assistance, and no longer know how to approach this subject

About a year ago, you were involved with a discussion on Involuntary celibacy, I've always had an issue with this close reflecting the apparent anti-fringing pushing bias rampant on Wikipedia these days. Upon viewing this version of the article I cannot find any guideline violating issues. Tone appears neutral and sources are not only mainstream, but academic. The contentious history regarding the article could only suggest that another DRV is going to be long and difficult. Alone there is nothing I can do, but with help I was hoping to overturn the deletion of the subject. It appears that the NFRINGE noticeboards have become a pool of anti-fringe canvassing whose editors decisions are confirmed and unchangeable prior to any debate. Wikipedia has never been a place where only mainstream views are accepted this in itself is a violation of NPOV we have long sought to establish yet it appears the trend is growing and correlates with the editor drain we have experienced. My gut tells me this article is the first step to changing the environment ... what can we do? Valoem ^{talk contrib} 23:06, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

I've asked Coffee to allow the article restored with no bias for immediate renomination instead of DRV. Valoem ^{talk contrib} 23:16, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

There is more than one question here.

As for Fringe, I never liked the way we deal with it, where we insist from the first that it is non-standard and hammer at that repeatedly, We instead ought to present it as fully as necessary for understanding in its own terms, and then say what people think of it. We need to avoid giving any false indication that fringe topics are accepted, but we still need to avoid giving primarily hostile coverage. If presented fairly, people will understand the relevance--that's the basic premise of an encyclopedia. We do not have to slant or censor, even by implication. WhatI particularly dislike is our tendency to try to minimize the coverage of people associated with a movement we disapprove of (or alternatively of maximizing the number of otherwise reputable people involved to a trivial extent for the sake of denigrating the the individuals)

I consider topics such as this unusual, but not fringe. ("Unusual" is the most neutral word I can find.) Outside sex, some political and religious topics are strongly disfavored. Others, equally unusual or far from the mainstream, but that do have a constituency here, resist all tendencies to discuss them with moderation, rather than in a frankly propagandistic manner.

But sex is always the most difficult area. WP has for long as I can remember been rather hostile to some forms of otherwise unexceptional sexual expression. People have a remarkable ability to disdain those forms of sexual expression they do not engage in; there seems to be some human need to assign some sexual practices as acceptable, and others not, presumably in order to reassure oneself that one is oneself doing it "right" rather than being a victim of limitations, and this supposedly tolerant community insists on resisting serious treatment of things that are now but did not used to be considered subjects for open discourse. For example, there's been a surprising amount of difficulty with articles on even widely-used sex toys.

The best way of dealing with such topics is first find as many additional references as possible. All difficult topics of any sort are best done by accumulating such an overwhelming body of references that he even the opponents realize. Tokyogirl79 has done a good job of it, but there's almost certainly still more to be done, especially considering the multiple uses. I think there are quite a range of different consensual and nonconsensual practices here, which have ended up in this one article because of the resistance to covering them individually. I unfortunately do not really have the time to work on it. I recall there was a 1973 book with the title "SM: the last taboo" ISBN 9780818401787, whose title I thought a good quick explanation of the problem in a few words. (the book itself is apparently a short anthology of stories, not likely to a usable reference) This is 40 years later, and everything in popular culture considered, I don't think the taboo really holds. Except, of course, in WP, which, while it should be the location for work on unusual things , is also the home of obsolete prejudices. People get very easily embarrassed about sex. In particular, some parts of the demographic working on WP particularly easily gets embarrassed.

However, I do not think we have an editor drain. We merely have the expected transition from a exciting new project to something which may be still exciting, but is not particularly new. People will naturally stay here for only four or five years. Relatively few make it a career, or a life-long hobby. People try out new things, and then turn to others; our contributor base is always going to be dynamic. What I do hope is that we will come to attract a wider group than the typical post-adolescent white male geeks. DGG ( talk ) 03:52, 15 March 2015 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the encyclopedia has not increased--and in fact in someways regressed-- in terms of scope. I think removing subjectivity from the closing of AfDs is the optimal method. After the article is restored I assume Tarc is going to AfD it immediately, some input when that happens would be appreciated! Valoem ^{talk contrib} 18:37, 15 March 2015 (UTC)

RFC is up, comments would be appreciated. :) Valoem ^{talk contrib} 20:02, 15 March 2015 (UTC)

 Done

Well said. In particular that the community tends to use FRINGE to rationalize attack pages, rather than merely documenting that their viewpoint is not accepted by mainstream science/medicine, using reliable sources. I'll take a look at your RfC as well Valoem. I also recently noticed that more effort has been spent on Victoria Secret than all of the articles under Category:Feminine hygiene brands combined (with exception to the one I wrote on Playtex). I found this strange, even given the gender gap, because so many women are interested in women's health, so I wonder if it is because people are too embarrassed to contribute. I looked up the Durex page after they did a presentation at a marketing conference. One of the biggest global condom brands and just a stub on it. Marginally notable supermodels and pornstars have more robust pages. CorporateM (Talk) 16:22, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

DGG, I did some research and commented there, however I wonder if you would still oppose the proposed article-title, now that I've shown an abundance of source material that uses the same phrase. CorporateM (Talk) 17:07, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

I do not oppose exactly, but I wonder whether it covers all aspects. DGG ( talk ) 20:47, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

"Consensus" and policy

...

The application of all WP policies is decided by consensus, and thus a certain degree of variability is to be expected. In this particular instance, the question is apparently whether African-American Civil Rights Movement (1954–68) should be moved to Civil Rights Movement. I'm not going to pas judgement on this; no one person decides these things. But I suggest you reconsider whether this move would display too much of an US perspective: WP is international. A reasonable case could probably be made for the move, or against it. My advice here has always been to concentrate on improving page content and not worry too much about page titles. DGG ( talk ) 08:19, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

Isn't the claim, "The application of all WP policies is decided by consensus" a contradiction to the statement, "The principles upon which these policy statements are based are not superseded by other policies or guidelines, or by editors' consensus" from the lede paragraph of Wikipedia:Core content policies that describes the "three principal core content policies: neutral point of view, verifiability, and no original research.". Thank you for responding. Mitchumch (talk) 08:37, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

The fundamental principles are not affected, but the application of them is always subject to consensus. Each of the individual policies has extensive talk pages discussing the proper application of them, as every single key word in them is ambiguous to some extent and the exact meaning of every one of them has been disputed . Tens hundreds of thousands of individual applications have been discussed on various WP and article talk pages. If there is disagreement on how to apply a policy, only consensus can resolve it. (And it isn't clear at all that your argument falls under any of the three policies, listed) We have no dictators; even arb com cannot decide on content. If consensus holds against you, you will need to accept it, because that's the way we work here. DGG ( talk ) 16:37, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

"The fundamental principles are not affected" That's funny considering bias constantly wins over things like basic logic and common sense, effectively making Wikipedia NOT neutral. Bottom line is that if the consensus is biased, the article becomes biased. Sega Genesis for example had a debate on the article name that was obviously skewed in favor of Americans as Americans take up the bulk of the English speaking part of the internet. Don't even get me started on the constant misuse of terms like "CGI" and "traditional animation" that violate all sense of basic logic but again, the consensus appears to be biased. Mattwo7 (talk) 15:24, 16 April 2016 (UTC)

Generally speaking several of your policies constantly serve to make Wikipedia everything it's not supposed to be because they allow common sense and basic logic to be completely overridden. Instead of having a policy that disallows requests for semi-protection due to hit and run vandalism, common sense dictates that low-priority articles be automatically semi-protected due to the vast amounts of vandalism from unregistered users on those pages. Just as deductive logic dictates that your reasons for deleting the most recent incarnation of the Zippcast page is bunk due to the vast amounts of low-priority articles with similar problems. This combined with the considerable amount of enemies the site's administration has somehow managed to make even makes me consider the possibility that the constant deletions are a a COI decision. Mattwo7 (talk) 22:08, 16 April 2016 (UTC)

The contributors to WP being human, bias exists, but there are other reasons for disagreement than bias. Most of us no doubt think that those views that consistently go against us are the product of bias, not reason. By whose standard then do we judge? If you wish to say we judge by the facts and the abstract truth, this gets us no further, for it is people who judge those things also. If you wish to say we judge by common sense, common sense is the term we use for our own unprovable prejudices.

You seem to be unhappy about several decisions, most of which have no connection with me. The only one that does is Zipp Cast. If you think an article can be written, use Draft space. DGG ( talk ) 02:16, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Detecting coi editors

...maybe DGG will) tell you about how i (or he, in his case) spot possible conflicted editors and how i (or he) deal with them. Jytdog (talk) 19:45, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

The first step is to realize that most people come to wikipedia with some degree of conflict of interest, to write topics about which the really care. The problem is not to keep the out, the problem is to see that what they do contributes positively to the encyclopedia. People who are firm believers in a cause , for example. can be great problems, because they care so much about something (hat may well be in fact really important) that they recent the writing of NPOV articles. Fans of an artist or sports team can be problems also, inserting all sorts of unjustified material in their praise, worse than a publicist would dare even try. Even for products or companies, there are great fans who want everyone to share the POV--those fixated on particular brand of camera or computer or automobile, or on a restaurant or type of clothing, of great believers in the wonderful work of a doctor or financial advisor or charity.

But the problem here is the people with a commercial interest. The come in all sorts: the owner of a business or professional practice; the press agent in a company, and the persona with a small or moderate knowledge of Wikipedia who advertises their services, or now especially those freelancers who answer advertisements on elance and similar websites, Most of these people do not know how to make a decent article even if they wanted to; but few of them want to--they or their clients will not be satisfied by a NPOV articles in proportion to the size of their business with adequate references--they want a web page here, not seeing us a s different fro mother places for posting advertisements. they do not care about our notability requirements--they all at least hope to be notable some day,and want the public to know about them. I and several others have estimated that at least half our article on commercial and noncommercial organizations and their leaders are the products of this kind of editing. t this point WP is so well known ,that it is hard to imagine an organization anywhere that would not want to have a WP page, and it takes a true understanding of the way in which WP is different, to realize that this is not he way to achieve that.

There is thus no reason to get angry at particular instances. The critical thing to do is to remove the pov articles; assuming we have half million, and if a hundred of us set out to do it for an hot a day, , and supported each other , we could mange to keep up with the inflow and clear up the background in a year or two. We did it for unreferenced bios of living people; we can do it here. If this seems unrealistic, for what is possibly the highest-priority category in terms of unjustified advertising, internet businesses, 4 or 5 people could do it.

In the meantime, we do have to pursue the chains of paid editor, who are responsible for perhaps 10 to 30% of the problem. It's not worth the trouble to work on an individual example. What is worth the double is to look for a group of accounts writing articles in identical format in a particular subject, or an individual account using a similar format for miscellaneous totally unrelated minor articles. In the first place, if the writing similarities are close enough , a SPI can be justify.d In the second, a firm explanation can usually stope them. More of the similarities to be looked for will follow in a day or two. DGG ( talk ) 23:58, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

{thank you guys for helping and guiding me, I really appreciate that and I am taking your WP OUTING very seriously. I worked on some col cases and I believe I handled those cases very well without violating any Wikipedia guidelines even though I was not aware of WP:OUTING. I usually kept my distance when dealing with such cases and never asked them to reveal any personal information other than their affiliation with the entity without asking any further explanation about their nature of work or name. I major in marketing and I can easily spot when someone is trying to promote something and I strongly stand against advertisement in Wikipedia.

we have to take advertisement in Wikipedia more seriously, some marketing courses are now teaching how to edit Wikipedia to promote companies coz they see it as important channel for public relations and product promotion, the only reason why we don't see well-written articles about these companies from new editors is becoz of their inability to navigate through Wikipedia and old web Wikipedia editor is still confusing for most of the people,as Wikipedia becomes more and more user friendly with addition such as visual editor, we will see more advertisement and vandalism .There are off course positive sides to these improvements but we should also focus on negative side too. Nicky mathew (talk) 06:54, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Professional press release writers can and do learn html and the very similar wikicode, and even our peculiar referencing conventions. Their set of expected skills encompasses that. What they have much more difficult in learning is now to write in a different style for different purpose. Their training and experience is in how to write effective press releases and advertisements,and they are lost in an environment which does not accept their well-learned glossy promises, convincing rhetoric, appealing personal claims, vague statement of benefits ,and carefully selected statistics.claims is not wanted, Tbey do not have experience writing where plain neutral presentation is w\excpected, where only a set of narrowly defined reliable sources are accepted, where testimonials and name-dropping are harmful, and where extravert claims are signs of puffery. The best preparation for working in WP is journalism, tho teaching and librarianship and technical writing also do well. can also be successful

So of course , is any intelligent member of the general public-- but unlike professionals, unless the are students who know html, they have great difficulty with our current format. it is these people whom we will be able to better reach when we have a rule workignand non confusing wvisual editor that does not require manual post processing to verify that it; has avoided bloopers. Perhaps we'll get there they year (I seem to remember saying that for several years now.)At theta point, our outreach programs can extent more practically to a much wider range of non traditional editors, many of whom maybe interested in the everyday topics we have such trouble with. and those they may be able to drive out the professionals DGG ( talk ) 08:12, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Notability

Of course you can point out that the argument may benefit me, but I don't think increasing notability requirements is the right way to go. Well, if I had my way, I would consolidate all of them into a single notability guideline of just a few paragraphs, rather than creating unique guidelines for different subject areas. The myriad of guidelines for different subject areas tend to reflect the biases of the community, setting a low bar for reporters, authors and academics, and a higher one for org's and business executives. I rolled my eyes at the reaction when I tried to delete an over-the-top promotional page about an open-source project.

But in any case, what I would suggest is instead that the burden of proof for notability be shifted to the submitter. Right now the AfD nominator is expected to investigate the article-subject's notability before nominating. The burden is that evidence of notability exists, somewhere out in the world, which means tons of research to delete every spammy article about a trivial org. Instead, the requirement should be that the article itself contain evidence of notability and that it be deleted if evidence is not provided in the article, shifting the burden of validating notability to the author, rather than the community. CorporateM (Talk) 20:28, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

The basic WP:GNG guideline is the same for most types of articles, the way it is applied is what varies widely, and it is those differences in appliation which reflects the biases of the community. That's all that I am suggesting: that in dealing with commercial organizations especially we interpret the term reliable sources to not include sources which are dependent on PR. (sources that are straight PR are of course excluded from all areas). I'm not even proposing this as a formal guideline at this point, but I intend to argue at individual cases that some sources, such as local business journals, or reports on funding, be disregarded for showing notability.

Most of the special guidelines are attempts to correct bias, not increase it further: the Athletes guideline, for example, is a way to limit what would otherwise be the overcoverage of college and high school athletes. WP:PROF is away to limit what would otherwise be the great undercoverage of researchers.

What I am suggesting is merely an empirical adjustment in interpretation, not a fundamental revision. My view on how I would truly like to go is entirely opposite to yours: I would eliminate the GNG entirely as too dependent upon interpretation have have guidelines for subjects which truly reflect what is of encyclopedic importance. I am not suggesting this, for the general feeling is opposed to it. (and in practice, it would immediately create a immense number of arguments in particular areas--the virtue is that once it were settled, it would decrease them.)

Establishing the burden of notability is already on the contributors to the article in practice: we almost always do decline articles where nobody can find sources showing notability, except for the correction of parts of the world or topics where this is accepted as particularly difficult. Establishing the rule you suggest would increase our already strongly existing cultural bias. It would also be opposed to the basic principle of WP by which non experts work together to gradually develop articles, by requiring an article be sufficiently well established immediately. It would prevent the formation of articles on many topic areas, including most historical topics except by those with access to research libraries. It would also immensely bias WP in exactly the wrong direction: towards news events, internet phenomena, popular artists, and minor sports figures. DGG ( talk ) 23:08, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

Hmmm.... - I do not have experience in areas like sports figures, so I am not privy to the circumstances unique to the subject area. I've heard that the German Wikipedia does have revenue requirements for companies to qualify. I think there would be more support for it than you would think. However, I would do something more along the lines of making the assumption that an org is not notable if they are below a certain funding/revenue threshold, allowing for exceptions when there are reliable sources to justify it - as oppose to a hard and fast rule. CorporateM (Talk) 23:53, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

I thought about revenue requirements. These depends a great deal upon the part of the world and the industry. The deWP deals with a more homogeneous range of topics than we do. They have been mentioned sometimes in afd discussions for financial companies , for example to explain that under $1billion of assets managed is not a big deal. DGG ( talk ) 00:01, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

Blackall and Yaraka Branch Railways

I assume you didn't mean publish Blackall and Yaraka Branch Railways to the Main space? JMHamo (talk) 20:41, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

there's a printed source given. I can't see it, but we should assume good faith that it does cover the material. Checking for copypaste would however require actually locating it. If an article has about at least 60% chance of passing afd, I think it should go in mainspace. Or did I miss something obviously fishy? DGG ( talk ) 21:59, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

The article needs clean-up, categories, more wikilinks etc, just messy. JMHamo (talk) 22:02, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

Certainly it does. As you know, there are several schools of thought: one is to get everything right before moving to mainspace; a second is to at least get them cleaned up to a reasonable extent extent before putting them in mainspace, the third is to put them in as soon as they have a decent chance of passing afd. I started out at the first, but then moved to an second, and am now close to the third. The part that takes experience is deciding if there is the basis of a sustainable article, & I try to look at that for as many AfCs as possible. I admit, tho, that this rougher than even my usual standard: I usually at least add article sections; tho adding links is a good exercise for beginners, I usually add enough basic ones to at least give the impression of a WP article. (But there are a great many people who like to add categories. I learned early on that the best thing for me to do about categories, was to let them do it.) I was going too fast here, and you were right to call me on it. DGG ( talk ) 22:19, 4 April 2015 (UTC) .

I subscribe to the get to as near perfection as possible before moving it from Draft school of thought. All too often the article is not found again (especially is there are no categories) and remains indefinitely in a bad state. A bad first impression for any reader coming across it. JMHamo (talk) 22:29, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

The reason for my style is the experience that slow as it may be to get material improved in mainspace, it is even slower and less likely in Draft. As I understand it, the likelihood of survival in mainspace is the only actual guideline. It's good to do more, and each of us will balance whether we want to work in concentrated way with a small number of articles, or as a preliminary rescue of many. I've always done mostly rescue, with a few each week taken beyond that. I didn't expect it, but I find I like to work at the bottom. DGG ( talk ) 22:39, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	For your tireless new page patrolling. Esquivalience t 02:30, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

Paid Editing Random Thoughts

In regards to the latest number of undisclosed paid editing issues, I was wondering if the creation of a new WP:CSD criteria is in order. The general idea is that if someone is found to be partaking in undisclosed paid editing, than the articles they have written can be deleted more efficiently. On the grounds that undisclosed paid editors COI prevent the content of the article from being written in a balanced manner. Sort of a Wikipedia:Blow it up and start over speedy for undisclosed paid editing. This would serve to more strongly discourage undisclosed paid editing and reduce the ability of businesses to profit off of the practice.

A rough draft of the deletion criteria could read:

A12: Articles created by an undisclosed paid editor while taking part in undisclosed paid editing where the only substantial content to the page was added by its author.

Is this good, bad, awful, would it destroy Wikipedia? You are a very experienced editor within the deletion process so I'm interested in your thoughts on this idea. Winner 42 Talk to me! 16:20, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

the problem with "undisclosed paid editor" is we have no means of proving someone is unless they confess to it subsequently. And if they do so confess, doesn't this to some extent turn them into a disclosed paid editor? Even confession isn't absolutely reliable because there have been a few verified examples of joe jobss where an upe pretended to be a well known wikipedian. As you know, the prevailing view here is that outing is more important than coi. Personally, I would be prepared to see that be reversed, but I unfortunately don't think it would get consensus, considering the defeat of the recent AfC on a very mild exception to the outing policy. Officially (i.e., in my role as an admin and arb), I will as I have always done apply existing policy, not policy as I would like it to be.

To the best of my knowledge, and as confirmed by opinions of some people with experience in this, there has never been an upe making worthwhile contributions, so they can all be gotten rid of otherwise. Of course, this means if there has been one consistently doing so, we obviously do not know about it. I doubt it, because the amount of junk being submitted now and in the past is so great that it is reasonable to assume any new entry on an organization is very likely to be coi at least, and in most cases also violation of the our Terms of Use; I would also say this about to individuals in some fields. This then raises the question of if they are making consistently good contribution why should we want to get rid of the articles--the same as undetected sockpuppets.

I would go a little further: imo, even for the best declared paid editors, the quality of their paid work is not as high as the volunteer work most of them also do.

The best course of action within existing policy is to have stricter requirements on articles in susceptible subjects, and for more people to participate in the afds. I would certainly propose a formal deletion reason , that borderline notability AND a mainly promotional article is a reason for deletion. (It is now, if we choose to do so, but a formal statement would make it easier to explain). I am saying this with great reluctance--for my first 5 or 6 years here, I devoted as much of my effort as possible into rescuing just those sort of article. DGG ( talk ) 16:57, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your thoughts DGG. I don't like the situation either, but the quantity of COI violations that are done on a daily basis is so large (if the quantity of G11s and adv declines at AfC are of any indication) that something needs to be done. I'm just grasping at straws for a solution. Can't we just get Congress to grant the WMF subpoena power or at least file FTC complaints against some of these people. /rant Winner 42 Talk to me! 17:14, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

In a very few extreme cases, where people or firms have been identified, the WMF has taken some legal or regulatory action. I have some knowledge of whom to speak to and approximately what their parameters are. DGG ( talk ) 20:15, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

Referencing systems

Hi David. I created Category:Referencing systems and rearranged or redirected some articles to fit the category. But it strikes me a category like this must already exist, and I thought you would be the best person to ask. Regards Peter Damian (talk) 10:26, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

working on it. See,for example the standard system for the Talmud and system for Chapters and verses of the Bible. DGG ( talk ) 04:08, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Right. It's actually quite a large subject. Thanks. Peter Damian (talk) 08:05, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Not forgetting Surah Peter Damian (talk) 08:08, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

I cannot see that anyone has ever written a general WP article on this. I'm not immediately aware of any general discussions in the librarianship literature, but there are many further places to check--I think I recall there are discussions of its use in particular subjects in books on how to do research in history, etc. , DGG ( talk ) 22:04, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Village Capital'

Hi DGG, could you help me remove the advert flagged banner on the Village Capital page? It's been flagged for a while now, and the page seems like it's been improved. I'd love an opinion on whether or not it meets Wikipedia's standards, and if not, what I can do to fix this to remove the banner as soon as possible. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dahlerbattle (talk • contribs) 14:36, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

as a start, remove the adjectives of praise. the substitute ordinary english for jargon like "across", and decrease the amount of dupllciation. Then I will take another look. DGG ( talk ) 19:04, 16 June 2015 (UTC) Still needed

Wikipedia:Impact factors

This is your promised reminder that it would be helpful to have information about how to use impact factors in a smart way for evaluating sources across multiple disciplines. Wikipedia:Impact factors is a new redirect to Wikipedia:Scholarly journal, which is mostly a notability essay. I think you can safely usurp the redirect, if you don't want to come up with another name. Thanks, WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

This would be really useful for me, if I'm understanding it correctly. Arthur goes shopping (talk) 06:24, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

"Really useful" is exactly my goal.  ;-) WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:43, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

A good reason for deletion

"so promotional that it would need to be rewritten from scratch" is a good reason for deletion.

You rightly owe someone a private thanks, or some form of acknowledgement for their work. Or are you only the whip? :) -- GreenC 13:58, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

You are apparently referring to my comment at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Canine Companions for Independence (2nd nomination)

if you mean others have used this wording before me, that's very possible, but I've been using it for many years, and I'm not consciously copying anyone.

If you mean it's not a valid reason:

WP:CSD is limited to the reasons specified; any reason the community accepts is good at AfD. See [[WP:Deletion policy]#Reasons for Deletion]], point 14." Any other content not suitable for an encyclopedia"

It is obviously a good reason for AfD, since it can even justify speedy G11; it's a restatement of "would need to be fundamentally rewritten to become encyclopedic." from WP:CSD#G11. Similarly the essay WP:TNT has been used repeatedly by others as an argument for many deletions. Whether any particular article in question is actually that bad, is of course subject to a community decision: at AfD if at AfD, at Deletion Review if it was done at speedy. In this case, it is indeed possible that the decision may be against my proposal.

a related deletion rationale I often give is that "an article that is only borderline notable and is also promotional should be deleted ." That only works at AfD, and only if the consensus agrees with it.

WP:CSD is limited to the reasons specified; any reason the community accepts is good at AfD. See [[WP:Deletion policy]#Reasons for Deletion]], point 14." Any other content not suitable for an encyclopedia" DGG ( talk ) 15:34, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Academic departments

ThanksHaydertouran (talk) 08:54, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Very few individual academic departments are notable. That's not my personal decision, but the consistent practice of the community. For practical purposes, without going into the rather elaborate Wikipedia jargon, the requirement is world-famous. The basic requirement for inclusion of any organization is coreferences providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources, not press releases or mere announcements. Very few academic departments can meet this requirement. In addition, a requirement for an article on an academic department (or any organization) is that the article be non-promotional--that it be directed towards what readers of an encycopedia might want to know, not what the organization might want to tell them.

Your department does not meet either part of the requirement. But the primary reason for deletion was not advertising, but rather that it gave no indication whatsoever that it might possibly be important in any sense, let alone world famous. I should have specified that as the reason, and I apologize for any confusion. It was for good measure, very difficult to understand. The title didn't even say what university it was in. The text was written in English that would need to be almost completely rewritten, even if it had been famous. There were no references except to its own site.

I also removed your edit inserting a direct link to your department in place of its name at the university article. We do not include such links. We linkonly to the main university web site. The reader can generally find the web pages of individual departments from there. DGG ( talk ) 16:06, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Ibn_Sina_Medical_College_(2nd_nomination)

Interested in your thoughts here, if you like. Jytdog (talk) 21:21, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

For my first 2 years here, I helped establish the principle that every institution of higher education is to be considered notable; ever since then, for the following 6 years, I have successfully defended it. It is almost never even challenged, which is more than I can say for most of our guidelines. (there are sometimes exceptions for unaccredited institutions whose real existence is not all that clear, but that doesn't apply here) DGG ( talk ) 22:43, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't understand why you did that, but congrats for setting a policy-in-practice! I have withdrawn the AfD (in word only at the AfD - I don't know how to formally do that) If you like, I would be interested in hearing your rationale - not to argue, just to learn. Jytdog (talk) 23:18, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

The argument I made is that if one searches carefully enough, especially for potentially notable alumni, it is possible to meet the GNG for high schools and colleges most of the time, depending on the usual argument over whether sources are sufficiently substantial, etc. It would also be possible to show this for elementary schools a good deal of the time. The results in practice depended on how hard they are argued and searched for more than anything about the school itself, and have an equal amount of error in each direction. Every last one of them was at the time argued, and we therefore spent a good deal of effort at AfD, without getting any more precise results than if we accepted all the high schools and rejected the elementary schools. (Most of the discussions were for high schools; it is accepted as being all the more true for colleges.) As a compromise, it was accepted that high schools and up were notable, but primary schools would not ordinarily be notable. We therefore avoided about 10 afds a day without adversely affecting the encyclopedia. Everyone, thse arguing in both directions, realised things were better that way.

As contributing factors for the acceptance of the result, was the general view that they were appropriate for the encyclopedia considering the interests of our writers and readers; that there was limited opportunity for spam; & that they were good articles for young beginners. It's essentially the same argument by which settled geographic places are notable, but not necessarily unsettled geographic features. Both of them have proven very stable compromises.

They rely on the notion of presumed notability as a concession to those who thing the GNG the main factor. I do not, personally think it ought to be, and I have supported every effort to set a demarcation line based on something intrinsic to the subject. There are stable similar compromises for many types of athletics, for popular music, for astronomical objects, for academics, for scientific journals, for government officials , for some types of local institutions, for national vs subnational associations, etc. I don't agree with the demarcation lines in some of them, but I support all of the compromises. I consider the GNG to reflect the bias of the internet, and that if we really worked at finding sources we could make nonsense out of it.

The entire rationale for a notability standard at all is a little shaky, as compared to most of our other rules. The original rationale is so we look like what people expect an encyclopedia to look like. This was extremely important in the beginning , when people already had an expectation based on the print encyclopedias they knew, and it was necessary to establish ourselves as a serious project. The better reason is that lowering the bar too far leads us to become an advertising medium. It is much easier to control what we have an article on, than to control the content of articles. If we are more or less inclusive, we're still an encycopedia ; if we accept advertising as articles, there's little point in existing, because the internet does as well by itself. DGG ( talk ) 00:14, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to write all that, that all makes sense. The only argument I would have, is the "limited opportunity for spam" thing. A good chunk of COI stuff I deal with (I won't hazard a guess on the percentage, but it is not insignificant) is raw academic boosterism - maybe the state of higher ed today would call for an examination of the assumption? I do hear you on cutting down on un-necessary AfDs - there is great value to that. Jytdog (talk) 00:25, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

I've said it all before :). As for promotionalism: I was thinking primarily of high schools, where the sort of promotionalism in their articles is usually trivial to remove, and goes as soon as someone notices it. Colleges are much more of a problem.especially because so few of us even occasionally try to clean them up (except that there are now consistent efforts to remove non-notable alumni) Almost every US college & university article on WP is written by PR staff, except the few written by over-enthusiastic alumni. The alumni are worse: just like all fans, they don't give up. The PR staff are usually local PR staff, who are generally incompetent as compared to the people who work in industry. They follow a standard pattern, which is remarkably similar to the one-page descriptions in college guides. I don't know if there are people training them, or whether they copy each other.

I hadn't seen the boosterism essay you linked to--thanks!. I think I'll add to it. I also added a little to WP:College and university article guidelines.

I've decided to check some of the university FAs, to make sure we aren't specifying well-written but promotional articles as examples. DGG ( talk ) 03:14, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Afc etc

Hello DGG. I couldn't help but notice your comment on User talk:Timtrent#afc_etc, saying that submissions that are clearly non-notable should be marked as such and that the users should "discourage continuing" writing the article. What do you see as the best approach to dealing with users that submit Afc submissions that clearly do not have a chance of passing? I feel confident in determining notability but I don't want to be too harsh on anybody, especially new users. Many thanks in advance, Aerospeed (Talk) 17:28, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

I typically say: "In order to get an article, you will need references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources, not press releases or mere announcements. If you can not find them, an article will not be possible at this time. When you become well-known enough for there to be such references, then it will make sense to try again. " The key word to avoid harshness is When. Almost everyone understands, except some paid editors. For those who do not, I sometimes go to MfD.

And it's crucial to say this as a short personal message, not as part of the boilerplate. People rarely read long boilerplate. I often modify the templated message after it is placed, removing almost all of the surrounding text. I sometimes remove the color also, so it doesn't look like a template. Here's an example I've given up on trying to get the people who program this to improve the messages. Even the custom message template still has too much unnecessary verbiage, DGG ( talk ) 03:20, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Writing articles about academics

I have created a number of articles about academics recently and I wanted to get some advice from you on how to write such articles, what should be included in them, etc. Everymorning talk 17:10, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

forthcoming, probably tomorrow. DGG ( talk ) 19:34, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

I will get there, probably Saturday. In the meantime, look at Chad Orzel, which I deprodded. A full article in Contemporary Authors is proof of notability -- and that article usually lists books review also)It's available online as part of Gale's Literature Resource Center, available thru most public libraries DGG ( talk ) 04:30, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, the only problem is I don't often edit from a library (unlike yourself, I imagine, since you are a librarian). But I'll keep that in mind the next time I stop by a library. Everymorning talk 02:50, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Most large city libraries have it available to library card holders remotely. You only have to visit once, to get a card. DGG ( talk ) 18:19, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Any word on when that advice is coming? It's been about 3 weeks now. Everymorning (talk) 20:58, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

Bypassing AfC

...

This can s perfectly legitimate--if the article is in the end acceptable. I've done it sometimes--the only real reason I go thru the RfC acceptance process is to get the articles in the right category & added to the statistics. The real problem is that PR people do this rather frequently, without improving the article. I have learned for some types of articles before deleting a G13, to see if by any chance the article is in mainspace, and if so, whether it's acceptable. Sometimes it is, and it is the reviewer who was in error, and rather than argue it, the person just bypassed them. Considering the quality of some reviews, I can well understand them.

The fundamental principle to understanding WP procedures is that there is no underlying principle or system. There are multiple ways to do anything, some of them devised by programmers wanting to display their cleverness or take care of every unlikely contingency they could think of. Not all of them had actual editing experience.

As for the article, it's not my field, but it looks fine to me. DGG ( talk ) 22:16, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

DGG: Thank you. Very clear and helpful. FeatherPluma (talk) 00:35, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

For all the abuse you are getting at AfD.

Bearian (talk) 20:46, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

For the last year or two I have been deliberately trying to stretch deletion process a little in both directions, to see if consensus is changing. To keep things responsive, somebody's got to, and better me than someone with a coi. DGG ( talk ) 22:18, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Einstein

See WP:EINSTEIN. Expand, mock or delete as you see fit... Guy (Help!) 14:21, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Guy, I must have quoted it about a hundred times by now! It is almost always very effective at putting an end to absurd arguments for coverage. And if someone doesn;'t get the point, it shows very nicely their total lack of objectivity on the subject. DGG ( talk ) 04:59, 11 June 2016 (UTC)

Adding Material to articles only serves to draw the attention of editors who nominate articles for deletion

Hi DGG,

(This is a continuation of similar threads on your talk page in 2012 and 2014). I have been away for a few months, and when I started editing again, I was hoping to be left alone to help build areas that, in my opinion, are sorely lacking.

On 8 August 2015 5 I found a little visited article about a very important organization: Condo Owners Association (Ontario) (which has an article here under the incorrect name) and at 17:10 I started renovating the whole area surrounding Category:Condominium on Wikipedia. According to recent news reports 50% of new home buyers in Toronto are now purchasing condos, and the number of condo owners is staggering, considering how little information exists on Wikipedia on this topic.

As usual, however, it appears that my efforts to build up have attracted the attention of the deletionist faction. By August 9 the article that was getting no attention at all for months, was up for wp:AfD, and instead of continuing my efforts to built this neglected Codominium area, I find myself spending more and more time getting into conflicts with other editors intent on deleting whatever else is associated with this article. I seem to have been unsuccessful in trying to convince another admin that the article that is now getting very little attention at AfD should be moved to its correct official name.

This is very discouraging, and I know that posting this on your talk page will undoubtably bring out more of the same, sigh… Ottawahitech (talk) 07:21, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

It might help me if you could specify the articles involved. DGG ( talk ) 07:57, 13 August 2015 (UTC) Thanks for clarifying.; response forthcoming. DGG ( talk ) 21:26, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

I consider it a little too much like a press release, and this will inevitably affect people's attitude towards it. Possibly there might be a little advocacy in some of the other articles also. The last thread is now at [6] DGG ( talk ) 04:53, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

I belong to a (dying?) minority of editors who like to work on articles that are not yet developed. Unfortunately it appears that my edits only serve to bring those articles to the attention of editors whose mission is to nominate articles for deletion. I have been asked before to provide examples of this phenomenon and thought : Condo Owners Association (Ontario) can be mentioned as one because no one paid attention to it until I started to work on it.

I am worried that my sad conclusion is also shared by others, which means few editors will be working on improving wp:stubs around here. Thanks btw for finding the 2014 thread - I am unable to locate the 2012 one tirled Useless stubs because the Edits by user tool is broken (another sigh...) Ottawahitech (talk) 09:43, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

It also looks like posting a link to an article at Helpdesk is a good way to send existing long-time articles to wp:AfD. See for example Wikipedia:Help_desk#Lynn_Walsh, I think. Ottawahitech (talk) 18:41, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

For those interested, I moved the discussion of this particular point to Wikipedia_talk:Help_desk#Deletion_of_articles_referred_to_in_questions_here. Ottawahitech (talk) 15:22, 23 August 2015 (UTC)

I have a dual intention here: One is to try to keep everything suitable for an encycopedia. The other to to remove promotionalism. Lately, due to the flood of promotional articles, the second has become more important--even critical. Small variations to the notability standard either way do not fundamentally harm the encycopedia, but accepting articles that are part of a promotional campaign causes great damage. Once we become a vehicle for promotion, we're useless as an encycopedia.

There are several hundred thousand of articles in WP accepted in earlier years when the standards were lower that we need to either upgrade or remove. It will take years, but work on them as I see them.

Normally I send a long standing article to AfD rather than to speedy unless it's utterly outrageous--t will not be deleted unless the consensus agrees with me. I accept the consensus there as the guide in establishing standards. DGG ( talk ) 22:22, 23 August 2015 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Admin's Barnstar
	Thanks for reverting a Speedy at Make It Cheaper, which obviously deserved to be fully considered. I wish more Administrators were as rational. Yours sincerely, BeenAroundAWhile (talk) 05:52, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

A belated note...

It was superb finally getting to meet you! I only got to hear the last bit of your talk but was quite intrigued. I look forward to seeing you and the rest of the NYC crew next time around. All the best — MusikAnimal ^talk 04:40, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

SNIA Long-term Retention Technical Workgroup

Hi DGG,

You have A7-deleted my page about the SNIA Long-term Retention Technical Workgroup (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=SNIA_Long_Term_Retention_TWG&action=edit&redlink=1). I would like to review the previously existing version of my article and edit with the relevant information. Can you please send me the text from the version I originally submitted?

Thank you.

Phillipviana (talk) 17:13, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

Phillipviana, I can not send you the deleted contents until you authorize email, using the Preferences link on your user page. But in any case, the material is entirely copied or closely adapted from various parts of their site. I suggest you try to integrate the appropriate material dealing with this topic on a single WP page. DGG ( talk ) 22:52, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

DGG, thank you. I will come up with new content but would still like to have the previous version. I have confirmed my e-mail a few minutes ago. Please send me the previous version when you have a chance. Thanks. Phillipviana (talk) 16:47, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

DGG, can you please put the version back online? Thanks Phillipviana (talk) 17:24, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

National Book Award

... our WP article on National Book Award explains it: hundreds of books get nominated--any publisher can nominates as many as they please. In the 2013 procedure, each of the 4 categories is winnowed own by a panel to a long list of 10, a short list of 5, and then a winner. The books on the short list are called Finalists, and get a prize; the winner gets a much bigger prize. By analogy with other similar awards, winning is notable, being a finalist contributes to notability, being nominated is not even worth mentioning. If the NBA site lists them as finalists, they're finalists--we usually regard the award site as authoritative. DLB's text is considered reliable--its headlines are, as usual with headlines, summaries & simplifications. Headlines never take precedence over the text, here or anywhere. USA Today, LA Times etc. are dependent on the actual source of data, and less reliable. Neither of them is really a RS for published books. (The LATimes is a RS for film). This is one of the cases where the PS is more reliable than any report of it. What must be avoided is using any statements on Amazon or the publisher's sites as evidence for anything at all; they both often list awards & best seller status in the most positive terms they can concoct. Pre 2013, there was no list of 10, just the short list of finalists and the winner. DGG ( talk ) 17:13, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

Essay

I want WP:ALTEXPAND deleted since it's undermaintained and horribly out of date. {{Expand}} was deprecated ages ago, so I doubt anyone's looking for "alternatives" to it anymore. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 03:38, 10 September 2015 (UTC)

TenPoundHammer (talk · contribs), Perhaps then it should be expanded/updated and retitled; it was good material--we shouldn't lose it. DGG ( talk ) 02:07, 11 September 2015 (UTC)

Peter H. Lin

You may want to have a look at this article and to its history. --Randykitty (talk) 20:19, 12 September 2015 (UTC)

citations are 500, 270, 170, 150 ... , so he's notable, even allowing for the very high citation rate in this area. Even tho its an autobiography, what it needs is rewriting. Once upon a time, I would unhesitatingly rewrite all articles like this, but in the last year or so the number that need doing has escalated to the point where I only do it if it is in my area of interest, it is easy to do, and the article is not hopelessly corrupt otherwise. This articles is a summary of his outrageously self-praising website even by the abyssmal standards for such websites, http://www.drpeterlin.com/dr.-lin2.html , but not close enough to be a copyvio. It's not even a competent summary, because it leaves out some of the actual encyclopedic information, such as the dates of his positions, and makes no attempt to select the most important among the publications.

As we have now learned we need to do, I checked some of the refs. That he was clinical advisor to the bill is referenced to the Senator's web site, but isn't stated there. Some of the rest are also ambiguous. It's implied he developed EKOS--he did not, a/c the references--he merely uses it. And a Reuters article referred to in this connection is not an article, but a press release on their site.

For an analogous case, by a known paid editor, see John Wesson Ashford, where I just removed the minor and stuff and unproven claims to be first in something. He , too, has very high citations.

I am holding off going further until I can decide what I want to do in such cases. I don't want to punish notable people for being naive enough to write their own article or use a paid editor, but I equally don't see why they should get priority for rewriting before all the even more notable people whom we are missing. DGG ( talk ) 23:09, 12 September 2015 (UTC)

I was thinking paid editing more than autobio, given the contributors' names (and didn't look into notability myself, as I have no time right now). You're right that it's not egregiously promotional. I removed some of the minor awards. If only those paid editors could get it through their heads that it is far more effective to write a really encyclopedic, neutral article... --Randykitty (talk) 08:41, 13 September 2015 (UTC)

It might be a group of editors. Look at the main editors and the other articles they have edited. All related.

• JeremyKai4077 (talk · contribs) created 9/10/2015
• Garfield4407 (talk · contribs) created 9/9/2015

• John.freeman.2010 (talk · contribs) created 9/8/2015 (also see their talk page about an article that was speedied)
• Also note that JeremyKai4077 and John.freeman.2010 have also the exact same user page.

Possibly some paid editing? At the least this group has a very narrow focus. Ravensfire (talk) 14:54, 13 September 2015 (UTC)

I have previously encountered obvious but undeclared paid editing devoted to a particular medical specialty, and to other groups of individuals, or companies in the same field, where I assume it was a PR company specializing in the field or working for a trade association. I have frequently encountered it for people in the same or related company, where it has sometimes not been an outside PR firm, but the employer: sometimes in-house PR staff, but sometimes a department manager or the like acting on his own initiative.

Experience has unfortunately shown that most (but not all) people with experience in PR cannot be taught to write a proper article, because they are so completely oriented to writing advertisements or quasi-adevertisements that they honestly cannot see the difference between that an a proper encycopedia article. Declared paid editors here whom I trust have told me they need to turn down most clients, because the clients even if notable will not accept a NPOV article. DGG ( talk ) 20:02, 13 September 2015 (UTC)

Copyvio within WP

... second technical issue at hand is that I was quite serious about needing to edit the individual pages for WP:CWW and WP:Content forking to mention the G12 issue and requirements for the "shadow-bibliography" issue (that is, current requirements to exclude Wikipedia article references in the Bibliography section of articles system-wide throughout Wikipedia, but include the Wikipedia article references on the Talk page or dummy edits). Since I am meticulous about checking and verifying references in Bibliographies and have spent a great deal of time cleaning up dead links and restoring bad ones, then this is an important issue. If the deleted articles were mislabeled as G12 (as you suggest in your comments above), then the deleted pages should be at least re-labeled on the admin-only data base as to your stated preference and reason. If they are G12, then WP:CWW and WP:Content forking need some editing and additions to cover the G12 issue which is currently not mentioned on those two pages. If you need some of the other IP-hopping addresses for the IP-account above, then let me know here and I will try to get them listed for you. MusicAngels (talk) 16:27, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

The G12 deletion in such cases can be applied, but usually the problem is corrected after a warning. As I said, I personally would not have applied G12 in this case, but the action was within the range of administrative discretion, and therefore I cannot say it was mislabeled. As I said above "Anything organized like WP will never be altogether consistent, or even always fair." The actually best way of dealing with the WP references is very simple: to remove the duplicated text and link the name. If you did think it necessary to include the text, in addition to the techniques listed in WP:CWW, there is also available a rather complicated technique, used often in history and geography articles, but relevant here also: WP:Summary style. I don't think anyone mentioned that possibility in the discussion--I am going to add a link to it on WP:CWW

There is no need to edit anything to say not to use WP articles as references--it's part of the Verifiability policy page--see WP:CIRCULAR DGG ( talk ) 16:47, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Yes, that was my understanding as well. This is the template that I had already prepared on my Talk page for insertion in the article, but I took one day off last week and the article was deleted without prior notice of closing. I think User:Fogettaboutit was also in agreement with you on this. This is the template as prepared on my Talk page and I was just going to fill in the names already listed in the Lead section of the poetry article. If you are saying that this will work then I am in full agreement with you and User:Fogettaboutit:

{{Copied multi|list=
{{Copied multi/Copied|from=Poet1 |from_oldid=1234567890 |to=Here |diff=http://link/to/diff }}
{{Copied multi/Copied|from=Poet2 |from_oldid=1234567890 |to=Here |diff=http://link/to/diff }}
{{Copied multi/Copied|from=Poet3 |from_oldid=1234567890 |to=Here |diff=http://link/to/diff }}
{{Copied multi/Copied|from=Poet4 |from_oldid=1234567890 |to=Here |diff=http://link/to/diff }}
{{Copied multi/Copied|from=Poet5 |from_oldid=1234567890 |to=Here |diff=http://link/to/diff }}
{{Copied multi/Copied|from=Poet6 |from_oldid=1234567890 |to=Here |diff=http://link/to/diff }}
}} Is that what you are reading as being what User:Fogettaboutit had in mind. MusicAngels (talk) 17:20, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

At a different level, I have to say that using these copies was not necessarily a good idea in a general article. Too much of them dealt with the biography, and the reader of a general article would want to see about the literature. They would know enough to go to the article about the author for the bios. It would have been, as I just said, the actually best way of dealing with the WP references to remove the duplicated text and link the name. That people didnt like the article affected the action. DGG ( talk ) 18:48, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

In stating that, you do realize that your suggestion is very close to the WP:TNT option if all of those biographical subsections are deleted. Since this is effectively equal to the solution previously put on the table by Drv participants, then I would like to offer to do the WP:TNT from the inside-out myself for the article. If you could restore the article as a Draft article under a new name "Draft:Poetry in the 21st century", then I will remove all of the biography subsections used in their entirety. This will effectively leave only the lead section and the outline structure for the rest to be then rewritten. This was only a "C"-class article anyway, and I would like to move forward with the option you are offering of straightforwardly removing all the WP:CWW biography material used and then rewriting/redrafting it along with WikiProjects as a Draft article. Also, I would mark the Talk page to inform other editors not to apply any WP:Content forking in the new article. MusicAngels (talk) 20:40, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

paid editing deletions

I'm sure you've seen the outcome of this and this. Personally, I relist at least once before closing as no consensus, but this is an admin's prerogative and is not a reflection on the closer. What I'm more concerned with is that while Cunard's efforts to rescue such articles are laudable, such closures possibly deny us of much needed evidence for finding solutions to Orangemoody and other issues concerning blatant paid-for (or indeed any) promotion. Perhaps one could consider employing G13, G11, and G5 more broadly or more vigorously. Thoughts? --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 21:44, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

Cunard is taking the same approach I would have taken 6 years ago. I then argued that the most important thing is to have acceptable content, and how it got there is secondary. I still think that the ideal way of looking at it, if it were not for the current epidemic of paid editing (and the realization that it was there before, also, but we paid insufficient attention to it.) You & I have been assuming a deterrent effect. Cunard has challenged that assumption, and I can't prove him wrong. As you said, its "possibly deny us", but just possibly. Based on some discussions, perhaps what it's most likely to do is discourage pd eds. from giving money-back guarantees, but they will still be able to show portfolios of whatever of their work has not been deleted, including that done before they were detected.

Frankly, I am no longer willing to challenge on the grounds of having been started as paid editing any article that he will rewrite and take responsibility for; I started thinking in the course of the discussion that I am not sure my renoms of those two articles was justified.

G5 has never covered articles started before someone is blocked, or articles with substantial contributions by others. I can see permitting it retrospectively, but the sort of thing we're discussing would require removing the " substantial edits by others" part. I'm not sure I would support that.

G11 of course should be more consistently applied, but I am not sure what wording would make it stronger, as every article on an organization or its product will have some promotional effect., We could add something about "promotional intent", but this is hard to really prove.

I don't see what you propose to do with G13 to make it stronger. I still have my list of 500 or sos articles that shouldn't have been deleted but were because the contributor gave up after improper reviewing.

What we need to concentrate on I think is the notability standard for organizations. Even here, it's hard to think of how to reword it so it doesnt remove the clearly notable--our emphasis on the GNG prevents any rational work on this area. DGG ( talk ) 23:47, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

There is already an extra-strict WP:NSOFT-essay, where three coverage-bursts are needed (not just three publishers). If the details of WP:NCORP-guideline are tweaked, so that three coverage-bursts (not just three published sources) are needed, that might ease some of the not-startup-type burden, since most startups only have one product, they get a coverage burst for their first funding round, a coverage-burst when their beta-product actually ships... and then have to wait around for that third coverage-burst (usually a second successful round of series B funding) prior to getting a dedicated wikipedia-article. In the case of Circle, they got their first burst in Oct&Nov'13, their second burst in Mar&May'14, and their third burst in Sep'14, plus their biggest burst yet in Apr&May of 2015. But if the WP:NCORP-guideline standards were shifted to require three bursts of coverage, spaced several months apart, then Circle (company) would have been a redlink (or more likely a WP:NOTEWORTHY mention under Bitcoin#companies methinks) for all of 2013 and most of 2014. Because they had a famous serial-entrepreneur founder, and got plenty of money early on, it would only have taken them a year of operation to get a wikipedia page... but that is still 12 months of WP:FAILN under the three-coverage-burst-test, used by WP:NSOFT-essay already. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 21:27, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

75.108.94.227 (talk · contribs), I don't think the number of coverage-burts matters--it's rather what gets said. If it's just funding, it doesn't show notability. I agree that a famous founder can be relevant--but if that's all there is, the information should be added to that pindividual's article as part of the list of companies he's funded. DGG ( talk ) 04:53, 11 June 2016 (UTC)

IP page creation

Were you aware of this? I wasn't. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 20:27, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Notability for bib databases

@Randykitty: Hallo David and Randy, I wonder whether either of you has any pointers towards notability criteria for bibliographic databases. Polymer Library, formerly Rapra Abstracts has been PRODded as failing WP:GNG and WP:COMPANY (?). It feels to me like something which ought to have a WP article, but ... any thoughts? You two seem the natural people to ask, and by pinging RK on this page I hope to avoid duplication of any effort! PamD 14:44, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

• Honestly? Nope, no idea. For the most important databases (like PubMed or the Arts and Humanities Citation Index) sources can be found without too much trouble. For the smaller ones, it's difficult. We have more database articles like this, none of them sufficiently sourced (just dependent sources for non-controversial info). In the present case, things are even more difficult, because "polymer library" is not an unambigous search term and gives many hits, but nothing really about this database. The links in the article don't help in establishing notability (the last one - STN - even seems to be a false positive as this library is not listed in the list of sources). Perhaps somebody from the Chemistry project would know of some sources? Curious what David will have to say about this. --Randykitty (talk) 15:48, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

I'll add the refs I have at hand. DGG ( talk ) 21:32, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Sierra Vista Mall

Do you think it's worth pursuing the close of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sierra Vista Mall (3rd nomination) (by contacting the closer or possibly del rev)? The closer's argument is that there is no clear interpretation of what constitutes "local" vs. "regional" coverage (play to the semantics/letter of WP:AUD). I thought the arguments clearly stated how the mall's coverage was still of "local interest" (best evidenced by the fact of how its larger import could be unclear at all). – czar 14:46, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

It rarely hurts to ask the closer, but I generally do not recommend taking a non-consensus close to Deletion Review, and , at Deletion Review, I rarely vote to overturn one unless it is truly perverse. .Just wait a few months and nominate again. But in any case the argument would be that publications serving the San Joaquin Valley are local not likely to have readers outside the valley; publications serving the State of California are regional, being of interest to neighboring states also; A major SF or LA paper read nationally is national. The Oakland Tribune is arguably more than local, and it is certainly outside the Valley, but Tribune Business News is not the Tribune. If one is going to get technical about wording, the rule is that at least one non-local source is needed, which implies that one source is not always enough. In practice, the result of mall decisions depends on how hard they are argued. W

More generally, the majority disputed afd decisions hinge on the exact interpretation of the sourcing rule, and in most such cases a decent argument can be made in either direction. That's why I support going by objective criteria. In the case of malls, size. We have failed several times to get consensus on a general rule. If we did, and it were > 1 million sq ft≈100,000 sq metres, this would be deleted with no argument; if it were 500,000 sq ft it would be kept with no argument. In either case the effort debating it could be used for more important purposes. DGG ( talk ) 15:27, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I don't think sqft is the proper metric (assuming WP:42 is not enough of a metric already). Malls in the Boston area will be low-sqft, and that goes triple for malls in Hong Kong. By constrast, malls in Dallas or Minnesota (e.g. the Mall of America for a 'famous' example) will naturally have far more sqft, because real estate is cheaper and the dense-packed-mall-layouts are not necessary.

  Something like average-visitors-per-week ... or maybe peak-weekly-visitors-during-the-year to account for the seasonal nature of malls i.e. december 25th ... would be a better metric than sqft, and similarly, annual revenues is a good proxy for visitor-count slash mall-importance. Physically large does not equate well with wiki-notability, but number of people involved (or as a proxy number of dollars changing hands) does a better job methinks. If we do this, I recommend the visitor-count or dollar-count cutoff be low enough that at least one mall per tiny-city-of-population-10k is theoretically able to get a wikipedia article dedicated to the mall -- in the USA there are about 600 such tiny-cities, according to the KGB.[7] Or, actually that brings up another idea, see below. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 15:14, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

proposal: Businesses of Greater Clovis, California

  Or... now that I think of it... we could just use *that* as the threshold: every city with a population of 10k+ people, such as Charlotte Amalie would be permitted by the hypothetical WP:NSHOPPING wiki-notability guideline to have a safe-from-AfD article called Businesses in Charlotte Amalie. Such a 'listicle' would obviously include the 'major' malls (with WP:UNDUE being calculated based on sqft or visitor-count or most pragmatically revenues-per-annum since that latter figure is often available -- or simply in the usual wiki-fashion by the amount of ink spilled in wiki-reliable sources), as well as other major employers like hospitals/schools/banks, notable tourist traps, oft-reviewed restaurants, and such.

  Obviously, these business-in-XYZ-summary-articles will be a goldmine for linkspam, so if we go thataway, I would suggest beginning with a Businesses in CityName, CountryName guideline that sets a temporary initial threshold of 100k+ population minimum for the associated metro area; we even have an on-wiki list of such areas, and for the USA the total as of ~2008 was roughly 267 such medium-cities of 100k+ people (total of 295 as of July 2014 data). Borderline-notable mall articles and such, could be merged inot the business-of-XYZ articles, with exceptions for Mall of America and other not-borderline-exceptions. This temporary approach would cover about 90% of the states and territories in the USA... California where the Sierra Vista Mall is located tops the list with ~70 cities of 100k+ population in 2014:

• 6+: CA TX FL CO AZ NC IL VA WA MI NJ OH TN
• 4or5: CT GA KS MA MO NY PR AL IN LA NV OK OR PA UT
• 2or3: IA MN SC WI KY NE NM
• one: AK AR DC HI ID MD MS MT ND NH RI SD
• zero: AS DE GM ME NI VI VT WV WY

  Later, if that 100k+plan worked out, we could expand the threshold to include the additional ~~300 tiny-cities in the USA with 10k+ people through 99k people. Most of the states and territories exxcluded by the 100k+ rule, would be included by the 10k+ rule, including Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands which is the capitol and has 18k population nowadays.

  If the scheme *does* work, it could be a good recruiting tool for the type of editor naturally-interested in shopping and tourist attractions (plus editors WP:COI-interested in the retail industry and microeconomics), as I mentioned at the AfD for the mall. Furthermore, this scheme could also be a good way to help decide borderline-notability-questions about startups and such with WP:PRESERVE in mind... rather than a binary question of bangkeep or bangdelete, we would (almost always since I'm proposing a geography-based scheme) have the additional option of merging Circle_(company) into the Businesses in Greater Boston article that was a spinoff from Boston#Economy.

  And in fact, wikipedia already has Greater_Boston#Major_companies as a spinoff-list from Boston#Economy. So my proposal is that we expand that to be a spinoff-article that gives some details about the companies mentioned, then do the same Businesses of Greater CityName thing with 300 or 600 more cities, based on a population threshold of 100k+ or 10k+ respectively. Both thresholds would permit bangmerging Sierra Vista Mall into a broader Businesses of Greater Clovis, California article ... which at population 102k people just makes the upper threshold.

  Anyways, food for thought here mostly. Ping User:Czar, User:Brianhe, User:Widefox, User:Kudpung, and User:CorporateM, who may have comments about this crazy proposal.  ;-)     p.s. Not sure if DGG wants to host a big discussion, here on User:DGG talkspace, please let me know if you'd rather see this taken elsewhere DGG. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 15:14, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

All I can see is the COI hell that would inevitably result from these sorts of lists (many more anons adding their businesses than caring about an esoteric guideline). More concretely, I don't think a NSHOPPING guideline would ever pass consensus—especially since I think (or hope?) we're moving in the other direction (away from content-specific guidelines) post-OrangeMoody. I'd also say that these types of articles are closer to directories in function (what Wikipedia is not). If any such article was necessary, it would need to extend naturally (in summary style) from the city/town article's "Businesses" section. czar 15:26, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

I submit to you that we are already in the COI hell of which you speak.  :-)     Orangemoody was a symptom: the only way even wiki-notable companies like Countly can get their articles approved, is by spending months and months learning all the wiki-policies, or by hiring some kind of wiki-consultant for cold hard cash. Because the COI-handling-facilities are so borked, we are quickly tilting the wiki-culture towards forcing honest disclosed-COI-editors into retirement, which will leave only the dishonest undisclosed bad apples. Agree about avoiding WP:NOTDIR, and agree about extending the Clovis, California#Economy section in summary-style, but disagree that WP:NOTEWORTHY is that hard even for a reasonably tiny business to surmount. The idea here is that the Businesses in Greater Clovis articles will become a place where

• #1) we can put 'quasi-local' organizations like the Sierra Vista Mall, that will be better-watched by the anti-COI-hawks than a dedicated Sierra Vista Mall article possibly could, and
• #2) we can also upmerge borderline-wiki-notable startups like Countly into Businesses of Greater Istanbul (or Greater Long since they have relocated to London nowadays), rather than let them molder in AfC as potential victims.
• There is even the possibility that #3) companies who clearly pass WP:GNG, such as Circle_(company) and the other bitcoin startups, could be down-merged into a paragraph of the appropriate city.

I'm not arguing this idea is a panacea of bliss, there will still be plenty of COI-encumbered clueless wiki-beginners (not all of them IP-anons dern it! ;-) but I think it is a better way to manage things than the hardline approach to handling COI, which I will unfairly mischaracterize as ban-'em-all-and-let-the-great-jimbo-sort-out-the-wiki-bodies. See my argument at the AfD, that the mall-article (and the businesses-of-xyz even more so) could be #4) a recruiting-tool... this is an expansion on that, which will also double as a way to mitigate the COI-encumbrance-problem, by putting all the COI-eggs into one basket, as it were. Whether it is a better idea, than what we are quickly moving towards, remains to be seen, but I do agree it is different from what we are quickly moving towards. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 19:08, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

WP:NOT business listing COI magnet, WP:INDISCRIMINATE. Suggest AfC or some other place is better location for discussing new articles (no idea why I'm pinged). Widefox; talk 16:11, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

There is no way of preventing promotionalism in an encycopedia that permits anonymous editing. There is no way of preventing undisclosed COI editing either, for the same reason. We have been able to detect those we have, because they've not understood editing here well enough to avoid detection--and because all edits on borderline notable subjects of certain types clearly merit investigation. If we lower the standard of notability, it will be all the easier for them.

We are not in great need of people who will write on local subjects; we are not in need of people who will write on barely notable subjects. We are in need of people who can write on the clearly notable subjects that not enough people have been interested in, and the obvious area properly receiving current attention here is our continuing gender bias. But what we need even more are people who can rewrite the existing promotional editing on the clearly notable subjects. Almost all articles on major corporations and nonprofit organizations need complete rewriting. They've been contaminated by PR from various sources: the PR people who have written many of the articles, the volunteers who write like PR editors because they think that's what we want here, and the inevitably PR writing based on the RW sources being PR in the first place.

It's unfortunate that a few honest paid editors have gotten undue suspicion. But, quite frankly, I would very strongly support eliminating all paid editing whatsoever. Their fundamental mission is not really compatible with a NPOV encycopedia.

However, the proposition that we write as volunteers basic factual articles on all clearly notable organizations is a reasonable idea. If we do it, we shouldstart at the top, not see how far we can go to the bottom. DGG ( talk ) 04:58, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

Well expressed. The only substitute for the editorial supervision that Wikipedia of necessity lacks is to depend on high quality sources that do have editorial supervision that insists on fact checking, a skeptical attitude toward press releases, and disclosure of COIs. The most reliable of sources are characterized by strict insistence on declaring C.O.I.s, and even the appearance of C.O.I.s, and the use of press releases as no more than sources of questions to ask. The more time spent working on articles written from a source-rich environment (the truly notable), the better our instincts become for working in less information-rich environments. This should be the starting point for pulling out the effects of systemic bias by developing skepticism toward hand-outs and coi claims. (The NYT public editor has just written a piece on two Times published book reviews in which the reviewers assigned had undisclosed COIs).

Wikipedia needs properly sourced articles on corporations—for completeness; the same reason Wikipedia needs any article. But not so much that non-NPOV, poorly sourced articles need be allowed. Wikipedia has accessibility, reliability, and completeness to offer. Completeness is getting out ahead of reliability—this is a perversion of our goals. While it may be admirable to strive for completeness (an impossible goal), reliability back-stopped by adequate cites to WP:RS is existential. —Neonorange (talk) 06:19, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

Inherited notability

....

I don't agree with the inherited notability argument above, or that notability can be measured by job title or award. Her notability can be established using the traditional method of evaluating sources, which in my view is the only basis from which notability should be measured. However, I don't question her notability, only whether her publication being nominated for this particular award is significant enough to warrant inclusion in her profile. I wasn't sure what you meant to say in this regard. Is the National Magazine Award known to the public? David King, Ethical Wiki (Talk) 02:19, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

What I think is the correct way to look at inherited notability is that the fact that a person is notable, doesn't mean that everything they do is notable; even a notable person does many less important things. But the way a person becomes notable is by doing important things, so that someone who has done sufficiently important things is notable. The nearest formally recognized analogy here is WP:PROF, where being editor in chief of a major journal is fully sufficient proof of notability. I would extend that to all media. The National Magazine Award certainly wasn't known to me before I looked at this. Based on the information in our article, i would say winning one should certainly be included. For finalist, it needs the recognition of the Nobel or the Booker or the Academy Award. DGG ( talk ) 03:58, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

General concept of whether there should be an article

...

Basic principle from WP:N--passing the GNG does not guarantee an article if it is more appropriate as a section in another article. And there of many other factors for whether an articles should be made: for example, avoiding the appearance of promotionalism or over-emphasis or just plain COI. The way to avoid these for someone notable for a single accomplishment/book/organization is whether to make the article on the accomplishment/book/organization or the person. (I usually see it for books and authors). If an author has written several notable but not famous books, I usually suggest that author, with sections for the books, which can be expanded if they're highly notable. If an author has one, I usuAlly recommend doing it on the person also, because if one books is successful, they are likely to write others. But if the book is much better known, which a first book may well be, then the book. This is a case where the restaurant is the better known. If you wrote one on the author also, it would duplicate much of the material, because you'd have to explain something about the restaurant. Such duplication looks like promotionalism, & can attract negative attention. If one just linked that part, the article would seem too scanty even if technically justifiable, and thus attract unfavorable attention.

Since there are many people here who can make a negative case against anything, and some who have a prejudice against any particular class of article or subject field, the best thing is to not attract them. I deprecate the GNG altogether--for any disputed article I can argue either way whether any reference is substantially about the subject, whether it is truly independent, whether it is based on PR, whether it is in essence a true 3rd party source. I choose which way to argue based on the result I think will help the encyclopedia (by which I of course mean my vision of what will help the encyclopedia. DGG ( talk ) 00:51, 9 October 2015 (UTC)

general response on Orangemoody socks

The difficult problem is is how to handle potential articles on the people & companies who have been exploited by the undeclared page editors. Most of the time, the problem does not arise: For orangemoody, 5% at most were likely to be notable ; in previous editing rings, the percentage has ranged from 10% all the way down to zero, depending on the general subject area. Aside from these large rings, there has also been use of undeclared paid editing by actually notable business concerns, sometimes with existing articles--most of the time, they knew very well what they were doing was deceitful, even before the clarification in our terms of service. In any case, I really do not see how anyone can ever have deluded themselves that paying to have an article written about themselves in an encycopedia was ethical, or that any respectable encycopedia would have staff who would accept such payment. True, a great many of those exploited did in perfect honesty not fact realize we were other than an advertising medium; some of the fault for this is in the promotion-ridden commercialized nature of society, but some is in our own lax prior practices.

In those cases where a subject is actually highly notable, I think the only reasonable solution is for someone here to write an article in the ordinary way. In most cases, I would advocate waiting at least 6 or 12 months, to avoid giving the impression that we do not remove paid articles. If someone is borderline notable, it as always will depend if anyone is interested, but my personal inclination is that I have other priorities: the truly notable subjects that are not covered. A practical question is whether the deleted material can be furnished to reliable editors prepared to rewrite. I think this would be subject to discretion, and anyone doing this needs to check that the material is not simply reinserted in altered form. (It would actually be a violation of copyright to do that without giving proper attribution to the paid editor!)

If someone else submits obvious coi material without a declaration of coi, the priority is to check for another member of the ring of sockpuppets, not to see if we can have the article. This is best done by one of the admins at spi; one of the main reasons I became an admin was to check deleted material. For articles written with a coi, deleting is more likely to be needed than rescuing.

...

Several of the checkusers have worked with these in detail, and they're the experts in this in general. But those of us who work with particular types of subjects gain special experience at recognizing problems with them. There have been , and will be, other rings, tho so far some of the Orangemoody techniques are thankfully unique. The attempt at promotional articles will always be a problem , if we retain open editing and anonymous users. The problem intensifies as the RW importance of getting a WP page increases. All we can do is try to reduce a combination of various means to try and reduce the impact. One key step has been taken: the current terms of use, and the general recognition here that they are enforceable policy. There are a variety of other possibilities, and I'd expect everything anyone can think of to be considered. One key change requires no change in written policy, and is a matter of outr individual attitudes: to interpret the notability requirements much more strictly in susceptible fields. There are some areas where we should stop accepting borderline articles if they show signs of promotionalism or promotional intent or possible sockpuppettry. So I argue at AfDs, and the position is often supported. I therefore do not agree with 75.'s efforts at trying to rescue such articles--they are better simply gotten rid of. The time spent in trying to fix them is counterproductive in two ways: it encourages the promotional editors, and it prevents us doing more useful work, such as writing the hundreds of thousands of needed articles on notable people, or maintaining the articles we have already. (I shared 75'a attitude for several years when I first came here, but with the rise in promotionalism my priority is now the opposite, and least in some subjects--including even some of my favorite fields.) The time spent on this article, and one lower down on the page in the last week or so, has made me resolve that I will no longer help promotional editors, unless the subject is so famous I'd write the article myself. DGG ( talk ) 01:28, 30 October 2015 (UTC)

For what it's worth

David, I just wanted to say that you are one of the biggest disappointments of this extremely disappointing ArbCom class. Resign. Carrite (talk) 01:25, 27 October 2015 (UTC)

Carrite (talk · contribs): Perhaps you mean that I should have done more. While I have discovered I can not do as much as I intended, I think I'm accomplishing more than if I had left the committee. But if you mean that my effect has been a net negative, I think I have come to understand the problems we are faced with better than you do. DGG ( talk ) 06:13, 27 October 2015 (UTC)

Question

Hey Dave, I wanted to know if you've ever been at the edge of retiring or ever thought of it? Considering you've been here for almost ten years as have I, there must've been times you had the impulse of retiring. I ask because I certainly have come and go in that time and although I sincerely appreciate this website and its concept (and I get hooked in periods here and there as I have recently, I always get walled by some eventual drama), the unnecessary and tiring drama simply seems to be unavoidable sometimes. Frankly, I think the fact several people have serious health troubles affects this sometimes especially if it's mental and psychological. Cheers, SwisterTwister talk 05:00, 28 October 2015 (UTC)

I never thought I'd say it, but I find that I am considerably more reluctant each day to start editing WP. In general the inevitable frustration of the way this system necessarily works can be dealt with by moving from one area to another, but I may be beginning to feel that I've done as much here as I can. Perhaps the fault is arb com, where the public work is frustrating for we almost never actually solve any problem (at least, nothing we've done this year has helped much), and the private discussions which are the bulk of the actual work are not just frustrating but distinctly unpleasant for me, as I generally find myself in a very small minority--I had not realized the extent of the focus on narrow legalism rather than substance. I only remain on the committee in the hope that the new arbs will be more willing to think in terms of benefit to the encycopedia, not in terms of what people "deserve." Of all the places in WP where IAR has a role, it is most relevant to the work of the committee, which has much greater powers of discretion than any individual admin. I suppose having said this much, I should emphasize that personally, I very much like every one of them whom I know--they're much more human outside the committee. DGG ( talk ) 21:26, 31 October 2015 (UTC)

I don't know if it is wiki-kosher for arbs to name specific usernames, that they would like as new arbs, but if so, please write up a voterguide, DGG. Or if you prefer, just toss out the names you had in mind, or even, the generic criteria that you are looking for. I too would like to see more IAR on the committee, although I also like the arbcom folks I'm familiar with, present company very much included. But it is a hard and thankless job. ( I will contradict my own flat statement by saying, thanks for doing what you can, it is appreciated.) In particular, nobody wants to do the arbcom thing; it is a huge timesink to run, and like a super-RfA tends to attract mostly new critics and little praise. Even if you "win" you tend to be the focus-point of much angst and many complaints. Point being, DGG, if you are permitted by your wiki-honour to urge people to run, that you think would be good arbs, in whatever fashion, please do so. Same goes for your compadres, if you can ask that they speak out. There are some folks already announcing candidacies at WP:ACE2015/C, but Yunshui just retired, and none of the arbs up for re-election have yet put forth their names. Because it has been such a hard year, this is an important arb-election methinks. Best, 75.108.94.227 (talk) 16:34, 8 November 2015 (UTC)

Precious again

Precious again, your not supporting to lose the valuable admin service of Yngvadottir!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:51, 28 October 2015 (UTC)

Happy Easter, Wikipedia:Main Page history/2016 March 27, with thanks for your ARCA statement, KISS! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:40, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

Wine

	A glass of wine for you
	Thanks for all you do! Heathart (talk) 03:37, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

Article cleanup?

Hey DGG, I was wondering about that article cleanup you wanted me to help with. I know you were going to send me an e-mail giving me examples of what needed to be changed, but I don't think I ever got it. I was wondering if you still wanted me to do it or not. It'll likely have to wait until after school lets out, since I remember you saying it was going to be pretty time consuming. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 10:42, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

Ben-Ami Shulman

David- thanks so much for your invaluable help! I look forward to many sessions BEN-AMI SHULMAN (talk) 22:05, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

Old Portage Road (New York)

You saved this from CSD13. After a slight clean up / rename, it's in mainspace at Old Portage Road (New York). FeatherPluma (talk) 21:31, 15 November 2015 (UTC)

FeatherPluma, thanks for picking up on it--all I did was repeatedly decline to delete by G13 in the hope someone would see it. I'd be very interested to know how you spotted it because one of our recurrent problems with AfC is how to get the drafts worked on by other than the original editors. DGG ( talk ) 00:01, 16 November 2015 (UTC) DGG ( talk ) 09:11, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

I would also be curious to know the answer to how FeatherPluma found this topic. There are three ways to get drafts worked on by people other than the original editors:

1. Attract other long-haul wikipedians to work the AfC queue, by making the work more attractive (tried and failed... long-haul people who wanna work AfC already know where to find it)
2. Change the AfC-submission template, so that as soon as the author clicks 'submit' ... or even before they click submit ... they can see a selection of other articles sitting in the AfC queue, and the usernames of the authors/originators associated with those other AfC articles. The template could explicitly suggest helping other good-faith wikipedians in the queue, by saying something like "Thank you for submitting your article to be reviewed! The queue is currently N days and NNN articles long. While you are waiting, you can help other people in the queue improve *their* articles, if you like -- this would be very WP:NICE of you, and might even speed up the queue." This method is a slight variation on how User:Anne_Delong got started as a wikipedian, so it might even work, although of course there will be some aspect of the blind-leading-the-blind.
3. Something a bit more risky: mainspace anything that ought to be an article, regardless of the current state of the prose and the refs, then undelete it per IAR, when the inevitable insta-deletion occurs (N.B. this method only works if you are a sitting arb with the heft to make your undeletions per WP:ILIKEIT actually stick :-)

User:Kudpung also has put forth the option, of merging NPP with AfC, so as to automagically have the NPP folks help with tagging/rating/patrolling/etc the draftspace articles; whether this counts as "getting the drafts worked on" will partly depend upon the definition of "work" one opts to utilize. Certainly it would bring more *eyeballs* to draftspace generally and the AfC subset thereof specifically. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 23:09, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

• There are lots of things that haven't been tried yet. One more thing that could be done to attract people to drafts would be to alter the search engine software so that if someone typed "Son of Foo", and there was no article, but there was "Draft:Son of Foo", then instead of saying "You can start the Son of Foo article, it would say "You can improve Draft:Son of Foo and help it become an article" or some such. Or how about a "Today's abandoned draft for improvement"? And there are more ideas at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Abandoned Drafts. But if you are going to suggest that editors improve each other's drafts, I would not make it automatic, but have a template that reviewers and Teahouse hosts could selectively drop on the talk pages of editors who appear to have made a good start - maybe to this page: Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation/Submissions/List.—Anne Delong (talk) 01:27, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Brilliant Idea Barnstar
	Thanks for helping me on wikiD New York writing workshop yesterday. Elf-I-D (talk) 21:36, 15 November 2015 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Admin's Barnstar
	You are the best in helping as well as in editing. Kudos! Josu4u (talk) 22:06, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Appropriate content for a university page

Hi, DGG. I was reading the page of Case Western Reserve University, and it seems to me that it's getting to be more like a promotional webpage than an encyclopedia article. Since you work with a lot of these types of subjects, maybe you can tell me if it's appropriate to include noted alumni in the lead, and a long list of academic rankings. I also don't understand the section called Undergraduate Profile. Am I just getting too fussy?—Anne Delong (talk) 10:42, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Almost all university pages in WP are similar to PR. There are two types: when the whole thing is an integrated PR effort, or -- like here -- where particularly PR-like sections are added to specific parts of an acceptable basic skeleton. And a third type, where either the central PR or the PR forthe individual unitshave tried to write separation pages for everything possible. There was one university which tried to write an article for the expanded quonset hut they used for a placement center. & another for the building where they stored the maintenance equipment. Enthusiastic students can do just as bad, but they do it differently:I;veseen articles for individual floors in a residence hall, and I think once for an individual suite.

It is normal to include the 2 or 3 most famous alumni in the lede--the appropriate standard I think is world famous. That they put the computer entrepreneurs there instead of the Nobel laureates says something about priorities. The academic rankings, alas, are standard. At least they're in the proper location, near the bottom. I did some tinkering, but I've seen worse. If I fixed them all, I could do nothing else. DGG ( talk ) 17:18, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, DGG for taking the time to look at it.—Anne Delong (talk) 06:05, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

Women scientists

Hi DGG. In your detailed assessment of the acceptability of the article on Rhonda Patrick, you tell us "There is an unfortunate undercoverage of notable women scientists, and there are thousands of notable ones to include. We should fill this by starting from the most notable." Can you share with us at least a few of the names (or direct us to pertinent sources) as we are currently engaged in a virtual editathon on women in science. It is not unreasonable to expect at least a thousand new start-class articles on women scientists over the next few weeks or months. If you wish, you can add red links to Wikipedia:WikiProject Women/Women in Red/Women science and technology. If not, simply list names here or on my talk page.--Ipigott (talk) 11:09, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

I agree this should be done. I am not sure I have time to do it. I can provide some guidelines for anyone wanting to do it. Note that they apply to women academics in general, not just scientists. I do not make a differentiation here in what I work on & perhaps you might want to consider this also.

(1) anyone who is president of a major college or university is notable. There are some obvious colleges to check here. tho some had male presidents in the past, and a few of the most impt seem to be done already. Checking a few, Simmons hasn't been done.

(2) Anyone in the Institute of Medicine or National Academy of Sciences or NAEngineering is notable. There should be a number in the IOM and NAS at least, who may not yet have been covered.

(3) All people in all distinguished named chairs are always notable. The lists in some appropriate colleges should be checked,

(4) Though it isn't a formal rule, essentially all full professors at a major university have in the past been held notable-- except in some traditionally female-dominated fields such as home economics or education or librarianship. I consider this a major inequity, and an indication of true bias at WP. I'm prepared to defend any article on anyone in such a position. I've lost some of these debates in the past. I hope things have changed. Please let me know of any challenged articles here, because this part is a high priority for me. I'm going to revisit the afds I lost in the past.

(5). There a problem with the first women in X field in Y place. It's fine if X and Y are big enough. The first women chemist in a country, for example. If it's the first women faculty member in synthetic inorganic chemistry in a particular state college, then it's not so obvious.

(6). Academics are easy to screen , because there is a formal internal hierarchy. Grad students are almost never notable, post docs very rarely, asst. professors usually not, associate professors usually not tho I disagree with the consensus here and thing they should be, and full, almost always.

(7)In fields where books show academic notability, WP:AUTHOR can be a very useful & flexible criterion.

I also intend to try to verify the existing red links on that page, & I will leave comments. DGG ( talk ) 18:57, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for these guidelines. I had the impression from your earlier comments that you had some specific names in mind. I see now that I was mistaken. Rather than spending your time on examining the notability of red links, I think it would be much more useful if you could add a few names to the red links on scientists -- or indeed any other of the categories listed under Wikipedia:WikiProject Women/Women in Red/Tasks. Maybe you would even like to create one or two new articles yourself? It would be great if you could join the current editathon with at least one article based on your notability criteria.--Ipigott (talk) 21:52, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

They are not my notability criteria -- they are my advice about what has been found to happen here in hundreds of afd discussions to be notable. The advice, as all my advice, is very conservative: it represents what should be safely notable and not challenged, not what might be possibly found notable in a particular discussion by strength of argument or chance of participation. My advice, not limited to this subject, is that people working on these projects should start out be choosing safe subjects, to avoid having a disappointing first experience. With sufficient experience, one can then try to stretch the boundaries a little -- but if one does that, one should be prepared to lose the argument without getting angry about it, or taking it as a lack of understanding on the part of the other participants. AfD can be unpredictable, and my predictive accuracy is not perfect, even when I know I'm right. When I know I'm testing to see if consensus has changed, I pick a point where I expect to succeed about 2/3 the time. To work here, one has to accept that not everything will go as it ought to.

If the question is what I think WP should include, that's another matter entirely.

Almost since my start here eight years ago, I do not generally write articles I want to, but rather on those which need rescue. As you can see from this page, so many people ask for help with their problems that this is my priority. (And it's where I can be most helpful--I'm not particularly creative, but I do know how to fix things.) At projects such as editathons, what I prefer to do is to check that what people are writing is OK; I do it in person in NYC, and I'll do it here for anyone who asks me. Everyone here works on what they want to, and that is what I've chosen. DGG ( talk ) 06:55, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

New users, drafts, and thanks

I am researching the effect of welcoming new users. Thus there are a lot of User talk: pages I created on my watchlist. It is a little depressing to see so many of them coming through with their drafts being deleted G13 six months after they join - but your messages that drafts have been accepted is a ray of sunshine. Thanks for that!

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 00:28, 23 November 2015 (UTC).

Policy change opinion

I believe there should be a sensible balance between deletion and creation of articles which balanced. What is your opinion about requiring an article historically kepted through AfD to undergo a DRV process before renomination as well? Valoem ^{talk contrib} 02:33, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

excess bureaucracy. It is already well established that there has to be a reasonable time between nominations, and that thistime increases after successive keeps. We haven't been able to mandate specific months or years, but we no longer seethe 6 or 7 times repeated attempts to delete an article we did when I joined. consensus can and does change, and afds are where the action is. What they need for fairer & more consistent decisions is more participation, and that's what we should focus on. If you are referring to Fastwalkers, I don'rt see it was kept by previous afds. The recent one is the first. If you have some other article in mind, what article is that? DGG ( talk ) 06:52, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

It was something I noticed in general not related with Fastwalkers. I believe certain situations which require deleted articles to go through DRV, should apply to kept articles as well. It was a question I pondered when I read Emijrp's sum of human knowledge which calculates that there are at least 104 million notable articles that should exist here, we are at a mere 5 million. The reason is the flaw of human nature inherent in us all. While we are all here to built an encyclopedia we are also here to ensure our views prevail, after all, ego is unavoidable. The degree which we suffer varies. Some people become defensive to the point they refuse to admit a mistake was made, protect their views knowing it is incorrect, find petty reasons to maintain it and then mobbing, as you eloquently put it, occurs. There are those who edit to expressive themselves by content creation and others through content deletion and much like defense and offense in combat, defense (being reactive) has its advantages. If the growth of Wikipedia is to be maintained policy needs to favor content creation and entice new editors.

Right now, policy favors deletion and impends the rate of content creation. It may take a hundred editors to create an article, but only one to delete it. To combat this, policy should be changed to favor inclusion. AfD by nature favors deletion, modifying policies to slightly favor inclusion brings natural balance. Requiring a DRV process for renomiation seems like a sensible start we could avoid situations like OpEdNews where a single editor refuses to admit error and attempts to have content removed perhaps in hopes previous participants are occupied elsewhere.

Another idea is to make AfD closure numerically based. For example, we could require a minimum amount of participation from established editors before discussion is valid. The AfD nominator's opinion should accounted and their vote discounted, after all he is looking for the agreement of others, this prevents articles with little to no discussion from being deleted. This of course should not apply to promotional or vanity articles, but NPOV articles with secondary sources. Fewer the participants means higher probability of missed sources and errors. Perhaps a new close called lack of discussion which defaults to keep could be included and applied to articles which have secondary sources. Of course discretion should be applied in exceptional cases. In the end, numbers don't lie, minimum AfD participation requirements could partially remove human bias and error. Valoem ^{talk contrib} 08:27, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

Regarding the main/sub-article relationship project

Hi DGG,

Thanks for replying to our page in the Village pump. I've created a Meta:Research page which details the research questions https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Main/sub-article_relationship Of course, you are welcome to take our survey and/or give us feedback! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cheetah90 (talk • contribs) 17:14, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

h-index

I wanted to look up some h-indexs for professors on Google Scholar, what is the general recommend level for notability and how would I do this using google scholar? Valoem ^{talk contrib} 21:35, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Look for their name in the form "FM Last", not their full name. The results will be in approximate descending order by the number of citations. Sort out those references that are to web sites, non-academic journals, newspaper articles, and the like. Th h index is the highest number where are that many papers with that least that many citations: r.g., if the counts as typical for a probably not notable biomedical scientist, are:

40, 35, 33, 30, 29, 27, 26, 25, 24, 22, 21, 21, 20, 18, 17, 16, 15, 14, 13,12, 12, 12, 11, 10, 8, 5, ....... their h=16, because there are 16 papers that have been cited 16 times or more. I report these counts saying just that italicized phrase, rather than report it as an index ,because it is clearer in words..

But the h index can be deceptive. Consider another biomedical scientist, almost certainly notable:

190, 180, 170, 60, 30, 10 , 5, 5, 4, 3 .... . For them, the h=6.

But which is the more notable? The h index emphasises doing a great deal of not very important work, over people who do a smaller amont of extremely important work. DGG ( talk ) 23:04, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Button makers

Hey, because of L. Nichols Buttons AfD, I was wondering, "Does Wikipedia actually have any button makers of notability?" I didn't find anything, but I keep thinking that that can't be right! Thanks! --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 01:26, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

There should be sources. It was in the NYC garment trade a distinctly separate industry. There are probably sources on historic manufacturers also. But in checking, beware: most of the material I can find on WorldCat is about political pin-on buttons, not buttons fro garments, and most of the rest about buttons for military uniforms. But see: Newberger, Edward Louis. The Button Industry in the United States. Haworth, N.J.: St. Johann Press, 1998. and Jones, W. Unite. The Button Industry. London: Sir I. Pitman & Sons, 1924. DGG ( talk ) 02:22, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

So, then I'm getting that Wikipedia has zero articles on button makers. Correct?! (Except that one currently being deleted, that is!) --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 19:32, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

In the NYC trade, the firms were mostly very small; I think it quite possible that none were notable. I have no knowledge elsewhere. Nut has several dozen elevant books listed in addition to the oes I already identified, in particular Jones, Nora Owens, and Edith Mattison Fuoss. Black Glass Buttons. Ypsilanti, Mich: University lithoprinters, 1945. DGG ( talk ) 19:55, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

This is a fascinating and worthwhile topic. While a modern invention such as zippers will tend to have notable manufacturers associated with the project -- see, e.g., the Wikipedia article on the YKK Group -- the button is one of those objects that's long been so familiar that its history is obscure. Important button makers do pop up in conjunction with subjects that are notable for other reasons or as an incidental mention in a larger discussion; for instance, the button makers of Birmingham are mentioned in the article on Matthew Boulton, while the button making industry of Muscatine, Iowa is discussed in the page on that town, and the storied royal button maker Firmin & Sons has its own page, even if buttons get only a brief mention. (For more background on Firmin & buttons, check out its website [8]. However, one could argue that separate pages could be made for companies or regional button-making industries such as these due to their significant historical impact; the Birmingham button makers were recently the subject of a book by economist George Selgin -- Good Money: Birmingham Button Makers, the Royal Mint, and the Beginnings of Modern Coinage, 1775-1821; the Arcadia Images of America series has a well-researched book on Muscatine's Pearl Button Industry; and Slate had a nice general overview of other key developments [9] Maybe the folks at The Button Room museum, the National Button Society, or the British Button Society would be interested in buttressing the button history here, assuming they have access to even more research. In the meantime, I'm going to see if I can dig a little deeper on L. Nichols. Fashionethics (talk) 01:35, 11 December 2015 (UTC)

Gonstead technique

What is your opinion with chiropractics coverage? This technique is the third most common in this field. I do agree a chiropractics is a form of quackery, but should be have some coverage on major techniques. I think this passes our GNG guidelines, but some editors deny the use of sources from within the field, what is your opinions on this? Valoem ^{talk contrib} 13:17, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

bias and prejudice, is what I think it. I commented there, though without using those words. DGG ( talk ) 19:43, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar
	Thanks DGG, ideal solution and we keep an emerging editor. Well Done Victuallers (talk) 20:45, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Self citation

I got the impression you may be familiar with the McKinsey Quarterly and I know you are also interested in several related topics (self-citation COI, improving business pages, etc.), so I thought I would bring this RSN post to your attention in case you were interested and/or had an expert contribution to the topic. David King, Ethical Wiki (Talk) 17:02, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

I never knew it existed until this moment, but I'll look at the discussion. (I just read some of the articles, which seem excellent; their greatest virtue is clarity.) DGG ( talk ) 19:24, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

The "Articles" tend to focus on McKinsey's recommendations ("China should do XYZ"). This is good information for current or prospective clients to see what type of recommendations they make, but I don't think it is appropriate for Wikipedia and as an involved party in their own recommendations, that's a bit primary. However, if you click "Download the Full Report," those usually have mountains of data deeper into the report about market sizes, global economy, demographics, etc. that I think could be useful in improving core business pages. I don't think it's overly boastful when McKinsey claims in the report to have collected the best available data on the subject - this is what they are known for. David King, Ethical Wiki (Talk) 01:51, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

subjective criteria and afd

hi david,

I hope this is an appropriate space to ask about how to improve an AfD(if not please let me know !), and also to clarify your viewpoint on what is surely a subjective criteria. in regards to a comment that you made about inclusion in a museum collection being a reasonable criteria for notability. the guidelines here dont make a distinction as to the merit of a particular museum or gallery. suffice to say that i mostly agree with your assessment of the particular institution in question,you fail to back your claim with a reasonable argument. please advise so i can best respond thank you!

I hope this is an appropriate space to ask about how to improve an AfD(if not please let me know !), and also to clarify your viewpoint on what is surely a subjective criteria. in regards to a comment that you made about inclusion in a museum collection being a reasonable criteria for notability. the guidelines here dont make a distinction as to the merit of a particular museum or gallery. suffice to say that i mostly agree with your assessment of the particular institution in question,you fail to back your claim with a reasonable argument. please advise so i can best respond thank you!

	+	

Etidorhpaunderground (talk) 15:39, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Involuntary celibacy (4th nomination)

... In addition to any particular prejudice against this particular topic, WP can show a remarkable degree of prejudice against some sexual topics. Like many individuals and organizations, WP's willingness to accept such things is in principle very broad, but in practice is limited to what people are familiar or comfortable with. DGG ( talk ) 05:43, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

DGG| DGG]] ( talk ) 05:31, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

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Redirects becoming articles

Here you are my friend: Special:AbuseFilter/342. Let's look into re-enabling, it'd be good to have the log for review, even if they are mostly constructive. Cheers — MusikAnimal ^talk 20:37, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

Turns out the page curation tool already picks up articles that become redirects. Not sure how, but I did some tests, and it works. This means they will appear in Special:NewPagesFeed. Now all we have to do is tackle that 1000+ page backlog :) — MusikAnimal ^talk 05:16, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Inclusion in a research presentation

Hi DGG. I've been building robust measures of productivity for Wikipedia editors. I'd like to use your edit history as an example when demonstrating the measures. See my write-up of the general measurement strategy here: m:Research:Measuring edit productivity. See my notes on your productivity here: m:Research_talk:Measuring_edit_productivity/Work_log/2016-01-18. TL;DR: It looks like your contributions to Wikipedia have been consistent since 2006. This stands in contrast to the bursty activity of me and Jimbo Wales. You've also contributed several orders of magnitude more productive content than I have (2.5 million vs. 17k "persisting words"). ;)

I'd like to present these graphs and the discussion you see beneath them at the January version of the mw:Wikimedia Research/Showcase tomorrow. Would that be OK? --EpochFail (talk • contribs) 18:06, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

EpochFailCertainly you can include it. I note that when I retired from Princeton & LIU as a librarian, I discovered Wikipedia, and after a few months experience, consciously determined to make a consistent almost full-time effort. There are others in similar positions. For some of us in my age group, various life factors have caused periods of inactivity, but that has not happened to me. Anecdotally, I've seen that for some of our members in the 30s to 50s, periods of their activity in WP have coincided with periods of their unemployment. Analogously, it's long been known to librarians that increased library use is seen during periods of economic depression.

I have one question that is not clear from your graphs: is your data coming only from Article space? I ask because I would have thought that more of my activity in recent years has been elsewhere. And I am only 98th in the count of WPedians by number of edits. My rank in that table has risen only very slowly over the years DGG ( talk ) 21:59, 19 January 2016 (UTC) which would confirm your hypothesis that the other highly active editors are also consistently active. DGG ( talk ) 21:59, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Indeed, I'm only looking at article space, but I would imagine that your work on drafts would eventually lead toward article space. Generally, measuring productive contribution outside of articles is very difficult, but something that I hope we'll have some good new thoughts about. E.g. productivity on templates may be related to template usage. Talk page productivity would be much more difficult to track, but I imagine that we can at least flag obviously unproductive discussion posts automatically using machine learning and natural language processing.

I haven't done any sort of ranking for Wikipedians by this measure of productivity yet, but when I do, I'll get back to you. --EpochFail (talk • contribs) 22:06, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

for Drafts, when I accept an article that needs fixing, sometimes I make my edits on the Draft and then move to mainspace, but equally often I will move to mainspace and fix it there (especially if I want to use visual editor, which I prefer for finding the correct internal links to add) DGG ( talk ) 01:40, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

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It feels odd...

...to be on the opposite side of a discussion from you, but it seems to keep happening recently! So here, have a thumbnail picture of a cup of tea, which apparently has some form of magical reconciliatory power :) Thparkth (talk) 19:45, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

GG| DGG]] ( talk ) 21:57, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

Draft prod instead

Ok, it looks like the G13 thing is going like the prior G13 discussions so I say we think up something new. What about a draftprod idea? It's suggested. It's not a speedy but it'll clear MFD through a different process and I think it can cover most people's concerns. Something like "any userspace or draftspace draft of an article that hasn't been edited in six months where the creator hasn't made an edited in the last year can be proposed for deletion if after seven days an admin determines that the draft has no likelihood of becoming an article." Any draft can be obviously removed by anyone and there's MFD then. Just off the top of my head but one year is WP:STALEDRAFT so maybe one year not six months and make this part of the STALE deletion process. I'm not sure where this complexity of 'what is a draft' is coming from but that's the only problem I'm still seeing. It's enough multiple parts here but we can suggest the idea first and then do a separate exceedingly complicated broken up RFC to offer the idea. What do you think? -- Ricky81682 (talk) 23:20, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

Strike this whole idea. It's not necessary. MFD, while not ideal, I think could handle this. I may suggest it again if MFD becomes unmanageable. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 10:45, 27 January 2016 (UTC)

In figuring out to do , we need to consider the purpose. There are three basic classes of material

1. Material that might significant contribute to a plausible article. In my opinion, this should never be deleted regardless of time, or whether the editor is active. What we need to do with these is to make findable. My main concern with these is to make sure that none of these get deleted. I've been spending half my time on that for a year now, and I would oppose anything that makes this harder.

2. Material that is abandoned but harmless, and will never make an article. There's been a lot of activity here lately--I regard this as a rather low priority. When we do clean up, it's more important to clean up the areas of Draft space and WT:AfC/ , which are joint-use non-private work areas, than Userspace or User talk space, which can accommodate a little harmless junk because it is not in the way. Cleaning up user/Usertalk space is in my mind an extremely low priority. The priority is in removing stuff that is harmful, and fixing what is erroneous or outdated. That probably amounts to at least 1 or 2 million articles.

3.Material that is harmful and shouldn't be here. The main types of that are advertising and copyvio. G11 & G12 is what we need here.

The main use of MfD for Draftspace is removing material that keeps getting resubmitted but will never make an article and isn't bad enough to be called G11.

The current attempt to remove variant incomplete article versions that do not contain harmful material is in my opinion unnecessary. It would be more important to check them to se if there is material there that would be useful in mainspace. DGG ( talk ) 03:40, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

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A beer for you!

on me…. Padudarrific (talk) 14:48, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

Campaign to Keep It an Encyclopedia, not a Business Directory

Can you take a look at these two: Stellar (payment network) and Pure Storage? I don't think they warrant being in an encyclopedia. What's the criteria for a company having an article in Wikipedia? It has to be remarkable in some way, right? Chisme (talk) 17:55, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

not exactly. It has to meet the WP:GNG, as explained further at WP:CORPDEPTH, but any individual case is decided at WP:AFD according to the policy-based consensus of the Wikipedians present. The general view is that the GNG is not met by routine announcements and Press releases, but the interpretation of this is often disputed. I personally sometimes take a stricter requirement for this than does the consensus, and the consensus is what decides.

In the two cases you mention, Pure Storage is on the main board of the NYSE and therefore almost certainly willl be considered notable enough for an article; Stellar seems to have gotten a good deal of technical press about its algorithm, and would almost certainly qualify also. Both articles are however quite promotional , and in need of major improvements.

I see you have been trying to fix articles on some similar companies. I consider AppDynamics borderline; Shyp borderline at best though there is some recent material that might make me think otherwise; I listed Stripe (company) for AfD as not notable; Sidecar was never notable, but it did get some press; I'm going to try to merge it. DGG ( talk ) 22:54, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for all that. I don't think Wiki should be naive. There is a certain cache about having your company written up in an encyclopedia, but I don't think Wiki should be used that way. Chisme (talk) 05:40, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

My strategy in raising our standard, is that the key step is to deal with the material which clearly does not meet our current standard,and that will clearly be deleted at AfD. In my experience, AfD rather than policy pages is where the action is, because it's how we interpret the rules that makes the actual difference . Removing that raises our average, and we can also proceed with trying to convince the community to raise it further--that is best done by trying to see with a few AfDs just what the consensus is, and how fast it is changing. In arguing, I try to lead a little; in judging, I stay with the mainstream; in giving advice, I try just to say what the current practice is and try to emphasise that it is not I who makes the decisions. DGG ( talk ) 06:09, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

I was at a business meeting in Silicon Valley a couple months ago as part of a freelance PR team. I was the writer. The subject of Wikipedia came up. "Can we get an article for our company?" This kind of thing goes on a lot. Wiki really ought to lay out criteria about when a company or business belongs and when it doesn't. Chisme (talk) 06:39, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes indeed, but Wikipedia goes by consensus, and unfortunately consensus has been to rely primarily on the GNG. I've been trying to convince people of the absurdity and inconsistency of this for 7 years now (my first year here I was naïve enough to believe in it). The way to do it is to argue in that direction at enough AfDs that people accept the idea. Perhaps it will only take a few years more. I'm a librarian--librarians think on that time scale. DGG ( talk ) 09:25, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

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Thank you for supporting my RfA

	Brianhe RfA Appreciation award
	Thank you for participating at my RfA. Your support was very much appreciated even if I did get a bit scorched. Brianhe (talk) 07:50, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

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I'll just note that the article Montoya, New Mexico (different from the draft of the same title) has existed since 2013 and has a photo of the Richardson Store, which is listed on the NRHP. So obviously the draft should be deleted, but not the article. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 14:43, 7 February 2016 (UTC)

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Deleted page Mangold Dangling

Sir, I was looking for a reference to Mangold Dangling, a long-standing game akin to human skittles enjoyed within the engineering community of the Royal Navy; I can see that there was an article which you deleted in 2012 as a hoax. The game exists (I can probably find some reference to it, or even pictures if I look hard enough), but do not wish the page to be deleted if I write a new page. Alternatively, is it possible for the old page to be restored (I do not know the process well enough)? Thanks, Jon F — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.89.130.70 (talk) 00:53, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

I will get to this tomorrow. DGG ( talk ) 06:14, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

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The lightbulb finally went off

In the beginning, I had a bit of a problem latching on to your concerns over "puffery" in the Gabor B. Racz article, but I think your efforts have finally paid off. To better understand the message you were sending me, I studied some of the articles you created and edited. I learn better with a hands-on approach. The first BLPs I reviewed made the lightbulb go on -Carl Joe Williams, Philip Needleman, H. Boyd Woodruff. By the time I got to Theodore Rappaport the light was much brighter and I saw exactly what you were trying to teach me. It appears as though other editors went in to that article and added all kinds of puffery and peacock words that I know you deplore, so I deleted them, and added citations needed templates as needed. Hopefully you will realize that I really am trying to learn to be the "encyclopedic" editor you envision from what your experiences have taught you. Thank you for helping me see the light. Atsme^📞📧 01:09, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. Very glad to have the help. But the process of improving articles is never complete. What you did at Rapport was quite good. But consider the need is for proportion: he's a IEEE Fellow, so he's very notable. But he's not a member of the National Academy of Engineering, or any comparable distinction, so he doesn't count as famous. The article is 2 or 3 times the length it should be, and minor material needs to be removed. And it wasn't "various people" who added the puffery, it was one particular promotional editor, with a lot of further tinkering from an ip. Now contrast Woodruff. He is in the NAS, and has received a further --and very exclusive--distinction. The article should be 4 times as long. It needs a more detailed personal bio, and some details about his work and probably a considerable number of other honors. Ditto with Needleman. Williams is OK in proportion, and has been added to appropriately, but needs a little more detail and clarity;

In my own editing, I usually do by successive rounds (tho sometimes i will remove whole sections), and there is so much to work on that I tend to leave an article to work another as soon as I've done the bare essentials. I don't generally recommend that, & I've been criticized for it, but we each have to figure out how we can be most effective. DGG ( talk ) 05:25, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

DGG, I think the article is where it should be now. With collaboration from Derek R Bullamore, who is a citation fixer deluxe, the references/citations are fixed. I'd like to nominate Theodore Rappaport for GA promotion and would very much appreciate a PR from you as the article's creator if you wouldn't mind? Atsme^📞📧 15:17, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

Further good work from both of you. But some more is needed: 1/ a little more bio: place of birth, high school, undergraduate degree, free photo if available 2/the books should be cited to worldcat, not to book dealers. Alternatively the {{isbn}} format template should be used 3/Strictly speaking each individual award needs a reference. But at least the list needs a link to his CV 5/ Many of the citations are a little defective., Press release sources should be minimized. Probably a single link to his cv would replace many of them. 6/the papers selected for citing merely show he worked in a field. They do not show he did significant work in a field. You can fix this by checking citations and listing them. DGG ( talk ) 17:45, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

DGG thank you. If it's ok with you, I'm going to copy your list of what still needs to be done over to the article TP with hopes of recruiting some help. I'm currently helping prepare another article for FA promotion, and as soon as I've completed that chore, I will start back on this one. Atsme^📞📧 22:36, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

IP keeps reverting

DGG - an unregistered IP keeps adding information about the history of wireless technology and promotional company material to Theodore Rappaport which is supposed to be a BLP. It's not unlike attempts to discuss surgical procedures and devices in a BLP about a doctor. There is no way for me to discuss the situation on the IP's talk page because there isn't one, [10]. Suggestions? BLPs fall under DS and I'm certainly not going to edit war with an IP who is proving to be problematic. Atsme^📞📧 04:04, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

I did some editing there. And I left a warning. DGG ( talk ) 06:10, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

DGG - they're back and the added call numbers which I deleted thinking that's personal information not unlike adding somebody's phone number, right? I don't know if I should contact oversight or just advise you so you can redact the numbers. I'm concerned about posting the diff here but I think something needs to be done ASAP. Also, can you semi-protect the page so I can finish editing without worrying about personal information being added again? Thanks in advance. Atsme^📞📧 02:33, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Cyber Defense Labs 2

Why are you recommending a draft article that is under development for speedy deletion? Draft_talk:Cyber_Defense_Labs

The entry on Microsoft is unambiguously self promotional, it includes content lifted directly for its investor reaction page. Firehouse (Armor) has an article in the main section that is obvious self promotional Armor, Inc. are you going to delete it for the main encyclopedia?

I'm trying to profile a group of companies that actually defend critical infrastructure, I'm not getting anything out off this. Why recommend for deletion from DRAFT SPACE!!!!! DrSchlagger (talk) 20:51, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

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Note about professors

The section with this name on your user page may have a problem, or maybe it's just me. I think you may mean "not likely to be notable". I call it a typo, but am not willing to change it on my own, since it reverses the meaning of what you are saying. Lou Sander (talk) 03:08, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

I said "People unfamiliar with the academic world may not realize that even a full professor at a major university is very likely to be notable" and indeed I do think that any full professor at a significant institution is very likely to be notable; I would say further than I think any full professor at a major research university is always notable. And in fact every one of them discussed at WP in the last 5 or 6 years has been found notable, with the exception of those in some special fields about which there is prejudice. Those at institutions less that major research universities, have sometimes been found not notable, but not all that often. DGG ( talk ) 04:19, 9 March 2016 (UTC) Was my wording unclear, or do you disagree? (perhaps there's some lack of clarity in the word "even" -- by which I mean that at ranks of assistant and associate professor, they in fact are not usually considered notable here.) DGG ( talk ) 04:19, 9 March 2016 (UTC) .

It was just me. I misread it, thinking that you said/meant "I thus sometimes delete..." Folks like me might benefit if you said "they thus sometimes delete..." IMHO it would also be clearer if the "even" were deleted. (But I'm just one guy out of the many who would read that paragraph.) Lou Sander (talk) 05:51, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, Lou, I will rephrase accordingly.In generaly, the author is not the best guide to whether what he writes will be unambiguously understood. DGG ( talk ) 03:39, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

Some baklava for you!

Thanks. Psychiatrick (talk) 06:22, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

request for assistance

Hi DGG. I don’t mean to overtax your patience and goodwill, but I thought since you have contributed to Wikipedia:College and University article advice, you may have a natural interest in college pages. Here I have suggested a draft to replace a poorly-sourced and heavily tagged article. If you do get around to taking a look, it would be greatly appreciated and if not, I understand your time is limited. Thank you very much. Berenice at John Cabot University — Preceding unsigned comment added by Berenice at John Cabot University (talk • contribs) 16:50, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

Berenice at John Cabot University, I will try to get to this tomorrow. DGG ( talk ) 05:32, 14 March 2016 (UTC)

Hi DGG. This is just a gentle reminder to take a look at the

draft [11].  I would really appreciate it if you could take a look and I welcome any suggestions you may have.

Thanks so much. Berenice at John Cabot University (talk) 15:14, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

I hear you. I won't forget. DGG ( talk ) 04:46, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

G13 Eligibility Notice

The following pages will become eligible for CSD:G13 shortly.

• Draft:Charles Maria Weber
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Thanks, HasteurBot (talk) 03:01, 12 March 2016 (UTC)

Request for comments on my first draft

Hello David. I hope this reaches you. This is Kevin and we spoke at last weekend's Art+Feminism Wikipedia-thon at MOMA. You suggested that I notify you once I have a reasonable draft for the new proposed article on the artist Renee Radell. May I kindly request that you take at look at the draft page for Renee Radell? Please let me know what you think, how I might improve the article and whether is has merits for pubication. Thanks much! OtterNYC (talk) 02:32, 14 March 2016 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) Draft:Renée Radell Jytdog (talk) 03:18, 14 March 2016 (UTC)

Hull 2017 Page

Hi DGG,

You have deleted the page I created 'Hull UK City of Culture 2017' and I am now unable to recreate it. Please can let me know why you deleted it and how I can reinstate it? I know some referencing still needed to be added but that was what I was planning on working on today!

Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ScandalousB1ue (talk • contribs) 09:33, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

It was an advertisement for the festival. and deleted not just by me, but by another administrator also. I have made it a redirect to the city, and you can add a short section there in the Festivals section--perhaps a single paragraph. Do not duplicate the material already at the appropriate section at the article UK City of Culture. And do not add the programme of the festival or puffery such as "The role of Hull 2017 is to galvanise local stakeholders to instil a shared vision for the city in 2018 and beyond" . DGG ( talk ) 16:02, 15 March 2016 (UT

The whole content of the article couldn't be considered to be an advertisement. The Hull UK City of Culture 2017 event is a year-long event that is taking place in 2017 and should be recognised with it's own article on Wikipedia similarly to Leeds and Reading Festivals etc. The entire programme of the festival has not been confirmed as yet but I was planning on updating the page once it was confirmed and I did include part of the programme strands. How do I go about reinstating the page and I will of course remove any promotional text regarding stakeholders etc as you suggest.

A barnstar for you!

	The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
	Hi DGG, thank you for replying on my behalf on my talk page during my absence. I'm very grateful for your help! Rollingcontributor (talk) 09:23, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

business plans

Hi David. I enjoyed our chat yesterday at the NYC meeting. Please remember to give me a call when you care to discuss business plans and how I might provide some help in that area. Cheers, Kevin — Preceding unsigned comment added by OtterNYC (talk • contribs) 16:06, 17 March 2016 (UTC) Sorry I didn't "sign" my last post. Looking forward to hearing from you on my help with business plan reviews. Thanks! OtterNYC (talk) 22:22, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

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A+F Nebraska WikiWarrior Editathon - new page creation issues

Hi David -- wanted to follow up with you about some of the new page creation issues that occurred during the recent Art+Feminism WikiWarrior Editathon at University of Nebraska-Lincoln. -- Erika aka BrillLyle (talk) 00:30, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
Here's the info pasted below. Draft are not as much of a concern as the rest of these. Thanks for addressing some of this. -- Erika aka 00:38, 19 March 2016 (UTC)

Articles created

Alphabetical by first letter

1. Bernice Slote -- ShreyaChoozi (talk) -- Good job, Orphan, NO references notable - DGG
2. Edith Lewis -- Ejrau21 (talk) -- GREAT JOB! notable - DDD
3. Eliza Pickrell Routt -- Haberdasherer (talk) -- too short notability difficult to determine - DGG
4. Karen S Kavanaugh Miller -- Raethomas (talk) -- Proposed deletion, not patrolled
5. Khenmo drolma -- Agraff5 (talk) -- notability issues, no links, orphan notability impossible to determine--DGG
6. LuAnn Wandsnider -- TChau7 (talk) -- Proposed deletion, not patrolled notable, but inadequate article- DGG
7. Lucile F. Aly -- Marisakaytj (talk) -- person is notable. too short, no links, orphan In my opinion prob. notable under WP:PROF but the current article does not show it Still uncited. DGG ( talk ) 23:06, 16 April 2016 (UTC) DGG
8. Maude Radford Warren -- Erin Cheatham (talk) -- notability issues notable, but needs expansion to show it--DGG
9. Nebraska Innocence Project --Dmartinez17 (talk) -- Great start! -- moved from Sandbox Still at AfD-- DGG
10. Tricia Raikes -- Ashlynlee13 (talk) -- notability issues, Conflict of Interest (they are sponsor?) kept at AfD, but I will renominate -- DGG
11. Women's Voices Now -- Kolokotch (talk) -- not even a stub (2 sentences)
12. Ying Lu -- HannaRogoz (talk) -- notability issues decent citation counts, tho mainly for work done as a PHD student--notability uncertain - DGG

DRAFT

1. Draft:Ada College -- Emttycup (talk) -- too short, not patrolled, not enough to review and WP:TOOSOON- DGG
2. Draft:Anita Sarma -- Bdwiles (talk) -- needs work to turn into a stub ) and WP:TOOSOON- DGG
3. Draft:Female Health Foundation -- Rachelsamuelson (talk) -- too short, two paragraphs, not patrolled, not enough to review & Promotional - DGG
4. Draft:Virginia Faulkner -- Cgwillard (talk) -- Submission declined, possible copyvio / copying, needs work (prob. notable, deserves further work - DGG)

I hope to get to each of these one by one over the coming week. DGG ( talk ) 00:13, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Chemicals

Well this closed keep saying that it is "chemically notable." You never dealt with what I said - that the only reason people care about that chemical is its potential use as a drug. Never responded to that. And I find that to be just disrespectful. And with this "keep" based on your argument - which seemed to me to almost willfully ignore that key thing (the use of the chemical as a potential drug) - you have just shut down an effort I was about to undertake to clean up a particularly filthy part of Wikipedia - a whole slew of articles about putative "nootropic" compounds that people write shitty Wikipedia articles about as part of their online community - they make these chemicals or buy them from reagent companies and actually take them. I will walk away from that effort now. I just wrote this out of protest; I am not really looking for a response to let you know I am upset, but you can of course reply if you like. Perhaps there was some larger issue at stake for you as well. But still, your not responding to the core of my argument was frustrating for me. Jytdog (talk) 16:58, 20 March 2016 (UTC)

There are, as you say, quite a number of such articles, and most of them need editing. I would gladly work with you in improving this content if we could agree on the principles that apply. 1) All chemical compounds that have been not just reported once but discussed further are notable, and the discussions need not necessarily be in scientific articles. 2) MEDRS is irrelevant to the chemical portion of articles on actual or potential therapies. 3)MEDRS refers to claims that something is a therapy, not that something might be a possible therapy. Decent sources are still needed, but secondary reviews in the sense of MEDRS are not required. 4)What I would suggest does need cutting is the detail in many articles on the phase I trials, and possibly some of detail on the phase II trials 5) I see no reason to avoid covering substances in illicit use. This is an important application of NOT CENSORED (I would in fact think just the opposite, that we have an obligation to do so.) The "larger issue at stake" for me is indeed NOT CENSORED, and I consider it as a basic policy that over-rides any guideline, and that we only even consider conflicts when they are to other equally basic policies such as BLP or NOT INDISCRIMINATE (and, to some extent, the less basic parts of WP:NOT, such as NOT TABLOID and NOT NEWS) DGG ( talk ) 00:10, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Here is where I feel like you didn't read what I wrote. I didn't argue with you on the chemistry thing at all - not even at the AfD. I agree that primary sources are OK for chemistry - that is a "predictable art" as they say in patent law. The place where you and I really part ways, is the "possible use"/"potential therapies" aspect, which comes down to biology. "Possible" is how garbage happens in Wikipedia. "Possible" is what altmed shills, pharma drug rep shills, people trying to boost the stock of biotech companies, and nootropic knuckleheads, blah blah use to try to wedge garbage into Wikipedia. "Possible" is how almost every search result here happens. Garbage. It is not a matter of NOT CENSORED it is a matter of "accepted knowledge". In the biological sciences, a research paper is absolutely not accepted knowledge. The primary scientific literature in all sciences but especially in biology is where scientists talk to each other as they grope toward understanding. That is why reviews are particularly important for biological content in WP. They give us the best indication of what is "accepted knowledge" at any given time. On top of that, there are literally hundreds of research papers discussing, say, "potential" diagnostics for Alzheimers. Hundreds. How in the world do we decide which of those to discuss in Wikipedia? Should we rely on which university PR office does the best job shilling theirs? Ugh.

Related to that are issues of WEIGHT. By relying on secondary sources to guide us in discussions about weight (which is the letter and spirt of NPOV), we don't talk about every phase I trial of every drug or every potential therapeutic. The literature guides us, not personal preferences or external interests. It is essential for helping us keep the tidal wave of promotional garbage out of WP about health. And there is so, so much.

If you would be willing, I would be happy to talk - to listen actually - to try to hear the deeper logic under what you are saying. Because right now I don't get it at all, and what you are saying has terrible consequences for many, many articles, in my view. And I hope you would be willing to listen to me. Jytdog (talk) 02:22, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

From my userpage, written many years ago:

I have "an extremely strong opinion that the uninhibited free play of ideas is essential to a free society and to humanity in general. (I basically follow J.S. Mill in this.) ... I take pride in being what some call a First Amendment Absolutist, and I mean it in the literal sense. We are responsible for presenting information accurately and honestly, not for what people will do with it. The way to prevent them from interpreting it wrong, is to present it better, not to conceal it. If anyone thinks I have deviated from that position, I'd like to be told, so I can correct myself."

I am consequently very dubious about using MEDRS and related guidelines, such as FRINGE. They are needed because of the continuing assault against honest judgment by superstition and commercialism, but they should be used narrowly to clarify what is the accepted status of what is presented as knowledge. We must not use them to avoid covering a subject in all its aspects. The fundamental assumption behind the creation of a crowd-sourced encyclopedia is that all people are able to judge, if they are given information. They are even able to judge what is reliable information, if the background and the principles of judging are explained properly. It is then their individual responsibility to decide; it is not ours. Those of us who understand science do not have the right to decide which information to give: if we both know science and know how to present it, we will be understood correctly. That is the true meaning of WP:EXPERT. DGG ( talk ) 05:01, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

all i can say to that, is you are in great company with every tinfoil-hat wearing nut job who comes to Wikipedia. I can't believe you of all people play the "censorship" card. My god. Here is where, in my view, your perspective on this is not just a little, but profoundly unwikipedian. We are not a community of experts. We are a community of nobodies. It is not for you or me to judge that primary source over this one. We rely on the published literature to adjudicate as much as we can. That is what happens in reviews; which are essential for adjudicating the biomedical literature. The Wikipedia world you depict is a Mad Max one where anonymous editors duel based on their putative expertise. I don't want to edit in that Wikipedia, and I don't. Jytdog (talk) 05:18, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

I also said on my user page, that among my biases was a

"distaste for quack anything: medicine, science, psychology, social science ... I often vote to keep articles on these subjects, because the advocates of orthodoxy here sometimes seem to be even less reasonable than the quacks--and because I think the best way to expose quacks is to let them state their views plainly." DGG ( talk ) 05:32, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

I am not saying you believe in quackery. I am saying that you are standing with the quacks. I have neither the time nor desire to debate with woo-pushers in Wikipedia. Applying high sourcing standards - what OR, NPOV, and VERIFY call us to do when we edit at our best - not only drives high quality content but provides a way to very quickly shunt aside woo-pushers' efforts to make Wikipedia into a Madmax world (both in content and in endless talk page battles) - and likewise helps us keep pharma reps from pumping up content about their drugs. Everybody wins when MEDRS is applied consistently to content about health, including - and especially including - "possible" applications of X. Everybody loses when we lower sourcing quality (including the content that is not generated when having endless debates with people trying push content based on low-quality sources). It is not about censorship at all. That is orthogonal to the heart of the issue. Jytdog (talk) 05:43, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

so, so many edits like this, every day here. Reverting that is not censorship. It just isn't. ack. Jytdog (talk) 06:24, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

What caused me to write that essay was my experience in working on the article on Intelligent Design. The people defending the ID side of things were defending it very weakly,not being aware of the sophistication of some of the modern proponents. I attempted to present these , in the classic model of WP:Writing for the enemy; arguments which are not at all that easy to refute with the usual high school-level of biology. I was accused of being a wolf in sheep's clothing, hypocritically pretending to be an proponent of science. Being new here, I decided it was hopeless and left the topic, and have not followed the argument since.

There are nonetheless several things I think we agree on: the necessity that you have just mentioned of writing good positive content, the overemphasis of early clinical trials (personally, I would attack first the problem of the notability of drug development firms that have never brought a product to stage III). I have learned in WP that people with quite different perspectives can nonetheless accomplish a good deal by simply working where their interests intersect, without necessarily ever coming to terms with the differences. DGG ( talk ) 08:07, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

I am completely with you on the ID thing. I made the effort to try to edit neutrally on the acupuncture article, which is a battleground between woo-pushers and woo-fighters and the resulting article is crappy. Acupuncture and some other alt med methods have actually become mainstream to help manage (help manage) otherwise unmanageable conditions, like cancer pain. Some of that is just ugly pandering by the medical establishment to make money, but some of it is evidence based; there is now decent evidence discussed in reviews and textbooks that some alt med methods help where standard medicine doesn't (mostly pain or nausea, where one would expect a placebo effect to play a big role....) but it is what it is. So no argument with that effort.

Anyway, I know that you have adjusted your thoughts about NOTABILITY in light of the promotional pressure that WP is under; in my view raising source quality accomplishes the same goal in articles that already exist, and should also be taken into account in deletion debates. That was why I was especially curious to see how you would respond on the AfD on this drug candidate. Anyway, I hear you desiring to move this to concrete discussion about actual content... I will suggest some things later today. Thanks for putting up with me. Jytdog (talk) 21:11, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

business plans follow up

Hello David. You must be terribly busy. Kindly recall our conversation about business plans last week at the NYC Chapter meeting. I am eager to be helpful on this as you see fit. I would also like to follow through with you on the Renee Radell draft if that is still the best approach. Please let me know if you are receiving my messages. All the best, Kevin OtterNYC (talk) 17:48, 20 March 2016 (UTC) Nice to hear from you David. I was hoping you would reach out. You may have noticed that I had some suggestions from Jytdog about my draft (draft:Renee Radell) and he made a talk page for it. He thinks it has notability so if there is anything I can do to further the process, please advise. I could probably add some online links to some of the sources, since I have seen online archives at a few of the major publications. And, as you may remember, I have the hard copies of the original art reviews. Also, would like to connect on the business plan concepts we discussed a couple of weeks ago. You have my number and happy to provide it again if you send me an e-mail at ktrgeneral@gmail.com. Looking forward to our conversation. I will be working at home all weekend so feel free to call. Cheers, Kevin OtterNYC (talk) 03:32, 26 March 2016 (UTC)

Need some advise about finding a source

Medical articles are not my strength and I usually deal in history, pop culture, computer science and general sciences and whatever I come across. I do not sign in as I do not wish to ever see my watchlist again. It has cost me thousands of hours of life and lost me income. I am having trouble finding a review article (they are preferred but not required) that Jyt is asking for but can find plenty of other non-reactionary doctors and researchers opinions on the subject along with text books that have included the primary research results. Do I use a Request for Comment to draw in other eyes for a deeper source search or some other method? So the article is Talk:Diphenhydramine and you can see the edit history for current discussion. Thankyou for your advise. 97.85.173.38 (talk) 00:45, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

If you want to add strong content about anything in WP, but especially about health, you need a strong source. You want WP to say that this drug causes dementia, so you need a very strong source. I would have been happy to help you but you chose to argue with me. I am glad you are asking someone for help. That is a good thing. Jytdog (talk) 00:54, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

I didn't say cause, and the source doesn't say that either I said "greatly increase the risk of developing". That wording is too strong and should be modified to "associated with a higher risk of dementia". And you started combativeness with weasel words and implications that I have no experience. Jytdog, this seems a bit stalkerish to come here to this page and insert yourself into this discussion. I didn't request your help here. 97.85.173.38 (talk) 01:03, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

jytdog did not come here in the expectation I'd endorse his position--there's some rather frank back-and-forth between the two of us a little above.

I'm quite a skeptic regarding the literature. I know it's been estimated most individual medical research papers are wrong. What I don't think MEDRS adequately recognizes that so are most critical reviews and consensus statements--this is very easy to prove: look at the last 30 or 40 yrs of consensus statements on diet, or blood pressure, or lipids, or anti-depresives. There is rarely reason to expect the current consensus will be better than prior ones. And medical textbooks have a unique style of writing: they typically include in their references everything , not just the material the authors think actually correct. I therefore think that MEDRS should be used in a more restricted manner, and that information based on multiple primary sources do have to be considered. I see no reason why medicine should be different from other fields, where a fair statement might be that no sources are wholly reliable, and , if used appropriately, no sources utterly useless. Mechanical rules for inclusion do not do justice with the very wide spectrum of reliability in almost any subject. What the spirit of MEDRS should be used for , is to a/eliminate the totally idiosyncratic reports, b/distinguish downright quackery c/ lead to proper use of qualifiers in wording. (That said, I think that wording alone cannot clarify adequately; I don't even pay attention to judgements not accompanied by actual numbers, and no numbers purporting to show probability without sample sizes and with an explicit basis for how the sample was taken. What is needed is numerical literacy--which fortunately can be found even among those who do not actually have training in formal mathematics. And wording alone is helpless against the tendency of people to interpret what read according to what they want to believe. what they want

Responses to pharmaceuticals, and in particular psychoactive pharmaceuticals have a tremendous variation. I'm not a physician, but in my experience good physicians in practice recognize this. Everyone has anecdotal reports, so there's no point adding my own to WP.

As for the actual issue, I think a compromise wording can be found. But that's what I usually say. DGG ( talk ) 01:46, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

NPP reform

Still having enormous difficulties finding someone to extract the required stats. Anoher one has just admitted after keeping us waiting for 3 months, that they don't actually know how to do it. I don't know my way around regex and scripts otherwise I'd do it myself. I've been trying for 15 months to get someone to do this. It can't be all that difficult because Scottywong, now sadly retired, used to shake this kind of stuff out of his late-night beer glass for us. Someone is even suggesting we should obtain Ironholds approval for this - I think that is most inappropriate.

IMO, providing stats to support proposals for improvement or addressing cross-Wiki issues is a service the paid technical staff should be providing to the community who at the end of the day has to do most of their dirty work for them. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 06:43, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

there are jurisdictional reasons why this is difficult. Tell me exactly what you want, and I know whom to ask. DGG ( talk ) 07:30, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

@Kudpung: I'm pretty sure I have explicitly asked you before, but in case I missed it: I have no interest in conversations around these topics as I've got utterly sick of the narrative. This goes double for these, since I'm also sick of how inaccurately data is used. Please do not tag me into them. That, I find inappropriate. Ironholds (talk) 14:25, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

If it's data that I have access to, I can probably process it into whatever form you need. As above - what exactly do you want? —Cryptic 14:53, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

Hi Cryptic, it's all information that is freely available. It just needs to be mined and collated into a Wikitable. I would mail you what we want but you don't have mail enabled. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:04, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

Sigh. Enabled. Send away, if it's really something that can't be discussed publicly. —Cryptic 15:13, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

• I think this is pretty conclusive now and we can probably go ahead with the RfC, unless you think Cryptic should dig deeper in his quarry while he knows what we're looking for. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:31, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

  (talk page stalker) Not that I have time to do it, but I think you guys should dig a little deeper on this one. First, are you sure that the page triage log is the one you want? That appears to include every action taken using the page curation interface - including adding tags and so forth - whereas your goal sounds like it is focused specifically on the filter created by patrolling. Second, you've shown that there are a lot of low-edit-count users using page curation, but not that their performance is worse. Third, while it's obviously much easier to collect data from the page curation tool than from twinkle, I wonder if your edit-count distribution mostly shows that inexperienced users are more likely to use the tools built into the interface, while experienced users use the more customizable option that requires more setup. Also, I think there's a typo/math-o somewhere, because the edit count numbers/percentages don't add up. Opabinia regalis (talk) 05:49, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Opabinia regalis: Who is 'You Guys'? It took us 15 months to find someone who was prepared to do the data mining. You may be a whizzkid at math but you tend to forget that we run-of-the-mill non-arbcom members are not statisticians. We don't need to be either, in order to know for years that something is desperately wrong with our system(s) of quality control that allows the very young, raw newbies, and paid spammers to operate Wikipedia's most crucial maintenance task of all. You don't have the time; I don't know how to dig for stats, so here we are now, all being criticised, and being sent back to square one. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 06:01, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

AfD

...

As for my actual opinion of the article, and my view that the efforts for exclusion of articles about nonstandard medicine of even the most absurd variety is an example of bias and prejudice and failure of NPOV. see the AfD. The best way of showing the true nature of this particular topic is to let its adherents speak for themselves. I didn't believe how ridiculous it was from the heavily censored WP article, under I read their own descriptions. Censorship is counterproductive, here and everywhere. QG, you wish people to read only what will do them good. This is paternalism and directly opposed to the spirit of NPOV and free inquiry. If you wish to express your biases ( a bias which in this case I happen to share quite firmly), it should not be on WP. To make clear my position on the subject, I and most other science editors left Citizendium in large part because those in charge they were insisting that Chiropractic was a valid branch of medicine. Fortunately, at WP nobody is in charge, and I will help defeat all attempts to use it even for the most wholesome promotionalism and propaganda. DGG ( talk ) 20:56, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

WP:SCHOOLOUTCOMES compromise

Hi,

I've seen in a few places you've mentioned WP:SCHOOLOUTCOMES (or the idea behind its practical use) as "the compromise". It sounds like there's some backstory there that I don't have.

To me, just seeing that description, it seems like the opposite of a compromise. In other words, who is it a compromise between? If it's between those who want to apply WP:N to school articles and those who do not -- or between those who believe sources always exist for schools and those who do not -- then it seems to fall squarely on one side. A huge number of AfD debates could go either way depending on participation and tenacity, but we don't say "this side is always right from now on" without there actually being consensus for a guideline to that effect doesn't sit right. Am I missing something? Maybe what I'm missing is just all the drama that led to the rule in the first place -- that if I went through that I, too, would breathe a sigh of relief even if a sort of IAR guideline-not-guideline was required? — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 01:49, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

User_talk:Rhododendrites, it is a compromise between those who wanted all schools to be notable, primary schools included, and those who wanted to limit even secondary schools by whether or not there were practically findable references to meet the GNG guideline. Back in the days before the compromise when I was new here (2006-2008) , I and a few others routinely defended every elementary school article, on the basis that it was significant to the community, and that if one had access to the local sources, one could always find references significantly discussing the planning and construction and zoning of the school. Additionally, quite a few of even the primary schools had two or more notable alumni and these would usually lead to coverage also. the arguments over whether the references were substantial were dependent mainly on how hard people argued, and there were at that time some really radical broad inclusionists way beyond anything contemplated nowadays, who were willing to argue very hard indeed. There were, correspondingly, some very radical deletionists (or more exactly, narrow-inclusion proponents), who at times were defining substantial to mean that the subject had to be the main point of the reference, and unless two entire substantial magazine articles or books were written about a subject, we shouldn't cover it. The effort needed for arguing about a single school could mean hours of work for half a dozen people. AfD decisions those days were really erratic.

At that time, I felt WP should be very comprehensive with respect to local notability, partly because of the readers, partly because it was a good place for beginning writers. I changed my mind about this over the last few years, because too many local institution, both non-=profit and business, were being used for promotion, and I came to realize as I became more involved with paid editing problems, that this factor was the most important. (Schools are very easy to remove promotion from, without the need for actual rewriting, and the amount of vandalism there used to be ton those articles is much less with the edit filter.)

You see, Notability is deliberately not a policy, because we can really set the dividing line anywhere we please. We make the encyclopedia , we make the rules, we can include in it what ever there is consensus for. This is a new kind of encyclopedia , and we're not limited by what used to be the limits of paper,or the convention that an encyclopedia was mainly an academic reference. It doesn't much matter if we have articles on relatively trivial subjects, as long as we can keep out the really dangerous content, which is promotionalism and POV writing.

I do feel that using the GNG for a dividing line is absurd--it was a really stupid guideline in the first place, because it made inclusion depend upon the practical availability of certain particular kinds of references to the sort of writers we have. We are limited by Verifiability, and that gives an unavoidable bias in some areas, but we shouldn't add to it. I have always thought any rational meaning of notability is a function of the subject, not of the references.

I also feel that consistency matters: people should be able to predict what they are likely to find in the encyclopedia, both what type of subject, and what type of coverage. This is very difficult to achieve with our method of decision making, but fortunately the range of variation is smaller than it used to be. One of the reasons it matters is to give a impression that the encyclopedia is prepared by serious people who know what they're doing. There are other practical compromises of this sort. One is PROF, which as applied means we cover all full professors (Though rank is not part of the formal guideline, the decisions in practice follow the full vs. associate line very closely.) I think this is the wrong cut-off, and it should include all tenured faculty at universities, including the Associate professors. I could give along argument why, and in my early years here I gave a great many. I usually lost, however, and I decided it was more practical to make sure we did cover the notable full professors at least. And in practice we reached agreement on that, and consequently AfDs on researchers are quite predictable--and quite rare. In other fields too: I would include many more academic journals than we do, but again, I thought better to accept a median position where we predictably kept the ones in major indexes.

It is better to have a clean compromise rule than to argue. This goes at least for everything that is not a fundamental moral principle. The only policy here I consider truly of that nature is NOT CENSORED. DGG ( talk ) 05:15, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

In short, Rhododendrites, notability for schools was in fact an idea originally seeded by our founder. Over the years, and even longer than the 7 years I've been a coordinator of the WP:WPSCH, this principle has been loosely applied as documented at OUTCOMES. There have been a geat many debates on the subject and even near-vandalism scale attempts to batch delete school articles through AfD. Neverteless, while not one single one of the debates reached a consensus one way or another, at AfD High Schools continue to be retained and non notable Primary Schools are redirected to their school district article or locality. In the meantime, as this is now supported by literally thousands of such closures, we can assume a tacit consensus for the current practice. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 05:36, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to go into detail. I indeed misread what the "compromise" is/was between. This is a more well reasoned way of framing the position than I've seen lately, when arguments have been dominated by demands that tradition take precedence over notability guidelines without going much further than that. I see granting ~"inherent notability" to a subject as a huge deal -- and if there is consensus for it to be so, then it's crucial it exist in the form of a policy or guideline rather than as informal understanding or tradition (I'm sure we could get into a number of discussions about the merits and problems with rules vs. traditions in the context of Wikipedia...).

While some who were part of the conversations leading to the compromise (and others) take it for granted, many others (myself included) take for granted that notability applies to every article unless modified, qualified, or exempted through some other policy or guideline -- because that's how it works for almost everything else (I can't think of an exemption as broad as secondary schools that is likewise uncodified somewhere). I agree that it's important for notability to remain a guideline. There's too much variability, too much subjectivity, too many other guidelines that modify it, and too great a need for judgment in exceptional cases. But providing a broad, [practically] beyond discussion exemption is just the sort of thing guidelines like the subject-specific criteria are there for.

Having read a great number of arguments on the subject now, I think I'm sufficiently persuaded to fall on the "support" side of adding it to a guideline should it be proposed, but until that happens I still see it as highly problematic to point to a descriptive essay to shut down discussion, asking for it to be treated as a prescriptive guideline. That's why I appreciate your rationale here, because it's not simply presented as WP:OUTCOMES -- a collection of noted trends that perpetuate themselves by their being wielded as an absolute rule.

In other words, your points are well taken. The problem is WP:OUTCOMES. I can't imagine those who support the notability of schools find it an ideal representation of consensus on the subject, either. I feel like I get the compromise, but if good will among the community was part of the reason for it, I think that the further we get from the date of that agreement, the more conflict and confusion the present arrangement will generate. Based on the above, I'd suggest you be one of those involved in drafting whatever RfC would address the problem? (Adding high schools to the gazetteer function of Wikipedia or WP:ORG seems the most straightforward rather than a whole new guideline).

Anyway, this is a longer followup message than I intended and I feel like I'm repeating myself a bit so I'll end there. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 02:50, 2 April 2016 (UTC)

The declining of these G13s

Hi DGG. I wanted to know why you removed the deletion nomination of Draft:De Paul School Brahmapur, Draft:GMERS Medical College and Draft:Government Engineering College Bharatpur. Please expand on what you believe what "notability" is. If there are no reliable sources available for the schools, obviously they aren't notable. Writing "it's the top school in ____" doesn't prove notability, either. I could go ahead and edit something like Steve Jobs and write "He was a good at fishing" but if it doesn't have a reference proving it's real, it doesn't matter whether he was the best at fishing or the absolute worst. I agree with one the essay on schools, where it says:

“ Individual schools are not inherently encyclopedic and there is nothing to distinguish insignificant schools like this one from thousands of nearly identical schools around the world. WP:NOT states "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of items of information. That something is 100% true does not mean it is suitable for inclusion in an encyclopedia." ”

I'd like to know what you follow for the notability guidelines on schools. I don't mean to be rude, and you have been here longer than me, but don't remove a CSD G13 from an article which obviously doesn't have any future, unless you, yourself, edit it and fix it. Draft:De Paul School Brahmapur was last edited on 14 April 2013‎, just under 3 years ago. Draft:GMERS Medical College was last edited on 8 August 2015‎ or 29 May 2013‎, depending on what you define an edit being; either way it's been at least 11 months since the last edit. Draft:Government Engineering College Bharatpur was last edited on 2 January 2015‎, a year and a few months ago.

Thanks for reading all this, I hope I didn't come across harsh at all, I'd just like to know your reasoning. I'll be waiting for a response, I'm watching your talk page so no need to ping me (not stopping you, though). Anarchyte (work | talk) 10:43, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

• there are several questions here. For the reason why I think all high schools, and most certainly all colleges should be treated as notable ( see my response to Rhododendrites, a little above. Basically, it's to avoid arguing each of them. Similarly I would treat essentially all elementary schools as non-notable-- again, to avoid arguing each one of them.

Second, under G13, the draft is deleted only if nobody is working on it, but we normally define that as nobody being willing to work on it. I am willing to work on school articles, so I removed the G13. And in fact I added some material to all three of them today, though not much, and removed the puffery, as I always do from any article I work on. I do have a rather long list of drafts to work on, but I eventually get to them, or someone else does. But even at MfD, we normally do not drafts if they have any plausible possibility of making an article, unless they are harmful in some such way as being significantly promotional, or if multiple attempts to make an article have failed.

Since in the last five years very few high school or college articles has every been deleted on grounds of notability, I would even be justified in moving them to article space, since the criterion is merely that the article is likely to pass AfD. But I did not do that, because I like most of us at AfC do not move such weak drafts to article space. DGG ( talk ) 00:30, 1 April 2016 (UTC)

Some dim sum for you!

Thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia. North America1000 08:27, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Common outcomes

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Common outcomes. Legobot (talk) 04:28, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

An Invitation

As one of the most respected editors I know I hope you can take some time to join an important discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Editor Retention about possibly finding a way to salvage Single-purpose editors and transforming them into positive WP collaborators in the general mainspace. I'm sure you run in to many of them as you wander around WP. I'm also sure that every now and then one of the SPA editors rises above the crowd and seems worthy of more of your time and effort. Your personal insight and experience would be appreciated. WP:WER has a declared mission to retain editors but we have become a relative ghost town (and I may be one of the few ghosts left in town) and User:Robert's idea may be just the boost the Project needs to revitalize. It's an opportunity for the Project to actually do something beyond handing out awards. I think Dennis Brown would like it. Please comment. Buster Seven Talk 14:28, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

commented there;will keep an eye on the discussion DGG ( talk ) 22:25, 16 April 2016 (UTC)

European Graduate School

Hi DGG. I noticed you have been active in the AfD lately. I've proposed a new section to replace the former "accreditation" section on the Talk page, here. I think the proposal threads the needle of the various perspectives, including yours. Would you please have a look and comment there? thx. Jytdog (talk) 07:58, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

A suite of dubious for-profit college articles

Hi David. If you have time, could you take a look at my comments at Talk:London College of Contemporary Arts#Serious notability issues? It's a for-profit unaccredited college and one of a whole suite of problematic promotional articles on institutions in the LSBF Group, of which it is a part. They all need eyes. And possibly redirects or AfDs? London College of Contemporary Arts was already deleted at this AfD in 2013 and recreated a few months later. I have no idea what the original one looked like. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 19:34, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

the most practical course is to merge to an article on the overall firm. I hope someone other than myself will do it. DGG ( talk ) 03:06, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

London School of Business and Finance and all its pomps and works

Hi David. Just a heads-up that I have begun clean up of this article following the London College of Contemporary Arts discussion. The details are at Talk:London School of Business and Finance. As I imagine my revisions will not escape the notice of the owner's brand managers, you might want to put it on watch. In the end, I also created a separate article on the owner, Global University Systems, which you might also want to put on watch. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 09:51, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

10:04:41, 16 May 2016 review of submission by Gillkay

• Gillkay (talk · contribs)
  • Draft:The Institute For Medical Research Israel-Canada (IMRIC) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Thanks DGG for reveiwing my draft. I have done a bit of wikipedia editing in the past, but this is my first article, which hopefully excuses my wordy style. I have edited the draft according to your suggestions. If I resubmit will it go to you? My first version was edited by CookieMonster755 and I thought when I submitted my second draft it would go back to him unless I requested otherwise (which I didn't). I don't really mind either way, but it would make sense that if I make changes according to a reveiwer's advice, that reveiwer would be the one to see if I had solved the problems.Gillkay (talk) 10:04, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

Gillkay, WP has very little organization, Whoever wants to & has the necessary experience can review a draft; it usually goes at random--most people simply take the oldest one in the queue, some, like myself, look for specific types of articles (I specialize in academic people and organizations, and certain types of businesses & certain types of problem articles) I also, as in this case, look at any submission another reviewer asks me to check. This does indeed mean that you may get conflicting directions in successive reviews, but it increases the odds that at least one of the reviews will be correct. The purpose of reviewing is only to screen out or get improved the articles that are unlikely to be accepted by the community after they are brought to article status; accepting an article when reviewing means nothing more than that the reviewer is of the opinion that the article is quite likely to be kept if brought to an WP:AFD discussion; unfortunately once more, the results of AfD discussions are not necessarily consistent or even always reasonable. Just like anyone can write articles, anyone can comment in a discussion. But the principle of WP is that it is not written (or controlled) by experts. The error rate in reviewing is very high--I would estimate that at least 10% of both the acceptances and rejections are simply wrong; in addition, at least 20% of the reviews seem to concentrate on the wrong issues. Some of the most experienced reviewers, including myself, try to check on ones other people have reviewed, especially when we think a particular reviewer is not doing it right, and then we try to explain to the reviewer. If someone persists in doing things seriously wrong, they can be barred from reviewing. At present, most of the really problematic reviewers have been dealt with. Most of the wrongly accepted articles do get removed at AfD; the wrongly rejected ones where the disappointed authors go away and are lost to us are the real problems. There is still some cleanup needed, but I will deal with it later today or tomorrow. You don't actually need to resubmit it DGG ( talk ) 16:00, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) DGG, Thank you for the wonderful explanation! CookieMonster755 ^{📞 ✉ ✓} 17:45, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining DGG. Learning gradually how this all works. Do I understand right that you can see my changes and will be telling me in a day or so about other changes I need to make?Gillkay (talk) 08:42, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

could you please help me with the African Library Project page?

Hi, a while ago you helped with making the African Library Project page more neutral. I made some changes. Then someone else suggested some specific changes, and I requested those edits, but no one has made them. I know you are a volunteer, and I appreciate that, but I am feeling a bit stuck, since it has been a long time. And just as a reminder, I am on the board so can't make the edits myself. Thanks very much. DeborahWC (talk) 20:16, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

{U:DeborahWC}}, I'll try to get there. DGG ( talk ) 05:11, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	Thank you for your help and guidance with the new article Nade Haley and for all you do here. Your time and experience is appreciated. Netherzone (talk) 14:51, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

North American Invasive Species Network

Hello DGG -

I noticed that the Bot known as HasteurBot has slated North American Invasive Species Network, in the Articles for Creation queue, for G-13 deletion. Personally, I think this article is worth saving and intend to move it out into the mainspace so it doesn't get deleted.

I am thinking this is somehow a notable organization after perusing their website. The work they are doing is profound.

FYI, I discovered this by accident because I saw a G-13 section on your talk page via my watchlist, and was curious as to what G13 is.

Anyway, from prior experience I know that you can be helpful and flexible when it comes to notability if the subject seems to warrant meriting inclusion. So, if you wish to help in any way it would be much appreciated. Also, if this doesn't work, and the page has to be deleted - well, at least I tried.--- Steve Quinn (talk) 03:06, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Third opinion request

Greetings DGG: I'm writing to request a third opinion about commentary at this AfD discussion. I'm not asking you to !vote in the discussion, but I'd be interested in receiving your viewpoints inre the commentary there about source searching. Thanks again for all of your contributions to Wikipedia, North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 10:24, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

The discussion has now closed, but the question referred to the use of deletion rationals that do not include a literature search, where you and Voceditenore were arguing, essentially ( that it was necessary to follow WP:BEFORE, rather that use rationales like obviously not notable. Of course I basically agree--I've been suggesting for 8 years now that WP:BEFORE be made policy in discussing notability. But there are many caveats. Key ones include:

1. This applies to the overall process of nominating an article, not each individual argument. In a typical discussion some people will concentrate on the number or quality of sources, others on additional factors.
2. There are other reasons for deletion besides notability -- promotionalism, blp, NOT DIRECTORY, NOT TABLOID, not being a distinct topic from other articles, inherent POV of the topic, etc... In each of these there's the possibility that a literature search may enable us to correct the article, but sometimes the other factors are so strong as to make it unlikely. This is often true for some types of arguments: Borderline notability combined with clear promotionalism is good reason for deletion. Not meeting the special notability standards are good reasons for deletions. Even those can be overcome by really good discoverable sources, but for these types of articles there's no presumption that sources will exist if.
3. Some subjects are inherently unlikely to have accessible sources. As a matter of form I could do a literature search for saints in Eastern religions, but I know from experience that it is extraordinarily unlikely that there will be any that I am capable of finding. There are similarly unlikely to be sources for a scientist who is still a graduate student, or who has published very little. Exceptions exist, but only rarely. DGG ( talk ) 00:13, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the detailed reply, which is appreciated. Yes, a variety of various factors can come into play at AfD. I was just concerned because it appears that you are perhaps mentoring a user in some manner who participated in that discussion, in which they ping you to various AfD discussions. I've politely pointed out WP:NEXIST to the user before, but they seem to just ignore it. As such, I figured it would be prudent to bring the matter to your attention. Thanks again for your input here, North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 08:38, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

NY entomology journals

Hi, could you perhaps have a look at Talk:Entomologica Americana (New York Entomological Society)? Thanks! --Randykitty (talk) 13:26, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

AfD concerns

Hi! I'm reaching out to you because I know you work well with many people involved with AfD. I am concerned about the lack of WP:BEFORE going on at these AfD discussions ([12], [13], [14]) and others. The thread that seems to tie these together is that they are genre writers or foreign actors/writers. Is there anyway you can intervene and help the nom understand WP:BEFORE? I don't mind improving articles brought to AfD, but there's a lot of pressure involved when it's at AfD instead of just being tagged. Anyway, thank you in advance! Megalibrarygirl (talk) 01:19, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

As I just said to the editor "Please in nominating authors and professors for deletion, remember to consider first if they may meet WP:AUTHOR and WP:PROF. It's very easy to use WorldCat to check for the importance of published books. " It is not really enough in these cases to do a cursory search of relevant databases. BEFORE is not a magic formula, but has to be used with clear understanding of where information is likely to be found. And then, if one finds some indication of importance, that should be followed up before nominating.

That said, I too sometimes make guesses, tho I would have to admit that it's an unfortunate shortcut, and I try to avoid the temptation to make them in unfamiliar fields. In the instances here, there does seem to have been a string of wrong guesses. DGG ( talk ) 04:20, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi Megalibrarygirl and DGG, i sometimes get annoyed at the number of afds that end up as 'keep' as the subject is notable, especially as WP:AFD encourages nominators to carry out a number of checks before nominating. but as i was informed here Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Peter Willcox, WP:BURDEN states "All content must be verifiable. The burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and is satisfied by providing a citation to a reliable source that directly supports the contribution", or in these cases, the article creator should have included approriate references, although we also have WP:CONTN ie. "Article content does not determine notability", it can all be very confusing. kitten stalker - meowr! Coolabahapple (talk) 08:27, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

I agree it can be confusing, Coolabahapple. DGG is right that not all searches are equal. Sometimes I don't find evidence of notability until I hit the right database. And it can be a guessing game where you have to balance a lot of factors. Perhaps itvwouk d help to continue to hold dialogue. I think it's very important for Wikipedia editors to be able to talk to one another. Sometimes AfD becomes a battleground. But we don't have to agree to start tslking and understanding each other. I appreciate your time here and I'll check my email shortly. Megalibrarygirl (talk) 17:04, 31 May 2016 (UTC)\

Faanya Rose - Recent Edits

@DGG: Hello!

• Every Faanya has been exchanged for Rose. If you will search the world you will see that she is the only Faanya in it. Since her surname changes from Arch to Goldin to Rose, and could perhaps change again, Faanya is unique and the name for her throughout the article can be Faanya. In life she is Faanya as Cher is Cher.
• Recommend Timeline is kept - helpful to position this subject in time easily
• The achievements/successes of family are germane to this biography. Faanya is a person who was integral to the successes to others. She has little college or what would be considered today apprenticeships or mentorships except in the relationships to these men. On another page was said that this material should be on a personal website. There is none and never will their be one. When she dies these facts die with her. Until research is complete for standalone articles for the men (I am working on this) can they not remain here? Perhaps in footnotes?

• Example - Poswohl and Judaism are key to Jonathan Sacks appointment to Jewish ethics in Britain
• Example - Robert Rose exploration history key to Faanya exploration history later in her life

Thanks for your consideration. Lynda Roy (talk) 02:45, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

I am still working on this--I normally work on fixing an article over several days.

@DGG: Great comments - my responses follow.

1. We refer to everybody except popular entertainers by their last name. Using a first name alone is not appropriate to formal writing and, especially for a woman, gives me a feeling of disrespect and condescension. I agree that in this particular case, where the name is that of her second husband, using it in the earlier parts of her biography can seem confusing. I know I need to find a better solution. I'm thinking of using just "she" more often, with a few uses of her full name. This is similar to what we usually do when there are several people of the same last name to be discussed in an article.

• I wrestled with this quite a bit because standard practice is surname. However, when I asked people to review my article before I even attempted to post on Wikipedia reviewers said they preferred just Faanya. Reviewers did not know Faanya personally. But I do get this.

2. This is an encyclopedia , and we write as compactly as possible. Saying things once is sufficient & appropriate. The article as presented said many things three tines over: the initial biography sketch, the sections on the various periods of her life, and the timeline. I don't have the right balance yet between the first two, but the timeline is absolutely inappropriate. I cannot easily think of a biography of any individual, no matter how famous or complicated, where it would be appropriate. It is sometimes useful as a summary of complicate historical events. We use it very occasionally for the history of organizations, where there are complicated mergers and other changes--but even here, usually an attempt to include it is an attempt to say things twice, which is a technique of promotional writing, or of advocacy. When we do need to use that style for organizations, we remove most of the descriptive paragraphs sayibg the same thing.

• Noted. I looked at Timelines inside and outside Wikipedia and chose this Template:Timeline of Einar Jolin's life. People do and don't read the entirety of articles online - research shows a higher give up rate for longer articles. Having a graphical depiction of the milestones of a life is an approach for cultivating attention.

• Thinking about promotional writing, I can see where a timeline can do this, but I also see where visual information is easily welcome to readers. I'd like to retain this timeline. Lynda Roy (talk) 14:48, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

3.In your comment at the AfD, you said "Keep. A Milestone for Women ". This seems to indicate a promotional intent, which is out of place in an encyclopedia

• I appreciate this observation. Not promotional really, but an understanding that different audiences view notability differently (see last bullet).

4. The accomplishments of family may be in some sense germane, but saying so is original research, and not appropriate here, unless there are references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources, not press releases or mere announcements independent sources, normally sources as responsible and objective as formal academic biographies, that do discuss them. We do mention the probably notable relations to provide links, but we just mention them.

• Noted.

5. We don't write an article in footnotes. We only use them as a way to provide references, and excerpts showing the exact wording, and absolutely necessary information about the reliability of a source or other account. Most of the existing footnotes that are more than references need to be removed or integrated. I was saving that for tomorrow.

• Noted.

• I have been looking at footnotes in general on Wikipedia, and I see often supporting information delivered in footnotes that doesn't so much tell the story, but enriches the telling. I adopted this approach after reading Bill Schwarz, Memories of Empire, where the footnotes clearly enrich the main story told in the text. Please know that I understand your point. My motivation was cultivating attention. Lynda Roy (talk) 14:48, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

• See footnotes of Hillary Clinton (and please know this is not to compare the two biographies, just the style of the footnotes.) Lynda Roy (talk) 02:42, 4 June 2016 (UTC)

6. If you think that any of her relations are independently notable, start articles on them in draft space (not article space). You'll have at least six months to work on them. You can copy over what text you need from the versions in the article history, but indicate in the edit summary from where you moved. For an explanation, see WP:NOY INHERITED

• They are. I will.

7. Had you written a briefer more focused article, it would probably not have been challenged at all. Lack of notability is not the only reason for deletion. Borderline notability combined with clear promotionalism or overexpansive writing is an equally good reason. For an explanation of why this is important, see WP:EINSTEIN.

• Noted. My observation is that quite a few shorter articles are poorer and fly under the radar, which seems to defeat the goals of Wikipedia. Yes, I could have gone for shorter, but this person is notable and I thought demanded the care, and consequently the length.

8. In summary, please remember that an encyclopedia article article is not intended for those who know the subject. It is intended to provide the information someone in the general public might look for who has come across the name. If you wish to write a full-scale biography , or use her as an example to discuss the general nature of the influences of women of her era, it should be published elsewhere. Lack of notability is not the only reason for deletion. Promotion or advocacy is an even better reason. DGG ( talk ) 03:35, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

• Noted. Please know that women's advocacy was/is not the intent of this article. Initial reasons given for deletion were notability. In considering why Faanya Rose would be notable it occurred to me that notability has shades, sometimes gender among them, which prompted the comment. If promotion or advocacy was the interpretation, that was not intended.

DGG - That you took the time to respond is much appreciated! Lynda Roy (talk) 13:48, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	Thank you for your help and guidance with the new article CareOnGo and for all you do here. Your time and experience is appreciated. Gamernight (talk) 09:29, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

World War I songs

Thank you for interacting with the new editors that are working on the World War I songs, World War I era composers and lyricists, and related topics. This is one of the weaker topic areas for Wikipedia and your assistance in helping out is appreciated. If you'd like to see the list we are working from, please check out: Wikipedia:GLAM/Pritzker#Songs TeriEmbrey (talk) 19:37, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

Template:TerryEmbrey, I'm glad to see it's a fairly selective list, not, as I feared, a list of every song that was published. Based on my general experience with a variety of topics, the safest way to cover a field like this is not to go down a list alphabetically or at random, but start with the ones most likely to be notable. In general, I'd advise you to first do articles on the people before the songs--it's relatively easy to write and document a biography, especially if you can find an obit. And I'd really suggest using Draft space until you get enough references to be impressive. DGG ( talk ) 02:24, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

(talk page watcher)@TeriEmbrey: Pinging correct spelling. PamD 04:26, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

comment

Thank you for replying, thank you for being an ArbCom member. I doubt I'll ever summon the courage, yes courage, to serve as an admin, much less an Arb, so there's that. A hero of mine just died, and life is short. Bless you, and yours, always. Jusdafax 05:11, 4 June 2016 (UTC)

retrieve delete material HVR Software

Hi DGG, I see my first article is deleted. is it possible te put it back in my sandbox for practice and hopefully a second change? Volgens (talk) 08:46, 7 June 2016 (UTC) Volgens

About: your review of UNEXMIN

Hi, DGG, and thanks for your review. You may think it was written in an "advertising" style, but please consider the context. This is a description of a European Horizon 2020 research project. It is not "news", and we are not promoting or advertising anything. The content will be edited from time to time as the project progresses, and new links will be added. The text was written by someone whose native language is not English, but will be edited and improved. Silicondale (talk) 06:28, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

comment forthcoming DGG ( talk ) 04:56, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

{U|Silicondale}},there are two problems: First, the first half of the article describes what the problem is, and gives the background for why the project is needed. That sort of material would belong in a grant request; but in an encyclopedia, such information would appear in an article about the problem in its own right, either as part of an article about mining in Europe, or even a separate article on Abandoned mines in Europe. not in an article about the project, which inherently gives the project undue emphasis. There are no references for this part of thearticle, except a ingle technical report. The second half of the article talks about what the project intends to do; however, this will not be appropriate content for an encyclopedia until the project has actually done it. This part of the article has no references whatsoever, and presumably relies entirely upon the project's website. An article in WP can not be written on the basis of such sources, but must have references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources; in this case, I would expect that they would be primarily from the technical literature of the profession.

Normally, I would have listed an article of this nature for deletion, as not meeting the basic requirements at WP:Notability; quite a few articles on European Union projects have in fact been deleted for this reason. I haven't done this yet for this article, mainly because I personally find the subject very interesting and unexpected, and I hope that you will be able to fix it. I'd advise you to do it quickly, before someone spots it and does list it for deletion. DGG ( talk ) 00:55, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

About Sustained Dialogue Institute

DGG, I will be declining your WP:A7 on that article as soon as soon as I click on savepage. Surely it would least amount to a WP:REDIRECT? Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 11:54, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

I'm trying to figure out what to do with the pair of articles, Sustained Dialogue Institute and Sustained Dialogue Campus Network. Together they represent a promotional campaign. If we had one, and could write it non promotionaly .it might make sense to have it on the Institute, but the one on the Network is the much more substantial article. DGG ( talk ) 18:29, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Amin Daliri

Hello, I noticed you tagged Amin Daliri page for deletion, while its an incomplete translate of his page in persian. He isnt just an Assistant to a Minister of state, he is an Economist, University teacher, a professor in economy field, and also Former manager of economic relations with foreign countries and more..... He is more famous than many others having a page in Wikipedia, also its an incomplete translate of his page in persian, i havent enough time to write and complete this article so you cant read more about him now, btw ill try to write some more to help complete this article during next weeks. regards

Some rows/sources added for now, you can find persian sources about him this way (About 7,040 results) (Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL) Faratel110 (talk) 19:23, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Faratel110, at worst, even if it is deleted, when you do have all the information and referneces together in English, you could try again in WP:DRAFT space. DGG ( talk ) 21:51, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

DGG, Thanks for reply, im new here and i dont know how to do it, would you please advise me? Faratel110 (talk) 18:14, 19 June 2016 (UTC)

23:04:27, 15 June 2016 review of submission by Guitarscarsaddict

• Guitarscarsaddict (talk · contribs)
  • Draft:Italia Guitar Straps (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Hi There. Trying to create an entry similar to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Couch_Guitar_Straps Having trouble seeing why one is viewed as advert and other is not. Thanks!

We have many unsatisfactory articles accepted in WP from earlier days when our standards were lower. Not all have been removed, and such articles can confuse people who take them for models. Unfortunately, too few people see this as a priority, so it will probably be years before we can remove all of them. I think the Couch article almost as unsatisfactory as yours --except that I note that essentially all of the musicians listed there who use it are notable (in the sense of having Wikipedia articles), while very few of the ones you list are. DGG ( talk ) 03:09, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

OK. Thank you for the guidance. I see now that I fell for an ad posing as an article and used a template I shouldn't have. The Couch article was created by a user that no longer exists and most of the references are referenced to the company's own website. I assume these factors combined would be reason to suggest deletion? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Guitarscarsaddict (talk • contribs) 18:53, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

There is no way to find out except by trying, and the results of AfD are unpredictable. If it should be the case that these are established people in WP who know and like the company, it often will not be deleted. (that major artists use them might possible be considered relevant) My guess is that AfD gets it wrong about 10% of the time--just just differing interpretations, but wrong. This is in my view too high a percentage of error, but I don't think we'll ever get it lower than 5%. Just as anyone can write here, anyone can comment. The principle of WP is that people will usually correct one another, but that's usually, not always;. DGG ( talk ) 20:44, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

The process continues to be confusing from notability standpoint. For example the Couch Guitar Straps entry was quickly edited after is was flagged by DGG as an advert. My guess is that certain companies monitor this stuff to make sure their "wikipedia ads" stay active? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Guitarscarsaddict (talk • contribs) 17:57, 19 June 2016 (UTC)

Articles

I wondered if you could review these articles I've found randomly: Anil Kumar Bhalla, J. Randall Price (is 1,663 holdings enough?), Jon McKenzie, H Abdul Raqeeb, Ola Orekunrin, Alice Beck Kehoe, Shi Hu (artist), Paul Leverkühn and Takashi Yamaguchi. SwisterTwister talk 04:21, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

can't judge Shi Hi; Leverkühn, Price, McKenizie, Yamaguichi clearly notable, , the others adequate except for Bhalla. We seem, to be using the padma shri as a standard of notability, but it is only a 4th level decoration. I'd consider the three hiher Indian civil ranks to show notability , not this, but I don't really want to start reviewing the several hundred existing articles. DGG ( talk ) 06:58, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Mikayil Alakbarov etc

Hallo David, I see you A-7'd Mikayil Alakbarov. Looking carefully he is asserted to be a Hero of the Soviet Union, which is described as "the highest distinction in the Soviet Union". I wonder whether that constitutes notability?

This is just one of a mass of unsourced stubs created today by a new editor. They have two major problems (not including any notability question - they all seem to be Heroes of the Soviet Union, which may or may not be enough):

1. All completely unsourced
2. All illustrated with old photos asserted to be "Own work" of the editor - ie almost certainly copyvio.

Could you have a look? I've asked the editor to stop disruptively creating so many unsourced stubs, and given a formal level 1 warning. PamD 17:26, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Hero of the Soviet Union is included in {{Highest gallantry awards}}, which is one of the criteria set in WP:SOLDIER, so all these horrid little stubs appear to pass Notability. PamD 17:29, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Indeed, they are all notable no matter how little is said, because it's the highest military award-- I removed the Speedy on this one. I thought perhaps we could use the provisions of WP:N that when there is no more information than fits in a list, there's no need for a separate article. However, it seems that he, and presumably every one of them, does have a full article in the Russian WP that gives sufficient details for a full article here (I added the link for him.) . The photos come from there, and have a full statement that they are free in the USSR and the US, So it seems that it is appropriate to make the articles, if it is done correctly. The MILHIS group are the best people to follow this up. DGG ( talk ) 17:55, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Not all the photos have that provenance: see Aslan Vazirov where the image File:Везиров Аслан Фархад оглы.jpg has been uploaded as "Own work" and is not the same as in the Russian article. The editor has produced about 9 more unsourced stubs since I asked them to stop doing so. PamD 23:07, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Notable and encyclopedic ?

Hi DGG.

I refer to your comment [15].

While I did think on balance Gregory Levey was worth keeping, just, the point about an argument for deleting the other articles was exactly the point I was making. I suspect we are in furious agreement ?

Aoziwe (talk) 13:50, 23 June 2016 (UTC)

Yes, Aoziwe, we are probably in agreement generally; No matter where we draw the line, there will be disputes about what side of the border something falls, and there are always some articles at afD which could reasonably go either way. Even werewe to make fixed rules, such as $ of revenue, there will still be cases where it would be reasonable to make an exception.

But we may not be in agreement about the relative importance of the different areas. The rule I go by. is that where there are good WPedians working on very detailed articles in a field I have no interest in, I see no reason to disturb them; what I ask is that they let others write detailed articles in fields that concern them,--in, particular, I of course mean fields that interest me. This especially holds with fields where the decisions are made in a rational and reproducible fashion. So for professional athletes, including jockeys , there are fairly good clear and widely accepted criteria; for asteroids also there are good criteria that call for listifying 99% of them; for music groups there's a very widely accepted simple standard of placement on accepted lists that I can accept as rational , even though I'd have placed the necessary level as higher. The problems come when we move from objective criteria like "fully professional team" to the GNG, where most sources can be considered as either substantial & reliable or as more notices and promotional depending on whether or not one wants to delete the article DGG ( talk ) 02:25, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. Food for my thoughts. Aoziwe (talk) 13:33, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

Not notable: Malls

I came across Brunswick Square (East Brunswick, New Jersey) during pages patrol. Looking for sources, there are trivial local news stories about a fire, needing an artist, and so on [16]. There is nothing notable there.

The article references do not appear to be related to the article. The first ref is broken anyway, but is supposed to be connected to "The International Council of Shopping Centers: New Brunswick". And one ref is supposed to be the list of stores at the mall, but it goes here: [17] (its a mix of page 404 and a link to a store). That ref would be really trivial anyway if it worked.

However, my biggest concern is the large template at the bottom of the page entitled: "Shopping malls in the New York metropolitan area". I believe the template is entitled: "New York City Malls", and yes here it is [18]. I count 89 malls - I might be off by a couple, but there it is. What can be done about this? The thing is, this shows that a number of people have no idea what Wikipedia is supposed to be. Steve Quinn (talk) 05:49, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

The NY Metropolitan Area has 24 million people. I think the number of malls reasonable. Certainly for the ones in NYC proper, all those listed are clearly notable, except perhaps one, that I just nominated for deletion. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bricktown Center at Charleston If anything, the listing is conservative; O can think of at least one or two more. In the suburbs, I only know a few of the possible regions, so there are probably a few borderline one. As for this particular one, if you think it not notable, list it for afd.

Afds on malls have been toatally inconsistent. Some ears ago I tried to establish a basic standard of 1 million sq ft, (100,0000 sq. meters) for the ordinary type of suburban mall (downtown city ones are harder to specify---they are normally more compact. The proposal was rejected. I think the best way forward is to look for chains of malls, and see if we can combine them. Malls sometimes do define an areas--after all, perhaps the original purpose of a city was to have a protected market square. DGG ( talk ) 06:36, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

• OK thanks - this was very helpful. Before this, I did not know the notability standards for malls. --- Steve Quinn (talk) 02:43, 25 June 2016 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Barnstar of Diplomacy
	For your recent contribution to the mailing list - nicely done. S Philbrick(Talk) 15:07, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

20:12:39, 1 July 2016 review of submission by Brenda haines

• Brenda haines (talk · contribs)
  • Draft:4imprint plc (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Hello, DGG. First, let me say how incredibly helpful the detailed responses have been on your talk page. Thank you for taking such time and care in helping all of us improve our submissions and generally making Wikipedia a stronger tool.

My colleague, Leah, has been working on the 4imprint, PLC, article. (In the interest of full disclosure: Leah and I work together and the article we are referencing is for a client. I realize that automatically poses a question about neutrality, so I want to be completely transparent about that.) We are genuinely interested in editing the article to make it a high-quality submission. Based on the feedback my colleague has received to date, we recognize the need to make significant edits to the article to meet the notability requirements and that it may not be possible at all. I've read your talk page description of notability and it has helped me understand in greater detail the chief issue we are facing here. My questions related to this are:

Is it possible for trade industry publications to be considered reliable, independent sources? Or, must the sources be mainstream media sources/scientific journals/research publications in order to qualify? (We currently use several trade industry sources in the article, which is what prompts my question.)

Likewise, can local media sources (e.g.: those that cover our geographic region) contribute to the requirement for "substantial" coverage? Or, by their definition are they unable to do so? For example, if a subject is covered substantially in a local newspaper story with a modest circulation, does that source generally add to or detract from the subject's notability?

If sources are used in another Wikipedia article on a company in the same industry, can we deduce they would be considered reliable and independent in another article? Or, do you use other factors to determine whether the source is considered reliable and independent in different articles? With gratitude for your guidance, Brenda ( User:Brenda haines 20:12, July 1, 2016‎)

Brenda haines, there is no simple clear answer. Each article is considered individually, and the standards to be applied are interpreted by the participants in the particular discussion. And just as anyone can contribute to WP, anyone can join in a discussion. The net result is considerable variability , with particularly great inconsistency in some fields, such as organizations--and most particularly the one relevant here, commercial organizations.

The reliability of sources is discussed at the Reliable sources noticeboard, WP:RSN, and, as is typical for WP, the information is found in the very extensive and unorganized archives of that page. As compared with discussions of an individual article, the discussions here tend to be more focussed and usually attract expert participation.

The suitability of trade journals for showing notability depends on the journal,and on the article. A long objective discussion of a company, or a major product review, can sometimes count, especially in a journal of known importance and objectivity. But most articles in trade journals are not written in this manner,but as announcements of celebrations. Similarly for local magazines and newspapers. Almost all such magazines rely on routinely covering everything in their area, and are not written as objective independent discussions. For both, we are particularly dubious about interviews with the ceo, which normally are just a platform for giving the person an opportunity to say what they like about heir company. This is especially true for local business magazines. This is also true of local editions of major national news sources. There is a difference between , say, a national story in CBS and a story in a local affiliate of CBS; I am particularly doubtful when I find something that was from a local affiliate is cited as just "CBS". Even the NYTimes coverage of local NYC businesses especially in its local editions is more uncritical than its coverage of national ones.

Do not go too much by other articles. There are several hundred thousand articles in WP accepted in earlier years when the standards were lower that we need to either upgrade or remove. And even now, many articles get in that would be deleted if more carefully examined. In particular, most of our articles on firms involved in any manner in advertising or publicity are considerable problems.

But an equally important problem with your article is not the sourcing or the notability: its the promotionalism. (Our current system does not make it easy to specify the very common circumstance that the two problems usually go together. One useful definition of promotionalism is that a promotional article is written to say what the company wants to say, whereas an encyclopedia articles is written to tell the reader what the general reader might want to know.

Promotional articles for non-notable companies are marked by an inclusion of minor awards: this usually indicates there are no major ones. Promotional articles focus of funding of the company, rather than what it has actually accomplished. They include many minor notices, trying to list everything they can find to make the company look more important. They tend to focus on rapid growth or future plans, rather than attained importance. It is much better to list only what is major. This is especially important for charities. There is no point in listing the minor charities all companies do in their communities. Similar for routine good practices, such as employee relations, or now-routine environmental standards.

as you will have realized, these requirements are much harder to meet for specialized b-to-b companies such as yours. There simply are not as good source as there are for consumer product companies, or those in fields with general interest, such as electronics or aviation.

In your particular case, there might be notability: there usually is for companies on the London stock exchange, and firms with a half-billion USD revenue are very often notable. In your case, you have a good source for market share in your field. That is not a formal criterion, tho it is one I would like to see us use more. (You need to indicate the relevant geographic area--I gather it's in the US.) There are some technical factors also that would make a better impression. See the technique for using multiple occurrences of the same reference is WP:REFBEGIN, and enclose urls in [ ] not < > -- < > is indeed the print standard, but it doesn't render properly in Wikipedia. Avoid using the name of the company repetitively in the article. I like "the firm" (not the Firm) once each paragraph and the rest of the time "it" or "they". Avoid using adjectives of praise or importance; avoid using jargoion like "in order to grow the business"

As you know, I am not all that happy doing work other people are paid for. But I am interested in helping people learn how to use WP effectively, and WP articles are a specialized form that people need to learn, for there is no type of business writing that really matches. People learn to write to achieve a purpose, but writing for general information is a very difficult purpose to do well, because there is no obvious focus. And, as you've said, what I write here is seen by others also. Let me know when to see the next version: I judge the usefulness of my approach by how much articles get improved. DGG ( talk ) 03:16, 2 July 2016 (UTC) DGG, thank your for answering my questions and providing additional insights and references. That context is very helpful. I will the materials you've cited and work on revisions... with the goal of submitting an improved version for your review. Brenda Brenda haines (talk) 17:34, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

Article A. Barkhudar

Hello DGG,

Some time ago you commented on my article - A. Barkhudar. I tried to follow the comments, also applied for WP:DCM permission(I wrote a letter again and still waiting), but still rejected. It would be important to hear your opinion concerning the improvements. If there is a need I can reason about all the changes and tries to address your comments. Thank you in advance, hope to hear from you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nairabarkhudaryan (talk • contribs) 13:36, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

Nairabarkhudaryan (talk · contribs), I made a comment there explaining what is needed. I appreciate your efforts, and I will see what I can do myself to deal with the formatting--it may be easier to do it than to explain it. I may need to ask you for help with the Armenian test. Please give me a few days to get to it. DGG ( talk ) 15:08, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

Question on Notability

David - are people considered notable when, on several occasions over the years, they have given multi-million dollar endowments to universities for professorships, medical research, and libraries like the Smithsonian, even though they may be low profile business leaders (founders and/or chairman and/or are council for notable companies & universities) but highly recognized as philanthropists? ^{Atsme📞📧} 21:24, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Normally they have done something notable to acquire the money. Anyway, "multi-million" is not nearly enough to be called a philanthropist these day, certainly not if its the main notability. Using that term would seem to be puffery, and articles stressing it would normally be press releases. DGG ( talk ) 22:59, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

It just seems to me there's a serious imbalance between what we're allowed to make notable, such as a relatively unknown sports figure or porn star while we delete BLPs about philanthropists who create endowments, support research, and/or help build and support educational programs, libraries and various other beneficial institutions to help advance humanity. ^{Atsme📞📧} 02:18, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

There is a very great imbalance, and I do not know anyone at WP who does not consider our imbalance absurd. But every person here has a different view of it: some consider us to have a prejudice against sports figures, because we do not accept articles on most college athletes; some against some forms of popular music, because we do not accept people who are considered interesting, but not yet made a hit recording ; some against academics, because we rarely accept associate professors; some against authors, because we rarely accept them if they self-pubnlish; some against politicians, because we do not accept them even though they are a major party candidate for national office unless they should win; some against artists, because even those who will be considered significant do not for many years get into museum collections; some against local topics, because we do not consider local branches of nation organizations; some against geographic features, because we do not cover every street in a city; some against porn stars, because we use too narrow a list of awards, some against video series, because we do not make articles for every named character, and so on. And for every one of these there are people who consider that what we do include in that field greatly excessive. For each example mentioned, I have my own position (though in one or two cases it has changed in one direction or another over the years).

Some of this is the inevitable result of relying on the WP:GNG, because the availability of references of the type we want varies in different subjects--even though in practice we do adjust for this informally, by varying the meaning of "substantial coverage," and "independent" for favored or disfavored topics.

Myself, I think such reliance is an obsolete survival of the early unsophisticated days here , before people realized the difficulties that would come from our size and importance -- in fact, before people realized that our size and importance was even conceivable. We need to cover the most important in each field, and do it by some quantitative standard applicable to each. We have a fe: nSPORTS, NPROF, etc. tho we insist or trying to modify them or use them together with the GNG, which can yield some rather odd results, but does have what some people here consider an advantage, of giving plenty of room for argument. We would still need to balance the fields, andI can only think of the principle I quote from Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman:

"So long as a man rides his hobbyhorse peaceably and quietly along the King's highway, and neither compels you or me to get up behind him — pray, Sir, what have either you or I to do with it?"

But increasingly, I have come to thin notability is not the main consideration for coverage: to quote myself this time, from many AfD discussions:

Small variations to the notability standard either way do not fundamentally harm the encyclopedia, but accepting articles that are part of a promotional campaign causes great damage. Once we become a vehicle for promotion, we're useless as an encyclopedia

As applied, those topics lending themselves to promotion are those where we should be the most cautious, and the most restrictive. I include philanthropists, a title that anyone can claim who has a few million dollars and wishes the tax and publicity advantages of disposing of some if it to anything the world considers a useful purpose. DGG ( talk ) 04:10, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

DGG - at what point do we consider a business leader successful? Would being long time Chairman of the Board for more than one notable investment firm that have articles in WP make that person notable? What about a professorship named in a person's honor - would that make them notable? What about someone who establishes multiple million dollar endowments to universities and hospitals and an unrestricted endowment to a notable educational endeavor at a highly notable library? Would that qualify? What if that person has done all of the above and there are articles in independent RS that verify it? Would that establish notability? How much does common sense play into determining notability? ^{Atsme📞📧} 00:55, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

My own view is that it depends upon the position, the notability of the company, and the degree of prominence in other roles--political, social, and so on. With respect to position, I consider ceo or the equivalent much more notable than any lesser position -- whether chairman of the board is equivalent depends on the company. A company that barely makes it in WP is not usually notable enough to be assumed to have a notable ceo, but a company large enough that it would not be challenged might well. As for notability of investment companies & other financial enterprises, I think the minimum figure we usually accept for notability is $0.5 Billion assets, but not always. I would never challenge one with $1 billion. I repeat: "multi-million" is a very low figure these days. Anyone who pays estate tax in the US has at least $5 million in assets, and if they leave half of it to charity, it's multimillion. The head of a billion dollar investment firm would be expected to be able to give many times that.

As always, these arerules of thumb--WP does not presently judge this way,t though I wish it would. DGG ( talk ) 01:17, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

^{DGG} forgot to ping you. Atsme📞📧 03:03, 13 July 2016 (UTC)}Ok, one last question (this time, *lol*) - what if they co-authored a book that focused on the business they're in (investments) in addition to all the above? Can we use a combination of things for subjects that are low-key but notable because of their leadership roles in business plus philanthropy over the course of 30 to 40 years? ^{Atsme📞📧} 02:01, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Barbera Coffee Company

You salted the talk page but not the article page? Regards, for (;;) (talk) 06:13, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

thanks for notifying me. I'll fix it. DGG ( talk ) 09

26, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing. for (;;) (talk) 12:41, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

Could you please help me with this? I spent considerable time working on the page for Barbera Coffee Company. While I recognize that some of the content might have been the same as previously posted content, I never saw the page, nor did I have any knowledge about it having been discussed and removed previously.

I researched the material and made every effort to meet Wikipedia's requirements for notability. If you research, as I have already requested elsewhere, you would find that I'm not a highly active editor on this platform. I find it very confusing to work in. However, I am a serious writer, who would never waste your time if I could help it.

It begins to feel like Wikipedia editors are not willing to allow this company a page on Wikipedia because someone who came before me didn't know what they were doing--possibly the company themselves, especially as English isn't their first language. Could I please be given access to the previous discussion, so I can know how to resolve the issues and advise Barbera Coffee Company on how to meet your demands and that of other Wikipedia editors (if there are any).Writingasaghost (talk) 17:39, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

I realize now, after some help from the help desk, that I broke a major rule when I failed to create a use page with the proper attribution for paid work. I wish someone would have told me this in the beginning when issues arose with the page. I've been floundering like an idiot.

I have rectified the failure to reveal the COI, now that I'm aware of the COI issue. If I read this over six years ago, I had forgotten it. Could I at least get the page back to draft status?Writingasaghost (talk) 05:26, 12 July 2016 (UTC)

Writingasaghost, I will take a look, but it may take another week or two. DGG ( talk ) 19:39, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

Belmond Eagle Island Lodge

Hi DGG

I notice that you have redirected my page about Belmond Eagle Island Lodge. I would like the chance to improve it, Please could you let me know why you believe it will 'inevitably be deleted' so I can make the appropriate updates to enable to page to be reinstated.

Thanks PurpleSpiderSpider (talk) 12:25, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

I will get back to you on this by tomorrow DGG ( talk ) 12:56, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

I am editing this page today, I reinstated it in order to edit it. Please do not remove just yet - allow me time to complete the revisions. Many thanks PurpleSpiderSpider (talk) 14:47, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Draft:Judith Donovan

Dear Graeme,

I have seen that Judith Donovan’s profile has been described as too promotional. She is an outstanding businesswoman, awarded a CBE (one of the highest Queen’s Honours) and has brought about real change and benefits to small businesses, especially in rural areas. We feel the public would expect her to be on Wikipedia?

Is there any way you could accept the profile if we were to edit with your guidance?

We would welcome your advice With thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jonnyross00 (talk • contribs) 12:33, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

I'lll get back to you tomorrow on this. DGG ( talk ) 12:54, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Johnyross00, I see her career on Google, and CBE is in fact considered notability, (but not OBE or MBE.) but I cannot find the draft article or the deleted article on Wikipedia. Were you the author? If I cannot find it to restore, I'll write a sketch myself. DGG ( talk ) 05:27, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

I will get there. I haven't forgotten. DGG ( talk ) 19:35, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

ANI discussion

There is a topic in which you were involved being discussed at WP:ANI. The topic is concern over Adam9007's removal of speedy deletion templates. You are welcome to join the discussion here. Toddst1 (talk) 20:00, 14 July 2016 (UTC)

Oil Nut Bay )and Notability in General)

Posted in 1 edit, this article is blatantly obviously created as a comissioned work and authored by someone with a perfect in-depth knowledge of article creation. I don't know what to do about it - f indeed anything can be done, but it's the kind of article that makes me want to give up volunteering my time and intelligence for Wikipedia. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 23:51, 14 July 2016 (UTC)

We're not helpless. I just listed it for G11. DGG ( talk ) 03:53, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

Just declined, so I listed it at AfD. If it does stay in, maybe we are helpless under current rules for what canbe investigated regarding COI. DGG ( talk ) 09:50, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

I declined the speedy; It may well be a paid editor, but the article isn't unduly spammy, "editor is suspiciously familiar with Wikipedia" isn't a deletion criterion much as some would like it to be, and the notability standards for hotels & resorts on Wikipedia are historically extremely low. I find it hard to imagine any reason anyone would want to pay an editor to create this; I would hope that people looking to buy multi-million dollar houses on private islands aren't basing their decisions on Wikipedia. ‑ Iridescent 09:57, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

This sort of thing is a matter of judgment (which i swhy I think we might indeed need a way of investigating) I do agree with you about our standards for hotels, which except for the most famous, seem entirely inconsistent. DGG ( talk ) 10:02, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

(edit conflict) You can hope, Iridescent, but I did not join Wikipediand spend literally thousands of hours on it to rub shoulders with this kind of obvious spam. We need to establish a clear policy to condemn this sort of thing, otherwise it will be the 'but other stiff like it exists' defense. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 10:04, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

As you may remember from my getting my fingers burned last time I tried to clean up resortspam (I was accused of "being on a deletion spree" for daring to suggest this might not be notable, and some guy called DGG declined my deletion request for this piece of obvious spam) I have no love for substubs about resorts, but this is a very poor one to choose as a test case. Virgin Gorda only has a population of about 4000, so the construction of this resort is almost certainly the island's largest employer, and once it opens it will probably be the largest populated settlement on the island, since each of those 88 houses and all the shops are also going to require a support staff and if the resort is only accessible by helicopter or ship they're presumably all going to be living in barracks onsite. Thus, either the scheme will succeed and the article will need to be re-created as an article on a significant population centre, or it will fail and undoubtedly be notable as a high-profile ghost town and spectacular bankruptcy. The existing stub isn't unduly spammy and doesn't have any element of "we're great"; if we're going to make "creator has a potential conflict of interest" into a deletion criterion, we'd be deleting half of Wikipedia. ‑ Iridescent 10:21, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

That was in 2010. My attitude has changed with the growth of paid editing. I'm willing to sacrifice complete coverage to prevent it, because it's a danger to the very purpose of writing a NPOV encyclopedia, and a great discouragement to the volunteers we need to be attracting to survive at all. I don't think WP or any community project can really have static rules. For example, the need for accuracy is much higher now that journalists and other people whom we once relied on now use us as a resource. DGG ( talk ) 22:27, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

Are you suggesting DGG that I was paid to start those London hotel stubs? The question is Iridescent, is are there enough sources to validate having those articles. And in most cases, actually, yes, they could be expanded into half decent entries. They should have been start as proper articles initially, I agree, but I think hotels typically get a hard time on wikipedia. There's a huge number of missing notable ones. Me personally, I prefer historic architecturally notable luxury hotels, not generic branches of popular chains, but at the time I felt like I was doing something useful to filling in a gaping hole in wiki's coverage of London hotels, so make no excuses for acting in good faith in starting them. Can San Domenico House be expanded into a better article? Chances are, yes, it could quite easily be expanded into something half credible. So why doesn't anybody do it? By all means, take a load of them to AFD and see how they fare. A quick look in google books tells me that San Domenico House is likely notable.♦ Dr. Blofeld 19:42, 16 July 2016 (UTC)

As I think you realize, the editor who thought it was spam was someone else. What I think is spam, and therefore suggested deletion, is Oil Nut Bay, which was written by a spa. I was explaining why in the past I might not have even bothered deleting such articles. I agree with you, Dr. Blofeld, that most luxury hotels are probably notable. But many of the current articles being written on such subjects are almost certainly paid editing. Opinion varies on whether we should fix them or delete them, and my attitude has switched to the second solution, for the same reason we usually delete articles by banned editors--as the only practical way to discourage the practice.

More generally, I've said many times that to try to distinguish by guessing from the nature of the article and the edit history is very rough work, and would be done much more precisely if we were able to know is suspicious instances who the editor actually is. How this can be done without compromising some of our basic principles is a very difficult question. DGG ( talk ) 21:03, 16 July 2016 (UTC)

The problem we have is that companies and hotels/resort owners don't "own" articles on their subjects. Obviously we need stronger protection against shoddy COI editing and promotional spam as an encyclopedia, but if some PR operative of a firm is trying to get their mits on an article, or start it, I just disagree with the principle that just because the firm and PR are interested in having an article on their subject we must delete or block it at all costs to completely stamp out paid editing and people using wikipedia for commercial gain . There are really a lot of notable firms which are started by PR operatives or CEOs themselves which if started by any neutral editor would never get deleted or be seen as a problem. And the issue is that thse people don't own the articles. Anybody can blast a puff piece written by one of them to smithereens and write it neutrally from scratch and put it on a watchlist. Over time wikipedia is going to increasingly attract the promotional types who just don't get what wikipedia is about. So while I respect your traditionalist view of what an encyclopedia should contain, I don't agree that we should block all article subjects which might have self-interest from companies. What matters is that the article subjects are notable and neutral/reliable. If articles meets GNG and can be written neutrally and sources to reliable publications we should keep them and nurture them. What we really need is a (paid) department of full-time foundation employees here whose job it is to parole company articles, block out the spam from PR operatives and paid editors and edit them neutrally, retaining the articles for the good of knowledge, not because some CEO wants it.♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:16, 16 July 2016 (UTC)

Opinion, obviously, varies. My own view is that the proportion of decent articles from such sources is so extremely low, that on balance we would improve WP by eliminating altogether if we could find an effective way to do so. But as we have not yet found a way, we have to remove on other grounds. Personally, I do make exceptions if the subject is highly notable and the article is truly satisfactory (which happens one time in a thousand) or the subject is highly notable a& it can be quickly fixed and someone is interested in doing so (one in a hundred) can be quickly fixed & someone is interested in doing it, but otherwise I will use whatever deletion process fits the circumstances. Additionally there is a difference between declared and undeclared COI. Undeclared COI , especially if paid editing, is a violation of the TOU, and according to WMF policy we are all responsible for enforcing it. We do not yet have this as a speedy criterion, possibly because of the difficulty in determining just who is violating it under existing practice. As any reason that has consensus is valid at AfD, and we need just convincing evidence not actual certainty, I would be considering using it as a reason; I know others have, and as a closing admin to accept a consensus to do so. As a first step, I would support retroactive deletion of articles started by blocked coi editors if G4 would be otherwise applicable except they had not yet been blocked. 5 or 6 Years ago I would have supported your view on this, but I think that the proportion of commercial promotionalism was not yet so high, and we had not yet realized the danger. (The key promotionalism problem then was ideological promotionalism)

I am, however, not someone who has a traditionalist view of the encyclopedia. I am very willing to find whatever reason we can to reasonably extend the boundaries for what we cover, to the extent we can write verifiable and useful articles. I am much more willing to do this in areas whichcan be relatively free from promotionalism. DGG ( talk ) 01:57, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

DGG, where are you getting Undeclared COI , especially if paid editing, is a violation of the TOU, and according to WMF policy we are all responsible for enforcing it from? This is not and never has been the case, and it's worrying to see that a sitting Arbcom member appears to think that it is. While undisclosed paid editing is forbidden, neither Wikipedia nor the WMF has ever had a policy against editing with a conflict of interest, and whenever such a thing has been proposed it's been shot down; even the relatively weak guidance at WP:Conflict of interest isn't and never has been Wikipedia policy. (WP:Comment on content, not on the contributor, on the other hand, is a formal Wikipedia policy, which you appear to be wilfully disregarding.) The exact wording of the relevant part of the TOU is These Terms of Use prohibit engaging in deceptive activities, including misrepresentation of affiliation, impersonation, and fraud. As part of these obligations, you must disclose your employer, client, and affiliation with respect to any contribution for which you receive, or expect to receive, compensation., and is explicitly and carefully worded to only relate to people being specifically paid to edit Wikipedia.

In the unlikely event that we did bring in a ban on all undeclared COI editing, Wikipedia would disintegrate into open chaos, given that it would mean bulk deletion of entire sections of the project. (As concrete examples, any article on an educational institution will have been written at least in part by attendees and alumni of that institution; virtually every article on an extant military unit has almost certainly been written at least in part by serving members of that unit; any article on a company has probably been edited at least in part by employees and customers of that company, since in most cases they're the only ones with enough on an interest to do the necessary research.) Much as Jimbo may like it to be otherwise, there is no obligation for employees of the article subject to disclose their affiliations unless they're editing Wikipedia as part of their job, and unless a paid editor admits to it or you can find a paper trail on Elance for the commission being offered and accepted, it's virtually impossible to prove that someone is writing in work time, rather than just writing about their place of work. ‑ Iridescent 14:13, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

From Wiki: (Overview, paragraph 2:

The community – the network of users who are constantly building and using the various sites or Projects – are the principal means through which the goals of the mission are achieved. The community contributes to and helps govern our sites. The community undertakes the critical function of creating and enforcing policies for the specific Project editions...

I interpret this as saying that enforcement responsibility here is the responsibility of enWP, and that out policies must be compatible with the TOU. With respect to paid editing, there's also a statement that and one WP's policies may vary if the variation is approved: we have not (or at least not yet) chosen to do so. Therefore, our Deletion Policy must be interpreted to include at least the restrictions made by the TOU.

The problem, as you correctly state, is how we are to do this. In the absence of specific targeted rules, we do this by enforcing the existing policies and guidelines in such a way as to produce the necessary result. Fortunately, our existing rules are so close to the TOU that this does not usually have to be stated explicitly in a deletion discussion; in those cases where they are inadequate, either we have to guess or we can take no action. In my opinion, since any valid reason is cause for deletion, and NOT ADVOCACY is basic policy, we should at least delete such articles if we reasonably think they have been contributed in violation of the TOU, unless we choose to make an exception, though I would much prefer if there were a more precise method. I continue to think that the community would do well to have some more effective way of directly enforcing them which is compatible with outing policy, and various suggestions have been made. I would support most of them.

As for the college and university articles, some have been written by attendees and alumni--a sort of COI that is not paid editing and which we could deal without most of the university articles have been written by university PR staff in the same style they use for their page in a college guide, and they need to be rewritten. There are indeed other such examples. But since we can not trust any paid editing to be NPOV, you seem to be suggesting we maintain biased articles to maintain our size. DGG ( talk ) 05:00, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you

I appreciate your feedback on my paid work, I've been trying my best to walk the tight rope of neutrality and making the client happy. I'm proud of my non-paid work and I want to ensure that the paid work reflects the same pride and adherence to guidelines. There are quite a few who've balked at the fact that I always reveal my paid status, I've been asked to vote "keep" on like 10-15 AFDs so far and I always tell them that it'd be a waste of money for me to state "Keep - And I was paid to vote". If the client wants to pursue the Born Warriors article in the future I would probably suggest a total rewrite. So thank you I appreciate the feedback.  MPJ-DK  12:22, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

Brian Timpone

Hi - I saw that this article is gone, and you replaced it with a redirect to LocalLabs. Is all of the history permanently gone? Some of the historical pages had very useful information (e.g., described his entire fake byline scandal that Poynter school of journalism broke). So, rather than reading bits and pieces of the story from 15 different articles, it was all unified there in sequence. The latest revisions were badly written and solely negative, but is there no opportunity to change this? There is a lot of negative information about him in various reliable sources such as NPR. Positive info is only really in his own publications on his own sites. Also, I noticed someone comment that he's a "local business man" (thus insignificant for wikipedia) but Blockshopper operates in over 15+ cities nationwide. Local Labs (his company) is used in a few different states' newspapers. The (main) significant thing about him is that he is the first person to ever try outsourcing the writing of local news articles to the Philippians, and he's doing it in many markets. The other significant thing about him was actually the inspiration for the CBS Show "Person of Interest," Episode "Nothing to Hide." Timpone started a business (Blockshopper) to collect personal info about people, posts it online, and refuses to let people opt out / take their home address off.

If the article cannot be accessed by regular users of wikipedia, is there a way I can just see a read-only copy of the history to copy it? I spent 8-10 hours writing an older version (the one about the Poynter / fake byline scandal - since I was there at the time) and that was completely wiped out. I didn't bother contributing to the new one. It is pointless to write anything negative about someone who has an army of 1000 people in the Philippians, constantly online. I won't upload it back here. It's for journalism students (an older version - not the latest one that was a mess that you ended up deleting anyway) ApolloLee (talk) 09:40, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

User:ApolloLee i will take another look, but it will take a few days till I get to it . DGG ( talk ) 00:13, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

Prolific Sock farm products

Hi DGG. FYI, see Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard#Slew of articles from a prolific sock farm. The farm was just discovered today. I've made a list of all the "articles" they've created and posted them at COIN, as I don't have time to go through them myself. Pinging also Kudpung and Orangemike. How utterly demoralising, sigh. Voceditenore (talk) 17:06, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

I see it's also being discussed at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Undisclosed Paid Editing Farm (re banning the farm and nuking the products). Voceditenore (talk) 17:16, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

deletions are underway; but expect to find more of them as we check further.

but this should not surprise you--1/as we improve WP, it increases in importance and people want their professional and business activities to be in it. 2/most of the are not suitable for articles without compromising nOT DIRECTORY and NPOV 3/most people and businesses cannot write their own well enough to get them kept 4/quite a few people think they have the skills to do such articles and offer these services 5/we cannot accurately detect paid contributions with compromising Privacy.

What it comes down to is a choice between NPOV and Privacy, and almost everyone at WP values Privacy higher. There is no solution if this remains the case. DGG ( talk ) 15:54, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

Hi DGG. I wasn't surprised at all, just fed up. But on the bright side, there seems to be a growing consensus for nuking the articles in situations like this rather than wasting everyone's time with AfDs. Of course, most of these people don't get caught red-handed socking as this farm did. I suppose one small step people can take is to check obvious paid articles and look at the contributions of the creator and those who have edited the same articles or supplied images. See, for example User talk:Seostrategists and User talk:Kkc knight, who uploaded the image at Josh Roush and voted "Keep" in the AfD and who created London & Country Mortgages (subsequently taken over by Seostrategists), although I doubt if there's enough to bring an SPI. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 07:09, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Bring one and see. I think it's enough. Maybe this is a good time for me to finally try using checkuser. DGG ( talk ) 19:49, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

CENGN

Hi There DGG! My article, CENGN, was recently deleted due to unambiguous advertising or promotion. <05:16, 21 July 2016 DGG (talk | contribs) deleted page CENGN (G11: Unambiguous advertising or promotion)> Can I rectify this for the article? I am open to any changes to make it Wikipedia worthy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.191.113.1 (talk) 13:54, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

explanation tomorrow. DGG ( talk ) 05:41, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Hi DGG! Is the explanation still coming? I am open to any changes to make this article work for Wikipedia. Thanks for your help!

216.191.113.1,

promotional writing is writing that says what the subject would like to have said, and is normally addressed to prospective or current customers, clients, funders, students, etc. In contrast, ec writing is addressed to the general public, and says what the member of the public who may come across a mention of the subject would like to know. encyclopedic writing does not contain jargon, such as " who aim to accelerate the commercialization" or "new communication solutions"; it does not contain vague promises, such as "To establish Canada as a global leader in the commercialization of the technologies that will underpin the next generation of converged global communication network" ; it does not contain puffery, such as " to accelerate and validate new technologies" or " innovative projects and ideas " ; it does not contain unnecessary adjectives, and specifically omits adjectives of praise. It does not list executives besides the CEO, or members of the board. It usually does not include a list of funders;. In the case of a network such as this, the list of participants is however relevant content, but should be presented compactly in columns.

encyclopedic writing does not rely upon sources connected with the network or its members; it does not rely of such instruments for disseminating press releases as city business journals, which normally simply reprint announcements from the organization (as is the case here); it usually does not rely on industry newsletters, such as sdx central. It is based on references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources, not press releases or mere announcements, that meant the standards of being reliable sources for notability,as explained in WP:RS. The article actually has no sources at all that meet this description, so besides the problems with promotionalism , it fails the requirements for notability at WP:CORP, though some of the sources, particularly the government press release,and possibly sdx, may be adequate for the description of what the group is.

In addition, if you have any connection with the organization, you probably have a WP:Conflict of Interest, which should be disclosed If it involves money, it probably is a paid conflict of interest, and you must follow the rules in the Terms of Use, particularly with respect to paid contributions without disclosure DGG ( talk ) 17:46, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

Thanks DGG! I guess less is more when the third party, neutral, sources aren't there. You're in depth feedback is very helpful! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rick Penwarden (talk • contribs) 14:36, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

UTRS appeal #16200

A user you have blocked has opened UTRS appeal #16200 on the Unblock Ticket Request System. The reviewing administrator, TParis (talk · contribs), has requested your input:

Dontreader (block log • active blocks • global blocks • autoblocks • contribs • deleted contribs • abuse filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

---

Time: Jul 21, 2016 22:45:37

Message: I've written a proposed response to the blocked editor and I would like to get your opinion before I make the offer.

Notes:

• If you do not have an account on UTRS, you may create one at the administrator registration interface.
• Alternatively, you can respond here and indicate whether you are supportive or opposed to an unblock for this user and your rationale, if applicable.

--UTRSBot (talk) 22:45, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

I have sent you a request by email--some of the details are better not repeated more than necessary. DGG ( talk ) 08:42, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

UTRS Account Request

I confirm that I have requested an account on the UTRS tool. DGG ( talk )

Hey DGG, I haven't seen an account request on the UTRS tool from you.--v/r - TP 07:55, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

({U|TParis}}, just tried again DGG ( talk ) 19:46, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Great, I've activated your account. Thanks for volunteering.--v/r - TP 20:12, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for watching COI edits on Andrij Dobriansky

I wanted to offer up a great big thank you for stepping in to comment on Conflict Of Interest issues on the wikipedia page for one Andrij Dobriansky. Your comments ring true, yet the person, Tufkaa, appears to be gung ho on offering this content to the public wikipedia audience. Having spoken to Mr. Dobriansky's still grieving widow of 40 years, she very much appreciates members of the greater Wikipedia community trying to maintain the reputability of this resource and not letting someone with a seemingly hurtful, emotional connection causing unnecessary harm to her. Since I am a new Wikipedia user and have no reputation, I really have no course of action to take on these edits in the future. Tufkaa will be able to override me. But if you, or others like you, continue to maintain an effort to not allow COI edits to exist, that will help many people - those seeking legitimate information, and those who have personal connections to the material being represented.

I will step in to attempt some more COI edits and represent Mr Dobriansky in the best, professional light. Again, thank you for stepping up and trying to help. If this bad behavior by users like Tufkaa continues, I truly hope you and others like you in the Wikipedia community can help maintain this as a truly reputable resource. ALU0819 (talk) 01:31, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

yes, I can take care of it, with the help of Voceditenore, a very reliable and knowledgable specialist editor in classical music and especially opera, but we can take care of it better if you let us do it. We do not present people in "their best professional light"; we present them objectively, in a fashion we call WP:NPOV, neutral point of view. See my comments on the article talk page for details. DGG ( talk ) 03:45, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

I fully support DGG's approach, and ALU0819, please note that you also have a serious COI in this article and should behave accordingly. Please read the guidance at Wikipedia:Conflict of interest. Voceditenore (talk) 08:15, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

A pointer

WP:AN/CXT. All the best—S Marshall T/C 20:34, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Eden English School Btl

I'm not asking you to agree with my comments there as you and I do occasionally differ with our opinions, but I do think that academically, this is an AfD you might wish to (and probably should) take a look at, particularly as a DR overturned the first closure. That said, I think that over the last year or so, the AfD process has begun to degenerate into a farce. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 23:09, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

Merger discussion for Italia Independent Group

An article that you have been involved in editing—Italia Independent Group—has been proposed for merging with another article. If you are interested, please participate in the merger discussion. Thank you. Adam9007 (talk) 02:14, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

NPP backlog

Just a few weeks ago the backlog was only a few hundred. 20 days ago it was 7,000, today it is over 9,000. That's an increase of around 30% in just 3 weeks. Where will it stop?The backlog number is totally unacceptable band is almost back to 2011 levels, but I don't know what the solution is. I've sent all day (over 8 hours ) on it today, but it's not made a dent. New articles are arriving faster than I can patrol them. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:57, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

I will get there. Perhaps we need to select a few people for autopatrolled? DGG ( talk ) 16:24, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

It's not really you and I who should be doing NPP except for checking on the performance of te oatrollers. I've patrolled about 120 articles and deleted about 20,so that's about 1 article patrolled about every 4 mins. I admit I'm slow but maybe I just do a lot more background checks or it's because the ones I patrolare the more difficult ones. Today's experience does not demonstrate that articles by established uses are the problem - I'm still going fr those that are unsourced and other suspicious articles, leaving the low-hanging fruit and non toxic articles or others to patrol. Is today a special holiday or something in the USA? --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 16:50, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

I frankly never concern myself about the situation too seriously because we will actually get there (given the certain portion of it being unacceptable and needing deletion); another side of it contributing (perhaps a three-fourths portion of it) is the fact the oldest (from years and years ago) are being filled with results of vandalism moving and other activities. As someone who fluidly went through 9,000 (when it was this number last year) within a few months or so and easily going through at least 1,000 or over a day, I've learned the NPP (no matter what numbers) can be accomplished. As DGG and I both know, particularly what helps alleviate repeated advertising, it is warning users seriously. SwisterTwister talk 16:54, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

I cannot do 1000 a day; in fact, I have learned I cannot accurately do more than 10 at a time, unless I work with ones that can obviously be accepted (there are many of them, which is why I will try to move some of the regular to auto-patrolled). I am currently concentrating on the patrolled NPs, screening ones with what might be problematic titles to see if there is anything wrong.

I do not think it a waste of time for experienced editors to do a little routine work of all sorts, and I try to get to miscellaneous places every once in a while, to keep contact with how they are working and what the current standards are. Or at least that's the excuse I give--perhaps it is just that I am restless. DGG ( talk ) 17:29, 1 August 2016 (UTC) .

NO Answer Received: Speedy Deletion of Logista

Hello DGG, I post again this conversation we had because I have not received a final answer and I do not find the draft of the page in order to add the references. Thank you.

Hello, I have tried to create the "Logista" page, a company that is part of the Imperial Tobacco group (now Imperial Brands) and that is listed on the Madrid stock exchange. I had a better look to the Wikipedia rules and I think I have understood why my article was deleted. Could you please remove the deletion and allow me to modify it ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88Rorschach (talk • contribs) 12:24, 13 July 2016 (UTC) I will get bavk to you tomorrow on this. 88Rorschach, do you have good references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources, not press releases or mere announcements ? If you do, I'll move the article into Draft space so you can add them. . DGG ( talk ) 04:21, 17 July 2016 (UTC)DGG, DGG hello, yes I do have good references from third-party independent reliable sources. Thank you for moving it into Draft space again. Sorry DGG , I do not see the draft. Where is it? Thank you for your help. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rorschach88. (talk • contribs) 09:29, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

By my standards, the company is probably notable (9 billion euro revenue) ; whether it will be found so in WP will depend on the sourcing. But looking more carefully at the draft article, I find mother problem, equally bad: it is thoroughly promotional. "ensuring specialised and customised service for each client." ; "provide added value to both manufacturers and points of sale" "Thus, Logista becomes the ideal partner to market products and service"

The only usable content is the list of national subsidiaries. I apologize if I've raised your hopes, but the deleted material does not provide a basis for an article.

I also should have asked you whether you have any relationship to the firm; if you work for them or have a business relationship, you must be aware of WP:Conflict of Interest; if you a a paid press agent or contractor, you also need to see the more detailed Terms of Use, particularly with respect to paid contributions without disclosure DGG ( talk ) 23:39, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

DGG I don't have any relationship with them and this is not my first article in WIKIPEDIA. Regarding the content of the article, if you read carefully what I wrote some weeks ago in the conversation we had, i mentioned that I had understood what the problem was with the article because at that time I had found some sources that were not careful enough. Now I have new relevant sources such as Bloomberg and Reuters and I would like to review all of it and change the parts that look promotional. Let me know, thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rorschach88. (talk • contribs) 08:55, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

OK, I will look again from scratch tomorrow or this weekend. DGG ( talk ) 02:52, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

Hello DGG, did you have the time to have a look at it? Thank you Rorschach88. (talk) 11:47, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

not yet DGG ( talk ) 12:36, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Thoughts on the Daniel Romanovsky discussion

Greetings David. I was actually going to make a comment about this subject and ask your opinion on your talk page, prior to your posting. I was mulling it over for the last 24 hours at least. I was (and am) very interested in your thoughts about how the current guidance in academic notability with regard personalities in the humanities could be made more flexible. You will probably disagree, but I believe them to be overly-rigid at this time. I am interested in a new discussion on the appropriate venue that may begin a new dialogue, and new thinking to this aspect of notability as the project currently sees it. I hope I have not made a fool of myself by defending the keep, in my response to your posting. I am trying to interpret the guidance as I see it, with a dash of common sense. I am fairly new to the fascinating topic of AfD and would like to become more engaged in it. I hugely respect your vast experience and insight both in this subject area and in the totality of the project. I must admit though, that I do believe the subject does have good grounds for relisting at least. Regards, Simon. Irondome (talk) 02:05, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

we go by the publications. The key criterion #1, impact, Academic impact in the 20th/21st century is almost always by publications in any field except some of the applied sciences. The current WP standard in practice is essentially the extent of publications that would qualify for a full professorship at a major university. (Myself, I'd just go by the professorship on the grounds that the university is a better judge than we are, but that's not the consensus). (Myself again, a little more radically, I'd support the lower standard of associate professorship, but again, this is definitely not the consensus). The requirements for even associate professorship in a first class research university is two academic books by major publishers known to do peer review--either university presses or the few relevant commercial publishers. Nothing else matters, except that at least the 2nd books should not be based on the thesis. but show an independent line of research capable of attracting graduate students and other faculty. At 2nd rate research universities this has been watered down in recent years to one academic book, and three substantial research articles in major journals. That's not our standard, that's the standard of the field.

there are a number special considerations:

1/the creative arts, but our standard makes special provision for them.

2/people in some humanistic specialties where publications other than books count: the most common one that causes problems here is archeology.

3/people working in research institutes of some sort, who publish in other than academic book or journal format. These can be hard to judge; often we end up using the GNG instead of PROF here.  :::4/people in geographic areas that do not fully participate in the US-WEuropean academic system--these can be almost impossible to judge here, as almost nobody has the expertise.

5/people in disadvantaged groups whose actual output is less than would be merited by their actual quality of work--there is no consensus about how much to take this into account. My own view is to take this only slightly into account for 2000+, increasingly more in earlier generations. What happens in any given case depends upon who appears and how hard they fight.

6/people in what are considered here to be weird. These are usually judged nonnotable unless there's a lobby overwhelming the discussion.

7/people in fields not considered rigorous here: education, home economics, library science, etc --fields that often are heavily populated by women at least in past generations. We've been very dismissive in the past, less so now.

8/there's an alternative that sometimes applies : some people who publish relatively non-scholarly books can be foudn notable by WP:AUTHOR.

Actually, the real problem has been the opposite of what you seem to think. People in the humanities can be dealt with quite easily, because they publish books, and the criteria for books & authors is very flexible and exceedingly broad. The difficulty has been with scientists. It took years here to get WP:PROF and citation analysis accepted as a basis for notability. At one point I started saying I might argue on the basis that if someone was cited at all, each citation would be a RS for N. (and the argument would then be on whether each of them had substantial criticism or discussion, which can be a very long argument--if there are 10 papers with 10 refs, each of 100 referring papers would need to be examined in detail.) The net result would be to extend notability down into the assistant professor category. I like to think that this ended the matter, for the people who thought only famous scientists were notable then accepted WP:PROF as a compromise.

It is a very poor idea to take one particular case where the rules don't show notability for someone that you want an article on, and use that as a basis for changing the rule. Argue rather that the particular case should be an exception. WP:IAR is fundamental policy and therefore can over-ride anything that might be provided by any notability guideline. DGG ( talk ) 05:12, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

I really appreciate your detailed and informative response DGG, and the brief history of the matter, and the advice at the end of the post. I will take it all very much on board. Thanks for taking the time. Simon Irondome (talk) 11:48, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

(talk page watcher)I wonder if point #5 ("people in disadvantaged groups whose actual output is less than would be merited by their actual quality of work") may apply to Romanovski? The 1980s weren't the 1950s, but studying Holocaust in the Soviet Union at that time was definitely a career limiting move. K.e.coffman (talk) 20:31, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

This actually occurred to me, but it's not the usual meaning. But there's a limit to how far we can stretch. It would have to be someone who's almost notable, and I don't think he's anywhere near it. DGG ( talk ) 20:38, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

The Isobar company article

Dear Sir, I am working on an assignment at University. My assignment was to choose an article at risk for deletion and improve it. Yesterday I added two references to the article with proper citations. Now I have found that a lady made a report about me at a place called SPI. I explained on there that I am working on an assignment. Am I not allowed to work on improving this article? I also left a note on the discussion page explaining my plan to try and improve the article. Also a second lady put a huge posting on my talk page about COI. Can you please assist me sir, and explain why improving an article is not proper? Thanks. Donald1659 (talk) 10:31, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

(talk page watcher) I've commented at User_talk:Donald1659#Student_assignments as I'm perhaps in a better time zone than DGG. PamD 10:55, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

this is a very interesting example (if true, as it probably is, and as we must assume it to be true for now) of someone in perfect good faith making edits that are indistinguishable from promotional edits, by following the existing pattern in the article and other articles.

It's the sort of edits where our ability to see who someone is would clarify the situation. In this case, a sockpuppet investigation would be reasonable (it might indicate the ed. is correct if it comes from a school IP, and even identify the school; or indicate likely sockpuppettry if it comes from the same ip as before; or indicate nothing either way, if it comes from yet another place or the place can not be determined.) But assuming the person is actually doing the edit on an educational assignment, he and the class need some focussed advice. I think it an extremely poor idea for a teacher to give an assignment like this to beginners. An assignment for beginners should be one that is certain or reasonably certain to be accepted, not an article that may well end up deleted. Donald1659, PamD gave you the proper advice about having the teacher contact WP for assistance with the course. DGG ( talk ) 14:25, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

"Nothing either way" was the result. MSJapan (talk) 02:48, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Reading Well Books on Prescription

David, can you perhaps have a look at this? Not sure what to do with it. Also pinging Doc James. Thanks. --Randykitty (talk) 09:28, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes undisclosed paid editing. Have removed their editing privileges until dealt with and tagged the articles in question. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 14:39, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

I listed for G11. DGG ( talk ) 20:28, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Doc James, I would of course like to know why you are confident it's a paid editor. Naturally, under our current rather absurd rules, you can't tell me on wiki. But since I'm on arb com, you can email me. If it looks interesting, I'll forward to my colleagues as an example of the problems we have, DGG ( talk ) 20:33, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Well it does look like it. I have my evidence plus it is definitely promotional for the organization.

Anyone can find the evidence if they so wish. I am concerned that arbcom may use privately submitted evidence as justification for a ban. So am a little hesitant to send them anything unless they request it and I have assurances of no retaliation.

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:16, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Posed the Q here[19] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:44, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

• (talk page watcher)If anyone paid for this article, they were robbed. Sloppily written (incorrect hyphen in "which was set-up by ", and "the scheme reached 275,000 people and libraries seen a 113% increase in loans" presumably intended either "saw" or "have seen"). Inappropriate to include the full reading lists. Nonetheless I've unspeedied it and will work on it - I've heard of it already (notice in local library I think, or possibly in doctor's surgery), and it seems worthwhile and I've found a couple of newspaper sources about it. PamD 20:47, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

• @Randykitty: @Doc James: I've trimmed the article (no need to include the reading lists), found a few new sources, showed the extent to which library systems are using it, and hope you'll agree the article is now OK, whatever the motives of its original creator. PamD 21:55, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks User:PamD Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:04, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks from me, too, to both of you! --Randykitty (talk) 22:42, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

@Doc James and Randykitty: Mark Stuart Betts has now made what seem to be well-intentioned disclosures (though to comply with the letter of the terms of use, the disclosures should be placed on his user page, rather than the user talk page). Two thoughts: (1) Perhaps Mark can be advised further and then unblocked. (2) Disclosures like that are a beneficial to readers and other editors. Paid editing relationships are a mundane matter that should be discussed in a matter-of-fact way. Wikipedians create unnecessary drama when they create the appearance that paid editing arrangements are of the same nature as sensitive personal information that people have a moral right to keep private. People do not have a moral right to keep paid editing arrangements private on Wikipedia. The moral course of action is to disclose. Andreas JN466 16:49, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks User:Jayen466, yes the editor in question email me. Just catching up and will unblock. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:29, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Deletion of Rohini Sindhuri (IAS)

Dear DGG,

This is regarding the article ROHINI SINDHURI (IAS) which was recently deleted by you. I think the original author of the page is not active anymore so she could not respond to the deletion nomination. The person concerned is notable and meets the Wikipedia:Notability guidelines. She is a junior officer but done significant work in her field and was recognised be the Indian Govt also which was covered in various mainstream newspapers( given in references) . And also there was nothing in the article which was promotional or exaggerated as said by the people in the deletion discussion. we could have improved the article but it was not fit to be deleted. Let me know what steps can be taken going forward. Just being a junior level doesnt mean the person is not notable, its the work she has done which makes her notable. Thank you

i had posted the same in the archive section 2 days back sorry.

Contrib1977 (talk) 09:41, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

I deleted the articles because the 4 people participating in the discussion all said it should be deleted; I must close according to the consensus of the discussion. Looking at the article, it was clearly promotional: "She is fondly remembered by Tumkur people" for example. As for the references, one of the news articles says about her only "Mandya Zilla Panchayat Chief Executive of Rohini Sindhuri, Superintendent of Police Bhushan Gulabrao Borase and nearly 600 ASHA and ANMs were present."Another says only "ZP Executive Officer Rohini Sindhuri, who chaired the meeting, directed the Health and Family Welfare Department to book criminal cases " This is not what we mean by substantial coverage. And similarly for the other references. DGG ( talk ) 20:04, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

While there maybe few sentences which should have been edited to make the article neutral.But that does not mean it was promotional. She has done considerable work in the field of sanitation ( building toilets ) which many would think is not a glamorous job. She led the district to number 1 position in entire india under her watch. there are numerous articles in local language Kannada. In india were basic necessities like toilets are not available and most would shy away from working that field she has done commendable work for which she was selected by the national government also. i can provide the references. I can help make the article more neutral and provide enough references which have substantial coverage in the local and national media.

Thank you — Preceding unsigned comment added by Contrib1977 (talk • contribs) 16:39, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

NewPages tesr

• DGG, All three pages show up at Special:NewPages as well as Special:NewPagesFeed. [20] [21] - NQ (talk) 19:21, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

DGG ( talk ) 20:24, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Set namespace to "all" in the box to show pages originally created as "Draft:" or "User:". - NQ (talk) 21:28, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

aha! I didn't realize it was the original namespace that mattered! thanks. DGG ( talk ) 22:13, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

NQ,Kudpung But the normal way of searching in NPP is just article space. I know that's the way I always use, and I suspect its's the way most people do also--Looking at the conventional NP feed with the filter set to "all", I see not just user pages but a great deal of clutter from categories, user talk pages, article talk pages, files, etc. As there is no way of saying "user + article", the unnecessary material cannot be removed. (compare with the flexible namespace choices in the Search function.) Using the Article Curation new pages feed, I see there is no "all" setting -- one can select either mainspace, or user, but , again, not the combination. We should be able to do much better than this.

And, looking at these , I see that article space drafts is a truly horrible morass, and I am beginning to think we should insist that all drafts go in Draft space. DGG ( talk ) 05:04, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Re: Draft:Double Mountain Brewery

Is this still too promotional for a stub? ---Another Believer _(Talk) 02:20, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

It is better; I'm not going to decline or accept it, but leave it for another editor; it's ok to resubmit it. DGG ( talk ) 16:52, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Anthony Charles Robinson

In this edit to Anthony Charles Robinson, you tagged the article for speedy deletion as G11: "Unambiguous advertising or promotion". I shouldn't have to remind you that WP:CSD is for pages with no practical chance of surviving discussion. Equally, you surely must be aware of what G11 says?

• This applies to pages that are exclusively promotional and would need to be fundamentally rewritten to conform with Wikipedia:NOTFORPROMOTION. If a subject is notable and the content could plausibly be replaced with text that complies with neutral point of view, this is preferable to deletion. Note: Any article that describes its subject from a neutral point of view does not qualify for this criterion. However, "promotion" does not necessarily mean commercial promotion: anything can be promoted, including a person, a non-commercial organization, a point of view, etc.

Are you trying to assert that either (1) the subject is not notable; or (2) that the content could not be plausibly replaced with neutral content? The subject is clearly notable, given the number of articles about him and the awards he's received - not least an OBE. Even if the content were exclusively promotional (which it isn't), with 32 references about him, a monkey with a typewriter could transform it into a neutral article.

I am astonished that an editor of your experience and inclusionist tendencies should make such a fundamental mistake, particularly with the first efforts of a new editor. I see you haven't even noted the CSD nomination in your log yet, so if there is another agenda at play here, I think you should be upfront about it. --RexxS (talk) 13:36, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

A bio based mainly on very minor awards & trivial references is promotional; there is no reason for it except to advertise his speaking career--in fact, quite a few of the paid editors use thie trick of adding a great many not very convincing references. To analyze the G11, let's say he were notable, for example it his award were higher than the OBE, It would need to be fundamentally rewritten because almost all the content is trivial awards , & sourced to local notices about his speeches. The potential G11s that should not be tagged are those that do not need to be fundamentally rewritten and can be easily fixed are, for example, where it's just a matter of adjectives, or a specific section that can be removed. Sot notable or not I do consider it a reasonable G11.

Now, G11 is not an exact criterion, and can be interpreted in many ways. The check on the tagger's interpretation is that I don't delete the articles myself, and anyone else can remove the G11. Even if the speedy tag stays there for more than a day, I take it to mean no other admin is comfortable deleting it, & remove the tag. It is true that I have usually been interpreting G11 more broadly in a sort of desperate response to the increasing promotional editing; it is possible that it has been too broad, and I must look to analyze the results of my CSDs. I'm always re-analyzing something or other from my logs, but this month I'm doing my deletion log, to see which recreations are reasonable and which not. I suppose I should check CSDs next. I like everyone else can drift in interpretation, which is why I do regularly look back. And if I do go too far, I;m glad when someone tells me., so I thank you. I will probably AfD as not notable, but not immediately. DGG ( talk ) 15:25, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

The "new editor" who created this gem, also produced Arthur Charles Evans, which has the same whiff of undisclosed paid editing. Similarly deceptively sourced. Once you look at the sources, like the Robinson article, most evaporate (dead links, trivial mentions, blogs, etc). --Randykitty (talk) 16:46, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

At least Evans is notable , because he has the CBE. DGG ( talk ) 16:53, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

The whole point of having criteria beyond the WP:GNG is that folks who have, for example, received significant awards are very likely to have press coverage and it becomes a short-circuit for the notability debate. It's not a question of how many awards are given out; it's a question of whether receiving that award would most likely imply significant coverage. Now the OBE is "a well-known and significant award or honour", but you may feel it doesn't guarantee that someone will have received coverage. OK, but even leaving aside the OBE, Robinson has significant coverage in an article in The Guardian - that's not a passing mention - and a whole article on him in the The Press (York), which isn't just some local rag, it covers a large chunk of Yorkshire and has a circulation of 25,000 (that's half the circulation of something like the The Washington Times for comparison). Having read the earlier parts of your talk page, I can appreciate your concerns over paid editing - and personally I'd see it banned if I could - but I'd hate for us to get so paranoid about the problem that we start to catch good-faith editors in the net. Now, I have no clue whether LazyLilac is a paid editor, but I can't see an easy way to determine that, and if there is significant coverage in independent sources, we're probably best off just making sure that the content stays neutral, IMHO, as I'd rather "ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer", don't you agree? --RexxS (talk) 19:00, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

• (talk page watcher) Interesting statements by LazyLilac at TeaHouse hereI am a freelance virtual assistant, so I am not his employee and the copywriter has been editing the text and I have been updating it on here, he doesn't know how to create pages on Wikipedia, so yes it's just me doing the editing on here. Time to delete and salt? PamD 21:05, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

@RexxS:@Randykitty: for info. PamD 21:09, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

first step is to take it to AfD and get it deleted. Iff it gets sufficiently edited, it is possible that it might pass, despite the paid editing. DGG ( talk ) 21:33, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Thanks, PamD, that clarifies things quite a lot. I'm not sure that's quite enough to block LazyLilac for TOU abuse, but she/he ought to have worked out what COI means by now. As for salting, I think we'd need to run the article through AfD first, and I still think it's more likely to be kept than deleted, given the press coverage. --RexxS (talk) 21:36, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

@Pigsonthewing: for info, as the editor who moved the draft into mainspace. PamD 21:49, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Comment: Interesting that none of the Teahouse hosts seem to have picked up on what looks like a declaration of paid editing! PamD 21:52, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Paid editing goes to the editor, not the article, which stands on its own merits. Montanabw^(talk) 08:13, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Montanabw, as I understand it personally, while declared paid editing certainly is judged article by article; undeclared page editing does go by the editor, just as other TOU violations like sockpuppettry. I certainly will ban undeclared page editors until they declare, though so far I have used the related reason of advertising-only account. The question of whether we should remove all contributions of detected undeclared paid editors is still open, but in some cases we have done just that, when the nature of the editing is reasonably certain-just as we do with sockpuppettry. DGG ( talk ) 13:29, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

I have sympathy with your intent, DGG, but we don't actually "revert on sight" the contributions of sockpuppets, per se. That draconian step is at present reserved for those evading site bans, as it has been agreed that the loss of possibly useful content is outweighed by the message sent to the ban evader that their contributions are not welcome. Nevertheless, I feel that the same message would also be appropriate to send to paid editors deliberately evading TOU. It would really best be agreed via community debate and consensus, rather than one person taking up the campaign, but if you felt up to raising it at VPP, for example, please ping me and I'd be happy to support you there. --RexxS (talk) 14:37, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes, we ban them first. but we ban on the basis of convincing behavioral and editing evidence, as well as CU. UPE are a little more difficult, because there are a surprising number of good faith new editors who write promotional articles, because that's what they mostly see here in some areas, and they think it's what we want. As discussions at various places have shown, it is quite hard to be sure, unless it's obvious or omitted. But we can and do block people who persist in writing promotional articles, after a warning, and at present the TOU are best used as a supplemental argument--it seems to sound more official. It is rather rare for a paid editor write anything else, though it does happen.

In my personal opinion, the only real reason for trying to identify a UPE is when we reasonably suspect a ring or an extensive commercial operation. DGG ( talk ) 17:21, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Cleanup of AfC submissions

I've recently noticed Cornelius Johannes Barchman Wuytiers, in which you didn't remove some remaining tags and categories. I've now fixed it for you, but don't forget it. Also, AFCH is an excellent tool that makes it significantly easier. Cheers, Dat Guy^Talk_Contribs 19:57, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

for unknown reasons, AFCH is not working reliably for me. When it does , I use it. (though I dislike its inflexibility, it does clean up the misc. nicely.) DGG ( talk ) 21:14, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

I've just read Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Damage_done_by_declining_AFC. I believe we have yet another example where, except for a tiny minority of truly dedicated reviewers, AfC is a broken process and which also the controls I introduced and which were adopted by the community are not working. Around 10% of new enrollments to the reviewer list are reverted following scrutiny, not to mention the others on that list who are blocked, banned, or while hovering until they scrape through the numeric requirements have quickly demonstrated that they nevertheless do not possess the required knowledge or skills. It's pretty much the same problem that we have at NPP. aybe 90/500 isn't enough and it should be 180/3000 as for Page Mover. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:22, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

that's longer than we used to require for admin! And, just like admin, the numbers aren't what does it. There will always be the need for scrutiny of the new reviewers. WHat we need is to get it organized, instead of random. DGG ( talk ) 02:02, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Salting

I believe you salted Talk:Yolande Milan Batteau, not the article page...? — Andy W. (talk · ctb) 02:12, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

fixed; thanks. DGG ( talk ) 02:14, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Mayliewan-Ozerna, Edmonton for Speedy Deletion

Hi. I am a longtime editor, but new to "deletion" requests, so I appreciate that I may have used the wrong reason. Based on your greater experience, I'd appreciate your help in assigning the proper reason, rather than the switch to the rather lethargic "unsourced" that you replaced it with. If you'd looked at the "Talk" page at the article, you would have seen that another user had already provided further (better than mine, I admit) background to the issue for this meaningless article (I couldn't find a "meaningless" reason amongst the Speedy Deletion reasons), which has been sitting dormant for 4 years for the specific reason that the other two articles (Mayliewan, Ozerna) fully replace this one-time placeholder article. Hope you can help. Thanks. Jmg38 (talk) 05:20, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

There is no speedy deletion reason for problems like this. The claim that a neighborhood is or is not notable needs to be discussed at AfD. But the first step before that discussion is to try to find some sources. DGG ( talk ) 05:55, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

But what is "a problem like this"? That's the advice I asked you for. The claim being made is NOT that the neighbourhood is not notable - the claim is that the neighbourhood does not exist, the original article was created WITHOUT SOURCES, and the original editor even states that he/she created the entire "Mayliewan-Ozema" concept out of thin air:

"The City of Edmonton formally divides the area into two neighbourhoods, Mayliewan and Ozerna. Because the two neighbourhoods are sometimes collective referred to as if they were one neighbourhood, they are discussed here together. As of 2006, the two neighbourhoods have a population of about 8,075, with 4,069 in Mayliewan and 4,006 in Ozerna."

The editor admits that two neighbourhoods exist, admits that the City, who created the neighbourhoods, refers to them as two neighbourhoods, but then adds his/her own decision that they should be 'discussed here together despite all those facts'. The entire concept that "Mayliewan-Ozerna" is an actual thing was created in the mind of the original editor, who openly admits it in the article!!!

This is not a discussion of notability, because there is nothing to note, there is nothing to source. The items to note and source are the actual, seperate, independent, fully sourced wiki-articled neighbourhoods of Mayliewan, Edmonton and Ozerna, Edmonton. I even thought that this discussion you and I are having here is exactly the discussion intended for the "Talk" page of the article, which the original short-lived "deletion" request directed people to do.

Actually - I think I realize now that I failed by not putting all these points in the original "Talk" entry after initiating the "deletion" process. (I've already admitted that I'm new to deletion). Do I reenter that request, and fill out the "Talk" with:

"The City created two neighbourhoods, the city produces seperate and distinct data for the two neighbourhoods - which has been used to fully source the two SEPARATE articles that exist under the names of the two neighbourhoods. The editor who created the original "Mayliewan-Ozerna" article years ago stated IN THE ARTICLE that he/she had singlehandedly chosen to make up the non-existent neighbourhood "Mayliewan-Ozerna", while admitting the fact that the City refers to them as two neighbourhoods. The two actual neighbourhoods of Mayliewan, Edmonton and Ozerna, Edmonton, which the original editor admits were the actual entities, have their own fully sourced articles and this admittedly (by the original editor) made up neighbourhood of Mayliewan-Ozerna, Edmonton has never existed, thus can be deleted."

To be fair, someone already added part of this explanation at the "Talk" page, before you removed the "deletion" tag, but perhaps I should go back and add the heavier detail shown above? Thanks. Jmg38 (talk) 08:31, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Looking back at the "Speedy Deletion" guidlines, I realize now that I should have used "A11", which is Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion#A11. Obviously invented, which is in keeping with the creating editor's actual statement that they invented the concept of "Mayliewan-Ozema" in opposition to the facts at hand from the City. Jmg38 (talk) 08:42, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

(talk page watcher)@Jmg38: Speedy deletions have to fit into quite narrow categories, and I'm not sure A11 is appropriate for something made up, but 9 years ago. How about using WP:PROD: designed for uncontroversial deletions, but gives all concerned (if anyone is indeed concerned) a week to object, amend the article, remove the PROD, etc. In the case of this article it looks very likely that no-one would object, so after the week the article will be deleted. Job done. Because Speedy Deletion only needs one nominator and one admin, with no time delay to allow input from others including the article creator, it's healthy to restrict it, even though frustrating when an "obvious" case doesn't fit into any of the boxes. This article has been around for 9 years, just give it a PROD and a week. PamD 10:31, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

OK, WP:SOFIXIT: I've PRODded it for you. PamD 10:35, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks - clearly a better place for this, and a good addition to my learning curve on deletions (not that I anticipate this being a regular event for me). Jmg38 (talk) 15:37, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

123RF Page Deletion

Thanks DGG. I'm one of the 123RF contributors. Submit images to 123RF to sell it. Hence, I'm not working for them. So, do I need to put COI on my page although I am only the contributor? If yes, how should I go about it. Please retrieve the deleted material to me for future reference or improvement. Do provide few examples of the acceptable Wikipedia content.

And, please advise whether these fulfill WP notable guidelines and TOU {Conflict of Interest}

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IStock

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockfresh

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_%26_Lion Angelina Lee (talk) 08:02, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Angelina Lee, What you say is interesting, because it confirms my feeling that the article was written from the perspective of a contributor. If I sensed that , then there probably is to some degree a conflict of interest, though not a paid conflict of interest, and the best course is to simply declare it. There's no reason why you shouldn't try to rewrite in draft space. Remember that details of pricing or submission, beyond a general statement, are of interest only to prospective purchasers or submitters, not the general public. encyclopedia articles are addressed to the general public; a firm's web site is where one looks for the details. The main problem , however, is the references: PRWeb is a place for reprinting press releases, and not a Reliable source for anything. The Stockindexonline item is a press release. written by their VP of marketing; stockphototalk is similar; The photobuyerguide reference is essentially a catalog page; the microstockman review in my opinion is usable, as a comparative review, though based on the various company's own information. But you will need additional references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources.

as for other articles, there are several hundred thousand articles in WP accepted in earlier years when the standards were lower or that have gotten in despite our vigilance that we need to either upgrade or remove. The least we can do is not add to them. But specifically, iStock has better references, but the catalog information should be removed, and it needs updating; Stockfresh probably needs removal. Lion & Lion is a different type of business & is fairly straightforward for its type compared to many that we have, tho it needs some promotional sentences rewritten.

Our practice with pricing information is to generally not give exact pricing, though we sometimes indicate the range because that can be the clearest indication of where the firm is positioned.

Since it seems t that you do indeed not represent the company with a paid COI, I shall move the material into Draft space, as Draft:123RF. DGG ( talk ) 20:29, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks DGG! Can you proofread my 123RF draft in the coming future before publish? Angelina Lee (talk) 07:56, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

to make sure AfC reviews are not prejudiced, normally we review at random. But I can certainly look at something I deleted and undelete it, so I can do this also, if you notify me. DGG ( talk ) 15:24, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

knrbeats page deletion

Hello DGG. A developing article was posted up on a production team by the name of knrbeats that you deleted. If your going to delete it, can you please also kindly remove it from the google search engine entirely. Once new information is added, it will be reposted meeting the acceptable guideline. If you can't do it, please kindly notify the administrative people who are privileged to do so. Knrbeats (talk) 13:54, 12 August 2016 (UTC)User:Knrbeats

(talk page stalker) I have explained to this user on their talk page that we do not control Google, but that now deleted this will drop off their search results within a few days. JohnCD (talk) 15:21, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

MicroVision, Inc.

David, regarding the deleted MicroVision Inc. article--I might understand the reason code. I initially posted a bare-bones summary of the company. The earliest submission was flagged for lack of importance. In response, I added the paragraph about patents. The next recommendation was to generate outside links--which I did a fair amount of. In doing so, I was surprised how many technical concepts pertaining to MicroVision's work are discussed elsewhere, but without a reference due to MicroVision as a legitimate source. I began to feel my effort was useful in tying up loose ends. Where I think this comes off as advertising is in the page's references. For example, references to consumer products were often derived from digital media. Regardless, those references were intended to validate the existence of a product where no other reliable source exists. With emerging commercial technology, in many cases there are no third party references outside the digital media domain. If a consumer product lacks a neutral third party reference or link to academia, should that make it irrelevant? Should a sole third party review be dismissed as promotion? I would add that the foundation of MicroVision's IP was spun off from research at University of Washington's Human Interface Technology Lab. The story to be told is a complex one that also touches on controversy. All in my opinion. --Dave H — Preceding unsigned comment added by Eugenious monk (talk • contribs) 16:46, 12 August 2016 (UTC) Eugenious monk (talk) 17:06, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

it is a little complicated to figure out how to handle this; I've re-read the various relevant pages, and read the references, now I need to think about it. Idon;t want to make a snap judgment. DGG ( talk ) 21:03, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. I appreciate the high standards sought after, and more often catch myself crossing the line. I am prepared to overhaul the article and strive for more reductive language and commercial-free references. The history portion might help offset the otherwise corporate inclination. For example, in terms of social welfare, one of the earliest proposed applications for the retinal scanning display was as an aid for the visually impaired--where those with various forms of macular degeneration might one day wear glasses equipped with an optical device that projects visual information directly onto unaffected areas of the retina--thereby enhancing vision. In the 90s a US company, Telesensory, developed an early prototype retinal scanning display for this purpose. Further development was constrained by cost and immature technology. Only this year, QD Laser (a Fujitsu spinoff) has announced the availability of such glasses. I should disclose that RP runs in my family. My knowledge of MicroVision mainly relates to my interest in this possible medical breakthrough.--Eugenious monk (talk) 23:22, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

The questions are how much of it should go in the general article on the method, and whether there should be a separate article on the company. DGG ( talk ) 01:27, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

I tend to agree. The company a footnote to the method. This describes the company's current relationship among licensees--as they have recently adopted an ingredient brand business model. But wouldn't the absence of a company article seem conspicuous? Why the omission while it's peers show up here? How otherwise to validate it's existence? Eugenious monk (talk) 22:17, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

What we do in such cases is make a redirect from the name of the company, and we can make it specifically to the part of the article on the method that mentions the company. DGG ( talk ) 15:20, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Declined speedy on Canton Drop Forge

Just out of curiosity, why did you decline this speedy? The only sources that I found were local human interest type news stories in a local newspaper. I personally don't consider the length of time a business has been open or how big it is to be "claims of notability" for the purposes of A7, but maybe I am wrong. Thanks, shoy (reactions) 18:19, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

I do consider it an indication of possible historical significance. A7 is " important or significant", not notability.--see WP:AFD Actual notability is a higher standard--A7 is deliberately set at a lower level. Notability is judged at AfD, so first check for sources; then, only if not found, nominate for deletion at AfD. DGG ( talk ) 20:34, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Please enforce the word limits

Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Michael Hardy/Evidence#Please enforce the word limits in the interest of fairness --Guy Macon (talk) 02:50, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

the clerks do this. DGG ( talk ) 05:56, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Template talk:Infobox organization

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Template talk:Infobox organization. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

John Travis (physician) - Neutrality of tone

Hi DGG - I saw that you had placed an alert on the John Travis (physician) page regarding the tone, indicating that it came across more like a news release. I'd like to try to rectify this and can see parts that might be at fault, such as the 'Work on parenting' section. However, I wished to check which areas you felt were causing issues?Fbell74 (talk) 06:31, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

You are right that the parenting section is altogether inappropriate, as almost all of it is not about his own work. Asides from that , take a closer look at the section on wellness, and the claims to be first or among the first. the claims here contradict the discussion in the WP articles on the subject.

Beyond those generalities, you are writing as a paid editor for the subject. It is my position that anyone doing so should know in advance how to do it properly, That is, if it can be done, for it seems that almost nobody can make satisfactory article with that degree of conflict of interest. I am always glad to give volunteer editors as much help as necessary, even to the point of personally rewriting articles if the subjects are notable, but I cannot be expected to do extensive work for free, but for which someone else will be paid. DGG ( talk ) 03:35, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Thank you - the pointers help and I'll work on those accordingly. Of course, free assistance wouldn't be expected when the contributions aren't of a voluntary nature. I appreciate any help, in light of this.Fbell74 (talk) 03:39, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Hi DGG - I think I've tackled the areas that were causing issues with the neutrality of tone, mainly by removing some details that might be seen as promotional and also paring down the content to focus on the subject (rather than connected parties). I haven't forgotten what you said about not doing extensive work in this kind of situation. I wondered if you might take a look though, as you had raised the alert originally? I appreciate you're probably quite busy with other Wikipedia work Fbell74 (talk) 05:55, 30 June 2016 (UTC)

Hi DGG - you're probably inundated with other work on Wikipedia. When you have a moment perhaps you can take a look at the article? I haven't made additional changes to it, since the time you were looking at rewriting it. However, if it's easier I can have a go again, with regards to the areas you highlighted in the recent posts on the Talk page Fbell74 (talk) 05:20, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Fbell74 I looked again. I decided to reorganize much further, and I have done so--see my comments on the talk page, which is where this should be continued. Basically, I removed material sourced only to his own site or a blog. I removed claims for first and one of the first. These need good third party documentation, and in any case "one of the first" has no specific meaning.

The connected contributor tag should remain on all paid articles where the paid editor wrote a substantial amount of the material. . I will remove the press release tag after its been sufficiently improved. The problem with paid editing is that a paid editor is typically not willing to make sufficiently radical improvements, because their client would not actually approve of an appropriately length NPOV article--they normally want the article because they want publicity, and this is an inherent conflict with the fundamental policy WP:NOT.

Here's my problem. It is easier for me to rewrite this than to coach someone else how to do it. Six years ago I would routinely rewrite, but I no longer am willing to do work for which other people are being paid. In this case I'm so much involved already that I'm making an exception. (Ideally, a promotional article should be removed, but in practice there's sometimes a choice between rewriting it and having it stay promotional) Most other other editors working with paid articles have no conflict--they simply won't work with a paid editor at all, and generally think that the only solution is to eliminate paid editing entirely. Unfortunately, in a system with anonymous editing permitted, this would simply drive it underground. So an argument can be made for helping the ones who declare, to encourage the undeclared ones to follow the TOU also. DGG ( talk ) 06:17, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

[Ashwin Porwal]

• i have read the COI as you had asked me to. I would even like to know on what grounds you have done the speedy deletion as i have not come towards anything that fits the criteria for speedy deletion .

The page was been discussed by the users and if changes were required it could have been asked for it on talk page or edit page . If COI is the issue even though i haven't ever met him personally would get a permission for uploading his data on wikipedia . Another issue is that when he has won the Prestigious Dadasaheb Phalke Award which has been giving a proper reference and even JITO award has been added into his favour . All this information i have gathered together as it was my first article and i do understand as i am new to Wikipedia i require your and other users help and guidance to get it straight . Now there would be a question Why only Dr Ashwin Porwal ? I was reading about Dadasaheb phalke award and read about Dr ashwin Porwal recieving it .I then looked into his work so thought of writing about Dr Ashwin Porwal as my first article so COI wasn't an issue. Franklin10hhc (talk) 15:47, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

this page had previous been deleted 6 times by different administrators. It was created under the Dr. Ashwin Powal title to evade the block upon further creations as Aswin Powal placed by two different administrators. The article met none of the objections at the AfD Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ashwin Porwal and speedy deletion as G4, re-creation of a title deleted at AfD was appropriate.

In the circumstances, you can see why I am a little skeptical of a claim of no conflict of interest. But it does not matter, for the article would be deleted no matter who wrote it

The article is totally unsatisfactory on several grounds. I cannot see how an award for health care given at a film festival is relevant. nor do I think that an award for young entrepreneur by the Jain International Trade Organisation is significan, especially when by checking the reference I see it is only "one of the categories of the pride of Pune awards, " --an award for a particular city. The papers are insufficient for notability by WP:PROF. The references are almost entirely press releases, republished press releases, or his own work. And is is basically an advertisement for him. DGG ( talk ) 17:07, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

I do understand what are you trying to say and the reason behind your act , but why exaggerating things by saying that the page was been deleted 6 times previously . As per the Deletion Log of Dr Ashwin Porwal it is clearly to be seen that it has been previously deleted 2 times and this was the 3rd time which it was considered for speedy deletion . So exaggerating things on Wikipedia by an experienced Wikipedia editor like you really sounds bad as you know it wouldn't help as Wikipedia has its Deletion Log . And upto the point of why he got the Dadasaheb Phaleke award which is for an Flim industry . I will research more about it personally and find out what it was actually given for . And surely we would consider press releases , His work and his Published work and wouldn't seek for what he hasn't done . And advertisement for ? Well if I am as a editor, writing on Wikipedia about his deeds and work , thats after knowing he has done something really which has bought change or improvement in the medical field . I will dig more into his work and answer the situation of Dadasaheb Phalke award for a medical field .Franklin10hhc (talk) 18:46, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) @Franklin10hhc: If you look at the public logs for Ashwin Porwal - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&page=Ashwin+Porwal - you'll see it has been deleted 6 times. Add that to the 3 deletions for Dr Ashwin Porwal and you get 9 deletions so far. I think you owe DGG an apology. --RexxS (talk) 18:56, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

ok , I apologize for that . And as I have done my research , I came across that every year Dadasaheb phalke award is even given to someone outside from flim industry in addition to flim industry awards. For example . you could refer to 2016 edition of the awardee list . P.S : Dr Ashwin Porwal was awarded in 2015 for the same. Franklin10hhc (talk) 07:16, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

In fact I realized that. It still doesn't mean that a Film organization award to a health care professional for being an health care profession implies any conceivable importance. DGG ( talk ) 15:17, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

ok. But why would they award a medical personality ? Surely due to some excellence achieved in medical field as achieving DadaSaheb Phalke award in India is a very big achievement and JITO award as a young entrepreneur award is been achieved from the hands of Padma Vibushan Awardee Hon. Mr Anupam Kher which is indeed not a joke . He is the founder of Healing Hands Clinic , which is India leading proctology Clinic in India. As per the information and references given in the article , He has preformed STARR highest series in India , which has even been published in worlds number one colorectal journal. Addition to that he has innovated MCDPA , which is considered a big time innovation which has saved thousands from surgery . DLPL : His innovation which is a ray of hope for those who have recurrent fistula cases which is spreading now all the references are been given in the article. It was just today that i had an interview with him and I asked him the permission about the same for sharing his information on wikipedia and he had no problem with that . I even got to know that Dr Ashwin Porwal recently delivered a lecture on smart health option in Health Sector for India in presence of Hon. Smt Pratiba Patil the former president of India . I got some photos of it which has been provided and shared By Dr Ashwin Porwal himself.

Photo Links : https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByPTppKtC0EfQ3kxU3p0cGxPODg/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByPTppKtC0EfVmlUNHREbzlyV1U/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByPTppKtC0EfLXdMUWpiYkVzUlE/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByPTppKtC0EfcDc0cWlzYXhDTkE/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByPTppKtC0EfQXllcUlYLTYyVFE/view?usp=sharing

PROD

Hi, I've noticed that you removed expired PRODs from several articles that cover questionable Knight's Cross winners. The notability of Knight's Cross recipients has been extensively discussed here: Notability in Knight's Cross Holder Articles, with practical recommendations in the subsection here that these specifically not brought to AfD. The related project (MilHist) has been notified about these PRODs (see for example Proposed deletion of Heinz Jürgens (SS officer), etc, with more discussion here PROD notifications, etc). I believe these PRODs are not controversial and should be allowed to proceed. Please advise. K.e.coffman (talk) 21:36, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

then you should have no problem at afd; but a/c the discussion, prior results at AfD were variable, and I do not see the consensus you state. DGG ( talk ) 21:44, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

The original set of AfDs took place before the discussion that I linked to. The resulting proposals, broadly, were: "Ok, here's a stab at a set of suggestions that may not make anyone particularly overjoyed, but could hopefully find some slightly less miserable middle ground than repeated AFDs or MILHIST discussions". The editor who originally objected at the AfDs stated: "I agree broadly with the above. Peacemaker67" The editor in questions (Peacemaker 67) has reviewed and objected to two of my PRODs, which I did not contest. They did not object to these other PRODs. We are both members of MilHist and the project was notified. So I believe the dePROD was unnecessary, since the project impacted does not want to see these brought to AfD. K.e.coffman (talk) 21:53, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

Projects do not decide notability ; only the community as a whole; the community can adopt the project's criteria, or not, depending on consensus. MILHIS is part of WP, not autonomous. It's beneficial to both a project and to WP as a whole, for the project's decisions to be confirmed in the broader forum. DGG ( talk ) 21:57, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

What is the reason to decline the PROD? From the previous AfDs, it can be seen that editors outside of the project supported deletion and that only MILHIST members objected. This has now been resolved. I've stated that these do not pass WP:GNG. Furthermore, they do not meet WP:SOLDIER as the Knight's Cross cannot be confirmed. These are essentially of lower notability than those brought up at the AfDs. K.e.coffman (talk) 22:05, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

You may indeed have consensus, but there is only one way to find out . Myself, I have no fixed opinion. DGG ( talk ) 22:08, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

The Movement for Black Lives move

Please explain why you moved The Movement for Black Lives to Movement for Black Lives? The official name of the organization is The Movement for Black Lives Is this a Wiki policy? Thank you. KamelTebaast 06:38, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

seemed obvious to me. If I was wrong, move it back. DGG ( talk ) 06:42, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

It didn't "seem obvious", I'm dumb as a post. I'm really trying to learn if it is a Wikipedia style or policy to remove "The" from official names or if that was simply your decision? (I notice the was deleted from The Ohio State University but not from The Hartford.) Thank you for the clarity. KamelTebaast 18:18, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

References

The guideline is at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (definite or indefinite article at beginning of name). The relevant section is 1.2. The general rule for titles is that we use the common name rather than the official name. For articles, the default is to omit the article if in doubt. The main rule for including the article is where the organization itself always include the "The", and the common name generally does in formal sources such as newspapers. "When a proper name is almost always used with "The", especially if it is included by unofficial sources, the article "The" should be used in the name of the corresponding Wikipedia page as well." In discussions of which name to use, the question is also what name is most likely to be used by the public in searching WP.

Myself, I think it doesn't much matter; other people think it very much matters, and we have had very long and even very bitter disputes over some titles, especially when there is no clear basis for deciding. DGG ( talk ) 15:06, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

For your assistance with the recent research mess that I bought to ANI.

Stuartyeates (talk) 10:19, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

Thank you for the temporary restore

Filmfan655321 (talk) 12:05, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

AFC redux

Rather than clog up ANI, I'd like to offer some responses to your last post there, specifically the Some things can never be done section:

• Consistency in reviewing standards, any more than there is consistency in AfD. Every editor at WP is basically free to do what they like, and we have no way of asserting authority except in gross deviations. I fundamentally disagree. Without some consistency, we might as well pack up the AFC project and go home. We should not need to assert authority to ensure some consistency: this isn't a schoolroom. Editors who see reviewers diverging too much from a standard ought to be able to raise a concern in a collegial way, and discuss it. It works for CSD, closing discussions, etc.
• Since we make the rules, we can interpret them however a consensus may please ... The only alternative is deciding content by a top-down hierarchy, or a dictator. Both can be done, but neither would be Wikipedia. We have policies and guidelines, many of which have been sufficiently refined to admit of little interpretation - no local consensus will prevail against those in the long run. As for top-down/dictatorship, WP:FAC was run like that for years.

More importantly, we somehow need to get greater engagement of reviewers with new editors if AFC is going to be successful. I just saw an exchange between a new editor and a reviewer that prompted me to look at the history of the draft in question. The draft is about Music rehearsal spaces, a topic that will never be a huge article, but ought to be sufficiently sourceable to either create a new article or to make a decent section of a parent article.

The draft starts with a load of references and not much content. It is declined for the first time because "You have added too many references for a short paragraph. Read WP:CITEKILL for more details. Also, you need to demonstrate notability of the subject involved".

So the editor sets about trimming out some of the references and adding more content. Eventually it is declined for the second time because "This article seems to branch out to too many topics. Listing individual rehearsal spaces is definitely out of scope. What it means to musicians does not belong here because that is WP:SYNTH. Music education is an entirely other topic. Think about what you want to say about rehearsal space and only the space."

First, too little content; now too much. So the editor asks the reviewer for help: "I have recently edited my declined submission following reviewers' reasons for not accepting it. I am new to wikipedia so hope I have done the right thing. I was wondering if reviewers could simply remove passages they felt did not meet the criteria."

Here's the response: "Bandspace, sometimes it is possible to just remove some extraneous paragraphs and "fix" an article, but often it would require a whole re-write. Given that there are often around 600-800 articles waiting to be reviewed, we wouldn't get far if we spent hours on each article. So the work reverts to the creator -- it's discouraging, but we hope it also is a good learning experience."

But the editor isn't learning anything, good or bad. They chop the draft down by 90% to address the "too many topics". It is now declined for the third time because "Submission is a dictionary definition".

How is the AFC process intended to terminate? As far as I can see, the 600-800 draft backlog will just recirculate the same drafts among reviewers when the editors aren't given sufficient help to improve the draft, either by a reviewer or by other editors who may have the expertise to help out. The only way that terminates is when the editor becomes so discouraged that they give up. Surely that's not the experience we want for new editors? It's little wonder we have had so much difficulty in recruiting them. I wonder if I could ask Kudpung, who was one of the originators of AFC, and Dennis Brown, who has spent so much time looking at editor recruitment and retention, if they concur with my concerns here? --RexxS (talk) 16:32, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

I certainly do. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:27, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Furthermore, I've published a version of it, at Music rehearsal space, so that the community can work collaboratovely to develop it. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:40, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

• I could have said it more briefly: reviewing articles requires human judgement. All humans are imperfect, Therefore there will inconsistencies and errors.
  

To elaborate on this: My estimate of the current error rateat AfD is about 5 % in each direction (this doesn't just mean ones I disagree with, but probably erroneous results) Any process for accepting articles based on whether they will passA fD, even if done perfectly, will have at least an equal error rate. But if it is done as imperfectly as AfD, the error rate will be double, presumably 10% in each direction. But reviews are done by individuals not group consensus, so the rate will be higher yet. I would be surprised if we could ever do better than 20%.

Fortunately there is already in existence effective ways to reduce that rate: articles improperly accepted should be caught at NPP just like article inserted directly. Article declined incorrectly, if submitted multiple times, get different reviewers. I think we are already at about 10% error in the overall process, and there no real possibility of ever going below 5% , because that's the error of our final decision making process.

Anyone can easily find individual errors; I find some every time I look (but when I review I am primarily looking for errors). They do not prove anything about the overall process. Their analysis however can often correct specific faults. The purpose of my checking reviews at AfC is both to rescue or delete individual articles, and to identify reviewers who are not doing it properly. Many simply need help, or reminders, and I provide it. Some need a warning, and if necessary to be told to stop working on the project until they know more,. This usually works: I do it, and so does Kudpung. Instructing people is a slow process and can take years. People improve slowly, not by a radical conversion. The difficulty is when experienced people insist on doing it wrong. It is very difficult here to challenge them on this, but even a challenge where they are defended usually does influence them to change a little. WP has no real defense against stubborn experienced people who do things wrong but with technical skill.

• As for other points.

It is not a circular process: eventually a draft will either get accepted, get speedy deleted for a reason other than G13, get deleted for G13, or submitted so many times without improvement that it will go to MfD, where it will either be deleted or get some attention. I can prove it works: we did clear out a backlog 10 times the current size, so we will eventually clear these also.

It does not take hours to rewrite an article so it passes AfD. For anything ordinary, it takes me between half and hour and an hour, provided I can find references in available sources. What does take hours is bringing articles to G, let alone FA., which is why the overwhelming majority of our articles are not at that standard. The justification for fixing them just enough to pass afd, is that they will get improved further in mainspace, as does any other article, , unless they are too obscure to interest anyone. This is the normal and desired method of working on articles in WP.

The problem of giving advice to new users will be greatly simplified when we remove those giving bad advice to new users. To clear that up--to explain to the user, to explain to the reviewer, to rewrite the article because the user is getting pretty frustrated by that point--that;swhat takes the time.

There's a related problem making this all worse: the majority of incoming AfCs are from undeclared promotional editors. If we could deal with them effectively, there would be much less trouble. This will take multiple approaches: one is to get agreement about what articles are not worth rewriting or defending, so we don't have to fight over marginal situations. DGG ( talk ) 19:11, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for such a comprehensive reply, DGG. I must say I don't disagree with your observations, but I'm not sure I can be so optimistic about the efficiency of AFC. Perhaps some 'blue sky' thinking might help? What are the chances of building in a 'second opinion' referral system for the reviewers (not the submitters)? What if a reviewer had a way of quickly alerting an active WikiProject to an article that they could help with? Anne Delong regularly drops a note to WT:WikiProject Medicine by hand, asking for advice or help on a draft she's found. I hope she would tell you how useful that has proved to be. Could we semi-automate that and roll it out to reviewers? What if a reviewer could call on another experienced editor - maybe an admin - to confirm a decision to delete a draft, if it was judged irretrievably lacking in notability (like Dr Ashwin Porwal above). That could potentially short-circuit the "eventually a draft will either get accepted, get speedy deleted for a reason other than G13, get deleted for G13, or submitted so many times without improvement that it will go to MfD, where it will either be deleted or get some attention". There's always REFUND if the submitter found some new sources. Can you think of other ways we could involve more reviewers in the process? Categorise drafts by subject area (like GA?) and invite subject specialists to join in on the reviewing process? --RexxS (talk) 19:38, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

RexxS, Andy and anyone else following here, I didn't actually have any part in the creation of AfC. I registered in 2006 but didn't start actively editing until I retired in 2008. I got interested in NPP when one of my very early articles was wrongly deleted and WereSpielChequers and I were discussing the monumental 70,000 backlog at NPP. AfC was started in 2007 ostensibly as a reaction to the January 2006 rule restricting the creation of articles in mainspace to registered users (proving, BTW, that WP is organic and that future necessary controls are theoretically possible).

DGG and RexxS are both correct from their different angles. I've worked for years now with DGG on the issues surrounding AfC and NPP, where his focus is more on the problems of AfC and mine more on NPP, but the two systems overlap significantly. I also share RexxS's experience in didactics and therefore enjoy every opportunity to facilitate or co-facilitate editathons. We all realise however, how challenging it can be to instruct new users whether on or offline, and to do so without losing one's patience. The fundamental difference between NPP and AfC is that NPP with aroud 1,000 articles a day is front-line triage where AfC with 150 a day is more of a field hospital. I won't say that at NPP we are callous, but the 'patients' at AfC get a bit more LCA - at least until they just become exasperating. A couple of years ago, DGG and I also worked on the project to rewrite all our warning and deletion templates in a move to make them less bitey.

Knowing RexxS's interest in editor education, I was disappointed that he could no come to Esino and share my efforts to convince the WMF that it is time the Foundation agree to investing in engineer time to complete and perfect some core MediaWiki systems that were already under development 5 years ago, but which the Foundation now regrets having not followed through. Unfortunately the Foundation has (or had) a policy of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted but the volunteer community is now sick and tired of cleaning up after their mistakes for them.

The good news is that (tentatively) the foundation is now looking at ways to improve the methods that are used throughout the movement to control the quality of new content, but obviously we can't expect anything to happen overnight. Very basically, the goal is to merge the functions of AfC and NPP and demand higher levels of knowledge and judgement of those who do he reviewing. More detailsaAt recent threads at WT:AfC, and I may be soon offering the Signpost an op-ed on the broader subject. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:11, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

• Since I was pinged...... I still see the one of the problems of draft and AFC is that they are not mainspace and therefore they don't attract the collaborative editing that can make Wikipedia enjoyable. This is exacerbated by AFC patrollers being able to decline articles in effect because in their judgement they would fail AFD. This is the equivalent of making "in my judgement would fail AFD" a speedy deletion criteria and then unbundling deletion to everyone who is autoconfirmed. My solution would be to combine draft, AFC and NPP together and have unpatrolled being "no index", better still make unpatrolled articles only visible to those who are logged in. That way you take the urgency out of New page patrol, reduce the speedy deletion criteria to just G3, G7, G10, G11 and G13, but you can reasonably start requiring every new article to have an independent neutral source before it gets patrolled and is visible to those not logged in. ϢereSpielChequers 10:21, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

As I understood the WMF response to ACCTRIAL -- Kudpung please confirm if I have it right -- they insisted that all new logged-in users must be able to immediately create articles. I do not know whether this implies that the articles must immediately be visible to to everyone, even if not logged in. I hope they did not mean to prohibit limiting new users to creating articles in DRAFT space, where they would be NOINDEX, because this is exactly what Kudpung and I intend to propose.And your suggestion of combining the NPP, AFC, and DRAFT processes is also our intention, though I do not know which of us came up with this obvious idea first. There's also a problem with userspace drafts, where all sorts of junk is hidden. (Personally, I'd eliminate them or automatically move anything that looks like an article to DRAFT space) )

As a separate issue, The community in the past rejected requiring new pages to have a reference, except for BLPs, and not even they are now required to have an independent neutral source--and I do not see how we could enforce that before patrolling, rather than as part of patrolling. DGG ( talk ) 14:46, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

(Also Kudpung) The ticket in question. My experience with Phab indicates that to tell the difference between a WMF veto and a developer veto is not straightforward. Some of the concerns raised would be adequately addressed by an auto-redirect of the added article to AfC space and some may not. Probably the best way would be to establish clear community consensus and then see if the developers are willing - we probably won't land in trouble for merely asking. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 16:48, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Well, Jo-Jo, and all the others who are perhas now asking rhemselves the same questions, WP:ACTRIAL, to give the Phabricator (Bugzilla) ticket its more widely used code name, was probably one of the most contentious treatments of Wikimedia/MediaWik/WMF policiy ever handed outby the Foundation. The proposal was the result of months of careful reasearch and preparation for the RfC by a team of experienced volunteers whose aim was to address a very critical situation. Although they never retracted their decision, the Foundation ended up being so embarrassed by it, they hatted parts of the discussion at Bugzilla where they had been most rude, condescending, and patronising to the volunteers, and even today refuse to discuss it. At meet ups and conferences, even though there is no one left among the staff who had anything to do with it, mention 'ACTRIAL' and people suddenly have another 'pressing engagement' or a need for a natural function. One just does not unilaterally dismiss one of the most heavily attended RfC in en.Wiki history, and an overwhelming consensus, with 'I'm not doing this bug - I don't see a clear consensus.' The fact of the matter is, that we the community should be interviewing candidates for their jobs in San Fransisco and not the Foundation itself.

5 years further down the line the situation is far worse and exacerbated by the fact that competing factions among he newcomers in the MFF want to start all the research all over again instead of listening to the empirical evidence and taking a heuristic approach. Although it was my own, one of the key comments at Bugzilla was the one I reproduce here to save looking it up and searching for it:

Wikipedia is indeed the encyclopedia anyone can edit. There has however, never been a policy that anyone can create new pages. If the trial delivers the expected results, it will solve a far greater number of perennial problems than simply that of over 1,000 pages per day (80% of all newpages) that have to be deleted through one process or another, and which are largely patrolled by a loose group of extremely inexperienced, and partly very young and/or non native speakers of English - NPP is already widely recognised as a broken process.

I believe there is every urgent reason to implement this trial now without further delay. The consensus was reached by a debate involving around 500 users and a clear majority in favour, and based on examination of the problem rather than straight subjective 'support' or 'oppose' !voting. A further centrally publicised RfC on the actual terms of the trial has also received practically unanimous support.

I realise by now that the WMF may not in favour of this new user right change, but they should accept a decision arrived at by the very kind of consensus that they insist is the way to get things done at Wikipedia. By questioning the authority of the self governing Wikipedia community, any devs who would refuse this request for a trial, will be rocking the very foundation of a pillar of Wikipedia policy.

[...] Rather than protecting a perceived user right for anyone to create new spam, attack, autobio, and copyvio pages, ultimately such action will result in the loss to the project of mature, established users and administrators who dedicate their free time to striving for improvement in the quality of Wikipedia, and its credibility as a universal knowledge base.

As a result, we did lose some mature, established users and administrators over it and what we got were the IEP catastrophe, Orangemoody, and a few other disastrous hiccups requiring monumental clean ups that the volunteers are getting sick and tired of having to do. Hence the two reasons why in spite of its excellent softare, NPP performs badly: the tiny handful experienced patrollers such as I dream of horses and montanabw see it as a never ending battle due to the Foundation having refused to provide enough ammunition, the apathy sets in (don't I know it after spending 60 hours on it this past week) and the rest are newbies who see yet another unrestricted opportunity to play MMORPG and SN with the world's 6th biggest web site site which isn't really a web site a all, but a webserver based reference work.

The fact that in 2006 authority for creation of live articles was removed from IP users clearly demonstrates that Wikipedia is organic, change can be made if and when it is expedient to do so, and now is the time to do it again. And if the community is allowed to have a hand in the development (as ther actually were with Page Curation), we'll get it right. Although the list of tweaks is long, they don't need community consensus (except for the right to patrol new pages), they are mostly minor but together they build a powerful package of measures that will give us all more breathing space, fewer needs for complaints such as the one RexxS as obliged to make at ANI, fewer need for me and DGG to ban another 200 users from NPP, fewer paid editing crises, and above all, fewer good faith newbies being bitten. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 22:45, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't really NPP much anymore. I mean, I'll inevitably go through a spat of patrolling a lot of pages in the future, and I do patrol pages I see on Huggle, but after a while, it seems futile. The backlog is neverending.  I dream of horses  If you reply here, please ping me by adding {{U|I dream of horses}} to your message  (talk to me) (My edits) @ 01:49, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

That's how I'm starting to feel about deletion/AfD – nearly every day I come across another actor BLP of questionable notability, and I simply can't take them all to AfD (PROD'ing them is usually pointless, because drive-by editors will stop by with a "Hey! I saw this person on TV! So OF COURSE they should have an article!!1!" and DEPROD it. [sigh...]) --IJBall (contribs • talk) 05:14, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

You know, You can write content or patrol content. There are only so many hours in the day and WP is a very big place. I'm hearing a lot of fatigue (ironically, IJBall and I seem equally tired, but for opposite reasons; I get tired of challenging bad PRODs and bad AfDs) Frankly, I sometimes wonder if there's something to the idea of implementing 30/500 before being allowed to create or move articles. Don't know if that's yet been proposed, but people could earn the right. If they aren't there, such as at a class or an editathon, they can sandbox articles and ask a more experienced editor to do the move. Montanabw^(talk) 05:19, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Montanabw, IJBall, et al, WP:ACTRIAL which we proposed almost exactly 5 years ago to the day, was a lot less radical than that and even came with a set of features to help the new users. As we all know, the Foundation summarily dismissed the massive consensus without even properly investigating what it was in fact all about. With an almost 100% turnover in WMF staff since then, there might be sense in asking the new Foundation line-up to implement it now. The situation requiring it has gotten so much worse since that it certainly doesn't need re-debating.Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 05:38, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

That's funny – I just suggested that unrestricted new article creation should be limited to Extended confirmed users over at WP:VPP! As to Kudpung's point, I'm dimly aware of what happened in the past with ACTRIAL, but I make it a habit to try and avoid thinking too much about the WMF and the ways they fouled up (sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally) the project – it's just too depressing to think about... As for "fatigue", it depends – I am tired out by PROD/AfD, but luckily I still love referencing content and generally sprucing articles up, and I'm going to be entering a busy working period from about now until Christmas, and I suspect simply referencing and article cleanup is all I'm going to have time for over the next few months anyway! --IJBall (contribs • talk) 05:46, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

:Unfortunately ((U|IJBall}}, when we have to go to [[MediaWiki}} for any core software changes, it means going through the WMF. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 06:17, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Draft:Centro Universitário da Cidade do Rio de Janeiro

Hi DGG. You commented that this is a notable subject. I tried to find some substantiation, but I haven't had success. There's an article in the Portuguese Wikipedia (https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centro_Universit%C3%A1rio_da_Cidade_do_Rio_de_Janeiro) but none of the references there seem appropriate from what I can figure out. I am not going to work on it any more. —Anne Delong (talk) 16:42, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

All universities are notable, and that's what this is. We can get the necessary details from their web site for the specifics, but w do need an outside source that it isn't imaginary--and, in thiscase, provides some needed NPOV The observatoriodaimprensa is about the head of the university; http://sindipetroalse.org.br has a section about him . "O Grupo Delfin" about 2/3 of the way down; ltimosegundo.ig.com.br is about this university, in para 5; Agência Brasil. is about the withdrawal of its autonomy; http://portal.mec.gov.br is about the withdrawal of its government accreditation

the enWP article mentions none of the last two items, so some work is needed, DGG ( talk ) 00:07, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia mirror mention on my talk page

Hi,

I cant find the mirror link in the article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000_Mumbai_landslide. Am I missing something? I see you posted on my talk page regarding it.Brownweepy (talk) 19:00, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

it has since been fixed, it was on this earlier version [22], ref. 5 DGG ( talk ) 05:59, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

your comment at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/London Buses route 53

Hi there,

I was looking through the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/London Buses route 53 and noted that you commented "kk Bus routes are significant geographic features of a city...". Is there any meaning to "kk" or was it meant to be a bullet point, a "keep", or something else? Sorry if this seems a bit dumb. Best wishes, jcc (tea and biscuits) 19:18, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

thanks for notifying me. It's a keyboard macro I use that didn't get expanded properly because I forgot the necessary space after it; I have a number of them, to try to compensate for my bad typing. BTW, I use the built-in facility of OSX rather than a commercial program. DGG ( talk ) 19:30, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

About: Republic Metals Corporation page deletion

Hi David, You deleted the page "Republic Metals Corporation" a little over a year ago. It was deleted for G:11 and A:7. The company at this point, and definitely at the time of deletion, is a growing refinery and private mint that is the biggest silver refiner in the western hemisphere and could be credibly indicated as important and significant. I think that through careful, deliberate research and strict adherence to Wikipedia article guidelines and rules, the article "Republic Metals Corporation" can be either un-deleted and fixed, or made anew. Thank you for your consideration.

SilverStacks (talk) 15:40, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

I was the third of three successive administrators who deleted the 2015 article. Re-creation in article space was blocked by yet a 4th administrator, You can try again in Draft space, but accepting it for moving it into mainspace would have to be done by an administrator.

I suppose it is likely that you have some association with the company. Please read our policy on WP:Conflict of Interest and our Terms of Use, particularly with respect to paid contributions without disclosure. Declaring the COI is not optional.

It has been relatively rare for a representative of a company to write an acceptable article--they generally write it like a web page, directed at the potential client or investor. In addition to writing in a neutral fashion, you will need references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources, not press releases or mere announcements. There was nor a single such reference in the previous article. In particularly, be sure to have reliable independent documentation for the claim to "largest". And be aware that we usually regard claims to "growing" as equivalent to "not yet notable".

And remember that even in draft space, promotional drafts for articles are deleted. DGG ( talk ) 15:59, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for your succinct and helpful response. SilverStacks (talk) 18:12, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Help, I need a Do-Over

In my haste and ignorance I somehow submitted an article too quickly. I wasn't near finished and would like more time to edit and revise. My article is/was on Davis Chocolate. I was advised on another talk page to gather my resources and put them on my user page for you to review and maybe give me another chance to write the article. Is this the best practice? I've added some of those references on my user page. What do you advise for my next step? Thank you. Shelton2267 (talk) 18:33, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

By now, not just myself, but 3 other very experienced editors, have either deleted or recommended the article for deletion. The version you submitted was entirely promotional, complete with a list of all the certifications and variations. You will need references providing substantial coverage from third-party independent reliable sources, not press releases or mere announcements. I've looked at the references on your sandbox page Most of them are about the use of the chocolate by a sculptor--this is not substantial coverage. The others are essentially press releases or disguised press releases in local newspapers--these do not count as sufficiently independent sources to show notability. Unless you have much better, there is no point in trying to writean article, for it will not be accepted. If you do, and you are prepared to write an article different from what would be used as a web page or an advertisement, you may try, but only in Draft space. Even there, promotional articles are deleted.

It is possible that you have some association with the firm. Please see or rules on [[WP:Conflict of Interest] and our Terms of Use, particularly with respect to paid contributions without disclosure. Inpractice very few people with a conflict of interest ever do succeed in writing adequate articles. DGG ( talk ) 19:46, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

A little help please with RevDel or Oversight (not sure which)...

Hi DGG:

Would you please look at the history of my talk page regarding the Your Peter Davison (composer) articles for deletion post section starting with the following edit:

• (diff) 00:48, August 15, 2016‎ Pdmus (talk | contribs)‎ . . (55,699 bytes) (+2,923)‎

A newbie user put external dropbox links to copyvio scans of text materials and I have redacted them but I am pretty sure our rules are that the page versions with the links are supposed to be revdel or suppressed? Also, what is the correct warning template to put on the user's talk page? I put {{cclean}} on my talk page and tweaked the text a little but I think there may be a more appropriate tag to put on his page. Thanks Koala Tea Of Mercy (KTOM's Articulations & Invigilations) 22:55, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

My understanding is that it is sufficient to delete the content from the articles in the usual way, ; it is better not to place a conspicuous Redacted label, which just calls attention to them. I don't think revdel is normally used either, though I know that some admins use it more broadly than the actual copyvio policy requires. Let me take a look and try to fix the pager as best I can (Unless one of my talk page watchers gets there before me). DGG ( talk ) 23:47, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks DGG. Looks like there is now a formal process for this which I just used. See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Copyright_Cleanup/RD1_Requests. Koala Tea Of Mercy (KTOM's Articulations & Invigilations) 00:52, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Recreation of Varun Manian | Help

Hi DGG, As per our earlier conversations on this particular page. I have understood my mistakes in the page. I would be writing a new page on him based on your feedback. Since it is locked for creation by a user like me, it would be great if you can help me share your views on the rewritten page and also help me submitting it to Wikipedia. Please suggest how we can take this aheadManan49s (talk) 07:20, 16 August 2016 (UTC)