Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion

Clarification requested for G5

I have just come upon an article that was deleted, recreated and nominated for G5 because the creator is globally blocked. The rationale for deletion was an interpretation of G5 as "the main contributor of this article was a globally banned user, so all of articles s/he creates can be speedied"). Now, I think that deletion of a good article because the creator is blocked is ridiculous, but the G5 policy is not very clear: "To qualify, the edit must be a violation of the user's specific block or ban. Pages created by a topic-banned user may be deleted if they come under that particular topic, but not if they are legitimately about some other topic." Let's set aside the part about topic-ban, and focus on the case of an editor blocked or banned from all areas. Would G5 indeed read as "any article created by a banned user is eligible for deletion"? In other words, the policy seems to state "if the user is banned from area x, his articles in area x may be speedied", but it could also be read "if an editor is not banned from any specific area, any of their creations may be speedied." I certainly hope this is not a common interpretation, and if so I think G5 needs a clarification that it applies only to articles created by topic-banned editors within said topics. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 11:52, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

No, any article created by a banned (not topic banned) editor after their ban (through socks, obviously) can be G5 deleted no questions asked. As an example (and I have seen no evidence that this user has socked after his ban): Wikicology is "topic-banned from biomedical content", but also completely banned, partly because also his other articles were very problematic. If he returns and creates more articles, then we don't need to check them one by one, we can just delete them. Ban + G5 is made to simplify the defense against banned editors, and to discourage them from socking (what's the use spending a lot o time on an article if it gets instantly deleted once yu have been found to be a sock.). So no clarification is needed. Fram (talk) 12:53, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

However, can != must, if the article could have been created by anybody else and meets the inclusion policies for mainspace, it ought to stay. For example, I wanted to restore Samantha Steffen a few days ago as I felt it had at least a fighting chance at AfD, though I gave up because the deleting admin felt far more passionately about deleting it per G5 than I did about keeping it. Ultimately I feel this is one of the biggest arguments on Wikipedia amongst admins, but my personal view is we are here to write an encyclopedia and we comment on the content, not the contributors, and given that's two pillars out of five, it trumps the CSD criteria, which merely say "consensus is we tend towards doing this". Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 13:01, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, User:Ritchie333, for citing those relevant policies; I fully agree with you - in particular, everyone commenting here in support of G5 should explain how it is compatible with "we are here to write an encyclopedia". Because I, for one, think it is clearly incompatible with that most important pillar of this project. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 13:18, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

There must be a better example of G5 deletions which harm the encyclopedia than an article about a reality show contestant with very, very minimal notability and achievements, which read like a promo piece for her work more than anything else, I hope. You can always just write an article on her, no one will stop you, and it will be much better than what we got here. Although I would rather spend my time writing articles on more notable subjects... Fram (talk) 13:18, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

I think this illustrates a major problem with G5. Deletion should not be used on articles that are genuinely constructive and within project scope because of who the creator are; that their deletion will discourage their creators is not as beneficial as denying the project a good article. Deletion of a good article is, simply put, vandalism. The purpose of deletion is to delete bad articles, not to serve as a tool of deterrence or reforming; this is putting a tool above its principle (creating good articles is the goal of the project, not deleting them!). The argument that a user's article's were problematic in the past is also lacking. This may be sufficient to warrant closer scrutiny, but WP:AGF should not be waived. Even Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations does not blanked delete articles of problematic users, they are reviewed and deleted case by case. I can see scope for some exceptions (users who routinely create hoaxes or copyvios), but just today I saw to G5 nominations for articles that do not appear to be either (Jan Pfeffer, World Deaf Championships). The latter may have notability issues, but neither should be speedied, they deserve proper attention at AfD. I am very concerned that they illustrate not an exception but a rule of how G5 is used, and therefore, that G5 may be commonly misused to delete good content in a misguided attempt to make deletions easier. I will once again restate that there is no justification in Wikipedia policy or common sense to delete perfectly good articles simply because of who their creator is. I'll ping User:DGG whom I noticed active above and whose opinion I value, and User:Kvng, with whom I often disagree on deletion policy, but whose inclusionist POV should certainly be worth hearing from here. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 13:16, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

That's not "misuse" of G5, that's accepted use which you disagree with. Fram (talk) 13:18, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Accepted use, huh? Would you have anything to back that up except your POV that it is used commonly in this fashion? Also, would you mind showing us the discussion(s) which led to the introduction of G5? Was it subject to any wide community discussion? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 13:21, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

You're right, I made that up, in fact I sneakily introduced G5 and no one ever noticed it until now. You may start the ban discussion at ArbCom. By the way, the two examples you gave, and the one given by Richie: all nominations and deletions of those under G5 were all made by socks of me. In fact, all G5 deletions of articles by banned (but not topic-banned) editors ever made were made by my vast sock armada. Fram (talk) 13:38, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Very amusing. So instead of answering my questions, you seem to think satire and ridicule will reflect better on you? May I remind you of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA? I know they are half-joke, but as an admin you could at least pay lip service to them. Also, I see you have deleted Jan Pfeffer with the edit summary "Any attempt to circumvent an active global ban constitutes a violation of the Terms of Use". Any connection between deleting an article and meta:Terms of Use seems extremely far stretched. I see this rationale as a leaf fig for an excuse to delete content that would otherwise require a more serious discussion. In fact I think the deleted article might have been a hoax, but this decision should be based on review of the content (I just spend half an hour looking into the sources for the article, a process which was sadly interrupted by its deletion), not the person. PS. The user who spotted the article even started a proper AfD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jan Pfeffer, which you speedy closed, preventing any constructive discussion there. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 13:47, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

And the user who started that AfD thanked me for my speedy deletion... Johann Pfeffer was a real sculptor active in the Kônigsberg at the time: whether the further info in the article was a hoax or not, I don't know. As for civility and snark, you have exactly the same means to look for discussions which lead to the creation of G5 a I do, and giving you the standard definition and use of G5 is not "my POV". So I was not really inclined to answer your questions, no, as they are the kind of answers you can find for yourself just as easily. I gave you my initial answer, you quite rudely didn't believe it, tough luck. Fram (talk) 14:04, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

G5 is very straightforward: "This applies to pages created by banned or blocked users in violation of their ban or block, and that have no substantial edits by others." If a sock creates an article in violation of their indef block, it can be G5'd. But restorations should be cheap with the caveat that the editor asking for the restoration takes full responsibility for all the content on the restored page. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 13:52, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Considering that only admins can view such content, this raises the bar for restoration quite highly, since 99.99% of the community cannot easily review said deletions, absent anything but the most basic rationale in the logs which often boils down to "deleted because the creator is banned", without any indication how good or bad the article was. Coupled with the fact that there is no log (correct me if I am wrong) listing G5 deletions for review, there is no control over how widely this tool can be misused. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 14:00, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

This tool is not misused. Deletions are done according to policy. You might not like the blanket nature of the policy but your dislike in no way translates into admin misuse. Get the policy changed if you don't like it. And there's no specific log for any speedy criteria. By your definition, criteria such as G4 and A7 can also be misused. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 14:17, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Allowing blocked users to EVADE blocks is not a good idea. It would only tend to encourage sock puppetry, spamming, and other undesirable conduct. What's the point of blocking users if the blocks have no practical effect?- MrX 13:57, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

The point is that if a blocked user creates otherwise good content, it should stay per the basic policy cited by Ritchie333. Now, I see also the point that it would allow for some gaming of the system, but the fact is that if a sock makes an edit to a regular article, it may be reverted, but their edit is in the article's history visible to regular users, it is not oversighted or made visible to "admins only". But speedy deleting their article removes what little oversight regular community is. To build up on my proposal above, if G5 is not to be repelled outright (as violation of "we are here to write an encyclopedia", we need some balance and checks. A log of G5 deletions. A way for non-admins to review the content. Perhaps they should be moved to a special draft space, and nominated for regular AfD with a rationale explaining that the creator has been banned due to ??? reasons. Of course, obvious hoaxes and copyvios and such have their own, better speedy criteria and if such could be used, that's fine. But once again, a procedure that allows for deletion of otherwise perfectly fine articles because of who their person is is a bad policy. And saying that it will discourage others is plain foolish. A useful article benefits the world, and we should not delete it to stick it to a few vandals. It's like tearing down a building because it architect was imprisoned, with no regard to whether the building is actually safe or not, if anyone is living in it, if it is useful for the community, etc. In other word, G5 is a nuclear over-reaction to a small problem, hurting this project more (by leading to occasional deletion of perfectly good content) then it is benefiting it (from deterring socks - which we knows doesn't work well anyway - and removing bad content few hours faster). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 14:10, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

A far more frequent problem I get is simply with banned user's edits being reverted on existing articles, where I am strongly weighted towards "block and preserve", most notoriously with Wikipedia:Long-term abuse/Best known for IP. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 14:13, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Many banned editors are banned because of hoaxes, copyvios, vandalism, and/or spam, often a combination of them and not always easy to spot. The ban usually comes after countless hours have been spent checking articles, comparing text with sources, generally doing a lot more cleanup than is needed for most good-faith editors. The G5 is an essential tool to stop wasting time on creations by editors who have been shown to be serial troublemakers and timewasters. The proposals above (AfD and the like) only make it easy for banned people to become more troublesome and disruptive again. That this means that the occasional good edit or article will be lost as well, too bad, but this doesn't outweigh the benefits of using G5 the way it has been used for years already. Fram (talk) 14:19, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

There is only one problem here: admins often do not link to pages with "ountless hours have been spent checking articles, comparing text with sources" and such. In the case of Jan P article, only the first admin deleting it (User:Vanjagenije) linked to a page that eventually redirects to meta:Requests for comment/Global ban request for Messina, you didn't (through I guess once in the log is sufficient). First, I'd strongly suggest that linking to a page explaining the reason for the topic or global ban for a given user becomes a requirement of G5. Second, I'll note that the meta page does not seem to say why the user's content is problematic, it seems to focus on their disruptive behavior (legal threats, socking). Therefore nothing there suggests to me his articles are bad, only that he is a troll. And if a troll creates a good article, I don't see why we should throw it away. If the article is not good, and if a user has a pattern of creating hoaxse, copyvios and such - I am all for G5 speeding them, but this needs to be made clear in the deleting log. What happens to often is that the log does not mention anything, and any editor who may be interested in asking for WP:REFUND has to spend a lot of time investigating the reasons. I don't see why the burden should be on such an editor; it should be on deleting admin who should spend a minute or two properly linking the reasons in his log edit summary. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 06:23, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

I support the existing G5 policy. I purposefully don't have a lot of experience in this area I assume the system of banning disruptive editors is effective and that being able enforce a ban a part of its effectiveness. ~Kvng (talk) 14:27, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

• G5 is a bit different than other criteria, in that it is based on the editor being problematic... and not the topic or content. It may well be that Wikipedia should have an article on the topic... Just not the specific version of the article that was created by a banned user. Remember that it is possible for another editor to start over and create a new article to replace the one deleted under G5. Blueboar (talk) 16:42, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

• • The pint of G5 is very simple: A user gets banned because (s)he has too much of a tendency to add bad content; we respond by assuming that any edits are bad unless we have reasonable evidence otherwise. If an admin, or an other user who saw the content before deletion, thinks it should be restored - it should be restored at the responsibility of the admin (or user who requested it); and if a user in good standing wants a copy if it to be able to decide, the admins should give it. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 20:36, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
• For those that want G5 pages restored and take responsibility for them, they should then also improve the page, then it will no longer be eligible for G5 delete. You can ask for restoring from the deleting admin or at WP:REFUND. But some admins are not happy if their delete is reversed. We probably should update the policy to say that a G5 deleted page can be restored on request, if someone actually checks it and takes responsibility. On the topic of World Deaf Championships, a lot of work had gone into making tables, but there were no foot notes, a sea of external links, and only 1.5 lines of text. This topic could be notable. Socks became quite abusive after subsequent G5 tagging, and it is fair enough for that part to remain deleted. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 23:43, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
• The spirit of G5 (but not the code G5 itself) appears in the original version of this page, as item 6. This was copied from the version of Wikipedia:Deletion policy that was current at the time. It first appeared in that page in the version of 18:06, 26 July 2003, item 4. At the time, bans and blocks looked like this. --Redrose64 (talk) 23:53, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

  Thank you for tracing this in the history, it does seem that G5 has been here for a while - but I will note that even back then it was the only policy which had a warning that "this is controversial". I think it is clear why: deleting good content because of who the creator is should not be done. I think we need to balance this somehow. If an editor is known for creating hoaxes or copyvios or such, I fully support speedy deletions, but the deleting admin should be required to clearly link to the page detailing the rationale for the topic/global/etc. ban which would show that due diligence have been carried out in the form of an investigation which determined that said editor creates hoaxes/etc. And if a user has been blocked for reasons unrelated to content creation, ex. legal threats, harassment, or for reasons unrelated to content creation in the topic of a new article (ex. a Scientology-POV-fighter blocked due to problematic editing in Scientology, plus harassment/edit warring, who then creates an article about a non-Scientology), their article should NOT be subject to G5. While the wording of my proposal above can be refined, I hope this should satisfy both the spirit of the project (good articles should be kept), and the need for a speedy tool to justify easily cleanup after serious hoaxers/copuvioers/etc. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 06:31, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

  @Piotrus: There was a discussion at the time, here; but it's kinda mixed up with other matters - WP:TPG hadn't yet evolved into its present form. It was later archived, initially to Wikipedia talk:Deletion policy/2003, but a number of threads were moved from one archive to another since then, sometimes being split; it's now mostly at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 1#Skipping the "Votes for deletion" page and partly at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 1#"no useful content". There is a supplementary a few weeks later, now at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 1#banned users. --Redrose64 (talk) 11:50, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Since I am one of the admins who deleted mentioned article, I want to comment here. Simply speaking: no clarification is needed, articles created by banned user in violation of their ban may be deleted without further discussion. WP:G5 cannot be discussed alone, it's purpose is to support WP:block and WP:sock, so those policies must be discussed together. I agree that at the first glance it seems bad to deleted good article, but you have to look at the big picture. We are here to write an encyclopedia, but we are here to write it together trough collaboration. If we have an user (for example) who is impossible to collaborate with (makes personal attacks, legal threats...), that user gets banned. Now, that user registers a sockpuppet account and creates a good article. Now the question is: does our need to have good articles outweighs our need to exclude the user whose behavior is unacceptable? I think that on the long run, it is better to delete the article, because that way we send a strong message that unacceptable behavior will not be tolerated. It is a loss to deleted such an article, but it would be even greater loss for the project if we would allow such an user to continue participating. They have to know that the only way for them to continue editing is to change their behavior and request unblock, and not to engage in sockpuppetry. Such situations are obviously loss-loss situations, and we have to decide what is a smaller loss. For me, the smaller loss is to delete the article, so I fully support standard interpretation of G% as explained by Fram and NeilN. Vanjagenije (talk) 11:05, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

"Now the question is: does our need to have good articles outweighs our need to exclude the user whose behavior is unacceptable?" - and that is Wikipedia's Schleswig-Holstein Question that we have only (and might possibly only ever have) personal opinions on, since what is unacceptable to one person may be viewed as harmless banter to somebody else. Just look at Eric Corbett's block log; he's almost the textbook example of why this question is so difficult. Or look at the group of admins who are okay in giving Kumioko another chance at editing, who got yelled at with an almighty force the minute they tried it. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:55, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

Why not filter editors, instead of edits? Keep that editor blocked, but allow their constructive edits to go through. The author should not matter as much as the content, we are building an encyclopedia, not creating profiles and dossiers for its authors - at least, we shouldn't focus on the latter as much as on the former. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 11:12, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

If we didn't delete articles created by banned or blocked users in violation of their ban or block (or by their sockpuppets), we would not be honouring WP:DENY. --Redrose64 (talk) 18:17, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

WP:DENY is just an essay, so any policies or the mission of Wikipedia override it. So if the encyclopedia is improved overall we do not have to deny those troublesome editors. It depends on the ratio of trouble to benefit. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 00:01, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

Deleting any article that can be helpful/useful to our readers, which number in millions (through for niche topics, let's say ~1,000 per year) to save some time for a few editors (admins) sounds dubious. Particularly as there is little proof that deny works - otherwise, there would be no sockpuppets and such. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 13:08, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

Other contributors for a translated page

Several CSD criteria refer to contributions by other editors. I'd like to know what people think about considering the contributions of Wikipedia editors at non-English Wikipedias, for pages that have been imported (or copied) and translated from another Wikipedia. I'm just hoping to get a sense of our general principle. AFAICT, this hasn't been discussed explicitly before.

So here's a simple example: If I write an article at the Spanish Wikipedia, and you translate it into English here, am I "a contributor" in terms of CSD, e.g., for a {{db-author}}? Always? Never? Sometimes? What do you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:11, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

Db-author would not apply there IMO; a translation is too large a secondary contribution.Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:13, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

I feel that {{db-author}} implies "The person who put this here has changed his mind." I think that's a necessary interpretation, because of this scenario: X writes an article in Spanish on Spanish Wikipedia, and then posts a {{db-author}} tag every time someone creates a translation of it on another Wikipedia. If we deem those tags valid and the articles are deleted accordingly, that is giving X control over the reproduction of his work that he was supposed to have relinquished when he became a Wikipedia editor and created the original article. Largoplazo (talk) 13:46, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

What about the other way around, if you decide to tag your translation as db-author? Is my contribution (at the Spanish Wikipedia) significant or ignored? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:58, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes, the person who created the article on English Wikipedia is the author on English Wikipedia for db-author purposes. He may have decided he's not happy with the translation after all. He may have realized that much of its content is covered by an existing article and have decided to start over, covering only the information that isn't already here and cross-referencing the rest of it. Someone may have questioned the article based on English Wikipedia's article guidelines, and he may have decided not to defend the article and just request deletion instead. There's no obligation to you to keep the article here if you didn't create it here. Largoplazo (talk) 20:20, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Or it could be editors who are angry with the community, and they want to take as much of "their" content with them when they say meatball:GoodBye. In that case, considering the contributions of the original authors might make a clear "policy-based" reason for declining the de-author request. I'm personally leaning towards "sometimes" on this question.

db-author isn't the only criterion affected by this principle; a translation by a banned user also involves deleting work substantially created by others (there was a case of that recently, and, given the WP:DENY issues, ignoring the contributions of the non-English authors might normally be the best net response in that case). WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:09, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Since the Spanish author had nothing to do with the article being on English Wikipedia to begin with, and the person who put it there was under no obligation to do so, why does he have any less prerogative to have it removed than if he'd written it from scratch, regardless of why he's chosen to remove it? Where did this entitlement on the part of the Spanish author come from? If he wants it on English Wikipedia, let him translate it, or request a translation, himself. Largoplazo (talk) 00:05, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

I'm thinking less about the Spanish author and more about admins feeling like they're required to delete such translations, even when, in their opinions, doing so would be harmful to the project. (Obviously, if deleting it is a net positive, then we all want it done.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:00, 23 July 2016 (UTC)

The question of whether an admin can deny a db-author request based on the admin's sense of the need for the article is an entirely independent one from the one you started this discussion about insofar as being a translation from another Wikipedia has nothing to do with whether one feels an article does or doesn't need to be on this one. Largoplazo (talk) 03:36, 23 July 2016 (UTC)

The related discussion is at my talk page about whether G5 should apply as well (WP:DENY isn't the only rationale, it's also about making sure that blocking policy is actually followed and encouraging editors to actually come clean with problems). I still say that the person who created the English language translation is the author, for all purposes. The actual translated English-language version is itself copyrighted. The licensing across the project requires more than than though and so while a translation could fall under fair use, the GFDL requires the link to prior contributors. Nevertheless, even if you wanted to db-author and blow everything up, the actual sources used and the facts within them are not copyrighted and so anyone could in theory recreate an article on the same topic with the same sources later. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 21:26, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

That someone can recreate an article is true of any article whatsoever that is otherwise valid but that was deleted under db-author. Whether it was written by a banned user or was translated from another Wikipedia has no bearing on that. Largoplazo (talk) 03:39, 23 July 2016 (UTC)

The first words in this section are "Several CSD criteria" – not "db-author only". I now regret giving the simple example, because people seem to have fixated on the example instead of the larger question. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:03, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

The only CSD criteria whose application to articles depends on who the author is seem to be G5, G7, and A11. We've discussed G5 and G7. Did you have anything in mind regarding A11? A11 means that an article is something the creator, or someone who the creator knows, made up. It's virtually guaranteed that if an article is getting tagged, then it isn't remotely notable, so it will disappear whether through A11 or a deletion discussion. I'm not sure how useful it is to debate whether or not an article qualifies for A11 here because it's a translation of something someone else who had no connection to the translator made up on another Wikipedia. I doubt it's common for people to troll Wikipedias for articles about invented topics by people they don't know and then rush to translate them onto other Wikipedias. Largoplazo (talk) 17:40, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

Only Admins Declining G4?

I reverted a generally well-thought-out addition to the policy here, limiting G4 declines to administrators, because it neglected the fact that any editor who adds significant new content to a previously-deleted article will also know, without needing to see the previous state of the article, that it no longer is eligible for G4. Do we want to say anything about this at all? I see a couple of options:

1. Leave it off and treat such behavior as a user conduct issue if it arises, per WP:BEANS,
2. Specify admin-only, overriding my objections, or
3. Specify anyone knowing that G4 does not apply may remove the tag. In addition to the exception I highlighted above, that could also include a user familiar with the previously deleted version of the article, or reviewing relevant content at Deletionpedia.

I prefer #3, assuming it can be collaboratively worded well. What does everyone else think? Jclemens (talk) 08:22, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

The problem is, only an administrator can tell if an article speedied under G4 is the same as the deleted version. If someone adds a line or two but the article is otherwise identical to the previous version, its still eligible for G4 - but only an administrator would know that. Since it requires an administrator tool to resolve, like other areas of WP (AFD's where the result is delete etc) it should only be rejected by an administrator. If a non-admin rejects a G4 under recreation of previously deleted material, they clearly have been unable to see if it matches. Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:24, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

That's why I specified significant new content above, although there wasn't really room for that in the revert edit summary. AGF would say that an editor in good standing who adds significant content AND deletes a G4 tag should be presumed to know what they're doing, and a user who disagrees can send the article to AfD, again, for reevaluation, where if CSD-G4 applies, it will be enforced and the offending editor trout'ed. Am I wrong here? Cheers, Jclemens (talk) 08:29, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

(I'll note that I'm assuming that topics where previous re-creation has been disruptive will have been WP:SALTed, so my objection isn't even relevant in cases of protracted disruption) Jclemens (talk) 08:30, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Yeah I hadnt seen that at the time I posted it :) See here for why this has come up though. The main problem is not where an editor has added significant new content, its that they technically have no way of actually knowing how much is 'significant' without access to the previous version. In the hypothetical case of a deleted version moved to draft/userspace, significantly added to, then moved back to main, we would hope no one would speedy it without looking at the revisions in the first place. Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:33, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

While significant is clearly subjective, do we really want editors who think they can fix a G4 article locked out of the process by policy? I'm fine with saying "Don't remove a G4 unless you have a good reason to believe it doesn't apply, such as being an administrator", and I think that addresses the user conduct issue without creating more administrator bottlenecks. Cheers, Jclemens (talk) 08:37, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Does the bottleneck exist? Most of the G4's I see are already handled by administrators except where its an obvious failing for another reason. I would be fine with spelling out the recreated material in more detail rather than requiring an admin to work it. As it stands its a bit vague and 'can be removed by any editor' is clearly not the best wording when not all editors can judge all criteria. Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:42, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Not all AFD outcomes are content-related. If someone adds a G4 tag to a new article about someone who has become very well known in recent months, about whom there is scads of coverage in independent reliable sources, and the AFD found five years ago that he was then not notable on account of failing WP:GNG and WP:BIO, I'm going to remove the G4 tag without seeing the original article (and will explain why in my edit summary). Largoplazo (talk) 10:34, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

If talk pages had "up vote" buttons I'd be hammering it like crazy right now. Thparkth (talk) 15:49, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

+1Tazerdadog (talk) 03:01, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

• The claim that "only an administrator can tell if an article speedied under G4 is the same as the deleted version" isn't 100% true. Anybody could have followed the RSS feed of the revision history to the article and have a pretty solid idea of what was deleted. Also, with content having been farmed out to wikidata & commons the veil of deletion isn't what it used to be. for (;;) (talk) 10:49, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

They may have got the pre-delete page content from an internet archiving service. At least, that's how I believe York & Selby Lines to have been recreated two years after deletion. --Redrose64 (talk) 11:32, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

I remember tagging articles for G4 in my pre-admin days when the copyvio bots saw that an article was similar to an archived/mirrored version of a previously deleted article. Wikipedia articles are frequently mirrored or archived and I would not say at all that only administrators can assess the similarity of an article to a previously deleted one. So I agree with Jclemens' removal.Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:16, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

• If all you have for comparison is the previous contents of an article at one particular point in time, that might be sufficient to tag for a G4, but it's not, in general, enough to untag. Not even if the article at that point had an AFD tag stuck on the top. For all you know, the article could have been heavily edited during the AFD and still deleted (the discussion won't always make this clear), the version you're looking at could be from near the start or end of the AFD, and the recreated one could be a verbatim copy from the other extreme; that's still a valid G4. It's even less certain if an article has been deleted more than once.
  I don't think this is worth worrying about too much, though. In almost all such cases, you're not going to be seeing a third party who's kept a stashed copy of the article or whatever; it'll be the person who recreated it, and they're already forbidden from removing the deletion tag. —Cryptic 15:37, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

• Absolutely cannot support that addition to policy. I have, as a non-admin, removed several G4 tags under circumstances where I knew that G4 did not apply. The wording of G4 specifically excludes "pages for which the reason for deletion no longer exists". The reason for deletion can usually be determined from the previous AfD discussion. For example, an article about a pre-release movie which was deleted entirely on WP:CRYSTAL grounds, cannot then be deleted under G4 after the movie is released. I had to argue very hard with an admin over this - he wanted to delete it. Thparkth (talk) 15:46, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

  Some people (admins or not) don't read past the summary heading "Recreation of a page that was deleted per a deletion discussion" and miss the important bits. The attitude is "it must always be deleted whenever it gets recreated, now and for evermore". See for example User talk:T.seppelt#Persondata not orphaned. --Redrose64 (talk) 20:00, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Discussion Notification

There is a discussion on the Administrators' Noticeboard regarding the criteria for speedy deletion. Everyone is welcome to participate. The discussion may be found here. Tazerdadog (talk) 23:36, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

I have implemented the results of the discussion. Help with the wordsmithing is greatly appreciated.Tazerdadog (talk) 03:49, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

Gauging opinion on a possible new criterion for templates

Hi folks. Recently, Wikipedia:Database reports/Unused templates was updated. It's a mess, to be blunt. The report found 50,698 templates with zero transclusions. Some of these are unused for legitimate reasons (substitute-only templates, for instance), but many were created by new users who didn't understand how templates are used. See, for instance, {{"Category: Career}} and {{(Karan parmar)}}. TfD has horribly low participation and usually a bad backlog, so if we shuffle these all through there, we'll severely overload that deletion process. Instead, I think a new speedy deletion criterion would help us out with the most obvious cases which would never survive TfD. I was thinking of the following:

T4. Unused templates created by inexperienced editors

Templates that have no transclusions and were created by editors with less than 50 contributions may be deleted after being tagged for seven days. This criterion does not apply to templates meant for substitution only, such as those which transclude {{Subst only}} on their documentation pages.

This is not an RfC or formal proposal, but I'd like some feedback on this. As the most active closer at TfD, I see no way to work through WP:REPORTS and find genuinely problematic templates (i.e. walled gardens of articles in the template namespace, which I've seen before) without such a criterion. We just don't have sufficient volunteers closing TfDs to make it happen. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 21:46, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

Sounds all good to me, but I don't like the "50 contributions" cut-off. No other CSD uses such a precise number. U5. Blatant misuse of Wikipedia as a web host talks about "few or no edits outside of user pages" to mean new users. I don't think we should go for a precise number here. Besides, editors who are experienced in other areas of the encyclopedia might be totally "new" to templates (me included). – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:54, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

I do agree that "few or no edits in the template namespace" would better define "new" here, but I worry that other people won't like the idea of a good-faith contributor with many contributions but no knowledge of templates having their stuff speedy deleted. I'm trying to balance effectiveness with the pragmatism of knowing that there are plenty of editors who will desperately try to oppose any new speedy deletion criterion. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 22:18, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

We already have WP:CSD#G2 for this. --Redrose64 (talk) 22:42, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

That's a rather generous definition of a test, and I'm not necessarily intending this to just cover tests (which possibly {{"Category: Career}} could be deleted under, but likely not {{(Karan parmar)}}). There's also things like navboxes that have never been used, created by new editors who don't realize we don't have a navbox for everything. Those aren't tests, but they are useless. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 22:50, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

As I said that, {{(Karan parmar)}} was deleted as a test, but I don't know that that's correct. I don't see all hardcoded text in a template as automatically a test, by far. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 22:52, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

To give an example of why this is needed, see {{人體溫度}}. It's unambiguously not a test, but it's also unambiguously useless. The author has four contributions on-site, two of which are to their userpage. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 02:09, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

Declined AFC drafts in mainspace speediable?

I'm seeing a trend, primarily with editors with ulterior motives, of declined drafts being moved into mainspace after being declined at AFC. Draft:Alexander Asiedu was one that was declined, put into mainspace, put back into draft, accepted as a WP:POINT, AfDed twice, and as I see it's now been declined at AFC a third time within the last few days. Draft:Comint Consulting was declined July 26, and Comint consulting was put in mainspace July 29. In these cases, there were no substantial changes made except to remove the AFC declined template. I'm sure these are not the only instances, either - these are just the ones I've found. Clearly, if they've been declined, they've been reviewed and it was concluded they don't belong in mainspace, so they're being put in mainspace contrary to policy/consensus. Can these be speedied instead of running an AfD? MSJapan (talk) 18:19, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

Speedyable? If any other criterion applies, such as promotion, copyvio, attack, unmodified/G4, absolutely. In other cases, I don't see a need to speedy poor quality articles, since anyone can make a new article in mainspace without *needing* to go through the AfC process. Do we really want to penalize people for using it? I think that has a lot of bad ramifications... Jclemens (talk) 19:40, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

In addition to what Jclemens notes, if the version put back into mainspace is essentially the version that was AfDed then G4 applies. If no existing speedy criterion applies then PROD it, AfD it or fix it. If an editor is giving you the run around then report the editor and they'll get blocked. If someone else then appears and does the same thing with the same article, then that's obvious socking and they'll get blocked. Thryduulf (talk) 23:56, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

I'm an experienced AFC reviewer, it's not a simple issue. If the editor who submitted the draft for review moves it to mainspace after being declined, it's their right to change their mind about submitting the draft to AFC - but also to have the article suffer the consequences. However, if the person who moves a declined draft to mainspace is not the submitter, that's a bad faith act. The submitter is, by submitting their draft, entitled to a proper review of their work, by a properly qualified reviewer working in compliance with AFC's defined criteria and process. When a different editor comes along and removes the draft from AFC without the "due process" of an AFC acceptance, the mover is effectively sabbotaging the submitter's work. In such a case the correct action is to simply return the draft to draft-space, restore the AFC templates and allow the AFC process to continue. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 21:32, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Theoretical A2 question

CX 24 Nuevo Tiempo is an article about a Spanish-language radio station in a Spanish-speaking country, which had a chunk of Spanish text added to it a year ago but was not tagged as requiring translation until earlier today. Because there is an all-English version that can be reverted to, it does not require deletion. But while reviewing the article I noticed the potential for a curious situation to arise. Let's assume it is a new article written in Spanish. I couldn't find a corresponding article at the Spanish Wikipedia, but a corresponding article with essentially the same contents exists at the Croatian Wikipedia. The information therefore exists in a foreign language project, but not the same language as what has been added to the English Wikipedia. Does it still qualify for deletion under A2? AtHomeIn神戸 (talk) 04:50, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

The wording of the criteria is "If the article is not the same as an article on another project" I don't think that an article in Spanish and an article in Croatian can be said to be the same, even if one is clearly a translation of the other. In this case I would transwiki the content to the Spanish Wikipedia, then mark the local copy as {{not English}} and, if the Croatian article is significiantly more comprehensive than the new Spanish one, with {{Expand Croatian}} too. Thryduulf (talk) 10:16, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

X1 Redirects (Neelix)

A few days ago, the speedy deletion criteria X1 was created for Neelix redirects. When I check Twinkle, X1 (and X2) hasn't been added. How can I nominate a Neelix redirect using CSD X1 with Twinkle? --MrLinkinPark333 (talk) 20:37, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

@MrLinkinPark333: Unless the Twinkle devs add support for it, you cannot. {{db}} can be used to tag the pages manually. — JJMC89 (T·C) 20:52, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

Proper CSD tag for images that are OTRS received but not confirmed.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This is a continuation of this thread at AN: Proper CSD tag for {{OTRS received}} but not confirmed.

Some background for those that don't want to wade through the AN thread. I have been going through the old images at Category:Wikipedia files with unconfirmed permission received by OTRS, double checking the permissions ticket, and if the ticket has not been resolved I have been marking them for deletion. The current CSD criteria only mentions OTRS once and that is in WP:F11. However, this mention uses {{OTRS pending}} not {{OTRS received}}. The two are different. Pending is when the ticket has been said to have been sent but has not been reviewed by an agent. Received means the ticket was reviewed but did not contain enough information to {{OTRS permission}} the image.

Images that I have been marking for deletion have been sitting, waiting for a response, for well over a month. This is the cutoff that Commons uses (see c:template:OTRS received) and that is plenty of time to work out the permissions once responded to by an agent.

So the question here is, what criteria should these images be marked under for deletion? Since the policy of CSD is rather strict, this needs to be worked out in order to make the processing of these images easier for everyone. Two main options here. F9 or F11. F11 has the further caveat that normally it has a 7 day delay with it. So if F11, with or without the extra week notice? If you support F11 please indicate whether it should have an additional 7 day waiting period or not as well. The other option would be to just use {{db}} with a custom rationale and do away with the letter + number scheme for these images. --Majora (talk) 18:08, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

F9 support

F11 support

• I would suggest that these be handled in the same way as {{OTRS pending}} - give the user some time to file a response and if none is received then apply speedy deletion. F9 is intended for obvious cases of copyright violation where the image clearly isn't available for use under a free licence, that does not apply to more ambiguous cases such as these. While there might be other criteria which are applicable in special cases (e.g. if the contact is from the copyright holder requesting deletion) in the typical case where we aren't sure the contact comes from the copyright holder or the permission granted isn't sufficient I think this is the right approach. Hut 8.5 19:33, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

  @Hut 8.5: F11 immediate? Or F11 with the additional 7 day wait beyond when the tag is applied? --Majora (talk) 19:41, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

  There is no such thing as "F11 immediate", all F11 deletions have a waiting period. These should not be any different - it would be unfair to delete it without giving the uploader time to address the issues with the permissions release. Hut 8.5 21:07, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

• As Hut 8.5 said, and as I said at WP:AN#Proper CSD tag for {{OTRS received}} but not confirmed., all we need to do to align the bureaucratese with both common practice and common sense is to change "Files tagged with {{OTRS pending}} for more than 30 days" to "Files tagged with {{OTRS pending}}, {{OTRS received}}, or a similar template for more than 30 days". (Perhaps removing any mention of a specific template there would be better.) The wording of F11 already doesn't mandate an extra 7-day wait in such cases, so since {{db-f11}} - the common case - does, just tag them {{db|f11}} instead. —Cryptic 19:48, 7 August 2016 (UTC)
• Support tagging as F11, notifying the user, and waiting the 7 days as policy requires for all F11 deletions. The policy page already specifies that this is what to do with old OTRS pending images. A good option is to tag them with {{NoOTRS}} which when substituted expands to {{di-no permission|source={{NoOTRS|days=85}}|date=7 August 2016}}. Since F11 deletion does call for the uploader to receive 7 days notice before deletion, the uploader should then be notified with a {{subst:di-no permission-notice|1=Saul G Bron.jpg|source=An OTRS notice was applied over 85 days ago, but no message at OTRS has been processed since this tag was applied}} (this is the option provided with the NoOTRS template) or you could alternatively use {{Di-no permission-notice-final}} to notify the uploader. I don't see any harm in waiting the additional 7 days, as we will occasionally have an uploader respond to these final tags. In fact I just had one today, at User talk:Ethersearch#Addressing file permission problem with File:Saul G Bron.jpg. — Diannaa (talk) 20:18, 7 August 2016 (UTC) Adding, ideally these steps should be undertaken by an OTRS team member so that they can have one last look for the missing email or one last look at whatever documentation has already been received to confirm that it is indeed inadequate. — Diannaa (talk) 20:26, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

  These are not OTRS pending images. These are OTRS received images. Completely and totally different things. And the example that you gave is also irrelevant to this. The image was marked F11, they said they were going to send in permissions to OTRS. If the permissions they send in are not valid, the image gets marked OTRS received. After a month it will be tagged for deletion. And you are saying after all that, that they should get another week? --Majora (talk) 21:00, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

  Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. The vast majority will be deleted after the week, but doing it this way does not generate any extra work, and it gives the uploader one last chance to respond. — Diannaa (talk) 21:35, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

• In most cases, F11 will likely apply so use that as a default. Sometimes F3 or F9 may apply better, depending on what the OTRS email says. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 22:04, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

{{db}} support

• Oppose {{db}} is almost as badly misused as {{db-g6}}, people use it to invent a "reason" for speedy deletion: if a suitable criterion cannot be found among the many listed at WP:CSD, the page should not be considered to be speedyable. --Redrose64 (talk) 22:05, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Discussion

Ask the OTRS people to tag the file. All these tags cover different scenarios and not all "permission not obtained" OTRS outcomes merit the same tag. For example, if the copyright holder denies permission and complains about copyright infringement, F9 would be appropriate. If no permission can be confirmed, F11 would be appropriate. If it's too narrow a permission - say for Wikipedia only - F3 may be. It'd depend on the correspondence. Alternatively, one might use a new F12 for all "OTRS could not confirm freeness" cases. And instances where a WP:NFC use would be acceptable are a separate case still. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 19:04, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

@Jo-Jo Eumerus: I am an OTRS person. I tagged a file. I was declined. Not fully but I was told that the tag I placed was wrong and that the person had an additional 7 days to rectify the issue beyond the months they were already given. So "let OTRS handle it" is apparently not good enough. --Majora (talk) 19:08, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

@Majora:, which tag did you use? F11 does give another seven days grace period, it's only F9 (copyright infringement) and F3 and sometimes F7 that merit immediate deletion. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 19:24, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

@Jo-Jo Eumerus: I used F9. I was told that that was wrong (by someone that could not view the ticket). They changed it F11 and the person was given another 7 days. Frankly, I couldn't care less what letter + number combination is used. But to let the image sit there for another seven days is completely and totally illogical. The customer has been given months to rectify the issues with their ticket. Most of the ones I have seen have not responded at all to the initial inquiry by an agent. F11, sure why not. But at least make it F11 immediate. --Majora (talk) 19:29, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

I've seen {{OTRS received}} being used to tag files with insufficient permission. I wonder if that template should be changed to contain a Db tag (which tag is what we are discussing here) when it's in the file namespace. I'll notify folks there. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 20:02, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

The only issue with an automatic CSD tag is human error. It is possible that the agent responded that the permissions were accepted but just forgot to change over the tag. There has also been instances where an agent accidentally overlooked an attachment with the information they were asking for. I have no problem just doing a quick double check on the images that have been tagged received for over a month. I just need to know what to tag them with. --Majora (talk) 20:11, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Having seen such pages being tagged for deletion by non-OTRS folks, I think that OTRS received is treated as a "doubt" tag by human editors. Wonder if such error may be reduced by having a time delay appear for the auto-tagging. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 22:08, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

There seems to be general consensus forming that the proper tag for these is F11. The only difference is whether or not there should be an additional 7 day waiting period after the tag has been checked by an OTRS member. Would anyone be opposed to me changing around the RfC a little bit? The main question would be the 7 day wait on F11. I can split the section and move the responses or let people move their own responses. Pinging people who have already responded to get their opinion on this: @Hut 8.5, Cryptic, Diannaa, Jo-Jo Eumerus, and Redrose64: --Majora (talk) 22:37, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment#Ending RfCs: I think the best way to do it is to close off this RFC as resolved and start a new one on the new topic. — Diannaa (talk) 22:42, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Waiting period for images tagged with OTRS received

Alright so, the RfC above with withdrawn after it became pretty clear that the correct tag for these types of images is F11 as the default. Now the question is whether or not the additional 7 day waiting period should be applied for these types of images. Note, it does not matter that the current F11 version does not include a type of "immediate F11". This is a question on whether or not the F11 criterion should be amended. The current practice with these images is for the permission holder to send in the proper permissions to OTRS. If the email has been reviewed by an agent but deemed not sufficient the image is tagged with {{OTRS received}}. After 30 days the ticket should be rereviewed by an agent and if no valid permissions has been received the image will be tagged F11. Should an additional 7 day waiting period be given after the 30 days have expired? --Majora (talk) 23:11, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Support 7-day waiting period

• Wait an additional seven days. The vast majority will be deleted after the week, but doing it this way does not generate any extra work, and it gives the uploader one last chance to respond. It also makes the procedure uniform with other F11 deletions. — Diannaa (talk) 01:09, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
• I find Diannaa's reasoning compelling. Jclemens (talk) 04:56, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
• Weak Support per Diannaa's comments, combined with the observation that leaving the images floating around for an extra week is unlikely to be harmful. Tazerdadog (talk) 04:32, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

  Moving to oppose upon further reflection. BU Rob 13's argument seems sound on multiple different points. Tazerdadog (talk) 04:51, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Oppose 7-day waiting period

1. Waiting an additional seven days after the 30 days waiting period for OTRS received is illogical to me. Almost every ticket that is not sufficient is resolved within 48 hours and the review by an agent after the 30 days will make sure that ongoing discussions with the customer are taken into account when applying the tag. --Majora (talk) 23:11, 7 August 2016 (UTC)
2. See my comment below. Nyttend (talk) 01:12, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
3. This does generate extra work, as it requires admins such as myself to nominate images for deletion and then another admin to come through seven days later and delete them instead of the first admin just being able to delete outright. More importantly, we're talking about images that the Wikimedia Foundation could reasonably be expected to know are being hosted without permission. This is a massive liability for the site, so there is serious potential for harm. Uploaders have had their notifications, as they will have received an email about the inadequate permission via an OTRS agent a month earlier. At some point, we just have to delete the images or we're creating Exhibit A in a class action lawsuit down the road to show that we systematically store images without permission with full awareness that there is no adequate permission to use them (which means we aren't covered by safe haven provisions). The 30 day time is already absurdly long given norms of response at OTRS. Adding another 7 days after notifying them about their previous notice of requiring permissions is stretching things way too far. If the desire is a uniform 7-day waiting period, this could be achieved by lowering the current 30-day hold on OTRS received to a 14-day hold and then tagging for 7 days. This keeps the uniformity of F11 while also lowering the time within which we're blatantly disregarding copyright laws. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 04:47, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
4. The point above about this making extra work for admins is very strong. Tazerdadog (talk) 04:55, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Discussion on waiting period

At Commons, the OTRS agents periodically update a counter for the oldest not-yet-addressed permissions email; if you've processed everything that's arrived since 8 August, you'll set the counter for 8 August. Any {{OTRS pending}} files that were tagged before the date are automatically nominated for speedy deletion. That system seems to work quite well, without the seven-day waiting period for Commons:Template:No permission since. Why would we want to make the related {{OTRS received}} process take longer here? By the time it's tagged, it's already been waiting quite a while (waiting an additional 30 days is unnecessary), so there's no reason to require yet another week. Nyttend (talk) 01:27, 8 August 2016 (UTC)

NOTE: I have posted a link to this at T:CENT since it is a proposed amendment to the CSD policy and it needs a lot more community input to determine a firm consensus either way. --Majora (talk) 01:37, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

We need to make sure that images are not deleted before the OTRS folks get around to dealing with the OTRS permission. There are often long backlogs. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:59, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

@Doc James: Permissions-en has less then a 10 day backlog nowadays. And this is about {{OTRS received}} which means the ticket has already been reviewed and deemed insufficient. --Majora (talk) 02:22, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes and at that point OTRS hopefully emails the uploader and they work on doting more i's and crossing more t's Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:25, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Of course. That is what the 30 days is supposed to be used for. We aren't just saying, "too bad, sucks to be you" and closing the ticket. We do what we can to get the proper permissions and 99 times out of 100 the issues get resolved within 48 hours. The 1% that doesn't is what this RfC is about. --Majora (talk) 02:35, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Applications and A7

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Should applications be deletable under A7? There have been many cases where the subject obviously isn't notable and would be deleted at AfD. We already have a criterion for websites and web content, why can't applications (whether it be a game or educational, whether it be for a computer or a phone) fall under the same criterion? Anarchyte (work | talk) 07:16, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes - A7 is, in my view, too narrow. The purpose of A7 is to have a way to delete content about unremarkable topics without the bureaucracy of a formal week-long discussion. A web application that does not make a credible claim of significance should not continue to be in the encyclopedia for the week-long discussion, and A7 can be extended easily to accommodate this. Tazerdadog (talk) 07:23, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Comment: I think it is worth noting that "software" is currently explicitly excluded from the scope of A7, while "web content" is explicitly included. Instead of limiting the question to applications, wouldn't it be better to expand the question to whether software in general should be moved within the scope of A7? AtHomeIn神戸 (talk) 07:48, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

That's what I was trying to get at with this RfC, although it may have been worded poorly. I'm proposing that the "web content" section of A7 to be expanded to include any types of software or applications. Anarchyte (work | talk) 07:52, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

I'd recommend removing this RFC, and updating the wording to include software on a new RFC while it's still early and the community hasn't put in a lot of effort here. This will minimize the potential for confusion, or a future RFC. Tazerdadog (talk) 08:02, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Oppose: This has been discussed many times, so it's been expressed by many other editors, but software is very broad, including things like programming compilers like Clang, user-facing software like VLC, and operating systems like QNX. Often, software is a creative work and is often debated in AfD. With the diversity of software and the number of software articles kept or debated in AfD, it would be very difficult and error-prone for even experienced editors to make a decision on whether an article about software makes a credible claim of significance. Anarchyte, I'd like to know what's different now compared to any of the previous times this has been brought up, as software is a perennial A7 scope expansion proposal. Appable (talk) 08:14, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

We need a FAQ page. See for example Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 58#A7 for products, Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 58#A7 and applications. --Redrose64 (talk) 16:31, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Template:Db-fpcfail and policy compliance

• Template:Db-fpcfail recently came to my attention. Despite its current wording, this template is intended and used to nominate "image[s], hosted on Commons, but with tags or information on [their] English Wikipedia description page that are no longer needed... (For example, a failed featured picture candidate.)" for deletion. Presently it uses WP:F2 as the basis for this deletion; originally, however, it was WP:G6.

Although I understand why several editors would use this template and criterion, I am concerned that this template as used and originally written does not conform to current CSD policies. F2's exception covers "pages containing information not relevant to any other project (like {{FeaturedPicture}})", without any stipulation that this information be related to current Wikipedia processes and templates. As such, a substituted FPCfailed template, or valued picture template, would still be an exception. The template has a much firmer basis in G6 (if we have a consensus to point to, then it meets the "uncontroversial" stipulation), but "image[s], hosted on Commons, but with tags or information on [their] English Wikipedia description page that are no longer needed..." is not listed explicitly.

My questions are, 1) is there consensus that "image[s], hosted on Commons, but with tags or information on [their] English Wikipedia description page that are no longer needed..." meets the criteria for speedy deletion, and if so, 2) should we update the criteria to make this more explicit? — Chris Woodrich (talk) 03:47, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Speedy deletion criteria for books

I know that there has been talk about creating a speedy deletion criteria for books, but there's never really been any true consensus on this. I think I might have come up with something that could potentially be doable. My thought is that this would fall under WP:A9 for the most part, as that one of the main things I drew from, but it could potentially be a new criteria on its own.

The basic gist of this criteria is that it would only apply to books that are published through vanity or self-publishing outlets like AuthorHouse, Smashwords, and CreateSpace, where the books do not make a credible assertion of notability and the author/contributor(s) do not have an article. This would allow us to quickly get rid of the obviously non-notable stuff like some random self-published book by a non-notable author without having to go through a full AfD. There are too many articles that have to go through a full AfD, despite being so obviously non-notable that there's not even a question that they'll be deleted. This criteria would also apply to fanfiction posted to places like FanFiction.net, so that we don't have to have to bring something like this to AfD because fanfiction doesn't always cleanly fit into web content. I've included podcast novels in this since that's sort of akin to self-publishing, but I'm fine with that portion being removed since it's a bit of a grey area publication-wise.

The criteria would not cover any book that is published through a large, indie, academic, or small press. It would also not cover the deletion of any book where the author has an article, nor where any credible assertion of notability is made. This assertion would be considered to be things such as coverage in a RS (a trivial mention would suffice as long as the source is a RS), assertion of bestselling status, the book being adapted into a film/TV show/game, or a major award - the typical type of stuff that admins consider when judging A7 deletions. I am thinking about making the age of the book part of this criteria - if the book was published prior to 2000, it would not qualify under this criteria. People could self or vanity publish prior to this point of time, of course, but it was harder to do so and slightly more rare than it is nowadays. That would keep us from instantly deleting a book from say, the early 1900s or earlier, as there's the possibility that the book could be notable. I chose 2000 based on the date in the self-publishing article that stated that the 2000s were kind of a turning point as far as self-publishing goes. We could probably go later if anyone wanted, but I think that 2000 is a decent option that would cover the majority of self-published and vanity works without being too inclusive or exclusive.

Here's my mockup of the basic guideline, but feel free to suggest tweaks and alterations.

No indication of importance (books).

This criteria applies to any book that is either self-published or a vanity printing after 2000 and does not give any indication where the work is important or significant and where the author or contributors' article does not exist (all criteria must be true). Fanfiction and podcast novels would qualify under this criteria if there is no assertion of notability and the author does not have an article. This is distinct from questions of verifiability and reliability of sources, and is a lower standard than notability. The criterion does not apply to any article that makes any credible claim of significance or importance even if the claim is not supported by a reliable source or does not qualify on Wikipedia's notability guidelines. The criterion does apply if the claim of significance or importance given is not credible. If the claim's credibility is unclear, you can improve the article yourself, propose deletion, or list the article at articles for deletion.

With new changes suggested by Graeme and Kevin

This criteria applies to any book that is published to the self-publishers or vanity publishers CreateSpace, AuthorHouse, Smashwords, Lulu, Leadstart Publishing, or the publisher is the same name as the author after the year 2000 and does not give any indication where the work is important or significant and where the author or contributors' article does not exist (all criteria must be true). Fanfiction and podcast novels would qualify under this criteria if there is no assertion of notability and the author does not have an article. This is distinct from questions of verifiability and reliability of sources, and is a lower standard than notability. The criterion does not apply to any article that makes any credible claim of significance or importance even if the claim is not supported by a reliable source or does not qualify on Wikipedia's notability guidelines. The criterion does apply if the claim of significance or importance given is not credible. If the claim's credibility is unclear, you can improve the article yourself, propose deletion, or list the article at articles for deletion.

My basic thought is that this is kind of overdue, given that anyone and their mother can put out a work through a vanity or self publisher nowadays. Again, this wouldn't cover anything put out through regular publishing arms or anything with even a remotely viable claim of assertion.

I'm going to ping the following editors, who were active during the bestseller as notability conversation at WP:NBOOK, are still reasonably active, and are editors that I'm fairly familiar with. @AngusWOOF, DGG, Coolabahapple, James500, Piotrus, and Dream Focus: I figure that you all run the gamut on how you approach articles, so we'd get a nice variety of input from all of you. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:39, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

• I know that this might be a long shot to get this approved, but I figure that it'd be worth opening it up for discussion again. Also pinging I JethroBT to weigh in here. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:40, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
• It looks like this was brought up a little bit ago, but my proposal is a bit more specific than the prior proposal and likely more so than any of the others that were previously brought up. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:47, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

• Also to reference the last proposal by Largoplazo, the book discovered by Frimley (brought up by Peridon) would not presumably fall under this criteria because while the book itself was found and presumably published for the first time post 2015, the original work itself would obviously predate 2000 and the idea of an old manuscript being discovered in this manner would be something that would have a valid assertion of notability. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:54, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
• My basic thing with this is that we've had a sharp increase in people trying to add self-published and vanity works to Wikipedia in the last few years and it's inevitable that we'll have at least 3-4 of them a week at AfD, possibly more. Sometimes we're able to slightly justify speedying them under criteria that doesn't really fit (like obvious promotion), but by large we have to take them to other outlets and the number of these is only increasing. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:56, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

For this to get up, there must be a very well defined way to tell if a publisher is a vanity publisher or not. Otherwise there will be too much room for argument. If we can stick with publisher = " AuthorHouse, Smashwords, or CreateSpace" or the publisher name = author name, then this could get my support. Otherwise you could have a list somewhere of vanity publishers. But Category:Vanity publishers is empty. There is however Vanity_press#Examples and Category:Self-publishing companies to get a handle on something definite. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 08:10, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

• @Tokyogirl79: Quick question-- what differentiates a vanity publisher from a self-publishing company, and how do we identify vanity publishers? I'm pretty new to that term, so I'm just seeking some clarification. For now, I think I'm more or less in agreement with Graeme Bartlett; I think because the criteria depends on editors knowing what publishers are self-publishing or not, we probably should build a Category or a Wikipedia: namespace page enumerating the usual suspects. I think it is also OK to note on that page or category that "this is not an exhaustive list", but care needs to be taken about what publishers are added. The language of the mockup seems pretty good to me, but I'll come back to this next week to provide any suggestions I might have on phrasing tweaks. (Sorry, busy week at the WMF for me...) I JethroBT ^{drop me a line} 08:38, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
• There's not a huge amount of difference, but the main one is that authors pay up front for vanity publishing whereas they do not for self-publishing. The reason for this is that vanity publishers require the authors to name a specific amount of books they want printed up front and the author pays for these books. They're also typically expected to sell the books themselves after this point in time. With self-publishing they aren't asked to specify print amounts, as the publisher will print the book after a customer requests the work in question. Self-publishing companies also tend to offer store fronts (like Amazon with CreateSpace or Smashwords with their website) to sell the works. Many vanity publishers don't really offer this, at least not to the extent that you see with self-publishing. This is pretty much why most authors have eschewed vanity publishers as a whole. They're on the decline, but still exist enough to warrant mentioning here. You typically see them in other countries - I know that there are quite a few in other countries, like Leadstart Publishing. There's a better description of the differences here from the SFWA. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 09:08, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

• I have no problem with limiting this to specific publishers for the time being - that's probably a good limiter to add as well. I'll add this to the criteria. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 09:09, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

• Comment Don't forget Xlibris and PublishAmerica (and its variants for outside the USA). I'm in favour of this as it gives a bit more definition. Self-publishing outfits are fairly easy to identify - just drop their name and "self-publish" into your search engine of choice. The basic search is the book title and Amazon - you can get the 'publisher' by scrolling down the Amazon page for the book. If it's new, is from the Western world, and isn't on Amazon, it ain't notable. If it looks like a regular publishing house, a search will quickly reveal whether only that book or that author come from that 'house'. If you can't find the 'publisher' at all, it's the author masking self-pub through CreateSpace. A Category would save repeated searching, though. The vanity publishers often have something like 'a different approach to publishing' in their intro. (It's interesting looking at their charges - why the heck anyone does business with them is beyond me when it can be done at the new-style on-demand places. Sometimes they do include proof-reading in their services, though.) For the benefit of those who can't see what's wrong with self-pub (from the Wikipedia point of view), being published by a regular house doesn't mean instant notability. It does mean a proofed, editor checked and advised, and well setup product with a publicity machine and press reviews behind it. Self-pub means you have to do all your own publicity (apart from the self-pub site), get reviews (Goodreads and Amazon reviews don't count for tuppence) and get the book onto shelves (as the browsing market is still alive). One other point about self-pub and notability: if a self-pub book looks like it's getting sales, a regular house will snap it up. I can think of one case here (but can't quote it). Peridon (talk) 10:51, 12 August 2016 (UTC)
• I can think of a few cases like in Peridon's last sentence, too, and it's not an argument in favor of this criterion. This criterion as worded relies on the tagger and deleting admin both doing their own research into who published the book, and if the self-published version was doing well and it was picked up by a small press with little marketing clout, it's the initial version that's going to dominate google results. The situation's worse if it's expanded to all vanity publishers instead of a specific list; while some are laughably easy to identify, the majority are not. "3-4 of them a week at AfD" isn't particularly compelling, either; 3-4 a day still wouldn't be. This fails the Objectivity and Frequency guidelines at the top of this page. AFD's the proper venue. —Cryptic 13:24, 12 August 2016 (UTC)