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Wikipedia:WikiProject Abandoned Drafts
Wikipedia:Abandoned Drafts

The following discussion is an archived proposal of the WikiProject below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or the WikiProject Council). No further edits should be made to this page.

The resulting WikiProject was created at Wikipedia:WikiProject Abandoned Drafts

Description

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As I discussed here, this Wikiproject would be a method of organizing userspace drafts that has been abandoned by their owners. Because it is unhelpful to just end up deleting these partial creations, this Wikiproject would work toward having users adopt abandoned drafts to work on themselves so that they may one day be submitted to the mainspace.

The scope of this project would primarily be userspace drafts belonging to retired users, as these would have little to no likelihood of being worked on in the future and probably eventually deleted. When userspace drafts belonging to retired users are found, they would be linked to from the project in order to allow easy access to users that are looking to adopt a draft.

Beyond that, this Wikiproject would also accept submitted drafts from active users who feel they don't have the time to finish a draft or have lost interest in finishing it and would end up abandoning it in due time anyways. Such users could follow a submission process that would likely involve just linking to their draft in the proper section and they would be put into the pool of abandoned drafts.

This is what i've thought of as an alternative to outright deletion of drafts that have been sitting around for a long time and have no likelihood of being finished because of a missing user. Instead of losing this valuable content to deletion, this Wikiproject will be able to give other users the opportunity of finishing up the articles in progress.

Note: This Wikiproject will only be dealing with drafts of articles and not drafts of other processes, such as essays or other such inter-Wiki type pages. SilverserenC 05:18, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]


Support

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Please specify whether or not you would join the project.

  1. SilverserenC 05:18, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support Of course, this is based on doing it in accordance with the above description. I probably would not join the project North8000 (talk) 11:00, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support I won't join, as I don't have the time, but it is a great idea. Who Am I Why Am I Here? (talk) 22:24, 9 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Support Darkjedi10 (talk) 23:06, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Support Not sure how we know who is a "retired" editor, but it seems like a reasonable idea. --DThomsen8 (talk) 23:06, 4 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  6. seems reasonable. Leaseve me a talk page comment if this gets off the ground --Guerillero | My Talk 01:56, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Support, such drafts should also be moved to the Wikiproject's sandbox space. 65.94.47.63 (talk) 07:41, 11 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Support I would like to join. WP:USERSPACEDRAFT. ~~EBE123~~ talkContribs 20:34, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Support this would be a great way to save some of the good-but-half-written material floating around out there to be made into a proper article later. dalahäst (talk) 07:36, 12 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Support, but I see another problem in userfied articles which are lost. (should be normally deleted if no progress) mabdul 11:23, 12 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose

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  1. Oppose. This kind of project shouldn't be started without strong support, otherwise better to collaborate with existing groups. --Kleinzach 06:40, 17 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  2. The Article Incubator already exists for this purpose. It's not clear what exactly this proposed project will do except scan MfD for things labelled as stale drafts and shift them to the incubator, which should already be part of that process. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 08:47, 11 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

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  • @ DThomsen8: Presumably, we can just start with the users who are utilizing the Retired template on their userpages. The people using it are all indexed, which makes finding them easy and then one can just run a user page search with their username to see if any subpages pop up (if there's a better way to search for subpages, please let me know because it would be really useful). Also, permanently banned users would probably fall under this Wikiproject as well, if they happen to have any worthwhile articles in their subspace (unlikely, but I did just get a few from Abd's deletion nomination, they're listed on my userpage now at the bottom.) SilverserenC 22:02, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • @ Thumperward: As discussed here, the article incubator is pretty much dead, as no one submits articles to it anymore. The main issue with the article incubator is that articles would be added to it and just sit there. The purpose of this Wikiproject would be active attempts to get users to adopt the drafts so that they will be worked on. Also, since the basics of most of the articles are set up, all the adopters would have to do is add in some info and a few references and they would be good to go. We have a wide spectrum of types of articles that we can cover, from bare bones to more fully fleshed out that need some work, depending on what the adopters feel up to task for doing. We have articles that only need some cleanup and POV fixes on the language and would otherwise be ready, such as this, and other articles that just needs references to be added and a small amount of cleanup and they would be good to go, such as this. Or if users want to adopt a subject that is more of a challenge, but that there's a lot of references out there for, they can try something like this. Essentially, unlike the Article Incubator, this project will actively work on getting active users to adopt and complete drafts, rather than have them sit around in a different space like the Article Incubator does. SilverserenC 09:58, 11 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • The question remains as to why you don't simply attempt to revive the incubator with a renewed focus on participation. Whether the incubator is active or not, at least people have heard of it, which saves in having to promote some new project with IMO very similar aims and methods. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 10:39, 11 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • After the discussion that led to this proposal, a number of other users told me that a new project would work better than the incubator, because it would be a fresh new attempt at fixing the deletion of draft articles and it also doesn't really have the same aims as the incubator as it is anyways. The incubator is focused on articles in mainspace that were either created too early or need further work in general. This project is specifically for abandoned userspace drafts. Secondly, the incubator at this point has kinda proven that it doesn't work, as the results it put out during its lifetime were only good during its early years and then dropped off precipitously. Associating this project or trying to revive the incubator would just be an uphill battle, because people already don't have faith in it. Just because no one had heard of this project (because it's new) doesn't mean anything. You could say the same for any Wikiproject that is created. I think the fresh take on a separate problem would work better for everyone than trying to fix a dying Wikiproject and revamp it. SilverserenC 10:49, 11 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or at the WikiProject Council). No further edits should be made to this page.
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