Wikipedia talk:Article Rescue Squadron/Archive 43

This is an archive of past discussions about Wikipedia:Article Rescue Squadron. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 40

Archive 41

Archive 42

→

Fledgling Jason Steed

Resolved

– Deleted. -- Banjeboi 17:16, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Does this: [1] make the book any more WP notable? (And therefore an article OK on Wikipedia?) Next Karate Kid film, starring Will Smith, based on portions of the book.--Beehold (talk) 16:16, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

If there would be reliable sources about this, perhaps. But no Google news hits, and very few Google hits[2], make this an unconfirmed rumour, nothing more, and so it does not help towards notability. Fram (talk) 06:29, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Hmmmm: More rumours then: [3]--Beehold (talk) 15:06, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Funny how Mark Cooper's name got added to that user-generated synopsis shortly before you made that edit. But of course, you couldn't possibly have put that there and then come over here to point to it, right?--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:46, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

No, I didn't - but thanks for being uncivil and accusing me of being devious! If I had put it on, I would have made sure it made sense. The bit near the end is just a ramble. Actually, I don't know if it is possible to check back on the edits of IMDB but, if you can, I spotted the original FJS piece last night. I think the rambling bit was added this afternoon.--Beehold (talk) 17:28, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

It wasn't there on May 13th. That's all I can find. Anyway, it doesn't really matter, again not a reliable source at all. By the way, the same IMDb doesn't list Will Smith as starring in that movie, but as a producer. Fram (talk) 19:46, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Odd tag

Why is Wikipedia:Article Rescue Squadron/Current articles in the hidden category "Articles for deletion and rescue"? Fences&Windows 01:23, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

This page is tagged somehow as well but I haven't bothered to figure out who did it or how. We've had many instances of creative vandalism - apparently not much going on in their lives. -- Banjeboi 01:45, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

And now they aren't. Who knows! -- Banjeboi 17:14, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for all the help

Yeah, I know I'm usually voting for delete. But I found an AfD on Lisa Niemi, a notable person that was on it's way to being merged out of existence. I tagged it for rescue, searched out sources and added enough that even the nominator changed his opinion to keep. But not one finger was lifted by the rescue squad. Tagging it for rescue got exactly no response at all. There are a number of members I can count on to show up at damn near every Xcountry-Ycountry relations AfD or to expand an article on a sandwich that can be summed up in 5 words.... but not one member of this project came in assist with so much as a suggestion or a vote. You guys missed an opportunity. The AfD closed as a keep. Niteshift36 (talk) 01:48, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but what were you looking for? YOU added the sources--were you expecting a thundering herd of keep !votes? Since you convinced the nominator based on the merits of your own research and improvements, what precisely did you expect the ARS to do to help? Jclemens (talk) 02:01, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

You don't get it. And if it sounds a little on the bitter side, maybe it's because I was hoping this project would change the opinion I've started to develop about it. I see ARS members work on digging out obscure passing mentions of a topic and argue that it is notable so that we can save an article about the nearly non-existant relationships between 2 countries that don't even bother to put an embassy in each others countries, and then they DO respond with that "thundering herd of keep votes" to claim that someone shaking hands with someone proves notability. But I come and ask for help on an article and the only sound I heard was silence. Not so much as a suggestion. Bottom line: I came here and asked for help. I got none. Niteshift36 (talk) 02:19, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for missing this one, she looks a most deserving subject for an article. I guess some good causes will slip through the net, as far as I know we dont have anyone working on ARS full time. For myself I usually look at only 5 or 6 articles at risk a week – if I assessed all of them it would take up most of my wiki time and it would be frustrating to see many of them deleted. If you find any more very worthy cases that dont get any attention you could always message one or two active members directly? FeydHuxtable (talk) 09:23, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I will speak only for myself. Yes you sound bitter. Most of what we Wikipedians do serves a greater good and we generally don't get a lot of acknowledgement of our work. I won't pretend that being constantly criticized by a recently topic-benned editor from here didn't have negative effects on this project. Part of that, it would seem, is a toxic atmosphere which repels editors who just wanted to help. In an effort to address a concern more dmage was done to a project that has accomplished a lot of good. We will again thrive but as always we help as time allows. We are all volunteers so sometimes a friendly note goes a long way. If you had posted here stating "I'm working on Lisa Niemi and would appreciate our eyes especially for sourcing on _____" I think you would have gotten a few nibbles. Similar notes on appropriate Wikiprojects are also helpful. In the end I'm glad you were your own best ally for the article and improved it. Next time if you feel it's getting lost in the shuffle just post a wee note for more eyes. -- Banjeboi 14:25, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually, Niteshift36, you didn't need any help, as you relate the story. The complaint reads to me like "I asked for ARS help, even though I was able to source it myself, and they didn't respond by showing up and mass voting as they've been criticized for doing". We don't know how many ARS members saw your plea, nor how many saw it between the time you posted it and when you had done the sourcing yourself. Only within that window, which seems to have been fairly small by your description, could ARS have helped. You're sufficiently persuasive on your own that you influenced the outcome and got the nom to change his own mind. Good for you! In other words, you've done a fantastic job without needing ARS help. Thus, it's really not possible to see whether anyone stopped by to help and noticed you didn't need any--just because no one happened to post "Well, looks like things are under control here..." doesn't mean that no one looked and left. I'm glad your article was rescued, but I just don't see how there's any blame to be assigned, anywhere, based on what happened. Next time you have a problem, please post here again. Next time you might actually need one or more of us to help change the outcome, and it would be a detriment to the encyclopedia if you had a rescuable article but didn't seek help because of this misunderstanding. Jclemens (talk) 15:34, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I appreciate the time it took to type that very lengthy excuse. Let me be clear, it was not MY article. I'd never even read it before I saw the AfD. I just knew who Niemi was and knew that she should pass our notability criteria. Niteshift36 (talk) 17:13, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, it looks like you did fine without any help. Pity you had to argue hard with someone who wanted to delete, but so it goes at AfD. No ARS member needs to work on any article, we all pick our articles to work on, and if some ARS members want to try to save bilateral relations article, so be it. Only a very few get saved, and those that do will have been improved and sourced, so what's the problem? And why so bitter about a tuna sandwich? It's notable, sources were found, it was kept; move on. Why are you even posting here? Fences&Windows 22:35, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I wasn't even thinking of the tuna sandwich AfD, but thanks for reminding me of it. Why am I posting here? Well if you ask it that way, I can see posting here was a mistake. Thanks for making that clear to me. Niteshift36 (talk) 04:00, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't respond well to sarcasm and needling; that's where you made the mistake. Fences&Windows 18:32, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Where I made the mistake? I wasn't even talking to you prior to your "get over it", "why are you even here" post, so I don't know why you'd find yourself "not responding well" to it in the first place. Niteshift36 (talk) 19:40, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

You addressed all members of the ARS in your post; I'm a member of the ARS, so you addressed me. "Thanks for the help" is sarcastic. What did you want, for us all to apologise that we'd not packed the vote? You must have had an aim in posting, but was it only to take a dig at the ARS? Fences&Windows 21:34, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Read into it however you want. No, I didn't expect anyone to pack the vote. If you bothered to stop being offended and actually read what I have written, you'd see what I actually did hope to see and why I bothered to post. Niteshift36 (talk) 03:51, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

You know, I appreciate the post. It may come off as a bit, well it could come off better. But they felt this was a place they could safely vent and would at least be heard and so we deserve a bit of credit for that at least. Ironicly this can be chalked up to ARS being inconsistent vote-stackers if nothing else. Let's agree it was good that an article that likely should not have been deleted wasn't - that's what we hope would happen and indeed did. -- Banjeboi 01:16, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Special Thanks

Special Thanks to: Benjiboi, Andy Dingley, Theaura, SmackBot, Richard Arthur Norton, Vejvančický, and Gigs for your work on "Physics of Impossible" when it needed resuscitation. Ti-30X (talk) 05:03, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

I've drafted a "so you added the {{rescue}} tag" template. Any thoughts or feedback. -- Banjeboi 10:31, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Good idea, will encourage users to participate in the AfD process beyond mere tagging. Maybe we could add a sentence encouraging them to also edit the article to address the issues raised at the AfD? pablo_hablo. 10:37, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

It's quite intrusive. Can it be smaller and less garish? Fences&Windows 00:53, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Intrusive and garish are my specialties ... but I'll se what I can do, mainly a formatting issue to move the drop-down tab. -- Banjeboi 01:35, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Nice work. I agree with fences its a bit high impact if we were going to use it every time, but used sparing it should get the message across nicely! FeydHuxtable (talk) 14:48, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

"if you have another language" seems awkward. Perhaps "if you are fluent in another language" might be better? Jclemens (talk) 19:01, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Done. -- Banjeboi 19:34, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Proposal on adding and removing the tag

I would like to formally propose that we change our procedure so that a comment on the AfD is required as to why the editor adding the rescue tag believes it can and should be rescued. In the absence of a justification, the rescue tag may be removed, unless another editor adds a justification first. The editor removing the tag should also consider whether they can justify the rescue tag. A note in the edit summary that the tag is being added should also be required, and a reason encouraged in the edit summary.

I would change the wording of Usage to:
If an article has been tagged for deletion (Afd), and you feel it meets the above guidelines, then you can flag an article for rescuing by:

1. clicking edit and

2. adding the following line of text at the top of the page as shown in the example below:

3. noting: "Added Rescue tag" in the edit summary.

If you are the main editor of the article tagged for deletion, or are unsure if an article is a good candidate for the Article Rescue Squadron, then please post a message including the article's title on the Article Rescue Squadron talk page. As part of this tag's use you must comment at the deletion discussion on why this item should be rescued and how that could happen. If a comment is not added the tag may be removed. Your input should constructively lead the way for other editors to understand how this item can be improved to meet Wikipedia's policies and likely benefits our readers.

I would change Removing a rescue tag to:
If a rescue tag is added but no justification is added to the deletion discussion, please add a justification yourself. If there is no justification and you believe the use of the tag was inappropriate, you may remove the rescue tag, explaining why in the deletion discussion and noting this in the edit summary. Any editor may readd the tag if they give a justification in the deletion discussion.

If a justification is given it is unhelpful, and possibly disruptive, to remove the rescue tag before the deletion discussion is complete. The XfD process usually takes a week and the tag is in place for less than that. Let the XfD closer remove it when the XfD tag is removed or the item is deleted. In all cases remain civil and assume good faith that other editors are working to improve Wikipedia.

Fences&Windows 00:04, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Not addressing most of your valid points here we have a bot archiving issue that makes this a bit problematic, and I don't see being corrected soon. Within approx. 30 minutes of the rescue tag being removed it is also pulled from our currently tagged listing. This was a bot feature implemented while I was ona break but I haven't sorted out a good workaround yet. I mention this because someone, for whatever reason, can thus use part of what you're proposing to disrupt what we're doing here. We've a few tag edit-wars and my opinion general has been to leave it and ignore unless there is a clear reason it's vandalism. I've seen too many "hopeless" articles rescued to justify pre-judging them on my own or empowering others to do so, presumably the XfD will correctly determine if something is rescuable or not. Having stated that I would support some statement that disruptive use will be teated with trout-slapping. -- Banjeboi 02:52, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

No need for all of this. If you feel a tag is added without good reason, challenge the adder on their talk page. They should be able to provide a reason why the tag was added (e.g., "I noticed twenty Google News hits for the person on AfD, but they were in a language I don't understand"). Similarly, if someone removes a rescue tag without apparent good reason, discuss it with them. No need to take all of this to the AfD. If you do want to have this on the AfD, do it on the talk page of the AfD, not on the main page. Fram (talk) 08:50, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
- Whatever we come up with, I'm tired of drive-by rescue tagging. I asked A Nobody to make comments to explain rescue tags, and they replied that "I usually wait to comment in the Afd until after I have had a chance to first work on the article, but I at the same time frequently avoid commenting in AfDs because some accounts follow me to them and reflexively say to delete just becasue I think it should be kept." So they never need to add a justification or work on the article? Fences&Windows 20:35, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
  - It certainly would be helpful if the tagger could at least comment on the AfD indicating why they feel the article is rescuable. (Or better still, do some rescuing to demonstrate how it can be done). If A Nobody has problems with editors following him to AfDs to !vote against him then a) he needs to address that with the editors concerned, possibly through admin intervention, and b) so what - if the article is rescuable then it is no less rescuable because of robo-votes from these stalkers. pablo_hablo. 21:32, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
Fences and windows and Pablomismo are right on the money. Drive-by tagging is of no Earthly use, and the point is to actually perform rescues. I recently did some rescue work at Rahimah Rahim (singer) (AfD discussion), and — wonder of wonders! — I didn't need to muck around with any kind of rescue tag at all. ☺ Uncle G (talk) 04:42, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Rescue review

AFD discussions and associated rescues now last for 7 or more days. In my experience, you tend to get a flurry of activity on the first day of an AFD but, unless it's a hot topic, you won't get many editors looking at the debate during the rest of the week. Rescuing an article is often a solitary task, as noted above, and there are so many articles on the list that it's difficult for us to watch them all. For example, see Credit management which I am rescuing while other ARS editors are not only not helping, they have made negative comments which no longer reflect the current state of the article.

An improvement which might address this would be to have a status flag associated with the rescue template and activity. This would be similar to the way that good article review is done. When a tag is first placed, it might have a initial, tentative status. Another editor might second or endorse the rescue and so raise the status of the rescue. When significant work has been done so that the article might be considered rescued, then another status might be set so that editors are encouraged to review and update their comments at AFD and then move on to rescue other articles. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:06, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Members of the ARS can of course comment or !vote in any way they see fit- just because you are attempting to rescue an article doesn't mean that they have to either help (see Thanks for all the help) or agree with the rescue, or you. pablo_hablo. 13:15, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

That ARS member making negative comments about Credit management would be me. If I chose to argue for deletion, that's my perogative. It didn't help your cause that you deprodded without any explanation. I may reconsider if you can persuade me that the article isn't redundant and adds to the articles about credit risk and management that we already have.

But your idea about rescue endorsements to help rank the articles for rescue is a good one, and echoes the comments I've made before about us needing a way to filter the articles, as some of those tagged for rescue are no-hopers. I think the filtering should all be done within this project, rather than using a template like prod2. Fences&Windows 13:51, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

You are mistaken. Your AFD comments were part of the initial flurry. It was user Niteshift36 who commented negatively after the rescue had started and so the observation is in the nature of a sequel to his comments above. Anyway, that's just a link - the point is to improve the sorting of the wheat from the chaff, however one chooses to categorise these. This is best done by parameters to the template as this devolves the process to individual editors working upon the various articles. The activity cannot easily be centralised because we have no formal hierarchy or creed which would allow for uniform processing. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:29, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not a member of the ARS. I was invited and I was actually entertaining the idea until recently when I posted the topic above and read the responses of some of the members. Niteshift36 (talk) 04:32, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I've been off rescuing several articles so haven't been working the list as heavily. I'm intrigued by the idea of some sort of status but have yet to figure what, if anything, would be NPOV, easy to facilitate and actually meaningful in anyway. My hunch is there likely isn't anything because every case is somewhat unique. One person's standard for "sources have been added - it's fine" might not work for the next person. The only strategy I think is fair is to keep sorting the list chronologically. AfD is a learning curve and learning how to quickly assess and employ some quick research skills is a process. I do support folks adding a note on our current flagged articles list just to note they are working on it. -- Banjeboi 15:41, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Do you mean the Articles currently tagged section at the head of this page? I don't like to touch that because I suppose that it is generated in some (semi) automatic way. And I don't look at it very often as it seems too long. What would be nice would be a sortable table of all XFDs with relevant columns like the age, size, category, number of sources, google hits, rescue status, etc. Colonel Warden (talk) 16:19, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like a plan Colonel! It might take a while to code a table that will auto-populate all those things. As a stepping stone maybe we could have a sub pages titled "SOS" or similar that intersted folk could have on their watchlist and all we'd have to to is add links to the priority target articles then remove them once they're saved? As you say it will likely work best if they're mainly just the articles that have had a fair bit of rescue work done, but where extra help is needed to secure its salvation. FeydHuxtable (talk) 17:39, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm intrigued at least, some of the issues I have with this well-intended line is that number of sources is meaningless if they are poor sources; likewise volume of content can also be rather meaningless, there are FA articles that are short and completely deletable articles that are massive. etc. -- Banjeboi 20:30, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm concerned about the usage techniques of the rescue template by members of this project

I have no doubt members of the Article Rescue Squadron do good work, and I'm not here to pick nits, though I'll offer this brief invitation to squadron members to engage with me on my concern that "drive-by" application of the rescue template by squadron members might tend to give the appearance of a subtle form of canvassing for page inclusion. I encourage discussion here. BusterD (talk) 01:41, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

A bit of history: This "project" OWNS the rescue template. Jclemens (talk) 04:19, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I read page histories on the template and the project and see that you're quite correct. If the template instructions were followed regularly I wouldn't need to be here discussing this. BusterD (talk) 11:25, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Editor notified here that this page is the proper forum for such concerns. Jclemens (talk) 04:26, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for singling me out, too - I never get any recognition around here. I sincerely apologise for the flurry of "keep" !votes that resulted from my little hit-and-run incident. Radiopathy •talk• 04:43, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

User incorrectly seems to think my concern is about "winning" the Parente discussion. While I maintain my deletion position, I yesterday added an entire section formatting the page as more a biography than a crime investigation page. I spent a good part of my time yesterday trying to rewrite a television journalist's bio so it could be kept. At the moment I began that process, I was acting from the same motivation as that stated at the top of the squadron page. Like many members of the squadron, I want to see good pages kept, and I'll agree the Parente page needed love (which I gave it, despite my concerns). User:Radiopathy's smirking statement above does little to calm my initial problem. Repeatedly and willfully ignoring template instructions hardly makes one a hero. BusterD (talk) 11:18, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

For those late to the discussion Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/William Parente (2nd nomination) is the AfD in question. Jclemens (talk) 05:34, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Comment We observe User:BusterD tagging an AFD for attention in a similar, drive-by way here. This action might be expected to attract editors with a particular set of views and, arguably, this is what happened. The rescue template is more neutral in that the ARS has no particular interest in any type of topic. In my experience, placing the rescue template is most likely to attract griefers or nobody at all. For example, see List of crooners which was relisted as there was so little comment. Colonel Warden (talk) 06:47, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Response I hope there's a difference between neutrally applying sort tags to deletion discussions as recommended at AfD, and applying the rescue template, while ignoring the part of the template instructions which specifically call on the tagger to make comments explaining the tag. The response to my query pretty much justifies my concern, despite any previous discussion. BusterD (talk) 11:04, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

This squadron seems to think it's a concern too. The {{Template:Rescue tagged}} was developed as a friendly warning to members who fail to heed the bold face instructions on both the template and squadron pages. BusterD (talk) 11:59, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I see little difference. In both cases, BusterD and Radiopathy added an informational tag without commenting in the AFD. In both cases, the lack of comment seems to indicate a neutral disinterest or diffidence. Myself, I looked the Parente article over too. I'm not especially interested in the topic but it seems quite a reasonable choice to rescue. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:18, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps it's time to revisit the template page, perhaps delete the part of the instructions which compels the tagger to "lead the way" in rescue discussion, or at least remove the bold face style from the text. BusterD (talk) 13:25, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I looked back at my deletion sorting activity and found I rarely add a category other than military or biography, so Colonel Warden is correct in pointing out my own inherent bias. But to the merits of this issue... BusterD (talk) 13:37, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Comment. Canvassing issues have been addressed and a thoughtful response is posted at the top of this page on the FAQ. The {{Rescue tagged}} template was proposed and created by me to address a number of concerns raised on these pages over several months. Mainly that those who employ the tag should engage the AFD so everyone knows why they tagged something; that those who are abusing the tag - for whatever reasons - have a NPOV talkpage notice on use of the tag with helpful resources; and to help track the tags' usage. I hope to have it be delivered to everyone who uses {{rescue}} with a second compacted version for those who tag multiple items in a row as well as creating a log page of which editor placed the tag on which articles and when. The hope is to empower those who employ {{rescue}} to help themselves and curb abuse of all kinds. In general I think the tag is used appropriately, misuse/abuse is pointless as it's ignored and ineffective and the tag has worked quite well. -- Banjeboi 20:44, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Reply I'm concerned a bit more now than when I first posted here. Four members of the squadron have posted here in this thread, and not one appears to engage with my argument that the tag (only when improperly and carelessly used, mind you, not when correctly applied) tends to appear as a form of canvassing for keep arguments. The Rescue tagged template makes sense (and is phrased very sensibly), but since we're really not supposed to template the regulars, I could see why if would be difficult to use successfully. The "wink and a nod" responses I've gotten here make me think that the bold face text on the instructions of the tag should be altered to reflect current consensus. Measured here strictly by comments, consensus seems to indicate that following template instructions (and squadron usage procedures as currently written) is merely optional. A clickthrough of a sample of consecutive rescue-tagged AfDs this morning showed about 50% of rescue tags in the sample were applied by a squadron member who failed to engage in pagespace in any significant way, and most of those failed to engage in the AfD. An admin I respect did it twice. So that seems significant to me. I'll perform the same test on a much larger sample this week, and I'll report back exactly what I've seen. So far it's not great, but another editor has reminded me of the immense scope, gravity and difficulties associated with this entire range of processes.

I'll admit the behavior of a couple of your members made the squadron look really good. That made me glad, because I basically agree with the concept of this organization. I rescued Edenton Bell Battery myself last week, built up the Angela Russell page to defuse page problems, and wrote the aforementioned actual bio section in the biography William Parente even though I still don't think he's notable or keepable as a bio. I did this in pagespace, not by adding a tag and walking away.

So I hope my comments here don't read as troublesome; if consensus indicates the instructions should be changed, I'm ok with that. If consensus says otherwise, then the instructions really need enforcement, perhaps at the AfD process closing level. Closing admins might admonish "drive by" rescue tagging, for exactly the reasons I've outlined above. BusterD (talk) 02:58, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I think the whole inclusionist/deletionist dichotomy is silly and detrimental to the encyclopedia. What I DO see as a real issue is the lack of good sourcing for many articles, and the lack of updating of older articles from when Wikipedia was less mature. Obviously, there are more people who want to add things than there are folks who want to cite things that are already here (and that's ignoring the vandals and anti-vandals). I don't pretend to speak for anyone else on this, but here's my perspective.

ARS should be a foundational "institution" like 3O or MedCab, NOT a wikiproject. As such "membership" rolls should be eliminated and all wikipedians, whatever their bent on the inclusionist/deletionist spectrum, be encouraged to find and improve articles facing imminent deletion.
People who read the current list of {{rescue}} artciles should weigh in when they've looked through things--especially if they've made an additonal good-faith effort to find sourcing and been unproductive. The encyclopedia should be improved both by keeping what should be kept, but also by merging or deleting what should not be.
Proposing an intelligent and insightful merge target can be as helpful as finding a new source. Much AfD discussion centers around WP:N, where editors agree that something is verifiable, but not that it merits its own article. Merging should be a much more used and advocated method to incorporate trivially small articles into larger and notable topics, and I guess this makes me a "mergeist" if you have to stick a label on me.

So, to the specific issue of drive-by tagging... I try not to do it myself, but there are times when I have time to say "Oh, I'm sure there's better stuff than THAT on that topic..." but not to look up any of it myself. I tend to work on the articles I tag as I get time, but under no circumstances do I want or expect any ARS people to show up, improve nothing, and vote keep. That's just dumb--it keeps marginal info in the encyclopedia and wastes everyone's time and effort on a contentious AfD. Frankly, the adversarial bent of AfD necessarily prompts adversarial uses of what should be neutral efforts like "improving sourcing". I don't have a good solution to that one, but yes, I think it's endemic to the way AfD is done. Jclemens (talk) 04:33, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Comment Though this question has been brought up a number of times by other editors in other forums within these pages, all I can offer here is that as with any tag it is a matter of an editor's proper understanding of its use before using it. For myself, I never tag for rescue unless I have first done research on the possibility of a rescue being successful and not until after I have done some cleanup to an article in question. My last act as I leave such an article, and before commenting at AfD, is to tag it using the summary "requesting additional help". Sometimes others assist in improvement. Sometimes others do not. But I never tag something with an intention of getting drive-by ivotes as an AfD. When I do do it, it's because I'd like a different set of eyes to help improve an article and review my work. No more, no less. If any editor is using the tag improperly, it becomes simply a matter of opening a dialog with that editor to insure he understands its use for the future. And with respects to BusterD, AfDs are even more suseptable to "drive-by" delete opinions, and the AfD tag itself sometimes seen as a form of soft canvassing. Closing admins make note of the value and merit of opinions, whether keep, delete, merge, redirect... and are never simply counting votes. An AfD might have 20 delete opinions that are drive-bys and only one cogent and well-reasoned keep opinion... and be kept. An AfD might have 20 keep opinions and only one cogent and well-reasoned delete opinion and be deleted. It is never weight-of-numbers. MichaelQSchmidt (talk) 04:40, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
MQS, I think you're being overly optimistic about how consensus REALLY works. I agree it should work that way, but far too many admins just count noses, and DRV hasn't seemed to want to override such closes, in my estimation. Jclemens (talk) 04:50, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Well (chuckle), I did use an extreme example... but only as illustration. AfD is never as cut and dried as that.. and neither is DRV. My point is that misuse of ANY tag is a matter for the education of those making the misuse... and misuse of tags is not a problem suffered only by ARS. MichaelQSchmidt (talk) 05:23, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Hm. Deja vu all over again. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 04:46, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually a quite civilized discussion herein. Very refreshing. MichaelQSchmidt (talk) 05:23, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you all. Seems like it's an issue not limited to my perception. Always interested in hearing pragmatism (and the voice of experience within each utterance). I'm sorry for talking pointy. I like to consider myself a compiler of minor biographies, and most of the subjects are very, very dead people indeed. The good thing: the dead don't argue much, they rarely self-promote, most of their defenders are professional historians and even THEY disagree. So I have it easier than some editors. As I get my head around the whole "why are we here?" thing (re: AfD and notability), I keep going back to Diderot. The entire introduction to the Encyclopédie page says it better than I can stab. But "to change the way we think..." by our common shared/encoded synapses, we're in higher terrain; it's an obligation, not a lofty perch. It's a pleasure to learn I can enjoy agreeing with Jclemens as much I enjoy our disagreeing together. I'm going to study this whole subject a bit more. BusterD (talk) 05:13, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Lol! - It's good to have a specialty - even if it's really dead people! Personally I think a bit bigger picture at times allowing that if an article is created someone thought it was a good idea. If there doesn't seem to be enough online sourcing - which requires the skills to figure out where to look - then is there anything that is salvagable and where should it go. As to tag abuse? It will always happen in one form or another, don't let it needle you too much and just focus on what interests you. -- Banjeboi 05:38, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I was challenged by an editor about this project, and I did an approximate count. in June out of 416 articles, 279 were saved in some form or other, and 137 were not saved. This is 67%. More than I thought it would be, but at about the minimum level I would consider acceptable. I found only about a dozen that were really improperly tagged: 3%. I found the same number of deleted tagged articles that fairly certainly should have been closed as keep. The conclusion is that we are not doing bad tagging to any greater extent than the normal process error here. DGG (talk) 15:34, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Rescuing articles which haven't been nominated for deletion

Why don't you try rescuing articles which really need rescuing, like Indiabulls? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 05:39, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I think you answered your own question here - it isn't at XfD ergo we don't officially enjoin. There are likely thousands of articles which we could work on but our focus is restricted to items at XfD which are brought to the group's attention with the rescue tag. If that article is nommed for deletion we probably could help. -- Banjeboi 06:04, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, there are hundreds of thousands of articles in need of editing help, sadly! The focus of the project is to rescue articles on notable topics that are nominated for deletion, which is brinkmanship - without improvement and sourcing, they'd be lost entirely. I do the same with prod patrolling. Is there an appropriate Wikiproject to ask to look at that article? Fences&Windows 02:47, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Anything worth rescuing?

I've got a bit of time, so I go to look through the queue. It's not obvious to me that there's anything flagged for rescue that's actually worth rescuing, let alone something there which is interesting to me. I think we may have gone too far the other way: not enough articles--or rather, not enough of the right articles--are currently tagged for rescue such that I can quickly and easily find something worth saving. Jclemens (talk) 01:24, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

I'd say dig through prods, we have at least one serial prodder whose judgment seems waaay off IMHO. -- Banjeboi 00:59, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I deprod about 2-5 articles per day - out of 70-90 that have been prodded - and usually add several references and improve the article while I'm at it. I agree that there's a dearth of interesting articles for rescue. Fences&Windows 17:00, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Examination of Apollo Moon photographs

Is Examination of Apollo Moon photographs a good candidate for rescue? The main issue seems to be WP:RS. Need fast action - was nominated on July 20. Bubba73 (if u cn rd ths u cn go to my talk page), 02:32, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I read through it and the original article it split from, and agree with you. I added the Rescue tag to it. Dream Focus 03:40, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, I've never used Rescue before, and I was not sure. Bubba73 (if u cn rd ths u cn go to my talk page), 04:16, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

The article was not deleted, but now there are discussions of how to fix it on the talk page. Bubba73 (if u cn rd ths u cn go to my talk page), 02:28, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Outreach by other wikiprojects

Here is some research I found. I created it, but like a lot of materials, never actually used it in the Arbcom. In all cases, no one protested.

Project	Conversation/notification page	Number of wikipedians notified
WikiProject Homeschooling	"Very shortly, I will be creating a custom template message that we can paste on the talk pages of those who are homeschooled. I have a list of Wikipedia users who are homeschooled, and once I get this set-up, I will need some people to help me notify these homeschoolers about this project. Would anyone be willing to help?" Invitations	Over 100 editors notified
WikiProject Seattle Mariners	Hey there, I thought of a method of who to invite to our project that will most likely join our project: Look through Baseball WikiProject's participants list...After that, go to their talk page and invite them. The list is pretty long, yet, convenient, so I assure you we'll be able to find a few contributers to join our project. I did that about a month ago. There might be newbies, but everyone I asked joined....
WikiProject Saints	.	Around 132 editors notified by evrik.[4]
WikiProject Korea	.	Around 71 editors notified by Wikimachine.[5]
WikiProject Rugby union	.	80 editors notified by Shudda.[6]