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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Just Step Sideways (talk | contribs) at 00:33, 19 December 2020 (→RFC: should WP:T3 be deprecated?: ehrmagahd). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.


Something needs to be done about the ambiguity between G3 and G10

Has anyone wondered that these criteria overlap so much? A lot of vandalism is insults, which can be "Attack pages", while attack pages can be made to deface the encyclopedia, henceforth it being "vandalism". 4thfile4thrank {talk} :? 20:32, 9 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I'll fully agree that the two can often overlap, but in what way does this actually cause a problem? Many non-notable autobiographies (A7) are also promotional (G11). Many test pages (G2) are filled with patent nonsense (G1). Speedy deletion criteria are designed to cover the most blatant problematic pages, and as long as there is a decent subset of both criteria that aren't covered by the others (in this case, vandalism pages that aren't directed at a specific person, and attack pages that are expressly negative but not made with the intent of vandalism) then there is no problem with having both criteria. ~ mazca talk 20:37, 9 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Doesn't seem like the overlap is much of a problem. Not all vandalism is attack pages, and some attack pages aren't pure vandalism. There's no need to combine these, as the Venn diagram combining these two has plenty of non-overlapping space. Hog Farm Bacon 20:44, 9 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Additionally, I don't think anyone is going to say that the "wrong" criteria was used if (for example) it "should have been" a G10 but was deleted as G3. Primefac (talk) 21:01, 9 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The "non-redundant" rule doesn't mean zero overlap. It means that each rule covers cases not covered by any other. If (in the absence of an already-existing article) someone had written a slightly-exaggerated article on the controversial Israeli politician Rehavam Ze'evi, it could easily be a G10, but wouldn't be a G3. If someone creates a vandalism page which isn't an attack page, it would be a G3 but not a G10. Overlapping criteria already exist of G11/G12, G11/A7, G1/G2/G3, A1/A3/A7, etc. 147.161.13.58 (talk) 11:04, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Spitballing - get rid of T3?

I've been mulling this idea over in my head for quite a while now, moreso since the deprecation of T2 a short while ago. I keep fairly consistent tabs on its tracking category and I would say that I decline probably 80-90% of the pages that have been tagged with {{db-t3}}. Some are mistakes about what T3 represents (I most recently declined the T3s of a /sandbox and /testcases), others are reasonable alternate names that could easily be converted to redirects (different dash types, alternate caps, etc), a small number being improper copy/pastes. WP:TFD is rarely overrun with nominations so an extra dozen nominations a week isn't the end of the world for the handful of actually-duplicated-but-not-redirectable cases. This isn't necessarily a formal proposal, as I'm mainly curious to see what others' have to say about the matter, though if there's reasonable support it would be easy enough to do so. Thanks for the input. Primefac (talk) 20:31, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like an effective T3 preferably (as I expressed in Template talk:Db-meta#T3 and C1 categories already, ofc; readers should review). Or full replacement with a template-PROD (maybe with some listing of prodded templates a la CFDS). (Or both tools would be nice. :D) --Izno (talk) 20:46, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That does remind me of an additional point/reason to get rid of T3 - there's already a seven-day waiting period, so it's just as easy to kick it to TFD as nominate it. I'm on the fence about dropping the 7 day period and making it immediate, but even if we removed that "holding time" I would still likely be declining the same number of requests. Primefac (talk) 20:51, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I mean, it's just a weak template-PROD today. It has the restrictions on it which make it not-speedy but which also make it not-PRODy. Let's drop the restrictions and let anyone tag anything with T3 if we don't do away with it. (And see if the world breaks.) --Izno (talk) 20:59, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
As an aside, re there's already a seven-day waiting period it is surprising the number of TfDs I see where people respond "Speedy delete T3" or similar. Since a TfD is already created, going through the TfD process is faster than now nominating for T3. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 22:20, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Not a TfD regular, but I don't have a strong feeling it needs to be kept (I note Izno's points as somewhat (IMO) for and against). It'd be weird not to have any T categories, though? As you point out, arguably we don't since T3 is speedy in process not time, but, still. Weird. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:31, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I would agree that not having any T categories would be a little strange, but having watched the multitudes of debates about expanding the cat get shot down, I honestly don't think there are any reasons to speedily-delete a template that isn't already covered by G2 and/or G3. Primefac (talk) 01:39, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The fact that T3 isn't immediate is not a reason to remove it. Many of the F criteria also have a grace period. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 13:57, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think anyone is saying that (I mean, I'm not). Primefac (talk) 14:00, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I might have said something that could be construed as rationalizing removal because it takes a delay, but that was not my intent. I am arguing it makes the criterion effectively useless as a speedy criterion. --Izno (talk) 18:15, 20 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I've been considering making this myself and the main reason why I haven't started an RfC is that I wanted some admin who works in the area on board. If a criteria gets denied 80-90% of the time (which seems reasonable from my experience having the category on my watchlist) it isn't a good criteria. TFD is a suitable replacement and I see no significant inconvenience caused by removing it. In fact most TFD regulars seem to prefer not to since theres a decent likelihood that it will be denied and taken to TFD anyway. I think it would be simpler just removing the criteria. --Trialpears (talk) 23:53, 16 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

RFC: should WP:T3 be deprecated?

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.

Should the speedy deletion criteria WP:CSD#T3 ("Duplication and hardcoded instances" of templates) be deprecated? Primefac (talk) 15:03, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Per the above/main section, I'm not seeing any significant opposition to deprecating or otherwise significantly changing T3 (quoted below just to save time clicking about).

Templates that are substantial duplications of another template, or hardcoded instances of another template where the same functionality could be provided by that other template, may be deleted after being tagged for seven days.

My reasoning for this proposal is twofold: first, as someone who regularly patrols this category I very rarely see instances where T3 would be appropriate and/or the only method of reasonable deletion; the template can be redirected to the "original" template or deleted under a different criteria such as WP:G2 (test) WP:G3 (hoax), WP:G6 (copy/pastes), etc. Second, there is currently a seven-day hold period for all T3 nominations, meaning that sending a template to WP:TFD would accomplish exactly the same thing as tagging T3 (and would catch any that wouldn't be eligible for the G-speedies). So there are two options (aside from the status quo) that I would like to propose:

  • Option A: deprecate T3 entirely
  • Option B: keep T3, but remove the 7-day hold (making it an actual "speedy" criteria)
  • Option C: Status quo, do nothing.

Thank you for your thoughts. Primefac (talk) 15:03, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Survey

Discussion

Expanding on my opinion above: I don't do a lot of T3 tagging, but when I do, it is almost always because some new editor has (a) created a direct copy-paste of a template and called it "Citation needed JohnnyFive" or (b) attempted to create a template whose function already exists because they couldn't find the one they were looking for. – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:31, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I would consider (a) to be a test, and (b) to be a reasonable redirect (if someone thinks it would be useful, others might). Primefac (talk) 19:56, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That's exactly what I'm seeing as well. Scenario (a) is best handled by G criteria, while scenario (b) would be best resolved at TfD. My only concern would be if this added to the caseload at TfD to the detriment of that board, but the dearth of T3 usage indicates that would not be the case. VanIsaacWScont 14:19, 27 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think the most I've ever seen in one go is about 15 in the category, but they weren't all nominated in the same day (and I would say there are usually well less than half that in a normal week). An average of 1-2 extra TFD nominations per day isn't the end of the world. Primefac (talk) 15:02, 27 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
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.

Requested change to G7. Author requests deletion - to allow for multiple authors to do a joint G7

Resolved

I'm collaborating with someone on a template.

It turns out the template may not be needed after all.

I would like to change G7 to add the following:

--cut here--

Special case of more than one author
If there is more than one author, use {{db|1=db-g7 All authors agree to deletion. '''Administrators must verify all authors have signed this request before deleting. Remove this template if it is incomplete after 1 week.''' [insert additional comments here] ~~~~]}} then have each additonal author add their own signature after the first author's signature in subsequent edits.

--cut here--

I'm not picky about the exact text, but you get the idea: G7 should be usable for "db-authors" plural. Perhaps a new "db-authors" template could be written to put the message to the administrator in automatically. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 15:53, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  • Or these multiple authors can first use the Template Talk page to raise and then each affirm that deletion is desirable, which would provide a signed trail (and space for anyone to dissent) before the first author places the G7 notice? AllyD (talk) 16:27, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks to all for the response. I don't know how I missed the "rationale" parameter, that solves the issue. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 17:42, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Creation of a CSD criterion for articles and drafts with no encyclopedic value

Pretty clear opposition to this proposal. Primefac (talk) 14:06, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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.

Moved from Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)/Archive 33 § Creation of a CSD criteria for articles and drafts with no encyclopedic value

As an example, there's a discussion currently ongoing at MFD to delete a draft that contains the writer's predictions for the upcoming NBA season. For items like this with no place anywhere on Wikipedia, we should create a CSD criteria. Basically, what I'm proposing is U5, but for draft and article namespaces. They could even be bundled together, eliminating U5 and creating G15. I don't believe A7, A9, or A11 apply in this scenario (or, at the very least, I wouldn't tag an article like the above-mentioned draft with any of those 3 criteria. Thoughts? Squeeps10 Talk to meplease ping me 23:57, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If the load at MFD is getting too high, then a CSD criteria may be in order (that may be the case here). If waiting 7 days for a discussion is unacceptable, then a new CSD criteria may be in order (I'm not seeing that here, but if I'm wrong, show me). Otherwise, you'll need to give more reasons why this is worth doing to demonstrate that the benefit is worth the "bureaucratic creep" cost. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 00:27, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't say MfD is overloaded (though to be fair I'm not a regular participant there so I wouldn't know for sure), but in the event something is obviously going to be deleted, there's not really any use in keeping it up for seven days when the results are obvious even before tagging. What I'm thinking is PROD, but without the waiting period, and with the ability to tag drafts. Squeeps10 Talk to meplease ping me 03:50, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I would absolutely use A7 in this sort of circumstance. If the article/draft doesn't make any viable claim about why that person's prediction is notable, that would seem to fit perfectly in the A7 criteria. If an admin balks at applying it in the draft namespace, you might need to start a discussion at WT:CSD to get drafts explicitly covered under A7 and A9. VanIsaacWScont 04:33, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

That still leaves us with the same problem of obtaining consensus to modify A7. Wikipedians love the status quo. {{u|Squeeps10}} {Talk} Please ping when replying. 06:20, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW I'd support expanding A7. Lev¡vich 07:51, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
For AFC drafts, maybe something that plays off the new AFC rejected (I think is the name) status? Sets the clock from 6 months to 1 month?
As for people hopelessly modifying some page in a NOTHERE fashion that doesn't meet that, dealing with the editor is usually the quickest way to take care of the problem. Block the editor from the page or entirely. Sometimes summary deletion isn't the best tool in the box. --Izno (talk) 14:17, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I would support such a criteria, if only because there are a multitude of absolutely pointless worse-than-GARAGEBAND entries in the draft space that are little more than "I'm cool, look at my soundcloud/blog/whatever" (even if they are formatted properly). If they're not G2, G11, or G12 (e.g. Draft:Kartick Ghosh), we are almost forced to have them sit for six months before they can be deleted. Is this the end of the world? No. Do we need to have absolute garbage in the draft space? Also no. It's a weird balance between "who cares" and "OMG the server kittens", and I think I fall slightly on the side of the kittens. Primefac (talk) 14:47, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Draft:Kartick Ghosh is offensive to Wikipedians. That discussion last year that concluded that G11 is invalidated by the spam language being written in the style of Native advertising was off the rails. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:48, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • The phrase "no encyclopedic value" is not a viable criterion, as its interpretation is completely subjective. CSD criteria must be precise. Expanding A7 to garage band kind of stuff sitting in draft space is a possibility. One could also consider creating a CSD criterion, probably for mainspace rather than for drafts, along the lines of "Pure WP:OR". That might cover somebody's speculation about the upcoming sports season or about what will happen in the next installment of the Avengers. Nsk92 (talk) 15:01, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    The whole point of draft space is to allow editors to develop their articles in peace without over enthusiastic editors or admins tagging or deleting their drafts. There are too many examples of bad A7 deletions already without adding drafts where we first told editors they can take their time. Remember, drafts don't get indexed and don't appear to the outside world unless someone links to it directly. Imho, even MFDing such drafts is unnecessary busywork. Decline them and move on, sooner or later they'll be G13'd anyway. In the few cases where the subject is indeed worthy of inclusion, the creator can fix it. Else, they will most likely abandon it and it will be swept up later. Both MFD or a hypothetical draft-A7 require more work from editors and admins than that. Considering the amount of stuff that actually needs doing, it would be probably more efficient in the long run if we banned MFD nominations of drafts instead, which would result in less time being sunk in such discussions. Those drafts that need immediate deletion can already be handled by the existing criteria (notably G10, G11 and G12). Regards SoWhy 17:21, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    You know, that actually is a pretty stellar idea (keeping drafts out of MFD); almost all of the drafts that get brought there are TE resubmissions and/or things that get closed as "who cares, let G13 handle it" (or "G13 will take it but why not since we're here"). The former is really the only major issue, and if anything that can be dealt with by sanctioning the editor (if necessary). Primefac (talk) 17:39, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    I have seen some pages live for years being edited once every 5 months (sometimes more often!) without being submitted which have no hope ever of being main spaced. MFD remains an important method of removal, if one prefers not to involve an admin to remove the NOTHERE editor instead for some reason (perhaps convincing some admin to do something about that editor or not knowing where to go for that is difficult or a crapshoot, whereas MFD guarantees the content is assessed for what it is, in such cases). --Izno (talk) 20:12, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    Somehow I doubt that this is actually happening often enough to warrant the creation of a new speedy deletion criterion. There are other ways to handle the few editors knowingly gaming the rules. Regards SoWhy 20:21, 22 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    I did not assert that as a defense of a new CSD criterion. Instead, I was rebutting Imho, even MFDing such drafts is unnecessary busywork. --Izno (talk) 18:52, 24 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Off-topic
  • Oppose. Drafts of no value are properly dealt with by AfC processes. These are:
If the worthless draft is unsubmitted, ignore it. This is the proper purpose for Draftspace and G13.
If the worthless draft is submitted, REJECT it.
If the worthless REJECTED draft is resubmitted (without dramatic unexpected improvement), MfD it.
There is no need, or desire, or any good reason for anyone to react to worthless pages in draftspace.
In mainspace, use A7 or A11.
With a whiff of promotion, a worthless page should be deletable by G11, blatant spam, regardless of the language style.
Overall, this fails WP:NEWCSD. No redundant. Not objective. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:48, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Close, but no banana. Clutter of articles that have no possibility of making it to mainspace helps hide the actual good stuff that is there. We don't have much collaborative editing in draftspace, and some skimpy CVs don't help that. It would be good to remind New Page patrollers that G3 and G10 both do apply in draft space, in recent weeks I have found and deleted both hoaxes and attack pages there. This particular proposal is too deletionist, but I would be in favour of something that took out the stale and unnotable. I am not a fan of the whole draftspace concept, but I think it would be a slightly better place if A7 could be applied to drafts that met the A7 criteria, and had not been edited for 30 days. ϢereSpielChequers 14:06, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I might be mistaken, but couldn't WP:NOTWEBHOST be used to delete some of these at MfD? SportingFlyer T·C 14:25, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, but I think the point is to avoid MFD in an effort to "lighten the load". Primefac (talk) 14:32, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    Also, WP:NOT is not a CSD criterion in itself. Regards SoWhy 18:49, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    Anything at WP:NOT can be a reason to take to MfD, but the problem with NOTWEBHOST is that very rarely does a nominator provide evidence of WEBHOSTing, such as pageviews. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 20:43, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I strongly suspect that in practice this criterion would be used to mean "badly written draft", or even "draft which isn't suitable for mainspace", which rather defeats the point of having draft space in the first place - it's intended as a place for articles which aren't up to scratch yet. The idea, I presume, is that drafts which aren't at least an attempt to write an encyclopedia article should be speedily deleted. There is a fine line between these pages and very poor drafts which are an attempt at writing an encyclopedia article, and in practice this line is likely to be ignored. Hut 8.5 19:37, 23 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. Doesn't meet the "objective" criterion 147.161.9.152 (talk) 16:04, 24 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose already notwebhost is abused for article attempts. And this proposal is so subjective, it would also be abused for anything the tagger does not like. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:43, 27 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose for the moment. It may be possible to devise a criterion in this area – I don't know, but no actionable proposal has been yet presented. Because of the extraordinary conservatism any new criterion proposal is approached with (for good reason), and the exacting nature of meeting the standards of objectivity, uncontestability, frequency and nonredundancy, a general proposal will almost always appear to fail them. (If past experience is any guide, for a proposal here to have a chance of succeeding, it is a necessity to devise and present near fullfledged, concrete language of a proposed criterion, already carefully honed to meet the mentioned standards.)--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 16:22, 27 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • The load at MfD is actually quite reasonable compared to the past and in general. Furthermore, whether or not something has "encyclopedic value" is vague and certainly not something uncontroversial (i.e. clear-cut). Drafting should be given a wide amount of leeway and applying this to the articlespace would be very problematic for many reasons. — Godsy (TALKCONT) 07:17, 29 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose fails the requirements for CSD criteria to be objective and non-redundant, and the frequent requirement is also dubious. Thryduulf (talk) 16:37, 29 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm actually leaning towards supporting, if for no other reason that to stop criteria such as G2 from being misused for this sort of thing (yes, I often see G2 being misused as a catch-all in draftspace; I've mentioned this before). If we're going to speedy-delete drafts simply because they would never pass muster in article space, I'd much rather it is done under a criterion that at least means something along those lines. Adam9007 (talk) 17:45, 29 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    • The answer to the problem of misuse of a speedy deletion criterion is not to authorise a semi-related criterion. Thryduulf (talk) 17:56, 29 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
      • To be honest, I don't see what else we can do. Speaking from my experience, if I were to start declining G2s or whatever on pages that at best simply wouldn't be accepted, and sometimes are just unencyclopaedic junk simply because they aren't strictly speaking test pages or whatever, the deletionists would get vexed really quickly. They'd consider taking those pages to XfD little more than overly bureaucratic, pedantic time-wasting. The fact is, it's happening, regardless of whether policy says it should be happening or not, and policy is supposed to reflect consensus and common practice, not vice versa. I do at times think that policies and guidelines give a somewhat romantic reflexion of common practice; the repeated rejection of an explicit criterion won't make it stop I'm afraid. If they're out of other options, they'll probably just invoke IAR anyway. Adam9007 (talk) 18:16, 29 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
        • Any using IAR to justify speedy deletion needs taking to ANI quick sharpish as it is never appropriate and similarly anyone regularly misusing a criterion. IAR is explicitly meant to be interpreted narrowly and represent the only situations where deletion does not require explicit consensus. Every deletion not authorised by CSD or consensus (almost always XfD or Prod) is, by definition, controversial. IAR is only to be used for actions that will uncontroversially improve the encyclopaedia, so cannot be used for speedy deletion. See also WP:IARFREQUENT. It might seem burocratic, but if they do nominate these pages at XfD then either they will find that some or all the pages are not deleted (i.e. they should not have been speedying them) or it they will always be deleted and we will have the evidence we need to craft a speedy deletion criterion that meets all the requirements (frequent, objective, uncontestable, non-redundant) in contrast to the current proposal which fails 2 of 3 of the four. Thryduulf (talk) 01:26, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
          • Bollocks. But debunking the above, again, every time the above user takes out their soapbox to rail inflexibly against WP:IAR and speedies serve little purpose and is pretty tangential to this thread. As I said here: "It is utter fiction that WP:IAR is never a correct justification for speedy deletion but I see no purpose in repeating the conversation." (Additional related posts: here; here; here; and here.)--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 21:46, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
            • You are entitled to your opinion that I am wrong, but you will have to do better than linking to old discussions where you have previously failed to demonstrate it. Thryduulf (talk) 22:51, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
              Expanding on this a bit, the old discussions are all variations of "I think it should be allowed" or "but it happens" without even attempts at rebutting the explanation I and others give every time for why it cannot be compatible with policy, or why not ignoring policy in this way is desirable - either there is something that should be speedy deletable according to policy but isn't (in which case policy should change, but can't because there is no evidence it needs to) or things are being speedy deleted that should not be (one of the most harmful things an admin can do). Thryduulf (talk) 23:25, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
              • Really. Fortunately, dismissive hand waving at prior discussion has no affect on its actual substance; mischaracterize it all you want; others can read for themselves.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 00:51, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
              • Thryduulf, I'm forced to agree with Fuhghettaboutit; I can't help but be reminded of Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/Draft:Alice_Coe. Although IAR wasn't outright cited, it was in effect an IAR speedy deletion. There was some hoo-ha at WP:AN over it too, where a bunch of editors agreed it should have been speedied regardless of whether it actually met the criteria or not. Getting back to the point though, unless we have such a criterion, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see IAR or whatever being used to speedy unencyclopaedic junk that doesn't fit any criterion. If we find ourselves IARing the same sort of things for the same or similar reasons, it's time to rethink the rule. Adam9007 (talk) 05:15, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
                • I can't see it because it was not just deleted but suppressed, but given it was suppressed it looks likely it falls under G10, which typically has to be more aggressively enforced (really, G10 and G12 are the only important CSDs - everything else it's only for convenience). Honestly, you can (and should) turn down bogus speedy requests. You'll occasionally get slagged at AfD or something, but that's the role. If the page should be deleted but doesn't qualify for speedy deletion, PROD is usually fine (and I fairly frequently decline speedy requests, then PROD the page), and with the profusion of automated tools, sending something to AfD isn't actually a hassle; if someone feels the need to win a deletion contest right now, that's a problematic battleground attitude that shouldn't be indulged. WilyD 10:13, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
                • How is citing something that was correctly speedily deleted under existing criterion G10 (it wasn't technically an attack page, but it was unsourced and full of BLP issues, clearly within the spirit of G10) and then suppressed evidence that IAR speedy deletion is acceptable? An XfD discussion with three total comments, including nominator and closer, is also not evidence that "a bunch of people" agree. Ultimately the point is that nowhere in any of the disucssions has anyone refuted the basic nature of the issue:
                  1. IAR is only for situations where a rule prevents an action that uncontroversially improves the encyclopaedia
                  2. The only situations where speedy deletion uncontroversially improves the encyclopaedia is when the page meets one or more of the criteria
                  3. Therefore, every speedy deletion not supported by a criterion is controversial and not suitable for IAR
                • If you think that "unencyclopaedic junk" should be speedily deleted and believe that a large number of administrators agree with you then there will be no problem at all in getting conensus to add it as a speedy deletion criterion. However, if you don't think that you will get consensus then perhaps that's a clue that there isn't actually a consensus it should be speedily deleted. If you know of an admin who is speedily deleting things there is consensus should not be speedily deleted then please remind them that this was a large part of the reason why RHaworth was desysopped by arbcom. Thryduulf (talk) 12:37, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, "no encyclopedic value" is inevitably going to fail the objectivity requirement. Stifle (talk) 09:24, 1 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
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.

Straw poll - bot to do simple db-user speedy

 Request withdrawn Apparently, there are cases where a user will say up-front that the content has been put in the main encyclopedia, and it turns out, it was put in by another editor, making it necessary to preserve attribution. Even though the particular case mentioned below[1] was a multi-author page which the proposed bot would ignore, it could just as easily have been a single-author page. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 21:28, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]


Many {{db-user}} requests are simple enough that they will always be deleted. This sounds like a task for a bot.

As a simple example, a bot that would auto-delete a page in user space in which ALL of these apply:

  • only editor is "the user" in question (I'd want a human to review multi-contributor pages)
  • page is a sub-page of User:username/ (not "User talk:", that could be abused to delete user talk page, not main user page, I'd want a human to read it first)
  • No move history at all (for keeping the bot simple)
  • Short waiting period (1 hour?) to allow for self-reverts ("oops, I didn't mean to do that") or 3rd-party reverts (mentors, education project coaches, or just someone who wants to force this to be looked at by a human)

I'm keeping this simple for now. There are no doubt other "obvious" cases of db-user and db-author that should be "routine tasks that any user can do without an administrator's help." That's what admin-bots are for, to do the "no brainer" tasks so admins can do the things that require human judgement.

I'm asking administrators - would this be worth doing? Would you support this if went to the appropriate channels and asked for a bot to be written? For any bot-writers out there, does this look like something that could be written up and maintained without much effort? davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 14:10, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

What problem is this attempting to solve? Do we usually have a backlog of U1 requests? Primefac (talk) 14:15, 26 November 2020 (UTC) (please do not ping on reply)[reply]
It's low-hanging fruit and will free up administrators to do other things. That's what bots are for, the "no thought required" things. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 16:47, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. As to the second part of your question, yes, as far as I'm aware this is something that could be written up to meet the specifications to which you describe. Primefac (talk) 16:50, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • My impression has been that G7 tends to be seen as an "easy" criterion, and so pages tend to get deleted very quickly, presumably without the sort of checks you would expect to see for more "serious" criteria, like G4 or G11. In these circumstances, a carefully designed bot will actually be an improvement, in term of due diligence, over manual action. – Uanfala (talk) 14:59, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    For what it's worth, db-user is WP:U1, not G7. Primefac (talk) 15:11, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    Ah, my bad. But otherwise, I've got the same experience with U1 as with G7. – Uanfala (talk) 15:19, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Probably a bit cart-before-horse at this point in time, but any bot tasked with this should be checking what links here for, and not acting, if the target page is transcluded/linked from {{Merged-from}}, {{Merged-to}}, {{Copied}}, {{Split article}}, etc. – or possibly, since I'm sure I've missed other relevant templates, hand made notes of attribution, and more I cannot think of, not acting if the target page is linked from the main talk namespace.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 17:34, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    It goes without saying that the bot should do all the same checks a human would do, or maybe a "superset" of those checks if that makes coding easier. For example "if linked to from anywhere, leave it for a human" would be a much easier check to do. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 17:48, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • That seems fair enough. U1 deletions do tend to be processed fairly quickly, because they are very easy to do, but there are quite a few of them and a bot would free up some admin time for other things. I'm not sure that merges are likely to be a problem in userspace, if user A writes something in their sandbox, copies it to a mainspace page and then tags the sandbox for deletion under U1 then the edit history of the sandbox doesn't need to be kept for attribution reasons because the content is attributed to user A in mainspace. Hut 8.5 18:04, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    @Davidwr: Agreed. That approach is safest. @Hut 8.5: Since this does present the occasional copyright problem, a bot must take the most cautious approach. Your scenario is absolutely correct; that presents no copyright issue. The attribution problem arises when the content (that meets threshold of originality) is taken and used by a different user. I've seen this not just in the mainspace, but in drafts. (Actually, where I've seen this play out most often is: User A copies over content from their dedicated user-subpage containing an article draft; that content was edited in substantive way by user B (or B, C and D); A tags with U1–but that won't be a problem here because the bot is already proposed to only act where the target has only edits by User A).--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 18:51, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    OK - it didn't seem very likely that the content would be copied into mainspace by someone else only for the owner to tag it for U1, but if you've seen that happen then fair enough. I don't think "linked to from anywhere" is a suitable standard though because there are various pages which list all articles with CSD tags on them. You would have to either filter those out, look for certain kinds of links only, or restrict to certain namespaces. Hut 8.5 19:03, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    Indeed: it does happen:-)--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 20:38, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I use db-author a lot and those pages are almost always deleted by @Fastily: so pinging him for his opinion on it. Schazjmd (talk) 18:14, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    @Schazjmd: This is about {{db-user}}, i.e. criterion U1, not about {{db-author}}, which is criterion G7. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:47, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    Oops, thanks for the correction. Schazjmd (talk) 23:53, 26 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Changes to U2 and U5

I added some "things to consider" for U2 ([2]) - nonexistent user, and U5 ([3]) - NOTWEBHOST. I think both reflect "common sense."

Since these are recommendations that can be "considered and ignored" by editors and administrators without causing someone to scream "you aren't allowed to delete the page because CSD says such and so," I went ahead and made the changes WP:BOLDly. If you revert, please start a discussion and ping me. Thanks. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 19:37, 29 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia R2

Pages that redirect to any other namespace (unless if it targets to Category:, Template:, Wikipedia:, Help:, and Portal: spaces) are usually deleted per WP:R2. Do you think that any namespace redirecting to Draft: namespace (i.e. Wikipedia: space to Draft: space) would also be applied to R2? Administrators would usually delete redirects to draft space because we would not want to redirect readers into pages that are under construction. If this is certainly possible, we can probably add that to WP:Criteria for speedy deletion#R2. Cross-namespace redirects. Seventyfiveyears (talk) 19:39, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Seventyfiveyears, redirects from mainspace to the draft namespace are eligible for R2. What are you proposing to change? – bradv🍁 20:10, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
We certainly wouldn't want to say that redirects from any namespace to draft should be deleted, as user sandboxes are regularly moved to draftspace as part of the AfC process. But also, redirects in other namespaces really aren't a problem – the point of R2 is to keep this stuff out of mainspace. – bradv🍁 20:15, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Except for user sandboxes, according to "WP:Cross-namespace redirects" administrators would also delete redirects from Portal: spaces to Draft: spaces (even when they are caused by moves). Seventyfiveyears (talk) 20:21, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That's WP:G6: accidental creation in the wrong namespace, i.e. routine housekeeping. Primefac (talk) 20:59, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Per WP:NEWCSD There are four requirements for new and expanded criteria: Objective, Uncontestable, Frequent, Nonredundant. I think what you are proposing is a criteria to speedy-delete cross-namespace redirects to draftspace from any other namespace. That's certainly objective, no problem there. As originally proposed it's mostly nonredundant (with the exception of redirects from the main namespace and redirects created by accidental moves) but that's not uncontestable though - moves of userspace drafts are just one example of something that could be deleted but should not be (you could exclude that, but you need to define your exception objectively). Is every other example something that always should be speedily deleted? I haven't looked, but you should have done this before making your proposal - please can you share your results? As for frequency - how many of these redirects are there? How often do they get created? How many of them are not already speedy deletable under the existing R2 or G6? Thryduulf (talk) 23:17, 30 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Non standard deletion processes

Is there a simple explanation for, as being revealed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Talk:Sarah Cooper/GA1, WP:GAN running its own deletion process?

Is it appropriate that GAN admins may delete per G6 a review that they don't like?

It's occasionally been said that CSD#G6 is a catch all that is easily abused. Is this an example? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:09, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

G6 is for uncontroversial maintenance - no more, no less. It is a catch-all, and that's a good thing, but it's also one that should never be used if there's a reasonable objection that could be made. I can totally see that "deleting clearly unhelpful GA reviews" is potentially uncontroversial in that project's context, and if it's genuinely uncontroversial outside of people demanding process for process's sake, then I wouldn't have any particular objection to it. This is probably an example of a poor use of it: it was a low-quality GA review, but well above the threshold of "unambiguously unhelpful". :Ultimately, I'm not seeing a systematic problem here - if a terrible GA review does get shuffled off because it's clearly uncontroversial, then that's a valid G6 to me, but if there's uncertainty, it ending up at MfD is correct. If there's a pattern of certain GA-active admins aggressively deleting stuff in this way, this might be something worth clarifying, but this particular incident doesn't look like one. ~ mazca talk 00:32, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Mazca, A similar thing happens at WP:SPI. Sometimes there's a case opened which is clearly not worth archiving. These routinely get deleted under G6. For example, Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/73.97.254.42. Deleting obviously bogus GA reviews (i.e. Talk:Sarah Cooper/GA1) seems like the same concept. -- RoySmith (talk) 01:05, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Roy, I have long wondered whether that is the case. Bogus SPI and LTA cases disappear, and only weird cases come to MfD, nominated by non-SPI people. I think these deletions are decidely contrary to the wording, spirit and intention of G6. These deletions are being used to for tidying, quiet suppression of trolls, arguably good deletions, but they are not G6. SPI is probably quite competent handling their own deletions of subpages of WP:SPI, and LTA, but they should not be doing it under G6. SPI freedom to delete outside of deletion policy would appear to be providing an example to other groups that they too may delete outside of deletion policy. I see good reason to create a CSD criterion to cover SPI cases, but I do not see a good reason for GAN admins to have near-arbitrary authority to speedy delete substandard GA reviews. Deleting obviously bogus GA reviews is the same concept, that concept being that some groups of people are not bound by deletion policy. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:21, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, Um, people actually nominate SPIs for deletion at MfD? I'll get the popcorn. -- RoySmith (talk) 01:47, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
On occasion, yes. Usually, ill-advised. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:03, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, Hmmm. I found Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Danielipforsecretary, but that's the only one I can see. -- RoySmith (talk) 02:08, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
[4] Random MfDs are not the problem or the point. The problem is Speedy Deletion "per G6" for cases where WP:CSD is lacking a line, and for this setting precedent for others to delete broadly "per G6". I think G6 should never be used for a page with a non-trivial history. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:24, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, G6 is also routinely used to delete talk pages of deleted pages, regardless of the history of the talk page. -- RoySmith (talk) 02:27, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That would be a mistake. WP:CSD#G8 should be used. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:28, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoe, Ah, my mistake on the talk page thing. You are correct on that. -- RoySmith (talk) 02:31, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think these deletions of pages with non-trivial histories, including signed comments by other editors, should be invalid under G6.
Past practice, eg Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Stonemason89

speedy delete. CSD G6, uncontroversial maintenance for SPI. T. Canens (talk) 22:24, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

implies that these deletions have consensus in practice, and so to make WP:CSD catch up with practice, "Checkuser or SPI clerk maintenance of SPI subpages should be assigned its own CSD criterion.
I am not sure that "uncontroversial maintenance for GAN" would be as easily justified. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:39, 7 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
To note I and other clerks have deleted IP only sockpuppet investigations under G6 in lieu of archiving the case. These IP only cases have always (from my understanding) been deleted when there are no other archived cases for this case page and where its not a deliberate sockpuppetry by the person behind the IPs (i.e. dynamic IP addresses being dynamic). Dreamy Jazz talk to me | my contributions 12:57, 11 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That sounds sensible. WP:CSD should catch up with accepted practice. A new CSD criterion for SPI business. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:00, 11 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Also I more often delete empty sockpuppet categories under G6 too. The idea for both is that they both are uncontroversial actions. For the deleting of case pages, if it meets another criteria (like due to G5, G10 etc.) I will delete under that criteria instead. Sockpuppet categories are deleted early because they are only filled when they have tagged userpages. If the tags have been removed / changed such that the category is empty it is very unlikely that the category will be re-filled with socks.
However, creating a separate criterion for SPI deletion of cases and/or sockpuppet categories seems unnecessary. G6 works well for cases where the deletion is uncontroversial and does not meet any other criteria. If the deletion is questioned and there is good reason for the question, then the case request should be restored as its not controversial. Such a criteria would still be used, but I just think as long as G6 can cover the cases where no other criteria apply it should be fine without an extra one. Dreamy Jazz talk to me | my contributions 13:09, 11 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
G6 should not be used to delete others’ non-trivial contributions. It is an abuse of G6. SPI doing it has provided poor example for admins in other areas where they too take a liberal interpretation. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:24, 11 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I referred Talk:Sarah Cooper/GA1 to MfD because I felt it wasn't an obvious G6. Given the number of conflicting opinions above, I think there should be an RfC to determine whether such pages are actually eligible for G6. -FASTILY 00:19, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

New criterion proposed, for creations that avoid WP:SALT

Frequently in the draftspace (less frequently in articlespace) we see pages created with an incorrect title when the correct title in that namespace is WP:SALTed; a current example is Draft:Ramy Khodeir (2), where the correctly titled Draft:Ramy Khodeir is salted. My feeling is, if the creator cannot (or will not) convince an administrator to unsalt the correctly titled page, the wrongly titled one should be subject to speedy deletion. This would not apply to creation of a correctly titled and otherwise non-problematic draft when its manspace equivalent is salted: the editor could defer the mainspace unsalt request for after the draft is complete. I believe this comes up frequently enough, and is clear-cut enough, that a new speedy criterion is warranted and appropriate. Thoughts? UnitedStatesian (talk) 23:36, 12 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I would be opposed to it being a G criteria but could see it, perhaps, as an A criteria, in other words only in article space. One effective way to convince an administrator to unsalt would be to have a promising draft. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 00:08, 13 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Salting is largely a legacy feature. Typically, some incident of spam or vandalism from 15 years ago would have rendered a given title protected for perpetuity, and when anyone, at whatever point in the near or distant future, tries to create anything at this title (whether it be an article about an unrelated subject with the same name, or a redirect, or a dab page), they will have to jump through completely unnecessary hoops. I don't think the solution here is to add further hoops to jump through. If something truly terrible has been created, then there will almost always be a relevant CSD. The problem with Draft:Ramy Khodeir (2) is not that it was created at a title similar to one previously salted, the problem is that it's spam. – Uanfala (talk) 00:19, 13 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Redundant. Either the new page is already deleteable for the same reason it would have been at the correct title, or the salting was incorrect. —Cryptic 00:21, 13 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
and B-I-N-G-O was his name-o. If another criterion applies (remembering, especially G4 exists if it wasn't speedily deleted the first time), then it wouldn't be necessary. If nothing applies, then not unSALTing and moving the page to the correct place is just a BATTLEGROUND mentality causing you to pointless BITE the new user unfamiliar with Wikipedia bureaucracy and accelerate declining participation. WilyD 05:47, 15 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Stop overquick SALTing of draftspace titles. There is SALT policy documented at WP:SALT, and a formal process at WP:RfPP, that seems to be overlooked unilaterally by admins annoyed by draftspace recreations. As in mainspace, SALTing too easily has the side effect of re-creations under an variant title, which is a bigger problem. Wait for repeated recreations be multiple accounts before resorting to SALT. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:18, 13 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
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