Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion

Proposal to merge db-blankdraft into G13

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.

---

Now that pretty much all drafts are under the purview of AfC, it seems unnecessary to have {{db-blankdraft}} separated out into its own category with different deletion criteria from what we're using on draftspace drafts. I think it would be better if we eliminated {{db-blankdraft}} and then add a new criteria under G13 allowing any draft, userspace or draftspace, containing only default placeholder text to be deleted after six months of no edits. That would bring it in line with how AfC drafts are currently being handled. --Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 07:21, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

• What would be the benefit? When blank or near blank Draft space pages come up unedited 6 months we G13 them anyway. In userspace we use "blank draft" and in Draft space G2 test edit to delete blank submissions. Perhaps we should extend Blank Draft over Draft space in Twinkle so we can more accurately tag the blank pages. Legacypac (talk) 08:00, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Legacypac: Right now, db-blankdraft requires a full year without any edits from the page creator, while G13 only requires six months without edits to the page. The only policy difference I'm proposing is changing the db-blankdraft requirements to the same "six months without page edits" we're using with G13 and extending it over draftspace as well. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 08:05, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

For reference, here's what I'm proposing as a rewritten G13:

This applies to any pages in the draft namespace, any pages in userspace with the {{AFC submission}} template that are not currently pending review, and any drafts in either namespace with no content except the placeholder text generated by the article wizard that have not been edited (excluding bot edits) in over six months. Redirects are excluded from G13 deletion. Drafts deleted in this manner may be restored upon request by following the procedure at Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion/G13.

All it really is is consolidating and slightly generalizing existing deletion policies to make it easier to eliminate pure, unnecessary trash. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 08:14, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support totally logical. So we would depreciate the G6 blank draft criteria then. Legacypac (talk) 08:27, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
• Whatever "db-blankdraft" is, it's not G6. (Except for the folks who consider G6 to be "anything I can delete without anyone except maybe some random influenceless newbie raising a fuss" or "any new speedy deletion criterion I can sneak in without gaining consensus for a new speedy deletion criterion".) I also agree that this is better than mistagging such pages as test edits. —Cryptic 12:05, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
  • On a bit more reflection, I'm more in favor of generalizing A3 to apply to most non-talk namespaces. We'd have to identify a few classes of pages to exclude - categories, sandboxes, and galleries of (free) images in userspace spring to mind. I still support this proposal, as written, as a second choice. —Cryptic 13:08, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Also needing to be excluded would be redirects and soft redirects, files and file description pages (especially for files hosted at Commons), templates (especially ones that don't display anything much/are just a framework + a transcluded documentation page), user and user talk pages. I don't think this would be an improvement. Thryduulf (talk) 15:31, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. G6 is by far the worst CSD criterion we have for misuse per Cryptic and anything that moves us a step closer to actually make it meet the standards required of new criteria is a good thing. Moving one aspect of it to a different criteria where it fits better is an example of such a step. Thryduulf (talk) 12:39, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - This is a clear improvement over the status quo. Tazerdadog (talk) 17:07, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support per Thryduulf. Word for word. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 00:52, 3 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Makes sense, less confusing funplussmart (talk) 15:58, 3 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support logical. Cabayi (talk) 16:02, 3 November 2018 (UTC)
• Q Would this mean blank drafts would wait 6 months before being deleted? I assume I'm missing something... ——SerialNumber54129 16:03, 3 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Yes. In draftspace and for userspace drafts with AFC templates, that's no different from the status quo. For userspace drafts without AFC templates, this proposal shortens it from sitting for a year (or longer, if the author edits other pages; or shorter, if you can con an admin into deleting it immediately). —Cryptic 16:14, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

(Ec) :I am in favor of reducing the wait from one year after the editor has been active" (a silly long time) to "6 months after the userspace blank draft was created." For Draft space blank submissions to AfC I see no reason to retain these test edits for more than a few minutes. The deleted page can always be easily recreated but almost never are. I CSD hundreds of blank pages submitted to AfC every few months to reduce the G13 burden and they never come back. Legacypac (talk) 16:20, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

This has been open over three weeks with no opposition, and no comments at all in nearly that long, so I think it is approaching time for a formal closure and implementation by someone uninvolved. Thryduulf (talk) 11:47, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Formal closure requested at WP:ANRFC. Thryduulf (talk) 01:51, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support as long as WP:REFUND doesn't apply to blank drafts and G13 has in its explanation for deletion a blank draft, then classifying it as G13 vs. G6 is fine. AngusWOOF (bark • sniff) 01:59, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
• I'm against refunds of blank drafts - hopefully admins will be wise enough to say no to those. Legacypac (talk) 06:09, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support to streamline the process.- MrX 🖋 11:25, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

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

Redirects in the File: namespace G6 → R4

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.

---

Criterion G6 is overloaded with many different things all lumped together as "uncontroversial maintenance" and is the most frequently abused of all criteria. It would never be approved if proposed as is today. The best way to solve this, in my opinion, is to unbundle the various different reasons into separate criteria that are individually objective. I'm not proposing to do this all at once, but to work on it step-by-step so that objections to one aspect don't derail the whole thing.

One aspect of G6 stands out as being a particularly poor fit with the rest: "Deleting redirects in the "File:" namespace with the same name as a file or redirect at Commons, provided the redirect on Wikipedia has no file links (unless the links are obviously intended for the file or redirect at Commons)." Accordingly I propose to move this criterion, without any changes, from G6 to a new R4 for these reasons:

• It deals only with redirects, and is thus where someone will look for it
• The general footer to the R criteria (don't speedy delete redirects with significant history, use RfD for redirects that don't meet the criteria) apply to these redirects equally with others
• It contains requirements that are significantly different to other things deleted using G6
• This isn't really "maintenance" in the same sense as other aspects of G6 (e.g. pages created in error/in the wrong place, etc)
• Deletion summaries will become more useful.

This does not change what can be speedy deleted, just under which criterion is gets speedy deleted. Thryduulf (talk) 12:43, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Support - This appears to be a clean improvement. How often are redirects deleted under this particular provision of G6? Tazerdadog (talk) 15:02, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't know, but we see several that possibly could be come through RfD. Thryduulf (talk) 17:16, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• Just a bit of history here: Back in 2015, there was (or is) a category that listed all of the pages on Wikipedia in the "File:" namespace that had the same name as a page on Wikimedia Commons; the category contained a few hundred or thousand pages. After consensus was established around that time for creating a WP:CSD criterion for deleting such pages that are redirects, I created {{Db-redircom}}. Afterwards, that category was essentially emptied by a handful of editors using {{Db-redircom}}. However, as of present day, I don’t think pages in the "File:" namespace on Wikipedia with the same name as a page on Wikimedia Commons get created that often ... most likely as a result of the 2015 clearing of the aforementioned backlogged category. Steel1943 (talk) 15:44, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Support not an area I work but this appears more logical Legacypac (talk) 20:30, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support. I knew there was a CSD for this, but I was looking in the wrong areas and couldn't find it until it was pointed out that this falls under G6. Hopefully moving it over will be more intuitive to prevent this in the future. -- Tavix ^(talk) 15:14, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Tavix: would a note in the Files: section footer along the lines of "For redirects in the file namespace with the same name as files on Commons, see criterion R4" be useful do you think? Thryduulf (talk) 02:17, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
    • I certainly would not be opposed to such a note. To clarify, do you want to add it to the notes at WP:FCSD? -- Tavix ^(talk) 14:23, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
      • I was thinking of placing it at the end of the list of criteria, but if others prefer the top then I'm perfectly happy with that. Thryduulf (talk) 15:29, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Whatever gets the concept behind {{Db-redircom}} more exposure. (Disclaimer: the diff that Tavix mentioned in the previous comment was an edit I made.) Steel1943 (talk) 15:30, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
• Neutral. I don't think unbundling is necessary - this is uncontroversial maintenance, caused by incremental software changes over nearly two decades. However, moving this into the redirects section of CSD does sound like a good idea. Deryck C. 16:25, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

  I think that is the point - to be in the Redirects section it has to be split from G6 and given an R designation. I don't know how often this is used. There was mention of a category tracking these cases. Does that still exist? Do we track how many times each CSD is used? Legacypac (talk) 22:24, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Deryck Chan: I'm not disputing it is "uncontroversial maintenance", I'm saying it's a different sort of maintenance to the examples given, applies to a narrower set of pages and very has different requirements to all other aspects of G6. G6 is not a dumping ground for everything that could be considered maintenance of some description - otherwise we might as well fold in G8, A3, F2, F10, C1 and U2. Thryduulf (talk) 18:08, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

  Changing to weak support. I don't mind which section and what serial number we put this type of deletion under, but I'm not massively excited about unbundling either. What I don't want to see (in the foreseeable future?) is that we deprecate away G6 altogether. Deryck C. 19:07, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

  Personally I would like to see G6 completely deprecated as that's the only way I forsee the rampant abuse of it by some administrators will stop. Every aspect of it that is required would be transferred to a new, objective and focused criterion - speedy deletion is not and never has been intended to be a routine method of deletion - it is a narrow set of exceptions to the need to get consensus for every deletion, limited to those situations where consensus will always be in favour, not just what one admin thinks people probably wont object too strongly too. This is all independent of this proposal though. Thryduulf (talk) 23:51, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support. Why not. — pythoncoder  (talk | contribs) 01:59, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support per nom. ---- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 23:04, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support; this changes nothing about our practice and thus will have no practical effect whatsoever, so the only real question is "what will users find to be simpler". Putting it with redirects is definitely simpler than keeping it at G6. Nyttend (talk) 20:37, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Good idea — Thryduulf sums up the benefits nicely throughout the comments. Wholeheartedly agree. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 21:25, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support makes it simpler --DannyS712 (talk) 04:02, 4 December 2018 (UTC)

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

Proposal/RfC - Extend WP:U5 to the draftspace

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

General opposition to this proposal. Primefac (talk) 17:15, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

---

I am going to propose that WP:U5 gets extended to the draftspace. This is because the draftspace is being abused in a way that there are so many drafts being found daily which are basically WP:NOTWEBHOST. It is mainly point 5 of WP:NOTWEBHOST which I am seeing in loads of drafts. Rule 5 of WP:NOTWEBHOST is "Content for projects unrelated to Wikipedia. Do not store material unrelated to Wikipedia, including in userspace." and I am seeing that new users are using the draftspace in a way so that WP:U5 can be escaped because WP:U5 does not apply to the draftspace at the moment. If this is implemented, there will be less drafts coming to WP:MfD daily that could actually do with being speedily deleted per WP:U5.

My new proposed wording for WP:U5 is:

Pages in userspace or draftspace consisting of writings, information, discussions, and/or activities not closely related to Wikipedia's goals, where the owner has made few or no edits outside of user pages and drafts, with the exception of plausible drafts and pages adhering to Wikipedia:User pages#What may I have in my user pages?.

Pkbwcgs (talk) 17:21, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support I also find these Drafts at AfC and otherwise regularly. I'm not sure that new accounts are researching our WP:NOTAWEBHOST policies and choosing Draft space over userspace to avoid U5 but we do channel new users toward Draftspace and a certian portion of these users post U5 type material. We need the ability to CSD this junk without wasting time at MFD even more in Draft then userspace because it often is submitted to AfC, and sometimes multiple times. Legacypac (talk) 17:31, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment U numbers only apply to userspace. I suggest deprecating U5 and replacing it with a G number, perhaps G15, worded to include userspace and draftspace as proposed. Purely to avoid confusion. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 17:55, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Need examples - This proposal is based on the idea that MfD is being bogged down by drafts that could be speedied under U5 if it applied to drafts. To support this, we need to see examples a number of recent drafts that would be speedied under the current proposal but cannot be under any existing criteria. @Pkbwcgs: can you give some examples of these "loads of drafts"? A2soup (talk) 17:58, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @A2soup: Things like Draft:Take care of your beauty, Draft:How To Pass Nebosh IGC Exam in First Attempt?, Draft:How ICT has an effect on Society and Draft:How I do control my thinking would be examples of drafts which would meet U5 if it were to be extended to the draftspace as they are not related to Wikipedia. Pkbwcgs (talk) 18:04, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Right now we have to use G11 as a catch all to deal with instruction manuals, product specifications, team rosters, and all sorts of assorted non-articles that could fit this criteria. Anything that might be fictional can potentially be db-hoax tagged but could fit this criteria better. Occasionally someone posts something that is not an advert or hoax but certainly isn't ever going to be an article and then it is just left to get swept away by G13 in six months time. This new criteria would make it more transparent and easier to deal with the material we should not be hosting. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 18:07, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support I have nominated a few of these drafts myself. Deprecate U5 and replace it with G15 as per Frayae. CoolSkittle (talk) 18:15, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Commment indeed G15. Most of this U5 stuff can be speedied out of Article space on some other A? Criteria but Wikipedia, Template and other spaces can be used for webhosting too. The main issue is Draft space though because we channel new accts there. Legacypac (talk) 18:19, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Legacypac: It is very rare to see U5-related stuff in the mainspace because a user has to be autoconfirmed to create a page in the mainspace on Wikipedia. Pkbwcgs (talk) 18:34, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
    • I am sure G14 doesn't exist yet? Pkbwcgs (talk) 18:32, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
      • G14 may not exist as enacted policy, but there are so many proposals for a G14 with various different attributes in the archives that I feel it would be wiser and less confusing to go one number up and match U5 with G15. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 18:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose I suspect this will be used to delete drafts which are just very bad, instead of just those which are NOTWEBHOST violations. Some of the examples cited above are original essays or violations of WP:NOT#HOWTO. In other words they are attempts to write Wikipedia articles by people who just don't know how Wikipedia works. That doesn't make them WP:NOT#WEBHOST violations, unless they've been hanging around for long enough (in which case G13 would apply). Hut 8.5 18:50, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Solution in search of a problem. MFD does not seem overrun by such drafts with the examples cited having been created weeks apart. Also, what Hut 8.5 said, the potential for abuse seems far too high because new users might very well write bad drafts that get better later. I also fail to see why G13 can't handle them. Where is the pressing need to remove them asap? Regards SoWhy 18:56, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

SoWhy have you participated in more than 25 MfDs yet? Why are you commenting on an area you have little experience with?

Hut - Any CSD can be abused, all we are talking about is location of the unsuitable material. If it is U5 in userspace why should it be ok in Draftspace which is a more collabertive environment. Legacypac (talk) 19:26, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Anyone can see that there are not that many MFDs. One does not have to participate in them to do so. SoWhy 19:31, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Sure, any CSD can be abused, but if a CSD is particularly prone to abuse than that's a reason not to have it. I'm not a particular fan of U5 in userspace, to be honest, but in draft space I think there's a higher chance that the author was at least trying to write an article. Hut 8.5 20:28, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

@Hut 8.5: Is a WP:NOTWEBHOST violation okay in the draftspace? Why do we have WP:U5 in the userspace but not in the draftspace? The draftspace is easily abused for WP:NOTWEBHOST. I have a question. If I see a personal profile of a user in the draftspace then what should I do? We can't leave these sorts of stuff in the draftspace. Pkbwcgs (talk) 20:43, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

You can get inappropriate material in draft space deleted at WP:MFD if it does not qualify for speedy deletion. Speedy deletion criteria are only good for narrow cases where people agree that pages meeting the criterion should be deleted. This suggestion shows a strong likelihood that it will be used to delete content which doesn't actually fall foul of WP:NOTWEBHOST, which makes it a bad idea. NOTWEBHOST doesn't apply to attempts to write encyclopedia articles, at least not unless abandoned, and even in this discussion there are suggestions that this criterion will be used to delete pages of this type. Hut 8.5 21:40, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

@Hut 8.5: Thanks for your reply. Yes it is clear that NOTWEBHOST doesn't apply for attempts to write an article. That is certain. However, WP:MFD is becoming flooded when taking inappropriate material there and most of it is WP:NOTWEBHOST stuff which can be eliminated by extending WP:U5 to the draftspace. Pkbwcgs (talk) 21:47, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't think it's being "flooded" with this stuff at all. There are plenty of people trying to get drafts deleted for being essays, how-to guides, dictionary definitions, etc but none of those equate to NOTWEBHOST. So either the criterion will be useless for those pages or it will be used to bring a criterion of "inappropriate draft" in through the back door. The first option makes it useless and the second one would be actively harmful. Bear in mind that drafts will be deleted after six months unless someone is working on them anyway, there's no particular need to bring them to MfD in the first place most of the time. Hut 8.5 21:56, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• • @Hut 8.5: If a user writes about personal stuff in the draftspace then what speedy deletion criterion should be used? U5 is only applicable to the userspace. Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:07, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
    • WP:UP#NOT says that personal opinions and "Extensive writings and material on topics having virtually no chance whatsoever of being directly useful to the project, its community, or an encyclopedia article" are writings, information, discussions, and activities not closely related to Wikipedia's goals which is what WP:U5 is about and I see those things in the draftspace. Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:11, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
      • You're assuming that just because something is inappropriate or deletable then there must be a speedy deletion criterion for it. It doesn't work that way. Hut 8.5 20:28, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment Draft:How ICT has an effect on Society, an example given above, was declined at AFC and the author invited to resubmit. Surely in this circumstance speedy deletion would be out of the question. Thincat (talk) 19:46, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Hut 8.5. -- Tavix ^(talk) 21:57, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Hut 8.5.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:02, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• This is bound to be unsuccessful like every single proposal I make is. I am pretty useless at making proposals and at everything. Pkbwcgs (talk) 22:03, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Complete overlap with G13. G13 works, with good pacing of notifications and ease of REFUND. No need to make speculative negative judgements on thin new unsubmitted drafts. If a draft does not meet any G* criterion, the six month G13 process suffices. NB. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:26, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

G13 is for abandoned pages. U5 is for webhost inappropriate pages. You don't need to speculate on the pages this will apply too, they are clearly not appropriate. Legacypac (talk) 22:53, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• I have not seen any draftspace NOTWEBHOST violations that are so bad that they can't be left to the G13 process. I have seen draftspace NOTWEBHOST nominations at MfD where the nominator is making quick assumptions about the limited content and an psychoanalysis of the author. A mistake in these assumptions is more damaging to the project than leaving a silly NOTWEBHOST draft violation to expire and get deleted per G13. We created G13 with this exact sort of thing in mind. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:33, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose - Unnecessary. Truly problematic examples are covered sufficiently by other deletion criteria (CSD or otherwise). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 04:08, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. I agree with the spirit behind this, but WP:NOTWEBHOST is way too broad of a speedy deletion criteria, especially for a process that receives a lot of poorly formatted drafts from people who haven't yet gotten the hang of editing. As others have said, this will almost certainly just turn into an "eject drafts I don't like" button. I'm always going to be in favor of retaining drafts unless they are either obvious corpspam (G11) or it's abundantly clear they are no longer being improved (G13). Other than those two criteria, I'd rather draft deletions go through MfD. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 04:11, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support per Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:When can you claim that you’ve been in a country or state?, and other supporting comments here by the editors who actually work in the draft space. I also support promoting this criterion to a "general" criterion. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:44, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Hut 8.5, SmokeyJoe and Nathan2055. Thryduulf (talk) 18:11, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support per nom and Legacypac. PrussianOwl (talk) 21:59, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
• All the people supporting "per Hut" fail to realize we almost never see Hut around AfC or MfD so it's no skin off their back to make those who actually work in these areas do more busy work on NOTAWEBHOST violations. In fact, the regulars at AfC and MfD are mainly supporting based on experience and the Opposes are mostly editors without significant contributions to the AfC and MfD. Legacypac (talk) 22:09, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

  You say this as though the maintenance of draftspace (or interpretations thereof) is all that's at stake; as though it is separate from the value and usefulness of draftspace itself or the people who actually use it. I'd say that the opinions of people who use, want to use, or coach people through using draftspace (regardless of AfC), are at least as valuable. Nobody is obliged to engage in any particular maintenance task. As this is not articlespace and nobody who isn't looking for them will ever see the overwhelming majority of these pages, the benefit to be gained from deletion is considerably less, but the extent to which editors' experience is affected is the same. So having hoops in place that must be jumped through to delete something doesn't strike me as a bad thing, apart from the most obvious instances. A central problem to me is not whether or not the most egregious examples are pages that should be kept, but about a fundamental disagreement about what constitutes NOTWEBHOST. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 23:36, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

  (edit conflict) @Legacypac: the number of NOTWEBHOST (a vague and subjective collection criterion that new editors cannot be expected to know about) violations is not relevant here, the relevant factor is the number of good faith pages that are not violations that will get swept away and the number of newbies who will be BITTEN and never return. Editor retention is already a problem, if the price of not making that worse is more work for some editors then that is a price worth paying ten times over. That you have failed to convince those of us who are not regulars at MfD that this is actually a problem that needs solving (let alone that this is the way to solve it) should tell you something. Thryduulf (talk) 23:42, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

  This is called an ad hominem fallacy--whether we do work there is irrelevant to the question of the work that should be done there. --Izno (talk) 02:01, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose: Where the NOTWEBHOST is a critical issue, we have better CSD to apply. Where it is not a critical issue, G13 is sufficient for draft space. --Izno (talk) 02:04, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• No confidence that taggers - and admins, for that matter - will prove any better at identifying material plausibly intended as drafts in draftspace than they have in userspace. —Cryptic 04:50, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• @Pkbwcgs and Legacypac: I've just had a look through every current WP:MFD listing. There are 33 pages in draft space, exactly 1 of which could be speedily deleted based on WP:NOTWEBHOST: Draft:Assignment Two(BF). This is evidence that this criterion is not needed. As Hut 8.5 notes above, there are many draft-space being nominated at MfD for other reasons - for example being essays, duplicates, covering non-notable subjects, etc. but these would not fall within the scope of this criterion so it would be either unused or abused. Of those others nominated, only around three quarters (at most) have no opposition to deletion - which is much too low for a speedy criterion which needs to be around 99% or greater, and at least half of those with no opposition are being deleted for subjective reasons that are unsuitable for speedy deletion. Thryduulf (talk) 12:44, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

@Thryduulf and Hut 8.5: I understand that you are against this proposed G15 being implemented. Your arguments apply equally to the existing U5 criteria, and could be applied equally to deprecating U5 without a replacement. What do you say to this? — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 14:35, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm not ideologically opposed to that, but I'd want to look at how often it is currently being used and what it is being used to delete before offering a firm view. Thryduulf (talk) 14:44, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) You didn't ask me, but in general I support deprecating U5 if it is not extended to the draft space. Before we had a draft: namespace it made sense that material completely unrelated to Wikipedia posted in an editor's userspace was CSDable, but now that users are just as likely to post this sort of material as a draft, the CSD restriction to userspace strikes me as ridiculous bureaucracy. If I post a plot guide to my D&D campaign at User:PEIsquirrel/The Mystical Age Of The One Pine Tree In The Yard With The Good Nuts U5 can apply, but if I post the same content to Draft:The Great War Of The Glorious Chipmunks And The Vile Felines it has to go to MfD, and I find that distinction silly. Either NOTWEBHOST violations are speediable everywhere, or they are not speediable anywhere. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:50, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

I completely agree with Ivan. There is a general opinion here that G15/U5 should not be used on drafts. Logically this would apply to all drafts or no drafts regardless of namespace as Ivan explains. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 15:24, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

However, some of the opposition to this proposal was based on the fact that we already have a criterion (G13) that will take care of these drafts and that those in favor have imho not demonstrated why these drafts should go to MFD instead of waiting for them to become eligible for G13. Regards SoWhy 15:44, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

@SoWhy: Who wants to wait for six months to get rid of loads of drafts that are basically tons of junk? Basically, what G13 is doing is creating more work for admins as they have to delete tons of drafts everyday that meet G13 and the majority of those drafts are nothing but junk. Some of these are NOTWEBHOST violatinos, some of these are how-to guides, some of these are spam and I even saw a homework assignment in the loads of piece of junk in AfC. Yes, there are very interesting and good articles created via AfC which is why it is a very useful process. However, it is so sad to see that loads of junk is in the draftspace as well. If you look at Category:AfC submissions declined as jokes, at least 90% of these can be speedy deleted without waiting six months. Here is a classic example of what junk is. I tagged for speedy deletion as a blatant hoax. I also see Category:AfC submissions declined as a test which is stuff that has zero chance of improvement. Basically, tons of useless rubbish that can be deleted but is G2 valid for the draftspace? One draft which I tagged as G2 has been deleted but I remember it was absolutely blank when I tagged it for deletion. However, does this mean the others can be deleted? If U5 is not going to the draftspace then we need a general criterion for deletion of junk in the draftspace. Look, over 3,000 junk adverts, around 60 dictionary definitions which don't stand a chance because Wikipedia is not a dictionary and around 90 drafts which are blank and hopeless and all of these have to wait six months to be deleted? However, I oppose the deprecation of U5 because I still tag web hosts in the userspace for speedy deletion and new users will use the userspace for personal stuff and web hosts which has no place on Wikipedia. Pkbwcgs (talk) 16:18, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

I fail to understand your "creating more work for admins" argument. Whether a page is deleted under G13 or under your proposed G15, the work needed to delete the page is the same. Indeed, the workload is probably higher if the admin has to evaluate the draft against a complex set of criteria for "junk" as you call it instead of just checking whether it meets the requirements for G13. However, saying "who wants to wait?" does not really answer the question "why can't we wait?". As has been pointed out above, the problem is not that people are in favor of keeping "junk" but that "junk" or NOTWEBHOST or anything like that is too vague to serve as a useful criterion because we always have to take into account the potential for abuse. Thryduulf has summarized it pretty well above. Regards SoWhy 16:41, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

I still don't understand this. Why should junk be allowed in the draftspace but not anywhere else? Pkbwcgs (talk) 16:52, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

There is no "junk" speedy deletion criterion. That's why you want to create one, isn't it? But as pointed out multiple times, "junk" is highly subjective and the whole point of draftspace is to allow new editors to work on stuff that some might see as "junk" to the point that useful articles are created from this "junk". If they lose interest, those drafts will already be cleaned up by G13. But if just 1% of drafts deleted under such a criterion were actually viable articles and these editors leave the project as a consequence, this is far more harmful to the project as a whole. Regards SoWhy 17:18, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Never in the time I worked in the draftspace have I seen someone successfully create a mainspace article from junk. If a draft looks proper then it is more likely to go to the mainspace. A piece of junk that will not be ever improved shouldn't have to wait six months and what users tend to is to submit the same draft over and over again without any difference so that it won't get caught on the G13 trap. Pkbwcgs (talk) 18:17, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

The tendentious resubmission without improvement that you describe usually leads to deletion at MfD. Why shouldn't a piece of junk wait six months? Drafts are not indexed by search engines and are impossible to find unless you're looking for them, deletion doesn't free up any Wikimedia server space (the data is still retained). There is no benefit to the project of deleting drafts, except in the cases where they pose legal issues, which are already covered by other criteria. If even one draft that would have been improved is deleted or even one newbie that would have become a productive editor is driven away, then your proposal will be a net negative to the project. A2soup (talk) 19:02, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

What you said about new users improving a "junk" draft is extremely unlikely based on what I have seen so far in the draftspace. Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:22, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• To answer the ping above, I would be quite happy to get rid of U5 entirely as I think it is frequently abused to delete acceptable stuff, but I doubt there's consensus for that here. Genuine NOTWEBHOST violations are going to be more common in userspace than in draftspace, if only because userspace is specifically marked as your personal area and because we do allow some content which isn't related to Wikipedia there. By contrast if you start a draft then you are explicitly setting out to write an article and it's more likely that you will end up with at least an attempt at an encyclopedia article.
  My main problem with this expansion though is that it is likely to be interpreted as "junk draft", which is a very bad idea for a speedy deletion criterion. Most of the examples which were cited to motivate this expansion above are not really NOTWEBHOST violations at all, and those are supposed to be the poster children for the criterion. I don't see any need to hurry to delete these drafts before the G13 expiry period. G13 is both more general and easier to assess than U5. The former only requires you to look at the edit history, the latter requires you to read the draft and come to some sort of judgement on it. If a draft is getting repeatedly resubmitted or recreated without any improvement then G13 wouldn't apply, but there aren't many of those cases. Hut 8.5 19:14, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Random question: Do/did we have a G14 criterion? I cannot find evidence of its existence or former existence anywhere. Steel1943 (talk) 20:23, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Steel1943: G14 may not exist as enacted policy, but there are so many proposals for a G14 with various different attributes in the archives that I feel it would be wiser and less confusing to go one number up and match U5 with G15. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 18:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC) If that helps. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 20:26, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
    • @Frayae: Yep, sure enough. Either way, IMO, if this somehow turns into an enacted “G” criterion, it should be G14 since the only G14 that will matter is the one that becomes policy. Steel1943 (talk) 20:30, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
      • Agreed, the only that matters for numbering is what is enacted. I'm sure there were multiple G13 proposals unrelated to our current criteria (and G12s before that) and I know there were several R4 proposals that are completely different to the one that looks likely to gain consensus in the section above. Thryduulf (talk) 21:09, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Hut 8.5 says "By contrast if you start a draft then you are explicitly setting out to write an article and it's more likely that you will end up with at least an attempt at an encyclopedia article." which sounds like someone with a very different experience in Draftspace than me or a very different idea of what an article looks like. User:A2soup your info on Draft is a few years out of date. You are correct Draft is not "indexed" but it is mirrored to sites that are indexed and Google does count links from no indexed pages toward importance. Google actually looks for no index links as part of a well rounded link profile for ranking. Wikipedia links are gold because Wikipedia is a high importance site. Spammers and link builders love your attitude. Legacypac (talk) 21:06, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Legacypac: Spam can already be speedy deleted under criterion G11 so that is completely irrelevant. Thryduulf (talk) 21:10, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• That's good info that I wasn't aware of, thanks. I agree with Thryduulf that anything problematic in this regard is already covered by G11, but it does change my perception of draftspace a bit. A2soup (talk) 21:17, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Note I have seen more WP:NOTWEBHOST stuff in WP:MfD today so I am going to continue with this RfC. Pkbwcgs (talk) 18:33, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Seriously, Draft:My Journey To Photography is another example of WP:NOTWEBHOST and still there are so many opposers? Examples have been provided. Pkbwcgs (talk) 18:38, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Your examples have not demonstrated the need for this criterion. Per the very top of this page, CSD criteria need to meet 4 tests: Objective (several commenters have stated that they believe WP:NOTWEBHOST is subjective and you have not refuted this), Uncontestable (nobody has even attempted to refute my comments about 75% (at most) of nominations at MFD currently being uncontested; others have also expressed doubts), Frequent (I saw only 1 of ~30 nominations of pages in the draft space at MFD that would fall under this proposed criterion, 1 nomination in ~7 days is far from frequent enough to justify a CSD criterion. Most of the other "junk" you want to speedy delete would not actually fit, further demonstrating that it is not an objective criterion) and Nonredundant (You have completely failed to convince me and many others that this is not redundant to G11 and G13). Using Draft:My Journey To Photography as an example: For starters it was speedily deleted as a copyright violation (so fails "non-redundant"), but if it wasn't a copyvio it could have been moved to become the userpage of the user submitting it (fails "Uncontestable"). Before you say that it would have been excessive as a userpage, that is a judgement call that requires consensus to determine (fails "objective"). Thryduulf (talk) 22:30, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

      Thryduulf's points are exactly what I was trying to get across. WP:NOTWEBHOST is one of the most subjective WP:NOT criteria, and we get a massive number of people unsure of how to properly write wiki articles in AfC. While there are blatant cases like Draft:My Journey To Photography (which still could have been userfied as Thryduulf said), I see absolutely no reason why we should not be encouraging people to write better articles and reformat valid submissions rather than throwing around the CSD hammer immediately. In my opinion, immediate CSD should only be used on drafts for 'blatant' corpspam (G11), copyvios (G12), and BLP violations (G10). There's no reason why we shouldn't wait the customary six months for everything else, bad drafts aren't indexed by Google and aren't causing anyone harm and at best helping someone complete a draft could help someone become a returning wiki editor rather than scaring them off. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 23:29, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Perfect - userfy these Drafts. Then we can tag and delete them U5. There are plenty of promosing drafts no one works on improving, keeping hopeless ones around helps no one. Legacypac (talk) 23:37, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Moving something to a different namespace for the sole purpose of getting it speedy deleted would be a blatant bad faith misuse of both page moves and speedy deletion. Anyone doing that should expect a very swift trip to ANI. It's also a strong argument in favour of deprecating U5. Thryduulf (talk) 00:19, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

I wouldn't even be opposed to repealing U5 per the reasons given here. WP:NOTWEBHOST is not an objective criteria, and while I'm unsure of how to search the deletion log to verify this, I can't imagine we use it enough that MfD wouldn't be a substitute for the few cases where it does come up. G11 already covers obvious spam in all namespaces anyway, and outside of stuff G11 already covers, everything else U5 could be used on is subjective violations of WP:UPNOT that should be deleted through consensus anyway. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 00:49, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

U5 is used a lot in userspace cleanup. Lots of random junk left by non contributors. MfD does not need all this worthless junk coming there. Legacypac (talk) 01:02, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

We need though to have an objective way of determining what is and is not speedily deletable "junk" though (and no, "junk" is not an objective description of anything). The more I read in this discussion the less convinced I am that U5 is fit for purpose. Thryduulf (talk) 01:51, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

Thryduulf, see this article or this article; "junk" is objective descriptions for both :-) Nyttend (talk) 20:46, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

@Nyttend: fair point on the second link, but not really that useful for this discussion :P Unfortunately the first link is "unavailable due to legal reasons" in the UK so I'm unable to form a judgement. Thryduulf (talk) 22:29, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Must be some nutty GDPR thing; I've previously heard of people in the UK hitting GDPR restrictions on ordinary US news reports, which this is. It's a news story entitled "Junk wins prosecutor's race", about the re-election of Robert Junk to office in rural Pike County, Ohio. Nyttend (talk) 22:33, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Update: Today, I came up with a new proposal at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Proposal/RfC: Should we allow WP:PROD in the draftspace?. Pkbwcgs (talk) 16:25, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

That proposal is now at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 147#Proposal/RfC: Should we allow WP:PROD in the draftspace?. Thryduulf (talk) 21:10, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose I don't think there's much of a reason for this - I don't see web hosting issues at all at AfC, and I feel like it will be misused. SportingFlyer talk 11:04, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

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

U5 timing

Hello, just wanted to come here for a sanity check. I just ran across User:AviatorTJ/SpaceKraft in CAT:CSD; it would definitely qualify for U5 were it newly created, but it's seven years old. Is the criterion meant for pages of any age, or should it be used only for recent creations? The criterion doesn't say anything about dates, but on the other hand I don't remember the last time I saw a page tagged for U5 that wasn't rather newly created. It would help if we expanded the criterion with a date comment, either "should only be used for recent creations" or "may be used regardless of the date when a page was created". Nyttend (talk) 20:40, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

There is no reason for any time limits. It takes time for us to find and action pages Wikipedia:WikiProject_Abandoned_Drafts/Stale_drafts Legacypac (talk) 20:47, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

The criterion does not specify a time limit so there isn't one. It is irrelevant how long people take looking for things. I don't see it as a "Blatant misuse of Wikipedia as a web host" so I don't think U5 applies anyway. Thincat (talk) 21:16, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

I might actually say the opposite — newer items are more likely to be something that might in good faith get worked on, while a userpage (from an editor that) has been inactive for seven years is unlikely to materialize into anything useful. On this specific case, it seems (from the user talk comments) like a fairly COI-driven attempt at a draft, probably for personal purposes, but not necessarily an explicitly U5-able page. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 21:20, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• In implemention discussions for U5, time was well considered. Age of the page and time inactive of the user. The consensus was that neither was an important factor. This page is actually typical of the driving problem, old drive-by dumped NOTWEBHOST pages. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 21:22, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Per Amory, this is a (very poor) attempt at an encyclopaedia article not anything that can be deleted under U5 (nor should be subject to speedy deletion). And the disagreements here about whether it is or is not a NOTWEBHOST violation are a perfect example of why the criterion should not be expanded - it is not objective. Thryduulf (talk) 22:32, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Deleted. Amory or Thryduulf, if either of you wants me to undelete it, I will; just don't call it junk, since "junk" is not an objective description of anything :-) Meanwhile, since consensus was that neither was an important factor when the criterion was created, I've expanded the criterion. Any objections? Nyttend (talk) 22:38, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
      • PS, I'm leaving for church in a few minutes. If either of you two (or anyone else) wants it to be undeleted and I'm gone, feel free to leave a request at WP:REFUND, and remember to link this diff as proof that I'm fine with the undeletion. Nyttend (talk) 22:45, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
      • Every speedy deletion criterion applies regardless of the age of the page, except for the handful which require a waiting period. Hut 8.5 22:41, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
        • The objection is bloat. It’s a non-information statement. If every non-information statement were included, policy would be useless. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:44, 18 November 2018 (UTC). It also applies regardless of the length of inactivity of the user. Another non-information statement. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:45, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
      • I’d call it borderline. SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:42, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
      • @Nyttend: I think Thryduulf was referring to #Proposal/RfC - Extend WP:U5 to the draftspace above when saying it should not be expanded. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 23:13, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
        • @Amorymeltzer and Nyttend: yes indeed my "should not be expanded" comment was about its applicability to other namespaces not the mention of the timing (I'm neutral about that as it's the least of the problems with the criteria). Thryduulf (talk) 23:25, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
      • @Nyttend: That was very much not a U5 candidate - it was an abandoned draft encyclopaedia article. That it wasn't a very good draft and wouldn't have survived MfD is completely irrelevant. U5 is only for "writings, information, discussions, and/or activities not closely related to Wikipedia's goals" - any attempt at an encyclopaedia article is closely related to Wikipedia's goals. A very bad deletion. Thryduulf (talk) 23:25, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
        • Okay, I'll restore it. That's the fundamental problem with any criterion based on WP:NOT — how am I supposed to know what's closely related and what's only tangentially related? I would immensely prefer to get rid of it entirely, because "Most reasonable people [cannot necessarily] agree whether a page meets the criterion", to modify the box at the top of this page. Nyttend (talk) 05:02, 20 November 2018 (UTC)
          • This was central to the implementation discussion. Some judgement is required in many cases, but implementation was/is justified by (1) the very large number of pages that would be (and were) SNOW deleted at MfD, (2) the objective requirement of no serious contributions in the user’s contribution history. Experienced editors can be trusted. I have not seen or heard of any cases of U5 misuse. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:55, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

This type of junk "contributed" by an otherwise non-contributor and abandoned is exactly what U5 is for. If someone wants to retire U5 start an RFC but in the meantime I've started Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:AviatorTJ/SpaceKraft Legacypac (talk) 06:12, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Legacypac: Just because something should be deleted does not mean that it should be speedily deleted. Speedy deletion is explicitly the exception not the norm and only for those cases where consensus at a discussion will always be to delete. Even looking at just today's MfD listings it is clear that poorly written draft encyclopaedia articles do not always get unanimous consensus to delete. Thryduulf (talk) 12:20, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to expand R2

One of the key distinguishing features of pages and namespaces is their intended audience: readers (content pages/namespaces) versus editors (administrative/technical pages/namespaces). As a general rule, and with some exceptions (e.g. shortcuts), we avoid redirects that transport readers from a content namespace to a non-content namespace. R2 currently covers the specific scenario of redirects from the main namespace to non-content namespaces (except the Wikipedia namespace).

I think that we should also avoid (and speedily delete) redirects that transport readers from any content namespace to the User namespace. These redirects can lend undue gravitas to user pages (and subpages) and as a result mislead readers into thinking they are part of the encyclopedia proper. Therefore, I propose to modify R2 as follows:

This criterion applies to redirects (apart from shortcuts) from the main namespace to any other namespace except the Category:, Template:, Wikipedia:, Help: and Portal: namespaces, and to redirects to the User: namespace from the main or other content namespaces (Book:, Category:, File:, Portal:, and Template:).

If there are good reasons to have redirects from content namespaces to the User namespace, please share them. Thanks, -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 02:00, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose as not needed. These almost never appear at RfD, and when they do they are often speedily deleted under G6 (redirects created when pages created in the wrong namespace are moved) or G7 (author requests deletion, e.g. if they're leftovers from swapping pages or after a major rewrite). Of those that are not speedily deleted, most are indeed deleted but some are retargetted. So unless you can show that there is an ongoing problem with these then a change to the speedy deletion criteria is simply not needed. Just because something is undesirable does not mean that it must be speedy deletable. Thryduulf (talk) 02:12, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Thryduulf: I agree with most of what you say, including that nearly all of these are already eligible for speedy deletion under G6. However, in view of that, would it not be better to clarify and use R2 instead of G6, so that a more informative deletion rationale than "general housekeeping" is used? Thanks, -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 02:51, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  I've very much in favour of moving things out of G6 (see my proposal for an R4 on this page for example), and pages created in error is certainly a good candidate for unbundling, but that needs to be a comprehensive G criterion (something like "Pages unambiguously created in error, at the wrong title or in the wrong namespace. This includes redirects created when moving such pages to their correct location if the redirect is not otherwise useful" along with some wording about leaving the redirect a while if the page was there a long time and letting creators and other interested parties know the new location if that isn't obvious) - analogous to how redirects created when cleaning up page move vandalism are speedy deletable under G3 not a separate R criterion. Thryduulf (talk) 11:42, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  I would support a new criterion along the lines you suggested, but I don't see that as precluding the option of expanding R2 in the meantime to include a subset of these cases. After all, if a new G criterion is established, it would be simple enough to restore R2's original language. If you remain unconvinced, then thank you anyway for explaining your reasoning. -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 19:25, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  That's true, but we're back to the basic issue that these redirects are so rare that there is no need to do the work of expanding then contracting R2. Thryduulf (talk) 21:48, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose per Thryduulf. This is a very rare encounter, and there are a few legitimate cases (userfications of books and userboxes being two big ones) where these redirects could and should be retained. Any other cases can easily be taken care of through RfD. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 02:28, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

  Userboxes I understand, due to transclusions, but... why should userfied Book: redirects be retained? -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 03:37, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Nathan2055: Friendly ping. -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 02:51, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Black Falcon: Sorry for the delay, finals hit and I forgot about this discussion. I'm actually unsure of the policy in regards to redirects from the Book namespace since I don't work in that area, it's possible that I'm wrong. But AFAIK we've generally retained redirects to userspace from other namespaces (with the exception of mainspace) as long as it's not actively disruptive (in which case it probably should be deleted completely) to help people be able to find content after userfication. I actually can't find any official policy covering userfication of content outside of mainspace, however, since it's a case that comes up so rarely. Because of this, I think it would probably be better to handle these at XfD on a case by case basis rather than making a blanket CSD for it. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 05:36, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

  @Nathan2055: Thanks for following up on this (and I hope finals went well for you). I may batch nominate some of these (e.g. Book: to User: redirects) at RfD to see what people think. I struggle with a case-by-case approach as I do not see any fundamental differences from one case to another—i.e. either we want these redirects or we do not. However, at a minimum this discussion suggests a CSD is premature until a consensus forms at RfD that these are in fact undesirable in all cases. Thanks again, -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 17:11, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

• Any redirects from articlespace to userspace (which as noted here is rare) are flagged up by this report and shortly after deleted (by me), under R2, which I have never interpreted as not including userspace--Jac16888 ^Talk 21:04, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Jac16888: That is a correct application of R2, but the main thrust of this proposal is to extend that to userspace from namespaces such as "Book:, Category:, File:, Portal:, and Template:" not just from the main namespace. Thryduulf (talk) 21:46, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Ah I see, I misunderstood the gist of the proposal, but yes it does seem to be a very rare situation. Also worth pointing out that there are many userspace based catergories and templates--Jac16888 ^Talk 21:55, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

  Templates, yes, but categories functionally cannot be in userspace (or any other namespace). Where I see this issue mostly, and what prompted my suggestion, is redirects from Book: to User: namespace that result from books being userfied without the suppression of a redirect. I admit it is not a very common issue (my guess would be 100–200 pages), so I suppose G6 will suffice. Thanks,-- Black Falcon ^(talk) 17:28, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

New criterion for rejected / advertisement-declined drafts

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.

---

I would like to float a suggestion about bot deletion of drafts that belong to two groups:

1. those that have been rejected (this is a new feature in AFCH script); and
2. those that have been declined on advertising grounds.

There are currently 350 drafts in the first group and 3100+ in the second group, and growing. Currently, unless these drafts are tagged for speedy deletion, they would be eligible for G13 deletion in 6 months. What I'd like to propose is:

1. expedited timeframe (30 days), and
2. making such deleted drafts ineligible for WP:REFUND.

Legacypac lays out the rationale for faster deletion of unsuitable, promotional drafts here: [1]. Bot deletions would also mean that editors and admins would save time G11 deleting those.

The new criterion would be technically similar to G13, in terms of bot-deletion procedure and one-week notice. This will give the author time to save their draft off-wiki if desired. I would appreciate thoughts on this rough proposal and then perhaps go to an RfC, if this suggestion is deemed suitable. --K.e.coffman (talk) 00:48, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose in favour of putting a G11 button inside the afch GUI. Draft reviewers should be consciously making the decision, and unsuitable advertising should be G11 speedied without delay. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:01, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

A bot does some G13 nominations but not the deletions. I favour deletion quicker but would hate to create anything that would e interpreted as a minimum time before deletion (as G13 is seen by some). Let's talk this idea out to build something that we can get passed.

I like the idea of building in the G11 button like the G12 button is built into the script. Anything duplicating G11 is going to be impossible to get passed as a CSD. We just need to get more aggressive at using G11 on the declined as an Adv cat and as we find the pages submitted to AfC.

The "unsuitable" declines can be run through MfD but some people don't like that. Many can be G11 or hoax or otherwise speedied under existing criteria. Legacypac (talk) 03:36, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

• Virtually no MfD deletions of drafts did not already fit under G11. “Aggressive” is not the word, just a straight face reading of G11 is needed. If it is promoting something (song, person, product, theory), and if it zero reliable sources meaning that no current content can be reliably reused, it fits G11. Even if the topic is notable, WP:TNT applies, with the current version needing deletion per G11. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:59, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

By aggresive I refer not to how we read G11 but that AfCers should use it more instead of just declining the page. Seek deletion of promotional drafts. Legacypac (talk) 04:09, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

AfCers should consider G11, alongside G12, first. There is no point making nuanced comments on a page that is to be immediately deleted. How can we get a G11 button the the GUI. Personally, I think the CSD tab is sufficient. I’m not what what I did to get nonstandard feature running for me. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:17, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

User:SmokeyJoe - I don't know if I agree or disagree about "making nuanced comments", and I ask what SJ means because he has in the recent past stubbornly insisted that the inability to provide comments on a Reject was a feature rather than a bug (although the developer recognized it as a bug and fixed it). What is meant by nuanced comments? My own opinion is that reviewer comments on a draft that is being tagged for G11 may be very useful to clarify for the reviewing-deleting admin why the draft is G11. For instance, I point out and take issue with the first-person plural, or with phrases that are marketing buzzspeak. (The presence of marketing buzzspeak isn't itself enough for me to hit G11. Writing in first-person plural is enough for me to hit G11.) Robert McClenon (talk) 04:08, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Robert McClenon, "stubbornly insisted that the inability to provide comments on a Reject was a feature rather than a bug" was based on a misconception and a slowness to understand what others, including you, were saying. You pointed out some good reasons for wanting to leave comments in different places, and I then agree with you. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:47, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

User:SmokeyJoe - Good. Thank you. Perhaps pointing out a particular aspect of the draft that makes it obviously spam, such as the use of the first-person plural, is one of them. I think that comments may be useful information for the deleting admin if G11 is used. Thank you. Robert McClenon (talk) 06:28, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose as that should shorten the WP:DEADLINE for drafts arbitrarily. It would also encourage editors to resubmit drafts that aren't ready in order to keep it active, increasing the workload on reviewers. There's no goal to reduce the number of rejected drafts overall, only ones that tackle the pending approval queue. As for advertising, if a draft is tendentiously resubmitted without reducing the tone, then I think that should be ready for CSD G11 or MFD. I'd prefer to use AFCH to guide a few decent drafts and editors to get better sources so as to meet GNG. AngusWOOF (bark • sniff) 04:14, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

As written, I'd have to oppose creating any additional criteria for drafts declined as advertising due to the overlap with G11. That said, there are two worthwhile ideas in this thread that are worth exploring. Allowing the deletion of rejected drafts does have merit, as does adding a G11 button into the AFCH script. Tazerdadog (talk) 05:10, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support with caveat I'm in favour of the idea's principle, because while encouraging article creation is important AfC does get quite a bit of promotional bullshit. The only thing that gives me pause is the rejection part, because I'm sure that there needs to be more rejection rationales and a clearly established consensus for what is eligible for rejection. The rationales are already set pretty much arbitrarily so I think waiting for the rejection to come out of beta, get wider testing, and establish rationales are needed before basing a CSD off of one. Thanks. ProgrammingGeek ^talktome 05:24, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose - This is really completely unnecessary, and just serves as a complicated way of speeding up G13. If a draft is purely promotional, G11 it. Otherwise just wait the six months and do G13. I have no idea why people are constantly pushing for more options to nuke drafts faster when we're already getting rid of them after six months anyway. Wikipedia does not have a deadline. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 07:05, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose' - a draft that is declined as pure/blatant advertisement also usually is a G11 candidate. This proposal is redundant. —Jeremy v^_^v ^Bori! 07:14, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Nathan2055. Hut 8.5 07:48, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment This seems rather pointless. Adverts can usually be G11ed anyway, and if we have to wait 6 months for a draft to get deleted... who cares? Just forget about it and a bot will deal with it later by nominating it with G13. Currently not seeing enough value here to support. — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{(or here)} 08:12, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose as a solution in search of a problem. When I decline drafts as adverts, I tag the worst of them for G11 deletion using Twinkle, it's really easy and simple to do with just a few clicks. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 08:32, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose if a draft is not sufficiently promotional to be speedy deleted under G11 it should not be speedily deleted for being promotional. I'm also not seeing any need for something like this, there are only four draftspace pages currently listed at MfD where being promotional is relevant: Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Daniel Mark Harrison which has received keep !votes and so is clearly not a speedy deletion candidate for any reason; Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Mike Smith (businessman) where the nominator (Legacypac) discusses each reference individually indicating that editorial judgment is required and so speedy deletion would clearly be inappropriate; Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Heart to Heart Counseling Center was originally a draft submitted in apparent good faith and only the actions of the author since that was rejected and their probable COI with a related person mean its being considered for deletion - no objective criterion could ever be crafted to deal with this situation; and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:National Data Guardian for Health and Care in England which appears to have been moved to mainspace as National Data Guardian for Health and Care in England without the MfD being formally closed - obviously not something that should be speedily deleted. Thryduulf (talk) 12:12, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Don't see that 30 days is so superior to 6 months. UnitedStatesian (talk) 20:13, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose . I'm not generally in favour of bot deletions of anything. Notwithstanding, a blatant advert or other promotional device can always be very quickly flagged G11 and deleted by an admin, plus, if necessary, blocking the author. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:10, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - My understanding from the referenced discussion is that the motivation for this proposal is to address SEO-related abuse. It is not clear that 1/ this is a significant and important issue to address 2/ this proposal actually addresses the issue or 3/ that this is the best or only way to address the issue. ~Kvng (talk) 17:36, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose shortening the period to 30 days, as stated by various editors, and oppose any CSD that involves Reject, which is still new. I support providing a speedy deletion option on 'adv', just as there is on 'cv', and speedy deletion options on Reject. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:08, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment - I support strengthening the existing rules on undeletion/restoration of G11. At present it might or might not be emailed. Don't restore or email it. Anyone who is stupid enough not to keep a copy of the spam that they submit is a dumb spammer, and I have no sympathy for dumb spammers. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:15, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
• oppose per all reasons given above by other 11 editors--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 02:04, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Speedy Tag Options on Reject

I think that there is consensus that speedy tagging from within the Reject dialog would be a good idea. Since the current bases for Reject are quite general, Notability and Contrary to Purpose, I suggest that any Rejection should have options for G3 for purely vandalistic crud, G10 for attack pages, and G11 for advertising. I know that G11 will be used more often, because there are rational self-serving reasons for trying to advertise on Wikipedia, and vandals and trolls get indeffed quickly. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:22, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

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

C1 question

I have always read C1 as meaning a cat could not be nominated until it had sat empty for 7 days, but @Liz: corrected me, to say the speedy nom. could happen immediately, but that the cat. would not be deleted until the seven days had passed. Perhaps a clarifying adjustment to the C1 language is warranted? UnitedStatesian (talk) 13:04, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

I fail to see the need. C1 has no waiting period after tagging, so whether you wait seven days and then tag or tag and then wait seven days makes no difference. Regards SoWhy 13:48, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to expand A7 (adding "product or service")

A new product or service may be an offering of an existing organization (perhaps one for which an article exists), and it may be the fault of the editor that

• it lacks citations to notable sources
• the value of the product or service is not well explained.

The combination may call for AfD, but at least there's a chance for others to pitch in. If the subject were an organization, CSD would not apply, hence my recommendation. Pi314m (talk) 18:51, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

• This has been proposed numerous times before, see the archives. It would be an extremely big expansion, so much so that several other perennial suggestions for A7 expansion would be included (e.g. books, films and software are all products). It would help your case if you could point to a large number of articles which are currently being put through PROD or AfD which would qualify for A7 if this was enacted. The categories of A7 are almost all areas where we have a subject-specific notability guideline, indicating that there are distinctive features of notable subjects that we can recognise. We don't have one for products or services. Hut 8.5 19:04, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

The categories of A7 are almost all areas where we have a subject-specific notability guideline, indicating that there are distinctive features of notable subjects that we can recognise. We don't have one for products or services Yes we do (well, sort of): WP:PRODUCT. Adam9007 (talk) 04:19, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Hardly. WP:PRODUCT is a discussion of whether information about products should be covered in the article about the organisation which makes the product, it doesn't give any guidance on whether a product is likely to be notable. Hut 8.5 11:15, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, sorry but I got to oppose any such expansion. It fails pretty much rules #1, #2 and #3 on top of this page. Products are, not only because there is not a notability guideline to well, guide us, extremely subjective (#1). Also, in many cases the product was created by a notable entity, meaning alternatives to deletion exist that are preferable to deletion, such as merging or redirecting. Last but not least, products don't have articles created about them frequently enough to warrant speedy deletion (#3). Regards SoWhy 19:18, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

It fails pretty much rules #1, #2 and #3 on top of this page. A7 as a whole fails #1 miserably, yet it exists and is not likely to stop existing any time soon.

Also, in many cases the product was created by a notable entity, meaning alternatives to deletion exist that are preferable to deletion, such as merging or redirecting. The same is true for organisations, bands, clubs, organised events, and web content, yet they still fall under A7.

products don't have articles created about them frequently enough to warrant speedy deletion Articles on individual animals aren't exactly common (probably less common than products or services), yet they still fall under A7. Also, articles on things like video games seem to be becoming more common these days. Adam9007 (talk) 04:19, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Adam9007, reasonable people do agree on A7, near-always. Obviously, you and Haworth are outliers, situated on opposite ends of the spectrum. ∯WBG^converse 15:16, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose per SoWhy and Hut 8.5. This fails three of the four most basic requirements for a new CSD criterion and narrower aspects of it have previously been rejected for being too broad. Thryduulf (talk) 00:17, 4 December 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to add T4: Unused

Templates that are unused and have been created more than 3 - 6 months ago should be able to be deleted by speedy deletion criteria, or moved back to user space. In my opinion it's a waste of time at WP:TfD to have to propose, then wait for multiple wikipedians to contribute to discussion about a template that's not actually used.

This proposal could be tweaked slightly - eg caveats being if there is an obvious use case or if it's an intended article to move back to user space - but I think the principle still holds. Thoughts? (I will ping TfD). --Tom (LT) (talk) 00:12, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

I have not given this proposal any deep thought yet, but my off-the-cuff reaction is that we'd need to be careful about templates that are designed to be substituted - it could be difficult to determine how often those are used. Tazerdadog (talk) 03:17, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

This should be like something like WP:C1 IMO; if a template has been tagged for more than 7 days and remains unused, it may be deleted; unless there's an indication the template is meant to be substed. Perhaps also the template cannot be deleted if it is less than 3 months old. Galobtter (pingó mió) 09:07, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

Question: How often (= requirement #3 for new SD criteria) are such templates really nominated for deletion? Looking at WP:TFD now, there seem to be but a few templates nominated that are truly unused, so why can't TFD handle them? Regards SoWhy 10:51, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

SoWhy, that varies - sometimes people nominate twenty in a day, sometimes there aren't any (see Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2018 September 2 or Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2018 November 7 for examples of a bunch nominated in a day). I'd definitely say there are enough for a CSD criteria; would probably reduce nominations at Tfd by 30+%. Galobtter (pingó mió) 11:06, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

Alas, this has been proposed, many, many, many, many times. The iterations sometimes vary, such as just for user namespace templates, or just for those "not encyclopedic", with varying waiting periods or age requirements. Just some of these discussions are: /Archive 72#Proposed tweak to T3, /Archive 10#Orphaned templates, /Archive 67#New criterion - T4, aka Template PROD, /Archive 44#New CSD - T4 Unused userbox that is more than 30 days old, /Archive 42#T4: Unused template, /Archive_52#Deprecated_templates, /Archive 22#Speedy deletion of unused templates?, /Archive 59#Gauging opinion on a possible new criterion for templates. There have also been several proposals at WT:PROD for this (reportedly four in 2007 alone). There seem to be three reasons this has never been adopted. Firstly, as pointed out by Tazerdadog, templates that are intended to be substituted have no transclusions by design, and a summary process like CSD is not efficient to distinguish those not transcluded by design from those by circumstance. Secondly, CSD is generally for urgent deletions and, although TfD is busy, it is not backlogged enough (with deserved thanks to Galobtter (above), Primefac and others) to warrant the use of a summary process like this, particularly since an unused template is not an urgent cause for deletion. Thirdly, that a template is unused is not, in any guideline, a dispositive reason to delete it; rather, it is just a relevant consideration; therefore, it would be egregious to make it a dispositive reason to speedily delete it before there is consensus on whether this should be decisive for a deletion discussion. --Bsherr (talk) 18:28, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

• I would be against any such criteria for speedy deletion; unused does not mean unusable. It is a subjective label and therefor inherently controversial. For example: I have never published an edit using {{pronoun}} but I have used it hundreds of times, without publishing, to determine the correct pronoun to use in various discussions. It's why I can say that Bsherr is spot on with his comment and that I agree with everything he said therein.--John Cline (talk) 13:13, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
• What Bsherr said. Many unused templates may have interesting history or potential, and deletion might not be the most useful thing to do with them. Sure, navboxes that haven't been used for years can usually be deleted. But not all unused templates, and not speedily. —Kusma (t·c) 19:33, 8 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. If there was an "arguments to avoid at TFD" page, "unused" would be on it. Kamafa Delgato _(Lojbanist)^{Styrofoam is not made from kittens.} 20:37, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

Proposal: Move deletion of disambiguation pages from G6 → G14

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

There is a consensus in favor of the proposal.∯WBG^converse 09:23, 19 December 2018 (UTC)

---

(This was originally proposed to move to A12; but as was pointed out below disambiguation pages occur in namespaces other than mainspace 05:20, 7 December 2018 (UTC))

Similar to Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Redirects in the File: namespace G6 → R4 above: another thing that seems out-of-place and better as its own criteria is the deletion of disambiguation pages. Multiple discussions have been held to clarify the criteria (examples: 1, 2), which belies the simple obvious maintenance nature of G6; and even in 2010 there was discussion of splitting it off. Compared to the other subcriteria listed at G6, this subcriteria is quite lengthy and explicit on what is or is not applicable, so it may as well be its own criteria. Another advantage is intuitiveness: people will more easily realize there's a criteria for deleting disambiguation pages and will find it quicker if it is separated out under its own heading (I didn't even know that the criteria was even there until I saw someone delete a disambiguation page under G6 and was wondering how G6 applied).

So I'm proposing to split it off as criteria G14, with essentially the same wording, that is, something like:

This applies to disambiguation pages which either: disambiguate only one extant Wikipedia page and whose title ends in "(disambiguation)"; or disambiguate zero extant Wikipedia pages, regardless of its title. If the page links to only one article and does not end in (disambiguation), simply change it to a redirect.

Galobtter (pingó mió) 11:29, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support exactly per nomination. I will advertise this discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disambiguation. Thryduulf (talk) 12:03, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
  • I support this either as A12 as nominated or as G14 per Izno and Tavix below. Thryduulf (talk) 20:57, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support per nom, though no-target dabs could also fall under WP:G8 in my opinion. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 12:17, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support per nom and the G8 idea is good too. CoolSkittle (talk) 12:28, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
• G8 already suffers from having too many cases that require dissimilar checks. Moving it there would be no improvement, especially since it would separate it from the single-page-with-(disambiguation) part. —Cryptic 15:21, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
  • I agree with Cryptic, keeping the dab page criteria together is good and we don't want to create the problems at G8 we're trying to solve for G6. Thryduulf (talk) 15:54, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
    • Oh, me too, my comment about G8 was just an observation. It's better to keep the dab criteria together. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 10:35, 7 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support splitting off standalone use cases from generic criteria is a good idea. Several of the other criteria are basically housekeeping deletions (e.g. G8, G7) but they are kept separate to make things simpler. Hut 8.5 19:02, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
• Disambiguation pages occur in space which are not article space. --Izno (talk) 19:05, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
• We would have to use a "G" prefix per Izno (eg: Category:Wikipedia disambiguation pages, Category:Portal disambiguation pages, Category:Disambiguation categories), and because disambiguation pages technically aren't articles. -- Tavix ^(talk) 19:15, 6 December 2018 (UTC)

  Oh yeah; I was thinking A prefix would be fine because article space disambiguation pages are discussed at WP:AFD (even though they are yes, technically not articles); forgot about other namespace disambiguation pages.Galobtter (pingó mió) 05:20, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

  ...That, and not all disambiguation pages are in the "(article)" namespace, especially disambiguation pages tagged with {{Wikipedia disambiguation}}. Steel1943 (talk) 06:22, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

  Yes, I said I forgot about other namespace disambiguation pages. Galobtter (pingó mió) 06:47, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

  Oh, that's a good point about WP:AFD. They are considered articles for deletion purposes, so A would be fine if not for the other namespaces. -- Tavix ^(talk) 15:17, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support splitting this out. No opinion on exactly where it should be split to. Tazerdadog (talk) 00:50, 7 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support now that my concern has been resolved. -- Tavix ^(talk) 15:17, 7 December 2018 (UTC)
• Support, good idea, and more friendly for admins. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 14:18, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

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

I have attempted to implement this closure. Feel free to adjust the wording as needed. Tazerdadog (talk) 17:14, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

IMO it should be called "unnecessary disambiguation pages" rather than "narrow disambiguation pages". Galobtter (pingó mió) 17:40, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

Agreed. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 18:10, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

New draftify proposal discussion

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Workshopping: Integrate draftification into the deletion policy. - MrX 🖋 12:39, 18 December 2018 (UTC)Template:Z48