Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 11

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proposed I8: Images available on Commons (again)

This is a perennial proposal, but I really don't understand why this does not fly. Here is an attemp on a compromise, sligthly wordy but it seems needed. This proposal meets all the criteria a proposal has to meet: It's objective (a checklist), it's uncontestable (images properly mived to Commons are routinely deleted at IFD, and this proposal includes an escape clause), it arises frequently (thousands of images meet it), it's nonredundant (obviously).

I8: Images available as bit-for-bit identical copies on Commons, provided the following conditions are met:

  • The image's license and source status is beyond reasonable doubt, and the license is undoubtedly accepted at Commons.
  • All image revisions that meet the first condition have been transferred to Commons as revisions of the Commons copy and properly marked as such.
  • All information on the image description page is present on the Commons image description page. That includes the complete upload history with links to the uploader's local user pages.
    • If there is any information not relevant to any other project on the image description page (like featured status), the image description page must be undeleted after the file deletion.
  • The image is not protected, and the image description page does not contain a request not to move it to Commons.
  • The image has been marked with Template:NowCommons or Template:NowCommonsThis for at least one week.
  • If the image is available on Commons under a different name than locally, it must not be used on any local page whatsoever.

That is more complicated than is required (the second and third points in particular are not required for public domain images at all), but they don't hurt either. Of course, administrators acting on this need to be well-versed with image licensing policy both here and on Commons, but people interested in this criterion generally are. Comments? -- grm_wnr Esc 11:18, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Looks okay to me in terms of the criteria of objective, uncontestable, occurs frequently, and nonredundant at the top of the page, but it is rather complicated. I'd vote yes on it. Deco 14:01, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes please! There's no reason to list on IfD when they're invariably getting deleted anyway, somtimes without even looking at the commons page. This way we can make sure an admin actually looks at it, and we don't have to wait for 5-10 days. --Rory096 17:59, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Propose speedying nn corporations

Recently there have been far more votes for deletion on articles about companies that fail WP:CORP. These votes are almost never controversial and usually unanimous (a few examples from today: 1, 2, 3, 4). A speedy deletion tag for nn companies would help speed things up, which may become very necessary as more companies realize how valuable a Wikipedia article on them would be. Recury 18:59, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I concur. --mtz206 (talk) 19:00, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Please elaborate on the criteria as discussed above at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Read this before proposing new criteria. Also, see discussion above at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#CORP or WEB. GRBerry 19:07, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
  • OK, here's a shot at it: "An article about a business or corporation that does not assert the importance or significance of its subject, or consists solely of advertising for the company or its products or services." Like existing criterion A7 for people, this limits speedies to articles where notability is not asserted -- if it is, even incorrectly, the article has to go to prod or afd.

As for the above discussion, one thing that I think has changed is the frequency of the problem. I spend a lot of time categorizing articles, and a lot of the articles showing up with "uncategorized" tags are corporate spam -- often 5-10 a day. Most of these would fail the above proposed category, and I think few if any "good" articles, or even future good articles, would be eliminated. NawlinWiki 19:23, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I saw the discussion above, which is part of why I decided to propose it. Everyone seems to be in agreement that this is needed, with the previous discussion's only reservation being how often it comes up, which I've addressed (there are plenty more examples at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion, if anyone isn't yet convinced). As for the others:

  • Objective: I see the criteria as being very similar to that for nn bands: failing to assert notability (in that case WP:MUSIC, in this case WP:CORP)
  • Uncontestable: As I've said, the votes for these articles are never controversial; even the authors themselves haven't claimed notability so there isn't much discussion beyond "Delete, spamvertisment" or something similar.
  • Non-redundant: If there is another criterion that addresses this, I would love to know so that we could start using it. Recury 19:24, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I can support the first clause that NawlinWiki proposed: "An article about a business or corporation that does not assert the importance or significance of its subject". I'm not sure about the second part. The Virospack article example (#4 above) is one that could be read either way on "consists solely of advertising", but it also fails to assert notability. Do we need the second clause? Hmm, we could have a clear advertising claim (best/fastest/most) that is also an assertion of notability. I think I'd rather see those go through Prod/AFD. GRBerry 19:46, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I see what you're saying. But I don't think every best/fastest/most claim should be considered a claim to notability. Virospack's is that it is basically the best "specialist manufacturer of packaging for skin care and treatment products" which wouldn't be notable even if it were true, IMO. Certainly something like a claim to being the best independent fernery in Eastern Okeechobee County wouldn't be. Maybe a "significant advertising claim"? Recury 19:56, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
I think it makes some sense to discount empty, meaningless superlatives like "best" (in what way?), "most popular" (among who? according to who?), or "most recommended" (by who? according to who?). I think the strategy I would take is:
  • One person edits out the meaningless claims.
  • Another person notes that there is no longer any claim of notability and deletes it.
I'm not entirely sure whether this is considered "cheating", but if removing something that should be removed anyway leaves a speediable article it would seem like the article as a whole should be speediable. Deco 23:09, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
A two step speedy deletion is a waste of effort, I'll agree. But we'd need to be restrictive in the G4, in that if the article comes back with citations for the claims to independent sources, then the article is sufficiently different to not be speedyable again.
Here are all of the companies sent to AFD yesterday: Google (speedy kept), Gecko sales, Pulseware, PC CLINIC Computer Service Center, IR Gurus, Macarthur Square (a mall is a company), Quova, Virospack (#4 above), Vertek, Doobstar (#2 above, and nominator BigDT said we need a CSD for things like this), Mochila (#1 above), Museum of Skateboard History, IEI Food, Intelliworks, and Advocacy Investing.
Ignoring Google, we had 15 AFD nominations yesterday. Only Mochila (link to NYTimes article) and Advocacy Investing (media coverage in last paragraph) make solid claims to notability. How about "An article about a business or corporation that does not assert the importance or significance of its subject, or that cites no independent coverage (i.e. not press release reprints) and consists solely of advertising for the company or its products or services." That way if it is only advertising, but actually cites independent coverage it will go to AFD. With independent coverage, there is both a debatable chance of notability and a start on the sourcing needed to produce a NPOV version. GRBerry 14:42, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
I would support this wording of it. Recury 16:37, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
Also support. --mtz206 (talk) 16:44, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
Good idea. Tom Harrison Talk 17:28, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
I like it. Advertising copy already fails NPOV, unless it also happens to be true. -- nae'blis (talk) 17:38, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
The word "advertising" is a little bit vague. Arguably, every article "advertises" its subject just by being on Wikipedia. I would say, "describes the subject from a strongly positive point of view". Deco 04:19, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't know if that is much better. The "strongly" helps, but it still seems vague which was the reason for a change. What do others think? GRBerry 02:13, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't think it's that vague; "point-of-view" is probably a good word to use because it describes the intent of the writer, which is very easy to tell. The problem with many of the articles on companies that are notable is that they are obviously written by a PR guy or the company's president and they all sound like this instead of this. It's almost impossible to go from the first to the second without just totally rewriting it (an important thing to point out to editors who would say "just fix it instead of deleting it"). At least this way the PR people will eventually get that, for their article to have a chance, it has to sound encyclopedic. Just to emphasize that people should be writing encyclopedia articles, how about "...or is written from a corporate or promotional, instead of encyclopedic, point-of-view"? Recury 02:38, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
I have to disagree with your presumption that the intent of the writer is easy to determine. It sounds easy when you pick examples at the extremes but it becomes very controversial when we have to make judgement calls at the margin. This does not sound like a good speedy deletion criterion yet. Rossami (talk) 03:22, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

It's only the ones at the extremes that we want to speedy: they either make absolutely no claim at notability or they make absolutely no attempt at writing an encyclopedia article. Maybe the language just needs to be stronger. Recury 13:29, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Understood. My concern is that none of the wordings proposed so far really define the extremes clearly. They leave more ambiguity than is healthy for a CSD criterion. Unfortunately, I don't have a proposal for better wording. On the other hand, 15 nominations on a sample day is not too bad. Maybe we don't need a CSD criterion yet. Rossami (talk) 01:32, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
How about just "it is an article about a company that does not assert the importance or significance of the subject. (CSD A7)" We probably don't even really need the second clause about spam/promotional stuff. Unless we can just start using db-bio on them, but that doesn't seem right since they aren't "biographies" really. Recury 11:12, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I oppose this expansion, even if we limit it to not asserting significance. I don't think speedy is the way to handle this problem. Delete if necessary, but give it a chance to be improved first. Assertions of significance are actually really easy to forget when you write an article, because it often seems to go without saying to those familiar with the subject. NickelShoe (Talk) 16:29, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

That's a pretty weak argument. You could say the same thing about biographies and we have a speedy deletion criterion for that. Recury 17:01, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes, and many people would rather see A7 revoked. Deco 04:35, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
Exactly. NickelShoe (Talk) 04:39, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't see why {{subst:prod}} is insufficient here. Stifle (talk) 10:16, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
I'm solidly with Stifle. In fact, let me back this up with some evidence. Since I'm not an admin, I can't look back at the June 19th example day, but looking at the June 29th list, here's what I find in terms of nn corp-related discussions. Out of 208 nominations: (1) Greendale Construction Limited (AfD) -- contested prod, speedied for lack of context, (2) Island Group Company, Ltd. (AfD) -- relist, uncontroversial, don't know if prod was tried, (3) Alliance architects (AfD) -- speedy may not apply, weak claims of notability made, prod not tried, (4) Z_Games (AfD) - speedy wouldn't apply, prod not tried, (5) Prosperity Automated System (AfD) - speedy might apply, recreated after prod deletion, (6) Seat24 (AfD) - speedy might apply, prod not tried, (7) Snuggle (AfD) - speedy wouldn't apply, will be kept, (8) ThugLine Records (AfD) - prod not tried, speedy wouldn't apply, controversial, (9) Apocalypse games (AfD) -- speedy would apply, prod contested, (10) St. Croix (store) (AfD) -- speedy might apply, but deletion is controversial, prod not tried, (11) Beck Theatre (AfD) -- speedy might well apply, prod not tried, (12) FakeAlibi (AfD) -- speedy wouldn't apply, prod not tried, (13) Southern Highlands Golf Club (AfD) -- speedy wouldn't apply ("world famous"), prod contested, (14) Armor Lock & Safe Co., Inc. (AfD) -- speedy deleted as blatant spam (!), (15) New Horizon Films Ltd. (AfD) -- speedy may/may not apply, prod not tried, and (16) True Blue PC (AfD) -- speedy would def. apply, prod not tried. My summary: having a speedy deletion criteria for nn corp would have helped #5 and #9, and made #14 legitimate. The rest, either speedy wouldn't apply or prod wasn't tried, so the conclusion is people should use PROD more. But while we're at it, note that in the case of #10, harm might actually be done; the article doesn't really claim notability, but all votes are for keeping. I think the trouble is that it's one thing for an article on some nn software company or consulting firm, but other kinds of businesses it's tricky. See Alien Workshop (AfD) for instance: not "notable" but not everything must be; some areas are small. Mangojuicetalk 03:45, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

I see the above points. But unless there's a good reason why corporations are different from people in this context, either we should get rid of A7 or add corporations to it. Morgan Wick 19:40, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

In blatant cases, I will sometimes just go ahead and delete a clearly non-notable corporation as a "non-notable... group of people" in an admitted slight stretch of criterion A7. More often I shift it over to {{prod}} though, which does the job 99% of the time. (ESkog)(Talk) 23:34, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I would agree that this is needed - there are lots of articles created that end up on Wikipedia:Dead-end pages which are just pure spam and should be obvious speedy candidates: they are just vanity articles about companies. ::Supergolden:: 16:04, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I also agree this is needed however I really think the assertion of notability is required via citation, or some other reasonable method. Otherwise this becomes a moot point if everyone using wikipedia for spamvertisement simply includes something "The company is extremely popular." I've seen that accepted as an assertion of notability.--Crossmr 16:10, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

That's fair, but I think speedy should be reserved for super-clear cases. I think your specific example is something that I, for one, would probably speedy under the current rules, but others may not. Perhaps we should clarify what we mean by an "assertion of notability"? (ESkog)(Talk) 02:10, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
I've always found this need to claim notability a bit suspect. Is this just a technical fix to weed out articles started by inexperienced editors? For example, if I write "Company X was the best performing new share issue in the TMT boom of 2000", it can be speedied, but if I write: Company X is notable for being the best performing new share issue in the TMT boom of 2000, it can't be. Of course, as soon as someone edits it, they change the second ot the first. Articles just don't say "x is notable because". For example. Prime number doesn't even mention the word notable. Stephen B Streater 21:01, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually the former example could not be speedied either as it is plainly a claim to notability. My criteria for disgnosing spam are:
  • advertorial in tone
  • monograph
  • creator has no significant edit history
  • contains no evidence or assertion of meeting WP:CORP (e.g. private company, no turnover details, no employee numbers)
  • added to one of the lists of companies from which redlinks and weblinks are routinely pruned
That's how I find most spam articles, anyway. As to how to write a spam speedy criterion, I don't really know - you know it when you see it, in general. Just zis Guy you know? 10:49, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree with the proposal. It's a long time coming, because I haved tagged many articles about non-notable corporations and websites for speedy deletion under CSD A7 (as a stretch) and most of them got deleted. There also needs to be a formal way to terminate spam on sight. For now, I think we have to make do with WP:IAR and delete it on sight. MER-C 12:56, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

I know I'm coming into this conversation late, but eCustoms is an example of a corporate autobiographical article which was fixed rather than removed. I spent a lot of work on this article, and in promising its author to help in exchange for his/her cooperation, I ended up being rather reluctant to log on to Wikipedia at all until I had finally built up the determination to hash out a netural, reference-based stub out of the advertisment. Take that for what it's worth, it is only one example. BigNate37(T) 04:52, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Subst:

Bold or not, I'd rather have opinions before editing a policy page. :)

I'm curious if there would be any point to request that people not subst CSD templates on to-be-deleted pages? ~Kylu (u|t) 20:59, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I personally think this doesn't matter at all either way. I'd rather see them not substed, since I don't buy arguments about server resources, especially for articles that are about to be deleted anyway, but it doesn't hurt all that much. Deco 23:11, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
It's just extra syntax to remember and type out all the time, in my opinion. Kind of seems instruction-creepy to me. --W.marsh 23:22, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
CSD templates, as opposed to {{prod}}, aren't dated. (I'm assuming that's the reason that {{prod}} is substed, and produces a nasty warning if you forget, so that the date sticks around and doesn't change every time the page is reloadededited?) --EngineerScotty 23:33, 19 June 2006 (UTC), modified 16:07, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes, that's why prod is substed, and there's no reason to subst CSD templates. {{tl}}, however, should be substed. --Rory096 18:11, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't really get the fixation with substing everything. It's easier not to, the article usually exist for a minimal period and are viewed a small number of times while they do exist. Those articles that are incorrectly tagged (and there are a good number) will finish up with gallons of unnecessary wikicode in them to scare newbies away: it's much easier for them (and admins) to just remove a curious thing with an obvious meaning. -Splash - tk 23:57, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Ummm, these are fine arguments, but wasn't Kylu's proposal to not subst CSD templates? It seems like everyone is in agreement. Deco 00:49, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
Ahem. I read that too quickly. Yes, we're in agreement. -Splash - tk 05:00, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Expand A7

I propose that A7 can be expanded to things that are created by, used only by, or related solely to blatantly non-notable people. For example, this would include for websites: a nn band's site, a blog/myspace, a web group of friends, etc. For companies: "mom and pop" stores with absolutely no assertion of notability. For WP:NFT: something made up in school the last week and that has not received major press coverage or other proof of notability. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 17:43, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

This seems like something that can be handled adequately by {{subst:prod}}. Stifle (talk) 10:14, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
Unless the person is creating derogatory articles, articles about people should always be discussed since the auther might disagree. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Henry Bigg 1986 (talk • contribs) .
There are certainly cases where A7 is de-facto applied, although the criteria does not fit. I just saw a card game (article titled Rape your mom), which was created four days ago (according to the article), and deleted as A7. Watching the speedies go by yields will yield many similar examples. We are already deleting beyond the strict reading of A7, and uncontroversially so. We should simply codify what we are already doing. --TeaDrinker 04:15, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm of the opinion that A7 should be dropped completely. A prod for non-notability serves this purpose and gives the creator/editors reasonable time to respond. There's no reason why something that is non-notable should be fast-tracked, especially when notability is such a contentious issue. Yomangani 14:24, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Moved recent discussion to Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Expanding A7.

Can Someone Take a Look? Looks Like Wrong License Given

This image [1] looks like a professionally crafted poster for the ART FLAME event it is being used for, however its license says that User:Kavala created it. I'm not sure what (if anything) to do about this. Thanks. BigNate37 07:45, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Just found the {{PUIdisputed}} tag. Duh. BigNate37 08:32, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Attack Images

Lately, I've noticed a rise in cases of images tagged with A6 templates. These taggings were correct in sentiment: one image included the word "Dumbass" under a person's picture. Of couse, CSD A6 doesn't apply to images; I am also wary of elevating A6 to General status, because (although personal attacks are always bad), I wouldn't want a personal attack speedy applied to a project-page in the midst of sometimes heated policy discussions.

In cases so far, I have deleted the attack images under G3, which is, in fact, what was formerly done for personal attack articles prior to A6 being adopted. Still, to clarify matters, I would propose an image criterion allowing for the speedy deletion of images obviously intended with the sole intent to disparage someone. I don't think this is controversial: it wouldn't cover uploading images that might be called "unflattering" (eg., the first President Bush vomiting on the Prime Minister of Japan), but would cover a case where the image (or its description) literally labeled someone a "moron," etc. I know G3 applies, but (as with the creation of A6), a specific criterion makes the issue more clear for all. Xoloz 02:17, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Having drawn no objection, nor comment, I will add CSD I8 as a corollary (and rephrasing) of A6, and see what people think then. Xoloz 04:09, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Template deletion: Please expand on "Divisive or Inflammatory"

Moved to Wikipedia talk:T1 and T2 debates.

db_empty and articles in progress

Something I've seen happen several times on RC patrol:

  • New user decides to create an article on an encyclopedic topic.
  • Being unfamiliar with WP policies, procedures, and traditions, creates a blank article (or one containing very little content); then goes off to start writing content.
  • Someone on RC patrol attaches {{db-empty}} to the article, it gets speedied. Or an admin notices and speedies it without the benefit of a db tag.
  • Newbie discovers that his new article has been nuked, gets upset about it.

I've attached db-empty to several articles in this circumstance, and then gotten asked why by the article's creator.

Perhaps we need a "fill this in or it will be deleted by X" template, where X is some small but reasonable duration of time, for good-faith new articles which are initially empty. This template, if substed on an article, will note that it is an empty article which will be removed if not sufficiently fleshed out by the indicated time. Even the creation of a stub is considered sufficient "fleshing out"; but some prose must be present.

This would apply in the following cases:

  • The article meets the criteria for a db-empty
  • The article doesn't meet any other CSD--an empty article entitled "George Bush is a dumb-ass" could be speedied under A4, for example, and should be.
  • Per WP:AGF, there is no reason to assume that the article is being created in bad faith (such as being created by a known problem user). If there is reason to assume that the article is being created in bad faith, immediately tagging it with db-empty may still be a reasonable practice.
  • There is no prior article history to revert to. (Implied by the db-empty criteria).

This appears to better comply with WP:BITE.

Of course, the ideal behavior of RC-patrollers, I guess, is to expand reasonable empties into stubs. This can be done without knowing too much about the subjet matter; and the RC patroller can also add appropriate cats at this time, if known. Even if this is done, though, a delay may be appropriate (to increase the chances that an RC patroller does discover and expand the article). Naturally, the aformentioned template would include category information so that RC patrollers can easily locate articles needing expansion to avoid deletion.

Thoughts? --EngineerScotty 19:51, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

  • Strongly agree - this is an excellent idea. BigNate37 19:59, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
This is a good idea, if the article is still new enough (<48 hours old). My practice has been to watch the page, and if it is still in poor shape the next day, then decide what I want to do about it. If it still meets db-empty and I think the encyclopedia needs an article on the topic, I'll try to make a stub. Otherwise I'll db-empty or deal with the content as it exists at thtat time. GRBerry 21:15, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
Good proposal, if possible fix it without introducing a subst:dated-empty or similar magic. -- Omniplex 21:14, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
Oh humbug, the db-meta on all the templates already tells them to check the history and logs. How hard can it be to notice that the db-empty was added within the past 2-3 days? Sometimes, I wonder whether half the admins are actually running mindless bots.
--William Allen Simpson 02:24, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
No need for this change, admins are not bots and will/should be checking that the nomination is valid before speedying it. This is just instruction creep. Stifle (talk) 10:13, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
Agree with Stifle. People should use good judgment, but introducing too many rules makes speedy less than speedy. If this is a major problem, encourage people to prod empty articles instead of speedying them (or propose getting rid of the speedy criterion, if you're particularly concerned), but don't overcomplicate either process. NickelShoe (Talk) 04:47, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

CSD U2 proposed

A user page that contains only libellous material, hate, or other legally questionable or inflammatory text in its history should be eligible for speedy deletion. It does not fall under A6 because it is not in the article space.  Denelson83  05:01, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Rather than create yet another CSD criterion to remember, why not simply elevate this clause from Articles-only to General? (A6 -> G9) Is there a reason why this clause would not apply in every space? Rossami (talk) 05:09, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
I'd imagine this is already standard practice even though it's not written into policy. Seems entirely reasonable, although to elevate it, we'd have to make sure it's available in the event of arbitration situations between users. --badlydrawnjeff talk 11:18, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
I agree that this one should be made policy. A6, I8, and all others should be merged into a criterion G9 - Content which has been added only to disparage or attack someone. Stifle (talk) 17:41, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Slight addition to I2

The rather non-controversial rule I2 reads:

2. Corrupt or empty image.

However, it is possible to save JPEGs, PNGs, and especially SVGs in some rather exotic ways that not all browsers support correctly. As such, I added a recommendation that they first preview a resized thumbnail; all such thumbnails are rendered by the engine and should present no problem for browsers. Deco 12:27, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Removing the part of my comment regarding SVGs - these are already rendered by the engine as PNG on the image description page. Deco 12:29, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
Corrupt verified by two parties (nominator and admin) is most probably really corrupt, and not only exotic. Besides we have now undeletion. -- Omniplex 21:20, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
Well, first of all CSD doesn't require a separate nominator and deleter (does it?) and second, it doesn't matter how many users can't read the image as long as the thumbnails rendered by the engine can be, since that's what appears in the articles. And well, yes, undeletion does help. Deco 21:36, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

G7 - correction required

At the moment, G7 includes the sentence - "If the author blanks the page, this can be taken as a deletion request." However, if an author blanks the page, it will immediately be recreated by the bots. This sentence should be removed to avoid confusion, and it should be made clear that authors have to use the {{db-author}} tag to request a G7. Tevildo 20:49, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

What bots are you talking about? Rossami (talk) 01:54, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Support -- I certainly hope that an author blanking a page isn't a deletion request! After a move, where the Talk isn't relevant to the new page, I routinely blank the Talk to eliminate the redirect. But I wouldn't delete the page and lose the history. That would be evil.

--William Allen Simpson 02:20, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

I believe Tevildo is referring to User:Tawkerbot, which reverts vandalism. William, that is not the type of situation the criterion is referring to (and admins are supposed to check the history before deleting). When a newbie creates an article on a non-notable topic, he or she frequently blanks it after giving up, usually after being informed that the article is or might be inappropriate, after it is nominated for speedy deletion or on AfD or after someone else has edited the article to their surprise (they don't want the article to be changed because they think it is theirs, or they don't want true but negative information about the topic put in). G7 is often applied in these cases, not just if the page was created in mistake, which is why the blanked by author part is in there. It would be good if this was cleared up. -- Kjkolb 09:45, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think there is any need to change this. If the author was the only editor and they blank the article, it seems reasonable to assume that they want it deleted. Wikipedia:Use common sense applies too. Stifle (talk) 10:10, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
True, the admin's decision to G7 the article in this sort of case shouldn't be difficult. However, my concern is that an inexperienced editor, wondering how to delete an article, will go to WP:CSD and think, from reading the G7 description, that all they need to do is blank the page. (I could also comment that "blank the page" is by no means an obvious piece of terminology, but that's a separate issue). We need to make it clear that such a procedure won't generally work, and that, in order to ensure their request gets admin attention, they need to put in the db-author tag instead. Tevildo 14:12, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

G8 clarifcation (2)

I propose to add to the end of G8:

Neither does it include user talk pages for users who happen not to have a user page.

Any objections? Arbitrary username 18:33, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

None from me; this seems to be a documentation of existing practice. Many users leave their user page blank, but have talk pages. --EngineerScotty 18:52, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
Does it really need to be General; why not Article, since that's where we get most of these? -- nae'blis (talk) 19:03, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
I can't see any rational for having talk pages (but no article/project page) in the image, Wikipedia, category, or template namespaces. Are there any other namespaces, besides user (many users prefer not to have a user page, but others may still create the talk page to contact them), where having a talk page only makes sense? --EngineerScotty 19:06, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
I think that's what it's trying to say with the phrase "This does not include subpages, nor archive pages, of unorphaned Talk pages.", but the sentence is grammatically incorrect. I've tried to clarify it so it makes sense - let me know if it projects the idea you're trying to convey. --Bachrach44 03:50, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, but that sentence makes perfect sense to me, and has seems to have been constructed that way for a reason. It is a concise way of saying "This does not include subpages of unorphaned Talk pages, nor archive pages of unorphaned Talk pages".
The point is that if Footle existed, then Talk:Footle would not be included, and neither would Talk:Footle/Archive or Talk:Footle/Wibble, even if Footle/Archive and Footle/Wibble didn't exist. But if Footle doesn't exist, then all these talk pages are included.
The way that you've rephrased this, you have excluded Talk:Footle/Archive even if Footle doesn't exist, which can't be the intention. So I'm afraid that I'm going to have to revert this.
As regards the second part of your edit, namely "or the user space", that is broader than the exclusion that I wanted to introduce, which was just a person's main "user talk" page. But I wouldn't necessarily disagree. There may still be a good case for extending it to the whole of user space. What do other people think? (For the moment I'll revert this part as well, just until we've had a chance to discuss which of the options to go with, but we may well be reinstating it soon.)
Thanks again, and I hope you're not offended by my reverting at this stage. Arbitrary username 05:46, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Actually, the more I think about it, the more I am now convinced that you are right to exclude the whole of user space. Talk pages in user space other than the main user talk page are of course already "speediable" under U1 if the request comes from the user, so the only difference we need to consider is deletion requests from third parties, which are probably disruptive anyway. And anyway there is real ambiguity about whether a user talk subpage is a talk page for a user subpage, or a subpage of the main user talk. I'm going to reinstate your bit about the whole of user space, although if anyone disagrees then please revert me and then we can have further discussion. Arbitrary username 06:07, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
I reinstated a comma that I thought I'd deleted, but then saw in the edit history that it was User:Kjkolb who had deleted it. That comma is actually necessary for the correct sense of the sentence. This shows that now two users have now had trouble parsing the sentence as it is intended. So it became apparent to me that it was time to rephrase it, but in such as way as to preserve rather than change its meaning. Hence my latest change. Arbitrary username 06:23, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

G4 revision

This picks up on points in the "nn corporations" discussion above, but I think it's different enough to warrant a new section. G4 contains a sentence that:

In case of a speedily-deleted page, they must also determine that it met a criterion for speedy deletion in the first place.

I envisage a problem with this, that a page is deleted say under A7, because the author has omitted the assertion of notability. It is speedied. The author recreates the page, otherwise identical, but this time including an assertion of notability. Someone may still decide that the recreated version is "substantially identical", and speedy it again, as the test described here is whether the criterion was met for the earlier deletion (which it was).

I think it would be better to replace the sentence with:

Speedily-deleted pages are not re-deletable under this rule alone, but may be deleted under another applicable speedy deletion criterion. (This is a safeguard to ensure that the new content still meets the criterion.)

Comments?

Arbitrary username 11:17, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

At a glance seems like instruction creep. If a claim of notability actually has been added, it's not "substantially identical", so the G4 would be invalid. The new version could be deleted under A7 again if it's different but there's still no assertion of notability... there's no need to add more instruction for what can already be done. --W.marsh 13:02, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
To me, it makes no sense that we should have to have a rule to speedy delete recreated articles that were speedied in the first place--because clearly they already fall under other speedy criteria. You're not really speedying it because it was previously deleted, IMO, but because it fails some other criteria. NickelShoe (Talk) 04:58, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Isn't the G4 criterion primarily for items that were deleted in a non-speedy fashion the first time around, and wouldn't be speedies except that they're recreations of deleted material? -GTBacchus(talk) 05:01, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
All the comments above are correct. There was an article recently that had previously been speedily deleted, but I did not speedy it for being a speedy deletion or recreated content because it had not gone through AfD and I was not sure that it met the speedy deletion criteria. -- Kjkolb 06:30, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Does anyone actually object to me making the proposed change? I don't think it's "instruction creep", as by making the rule not apply to speedily-deleted pages, it's reducing the scope to what is actually necessary. The change is only instruction creep in the minor sense that by adding an explanatory comment in brackets we are increasing the number of words. If that's really an issue, we can discuss the wording.
By making the rule not apply to speedily-deleted pages, in one go we remove a whole stack of ridiculous anomalies that arise from the present wording of G4. All of the following examples (list below) are re-deletable under the letter of G4 as it stands, simply because the original deletion met the criterion, even though common sense says that the recreated page should no longer be deletable because of the now changed circumstances. By proposing a change with would prevent G4 from applying to speedies, the requester/admin would be forced to consider whether a valid speedy criterion still applies.
  • A bio deleted under A7, recreated with a lot of previously speedied content plus the additon of a relatively short but all-important claim of notability. May well judged to be "substantially identical" to the deleted version (even if we argue that it shouldn't be) hence re-deletable under G4.
  • A page speedied under G5 (banned user). Recreated with identical content after the ban expires. Re-deletable under G4.
  • An orphaned talk page (perhaps created as an orphan in the first place), speedied under G8. The corresponding article is subsequently created, with its talk page. The talk page is re-deletable under G4.
  • A copyvio speedied under A8. Permission is subsequently obtained and noted, and the page recreated verbatim. Re-deletable under G4.
  • A redirect with no target is speedied under R1. The target is subsequently created. Redirect recreated. Redirect re-deletable under G4.
  • An image exists with two filenames A and B. B is speedied under I1 (redundant). After a change of plan, filename B is prefered, so A is deleted and B recreated. B is redeletable under G4.
  • An unused copyrighted image is speedied under I5. The image is subsequently uploaded again, and this time used in a page under fair use. Image re-deletable under G4.
  • Empty category speedied under C1. Category recreated and populated. Category re-deletable under G4.
  • User requests deletion of subpage under U1. If user ever recreates it, it is re-deletable under G4 on request by any user.
Arbitrary username 23:42, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
I think you're reading too much into it. G4 has never applied to speedy-deletions. G4 does not allow any of the situations you cite above. It only applies to content which was decided through a full XfD discussion. A page can be re-speedied if the original speedy-deletion justification still applies but not as recreated content. And, yes, I am concerned about increasing the wordiness of the instruction. The page is already much longer than it should be. How about this change instead? I think it makes the clarification you are looking for but in even fewer words than the current. Rossami (talk) 04:08, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
current proposed
4. Recreation of deleted material. A substantially identical copy, by any title, of a page that was deleted according to the deletion policy, except if it is in user space or undeleted per the undeletion policy. Before deleting again, the admin should ensure that the material is substantially identical, and not merely a new article on the same subject. In case of a speedily-deleted page, they must also determine that it met a criterion for speedy deletion in the first place. Likewise, an article that was deleted as an uncontested prod and then re-created is not subject to this criterion, as the re-creation effectively amounts to contesting the proposed deletion. Such cases should be taken to Articles for deletion for discussion by the community. 4. Recreation of deleted material. A substantially identical copy, by any title, of a page that was deleted as a result of an XfD discussion, unless it was undeleted per the undeletion policy or was recreated in the user space. Before deleting again, the admin should ensure that the material is substantially identical and not merely a new article on the same subject. This clause may does not apply where the only prior deletions were speedy- or prod-deletions (though other CSD criteria may apply). Such cases should be taken to Articles for deletion for discussion by the community.
This proposed wording is clear and concise, but I think the sentence starting This clause may not apply where... should read This clause does not apply if.... Spacepotato 07:51, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
The last two sentences are entirely redundant, since the requirement for deletion through an XfD process is made explicit (rather than just deletion policy, which includes speedies and prods). The very last ("take it to afd") isn't even accurate in all cases, since this a general criterion, not an article one. —Lamentation :( 09:54, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
Many thanks to Rossami for the proposed new wording. It looks good, and I have no strong opinion about whether the last two sentences (which offer additional explanation) should be included or not, although if they are included then I second Spacepotato's comment that "may" should be replaced by "does". Barring any further objection, would someone like to make a decision on this point, and implement the change based largely on Rossami's suggested wording? Arbitrary username 10:05, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
My intent was "may not" in the sense of "is not permitted", not in the sense of "might not". "does not" is less ambiguous. Changed.
Agree that the reference to AFD is not technically accurate in all cases but I couldn't quickly find better wording. If you all think the reference to XfD is sufficient and not too much like jargon, I'm okay with trimming the case even further. Rossami (talk) 14:40, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

<carriage return> User:Extreme Unction and I were wondering about this a while back (see here and here for the iterations. Anyway, in the end, we whittled it down to:

A substantially identical copy, under any title, of a page deleted by one of the regular deletion processes. Pages which have never gone through one of these deletion discussions (i.e. pages which have only ever been speedily deleted) must not be speedied with this criterion.

Which seems to say most of what Rossami's version does, although PROD did not yet exist and would need adding. The blanket exception for user space is difficult to apply with the advent of MfD. -Splash - tk 16:31, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

"Regular deletion processes" looks good at first glance, until you compare the number of pages speedied per day to those deleted by other processes. The number that usually gets thrown about is 2000 deletions a day as of November 2005, I believe; no more than two or three hundred of those are nonspeedies. If "XfD" is too jargony - and I don't think it is, keeping in mind that not only is this a page primarily aimed at the Wikipedia community, it's aimed at administrators and rc/np-patrollers - then "discussion-based deletion processes" might work. Specifically enumerating speedy deletion and prod doesn't seem the way to go, since it's not inconceivable we could add more g4-immune processes in the future.
As for the userspace exception: perhaps "or was moved into the user space"? —Lamentation :( 16:51, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
I would explicitly exempt prod and speedy deletion. We should be crystal clear. If other processes are developed, working out their interaction with this page is one of the steps of their acceptance. Septentrionalis 17:22, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
Yeah. An earlier iteration we looked at read (slightly copyedited):
Recreation of deleted material. A substantially identical copy, by any title, of a page that was deleted via one of the deletion discussion pages (AfD, TfD, CfD, IfD, RfD, SfD, and/or MfD). Pages which have never gone through one of these deletion discussion processes cannot be speedied with this criterion. The admin should ensure that the material is substantially identical to previously deleted versions, and not merely a new page covering the same subject.
Which is substantially wordier for its greater exclusions. -Splash - tk 17:46, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
I think the above seems to show a broad agreement for something along the lines of Rossami's suggested wording; we now just seem to be discussing relatively minor details. The discussion has now been idle for a few days, and nothing has yet being changed. I think there is a risk that this discussion gets forgotten without leading to any action. So to avoid this, I am now going to implement Rossami's version, on the grounds that it is at least better than the status quo. If details of the wording can be further improved, then let's iterate from here. Arbitrary username 15:29, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I have 2 suggestions:

  • The last sentence: Such cases should be taken to Articles for deletion for discussion by the community should IMHO be changed into Such cases should be taken to XfD for discussion by the community.
Yes, I agree with you, and imagine that this change is uncontroversial. I'm going to be bold and put it in. Arbitrary username 21:26, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Suppose somebody copied some text from a website. It is marked as copyvio and then deleted. It is recreated. Should it be speedied, even when it does not fully satisfy A8 (for example it was not identified within 48 h)? I think it should. According to the original sentence it should. According to the current meaning not. googl t 17:11, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
This is unnecessary, it already completely includes all of the above concerns. If admins are not properly interpreting G4, then tell them how to do it. This idea, while well-intentioned, is instruction creep. Stifle (talk) 17:39, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Latest edits by Spacepotato are good. Thanks. Arbitrary username 18:07, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Rerouting AFD to SD for blatent adspam cases

There are some cases, and I'm thinking especially of advertizing, where it's not possible to set a blanket rule because one persons' spam is anothers 1st draft of an encyclopedic article. As a result some new adspam articles sit on AFD for up to a week, when it's really very clear within hours that they're almost certainly non-notable and rapidly heading for WP:SNOW.

I'm thinking of this one, as an example of such an article: WP:AFD/Kimi height.

How would people feel about a policy tweak, either

  1. "Reroute to SD" is a valid response and consensus on AFD, or alternatively,
  2. WP:SD allows rerouting blatent non-starters from AFD to SD, given admin concurrance and AFD voting to date?

What I'm thinking of is something simple, like that an advertizing article may be moved from AFD to SD "at admin discretion", if it appears to be NN advertising, and AFD appears to have already reached a tentative consensus (eg,to the point of WP:SNOW)?

Just to have a way for the more blatent judgement cases to be handled faster. Thoughts? It would allow a quick way to use judgement to fast delete adverts, bio's etc that aren't likely ever to survive AFD but which aren't formally allowed to be SD'ed in case notable articles get removed by mistake.

FT2 (Talk | email) 16:16, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't know why I can't reply directly to this, it's really weird. But speedying things because they're "on the way to WP:SNOW" isn't possible because WP:SNOW isn't anything, and there's no way to predict the future regarding what can turn up in an AfD discussion. To expand, there's a reason the discussion rages on for 5 days - it's a discussion, and to shut that down because you think there's a "tentative consensus" should never, ever fly. --badlydrawnjeff talk 16:10, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Articles on AFD that are speediable get done so all the time; just mark your response speedy delete and it has the same effect as what you're suggesting (and has more basis in policy/procedure than WP:SNOW). -- nae'blis (talk) 16:19, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Yup, that's roughly what I meant. Will clarify that in the relevant policies then. I think that might be all that was missing. FT2 (Talk | email) 16:53, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Although some debates on AfD are being closed early because of claims that the article is advertising, a neologism, etc., this is out-of-process. There is no policy basis or consensus for this behavior. Spacepotato 00:51, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
The important point is that articles must be speediable, as Nae'blis says. If they already meet a CSD, then sure, speedy them, but we can't speedy things because someone thinks they meet WP:SNOW, which as others have pointed out, isn't anything, not policy, not consensus, not nothing. If it's not "formally allowed" to be speedied, it's not allowed to be speedied. · rodii · 01:33, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

I7 should be removed

I propose the removal of rule I7, reading:

  • Invalid fair-use claim. Any image with a clearly invalid fair-use tag (such as a {{logo}} tag on a photograph of a mascot) can be deleted at any time.

This is a bad rule, primarily because an image that has an invalid fair-use tag on it may still be permissable under a correct fair-use tag, and other tags should be considered first. IfD is an appropriate forum for these considerations, as the deleting admin may not know an appropriate tag either. In addition, the rule does not require examining the history; it may be that the image once had a valid fair use tag but it was replaced with an invalid one. These are not theoretical issues, because the person who added the tag may have simply chosen the wrong one, for lack of knowledge of either fair use or our tag system.

Even more bizarrely, this rule allows an "attack" in which a user can replace a fair use image's tag with an invalid fair use tag, then an admin (perhaps the same user!) deletes it. Deco 23:14, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. It's the admin's duty to check for this sort of thing, and somebody with no grasp of Wikipedia:Fair use shouldn't be dealing with CSD I7 (arguably they shouldn't be an admin at all, though that's debatable) - they'll get a good kick up the backside from the uploader if they messed up on an I7 call. We rely on admins to actually understand the rules they are using and to take due care when exercising them: I guess that's the main point of WP:RFA. A tag-swap attack would be blatant vandalism, I can't think that any serious user would ever want to do it or that a vandal or troll would get away with it. An admin can always change a CSD I7 nom into a "fair use disputed" tag in marginal cases where they may be a more suitable tag but they can't think which, and there is image undeletion in reserve if necessary. I think what you may be emphasising insufficiently is that having the right tag doesn't make something fair use - what matters is the rationale which all fair use images should have regardless of tag. There are plenty of instances where, for instance, "screenshot" is the correct tag but the image would not come under "fair use" doctrine the way it has been used in an article. Putting on a fair use tag is often (almost always!) an excuse for not bothering to write a rationale - and in these circumstances often no rationale would be very convincing. An image whose sole justification for its use in Wikipedia is an incorrect fair use copyright tag with no obvious alternative is almost certain to have no good fair use rationale, and should be viewed completely analagously to an image that has been uploaded with the "standard" fair use template and no rationale. This is the deeper logic behind I7 - it shouldn't be a way to evade the "standard template, no rationale" CSD criteria to throw an absolutely random fair use tag on. TheGrappler 08:00, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
But the action that I7 enables - immediate deletion with no waiting period - is even stricter than that for standard template, no rationale images. I'll admit that a tag swap attack is unrealistic, and that admins are (supposedly) supposed to check the history on every speedy, but I still think the decision of whether or not a more suitable tag is available is too subjective to assign to one person. Finally, the argument that it is essentially the justification that matters, not the tag, is something of an argument against the rule - what if they provide a clearly invalid tag with a perfectly valid justification? Such cases could be dealt with by a thinking admin with appropriate tag-changing, but I'd ideally like the letter of the rule - or at least the accompanying interpretation - to reflect this. Deco 03:41, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
I can see where you are coming from. Usually the existence or not of a suitable tag is pretty obvious, though sometimes it's not so clear. In the borderline cases a "good admin" would seek help. I suppose I am partly influenced here my philosophy that (a) our admins should be - and on the whole, are - very good, (b) and we should trust them with as many revertible powers as possible that keep the wheels of Wikipedia running smoothly. If I7 was being regularly abused by admins then I might change my mind about it, though. TheGrappler 13:17, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
This was discussed at length prior to adopting the criterion. The difference is in the case of missing fair use rationale, the user has done nothing wrong, but with a bad rationale, they've already intentionally lied and brought the project into danger - why give them another chance to do this?
Anyway, images can be undeleted now, so it's no big deal. Stifle (talk) 17:36, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
This assumes malicious intent though. I don't consider the case of vandalistic misuse of tags, but rather accidental misuse of tags, out of ignorance of exactly which tags apply to which items. Ironically, the example given by the rule itself is one that an uploader might realistically screw up accidentally (using {{logo}} for a photo of a mascot). Deco 18:20, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, the uploader is supposed to be notified by {{subst:badfairuse}} when an image is tagged under this CSD. The uploader notices, and either says "yeah, I guess that's right, I can't use this" or "hey, I goofed" and notifies the admin, who restores the image and puts the right tag on it. Stifle (talk) 14:18, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
The use of {{subst:badfairuse}} doesn't give the uploader any particular length of time to respond in—as the tag says, the image "may have been deleted by the time you see this message". Why not give the uploader a seven-day period to respond, as with I6? Spacepotato 23:47, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
Because, as I said before, the user has already intentionally lied and brought the project into danger. We cannot afford to take any risks with copyright images - it is something that we have to be extremely tight on. Also as I said before, the user, once notified, can contact an admin and say what fair use tag they intended to apply, the admin can verify that it's valid, and restore the image.
This is the same process as happens for other copyvios, see {{nothanks-sd}} as that is what {{badfairuse}} was based on. Stifle (talk) 23:03, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Flags nominated for speedy deletion

Several flags from "Flags of the World" website have been nominated for speedy deletion due to a non-commercial license. I do not believe that they should be deleted, and have written a query at Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Fair use claims. - Mike Rosoft 15:47, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

True, these should not be deleted. --Siva1979Talk to me 17:22, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Proposal for Music Samples

As the new guideline Wikipedia:Music samples (actually it's under a vote with probably a positive outcome) says:

  • Copyrighted, unlicensed music samples that are longer than 30 seconds should be speedy deleted.

Could we add this as a new CSD criterion because it limits copyright violations that concern music samples. CG 19:41, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

While I don't see that line in the guideline currently, I agree it should be written into the guideline, and adopted as a new CSD. See below. --Wine Guy Talk 20:40, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
The guideline says: Copyrighted, unlicensed music samples may not be longer than 30 seconds or 10% of the length of the original song...
Although I support the guideline, I must disagree with this new CSD. Wikipedia:Music samples is only a guideline and there may be reasonable cases in which we want to make exceptions to the 30 second rule. For the gratuitous violations, I think PROD will do - because creation of samples is relatively difficult, I don't anticipate having a problem with lots of these being uploaded (see "arise frequently" at the top of the page). Deco 17:37, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
Guidelines are not policy, ergo making part of a guideline into policy on the spot isn't really the right way around. -Splash - tk 22:05, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
I know it's not a policy, but we agreed during discussions that we could very easily make copyvios with music samples. This proposal is just here to limit risks. And every law text says that the 30 second is a limit that should never be crossed (for copyrighted licenced work) CG 12:21, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
30 seconds is a good heuristic length and even a widely-used convention, but to say that it "should never be crossed" is a bit too strong. Also, "unlicensed" isn't quite right - it should be "that are not released under a free license", since any music you ever buy is licensed for limited use by the consumer. Deco 18:18, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
Having looked at this issue more closely, it seems that there is already an applicable CSD in place for flagrant violations. Here's my reasoning:
  • CSD I/M 7 Invalid fair-use claim says "Any image or media with a clearly invalid fair-use tag...can be deleted at any time."
  • The music sample fair use tag says "The sample is short in relation to the duration of the recorded track..."
  • Short is defined in the guideline as 30 seconds or 10% of the length of the original song...
Therefore, a copyrighted, fair-use sample which is longer than 30 seconds is not short, thus invalidating the music sample fair use tag and making it a candidate for speedy under CSD I/M 7.
I hope that makes sense. Any thoughts? --Wine Guy Talk 20:32, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Reducing CSD I4, 5, and 6 lag time from seven days to five

Does anyone here think it would be good idea to reduce the lag time for CSDs I4, I5, and I6 from seven days to five? I have observed that for the majority of the images deleted under those criterions, the uploader never returns to make any changes to the image page, for better or for worse. And, even in cases where they do come back, it usually happens quickly, within two or three days. Right now, I'm not considering a formal proposal, but would like to see what everyone thinks of the idea. Alr 21:47, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Probably not a good idea; it will burn some people, who edit weekly, quite badly in exchange for slightly increasing the speed of removal. (After all, it can take a while for an image to be tagged.) Septentrionalis 16:16, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
Fair enough on burning weekly uploaders, but in the cases where images are tagged long after they are uploaded, how many uploaders are still around by then? I would think that a sizable portion are hit-and-runners who do a few edits just to try things out, then leave. Alr 01:03, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
People should consider the use of {{speedy-image-c}} on the pages where the images are being used, so that regular editors of the articles can help out in these cases when the original uploader is long gone. howcheng {chat} 23:53, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
I like the idea of shortening the window, but another practical reason for the seven is that it allows OrphanBot plenty of time to remove the images from the article. This usually happens around day five (apparently Carnildo was bombarded with complaints when it happened too soon after tagging and uploader notification). Like the caption template, the removal of the image also warns the article's community that the image is in danger. ×Meegs 06:12, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Explanation of Tony Sidaway's removal of wiktionary links from T1

Somebody thought it would be helpful to add wiktionary links to T1. We probably don't need that because the templates that have been deleted from Wikipedia, whose deletions have been confirmed by review, provide sufficient guidance on what Wikipedia considers summarily deletable from template space.

Since most controversial templates have been removed to user space, the problem has largely subsided, and I suggest that the test to be applied in T1 should be assumed, in the absence of other factors, to approximate to the User Page guideline. --Tony Sidaway 21:50, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I am sorry but I disagree, and I was the one who added those links. The reason I added them was specifically to try and remove the "smoke and mirrors" that seems to come with those terms. The removal of Template:User transhumanist was what made it seem inconsistent to me. If we look literally at the term divisive then a template simply stating you are male clearly and undeniably IS divisive. So why the does this stay and others go? Clearly we do need to state definitions here and what better definition than one provided from this set of websites itself? The template is also not inflammatory, there is no global outcry or shouts of injustice or immorality with transhumanism, and with any topic there can always be those who vehemently oppose something... if I were to start objecting profusely against those people who like spagetti would it turn that template into an inflammatory one? I personally find religion itself offensive (as do many others), so a userbox which states someone follows a particular religion is something I would object against... so why do they have a right to exist but stating a belief in ones own evolution is considered "divisive and inflammatory"? The problem has not subsided... it has been moved into "slow motion" with templates being deleted every now and then in order to avoid the "do not go on mass deletions" dictate. Enigmatical 22:29, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
I agree with Tony's edit, precisely because this rule is not to be interpreted literally but based on consensus and precedent. It would be better to provide links to some relevant undeletion debates. Deco 17:38, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
Well I have often found in a lot of cases where disagreement occurs it is a result of differing terms. One believes it means one thing and the other believes it means another. They both argue the other is wrong when in reality it is just a case of them not agreeing on the fundamental definition of what they are arguing over. I have also found that often those who wish to abuse terminology don't wish that terminology to be properly defined because in doing so it nullifies their ability to abuse it. Keep the term more.... fuzzy and thus you can always claim that something falls within its definition. It was my hope, in good faith to try and eliminate confusion and the potential for abuse by simply making the terminology clearer. I guess we must now go through another several months of the same old thing without any resolution of the matter. Is that desired? Enigmatical 23:03, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
The original wording assumed a definition of both of the words. It did not place its worth on the definitions that Wikisource is able to come up with. It is much like saying you have to define every word explicitly or else it will be "fuzzy". The criteria survived a strenuous initiation period and should be fine as it is, given the low number of templates likely to be even under it given the recent happenings (see Jimbo on Userboxes). Also, it is all well and good to complain when I put warnings about assuming good faith on your talk page, maybe you should be less hasty to put the words "bad faith edit" in your edit summaries. Its not like you had everyone backing you on your edit yourself. I for one don't think it should be there, but that had nothing to do with my warning you. Ansell 08:30, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

More on rewording G1

A few weeks ago, Kjkolb et al. pointed out that CSD G1 should be reworded because it is so often misused—it is abused to cover articles that are merely untrue or poorly written, but which are not patent nonsense by Wikipedia's criterion. I am requesting comments on the following rewording of G1:

G1. Gibberish, called by Wikipedians patent nonsense—an unsalvageably incoherent page with no meaningful content. This does not include: poor writing, partisan screeds, obscene remarks, vandalism, fictional material, material not in English, badly translated material, implausible theories, or hoaxes.

Spacepotato 21:22, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't see why we can't take out the reference to "patent nonsense" altogether. Why not just say "An unsalvageably incoherent page with no meaningful content"? Sometimes it's better to omit jargon than modify it. Deco 18:12, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
The reason to call it "patent nonsense" is so that G1 can refer to Wikipedia:Patent Nonsense, which gives a more extensive definition. Ultimately, it might be best to rename the Wikipedia:Patent Nonsense page, but rewording G1 seems an easier first step. Spacepotato 21:13, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I guess the question for me is whether we need a more extensive definition. It seems easily and accurately describable in one sentence, and we don't provide more extensive descriptions of most things in the list (except maybe vandalism). Deco 17:48, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
The problem with this is that this will tempt editors to use the reasoning I don't immediately understand it, therefore it's unsalvageably incoherent (analogous to: I never heard of it, so it's not notable). I think it's better to leave in the link. Spacepotato 22:34, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
I tend to agree with this. Stifle (talk) 23:42, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I was bold and made the change. Spacepotato 23:09, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Propose speedy deletion of lower taxon articles redirecting to higher ones

I propose deleting all the lower to higher taxon redirects. If there is only one lower taxon, the higher taxon should redirect to the lower one anyway, so this rule always applies. (for example, Homo sapiens should NOT redirect to hominadae, but the other way around) People from TOL here have already agreed that this is bad practice (in short, species articles shouldn't redirect to genus articles, etc). I also nominated a couple articles like that for speedy deletion, and were indeed deleted. I just want it to be an official rule --TheAlphaWolf 17:13, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't think this will work because unless you can explain it far more simply than above then its just too complicated (and possibly too specific) to work. IMHO speedy deletion criteria must be obvious, succinct and memorable. I also forsee the potential for many exceptions to be arguable in good faith. I know next to nothing about the subject area, and when I've looked up taxinomic names there seems to be no logic to whether the name I've heard of is a species, family or whatever. Thryduulf 21:29, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
This rule isn't suitable for speedy deletion as it requires admins to know taxonomy, which they might not. Also, I don't think that these redirects are always a bad idea. For example, an article on a family might include a list of genera broken down into subfamilies, in which case there seems no harm in redirecting the subfamily to the family; or, an article on a genus might include brief descriptions of some of its species in the case where there is insufficient material to warrant a separate article. Spacepotato 22:26, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
Assume that the admin reviewing the nomination has no specialist scientific training - even someone with a PhD in a field like physics probably wouldn't have the relevant training. Format the criteria so that they can tell just by following the redirect whether the criteria is met. KPCOFGS isn't that hard to remember. (heck, it ought to be a redirect or a short article, but it isn't.) However, Taxon tells us that there are different systems that can rank the same thing (current example is liverworts) at different levels. How would the non-science specialist be able to tell if it is a redirect from one system to another that is legitimate versus a same system redirect that isn't legitimate. I've glanced at the criteria for proposals above, and if you can make it easy for the non-scientist to figure out, this shouldn't have much trouble.
Alternatively, folks could just make a practice of converting a lower taxon redirect to a stub whenever they see one. No need for a CSD if that practice evolves, and wikipedia gets better with that stub. GRBerry 22:13, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
This was written at a point when only Thryduulf had responded: Also, there was not that much participation at the talk page linked to, and I'm unconvinced that redirecting to the genus is a bad idea. The only downside that I can see is that you would not be able to tell that there was not an article on the species from looking at the link. Unless we intend to create individual articles for many, many species, I don't know if this is enough of a problem to prevent redirecting to the genus. Most species will probably not have articles for decades, and they may never have articles. Redirecting to the genus or some other higher taxon will at least give people some information. I don't think it is misleading, as was claimed on the talk page. Many topics are redirected to a larger or similar one. -- Kjkolb 23:37, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
First, about explaining it more easily- Redirecting lower to higher taxons is bad practice when lower taxons aren't described in the article. That's the reason. I think it qualifies as "obvious, succinct and memorable". Also, you said "I know next to nothing about the subject area, and when I've looked up taxinomic names there seems to be no logic to whether the name I've heard of is a species, family or whatever."... That's Part of the point. If someone like you searches a species name and gets redirected to a genus article, it will just confuse you and make life harder for you won't it? To put it simply, redirecting lower to higher taxons is the same thing as redirecting to the wrong article. For obvious reasons redirecting to the wrong article shouldn't be allowed.
About this requiring admins to know taxonomy, well... I can't help that. You're expecting us not to delete bad articles because they require knowledge of the subject matter? How then do you suppose the wrong things, vandalism, etc. will be fixed? If you don't know taxonomy, let me use a simple example. I'm sure you know that there are many types of monkeys right? Well, say you type in "Capuchin monkey" and it redirects you to "monkey". That's obviously wrong and should be deleted don't you think? That's a lower taxon redirecting to a higher one. Same thing with what I'm talking about. I can't help it if admins have to know some about taxonomy.
About that rule not always applying, I fixed the rule, because I guess you're right :P However, I've been across many redirects where the lower taxon isn't mentioned in the higher one.
GRBerry, you bring up a good point. Taxonomy is a pain, lol. And really I can't think of a way to solve that problem. However, how else do you propose us non-admins help contribute to wikipedia? The other day I tried to get a lower to higher taxon redirect deleted, and I'm guessing the admin didn't know about taxonomy (I'm not claiming I'm a taxonomer or anything, but this was obviously wrong), s/he deleted my tag. I'm proposing this category for speedy deletion so that we regular members can use a tag and cite the rule. That way, redirects that should be deleted are deleted, not left there to confuse people only because the admin isn't a taxonomist. If my proposed criterion is added, the admin wouldn't need to be a taxonomist.
Kjkolb , Here are (some of) my reasons for deleting those kinds of redirects:
1. If someone searches a species name, they want to know about that species. They don't want to know about the genus or family, they want information specific to the species.
2. For obvious reasons, linking species names in the genus page is pointless (say you have a genus article with a list of species, something which is very common), as they will redirect to the same page. If someone searches the genus and then wants to find out more about specific species, it is very annoying to have to copy and paste the unlinked name and then search, only to be redirected to the article you were reading in the first place. The same one that promted you to want to know more about specific species.
3. It discourages people from making species articles. Many people who make articles are newbies, and they may not know how to start an article if their topic redirects to another page. Another issue are common names, it is annoying to have to change the redirects, and even more knowledgeable members may one- not know all the common names, or two- forget about some of them. This means that (for example) searching the scientific name of a plant will take you to it's own article, but searching one or more of it's common names will take you to the genus article. Obviously this is annoying and it makes wikipedia look bad.
4. As mentioned above, not everyone is a taxonomist, and it IS misleading. Thryduulf gave us the perfect example: "I know next to nothing about the subject area, and when I've looked up taxinomic names there seems to be no logic to whether the name I've heard of is a species, family or whatever". Now, imagine if he/someone searches a species name and gets a genus article, that's even MORE confusing, and misleading.
Sorry this was so long --TheAlphaWolf 01:15, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
TheAlphaWolf, I'd like to address the procedural points you've just raised.
  1. You say that the admin need not be a taxonomist because the person adding the tag can supply the taxonomical knowledge. However, this will not do as the admin must be able to verify that the tag has been applied correctly.
  2. You ask how, without this rule, non-admins (I'm not an admin either) can get these redirects deleted. The answer is that you should list them on Wikipedia:Redirects for deletion. Speedy deletion is not the only, or even the primary, deletion mechanism on Wikipedia.
Spacepotato 01:55, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
I don't think that will work, and definately not as efficiently, but I'll give it a try. --TheAlphaWolf 00:51, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
The AlphaWolf has raised a serious problem within ToL. But CSD is not the way to solve this. It requires a good knowledge of taxonomy, sometimes even a specialized knowledge of a small branch of taxonomy. However, there is an easy solution. There are several admins working within the ToL (I'm such an admin myself). This problem can perhaps be solved with a special list on the talk page of ToL, that would alert those admins and prompt them into action (by deleting or, even better, by writing the much needed article, or ask a specialist in the field to write the article). Anyway, this is too complicated to be handled as a CSD. JoJan 08:43, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
Hmm, a special list... sounds good to me. It would make it much easier. --TheAlphaWolf 19:01, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I can't see an argument for deleting lower taxon redirects, much less speedily deleting them. What would be the point of making accurate information about the higher taxon more difficult to access? --Tony Sidaway 19:35, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

And the idea of lower taxa redirects, of which AlphaWolf seems to approve, makes my head hurt; which lower taxon should the redirect point to? 128.112.207.249 21:23, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I think this is not a case for speedy. As Tony says, it is likely that people may know the name of the lower order species and they may wish to search for that. Redirects are (almost) free, and as long as people are not abusing the redirect service with an extreme number of these redirects, the ones that are there should be fine. This issue is more appropriate on a Science/Biology Wikiproject. Ansell 23:17, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Proposed addition to R2

I think redirects to the project or project talk (Wikipedia: types) (in addition to the user namespace) should be candidates for speedy deletion. I often work on RfD and there are far to many cases of votes being done on cross namespace redirects like Articles for deletion → Wikipedia:Articles for deletion. I think does should be rapidly deleted so the user does not have to fill out the whole rfd2 template. Also, many users do not know about the rules about cross namespace redirects and make them, this will help eliminate cross namespace redirects (which get numerous delete votes on rfd anyway, one request was, "'delete this and all other cross namespace redirects.") Polonium 20:25, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Can you show where the rules became accepted practice, since you state that they are rules? We've had deletion reviews recently that demonstrate a lack of clear awareness of and consensus about this rule. GRBerry
There was no consensus on the issue of speedying cross-namespace redirects when it was discussed at the end of June. Spacepotato 22:31, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Meanwhile, in the trenches...

I work on speedied articles sometimes, and I would say that easily 25% of speedies that I see shouldn't be speedies. Some should be PRODs, some should go to AfD, and some shouldn't even go to AfD. Of the rest, some can be salvaged with juat a bit of editing, and some can be salvaged with some more serious editing. 25%. The other 75% are properly speediable.

I'm not sure that all of these are getting the consideration they deserve, especially when there's a backlog. I just had an article I was salvaging deleted out from under me despite the ((hangon)) tag. There had been a big backlog, and whoosh it was gone, which is all well and good, but if the closing admin in is a hurry to clear the backlog, an inappropriately speedied article can slip into nothingness.

I'm just saying. I don't know the answer. But the CSD are honored more in the breach, sometimes, I guess. Herostratus 02:42, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

<dreaming>With m:Help:DPL admins (or in fact anybody) could list categories like the speedy deletion candidates sorted by date of addition excluding "hangon"-cases. </dreaming> Time for a DPL-petition at the Pump? -- Omniplex 09:38, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't know about other admins, but whenever I encounter a {{hangon}} tag I check to see how long it has been in place. If after about 12-24 hours there has been no edits to the article or talk page then I treat it as being abandoned. I don't think it needs to be perfect, but I think it is reasonable to expect someone adding a hangon tag to either at least attempt to make it not-spediable or write a note on the talk page within that time. The less information there is in the article the less likely I am to be generous.

If edits have been made, then I make sure that it isn't being actively edited (several hours since last edit). If it is not being edited, then I see if it still meets a speedy criteria. If it is being actively edited, then I leave it as not complete. Thryduulf 00:25, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Proposed new criteria for "patently worthless media"

That's not a spectacular way of putting it ... but it would be nice if vandalism-only images, vanity images (beyond something used legitimately on a user page), obviously stolen images with no fair use criteria, images where people are using Wikipedia for free webhosting, etc, could be deleted without the formality of sitting thought IFD. I'm listing below a few ideas for new criteria. Feel free to mercilessly edit, aggressively mock, whatever. ;) BigDT 00:41, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

  • Proposed I10 - Images used only on deleted articles or for reverted vandalism that have no other valid encyclopedic use. BigDT 00:41, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • This to me seems unnecessary. Whenever I delete (AFD or speedy) articles with images, I just toss the images at the same time (provided they're orphans used only the deleted article). IMHO it should just be standard operating procedure to just consider such images part of the article. howcheng {chat} 23:08, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
      • Not all admins do the same, though; it would be nice to have a general guideline, as current practice is ambiguous. Titoxd(?!?) 23:48, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • Needed, but wording will have to be made clear so that it is completely unambiguous. "[N]o other valid encyclopedic use" is way too wide. Vandalism images are already under G3, so how about:
      Images that were used only on pages that have been deleted and were uploaded shortly before or anytime after any of the pages were created. Stifle (talk) 09:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Proposed I11 - Image pages for images hosted on Commons where there is no actual media on en Wikipedia. (For example, Image:A60.jpg - the media is on Commons. Someone wanted to comment on it, but they instead created a page here that serves no real purpose.)
    • I proposed this too but we can cover this under I2 (missing image). howcheng {chat} 23:08, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • A common vandalistic tactic on eswiki is to create pages like that, but it does apply under G2. Titoxd(?!?) 23:48, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • Redundant to I2. Stifle (talk) 09:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Proposed I12 - Orphaned images with patently false licensing information (for example, a photo obviously from a news media site tagged as "all rights released")
    • These can be dealt with by either WP:PUI or simply striking out the patently false licensing and replacing with {{subst:nld}} while notifying the uploader. howcheng {chat} 23:08, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • What howcheng said. Stifle (talk) 09:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Proposed I13 - News media photos being used to illustrate the subject of the photo (see WP:FAIR#Counterexamples #5)
  • Proposed I14 - Orphaned images with no encyclopedic use uploaded by users who have no non-reverted article edits
    • This is far too much instruction creep. Most of these can be covered under G3 (vandalism). howcheng {chat} 23:08, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • The usual case here is someone uploading their porn collection to WP; just delete it on sight as vandalism. Titoxd(?!?) 23:48, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • Either it's vandalism (already covered by G3), or it's very instruction creepy. Stifle (talk) 09:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Proposed I15 - Image pages where no media is present that would qualify for speedy deletion as an article (in other words, if someone creates a vanity page in image space like Image:AAK_CV.pdf)
    • In most of these cases that I've seen, {{subst:nld}} usually is good enough. These people don't usually come back to their vanity upload pages. howcheng {chat} 23:08, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
    • {{subst:nld}} and its family will cover this. Stifle (talk) 09:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Good intentions on your suggestions, but I believe there are already processes in place to deal with these situations. howcheng {chat} 23:08, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
I don't question that anything can be deleted eventually ... my hope was to remove the barriers in cases where the image is obviously worthless. If you go to Special:Allpages, pick the image namespace, and pick a random spot of the alphabet (hit two random letters, then go to the middle column, halfway down), I'd say you probably have better than a one-in-five chance of hitting an image that doesn't belong on WP. Adding ways for the more patently useless images to be speedied wouldn't be a bad thing. BigDT 02:35, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
The real question is whether we actually need them or can apply the processes we already have. Stifle (talk) 09:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
I did an empirical test of BigDT's postulate there, by randomly picking 10 images beginning with K. One was a photo with {{logo}}, and another was an orphaned fair use. The others were all good. don't think we need more criteria (other than perhaps the top one), we just need to apply those we have strictly. Stifle (talk) 15:11, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Drag it to another section, so it is more visible. I agree that one is a good idea. Titoxd(?!?) 23:32, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Revise "Author requests deletion"

This criterion implies that the page must have been "mistakenly created" in order for it to qualify under speedy deletion, regardless of whether the author now wants it deleted. Yet, it then states that author page blanking is sufficient reason to qualify.

The "mistaken" wording, without page blanking, was added in Wikipedia:Proposal to expand WP:CSD, with discussion at Wikipedia talk:Proposal to expand WP:CSD/Proposal VI (Requested deletion). It appears that this wording is because the idea was originally conceived for deleting accidents, but it was never asserted that it should be a restricting factor. Indeed, comments there indicate that a "mistakenly created" necessity is inappropriate for Wikipedia and even legally invalid under the GFDL because the author retains copyright ownership over what he writes. I propose that it be revised as follows:

Author requests deletion. Any page for which deletion is requested by the original author, provided the page's only substantial content was added by its author and was mistakenly created. If the author blanks the page, this can be taken as a deletion request. Note: Please check the page history to make sure there is only a single author.

—Centrx→talk • 02:51, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

This was discussed when another editor attempted to remove the wording in question. It was noted that this would enable an author to unilaterally arrange for the deletion of valuable content (which others wish to keep) for any arbitrary reason.
You misunderstood the "author blanks the page" rule; this can be interpreted as a deletion request (which can be honored if the page appears to have been created accidentally). It is not "sufficient reason to qualify."
Kelly Martin's interpretation of the GFDL is news to me. It certainly should be investigated, but I don't believe that it reflects the reasoning behind this CSD's creation. G7 was established for situations along the lines of "Whoops, I just created a page with a typo in the title!", "Whoops, I just duplicated an existing page!", or "Oh, I didn't realize that this sort of thing was against Wikipedia policy." It does not apply to situations along the lines of "I created this, but now I changed my mind." —David Levy 03:31, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The other reason given in the old CSD proposal discussion was not just that Wikipedia contributions did not constitute a legal contract submitting copyright ownership, but also that Wikipedia depends on the voluntary contributions of editors, that it is a free host of information that ought not be a "trap". —Centrx→talk • 05:18, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I like the language that used to be on the db-author template [2]. "The only editor of this page either accidentally created it or no longer believes it to be useful, and requests its deletion." In other words, if you are throwing a Wikifit and asking for everything you created to be blown away, it's not going to happen. But if you honestly believe that this thing which you did, really, intentionally create is no longer useful, it can be deleted. I'm sure that most people have once or twice started on a template, then realized that it wasn't going to work. It wasn't mistakenly created - you really did mean to create it - but then you changed your mind and no longer find it useful. BigDT 03:36, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

But what if other editors disagree? During the brief period in which the wording was absent (following its unilateral removal), I saw someone apply this CSD to a template created eight months earlier. (I actually thought that it was potentially useful, but the author decided that it wasn't.) —David Levy 04:31, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
How about adding "and is unused" or words to that effect? An admin needs to exercise common sense when applying this criterion or anything else. If there are any non-trivial inbound links, then don't delete it. BigDT 05:05, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Unused is a good idea. I was going to suggest a time limit. However, note this criterion is for articles specifically, and any article that remains unedited, such that it qualifies, is essentially unused anyway, and is such a fringe article that its removal would not be any significant loss. —Centrx→talk • 05:12, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Agreed, I ave no problem with authors requesting deletion of something, especially if they are the only contributor, and it is orphaned. — xaosflux Talk 05:16, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
This is a general criterion. It does not apply strictly to articles. —David Levy 05:24, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The fact that a template (the namespace to which this branch of the discussion appears to be confined) is unused (even assuming that it hasn't been deliberately orphaned) doesn't necessarily mean that it isn't potentially useful. The template that I cited was unused, but that may have been because it went unnoticed. I certainly wasn't aware of its existence until the creator listed it at TfD (at which point the CSD was applied). —David Levy 05:24, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, if an article/template/page is nominated for deletion by the author, but someone else objects to the deletion, it is not a speedy. Speedy deletion should only be used in uncontroversial cases, hence the narrow criteria. Titoxd(?!?) 05:27, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The case that I cited is unusual in the respect that the matter was discussed in a deletion forum. Had the template's creator simply applied the speedy deletion tag, I (and most other members of the community) never would have had the opportunity to examine the template and formulate an opinion; it simply would have been deleted without discussion. —David Levy 05:33, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
If the template is speedied as G7, then there is no ban on recreation. If you think it can be used, any admin can restore it for you. xFD discussions are already overburdened. Forcing all deletions of non-accidentally-created but non-controversial content to go through xFD would be a needless addition to the process. Take a look at Special:Log/delete. Deletions with "db-author" or "G7" in the description are pretty frequent. That's a lot that would just be extra work to add to the xFD discussions. BigDT 05:39, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
If a page (of any kind) is speedily deleted before a non-sysop sees it, he/she will have no way of knowing to request its undeletion.
I wouldn't object to the creation of a WP:PROD-like process for unused templates, but I do object to the removal of community oversight. —David Levy 05:47, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
I really think this is more a situation of a solution looking for a problem. There can't be but so many times that a template gets created, never used, brought to TFD, and then finds a new purpose in life. The benefit of saving time with lots of deletions every day has to far outweigh the one or two times someone might come up with something useful and not realize it. BigDT 06:03, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Again, I would support the expansion of WP:PROD to cover unused templates. The only substantive difference between that and speedy deletion is a five-day delay (which enables interested parties to examine pages in question). What would be the harm in that? —David Levy 06:13, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
If it's your own template, it probably doesn't matter too much ... but there are some templates like {{subst:test}} and the other user warning templates that don't get transcluded. So a template may look like it is unused, but in reality, it's always being subst'ed. Also, think about userboxes. This may be WP:BEANS but what's to stop someone from going through and tagging every userbox that remains in template space, rather than letting them be addressed by the WP:GUS? I really think that other than something you personally created, it needs to come through TFD. BigDT 11:11, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Okay. How about a WP:PROD-like process that applies strictly to unused templates created by the tagger (and substantially edited by no one else)? —David Levy 15:34, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
That just adds an extra step. Why not just instead put something on the db-author template or on WP:CSD that says, "if you are feel that it is possible that the page may be useful to someone else, consider raising the issue on the talk page of a relevant article or WikiProject before requesting that it be speedied"? BigDT 17:40, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
My proposed setup would not add an extra step (unless you count the five-day delay as a "step"). Either way, the template’s creator inserts a tag, and a sysop comes along and deletes the template (assuming that there are no objections). The only difference is that a WP:PROD-like system would provide a reasonable opportunity for interested parties to optionally examine the templates (without requiring anyone to do so). —David Levy 17:53, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
What does all this achieve though, that a relaxed 7 days on TfD does not? Are we in a hurry? Are these templates that are presumably not otherwise speediable as damning to the projet as the other speedy criteria? No, is the answer to all of these. There is no need for a new speedy, or pseudo-speedy to handle this. Patience, on the other hand, is a virture... -Splash - tk 23:50, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
To be clear, I proposed the above as an alternative to speedy deletion. I agree that TfD usually is the appropriate process. —David Levy 00:35, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
It still looks like a needless step. PROD works precisely because it goes right on the article, where someone should see it in five days if it's being viewed/edited. Not all templates get the same eyes on them, therefore TFD makes sense in cases where speedy deletion is not absolutely clearcut. -- nae'blis (talk) 02:10, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
That's fine by me, provided that the "mistakenly created" wording remains. —David Levy 02:25, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
The PROD system would guarantee quick undeletion of the template if it were brought to DRV; however, if a template is indeed useful to someone else, a reversion of a speedy-deletion in DRV would be likely to occur too. Also, I'm not sure how the PROD system would actually accomplish something: it would be flooded with legitimately bad templates, so most users won't bother sifting through the junk to find something useful, they would just create it themselves. Titoxd(?!?) 23:57, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

The GFDL says "Such a notice grants a world-wide, royalty-free license, unlimited in duration, to use that work under the conditions stated herein". You cannot limit an unlimited duration just because you're having a fit. The GFDL is irrevocable. Requesting deletion is not sufficient to achieve it. -Splash - tk 23:50, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

We're not talking about letting people delete anything they want. To be perfectly honest, this whole debate is silly. The current criterion as it reads right now says, "mistakenly created". Whether you realized that you made a simple mistake (misspelled the page) or a complex one (created a template that you later figured out is useless or uploaded an image that you later realized doesn't add anything to the article), both are "mistakes". The only question is how long it took you to realize your error. No administrator (I would hope) is going to delete things encyclopedic content just because someone is throwing a WikiFit. BigDT 00:49, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
What if the user did not actually intend to license his submission under the GFDL? The notice to which the above quote refers is "a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it can be distributed under the terms of this License." That is, the licensing is based on an action by the author, which is not the same as accepting that a possibly accidental submission is, ipso facto and passively, re-licensed. If the Wikimedia Foundation received a letter asking for removal of an article with only that one author, I think they would honor it. Also, this is not merely a legal matter. As said previously, Wikipedia should not be a "trap" and should honor requests to remove text added by one author. The problem is that, read literally, the current criterion would mean that an administrator must verify that it was created mistakenly, in the same way that an administrator must verify that a text is a copyright violation or that it was a recreation of deleted material. —Centrx→talk • 01:44, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
I also disagree with the proposal in the strongest terms. If authors were able to withdraw their contributions, how would we produce a print version? How would we separate their contributions from those of others? How would we convince anyone to reuse our content? Such a rule would be not just a bad idea, but an outright threat to Wikipedia as a whole. Wikipedia is, and must be, a "trap", for better or worse. Deco 02:02, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
This still applies only to cases where there have been no other substantial edits, to make the result no longer that person's sole creation. No article that is central enough to go in the print version remains for long without substantial edits by others. Any article that satisfies the criteria at Wikipedia:Version 0.5 Nominations or Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Release Version Criteria has already been around for a while with many edits. —Centrx→talk • 03:45, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Wording of I1

The actual wording of I1 gets pointed out to me fairly regularly whenever I forget that it's worded this way: "An image that is a redundant copy, in the same image file format..." I always wonder, does it make sense to be able to speedily delete redundant images in the same image file format, but not speedily delete redundant images in a different image file format? (Someone is bound to mention that different file types can be used in different ways, but if that was the case for a given image it wouldn't be redundant.) --bainer (talk) 15:15, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

You hit the nail on the head. If an image is in a different file format, it isn't redundant by speedy deletion standards. The purpose of this CSD is to enable the deletion of obvious duplicates, not images that are arguably "inferior" because of their formats. (Such a determination should be made at WP:IFD.)
I've seen numerous attempts to blindly replace PNGs with sloppy, bloated, computer-traced SVG versions, and this mustn't be carried over to speedy deletions. —David Levy 15:29, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
But if the quality of the other image is inferior then the original is not redundant. If the images are identical except for being in a different format, then surely they are just as redundant as identical images in the same format? --bainer (talk) 15:59, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
1. No, that isn't necessarily so. Due to a MediaWiki bug, all SVGs are rendered as 24-bit PNG files (which are needlessly large and display without transparency for 85% of users). While their scalability makes these files quite useful, it often is preferable to use optimized 8-bit PNG versions of the scaled images (which are smaller and display properly for most users).
2. SVGs are often perceived as "identical" to the original images, despite the fact that they contain sigificant differences. One pair of eyes is insufficient. —David Levy 16:18, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Additional speedy delete for redirects

Shouldn't we be able to speedy delete a redirect to a page that meets speedy deletion criteria? Aplomado talk 01:27, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Cleaning up after a deletion would probably come under G6, the "housekeeping" criteria, presuming that the cleaning up is not controversial. --bainer (talk) 01:33, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
A speedily deleted page no longer exists, so R1 ("redirects to non-existent pages") applies. —David Levy 01:43, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Remember, however, that pages are sometimes turned into redirects as an act of vandalism in cases like this. In this situation, it is particularly important to double-check the redirect's page-history before carrying out the housekeeping. Rossami (talk) 01:25, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Proposed amendment regard A7`

Articles should only be deleted if they're deragatory or if the Person requests deletion. We often have cases where users tag these articfes for speedy and the author promptly removes them. Because of this, all such articles should be discussed or at least given a certain amount of time (such as 24 hours) for the auther to improve the page so it doesn't get deleted to begin with. Henry Bigg 1986 12:23, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

We have the {{hangon}} tag if an author contests deletion of the article and wants to improve it. Metros232 12:24, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Which is often ignored. --badlydrawnjeff talk 12:34, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
{{hangon}} is not sufficient in itself (I've seen a hangon template hang around for three days with no subsequent edits) . The person placing it actually needs to make som effort into improving it. I tend to allow 12-24 hours to do this, after that I treat it as abandoned. If subsquent edits have been made, but it still meets speedy deletion criteria I've generally deleted it. Just now though I've thouhgt that removing the {{hangon}} template would be better? Thryduulf 00:35, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
The hangon tag is not to be used to say "I think this isn't a speedy", it's to be used to say "I think this isn't a speedy, I'm just about to tell you why on the talk page, so give me a couple minutes to write it". The tag is supposed to be removed as soon as this explanation is written. Stifle (talk) 22:59, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
I think that deleting biographical articles which do not claim any notability is indispensable. Otherwise, what would we do with the dozens, perhaps hundreds, of vanity articles created each day by people who think "hey, it would be a great idea to have a Wikipedia article about me"? Stifle (talk) 22:59, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
I concur, there is a greater danger in over-burdening the deletions process with lots of non-notables. If the article does not make the subjects notability clear, the article should be deleted. If the author is in the process of writing when the speedy is added, the {{hangon}} tag is sufficient to give the person a few minutes to write their notability into the article, or even a few sentences on the talk page. --TeaDrinker 05:55, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
No. Don't. This proposal is an extremely bad idea. A7 articles are a serious problem, and A7 was written specifically to define them by the content of the article and not the article's subject, so as to restrict argument over what does or does not meet the criteria. It has been an almost overwhelming success; in the rare case where an article about a genuinely notable person gets A7'ed due to a failure to assert that notability, it is usually simple enough to rewrite, since an article that failed to note the most important part of their subject was unlikely to have had much meaningful content in the first place. --Aquillion 00:11, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Although it sounds like a good idea, A7 has been almost an overwhelming failure as I see it. It is almost never applied correctly, and I hesitate to truly consider how many worthwhile articles have been deleted by it. Ardric47 00:05, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
The speedy category for this type of article is overkill. There's no real reason for it to be speedy: it's not as if it is a legal problem. The problem here, I think, is that there is nothing between {{prod}} and AFD: since you can't prod it if you think it likely to be contested you then have to take it to AFD. {{hangon}} isn't much help either as it often doesn't give the editor enough time to react (not everybody sits in front of wikipedia hitting F5 on their watchlists) or is invoked and nothing is done to the article. We really need an 'unlikely to be controvesial' interpretation of the prod rules (rather than the strict one that exists now) and to lose A7. Yomangani 13:26, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Amending A8?

I am thinking that it might be best to amend A8 and remove the requirement "Material is unquestionably copied from the website of a commercial content provider (e.g. encyclopedia, news service)." Currently, pages that are copyvios of materials from non-profit organizations take too long to process. People have to check if the article is a copyvio, blank the article, insert the {{copyvio}} template, and list the page on WP:CP. Then, a week later, somebody else has to verify that it is a copyvio and then speedy it. Given that there are an astronomical amount of copyvios, this can cause a lot of wasted time. Thoughts? -- Where 20:13, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

One reason for this is to allow a new article to be easily created from that information, when the copyright violation is not from a company that makes money off its content or when the copyright violation could even be questionable. However, it would nice to be able to delete all these cut-and-paste articles, and I doubt that many articles get refactored into a non-violating article. —Centrx→talk • 20:36, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
"The main reason is that it is not uncommon for an admitted copyvio to recieve permission later. "commercial content provier was intended to be a bright-line rule for those cases in what we could effectively never expect this to happen." [3]. Actually, according to that section, there was a vote in Nov-Dec 2005 that apparently supported speedy deleting all copy-and-paste articles, regardless of copyright status. I don't know why it wasn't implemented. Looking through the archives, it looks like the general consensus overall is that the criterion needs to be loosened a bit, but should not apply to all copy-paste articles or to all copyright infringements. However, with the growth of Wikipedia, it may be that copyright infringements only rarely get refactored into articles. Still, if something is important enough, an editor can easily make a one-liner out of it. A possible, but complicated compromise is to say that any copy-paste that is just plain not notable should be speedy deleted, regardless of whether it asserts notability. On another note, I think a page should be created that cleanly describes the reasons for and against each of the CSD criterion. —Centrx→talk • 20:56, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
That's a very good idea. Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion/Explanations coming right up. Stifle (talk) 23:00, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Any copvio should be deleted on sight. To knowingly keep copyvio material for whatever purpose is firstly not ethical, and secondly renders wiki and/or the uploader to legal action. This applies to all material for which permission has not been explicity given or to which fair use criteria do not apply, whether it's a newspaper, a blogger or what. To not delete because of inconvenience is unacceptable.

8 should read:

  1. An article that is a blatant copyright infringement and meets these parameters:
    • The article cannot be reverted to a non-copyvio version;
    • Uploader makes no proved assertion of permission or viable assertion of fair use;
    When tagging a page for deletion under this criterion, a user should notify the page's creator using wording similar to {{Nothanks-sd}} or an equivalent message. If the deleting administrator is notified of an error, and finds the claim of error proved, he should restore the content immediately.

(Sorry, didn't sign before. Tyrenius 10:53, 5 August 2006 (UTC))

#I5: Unused copyrighted images - (fair use replaced with free)

My proposal is that we allow fairuse images replaced with free ones to be deleted "on sight" if they're likely to be inappropriately re-added to articles. This would avoid the nuisance of anons persistantly re-adding such images and even removing the speedy tag. It removes the need for people to "baby sit" the article and image while awaiting deletion. Of course users can re-upload such images, but anons can't, so this rule would have some positive effect. I suggested this in the past, but now that images are undeleable, I see no reason not to do this now. Replacing fair use with free images seems to be hopelessly slow process, filled with silly revert warring that's a total waste.

p.s. On a minor side note, this rule should be called "Unused nonfree copyrighted images", since there's no problem with unused GFDL images. --Rob 21:50, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Per this outcome, we will be moving up the timeframe to two days instead of seven, after July 13th. Deleting unfreely-licensed images that have been replaced by freely-licensed ones on sight would mean less edit-warring and/or page protection, but would probably increase traffic at WP:DRV. Jkelly 21:54, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Ok, good point. --Rob 22:06, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

CSD U1

Why does CSD U1 apply to subpages only. Can't I have my main user page deleted if I want? TZMT (de:T) 13:08, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

My guess is that the policy doesn't allow it because otherwise, many people would request that their userpages would be deleted whenever they went on "indefinate" wikibreaks. This would be a waste of people's time. Also, I don't think there is any need for people to have their userpages deleted. -- Where 15:28, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually, you can have your user page deleted; before the present hide-my-edit button, I did. User talk pages can contain things not to be removed, like vandalism warnings; they should not be deleted without consideration. WP:MfD exists for this. Septentrionalis 23:58, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Septentrionalis is correct. User pages can be deleted upon request while user talk pages are supposed to be kept forever. However, some long-time editors have had their user talk pages deleted anyway for various reasons, like promising not to vandalize anymore if the talk page is deleted, to prevent other people from using the talk page to harass the editor, or the editor is well connnected and has the page deleted as a favor. If you want yours deleted, I suggest you kiss Jimbo's ass for several months before asking, as admins are unlikely to reverse his deletions of user talk pages, historically. ;-) -- Kjkolb 02:32, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

other non-notable advertisements

While people may create pages about themselves in vanity, what about other pages they create about things they do that are non-notable? For example we have an individual who made a film and put it on the internet. He's been trying to push through pages about him, his magical film company and now the movie. The page on him and his film company (which have only the movie he made to their credits) are covered by vanity, but is the film? Should any pages they try to make in relation to their vanity articles be considered part of the whole and qualify for speedy deletion, or is that just license to make vanity pages about the things you do rather than you yourself?--Crossmr 16:12, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Vanity isn't speediable per se. --Tony Sidaway 02:46, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Unremarkable people or groups/vanity pages While this directly references people and groups, what about other pages created in the same vein that aren't specificly about a person or group. For example person X creates a page about himself and its non-notable and speedied, but he creates a page about his pet project and its not technically about a person or group, so it doesn't technically fit the criterion. Should it be expanded to cover these types of vanity pages.--Crossmr 02:50, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
The wording has changed, I see. The use of the term "vanity" there is misleading. It is possible for a person to write a non-speediable vanity article (for instance, a newly elected member of the US Congress might be the first person to write about himself). --Tony Sidaway 02:57, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm talking about something completely non-notable, as in some high school kid rights a bio of himself, and then makes a non-notable entry about some pet-project of his that doesn't fit on a speedy criteria. While the non-notable bio on him can be speedied, there doesn't seem to be any provision for speeding his non-notable pet project, unless it happens to be a band.--Crossmr 04:30, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Proposed U2 CSD

"Personal pages (User: and User talk:, including subpages) of users who do not exist"

What do you think? googl t 19:33, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

This seems logical to me. A user page for a nonexistent user can create a great deal of confusion, and would probably cause problems if someone ever registered under that name. I can't think of any good reason why we'd want people going around creating user pages for nonexistent users, either. I feel like there's some rule or guideline out there referring to the case where someone creates such a user page, but I couldn't find any mention of it on Wikipedia:User page... --Aquillion 20:50, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
What is the best way to determine if a user exists or not? Looking at logs or other special page? --EngineerScotty 20:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
The user creation log would be useful. Also, go to the user page itself, and look for the "User contributions" link in the toolbox, if it isn't there, then the user does not exist (even a user with no edits will have a link to the contributions page). --bainer (talk) 02:27, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
This seems very reasonable to me. Absolutely no reason for User: or User talk: pages if the user with the corresponding name has never existed. I didn't even realise you could create these pages without creating a new user. :) Ansell 02:31, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Great idea. I'm a bit worried about instruction creep from having too many CSD, but I guess it is better than the alternatives. I support this proposal though. -- Where 02:33, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Agree, I delete these all the time, but generally under the flag of G2/G3/G6. — xaosflux Talk 04:08, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Note that user accounts created long ago may not have user creation log entries, at least mine doesn't. The deleting administrator should also check for user contributions from that account. —Centrx→talk • 04:21, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Special:Listusers contains a record of every account. —David Levy 05:02, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
OK, so may I add it? googl t 20:59, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
Is it needed or is it instruction creep? Stifle (talk) 17:49, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

A8 changes

NB: this discussion continues the "Amending A8?" discussion above and this discussion from the policy village pump


Having recently helped a user who, after a copyvio contribution did assert ownership and is now rewriting it to make it encyclopedic, having recently found a few tagged copyvios that were in fact from public domain sources, and in light of comments found in the archive such as those mentioned at #Amending A8?, I think there might need to be more discussion about this criterion. If the unwieldiness of WP:CP and Category:Possible copyright violations is the problem, there are at least a couple of alternatives or combinations to resolve this: 1) Copyright violations could be dated and categorized like PROD is, see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Dated categories for Deletedpages and Copyright violations; 2) the waiting time for copyright problems could be reduced, to say 3 or 5 days, which is far longer than the minutes or hours a CSD candidate gets before deletion; 3) copyright problems with claims of ownership could be dealt with more summarily with claims that are unsubstantiated or for users that don't respond within a couple days. —Centrx→talk • 04:37, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

How about making the amendment a bit stronger, like "Material is copied from a website with an obvious copyright notice that is unquestionable not compatible with Wikipedia." I may not be quite satisfied with the clarity and simplicity of this wording, but this is trying to make it airtight against deleting material that is unquestionably copied but from text that is available for licensed use on Wikipedia. —Centrx→talk • 19:40, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
All very good points. I completely agree with Centrx's proposed amendment. -- Where 19:58, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
I am not yet convinced it is necessary. I agree there must be improvements to copyvio process, but I don't see what shortening the deletion time to minutes or hours will do. As was said in the archive, "releases are grnted in a fair number of cases (albiet a small proportion of the whole) and this would be to toss out perfectly good content"; new users may also be perplexed at the disappearance of the page they created, when with discussion they might be convinced to write a non-copyvio article about the subject, etc. —Centrx→talk • 04:34, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
Good points. However, if the user uploaded the copyvio content, s/he would be able to discuss the deletion if s/he disagreed with it after seeing the {{nothanks}} template on his/her talk page. Thus, they would still be notified of the oppertunity to write a non-copyvio version and would still be able to point it out if they had released it under the GFDL. -- Where 21:12, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
I would strongly support ditching A8 entirely. It is pointless, as it allows us to delete almost nothing. -Splash - tk 22:15, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
If we just got rid of the 48 hours issue, it would be much more useful. Admins have an undelete button too if the material is proven to be from a GFDL/PD/verbatim-copy-compatible source and was deleted in error. Titoxd(?!?) 23:47, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
What could be a possibility for this and similar deletable pages is to require that it first be tagged, even by an administrator, and then another person must be the one to delete it. So, it would still be fast and efficient, but two people would look at any page where there is the possibility of, for example in this case, mis-identifying something that is actually on a mirror that copied Wikipedia. —Centrx→talk • 23:22, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
I would agree with that. Here is a possible implmenetation of that idea: How about we modify {{copyvio}} so that it automatically adds pages to Category:Copyright problems and so that it lists the user who tagged it on the page using ~~~. Then, once it is listed, an admin (who did not originally list it), can delete it. This would have an advantage over the previous system since it would be much quicker to list a page and since copyvios could be deleted quicker. Thoughts? -- Where 20:58, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
That it is not practical to insist that it be an admin in the first stage of the process. There aren't enough of them to handle CP as it is, and really if a minion-level editor (sic :) ) finds a copyvio, I can see no reason for not allowing them to tag it any say so. However, to pour some cold water on the notion of making all copyvios speedier than PRODs, there have been at least a large number of cases where the copyright owner has only come back to check on their masterpiece a few days later. Shortening its delay to 48 hours is too much by far; not all our users live, eat and drink Wikipedia and while a lot can happen in 48 hours if one is very plugged in here, it is much shorter a time to people with less engagement in Wikipedia. It is for example, about the length of a weekend away. -Splash - tk 21:01, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
The first person, tagging it, wouldn't have to be an admin, but if it were they would tag it and not delete. The idea is just to have two people, they don't have to both be admins. I agree that a user coming back to find their addition gone is a problem, but I think as was said above, the Hello, and welcome to Wikipedia! We appreciate your contributions to the [[{{{1}}}]] article, but we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material. Perhaps you would like to rewrite the article in your own words. For more information, take a look at Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Happy editing! template is tells them what happened. Regardless, it needs some streamlining, like not having to list every page on WP:CP, no matter what the delay time is. —Centrx→talk • 21:29, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

What about content that is from a website but its not a commercial content provider? I.e. in this case we had a user copy the wholesale description off a product page for a CD and just make an article out of that. Eudemonic. It can't be speedied because the website isn't an encyclopedia or newspaper, yet its obvious copyright infringement and its the entirety of the article.--Crossmr 03:19, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

You have hit on precisely the fatal flaw in A8. However, I think there'd be a pretty strong case for a CD release constituting commercial content provision. That should be a speedy. -Splash - tk 21:08, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

That fact is that most copy and paste stuff is unwikified crud. A8 needs to be turned into Gwhatever and the comercial clause needs to be removed.Geni 00:44, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Old U2 CSD

The old U2 CSD (recycling old IP talk pages) was deleted. I can't find a disscussion related to this, and I don't think that blanking is better. Say X received a vandalism warning while editing under IP 1.2.3.4. Later the vandalism warning is removed and the page is blanked. Now, Y gets IP 1.2.3.4. Y opens any Wikipedia page and the first thing (s)he sees "You have new messages", although the only "message" is the page blanking. I think this _is_ confusing. What do you think about restoring old U2? googl t 10:54, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Heres the discussion: Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive9#IP talk pages. NickelShoe (Talk) 13:40, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, how I could've missed it. googl t 14:14, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

G7 applied to user talk pages

I recently left a message on User talk:Matthew Low, but now the page is gone. It was deleted by User:(aeropagitica), evidently because it had been tagged with {{db-author}}. Is this an acceptable usage of G7? Usually the user is not the original author of the talk page, there is much substantial content on the talk page created by other users, and the talk page was not mistakenly created. —Bkell (talk) 17:37, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

I would not think that this is acceptable. Stifle (talk) 17:46, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
I don't know I've used it before on a talk page of mine I wanted deleted and someone deleted it with no qualm. Whispering 17:50, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
This is not acceptable. Any user who has had some questionable past actions disscussed on thier talk page (vandalism, incivility), can request it be deleted. The Gerg 19:03, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
An admin should ignore all rules and perhaps refuse here. Anyone who goes ahead and deletes anyway is responsible and may be subject to arbitration. (The nuremberg trials didn't find "befehl ist befehl" to be an acceptable defence, and nor do we.) Kim Bruning 20:32, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually, there's no need to ignore the rules. If the rules were followed, then the page shouldn't have been deleted at all. Read CSD G7 in its entirety:
Any page for which deletion is requested by the original author, provided the page's only substantial content was added by its author and was mistakenly created. If the author blanks the page, this can be taken as a deletion request. Note: Please check the page history to make sure there is only a single author.
  • original author: No, you're not allowed to delete your talk page, as you're deleting other users' contributions. You're not the original author. Even if you did create your talk page, if you're not the only one who has edited the page, you can't request its deletion.
  • mistakenly created: Unless someone leaves a message on your talk page and then he/she (not you) decides that it was a mistake, then perhaps the page may be deleted. You can't delete something you think is a mistake, particularily a warning.
In this case, since we're talking about a renamed user, the old user talk should be moved to the new, not deleted outright. Titoxd(?!?) 20:45, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
Ok there's where it made it ok for my talk page to be deleted I was the original author and nothing was on the page I made a talk page instead of a user subpage simple mix-up. Whispering 20:59, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

I am the owner of the talk page that spawned this discussion. How can I appropriately appeal for its deletion? PhotoBox 20:57, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

[[4]] deals with this. My judgement as to the appropriateness or otherwise of deleting this user page was down to any record of suspicious or vandal-related activities of the user on their Talk page. I couldn't see any record of this, something that perhaps a vandal might do in order to attempt to wipe their record clean, so it looked like a legitimate request. An interesting point of semantics is raised above. Multiple contributors to a Talk page rendering a Talk page as an object with the same status as a Wiki article? Does no one according to this own their own Talk pages. I will take responsibility for my actions and hold my hands up if the interpretative error of the CSD request is down to me.  (aeropagitica)  (talk)  21:53, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
If you are leaving wikipedia, or if you have overriding privacy reasons, you can request deletion. To do so, write an email to the wikipedia contact address with your request. Kim Bruning 21:57, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the info. I am planning to leave Wikipedia. Where can I find the 'wikipedia contact address'? PhotoBox 22:04, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
I've had some of my edits deleted when someone else's talk page was deleted. This is slightly annoying as my original contributions could have been copied to other places without attribution, and now it would appear that I didn't come up with the ideas. However, the page was deleted despite my objections and with no particularly good reason for deletion. I think the user was not even leaving WP. I don't know if this sets a precedent. Stephen B Streater 22:16, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

New image CSD proposal

This was mentioned above, I would like to gather consensus.

  • Proposed CSD: I10 - Images that were used only on pages that have been deleted and were uploaded shortly before or anytime after any of the pages were created.

See above (under "patently worthless media" for further discussion. Stifle (talk) 17:48, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

The current setting is a bit unclear as to what to do with these, so it would be better to be uniform about them. Sure. Titoxd(?!?) 20:46, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
I approve of the idea, but I have a couple of minor comments. First of all, I'd suggest that we restrict this to cases where the uploader was a major editor (if not the only significant editor) of the deleted article (should only be for articles) in question. Second, we should restrict to cases where the article was deleted for being on a topic unsuitable to inclusion in the encyclopedia. For instance, if someone created an article on an individual musician, it might be okay for an article to exist on the band's article even if the musician on their own is too minor. I don't know if we can meet that in a totally unambiguous criterion, though. Mangojuicetalk 20:53, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, I don't know if that's needed. For one thing, if the image proves useful in another article it can always be restored or reuploaded later. Stifle (talk) 23:17, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for bringing this back up. I don't know that I like linking it with page time. That leaves it too open - what is shortly? Should an administrator not speedy the image because the logo for some band was uploaded Friday, but they didn't get around to starting the article until Monday morning? I kinda like something closer to my wording - "Images used only on deleted articles that have no other encyclopedic use." The whole idea is so that when someone's advertisement/vanity article is deleted, the 10 pictures of themselves they uploaded can be deleted too and we don't have to go through the process of tagging each one for deletion. BigDT 01:40, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm with you on page time; I prefer the idea that it be uploaded by the article creator (or its main editor). "No other encyclopedic use" is what I was trying to get at.. but doesn't it seem a little too open-ended? Mangojuicetalk 02:10, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
You're right ... it does ... and I'm trying to think of a better way to say it. Maybe the tag needs to say "have a little common sense when deleting it". ;) I guess my thought was that if Bob's Petting Zoo creates an article that gets deleted after a {{prod}}, but Bob uploaded a nice GFDL photo of a cat, there's no reason to delete the cat - just the logos that serve no purpose any more. BigDT 02:16, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
  • I oppose this. Orphaned fair use images can already be deleted quickly (if not, they should be, so should any dubiously licensed image). Orphaned free images should be deleted only if listed on IFD, so good ones can be saved for use in other articles, or possibly transferred to Commons. One admin shouldn't decide alone, if there's no possible use for an image (here or on Commons). I would be open to the idea of allowing speedies of image spamming (e.g. "the 10 pictures of themselves" example above). Also, if there's doubt whether an image is actually free, and its orphaned, then that should be speedied. But I just don't think we're being swamped with definatively free images, and so I see little need for speedying them. --Rob 03:14, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
    • This is one of those things where WikiCommonSense needs to be used. If someone uploads 50 worthless images for their advertisement, there's no reason that the closing administrator shouldn't just delete the images along with the ad. Requiring that they be tagged, the uploader notified, and possibly (depending on the license) the images listed at IFD is nothing but a pointless exercise in wasting time. If we had lots of people patrolling images and inappropriate images were quickly deleted, I'd agree with you, but as it is, it takes a really long time for something improper to get noticed and removed. Check out Special:Uncategorizedimages. There are images in there that were uploaded months ago that are unsourced, unlicensed, unused, yet sitting happily undisturbed. Either Orphanbot missed them or, in many cases, the uploader just blanks Orphanbot's warnings. Until such time as there are enough image patrollers to cope with the number of images, we need tools like this CSD to help take some of the workload. BigDT 18:22, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Speedy time

Just something I was wondering about I've seen prods before stating that if the article wasn't so old they would of tagged it for speedy. So I was wondering is there a time limit on such thing? Or if a article is speedy material it's always a speedy candidate? Whispering 18:27, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyvios are speediable in their first 48 hours, otherwise I believe the logic is that they may have acquired enough edits/been picked up by enough mirrors to make determination of copyright violation more complex. That's the only one I can think of that's time-sensitive... -- nae'blis (talk) 21:59, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
Alright thanks for the reply. Whispering 20:57, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
It shouldn't be prodded in that case, though, it should be blanked and {{copyvio}} added. Stifle (talk) 23:16, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm gonna disagree with that. I think copyvio articles on subjects that WP shouldn't cover should ALSO be prodded. If they're deleted this way, all the better: prod is a lot less work to check than copyvio, and there's always a huge copyvio backlog. Mangojuicetalk 02:11, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
This is an excellent idea. —Centrx→talk • 21:15, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Images moved to commons should be speedy deletable.

Images 'moved'/'coppied' to commons (with compatible license of course) should be speedy deleted. Are there any objections for such a thing? If so why? --Cat out 23:53, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

See WP:CSD#I9. Dragons flight 00:00, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

i6

CSD:I6 stipulates that only "image[s ...] tagged only with {{fairuse}} or {{fairusein}}, with no fair use rationale, may be deleted seven days after it was uploaded". There are enumerable templates that also require a detailed fair-use rationale ({{tv-screenshot}}, {{movie poster}}, {{albumcover}}, etc); why are they not subject to CSD:I6 and only {{fairuse}} or {{fairusein}} are? — pd_THOR | =/\= | 20:44, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Simply because it's easy to slap a {{fairuse}} tag on a page, and for the time being patrolling all those other categories would be too much to do. Anyway, the fair use rationale for an album cover, movie poster, etc. is fairly obvious. Stifle (talk) 23:15, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

A suggestion for T2

Can I suggest the following as speediable? "Any template which serves an identical purpose to one previously deleted". I recently speedied a template on these grounds using A4 and its creator of it has contested this, saying that although the template served an identical purpose, it was worded considerably differently. Grutness...wha? 00:09, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

  • I assume you mean G4... anyway, if all that has changed is the order of words but the content remains the same, it sounds substantially identical. Unless the change might have remedied the problem that caused it to be deleted in the first place, then a second look is probably not in order. Christopher Parham (talk) 17:14, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

A suggestion for U2

(Or Un, if U2 is already open.)

  • User pages for a non-existent user:
(i.e., User:FooBar can be speedily deleted unless there is actually a User named Foobar.)

— Arthur Rubin | (talk) 19:58, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

See #Proposed U2 CSD. googl t 20:13, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

I have added it. If someone thinks it is instruction creep, they can remove it. —Centrx→talk • 21:43, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
I've added some exceptions. If you disagree, you can remove the clause and explain here. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 21:48, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
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