Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Vanispamcruftisement

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellany page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was keep by overwhelming consensus. El_C 04:22, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Vanispamcruftisement

This essay is a race to the bottom: it reduces dialog down to simply name-calling rather than discussion the issues of an article. Its shortcut, WP:VSCA, was recently used as the sole justification for a support vote for a AfD on another article. This is not dialog or collaboration: it is just tossing labels around to avoid the issues. It is also a burdensome neologism, which we are supposed to be avoiding according the guidline WP:NEO. If it was funny at one time, then, OK, we have all had a laugh for six months. We have all had our laugh now. This is not communcation: it is name-calling and depreaction via neologism without the least trace of genuine, sincere communication. Heck, I thought the thing was, for a moment, in German the word is so long and ridiculous. It is trying to say so much that it succeeds in communicating nothing. If you are going to vote in an AfD, at least try to demonstrate that you read the article from start to finish. This is just a shortcut for the ignorant and inarticulate to hide behind. What does this cumbersome term accomplish that is not already covered by WP:NN and WP:CSD#A7? Is this just a backdoor way to trying to suggest that something is not notable when, in fact, it is notable? This cumbersome neologism itself amounts to nothing more than vanity on Freakofnuture's part. Get rid of it. This neologism reduced discussion down to strictly a popularity contest. This is about what you want Wikipedia to be: superficial and based on popularity or educational and rule based. Rules require thought, intelligence and judgement. Popularity and cliques do not. -- DocCory 04:20, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

• Strong Keep This term elegantly captures a plethora of faults that plague articles that deserve to be deleted. I am afraid that the proposer is somewhat bitter at the result of an AfD, and is trying to make a point by this proposal. -- Avi 04:13, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Note, this userid seems to have been created with the express purpose of this MfD:

• DocCory (talk • contribs • count • logs • page moves • block log • email)

I am afraid we might have an arachnoid mountaineer issue 8-D. -- Avi 04:21, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

• Strong keep this is the distilled essence of AfD. Sorry some AfD outcome didn't go your way but there's no need to make a scene about it. Opabinia regalis 05:06, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
  • This simply means: "I am too lazy to figure out which rule actually applies, so I will just say 'many of them, but do not ask me which ones'". It is like the traffic cop writing you a ticket because you have broken "some law, somehow". It is too vague to be useful. -- DocCory 05:19, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
    • This is an essay. It's not meant to be used as a rule. — Saxifrage ✎ 19:51, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep I fail to see how it "reduces dialog down to simply name-calling" - the symptoms of Vanispamcruftisement are sadly part of the world of Wikipedia, and I think Vanispamcruftisement is a acceptable choice for naming them. CharonX/talk 13:00, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, but:
  1. "Speedy keep" does not mean "strong keep". If you move for speedy keep, please explain why you think this discussion should be closed before the normal length of time.
  2. As has been pointed out, User:DocCory's account was created to start this MfD (note that you need to create a new page to form an MfD, so creating an account to start an MfD is absolutely valid). He has no contributions to any AfD. Claiming that this nomination is due to an AfD that didn't go his way is assuming bad faith. No more, please. --Sam Blanning^(talk) 14:51, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

• Would you prefer snowy keep then? Opabinia regalis 23:23, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

• WP:SNOW is primarily a deletion review argument for not starting another discussion; it's not an argument for closing current ones a few days before it becomes necessary. What, is it Judgement Day tomorrow and we're all going to hell if we leave MfDs open? --Sam Blanning^(talk) 14:54, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• Strong keep. This appears to be a nomination that assumes the essay is in bad-faith. — Saxifrage ✎ 19:45, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep per Avi. The essay is not written in bad faith, and is in fact quite interesting and valid. Stifle (talk) 22:33, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. If you see users citing it at AfDs then think of it as if they said "I think it's a vanity article" + "I think it's spam" + "I think it's cruft" at the same time. Imo the only purpose of WP:VSCA is to save time and characters. If someone says "vanispamcruftisement" and the article isn't (say) a vanity article, correct him at the AfD immediately. But don't bring the essay to MfD just because of that. --Zoz (t) 23:19, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Personally, I prefer Vancarlimospacecraft, it's easier to remember 8-D -- Avi 23:21, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Yep, and what's more, it boosts the word entropy of the wikislang! --Zoz (t) 00:05, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• Keep per Zoz' fine explanation and inasmuch as any essay that is written in good faith and in view of encyclopedic purposes (as understood by the author/editors of the essay) should be kept unless the fact of its existence becomes extraordinarily disruptive; no disruption is evidenced here, and, in fact, the essay—rightly or wrongly—is often adduced at AfD, such that it serves to faciliate the deliberative process that underlies the project. Joe 23:57, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Possible biting of new users nonwithstanding, it's a valuable internal way to talk about the deluge of junk Wikipedia gets. If nothing else, it's too old to die cleanly anyway: a projectspace deletion will just cause it to move to userspaces everywhere, so the deletion would create work and hassle . -- stillnotelf is invisible 02:09, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. Looking through the links to this page, it's clearly doing more harm than good, as I can't find an instance in which it was useful, and in every instance it is pointlessly inconsiderate. Though the lack of consideration on the part of AFD users is unlikely to be corrected by deleting this page. Christopher Parham (talk) 06:46, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep used throughout AfD http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Whatlinkshere&target=Wikipedia%3AVanispamcruftisement]. Per above :P Computerjoe's talk 10:29, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep Highly-used, interesting page. Almost certainly a bad faith nom (although I'm attempting to assume good faith), and even if it wasn't, my opinion on the page would be the same. I actually just used it in an AfD, and I was shocked to see that this was up for deletion. -- Kicking222 21:16, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, interesting article! --TheM62Manchester 21:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: It is interesting and funny as an essay when it is time for play, but when we get back to work and are trying to decide if the work of others should be deleted, it is an obfucating neologism. Hey, I am flexible. A proposed compromise: let us destroy the shortcut, rename the artitle to a descriptive title and we can provide the proper hint that this essay is only good for playtime and baby-talk. -- DocCory 07:31, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. The term itself is self-explanitory and the article itself is useless outside of giving someone credit for inventing a neologism, which is usually frowned upon by WP. Furthermore, the term, especially when use as a derisive, just makes the WP community look insular--people just throw that on top of a AFD and while all us insiders nod in agreement, it does little to instruct new users on the sins of vanity or advertisement or cruft. Linking to WP:SPAM, WP:CRUFT, or WP:VANITY instead will be more instructional and allow for a single click to find information--don't underestimate single-clicks, ask your nearest information architect. Terms like this should be discouraged because it can be misconstructed as a personal attack (per WP:CIVIL) and just makes WP look more like the insular cabal that it denies to be. hateless 05:26, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep the irony, tag it with {{humour}} if you want. - Mailer Diablo 16:33, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Disagreement with an essay or how people use it is not valid grounds for deletion. Sandstein 16:44, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

• Comment Excellent point, Sandstein. — MrDolomite | Talk 03:40, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

• Strong Keep per most of above. -^demon^{[yell at me]} 22:51, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Already tagged as WP:ESSAYS, not WP:POL. Definitely gets to the heart of what WP:NOT from many directions. Used in XfD pages where it is needed. — MrDolomite | Talk 03:39, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
• Hmm Comment As mentioned above about possible new userid creation, the first thing I thought on this MfC was "Gee, that's an awfully long nomination with a fairly extensive knowledge of WP references for someone who didn't bother to make a user page." — MrDolomite | Talk 03:44, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
  • So what am I to think? That you would rather just deal with new and naive users who find this meaningless neologism to be cool and fascinating? Perhaps that only you, your hip friends and new users should be allowed input into the deletion process? That is how it works in the world of Logan's Run, but that world is vacuous and dystopia, and eventually, it becomes your turn to be excluded when you fall out of favor with the new trendy crowd. -- DocCory 09:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
    • Its an essay. WP:NEO doesn't apply. — Dark Shikari ^talk/_contribs 19:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
      • Please do not jest with us. We are all here of above-average I.Q. It is plainy and overtly used as a WP:NEO. Why, some of these people suggest that it cannot be deleted simply because it has been frequently used as a WP:NEO. -- 75.25.180.27 05:06, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
        • Shikari isn't jesting—WP:NEO only applies to articles and this isn't one. If WP:NEO applied to all of Wikipedia then we'd be in dire trouble using any term that originated within the Wikipedia culture! We wouldn't be able to say NPOV, for starters, or wikilove, of which we could use more right here and now. — Saxifrage ✎ 05:13, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
          • Yeah, wikilove is another problematic piece of jargon, but it is not often used in the context of an AfD. This piece of vague-to-the-point-of-meaningless jargon is used in the context of an AfD and that is why it is a problem. Again: the problem is that people are avoiding the real issues of AfD's by resotring to this peice of jargon. There are plenty of other peices of jargon in Wikipedia that are OK. But not this one. -- DocCory 13:26, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
            • Deleting the essay won't solve your problem. You seem to have a problem with part of Wikipedia culture that this essay is a product of. You can't just hand out a list of "acceptable" jargon and expect that people will only be able to use that. People will express themselves as they see fit. If you have a problem with how one person or a number express themselves, trying to make a word "taboo" is not addressing the issue. — Saxifrage ✎ 16:51, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
              • I wish that we use this word only in playtime, but that is not what is happening. I feel that exercising judgement and communicating about decisions to delete the work of others to be worktime. I proposed a compromise above that does not involve deleting the essay, but your approach suggests to be that you are not receptive to compromise. -- DocCory 21:40, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
                • I must have missed the proposed compromise. Could you restate it? — Saxifrage ✎ 23:42, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
                  • I can, but I won't. Just click control-f in your web browser and search for the word "compromise". Nobody else is using the word, so it should be pretty easy to find my proposed compromise, which is currently being ignored. -- DocCory 01:12, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
                    • Ah, that compromise. No thanks. I generally don't sign on to anything that belittles editors as children by design. — Saxifrage ✎ 02:53, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep. Possible bad faith nom. — Dark Shikari ^talk/_contribs 19:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete Confusing; it covers too broad a sweep.--Runcorn 21:36, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
• DeleteIt's an ugly word used to turn off the brain. Check out Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sexual Freedom League for a particularly ugly situation where a bit of history was damn near put in the dustbin partially because of this word, which in fact does not apply at all. Bustter 22:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: I can think of quite a few cases where another ugly phrase, "non-notable" was used inappropriately. Does that mean we should delete that essay too? I think it's better to simply point out when it's used inappropriately. --Zoz (t) 15:44, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, useful and funny. —Nightstallion (?) 10:04, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Keep, it is articles like this which gives wikipedia it's flavour. This and the excellent content are the two reasons I keep on coming back. Mathmo 13:28, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Well, for those who actually produce results at Wikipedia, I can assure you that watching the results of their work be tossed into the toilet because of "Vanispamcruftisement", well... that leaves a bad taste in their mouth. You might be all wearing shit-eating grins, but for the person who actually did the work, it leaves a bad tasted in their mouth. Especially genuine experts. -- DocCory 21:43, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.