Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Wikinfo (5th nomination)

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

The result was Keep. There is reasonable disagreement regarding the question of whether reliable sources are provided, and whether notability conferred by forking from Wikipedia constitutes some sort of self-reference and/or conflict of interest. However, it is clear that consensus to delete will not emerge from this discussion; although consensus can change, the extensive record of past nominations concerning precisely the same questions suggests that the community's feelings on this article are unlikely to shift. Further nominations are discouraged, absent new information, or new arguments. Xoloz 15:42, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wikinfo

Wikinfo (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Wikinfo has previously been nominated for deletion four times, and honestly in every one of them I don't see any actual claim to notability. The only arguments I see on the side of keep are:

• Functioning Fork of Wikipedia
  • This is a huge example of bias toward ourselves. If we're going by the size of a Wiki and it's ability to function, instead of WP:WEB, certainly we would have articles on many more Wikis than we do. Compare Wikinfo's statistics to another wiki. You'd think from the statistics alone that Wikinfo is less notable than the other one, yet the other one has been deleted no less than six times. If it is infact notable because It's a fork of an existing project which is notable, then it should be merged to Wikipedia's article, not given it's own article, per WP:N, which states that the notability of something applies to articles subject, but not content.
• Notable
  • These votes never actually link to a reliable source that shows that it is in fact notable.
• Bad-faith nom
  • While this can be a legitimate reason to close an AFD, it's not a valid reason to keep an article that just doesn't meet our policies.

Now, there are only two reliable sources I see on Wikinfo that mention it at all, and the name only appears three times in one paragraph, while the article is actually about Wikipedia. This almost certainly qualifies it as a "trivial mention" at best. A quick look at google shows no reliable sources in the first five pages, which there almost certainly would be. A Google News search returns zero results, and a Google scholar search returns only one thing (other than our existing sources) which, and I'm not even sure if it's a reliable source, given it's in German, again only mentions Wikinfo twice, in a single paragraph.

I've seen absolutely nothing to suggest that this page is being kept for anything but WP:ILIKEIT, WP:USEFUL, and WP:OHHEYTHEYRETALKINGABOUTUS. Furthermore, even their own main page has red links to fairly major topics, as well as a redlinked project page. I have seen absolutely nothing that makes me think this article is a "Special Case" that gets to ignore our notability requirements, and a lot that makes me think that people are only voting keep because they are an offshoot of ourselves. If being an offshoot of Wikipedia is the only reason they are mentioned, Merge it with Wikipedia, and watch it get worked out of that article. I'd be more than happy to keep this if it had more than trivial mentions, or mention at all in the press. However, it does not and should be deleted for a total lack of reliable sources, or any proof of notability under WP:WEB. lucid 12:45, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

• Strong Delete - Zero reliable secondary sources that actually deal with the subject (trivial mention). Beyond that, it certainly fails WP:WEB. The WP:IAR arguments are unconvincing. /Blaxthos 13:43, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
• Delete per lack of significant coverage from this wiki. Corpx 15:58, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
• Delete non-notable, fails WP:WEB etc.— JyriL ^talk 22:44, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
• Keep per previous nominations and role in the history of Wikipedia (one of the first and longest-functioning fork). I frankly don't see the value of nominating an article of this nature for deletion for the 5th time. Newyorkbrad 01:02, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong keep - per agruments that was written in previous nominations. 5th nomination? I see that some editors of Wikipedia only don´t like rival encyclopedias. --Dezidor 01:37, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Then why did we feature an article on by far our biggest rival? Your argument doesn't stand up. --W.marsh 00:39, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
• Comment Above two comments show what I'm talking about perfectly. Notable because it's a fork of Wikipedia (Being a fork of Wikipedia is NOT a notability criteria. If it is only notable because it's a fork of Wikipedia, that would be a grounds to merge it to Wikipedia, not keep it), "Keep, it was already nominated" votes, which is not a valid reason to keep an article, and "Keep, bad faith nom". This has nothing to do with Wikinfo being a fork of Wikipedia, or me 'not liking rival encyclopedias' (I loathe Conservapedia, but they are notable), and everything to do with them not being notable. WP:CCC As well-- just because it was nominated before doesn't mean that consensus will change, or even that consensus was correct. Again, nobody has been able to find any reliable sources that give it more than a trivial mention. --lucid 04:01, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
• Keep. Arguments about notability have been made before, and consensus was that Wikinfo is notable as functioning fork of Wikipedia. Third-party sources have been provided and rejecting them as "trivial" is unconvincing, the article is accurate and complete, and there's no reason to reject the consensus achieved in many prior AfD's. Casey Abell 17:34, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment As nobody has actually shown any third party sources that give Wikinfo more than a trivial mention, would you care to back up your statement? Without actually showing a source, there's absolutely no proof one exists like you claim they do. And actually, the article is very poor, there's three external sources, used as such: 1- A source that requires the user to log in, that might not even mention Wikinfo, the main article (what people can actually see about it), and is only used to back up the statement "They use SPOV instead of NPOV" 2- The second source is from this extremely unreliable website, and only mentions Wikinfo once in two sentences, only to really again say "It's a fork". 3- A German source that only mentions it in a single paragraph of a large article about wikipedia, and only used to back up the statement "SPOV not NPOV". Everything else is derived directly from their site, with some things referencing their VP archives!. There's been absolutely no case made that they're notable as an offshoot, just "oh well they are so there", which sounds suspiciously like WP:ILIKEIT. --lucid 04:19, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
• Keep A fork of a very well known project can be notable if t here are sources to show it's well known, and there are. Just barely, but sufficient. Paid sources are acceptable. Paid external links, no, but as sources, sure. DGG (talk) 09:56, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Looking at the publication's own article, we see This full version (which needs to be removed), it only mentions Wikinfo once -- and that mention is referencing Wikipedia. I see no actual discussion of Wikinfo itself on the site, just a very trivial "this is what someone else says" reference, which could've come from any of our criticizing websites. Again, there are no sources that show that Wikinfo is well known or notable, and the fact that four keep votes have not found a single source that even suggests that is evidence of this. All of the sources provided have been extremely trivial mentions. In addition, there is no notability clause that states that forks of well known projects are notable-- and the fact that Linux Distribution articles are ever deleted is proof of this. They are all forks and derivative works of the Linux kernel and other Linux distros, but many of them are still deleted. In addition, not even official Wikimedia project Wikipedias are always notable, see Assamese, Inuktitut, Irish Gaelic, Luxembourgish, Mongolian, Nahuatl, Quechua, Scots, Uyghur, not to mention the large number of redlinks on List of Wikipedias. If Official Wikipedias are not notable, how in the world is an unofficial fork of Wikipedia? --lucid 11:04, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

I do not see how the official/unofficial distinction has the least thing to do with notability one way or another.DGG (talk) 17:18, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. If OFFICIAL WIKIPEDIAS are not notable, how in the world is an UNOFFICIAL FORK OF WIKIPEDIA? If notability IS INHERITED, then WIkimedia projects would BY DEFAULT always be notable --lucid 00:05, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

• Delete were this a random forum, or worse yet, a site critical of Wikipedia, it would probably be speedy deleted. Keeping it around just has always seemed like bias, given the lack of sourcing... and we need to counter bias. --W.marsh 00:34, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
• KeepElmao 11:33, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletions. -- John Vandenberg 08:50, 8 September 2007 (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 article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.