Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2006 May 17

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1 May 17, 2006

[edit] May 17, 2006

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

The result of the debate was keep Circeus

[edit] Template:Link FA

{{Link FA}}
(Per the metadata nominations below) - Another metadata template which violates policy. Raul654 21:10, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Which policy does it violate? Kusma (討論) 21:54, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
- Ditto, I must say this is a very useful template, and when I saw someone add it to a page I thought it was genious!. It is as it always was ^{T | @ | C} 22:08, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  - The policy is to keep metadata out of articles (so as to make them re-usable outside of wikipedia). Raul654 22:10, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
    - I don't see how metadata makes it harder to reuse the content. See also Wikipedia:Persondata, which puts lots of invisible metadata on article pages. Does this violate policy? Kusma (討論) 22:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
      - Meta-data, in this case, refers to Wikipedia-related designations (featured article, good article, stub, 'etc), which are of no interest to anyone outside of Wikipedia. These makes it *MUCH* harder to run a coherent mirror and have to be specially deleted. Raul654 22:34, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
        
        I would like to hear from someone who actually runs a mirror how we can best help them. For example, we do have {{selfref}}, we could also make sure all metadata is wrapped in a standard form that our mirrors recognize. I am all for helping mirrors run by people communicating their problems to us; not doing useful things here because they might break on mirrors is not a valid reason to me. Kusma (討論) 22:38, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
        
        It's not just about web mirrors (although that is one of the most common reuses). Basically anyone who reuses wikipedia text is negatively impacted by meta-data pollution in articles. That's why talk pages were invented in the first place - to avoid just this. Raul654 22:41, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
        
        Have you just started a fight against {{cleanup}}, {{NPOV}} and all stub templates? There are so many useful Wikipedia-related templates used on articles that maybe some other solution than removing all of them (that seems to be what you want) is more appropriate. Kusma (討論) 22:58, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
        
        Moving them to the talk pages would be most appropriate. And the fact that stub (an ancient tag invented back in the days when good practices weren't well defined) exists should not be used as a justification for more bad templates. Raul654 22:59, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

delete: a per {{featured article}}, this looks to me like pointless bragging. If I need the French (say) version of an article, then I need it, regardless of its quality, which I will be able to evaluate for myself by cunning use of the big slimy thing between my ears. I find it hard to believe that there are many people who choose between the French, Hebrew or Scots version of an article based on which one has a gold star. — Johan the Ghost _seance 22:49, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Keep per {{featured article}} - yes, keep metadata down as far as possible, but this is useful metadata. There is little enough inter-language-wiki co-operation: it is helpful to know that a poor :en article has an excellent cousin at :fr or :de or wherever - these are prime candidates for augmentation by translation. -- ALoan (Talk) 23:12, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
- "these are prime candidates for augmentation by translation" - That's what template:FAOL, an already extant template, was specficially created for. Raul654 23:13, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  - Indeed, but given that the interwikis are there already (is that Wikipedia-related metadata?) what difference if there is an extra star attached? What do mirrors do with interwikis anyway? It may be pointing people to the snappily-titled Wikipedia:Keep Wikipedia-related metadata out of articles. (Keep policy titles short... grumble...) -- ALoan (Talk) 23:59, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. The template aids significantly in identifying which articles should use {{FAOL}}, as well as to indicate ordinary editors that a sister Wikipedia may have more information than our own, in case they understand the relevant language. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 01:02, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- "aids significantly in identifying which articles should use {{FAOL}}": Isn't that rather spurious logic? Person A puts the star on the article, to hint to person B that he/she should put {{FAOL}} in the talk page? Why didn't person A just put {{FAOL}} in the talk page? — Johan the Ghost _seance 15:11, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  - Because users might not know about the existence of {{FAOL}} when coming from other Wikipedias, but the featured star next to the interwiki link is more prevalent in other wikis, so they may be more familiar with it. Tito xd^{(?!? - help us)} 17:32, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, per Raul654. I was okay with the FA star for our own featured articles at first, but this is just unnecessary. — Rebelguys2 ^talk 03:59, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, helpful in transwikiing good content. Also, if a reader is bilingual and sees an FA on his other language's article, he might read that one instead because it's likely to be more accurate. --Rory096 05:13, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, cut the spread of this crap. It makes Wikipedia looks like a self-righteous joke. Christopher Parham (talk) 05:40, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, it's so unobtrusive and useful to know at a glance that you're looking at a featured quality article. - Phorque 09:01, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, anoither one of the rare cases in which metadata is useful enough to make the tradeoff against database purity worthwhile. -- grm_wnr Esc 11:17, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Comment - Setting aside the 'self congratulatory' objection (which is a matter of perspective and could as easily be applied to the concept of 'Featured' articles in general) the primary issue here seems to be portability... if the template is not copied over to wherever then it appears as a red-link or printed text or something else unintended. Can't this be solved with CSS, the 'selfref' template, or some other means? I'd like to see a global 'do not mirror this content' identifier which could be put around all the 'cleanup', 'stub', 'link FA', 'metadata', 'spoilers', et cetera. Possibly a no-mirror 'magic word' such as {{nm:linkfa}} or <nomirror> tags. Stuff of this nature has always existed and always will exist on Wikipedia. We should be looking for better ways to exclude it from mirrors/printouts rather than fighting over which are and are not useful enough to retain. I don't have a strong opinion on whether this particular 'metadata' is a net positive or negative... but I think fighting over that issue is silly when it ought to be possible to retain the positive aspects of all metadata while removing the negative impacts on mirrors. --CBDunkerson 12:05, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- The "self-congratulatory" issue does not apply in general if it's kept to the talk page. The article namespace is not the place for that kind of thing; the article namespace should strive for the quality and neutrality of a good encyclopedia. You don't see articles in Britannica with footnotes to the effect that "isn't this a great article!". — Johan the Ghost _seance 15:11, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep. For one thing, it is a good reference if you are looking for material to improve the article that is FA in another language. Second, it is a nice example of cooperation between different languages. And third, it is not a fancy coloured template that covers half a page, I don't see why you find it annoying. --Ton e 12:54, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. I was pleasently surprised when I saw these unobtrusive markings on the interlanguage links, and they do serve a useful purpose to the encyclopedia. By pointing to featured articles in other languages, they give editors a chance to improve the English articles by incorporating information from the featured ones in other languages, which can only be a Good Thing. Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:54, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Neutral, what really needs to go is the whole concept of Featured Articles. WP:OWNership gets really bad after an article has become an FA, with the people who worked towards getting there fighting to keep any substantial change away from the article. Which is a real pity considering how badly written most featured articles are. So yeah, delete this template, and delete the whole idea behind this template. Angr (t • c) 15:54, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- How would you select the articles that are featured on the main page? -- ALoan (Talk) 16:05, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  - I'd stop featuring articles on the main page. It suggests these articles are somehow "done", when they aren't, and when newcomers come to the main page and see that the best Wikipedia has to offer is in most cases laughably mediocre, it can only hurt our credibility. Angr (t • c) 19:03, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
    - "Laughably mediocre"? Restoration spectacular? Sicilian Baroque? Hubble Space Telescope? S. A. Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition of 1897? Saffron? 1755 Lisbon earthquake? Krag-Petersson? Simon Byrne? Welding? -- ALoan (Talk) 19:35, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
      - Hmm... you're right, "laughably mediocre" was inappropriate. I should have said "sadly mediocre". Angr (t • c) 06:27, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
        
        For one who is so quick to dump on the good work done by others, I don't remember seeing too many great articles written by yourself. Raul654 06:32, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
        
        I'm proud of the articles I've started (you can see a list here), and of the ones I've worked hard on with others (e.g. Berlin), but I would never be so arrogant as to assert that my own work is "the best Wikipedia has to offer". Angr (t • c) 07:59, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Strong Keep This is a very useful peice of metadata. Identifying high-quality information is a very useful tool, and can only help Wikipedia's reputation when the good stuff is easy to find. If the good stuff is available in another language, and someone speaks that language, why shouldn't they be alerted to this fact? The key is providing useful information, after all... and I also agree that it makes translation from that other article more likely, {{FAOL}} is a good template for talk pages, but when looking up information, I don't always GO to the talk page. In fact, I would hazard a guess that there are thousands, or millions of users of wikipedia who are not usually editors who NEVER go to talk pages... but they might know the other language, and on seeing the star, might consider translating it for us. I understand that too much metadata clogs things up for users mirrors alike, but we need to figure out where "too much" lies, and I argue that it doesn't lie here. This peice of metadata, I would argue, is useful TO users, including and esspecially for non-editor users, and mirrors can strip it out. Fieari 17:07, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. CTOAGN (talk) 19:38, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. As per {{featured article}}, I have found this to be very useful more than once. Schutz 23:29, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep Per Tone & Fieari... On the pro-deletion side, at least it's not a userbox... :-) --Ssbohio 01:45, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep for much the same reason as my rationale on the below metadata templates vote. We are trying to create an encyclopedia for the masses here. Part of that endeavor is to ensure that people know which articles we trust and take pride in. --Danaman5 06:12, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep: as per above comments. - Tutmosis 12:41, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, a useful tool and if we are going to purge this as metadata then shouldn't we remove all normal interlanguage links? the wub "?!" 14:00, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep. Really useful. Poppypetty 21:32, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, featured-article star next to interwikis are interesting if not conspicuously useful (and I don't really buy the mirror argument; our mirrors appear to do fine at ignoring such tags, by and large). —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:07, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep as per Danaman5. I find the small star unobtrusive and welcomed it when it arrived. --BillC 08:49, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep per Simetrical. It useful, and interesting. I don't understand the point all of this anti metadata crusading. Falphin 17:43, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep Often the best Wikipedia article is not in English but in some other language - this little template has helped me find good information in the past. Haukur 19:28, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. This is a useful resource both for people who speak other languages, indicating that another language's article may be better than en's, but also for en contributors to identify where there are good articles to take inspiration from. I've never seen a problem on a mirror from this? -- Mithent 23:32, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. Mighty useful. As for 'The policy to keep metadata out of articles (so as to make them re-usable outside of wikipedia)' I always thought it was one of the most useless and restricting policies we have. Where can one recommend policies for deletion?--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 20:44, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. Useful. —DDima ^(talk) 20:49, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep this extremely helpful template and amend any applicable policy to specifically allow it. Silensor 23:23, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep. This is useful both for multilingual users wanting to expand articles, and for "advertising" smaller Wikipedias to native speakers of that language who only contribute to the English version. Jon Harald Søby 05:55, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep. —Nightst a llion (?) 06:03, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep NCurse 08:17, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete - the standard of featured articles on some Wikipedias is incredibly poor. As such, using it as a gauge of quality isn't very useful. Interlanguage links are useful to people who are looking for additional information in a language they understand, or information in one they understand better. Knowing whether by that Wikipedia's standards the article is particularly good or not doesn't tell you anything about whether the link solves your problem if the said featured article is worse than the unfeatured English equivalent. BigBlueFish 15:20, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep - useful to know which articles have featured status on other wikipedias. May inspire people to feature english articles. =Nichalp «Talk»= 12:02, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, it's useful. MaxSem 14:50, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep as this shows where the strengths lie on topics in the Wikipedia world, and allows users to collate information from across languages. Harr o5 09:07, 26 May 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 template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was deleted by User:ALoan Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Series box

Template:Series box (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
This template is a copy of the well-known Template:Succession box. It was created about a year ago and used exclusively on Church of Latter Day Saints figures. I've orphaned it with AWB and now request its deletion. Mackensen (talk) 19:33, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Delete per nom. – Someguy0830 (Talk | contribs) 05:29, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete. It's depracated, and it's redundant in view of the succession box. It should be deleted. Jude (talk,email) 06:40, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete as redundant and obsolete. Ardric47 20:10, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was merge Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Bibleref

Template:Bibleref (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
This template does the same thing as Template:bibleverse, There was a proposal for merger some time ago and nothing really came of it. I think that Template:Bibleverse should "win" because:

it was first (made 29 March 2005 as opposed to 18 February 2006)
bibleverse is more widely used (over 200 v. about 50)
it has more advanced features.

see Template talk:Bibleverse#merge for other comments on this issue. Jon513 19:23, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

If someone does the legwork and converts all 50 or so inclusions to bibleverse, I'd support a Delete, but if we delete the template before the links are switched over, then we break all those pages. Any volunteers?--Andrew c 20:47, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Merge any relevant features, and leave the page as a redirect to said better template. Everyone wins! – Someguy0830 (Talk | contribs) 23:36, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Merge. Template:Bibleref has disadvantages: it does not allow book names with spaces in them "Samuel 2" or "2 Samuel", but would require "2-Samuel" or "2Sam" while the former are common references; it is restricted in its available sources. Its only perceivable advantages are a somewhat simpler usage, and independence of an intermediary 3rd-party script. But these are no huge advantage. The merge should not be difficult to do with a bot. Its only complicated logic would be those numbered books again. jnothman ^talk 08:07, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Merge as per Jon513. IZAK 09:19, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Merge I dont currently have the time needed to change the links over. Are the two formats suitably similar to have a bot do the transformation, or at least most of the work? Ans e ll Review my progress! 11:04, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Merge Per nom... Two templates doing substantially the same thing? It's hard to see the need. --Ssbohio 01:45, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Comment Will changing bibleref to {{subst:bibleverse||{{1}}|{{2}}|{{3}}}} make all of the bibleref automaticly change? If so, it will work exactly the same as it did before, except for the books with spacing in them (2 Samuel for example) as jnothman pointed out. Jon513 18:46, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
- No, because that will subst onto the template page not the articlesClinkophonist 15:10, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

well at least than without the subst. Then it will emulate as if bibleverse was used. Jon513 15:46, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Keep - the difference being that bibleref doesn't require a version to be specified, and that it is much shorter to type out; imaging doing 50 or so references in one go, which would you prefer to have to type out the short one or the long one? Personally, I would prefer bibleverse to be the one that gets merged. Clinkophonist 15:10, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

3 extra characters? Even times 50 that is not that much. Jon513 15:46, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was deleted by User:ALoan Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Oftvandalized

Delete invites vandals to the vandalizing thign they do while vandalizing --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 19:29, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, WP:DENY. --Rory096 22:28, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete per WP:BEANS. Signed, Fredd ie 01:33, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete per Rory and Freddie. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:19, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete. It's hideous; I hate seeing this at the beginning of articles.--ragesoss 13:50, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was Withdrawn by nominator per comments. Spoken template discussion continued on Template_talk:Spoken_Wikipedia#Icon_at_the_top-right.2C_pt_2 Raul654 17:06, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Metadata templates

(Per the Template:Hong_Kong_article discussion below) All of these place icons in the top-right of articles. I was *adamantly* against creating a featured article template. I said it would inevitably cause a proliferation, and sure enough I was right. Kill them all. They violate policy, they clutter articles, and they break the layout of non-monobook skins. Raul654 18:41, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Keep only {{featured article}}, delete the rest. The tradeoff is acceptable for the special status FAs have, but not for anything else. -- grm_wnr Esc 18:53, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Keep only {{Spoken Wikipedia}}: and Spoken Wikipedia should have the top-right-corner icon removed. I'm with Raul on this. If people want to find FAs, they can use Wikipedia:Featured articles. Otherwise we're just bragging. An FA's quality should speak for itself, or else it shouldn't be an FA. (But I don't see any reason to completely delete Spoken Wikipedia...?) — Johan the Ghost _seance 19:38, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
- comment: what about {{Link FA}}? — Johan the Ghost _seance 19:45, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  - Good point - I have nomintaed it seperately above (because it's slightly different than these templates). Raul654 21:10, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Delete Per nom —Preceding unsigned comment added by QuizQuick (talk • contribs)
Keep Template:Featured article (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) and Template:Spoken Wikipedia (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs), useful metadata. Perhaps consider removing the icon from the templates, I don't have a strong opinion on that. I have actually used links to Template:Featured article (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) and CategoryIntersect to create a list of featured articles in a given category. Not to have a technical means of finding Featured articles is bad. (Yes, I know that enwiki data on the toolserver is broken right now, but I don't expect that to be true forever). Kusma (討論) 21:51, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
- For the purposes of analysis, template:featured (a talk-page template) can be used just as easily. Raul654 22:11, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  - It would require some extra coding on the toolserver (so "as easily" is wrong), but this certainly correct in principle. Kusma (討論) 22:55, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
    - Couldn't the template be made invisible, since it's machine-read only? I mean, only have a category or something in the template, thus taking up zero space? Garrett^Talk 09:00, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete all; articles should contain only that - information pertinent to articles, unless it is something that is temporary and alerts readers of potential problems (i.e. protected, cleanup, etc.) Also thinking about nominating {{Geolinks-US-buildingscale}} and all the geolink templates in Category:Coordinates templates for deletion; I don't see how coordinates should be given special status in the top right of an article. (Just to be clear, I don't mind the bottom part of those templates, only the top part, which utilizes {{Coor title d}}, to place the coordinates in the top right of the article.) Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 22:16, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep {{Featured article}}, delete the others. FA is good because it tells the reader that what he's reading is probably correct. Spoken Wikipedia has another template that isn't on the top right of the page. --Rory096 22:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep {{featured article}} with its icon; Keep {{Spoken Wikipedia}} without the icon; delete the others (there are already TFDs for {{Japan article}} and {{Hong Kong article}} already). Yes, it is metadata, but it is useful metadata, like stub templates and categories - are we deleting those too? For the record, the layout works with my skin (classic) too, in addition to monobook. -- ALoan (Talk) 23:09, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
- No, it doesn't work in classic skin. The spoken article icon display overtop of the talk-page link (and it only gets worse when there are more icons). Hence, my comment about it being broken. Raul654 23:12, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  - To reiterate: it works in my classic skin. But then I am User:ALoan and you have a few extra characters. -- ALoan (Talk) 00:01, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  - Can that be repaired by fixing the templates or the skin? Kusma (討論) 23:32, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
    - I don't know, but I doubt it. Raul654 23:48, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
      - That's easy - set the CSS class and id to be invisible in common.css, and override that to be visible again in monobook.css and any other skin in which it works. -- grm_wnr Esc 11:14, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
      - The 'Spoken' icon overlaps the talk link in my Classic skin, but the 'Featured' icon does not... so it would seem to have something to do with how they are 'coded' rather than the concept in general. --CBDunkerson 12:14, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep {{featured article}}, remove the icons at the rest (or delete the rest, failing that). The complaint that templates similar to it will proliferate is a valid one, but the Featured article tag is significant enough to merit an exception to the rule. Tito xd^{(?!? - help us)} 00:58, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete all, per Raul654. The FA star I was okay with at the time, but this is a slippery slope. We're just seeing more and more of these clutter-inducing and possibly non-monobook-skin-breaking templates. I don't see any need to point out which of our articles are featured or which have been recorded. — Rebelguys2 ^talk 03:56, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Comment In my opinion, showing that the article is featured or has a spoken version dramatically enhances usabilty. Is there a hope of a MediaWiki workaround for this in the future, that would allow these sort of icons to be associated with pages without ugly hacks to the templates? Twinxor t 07:04, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- It shoul be possible to create a new span/div class (e.g. "titleicon") and have differing definitions in MediaWiki:monobook.css et al. for it, without waiting for an actual MediaWiki change. Garrett^Talk 08:57, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete Japan - These really should have been listed separately... note the number of people voting different things on each template. I don't think the other two are absolutely critical to have, but I don't see them as significant problems either. Thus no reason to delete. Having icons for more common topics like 'Japan' just opens the door too wide. --CBDunkerson 12:14, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- Not the whole of Japan surely? Anyway, there is already a TFD for the Japan template. -- ALoan (Talk) 13:19, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Relist them separately. Too different to vote at the same time. --Ton e 13:48, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete both. If there's a spoken version of an article, the template on the talk page is sufficient. And per my comments above, eliminate the entire wrongheaded idea of having "featured articles". Angr (t • c) 15:58, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Strong Keep {{featured article}} and Weak Keep {{Spoken Wikipedia}} for sheer usefulness to the average non-editor reader. The featured article template indicates we believe this article to be quality, which is useful to know for reliability's sake, and the spoken article icon could be useful to the handcapped, although the larger template also shows up, and kinda makes the spoken article icon unnessesary. I personally wouldn't mind replacing the larger spoken template with the icon alone, however. Users who need the spoken article can still look for it and find it, and users who don't care won't have their articles cluttered. Wikiprojects, on the other hand, are not useful to have such symbols for readers. They are useful to editors alone, and even then... not really useful to those editors, I don't think. Editors read talk pages, after all, while non-editors usually don't. So Strong Delete the Japan one. Fieari 17:17, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, unuseful and exceedingly unattractive. Christopher Parham (talk) 19:47, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, none seem to meet any of the requirements of TfD, and I dare say they all are helpful to the encyclopedia project. PoptartKing 21:10, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep Do you hate blind people or something? What's going on? --mboverload@ 23:19, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- I remain to be convinced that blind people are helped very much by the Spoken Wikipedia template in general, or the dinky icon in particular. When is the template or icon picked up by reader software? The template tends to be buried in the guts of the article; surely we are not expecting blind people to spot the icon and realise that there is a spoken version? -- ALoan (Talk)
- Don't get me started on blind people!!1!11 — Rebelguys2 ^talk 17:29, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep {{featured article}}; Weak Keep {{Spoken Wikipedia}}; Delete {{Japan article}}. The template {{featured article}} has already been useful to me, more than once. The "slippery slope" argument is irrelevant here; if we don't want templates to copy {{featured article}} and proliferate, that's fine, let's just delete them. But it has no implication whatsoever on the existence of {{featured article}} itself. Schutz 23:24, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep {{featured article}}; Remove the icon of {{Spoken Wikipedia}}. The main argument for the FA star is that it motivates editors to improve articles, plus it's discrete. The spoken icon is useless. CG 17:23, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep all. There is no problem with metadata in articles — that's what metadata is for to provide information on articles. These templates have also not been listed for deletion properly. Cedars 03:56, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep both. Needed for projects such as FA, VA, GA and so on and helps with the V1.0. Lincher 04:26, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep all. These icons help to reassure readers as to the quality and accessibility of the information they are reading. I also think that showing a little pride in our work is not a bad thing. --Danaman5 06:09, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep both. I understand the arguments - strong as they are - against metadata in the article namespace. However, IMO, these two are simply exceptions to those rules. Perhaps when the vast majority of Wikipedia articles are Spoken and Featured we can remove them. For now, though, keep. Batmanand | Talk 09:08, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep both with icons. Easy for seeing at a glance whether the article is featured and/or whther there's a spoken version. --NorkNork ^Questions? _fnord? 11:33, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep these but delete others. Per above, to know that an article is featured is useful, but to have GAs and B-Class...ick. The buck stops here, but there's nothing wrong with the buck until it doesn't stop.--Here T oHelp 12:24, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep: both extremely informing + they are great symbols on wikipedia. Deleting would be like instead of soldier getting a medal, he gets a pat on the back. - Tutmosis 12:34, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep both – putting the metadata arguments aside, I personally find these very useful, and I have no doubt that there are many thousands of users who agree with me. For that reason alone, they should stay – Gurch 13:06, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep FA and Spoken. Far from detracting from articles, they improves them! They are globally applicable to WP as every single article could possibly achieve them (unlike the "Japan" template). Furthermore, having the FA tag there is a big credential improvement and encouragement/thanks to the people who got the article that far. People resepect the FA status and it should be rewarded.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Witty lama (talk • contribs)
Keep FA and spoken, but delete any others that show up (unless there is a clear consensus to implement them beforehand). the wub "?!" 13:56, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep FA and spoken, but delete any others that show up (unless there is a clear consensus to implement them beforehand). Poppypetty 15:11, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep FA and spoken provide quick-glance information about an article. Cynical 15:15, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep both. First when I heard about featured articles I was surprised that they weren't marked in any way and I was glad when the appropriate template was finally created. The spoken template seems appropriate as well though I don't have strong feelings about it. Haukur 15:27, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete FA. Keep spoken. Noisy | Talk 16:34, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep Both Don't remove one of the best ways of identifying fantastic content. This would be an enormous step back in terms of building up Wikipedia 1.0, and should be resoundingly rejected. Judgesurreal777 18:10, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Relist them separately and Start over the votes. These two templates are very different. CG 18:22, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete Per nom Bryan 18:33, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep FA, and Delete Spoken. Coffee 19:32, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep both, but I really think this vote should be started over with the two concepts separate--Rayc 22:17, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep both per the comments of many. 69.199.220.88 22:43, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep for featured article; neutral on spoken. The fact that an article has gone through FAC is useful information for a reader. I hate to disagree with Mark, but 1) I'm not sure what policy it breaks; 2) if there are skin problems, that's a technical bug we can fix, and 3) The FA star is so small as to provide very little clutter. — Matt Crypto 00:40, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete all: They break layout in some browsers. --Carnildo 01:53, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep FA, keep spoken. Don't feel so strongly about the spoken one, but it's definitely good to identify FA. -- Mithent 01:57, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep featured article, delete spoken. If someone pours their research, knowledge, and writing into an article, why not keep the star around as a reward? I don't see why anybody would mind them. Dakpowers | Talk 02:56, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep featured article, delete spoken, there should be a way of finding a featured article.--Zxcvbnm 04:19, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep FA, ambivalent on the rest (but make sure everything in a class that can be set to invisible for non-Monobook skins, or in user prefs). I do find the idea of an icon informing blind people that the article can be spoken exceedingly amusing, though. :) —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:00, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep for FA, no opinion about spoken, delete the rest. Renata 07:46, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep for FA and Spoken, provide useful, at a glance differentiation of the quality of the article. Iorek85 08:13, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep FA --Ancheta Wis 16:56, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep for FA, I don't care about the spoken one and the others, but I think the FA star is quite important -- Snailwalker | talk 17:02, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep the featured template. It is an unobstructive and is just as useful as POV templates. Should we put those on tfd to, since they "clutter articles". Keep spoken template. Its used througout wikipedia, and is no different than the wiktionary, or wikinews templates. Useful to reader. Falphin 17:29, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Weak Keep for FA. Neutral for Spoken. Delete all others. CheekyMonkey 17:38, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep for FA. — Wackymacs 19:03, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong Keep for Featured article. I-find-none-of-them-jarringly-obtrusive-Keep for the others. Here's a utility no one has discussed: I often surf the Spanish Wikipedia looking for quality articles to translate. Translation of a featured article I found there (Trabancos River) was completed today. I initially became interested in that article because after hitting the random article many times quickly, I stopped on the article because I saw the FA (Artículos destacados) star (for some reason the star is missing now). I might have just hit the random article button again if the star hadn't alerted me that the article was likely stable, well-researched, etc., as rivers are not especially interesting to me. --Fuhghettaboutit 19:40, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
'Keep All - these sweeping TfD's are bound to fail. Basically the nominator seems to be trying to make a point "see, I was right". Waste of time. Deal with the specifics of each template. -- Stbalbach 20:21, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Strong keep for all. It is sickening to hear that they "clutter articles", when they are just sitting in the top corner. I can understand the getting rid of the "good article" corner image, but this is going too far. It is a great indication of a featured article or spoken one. → J @red 22:33, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep FA, neutral on spoken, delete others. It's worth highlighting featured articles on the actual article page, not just talk, and this is an unobtrusive way to do so. However, FA should be the exception, not the rule. BryanG 22:47, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep {{featured article}} and {{Spoken Wikipedia}} as they are both useful and readily indicate a quality body of work. Delete {{Japan article}} as it is too specific to be practical and would encourage copycat templates. —Joshfist 01:24, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
KeepI think that for the templates are of such a small size that they should cause little concern. I personally find the FA one useful, as it makes knowing what a FA is much easier. I can understand why people may want to get rid of them, but for me I can't see what harm they do, and I personally find them quite useful.--Wisd e n17 12:43, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep both. Graphic symbols are useful as an alternative mode of communications; to me they seem to be a logical extension of categories. I'd support creation of more such tools.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 20:43, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was delete redirect Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Picture of the Week

Template:Picture of the Week (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
delete as confusingly similar to template:pic of the day --M @r ē ino 16:25, 17 May 2006 (UTC) moved template to a better name, it was confusing. Delete please. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Baku87 (talk • contribs)

Agreed, Bak87 did exactly that, moving the template to template:Azeri_Picture--M @r ē ino 16:55, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was keep Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:User blank

This template gives the user too much leeway. The user can write anything he wants using it.QuizQuick 17:24, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Keep, delete the inflammatory comments themselves Will (^E_@) T 17:28, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
"keep' useful for user boxes --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 19:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Speedy keep; Wikipedia is not censored. —Andux^␅ 21:42, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, redundant to {{userbox}}. --Rory096 22:29, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, far too widely used. Also, "The user can write anything he wants using it" is not valid grounds for deletion. – Someguy0830 (Talk | contribs) 23:39, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete. I don't plan on touching the userbox debate anymore, but this seems redundant, per Rory096. — Rebelguys2 ^talk 03:57, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep Spurious nomination. --24.20.49.179 06:00, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. Any template with a parameter could be made inflammatory if people abuse it (e.g, again at the risk of violating WP:BEANS, {{db|This article was created by the troll Sjakkalle who is not yet banned but who definitely ''should'' be}} but that should not count against it. A blank userbox is not a problem in itself, and its use should be encouraged in favor of making low-use joke-boxes individually. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:17, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- (I would like to note that while it is true that the box is "redundant" with the userbox template, the order and name of parametres is different, and replacing it all will take a lot of time which there is hardly any need for.) Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:34, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, unless someone wants to use a bot to convert every occurence to {{Userbox}}. --StuffOfInterest 18:02, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep - a text editor lets a user type in anything they want. Plus, it's useful as just about every other type of userbox will be nominated for deletion by people with nothing better to do. CTOAGN (talk) 19:36, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep per CTAOGN. --D-Day^{(Wouldn't you like to be a pepper too?}) 23:20, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. Words fail me. "This template gives the user too much leeway"- the nominator is the appointed terminator of free speech or what? Loom91 06:27, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep тəzєті 13:50, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep all in-policy UBX. If you want to edit that policy to reflect your concerns, please do so. TfD is not the right place to create or subvert policy. John Reid 13:52, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep Keep userbox templates. See policy UBX. Assume good faith. TfD is not the right place to create or subvert policy. 'Too much leeway' - on an internet site that anyone can edit?! Bastun 17:00, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, meets WP:UBX, Wikipedia:Userbox policy and T1. T2 is not valid at this time.
Keep Oppose, prima facie, deletion of userboxes one by one while consensus is lacking on the larger issue. These kind of userboxes do no harm and, by and large, are opposed with the intent to artificially limit the behavior of Wikipedians. That they are in template space is an issue of system architecture; they are not used in article space. The controversy needs to be put to bed once & for all, not endlessly played out here.--Ssbohio 01:45, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Speedy Keep - QuizQuick, can you please explain your reasoning further? I don't understand what this is about? --mboverload @ 08:17, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep Stop nominating so many userboxes for deletion. G eneral E i senhower BLOCK 15:11, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep. Seriously, WTF. (Maybe engineer it to point to {{userbox}}, though, rather than redefining the box structure, so that they're necessarily in sync—the people who point out redundancy do have a point there). —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:03, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep Don't "blame the gun because people were shot". The template's not at fault, it's the people who use it to post inflammatory statements. Deal with them instead. — Natha n ^{(Got something to say? Say it.)} 02:06, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was delete Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Hong Kong article

Template:Hong Kong article (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
This template "places places a small Hong Kong Article symbol () in the top right corner of an article to indicate that it is an article related to Hong Kong" - see Hong Kong for an example, where it conflicts with the {{featured article}} star and the {{Spoken Wikipedia}} icon (I am beginning to think that the latter should go too).

It - and any others of its ilk - should be deleted for the same reason as the {{good article}} symbol: we do not clutter up the main article space with this sort of metadata. These articles should be identified, if need be, by a template on the talk page. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:50, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Delete per nom American Patriot 1776 11:57, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete as above. Breathstealer 12:24, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete as above if not rewritten.--Jusjih 14:24, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete POVQuizQuick 17:25, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete slippery slope --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 19:32, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete them all! Kill them with fire! Yes, even template:featured article - it was a manifestly bad idea and only opened the door to these things. Raul654 18:38, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete: why should Hong Kong articles have special status? Ultimately many articles would have dozens of these icons. They make Wikipedia look like a trading card game. — Johan the Ghost _seance 19:32, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete per above. Flcelloguy (A note?) 22:34, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, no compelling reason to keep this template, and having one for each WikiProject can get nasty quickly. Tito xd^{(?!? - help us)} 01:04, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete. Unnecessary self-reference. Unnecessary metadata. Unnecessary clutter. — Rebelguys2 ^talk 03:51, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete - The featured article star was a 'nifty' idea that alot of people want to copy for other identifiers, but doing so would produce hopeless clutter. Thus we need to severely limit these 'icons' to, if anything, a handful of topics central to Wikipedia as a whole. For instance I wouldn't be opposed to replacing the big ugly 'this is a policy' boxes with little icons... but if 'Hong Kong' uses them then thousands of other things of equal 'stature' would as well. --CBDunkerson 11:46, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
- Note that the "this is a policy" pages are in the Wikipedia namespace, not article namespace; it's the rticle namespace, which is the actual encyclopedia, that we want to be ultra-scrupulous about. — Johan the Ghost _seance 15:15, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, unnecessary template. --Ter e nc e Ong 12:30, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete. While I do not oppose the inclusion of metadata in articles, this type of designation is best served with a box on the talk page. The corner icons should be reserved for denoting high quality articles, not just all articles on a certain topic. --Danaman5 06:16, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete we have categories to do this sort of thing. Cynical 15:17, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete Pointless clutter. Wikipedia's simple presentation is one of its strengths. Nathcer 10:30, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Keep, per my agruments to keep Japan one. Symbols are tiny but useful.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 18:18, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, unneeded. We have categories for this.--May the Force be with you! Shr e shth91 ($ |-| ŗ 3 $ |-| ţ |-|) 18:38, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
delete unecessary 131.194.196.34 05:12, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete in order to minimise the growth of metadata on Wikipedia; use categories for grouping. Harr o5 09:06, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was Withdrawn Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Tri Nations Aggregate

Nomination withdrawn There is the intention to use this on four page (I just discovered). Sorry. Cvene64 06:28, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was delete Circeus 21:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Auteurs

Template:Auteurs (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
Silly, just a list of someone's favorite directors; there are thousands of directors who can be called auteurs and thery can't all be put here. It's a huge ugly box as well. The Singing Badger 01:23, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

As there is apparently no clear criterion for inclusion (or it is POV), and the auteur theory is disputed so it is not likely there will ever be a clear criterion, delete. Kusma (討論) 01:26, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete. Silly misuse of technical terms and POV. —Cuivi é nen^T|C, Wednesday, 17 May 2006 @ 01:56 UTC
Delete. It's impractical if the term is disputed; it wouldn't be neutral for us to decide who is and who isn't. It's also painfully large, as seen here, where it stretches the article almost an extra screen (on my monitor) down the page. Jude (talk,contribs,email) 02:29, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete and do NOT subst - unless I'm really missing something from reading Auteur, it's a POV list, not an objective job description. BigDT 03:28, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, useless list with no practical application. – Someguy0830 (Talk | contribs) 03:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete per above --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 19:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete, per above. jareha ^(comments) 10:00, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete Indeed. The category is more of a hindrance rather than insightful. Mabuse 15:37, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete per above. --DestradoZero 18:39, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

The result of the debate was Speedy, verging onto T1 Will (^E_@) T 09:14, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Delete Pure POV. Nathcer 10:33, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete - Ajshm 14:37, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Ick

Template:Ick (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) - divisive, verging on POV, offensive, created by brand new user who has suddenly shown up declaring him/herself a cleanup patroller and vandal hunter. Comments about such tags should never go to a particular user's Talk page, but should always go to the article's talk page. Template is offensive. User:Zoe|^(talk) See also Template:Byepage, Template:Conlink, Template:Notalot, Template:Ruderude. 02:49, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Delete, useless and inappropriate warning. Wikipedia isn't censored, after all. – Someguy0830 (Talk | contribs) 03:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Delete or even speedy T1 or G1 ... aren't links into user space generally frowned upon? Am I missing something? His enthusiasm should be applauded, but the templates direct you to his user page are ... weird. BigDT 03:35, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
- Actually, all of the above can be speedy deleted as G7. See the message from User:mtz206 on User talk:Joler1 and his reply here [1]. That, to me, sounds like a G7 - author requests deletion - for all of them. (Of course, T1 could also still be applicable). BigDT 03:43, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Speedy Delete. --Coredesat 04:26, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Speedy Delete. Inappropriate template by new user. Nhprman 05:08, 17 May 2006 (UTC)