Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2007 July 28

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The result of the debate was delete. IronGargoyle 00:43, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Template:Planetbox observe (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

The functionality of this template has been merged into {{Planetbox orbit}}, is no longer transcluded in the Wikipedia, and is thus no longer required. — Chaos syndrome 20:24, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:11, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

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The result of the debate was delete. IronGargoyle 00:45, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Template:Planetbox microlens (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

The functionality of this template has been merged into {{Planetbox orbit}}, is no longer transcluded in the Wikipedia, and is thus no longer required. — Chaos syndrome 20:24, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:11, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

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The result of the debate was Keep. Mike Peel 07:37, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Template:USstatements (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Vague and subjective grouping. Best handled by categories. — JW1805 (Talk) 18:12, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

• Strong Keep; there's nothing wrong with this at all other than "statements" is kind of a fuzzy word. All navboxes are "vague and subjective", otherwise they would be 40 screens long. The entire point of them is that a group of editors (typically a WikiProject or taskforce thereof) apply critical judgement to come to an internal consensus that "the most important articles we have to offer on X topic are the following, and they seem to be logically arrangeable, like so (and not barring other possible logical arrangements that we did not happen to choose), in a template". By definition, such conerns are not objective or predefined/predictable criteria. I'm not totally wild on the title of the template, but oh well. And as long as it's not divisive or misleading, I don't think the template name is really TfD's business; if the people who use this want to call it USstatements, or WikiProjectUnitedStatesTemplateNumber23, who cares? Another way of looking at this is that if this template is successfully XfD'd it could set a precendent by which any navbox could be nuked as long as someone could vaguely convincingly identify anything "vague" or "subjective" about it, and that would apply to every single one of them. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:22, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

I disagree that all nav boxes are "vague and subjective". A good one certainly isn't (say, US States, Governors of Virginia, etc). What we have here is grouping of dissimilar items (speeches, laws, inscriptions, songs) that have something to do with the history of the United States. (Although the Mayflower Compact was written 150 years before the US was founded). Why not include the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, or Yankee Doodle, or Lee’s Farewell Address, or Magna Carta, or Indian Removal Act, etc, etc, etc. This template certainly has the potential to be 40 screens long.--JW1805 (Talk) 00:57, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I did momentarily forget that there are certain navboxes that are auto-limited by things like there only being 50 US states, but so what? My point still stands (just substitute "the vast majority" for "all" or "every"). As for the "why not include...?" question, well, the issue of what exactly should be in the template is a matter for consensus discussion at its talk page. Better organization within the template could obviate any confusion caused by the dissimilarity. None of that speaks to a rationale supportive of deleting it. The dissimilarity issue in particular strikes me that it would set a nasty precedent. Many, many helpful navboxes have dissimilar sections (politics, geography, etc., for a region, for example). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:17, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

I just have to pop in to quickly point out that the Magna Carta is in no way American, history-stealer :P (kidding around, no harm - no foul) Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 06:08, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

• Comment as it is clear that this is part of a suggested policy change to change the criteria so as to eliminate almost all navboxes, it should be proposed as such. 20:23, 30 July 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by DGG (talk • contribs)

• Concurring comment: Hadn't quite thought to phrase it that way, but this is precisely what I was getting at. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:25, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
• I'm not suggesting any change in Navbox policy. There are good templates and bad ones. There are ones that group a concise collection of related articles into a useful template, and there are ones that don't. This one doesn't. --JW1805 (Talk) 23:42, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

• Keep Looks well-defined enough to me. Circeus 00:59, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

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The result of the debate was Delete. Mike Peel 07:56, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Template:Pet Species (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Totally subjective criteria; people keep all manner of animals as pets. I would argue that many of these are, in fact, not common examples. Beyond that, there is no need for a navbox. The association between these animals is tenuous at best, and it would be best just to leave it as a category.. Eyrian 14:34, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

^[clarify] The basis was deliberately to include all animals where the articles discuss them as pets, which I think was more useful than "common pets" DGG (talk) 17:51, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

• Neutral If it were repurposed to only include animals that only or principally (other than feral escapees) exist as domestics, maybe? I agree with Eyrian that having this (and any associated category for that matter) be open to any animal that X number of weirdos try to keep as pets before their "pets" kill them is off-base. But there is, I would assert, a class of quintessentially pet animals (few of them are species, but many are "varieties" which I gather is what subspecies are being called these days when the exact boundaries of the subspecies are too blurred to identify clearly; don't care what the term is... whatever is the animal equivalent of "cultivar"), among rodents, cats, dogs, etc. May still be too hard to say "this should or should not be in this template/category", but at least it's narrower than "this animal's article says someone kept it as a pet once". Heh. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:09, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Changed to Delete, as overcategorization. This really isn't any different than a category like Category:Women over six feet tall. It's non-defining. I think what is really needed is Category:Domesticated animals for the articles that actually qualify (Gerbil, etc.), and no such category or template at all for instances where some individuals have incidentally kept the animal as a pet (Jaguar, etc.) Template:Domesticated animals doesn't seem to exist yet, but would probably work out well, divided into rows for different sorts of animals. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:32, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Clarification: The subjectiveness of the criterion in one thing. The other is that navboxes are for groups of tightly-related topics, whereas this is a comparatively loose association. It introduces rather unacceptable template creep. --Eyrian 02:40, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Reply comment: Sorry, the "clarify" tag was for DGG; I put it in the space his !vote or "Comment" should normally have been. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:11, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

• comment what is a loose versus a tight association, Eyrian? You've used this argument elsewhere, and i could evaluate respond better if I knew just what you meant. I see things made use of by humans in the same fashion as a tight associaion. I see things beginning with the letter A as a loose association. DGG (talk) 20:25, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

• In general, I would say that the tightness of an association is determined by how many constraints it guarantees by virtue of inclusion. Just being kept as humans tells you very little about these animals, particularly given how varied the members are. What do a snake and an alpaca have in common? Millipedes and chickens? Scorpions and squirrels? Humans, by virtue of our mastery of the world, can keep just about any animal as pets. Having a navbox implies that these concepts are well-understood in harmony, or fundamentally sequential. Inseparable. These species are anything but. --Eyrian 15:48, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

• Comment previously nominated, with a no consensus result. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 13:53, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
• Delete because I think it reaches too far, and its links should be to stuff like Pet skunk. Many of these articles make no mention of keeping these as pets, or might often be outright illegal in most jurisdictions. Also, calling a horse a "pet" is rather a stretch.

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 section.

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 no consensus. The key question here seems to be whether the information on the site outweighs the fact that the site is arguably promoting software piracy and copyright infringement. There is no consensus on this point, so it seems best do deal with individual games on a case-by-case basis per Radiant. IronGargoyle 01:54, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Template:Hotu (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Home of the Underdogs is an abandonware site. The beliefs behind abandonware are not recognised by U.S. copyright law. Additionally, since the information on HotU is often far briefer than Wikipedia's, linking to this site as an external link serves no purpose other than promoting distribution of what is nine times out of ten a work still under copyright. This template therefore violates Wikipedia:Copyrights#Linking to copyrighted works, "Linking to a page that illegally distributes someone else's work sheds a bad light on Wikipedia and its editors". I would strongly suggest that this template and all its uses be removed, with exceptional cases being re-added where appropriate. — Garrett^Talk 09:28, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

• Delete Agreed. I have read that the site will remove copyrighted games at the copyrighted holder's request, but I don't think that is enough to allow it when the external link guidelines make it clear that no copyright infringement should be linked to. As for exceptional cases, if HotU is considered for linking, I'd strongly recommend a different site (mobygames?) instead, given its current copyright infringement, even given the recent discussion about the mobygames template. --GargoyleMT 14:47, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
• Delete per all the above; if any "exceptional cases" are identified where the template should be retained, simply subst before delete. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:28, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

  Changed to keep if documented properly: Radiant raises a good point below. I remain concerned, however that this template will be over-used to extlink everything that can possibly be linked in this way, an abuse that is the cause of this TfD in the first place. The template should be documented to very specifically discourage this, and to indicate that the template should only be used in the situation that Radiant outlines. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:38, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

• Delete in agreement with the above. If HotU has some genuinely useful information then a link may be necessary, but the repeated use of an abandonware site shouldn't be encouraged with a template.QuagmireDog 16:09, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
• Keep. You assert that "the information on HotU is often far briefer than Wikipedia's", however, a random sampling of related articles shows that this is false. For instance, Beasts and Bumpkins, Firehouse Rescue, Eric the Unready. By all means remove the template from articles that have enough information, but for any stub this external link is a valid way of getting more information. >Radiant< 16:34, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

The statement isn't false, the word used was often not always, the three examples given are from the handful of sub-stubs using the template. I've gone down every article in the 'what links here' from the HotU template, by the time the inappropriate uses of the template are removed we are literally talking a handful of articles here.

The issue of providing information to our readers must of course be the priority, so a stop-gap external link to the HotU page for that game could be provided if it is the only source of info that is currently available online. That doesn't need a template, and even then should be the last resort. Considering the dim view taken of copyvio in articles, the now fever-pitched urgency in getting fair-use rationales for images in games articles etc., it seems hypocritical to casually syphon traffic away to an abandonware site if the information can be got elsewhere.

Please look at some of these examples which I believe are misuse of the template - A Mind Forever Voyaging, Betrayal at Krondor, Heart of Darkness (game), System Shock, Transport Tycoon and Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together - the link isn't needed it's just there. Now look at Syndicate (computer game) and Gish (computer game) - both of these are examples where there are multiple sources out there, the HotU link could just as easily be replaced with countless ELs to reviews.QuagmireDog 23:47, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes. The template should be removed from those entries, but I don't think it should be deleted entirely, as long as HOTU covers thousands of games better than Wikipedia does. >Radiant< 08:08, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

• Keep, Home of the Underdogs nolonger distributes files to anywhere even near to the same degree it used it. And it will as a general rule contain much more useful information about a game than the typical stub would provide on wikipedia. Mathmo ^Talk 10:01, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

• Keep. Useful site with lots of info on old video games. Often may have more screenshots than we do. Not all games have download files. — Frecklefσσt | Talk 12:38, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

• Delete. Unused in article space, and linking to copyright voilations is NOT what Wikipedia should be about ShakespeareFan00 14:01, 4 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Well, of course it's going to be "unused in article space" if you remove the links to it. - furrykef (Talk at me) 15:41, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

• Weak delete. There are indeed some exceptions where a HOTU link would be valuable (Trust & Betrayal is an example, where the linked page contains a rare and legal prototype version of a DOS port of the game). Still, having a general-purpose HOTU link feels like it encourages piracy. I've seen people manually insert external links to abandonware sites, which is bad enough; we don't need to make such things even easier. - furrykef (Talk at me) 15:41, 4 August 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 template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

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The result of the debate was delete. IronGargoyle 00:51, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Template:SampleWikiProject (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Obsolete nonsense (in the sense of meaningless going-nowhere stuff in the Wikipedia of July 2007; I'm sure it meant something in 2005). Aside from the fact that it uses passive voice to make a claim of consensus that is not evidenced, the instructions in it do not make sense and haven't made sense in a very long time. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 05:33, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

PS: As far as I can determine, the only reason it still has any deployment at all is that it was included in some "how to set up a blank WikiProject" instructions way back when, so it's just been sitting there confusing people on various projects for years, and occasionally being redeployed in brand new projects. I even had it at WP:CUE for a while because I thought it was "normal" but after a while I realized it was useless and removed it... — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:32, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. T Rex | talk 16:20, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
• Delete long outdated. –Pomte 01:51, 1 August 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 template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.