Hi! On Twitter I was pointed to:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deletionism_and_inclusionism_in_Wikipedia This is amazing. I think John Oliver should make a segment "Wikipedia Deletionism - how is this still a thing?" I mean, is this a failure of Wikipedia community governance? Reading about this seems deletionists are just a vocal minority who benefit from the fact that deletion is much stronger action than keeping things. Destruction is always easier than creation. There are 1536 inclusionists just on English Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Inclusionist_Wikipedians And 280 deletionists: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Deletionist_Wikipedians So, how is this still a thing? How can this be put to a vote and finally move on? What is Wikipedia's governance process here? Does Wikipedia has something like https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/ ? Mitar On Sat, Jun 25, 2016 at 12:06 PM, Mitar <mmi...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi! > > Thank you for your responses. > > On Fri, Jun 24, 2016 at 11:29 PM, Brill Lyle <wp.brilll...@gmail.com> wrote: >> Please include your user name and the name of the article you were working >> on. Without any context it's impossible to help you. Thankfully I was able >> to dig and find the page, etc. But include identifying info if you want >> help / resolution. > > I didn't want to include this information because I didn't want to > make it about my issue in particular. I wanted to give feedback and > discuss principles behind my experience. > > I otherwise had good experience editing Wikipedia. Other editors were > constructive and often with patience helped me learn how to improve > the content and related rules of Wikipedia, which also seemed > reasonable. But this rule I do not get and cannot relate to, thus I am > bringing it here. > > I read that Wikipedia is trying hard to get new editors and this is > why I am sharing this story here. Because from all my experience this > one is the most problematic. It really pushes you off. > > And it is pretty reasonable that it is problematic. Now that most > clearly "notable" articles have been already written the one which are > left will be increasingly more and more in the "gray zone". And > increasingly local, specialized, where such mistakes might be common. > > Maybe this policy for notability and significance had its historic > place. It focused the community on the core set of articles, improving > the quality of existing articles and created a name for Wikipedia. But > I think maybe it is time that it is relaxed and a new level of > articles is invited in. As I said, a warning could be used to tell > readers that they are reading such a new article. > > (Oh, and please improve talk pages, that way of communicating is also > a mess, but that one I can understand, it is a technical legacy. It is > cumbersome, but I can understand it. But it does influence other > issues then, like this one when you have to discuss something about > Wikipedia. Why Wikipedia does not simply use some issue-management > system where people could be opening issues for articles and other > people and have conversation through that? It would also allow much > better statistics of how many issues were satisfactory resolved, for > example, for all sides.) > >> Discussion (with reason): >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG#Please_remove_the_tag_from_Poligon_page > > Yes, it is clear that the editor who deleted it does not understand > local importance of the article. They could read the news articles I > cited and might get a better picture. > > The issue is here that while new editors can edit pages, see tags to > improve sources and so on, that is all helpful. But once a page is > deleted, they are pushed off and cannot do anything anymore. I just > started with the article. I could improve it through time, get more > information in why it is important and so on. But once it is deleted > nothing of this is not possible. I have to go around and find ways how > to object to this, and I have no idea how to do that. (This is also > why I am writing to such general list like this.) > >> I don't have rights to view the deleted article, but if someone who does >> moves it to your sandbox or a draft space you could work on it there, and I >> would be happy to take a quick look at it / try to help. > > But the problem is systemic. It does not matter if we resolve it for > this particular page. Also, if a page is in my sandbox then it is only > on me to fix it and improve it. If it is its dedicated namespace then > others can help edit it because they can find it. This is the whole > power of Wikipedia, that it is not that one person has to write the > whole article, but that multiple people can collaborate. > > Maybe a solution would be that an article can exist under its > namespace and link then to this sandbox version saying that article is > still in development. In general Wikipedia could be just an directory > of pages, some could be edited in Wikipedia and some could be linked > elsewhere, until they are seen as worthy of Wikipedia. > >> The structures you propose exist, but if you don't educate yourself on >> procedures and policies and are a casual editor, you might not be aware of >> them. Not trying to be mean or harsh here but I appreciate your passion and >> thoughts and want you to know there are solutions in place.... > > I followed instructions which were presented to me in the speedy > deletion tag: I opened a talk page for an article and objected to > deletion. The result was that next day the article was deleted without > any discussion. > > What structures exist here? > > I am talking about structures which would prevent deletion, and > structures which would help editors explain local significance of > articles. Structures which might exist to revert deletion are too > late. Editors might not return anymore. > >> The best solution I've found if as a newish user you are wanting to create >> new articles (as a short stub) is to do it in your Sandbox and make sure >> you have at least 5 (or even 10) very solid citations. > > I had citations. It seems it was not enough. > >> Have a friendly editor take a look at the article before attempting to move >> it to the main >> space. > > Friendly editor? How am I supposed to find one? I do not want to be > harsh, but I am here to write content, not to mingle with other > editors and socialize. I have enough other things in my life. I can > understand that for some editors this is their online social > space/forum and they know each other. But for me is something where I > get to occasionally, I want to fix a thing I care about, and I move > on. If I find trash on the floor I pick it up and carry it to the > nearest thrash can. I do not want to interact with city utilities > system or talk to supervisors. > > (BTW, talking to a friendly editor comes back to the issue of really > strange talk pages. Probably all you got used to them, but they are > really a mess.) > >> It is critical you use the citations to establish notability. Not >> everything is notable, and especially if the Wiki-en audience isn't >> knowledgeable of the subject matter, it's even more important. > > I did that. Of course, citations were to Slovenian news articles in > Slovenian, only one was in English. And this is why I started the > Wikipedia article. To bring more international exposure to a local > thing. > >> but their goal is to "protect" Wiki content, so.... > > Hm, protect from what? Existence? If content is true, why it needs > protection? If content is not yet complete, guide it to being > complete. > >> The IRC help channel ( >> http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=wikipedia-en-help) is also a great >> resource -- especially if it's a time zone issue. > > BTW, you do realize that many of new people online and potential new > editors are not familiar with IRC? Mailing list are already > > On Sat, Jun 25, 2016 at 1:11 AM, carl hansen <carlhansen1...@gmail.com> wrote: >> You have been hit by crossfire in the long running Inclusionist vs. >> Deletionist war. > > Instead of waging war, could we open some discussion about middle > group solutions? For example, what is wrong with having such pages > tagged with "not an encyclopedia-grade article, possible lacking > notability and/or significance" and move on? And then we can discuss > the merits of that tag being applied to a particular article. Which is > much less new-editor-scary than a warning "page is nominated for > speedy deletion" and bam, deleted. > > Has this ever been put up for a vote by the community? > > > Mitar > > -- > http://mitar.tnode.com/ > https://twitter.com/mitar_m -- http://mitar.tnode.com/ https://twitter.com/mitar_m _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>