User talk:JzG/AfD

Angr

Just a couple of points. First of all, some people try to bully keep voters into changing their vote, too. Second, lists are useful when they are organized in some way. Thus, both List of highest mountains and List of mountains tell us things that Category:Mountains doesn't. Third, I totally agree with you about schools. See User:Angr#The ongoing school debate for my opinion on the criteria for keeping schools. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 19:47, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Valid comments. I'll do an update soon (I've learned some lately) and incorporate these examples, which are good ones. - Just zis  Guy, you know? ^[T]/_[C] :: AfD? 10:46, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Fancruft

Hey, if you run across rampant fancruft, before listing it on AFD, drop a note on my talk page. I'm not trying to bully you away from using AFD, but if you just let me know to deal with it instead of listing it on AFD, I can merge and consolidate it somewhere, saving everyone the hassle of a contentious AFD. (Plus, if it's a contentious merge, I'm already ready to deal with that.)

I've been pondeing making a personal cruftwatch to-do page; I've already got quite a backlog. - A Man In Black (conspire | past ops) 01:16, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. I've been dealing with some of it myself (merging articles on minor chcracters in TUGS for example). I'm trying only to bring to AfD thigns where I want to find out what consensus exists, or where I think something is contentious. I am loath to splat a large article even wehn it is clear to me that it is unjustifiable. - Just zis  Guy, you know? ^[T]/_[C] :: AfD? 10:45, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Some thoughts especially on fancruft and lists

I enjoyed reading this page and find that I agree in principal with you on almost everything but not in degree on again almost everything. In any event I wanted to make one comment and then answer the question you posed please show me why any particular list is anything other than an indiscriminate collection of information.

• Fancruft - I have long fought the desire to try and start an article consolidation drive in the Harry Potter article space. I am a big fan of Harry Potter and while I disagree with you that Hobbits for instance do not deserve an article (due to their appearance in and impact on things outside of Token), I think Wikipedia could do with 10 or maybe 20 Harry Potter articles total. I probably will never actually even suggest such a consolidation because the number of youthful HP editors are so large and so unwilling to even consider that a single well written article (or even list) can be better than 30 short articles on subjects so minor that the article could never hope to be quality.
• Lists - Per your question I think that in many cases lists are actually PART of the category system on Wikipedia. That is they are navigation aids which serve to compensate for shortcomings (either technological or organizational) in the Wikipedia categorization system. The debate about the inclusion of an article in a category and sub-category in the same tree can frequently be resolved with making one of them a list. Glossary articles are also lists that include lots of terms that people might actually lookup. As is the case above with all the minor Harry Potter articles and objects getting their own articles having all those names redirect to a single list/glossary would, I think, be very encyclopedic. I realize that you were probably not talking about lists where each item gets a section or paragraph such as the tragically incomplete Go terms article but I think some of the same applies to other lists. In any event if the Semantic web (and Semantic MediaWiki) ever take off then even those lists become a lot more useful. Dalf | Talk 22:34, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

I love the opening sentence :-D

Your idea of a consolisation in the Potter articles is absolutely sound (in my notoriously biased opinion). If you achieve that, you will be a standard-bearer for the Association of Mergist Wikipedians. Of course the happy medium lies somewhere between the current argument regarding articles for each individual verse of the Bible (I have not the words!) and the merging of hobbits to Tolkein as a single sentence. Time gives a certain perspective: I have a view that nothing should be documented on the 'pedia until at least a year after it's happened. There is no doubt that the hobbit is a substantial meme. But still fiction... Perhaps we should have a "ficipedia" as well?

Sometimes lists are part of the category system, but when used as such they are very often abused by spammers, POV pushers and other bottom feeders. I don't discount that lists have a use (mainly of course when they include actual encyclopaedic content such as being sorted by year or explained - but then they cease to be lists as such and become encyclopaedia entries. And in the end this is supposed ot be an encyclopaedia.

My view on lists has softened over time, I have seen some good ones. But many more bad ones!

Thanks for your thoughts, and yes comments like yours do help me form a better balanced view. - Just zis  Guy, you know? ^[T]/_[C] AfD? 22:55, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Every verse? Are you kidding? Might be an intresting wiki project in its own right but here ..... the mind does boggle. You are probbly right about some of the lists (some of the lists of people seem to be questionable) though areguments of encyclopedic value aside I have derived substantal enjoyment (and learned a bit) out of things like List of words having different meanings in British and American English. Anyway one of the things that really got me to thinking about the Harry Potter articles was this: HarryPotterWatchlist -- Now that is a lot of articles. Sadly I think a consolidation of some of these articles could provide enough context to make a number of really good articles, but I don't see it happening. Dalf | Talk 00:03, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

So you're a deletionist?

I agree that AfD is almost never bad as people through consensus generally make the right choice (we have DRV for when mistakes are made, and no consensus articles can be renominated), but I think you are too much of a deletionist if you would not advocate articles on hobbit or Katie Price. AfDs for either would be a speedy keep. Having said that, crufty neologisms, original research and unencyclopedic lists generally may as well be deleted, although with AfD it should be taken on a case-by-case basis. Wikipedia is not paper, though, and if we can reliably source and verifiably have an article on a topic with third-party sources (notability seems to be the ability to be taken note of), then there's a strong chance I think the article should be kept.--h i s ^{s p a c e} _{r e s e a r c h} 15:27, 19 December 2007 (UTC)