[WikiEN-l] "Wikipedia approaches its limits" - Technology Guardian

[Michael Pruden]

There is a similar discussion at the en.wiki Village pump on this, and I think it runs parallel to this discussion.

I tend to think that the bigger problems with AFD is the lack of participation on many of them; if you disagree, then look at the bottom of each page of any given day's AFD and observe all the relisted (some twice) discussions that have zero, perhaps one other comment.

I think people are discouraged from participating in AFD discussions or even sounding off what they think the best actions should be taken for two reasons. First, there are those who are afraid to participate in AFDs for the fear of being pigeonholed or labeled (i.e. as an inclusionist or a deletionist when they are actually in the middle). Second, there are those users who are discouraged or perhaps disgusted over the level of wikilawyering and incivility that permeates especially in the more contentious discussions.

I partially fall into both camps myself. When I first came on over a year ago, I took a lot of advice from the Help pages (as the article indicates, taking it in by 'osmosis'). [[Help:Contents]] mentioned "deleting pages", which I kind of took as some sort of a Wiki-responsibility to participate in AFD discussions, or at the very least, chime in. And that's what I did for about the first six months or so in which I have been active. However, that has slowed down greatly since then for the reasons that I have explained above.

Not to say that I don't regret not having participated in AFD discussions frequently. In fact, it was through AFD where I have learned about everything policy and guideline-wise that I know now, how to interact with other users as well as what to do and what not to do in a general sense (not just in AFD discussions but in any WP discussion).

With that said, I don't think the pros or cons of AFD are going to necessarily effect article volume. There are always going to be new topics out there, which will perpetually facilitate new articles. Looking at the big picture with regards to the current information that exists on Wikipedia, it ultimately becomes an exercise on "how" to organize said information as opposed to squeezing every last bit, every last letter, into everything (not that you don't see the latter, as that happens very often, as well).

Speedy deletion is going to happen, PROD is going to happen, AFD is going to happen. The rest, as Ian puts it, depends on the integrity and open-mindedness of the editors out there to make sure they're running with the intention of the encyclopedia's net benefit in mind.

-MuZemike

--- On Thu, 8/13/09, Ian Woollard <ian.woollard at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Ian Woollard <ian.woollard at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] "Wikipedia approaches its limits" - Technology Guardian
> To: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com, "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org>
> Date: Thursday, August 13, 2009, 11:08 AM
> The 'limit' that's being reached is
> the article count; so reverts
> aren't the question.
> 
> The real question is whether the AFD process is working
> correctly,
> particularly for new articles, now that the low-hanging
> fruit is gone.
> 
> I've personally seen several of my referenced articles that
> in all
> honesty didn't violate a single policy get AFDd; one was
> 'merged' in
> 40 minutes of the review starting by the admin who also
> voted in the
> review, and then he unilaterally decided the results of
> review was
> something that not even he voted for!?!
> 
> That marks a new low point for the AFD process I think;
> 
> (FWIW it got overturned at DRV, but then deleted anyway,
> but not for
> violating policy that I could point you to...)
> 
> Right now the AFD process never looks for potential in
> articles and
> never looks at violations of policy, it's simply a
> popularity contest
> for articles; articles that haven't been created yet are
> inevitably
> less popular topics, so are even more likely to get deleted
> out of
> hand.
> 
> That's not the way it's supposed to work, but that's the
> way it does work. ;-)
> 
> -- 
> -Ian Woollard
> 
> "All the world's a stage... but you'll grow out of it
> eventually."
> 
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