G'day Tony,
On 6/16/06, Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au wrote:
There's no excuse for saying silly things like "nobody may remove the speedy tag; use {{hangon}} instead".
What does "hangon" do that removing a speedy tag doesn't? Is there any reason why we shouldn't just speedy the hangon tag and edit the template to stop referring to it?
We like to discourage people from removing the speedy tag from their own articles, since (for instance) 13-year-olds writing about their homosexual friends tend not to be particularly objective when appraising their own profanity-strewn contributions.
However, this meant that perfectly good articles got speedied because of the following sequence (f'r instance): a) User A creates article that could stand to be improved. b) User B tags it for speedy. c) User A removes the tag. d) User B reverts, says "you cannot remove the tag from your own article" e) User A goes to the talkpage and complains. f) Admin C doesn't even read the article, let alone the talkpage, just deletes. "It's not my job to tell users they can't speedy if they want to."
So {{hangon}} serves the dual purpose of preventing authors from removing appropriate speedies, but allowing them to contest in an obvious way inappropriate speedies even when the admin isn't doing his job properly (not that I'd mention any names).
These days, however, {{hangon}} seems largely to encourage people to beat clueful editors over the head for no apparent reason. But, like geni says, that's the world of tomorrow. I haven't forgotten how to suck eggs, it's just that the egg-sucking procedures have changed and I never bothered to stay informed.