From: Steve Bennett stevage@gmail.com
It occurred to me that there are three totally different situations which could be described "deletion":
Topic: The topic itself simply doesn't belong in Wikipedia, and even a brilliant article should be deleted. Examples: Dictionary definitions, un-notable people/groups. Solution: Delete and put a note on the topic. Article: The topic itself could belong in Wikipedia, but it doesn't deserve a whole article. Examples: Less well known songs of notable but not famous groups, less well known characters in fictional universes ("fancruft"). Solution: Merge with other articles. Content: The topic itself could make a good article, but this isn't it. As it stands it's worse than nothing. Examples: Copyright vio, substub, horribly POV etc. Solutions: Delete, reduce to stub, call for help to rewrite, trim, as appropriate.
Perhaps the format for AFD could be modified to split nominations into these three categories. This could reduce some hurt for some article "owners" ("It's not that your writing is bad, it just doesn't belong here"), and also make it a bit clearer when an article is being deleted for the wrong reason. Ie, it's in the bad topic section, but the dispute is about poor writing or lack of comprehensiveness.
Comments?
Mod +1, "insightful."