On Thu, Jan 5, 2017 at 8:33 PM Risker <risker.wp(a)gmail.com> wrote:
I do not know enough about how other Wikipedias handle
such spam, although
I have heard from some people editing on some projects that similar
articles there would be speedy-deleted without a second thought. I do not
think that it is likely that English Wikipedia will get to that point
unless more people who feel strongly about spam actively participate at
AfD.
AfD is one end of the problem; it is worth recognizing that the other end
is English Wikipedia's notability policy, and specifically the General
Notability Guideline ([[WP:GNG]]).
As you anticipate, some other wikis handle this sort of spam differently,
and the first (and effective) line of defense is their notability policy.
On my home wiki (Hebrew Wikipedia), for example, the notability threshold
for commercial ventures of any kind (including even international
corporations) is fairly high, so that a business needs to have created or
achieved something notable, or to have been involved in notable events, for
an article about it to be considered notable. This, coupled with the lack
of the GNG in Hebrew (i.e. it is *not* enough to have two reliable sources
independent of the subject to achieve notability), weeds out a very large
proportion of the commercial spam that people attempt to introduce to
Hebrew Wikipedia.
This is obviously not the venue to review English Wikipedia's policy, and I
recognize that the thread's topic is a call to action by WMF, aimed at the
board. But since Risker specifically identified "more participation at
AfD" as a key to achieving change, I thought it worthwhile to offer context
about another possible (and not necessarily easier to effect) lever of
change, viz. notability policy reform.
Cheers,
A.