[WikiEN-l] Re: Afd "votes" with no real reasons given

[Mark Gallagher]

G'day Ryan,

> On 9/15/05, dpbsmith at verizon.net <dpbsmith at verizon.net> wrote:
> 
>> It frosts me when people on EITHER side make short, curt,
>> dismissive comments in AfD that consist simply of a vote and a
>> _generic_ remark, like "Delete, nn website," or "Delete,
>> [whatever]cruft," or "Keep, all [whatever] are inherently notable,"
>> or "KEEP! Of course. Why would anyone want to delete this?"
<snip />
> Count the number of articles that go up to AFD every day, and ask
> yourself if you think its reasonable that everyone write a paragraph
> - or even a short explanation - on everything they vote for. Simply
> *voting* on everything would take an hour a day at least. Demanding a
> detailed explanation from every vote would only reduce the amount of
> communication because people would stop voting. If you want to fix

Not necessarily.  My voting pattern is (largely) thus: I come across 
something stupid (via RC patrol, doing the "random page shuffle", or 
just browsing), add it to AfD.  While I'm there I check out some of the 
other stuff nominated on that day, and vote accordingly (usually, but 
not always, to delete).  It doesn't take that much time.

To refuse to take time to explain yourself --- and do the minimum of 
research required to do so credibly --- is to make a stupid vote.  I've 
voted (or even nominated), only to have someone point out some crucial 
fact that I've misunderstood, and had to change my vote ... if I'd done 
the appropriate research (or understood the appropriate policy) better, 
then I wouldn't have wasted anyone's time like that.

If you don't have the time to make an informed contribution to an AfD 
discussion, you probably shouldn't be recording your opinion on that 
discussion.  The risk of being incorrect (and having others cite you for 
their vote!), regardless of whether you want to keep or delete, is too 
great.  Better, instead, to vote selectively --- only choose particular 
days (as I do), or those subjects you know something about, or whatever.

> that, you either expand the CSD, so stuff that doesn't need
> deliberation won't waste everyone's time, or you implement pure wiki
>  deletion, so this whole problem goes away entirely. Right now, if

But a bunch of new problems crop up.

> band and business vanity, link spam, personal essays, and neologisms
> were all covered by CSD (which they aren't), you could cut the amount
> of articles going up to AFD by up to 1/3.

I'd say you could cut it by a lot more than that.  Plus, we'd suddenly 
find out how many Rabid Deletionists(TM) were in fact Everyday Rational 
Editors(TM) who happened to be voting to delete Extremely Stupid 
Articles Which Are No Longer Handled By AfD Thank Goodness(TM).


-- 
Mark Gallagher
"What?  I can't hear you, I've got a banana on my head!"
- Danger Mouse


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