[WikiEN-l] Scott McCloud on Wikipedia

[Michael Snow]

George Herbert wrote:

> Random idea to throw into pot:
>
> We use AFD right now to cover a whole lot of different reasons by
> which one might want to delete an article.
>
> Possible improvement: Develop separate processes for each reason one
> might have for deleting an article.
>
> Some ideas along these lines:
>
> Unreferenced and thought to be unreliable - something like Prod, with
> a longer timeout, see if anyone will come along and provide suitable
> refs, else it goes.  Soft deletion (can be restored if someone comes
> along with good refs)
>
> Notability - still a sticking point.
>
> (and so on)

I've favored something like this for a long time, even when it was still 
called Votes for deletion. I figured it would be the most sensible way 
to keep the process organized when the date pages became unmanageable. 
Categories could have been a helpful tool in this regard, but instead 
people have used them to group the deletion nominations by the subject 
matter of the article. We could do both, I suppose.

This approach has several benefits. It requires people seeking deletion 
of an article to figure out and articulate why they want it deleted, 
which is sometimes done poorly or not at all. It also would allow those 
who want to salvage worthwhile material to focus their efforts on the 
justifications they find most problematic. Experience would further help 
us better shape the acceptable grounds for deletion.

--Michael Snow