Misplaced Pages

Template loop detected: Misplaced Pages talk:Article Rescue Squadron/Header

restoring unsourced BLPs

If an article has been deleted purely because it is an unsourced Bio, and you are willing to reference it, then I am one of the admins who is willing to restore it. ϢereSpielChequers 23:54, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Me too. the wub "?!" 00:14, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Me three. Jclemens (talk) 03:14, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Is there an easily accessed list of all the deleted biographies? What is the current damage?--Milowent (talk) 06:30, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Here is one, Alan Giles, that could be easily sourced, and had no controversial content, if restored to me. As could be David Freiberg. Those are just the first two I found! Looking farther into the mayhem, i noticed this admin restoration of one deleted by Scott McDonald: "Frank Andersson" ‎ (45 revisions restored: an olympic medallist for fuck's sake)"--Milowent (talk) 07:04, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

• Thanks for restoring Alan Giles and David Freiberg they how have sources added. The next random deleted ones I looked into are Morton Gurtin (2004 Timoshenko Medal winner, the highest award one can receive in applied mechanics), Cathy Greene (non-contentious actress bio, imdb and other sources easily would eliminated "unreferenced" concern), Christina Dieckmann (former Miss World Venezuela, all of whom have articles, completely non-contentious bio--its amazing how random these deletions are, poking little holes in huge organized swaths of the project), Elly Dekker (Caird award winner, whatever that is, but sourceable for the little and wholly non-contentious content it contained), Sébastien Charpentier (motorcycle racer) (apparently a world champion for two years in his sport, as the first google hit told me), John Bucklaschuk (Canadian politician, cabinet minister in the 1980s), David Blum (fairly well-known journalist, I recognized the name immediately, former editor-in-chief of The Village Voice, among other roles), etc. etc. etc.--Milowent (talk) 18:16, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
  • Well yesterday I restored Frank Andersson, an Olympic medallist and winner of Sweden's most prestigious sporting award; Tarja Filatov, a member of the Finnish cabinet; Birthe Kjær, a Danish Eurovision entrant; and Judith St. George, American author who won the Caldecott Medal; along with others. These were all easy to source. If anyone is interested I am making a list at User:The wub/Lazarus of deleted BLP articles. This has information like inbound links and other language versions, that could help prioritise sourcing work rather than picking at random. Tomorrow I plan to add more that were deleted by other admins. the wub "?!" 20:31, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

• • • Excuse me but Judith St. George did not win a Caldecott Medal. Caldecott Medals are only awarded to illustrators. It was David Small who won the medal. I will fix the Judith St. George article to make that more clear. - Josette (talk) 14:50, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Can we simply incubate the Scott MacDonald to incubator, so editors can see what was deleted? Ikip _{an olympic medallist for f**k's sake} 21:09, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Milowent are you offering to reference Cathy Greene, John Bucklaschuk, David Blum and Elly Dekker? If so I'll restore them for you. ϢereSpielChequers 00:43, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I am also willing to restore such articles for anyone willing to undertake to reference them. Stifle (talk) 09:36, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

thank you stifle, please suggest WP:incubator so several editors can work on the articles. 09:43, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Lists of articles deleted

List of all articles deleted by Scott MacDonald

I know that wub mentioned this above, but it deserves its own section.

All of the article deleted by Scott MacDonald are now found here: User:The wub/Lazarus Ikip _{an olympic medallist for f**k's sake} 21:09, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

What do we think about having different volunteers to do different categories? I'm happy to work on musicians, actually just asked the wub to userfy 5 of them to me. I'm sure between us all we could hit most categories and get more done if we're only looking at the types of articles that we are used to dealing with. J04n(talk page) 21:13, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I am fine with splitting up however it makes sense. I can take some from whatever categories are unclaimed. There's little rhyme or reason to the deletions.--Milowent (talk) 21:20, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I had a autohotkey tool (big page loads slowly, see red boxes) which scraped google and gave number totals for scholar, book and news. I can work with another editor to restore and adapt this. It is very easy to see at a glance (in some cases), if an editor has no google hits.

User J04n: I ask everyone who got the newsletter to answer a survey, Misplaced Pages:WikiProject_Article_Rescue_Squadron/Newsletter/20091001/News so we can match interests with articles tagged for rescue.

Just answered survey J04n(talk page) 22:13, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

It is very important to remember that this is only 150 deletions. Editors are currently debating at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Biographies of living people whether to delete 60,000 articles. Ikip _{an olympic medallist for f**k's sake} 21:38, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

List of all articles deleted by the three editors

• User:Apoc2400/Deletion list now with Google cache links that might work for a few more days at least. Ikip 00:56, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

• • Transcribed from User talk: Ikip:

I have made a list of those unreferenced BLP articles that got deleted a few days ago. User:Apoc2400/Deletion list. Feel free to use it or send it on to anyone who might have use for it. I have not really followed what happened on the issue since the RfC started, but it seems you have. --Apoc2400 (talk) 00:37, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Now with Google cache links that might work for a few more days at least. And yes, I do occasionally help out with articles tagged for rescue, so I am aware of the ARS. --Apoc2400 (talk) 00:58, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Wow! What an incredible idea! I never thought of that! Thank you. Check out Wikipedia_talk:Article_Incubator#I_suggested_this_on_the_BLP_RFC.2C_what_do_you_all_think.3F we need an editor like you to help! I will let the other editors know in Wikipedia_talk:Article_Incubator and WT:Article Rescue Squadron. Please notify us of all updates, there. See WT:Article Rescue Squadron someone already made a list of Scott MacDonald deletions. With categories included. Ikip 01:04, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

These are all quite highly notable. All have been undeleted.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/Yury_Yarov
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Koloa_Talake
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Lee_Hun_Jai
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Sebastian_Anefal
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Giuseppe_Gargani
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Ritva_Sarin-Grufberg
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Danne_Sundman
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Runar_Karlsson
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Harriet_Lindeman
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Milan_Radulovi%C4%87
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Predrag_Bubalo
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Kerstin_Alm

--Apoc2400 (talk) 13:05, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Graph showing what was deleted and what was restored

I created Misplaced Pages:Article_Rescue_Squadron/BLP, I think it is important to list all of the articles which were deleted and restored.

I envision a sortable list of all articles deleted and restored, with the most prominent person on top. Frank Andersson, an Olympic athlete is #1 so far.

We can use this list to show that what is happening is wrong. It will not convince those who support this radical change, but it maybe sway others.

As DGG says: I do not attempt to convert my opponents--I aim at converting their audience. Ikip 02:49, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, at it's current state, more then 50% of the articles deleted shouln't have been. I'm sure the amount of libelous articles were way less. ηoian ‡orever ηew ‡rontiers 16:40, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

You don't need to convert their audience. Consensus is against their actions. ηoian ‡orever ηew ‡rontiers 16:40, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Creating BLP subpages for unreferenced BLPs

Moved to Wikipedia_talk:Article_Incubator#List_of_all_articles_deleted_by_the_three_editors

I think this is the solution to being able to examine 50,000 articles. Ikip 01:01, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Unreferenced BLPs counter

I have been asking "why doesn't the unreferenced BLP counter go down?" I spend my time adding references, but at the end of the day, the number stays about the same. Sometimes it goes up. I even cleaned up a few categories, only to find them filled the next morning. Well I found one answer User:Tassedethe is busy sticking more tags on, faster than they can be sourced. Obviously this user is not making an attempt to source them, just tagging and moving on, by the hundreds. I don't know what can be done about it, but there's your answer.Trackinfo (talk) 21:52, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

That user seems to do a lot of wikignoming which rightfully involves tagging unrefed BLPs as such. They don't seem to be doing anything out of process or disruptive just correctly modifying that an unrefed article is actually an unrefed BLP article. That's helping things. I'd be more concerned about the tendentious editing to removed content and sources and then claiming no sourcing exists. -- Banjeboi 22:35, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

This user's contributions is a source to chase. And in reference to the unreferenced BLP situation, we should get credit for making progress against this additional surge, as opposed to later being told that our efforts have failed (so mass deletions are the only course of action). I fought this argument with some of the deletionists, that is what they will push for.Trackinfo (talk) 02:29, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

We can agree to disagree, I'm seeing them make incremental improvements and not in a disruptive way. That the total BLP count changes in not that big of deal, ideally we want to know the true scope of the category and generally they're helping. In theory the articles that they move into the category are put in the March 2010 pile rather than the ones from months or years ago so the back-log can still be seen as the number of pre-2010 articles will still be going down. If you feel someone is mixing statistics you can put out that it's more accurate to count pre-2010 or whenevr this whole drama started rather than just the total number although both numbers are still very high in almost everyone's opinion. -- Banjeboi 10:09, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

change name to Article reference squadron

Would anyone consider changing the name to Article reference squadron? The name is less exciting, but it is also less contentious. Instead of focusing on "rescuing articles" we can focus on "referencing articles" basically the same thing, but less contentious. Okip (the new and improved Ikip) 11:02, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• I don't think that rescuing articles is or should be contentious. I suspect that the article rescue template is contentious because some might interpret it as canvassing - and it could indirectly lead to getting extra !votes at AFDs rather than extra assistance at improving an article. I would suggest that rather than rename the project we review the template and the AFD template with a view to merging the two - a better AFD template that gave newbies an easy how to guide as to how to see if their article is notable and if it is how to bring it up to a standard that would get it through AFD would reduce the contentious aspect of the ARS and ultimately rescue far more articles than we currently do. ϢereSpielChequers 14:52, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• The current name is good, in my opinion. The "rescue" term is a good one and used in good faith, despite occasional bickering from those who less inclusionist-minded.--Milowent (talk) 15:44, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• It's not just referencing. Sometimes it's establishing notability and that can mean taking the article beyond a stub. SunCreator (talk) 19:23, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

• Rescuing sometimes involves giving reasonable arguments to keep something, to count that of the drive-by deletionists. Not all articles saved, are done by references. Articles are also rescued by rewriting them, or changing the name if that's the only thing people were upset about. Sometimes its just a list article that needs a clear definition for inclusion, to convince people its worth keeping. And the only people who whine about it being canvassing, are those who don't always get their way in the AFD, and want something to fuss about. These people are also often found in other Wikiprojects, that do canvas, asking for help from each other to have their will done. See for the most obvious example of that. Dream Focus 19:32, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Agree Dream Focus, sometimes it is about giving a reasonable argument. Have encountered canvassing also, unfortunately. SunCreator (talk) 20:05, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

I respect everyones opinion.

What emotions does each template convey.

1. When you think of the word "rescue" what is the first word that comes to your mind?
2. When you think of the word "reference" what is the first word that comes to your mind?

The first word that comes to my mind when I think of "rescue" is "help".

The first word that comes to my mind when I think "reference" is a much more neutral words, "books" or "library".

Which word sounds more encyclopedic?

I think the word "rescue" for better or worse conveys a more stronger response.

• Negative: "help" and "rescue" is often seen as synonymous with "canvassing"
• Positive: rescue and help are seen by supporters as a good thing.

The question we have to ask ourselves does this stronger response outweigh the negative response?

Lets assume we are using the word "rescue" to recruit people and get them motivated.

Cost-benefit analysis: Do these positive reasons for using the word "rescue" outweigh the negative "canvassing" feelings?

Okip (formerly Ikip) 04:49, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

• The idea of reference vs. rescue also dulls the focus on articles currently at AfD. I don't think that's a beneficial focus shift. Jclemens (talk) 04:56, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

• I think we should keep Article Rescue Squadron. NBeale (talk) 13:54, 14 February 2010 (UTC)
• I would leave well enough alone. It's like changing who you are because the mean bullies will then stop calling you names. Guess what? They're bullies and will simply make up new names. Just get on with doing quality work and don't pretend we are experts at referencing, that's for the good folks at wp:RSN. -- Banjeboi 22:28, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Modified name to center our focus

Let's consider Improvement & Rescue Squad which might then better serve to indicate that our goal is to "improve" articles first as part of an overall attempt of a "rescue"... specially since improvement includes much more than just adding references. We need to be cognizant of needs for expansion or reduction, for cleanup and style, of grammer and wikilinks... of all the various factors that improve an article and make it worthy of the project. With some editors feeling the current title simply encourages a stampede of keeps at AFD, perhaps this acknowledgement that our goal is to "improve" articles would better reflect our contributions. Schmidt, 19:17, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Michael, I completely agree with your sentiment. The title is a bit cumbersome but I think it is the best idea yet. J04n(talk page) 21:12, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

how about, for now, simply changing it to: This user improves articles for the Misplaced Pages:Article Rescue Squadron. same name slightly different project tag. Again, I am indifferent. I simply throw up ideas here and see if they are decent enough to stick. Okip 02:26, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Do we really want our initials to be IRS? I think ARS has far fewer negative connotations. :-) More seriously, the only concern I'd have with that is that it might increase confusion about what we work on, that is a) articles which are b) up for deletion. It might sound like we improve any articles or even any categories etc. ...But I can't think of a better one, so I'm happy either way. --Zeborah (talk) 05:51, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Oh that is funny, good point! Okip 03:05, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

I like the idea behind improve. Goes to eat thesauras. SunCreator (talk) 03:28, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

enhance, upgrade, transform, renovate, help, augment, develop, elavate, grow, cultivate, enrich etc. SunCreator (talk) 03:44, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Enhance notability, reference improve, cultivate, help. ENRICH SunCreator (talk) 04:08, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Contest

This page just began today, we would love help building this contest and suggestions. You can strongly influence how this contest is built. Okip (formerly Ikip) 10:40, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

sign ups to be a constant are now open. Okip 15:26, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Out of character/in character

I don't know if there's even anything to be done with these, but I am posting here in case there is interest in working on the articles: Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Out of character BOZ (talk) 03:38, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

you may want to comment in the AFD, thanks for bringing this up. Okip 12:32, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Question about how contributors "consistently and successfully violate policy without sanction"

See: Unequality shown in the enforcement of 3rr

Permalink:

Okip 12:56, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Here's a recent paper which touches on this point: "Redistributing Moral Agency: One of the most striking elements of Misplaced Pages‟s vandal fighting networks is the extent to which it transforms the decision making process in reviewing edits. In a setting such as Misplaced Pages, such decisions are key turning points in deciding what is valid or invalid content and who are the legitimate or illegitimate contributors to a base of knowledge.". Colonel Warden (talk) 13:25, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

And how is this section relevant for the ARS project? Fram (talk) 14:31, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

The paper I cited provides an interesting account of how a variety of processes and flags interact to form a distributed and powerful defense mechanism for Misplaced Pages. The ARS is a component of a similar sort in the overall complex of processes relating to article improvement, amendment and deletion. The mechanisms tend to interact and evolve and it seems good to share sources which comment intelligently upon this. Colonel Warden (talk) 16:03, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

I'll take that as a not. Fram (talk) 07:32, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

We deal with issues of content and newbies adding content all the time. This thread may be a bit highbrow for this page but certainly speaks to the general atmosphere of combativeness that has been seen here and elsewhere on Misplaced Pages. One of the things I've learned from my ARS experience is that newbies often feel very put off and given a welcome message are sometimes quite appreciative of sound advice especially in creating content. -- Banjeboi 10:14, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Flagged revisions

• User talk:Jimbo Wales/poll seems relevant to the interest of editors here. Or at least can someone point me to any studies examining its effect of any other wikipedias?--Milowent (talk) 15:45, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
• In what way is there are specific interest for this project wrt flagged revisions? Fram (talk) 15:46, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
• Well, it would be helpful if there was an official explanation of what Jimbo is suggesting to implement, then I would know better if there is a true link. Jimbo assumes common knowledge that is actually known by a small % of wiki editors. But as its being described, edits of regular editors won't appear in articles until approved by some unknown group of approved editors. Some concerns (among many): This sounds like it could severely depress the contributions of casual editors of wikipedia, among whom the idea of 'the encyclopedia anyone can edit' means their edits appear when they make them. Obscure but notable article subjects may thus be harmed. This goes against the core mission of this project, "All too often, an article about a perfectly notable topic lies wounded, badly written, unsourced – but should its life be taken at Articles for Deletion? No! Only articles about non-encyclopedic topics should be deleted, not articles that need improvement. Improvement is the opposite of deletion." A huge policy change which could harm the improvement of some articles (while presumably protecting some others from vandalism) seems relevant for discussion.--Milowent (talk) 16:00, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

That "All too often ... wounded ... bleeding ... think of the children ..." thing probably puts more people off than it attracts.
In answer to Fram though - the only significance to this project as far as I can see is if it will make it harder to place the {{rescue}} tag. So probably not.   pablo_hablo. 16:18, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Well, that language comes from the project page and its as I found the project when I became interested in actively contributing here. In any event, I don't know why we beat around the bush to ignore that a number of ARS members are inclusionists. There are ardent deletionists who also believe in the virtues of article improvement, of course, but having a talk topic about Jimbo's poll here shouldn't offend, right? Anyhow, its funny that you mention the "rescue" tag, because under flagged revisions, I think the rescue tag would be of much more limited effect, as many potential editors would never see the tag.--Milowent (talk) 17:22, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

• The details are still unclear but it seems that the proposal would have a significant effect upon the editing of all articles and so every project should be notified. In the case of the ARS, it seems that there would be a significant impact because the proposal introduces a delay into the editing process. As AFD is run to a strict timetable, the results of article rescue might not be visible in sufficient time. This seems unsatisfactory. Colonel Warden (talk) 17:33, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

As it affects all articles (and all projects) it therefore is not of specific interest to the ARS, to return to the original question.
If there were any improvement of a rescue-tagged article, of course those improvements would be visible for editors to review (just not published), which seems satisfactory.   pablo_hablo. 21:09, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

• As the exact details of the putative mechanism are still unclear there is no "of course". If all edits were visible immediately, as they are currently, then there would be no point in the mechanism. The whole point of the scheme is to mask edits in some way. In discussions elsewhere, editors report that, where similar schemes have been tried, they may have to wait days for their good faith edits to be approved. This seems unacceptable for edits made during the 7-day window of AFD. Colonel Warden (talk) 22:13, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

It will affect all editing equally, including editors who are members of the Article Rescue Squadron in their chosen activities (whether this be placing a {{rescue}} tag, voting at one or many AfDs or even editing an article). It will not affect those editors specifically, or in a different manner to any other editor.   pablo_hablo. 23:24, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

No, it would not affect all editing equally as only edits to article space would be affected. This would therefore increase the systemic bias whereby it is easy for editors to make drive-by nominations of articles for deletion in a twinkle or post a per nom but it requires significantly more effort to improve articles by researching and editing in a short time. Such article improvement is performed specifically by ARS editors. Colonel Warden (talk) 23:33, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Article improvement is most definitely not performed specifically by ARS editors.   pablo_hablo. 23:51, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

The word specifically does not mean exclusively. It is a specific characteristic of ARS editors that they improve articles, especially at AFD. Other editors may do this too and that's fine. Numerous editors seem to be opposing the proposal and so the matter may be moot. Colonel Warden (talk) 00:08, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I know what it means, and I know that some ARS editors do exactly that. Many do not.   pablo_hablo. 00:15, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

• Going back to Colonel Warden's original point, my reading of WP:Flagged revisions#Description and WP:Flagged revisions/fact sheet#Visibility is that all users will be able to see all currently visible (not deleted or oversighted) revisions. It will affect which version is shown by default. It would be an issue if editors were participating at AfD based on the lagged sighted revisions, but that could be addressed by education, documentation, and maybe a temporary addition to the AfD templates. Flatscan (talk) 05:51, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

• The most recent "poll" should have been announced on mainpage.. or at the village pump, as it afffects every project and every article contributor, old and new.... specially as there are lots of issues yet to be ironed out before seeking even a "trial" implementation. For instance, the current proposal allows a contribution be autoconfirmed if the author has at least 1 year on board and at least 1000 edits. But strangely, the proposal only requires 3 months on board before one is allowed to vett the edit's of some other newcomer. Seems a bit contradictory if it is seen that 3 months experience allows a new editor to stand in judgement over contibutions of someone who may have 4 times the experience. I would hope this does not then become a series of repeated battle-of-wills among newcomers. Perhaps lowering the bar more realistically for both... allowing one or two months with one or two hundred mainspace contributions in order to qualify for either autoconfirmation or reviewer. May as well level the playingfield. Schmidt, 04:33, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

  It does not seem that someone with even 3 months in could figure this out: Read Help:Extension:FlaggedRevs and then mediawiki.org/Extension:FlaggedRevs. Will the "tools" be automatically granted as shown here if meeting the criteria? Or will en.Misplaced Pages create another level of beauracracy similar to RFA and RFB with editors voting on whether or not to allow someone else these tools? Schmidt, 04:55, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

  "The most recent "poll" should have been announced on mainpage.. or at the village pump, as it afffects every project and every article contributor, old and new..." And that's exactly what I did, announcing it at two Village Pump pages, at the Community portal, and at WP:CENT. I don't decide what comes on edit notices or the main page though. 08:46, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

• Fram also announced the poll at the Administrator's Noticeboard. What is the specific interest of admins in flagged revisions? Colonel Warden (talk) 11:48, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

That it will replace (at least for some groups of articles, e.g. BLPs) (semi-)protection, an admin-only tool so far? Also, the rights for people to be a flagger or reviewer or whatever will be granted and revoked by admins. So, this proposal has a clear impact on what admins will have to do or no longer will have to do. What is the impact of this proposal on what ARS'ers (compared to other editors) will have to do or not to do? Fram (talk) 13:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I suspect the only difference will be that in some AFD discussions ARS members will need to start saying "please look at the version that includes my latest unflagged change". So not a big difference and one we can easily include here and perhaps in our next newsletter when and if the time comes. ϢereSpielChequers 13:50, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

It seems likely that flagger rights will be assigned automatically, like other autoconfirmed rights such as new page patrol, which this resembles. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I don't believe that such automatic rights assignment has been decided yet. On the German version, there are quite strict automatic granting rights, plus a manual granting process for whoever doesn't meet the automatic requirements (e.g. if you have ever been blocked, you don't get the rights automatically). Admins on the German Misplaced Pages can always remove the right (contrary to how currently patroller is implemented here). So if we follow the German implementation in this regard, the rights are still of direct inteerst to admins. The overlap with or replacement of protection remains as an argument as well of course. Fram (talk) 14:58, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

The lack of clarity about such details seems to be a significant reason that there is no consensus for the current proposal. It is well described as a pig in a poke. Colonel Warden (talk) 15:17, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Powergaming

This one is at AFD, in case anyone can do anything for it. BOZ (talk) 17:51, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

I have added the rescue tag to the article to try to solicit editors to improve and source the article better.--Milowent (talk) 19:19, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

This is a classic example of people wasting our time with pointless deletion nominations. Spending just half a second clicking on the Google news search or Google book search, would've revealed plenty of sources for this. Dream Focus 03:51, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Hitlerszalonna

This got saved from scrap heap on the last day of the AfD today. It started out as Hitler bacon (literal translation) from Hungarian, which seemed to cause a number of knee-jerk delete votes, and another newbie editor (and Hungarian speaker to boot) being scared away. With some effort, including help from the Bacon project (or whatever those bacon obsessed guys are called), it was greatly improved and at least closed no consensus. What disturbs me is that the concept of the article was verifiable (with some difficulty) and improvable, and relates a fascinating story about how a cheap jam product in Hungary is named after Hitler and bacon. The knowledge of Hungary's version of a Spam like product would have been lost to English wikipedia for no good reason.--Milowent (talk) 02:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Barnstars for all three of you ;) thanks for letting us know. Okip 06:04, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikilobbying

There seems to be a lot of wikilobbying going on at Reddit right now, so, in the spirit of transparency, I thought I would do some hopefully allowable lobbying myself. I've added a Link to this article on Reddit cojoco (talk) 05:06, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Reddit doesn't seem to be worth our energies. Really, if it's not on Misplaced Pages it's simply out of our scope.

Zoo code

I've had a lot of unfortunate interactions with Delicious carbuncle and have now reverted their adding the rescue tag seen here. The article first off shows little signs of rescuing to begin with, that editor seems to be grinding an axe and they've made absolutely no indication why they think the article should be rescued. Feel free to revert if you want to take owner ship for defending the article at AfD. -- Banjeboi 23:06, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I've tagged over articles for rescue in the past and never had any problems. I'm not sure why this one should be any different. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 23:15, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

That you don't see the problem is actually the problem. - As part of this tag's use, please comment at the deletion discussion on why this item should be rescued and how that could happen. Your input should constructively lead the way for other editors to understand how this item can be improved to meet Misplaced Pages's policies and likely benefits our readers. If this is just your latest round of distraction and disruption or some other WP:Drama I don't know or care. But that you are gleefully disrupting more areas of the overall project only serves to demonstrate the lack of respect you have for other editors and the project as a whole. -- Banjeboi 23:25, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I have just made a comment at the AfD, but to be honest, I don't think the text you've quoted is generally followed by others. I'm not here to criticize, that's just my impression. I appreciate any help your can offer finding good references. Thanks. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 23:37, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Tom Cousins

This was an example of a poorly written article that just needed a little TLC. Article Rescue FTW! ^_^ ManicSpider (talk) 00:53, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Glad to see it got worked on. I tackled Cousins Properties, glad to see Tom got preserved as well!--Milowent (talk) 03:43, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Process for adding an article to Hall of Fame

I just finished rescuing Mesame Dasi, with the nominator withdrawing the AfD nomination. I guess it should be added to the Hall of Fame now, but...how do I do that? The instructions section in the Hall of Fame is blank for some reason. Silverseren 03:10, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

It is rather difficult to add new sections to the hall of fame. I attempted to make this semi-automatic, then failed and deleted the instructions.

If you know how to add sections to a table, please go ahead, I can correct any mistakes you make. Okip 03:54, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

I suppose i'll try. If I mess it up, I can always revert it. Silverseren 04:07, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

Cool, it worked. Silverseren 04:16, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

congratulations. And always nice to see new editors join the squadron. Okip 04:27, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

Some help?

I could really use some help on the articles I added to the list. A number of them (though i'm wavering on about two of them) are extremely notable, but the other users are being nitpicky or are just focusing on the short length of the articles. I believe i'll be able to handle Status paradox, maybe, on my own, as i'm focusing a lot of my attention on that. I'll also focusing a lot on Planck particle, and Meg Sneed seems like it will survive, but the rest aren't doing so well. Could I get some help in handling them? Silverseren 06:56, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

I feel like there's only three of us that even do anything. ._. Silverseren 03:46, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

I think that might be a little unfair, but I understand your frustration when there is so much that needs doing and we always seem to be swamped by the never-ending tide of deletionists. ManicSpider (talk) 22:12, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

I just feel that there's only a few of us that I ever see active and doing stuff related to the squadron. And, yeah, the deletionists are winning at this point. Silverseren 00:06, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

• Who are the three active contributors in your view? Just curious as I'd not come across User:Silver seren myself before and so there may be more activity than he supposes - our paths may just have not crossed yet. Colonel Warden (talk) 20:03, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

I just threw the number three out there as an example for a small number of people. The most prolific people that i've noticed have been User:Milowent, User:Dream Focus, and User:Benjiboi. Though i've seen you around too, Warden. I'm surprised you haven't noticed me, considering I added almost all of the articles that are on the rescue list now. Silverseren 20:11, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

• IMHO, the deletionists are "losing" like crazy. Do worthwhile articles get deleted? Yes. And the deletion of worthwhile articles does damage editor morale and discourages new editors. And sourcing articles up for deletion that can be rescued is hella fun. Misplaced Pages is still growing by over 1,000 new articles per day, even net of deletions. I've seen deleted articles get recreated and survive, or the same information blossom in new places-- in short, information finds a way. It would be nice if the administrative burden of needless AfD debates could be eliminated, but life always has overhead. Not everyone with an inclusionist outlook is always active here, but they appear throughout AfD discussions again and again, be it names you know, occasional names, new names, or even IP editors calling B.S. on something they think belongs.--Milowent (talk) 21:24, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Kent Glowinski AfD

I need help over at the Kent Glowinski Afd discussion, stat. From what I was able to research, he is ridiculously notable and yet a bunch of people went in there and voted delete without even trying to look up any sources. Silverseren 00:52, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

• looks a bit odd, i'll try to check it out. seems like the subject wants his article deleted because he's done some stuff he'd rather not have perpetuated.--Milowent (talk) 04:03, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Except the nominator gave no proof about this statement. It's just hearsay at this point. Silverseren 07:05, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

The guy is kinda marginal. 21 hits on google news archive for oddball things. he's run for Canadian office at a very young age, which made some press, and lost. And he's had some legal squabbles on minor import. Canadians may think he's notable.--Milowent (talk) 13:50, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Post the AFD at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Canada but make sure to mention that you posted at the wikiproject in the AFD. Okip 03:06, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Nancy Duarte AfD

Please go here and vote. Silverseren 02:33, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

restoring unsourced BLPs

If an article has been deleted purely because it is an unsourced Bio, and you are willing to reference it, then I am one of the admins who is willing to restore it. ϢereSpielChequers 23:54, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Me too. the wub "?!" 00:14, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Me three. Jclemens (talk) 03:14, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Is there an easily accessed list of all the deleted biographies? What is the current damage?--Milowent (talk) 06:30, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Here is one, Alan Giles, that could be easily sourced, and had no controversial content, if restored to me. As could be David Freiberg. Those are just the first two I found! Looking farther into the mayhem, i noticed this admin restoration of one deleted by Scott McDonald: "Frank Andersson" ‎ (45 revisions restored: an olympic medallist for fuck's sake)"--Milowent (talk) 07:04, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

• Thanks for restoring Alan Giles and David Freiberg they how have sources added. The next random deleted ones I looked into are Morton Gurtin (2004 Timoshenko Medal winner, the highest award one can receive in applied mechanics), Cathy Greene (non-contentious actress bio, imdb and other sources easily would eliminated "unreferenced" concern), Christina Dieckmann (former Miss World Venezuela, all of whom have articles, completely non-contentious bio--its amazing how random these deletions are, poking little holes in huge organized swaths of the project), Elly Dekker (Caird award winner, whatever that is, but sourceable for the little and wholly non-contentious content it contained), Sébastien Charpentier (motorcycle racer) (apparently a world champion for two years in his sport, as the first google hit told me), John Bucklaschuk (Canadian politician, cabinet minister in the 1980s), David Blum (fairly well-known journalist, I recognized the name immediately, former editor-in-chief of The Village Voice, among other roles), etc. etc. etc.--Milowent (talk) 18:16, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
  • Well yesterday I restored Frank Andersson, an Olympic medallist and winner of Sweden's most prestigious sporting award; Tarja Filatov, a member of the Finnish cabinet; Birthe Kjær, a Danish Eurovision entrant; and Judith St. George, American author who won the Caldecott Medal; along with others. These were all easy to source. If anyone is interested I am making a list at User:The wub/Lazarus of deleted BLP articles. This has information like inbound links and other language versions, that could help prioritise sourcing work rather than picking at random. Tomorrow I plan to add more that were deleted by other admins. the wub "?!" 20:31, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

• • • Excuse me but Judith St. George did not win a Caldecott Medal. Caldecott Medals are only awarded to illustrators. It was David Small who won the medal. I will fix the Judith St. George article to make that more clear. - Josette (talk) 14:50, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Can we simply incubate the Scott MacDonald to incubator, so editors can see what was deleted? Ikip _{an olympic medallist for f**k's sake} 21:09, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Milowent are you offering to reference Cathy Greene, John Bucklaschuk, David Blum and Elly Dekker? If so I'll restore them for you. ϢereSpielChequers 00:43, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I am also willing to restore such articles for anyone willing to undertake to reference them. Stifle (talk) 09:36, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

thank you stifle, please suggest WP:incubator so several editors can work on the articles. 09:43, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Lists of articles deleted

List of all articles deleted by Scott MacDonald

I know that wub mentioned this above, but it deserves its own section.

All of the article deleted by Scott MacDonald are now found here: User:The wub/Lazarus Ikip _{an olympic medallist for f**k's sake} 21:09, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

What do we think about having different volunteers to do different categories? I'm happy to work on musicians, actually just asked the wub to userfy 5 of them to me. I'm sure between us all we could hit most categories and get more done if we're only looking at the types of articles that we are used to dealing with. J04n(talk page) 21:13, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I am fine with splitting up however it makes sense. I can take some from whatever categories are unclaimed. There's little rhyme or reason to the deletions.--Milowent (talk) 21:20, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I had a autohotkey tool (big page loads slowly, see red boxes) which scraped google and gave number totals for scholar, book and news. I can work with another editor to restore and adapt this. It is very easy to see at a glance (in some cases), if an editor has no google hits.

User J04n: I ask everyone who got the newsletter to answer a survey, Misplaced Pages:WikiProject_Article_Rescue_Squadron/Newsletter/20091001/News so we can match interests with articles tagged for rescue.

Just answered survey J04n(talk page) 22:13, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

It is very important to remember that this is only 150 deletions. Editors are currently debating at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Biographies of living people whether to delete 60,000 articles. Ikip _{an olympic medallist for f**k's sake} 21:38, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

List of all articles deleted by the three editors

• User:Apoc2400/Deletion list now with Google cache links that might work for a few more days at least. Ikip 00:56, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

• • Transcribed from User talk: Ikip:

I have made a list of those unreferenced BLP articles that got deleted a few days ago. User:Apoc2400/Deletion list. Feel free to use it or send it on to anyone who might have use for it. I have not really followed what happened on the issue since the RfC started, but it seems you have. --Apoc2400 (talk) 00:37, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Now with Google cache links that might work for a few more days at least. And yes, I do occasionally help out with articles tagged for rescue, so I am aware of the ARS. --Apoc2400 (talk) 00:58, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Wow! What an incredible idea! I never thought of that! Thank you. Check out Wikipedia_talk:Article_Incubator#I_suggested_this_on_the_BLP_RFC.2C_what_do_you_all_think.3F we need an editor like you to help! I will let the other editors know in Wikipedia_talk:Article_Incubator and WT:Article Rescue Squadron. Please notify us of all updates, there. See WT:Article Rescue Squadron someone already made a list of Scott MacDonald deletions. With categories included. Ikip 01:04, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

These are all quite highly notable. All have been undeleted.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/Yury_Yarov
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Koloa_Talake
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Lee_Hun_Jai
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Sebastian_Anefal
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Giuseppe_Gargani
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Ritva_Sarin-Grufberg
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Danne_Sundman
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Runar_Karlsson
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Harriet_Lindeman
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Milan_Radulovi%C4%87
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Predrag_Bubalo
• http://en.wikipedia.org/Kerstin_Alm

--Apoc2400 (talk) 13:05, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Graph showing what was deleted and what was restored

I created Misplaced Pages:Article_Rescue_Squadron/BLP, I think it is important to list all of the articles which were deleted and restored.

I envision a sortable list of all articles deleted and restored, with the most prominent person on top. Frank Andersson, an Olympic athlete is #1 so far.

We can use this list to show that what is happening is wrong. It will not convince those who support this radical change, but it maybe sway others.

As DGG says: I do not attempt to convert my opponents--I aim at converting their audience. Ikip 02:49, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, at it's current state, more then 50% of the articles deleted shouln't have been. I'm sure the amount of libelous articles were way less. ηoian ‡orever ηew ‡rontiers 16:40, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

You don't need to convert their audience. Consensus is against their actions. ηoian ‡orever ηew ‡rontiers 16:40, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Creating BLP subpages for unreferenced BLPs

Moved to Wikipedia_talk:Article_Incubator#List_of_all_articles_deleted_by_the_three_editors

I think this is the solution to being able to examine 50,000 articles. Ikip 01:01, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Unreferenced BLPs counter

I have been asking "why doesn't the unreferenced BLP counter go down?" I spend my time adding references, but at the end of the day, the number stays about the same. Sometimes it goes up. I even cleaned up a few categories, only to find them filled the next morning. Well I found one answer User:Tassedethe is busy sticking more tags on, faster than they can be sourced. Obviously this user is not making an attempt to source them, just tagging and moving on, by the hundreds. I don't know what can be done about it, but there's your answer.Trackinfo (talk) 21:52, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

That user seems to do a lot of wikignoming which rightfully involves tagging unrefed BLPs as such. They don't seem to be doing anything out of process or disruptive just correctly modifying that an unrefed article is actually an unrefed BLP article. That's helping things. I'd be more concerned about the tendentious editing to removed content and sources and then claiming no sourcing exists. -- Banjeboi 22:35, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

This user's contributions is a source to chase. And in reference to the unreferenced BLP situation, we should get credit for making progress against this additional surge, as opposed to later being told that our efforts have failed (so mass deletions are the only course of action). I fought this argument with some of the deletionists, that is what they will push for.Trackinfo (talk) 02:29, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

We can agree to disagree, I'm seeing them make incremental improvements and not in a disruptive way. That the total BLP count changes in not that big of deal, ideally we want to know the true scope of the category and generally they're helping. In theory the articles that they move into the category are put in the March 2010 pile rather than the ones from months or years ago so the back-log can still be seen as the number of pre-2010 articles will still be going down. If you feel someone is mixing statistics you can put out that it's more accurate to count pre-2010 or whenevr this whole drama started rather than just the total number although both numbers are still very high in almost everyone's opinion. -- Banjeboi 10:09, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

change name to Article reference squadron

Would anyone consider changing the name to Article reference squadron? The name is less exciting, but it is also less contentious. Instead of focusing on "rescuing articles" we can focus on "referencing articles" basically the same thing, but less contentious. Okip (the new and improved Ikip) 11:02, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• I don't think that rescuing articles is or should be contentious. I suspect that the article rescue template is contentious because some might interpret it as canvassing - and it could indirectly lead to getting extra !votes at AFDs rather than extra assistance at improving an article. I would suggest that rather than rename the project we review the template and the AFD template with a view to merging the two - a better AFD template that gave newbies an easy how to guide as to how to see if their article is notable and if it is how to bring it up to a standard that would get it through AFD would reduce the contentious aspect of the ARS and ultimately rescue far more articles than we currently do. ϢereSpielChequers 14:52, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• The current name is good, in my opinion. The "rescue" term is a good one and used in good faith, despite occasional bickering from those who less inclusionist-minded.--Milowent (talk) 15:44, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• It's not just referencing. Sometimes it's establishing notability and that can mean taking the article beyond a stub. SunCreator (talk) 19:23, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

• Rescuing sometimes involves giving reasonable arguments to keep something, to count that of the drive-by deletionists. Not all articles saved, are done by references. Articles are also rescued by rewriting them, or changing the name if that's the only thing people were upset about. Sometimes its just a list article that needs a clear definition for inclusion, to convince people its worth keeping. And the only people who whine about it being canvassing, are those who don't always get their way in the AFD, and want something to fuss about. These people are also often found in other Wikiprojects, that do canvas, asking for help from each other to have their will done. See for the most obvious example of that. Dream Focus 19:32, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Agree Dream Focus, sometimes it is about giving a reasonable argument. Have encountered canvassing also, unfortunately. SunCreator (talk) 20:05, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

I respect everyones opinion.

What emotions does each template convey.

1. When you think of the word "rescue" what is the first word that comes to your mind?
2. When you think of the word "reference" what is the first word that comes to your mind?

The first word that comes to my mind when I think of "rescue" is "help".

The first word that comes to my mind when I think "reference" is a much more neutral words, "books" or "library".

Which word sounds more encyclopedic?

I think the word "rescue" for better or worse conveys a more stronger response.

• Negative: "help" and "rescue" is often seen as synonymous with "canvassing"
• Positive: rescue and help are seen by supporters as a good thing.

The question we have to ask ourselves does this stronger response outweigh the negative response?

Lets assume we are using the word "rescue" to recruit people and get them motivated.

Cost-benefit analysis: Do these positive reasons for using the word "rescue" outweigh the negative "canvassing" feelings?

Okip (formerly Ikip) 04:49, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

• The idea of reference vs. rescue also dulls the focus on articles currently at AfD. I don't think that's a beneficial focus shift. Jclemens (talk) 04:56, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

• I think we should keep Article Rescue Squadron. NBeale (talk) 13:54, 14 February 2010 (UTC)
• I would leave well enough alone. It's like changing who you are because the mean bullies will then stop calling you names. Guess what? They're bullies and will simply make up new names. Just get on with doing quality work and don't pretend we are experts at referencing, that's for the good folks at wp:RSN. -- Banjeboi 22:28, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Modified name to center our focus

Let's consider Improvement & Rescue Squad which might then better serve to indicate that our goal is to "improve" articles first as part of an overall attempt of a "rescue"... specially since improvement includes much more than just adding references. We need to be cognizant of needs for expansion or reduction, for cleanup and style, of grammer and wikilinks... of all the various factors that improve an article and make it worthy of the project. With some editors feeling the current title simply encourages a stampede of keeps at AFD, perhaps this acknowledgement that our goal is to "improve" articles would better reflect our contributions. Schmidt, 19:17, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Michael, I completely agree with your sentiment. The title is a bit cumbersome but I think it is the best idea yet. J04n(talk page) 21:12, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

how about, for now, simply changing it to: This user improves articles for the Misplaced Pages:Article Rescue Squadron. same name slightly different project tag. Again, I am indifferent. I simply throw up ideas here and see if they are decent enough to stick. Okip 02:26, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Do we really want our initials to be IRS? I think ARS has far fewer negative connotations. :-) More seriously, the only concern I'd have with that is that it might increase confusion about what we work on, that is a) articles which are b) up for deletion. It might sound like we improve any articles or even any categories etc. ...But I can't think of a better one, so I'm happy either way. --Zeborah (talk) 05:51, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Oh that is funny, good point! Okip 03:05, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

I like the idea behind improve. Goes to eat thesauras. SunCreator (talk) 03:28, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

enhance, upgrade, transform, renovate, help, augment, develop, elavate, grow, cultivate, enrich etc. SunCreator (talk) 03:44, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Enhance notability, reference improve, cultivate, help. ENRICH SunCreator (talk) 04:08, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Contest

This page just began today, we would love help building this contest and suggestions. You can strongly influence how this contest is built. Okip (formerly Ikip) 10:40, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

sign ups to be a constant are now open. Okip 15:26, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Out of character/in character

I don't know if there's even anything to be done with these, but I am posting here in case there is interest in working on the articles: Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Out of character BOZ (talk) 03:38, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

you may want to comment in the AFD, thanks for bringing this up. Okip 12:32, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Question about how contributors "consistently and successfully violate policy without sanction"

See: Unequality shown in the enforcement of 3rr

Permalink:

Okip 12:56, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Here's a recent paper which touches on this point: "Redistributing Moral Agency: One of the most striking elements of Misplaced Pages‟s vandal fighting networks is the extent to which it transforms the decision making process in reviewing edits. In a setting such as Misplaced Pages, such decisions are key turning points in deciding what is valid or invalid content and who are the legitimate or illegitimate contributors to a base of knowledge.". Colonel Warden (talk) 13:25, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

And how is this section relevant for the ARS project? Fram (talk) 14:31, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

The paper I cited provides an interesting account of how a variety of processes and flags interact to form a distributed and powerful defense mechanism for Misplaced Pages. The ARS is a component of a similar sort in the overall complex of processes relating to article improvement, amendment and deletion. The mechanisms tend to interact and evolve and it seems good to share sources which comment intelligently upon this. Colonel Warden (talk) 16:03, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

I'll take that as a not. Fram (talk) 07:32, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

We deal with issues of content and newbies adding content all the time. This thread may be a bit highbrow for this page but certainly speaks to the general atmosphere of combativeness that has been seen here and elsewhere on Misplaced Pages. One of the things I've learned from my ARS experience is that newbies often feel very put off and given a welcome message are sometimes quite appreciative of sound advice especially in creating content. -- Banjeboi 10:14, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Flagged revisions

• User talk:Jimbo Wales/poll seems relevant to the interest of editors here. Or at least can someone point me to any studies examining its effect of any other wikipedias?--Milowent (talk) 15:45, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
• In what way is there are specific interest for this project wrt flagged revisions? Fram (talk) 15:46, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
• Well, it would be helpful if there was an official explanation of what Jimbo is suggesting to implement, then I would know better if there is a true link. Jimbo assumes common knowledge that is actually known by a small % of wiki editors. But as its being described, edits of regular editors won't appear in articles until approved by some unknown group of approved editors. Some concerns (among many): This sounds like it could severely depress the contributions of casual editors of wikipedia, among whom the idea of 'the encyclopedia anyone can edit' means their edits appear when they make them. Obscure but notable article subjects may thus be harmed. This goes against the core mission of this project, "All too often, an article about a perfectly notable topic lies wounded, badly written, unsourced – but should its life be taken at Articles for Deletion? No! Only articles about non-encyclopedic topics should be deleted, not articles that need improvement. Improvement is the opposite of deletion." A huge policy change which could harm the improvement of some articles (while presumably protecting some others from vandalism) seems relevant for discussion.--Milowent (talk) 16:00, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

That "All too often ... wounded ... bleeding ... think of the children ..." thing probably puts more people off than it attracts.
In answer to Fram though - the only significance to this project as far as I can see is if it will make it harder to place the {{rescue}} tag. So probably not.   pablo_hablo. 16:18, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Well, that language comes from the project page and its as I found the project when I became interested in actively contributing here. In any event, I don't know why we beat around the bush to ignore that a number of ARS members are inclusionists. There are ardent deletionists who also believe in the virtues of article improvement, of course, but having a talk topic about Jimbo's poll here shouldn't offend, right? Anyhow, its funny that you mention the "rescue" tag, because under flagged revisions, I think the rescue tag would be of much more limited effect, as many potential editors would never see the tag.--Milowent (talk) 17:22, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

• The details are still unclear but it seems that the proposal would have a significant effect upon the editing of all articles and so every project should be notified. In the case of the ARS, it seems that there would be a significant impact because the proposal introduces a delay into the editing process. As AFD is run to a strict timetable, the results of article rescue might not be visible in sufficient time. This seems unsatisfactory. Colonel Warden (talk) 17:33, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

As it affects all articles (and all projects) it therefore is not of specific interest to the ARS, to return to the original question.
If there were any improvement of a rescue-tagged article, of course those improvements would be visible for editors to review (just not published), which seems satisfactory.   pablo_hablo. 21:09, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

• As the exact details of the putative mechanism are still unclear there is no "of course". If all edits were visible immediately, as they are currently, then there would be no point in the mechanism. The whole point of the scheme is to mask edits in some way. In discussions elsewhere, editors report that, where similar schemes have been tried, they may have to wait days for their good faith edits to be approved. This seems unacceptable for edits made during the 7-day window of AFD. Colonel Warden (talk) 22:13, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

It will affect all editing equally, including editors who are members of the Article Rescue Squadron in their chosen activities (whether this be placing a {{rescue}} tag, voting at one or many AfDs or even editing an article). It will not affect those editors specifically, or in a different manner to any other editor.   pablo_hablo. 23:24, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

No, it would not affect all editing equally as only edits to article space would be affected. This would therefore increase the systemic bias whereby it is easy for editors to make drive-by nominations of articles for deletion in a twinkle or post a per nom but it requires significantly more effort to improve articles by researching and editing in a short time. Such article improvement is performed specifically by ARS editors. Colonel Warden (talk) 23:33, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Article improvement is most definitely not performed specifically by ARS editors.   pablo_hablo. 23:51, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

The word specifically does not mean exclusively. It is a specific characteristic of ARS editors that they improve articles, especially at AFD. Other editors may do this too and that's fine. Numerous editors seem to be opposing the proposal and so the matter may be moot. Colonel Warden (talk) 00:08, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I know what it means, and I know that some ARS editors do exactly that. Many do not.   pablo_hablo. 00:15, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

• Going back to Colonel Warden's original point, my reading of WP:Flagged revisions#Description and WP:Flagged revisions/fact sheet#Visibility is that all users will be able to see all currently visible (not deleted or oversighted) revisions. It will affect which version is shown by default. It would be an issue if editors were participating at AfD based on the lagged sighted revisions, but that could be addressed by education, documentation, and maybe a temporary addition to the AfD templates. Flatscan (talk) 05:51, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

• The most recent "poll" should have been announced on mainpage.. or at the village pump, as it afffects every project and every article contributor, old and new.... specially as there are lots of issues yet to be ironed out before seeking even a "trial" implementation. For instance, the current proposal allows a contribution be autoconfirmed if the author has at least 1 year on board and at least 1000 edits. But strangely, the proposal only requires 3 months on board before one is allowed to vett the edit's of some other newcomer. Seems a bit contradictory if it is seen that 3 months experience allows a new editor to stand in judgement over contibutions of someone who may have 4 times the experience. I would hope this does not then become a series of repeated battle-of-wills among newcomers. Perhaps lowering the bar more realistically for both... allowing one or two months with one or two hundred mainspace contributions in order to qualify for either autoconfirmation or reviewer. May as well level the playingfield. Schmidt, 04:33, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

  It does not seem that someone with even 3 months in could figure this out: Read Help:Extension:FlaggedRevs and then mediawiki.org/Extension:FlaggedRevs. Will the "tools" be automatically granted as shown here if meeting the criteria? Or will en.Misplaced Pages create another level of beauracracy similar to RFA and RFB with editors voting on whether or not to allow someone else these tools? Schmidt, 04:55, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

  "The most recent "poll" should have been announced on mainpage.. or at the village pump, as it afffects every project and every article contributor, old and new..." And that's exactly what I did, announcing it at two Village Pump pages, at the Community portal, and at WP:CENT. I don't decide what comes on edit notices or the main page though. 08:46, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

• Fram also announced the poll at the Administrator's Noticeboard. What is the specific interest of admins in flagged revisions? Colonel Warden (talk) 11:48, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

That it will replace (at least for some groups of articles, e.g. BLPs) (semi-)protection, an admin-only tool so far? Also, the rights for people to be a flagger or reviewer or whatever will be granted and revoked by admins. So, this proposal has a clear impact on what admins will have to do or no longer will have to do. What is the impact of this proposal on what ARS'ers (compared to other editors) will have to do or not to do? Fram (talk) 13:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I suspect the only difference will be that in some AFD discussions ARS members will need to start saying "please look at the version that includes my latest unflagged change". So not a big difference and one we can easily include here and perhaps in our next newsletter when and if the time comes. ϢereSpielChequers 13:50, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

It seems likely that flagger rights will be assigned automatically, like other autoconfirmed rights such as new page patrol, which this resembles. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I don't believe that such automatic rights assignment has been decided yet. On the German version, there are quite strict automatic granting rights, plus a manual granting process for whoever doesn't meet the automatic requirements (e.g. if you have ever been blocked, you don't get the rights automatically). Admins on the German Misplaced Pages can always remove the right (contrary to how currently patroller is implemented here). So if we follow the German implementation in this regard, the rights are still of direct inteerst to admins. The overlap with or replacement of protection remains as an argument as well of course. Fram (talk) 14:58, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

The lack of clarity about such details seems to be a significant reason that there is no consensus for the current proposal. It is well described as a pig in a poke. Colonel Warden (talk) 15:17, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Powergaming

This one is at AFD, in case anyone can do anything for it. BOZ (talk) 17:51, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

I have added the rescue tag to the article to try to solicit editors to improve and source the article better.--Milowent (talk) 19:19, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

This is a classic example of people wasting our time with pointless deletion nominations. Spending just half a second clicking on the Google news search or Google book search, would've revealed plenty of sources for this. Dream Focus 03:51, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Hitlerszalonna

This got saved from scrap heap on the last day of the AfD today. It started out as Hitler bacon (literal translation) from Hungarian, which seemed to cause a number of knee-jerk delete votes, and another newbie editor (and Hungarian speaker to boot) being scared away. With some effort, including help from the Bacon project (or whatever those bacon obsessed guys are called), it was greatly improved and at least closed no consensus. What disturbs me is that the concept of the article was verifiable (with some difficulty) and improvable, and relates a fascinating story about how a cheap jam product in Hungary is named after Hitler and bacon. The knowledge of Hungary's version of a Spam like product would have been lost to English wikipedia for no good reason.--Milowent (talk) 02:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Barnstars for all three of you ;) thanks for letting us know. Okip 06:04, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikilobbying

There seems to be a lot of wikilobbying going on at Reddit right now, so, in the spirit of transparency, I thought I would do some hopefully allowable lobbying myself. I've added a Link to this article on Reddit cojoco (talk) 05:06, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Reddit doesn't seem to be worth our energies. Really, if it's not on Misplaced Pages it's simply out of our scope.

Zoo code

I've had a lot of unfortunate interactions with Delicious carbuncle and have now reverted their adding the rescue tag seen here. The article first off shows little signs of rescuing to begin with, that editor seems to be grinding an axe and they've made absolutely no indication why they think the article should be rescued. Feel free to revert if you want to take owner ship for defending the article at AfD. -- Banjeboi 23:06, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I've tagged over articles for rescue in the past and never had any problems. I'm not sure why this one should be any different. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 23:15, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

That you don't see the problem is actually the problem. - As part of this tag's use, please comment at the deletion discussion on why this item should be rescued and how that could happen. Your input should constructively lead the way for other editors to understand how this item can be improved to meet Misplaced Pages's policies and likely benefits our readers. If this is just your latest round of distraction and disruption or some other WP:Drama I don't know or care. But that you are gleefully disrupting more areas of the overall project only serves to demonstrate the lack of respect you have for other editors and the project as a whole. -- Banjeboi 23:25, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I have just made a comment at the AfD, but to be honest, I don't think the text you've quoted is generally followed by others. I'm not here to criticize, that's just my impression. I appreciate any help your can offer finding good references. Thanks. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 23:37, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Tom Cousins

This was an example of a poorly written article that just needed a little TLC. Article Rescue FTW! ^_^ ManicSpider (talk) 00:53, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Glad to see it got worked on. I tackled Cousins Properties, glad to see Tom got preserved as well!--Milowent (talk) 03:43, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Process for adding an article to Hall of Fame

I just finished rescuing Mesame Dasi, with the nominator withdrawing the AfD nomination. I guess it should be added to the Hall of Fame now, but...how do I do that? The instructions section in the Hall of Fame is blank for some reason. Silverseren 03:10, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

It is rather difficult to add new sections to the hall of fame. I attempted to make this semi-automatic, then failed and deleted the instructions.

If you know how to add sections to a table, please go ahead, I can correct any mistakes you make. Okip 03:54, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

I suppose i'll try. If I mess it up, I can always revert it. Silverseren 04:07, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

Cool, it worked. Silverseren 04:16, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

congratulations. And always nice to see new editors join the squadron. Okip 04:27, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

Some help?

I could really use some help on the articles I added to the list. A number of them (though i'm wavering on about two of them) are extremely notable, but the other users are being nitpicky or are just focusing on the short length of the articles. I believe i'll be able to handle Status paradox, maybe, on my own, as i'm focusing a lot of my attention on that. I'll also focusing a lot on Planck particle, and Meg Sneed seems like it will survive, but the rest aren't doing so well. Could I get some help in handling them? Silverseren 06:56, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

I feel like there's only three of us that even do anything. ._. Silverseren 03:46, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

I think that might be a little unfair, but I understand your frustration when there is so much that needs doing and we always seem to be swamped by the never-ending tide of deletionists. ManicSpider (talk) 22:12, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

I just feel that there's only a few of us that I ever see active and doing stuff related to the squadron. And, yeah, the deletionists are winning at this point. Silverseren 00:06, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

• Who are the three active contributors in your view? Just curious as I'd not come across User:Silver seren myself before and so there may be more activity than he supposes - our paths may just have not crossed yet. Colonel Warden (talk) 20:03, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

I just threw the number three out there as an example for a small number of people. The most prolific people that i've noticed have been User:Milowent, User:Dream Focus, and User:Benjiboi. Though i've seen you around too, Warden. I'm surprised you haven't noticed me, considering I added almost all of the articles that are on the rescue list now. Silverseren 20:11, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

• IMHO, the deletionists are "losing" like crazy. Do worthwhile articles get deleted? Yes. And the deletion of worthwhile articles does damage editor morale and discourages new editors. And sourcing articles up for deletion that can be rescued is hella fun. Misplaced Pages is still growing by over 1,000 new articles per day, even net of deletions. I've seen deleted articles get recreated and survive, or the same information blossom in new places-- in short, information finds a way. It would be nice if the administrative burden of needless AfD debates could be eliminated, but life always has overhead. Not everyone with an inclusionist outlook is always active here, but they appear throughout AfD discussions again and again, be it names you know, occasional names, new names, or even IP editors calling B.S. on something they think belongs.--Milowent (talk) 21:24, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Kent Glowinski AfD

I need help over at the Kent Glowinski Afd discussion, stat. From what I was able to research, he is ridiculously notable and yet a bunch of people went in there and voted delete without even trying to look up any sources. Silverseren 00:52, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

• looks a bit odd, i'll try to check it out. seems like the subject wants his article deleted because he's done some stuff he'd rather not have perpetuated.--Milowent (talk) 04:03, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Except the nominator gave no proof about this statement. It's just hearsay at this point. Silverseren 07:05, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

The guy is kinda marginal. 21 hits on google news archive for oddball things. he's run for Canadian office at a very young age, which made some press, and lost. And he's had some legal squabbles on minor import. Canadians may think he's notable.--Milowent (talk) 13:50, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Post the AFD at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Canada but make sure to mention that you posted at the wikiproject in the AFD. Okip 03:06, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Nancy Duarte AfD

Please go here and vote. Silverseren 02:33, 27 March 2010 (UTC)