User:Mdupont/SpeedyDeletionWikia

RfC: can we contact users with archives of deleted articles?

I would like to write to contributors of articles which are speedily deleted, and proposed for deletion at least one time to inform them about deleted articles. we dont host the articles on wikipedia, so all links would have to go offsite, some people consider that then spam.

See this thread here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Mrmatiko#Spam.3F and here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Mdupont#Promotional_edits

James Michael DuPont (talk) 13:10, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Which articles are you archiving, exactly, Mike, and which authors do you plan on notifying? How would you feel about the Wikimedia Foundation taking over your role - archiving harmless deleted articles and notifying the authors, in a separate Wikimedia project, or Wikipedia taking it on? --Anthonyhcole (talk) 14:33, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Well the code i wrote is open source, and of course I am doing this only because it needed to be done, if WM/WP takes it on it would be the best of course. James Michael DuPont (talk) 05:23, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

The articles I am notifying people on a case by case basis, not automatically.

I'm opposed. I'm a little nervous about the concept to begin with. Even if I get passed a lot of the garbage, POV pushing, and completely inaccurate articles out there, there's still the issue of copyright violations and defamation. The consolation is that most people won't see them at Wikia, which means that most people won't be misinformed, and that Wikipedia will be protected from liability. If we puncture that barrier between Wikia and Wikipedia any further, we run into far more problems. I might even extend that to a general principle: Wikipedia shouldn't go to any length to promote outside projects that we can't control, because it means we're effectively sanctioning what other people do without asking those people to work within our policies. Shooterwalker (talk) 20:29, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

Well so I should not be able to notify people if there is no other way to contact them? Is it spam? please answer the original question. James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose at present time.

1. Please don't continue notifications about this while you have an outstanding RFC on the issue. The wording change you made to your template didn't fix the issue of perceived spamminess, and personally actually made me feel worse about it. Hold off on notifying further people until you have achieved a consensus in this RFC or at another major on-wiki forum. It's not a good idea to have your edits contested, start an RfC on the issue, and then keep making the contentious edits.

I have done one or two small notifications, but I am not telling people about my website, they can contact me. I dont see this RFC being structured or people addressing the issues. We need to stay on topic here. James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

1. Please don't try to represent mailing list discussions as having any sort of on-wiki power or consensus, as you did at User_talk:Mrmatiko. The people who read mailing lists are an absolute tiny minority of the people who edit the English Wikipedia... and the people who actively contribute to any given mailing list discussion are an even smaller minority. Even though you've discussed this on the wikien-l and wikimedia-l, and even though some people on those lists think it's a good idea, you can't use mailing list based discussions to write off people's on-wiki concerns.

Well lets have a good discussion here and resolve the issues. James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

I might feel comfortable endorsing this if you rewrote the notification you use to be neutral and not taking jabs at people, and you rewrote the RfC to include a clear description of how you intend to ensure that the articles you copy and link to people's user pages on Wikipedia are WP:BLP violation free and copyright violation free. Looking through a dozen pages on your wiki, I came across at least one that contained text that was almost certainly a copyright violation. Articles are frequently deleted using CSD tags that are not the only applicable tags; you will have to check each copied over article by hand to ensure it is not libelous and it is not a copyright violation, or recruit a community of people who are willing to do so. I don't feel comfortable with the mass-linking of Wikia pages that have not been vetted for BLP concerns or copyright violations in a non-neutral template. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:49, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

I am not mass linking, and I am reviewing the articles on a case by case basis. James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose, strongly, per WP:LINKVIO. Knowingly and intentionally directing others to a site that violates copyright has been considered a form of contributory infringement in the United States. It is a violation of our Wikipedia copyright policy. The Speedy Deletion Wiki currently hosts a number of articles which have been speedily deleted from Wikipedia as WP:G12 blatant copyvios. It took me only a minute to find some which have been hosted there for weeks. I also agree with User:Kevin Gorman -- please do not add any furthe, notifications until this RFC has been resolved, especially with regard to issues of copyright violations, as well as other pages deleted for BLP, attack, etc. — CactusWriter ^(talk) 02:56, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Ok Well then what do you think about telling people that I have a copy and not linking to it? James Michael DuPont (talk) 05:23, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

I would be personally opposed to you doing so until you meet the criteria I laid out in my initial post, but I'd accept it if consensus disagreed with me. But if you continue to do so while this RfC is underway/before you have achieved an on-wiki consensus to do so somewhere, I suspect that you would encounter at least one administrator who would sanction you for continuing to do so. Please do not add any further notifications until this RfC is resolved one way or another. Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:13, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

@Mdupont. Sorry, but no. I am not in favor of you contacting users for this at all. This kind of solicitation is inappropriate. Whether you explicitly post the link or not, the intent is the same. You are using your Wikipedia account to solicit Wikipedia editors for your personal website -- a website which also happens to violate copyright. — CactusWriter ^(talk) 17:19, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Well that is a good answer. But your allegations of copyright violations are temporary, I am activly working on removing any copyvio. James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose, because the purpose of the Speedy Deletion Wikia is to contain pages that have been speedily deleted from Wikipedia. It might prove helpful to have a archived copy available if someone ever wanted to recreate an article and solve the problems, but it was deleted for a reason, which is what stands out to me. As for informing editors, that seems like spam to mass-inform article creators of off-wiki archives of their deleted articles. Mysterytrey talk 15:08, 11 July 2012 (UTC)
• Comment -- The reason stated above by Mdupont for creating Speedy Deletion Wiki that "we dont host the [speedily deleted] articles on wikipedia" is fundamentally wrong. Wikipedia already hosts in its history every page ever written here. That includes all deleted material. It is archived. It is accessible. That is why the CSD notification template that is placed on the user page states: if the page is deleted, you can contact one of these administrators to request that the administrator userfy the page or email a copy to you. There appears to be no reason for this added solicitation of Wikipedia editors. — CactusWriter ^(talk) 17:41, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

• How long is that template on an article before it's deleted, and is the main author usually contacted on their talk page or emailed with the information contained in the template, CactusWriter? --Anthonyhcole (talk) 15:09, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, Anthony. Our policy for speedy deletion is that the creators of articles tagged for speedy deletion need to be warned. That is why each speedy deletion template contains a pre-formatted warning which is pasted onto the creating editor's talk page. That template on the editor's talk page is never deleted (unless the editor removes it them self.) The creator is then notified of template on their talk page per Wikipedia's typical yellow bar that there is a message for them. And it is that template, the one on their user talk page, which describes contacting an administrator about userfying or e-mailing a copy of the deleted page. — CactusWriter ^(talk) 16:30, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I've never followed that process. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 18:40, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose: I have some issues with the concept of the speedy deletion wiki, primarily due to the possibility of mislabelled copyright violations/attack pages being hosted there; however the general concept is reasonable and isn't the issue here (what an external website does is irrelevant). The main issue is that posting a templated message on the user talk page of every editor who has an article "archived" that points to an external website is, quite clearly, spam. I would consider it spam whoever was actually posting the message, but it becomes even more problematic when the person doing so created the website and therefore has a clear conflict of interest. I am also not impressed by the template that uses my name nor the childish rewording of the original template, but again, that is out of the scope of this RFC. -- Mrmatiko (talk) 18:23, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

The template 2 was a backup, I had changed the template after it was criticized.

• Comment -- I have removed all the copyvios (replaced them with stubs and rewrote them), deleted the attack pages and will keep those categories empty. http://speedydeletion.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Keep_Empty . The real value of the speedy deletion wiki can be seen in the category list, http://speedydeletion.wikia.com/wiki/Top_Categories bands and sports , india and pakistan seem to be the most deleted articeles. Next I need to look into removing/purging the data about kids under 13 years old. Some articles I like are http://speedydeletion.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Featured_articles . The reason to contact the authors for non notables, not the copyright violations is to give them a chance to work on the article until the time when they will become notable. James Michael DuPont (talk) 04:47, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

As soon as people visit the deleted article, they can see the CSD template, and take it from that, rather than sending mass messages via talk pages. Mysterytrey talk 17:11, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

So you think I should update the template? I think that would be very bold. James Michael DuPont (talk) 18:46, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Despite your claim, you have not removed the copyvios. This demonstrates an inability to find them. (Which is to be expected from someone trying duplicate Wikipedia tasks which require thousands of editors and several administrators.) Again, today, it took me only one minute to find that you are still hosting Mc edit, International Youth Congress, Mufti Faiz Ahmed Owaisi, and Farhan Mirza among others -- all previously deleted as copyright violations several weeks ago. There are others. If you are interested in contributing to Wikipedia, I think it would be more helpful if you spent your time and energy on developing good content here rather than preserving the bad and illegal content on a redundant website. — CactusWriter ^(talk) 17:38, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• *Comment -- I have scripts now to blank out copyvio pages and replace them with just the links. Also, lets get back to "spam here", spam is unwanted messaging, 99% of the people I talked to said thanks. It is not unwanted, people want to know about this. James Michael DuPont (talk) 18:46, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

• *Comment -- I am not automatically notifing people, I am taking the articles researching into them, and contacting people if needed, right now I am focused on articles that have twitter, email or facebook contact. James Michael DuPont (talk) 18:46, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose For the sake of Wikipedia's integrity, speedily deleted articles need to go away. Calling attention to them by notifying their creators reduces the likelihood of that happening. G. C. Hood (talk) 21:55, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

But is is spam to tell people about it? that is the question. To address your point, I think that if people have articles that are saved they wont put them back on wikipedia, because they have an outlet. James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose - It's just a bad idea all around. Articles can already be userfied at pretty much anyone's request. If someone isn't asking for it, the article isn't worth keeping in any way. DreamGuy (talk) 00:29, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

That is not the question. Many of the people have thanked me for the articles. Non notable bands articles may one day be notable. James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• *Comment -- Many of you are not even answering the question, The question is, it is spam to manually notify the original authors of articles about the backup,

• *Comment -- Well the best argument I have seen so far is that link spam is not appropiate, I can understand that. I think that if I am looking to contact some band and write to the author about the article, is that going to be punished? It would be wrong. Banning solicitation is very very difficult, how about soliciting people to join a wikiproject, or to invite them to an public event related to wikipedia. I guess I will need to create a internal project for wikipedia that manages non notable bands etc. Where are you going to draw the line between what is allowed and what is now? Who is going to decide that? James Michael DuPont (talk) 14:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

Posting the website via notifications would be linkspam, and, as CactusWriter said, 'whether or not you post the link, your intent is the same', and it is still notifications in mass. If it was made into a WikiProject I don't think I would mind it that much, but I don't really think a WikiProject catering to non-notable bands is that good an idea. Mysterytrey talk 15:17, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. Since the author is advised on their talk page how to get a copy of their deleted article as part of the speedy process, I think adequate archiving is already available. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 18:40, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• The original proposal was, "to write to contributors of articles which are speedily deleted", and not "to notify only the original creators (of articles which are speedily deleted)". Surely this is a key issue to be debated. If the Wikipedia system could be easily modified to automatically notify active recent contributors (if any) rather than just the original creator, that might be a good compromise. Another compromise might be—if an article was deleted solely because somebody considered it to be not notable or a stub article (rather than deleted for a policy violation)—to copy it to the sandbox of the user who created it, or to that that of the most active recent active contributor, with the reason for their deletion from Wikipedia. This would allow the article to be fixed up (in the sandbox) or moved elsewhere. LittleBen (talk) 14:59, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

• Strong oppose. Deleted is deleted, and Wikipedia has sufficient lines of appeal for creators who feel their articles were wrongly deleted. More appropriate would be to investigate the possibilities of better informing potential new article creators of what articles are wanted at Wikipedia and what are not, and the policies that govern them. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:21, 23 July 2012 (UTC)
• Strong oppose - We've got four million articles in the English-language Wikipedia to deal with. There is no purpose of value to this, and we should not allow ourselves to be associated with it in any way. --Orange Mike | Talk 13:30, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
• I Support the speedy deletion wikia actually, despite some of the issues that have cropped up. Notifying authors that their article has been preserved also seems to be in line with the wiki way, so I support that also. --Kim Bruning (talk) 16:08, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
• Not spam to notify. Whatever you think of the merits, the owner is within their rights, and notification shouldn't be censored. 207.224.43.139 (talk) 07:51, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

There is no "owner" of any article on or deleted from Wikipedia. Please see WP:OWN. --| Uncle Milty | talk | 00:29, 31 July 2012 (UTC)