Wikipedia:Deletion review: Difference between revisions

Stuff is deleted by administrators. Sometimes these decisions are completely correct, and undisputed. Sometimes, they are more controversial. The forthcoming meta:deletion management redesign may address many of these issues, but that is some way off. See also:deletion policy and undeletion policy.

Please note that the archive of deleted page revisions may be periodically cleared. Pages deleted prior to the database crash on 8 June 2004 are not present in the current archive because the archive tables were not backed up. This means pages cannot be restored by a sysop. If there is great desire for them it may be possible to retrieve them from the old database files. Prior to this, the archive was cleared out on 3 December 2003.

Purpose of this page

It is hoped that this page will be generally unused, as the vast majority of deletions do not need to be challenged. This page exists for basically two types of people:

1. People who feel that an article was wrongly deleted, and that Wikipedia would be a better encyclopedia with the article restored. This may happen because they were not aware of the discussion on votes for deletion (VfD), or because it was deleted without being listed on VfD, or because they objected to deletion, but were ignored.
2. Non-sysops who wish to see the content of a deleted article. They may wish to use that content elsewhere, for example. Alternatively, they may suspect that an article has been wrongly deleted, but are unable to tell without seeing what exactly was deleted.
   • As a subset of this, sometimes an article which is appropriate for a sister site is deleted without being properly transwikied. If the page is undeleted temporarily, it can be exported complete with history using Special:Export, and then redeleted. This will be especially useful once the import feature is completed.

This page is about articles, not about people. If you feel that a sysop is routinely deleting articles prematurely, or otherwise abusing their powers, please discuss the matter on the user's talk page, or at wikipedia talk:administrators. Similarly, if you are a sysop and an article you deleted is subsequently undeleted, please don't take it as an attack.

If you wish to undelete an article, list it here with a brief reason. The procedure explained at Wikipedia:Undeletion policy will then be followed, and if the conditions are met, the page will be undeleted.

If you wish to view a deleted article, list it here and say why. A sysop will provide the deleted article to you in some form - either by quoting it in full, or by emailing it to you, or by temporarily undeleting it.

See also Wikipedia:Viewing and restoring deleted pages by sysops.

History only undeletion

History only undeletions can always be performed without needing to list the articles on the votes for deletion page. For example, suppose someone writes a biased article on Fred Flintstone, it is deleted, and subsequently someone else writes a decent article on Fred Flintstone. The original, biased article can be undeleted, in which case it will merely sit in the page history of the Fred Flintstone article, causing no harm. Please do not do this in case of copyright violations.

Some articles are listed here, and after discussion and review, a consensus is reached to keep the articles deleted. They are listed at Wikipedia:Votes for undeletion/deleted. Archives of recently undeleted pages are recorded at Wikipedia:Votes for undeletion/undeleted

Votes for undeletion

August 18 (ends Aug 28)

Atlantium

I believe the deletion listed below to be in contravention to current published Wikipedia policy, which states (italics mine):

"At the end of five days, if a "rough consensus" has been reached (some would call this a 2/3 majority) to delete the page, the page will be removed. Otherwise the page remains."

22:40, 17 Aug 2004 VampWillow deleted "Empire of Atlantium" (Deleted after VfD discussion: Vanity, Fantasy. (I read all comments in detail, not just 29-19 vote; balance is clearly justified to delete))

VfD here shows a vote of 29 for deletion (60%) and 19 against (40%):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Atlantium

This is long way short of the 38 votes to delete required for a 2/3 consensus.

Additionally, the article has already survived 2 VfD's since February 2004, so the argument can be made that the latest VfD listing itself is, even if not defined by any existing policy as specifically invalid, then certainly at least highly questionable.--Gene_poole 04:18, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

• Undelete. While there may be concerns over the content, Atlantium has clearly received a modicum of notability sufficient for its inclusion in Wikipedia. Almost all concerns seem to relate to content of article rather than its existence. And Gene Poole certainly has a colorable point about survival of 2 VfD's and questionableness of deletion after vote. --Daniel C. Boyer 18:04, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
• Undelete. I don't like micronations very much, except for the real notable ones like the Hutt Valley (or something) in Australia, but this one clearly contravenes established policy. Johnleemk | Talk 08:25, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
• Undelete. 29 to 19 is clearly not consensus. It is a disgrace that it was deleted with these votes. Dmn / Դմն 12:42, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
• Keep deleted. - UtherSRG 14:00, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
• Keep deleted. Wile E. Heresiarch 15:23, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
• Undelete - Perhaps User:VampWillow can explain the deletion comment when it was deleted - Tεxτurε 15:42, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

  22:40, 17 Aug 2004 VampWillow deleted "Empire of Atlantium" (Deleted after VfD discussion: Vanity, Fantasy. (I read all comments in detail, not just 29-19 vote; balance is clearly justified to delete))

• Keep deleted. Clear majority to delete. The argument "29 votes is not a good enough majority, so let's go with the minority of 19 votes instead" does not make much sense. Gzornenplatz 17:08, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)
  • Our policy is consensus, not majority. If you want to change the policy, then see if you can rally enough community support to do so. But we have a consensus rule and we should stick to it. The principle of sticking to the guidelines we already have is more important than this one page. Undelete. [[User:Theresa knott|]] 18:19, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
• Keep deleted. Jallan 17:42, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Annoyance

Was rightly listed as a dict def. but was substantially expanded during the debate. This does not seem to have been taken into account in its deletion - SimonP 15:16, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

• Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Annoyance shows the discussion. Undelete, with the possibility of soft redirect as per the discussion. - UtherSRG 15:59, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Add new votes at the bottom.

• Keep with possibility of soft redir. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 16:03, 2004 Aug 18 (UTC)
• Undelete [[User:Theresa knott|]] 17:22, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)