Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/CompleteFTP Server


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   delete and please remember AFD is not a vote.  MBisanz  talk 04:48, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

CompleteFTP Server

 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Software-related deletion discussions.  —Dialectric (talk) 13:53, 3 April 2009 (UTC)


 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

Contested PROD. Unreferenced article about an apparently non-notable product. Tagged as such for 2 weeks without improvement. Googling shows no signs of RS coverage, or much of anything else. See comments on talk page. DanielRigal (talk) 12:03, 3 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete - as above, article lacks 3rd party references establishing notability. Dialectric
 * Delete, yet more software with no showing of minimal importance. - Smerdis of Tlön (talk) 14:54, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep - the 3 lists that CompleteFTP is listed in (Comparison of FTP server software, List of FTP server software, List of SFTP server software) would be completely useless if you remove all products considered non-notifiable - you'd be left with IIS, Filezilla and maybe one other product. Agreed, they aren't exhaustive lists, but removing any of the few products listed makes every reader less informed. In particular there are very few SFTP servers specifically for the Windows platform, and CompleteFTP does not appear any less notifiable than the others listed. Also its earlier incarnation as edtFTPD was widely used, and significant for being a Cygwin port of a Unix FTP server. Note I am the author of the article and one of the developers of the product. Bblackshaw (talk) 11:58, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep - I should also add that if you google "FTPS Windows", which is a pretty broad search in this area, CompleteFTP comes up in the first couple of results, which to me indicates it is a significant product. Bblackshaw (talk) 12:13, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
 * This is just to let you know that you shouldn't vote (i.e. say Keep or Delete) more than once. Of course, you can still make as many comments as you like. I have struck out your second keep, just to keep things straight. --DanielRigal (talk) 12:58, 4 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep - As Bruce said, why keep lists of things if you're not going to allow people to add things to them? CompleteFTP is as notable as many of the other servers in the lists Bruce mentioned.  FTP servers are not a sexy technology that people are likely to write articles about.  Yet they are a very important part of the invisible plumbing of the Internet.  Much more important, for example, than some groovy new social networking idea that gets heaps of press for a few months and then dies a quick death.  I'm not saying the notability criteria are fundamentally flawed but surely they need to be applied judiciously and consistently (wrt other FTP servers) Hcaandersen (talk) 23:33, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. Be careful of falling into the WP:WAX trap. The fact that other non-notable articles exist is not a reason to keep this one. If you can spot other articles as poorly referenced as this one, and Google shows no RS coverage, then they are candidates for deletion too. That is how we should enforce the rules consistently.BTW: How do you know user:Bblackshaw as "Bruce"? --DanielRigal (talk) 23:43, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Ah. I just found this: . You both work at EDT, who make the product we are discussing. I think you guys have a conflict of interest issue. --DanielRigal (talk) 00:00, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. Hey Daniel, I disclosed this in my earlier post where I said I was one of the developers - I wasn't trying to hide the affiliation. Does it invalidates the points though? Bblackshaw (talk) 01:05, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. I appreciate that you made the disclosure. User:Hcaandersen did not and I thought it important that the connection between the two of you and with EDT was made explicit so that the closing admin can make an informed decision. It does not invalidate the points made, which is why I responded to those as well. I am not accusing either of you of acting in bad faith and I apologise if I gave that impression. You are using your real names and it would have been easy for you to disguise who you are if you had wanted to. I still think there is a potential COI. The thing about COI is that it isn't always done in bad faith. People just find it hard to be objective about the merits or notability of their own products. --DanielRigal (talk) 08:44, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. With regards to the article itself, I think it is pretty neutral in nature - there's no marketing in there, just a basic history of the product. Bblackshaw (talk) 01:12, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. I agree that it is not intended as spam. It is the sort of description that one might legitimately submit for inclusion in a software directory. The problem is that Wikipedia is not a directory. I appreciate that this is not very obvious when somebody sees a list of products or companies with articles and thinks that theirs is equally worthy of inclusion. The "not a directory" thing is what I seem to end up explaining to people more than anything else and I do wonder if there was some way to prevent these misunderstandings before somebody goes to the trouble of making an article. Only last week I had to explain to my boss why it would not be appropriate for my employer to have an article here. --DanielRigal (talk) 08:44, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. I'd like to point out that I'm using my real name as my user-name and I implied that I know Bruce, who has already disclosed his affiliation. The fact is that I saw the list on wikipedia and noticed that there are products from relatively obscure companies on there.  You say that the existence of other articles is irrelevant, but surely existing articles give readers a strong indication of what's acceptable.  And I think it's reasonable to expect that rules be applied consistently.  By the way, what's "RS coverage"? Hcaandersen (talk) 01:59, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Clarification: Sorry for using jargon. RS is a very common abbreviation for Reliable Sources. I should have linked it. BTW, I see that you never got the standard welcome message when you joined. This explains all this policy stuff so I have added it now. Also, thanks for confirming that it was a list article that got you started. I have a nagging suspicion that these are a cause of a lot of incidents like this. We have a policy that Wikipedia is not a directory but then we have list articles that look very much like directories to anybody unaware of the policy. --DanielRigal (talk) 08:57, 6 April 2009 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.