Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Criticism of Linux (2nd nomination)


 * 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 Keep - left as an exercise for the editors if they wish to merge or rename it - Peripitus (Talk) 05:40, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Criticism of Linux
AfDs for this article: 
 * – (View AfD) (View log)

Criticism articles are POV pushing ground, in this case it's a soapbox for repeating Microsoft ad claims and promote fanboism criticisms. Software is not a piece of art to demand "criticism and praises" sections or separate articles, and this is also not encyclopedic information -- Linux is used by about %1 of the people and it's usually installed for free by people who want to install it, I doubt any kind of criticism of it is of encyclopedic importance -- the jury is still out for criticism of Windows because it's used by over 90% of the people and comes preinstalled on most of the computers, that by itself make is more relevant, yet, I would still suggest deleting such a criticism article about Windows and integrating stuff inside the Windows article. Back to this article, it's clearly a collection of quotes and claims from competitors, this shouldn't be allowed: Wikipedia shouldn't be a soapbox for fanboys or people who have interest to hit competitors' products. This article is of very poor quality too, and because of its POV title it's doomed to remain like this. In addition this article should have been deleted since 2005 per this decision. AdrianTM (talk) 19:12, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep The nomination seems shrill compared to the article. The article might be improved but this seems quite feasible.  Here's a long list of scholarly sources to sort through. Colonel Warden (talk) 20:58, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
 * OK, shrill... good enough, but look at the Wikipedia recommendation regarding "Separate articles devoted to criticism", it clearly says: "Don't make articles entirely devoted to criticism of a topic that has or should have its own Wikipedia article." Sure that's not an official policy, but I think it's a good advice. -- AdrianTM (talk) 21:18, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
 * it's not even a guideline, it's just an editors opinion. -- neon white user page talk 00:21, 2 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep - article is well sourced and therefore is notable. Could easily be a fork from the main article. This appears to be a POV motivated nomination that does not really state a valid reason for deletion -- neon white user page talk 00:14, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I thought the reasons are evident, but clearly I haven't explained right, to quote from the valid reasons listed in the link you provided:
 * content fork
 * subject fails to meet the relevant notability guideline or simple not suitable for an encyclopedia (how encyclopedic is this info anyway?),
 * it also contains info from Microsoft campaigns against Linux which could be considered spam or at least not a reliable source.
 * besides, article was supposed to be deleted in 2005 per this decision, not sure why it was allowed to be created again. -- AdrianTM (talk) 02:53, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
 * There is no reason why this can be a split from or merged in the main article (which should have been proposed long before this), it is well sourced by several verifiable sources therefore it meets notability guidelines. The issue of whether microsoft.com is a valid source is not a criteria for deletion. Articles can be recreated if deleted, this article was created over 2 years after the old one was deleted and is likely very different. An afd descision about a previous article with the same name is irrelevent to this discussion. -- neon white  user page talk 03:11, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually if you look at the second delete nomination one of the conclusions was to take info from this article and merge it within Linux article, this article till yesterday was only a sorry link to Linux. I understand that some people complain that "we can't promote this on Linux page because editors from there don't accept this material" but is really an argument that stands? "We can't push the POV on main page so will put it in a secondary page that faces less scrutiny" at least this is how I see the motivation behind the existence of this page, and of course the argument "we have a criticism page about Windows we need one about Linux", how about BSD, what about OS/2? How encyclopedic are criticisms of OSes that have less than 1% of the market? Again software is not a piece of art that needs "praises and criticism" articles. -- AdrianTM (talk) 03:31, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

To begin with, there are references (not only Microsoft; there's plenty of references from independent sources like ZNet.co.uk, Computerworld (Australia), EE Times, and Newsforge). There are plenty of other "Criticism of __________" articles (such as:Criticism of Wikipedia, Criticism of Microsoft, and Criticism of Wal-Mart. A full list is available here). I do know that WP:OTHERSTUFF is not a valid reason for keeping the article, but the more important keep reason is above (reliable sources). Puchiko (Talk-email) 10:39, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep As the contester of the PROD, I obviously disagree with the deletion of this article.


 * Furthermore, Criticism of Wal-Mart is a WP:Good article. Puchiko (Talk-email) 10:42, 2 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete and restart; viable subject, but balanced article > no article > POV articles, every time Will (talk) 11:57, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
 * POV issues are not a reason for deleting an article. -- neon white user page talk 14:35, 2 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete and possibly rewrite under a different article title. Criticism of Linux notably comes from the corporate sector. Therefore the title is deeply POV. Consider that it might even more appropriately be titled "Revenue- and shareholder-value- motivated corporate campaign against the open source software community and ideal". Although that would be the opposite POV, it would still be more accurate. Microsoft's "criticism" in particular is not valid, since of course they are bashing their competition like crazy (real-world COI, so to speak). There might as well be an article or section on Microsoft's actions in that direction, like when Steve Ballmer himself flew to Munich, when the city administration considered switching to Linux. Or Microsoft's increasingly desperate attempts to secure the basis of their overrated and overblown business model. User:Dorftrottel 16:15, February 2, 2008


 * strong keep Yes, Microsoft fanboys will spam the hell out of it, but why do we have a "criticism of Windows X" article for each version ever, but no Criticism of Mac or Linux? It makes wikipedia look unbalanced. I mean, Windows deserves it, but if someone is like "oh, look at all this criticism, oh but its competitors don't, well this must not be a reliable source".  So let's have a small criticism page just for fairness sake! Hendrixski (talk) 19:20, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Not a very convincing reason to keep it, NPOV doesn't span across several articles. See also WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. User:Dorftrottel 23:35, February 2, 2008


 * Keep. Heck, we even have Criticism of Wikipedia. :-) I don't mean it as an OTHERCRAPEXISTS kind of argument, but rather that IMO there's nothing wrong with "Criticism of..." articles as long as they are written properly. --Itub (talk) 17:06, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
 * WTH. Actually, you're right. Striking my delete. User:Dorftrottel 08:16, February 5, 2008
 * Merge to Linux, the article is short enough to include. To leave criticisms out of the main Linux article leaves it unbalanced. --Salix alba (talk) 11:03, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep. Notable subject and sourced. "Criticism articles" have every right to exist.Biophys (talk) 20:52, 7 February 2008 (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.