Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Canadian magazines


 * 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. (non-admin closure) Armbrust, B.Ed. Let's talk about my edits? 08:23, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

List of Canadian magazines

 * – ( View AfD View log )

This list's stated inclusion criterion is identical to that of Category:Canadian magazines and unnecessarily duplicates an existing category &mdash; which is not the purpose of a list article. The two redlinks in the list make up an insignificant fraction of the total; there is no loss in relying on the category. A list such as this seems like it would invite redlinks for additional magazines that are not or will never be notable (as a currently blocked editor is suggesting doing in the unblock request). ~Amatulić (talk) 23:04, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 14:20, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 14:21, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Canada-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 14:21, 12 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep, deletion rationale is contrary to WP:CLN, and otherwise cites only cleanup/maintenance issues. The whole point of CLN is that mere duplication between lists and categories is not a good reason for deleting one or the other, because each has their benefits and different editors may prefer working with either one.  The list can also be expanded to include publication dates, genre, or other annotations.  postdlf (talk) 04:52, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete As it stands, this is indeed a spammagnet. There is nothing that makes this list more than a directory. There are no clear inclusion criteria. Although I agree with Postdlf that lists can be useful even if similar categories exist (which are, in fact, just directories, but in this case directories that we want to have), I don't see any use in having a carbon copy of a category in mainspace. --Guillaume2303 (talk) 14:47, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I've begun converting the list to a sortable, annotated table, something that I had already noted above could be done. You really need to frame your deletion !votes in terms of an article's potential, not merely its current state.  postdlf (talk) 16:01, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's the nice theory. However, 99 out of 100 AFDs, people point to a potential, dig up sources, etc, and then nobody ever adds this to the article. In this case, there was no content whatsoever (except the carbon copy of the same category), so better perhaps to start from scratch if there is a worthwhile subject here. I've looked at your changes and while appreciate the enormous amount of work, I am not sure it's worth while. BTW, shouldn't lists also be sourced? I don't mean links to the homepages of the magazines and such, but sources that make the list something else than WP:OR? --Guillaume2303 (talk) 16:11, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
 * See WP:NOEFFORT; that's not a valid deletion rationale (particularly after you've just seen effort demonstrated!). Deleting it certainly wouldn't help improve it, and I don't remotely see how this was reasonably a list for which it might have been better to start from scratch; I think I removed only one or two listings in the couple dozen or more that I started formatting into the table.  Starting from scratch would, at a minimum, have just required recreating the list from the category, so why waste that effort?  It sounds like you just don't value lists as a method of indexing and navigating article subjects.  Lists, like categories, are "directories that we want to have" whether or not you consider yourself part of that "we" (please read WP:CLN, which I linked to above, on why both are useful even when they cover the same subjects).  It's your right to have an opinion contrary to consensus, but it's just not germane to this specific AFD.  Re: the sourcing, it's a matter of editorial discretion as to whether a list needs references internally or whether it's sufficient to have them in the articles that are linked to.  WP:V does not require it (only that the information be verifiable), and here it would be unwieldy to add the clutter of footnotes to every column.  Also, the homepage of a magazine is undoubtedly going to be a reliable source for the mundane kinds of facts that I've added.  It's silly to think that we couldn't trust a magazine's publisher regarding how often they publish issues or what language it is in.  Contrary to common misunderstanding, reliance on primary sources does not in and of itself constitute OR.  Whether or not these magazines further have independent coverage as subjects is a separate question, that of a case-by-case determination of their notability, and not a concern for this list.  postdlf (talk) 17:21, 13 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep You don't destroy a list because you prefer a category, the rules saying its fine to have both. This list has more information than a category has, and thus is far more useful for people looking for information.   D r e a m Focus  22:31, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Keep Yes, I'm having trouble understanding how others could view the deletion of this list, in its current state, as a positive for the encyclopedia. The list provides information at a glance in a way that the list category cannot (and I've just added it as a main article at Category:Canadian magazines, which did not have one). Questions about level of editing activity, or whether or not lists need citations ( I think they do ), are not arguments for deletion. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 16:52, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
 * On second thought, a list with hundreds of entries would mean hundreds of refs and I don't think that's helpful. I've removed the ref on the one title I added. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 17:48, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't know about Canada, but in the U.S. at least all mailed periodicals are required to have basic information such as their frequency (monthly, etc.) or ownership clearly printed within each issue. The language and subject matter are also going to be obvious from the magazine itself.  These entries are thus sourced simply by reference to the magazine title, because that tells anyone where they can verify that information, and that's what WP:V requires ("it must be possible to attribute it to a reliable, published source appropriate for the content in question. While all material must be attributable, in practice you do not need to attribute everything".).  Other information such as the publication debut can just be sourced within the linked articles.  Only if something proves contentious for some reason (I can't foresee what, with this kind of mundane information) should it need to be sourced directly in the list itself.  postdlf (talk) 17:55, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Makes sense to me! Good work on this list, too. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 17:59, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Per WP:CLN, the fact that a category exists does not inherently invalidate a list; they're two different methods of organizing the information, which are not mutually incompatible or redundant with each other. For one thing, almost all of the articles in are diffused by subject and/or language and/or publication status and/or geographic location, meaning that the category does not offer a way to access a complete list of all Canadian magazines that have Wikipedia articles; rather, the user must jump around among several dozen separate subcategories to see different subsets of the total, and this page is the only method that exists of collating or accessing a complete A-Z list (and no, doublecatting articles so that they're filed in both  and  at the same time is not the answer.) Secondly, if there's a spam problem, that's best dealt with by cleaning it, not by deleting the page entirely — if we deleted pages just because they had the potential to become spam magnets, we'd have to delete every last article on here. Keep. Bearcat (talk) 03:20, 15 January 2012 (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.