Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Coptic Orthodox Churches in the United States


 * 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   no consensus. No consensus to delete, but there appears to be consensus to remove the links. Shimeru (talk) 22:27, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

List of Coptic Orthodox Churches in the United States

 * – ( View AfD View log  •  )

This clearly runs afoul of WP:NOTDIRECTORY. The page is a directory of Coptic parishes in the US. Most entries are plain text with just the church name and a city. Many that aren't plain text contain links to the parish's own website. No encyclopedic content. oknazevad (talk) 03:38, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete, this is something that belongs on the Orthodox Wiki, not here. Nyttend (talk) 12:28, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete Very very informative, but Wikipedia's rule WP:NOTDIR is one of the fundamentals of what Wikipedia is not. The way this would be handled would be to put a link to an existing directory into the article about Coptic Orthodox Church.  Tempting as it is to help the reader by putting the directory right on a page rather than linking them to it, the directory rule is part of keeping the online encyclopedia from getting out of hand, whether one is attempting to list Coptic Orthodox churches or Southern Baptist churches or U.S.-based Rotary Clubs.  Mandsford (talk) 14:38, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 15:01, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 15:01, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep, with all due respect for the previous two contributors' opinions. My logic is that it would be appropriate to have a category for "US Coptic Orthodox Churches", and if one could have a category, then per WP:CLN, it would also be appropriate to have a list. WP:NOTDIR is not quite as relevant as it might seem. Point 1 ("Lists or repositories of loosely-associated topics") is probably the criterion under which Oknazevad suggests deleting the material, but the key word there is "loosely". I think these churches are more than loosely-associated.— S Marshall  Talk / Cont  23:19, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
 * But a category would be limited to those churches that have their own separate articles. You raise a good point with association-- I don't know if the Coptic church has dioceses the way the Roman Catholic and the Episcopalian churches do, or if it's a set of independent churches the way Baptists and Methodists are. The directory ban is what prevents Wikipedia from degenerating into yellowpages.com, much as the ban against memorials keeps us from becoming heritage.com; people have figured out ways to save the information without violating the rule. Mandsford (talk) 00:21, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
 * While it is true that the Coptic Church has a heirarchical diocesan structure, and therefore these are certainly more connected than a group of congregationalist churches, I genuinely believe that this looks exactly like the sort of directory of parishes that would appear on the Coptic Church's official website. That, in my interpretation, is exactly what WP:NOTDIR is meant to guard against. oknazevad (talk) 01:26, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, this highlights a problem with negatively-phrased policies, particularly WP:NOT, which is that they're written in response to a particular need and then there's a natural (and understandable) tendency to generalise them beyond the immediate need so they end up being applied in ways the policy author never envisaged. I mean, you can imagine how this goes—first some well-meaning new user thinks it might help people if they write down, let's say, their favourite recipes and publish them on Wikipedia; then some other well-meaning users AfD all of them, leading to six months of AfDs and enough closely-argued text to fill a fair-sized fantasy trilogy.  In the end our perfectly well-meaning users get together to create a guideline that says "Wikipedia is not a cookbook"; and two years later, they come back to find that with the help of more well-meaning users, WP:NOTCOOK has turned into an ambiguously-phrased four thousand word essay with thirty-seven separate bullet points and nineteen numbered exceptions, and yet another entirely well-intentioned editor is trying to use it to delete Chicken tikka masala.  I do think the best defence against that kind of thing is to interpret negatively-worded policies quite narrowly. Lists aren't articles, but they're still perfectly encyclopaedic.  Every decent encyclopaedia needs an index, a table of contents, and ways to convey information that doesn't fit appropriately into article form, and lists are important.  This list isn't spam, it isn't marketing, it isn't hype or promotional.  It's entirely NPOV and entirely factual.  It's also information a researcher or other encyclopaedia end-user might want, and I'm quite convinced that there's nothing inappropriate about containing this information on Wikipedia. As a final consideration, the first pillar says that Wikipedia isn't just an encyclopaedia.  It's also a gazetteer, and I should think that each of those churches would be a notable local landmark.— S Marshall   Talk / Cont  02:41, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
 * And yet I got one of those articles deleted. Abductive  (reasoning) 12:48, 20 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep of course. Very important and very pertinent to an encyclopedia. -- λⲁⲛτερⲛιξ [talk] 21:28, 14 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Weak delete - as per WP:NOTDIRECTORY. Listings of parishes within perhaps a diocesan article might make sense, but a separate listing of this type seems to me to maybe cross the line. John Carter (talk) 18:22, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep as per S Marshall   Talk / Cont  --Michael C. Price talk 18:31, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Might want to recheck your rationale, as I'm the one proposing deletion, and therefore am obviously in favor of deletion. oknazevad (talk) 04:44, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Amended original text. Wrong sig, right rationale. --Michael C. Price talk 08:39, 20 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep information on the Copts are not so much available. -Titensd (talk) 15:54, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Doesn't mean this is the right place for it. oknazevad (talk) 20:22, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Nor does it mean this is the wrong place for it. --Michael C. Price talk 09:22, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Shimeru (talk) 08:55, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Strong Delete per WP:LINKFARM. "Wikipedia is NOT... mere collections of external links or Internet directories."  This article is precisely a collection of external links.     talk 00:53, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * The key word is mere. How does a number of articles which host links turn all of WP into the like?  It doesn't, does it? --Michael C. Price talk 08:42, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Inclusionists seem to come up with most convoluted logic to interpret WP policies. So your assertion is that as long as there aren't too many linkfarm articles in WP, then WP itself is not a mere collection of external links.  Therefore, we can keep a couple of linkfarm articles here and there.  In other words, WP policies apply only to WP as a whole, not to specific individual articles.  Where do you people come up with this stuff?  By that same logic:  One of Wikipedia's core policies is that WP has a neutral point of view.  Well, a few articles here and there that aren't neutral aren't going to significantly affect WP's neutrality on the whole, so they don't need to be deleted or revised.  I can't believe I'm wasting my time refuting this kindergarten logic.     talk 02:06, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete. This linkfarm has been bugging me for awhile now. Wikipedia is not a webhost. An external link in the main article should be sufficient. Abductive  (reasoning) 03:13, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.


 * Keep the list, remove the links. The fact that most of these churches have their own web presence is hardly relevant. Once the individual articles are added, each one could have its relevant external link. However, the list itself is imho by no means indiscriminate. --Pgallert (talk) 15:37, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep, as per S. Marshall, and lose the links to the individual churches. Joal Beal (talk) 19:33, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete both as a directory and as a linkfarm. A category is not an excuse to have a list. Both have seperate functions and while they may lap they do not overlap 100%.  This is a good example of a category that doesn't need a list because the grouping is too broad (per WP:SALAT) to have an encyclopedic article built off of it.  Them  From  Space  19:38, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete with extreme prejudice i first scanned it to look for names without external links, and saw a few. THEN i noticed that almost all of those were only blue linked to the cities. the category for this subject shows, as suspected, fewer than a handful. this doesnt need more than a category at this time, regardless of the subjects clear inclusion criteria. if these churches listed here ever get articles written, then in the future if someone wants to create a list when we have, say, at least a dozen or so, fine. but now, WP list guidelines are clear: we dont use lists as placeholders for voluminous numbers of nonnotable subjects. Hardcore Inclusionists: just start creating articles for notable churches listed here(which i suspect will be hard with this less notable church).Mercurywoodrose (talk) 08:10, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep the list, Remove the external links. Churches are generally notable enough to warrant mention in their location articles, so we could conceivably add the churches to those articles and link the list to those. Buddy431 (talk) 18:55, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep Highly useful and well constructed list. Carrite (talk) 03:24, 22 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Weak keep - This appears to be a very useful list, but I'm not sure if we want to make an exception to WP:LIST, or rescue this by fixing it up to be more than just a directory. If someone who knows something about this denomination will adopt this list, I'd be happy.  Rescue?  Incubate? Bearian (talk) 16:56, 24 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep per editor Carrite. The encylopedia is here to be usesfull. FeydHuxtable (talk) 08:59, 26 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep Wikipedia is an wp:almanac, not a directory. This seems more like an almanac type entry to me.    D r e a m Focus  09:17, 27 May 2010 (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.