Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/TL;DR (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__EXPECTED_UNCONNECTED_PAGE__. (non-admin closure) Alpha3031 (t • c) 13:05, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

TL;DR
AfDs for this article:


 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

Wikipedia is not a dictionary. This article has almost 0 substance, and only 3 references from 2 sources, which are both dictionaries. Quick Quokka [⁠talk • contribs] 18:19, 4 September 2023 (UTC) Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 23:17, 11 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Language and Internet.  Quick Quokka  [⁠talk • contribs] 18:19, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Redirect to SMS language, which mentions this term in its list of terms. BD2412  T 23:23, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
 * This isn't a good resolution at all. It violates the principal of least astonishment, and even if it took the user to the right place in the article there's no definition there so it still isn't as useful as it could be.  Additionally use of this term isn't specific to SMS, so it's misleading.  See below for better alternative. Dan Bloch (talk) 01:27, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Redirect to Wiktionary (tl;dr). Per nom; WP:NOTDICT, and article doesn't have any obvious potential to grow. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Danbloch (talk • contribs) 04:34, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Agreed. In my opinion, it should be a soft redirect to tl;dr or similar with the Wiktionary redirect template. -- Quick Quokka  [⁠talk • contribs] 09:25, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Agreed, on further thought the redirect would be of value. Dan Bloch (talk) 13:58, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Delete without a redirect, soft or otherwise. I agree with the overall notion to delete as a DICDEF.  However, there's no obvious target (it has far more use than just in text messages as suggested above).  Having a redirect in place tends to inhibit searching article space for this text.  You can still do it, but it takes an extra nonobvious step.  And for those unaware, the search result page  already brings up a Wiktionary link right at the top. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 14:31, 6 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Why is Wiktionary not an obvious target? Dan Bloch (talk) 16:31, 6 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Wiktionary redirects are harmful. Having one in place makes trying to search article space for the term sitting at the redirect title more difficult.  Couple that with the fact that they're also not particularly useful, because if no page exists at the title, the user searching for the term gets search results, which already include a Wiktionary link if one exists...see the link in my comment above. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 23:51, 7 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Then yeah, maybe delete without redirect. Quick Quokka  [⁠talk • contribs] 17:42, 8 September 2023 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.


 * Keep and expand (or maybe draftify): There's nothing in WP:NOTDICT that says we can't have an encyclopedic article about a term. In fact we do have some: e.g. gay or TERF (acronym). This article is definitely not up to snuff as is, but I strongly suspect that there's enough material out there about the history of the term to make an article out of it. Loki (talk) 05:25, 14 September 2023 (UTC)
 * I mean, the article doesn't really have much other than DICDEF in its current condition, and I struggled to find any reliable (non-dictionary) sources about the term.
 * I never said that there shouldn't be articles about terms, just if they're notable enough, and aren't just basically Wiktionary entries. Quick Quokka  [⁠talk • contribs] 22:02, 15 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Quick Quokka [⁠talk • contribs] 22:04, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Keep per the significant coverage in multiple independent reliable sources.  Analysis  The term "TL;DR" has been discussed in numerous reliable sources:  A study of "the real world 'tl;dr' phenomenon" in a peer-reviewed journal The etiquette of using TL;DR  When using TL;DR is rude. When using TL;DR is not rude The origins of TL;DR (,, and ) How TL;DR "spread to other online forums"  </ol>The subject passes Notability. There is enough information about the history, social, and cultural aspects of TL;DR to support an encyclopedic article about the topic such that this would not violate What Wikipedia is not or What Wikipedia is not. The current article is well-sourced and does not violate any policies. The article can be expanded and improved. Per Editing policy and Deletion policy, the article should be kept.  Sources  <ol> <li> The article notes: "TL;DR (also sometimes seen without the semicolon as TLDR) means “too long; didn’t read.” It’s an abbreviation that you’ll frequently find at the end of internet communications, usually ones with a lot of text. It’s a phrase that basically means “summary” and is followed by a short, one- or two-line overview for people who may not have read every word of a long chunk of text. ... Is TL;DR rude? No, it isn’t rude. But like any abbreviation, there’s a time and a place for it; there are different etiquette rules for formal and less formal situations. It’s OK to use it on social media, with your friends or in a quick, informal note to a coworker. But an important email, a big presentation or a business proposal is not the time to use slang or abbreviations of any kind." </li> <li> The article has these sections: <ol><li>What Does TL;DR Mean?</li><li>How Do You Use TL;DR?</li><li>What Is TL;DR on Social Media</li><li> Why Do People Put TL;DR at the End? Is TL;DR Rude?</li><li>What Can You Say Besides TL;DR?</li></ol></li> <li> The journal article notes: "One such textual feature is the length of sections in which a given text is presented. The growing use of the short form “tl;dr”—which stands for “too long; didn’t read”—suggests that people may be more likely to attend to bite-sized segments of information (e.g., Twitter posts, news-bites) compared to longer chunks of information (e.g., long paragraphs in a news article). ... Recent empirical work (Forrin et al., 2018, 2019) tested for the existence of this “tl;dr” phenomenon in an educational context. ... Here, we examined the role of intentionality in peoples’ tendency to mind-wander more often while reading longer vs. shorter sections of text. Our goal was to help elucidate whether this effect—which is related to the real world “tl;dr” phenomenon—reflects the intentional or unintentional disengagement of attention from passages with relatively long sections of text." </li> <li> The article notes: "There’s no better sign of our times than Internet shorthand that demands writing be as short as possible. "TL;DR" likely originated on the comedy forum Something Awful around 2002, and spread to other online forums like 4chan, Slashdot and Reddit. The first Urban Dictionary definition for TL;DR appeared in 2003, and it earned its own Wikipedia page in 2007." </li> <li> The article notes: "In her April 5, 2020, Wordplay column, Deb Amlen hides the puzzle’s theme behind a link: “Tl;dr (Spoiler!).” I had to find out more about this one. It is the only internet abbreviation I know of that boasts a perfectly used semicolon, although it seems that few people use the semicolon any longer. Tl;dr stands for “too long; didn’t read” and it seems to have begun in the early 2000s. It is hard to read large chunks of text online, so someone who posts, say, a 10-paragraph essay on her theories about “Star Trek” might receive a disgruntled tl;dr (or tldr) in response. Or she might realize she had gone on too long and acknowledge the fact by typing tldr at the end." </li> <li> The article notes: "Another one of these great time-saving acronyms is tl;dr. This means, "Too Long; Didn't Read." Apparently, tl;dr originated in online discussion forums as a way for users to aggressively respond to posts deemed unnecessarily long or preachy. Yet from these hostile beginnings, the acronym has blossomed. Now, it occasionally takes on a nicer tone, in which self-aware users invoke the phrase at the end of their own long message. This is then followed by a highly truncated and very convenient summary of their main points." </li> <li> The article notes: "Deep in the belly of many internet comment threads you will sometimes see the letters “tl:dr.” Birthed on the web in 2002, these initials simply mean “too long: didn’t read.” In other words, either my time is limited or my attention span is too short to read the entire article or thread or theory or propaganda piece. So, “tl:dr” often is accompanied by a short summary of the longer material." </li> <li> The book notes: "Words are cheap online, and sometimes there are simply too many of them. It’s for such circumstances that the five characters “TL;DR” have developed as a staple of online discussions. They stand for the phrase “Too Long; Didn’t Read,” and are traditionally deployed as a response to an excessively long piece of comment or argument in an online debate (or as a humorous way of asking someone to stop waffling and get to the point). TL;DR is an interesting acronym, not least because it’s one of the very few to contain a semicolon—a hint at its likely origins among the ranks of editors on Wikipedia and members of other less high-minded online forums like FARK, where it first began frequently to be used around 2003. One unusual variation on TL;DR is an animated image of a teal deer— sometimes used in online postings due to their similar pronunciation—but the ethos it embodies today is more often expressed both without the “official” semicolon and in deliberate haste." </li> </ol>There is sufficient coverage in reliable sources to allow TL;DR to pass Notability, which requires "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject". Cunard (talk) 08:15, 18 September 2023 (UTC) </li></ul>
 * Keep, it is expandable beyond a dictionary definition. -- Tavix ( talk ) 14:39, 18 September 2023 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. <b style="color:red">Please do not modify it.</b> 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.