Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Proposed mergers (2nd nomination)

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

The result of the discussion was Merge to WP:WTF Withdrawn It sure as heck didn't look active. Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • (Many otters • One bat • One hammer) 18:00, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Proposed mergers
Either tag as inactive or delete. This page has a backlog stretching back to January 2008 and it's only getting larger and larger without anyone working on it. We already have Merge and other similar templates, which encourage merge discussions to take place on the talk page. This page is nothing but clutter, moving merge discussions away from their intended and logical place on the talk page. If someone sees a merge, they can either boldly merge themselves or discuss on the talk page, without this extra unnecessary step of listing it here and adding to a never-decreasing backlog. Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • (Many otters • One bat • One hammer) 15:26, 5 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Oppose. There is cleanup activity going on, this page clearly states that it does not replace but merely supplement the standard merging process (optionally!), and it has parallels with e.g. the Move requests page. No reason at all for it to go. --LjL (talk) 15:34, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
 * It's a redundant supplement. All it does is list a select few mergers which are currently up. This is probably 5% of them. Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • (Many otters • One bat • One hammer) 15:43, 5 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep. It's not inactive, and the size of the backlog is a problem that won't go away by deleting the page. The page gets way too little attention, yes, but it's not inactive, and it's helpful in locating and keeping track of merger discussions. Without this page merger discussions would get even less eyes on them, and I don't know what anyone would benefit from this page being deleted. Jafeluv (talk) 20:29, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep I know at least one person is actively working on this page, me. | In march 2009 the backlog went all the way to 2007, it's come a long way since then. Little to no discussion actually goes on at this page anyways, all discussion takes place on the article's talk pages. This page is only a notice board, and an active one at that. Try checking the page history. -- Nick Penguin ( contribs ) 20:44, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep - firstly, the backlog is not that bad - there are only eight outstanding requests from 2008 including only one very old one. Secondly, merges take some time to do correctly, to gauge consensus and then to ensure important details are neither misinterpreted nor lost during the actual rewriting to create the merged text. It's not as simple as simply pasting one article on top of another, and shouldn't be rushed through simply to deal with a backlog. Thirdly (and fairly self-evidently), a backlog should be addressed by responding to requests ratehr than deleting the noticeboard where the requests are listed. This would be akin to a call centre backlog being addressed by unplugging the phones. Fourth, there is slow but steady progress in addressing emrge requests, as previous editors have posted above. Fifth, the presence of merge requests not listed on this page is no reason to delete it - the page need not be a comprehensive list of every merge request in Wikipedia, but simply a worklist for those with copyediting skills and an understanding of merge policy, to help complete requests by other editors not be confident enough to do it themselves. If this sounds unfriendly its not meant to be - I just can't really see the argument for deleting a useful and routinely accessed noticeboard. Euryalus (talk) 23:33, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep, poorly researched nomination. PM could use improvement, particularly greater participation, but retiring it is not appropriate. Flatscan (talk) 04:59, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * According to the page history, NickPenguin has been removing completed entries, greatly reducing the page size since late March 2009.
 * Discussions are linked from PM and occur on an article Talk page.
 * As mentioned above, PM is optional: it doesn't bog down obvious mergers with unnecessary procedure, but is available if additional input is needed. Similar to the complementary category/list interaction described by WP:CLN, PM is a manually-selected subset and has a brief description to assist list browsing. Flatscan (talk) 04:59, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. Worthy effort.  Not inactive.  Backlog is not overwhelming.  Could use advertising.  --SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:56, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment There's actually only 50 merge requests on this page. Some are clearly more complicated than others, and most of the easy ones have been completed by now, but this has to be the smallest backlog on record. -- Nick Penguin ( contribs ) 18:01, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep Sure appears active to me -- making the argument totally moot. Collect (talk) 13:47, 7 July 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 page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.