Wikipedia talk:Mass nomination

This doesn't seem to comply with WP:BRD. It is clearly outside the scope of this essay and should go in a separate essay. It is not the reverse, which would be removing PRODs so quickly that you could not be properly considering them or in a way that misunderstands or ignores content policies (ie failure to have a valid reason, rather than failure to explain it in express words). And I can't see any reason why the explanation should be on the talk page instead of in an edit summary. Except, of course, to waste the patrollers' time and to rig the game against them by forcing them to make twice as many edits as the nominators. James500 (talk) 15:31, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Talk page: there's a userbox on your user page that links to WikiProject Proposed deletion patrolling, which clearly says that reasons should always be given on the talk page. Personally, I'm fine with a good edit summary, but some people don't give any valid reason (beyond: should be discussed at AfD or some such) and that's quite irritating. --Randykitty (talk) 15:55, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Unless I am mistaken, that page hasn't gone through the proposal process and the project is marked as semi inactive. I had it in mind to suggest that the link in that template be retargeted to point at Proposed deletion because it is clear to me that a person can be a patroller without being a member of that Wikiproject. James500 (talk) 16:25, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * There's no approval process for project pages. But the link you give also mentions the need for a clear explanation (both for a PROD2 tag and a de-PROD), which of course is quite logical if you think about it, because both adding a PROD (or PROD2) or removing a PROD are not minor edits. And, of course, anybody can patrol PRODs and many do (DGG comes to mind). --Randykitty (talk) 16:31, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree that those sentences are outside the scope of this essay. I'd be OK with deleting them. --MelanieN (talk) 15:44, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I think that mass PRODding without good reasons are just the other side of the coin of mass de-PRODding without providing a good reason. Last week we had an editor going from AfD to AfD and !voting "Keep as above" 32 times in 36 minutes... --Randykitty (talk) 15:55, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * That may be so, but it is not "mass nomination". You would have to move and rework the page or create a separate essay, to fit that in. And to include mass !keep votes, you would have to include mass !delete votes, which are not presently addressed. I am inclined to suggest three separate essays. James500 (talk) 16:53, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't think that is a good idea, that would make for 3 very brief essays. And to me, both type of mass actions are very much related: they both concern our deletion policy and they are both very disruptive. I think this can become quite a nice essay on how to PROD/dePROD/behave in AfD if these issues are discussed together, as different sides of the same (type of disruptive) behavior. --Randykitty (talk) 16:59, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * This essay also doesn't presently address failure to give good reasons for PRODS which is the opposite of failure to give good reasons for de-PRODS. We also have the problem of genuine disagreements between over what constitutes notability etc. We do not want to call editors disruptive merely because they are particularly inclusionist or deletionist. James500 (talk) 17:15, 26 August 2014 (UTC) And then there is the issue of deciding what is a sufficient explanation. James500 (talk) 17:19, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Comment
I object to this sentence - "Mass PROD nominations might conceivably be accompanied by inappropriate attempts to bully the patrollers into not removing the inappropriate PRODs" - and its footnote. It is speculative ("might conceivably be") with no evidence to back it up, and it assumes bad faith. And it's hard to even imagine in practice; how can one bully a patroller into not doing something? I think this sentence and its footnote should be deleted. --MelanieN (talk) 15:22, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree. --Randykitty (talk) 15:26, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

The patrollers could be bullied by being falsely accussed of being disruptive and with "smoke and mirror" threats to take them to ANI. James500 (talk) 15:35, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Those threats could only be made AFTER the prod is removed, by which time it's too late to bully them; a PROD, once removed, cannot be reinstated. And before the PROD is removed, the nominator would have no idea who to bully. I really think this "threat" is far-fetched.--MelanieN (talk) 15:43, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Suppose that an editor places a large number of silly PRODs. A patroller removes half of them. The nominator then tells the patroller that if the rest of the silly PRODs are removed, or any of them are, he will take the patroller to ANI for being disruptive. That is the scenario that I have in mind. Some people would find that distressing, even if it was nonsense. James500 (talk) 16:04, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I'd love to see a case like that at ANI: WP:BOOMERANG would hit the silly PRODder as soon as they hit "save"! If all you're doing is cleaning up silly PRODs, there's nothing to fear from ANI. On the contrary, you should go there as soon as it is clear that somebody is putting up such kind of PRODs, because that is clearly a disruptive behavior that needs to be stopped. --Randykitty (talk) 16:18, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Many users avoid ANI like the plague and are not prepared to go there for any reason. James500 (talk) 17:55, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I can only imagine ANI threats if someone is mass de-PRODding without good reasons (I actually think I have once seen such a case, with the editor in question actually ending up being blocked, but for the life of me can't remember when or who...) --Randykitty (talk) 15:55, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * And the fact that we don't have a link to this precedent creates an opportunity to misrepresent what actually happened. James500 (talk) 16:04, 26 August 2014 (UTC) I have found references to that case in various places, but I can't find it in the archives, even with Google. James500 (talk) 16:07, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * WP:AGF? --Randykitty (talk) 16:19, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I think this may be the incident you are remembering - from earlier this month. The (ultimately topic-banned) user was very proud of the fact that he was going through the list of unsourced BLPs and slapping "PROD - unreferenced" on all of them. He boasted that he had already completed PRODding the A's and B's, and continued his alphabetical prodding even while the ANI discussion was going on. --MelanieN (talk) 23:13, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * That's a good example to link to in this essay. The case I rememebr, however, was years ago and was the opposite. It was somebody who was mass-removing PROD tags, even very well argued ones, without any justification. By doing several a minute, it was also clear that this editor did not give any of these de-PRODs anything more than a cursory evaluation (if at all) and eventually was topic-banned, too. But with close to 900 archives (and not more specific info than this), I have no clue how to find this case... --Randykitty (talk) 11:03, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I still think this whole possibility that a nominator might "threaten" or "bully" patrollers, so as to pre-emptively prevent them from removing a PROD, is so unlikely it should not be included in this guideline. And in any case it's outside the scope of the essay, which is about mass nominations, not about disruptive attempts to support nominations. In my observation, a person who makes mass nominations in the sense you are talking about is not going to follow up with extreme measures to enforce their nominations. On the contrary, they usually nominate-and-run; they don't even watchlist it; basically they pay no attention to what happens next. I still recommend deleting this speculative scenario. --MelanieN (talk) 17:04, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree that it may be outside the scope of this essay, the title being what it is. James500 (talk) 18:15, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Possible addition
The lead sentence here makes it clear that it is not JUST about making a lot of nominations; it is specifically about when "WP:BEFORE is not being complied with, or that the nominations misunderstand or ignore Wikipedia's content policies and guidelines." I wonder if we can expand this somehow, to make it clear that simply making a lot of nominations, even in a relatively short time, is not a problem? That the problem is poorly researched nominations or generically phrased nomination statements? Here's why: I sometimes see people raise an objection at AfD, calling for "keep" or "speedy keep", on the grounds that the nomination was one of a series of mass nominations. I came across a recent example where each of 10 nominations by one user was clearly reasoned and customized for the case, but an editor used cut-and-paste wording to call for "Speedy keep" of all of them on mass nomination ("deletion spree") grounds. I would hate to see this essay become merely another form of shorthand for lazy thinking at AfDs. --MelanieN (talk) 17:27, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * That might be a good idea. James500 (talk) 18:37, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Absolutely! --Randykitty (talk) 18:47, 26 August 2014 (UTC)


 * I'm also aware of a recent case of a large number of hasty AfD nominations, that showed no evidence of following WP:BEFORE, and no verifiable evidence, just personal opinion. The nominations also ignored content policies.  And I agree that it is not by itself the number of nominations.  The quality of workmanship separates agenda-driven nominations from constructive contributions.  But numbers also matter.  I remember another case where an editor was dropping hundreds of AfD nominations on the AfD volunteers daily.  Unscintillating (talk) 02:10, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Question
Can we come to an agreement on what the scope of this page should be, and whether it needs to be moved? I think that is the first issue that needs to be decided. James500 (talk) 18:31, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * First question: what was your goal in writing it? Granted you don't "own" it, but your goal should be a starting point for discussion. --MelanieN (talk) 18:33, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * My goal was to address mass nominations as a discrete issue. I think narrowly focused essays are less likely to descend into masses of hastily written waffle. James500 (talk) 18:47, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * OK, good. And how do you envision it being used? In other words, under what circumstances would someone link to it? --MelanieN (talk) 19:04, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * When they are confronted with an apparent mass nomination, especially a spree of PRODs, and want something that explains the issues and perhaps what to do. James500 (talk) 19:20, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * So in other words, you intend it mainly as a way for people to inform themselves about mass nominations. They came across a mass nom situation, they want to know what the deal is or what to do. Also to be used as a link for people to use at a user's talk page, if they want to express a concern about that user's deleting pattern? How about as a link for people to cite at AfD discussions? How it is written depends in large part on who the target audience is, so we should determine that before doing a lot of writing. --MelanieN (talk) 21:56, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

I've given the matter some thought, and I suggest pruning back the material that doesn't relate directly to mass nomination. This would be the material that Randykitty added and the material that MelanieN suggested be removed. May I do this? James500 (talk) 21:26, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I think you should. --MelanieN (talk) 21:50, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * ✅. James500 (talk) 22:53, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

I did a little copy editing, hopefully non-controversial: writing out the acronyms, and expanding a little on WHY these noms can be a problem. --MelanieN (talk) 23:00, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Seems okay to me. James500 (talk) 23:17, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Expansion
The article right now is correctly targeted but pretty bare-bones. I'd like to expand on good vs. bad types of mass nomination, as hinted at in the lead. Here's a possible approach, feel free to edit it. --MelanieN (talk) 23:33, 26 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Proposing to delete a large number of article is not always or necessarily bad. Some people patrol areas like Category:Unreferenced BLPs or ‪Category:Articles with topics of unclear notability‬, specifically looking for articles that deserve deletion. Such people may propose or nominate for deletion numerous articles in a day. This can be a positive way to help the encyclopedia, PROVIDED they first make an attempt to determine if the article could be saved, perhaps by being improved rather than deleted (including a search for sources, see WP:BEFORE), or by being merged into a related article. The problem arises when someone does not make that effort, but simply proposes deletion without making any attempt to evaluate the article. Indicators of indiscriminate nominations can include: insufficient time between nominations to have actually evaluated the article; generic reasons for deletion given, such as "unreferenced" or "non-notable", rather than topic-specific reasons such as "unreferenced since 2006, no sources found in a search"; or non-policy-compliant reasons for deletion given, such as "stub" or "poorly written".

Another indication is the repeated nomination of obviously notable topics or (bearing in mind WP:R#CRD) obvious redirects. James500 (talk) 23:45, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
 * The problem (arguably) doesn't just arise when someone fails to evaluate the article. It also (arguably) arises when their evaluation is incompetent. James500 (talk) 00:12, 27 August 2014 (UTC) (It might be worth suggesting that nominators send a single "test case" to AfD before doing a batch of similar nominations.) James500 (talk) 00:26, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
 * You might as well just go ahead and expand the essay as you see fit. James500 (talk) 00:17, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
 * You sound offended. I'm sorry! I'm not trying to take the article away from you. On the contrary, I was trying to put into words what I thought you intended. (I'm usually pretty good at putting other people's ideas into words; in fact I have done work as a ghostwriter.) Above, we all agreed about "Possible addition"; that's what I was trying to work on here. Aside from needing to add your thoughts above, did I get anything wrong? in specifics or in tone? Let me know and we'll work this out. The idea is to work together and come up with an essay you will be proud to claim authorship of. --MelanieN (talk) 02:24, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I am not offended. I was trying to express broad approval for what you wrote and to suggest that you be WP:BOLD in editing the essay. I apologise if what I wrote was ambiguous. James500 (talk) 12:19, 27 August 2014 (UTC)