Wikipedia talk:Templates for deletion/Log/2008 February 17

Recap Summary for Templates for deletion/Log/2008 February 17
As an involved editor in this discussion, I have provided this recap to assist anyone who is just showing up at this deletion discussion and finds getting a quick whiff of it, to be very difficult due to its length. I have tried to assess the intentions of the participants to the best of my ability, and have tried to summarize their relevant comments in a neutral way. If my bias shows through, then I apologize, it is not my intention to bias or influence the discussion with this summary... that is what my participation was trying to do, though, naturally. If you disagree with my comments here, please provide your own follow-up comments in a separate section below this. Please do not strikethrough, correct, or interrupt my comments here, as it may be difficult for others to see what I wrote and what you wrote. If you want me to read or reply to such a follow-up comment or want to ask me to correct what you think is an obvious error, please address that on my talk page.

Raw !vote count

 * Delete
 * 1) Tony Sidaway
 * 2) CharlotteWebb
 * 3) Rossami
 * 4) EJF
 * 5) Mr.Z-man
 * 6) Doug
 * 7) Cryptic
 * 8) Guy


 * Keep
 * 1) Jay*Jay
 * 2) Dorftrottel
 * 3) The Helpful One
 * 4) Equazcion
 * 5) VigilancePrime
 * 6) Black Falcon
 * 7) EconomicsGuy
 * 8) нмŵוτн
 * 9) DGG
 * 10) Jerry


 * non-!voting
 * 1) Hypnosadist (sounded like a keep, but not explicitly so)
 * 2) Tony (sounded like a keep, but not explicitly so)
 * 3) Ned Scott (made no discernable recommendation)

Arguments

 * Delete arguments
 * intended to be used as a vote tally
 * no use supported by consensus
 * only provides two possible outcomes
 * damages the consensus-forming process by highlighting division of opinion
 * automatic vote counting is unwikipedian
 * could never be improved to allow enough potential recommendations, because they are infinite
 * encourages current headcounting practice to grow
 * creates an us and them mentality, which is detrimental to creating community consensus
 * reinforces the misperception that deletion discussions are about voting
 * highly involved wikicode that can not (and never will be able to) account for the nuances of actually reading and weighing the contents of the messages
 * ignores ambiguous or conditional opinions and provides no sense of the evolution of the discussion (or of the connection to changes in the article being discussed).
 * vote tallies do not take into consideration other factors like strength of argument, SPA, COI, etc.
 * serves no useful purpose
 * encourages edit wars
 * gives non-admins more power than they should have
 * If it is used as part of the closing process, that is bad
 * if it is not used as part of the closing process, that is bad
 * creates a burden for users to keep checking it to make sure they are not mislisted
 * can result in misstating the current "tally"
 * sabotages the consensus-making process by biasing the closing admin
 * used to try to influence the closure of a deletion debate
 * redundant to existing closure templates
 * provides unfair advantage to first party to use it
 * every use of it is biased and every attempt to correct that bias is disruptive
 * admins will undoubtedly close debates with no rationale if this template exists

JERRY talk contribs 19:00, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep arguments
 * summary is useful for capturing the flavour of long discussions
 * not simply a voting list, but a summary of arguments
 * allows division of opinion to be seen clearly
 * the need to modify it does not imply a need to delete it
 * may make closing admin reluctant to ignore consensus where one exists
 * not automated in any way; requires human research and consideration
 * AfD IS a headcount/ votecount so why keep hiding it?
 * provides a point of reference for those who show up late at a long debate
 * makes extremely long discussions less daunting to potential closers
 * designed to summarize in a purely neutral way
 * helps eliminate double headcounting when people bold a recommendation more than once in the dicussion
 * helps clarify ambiguous or non-standard recommendation verbiage
 * people who do not like it or feel they will be unduly swayed by it can ignore it
 * admins can be trusted to use good judgement
 * it is useful
 * can be used to greatly assist discussions
 * discussions where it is needed, do tend to be polarized
 * good to have a standardized way of doing things
 * much more nuanced view than tally boxes
 * any admin who would be confused by things such as this should not be closing afds in the first place
 * users summarize eachothers comments all the time, this template merely provides an optional way to standardize that
 * biased summaries can be reverted, corrected or removed altogether
 * All tools have the potential to be misused, and all tools have the potential to be very helpful
 * Preemptive deletion to prevent misuse is misguided, goes against wikipedia's core principles
 * as wikipedians we will mentor eachother and that in the end consensus will prevail
 * AfD's are NEVER a votecount, and no matter if we used pound-sign sections or tally boxes or what, never will be
 * administrators who close debates follow the administrators' guide to deletion - determination of rough consensus instructions
 * can help clarify confusing comments
 * can help avoid an inadvertantly improper close against consensus
 * it is a neat idea, and WP:ILIKEIT

Other opinions and comments
This is too long for my poor eyes to read. Perhaps it could be concisely recapped for easier comprehension? Err, wait... — CharlotteWebb 20:16, 23 February 2008 (UTC) --
 * The above user added this to my summary of delete arguments, although I had asked people not to contaminate my summary with their input, So I am moving it down here with their other comment, and sectionalizing them together. JERRY talk contribs 20:59, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
 * anybody who is too lazy to read the entirety of a complex discussion is probably too lazy to read a faithful recap of it.

--


 * (And, fortunately for Jerry, "encourages edit wars" is already part of his list.) [[Image:Smiley.svg|15px|]] — CharlotteWebb 21:27, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I wasn't aware that anyone was edit warring over this. You mean moving your comments, once, with a reasonable explanation, out of a section that isn't meant to contain comments? Is that edit warring?  Equazcion •✗/C • 22:47, 23 Feb 2008 (UTC)