Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Wikistory (2nd nomination)

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 Delete I have nothing against fun, especially fun that helps the goals of the encyclopaedia or provides fun for the reader. In this case I am pursuaded by the comments of those that this page is not helping the encyclopaedia. Enter CambridgeBayWeather, waits for audience applause, not a sausage 00:04, 28 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Wikistory

Speedily deleted as WP:CSD#G1 and overturned (correctly, G1 does not technically apply here). It is, however, a pretty obvious violation of WP:NOT. I'd be interested to see what creative interpretation of Wikipedia policy allows for the creation of one-word-at-a-time original fiction, regardless of merit - thousands of edits to this page, with all that database load, to support something whose connection to building an encyclopaedia completely escapes me. Guy (Help!) 22:20, 22 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. see log, Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/Wikipedia:Wikistory and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 22:27, 22 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Nuke this garbage. Synergy 23:02, 22 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: shame I thought this was Wikihistory, which may have been fairly interesting. This certainly isn't. Majorly talk 23:14, 22 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Re-opened this - my error, read a previous MfD incorrectly. Black Kite 01:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Anyway, Delete per the original nomination, which states the point well. Black Kite 01:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
One-word-at-a-time is great fun at my weekly improv workshops. This is not my weekly improv workshop. Delete. DS (talk) 01:24, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Also, User:Oddmartian2/Wikipoem, User:Oddmartian2/Things of the World, and User:Anthrcer/Wikipoem (line). DS (talk) 01:40, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

delete We don't put encyclopedic articles in your poetry books. Please don't put poems in our encyclopedia. Really, poetry is great and wonderful and all, but this is not the place. It is just not the web site to be creating original fictional works. Chillum 01:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete There is a fine line. Sam ^Blab 01:48, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - this is very similar to Wikipedia:Sandbox/Word Association which is clearly part of the sandbox training ground. Is this too part of the training for newbies? Graeme Bartlett (talk) 01:53, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No it isn't. Not sure if that page is either. At the very least the sandbox page has a vague link to the encyclopedia in that it involves linking articles, though I think that link is labored at best. Chillum 01:55, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

And also relevant to this is Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory where it decided to keep, and this was part of the sandbox and user training at that point. Was that page moved to the current one? Graeme Bartlett (talk) 01:59, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

But it ended up being deleted, probably in error:

10:36, 14 February 2009 MZMcBride (Talk | contribs) deleted "Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory" ‎ (CSD G8: Wikipedia:Wikistory)
15:57, 11 July 2007 Brookie (Talk | contribs) restored "Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory" ‎ (2,354 revisions restored: Revert silly deletion - long standing and much loved/used article)
15:50, 9 July 2007 A Man In Black (Talk | contribs) deleted "Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory" ‎ (patent nonsense)

Graeme Bartlett (talk) 02:04, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Consensus can change. I wonder why the restoring admin called it an article? Oh well it was about 2 years ago. Chillum 02:07, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

more logs

10:36, 14 February 2009 MZMcBride (Talk | contribs) deleted "Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory" ‎ (CSD G8: Wikipedia:Wikistory)
12:36, 15 July 2007 Ragesoss (Talk | contribs) moved Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory to Wikipedia:Wikistory ‎ (Sandbox subpage is not the best place for this.) (revert)
23:23, 11 July 2007 Shalom Yechiel (Talk | contribs) moved Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory to User:Shalom/Bad jokes and other deleted nonsense/Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory ‎ (Moving to personal BJAODN per MFD discussion.) (revert)
15:57, 11 July 2007 Brookie (Talk | contribs) restored "Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory" ‎ (2,354 revisions restored: Revert silly deletion - long standing and much loved/used article)
15:50, 9 July 2007 A Man In Black (Talk | contribs) deleted "Wikipedia:Sandbox/Wikistory" ‎ (patent nonsense)

So the previous debates are clearly relevant. My vote is undecided at the moment, and I am surprised that the opinions are so different to before. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 02:04, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per nom. Way too much text all in one spot of the article and weird stuff just is nonsense. Versus22_talk 04:57, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Part of our history and culture. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. 1. It's not an article, it is in Wikipedia namespace. 2. It's part of a select number of humourous pages to keep editors engaged and amused. The page is therefore helpful in creating an encyclopedia. It helps retain editors. If people feel WP namespace is the wrong place for it, it can be userfied to whoever wants to take it. - Mgm|^(talk) 08:39, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Wikipedia is not a social networking site. Stifle (talk) 09:41, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
A comment or two here. Whilst the WP:NOT arguments are useful: this is in the meta (i.e. project) namespace. However, someone will probably move it, per the GFDL to one of their own wikis. I will move it over to my wiki if the outcome is delete, so people can carry on with it - is this a fair compromise? --Litherlandsand (talk) 10:46, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
No objections at all, assuming your wiki is GFDL (: Stifle (talk) 11:48, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep or Userfy. Many of the pages in the Department of Fun are exactly this type of game: collaborative silliness designed to give Wikipedians a break (thereby indirectly helping the project by making its contributors more relaxed). I'm not making an other stuff exists argument here, I'm just saying that humour and fun have historically been shown some leniency when they exist in Project space or User space, and in those cases they can actually be beneficial.--Unscented (talk) 12:34, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per 2005 discussion. And unless all "fun pages" are also nominated to be consistent. With the current potential problems on keeping editors, saying we do not need any community seems short-sighted indeed. Not an encyclopedia article, hence that is not a valid reason for deletion per se. Collect (talk) 12:49, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Who says we don't need any community? We are discouraging people using our servers for off-topic purposes, that is not anti-community. We have plenty of community without this game. Chillum 14:45, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, exactly. There would be no prejudice against a game which honed Wikipedia editing skills, but this is a page which is calculated to maximuse server load while engaging in something which is not even slightly aligned with Wikipedia's mission - indeed is antithetical to it. Do we really want to encourage people to write original fiction here? Are we that short of articles to edit? Guy (Help!) 18:47, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep per SmokeyJoe and tag as historical . This page has been around a long time, and back when we were less uptight, many of WP's most prolific contributors contributed to this page. WP's culture has evolved, though, and so it should be tagged as historical. Mike R (talk) 19:22, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete--neither funny nor interesting. {{Historical}} should be used for former policies or processes that contributed to the community in a real way; I'm sure that no one who participated in this imagined it would be maintained permanently. Chick Bowen 23:06, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete since it does not belong here, but move per Litherlandsand -- it would be a shame to lose all the effort completely, & anyway it's his right according to the license. DGG (talk) 00:57, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: It's a shame to see every last bit of fun and frivolity around here ruthlessly hunted down and exterminated, but I still can't really !vote "keep" in good conscience either, given that this has nothing to do with an encyclopedia, so I'll refrain from doing any specific !vote at all. I'd be interested to see this concept resurface over on some other site where it's actually on-topic. *Dan T.* (talk) 02:10, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. This is a bit of silliness that gives editors a chance to do something fun and doesn't violate any policies. Wikipedia is not a social network, but it is a community, and things that help maintain the community and keep people from burning out, ceteris paribus, are good things. It doesn't do any harm, and a significant number of editors have found meaning in participation over the years. It may not meet the "how to be funny and not just stupid" test, but it's intended to be fun for participants, not necessarily funny for non-participants. [Note: I restored Wikipedia:Wikistory (Sentence), since the deletion review implicitly supported that, but obviously that page should have the same fate as the original Wikistory page at the conclusion of this MfD, whether keep or delete.]--ragesoss (talk) 04:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Allow transwiki to any other GFDL-compliant wiki that wants the page per Litherlandsand, but delete from Wikipedia per nom. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 05:36, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: If the result is delete, please leave this page to be transwikied within a timeframe of about 2 - 3 weeks (I may not be available all the time), and it can be moved there.

Note that you will have to change the links to [[:w:en:{{PAGENAME}}|PAGENAME]] since that's the interwiki prefix on the new wiki. Without blatantly advertising, all I will say is, that for anything that's deleted here via MFD will always be welcome there, as the wiki is GFDL licensed. --Litherlandsand (talk) 13:53, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. This is not the place. — Hex (❝?!❞) 18:56, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Playing is not just silliness. Playing is a method of learning. These pages have educational merit, and should be kept for that reason, if no others. So far, they an experimental playground in collaborative creation – clearly compatible with wikipedia. They are not working very well, you might think, from looking at them. They have shown one thing: that if in contributing you may only add, not remove or change, then multi-authored contributing only leads to gibberish. These pages have a design flaw, which I propose to fix (see here). The experiment here is now “can more complete wiki editing (collaboratively add, change, delete, but only a little at a time) turn the gibberish into meaning?”. Can the poorly understood process documented at Wikipedia:Consensus (particularly the simple current schematic) work, even without a prestated objective or external references (as per WP:PSTS)? Let the experiment continue. It is using negligible resources, and may offer something useful to learn. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 21:05, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
delete. This sort of page is completely at odds with our purpose (and WP:NOT). — Carl (CBM · talk) 02:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep This humorous article reflects our concept of collaboration and community editing. --J.Mundo (talk) 18:41, 25 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keeperween, Keeperween, you're 55 million lightyears from Deleterween! Funny, cool, I want to let it continue. And there are other funny pages on the wiki. --98.162.148.46 (talk) 00:37, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. The page is nonsensical, nonencyclopedic and not useful for encyclopedia-building. ➲ redvers ^{sit down next to me} 11:14, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - dumb. --B (talk) 03:36, 27 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Very Strong Keep This page is actually part of the Wikipedia Department of Fun and has stood as a monumental element of that page. It has been kept for a very long time and there has been thousands of edits. If it is going to be deleted then why is the Dof still here? The dof is made up of many pages like this. There are many other random wikistories like this that have survived. This page has offended no-one and if you ask one of the many editors to this page they will tell you why it should stay here. If it is part of a users sandbox then it should be recreated as part of a userspace. I leave you with the thought that this page brings joy to many wikipedians and that you may end up deleting a part of Wikipedia and may drive many users away.Darkside2000 (talk) 12:53, 27 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Those parts of the "Department of Fun" not related to creating an encyclopedia should be deleted yes. We are the "Department of making a free encyclopedia", fun is not against the rules but we do have a goal here that people are expected to stick to when using our resource. The idea that it has been there a while and that other stuff like it exists is not an argument made in policy, neither is "it is fun". Lots of things are fun, that doesn't mean Wikipedia is the place for it. Chillum 14:42, 27 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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.