Controversial e-mail proposal, invalid AfD

Discussion report

Controversial e-mail proposal, invalid AfD

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On Saturday, David Spector suggested a new feature be made available as an option for all users: in addition to the orange banner telling a user that another Wikipedian had edited their talk page, the user would be sent an e-mail informing them of this.

It soon emerged that such a feature was available on MediaWiki, but it had been disabled on the English Wikipedia because of performance issues. Dougweller said, "I'd hate it. I don't want that much email. Vandals might love it."

TreasuryTag was the first to object. "I simply do not see the point. If anybody is interested in the collaborative side of Wikipedia, then they will most likely use the site. Even if they do not keep an eye on their watchlist, the orange 'new messages' banner will always alert them if anybody wishes to get in touch, no matter what page is being viewed at the time." He said it would be "irritating" for active editors to receive an e-mail every time a message was left on their talk page. He concluded that "any needless drain on the Wikimedia Foundation's (charitable) resources should not be contemplated" if developer time were needed to fix the performance issues.

However, Sadads thought it was a good idea: "if I didn't spend every waking moment plugged into Wikipedia I would want to get e-mails when I [had] something on my talk. It would be like what I do with Facebook."

Following TreasuryTag's comments on potential performance issues, David Spector, "a semi-retired software engineer with about 40 years' experience working with computers", said he did not think such a system would have any impact on performance. "I can't see how sending an email to those who want one whenever their Talk page changes would create a performance problem ... this is a Proposals page", he said. "I assume that means that every proposal will be considered for implementation on its merits, not on some memory of 'they already rejected that' ... of course, if there really would be a performance problem, or this proposal turned out to help vandals significantly, then this proposal should not be implemented."

TreasuryTag countered this, saying that the feature had been disabled by "a team of dedicated experts to make such judgements." David Spector responded that "I've designed and implemented improvements on a time-series, multidimensional OLAP business database system for Dun and Bradstreet. I improved the runtime performance of the Multics linker by 27%. I currently do database development for another startup of mine. I understand performance issues well. What I don't understand is the unnecessary but pervading atmosphere of viciousness here at WP." TreasuryTag told Spector that "We have developers to make decisions about performance. If you consider this apportionment of functions according to expertise to be 'vicious' then perhaps Wikipedia is not the right environment for you."

The proposal discussion continues.

No consensus for article "pretending to be something that it isn't"

Cultural impact of the Chernobyl disaster was nominated for deletion by Rodhullandemu who thought the article had "become a repository for unsourced trivia of the worst kind. There is no encyclopedic treatment or commentary, it's just a list of mentions."

Colonel Warden disagreed, pointing to a book chapter on the cultural impact of the disaster. Themfromspace supported the nomination: "an article on this topic may be acceptable if written in prose and compiled through material found in reliable sources which discuss the cultural impact of the Chernobyl disaster."

SummerWithMorons thought the article should be kept and that the AfD was invalid. "Arguments for deletion must be based on the notability of the subject itself. The supposed inadequacy of the content of current version of the article may be an argument for other changes, not for deletion."

Mandsford replied: "honestly, does anyone see anything here that describes the 'cultural impact' of the Chernobyl disaster? This one really was called 'Chernobyl in popular culture' until last year, and it's possible that someone hit the panic button when i.p.c. articles were being nominated, but this article is definitely not about the cultural impact of the Chernobyl disaster. We have lots of good articles that use the conventional 'in popular culture' name, and perhaps it's time for this one to go back to calling itself what it is, rather than to be pretending to be something that it isn't."

Courcelles closed the AfD more than a week after the nomination was posted. The result was no consensus.

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Ok, so why on earth was that AfD special enough to be singled out here? Sounds pretty typical to me. Jclemens (talk) 05:23, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It is pretty typical, and there is nothing special about it. I choose a random AfD and write about that. If there is an AfD that you would like to see covered you can suggest it at our tips desk, if you like. WackyWace ^{converse | contribs} 07:42, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You chose a random AfD? Is there really nothing more important to cover? Alternatively, y'know, you could spend your time contributing to the encyclopedia... If there's nothing worth talking about, don't just make it up. J Milburn (talk) 14:45, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've been here just over four months and in that time created 58 articles, contributed to one DYK, and spent countless hours working on my own to get an article up to GA status. So please, saying I should spend more of my time contributing to the mainspace is really a little patronizing. If you don't want to read the Discussion report, then don't read it. WackyWace ^{converse | contribs} 18:01, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's actually useful to remind people that simple content issues are unlikely to be grounds for AfD. Many AfDs could be avoided, many many more streamlined if more folk remembered this simple guideline. Rich Farmbrough, 23:31, 27 July 2010 (UTC).[reply]

Good question, Jclemens. Moreover, why was TreasuryTag's behaviour deemed deserving of a public commentary by the Signpost? This is a very unusual piece, and not one I'd enjoy seeing emulated in future weeks. AGK 18:03, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The intention of that section was not to highlight TreasuryTag's behaviour, but because I found the proposal that e-mails should be sent to users about talk page messages was interesting and something that the wider community would be interested to hear about. At the time of writing, however, almost half the report was taken up by the argument over TreasuryTag. I felt that if I covered half the discussion, then this COULD be considered censorship. My aim was to highlight this discussion so that users unaware of its existance would discover it and hopefully voice their opinions, which they have. WackyWace ^{converse | contribs} 18:13, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hey guys, this is a wiki, remember? Feel free to edit the article and add what you'd like to see rather than just berating the person who took the initiative to write something. Kaldari (talk) 22:11, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've removed the last comment about TreasuryTag from the article, as I feel it's not worth highlighting here and just makes Wikipedia look bad. Let's remember that the Signpost is meant to showcase the best of Wikipedia, not comments we'd later regret. Robofish (talk) 23:43, 27 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't like talking about AfDs here. I think it just looks like the signpost has nothing better to write about. Even Cunard's nominations of secret pages is more notable than an individual AfD. Kayau Voting IS evil 01:25, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I also agree. I have the feeling that the author write these 2 stories just as a page filler. There're lots more discussion happening that are more worthy to mention (e.g. about relaxing Betacommand's restrictiong to run the SPI bot) OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:27, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think that partly because of the comments here, and partly because the page is very hard to write, it has gone on a holiday from now. The page labours under the burden that we are all suffused in the reading of discussions. However, if a few noteworthy discussions arise in the future, I guess they could make a good story. Tony (talk) 03:33, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I welcome the reporting of some discussions and AFDs in the Signpost. Wikipedia can be a puzzling place for a newcomer and this sometimes fraught activity needs a window where some of the niceties and outcomes can be observed without diving in. It also tends to be the perogative of news editors to decide what constitutes news. Lumos3 (talk) 21:27, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think this was a pretty good article. You're actually doing something right if it stirs up some hoopla. Keep it up. I like BLP1E AfDs that get tons of votes, when you go looking for your next one. They're usually pretty interesting. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 23:11, 28 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I too don't see the need to report on individual AfDs. This one wasn't anything special. The email story is also too detailed, in that it centralize the debate around the views of two or three people, and encourages an "Editor 1 vs. editor 2, who will win!11!!" attitude. Report that the discussion is taking place, give a quick general summary of the for and against position, but there's no need to report "User:X said this, which was countered by User:Y who said this, which was re-countered by User:X who made this argument", etc... Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 03:45, 31 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know. I think that there are some AfDs that have interesting arguments and perhaps some policy ramifications and might be worth reporting. But this one was not one such. Why not report on debates in WP:Centralized discussion? I find some of those mystifying. Abductive (reasoning) 10:21, 31 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

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