[WikiEN-l] Re: Afd "votes" with no real reasons given

Thu Sep 15 13:00:03 UTC 2005

It frosts me when people on EITHER side make short, curt, dismissive comments 
in AfD that consist simply of a vote and a _generic_ remark, like "Delete, nn 
website," or "Delete, [whatever]cruft," or "Keep, all [whatever] are 
inherently notable," or "KEEP! Of course. Why would anyone want to delete 
this?"

It's lazy, it's polarizing, and it tends to push AfD in the direction of 
being a vote (bad) rather than consensus-building discussion (good).

(Equally bad are appeals to _fictitious_ precedents or vague assertions that 
imply that concensus has been reached in areas where they have not).

People unwilling to take a few minutes to look seriously at an article and 
make a real, open-minded assessment of _that particular article,_ have 
nothing useful to contribute to the discussion and should refrain from 
posting.

To cast votes based on one's like or dislike for _a particular topic area_ is 
unhelpful. 

And the accumulation of initialisms and jargon doesn't help either. For gosh 
sakes... if someone can't spare the 3.5 seconds it takes to type out the word 
"non-notable" in full, I have to question whether they've got enough time to 
do a thoughtful assessment of the article.

Personally, I comment in about one in five of the AfD discussions that I read 
through. If I were a better person than I am, it would be more like one in 
twenty. If I don't have something to say that is useful in forming a group 
opinion, I don't say it. (Well... actually... you know... I often do, anyway. 
But I SHOULDN'T).