[Wikipedia-l] Re: Deletions: cleaning up primary namespace

Tue Apr 9 02:03:35 UTC 2002

lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:

> I think I have a reasonable method of cleaning up many of
> the leftover pages in the main namespace that should be moved
> to wikipedia: or meta (most of which have already been moved,
> but still exist).  But before I do this I want to give the
> group some warning and ask if anyone has concerns.
>
> I think it's important to actually delete these for
> several reasons.  One, they distort our statistics; they
> make it appear as though we have more real articles than
> we do.  They show up in searches.  They also make the
> utilities of the new software like orphan pages less useful.
> Second, their existence is confusing to new users and might
> encourage the creation of more such articles in the wrong
> namespace.  Finally, having the articles in the right
> namespace should make it easier to update and consolidate
> them, as many of them are badly out of date.
>
> I'm looking at things like "Wikipedia commentary/*", most
> of which have been moved to meta but still hang around,
> and things like "Wikipedia Announcements", "Wikipedia FAQ",
> etc.
>
> But before I go about removing these and fixing links to
> them, I want to hear if anyone has reasons to keep some of
> them in the primary namespace, or other concerns.
> 0
> ------------=_1018292717-19285-0--

No, please do not delete such things as [[NPOV]] that is a redirect to 
[[wikipedia:Neutral point of view]]. Redirects do not skew our statistics 
because they are listed as so on the statistics page. They are also useful in 
that MANY links would be broken is they are gone -- besides I personally 
don't want to write [[wikipedia:Neutral point of view|NPOV]] each time I want 
to link to that article. 

However, there is much other material that should either be placed in the 
meta or behind a new namespace -- wikipedia commentary: or wikipedia forum: 
perhaps?

maveric149