Administrator instructions
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Before listing an article for deletion here, consider whether a more efficient alternative is appropriate:
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- Click here to refresh this page
Articles for deletion (AfD) is where Wikipedians discuss whether an article should be deleted. Articles listed are debated for at least seven days, after which the deletion process proceeds based on community consensus. Then the page may be kept, merged or redirected, transwikied (copied to another Wikimedia project), renamed/moved to another title, userfied to a user subpage, or deleted per the deletion policy.
This page explains what you should consider before nominating, the steps for nominating, and how to discuss an AfD. It also links to the lists of current debates, and two companion processes to AfD: Wikipedia:Speedy deletion has a clearly-defined set of criteria such as vandalism and patent nonsense, whereas Wikipedia:Proposed deletion is used to suggest deletions that no editor would contest.
If you want to nominate an article, the Wikipedia deletion policy explains the criteria for deletion, and may help you understand when an article should be nominated for deletion. The guide to deletion explains the deletion process. If an article meets the criteria for deletion and you understand the process, consult the instructions below. If you are unsure whether a page should be nominated for deletion, or if you need more help, try this talk page or Wikipedia's help desk.
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Before nominating an article for deletion
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- Read and understand the Wikipedia deletion policy (WP:DEL), which explains valid grounds for deletion. If the page can be improved, this should be solved through regular editing.
- Read the article and review its history to properly understand its topic. Some articles may have been harmed by vandalism or poor editing. Stubs and imperfect articles are awaiting further development, and so the potential of the topic should be considered.
- If the article is not already tagged to note an existing problem, consider applying a tag, such as {{notability}}, {{hoax}}, {{original research}}, {{unencyclopedic}}, or {{advert}}; this ensures readers are aware of the problem and may act to remedy it.
- Consider turning the page into a useful redirect or proposing it be merged. Uncontested mergers do not require an AfD.
- Check the "What links here" in the article's sidebar, to see how the page is used and referenced within Wikipedia.
- Check any interlanguage links, also in the sidebar, which may provide additional material for translation.
- Read the article's talk page, which may provide reasons why the article should or should not be deleted; if there was a previous nomination, check that your objections haven't already been dealt with.
- Familiarize yourself with the guidelines and policies on notability, reliable sources, and what Wikipedia is not. Related guidelines include WP:BIO, WP:COI, WP:CORP, WP:MUSIC, WP:WEB, and, for list articles, WP:CLN. For a list of policies and guidelines that can be useful in a deletion proposal, see Wikipedia:List of policies and guidelines to cite in deletion debates.
- When nominating due to sourcing or notability concerns, make a good-faith attempt to confirm that such sources don't exist.
- If the article was recently created, please consider that many good articles started their Wikilife in pretty bad shape. Unless it is obviously a hopeless case, consider sharing your reservations with the article creator, an associated WikiProject, or on the article's talk page, and/or adding a cleanup tag, instead of bringing the article to AfD. If the article can be fixed through normal editing, then it is not a good candidate for AfD.
- Confirm that the article does not meet the criteria for speedy deletion or proposed deletion.
- If you expect the AfD page will be edited by newcomers to Wikipedia (perhaps because the article is linked from some visible place outside Wikipedia), or if you notice this happening, you might want to insert the {{Not a ballot}} template into it.
- If you are not logged in, you won't be able to create the AfD discussion page. You could either log in, or sign up, request an account first, or request that a logged in user complete the nomination on the article talk page.
Articles being considered for possible deletion are indexed by the day on which they were first listed.
Add a new entry
Alternatively, if you are confident that deletion of the article would be uncontroversial, consider using {{subst:prod|reason for deletion}} instead (see Wikipedia:Proposed deletion). See the proposed deletion current nominations.
Administrator instructions
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How to list pages for deletion
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This section describes how to list for deletion articles and their associated talk pages. See the related pages for templates, categories, redirects, stub types, pages in the Wikipedia namespace, user pages, or images and other media, or use copyright violation where applicable. As well, note that deletion may not be needed for problems such as pages written in foreign languages, duplicate pages, and other cases.
Autoconfirmed registered users can use the Twinkle tool for nominating articles for deletion.
Note: Users must be logged in to complete steps II and III. An unregistered user who wishes to nominate a page for deletion should complete step I, note his or her reason on the article talk page, and then post a message at Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion asking for a registered user to complete the nomination.
- You must sign in to list pages for deletion. If you do not sign-in or edit anonymous, you cannot complete either process.
- To list multiple related pages for deletion, see this page.
- To list a single article for deletion, follow this three-step process:
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Put the deletion tag on the article.
- Insert
{{subst:afd1}} at the top of the article.
- If nominated before, use
{{subst:afdx|2nd}} or {{subst:afdx|3rd}} etc.
- Do not mark the edit as minor.
- Include in the edit summary
AfD: Nominated for deletion; see [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/NominationName]]
Replace NominationName with the name of the page as it was nominated.
- The NominationName is normally the article name (
PageName). But if it has been nominated before, use "PageName (2nd nomination)" or "PageName (3rd nomination)" etc.)
- You can check the "Watch this page" box to follow the page in your watchlist. This allows you to notice if the AfD tag is removed.
- Save the page.
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| II. |
Create the article's deletion discussion page.
The resulting AfD box at the top of the article should contain a link to "Preloaded debate" in the AfD page.
- Click that link to open the article's deletion discussion page. Some text and instructions will appear.
- Give a reason for the deletion and a category for the debate (instructions are on that page).
OR
- Click the link saying "this article's entry" to open the deletion-debate page.
- Insert this text:
{{subst:afd2 | pg=PageName | cat=Category | text=Why the page should be deleted}} ~~~~
Replace PageName with the name of the page, Category with a letter from the list M, O, B, S, W, G, T, F, and P to categorize the debate, and Reason... with the reasons the page should be deleted.
- Add a deletion sorting template to the nomination, if appropriate.
- You can check "Watch this page" to follow the debate.
- Use an edit summary such as
Creating deletion discussion for [[PageName]]
- Save the page.
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| III. |
Notify users who monitor AfD discussion.
- Open the articles for deletion log page.
- At the top of the list on the log page (there's a comment indicating the spot), insert:
{{subst:afd3 | pg=NominationName}}
replacing NominationName appropriately (use "PageName", "PageName (2nd nomination)", etc.).
- Link to the discussion page in your edit summary:
Adding [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/NominationName]]
- Save the page. Your insertion will be expanded to the same form as the preceding lines in the file:
{{Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/NominationName}}.
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Notifying interested people
While it is sufficient to list an article for discussion at AfD, nominators and others sometimes want to attract more attention from and participation by informed editors. Keep in mind that all such efforts must comply with Wikipedia's guideline against biased canvassing.
To encourage participation by less experienced editors you should avoid Wikipedia-specific abbreviations in the messages you leave about the discussion, link to any relevant policies or guidelines, and link to the AfD discussion page itself. If you are recommending that an article be speedily deleted, please give the criterion that it meets, such as "A7" or "biography not asserting importance". Unless it is obvious from the page's title, the nomination should also indicate what the nominated article is about (e.g., "Broda Otto Barnes, a physician that developed a now-discredited idea about thyroid function").
- Deletion sorting
Once listed, deletion discussions can, optionally, also be transcluded into an appropriate deletion sorting category, such as the ones for actors, music, academics, or for specific countries. Since many people watch deletion sorting pages for subject areas that particularly interest them, including your recent AfD listing on one of these pages helps attract people familiar with a particular topic area. Please see the the complete list of categories.
- Notifying WikiProjects that support the page
Many projects have subscribed to Wikipedia's article alerts service, a fully automated program that keeps track of AfD discussions for subscribed projects. Projects that have not subscribed may welcome a brief, neutral note on their project's talk page about the AfD.
- Notifying substantial contributors to the article
While not required, it is generally considered courteous to notify the good-faith creator and any main contributors of the articles that you are nominating for deletion. Do not notify bot accounts, people who have made only insignificant 'minor' edits, or people who have never edited the article. To find the main contributors, look in the page history or talk page of the article and/or use Duesentrieb's ActiveUsers tool or Wikipedia Page History Statistics. For your convenience, you may use these neutrally worded notification templates:
- For creators who are totally new users:
{{subst:AFDWarningNew|Article title}} ~~~~
- For creators:
{{subst:AFDWarning|Article title}} ~~~~
- For contributors or established users:
{{subst:Adw|Article title}} ~~~~
- For an article you did not nominate:
{{subst:AFDNote|Article title}} ~~~~
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How to list multiple related pages for deletion
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Sometimes you will find a number of related articles, all of which you feel should be deleted together. To make it easier for those participating in the discussion, it may be helpful to bundle all of them together into a single nomination. However, for group nominations it is often a good idea to only list one article at afd and see how it goes, before listing an entire group.
Examples of when articles may be bundled into a single nomination:
- A group of articles with identical content but with slightly different titles.
- A group of hoax articles by the same editor.
- A group of spam articles by the same editor.
- A series of articles on nearly identical manufactured products.
If any of the articles you are considering for bundling could stand on its own merits, then it should be nominated separately. Or to put it more succinctly, if you are unsure of whether to bundle an article or not, do not.
For the sake of clarity, debates should be bundled only at the start or near the start of the debate, before most of the discussion.
To bundle articles for deletion, follow these steps:
| I. |
Nominate the first article for deletion.
Follow the steps as outlined above.
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| II. |
Nominate the remaining articles.
On each of the remaining articles, at the top insert the following:
- {{subst:afd1|PageName}}
Replace PageName with the name of the first page to be deleted, not the current page name. In other words, if Some article was the first article you nominated, replace PageName with Some article. As before, please include the phrase "AfD: Nominated for deletion; see [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/PageName]]" in the edit summary (again replacing PageName with the first page to be deleted), and do not mark the edit as minor. Save the page. Repeat for all articles to be bundled.
(If the article has been nominated before, use {{subst:afdx}} instead of {{subst:afd1}}, and replace "PageName" with the name of the page plus a note like "(second nomination)" for a second nomination, etc. See Template talk:Afdx for details.)
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| III. |
Add the remaining articles to the nomination.
Go to the first article's deletion discussion page,
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/PageName, and add a note
under your original nomination listing all related pages, for example:
I am also nominating the following related pages because [insert reason here]:
:{{la|related article 1}}
:{{la|related article 2}}
In the edit summary, note that you are bundling related articles for deletion.
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Use this template:
Alternatively, you can use Twinkle (TW) to do the same thing, plus a bunch of other things, such as reverting and reporting vandalism and mark articles and templates for speedy deletion. For more information, see Wikipedia:Twinkle/doc.
- Users participating in AfD discussions are expected to be familiar with the policy of civility and the guidelines Wikietiquette and "do not bite the newbies".
- This also applies to the other deletion pages.
- AfDs are public, and are sometimes quoted in the popular press.[1][2] Please keep to public-facing levels of civility, just as you should for any edit you make to Wikipedia.
- Avoid personal attacks against people who disagree with you; avoid the use of sarcastic language and stay cool.
- Do not make unsourced negative comments about living people. These may be removed by any editor.
- Remember that while AfD may look like a voting process, it does not operate like one. Justification and evidence for a response carries far more weight than the response itself. Thus, you should not attempt to structure the AfD process like a vote:
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- Do not add tally boxes to the deletion page.
- Do not reorder comments on the deletion page to group them by keep/delete/other. Such reordering can disrupt the flow of discussion, polarize an issue, and emphasize vote count or word count.
- Do not message editors about AfD nominations because they support your view on the topic. This can be seen as votestacking. See Wikipedia:Canvassing for guidelines. But if you are proposing deletion of an article, you can send a friendly notice to those who contributed significantly to it and therefore might disagree with you.
- If a number of similar articles are to be nominated, it is best to make this a group nomination so that they can be considered collectively. This avoids excessive repetition which would otherwise tend to overload involved editors. However, group nominations that are too large or too loosely related may be split up or speedy-closed.
- While there is no prohibition against moving an article while an AfD discussion is in progress, editors considering doing so should realize such a move can confuse the discussion greatly, can preempt a closing decision, and can make the discussion difficult to track.
AfDs are a place for rational discussion of whether an article is able to meet Wikipedia’s article guidelines and policies. Reasonable editors will often disagree, but valid arguments will be given more weight than unsupported statements. When an editor offers arguments or evidence that do not explain how the article meets/violates policy, they may only need a reminder to engage in constructive, on-topic discussion. But a pattern of groundless opinion, proof by assertion, and ignoring content guidelines may become disruptive. If a pattern of disruptive behavior persists after efforts are made to correct the situation through dialogue, please consider a dispute resolution process outside the current AfD.
There are a few basic practices that most Wikipedians use in AfD discussions:
- Usually editors recommend a course of action in bold text, e. g., "Keep" or "Delete".
- Start your comments or recommendations on a new bulleted line (that is, starting with
*), and sign them by adding ~~~~ to the end. If you are responding to another editor, put your comment directly below theirs, making sure it is indented (using multiple *s).
- Please disclose whether you are an article's primary author or if you otherwise have a vested interest in the article.
- Please have a look at the article before making a recommendation. Do not base your recommendation solely on the information supplied by the nominator. To understand the situation, it may also help to look at the history of the article. Also, please read the earlier comments and recommendations. They may contain relevant arguments and further useful information.
The following are practices that should be avoided:
- The debate is not a vote; please make recommendations on the course of action to be taken, sustained by arguments.
- When making your case or responding to others, explain how the article meets/violates policy rather than merely stating that it meets/violates the policy.
- Do not use multiple accounts to reinforce your opinions. Multiple recommendations by users shown to be using "sock puppets" (multiple accounts belonging to the same person) will be discounted and the user manipulating consensus with multiple accounts will likely be blocked indefinitely.
- Do not make conflicting recommendations; if you change your mind, modify your original recommendation rather than adding a new one. The recommended way of doing this is to use strike-through by enclosing a retracted statement between
<s> and </s> after *, as in "* Delete Speedy keep".
- Unregistered or new users are welcome to contribute to the discussion, but their recommendations may be discounted, especially if they seem to be made in bad faith (for example, if they misrepresent their reasons).
There are many good ways to advocate keeping, deleting, or even redirecting an article. This includes:
- Arguments commonly used to recommend deletion are: "unverifiable" (violates WP:V), "original research" (violates WP:NOR), and "non-notable" in cases where the subject does not meet their respective notability criteria. (In the cases of non-notable biographical articles, it is better to say "does not meet WP:BIO" to avoid insulting the subject.) The accusation "VANITY" should be avoided,[3] and is not in itself a reason for deletion. The argument "non-neutral point of view" (violates WP:NPOV) is often used, but often such articles can be salvaged, so this is not a very strong reason for deletion either.
- If you wish for an article to be kept, you can directly improve the article to address the reasons for deletion given in the nomination. You can search out reliable sources, and defuse the deletion arguments given using policy, guidelines, and examples from our good and featured articles. In certain cases, if you believe the article topic is valid and encyclopedic, and it lacks only references and other minor changes to survive, you may request help in the task by adding a {{rescue}} tag below the AfD template, in accordance with info given at WP:RESCUE. Please do not do this for articles which are likely to be eventually deleted on grounds other than simple incompleteness or poor writing (see WP:SNOW).
If the reasons given in the deletion nomination are later addressed by editing, the nomination should be withdrawn by the nominator, and the deletion discussion will be closed by an admin. If the nominator fails to do it when you think it should have been done (people can be busy, so WP:AGF on this point), leave a note on the nominator's talk page to draw their attention.
- If you think the article should be a disambiguation page, or a redirect to another article, then recommend "Disambiguation" or "Redirect". Do not recommend deletion in such cases, because deleted pages cannot be redirects or disambiguation pages.
You do not have to make a recommendation on every nomination; consider not participating if:
- A nomination involves a topic with which you are unfamiliar.
- You agree with the consensus that has already been formed.
Please also see Wikipedia:Notability.
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What to do after an AfD discussion has passed with a confirmation
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Nothing. If the discussion has been listed according to the rules above, at the end of the discussion period (seven days), it should be closed within a few more days at most. Asking for someone to close the discussion is unnecessary.
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How an AfD discussion is closed
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After seven days have passed, the discussion is moved to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Old, and an uninvolved (i.e. one who has not participated in the deletion discussion) admin or editor in good standing (observing the recommendations for non-admin closure) will assess the discussion and make a decision to Keep, Delete, Merge, Redirect, or Transwiki the article based on a judgment of the consensus of the discussion. If there has been no obvious consensus to change the status of the article, the person closing the AfD will state No consensus, and the article will be kept. If not enough people have joined in the discussion to judge consensus, the article will be relisted for several more days.
The majority of AfD discussions are expected to run for at least seven days. In some cases a closure earlier than seven days may take place if a reason given in either Wikipedia:Speedy keep or Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion applies. If there is some concern over the validity of the closure, questions may first be asked of the person who closed the AfD, and, failing satisfaction there, raised at Wikipedia:Deletion review.
Usage: To search for the word battleships in the full text, just enter:
- battleships
to limit search to only title of the page, enter search term preceded with intitle; example: to search for battleships in the title, enter:
- intitle:battleships
to search for navy in the full text, but battleships specifically in the title, enter:
- navy intitle:battleships
Please DO NOT try to update these pages or start a new day yourself. (Note: These pages are not the deletion log pages referred to in step 3 of the instructions, above).
Purge server cache for today's AFD page
