attempt to create U-Con article on wikipedia

[netmouse]

Was just trying to help sorcycat get an intro to Wikipedia by creating a wikipedia article on U-Con. Someone quickly tagged it for speedy deletion as not having demonstrated the significance of the event. Please feel free to join the discussion arguing for the article's continuance.

Comments

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

There, that should be interesting.

[netmouse.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I just added an independent citation so hopefully that should carry it until she gets a chance to add more material.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

In more detail: the criteria cited for speedy deletion said that the article had not *claimed* (not demonstrated) the significance of the event. The article clearly *had* made such a claim.

So, acting as a proper and sensible editor, I deleted the speedy deletion tag, and explained why on the talk page.

[netmouse.livejournal.com]

If you look at the history, the article had not made the claim by the time the editor marked it for speedy deletion, but that was only 3 minutes after the article was created. The criteria for speedy deletion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:CSD) clearly states that administrators should try to give editors time to create their articles before tagging them for speedy deletion.

The deletion policy also recommends doing gentler nudges to improve an article before deleting it. Since the article was created by populating a link from the Gaming Conventions article that had pre-dated sorcycat's actions, it seems to be the editor should have recognized there was context for the article and given it time and/or guidance to accrue content.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

There's no link from the main gaming article any more, either (at least nothing shows up on "what links here"). And I can't find any "gaming conventions" article; not even any hits in the text search, in no mention in the role-playing gaming article. I wanted to see if that link had maybe been taken out by the same guy at about the same time.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

Never mind, found it.

Huh, sorcycat fixed the name of U-Con in that article just recently. This is looking stranger and stranger; not, apparently, a vendetta or any such, but on the other hand if he knew about that link, why the speedy deletion? Oh well, whatever.

[netmouse.livejournal.com]

um... sorcycat is the person who created the U-Con article, not the one who marked it for deletion.

[netmouse.livejournal.com]

To clarify, when I mentioned Sorcycat's actions, I meant her actions in changing the spelling of the U-Con listing in the gaming conventions list - it was already listed under Michigan before we got started, was my point, she just fixed the spelling and started an article.

[elaine-brennan.livejournal.com]

What seems to keep the "editors" at Wikipedia happy in these sorts of situations is finding an "outside" source that corroborates the existence of the con.

First-person accounts of "I was there" do not matter to Wikipedia -- they've got to have some mention of the event in a secondary source.

Remember, this is the organization that said that they wouldn't admit that Fred Saberhagen had died (despite multiple sf authors posting it on their blogs) until it had appeared in a secondary source.

And, yes, there does seem to be somebody who prefers to go after .orgs, and he's been doing this to lots of sff clubs and conventions.

[netmouse.livejournal.com]

The organization didn't say they wouldn't admit Fred Saberhagen had died. That was Quatloo, a single user. Other editors chimed in that he was wrong, and the wikipedia board later sent an apology email to scalzi. (And no, I can't list a citation for that. I know that from a personal conversation with Scalzi. :P )

The reference guidelines on reliable sources (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:RS) do permit the use of primary sources that are considered authorities on the content of the topic.

I think it's a Wikipedia backlash response, a cultural trend, rather than a single user, pushing for citations and references. The editor who marked the ConFusion article as needing references in May was different than this editor who marked the U-Con article for speedy deletion. This editor marks himself as a new article patroller. Based on comments in his user profile's talk history as well as the experience we just had, I think he's a bit overeager. Aggressive activity like that discourages otherwise earnest and willing people from contributing.

[tammylc.livejournal.com]

The funny thing is, the outside reference article cited is wrong - U-Con has started on Friday for much longer than 2005. It used to start Friday evening, and now runs all day on Friday, but I wouldn't have called it a two-day vs. three-day distinction.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, I fixed the text.

[tlatoani.livejournal.com]

(That was me. I had to delete my cookies to read the Michigan Journal article since I'd accessed them too many times and am not a registered member of the site.)

[thatguychuck.livejournal.com]

Another option if you use Firefox as a web browser is to block cookies from that specific website. Though I haven't done it for the Michigan Journal, I've done it on various other websites with great success.

[tlatoani.livejournal.com]

I added a citation to a Michigan Daily article from 1998. There's an earlier one too, but I haven't been able to find it.