User talk:Dahliarose/Archive 3 - 2012 January-March

Talkback

Hello, Dahliarose. You have new messages at Guerillero's talk page.
Message added 19:03, 17 January 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

--Guerillero | My Talk 04:45, 18 January 2012 (UTC) --Guerillero | My Talk 01:21, 20 January 2012 (UTC) --Guerillero | My Talk 14:59, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

School AfDs

G'day. If you've got a moment, can we try to figure out a way to work out the issue with St. Bede's? Can we talk offline somewhere? ˜danjel [ talk | contribs ] 11:13, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Bad faith accusation

Your recent edit at the Village pump displays an astonishing high level of lack of good faith in other editors behaviour. It is frankly unacceptable. You have no idea what other editors did or did not do before they voted and you should recognise that and strike your comment as soon as possible. Fmph (talk) 11:13, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

I know that in this case content was added to this particular article by another editor *after* the initial votes were cast. The early votes were based on an earlier version of the article. I can't prove that editors did or did not check for sources but there seem to be a lot of people who are weakly voting for schools to be deleted simply because they are primary/middle/elementary schools regardless of their history. This particular school was founded in 1725 when there was no such concept as a middle school, and it has only been a middle school for a short part of its existence. Sources therefore had to be searched under different names. Dahliarose (talk) 11:39, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

Then strike the accusation that they didn't read the article or check for sources. The rest I don't have a problem with. To strike a part of a post just edit the page again and place <s> at the start of the part you want to strike and </s> at the end and it comes out like this. Fmph (talk) 12:26, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. Fmph (talk) 13:31, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

Edgeborough School/Franham

I have reverted your restore of the unreferenced information for Edgeborough School. Would you prefer I nominated it for AfD? You have objected to that as well. The article has been tagged for over 6 months and you have failed to improve it in that time. Is that because it wasn't on your watch list? If so, then how on earth did you manage to notice that I had performed the merge? Dont tell me that you have been acting as an unelected wiki-policeman, traipsing through my edit history (am I the only one you inflict such behaviour on?) looking for stuff to revert? The correct procedure would be for you to supplement my merge, with whatever extra information you felt should also have been merged. If this is repeated I will take you to ANI. What info do you think I left out when I performed the merge? Fmph (talk) 06:49, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

If an article has been tagged for a merge the usual procedure is to merge the conent and then do the redirect. You redirected the article but did not merge any of the content which is why I restored the article. The school has at least three notable alumni. I will refer it to WP:Schools to see if anyone else wishes to comment. As you will have seen from my comments on the various boards I am concerned at the current campaign to delete all primary/elementary/middle schools regardless of their notability. The scale of the nominations has meant that it has been difficult to keep up with all the nominations. I am now trying to establish which English schools have been caught up in the mess. I have not had time to do much editing on Wikipedia in the last year or so. Dahliarose (talk) 09:41, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Notability is not inherited. Please stop referring to my editing as a campaign. This is an entirely legitimate edit. If it is not, then report me to ANI. But it is not up to you to patrol my edits reverting those you disagree with. Please stop now. If and when you have produced a well sourced, well written article for Edgeborough School, which establishes the notability of the institution, I will be the first to welcome it back. Meantime, butt out. Fmph (talk) 10:03, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

I've restored the article and started a discussion on the article's talk page. The school is in an historic building and there are plenty of sources to suggest that it merits its own article. I'm not talking about your editing in particular but the recent campaign of school AfDs. Dahliarose (talk) 10:09, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

There you go again. Not me in particular. Just me as part of a campaign. THERE IS NO CAMPAIGN! You are smearing my conduct on the project, and you are so blind to your own POV, you don't even notice. There are not plenty of sources to suggest it merits i's own article. If there were, surely you would just cite them and be done with it. Fmph (talk) 10:57, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Fmph, if you want an article merged - nothing wrong with being bold, but after someone has raised objections in good faith there should be a discussion on the issue. I see no real evidence to support most of the allegations you have made against Dahilarose; the conduct of all parties is examined when something is brought to ANI, and I will not hesitate to do so if it is. Objecting to someone's actions is not a "bad faith accusation", doing something with good intentions and doing good are different things. As for the claim of a campaign, the unusually large number of school articles that have been at AfD during Christmas and since might be called a "campaign" - that is neither a statement that it is being done in good faith nor bad faith. CT Cooper · talk 14:09, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm afraid that the suggestion that this article could be or is part of a campaign is a bad faith accusation. But enough of that. How did Dahlia come across my initial edit? There is no trace in her edit history of editing either the school article or the destination of the merge. So how then did it come to her attention them? please can someone make a decent suggestion that will bring back my good faith? By way of the random article link perhaps? Or is it, as I suspect, that she has turned herself into a one person wiki-school-rescue-police force and is patrolling the edits of those she suspects may be 'guilty' of crimes against school articles? Or do you have a more plausible explanation?Fmph (talk) 22:04, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

If saying someone is part of a campaign is now a statement of bad faith, regardless of motive, the dictionary definition of the word, and the well cited AAGF essay, then clearly the statement that she is "one person wiki-school-rescue-police force and is patrolling the edits of those she suspects may be 'guilty' of crimes against school articles" also a statement of bad faith. Dahliarose has been a contributor to school articles for over five years, and while she is human like the rest of is, she has always been here to improve the encyclopedia, and I think she has handeled herself well given the less than civil commentary about her actions recently. I think I need to inform you that you do not own the Edgeborough School article, and you are not in a position to tell Dahliarose, me, or anyone else to "butt out". If someone else sees some action taken that they have good reason to object to, they have the liberty of responding and asking for discussion. That may slow things down, but this is a collbarative project, and that is the way it is. CT Cooper · talk 23:56, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree entirely that my GF supply has been exhausted by this latest jaunt from Dahlia. That was my point. Can you replenish that supply by suggesting an alternative explanation for how she came across my edits to the Edgeborough School article. I would be delighted to be able believe that her actions were done in good faith. I agree that this is a collaborative project, but appointing oneself as the authority for what is a good or bad edit, and patrolling other editors contributions, is the epitome of uncollaborative behaviour. I have never suggested that I own the Edgeborough article although I have as yet to see any referenced improvement to the article concerning the school (the actual subject of the article). What the current references show is that various people have had occasional fleeting interactions with the building, some by purchasing it, some delivering services there, and some by attending school there. What we haven't seen is even one reference which provides significant coverage of the school in independent reliable sources. Why is that do you think?

But we will disagree all night over this article. Thats allowed. I have no problem with that. Nor with an WP:AfD which goes against my view. I do have a real problem with Dahlia thinking she can patrol other editors contributions. Don't you? Fmph (talk) 10:29, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

No I don't. If she was reverting every edit you made you may have a case against her, but otherwise she is free to contribute to what articles she wishes to. Examples of ownership behaviour include "An editor comments on other editors' talk pages with the purpose of discouraging them from making additional contributions." I think that is a fair summary of this thread. If you are unable to assume good faith in Dahliarose's actions, so be it. She is trying to improve the article; if the article is kept, then that is good for the encyclopedia, if it isn't, there is more content to merge to another page. Either way, the encyclopedia wins. CT Cooper · talk 11:05, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

So let's be crystal clear here. Can you offer an alternative explanation for how Dahlia happened across my edit to the Edgeborough School article, other than the bad faith one which I have suggested above? Because I would like to have my general good faith view of other editors contributions restored with regard to Dahlia. I am very open to realistic suggestions if you have any.

Lets also be clear that I am certainly not trying to intimidate Dahlia to not contribute to the project. Au contraire, I think she makes useful contributions in many cases and I would like to see those continue. I would just like her to stop making unevidenced assertions against her fellow collaborators on the project on talk pages. I don't believe that is an unreasonable request. Fmph (talk) 11:30, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I've now added sources to the article. Sources can invariably be found for English prep schools housed in buildings over 100 years old. There have been an unprecedented number of school AfDs from mid-December onwards from people who mistakenly believe that all primary schools are non-notable. I'm merely trying to ensure that notable schools do not get caught up in this process and am trying to restore articles that have been deleted after having got swept up in the frenzy. Dahliarose (talk) 14:15, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

I for one do not believe that all primary schools are non-notable. I don't believe that many, if any, editors here believe that either. What I do believe is that primary schools are inherently non-notable and that is not a mistake. That is supported WP:CONSENSUS. And anyone suggesting otherwise, or suggesting that editors who also believe that are somehow mistaken, is probably being disruptive. Fmph (talk) 10:34, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

"Inherent notability" means that all articles on a particular topic are considered notable, so "inherent non-notability" logically means that all articles on a particular topic are non-notable. At least some primary schools are clearly notable, so this concept of "inherent non-notability" is clearly false and does not have consensus. If the term is re-defined to mean that one assumes that the topic is non-notable, but is open to evidence which suggests otherwise, then that can be applied to most topics on this project making the term pretty meaningless really. CT Cooper · talk 11:05, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately you're wrong in this instance. The use of the word 'inherent' doesn't mean something is notable. It means it's likely to be notable, but it leaves open the option that through it may not be for reasons unseen just now. I don't see it as meaningless, but you are entitled to hold that opinion.Fmph (talk) 11:35, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Fmph. I do not understand your contradictory statement. Inherent simply means innate or inborn. If you use the term to apply to a class of articles like primary schools then it means that all schools in this class have that quality. There is no consensus that primary schools are inherently non-notable just as there is no consensus that high schools/secondary schools are inherently notable. I see no point in continuing this discussion or responding to your bad faith accusations above. I will say no more on the matter. Dahliarose (talk) 12:26, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I think that definition is far from universally shared. The by far number one objection to inherent notability I have seen is along the lines of that even if 99% of articles on the topic are notable, the fact that 1% aren't mean that such a concept is inappropriate. This can be reversed for criticism of inherent non-notability. If you describe inherent notability and inherent non-notability, as a rebuttable presumption, then such a view would likely be more acceptable. However, I think better terminology in such cases is "presumed notable" or presumed non-notable", so there is no confusion. CT Cooper · talk 12:30, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I think inherent literally means 100% entitlement. If you believe a class of articles is inherently notable then they all by definition have a right to notability, and logically the reverse also applies. There probably isn't a single class of articles on Wikipedia that is guaranteed notability or non-notability come to that. There are grey areas even with place names. Should tiny hamlets or ancient manors that are now just a farm be automatically entitled to an article? I agree that presumption is a better word to use than inherent. Dahliarose (talk) 12:40, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

If you would prefer to use an alternate wording, please do so with my blessing. At least we all now understand what we mean when we say inherent/presumed non-notabilty. Fmph (talk) 12:49, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Policing other editors contributions

I have notified you above that it is unacceptable for you to traipse through the contribution history of editors you disagree with reverting article merges which you disagree with. You have now done this three times that I am aware of:

• On Edgeborough School you reverted my merge to Farnham
• On Loreto Secondary School Kilkenny, Kilkenny you reverted Guerillero (talk · contribs)'s merge to Kilkenny
• On Tredington Community Primary School you reverted Bob Re-born (talk · contribs)'s merge to Tredington

With each of us, you had interacted negatively (it takes 2 to tango) in the preceding weeks. You had no previous edit history with any of those 6 articles. It seems to me that this is conclusive proof beyond WP:AGF that you have been policing other editors contributions. This is extremely disruptive behaviour. You have not been appointed to such a role. It is extremely un-collegiate, and demonstrates an appalling lack of good faith in your fellow editors contributions. It needs to stop and you need to confirm that you will not behave like this anymore. Otherwise I'm afraid I will have to take it to the wider community. Fmph (talk) 16:58, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't understand your problem. It seems to me that you are patrolling my edits and taking issue with any of my actions that you disagree with. I've interacted quite amicably with Guerillo and he kindly agreed to restore an article under a redirect that he had mistakenly deleted. I've had no contact with the other editor until today which has been quite amicable. I have been an active member of WP Schools for many years and it is only natural that I should be concerned about all of the project's articles on primary schools that seem to have been deleted or redirected over the last few months. I monitor huge numbers of school articles, and have a particular interest in Gloucestershire schools and did all the initial assessments for these schools. If I notice articles disappearing from navboxes and lists I don't see why it should be a problem if I choose to investigate them. It seems to be the same few editors who are making all these changes. Edgeborough and Tredington were both proposed merges, but in both cases the pages were redirected without merging the content (Edgeborough as you know had a number of notable alumni). I thought we agreed that secondary schools are presumed to be notable so why should it be a problem if I restore an article that was presumably redirected in error? That is the end of this discussion as far as I am concerned. Dahliarose (talk) 18:57, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

If you don't understand my problem, then perhaps you need to consider this. Doing this will cause you problems. Thats it for now.

I dispute that the Edgeborough content was not merged. Given that I did the merge, perhaps you could show me what I missed. So this is what the Edgeborough school article looked like when I did the merge and this is what I moved over to the Farnham article. So what extra would you have moved and why? Can you explain that to me? Because I think you have a rather an unusual understanding of what a merge actually is. And it may be helpful to both of us to understand which (if either) of us is correct. Fmph (talk) 20:32, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

The school had four notable alumni and these should have been merged into the Farnham article too, though the fact that a stub article already has four notable alumni is usually an indicator of the notability of the school which is why I thought the article deserved further investigation. Dahliarose (talk) 20:58, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Help spread the WikiLove

	Happy Valentine's Day
	All the best for one of Wikipedia's best! (Feel free to send this to your other Valentines) --DThomsen8 (talk) 19:03, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Edgeborough School

You did very good work on Edgeborough School, but perhaps not quite enough. I have saved the article as it stands now on my hard drive, so I can use it to add to Farnham. There is the possibility of recasting it as Frensham Place, emphasizing the building with the history rather than the current use as a school. --DThomsen8 (talk) 19:17, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Now that is a great idea, given that none of the current references actually refer to the school itself. Fmph (talk) 20:33, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Thank you Dthomsen for the Valentine best wishes. It is very much appreciated. Thanks for saving the article on your hard drive. I suspect that won't be necessary as at the least it should close as no consensus defaulting to a keep. The delete votes are very weak in any case. School articles are not normally deleted but are redirected though I've never quite understood why. If you're going to keep an article under a redirect you might as well retain the article. Dahliarose (talk) 20:58, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

U.S. High Schools and their equivalent secondary schools are always kept. Primary schools are usually deleted when challenged. Other schools are sometimes kept, as perhaps this one will be. This one was placed on the ARS list, so it had a much better chance of being kept. --DThomsen8 (talk) 22:02, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

There's been some discussion about redirects at the school's project (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Schools#Recent_Afds). In the past my understanding was that the normal practice with primary schools was to redirect them, but much depends on who is around to cast votes at AfD. If a redirect is suggested and enough people agree then it's not normally a problem. I managed to get this article restored under the redirect after appealing to the admin. I want to restore this article when I have the time as it also got mixed up in the mass school AfDs. Most of the votes were cast before I'd located sources. I'd never heard of ARS before but it was a very pleasant surprise to have your intervention. You are all doing a brilliant job. It makes such a change to have some voices of reason in these AfD discussions as there currently seem to be a lot of people voting to delete or keep simply on the basis of schools being high schools or elementary/primary schools rather than voting on the sourcing and actually trying to root out the appropriate references. Dahliarose (talk) 22:32, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

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Edgeborough School - again

So why did you add Edgeborough to the state secondary schools in {{Schools in Surrey}}? It's neither a state school nor a secondary. Fmph (talk) 18:42, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Sorry about that. It was a mistake. I thought I'd put it in the independent schools. I've now corrected it. Dahliarose (talk) 18:46, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Editor's Barnstar
	I award Dahliarose this barnstar for outstanding contributions to the Edgeborough School article while under significant personal pressure. Keep up the good work! CT Cooper · talk 00:18, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Two things on the side note, firstly I would recommend archiving your talk page at some point as it is getting rather long. Secondly, the AfD did not ultimately resolve the possibility of a merge. I think it would be difficult to argue for one now given the amount of sourced content, but the merge tag should not remain up there for ever. CT Cooper · talk 00:21, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Many thanks for the barnstar. I was rather pleased with the way the article turned out. It's fascinating what can be discovered with a little effort. A merge with Farnham does seem somewhat inappropriate especially as the school started out in Guildford, and there is really too much material to be merged easily. I'll leave it to others to remove the merge tag if they see fit, though there's no linked discussion on the takl page and I believe if that is the case then the tag can just be removed. Thanks for the advice about archiving my talk page. I need to work out how to do it! Dahliarose (talk) 11:24, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Follow-up

The short version, of my follow-up.

1. What would you think of the idea of providing better clarity for schools AfDs, by developing a guideline for notability/schools? I think that would be a great idea -- whatever it would say. Better clarity is a good thing, and I care far more here about clarity and streamlining than whether it says schools through grade 10, for example, should be treated the same as lower or higher schools.

2. What about encouraging, somehow, the snow closing of school AfDs?

3. What about, at each page which is a target page for schools, developing the practice for schools that are presumptively non-notable but for which there is no article of ... instead of leaving the current black-links as-is ... changing all to redirects (where not article currently exists)?

Just some musings. Best.--Epeefleche (talk) 23:59, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

This is a subject for the WPSchools project not for an individual's talk page. There have been numerous attempts to establish notability guidelines for schools and the efforts are summarised at Wikipedia:Schools. There are also guidelines on the content of school articles at Wikipedia:WikiProject Schools/Article guidelines. As you will see, the school guidelines suggest that non-notable schools should be merged with the locality article or, for the US, the school district article. Rather than Prodding school articles or nominating them for deletion it would be more helpful if you could propose mergers and then go back after a reasonable period, say six months, and perform the merge if there has been no objection. In that way the useful referenced content can be preserved in the main space rather than hidden away under a redirect. It would also help if you could actually read the articles before taking any actions. Any school that's been around for 100 years or more, regardless of type, is very likely going to have sufficient sources available to write an encyclopaedic article, as is any school with a reasonable number of notable alumni. Dahliarose (talk) 14:06, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

your comment at ANI

In a recent statement you said, "About 90% of [an editor's] school AfDs were for schools that probably should have been deleted anyway."  Your position is far away from community consensus, which in an analysis I did of 25 recent primary-school AfD nominations, only 8% resulted in deletions.  In most cases the outcome is redirect without deletion.  Editors that previously worked on articles that get such redirects can look in the edit history of the redirect and their record of contributions remains available on Wikipedia.  Unscintillating (talk) 02:32, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

(talk page stalker)I'm pretty sure that Dahliarose isn't suggesting that 90% of articles get "deleted", but, rather that their content is removed from their articles (whether that be through Merge, Redirect, etc.). ˜danjel [ talk | contribs ] 09:45, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Is this also happening at AfD discussions, that editors type in bold "delete", but to them it means something else?  Unscintillating (talk) 17:26, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

In AfD discussions people a delete vote means delete. If WPSchools editors participate in the AfD process then they usually vote redirect as that is standard practice for school articles. Dahliarose (talk) 01:21, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

You're quite right that the normal practice is that school articles that are not kept are normally redirected, though this does not seem to happen routinely. But redirecting an article is effectively the same as deleting it as I can't imagine that any new editor wanting to write an article about a school would realise that there was a pre-existing article hidden away under a redirect. I believe someone did analyse the recent spate of mass school AfDs and found that only about 50% got redirected and the rest got deleted. Even an article is that is deleted is still preserved, but only admins can access the deleted content and restore it. I always understood that the recommended procedure for non-notable schools was to merge the content into the locality article but this rarely happens unless an editor pro-actively goes ahead and merges the content as I did here Tredington, Gloucestershire. Dahliarose (talk) 09:57, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

And the ignorance of new editors justifies misusing a technical term at ANI?  If by "delete" you meant "delete, or delete and create a redirect, or redirect without deletion, or merge" then I think that you should not have said "delete".  From my viewpoint, your argument deeply undermined what I had been working for in the discussion, which at the time I thought we had a common viewpoint.  My recollection is that of the 25 AfDs I analyzed, 21 of the 25 were redirect without deletion.  Unscintillating (talk) 17:26, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry for the ambiguity. I hadn't intended to undermine anything you were saying, and I think we are both broadly in agreement. The survey I was thinking of was a different one to yours. The standard practice is indeedfor schools to be redirected and in this AfD frenzy that certainly wasn't being done, and some of the redirects that have been done have been a complete mess and have been sent to the wrong target. However, if an article does get deleted it is still possible to appeal to the administrator and ask for the delete to be changed to a redirect. I did this with one article for a notable school with quite a lengthy article that got deleted. The admin was able to restore the copy for me so that I could work on it again. If a merge is required it's best to be done boldly during the AfD process if it becomes clear that the subject doesn't merit a standalone article as I did with a school that I added to this page: Tredington, Gloucestershire. The redirects are another concern because I'm finding that some quite lengthy school articles are being redirected without any prior discussions on the talk page. Some of the ones that are being redirected have had a merge proposed and it seems to me to be completely out of order to blank an article in this way rather than merging the content. 22:22, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

And that seems to be the nub of the issue. You would quite happily move unsupported and unreferenced text from the source to the target, and seem to believe that anyone who doesn't do so is vandalising Wikipedia. Which they are not.Fmph (talk) 00:30, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Deleting usable content is counterproductive, discouraging to potential editors and is contrary to the whole spirit of Wikipedia and the Five pillars. Articles should strive for verifiable accuracy. No one would ever edit anything if they had to produce a citation for every single fact. That is what we expect of featured articles, not of stubs and start articles. Every article has to start somewhere. It's better to have some content to work with to expand an article than nothing at all. Dahliarose (talk) 01:18, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Deleting usable content ... is contrary to the whole spirit of Wikipedia and the Five pillars ? What? Which of the 5 pillars is it contrary to? Is it contrary to All articles must strive for verifiable accuracy: unreferenced material may be removed, so please provide references. for instance? Have I missed a new policy or guideline that says "Keep all the unreferenced drivel in the article itself until someone can be bothered to find a reference for it". The fact is that the content is in the history permanently, so anyone with an interest can find it, reference it, and add it - if relevant - to the target article. For instance, if a non-notable school is merged into a locality article, it wouldn't make sense to merge the heads name, or the number of pupils, or the house names, or the school colours. But it might make sense to merge content about, for instance, the sports facilities if those facilities were open to wider community use. It's not a matter of copy/pasting the entire source article into the target. Fmph (talk) 07:43, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Of course you would only merge the relevant encyclopaedic material and not the trivial stuff, but just because there is something that isn't referenced doesn't mean that it can be included as a local editor might be able to find the appropriate reference at a later date. The five pillars also state that "Wikipedia is free content that anyone can edit, use, modify, and distribute". You won't encourage everyone o edit if you insist on having every single sentence referenced in a new or developing article. Another pillar also states that "Wikipedia does not have firm rules". For many articles it is simply a matter of common sense. Dahliarose (talk) 10:16, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Actually, encouraging new editors to support their arguments/opinions and contributions by providing references is exactly the way to get them to understand that Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, not a collection of personal opinions. It's also an encyclopaedia that they can freely contribute to and re-use. But it also means citing [[WP:V|verifiable], authoritative sources. We have a concept of userspace, where editors can create just about anything within their own area, without any references and unverified, and then when they wish to move it into article space, they add references, verify the info, and then add it to article space. And there is no good reason not to do that. I just don't believe that allowing newbies to add anything they like to an article without references benefits anyone. It doesn't benefit wikipedia, because it maintains the prevailing view that WP is a collection of unverified nonsense. It doesn't benefit readers because it may well give them false information, and doesn't provide any level of confidence in the quality of the articles. It doesn't benefit the newbie cos they never learn to write good articles or improve existing ones. And it doesn't benefit you and I cos we spend time arguing over what is and what is not a good article. Look here's an offer: when I do a merge, if you want to add more content without references to the merge destination, then please do so. Just don't go around saying that I didn't merge properly, or that the article wasn't merged properly. Thats just an opinion (and a flawed one IMHO). Just say that you are adding extra information to the merge target. I won't go around reverting such additions, although I might add a few {{fact}} tags. Fmph (talk) 13:33, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

You encourage people by providing support and guidance, and demonstrating by example how things are done. If someone starts an article and it immediately gets tagged with labels because there are no references it will put them off. We don't want to include nonsense articles but if someone includes an interesting and useful fact about a subject without a reference then it's easy enough for another editor to see if an appropriate reference can be found. When writing about a subject you don't know about it's always more helpful to have some material to start with so that you can direct your searches accordingly. It was the redirect that I objected to on Edgeborough School. If an article has been tagged for merging then I really don't think it is appropriate to blank the page and redirect it. I've no objection to merges in principle and I think it's appropriate when an article is very short and the subject is not likely to be encyclopaedic. We seem to have different views on what constitutes encyclopaedic content. You take the view that all the content should be notable or out of the ordinary, whereas I take the view that notable means being noted in sources, which is how WP:N is defined. Not all the content of school articles is necessarily "important" but there are routine things that we normally include in all school articles as per Wikipedia:WikiProject Schools/Article guidelines. Perhaps we can reach an agreement whereby you only merge/redirect the short articles and the ones with trivial content. I know from experience that for nearly all the older schools and those with lots of notable alumni it is invariably possible to find sources to write an encyclopaedic article so if I revert a redirect on one of these perhaps you could leave it for now rather than going straight to AfD. The editorial work of writing content and finding refs is very time-consuming, but it can be an interesting challenge. Dahliarose (talk) 14:16, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Let's be very clear. You have an opinion about WP:N. It's not a fact. It's not accepted as true and valid by a wide section of the community who wouldn't accept that "... is how WP:N is defined.". It's just your opinion, an opinion shared by another section of the community. But that doesn't mean yours is right and mine is wrong, or vice-versa. It means we have different opinions. So please stop pretending you have an infinite wisdom in this area. You don't.

Let's move on to "If an article has been tagged for merging then I really don't think it is appropriate to blank the page and redirect it." Well, again, you are entitled to your opinion. But thats what happens in merges. Again we have different views. But yours is not the all powerful, over-ruling one. This is a collaborative community. You need to respect the views and opinions of others, even if you disagree with them.

And wrt "Perhaps we can reach an agreement whereby you only merge/redirect the short articles and the ones with trivial content", that would require us to reach agreement about what constitutes short articles with trivial content. For instance, I would suggest thats exactly what I did on Edgeborough School, but you took exception to it. Wouldn't you agree? Fmph (talk) 15:11, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

I acknowledged in my reply that we have differing opinions. I prefer the carrot approach you prefer the stick approach. We can simply agree to disagree. You also need to respect the views of other users. If someone reverts a redirect the polite response would be to discuss the matter on the talk page not immediately take the article to AfD. Although some of the content of the Edgeborough School article was trivial there were four notable alumni and the school was founded over 100 years ago, all of which, as I indicated earlier, are indicative that a standalone article is justified. You need to look at the potential of the article not just the existing content. Dahliarose (talk) 21:14, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Actually, rather than me taking it to the talk page, don't you think it would have been polite if you had taken the matter to talk before reverting my merge? Especially given that you left a bad faith judgement of my editing in the edit summary when doing so? Why is it me who must be polite? You don't think these rules apply to you, is that it? And please don't characterise my edits as 'the stick approach'. You are not the judge and jury. And as you are well aware notability is not inherited, so it doesn't matter how many alumni were on the original page, it didn't make the school any more notable. And their prep school was so notable for these 4, why is it still not mentioned on 2 or the articles? What you still fail to grasp is that I did look at the potential and came to a valid, but different viewpoint to yours. Don't you understand that? There was nothing wrong with my actions. They were just different to yours. You really need to grasp and acknowledge that point. Anything else is continued bad faith. Fmph (talk) 12:41, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

My understanding is that the usual process for a merge is that when an editor places such a tag on an article there should be a rationale on the talk page. This was not done in this case, and in fact it would have been quite in order for anyone to remove the merge tag as per Wikipedia:Tagging pages for problems. You took the initiative to redirect the article rather than merging it. To my mind adding half a sentence to the Frensham article is not a merge, but I understand that you think otherwise. I was acting in good faith. All I did was remove the redirect and start a discussion on the talk page, expecting that a polite discussion would ensue. Your actions in reverting my edits seemed antagonistic, especially as at no point had you provided the reasons for your decision to redirect on the talk page. I think we will have to agree to disagree on this. I see no point in continuing this discussion. Dahliarose (talk) 22:58, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

I'd be interested in looking at that analysis, whomever undertook it. I've commented on the issue at WT:WikiProject Schools/Archive 21#Secondary Concern: Redirects.2FMerges won.27t be fulfilled_properly and User talk:Kudpung/Archive Jan 2012#There.27s about a dozen.... ˜danjel [ talk | contribs ] 10:08, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately I can't now remember where I saw the figure. I thought it was on one of the school project talk pages. Dahliarose (talk) 10:11, 23 February 2012 (UTC)