Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Claus Peter Poppe

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Delete any unreferenced biographies. Dr. Blofeld has respectfully requested that these articles be deleted. Given the author request combined with the mandate to delete here, I'm closing this discussion. An admin, likely Juliancolton (possibly with help from others), will go through the list to ensure that any articles that have been improved since creation are not deleted. --MZMcBride (talk) 16:38, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Claus Peter Poppe

Claus Peter Poppe (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

From the discussion here, 2798 biographies (some BLPs, some BPDs) were created in the past few days by one editor in good faith. These politician bios were transwikied from the German Wikipedia using AWB. They are each sub-stubs which include only the same introductory sentence and no actual references. The reference section links to the original German article, some of which are not referenced. So, in addition to this article, this nomination also includes the other 2797 articles listed here.

If this listing was done incorrectly, I apologize. I'm not sure how to nominate this many articles at once, and tagging them seems implausible. But, considering the circumstances, I think notification to the author and Dr. Blofeld is sufficient.

Lara 06:45, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
]

I'm lost for words' - I can't believe this. These are notable biographies and should be expanded not deleted. Over half of them do not even violate BLP . This is really silly. I've expanded this nomintation and it is clearly notable and within guidelines this politician was one of the

List of members of the Lower Saxon Landtag 2003-2008 a representative of regional parliament and you honestly think sources can't be found??. God give us a few weeks to expand a few of them. I DO NOT waste my time and neither does Albert in that we create articles we believe could reasonably be expanded immediately by anybody. You are all the lazy ones by taking the easy way out and deleting articles which in due course will become perfectly accpetable and much needed encyclopedia articles. This is the kind of ignorance I've come to expect from the shitty community (meaning editors give each other little support when most of us all have a common goal) that runs this website and forces away the decent editors . A bot could EASILY salvage all of these articles by adding a reference linked to the main website of the parties and reliable publication and just sheer hard work to fill them out. These articles WILL be started again so I think we should not waste time and just work hard at expanding them. If people here really care about content in the long term they would certainly not think deleting articles which can become acceptable within minutes would be the right answer. Dr. Blofeld White cat 09:27, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
]

We do care about the long term - we appreciate that in the long term, these articles could be valuable additions to Wikipedia's coverage. In the short term, however (and unless you are a bot, I mean " the next six months") these are nothing more than one massive liability. I'm sure you and Albert can work on a few, but that's the problem - you can only do a few. If a few is what you can maintain, limit yourself to writing a few. Sheer hard work is being used to cut down the current BLP backlog, a backlog you've massively added to. With the size it is currently at it will be months before people get near your articles. If you have such a problem with the Wikipedia community then you can leave, and read
WP:STICK on the way out. Ironholds (talk) 09:37, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
]

Look I don't have a problem with everybody here. There some very kind and helpful editors on here who are a pleasure to know and discuss things with. It is just the way the general community responds and sees us in bad faith for trying to start the transfer of content that's all. I agree to a point that these articles will require a massive amount of work, what I hate about the general response given here is the snippy comments that we should somehow be heartily ashamed of outsevles for trying to start the prcess of transferring notable articles into English. I just think some of the responses to this have been quite mean. I differ from a lot of people in that I look towards our long term goals for wikipedia, I root out articles and believe there is a set task for every subject to work towards. The problem here may be that the task is a little big for us to take on at least within the next few months so if there are BLP issues then I se eyour views. I just wish more people would see why such articles are created and why we create small stubs because of the sheer amount to transfer. As normal this is a conflict between quality and quantity. Ideally I'd like both but given the few editors who seme willing to help is often beyond possibility. Can't we at least keep several hundred of these articles to work through?

Claus Peter Poppe as it stands is not deletable, it meets our content requirements. Several hundred of these articles could be expanded with a reference similarly within a few days. Dr. Blofeld White cat 09:48, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

What is wrong with deleting all the substubs and then working through the list? Kusma (talk) 09:58, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see anyone assuming bad faith. I see a lot of people disagreeing with your good-faith actions though. I think it was implicit in all delete !votes that they apply only to the unsourced sub-stubs. I would expect the closer to make it explicit that whoever is going to perform the deletions should, if practicable, spare any seriously improved articles. Hans Adler 10:08, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Mmm I've been called all sorted of names and been insulted many times during the ANI discussion unnecessarily. I do a lot of good work on wikipedia other than just creating stubs of which I rarely get credit for. Not one person has said that they appreciate my efforts to "try" to transfer content even if it was certainly not the best way to go about it. These article should and could all be translated and expand fully. The problem is lack of content and an external reliable source which will be difficult to tackle manually in the short time at least. Dr. Blofeld White cat 10:53, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Right so we've established that we definately think these articles have the potential to be good articles at least that's something. The problem is that nobody was bothering to start the articles. I think the best solution would be to remove the BLP tags with a bot. Then maybe delete the living ones using German wikipedia as a check until they can be started fully. We can at least work towards the deceased bios which do not violate BLP. Dr. Blofeld White cat 10:02, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

These people have potential to have articles written about them, but that does not mean we need these substubs. Kusma (talk) 10:03, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The way wikipedia has grown to date has revealed that if the article is created it stands a much better chance of being expanded. A lot of people ignore red links and will not create an article but if they come across a lacking article may wish to expand it. Dr. Blofeld White cat 10:06, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In my experience that's
WP:BOLLOCKS. When I see a redlink I'm a lot more likely to write an article on the thing than if there was something sub-standard there that I'd have to work into my prose. a lot of articles drew my attention because of the honking red words in the middle of an article that mentioned them, not because I went to them first and went "this needs to be expanded". Ironholds (talk) 10:12, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
]
Wrong. We have loads of poorly written articles now. We are behind on maintaining them already. A large number of our articles about people are stale because they are not updated after the original user starts them. Frequently, articles are on few people's watchlist so vandalism with remain for hours, days, or sometimes weeks and months. This is a large issue already that will not be helped by adding thousands of articles that are on no one's watchlist. FloNight♥♥♥ 10:15, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
No, it is not alright to start any article without content or sources. There needs to be a minimum standard for the content that is added to Wikipedia English. We give some leeway to brand new users for adding material that is poorly written and sourced. There is not any reason that we should allow it from experienced users. FloNight♥♥♥ 10:15, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
There is a reason nobody starts a particular article; lack of interest. Creating stubs won't change that, why would it? The stubs you created for all those Greek museums never went anywhere. Abductive (talk) 10:10, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Mmm that's why wikipedia has tens of thousands of articles on low league baseball and soccer players and lists of Pokemon charatcers rather than decent articles about national Greek museums. If that is the interest of wikipedians overwhlemingly I wonder what that tells us about the people who use wikipedia. Dr. Blofeld White cat 10:43, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • If people want to write about pokemon, who are we to stop them? If you know that Wikipedians are interested in such areas rather than more serious subjects then creating 3,000 articles and expecting the same community to pick up the pieces is just.. well, silly. Ironholds (talk) 10:53, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • This is a volunteer project. Nobody is obliged to work in any particular area so it's not surprising that most editors prefer to write about subjects that they are interested in and know something about. This does mean that there are many subject areas which have the potential for good articles which never get written because there few or no editors with the time, interest or inclination to write them - be it Greek museums, villages in Uzbekistan or minor German politicians. But this is an inevitable consequence of the way Wikipedia works, and the mass-creation of sub-stubs won't change it, or cause dozens of editors to develop an interest in German politicians and start working on the articles. And if some editors with an interest in German politicians do come along and decide to start writing proper articles about some of these people (which I agree would be a worthwhile thing for someone to do, though I doubt anything like 3000 good articles will be written any time soon), they won't find their job is made more difficult by the lack of one-line substubs. Iain99Balderdash and piffle 11:07, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, I do me best to try to overcome the bias and uneveness in articles on here but I can't force people to edit articles they are not interested in. I've created a lot of good articles about places all over the world but little in comparison to what could and should be written. This is why I create so many stubs is because I try to venture into poorly developed areas and try in the long term to make them produce results by relying on the sheer traffic and mix of interests this site has. A lot of my stubs have been expanded into really good articles, even the most seemingly "perma stub" type of stubs like Der Müller und sein Kind for instance and Xinjiang Medical University etc (which is what inspires me to create more) but there are also many of my stubs which have remained untouched. I am pretty certain a fair number of these German politicians will have fairly decent articles eventually. If you believe it is best to build it one at a time rather than building upon 3000 empty stubs then I respect your views people I just really hate the tone of some of the editors especially at ANI and how they react to an honest attempt to develop wikipedia. I am a human being, I have feelings. At least the nominator Jenna has not described me as "intellectually lazy" anyway.

Where editors like myself and Albert differ in our outlook on wikipedia is that we see a fixed amount of articles on any given subject and believe that we as a project are working towards providing a more complete coverage of each subject with a fixed amount of articles to work towards and build up. I believe it was exactly the same with these German politicians in that in order to catch up and work towards filling this field starting the articles however stubby was the first step on the path to a better future coverage of this area of the encyclopedia. Sure we knew it would take a lot of work but both Albert and I firmly believe that the articles were worthy of creation, however stubby because we believed the content exists on German wikipedia and the articles could have bene brought easily up to scratch. Luckily I managed to organize a bot to trasnfer articles on czech municipalities more efficiently it is a great shame I can't organize a project and bot to do the same thing here. I am thinking of proposing a new wikiproject dedicated to trasnwikiying articles properly and the use of a bot, judging how many people here seme to regard me I'm having second thoughts. I personally think this project would benefit massively from content translated form other wikipedias esepcially if supported by reliable sources. Dr. Blofeld White cat 11:15, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. -- the wub "?!" 10:44, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think we're talking past each other here. I, for one, don't have a problem with you creating stubs for old movies or museums or geographic locations for that matter. The problem here is that many of these are BLPs. It has been consensus for quite a while now that these default to delete, meaning that the onus is on the creator to source them and prove that they are indeed notable. If you want to develop these one at a time with proper sourcing from the beginning then I don't have a problem with that. I do, however, have a problem with the creation of thousands of more underwatched stubs of living people. I'm not sure if you've worked with watching these articles in the past but politicians are frequent targets of very bad BLP violations. This just isn't a good idea.
    Vyvyan Basterd (talk) 11:37, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
    ]

Thankyou, I'm glad you've clarified that. I agree if there are BLP problems but remember the BLP tagswere wrongly applied to half the articles on people who died 30 years ago etc . The misconception is that I don't want the encyclopedia to be of the highest quality as other people, I do, as much as anybody here, but I also think in order to achieve our project goals of "the sum of all knowledge" which is equally as important we could not ignore 99% of the notable politicians in Germany. I thought at least starting the articles was the first step even if they were poorly started. Can you understand how I view wikipedia? Dr. Blofeld White cat 11:43, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I understand completely and if this had been about any other area than BLPs I would probably agree but this is one area where growth without a plan for further improvement and patrolling isn't a good idea.
Vyvyan Basterd (talk) 12:00, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
]

For the record I think

Christian v. Ditfurth too. I'm certain if they had all been started like this we would not be here now. It is a valid source about a clearly notable politician. If I was fluent in German I'd expand it to b-class. Can we please keep this article even if you delete the others? If I try to fill out a handful of articles when we come to delete the mass can we at least keep the ones I've sorted a little bit? Dr. Blofeld White cat 12:21, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
]

I would be willing to go through the list and seperate the BLPs from the ones which are not. After all the BLP tags were applied wrongly to many many articles on deceased politicians which is partly what the problem was. I just need some time to be able to sort out the BLP vios. If you are going to delete the lot anyway I will not bother to at least try to salvage a few of them if you are adament they should all be deleted even if some of them are expanded to start class with references. Well. I'm probably wasting my time here. Dr. Blofeld White cat 12:38, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Neutral This is very long so I'm breaking it into sections. BLP issue: I don't think the BLP problem is too grave. For the same reason German politician articles are unlikely to be improved or watched in the short term, they are also unlikely to be vandalized. If someone wants to libel a relatively obscure German politician, they'll do it in the German wikipedia, not here. (And if someone wanted to write an attack, they could start a page to do so - though obviously this isn't true for IPs.) Value to readers: I think there is still significant value to readers, even when the articles are extremely short. They all include an expand tag that links to a machine translation of the German article, so English-language readers have immediate access to decent (if not great) information about the person they're looking for. Potential for expansion: I firmly believe that sub-stubs like this are more likely to be expanded than redlinks, because I have been monitoring translations done where {{Expand German}}-type tags had been on articles. Most of the translations that get done are actually by IPs and un-autoconfirmed users who would not have been able to start articles themselves. These new users find a stub and are immediately instructed on how to improve it - simply translate! This is a much easier undertaking than having to do research from scratch. Content of article in short term This is my biggest problem with these articles. A good number of the stubs created are inaccurate. I suggested that at very least the creators look for the word Politiker (politician) in the article before assuming that the subject is actually a politician. I think deletion might be productive so that these articles can be started with better information, with a bot reading basic facts from the German article and transferring the reference section to the English article. Conclusion I'm ok with deleting (but don't think it's necessary) because a nontrivial number of these articles are inaccurate. I don't think BLP problems justify deletion. Calliopejen1 (talk) 13:00, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
When I looked through the sub-stubs and the German articles, I saw several different problems. Much of the content in the German articles do not have inline citations. As well, some of the articles looked stale and out dated. So, if we bring that wording to Wikipedi-en, then we are not starting out ahead in my opinion. I think that all articles need to be sourced. We should not knowingly start any article without refs. We support our model for writing articles by non-experts by saying that our articles are sourced. That all content can be verified. If we are not doing this then we are not following core Wikipedia policy. For those reason, I think these articles need to be deleted (unless they have been improved with sourcing). FloNight♥♥♥ 13:24, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That is exactly how I feel about it actually. Especially what you said about the experiences we know of on many articles which have been expanded very well by IPs and we would not have had that content if it wasn't for them. So I do not think that view is WP:BOLLOCKS as was claimed above. Dr. Blofeld White cat 13:12, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is not that these articles were started but that care was not taken to write them at a minimum standard that we expect of users that are not newbies. We have loads of examples of stubs that have been on site for years without significant improvement and that have even grown worse with passing time because they are stale and outdated now. FloNight♥♥♥ 13:24, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, I wish there was someway we could methodically plough through huge banks of missing articles and have everyone with adequate info and details first time. If they could be started in the way that Claus Peter Poppe is now I seriously doubt anybody in the community would seirously mind. A lot of new content could be started much more efficiently using well programmed bots and I have always requested them before I've started banks of stubs. The lack of bot operators actually interested in running bots to produce starter article more efficiently and productively seem extremely small compared to the amount that run bots for practically every other part of wikipedia. Maybe this is because the coding required to autogenerate articles correctly in this way is beyond most capabilities I don't know. What matters most to me is content and it a shabby human attempt by myself to try to do something about the mass of missing content on here. Dr. Blofeld White cat 13:32, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Delete...speedy, if necessary. If it makes life easier for people, by all means...I didn't mean to cause problems, which is what this seems to have become. So get rid of the lot. --
Io son l'orecchio e tu la bocca: parla! 13:39, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
]
  • Delete All. 1) In addition to the very real issue of sources and BLP considerations, I only see a few mentions of the fact that because a subject is
    notable on another Wikipedia site does not make it so here. Every article should display notability on its own merits. I'm a lightweight deleter, but still, after a couple of thousand deletions in the last year, I see a very common pattern: song article created and deleted because artist is non-notable; artist article created; song article re-created and no-longer qualifies for A9. There are similar scenarios; BIO articles created in near proximity to company articles, in support of each other. We're like deer in the headlights on this (sometimes). So here we have a similar situation: they're on another project's Wikipedia (a non-trivial one, at that - with apologies to other, less-established versions). But this doesn't mean they are notable here. No prejudice against recreation of any (or even all) if and when notability is established in reliable sources, same as any other article. 2) I would also like to see some sort of policy on trans-wiki articles and mass creation of new articles; that may not be appropriate in this discussion but it would help if such existed. I would add that, quite apart from the merits (or lack thereof) of these articles, their robotic creation clogged up the new pages patrol, such that those watching the list would have to look carefully for clear CSD candidates (which I agree these are not). The limitation on creation is a separate issue, not really for this AfD since they are already created, but bears noting.  Frank  |  talk  13:53, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
    ]

Do you think that Claus Peter Poppe is really non notable? WOuld you say that somebody who represented the Scottish Parliament would also not be notable? I am certain if you researched any of these articles you'd realise the vast majority are notable figures in German politics, that isn't the issue I'm sure. The problems are mainly those that have been highlighted previously. I can guarantee that a lot of these articles will be restarted eventually but perhaps rather more impressively than what was attempted recently. Dr. Blofeld White cat 14:00, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

But this doesn't mean they are notable here Disagree. If they are notable in Germany (or whatever country), then they are notable, fullstop. Just the same way some back-bench local politican is notable in the UK, regardless if anyone has heard of him/her in another country. Lugnuts (talk) 14:03, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
By here I mean on en.wikipedia. Each project has its own definition of notability. The assertion of notability of these articles seems to be "they have an article on de.wikipedia", at least in part. I'm not by any means asserting they aren't notable, and I have no prejudice against the articles existing. But I don't think it's appropriate to carpet-bomb the project because the pages exist elsewhere and leave it for others to clean up. That's not expanding the project; it's expanding a "to-do" list.  Frank  |  talk  15:23, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Do you think that Claus Peter Poppe is really non notable? Arguments from Incredulity don't work; arguments from evidence do. --Calton | Talk 14:11, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all per my general reasoning at the ANI thread this sprung out of. There's no reasonable expectation that these articles will become more than stubs in months or even years, given that even the longstanding articles are stubs in their native language. They weren't given enough detail and sourcing in the beginning to merit their inclusion. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 14:04, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Now what you said there was reasonable and justifiable. Dr. Blofeld White cat 14:20, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy delete all except the two I highlighted as worked on. OK so this didn't work out and it is obvious where this is headed. Can we please end this nomination and delete per request of the creator. I'm tired of this now. We get the point and I now have work to do in improving quality which believe it or not I am interested in. Dr. Blofeld White cat 14:20, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Delete all except those that are already being worked on, without prejudice to recreation with references and actual content, where the original article is already sufficiently well-referenced. - Pointillist (talk) 14:08, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all absent any actual work being on. The article creators should focus on actual quality rather than pumping up their edit counts. --Calton | Talk 14:11, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I improved Tea production in Sri Lanka and many others precisely for that reason, obviously true. Dr. Blofeld White cat 14:23, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep. A proposal for the bulk deletion of almost three thousand articles has to be much more convincing than this is. I cannot countenance a drastic expansion of
    bold in the creation of new content, if an adequate article of a politician on a foreign language edition does not make a prima facie case for a translation of that article in English.

    I'd suggest that a bulk deletion of these 3000 articles be first mooted on the German Wikipedia. See how that flies. If inadequacy of references, BLP concerns, or lack of notability leads to the deletion of the original articles in German, I'd defer to the German Wikipedia's conclusions and delete only those articles. But I doubt that a similar proposal for bulk deletion of material would sit well there. It shouldn't sit well here either. - Smerdis of Tlön (talk) 14:22, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
    ]
  • Delete all (except those that have been improved since the start of this AFD) as unreferenced one-lines but with no prejudice against recreation with actual sources and content. Any article(s) that have already been improved should be removed from the list though, so that they are not deleted with the mix. Abecedare (talk) 14:40, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all (except those that have been improved since the start of this AFD) as there is a clear duty of care on editors using automative tools, such as Bots, to ensure that their work stictly complies with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. It is a clear breach of good faith create or contribute to Wikipedia on an industrial scale if there is no quality control. The creator of these articles should be blocked indefinately - its clear that this mass creation of articles is just a stunt to attract attention. Childish pranks like this may be forgiven on a smaller scale, but on a large scale is hard to defend that this act of vandalism is not a premeditated attempt to disrupt Wikipedia on a grand scale. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 14:47, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    Discussion regarding the (absurd) call for the creator to be blocked has been moved to the talk page.
    Lara 16:08, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply
    ]

Could somebody please end this debate. We know where it is headed and the stub creator has even voted delete. This is embarrassing to those involved and a very unpleasant situation which has caused the creator to leave wikipedia. Please end this asap, this is pretty much a snowball delete. Further drama here is unnecessary and I think you should do the decent thing any admin viewing this and make the obvious decision. Dr. Blofeld White cat 16:13, 24 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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