Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Missing Wikipedians (2nd nomination)

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

The result of the discussion was withdrawn by nominator.--Aervanath (talk) 14:12, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Missing Wikipedians[edit]

This page is a prime example of Wikipedia bureaucratic cruft. On one hand, it is a memorial, so please see WP:NOT. On the other hand, it's a rather pointless list of people who have simply stopped editing for one reason or another. There is zero reason for such a list. If there is an argument that we need to keep a list of "people who were important", well, how do you measure importance? This is just a general list. Finally, it could very well constitute a privacy issue, as some people may have stopped editing for privacy reasons, and adding their username to a tally sheet isn't helping them to disappear. Even if they don't necesarily want to "disappear", people should not be adding the usernames of others (particularly editors in good standing) to lists of names. This should be deleted as it does not help the encyclopedia and may even be harmful. <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 03:18, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I created the page. It's now a part of Wikipedia history. I suggest perhaps listing it as historical. While I appreciate the desire to clean up our meta pages - in fact I may enlist your help in dealing with certain related matters - that is not to say that setting oneself up at the woodchipper and throwing various things in should be considered helpful. -Stevertigo 03:33, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep and continue. Read Wikipedia:Editors matter. WP:NOTMEMORIAL doesn't apply to wikipedians in userspace/project space. See a relevent recent discussion, and the current wording of WP:NOT. Keeping track of our colleagues, having a care for them, is important for the community of editors. There is nothing in the list warrenting the nom's concerns of measures of importance. Privacy concerns can readily be dealth with: You can remove your own entry; you can mail wikipedia where it will be dealt with responsibly and respectfully. Please don't start acting on imagined privacy concerns of people your don't know. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:42, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep It hasn't done any harm so far and I doubt it will. It's useful for historical purposes so I'm not opposed to tagging it with historical or even moving it to the meta site but deleting it wouldn't serve any purpose. And anyone who doesn't want to be listed can easily remove their name or request that it be removed. The first nomination was a unanimous keep and I say keep for most of the reasons listed the first time. -- œ^™ 05:45, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep per the above reasons. As pointed out, WP:NOT doesn't apply, and privacy matters are easily dealt with by the opt-out nature of the list. It is useful as a chronicling of the early days of Wikipedia, and continuing it will ensure that it also helps in the chronicling of current 2009 wikipedia in the years ahead. Grutness...wha? 06:43, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The pricacy concerns are very real. If someone is "missing", they are likely gone, so how can they opt out? Furthermore, people shouldn't have to opt out. This is like an unscrupulous telemarketer who calls trying to sell someone timeshares. The person says "why are you calling me, I have no interest in this product and the telemarketer says "well, you can opt out at any time". That's not the point... the point is, the call (or in this case, the addition to the list) should never have happened in the first place. Editors in good standing should not be added to lists on the basis that they can later ask to be removed (IF THEY EVEN KNOW THE LIST EXISTS!). This is a bad precedent. We need to be proactive, not reactive, when it comes to privacy and the rights of editors in good standing to not have their usernames added to lists. The only way to make this right is to allow only the editors themselves to add their names, which would, by default, make the list irrelevant as they would no longer be missing. <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 16:43, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It would be the simplest thing in the world to create a template saying something like "This user has left Wikipedia. For privacy reasons, do not add his or her name to Wikipedia: Missing Wikipedians". Any editor wishing to leave WP and not be traced could simply place this on their user page when blanking it as their last edit. Grutness...wha? 23:42, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Again, how would they know this particular page even exists? I didn't, until just last week. And again, people should not be added to lists on here unless they do it themselves, unless they're some kind of blocked troll or abusive vandal who administrators need to keep logs of information on. Lists of names are not good. Doesn't anyone out there see this? If I were to stop editing, I would not want someone to come along and add me to a list somewhere simply because I stopped editing and they decided I was "missing". This could certainly happen for a number of reasons and I'm sure it happens every day. If I hadn't stumbled on this accidentally, I would never have known it existed. It seems nobody agrees with me, so I'll just leave it at this: nobody should ever add anyone else to a list anywhere unless they're a troll/vandal. Editors in good standing don't need to be kept track of. <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 23:03, 1 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps the reason you didn't know about this page is that you are not someone who is likely to become a missing wikipedian with major privacy concerns. It seems unlikely to me that anyone wishing to remove all traces of their Wikipedia activity (which anyone leaving WP in circumatances where privacy is an issue would almost certainly do) would fail to check user name policy pages such as Wikipedia:User name. The page Wikipedia:Missing Wikipedians should be mentioned there, along with methods for avoiding listing. As for being a troll/vandal, I've added names to Wikipedia:Wikipedians with articles; which do you consider me to be, a troll or a vandal? Grutness...wha? 01:11, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A misunderstanding: I meant that only trolls and vandals should have their usernames added to lists. <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 01:48, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Multixfer, you have this backwards, or perhaps WP:DENY has got this wrong? We want to recognise that who have worked postiviely for the project. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:12, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Although this doesn't quite work this way all the time. As in the case of Kurt Weber where he made a request at the talk page for someone to edit the comments about him because they were too negative. If we keep the page we must take precautions so that this can be avoided. Dr.K. logos 03:28, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. Apologies - I did misunderstand you. Mind you, that leaves the question of those listed on Wikipedia:Wikipedians with articles... Grutness...wha? 01:58, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I feel the same way about that: if someone here wants to add themselves to that, then let them, but it should be that person. But seeing how this is going I'll probably just drop the whole thing once this is closed. :-) <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 04:00, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep per common sense. 211.30.100.235 (talk) 08:20, 1 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, what does that mean? Not much of an argument for keeping. <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 23:33, 1 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. The encyclopedia was built by people, and they matter. If someone spends years of their life, of their free time, writing hundreds of articles, and they leave, they leave a name, and that name matters, for it is part of our history. The memory hole is for organizations without compassion and care. Please read Milan Kundera's Book of Laughter and Forgetting to get yet another view of the importance of historical memory. This is a big thing we are doing here, and don't ever forget it; it's already the largest collection of information in the history of the human race, and the laborers who built it matter. "Who built the pyramids," asked Bertolt Brecht, "Who built the Seven Towers of Thebes? The books are filled with the names of kings..." Editors matter and this is part of our history. Antandrus (talk) 01:58, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Then why is the list so small? How many people just lose interest, stop editing, and move on to other pursiits but aren't listed here? Seems a bit... elitist? Either that or totally random. Some of the best articles here have probably been written by people who weren't wiki-pals with anyone, or were just quiet and preferred to work on articles rather than engage in the social aspect. So, is this a list of people who mattered to the encyclopedia or a list of people whose current status of "missing" saddens their friends? A true and accurate listing of people who contribute significantly but then get bored or just stop for whatever reason would probably be in the thousands, if not tens of thousands. <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 03:59, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - a useful list to show that we at least have some concern for our fellow editors' well-being. We care that they haven't been around lately, we wonder what happened to them - are they ok, did they just get bored, or did something happen to them? We don't know. But this list is harmless in any case. See also Wikipedia:Friends. I assure you, whenever I notice an editor who used to be a regular here just go cold turkey in their contributions, I get very worried for them. Majorly talk 23:48, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone can feel free to close this, the consensus is clear. -- <>Multi-Xfer<> (talk) 01:04, 3 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 page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.