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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: userfy. Salvio giuliano 10:56, 1 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Unsourced information is not valuable

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Wikipedia:Unsourced information is not valuable (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)​

I suggest this page for userification, i.e., that it be moved to User:Veverve/Unsourced information is not valuable.

I started to clean up some of the grammar errors, but I gave up because I decided that this is sufficiently far from the community's views that it is better kept as a user essay. As examples:

  1. "In the overwhelming majority of cases, adding unsourced information on Wikipedia amounts to nothing more than digital graffitis." – Check Special:RecentChanges for unsourced contributions, and see whether that lines up with your idea of graffiti or any other type of vandalism.
  2. "References which are too imprecise to identify where the information is supposed to be found in the source, or to identify the source itself, can be discarded. Those include, but are not limited to: * works with no publication date" – Most websites don't give a publication date, and we don't discard them.
  3. Loads of unsourced data and material on something are useless noise, for they do not comply with Verifiability. Information in itself is worthless. – The author seems to have confused cited with verifiable, as in able to be verified. "Smoking tobacco is a major risk factor for lung cancer" is verifiable regardless of whether it's cited.
    Also, sometimes that "useless noise" is an effort at explaining something in simpler language or building the web to related content. For example, one of the author's most recent edits was to added the uncited statement that "Heresy has a specific meaning in the Catholic Church when it applies to someone's belief", and I don't think that contribution is either "useless noise" or "worthless". If we believed that information per se was worthless, none of us would be here.

I'm all in favor of full-throated support for citing sources (after all, I am the top editor for Wikipedia:Inline citations), but this particular one seems to go beyond support for citations towards an uncollegial approach to building the encyclopedia.

(The author is unfortunately blocked again, so he won't be able to comment.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:50, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  • Tentative userfy Wait - We certainly allow latitude for users to post essays in project-space to share their opinions or editing philosophies. However, this is not a well-constructed essay. It contains too many sections, many of which do not flow in a logical order. Moreover, as stated above, some of the statements such as {"loads of unsourced data and material ... are useless noise" are just misleading at best and completely false at worst.
That being the case, I am not a fan of nominating essays for deletion when the author who would otherwise be able to rebut/revise is temporarily blocked. I'd much rather suspend this MfD until after the block is lifted. There is no harm in waiting. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 15:01, 25 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wait: for Veverve's block to expire so that they can participate in any discussion.  — Archer1234 (t·c) 16:06, 25 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Speedy Wait: We should consider closing this discussion with an agreement to all meet back here when Veverve can defend this essay. I don't feel terribly strongly towards it one way or another, but the blocking admin has elected to take a fairly strict view on what Vevevre may comment on—even on their own talk page (this is an appropriate subjective decision). ~ Pbritti (talk) 04:03, 26 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Userfy per WAID. The idea that anything without a citation, regardless of whether it's verifiable, neutral, and important to understand the topic of the article, is harmful blight which must be purged from the 'pedia en masse is, IMO, one of the more detrimental strains of fringe wikiphilosophy. It's not new, but I almost hesitated to say userfy because there are perhaps more who hold this belief now than there have been in the past. Ultimately, however, the view runs contrary to core principles and shouldn't be in projectspace. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 14:57, 26 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep as a valid statement of opinion that is sufficiently mainstream to belong in project space. (We don't need to wait for the author.) Robert McClenon (talk) 17:15, 26 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Userfy per WP:PG, essays which contradict widespread consensus belong in userspace. That includes this essay, which alleges that anybody who adds unsourced information is basically acting in bad faith (which isn't true at all), and the idea of deleting all unsourced information has been repeatedly rejected. Hut 8.5 18:22, 26 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete this just goes overboard, as I've quietly observed for a while. - TheLionHasSeen (talk) 00:07, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Userfy: As a disputed single-author essay. SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:41, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Userfy. WP:SKYBLUE and WP:NOTBLUE complement each other and actually interweave pretty neatly so that you could easily combine them into a single, a bit more dialectical, essay. "Wikipedia:Unsourced information is not valuable" sets out an extreme view, and eliminates a lot of nuance, in such a way that it doesn't successfully capture a mainstream opinion, and it doesn't really complement anything.—Alalch E. 09:11, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per nom and TheLionHasSeen. — Sundostund mppria (talk / contribs) 22:31, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I want to also add that this user has continuous issues with edit warring, and other conflicts necessitating some behavioral issue with cooperation on differing viewpoints. Someone may have a valid source, but, if it's not according to their norms, it is removed and strongly debated against. - TheLionHasSeen (talk) 01:41, 30 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Userfy we don't delete Wikipedia-related essays based on their content. While I personally agree with much of the content of this essay, and think we should take a stronger stance against unsourced content, I accept that the essay is contrary to current norms and a userfication seems reasonable. * Pppery * it has begun... 00:32, 1 April 2023 (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.
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