Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/17 single-navbox automated portals

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: delete. — JJMC89 (T·C) 00:28, 14 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

17 single-navbox automated portals[edit]

(Time stamp for bot to properly relist.) BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:41, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Every one of these seventeen portals is based on a single navbox. That is, their list of selected articles (using {{Transclude list item excerpts as random slideshow}} or {{Transclude linked excerpts as random slideshow}}) is drawn solely from a single navbox. For example, Portal:Six Flags is drawn solely from {{Six Flags}}.

This makes each of these portals merely a WP:REDUNDANTFORK of the navbox, with much less utility than the navbox because:

the navbox displays a full list of the articles. The portal displays only one page at a time, out of a randomly selected subset of up to 50 articles.
the navbox should be present on every page in the set. The portal always requires navigation to a separate page.

The topic's main page works much better as a navigational hub, because it includes:

both the topic navbox and related navboxes
A full summary of the topic rather than an excerpt of the lede.

I propose deleting all these portals in one go because:

Being each built on a single navbox, they add no navigational utility, and are an inferior WP:REDUNDANTFORK of another navigational tool
Portals are not content; they are merely a means of navigating between content. So their mass deletion removes precisely zero encyclopedic content.
The pages have no prior history. There is no non-automated version to revert to.

All these portals were created by User:AmericanAir88 between October 2018 and February 2019. They were not part of any bot-like process and I see no reason at all to doubt that they were created in good faith. However they all use the automated portal technology, and all were created with {{subst:Basic portal start page}}.

Few of these topics seem to me to be broad enough to satisfy WP:POG's requirement that portals be about "broad subject areas, which are likely to attract large numbers of interested readers and portal maintainers", and many of them look like similar topics to portals which have been deleted in recent weeks. However, consensus remains unclear about where to draw the lines, and a few of them may be broad enough to support a thoughtfully-designed and properly-curated portal which used a selected article list extending way beyond the navbox, if enough editors were willing to do the sustained the hard work needed to curate and maintain it.

So, I propose that these pages be deleted without prejudice to recreating a curated portal not based on a single navbox, in accordance with whatever criteria the community may have agreed at that time. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:34, 17 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion (17 single-navbox automated portals)[edit]

add your keep/delete/comment here

Delete all. RIP Hartford Whalers That being said, only a few of these should even be considered for recreation (ie. Portal:Mail) if that is ever back on the table. They're all useless in this state anyways. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 15:51, 17 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete I don't see any need for any of these. Some are probably already covered by parent portals, such as Portal:Philately basically covers Portal:Mail. ww2censor (talk) 09:54, 18 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete there's no need for these portals, particularly given above. No problems if other editors want to recreate them though. --Tom (LT) (talk) 10:34, 22 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Weapons, delete the rest. The Weapons topic has a significant number of related articles so a good candidate for a portal. Might need some work due to the method of creation, but that's not a valid reason for deletion. The others are probably better served by singular parent topics (Economics instead of macro/micro-economics for example). Waggers TALK 11:06, 30 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Waggers. This method of creation is a valid reason for deletion, as agreed at the two mass deletions of similar portals: one, and two. Those discussions were advertised WP:CENT, and there was overwhelming consensus of a very high turnout to delete a total of 2,555 such portals. So the principle of deleting this sort of portals is very well-established, and has been followed in many dozens of similar nominations. The possibility of creating an actual portal is no way impeded by deleting this one-click wonder. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:50, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That's pure WP:AON / WP:OTHERSTUFFDOESNTEXIST reasoning and doesn't wash with me. Nothing in the deletion policy states that using templates/bots/scripts or any similar means to create a page is sufficient on its own to require the page to be deleted. Waggers TALK 16:07, 7 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Waggers, if I hadn't seen it all before, I would be severely astonished that after a month of the community repeatedly deleting portals on this way, based on overwhelming consensus of a huge turnout in two WP:CENT-advertise discussions, you as an admin would try to disrupt the ongoing cleanup of the spam by ignoring the broad consensus.

Sadly, I have seen you try this tendentious disruptiveness before, so I am not shocked, just saddened. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 22:58, 7 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If you can find a policy based reason for deletion, I'm listening. But given the state of your interactions lately, I won't hold my breath. Waggers TALK 07:20, 8 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

More wiklawyering. We a here to build an encyclopedia, not to engage in scholastic interpretation of documents drawn up to facilitate that aim. Waggers. What on earth are you actually trying to achieve by keeping this repeatedly-deprecated automated junk? In what way does this benefit our readers?. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:36, 8 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete all per WP:TNT; no prejudice against recreating a proper curated Portal:Weapons. UnitedStatesian (talk) 11:38, 3 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: I wondered why this had never been closed, but did some checking and found that it had never been listed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion. Sorry everyone, that was my oversight. So I have listed it now.[1]
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:55, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. For some reason this is not showing the list of portals that it covers in the transclusion? Espresso Addict (talk) 16:31, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Let no-one be lulled by this nomination into thinking that portals based on more than one navbox are any safer. It has been made clear that some of these are equally in the firing line: ... if the portal is based on multiple navboxes which are all transcluded on the head article, the the portal is still a WP:REDUNDANTFORK of the head article. That applies regardless of whether the number of navboxes is one or one hundred.[2] Navboxes may of course be added to or removed from any article at will: does this operation affect the value of the portal on the related topic?

At a minimum Mail, Weapons, Malaria and Exercise may be seen as broad topics of global significance. The possibility that portals on such topics, once deleted, would ever be recreated in a new form is greatly impeded by the uncertainty of whether new creations too would fall victim to deletion on dubious grounds such as "redundant fork", "needs improvement", "wrong method of creation", "created by wrong editor", "not enough page views", "no named maintainer", "didn't take long enough to create" and so on: Bhunacat10 (talk), 16:40, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If Bhunacat10 is worried that too many portals are being deleted because they don't add value for the reader, then I suggest that they open an RFC to amend the guidelines to clarify that uselessness is no grounds for deletion, and that the consensus at the two widely-advertised and overwhelmingly-supported mass-MFDs should be explicitly overturned. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 20:04, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete these portals, useless navigation tools, redundant to the existing articles and navboxes, and of lower quality

Listing one by one, to be sure

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2019-02-16 14:05:27 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Seinfeld

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-12-13 20:30:01 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Mail

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-12-11 02:36:32 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Weapons

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-12-10 23:39:02 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Malaria

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-12-06 21:33:02 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Macroeconomics

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-12-06 21:27:30 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Microeconomics

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-11-25 15:57:07 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Six Flags

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-11-20 03:01:52 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Fallout (series)

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-11-17 15:56:21 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Eels

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-11-11 03:12:42 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Hartford Whalers

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-11-10 01:34:49 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Exercise

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-11-08 02:41:41 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Olives

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-10-31 01:06:07 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Bone fractures

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-10-29 01:40:16 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Carbohydrates

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-10-28 00:26:12 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Coconuts

- Automated portal, 0 subpages, created 2018-10-27 23:15:46 by User:AmericanAir88: Portal:Cherries

Pldx1 (talk) 17:30, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - This one is a redirect ------------ created 2018-10-30 00:50:51 by --User:AmericanAir88--: Portal:Integumentary system. Pldx1 (talk) 17:30, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Pldx1, it should not have been redirected while under discussion at MFD, so I have reverted the redirect. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 20:07, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Special mention to Weapons, since this one could be special, we are told. This is surely a broader topic, since Malaria, Coconuts, olives or cherries kernel and even electric Eels can be used as weapons: good candidate indeed for a portal. Might need some work. But this work will not been done, since delete !voters have !voted delete and keep !voters don't appear as wanting to do more than waiting for someone else to do what could to be required. By the way, we have another blatant stupidity "in the news" section of this portal. [ABC News report] North Korea fires projectiles from Wonsan towards the east... several unidentified projectiles ... that flew between 70 and 200 kilometres becomes "North Korea and weapons of mass destruction". But who cares! With 11 views per day during the year before this MfD, part of them being crawling robots, no great damage will result, isn't it ? Pldx1 (talk) 17:30, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - The titles make me think of a high-school composition exercise to use all of the titles in a paragraph. We can list the carbohydrate content of eels, olives, cherries, and coconuts, and discuss the merits of a high-carbohydrate diet for a hockey player who is recovering from bone fractures due to unrelated exercise. The price of each of the commodities is subject to supply and demand, which is microeconomics. Since the whole exercise is meaningless, it could be a script for the Seinfeld show. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:02, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete anyway. The exception is not an exception, because the nominator said without prejudice. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:02, 6 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete for now creating portals just to increase the number of portals is wrong however Weapons might be one to keep or bring back. Alucard 16_{❯❯❯ chat?} 12:28, 8 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nomination. Again, this is without prejudice to recreation provided thought and care is put into maintaining the portals. SITH (talk) 21:11, 12 May 2019 (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.