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Wikivoyage:Votes for deletion/September 2014

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It's a seemingly well-liked article that is prominently linked to in Wikivoyage talk:Destination of the month candidates and (if I remember correctly) been brought up in a number of previous VfD arguments as an example of why list articles shouldn't be deleted. And I suppose that's a big part of why this article has avoided the chopping block for so long, but if we're to avoid being hypocrites, it needs to be VfD'd like the above two.

Especially because it openly describes itself as a list article: "This is not really an itinerary... but rather a listing of interesting places scattered around Japan."

Also worthy of note is the article is classified as a travel topic and has not received any updates since July 2013, so the one-year rule applies.

I concur. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:23, 23 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. Skeletal itineraries & travel topics should be deleted; we have a policy on that & I agree with it, but this one is not skeletal. It has decent one-line descriptions of nearly all the attractions, in accordance with policy, plus a few longer descriptions which might well be justified exceptions; if not, they could easily be edited down. It also has a nice collection of photos. I'd say promote it to usable. which seems justified & gets it clear of the 'delete outlines after a year' policy.
There is also a broader issue; index-type articles with many links are good for search engine ranking, so we should be trying to create more of them wherever that is reasonable, definitely not to delete existing ones if that seems avoidable. Discussion at Wikivoyage_talk:Search_Expedition#Index_articles. Yes, rubbishy indexes should go and we should not create silly new ones, but we should be looking for opportunities for useful indexes. Pashley (talk) 01:22, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The answer, then, is that we need to clarify our policy. I was under the assumption that we did have an actual policy written somewhere that concurs with what Ikan said above, "this site frowns upon list articles", hence my nomination of this article and my now-struckthrough vote to merge and redirect. However, a later search for any such policy text came up emptyhanded.
Does Wikivoyage, in fact, have a clear policy against list articles? If so, are all list articles included in that prohibition, or are they sometimes allowable? If so, under what circumstances? On the other hand, if there is no such policy, is the disdain for list articles just the personal opinion of one or more editors? Or is it something that has broad community consensus but we simply didn't get around to officializing?
Before we start nominating list articles for deletion, we need answers to those questions. Otherwise, we lack a uniform standard by which to make judgments on a VfD of a list article, and the outcome of any VfD decision depends on the random chance of which editors comment on the nomination and/or the arbitrary personal whim of whichever editor performs the deletion.
-- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 03:05, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Wikivoyage:Goals_and_non-goals does explicitly mention as non-goals both being a "yellow pages" for all of a town's hotels and restaurants and being a "web directory" collecting masses of external links. There are perhaps exceptions; for example Retiring abroad is rated a star article but it has many external links as well as many internal links. There are also articles like Volunteer travel that look to me to badly need cleanup because they are too much a web directory now.
I do not think an index-type article with large numbers of internal wikilinks is at all problematic in terms of those policies, and I do not know of any other policy that would apply. Pashley (talk) 03:37, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - While it's unavoidable to have list articles in cases like packing list I think we should avoid them when it comes to destinations per the policy against yellow page-like articles. In the past we've also even deleted outline itineraries because they were personal ("one week in X") and not referring to an official route. From that POW I'd say redirect to Japan and merge the content into the regions. On the other hand, if people think the article is useful for something like SEO it can be kept. ϒpsilon (talk) 07:32, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - User:ChubbyWimbus has put in a lot of effort into the Japanese articles in general, so perhaps he would have some insight? I personally would suggest turning this into an Itinerary article (even though, yes, it states clearly that is not what it is). It could even be multiple itineraries within the same article. Andrewssi2 (talk) 09:24, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
User:Jpatokal has also contributed a lot to Japanese articles in general and he started this one way back in 2004. It would be nice to hear from him as well. Pashley (talk) 14:24, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. I have been to Japan a couple of times and have made a point of visiting places off the beaten track (but not on this list) each time. The article is a useful list and may be good for SEO, but could be improved by stating the criteria for inclusion, and by showing the places on a map. I am not sure about converting it to an itinerary, as that would probably best be a mix of places off and on the beaten track. The article is ten years old, and I think that we should only delete articles that have been around that long if there is a really good reason. AlasdairW (talk) 21:41, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. I think our aversion to list articles was more specifically aimed at avoiding yellow page-type listings and things like the many list articles they have on Wikipedia. The above nomination for Ohio Museums is primarily a yellow-pages-style directory of names and addresses of museums, but the main reason I nominated it was that the museums themselves are not particularly unique or notable even on a state level, just the regular local museums that small towns have almost anywhere, with no particular reason to be all listed together and nothing very likely to help shape anyone's potential trip to Ohio. This article, however, I feel is more than a simple list, but more importantly, is full of things that are notable, on a national level, and would easily enhance the research and preparation experience for anyone preparing for a trip to Japan. Texugo (talk) 02:46, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, although as the article's original creator and former primary maintainer of sorts my opinion on this is obviously unbiased. That said, I think the page is useful, sufficiently complete to be usable, and cannot really be transformed into any other article type we have: it's not a sensible "itinerary", for example, because nobody is going to visit every place on that list sequentially. I do agree that a map and clear inclusion criteria would be useful. Exclusion criteria might be a good start: cap the number of places at N (3?) per top-level region in Japan and require discussion on the Talk page for any changes once the cap is hit. Jpatokal (talk) 03:11, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: This is exactly the kind of commentary that is generated when we try to VfD articles for reasons that are not based in policy. Off the beaten track in Japan is well-written, it's useful for travellers, it's a list of notable sites rather than little rinky-dink ones, it helps our SEO - those things may all be true, but wouldn't they also be true for Off the beaten path in Alberta if it were developed to its full potential? If so, why are the votes running unanimously against that article and unanimously in favor of this one?
The responses here duck the real issue, which is whether or not we want this type of article on Wikivoyage. Ikan Kekek says we frown on list articles here, but we're falling all over ourselves to prevent the deletion of this list for reasons that, at the end of the day, are arbitrary. I know that crafting policy on Wikivoyage is a minefield, and no one likes to do it. But if we want a policy basis to VfD this article or any other list articles, including the two nominees above which are all set to be deleted, we need to continue this discussion on the relevant policy page. I'll shortly be beginning a discussion at Wikivoyage talk:What is an article? and I hope to see you all there.
-- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 13:24, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The clear deletion rational comes in where it says "was last edited on 20XX-XX-XX and will be merged or deleted if not modified for one year." If we decide that any of these should be upgraded to "usable", they'll be saved, if not, they should go. I'd argue that both this one and the Alberta one are useful enough, and therefore "usable", while the usefulness of the Ohio museums one is highly questionable unless you happen to already be an Ohio history buff with some plan to make sure you don't miss any small-town museum in the state. Texugo (talk) 13:54, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
It certainly wouldn't hurt to develop guidelines for what an "Off the beaten track" article should be like, though. I think they are much more likely to end up being useful than a bunch of "list of museums in X" articles could ever be, but there is still going to be a notability threshold. It's doubtful that we need "Off the beaten track in Random County, Minnesota". Texugo (talk) 13:59, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'd suspect the guideline is that, if "One day in X" or "Off the beaten path in X" contains nothing other than a duplicate of the main article on X, then the page can be proposed for {{merge}} as duplicate. For instance, Off the beaten path in Labrador would be all of Labrador while Off the beaten path in Manhattan would likely be empty. Conversely, Quebec has a clearly-defined "beaten path" through the southern portion of the province and the St. Lawrence river valley while the north is empty, frozen wilderness; Saudi Arabia has an even more obvious "beaten path" trampled by Hajj pilgrims. Certainly our list articles need to be more descriptive, for instance archaeological sites lists everything from Nineveh to l'Anse-aux-Meadows but doesn't explain what makes these places notable. The topic is valid, though, and VfD is not a substitute for repair. K7L (talk) 16:31, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The statement that "VfD is not a substitute for repair" appears to be at odds with the current policy that says we delete outlines that aren't improved for a year. If sitting untouched at outline status for a year or more is not sufficient for VfD then we shouldn't say that on the {{outlinetopic}} tag. Texugo (talk) 16:50, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know what to say anymore. This article is a list, though a pretty well-annotated one. If a majority of you would like to keep it, I think that's OK, but it seems to me that more people would be looking for these "Off the beaten path" attractions in articles for the regions in question, rather than a Japan-wide list with links, though I do see that it's linked to from Japan#Other destinations. I really think it's important to arrive at a clear policy on list articles, for the benefit of article-starters, people posting requests in Requested articles, and for the sake of judgments right here in Votes for deletion. I propose a moratorium on any deletions of list articles until we arrive at a consensus on a clear policy wording. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:00, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Heartily seconded. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 23:20, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
And yes, though it got away from me today, I do intend to launch the policy discussion I mentioned above. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 23:20, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that having a policy discussion would be the best way forward. This wouldn't be just to define new 'rules and regulations' but rather clarify what should be a relevant article content for the goals of Wikivoyage. Andrewssi2 (talk) 03:31, 26 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't have any strong opinions on this (keep vs delete), but I do believe there is a difference in this article versus the Alberta one above. The Alberta article's name may be "Off the Beaten Path", but in fact it is a list of Alberta travel topics which (if enough content is found) could easily each be their own article but there it makes no sense to have a list of roadside attractions in the same article as First Nation sites. The content simply doesn't match the title. I would also argue that Alberta itself is kind of Off the Beaten Path, so it seems odd to have an article about what's off the beaten path of the unbeaten path.
This article attempts to list sites that are less commonly visited while maintaining that the sites found in these places are likely of interest to enough travelers to warrant mention. Arguments could be made against a few (Hirosaki and Mount Koya are rather well-known and popular among visitors in their respective regions), and some regions could use a few more listings, but I think it meets its goal pretty well.
I don't personally have anything against lists, particularly if they are official. These sorts of arbitrary lists will always be called into question (or always deleted if such a decision is reached), but I don't personally have a strong aversion to lists if there is a clear and useful purpose (and perhaps if they are developed enough). ChubbyWimbus (talk) 17:11, 28 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Resolution: promote to usable and keep Pashley (talk) 17:36, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete- This outline directory has been sitting around for years. There's not really any descriptions of the places or events either. Let's move whatever useful stuff there is either into Alberta, regions of Alberta or the cities/towns. ϒpsilon (talk) 08:40, 23 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge content as appropriate and then redirect to Alberta. This is a list article, and this site frowns upon list articles. The "World's biggest" list could be turned into a travel topic if someone wants to do so, but when I checked Big things in Australia for an analogy, it turned out to be just as listy though more extensive than Off the beaten path in Alberta and with some photos for illustration. "Lesser-known Natural Areas," "First Nations Events and Historic Sites" (Under "Do/Events"), "Rodeos and Stampedes" (ditto), "Tourism for Engineers" and "Other Cultural and Historic Sites" should be included in the appropriate Alberta regional guides, with some of the "Tourism for Engineers" sites possibly also being included in Science tourism. The two "Favourite Rural Cafes," if still in business, should be given full listings in the Longview article and an article for Camrose, if anyone wants to start one. Ikan Kekek (talk) 10:56, 23 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge and/or Create Other Articles I think the World's Biggest list would make a nice article for those who like that sort of quirky traveling. The others could be used to enhance Alberta until someone decides to expand them. This article is not an "Off the Beaten Path" article at all. Rather it's a list of travel topics. ChubbyWimbus (talk) 16:52, 28 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would not describe a list of novelty architecture as "off the beaten path" as these venues, inherently, were constructed as tourist traps and for no other reason. The OtBP label should be reserved for obscure places that haven't been turned into tourist venues, whose character hasn't already been altered or destroyed by flooding them with too many travellers - individual Newfoundland fishing outports, for instance, but not venues built for tourism. K7L (talk) 17:35, 28 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Result: Merged and redirected to Alberta --Saqib (talk) 18:51, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

While we're nominating list articles, this is another one that's been sitting around for ages. Ohio is not more well-known for its museums than most other states, and almost everything in the list is a small-town local history/folk/craft museum that isn't notable except in the context of its host town article. So that someone can go through the list later and make sure these are actually covered in the town articles, we can move the contents into Talk:Ohio/Museums or another non-main namespace location for the time being. But for the article itself,

  • I think this one is borderline. As it stands, Ikan is right; merge & redirect. However, it does have plenty of internal links which makes it useful as an index article (see comments below for OtBT in Japan) and it would not need a lot of work to clean it up:
check that all the attractions are mentioned in the linked articles & add them there if not
get rid of the addresses which belong in the linked articles
add one-liner descriptions here
If someone who knows the region wants to volunteer to do that, I'd say it would be worth keeping. Pashley (talk) 04:08, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Result: Merged and redirected to Ohio --Saqib (talk) 18:51, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Clear from content and make a disambig - this is a neat article with all the sections filled and even a nice banner, but the problem is that it is not needed at all. South Korea and North Korea are different as chalk and cheese, especially for a traveller - but I guess in almost all possible ways as well, except for shared history, barely visible in the North, and the same, yet by now much differentiated, language. And this is the way the article presents it - it is mostly one paragraph for North, one for South, and so on. The common bits about language and history are inferior to much better discussions in our guides to particular Korean countries, where each other country is also referenced where applicable. I see no reason to maintain this article, it only adds more clicks for the traveller and makes our coverage of the region look less complete and in-depth than it is. PrinceGloria (talk) 04:36, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep - This is a useful extra-region to have. Culturally there is a lot shared and 'chalk and cheese' is not an informed way of describing them, possibly taken second hand from media reports. For sure the differences of economic development are truly stark, but nevertheless it is actually officially regarded as one country by both North and South. Both countries belong to the East Asia region, and nothing in the heiracrchy changes that. This is a clear and valid extra-region case. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 04:47, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - guys, have you actually read the article and compared vs. those on both Koreas? We know Korea is VEEEEEEEERY important as one, but how does the article at hand provide any extra value? PrinceGloria (talk) 06:26, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it provides value to anyone interested in knowing what is shared and not shared between the two closely related countries. In any case you probably want to look at gaining consensus with your concurrent extra regions thread first, since as it stands this article fits all requirements for an extra-region. I'm happy to help you conclude that discussion over there first. Andrewssi2 (talk) 06:48, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion at Wikivoyage talk:Geographical hierarchy is independent of this discussion and the criteria are different there than here. A deadlocked discussion there falls to status quo bias, whereas here All nominated articles, files or templates are guilty unless proven innocent. Don't ask me why, but that's policy. K7L (talk) 06:56, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
It looks like we are far away from consensus there, and I'd nominate it for deletion were it a regular region or travel topic as well. It is obviously of minimal benefit just to compare the two Koreas, let's be serious here, and we do it anyway in each article on either Korea so much better and more comprehensively. We might just as well start expanding America to compare the Americas and discuss how they are different but similar. This is trivial. PrinceGloria (talk) 06:55, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly, you are far from consensus there. So if it is about status-quo, please point out exactly where in the definition of an extra-region this article does not fit. --Andrewssi2 (talk) 07:05, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
K7L, they are guilty unless proven innocent but only if they fit one of the valid deletion criteria in the first place, which this article does not.
  • Speedy keep - Just because a user does not like extra regions as a class does not make it a valid nomination for deletion, and this a disingenuous attempt to steal home base in an ongoing losing game against the existence of extraregions. Discussion of their existence as a should be kept there. Discussions of what should be said in this article or whether the article should be hierarchical or extra should be kept to Talk:Korea. if this were an airport article nominated for deletion by someone in an ongoing and losing attempt to abolish airport articles, I would expect no different. Texugo (talk) 10:40, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I have nominated this for deletion because it is unnecessary, not because of its qualification as an extraregion or whatever. It is not a useful article, contrary to many other extraregions which seem to serve a purpose beyond redirecting. Would be good to hear from other users than the participants of the other discussion anyway. PrinceGloria (talk) 10:45, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
To nominate an article for deletion you need to look Wikivoyage:What_is_an_article? and say why you believe this is not valid generally. Otherwise since this is currently defined as an Extra Region you need to say why this is not a valid extra region article. Simply disliking an article is not reason enough. Andrewssi2 (talk) 10:59, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not opposed to the idea of getting rid of extraregions by turning them to either travel topics or disambigs, but I don't think nominating individual articles for deletion is the way to go. ϒpsilon (talk) 11:08, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
This article doesn't hold water from the logical point of view, regardless of what you think of extraregions. It is just totally pointless, given the large differences between the two Koreas from a traveller's point of view. What happens to the extraregions is another thing, this article might become something else if we decide to resign from the extraregion status at some point, but it still doesn't make sense to keep it. This is why I nominated it before any reasonable conclusion of the debate. PrinceGloria (talk) 11:32, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
So... basically no reason as per WV article guidance? OK. Looks like an easy one to settle.
If you have some criticism of the content, then by all means place your comments on Talk:Korea and some of us will be more than happy to respond to it and improve the article further. This is not actually a candidate for deletion at all.Andrewssi2 (talk) 12:54, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
An obvious keep. User:Andrewssi2 and User:Texugo have given good reasons. Pashley (talk) 13:31, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Merge useful content and make disambig page - This is a silly article. There are only two countries in this "region" and you cannot even travel between them. All of the information has to be split up into an "In North Korea" followed by "In South Korea" format. That's silly. We have articles for these two countries that explain them much better than this one. Even their history sections are more interesting, since they focus on the impact of events on the respective region/nation. I don't have anything against extraregions, but this one really is useless from a traveler's perspective. I will add that I think it's a mistake to make the Persian Empire article an extraregion. It would be a lot more interesting and useful as a travel topic or itinerary in which places that were important specifically to the empire referenced in the name were highlighted. Trying to make it an extraregion really sounds like a good way to chokes all of the interest and potentially useful content right out of the article. The article sort of seems like it's attempting to be as I describe anyway, although it doesn't really have content yet. ChubbyWimbus (talk) 13:56, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Agree with ChubbyWimbus. This is not a valid travel region, you can't cross the border. However, this page shouldn't be used for these discussions. Globe-trotter (talk) 17:06, 2 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Clarification Travelers used to cross the border until just a few years ago, and probably will again in the next few years. It is a changing situation as it is for all countries. The alternative process of flying via Bejing in neighboring China is complicated and actually this is actually why a unified explanation of the process in this one article is helpful. Andrewssi2 (talk) 00:37, 3 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Guys, this is silly. Korea is both a real-life region and an extremely likely search term. We will always have a page at this title, so there is no need to delete it. Discussion about the content of the page should go on Talk:Korea, not here. Please don't waste everyone's time by asking to delete a page that will never ever be deleted. Powers (talk) 01:27, 3 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Hear, hear! Pashley (talk) 17:19, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. Agree with Powers. There will always need to be an article here. It's clear that the current content isn't ideal, and it may be a region or disamb, or whatever is a better way to proceed. Regardless, the article stays, and the discussion can take place there. --Inas (talk) 23:58, 3 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I just closed this as keep, then reverted myself because it had not been two weeks. Can we close it now? To me, it is a speedy keep, should obviously not have been nominated. Even giving the nomination the benefit of the doubt, I'd say there us a clear consensus to keep. Pashley (talk) 22:36, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not that admins have any more "vote" than anyone else, but admins are the ones to close these discussions, and I think there are at least three to four admins here (you, Powers, Inas and myself) who agree that this did not meet any of our deletion criteria for nomination and thus was not really valid for nomination here in the first place, and two more admins (Ikan and Andrewssi2 who have at least stated that it is a clearly valid article. If that's not enough to effect a "speedy keep" then I don't know what is. Texugo (talk) 22:46, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Result: Kept. --Saqib (talk) 21:25, 15 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I think this category should be renamed to Category:Articles to be merged.--GZWDer (talk) 05:25, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

{{VfD}} also places articles into this category, so it's not exclusively merge candidates. Powers (talk) 17:14, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, that is not true. {{VfD}} only places things into Category:Vfd (which really also ought to be renamed for clarity). As far as I know {{merge}} is the only thing that uses this category.
That's weird. I could have sworn there were other templates that used this category. Powers (talk) 19:54, 10 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - Except for the technicality that "renaming" a category requires deleting one and creating the other, this is not really the most appropriate place to discuss this proposed change, but I'd strongly support this rename. "Articles to be merged" is a far more precise description than "not an article", and the current name is not even necessarily very accurate to describe all the possible reasons for merging. Texugo (talk) 22:16, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - I see no sign of this being in use for anything other than {{merge}} requests, so a more descriptive name is in order. K7L (talk) 16:52, 11 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Result: Deleted and created Category:Articles to be merged --Saqib (talk) 10:05, 27 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

We have no policy that allows the categorization of users except for Babel purposes. Powers (talk) 17:28, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Result: Deleted --Saqib (talk) 10:05, 27 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This should be a sightseeing listing. IonutBizau (talk) 09:35, 11 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Result: Merged and redirected to Curtea de Argeş. --Saqib (talk) 10:05, 27 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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