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. No consensus, but copyright concerns mean deletion is significantly safer. tedder (talk) 07:49, 28 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Noncommutative polynomial[edit]

Noncommutative polynomial (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · AfD statistics)

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The article refers only to a single theorem about noncommutative polynomials. Whether or not that theorem deserves an article, the topic of noncommutative polynomials shouldn't start with that theorem. It's possible a move, followed by overwriting the redirect with a sensible article, might be better. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 00:02, 4 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

As an alternative, move the current Non-commutative polynomial ring article (actually, at free algebra) to this name (Noncommutative polynomial). This involves deleting the article presently here, so it still requires a delete result. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 05:37, 4 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete: The article does not seem to be about the subject but a narrow aspect of it. There might be material for an article with this name, but it's hard to see where it find it from what's here. Given this, a move might be in order but the references given do not establish notability for what is covered.--RDBury (talk) 04:56, 6 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. AfD is not a clean-up process. If you want to suggest a merge into Non-commutative polynomial ring, you should suggest that. There is literally nothing - no comment at all - on the discussion page of the article. This nomination is not apparently about the topic of the article, but about the handling of this draft, so is quite out of scope for the process. Please follow the good steps mentioned at WP:BEFORE. Charles Matthews (talk) 16:23, 10 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, due diligence suggests googling for "Connes embedding conjecture" before rushing this article to deletion. I find this, which suggests that the correct tagging is for more context, nothing more. Charles Matthews (talk) 17:48, 10 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sometimes an article can be cleaned up and sometimes it's better to start over from scratch. I don't see what there is in the article that can be salvaged. The title seems to have little to do with what the article is about, there is so little context provided that it's difficult to tell what it is about, and there are no references given to show that whatever that may be is notable. In light of this I think the nomination was appropriate. If delete is not in order then please indicate sources that establish notability, or indicate which article it should be merged with. The responsibility for establishing notability rests with the article's creator, not with the person nominating it of AfD.--RDBury (talk) 08:07, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, that seems to include a number of basic misconceptions about the deletion process. I remark that by convention an article at AfD should not be moved to a new title. Therefore an article that has a poorly chosen title should not be prematurely nominated; and, further, the argument that the title is wrong when something is at AfD is then a Catch-22. ((context)) would have been a good addition to the article; talk page comments also. Having an article run off the site by specious arguments doesn't serve the purposes of the encyclopedia I write for. And I think you also should look down WP:BEFORE, to inform yourself where the onus lies in nomination. I don't think either of the Delete votes here is backed by any research at all into the content of the article. Charles Matthews (talk) 08:23, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Articles at AfD can be moved to new titles, and should, if the title is bad. That has been true since 2007. Please do not spread misconceptions about the deletion process. — Kusma ^talk 09:31, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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I think he means to say if a move is the required action there is no reason to list the articles here to begin with. There is no need for an AfD to facilitate a move. And if a possible rearrangement or merging of several math articles isd required, that is also something that could/should be discussed with other math editors at the wikiproject for mathematics first before listing it for deletion.--Kmhkmh (talk) 11:19, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, User:Arthur Rubin decided to mass-nominate four articles by User:Henry Delforn diff. It is hard to see there any attempt to treat the cases each on their merits. "If the page can be improved, this should be solved through regular editing", "Stubs and imperfect articles are awaiting further development, and so the potential of the topic should be considered", "If the article is not already tagged to note an existing problem, apply a tag", "Consider turning the page into a useful redirect or proposing it be merged", "If there is no discussion then start one, outlining your concerns", "When nominating due to sourcing or notability concerns, try to confirm that such sources don't exist", "Unless it is obviously a hopeless case, consider sharing your reservations with the article creator, an associated WikiProject, or on the article's talk page, and/or adding a cleanup tag, instead of bringing the article to AfD", and especially "If the article can be fixed through normal editing, then it is not a good candidate for AfD" are all exemplary pieces of advice from WP:BEFORE, and no attempt has been made to follow them. Charles Matthews (talk) 12:44, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Tim Song (talk) 01:30, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• The article certainly can't stay as it is. It could be moved to an appropriate title, and the current title redirected to Free algebra. If we can't find an appropriate title, redirecting without doing anything else is probably the best option for the moment, as that tells people looking for noncommutative polynomial what that should be. — Kusma ^talk 09:37, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete I cannot see any point to having this article. It is a fork of the Connes embedding problem, another article by Henry Delforn (talk · contribs) which is poorly written but capable of improvement. Non-commutative polynomials occur in many places in the subject of operator algebras, most notably in free probability theory, to which this article makes no reference. However, it seems more appropriate to treat their occurrence separately in the correct context, rather than a separate article. Mathsci (talk) 13:23, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Taking your point, a merge to unfork and a redirect of the title to free algebra is surely indicated. In fact I'd be content to have the content of this article placed on Talk:Connes embedding problem, for consideration, and then the title redirected. Charles Matthews (talk) 17:46, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Cirt (talk) 19:38, 19 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep so it can be improved through editing. Mathematicians always prefer to bite the newbie instead of doing some little work.  franklin  01:32, 20 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

And the little work I support is the one Kusma was proposing.  franklin  01:36, 20 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete. Given the content fork issues, the copyright problems involving its main contributor, and WP:NPOV issues with its too-narrow focus, it doesn't seem that this is a helpful contribution. No prejudice against someone later creating a proper article on the subject. —David Eppstein (talk) 02:22, 20 December 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.