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: keep, kind of dumb but not malicious or evil. No opposition to someone sticking ((historical)) on it if they want. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 05:10, 3 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Wiki-Hell[edit]

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Wikipedia:Wiki-Hell (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Inane, allegedly "humorous" essay which does not seem to make any kind of coherent point other than being a petty display of tribalism: delineating an out-group and then vilifying it.

When someone needs to be told what kinds of content/conduct are unacceptable on Wikipedia, there are much better pages to direct them to; they have the advantage of not gratuitously antagonising the reader. This page is just childish and serves no purpose. —Keφr 10:20, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep as primary author. Comedy is in the eye of the beholder. Also, this is of historical importance to the project, as editors have used it as a link to explain their !votes in deletion discussions and similar contexts. If the current content is not kept, something has to be here to inform readers perusing such discussions of the gist of what editors making such links intended to convey. bd2412 T 11:18, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comedy, wherever it lies, cannot be the sole reason a page is kept. Otherwise we might as well keep articles generated by a Markov chain built from policy pages; I can generate gigabytes of this stuff. Because surely each individual page will be funny to someone — for about ten minutes.

  As for the legibility of deletion arguments, I decided to examine if this claim holds water. I have counted 104 direct links to this page, of which 58 appear to be from deletion discussions. Here is a random sample of five such links from deletion arguments:

  • Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Phone rule:

    Delete this utter nonsense - straight to the new and somewhat improved Wiki-Hell!!! -- BD2412 ^talk 05:28, 2005 Jun 24 (UTC)

  • Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/White dragon:

    Send to Wiki-Hell!!!. BD2412 T 03:49, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

  • Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Law at work

    Delete. Adverts go to Wiki-Hell! -- BD2412 ^talk 15:25, 2005 Jun 8 (UTC)

  • Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Scrotasm

    I condemneth this neohoaxism to Wiki-Hell!!!  BD2412 ^talk 03:40, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

  • Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/US Government Simulator

    Delete Advertising foolishness which deserves to go straight to Wiki-Hell. Digital Thief 21:45, 17 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  I could provide more, but this should be representative enough. I very much doubt that the legibility of these arguments will be harmed if the nominated page is deleted; link or not, they basically amount to "whoever made that page is evil" or something along those lines, i.e. little more than a veiled personal attack, just as inane as the page itself.

  I do also note that the vast majority of these arguments (50 by my count) seem to be made by a single user who is also the page's author, which in my eyes casts some doubt on its historical significance. —Keφr 22:12, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  Even if there were only a handful by other editors, those links need to be respected. Also, uses outside of deletion discussions are as relevant as those in such discussions. bd2412 T 23:52, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  This was not enough to keep Technical 13's "CSD:" redirects, even though there have been a handful of other users who also used them; they are not difficult to find, and yet few people bothered to mention that. —Keφr 17:40, 2 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep, seems funny to me. Specifically it seems to be a reasonably skillful parody of Dante's Inferno framed in a Wikipedia context, with allusions to Dungeon's and Dragons and other geek stuff thrown in. May also be useful in introducing some of the main things that need to be deleted, so newbies who read this essay can recognize them, with convenient links to further information. Siuenti (씨유엔티) 11:32, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • One of the things that are necessary for humour to work is some kind of shared context. The context need not be very elaborate; a human being with a capacity for and desire to avoid pain should understand slapstick just fine. More sophisticated forms of humour require other kinds of context. Unfortunately, in Wikipedia, where the edit button is just one click away from an untrained person completely unfamiliar with the community, such shared context is non-negligibly often absent.

  Imagine you are a newbie. Being a newbie, your judgement of, say, notability is somewhat flawed. You write an article about some niche technical company you have heard about recently, because you are a technical person, not very much into Late Medieval art. You find it decent enough to be submitted, so you do. Soon enough, you see it nominated for deletion, where people say the page, or yourself, should be sent to some kind of bizarro-hell. I doubt you would appreciate the Dante references, and I doubt that any amount of "JUST A PRANK BRO" disclaimers would soothe your frustration. —Keφr 17:40, 2 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep Perhaps we should add busybodies like the nominator to the essay. I don't think it's particularly funny, but that's not for me -- or you -- to say. Let people have their fun. Jeesh. EEng 14:58, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Perhaps we should add busybodies like the nominator to the essay." — see, this is exactly the kind of primitive us-versus-them mindset that in my opinion be better avoided, and is unfortunately encouraged by this essay. And who is it to judge if it is humorous if not you and me? And should someone finding a page funny be a sufficient reason to keep it, even though it is arguably detrimental to the stated goals of Wikipedia — collaboratively building a free-content encyclopedia? —Keφr 19:28, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well, primitive is one way of putting it. "Too subtle for some to appreciate" is another. EEng 01:56, 26 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I think it might be easier to collaborate in a Wiki where few people appear to listen if we are allowed to blow off some steam with humour. Siuenti (씨유엔티) 23:31, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment @BD2412: seems to be the author, I think BD is supposed to declare that when !voting. Siuenti (씨유엔티) 23:50, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

   Done, thanks. bd2412 T 23:52, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment in order not to break inbound links if this page is tossed on the bonfire, a redirect or better IMO a soft redirect could be left in place. Siuenti (씨유엔티) 00:09, 26 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment the essay also whets my appetite to read Bonfire of the Vanities or whatever that fictional element first appeared in so I can fully appreciate the "alleged" humour. Siuenti (씨유엔티) 00:12, 26 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - A reasonable ((humorous essay)). It also has historical value because it has been in existence since 2005 and has ~150 links. Deprecating it with ((historical)) may be due. — Godsy ^(TALK_CONT) 09:58, 26 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep, funny and still (mostly) accurate, 12 years later. I suspect our easily-offended nominator simply isn't getting the joke, which is unfortunate for them but not at all a reason to deprive anyone else of the material. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 21:16, 26 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  The one area where I have noted a distinct drop-off in cruft is attempts to create articles on absurd made up sex positions. bd2412 T 23:24, 26 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Come again? EEng 02:44, 27 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

WP:EYEROLL. bd2412 T 02:47, 27 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I do the best I can with the material available. BTW your EYE is really red! EEng 03:55, 27 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep, If I'm late to the party, I hope my vote is still considered. I didn't find the article particularly funny, but then I didn't understand more than half of the references to Wiki pranks and monkeyshines. I followed some of the links, and I have to say it was interesting in a morbid way. As was already mentioned, this article has been around a while without offending the masses or the serious editors sensibilities, so perhaps it should remain. It does address several problem areas in a way that leaves no doubt that they are problems. It does serve the purpose of giving users a place to consign violators of Wiki policy.  — Myk Streja _Talk to me 04:25, 2 June 2017 (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.