This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints.

So I've closed an articles for deletion discussion, and you want to know why I closed it the way I did. Here are some general comments about my AFD closing style:

• Deletion discussions are not a vote. I generally do not even count the number of comments on each side of a discussion. I may close the debate in a manner that is counter to a strict numerical tally of each side. Why? I am looking for a rough consensus as to what should be done. Also, just because a numerical vote count looks like a 50/50 split, I may not close as no consensus; I will weigh the quality of the arguments made by each side, and that weight may drastically shift the end result from what a numerical tally would indicate.

• However, in closing I will use common sense and reason. If there are 10 people commenting at a discussion, all of whom are active, longterm editors, and 9 are arguing for one result and one person is arguing for another result, it is highly unlikely that the argument of the one person will be convincing enough to sway it in that direction. This is not a vote count; it is an admittance that after a full discussion, there is a strong consensus as to what should be done with an article, and that such a consensus is not a unanimous agreement, but a reflection of the general feeling of those taking part in the discussion.

• I close on a continuum of results. What does this mean? This means that there is a range of possible closes, and based on the weight of the arguments made, the close will point at one of the possible closes. This also means that a view that had a minority of people supporting it may be the close, if it reflects a balanced weight of all parties. The continuum that I employ is visually rendered as:

• When I close a discussion, I am closing it per the community consensus on the article; frequently I disagree with the community consensus, but that does not change my close. Closing an article that I would have kept with a result of delete serves as a reminder that my opinion of the article does not figure in the final result. That is correct: I do not include my opinion of an article when weighing rough consensus.

• As of April 9th, 2009, I have closed approximately 4,800 articles for deletion discussions in the following manner:

• I am reasonably accurate in my closes. Of the 4,800 closes, 47 have been brought to deletion review, which closed as follows:

Details at User:MBisanz/DRV.

This works out to a 99.9% accuracy rate in closing debates. What does this mean? This means that usually my closes are highly accurate and reflect community consensus. What else does this mean? That I do make errors. If something looks funny to you; ask me. I am more than happy to review and explain my actions.

• Some pet peeves I have when closing AfDs:

• Multiple articles in one AFD are annoying. If I see an AfD with 10 articles listed, that means a couple things. Remember, keep it simple: 1 article, 1 debate; unless there is a really good reason to list a bunch of articles.

1. I can't script close it.

2. People may have split their comments to Keep some and Delete others; this make consensus harder to interpret.

3. Some article may have been listed after the AfD was opened, making some comments inapplicable.

• Comments on the nominator or the commentors. I don't care if the person who started the debate has 10 edits or 100,000 edits. I don't care if they were blocked last week or passed WP:RFB this week. I want comment on the article under discussion. WP:RFC/U is thataway.

• Please read over Wikipedia:Guide to deletion and Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions. They are quite useful. If I see comments of "Keep, under-represented topic" or "Delete, we already have deleted X", those comments will not be weighted strongly. If I see "Keep, meets bullet 3 of notability guide X" or "Delete, fails WP:RS as it is not listed in any topic journals", those are comments I will weigh strongly, as they are based in policy, and show an examination of the specific article under consideration.

• And lastly, have fun, don't stress AfD. I've had articles deleted and I know it isn't fun. I also know that there are literally millions of articles to be written, and if your first try is deleted, move on and keep trying, eventually you will succeed.