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 no consensus. to delete. As many have said here, AfD is not for merging and that can be discussed on the article talk pages or a project talk page. No one is arguing for the deletion of this material and where it lives doesn't require continued AfD StarM 17:19, 15 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The Galaxy Being[edit]

The Galaxy Being (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

Retroactive test case: This is one of approximately 150 The Outer Limits episode articles that I by-and-by boldmerged last week with the reasoning "plot-only article (WP:NOT#PLOT), no apparant WP:NOTABILITY" (I do that a lot for shows whose wiki coverage seems to have been abandoned by fans). All but three TOL episode articles follow the same formula: One-sentence lead, one-sentence plot Introduction, Opening narration quote, one- or two-paragraph Plot (which I merged into List of The Outer Limits episodes), Closing narration quote, very occasionally an unsourced Trivia section, Cast list, EL. One editor is concerned about the legitimacy of my merge approach and agreed to an AfD for objective outsider feedback. (I know that my wrist will get slapped for retroactively justifying mergers through AfD, but since my wrist would also get slapped for immediately going to AfD before considering a merger, what can I do? I am firm in my opinion that these articles in their former state don't need articles. I have no prejudice against recreation of articles whose notability gets established, but that hasn't happened yet, and I doubt it will for most of them. Keeping/Restoring the articles now is pretty much redundant to the information in the LoE.) – sgeureka ^t•c 13:13, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - A 150 episode list cannot contain any information and still be practical due to page limits size. My 300 baud modem just can't take it. WilyD 14:31, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Season articles would solve this problem pretty easily. You could also divide this LoE into two LoEs, because they are two shows. Either way, that isn't really a reason to keep individual episode articles. – sgeureka ^t•c 14:49, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Err, maybe. Either way, to satisfy the GFDL you'd have to keep the individuals as redirects, so merging isn't an AfD outcome anyhow. It's a "regular editorial decision". WilyD 15:02, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • Did you read the nom? As for the second part of your reply, per WP:AFD mergers are a legitmate AfD outcome, and GDFL would also be satisfied by moving the episode articles to subpages in talkspace (although I don't think that's necessary). In this case, the only "problem" is that merger has already happened but is questioned now. – sgeureka ^t•c 15:29, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • Xe is quite right. I suggest that you read the notice that is right at the top of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion, as well as Wikipedia:Deletion policy#Alternatives to deletion. AFD is not a big hammer, and is not the venue to come when an adminstrator hitting a delete button forms no part of what one wants. As far as deletion discussions are concerned, merger is just a variant on keeping an article. No deletion, or any other administrator tool, is involved. Any editor, even one without an account, has all of the tools required to perform an article merger. It is an ordinary editorial process. Uncle G (talk) 16:34, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge As per the nominating editor.Theseeker4 (talk) 16:00, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• This really shouldn't have been brought to AfD, but merge per nominator. Agree with WilyD, however, in concerns of scope; better to split the list into sections for each series rather than mash them all together. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 16:18, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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• The description of the article given in the nomination is now inaccurate. I also note that although article talk pages are there precisely to discuss controversial mergers, Talk:The Galaxy Being is currently nonexistent and there is zero discussion at Talk:List of The Outer Limits episodes. AFD is not for discussing mergers. It is, as the name Articles for deletion says, for discussion of deletions. Article merger does not involve deletion, or AFD, at any stage of the process. This is not Wikipedia:Requests for comment or even Wikipedia:Proposed mergers. Do not nominate articles for deletion unless you actually want an administrator to delete an article and its entire edit history. Uncle G (talk) 16:34, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment; however as there is a move afoot to banish individual episode articles, this is not necessarilly completely an improper AFD because there are those who want these articles removed. Which brings me to my vote... 23skidoo (talk) 17:31, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep all Outer Limits. Like Twilight Zone, the Outer Limits is considered a major, notable, and widely covered anthology series featuring productions of short story adaptations and original works by notable SF authors. Each episode has individual notability and merging into season lists would be illogical and unhelpful as this is not a series with continuing characters. I support the notion of some series having their episodes combined into lists when the individual episodes are not notable (Mission: Impossible being an example), but The Outer Limits is an example of a series that demands individual treatment. (Note: this refers to the original 1960s series only, and not necessarily the later remake series; a separate argument would need to be made as to whether the revival established notability on its own). 23skidoo (talk) 17:31, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment I endorse the noms WP:BOLD editing and in keeping with the spirit of Wikipedia should continue with their good work. My impression of the nomination is not for AfD but should have been a request for comment or a 3rd opinion to the editor that was questioning the noms actions. It appears that the nom is following WP:EPISODE.--Pmedema (talk) 18:46, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Support merger - regardless of the formatting of the discussion and regardless of whether this particular article has been improved, I support the initiative of merging individual episode stubs into either a single list of article or by-season series of lists. If any individual episode has received substantive coverage in reliable sources then I have no objection obviously to undoing the redirect and establishing an actual sourced article. No series "demands individual treatment" for each of its episodes as a matter of course and I wish more editors took the view of the nominator and didn't rush to create individual articles for every episode of every series. Otto4711 (talk) 21:31, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep all Outer Limits. User:Sgeureka not only merged all 150 episodes into one single page. He just removed all episodes, without any discussion with community, and removed all links to these episodes from this List of TOL episodes. May be, adding a short summaries to this list is a good idea, but my position is that all these articles must be recreated. Most part of these articles were created 2 or 3 years ago, but most of the users (who created these pages) are not still writing at Wikipedia, - and I cannot to bring them to this discussion to vote for re-creation. Krasss (talk) 21:45, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Would you elaborate why these article must they be recreated? The fact that the last TOL episode aired 6 years ago and that these stubs were created 2 or 3 years ago yet still don't contain anything non-plotty or notability-establishing is kind of a sign that recreating them now doesn't solve any of the problems they've had for years. – sgeureka ^t•c 09:41, 11 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • 1) Note, that the last TOL episode was aired 6 years ago at first time. And it is not a reason to delete any articles about films. 2) "...Doesn't solve any of the problems they've had for years" - what concretely problems do you mean? There was no any problems with these films. 3) The articles about episodes contains not only a short summaries, they contains detailed plot of these films, and other information - for example, nominations, awards, influence on culture & science etc. Krasss (talk) 11:53, 11 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep all Outer Limits, per 23skidoo. Notable show. This program has had major impact on most of the science fiction anthologies that followed it as well as major motion pictures such as The Terminator. --Captain Infinity (talk) 03:26, 11 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • This AfD is about what to do with stubby episode articles, not a deletion attempt for The Outer Limits, so the notability of the show is not really important here. – sgeureka ^t•c 09:41, 11 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • It is really important, - so as The Outer Limits is not a multi-serial film. TOL consists from different episodes based on different stories of different authors. For this reason, each episode of TOL has its own notability. Krasss (talk) 11:53, 11 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment Yes, there are alternatives to AfD, but I considered AfD to be the quickest and most objective process to discuss merged stubs. If someone objected to my bold-merger of a (hypothetical) Marriage and family life of Albert Einstein stub into Albert Einstein#Marriage and family life, I'd bring the stub to AfD just the same. – sgeureka ^t•c 09:41, 11 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • A "quick decision" is not necessarily a correct decision. And AfD is not necessarilay an "objective process". By adding the deletion option to what otherwise would be a discussion between keep vs. merge vs. redirect, it creates bias from what can be called the "decoy effect" (an additional but inferior option may bias choice towards one that is clearly superior to the new option but not necessarily superior to all other options), or the "compromise effect" (by taking a position more extreme than what one desires, "compromise" is encourage towards the real desired outcome). DHowell (talk) 00:54, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - I keep finding excellent Outer Limits articles in Google's cache, but when I click on them, all I get is a near useless list. The details that these articles provide are useful and informative. What on Earth is the rationale for deleting them? I also note that delete is the correct term here, since much of the information contained in the individual articles is not present in the episode list, i.e., it is deleted as a result of this "merge". For this reason, this mass deletion almost seems like vandalism to me. Vttoth (talk) 14:15, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Television-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 18:07, 12 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science fiction-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 18:07, 12 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep all Outer Limits episodes. The sources that Uncle G has added to this article prove that this, and most, if not all, Outer Limits episodes are individually notable. Articles at the season level make little sense as this is an anthology series where each episode is an individual self-contained story, with different actors, characters, writers, etc. The only "contintuity" here is the opening narration and closing narration and general format of the show. Further, as Uncle G points out, this should never have gone to AfD in the first place. I don't know what we must do to squash the misconception that AfD is the place to go to get a consensus on merge or redirect decisions, but I believe these type of nominations are a waste of time and do more to encourage factions, stifle consensus building, and drive away productive editors, than to encourage collaboration towards a true consensus outcome. DHowell (talk) 00:37, 14 November 2008 (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.