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This page was nominated for deletion on 22 October 2008. The result of the discussion was Speedy keep.

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See for example Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dr. Nick. When AfD nominators dare to mention that a merge is possible, sometimes people will vote 'Keep, discuss at merge first'. This in turn makes AfD nominators not want to bother to identify possible merge targets in fear of such votes, which is damaging (reduces the chance of some content being rescued). Just like a merge target can be proposed in a comment/vote, there shouldn't be any bias against nominations which mention this as a possible outcome (ie. 'let's discuss whether this should be deleted or merged'). Thoughts? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 04:18, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think it depends on what the nominator is proposing. If the nominator wants a merge as an outcome then they definitely should not be bringing it to AFD. They should open a discussion at the article or else just be WP:BOLD. I think WP:SK#1 was the correct response in your example nomination and that's how I would have voted as did most of the participants. Sometimes nominators bring a page to AFD because they are too lazy, or don't have the confidence, to execute a merge of the material themselves. That quite rightly should be strongly discouraged—it unnecessarily creates a battleground where an easy compromise existed. The whole reason for existence of a separate venue for deletion discussions (away from the article talk page) is that a deletion requires an administrator. It exists for problems that can't be solved by ordinary editors at the page in question. SpinningSpark 10:42, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Merge is a valid outcome from AFD, and a nominator can be open to that or not at their preference. Further, a nominator may be unclear in their own mind if deletion or merge is best and is asking the community for input. AFD is a discussion, not a death sentence.--Paul McDonald (talk) 12:56, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The scenario you bring up might be better addressed at Wikipedia:Arguments_to_avoid_in_deletion_discussions#Surmountable_problems. WP:DELETIONNOTCLEANUP is a correct shortcut there, but having WP:AFDNOTCLEANUP seems to lead to a lot of confusion in AfD discussions. A lot of times AfD is a place for cleanup when the conversation moves away from delete, but towards redirect/merge because the notability of the topic is already housed at a different article as Paul gave an example of above. A lot of times, redundant article creations are by new or student editors with poorly written content where cleanup is the general concern, and the redirect/merge content discussion occurs in part at AfD as one of its core options outside of keep/delete. I've been coming back to this section thinking about how to improve it, and part of that might be putting the focus more on !voting delete as not cleanup rather than AfD itself (which an additional sentence or two on how redirect/merges can come up at AfD when cleanup is a concern.

I'll try to tackle some draft text at a later date, but I figured I'd throw it out there on this essay talk page for now. Kingofaces43 (talk) 22:07, 16 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I just added the text below. I think this elucidates this topic somewhat. I am open to comments on this. thanks.

===Corollary to above===

For certain items, the fact that they exist may be enough reason to create an entry; such as e.g. a Top 40 song, a major network sitcom, a published work, a regulatory agency, motor vehicle, government entity or policy, elected official, historical event, war, geographical unit, etc etc; their mere existence often is enough reason to keep them in an entry here. But for the most part, such entries don't generally come up for deletion anyway. Thus, those items that can be kept merely because they "exist" are those which fall into some widely-accepted area of importance, based on cultural, historical, political, or societal significance.

thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 15:10, 4 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps you meant something other than "corollary": it certainly doesn't follow from the invalidity of the "it exists" argument that sometimes "it exists" is a valid reason to have an article. You are describing standards for having an article (English Wikipedia notability), which is separate from "it exists" arguments. isaacl (talk) 16:26, 4 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I reverted the change pending further discussion, as it focused on notability in a way that served to support the "it exists" argument, even though this essay is covering arguments to avoid. isaacl (talk) 16:33, 4 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

In some circumstances, a newborn may be notable for the circumstances of its conception or birth. For example, Louise Brown seems to be notable only for being "the first human to have been born after conception by in vitro fertilisation, or IVF." Therefore, if she is notable now, then she was already notable as a newborn. (Looking at the discussion of merge proposals on that article's talk page, the question of her being a newborn wasn't even raised as an argument for deletion.) Similarly, the first human clone will be notable from birth, and if we knew who was the first person born by C-Section, that person would be notable too.47.139.46.84 (talk) 18:00, 15 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Why is this included here, just under bare !votes? The section even includes a self-defeating statement: "If the rationale provided in the nomination includes a comprehensive argument, specific policy references and/or a compelling presentation of evidence in favour of keeping or deletion, an endorsement of the nominator's argument may be sufficient." -- yeah. That's typically the only time when people say "per nom". There is no virtue in just repeating the same arguments already well articulated by someone else just for the sake of repeating them. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 23:36, 20 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Per Rhododendrites, I see nothing wrong with a 'per X' !vote, when it is a valid point. It also can help us avoid duplicating masses of text that are making the same point. Best Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 15:21, 21 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Absent any argument to retain it, I've gone ahead and removed it. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 15:17, 24 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]