Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Wikipe-tan (2nd nomination)

Wikipedia:Wikipe-tan

There's a couple of problems with this page.

First, it is masquerading as an article, which has confused a number of people. See the WP:FAKEARTICLE rationale.

Secondly, the utility of this page is dubious and the contentiousness of this page is obvious to those who have been following the controversies surrounding this particular attempt to make a mascot for Wikipedia. As has been pointed out, this is not the mascot of Wikipedia, so it's a bit strange that we would have a part of project-space devoted to this.

One possible solution to this issue might be to simply reorganize this as subpages of Wikipedia:WikiProject Anime and manga. This is a Wikiproject which has adopted this character as their mascot and, indeed, most of the instances of this character are associated with this group of fans.

Aside from the controversial nature of this page as it stands, the problem with keeping this page as a separate Wikipedia project is that it has historically encouraged problematic project content in the form of the recently deleted: Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Think of Wikipe-tan!‎. The particular issues surround the culture of moe in anime circles. Please read this section of the article. Now, I'm not going to take an explicit side in whether these criticisms are justified or not, but it seems to me that is pretty clear that this criticism will necessarily continue to play themselves out if this page is kept as a part of Wikipedia Project space and users are encouraged to "work" on Wikipe-tan for continued inclusion of images of her in project space and articles. If individual Wikipedia projects want to deal with individual images, I think this is fine, but this centralization of the character is problematic from the perspective of inclusiveness and, for example, the situations where certain depictions in the gallery of images are likely to drive good-faith contributors away who will see misogynistic or even lolicon implications in them.

I'm not recommending here a wholesale deletion of every instance of this character. I'm simply arguing that, as a part of "project space", this image should not have a dedicated page as it is too problematic and a distraction from WP:ENC.

IvoryMeerkat (talk) 03:08, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Anime and manga-related deletion discussions. -- G.A.S^talk 04:38, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Speedy Keep As this user continues to show bad faith toward trying to purge Wikipe-tan off Wikipedia in general. There's absolutely ZERO reason to delete this page as it stands. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 05:04, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Keep I see no images in Wikipedia:Wikipe-tan#Gallery which could be considered lolicon, and or drive people away in any way. Also, in the section Wikipedia:Wikipe-tan#Use_outside_Wikipedia_and_Wikimedia_organizations it list how many times Wikipe-tan has been used in a major news source. Dream Focus 05:31, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Keep. In reference to the specific points raised by the nominator:
  • WP:FAKEARTICLE is a guideline for user pages—based, in large part, on the general principle that Wikipedia is not a host for users' personal materials—and is not directly applicable to project-space pages. Even if the guideline were applicable here, however, the nominator presents no evidence that the page could reasonably be mistaken for an article by the average reader; an isolated instance of confusion is hardly sufficient reason to delete an established page.
  • The alleged "contentiousness" of the page appears to be, in large part, a product of the nominator's dedication to removing all mention of it from Wikipedia; see, for example, this discussion, or this one. The page, and the associated imagery, has existed since 2006; certainly, if there were indeed some great controversy over its existence, it should have become apparent before now.
  • There is a wide variety of project-space pages devoted to concepts that are also not official mascots (or official anything else, for that matter); Category:Wikipedia culture contains hundreds of similar pages, many of them well-established and widely known. The long-standing consensus of the community is clearly that a lack of official "status" is not in and of itself reason to remove material from project space.
  • The fact that another—now deleted!—page was found to be problematic is hardly a reason to delete this one; each page must be considered on its own merits.
  Overall, so long as the community's position is to allow pages related to Wikipedia culture in project space, I see no reason why this one should be singled out for deletion; it documents a well-established aspect of said culture, and there is no evidence that its existence causes any substantive disruption.

  If there are concerns regarding some particular image listed on the page, then those are best addressed by way of discussing the image itself; deletion of the page would do nothing to stop use of the images (which are hosted on Commons) in any case. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 05:33, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  I think the nitpicky argument that FAKEARTICLE is for "userspace" is ridiculous. There is more than just one isolated incident where this page is being treated as an article (see this and this. Your implied contention and the contention of others rudely commenting here that this is somehow only my problem is enough for me to cry foul on the WP:NPA front with your failure to comment on content rather than the contributor. There were enough people commenting that they disliked Wikipe-tan in general at the last MfD and even at Wikipedia talk:Wikipe-tan for this conversation to be considered something that should happen, I think. It would be nice to see someone in the echelons of Wikipedia power structure like yourself encouraging less personalization of the situation rather than more. Just to show I'm not the only one who finds problems with this character, Jimbo Wales according to the very page is not a fan, for example. You might ask him why. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 15:01, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  From WP:FAKEARTICLE: "Userspace is not a free web host and should not be used..." (emphasis mine). The assertion that the guideline applies to userspace is hardly "nitpicky" when the guideline explicitly states such!

  As for your other points, it is not at all a personal attack to point out that, prior to your concerted attempts to remove all references to this material—and this principle is quite relevant, given the spread, speed, and volume of your efforts—the page existed with for years with little or no controversy. It's hardly reasonable for you to create a controversy around the page and then argue that it is too "controversial" and must therefore be deleted.

  Jimmy's opinion, incidentally, is of limited relevance; but note that he did not suggest the page should be removed, merely that he personally was not a fan of it. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 15:20, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  The principles of FAKEARTICLE clearly apply to more than userspace... otherwise creating fake articles in Wikipedia space would be an obvious way for people to skirt the rules. And as to your continued personalizations: Maybe you'd like to explain how little-ol me "creates" a controversy? I thought a consensus model dictated that one person's opinion is supposed to be weighted less than a group's opinion. Either there is a controversy or there isn't. Shooting the messenger is not very heroic. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 15:29, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  Wikipedia is, for better or worse, not a democracy; the fact that a greater number of editors supports X than Y does not necessarily mean that X will be chosen over Y in a "consensus" discussion. It is quite common (if somewhat unfortunate, in my view) for a small group of vocal users, or even a single vocal user, to dominate a discussion and exercise disproportionate influence on its progress and outcome—particularly when that user produces such a quantity of commentary that others find it difficult to respond to it all. (If you're looking for specific examples, a perusal of arbitration cases from the past few years might prove of interest.) Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 16:54, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  Well, that's a certainly damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don't proposition if I've ever seen one. Wikipedia is not a democracy so that a small group of thoughtful editors can establish consensus despite being outnumbered. However, if they do this, then they run the risk of being accused of "dominating" the discussion and "exercising disproportionate influence". It really reads as if you would prefer that Wikipedia really was run as a democracy. If that's the case, might I recommend instead of pointing out personalities in these discussions you work to change the rather hare-brained rules codified at WP:CON? Your implied endorsement of the "IvoryMeerkat made a bad-faith nom" party line runs counter to behavioral guidance such as WP:AGF. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 19:48, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  Well if you got to WP:ANI after removing images from articles regardless case by case consensus or the relevance of the images to the said articles, this can't help AGF. Adding the fact that you started a discussion here and another one on WT:ANIME both related to Wikipe-tan which could be perceived as a hostile attempt of two pronged attack aiming to over-run opposing editors which helps even less AGF. The finishing touch is how you managed to infer the argument "supporters of Wikipe-tan" = "lolicon" = maybe also "pedophile". Even if this not what you wrote, this is how your argument was perceived but opposing editors. So there is no surprise that they are tossing AGF to the sewers. --KrebMarkt (talk) 22:58, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

  I suppose if your culture is that everyone who is accused of a crime is guilty, you'd have a point. It's really interesting that you think you've been able to determine my "aim" so poorly to be able to repeat false accusations that I made arguments that I did not make (some of which don't even make logical sense). What you are accusing me of is thoughtcrimes (even if you didn't actually say it, because other people think you have this or that motivation you are GUILTY!) If that's truly an acceptable cultural practice here, Wikipedia has no business being associated with the so-called "Free Culture" movement. Thankfully, it seems that the evidence is plain that the people who have opposed me, on the whole, have almost no real substance to their arguments and tend to resort to personal attacks almost immediately. It doesn't make their arguments any better. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 02:28, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

  The point is you have continually shown in your behavior (note: actions) things that make unable to assume good faith any more. You remove images for no reason to make a WP:POINT, you call us mysogenic pedophiles, and so on (Farix above displays the issues much better than I). I honestly can't see how anyone can count us as the 'bad guys' here, when when it's pretty clear what the truth is. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 03:08, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

  I don't think there's any particular doubt that IvoryMeerkat believes that Wikipedia would be better if all images of Wikipe-tan were removed. That's not a particularly controversial stance: I share it, but I don't do much about it because I don't care much about it. All WP:AGF requires of you is that you assume that IvoryMeerkat is editing in a way that he believes will improve the encyclopedia, and I don't see any real reason to doubt that. That you disagree about the effect of his changes is a completely separate issue.—Kww(talk) 03:40, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

• Delete per the reasoning at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Think of Wikipe-tan!. Apart from being pointless, the troll is a diversion that wastes the community's time and drives away potential contributers.--William S. Saturn (talk) 05:39, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• The page definitely does seem to violate WP:FAKEARTICLE. Some sort of template or message should be added to the top (similar to many userpages) to indicate this is not the case, unless the page can be otherwise changed to indicate this. Also, a concerted effort does need to be made to keep "inside" references to Wikipe-tan out of the article mainspace. If this can be achieved and agreed upon, then I'd feel this justifies a weak keep. Changing to neutral, I'm not sure it should be in the wikipedia space.--Yaksar (let's chat) 05:48, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Keep in mind that even if the page were moved, it would remain in the "Wikipedia:" namespace (albeit perhaps nested under some other page), with everything that entails; and that, as mentioned on the page, the image is used by a number of groups other than the Anime and manga WikiProject (including, at last count, the CVU, the Admin Coaching program, the Military history WikiProject, and Wikimedia Hong Kong). The proposal to move the page is based on an incorrect marginalization of the subject as being only "an anime thing"; it's rather more wide-spread than that. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 12:14, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Come now, I'm sure those four projects can make-do with keeping their illustrations without this particular page. Just because this page gets shunted or deleted does not mean it will be impossible for those projects to use images that are on commons or in file space. The proposal to move this page is based on the fact that the text, arguments, and gallery of images are almost entirely the work of the anime and manga group. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 14:45, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
      • Perhaps the current page is indeed largely the work of that particular WikiProject; but their role in creating it is not a convincing reason, in and of itself, for requiring it to reside on a subpage of the project. In any case, as you yourself point out, moving the page would do nothing at all to prevent the use of the images elsewhere; your allegations about the images' "misogynistic or even lolicon implications" are therefore quite irrelevant to the question of where the page should be located. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 14:51, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
        • The fact that one project has a major stake in this page suggests a natural way to shunt this page away from being an independent entity. I'm not taking your strawman zero-sum game approach here. An alternative option to outright deletion might be to consign this back to a nother project. I do not think it is a good idea for this page to be kept at all, but I offer the idea of subsuming it into another project as an option for those who might want to try out an intermediate step before deletion. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 15:07, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Keep - If anyone's concerned about the WP:FAKEARTICLE argument, stick an essay or humour or custom-made box at the top of the article to make it status clear. In the mean time, keep as fostering community organisation and engagement. I realise there's a limit to how many such pages we can keep without causing confusion, but this particular one seems well known and well-liked among its segment of the Wikipedia community and wouldn't be one of the first to go.- DustFormsWords (talk) 06:16, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Move to someplace deep in the bowels of the anime Wikiproject and forget about her. She isn't Wikipedia's mascot, is very unlikely to ever become Wikipedia's mascot, and serves no useful purpose. That said, if the anime Wikiproject wants to keep her around for some reason, I can't see a policy-based reason to say that they can't.—Kww(talk) 06:18, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Keep This isn't in main namespace, so it won't show up in search while looking for other topic, unless you want to. Currently, there's no article in Main namespace link to this project either, so I don't see how one can mistaken it as normal article unless you're looking for it. Troll? Only trolls I known are people who hate this simply because it's anime-like character and want to get rid of it. L-Zwei (talk) 06:20, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Speedy Keep Per Kirill's well reasoned statment. Also, I wish someone would remind the initiator of WP:POINT. Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 06:26, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Note I added a template to the article that will hopefully help clear up at least some of the issues with WP:FAKEARTICLE.--Yaksar (let's chat) 06:45, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Move to subpage of Wikipedia:WikiProject Anime and manga per nominator. I think the nominators argument is well put and I do not see it as being in bad faith. Also per Kww. --Bduke (Discussion) 08:09, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Move to Wikipedia:WikiProject Anime and manga/Wikipe-tan. It is an anime thing, not a wikipedia thing. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 09:13, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Move to Wikipedia:WikiProject Anime and manga/Wikipe-tan per nominator and above. --Kleinzach 09:38, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Speedy keep as this is obviously a bad faith nomination given IvoryMeerkat's previous comments.[1] and attempts to remove images of Wikipe-tan from WP:ANIME's project banner and from the Anime and manga portal.[2][3][4][5] IvoryMeerkat's war on everything related to Wikipe-tan needs to stop now. The page does not violate any Wikipedia policy and none of the images violate Wikipedia policy. And unlike Wikipedia:Think of Wikipe-tan!‎, there is nothing about the page that someone can misconstrue as insulting. IvoryMeerkat has also implied that other editors who defend Wikipe-tan are promoting pedophilia on Wikipeda, an offense that can result in an immediate and indefinite ban.[6][7][8] —Farix (t | c) 11:53, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Speedy Keep Bad faith nom, I do not think a move is warrented as other projects use wikipe-tan as well (her image and through userboxes) - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 12:40, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Comment looking at the article's history this is actully the Third AfD nomination, someone might want to fix this and link the past AfDs. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 12:46, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Delete or move to anime-space as suggested by others above, if they want to salvage it. According to Wikipedia:Project namespace, this section of the project is "...a namespace consisting of pages with information or discussion about Wikipedia." What exactly does this comic character have to to with the Wikipedia itself? Other than something that a tiny group has latched onto as some sort of very, very unofficial mascot, not much that I can see. As the nom noted, if people want to use these images in individual articles then that is an editorial decision to decide appropriateness or not. Apparently self-creation and such is covered by WP:OI. But this centralized, project-level recognition just has to go. Wikipe-tan has nothing to do with the rest of us. I will also note that all "speedy keep" calls are without merit and should be discarded when it comes time to close this. People can object to objectionable content in good faith. Farix's screed is particularly odious as it attempts to impose the proverbial "chilling effect" by suggesting the nom be blocked. Tarc (talk) 14:42, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • As far as I can tell, Farix is referring to the fact that those who promote pedophilia, as IvoryMeerkat has alleged some editors are doing, are banned—which is true enough—rather than suggesting that IvoryMeerkat himself would be banned for anything. Kirill ^{[talk] [prof]} 14:47, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• I read that comment the same way Kirill did. It's not a suggestion that the nominator be blocked, but pointing out that those who promote pedophilia are. LadyofShalott 15:01, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Perhaps we're all reading something differently then. IvoryMeerkat has called out people for supporting lolicon like Wikpe-tan, he at no time said anything about pedos. Tarc (talk) 15:08, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Except that it's not lolicon, so there's nothing to be "called out". Yes it's true that there have been sexual versions of Wikipe-tan made, even loli ones, but Rule 34 and all that. You can't blame people for the actions of other people like that. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 17:14, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• I believe it is, as do others. Tarc (talk) 17:22, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Well then I guess File:Girlgenderrole3.jpg is child porn, as is File:PortraitGirl2005-1a.jpg. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 18:02, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Cute. Do you have any pictures of girls dressed as strawmen ? Tarc (talk) 19:03, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - I will also note that there is a working draft at User:Jinnai/Wikipe-tan of what appears to be an attempt at an actual article on this Wikipe-tan nonsense. So if anything, this problem is spreading and getting worse, not better. Tarc (talk) 14:44, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Move to a sub-page of the anime and manga project. It is they, not the entire Wikipedia community, who generally have an interest in Wikipe-tan, and Wikipe-tan is not representative of Wikipedia as a whole. While IvoryMeerkat has expressed opinions on Wikipe-tan, it does not automatically follow that this is a bad faith nomination. Now that other opinions of move and delete have been expressed, any "speedy keep" is out of the question. LadyofShalott 14:59, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• But what if wikipe-tan is being used by multiple projects? I see images and use of wikipe-tan under Wikipedia:WikiProject Essays, Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history, Wikipedia:WikiProject Scouting, over at Wikipedia:Motto of the day, and is even an admin icon (Wikipe-tan sweeping) and over here Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in adminship discussions. I did not look under all the images but I am sure that there are many other areas of wikipedia that also use wikipe-tan. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:19, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Moving this page to a subpage of the anime project doesn't in any way prevent the other projects from accessing files and images that have Wikipe-tan in them. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 15:22, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

• Keep at current location, as the character is useful for mock-up screenshots that go beyond the Anime and Manga project. — PyTom (talk) 16:26, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Can you explain this and/or give an example? What makes this page particularly useful for screenshots as compared to any other page of the project? LadyofShalott 16:36, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Wikipe-tan is a freely licensed human character, which is actually pretty rare. That makes her useful for creating screenshots such as the one that IO created to illustrate the Visual Novel article. What's more, since she's an original character, she doesn't bring in the baggage that a character from an established work might. As pointed out by Kirill above, she's used by multiple projects, which makes the Wikipedia namespace more appropriate than a single project's. And it's not like the Wikipedia namespace is only used for policies and guidelines - if essays that many people disagree with can live there, why can't a page like this? — PyTom (talk) 20:25, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• I think what you are proposing is something like a subset of Wikipedia:WikiProject Images and Media/Free. It would be great to have a list of original characters that are freely-licensed. Encouraging those with the skills to make such characters to make them for Wikipedia or Commons would be fantastic, but this page doesn't seem to do that. IvoryMeerkat (talk) 15:24, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

• Keep at current location. As Kirill mentioned, Wikipe-tan is also adopted by the Counter-Vandalism Unit, the Admin Coaching program, the Military history WikiProject, and Wikimedia Hong Kong. The last of which even printed her out to be used in Wikimedia HK functions and have someone dressed like her to attend. Like it or not, Wikipe-tan has extended beyond the Anime and Manga Wikiproject and is a sizable part of Wikipedia culture; and thus the page cannot be moved as a subpage of that Wikiproject, much less be deleted. The only real concern here, WP:FAKEARTICLE, can be (and is) dealt with with a header note. _dk (talk) 17:52, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Speedy keep per WP:SNOW. – Allen4names 18:21, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Huh? SNOW obviously doesn't apply here, as LadyofShalott pointed out above. Drmies (talk) 18:50, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Move per LadyofShalott. Despite the multitude of keep votes here (and the somewhat random accusations of bad faith, etc.), this is not a big thing, certainly not big enough (in terms of representing the WP community, as the Lady pointed out) for a spot outside of a subpage of a project. She does not represent me and I find nothing cute about it. The "she's not a lolicon" argument is just distracting--that difference, between moe and lolicon, that the anime experts here say is so obvious, I don't see that. I don't doubt the good faith of at least some of the contributors to the page and (some of) its images, and that's one reason for me not to immediately call for deletion (i.e., right now I don't mind the history being preserved, for instance), but I certainly want lower visibility, and I really never want to hear the claim that she represents anything but a small but vocal minority of contributors. Drmies (talk) 19:00, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Move but Keep part of the wiki-history of not part of some wiki projects life. Denial mode that ever existed wont do. People can try to wash whiter than white all they will manage is to create bigger holes within the wikipedia community if one ever existed at all. I also accuse also the article nominator to be on a personal crusade trying to steamroll editors who don't share his view. Sorry you may consider Anime/Manga as "low culture" or "craps" and its editors as "scums" or "retards" but unfortunately for you we are still part of Wikipedia however much to your chagrin. So much for people preaching tolerance & diversity in Wikipedia... --KrebMarkt (talk) 20:27, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
• Keep per Kirill's well-argued rationale. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 00:35, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
• Keep She's a part of wikipedia culture that's been around as long as I've been editing. Maybe not an official mascot but Jimmy Wales has referred to her as a "mascot" in at least one post. Half the nom's arguments are spurious and I see no harm in keeping her. As mentioned she goes beyond just the anime project to other wiki projects as well. 65.29.47.55 (talk) 07:00, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

• Where does Jim Wales refer to wikipe-tan as a mascot? Wikipedia:Argumentum ad Jimbonem - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 12:22, 1 March 2011 (UTC)