Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Port Harcourt

Portal:Port Harcourt

Portal:Port Harcourt (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Abandoned manual-style mini-portal on a marginal topic. Possibly paid-for spam.

This portal was created in 2013 by Afrowildchild (talk · contribs), one of many blocked sockpuppets of Stanleytux (talk · contribs); see Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of Stanleytux.

It languished for a year with no content beyond one selected picture: Portal:Port Harcourt/Selected picture/1, which could be a candidate for a worst-ever-selected-pic prize. The portal was enhanced a little in 2014 by @Stanleytux (editing under his own account this time). Special:PrefixIndex/Portal:Port Harcourt shows that there only 4 selected articles and 4 selected biographies, all created by Stanleytux in 2014 except for Portal:Port Harcourt/Selected article/4, created in 2016.

And there the portal has languished for 3 years. Stanleytux has been blocked since December 2018 for a second round of sockpuppetry after already getting a final-final chance (see User talk:Stanleytux#December_2018). There is strong whiff of undisclosed paid editing around that account, although I'm not clear where the allegations got to. But Stanleytux and the socks have engaged in bouts of spammy external links and of massive overcategorisation,of Rivers-State-related topics. So whatever exactly was going on, this portal is not the product of a trusted, good faith editor, and I would not assume that the choice of selected content was made with NPOV in mind. And Stanleytux is not going to be editing, so this dodgy portal is abandoned.

Port Harcourt is the state capital city of Rivers State in Nigeria. Its 2016 population is estimated at 1,865,000. If that was a European or North American city, we'd probably have lots of content and maybe enough editors to sustain a portal, but Wikipedia's systemic bias makes that less likely in Africa. Sad, but that's how it it is, and as showcases for content, portals have to follow articles not lead them.

The head article Port Harcourt is maybe overrated at B-class, but with lots of links and the navbox Template:Port Harcourt, it's a much better navigational hub than the sockmaster's abandoned mini-portal. Plus the head article has way more pictures than the portal. Per WP:PORTAL's guiding principle is that "Portals serve as enhanced 'Main Pages' for specific broad subjects" ... but this another example of portal as severely degraded version of main article.

I seriously doubt that we will l ever have enough skilled, non-socking editors to maintain a portal on this topic, let alone create enough quality content to feed it. But without clear, broad-consensus guidelines on portal scope, I can't say this is definitively too narrow ... so I propose that this sockpuppeteer's portal and its sub-pages be deleted per WP:TNT, without prejudice to recreating a curated portal not based on a single other page, in accordance with whatever criteria the community may have agreed at that time. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:00, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

• Port Harcourt is a state capital, with nearly 2 million population, so could conceivably form a decent portal basis. The header article is ok, aside from one orange-level section tag that could be replaced by requesting further citations. There seems to be a fair amount of Port Harcourt coverage. However I tend to agree with the nominator that after the blocking of the creator, there's a very limited chance anyone is going to pick this up and develop it, and with a total of 8 articles it does not meet the minimum threshold. (And the prize for Worst Selected Picture would be stiffly contested. I don't think this would even be a finalist.) So I'm leaning delete unless anyone comes forward to offer to develop it. Has the Wikiproject been notified? Espresso Addict (talk) 05:56, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
• Question - When EA asks about a WikiProject, do they mean WT:WikiProject Nigeria? Robert McClenon (talk) 17:48, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

@Robert McClenon: That seems the most likely to cough up a replacement maintainer, yes. Espresso Addict (talk) 18:26, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

• Delete:
  • • Yet another portal created, not by a portalspammer, but by a spammer.
    • Yet another portal created by a blocked account, so not likely to be maintained by a good-faith editor.
    • WP:TNT
    • Recommend Salt to Extended-Confirmed Protection so that a portal can only be created by an experienced neutral editor.
    • It isn't clear who is paying for the portal, maybe the Tourist Bureau, but it probably doesn't matter.
    • Notify the WikiProject.

Robert McClenon (talk) 17:48, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

I don't know about salting, but we could really do with a Portals for Creation process. Espresso Addict (talk) 18:26, 30 April 2019 (UTC)