Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Kosovo

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was Delete. Besides inactivity, numerous POV problems have clearly plagued this project. If revived in the future, it would be best to start fresh. Xoloz (talk) 17:03, 19 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:WikiProject Kosovo

Propose deletion of project page and all project subpages, templates, categories, etc. Project is basically very inactive, with so far as I can tell recent activity being about how an earlier proposed merge was "illegal". Clear and explicit concerns have been expressed on the talk page regarding potential POV pushing, including individuals saying that they have the right to remove members at any time. Also, there is no good reason given for why a project which only two listed members should continue to function, particularly as the founder indicates on his user page that he has retired from wikipedia. Given the history of contentiousness regarding this subject, the contentiousness displayed on this page by at least one of the same parties in those earlier instances, the narrow scope of this project, and the fact that there already is an established national project more than adequately equipped to deal with the subject, I can see no good reason for the separate existence of this project. I would not necessarily object to its existence as a task force, but one party has evidently unilaterally decided such was "illegal". John Carter (talk) 14:25, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - It looks like this was recreated by User:CrnaGora in May 07 after deletion in some other form and then merged two days later to WP:SERBIA by User:Bolonium without discussion. The creator of the "new" project stopped editing in June 07. The talk page goes back to 06 for some reason and that's where the discussion relating to removing members at any time comes from - is it possible that the deletion was never completed, that the talk page never got deleted with the project so that when the new project was created it had a talk page already with old stuff in it? The editor who had made that suggestion (User:Hipi_Zhdripi) was subsequently blocked for a year from editing any articles in this topic and is not currently listed as a member of the project. Also, the Project would appear to be subject to the WP:SANCTIONs in Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Macedonia (technically only applies to articles but sanctions written very broadly). That being said, there is only one active user of the new project and he or she not only said the merger was "illegal" but summarily reverted it after it had been merged for 7 months! It should be noted that the only discussion that really seems to go with the project as currently constituted is the last section relating to the merger.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 19:52, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

To summarize - Delete.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 19:53, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
delete One look at the talk page shows it to be incredibly POV and political, where other groups are held to high standards. Chris (クリス) (talk) 20:04, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep, the merger was indeed illegal as only one person had supported it and no other users had discussed the possibility of a merger, so it had to be reverted. And according to a comment made by Bolonium on the project's discussion page, he said that WP:SERBIA covers more ground than WP:KOSOVO, but look at it this way, Belgrade has its own WikiProject, should WP:SERBIA cover that? Yes, but there is a WikiProject for Belgrade any. Same goes for WikiProject Serbian Orthodox Church. Besides, WikiProject Kosovo is a descendant of the Serbian WikiProject, so technically, it has the rights to overtake WP:SERBIA in Kosovo-related articles, no? --Prevalis (talk) 20:54, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Actually, a WikiProject by definition is supposed to be a collaborative effort. It is extremely hard to see how a group with only one active member can remotely qualify as such. John Carter (talk) 00:17, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That is true, however, there is another active member who has joined the project yesterday, with the possibility of another two-three joining in the next week. You must realize that WikiProjects take time to grow, its membership consisting of one or two members in the beginning. --Prevalis (talk) 00:39, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I do realize that. However, considering that the group began in May, 2007, and had only one member until earlier this month, I believe that the grace period has probably already elapsed.John Carter (talk) 00:56, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but the project was unconditionally merged into the Serbian WikiProject two days after its recreation, though I doubt User:CrnaGora didn't realize this merger, nor did anybody else until now. So technically, this "new" version of the project can be considered a recreation from the former that was, as previously said, merged. --Prevalis (talk) 00:57, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The merger was I believe done because the original project was perceived as being POV-pushing, which is specifically disallowed in wikipedia. Having said that, I personally would have no objections to seeing the page moved into userspace and placed as a proposal on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals page to see if it received enough interest to be viable. However, it still is far from meeting the standards of any active WikiProject, which it seems to claim to be by being in Wikipedia space. John Carter (talk) 01:02, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The reason why it was identified as POV-pushing was because its former members (now all blocked, or so presumed) were POV-pushers themselves, having strong nationalistic feelings and presenting what appeared to be false information to the project (well, User:Hipi Zhdripi that is). Others had tried to prevent this, but had failed to do so and in the end, the project was deleted to end the POV-pushing of Kosovo-related articles. BTW, If you hadn't noticed, the original Kosovo WikiProject was originally called "WikiProject Dardania". Now, since those users are out of the picture, there has been much less POV-pushing on Kosovo-related articles. And as I said, the WikiProject needs time to grow because in this case, the "grace period" doesn't apply due to the fact that the WikiProject was unconditionally merged without notice. --Prevalis (talk) 01:08, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Believe me, this WikiProject will receive enough interest within a month's time at the latest. If not (or if the project gets deleted due to this ongoing discussion), then I will temporarily redirect the WikiProject to WP:SERBIA and place the WikiProject up for proposal. Sounds fair, no? --Prevalis (talk) 01:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, for the purposes of removing pointless banner clutter, I'd move it to user space and then propose it as a project one the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals page. If you want to see just how many other potential project starters thought the same thing you do and were found to be mistaken, please see the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Inactive projects page. Personally, I think it'd work better all around as a subproject/task force/work group of WikiProject Serbia. I could even adjust their project banner to include separate assessment if such was wanted. But in general we are moving toward subprojects whereever possible, as it both reduces banner clutter and the number of projects which have to be deleted or "task-force"-ized in the future. John Carter (talk) 01:26, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to agree with you into turning this WikiProject into a task force because this discussion is leading more towards deletion of the Project (well, if we had more Wikipedians contributing to this discussion, it would be more open-ended and more concise, rather than having only three Wikipedians argue about the deletion of a WikiProject). However, I must decline your offer to turn this WikiProject into a task force because Kosovar and Albanian users will begin with their nationalism as they continually refuse to accept that Kosovo is part of Serbia and turning this WikiProject into a task force of the Serbian WikiProject will just enrage them even more. And also, Kosovo is most likely declaring independence after the Serbian presidential elections, so turning the project into a task force will just make matters worse. --Prevalis (talk) 21:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, the Montenegrin WikiProject was never a proposed project, it was started up without ANY proposal whatsoever at WP:COUNCIL/P and only had two members active at that point. This is pretty much the same situation with the Kosovo WikiProject. --Prevalis (talk) 21:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The argument that there are projects for other regions and the Serbian Church amounts to WP:OSE and is not an argument for anything.

There is no such thing as an "illegal" merger. Mergers are fairly substantial edits and normally do have some discussion, but the general rule is if you see something that needs doing do it and that goes for mergers too.
You didn't understand what I was talking about, did you? Only one person (User:Bolonium had proposed that merger and was the only one active in the merger discussions. And without any further addition to that discussion, he/she just thought that it would be alright to merge the project with WP:SERBIA two days later. Technically, such a merger like that one would require a lot more discussion, rather than only one support vote, right? --Prevalis (talk) 21:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Whatever the reason for the merger without discussion, it was still only a one person project, shortly to become a zero person project, the sole member having stopped editing less than a month after the merger.
The most likely reason why it was a one-person project was because not many actually knew it came into existence. Even while it existed, User:CrnaGora didn't even bother inviting anybody to join the WikiProject, like most sane people would do when starting up a WikiProject (I doubt the guy was respected as much in the Wikipedian Community either, but then again, what do I know). This same User:CrnaGora co-founded WP:MNE and yet, the project grew a lot, but apparently, neglected the Kosovo WikiProject he recreated. --Prevalis (talk) 21:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Even if you wanted to get the project going, that talk page has material that needs removal and the main page has nothing on it of value - it's just a template.
The talk page material was from the leftover from the original Kosovo WikiProject, which was known as WikiProject Dardania, but was later renamed to WikiProject Kosovo shortly before getting deleted. And the reason why the original WikiProject got deleted in the first place was that its Albanian (Kosovar?) members were disruptive and ended up getting banned from Wikipedia, possibly indefinetely. --Prevalis (talk) 21:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete and if the two new members want to start a project, a posting on WP:COUNCIL/P as suggested by John Carter and we'll see if five to ten prospective members can be found. Then they can start fresh.

--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 04:27, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That would be a fair solution, however, let's wait for the outcome of this discussion. Honestly, this discussion needs more people to contribute their opinions because three people discussing the outcome of a WikiProject sounds pretty unfair, wouldn't you say? --Prevalis (talk) 21:21, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, it can be perceived as being unfair, but it's also often about par for the course for WikiProjects and a lot of MfDs in general. And it is actually four, not three. John Carter (talk) 21:50, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I know its four, however, only three (I (Prevalis), you (John Carter) and Doug) are actively participating in the discussion, the fourth (Kintetsubuffalo) practically only gave a Delete vote and a reason that only has to do with the project's talk page, which is an illegitamate reason as most of the project's talk page was leftover from the former (original) WikiProject Kosovo (which was formerly known as WikiProject Dardania). --Prevalis (talk) 21:56, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You're not winning any support by continuing to say things are "illegitimate", "illegal", etc.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 22:11, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How am I when there are only three users active in this discussion? As I said, we need more users participating in this discussion to make it sound more fair. --Prevalis (talk) 22:31, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There are no "laws" or "legitimacy" factors regarding a discussion for deletion. Your repeatedly using those clearly inflammatory words does not help your case. The discussion is brought about through consensus and policy concerns. Also, unfortunately, your statement, right or wrong, about it possibly becoming independent later is not an argument for the project existing now. If and when it declares independence, that'll be different, but we don't try to determine the future. At this point, I'm still leaning toward deletion or making it a task-force. Task forces can be and often are related to several projects, not just one, and I do believe that the unnecessary banner clutter is still something to be avoided. If and when it declares independence, that would be a different matter. John Carter (talk) 14:26, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have to take back something I stated above, there are assessed articles, they aren't reporting properly in the table but the talk page banner template shows quite a few what links here entries. I have no idea why, probably something wrong with the table though, maybe John could take a look.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 22:12, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have fixed this problem by updating the template code. Apparently, the template code did not allow for the assessment to be fully shown on the template for some strange reason. --Prevalis (talk) 22:40, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The statistics page automatically adds the table itself. When you added all the lines, it basically was blocked. It should function continuously without any input once the Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Kosovo articles by quality statistics page is created blank. John Carter (talk) 23:07, 15 January 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 page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.