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Wikipedia editors may find articles, images, or other pages that they believe should be deleted, and raise these concerns in various deletion forums. Administrators determine consensus and examine policy to determine if there is sufficient justification for their removal from Wikipedia.

Deletion review (DRV) considers disputed deletions and disputed decisions made in deletion-related discussions and speedy deletions. This includes appeals to restore deleted pages and appeals to delete pages kept after a prior discussion.

If a short stub was deleted for lack of content, and you wish to create a useful article on the same subject, you can be bold and do so. It is not necessary to have the original stub undeleted. If, however, the new stub is also deleted, you may list it here for a discussion. If you are proposing that an existing page be reconsidered for deletion, please place the template {{Delrev}} on that page to inform editors who may wish to join the discussion here (administrators may replace with {{TempUndelete}} where appropriate).

Before posting a deletion review request, please read Wikipedia:Deletion policy and the list of perennial requests.

What is this page for?

Please consider the options below, and then follow instructions to add your request to the main part of the page.

Principal purpose – challenging deletion decisions

This process should not be used simply because you disagree with a deletion debate's outcome for reasons previously presented but instead if you think the closer interpreted the debate incorrectly or have some significant new information pertaining to the debate that was not available on Wikipedia during the debate. Equally, this process should not be used to point out other pages that have not been deleted where your page has — each page is different and stands or falls on its own merits. This page exists to correct closure errors in the deletion process and speedy deletions, both of which may also involve reviewing content in some cases. Purely procedural errors may be substantive and result in an overturn (such as failing to tag a page for its XfD discussion) or irrelevant (such as closing 1 minute early).

Listings which attack other editors, cast aspersions, or make accusations of bias, or where nominators do any of these things in the debate, may be speedily closed.

The main purpose of the page is to review the outcome of deletion discussions, as described above. There are some ancillary cases where editors wish to have pages restored. These are also handled in the main part of the page—please consider the usual reasons below and state clearly the basis for your request.

Temporary review

Request this if you want to use the content elsewhere (such as in other articles), you suspect the article has been wrongly deleted but are unable to tell without seeing what exactly was deleted, or if the full article history is needed to complete a transwiki properly. Please state whether you would like:

1. The article temporarily restored for all to examine during a review.
2. The article restored to your userspace so you can work on it to attempt to address the problems that led to deletion.
3. The source of the article emailed to you to review 'off-Wiki'.

The latter two may be requested here. Only uncontroversial revisions will be restored. Content that is moved back to the encyclopedia without being improved may be subject to speedy deletion, and content held in userspace without evidence of intent to work on it may also be nominated for deletion.

History-only undeletion

Request this to have the history of a deleted article restored behind a new, improved version of the article. The old, deleted revisions will sit harmlessly in the history of the page. 'History-only' undeletions can be performed without needing extended discussion on this page.

Contesting 'proposed deletions'

For these uncontroversially deleted articles, you can make a quick request at Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion.

How do I do all this?

All requests go in the main part of the page below. Please state clearly your reason for requesting undeletion. If you want to review the debate or the cause of deletion, then these ancillary options are not appropriate, and you should request a full review.

Under no circumstances will revisions that are copyright violations, libelous or contain otherwise prohibited content be restored.

Instructions

Before listing a review request:

1. discuss the matter with the closing administrator and try to resolve it with him or her first. If you and the admin cannot work out a satisfactory solution, only then should you bring the matter before Deletion review. See #What is this page for?.
2. please check that it is not on the list of perennial requests. Repeated requests every time some new, tiny snippet appears on the web have a tendency to be counter-productive. It is almost always best to play the waiting game unless you can decisively overcome the issues identified at deletion.

Commenting in a deletion review

In the deletion review discussion, users should opt to:

• Endorse the original closing decision; or
• Relist on the relevant deletion forum (usually Articles for deletion); or
• List, if the page was speedy deleted outside of the established criteria and you believe it needs a full discussion at the appropriate forum to decide if it should be deleted; or
• Overturn the original decision and optionally an (action) per the Guide to deletion. For a keep decision, the default action associated with overturning is delete and vice versa. If an editor desires some action other than the default, they should make this clear.

Remember that Deletion Review is not an opportunity to (re-)express your opinion on the content in question. It is an opportunity to correct errors in process (in the absence of significant new information), and thus the action specified should be the editor's feeling of the correct interpretation of the debate.

The presentation of new information about the content should be prefaced by Relist, rather than Overturn and (action). This information can then be more fully evaluated in its proper deletion discussion forum.

Temporary undeletion

Admins participating in deletion reviews are requested to routinely restore deleted pages under review and replace the content with the {{TempUndelete}} template, leaving the history for review by non-admins. However, copyright violations and violations of the policy on biographies of living persons should not be restored.

Closing reviews

A nominated page should remain on deletion review for at least seven days. After seven days, an administrator will determine whether a consensus exists. If that consensus is to undelete, the admin should follow the instructions at Wikipedia:Deletion process#Wikipedia:Deletion review discussions. If the consensus was to relist, the page should be relisted at the appropriate forum. If the consensus was that the deletion was endorsed, the discussion should be closed with the consensus documented. If the administrator finds that there is no consensus in the deletion review, then in most cases this has the same effect as endorsing the decision being appealed. However, in some cases, it may be more appropriate to treat a finding of "no consensus" as equivalent to a "relist"; admins may use their discretion to determine which outcome is more appropriate. Deletion review discussions may also be extended by relisting them to the newest DRV log page, if the closing admin thinks that consensus may yet be achieved by more discussion.

Steps to list a new deletion review

If your request is completely non-controversial (e.g., restoring an article deleted with a prod, restoring an image deleted for lack of adequate licensing information, asking that the history be emailed to you, etc), please use Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion instead.

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Active discussions

23 May 2012

22 May 2012

Liz White (animal rights)

Liz White (animal rights) (talk|edit|history|logs|links|cache|watch) (XfD|restore) For comparison, the deleted article is here. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 11:07, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

I started this article yesterday though there was a recent AfD under a different title. I discussed it with Joe Decker, the deleting admin (discussion here), and he suggested DRV.

I would like to keep this because we lack articles about women in general (outside the entertainment industry), about Canadian women in particular, and this would be our only article about a Canadian woman animal rights advocate. She appears regularly on television in Canada discussing animal welfare. However, she talks about the issues, not about herself, so there isn't a lot of biographical information around, which is perhaps why some editors argue she isn't notable enough.

There have been two AfDs:

• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Liz White (politician) (September 2008, keep)
• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Liz White (politician) (2nd nomination), May 2012 (delete and merge)

The second AfD discussion was somewhat borderline, the current version of the article is quite different, and additional sources have been added. This was the article at the time of the second AfD, which focused mostly on the political party she led and the elections she stood in. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:49, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Overturn and keep. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:49, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• Overturn and keep. Nice work SV - Article is substantially different and improved from the previous version , including additional WP:RS asserting the subject is over the WP:NOTABILITY hurdle - Youreallycan 21:13, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn self and keep. When SV and I discussed this yesterday or before, I expressed the opinion that it was marginal (based on what was there at the time), but with Slim's judiciously additional sources added since I think it's now over the bar. --joe decker^{talk to me} 23:44, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse recreation and keep, and a good job to SV. The only thing I wouldn't endorse is the idea that we should base any part of a keep or delete on the grounds of its subject's gender or nationality (or anything else about the nature of the subject), as that's just an I (don't) like it. The only criterion should be source coverage, but here, that requirement is met. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 00:33, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn and keep There are quite a number of references in major publications (e.g., Toronto Sun, Washington Post). She clearly passes WP:BIO. NJ Wine (talk) 03:37, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
• Comment. Yes, as written by SlimVirgin it is a different article, it is about animal rights activist Liz White. But if the article is to be kept, a lot of the political information should be re-added. Would the article be kept in good repair if it once again becomes about politician Liz White? 117Avenue (talk) 04:21, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
  • If content from the old Liz White (politician) article is used, it should be histmerged into the new article to keep the history in one place. Flatscan (talk) 04:32, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
• The last AfD was closed as merge, no delete. WP:Non-deleting deletion discussions (essay) may be of interest. Flatscan (talk) 04:32, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
• Wrong Venue DRV is not necessary when an editor believes that he has fixed all the issues raised in a previous AfD and BOLDly restores the content as fixed. DRV does not exist as a prior restraint on such issues, and I think we're all sufficiently acquainted with SV's BLP policy knowledge to have confidence that anything she restored would have a pretty high presumption of appropriate policy compliance and inclusion-worthiness. Jclemens (talk) 04:54, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
• I want to support what both Flatscan and JClemens have said. Procedurally, it looks very simple to me: the material has been AfD'ed twice but never deleted, on the very simple grounds that there has never been a consensus to delete it. The most recent closer wishes to overturn himself to a full "keep" outcome, and there is no reason why DRV would prevent him from doing so. Our role is to see that the deletion process is correctly followed and it seems very clear that it has been. I think this can be speedily closed. What Flatscan says about the history merge is of course important.—S Marshall T/C 11:12, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse AfD(2nd) and allow creation - The Liz White (politician) article seemed to require her notability to be based on her being a politician and I can't say that AfD(2nd) closer got it wrong. So, endorse AfD(2nd). However, reliable sources don't write articles based on Wikipedia's classification of people. They write news articles, etc. to convey the information they want to convey irrespective of Wikipedia. Liz White (animal rights) is a better article name as it gives the impression of more freedom to use information about Liz White from all reliable sources, not just those discussing her political career. Plus, the Liz White (animal rights) article Slim wrote is different from the deleted article. Thus, allow creation of Liz White (animal rights). I suggest merging the content of Liz White (politician) into Liz White (animal rights). -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 11:19, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

21 May 2012

20 May 2012

Warrandyte Cricket Club

Warrandyte Cricket Club (talk|edit|history|logs|links|cache|watch) (XfD|restore)

5 years on, I have found many articles from newpapers from as early as 1881, documenting the importance & history of cricket in the eastern suburbs goldfields region of Victoria, and am hoping you can reconsider re-adding this page. I particularly want to highight how cricket was formed & developed in Victoria some 158 years ago, and have many stories to share. Mystery92no (talk) 01:24, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

• Restore the AfD was 5 years ago, a weak delete at that. I see no reason to not restore this to allow addition of new sources, which no one appeared to advocate for in the linked deletion discussion. If it remains unimproved, I anticipate no prejudice against re-deleting it through a fresh AfD discussion. Jclemens (talk) 01:34, 20 May 2012 (UTC)
• Restore. Though not really phrased in those terms, the discussion seems to have tended towards delete based on the lack of sources in the article. If they can be supplied, there is every reason to recreate and expand the article. Newspaper accounts are excellent for that purpose as long as they are not just listing of match schedules or results but rather actual discussions of the team and it's players. Eluchil404 (talk) 07:23, 20 May 2012 (UTC)
• Allow re-creation. For future reference, you didn't need to come here, but if you feel tentative and want to come here, I recomment that you prepare a userspace draft in advance. What new articles have you found? I recommend undeleting the history for referecne. Userfy to User:Mystery92no/Warrandyte Cricket Club. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:18, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
• Allow re-creation - "The Warrandyte Cricket Club is one of the oldest cricket clubs in Victoria, dating back to 1855."[1] While the Internet may not provide easy access to reliable source information on the topic,[2][3] seems likely some have written about his 150+ year old club in the last 150 years. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 11:40, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
• temporarily restored for discussion at Deletion Review DGG ( talk ) 03:22, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
• I agree with SmokeyJoe that a DRV isn't really needed here and recreation should be allowed if the proper sources are there for GNG. The article was deleted in AFD over five years ago and the AFD didn't have really much of a policy based argument anywhere. The only argument in that debate was I think the third oldest club might not be notable enough but I really don't know, delete anyways. It may have been a acceptable argument back then, but it's not now. This should be speedy closed with a talk page comment to the nominator that it's ok for an article, but to take GNG to account while creating it. Secret ^account 05:33, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

19 May 2012

18 May 2012

Afranet

Afranet (talk|edit|history|logs|links|cache|watch) (XfD|restore)

This isn't a request for a deletion review of the AFD as it was done correctly. Editors have stated that in order to make way for Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Afranet the issue must be brought here. I am making this request on behalf of User:ChazzI73 and will inform him of this discussion so he can take part. Ryan Vesey Review me! 17:42, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. Here is my argument about Afranet. Sorry if it is a bit lengthy. For whatever reason, the article I crated is available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/Afranet and the history I can see under page Afranet has different content. Anyhow, here is my reasoning:

Population of Iran is about 75 millions. Tthe second language there is English, so it is crucial to have information about reputable Iranian companies both in Farsi and English.

Iran has the highest rate of education in Middle East. It has large and successful immigrant community in English speaking countries including US, UK & Canada. More than half of the population there is below 30, Internet Usage in Iran and number of Internet users in Iran are the highest among Middle Eastern countries, which make it important to have information about important Iranian companies online.

Except Afranet, at present there is no other ISP/ICP in Tehran’s Stock Exchange and they are the only private IT company in Iran that has ever gone IPO. Afranet's market share in Iran’s Internet is almost 10%. (3 millions out of 30 million users ref - http://www.internetworldstats.com/me/ir.htm , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_in_Iran & http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHQyXXx3GfY )

Largest University of Iran (Islamic Azad University) is hosted in Afranet’s Data Center which is another measure of credibility (check it at http://notification.azmoon.org/). This is one of the honorary national projects in Iran completely hosted by Afranet with 2.5 million daily visitors and two millions registered students.

Afranet Data Center has almost 3,000 physical machines that put it among the largest in Middle East. If you want to compare it, the three leading Data Centers in the United States are Google, Amazon and Microsoft. Afranet has the similar role in Iran.

Afranet categorized as a “Medium” sized registry by Ripe (https://www.ripe.net/membership/indices/data/ir.afranet.html ). It accounts for about 1% of IPv4 addresses in Iran (ref http://www-public.int-evry.fr/~maigron/RIR_Stats/RIPE_Allocations/IPv4/Alpha/IR.html) and

No other Data Center in Middle East except Afranet holds an Information Security Management System certificate (ISMS or Iso 27001 ref http://www.gilanifoundation.com/homepage/128/Asia%20128/Iran%20128.pdf , http://www.iso27001certificates.com/Taxonomy/ScopeResults.asp & http://www.afranet.com/Stocks/MarketingInfo/Afranet-Catalogue.pdf )

Afranet's website has Google Page Rank of “5” which means it has good amount of authority in the eyes of Google. This authority mainly comes from the history, links by third parties to the website and visitors and could count a measure of credibility (check the Page Rank at http://www.prchecker.info/check_page_rank.php). Besides, there are about 1 million indexed pages in Google by searching “Afranet” or “افرانت” and its CEO, “Fereidoun Ghasemzadeh” or “فریدون قاسم زاده” in both English and Farsi on aggregate. Only in Google and not considering other search engines or search sources, there are over 100,000 searches annually for aforementioned terms (according to Google Adwords tool available at https://adwords.google.com/o/Targeting/Explorer?__c=1000000000&__u=1000000000&ideaRequestType=KEYWORD_IDEAS ).

Afranet Competitors such as Parsonline (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsonline ), Sepanta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sepanta) & Shatel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shatel ) with sometimes smaller market share are listed and accepted in Wikipedia. Afranet is a much more credible company from some aspects.

The company's Public Offering was late last year (2011). Now there are a lot of inquiries about investing in this company, analysis of its stock or more information on it. Their market cap is 27 billion Rials (ref – Tehran Stock Exchange site @ http://en.tsetmc.com/loader.aspx?ParTree=121C1412&inscode=52792903131341205 and balance sheet at http://www.fipiran.com/CompanyBalanceSheet.aspx?lan=en&FinancialInstrumentId=4415&CompanyId=756 ) (was about 17 million USD as of 2011 – ref www.turquoisepartners.com/iraninvestment/IIM-Aug11.pdf and http://www.reportlinker-news.com/n018990830/Market-Overview.html ).

Afranet has been mentioned numerous times in English and Farsi news including the following:

United Nations report on Iran: http://un.org.ir/sites/default/files/docs_pub/3970/doc_attachments/post_report.pdf

MacMaster Times: http://www.afranet.com/En/App_Themes/images/About/Press/MACMASTER.jpg

Business Week: http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=51800721

Tehran Times Newspaper (report on ISO 9001): http://www.afranet.com/En/App_Themes/images/About/Press/tehrantimes-iso-ceremony.jpg

Tehran Times (Announcement of IPO): http://old.tehrantimes.com/PDF/11206/11206-4.pdf

Global Survey of Broadband Service Providers in the world: http://www.arcchart.com/reports/dl/BWAOperators_promo_ARCCHART.pdf

Iran News (News Paper): http://www.afranet.com/App_Themes/images/About/Press/press22-origin.jpg

Collection of 60 newspaper Articles about Afranet: http://afranet.com/App_Themes/images/About/Press/Afranet-in-Media.pdf

The company is pretty active in social activities and accordingly, has many searches for that, which makes it essential to be available in Wikipedia too. (look at http://afranet.com/En/Social/Responsibility.aspx ) The company provides free internet to schools in deprived areas, Free equipment to Schoolnet, Financial and logistical support for rural kindergartens (in cooperation with Unicef), Financial Support Program for orphans (in cooperation with the I.K. Relief Foundation) and much more of social activities. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ChazzI73 (talk • contribs) 18:42, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

• I'm not really buying the argument for a separate article at this stage, I'm afraid. When I checked a random sampling of the references provided, I couldn't seem to find the kind of sources appropriate for a Wikipedia article. Is anyone aware of a credible secondary source? I'm open to being convinced but sceptical of the long list of passing mentions, or references to Afranet itself, listed above.

  However, I also think it's inappropriate for this to be a redlink when it could be a redirect to Communications in Iran#Internet, so I'd suggest we discuss the possibility of redirecting. We should probably consider protecting the redirect, since it was necessary to salt the article title.—S Marshall T/C 20:32, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the time you spend. I want to bring your attention to this list of independent references about Afranet, which has some names as big as "United Nations":

United Nations report on Iran: http://un.org.ir/sites/default/files/docs_pub/3970/doc_attachments/post_report.pdf

Business Week: http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=51800721

Tehran Times (Announcement of IPO): http://old.tehrantimes.com/PDF/11206/11206-4.pdf

MacMaster Times: http://www.afranet.com/En/App_Themes/images/About/Press/MACMASTER.jpg

Tehran Times Newspaper (report on ISO 9001): http://www.afranet.com/En/App_Themes/images/About/Press/tehrantimes-iso-ceremony.jpg

Global Survey of Broadband Service Providers in the world: http://www.arcchart.com/reports/dl/BWAOperators_promo_ARCCHART.pdf

Iran News (News Paper): http://www.afranet.com/App_Themes/images/About/Press/press22-origin.jpg

Iran Investment Magazine: www.turquoisepartners.com/iraninvestment/IIM-Aug11.pdf

Collection of 60 newspaper Articles about Afranet: http://afranet.com/App_Themes/images/About/Press/Afranet-in-Media.pdf

Tehran Stock Exchange: http://en.tsetmc.com/loader.aspx?ParTree=121C1412&inscode=52792903131341205

Financial Information Process of Iran: http://www.fipiran.com/CompanyBalanceSheet.aspx?lan=en&FinancialInstrumentId=4415&CompanyId=756

Gilan Foundation: http://www.gilanifoundation.com/homepage/128/Asia%20128/Iran%20128.pdf

Second point that I want to emphasize is presence of competitors on Wikipedia with much less credibility including Parsonline (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsonline ), Sepanta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sepanta) & Shatel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shatel ). Do you think it is appropriate?

Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ChazzI73 (talk • contribs) 23:20, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment While the article isn't perfect, I do personally believe that the subject has more coverage than it had in 2009 (due to the initial public offering) and should be in the article space. Ryan Vesey Review me! 23:41, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Here are some examples in Farsi, all in independent newspapers:

Farsi Articles about Afranet:

Economic World (Donya E Eqtesad) Newspaper:

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=262541

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=262898

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=257408

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=300670

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=266799

http://donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=274017

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=296201

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=289202

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=281562

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=263219

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=301515

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=266948

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=300126

http://donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=283956

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=278979

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=292064

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=294887

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=300280

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=297685

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=295495

http://www.donya-e-eqtesad.com/Default_view.asp?@=289007

and many more

Keyhan (The World) Newspaper:

http://www.kayhannews.ir/901011/4.htm

http://www.kayhannews.ir/901022/4.htm

http://www.kayhannews.ir/890416/4.htm

http://www.kayhannews.ir/870715/4.htm

Khorasan Newspaper:

http://www.khorasannews.com/newssource/17688-890810/pdf/11.pdf

http://www.khorasannews.com/newssource/17667-890715/pdf/11.pdf

Fanavaran (Technocrats) Newspaper:

http://www.itmen.ir/index.aspx?pid=10319&articleid=5314

http://www.itmen.ir/index.aspx?pid=10319&articleid=4552

http://www.itmen.ir/Files/104/Document/NewsPaper_PDF/1390/8/8/d33cb6589ca943d1b2905dd75728566d.pdf

http://www.itmen.ir/index.aspx?pid=10319&articleid=2553

http://www.itmen.ir/Files/104/Document/NewsPaper_PDF/1390/10/11/a46df0dafcf4499d961d5d599fee5c0a.pdf

http://www.itmen.ir/Files/104/Document/NewsPaper_PDF/1390/7/24/740051d35c2048358e366114cd7682db.pdf

http://www.itmen.ir/files/104/document/newspaper_pdf/1390/9/9/12cc6c3c08ea4c0d91684f2e7a2bb068.pdf

http://www.itmen.ir/Files/104/Other/NewsPaper_PDF/1390/5/29/7b30b08bac7e41008568f78f31d3ae6c.pdf

http://www.itmen.ir/Files/104/Other/NewsPaper_PDF/1390/7/11/26c5de961ace49e4b01fb603af78a14d.pdf

and many more

JameJam Newspaper:

http://www.jamejamonline.ir/Media/pdfs/1390/02/25/100843591385.pdf

http://www.jamejamonline.ir/printable.aspx?newsnum=100843584378

http://www.jamejamonline.ir/printable.aspx?newsnum=100004187710

http://jamejamonline.ir/Media/pdfs/1390/02/25/100843591456.pdf

http://www.jamejamonline.ir/Media/pdfs/1389/04/20/100880136525.pdf

http://jamejamonline.ir/archnewstext.aspx?year=1387&month=9&day=21&newsnum=100956682421

http://www.jamejamonline.ir/newstext.aspx?newsnum=100947782269 — Preceding unsigned comment added by ChazzI73 (talk • contribs) 00:17, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

There are much more to add, probably like 200 more newspaper and magazine articles in Farsi. I can add the links too if you think it makes a difference ChazzI73 (talk) 00:26, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

You should probably spend some time incorporating new sources you have found into the article. About half of the sources you are currently using are primary sources and some others aren't entirely reliable. Replace anything that you can with a more reliable source from a news organization. One example of an unreliable source is the source from wikibin you use for Fereidoun Ghasemzadeh. As the CEO and founder it should be easy to find a reliable source. Also remember that Wikipedia:Other stuff exists is not an argument. Ryan Vesey Review me! 00:27, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

• 'Speedy close as not rising to the scope of DRV. The nominator (or anyone else) should move it to mainspace and list at AfD. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:12, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

So, what would be the next step? I already incorporated a few of the sourced to the original article, even though they are not in English. ChazzI73 (talk) 07:26, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

SmokeyJoe, what else is there to do? It cannot be moved to the mainspace because the page has been salted. It cannot be unsalted at requests for page protection because they told us to come here. Ryan Vesey Review me! 07:52, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, I missed that it was salted. Why was it salted and what has changed now? I'll look into that now. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:58, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

It was salted because it was repeatedly recreated. It was deleted in AFD for a lack of reliable sources. I believe that the IPO caused enough reliable sources to exist that the article can be recreated; furthermore, it is written with an encyclopedic goal in mind. Ryan Vesey Review me! 08:07, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Allow re-creation. This is much more than enough to justify a fresh AfD if someone disagrees. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:21, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

• Unsalt and allow recreation - Obviously, significant new information has come to light since the AfD deletion. If you think the information in the deleted article would be useful to write a new article, request an admin to undeleate it. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 11:27, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

How can we do that? ChazzI73 (talk) 21:18, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Can you please help here? I really don't know what is the next step! ChazzI73 (talk) 17:40, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Its all a waiting game here. An admin will make a decision and close the discussion at some point. I'm sorry that your experience with Wikipedia has been so difficult. Ryan Vesey Review me! 17:43, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• Overturn and allow recreation Afranet is mentioned in quite a number of reliable sources, and appears to have a large influence in Iran. Article meets corporate notability standard. NJ Wine (talk) 03:46, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

17 May 2012

Arthur Custance (closed)

Sealand national football team

Sealand national football team (talk|edit|history|logs|links|cache|watch) (XfD|restore)

History was not preserved as a result of the 2007 AfD; the old article was deleted and replaced with a redirect. Request recreation of pre-2007 history for the following reasons:

1. The AfD should have been closed as no consensus rather than redirect; there were roughly the same number of keep votes as delete or redirect ones, and the keep ones had more of a basis in policy
2. Some of the arguments used in deletion five years ago wouldn't wash in an AfD today; plus consensus can change, and certainly enough time has passed to revisit it
3. Additional references to assert the team's notability have come to light since the AfD, due to the team resuming playing international fixtures since the 2007 AfD (See refs 64 and 65 in the Sealand article) pbp 16:02, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

• Agree, Restore the history, but endorse the redirect. There was consensus for the redirect, and redirect is still suitable because there is room at the target to say what little there is to say about the national football team. If a section on the national football team becomes large, it may be spun out as a separate article. Undeleting the history is reasonable, assuming that there was useful content there. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:18, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Having a football side redirects to the entity it represents is highly unusual, however, particularly since the side passes GNG (there's more than "a little"). I think if references were added, it wouldn't be redirected or deleted in an AfD now. And I want to add said references pbp 04:28, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

The football team passing the GNG is not quite obvious. Can you make a userspace version? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:20, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

I'd rather fix it in mainspace and start with the information in the old article. Userspace is just adding an extra unnecessary step pbp 15:07, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

• Commenting as the original deletion nominator: Just restoring the history is pointless unless you want to do something with the historic content, i.e., either restoring the article or merging the content somewhere. If you want to restore the article or re-argue the AfD based on new notability standards or references, you should draft a userspace stub that includes the references that you believe are now sufficient for notability.  Sandstein  05:40, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

See below comment pbp 15:06, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

• I agree with the original AfD closure. Today there is a lot more emphasis on passing WP:GNG, and about the only argument for retention put forward was that Sealand is a member of the N.F.-Board. However there does seem to have been a bit more coverage since then ([4], for instance), so someone wants to write a userspace draft based on it it might be OK to move it into article space. The topic is already mentioned at Principality of Sealand#Sports, and it may be better to improve the coverage there instead of creating a stand-alone article. Hut 8.5 09:07, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

The combo of [1], 2, 3 is enough to pass GNG IMO. And I'd like any userspace draft to start with the information that was in the old article, such as the kit (which I'd rather not recreate from here). And to be honest, I'd just rather fix it in mainspace, if that's alright with y'all. Also, while the keep argument may be flawed, so is the delete one, which amounts to "the N-F and Sealand are bogus, so this must be too". That's a total judgement call. pbp 15:06, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

The BBC report is ok, but the second link is a press release and I don't know how reliable sabotagetimes.com is. I'm not sure that this is enough for an article, but if this discussion agrees that it does, the article can be restored as far as I am concerned.  Sandstein  15:32, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

There isn't actually anything preventing you from overwriting the redirect with a new article about the team, provided it is not substantially similar to the version which was deleted at AfD. I'm not really persuaded that there should be a separate article as opposed to a paragraph or two in the article about Sealand. The deleted version only cited a few team websites that have since gone dead and this stats site (which sort of confirms they once played a match, though they don't seem sure). Though the page did have the kit displayed it didn't cite any sources to show that really was the Sealand kit and the reformed team may well have a different kit, so you shouldn't just copy the kit from the old article unless you've found something to verify that it really is the Sealand kit. Hut 8.5 15:47, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

The Sabotage article contains a photo that matches the kit pbp 16:56, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Well it doesn't actually match the kit in the article, since the photo has a white stripe that wasn't in the article version, and a picture of them wearing the kit can't act as a source for the statement that this is the team's official kit, or that this is their home kit. Hut 8.5 19:59, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment: I have a userspace draft up now at User:Purplebackpack89/Sealand, which contains five references and also five interwiki links. With your blessing, I will move it into mainspace pbp 20:27, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Well [5] is a forum post and definitely unreliable, and I'm not sure about [6]. Again a picture of the team wearing some kit isn't a source for the claim that this is their official kit. Apart from that I think it could be moved into mainspace, though it may be subject to a new AfD or merge discussion. Hut 8.5 15:32, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

• You should add more content to Sealand_national_football_team#Sports and N.F.-Board. I don't see this team as sufficiently notable. However, that is properly a discussion for AfD. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:52, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure N-F Board is the place for information about individual federations pbp 03:58, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

I think N.F.-Board#Members needs a little expansion for every time on the list. The other two associate members are red linked. Why? Does this suggest that associate membership of the N-F Board is not much in the way of notability? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:35, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

That's obviously an other stuff doesn't exist argument; but associate is higher than provisional, and six provisional members have bluelinks. Several N-F Board members were deleted around the same time Sealand was (five years ago), but no effort has been made to ascertain if they've met GNG since then. Sealand and a number of other N-F Board members do have articles on other Wikipedias pbp 16:07, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment: Since two of the three other editors have expressed sentiment for giving mainspace a go and seeing what happens, I'm going to...give mainspace a go pbp 03:58, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

• I support letting you do this (normally you shouldn't while the DRV is ongoing, and I thought it was a protected redirect??), and allowing any editor to take it to AfD. As the single AfD was so long ago, you shouldn't need to come to DRV to recreate. I still think that the old history should be undeleted. --SmokeyJoe (talk)

• Endorse AfD - Closer determined consensus correctly. Also significant new information has not come to light since the deletion. No reason for a new AfD since the notability issues of the first AfD have not been overcome. The editors bypassed DRV process to post the article to main space and no effort has been made to get the information accepted into the redirect target article Sealand_national_football_team#Sports. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 11:54, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

"Significant new information has not come to light since the deletion." That's completely inaccurate. Most of the references in the article occurred years after the AfD you mention occurred. Since two editors have suggested mainspacing, I've leaving it in mainspace, and if you think it should be deleted, take it to AfD pbp 13:44, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment: "Endorse" arguments are invalid, topic should either be relisted at AfD or kept Why? a) This is a completely different article than five years ago; the references used in it hadn't even been written yet; b) consensus can change. Five years is a long time to be reinforcing a consensus that was weak to begin with pbp 16:07, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

16 May 2012

Recent discussions

15 May 2012

14 May 2012

13 May 2012

12 May 2012

11 May 2012

10 May 2012

List of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition monsters

List of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition monsters (talk|edit|history|logs|links|cache|watch) (XfD|restore)

This list article was brought to AFD on May 2 by Axem Titanium over concerns that it violated WP:GAMEGUIDE, may have violated WP:COPYVIO, and had no references to support its notability. Independent sources were added during the course of the discussion, which rendered WP:NOTE a non-issue, and shifted the discussion to the two other concerns. Sandstein, who closed the discussion, noted that "There is clearly no consensus" about the GAMEGUIDE argument. As these two concerns were not motivating factors in the close, this DRV is not an attempt to address either one.

OrenBochman (BO) replied first with a Keep, contending that the nominator's argument for copyvio was "unconvincing" and giving an explanation; the nominator did not contest those points. I responded next with another Keep, noting my agreement with this copyvio argument, and as Polisher of Cobwebs and Robbstrd both also indicated Keep per me, I will assume that they therefore also agreed with OrenBochman's arguments. Jclemens next replied with a Keep, asserting again that the list is not a copyvio. Sangrolu also replied with a Keep, and also contended that the article is not a copyvio. All of these responses are to the original nominator's argument regarding possible copyvio.

Masem added the first Delete response, and was also the first to begin any detailed discussion about why he felt this was a copyright violation, and discussed this with Sangrolu and Postdlf. Masem approached Moonriddengirl on her talk page for input, which she provided, with addition discussion on the subject. Orangemike and Shooterwalker both argued to Delete the article based on WP:GAMEGUIDE; neither one addressed the potential copyvio issue. Postdlf, however, was ultimately convinced by Moonriddengirl's argument and responded to Delete.

After her input, David Shepheard (Big Mac) and Daranios both argued to Keep based on disagreement with the nominator's other arguments for deletion, but after discussion both also noted that they did not feel the list is a copyright violation. Hobit and Webwarlock both also argued to Keep based on the list not being a copyright problem. Marikafragen also contributed to the discussion about copyright violation, and although the repsonse is inline, also argued to Keep. There is a fair amount of discussion of the issue after Moonriddengirl's initial posting, and I have only summarized the nature of the respondents here.

Sandstein's rationale for the close mentioned Moonriddengirl's "prima facie persuasive case" for copyvio argument, although he admits that "I myself am not sure that I agree with it". He also contended that because almost all of the "keep" opinions "do not address her analysis but at best only assert that the list is not a copyright violation, without giving reasons why. These arguments are not persuasive and must therefore be discounted." It is not clear from this description which Keep opinions were counted or discounted or why they were or were not persuasive. I did not respond to Moonriddengirl's analysis because I had already made my feelings on the issue of copyvio clear and did not feel the need to repeat myself; I can only wonder if anyone else did the same thing. If I had known it was necessary to counter all arguments, I would have done so.

All eleven users responding with Keep did address the copyvio issue in some form (two by deferring their responses to me) as I believe I have demonstrated, most disagreeing with the rationale or calling it into question, and several of them offered their own persective on the issue. Of the five people indicating Delete, only three offered their thoughts on the copyvio issue. Is this a consensus to delete based on copyright violation? That is the only issue that needs to be determined here; not whether you agree with one rational or another, just whether this AFD had come to the consesus that the closer posited.

It could be argued to Relist the AFD, but I am concerned that this discussion Masem started could taint the results. Therefore, it is my opinion that the article should be Overturned to at the very least a No consensus to allow it to be rexamined again in the future. BOZ (talk) 16:40, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

• Closing admin's comment: I closed this as a "delete" because Moonriddengirl (supported by others) made a good case that the list amounted to a copyright violation. Almost all "keep" opinions that addressed this issue simply asserted that there was no copyright violation, without bothering to explain why. Copyright is a serious and rather complicated issue; it depends not on editorial judgment (as with most AfD issues) but on legal arguments that apply the relevant specialized policy as well as U.S. statutory and case law to the content at issue. The "keep" opinions failed to do so, perhaps with the exception of Marikafragen or one or two other people. So, to summarize, among contributors who appeared to have given thought to the problems surrounding copyright in lists, there was sufficient concern about this being a copyvio that I had to delete it. Now, I suppose the copyvio discussion could well come to a different conclusion, if it were to occur in more depth, which is why I suggested in my closure that DRV could be the place for that. (Or perhaps here?)  Sandstein  17:28, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse. Well within admin discretion. T. Canens (talk) 17:41, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
• I rethought my question above about consensus, and I feel that an even better question to ask would be "Was there a consensus that there even was a copyright violation?" BOZ (talk) 17:52, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
  • If there's a perceived copyright violation, no amount of consensus can overturn that. We are proactive to remove these once discovered. It's fair to argue (again, I was expecting this DRV and thus started the noted discussion) so that there may be a reason to readd it, but until we know that it is clearly not a copyvio, we have to remove it. --MASEM (t) 19:00, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
    • not so. If there is an obvious unmistakable copyright violation, sure. But if there's only a possible copyright violation, the community decides by consensus whether it is a sufficiently clear copyvio for deletion. Calling "Copyvio!" by itself is not enough. Quite the opposite, until we decide it is a copyvio we do not remove it. If there is no consensus that it is in fact a copyvio, we do not remove it. that would be copyright paranoia. DGG ( talk ) 19:20, 10 May 2012 (UTC) Who else is going to decide for us? (unless it's an office action, which this was not). there is no presumption that an ambiguous case is copyvio. If the admin closed on that basis, it must be overturned as contrary to policy --and contrary to reason also. DGG ( talk ) 19:20, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
      • I point to Sandstein's call above that based on the copyvio arguments (whether it was or not) that the arguments weren't convincing that it wasn't a copyvio. Ergo the reason to delete is appropriate, until such time that the copyvio issue is resolved. That's why I started that new discussion because I recognized the straw-men arguments that could result and that we're going to need better clarity. (I do note that our NFC policy is also similarly proactive in removing content that may be against fair-use though can be restored later if that was determined to be at fault). --MASEM (t) 19:38, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
  • In short, no. Here's the thing: the article was closed on the premise that Moonriddengirl made the case that there was a WP:COPYVIO. In fact, Moonriddengirl agreed with my assessment that the article was fair use, but qualifying that at wikipedia, we need to be more conservative that US fair use guidelines. That being the case, what decides what is "conservative enoough" other than consensus? Given that the commenter that the closing admin says demonstrated WP:COPYVIO in fact agreed that it was fair use, I don't see how the closing admin is justified in deleting without consensus. - Sangrolu (talk) 20:28, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Oh, I'm afraid you misunderstood me. I agreed with you that "fair use" was the only avenue we had to make use of the material. :/ I actually evaluated the fair use criteria and myself felt, as I said, that "While only a court could determine definitively, I think that this list is likely a substantial copyright problem." --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:35, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse As the closing admin says, a rational case was put for regarding this as a copyright infringement, whereas no rational case was put for not regarding it as such. The earliest "keep" arguments simply asserted that it is not a copyright infringement without elaboration (e.g. "Not a copyvio" from Jclemens, "The article as a whole is not a WP:COPYVIO" from Sangrolu). Later, attempts were made to go further, but they did not actually provide any reason. For example, we have "The list of Toyota cars is not copyrightable - that's factual data. Names are not copyrightable, but trademarkable" from MASEM: however, the issue is whether the list is copyright, not whether the names on the list are copyright. Then there is "I don't think the list is subject to copyright any more than a list of characters or list of actors for a show would be" from Hobit, but "I don't think the list is subject to copyright" does not give any a reason for believing it isn't. I don't know what I would have said had I been closing the discussion, but there is absolutely no basis for regarding the actual decision as being outside the range of discretion that an administrator is expected to exercise. JamesBWatson (talk) 19:34, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Hobit's argument is a perfectly good one and should not have been discounted. Whether a list like this is copyright is a matter of judgement, and his is as good as yours. DGG ( talk ) 19:39, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

As good as mine? I have no idea whether the list is copyright. What is at issue is not whether it is, but whether the closing admin correctly assessed consensus in the discussion. According to Wikipedia's concept of consensus, what matters is not just how many people express an opinion, but the strength of the arguments advanced. "I don't think the list is subject to copyright" without any reason advanced for holding that opinion is about as weak an argument as it is possible to come up with. JamesBWatson (talk) 19:44, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Arguably, in Hobit's defense, he asked "what makes this different from a list of characters?" (all completely fair devils advocate questions). I'm not saying that's necessary a strong argument either way, but he expressed more than just a "I like it/I hate it"-type opinion that is generally ignored. --MASEM (t) 19:47, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

• Endorse we can't take chances on copyvio material, and the encyclopedic value of a list of monsters appearing in one edition of one game hovers right around zero anyway. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 20:22, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
• I rarely disagree with Moonriddengirl about copyright, but in this case I'm not seeing a consensus to delete in that discussion, and I find the argument that this is a copyvio totally unconvincing. We're merely producing a list of the work's contents in alphabetical order, and that's all. If we were reproducing game statistics then sure, this would be a copyvio, but a simple contents list? I don't believe a word of it.—S Marshall T/C 20:37, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
  • In MRG's first comment, she writes, "I see no critical commentary here; it is a page by page index with explication which incorporates by explicit link many detailed descriptions of the TSR versions of legendary creatures and their original ones." She later clarifies that she is concerned by the system of articles: the list and the individual monster articles. If the articles are considered together, they are awfully similar to the Monster Manual. Flatscan (talk) 04:30, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
    • That is my concern, yes. The last time I checked with legal, there was no known precedent for whether or not articles should be judged in isolation in terms of "substantial similarity" or whether spreading the contents of one book over multiple articles was a factor. I note that when we received a complaint from the publishers of the DSM-IV a couple of years ago, we were called on to judge in aggregate rather than isolation, but other factors may have influenced that (including complaint from the copyright holder and the fact that many of the articles would probably have infringed copyright on their own). I'd feel a lot more comfortable with this situation if there was more critical analysis or other transformative content to support our use of the material. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:40, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
      • Good points, well argued, from both of you; but I'm afraid I remain strongly of the view that this should be overturned. The argument is that if the articles are considered together then they resemble the Monster Manual to too great a degree. In fact as far as I can see the Monster Manual is an eclectic cobbling-together of (1) material to which nobody can claim copyright (giants, dragons, vampires, zombies etc.) and (2) undisguised or thinly-disguised ripoffs of material originally generated by others (notably JRR Tolkein, Fritz Leiber and RE Howard). At the time of publication the new and original aspect of the Monster Manual was the way it converted fictional creatures which were almost without exception not original to the author, into what I understand as game pieces. Wikipedia makes no mention of the game statistics so can be no violation of TSR's copyright.

        I see this as related to the much bigger question of to what extent Wikipedia can consist of abridgements of copyrighted works, and whether it's possible for Wikipedia to be anything but a series of abridgements of copyrighted works given how closely we enforce WP:V. I think that if we decide Wikipedia articles cannot be abridgements of copyrighted works, then there's a lot more urgent things to delete than this list!—S Marshall T/C 14:13, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

        • Most of the monsters in the monster manuals are likely derivative works of tropes and the like that have long-entered the public domain or equivalent realm. That's a fair assessment. The problem is that because these are not (necessarily) slavish reproductions of the public domain work and include new creative elements, they have a brand new copyright assigned to TSR/Wizards. That it: TSR does not have a copyright on the idea of a zombie, but they do have a copyright on the D&D version of a zombie. So this is still a copyrighted work regardless of the basis. And because TSR published this list in its entirity in one place, it is defining the creative nature of the monsters and NPCs that inhabit its world, and ergo a creative collection itself. The reason other lists of characters/etc. aren't a problem is because it is very rare for the creative work to publish this directly themselves, and the compilation is a new work that is separate from the original fiction and thus not in the same boat. --MASEM (t) 14:22, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
          • It's not "likely" that giants and dragons and vampires and werewolves are "in the public domain or equivalent realm". It's fact: copyright in these things belongs to no-one. It's certainly true that TSR's successor company Wizards of the Coast have a copyright on the "D&D version of a zombie", but the "D&D version of a zombie" is inextricable from its in-game attributes that we do not reproduce on Wikipedia. Essentially the D&D version of a zombie is not an original work of fiction. It's a gaming piece, described in a table format and (if I understand this correctly) represented by a small lead miniature figure. Our article on D&D zombies does not and cannot possibly infringe, either as an individual article or as a part of our corpus on dungeons and dragons, because there is no way to get from the content of Zombie (Dungeons & Dragons) to a usable gaming piece, and there is no way that TSR's successor company can claim copyright in Zombies except in the specific context of their game. Do you see?—S Marshall T/C 16:29, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
            • TSR has created a creative setting which those game pieces are used. You are most likely right that game rules and concepts can't be copyrighted, but the creative world around it can be. Calling the D&D Zombie a "gaming piece" is drastically understating the creative aspects used by TSR to take the public domain aspect of a zombie and make it work in their creative fiction, even without considering any of their specific gameplay elements or statistics. --MASEM (t) 18:07, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
            • Let me go back one step further. The reason the copyvio appears to be the case is exactly why we removed the Time 100 lists. Time doesn't own the copyright on the people on said list (obviously) but they own the creativity needed to assemble that list and place the people on it in that order. Thus, our recreation of that list, in whole, without transformation, is a copyvio. The same applies to this monster list here, it is a direct comparison. --MASEM (t) 18:14, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
              • I’ve seen this example brought up a few times, but I don’t think it’s a very accurate example in terms of similarity. If a company had published a list called “Our top 50 favorite D&D monsters”, and if someone reposted that list in its entirety on Wikipedia, then that would be more like reposting the Time 100 list. Posting the entire content list of a book of monsters would be more like posting the entire cast list of a movie instead of just the main characters, which is something IMDb does all the time. BOZ (talk) 18:25, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
                • The problem is that the starting list, the list of monsters in 1st edition D&D, is also creatively selected. --MASEM (t) 18:33, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Masem, you said, You are most likely right that game rules and concepts can't be copyrighted. That may be true in US law, but it's probably less useful to us than it sounds at first sight. My view is that the way the rules are presented can be copyrightable and indeed copyrighted. I'll explain this in terms of computer games because that's easier to envisage.

    In a computer game, a zombie would have certain attributes. It would have a movement rate and an attack speed and a certain number of hit points. It would have a certain probability of hitting its target, and so on. These underlying "attributes" can't be copyrighted. But in the game it would be represented by models and sound effects which certainly are copyrighted.

    Now, in TSR monster books, zombies are, I believe, detailed in a similar way, having a movement rate and hit points and an attack speed and all the rest of it. These attributes are not copyright. But they're presented in a table format which is copyrightable, and supplemented by copyrighted artwork and text.

    Thus irrespective of whether game rules are copyrightable or not, we can't produce the in-game statistics. Neither can we reproduce the text that TSR's authors used, nor a close paraphrase of it. If we did those things, then we would be in breach of copyright, no argument at all. But my point is different. It's that TSR never owned anything to do with Zombies except for specific kinds of Zombies used as playing pieces in their game. Therefore we can't possibly be breaching TSR's copyright if we don't reproduce the data needed to use the creature in their game.

    The argument that we're breaching copyright by reproducing the table of contents will not survive scrutiny and can be dismissed out of hand. The more subtle argument that originates with Moonriddengirl, i.e. that our table of contents together with our articles somehow combine to breach copyright, is more defensible but I still don't buy it, I think it's overcautious. If there's a breach of copyright then those taking the "delete" position need to point to a specific article or passage that does breach copyright. A vague wave at a whole topic area saying "that's too detailed, copyright breach!" seems like a most dangerous thing to allow.—S Marshall T/C 19:24, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

    • I'm not talking about hit points or the like. It has been a long while since I had to crack open my D&D manuals, but even my vague memory tells me that for many of these creatures (generally, the more mythological ones), there are backstories and "flavor text" that enhance the world setting. That is a creative element, even if they directly pull the monster from Greek myth, for example, and do nothing to its backstory. The combination of all that fills their world with color and flavor, and hence is one core of the creative setting TSR had made. A full list of the monsters, therefore, is outlining their creative world. So immediately one needs to recognize that this is an issue of fair use to start, period; from that, we apply all the tests and at that point, we recognize that we're using the whole list (even if absent of stats and other details), and we have no transformation of the work, both points against the list.
    • Again, I bring up the Time 100 list verses the List of Time Person of the Year. The former is a creatively-constructed list, so inclusion in full is, to WMF's eyes, a copyvio. The List of Time Persons of the Year, on the other hand, is not a creative-constructed list though a list of creatively-selected people over time. It is still factual, and thus not protected by copyright, ergo inclusion in full is not a problem. The same analogy here: The list of monsters in the specific book is a creatively-constructed list; a list of notable monsters from all of D&D is not. --MASEM (t) 20:24, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
      • I don't think I understand you here. You seem to be saying that this list of monsters breaches copyright in Dungeons & Dragons' implied setting. But that can't possibly be right because even though you use the singular, there isn't one particular fictional setting for Dungeons & Dragons. If I understand this correctly the situation is that each game master comes up with his own dungeon that's set in a fictional world of his own devising. There isn't a "creative world" associated with Dungeons & Dragons. It's a toolkit for end-users to make their own "creative worlds".—S Marshall T/C 22:18, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
        • Yes, but they provide a toolkit via the monsters that given one type of fantasy setting. This setting is far different the fantasy setting of other works like Lord of the Rings, A Game of Thrones, or Diskworld, even if there are common elements in terms of monsters shared between them. When players create their own adventures, they are creating a derivative work of the D&D world. Add to the fact that TSR has published numerous official "modules" that build on the core rulebooks to create an interactive fiction. --MASEM (t) 22:24, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
          • When I was younger, I played the computer games Baldur's Gate and Planescape: Torment. Each was ostensibly based on published Dungeons and Dragons materials, but the settings were very different indeed. I also played Morrowind, which was set in a world based on the game author's D&D campaign. From these experiences I think the argument that all D&D worlds are essentially one world based on their monster lists is rather a stretch.—S Marshall T/C 08:59, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
            • The AD&D campaign includes multiple settings, and there are many creative variants. As my billions of Planescape reference works (loved the computer game as well) attest, they are all pretty exhaustively documented. In terms of this particular situation, though, I think it's important to remember that what we are actually doing is discussing the book. :) Explicitly, by title. This is an article about a single, specific book which may have "weak" copyright protection in many elements (those incorporating public domain material) but nevertheless does have its own creative spin and its compilation protection (because, of course, even if all elements are public domain, a mural formed of them is copyrighted). I believe that there is room for a discussion of this specific book and certainly for a discussion of monsters in AD&D (specific campaign worlds or varied) - although it would be great to see some actual critical commentary - but I think if we are going to discuss the book, it is essential that we bring something new to the table rather than a distillation of its contents. And I believe the more of their creative content we use, the more we need to balance that with something new. I don't think that a descriptive list of the contents of this book is the best way to go about this. A comprehensive article about monsters in AD&D could avoid the issue. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:04, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
    • ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Wait, what? You say: the book.  :) Explicitly, by title. This is an article about a single, specific book and this tells me we're talking at complete cross-purposes. What I am talking about is a list that gives a sort of table of contents from six separate creative works, called List of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition monsters. I agree that a comprehensive article about monsters in the game would be desirable but I do not understand how this precludes a list. I'm also of the view that reproducing the table of contents is fair use.—S Marshall T/C 12:48, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
      • You're still reproducing without transformation, hence making the conflict with fair use even worse since you now have 6 books you're borrowing from. Remember, we are stricter than fair use law to avoid potential conflicts and to assure that our text is CC-BY. Again, the problem here is that while the table of contents could be considered factually, it is still based on the same creatively-selected lists that appear in the books, and thus is still a creatively-selective list itself. Without transformation, that's a problem. --MASEM (t) 12:55, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
        • You're right; it's not a single work, but a collection of several from one edition. We are summarizing not one but several books (sorry; late night, early morning.) Reproducing a table of contents is generally perfectly fine, as tables of contents usually just lists titles and titles are not copyrightable ([7]). (This is why we can get away with tracklists in album articles.) This isn't a table of contents, though, and doesn't stop at listing the monsters. I myself think that a simple list would be okay, but - again - I personally am concerned about the web of details and images interlinked (I do not believe legal precedent has been established there yet, as I've said). I don't think we would create a list without the links to the various monster articles, and I think the best way to support such a list would be to add critical commentary and other transformative material to support the fair use. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:13, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
          • A small amount of critical commentary for several monsters, taken from reviews on the books themselves, had been added to the article during the AFD - that was a start, at least. BOZ (talk) 13:21, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
            • That's good. And I don't actually argue with the existence of the article (although I think the list format is risky). I just think it needs to be very carefully balanced to support the fair use factor. :) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:26, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
            • Though I would argue the critical commentary has to be about the list itself. If it's about the individual monsters without considering the whole of the rest of the list in terms of defining the game world, that's better support for trimmed version of "notable monsters from D&D" and the separate article on the monster itself. --MASEM (t) 13:29, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
              • As this list was never published by the publisher in the form of a list, I think that finding critical commentary on such a list would be impossible. At least, I've never heard of anyone doing a book review on the book's table of contents. BOZ (talk) 13:37, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
              • Let me ask a question. If this had been a single aggregate list of monsters appearing throughout the first edition books, instead of a segmented breakdown of the contents of each book individually, would there still have been a copyright concern? BOZ (talk) 14:14, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
                • Possibly, yes, more likely depending on how much critical commentary/transformative nature there is of the lists. A counter example (that I specifically asked about at NFC) is the List of Pokémon (1–51) and its numerous index (up to 650 now?). To borrow from what Jheald stated there: In the case of the Pokemons, TV characters and TV episodes, I would say: no, because in those cases the lists are derived from the original fictions, rather than being the essential nature of the original fictions themselves. Presenting such a list is therefore transformative in a way the AD&D list is not. It is also only a comparatively small taking from those original creations; and not likely to impact at all on their original market roles. The J.K. Rowling case is perhaps useful: it was ruled that it was acceptable in general to produce an Encylopedia of Harry Potter; but what was not acceptable was to substantially reproduce what essentially was itself an annotated fictional listing, viz the content of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, nor to closely reproduce actual prose from the original novels. That was the material that had to be heavily re-written before the book was re-issued. Applying the argument to the full list of 1st Ed D&D monsters, the more we can add to the list to transform it, if possible, the better we get away from the copyvio. (At this point, then there becomes the GAMEGUIDE issue which, if this is relisted, is going to be focused on). --MASEM (t) 14:26, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
                  • Fair enough, if you can agree that it may have been possible to fix, then it should not have been deleted based on the copyright concern. BOZ (talk) 14:31, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
                    • The Time 100 was a possible list to fix, but we were asked to delete it. We are proactive on copyright. I don't argue that there's a potential version of this list - maybe not in the same form - that would minimize the copyright issue, but we can't let sit the known problematic list until that one comes around. --MASEM (t) 14:37, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
• ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Thank you all for your input. With your help I've finally arrived at the kind of position I can sum up with a word in bold for the closer's benefit.  :)

  Overturn and relist because the closer said he took Moonriddengirl's arguments as a prima facie reason to delete the list. It's emerged from the discussion above that Moonriddengirl's position is that the list is fixable. Therefore, while Sandstein's close is very understandable in the context of the discussion, it's also clearly mistaken.—S Marshall T/C 13:43, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

• Overturn per BOZ. Polisher of Cobwebs (talk) 21:29, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
• (edit conflict)Relist - It doesn't seem to me that many people in the discussion agreed with Moonriddengirl's analysis that the article was a copyright violation. It also doesn't seem clear to me that Moonriddengirl's analysis presents a reason to delete the article entirely as opposed to possibly trimming the content to remove excessive detail. At lot of the discussion was focused on WP:GAMEGUIDE, and I think further specifically on the copyright questions would be useful. I don't think there was a consensus to delete the article on copyright concerns, so I would favor a relist of the article with a comment making it clear that the relist is to come to a consensus on whether the article should or should not be deleted on copyright grounds. Calathan (talk) 21:33, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse, but allow userfication and re-creation of a substantialy restructured page. I agree with the comments of Moonriddengirl, specifically that the page is a derivative work, with insufficient transformation of the primary source material taken directly from the copyrighted guides. Derivative works of fictional materials, if not a copyright infringement, is also really bad article writing. There has to be some transformation, using sources that discuss the monstors from a perspective outside of the game. A lot of care is required, and in the end it may be impossible, because transformation without enough sources falls foul of WP:NOR#WP:SYNTH. The best advice on how to proceed is found at WP:WAF, which the deleted article didn't follow at all. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:13, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
• Something completely different In a case where a Wikipedia page has a problem that's FIXABLE, deletion is probably not the best option, especially when everything else in Lists of Dungeons & Dragons monsters and its WP:SS components has the exact same problem. Rather, what's probably needed is a detailed rewrite of ALL of these pages, to remedy the copyright objections. Which, for the record, I disagree with Moonriddengirl's analysis, especially of clause 3, the amount of "copying" permissible under fair use. BUT, seeing as how a reasonable challenge has been identified, let's fix it. This decision eviscerates our coverage of D&D monsters, and really can't be allowed to the final word on the matter. Some of the "endorse"rs above may have lost sight of the fact that we're an encyclopedia, and need to cover things--if our current presentation is problematic, we need to fix it, not amputate large swaths of good content. Jclemens (talk) 05:21, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • The list wasn't fixable even with serious trimming - even if it was turned into a bare list of just the monsters as listed, it hit the copyvio problem. As I've said, the option of a list of notable D&D monsters in connection with their articles that include transformative use is appropriate, but not a straight-up list from the books. --MASEM (t) 05:26, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
    • No, it was fixable... but not necessarily via trimming, but by adding commentary as you describe below. BUT, I disagree that even without that it's a copyvio, since it omits not only the game stats (as MRG noted), but the descriptions as well. Furthermore, there's no clear decision--just an argument--that the amount reproduced constitutes copyright infringement. Per this, I would argue that by omitting the pictorial and literary material (pictures and notes), what is left mostly constitutes uncopyrightable game rules and ideas. Jclemens (talk) 16:42, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
      • What commentary could be added on the list to make it transformative? I agree some monsters themselves may have notable aspects to make the inclusion of their creative aspects appropriate in WP, but the full list of monsters from one rulebook? And there is still the fact that I mention above that the collection of the monsters and the like - even if just names - creates the backdrop and setting of the D&D world for them. What if TSR used ponies and bunnies and birds instead of zombies, ghouls, and dragons? You claim their game pieces, but clearly there's creativity in winding down what available creatures (mythological or real-world or otherwise) to create their setting. --MASEM (t) 18:14, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn per BOZ. Basically it's a flawed close as just claiming copyright isn't enough, there needs to be an accepted case that there is a copyright problem. If instead any reasonable (but almost certainly wrong and generally rejected argument) is enough, there is easily a similar claim for Dr. Who or any other major series. And I assume that's where we'd be going (as the arguments are a LOT stronger there). Are we really talking about walking that route? Dr. Who has way way way more detailed and complete information about plot, characters etc. and certainly is more likely to interfere with commercial opportunities (the plot summaries allow people to catch up without paying to watch while this list doesn't have any of the material one would expect to want to know, nor (AFAIK) it the product still on the market. It would make me sad to walk that way, but I'm not seeing how we could do anything else and be consistent with this decision. Hobit (talk) 13:06, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • The reason that this specific list is a copyvio is two-fold. One is the lack of transformative information: there's nothing to discuss the significance of this list to the reader beyond "it came from the 1st edition book". Most of our other lists (lists of characters, episodes, etc.) are used in conjunction with development and reception to transform that information into something new. But the second factor is best explained by Jheald's response to the same devil's advocate questions I poised at WT:NFC. Specifically, this list is fundamentally and wholly part of the original creative work (it's straight out of the book without omission). In the case of episode lists or character lists, these are generally built up by multiple parts of the fiction (numerous episodes, etc.) and thus the list itself as made for WP is not a fundamental part of the creative work, even if the elements of the list are copyrighted. If the monster list was an assembly of all editions of D&D and only those that were notable (read: transformative information about said monsters on their respective pages) it wouldn't be a problem. But the whole recreation of the list of monsters from a single book without comment is copyvio. --MASEM (t) 13:17, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse. I see nothing wrong with this close. AfDs are decided on strength of argument not vote counting or similar hence I think it's more than reasonable to weight Moonriddengirl's opinion heavily - she's one of (if not the) acknowledged text copyright person here and is also the person to discuss the issue with the WMF attorney. If everyone else was arguing that the article wasn't a copyvio then I might agree that the close was bad but there was support for her views. There is consensus that we err very much on the side of caution when it comes to copyvios and so deletion is reasonable even if there is less of a consensus than would normally be necessary for a delete. Dpmuk (talk) 19:10, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

ever hear about WP:OWN ? all editors are equal, and are judged in each discussion on the basis of what they say there. If we're going by reputation instead, I consider MRG to have a reputation for excessively strict interpretation of WP:Copyright, and the difficulty in counteracting her established Ownership is why I rarely work in that area. In a doubtful case, I would not see any reason to follow her, though I would certainly listen to what she said. Suppose I had closed, and given that as my argument--I hope it would have been reversed here. Copyright does not have privileged status for deletion, unless it's undoubted copyvio--in which case I've deleted a few thousand articles: I strongly agree with basic copyright policy. DGG ( talk ) 20:02, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

The WMF asked us to remove the Time 100 lists, despite the fact that if you or I did it on our personal websites, no one would blink. Just like with NFC, we take a stronger , proactive stance on copyright per the WMF direction. --MASEM (t) 20:27, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I have heard of WP:OWN (by weird coincidence I've already referenced once today on something completely different). I don't see this as an ownership issue at all but rather accepting that someone has shown, thorough their on-wiki actions, what is generally considered a good understanding of the subject. I have not said we should follow her view regardless rather that we acknowledge expertise and take that into account. I take your point about "what they say there" but if we applied that strictly across the board are you also arguing we shouldn't label comments from people with "few or no other contributions outside this subject" which we regularly see at AfD. If you're arguing that we should only take into account what a person says in a discussion then surely these should go to.

I also disagree that copyright does not have privileged status. It's one of the few areas that could get us into real legal trouble and I think it would be incredibly dumb of us not to err on the side of caution in all areas that could cause us legal troubles, be it WP:BLP, copyright problems or something else.

As a slight aside I actually disagree with Moonriddengirl's assessment that this is a copyvio and think it's probably not. I do however think that it could be a copyvio so think erring on the side of caution and deleting makes sense. This is, of course, a moot point for a DRV as I should have mentioned it at the AfD not here.

As a final aside I don't think Moonriddengirl acts like she owns copyright - I've always found her open to discussion when we disagree. However there are very few editors that work copyright problems so she does inevitably end up dealing with a lot of it and I can see how this appears as ownership. Only having a few editors dealing with the area is obviously a bad thing as it hardly allows consensus. So instead of just moaning about it why don't you try helping out and if you still think there are problems try to improve things? Dpmuk (talk) 20:59, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

User:DGG, this is the second time that you've more or less pointed WP:OWN at me in a forum recently, but you've yet to talk to me about it directly. :/ I was pretty shocked the first time; I don't ever recall having rebuffed conversation with you...certainly I never would have intended to. I've never attempted or even wanted to own copyright work on Wikipedia; I just do my best to fill a need. Honestly, it's a bit of a headache. :) I ask for second opinions and assistance all the time and have repeatedly advertised for more people to work in the area. That said, I want to be clear here that my opinion in this AFD was only ever offered as my opinion...complete with "I think" and "I don't believe" and "my concern." If I thought it was a clear-cut, blatant copyright problem, I would have blanked the content with {{copyvio}}. I do that at AFD when I see clear need. My interpretation here is conservative, based on feedback I'd received in compiling Wikipedia:Copyright in lists and on the policies at WP:C and WP:NFC, which strongly encourage us not to push boundaries with copyright. I might have come down on the other side of the question in this article with my own opinion if there were just a more transformative material here. I don't think this is unsalvageable. And I could be wrong in either direction - as I said at the AFD, only a court can determine definitively. And given the number of appeals we see, only a high court, at that. If these matters were easy, there wouldn't be so many lawyers working on them. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 01:29, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

all careful debaters use such apparently tentative wording as a rhetorical device, to the extent that it can be difficult to tell when someone is truly unsure. And if I am going to challenge someone's opinion on something I'll do it where the matter arises, not on their talk p.; I'm not challenging them. . I try to not use individual's names in AfD discussions except when needed for clarity, but here I was challenging the use of your name by someone else. Anyway, I do not mean to challenge it as your opinion only, for I think we should delete as copyvio only that which is very probably copyvio. Otherwise, calling something copyvio is a license to remove anything. Saying something is legally too risky is the prerogative of the WMF office. I only challenge someone's views if it's something I would come across in my usual course: if I participated more at Copyright problems I would be too often coming into conflict, especially as I would usually be in a minority. I try not to be too persistent about it, but I will state my view once in a while nonetheless, if only to show there is an alternative position. DGG ( talk ) 20:07, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

• Overturn. By following all the conversation here the best thing would have been to delete the "Description" column. Once that is gone then it becomes a list of monsters with publication notes. Still useful. Honestly this is why we should be editing articles and not deleting them. Web Warlock (talk) 20:39, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Again, the core problem is that the list of monsters - irregardless what other aspects were added on - is what the copyvio is, not the descriptions or anything else. --MASEM (t) 21:12, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
    • No, it's what you are claiming is a copyvio, not what is a violation. You really need to adjust your language to acknowledge that (unless your a certain in which case I'd really like to know how you can make such a claim). It is per S Marshall, very very unlikely a court would ever find the material to be a copyright volition. Further, given the utter lack of a "potential market" in this context, the non-profit nature of the use, the fact that this doesn't have any of "new" part added by TSR (substantiality of the original) it would easily be fair use. Hobit (talk) 22:59, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
      • True, it is being supposed as a copyright violation which can only be determine via court of law. But again, given that the WMF has asked us to proactivity consider things like full-scale inclusion of the Time 100 lists as "copyvios" (a term of art used on WP to indicate potentially infringing material) and that are to be removed, then we have to follow the WMF, which like with NFC, can set a stronger standard for inclusion than U.S. Fair Use law. And my argument is that this case is directly comparable to the Time 100, so the same standard and approach need apply. --MASEM (t) 23:14, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
      • WP:Copyright violations (usually shortened to "copyvio", violations of WP:Copyrights policy) is not the same as copyright infringement. Flatscan (talk) 04:37, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
        • Indeed. I think it would be impossible for TSR's successors to claim copyright infringement because (1) they've released the names and in-game statistics of almost all these creatures under their Open Game License and (2) under that licence they're widely-reproduced on gaming-related websites such as this one, giving rise to an excellent defence. This whole debate needs to be focused on the question of whether the article complies with Wikipedia policy. Which is a good job, considering we're trying to decide without legal advice.  ;)—S Marshall T/C 13:04, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
          • We do have legal advice, pertaining specifically to the Time 100 lists, which WMF counsel had said would be problematic in terms of copyright. We're apply the same logic that was discussed then to here. --MASEM (t) 13:10, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
            • Yes, we have legal advice pertaining specifically to something different. It's pertinent that the Time 100 lists weren't released under an open licence by their copyright holder...—S Marshall T/C 13:43, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
              • Neither were the 1st edition TSR books, regardless of what the license on D&D property is today - it is a fundamentally different piece of work. So it is exactly the same scenario. --MASEM (t) 13:53, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
                • Well, no, with all due respect, it clearly isn't a fundamentally different piece of work. If I'd invented Monopoly and then released Park Lane under an Open Game Licence in 2000, but then I stood up in a Court of Law and tried to tell the judge that my version of Park Lane in Monopoly from 1977 was still under copyright because it was a different edition of the game, then the judge would peer at me over his glasses and ask if I was trying to be funny. If Wizards of the Coast were going to claim that their 2000 edition of the game was a "fundamentally different piece of work" then they shouldn't have called it Dungeons and Dragons. Thus, with all due respect, it clearly isn't exactly the same scenario as a Time 100 list.—S Marshall T/C 16:40, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
                  • Except that it is. There's a reason that people clarify what versions of games they are running by the D&D version because there are fundamental differences between each. They aren't just reprintings of previous work, it is a new work. Now, Wizards or TSR *could* retroactively re-release the older works in an freer license, but there's no evidence of that, so those works are under normal US copyright laws. --MASEM (t) 16:57, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse as a reasonable interpretation of consensus when you look at the policy based arguments. Shooterwalker (talk) 22:34, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse Moonriddengirl's copyvio argument looks reasonable to me and it was not addressed during the discussion. Many keep !voters simply stated that the list was not a copyvio, but that's not an argument. There were comments along the lines of "it's hard to claim copyright om lists", but that view is overly simplistic. It is hard to claim copyright on lists which contain purely factual information and no creativity is involved in creating the list (which covers the vast majority of the lists on Wikipedia that can be found in an external source), but this list was fundamentally different in that it was a duplication of a central part of a creative work. Copyright is not an area where taking risks is a good idea. Hut 8.5 17:34, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse as original nominator and per Moonriddengirl's comments. I noticed the copyright concern, which is why I nominated the list, but I'm not terribly familiar with the specifics of copyright. Moonriddengirl put it best, that this list is not transformative. I am not opposed to Masem's suggestion of a "List of notable D&D monsters" of some sort but creating that would not require the overturning of this decision. Jheald also had some eloquent things to say about the topic at WT:NFC, which is relevant to this case. Axem Titanium (talk) 22:20, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn There was no consensus to delete. There was no consensus on the specific issue of copyright violation as it was addressed by multiple experienced editors who !voted Keep and even the closer said that he didn't agree with the copyvio argument. The claim that the list significantly impacts the commercial sale of that edition is ridiculous because that edition is now out of print and has been made obsolete by multiple later editions. This level of copyright paranoia is dangerous to the project and should not be accepted without a stronger consensus than we saw here. For example, consider the current FA: Limbo (video game). This contains considerable detail of the play of a game which was intended to "keep you guessing". This includes the ending of the game and that's a complete spoiler which eliminated all desire on my part to purchase and play the game, which had initially seemed intriguing. Shall we delete that article too? Warden (talk) 19:56, 13 May 2012 (UTC)
  • The difference, as has been pointed out, is the amount of transformative use we have done with the list or the game. In the case of the game (since I was the primary editor on that) we're describing the game in the presence of critical commentary, discussion, and other aspects of it. As such, discussing the plot (and spoilers) or gameplay elements even at the depth and length relative to the game easily fall within fair use within an encyclopedia. In this list, all that was presented was the list of monsters with some more primary information, but no critical discussion of the monster list or the like. At that point, since the list is creative to start with, we are doing no transform on it and thus makes it a likely copyvio - one that we have WMF's advice to act on. --MASEM (t) 00:09, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Are you asserting that Moonriddengirl is posting in her capacity as a WMF employee and making a specific pronouncement? If so, that's different, but I do not see that. I see a particular, risk-adverse interpretation coming from one person who doesn't claim to be the foundation's counsel or giving legal advice on the matter. I'm certainly not posting as an ArbCom member--just as another editor in good standing with an interest in the problem an a familiarity with the principles involved. Jclemens (talk) 03:40, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
      • No, the advice from WMF counsel came during the discussion of the Time 100 list. Because this is nearly the similar case (a wholly-inclusive list created with creative elements, with little to no transformative work), we can apply the same WMF advice to this. --MASEM (t) 04:03, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
        • No, it's not a nearly identical case. This is more like the table of contents of a book, rather than an ordered list of elements where the list order is part of the creative element. Jclemens (talk) 02:20, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
          • Strip the ordering, it would still be a creatively selected list and still not included in whole on WP without transformation. So it is the same case. --MASEM (t) 02:29, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
            • Strip the ordering from the Time 100 list, and WMF counsel would never have encouraged us to remove it in the first place, because the ordering of importance is a key element of that article's copyright issue. Please stop trying to pretend they're sufficiently the same that a precedent applies. It doesn't, multiple people have explained why, and your protestations are starting to enter WP:IDHT territory. Jclemens (talk) 00:55, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
              • Actually, I just checked [8] There is no ordering on the Time list. So, yes, it still is the same. --MASEM (t) 01:00, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
                • The list is bulleted instead of numbered, but it has no obvious order. I skimmed the blurbs for Jeremy Lin (first) and Stephen Colbert (last) and found no indication that either was #1. The three-member "Rogues" section is not presented relative to the other 97. Moonriddengirl rejects merely alphabetizing the list at WP:Articles for deletion/2012 Time 100. Flatscan (talk) 04:39, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Fair use is quite debatable when you reach the level of an FA because it is the nature of an FA to be comprehensive - to tell you everything worth knowing about a topic. For another example, take today's FA, Fanny Imlay. The subject is obscure and so the FA explains that there is only one biography of her. The FA is necessarily compelled to loot this extensively and so it might be argued that this is now a derivative work which, by its deliberately comprehensive nature, has a significant commercial impact upon the principal source. So, an FA goes beyond fair use by trying to do it all and so, while a fair use review would hold back on spoilers because of their commercial and ethical effect, the FA deliberately spoils the work by revealing the ending. The beef against this list seems to have been that it was comprehensive in a similar way. That argument seems comparatively flawed because the list was a summary which did not include the key information required when playing the game - the game statistics. The information was not originally presented as a list and so the formatting as a list does not seem significant; unlike the tables of wandering monsters, say, in which the list-like structure and ordering is significant. Anyway, the main point here is that the copyvio argument was quite fanciful and was applied in a draconian way which is not applied to other articles. And when the closer himself said that he didn't accept the copyvio argument, I really can't see any logical basis for the close. Warden (talk) 06:47, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Spoilers and endings have absolutely nothing to do with fair use; its the amount of the work, not where from the work the fair use was taken. The FA you point certainly does not do this (there's two books repeated cited, each with 250+ pages going by citations, so no way is this an extensive republication of the work in whole, plus there is obvious transformative use). It doesn't matter that this list lacked statistics or anything else: the list was a creative element generated by the game designers to flesh out their world, and as such is a list generated from creative elements and thus does have copyright protection (as opposed to databases of factual information). That means that it wholesale inclusion in WP must be strongly backed by transformative use, otherwise, to the WMF, it reflects a potential copyvio they don't want on their servers. --MASEM (t) 13:01, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
      • There's also a definite difference between citing a biography for facts and citing a creative work in this case. For Fanny Imlay, it is a fact that she was born in Le Havre on 14 May 1794 and named after Fanny Blood, her mother's closest friend. These are facts which use the biography as a WP:RS to verify those facts. Biographies of course always have historical interpretation (creative) but the Wkipedia article, as a NPOV entity, necessarily avoids those sections. This is analogous to the example from Wikipedia:Copyright in lists where "estimates which are based on a repeatable calculation, such as trend analysis or interpolation" are acceptable, but "ordered rankings based on judgement, such as the top 50 most influential Muslims" are not. The former is based on facts; the latter is based on creative selection. Citing a Fanny Imlay biography supports facts; data mining a D&D book for monster names infringes on the creativity of the author. Axem Titanium (talk) 15:40, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
        • There's nothing creative about saying that the beholder, say, was an original monster in D&D - that's just a plain fact. Nor is it at all creative to provide a list of such monsters. And what's absurd is that we will continue to do both these things in the beholder article and navigational structures such as category:Dungeons & Dragons standard creatures. This AFD seems to have been quite arbitrary and, as there was no consensus for the deletion, the content should be restored. Warden (talk) 16:41, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
          • It is factual that a beholder is a creature used in D&D. It is creative to assemble a grouping real and mythological creatures from several genres to create a fictional setting; again, as I've posed, if they used ponies and bunnies and butterflies as their creature set, it is an entirely different setting, and even moreso when you contrast the D&D setting to other fantasy settings that use a comparable set of creatures. Again, look to the Time 100: it is not a random list of 100 people or a factually selected list of 100 people, it is a creative list that critically praises specific people, and as such the grouping of that people is creative. Same thing here.
          • Now, as has been pointed out, if this was a partial list of D&D monsters, those with their own pages and perhaps throughout the entire 4 editions, then there's something of transformative use in play (this also justifies the category). That is, this list now serves as a navigational aid to specific monster articles that discuss the creatures in- and out of game context (well, arguably, there's a few creature articles that would fail PLOT, but let's work that that's not the issue here for right now). Or, alternatively, I can see critical discussion of the D&D game system that discusses their choices for monster inclusion not necessarily focusing on a single one but calling out highlights of specific systems. I don't see that happening specifically for the 1st edition D&D books, making the ability to transform the list difficult to imagine. --MASEM (t) 16:51, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn: The discussion here has pointed to ways of fixing problems with the list. As already stated by others, I think the comparison with the Times 100 list is not fitting, because the Time 100 list itself, the placement of the individuals relative to each other and to the rest of the world, is the important content, while the information about these individuals can be gotten by other sources, too. In the monster list, we basically have tables of contents, with no more internal information than the tivial "this monster appeared in that book". The descriptions on the other hand, can be gotten exactly from the book and sometimes nowhere else. Representing tables of contents is fine, however, as was stated by Moonriddengirl. So would we solve the copyright problem by restricting ourselves to tables of contents, i.e. removing the descriptions? My idea would then be to organize the list alphabetically, (keeping the "Variants" column and) changing the "Other appearances" to "Appearances". This kind of sorting and indexing would be, in my opinion, at least a minimum of transformative nature. If something like that should be the solution, we would then need to decide if we had other problems like conflict with gameguide policy. Daranios (talk) 19:34, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
  • In any case I also feel there has been enough debate on the issue here to assume that the article can be fixed and a deletion was the wrong choice. As far as descriptions go, most of these creatures do not differ very much from there mythological antecedents. Web Warlock (talk) 21:57, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse, the closer correctly discounted the keeps relying on unsupported assertions. Sangrolu gave Moonriddengirl's argument due consideration, and Hobit attempted to engage on the merits, but their arguments boil down to invalid WP:Other stuff exists comparisons to plot summaries and lists of characters. I think that it will be possible to restore the list in some form, but the broad implementation – e.g., removing all non-notable (no separate article) monsters, removing the description column, combining the lists across editions – should be determined before undeletion. On the other hand, this AfD, if upheld, shouldn't be taken as precedent for open season on similar list articles. I'm not sure how fixing the list will work, as copyvio is disallowed from all namespaces, including hidden in the page history. Flatscan (talk) 04:21, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
  • No, there is no particular reason why "I don't agree with your logic" is any less policy based than a speculative set of legal arguments by a non-lawyer. Jclemens (talk) 02:20, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Could you point out specific comments (diffs would be helpful) that you found compelling? Sangrolu's second-to-last comment compares the list to plot summaries. One of Hobit's later comments makes comparisons to "directory-like information" and character lists. These are rebutted by 1) the format of the original works like Monster Manual that lack an overarching narrative and 2) the creative selection of the members. In addition, both view the list in isolation without considering the linked articles on individual monsters. Flatscan (talk) 04:22, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
      • My "second-to-last" statement that you seem to be tarring with "Other stuff exists" is based on the notion of being "more conservative than fair use". Just how conservative is this? The standard being presented here is such that we could not have plot summaries or character lists were we to apply it to novel. Hence it's a non-functional standard and we should not be operating by it. As for actual WP:COPYVIO, this notion that a list of creatures somehow represents the "creative heart" or is something that I am not aware of in any settled copyright case law. If anyone is aware of any cases that show this principle in use, I would invite you to share it with me. As it stands, this seems like jumping at copyright boogeymen to me. - Sangrolu (talk) 12:52, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
        • We are taking this action not based on any established copyright case law, but on the request of the WMF based on a near-similar situation that they have stated is, to their eyes, a copyright violation. As long as they are the ones paying for the server space and the like, we need to play by their rules even if it sees like paranoia; eg WP:NFCC is purposely stronger than US Fair Law law for this reason, to protect themselves from crossing the fair use line in the first place. If we never had any input from WMF on this, I would agree it would be a case of copyright paranoia, but in this situation it is not that. --MASEM (t) 13:06, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
          • Yes, you've said many times that you find that situation "similar" or "near-similar". One hopes the closer will see the difference between an assertion that's been accepted, and one that's merely been repeated.—S Marshall T/C 14:58, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
        • I think that I have sufficiently explained the difference between this list and a character list. Wikipedia has ample guidance for plot summaries: WP:NOTPLOT (policy), WP:Manual of Style/Writing about fiction#Plot summaries (guideline), and WP:Plot-only description of fictional works (essay). A summary is roughly the same form as a novel, text organized as prose. Considering that each two-page monster description is condensed into half a sentence (ignoring the separate articles), I think a fair comparison would be a plot summary with one paragraph per chapter. Any plot summary affected by this precedent would be excessively long and already covered by the existing guidance. Flatscan (talk) 04:39, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
          • Yes. While I don't fully agree that this leads to a copyright breach, I agree that your position is a very arguable objection to the list as currently written. But isn't it the essence of the "keep" argument that the problems are fixable? A list with this title would not need the half-sentence description.—S Marshall T/C 11:15, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
            • I think that the copyvio issue makes this a special case. If the list is restored, we can't leave it unchanged indefinitely – WP:There is no deadline doesn't apply – and another AfD is inevitable if the list is not fixed. Regarding the specific change of removing the descriptions, the obvious next step seems to be removing non-notable monsters entirely, as their names aren't very useful to a reader who doesn't know what they are. I think that severe cutting is necessary, and thus I expect that the discussion will be drawn out. Flatscan (talk) 04:49, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
              • That's a tempting point of view. I must say that I wouldn't want the allegation that this is a copyvio to lead to the list's deletion pending a consensus, though. That seems quite back to front in view of Wikipedia's normal position that material is kept until there's a consensus to delete.—S Marshall T/C 08:26, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
                • I have to grant you that point. Comparing to WP:Biographies of living persons, "no consensus, default to delete" for WP:BLP1E low-profile individuals has not gained consensus. We differ because I see a rough consensus to delete at the AfD and have been assuming deletion as the initial state. Flatscan (talk) 04:18, 19 May 2012 (UTC)
• overturn per S Marshall. JoshuaZ (talk) 13:39, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn (changed !vote per statements below including closing admin). Relist for complete discussion of the copyright issue. If noone appears to have discussed or considered MRG's arguments, we cannot pretend it was accepted by the pedia. A "cast list" or "character list" is usually not subject to copyright, so further discussion would appear in order. Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:59, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
  • On the contrary, Sangrolu and Hobit discussed Moonriddengirl's comments, and other keeps came after her original comment. BOZ wrote in his DRV nomination that he chose not to respond. Flatscan (talk) 04:39, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
    • 1) The close said there was a prima facie case made on Copyright. 2)Prima facie means "on its face." Thus there was no in depth discussion of the issue. The closer also did not agree with the prima facie case and suggested there be more in depth discussion on the issue. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:34, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
• Note The copyright arguments are severely undermined by the presence of the SRD (System Reference Document), listing the vast majority of these monsters as Open Game Licensed properties. The only monsters reserved as "Product Identity" under the legal document at that page are "beholder, gauth, carrion crawler, tanar’ri, baatezu, displacer beast, githyanki, githzerai, mind flayer, illithid, umber hulk, yuan-ti." I'm not even sure all of those are reflected in AD&D 1st edition, but even if they are, this list represents a small fraction of the total content of the list. No pro-copyright argument yet has taken this legal use permission into account, and thus all should be disregarded if they haven't specifically addressed this permission grant by the copyright holder. Jclemens (talk) 01:04, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Arguably I'm not sure if the SRD is 100% compatibly with GFDL/SS-BY (it would seem to favor compatibility, but there seems to be some uses more restrictive than ours, but not sure on those). That said: this applies to the d20 systems of D&D (as indicated by the header) which to the best I can tell is v3.5 and after (I know my time with earlier D&D was 3d6 stat roles). So no, the SRD does not retroactively apply the contents of the books in the 1st edition. And to that end, while the monsters in the 3.5 and 4th editions may be under an open license, their counterparts, or the listing of their counterparts in the earlier editions still falls under standard US copyright laws which do not give the same permissions for reuse. --MASEM (t) 01:13, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
    • The SRD and the OGL cover D&D 3.0 and 3.5. D&D 4.0/Essentials is covered by the GSL. The exact same list of monsters (minus Beholder and Mind Flayer) are considered to be 100% open and have been reprinted by such products as the Castles & Crusades Monsters & Treasures book, the Pathfinder Bestiary fro Paizo and the Tome of Horrors from Necromancer Games/Frog God Games. There are more, but these are the big three. None of these companies is TSR/WoTC. Web Warlock (talk) 01:45, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
      • But again, we're talking the 1st edition, which as best as I can read, the SRD does not cover - though the current copyright holder, Wizards?, is completely free to transform that license if they wanted to - they just seemingly haven't. Arguably we could include the list of 3.0, 3.5, and 4.0 monsters as long as we credit the SRD (as I read it), and the issue becomes a GAMEGUIDE problem, but for this list that's not the case. And to be clear as an example, were I to make up my personal top list of public domain books or other works, that list is still copyright to me regardless if the entries on the list can't be copyrighted. So the argument that "all these monsters are SRD-free" still doesn't clear the list of the copyright problem. --MASEM (t) 02:37, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
      • I agree with Masem: this is a reasonable argument for list(s) covering the compatibly-licensed editions, but I see no reason to assume that the free licenses cover 1st edition. Flatscan (talk) 04:39, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
        • I feel that what we should be discussing is the list's compliance or otherwise with Wikipedia's policy on copyright. I do think that in the real world WOTC would not have a claim against Wikipedia for publishing this list, and not just because of what JClemens says—but Wikipedia's copyright policy sets the bar rather higher. It seems to me that if we're over the bar for Wikipedia's policy then we'll very likely be safe in a real-world copyright action, and if we're not over the bar for Wikipedia's policy then it was right to delete the list in the first place. Therefore I think the Open Game Licence is a red herring; it's not CC-BY-SA or GFDL so it doesn't help us keep the list.—S Marshall T/C 11:15, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
          • If the later editions have the same characters then the first edition, than they either fall under the license or they fall outside of copyright altogether, because a non-copyright holder cannot license and a copyright holder that later licensed the same characters has licensed the characters. But even were this list copyrightable, which character lists generally are not, it would still be subject to the educational or transformational purposes of fair use. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:53, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
            • I think you've misunderstood, or I can't parse your grammar. Each edition has its own copyright status. And the material that was licensed (not released from copyright) was the mechanical aspects of the creatures, not their creative descriptions. And some of the most iconic creatures were not released under the OGL. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 18:34, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment. As according to the close, this was deleted solely on the arguments on copyright, and as this discussion has gone into detail of copyright issues, and it is pushing the scope of a DRV discussion, I think maybe we should undelete and run an RFC on the copyright issues on the article talk page. The discussion may lead to a demonstration of a solution. The discussion also may well be precedent-forming for many similar pages. I don't think there is any suggestion that the alleged copyright problem is immediately egregious, but if any stakeholder, such as the copyright owner, feels there is a real problem, I'm sure they will be listened to in such a talk page RFC. I am quite sure that the page didn't qualify for WP:CSD#G12. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:10, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
  • As I replied to S Marshall above, I expect the discussion to be long, too long to leave a copyvio problem lying around, especially if it sputters out without a solution. A RfC is a good idea, but I think it should go in WP:WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons space. Flatscan (talk) 04:49, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
    • OK, but we need an editable page, WP:WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons/List of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition monsters, is fine, because it is through editing that a solution, if possible, can be demonstrated. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:17, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
      • Due to the length of the list and its table formatting, I think that discussion would be a more manageable start and vastly preferable to the WP:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle. A short prototype would work also. Flatscan (talk) 04:18, 19 May 2012 (UTC)
        • Possibly. I was not advocating BRD. The sheer length of the article highlights much of the problem. The difficulty of editing a table, yes, that's another big problem. However, I think a decent prose lede section, discussing the contents of the table, is an early step in improving on the problem. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:53, 19 May 2012 (UTC)
• Additional Comment we keep throwing around the Time Top 100 lest, but that is not applicable here either. The creative value of such a list is how the elements in the list are ordered. This is a list of monsters in alphabetical order. This is closer in terms to a table of contents than a top 10 list. I think there is has been enough discussion here to show that there is no consensus. In that case the default position should be to Keep. I still feel the original AfD took two unrelated issues and closed despite there being no consensus there either. Web Warlock (talk) 12:31, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

That sounds right. The individual entries on the Time 100 list were not copyrightable (absent unique expression in words of those things, and that could be answered by expressing them differently, in any event), what is protected is thier ranking of them. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:00, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

The Time 100 list was not ordered (I thought I was even, but I double checked [9]). It was just a collection of 100 names, and yet that was still a problem from the WMF counsel to include on WP in full, because, as noted, they creatively selected those names. Even if we re-ordered the Time 100 in alpha order, we'd still be duplicating it in full. --MASEM (t) 13:10, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I didn't say "ordered" I said ranked. They ranked them above other things and that was unique enough, in full (although not in summary) for the WMF, probably because that ranking above other things (in full) is why one would be interested in buying the magazine (or clicking on thier website). Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:08, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

• Note that we still have multiple articles for the Times lists including Time 100 and Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century. This demonstrates that, whatever one makes of the copyright issue, deletion is not the established precedent. All that seems to happen in such cases, if anything, is some summarisation. To do this in this case, instead of listing the creatures from Greek mythology, we might just give some examples such as minotaur and medusa and refer to the list of Greek mythological creatures for the rest. Warden (talk) 16:15, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
  • This is a very misleading comment. Time 100 describes the yearly articles and repeat appearances and, as far as I can tell, has never had copyvio issues by including a full list. Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century survived WP:Articles for deletion/Lists of Time 100 (November 2007, two other articles were deleted) only after the full list was removed. The related/duplicate article List of TIME Magazine's 100 most influential people of the 20th century was deleted in February 2006 for copyright problems. All of the existing year lists are blanked pending processing at WP:Copyright problems, which will probably delete them. Deferring to another list is a good idea. Flatscan (talk) 04:49, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment I voted to relist above, and I don't really think this is the right place to discuss the copyright status of the article (other than discussing what was already brought up in the AFD). However, since it seems a lot of new discussion on the copyright issue is taking place here, I thought I should express my opinion now. I disagree with Masem's opinion that directions from the WMF related to the Time 100 list are applicable to this list. For the Time 100 list, the main point of the list is just which people are selected for it. If we duplicate the whole list, then there is no real reason for anyone to buy Time's version of it when they can just read ours. For the D&D monster manuals, however, the main point is as a tool for playing Dungeons and Dragons. Since our list did not include all the stats and rules for each monster, it can't be used as a substitute for the actual product that TSR/Wizards of the Coast sells. If you want to play 1st edition D&D, you still need to buy their product. I think that is a major difference between the two cases, and means that we can't assume instructions related to the Time 100 list apply in this case. That doesn't necessarily mean that the D&D list doesn't have copyright problems, but just that, in my opinion, the situation isn't very comparable to the Time 100 list. Also, I want to echo S Marshall's comment that just because Masem has repeated his opinion many times doesn't mean that it is accepted by everyone else. Calathan (talk) 15:51, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn own closure to no consensus, and work on a usable policy about copyright in lists. Thanks, all, for the insightful comments. As I outlined, I closed the AfD as "delete" because a good prima facie case was made, and not satisfactorily addressed in the AfD, that this list is a copyright violation. As the DRV discussion has shown, there are good arguments for either opinion, and we have no clear consensus about the circumstances under which we deem a list of elements from a work of fiction to be insufficiently transformative and therefore a copyright-violating derivative work. Personally, knowing too little about the applicable law, I have not been able to form a clear opinion about that. But it appears likely to me that there is no clear-cut answer under U.S. copyright law as it currently stands. Under these circumstances, I believe that we should work on developing a policy about these issues, perhaps based on the essay Wikipedia:Copyright in lists, but guided by advice from Foundation counsel whose responsibility (and not ours) it is to decide what level of legal risk the project should take. Until we have agreed on such a policy, I believe that, when in doubt as here, we should err on the side of our interest as a project to supply encyclopedic information to our readers, and delete lists as copyright violations only when they are clearly non-transformative derivations of a creative work and impair that work's commercial prospects, as in the case of the TIME 100 list, but probably not in this case (if only because the 1st edition of the game is long off the market and the list is no substitute for the published materials for the purpose of playing the game.) If restored, the list could be edited to remove its most derivative aspects, as several people have argued above, but a broader application of this to other similar lists should wait until we have agreed on a policy.  Sandstein  06:11, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I think the tone of this discussion is moving toward some kind of "List of notable D&D monsters". As far as I can tell, that is not something that requires undeletion since it would be primarily prose, rather than a table of monster names, descriptions, and page numbers. Axem Titanium (talk) 16:21, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
• Overturn per Sandstein immediately above and also DGG and S Marshall. In my opinion, as a non-lawyer, the list is not copyright infringement: without including the game statistics, it doesn't replace the original work in any way and is best seen as a (limited or incipient) commentary on which monsters were chosen. The argument that this is comparable to the TIME 100 list is reasonable, but not decisive in the absence of consensus. There are important differences, as well as similarities, between the two lists. Eluchil404 (talk) 11:51, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Keep in mind: the decide to remove the content of the lists from the Time 100 articles was not driven by consensus but by WMF counsel. If they tell us to do something, even if it is stricter than fair use allows (which is a reasonable argument) we need to follow it, irregardless of consensus. --MASEM (t) 13:05, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Then this should be overturned until such time as the WMF says this article should be treated otherwise. This was deleted based on a premise of a faulty understanding of what is, isn't or may not be copyright violation. Web Warlock (talk) 13:27, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
    • If the WMF really wants to delete this specific type of list, and not just ones vaguely similar to it, then I’d really rather hear that from them, instead of this continued grasping at straws. Meanwhile, if Sandstein is fine with overturning to work on the article, then I don’t see why there should be an impediment towards doing so. BOZ (talk) 13:49, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Certainly, the WMF has the authority to decide what content they will host, regardless of my personal appraisal of its copyright status, or even a considered consensus. My point was that there were no substantial free standing copyright issues and that the similarities to the TIME 100 list are not sufficient to mandate deletion based on what was done there. If the WMF Counsel thinks that there are issues they should say so, or issue guidance that more clearly covers this type of list. Until then there is no overriding reason to delete and "No Consensus" defaults to "Keep" as normal. Eluchil404 (talk) 21:16, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
• Relist the AFD debate had poor arguments on both sides, the closer kept to account that many of the keep voters had no policy based agreements, like meeting WP:LIST without giving much of a reason on why it does. But the main reason why the article was deleted was because of a copyright concern which was proven to be a flawed argument that wasn't really discussed policy based as well. Clearly a no consensus close here, but because of all these flawed arguments from both sides in the original AFD, a second AFD is needed to decide a consensus. Secret ^account 07:05, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Greater Bristol Metro scheme (closed)

Favorite betrayal criterion (closed)

9 May 2012

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