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

The result of the debate was Keep. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:35, 11 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Wikipedia:Service awards

The service awards were proposed in July 2006, with the relevant discussions being here and here. Inspection of both reveals 50/50 for and against, and it seems that the proposal was archived early by Ed. Herostratus, the founder and maintainer of the awards, refuses to resubmit this to Proposed Awards, apparently because he fears delisting, so I am forced to bring this here. I find an award given on the basis of people rather than edits kinda worrying, and somewhat against the principles of Wikipedia (people don't matter, edits do). I don't really think this has a place on Wikipedia. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 21:51, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Very strong need to keep - we have plenty of awards that are given out because the giver subjectively thinks that the recipeint should receive them. We need these awards, which have refreshingly objective criteria, to keep a balance. Johntex\ ^talk 23:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep This gives an idea where users are at in terms of service though some users have more edits than time (or vice versa) than others. Chris 22:56, 6 March 2007 (UTC)This comment moved from Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Awards by Johntex\ ^talk 01:08, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

[The following comment was misfiled, and has been copied here.]

I think you're voting on the wrong MfD. In any case, if users want to show how many edits they have and how long they've been here, they can via a userbox. See my page, for example, where I have both. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 23:06, 6 March 2007 (UTC) reply

[End copy.]

• Comment: Dev920, by that reasoning we should also delete all barnstars, since people can recognize others' edits and other activities with simple messages on their talk pages. We should also delete all userboxes, since basic prose, like "This user has been a wikipedian since (date)" could be used instead. Etc. Just because something can be done one way doesn't militate against the idea of having alternative ways of doing it. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ contrib ツ 01:46, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Strong keep. Do not agree with nom's reasoning at all. If nom wanted this listed at "Barnstar and award proposals", and main page-author did not do it, nom should have done it instead of punitively MfDing it. Especially since known support level for the template by nom's own admission is ca. 50% as of middle of last year and almost certainly higher now, since page has multiple editors at this point. Don't agree with deletion rationale either. By that reasoning, user pages themselves (the only place these templates are used) should all be deleted too. I think nom is confusing Wikipedian principles for article writing and policy formation, on the one hand, with user page twiddling, on the other. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ contrib ツ 01:29, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep I see no reason at all why this page should be stricken from the project. There are lots of awards for all sorts of things in the project and I don't see why these should be banned. Is the problem that there is some reason why this should be moved from WP to some other namespace? Even if there is consensus at Wikipedia:WikiProject Awards to not allow it to be added to {{ Barnstarpages}}, I would see no reason that it could not stand alone. -- After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 01:39, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Comment: See immediately below in the MfD listings. Someone is trying to "punish" WikiProject Awards by MfDing the entire project! Anyway, given the WP:SNOWBALL's chance that that MfD has, the issue could be taken up at WikiProject Awards, but it should be noted that the Wikipedia service awards were never intended to be a form of barnstar; they are a different animal completly. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ contrib ツ 01:46, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Strong keep. This is an adorable page, constructed with care and good humor. It's also a progressive set of barnstar-like awards that absolutely anybody can earn just by being active. It's the perfect answer to barnstar envy that some people might feel and gives users something to shoot for. Durova ^Charge! 02:49, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep. Awards have an approval process now? That is so stupid. Anyway, people most certainly are important, becasue they're the ones who make the edits. - Amarkov moo! 04:34, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Delete. I am going to go against the tide here. These awards are pointless. Any user can state on their user page how many edits they have and how long they have been on WP, and take up less apace than these do. -- Bduke 10:33, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
  • OK, let it stay, but it is still pointless and unnecessary. -- Bduke 23:13, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

Question: How is that differenet from any userbox - the user can just add text to describer themselves? Same with barnstars - why not just leave a note for the person? Johntex\ ^talk 14:14, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Strong Keep Since Barnstars and the like are awarded on the basis of either acts of particular merit or continuous service in a particular field, it seems only fair that there should be general service awards as well. Every other organisation that awards medals of some description has those for general service. In any case they are entirely voluntary and nobody is forced to display one if they don't want to. A1octopus 16:05, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep. I originated the page so I'm biased, I guess. Anyway, my argument is: these are presumably motivational at least for some editors. They certainly don't do any harm, and editors who find them unpleasing may ignore them. There is a reason that many organizations do have service awards. For the motivation, morale, and development of a large volunteer organization, they are helpful - that is my opinion, but it is based in accepted organizational development practice. They are specifically structured to require time in harness, with a reasonable amount of edits to show active status, to avoid the calumny of promoting "editcountitis" (the danger of which is overblown anyway, in my opinion). Herostratus 16:57, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Strong Keep Are you kidding?!? I love these awards. What a great way to get new users excited about wikipedia. These awards have given me incentive to become MORE involved in wikipeda so that I can meet the requirements to get the next one. Now, I wouldn't mind someone implementing a rule where the awards are taken away if the person who gave it to themeself doesn't deserve it. For instance, I'm not quite sure User:Lapinmies deserves Master Editor status. It may also be a good idea to increase the number of eidts required even more (since some people might consider correcting a spelling error that THEY made as an edit). However, this award system is wonderful, I can now throw myself a bone instead of waiting around for somebody to notice all the work I'm doing on Category:United States Senators by seniority.-- Dr who1975 20:15, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep So what if it can be done with Userboxes, barnstars, plain text, whatever? There's no rule saying every has to do things in the same way. These are a nice way of acknowledging the contributions of editors. As for the claim of "people don't matter, edits do", if that is the case, why have user pages at all? Koweja 20:28, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep An editor can reward themselves for their number of edits they have made. Others, however, should not judge an editor on the amount of edits they have made. -- sony-youth ^talk 22:45, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Delete leads to people intentionally making more edits without thinking. Useless egoism. - Lapinmies 22:51, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Comment: I would have to say that this doesn't mean much coming from someone who is falsely claiming a "Master Editor" Wikipedia:Service award on his user page. Please see WP:POINT. If you don't like the awards don't abuse them to make a wikipolitical point, just ignore them. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ contrib ツ 23:01, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Comment: Oh look, somebody else noticed.-- Dr who1975 23:37, 7 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Strong Keep. The more awards the better. There are so many editors that voluntarily work so hard to help preserve this encyclopedia's integrity and they deserve all the encouragement and pats on the back they can get. Cricket02 04:34, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Further comment: The "this leads to editcountitis" reasoning seems faulty to me right from the get-go, because the awards have time limits, and any reasonably active editor will meet the edit count requirements long before they meet the time requirements. Game over, please drive through. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ contrib ツ 05:33, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep: You have to be kidding me. Does anyone here really care if someone has editcountitis? The more awards the better. There are a lot of really active users who don't get many awards, this a good way for them to have at least one. In addition the time requirement is what makes the award a bit more meaningful. Yeah, of course you can get a bunch of edits quickly, sticking around for the long haul is another thing. IvoShandor 12:49, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Delete This leads to editcountitis. -- South Philly 14:05, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

(A) No one has shown this leads to editcountitis. (B) No one has shown editcountitis is bad. More edits to the 'pedia is a good thing, and should be encouraged, not feared. Force10 14:26, 8 March 2007 (UTC) reply

• Keep. Hey, I just got mine! The story of my life. My radical opinion is that even robots deserve these things, especially SmackBot. I say keep 'em happy and feeling appreciated, because you never know what'll happen should they decide to get testy. - Tobogganoggin ^talk 00:11, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Keep All of the above keep is relevant, and extremely correct. These awards aren't hurting anyone. Let's promote WikiLove. Alex43223 ^{Talk | Contribs | E-mail | C} 05:12, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply
• Super Strong Keep and Ultra Strong Keep. Ask yourself - what does a Wikipedian gets in return of her/his contribution to the cause of human knowledge? No money, no fame, sleepless nights, ugly fights, lot of stress and little praise. What is wrong in letting them have these tiny tokens of appreciation? The abstract sense of fulfillment by contributing to unknown faces humanity is not always motivation enough. Sometimes a little token can take a Wikipedian really far. Crying-on-top-of-voice Keep. Aditya Kabir 16:44, 9 March 2007 (UTC) reply

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