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

The result was keep‎. I'm closing this as Keep partially due to the lack of a valid and strong deletion rationale. You have to present an argument for why Deletion is the correct resolution for an article with problems instead of regular editing choices. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 06:21, 27 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Cliffjumper[edit]

Cliffjumper (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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This article has been languishing in the notability issue for three months now, let's bring it to the chopping block. Grandmaster Huon (talk) 05:22, 20 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Fictional elements and Comics and animation. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 08:38, 20 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Toys-related deletion discussions. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 08:39, 20 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Weak keep: setting aside outright fan sites there is some spammy stuff on notable sites at least:

-https://screenrant.com/new-transformers-why-no-bumblebee-cliffjumper/

-https://www.cbr.com/transformers-cliffjumper-redemption-image-skybound/

-https://wikiofnerds.com/dwayne-johnsons-character-killed-in-transformers-rock-rejects-lead-role-later/

-https://comicbook.com/anime/news/netflix-transformers-war-for-cybertron-cliff-jumper-clip/

etc.

BoomboxTestarossa (talk) 17:12, 20 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That could be turned into content for list of transformers characters#cliffjumper, so the Cliffjumper page can be turned into a redirect. Grandmaster Huon (talk) 17:15, 20 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Why? There's every chance there are even more sources out there (I haven't done a full check, but then I didn't nominate if for AfD without doing Before); what's your rush? With other noms and your apparent confession that you don't actually know what AfDs are *for* it's not adding up to a good look. BoomboxTestarossa (talk) 17:58, 20 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I definitely agree with what Boombox is getting at here. You're new to AfDs, and thus I can forgive making mistakes. (I mean, I was the guy who nominated like sixty in a day once) But really, there is no rush. These articles have existed for years on Wikipedia, and typically if they've been lying around for that long, then you can wait a bit to perform a BEFORE in advance.

In the future, when nominating articles, perform a BEFORE. A BEFORE basically means looking for sources prior to deletion. Are there sources in News articles about the subject? Are there sources in books or scholarly sources? If you can find enough sources that say something about the subject to justify a separate article, then it doesn't need an AfD and you can use those sources to further improve the article. Try to avoid trivial mentions, as those typically don't have much to say about the subject in question. Look for sources that really say something about them.

If an article needs reworking or a cleanup, I'd suggest trying your hand at it, or suggesting improvements on the article talk page. I'm a bit more unfamiliar with this kind of thing, so I can't really suggest more than that, but the motto when it comes to Wikipedia is improvement before deletion. Try your best to patch up the article before nominating it. If you really can't find anything at all, then the article likely can't be improved and should be nominated. I say likely because some exceptions exist, but that's a rabbit hole I feel will confuse more than anything else.

But yeah, TLDR, search for sources beforehand, and try to improve an article before nominating. Just a scroll here should show that we do delete articles that genuinely aren't able to meet the article criteria, but it shouldn't be used as a way to request improvement. Establish if an article meets the criteria, and then work from there. Pokelego999 (talk) 20:27, 20 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The first two sources seem ok-ihs, the other two I'd call unreliable or just too poor (SIGCOV failing). The character may be notable, but this really could use a WP:TNT treatment, the article has no reception section and ton of plot summary/mechandise info WP:FANCRUFT. I vote for 'weak redirect to the list of characters, with no prejudice to this being rewritten from scratch. But let's face it, 95% of the current content in the article needs to be deleted (blanked). Keeping this as it is is sending a bad messeage to the readers - that this is encyclopedic, or that Wikipedia is no better than fandom. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 06:34, 24 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. [1] is a good example of reliable SIGCOV already referenced in the article. Comics Bulletin from that era should be reliable as well. Not as sure on MTV Movies Blog but likely reliable. I think this meets WP:GNG based on sources in the article, and there's certainly more out there as BoomboxTestarossa has pointed out. —siroχo 02:17, 21 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  I don't we should treat this type of collector's catalogue entry as useful for the purpose of estabilshing notability. "this unparalleled guide presents every character in robot and alternate modes with accessories". I don't think that listing of merchandise for collectors is a type of souce we want to rely on. This way lies the argument that we should have a separate article for each collectible item (baseball card, Magic the Gathering card, gum wrapper, etc.). _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 06:21, 24 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  This, like most of these Transformers topics have coverage of varying overlapping depths as toys, collectibles, characters in comic books, characters in TV shows, characters in movies, characters in video games, etc. I don't think the same can be said for most collectables.

  If there's a gum wrapper that has this level of coverage, such that we can write an article on it, then we should do it: The first paragraph of WP:N suggests Information on Wikipedia must be verifiable; if no reliable, independent sources can be found on a topic, then it should not have a separate article. Wikipedia's concept of notability applies this basic standard to avoid indiscriminate inclusion of topics.

  I agree that this does desperately need cleanup. But I do feel like we as editors need some better approaches to cleanup. The dichotomy of letting it sit vs redirecting as TNT is not healthy for the development of articles in this state.

  Getting out of scope for the AfD but, maybe we need to embrace a role of "tag percolation" of some sort. I'll point you at two edits on Mandelbrot Set. At one point I removed "more citations needed" with an explanation: [2], then another editor took me up on that offer and interspersed the cn tags throughout [3]. I feel like doing this process for other issues (including ones of ALLPLOT and FANCRUFT) could help the collaborative editing process. —siroχo 01:58, 25 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  Agreed, there definitely needs to be some sort of middle ground between broad tagging and AfD. Taking the time to actually break down the issues with a page in a way they're evident to passing would-be editors rather than going to AfD when no real intermediate work has been done is something that needs work, it might attract more editors with knowledge of the area that way. Inline tagging of OR/CN, removal of unsuitable material line by line and constructive feedback on talk pages all need to be used more. Some people just edit Wikipedia and don't follow AfDs, after all. There also needs to be more aftercare for any merges or redirects. Is List of Transformers a viable article in itself or are we just kicking the can down the road? Does it have a section on Jazz/Sideswipe/Cliffjumper/Blaster or is that just going to be a hole? How does the list handle that there are multiple versions of these characters as best as I can tell, which are sometimes quite different to each other (e.g. when I was a kid Scorponok was a big chap who was in charge of the Deceptions but in the films he's a drone-type minion).

  I think most of us have gone through a phase of finding Twinkle and tagging/prodding stuff like it's a computer game. I know I did. But you have to back the driveby stuff up with some work. There are far, far too many redirects on Wikipedia to pages that tell you nothing about the redirect, and from what I've seen here the past few months this "vote and do nothing constructive afterwards" attitude in AfDs is a major factor in that. BoomboxTestarossa (talk) 10:44, 25 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep, he was a prominent member of the Autobots in the cartoon as he was an equal to Autobot Bumblebee being seen as much in the series, which is saying a lot. Davidgoodheart (talk) 02:59, 27 August 2023 (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 article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.