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Omnibus articles

If you came here because someone asked you to, or you read a message on another website, please note that this is not a majority vote, but instead a discussion among Misplaced Pages contributors. Misplaced Pages has policies and guidelines regarding the encyclopedia's content, and consensus (agreement) is gauged based on the merits of the arguments, not by counting votes. However, you are invited to participate and your opinion is welcome. Remember to assume good faith on the part of others and to sign your posts on this page by adding ~~~~ at the end. Note: Comments may be tagged as follows: suspected single-purpose accounts: {{subst:spa|username}}; suspected canvassed users: {{subst:canvassed|username}}; accounts blocked for sockpuppetry: {{subst:csm|username}} or {{subst:csp|username}}.

I really think that instead of having dozens of AFDs for individual events, the best way forward is to consider combining coverage in omnibus articles, such as "MMA events in 2011" or something like that. In this way, readers are given a "road map" of related content, and there is no worry about particular events being notable enough as they are but aspects of the wider, obviously notable, umbrella subject. Those events that are most obviously notable unto themselves can have brief mentions with {{main}} used to direct users to the stand alone articles. I therefore would ask the following of both those who want to keep and those who want t delete these many MMA articles that have been flooding AFD: Please suspend debating the individual articles and consider this idea. Thanks Beeblebrox (talk) 18:13, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

• Support the proposed omnibus article plan. Mtking 19:26, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
• Support This idea has been discussed at the MMA WikiProject but hasn't seemed to gain a lot of traction. I have drafted an example 2012 in UFC events in my sandbox. There has been some positive comments about it from some non-MMA Wikiproject folks. Maybe I should just be WP:BOLD and create the article. I guess I'm afraid to see the flack that results from the individual articles being redirected to the 'year in' article (and the potential edit wars from IPs and the WP:IDONTLIKEIT folks). Suggestions? Encouragement to go forward? --TreyGeek (talk) 21:59, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Just do it, if we get into a edit war situation with IP's et. al. then we ask any of the number of admins who have helped out to step in and protect the redirects, the bottom line here is that there is such a clear policy, guideline and common scene position here that any uninvolved or not admin would see that without clear evidence of meeting WP:MMAEVENT any attempt at undoing the revert is just being disruptive. Feel free to drop me a note at my talk if I can help out in any way. Mtking 22:11, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

 Done 2012 in UFC events has been created in mainspace. I was about to say "only 18 more years of articles to create". However some of the earlier years wouldn't make sense. 1993 in UFC events would include only a single event, 1994 had three events, 1995 four events, 1996 five events and I'll stop counting. It may be easier to work backwards and figure out how to deal with the earlier years later.

See comment below for a possible solution to that. Mtking 05:10, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Question: Articles titled similar to List of Central Texas World Championship Cage Fighting events should be list-class articles (because of the title) and contain relatively little prose, particularly in comparison to 2012 in UFC events. Correct? Assuming we were to combine event articles for lesser notable promotions (ProElite, BAMMA, Impact Fighting Championships to randomly choose a few) who only hold one or two events per year what would be the suggested article title? Again, I was randomly choosing promotions so they may be bad examples in terms of notability, but for sake of argument, I'm wondering what the answer is. --TreyGeek (talk) 03:47, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

See comment below for a possible solution to that. Mtking 05:10, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

• Support omnibus articles Putting the UFC events for a year together in one article is a reasonable compromise. For lesser organizations, it's a tougher call. I don't have have a problem with "List of XXX events" for organization XXX, but I don't think WP is the place for more details about events by minor organizations. Papaursa (talk) 04:29, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

We could do something along the lines of 2012 in MMA which would summarise all promoters events, in the case of UFC it would have a brief section on the highlights of the year and a {{Main}} to the 2012 in UFC events article, this could also help out for years when a given promoter has few events such as 1994 for the UFC or when the promoter only runs a few given their location constraints. Mtking 05:10, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

The idea of having a 2012 in mixed martial arts events that subdivides for the larger, more active promotions seems reasonable to me. It even works for 1993 in mixed martial arts events as it would apparently include four Pancrase events in addition to UFC 1 (Category:1993 in mixed martial arts) before considering events that don't have articles already. Something that Papaursa said at the start of the "year in" article discussion on the MMA WikiProject talk page was the potential length of 2012 in UFC events. It's 45k in size now and there is potentially still a lot more content to come just in terms of additional events and main events. Building off Mtking's idea and an idea that Glock had on my talk page we'd potentially have a hierarchy of omnibus articles similar to:

2012 in mixed martial arts events	2012 in UFC events	2012 in UFC on FX events
		2012 in UFC on Fox events
		2012 in UFC on Fuel TV events
	Bellator Fighting Championships: Season Six
	2012 in Strikeforce events
	2012 in Super Fight League
	More if there are other very active promotions

Those three categories of UFC events and their couple/few paragraphs of prose for each event would be split off from the main UFC events article into their own sub-article. It would leave the "numbered" UFC events and the TUF 15 finale in the main UFC events article and potentially shorter. Very active promotions such as Bellator, Strikeforce and presumably SFL (judging from their desired event schedule) would have their own omnibus articles. In other years, promotions such as WEC, Dream, and Hero's could have their own "year in" article when they were particularly active. --TreyGeek (talk) 13:43, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

seams a good starting point. Mtking 09:54, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Jesus, nice job ruining a perfectly great resource. Now no one can know the history of fights that got scrapped or even just the plain results. This list idea is terrible and I can't believe three days of "debate" allowed you to do this. Udar55 (talk) 02:42, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Strong oppose - I agree with Udar55. Action was taken before this debate is over. The new omnibus omits info. I stumbled onto this topic via BigMMA, and don't know much about it. A whole bunch of these becoming a single this is a major change, and deserves a longer debate. Heck, merging two simple articles means waiting at least a few weeks. This happened in a few days. And, in my opinion, the old, separate articles were better, and deserve articles. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:47, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

This is not a major change, what it is, is applying existing wiki-wide consensus to the topic, it allows for any event that can be shown to have lasting effect to have a stand alone article, the others have a section in an Omnibus article. We don't have an article for every MLB game or every MLS game, so why do we have one for every UFC event ? Mtking 06:04, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

You are grasping at straws with the MLB argument. There are literally thousands of MLB games in a season, whereas the UFC puts on 20ish events a year.Hollaluuie (talk) 18:02, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Regardless of the rationale, it is indeed a major change. Plus, when a discussion is started, it must be given time before action is taken. Beeblebrox suggested this at 18:13, 28 March 2012, and you added  Done at 05:10, 29 March 2012. Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:12, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

How much time is needed? An AfD was closed two weeks ago by User:DGG suggesting that a "list of" events article would be appropriate. The overall issue with non-notable MMA event articles has been an ongoing issue for more than a year. I'm curious as to how long AfD discussions should go on before it is allowed to try to rectify the overall situation. --TreyGeek (talk) 06:18, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

LOL@ "how much time is needed"! You came into this omnibus discussion with the mindset that you were already going to change it. After you and Mtking slapped each other's backs, you made the edits swiftly by implying you saw "more and more support" for the omnibus style article. In one fell swoop, you removed everything and most of the reasons why people come to Misplaced Pages for UFC information (buy rates, attendance figures, payouts, background on cancelled fights).Udar55 (talk) 14:11, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

This formal and centralized discussion right here over omnibus vs individual articles just started. What DGG suggested some time back in some other location, and the overall ongoing issue has led to this discussion. This is the hexagon, or octopus, or whatever it's called. This is where it finally gets decided, right? This discussion should be allowed to stay open for a week or more. Let the chips fall as they may. I can live with the omnibus or the individual articles. What I care about is consensus, and due process. A 24-hr discussion is not due process. Cheers, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:30, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Anna on this, the discussion should have been given more time, not just to gauge consensus, but to be able to show consensus, because it is clear that this change will bring questions. --kelapstick 07:19, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Support based on my comment at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 149 (2nd nomination) "UFC holds ±23 PPV events per year, which is about one every 2-3 weeks. In my view having an article about each event is akin to having an article about each week in an NFL football season" and to keep the UFC articles out of AfD by supplying the information in a common area.--kelapstick 07:19, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

The problem with the way Trey and MT were doing it was that they were just including 5 broad/vague lines about each event, which if you look at the info required to understand an event, it's quite poor. I wouldn't mind a single page with all of the events on it however you'd still need to include ALL of the information previously shown on the individual event pages. Eidetic Man (talk) 12:34, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Do NOT Support I don't think anyone will have an issue with a single or multiple event pages as long as they still have all of the information they always did. (i.e. results, fight times, walk in music, buy rates, gate, attendance and other info) The lack of this is generally what is upsetting people. I agree that 20+ single pages for UFC events a year can get hefty however all of the results should be compacted into one single page at worst. This way, there will be no complaints, rather people will just adjust. The format that Trey and MT wanted to implement was poor and SEVERELY lacked useful information and frankly it just became a large wall of useless text. Eidetic Man (talk) 09:18, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Do NOT Support donotwant.jpg — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.214.12.184 (talk) 09:28, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Strong oppose The old articles were fine there was no need to change them! Not only did a vast majority of people love the old articles, they learned from them, and what they learned was useful. This 2012 in UFC events has no useful information what so ever. It lacks the most important part of a UFC article, and that is the fight results and upcoming fights. And no, that doesnt make Misplaced Pages a stats book or a newspaper, it tells about the most important part of an MMA related article, the fights! Thats what the people watch MMA for in the 1st place! And to say ANY UFC event is not notable is ludacris, because thousands of people watch each UFC event. If thats not notable, I dont know what is. We dont want this 2012 in UFC events shoved down our throats, we prefer the old way which has worked for years. If it aint broke, dont fix it! Glock17gen4 (talk) 10:00, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Support This would appear to be 100% consistent with the statements made by closing admins on the various AFDs on MMA subjects. It doesn't prevent any stand alone article on an event that is clearly notable, and puts the more marginal events together where the information can still be here on Misplaced Pages, while making it more accessible and usable AND more likely to be within the guidelines of WP:N. I'm open minded as to the final layout and separation, but this is certainly a move in the right direction. Dennis Brown (talk) 01:25, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Jesus, nice job ruining a perfectly great resource. Now no one can know the history of fights that got scrapped or even just the plain results. This list idea is terrible and I can't believe three days of "debate" allowed you to do this. Udar55 (talk) 02:42, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
• Please revert the pages to the old format. It was far easier to follow and also made it easier to view other information about the event (fighters, locations and many other bits of info) The layout is not so much the issue as the lack of this information which we all like to know as it means we can find past fights of a new fighter easier and the like. Ctrlchris (talk) 12:13, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
• Strong oppose per WP:COMMON and block any account trying to force this through before this discussion has closed. Enough said. Spyder Grove (talk) 13:17, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Strong oppose Also, I've nominated 2012 in UFC events for deletion since it was done on a whim and without approval (or even a real debate).Udar55 (talk) 14:24, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• "strong oppose" What is wrong with you people. You have made a knowlege rich infomation bank reduced to nothing. There was coutless media coverage on each event. This is nothing more than lazyness or a power trip. Last time i checked that is not what wikipedia stands for. 68.59.127.207 (talk)Thecrow1313 —Preceding undated comment added 15:03, 31 March 2012 (UTC).

• "Strong oppose" Terrible change of something that didn't need or wanted to be changed. Rm92 (talk) 15:08, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
• Comment What people are failing to address in their opposition is how the individual articles meet Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines. There has been little offered to show that an MMA event on its own is notable, that the articles provide "well sourced prose" as required by WP:SPORTSEVENT, that the article contain more than WP:ROUTINE fight announcements and results, and that they provide anything more than news and statistics (WP:NOTADVERTISING, WP:NOTEVERYTHING, WP:FUTURE, WP:NOTNEWSPAPER, and WP:NOTSTATSBOOK). I'd be more open to listening to comments if they could say something other than WP:IDONTLIKEIT. --TreyGeek (talk) 15:46, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

And what makes you think that useless wall of text you made beats the old system? It doesn't matter what we say because you will just try and twist wikipedia policy in your favor, explain how the old system violated ANY policy. Glock17gen4 (talk) 16:16, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• comment where do we go to report mods? You clearly dont listen to anything we have to say. If this is not the place where we can say "i dont like it" feel free to direct me to the proper place. 68.59.127.207 (talk) Thecrow1313

• Strong oppose This is a terrible idea. It takes away the entire point of going to the individual event pages. This gives no ability to provide in depth background of the event and makes sifting through an enormous eyesore of an omnibus page to break out individual fight results heinously painful and tedious. What value does this even provide? I think the way it is now with an article per page is great. It provides solid background information per event, the bout results, bonuses, walk out music, the pay outs, and other awesome information. There will be absolutely no value whatsoever in a small blurb of a paragraph explains the event briefly in a large omnibus page. As someone who frequents many of the UFC, Pride, and WEC fight pages regularly, I will just goto Sherdog from now on because its much more digestible as a single source for event data. Pull lead (talk) 16:10, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• oppose Kaizenyorii —Preceding undated comment added 16:36, 31 March 2012 (UTC).

• Comment - Okay, here's my rationale at the moment. Maybe it's flawed, so feedback is welcome.

There is a long list of WP:XXX guidelines that say these stand-alone articles are notable, and a long list that say they are not. So, guidelines alone cannot decisively solve this.

What may solve this is fundemental reasoning: This is an encyclopedia here to serve visitors. This content is mainly useful to, and valued by, people interested in UFC. The content should be presented in a way that they want. Sherdog forum members typify these people, I think. I investigated the site from a post at Mtking's talk page. They, and numerous others here seem to overwhelmingly prefer the individual articles.

Serving visitors per WP:IAR trumps the approach of comparing pro and con guideline lists. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 16:41, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Further, the stand-alone articles in question got tons of traffic. I really think it would be a mistake to remove them:

• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_142
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_143
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_144
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_145
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_146
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_147
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_148
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_152
• http://stats-classic.grok.se/en/201203/UFC_154

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 16:57, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Anna, the attempt with the omnibus article is to discuss significant happenings of the events with prose so that they are informative without being simply a list of results, trivia (such as walk in music), and statistics. Having omnibus articles does not mean individual events which are notable cannot have their own page. Rather it is an attempt at giving non-notable events a place. If users want to put in the time to improve individual event articles so that they are not simply a list of results and stats, they are welcome to. If there are specific ideas you or others have for improving the omnibus articles, I'd love to hear them. So, far the only thing I've seen is that people prefer a list of results as opposed to reading prose. However, the Misplaced Pages community has decided that Misplaced Pages is not a stats book. --TreyGeek (talk) 17:12, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

You must be joking if you think "the only thing I've seen is that people prefer a list of results as opposed to reading prose." Your omnibus article completely removed many factors of why people visit those pages frequently. Namely, people like to know the event's history (matches that got scrapped/altered), buy rates, attendance numbers, live gates, etc. For example, instead of history of UFC 142: Aldo vs. Mendes that the original page offered, you just changed it to a few paragraphs that basically said, "At this even Jose Aldo beat Chad Mendes. There were some other fights too." Wow, thanks! What you did is akin to someone changing Star Wars: A New Hope's detailed history to "This film is about Luke Skywalker fighting Darth Vader. It was popular." Udar55 (talk) 19:00, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Hi Trey. Well, "Misplaced Pages is not an indiscriminate collection of information", i.e. WP:NOTSTATSBOOK doesn't quite apply. "NOTSTATSBOOK" sounds like it applies, but the guideline really doesn't talk much about that. As far as these standalones being just stats, they also have a poster image, prose, etc. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 17:53, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Anna, you claim above there is a "long list of WP:XXX guidelines that say these stand-alone articles are notable" - please list them as I cant see any, in fact a number of the closing admin comments at the AfD's have pointed out those seeking to keep the articles have not quoted any poilicy or guidelines in their arguments. Mtking 21:50, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Anna, I think you are mistaken in your claim that there are lots of policies that support the inclusion of most of these stand alone articles. That is the reason they have been sent to AFD and deleted. Recently, several admins and users have developed this omnibus idea as a way to preserve the less notable and future events, somewhat shielding them from instant deletion. Misplaced Pages's WP:GNG is still the king when it comes to inclusion, the subpages are only meant to offer guidance. WP:RS hasn't been relaxed for MMA events either. The criteria is the same for an articles here. MMA articles are often only referenced by sites quoting statistics or forums. These clearly fall short of the requirements of WP:RS, and outside of the MMA discussions, stand alone articles that only use these types of sources are quickly deleted. While many of the MMA fans might not agree, the community as a whole does. The omnibus articles, with redirects, is the solution. Independent articles can only exist if they pass WP:GNG, like all other articles here, ie: they have multiple and significant coverage from reliable sources that are independent of the subject matter. I don't know much about MMA, but I do know a little about what the consensus of the community is when it comes to "multiple", "significant" "reliable" and "independent", and what is and isn't acceptable. Once you filter out all the socks and meatpuppets at the previous AFDs (which we now have a team doing), the consensus becomes very clear and one sided. This is why the omnibus articles and redirects are important, as this is the only way to salvage the information. Otherwise, they will be deleted, one by one, with a few exceptions for the events that actually do meet the criteria here. Dennis Brown (talk) 01:58, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

"MMA articles are often only referenced by sites quoting statistics or forums." You have said often that you don't follow MMA and this statement proves it. Nearly all of the sources quoted in UFC event pages come from the official UFC site and MMA news sites, not places just "quoting statistics or forums." Reference sites such as UFC.com, ESPN, Yahoo, Sherdog, MMA Junkie and MMA Fighting clearly fall under WP:NEWSORG. That is more than most movies and books get on this site (when are you going to start policing them?). Regarding AfD notices, go back and see that nearly every one placed on a UFC event has been by Mtking, the same guy who spearheaded this "reform" campaign and provided TreyGeek's sole back slapper. I clearly established the events as notable entertainment products for him further down on this page. To repeat it, per Misplaced Pages's primary criteria for notability, you can read the following simple guideline: A company, corporation, organization, school, team, religion, group, product, or service is notable if it has been the subject of significant coverage in secondary sources. Udar55 (talk) 03:37, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

• Comment - Do not allow TreyGeek and MtKing to throw the rule book at you, if they do, show them this! WP:NOTBUREAUCRACY
• Opposed to the new system. I use wikipedia extensively to read about MMA events and MMA fighters, and now it seems content is mashed into one gigantic article. Chaotic, and definitely a step back from the previous and original way. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.249.249.5 (talk) 17:45, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

WP:IGNORE Glock17gen4 (talk) 16:43, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

• Comment So far it's pretty obvious that only Trey and MtKing want to do the omnibus thing and everyone else (who constitute the vast majority of users) don't want this. I understand you guys think you run some sort of little empire here, but the fact that each event having a stand alone article is a total valid style of organization in accordance with the guidelines highlighted by Anna. Move on to something else and stop wasting everyone's time. The omnibus is a bad idea, period. Leave it at that. Pull lead (talk) 19:55, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, TreyGeek is always going on and on about consensus being reached to defend his changes (I think maybe two people agreed with him). Yet we don't see him addressing the overwhelming opposition that has shown up here since his unwarranted move. It is glaringly obvious from this real debate that most people prefer the old system. Udar55 (talk) 20:03, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

There is nothing to address the opposition is all WP:IDONTLIKEIT of the new, not a single poilicy or guideline (other than WP:IAR) has been putforward either here or at any AfD on the article pages. Mtking 21:50, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Well, chances are you won't even listen to reasons listed, but I'll give it a shot. Broken down to its core, the UFC is a company that delivers a entertainment product, much like the WWE, Simon & Schuster and countless movie studios. It is something that is made commercially available to the general public through PPV and then DVDs of the product can be purchased online at places such as Amazon.com. As a tangible product, it easily falls under the WP:GNG policy. Also, per Misplaced Pages's primary criteria for notability, you can read the following simple guideline: A company, corporation, organization, school, team, religion, group, product, or service is notable if it has been the subject of significant coverage in secondary sources. Using that easy to understand criteria, I think it is safe to say each UFC event passes the notability guidelines easily. Curiously, I don't see you starting a campaign to eliminate the pages for every WWE PPV, John Grisham novel or Lionsgate theatrical release. Udar55 (talk) 23:00, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

If every UFC event were notable then the following AfDs would have been closed keep, but they weren't:

• Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 152 result redirect to 2012 in UFC events#UFC 152
• Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 154 result redirect to 2012 in UFC events#UFC 154
• Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC on FX 4 (2nd nomination) result redirect to 2012 in UFC events
• Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 140 (2nd nomination) result no consensus with closing admin suggesting a merge into an omnibus article.
• Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 149 result merge to location to be determined with admin suggesting a year in article.
• Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 140 result was delete.

As far as relating UFC event articles to WWE event articles, the WWE event articles seem to comply with Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines as they don't contain only routine fight results and announcements. Just take a look at the contents of the wrestling WikiProject's C class articles: Royal Rumble (1988), Starrcade (1997), Bragging Rights (2009), Armageddon (2002). Tell me that our (MMA WikiProject) event articles come anywhere near as close to covering the events in the same amount of prose discussing the event with the same level of detail, citing an equivalent number of sources. I believe that if we cannot have our event articles (regardless of the promotion) come close to being a high quality article (again, I'll point to UFC 94 which is a good quality article) then a "year in" article is the best way to go. --TreyGeek (talk) 23:34, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Are you really using articles that were deleted because they existed well before their time (UFC 152 and 154 are months away and not a single match announced) to prove your point? As for the level of detail in articles, the original UFC 142 had way more detail than the UFC 142 write up you offered in the yearly page. Do you really think the original UFC pages only had "routine fight results and announcements."

Regardless, your boy Mtking asked for policy and guidelines and I provided that. Then -- shocker! -- you move the goalposts and say, "But the UFC pages aren't as thorough as the WWE ones." So what? How does that have any bearing on the notability I established? More people saw the aforementioned UFC 142 live and on PPV than something like WWE's December to Dismember (2006). Are you seriously contending that only a bunch of extra words in a Wiki article makes something more notable? If so, you better jump on -- picks random entertainment products -- Tactical Force or Dragon Tears because both only have scant details on them. After that, I expect you to peruse every entertainment product on Misplaced Pages and then get back to me to let me know if they all have as many words as the WWE pages. Udar55 (talk) 00:12, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I listed 6 AfDs and you commented on only two of them. The prose in UFC 142 seems to consist of reporting of routine fight announcements and changes plus Johnson coming in overweight (which is discussed to some degree in the omnibus article). Also, if someone feels additional information is needed in 2012 in UFC events they are free to add it. I'll freely admit there may be a significant fight on a particular card that I over looked. The comparison between the MMA event articles and the WWE event articles was started by you. Maybe I should have expanded my thought process. WP:ROUTINE says that an article should not contain routine news coverage such as announcements and sporting coverage. WP:SPORTSEVENT say that "rticles about notable games should have well-sourced prose". The vast majority of MMA event articles contain simply routine coverage of fight announcements and a list of stats in the form of fight results. They lack well-sourced prose that explains why the event is notable or why it has lasting effects. --TreyGeek (talk) 00:51, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

"The comparison between the MMA event articles and the WWE event articles was started by you" Actually, I made the comparison between UFC events and three separate entertainment product companies (WWE, Simon & Schuster, Lionsgate). I also mentioned two other products (Tactical Force or Dragon Tears) with scant prose that are readily accepted on Misplaced Pages for comparison purposes. You then made the ridiculous assertion that because the WWE articles have more text, they are somehow more notable. Once again, per Misplaced Pages's primary criteria for notability, there is this simple guideline: A company, corporation, organization, school, team, religion, group, product, or service is notable if it has been the subject of significant coverage in secondary sources. Simply put, Mtking asked for reason of notability and I established that. Then, as I predicted, you guys ignored the evidence given to you and cried, "They're not as big as WWE articles, therefore they are not notable." Color me shocked. Udar55 (talk) 01:26, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Isn't the best solution then to improve the individual event pages that the MMA community prefers rather than getting rid of them entirely? We could add a nice background section to every event like the one UFC 94 has. Hollaluuie (talk) 23:42, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes it would. However, very few people are doing that and it's taken me some time just to get as far as I have with UFC 140. No one who is advocating for the omnibus articles has said events cannot have their own individual articles. Rather, unless that event can be shown to be notable and can have an article written to comply Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines, the omnibus article is a good alternative. The additional benefit of omnibus articles is that events from promotions that do not meet Misplaced Pages's notability guidelines can still have information about it in the omnibus article. Examples are 2012 in Super Fight League and 2012 in mixed martial arts events (which needs more added to it). --TreyGeek (talk) 00:05, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

The omnibus articles work for smaller promotions, but the UFC events are notable enough to warrant their own pages. The prose you've written as event summaries on the UFC omnibus article can easily be included on the event articles. Hollaluuie (talk) 00:16, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

You're right again. If someone wants to spend time working on improving individual event articles, the prose I've put in 2012 in UFC events would probably be a good way to start. What in the meantime? Have a bunch of articles that fail to comply with Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines and could possibly be deleted as a result? (See the AfD list I put above as examples of how this is starting to happen.) Also, just to be sure I understand you, you are in support of omnibus articles for MMA events as long as it's not for UFC events. Or am I misconstruing what you stated? --TreyGeek (talk) 00:51, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) in response to Udar55 - are not the NFL, NBA and MLB also companies that deliver an entertainment product ? But we don't have an article for each game they put on do we ? The truth is as each of these events ends, it is forgotten and they move onto the next. Mtking 23:47, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Do the NFL, NBA and MLB charge for each and every product (game) on PPV and then release them commercially on DVD to stores? No, they do not. In most cases, it is broadcast to the public for free. The UFC releases products just like a movie studio. Therefore the product should be treated as such. Udar55 (talk) 00:12, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

They may not in the US, but access to thoes sports outside the US is quite often PPV or subscription TV, also a number of other top sports around the world do use PPV, and we still do not have articles on the each or every games/match. Mtking 00:53, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Again, you are framing it as sports issue rather than an entertaining product issue. How are UFC PPV events and DVD releases any different from the various Hellraiser sequels hitting DVD or Dean Koontz books on the shelves? I see no difference between these two pages:

• UFC 142
• The House of Thunder Udar55 (talk) 01:30, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

You are grasping at straws. There are thousands of MLB games in a season, whereas the UFC has 20ish events. Hollaluuie (talk) 23:56, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

The NFL is a 21 round season, there is one article for the season and one for the Super bowl, not one for each round, the same model is used for other professional sports that play all round the world, soccer, rugby (both codes), Aussie rules, so this proposal just mimics what is established practice. Mtking 00:53, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but MTking putting UFC articles up for deletion and then pushing for an omnibus so that individual UFC articles don't get deleted is slimy and deceitful. One person came along, TreyGeek, and agreed. Then they took it upon themselves to change the entire UFC section of Misplaced Pages. I'm sorry, but that is ridiculous. You two guys are also acting like everybody is on board with you. And when it is pointed out that nobody is on board with you, you retort with "Misplaced Pages is not a democracy". The nerve... Gamezero05 (talk) 06:39, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

lol @ this is based on merit, not a majority decision. This is two users on a power trip who went against Wiki policy and didn't gauge the consensus of anyone in the talk page before deleting/merging articles. I've been a part of the Mixed Martial Project on Misplaced Pages for 3 1/2 years and this is the worst edit to the project I've ever seen. EvolutionarySleeper (talk) 07:13, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

• On the contrary, what they have done is take the lead to prevent further deletions. Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 149 and Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 140 (2nd nomination) made it clear that the only alternatives to merging into an omnibus system was outright deletion. There already is a strong consensus in the community, by editors who are normally not involved with MMA articles, like myself. Several editors that were against the change are already coming around to appreciate the changes. What is happening is that the WP:GNG policies are being enforced. The subpages of notability can't have a lower threshold for notability than the parent. This will still allow individual pages for events that are clearly notable, with the advantage of NOT having the future events and less covered events deleted due to a lack of significant coverage, from multiple and independent sources, which is required by any reading of GNG. In the end, there will be MORE MMA info available, not less. Everyone is just jumping to conclusions on what the changes mean before seeing the final product. Dennis Brown (talk) 08:34, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Dennis, I addressed you above but got no response, so here it is again. Nearly all of the sources quoted in UFC event pages come from the official UFC site and MMA news sites, not places just "quoting statistics or forums" like you said earlier. Reference sites such as UFC.com, ESPN, Yahoo, Sherdog, MMA Junkie and MMA Fighting clearly fall under WP:NEWSORG. That is more than most movies and books get on this site (when are you going to start policing them?) and clearly passes WP:GNG. Regarding AfD notices, go back and see that nearly every one placed on a UFC event has been by Mtking, the same guy who spearheaded this "reform" campaign and provided TreyGeek's sole back slapper. I clearly established the events as notable entertainment products for him. To repeat it, per Misplaced Pages's primary criteria for notability, you can read the following simple guideline: A company, corporation, organization, school, team, religion, group, product, or service is notable if it has been the subject of significant coverage in secondary sources. Simply put, how is a UFC event listing any different from an entry for a film or book in a series? If you goal is to enforce WP:GNG (which is laughable), why aren't you policing all of the film and book entries with one or zero sources? Please explain to me how an entry for UFC 142 is any different from a book entry for something like Dragon Tears. Udar55 (talk) 13:17, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary Break #1

ATTN: TreyGeek, Mtking, Dennis Brown You keep saying that individual UFC pages are in violation of WP: GNG. I established otherwise and also showed that the pages easily pass the primary criteria for notability as they are an entertainment product released commercially to the general public and covered by a wealth of secondary sources. I ask you this, how is a UFC event page any different from the pages for the following products, which are all deemed notable by Misplaced Pages's standards (randomly chosen book, films and events):

• The Bighead
• Children of the Corn: Revelation
• Tyson
• Fangoria's Weekend of Horrors

If those entries, which I'm sure draw far fewer hits than UFC pages, are allowed on Misplaced Pages with few or no sources, why aren't individual UFC pages (which usually have tons of sources)? Do the aforementioned examples not past the muster of WP: GNG that you so valiantly defend? I wouldn't dare say you are just bending the WP: GNG policy to aid in your quest. Also, TreyGeek, stop redirecting the pages of individual events to your omnibus page. Consensus has not been reached (LOL @ your comment about there being "few objectors" and "copyright violation," as if you didn't copy the original pages to get the results).

Hi Udar55. I'll field this one. But first, uncivil remarks like "...LOL @ your comment..." will not serve your cause. These folks have different views, but that does not mean they deserve abuse. They've been admirably tolerant of incivility and attacks. Please be polite.

Now, I'm sure you're aware of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. But the big question that must be answered is why the individual pages are better than the omnibus. How do you respond to that? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:56, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Damn, I had no idea saying "LOL @ your comment" was considered uncivil as I've been the most civil one on here trying to debate them. Definitely noted. Anyway, to answer your question, the individual pages offered way more information for MMA fans to read. Examples include background information on fights that were announced, but eventually got changed (very important resource); buy rates for the PPVs; attendance and financial numbers for the live crowd; walk out music for fighters (in some cases); controversial pre-and-post-fight happenings (if any); television broadcasters for foreign markets; and reported fighter payouts. I see a UFC page the same way I see a film page with the behind the scenes information and credits being just as valuable. Believe it or not, I'm not opposed to an omnibus style article. In fact, I created the Bellator Fighting Championships season omnibus articles. However, when someone tried to include the aforementioned information, TreyGeek removed it and said it made the article "too long." In fact, people had to twist his arm to even offer results as he was perfectly happy having a three paragraph summary of only an event's biggest highlights. Udar55 (talk) 14:06, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I wouldn't say it was heinously uncivil, but it's always best to err on the side of insanely polite at Misplaced Pages. :)

You make good points. I gather all that additional information would be useful to visitors, right? Okay. Now, if all that were added to each section (UFC event) in the omnibus, would that make it too big? Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:14, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I wouldn't think it would make it too big, but it would be aesthetically unpleasing. Look at the Bellator Fighting Championships: Season Six page. They only hold 11 events per season and it starts to get pretty crowded in the references. The UFC holds 20+ events a year. I think this is why most folks here liked the individual UFC pages. Udar55 (talk) 14:30, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

As an example of the disparity, I offer these two links. The first is the original page for the first UFC on Fox show this year, a major show. The second is TreyGeek's revision:

• UFC on Fox: Evans vs. Davis
• UFC on Fox omnibus

Notice how he removes all of the background information (important to MMA fans) and instead offers a summary of the results that can be read below. Even my Bellator ominbus pages offer background information. Udar55 (talk) 14:45, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I see what you mean. So, if the entire UFC on Fox: Evans vs. Davis were to appear at 2012 in UFC events with nothing left out, would that be okay? Why not dump the entire contents of each separate article into the omnibus? What is the reason for content being left out?

As for references section being crowded, I don't see how that's a major problem. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:56, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

• Keep in mind that once the article content is in the omnibus article, it becomes a matter of content, not policy, thus the talk page is where it can get resolved instead of AFD and other forums. This is a big plus. And the tree structure of the omnibus system isn't completely worked out. Working with everyone on those will insure the right content is in the right place. The big beef with some editors arguing policy (like myself) is that there were too many small articles of questionable notability as stand alone articles. Our arguments and concerns were not about content, only policy. This makes all those problems go away, which I'm sure will make many of you very happy. ;) Dennis Brown (talk) 16:04, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Once again, you keep talking about these stand alone entries violating policy. I've clearly shown they do not violate policy over and over, yet you keep ignoring that. I've also given you plenty of examples stand alone articles that are far worse. I can point to a million other examples on Misplaced Pages of questionable notability, but you'll just avoid that too. As for AFDs, I've said it time and again that one editor (Mtking) has specifically been targeting MMA articles. Look at his history and you will clearly see that. The problem is he generalizes when it comes to MMA. I had no problem with the deletion of my Shark Fights 18 entry. But to contend that a UFC event -- something viewed by millions -- is similarly not as notable is ridiculous. The whole question of notability was started by him. When I established they are notable and in line with policy, the proof is just avoided.

And it is hilarious to see you say "our arguments and concerns were not about content, only policy." The reason all the MMA fans were up in arms in the first place is TreyGeek magically changed detailed pages into tiny paragraphs that didn't even sum up the entire card. Then he hid behind the "oh, it is just policy" excuse and has since tried to beat back anyone who didn't like his unwarranted change. Udar55 (talk) 16:27, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Udar55 you are selectively looking at the notability guidelines (which are not policy) the policy relevant here is WP:NOT (or its section WP:NOTNEWSPAPER) which says "While news coverage can be useful source material for encyclopedic topics, most newsworthy events do not qualify for inclusion. For example, routine news reporting on things like announcements, sports, or celebrities is not a sufficient basis for inclusion in the encyclopedia". If you look at all the notability guidelines for events (WP:EVENT, WP:SPORTSEVENT, or WP:MMAEVENT) you will see that the common thread running through them is the requirement to show "lasting effect using references from reliable and diverse sources that are both independent of the subject and show that the duration of coverage lasted beyond the end of the event.", for example UFC on FX: Alves vs. Kampmann only has one ref from after the event and it is from the MMA media. Mtking 19:48, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

And who wrote the WP:MMAEVENT page? Gamezero05 (talk) 19:59, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

• Your point is moot. No one "owns" the page so it doesn't matter. All subsets of WP:N (such as WP:MMAEVENT) are just explanations for different areas to make GNG more understandable or applicable, however, all articles still have to pass WP:GNG as that is the authority for all the subset pages on notability. Dennis Brown (talk) 20:35, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

So basically what you are saying is some random Misplaced Pages users just made up a rule one day because they felt like it, and now you use that as the standard to go by? Gamezero05 (talk) 20:53, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

• reply to Udar55 and I have sent several to AFD and watched them get deleted, time after time. The omnibus solution was created as a way to prevent mass deletion of the material. Perhaps you weren't a part of the previous discussions, but they took place. And please do not confuse "violate policy" with "fails to meet criteria". Those are two completely different arguments. I have argued they don't pass the criteria for inclusion at WP:GNG, others are arguing that they violate WP:NOT. Both are true enough statements, but if you are going to attack my rationale, attack the one I'm actually using, and used . If you think that TreyGeek and Mtking just went maverick one day, then you haven't been paying attention to all the fuss over the last month, and you are flatly mistaken. What they did is boldly take the initiative and ask others to help. The road has been bumpy, but they have more support for their efforts than you realize. While all the meatpuppets and SPAs just came to vote, be disruptive and get blocked, others were actually quietly working on a solution. You might not LIKE the solution, but you could have been a part of it at any time if you so choose, but you weren't there at the AFDs, several ANIs, SPIs and every other venue it has been drug into, kicking and screaming. Dennis Brown (talk) 20:28, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I've been following the discussion for a long time. Longer than you actually, so I don't appreciate your implying I haven't been "paying attention." These two did not "boldly take the initiative and ask others to help." They ran just over a day of dialogue between themselves and then TreyGeek said "done" and introduced the 2012 page. What they did was take the full length, in depth pages and obliterated them. TreyGeek's initial solution? To make the detailed UFC 142 page look like this.

UFC 142

UFC 142: Aldo vs Mendes was held on January 14, 2012 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The event featured José Aldo defending his UFC Featherweight Championship against Chad Mendes. Aldo became WEC Featherweight Champion on November 18, 2009, which was later converted to a UFC Championship, and has defended his title four previous times with stoppages. Five of the last six fights, all wins, for Mendes resulted in unanimous decisions. Aldo defeated Mendes by knock out in 4:59 of the first round with a knee.

The co-main event was a bout between Vitor Belfort and Anthony Johnson. The day prior, during weigh-ins, Johnson failed to make the 185 pounds (84 kg) weight limit for the match and was 11 pounds (5.0 kg) over weight. Belfort agreed to fight Johnson in a catch weight bout of 197 pounds (89 kg) if Johnson did not weigh more than 205 pounds (93 kg) on fight day. Belfort was able to submit Johnson with a rear-naked choke in 4:49 of the first round. Johnson was cut by the UFC following the fight.

The fight of the night bonus award was given to Edson Barboza and Terry Etim which ended at 2:02 of the third round when Barboza knocked out Etim with a spinning wheel kick. That knock out also earned Barboza the knock out of the night award. The submission of the night bonus award was given to Rousimar Palhares following his submission of Mike Massenzio with a heel hook at 1:03 of the first round.

Seriously, he wanted no complete results! If you can't see why that upset people, then I can't help you. Like I said earlier in this discussion, I'm not above change and personally created all the Bellator Fighting Championships omnibus articles when the individual pages got AFD. What I can't stand are two guys launching into a "it's my way or no way" stance. Anyway, have at it. You three can do whatever you want now. Udar55 (talk) 22:06, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I was just talking with him about how much detail to go on what kinds of articles, so obviously no final decision has been made. You could just join the conversation on the omnibus article, which is the right place. You are assuming that the content won't be there when that decision hasn't been made. Until it is, something has to go there. Dennis Brown (talk) 22:21, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I've read those discussions you are referring to, and now you are straight-up lying. There was not all of this support you are talking about. And after TreyGeek went ahead and changed it, there were other people saying that it was ridiculous that he did that because the discussions were nowhere near complete. Gamezero05 (talk) 20:56, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

You need to parse your words more carefully. There is no justification for your incivility. The closing statements of the AFDs speak volumes and represent the consensus, I would suggest you try reading them more carefully. Dennis Brown (talk) 21:02, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Incivility? What are you talking about? MTking also sent me a message to stop making personal attacks against people. I have not attacked anybody personally, and it's really quite ridiculous that you 3 are ganging up and threatening people who disagree with you. Gamezero05 (talk) 21:32, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

You said "and now you are straight-up lying". You are welcome to attack my logic, you are not welcome to attack my character. Calling me a liar is attacking my character and is unacceptable behavior. If you can't understand that, then you shouldn't be editing here. Dennis Brown (talk) 21:46, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Keep it on topic please. Straying off only fuels any opposition you may receive. Threatening people will not get this issue resolved. A lot of them are new members so please try not to incite anything. Eidetic Man (talk) 23:46, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

So you are telling me that I can't say you are lying even if you are lying? Now, that might call for an attack on logic. Gamezero05 (talk) 21:52, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Comment/Oppose I'm really worried about the possible precedents that an omnibus page has- because clearly the UFC or MMA events are the only articles to follow the current format. To say that UFC events fail WP:EVENT and WP:SPORTSEVENT implies we can simply merge similar pages into similar omnibuses, even if it is not the correct way to go about things. Unless you plan on making similar omnibuses for Category:2012 in motorsport and others, this really shouldn't happen at a current time. Teamsleep (talk) 00:00, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

• That is a valid concern, but you are pointing to categories, not omnibus articles. The omnibus article will have much more info than any cat can. It doesn't have to be "exactly like" anything, just consistent with other content. And the motor sports already have omnibus type articles, but they are so large, they are broken down into country and year or other ways, such as 2012 American Le Mans Series season, etc. MMA isn't as extensive as motorsports, so a main article would be similar to a main cat, except have prose that could sum up important events, compare, contrast, anything that any article can do. The "sub omnibus" articles would be similar to what I just linked. Or it could be different, depending on what editors want to make them. Several AFDs have indicated they must be grouped somehow, but how they are grouped is still open for discussion to anyone that has ideas. What we have now is just a starting point. Dennis Brown (talk) 00:19, 2 April 2012 (UTC)
• Don't think that comparison holds up, a better way to look at this is does WP have articles on each week of the NFL season? or each week of any of the major sporting codes across the globe. I could (if I was looking to get a block for violating WP:POINT) very easily create a well sourced article on any of the NFL games from the 2011 season or any of the Aussie rules matches played this weekend, all would have prose sourced to numinous sports reports published in top-tier newspapers, these articles would pass WP:GNG as each game would have "received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject" yet the articles would all fail WP:NOTNEWSPAPER policy and WP:SPORTSEVENT and WP:EVENT and would be WP:SNOW deleted at AfD because I or others could show no lasting encyclopaedic effect of each event or game. The same is true for these MMA events, the coverage ends when the results are posted on MMA websites and attention moves to the next event. Mtking 02:55, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

• Strong oppose As per many of the opposing users above. The omnibus page fails to include information that was interesting and worth including. Disappointing to see that the minority of users have edited the pages without general consensus. (AdamD123 (talk) 01:55, 2 April 2012 (UTC))
  • You seem not to have advanced a policy or guideline reason for your comment, also I notice that this first contribution in over 14 months, I think it is appropriate to point out that you might like to take some time looking back over MMA related AfD's over the last few months and comments made by closing admin, this is not something that was dreamt up over night. Mtking 02:55, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Who cares how long it's been since he's posted? It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that your idea sucks. Gamezero05 (talk) 03:28, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

• Strongest level of support Feel free to check my bona fides, however having worked with the AfDs, WP:MMANOT, and a couple editors in the field, I feel that the Year in MMA/Promotion/Subcategory is the best compromise that we as a compendium of notable information that can be struck. Individual articles that are the fight card and results of the fights have been judged on multiple occasions as not having enough notability or reliable sources to qualify for inclusion. By batching the events into an omnibus, we have the benefit of a better cited and sourced article that gives the perview of a "Season" of the sport in a single league. Hasteur (talk) 03:30, 2 April 2012 (UTC)
• Strong oppose per overwhelmingly strong reasons not to. Notable, shmotable. By common practice and reader interest, individual articles of events are what we want. A vocal minority that focuses on deleting things tries to say otherwise, but it is nothing more than WP:IDONTLIKEIT. Now, if someone wants to have omnibus articles, but also keep the indivdiual event articles, well, that's cool, but there just is no real rational reason to get rid of the event articles. All this "notability" nonsense is bureaucratic elitist mubo jumbo. --Pro Elite Fan Man (talk) 04:12, 4 April 2012 (UTC) Note: Blocked Sock.

• This isn't a vote, the decision to merge has already been made by a couple of closing admins based on two different consensus discussions. Some of the events ARE notable enough to have their own articles. The purpose of the omnibus system is so that all the MMA events can be included, even if they aren't independently notable, including future events. This is better than deleting half the articles. The question isn't "if we do it", it is "how we do it". and the guidelines here can't simply be ignored, even if some people call them "bureaucratic elitist mubo jumbo". Dennis Brown (talk) 12:07, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

• Point of order: This discussion, along with the opinions of DGG and Beeblebrox (the closing admins mentioned in Dennis' last post immediately above), cannot resolve this issue because of the WP:CONLIMITED policy which says that decisions about this kind of thing which are made at projects or other local venues cannot bind the community as a whole. For this to bind the community, even if it is limited to the articles within the scope of this project, it must be proposed and approved as a policy or, more likely, a guideline via one of the methods set out in the policy policy (not a typo) (most significantly, via creation of a {{rfc|policy}} and announcing it at least at the policy or proposal subsection of the Village Pump). Neither the current discussion nor the opinions of sysops in closing decisions is sufficient to do that and, in my opinion, the result here is not going to be binding on anyone. (It should be noted that there is a pending policy RFC on a very similar point, but it seems to be going nowhere and I haven't looked to see if it was properly announced or not.) Regretfully, TransporterMan (TALK) 14:02, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

• This is a little different as the previous decisions are being used as a basis for developing a solution that stay within the the same sport that is based on current policies and guidelines, and not being used to change policy. This is consistent with CONLIMITED as these articles already have an consensus as failing WP:N at AFD (as individual article, not as a class), and the purpose of the omnibus is to allow inclusion of material that is only notable in the aggregate, while still allowing individual articles to exist if they pass WP:N. This isn't a matter of creating new policy, it is a matter of enforcing existing criteria for inclusion and offering an alternative to outright deletion. But I do get your point that at some time, and perhaps soon, we should consider obtaining a broader consensus in regards to the larger issues regarding consolidations. I still feel that this is within the current guidelines and doesn't require a broader consensus, but failing to do so forces us to deal with each article on a case by case basis. Dennis Brown (talk) 15:14, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

• I fully concur that it is always a good thing to preserve verifiable, non-undue content when we can and that many of the individual-event articles, especially those for future events, are not sufficiently notable to survive other than as redirects. Having an omnibus article to use when a notability contest is going ought to have a snowy result is an excellent idea. The problem, as I see it, however, is that there is a great deal of disagreement over the snowy nature of most of the individual event articles and, at that, a disagreement which appears to be compounded and complicated by a great deal of puppetry and even off-wiki canvassing. The result is that every conversion of a individual-event article into a redirect has the potential of turning into an edit war. The secondary result is then that the articles must go to AfD where, instead of a snowy confirmation of the redirect, a dramafest and puppet show results. (At least that's what the situation appears to me to be; if that's wrong, you can probably just ignore everything I've said here today and stop reading at this point.) I've not followed enough of the individual AfD cases to know for sure, but I suspect that a lot of them end up in keeps or no consensus decisions. The fact that redirecting into an omnibus article is a good idea counts for very little, because unless it is a policy or guideline, that's all that it is: a good idea. While sysops have the right to close AfD discussions on the basis of whoever has the best idea (that is, after all, the way that consensus is supposed to be judged), that takes a good bit of fortitude to do so and provides a great chance for the sysop being censured if he or she does not get it right on the mark and in complete accord with the pulse of the community. And you only get there if pro-omnibus editors exercise eternal vigilance and are willing to weather the dramafest over and over and over again. The only way to avoid that is to have a policy or guideline that says individual event articles have to be handled in the desired way. And that's what I thought that you were trying to do here, though perhaps I'm mistaken. That policy or guideline can be written so as to support snowy results at AfD or could even be written in a way that makes revering a redirect even a single time to be EW'ing. Can either of those obtain the approval of the community as a whole? I have some considerable doubt about the first option and an absolute trainload of doubt about the second but, hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 16:27, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose/support having BOTH omnibus articles as like a table of contents, but keeping the individual articles to go into greater detail. Also, request halt to edit warring to impose redirects while discussion is still open and opposition so strong. --131.123.122.38 (talk) 15:11, 6 April 2012 (UTC) This template must be substituted. Note: IP range now checkuserblocked

Here is the deal

I don't think anybody is opposed to an omnibus article. People are pissed that at first, you guys wanted to just do a small summary of each event. Now, people are happier in the direction it has gone. BUT, they are still not happy that things like fighter payout and walkout music has been removed.

Everybody would be happy if those things were added back, like they were when there were individual articles. I think the omnibus would be a welcomed change.

Two things have happened that ticked people off.

1. Like I said, the way that you guys have gone about it was completely wrong. The way you guys took it upon yourself to decide for everybody when there was still plenty of discussion to be had. That wasn't right.

2. You guys are trying to REMOVE information instead of ADD information. That pisses people off more than anything. How is removing information making the Wiki MMA Project better? How is that an improvement? You guys are too caught up following arbitrary rules that other editors just made up one day and it is change not for the better.

So if we can agree that an omnibus is fine AS LONG AS there is the same information as there was in the individual articles, then I think everybody would be happy. At least we would... those who originally opposed. What are your thoughts? Gamezero05 (talk) 03:43, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Can you explain what the significance of the fighter payout and walkout music is ? why it is worthy of Encyclopaedic note and why is it not the embodiment of WP:FANCRUFT, in other words to the non MMA fan who comes to this page via the Random Article link, what does it tell them ? Mtking 03:49, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

In prizefighting, the prize is generally information that people would like to know. Walkout music is not as important, I'll give you that. Gamezero05 (talk) 03:55, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Can you list some examples of reliable sources that discuss this in relation to MMA ? Mtking 04:08, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

(EC) I've never been in favor of tables of walk-in music. My reasoning has been that the music a fighter walks to the cage to has no bearing on the event or the fight itself. The few of these tables I've actually paid much attention to seem to not list all fighters or has missing information. To me, it seems to mostly be WP:TRIVIA. Do we have reliable sources for payouts for all events? It would seem odd, to me, if some events listed payouts and some didn't. Again, just my opinion. --TreyGeek (talk) 03:51, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Fighter payouts are required to be released by the athletic commissions. Gamezero05 (talk) 03:57, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Not every event (not even UFC event) is governed by an athletic commission. Also, the numbers reported by the commissions, when there is one, is not necessarily an accurate representation of how much money a fighter earned that night. I've seen stories about fighters earning "locker room money" that goes unreported as well as top level fighters getting an undisclosed share of the gate and PPV revenues via fight contracts. --TreyGeek (talk) 04:00, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

That is correct... but what is your point? Gamezero05 (talk) 04:00, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

If we are going to report prize money it has to be verifiable correct, so if correct numbers are hard to come by or are only released when UFC is forced to then it may not be appropriate to included them at all, leave it to the fan sites to speculate. Mtking 04:13, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

If payouts are included, I would suggest presenting the fights in a table, because each fight would be showing more information (winner, loser, fight time, loss method, weight class, & payout.)--kelapstick 05:10, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Do you mean the whole omnibus as one big table, or a table within each section? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:13, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

A table within each section, converting the results sections of each event into tables, rather than the way they are presented now.--kelapstick 05:18, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Good idea. I like it, and I think it will help sway opponents toward accepting this omnibus. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:23, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I really like the idea of a table. It would look much nicer than what there is now, and it would be easier to read. Gamezero05 (talk) 05:33, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

And payouts are released by the athletic commissions. If a fight takes place in, say, Japan, the UFC does not have to disclose fighter payouts. So there will be no official info in that case. But I don't see why that should stop us from posting it when it is official from the commissions. Gamezero05 (talk) 05:40, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

←Example - feel free to change the format dramatically.--kelapstick 05:43, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I think a table layout is also a good move, I am also thinking it may fix the issue with the flags as at the moment they are a distraction. Mtking 05:45, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Completely disagree with flags being a distraction. Gamezero05 (talk) 05:51, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

As far as the table goes, you'd need to have spot for the round number that the fight ended, "Decision Time" should just read "Time" in my opinion.. as not all fights go to decision, and both fighters receive payouts... so you'd have to adjust for that somehow. Gamezero05 (talk) 05:55, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Looks good. Again, throw the whole kitchen sink into the omni, and worry about decrufting later. If/when the stand-alones redirect to the omni, thousands of eyes will suddenly land and scrutinize the page. Let's give them what they want to see: lots and lots of content. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:48, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I just added a refgroup to it, it may be beneficial to not have the judges decisions in the table, as it takes up quite a lot of room, but they can be linked in a notes section below.--kelapstick 06:09, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Per Kitchen sink: I personally don't mind the judges decisions in the table. It can always be (re)moved later. My two cents. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:27, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

My concern is that it will be too hard to edit. When we have a table of upcoming fights, it would be easy to just fill in the boxes after the fight happens. The way you have it set up, it would be hard to do. Somebody would have to do a lot of editing to update the table after a fight.

I'm sure there is more than one way to do it. But the only way I figured it could be done is like I did it on my userpage where the winner is highlighted in green and the loser in red. Gamezero05 (talk) 06:39, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Point taken, just keep in mind the issue I mentioned with WP:COLOR, I do suggest that you bold the winner as well, and the refgroup is just a suggestion.--kelapstick 06:52, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Do you guys know how to align text in the box to the left? Gamezero05 (talk) 07:00, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I think it was missed on the 2012 in UFC events talk page, but yesterday I created similar tables at 2012 in Super Fight League for suggestions and advice. --TreyGeek (talk) 13:56, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Gamezero05, in the table, just change "center" to "left" or "right" for alignment. Some layout comments. On the Payout, does it vary for winner vs loser? If so, you'll need two payout columns. Consider changing "Loss type" to "Decision", I think it's more descriptive. Rather than add the results for a judges decision or a note about it, it may be easier to include a link to the reference with the decision results. Since you need to have it reference anyway, that may be a good column for the match results reference. My main worry would be that for organizations with lots of events per year the notes section could get fairly large. Another option would be to keep the notes, but use a notes group for each event but have it collapsed initially so it won't take up as much space on the screen.

Once you get something that looks good, I'd suggest creating a template to make it easier to create the results tables (and to make any changes apply to all results). Wikitables can be more intimidating than templates, especially if the templates are fairly straightforward. Same thing with the summary event table. If you'd like some help there, give me a shout on my talk page and I'll be glad to help out. Ravensfire (talk) 15:13, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

So I hit a slow spot at work, waiting on a 45 minute compile run and since this had tweaked my attention, please take a look at this page - User:Ravensfire\UFC. It's based highly on Kelapstick's example (thanks!) but uses templates (3 total, header, data, footer) to hide all of the table formatting. It still allows for reference groups if needed and you can use different reference groups for each event with each group collapsed to conserve space. By having them as templates you'll have a consistent look and feel without much work to adjust it. Ravensfire (talk) 17:26, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes! Let's deal.

I like this direction.

With the omnibus having taken shape, it's time to sell it and see who's buying.

When I first saw it, it looked like a step backward. Now, it's looking pretty good. So, first, make this omnibus appear exactly like 20 articles jammed onto one page. If you do that, then the issue becomes solely about how these 20 items are presented: one page or 20 separate ones. All else is excluded.

Both sides bureaucratically cite policies for and against the stand-alones. That's getting us nowhere.

Let's look at the practical selling points of this omnibus:

• One-stop shopping.

• It's only got 83 hours on it, and still has that new article smell. A bargain!

• And a huge one: Zero risk of stand-alone articles being deleted and not covered at all at Misplaced Pages. (And it's not just this handful of editors who may AfD. It's anyone, anytime in the future.) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:00, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

not sure where or how to post this. but the new table format for cards and results can not be seen on mobile. it squeezes everything and impossible to even read. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.233.73.12 (talk) 03:18, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

It's not easy to figure out where to put things on this talk page at the moment. I took a look at 2012 in UFC events on my cell phone. The tables do get squished quite a bit, particularly in portrait mode (landscaped wasn't as bad, but still lots of wrapping within cells). I'm not sure if this can be resolved and keep the tables. I've never looked into how MediaWiki formats things for mobile sites and how much control we have for that in the markup. --TreyGeek (talk) 03:46, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary Break #2

One more thing about flags.... why does the ATP Tennis rankings use flags? Here: http://en.wikipedia.org/ATP_Rankings How about the PGA Tour? http://en.wikipedia.org/PGA_Tour How about the International Boxing Federation? http://en.wikipedia.org/International_Boxing_Federation Or the World Boxing Association? http://en.wikipedia.org/World_Boxing_Association Or Le Mans winners: http://en.wikipedia.org/List_of_24_Hours_of_Le_Mans_winners

Look, any sport that competes on a WORLD-WIDE stage with a bunch of international participants, I think it is appropriate to list their nationality. It is commonly done not only on Misplaced Pages, but by the very organizations themselves. The PGA has flags next to the names. Boxing does. MMA does. Tennis does. Etc.

There is absolutely no reason to remove them from MMA. It is completely relevant to the sport. Gamezero05 (talk) 03:09, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

There is a reason to remove them, that is why we are discussing it, as for the examples you list Golf and Tennis do not help your as both have some form of national or super-national representation at the top level, be it Davis Cup or the Olympics in tennis or Ryder cup or Presidents Cup or World Cup in golf. Boxing given its connection (all be it tentative) with MMA is a better example, however this still has a representative form in the Olympics, so unless there is some way an MMA fighter can represent the country at the sport I still think that they should be removed as implying a level of representation that is not there. Mtking 06:45, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

That is not a strong argument at all. That would make sense if the article was about an international event, like the Olympics or the Ryder Cup. But they are listing their nationalities in main articles about the sport that have nothing to do with competitions where you specifically represent a country. And as for boxing, boxing in the Olympics is only done by AMATEURS. Professionals cannot compete in the Olympics. So your point about boxing is irrelevant. Professional boxers have no equivalent of the Olympics. I can look at the baseball homerun leaders and NONE of them have flags next to their name. Why? Baseball was an Olympic sport. Using your logic, they should have flags next to their name... but they don't. Look, these athletes from those sports I mentioned don't have a flag next to their name because some of them may happen to compete in an event where they represent a country once every 4 years or something. The reason they have a flag next to their name is because their sport is a sport that is world-wide in nature and consists of players from all over the world. Golf is played all over the world with players from all over the world. Same with tennis, boxing, auto racing, and MMA. They are international sports with international participants. Which is why the flags should stay. Gamezero05 (talk) 17:01, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

• The strongest argument for deleted them has already been made, WP:MOSFLAG specifically says you shouldn't include them. That is the guideline that has to be followed. Unless you can explain how our reading of WP:MOSFLAG is flawed and how it actually permits them, then the place to get that changed is on the talk page of WP:MOSFLAG itself. We don't have the option of ignoring guidelines just because we don't like them. Dennis Brown (talk) 17:10, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Then explain to me why MMA articles have always used the flags, and other sports such as golf, tennis, auto racing, boxing, etc. also use the flags? You said earlier that the reason the rules should be followed is so that Misplaced Pages is the same. But at the same time, the trend seems to be allowing flags for sports that are world-wide with international competitors. So I don't see how following some arbitrary rule helps anything at all. Gamezero05 (talk) 18:33, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

P.S... I just read WP:MOSFLAG, and I can't find anywhere that specifically says that you shouldn't include them. The burden of proof is on you. Copy and paste exactly what you are referring to when you state "WP:MOSFLAG specifically says you shouldn't include them". Gamezero05 (talk) 18:48, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

I already quoted the passage from WP:MOSFLAG, "As with other biographical articles, flags are discouraged in sportspeople's individual infoboxes even when there is a "country", "nationality" or equivalent field: they may give undue prominence to one field over others." Additionally, WP:BURDEN clearly states "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material.". Deleting items doesn't have a burden of proof, only adding or restoring it does. Dennis Brown (talk) 18:55, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

That says "flags are discouraged in sportspeople's individual INFOBOXES". This isn't about infoboxes. So that passage does not apply. Gamezero05 (talk) 19:22, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

• Counting the conversations at 2012 in UFC events, 5 out of the 6 editors commenting on it believe it does apply, but you can always seek an outside opinion such as WP:DR if you feel that strongly about it. (added the following) Let me be clear, it isn't a vote, I'm just saying that all 5 have given legitimate reasons why they think they shouldn't be included, and you have given legitimate reasons why they should, and your reasons have been considered but I don't see them overcoming the obligation in WP:MOSFLAG. That doesn't mean it is impossible, it means we would need experienced and objective editors (not involved in this discussion) to review and give an opinion as to whether or not there is an overriding value in going against MOS in this instance. WP:DR is just one option. If it went to WP:DR and the consensus there was that MOS didn't apply, or we would be better off doing it anyway, then myself and all the others would comply, I can guarantee that. This is the proper way to build a consensus where there is a reasonable question as to whether or not a guideline applies or not. It takes a few days, but doing it right is better than doing it fast. Dennis Brown (talk) 19:52, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

So basically what you are saying is that I am right, and you can't find anything specific in WP:MOSFLAG. Your only argument now is that other editors agree with you. Well, if you remember, this is not a democracy. You can have a billion editors agree with you, but if you can't find anywhere in the rules that says explicitly that flags should not be there, then you have no argument. In addition to that, plenty of other sports that I have listed (golf, tennis, boxing, auto racing) have flags next to the list of competitors in different tables. So that would show that not only is there no rule against it, but consistency across Misplaced Pages is on my side. Gamezero05 (talk) 21:10, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Actually what he is saying (not that I want to speak for Dennis) is they you are not right, and the MOS explicitly states that the flags should not be used, because the fighters are not representing their country in the fights. This has been explained by DGG, and others, and is quite clear in MOSFLAG. It has nothing to do with infoboxes. You may initiate a discussion to determine if there is consensus to include them (against the MOS), but as i had mentioned, that should be seperate to this, after this article is fleshed out. Boxing, racing, golf, lawn bowling, etc. articles not following the related style guidelines is not grounds for MMA articles breaching them too, if there is an issues with those articles, the issue should be fixed, not used as grounds for not following style guidelines here. --kelapstick 23:31, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

You are wrong. Nowhere in MOSFLAG does it say anything about what we are talking about. What Dennis quoted was pertaining to INFOBOXES. We are not talking about info boxes. So it doesn't apply here. MOSFLAG says NOTHING about what we are talking about. It does not explicitly state what you say it does. So once again, if I am wrong, and it DOES state that flags are inappropriate for what we are using them for, then show me exactly where. I mean, it should be really easy since it so "explicitly" states it as you say it does. Gamezero05 (talk) 23:56, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

I've long believed that flags are misused by the MMA WikiProject, but as I have mentioned before it is a controversial subject. my reasonings from MOS:FLAG: "Flag icons should never be used to indicate a person's place of birth, residence, or death, as flags imply citizenship and/or nationality." "Flags should never indicate the player's nationality in a non-sporting sense; flags should only indicate the sportsperson's national squad/team or representative nationality." "Use the flag and name of the country (be it a state or a nation) that the person (or team of people) officially represented, regardless of citizenship, when the flag templates are used for sports statistics and the like." "f a sportsperson has represented a nation or has declared for a nation, then the national flag as determined by the sport governing body should be used (these can differ from countries' political national flags)." Also, as mentioned somewhere above, this is probably not the correct forum to extensive debate on this issue. It should probably be held at WT:MMA. --TreyGeek (talk) 00:08, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

It does. And this is what it says. Flags should never indicate the player's nationality in a non-sporting sense; flags should only indicate the sportsperson's national squad/team or representative nationality. Where flags are used in a table, it should clearly indicate that the flags represent representative nationality, not legal nationality, if any confusion might arise. Since the fighters don't represent the country in question, they should not be used as per the MOS. This has all been explained at length, in various places.-kelapstick 00:07, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

• The main point here is that there are many editors that feel that flags should not be used because they are counter to the guidelines and have provide ample explanation. Nothing more can be said. The guidelines don't give explicit details on purpose. They don't need to say "inside an infobox, outside, in a table, in a span, in a paragraph, on your good china, etc." to be understood. This isn't an issue for MMA so much as WP:DR, because the issue isn't "is it better to or not" but "do guidelines allow it or not", which is why you go to a neutral place if there is a question, ie WP:DR (this prevents ignoring rules simply because a group of users prefer to). At this point, I think there is enough consensus as to the meaning of WP:MOSFLAG to remove them if someone wanted to, and if the one editor wants them added back, WP:BURDEN says he needs to get outside opinions in the proper, neutral venue, again, WP:DR. This is exactly why it exists. We keep talking about it, but at some point, the editor has to realize it is time to drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass. No new info is being introduced, and continuing it here is becoming disruptive. Dennis Brown (talk) 00:35, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

1. Flag icons in MMA do not indicate a person's place of birth, residence, or death. It clearly says in your quote "flags imply citizenship and/or nationality". We are simply using flags to represent nationality. So it is acceptable under that rule.

2. "flags should only indicate the sportsperson's national squad/team or representative nationality" Very vague. An argument can be made that as an individual athlete in an international sport, they are representing their countries. Even in the UFC, when announcing the fighters, the announcer will say something like: "This man is a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu fighter. Holding a professional record of 14 wins, 3 losses. Standing at 5 feet, 10 inches tall, and weighing in at 170 pounds. Fighting out of Fortaleza, Brazil ..."

Or how about when the UFC had "The Ultimate Fighter: UK vs. USA" where the fighters were fighters from the UK vs. fighters from the USA. Clearly the UFC sees the nationality of fighter's as representative. Gamezero05 (talk) 00:39, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

• In a section that is UK vs USA, then you have a solid argument about using the flags. That is the exception, however, not the rule, and in that instance, it shows which "side" the fighter is on. Not a shoe in, but that is a good reason as it adds information that is actually relevant to that one event, and for that specific event (or other events that are 100% "country vs. country"), I would back you up on it. Granted, they aren't sponsored by the country, but "country vs. country" is the obvious point of those special, and rare, matches. As to announcing their birthplace, pro wrestling announced the city/state of the fighters even back when I watched it, (which was around 35 years ago) so that wasn't started because it was different countries. More of a tradition thing back then, to pump up rivalries from different areas. Yes, wrestling was regional then, not national, and we cheered for Fritz Von Erich back in Texas. And of course, Andre the Giant. Dennis Brown (talk) 00:59, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Explain to me this... why does the UFC sell shirts with a picture of a fist with a Brazilian flag bandanna wrapped around it. They also sell one with a Canadian flag, one with an American flag, one with a Japanese flag, one with a British flag, etc. Why do fighters like Dan Henderson have "USA" stitched on their shorts? Why do fighters like Chael Sonnen have stars and stripes on his shorts? Why do other fighters have Brazilian flag shorts? Why do walk-out shirts almost always incorporate the country into the design? Whether you agree or not, fighters are always representing their country, and it has always been part of combat sports and prize-fighting. And like I said earlier. Sports like golf and tennis and auto racing display the flags not only on Misplaced Pages... but by the very sports themselves. The PGA Tour displays where each person is from, and so does the ATP World Tour for tennis. I haven't even looked, but I know for a fact auto racing does. Gamezero05 (talk) 01:12, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

• Profit. If having a picture of a 1974 AMC Gremlin on the t-shirt made it sell more and made more profit, believe me, it would be on the t-shirt. (marketing is my day job, trust me on this one) It is done to fuel national pride, which sells stuff. Or the individual fighters have their own national pride. If you never knew their countries of origin, it wouldn't affect the outcome of the fights, would it? And be sure to read what about this other article. There are lots of improperly formatted articles of Misplaced Pages. Drives me nuts. Every sports team also has their team colors in the bottom templates of their articles, and this is an absolute and obvious MOS guideline violation. Each one takes so long to debate, we can't keep up with them. Once something *does* get my attention, I see it through, then move on. Right now, I'm here, so that is my focus. Very likely, once the formatting issues are complete here, you won't see me unless I'm invited. I understand the guidelines fairly well, but you and others know the content much better. We each do what we do best for the good of Misplaced Pages. And yes, the guidelines are confusing. I've been here 5.5 years registered, a year before that as anonymous, and I obviously spend a lot of time in policy issues, yet I still read one guideline or another daily and get outside opinions regularly, even here. No one is going to come here and understand all of them in a few months, or years. They do work, however, and I respect and follow them as best I can. Please note, sometime I don't want to, and I disagree with the guideline, and it might even piss me off a little, but I suck it up and follow it anyway. That's the breaks. Dennis Brown (talk) 01:29, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Compromise proposal

The discussion is not moving forward, it is clearly one of style over substance and in the interest of moving this forward, let me propose the following compromise :

1. The table form proposed is adopted and the results list is converted to them;
2. That for the time being only the flags remain;
3. On the 1 May 2012 a 7 day RFC discussion on the the article talk page is started with the question "The use of flags next to the fighters names is appropriate" on May 8th the discussion will close and a notice posted to WP:AN asking for an un-involved admin to review consensus, if they feel there is consensus for the flags to be there then they should remain, in the cases of "no consensus" or "consensus not to have flags" then the flags should be removed.

Mtking 01:31, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

• Support as proposer. Mtking 01:31, 4 April 2012 (UTC)
• Support. I suggested this when we started talking about flags. Gamezero05 (talk) 02:06, 4 April 2012 (UTC)
• Support The overall tone of discussion here has improved greatly here, and getting outside opinions is likely to continue that trend, insuring everyone has an equal chance to voice their concerns. Dennis Brown (talk) 11:24, 5 April 2012 (UTC)
• Support documented consensus to determine their use or lack of is required to prevent issusues like this in the future. Seems like a fair way. --kelapstick 11:42, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

 Steps 1 and 2 are done I've edited 2012 in UFC events, 2012 in Super Fight League and Bellator Fighting Championships: Season Six to use the table as most recently proposed above to display event results and official fight cards. Two notes on 2012 in UFC events. 1) For future events, I used the table only for the "official" fight card; instances where a bout has been announced but not placed on the fight card I left in 'old' format. I wasn't sure of the best approach to add them into the table. 2) While the existing results and future fight cards split many of the cards up between Facebook/Fuel TV/FX/etc as discussed above, the cited sources did not show this distinction. So, at the moment it appears to be WP:OR unless someone can find a source that outlines the different parts of the cards. --TreyGeek (talk) 18:57, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

order of fields

• Something else I just thought about with the table is order of the fights. There are two ways it is done across MMA event articles: Order of fights as they occur (preliminaries to main event) and the reverse of that (main event first then down to the preliminaries). It might be a good idea to standardize this ordering across all events. --TreyGeek (talk) 01:42, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

The best and most NPOV way is list them in the order in which they happened starting with the first, as for the order of the fields, I do think the Weight Class should be listes to the left but the TV status should come last before and notes, it is of no real consequence in evaluating the fight. Mtking 06:45, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

TV status should be on the left because that is what order the card is in. It is another way of displaying "main card", "preliminary card", and "facebook", as in how it used to be done. The order of the card should be known before it is known who is fighting in each "section" of the fight card. Gamezero05 (talk) 19:27, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Ultimately, we want a format that presents the reader with the critical pieces of information in a manner that's easy to read, works with various display sizes (including mobile) and doesn't get bogged down with details that can be pulled from the linked sources. So let's take a step back. We're in the event list article, working on the entry for a particular event. Looking at the existing 2012 in UFC events article, each event section has a summary of the event overall, an infobox describing the event and the results. Gamezero05, from your description it sounds like there are three phases to the event - facebook/other, preliminary and main. So let's call them that. In the infobox, we cover how the event is published "Prelims broadcast: PPV" and "Main broadcast: Fox". (Ignore the phrasing for now) If a phase isn't broadcase, it's not listed here. If there's something odd, that's what the summary text is for. Basically, move duplicated information that's not critical to a higher entity (yes, I am a programmer ...).

The results section would then be phase (prelim, main, other), Class, Fighter1, Fighter2, Round, Time, Method. For the payouts, it's honestly more trivia that useful except for anything major, but that's exactly what the summary section is for. If there's a really good site that summarizes MMA results and is considered a WP:RS, using it as a source link would be perfect and really help keep the WP article in summary style but make sure the reader can get all the details quickly. Ravensfire (talk) 02:30, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Article name change?

Instead of 2012 in UFC events, would UFC events in 2012 be better? I think putting it like that would help search engines find it better and also help with organization. Thoughts? Glock17gen4 (talk) 20:59, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I was thinking the same thing. I'm not sure about established conventions here, though. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:09, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

• Nor do I. I'm going to dig around WP:MOS and see what it says. I'm neutral as to titles as long as whatever is used conforms to the expectations of MOS, if there are any. Dennis Brown (talk) 23:13, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

• Ok, what I am seeing after reading a half dozen guideline pages is that there isn't a hard rule on how to do this. Misplaced Pages:Naming conventions (numbers and dates)#Articles_on_events would appear to be the most applicable guideline. For events that occur on regular intervals (more or less what we have here), it says that naming something such as 2012 Event name is not preferred because it puts too much emphasis on date, but commonly done so it is accepted. It strongly suggests using Event name (2012) as the preferred way, but it isn't mandatory. I would suggest that everyone take a look at this section of the guideline first (fairly small) so we are all working from the same page. No matter where you put the date, it isn't likely to run afoul of any policy or guideline. I will stay neutral on the actual name and will support whatever the consensus of editors agree upon. Dennis Brown (talk) 23:44, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

This is more in line with 2012 in music style, not saying it is correct or othrerwise. --kelapstick 00:26, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

I personally think "2012 in UFC events" sounds fine. I don't know anything about search engines finding it. Gamezero05 (talk) 00:30, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

It sounds backwards to me. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:31, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Like something Yoda might say? --kelapstick 01:38, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Essentially, what you're creating here is a list article, but without the explicit list. I'd look at it as UFC events in 2012 vs 2012 events in UFC. I wouldn't worry about search engines - they'll easily handle any of the suggested names and make sure that people looking for UFC events that happened in 2012 will find their way here. Ravensfire (talk) 03:32, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

• I think you are correct that these articles are related to lists, just with more content. A hybrid of sorts. I went and checked all the guidelines on lists, but didn't really see anything that would apply to dates, which led me back to the guideline on generic 'naming conventions' for articles. And yes, search engines can handle any order, so we really don't need to worry about that when choosing. Dennis Brown (talk) 13:17, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Spent some time looking for anything in the MOS for titling this and didn't find much, but did find a ton of pages named 2012 in X and not many named X in 2012. There's also group of categories that go with that naming scheme (see the 2012 in film article, the category for it and the parent category structure from there). Looks like a de facto standard to me. Ravensfire (talk) 02:06, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Actually, from this, the preferred title would be 2012 in UFC. Unless ... that's a summary of EVERYTHING UFC related in 2012, and this would focus purely on events. I'm thinking the main article would mention Ultimate Fighter and any drama/chaos/notable events that happen in UFC outside of an event. So the structure would be something like this:

2012 in mixed martial arts

2012 in UFC

2012 in UFC Events

The Ultimate Fighter season X

2012 in Other MMA (if only one article is needed, then all events would go into here)

Thoughts? Ravensfire (talk) 02:36, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

• The naming convention guideline Misplaced Pages:Naming conventions (numbers and dates)#Articles_on_events says otherwise, but it is only a suggestion even there. That is where I got the Event (date) format, which it strongly recommends. I see the logic in the recommendation, but it is not the prettiest nor most intuitive titling structure. Again, I'm not voting and I'm fine with any name, but that small section is worth a read as it appears to be the closest to what we are doing here, even if you disagree with its suggestions. Dennis Brown (talk) 01:36, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

The Elephant in the room

It is now over a week since User:Beeblebrox posted asking us to adopt an Omnibus format for MMA events, we have such an article in 2012 in UFC events, I think it is time to reinstate the redirects, but before I did I would ask that if anyone thinks any of the events UFC have held or are planning to do in 2012 meet WP:MMAEVENT and demonstrate genuine lasting effect then please list them below so we can discuss them on an individual bases Mtking 12:42, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Related to this. The fair use rationale will have to be changed on the posters that appear here. I won't be able to get to it till Monday, if someone can get to them before then, it would be great. -kelapstick 12:56, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Anyone ? I plan to start with those yet to happen and work back. Mtking 23:10, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

• I would expect some backlash from a few that haven't been participating and wanting to start old discussion up all over again, and it would be better to deal with it here than on each page, demonstrating prior consensus, keep from resaying what has been said, etc. A section to deal with it here, one header per article, might be good, with a comment on the talk page and summary pointing here. I think the timing is right, but no need to try to argue 20 articles at the same time. Besides, it isn't a race, it is just a destination. You might try limiting your "changes" to a few at a time (one or two a day average, for now), to prevent it from becoming a free-for-all. And it about time we look at getting a bot to start archiving this page. Dennis Brown (talk) 23:35, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Agree, I will limit it to small sets, post a note on the talk page (with a link here) and post a 3rd level section here with done. As for the bot, yes with a 14 day period to start seems good. Mtking 23:52, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

When redirecting the individual articles to the omnibus, I would recommend, targeting the redirect to the specific section of the omnibus discussing that individual event. If someone is trying to go to UFC on Fox Y and they see information about UFC on Fox Y they may be less likely to complain than if they see the top of 2012 in UFC events. --TreyGeek (talk) 00:02, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

• Absolutely. And just think, once this is done, you can start working on all the other years. :D As you know, I'm useless on helping with content, but keep me in the loop if you need someone familiar with the previous administrative decisions and guideline considerations with the other stuff. Early is always better than late. Once complete, this is going to be a very good thing for both MMA and Misplaced Pages, even if it wasn't obvious to many in the early days. Dennis Brown (talk) 01:01, 6 April 2012 (UTC)
• I have stated with the three UFC on FX not already redirects, I will do the three UFC on Fuel TV and the three UFC on Fox in two stages tomorrow, then take it from there. Mtking 07:42, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

• I've asked for semi-protection on UFC on FX 4, and left a warning on the IPs talk page. This one was clearly deleted at AFD and the IP reverts are becoming disruptive, bordering on edit warring. Dennis Brown (talk) 13:29, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

*An Afd is not the end all to prevent an article from being expanded when new sources are found and added. --131.123.123.124 (talk) 15:37, 6 April 2012 (UTC) Note: IP range now checkuserblocked.

Nice try with the redirects. Per the dispute resolution discussion that I know you're aware of, if you want to remove/redirect pages, you have to follow procedure and nominate each and every one for deletion as the mediator suggested. Udar55 (talk) 15:46, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

• That isn't what was said. His comments were limited to the one article. He wouldn't have been addressing an entire class of articles at WP:DR, that would be beyond the scope of that particular venue. Dennis Brown (talk) 21:44, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

2012 Redirects

I have just done the following redirects :

UFC on FX: Guillard vs. Miller

 Done Mtking 07:33, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

FC on FX: Guillard vs. Miller

 Done Mtking 07:33, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

UFC on FX 3

 Done Mtking 07:33, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

What Now ?

So where do we go from here, we have an omnibus article that is ready, has all the information in it that the stand alone articles had yet there is still no consensus for the redirects, in fact one editor is requiring AfD's on them all before the redirect can be put in place.

1. It has be recommended that we hold a RfC on this issue, however I can find no real precedent for it, and have spent most of the morning trying to frame a question to ask, all of which boil down to "Can the project have the community consent to enforce WP:NOTNEWSPAPER, WP:EVENT and WP:SPORTSEVENT with the use of WP:MMAEVENT". It has also been pointed out we should have some examples of what are acceptable sources, however I cannot find an MMA event that has been sent to AfD that has been kept becouse it meets the "Lasting Significance test".
2. Accept that despite our best effort here we will have to nominate them for deletion at AfD, and accept the inevitable disruption when posts are made to Sherdog forums and all the socks and SPA's pile in. Maybe we ask that they are semi-protected at the start and a number of admins are asked to act as observers ?
3. Continue to discuss it here, however I feel those that are now left that want the stand alone articles may not be willing to accept anything other than retaining the stand alone articles.

Comments please ? Mtking 02:41, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, ask for comment at WP:ANI. It's exceedingly obvious after multiple AFD's what the correct approach is and a small number of editors don't want to hear that. Explain the situation and ask for advice and see what they say. I think forcing every article time and time again to go to AFD when they know the approach is being disruptive and shouldn't be tolerated. Ravensfire (talk) 02:51, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

I would agree with Ravensfire that having to AfD every individual event (even if grouped together in AfDs) is not a constructive use of anyone's time. However, in various discussions scattered around Misplaced Pages, it seems to me that either a string of more AfDs and/or a definitive RfC is going to be required to settle the matter. In terms of an RfC, I don't think Mtking or I can construct a question in a NPOV manner because both of us already have the arguments against individual article constructed in our head. At the same time, I don't think the "other camp", particularly those who believe that UFC events are inherently notable, can construct the RfC question either for similar reasons. It may take a neutral party with some familiarity of the situation to create the question. Ravensfire suggested getting advice from ANI, though I'm on the fence on how useful that will be. WP:DR has already been done, for a limited case, and the answer was basically AfD. I'm not sure if WP:Mediation Cabal would offer anything new or not (I've never seen it in action) or if this should just go straight to RfC (which I haven't seen used or participated in extensively). It does seem like we are running around in circles though in terms of where to go in terms of the UFC set of articles. Of course, it's only been a week (though it doesn't feel like it), so maybe I'm just expecting too much too fast?

• I've already piped in on talk pages, and I can't say what I *know* is the correct answer, but to answer in a more public venue, I think we might be looking at an RfC in the near future. ANI is more about incidents, and the user forcing everyone to go to AFD isn't violating any rule, just being difficult. It would be nice to have a consensus at RfC that any article that is sourced ONLY by primary sources and sources that are not independent (ie: they only focus on MMA events) should be redirected in order to *AVOID* AFD. In those cases, forcing it to AFD is very pointy and not productive. Dennis Brown (talk) 11:27, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Dennis, you mention something that perhaps should be asked in an RfC at some point: Are MMA media websites, who are not affiliated with any MMA promotion, independent of the subject as required by WP:GNG? What if those MMA media sites are used for content at more "mainstream" sites? (For example, MMAFighting.com articles appear at Yahoo Sports.) This area will help answer the question of if MMA event passes WP:GNG if they are only covered by Sherdog, MMAMania.com, MMAJunkie.com and similar sites. --TreyGeek (talk) 16:38, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

• I think that is a question that needs answering, yes, and only an RfC can do that. If an article is covered by Sports Illustrated, then obviously they are independent of the source since they cover more than just MMA, but sources from MMA only websites aren't independent, at least I don't think. They are fine (and likely the best) for citing facts, but not for demonstrating notability, as it is their job to promote the sport, not to simply report on sports. Dennis Brown (talk) 17:02, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

I would dispute that it's "there job to promote the sport" as a number of MMA journalists routinely state, it's there job to report the facts as best they can, not to promote the sport even if Dana White & some fans think that's there job. Obviously not all sites/people are created equally when it comes to objectivity. --Phospheros (talk) 18:01, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

• The job of the individual reporter is to report facts, but make no mistake that the job of the websites themselves is to promote the sport, which promotes themselves. The web owners have every desire to attract more users, promote the sport, which means more potential users, rinse, repeat. This is true of any highly specialized website, not just MMA. When we are determining the usability of a website for references, we aren't looking at the individual reporters, we are looking at the management, the editorial process. That is what makes a site "reliable" per WP:RS. Independence is a completely different issue. Independence is not required for citing many non-contentious facts, but it is required for establishing notability, per WP:N. Dennis Brown (talk) 18:50, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

"The web owners have every desire to attract more users" just as ESPN has every desire to attract more viewers, to "promote" sports, which means more potential viewers, rinse, repeat. This is true of any highly specialized channel, not just sports. "the editorial process" and that was my only point, some sites have editorial credibility and some don't. But one should not paint all sites with a broad brush. Each site should be judged on its own merits.--Phospheros (talk) 19:10, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

• That each site be judged on their merits IS what we are suggesting. You can't really compare ESPN, however, as they cover ALL sports. We are talking about sites that only cover ONE sport. A website that only covers NASCAR, for instance, isn't "independent enough" to establish notability for a NASCAR event if that is the only source that can be found, at least per the understanding of a great deal of editors and administrators. It can still be used as a reliable source for information if it passes WP:RS, no one is arguing that. That is what an external consensus needs to establish. Again, a site can be reliable without being independent. Even primary sites quality under this interpretation, but not for establishing notability. Dennis Brown (talk) 19:19, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

The long game

The omnibus is good because it contains events that cannot really pass GNG. So, the issue is not whether or not it should stand. It's the articles redirecting to it. So, why not abandon the heavy handed AfDs and redirects. Instead start merge proposals, and add the omnibus to "See also" section of each article. Take it slow. What's the hurry? I didn't read the above very well, so if this has been suggested, please forgive me. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 12:21, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

• No forgiveness ever needed, your input here during the whole debate has been very constructive, helpful and appreciated. No had suggested going the merge route yet and going after AFDs for the purpose of getting a merge isn't appropriate anyway. I think both of our ideas can be done at the same time, to both reduce stress, prevent backlash, and clearly determine a consensus for the future. Dennis Brown (talk) 14:29, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Something else that may be needed if the AFD approach is considered is to request protection (semi or full) for the redirect for at least a month to prevent the edit wars that is happening from people directed from the forum. Ravensfire (talk) 17:34, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Many admins won't do preemptive protection. Maybe if it was agreed in an RfC, but I wouldn't hold out for that. Since Misplaced Pages is "the encyclopedia anyone can edit" (and vandalize), it is considered against the core principals to auto-protect an entire class of articles. But if you can find a sympathetic ear, I agree it would make life easier. Dennis Brown (talk) 18:56, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Anna in part, in my thinking for UFC in 2011, that would be to draft as a user space draft then use the {{merge to}} template on each of the of the proposed redirects pointing to one discussion (probably on the user space draft talk page), that approach now has the feeling of being the wrong way round, the merge has been done now, all that is left is to put in the redirects. Mtking 00:27, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

• I'm pretty sure you can't start a mergeto with the destination being in userspace, you can't mix the two areas. Likely, you would be better off to create the article, finish it, use main tags for attribution, then start merge discussions, pointing the talk to that 2011 omnibus article. You would likely get less resistance that way as well since it was merging to a real article, not just a promise of one. Maybe a little less. Forgot to add, an admin would need to merge attribution once the main tags were gone and they became a redirect. Dennis Brown (talk) 01:07, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Sorry should have explained better - do the draft in user space but then propose the merge to the 2011 in UFC as a red link and use the userspace draft as the example of what it would look like, when it is clear there is consensus, move the userspace article and put the redirects in place. As for the issue of attribution that can be done by non admins, all that would be needed, is when the userspace draft is created, event by event a link in the edit sum back to the source page (for example with the edit sum adding content copied from revision 123456789 of ] - for more info see WP:CWW), doing it this way it is not possible to argue that the murge has already happened (as is the case with 2012). Mtking 01:26, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

• My gut still says creating the article in full (which will not violate any guideline) first would be best, essentially what you are saying but move into mainspace before starting the conversations. It is semantics, but the appearance of an already "real" article is persuasive vs. user space, which looks more like one persons idea rather than a communities idea. ie: it helps sell the idea better. Not a biggie, I won't slow anything down for it, just my opinion. Dennis Brown (talk) 18:13, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

• It'll take some time to write the 2011 in UFC events article (based upon how long it took me to write the initial draft of the 2012 article and we're only 3 months into the year). If the idea is to do the "merge" proposal route from individual event articles to the omnibus article, why not start that with 2012 in UFC events. I know Mtking has redirected a few of the individual events to the omnibus article, but there are still a number of individual event articles, particularly for the numbered events. This could allow for another trial run of how to do this while the 2011 article is under construction? Just a thought. --TreyGeek (talk) 21:17, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

• Makes sense. I've been thinking about it all day. I had reverted one of the contentious redirects earlier today, but I think we all need to stop doing this, and go the merge route. I don't want to become as disruptive as we claim others have been, and continuing to just revert, even when we are right, isn't helpful. It's only a small handful of objectors now, most have seen what you are doing and are fine with it, but we don't need to start another round of meatpuppet battles here. I just undid my own revert in good faith to start a discussion at UFC on FX: Alves vs. Kampmann. That would be a good place to start a merge discussion. Dennis Brown (talk) 00:32, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

• Should a {{Merge to}} template be added to the article so that the discussion can be formally started? --TreyGeek (talk) 16:10, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

I think yes. The {{Merge to}} route is best. When I started this subsection, I was referring to the 2012 articles. Omnis are solid, worthwhile, and will survive AfDs. Redirecting to them is the concern. AfDs freak people out and are seen as a blackmail tactic. Redirecting circumvents procedure. Merge seems to be the best way, albeit a pain in the butt. Like Dennis Brown says (I think), make the omni, then look after the next steps. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 16:25, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

AfD is not a blackmail tactic, the only tactic at play here is that of Udar55, by not engaging in a meaningfully dialogue, posting off wiki personal atacks on those acting in good faith to resolve this, hopping that either TreyGeek, Dennis Brown or myself will give up. Do place the merge template on the articles, when doing so point to one central discussion point for all though, we don't need 10+ locations for discussions.Mtking 22:02, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
Further, it is probably a good idea to notify DGG, Beeblebrox and MuZemike of the location and ask that they keep an eye on it for attacks, socking and the like, may be also WP:AN (not ANI) the more admins with eyes on it might help it remain constructive. Mtking 22:50, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

• And keep me in the loop on any merge discussions you start, a note on my talk page is always good. I'm still working 12+ hours a day, and lately I've had to be away from my desk some, so I can miss stuff. Dennis Brown (talk) 23:20, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

AfD can very easily be seen as an unfair tactic. I'm not saying that that is your intention, just that it can been '"seen" that way. That's why I've been iffy about it. If it freaks everyone out, we ought to consider other ways.

And once again, we should keep the option of allowing many of the major UFC event articles to stand. Policy or not, opposition's ability to cite guidelines or not, it is clear that the masses want the major UFC articles to remain. Serving the masses is paramount.

You've done good work creating the omni, and you have set a precedent. They contain articles that could never stand alone. But maybe compromise is in order. If we insist on omnis alone, we run the risk of the Sherdog crowd setting up their own filecard-style wiki for all events. We would then likely lose our status as the hub for info, and the whole MMA project could suffer. Misplaced Pages remain the main hub for MMA articles is important, right?

Anyway, we can do a multiple merge (Misplaced Pages:Merge#Tagging multiple articles) with the pre-created omni talk being the location for centralized discussion, and see how the chips fall. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:29, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I don't agree that WP should be the hub (or go to point) for anything, if the MMA fan base what a wiki for the sport then they can create it and I would be willing to help them transwiki the content from here (assuming they chose to use CC-BY-SA). Do we need to cover the sport ? - yes, but we should not treat MMA any differently than we do any other sport, there is also a ongoing discussion about a collage american football game with the same arguments, yes they are newsworthy, but not encyclopaedic. I also support the idea of the creation of "sportspedia" in the same way that wikinews exists, that can cover every sports result and event, there is a danger that we loose the focus of what we are building here and that in the long term will damage the brand as it gets associated with fan created triva and not a serious well respect, well sourced factual resource. Mtking 00:11, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

"...I don't agree that WP should be the hub (or go to point) for anything..." ???? I disagree. It should! There are enormous advantages to be gained, least of which is the crossreferencing bluelinks. Mainainting critical mass for a topic means all the valuable information lands here.

You may call this news. I call it events. In time, news becomes history. An article about a boxing match in 1844, complete with poster, photos, and plenty of content, including walk in music, would be a very welcome and valuable part of the project.

What "we are building here" is a massive body of information. This is only the first decade of a project that hopefully will last hundreds of years. Please don't worry about it becoming too large. As for quality, an article on UFC 145 is as valuable to some as Man Afraid Soap is to others.

As Jimbo said: "...Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing..." Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:13, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Well that seams to be at odds with WP:NOT, the community has agreed limits to what we included, for example it says "not all verifiable events are suitable for inclusion in Misplaced Pages" and "most newsworthy events do not qualify for inclusion" that's what we have here, an event that has made the news, in common with most sports events this last week, but with one or two notable exceptions (The Masters springs to mind) none of them will have any enduring significance. What I mean when I say WP should not be the go to point, is best explained with the following example : If I want up-to-date game info on a round by round basis on the AFL (Aussie Rules) I go to afl.com.au, if I want a historical perspective on a past season I would come here; WP should not be the place MMA fans come for gossip and news headlines. Mtking 01:43, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Lots of policies and guidelines are deliberately vague and at odds with each other. The intent is for the community to ultimately make judgement calls.

Today's news headlines and up-to-date game info is tomorrow's historical information. Gossips has nothing to do with this discussion.

Many editors have made the point about this project being here to serve visitors, and that an ocean of them want individual articles. Please respond to that. Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:51, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Anna, AfD will always show the appearance of impropriety to new people, especially those who come to the discussion based on a post on a forum (the big scary deletion notice on the top). I also fear that a merge template will do the same, and even a disclaimer at the top in big bold letters saying "this is not an attempt to remove the content from Misplaced Pages, rather to put it in an improved format" probably will not help (ever hear of the hierarchy of control, signs are one of the least effective methods of eliminating a hazard, from an occupational health and safety point of view). The benefit of the merge over AfD is there can be no comments about "AfD is not for merging", which is bound to come up. The only issue I have with merging is because they don't have a fixed timeline like AfD, they frequently get forgotten about, or not closed (I've seen merge templates on articles for over 2 years). I am sure there will be lots of eyes on the discussion, but setting a fixed duration is a good idea, then the discussion can be posted at the appropriate noticeboard to request closure after the discussion takes place. --kelapstick 23:47, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

• Any AFD that is for the purpose of merging will, and should, get speedy kept. I would push for that, it is an improper use of AFD. I don't think anyone is arguing to use AFD as a weapon, fortunately. And I've always maintained that any article that passes WP:GNG should remain an article. The only question is what sources establish notability and which don't. If they are only MMA forums, or MMA only websites, then no as that is routine coverage by non-independent sources. (imho) Merges shouldn't take more than 7 to 10 days per article, and anyone can close a merge, it doesn't require an admin. It's best if someone not participating directly close it, of course. Likely, listing merges here would be fine. No matter who closes a merge, someone can revert back and force the issue into WP:DR, so a clean discussion and close is important. I see a few block along the way, but nothing major. And some discussions won't go the way you want, but if the discussion is clean and fair, that is the way it goes. Dennis Brown (talk) 01:49, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

• For me it is not where the source comes from, it is "'does the source demonstrate that the event had lasting significance?", going back to the AFL, all of this weeks games received more than enough coverage in RS to pass GNG, (all of them viewed by far more spectators at the ground and on TV than any of the MMA events we are talking about) but none of them have any lasting significance, so when I look at the UFC events, to see if they meet WP:EVENT, I am looking for firstly sources written at least 4+ weeks after the event, and they collectively need to pass GNG. Mtking 02:10, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

"does the source demonstrate that the event had lasting significance?" and Misplaced Pages:EVENT are guidelines, not a policy. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:51, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Citing the absence of football events is like reverse WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, and doesn't hold much water. With respect, we've heard these positions over and over again. This boils down to citing guidlines vs. the masses wanting individual articles. Commons sense and compromise will ultimately prevail. That means most likely some event articles, but not all, will remain. There is little chance of it going completely in one direction. So, 1,000,000,000 words later, where are we? And what is this all over? A few UFC event articles that are, by the way, visited by thousands each day. If this is about cleaning up and controlling enwp content, here are some links in that area of much higher importance:

This has really continued so long. Remember at the very end of THX 1138? This has gone overbudget on backroom keystrokes. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:05, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Anna I agree with you that this has gone on far to long, and I will not waste any more of my time on it, those who favour the stand alone articles are just not listening to the words of the admins closing these AfD's. I am going on an out of state business trip for the next two days, upon my return I will feel free to start nominating any MMA article that does not demonstrate any lasting significance, it is not upto fans and members of external forums to unilaterally decide that WP shall cover these sports events because they want them covered when policy and precedent is so clear, and given the closing statements made by admins when they close the AfD's for example the latest one here when the admin said quite pointedly when talking about the keep !votes "there are very few (if any) that have a valid, policy-based rationale". Mtking 13:20, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Do you intend on nominating for deletion all the stand-alone UFC event articles, or just some of them? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 15:05, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

This is the problem. Lasting significance is ultimately subjective for a long time. Surely the results of the 2011 Japanese Grand Prix would have lasting significance to those involved with motorsports or interested in Formula 1, but have little to no bearing to those who aren't interested. Does that mean Formula One solely needs an omnibus? No. You'll notice in particular that singular event pages are in conjunction with a stand alone article. I suppose my stance is keep both the stand-alone events and the omnibus in the interests of completion/navigation/readability. Teamsleep (talk) 22:57, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Notability of MMA Events

Due to the large volume of UFC articles that have been proposed for deletion I think it is time that we discuss what makes a mixed martial arts event notable. Per Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/UFC 142 a set of guidelines outlining notability would be ideal in order to promote a consistant guidelines for AfDs. There are a few questions that need to be addressed immediately:

• Are UFC events inherently notable?
• Are top tier MMA organization events per WP:MMANOT inherently notable?
• What would make any MMA event notable?

I have a set of criteria I would like to see introduced. I want to see Misplaced Pages contain comprehensive and consistent coverage for the events that have lasting significance for the sport; sometimes, that effect is hard to see in the short term. Fortunately the UFC already has a method of sorting it's events; currently there are four types: numbered UFC events, UFC events on FOX, UFC events on FX and UFC events on FUEL TV. Immediately, A simple way to have consistent coverage of the most important events (as decided by the UFC) would be to grant all numbered UFC events notability. An argument against this would be to say 'just because the UFC says it's important doesn't make it notable'. This argument makes an assumption that is false, that the UFC has complete control on numbered events. It is actually the consumer, who purchases MMA events via pay-per-view, that decides that notability. Recently the UFC had a proposed numbered event in Montreal that had to be cancelled. Why? Because they could not find large enough fights to merit the notability of a numbered event. By making all numbered UFC events notable we can allow a Misplaced Pages viewer to browse through the events with an appealing consistency. Another way to confirm notability would be for an event to have a title fight. These fights represent a contest to decide the top fighter in their respective organizations, and have lasting historic effects for the sport and the company. Obviously, all organizations are not created equal, therefore it would be fair to grant notability to title fights in top tier organizations as per WP:MMANOT. A final objective way to determine notability would be for an event to contain a certain number of top ranked fighters. A discussion is required in order to decide what source(s) could establish top ranked fighters. ESPN is a good source because they poll different reporters, for the same reason SB Nations MMA rankings are also favorable due to their large number of sources (including reporters, websites and public opinion). The number of top ranked fighters that an event needs to be notable is difficult to pin down. For these initial guidelines I will arbitrarily say four top-ranked fighters will need to be involved in an event to establish notability. This number and the method of determining a definition for 'top-ranked' will need to be discussed. In sum, my advised guidelines for notability of MMA events are:

1. Any numbered UFC event
2. Any event for a top tier organization that contains a title fight
3. Any event that contains four top ranked fighters (discussion needed)

--Pat 16:37, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

USA Today/SB Nation Rankings would be a good toll to use http://www.bloodyelbow.com/rankings Fraggy1 (talk) 18:34, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Before we get into the exact wording we need some examples of events which pass the WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE test and then demonstrate that what ever set of words are framed they reflect reality otherwise the community won't accept this as a creditable guideline. Mtking 21:01, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

It's fairly clear that you have been the main voice against MMA events notability. This discussion is an attempt to clarify exactly what the community deems as notable. I would really appreciate your input on the questions I put forward, as well as the notability guidelines I have outlined. The AfD results are asking for a specific definition of MMA event notability and I find putting forward more AfDs extremely useless (due to the circular nature of this method). However I would like to ask, respectfully, for you to try not to monopolize this conversation. --Pat 21:25, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Good on ya both. This looks like progress. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:09, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Agree. WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE is the real bugger. Details of what happened during the event do continue to be discussed, even though the event as a whole does not. Does that satisfy the guideline? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:15, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Going back to Pat's guidelines:

1. Any numbered UFC event These are broadcast all over the world by media companies such as ESPN (UK and Ireland), Rede Globo (Brazil), Rogers Sportsnet (Canada), Sky Italia (Italy), Fox Latin America I could go and they should be included.

2. Any event for a top tier organization that contains a title fight I think this should be limited to Zuffa owneed promotions due to the fact the vast majority of top fighters are under ex clusive with either the UFC or Strikeforce

'3. Any event that contains four top ranked fighters I think any four top 25 ranked fighters in the USA today poll would be a good enough indication of event notabilty. The USA today poll includes ESPN, Sherdog and a number of top MMA journalists and is the closets thing MMA has to rankings. Fraggy1 (talk) 22:41, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I'll respond to Pat's guidelines too: Perfect. I would support that. But, Mtking makes a good point. Considering such articles may still conflict with WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE and other guidelines, would community consensus be hard to achieve? The three groups you suggest would become exceptions to the guidelines. Wouldn't we have to show why? Next, international curling events could want the same. We need convincing rationale. Am I on the right track with my thinking here? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:48, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

WP:NTEMP directly conflicts with WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE. I would rather we tried to come up with a standard specific to MMA, as opposed to focusing on established rules. This may seem like I'm trying to avoid the rules, but it's more a case that the rules don't apply. For instance WP:SPORTSEVENT doesn't apply to an MMA event because it's not a game or series, and WP:NSEASONS doesn't apply because an event is not a season. We are left to use WP:EVENT which leaves much to be desired in order to have a clear definition of notoriety for specific MMA events. --Pat 22:43, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Regarding "Next, international curling events could want the same." Actually, International World Curling Championships do have their own unique pages, for Men's, Women's, and Mixed Doubles. In fact so do some of the more recent national championships for the U.S., Canada, and even Scotland. The 2012 Scottish Women's Curling Championship has less prose and more statistical information than almost any major MMA event page. Yes, that's still far fewer annual pages than the UFC, Strikeforce, and Bellator produce, but Curling is a sport a very tiny fraction the size of Mixed Martial Arts and gets zero mainstream press attention whatsoever outside of the Olympics, yet they are better represented in proportion to their fanbase than the top three MMA promotions are when it comes to annual Curling Championships versus major MMA-event pages. In fact, damn near all the arguments applied to MMA could be magnified many times over against wikipedia's representation of Curling. So that isn't an issue. At least, not until someone decides to try and get all the curling articles deleted. Beansy (talk) 04:25, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Being less lazy with what sources we use would help less MMA Junkie more USA today, ESPN, SI, TSN, etc Fraggy1 (talk) 22:56, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

MMAJunkie, MMAFighting, and Sherdog all are much better, faster, and more comprehensive news sources for MMA than ESPN, SI, or TSN (Sherdog more for lesser events). In fact I believe Sherdog is CBS's official partner for sporting news and MMAFighting.com's Ariel Helwani has Fox Sports credentials now, among other MMA reporters who do so, but he still breaks far more news in interviews that appear on MMAFighting. What's more, USA Today, while it does have one MMA staff reporter, farms out its MMA meta-rankings to SBNation (USA Today's Sergio Non is one of about a dozen contributors to the monthly meta-rankings). There are lots of not-so-great MMA-specific news sources out there and lots of cut-and-paste sites too, but there are also some very well known MMA and very well respected MMA sites there. MixedMartialArts.com for instance, while importing most of its reported news from elsewhere (while giving credit), has news that pops up from its own forums, as posters who are verified MMA fighter and other MMA industry figures regularly post there, including Dana White himself. Really, there's nothing wrong with those sources. Sure, I regularly see completely banal op-eds, but as for the actual reporting and the factual accuracy, the leading MMA sites tend to be better sources than places like the Washington Post (and it pains me to say that since that was the newspaper I grew up on), where you might have a boxing writer who is only semi-knowledgeable about MMA doing occasional and less-than-comprehensive write-ups because he's ordered to instead of because he's a fan of the sport. I suppose more Associated Press articles as sources might be helpful though I guess...Beansy (talk) 00:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

This could turn into a major push to hammer out some MMA guidelines. It's also on a pretty hidden page. Should we do something about that? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 22:45, 25 April 2012 (UTC) And maybe we should consult some editors who are really, really experienced with policy. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:08, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Fraggy1, the use of less MMA centric sources is a very good idea. I don't see WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE conflicting with WP:NTEMP, if your read them in conjunction with WP:ROUTINE. What is often overlooked is that just because every newspaper or website publishes an article on some event be it a crime, a party or in this case a sports result, it does not mean that is notable as a result of it being a news story of interest. Mtking 00:15, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Although Beansy is correct in his assertion that a lot of the time MMAjunkie and MMAFighting are more reliable then mainstream coverage, both Mtking and Fraggy1 are correct in their assessment that more mainstream references are required. WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE and WP:NTEMP do contradict, as mentioned in WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE. I suppose I'll quote it... "The duration of coverage is a strong indicator of whether an event has passing or lasting significance. Although notability is not temporary, meaning that coverage does not need to be ongoing for notability to be established, a burst or spike of news reports does not automatically make an incident notable." --Pat 00:55, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

That's exactly what we see here a burst or coverage in the MMA media following the announcement of the event then reporting on further card additions followed by a spike of coverage in mainstream media reporting the results then it drops to nothing. Mtking 01:31, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

True. And Pat does point out that "...coverage does not need to be ongoing for notability to be established...", which somewhat mitigates it. So, can we add other considerations, including guidelines such as WP:GEOSCOPE that further mitigate WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE, and make a select group of top MMA events notable? Let's compromise here a bit. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:51, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

How do we deal with the issue that a lot of that coverage is just Misplaced Pages:ROUTINE in it's nature, reports on who is and who is not going to fight, much like the reports on who is and is not fit to be picked for a sports team for a match ? Mtking 02:29, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

WP:Routine says "Routine events such as sports matches" are not notable. A single UFC event has anywhere between nine and twelve single matches. In this regard, it is much more like a wrestling event than a single sports match. If wrestling events are notable, UFC events ought to be notable as well. Dominic (talk) 12:33, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

UFC events are notable, watched by millions and is covered by mainstream media outlets. Who cares if the event doesnt have a long-lasting effect on society. This isnt the moon landing, its a sports event. It becomes a part of history, just like everything else. Portillo (talk) 02:03, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

It's quite a unique case, and that should be a consideration, as Pat points out. As it's sort of an event and a sport at once, we mustn't be too rigid in observing guidelines -- guidelines which offer flexibility with terms like "probably" and "likely". Flexibility can win the day here. The whole MMA Wikiproject has a lot to gain if we can compromise a bit. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:23, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Because as an encyclopaedia we have rules, guidelines and policies on what information is deemed of encyclopaedic worth, for example WP:NOT and the subsection WP:NOTNEWSPAPER and WP:EVENT. Mtking 02:29, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

(This is cross-posted from the UFC 146 AfD with some modifications.) Comment I hesitate to comment but I hope the "keepers" will take this as constructive suggestions and insight into the "deletionists" mentality. "Articles about notable should have well-sourced prose, not merely a list of stats." Currently, most MMA event articles appear to contain only "routine news coverage of such things as announcements sporting ". If MMA event articles (UFC or otherwise) included more prose discussing the significance of the event, the background of bouts and the fighters involved in them, what happened during the bouts, and any after effects of the event then "deletionists" will have less to argue from. As concrete examples of what I'm referring to look at UFC 94 and UFC 140 as articles that contain significant amounts of well-sourced prose that discuss all aspects of the event. If a particular event is notable, the article should explain why it is notable and nearly all MMA event articles fail to do so. If the significant issues about an event were discussed for more than a single sentence, it adds weight to outsiders (non-MMA viewing folks) that these may really be notable articles and will help support the "keepers" case during AfD. So the most important thing that should be done, in my opinion, is not constructing notability criteria for MMA events, but to actually improve the MMA event articles so that they are more likely to meet the existing guidelines and notability criteria. --TreyGeek (talk) 02:58, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't think anyone disagrees that MMA events require better sources and more information. I'm simply trying to put forward specific criteria to help create consistency. I fear that TreyGeek and Mtking care more about removing articles than improving them. This mentality, along with a lack of specific guidelines, has led us into a position where major PPV events, with huge ramifications for the sport, are now up for deletion. I think we need to work together to try to improve Misplaced Pages, as opposed to grouping people as 'deleters' or 'keepers'. --Pat 03:06, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

With the work I put into writing up UFC 140 and what I could on the early background of UFC 147 in addition to writing up the initial version of 2012 in UFC events, 2012 in mixed martial arts events, and 2012 in Super Fight League I take offense to the suggestion that I don't care (or didn't care) about improving MMA event articles. Thanks for reminding me why I'm wanting to retire from the MMA WikiProject. --TreyGeek (talk) 03:29, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I was completely wrong in that assertion. I hope you'll forgive me. I know you are actively working towards making pages better, as evident with the amount of time you put into the '2012 in UFC events' page. I was attempting to refer to each individual AfD that has come up, and apparent lack of effort by everyone (myself included) to include better references and provide more information. I'm trying to simply change the way we are approaching these pages. I was wrong to say that you don't care about improving the articles. I'm sorry. --Pat 03:39, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

(Sorry if this is a little out of place as while most of this was written, two more nested exchanges above it were posted). Regarding User:TreyGeek's assertion on what would make for weightier MMA event articles, that seems to almost directly contradict WPNOTTHENEWSPAPER. And every major MMA event where things haven't gone perfectly (which is to say most of them) has had prose in a "Background" section. Could some of these be more fleshed out? Sure. But the actual match info is exactly what you would not find in a newspaper, ironically. Ever read an AP article about a UFC event? They don't even usually give a complete list of who was on the card, let alone full match results with times, rounds, method of victory, whether a competitor missed weight and by how much, whether they tested positive for a steroid test, or SAC-disclosed salaries. They have a very basic recap. This is where wikipedia comes in.

Misplaced Pages is a fabulous source of MMA nuts and bolts information in addition to prose on the background info, which is exactly what so many people come here for. Or at least it was. If full background information on certain events haven't been fleshed out, I would think the appropriate response solution would be to put a tag on the article requesting that. It kind of seems like you and Mtking aren't even quite on the same page though. One of you managed to ask about extremely important events "how is this at all notable?" while the other seems to be more concerned with a formatting change, albeit risking the deletion of a tremendous amount of information in the process.

Also, about this: "If the significant issues about an event were discussed for more than a single sentence, it adds weight to outsiders (non-MMA viewing folks) that these may really be notable articles and will help support the "keepers" case during AfD." if it were not for the two of you, this wouldn't even be coming up at all. Furthermore, yeah, most recent UFC events have something or other of major significance. UFC 145 had the complete ascendance of Jon Jones as a phenomenal champion bringing stabilization to one of the two most popular weight divisions for the first time in years, only so see his popularity among fans plummet, despite all UFC efforts to try and make him a cross-over star. UFC 144 had tons of ramifications by bringing major attention back to MMA not only in Japan, but also in Korea with Benson Henderson capturing the LW world title. 146 has the complete self-destruction of Alistair Overeem just before he would have unified the Pride, Dream, and WAMMA linear titles into the UFC title, in a match between the only two remaining elite HWs with no losses in the last several years, in a match that was supposed to finally answer the question of who the toughest person on the planet is, on top of an experimental main card that had (and still has) all matches taking place in the Heavyweight division. UFC 143 had an Interim Welterweight Title fight between Carlos Condit and Nick Diaz, the latter of whom was the first Welterweight in years to be considered a serious threat to Georges St. Pierre, only to have him lose the decision, announce his "retirement" in frustration, then test positive for marijuana, leading to the Nevada State Athletic Commission announcing that therapeutic exemptions for medical marijuana would technically be allowable under the current framework, something no one in all of MMA or boxing ever thought to look into apparently. These are all really more suited to literary accounts in my opinion, but I hope you get the gist of what I'm saying. I could go on. I just don't think a lot of this stuff is necessarily what an encyclopedia is for, which is to be a dispassionate repository of unbiased information (exactly what MMA fans are looking for by the way). And if it is, then I really think adding a tag requesting more event background information or prose on the significance of the event itself would be a superior solution. Beansy (talk) 04:05, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Excellent point TreyGeek: ("...If ...more prose discussing the significance of the event...then "deletionists" will have less to argue from...") But let's do both. Some MMA-specific guideline that is somewhat less stringent is vital. If you accept no compromise, then this whole mess will continue indefinitely. About the prose: I asked Mtking a question about this, and would like both of your input, as you two know the scoop. Please see the preamble to the PLAN. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:31, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I can agree that some of the smaller shows like Fight Nights are not as notable and perhaps could be in one article. But most of the pay per view shows are clearly notable and have enough reliable sources. Portillo (talk) 04:59, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Just having reliable sources is not enough to demonstrate enduring notability, if, as is the case those reliable sources are routine reposts on newsworthy sports events they don't demonstrate enduring notability. By way of an example have a read of Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/2011 Michigan vs. Notre Dame football game I assure you that game had far more reliable sources, far bigger viewership than these MMA events, but because those sources failed to show what the enduring significance the event had it was deleted. Another example this time outside the sports world in Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Barack Obama's visit to India, again coverage by the container full, in the lead up to and during the event across the whole globe, the US, India, the EU and here in Aus, but with no enduring significance the article was deleted (and if memory servers me re-created and deleted again), I will again quote WP:NOT when it says Misplaced Pages considers the enduring notability of persons and events. so to retain these articles first we need to find sources that to that. Mtking 06:01, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

While going to great lengths to destroy a resource that has been working perfectly well does make me question your motivation (I can cherry pick a million counter examples too if you like), I'd just like to point out that a home video release alone making individual UFC events a DVD you can purchase on Amazon.com is enough to be considered inherently notable under WP:GNG, which in turn should eliminate all UFC numbered events and select non-numbered events from this discussion entirely. Beyond that, really, this was a broadly established and very popular wiki-project that would have easily fell under WP:IAR guidelines ("Misplaced Pages is not a bureaucracy" or at least not supposed to be) to the same degree a million other pages do, and I don't think a couple of people crusading for deletion should negate that. So I seriously think if we're going to discuss this at all, discussion should be narrowed at this point with all UFC PPVs and any other home video released UFC events removed from deletion considertion. On the flip side, if someone wants to compress KSW, BAMMA, or similarly tiered promotions into omnibuses I don't think you'd find much opposition, but it should be up to someone actually familiar with the subject to make the distinction of what is a lower-tiered league. For instance, Strikeforce Challenger shows have included at least one legitimate World Title match (the inaugural Women's Bantamweight World Title match, a title currently held by one of the two most popular women in the history of the sport, Ronda Rousey, who single-handedly may have saved Women's MMA from extinction on the highest level) and now half of those pages are gone without a replacement. Also I'd appreciate it if you didn't just make a partial response to this as I believe I stated two independent arguments for why either this entire thing is unnecessary or why approximately 140 UFC events should automatically be disqualified from deletion consideration.Beansy (talk) 06:36, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Please allow me to cut to the chase here. I am seeing the same debate as before. TreyGeek, Mtking and others: are you willing to bend at all? If so, what compromise would be acceptable to you in a new MMA event guideline? Let's stop trying to sell each other our points of view. We all know existing guidelines by now. Let's propose some guidelines we can live with. Then we will know quickly if this will end in an impasse. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:31, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Of course, I am willing to agree to something along the lines of Pat walls1's proposal above providing it's backed up with evidence that the sources demonstrate that it reflects reality. SNG's are meant to help provide a short cut to show when something meets our inclusion policy, so for example WP:NBOX is a simple check list that says a person is presumed to meet the notability requirements if they meet one of the criteria on the list, this is because in order to accomplished such a feet you will have gotten the coverage of the type required to pass the inclusion policy. So what ever we propose as a guideline has to come with a rational and with examples thatshow it is a good short cut otherwise any guideline won't be accepted by the wider wiki community. Mtking 07:26, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Again, the wider unaccepting wiki community seems to be mostly you and Trey at this point. Care to explain who exactly you feel you are representing? Beyond that though, I would consider the USA-Today/SBNation meta-rankings to be the gold standard for rankings, and is the only ones with multiple blessings from any "mainstream" publications that you all value so much. However this applies to people not events. Again, almost all UFC PPVs, much like WWE PPVs, have been available for individual home video release at some time or another (a few of the ones from "the dark ages" prior to the Unified Rules that made it a legitimate sport and after it was banned in most states have only been available as part of box sets). Any such event would qualify under WP:GNG I believe. You still haven't addressed why WP:IAR. Consider this quote: "The spirit of the rule trumps the letter of the rule. The common purpose of building a 💕 trumps both. If this common purpose is better served by ignoring the letter of a particular rule, then that rule should be ignored." No one in the MMA community had a strong objection to the Misplaced Pages articles' existence beyond apparently TreyGeek before you started this campaign. The minutiae points you've offered from the "enduring notability" clause is quite commonly trumped in any number of ways by the popularity of these pages, their uniform format, the numerous custom templates specifically made for MMA, the fact that these pages have existed for years uninterrupted, and similar examples of such pages from other sports and similar industries like the very PPV-based professional wrestling (there are literally hundreds of individual PPV-event pages for the WWE, WCW, and other promotions), per the general WP:IAR policy that this is an encyclopedia and thus a repository of information. There was a very-well established and in fact codified presentation of this material already in place, allowing the pages to do their job (i.e. give pertinent information that people were seeking; there's even been spats about how the match tables should be uniformly presented in biographies, but that is to this as a skirmish is to obliteration). You could delete most of Misplaced Pages if you wanted to use the first four pillars to the letter the way you are doing. Beansy (talk) 08:36, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Mtking is talking of compromise: Yay!

Beansy: You're still pitching. And, comments like "...Care to explain who exactly you feel you are representing..." can make others defensive, and that's never good while negotiating. And, the length of your posts risk WP:TLDR.

But, we, my friends, are getting closer. We all know all the relevant guidelines and rationales by now. So, how about we lay down a draft of WP:MMAOKAYICANLIVEWITHTHAT, then bitch, haggle, and couter-offer our way to something all can accept? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:09, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

You know what, fair enough? But we still seem very far apart. However I suppose I can live with Pat's criteria on a card as a standard for notability for events. I suppose it is acceptable for recent events. I would consider Bellator's 115 lbs. Women's Title to also be a legitimate world championship but it's a moot point due to Bellator's already omnibused articles. I also second the recommendation of using the USA-Today SBNation rankings locatated at BloodyElbow.com/rankings. However, those only archive back to about 2009? at the moment I think. Meanwhile modern MMA has been around for 19 years now. That is actually a huge problem. However, since the currently targeted articles are the most recent ones for some reason anyway, I suppose we can start there. I have a number of suggestions on how to determine whether a fighter was "important" enough or not to validate an older MMA event in the same manner, but I'll hold off on that for now.

As for "Of course, I am willing to agree to something along the lines of Pat walls1's proposal above providing it's backed up with evidence that the sources demonstrate that it reflects reality." I'm a little confused here by what you, Mtking, mean by "reflect reality," because that can be interpreted a number of different ways semantically. Are you talking about the sources? Would UFC.com's own event results be considered acceptable for? How about the Sherdog database for non-UFC events? Alternately are you questioning a choice of ranking sites? If you could please elaborate on that comment, that would be great. Beansy (talk) 11:50, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Good job. We seem to be heading into Bargainsville. Beansy: We don't know how far apart we are till we lay down the proposals and haggle. I'm pretty useless with evaluating MMA other than UFC, so you folks can hash that out.

I gather Mtking et al. will rightly object to Pat's 123 unless some conditions are included. Maybe it could read something like:

"All numbered UFC events are considered notable provided that they contain...and are...and blah blah blah..."

So, what "..."s do we want, and what can we forego? How about:

• ...do not necessarily need to have continued coverage beyond....
• ...should contain substantial content in prose form...
• etc etc.

Thoughts? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 12:21, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Observation I have concerns about declaring all numbered events as automatically notable, although I understand the logic behind it. UFC 149 is one of the better examples with two separate AFDs that both resolved as merge and . While we can add clarity to the notability guidelines here, we have to be careful not to try and redefine them, and WP:GNG still has to be met. I do think this is a great place and time to start this discussion, and thrilled at the overall tone here. I would clarify for Beansy that TreyGeek and Mtking weren't alone in their perspectives: DGG, Beeblebrox and myself agreed with them, and others as well. Of course, we still need to find a working compromise and it will take a while, but everyone seems to be onboard with the idea of working together. One of the problems with establishing notability in the past has been sources. I'm still of the belief that websites like sherdog are great for sourcing facts, but not for establishing notability because they aren't independent enough. Of course they will cover every event. Obviously when ESPN or Sports Illustrated covers an event, that is clearly independent and establishes notability, as their scope is broader than one sport, and addresses the continuing impact issue for me. It may be difficult or impossible to create any hard and fast rule without considering each article on the merits of its individual impact, as documented by these independent and reliable sources. But I'm certainly open to any ideas that can add clarity to the guidelines here. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 12:24, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)@Beansy: As a editor who's dabbled in the MMA project space from time to time I have a few points

1. Stop picking individual statements to attack. It's still an attack.
2. By "reflect reality", I assume Mtking was paraphrasing "A uninvolved user with no special devotion to MMA topics could draw the same conclusions from the provided neutral reliable sources".
3. A significant problem that we (collectively all of WP editors) is that rabidly fanatical supporters of MMA come in and argue that "black is white, up is down, every MMA event (even backyard exhibitions) should be included". Granted the example is extreme, but it demonstrates how several editors are under a siege of new event articles that are very poorly cited and written.
4. UFC.com's own event results/Sherdog's event results are good for stats of the event, but we need some prose around the stats to make it the article more than a stats reporting.
5. Finally, posts on various MMA interest sites (and posts on the MMA sub-reddit) inciting fans to come in and express blind faith keeps (or opposition to trying to tidy up the article space) is counter productive and only leads to further siege mentality. If you wanted to help out Misplaced Pages, go to the external communities to educate them how to go about expressing a policy based argument or suggest that they stop posting calls to arms.

I hope these points will help you, and others in the MMA space see what experienced editors see when looking at the discussions Hasteur (talk) 12:27, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

1) Not sure which you are referring to. Attacking points is part of debating. Different from attacking people. I suppose I didn't entirely separate the two when I was asking whose interests Mtking felt he was representing, which was probably a bit over the line. Obviously I'm still curious about most of the people's motivations here aside from TreyGeek (who appears to genuinely feel different formatting would be better). I'm okay putting aside all that for hammering out some sort of compromise.

2) Maybe but I really don't think lack of sourcing has been a particular problem with these articles. For instance, if you look at the sources for a specific Chess Championship that wasn't one of the very few that made international headlines and almost all the sources are going to be chess magazines, newsletters, or websites.

3) I've not been involved in this for long but that really sounds like an extreme overstatement. The _lesser_ promotions I've seen targeted included things like Konfrontacja Sztuk Walki (KSW), which I would consider the top promotion in at least Eastern Europe if not all of it. Some of these events have gotten over 10 million viewers on television. I'm still fine for omnibussing that one but it's hardly a backyard exhibition.

4) It's not that I completely have a problem with that, but most other sports are not held to that standard (do you really want me to list them? I'm being 100% literal when I'm saying Curling gets off easier; shall I give direct examples?), there generally is some background prose in any given UFC article at lesat, and the actual implications aren't always concrete and not really encyclopedia material. Was the winner of the main event on UFC on FX: Melvin vs. Guillard guaranteed a spot in a LW title eliminator? Most MMA fans seem to think so, but no one actually knows this. Jim Miller does seem to be in a #1 Contender match though against Nate Diaz and is headlining the next show on Fox. Maybe an "Aftermath" section in some of these articles or something would help. Where applicable.

5) I believe I've made a single comment post in a thread-reply to someone else's blog post on this subject, and asked people to not be idiots, not use ad-hominem attacks, and study the wikipedia guidelines. As for a "siege mentality," if you really want to be the (morally) better side you need to be willing to ignore the idiots making crude attacks (sometimes idiots like me) and look at the larger picture and not judge this entire fandom as "the enemy," if you feel you are under siege. Beansy (talk) 22:44, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Hasteur: Good points. Would still like Mtking to talk about "reflect reality". A lot of what you said could be solved if we can invite the MMA community to become Wikipedians per THE PLAN. They could not only expand and source, but protect integrity too. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Welcome back Dennis Brown! I don't think we even need a "hard and fast rule". If we throw in a few "likely"s and "substantial"s, that should work, right? (Ever notice that the guidelines are loaded with weasel words?)

I like the varied sources condition. That's probably agreeable, and necessary. If we could bend on the WP:PERSISTENCE a bit as a compromise, that would be good, considering the fights within the events do continue to be discussed anyway.

Two key components to keep at the forefront, I think:

• Identifying specific events, (Pat's 123 sounds good), which are subject to the more lenient conditions of this prospective guideline. And, others, which are either not, or are subject other conditions yet to be discussed.

• Trying to get a list of which existing guidelines can be compromised on, and which cannot. Then we can haggle better to find something that the community will approve of. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

• From my experience, Persistence is a non-issue if the sourcing is strong enough (clearly not focused only on MMA events). When the sourcing is only dedicated MMA websites, it is a legitimate concern. This is kind of like a couple of overlapping concerns, I just have focused on the GNG side of this coin because I think it is easier to be objective about if everyone agrees 1. what is independent enough to establish notability. vs. 2. what is reliable enough to source "facts". I think we all agree on point 2, and feel that if we can focus on point 1, that might make a few things fall into place. What is "independent" or not is not as clear as it could be in WP:RS, which is why it would be appropriate for us to clarify here. And again, a site can be reliable without being independent, I can't stress that enough. Primary sites are just one example. My current perspective is this: If the only sources available for an event are from websites that are exclusively MMA related, then it doesn't pass WP:GNG. If it also has sources from other reliable publications that are more removed (cover other sports or topics) and the coverage is significant, then it is likely notable. Some of the UFC events get outside coverage, some don't, meaning that the independent publications themselves have already decided if the event was notable or not by their choice to cover them or not. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 13:29, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Bloody good news indeed!

1. MMA, and in particular UFC is international. So, there must be bags of foreign language sources nobody is digging for.

2. If we get editors on board from the MMA community via THE PLAN, then maybe we can make a subpage here listing good sources, even rating their crediblity and arms-length. Something like this maybe. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:45, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

It does seem that foreign sites could be one solution. UFC 144 has mostly USA refs. When I search with http://www.google.com.br/, I see pretty good stuff like and . Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:07, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't think we're going to be able to completely satisfy every wikipedia guideline but hell that's what WP: IGNOREALLRULES is for I think using reports from the UFC's broadcasters outside the US (ESPN UK, Rede, Rogers etc) should be encouraged as it satisfies WP: GEOSCOPE. Also to avoid situations like UFC 149 occurring again I don't think articles about future events should be created until the card is finalized. We're on the right track here let's not screw it up!! Fraggy1 (talk) 18:28, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

One of the distinct advantages of the omnibus system is that it allows a redirect to be created under the unsourced UFC match, pointing to the proper omnibus article section that contains whatever info exists. This removed the temptation of padding an unsourced article with junk to make it "look" good enough, and greatly reduces the risk of AFD. Eventually, some events will become notable enough to justify their own article, some won't, but you still have a logical system that points to the data for all events. All new events should be placed in the omnibus article first for this very reason. This is the only way to keep event data from from (properly) being deleted because it can't justify a stand alone article. And I'm actually confident we do meet every guideline when we do it this way. Each article that is stand alone still needs to meet WP:GNG, but that is no different than any other article on Misplaced Pages. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 17:58, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

The problem with the Omnibus article is there is a lot of events 2012 in UFC events is already an unreadable mess and it's only April, there's a very good reason why WWE PPV's aren't done as year by year articles. I agree that the number of MMA event needs to go down KSW, One FC, MFC events do not deserve there own articles and the sparness of there events comapared to UFC shows means an omnibus makes more sense. A UFC event, particularly a numbered or Fox event will contain several fights involving top fighters and sometimes multiple world championship fights. A lot of the problems with UFC articles can be fixed with a greater diversity in sourcing and hard work.Fraggy1 (talk) 18:28, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

That is why we are here, not to push any idea, but to try something, tweak it, try again, until we have something that fits the basic description of an omnibus system. You can always create a new way (maybe in your sandbox) and show everyone, and if it is better, it would win favor. The omnibus system is new, and by no means have all the bugs been worked out. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 18:34, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Another problem with the omnibus article is that it only includes results. Individual articles allows payouts, awards, attendance, gate takings, background and other information to be added, which is alot more useful for people who use Misplaced Pages to search for UFC events.

{{ec}*2 That's not a problem, only a challange. If you had looked at the 2012 in UFC events article, you would have seen a paragraph of prose giving the highlights, an infobox containing gate takings, attendance, buy rate, etc. and a listing of the contenders. It seems fairly clear to me that has all the information you are wanting to include. Hasteur (talk) 23:41, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Sorry if I'm sidetracking a little but shouldn't the Ultimate Finale Articles be merged into the corresponding article as there technically the concluding episodes to a TV series? Fraggy1 (talk) 18:11, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary Break #3

This could sort of be a stage of the MMA notability push, so made it part of the section, and a arb. break was due anyhow.

Should I/we go ahead with Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Mixed martial arts#The statement and invitation to MMA forums? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:51, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Anybody care to guess when we might come up with an agreeable guideline? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:55, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

• Give it a week or two. Lots of people don't check in regularly and it is important that there is a clear consensus so we don't repeat efforts. We have good momentum and good participation, we need to make it clear that no one is trying to force this by brute force. Putting a notice on a few pages, like 2012 in UFC events is likely a good idea, and would trust your judgement to decide which others. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 14:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Give it a week or so to start writing the draft? A week or so to decide whether or not an invitation is a good plan? A week or so for this to run its course?

"...Putting a notice on a few pages.." to help with the statement or for this guideline thing? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:07, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

• To first develop a consensus and clarify the guideline here. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 15:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I may not get chance to respond more until Saturday, when I said above about "reflect reality" Hasteur hit the nail on the head all we have at this time is MMA fans saying they are notable and have lasting significance; well lets start having some cites that demonstrate that, not a single external link has been proffered in this whole debate. When I said about "wiki community" if you really think this is only me and one other go and have a look at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Admin Attention on MMA, any proposal here will have to go through a RfC fully promoted wiki-wide and unless it can be demonstrated to be reasonable and in line with other WP polices it will not garner much support. Mtking 21:38, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Hasteur said "A uninvolved user with no special devotion to MMA topics could draw the same conclusions from the provided neutral reliable sources". That is a fair request and one I believe most major articles already meet, at least when I've actually used them. What you are saying is completely different. You're going back to square one asking about how one establishes notability. That's exactly the guidelines we are trying to hammer out here. What sort of external link are you looking for? I would be intrigued by a correlating example from a kickboxing event, non-Olympic judo tournament, non-Olympic amateur wrestling tournament, sumo tournament, or professional wrestling event (there are more pro-wrestling articles than MMA articles by the way). Beansy (talk) 22:53, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

• I've been saying this for some time. Before you go to an RfC, you need to have a good idea what it is that you are asking for comments on. I would say a clarification (ie: a change) of the inclusion policy, which is what I've been focusing on. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 21:42, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Feedback request

1. Like TreyGeek says, "...more prose discussing the significance of the event...then "deletionists" will have less to argue from..."
2. Articles inherently satisfy WP:GEOSCOPE.
3. We are considering forgoing WP:CONTINUEDCOVERAGE as part of the compromise.
4. There are plenty of WP:DIVERSE sources using http://www.google.com.br/ etc.
5. Where do we stand on WP:EFFECT and WP:ROUTINE?
6. The omnibus system is good because every event can be represented, and many other reasons.
7. Is this our path forward:

• Get an idea of what this MMA guideline should contain.
• Lay down a lay down a rough draft?
• Bargain and tweak.
• Agree here.
• Bounce it off the community and get broad consensus.
• Get MMA forum folks on board
• Tag --> improve --> check off articles

Am I missing something?

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 22:49, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm rather burnt out on all this right now but I have a suggestion on #1: where applicable make an "Aftermath" section or something similar to talk about the ramifications of an event and also help explain their longer term significance. I suppose it would increase the "prose" content of some of them. Also, on #2, yes, thank you for stating that clearly, articles being inherently satisfying to the people who use them is absolutely critical and I hope that that can be accomplished. Beansy (talk) 23:37, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Idea #1

• Inclusion Critieria For an event to be considered notable enough to warrant its own dedicated article outside of the omnibus articles, the article should have at least one source that is both reliable, independent of the subject, and is significant coverage. This means that the one source passes WP:RS, is not primarily MMA related, and the coverage is about the event and doesn't just mention it in passing. Websites like sherdog are fine (and preferable) for sourcing facts, but not to establish notability as their scope is limited to MMA events. This would apply to any website that is either exclusively or predominantly dedicated to covering only MMA or similar sports. Sources such as ESPN or Sports Illustrated or other sources that cover multiple sports are fine to demonstrate independent notability, as would be any normally independent source such as general interest newspapers, magazines and major news websites.

See 1b below, which addresses one omission in the Inclusion Criteria. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 00:53, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• Article creation When an event is announced through a source other than one of the fully independent types of websites listed above, the preferred way to introduce the material is to create a section in the proper omnibus article, then create a redirect in main space that points to it. This will allow an article to be created later if the event eventually passes the criteria for inclusion and makes searching and finding the event while it is in the omnibus system more logical and easier. All events should be in an omnibus article, regardless of whether or not they have an independent article. This allows a single page to list events logically on a single page, making it easier to find specific information about any particular event and compare event data. A article should not be created over a redirect until there is at least one source that meets the criteria above, and once created, a hat note pointing to this main article should be added at the top of the corresponding section in the omnibus article, allowing the reader to easily tell which events are particularly notable and have an article with more extensive information.

Commentary/Discussion

• Or something to this effect. Someone better than I would need to merge this into the existing guidelines, this isn't meant to be official text, just my explanation of the critieras. This would be consistent with current WP:GNG guidelines, yet quite lenient in interpreting them, AND it would insure that all new info is preserved somewhere where it will be allowed to be developed potentially for a full article. This would mean 99% less AFD issues plus more overall content. It just adds clarity. As to what info is on each omnibus article and how they are arranged would be another discussion. If I'm missing some finer point, feel free to point it out. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 23:11, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
• ENDORSE With all my heart, this is the kind of processs and guideline that I've been seeking for the articles. Only a few minor points: Obviously we don't want the omnibus articles to get too large, so splitting the omnibus articles prose into sub articles is definitely encouraged (i.e. 2012 in UFC events gets spinouts to 2012 in UFC Numbered Events, 2012 in UFC on FX, 2012 in UFC ...) as long as there's a minimum of 3 events that are sourced. Second, I'd like to see about 3 to 5 descriptive sentences of prose for an article if it's going to count to the sub article total and about 3 to 4 paragraphs besides the fight descriptions for stand alone event articles. The idea is to have information that a non-fanatic will read and be able to understand. Hasteur (talk) 23:31, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) Question : How would that compare with how other sports are treated, for example, if that was to be applied to Baseball, would not every professional baseball game meet the requirements and therefore qualify for an article ? In which case this proposal would be out of step with current WP practices and if that's the way everyone wishes to go, that's fine, but we need to move this to a more central policy page (WP:Village pump (policy) for example). Mtking 23:34, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Can of worms alert. :) Maybe we should stick to MMA for now, and then others can follow this route too, if they like. This is because MMA is part sport, part event. Baseball can't claim that. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:41, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict × 2) For example Allen's 2-run HR in 9th lifts Rays over Angels 4-3 or Mendoza, clutch hitting lead Royals to 4-2 win would both be described as from a WP:RS (CNN in this case) and CNN is independent of the subject, and they cover the games in significant detail. Mtking 23:53, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Don't invite the WP:OTHERSTUFF comparison, this is a local project space rule to help reduce the number of AfDs and to ensure that there's a reasonable structure in place before an event article gets split out. Hasteur (talk) 23:46, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not, all I am saying is how does this proposal stack up against established practice across other projects, and taking into consideration WP:CONLIMITED, if we are going to depart from that what are the implications. Mtking 23:58, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

The key here is that what I am proposing is simple, understandable, reasonable, within policy, and isn't bogged down with a dozen different policies. Even those that hated the idea at first should find it a reasonable compromise since it guarantees all info will be kept and can be developed, with no new restrictions on article creation. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 00:04, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

My thinking exactly. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:23, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I agree it is simple and understandable, but at the moment I am not sure it is in line with our current practice or policy, all MMA events get covered in the sports section of most newspapers or news website, the same as football, baseball, basketball or cricket, so the net effect of this would turn all MMA events covered by CNN or the BBC or the LA Times into a notable event. Mtking 00:26, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• WP:SOFIXIT and create Idea #2 ;) Dennis Brown 2¢ © 00:29, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• ENDORSE

• Inclusion Critieria Excellent. In fact using foreign sources, multiple refs should be easy.
• Article creation Excellent. As these get created before the actual event, birthplace should be omni, then {{main}}. As you say, this prevents lots of AfDs.

Shouldn't we exclude this requirement from the MMA notability guideline we're putting together, as it overlaps with current GNG? Besides, the aim is to publicize this as the best route. So, why not just add it as a statement to the Wikiproject main page. The slimmer MMA notability guideline the better.

The whole idea of "section then main" is already in the guidelines, right? What do you mean by "...need to merge this into the existing guidelines...". Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:41, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

• There are already guidelines on the main page here. This isn't to replace GNG, this is to interpret GNG as it applies here, in plain english, so it must be 100 percent consistent. GNG requires 1. Independent, 2. reliable 3. significant. 4. At least one (more is better, we let sherdog and others be the "more than one" as long as one is truly independent) We are explaining what the means when you are referring to MMA, we are not redefining it, and we are doing so at the minimum standard. Baseball has to interpret GNG for itself and we need not concern ourselves with that, we only need to make GNG be "common sense" as applied here. This criteria isn't a guarantee it is notable, it just says you can probably assume it is if it passes this test. I think it will be easier to decide what the omnibus articles should look like once we all understand the criteria and methods for introducing new material. More time adding, less time debating, because it is clear. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 23:48, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

100% agree. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:23, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Idea #1b

• Inclusion Critieria For an event to be considered notable enough to warrant its own dedicated article outside of the omnibus articles, the article should have at least one source that is reliable, independent of the subject, and discusses the event and its significance. This means that the one source passes WP:RS, is not primarily MMA related, and the coverage is about the event in a way that is more than just routine newsreporting of a sports event published in the days following it and doesn't just mention it in passing. Websites like sherdog are fine (and preferable) for sourcing facts, but not to establish notability as their scope is limited to MMA events. This would apply to any website that is either exclusively or predominantly dedicated to covering only MMA or similar sports. Sources such as ESPN or Sports Illustrated or other sources that cover multiple sports are fine to demonstrate independent notability, as would be any normally independent source such as general interest newspapers, magazines and major news websites.

Commentary/Discussion

• Endorse You are correct that it should consider WP:ROUTINE and that doesn't introduce too much complications. This is how we work out what we would introduce at RfC. Of course, now we need more people, which will take a few days. I will strike mine above as it has an obvious flaw that yours fixes. We may have to do this several times. This is the process, and this is progress. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 00:51, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
• Endorse Though I would prefer something like "multiple" over "at least one source" for RS. This would help produce more robust, AfD-proof articles. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:13, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

It would, it would also make it more likely to get wider support at the RfC, but maybe less like to win support of the MMA fans/forums. Mtking 01:25, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

GNG suggests but doesn't require multiple sources. Keep in mind, there will be other sources from sherdog, etc. that source the facts themselves. We are only setting the bar for independence. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 01:41, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

But GNG is just that, "general", from there other guidelines spell out exceptions, provisos, etc. So, why not use "multiple" to, as Trey says, give deletionists "less to argue from"? With foreign language references, there should be plenty. Anna Frodesiak (talk)

I would argue that the other guidelines do not offer exceptions, but instead off guidance as how to apply a very general guideline to a specific area. This keeps GNG from being too large and confusing. My experience has always been that if there is a dispute where an article fails GNG but passes a sub guideline, GNG wins every time. GNG is the authority to which all other guidelines get their authority. It has the broadest consensus after being held to the highest scrutiny. The guidelines here are just that, guidelines, and even WP:GNG isn't a policy. An article that passes the guidelines here at MMA can still be deleted for failing WP:N in general. They are only here to give us guidance as to what is likely if the notability of the subject matter were to be called into question, they aren't here to be the final word. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 14:12, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• Endorse, with one suggestion Since event announcements and details usually get covered by places like MMAJunkie, Bloody Elbow, and Sherdog first (as in there's often an article up within an hour or two), I would give a grace period between when an article is created for an event and when it gets sourced with a mainstream news report about it before deletion. Say, an article cannot be up for more than two weeks without the latter? I think that would be sufficient for newly created articles, allowing that a deleted article may also be recreated once there is a mainstream news source included. Also I would give editors a longer period of time to add such a citation to existing articles (since there are a lot of them). Beansy (talk) 03:06, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I think the plan is for these new articles to be born mostly in omnibuses, expand, then break away to {{main}} articles. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:09, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I can live with that, but the people who write these things have to be made aware, and they're not going to be happy that MMA is now being held to what will be perceived as a higher standard than most of the competitive martial arts that serve as its pillars (I have a million more examples). Therefore, the new guidelines need to be very transparent so that when someone makes a page for UFC 150, which I'm guessing will be announced will be announced within the next month (and will probably be a mega-card), it isn't immediately threatened with a deletion tag, but instead gets directed to agreed upon guidelines to adhere to. Maybe a tag for MMA-wikification guidelines can be created for this? Beansy (talk) 06:56, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

"...people who write these things have to be made aware..." Good point. I'm not sure how to spread the word, or what to do when people make stubs. I suspect we cannot put in the new guideline that "event articles must grow up in the omnibus nursery".

Starting UFC 150 as a stand-alone today would be just as vulnerable as any event considering the poor sources that would be available. I don't know if the omnibus nursery is an enforceable "higher standard", but more of a "better way".

Am I missing something here? What is our procedure when UFC 150 is created in advance of the event, and not up to snuff? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 07:19, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, the way I use a lot of the articles on upcoming events is to keep a tally of what matches have been announced (there are typically 10-12 matches at any given UFC event). Maybe something for UFC 150 could start in the 2012 in UFC events article or whatever when the event is first announced, and as the card is sufficiently developed with significant matches and it meets single-article criteria with news coverage it could then be made into its own article. Adding a link to 2012 in UFC events to existing UFC event articles from this year will help make readers more aware of the omnibus article. In conjunction, you could then have reciprocal links in the omnibus articles to the individual UFC articles when the required threshold for an individual article is met and one is created. This would also work for Strikeforce shows in my opinion (the UFC and Strikeforce will account for 80% of MMA events able to meet the notability criteria laid out so far). Beansy (talk) 10:41, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

The MMA articles aren't going to be held to a higher standard for inclusion as a stand alone. The problem is that it is more complicated with MMA articles versus an article on a book, for example, because books don't get routine coverage and MMA events do. The key here is that we are creating a "safe" zone for the material to be developed. The real beauty of this is that puts the responsibility and discussion with the MMA community. For instance: A section in an omnibus article can be developed, then you go to the talk page of the omnibus article with "I think UFC 999 is ready to fork into its own article" and the other editors !vote. Often, it will be clearly "support". Other times, it might be split, which gives people the time to go dig up more sources if they exist. Other times it will be clear that it is not ready. At first, you might create an article and someone else pushed it to AFD (maybe it stays, maybe it gets deleted), but soon the MMA community will be able to clearly tell when an article will be accepted by the wider community. This gives the MMA/Wiki community some breathing room and reduces lost effort and drama. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 12:03, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Totally agree. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 12:14, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

This works for me, but for the major promotions like UFC, the omnibus article is going to be too large and unwieldy for every event to "grow up" there. I would like to re-push the concept of sub-articles that classify the events more if they are not up to the level of independent event articles (2012 in UFC Numbered Events, 2012 in UFC on FX events, 2012 in UFC on Fox events, etc.) The idea is to split the big omnibus into something more readable in a single sitting. Hasteur (talk) 11:49, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

You are correct, and I'm working on some ideas for that, but need some education from others, and want to cover that in a different discussion. The focus here is just the guidelines. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 12:03, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Interesting. I see pros and cons. Advantages of a single omni are greater, I think:

• Ease of navigation
• A cramped omni is incentive to push sections into {{main}}s. We want them to outgrow the pot and need planting in the forest of articles.
• Sequence! MMA's all important sequence of events.
• KISS

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 12:10, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

But yes, as Dennis says, let's focus on the guideline and then worry about that. Also, I'm dying to know how we will handle existing articles and new pre-event stubs, but we can maybe save that discussion for after, (unless it is relevant to putting together this guideline now.) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 12:21, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

• The Article Creation section wasn't changed, so it would apply. If someone creates the article anyway, and it easily can't pass the criteria, then that info is merged into the omni article and the article becomes a redirect to the omni. No admin or AFD needed, you could boldly do that yourself and discuss it on the talk page. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 12:36, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
• Oh, and I forgot to mention. If it DID get pushed to AFD before someone noticed, it would quickly close as "merge to omni per previous consensus". At first, everyone just !votes "merge" and it quickly snow closes as such. I would need to check policy on that, but I'm betting there are ways to quickly close as such, IF this was the guideline here. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 12:39, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Perfect. And while we're on the topic, if a guideline is established, and existing articles don't measure up, could we hold off on AfDs during a campaign to improve them? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 12:43, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

I would argue yes we can and should, but that won't stop some random editor on new page patrol from doing so. That is why the guideline change is needed, to offer the closing admin guidance, or to justify a faster closing. (the proposals are only slightly different than the current guidelines anyway, just more specific). If the event is clearly not an article, just a stub with one source from an MMA only site, the better solution is to merge, redirect and THEN discuss it, just so we prevent any hassles, as the end result would already be pretty clear. If editors follow the guidance here and start in omni, then there is very little chance it will be an issue, which is the point. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 13:00, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Perfect again. One more for you: search above for "provisos". Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:26, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Okay, this is a question, since UFC 150 was announced either today or late last night, with a date (August 11th), location (Denver), and venue (the Pepsi Center arena). Obviously the MMA media were quick to report things, including internationally], but it also already has articles about it on Yahoo Sports] and ESPN.com] with both reporting a Lightweight World Title match, and with both articles being more than just stubs, and explaining the significance of the event so far. However, I haven't found mainstream international coverage yet beyond a non-article mention on Globo.com (Globo is Brazil's #1 television network as far as I know), which I wouldn't count. The card as a whole has only 3 announced matches so far out of a probably 11 or 12. So, what would be the remaining criteria needed at this point for an independent article that we could agree upon? Additional news coverage from multiple international mainstream sources I'm pretty sure is inevitable after doing further resource, although obviously that doesn't mean anything until it actually happens, but in any event perhaps this could be considered a test case to discuss. Beansy (talk) 03:21, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

The coverage you linked to is just the sort of routine coverage that the announcements of these events get (can't read the Globo.com one) , so as far as a stand alone article (correct me Dennis if I have misinterpreted your wording) there would need to be an article that discuss why this event is going to be of enduring significance in other words why will people keep writing about this long after the UFC trucks have left town to go to UFC 151. Mtking 03:35, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

I was under the impression we were past that point with comparing it to other sports, and were instead trying to establish standards of notability within MMA. Trying to compare individual sports with major team sports is a fallacy anyway. Will anyone talk about the 2008 Legg Mason Tennis Classic - Singles tournament years from now? It's not even a Grand Slam. I'm pretty sure tennis fans will. Will anyone talk about the Formula One 2011 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix? Auto racing fans will, and I'm sure they knew they would as soon as the event was announced. Will anyone talk about the 2005 Iditarod? I'm pretty sure sled racing fans will. Does anyone talk about the 2009 K-1 World Grand Prix Final 16? Kickboxing fans do. Will anyone talk about UFC 150? MMA fans will undoubtedly, and would even if a World Title wasn't on the line. Several years from now, will baseball fans talk about a particular game this summer between two random teams that gets viewed by millions of people? Not unless something absolutely incredible happens, and even then probably not unless they're a fan of that team. Again, we're trying to establish standards of enduring notability within a sport. Beansy (talk) 08:05, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Moot. If you look at the main page here, it already spells out the guidelines for notability, which are close to what is already being discussed (identical in most ways). Until there is a change, those are the guidelines. If you can demonstrate how an excluded article meets all the points of the existing criteria, then I'm all ears. All the comparing is pointless as it is entirely subjective. That is the purpose of the guidelines, to provide an object stick with which to measure by. Sometimes I think we all forget that. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 18:29, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Moving forward

• Let's not lose momentum. Shall we push forward?
• Will this proposed guideline mention specific events (Pat's 123, for example)?
• Are we ready to lay down a draft?

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:45, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

I am open to including some form of mention relating to specific events, but before we could, it would have to be shown that at least more often than not that class of events passed the proposed test above. The big advantage to this wording over the current is it explains exactly what is expected of the article on a MMA event. Mtking 09:38, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

"I am open to including some form of mention relating to specific events". Parsing that, it sounds like all you are even "open" to is the existence of specific MMA events being mentioned somewhere and nothing more. That would mean that the lower limit of what you are open to is reducing hundreds of articles down to a short list of the biggest events with event names, dates, and locations, and no other details, placed as a section inside the main Mixed Martial Arts article or main UFC article. If that's not what you meant, could you perhaps clarify what you meant?

Beyond that, the standards of inherent notability seem to be the biggest impasse here. I'd like to resolve that too, but there are a number of other issues that I think most people seem to be much closer to an agreement on. Specifically:

• What goes into an event-specific page or an omnibus article (I think the elements that were already in there in the first place would be fine with the addition of a section that details the ramifications of the event, and maybe minus walk-out music lists)

• How a promotion is split into specific omnibus articles (if they are split at all, in the case of a short-lived promotion; I think we have an agreement that for most promotions annual omnibuses are fine, while Bellator's numerous shows require being split into different seasons and the annual Summer series, and the UFC's numerous huge events require four different articles)

• When to add an event to an existing omnibus article (I would think sufficient criteria for an addition to an omnibus would be once a name, date, and venue are announced, with some flexibility on venues in situations where a venue is announced and then canceled while the event relocates; other details would be added as they are announced)

• What to do with omnibus articles as events are split off (I would propose to keep all the raw data and continue to add it, with much less emphasis on prose than in the individual articles)

• How to make editors aware of the new guidelines once established

• I think we've come to a tentative consensus that when inherent notability of a specific event has been established it is to be separated from an existing omnibus article.

So perhaps we could work on those at the moment? It will make things a lot faster once the notability issue is resolved and it may also build some momentum in the meantime. Beansy (talk) 11:56, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

What goes into event specific or omnibus article: Infobox with date/place/location/attendance/gate takings/prize pot, 1~3 decently sized paragraphs explaining anything besides raw match-up stats (including if a fighter is switched out, the event is moved/rescheduled), and raw match-up statistics table

How to split a promotion's events into manageable units: All events start in the List of events omnibus. Once we get to 3~4 events on the omnibus that can be classified a specific way (EX:2012 in UFC on Fox,2012 in Bellator Summer Series) then we can spilt them to a sub-omnibus article

When to add a new event to an existing omnibus article: Your definition sounds about right with the explicit caveat that promotions that have not hosted about a year's worth of events yet be not added as they're more likely to close up shop before they establish any real notability.

What do do with Omnibus articles as events are split: I would say remove the raw data, and re-write the prose to give a overview of the event.

How to make new editors aware of the guidelines: The same way we do with all new editors, we offer them the advice, explain WP's consensus model, show them the guidelines, let the "WikiAdults" get the articles into a position where it's likely to not be AfDed, start applying sanctions for those that refuse to work collaboratively.

Sorry for the long line of posting Hasteur (talk) 13:27, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Summary Break

Moving Backwards

Since Misplaced Pages ostensibly pretends to be a useful reference for all its users, can someone please please summarize for all the actual people who use these pages why the hell are we doing this? I posted the following msg to another page a while back and didn't get a single reply from the 3 "contributors" who obviously know very little (other than it's a sport) about the article content under discussion yet are on a personal crusade for a change that NONE of the very numerous page users want:

AFAICT, the argument fundamentally comes down to this: "this is an Encyclopaedia and not a fansite". These two purposes are not mutually exclusive. It's entirely possible for a page to be useful to fans and be of notable historical value. For example, prior MMA events have bearing on current and future ones, and therefore are quite frequently references by those interested in the background tree leading up to any subsequent upcoming event. The hits for each event page tell the tale of this inherent usefulness. I can only assume that this argument is being perpetuated by someone who knows practically nothing about the specifics of the subject/sport at hand and therefore cannot contribute a meaningful opinion. Even if we're to combine the the pages, the result is unwieldy and reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of how computers work; it does not cost any more bits, but in fact less, to link smaller pages. This isn't some new revelation, Tim Berners-Lee had it when he created the WWW/HTML.

At some point I think we have to step back and ask if the priority of Misplaced Pages is provide a useful reference or provide a playground for bureaucrats who don't care about the usefulness of the end result. These two purposes ARE mutually exclusive, so will the less than handful of crusaders please answer this simple question (you know who you are). Agent00f (talk) 13:14, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• Your questions have already been asked by others and answered previously, above. If you ask more specific questions, it is easier to give more specific answers. The issue isn't the number of bits. In part, the issue is that other editors keep nominating the articles for deletion, and many are getting deleted. One solution was the merge to allow articles to develop before spinning them off, to reduce deletions, and allow more MMA content on the whole. It is helpful if you assume good faith, and consider that the actions being discussed are for reducing deletions and debates. It is fine to disagree with the solutions presented, but it is more helpful when you suggest better ideas. "Leaving it alone" has already failed spectacularly, so it isn't a viable option. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:32, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

• • I have read much of the above and cannot find what I seek (and what you speak of). Even if it exists, no normal sane MMA fan who uses these pages is going to go through the pain when a simple summary from the decisionmakers makes it so much easier for EVERYONE ELSE. If anything, that attitude is exactly the kind of bureaucracy over clarity that anyone looking for straightforward information find so abysmal. More to the point, if the fundamental issue seems to be that a few (and by few I mean 3) other editors who obviously have zero interest in this topic/sport other than just another target for their rule-guided rather goal-guided obsession is causing problems, why is everyone else compromising the USEFULNESS of all the material to accommodate their OCD? It's also clear that we're only assuming "good faith" in their ability to argue minutia rather than serve users, and that "leaving it alone" is only being dropped to satisfy a vocal minority who doesn't even count among the actual userbase, instead of because it's an inherently poor solution in the eyes of actual wiki users. Finally, the simple and clear question above still doesn't have an answer. Agent00f (talk) 13:53, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
    • Anyone can register an account, and nominate the article on the same day, in good faith. Doing nothing means that people will keep nominating these articles because, at the least, there is reason to believe they don't comply with the criteria here. I can't stop that, no one can. So you find the ideas on this page as fatally flawed. Ok, fair enough: Then what do you suggest as a solution to stop all these articles from getting nominated and deleted at AFD? I'm all ears. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 14:04, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
      • You seem to automatically assume it's done in good faith when it's beyond abundantly obvious that it's less than a handful of users who have an agenda which is in conflict with the goals of all the other users. Let's step back again and evaluate the situation: there's some pages on the web with thousands if not hundreds of thousands of users who are quite content, then there's less than a known handful of "contributors" whose actions screw up this arrangement and make life harder not only for the users but also creates unnecessary work for their peers. Add to this the fact they already expressed they don't care about anyone else. Given that this is something which occurs on the internet with great frequency, the solution seems rather obvious to me. The alternative is that we must necessarily accommodate crusaders just because they can be persistently annoying. Agent00f (talk) 14:11, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
        • Agent00f, you have come in claiming malicious intent of several editors without specific proof, you've accused Mtking of deliberately wanting to wreck the entire article space, and you've made strong suggestions that editors are acting in bad faith with the article space and on the policy pages. This constitutes an official warning to knock off the assumptions of bad faith. Misplaced Pages works by consensus, and for the most part we're forming one. The reason why we're laying out all these policies and rules is to prevent editors such as yourself from landing on the wrong side of the policies and being sanctioned for it. I think I can speak for most of the contributors to this draft when I say that we're trying to make a fairly ironclad checklist (as that's what several drive-by nominators use) to prevent the unnecessary deletion of articles. Hasteur (talk) 14:36, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
          • To the contrary, I've never said that anyone is acting maliciously toward another. To be clear, what I said is that they have acted selfishly, a rather different concept altogether. This claim is very self-evident given that they see no value in the views of the far greater plurality who actually use the pages, instead dropping only very narrow interpretation of the guidelines in every reply. Their faith in their own personal take on the Wiki rules is quite devout and apparently unassailable by evidence or argument to the contrary, so there's no reason to question this good faith and I'm puzzled at why you feel I was. However given that they've brought up the users approximately zero times, I can only assume that their faith in users is approximately zero. Ergo, from my perspective I'm not the one perpetuating wrong assumptions. Agent00f (talk) 12:53, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
          • it's beyond abundantly obvious that it's less than a handful of users who have an agenda which is in conflict with the goals of all the other users, less than a known handful of "contributors" whose actions screw up this arrangement, creates unnecessary work for their peers, we must necessarily accommodate crusaders just because they can be persistently annoying,what I said is that they have acted selfishly, a rather different concept altogether,very self-evident given that they see no value in the views of the far greater plurality who actually use the pages,faith in their own personal take on the Wiki rules is quite devout and apparently unassailable by evidence or argument to the contrary,I'm not the one perpetuating wrong assumptions. These are the attacks on editors who are attempting to uphold the policies as they exisist and are here for the long run. Not the fairweather whims of the MMA community who come in for their day in the sun and vanish overnight. Hasteur (talk) 13:47, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
            • These are all factual statements based on what (and only what) certain editors have post themselves. If you feel they are not accurate in any way, please argue the case for it instead of dropping righteous indignant in an attempt to stop an uncomfortable discussion about how things are. Sometimes, the truth can portray people in a poor light, that's simply how reality is. However, just as there can be two divergent opinions on how to handle wiki pages, I don't feel that covering up what is real because it can hurt feelings is preferable to being open and transparent. For example, it's simply undeniable that creating these new omnibus pages is a bunch of work, and the results are plainly worse for their users. Not once have the 3 editors we all know spoken of this plain and obvious fact to indicate that they give a damn. Given that all evidence to date supports what I have written, I cannot rescind these statements of fact; they can be deleted, but not because they're inaccurate in any way. Now that we have established these are all correct, I hope someone can address this reality openly and transparently. Agent00f (talk) 01:00, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• • • • • Agent, you've managed to restate the problem, but I'm asking what is your solution? What fix will make these problems go away? I'm quite sincere here, I would like to hear what you think would fix this mess. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 14:39, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, I think very few of the users or editors who generally created, maintained or read the MMA articles had any egregious problems with them in the first place (and without anyone being "sanctioned" that I can recall as long as they followed the established format). That's the problem. The MMA wiki project and format has been well-established for several years. There are a few things that few contributors to those articles would terribly object to (the removal of entrance-music lists, for example), but those things are completely trivial compared to what has been proposed. This is why people need to know why these are actual "problems" not protected under Misplaced Pages's Fifth Pillar: "The principles and spirit of Misplaced Pages's rules matter more than their literal wording, and sometimes improving Misplaced Pages requires making an exception to a rule." These were/are informational articles with a uniform format, a solid and well-established community that would maintain them and protect them from vandalism, and would resolve internal formatting disputes on their own, and were pages with considerable popularity, and the articles existed in such a way that they helped those interested in the sport have a deeper understanding of it and its history, and those who were looking for specific historical information in MMA find their answer, while being generally and inherently satisfying to their userbase. The result is that absolutely no one is happy with the current situation. There are compromises people have put on the table that I could personally live with, but it is absolutely fair to ask what purpose the current action against the MMA Misplaced Pages Project serves beyond satisfying bureaucracy in and of itself, when Misplaced Pages is explicitly not a bureaucracy. Beansy (talk) 00:12, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Dennis_Brown, my overall point is that to the users of these pages, these all look like solutions in search of a problem. IOW, no problem exists with the pages themselves, and if we're forced to identify the "problem" as source of the dispute, it's the 3 persons here who seem to have a personal vendetta against a useful reference despite knowing nothing about how the resource is being used. To put it bluntly, get rid of these few troublemakers whose purpose is at odds with everyone else (ie thousands), and everyone will be happy. This is exactly why I address my criticism to them directly, and why they will continue to dodge the question above of where their purpose lies. Put another way, given they are 3 people who have no interest in the subject otherwise, while there are far more active contributors who see no problem with the status quo, why the hell is anyone even giving them time of day? As some reinforcement for just how terrible this new system is: no entity in MMA thinks of UFC events in terms of annual "seasons"; it's a context which simply has no meaning, whereas an Event/Card very much does to anyone remotely versed in MMA. Other useful ways of organizing MMA information are by title/weight and by fighter, both of which are also already covered in wiki. The comparison to seasonal sport would be like dividing them by month with an entry for each, eg "Jan 2007 F1 races"; IOW even worse than a waste of effort for the many other volunteers trying to appease a very vocal tiny minority. Furthermore, to elaborate on idea around guidelines for Wiki, IMO the fundamental goal of the project is to present useful general reference info, and the point of the rules are guidelines to assist contributors towards that end. There is no dispute here AFAICT that the existing MMA pages are useful references for everyone with an interest in the sport, and until the three crusaders can propose a superior solution themselves we're simply pampering those throwing a tantrum without a purpose. Agent00f (talk) 09:40, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I think that's quite beautifully argued, Beansy. If there's no overriding objective for usability, isn't Misplaced Pages just a social experiment? It's worth looking at who the proposed compromise is satisfying. Are the pages usable for its actual viewers? If not, are the pages gone for the deletionists? If not, is the compromise just a 'win' (I assume good faith, but I struggle to suspend logic and ignore basic human nature) for people who felt like changing something without any plan in mind whatsoever? If the honest truth is only a 'yes' to the last question, can you really say that's reason enough to break from an established format? Can you really say that satisfies common sense? Can you really say 'There's nothing horribly wrong about this?' You tell me. I say the following with no intent to offend: Perhaps it's time to X out of this box, look left, look right, and look ahead again. Perspective's valuable. Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 01:57, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• You both raise interesting points, and I appreciate the overall tone. It is late here, too late to give a proper reply, and besides I want to think about your points. Again, my role here has and is to help implement whatever the consensus is, that is within the guidelines at Misplaced Pages. Yes, it sounds bureaucratic and to a degree it is I suppose, but there is a degree of bureaucracy here whether we admit it or not. I'm not interested in making changes solely for the sake of bureaucracy, however. I came here because of a string of AFDs that were full of sockpuppets and meatpuppets and frankly, lots of bad faith. The fact that I'm neutral as to MMA serves a purpose as one voice that isn't tainted by love or hate of the sport. Let me be perfectly clear: The numbers in a vote do not impress me. The logic and rational applications of common sense and the 5 pillars, as well as other guidelines does. In my opinion, it was a mess before, but it is still a mess, and I've sworn that I will ride it out until we can find a compromise that works best for the largest number of people and is still acceptable to the larger community as a whole. And yes, the larger community matters, because people who don't like MMA, or love it, or don't care, they all have the same voice here. A few people are still coming here whose faith I doubt, but most of the people still here I don't doubt, even if we disagree on some points. Every time someone announces for their buddies to come here on outside forums, it just slows down the process. Again, numbers of votes mean nothing on Misplaced Pages, it isn't a democracy. But I take your comments in full faith, and I've been talking to others, including TG, Mt, Anna and admins who have been involved, and I'm trying, truly trying, to help provide some guidance on moving forward. I ask a little patience, and most of you have complied. We all need to remember to continue to assume good faith and remember that we all want to find a solution. In that respect, we are already on the same side. Lets work on finding other commonalities that we agree on, build trust in each other, and work a solution in a calm and productive way. It looks to me that we are already moving there by the fact that we can calmly discuss this, and I appreciate that. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 02:22, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
  • "The numbers in a vote do not impress me": If the voice of the people who use the reference pages on a given subject are not the primary concern, then the question become what exactly is the purpose of having a wiki anyway? This might not be a dictatorship of the masses, but I hope it's not the dictatorship of a detached elite either. "remember that we all want to find a solution": I think it's more important to discern what problem is being "solved" here. For those interested in MMA and thus view the pages, it's to provide the most useful reference for the sport possible. For some, it appears to be that some useful pages do not live up to their rigid personal interpretation of general guidelines. These are cross purposes and fundamentally dualing priorities here, which is exactly why I asked the first question which has not been answered by anyone (though we could all hazard a guess given what's been going on). I'm not saying one is necessarily better than the other, but it's critical the powers that be defend their preference in their decision. Put in simple terms, it seems the point of Wiki as a whole is to draw the audience for any general topic of reference (which the individual UFC pages most assuredly do given that they're events viewed by millions), and to leave them with their curiosity satisfied. The current state of things cover both to the best of the contributor's abilities. Of course others can disagree this is a good way to evaluate pages, but I only ask that they also state the basis of their disagreement simply. Also, speaking of decisions, I was hoping from the beginning that someone, anyone, can eventually summarize the executive decision(s) so that the rest of us don't have to divine it from many long and poorly organized pages.Agent00f (talk) 10:34, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
    • Agent00f, again you're making tangential/ad-homenim attacks. STOP NOW. The status quo for how MMA articles is not working. That's why we are needing to refine the current guidelines.Hasteur (talk) 11:45, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
      • If we're conducting ourselves to the standards of formal logic, please specify how any of the above is tangential or adhom. AFAICT, reflecting on how these pages are serving users is quite relevant to a discussion about how to format these pages. I have also not predicated any judgement on any specific person (to be fair many people use the "adhom" fallacy without understanding what it means). Perhaps my argument was not clear in which I can re-state even more simply: there are clearly two different and divergent ways of evaluating the worth of a page. One way is to consider its usefulness to actual users, which is how I and all other users in general do it, and which doesn't factor into the judgement of a few here (as we can plainly see from all their comments above). Another path is to evaluate the page against personal interpretations of general wiki guidelines, which is what the latter use, and which I obviously do want to engage in (for various good reasons I can expand on if anyone cares). These two approaches are fundamentally different, and it's best if we all got a clarification of what the powers that be prefer so that we don't waste our time chasing solutions down the wrong path.Agent00f (talk) 12:17, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
        • I have to agree that there is no semblance of an ad hominem attack in Agent's post. Personally, I'm getting sick of the innuendo, and the accusations being levied at one side of the contributors. We've seen at least one false sockpuppet allegation (I don't feel it necessary to link the page, but if anyone wants to see it, I will provide a link), and the minority appear to be trying to make the point that there is 'meatpuppeting' going on. I think it's clear people visited those pages. Anna was kind enough to provide us with page view statistics. It's really quite plausible that people tried to visit those pages, were unable to, and independently came to these discussions. I think it's really quite rich that some experienced contributors seem to be assuming people are 'meatpuppets' because there was some lobbying on some forums (you can call it lobbying, I call it informing potentially affected third parties). That is an example of gross hypocrisy. We should assume good faith, and you should assume we've been canvassed? It's obscene and it's offensive. As is the constant tagging of users on this side of the argument as 'fanboys.' MtKing (and others) make it really quite hard to assume good faith when he uses words to the effect of 'let the MMA fanboys go cry about it on their forums when Misplaced Pages takes away their statsbook.' I didn't see any apology for that. Without such, I can't see where the rationale for assuming a lack of bias comes from. I'm not a boy. I'm a man. I'm a fan man (Please note: I am not the Fanman). Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 13:38, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
          • You deplore innuendo, but contribute to it. Great to see the double standard in effect. Hasteur (talk) 14:19, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
            • Do you have any intention of backing up that claim or challenging any of my assertions? I will gladly substantiate them. If not, feel free to stop accusing people of things without basis, when they disagree with you. It's transparent. Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 14:26, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
              • Transparency is what WP is founded on. Either lay out what you believe to be the false claim of Sockpuppetry that you asserted in the 13:38 post or strike it to show a retraction of your claim. Civility is applicable to every editor. As such I am striking my commentary about the double standard, but I still think your posting invokes such a standard. Editors who have been working on the project are extraordinarily familiar with the "Call To Arms" mechanic that has been repeated multiple times in the 6 months I've been looking at the topic space. It appears that every time the project starts to take a step forward in raising the bar of quality, hordes of newly registered accounts (and IP editors) come out of the woodwork to clamor for the status quo. I say again... The Status Quo for MMA articles is not working. This is evidenced by the rounds at various content discussion boards, ANI, and multiple forms of dispute resolution. Hasteur (talk) 15:12, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
                • Transparency, yes. Transparent retaliation, I don't believe so. That said, I will take your retraction as a positive sign. Here is the SPI: http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/63.3.19.129/Archive I would appreciate an acknowledgement that I did indeed say I would provide the evidence upon request, then followed up exactly as I said I would. I am not suggesting that you are personally adhering to a double standard, Hasteur. I am suggesting that what I perceived to be an incorrect accusation of ad hominem attack is adding to a distinctly anti-MMA fan atmosphere. I'm willing and able to contribute (not just to MMA), and I am clearly capable of being civil. I just don't appreciate the continued vilification of MMA fans. As for the Call to Arms pattern, are you suggesting that this should negate an assumption of good faith initially? I think that's unfair and wrong. I don't get the sense that we're being encouraged to participate. I get the sense that we're being dismissed as 'fairweather' and encouraged to leave. I don't appreciate that. Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 15:26, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Once again I agree that the old format was fine. The MMA Wiki Project is a capable group of editors who make sure that UFC articles are well sourced, detailed and filled with useful information. Not sure what the point of it is, but the new format will only damage the successful coverage of UFC events on Misplaced Pages. After an event, the article for the event always get high traffic. Portillo (talk) 06:44, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• It should be clear, but when I say that the sheer number of votes don't impress me, I am clearly referring to droves of people that have never been here, suddenly appearing and their only contribution is "Mee too!" at a !vote. Misplaced Pages is not a democracy is very clearly the basis for my statement, if anyone needs the actual link. What convinced me is strong arguments and open and honest discussion. In other words, good faith deeds by those who are participating. And yes, I've seen many, many threads on the various forums calling for others to participate here, in hit and run "mee too!" fashion, and when it happens, I'm not persuaded. As to those arguing they are useful, this link is likely a good read. Utility is a valid concern, but it doesn't trump the existing guidelines. Again, my goal is to try marry the two. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 15:32, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
  • Just to be clear, I'm not using 'It's useful' as a reason to keep the articles. I think other people have properly summed up the argument of notability for inclusion. I'm suggesting that utility ought to be relevant in the WEIGHT arguments are given when trying to establish the consensus, and particular when considering a compromise. My point on usability is only relevant in the context of an unnavigable omnibus. If a compromise can be reached whereby the information should be kept, it seems contrary to logic, and contrary to utility for such information to be presented in an in-optimal manner, solely to appease people who won't be using it. Kind regards, Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 15:46, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• "What convinced me is strong arguments and open and honest discussion." What would convince me and other page users that this statement is true is if the simple arguments of fact presented here by those opposed to change are all addressed instead of "noted" without a subsequent reply (this is not necessarily direct at Dennis Brown, who has been among the more helpful editors). What's been obvious from the start is that actual empirical evidence like page hit stats and discussion of use cases (many graciously provided by Ana) have been ignored and the majority was roped into an argument between personal interpretations of vaguely worded/connected rules (ironically guidelines ostensibly set up to make for the best user experience). Let's be completely frank here and consider how a typical wiki user (rather than a career editor) sees this discussion: a couple of insiders leveraging their knowledge of the system and unambiguous rule minutia with the consequence of taking down what is a very useful public reference resource. Even in light of this "injustice", a common user would be very hesitant to step into this fray of bureaucratic debate esp if he sees straight up facts being brushed aside for focus on rules seemingly only based on other rules, even if the hideous markup language (why isn't this done w/ proper discussion sw?) wasn't already daunting enough. Thus the voice of stake-holders (ie users) is shut out altogether, even if that's not the direct intent. Agent00f (talk) 01:00, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
• This is a separate comment on the role of "compromise" in this situation. Not sure why I persist on this given that I haven't received a single straightforward reply yet; I'll just chalk that up to not being clear enough instead of lack of good faith. So to put the question as simply as possible: what exactly are we "compromising" between here? If it's between different factions of bureaucracy, then there's nothing more to be said by people not interested in these strictly internal matters. However, if it's between some semblance of the real world and bureaucracy (ie what claims to be useful and what claims to be technically correct), then it's worth noting that while it's always possible in some sense to split the difference between two divergent paths, splitting between reality and the rulebook makes for arbitrary decision making which is not conducive to rational objectives. Also, speaking of logic/reasoning, in its formal academic formulation resorting to axiomatic truisms to argue deductive logic will never make for a provably consistent case. Put more elegantly, there's a reason why science with its emphasis on observable empirical reality rather than rigid mathematical definition is far more successful at producing positive real world results; and it's also worth noting that the technically correct camp's "rigid" formulation is only true in the rhetorical rather than technical sense.Agent00f (talk) 01:00, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I can't stress this enough, the "new" format would not prevent any article that is properly sourced from existing in any way. I think this is the point that keeps getting missed. It would allow events that are future, or didn't get enough coverage, to still exist in the omnibus, rather than be completely erased outright. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:28, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Dennis, I don't think people are necessarily missing this entirely. If users graded solution on a scale of 1-10, with 1 being deletion and 10 being the status quo, the omnibus might be a 7. IOW, much better than 1 but not quite as good as the original. The various objections to this pretty nonsensical way of organizing MMA info have already been stated, and it can be deduced from your replies thus far that these are simply less important than accommodating a (vocal) specific reading of broad guidelines. AFAICT, this basically solves the objection that single pages don't contain enough stuff by cramming a bunch all together so it crosses some arbitrary threshold. It's not the worst way to go about it, but IMO seems more like a face-saving measure (again, not direct towards you but rather the process as a whole) than rationally justifiable decision. Agent00f (talk) 01:46, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

In regard to what you're saying, Dennis, I think most everyone appreciates the work you're doing on this project. I don't think there's any need for rush. At the risk of repeating myself, one point, on the aspect of 'satisfying the largest number of people.' I really do think utility has to play a part in determining the eventual guideline/policy. I don't mean usability this time. What I mean is, it is really worth spelling out HOW the different groups are being satisfied from the compromise. If one group is getting great utility from the pages, and the other group gets virtually no utility from their removal or compression, I think regardless of the numbers (and those are self-evident), one side's arguments command more attention. If we're talking about the Project, I don't get the impression that it exists in and of itself. People who are claiming to want these pages gone for the sake of the Project, seem caught up on what their idea of the project should be. An inflexible approach on such a topic seems a betrayal of the Misplaced Pages ethos. Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 11:27, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

So the new format will allow individual articles as long as they are properly sourced. But it seems as though even if we add reliable sources, these editors will still say that it is not notable because it did not have a long-lasting effect on society. Portillo (talk) 04:41, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Archiving

Do you think we could archive some stuff? Everything before this notability discussion is well moot. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:11, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Archiving is set up to archive threads in which no responses have been made in 672 hours (28 days). That is somewhat shorter than normal, but appears to work out just fine. Hasteur (talk) 15:00, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

That is probably about right for this page. There is a lot of discussion, but there is a lot going on right now. Dennis Brown 2¢ © 15:04, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Okay. I can live with it. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 15:07, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Mainstream coverage of Bellator

Removed duplicate posting from Talk:Bellator Fighting Championships by same IP address Hasteur (talk) 22:00, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

And here we go again...

Well, while everyone is trying to figure out the best process, user Newmanoconnor has taken it upon himself to nominate 8 more UFC pages for deletion. Sigh. Udar55 (talk) 17:42, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I put up an ANI notice here and notified all those I mentioned. Anyone else feel free to add to the discussion. I'm not entirely sure he even knows what he is doing as he appears to have only been here for 16 days or so. Udar55 (talk) 18:17, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• I made a request at the ANI to hold off, as a personal favor. He is under no obligation to do so, of course. I wish I was faster about this, but I'm actually trying to cook up an idea that might be consistent with what everyone wants, subject to everyone's approval of course. This has been a trial by fire for me, and you all have no idea how appreciative I am of the fact that everyone is getting along better and beginning to trust each other's motives. Yes, it gets snippy from time to time, but that is part of the process and we just need to keep assuming good faith of each other and keep working on the problem. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 19:09, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• OK, now that I'm on the same page with the other hard working guys here, Where do things stand, this page is a mess. It might be good to summarize where things are?

Also, Udar55 , in an effort to show I'm not trying to stir @#$! up, I was about to nominate a host of Bamma pages, 6 or so, do you have an issue with that? I believe, and correct me if I'm wrong, you've argued that Bamma and other promoters do not meet notability requirements for stand alone pages compared to UFC? Now I'm not gonna nominate anything until Dennis says it's ok, but I'd like you opinionNewmanoconnor (talk) 19:34, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I have no problem with BAMMA individual event pages being AfD. Udar55 (talk) 19:58, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• • • Just look up and read. We are at the part where we are picking up all the random pieces and trying to figure out how to put Humpty Dumpty back together again ;) Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 19:46, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
• Just a suggestion, but AfD is generally seen as adversarial. Take a look at WP:BEFORE as it offers some suggestions on alternatives (Such as proposing a Merge of the content) to lessen the impact that Deletion typically engages. Hasteur (talk) 19:53, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Moving forward, no need to wait

Putting aside the RFC for just a moment, lets work on something we might all be able to agree and work on. This is a rough idea, based on the ideas and hard work mainly of Mtking and TreyGeek, after hearing the concerns of everyone, adding some tweaks, and after consulting the almighty Wikibible. I can take no credit for the idea, unless you think it sucks, then I guess I will take all the blame ;) This has nothing to do with individual articles at all, and works whether or not they exist, in whole or in part. Just clear them from your mind, or pretend they all will exist, it doesn't matter for this omnisystem. Even if we include every single UFC event in separate articles, having an omnibus system will very cool because it will allow you to see all the matches at a glance, including links, results, etc. We can debate the names I'm using another day, first I want to focus on the structure only. Obviously, you can insert the appropriate year as needed. And please use your imagination, this can be tweaked in many ways, small or large. Think about it a bit.

• List of UFC events (2012)

(This article has the least amount of info per event, but it will list every single events that happens for the entire sport. It is kind of like a table of contents of sorts, and links all the individual articles and the subsections. No images. It might show the main event, but not every single event. It is more of a quick guide, with links to the other main pages below. Not pretty but extremely useful in limited circumstances as it puts EVERY match in one place, something that appears to be missing now. Likely, each entry should be one or two lines in a clean table, with no results. This makes it easy to maintain as it is mainly a gateway article.)

• • UFC on FX 2012

This is just like 2012 in UFC events now, but limited to FX matches so it won't be so long. It lists matches, with prose of highlights, images of the poster when appropriate and if legal, just like the current (but oversized) omni. Think of it as a collection of mini-articles, and it can have MAIN tags to the primary individual article. Even when we all agree that an event doesn't justify a separate article yet, it will get the respect it deserves here. These will be the most useful, since you can compare the results of many, many matches all on one page.

• • UFC on Fuel TV 2012

See above, same thing different channel, and do the same for all channels...

• • UFC ???

Same as above, but for listing the numbered events like UFC 143, etc. I have no idea what to call it, help me out here.

• • • Individual articles - (not an issue for this proposal. This proposal works regardless.)

Overview

• PROS - It doesn't matter what individual articles exist, these omnibus articles are useful. You can quickly get a feel for the entire year on FX or Fuel TV at a glance. When a future match is announced you always start it in the omni article and add it to the yearly directory. You then create a redirect with the future name (ie: UFC on FX 200 ) and point it toward the UFC on FX 2012 (or whatever omni) article for now. The information will exist, no one is likely to try to delete the redirect, the information is safe. Once there is enough information and sources to allow it to be a full article, you just recreate the article over the redirect (no admin needed). Even if an article goes to AFD, the information can't be deleted because it exists in the omni. Worst case scenario, it becomes a redirect (under the same naming convention you already use) and points to the exact same info in the omni. Data, results, prose, none of that can ever be lost. Because it is now a redirect, the article history itself is never lost. This makes it way, way easier to recreate the article once it does meet notability. This is particularly true for future events which don't have much coverage.

• CONS - It is a little more work, but not much. For example on a future event, you create the section in UFC on FX 2012, you add a line in the main List of UFC events (2012) pointing towards it, then create the redirect in main space and point it to the UFC on FX 2012 section (same link as in the List of). Once notable, the article is just placed over the redirect, no admin is needed.

• BIG BIG PRO - One of the biggest advantages of this is that most matches will start in UFC on FX 2012 (or similar) so the tables and info will be uniform across all articles, and you will be able to add and add and add until it is complete, with NO fear of AFD. A stress free place to build the future article. The subarticles are pretty safe because even if a few of the events might not pass muster as "notable", I would fight hard to convince others that the grouping as whole ARE. Once it clearly passes criteria, you merge/copy the info from the omni to the individual article. Most of the time, it won't pass criteria until after the event, so the omni will have the results already, just copy over, then in the new article, you add extra prose until your heart is content. Keep in mind, it still has to pass criteria as a stand alone article, but that doesn't change anything inside the omni articles.

Again, much of this is simply restating what Mtking and TreyGeek have previously done with one big exception: Forget about what articles belong and don't for now, just we just build the thing and hash out the individual article later. No RFC is needed for this part of the solution and there will be instant benefits in usability and the amount of material here. This omnibus system is useful because it offers additional coverage, ability to compare matches on one page, a safe haven for results, and is handy whether or not anything else is done.

Feel free to point out the holes or failures in my logic, I can take it. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 21:09, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

That's perfect... I'd suggest UFC Numbered Events in 2012 for the non-channel series of events. This does mean that the numbered events sub-omni will be significantly larger than the other ones, but that only encourages editors to develop the content so that we can properly spin out the individual numbered events. The only thing I can think is possibly a big edit notice that we slap on each of the redirected articles (and ones we discover) so that the effort is not wasted on de-redirecting something that isn't ready for it's own article. Hasteur (talk) 21:46, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I think that is a great idea along with Haster's point. I also think it would be a good idea to have omnibus pages for Bamma, I really am not interested in just getting rid of MMA stuff, the really minor stuff I think should not be included but 2nd tier(I think) like Bamma and Strikeforce would probably need a single Omnibus for quite awhile. I'm more than willing to do the work, but I need some help with the formatting.Newmanoconnor (talk) 22:03, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

As a sidebar, 2012 in Super Fight League was created partially as a last frustration of a editor, but the "evil 3" decided to let it remain and be a vehicle for the SFL event chain. Hasteur (talk) 22:25, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• Agree with this course of action, if it can be shown that the aim is to cover the events in a way consistent with existing WP existing policy, maybe the fans will understand it. On a procedural note when (if) we go this route it would be crucial to use the {{merge to}} with a centralised discussion point and rap that in with a RfC header. Mtking 22:45, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Frankly this is the kind of top-down bureaucratic attitude that drives away actual stakeholders (ie users/readers) from interest in the discussion and ultimately away from wiki. Whether this is intentional is debatable, but the consequences are clear. To make the logic surround "rules" crystal, note that generalizations (ie rules) are only valid with an understanding of the unlying specifics. To borrow a very common example from above, without some knowledge of how MMA works on the ground, it's farcical to random apply rules from other sports in the hopes that they fit by coincidence. Again, rules as generalities only have meaning when they're derived from a correct comprehension of reality, not when they are divined by dogma, esp. via other rules. Humanity learned this from the scientific revolution about two hundred years ago, but the broad consensus among wiki insiders still seems to be to start with law and work reality into it somehow instead of the other way around. This argument will of course be ignored like all others which makes perfect sense because the process can proceed regardless.Agent00f (talk) 02:38, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I opened a discussion at Talk:BAMMA#Merge_Events_into_BAMMA_Events_article about how I intend to merge all of the BAMMA events together into one article. Please feel free to make comments. I'll go back through the individual articles and re-tag them with the link to the discussion Hasteur (talk) 22:47, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps pointing them here might be more effective, and keep it on one page. Just to prevent confusion. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 22:54, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• I agree that BAMMA can be a part of this, and would like want to make sure they know this idea is on the table, and take several days to make sure that we have a consensus for this upgrade of the MMA coverage. For that matter, the directory type article can be "List of MMA events 2012", not just UFC if there is a consensus to expand this the entire sport. But I want to make sure that everyone has had the time to comment, offer ideas, and most importantly: be heard. If I've learned anything while I've been here, it is that we all need to be working together and compromise a little bit to get good things done. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 22:53, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
  • Using the mechanics outside of AfD and others to WP:SOFIXIT on the series of articles. I'll include a pointer at this centralized discussion in the merger proposal Hasteur (talk) 22:57, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Nice work there, Dennis. One thing I would like to point out is that a List of UFC events already exists. Perhaps List of UFC events (2012) would be redundant? Also, the UFC has televised events on FOX (I think 5 total this year). For the sake of consolidation, you might consider doing the following:

• UFC Numbered Events in 2012 (per Hauser's title suggestion above)
• UFC on TV in 2012 (this could incorporate all of the Fuel, FX and FOX events, which will total 16 or so)

In the end, I can see them existing like the Bellator Fighting Championships season pages. Udar55 (talk) 23:09, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

• This is exactly what I'm wanting to happen. Not to give you the answers, but to offer some ideas and let you guys, the ones that really know MMA, figure out the proper solutions. Think I will sit back a bit and let you discuss... Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:13, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Frankly I don't think there are much in the way of interested users of these pages left at all for the reasons stated above. In a real sense the bureaucrats have already won if this is going forward regardless with implementation details rather than a discussion of what actual value change brings. The lack of any summary of the broader decision making is already evidence that those interested in that conversation need not apply. Agent00f (talk) 03:21, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• I have been out of this discussion for a couple weeks now, and I don't know if this is the right section to put this comment (feel free to move it if it belongs somewhere else). I probably read this on a talk page somewhere, but I can't find it. Regarding naming conventions, while in the past I supported the 2012 in UFC format, I have been doing some thinking (that was the burning smell) and have an idea (again, probably read it somewhere else first). As UFC events are not "seasonal" like baseball, basketball, and the like (as mentioned below), the grouping by year may not be the best way to go (for the numbered events). What about a UFC 100-109 format? Sticking to a set number of events per article (in this case ten), rather than all events of a given year. The issue with the dated titles is the early years are going to be small (less events per year) while the more recent will be larger (more events per year), as UFC popularity grows, and more events are held per year, I only see this issue compounding. I like the UFC on TV suggestion above, or something similar, this is just a suggestion for the numbered events, and if someone knows where I originally heard this, please post a link, because I am sure I didn't come up with this on my own. --kelapstick 08:35, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Also, feel free to disregard my suggestion if it will not help progress the discussion at hand, as I don't want to stall the discussion, but I thought it might be a good format to adopt.--kelapstick 08:38, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Someone else brought up the issue on my talk page. I can't find any clarity at MOS, so I would need someone more familiar to pipe in if the consensus agrees to the general structure. However it was broken down, the basic structure would still work. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 12:32, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

General Objection

From the view of promoting good design and presentation, this structure has all the elements of a poor one. First, the distinction of where things belong is completely arbitrary. MMA is not a seasonal sport, and there's no real distinction in the sport between where events are first broadcasted, so right from the get go users are confused about how the info is segregated since it follows no logic of the relevant subject. For example, UFC events are sometimes broadcast on free venues after their PPV debut, so how is a user to know that what they just saw is on the other page instead? The only way this could possibly make any sense is that the individual articles don't contain enough stuff so let's just cram them all together so they cross some arbitrary threshold (and by arbitrary I mean only exists in the head of a small minority of editors) of stuff. Second, exactly where info is available to a user is also inconsistent even after they've grasped this poor formatting. Previously, if a user thinks of a card (much like a seasonal sports fan would think of a year, or a team) they can directly navigate there and see what's available instead of sometimes to a page title that bears no relationship to what they're thinking about, all depending on when they had interest and who's been editing/adding information. It also presents a less uniform front for search engines which is probably where most readers come from. Fundamentally, the original format is exactly what everyone with any knowledge (and thereby interest) of the sport would expect, rather than what arbitrary interpretation of rules would dictate.

Given these types of fundamental deal-breaking flaws present in the basic design without even going into details, it's scary to think that it ever made it past first level of committee in the first place. Frankly I can't find any purpose to this new format other than placating the needs of an idle bureaucracy (please argue the case if this is wrong instead of just moving on anyway as has been the custom here). There have been many comments from users actually familiar with subject that it makes zero real world sense and unfortunately this is moving forward without addressing their concerns at all. Agent00f (talk) 02:19, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• I've moved your objections at the bottom instead of in the middle, as it is proper and polite to do so, as to respect the flow of the conversation. Your opinions are noted. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 02:24, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

No problem, though I wish it were addressed instead of just noted. Originally I thought it was best to put it directly underneath your call for general comments since it's not directly related to the implementation details in the "discussion" area. Agent00f (talk) 02:42, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Agent00f, one thing that you may be missing, is that if a all the events of one year are in the same article (say 2012 for instance), and someone types in UFC 143, they are be taken to the section of the 2012 in UFC events that relates to UFC 143 not the top of the article, so they do not have to navigate the page, they will be taken to the section that they are looking for. I don't expect this to change your opinion on the matter, I just want to make sure you understand that they will be directed to the section in question and not just to the top of the page.--kelapstick 09:40, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I took into account redirects in my comment. They make the interface inconsistent for both users and search engines, resulting in less interest from readers and less hits from web search of the exact same info. Given that none of the deletionist contingent here have contested these or any other such concerns, it only provides further evidence that this what they desired in the first place. Agent00f (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 11:06, 1 May 2012 (UTC).

I just did a Google search of UFC 143. UFC 143 was deleted after an Articles for Deletion discussion, and yesterday I created a redirect to the appropriate section in the 2012 article. The first entry in the Google search was the Misplaced Pages article (under the heading UFC 143), and when I selected it I was taken to the correct section within the 2012 article, so I don't understand what you mean by an inconsistent interface with search engines. Regardless, as I said I didn't expect to change your opinion on the matter, I just wanted to make sure you understood that you would be taken to the appropriate section within the article, which you did. Cheers, --kelapstick 23:21, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• I explained what I meant to Dennis below, so please read that for a longer explanation. The short of it is that it's not so much the engine cannot find the material, but way the results show up and are sorted. Dennis never replied to the specifics, so I somewhat doubt he has in-depth expertise. Agent00f (talk) 05:20, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I disagree with many actions by many people, which is why I would rather focus on what we do agree with. The omni system works and adds usefulness regardless what other articles exist. It is the safe haven for new or undersourced articles in addition to adding new ways to look at data. Doing them by year is common and within the guidelines here, when you group anything, you have to choose an arbitrary cutoff, this is no different. Agent, I don't find your arguments persuasive, nor your condescending tone in delivering them. Since you see no purpose for this system, and it doesn't depend on individual articles existing or not, your constant calls against "bureaucracy" only distract rather than discuss. As far as search engines, you are mistaken. Search engines are fully capable, and do, deliver results of sections via redirect headers. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 10:37, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I understand that it's your purpose and priority here to reach a "compromise" between a very small anti-MMA contingent vs. the entire userbase of these pages (and therefore find arguments against the compromise to be axiomatically unpersuasive regardless of their merits). It must be a difficult task given that no one with any understanding of how the sport works can appreciate (a different sort of thing than accept) the changes and the bureaucrats won't be pleased until they live up to their namesake. The main point here is that an argument based on the quality of the user experience (aka the fundamental point of design) should be meaningful to anyone concerned about the wiki user, but unfortunately it's become obvious that's not even on the ranked list of priorities. BTW, this is simply a statement of fact, it's been clarified numerous times and if anyone had a reasoned rebuttal they would've used it by now. As I've already mentioned, sometimes reality paints people in a bad light, and IMO the solution to this is to change the reality so that it doesn't instead of complain about the observation. As for search engines, I'm well aware that they're technically capable of indexing redirect headers, but unless sort algs are intelligent enough to combine user clicks/activity from both sources (which they aren't), it means that resultant rankings will necessarily be lower and inconsistently so between event links. Again, tautologically not persuasive for those unconcerned about end user experience. Finally, in light of all this, this phrase is rather odd: "distract rather than discuss"; to people who actually use these pages, it's the distraction of incessant focus on rules minutia over reality which has prompted champions of usability to leave rather than participate in a administrative charade where their inputs and numbers are ever diminished. I don't blame you for this result since it's the natural systemic consequence of the process involved, but you are at fault for unquestioning support for the process. Agent00f (talk) 12:07, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I might not know MMA, but I have a high degree of confidence when it comes to search engines, due to my day job. They already weight heavily toward Misplaced Pages, and give solid results. Go google "UFC 149" for example. The first result is the section in 2012 in UFC events. And that was just the first example I tried. The search engine problem, well it isn't a problem. I appreciate the concern but it is misplaced. This omnibus system isn't meant to replace the existing system, is meant to serve two purposes: 1. Add functionality to the existing system. 2. Preserve data until an article can stand on its own two legs. It isn't required to use the existing system, doesn't change the existing naming system (rather, it depends on it). I understand a degree of paranoia regarding AFDs, but they are already happening. I've gone out on a limb to stop them until we reach consensus here (see yesterday's ANI). I've also privately "communicated" to several people that the AFDs should stop. This IS the best compromise as it doesn't force anyone to do anything. And again, I still think it adds some cool functionality. If the only question is how useful it is, I would say to judge it after it is built, then simply don't use it if you don't find it useful. And the only reason I am here IS about the rules: to find consensus, clarity, and put an end to endless battles over "the rules" at AFD. Otherwise, the battleground at AFD will continue, and data will be lost. The larger community (ie: not the anti- people, not the fans) isn't as convinced as you are regarding the inclusion of much of the individual articles, and I've managed to keep heavier hands from interfering so far, but I have no authority to prevent these AFDs, only my words and the trust of a few people and that can only take us so far. If you don't like my ideas, offer better ones, but a solution must be the goal, not just discussion. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 12:30, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

To reply to everything in order:

• Since you didn't reply to what I meant, it's not clear how familiar you are with search engines. User input is generally weighted in the sort (esp near the top), and since UFC2012#149 is not intelligently hashed to the same location as UFC149, dividing a conserved number of user clicks necessarily lowers ranking. This is only offset by the consequence that an aggregate UFC2012 will eventually always be at the top, which is not only confusing to any MMA fan (eg. "F1 June 2010", wtf?). But this is cheating the system by virtue of aggregation, and would likely result in demotion of wiki mma results in general (probably automatically, sometimes manually). For example, to maximize "UFC" search results in the short term, we can simply create a massive UFC page, and google will likely weight their relationship with wiki vs removing the page altogether from their sort. BTW, if you search UFC 143 (vs 149), you can also see the inconsistent title issue already.
• As someone ostensibly familiar with MMA, I really can't see how something so inherently confusing adds functionality. Putting more stuff on one page of course always has the benefit of more stuff on a page, but there's a reason why html was created and very good reasons why they were separate in the first place. Those good reasons are necessarily mutually exclusive to these new supposed good reasons, and if we're designing this for MMA as a sport, it's obvious which to choose.
• I really do appreciate your efforts to stop AfD's (as would all MMA page users), but as stated previously, the problem here is that a very vocal minority of anti-fans can disrupt everyone else with only questionable cause. Now, it would be quite unfair to expect you to personally solve this problem, but it doesn't help retain or restore faith in the process by dismissing this fundamental issue out of hand. IOW, users are more likely to accept change if its presented honestly as the only way to fend off abusive bureaucrats than to cover that up and pretend it's something it's not.
• We talk about transparency, but frankly only the agenda of the page users seem to be open here. For example, I believe there's a very strong argument to the powers that be that when a cohesive collection of useful pages already exists (ie contributed by many people, used by many people), it makes no sense to have to protect individual elements from what's basically loophole vandalism. I have trouble believing that this situation is unique to MMA, and thus precedent should exist for protecting a page group whose value as whole is greater than sum of parts.
• More specifically, subjects like US constitution have a sidebar "This article is part of the series:United States Constitution", and I suspect random editors can't simply arbitrarily ask to delete any of the entries. And thus I've presented a "solution" of sorts: help find a way with whomever you're consulting with to set up a similar arrangement to defend the collection as whole instead of piecemeal as we've been doing. Put another way, either MMA and UFC in particular is a worthwhile wiki subject or it's not. If it is, it makes no sense at all that we have to significantly compromise the way this subject is best presented just so that each key component is safe. From yet another angle since this argument is key: people come to trust wiki because they've come to know that it provides an authoritative reference on a subject and not just a random set of entries. As it was, the linked chain of UFC events constitutes that set/trust for this subject and considering them individual on the part of wiki (for AfD's, etc) is equivalent to trivializing and thus breaking that trust. Unless someone can actually come up with a coherent response to this, we're back at doing it only because it's an acceptable spirit-of-the-rules run around of the initial letter-of-rules run-around. Ball's in your court. Agent00f (talk) 13:59, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
  • • To answer your question, I'm extensively familiar with search engines, dating back to well before the existence of Google. It is the primary function of my occupation to be intimately familiar with them. As to whether a Cabal exists to remove all the articles, that isn't exactly a good faith assumption, although your tone throughout the discussion was already indicating this is how you felt, I was just waiting for you to explicitly state so. I've been very clear that future events and articles that aren't sourced would be redirects. MMA articles should be held to the same standard as any other article. Some will be articles, some will not. At least those future and less covered events will still have coverage, and the redirect is just as easy to locate as an article, as I clearly demonstrated below with a search of UFC 149 on Google. At this point, it would seem you want to only be contrary and pick apart every comment and flood the discussion with FUD, to have it die by a death by a thousand cuts, as your opinions are obviously tainted with the assumption of bad faith of others. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 14:24, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I have no idea what the hell you're talking about. If you're going to make accusations, please substantiate them in clear way so they can be replied to. Since you don't seem to be in habit of giving honest or straightforward replies, this likely wouldn't happen. For example, you seem to open the floor to comments, but when comments actually come, you cut them off or ignore any which are not convenient. There isn't a single reply to any relevant issue iterated above (other than the one attempt at argument from authority), so if you want to pass it off as something to do with me even though no one else is getting answers either, that's your personal prerogative but let's be clear it's not substantiated by evidence. I tried pretty hard to attribute all this to reasons other than contempt for the user-base, but you don't seem like a incompetent person and the only one that makes any sense is perhaps you were hoping that once the few remaining non-bureaucrats were driven off a "consensus" will remain. But you are correct about at least one thing: it's been rather impossible to read what transpired and not come away with the impression that a few anti-fans (not you, you simply don't care, note this is different from questions of faith) are abusing the process to achieve personal goals. I know wiki likes to pretend otherwise as a matter of policy, but policy like rules don't dictate reality. I've also provided clear evidence of this before, so please at least respect your integrity enough to not deny it. Finally, just because you can't be straight with others doesn't mean I'll follow in kind, so this is what it comes down to: unless you basically tell all the users that wiki has no other way of handling and protecting a comprehensive set of page as whole without arbitrarily bunching them together to get around loopholes in the rules, they're not going to accept that this is a good faith solution, only at best the convenient one. Agent00f (talk) 15:09, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

A round of applause for Agent00f. The new format is incredibly disruptive and confusing. The editors seem to think that UFC events are not notable and nothing is going to change that. I can only see a power struggle taking place here. Portillo (talk) 09:28, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I like the ideas put forth in the fact that they are potentially useful pages in addition to the stand-alone articles. I also like the idea of them being the places where the stand-alones are born. That said, it seems like these omnibuses are keeping people busy, while those who have fervently set out (and please, let's not suspend logic to the extent that we don't acknowledge that at some point it became a CAMPAIGN) to remove the individual articles are just going to continue picking them off while the omnibuses are worked on. UFC 143 is gone as well now. Disappointing indeed. And if anyone finds my comment of a 'campaign' inappropriate, look around. MtKing has had virtually no input here, but continues to lobby to Admins for the closure of individual pages. You know it isn't right, I don't know why you're tolerating it. Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 08:07, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Agent00f, all of your collaboration so far has been to effectively say WP:IDONTLIKEIT coupled with WP:BURO. Year was chosen as the classification to figure out how to group the articles. Yes we acknowledge that you are opposed to any proposal that does not keep the status quo. I personally have decided to dismiss your objections as you provide no way forward other than to drop back to the status quo. Part of consensus building (which we're trying to do here) is to understand that there will have to be compromises. If you look at the BAMMA series of events you'll see that while I have been previously tarred and feathered as a deletionist of MMA articles, I actually suggested that it might be better to merge all the events together to make it less likely to be AfDed. I followed through once there was a reasonable amount of support to propose a Merge/Redirect. So in summary, please feel free to continue throwing a temper tantrum in the corner, I've decided to ignore your input until you come up to the minimum level of discourse that is expected of all editors by providing positive suggestions Hasteur (talk) 12:04, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

The claim that I've only been complaining is trivially and demonstrably false given that this is being posted in a section whose primary content is well-reasoned arguments as to why the new design is terrible (it's worth noting it also presents an argument as to why some don't take user considerations as real ones). Generally speaking, this is done in the preliminary states of evaluating a plan to determine its value, though in this case it's understandable why it's not considered useful given that the actual goal is to "do something" rather than decide what is best. Or in more familiar terms, the status quo is politically out of the question. More specifically, we could talk about why it makes sense for BAMMA and other tiny promotions whose relatively inconsequential events all fit on one page and other specifics of the subject at hand, but let's not delude ourselves that practical considerations have any place here. It's also notable that when I previously asked what we're "compromising" between, there were no answers forthcoming so it can only be assumed that this word being used to refer to some kind of process which isn't open to inquiry, and that's confusing because it coincides in spelling with the kind that is. BTW, I was under no illusion that an outsider uninterested in rule-based committees could divert this steamroller; it's personally sufficient to register the fact that almost no one using these pages is pleased with the process or the solution and that no one piloting it cares. Provided that this an accurate summary (and it is), I'm honestly not sure what people expect non-bureaucrats to do. Agent00f (talk) 12:53, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree on your point that we have to decide what is best rather than just "do something". Since the current system is dysfunctional, part of deciding what is best is to consider what we can do to fix it, however. This at the core of the current proposal, as it doesn't depend on throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and is instead to the side of the current system, simply acting as a failsafe with added benefits. That is why it is a compromise. Even if all articles are kept, this proposal doesn't diminish them and only enhances. Even if all the articles were deleted, this system would be the failsafe. These are both highly unlikely scenarios, but even at the extremes, this proposal serves the purpose of preserving data while adding functionality that is optional to the end user. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 12:56, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• One extra note: Technically, since this isn't changing the current articles in any way, a consensus isn't even required. There is no policy restriction holding me back, and the previous, multiple speedy keep decisions for 2012 UFC demonstrate that. I could simply go and create these articles and they would stand up to scrutiny quite easily. The reason I don't is simple: That isn't my style and wouldn't be fair to you guys. I want everyone to grab a hammer and pitch in, and build this new system themselves, in a style and design of their choosing, and finally offer a failsafe solution that is both effective and sensitive to the needs of both the larger community and MMA fans both. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:28, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Agent00f, while I understand your frustrations, as well as Hasteur's, I think you are missing the point. Nobody is trying to steamroll this through, when it became apparent that following the Misplaced Pages guidelines were not in the best interest of anyone involved, we all stepped back to look at the process and talk about things,and as has been stated, build a consensus. Misplaced Pages does have policy and it also has bends and breaks and exceptions to it, it is not the Brittanica, but the community that values Misplaced Pages as a whole over single sections, have developed consensus on what those policies and guidelines should be to keep us encyclopedic in the "Misplaced Pages" way.

Im only speaking of my opinion in this statement, but I think part of the problem is you see how wikipedia has had a section built as an MMA wiki might be as an extremely useful tool for fans of MMA. The problem with that is it doesn't follow the guidlines of what a wikipedia should be to maintain at least some value as an accurate sources of reference for educational,professional and research endeavors. Part of that means trimming single articles across all topics to a certain level,excluding things based on verifiability and notability,etc. No one disputes that the single page on UFC as an org far surpasses the requirements for notability, or that some UFC events deserve a single article. The problem is, almost none of them are written with any prose to explain their significance to meet notability, are created before the events happen, Have an increasingly high number of matches(like football or soccer or basketball), and often things need to be reorganized to ensure their long term viability in the encyclopedia.

Hit counts and arguments about how useful the status quo is to fans, aren't sufficient arguments to keep the status quo. If that kind of tool is that valuable, someone should start an MMAwiki and have advertising like the other MMA fan sites. Honestly I would encourage someone to do that regardless from the arguments about how useful the particular format is. I am sure and deleted content could be made available.

What I really wish is that someone as passionate as you could try and work withing the frameworks that consensus is built upon, and help the editors make better choices if you don't want to grab a hammer yourself. The solutions may not meet your ideal, but there won't be a solution to things like your chronology issue if you can't stop thinking about how much you hate this and start thinking about ways to fix it.Newmanoconnor (talk) 14:38, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

To be very clear I do not dispute that some individual pages as they exist now might not met strict standards, but the point that's been ignored is that this is simply due to an unfortunate way in which wiki limits the organization of content. Or perhaps more accurately, the problem is that the ideal formatting for ufc events just happens to open itself up to institutional vandalism. In a sense, all we're really arguing over at this point is how to re-organize (or more accurately, how to see in a new manner) the same data to avoid that problem or get around the static page/entry limitation depending on the perspective. This is not what is frustrating, because that's either a matter of coming up with a wiki-centric solution (ie. whatever their general guideline is for protecting a inherently connected set of pages) or failing that a very straightforward design process.

What is frustrating though is that Dennis understands what this mean given his supposed background, but refuses to acknowledge the reality of it because frankly it's insulting to the intelligence of the anti-editors. Otherwise this would be done in a logical way (ie consistent with how design is generally done, not built from citing arbitrary rules written for unrelated subjects) and people wouldn't be complaining about a charade of a process. Instead the decision making is deliberated obfuscated and actual design discussion outside of very narrow boundaries is discouraged. Perhaps this is being done for good reason to avoid pissing off a couple of folks on the other end of the "compromise", but that's beside the point. What's perhaps most infuriating is that's it's blatantly obvious at least some of the people some of time are not acting in good faith, but rather than avoiding bad faith by addressing the issue, even if it's uncomfortable, we just move on with hidden agendas and nobody really trusts anything even if they're forced to grin. If we're to approach this realistically, between choosing to insult the intelligence of one side or the other (either the anti-fans for being so trivially placated or the fan that this is a "design" process), it's probably more important to have the people who are still interested in the subject remain around. Agent00f (talk) 15:42, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Please feel free to comment on the following stand alone articles that are part of a yearly series; 2012 OEC Kaohsiung, 2012 Indy Grand Prix of Alabama, 2012 China Open.Ppt1973 (talk) 15:27, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

WP:OTHERSTUFF. Perhaps I'll take a look at those to apply the inclusion rubric, but that's not pertinent to this discussion. Hasteur (talk) 15:39, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

What the hell, I'll bite. 'Delete all as lacking secondary sources to prove notability. --TreyGeek (talk) 15:48, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

• Getting back on topic, what makes this so different is that we are tying to do something different than other sports have done, while remaining within the guidelines and serving the reading public well. What we are trying to do hasn't been done in the way that we are doing it, which is why we are starting a bit from a blank slate. MMA is different than other sports, which is why a custom solution is needed. And yes, some articles are going to get deleted regardless of what happens in this discussion. The entire purpose of this discussion to make sure that the information isn't lost and in those case, is instead preserved. It is better to have some information in a lesser preferred format that completely gone. And it won't affect any article that can stand up to regular criteria. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 16:00, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary Break #4

(EC) Agent00f, as I look over the bottom half of this talk page you have made repeated calls to the "anti-MMA" folks to respond. I think you are referring, in part, to me even though I started working with the MMA WikiProject four years ago and have done a lot to improve articles and fight vandalism primarily on MMA articles in my time as an established editor. I have not responded and am still very hesitant to respond now, because in the last two months I have had to endure personal attacks, harassment, outings, and off-wiki calls to find out who I am in real life. The "pro-MMA" folks (and yes, I intentionally made that over generalization to hopefully point out that doing so as you have done is incorrect) have turned this situation into a toxic, non-constructive battlefield where discussion hasn't been wanted but rather that the "evil 3" (as Hasteur jokingly called us) should simply leave. But you didn't ask for explanations why some of us are not participating you wanted explanations on our reasoning of what started this course of action.
For a number of years, I have commented that MMA event articles are subject to deletion for a number of reasons. "Articles about notable should have well-sourced prose, not merely a list of stats." Currently, the vast majority of MMA event articles appear to contain only "routine news coverage of such things as announcements sporting .". You may complain about bureaucracy, but it's here for a reason. These guidelines I, and others, cite are here to provide well written, informative articles for everyone, not just MMA knowledgeable people. With the exception of UFC 94 and UFC 140, if someone with little to no knowledge of MMA visits an event article, they will have no chance of understanding the significance of what is going on.
UFC 125 is an event I picked at random. If you read it, you see there were apparently a lot of changes to the fight card. However, there is nothing to suggest why this event was important. An uninformed reader can easily over look that there was even a championship match at the event. That this championship match was part of a series of bouts between two fighters that even today is questionable which of the two came out on top of after the series of fights and rematches they had.
Anyhow, so MMA event articles for non-UFC promotions are deleted all the time for this reason. UFC articles have been put up at AfD off and on over the years and this time, they started getting deleted a number at a time for the reasons I explained above. The omnibus article was proposed for two main reasons. One was to preserve information about deleted MMA events in a form that may be more palpable to deletionists. It also serves as a way of discussing the significant aspects of each event in a time period. By doing so it would try to establish the potential notability of individual events but it would certainly establish the notability of the events as a group and their inter-relatedness. No one, that I can recall, has said individual event articles cannot exist on the whole. Rather, individual event articles need to contain something other than fight results and a few sentences discussing all the changes to the fight card; an individual event article need to be able to assert why it is notable on its own. --TreyGeek (talk) 15:04, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. I suppose it's not meaningful for me to apologize on the behalf of anyone else, but I do feel bad you were personally victimized regardless of the quality of your argument. I can however apologize for being repetitive and state again that I never disagreed with the letter-of-the-rules arguments on some of the articles. My point has always been that looking at this as only unrelated articles instead of parts of a cohesive set is an myopic view of wikipedia in general, and this point is evidenced by the fact that once they're slapped together even in nonsensical manner it's magically wiki-worthy with no additional work necessary. IOW, it's simply a matter of organization, and thus it makes no sense that the bureaucracy prefers (or dare I say allows) one design over another for reasons unrelated to design. "Because the rules say so" is a terrible reason to pick an inferior format over the logical one even if the rule were design-specific. If the power that be simply acknowledge the executive decision is that this bullshit decision is mandatory as a necessary feature of wiki house law as it pertains to MMA-like subjects, I think people would take it a lot better than lying to them about the point of the process (ie since it's more reconciliation to a done deal than problem-solving).

On "anti-fans", please understand that capitulating to this kind of political nonsense is functionally equivalent to hating on the MMA userbase of wiki who find the data quite useful. Enabling isn't philosophically as bad as doing it, but that's a distinction without a real world difference. Agent00f (talk) 16:12, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

After reading through pages of painstaking discussion, I'm still vague on why we should use an omnibus system. So far, the only arguments in favor of such a system are: 1: It follows Misplaced Pages policy -> ie "It's the rules"; and 2: Prevents info from being deleted when individual pages get flagged for deletion in accordance with Misplaced Pages policy -> ie "It's the rules"

So is there any argument for deleting individual pages and using the omnibus system that does not involve pointing me to the various Misplaced Pages policy pages? Unless I'm missing something, I haven't seen anyone make the argument that the omnibus system is -better-, and plenty of people listing reasons why it's worse. 75.101.47.18 (talk) 20:22, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

It is better for the simple reason that it means WP covers all UFC events rather then just the ones that have enduring notability (as defined not by MMA fans but by WP policies). Mtking 23:09, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Your reply is exactly what I was pointing out: The omnibus idea came about because of "WP policies" and its subsequent application to MMA pages. Is there any reason to prefer the omnibus system -besides- WP policies? Or let me put it in another way: What would the merits/benefits of the omnibus system be if people (you?) -hadn't- started flagging UFC pages for deletion? 75.101.47.18 (talk) 00:28, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

What as opposed to not covering them at all ? WP has policies and procedures that are there to guide what as an encyclopaedia it covers, WP does not purport to cover everyone or everything. For example I could write a bio page on myself, I could provide sources to confirm education, employment and recreational items listed, it would be interesting to some (not many I grant you) but it would be deleted probably within 2 hours of posting it and defiantly within 7 days as I do not meet the bar that WP has set for including bio's; I could argue what harm does it do, it is all true and all verifiable, but it would still get deleted. The same goes for these MMA events, the WP bar for events (is detailed both in WP:NOT and WP:EVENT) is what it is, if MMA fans do not like that, arguing here about that bar can not change the bar, all we can do here is work out how to apply that bar to allow WP to cover MMA events. The argument that we keep them as they are is going to lead to the situation over time where the information on MMA gets wittled down to only those select events that demonstrate enduring notability and nothing else, the omnibus system is better as it allows for all events to be covered in the one article, with those events that do demonstrate enduring notability covered in there own article. Searching for "UFC 165", either on Google or WP will get you to the part of WP that covers that event. Mtking 01:01, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

This argument makes the giant logical leap that Wiki entries are simply isolated articles to be considered individually when one of the most compelling reasons why people use it is that it's become a fairly comprehensive collection of intrinsically related material that users can reasonably expect to contain in aggregate what they're going to be curious about. For example, it would make the linked chain of UFC events much less useful if arbitrary ones are missing. The bureaucrats here of course also acknowledge this given that they will readily accept the exact same info only organized in a worse way, rather than forcing the deletion of previously inadequate sub-entries, even though there's no functional difference except all the baggage that comes along with terrible design.

That is also why I said that the users will not approve of this decision unless all other methods of protecting the set of pages as whole have been exhausted. What's being forced on us is a ridiculous solution, but people will accept ridiculous solutions if it's the least worst alternative. This is exactly why I asked Dennis (or anyone with decision making power) to certify that wiki technically cannot produce a better way of organizing page sets or dealing with them in general, because being honest enough to admit this (if it's true) would at least reconcile it to the "shitty executive decisions that you have to live with" bin. I also offered suggestions but my knowledge base of wiki features/history is not sufficient to ensure that they are coherent (and as an honest person I fully admit this instead of asserting incoherent solutions on topics I know nothing about), however you can read Denni's reply where he acts as the voice of the bureaucrat team instead of a neutral party who at least tries to look out for user interests, so that's a dead end. Put another way, the users are essentially being told it's not a rigged design process as long as they agree with the terrible design being handed down. At some point one has to decide that participating in a sham only lends it credibility, and it took me longer than many to grasp this. Agent00f (talk) 02:16, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Dennis, Trey, King, et al. I withdrew my AfD's for the UFC pages that failed not only WP:GNG/MMAevent, but WP:FUTURE to help facilitate a compromise , and work towards making this encyclopedia better. When do we move past users with the attitude of WP:IDONTLIKEPOLICY and WP:NONEOFTHERULESAPPLYTOTHISBECAUSEILIKEITTHIsWAY and forward with ones like UDAR who are willing to help make this work.Newmanoconnor (talk) 03:24, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It's already been long decided that user input doesn't matter, so why pretend anything needs to be done now? You claim to "disagree" with what I've said, but given there are zero rebuttals of many many factual claims, it can only be deduced that daring to speaking out was instead "disagreeable" rather than a response related to actual content. BTW, the users here would assume good faith more often if they didn't get burned so much for it; we can start assuming good faith again when people actually show some. Agent00f (talk) 03:54, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

But you are under the mistaken belief that this project can choose to unilaterally change established WP inclusion criteria in a self serving way, it can't. So you have a choice, you can either work within the existing inclusion criteria, or dig your heals in insist on an article per event and accept that WP's MMA coverage will have gaps in as article after article gets deleted. Mtking 04:03, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

The law doesn't need to be changed; just like law in the real world, precedence to interpret it in an intelligent instead of rigid/literal way can be set. As much as it's the bane of bureaucracy, a spirit of the rules does exist. The opposing opinion here is that a dictated dogmatic interpretation will always be granted priority as matter of course, and even then I very clearly stated that users would go along with terrible decisions as long it's clearly demonstrated there are no better alternatives to bureaucratic stupidity. That's what compromise is, and this is what acting in good faith means: being minimally forthright instead of insulting our intelligence by pretending a worse format created to run around the literal interpretation is some kind of design process. Agent00f (talk) 04:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

The reason "article after article" gets deleted is because you have lobbied for their deletion repeatedly. I don't mean to be rude, but what you say feels like "do what I say or watch me delete your articles". 76.103.153.126 (talk) 04:13, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Not me saying it, have you read the closing comments at the AfD's, the page after page of comments at ANI, the 300k+ worth of comments here, it is admins and other established editors saying it, loud and clear take for example User:Black Kite when they said Misplaced Pages's policies clearly say that routine sports reporting falls clearly under WP:NOT.; I could give other examples, but what's the point as you can't or won't change your position on this will you ? Mtking 04:28, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but: A. Weren't you the one who flagged (many of) the articles for deletion in the first place? You could just have left them alone (or improved them!), policy or not. And B: There is no consensus among the admins either considering they didn't follow your lead in your attempt to delete UFC142.76.103.153.126 (talk) 04:44, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

No 76.103.153.126, that's just "good faith" in action: blame administrative decisions for your own free actions. Agent00f (talk) 04:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

What's most frustrating to me aside from the fact that Agent00f should be blocked for his disruptive comments, passive aggressive attacks, and assuming bad faith. There was real progress being made here, until he decided to try and bog everything down with WP:IDONTLIKEPOLICY rants.Newmanoconnor (talk) 04:20, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It's worth pointing out that this member also laid out similar baseless accusations on my talk page. I would respond to each accusation again but he clearly shows bad faith at every turn given he never replied with anything of substance or specific even when explicitly prompted; no assumption is necessary here. Also worth pointing that it's equally bad faith if not terrible logic to blame a general lack of interest from other users who've been burned on me. I do not control their actions, nor do I have any power over the process as abundantly demonstrated. Perhaps the problem here is that this member doesn't know how "assumptions" work or the idea of "good faith". That last statement is not passive aggressive btw, he literal does not seem to understand those words which might be what's leading him/her to make these claims; this is a good faith assumption. Agent00f (talk) 04:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary Break #5

I think it is time to move this on to a proposal which can be put to a RfC, we have clearly two editors in the SPA of Agent00f and the IP 76.103.153.126 who are here to defend the single article format and are not willing to consider the alternatives and all they are doing at this time is filibustering any progress towards a clear proposal. It is therefore time to accept they will never be convinced of the merit in the omnibus format but that should not stop progress on this matter and of course they are free to oppose any RfC that comes out of this discussion. Mtking 05:48, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

We can only hope that blatant lying is as covered by wiki code as the not assuming good faith that's always being trotted out. I've laid out very clearly, include in direct reply to Mtking, that this is a terrible but marginally passable solution as long as it's declare by someone with authority (ie not Mtking) that there are no other methods in wikidom to resolve the issue of institutional vandalism against cohesive article sets. There was no attempt at all to act on these legitimate concerns or even reply to them; at all. By pretending these events never occurred it provably demonstrates extremely bad faith. Please recall all these comments mentioned are recorded above for factual posterity and are not subject to deletion. If the process can dismiss good clear arguments out of hand, it seems in bad faith to call it "consensus" given that only one party is necessary anyway. However, in the spirit of compromise we should continue the charade so long as the participants start accurately calling it "ruling by dictat" instead of "consensus". Agent00f (talk) 06:26, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

to quote "but the conversation goes on and on and on, in such a way that it's clear that it's more of an intellectual game, like a staring contest, to see who will give up first, rather than an actual rational, meaningful discussion." it continues "The key to dealing with a filibusterer is to point out that they're filibustering and to ignore them.", so consider it pointed out...... Mtking 07:16, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It's unfortunate that focusing on the facts of the case are an intellectual game to Mtking, because it's not to those of us who are serious about this matter and take an interest in this subject beyond playing petty authoritarian. Note that Mtking has attempted to cleverly weasel out of replying seriously to a serious comment while playing the victim. This exemplifies seriously bad faith, and unfortunately this behavior has has been the norm. For example, 76.103.153.126 above also points out the lie when Mtking pretended to care about retaining article info when he's been strongly pushing to delete them regardless of whether another solution exists. No response to this serious allegation of blatant dishonesty as expected, yet such an untrustworthy editor remains one of the key players and proponents in this process.

It's not controversial to claim that "assume good faith" is not equivalent to "axiomatically assume good faith", iow assume it until evidence exists to make a good determination either way. Given the abundant display of atrociously terrible faith that's been acted out in this thread, it's no wonder that only the worst actors are still left to push it onward after most all the initially numerous page users have left in disgust. Agent00f (talk) 07:57, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Before we continue, I would like to restate what I wrote above, since I never did get a proper reply to it. The reason I am asking for this is that Dennis Brown implied he would get around to giving me "a proper reply" so but the conversation surged far forward and away and that didn't happen. To restate, when Dennis Brown fairly asked what a proper solution might be, I replied: "Honestly, I think very few of the users or editors who generally created, maintained or read the MMA articles had any egregious problems with them in the first place (and without anyone being "sanctioned" that I can recall as long as they followed the established format). That's the problem. The MMA wiki project and format has been well-established for several years. There are a few things that few contributors to those articles would terribly object to (the removal of entrance-music lists, for example), but those things are completely trivial compared to what has been proposed. This is why people need to know why these are actual "problems" not protected under Misplaced Pages's Fifth Pillar: "The principles and spirit of Misplaced Pages's rules matter more than their literal wording, and sometimes improving Misplaced Pages requires making an exception to a rule." These were/are informational articles with a uniform format, a solid and well-established community that would maintain them and protect them from vandalism, and would resolve internal formatting disputes on their own, and were pages with considerable popularity, and the articles existed in such a way that they helped those interested in the sport have a deeper understanding of it and its history, and those who were looking for specific historical information in MMA find their answer, while being generally and inherently satisfying to their userbase. The result is that absolutely no one is happy with the current situation. There are compromises people have put on the table that I could personally live with, but it is absolutely fair to ask what purpose the current action against the MMA Misplaced Pages Project serves beyond satisfying bureaucracy in and of itself, when Misplaced Pages is explicitly not a bureaucracy." Beansy (talk) 09:29, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Sorry if your question got lost in the flood. There are a couple of problems that I'm trying to address. One of them is that several of the articles don't pass criteria and if they go to AFD, they will and have been deleted. Agree or not, it is the reality we have. It is better to keep the info somewhere than to simply lose it. Another problem is future events. When someone creates an article on future events, it is almost always deleted. I can quote you all the reasons, but i doesn't matter, 99% of the time future events don't pass criteria, so ends up happening is a big drama fest AFD. Until recently, no one paid much attention to the MMA articles, so all the articles went rather unnoticed, but many were short of criteria all along. Once everything exploded in the drama fest that was a series of AFDs, the larger community took notice and started saying "well, some of these don't pass criteria". The simple fact is, the genie is out of the bottle. There is no "going back to how it was", there are too many eyes on it. Hell, at my Request for Admin, there was a larger than average turn out and it was one of the topics often covered was my involvement here. Trust me, there are many, many eyes on this, they just aren't talking, and glad to have me try to sort this mess out instead. I've already had to make several gestures to get people to delay AFDs, including at ANI, but patience is wearing out. All articles on Misplaced Pages have to conform to a set of established guidelines and policies. This is not different than UFC itself. There are "rules", of sorts. Misplaced Pages may not be a bureaucracy, but it isn't anarchy either. There is some bureaucracy here, there has to be. Established procedures for dealing with disputes like WP:ANI and WP:DRN are purely bureaucracy, so lets not kid ourselves. I'm trying to not get bogged down with it, but rather apply the good parts of bureaucracy (ie: the guidelines that insure we all play by the same rulebook), and apply some common sense and flexibility (create something new that hasn't been done, that will protect info and preserve the current naming conventions). Like it or not, change is coming, and it isn't by my choosing. If at some point I decide that I can no longer help here and back away, the alternative isn't going to be as patient. If the wider community feels like this project is not going to happen and I'm wasting time, then I will have lost the ability to persuade them to hold off on sending stuff to AFD. Remember, I have NO authority except the power of my words here, backed up by progress they see here. Being an admin gives me no authority to force someone to withdraw an AFD. Then you might actually see something that looks like bureaucracy, as there are plenty of people in the wider community that think I am wasting my time and we should just let it all go to AFD and hash it out there. And more drama would happen. If the MMA community takes an "all or nothing" approach, that is a big risk that I don't see coming out very well. I don't think you are, you seem entirely reasonable. But in a nutshell, there are many eyes on this, so the problems can't be ignored. Either the problems can be solved here, or by the outside. I prefer that we try to let the MMA community try to solve the problems, as that is more likely to produce a result they like, but in the end, We are here to build an encyclopedia, which means consistency, and MMA events are but one part of it. I'm trying to offer solutions and acknowledge and comply with the concerns of the MMA community, but at some point, the MMA community has to say "Ok, we don't like some of the guidelines, but I admit I can see where some of these articles come up short. Lets find a way to bridge the gap". Fortunately, many already have and are trying to help here. My guess is that you will, too, even if you have some legitimate questions and concerns along the way. Nothing wrong with that at all. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 12:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

As a practical matter can we at get a clue as to what the boundaries of omnibus design are? Far as I can tell we're just cramming stuff into pages until someone's imaginary threshold is met. For example, kelapstick's proposal of 10 events per page makes more sense than an annual division if only because it's not as ridiculously crowded, but it's all a rather precarious setup when splintering off more substantive events risks AfD on the rest. If we're actually serious about "try to let the MMA community try to solve the problems", I think most users would prefer that people who came into this with the desire to delete the subject should limit their input to avoid conflict of interest. Related to this, is there an inherent wiki benefit for protection of sections within pages, or are we just assuming good faith that at least the detractors won't strike again? BTW, I've taken the time to read the admin resolution board for MMA matters and you are undisputed correct that the local opposition to the subject don't even rank among the extremists. Agent00f (talk) 22:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

In a curious but not altogether unexpected turn of events, the user Hasteur, who AFAICT is not an admin, has also taken to threatening me on my talk page. This seems to the preferred option by one side of the disagreement here for settling disputes instead of discussing issues in the open. "lack of good faith assumptions" indeed. Agent00f (talk) 12:25, 2 May 2012 (UTC):

:Final Warning regarding disruptive editing and lack of good faith assumptions

So, is it the policy of wiki for editors to continuously make arbitrary accusations without evidence? I've asked for substantiation of any of these charges, but none has been forthcoming, so I'm puzzled as to why you believe them to be true. It's also notable that list of "banned by Hasteur" topics is currently what's under discussion at the MMA omnibus page, so the request is to essentially voluntarily ban myself from the conversation, or else. Look, I don't doubt that you have more pull with perhaps some other insiders that you've come to know in the past, but please consider how this kind of behavior reflects on your peers when one party to a "consensus" takes to threats to prevent the other side from participating. Agent00f (talk) 12:21, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Let me clear up one point for you Agent. Admins don't have any more authority than non-admins in this area. As an admin, the only difference between me and you is that I have a set of tools that allow me to take action when needed and the wider community has decided that I can be trusted with them, but my voice is no more important than anyone else's, and Hasteur's voice is no less important that any admins. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 12:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Surely it's evident from the tone displayed by Hasteur, Mtking, etc that some editors feel more equal than others. Agent00f (talk) 13:07, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Some editors are more constructive than others, perhaps. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:14, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It aids constructiveness when questions and very well reasoned and sourced arguments aren't just ignored out of convenience if not routinely threatened. Agent00f (talk) 13:44, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I have striked a out of context reposting of my appropriate and justified warning on Agent00f's talk page. We (those editors who are collaborating) have tried on multiple occasions to explain why Agent00f's actions are not appropriate. Part of being in a community is you have to follow the community's guidelines in terms of basic structure, posting, civility, etc. We have warned Agent00f multiple times about assuming good faith, yet all we are presented with is continues assumptions of bad faith and cries of "rules for rules sake". I did not threaten you with banning (I do not have the toolset), I simply informed you what the next step in the process would be if you didn't come into conformity with the behavioral guidelines really quickly. The fact that you've responded negatively and are striking out at a user whom the community has chosen to entrust with additional functionality (Dennis Brown) suggests you're not here to do anything but cause disruption. Your next posting here should be an apology to all the editors whose time you've wasted or you and I will take a trip to a forum of larger consensus (Administrator's Noticeboard) to see if sanctions are appropriate. Hasteur (talk) 13:28, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure what's more ironic, threatening others with "assumptions of bad faith" if they don't leave all the while claiming it's not a threat, racketing up the demands and drama they supposedly seek to avoid when the threats are laid bare for the world to see, or that this is mainly a response to a call for more honest discussion. BTW, can I get a link to these "multiple explanations" referenced above that I must've missed so I can prepare an appropriate defense? I asked for it before but you must've missed the request. Agent00f (talk) 13:44, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

There are your repeated warnings. I could probably find more by parsing the intermediate text, but these are the primary ones prior to the final warning I delivered Hasteur (talk) 15:18, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately I was looking for explanations rather than hollow accusations. Anyone can throw arbitrary lists together like "not assuming 2+2=5", but it's another thing to make them evident. Agent00f (talk) 22:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

NO ONE IS ASKING YOU TO LEAVE You offer no constructive ideas, no support for compromise or consensus, you simply make statements about how logical this is, and illogical that is, all well written yet completely framed outside the idea of an encyclopedia, much less wikipedia policies.

Any reasonable person, who is neutral can come and read your contribs and see that this discussion was moving towards compromise and at least working towards a common goal,until you decided to disrupt the process over and over again. Your are guments are full of things that cannot coexist with WP:WhatWikipediaIsNot, WP:GNG, WP:AAGF, WP:OTHERSTUFF, WP:IDONTLIKEIT.

Look anyone in an adversarial position is going to on occasion make statements that aren't inline with assuming good faith. But every comment for the past 5 +/-20 have had blatant assumptions of bad faith.

Again, NO ONE IS SAYING YOU SHOULD LEAVE although at this point, it certainly is BE CONSTRUCTIVE,OFFER IDEAS OTHER THAN THE STATUS QUO OR MOVE ONNewmanoconnor (talk) 14:55, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

"NO ONE IS ASKING YOU TO LEAVE". Really? Did you bother to read Hasteur's latest threat right above or do need a neutral party? I've also already explained in detail why assumptions are no long necessary when empirical evidence is readily available, so it really helps to read what others are saying, otherwise you're not going to be on the same page. Anyway, I'm sorry that the many substantive arguments offered above don't meet your definition for "encyclopedic" since they certainly make sense in the context of wiki as evidence by the omnibus page itself (same stuff, different format). It's generally difficult to make good decision without requisite knowledge of what is being decided, and willfully ignoring broader context isn't help here. Also consider that Wiki is the way it is today because of way that it met user needs, not because the latter were somehow crammed into a dictated box a la Britannica. It's furthermore very difficult to be constructive when power is mostly wielded by a small clique who concoct the plan outside public view and then present it as an inviolable framework. Agent00f (talk) 22:33, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Or put another way, if you aren't part of the solution, then you are part of the problem. Everyone has been welcomed with open arms to be part of the solution, including Agent. Simply taking a contrary position to every offered solution without ever offering your own solution, is not constructive, it is obstructive, and stretches the limits of good faith. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 15:07, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, we can all see it was us (the AfD clique) vs them (unwashed MMA masses) from the start, but if we're talking about good faith, it's hard to maintain a straight face when the inviolable plan is mostly the former's. It's also curious you say "been welcomed with open arms to be part of the solution" when you've ignored the ominibus-relevant comments in reply to your longer post right above. (btw they were posted many hours ago but unfortunately lef unsigned, check the record to verify if need be) Agent00f (talk) 22:14, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

OPPOSE OMNIBUS CONDITIONALLY SUPPORT NOW, SEE BELOW I wasn't around for the the AfD's on UFC 140 and 143. The admins who closed them, with deletions, made comments that made sense, although in one case in the unusual move of deleting despite closing as "no consensus." In the UFC 146 AfD, I have shown (I just wrote it) secondary sources of prose discussing events surrounding UFC 146, that is not just stats, dates, names, etc. WP:SPORTSEVENT only covers those things as it is written. As it is written, it does not say anything like, "If the secondary prose is just the kinds of storylines you can find as a lead-up to any sports event, then that's still routine, and doesn't past muster." although those in favor of the deletions and an omnibus article here are interpreting it that way. And they have a point, because such previews are commonplace, and it does seem to be covered more specifically in WP:NOTNEWSPAPER. The problem with an interpretation that goes beyond the strict lettering of WP:SPORTSEVENT and includes normal secondary media coverage of storylines leading up to and following the event is it's not consistent with how other sporting events are covered in Misplaced Pages. Did anything truly memorable, a permanent place in history occur at the1969 Sandlapper 200 or the 1989 Hopman Cup or even the 1977 NBA Finals? No...but they do have the secondary prose coverage (apparently...I haven't checked). Many, many, many, MANY sporting events in many sports are just considered notable on its face in Misplaced Pages, whether or not anything really unusual or memorable happened in them, and the notability of UFC events (leaving aside other MMA promations for the moment) cannot be said to be less than a great many of those events. And before anyone trots out WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, let me do that myself as I did in the UFC 146 AfD: "When used correctly though, these comparisons are important as the encyclopedia should be consistent in the content that it provides or excludes. Trouble arises when legitimate comparisons, either by analogy with existing or non-existing article kinds, are disregarded without thought or consideration of the Misplaced Pages:Five pillars." One of the themes of that essay is "other stuff exists" makes a lousy standalone argument, but in conjunction with other legitimate arguments may be valid and important for the sake of consistency. That's what I am trying to establish here. Secondary prose from major media non-MMA sources exists for every single UFC event, that standard is good enough for the vast majority of sporting events on Misplaced Pages even if the secondary prose is not of memorable consequence, and so my position is that every UFC event should have a standalone article. If existing UFC events are lacking said secondary-sourced prose, it should be added and the article improved, not deleted. I am sorry my side of this coin is beset by meat puppets and questionable civility, but hopefully that won't unduly influence anyone focusing on the crux of the debate. Mreleganza (talk) 19:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• The omnibus system doesn't require that other full articles be removed. It is ancillary to them, additional. That point keeps getting lost for some unknown reason. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 19:47, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Mreleganza i will be more than happy to help with the inline citations and even writing the prose into the articles, but you're going to have to provide them from these sources, I can't find any myself. I do wonder if EVERY UFC event is notable, that sounds a bit concerning, but I truly wish someone would help write even one into a prosaic page that demonstrates lasting significance and continuous coverage. Though it's also worth pointing out this is not a vote on whether an Omnibus is a good system.Newmanoconnor (talk) 20:09, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• (edit conflict)Thank you for your opinion. WP:OTHERSTUFF is applicable. Other articles in other sports are not of debate. This is about MMA articles and how we can reconcile their current existence with the policies and guidelines of en.Misplaced Pages. IF the article is sufficiently notable and sourced (as judged by a neutral good faith editor) then the article remains just that, an Article. If a neutral good faith editor comes in and does not see the notability and sources necessary, they are within their rights to nominate for one of multiple processes (including merging/redirecting and deletion). The Omnibus system allows us to merge and redirect the content to a new article that has more viability at surviving various WP processes and does allow for the article to be spun back out if/when there is enough appropriate content. Hasteur (talk) 19:54, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I just want to add that all the talk about what *might* happen to an article is distracting. The fact is, the omnibus system is separate. If every single article on MMA is kept as is, it will not affect the omnibus articles. It won't change the content, the usefulness or the policy behind implementing them. I think it would be helpful if we moved forward from that presumption. Decisions as to what individual articles do or do not belong are NOT the function of this MMA notability page, and are outside the scope, and at this point, a distraction. PRODs and AFDs are also unhelpful right now as they are fueling the fires and making the work harder for some of us. No reason to address further comments whether the omni is good or bad. After it is built, if someone wants to nominate it for deletion at AFD in good faith, they can at that time, I am not concerned as to the outcome. For now, we just need to focus on what everyone thinks is the best way to design it. If people want to say how bad it is and don't want to help build it, fine, you can use my one line quote above and simply move on. We need less verbosity about this unrelated issue. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 20:07, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Fair enough, Dennis Brown. Considering the omnibus concept in a vacuum, and with the assumption that it will have no impact on the viability or lack thereof of invidual event articles, I support it. I do note that it appears many or most of the other supporters do support it as a direct alternative to individual event articles, which I do not endorse per the above. Hasteur, I agree WP:OTHERSTUFF applies, I cited it myself after all. Obviously we don't agree on which way. I repeat, WP:OTHERSTUFF maintains that consistency in Misplaced Pages is important if it is in conjunction with other factors and that's why, along with those other factors, I find the way other sports are treated are relevant if we are talking about an Omnibus as a replacement for single-event articles as you seem to be doing, although again I tip my cap to Dennis Brown's wish not to have that discussion here and now. Newmanoconnor, I provided those links as they pertain to UFC 146 per your request in the UFC 146 AfD. I note, however, that similar links are already in the UFC 146 article, and I assume you have seen that, and therefore you consider the links in the article (and then most likely the similar links I suggested) also inadequate, and my arguments above have been based on that. But let me not assume anymore, please tell me if the links provided or the links already in the article are adequate in your opinion, and if not, why not. Mreleganza (talk) 20:32, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Fair compromise. Dennis, can we get UFC143 and others that have been deleted restored to their original states for the time being while work on the omnibus page (or other solution) is taking place? 75.101.47.18 (talk) 21:00, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• • • • You would need to ask the admin that closed the previous AFD, which is the standard way. I can't do it, and because of my involvement in this building process. It is required that any admin that closes or takes action is "uninvolved", and safe to say, I'm involved here. I can !vote at MMA AFDs if wanted, but I'm pretty sure that I can't ever close them or undelete them. Even if I wasn't involved, I would have to ask the closing admin as not to make it look like I was wheel warring, which can get ME blocked. There are a lot of rules for admins, many, many more than for non-admins. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 22:32, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• • • • Mreleganza and 75 IP: Can we get the guideline/essay out first? That way when we restore the articles with the rationale of pointing at the guideline/essay. We don't want to leave the previously AfDed articles out there where they could be re-nominated for deletion too long. In my mind I'd like to have each one restored for long enough to apply the merge, and then place the redirect. Hasteur (talk) 21:10, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I am oppossed to restoring any deleted UFC events unless someone can provide a draft that dempnstrates notability.We need to see some assistance building the Omnibus and getting notability guidelines hammered out before I would want to see that. Even in that case, I think someone should be provided with the content and build a draft IF it can be shown to be notable.

As far as UFC 146,it still needs more sourcing, and to be written better, there are three sources ESPN,SI,and another in the google search i posted to the AfD. Yes there are TWO other good sources, but the material that cites them is simplistic and routine. I'm not going to save the article alone. 1. I'm not a good story teller and 2. If I can work in a team so can those who were initially opposed to any of this.

I think this needs to be an opportunity to better the MMA section on wikipedia, for me to be wiling to help bend WP:POLICIES around MMA, the other editors/fans are going to have to help.Newmanoconnor (talk) 22:11, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Mreleganza, before offering support based on abstract considerations only, also consider looking at the condition of the 2012 article as it stands in practice. It's horribly unwieldy and it's barely May. If we're going forward with it, the userbase should at least consider alternative organizations that aren't so atrocious. In general, given it's supposed to be a "compromise", it would be best if user actually push back as standard part of negotiation instead of accepting wholesale. That's why I asked where this still imaginary threshold for minimal size is, but that still hasn't been answered. Agent00f (talk) 22:37, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

The threshold for minimal size is arbitrary (as arbitrary as my 10 events per page is), it was created as 2012, with all the articles related to events in 2012 in the same article because it seemed like a good idea at the time. It not be the best way to group them, but that is the purpose of this discussion, to come to an agreement as to the best way to format it. --kelapstick 22:56, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

No, it clearly isn't arbitrary, and it's clearly no up to you or I but rather the AfD team. If one event is not notable, then two clearly isn't logically speaking. All we know so far is that a arbitrary year's worth (even if it only has 1 event) is, though. The fundamental purpose of this discussion is what's considered long enough that they won't go AfD crazy again. The MMA userbase will then be smart enough to organize around that hopeful brightline rule. And since this is ostensibly still a "compromise", and not being crammed down our throat (as far as it's public claimed), I suggest actually negotiating instead of taking whatever comes. Agent00f (talk) 23:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• At this point, can we (and by we I mean actual users) get a general idea of why wiki should continue to be used in the future for MMA given that the few guys running the show here seems have no interest in the subject otherwise? What I mean is that all the framework was created with no input from us, and in fact already put into place with no input from us, and all the decisionmaking is mostly done by a largely disinterested party, so when the disinterested parties eventually leaves, what power over how to run the omnibus cluster that remains be retained by MMA contributors? For example, who will vet splittering new entries? This is rather serious given that users have been provide no reason at all to continue investing in this except the basic motivation to see it not disappear. added: ok, I see one person who'll work on it. Agent00f (talk) 23:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I am on board with Hasteur's questions if I understandcorrectly - that is, I vouch for my support that we continue to work on the MMA guidelines, and that we proceed with Dennis Brown's plan to start *new* articles in the 2012 in MMA space, and move from there and continue hashing out guidelines - then yes, I for one agree to that. ADDENDUM: While I am in agreement with the suggestions laid out by Dennis Brown thus far, there is still much work to do. For one, I don't think we have built consensus yet on the guidelines for creating standalone articles. I completely agree that each standalone article would need one mainstream secondary (non-MMA site) source of prose previewing and reviewing the event (I'd actually say two is more reasonable, but I'd also say that is easily achievable). The beauty of the 2012 MMA article - and sorry, Dennis Brown, for not really grokking this before - is that it does not at all impede the creation of standalone event articles, which if we can achieve consensus on the proper guidelines for establishing those will keep the MMA hardcore fans happy. Indeed, although I am loathe to nominally be on the same "side" as those who are canvassing, making sockpuppet allegations, and generally not being very civil - I wholeheartedly agree that the way MMA pages worked(well, UFC pages at least) before this spate of AfD's came along was not problematic. Clearly it was problematic to those who nominated the AfD's, who saw a problem with the fact that standalone UFC articles had been created for years and stated creating scads of AfD's. That I think it the crux of the problem we have to tackle next, and I seem to be far apart from MtKing and others on whether prose from multiple mainstream sources previewing and reviewing events and their specific storylines is sufficient to justify creation of standalone UFC event page (as well as other MMA events). I believe it is. If I understand MtKing correctly, that would still not necessarily be sufficient, because such secondary mainstream prose would not necessarily evidence an "enduring" legacy. This needs to be sorted out. I would propose that, in the interim, no AfD's are created (or redirected, yet) by the people involved in this conversation for existing standalone MMA events, be the event upcoming or in the past. My reasoning is that I think the focus should be on trying to save/improve the articles to adhere to the standalone MMA events guidelines we agree on, and AfD'ing them after if they cannot be brought up to our guidelines, rather than deleting them all and then going back to recreate them. Not only do I feel would this way forward would catalyze the improvement of articles already created, but it'd have the added benefit of not enraging tens of thousands of MMA fans who use the articles and then, once they are gon,e come in here and disrupt our attempts at building consensus. Towards that end, I'd also propose that the AfD MtKing created for UFC 146 be withdrawn, although I do not expect he will agree and I'm not going to go to war with him on that in this space.Mreleganza (talk) 22:50, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• • I have previously asked someone to remove 9 AFDs and they quickly complied (thank you!). I've made a request at the bottom of this page as well. I haven't looked at the actual articles in question, so it was based solely on my desire to ratchet down the controversy and fix the problems, but we have to in a certain order. We have to get the omni working first. Next, we go to RfC with the criteria issue (we can't go there until there is a omni in place, since it concerns it). Technically, we don't need a consensus to build the omni, but I know that if we do and everyone is on board, it will be easier to get everyone together and agree on criteria considerations. Besides, the omni works independently even if all articles are kept, and would just be the building block and failsafe for new or lesser known events. I can NOT make anyone withdraw an AFD. The only tool I have in this is the strength of my arguments, reinforced by those of you here in the community. I'm not an MMA person, I came as an outsider solely to help move it along, as an objective party, and someone with a great deal of experience at Misplaced Pages, particularly in dispute resolution. I wasn't even an admin when I started this. Oh, and welcome :) Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:28, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I barely know MTKing and I think he would withdraw the AfD, IF it was fleshed out just a little more with the references from SI and ESPN that remain unsourced and could substantially add to the prose needed. Unfortunately he cannot as there are other comments that endorse the nom, each would have to be withdrawn. However, a merge of the info as is to the OMNIBUS may be better as it fits with the plan going forward, UFC 146 could be moved to a stand alone article when it actually happens, and We may be able to find an admin willing to do that.

I'd prefer that you revise the article further, and then have Dennis close the AfD as no consensus. We ALL agree to leave it up as a gesture of good faith, though it violates WP:FUTURE, and move on. I don't know if Dennis Can or is Willing to do that.Newmanoconnor (talk) 23:00, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I can't close AFDs on MMA events because I'm too heavily involved in this discussion. Only uninvolved admins can. Same reason I can't take admin action at the ANI. Admins can only use admin tools in places that they are far removed from. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:04, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Newmanoconnor I agree that it could be improved, and I will take a stab at it. I also don't think it's really that terrible as is, but as we both have said, that's why we need to keep talking about this. I am tentatively okay with already-deleted articles not being restored, and by the same token (to reiterate) I would like to see no new AfD's go up until we have indeed hammered out these guidelines. Agent00f I am not sure if this answers your questions or not, but as I understand it, truly endorse the model suggested by Dennis Brown for the 2012 in UFC Model (as opposed to a "wholesale" unthinking agreement based on "abstract" principles), and as such, I think its unwieldy state should be worked on and fixed rather than thrown out, just as I think the standalone UFC events that already exist should be improved rather than thrown out. Mreleganza (talk) 23:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

All I asked for for days is some written statement that no better solution to protect page collection was available, but you know how the other side is. Frankly I have no idea why we're being consulted at this point in time considering the atrocious and nonsensical page format is already a done deal in practice. Agent00f (talk) 23:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary Break #6

: Let me be clear about something: I wish everyone would quit nominating articles to AFD for a few weeks. Let us settle the other issues first: 1. the omni system, 2. then the criteria issue which will have to go to RfC. Right now, the AFDs are causing more drama and more drive by problems. It won't kill you to hold off until a consensus is built. You have every right to nominate whatever you want, I'm just asking this as a personal favor. It isn't making my job any easier, or this task. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:09, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Another note 2012 in UFC events was the prototype for what we are trying to do. It needs refining, but Mt and TG (and many others who helped them) did an amazing job considering all the obstacles. I may disagree with them on some things, but I respect them and know they act in good faith. The ONLY reason we can consider moving forward now is because of these efforts by many different people, and this article allowed us to experiment and refine, try some things, figure out what worked and didn't. Again, the idea on the table isn't MY idea, I just presented my interpretations of YOUR ideas, that were based on this previous work. We fix one thing at a time: 1. Omni, which is a new tools that adds new uses and acts as a place for future events and a fail safe for articles that don't pass criteria (and even if most do, some don't) 2. Clarify the dang criteria at RfC with the larger community, so we all know exactly what the criteria is, and don't have to debate every single article for weeks on end. 3. Create content. After all, we ARE here to build an encyclopedia, and once these two are done, we can get back to actually creating content. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:16, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I'm all about part 3! Looking forward to this being over. I'd like to reiterate my thanks to Agent for presenting the end-users' arguments well, and to Dennis for putting so much time into this process. It's all very much appreciated. Kind regards, Sunny Sundae Smile (talk) 00:02, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• • @Dennis Brown Three things: I'll start with the one on omnibus design. Look, I could probably live with an omnibus (in the UFC's case, I am amenable to omnibuses done by year, and then additional annual omnibuses by outlet are probably fine; up until 2005, with just one oddball exception, every UFC event was on PPV and so it could just be done by year until then, and non-PPV events were aired exclusively on Spike domestically from 2005-2009, so it only gets more complicated starting 2010). What I can't agree to at all is the idea of removing data in the omnibus for more prose once articles get split off. Really, the omnibuses should be mainly for a quick scan of full event results in the existing tables including method of victory, round, time of round, and any notes of interest (like a "Fight of the Night" bonus, if a fighter failed a drug test afterward, if a fighter came in overweight necessitating a catchweight bout, if it was a championship bout, etc.), as well as event information for which there is an existing infobox, while individual articles should contain more prose with in-depth information. More prose is generally to provide deeper context, and that really ought to be reserved the individual articles, as a deeper context is something that almost all wikipedia articles that split off from an existing article is supposed contain. The raw information should be in both though.

Second: I appreciate your response to my re-statement above, but it doesn't explain why the UFC is specifically undeserving of fifth pillar protection despite everything that's been laid out. The MMA articles were not "anarchy" and I believe I gave enough reasons why. They were long established, uniform, codified, popular, well maintained, and belonged to what is arguably the fastest growing global sport of the last 15 years. Still, I wouldn't have brought that up more than once (that wasn't the first time I brought it up but was previously unanswered), but there are so many other sports that have sporting event articles of equal or lesser significance whose existence has never been challenged, and I believe specific examples have been given repeatedly now. With everything else the MMA Wiki project had going for it, it really does force the question: why MMA is specifically targeted when so many similar types of articles are not?

Third: perhaps we can agree upon at least how far apart we are? Would you consider articles where a new world champion was crowned in the historical top two promotions to be "off the table" for deletion, so to speak? Beansy (talk) 03:13, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• "Again, the idea on the table isn't MY idea, I just presented my interpretations of YOUR ideas". I think we're all aware that the process wouldn't be so contentious if the format included input from some users from the start instead of just the AfD team and then presented as something we should love. For example, I'm not sure where the Annual/Season idea came from, but that's pretty obvious it's already vastly overcrowded, yet the page already exists like this to anyone who visits now. We'll see if there's any leeway as promised or whether the omnibus is the final version "as is". BTW, the critical question in "As a practical matter can we at get a clue as to what the boundaries of omnibus design ..." above still has not been answered even though you've taken copious time to attack me on the ANI page to fish for a ban. Agent00f (talk) 00:23, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
  • If the omni article is so overcrowded, perhaps it'll motivate you and other MMA enthusiasts to do something about it by improving the sections so they can be spun out to individual articles. Of couse this is predicated on the MMA enthusiasts wanting to improve the articles. Hasteur (talk) 01:58, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• Let's not get ahead of ourselves with what might happen later. The clique till now has still been hammering away at AfD's in poor faith so there's no reason to believe their behavior in the future won't continue to change the course of events. In the meantime, in the spirit of good faith, can you help us get some clear answers to what WON'T be AfDed by at least the gang here so we can at least try to approach decisions in a reasonable matter? Agent00f (talk) 02:30, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

What do you think the omni should look like? Or is that not an avenue you're willing to consider? Again, I think it was fine the way it was but an overviewish omni page has potential to be good and useful IMO. My preference to the "limits" of the omni page would be something like this, even though I don't know if we have enough content contributors to pull it off: UFC and other major promotions would each have their own Omni page (like Bellator already does...we would have to figure out which promotions qualify as "major" and then maybe one other one for "2012 in minor/second tier/other/I don't know MMA events.") On the UFC Omni, for each UFC event, including Fox, Fuel, and FX events, there would either be a link to the main article (sort of like how it's done for airline destinations, example http://en.wikipedia.org/Royal_Jordanian#Destinations), and for the ones that don't have its own article, a blurb about when and where and any other cursory details, and then a table of results. Mreleganza (talk) 01:45, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Again, I'm just trying to get the parameters of what's allowed by whomever is setting the threshold for notability (along with other critical questions above). That is generally how design starts: understand the boundaries and work within that space. I would also suggest users push back somewhat on what's tenable since this is after all still being call a "negotiation", even though Dennis feels people should be banned for even suggesting that there's leeway in a "compromise" (see his comments about "battle" in the ANI). What we've been given is a design (sorted by year) done by people who obviously have no idea how MMA works as a sport, and the unwieldy result is the consequence. For example, compare uf145 to ufc2012, there elements missing from the omnibus like payout which would make it even more ridiculous if they're added (which they should), and year is barely in may. Also note my longish criticism of flaws above. What's interesting is that a list of UFC events already exists which is now also redundant with long omnibuses.

I (and IMO most) would prefer a shorter format, but done with consistence/predictable divisions between pages so that it's easy to find yet manageable. I mean, this is a bunch of work being saddled on users while being decided by others, so we might as well design it as close to what we really want (ie. original) as possible. Agent00f (talk) 02:05, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Final note

I'm divorcing myself from this bad relationship. No permission is needed to build the omni, it has already stood up to scrutiny and has the support of the community, I just wanted it be a GROUP design decision. This is Misplaced Pages, you can make any article you want anyway. That point has been made time after time, but some people don't hear very well. I've tried for months to find solutions, dealing with self appointed protectors who haven't taken the time to go back into the archives and see the big picture. I've spent a lot of energy begging people to stop sending stuff to AFD until we can find common ground, but can't do that in good faith anymore. In private, many admins literally called me a fool for trying to help here, calling it a "toxic cesspool", and they were right. My goal was to come in as an outside party, protect the information in one form or another, as part of building an encyclopedia, by bridging "wants" with "encyclopedia needs". Neither side can restraint themselves or have the discipline to even maintain a singular line of conversation long enough for any change to happen, however, and seem to actually enjoy the drama, something I don't want to be associated with. The irony is that the obstructionists joined the party late thinking they were protecting the articles, yet they have shot themselves in the foot, putting more eyes on the situation, making deletions much more likely, not less likely.

Please understand that I'm unwatching this page, so I won't answer questions or even see them here. Please don't leave them on my talk page either, as I won't answer and inclined to just delete them, and I don't want to appear rude, but I'm serious about being "done". I have no more time to waste on this. Game over. If you would rather bicker and fight at AFD, I don't want to know about it, I no longer care. Obviously, my attempts to bridge the two sides have failed and I'm tired of beating this dead horse. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 11:05, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

= Appointing a "sheriff" to shut down the Wild West mentality on this page

As it's been demonstrated that this page has ballooned over 150k in Wikitext in 5 days, I propose that a neutral uninvolved admin be solicited for the purpose of actively monitoring this talk page, warning participants regarding minor violations of the community conduct, issuing blocks/sanctions for repeated violations (or major violations), and guiding us to a future in which MMA articles can be in WP with a reasonable certainty of surviving deletion. Said administrator will apply the community conduct standards as evenly and as fairly as possible. Thoughts?

Dennis suggests we won't be able to find one. Even Anna has left for similar reasons. The situation was good when progress appeared to be made. However, every time someone new jumps into the fray sending the discussion into circles it becomes frustrating for those who have been involved. If you can find another admin good luck. But, unfortunately, there always seems to be someone hijacking the process. --TreyGeek (talk) 14:46, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Discussion derailers will be treated just like any other disruptive editor, they'll be given warnings and proceed appropriately to blocks. Hasteur (talk) 14:53, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't think that any admin is willing. I do have an Idea however. We do have a few editors who SAY they are willing to work at it. This talk page shows we tried to get consensus and change MMA NOT criteria. If they really want to build content in Compromise, give them free reign over the Omnibus and continue to AfD individual articles.

I'd still like, as a show of good faith, to try and get UFC 146 closed as KEEP in an efort to show good faith, despite it's failing WP:FUTURE.

Just an FYI, All the other UFC fights I closed withdrew will be opened again, but I am going to also use it to drive people to find sources and if they can KEEP the articles that are notable. However, If we can put a stop to Future events being created as stand alone articles, and let them have leeway at the Omnibus, it may be a way to dent the cesspool it's food after awhile.

Dennis and other admins thoughts on the whole arena are the reason I think we need to continue. If not, all of wikipedia is destined to a slow creeping failure.Newmanoconnor (talk) 15:40, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

• What's indisputable about this whole fiasco is that as much as the AfD clique tries to hide behind "assume good faith", it's blatantly obvious that no one in the subject space trusts them as human beings even the slightest as they abuse the system for whatever kicks they get out of it. Trust is built through acting out good faith, a concept so seemingly foreign to these "people" that quotes around the word is strangely poignant. That's simply a piece of reality that no bureaucratic rule can change. The other more fundamental reality is that a loophole exists in "Wiki-law" that allows individual entries to be picked off via AfD, even when the entries taken as a cohesive set (which they undoubtedly are as evidenced by consistent linkage and indexing) do not violate any rule, and there doesn't seem to be a ruling or tool or hack to protect this scenario. This is something others and I asked Dennis about numerous times, and if he had only acted in good faith by ensuring users that this is a wish they have to hold off on as a temporary shelter is built in the meantime, then trust can be gradually built in the process. Note this is a question the AfD clique avoided with a vengeance, since their obvious goal is to minimize the presence of MMA on wiki. Even though we charitably call them bureaucrats, real bureaucrats would by definition accommodate or even welcome new rules or tools as long as it's sufficiently spelled out.
• Until an admin or whatnot comes along who's willing to face these core truths, this battle of the deletionist's creation will not end. Again, let's be clear, the only reason any other "side" (currently a unorganized mash of MMA misfits) exists is just an inevitable consequence of the AfD clique's pursue of their goal. Assuming basic facts away is not how reality works, and any solution that doesn't follow the rules of reality set itself up to fail. Agent00f (talk) 17:02, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

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