On Wikipedia, there is an ongoing debate between ‘inclusionists’ who feel that any factual information – no matter how trivial – is suitable for inclusion and ‘deletionists’ who think only articles with a certain level of importance should be kept. Regardless of who wins on Wikipedia itself (or rather, which balance between the two views becomes stable), another site is automatically archiving everything that gets deleted from Wikipedia: Deletionpedia provides a fairly valuable service: both by being willing to archive information of limited importance to most people, but perhaps some use to some. Also, it lets people keep tabs on what kinds of articles are being removed from Wikipedia, which should provide editorial oversight.
Debating “Deletionism” At Wikipedia
Posted by timothy on Sunday September 21, @09:38PM
“In a strange turn of events, the Wikipedia entry for Deletionpedia — an online archive of deleted Wikipedia articles — is now being considered for deletion. The entry for Deletionpedia was created shortly after the publication of an Industry Standard article and a discussion on Slashdot this week. Almost immediately, it was nominated for deletion, which has sparked a running debate about the importance of the Wikipedia entry, Deletionpedia, and the sources that reference it. For the time being, you can read the current version of the Deletionpedia entry, while the Wikipedia editors carry on the debate.”