 | This is an essay on the needlessness of being alarmed by perceived "backlogs". It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
Wikipedia is a backlog, by its very definition. It is made up entirely of improvements to make, discussions to be closed, edit requests to be processed, noticeboards to be patrolled, database reports to be analyzed, bugs to be fixed, articles to be created, deleted, merged, renamed, split, redirected, and everything else in between.
RFPP, UAA, WP:AIV, RMs, XfDs are backlogs; simply. They are queues of discussions to be held, actions to be taken, decisions to be made and consensus to be finalized. Complaining that "TfD is backlogged!" is like saying "The articles about topic X aren't all perfect!"; it is a flat evidence that there is ALWAYS something to take care of. There will never be a day where every backlog is cleaned out. There will be days when the backlogs seem larger or smaller, there will be days where RFPP seems a hundred miles long, and there will be days where every incoming request for protection is handled within minutes. It comes and goes with the continually evolving flow of logged-in admins available to work the mop. Actively seeking out admins to try to prod them into taking care of the requests is unneeded; eventually, it'll all be taken care of. MfDs that stay open for a few more days will not hurt the project irrevocably (otherwise they shouldn't be at MfD).