Deletion Policy

⚠ Out of Universe Page

     **This page is not part of the website!**
Deletion Policy *(This page)* is not apart or cannon to the actual in universe wiki. Everything you see in this article is non-cannon and should not be taken as information that is in universe. Do not mention this page or topics in this page in other articles. However, it does not mean you shouldn't use the information in this article, as it could be useful. Such as guides.

In order to maintain quality standards for the site and for authors wishing to contribute, the following policy has been put in place to maintain quality among articles and continuity for the site. This policy goes hand in hand with the green light process for pages and deletion applies during this process as well as after any changes are made to the article after being posted. Deletions will be recorded in the public Google doc ***(NOT YET CREATED)*** showing all deletions.

### Grace Periods

Pages, regardless of quality or effort put into it, will be offered a 24-hour grace period after posting the deletion notice for the page, during which time they are not eligible for removal from the site, regardless of rating. If a page is one hour or one year old, it doesn't matter. Everything gets 24 hours.

### Reasons for Summery Deletion

There are instances when Staff will waive the standard deletions process and delete the article (with one other staff member needed as a witness). These situations are:

* Articles with malicious intent such as, but not limited to: links to viruses, sexually explicit material, spam, advertising, trolling, and illegal content.
* Pages that are physically harmful towards anyone who has any form of photosensitive epilepsy, or toward any user in general.
* Pages that are clearly unfinished. (e.g. articles with blank sections or [insert text here] notes)
* Stub articles
* Blatantly plagiarizedmaterial.

### Self Deletion

Authors can delete their page at any time. In lore; these are referred to as effacement . This is a term typically used with levels; however can be applied to pretty much anything that has been seemingly erased out of nowhere within lore. Though this can be implemented within lore, authors can decide to not have them effaced and simply removed from lore entirely. (Authors must be present to oversee the deletion of a page) and it is done like so:

* Click on the three dots at the top of the page and in the top right corner.
* Click Delete Page
* Implement the reasons for deletion and press delete.

Be sure to actually delete your page instead of blanking it, as the page still stays around and is visible in the total pages. (If blanked, moderators will remove the page completely themselves.)

If an author should request their material be removed, and be able to prove authorship beyond a reasonable doubt, these requests are granted. Authors may also request deletion of all their work to be done by staff. This will likely require a basic explanation of why, and may not be immediate, but generally speaking, the wiki staff will acquiesce to such requests.

If circumstances imply that a deletion request is being made during a time of distress, or there is evidence of malice or spite on the part of the user, requests for self-deletion may be delayed or denied.

## Policy

 **General Deletion Policy**
1. All pages, regardless of quality, purpose, article type, et cetera, must be greenlit by staff for it to be on the site. Any page found to have not been greenlit will be removed. There are no appeals for this and you will have to rewrite it if you want it on the site.
2. Articles will not be deleted immediately, once an article is put up for deletion there will be a 24-hour wait period before the page is officially deleted from the site.
	1. In this time you can make appeals to moderators, but after this waiting period is over your page will be deleted and can only be brought back at the discretion of the staff. Manually bringing it back will result in penalties.
3. Staff will decide whether to keep, delete, rewrite, or generally change an article once the 24-hour wait period is over.
	1. In the event the original author requests to rewrite the article themselves, their request will be respected.
	2. In the event the original author requests to delete the article entirely, then their request will be respected.
	3. You (including staff) must gain permission from the original author before rewriting their article.
4. The original author must be notified when their article is up for deletion. If the author is not notified then no further action can be taken.
	1. In the event the original author cannot be notified, then the staff can take further action without author notification — this does not extend to rewrites.

 **Deletion on the basis of site rules.**
1. Any page or article that violates the site rules will be deleted immediately with no 24-hour wait period attached. No exceptions.
2. Content not related to the Backrooms, or content that is not original will be removed with no grace period.
	1. This rule does not apply to real images, though does apply to things such as artwork, or copyrighted material.

 **Hard Deletion**
1. Hard deletions — defined as deleting the article entirely off the site as opposed to archiving it on-site — can only be done if there is an archived version of the article hosted off-site. This archive would be subsequently sent to the author.
2. There is no appealing hard deletion, once it's gone, it is gone from the site and cannot be added. Doing so will result in severe punishment from staff.
3. Methods of archival include but are not limited to Generally messaging moderators on their message boards, Discord DMs, pastebin or other text hosting sites, Google Docs, et cetera.

 **Decannonization**
1. Decanonization — meaning that an article is moved to the non-canon section of the site. This is not done typically, but when done, the article you have a large grace period to either rewrite your article or move it to the non-canon section.
2. Articles are not deleted when they are canonized. And the staff are not allowed to make any article they wish decannonized, this is for administrators only and special occasions.
3. An Article can be recannonized by appealing to it as well as evaluating the material for the article. More than likely you will have to rewrite the article for it to be readded.
4. After being decanonized, the author must be notified about their article being decanonized and must be informed of their right to remove or rewrite their affected article.
	1. Refer to 4.1 (In Deletion Policy) for if the author cannot be notified; however, if they cannot be notified the page will be put on standstill and labeled as up for decannonization.

## Footnotes

1. ↑ A stub is an article that, although lacking the breadth of coverage expected from an encyclopedia, provides some useful information and is capable of expansion. These aren't allowed because of the greenlight process requiring pages to be completed before posting.
2. ↑ Non-article pages, such as disambiguation pages, lists, categories, templates, talk pages, and redirects, are not regarded as stubs.
3. ↑ Believed to have copied from another work, in part or in whole, on this wiki or elsewhere, or if it conceptually borrows heavily from another work, and if the new work makes no effort to credit the original work or its creator. This rule also applies to works that are copyrighted such as art, photographs, et cetera.
4. ↑ This does not apply; however, when done to pages that are considered vital pages. (i.e. the level 0 page or specific entities.)
5. ↑ Effacement (verb): meaning in lore to be completely removed for inexplicably from the Backrooms. Typically these will be caused by certain events such as Category D Blood Moons or other such cataclysmic events to levels. If you are effacing entities then just label them as extinct. You have the option to add effaced levels to their respective section on the wiki.
6. ↑ This only applies to articles that have gone through the greenlight process.