Thread:Alley Cat Sunflower/@comment-22439-20150205223840/@comment-26041498-20150206074524

Thank you for accepting at least some of my changes. It means a lot.

Of course it's not too much to ask to type an extra word or so; I've done it on many occasions due to your lack of redirects. It's obnoxious, but not particularly time-consuming. However, that is not the point.

As I've already stated, it's not an issue of whether or not a redirect is necessary, it's a matter of whether it is convenient. I've already mentioned that many, many other wikis are surviving with redirect pages just fine, and because of them are actually better than this one for the purposes of looking things up shorthand. For instance, the Tales wiki, Aselia, is an absolute mess in most respects, but it's still much easier to look things up there than here because it employs redirects.

I suppose I'm mostly curious about why you, or anyone else, should go to the effort to seek out and delete pages that realistically will do more good than harm. You said they're not harmful, so why track down and eliminate them? Redirects were specifically designed to make it so that users don't have to look at the navbar or type up full names to find what they're looking for. I don't understand why anyone would choose to ignore that benefit and opt for something more complicated simply because the simpler option is not "necessary".

To use a metaphor: cell phones are not "necessary", but they are incredibly useful despite performing a very simple service. Specifically deleting a redirect you didn't make on the basis that it isn't "necessary" is like smashing a cell phone which someone else bought you simply because you don't have a problem waiting until you get home to call someone. Not everyone would rather wait a few minutes and use a landline when they have been handed a tool that could make it faster and easier for them, if only a little.

And besides, instead of several pages' worth of potentially useful redirects, you now have several pages' worth of pretty much worthless dead ends where those redirects used to be. Is that really an improvement…?

I apologize if I seem insolent or out of line; I'm just… really, really confused. And frustrated. I don't expect you to change your mind, but I can hope, and I can always try to clarify my position a little more. So I hope you understand why I think the way I do, and I hope you know that I was only trying to help.

~Alley