Wikipedia talk:Do lists of postal codes belong on Wikipedia?

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List of ZIP codes in the United States

And all of the pages linked from it. Move to Wikisource. RickK | Talk 21:12, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Wikisource appears not to want them, so a move option doesn't exist. Perhaps you'd like to change to suggesting something which is doable and relist? Jamesday 09:35, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

List of ZIP codes in Oregon 6 entries
List of ZIP codes in Arizona 1 entries
List of ZIP codes in Texas 2 entries
List of ZIP codes in Minnesota 5 entries
List of ZIP codes in Iowa a lot of entries
List of ZIP codes in Ohio 2 entries
List of ZIP codes in Florida 2 entries

were added today from wikisource. Maximus Rex 21:44, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I just undid the wikisource side of the move. Delete en.wikipedia versions -- Cyrius | Talk 22:30, Mar 28, 2004 (UTC)
- Ugh, Eclecticology has been doing this for the postal codes of other nations as well. -- Cyrius | Talk 22:52, Mar 28, 2004 (UTC)
delete all. --Jia ng 23:06, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Keep or merge with lists of cities. anthony (this comment is a work in progress and may change without prior notice) 00:58, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Keep, though it might be more useful if it actually gave specific ZIP codes for each region. Would be a long page, though; it looks like there are around 41,000 ZIP codes in use. Plus, I imagine there may be some kind of copyright applicable to a complete collection of that information. -- Wapcaplet 01:11, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- There's no copyright issue for lists of this sort. It's simply factual data and ineligible for copyright, at least in the US. Not sure if it was ever federal employee work product, which would place it in the public domain as well. Jamesday 09:35, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
User:Eclecticology has stated that he will oppose any attempt to put the postal code lists on Wikisource, and that he will not be taking part in the VfD process. -- Cyrius | Talk 04:50, Mar 29, 2004 (UTC)
Why even have these if they're not complete (and who are we going to get to complete them if we decide to keep these articles?)? Also, isn't the information available elsewhere on the internet? I'm not voting yet, just wondering what's going on. -Seth Mahoney 06:27, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- It's a wiki, so it' s expected that it'll be incomplete until it's finished. Jamesday 09:35, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Since when does one person's opinion override the consensus of everyone else? Move back to Wikisource. Ambivalenthysteria 09:51, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- Since it's Ec. He refuses to agree that there's anything as consensus. RickK | Talk 01:36, 30 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- They were probably voted on as a move to wikisource. Since wikisource doesn't want them, that makes it necessary to have a delete vote here. Jamesday 09:35, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Delete. These were already voted on which is why they were moved to Wikisource in the first place. If Wikisource choose to delete them, that's their issue. They can't expect us to take back these unencyclopedic lists just because they don't like them. Angela. 10:53, Mar 29, 2004 (UTC)
- If they were voted on as a move to wikisource, they should come back here if wikisource doesn't want them. Jamesday 09:35, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Delete. Agreed with Angela. Wile E. Heresiarch 13:46, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Keep. See Talk:Lists of postal and ZIP codes of the world/Delete. These are indexes to locate related content by location. Add any which are missing. Jamesday 09:35, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Lists of postal codes

See above List of ZIP codes in the United States discussion.

These all either need to be moved back to, or moved to Wikisource and delete -- Cyrius | Talk 23:22, Mar 28, 2004 (UTC)
Keep or merge with lists of cities. anthony (this comment is a work in progress and may change without prior notice) 00:59, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Delete. These were already voted on which is why they were moved to Wikisource in the first place. If Wikisource choose to delete them, that's their issue. They can't expect us to take back these unencyclopedic lists just because they don't like them. Angela. 10:53, Mar 29, 2004 (UTC)
- Sounds as though there wasn't a vote to delete them here, only to move them to wikisource. If wikisource doesn't want them, they should come back here. Jamesday 09:44, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Delete. Agreed with Angela. Wile E. Heresiarch 13:46, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Comment: Please also consider List of stations of the Paris Métro, and all of the stations it links to(lots of data but almost no encyclopedic content).Chicago 15:39, Apr 3, 2004 (UTC)
- Keep and expand those. Looks like it'll be an interesting series of articles once it is complete. Jamesday 09:46, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Keep and expand to cover all countries. See Talk:Lists of postal and ZIP codes of the world/Delete. These are useful indexes to locate related content by location. Jamesday 09:44, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Keep here for now. These belong on Wikisource. It's an extremely bad move to give one person sole authority over what stays or goes there, regardless of who it is. I think these should be saved until the situation is rectified. - Hephaestos|§ 15:22, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)

List of ZIP codes in Oregon

Why are we moving things OUT of Wikisource? RickK | Talk 20:52, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Why delete this page but not similar pages about other U.S. states?? 66.245.65.5 20:55, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- I was just coming here to discuss that. See below.
Keep or merge with List of cities in Oregon. This is no worse than that list. anthony (this comment is a work in progress and may change without prior notice) 01:06, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Delete. These were already voted on which is why they were moved to Wikisource in the first place. If Wikisource choose to delete them, that's their issue. They can't expect us to take back these unencyclopedic lists just because they don't like them. Angela. 10:52, Mar 29, 2004 (UTC)
- They were probably voted on as a move to wikisource, not as a delete even if wikisource doesn't want them. Jamesday 09:25, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Delete. Agreed with Angela. Wile E. Heresiarch 13:45, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)
dlete. --Jia ng 00:16, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Delete. Maximus Rex 00:17, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Delete. Cribnotes 23:35, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Keep. See Talk:Lists of postal and ZIP codes of the world/Delete. These are indexes to locate related content by location. Jamesday 09:25, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Keep. According to Wikipedia:What is an article, "A Wikipedia article is defined as a page that has encyclopedic or almanac-like information on it ("almanac-like" being; lists, timelines, tables or charts)." Almanacs do have ZIP Code lists in them, although in a slightly different presentation (numerical only within state). Also, as the note on the Wikisource page points out, it is MUCH easier to link to the city and other names on Wikipedia, FROM pages ON Wikipedia. If they are moved to Wikisource, either someone has to edit them all to point back to WP, or they are a bunch of red links begging people to enter city articles on Wikisource, which wouldn't be appropriate. Finally, I don't believe there is anyway to find out what city a certain ZIP Code belongs to on usps.com, so there is value to the lists. Niteowlneils 23:53, 24 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Delete. This is another example of a list which will be very difficult to maintain in Wikipedia but which is easily and reliably available outside Wikipedia. Rossami 21:25, 19 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
1. Even though we think of them as very stable, zip codes are periodically changed. When someone makes a correction in the middle of the list, it will be functionally impossible for a future reader to know if that change represented a correction or vandalism. Unlike our content-rich articles, there is no critical mass of experts who will watch this article and be able to immediately sort out the corrections from the vandals.
2. In contrast, here are just a few locations where the same information (US anyway) is easily and reliably available - some free and some for-fee. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] Admittedly, these are in a different format - usually a web-based lookup (which I will argue is more useful than the formats we can accomodate in Wikipedia).