Delete Me

Used to mark time-sensitive text for deletion. Set a date of deletion (e.g.: 'DeleteMe after October 31, 2003') if you want anyone to actually do the deletion. Without them, most Wiki contributors will leave these brave, humble instructions around, for many years in some cases.

Moved from DeleteHint, which wasn't being used:

An EditHint set by the FriendlyPeerContributor to suggest the original contributor should delete some text, even a single character, to improve the readability or some other value.

Reason::

contributors can easily see via inverse links what needs editing
FriendlyPeerContributors have a handy marker for reuse

The most frequently used WikiBadge or EditHint that's not a category or topic. There were 55 instances before we started to go through them in April 2000.

Did you actually do the deletion, or did you just delete the DeleteMe tag? Do you have any metrics on how often PlainEnglish idioms for DeleteMe have been used, and how many of those have persisted for even longer?

DeleteMe has sometimes been used to label an aside, or to indicate that an author is requesting information or correction, for example:

frammitzes rotate clockwise (or is it anticlockwise? DeleteMe)

A conciser view is that the question mark is itself an EditHint, for example:

frammitzes rotate clockwise (or is it anticlockwise?)

Should be edited by a knowledgeable reader to:

frammitzes ALWAYS rotate anticlockwise North of the Equator.

See ProudRefactorer for some additional discussion of "DeleteMe".

I use this as a way to send little editorial messages that I intend for someone specific to read and then delete. I think it's a good idea to know who it is you think will delete your DeleteMe message before you put it up. It's not going to happen magically - at least not very quickly. -- PhilGoodwin

If the editorial message is on a signed contribution, the message would be more effectively placed on the signed contributor's home page; if not signed, do the work yourself - it's the WikiWay!