The usefulness criterion would allow promotional articles and edits. Automated spam should still be deleted, but promotional handwritten stuff that contains some facts is better than nothing. Subsequent edits can remove the spamminess.
Of course, this means an article on any topic is OK. In a web encyclopedia, that's the right thing.
I would like to see someone create a new Wikipedia entry about Mzoli's that says "Mzoli's is a small restaurant in South Africa that sparked a fierce controversy among Wikipedia contributors..." Ironically, if deletionists were right before, they are certainly wrong now. Mzoli's does now have significance :-)
Everytime I visit Wikipedia I contemplate writing a Greasemonkey script that would get rid of the "this article lacks citations" warning. I think they are definitely on the wrong track, hopefully they'll be able to change the direction again soon.
The usefulness criterion would allow promotional articles and edits. Automated spam should still be deleted, but promotional handwritten stuff that contains some facts is better than nothing. Subsequent edits can remove the spamminess.
Of course, this means an article on any topic is OK. In a web encyclopedia, that's the right thing.