Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Zombietime
- The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The result was delete. Consensus is clearly in favour of the view that the mentions of this website in reliable sources are just that - mentions - as opposed to any in-depth coverage (or the sources are themselves not good enough for RS status). There were also a number of
Zombietime
- Zombietime (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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Article about a blogger with no notability for an article of its own. Sole claims to fame are being one of 11 blogs blocked by a government for posting images of Muhammed, and expressing an opinion on a memorial design and asserting that a news story was a hoax despite all evidence to the contrary. The mentions in conservative blogs and so forth are trivial, and generally aren't mentions of zombietime itself but the general controversy "zombie" was a part of. Article also previously made claims that trivial mentions in conservative-slanted books (where hundreds if not thousands of such mentions are made) and getting one trivial "award" by a group that's not notable enough for a Wikipedia article was the proof of notability. I've done extensive pruning of article to try to lessen the severe POV of the article, but earlier minor such edits were reverted en masse. This page seems to be merely a place where people with a political axe to grind promote a minor axe-grinder who shares their views. DreamGuy (talk) 15:03, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions. -- –Juliancolton | Talk 17:48, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politics-related deletion discussions. —Cirt (talk) 20:44, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This debate has been included in the list of Websites-related deletion discussions. —Cirt (talk) 20:44, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Note: This debate has been included in the ]
- Weak Keep -- Zombietime isn't notable as an individual, nor for expressing opinions in the usual blogger way, but on the other hand, he/she is reasonably famous among some circles for going to left-wing events in the Bay Area and snapping photos, and a number of the photos have generated a fair amount of controversy. Would support a rename to "Zombietime photos", since it's true that Zombietime's activities other than the photos are not very notable... AnonMoos (talk) 15:16, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep—article is about a notable blog, not a blogger. It has been covered in a number of 3rd party reliable sources, in accordance with all notability guidelines. Argument that "Sole claims to fame are being one of 11 blogs blocked by a government for posting images of Muhammed" is blatantly incorrect, as likely the most notable incident that Zombietime is known for is the ambulance controversy exposé. —Ynhockey (Talk) 23:51, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- P.S. I will also note that the nominator is largely responsible for removing about half of the article, and from an initial read-through it's not clear to me whether he removed any reliable 3rd party sources, but it's worth a look. —Ynhockey (Talk) 00:01, 14 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I will not that your claims that my statement was "blatantly incorrect"' only works if you cut off most of the sentence that I actually said, as you did. It appears you either didn't bother reading my comments or are misrepresenting them. But if you agree that that's what he/she is most notable for, then you must admit he/she's not notable enough for a separate Wikipedia article. DreamGuy (talk) 18:45, 16 September 2009 (UTC) [reply]
- P.S. I will also note that the nominator is largely responsible for removing about half of the article, and from an initial read-through it's not clear to me whether he removed any reliable 3rd party sources, but it's worth a look. —Ynhockey (Talk) 00:01, 14 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete the claims to fame are tenuous at best, the sources on the page fall well short of the bar. There is no analysis, just passing mentions. Darrenhusted (talk) 00:00, 14 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep — the site is regarded as an important source by RS third parties. That makes an article about it in Wikipedia valuable. If there are third parties critising it, but all means include that so people can make up their own mind... but removing an article on a notable source of information would damage and not advance the project. Oboler (talk) 00:59, 14 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Strong Keep. I'll make several points, basically going through DreamGuy's message of "15:03, 13 September 2009" point by point. See also my recent comments at Talk:Zombietime.
- The article is not about a blog, nor about a blogger. It is about a website carrying photojournalism which (1) made a big impact amongst conservative (and libertarian?) bloggers and their readers, and (2) had a notable impact outside the blogosphere. (The blog/website distinction is not obvious, and the fact that 'zombie' now has a blog hosted at that website further blurs that distinction. But 'zomblog' did not start until April 2008, well after 'zombietime' became notable.)
- What makes zombietime an essential part of any good encyclopedic coverage of blogs (there's that tricky distinction again) is the impact the site had on and through conservative blogs starting in 2004. At that time, coverage of blogs and related websites in newspapers and other WP:RSeswas quite scant; AFAIK, there are no first-class secondary sources describing zombietime's impact. So we can only list instances of zombietime having an impact outside the blogosphere. (OK, we could list instances of conservative bloggers saying how important the website was, but I say that would not be encyclopedic.)
- And zombietime did have an impact outside blogs.
- The controversy which forced a redesign of the Flight 93 memorial basically started at zombietime. (Once again, we have no RSes demonstrating zombietime's role in the dispute. Like others who have edited the article, I am aware of zombietime's impact here because I followed the dispute at the time. (It struck me as an interesting early case of bloggers affecting 'real-world' politics.)
- A 'zombietime' photoessay forced the San Francisco Chronicle to (try to) defend itself against charges of bias.
- Another 'zombietime' photoessay arguing that Human Rights Watch propagated a hoax about Israel attacking an ambulance helped create a furor that forced HRW to (try to) defend its reporting
- The Weblog Awardsare the only awards that create any significant 'buzz' amongst political and science bloggers and their readers. Again, AFAIK they get little if any mainstream media coverage, but anyone who follows those blogs will know about them. (We should have an article about the 'webbies'. I for one would have created it if I knew of any usable RSes about them.) Winning a 'webbie' is a non-trivial accomplishment especially for a website that is not a blog.
- I'm not claiming "that trivial mentions in conservative-slanted books" is "proof of notability" (these quotes are from DreamGuy, above). AFAIK, no-one has made that claim. I'd say that any such claim is wrong, and that the use of zombietime's photos in Unhingedis not worth mentioning in the article. (OTOH, I am claiming that winning a webbie is not "trivial", even if we don't yet have an article about those awards.)
- It was I who "reverted en masse" DreamGuy's "earlier minor such edits". I did so because IMO they were (1) far from "minor", (2) violated our rules and (3) damaged the article.
- I'm here to improve our coverage of zombietime, not promote it.
- I'm sorry for using the word "blogosphere" here. It's ugly, but convenient. Cheers, CWC 04:12, 14 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Your idea of "improving" the article so far has been to include clearly promotional language and slanted information, and your concept of what our rules say is entirely different from what are poloicies actually are. DreamGuy (talk) 18:45, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Reaction: Hmm. I say that WP:EL allows links to YouTube channels which do not carry copyright-infringing videos; DreamGuy disagrees. I think my understanding of the project's rules is fairly good (within limits: image licensing is not one of my strengths), and I'm open to advice, corrections and trout-slaps.
- I do not think I've "include[d] clearly promotional language and slanted information" in this article; I make an effort to not do that. If(when?) I slip up, I welcome rewrites ... but not blind reverts, please. CWC 02:51, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- BLP protects people, not necessarily websites. As I said on AN/I, the fact that this somewhat obviously right wing website lacks any sources which characterize it as such should send ]
- Oh dear oh dear. Unless zombie is an AI (in which case zombietime is really notable!), BLP protects him or her.
- And here's a source calling zombietime "right wing".
- Cheers, CWC 08:05, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- BLP protects people, not works. I have a much lower threshold for referring to a book as right wing than I do the author. Assuming that BLP extends from the author to the creation is both wrong and dangerous, because BLP is a powerful tool to suppress criticism. Protonk (talk) 13:52, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- BLP protects people, not necessarily websites. As I said on AN/I, the fact that this somewhat obviously right wing website lacks any sources which characterize it as such should send ]
- Reaction: Hmm. I say that
- Your idea of "improving" the article so far has been to include clearly promotional language and slanted information, and your concept of what our rules say is entirely different from what are poloicies actually are. DreamGuy (talk) 18:45, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep Per all the reasons above. Clearly a notable blog cited in third-party reliable sources.talk) 04:31, 14 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep passes WP:notability- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 04:45, 14 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- keep The blog has been in the news repeatedly for different events. Seems to pass ]
- Any proof of REAL news coverage, or do you just mean other far right sources tried to use the site to advance their editorial cause? Please cite actual news stories from reliable mainstream news sources separate from political posturing if you make that claim. DreamGuy (talk) 18:45, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete or merge to 2006 Lebanon War photographs controversies#Ambulance controversy. If you look closely at reliable third-party coverage of this fairly minor blog, it has only received significant coverage for one episode - its commentary on the incident linked above. All of the other coverage consists, as others have already said, only of passing mentions. There simply is not enough coverage to make this blog notable for anything more than its 15 minutes of fame in 2006. -- ChrisO (talk) 00:43, 15 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete — no non-trivial references outside of a far-right-wing walled garden. I would have no objection to a brief mention in 2006 Lebanon War photographs controversies#Ambulance controversy as suggested by ChrisO above. *** Crotalus *** 13:44, 15 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment: A "]
- In Croatalus' defence, I have to say that you're misinterpreting his comments: the "walled garden" he speaks of refers to the external references, not Wikipedia articles, and "far right" does not automatically equate "conspiracy-minded racists", as our far right article makes clear. Zombietime is certainly conspiracy-minded, though, as its coverage of the Lebanon ambulance issue showed. -- ChrisO (talk) 08:16, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- 1. Croatalus wrote nothing about links. 2. Our article on the far right strongly implies that they are conspiracy-minded racists ... which it should, because they are. 3. Zombie explictly states that "no 'conspiracy' is necessary to explain" the Ambulance reports. CWC 08:05, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Zombietime is not really famous for expressing far right opinions, anyway -- Zombietime is famous for the photos snapped at left-wing events held at the Bay Area... AnonMoos (talk) 09:31, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Actually, Zombietime is not "famous" at all. *** Crotalus *** 14:26, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Zombietime is not a broad celebrity like Lindsay Lohan or whatever, but within Zombietime's chosen field of endeavor, Zombietime is reasonbly well-known (similar to tens of thousands of other people with biographies on Wikipedia), as I explained in my previous message of 15:16, 13 September 2009 above. AnonMoos (talk) 22:17, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- In Croatalus' defence, I have to say that you're misinterpreting his comments: the "walled garden" he speaks of refers to the external references, not Wikipedia articles, and "far right" does not automatically equate "conspiracy-minded racists", as our
- Delete per lack of apparent existance of substantial reliable sources. Sources that discuss this website either only mention it in passing, or are themselves not up to the muster at WP:RS, many only marginally above the "blog" level of reliability. If actual, mainstream, reliable sources could be shown to discuss this website in depth (not just in passing) then I could be persueded that the article could be kept. But I don't see anything right now that looks promising. --Jayron32 21:05, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete due to lack of non-trivial reliable independent sources which are actually about the subject, rather than just mentioning it in passing. A redirect or smerge would be equally acceptable, but we really don't have enough for an article about this website. Guy (Help!) 21:26, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per Jayron32, couldn't put it any better. ukexpat (talk) 21:29, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete Minimally sourced. The sourcing which refers to the subject does so in passing. The article focuses heavily enough on the site so as to be inherently promotional. Protonk (talk) 22:00, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep as per CWC. Another zombietime issue that received a good deal of press coverage related to the Google/Memorial Day issue (when it was noted that Google had never changed its logo on Memorial Day, as it had done for many other holidays). That was covered by CBS News [1], and several different US News and World Report ([3]) with a link to his photo essay. This website isn't Daily Kos, but it's also not your Aunt Mildred's cat blog. Horologium (talk) 22:32, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per nom and Jayron32. Casual passing mentions do not a reference make, whether they be in reliable sources or not. ]
- Delete - All the claims to notability in this AfD are that the site was "mentioned" in various publications. Simply being mentioned does not satisfy WP:N, coverage must be significant to be considered evidence of notability. -- Atama頭 00:01, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I have found two columns (one from the San Francisco Chronicle reader's representative and one from The Guardian reader's representative) that focus extensively on two separate zombietime photoessays. The one from the Chronicle which is linked above by CWC) discusses the photo taken by the Chronicle at an anti-war rally, and zombie's challenge to the context missing from the photo. ([4]) The Guardian column is a response to zombie's ambulance photoessay and the Guardian's coverage of the issue. ([5]) Both of these columns alone justify retention of the article, as they cover two separate events, and they offer significant discussion of the subject in mainstream, reliable sources. Horologium (talk) 00:18, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Both of those cover the photo controversy and not the site. Protonk (talk) 00:41, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Controversies (note the plural), and both issues are specific to issues raised by zombie, on zombietime. Without the photoessays, there would have been no controversies, and that doesn't address the impact of zombie's coverage of the Flight 93 dispute. Horologium (talk) 00:48, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The source of those controversies is largely immaterial. The fact remains that the coverage of the subject is minimal and tangential. Protonk (talk) 01:23, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The source of the controversies is the subject. You can't separate them, because without the subject, there would have been no controversies. It's not tangential at all. Horologium (talk) 01:26, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Also covering the same material covered in a reliable source does not mean that reliable sources actually cover the WEBSITE. Replace the website name with a person's name. If it said "John Doe found out that..." or "John Doe reported that..." and then it makes no effort to explain who John Doe is, or why he is important, and makes no further comment on John Doe, then there isn't anything there to build an article around. The coverage still is not about the website, its about something the website reported about. Again, lets find something where the website itself is the subject of the article, NOT where the website is mentioned a single time in passing somewhere in the article. --Jayron32 01:53, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The source of the controversies is the subject. You can't separate them, because without the subject, there would have been no controversies. It's not tangential at all. Horologium (talk) 01:26, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The source of those controversies is largely immaterial. The fact remains that the coverage of the subject is minimal and tangential. Protonk (talk) 01:23, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Controversies (note the plural), and both issues are specific to issues raised by zombie, on zombietime. Without the photoessays, there would have been no controversies, and that doesn't address the impact of zombie's coverage of the Flight 93 dispute. Horologium (talk) 00:48, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Both of those cover the photo controversy and not the site. Protonk (talk) 00:41, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I have found two columns (one from the San Francisco Chronicle reader's representative and one from The Guardian reader's representative) that focus extensively on two separate zombietime photoessays. The one from the Chronicle which is linked above by CWC) discusses the photo taken by the Chronicle at an anti-war rally, and zombie's challenge to the context missing from the photo. ([4]) The Guardian column is a response to zombie's ambulance photoessay and the Guardian's coverage of the issue. ([5]) Both of these columns alone justify retention of the article, as they cover two separate events, and they offer significant discussion of the subject in mainstream, reliable sources. Horologium (talk) 00:18, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep - At this point there has been enough coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject. Here are some additional sources: 16 in books, 46 in news, 15 in scholar. Cirt (talk) 00:53, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- In a quick scan of a half dozen of the articles in Google News, I notice that none of them is really about the website itself. Again, 46 single sentance mentions of the website does not necessarily equal any depth. Substantial coverage, as noted at WP:GNG, would imply that the website itself was covered by the sources, not merely mentioned. Having the name dropped a few dozen times doesn't really make it notable. --Jayron32 01:57, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- In a quick scan of a half dozen of the articles in Google News, I notice that none of them is really about the website itself. Again, 46 single sentance mentions of the website does not necessarily equal any depth. Substantial coverage, as noted at
- Delete per Jayron. Ironholds (talk) 01:22, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per above. --John (talk) 01:41, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Non-arbitrary section break
- Delete - Despite the number of sources, the most I've lookedat don't seem to give any detailed or significant information about the website, and it would therefore seem to be non-notable. Skinny87 (talk) 07:42, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment. All but the last two of the preceding !votes were made before I found a scholarly paper (and added it to the article)
- Stephen D. Cooper. A Concise History of the Fauxtography Blogstorm in the 2006 Lebanon War, American Communication Journal, Vol 9, Issue 2, Summer 2007
- As the title suggests, it's primarily about the controversy about coverage of the 2006 Lebanon War. The next biggest topic is an analysis of two of zombies essays. (BTW, I wouldn't call that paper "concise".)
- In terms of WP:GNG, this is "more than a trivial mention" (first bullet point), reliable (second point), a secondary source but only one (third point), and independent of the subject (fourth point). I contend that this paper, in addition to playing a role in 2 widely-reported controversies and winning the blogosphere's equivalent of an Oscar, establishes notability.
- (I also found this criticism of the coverage of the Mactelkerfuffle. Tilt.)
- Does anyone want to change their !vote? CWC 08:09, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Quick comment on your source - the professor at Marshall specializes in blogs and web media, which is the topic of his book. He discusses several blogs in his book, because that's what he studies. I don't know that that makes any of the blogs he discusses particularly more noteworthy than any of the others.
- I'm also not convinced that this blog played more than a very minor role in the two "widely-reported controversies" you mentioned. The zombietime article lists three controversies: The Flight 93 National Memorial, The Mohammed Image Archive, and the 2006 Lebanon War/Red Cross ambulance incident. The description of the first of these controversies states that "similar claims were made by a variety of blogs and news outlets". The description of the second states that "zombietime was one of 11 blogs listed on a Muslim hacker forum". Neither of these strikes me as being particularly unique or noteworthy, or any reason to single out this blog above any of the other blogs or bloggers that complained about the memorial or posted the Mohammed images online (or both). The only true "claim to fame" that I can seem to find for this blog is related to the 2006 Lebanon War and the controversies therein. Given that, I'd rather see it merged into the 2006 Lebanon War photographs controversies article as ChrisO suggested earlier, or deleted (as the topical material is pretty redundant between the two). ← George [talk] 09:39, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- P.S. I think the list of pages that link to this one is pretty telling. (Spoiler alert! Only one article links to this one - the 2006 Lebanon War photographs controversies article) ← George [talk] 09:42, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I followed the blog posts which led to the F93 memorial redesign, so I happen to know that zombie started that ball rolling. But sourcing this would require citing lots of third-party blog posts (ugh) and that would unbalance the article (bigger ugh). And yet the memorial is an interesting early example of New Media affecting a government project. Architectural Record's (rather good, IMO) report was quite right to single out zombietime, but I say a claim based on z being singled out would be WP:OR.
- Flight 93 National Memorial should cite that Arch. Rec. item and link to zombietime. It now does both.. CWC 00:02, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I agree, it's a good source, and thanks for updating that other article. I'm just not sure that the coverage of zombie related to the memorial (one paragraph in one source) is sufficient to warrant the article. For what it's worth, I think you've changed my mind from delete to weak delete. I wouldn't personally be opposed to keeping the article and trying to clean it up, though I'm still not convinced that it should be kept either. ← George [talk] 00:14, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I followed the blog posts which led to the F93 memorial redesign, so I happen to know that zombie started that ball rolling. But sourcing this would require citing lots of third-party blog posts (ugh) and that would unbalance the article (bigger ugh). And yet the memorial is an interesting early example of New Media affecting a government project. Architectural Record's (rather good, IMO) report was quite right to single out zombietime, but I say a claim based on z being singled out would be
- P.S. I think the list of pages that link to this one is pretty telling. (Spoiler alert! Only one article links to this one - the 2006 Lebanon War photographs controversies article) ← George [talk] 09:42, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Regarding the scholarly paper cited above, its reliability is high, but the mentions are still kind of trivial. The paper itself amounts to 43 pages of computer screen text (on my computer) and the entirety of the coverage of the Zombietime Website in that paper amounts to two paragraphs of original text, and a quote of another paragraph's worth of material from the Zombietime's website itself. This is certainly better than anything else presented so far, but I still don't see this as enough. --Jayron32 12:58, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Huh? I count eight paragraphs of original text focused on zombietime, plus another eight (depending how you count bulleted lists) or so of quotes from zombie. Clearly, while the focus of the paper is the "Blogstorm" (Cooper's word, AFAIK), zombies essays are the next biggest 'topic'. Unless WP:GNG has changed since I last read it, this is a perfectly good source ... but only one. CWC 00:02, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Sorry, I was looking for refs of the website not the author. Re-looking at it with the name "Zombie" as a search term does turn up more coverage. Still, it's coverage of Zombie's coverage of another incident Again, better than anything else we have so far, and I am getting closer to changing my vote, but I would need to see more stuff like this... --Jayron32 01:35, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Huh? I count eight paragraphs of original text focused on zombietime, plus another eight (depending how you count bulleted lists) or so of quotes from zombie. Clearly, while the focus of the paper is the "Blogstorm" (Cooper's word, AFAIK), zombies essays are the next biggest 'topic'. Unless
- Delete; with an eye to merging the good tidbits in 2006 Lebanon War photographs controversies. — Coren (talk) 10:47, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per Jayron32's reasons. Potentially, a slew of RS mentions could push it up and over the talk) 14:26, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete/Merge Keep the bits and pieces related to the 2006 Lebanon War photographs controversies, ditch the rest as above. — ℳℴℯ ε 14:59, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Delete per Jayron32. Consider salting.—S Marshall Talk/Cont 16:21, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep per CWC and Cirt. 15 cites in Google scholar does it alone. --tickle me 16:33, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- With respect, I think you misunderstand what notability requires. I could probably find 15 cites, mentions or quotes of my own comments or works in reliable sources. That would not make me notable, though. Mentions or citations are not enough to establish notability - we need material that actually covers the article subject in non-trivial detail, but unfortunately we have very little of that here. -- ChrisO (talk) 18:02, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Speedy Keep. A quick check of news.google.com shows multiple instances of non-trivial press coverage. THF (talk) 20:54, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Examples? Convince me. -- talk) 21:24, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- There are at least four on this page—I cited two and CWC found that journal article, plus the Architectural Record article on the Flight 93 memorial, and there are several more already in the article. The two reader's representative columns I cited cover two different events (one is a US paper discussing coverage of an anti-war rally in San Francisco, the other a British paper covering the ambulance issue, and there are at least three articles dedicated to the ambulance issue from Australia (already cited in the article). That's three different continents, and three separate events. Not to mention that the site was singled out as an "enemy of Islam" for hosting the Jyllands-Posten cartoons, and blocked by the Pakistani government. Horologium (talk) 01:05, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- As has been pointed out above, what we need is coverage of Zombietime, not mentions of what Zombietime said about another issue. Where is the coverage that goes into some detail about the history of the site and what changes it may have undergone, or provides some description of how it's valued or criticized by others? We need coverage more detailed than what we get from the sources you mention. That's what the mentions of "substantial" and "trivial" coverage are about at talk) 01:56, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Have at it. You'll not see me contributing to Conservapedia, and from what I understand, they don't use the same license we use, which means that it can't be ported over there. FWIW, the bar that is being set here is going to result in carnage among our blog coverage, because there are very few blogs that have coverage of the blog itself in reliable sources. I suspect that fewer than a dozen blogs have substantial coverage of the blog's history in multiple reliable sources. I plan to nominate Americablog for deletion for the same reason used to delete this article. There is little to no coverage of Americablog itself, only reactions to the Jeff Gannon photos and Wesley Clark's cell phone records issues. Horologium (talk) 02:05, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- If proper sources can't be found for that one, I'd vote to delete. Please let me know if you nominate it. And about porting it over there: I think that if you write something, you get to port what you've written, so if you've contributed a lot to this article, I think you're free to do that (and rewrite whatever isn't your own work). -- talk) 03:33, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- If proper sources can't be found for that one, I'd vote to delete. Please let me know if you nominate it. And about porting it over there: I think that if you write something, you get to port what you've written, so if you've contributed a lot to this article, I think you're free to do that (and rewrite whatever isn't your own work). --
- Have at it. You'll not see me contributing to Conservapedia, and from what I understand, they don't use the same license we use, which means that it can't be ported over there. FWIW, the bar that is being set here is going to result in carnage among our blog coverage, because there are very few blogs that have coverage of the blog itself in
- What you're asking for is pretty much what Zombietime has been intentionally trying to avoid -- Zombietime prefers to remain strictly anonymous as an individual, and Zombietime has rather little interest in bulking up the web hits of the Zombietime site as a goal in itself, or making the Zombietime website itself the main focus of a story. What Zombietime is actually interested in is influencing people's opinions by providing photographic documentation, or calling attention to photographic documentation, which throws light on various controversies and disputed issues (and Zombietime is more interested in influencing people's opinions directly or indirectly than in promoting the Zombietime site as such). Zombietime has in fact been reasonably successful at this goal of achieving influence, which is why an article on the Zombietime site deserves serious consideration for inclusion in Wikipedia. It seems to me that the Zombietime site should be judged on the basis of how far it succeeds in what it has set out to do, rather than on whether it jumps through a set of quasi-arbitrary hoops or generic criteria which were devised for different types of websites than Zombitime's, and have little usefulness in truly meaningfully evaluating the Zombietime site's notability... AnonMoos (talk) 09:56, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- No, what we're concerned about here is whether the site is notable enough to be included, not whether the site met its own goals. The "generic criteria" are Wikipedia's criteria for Wikipedia's purposes, and we have them in order to keep Wikipedia roughly fair in how it decides what to include or not include, because it helps us to base a decision on some kind of objective proof. One way that we can be roughly fair with whether or not to keep, say, Americablog, is to use the same standard we use here, and vice versa. Otherwise we'll have simple I LIKE IT/I DON'T LIKE IT political fights, or at least a lot more of them. (By having generic criteria, the LIKE/DON'T LIKE voices are [supposed to be] ignored, or they have to jump through extra hoops, working to disguise their goals -- we want to make that hard and make it easy to focus on nonpartisan ways of measuring importance.) As far as this decision is concerned, Zombietime's own purposes are irrelevant. -- talk) 13:58, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- That's nice. All I'm asking is that the site be evaluated for what it actually is, instead of being evaluated as something which it never was claimed to be or intended to be, just because it's a little atypical, and can't be conveniently slotted into preconceived inflexible rigid bureaucratic categories... AnonMoos (talk) 17:23, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- What it actually is is a site that doesn't get enough reliable sources that give us substantial, not trivial amounts of information on it. That's what it is, as far as talk) 20:14, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- What it actually is is a site that doesn't get enough reliable sources that give us substantial, not trivial amounts of information on it. That's what it is, as far as
- That's nice. All I'm asking is that the site be evaluated for what it actually is, instead of being evaluated as something which it never was claimed to be or intended to be, just because it's a little atypical, and can't be conveniently slotted into preconceived inflexible rigid bureaucratic categories... AnonMoos (talk) 17:23, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- No, what we're concerned about here is whether the site is notable enough to be included, not whether the site met its own goals. The "generic criteria" are Wikipedia's criteria for Wikipedia's purposes, and we have them in order to keep Wikipedia roughly fair in how it decides what to include or not include, because it helps us to base a decision on some kind of objective proof. One way that we can be roughly fair with whether or not to keep, say, Americablog, is to use the same standard we use here, and vice versa. Otherwise we'll have simple I LIKE IT/I DON'T LIKE IT political fights, or at least a lot more of them. (By having generic criteria, the LIKE/DON'T LIKE voices are [supposed to be] ignored, or they have to jump through extra hoops, working to disguise their goals -- we want to make that hard and make it easy to focus on nonpartisan ways of measuring importance.) As far as this decision is concerned, Zombietime's own purposes are irrelevant. --
- As has been pointed out above, what we need is coverage of Zombietime, not mentions of what Zombietime said about another issue. Where is the coverage that goes into some detail about the history of the site and what changes it may have undergone, or provides some description of how it's valued or criticized by others? We need coverage more detailed than what we get from the sources you mention. That's what the mentions of "substantial" and "trivial" coverage are about at
- There are at least four on this page—I cited two and CWC found that journal article, plus the Architectural Record article on the Flight 93 memorial, and there are several more already in the article. The two reader's representative columns I cited cover two different events (one is a US paper discussing coverage of an anti-war rally in San Francisco, the other a British paper covering the ambulance issue, and there are at least three articles dedicated to the ambulance issue from Australia (already cited in the article). That's three different continents, and three separate events. Not to mention that the site was singled out as an "enemy of Islam" for hosting the Jyllands-Posten cartoons, and blocked by the Pakistani government. Horologium (talk) 01:05, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Examples? Convince me. --
- Delete (or merge) per ChrisO above. Only a single page links to this article, even though it has been around for almost three years. Fails to meet notability beyond one event per ]
- Delete - non-notable blog; lacks significant coverage in reliable third-party sources. One possibility would be to redirect to ]
- Delete - notability is marginal. The references are either to the blogger's site, or to brief mentions in mainstream media. --John Nagle (talk) 05:14, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Keep. Clearly meets notability criteria 1 and 3 of ]
- Comment - Actually I like it but still advocate deletion. Clearly does not meet criteria one, I'm guessing you missed where it says that it must be the subject of published works. That doesn't include being mentioned in passing. I really don't understand your criteria 3 claim, who is redistributing content of the web site? Sure, some news sources quote Zombietime but that's a far cry from saying that what they're published is being redistributed. -- Atama頭 18:14, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I agree. I really don't understand the criteria 3 claim - it's completely inapplicable to this case. -- ChrisO (talk) 18:46, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- (to Atama, after E/C with ChrisO) Actually, it does meet criteria 1 for WP:WEB does not require discussions of the site's history or stucture; only the content, which is what all of the fuss is about. And for what it's worth, I have no stake in this article; not a single word of it was written by me, and I have no connection to zombie. Horologium (talk) 19:08, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- If no independent, reliable source has given us more than a trivial amount of information about the site, as opposed to giving us information about what the site commented on at particular points, how are we supposed to ever have an adequate article that fully describes the subject? We can't seem to get information enough for an encyclopedia article because it doesn't seem to be out there. We're an encyclopedia, not a directory. -- talk) 20:14, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The San Francisco Chronicle article was an editorial piece about a picture that the Chronicle had posted. Zombietime itself wasn't the subject of the article, the Chronicle itself was. The same can be said for the Guardian editorial. The fact is, neither was about Zombietime itself, so criteria 1 of WP:WEB doesn't apply. And for what it's worth, I've never heard of Zombietime before this AfD. -- Atama頭 22:55, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The San Francisco Chronicle article was an editorial piece about a picture that the Chronicle had posted. Zombietime itself wasn't the subject of the article, the Chronicle itself was. The same can be said for the Guardian editorial. The fact is, neither was about Zombietime itself, so criteria 1 of
- If no independent, reliable source has given us more than a trivial amount of information about the site, as opposed to giving us information about what the site commented on at particular points, how are we supposed to ever have an adequate article that fully describes the subject? We can't seem to get information enough for an encyclopedia article because it doesn't seem to be out there. We're an encyclopedia, not a directory. --
- (to Atama, after E/C with ChrisO) Actually, it does meet criteria 1 for
- Comment - Actually
- Weak delete. I'm not sure that websites/blogs are a proper topic for an encyclopedia. I also get a talk) 05:47, 19 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- There's not much doubt that it was originally created to promote the website. An editor called User:Zombiefan created the first version, which was nominated for speedy deletion as blatant promotion in January 2007 [6]. He (I think) subsequently removed the speedy deletion tag and was responsible for writing much of the content. -- ChrisO (talk) 11:08, 19 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.