Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Duffy's law

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 of the debate was delete. Sorry, but the article does not satisfy the requirements listed at WP:V. There are no reliable sources with the only reference being the creator's web site. If anyone voting keep can properly source this article, I'll be happy to restore it. howcheng {chat} 20:07, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Duffy's law

Non notable (google) and probably an attempt at a promotional article for a controvertial / non mainstream belief system Tagishsimon (talk) 15:23, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

• Delete per my nomination --Tagishsimon (talk) 15:23, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete as per above. --King of All the Franks 15:24, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, per nom Tom Harrison ^(talk) 15:54, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete per nomination. The eponymous Mr Duffy is a proponent of Applied kinesiology, I can see why he thinks most people are wrong most of the time. --Quarl 21:20, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
• keep. I created this article because it's a useful aphorism, and despite Duffy's probable belief that he's right about AK, it humbles one to apply this to oneself. To my knowledge, Duffy did not self-promote any of his stuff to wikipedia, and as far as I'm concerned, deletion based on whether Duffy is working in a discredited field is a better argument for keeping it than for deleting it in this particular case, if only to show Duffy in his own words that he could be wrong, too. As a point of process, there was no discussion of problems with the article on its talk page before its nomination on AfD. Those problems may be fixable, if someone would say what they are? -- Vansig 05:55, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
• OK, you're right that AK is not that relevant here. But it remains that the phrase is a non-notable recent neologism. Google search shows 71 unique hits. First hit is his own website, which has no alexa data (in terms of WP:WEB that reaks of non-notability). The first hit not from that website or its guestbook is some user comment on IMDb about an unrelated fictional character named Duffy, the rest are equally unrelated or Wikipedia mirrors. It is not a problem with the article, it is a problem with the subject of the article (i.e. notability) -- which can't be fixed in the article. If it were this easy to create a "law" and then have an article on Wikipedia describing it, everyone would be creating "Quarl's Law" just to get free advertisement. As for process, most articles that are non-notable don't get Talk discussion before being brought here. I still vote Delete. --Quarl 08:12, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
• Keep, can't see what makes this unencyclopedic or unsuitable. It is referenced, and it isn't complete bollocks. Stifle 02:11, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
• please keep. Alexa/Google stats are really tricky measures for neologisms. Think for yourself: this may well be the only noteworthy produce from the Applied kinesiology crowd until they get their claims and experiments right. -- 70.29.131.204 19:41, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Not a noteworthy adage, not proven to be true, and it is the product of a very alternative chiropractor/conspiracist whose other theories are also not proven to be true. There's nothing inherently encyclopedic about a clever turn of phrase. -Will Beback 07:23, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
• keep: I'm in favour of creating some kind of technology-based filtering instead of deletion for non-notability-- Marvin147 10:18, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
• keep: Not proved false. -- Waveguy 15:51, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. I see the argument that "Duffy is a proponent for a controversial theory" as an example of guilt by association: a law coined by a proponent of this theory cannot possibly be true or notable. The law itself is not related to that obscure theory, and I'm content with it being here as long as links to "applied kinesiology" are removed from this article. Delete if removing the links is not possible. - Sikon 17:55, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Copied from Talk:Duffy's law:

This article was nominated for deletion on 27 Dec 2005. As of 3 Jan 2006 there is no clear consensus; while the question of notability is problematic for biographies, comix, music and eponymous laws, this article is exemplary of the problems with blindly applying Google/Alexa stats to the AfD process.

Suspiciously, the first three votes for deletion occured within minutes of this page's listing on AfD, all making no additional argument beyond the allegations of non-notability and self promotion. Have deletionists been running a xmas holiday deletion campaign?

User:Quarl astutely pointed out that unless notability is a question here, anyone could make up an eponymous law and promote it. I would agree, usually. But looking deeper into the implications of going ahead with deletion, it could spur increasing conflict between deletionists and inclusionists.

It could turn out to be staggeringly pivotal: inclusionists could do very well to allow the vote to sway against them for this article, and then both: offer the deletion as proof of Duffy's law itself, and at the same time make the claim that deletionists are purging the wikipedia of important but obscure knowledge.

So clearly, this article is not WP:VAIN, not WP:BIO and is NPOV; the article is of interest to multiple people, so it is totally noteworthy, just not very popular because most people don't like to apply it to themselves. -- 70.29.131.204 05:39, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

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.