Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of computer pranks

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 no consensus. - Mailer Diablo 22:54, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] List of computer pranks

Oh my. Probably the most uncited list on Wikipedia; replete with everybody's favourite funny thing which by some stretch of the word prank and by virtue of being accessible by computer might be described as a computer prank. Just zis Guy you know? 21:31, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

• There have been attempts tidy up the article [1] that seem be reverted constantly by varying IPs, but nonetheless it does appear to be just an uncyclopedic list of links. Wikipedia is not a repository of links, so I say delete. Cowman109^Talk 21:40, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete under WP:NOT a link repository and WP:NFT. Gazpacho 21:50, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep - I have reverted back to the cleanedup version. This has fewer links and better categorisation. BlueValour 15:23, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

  While the cleaned up version is indeed part of an effort to make the page more usable and less cluttered with external links, it does still appear to be a respository of links while WP:NOT states that is exactly what Wikipedia is not. It should probably be noted that this page is also a fork from Computer prank as the list there was cluttering the page too much (possibly a reason for inclusion). This could be a borderline case, though, as by its very nature a page such as this would end up being a repository of links. Cowman109^Talk 16:44, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

  My biggest problem here is the lack of any cited sources explicitly describing these as computer pranks. I think we should have a few of the most prominent and well-defined examples in the article on computer prank and leave it at that. Just zis Guy you know? 20:53, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

  That would probably be best, assuming that the information about the pranks was published by an external source somewhere to confirm its notability. Cowman109^Talk 06:45, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

  What external source? Who would go to the trouble of publishing anything on computer pranks, except for an encyclopedia like us? The only decent guideline for notablility is the ABS collection. Λυδαcιτγ 04:51, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

  Well that's just it - there would need to be some sort of way to determine which pranks were notable and which werent. If there isn't one, then perhaps many of these are not well known and are simply non notable, as Wikipedia is not for something made up in school one day. There wouldn't be a good way to keep people from simply advertising pranks they made. Cowman109^Talk 04:54, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• Delete: contents seems entirely WP:OR - the judgement about what should be included is not backed by published sources. Stephen B Streater 06:38, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete: List is fundamentally WP:OR. No content meets WP:V. For that matter, the parent article is unsourced as well, containing only one external link that does not appear to be a reliable source. Serpent's Choice 09:03, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep: Looks like a good article to me and isnt as sloppy as before. Johhny-turbo 22:32, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
• weak keep: as glad as I am to have this complete list all in one place (and I was wondering whose face that was in the "Say it" prank, so it's Linda Blair), I must admit that it does appear to be a repository of links, and as has been said before, that's not what Wikipedia is for. However, there are many other such lists on Wikipedia of examples pertaining to a specific article, and I'm not sure how different from those this can be considered, even given that it's a bunch of links. This was first put on a separate page from the main article on "computer pranks" because the complete list was cluttering up the page too much, and by its very nature, a page such as this is fundamentally supposed to be a repository of links anyway. Oh, and I'm not sure how much good it would do to have a section describing why these are classified as pranks, given that the original parent article on computer pranks explains that already. Are we supposed to copy even more material from the parent article and paste it into here, just to keep this page from being classified as WP:OR? I'm not sure what the point of that would be. Of course, on the other side, what else would citations be for on this page? What exactly are we supposed to cite? I don't know if it should be deleted or if it just needs work, but I can't deny that it is a list of examples of something with it's own page, and that has been done before. For instance, if this page is deleted, then why not go back further delete the entire page on Internet Memes, and all the articles that it is parent too? Maybe I'm just not savvy enough to understand the difference, but I don't see how that page is much further away from WP:OR than this is. --Sylocat 06:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC) Sylocat

  The issue appears to be that people at any time can simply add a simple prank that was made up someday, so the list inevitably grows larger and larger. Wikipedia shouldn't be used as a repository of links, however, and if anything, perhaps only a few examples of notable pranks could be mentioned on the parent article. Cowman109^Talk 17:06, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

  I've been checking additions to the list for notability and removing obviously non-notable ones such as you describe (example). I can promise you that the list will not become bloated like it was before. Λυδαcιτγ 18:25, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• keep just kidding DeleteWP:NOT a random collection of useless (non) information. and possibly WP:ORCheers. :) Dlohcierekim 18:10, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• Keep: Interesting to read, and useful as a counterpart to Computer prank. Whereas some readers may want to get a general overview from the main article, others are interested in delving deeper into these pranks, and will find a table-formatted list an excellent way to do so. I plead WP:IAR: this article serves a good purpose, and cannot possibly be created according to policy (WP:OR and WP:V) since to my knowledge there are no secondary sources related to computer pranks. In this case, the policies hinder us from developing an encyclopedia, so from a utilitarian point of view the maximally productive option is to ignore them. Here's a quote from an earlier version of WP:IAR which I found helpful: "Ignoring all rules is about cutting through red tape to construct an encyclopedia. Remember, Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy. Some actions may be reasonable, even if they might be against a strict interpretation of a certain rule." Λυδαcιτγ 18:50, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• This amounts to an argument that WP:INTERESTING trumps WP:V and WP:NOR. I would dispute that. Just zis Guy you know? 20:21, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• Two separate arguments are going on here. First, does the need for an article on this subject trump the lack of secondary sources? If not, both articles must go - neither has any real secondary sources, and the main article suffers from the same verifiability problems as this fork. The second argument, and the one that I think should be addressed by this AfD is whether this article is useful as a fork of Computer prank. I'm arguing that if Computer prank stays, this should too. Λυδαcιτγ

• Keep as a valid fork of the computer pranks article. We need forks to help keep main articles from being unwieldly and unfocused. The curious reader can then move to a list to see the breadth of the subject matter. It is in this precise manner that this list has value and without it the computer pranks article is weaker.Agne 18:38, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

• But it's not - it's largely a collection of things which are not verifiably significant so got kicked out of that article. If WP:NOT a web directory, how is it a directory of (often harmful) prank websites? Just zis Guy you know? 18:45, 11 August 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.