Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Davido, Victoria

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. — JIP | Talk 07:06, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Davido, Victoria

A hoax. As per recent discussions at the Australian Wikipedians' noticeboard. It is not on Geoscience Australia which does have localities no longer extant such as Homebush, Victoria or Dondangadale, and thus is extremely unlikely that Davido was ever a recognised Australian place name. The original editor cited a book reference. An Australian wikipedian reviewed that book and others and found:

The book cited by the editor, The Colonial Experience: the Port Phillip District 1834-1850 seems to be a school textbook, consisting mainly of diary entries of Victorian pioneers, covering the timespan 1834-1850 (obviously). The Davido article states that the town's active period was between 1867-1871 (beyond the timeframe of the textbook). There is no index in the book, and so I scanned the pages for mention of Davido - but there seemed to be nothing.

I checked the indexes of numerous books on nineteenth century Victoria, particularly those covering the Hamilton area, and found no mention of the town. I also checked the index volumes of the Victorian Historical Journal, which dates back to 1911, and this also revealed no mention of Davido.

Finally, in the genealogy room, I found Angus B. Watson's excellent and addictive book Lost & Almost Forgotten Towns of Colonial Victoria: A Comprehensive Analysis of Census Results for Victoria 1841-1901. This book includes all towns and villages as defined by the Government Statist for collection of Victorian censuses from 1841 to 1901. This includes settlements of as few as 13 people, yet there was no mention of Davido, which the article claims had a population of 1,500.

My conclusion is that the article is most definitely a hoax. If anyone wants to put this up for AfD, feel free to use the information I've just supplied. -- Cnwb 06:26, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

• Delete A Y Arktos (Talk) 07:51, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Xtra 08:25, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete according to WP:V. Cnwb has gone to great lengths to verify this and failed. I can add that there were no hits on Macquarie.net, an online resource sponsored by Macquarie University. A Google search revealed nothing useful see [1] and a search of Websterworld an Australian online research database proved fruitless. Capitalistroadster 08:29, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Impresive effort Cnwb. Ben Aveling 11:07, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Australia-related deletions. -- A Y Arktos (Talk) 08:32, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Thanks Cnwb for the quick response to finding the book, and the extra efforts you made. --Scott Davis ^Talk 11:11, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Fantastic effort Cnwb (it can't be said too many times!) -- Chuq 11:30, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. ditto what everybody else said. -- Adz 13:32, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete per Cnwb and Capitalistroadster. encephalon 14:47, 5 November 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Brilliant bit of sleuthing by Cnwb to show this is a hoax. --Roisterer 03:58, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Maybe move the page to Wikipedia:Bad_Jokes_and_Other_Deleted_Nonsense as a sort of tribute?

Regards, Ben Aveling 02:24, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Ben, lets move this page to the jokes and nonsense page. bad luck to the suckers who made this up, try find something better to do with your time like Cnwb who has spent hours oh his life trying to prove this wrong! excellent work guys. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.51.162.131 (talk • contribs) 22:29, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

The suckers? You mean yourself? I think vandalism that is obviously false or a joke should go to BJAODN, but creating articles that look real, and even making up fake references when asked.. I think BJAODN would give the vandal the "immortality" he wants. -- Chuq 11:55, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Chuq. This guy sets up a page and wastes our time, then posts a message on user talk:ScottDavis telling him that he just had to test the system and see how reliable wikipedia is, while on the Davido, Victoria talk page, asks us whether we have nothing better to do with our lives than investigate fraudulent articles, refers to himself on this page as 'the sucker who started the article' and wants it put up on BJAODN. If it were the case that he was a well meaning wikipedian who wanted to test the system and intended to make valuable contributiotions, I'd perhaps be inclined to let him while keeping a close eye on him, but under the circumstances, I can't see why we shouldn't block him for a long time. What are the policies about that? Do we have to warn him before we block him? (I refer to him as 'him' instead of 'him or her' because the person who started this article originally called himself David Foley - the same guy who wrote about a boy named David Foley living in Hamilton, Victoria. See the Australian Wikipedians' noticeboard for more info about David Foley's pranks. -- Adz 00:23, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

We didn't have to prove it incorrect. We could have said, "prove it, or else we delete it". Boring and Effective.

I think Cnwb did the look up because it was fun, and educational, and I don't see it as a waste. IMHO, it was a stylish victory in a complicated game. OK, the world isn't a better place for it, but hey, no dumb animals harmed in the making and all that.

If we admire the play, we can BJAODN with full credit to Cnwb and no credit to the vandal.

Regards, Ben Aveling 02:23, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

I think that it is good that people are taking this project and its verifiability as seriously as Cnwb. This is naturally an unreliable source and it is to Cnwb's full credit for looking this up in verifiable sources. If only everyone had the time to check everything on Wikipedia. Xtra 05:13, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Hey guys, I'm the d**k who did this. Umm I would just like to verify that I am not David Foley and he had very little to do with this. I just wanted to point that out because he is very angry at me. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.51.162.131 (talk • contribs).

Very little isn't nothing. What was David's contribution? Regards, Ben Aveling 09:11, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

David asked me how they monitor pages and I said I would find out for him and whilst at his house I created the page called Davido, Victoria. I will apologise once more, but if you don't accpet my apology I understand. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.51.162.131 (talk • contribs).

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.