Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/O RLY? (2nd nomination)

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 O RLY Keep. Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 01:19, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

O RLY?

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Survived the last AfD (see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/O RLY?), but still thoroughly unencyclopedic, and throughout the three months since the last AfD, has been a vandalism magnet and has been used to justify the existence of many unencyclopedic articles. There is no way that a serious encyclopedia, online or not, should include this one. Delete. --Nlu (talk) 17:34, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep Wikipedia is a place to get information. This article contains usefull information.

• Keep it. Wikipedia isn't the freaking World Book. This is a unique entity, and it is used by us, the people, to define the world around us.

• Keep seriously just keep it if you guys delete articles then what is soo good of wikipedia shouldnt it have all kinds of information?

• Keep There are bigger fish to fry in Wikipedia.

• Keep. Internet culture. --teckjunkie

• KeepPopular culture is a part of culture and as such part of our society and daily life. You will agree with me that internet today also forms some kind of popculture, right? the "ORLY" expression has to be looked upon as part of this. so why delete it? if you delete this you should do the same for Freebird and other popular expressions from popculture. I do agree however that this article is not really what you imagine as enyclopediac style. but deletion is the wrong impulse. deletion will spawn thousand new articles instead. so go ahead and try to rework this article to an encyclopediac level and then lock it from vandalism.

• If O RLY goes, LUEshi goes. I think most people would agree that they're on the same level here. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia for just about everything that you don't understand or know, and I find it to be a very good place to go when I have no idea who the chuckling pirate baron I see is. Keep. --Blinkstale 17:43, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Whether LUEshi should be deleted is a different issues. We have to take them one at a time; otherwise, we get into a "we should keep A because B is not deleted" and "we should keep B because A is not deleted" cycle forever. --Nlu (talk) 21:12, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. 1) The last nomination resulted in a consensus to keep, so we can ignore 'still thoroughly encyclopaedic' because it wasn't a problem last time and so shouldn't be this time. As for the new reasons, 2) Vandalism isn't even close to being a big problem on this page. I've seen high-vandalism targets, this isn't one of them. 3) We certainly shouldn't delete articles just to make arguing a certain side on AfD easier. --Malthusian fa(talk) 17:47, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep noteworthy 58.6.95.139 17:48, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep: You have to be kidding: O RLY is one of the more famous internet memes. Wikipedia should inform people about it. GoldenTie 17:53, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Uh, why? What redeeming value does it have that people should be informed about it? --Nlu (talk) 23:17, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

What standing do we have to decide that people should not be informed on a notable topic? Adrian Lamo ·· 21:24, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

If they want to be informed, they can go elsewhere. It's not like Wikipedia owns the Internet. What Wikipedia aims to be is to be an encyclopedia; something this unencyclopedic does not belong. --Nlu (talk) 04:06, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Consensus does not seem to be in favor of your contention. Wikipedia exists for the benefit of the reader, and it's most appropriate for us to include topics that users are likely to search for information on. Adrian Lamo ·· 01:08, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

• You wouldn't dare! >:( "SRSLY" though, this is widespread enough that I think it's worth keeping. (I ended up here because I was looking for a link to explain to my friend what "O RLY" is.) In her words, "The whole world knows and I'm the only one left out :(" Keep. --jeian 18:46, 11 February 2006 (GMT+1)

• This vote was actually cast by User:193.80.2.162, not User:Jeian. [1] --Malthusian (talk) 17:55, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep personally I dont care for this article, but its been kept once, and that should be an end of it in my view. Jcuk 18:26, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Merge with other similar articles, into a larger 'internet meme' article. The article is highly repetitive, unsourced and speculative and it could be compressed to about two sentence. Much the same can be said about 95% of all other articles of this nature. A more general reference article could be much more useful. Barring that, delete. Non-notable - similar in nature to extremely specialized "Star Trek" wiki, etc.. --Hamiltonian 18:28, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per Blinkstale. New Progressive 18:29, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep – Yes, this has been kept once already, and the article is fairly nice. The topic isn't completely trivial, either. Finally, it would make a nice addition to WP:UA, though that didn't factor into my decision. – ClockworkSoul 18:31, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Apply for semi-protection if you think that vandalism is that much of an issue, but I don't see how that would be a reason for deletion. This article refers to the most notable internet expression there is.SoothingR 18:48, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, notable Internet meme Luigi30 (Ταλκ) 18:54, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, there really isn't any debate here. O RLY? is a very important event in internet pop culture. The simple fact that virtually everyone online knows of the owl makes it a nessicary article.--SeizureDog 19:09, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Being well-known doesn't mean that it's not extremely, extremely stupid. --Nlu (talk) 21:14, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely true, but stupidity is not, and never has been, a criteria for deletion. (Unfortunately.) Marblespire 04:35, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep, and enough with people nominating notable phrases or memes for deletion. Adrian Lamo ·· 19:47, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. I'm a 4channer, but I honestly don't think this should be here, nor LUEshi. This is an encyclopedia, not a collection of underground community memes. --Anonymous, 21:31 CET, 11 February 2006 - actually posted by 82.159.70.25 (talk • contribs)
• Keep Definitely worthy of a place, and has survived the VFD before —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Winckle (talk • contribs).
• Keep I see no reason to remove information from Wikipedia. Non-notable is hardly a valid arguement for something I'm sure 90% of Wikipedia users have heard about. --Falcorian ^(talk) 20:38, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, notable internet memes are encycolpedic. Might I also mention here that anyone interested in this type of issue should voice their opinions in the deletion review of Brian Peppers. VegaDark 21:39, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment - Nice vote farming. FCYTravis 01:11, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
    • How is bringing an issue to people's attention vote farming? I didn't say "Only those who vote keep go look at Brian Peppers". Also, last I checked, the only voter that came from here voted against undeleting Brian Peppers. Nice try though. VegaDark 03:16, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Delete RLY TRLY. This is not a meme worthy of inclusion, it is a passing fad not even making a ripple on the surface of the memepool. We are not l33t-sp33k, nor are we an urban dictionary. Lose the fluff and lets try to fill in the redlinks of truly notable stuff, shall we? KillerChihuahua^?!? 23:13, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, it's a massive internet phenomenon, probably more often used than leet. --Rory096 23:18, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep silly but notable. Content of the article seems fine. Mikker ^... 23:51, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
• Delete, for an encyclopedia, this is utter nonsense.--Sgstarling 00:01, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, Still, even things that are extremely, extremely stupid might find a place inside the warm walls of Wikipedia. Many things that Wikipedia contain are quite narrow (smaller communes in France are surely not the interest of most of the world's English speaking population), but still worthy of inclusion. The O RLY-owl is definately worth the inclusion, and probably much more well known than the commune of Tulle. The petty space it occupies is surely not vast enough to warrant an exclusion. I'm quite sure the O RLY-owl isn't keeping us from analyzing imperialism in Africa, or the ungoing struggle against poverty. Ya RLY, keep the owl!Shandolad 00:23, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. If it was unencyclopedic, it wouldn't have survived the last AfD. the iBook of the Revolution 00:54, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, for all people might hate the meme, it's fairly notable. We should write on notable things whether they're silly or not. -- Mithent 03:04, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, o rly is more of an internet meme than most of the halfassed crap I've never heard of that's listed in the memes article, so it shouldn't be singled out for deletion. The article itself upholds all of Wikipedia's values regarding NPOV and verifiability. I hate o rly and find it vastly annoying but it's still just as valid a topic for discussion as AYB etc. Some winamp 03:48, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Comment: If vandals are a problem, why don't we just protect the page? Deleting an article just to stop vandalism article seems a bit like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Marblespire 04:22, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

It's not just the vandalism; it's that this is an article that has no redeeming value that I see and brings only trouble. There's nothing to balance the trouble of dealing with the vandalism against, because this article has no value. --Nlu (talk) 04:24, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Comment:This article's redeeming value is that it provides information on an obviously notable subject. Honestly, I think it needs no other justification than that. --Falcorian ^(talk) 16:53, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep: Just as many other internet memes are listeed on Wikipedia, "O RLY?" deserves to stay. The O RLY owl is still an ongoing part of internet culture and will continue to be used for a long time to come. If one wishes to seek information on this meme, one should be able to do so in a more controlled and reliable environment such as wikipedia. (eloquent but unsigned 1st and 2nd edits by 70.110.199.88 ~Mbsp)
• Keep. O RLY? is a sufficiently notable Internet meme (one of the most widespread memes around, currently) to be Wikipedia material. A Google search for "O RLY?" turns up 347,000 hits, and the article itself is properly NPOV and sourced. Unless Wikipedia policy is changed to declare that Internet culture in general is non-notable, I don't see any reason to delete. Redxiv 04:56, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Redxiv summed my opinion up quite well. Definitely notable, great article. Why do people want to delete it so badly? It's not harming anything. Varco 05:08, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Some people get real sick of fads, Varco. Doesn't stop them from being notable, though. The Taped Crusader 05:22, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Many others have already articuled the reason I think it should stay.--O.F.Fascist 06:10, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Notable internet fad. --Blu Aardvark | ^{(talk) | (contribs)} 06:11, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Just because you don't see any 'redeeming value' in the article doesn't mean it's not worth having. If that were the case, I could find several articles that most people would find 'redeeming' and I do not. It's not like the article is comprised of, "O RLY? YA RLY! NO WAI! LOLOLOLOL!". For an article about an internet meme, it's quite informative, well-constructed, and complete. Furthermore, it's 'redeeming' for those that have seen the meme and are wondering about its use or origin. In short, just because you don't like it doesn't mean it shouldn't be here. ~ WindOwl 07:33, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Notable internet saying. Is encyclopedic. ChronoSphere 07:45, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep 'O RLY?' and the O RLY? owl have become an internet legend of sorts, and if this one is deleted, then every other article on an "internet legend" should go as well. This has become part of the internet culture, and should definitely stay. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 130.157.39.52 (talk • contribs) 08:23, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep as a notable internet meme, garners approximately 350,000 hits on Google right now. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 10:36, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Notable by my definition. Everyking 10:39, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, as it's one of those things I'd never heard of before, and it was very useful to be referred to this page. I'm sorry to hear that it's a vandalism magnet, but surely there are better ways to prevent that than simply deleting the information? from tigerbright@LJ —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.218.146.149 (talk • contribs) 10:52, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep as per every other keep vote. --220.239.77.85 11:28, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. DOH RLY? // Gargaj 12:54, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, but semi-protect due to vandalism. 69.138.229.246 15:22, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, o RLY is a great sensation. --Rick Browser 15:28, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. While some may find it annoying, annoyance does not translate into non-notability.--み使い Mitsukai 15:48, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, notable meme. Rhobite 17:20, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, this is what makes Wikipedia useful matt kane's brain 17:33, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep notable internet memes. --badlydrawnjeff (WP:MEME?) 17:54, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep I'm willing to keep an eye on it to stop vandalism. It gets tons of hits, and it's informative. James Kendall 18:57, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep pf Merge It shows up all the friggin' time. I've been out of country and mostly away from the net for a year so I never saw this one evolve. I had to look it up on Wikipedia and saw that it might get deleted. Gornzilla 19:27, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, YA RLY!!! Seriously, this is notable just as so many other internet memes on Wikipedia. bbx 20:09, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, I don't see the point of deleting this entry, it seems as valid as Goatse or most of the other articles about internet memes. Chris Buckey 20:19, 12 February 2006
• YA RLYkeep. I hate it, but unfortunately it's notable. bogdan 20:23, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keeep. I'm not really a fan of this meme either, but it is very notable. The reasoning that it "has been a vandalism magnet" is not a valid one IMO. George W. Bush is a vandalism magnet, should we delete that also? However, I would also like to see the article made more encyclopedic. --PS2pcGAMER (talk) 21:09, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Delete This isn't the place to list every random internet slang word. At best, it shold be part of a list of similar terms. ---J.Smith 21:13, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep This is MAJOR internet stuff. Why delete? What's wrong with it? even used this article to explain what O RLY is to my friends. RLY should not go. 82.5.225.131 22:11, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
• keep please erasing this does not make any sense it was kept in december 2005 too Yuckfoo 00:13, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Delete Of interest and relevance only to a vanishingly tiny percentage of the Earth's population. My guess is 95 percent of people have never even heard of this term. For those who have, in ten years it'll be just a nostalgia thing. Put this in a dictionary of internet memes. It doesn't belong here. Denni ☯ 00:25, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

We could say less about your personal page, regarding global familiarity. Does that mean it should be deleted? -Akaroo 23:18, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

My user page, and the user pages of anyone else here, are not meant to be encyclopedic. You will not find it in a search of wikipedia unless you are deliberately looking for it and know precisely how to ask for it. Besides, user pages are not bound by the same rules that articles are. If this troubles you, you can always raise your concern at the village pump. Denni ☯ 01:24, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Disregarding asanine comments about people's personal pages, I'd estimate that less than 5% of people in first-world countries know what a cyclotron is. Obscurity is not itself adequate reason for the removal of an article. As it stands, Wikipedia is quickly becoming a place where people can go to quickly find out what a word or phrase means, and that's not a bad thing at all for an online encyclopedia to be.Fdgfds 19:17, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

My point exactly. Just today I remembered a show I watched when I was little called Zoobilee Zoo. When I looked it up on wikipedia there was only a picture and some brief information about it, but that's all I wanted. O RLY might not be much more than a picture of some owl and a short blurb about it, but people will hear it being used and they will come to this site to find an unbiased answer on what it is. What good (to the average internet user) is an encyclopedia that only has "sophisticated" information? -Akaroo 19:20, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. --Myles Long 00:35, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Wikipedia is not paper. Being an Internet-based encyclopedia, these sorts of articles would be of interest and note to many of its users. It meets notability; just because it is vandalized often is not a reason to delete. The Featured Articles also get vandalized often and nobody puts them up for AfD. Crystallina 02:19, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. It's impossible to simply disreguard this article as a passing fad, since it is impossible to predict how long the meme will last. I've seen O RLY being used in real life in a similar manner as on the internet by numerous people, suggesting that it is far from diminishing in strength. Also, 95 percent of people not having heard of the term is totally irrelevant. 95 percent of people have not heard of Simo Hayha. It is ridiculous to continue trying to delete this article because you don't like the outcome of a previous delete vote. Instead, try fixing the article if it's so "unencyclopedic." Anyhow, the article is obviously notable because of the large response it is generating, thus it should not be deleted. syphonbyte 02:30, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Comment. O RLY?! 70.152.47.105 02:50, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. This is a major meme, not just a passing fad. No reason for deletion. -Rmzy717 AT SCHOOL 02:38, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Very silly, yet very notable. Grandmasterka 02:52, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Notable. Letoofdune 05:12, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Delete, pure nonsense, per nom Page history shows that this vote was made by 3H.

Pure nonsense? Explain what part of social symbol dynamics is 'nonsense'. -Akaroo 23:14, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. SRSLY! Meme's like this has as much impact on daily life in the modern age as the catch phrase 'Hey Charger' did in the 70s. The Medium that its cast upon has changed, but the idea has not. O RLY 4 Teh Win~~1111oneleven!!11.
• Keep. Very large and popular meme, I usually link this exact page to help explain it to people who haven't seen it before User:Senner 18:19, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Not very many internet memes are notable, this one is. Hall Monitor 22:05, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Some of these users claim that O RLY isn't worth hosting on wikipedia because it is not notable enough. Yet when you click on the personal article for these same users, they have dozens of kilobytes worth of worthless information on their page. Sure, we'll delete O RLY on the grounds that it's not important enough as soon as you delete your entire bio that maybe a few dozen users will ever look at.
  The fact is that wikipedia is an encyclopedia. Not some ritzy collection of articles arbitrated by self-proclaimed psuedo-intellectuals. Everything from kitty litter to physics belong here. -Akaroo 23:11, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Comment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_litter

• Keep. Tenacious as hell and not going to go away soon. If I had no clue what it was, this article would be a huge help. <fontce="georgia">Snurks ^{T C} 01:00, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. We clearly have different ideas of what "serious encyclopaedias" should include. Mine is that any such encyclopaedia should not just pretend things don't exist because they are problematic. Grace Note 01:39, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. It becomes more apparent that some Wikipedians sems to have a problem with YTMND. They have deleted the article on Brian Peppers and are attempting to delete this page. If this page goes, than internet acronyms like pwn, noob, and lol should not stay either. Kntrabssi 02:22, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep notable internet meme we should document. Yamaguchi先生 02:32, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. This article is a useful and informative. For those who don't know what the heck "O RLY" is supposed to mean, this article is extremely helpful. I myself was linked to it on a forum after asking its meaning not so long ago. Even if the meme is not "notable" (although I believe it is) or if some think the meme is stupid, it is informative and helpful to many people. YA RLY! Mokupo 02:36, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Jm51 02:46, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Don't be funny-fascists. This is Wikipedia not Wikigulag. Phontain 02:59, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Umm.. guys? it's a picture on the internet, there is nothing of encyclopedic value here. This is purely academic, but delete. Friday (talk) 03:11, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Really really really strong delete in protest. I would have voted "keep", till I saw the sheer amount of meatpuppets that hit the vote. So I'm voting "delete" as a symbolic act of protest. Elle _{vécut heureuse} ^{à jamais} (Be eudaimonic!) 05:19, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keeep...Ya rly - THis old is the worst thing to hit the internet since lee hotti. But just cause something is gay doesn't mean you delete it. We don't delete the Michael Jackson article because no one likes MJ anymore. False Analogy? Hah! beat you guys too it. Now I said it first so you can't accuse me of making one. Muhahaha.--God of War 06:05, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
  • What the hell does that do with anything? MJ is notable because he is the King of Pop. We are disusing this on the grounds nf notability, which is dubious here. This has not been around since the Internet was born. I don't know what the hell are you talking about... - Hbdragon88 06:22, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per all above. --Terence Ong 06:21, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Delete as a load of bosh with no encyclopedic value. Keresaspa 12:33, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Whilst I agree that this is not neccessarily the type of thing that a traditional encyclopaedia would cover, this type of thing is very useful to know for the average forum user. Besides, if this isn't valid, then neither is the All your Base phenomemon. Markusdragon 12:57, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Notable and verifiable Internet meme. --Ashenai 12:59, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, annoying meme but has risen to the level of notability, and (most) information is verifiable. The article being a vandal target is not a good reason to delete it. -- nae'blis _(talk) 14:43, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Being unhappy with the consensus from a previous AfD is not a good reason to renominate. Nor is vandalism - Wikipedia has many ways to counter article vandalism, but deleting a page has never been one of them. Turnstep 15:59, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep I find this no less notable than a lot of Internet_phenomenons for which we already have articles. -- BinaryTed 19:11, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep or Merge The content of the article is a useful record of the birth and life of a piece of pop-culture, and serves as a written record of an event that is very rarely recorded. To delete it would be unacceptable, but to be merged into a larger article on Internet Memes would be perfectly fine.Fdgfds 19:17, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep and wikify: Possibly the most notable internet neologism. Savidan 19:39, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep notable meme.  ALKIVAR™ 19:43, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Its name is Jonathan, my name is Jonathan end of story —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Lowgear (talk • contribs) 20:46, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

You realize that we can't really accept that as good argument, right?SoothingR 21:22, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Shame, as it's a good one. James Kendall [talk] 22:41, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. It's not doing much damage, is it? David | Talk 22:42, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

• Keep Found this article while browsing WP:UA and found it informative and enjoyable. Why on earth would you want to delete it? ~ Veledan • Talk 22:48, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
• Keep If Ate My Balls can get an article, this certainly can. ShadowMan1od 00:35, 15 February 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.