Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Butt harp

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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. Singularity 05:37, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Butt harp

Butt harp (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (delete) – (View log)

Non notable sex toy. The only mentions are by the one person, RICHH on some blog. I can't find any other mentions on the web. Also, the book entry states only a mention of the device, but fails to give any description about it. I say delete per WP:N and possibly WP:V. Undeath (talk) 00:33, 31 March 2008 (UTC) Undeath

  • Delete, with a suppressed giggle. A couple of pornographic stories posted to USENET hardly count as sources! Zetawoof(ζ) 00:40, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete sounds like a hoax, at least I hope it is. AlbinoFerret (talk) 02:47, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete Wikipedia is not for things made up on Usenet one day -- and this clearly was made up one day, as it hasn't been covered in any reliable sources. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • (Broken clamshells•Otter chirps) 03:01, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete, I agree it's probably a hoax, and there does not appear to be enough coverage to establish that it is a notable hoax. Lankiveil (speak to me) 05:00, 31 March 2008 (UTC).
    • "Hoax" would imply that it was intended to be taken seriously. The sense I get, looking at the USENET posts, is that it was intended to be a somewhat silly erotic fantasy, nothing more. Zetawoof(ζ) 05:58, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
      • Aye, that's what I meant - it's not a real object, but rather a bit of a joke. And one that never really caught on. Lankiveil (speak to me) 04:27, 1 April 2008 (UTC).
  • Delete - Fails WP:RS and in my opinion is WP:MADEUP. Not encyclopedic in anyway. Obliterate... POOF! --Pmedema (talk) 16:20, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep. OK, I'm the article author, so I'm obviously a little biased. But I did not primarily write this article because I thought it was funny or cute or anything like that. I would not create an article just to tell a joke, no matter how good. I came across the phrase and had to dig a little to find out the definition and history. And once I did that, I thought it was article worthy for the following reasons, which I mentioned on the talk page for the article:
    • this article explains the naming of a usenet newsgroup, something which I think should happen for every usenet newsgroup up to the beginning of the net explosion, around 1995. As a key forerunner of the probably millions of web forums that exist today, usenet history is important.
    • it relates to the history of one of the earliest internet social groups, talk.bizarre, which I think should be documented. Up until 1995, the number of internet based communities which took on a physical component (with the members holding gatherings and flying cross-country to meet each other in person, moving in with each other, etc.) is probably only in the range of a couple of dozen; alt.callahans is the only other usenet one I can think of from this period that was not professionally based. Documenting the history of how virtual community became physical community in the early days of the net is important.
    • richh is fascinating as someone who led a double life, writing numerous stories of his supposed escapades that blended in real people and real facts from his life, while never revealing that he was in fact seriously disabled. Despite having actually met and dated people via his participation in online community, the fact that he was usually restricted to a wheelchair, unable to use one side of his body, did not become public until after his suicide in 2001. I find this pretty compelling, and probably worthy of a separate article.
    • I don't know if anyone has ever built one of these or tried to use it, but I'm far from sure how many people have actually performed a Dirty Sanchez either. Since the article notes that the device may well be fictional, I don't see a problem.
    • It's not OR, it's not NPOV, it's verifiable. It's not a hoax, though obviously I didn't stress the probably fictional aspect enough. It's not something a friend of mine made up; I'd not heard of it or richh until around when I wrote the article. I'd agree that it was only trivially notable if it weren't for the usenet connections. -- Akb4 (talk) 07:37, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
  • nuke it even the article contributers admit in the article that little enough is known they're not sure if its real or not. Hardly encyclopedic. --BrucePodger (talk) 21:27, 4 April 2008 (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.