Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Sneed's rumor

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 Speedy redirect to Inaccurate media reports of the Virginia Tech massacre. This article was begun as a bogus copy & paste "move" of Michael Sneed (AfD discussion) (itself since renamed) when that was nominated for deletion. There is no reason to have two deletion discussions for the same thing. The usual, long-standing, procedure for cases where articles are copied during an AFD discussion is to simply include the copied articles under the same AFD discussion umbrella as the originals. I am therefore speedily closing this discussion. Please contribute to the discussion of the original article, rather than this 11-edit copy. Uncle G 13:06, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Michael Sneed's rumor

Michael Sneed's rumor (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

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article is serving to provide forum-like material in terms of arguing for/against columnist Michael Sneed and Chicago Sun-Times coverage of the Virginia Tech massacre. Violates WP:POINT, WP:N, and arguably other WP guidelines; Delete Mhking 03:04, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

• Keep. or merge with the other one. The event is significant enought to have its place in wiki. Ww2007april 05:56, 19 April 2007 (UTC) — Ww2007april (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• Delete. This is just getting ridiculous. Delete (or at least merge into Virginia Tech massacre).

_└^Jared_┘^┌_talk^┐  03:05, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

• • I do not understand why this should be merged into Virginia Tech massacre. This is a social event showing the irresponsibilities of some media.
    • Comment. Because it means nothing. Because it doesn't deserve a full article of its own. It is not notable in the grand scheme as a seperate entitiy. Therefore merging it into the massacre page simply turns it into anothing bit of information about that instead of pretending it is an event in it's own right. --Jimmi Hugh 03:55, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
      • Keep This article is too long to be tucked in the VT Massacre entry.Dongdongdog 06:35, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Merge. This article and Michael Sneed contain the similar content. It describes a historical event rather than a bio, so suggest to merge that one into this one. Also the title might need to be changed to conform to wiki rules.--Zhangwl03:11, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Delete As above... --Jimmi Hugh 03:25, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Keep, this article is a literal description of an event. People writing this article and people reading this article demonstrates this is a notable topic. Dodidwiki 03:32, 19 April 2007 (UTC) — Dodidwiki (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
  • Comment. I am not sure what counts a personal insult... but i don't think this does, and my apologies if anyone thinks it is... but, are you high? Please don't waste reading space with comment's like this. --Jimmi Hugh 03:52, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Delete. This article devotes an inordinate amount of attention to something which turned out to be "a newspaper columnist printed something that turned out to be incorrect" -- something that happens every day. Sneed didn't even libel anyone with the inaccurate information, given that she didn't identify the person she believed to be a suspect. At most this might be worth devoting one sentence to in Virginia Tech massacre and/or Michael Sneed, not a full article of its own. --Metropolitan90 03:32, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Considering the attention and mixed feelings resulted from Michael Sneed's false claim from across the world, the attention to an article like this to clarify the fact is never 'inordinate'. It's very important for people to be able to know the detail of this event from Wikipedia, because such information is not readily available from other sources, for example, a statement from Chicago Sun-Times or Michael Sneed herself. Dodidwiki 03:58, 19 April 2007 (UTC)— Dodidwiki (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Comment - Wikipedia is not a soapbox. There are plenty of blogs, message boards and forums that are deigned as soapboxes. Wikipedia is not one. You want to rail against the Sun-Times and Sneed? That's your business. But not on Wikipedia. --Mhking 04:02, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment The fact is if the thing is handled properly from the very beginning, this may be just another 'something that happens every day'. But now it's notable event for its own sake, irrelevant of what Sun-Times and Michael Sneed have done. The article here is NOT a request for apology or whatever. Even if that happens, it doesn't void the value of the entry. Any on-going development of this event will be put into the wiki. The article is here to record a history. Dodidwiki 04:30, 19 April 2007 (UTC)— Dodidwiki (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Keep, the impact of this event is globally, and this rumor was cited all round the world. It's a notable topic and deserves its place. georgeww 04:04, 19 April 2007 (UTC)— georgeww (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• delete, per my reasoning at the related AfD discussion for Michael Sneed. With reference to an earlier comment here: I would note that while media outlets do indeed print incorrect statements every day, not all of them are picked up on and repeated globally in association with a high-interest event. Agreed that the present treatment of it is way too exhaustive and not in proportion, but I think it warrants more than only a passing mention. The place it needs to be mentioned however is the main VT shootings article itself,which is the proper and most relevant context -and not as a stand-alone fork which could readily be seen as an attack or denigration.--cjllw ʘ TALK 04:13, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

• Keep If the false report offends too many people, then it would deserve its own article on wikipedia.Dongdongdog 06:30, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

• Keep - The details presented are valuable and interesting, and would simply clog up the main article if merged in. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) (talk/cont) 04:38, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Keep, this article covers an important incident just happened and the article itself can become an important information source in the future. As we all know facts easily become blurred with time pass by, I strongly recommend keep this article bluegene_ca 03:26, 19 April 2007 (UTC)— bluegene_ca (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• Delete; Apparently a lot of Chinese people felt uncomfortable the other day, because for a short while they believed that the killer was Chinese. A few hours later they found out he wasn't. And that's it. But some people want to immortalise this minor event with its own article, in order to demonstrate how irresponsible Sneed is. This isn't notable in itself, and it certainly isn't notable in the context of the entire massacre. At best it warrants a sentence in the VT article. Masaruemoto 05:08, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep As Masauruemoto said, it affected a lot of Chinese people. Who might not be as important as American people, but in large enough numbers, they still count.--Isocyanide 05:50, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
    • Yeah well nuclear threats during the cold war affected lots of people but we don't have an article on each and every one. You know why? Because people then knew that they were ok. They had no doubts over their morality so they didn't need to prove it by looking like they care on some website. Also they weren't pathetic PC fools who think shows like open all hours made racist jokes because they make mention of black people being black... --Jimmi Hugh 06:02, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Keep one of the articles; the rumor was widely reported and notable. It has much higher impact than say Essjay controversy and Seigenthaler controversy. On the day of the shooting, the public was anxious to know the gunner's identity and Michael Sneed/Chicago Sun-Times apparently rushed to release the "exclusive" information without proper verification. This constitutes a serious violation of journalism standard. This rumour incident is now the subject of several sources such as [1]. --Vsion 06:11, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Merge small portions of relevant information. I think a few paragraphs are adequate. Not a full page of information. Radio-x 06:20, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Keep per has proper citations. the_undertow ^talk 06:41, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Delete, as I have argued on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Sneed, this blows the ceiling off of WP:NPOV#Undue weight and would violate WP:BLP if more than a fraction of a proper Sneed biography article. Maybe if there are lawsuits later on this could become notable, but as it is, there simply are very few news articles from reliable sources actually reporting on the false identification as a story. --Dhartung | Talk 06:56, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
• Delete. This is a minor footnote to the real story. BTLizard 09:47, 19 April 2007 (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.