Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/PSentry

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. The essential fact is that software that merits inclusion in the historical encyclopaedic record is in the extreme minority... and neither third-party sourcing nor strong argument indicates that this software is outside the minority. --Sam Blanning^(talk) 02:09, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] PSentry

Article started by User:Wikrockstone and read strongly as an advertisement. Was prodded and prod2ed as an advertisement for a non-notable piece of software (Google returns only 56 unique results for PSentry plus ("Plus" as in "Plus Communications", the developer), or 61 for PSentry filter). The article was since rewritten to be more neutral in tone by User:Idealistic cynic and the prods removed, but this does not address the notability issue. ~Matticus ^T_C 21:43, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

It seems I mistaked the article's discussion page for this one. I take mild offense at the fact that you would insinuate I deleted comments from here or that my removal of the page was vandalism as it's obvious by the discussion page at PSentry that I was attempting to discuss the issue at hand.

PSentry is somewhat notable in the Corporate and specifically the Corporate Security sectors as being a more indepth piece of security software, both in network blocking and in logging capabilities than Websense. Just because it doesn't show up in a "google" doesn't mean it isn't notable. Due to the nature of this product, it was marketed directly to my CMO, and he passed it down the line to me. I get the suspicion that this is how it's generally used and thus its web presence is de-emphasized as you've seen in your google results. --Idealistic cynic 17:56, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Ah, a second note, sorry about that. I've now fully read up on the policy, I had yet to learn that AfD's should stay up for 5 days or that they had their own specific discussion pages. I apologize for removing it, but as the saying goes, don't attribute to malice what could more easily be attributed to ignorance. Well, that's not the saying, but it makes me seem a little better ;).

I don't really see this piece of software as being any less notable than say...Bleach_(anime) or any number of other articles here on wikipedia. It applies to a very specific subset and Wikipedia is known for covering even the most trivial details extensively. If there's any doubt there, check the almost complete episode guide with detailed description for every single episode of the Simpsons, Family Guy, or Futurama among others.

This doesn't appear to be that much different than those examples, or many of the hundreds of other examples here on Wikipedia. I can tell you if this page had been around when my CMO asked me about "some PSentry product" it'd have made things a hell of a lot easier for me as a network manager and for anyone involved in the corresponding meeting where we discussed our filtering solutions.

Finally, I don't really see non-notability mentioned on the articles for deletion, but as I said in my previous post this isn't the type of software that's even heavily known about. It doesn't produce websense pages, it just produces blank pages and logs large amounts of content. Hope that helps. -- Idealistic cynic 18:16, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I just used the standard "don't remove AfD tags" template, and the wording is not always ideal. I meant no offense by it.

Wikipedia has guidelines on the notability of software at WP:SOFTWARE, though I should emphasise that these are currently proposed guidelines only, not yet official policy. The alarm bell with this article was rung by how it started off reading strongly as an advertisement and was created by a user new to Wikipedia, which is often a sign of someone signing up with the sole purpose of promoting their own/their company's product/service. The article has been improved since, as stated the my opening rationale, but I decided to go ahead with an AfD to obtain the community's opinion.

As an IT professional myself I am familiar with a number of internet content filtering packages intended for corporate networks. The "Google test" is not the definitive test of notability in all areas, but in IT-related subjects it has proven itself a useful guide at the very least. Googling for Censornet (another corporate filter) returns 281,000 hits, Surfcontrol (another) over 1.5million, and Websense (yet another) over 4million, while PSentry returns 1,170 (with a number of obviously unrelated pages on programming in the first page of results).

Putting ascertaining the notability aside, the other problem with the article, I feel, is in finding third-party verification of the facts therein (the all-important "multiple non-trivial published works"); a critically important factor in any Wikipedia article regardless of the subject. There is a stronger case for keeping the article if third-party reviews of this product can be found and cited (by which I mean an independent critical review - the paragraph on CNet is just the publisher's blurb). ~Matticus ^T_C 19:26, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't really believe that there's too strong of a case for deleting the article wholly, in all honesty. I think the sources could use a bit of work, but we've got a category specifically made to deal with that particular problem. By mention of the google test, I meant to say that google isn't always an adequate test for notability within some domains. I work for a Fortune 500 company where software like this is often promoted and this particular package isn't exactly unheard of around here. Granted, this is a US Company and this is a US Product so that could explain why you've yet to read or hear too much about it being in the UK.

I think your concerns about spam and marketing were originally valid, and I have had to deal with a slight bit of vandalism in that regards already, but I don't believe the page itself is without merits. In addition, if it's a marketing move it may not be a particular good one as the types of people that can purchase contracts like these don't exactly look at Wikipedia for their product decisions. I've added the page to my watchlist just incase to ensure that no further vandals can get at the page, but it could have been a misinformed user as well. It's difficult to know exactly how to label someone when all you have from them are direct edits with no context.

To sum up this long winded response: It's my personal opinion that we should mark the page with "verify sources" and let it go from there. The page certainly contains at least a bit of merit, and we should be wary of making the barrier of entry for new pages to even exist too high. Otherwise, we may stand to lose what could be beneficial contributors over small issues that could be dealt with before deletion was ever required. --Idealistic cynic 19:45, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I think that's a fair course of action. I suggest letting the AfD run its course to gauge some other people's opinions (after all, it's just thee and me who've commented on this so far) and see what to do from there. Thank you for your well-reasoned input to the debate. ~Matticus ^T_C 20:04, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

And you as well. I wish to apologize for my original harsh reprisal. I'm still learning the ropes here. -- Idealistic cynic 20:12, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Can we get an Admin?

It's been a week exacctly since this article was put into AfD. Matticus and I have both discussed the merits and flaws of the article and come to the consensus that it should be kept but with a sources needed tag. No other contributors have really chipped in and the article appears to have stabilized across edits.

I'll still be keeping it on my watchlist for the next couple of months just to ensure there isn't any future vandalism or marketing hype. Thanks. --Idealistic cynic 02:17, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

• Delete, no indication of notability, 145 unique google hits, which is horrible for software. Only external links in the article are to a download site, where pretty much anyone can post their software. The arguments here for keeping it aren't concerned with the software's merits but with "making the barrier of entry for new pages to even exist too high", which is not afd's concern. - Bobet 21:29, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete as spamvert, non-notable to boot. Ifnord 00:58, 19 August 2006 (UTC)