Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Snowmen hunters (2nd nomination)

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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 Notability and RS needed to be address given its been listed for 14+ days at afd something beyond a single news article attributed to LA Times(not dated) should have been forth coming. The nomination of a You tube show for a You tube award doesnt make notability. Gnangarra 01:42, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Snowmen hunters

Snowmen hunters (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Non-notable Youtube series. No claims of notability, no reliable sources of notability. Nothing at news.google.com. I gave up looking for reliable sources after the first five pages of Google. Nothing has changed since this was closed as a rather disputable no consensus back in March. First Afd at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Snowmen hunters. Corvus cornix 22:20, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Strong delete Just a youtube series, fails WP:NOTE. Cheers,JetLover 22:23, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

  • Delete per lack of any notability outside youtube Corpx 00:06, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete. Previous discussion was dominated by WP:ILIKEIT votes and several editors who argued extensively that due to their nature, viral videos should be excluded from WP:V and WP:N. That bit of wikilawyering aside, all the same concerns are still there. These videos are on the edge of notability, no reliable sources (and two of the references in the article point to the same trivial mention). Most of my comments in the previous AfD have been taken care of (the article is a damn sight better then it was when the first AfD started), but I still think that 700k all time views is just a blip in the YouTube world, where even the most 100 most popular comedy clips have over 3 million views. I don't have anything against truly notable and widespread viral videos, but Wikipedia just isn't for whatever happens to tickle the fancy of folks trolling the front page of YouTube. - CosmicPenguin (Talk) 00:43, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Strong Keep Granted that when I or the other main contributer to the article have updated it in the past few months we somehow missed that the original links were changed by the sources. The links are now fixed and some new content added. Please note that the creators of Snowmen Hunting were invited by the YouTube management to be the only representatives for all the comedians on YouTube to the YouTube Sales and Business Development conference. This in and of itself gives them some notability within the YouTube community.

As to Corvus_cornix's search on Google please note WP:GOOGLEHITS as a guide to why this may not be a reliable way to judge notability.

In answer to CosmicPenquin about the number of views I call your attention to the guideline of WP:NOTBIGENOUGH which points out that there is no arbatrary number that denotes notability. As you stated: "These videos are on the edge of notability". Where exactly is that edge and at what point does one cross over? Many of the top 100 videos that Mr. Penquin mentions are clips of professional comedians. Many of which may have an entry about them in WP. At what point in their carreer did these professionals become notable? I'm reluctent to try and put an exact date or number of people having seen them as a way to designate that they have arrived and are notable. steveoutdoorrec 23:43, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

I personally don't believe that YouTube views or subscriptions or reviews should not be determining factors of the discussion (in much the same way that WP:GOOGLEHITS should not having direct bearing on what goes on here), but I bring it up because both the article and the previous AfD make YouTube popularity the primary reason to keep. This is never about popularity, its about reliable non-trivial references, which presumably those professional comedians have, and if they don't they should be deleted as well. I say that Snowmen Hunters are on the edge of notability, because you seem much better organized then most YouTube citizens and are obviously on your way up, but as it stands today, there is just too little that meets WP:N. These problems are not new - they were brought up before, and as is now, your arguments were not for the merits of the article, but rather the inadequacies of the guidelines. I can appreciate that, but they don't actually get you any closer to keeping this article from being nominated for deletion every other month or so. Believe me, I have tried to find something that adequately convinces me that this article belongs here, but I have come up short. Thats not to say that sources don't exist - its just that I have been unable to find them. Rather then question if the other editors are applying the guidelines fairly, perhaps you can help where Google falls short. - CosmicPenguin (Talk) 02:50, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
My comment about Google was not about "how many" Google hits there were, but the quality of them. I couldn't find a single one which qualifies under reliable sources. Corvus cornix 16:47, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Cosmic: believe me I'm not here to pick fights with other editors about applying guidelines. I was just responding to a comment and trying to make sure we were all on the same page. Text is sometimes a poor medium to use in discussions as it's easy to read emotions in where none exist. But, as you just said that you "personally don't believe that YouTube views or subscriptions or reviews should not be determining factors of the discussion," (emphasis mine) it would seem that you are trying to apply a double standard by saying it's ok for you to ignore guidelines that you disagree with, but I should be held fast to those same nebulous guidelines. This series is notable by vertue of the over 2.5 million times the episodes have been viewed across the web (not just on YouTube) and the amount of on-line mentions from various sources. Notability is all about popularity, worthy of notice, and being memorable.
To try and clear up where Snowmen Hunters are talked about in print and on videos I've added a few more links in the article to mentions of the series on Digg.com and from the LA Times. I could have added more from the well known bloggers but didn't want to clutter the article with too many of the same type of mention. The show has been featured on CMT's Country Fried Videos and will be available via Comcast's Video On Demand service in the near future. I haven't added links to these as this information is about how, due to the popularity of the series, it is getting picked up by other media outlets. As more data comes in about how many times it is demanded by Comcast subscribers that information will be added to the article.
Corvus: I understand when you say you can't find a "reliable source" on Google because what you consider reliable for WP is not a criteria that Google uses. They rank pages by how many other websites link to a particular webpage. See: How does Google find and add sites to its index? My quick Google search yielded over 1.7 million hits. I had to go past the first 300 just to get beyond the many bloggers that have written about the series. In this age of the blog-o-sphere many notible web-based events and entertainment are not written about in the dying paper-based press that is rooted in the the 18th century. If you don't believe the print press is dying, just ask yourself why they are all going with digital editions? All of which I stated six months ago when the article was first put up for deletion. steveoutdoorrec 00:57, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Again, you debate the guidelines, rather then the content of the article. I admit, its an effective strategy, since there are only so many times we can say, read WP:N and WP:RS without it getting tiresome. I guess you care more then I do, but only enough to get the article kept, but not enough to improve it until the next AfD comes along. My last word on the matter is that I suppose that the LA Times article is probably enough to convince the closing admin to keep, but I'm going to stick with a Weak Delete, because I just don't think this hits WP:N. I do want to point out that the same source is linked three different times under News Articles, and one other time as a reference in the article, and the LA Times article is linked twice, so if this is kept, the article should be tided up. - CosmicPenguin (Talk) 01:45, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
  • It has been tided up. It's not that I don't care enough to only improve it when challenged as you will notice that the article is continually updated as new episodes are added. I'd say it was that I have a very busy late spring and summer managing a wilderness park and don't get on-line as much as I do in the off season, so when I'm on I don't have time to go back and check for broken links on every site I have a hand in. Checking here and the two websites for snowshoe racing that I run for just this kind of thing is a priority in the fall. Thank you for helping improve the article. Going back to the original AfD, one of the reasons given was that noone could find mention of the creators or the series in IMDB. There is a new website for user-generated content at UGCDB steveoutdoorrec 10:28, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
  • UGCDB does not appear to be a WP:RS because its primary method of listing is people adding themselves in [1]. Leuko 15:00, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Leuko: As stated on the UGCDB homepage "The information comes in part from the ugcDb community contributions as well as dedicated editors." This should sound familiar as "Wikipedia is written collaboratively by volunteers from all around the world." Anyone can add content to either, not just a person "adding themselves." I'm happy to report that the creators of Snowmen Hunters didn't add themselves to the database. The entry was made by the site editor after he did an interview with the creators of Snowmen Hunters steveoutdoorrec 00:33, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Strong Keep There is reference to the LA Times. Not to mention EVERY other person nominated in the Best Series category for the 2006 YouTube awards has an entry in Wikipedia. The removal is without merit. No need to single out these guys. ScottS —Preceding unsigned comment added by ScottS (talk • contribs) 16:03, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Why is it that that LA Times article is not hosted on the LA Times website, but on a different website altogether? Corvus cornix 22:15, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Because the article expired. It's not uncommon. It was linked here on Wikipedia through the LA Times for a while. ScottS

I repeat - I went to news.google.com to look for "Snowmen hunters", and came up with nothing. Nobody in the mass media appears to be interested in these guys. Corvus cornix 17:47, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

  • Nobody that is except the LA Times and the Chico News and Review. These publications have documented articles on the subject (see links in article), yet they do not come up on a Google search. Is it possible that Google has a way of ranking items found from a search that precludes some subjects from being listed? On the Google.News' FAQ page for How do you decide which stories appear on the Google News homepage?they state, "Our headlines are selected entirely by computer algorithms, based on factors like how often and where a story appears online. Google News has no human editors selecting stories or deciding which ones deserve top placement." I don't know about you but I don't find that machines know what news items I want to read. Google is not a credible source, in my opinion, to base decisions on what constitues news. As I've stated above, and in the original discussion, that in this day and age we have to take into account alternative sources for articles written on many subjects. Especially for web based entertainment. The print media is dying and with most of them being owned by the same people that control traditional media (TV and radio) there will be a dreath of stories about the new competition. The reporters and editor know who signs their paychecks. steveoutdoorrec 00:11, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so that consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Maxim(talk) 13:31, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete One LA Times column doesn't impress me - notability means more than that. And Wikipedia doesn't change its rules for web based content. If the only coverage comes from some guy's blog, then it isn't notable. MarkBul 17:42, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm sure you noticed that no blogs are or ever were listed as links for the article. So your point is moot. They are honored by YouTube by being asked to represent the comedians on the site. The show is picked by YouTube to be one of the top ten comedies in a contest in which they placed 8th. The show has at least two other YouTubers doing paradies. The Snowmen Liberation Front and the Snowmen Hunter- English Version. Some would say that all of these as well as the other links in the article point to some notarity steveoutdoorrec 02:11, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep - I don't see what's wrong with sources like this one, among several others. Substantial coverage from reliable sources >> notability. 10:00, 10 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by XDanielx (talk • contribs)
    • The New America Foundation has an agenda, I'm not sure anything on their site is particularly neutral. Corvus cornix 16:22, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
      • Probably right, but I don't think the New America Foundation has any outstanding biases that would prevent the group from qualifying as reliable. And it was published by the Los Angeles Times. Seems fair enough - probably not exactly neutral, but I don't think there's anything remarkable here compared to other sources that are considered reliable. — xDanielx T/C 00:55, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
      • I don't think there's a mass media outlet that doesn't have an agenda. Whether you agree with it or not depends on your personal outlook and which side of the aisle you lean toward. This does not preclude them from being a credible source for items that are non-political in nature such as the entry under discussion. steveoutdoorrec 10:45, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
        • The New America Foundation is not a "mass media outlet". Corvus cornix 15:44, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
        • I was refering to XDanielx and the way his wording implied that the LA Times was not exactly neutral. In my opinin no media outlet is, main stream or otherwise. But that's for another discussion on some other forum. steveoutdoorrec 22:43, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep Just a highly successful, press-garnering YouTube series. Chubbles 22:04, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Strong Delete Ridiculous, no refs, non-notable. If we had articles on every you-tube that got a passing mention in a newspaper.... NBeale 23:06, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Did you read the article? It certainly includes many assertions of notability beyond "a passing mention in a newspaper." — xDanielx T/C 09:10, 16 September 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.