Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Spoofhound

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 per WP:V and as a near word-for-word duplicate (as such, there is nothing to merge). This will be recreated as a redirect to Maryville High School (Missouri). --Coredesat 04:39, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spoofhound

This just plain isn't notable. It will never grow beyond being a stub. At bare minimum, it should be merged with the Maryville High School article. IrishGuy ^talk 01:05, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

• Conditional Merge If there becomes a spoofhound article (about this toy from the 1920's) then it needs its own article. As it stands now, crop needed info and place it on school page (merge). /Blaxthos 01:09, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Redirect to Maryville High School--TBCΦtalk? 01:24, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep - This nomination was made by a school rival as a personal vendetta. Its notability is noted by List of unique high school mascots sorted by state. Americasroof 01:47, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

comment I am thirty years old. Not in high school and have never set foot in the state that this high school is in. Please don't make wild and unfounded accusations. IrishGuy ^talk 02:10, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

• Merge. The best place for information on a high school mascot is in the article on the high school. Joyous! | Talk 01:57, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Merge per above. High school mascots are not independently notable. Resolute 02:42, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

comment - Is the article List of unique high school mascots sorted by state also not notable? Unique high school mascots have quirky, offbeat names that that tell a lot about the local culture. There are at least two websites that attempt to catalog he unique names that are often funny if you have a sense of humor. Spoofhound was highlighted on an ESPN segment. Little stub articles like this will tell the stories of these quirky names. It's pretty clear from the comments thus far that the article is going to disappear. Too bad. There's a category for unique high school mascots. Americasroof 02:54, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

IMO, no, that list is not particularaly notable either. However, that is irrelevent to the discussion. This debate is not about the validity of that list, and linking a topic to another article does not make the original topic notable. Also, given how the discussion has gone, the information on Spoofhound will not be going, it will be merged into the school's article. In fact, it already has, so this article can either be deleted, or turned into a redirect to Maryville High School. Resolute 03:59, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

comment Since you created the article List of unique high school mascots sorted by state, I think it is safe to say that you cannot use it to protect your other pet article, Spoofhound. You cannot create two articles and claim they verify each other. IrishGuy ^talk 19:46, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Comment I should note that I have nominated the article on Maryville High School for deletion. Public high schools are, by and large, not notable either. Since that's where the 'spoofhound' article is possibly being merged to, I thought it relevant to point this out. --The Way 18:31, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

• Comment. Resonding to Americasroof's comment on my talk page, being "unique" , "quirky" or "fun" does not always make a subject notable. After all, Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information--TBCΦtalk? 02:57, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete Non-notable sub-topic about a non-notable school. --Holdek ^(talk) 02:58, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep - A unique mascot to an American high school with an interesting origin is more than enough reason for keeping the article. Just because an article is brief is not grounds for deletion. All articles were brief at some point, and length of article does not factor into article importance. Very strong keep. mobyrock 04:14, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete I don't understand why this is even being debated, it's an incredibly clear example of non-notability. A particular mascot for a high school. Are we going to accept mascots for every high school in the country? Who is going to lookup a high school mascot? This is non-encyclopedic and Wikipedia is not a source for random bits of information. If their high school has an article it'll mention it (and I'll probably nominate the High School for AfD after looking at the article). This is a perfect example of what should NOT be on the Wikipedia. --The Way 04:19, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete Fails WP:NOT. This is an international encyclopedia. I'm sure it's a very nice mascot but how notable is it on a worldwide scale? --Charlene 05:15, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Comment I think that many of the people advocating deletion on the basis of the mascot not being noteable are not aware of how often it crops up in the media and other places. I sympathise with some of the other arguments, but certainly the world-at-large seems to think the Spoofhound is notable enough.Felixstrange 22:13, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

• Redirect per above. Every single word is copied from the Maryville High School article, so there's no point in a seperate article existing. Ultra-Loser Talk / Contributions 05:58, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Redirect only: Indeed, a list of "notable" "unique" mascots is oxymoronic at the high school level. I went to a university with a green wave as its mascot, and, no matter how weird that is, it's not actually a matter of importance. If you want to see St. Bob's Frisbeetarian High School and Reformatory's mascot, go look at the article on St. Bob's Frisbeetarian High School and Reformatory. Geogre 11:41, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Comment Geogre, I have you beat... the mascot for the college I graduated from was the color blue. Still, I'd never dream of putting up an article for that. Not even college mascots deserve articles. --The Way 18:34, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Blue? "Go, Color Blue!" The thing about the wave was that it raised the question of what an individual from the school was. If someone from Auburn is "a war eagle," someone from Texas is "a longhorn," I could never figure out if I was supposed to be a "green droplet" or a "aquamarine squirt." Geogre 02:07, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

• Keep - If wikipedia has a list of unique sports mascots, then, I dont see why the article should be deleted. Chris Kreider 13:49, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
  • That's "two wrongs" argumentation. Is your motion to delete if the list is deleted, as well as keep if the list is kept? Please square your vote with the deletion policy. Geogre 14:02, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
    • I am sorry about that, I did not look at that argument in that way. I still think it should be kept. Defintley needs to cleanup though. Chris Kreider 14:49, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Merge With the article for the school. It is senseless to have for each school an article about its mascot, its band, its school colors, its school song, its lunchroom, etc. Non notable: no mainstream press coverage.Edison 14:33, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Comment: It is senseless to have an article about individual aspect of a school, unless that aspect is a unique and interesting point. mobyrock 16:02, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

• Delete to me, there are 2 things to look at here. First, is the concept of the "Spoof Hound" Carnival Toy and the stated origin of the team name notable and verifiable. I think the answer to that is clearly no. All sources for this definition and explanation of a spoof hound are from this site (which apparently is based on submissions from the general public and is not in any way vetted or verified), the school website, and Wikipedia mirrors. I just don't see enough reliable sources to consider the supposed carnival toy and name origin to meet verifiability requirements. That said, the second thing to consider is if a high school mascot is notable enough to have a standalone article. I think the answer to that is no as well and it appears to be pretty common practice that mascots are only mentioned in the school article. I'd say merge, but the information has already been integrated into the Maryville High School article. I don't see much of a compelling reason to keep this as a redirect unless there is a licensing reason to do so.--Isotope23 18:33, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Keep I think that the article should be kept in that the Spoofhound mascot is notable beyond Maryville High School. I'm an alumnus, and when we participated in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1989, every interview conducted with the band focused on the mascot above everything else. I've met strangers who have heard of Maryville High School only because of the Spoofhound. I'm always surprised at how often it is mentioned in national media. Personally, to me, its just a mascot, but it certainly gets a lot of attention. If I wasn't aware of the Spoofhound and heard about it, I might turn to Wikipedia to find out more about it.Felixstrange 21:11, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete, lacking multiple non-trivial reliable sources to bear on its notability. —ptk✰fgs 00:16, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Certainly many, many articles fit this criteria. Very few articles have citations regarding the notability of their subjects. Why single this article out? Felixstrange 01:01, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

This article isn't being singled out. It is one of many that are under AfD each day because they fail to illustrate encyclopedic notablity. Comparing it to other articles which may need to be reviewed isn't a very valid argument for keeping this one. IrishGuy ^talk 01:02, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

I understand the deletion process. My argument is based on the fact that the prevalence articles which do not attest to the notability of their subjects (most articles) indicates that this is not a particularly important standard for the inclusion/exclusion of an article. To restate: why apply a standard to this article which doesn't seem to be applied to articles in general? Felixstrange 01:25, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

It is applied to other articles. Guidelines for various subjects state that the verifiable importance of the subject must be outlines within the article itself. This article doesn't...quite frankly because it cannot. This isn't a notable and important subject. IrishGuy ^talk 01:57, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Generally, what is the benefit of deleting this particular article? Felixstrange 01:25, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

The same benefit as the removal of any other non-notable article...it benefits the encyclopedia to remove unencyclopedic articles. IrishGuy ^talk 01:57, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Answering that deleting this article benefits the encyclopedia because it is unencyclopedic is tautological. The real issue is why the article is unencyclopedic. You are asserting that it is because it is not "notable" or "important". This seems to me a very arbitrary and subjective criteria for removing someone's work from Wikipedia. There are many, many articles on Wikipedia that most people would find neither notable or important (trivia for a particular Babylon 5 epsiode, for example), but they are significant enough to enough people that they warrant inclusion under the prevailing standards of Wikipedia. If this work is to be removed, it should be for a specific (and compelling) reason. I don't feel that such a reason has been outlined. Felixstrange 02:39, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

User:Uncle G/On notability explains pretty well why we want to ensure that included articles are on notable topics. —ptk✰fgs 03:36, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Comment In regards to Felixstrange's response to IrishGuy: Saying 'deleting this article benefits the encyclopedia because it is unencyclopedic' is actually not a tautology, one being a noun and the other being an adjective which descripes specific attributes that make something acceptable for inclusion within that particular noun. Aside from that, Wikipedia has pretty good and clear guidelines as to what qualifies something as being notable enough for inclusion and it seems many people here agree that this article does not meet those standards. Sometimes these standards aren't always the best, but they work quite well and without them AfD couldn't function. If you disagree with notability standards I believe it is appropriate to go to the pages outlining them and making a case for change on their talk pages. Finally, in regards to your statement that other things, such as Babylon 5 trivia, are kept: these are articles that have so far slipped through the cracks. AfD is run by average editors and they nominate things when found, things can last awhile before someone who knows about AfD and cares finds them. There is a lot of inappropriate articles out there that do need to be removed and that's what we're here for. An article on Babylon 5 trivia certainly would warrant an AfD nomination. --The Way 03:48, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, that is a textbook example of tautology. By definition something which is "unencyclopedic" is bad for an encyclopedia. My only point here is that the notability/non-notability of the subject of this article is not as clear as its being made out to be. I've certainly read about it in newspapers and heard about it on TV (some one has mentioned an ESPN feature). The main thrust of the notability guidelines Ptkfgs posted is preventing Wikipedia from becoming a directory, which is certainly not a danger in this case (the MHS article is another story). I mentioned the Babylon 5 example to point out that while in writing guidlines may seem very specific, in practice they can be very subjective. To be too literal and severe with the application of standards would result in deletion of a substantial portion of Wikipedia (as well as a lot of angry Babylon 5 fans). I just don't think the case is clear for this article. Felixstrange 04:22, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

As a B5 fan, and as a Wikipedian, I would prefer without hesitation to see many of our unnecessary B5 articles removed. —ptk✰fgs 13:17, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

I think you mean begging the question rather than tautology. The odd mascots around the world (not just US) and their stories are always interesting, but they're curiosities. All curiosities get some slight discussion in the wider world, but usually in the context of "Hey, didja know?" segments. ESPN had had a mascot challenge, but it was devoted to college mascots (which are peopled by male cheerleaders and gymnasts, generally). Even with them, it was a "hey, this is cute" bit. What needs to be present for us to avoid either a Rippley's Believe-It-Or-Not or Guiness Book of Records museum of raree shows is for the mascot to be significant in its own right by something it does/has done. Did Spoofhound bite a player? Did a player bite Spoofhound? Other than some attribute to the story, we need something that needs to be explained about the mascot. Geogre 13:11, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

• Delete. The Spoofhound is a cute little dog, and the very short story about the adoption of Spoofhound as a high school mascot is an amusing anecdote, but it just isn't ever going to rise above the level of loveable local trivia, based upon the evidence. Any useful information is already included in the article on the high school itself.OfficeGirl 00:52, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete: No need to merge into Maryville High School, since all the material is already in the latter article which should be kept (also up for deletion, see below). Hu 14:34, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete, unverifiable, and even if it was, I'm not sure it would be notable. --Kuzaar^-T-C- 17:57, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. No independent reliable sources, no realistic claim to notability. Also ( but that's of course not grounds for deletion) leads like "the only ... in the country" irk me big time, since of course there is only one country in the world. Sandstein 06:16, 30 October 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.