Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Star Sonata (3rd 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. The argument that this article does still not contain sufficient references to substantial reliable third-party coverage (after three years!) is compelling. The "keep" arguments are partly eventualist, and for that very reason do not weigh heavily against deletion: As Coccyx Bloccyx notes, all are free to recreate the article with sufficient sources; in that sense, deletion decisions do not, in Kizor's words, "stick". The "keep" opinions who think that the current level of sourcing is sufficient, on the other hand, are distinctly in the minority.  Sandstein  10:14, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Star Sonata

AfDs for this article:
Articles for deletion/Star Sonata Articles for deletion/Star Sonata (2nd nomination) Articles for deletion/Star Sonata (3rd nomination)
Articles for deletion/Star Sonata Guide
Star Sonata (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (delete) – (View log)

Relisting this for AFD, the article has not been improved (citation wise) since the last AFD, remains poorly sourced and its notability is still unestablished.

Most of the support from the previous AFD was based on the fact more references would be added and notability established, but this has not happened. --TheSeer (TalkˑContribs) 08:59, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

  • Oblig nom delete, as above. --TheSeer (TalkˑContribs) 08:20, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Weak delete, mainly since the sourcing is horrible - six links to the game's own web site is ludicrous. Searching "star sonata review" on Google finds a lot of links (mostly from download sites), but nothing I can see as a real critical review. The article itself claims the game can boast only around 700 paid subscribers and a high of around 12,000 user logins - hardly on the level of other fully free MMORPGs like MapleStory or Travian. If real notability can be established, cool - otherwise, I have to say delete until the game gains more ground in the market. Duncan1800 (talk) 09:35, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Note: This debate has been added to the list of video game related deletions. MrKIA11 (talk) 13:53, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete: How in the merry hell did this survive multiple AfDs? (Actually, it seems, it didn't survive the first one, and this is a recreation after deletion.) An admitted subscriber base of 700 is pathetically low in MMORPG-land, there are no reliable sources to be found, and the previous AfD was riddled by SPAs. No suggestion that this has won any industry awards or has pioneered any enduring innovations in the field. No Alexa rank.  RGTraynor  15:15, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Premature nomination. The article was restored in a deletion review and the procedural AfD was concluded as keep only last month, five weeks ago. As failed nominations can be repeated but deletion decisions stick, and AfD has an inescapable tendency to resemble a random number generator in close-cut cases, it is vital to allow time to pass between nominations or the decisive factor in inclusion would be the effort to hammer on articles until they give. In my experience the line after a no consensus "decision" would be about a month, but after a keep decision it is significantly higher. This is too soon.

    Oh, and also, a month isn't representative of what's going to be done on a wiki. It was not just argued in the DRV and AFD that more citations would be added, but the basis of those discussions were new ones that had come forth. I added those things into the article, though they can be of significant further use so you might want to contact those people who voted keep the last time around and ask them to work. --Kizor 16:14, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment: A month is plenty of time to add references and establish notability, the problem is there are few independent sources and no notability to speak of. And like RGTraynor says, the article has been inexistent for a long time and yet it remains poorly sourced. --TheSeer (TalkˑContribs) 08:26, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • It is, but not nearly enough to assume a negative (ie. that the above will not be done), or (subsequently) to assume a fair long-term outcome. And the article has been around a long time, during which our standards and practices have changed a lot. It was eventually deleted and then restored in a DRV - the current state of affairs has only been around since last month.
    Anyway, I would've closed this AfD as premature had I not recused myself from the field. Amusingly enough, by bearing the mop I'm at far less liberty to ask others to do so than I would otherwise be. --Kizor 14:21, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment: Almost all the references are self-references. --TheSeer (TalkˑContribs) 08:20, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep I guess, since there are multiple non-trivial third party publications about the subject. coccyx bloccyx(toccyx) 17:07, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment: Which would those be?  RGTraynor  17:16, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Changed to delete after further consideration. The publications weren't as non-trivial as I had originally thought. I'm not sure how much more time this article really needs, given that it has been allowed two chances in the past. No prejudice against recreation though once the better sources can be unearthed. coccyx bloccyx(toccyx) 18:17, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Weak keep - This just needs more time. My vote might be different if it hadn't just passed an AFD one month ago. It deserves at least a couple more weeks. Not to say that I know for certain if this is notable, but I think it deserves the chance by virtue of surviving an AFD. Randomran (talk) 01:10, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • This article was created three years ago. Exactly how much time to acquire proper sourcing should it receive, and what sourcing do you imagine is out there that hasn't surfaced in all that time?  RGTraynor  02:51, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Editors should have as much time as they need to improve an article that is not a hoax, not libel, not a how to, not a copy vio, etc. Wikipedia has only been around for several years; Britannica has had centuries to develop and grow. I have encountered a number of articles that were around for months or years and when nominated for deletion were still stubs, but lo and behold in but minutes I managed to improve the article sufficiently enough for it to be saved from deletion. It only takes one editor to come along and improve the article to most editors' satisfaction and it is much easier for them to do so when they don't have to start over from scratch. Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 03:31, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • It only takes one editor, but even after 3 AFDs no one has bothered? If for every article we just said, wait indefinitely for someone to improve it well... that doesn't work. --TheSeer (TalkˑContribs) 07:41, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Given the near-total absence of possible third-party sources, it's probably unrealistic to expect the situation to change... Jakew (talk) 16:30, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Actually, I have a better notion. Grand Roi, if you're so certain that there are reliable sources out there that could only be unearthed if we weren't such slackers ... well, the AfD has a few days more to run. What's stopping you from finding some? I'm sure the Delete proponents would be more than happy to change our opinions if you did. I look forward to seeing the results of your research.  RGTraynor  16:35, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I'd argue it was up to any editor to prove it is notable by establishing that in the article. Not the AFD. --TheSeer (TalkˑContribs) 08:12, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Err. That IGN "reliable source" is in fact an anonymously uploaded single paragraph "game profile." The second is a nice review, yes, but WP:WEB specifically requires "The content itself has been the subject of multiple non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the site itself." (emphasis mine) To quote WP:WEB again: "Self-promotion and product placement are not the routes to having an encyclopaedia article. The published works must be someone else writing about the company, corporation, product, or service ... The barometer of notability is whether people independent of the subject itself (or of its manufacturer, creator, or vendor) have actually considered the content or site notable enough that they have written and published non-trivial works that focus upon it." Feel free to cite such multiple reliable sources.  RGTraynor  18:00, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • There's also [1], but in any event an adequate search would need to be done in magazines like PC Gamer. Look beyond the internet. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 19:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Were I to try to demonstrate the notability of an article, I wouldn't link to a graph that showed the game was the 6,246th most frequented online game or MUD of the ones the site charted. That aside, as you know, the burden of evidence is on an editor wishing to save an article. My position is that multiple reliable sources on this game do not exist.  RGTraynor  21:56, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Enough editors argued convincingly to keep last month and enough editors are working on it and enough evidence exists to suggest that there is no general consensus to delete the article and that plenty of editors believe in its potential. It takes time to go through game magazines, i.e. more than 5 days on a volunteer project. As it is not an obvious hoax, copy vio, how to, or libel, that it at least has some degree of notability (it is not some game that I invented and only play with a handful of buddies), there's no urgent need to delete a work in progress. Best, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 02:58, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Making statements hoping people won't check them is ... futile. Lesse, last AFD, 5 keeps. One was a developer of Star Sonata. Of the remaining 5, 4 are "weak keeps" (I count mine as a week keep), two are SPAs and all were based on the article being improvable; people hardly "argued convincingly". Also, about the WP:NOEFFORT issue, that's about content. Not about notability and verifiability. --TheSeer (TalkˑContribs) 08:17, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Nevertheless, still five keeps to no clear deletes (the nomination was a procedural relist with no argument per se for deletion). As for the first AfD, three editors do not represent the consensus of a community of thousands of editors and even there, one of the deletes was a "weak delete", the other delete was not even signed. The nomination then is essentially a WP:JNN with shortcuts to pages that are themselves edited regularly (see [2] and [3]} Notice, for example, on the same day that the first Star Sonata AfD closed such edit summaries on the short cut linked pages as "still working towards consensus". Thus, if those were the reasons for deletion, well they didn't real have consensus and even after that day and over the past several months, the policy has revert after revert as editors edit-war and continuously attempt to change it. So, who knows which version actually matters.) Sincerely, --Le Grand Roi des CitrouillesTally-ho! 03:20, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete. First, almost all the references are starsonata.com. Second, nothing (relevant) on Books or Scholar, and almost nothing (press releases, etc) on News. Fails WP:N, little potential to properly satisfy WP:V. Jakew (talk) 19:31, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep The Game Tunnel review in external links could be cited, together with the GameZone review that makes a reception section. The interview could be used for a development section. That's multiple independant sources and would result in an article as opposed to an unsourced gameplay description which would be nothing more than an entry in a games database. In terms of reliability Game Tunnel is an established site with named authors, a set of reviewing standards and an identified editor (Russell Carroll) to take responsibility for the writing. To my way of thinking it's notable, not monstrously so but enough to warrant an entry. Someoneanother 00:30, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • From WP:V: "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy ... peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; university-level textbooks; magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses; and mainstream newspapers."  RGTraynor  12:41, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Weak Keep - Looking at WP:N, I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt for the reliability of GameZone and GameTunnel (two sites I'm not familiar with, but they appear to have editorial oversight). Marasmusine (talk) 08:21, 24 May 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.