Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/SyncTERM

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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. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 15:41, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] SyncTERM

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

SyncTERM fails to meet two criteria for inclusion. It is not notable and it does not belong in an encyclopedia (Wikipedia is not a directory) This account has been created pretty much for the sole purpose of creating this discussion.

Sure - go ahead and delete the program. -- Tedickey (talk) 19:32, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete as non-notable. All ghits seem to be download sites and forums. Could probably be speedy because there is no indication of importance/significance. Phil Bridger (talk) 14:58, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
    • prod was reverted which, as I understand it, means it needs to go though AfD --Real Deuce (talk) 20:25, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete not a speedy candidate as A7 requires that the article be about "a real person, group of people, band, club, company, organisation, or web content"Balloonman (talk) 08:10, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete per nom. :-) Stwalkerster talk 21:58, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep I want to point out that the editor who started the AfD is the actual author of the software this article is about. So he is obviously biased and WP:COI applies, although in this example in a very weird way. I still don't understand yet why he is so anxious to get the reference to his own creation wiped from Wikipedia. It started with removing content from the main article, which caused the article to lose a substantial amount of its content diff. He also stated his disapproval at the articles talk page. He even mentioned it on his site, which does now 301 redirects to this article here at Wikipedia. I rebuild the article to some extend, just to see again that it has been severely altered and that not to the better in my honest opinion diff. Under normal circumstances show people a positive response if they or something they were part of gets an article at Wikipedia, unless of course if the article puts things in a different light than they would like it. This is not the case here. It is/was a positive article. I am still trying to find out what the reason is for Stephen Hurd to go through all this length to get the article about his software application wiped off from Wikipedia. He did not create the article, I did that. He states that his own product is not notable to be mentioned anywhere, but I created the article because I have the complete opposite believe. I think that it is noteworthy. Why? Because there are not many terminal emulation or terminal software out there that is available for virtually every computer platform, supports virtually every platform that ever had a bulletin board software available and somebody who ran a bulletin board system on that platform, including IBM PCs with MS DOS, 8-Bit Atari and Commodore home computers, mainframes that used VT100 emulation. On top of that is the software also freeware with no strings attached. --roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 02:24, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
    • Just making a few points here: I'm not anxious to get references removed, just articles. I've restored the site as it was so people can refer to it. While it is flattering to have your work be notable enough to get a Wikipedia article, this particular work is not. There is no possible reason for this article to be in an encyclopedia. Ask yourself what a user is supposed to take away from the article, then ask yourself is the article is not an ad. (nit) It's not freeware, if anything it is GPL. --Real Deuce (talk) 03:09, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
    • Comment. I'm sure there are loads of reasons why this is a wonderful piece of software, but that doesn't make it notable according to Wikipedia guidelines. For that you need to provide verifiable independent reliable sources. Phil Bridger (talk) 09:31, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment please make sure that you don't confuse notable with popular. I think that it is notable for the fact that it is the only program I ever heard of that allows you to connect to virtually any BBS platform in existence and that from virtually any desktop platform that is used today. The fact that is free is IMO not relevant for this debate. I would have created the article for it, even if it would be a commercial product. However, we would almost certainly not have this discussion right now, if it would be commercial, because the creator of the software wouldn't be here to get the entry deleted. We would more likely have a discussion about the intend of the article and whether or not it is an attempt to put an "Ad" up on Wikipedia. Since there is no commercial intend behind it, can we luckily just concentrate on the aspect of "notability". --roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 18:16, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment. Please don't confuse notable as a general concept with notable as a specific criterion of Wikipedia, which is defined here. Phil Bridger (talk) 19:26, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Response We are on the same page I believe. I mentioned already that I was not able to find the source anymore that made me aware of the software. However, this does not mean that there is none. There is also no reason for me to make something up, since I have no ties to the software or the people that created it whatsoever. Because of this did the article remain a stub. Until the needed sources were rediscovered (online or offline) does the software stub has to carry itself based on just the list of properties that are making up the extra ordinary characteristics for this software. Those properties are verifiable by downloading the free software and installing it. I hope this makes sense. --roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 07:55, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Response Just because an ad is for free software doesn't make it any less of an ad. --Real Deuce (talk) 18:58, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Response Taking your implied definition of what an ad is, every mention of anything would be considered an "ad". This is not the intended meaning of the term "ad" within the context it was used in this discussion. There is no need to get further off topic. My statement is leading, please ignore it. For clarification, I meant to say that commercial intent is not a factor that needs to be considered for this debate, because it does virtually not exist or is marginable and thus irrelevant.--roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 07:55, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Another Comment I can't remember how I learned about the software to use it as verification. It was probably during my research for the article to ASCII art. Because of that did I create the entry at Wikipedia as "stub" an not as a full article yet. I hoped that other editors would come and help and not that the author comes to get the entry removed. I was not able to find the reference that made me aware of the existance of the program in Google anymore, but that does not surprise me. I found references for this kind of stuff for other articles (such as PCBoard) burried "miles deep" in old text files and BBS email log archives. Those text references pointed some times to vital publications in old print media that are not available in digital format on the internet (yet), but are nevertheless valid references to be used in an encyclopedia --roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 18:28, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Response It is my opinion that most of those entries do not belong either. While they should be mentioned in an article on the subject as a whole, most of the BBS releated software articles should not exist. Pointing out that other articles should be deleted for the same reason isn't an argument to keep the SyncTERM article. --Real Deuce (talk) 18:58, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment There are very little articles to things that are associated to the once thriving BBS era. One article can't cover the whole subject. A six hours documentary wasn't able to do it either. The definition of an encyclopedia is: "a work that contains information on all branches of knowledge or treats comprehensively a particular branch of knowledge usually in articles arranged alphabetically often by subject" (from Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary). Bulletin board systems and everything that came with it are not an "evolutionary dead end" that could be left out from a comprehensive encyclopedia. There are things that lead to BBS's and things that derived from it. Leaving it out would create a gap that can not be filled by derivatives. People would have to guess and speculate in the future about what happened and how things came into being if no information to the subject are available anymore. Could it be that your discontent has to do with the bulletin board system subject in general? It seems like you would prefer that this subject will be forgotten entirely, which also would also include your own creation as a side effect of this. I am only guessing, because I am still puzzled by your actions. Correct me, if I am incorrect and feel free to comment on it, if there is some truth to it. --roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 07:29, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
  • The issue is with SyncTERM as an important enough piece of BBS knowledge to warrant an article which only covers "knowledge of SyncTERM"... I can't think of any subject that would have a gap in it if SyncTERM was left out. The rest of this should probably go to my talk page —Preceding comment was added at 09:43, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Merge based on the discussion here am I changing my vote from Keep to Merge as a paragraph into the article about Synchronet instead. SyncTerm might not warrant to have its own article, but it is notable to the subject matter. It is a project that derived from Syncronet, so it would be the logical place to include the SyncTerm program. --roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 01:14, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
    • Agree I'm not sure what the difference between "merge" and "delete" are in this context (The SyncTERM article goes away, and the Synchronet article stays), but a mention of Synchronet sub projects in the Synchronet article does make sense to me. --Real Deuce (talk) 04:17, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Info I added the paragraph about SyncTerm to the artile about Synchronet and left a not on the articles talk page. This means that this article to [[SyncTERM] could be deleted. --roy<sac> Talk! .oOo. 01:31, 24 November 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.