Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Zero Wing (translations)

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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 of the debate was List as copyvio. Copyvio supercedes everything else, but I'd rather be safe and list it on Wikipedia:Copyright problems. Deathphoenix ʕ 03:12, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Zero Wing (translations)

Simply includes a transcript of a video game script (which is a copyright violation just like song lyrics), and then a bunch of different options for the English translation (which I believe constitute original research) (ESkog)(Talk) 21:24, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

  • Keep. I have moved the page to All your base are belong to us/Translations, which I believe is more fitting as this information was originally on the AYB page. The translations are provided by the author under fair use, and the words are already all over the interet as it is. It appears that the author decided the translations were taking too much room on the originaly AYB page and decided to make another article; I have reflected the arcle's origins in moving it to a subarticle of AYB. Isopropyl 21:30, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Speedy keep valid fork per Isopropyl. Just zis Guy you know? 23:11, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Yikes! Speedy delete as copyvio, and strong delete even then as original research and source material! This is the entire script of a game, from both the Japanese and English-language versions, as well as some OR translations. This is totally inappropriate, even if moved to somewhere else. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 00:17, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
    • Maybe nobody noticed, but this is a COPYRIGHT VIOLATION. That text is the entire dialogue, not merely a short quote. It's not a text-heavy game. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:16, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
      • Prove it. In a proposed deletion of an article, I think the burden of proof rests on those who want it gone. And for what it's worth, the company that published the game no longer exists. --BRossow 03:32, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
        • "Prove it"? I still don't understand your confrontational tone through all of this. If we had a script of an episode of Seinfeld up here, it would be deleted on sight. We regularly do speedy-delete song lyrics and copyrighted works of modern literature. Why is this any different? (ESkog)(Talk) 04:05, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
          • Comment. Toaplan went out of business in 1994. Also, the comparison to "song lyrics and copyrighted works of modern literature" is not valid. Compare to the Muhammad cartoons controversy; Wikipedia includes the (copyrighted) drawings in their entirety because it is necessary to understand the situation. Simiarly, this bit of dialogue from a game produced decades ago by a company dead for almost as long as I've been alive is necessary to set the context for the AYBABTU meme. Isopropyl 05:37, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
          • If I seem confrontational, it's because you've suggested the deletion of a page of information, used under fair use, that is critical to understanding the AYBABTU phenomenon. I'm truly sorry that you don't see this. A lot of work has gone into this and related articles and it's disturbing to see it being proposed for deletion on grounds I consider shaky at best. --BRossow 14:52, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
    • Okay, okay, so the copyvio isn't an issue. That said, this is still source material and the other translations are original research, neither of which is appropriate to Wikipedia. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 17:49, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete AYBABTUcruft. If there was anything worthwhile, it would go into the appropriate article.Keep for great justice! After long hard consideration, I have to admit that several people do have a point about the, um, "historical" (or is that hysterical?) importance of the translations.--All your base are belong to us 00:57, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
    • All my thanks are belong to you. Nova SS 17:34, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Speedy keep The text presented is integral to the understanding of the AYBABTU phenomenon but also is relevant to the Zero Wing game page as well, which is in large part why it was made a separate page and not a subpage of AYBABTU. (Also, it was my understanding that subpages were discouraged.) The text was originally found in the AYBABTU article as mentioned above and existed peacefully without complaint for months or even years. Removal of this page would be hugely detrimental to the AYBABTU page and would completely defeat the purpose of fair use laws. As for the comment above that this is "the entire script of a game," I take extreme issue as the text presented is only a few lines from the opening and closing scenes, certainly not the entire game! I could go on, but it would be pointless. --BRossow 02:35, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Speedy keep per what BRossow said. This is an important part of understanding AYBABTU. I feel this is a very misinformed and petty AFD that is based on conclusions derived from (unwritten) original research of copyright law. If this is a problem, then many very public sites have the same problem[1]. Even Amazon.com has it.[2] AFD originator should have completed these steps before submitting AFD:
    • Establish why the copyright hasn't been diluted due to clear lack of enforcement and widespread use.
    • Establish the identity of the copyright owner since the company is apparently dead. (If you don't know who owns the copyright, how do you know there is even a valid copyright? How do we know the copyright didn't lapse into public domain?)
    • Establish why this isn't simply fair use since the entire text of that opening statement is necessary to understand the phenomenon.
    • Establish why the concept of fair use of a copyrighted work somehow gets blown out of proportion in this case because the game didn't contain much text. If the game contained only three words, would it therefore be not fair use to repeat the three words since they compromise 100% of the words in the game? Of the entire copyrightable mass in the game, the text likely compromises a tiny percentage of the entire work.
By the way, the comparison of this text to a song lyric is invalid. Lyrics are an integral part of the song. Without the lyric, the song's character changes fundamentally. This text does not bear the same kind of relationship to the whole copyrighted work as a lyric does to a song.
Nova SS 05:10, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm again troubled by your characterization of this as "petty". There is absolutely nothing personal about an attempt to make Wikipedia better, whether it's for compliance with copyright laws or its own policies. No one should take personal offense when "their" article is nominated for deletion. (ESkog)(Talk) 18:14, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
If you can satisfactorily answer the points mentioned above, I will withdraw my "petty" comment with apologies. By the way, I am not an editor of that article. Nova SS 03:05, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete as copyvio (video games are no less under copyright just because they're video games) and original research. -- Grev 05:11, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete; Copyvio. And I don't bandy that term about; this is an unambiguous case. Fishal 03:53, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Almost certainly a copyvio. Note that the quotes that have caused this thing to be a pop culture item are available at Wikiquote, and thus we don't need them here, regardless of their copyright status.--Sean Black (talk) 05:24, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Speedy keep; Apparently not a copyright violation; on all of the Internet, there are sites that contain this text. I'm talking about Flash movies, HTML pages, Quicktime movies, the lot. All of these movies show both the text and also the images from this game. The publishers, Naxat Soft and SEGA, have never, not once, attempted to enforce their copyright (if it is indeed their copyright; it could have been Toaplan's, and they are no longer in existence; there is no certainty about this at all). It would appear that there is no need to consider this for deletion, as it seems that the copyright holders of this material don't seem to mind fair use of their material. On a sidenote, certain important prerequisites for mentioning that this a copyright violation haven't been adhered to; like Nova SS mentioned, people don't seem to realize the extreme widespread use of this text, and its important in understanding the All Your Base Are Belong To Us phenomenon. --Michiel Sikma 06:56, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
    Erm, all those other websites using it are probably infringing on Sega and Naxat Soft's copyright too. And as I said, a few select quotes in the main article are indeed covered by fair use. Additionally, q:Zero_Wing contains the specific quotes, so it's a dpiulicated effort to have them here.--Sean Black (talk) 07:18, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
    "They aren't pursuing their copyright, so let's infringe upon it" seems to me to be a pretty scary line of reasoning. Nowhere in WP:Copyrights does it say that we should only protect those copyrights which are already being actively protected. (ESkog)(Talk) 13:05, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
    • That is a valid argument. Look up the concept of copyright dilution. Nova SS 14:10, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
      • The point here isn't the fact that "those other websites are also infringing copyright", the matter is that the copyright of this phenomenon has been ignored for so long, along with it gaining such widespread recognition, that it's become almost unenforcable and absolutely imperative to know the full text in order to understand the magnitude of its following. Although I do think that the Zero Wing translations article should be merged with All your base are belong to us, it's to be understood that there is no way that this text is not fair use. It's important enough and without it, the whole thing no longer makes sense. Or are we going to have to start linking to external sources in order to give people the information about the text that they really want to read? That's wholly illogical. --Michiel Sikma 20:12, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
        • No. This text is copyrighted. We cannot use it under the terms of the GFDL, nor under the fair use provision of US law. Full stop. There are quotes at q:Zero_Wing that we can link to, but that's the most we can do.--Sean Black (talk) 20:20, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
          • Please explain how fair use doesn't apply here. Having taught Internet law and fair use in workshops for many years, I'd truly like to hear your take on this. The lines are but a small fraction of thousands and thousands of lines of code from the game. Further, no one here has thus far been able to establish that there even is an enforceable copyright in place on the snippets of text or the game as a whole. Unless you can demonstrate a valid, current copyright and explain how a few lines taken from countless thousands doesn't meet fair use guidelines, I really don't think you have a case. ⇒ BRossow T/C 20:44, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
            • They are fair use within the main article. They can not qualify for fair use, by definition, when they are in a stand alone article such as this. When the original research is removed, then this article is nothing but a copyrighted source text, which should be deleted on sight.--Sean Black (talk) 21:45, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
              • Then you shouldn't petition for it to be deleted, you should petition for it to be merged. --Michiel Sikma 21:58, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
              • Huh? It's fair use if it's in the middle of the article, but not fair use if it in what is essentially (1) a subsection of the article (2) that just happens to be on a separate page but (3) which is still clearly connected to the parent article? I do not follow your logic. Nova SS 22:02, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
                • What I'm not seeing is anyone providing even the slightest bit of evidence that the copyright once held by a long-defunct company is valid. Suggested reading: m:Avoid Copyright Paranoia. ⇒ BRossow T/C 22:14, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
    • (unindenting) Of course it's valid. But no matter the copyright status, this is an unencyclopediac collection of original research and quotes, the latter of which already exists at q:Zero_Wing, as I've said several times. Basically, there's no reason for this page to exist.--Sean Black (talk) 22:23, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
      • Huh? Unencyclopedic? It's terribly important to be able to read this text in order to understand the phenomenon. It is in no way unencyclopedic because of how noteworthy it is. This is one of the most famous Internet legends, afterall. You can't tell a visitor to go look up the appropriate information on Wikiquote; it's supposed to be right here on Wikipedia. --Michiel Sikma 06:59, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
          • Why? Wikipedia is not for collections of quotations. Have some of them in the main article, accompanied by examination and discussion, but blocks of quotations go in Wikiquote, where they already are- I will add the {{wikiquote}} template, which I neglected to do earlier, if that addresses any of your concerns.--Sean Black (talk) 07:10, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
            • The full quote is necessary to understand the background of the AYB meme. Look, all your base are belong to us. OK? Main screen turn on, and it say that for great justice, this is not clearly a copyright infringement. So please move zig. You have no chance to survive make your time. Nova SS 15:48, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm an anonymous user so feel free to disregard my opinion, but isn't the point not the fact that the sites that have the Zero Wing text are infringing copyright as well, but that whoever the copyright holder is doesn't seem to mind or enforce their copyright? I'd be in favor of a keep. --213.84.233.132 10:47, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep until and unless the copyright holder (whoever it may be) asks us to take it down. The text is necessary to understand the phenomenon, it's not long, the copyright holder doesn't seem to care, and replacing it with links to other sites is an unnecessary hoop for readers to jump through. Tualha (Talk) 13:53, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep it. EamonnPKeane 21:30, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, possibly merge back into the AYB article. --Sparky Lurkdragon 21:35, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep Almost certainly fair use. Opening sequence is a very small part of the video game, but is important to understand "All your base" phenom and its origins.  The Steve  22:33, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep As TheSteve said above, the value of the entry in understanding the "AYB" phenom is the most important consideration. The text quoted is but a tiny part of the overall work. I think it would be nice to re-incorporate it into the AYBABU page.Mikereichold 05:45, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Merge back in to All your base are belong to us, where it originally was. A standalone article makes no sense, there is no context. The Zero Wing article already links to the All your base page, so there's no particular need for breaking it out as a standalone article. The 73 words of dialog quoted are a small fraction of the overall content of the original video game, well within fair use guidelines for quoting textual material. As others have pointed out, in all these years no copyright complaints were ever undertaken by the copyright holder even against the makers of the Flash animation or websites distributing it, and the Flash animation made extensive use of images as well as dialog. We have a strong presumption of fair use; if the copyright holder should one day change its mind about fair use, then there is always Wikipedia:Request for immediate removal of copyright violation. -- Curps 01:13, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep per Curps A Clown in the Dark 02:48, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Transwiki to Wikisource and delete. WP can't use piles of fair use text, but I'm not sure that a copyright assertion will stand up. However, this is not encyclopaedic. If anything was originally in All your base are belong to us, merge it back there. Stifle 09:47, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Strong Delete, copyright violations are simply not endorsed at wikipedia. Absoluely not. When one is discovered, it is deleted or promptly rewritten. We simply don't endorse breachment of personal accomplishment and the muggery of work by others. Full stop. -ZeroTalk 20:01, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

  • Merge back into All your base are belong to us, where it originally was. That way, you could delete this page, but we could still have the information that some of us want on the main page of the related article. - Brittany

Keep and/or Merge This is still very valuable to the article and all those copyvio pushers need to just chill. We might not want to merge back, as I think some of those additional english translations shed light on how the game translation is different, and all that text might be too large to merge into the original article. -Ridge Racer 17:02, 5 March 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.