Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/A-10 Thunderbolt II in popular culture

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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 delete. Kilo-Lima|(talk) 14:14, 26 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A-10 Thunderbolt II in popular culture[edit]

Wikipedia is not a directory of film/culture appearances - i.e. an ImDB for technology. The article claims that "the aircraft has been a popular subject in television shows, films, video games, and other media". However, a cameo appearance in one scene does not mean it was "the subject" of the show. Top Gun was about the Tomcat, or at least featured it prominently. War of the Worlds did not feature the station wagon that Tom Cruise drove, the 737 that crashed, or the many pieces of hardware that appeared. Similarly for games where the A-10 appeared in a cut-scene. What, are we to start a list of Hummer H1 appearances in pop culture and list every game and movie it's appeared in?

Regarding video game appearances, they fail the guidelies established by Wikipedia:WikiProject_Aircraft/page_content#Popular_culture and discussed Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Aircraft_Archive_9#Popular_Culture. Namely, that no attempt should be made to document every appearance, but only significant ones relevant to the aircraft. As a large number of military hardware is typically used in RTS games, its appearance is not particularly significant nor insightful to the game. Nor are arcade simulations with little faithfulness to the actual aircraft (e.g. Ace Combat). Furthermore, since the link between fictional versions is often speculative (e.g. Transformers), it fails under OR.

The only redeemable piece of the current article is the list of simulations - the only pop culture in this case that did indeed feature the A-10.

The A-10 was the main feature in several flight sims: A-10 Tank Killer (1989/90), A-10 Attack! (1995), A-10 Cuba! (1996), Silent Thunder: A-10 Tank Killer II (1996), and Lock On: Modern Air Combat (2003),

That piece only should be Smerged into A-10 Thunderbolt II and the article summarily Deleted Mmx1 21:45, 20 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment Please remember that the GFDL prevents us from doing "merge and delete", as doing so would destroy the history of the merged content, which would in turn make the merged article a copyvio. Merges must always leave a redirect. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 22:03, 20 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Finlay, please. That's wrong. It is perfectly feasible to perform a GFDL-compliant merge and delete by merging histories, and the method for doing so is spelled out at [Wikipedia:How to fix cut and paste moves]. It is strongly discouraged because it is a lot of work for the closing sysop, but I cannot figure out how the myth that it is impossible, or forbidden by the GFDL, arose. Dpbsmith (talk) 00:24, 21 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Supersquishify and merge. It's reasonable for the A-10 article to contain mentions if it in popular culture, but in general these need be little more than wikilinks. We solve the same problem in Area 51#Area 51 in popular culture (which has far more popular culture references) without letting it monopolise the article. One lesson that article teaches is that if you remove pop culture articles, well meaning folks will just add them back in. So mention them briefly in the main article, and point out to those who would expand each reference that said expansion belongs in the relevant pop-culture article, and not in the A-10 article. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 22:03, 20 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment
I made that page to draw junk away because I got tired of cleaning up the edits every night instead of making useful contributions to Wikipedia. Then I unwatched it and voila, out of sight out of mind. I'd rather keep it for the sake of my sanity. - Emt147 Burninate! 00:17, 21 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I did consider the same idea for Area 51, but I feared it'd eventually boomerang. This AfD, which is far from novel, is really the inevitable destination of such "sin-bin" articles. I think the "managed sin-bin" approach in Area 51 has worked well, and overwhelmingly new users just add another one or two word entry to the list; most take the hint from the pattern and don't add a whole paragraph. I'd guess A51 is more prone to pop-cult stuff than A-10 (it seems to be in many more games), and roughly it needs modest gardening every two months or so. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 00:28, 21 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I am taking a cue from the recent deletion of the M16 in popular culture page. --Mmx1 07:21, 21 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
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.
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