Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2010 Damghan earthquake

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:NOTNEWS. Jayjg ^(talk) 03:01, 5 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

2010 Damghan earthquake[edit]

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Non notable earthquake, does not assert it nor has historical significance. WP:NOTNEWS. Write this article on Wikinews instead before it gets stale (today). Diego Grez (talk) 02:17, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - Fails the rule of 7. Carrite (talk) 02:21, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per WP:NOTNEWS; this quake won't be remembered as it seems fairly normal in effect. —fetch ·comms 02:26, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per WP:NOTNEWS. Completely non-notable. —Mike moral ♪♫ 02:27, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Weak quake in an area where they're not really uncommon. Killed a few people, but nobody notable. Many people across the world would shrug off an earthquake of comparable size. This kind of stuff really needs its own speedy criterion. Might be remembered tomorrow but it won;t be next week and certainly not next year. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 02:37, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
- Question: Can you honestly name anyone who was killed in the 2010 Chile earthquake right away without looking up old news? I really do not think that an earthquake is not notable just because victimes are not known by someone who lives thousands of kilometers away. Qrfqr (talk) 11:42, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - That's not really a valid comparison. The 2010 Chile earthquake registered an 8.8 and killed over 500 people. This one was a 5.7 and killed 3 people. A large death toll can be an indicator of notability, but events that aren't notable based solely on a high number of deaths need something else that makes them unusual to be considered notable, for example, notable people being killed or occurring in an area where such events are unusual or something else that means it's not just another weak quake in a quake-prone area. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 12:19, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    - Then we have fundamental difference in opinion about what makes an earthquake notable. For me a life is a life, no matter how well known that person is. Your reasoning is partly convincing, as such criteria (magnitude OR casualty) have been in practice (cf. significant earthquakes listed by USGS). However, the other part for me is not that convincing. Can you give the number of people by whom a person must be known to be called "notable" so that a small earthquake earns it right to have an article in Wikipedia by killing that person? Qrfqr (talk) 12:33, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      - Well not every event that results in the loss of human life is notable. It doesn't make it any less tragic, but Wikipedia is not a memorial. Exactly how many deaths make an event notable is the subject of many heated debates in many previous AfDs, but I think it's safe to say that three deaths is not enough, on its own, to make the event notable, while 500 would be. If there were something to indicate the significance of this quake besides a small number of fatalities, I'm open to changing my !vote, but I've yet to see any indication of such significance. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 12:48, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    - Well, I think that any earthquake causing loss of life is notable. And frankly speaking, I am afraid that without a clear set of criteria such debates will not stop and arbitrary deletion decisions are difficult to avoid. Qrfqr (talk) 12:59, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      - Unfortunately that's an opinion that isn't grounded in policy. While we lack firm criteria on what would make it inherently notable, we can determine notability by its coverage in reliable sources as required by WP:GNG, which it has to a some extent, but there's little to none of the ongoing coverage required by the policy WP:NOTNEWS. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:14, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    - This is very interesting.

1: We can ask what the gound or object of the such policy is. Is a policy of notability which could not guarantee notability superior to everything?

2: The policy is by itself not clear. How long is "long" for the duration of the coverage? What I called arbitrary is exactly saying "I think it's not long enough", "no lasting damage" without giving any objective reference. (In fact I just found a couple of coverages popping out today!)

3: People seemed to have abused those policies, or the way the policies were designed invite people to abuse them. It's been just about 3 days since the earthquake. How do people know that there's not going to be any case study, lasting damage, or other indications of notability? Some research papers won't surface until years later, and now it seems that many people do not have the patience to follow the policies they've been talking about. Qrfqr (talk) 14:16, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment to 3. How do the creator of the article know that there will be any case study, lasting damage, or other indications of notability? Armbrust ^Talk _Contribs 20:58, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Good question. So let's see what the process of establishing an article in Wikipedia is. Is there any board, to which a person must prove the value of his article, in order to officially post it? Or is it a person posts an article, and then the value of the article might be challenged? If it's the former, it's the author's responsability to prove the notability. If it's the latter, it's the challenger's responsability to disprove it. Qrfqr (talk) 02:17, 31 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per HJ Mitchell--Wikireader41 (talk) 02:46, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
merge into another article. I think there is a List of 2010 earthquakes or something.Lihaas (talk) 03:18, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Weak keep This quake killed 3 people, I suppose this just about makes this notable. Justmeagain83 (talk) 04:43, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Why? Car accidents kill more people than that every day, but they don't get articles and, as far as I'm aware, there's no policy that says n deaths = notable. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 12:50, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

- I'm also not aware of any policy saying that an earthquake must have a victime known by n other people to become a notable earthquake. Qrfqr (talk) 12:10, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Notability isn't tempory. Meets WP:GNG with the WP:RS provided. Since when do any of the fatalities to an accident have make the accident notable? Lugnuts (talk) 08:18, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No it doesn't. I respectfully suggest you read WP:NOTNEWS. A brief period of news coverage ≠ notability. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 12:50, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

merge to the list of earthquakes. The article covers so little information that there is no need for a separate one. --Tone 08:59, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Merge Per Lihaas. Mjroots (talk) 09:29, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete as Wikipedia is not the news. There is no indication for lasting impact. Armbrust ^Talk _Contribs 13:33, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Iran-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 19:15, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 19:15, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of News-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 19:15, 29 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Weak delete Don't think this one is a merge candidate. 2010 earthquakes lists its inclusion criteria as 6.0 or above unless the earthquake itself is unusually notable. In Persian, there are some more in-depth articles in national sources like [1], but nothing rising above the level of daily coverage. Sometimes even small earthquakes can turn into big scandals, e.g. if families of the victims bring up corruption accusations against real estate developers or local government officials, but there's no evidence that this is happening here. As mentioned above, this area is quite earthquake-prone (e.g. 856 Damghan earthquake which killed 200,000 people). cab (call) 01:29, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: per Lugnuts. - Ret.Prof (talk) 02:19, 2 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Since Wikipedia:Notability is not clear and pratical for recent earthquakes, I suggest that we go back to this. These criteria are not perfect, but at least they are clearer, more concrete, and more suitable for earthquake topics. Frankly speaking I don't want this kind of debates become kind of gladiator fights and are decided by counting how many thumbs up and how many down as people please. Voting is the way Wikipedia operates (hopefully), but it would be better that every counted thumb has good reason. Qrfqr (talk) 12:17, 2 September 2010 (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.