Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2010 Duke University faux sex thesis controversy

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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 nominator has given a thoughtful rationale for deletion. The rationale has received significant support, and defence, from other editors. There are of course a number of keep arguments made. But the bases for a number of them have been refuted: a couple of delete !voters have gone to significant and successful lengths to do so on a policy basis. For example "no policy/guideline basis for setting the GNG aside" is a rationale refuted as having been made without reference to WP:NOTNEWS. Not all the keeps are weak - a number of them directly deal with NOTNEWS - but a number of them have been given less weight due to the refuted "news coverage=inclusion" view.

The numbers here seem to be 7-5 to delete (with one keep being explicitly "weak"), but it is the balancing of the arguments that has tipped it firmly into "consensus to delete" territory.--Mkativerata (talk) 01:03, 26 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

2010 Duke University faux sex thesis controversy[edit]

2010 Duke University faux sex thesis controversy (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log) • Afd statistics
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This is a difficult decision, but I think the right one. There will be some who feel that the news item went viral and is notable, and that deletion must be due to censorship or prudery. It isn't. It's because this really is, in this day and age, "just routine news". Emails are routinely forwarded whose creators didn't want them to be, they routinely get mass circulated, a huge number of things "go viral", and many people put details of sexual performance of past partners online or send them to close friends - for fun, to embarrass exes, or for other reasons.

By way of comparison, many news items of significance (murders, speeches, suicides, tragedies and "funny page" news) have long been considered "routine" even though they routinely gain widespread coverage in reliable sources. We don't document everything. This seems to be of the same kind - if we can agree that most suicides, murders or other horrific incidents are "just routine" and salaciousness isn't a factor, then "embarrassing emails sent out by friends that get commented on for being widely circulated lulz" probably are of the same kind too. Perhaps only the most notable or those with some specific reason, should be given their own articles.

In brief, I'm not sure at all that this meets the spirit of WP:NOT. The question is whether "person writes embarrassing email (content irrelevant) that a friend forwards and goes viral" is sufficient for WP:NOT#NEWS.

In this case there are a lot of cites, it has gained mentions in reliable sources and the letter of WP:GNG. But where as a community do we set the hurdle of WP:NOT#NEWS to ensure not every last widely circulated internet mistake becomes a Wikipedia article? Internet circulated emails, memes and other viral matters - even those commented in reliable sources - are as routine as political speeches, suicides, murders, and funny page or human interest news snippets. This one seems to be "just another person who sent an email about their sex partners that got forwarded by a friend to the world". They're all but routine. Hence after some deep thought, nominated at AFD. FT2 (Talk | email) 19:52, 11 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • I have to agree. Delete. DS (talk) 20:21, 11 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete I'm going to disregard policies and guidelines for a second and go all the way back to the five pillars. The very first one is "Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia." When it comes down to it, deletion policies and guidelines are aimed to guide us towards figuring out what actually belongs in an enyclopedia. This simply isn't encyclopedic content – it's news. Regardless of how viral it is, when it comes down to it, in a few years nobody is going to look up something like this in an encyclopedia. If it really is something that needs to be looked up, probably the first place to look would be news archives. Wikipedia is not a news archive, it is an encyclopedia. --Shirik (Questions or Comments?) 20:23, 11 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • WP:Ignore all the rules should be about improving Wikipedia, not about deleting article. When it comes to deleting articles, the debate should be about policies. Articles should be deleted only if they fail to live up to a Wikipedia policy. Victor Victoria (talk) 05:34, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • You seem to believe that deleting articles is not improving Wikipedia. As an obvious counter-example, consider the hundreds of vandalism pages that get deleted every day. Surely deleting these is improving Wikipedia. I argue that this is also such a case (not vandalism, but a case where deletion improves Wikipedia by keeping it in-line with the five pillars). --Shirik (Questions or Comments?) 06:30, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
        • Deleting is definitely NOT improving. It's maintenance work. Improving means adding value. Deleting, by definition is not adding; it's subtracting. Victor Victoria (talk) 06:49, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, but disagree. "Value" is not the same as "data". Removing never adds data, but often adds value. Canonical example, a 200 page report nobody will read contains more "data" but less "value" than a summary that will be readily readable and noticed, and hence more widely useful. A project policy contains less data but is of more value than a dump of the 20 MB of threads and discussions that may have produced it. Why do people use Wikipedia itself when all our articles are based on information available elsewhere or google-able? Because it's more value, even if less raw data. Removal of unsuitable pages can be every bit as important as addition of suitable pages on the project's value to a reader. Consensus and the community decide which is which - which is in effect what this page is doing now. FT2 (Talk | email) 07:28, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Disagree too. Victor, what about hoaxes - deliberate misinformation? For nine months last year Wikipedia had articles about a political party which was said to have made a revolution in Brunei and overthrown the Sultan, and about the man who was said to be President in his place. Those were totally false; don't you think deleting them improved the encyclopedia? JohnCD (talk) 12:36, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Of course hoaxes have to be deleted, but this article is not a hoax. Let's end this debate, as it is a philosophical sidebar on whether WP:IAR applies in deletion debates. I think we will all agree that WP:IAR is a much weaker argument than one referencing actual Wikipedia policies Victor Victoria (talk) 13:55, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry but I can't agree with you (so please don't say "we will all agree"). In fact, you totally missed my point. My point isn't about WP:IAR, it's about WP:5P. Every policy and guideline is somehow based on the five pillars. By going back to the five pillars, I'm saying that I don't care what the policies and guidelines say, it is quite clear what needs to be done here to keep Wikipedia on track. --Shirik (Questions or Comments?) 17:22, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
We are not relying only on IAR, but on NOTNEWS (which applies to the fuss, as well as to the document) and BLP. I agree that my comment three above is straying from the point; but I thought your assertion that "Deleting is definitely NOT improving" needed to be challenged by a counter-example. JohnCD (talk) 17:45, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sexuality and gender-related deletion discussions. -- Jclemens-public (talk) 20:58, 11 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:NOTNEWS. I agree with Shirik. It is not part of Wikipedia's role to help these passing scandals "go viral." Nominator mentions the GNG, but that explicitly says that "significant coverage in reliable sources establishes a presumption, not a guarantee, that a subject is suitable for inclusion... For example, such an article may violate what Wikipedia is not", and that is the case here. There are also BLP considerations. JohnCD (talk) 21:46, 11 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep: This is not an article about the faux thesis, it's an article about the controversy that the faux thesis generated. I am the principal editor on this article, and I can assure you that I would never have created this article if it was just about the faux thesis. I agree that the faux thesis itself would fall under the WP:NOTNEWS policy, but the controversy surrounding it (i.e. the questions of double standard, privacy, and other considerations) is notable enough and unusual enough to surpass the threshold of WP:NOTNEWS. Victor Victoria (talk) 05:22, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's a consideration (and the good faith is not in question). But most of the coverage was not commentary on the controversy (and "media discussion over routine privacy breaches" is also very routine and needs a fairly high standard to pass WP:NOT#NEWS. For example, is there evidence that any reliable sources have assessed this controversy within the field of "controversies over privacy" and concluding this is a significant one?). As a controversy, is this seen or will this be seen as a controversy of "enduring notability" (WP:NOT) that changed, shaped or defined the debate on privacy compared to a thousand other private communications that someone's friend posted to the world and went viral?

It just doesn't seem so, or at least there's not currently evidence of the possibility (WP:CRYSTAL). Some events do have significant impact on a controversy and are seen or will be seen as significant points of enduring notice in the debate. But right now we don't have good evidence this is (or is seen as, or will be) anything more than "another privacy breach controversy of similar kind as many many others have been or will be". FT2 (Talk | email) 06:35, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia does not operate on a standard of "enduring notability". It operates on a standard of notability is not temporary. This was a notable controversy as evidenced by the fact that it was covered by many sources independent of the subjects. Hence, it's notable. I have already covered in my original argument why WP:NOTNEWS does not apply to this article. Victor Victoria (talk) 13:50, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Actually it does - precisely that. WP:NOT has included this wording for a long time: "Wikipedia considers the enduring notability of persons and events". Before then it stated that Wikipedia considers "enduring historicity". NTEMP is guideline wording. NOT is policy. It's useful to go back to policy and basic principles on difficult cases like this. FT2 (Talk | email) 03:49, 13 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Precisely because we operate on a principle of "notability is not temporary" we have policies such as WP:NOTNEWS and guidelines like the last clause of the WP:GNG to help us avoid assigning notability to things which may be in in all the papers but are of no enduring significance. There are lots of murders, which each get coverage in reliable sources, but we don't want articles about every one; we ask, is there anything significant about this one, such as a change in the law resulting? Is there any reason why it will be remembered in a year?
In just the same way, occurrences of "indiscretion is leaked to the internet, goes viral, brouhaha about privacy ensues" are frequent enough that, even though the brouhaha may be in all the papers, we don't want or need articles about each new example. This particular one has unusually salacious subject matter, but why is it significant enough to need recording in an encyclopedia? JohnCD (talk) 18:14, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I simply remain unconvinced about your notability argument. Can you honestly say that this would be looked up in an encyclopedia in 5 or 10 years (let alone 100)? I'd be surprised if I still remember this in a few weeks, myself, but I admit I really don't care much for history. Fact of the matter is that, at least for me, this is something I would go to news.google.com for instead of an encyclopedia. That is what WP:NOTNEWS is all about. How was this a historical event in any sense of the term? --Shirik (Questions or Comments?) 18:09, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: we have also to consider BLP aspects. See WP:BLP#Avoid victimization on "dealing with individuals whose notability stems largely or entirely from being victims of another's actions. Wikipedia editors must not act, intentionally or otherwise, in a way that amounts to participating in or prolonging the victimization." It could be argued that by her foolishness in giving the document to three friends the author has forfeited her claim to consideration; I am not persuaded even of that, but certainly her subjects come under that policy clause. The original article linked a "redacted" version of the document with blacked out names and blurred faces, but it would not be hard to identify them, and inevitably an IP soon linked an unredacted version which named names and included clear pictures. I have removed that link, but no doubt it will be added again if the article is kept. JohnCD (talk) 12:20, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
On reflection I think that, foolish though she was, the author of the document is also a victim (of her "friend" who leaked it, and of the general heartlessness of the Internet) and that we have a duty of care to her under the policy clause I quote just above. Yes, it is already public in the internet, but putting it in Wikipedia gives it more status, more accessibility and more permanence. JohnCD (talk) 17:53, 12 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete: this is, at bottom, a news incident that will be forgotten in a couple of months. If it ends up having far-reaching significance, the article can always be re-created. Roscelese (talk) 03:22, 15 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Major news story, coverage worldwide. . The bias should be that if there are major sources, it should be presumed to be notable. (I seem to remember some rule about that somewhere :) ) DGG ( talk ) 05:22, 15 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, -- Cirt (talk) 03:39, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak Keep This one garnered a ton of news coverage, and is likely to show up in academic literature on viral events, with some sort of very low half-life, from here until PowerPoint is long forgotten in its dusty grave. I wish this stuff would disappear too, but I'm afraid that's the nature of the world we live in. RayTalk 03:46, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of News-related deletion discussions. -- Jclemens-public (talk) 06:23, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:NOTNEWS. This is an encyclopedia, which should have articles about subjects of timeless notability, rather than a mirror of each transient news topic about some publicity stunt or attention seeking individual's actions. Edison (talk) 14:14, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - Pure "not news", a singular story with no lasting impact or significance. None of the 'keep its notable' actually address the nomination, per usual. Tarc (talk) 15:40, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. When an incident goes viral and gets global news coverage I think this in itself is sufficient to establish notability per our guidelines. This then goes beyond WP:NOTNEWS as I interpret these guidelines. Had the item been regular news, how would it have gathered its viral momentum? It wouldn't. There's something exceptional about it, thus the virality. Add to that significant mainstream media coverage and this item should fly above the notability threshhold with a wide margin. __meco (talk) 16:15, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep per DGG; no policy/guideline basis for setting the GNG aside. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 20:01, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment on the last two entries: I absolutely disagree that "gone viral" implies "notable" - things can go viral that are utterly trivial, but, per WP:NOTNEWS: "Wikipedia considers the enduring notability of persons and events". Nobody could claim that there is any "enduring notability" about this. And WP:NOT, specifically WP:NOTNEWS, is an excellent policy basis for setting the General Notability Guideline aside, even if the fifth bullet point of the WP:GNG did not already explicitly say that significant coverage does not guarantee that a subject is suitable for inclusion. JohnCD (talk) 22:41, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Agree. Both as a guideline v. policy and also by its own stated wording, WP:GNG makes clear it is subordinate to and overridden by WP:NOT. WP:GNG itself also cites WP:NOT as overriding any presumption.
If the topic were considered to be routine as an event (NOT#NEWS) and of unproven significance as a controversy (NOT#CRYSTAL), then that's the bottom line.
Being widely reported doesn't change that the event is within "routine news" these days, the controversy such as it's been has been of no enduring significance at this point (CRYSTAL, zero actual evidence), and by agreed policy Wikipedia doesn't exist to cover routine news even if it was widely reported for a brief period. FT2 (Talk | email) 23:43, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Since mine was one of the last two entries you comment on I must point out that you are rebutting a straw man. My equating was between notability and the combination of virality and global news coverage. __meco (talk) 11:20, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I will be more precise. I disagree that "gone viral plus global news coverage" necessarily implies the "enduring notability" which is what concerns Wikipedia. In today's global village, things can go viral and get global coverage which are utterly trivial and will be forgotten within weeks. JohnCD (talk) 15:34, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Not least, "gone viral" is incredibly meaningless, non-specific and not a criterion of any kind for keeping. The expression means "circulated very quickly and widely", it's not some additional notability criterion. But many things are spread very quickly and widely without being notable- a specific chain or hoax email, a specific Darwin Award winner's story, a video of some celebrity supposedly having sex, or a specific Lolcat image are 3 quick examples. Some get coverage too and are still ephemeral all the same.
We usually exclude "measures of supposed popularity" from AFD and consider evidence of meeting both WP:NOT and WP:GNG instead - see the "notability fallacies" at arguments to avoid. The concern at this AFD is that while GNG is met, NOT is not. WP:NOT is not optional or subordinate to GNG, in fact NOT trumps GNG (both by GNG's own wording and as a policy to a guideline). FT2 (Talk | email) 16:37, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I've already cast my !VOTE above, so I won't do it again. I just wanted to acknowledge (as the principal editor of the article) that all those making the WP:NOTNEWS argument have a legitimate point in that the majority of the references are from just two days: October 7 and October 8. I have therefore just added a reference from October 29 saying that there was a forum held at the university about the controversy. According to the reference, this is the first of several forums about the topic.
    On a related matter, one option in such tough cases is to make a redirect, so that if/when additional information surfaces up, it would be easy to resurrect the article. Unfortunately, I don't think this option exists, as I cannot think of anything that this article would redirect to. The likelihood that more will develop is strong, as has been speculated in the Washington Post she could make a lot of money if she wrote a book about it. I am well aware of the WP:CHRYSTAL policy, and I'm not advocating that the article be kept just because there exists a potential for the story to develop (I've already gave my KEEP !VOTE). All I'm saying that given all the people involved in the controversy: the author, the three friends who received the faux thesis, and the 13 sexual partners, it is very likely that one of them will come out into the limelight some time in the future, bringing the controversy back into the headlines and then WP:NOTNEWS will definitely not apply. Victor Victoria (talk) 18:09, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
As a comment also, when I close AFD's where this has happened, one option is to close it as delete - but explicitly note the basis of the deletion. A usual wording is something like "delete, without prejudice to recreation if enduring notice is later established" (or "...if NOTNEWS is later met").
The aim being that it's explicit and unambiguous that it's for want of that one point and if it were to change then recreation could become valid. Would something like that work? FT2 (Talk | email) 18:38, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Updating: the forum was internal. So it shows the place it happened took action, which is expected, but it doesn't add to any attention by the wider world. FT2 (Talk | email) 18:49, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
How about "without objections to undeletion", rather "recreation". Victor Victoria (talk) 19:00, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It's a standard wording, people'll know what it means. You'll find numerous AFDs closed that way ("without prejudice to relisting/recreation"). "Recreation" would include both re-posting or rewriting, as well as requests to undelete due to achieving notability later. The standard venue for that is deletion review ("DRV") where it's common to post "This has now become notable due to the following evidence, can undeletion be agreed". FT2 (Talk | email) 19:11, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I have reverted a non-admin closure by 96.32.181.73 (talk · contribs). Per WP:NAC#Appropriate closures, non-admin closures should be restricted to "Clear keep outcomes after a full listing period... absent any contentious debate among participants" or Speedy keep situations. Neither of those applies here. JohnCD (talk) 11:19, 24 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • WP:SNOW applies because it is quite clear that there is no consensus, even after relisting. The principle of WP:SNOW is that if the outcome of a process is already known it is not necessary to run the entire process. As for how that applies here, it means "Clear keep outcomes after a full listing period..." need not run the full listing period because it is already known that there is no consensus. And thus, IMO, my early closure is within the guidelines/policy for non-admin closures. But whatever. --96.32.181.73 (talk) 17:35, 24 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • You did not complete the quote from WP:NAC: "Clear keep outcomes after a full listing period... absent any contentious debate among participants." There are at this point, including the nominator, seven voices for delete, four keep and one weak keep. It is for the closing admin to assess the arguments presented, but a delete decision does not require unanimity; there is no way that this situation is a SNOW keep. JohnCD (talk) 19:02, 24 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
        • I didn't say it was a SNOW keep, I said it was a SNOW non-consensus. --96.32.181.73 (talk) 19:21, 24 November 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.
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