Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of The Price Is Right pricing games (3rd nomination)

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 Keep Mandsford 18:36, 1 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

List of The Price Is Right pricing games[edit]

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WP:NOR & WP:VERIFY:The vast majority of the information incldued in this article is unsourced and contains unverifiable original research concerning the specific rules of pricing games. Rules to pricing games that no longer regularly appear on the program are not covered by independent verifiable acceptible sources.
WP:N: With the exception of Plinko and Cliff Hangers, the pricing games appearing on The Price Is Right are not notable in their own right to warrant coverage aggregated in a separate article. Notability is not inherited from the parent article.
WP:LINKFARM: Including links to websites such as the the show's official website, with a link to each game's individual page there could fall under WP:LINKFARM and would essentially be a duplication of the copyrighted information included on that official site. Including link to the show's official website in the parent article's "Pricing games" section as a reference or in the External Links section of the parent article is sufficient and a better alternative.

All individual pricing game articles were either deleted or merged into this article through AFDs with similar WP:OR and WP:N arguments (see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Make Your Mark and related AFDs linked there). Sottolacqua (talk) 15:33, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep current games but cut material on retired games:The current games are sourced through the show's official Websites (the Daytime page at cbs.com, and priceisright.com), but (as I've said in previous discussions of this) the retired games probably aren't sourceable except through the unusable YouTube and fansites. Nor do I think the retired games are all that relevant to the current show; one game was played exactly twice, and it was in 1977. Hardly worth a paragraph on Wikipedia. The current game material is relevant to a description of the show, but merging it into the parent article would make the parent extremely large and unwieldly. JTRH (talk) 16:20, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. I'm troubled by this kind of AFD nom, because the deletions/mergers of the separate pricing games articles were predicated for the most part upon this list existing. Sottolacqua himself noted in his nom at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Buy or Sell (for example) as part of his deletion rationale that the subject was already covered in this list. So to now try to delete that list after relying on its existence in other AFDs is, well, problematic at best.
Notability is much less of a concern with a split-off list of this kind because it's a subtopic of a notable topic. That's really not a "not inherited" issue where it is indisputably part of a notable topic, and the main article has a section for this very topic, and as the nom notes, there are at least two items on this list that are independently notable. So it's not a matter of notability analysis, but rather a question of what level of detail. For example, if someone were to create Barack Obama presidency on March 25, 2011, it would not be a coherent or useful argument to assert that it did not inherit notability from Barack Obama presidency, but more useful to analyze it as a NOTNEWS or summary style violation.
Sourcing and verifiability are of course important, however, so before we get into a discussion of why or why not this level of detail is appropriate for Wikipedia's coverage of this game show, I'd like to see some discussion of why or why not this is verifiable and to what extent. If the claim is that it's sourceable to the primary source episodes, then I'd like to see an analysis of why or why not that's appropriate. postdlf (talk) 16:29, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- - Comment: The source for the current games is the show's official site:[1]. Each game has its own article linked from that page. There is no mention of retired games. JTRH (talk) 16:59, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Merge into article per WP:NOR, WP:VERIFY and WP:N. Darth Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 16:46, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep They aren't notable to each have their own page, that is why we have this page. The Price Is Right (U.S. game show) is long enough that it wouldn't be logical to merge this with that page. CTJF83 17:02, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- This is not a merge proposal. The list of games should not be merged into the main article. A link to the official site in external links or as a reference is all that is needed. Sottolacqua (talk) 17:18, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - My keep was meant to be the show is focused on the games, so it isn't unreasonable to have a list and brief description of said games. CTJF83 17:23, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    - If verifiable, acceptible sources can be included and original research can be removed or cited as actual information, that would be fine...but this article has sat tagged with an OR flag for over a year and more refs flag since August 2010. The backup information needed for this article to meet standards listed above in the AFD proposal has not been provided and searches turn up little information that meets WP's referencing standards. Sottolacqua (talk) 17:26, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      - JTRH provided a nice source. CTJF83 17:38, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        That source was already mentioned in the AFD nomination above. Sottolacqua (talk) 17:45, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        I understand it isn't a 3rd party link...but it only verifies what we can see ourselves watching the show....how the game is played. CTJF83 17:50, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        I apologize for not noticing the comment in the original statement about the show site before my comments above. However, the individual game articles merely give a list of factual information. There's nothing that needs to be objectively sourced or verified by a third party source in order to demonstrate accuracy. JTRH (talk) 19:17, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The pricing games themselves are basically the main element of The Price Is Right game show, and the game show itself is clearly notable enough to justify having a list of pricing games on Wikipedia. It makes sense to have such a list since most of the pricing games aren't sufficiently notable by themselves to qualify for separate stand-alone articles. Furthermore, if this list were to be merged into the article The Price Is Right (U.S. game show), the result of the merge would be unacceptably long. However, any material about retired games that cannot be verified with a reliable source should be cut out since all material on Wikipedia must be verifiable. --SoCalSuperEagle (talk) 18:27, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, as per all above reasons. -- Zanimum (talk) 19:33, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep The games are the essence of TPoR, but remove any games that can't be verified by WP:RSes. For the purposes of verification, the primary source is acceptable. —Torchiest ^talk_edits 21:54, 25 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Television-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 01:24, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 01:24, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Changing to Strong keep ~~Keep~~ and source where needed. A quick check of Google Scholar will pull up articles like this about individual Price is Right games like Plinko. Also, I just looked up The Price is Right in McNeil's Total Television, the go-to book for reliable info on U.S. network television programs between 1946 and 1996, and there was indeed some information on individual games, including something not mentioned here: the original gameplay of the show when it debuted in 1956 was considerably different from the current version; I may add this to the article. At any rate, there does appear to be a lot of info out there about individual Price is Right games; we're talking about a popular series that ran on three major U.S. networks, syndication, daytime, and prime time for 55 years, not obscure shows like What's the Story or Down You Go. Firsfron of Ronchester 02:11, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- The original gameplay of the 1956 version is covered in The Price Is Right (1956 U.S. game show). The version to which these games relate has only aired on CBS and in syndication since 1972, not on three networks...but that's irrelevant to this discussion about the list of pricing games article. The reference you listed you listed for Plinko belongs on the Plinko page—it doesn't apply to the vast majority of information in the article for this AFD, and is barely applicable to the Plinko page as it appears to be a test of programming the randomness of the game rather than the notability of the topic. Sottolacqua (talk) 03:51, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - I'm not sure why we have separate articles about The Price is Right, but that certainly has no bearing on the notability of the games themselves. Discussion of the topic in reliable sources that are independent of the subject is how we judge "notability", and I've already provided a Google Scholar article which discusses Plinko: the article discusses probability of winning in Plinko, and also necessarily discusses gameplay since that affects the probability of winning. Here's an article which discusses the Grocery Game and here's one which discusses Punch-a-Bunch, the Range Game, Spelling Bee, Barker's Markers, Card Game, Cliffhangers, Cover-Up, etc. Really, Sotto, this is all available on Google. I haven't even attempted to do much research in offline sources. I'm going to change my opinion from Keep to Strong keep at this point, since it seems clear that no research was done by the nominator before this article was nominated for deletion, as each scholarly article I pull up (stuff easily available on Google Scholar) refutes the idea that these games are discussed nowhere in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. Firsfron of Ronchester 17:35, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, as it would cluster the main article up, plus its notable. Intoronto1125 (talk) 19:21, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, I'm satisfied by the answers I've seen here, primarily Firsfron's comments. postdlf (talk) 22:32, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Sotta claims "the vast majority of the information incldued in this article is unsourced and contains unverifiable original research concerning the specific rules of pricing games"; however, if the rules are explicitly mentioned by the host or are obvious to anyone, there is no original research, and it meets verifiability since since (1) the material is unlikely to be challenged, making a source unnecessary and (2) the episode(s) fall(s) under WP:SELFPUB. [This is not to say that anything at all that could be said about the pricing games is acceptable; speculation and unsourced comparisons would still be original research that we would have to remove, but this does not justify deleting the whole article.] E also says "rules to pricing games that no longer regularly appear on the program are not covered by independent verifiable acceptible sources"; again, independent verifiable sources are not necessary because the past episodes on which those games were played can be used as sources on the rules of play of the game per WP:SELFPUB. (In reference to JTRH, note that YouTube links to old shows would likely be verboten per WP:LINKVIO; however, we can still cite the episodes by airdate, contestants, production number, or other information that serves to uniquely identify a single episode.) I do agree that most of the pricing games would likely fail WP:N for having their own articles, but within a larger article on a sub-topic of a notable program, the main criterion to examine is verifiability, which is passed with flying colors. In disposing of Sotta's last argument, I would like to point out that it is a big stretch to suggest that there would be copyright problems in this article. First, game mechanics are not copyrightable subject matter. For example, the idea of picking which of two prices is the correct price of a prize is simply not protectable. While CBS may have a copyrighted description of Double Prices on their website, only the expression and word choice of the description are protectable. Likewise, we can make a description of how Plinko is played that does not infringe on the copyright of CBS's description. However, there are also copyright issues of the list of games and their selection, coordination, and arrangement. I do have an issue with the classification of games as "active" or "retired", which appears to (1) come from Wikipedians' judgments (making it original research) or (2) come from some CBS declaration (in which case, there may an infringement on CBS's copyrighted judged selection of which games to consider active. I don't think there would be a problem, though, if there is a clear factual basis for declaring a game retired (such as, the game hasn't been played on episodes first aired since September 1, 2009). Apart from the active-retired issue, the games are arranged in alphabetical order, which again is not sufficiently creative to merit a copyright on the listing, and further, all the games are listed, meaning that there is no copyrightable selection within the list. Overall, the article should be kept, but the issues above need to be worked out (however, this does not require deletion). RJaguar3 | u | t 23:13, 26 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

There's no "determination" or "judgment" involved on the CBS site. Only the games currently played on the show are listed. There are a couple of games on that list that haven't been played in a while (including one that I think was last seen two seasons ago), and I've fended off a few attempts by editors to move them to the retired list simply because there's no other official way to confirm that they've been dropped (and "I haven't seen it on the show in two years so I know it's retired! Trust me!" is not a RS). I haven't read through the article's descriptions of the games carefully enough to compare the WP content to the CBS site content, but if proper credit is attributed, there shouldn't be any kind of copyright problem even if WP duplicates CBS. JTRH (talk) 16:36, 28 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

There are over 100 pricing games that have been played on the show since its 1972 premiere. CBS considers a subset of those games to be active. Sometimes, games are not on CBS's active list even though they've been played during the season in progress. Sometimes, a game is not played for a long time and yet CBS still considers it active. The "active" distinction is not completely determined by the facts of which pricing games were played on which episodes. Hence, CBS has used creativity (albeit modest) to formulate a list of "active" pricing games. This list therefore would be subject to copyright protection. RJaguar3 | u | t 22:58, 28 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm aware of games remaining on the list long after their last playings, but not of the other situation. Can you offer an example of a game that's been played this season that isn't on the list? And the show site doesn't call it a list of "active" games. As far as the show's Website is concerned, if it's not on the list, it never existed. (I realize that Daniel Benfield thinks that's an abomination, but I see no reason why the show site should be expected to provide a comprehensive history of the show's entire run.) RJaguar3, I still don't see your reasoning as to how a sourced, descriptive list would violate copyright. JTRH (talk) 23:23, 28 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I thought that in the past, there were some pricing games that were "retired" in the middle of a season. Regardless, the fact of the matter is that the games CBS features on its website are only a subset or selection of all the pricing games ever played. This selection is not made by some rigid analysis of the facts of which games were played on what episodes (such a list generated by such a procedure would not merit copyright protection) but instead involves a creative judgment on CBS's part as to which of the over 100 games on the show they describe. Hence, the subset of pricing games, as a list, would appear to qualify for copyright protection. RJaguar3 | u | t 03:07, 29 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure if this changes anything, but I had been under the assumption that priceisright.com (the show's "official site") was a CBS property, and it turns out to be Fremantle. So we're talking about the intellectual property of the owners of the show and not just the network that broadcasts it. If the descriptions in the Wikipedia article are lifting descriptions from the pir.com page and reproducing them here, then, yes, we may have a problem. However, I don't think the pir.com list itself is the product of any kind of "creative judgment" simply because it applies to the show as it currently exists, and doesn't acknowledge pricing games that haven't been played in 30 years. But I'm not an attorney, much less a copyright expert, so this isn't my field. JTRH (talk) 03:40, 29 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As I recall, this article started out as a list with no description whatsoever. After the individual game articles were AfD'd, I and several other editors added descriptions to the entries for the active games on the list, using the material on the show site as a source but not (IIRC) directly quoting from that site without attribution. Someone (IIRC, an anon IP) put in the information on the retired games, which (as I said above) is some combination of OR-unverifiable-impossible to source without YT or fansites.

The criterion we've been using for "active" vs. "retired" is that the list of games on the show site is the source. If a game is listed there, it's active; otherwise, it's retired, and I'm well aware that the fact that something doesn't appear on a list can hardly be cited as a reliable source. That's why I think the article is both relevant and verifiable if the retired games are removed. I have no idea how to source or verify an episode's airdate, and even if YouTube were an acceptable source, there's no way to verify that the poster of a clip got the information correct. JTRH (talk) 00:19, 27 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

First, episodes that aired previously are not "impossible to source without YT or fansites." As I mentioned above, we can cite an episode by providing enough information to uniquely identify an episode. As I wrote to TenPoundHammer on my talkpage (User talk:RJaguar3#Hidden Temple)

I don't think original airdates are necessary with this type of show. To use primary sources, we have to have enough information given identifying a particular episode so that someone else can obtain it and check for themselves. Here, the episode titles are uniquely identifying enough. For other shows without distinct titles, information like celebrities appearing, names of contestants, names of teams participating, as well as original air date and production number can serve to uniquely identify one episode. There's no problem with citing a particular episode, but stuff like "once on The Joker's Wild, there was a 'Road Signs' category that caused problems for the two contestants involved" is (in addition to being remarkably trivial) hard to verify.

Also, as I wrote above, using the CBS site as a source for active/retired games may very well present a copyright problem, as CBS has undoubtedly used some judgment in their selection of which of the pricing games that have been played on the show are "active" and thus worthy to be listed on their site (as I recall, some games were active for years before they were retired per CBS). I would personally rewrite the criterion for active versus retired on a factual basis of which games were played when or intermix the active and retired games. If we were to only list active games, we would have to take care that our determination of "active" is factual and not copied directly from CBS's determination. RJaguar3 | u | t 14:47, 28 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Strong Keep per RJaguar3. ℥^nding·start 14:59, 27 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep as per the above. In a case such as the retired games, information is hard to source without going to fansites; Golden-Road.net, which has been sourced in the past, has been verified to get its information from former producer Roger Dobkowitz (who has openly supported Golden-Road instead of the official website).

2) The official website isn't going to list the retired games and the reasons they're gone for the simple reason that several games were ousted out of hatred and other petty reasons (i.e., you won't be seeing "We retired Make Your Mark because Drew screwed up the rules and we didn't want to tell him he was wrong.").

3) Firsfron mentioned that Alex McNeil's Total Television was "the go-to book for reliable info on U.S. network television programs between 1946 and 1996". As mentioned on the PDQ (game show) page, the book makes at least one statement that has never been supported elsewhere. Daniel Benfield (talk) 02:27, 28 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You have absolutely no way to prove or reliably source your statement about their motives or their reasons. Why should the show's official Website contain anything about, for example, "Professor Price," which was played something like twice in 1977, and dropped almost immediately? JTRH (talk) 16:36, 28 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - The nomination does not provide a valid deletion reason. The NOR/VERIFY issue concedes that at least some of the information is verifiable, which suggests possible cleanup, not deletion. The N issue notes that at least some of the specific games are individually notable, and even if not that would not necessarily be an appropriate deletion reason if the overall topic is notable. And the LINKFARM issue - if it exists at all, I don't see it - can be addressed through editing, not deletion (and there is nothing wrong with the article linking to the show's official site. There may be a case for merging with the parent article, but given the length of this one I don't think that would be appropriate. Rlendog (talk) 15:17, 29 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep the present games are easily verifiable through primary sources — since this is essentially a subpage akin to a list of episodes, it doesn't really need secondary sorucing. As for the retired games, I know the What Were They Thinking book has a whole article on Professor Price, which also gives a little information about On the Nose and Shower Game. Going somewhat with Rjaguar3's argument, {{cite episode}} citations are fine for verifying instances where a game's debut or rule change was explicitly mentioned on-air. Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • ^{(Otters want attention)} 17:28, 31 March 2011 (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.