Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of low-radiation smartphones

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, Ivanvector offers the most policy-convincing argument and there is sufficient consensus to delete the article behind this rationale. Daniel (talk) 00:33, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

List of low-radiation smartphones[edit]

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Unsure why this is a list of any relevance. Lacks sources currently, although that could change, it's merely questionable as to why we need this list. Thargor Orlando (talk) 14:14, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Technology-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 15:19, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 15:19, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. This is WP:SYNTHESIS. Pburka (talk) 16:12, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

No it's not. It's a referenced, verifiable list. Please quote something relevant from WP:SYNTHESIS to back up your claim.--Elvey (talk) 21:43, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. The problem is for a list to be useful it has to be reasonably complete and authoritative. Occasionally, people have tried to add an external link to a list at some site to the article Mobile phone radiation and health. But these are often of the dubious quality like "GSM Arena" used as the only reference for the list here. A WHOIS for GSM Arena gives a location in Sofia, Bulgaria, not likely the centre of mobile telephony of the world. The challenge is for accuracy and completeness, and that I think should mean reference to regulatory authorities. But these are country based. And manufacturers' sites many be by country by model; models may differ by country or even within a country by carrier. I think there is no way to ensure a reasonably complete and accurate list for a particular Wikipedia user somewhere in the world. --papageno (talk) 20:24, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

First of all, be civil. Your comment is very bigoted. Please retract it. Don't cast vague negative aspersions toward Sofia, or by association GSM Arena. If you have anything other than bigoted commentary to evidence GSM Arena being of other than first caliber, put up. 2)Will you please at least admit that it's true that all these mobile devices' SAR values can be verified in the FCC's online database? 3)And that that makes the values WP:VERIFIABLE?--Elvey (talk) 21:43, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your comments, Elvey. My point was simply that Sofia isn't the location for any major regulatory authority for cell phones, whether for Europe, the Americas or for the world as a whole. GSM Arena is clearly a commercial site, and there is no evidence to suggest it is a reliable source or that it takes its evidence from a WP:RS site. I see there are now additional references to sites called SARValues and SARBatabase which are in the same way suspect. One could go to the FCC (which is a reliable source), but that would only cover models for the United States. And models even with the US vary by carrier. The ratings wouldn't apply even for neighbouring countries such as Canada and Mexico, and not for Japan, Australia, South Africa, India, etc. Thus, for a list to be useful, it would have to be many thousands of entries long. In addition, models change with regularly as such a pace, that to keep any list up to date would be an almost impossible task. I think User David Hedlund wishes to create a list out of good faith, but the concept of such a list is flawed from the outset. --papageno (talk) 17:40, 27 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. OP provided no specific justification for deletion in the first place.--Elvey (talk) 21:43, 21 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment It does not define the units (SAR), without this the list is meaningless. Phone radiation will depend on numerous factors, e.g. how strong the signal is, whether bluetooth is on (and what version it is), what country you live in, and possibly what network you use. Also, What is low? A low radiation phone of ten years ago would probably be a high radiation phone today. Ditto 20 and 10 years etc.Martin451 05:44, 22 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per WP:SYNTHESIS. The FCC explains that SAR tests are used to certify a device for sale, and are meaningless for comparing one device to another. This article seems to have made up its own definition of "low-radiation", being any device that tests lower than an arbitrary SAR level, which is not a conclusion supported by the citations. If "low-radiation" is meant to mean any device approved by FCC & other regulators, then delete per WP:NOTDIR. Ivanvector (talk) 07:49, 22 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Note: since being nominated, the page has been moved to List of smartphones with FCC approval and low-radiation, which is still synthesis. Ivanvector (talk) 07:49, 22 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

'meaningless'? That's overstating it. They do offer major caveats.--Elvey (talk) 03:10, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Or maybe it's been moved back and redirected? I'm not sure now. Ivanvector (talk) 07:51, 22 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Delete The FCC sources [1][2] say: "Any cell phone at or below these SAR levels (that is, any phone legally sold in the U.S.) is a "safe" phone, as measured by these standards." And then they give SAR values for all existing smartphones. They don't qualify any phone as "high radiation" or "low radiation". So, this list is based on a criteria that is not present on its sources.

If we followed sources, we would have to list the SAR value of all smartphones approved by FCC. This would be a very broad and unfocused topic, and it would run afoul of Wikipedia:Stand-alone_lists#Appropriate_topics_for_lists. If we tried another criteria, like number of phones manufactured, etc, we would run again into sourcing and synthesis problems. There should be several reliable sources of high quality explicitly labelling some phones as "low" and explaining why this is important. And I don't mention newspaper articles, and stuff like that. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:09, 22 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"And then they give SAR values for all existing smartphones." That's not true! They link to a database where, if you have the smartphone's FCC ID, then you can, eventually, find reported SAR values, one by one.

Is it your contention that any list on the topic of any subset of device SARs is unsuitable by virtue of the nature of the topic? I don't see anything at WP:NOT to support such a view.

There are several reliable sources of lists of low-radiation phones - several major news sources have covered this topic.--Elvey (talk) 03:07, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Those reliable sources would help a lot to preserve this article. But, where are those reliable sources? Why aren't they already used in the article, or listed in the talk page for other people to use, or listed here to convince the closing admin that there were sources after all?

If we can't look at the newspaper articles, we can't tell if they are serious articles on scientific analysis, or an article on all cellphones and not just smartphones, or just sensationalist interpretation of a scientific paper that said something very different.

To avoid deletion, your best bet is dumping here a list of the best sources. I'll list one myself because it's only 5 minutes on google. I suggest you search in news.google.com and other places.

CNET Cell phone radiation levels, puts SAR levels in context, includes updated list of 20 lowest radiation cellphones

I would accept only newspaper articles if they were a few of them with enough quality. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:31, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It seems so blatantly obviously verifiable to me that "There are several reliable sources of lists of low-radiation phones", I thought that the statement didn't require sources. Challenging obvious facts because you dislike them is disruptive, as noted at WP:BLUE. But since you seem to have done so, here are more sources - a couple I had already noted a while back. Computerworld is certainly a particularly high quality source and publication in general.:

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9217287/What_s_your_cell_phone_s_maximum_radiation_level_Interactive_database?pageNumber=2I

http://sarvalues.com/the-complete-sar-list-for-all-phones-usa/

--Elvey (talk) 18:15, 28 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The page has changed greatly since voting started. -Elvey (talk)

Keep is implied by David Hedlund's editing. (But David hasn't actually !voted here.)

Kudos to the editors for working on improving the article, but the core issue has not been addressed. The list is based on an entirely unsourced and at this point unscientific assertion that a "head SAR less than 0.4" qualifies a phone as "low-radiation", and this has been changed in recent edits from 4 (a ten-fold change) and has never been backed up by a citation. The sources do not say that and in fact do not offer any definition of "low-radiation" other than that phones are approved for sale by various rating agencies. This article's "low-radiation" definition is entirely made up, and the list is entirely based on that made-up definition. Furthermore, the implied assertion that phones that make this list are safer than other phones is not only not backed up by science, it is explicitly refuted by the FCC, therefore it is potentially legally negligent for Wikipedia to invent this definition. Delete. Ivanvector (talk) 15:48, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Also delete the mess of redirects being generated by moving this page so many times. Ivanvector (talk) 15:52, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

— Duplicate !vote: Ivanvector (talk • contribs) has already cast a !vote above.[reply]

You voted twice. You are misinformed; Naval cited an article with the title "20 lowest-radiation cell phones (U.S.)". Also you're making stuff up - or if you have a citation that shows the FCC "explicitly refuting" "that phones that make this list are safer than other phones", provide it. In other words, I believe the FCC has never referred to this wikipedia article… Perhaps what you wrote is not what you meant to say… So, this new issue you raise and call the core issue - is it addressed if the article is based on CNet's list of the 20 lowest-radiation cell phones currently on sale in the U.S.?

Please don't edit comments made by other editors in an AfD. I undid your edit to my comment above. AfD is not an election, a user may make as many comments in favour or opposed to deletion as is warranted by the discussion. Since you appear to feel strongly about it, in good faith I have added a duplicate vote template to my duplicate !vote, and I have added one to yours as well. Now if you'll agree with me that further discussion on !vote counts doesn't enhance the discussion, let's stick to arguments about the Wikipedia-worthiness of the article's subject. Ivanvector (talk) 22:07, 28 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Agree with the comments made by User Ivanvector --papageno (talk) 17:40, 27 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

To both of you: Is it your contention that any list on the topic of any subset of device SARs is unsuitable by virtue of the nature of the topic? I don't see anything at WP:NOT to support such a view. --Elvey (talk) 18:15, 28 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

My contention is that the basis of the list is unencyclopedic, mirroring Enric Naval's concerns above. There is no verifiable criteria for inclusion in the list; the one given (SAR value less than 0.4) doesn't mean anything without being backed up by citations. As an example of what I mean, an "Ultra-low emission vehicle" is one that meets a specific measurement - it's not a flat numeric measurement but it is specific, i.e. some cars qualify and some don't, based on a verifiable standard (and not one invented here). We could make a "list of ultra-low emissions vehicles" based on that standard. However, we couldn't make a "list of high fuel efficiency vehicles" which are cars that have an EPA rated fuel economy greater than 50 miles per gallon, because that would be an arbitrary standard that we invented. That appears to be what has happened in this article with SAR value less than 0.4W/kg. The standard given isn't backed up by any sources, and therefore appears to be original research. If such a standard does exist, and an editor can provide a source to back it up, I will happily withdraw my objection. I have no issue at all with the references for the SAR values for the individual phones. Ivanvector (talk) 22:07, 28 December 2013 (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.