Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Picaboo

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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 no consensus. A Traintalk 19:28, 27 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Picaboo[edit]

Picaboo (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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Non notable, WSJ page does not exist. all are nothing indepth coverage. Light2021 (talk) 20:21, 2 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Ritchie333: I suggest that you re-read the Fortune.com article, and reconsider you !vote. It states: The name "Picaboo," it turns out, is a name already in use by an older New Hampshire-based company that published and printed images. To avoid market confusion, the co-founders rechristen their invention "Snapchat." The article under discussion here is about that undistinguished New Hampshire image publishing and printing service, not the Stanford wiz-kids' idea. --Bejnar (talk) 06:04, 4 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I figured that out, but forgot to update my comment here. In any case, in the long term we should at least have "Picaboo" as a redirect going to Snapchat, whether that is simply done by re-appropriating this article, or deleting this one and recreating it is six of one and half a dozen of the other. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 10:48, 4 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Photography-related deletion discussions. Jupitus Smart 09:01, 3 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Business-related deletion discussions. Jupitus Smart 09:01, 3 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of New Hampshire-related deletion discussions. Jupitus Smart 09:01, 3 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete -- nothing encyclopedic here, just a product brochure. This content can just as effectively be housed on the company web site. K.e.coffman (talk) 00:35, 4 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak Keep Bloomberg, TechCrunch and the WSJ provide more than just trivial mentions, so I believe that it barely meets our general notability guidelines and that it does not violate what Wikipedia is not. I have removed from the article the content sourced by the corporate page and the related references to eliminate the promotional tone. The remaining stub I believe meets, just barely, our criteria for inclusion. At the beginning of the article there is a disambiguation note pointing to Snapchat.--Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 11:06, 5 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Comment a couple of additional sources after a quick search: New Hampshire Business Review: Book Smart and Valley News: Picaboo, I See a New ... Yearbook. --Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 11:23, 5 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • 'Comment -- " Bloomberg Businessweek" is not Businessweek but a separate directory service, whereas the content is user submitted. So it adds 0 to notability considerations. TechCrunch is usually routine funding news. New Hampshire Business Review is local source, also probably PR driven. I don't see GNG, let alone WP:CORPDEPTH being met in this case. K.e.coffman (talk) 07:05, 9 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Reply Comment I have to disagree with K.e.coffman arguments. Here are some of the reasons why I believe that WP:GNG is met:
I will improve the article by adding some of the content referenced by this sources --Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 20:12, 9 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Relisting per several sources provided later in the discussion.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, North America1000 00:53, 10 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I added some additional content and inserted some of the sources I mentioned above into the article. In its actual state, I believe it is a valid stub as there is enough non trivial coverage from multiple independent reliable sources, it is no longer promotional, and it does not violate what Wikipedia is not.--Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 09:26, 10 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Companies-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 02:03, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete no claim to notability is made in the lead. Fails WP:CORP for lack of in-depth coverage in independent reliable sources. The article was created on 5 August 2014‎, by an editor who then ceased editing. It appears to have been created for promotional purposes. --Bejnar (talk) 06:04, 4 July 2017 (UTC) I have moved my !vote down here, as I have re-reviewed the article, and still find no claim to notability, and no in depth coverage as per WP:CORP, despite the additions. For example the added New York Times article has a brief mention of Picaboo in an article about modern self-publiahing. The article added from the New Hampshire Business Review is more substantial, but is highly promotional, it also conflated the origin of Snapchat with Picaboo as did Ritchie333 above. The net result is still lack of in-depth coverage. --Bejnar (talk) 22:06, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Comment @Bejnar: According to our general notability guidelines:
"Significant coverage" addresses the topic directly and in detail, so that no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention, but it does not need to be the main topic of the source material.
Please let me know which of the following sources included in the article do you consider not to meet that criteria and why:
The brief mentions from other reliable sources (New York Times: [4], Fox News: [5], Chicago Tribune: [6]) complement it's notability, but if you agree that at least three of the above are valid I think it follows that there is enough in depth coverage by multiple sources to meet WP:GNG.--Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 09:08, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I also do not understand the argument "it also conflated the origin of Snapchat with Picaboo" as the first line of the article includes the following disambiguation statement: "This article is about the web-based image printing service. For the photo sharing app formerly called Picaboo, see Snapchat." --Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 15:27, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Your cited source did the conflating. --Bejnar (talk) 15:09, 20 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Please clarify what you mean. I did not see any mention of Snapchat in the source. This company started in Palo Alto and moved to New Hampshire.
  • Delete. The first two sources are rewritten press releases, essentially repeating the company's own advertisements for itself, and local newspaper can't really be expected to do more than that.. The accuracy can be gauged by their use of the NYT articles as their reference, whichgave this company one sentence in a general article. TeleCrunch varies: its long reviews can be RSs, but this particular reference is a short notice. Bloomberg is a directory entry. Thefirst of the booksmentions it only, (twice pluas a picture legend) It is a fair assumption that the others are similar. DGG ( talk ) 03:22, 18 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: To allow further discussion on the sources provided and Crystallizedcarbon's question
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, SoWhy 07:26, 18 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Having four users (two of them admins for which I have a great deal of respect) with a different criteria on this article I am beginning to feel like Custer on his last stand. I honestly don't know this tool as I no longer print my photos and I never heard about this company before stumbling upon this AfD, but I feel compelled to invest my time and defend its inclusion. Besides fighting vandalism I use a lot of my time patrolling new pages, so if my understanding of how to apply our notability criteria is not 100% correct I am very interested in learning why and continue to hone in my skills. But if my interpretation is correct I feel that I need to be consistent and continue to defend that this article be kept.
@DGG: I very much admire your work, I read the comments on notability posted on your page. I agree that there is always some degree of subjectivity, but I personally feel that our goal should be to apply the criteria in the most objective way posible. In this case I see no reasonable reason for deletion. Addressing your comments:
  • I do not share your analysis of the first two sources. They are both reliable sources and both provide significant coverage so I feel they meet word by word the requirements outlined at WP:GNG. There is no clear indication that they are press releases as they are both signed. I also understand by our definition of secondary sources:
A secondary source provides an author's own thinking based on primary sources, generally at least one step removed from an event. It contains an author's analysis, evaluation, interpretation, or synthesis of the facts, evidence, concepts, and ideas taken from primary sources. Secondary sources are not necessarily independent or third-party sources. They rely on primary sources for their material, making analytic or evaluative claims about them.
That the fact that they also include some information from primary sources like the company, its employees or even PR releases does not invalidate them as proper sources, as long as they are not copied entirely word by word, in which case I would have to agree with you. If there is such a PR release, please provide the link and I will remove the sources.
  • About the NYT. The source does not include only a single sentence. There are two separate references from two different articles published by the NYT, and in both cases they include a paragraph with three sentences.
  • The TechCrunch article has 362 words clearly meeting (in my opinion) the significant coverage criteria outlined in our general notability guidelines to consider that source valid towards establishing notability.
  • Bloomberg is not just a directory entry, There is a criteria to be included, it provides a brief description so it seems to be more than a trivial mention and being a secondary source subject to editorial control I feel it also contributes to establish the notability of the subject.
  • Regarding the books: The first book, as you say, includes just a paragraph with two sentences and an image with its caption but this also is more than a trivial mention so it also contributes to establish notability. I believe that your assumption about the other two books is incorrect. One of them has a very extensive coverage of its features comparing them to those of other relevant tools for picture books and mentions the term Picaboo 46 times. The third book includes at least two paragraphs.
  • There was no mention about the article in the WSJ rating it top photo book creator in terms of quality. Finally the brief mentions by Chicago Tribune and Fox News I think complement the other sources and help establish that this is a reasonably popular tool for photo editing and printing.
I have been here for three years and I am honored to have been trusted with the responsibility to be an admin at the es project, still I admit that I continue learning every day and I welcome the opportunity to contrast criteria with other editors with much more experienced than myself, so if I am mistaken in my interpretation of our policy I will gladly accept any guidance or criticism. --Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 10:14, 18 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Software-related deletion discussions. Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 07:52, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]


  • Keep per the significant coverage in multiple independent reliable sources.
    1. Rajala, Liisa (2015-10-02). "Hanover-based Picaboo looks to disrupt the school yearbook market". New Hampshire Business Review. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      In 2002, two Babson College students, Kevin McCurdy and Howard Field, formed the idea for a cloud-based software platform to create personal photo books. That platform became Picaboo, which, in 2012 The Wall Street Journal rated the best photo book provider, in a comparison with Blurb, MyPublisher and Shutterfly.

      ...

      With millions of users worldwide, the business was doing well, but McCurdy said he started to hear stories from friends and family about the hassle of putting together school yearbooks.

      The company has worked already with several thousand elementary schools, middle schools, smaller high schools and some colleges in the U.S. and Canada.

    2. Dizik, Alina (2013-01-09). "Pages of Memories Done in Less Than an Hour". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on 2017-07-27. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      Picaboo Corp.'s BookGenie service required the least amount of editing. Without any tips or suggestions in the tool, it took us awhile to learn how to swap photos, but once we figured it out, it was simple. As for the lack of guidance offered in the tool, "It's a delicate balance of keeping things simple and offering a rich set of features," says co-founder Kevin McCurdy.

      Photos uploaded quickly and the layout looked good, requiring minimal tweaking. We liked the album's vintage travel theme. The site allowed the most customization of layouts, including adding more than 10 small photos per page.

      Once it arrived, the book was the best of the four services. While the cover quality was great, we would have liked to change the look of the cover title; an opaque textbox seemed out of place. Users can change the opaqueness of the text box, Mr. McCurdy says.

    3. Lippman, John (2015-09-20). "Picaboo, I See a New ... Yearbook". Valley News. Archived from the original on 2017-07-27. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      A Silicon Valley firm has relocated to Hanover and moved into the 128-year old Rosey Jekes building — no sign advertises the new tenant — that was formerly occupied by the retail boutique of the same name. The firm, Picaboo, launched in 2002 with an online application that enables users to design custom paper-bound photo books from digital pictures. Picaboo survived the subsequent shakeout among online photo book makers and went on to sell more than 2 million books to 1 million customers.

      ...

      Now the 50-employee company — 10 of whom work in the Rosey Jekes building — is adapting its online photo book application to the high school and college yearbook market, an old-school industry that continues to operate much the way it did half a century ago.

      ...

      The impetus for Picaboo began at the sixth hole at the Stanford University Golf Course.

      In 2002, McCurdy and Howard Field, who had been friends since their days together at the business-studies oriented Babson College in Massachusetts, were already a couple of successful young entrepreneurs.

      ...

      He and Field hired programmers to design the software and raised $18 million through two rounds of venture capital. The barrier to entry is relatively low: There are no plant or infrastructure costs and the capital expenditure goes largely toward software development. Fulfillment, printing and delivery of the photo books is contracted out to digital printing companies and other firms. Many of Picaboo’s staff members are dispersed around the country: The 12-person engineering staff lives and works in low-cost Boise, Idaho, a growing mecca for coders. Field remains in California and is executive chairman of the company.

      By 2012, after operating for 10 years, Picaboo was profitable.

    4. Grotta, Sally Weiner (2017-07-21). "Best Photo Cards 2017: Picaboo". Tom's Hardware. Archived from the original on 2017-07-27. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      Picaboo has easy-to-use online card designs with some very nice creative controls, as well as a sensible, time-saving interface. Unfortunately, its print quality didn't live up to our expectations.

    5. Ricketts, Camille (2009-06-08). "Picaboo raises $1M for photo publishing services". VentureBeat. Archived from the original on 2017-07-27. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      Picaboo, a company that lets you publish your digital photography in professionally bound books and greeting cards, has brought in $1 million in equity and rights, according to VentureWire. Based in Palo Alto, Calif., the company hadn’t raised money since its undisclosed second round of funding in 2006. Its existing investors include New Enterprise Associates, CampVentures, Odyssey Research, Softbank Capital Venture Partners Mike Perlis and Randy Komisar and an unnamed partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

    6. Arrington, Michael (2005-10-31). "Tag Camp Photo Album with Picaboo". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2017-07-27. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      Picaboo was founded in September 2002 by Howard Field and Kevin McCurdy, and is funded by Kleiner Perkins and Softbank. They launched in May 2005.

      It only works on Windows right now (although Mac user have built in software for this stuff that works very well already). Picaboo requires a client download and the album editing occurs on this client. While I’d prefer a web app (flash or ajax), having a desktop client does speed things up considerably.

    7. "10 Great Apps to Preserve Memories". PC Magazine. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      Picaboo recently announced Version 2.0 of its popular free software to create photo books and greeting cards from digital photos. Picaboo's new features include more customizable photo greeting cards and photo book covers, as well as an online tool called StoryFlow, letting users group photos onto pages before the book is created and the book is auto-created within seconds. Select from over 240 page layouts, dozens of themed backgrounds, and over 40 different fonts to customize your photo book. Use the built-in photo tools to rotate, crop, adjust brightness/contrast, and remove red eye to ensure that your photo pages will look great. Choose from over 50 professionally designed greeting cards in five different card sizes. Greeting cards are $2.28 each, while photo books are $9.99 and up. Picaboo 2.0 can be downloaded for free from Picaboo.com.

    8. Fasig, Nicole Price (2008-01-09). "Hands-On with Picaboo: Creating Photo Books". PC Magazine. Archived from the original on 2017-07-27. Retrieved 2017-07-27.

      The article notes:

      Similar to competitor MyPublisher.com, the actual building process occurs on your local system after you download the free software from Picaboo's website. Here's where I hit the first glitch: I own a MacBook, and Picaboo only works on Windows systems. I regrouped and brought the photos to the office on a flash drive, so that I could use a Windows machine. Unfortunately, the installation process still didn't run smoothly, and I kept getting vague error messages. I tried going to Picaboo's troubleshooting page, but it wasn't particularly helpful or straightforward. Finally, after turning off all other programs and restarting my computer, I was able to fully install the software, which ran smoothly after that.

      ...

      Though I didn't test it, Picaboo also offers a soundtrack option, where you can upload songs from your computer or download tunes from eMusic.

      Despite my complaints with the process, with a little time and tinkering I was able to get the result I wanted. I wish that Picaboo was compatible with Macs and that the installation had run smoothly, but once it was up and running I had few complaints. My dad's book looks fantastic on the coffee table, and that's what really counts.

    There is sufficient coverage in reliable sources to allow Picaboo to pass Wikipedia:Notability#General notability guideline, which requires "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject".

    Cunard (talk) 06:30, 27 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  • Delete as I analyzed and found the above sources to be equally promotional; "He and Field hired programmers to design the software and raised $18 million through two rounds of venture capital", "Picaboo also offers a soundtrack option, where you can upload songs from your computer or download tunes from eMusic.", "Picaboo's new features include more customizable photo greeting cards and photo book covers, as well as an online tool called StoryFlow, letting users group photos onto pages before the book is created and the book is auto-created within seconds. Select from over 240 page layouts, dozens of themed backgrounds, and over 40 different fonts to customize your photo book. Use the built-in photo tools to rotate, crop, adjust brightness/contrast, and remove red eye to ensure that your photo pages will look great. Choose from over 50 professionally designed greeting cards in five different card sizes. Greeting cards are $2.28 each, while photo books are $9.99 and up. Picaboo 2.0 can be downloaded for free from Picaboo.com.", "lets you publish your digital photography in professionally bound books and greeting cards, has brought in $1 million in equity", "Photos uploaded quickly and the layout looked good, requiring minimal tweaking. We liked the album's vintage travel theme. The site allowed the most customization of layouts, including adding more than 10 small photos per page." and "easy-to-use online card designs with some very nice creative controls, as well as a sensible, time-saving interface", objections aside are still violations of our policies WP:What Wikipedia is not, WP:Not webhost, WP:Deletion policy, WP:Promotion and WP:Not guide. Every one of these says that fundamentally promotional content cannot be accepted as the encyclopedia's goal, including that of a advertising-free neutral encyclopedia. GNG itself makes clear that policies are priority before suggestive guidelines, and that company republishings cannot be labeled as independent and this is a sensible implementation; as always, quantity sources is not enough as quality. Crystallizedcarbon, while these sources may be significant to the company and consumer, we would simply consider and need something else outside that scope. SwisterTwister talk 07:16, 27 July 2017 (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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