Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Solarpunk

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. All the keep opinions are by accounts with very few edits, which is ... not a good sign, usually. Policy-based discussion clearly points towards delete. It's surprising that the merger to Cyberpunk derivatives has not been discussed more, though, but such is life. Obviously this can be recreated if it ever gets more substantial coverage.  Sandstein  20:42, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

Solarpunk

Solarpunk (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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Looks like a made-up genre to me. All references are either personal publications on tumblr or just questionable news articles, unrelated to actual works of fiction. Google book search struggles to bring anything up, there is just a couple of books with "solarpunk" in the title. There is actually a "solarpunk" genre on goodreads, but it's filled mostly by a single user [1]. Article itself doesn't list any works either, it's basically empty. Some more points are on the talk page Jazz (talk) 12:19, 19 March 2017 (UTC) — Jazz (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. Jazz (talk) 12:19, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

• Delete — With no notable works in the genre (to quote a 2015 Medium article, "not to mention a literary genre that has rabid fans but has yet to produce any literature"), I see no reason that "solarpunk" is notable enough. Laurel Wreath of Victors ‖ Speak 💬 ‖ 21:35, 19 March 2017 (UTC)
• Keep — The discussion here seems to be approaching this concept as if it were strictly a speculative fiction subgenre (and thus, that it's somehow invalidated by the dearth of works explicitly classified as such). What it seems to actually be is a distinct, if still nascent, ecofuturist revival which owes a lot to extant works of speculative fiction.  Additionally, I see little evidence of the linked articles being "questionable" or the fans being "rabid;" and I'm not entirely sure how it's at all relevant that the other links are from Tumblr. At worst, this should be merged into "ecofuturism." 2602:306:3A29:DBF0:A957:9936:F235:F92B (talk) 03:05, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

Whether it's being discussed here as if it's only a fiction subgenre, you can see on the talk page for it that it has been discussed as an 'aesthetic movement'.. yet no notable works of any kind and no real reliable sources have been added to the article. Centerone (talk) 21:01, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

And yet, concepts which owe their entire existence to single biased individuals and break down outside of a very limited perspective are deemed "notable," complete with insinuations that anyone who questions their legitimacy must be a "right-wing authoritarian." This page stands at least as well on its own as the one in question does; nonetheless, there seems to be no debate as to the notability of the other. Again: if anything, a case can be made for merging it with "ecofuturism" (of which it's a clear spin-off). 2602:306:3A29:DBF0:A957:9936:F235:F92B (talk) 19:45, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

And this relates to this article, how? We're discussing this article. Not any other. I don't know of these other concepts or biased individuals of which you speak, nor why we should deem them relevant. Centerone (talk) 12:02, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

• STRONG DELETE Y'all already know what I think based on my comments on the talk page. There is no way in heck this article should exist, and I'm surprised it lasted this long. Throwing a few words together in the *-punk methodology does not simply or automatically create a notable thing worthy of coverage. Claiming that notable authors or artists have influenced an artistic movement does not automatically bring that movement into being, or mean that they actually have anything to do with that thing, or make that thing notable. Centerone (talk) 07:31, 20 March 2017 (UTC)
• Keep — There are over forty novels listed on Amazon if searching for "solarpunk". Most notable seem to be Wings of Renewal (various), Suncatcher (Alia Gee), Viral Airwaves (Claudie Arseneault) and Twenty One Twenty (Jason J. Robinson). There are also active communities on Tumblr, Twitter and Facebook with posts daily. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Petulant Mouse (talk • contribs) 11:42, 20 March 2017 (UTC) — Petulant Mouse (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Well, many of those 'novels' appear to be padded short stories about 20 pages long. Many if not all of them appear to be direct to amazon ebooks. I'm not even sure if some of them are really what one would consider 'solarpunk'... does anybody want to do a comprehensive study of them, or at least check each of them out to examine this argument? I stand by my previous statements in the talk page on the article. A subgenre of a subgenre that people are trying to wish into being simply by blogging about it and forcing an article on us. Also, if so many of them are notable, do they have their own pages, news articles from reliable sources, etc. etc. ? Centerone (talk) 19:43, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

As far as I understand it, to be under a category on Amazon the publisher/author must choose that category. Wikipedia is about reporting facts. It is, therefore, a fact that 40+ works with real ISBN numbers have chosen to be published under the genre called 'solarpunk'. To that extent, it does exist. That should be the only criteria necessary.

I certainly don't believe that it is down to Wikipedia editors to decide whether a genre exists. It is, and always must be, down to the artists working in any particular genre to name their work how they choose. They are the owners of the genre. If you want to delete the genre, ask the artists first. I'm guessing they might object.

Personally, I don't think that it matters whether a work is a collection of short stories or a single story of epic length, but if it *does* matter, then a quick review of the stats on Amazon reveals that Viral Airwaves and Suncatcher are proper length novels, and Twenty One Twenty is even longer still. Does it matter that some of those 40+ novels are ebooks? Definitely not. The Martian and many other popular books/movies began life in that way.

I do, however, agree with the point that it would be helpful if a professional and independent literary critic were to review the literature in it's totality. I'm afraid I don't know anyone at the New York Times and I don't have time to read those books myself. Many of them might actually be rubbish for all I know. Over to the solarpunk fans to read the books written for them and write the reviews. But I say innocent until proven guilty, unless you want to read those books yourself from start to end and prove they are NOT "solarpunk", then your argument does not stand. Wikipedia is about facts, and it is a verifiable fact that 40+ solarpunk "novels" exist on Amazon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Petulant Mouse (talk • contribs) 21:50, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

No, it's not a verifiable fact that 40+ "solarpunk novels" exist. Yes, there are a few collections of short stories there. Many of the entries are also as I said, around 20 pages. 20 ebook pages does not a novel make. This is why I asked for someone to check on them. I didn't really want to go through each and every one of them to prove or disprove your point when it became clear that in a random sampling of them, several of those that I looked at were either 19-24 pages, collections of short stories, or didn't even seem to give them impression that they were really solarpunk, but rather potentially used the term as a marketing gimmick, which is common for this sort of direct to ebook publishing. Your claims are disingenuous. Centerone (talk) 02:34, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

Please be assured that no offence was intended. Here is the Amazon.co.uk top ten solarpunk books sampled on the 21st of March 2017 (47 results returned).

Extended content from Amazon.co.uk

1) Wings of renewal A collection of short stories by 19 authors. 338 pages 2) Twenty One Twenty A full-length self-published novel by Jason J Robinson 405 pages 3) Elf Saga volume 4 Part of a series of books by J Lewis 416 pages 4) A solarpunk titled book in Portuguese - a language I don't read, so I can't make further comment. 256 pages 5) The Solarpunk colouring book. 6) The Eleventh Upgrade. A (very) short story by Charlotte Tracy 19 pages 7) Greenshift A novella by Heidi Ruby Miller 160 pages 8) In Bright Glass A novella by Virginia Marybury 114 pages 9) Double Nocturne A novel by Cynthia Felice 330 pages 10) Viral Airwaves A full length self-published novel by Claudie Arseneault, also known as White Renegade in a multiparty series. 478 pages

You are correct that one of those titles is only nineteen pages long, you are very probably also correct that a large number of those are Amazon slush-pile trash, but I still assert that I am correct in saying that some of those (but admittedly not all 40+) are of a decent length and therefore proper novels. Are they any good? That is honestly not for me to say without reading them all, and in any regards it would only ever be a matter of personal opinion, but they do call themselves Solarpunk, and if at least one of them is of a passable quality in the eyes of some readers, then that must go some way towards validating the genre. That is the one and only point I wish to make and I shall say no more. I never intended an argument. My warmest regards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Petulant Mouse (talk • contribs) 05:23, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. All I see in the way of reliable sources is the Australian Broadcasting Corporation article. Way too soon to be called a full-fledged genre. Clarityfiend (talk) 23:17, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

• Keep —An anthology called Sunvault: Stories of Solarpunk and Eco-Speculation will be released in late summer or fall 2017 from Upper Rubber Boot Books, featuring stories by notable writers such as Daniel José Older and Nisi Shawl, among many other writers who may not have Wikipedia pages, but are known within the speculative fiction community. The Sunvault anthology was successfully crowdfunded on Kickstarter in 2016. Additionally, another forthcoming crowdfunded anthology from Microcosm Publishing, Biketopia: Feminist Bicycle Science Fiction Stories, contains both stories and comics self-identified as solarpunk. Deleting the solarpunk page is premature.73.26.136.115 (talk) 17:56, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

• Keep - Other sources dealing with solarpunk include Issue 10 of "Obsolete!," a solarpunk themed issue from an anarchist magazine, and Solarpunk Press, a web, print, and podcast magazine of solarpunk fiction that ran for 11 issues, all of which continue to be available online. Disclosure: I was one of the editors of Solarpunk Press, and I was interviewed for the solarpunk issue of "Obsolete!," so of course take those into account when evaluating those sources, but that's two more publications that heavily address and acknowledge the existence of solarpunk media. Jay of the Solarpunks tumblr also recently published a solarpunk reference guide, gathering up much of the material that has come out of the last few years to help people new to the genre get an idea of what's going on with it. I don't think this would necessarily be appropriate for a Wikipedia citation, but it might help unsure editors familiarize themselves with the genre. At this point, there's a possible future in which solarpunk turns out to have never been a very significant genre, but it's demonstrably false that solarpunk is not a distinct and recognized genre of fiction. I object to deletion on the grounds of no content; I think a reasonable discussion could be raised about whether solarpunk is sufficiently notable, about which I don't think I have a sufficiently distant perspective. But that's not the grounds on which deletion has been raised, and that's not the discussion I see happening on this page. Txwatson (talk) 22:14, 21 March 2017 (UTC) — Txwatson (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Keep - The way I see it, we've run into the eternal dilemma of Wikipedia: Solarpunk is notable enough that users feel it's worth adding to the site, but it's new enough that it hasn't been picked up by the mainstream. The same phenomenon happens with developing news stories that we know will be significant but just don't have all the details. So we put in placeholders with an unfortunate lack of "hard sources." In the case of Solarpunk, I'd argue that we're in the middle of that process and the timeline is just stretched out because it's an artistic movement that's still searching for its footing. But even then, it's still notable enough to have works listed on Amazon and across the internet (no, not just limited to Tumblr and blogs. Bigger sources are beginning to pick up on Solarpunk). How embarrassing will it be if this page is deleted before Solarpunk does hit its stride? "Sorry all, we thought said this was notable, then we said it was worthless, and now it's notable again." If nothing else, give it another year before considering this question. --24.158.18.218 (talk) 06:16, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

• Comment. You've just listed all the reasons why this article should be deleted: "hasn't been picked up by the mainstream", "an unfortunate lack of 'hard sources'", "give it another year" (WP:TOOSOON). Clarityfiend (talk) 23:57, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

• Merge to Cyberpunk derivatives. There is some coverage in reliable sources (New Republic, and Australian ABC) but most references are to blogging platforms like Tumblr and Medium, or small-press/self-published books and journals, so I don't think it quite meets notability requirements. However, the movement seems to have some supporters in Brazil so people might check Portuguese-language sources. Colapeninsula (talk) 15:12, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

• Despite the name, it's more of a derivative of ecofuturism than of cyberpunk (although the concept seems to incorporate the idea of ecofuturism as pushback against the unsustainable status quo, hence the "-punk" suffix). 2602:306:3A29:DBF0:A957:9936:F235:F92B (talk) 19:45, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

• Keep - Hi, this is Adam Flynn, one of the people 'trying to make Solarpunk a thing,' so I'm going to be very circumspect about what I add to this discussion that's not about me or anything I've personally written. So, solarpunk. It's been the subject of panels at Readercon, the prompt for at least one game jam, and has an oversize influence in visual domains: There's a seemingly endless scroll of solarpunk pinterest boards, and I've seen it start to pop up in concept art from webcomics to wakanda. Finally, in terms of the purely literary, the lineup for the Sunvault anthology (Kickstarted 2016, coming out in May 2017) includes some significant names--Nisi Shawl is no joke. I would agree that the article as it currently exists does not reflect a lot of what's percolating, in part because of how diffuse and decentralized this all is. It's not as though we're all gathering at the Cabaret Voltaire to write a manifesto like the Dadaists did. Rather, it's much more of a collective steam engine time, and by 2016 we started to see that go from a widespread enthusiasm into real works. A few years ago (circa 2014 or so), I think having a wikipedia page for solarpunk would have been premature. But I'd say that a number of developments from the past year or two are pushing it further into notability. I just took a bit of time to edit the solarpunk page to try and reflect a bit of that, without getting overly self-referential. (Also, I looked up more ion the 2012 brazilian anthology, and it had some of the heaviest hitters from portuguese-language speculative fiction writing. I'm not sure how cross-language notability works, but Draco is basically the brazilian equivalent of Tor or Baen.) In any event, I'm happy to take suggestions or otherwise add sources for this. I'd say that solarpunk is roughly on a similar level of notability as Project Hieroglyph, which seems to be safe-- there are a few articles on mainstream publications, some published anthologies, and a lot of discussion about what ought to be done in science fiction writing. It's a prefigurative movement, which can make it hard to show results early on, but they're finally starting to roll in. Threadbare (talk) 00:00, 25 March 2017 (UTC)

• Very strong keep - there are a large number of hits with Google News. This article is notable. --Oskinet (talk) 03:49, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

• Very leaning to Light Merge (But also now lean to Light Keep) - Maybe move Solarpunk page into their Ecofuturism as subcultural section or Cyberpunk derivatives into futuristic section. But besides that most people who defending page existance has points, So I will said an popular site TvTropes already made page on Solarpunk from last year as "Punk Punk" genre see here Solarpunk page from TVTropes and movement/genre is now close to 5 years old, so yea for now merged until become mainstream genre (and than later revived the whole page) in next decade eventually like how Steampunk did from this decade. 2606:A000:85C0:E00:F155:2D8F:CDF5:2067 (talk) 20:50, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: All "keep" opinions are by IPs or accounts with very few edits. The discussion could benefit from the input of more experienced editors.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein  08:06, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Rcsprinter₁₂₃ (notify) 17:11, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

• Delete Non-notable neologism "genre". Can I please point out that using multiple accounts to edit Wikipedia can lead to the loss of your editing privileges. Exemplo347 (talk) 17:44, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

• Comment - Holy WP:SPAs (including nominator, who even knew about deletion sorting). Lots of claims relating to why it should be kept, but little-to-no evidence of notability. This is what we need to keep the article: significant coverage (not mentions that it exists, not examples of the genre, not event themes, but serious discussion of it as a subject) in reliable sources (no self-published sources like personal blogs or self-published books, no company websites, no press releases or manifestos, but rather books, newspapers, magazines, journals, or websites with a reputation for accuracy and rigor) that are independent of the subject (if it's written by someone who writes in this genre, a publisher, anyone who makes money from selling books in this genre, or otherwise anyone with a stake in any of this, it's not independent of the subject). I don't see any such links offered so far. The appearance of so many SPAs means there's almost certainly some WP:CANVASSing/WP:MEAT puppetry, and seeing that automatically makes me assume go in the other direction. My skepticism increases when I see people talking about "trying to make Solarpunk a thing" (sorry to single you out) by using Wikipedia. Wikipedia is a lagging indicator of significance, and by definition an encyclopedia would not cover something that is not yet a thing.

All that said, here's what I found that could contribute to notability: Solarpunk: a new movement sees the future in a positive light (ABC Online), This sci-fi enthusiast wants to make “solarpunk” happen (Grist), The New Utopians (The New Republic)... I see some halfway decent blogs/scifi websites, but meh. If you cannot add to this list, you should not be arguing to keep this. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 00:02, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

What about this one? This article from last year call 'Two nerds' on the future of Earth from Arizona State University website pretty on talking about Solarpunk as genre? 2606:A000:85C0:E00:C16B:CDDD:4E2F:9860 (talk) 23:15, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Could be a reliable source to include in the article, but it's a primary source. On one hand, it's a university publication about a university contest (i.e. only a little better than a press release). On the other hand, it's two people basically talking about starting a genre (i.e. a primary source and an indication it's probably too soon). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 15:24, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

• Weak Delete - Basically per above. May be notable in the future, but it seems too soon at the moment. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 15:26, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

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.