Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/SpectraSite Tower Holopaw

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 except Griffin Television Tower Oklahoma, for which there's no consensus. Conscious 21:43, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

SpectraSite Tower Holopaw[edit]

As cleanup following successful batch deletions of unremarkable masts, I'm nominating another 24 radio and TV towers on mainland USA which are below 500 meters tall. None of the towers that I am nominating are notable in any way whatsoever, as far as I can tell. Most of these have been stubs for over a year, none have any substantial additional information other than their name, location and height. Delete per WP:NOT#DIR and WP:NOT#IINFO. Ohconfucius 07:04, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Delete as per nom. Gordon Bennett, how many of these articles are there??? Bwithh 07:11, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all per nom. MER-C 08:12, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all per nom. Sr13 (T|C) 08:54, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
delete all per nom--Dmz5 10:06, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Keep all. First, I don't like the Easter egg links sprinkled throughout the rationale, with additional information beyond that stated in the one that got me here. More importantly, these fit absolutely none of the criteria listed in the cited WP:NOT#IINFO. They fit none of the criteria in WP:NOT#DIR either, so there's a good reason the nominator wasn't more specific about that. Mast height is one of the least significant discriminators once you get below the top 10 which are interesting because of their height alone. The terrain is a major factor in that, and the demographics. Gene Nygaard 11:11, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Watching the AfDs for the mast articles I believe that, faced with a huge number of articles, the submitter has organised them by height as a way to break down the task. This is likely because they are sorted that way on the list of masts page. I doubt the submitter is intending it be taken as a primary reason for deletion, other than low-height masts do not have their height as a reason for notability. Akihabara 13:54, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Delete all. There may not be a line stating "Wikipedia is not a collection of unremarkable masts," but the spirit of WP:NOT#IINFO is certainly maintained by deleting these articles. I have yet to see a coherent argument for why articles like these should be included in Wikipedia, and if every manmade electronic structure is given its own page, then Wikipedia will be unreasonably bloated, and beyond control. Charlie 12:09, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It isn't covered there in those guidelines, so a mere unadorned reference to them is not sufficient. At a minimum, there would need to be a showing of what the rule is and how this fits under that rule, and there have been no coherent arguments along those lines.

There are fewer manmade structures over 400 m tall than there are episodes of one long-running soap opera. There are fewer manmade structures over 400 m tall than there are no-name soccer players whose fans think they are famous enough to get by with only one name. There are fewer manmade structures over 400 m tall than there are links in the "What links here" of some one sentence articles about no-name villages with three page navigation boxes linking to all their neighboring no-name villages. There is no more room for growth in the tall masts, but there are several million villages which don't yet have Wikipedia articles, and likewise a few billion people and twice as many manga and anime characters as people. Gene Nygaard 13:37, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

All of the things you say are true, and none of them represents a reason why Wikipedia needs these particular articles. In addition, the nominator pretty clearly states that none of the towers "are notable in any way whatsoever". This seems to be a fairly coherent argument, to which you have not provided a response. Charlie 14:03, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. These arguments don’t establish notability, which is the nominators main argument for deletion. And there are more fish in the sea than manmade structures over 400 m tall. These statistics mean nothing- not every structure over 400 m tall is notable. Fledgeling 17:37, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What the nominator cited for the reasons was "per WP:NOT#DIR and WP:NOT#IINFO" with no citatation to any notability criteria whatsoever, just a bald claim.

Every one of the towers in all these articles (all American), however many are listed, are taller than the Empire State Building, the second tallest building in America, including the antenna which adds 204 ft (62 m) to its height. That in itself gives them a certain degree of notability.

Every one of these towers listed is also higher than the roof of Sears Tower, the tallest building in the United States, though they don't reach quite as high above the ground as the antenna on top of it. Gene Nygaard 23:07, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Gene, the list of masts, if I counted right, details 132 masts over 500m in the US alone. I don't think that makes them notable. I do believe that (say) the top 10 in the US may be notable, perhaps the top 20 at a push. Once you take into account masts in other countries, those nominated for deletion certainly become non-notable based on their height alone. Of course something else may make them notable. I do accept that we're getting close to a point where they cease being "just another mast", when it needs to be considered more carefully. Akihabara 23:46, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's easy to count up all the masts in other countries that are over 500 m tall: there are exactly zero of them. The one in Poland that was once the tallest in the world collapsed.

It's pretty easy to count the other structures of any other type anywhere in the world that are taller than 500 meters: Taipei 101, CN Tower, Ostankino Tower, and Sears Tower when you include its antenna. Even if I hadn't had good mathematics teachers, I'd probably be able to figure it out: that's four. The only difficulty is in deciding whether or not to count the mostly undersea drilling rig Petronius Platform, which would take you all the way up to five. Have I missed any? Gene Nygaard 01:51, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

So, how many masts are there outside the United States which are taller than the shortest one on this current list nominated for deletion? Zero, isn't it. I didn't double-check all of them again; all of these were over 443 m, and I'm pretty sure they are all over the 460 m of Balashikha Transmission Mast, and that that is currently the tallest one outside the United States. Gene Nygaard 02:01, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Incorrect. If you actually look at the list of masts, you see well over 50 in the 600 m + range. NOT… “five” as you say, and this is in the US alone. Thats makes these masts non-notable height-wise by comparisonFledgeling 04:53, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is indeed four (also zero) as I say (I don't count Petronius Platform). What exactly is it that you don't understand about 4 "structures of any other type" over 500 m anywhere in the world including the U.S.A., or about 0 masts "outside the United States" taller than the the ones nominated for deletion here? That list at list of masts is a worldwide list, not a U.S. list. Gene Nygaard 08:31, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what the issue is here in any case? Only non-trivial press coverage or other third-party sourcing makes a thing notable, so regardless of who's correct on height, if feature-length pieces have not been written about the structure, it's not notable-even if it's several thousand feet high. Seraphimblade 08:48, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

They are thousands of feet high. Two thousand, to the nearest thousand. Same as the tallest structures ever made by man, when rounded to the nearest thousand feet. Gene Nygaard 14:41, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What? Comparisons against any other type of structure mean nothing! Notable amongst other masts is what we are looking for. If you again, actually look at the list, all the 600 m + structures that are listed are in the US- hence that’s what i said. And you haven’t addressed Seraphimblade’s point: Only non-trivial press coverage or other third-party sourcing makes a thing notable! Height is not the only reason unless it is in the top 10 or so. Just because its tall doesn’t mean it meets the criteria.Fledgeling 17:17, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Delete all per nom. Some might be notable for something, but it is hard to find any newwspaper article based on the corporate name of the company which owns it. Edison 16:48, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all per nom. What else is there to say? Fledgeling 17:29, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete and repeat as collection of non-notable structures. Seraphimblade 23:33, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Nobody will miss them. Maddy626 09:51, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Griffin Television Tower Oklahoma, It was the tallest structure in the world at the time it was built. —Quarl ^(talk) 2006-12-27 02:20Z
Delete all except Griffin Television Tower Oklahoma. As a part of this cleanup, can someone create a sucession box for the highest towers in the US and place it in the appropiate articles? I think it is clear the this fact is notable and the towers replaced by and that suceeded by the specific tower are notable and should be listed in the article. Vegaswikian 07:23, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion[edit]

Nominator has misstated the facts with respect to American Towers Tower Cedar Hill which is over 500 m tall (two towers, one over, one just under). Gene Nygaard 23:07, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Gene, I would like to ask you to step back for a moment, and look at this from a different angle. Forget the exact heights of various masts, or whether the nominator has all of his facts straight. You certainly seem to be adamant that these articles be kept, despite the number of those who disagree. This is admirable, and I would hate to think we are bullying you, or any others in a (seemingly) minority view. Therefore, I would like to ask: Why exactly do you think that these articles about various masts should remain in WP? If you think they add to WP's mission, I would really like to hear your reasons. I want to see WP cleaned up, but not at the expense of articles that support the mission, and I make no pretenses to omnicience. Charlie 10:01, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't created any of these articles, and don't have any significant time invested in any of them.

I haven't created any of the lists, either, though early on I did quite a bit of formatting of the tables in a couple of them.

There probably were too many articles. The excess have mostly been deleted already.

The biggest problems with this nomination include:

The bogus concern about "Once you take into account masts in other countries" (Akihabara). There are zero masts in other countries taller than the tallest one here; there once was at least one that was in fact the tallest in the world, but it fell down. There are only three structures of any kind whatsoever outside the United States which extend more than 500 meters above ground, and one more that tall that is mostly underwater.

The fact that all of these masts are in the United States, yet the only numbers that have been mentioned are the maximum height in meters (and as I pointed out, one may exceed that), without any mention of the height in feet. Most Americans are not as comfortable working with metric units as I am. A very significant number of Americans won't even try to figure out what this means.

Every one of these masts is over 1,500 feet tall.
23 of 24 masts in 23 articles are over 1,550 feet tall. One is 1549 ft. The Empire State Building remains the tallest in the U.S. at 1250 feet to its roof, and 1454 feet to the top of its antenna. The shortest of those nominated here reaches 95 feet higher than the antenna on the Empire State Building. All of these are at least 98 ft taller than the roof of the Sears Tower at 1451 ft, but all are shorter than the Sears Tower with antenna which adds another 279 feet.
10 of 24 nominated here are over 1,600 feet tall, with the tallest at 1661 ft.

Even in meters, the nominator just vaguely said that "all are below 500 meters", without saying that "all are over 470 meters".

Seraphimblade expressed concern about sources, but that is the one thing that could be lost in deleting these articles, is the additional source information other than the FCC certifications that is contained in some of these articles.

I'd suggest that for now, you leave the ones over 1,600 feet, and revisit it later if necessary. A hundred articles isn't going to overwhelm "Wikipedia"; it isn't going to make it likely that these will show up frequently for anybody pressing the "Random article" link. There are no legitimate concerns about proliferation; there are none missing over the shortest one listed in this AfD. Gene Nygaard 15:23, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

We arnt looking for Statistics on how these match up on other types of structures. When compared to other masts, all these listed fall short. I even think we don’t need all of the masts in the 600 m + range, unless they are in the top 10 or otherwise notable. You don’t cite some of your evidence about heights in other countries, as well.Fledgeling 17:30, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

*Comment - I think that there is some concern about proliferation: though not specifically articles about masts. Look back over the AFD's for just the last week, and see how many times the author of an article about a non-notable subject says something like "well, I only wrote the article because I saw this other article about an even less notable subject." Charlie 06:26, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Note my comment isn't part of the nomination, it's part of the discussion. I'll take your word for it that masts this high are unique to the US, I have no idea. However you haven't addressed my basic point, which I think is similar to the concerns others have: there are over a hundred of these left, so their height alone doesn't make them notable. I see little reason to keep any other than the highest ten or twenty, and your discussion only refers to their notability on the basis of their height. As someone else mentioned, I also do not intend to single out masts here. Akihabara 14:51, 24 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Let me reply to Gene about his concern arguments: I stand accused of the mass murder of over two hundred articles about masts, and also attempting to "slip one in" by deliberately misstating the mast height in one article. The misstatement about the height was unintentional in that yes, the nomination did include ONE article containing one of two masts which was within the height range specified in the nomination. Those editors who have been participating in the debates over the last 2 weeks will know that the deletions are taking place in a systematic manner, and it should be obvious that the AfDs are grouped and are progressing according to ascending order of mast height. Masts in excess of 500m will be put under the spotlight in due course, so please don't wet yourself about just one which apparently falls outside. None of the articles being proposed for deletion are in any way special or encyclopaedic. If anyone has volumes to write about any special mast in compliance with wiki policies, an article can be created. I am not wantonly destroying, but quite the opposite. Please refer to edit history of the List of masts article for the efforts I have put into the subject.

For a fuller exposition of my motivations and rationale, I would refer you to an essay in my personal space here. Ohconfucius 16:45, 25 December 2006 (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.