Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Summer of Death

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. Sandstein 17:49, 12 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Summer of Death[edit]

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List fails GNG, there are mentions of a "Summer of Death" but this list of celebrities is not mentioned anywhere, it appears to be an OR-picked selection of individuals who died in a particular time frame in 2009, a personal selection of Deaths in 2009. The Rambling Man (talk) 14:10, 4 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

delete I do see a few mass media hits from back in 2009 but the tag appears to have had no staying power whatsoever. Wikipedia is not for some catchphrase headline that nobody cared about a year later. Mangoe (talk) 14:53, 4 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Per WP:EVENT. There's no "lasting, historical significance" about a bunch of deaths in some arbitrary time frame of people who happen to be famous. Further, even if the list were to pass WP:GNG, WP:EVENT presents more stringent criteria than GNG for events precisely because so many events easily meet the GNG, and this "event" does not meet those criteria. -- Irn (talk) 15:51, 4 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Again an arbitrary list of deaths with a brief and quickly forgotten title created by journalists. I note it coincides with the traditional Silly season, as it is known here in the U.K. Think it should fall under the criteria of WP:EVENT. It was no event. WP:GNG would be as effective in proving the ephemerality of this non-event. Irondome (talk) 01:23, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Keep The topic is notable and notability does not expire. For example, TIME magazine highlighted the phenomenon in its summary of 2009, saying "It was a busy summer for obit writers around the country ... the summer when baby boomers began to turn to the obituary pages first, to face not merely their own mortality or ponder their legacies, but to witness the passing of legends who defined them as a tribe". And here's coverage of the phenomenon years later in a book, which demonstrates the enduring nature of the topic. The naysayers above do not support their opinion with such sources or evidence. Those are just personal opinions. Andrew D. (talk) 07:17, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
That's a lie, we have provided policy based reasoning. You have provided anecdotal evidence that this kind of tabloidism has received some coverage once upon a time. The list is unreferenced, once again it's a list of people's personal opinions on who should be listed. Original research that does not belong in any encyclopaedia. The Rambling Man (talk) 08:25, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Keep This, along with 2016 celebrity death cluster are shown to be notable from the large amount of coverage they've received in reliable, mainstream media sources. The claims that this is expected due to the baby boom is proven untrue by the fact that we didn't have anywhere near as many celeb deaths in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 or 2015. Summer is often referred to as the silly season, but these high-profile deaths actually happened, received a great deal of media coverage and this spike in celeb deaths didn't happen during any other summer. There are people saying that 2009 wasn't any different to any other year in that respect. However, if that were the case, why doesn't anyone ever refer to the summer of any other year as the Summer of Death? The Summer of Death included the deaths of high profile people from many fields, including acting, music, sport, politics, presenting and writing. I remember many people commenting at the time about how many people had died that summer. Not until this year has a celeb death spike happened again. Jim Michael (talk) 08:06, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Per the other deletion discussion, this is just someone's original research, a group of unreferenced individuals who happened to die. What makes these people more notable than those who aren't listed? What is the inclusion criterion? The Rambling Man (talk) 08:27, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

There are several reliable sources referenced on the other article, and similar sources can be added to this article. It's not one person's research - it's the research of many people and organisations. The talk pages of each article are the places to discuss who should or should not be included. Are you really saying that there was no celeb death spike in June-September 2009 and in January-April 2016? If so, why have the public and the media concentrated on those two periods of time? Journalists didn't all go on holiday for the whole of 2010-2015; why didn't they say there was a celeb death spike at any point during that time? Jim Michael (talk) 09:31, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The article is full of unreferenced names, it's original research. What are the inclusion criteria please? The Rambling Man (talk) 09:44, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Many of the names are referenced to reliable sources. The inclusion criteria can be discussed on the talk page. For the time being, anyone cited by a reliable source as having been part of the Summer of Death (or similar expression) is eligible for inclusion. Jim Michael (talk) 10:57, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

And many are not, and where are all the other celebrities that died during that period (you can find many in Deaths in 2009 by the way)? This is a poorly defined, badly written piece of tabloid journalism trash and should be removed, and glad to see the consensus is in favour of that. One down, two to go. The Rambling Man (talk) 12:18, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Which celebrities (not notable non-celebs) who died between June-September 2009 aren't included in this list? What was the 'one down' you mention? Jim Michael (talk) 14:08, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Mollie Sugden, Gordon Waller, Sybil, Bobby Robson, Godfrey Rampling .... Of course, your definition of "celebrity" is clearly your own personal original point of view (see WP:OR and WP:POV by the way) but my definition would include all of the former given the current individuals listed with or without reference at all. Naturally we could just delete this and redirect to Deaths in 2009 which would be perfectly normal. And where does summer extend from May to September? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:26, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This article and the sources that mention it are Americentric - they have ignored most of the British celebs who died during the same period. I wouldn't include May in this article because a) it's not summer in most of the world; b) there weren't many celeb deaths in that month. Most sources who mention the Summer of Death don't include May. Summer lasts from May to September from about the 20th parallel north to about the 40th parallel north (with the exception of those areas at high altitude). Jim Michael (talk) 19:51, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, so the premise of the article is poorly defined, the inclusion criteria are poorly defined, the subject matter is tabloid, the lasting impact is negligible, the statistical significance is zero, this is a non-article. Cheers for clearing it up. That's it from me here, looking forward to seeing the consensus enacted. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:55, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

You're arguing that it meets WP:GNG. As I pointed out at the 2016 celebrity death cluster discussion, you need to show how these meet WP:EVENT, not WP:GNG. -- Irn (talk) 16:01, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Which part(s) of WP:EVENT are you saying that this doesn't fulfil? Jim Michael (talk) 16:23, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Not to be glib, but pretty much everything under "Inclusion criteria". The part I've quoted repeatedly and that I think is most important is that events need to have "lasting, historical significance." The "Summer of Death" has no lasting effect, no significant impact over a wide region, little or no in-depth coverage, and almost nothing beyond a relatively short news cycle. -- Irn (talk) 17:45, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

It depends how you define it. How much impact? How do you define a short news cycle: a week, a fortnight, a month? Jim Michael (talk) 19:44, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Delete This isn't an encyclopaedic topic: it's the kind of thing I'd expect to see in a gossip magazine or particularly stupid tabloid newspaper. Nick-D (talk) 10:31, 6 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Humans (famous and otherwise) have been dying for over a million years, and probably have a century left. That a few content farmers noticed a "link" between Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett is their business entirely. Enycyclopedias shouldn't suggest there was "something going on" that summer. No celebrity has ever died without another following soon enough. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:11, 7 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'd also wager fewer than 10% of our readers have any idea who Budd Schulberg was. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:18, 7 May 2016 (UTC) [reply]

Having an article about the fact that a particularly high number of high-profile celebs died in summer 2009 isn't propagating a conspiracy theory. The Summer of Death was noticed by millions of people, not merely a few content farmers. Jim Michael (talk) 09:09, 7 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

"Something going on" doesn't mean a conspiracy. Just means there's something real connecting these deaths, or something actually unusual about the pattern. There isn't and the article admits it, so why even insinuate it? Hjördis here has been noticed by over 38 million people, but you don't see Hjördís here. Ten million people watched a press fold paper. Sixty-six million watched Fred swim. There's a place for that stuff, but this isn't it. InedibleHulk (talk) 12:54, 7 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Delete The article states there was "nothing statistically unusual" about the deaths, thus signing its own death warrant. Philafrenzy (talk) 11:43, 12 May 2016 (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.