Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Userbar

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 as per WP:V, also per dicussion via my talk page. Since the WP:V policy overrides any consensus generated from this discussion, this article has to be deleted. Yamamoto Ichiro 会話 08:50, 20 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Userbar[edit]

Contested prod. "No original research" is a non-negotiable requirement for Wikipedia articles, and this article is entirely original research based on the observations of its authors. In addition, it is not sourced with any sources, so it lacks verifiability, which is another non-negotiable requirement. Finally, there's no evidence that this meets notability by any objective test. Chardish (talk) 20:54, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - I agree the article is not a particularly good one, however there are sources for notability and content - as listed at the Open Directory link. So it is not. imo, WP:OR, however it does need an {{unsourced}} tag. Springnuts (talk) 21:19, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- I don't see any at that link. Of the 9 things listed: The first cites this Wikipedia article as its source in its description of this subject, and is thus not a reliable source. The second is a discussion forum, and not a source. The third has the same text as the first. The fourth has 2 sentences of description of userbars; its FAQ is actually about the web site and what sorts of things it will and will not accept. The fifth is a download site, and not a source. The sixth has the same text as the first. The seventh is a download site, and not a source. The eight has 2 sentences of description, logically equivalent to the 1 sentence from the fourth; its FAQ is again actually about the web site and how to use it. And the ninth is this Wikipedia article itself.
  So what sources were you proposing to support anything above the 1 sentence that an image can be put into a signature block to say something about onesself? Where does the rest of the article come from? Uncle G (talk) 22:44, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - For the first link you mentioned on dmoz (ubanimator.com), I strongly disagree that referring to a Wikipedia article for more information completely invalidates it as a reliable source. The third link (ubdesigner.com) does in-fact have a detailed description of userbars on the overview page mentioned in the first sentence of the second paragraph. If such a large percentage of the userbar sites listed in the open directory project have "the same text as the first", does that somehow make the description wrong? Drunnells (talk) 03:00, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - According to the Wayback Machine (Archive index at the Wayback Machine), the third web site with the "detailed description" didn't exist before January 2007. The domain name wasn't even registered before 2006-06-29. In contrast, our article had this information in this same form in May 2006. Who, exactly, do you think copied whom? I'm pretty sure that the webmaster of Ubdesigner is not in possession of a time machine.
      Similarly, according to the Wayback Machine (Archive index at the Wayback Machine), our article in January 2006 predated the creation of the first web site in February 2006, and its description then was as sparse as our article then. (More exactly: Our article had this content first added on 2006-01-05. The domain name was registered on 2006-01-31.)
      The simple fact appears to be that no-one has actually sat down and properly documented these things, but instead people have come here thinking that Wikipedia is a free webhost where they can write up some primary source documentation simply and cheaply, in violation of our Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research policies.
      We have no way of knowing whether the description is right or wrong. It is, as I have said, unverifiable. You're pointing to those other web sites as sources. But they got their descriptions of userbars from Wikipedia in the first place. The answer to the question "Where is the standard set for userbars?" appears to be "the Wikipedia page". How can readers check, say, that Wikipedia is correct to say that userbars must be 19 pixels high, rather than 29 pixels high or 20 pixels high? The answer is that they cannot. There's no website documenting the userbar "standard" that pre-dates this article documenting that "standard". This article is a collaborative invention from whole cloth. That is not how Wikipedia is written. Uncle G (talk) 06:06, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - Are you saying that any document written after a Wikipedia article is automatically unsourceable? Can no book ever be written about penguins again and be sourced here because there is already an article in the Wikipedia about penguins? The UBDesigner overview page is in-fact a detailed description of what a userbar is and should very much be considered a source even though it happens to have been written after the Wikipedia article. Please don't attempt to present "they got their descriptions of userbars from Wikipedia in the first place" as evidence that this article should be deleted, as it is untrue and unhelpful in bringing about a consensus. Drunnells (talk) 06:16, 20 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was doing some Proposed Deletion patrol yesterday and this was in fact one of the articles that I researched to see whether it could be rescued. I couldn't find any reliable sources that document userbars, and anything to support more than the 1 sentence above, that can be quite adequately stated (and pretty much already is) in signature block#Internet forums. Wikipedia appears to be being abused as the primary source documentation of this subject. As noted above, the web sites that document it are using Wikipedia as their source. So we have no way to know whether any of this content is accurate, because there are no sources to check it against that didn't get their information from this article in the first place. This is simply an undocumented subject, and an obvious niche for an enterprising author of a book, a paper, or an article to fill.
I left the article to complete the Proposed Deletion process, and my opinion is the same now as it was then. Uncle G (talk) 22:44, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. This is not a common term for this sort of thing, although it may well be used somewhere. The topic is covered somewhat adequately in Avatar_(computing)#On_Internet_forums. --Dhartung | Talk 23:05, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep It's wide spread enough (over 1 million ghits) and there are enough sites for it to be kept but the article could do with some improvement, removing the 'conventions' sections for a start. A userbar is not the same as an avatar different purpose altogether. --neonwhite user page talk 01:19, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- How do you propose addressing the complete lack of any sources whatsoever? Uncle G (talk) 06:06, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge with signature block in its own section. Variations of these signatures are often found in forums but not as thin as these. The article is short and all content as of now is not special or spectacular for a reader so just merge it with the other. It lacks historical info and importance also. - 6etonyourfeet ^(talk?) 02:33, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- What it lacks is Verifiability. Why should we merge information that cannot be verified? Uncle G (talk) 06:06, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Verifiability only applies to controversial material or material likely to be contested. Obviously none of the material doesn't fit that threshold. But I do see alot of weasel words used in this article which should link to a HOWTO guide. Back in my day when I was playing WoW we referred to these things as badges. The Zune social also uses a flashed based signature box. There are all sorts of these crap out there. The counterstrike version... The geek test version... etc. Anyways the current article lacks love and attention the reason why you do not see diverse interpretation but the POV of one editor. - 6etonyourfeet ^(talk?) 06:30, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - This material is contested since it is being considered for deletion. The burden of evidence now rests on those who wish to preserve the material to back up the material with a reasonable number of reliable sources. 5 days is plenty of time to do that. - Chardish (talk) 06:54, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I think that deleting this article from the Wikipedia would be a disservice to users. Userbars are popular, notable and distinct. People will come here to find more information. Add {{unsourced}} if necessary as linking to a specific userbar site is going to show promotion and bias. Drunnells (talk) 03:00, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought, and this means that information here that does not exist elsewhere must be removed, regardless of whether that information is subjectively deemed useful. - Chardish (talk) 04:00, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - It clearly exists and is encyclopedic. Please see Wikipedia:Use common sense and Wikipedia:Ignore all rules. --neonwhite user page talk 04:23, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - Allow me to be Zen for a moment: Wikipedia's rules are like the advice of a wise and revered elder - they should usually be followed, except when circumstances arise which the elder did not anticipate or adequately account for. The reckless person disregards the elder's advice because it prevents him from having his way. The wise person understands that the elder's advice is not to be taken lightly, and ignores the elder's advice only with great prudence, discretion, and forethought - when he is certain that his way is correct, and feels advanced enough in his understanding of the advice to make the right choice.
      Wikipedia's rules work the same way. If you feel like they must be ignored in order to benefit the project, please present a specific argument why this is so: do not simply state that because the rules can be ignored, they should. - Chardish (talk) 04:37, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - My house clearly exists. Pulling out IAR in an attempt to trump fundamental content policy is a sure sign that one has no argument that is actually based in policy. Uncle G (talk) 06:06, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - Tt is used when something has obvious notability despite not quite living up to policy. This exists, is widespread and popular and the encyclopedia is improved by it's inclusion that is why we can ignore all rules. As WP:N says it is not set in stone and should be treated with common sense and the occasional exception. --neonwhite user page talk 20:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        Could you please point to another deletion discussion where IAR was cited by the closing admin as to keep an article consisting of entirely original research with no objectively established notability? Could you please explain why this article, in particular, is an exception to the community's accepted standards of notability? Could you please explain how including an article consisting of entirely original research improves the encyclopedia? Could you please explain the purpose of the notability standard if we discard it whenever we disagree with it? - Chardish (talk) 21:42, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        Simply becasue it's notability is glaringly obvious as many people have pointed out. The whole point of WP:IAR is that not everything fits the criteria and common sense should be applied to all cases rather than rigid adherence to policy and guidelines (which is discouraged) when it's obvious they arent always helpful. We dont always discard them, we judge everything case by case. --neonwhite user page talk 18:17, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        You are also dealing with the concept of notability independently of other core concepts of Wikipedia. The reason that we require secondary sources to establish notability is because articles that consist entirely of primary sourced material have a very strong tendency to be original research, which this article is. You have yet to address why an original research piece should stand when there is no reliable information to back it up. Furthermore, you are incorrect in your assertion of what IAR means. The "whole point" is that improving the encyclopedia is the supreme directive and the rules sometimes get in the way. In this case, the rules tell us that original research gets deleted because it runs contrary to what our project is about. The rules help us improve the encyclopedia in this case, as they do in most cases. - Chardish (talk) 22:20, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Aside from the first line of the article, I don't think that there is a single "original thought" here. Line by line the description of a userbar in the article is described elsewhere. The first two lines of the characteristics describe the dimensions, this can be found in the first few paragraphs of userbars.com, ubanimator.com, ubdesigner.com, nav bar of userbars.net, faq of userbars.be, and every tutorial listed on userbars.com. Lines 3-6 describe the characteristics mentioned on the overview page of ubdesigner.com, almost every tutorial listed on userbars.com, and all of the userbar tutorials that I glanced at while looking at the 55,000+ results from a "userbar tutorial" google search. Line 7 I wasn't able to verify in the few minutes that I was searching. Line 8 is exactly what the userbar tutorials tell you. Line 9 can be found everywhere that 3-6 are. And the words that say userbars are created with graphics programs is probably original. Drunnells (talk) 05:01, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Your "verification" process is entirely circular, using sources that post-date this article. Uncle G (talk) 06:06, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - You missed checking userbars.com in 2005 in your own "verification" process while you were checking the other sites with the wayback machine. In 2005 userbars.com linked to this tutorial on tutorialtomb.com to describe userbar characteristics and creation. If you are looking for the ground-zero of where the userbar was first conceived, I doubt you are going to find it. The original userbars.com mentions userbars being designed by users of consolenetwork.de and tutorials on tutorialtomb.com.. none of which are accessible today. Drunnells (talk) 13:08, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - That forum post tells us absolutely nothing because forum posts are not reliable sources. In most cases we have no way of knowing if anything a user anonymously posts in a forum is true. In this specific case, we have no way of knowing if anything a user posts in a forum is indicative of an accepted standard for userbars. For this reason, all self-published sources (such as personal or hobbyist websites) are considered unreliable unless third-party sources (newspapers, magazines, etc.) cite them as an authority. Furthermore, we aren't looking for the "ground-zero" of userbar origins because that would be original research as well. We can only summarize and present what other people have found and published in reliable sources; we cannot do any investigation of our own. - Chardish (talk) 18:45, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: the phenomenon is clearly notable, and I think the large quantity of unreliable sources makes it sufficiently verifiable. Searching 'userbar tutorial' on Google yields hundreds (thousands?) of tutorials listing pretty much the same specifications — although nearly all of them are on forums/blogs/etc. I think we should invoke common sense here, because although these sites would not be reliable sources individually, there's so many of them stating basically the same thing. There's also the userbars.be FAQ that I've referenced in the article, which can probably be considered a more reliable source. -- intgr [talk] 10:56, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- A self-published webpage written by an anonymous author, such as that FAQ on userbars.be, is not a reliable source for any purpose. There is no evidence that the userbars.be webmaster is more of an authority on this topic than you or me or anyone else. - Chardish (talk) 20:34, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - There are literally hundreds of thousands of articles on this, it clearly exists, that makes it worthy of inclusion. --neonwhite user page talk 20:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep horribly useless, yet notable. Bearian'sBooties (talk) 18:24, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

LOL Springnuts (talk) 23:20, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep ONLY if sources that do not link back to the article itself are found. ShadowUltra (talk) 01:48, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I'm also gonna quote the WP:IAR and common sence here... Fosnez (talk) 02:37, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions. -- -- pb30<talk> 03:51, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
keep. this article is in need of cleanup and citations, but not deletion. Kingturtle (talk) 13:42, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to Signature block. These are simply graphic variations of a signature block. -- Whpq (talk) 22:00, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. "Userbar" is an independent noun and is widely used in the WWW discourse. Deleting this article would be a step to weakening the Wikipedia itself! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Greencat4 (talk • contribs) 23:05, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, I've never heard of this sort of thing and I'm pretty active around the net. I'd guess that the maker is also involved with a push from some quarters to try and have this thing become the standard. So it falls under OR.--Him and a dog 19:50, 19 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Where have you been hiding? this has massive popularity, google it. --neonwhite user page talk 04:08, 20 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The so-called "google test" tells us nothing about a page's notability. - Chardish (talk) 04:31, 20 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is not a few hundred or a few thousand hits, this is over a million. How would a strict interpretation of the rules having this article removed be beneficial to the Wikipedia or its users? Isn't that the exact purpose of the common sense rule and ignore all rules? Perhaps no one argument you have seen here over the last few days conforms to your interpretation of notability, but there are hundreds of thousands of users out there that see userbars every day, and I'm sure many that see them don't know what they are and want more information about them. Removing this article isn't going to help anyone, keeping it will. Drunnells (talk) 06:40, 20 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete; I don't find them to be "obviously notable" at all, and there is a clear lack of reliable published sources regarding them. Every single concept or object in software or on the Internet is not necessarily notable. --MCB (talk) 06:37, 20 January 2008 (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.