Good articleDril has been listed as one of the Social sciences and society good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
January 19, 2018Good article nomineeListed
Did You Know
A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on September 21, 2017.
The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that the absurdist Twitter writer known as dril continues to insist that he is not owned, even as he slowly shrinks and transforms into a corncob?

Clearly not as important as it claims, most of the article is a joke

This article is definitely not "high importance" for internet culture. It's obvious someone filled that in as a joke. I know I should assume good faith, but there is no evidence provided in the article for why its subject should be high importance. Yet another internet personality, not exactly on the same level of importance of someone like Tim Berners-Lee. And to address the content of the article: most of it seems to be written as a joke, or a collection of jokes this person has made. Is this really encyclopedic content? It doesn't seem like including the person's jokes makes a fitting biography. This whole article is someone taking a joke too far, probably a fan engaging in hero worship. Cnehren (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 15:24, 26 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Cnehren: You could nominate it at WP:AfD, that is often a good notability test and would bring attention to the article. —PaleoNeonate – 05:08, 27 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Internet culture is serious business, there are no jokes involved, and certainly not at the high-importance level. I don't see why this couldn't be high-importance within the context of "Internet culture," or if that is too high, then medium importance at the least, but WikiProject importance was really not a priority for me. I simply took a look at the list of articles in the medium and high importance categories, and made my own good-faith estimation of where dril falls, and I'm happy to have my (subjective, ballparked) estimation adjusted down a peg. While I'm not as concerned about that, I do object to the characterization of this article's quality, seriousness, and notability (from the standpoint of whether it should exist or not).
I know that this article seems like it's full of jokes. That's because dril is a writer who is notable for uh, making jokes. I'm not trying to pull one over on anyone; yes, dril writes jokes, but I didn't write this page as a joke or prank. This would be a very boring page if I wrote about a famously idiosyncratic joke-writer without ever quoting or explaining the significance of any of the idiosyncratic jokes that have made him notable. Not just boring: it would fail to serve the reader in any encyclopedic way to understand what it is about this writer that makes his work so distinctive, noteworthy, and popular. I'll admit that dril is sui generis; a difficult-to-explain, unusual phenomenon; a flippant jokester; and a product of Twitter. The article in its present form more than justifies his notability as all of those things—and all of those things are very clearly in line with what it means to be a "notable" phenomenon in internet culture. I'll concede to bumping this down to mid-importance in a behind-the-scenes WikiProject, but I strongly object to the necessity for an AfD. —BLZ · talk 20:22, 27 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
High-importance may be pushing it a bit, but notability isn't in doubt. Blythwood (talk) 17:09, 29 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I bumped the page down to mid-importance. In the interest of reaching some consensus and resolving any dispute here, I'm more than happy to err on the side of a more conservative estimate of dril's notability for the time being (especially on an internal assessment that doesn't materially change the page itself for the average reader.) —BLZ · talk 19:19, 29 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the mid-importance judgement; dril's appeal seems to be limited to Twitter and Twitter-adjacent sectors and is not something widespread in general Internet culture. I do also concur on the notability question: most every media article about "weird" (aka, not corporate or personal) Twitter accounts ends up mentioning dril himself. It's clearly a subcultural thing, but it's a notable subculture (hence all the Twitter-related articles present on Wikipedia without any controversy) with ample secondary sourcing/evidence/analysis, and dril is significant in that subculture. An article for dril isn't a first-in-class or precedent-making phenomenon either -- there's articles for plenty of other pseudonymous twitter accounts on here, many of whom have fewer followers and far less enduring media coverage than dril. IGBTQ (talk) 22:21, 29 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Unnecessarily long

This article is way too long, it seems like it was written by someone who doesn't have a clue how to summarize. Yes I agree this user is very famous as an avid user of Twitter myself. But I haven't even ever heard of the "corncob meme" and "Keebler Elves controversy." Much more well known memes from his tweets would be the "skeleton war" and "the year of luigi". Leave meme documentation to Know Your Meme, those wouldn't even be confirmed on there. If people want to know what he's like, they can just look at his twitter page, not read inane comments comparing him to Trump. Also, what's up with the emoji approximation of his icon in the tweet template??? I thought that was funny. Kingtunk (talk) 15:00, 30 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Kingtunk: I tend to agree with you that there are dril tweets that may be better known or funnier ("Betsy Ross Museum" comes to mind for me) than those mentioned here. However, those are exactly the kind of memes that Know Your Meme is better suited for, as they have a more "anthropological" approach. Know Your Meme can directly cite memes themselves as evidence. Unlike Know Your Meme, the sources that can be used for this page are required to comport with Wikipedia's policies on reliable sourcing. This is good in some ways, because it prevents the page from becoming an endless, purely subjective list of his most "notable" single tweets. That is a task best suited for a site like Know Your Meme, or as you pointed out, for reading dril's tweets himself (the same way that reading the Wikipedia article for The Sun Also Rises is not a substitute for reading the novel, nor does it attempt to do so; an encyclopedic article is not the thing itself.)
I wanted to be as comprehensive as reasonably possible, but I was also bound to what sources found notable about dril. For instance, I am dismayed at the (in my mind) outsized reaction to the "(((Keebler Elves)))" tweet, which I would neither rank anywhere near his best work nor consider outstandingly offensive in a way that warranted so much notice. (Still, I think there are valuable ideas embedded in the "(((Keebler Elves)))" section that couldn't be addressed otherwise, such as dril's sense of trust in his audience to "get it," and his indomitable adherence to keeping a straight face, even when faced with a controversy that would pressure others to break character.)
As such, this article (by necessity) presents a version of "dril" as filtered through the lens of incidents that journalistic publications found noteworthy: typically minor political controversies that involved dril in some way, or comments on general political discourse with many participants on Twitter who are aware of, and highly influenced by, dril. If it's any consolation, I believe that dril's coming book projects (due sometime in the next year or so) will inspire more (conventionally "reliable") sources to publish critical and "literary" articles on dril's work. I imagine we'll be likely to see other retrospectives on dril at the ten-year anniversary of his account, which is only about a year out. At that time, we might get a better focus on what makes dril special to the people who already know what he's about, rather than the focus of newspeople when forced to quickly explain dril to outsiders during an odd flashpoint moment like the "corncob" thing with Neera Tanden.
I'm glad you enjoyed the emoji icon. —BLZ · talk 17:21, 30 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sad someone removed those - I liked the kind of historical re-enactment feel of them. I do think we could trim it a bit - I mean, perhaps it rewrites journalists saying "Hur hur, maybe @dril should be Donald Trump's vice presidential pick!" or something like that a few times too many. (I'd understand throwing in a lot of citations if I was desperate to prove notability, but maybe it's got a bit much now. Still, it's your article.) Blythwood (talk) 01:42, 21 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The ratio

I'm new to wikipedia so i don't know yet how to properly cite sources but I think that the article would benefit from rewording the section referring to "the ratio" to make it more clear to someone unfamiliar with Twitter. I think we can cite some more sources about "the ratio" to make it clear that this is a notable/enduring (albeit mildly tongue-in-cheek) thing and not just a throwaway/flash-in-the-pan meme:

https://www.vice.com/en_nz/article/d338qj/corncob-donut-binch-a-guide-to-weird-leftist-internet-slang http://news.avclub.com/congressman-finds-out-the-hard-way-that-people-liked-ob-1798261686 http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a54440/twitter-ratio-reply/ http://nymag.com/selectall/2017/05/ny-rep-john-faso-gets-owned-for-supporting-ahca-on-twitter.html http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a54750/ratio-watch/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/07/06/the-gop-tried-to-troll-hillary-clinton-it-backfired-spectacularly/?utm_term=.cefd2d07f44f — Preceding unsigned comment added by IGBTQ (talk • contribs) 00:35, 31 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@IGBTQ: This is something I struggled with throughout writing: the balance between (relative) brevity and concision versus wandering a little further down a tangential wormhole to provide necessary context for the general reader/Twitter neophyte. I feel like the definition I've provided is not much more expansive than, for instance, the one provided by the Vice guide to Weird leftist internet slang. These other sources are great for talking about "the ratio" more in-depth, but it's only relevant to dril in terms of this particular study, which almost seems to have selected dril as a "control".
I thought the ratio study included in the article was interesting because 1) it provides some quantifiable evidence for dril's popularity and the relative lack of vitriol he gets compared to some other popular accounts, and 2) the study shows, indirectly, that dril is familiar enough to sophisticated social media users that he "jumps to mind" for the role of a clearly distinguishable "wildcard" for a Twitter study like this. But both of those put "the ratio" in service of articulating dril's notability; the phenomenon by itself doesn't need to be explored in-depth here.
Maybe it warrants its own page? I know Twitter is less popular than some other social networks, but it has an outsized impact on discourse because of its pace and high concentration of avid users in news and politics. Therefore, I'd be comfortable saying that some of Twitter's fairly "niche" phenomena still have disproportionate impact on other notable areas. There's an argument that, as Twitter is a major tool for disseminating news and public relations, that articles on things like "the ratio" are helpful from a basic media literacy/digital literacy perspective.
For the time being: I'm wondering if there are specific ways that you think the definition already provided in the article could be clarified using these sources, but I'm wary of expanding into the dril article itself beyond, at most, an explanatory "see e.g."-style footnote. Btw, I definitely appreciate your other efforts to improve this page so far—especially since, based on your contributions, you seem to have joined Wikipedia for the purpose of editing the dril article (so far.) —BLZ · talk 01:06, 31 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that mentioning "the ratio" is relevant -- I just kinda disagreed with how it was introduced because it doesn't give enough context and uses a kinda stilted phraseology that would be more appropriate for a tongue-in-cheek meme-explaining page rather than an encyclopedia. "Twitter phenomenon" is kinda not the right phrase to use and to someone who has been blessed with ignorance of Twitter, it's unclear whether it's referring to a site feature or something else. Something more like "a common cultural metric (or figure of merit) for how disliked/controversial/unwanted-attention-provoking a tweet a tweet is the ratio of (replies)/(retweets+faves)", provide adequate citations for that, and then mention the study that studied dril's ratio; to quickly establish 1) what "the ratio" is, that it is a legitimate/notable metric and regularly gets talked about in any serious analysis of Twitter and 3) that dril is notable enough to be the control group / gold standard for any sort of quantitative analysis of reply/(RT+fav) numbers.
I don't disagree with inclusion of "the ratio", just, it merits explaining it and its notability in an objective / non-memey/ingroup way in a sentence of its own and then mentioning how this relates to dril's notability and use of twitter -- and not just in one long sentence (that might be difficult for someone not in twitter to understand). I'm not proposing a significant change beyond small wording tweaks and making that into two sentences instead of one; I just wanted to bring this up in the talk page because I didn't have any specific ideas for the exact phrasing. I do concur that it would be bad for this article to devolve into just twitter ingroup term dumping, but I don't feel like properly explaining "the ratio" in a sentence of its own (followed by its applicability to Dril) comes close to crossing that line.
Also yeah I sorta did create an account for this, because all my prior WP-editing has been anonymous stuff on technical/engineering pages (mostly correcting errors I happened upon, not any focused work / addition of new content) and I sorta felt that creating an account where I could have a proper pseudonymous presence was more appropriate for this. IGBTQ (talk) 02:06, 31 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@IGBTQ: OK, I see more where you're coming from now. I completely agree that the wording should avoid language that misconstrues the Ratio as (exclusively) an in-joke, and presenting it that way wasn't my original intent. The Ratio's (relative) notability to public relations on Twitter, and its routine use in political discourse/analysis on Twitter, means that it should be represented as a legitimate term within a digital/media literacy context—just one that only happens to apply within Twitter.
Incidentally, and to show that I at least attempted to avoid the jokey connotation you described, I borrowed the word "phenomenon" from Wikipedia's long-standing List of Internet phenomena. "Phenomenon" seemed far less than a perfect choice of word, but it was at least better—a little more general, a little more serious—than clearly jokey alternatives like "meme" or "Internet slang". I don't know if there yet exists an adequate/accurate/neutral word that describes a term that is Internet-specific, yet not jokey or slangy, but I chose "phenomenon" for lack of a better word. Regardless, I agree with your criticism of that word and removed it, just thought I'd share some of my thinking.
I've adapted from some of your proposed wording above and added these three introductory sentences on the Ratio:
"On Twitter, "the Ratio" is a term referring to a common rule of thumb or figure of merit used to measure backlash. Deemed to measure controversy or unwanted attention, the Ratio occurs when a tweet receives a disproportionately high number of replies and a low number of retweets (or a low number of retweets and favorites). The conventional wisdom is that, in most circumstances, the Ratio indicates that a tweet had many more users who expressed disapproval of its contents than users who were willing to endorse or share it."
There are two citations, the Vice article (defining it within a glossary of other terms) and the Esquire article (describing the Ratio in-depth). Three sentences is maaaybe a lot, but I wanted to provide unambiguous context that avoids the potential points of confusion for the general reader that you highlighted. I think now, hopefully, any of those potential questions (Is "the Ratio" a site feature? Is it a meme, or a joke? Is this just some cliquey Twitter thing that I can't get?) should be avoided now.
Any ideas you have to further reword or condense? I think it's super helpful to talk through this stuff, even if it's a little silly as others have observed, because without fully unpacking and hashing out some of these finer points it's super easy for the writing to fall into the trap of being imprecise, inaccessible or jokey. —BLZ · talk 21:03, 31 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I would delete the section more or less completely and move a shortened discussion of "the ratio" into the main Twitter article, which doesn't mention it. I've come to feel that it unbalances the article and isn't that relevant to dril. It's fairly obvious that the "dril has the perfect ratio" data start-up press release is just them trying to get marketing attention (like the Paul Graham submarine essay) You see this a lot, some restaurant chain hires an underpaid maths professor to come up with "the perfect formula for splitting a bill" or something. Blythwood (talk) 16:00, 1 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah the line between giving this fun fact enough context that it makes sense and giving it undue weight is a tough one to walk. In a world where everyone was cursed with high Twitter literacy and implicit knowledge of "the Ratio," I would leave it at a single sentence. And I would completely agree with you, Blythwood, about the attention-seeking angle of this study if it didn't get independent third-party coverage. I wouldn't have mentioned it at all without the New York article, or if the New York article was just a little bit worse than it is. Even then it's really not that consequential of a fact on its own, the study just happened to serve as a fun pretext for a professional writer to talk a little about dril. Like a lot of things with this article, it's tough to use only the sources at hand to gesture at things people familiar with dril know intuitively about dril, but which are not (yet) explicitly spelled out anywhere.
I've edited it again and come up with what I hope is a workable middle ground. I took out the last sentence, which tended toward undue and extraneous info, and relegated the explanation of the Ratio itself to an explanatory footnote. It merits explanation for the uninitiated, and now those unenlightened readers can just click the note and stay on-page. —BLZ · talk 23:16, 1 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I've edited it again to emphasise 1) the Twitter displays the reply/RT/fav counts for each tweet 2) a high ratio of replies to RT+favs is very flagrant and easy to notice and 3) it is usually indicative of backlash because it means the tweet is getting attention but nobody wants to share it further. I am of course fine with wording changes (I'm ESL so there's probably room to phrase things concisely and better), but I would argue that these three points should remain so people unfamiliar with the Twitter UX can understand why this "the ratio" is a notable/significant thing and not some obscure data science nonsense IGBTQ (talk) 01:11, 2 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Update: I've added a redirect for "The ratio (Twitter)" to a section on a Twitter culture page with a few citations. Blythwood (talk) 05:49, 11 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Meaning of "corn cob"

Okay, maybe I just don't "get it" but I am very confused about the "corn cob" bit. Was dril quoting/referencing something with the "slowly shrink and turn into a corn cob" bit or was that usage something he originated? The article talks about "use of the term 'corncob' in this sense" and "slang use of 'corncob'" but has not (to that point) actually explained what the sense was. --Khajidha (talk) 11:01, 21 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hah, yeah dril is the first person to use corncob in this way. It has spread into other users of weird/left twitter using "corncob" against other users. —GFOLEY FOUR!— 13:21, 21 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
This is correct, dril originated it. In the original tweet it was a purely surreal and silly image, not attached to anything else. Uses of "corn cob" as Twitter slang are referring back to his tweet. I've always thought the corn cob tweet has an echo of this scene, but it's not a direct reference, just a shared archetype that resonates and might help understand the sense of the tweet if you don't get it. —BLZ · talk 18:04, 21 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I get the fact that he originated it. There still seems to be a disconnect when it talks about the "slang use" and "use in this sense". It still doesn't say what that sense is.--Khajidha (talk) 19:56, 21 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
As it appears in the article, the phrase "in this sense" means "in the sense of the secondary definition just provided," as in "not in the literal sense of the word, which describes a vegetable, but in the sense of 'one who refuses to acknowledge having been owned.'" I worded it that way because it should be clear that the word "corncob" ordinarily means an actual corncob (this: 🌽). So when a reader reads the phrase "corncob in this sense," it should be clear that speaking of a special "sense" of the word must refer back to some secondary definition that was just provided.
However, it wouldn't be accurate to substitute the phrase "slang use," because "slang" is about the usage of a word (i.e. colloquial, informal, perhaps subcultural), not the definition itself. The word wasn't slang when dril first dropped it, right? But it still carried a secondary definition, or at least some sense of what the word connoted. Next, people would just quote/post a screenshot of the tweet itself—still not slang! Just referencing dril, but not in a way where the word could really be used independently without the context of the complete quote. Because it was still part of a complete quote, the word standing alone wasn't "slang" yet. Then sometime later, use of the word "corncob" in the sense used by dril and quoted by others became independent; at a certain point in 2017, someone could just say "what a corncob" and people knew what they meant. Once people could just say "corncob" without the quote, the term became slang, but was not slang before that. —BLZ · talk 20:51, 21 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I get that that was the sense of the tweet as a whole, I just don't see the transition from the tweet as a whole to corncob by itself having that meaning. But it could just be me. Anyways, that's all I have to say on this one.--Khajidha (talk) 22:28, 21 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I think I see what you're getting at. I suppose the transition from "reference" to "slang" is that by the time it becomes slang, you don't have to know the source to "get" it. Earlier on, no one (not even extremely online people) would have said or heard "corncob" and immediately understood, or expected others to understand, "ah yes, like from the dril tweet." You had to quote/screenshot the entire tweet, you would say "This situation is like this dril tweet." This happens with any number of dril tweets that don't become as famous as corncob. I think that one is such a universally applicable tweet for Twitter that it got used for comparison more frequently, and then over time it was used so frequently that people would say someone was a "corncob" or had been "corncobbed" as shorthand for the full quote. At that point, people could say "corncob" without ever having to indicate the source at all; either the reference was implicitly understood, or it was just not required. It's entirely plausible that someone out there understands what "corncobbed" means because they've seen people tweeting it, but has never seen the dril tweet itself. Cf. any other pop culture references that you'd have to quote at first, then become so ubiquitous that you can just say the thing itself and everyone gets it even if they've never encountered the original. —BLZ · talk 00:12, 22 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Otterathome: Hello, Otterathome. Here's why a Know Your Meme link should be included among the external links section.

You raise two policy objections under "Links normally to be avoided" (WP:ELNO), categories 2 and 12 (of links an editor "should generally avoid providing external links to").

WP:ELNO 2:

"Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research, except to a limited extent in articles about the viewpoints that the site is presenting."

I'd be very curious where misleading, factually inaccurate, or unverifiable information can be found on that page. I welcome you to survey that page and determine where misleading or factually inaccurate information can be found. I'd be especially shocked to learn that there's "unverifiable" information, as the Know Your Meme page has 28 references as of this writing. It may not conform to Wikipedia's standards of verifiability, but that's precisely the point of linking it. Know Your Meme's looser, "anthropological" standards allow them to write about aspects of this topic that Wikipedia itself wouldn't under WP:OR. If you find severely glaring misleading, factually inaccurate, or unverifiable information, please indicate where it occurs in response here.

(Side note: to be clear, I would never cite Know Your Meme as a reliable source in its own right. I would completely agree with any users anywhere on the site who sought to remove Know Your Meme as a reference, the site is clearly not suited to that purpose. However, Know Your Meme is never used here as a source. Indeed, the compilation of dril-related information and memes it contains are precisely where we should refer a reader who wants to seek out more information beyond the bounds of what Wikipedia can, within its own policies, permissibly describe, so in other words it is ideally suited to an "external links" [in essence, "further reading"] section.)

WP:ELNO 12 (note that I've italicized and bolded relevant portions of all quotations that follow):

"Open wikis, except those with a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors. Mirrors or forks of Wikipedia should not be linked."

From Know Your Meme's "about" page:

"Much like wikis, any registered member can submit a meme or viral phenomena for research at knowyourmeme.com. Other members may contribute to the research of the topic, archival of notable media or discussion about a meme. The editorial staff and moderators then evaluates each entry by further researching the online presence of the meme for confirmation or invalidation."

In short, Know Your Meme is not an "open" wiki within the meaning of WP:ELNO 12. The site is only a wiki to the extent that it welcomes submissions and research contributions from a general community of registered editors ("registered" being important because it evinces a level of gatekeeping that, for instance, Wikipedia itself is not subject to). Those submissions and contributions are then evaluated by a permanent editorial staff. Beyond the site's general, structural policy of strong editorial control, the specific page at issue demonstrates a high level of stability: most edits occurred three years ago when the page was first created and published (by a site moderator, no less). If some prior Wikipedia discussion to categorically rule out Know Your Meme as an acceptable external link on meme/internet phenomena pages exists, well, I'd like to be made aware of what has been said, because I would dispute the wisdom of such a blanket policy.

Finally, I'd like to address additional arguments implicit in a message you left on my talk page, which can presently be found here:

"Information icon Please do not add inappropriate external links to Wikipedia, as you did to Dril. Wikipedia is not a collection of links, nor should it be used for advertising or promotion. Inappropriate links include, but are not limited to, links to personal websites, links to websites with which you are affiliated (whether as a link in article text, or a citation in an article), and links that attract visitors to a website or promote a product. See the external links guideline and spam guideline for further explanations. Because Wikipedia uses the nofollow attribute value, its external links are disregarded by most search engines. If you feel the link should be added to the page, please discuss it on the associated talk page rather than re-adding it. Thank you. [Signature omitted] 23:48, 9 November 2017 (UTC)"

Like any Wikipedia user who's contributed to the site for ten years, I appreciate the experience of receiving a note as carefully considered, personalized, and respectful of my experience as the one above. Ah, wait, actually it's a generic template message that broadly accuses me of under-handed, self-serving motives and/or misunderstanding or ignoring basic policy. So, if I may go line-by-line to deflate any conclusory assumptions in the above message:

  • Thank you. However, Know Your Meme is a notable, centralized database of memes, and it seems worthwhile to link to a premier site dedicated to in-depth research of a topic that encompasses dril. Let's see what guidance we can glean from the underlying policy, Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#LINK:
  • "There is nothing wrong with adding one or more useful content-relevant links to the external links section of an article; however, excessive lists can dwarf articles and detract from the purpose of Wikipedia. On articles about topics with many fansites, for example, including a link to one major fansite may be appropriate."
  • Hm well, we certainly don't have an excessive list that has dwarfed the article or clearly detracted from Wikipedia's purpose. Nor do we have a situation of undue preference for a single "fansite" or fansite-style site among many. Know Your Meme is the most authoritative and notable resource for this purpose.
  • Thank you. I have not done that.
  • Thank you. Not my website.
  • Thank you. I am not affiliated in any way with Know Your Meme—in fact, I've never even registered an account there!—and I am not included in any links within the article text, nor a citation in the article.
  • Thank you. I am not "attracting" visitors to the website in any unseemly or conflicted way, nor does Know Your Meme promote a product. Relatedly...
  • Thank you. Know Your Meme is not spam, it is not solicitation or advertisement for a business, it does not use sales-oriented language, and in general, it does not qualify as spam under any Wikipedia:Spam policy.
  • Thank you. As I said, I have no ties whatsoever to Know Your Meme and it doesn't benefit me one way or another to include their link or not, and certainly not from an SEO standpoint. I just think their link should be included.
  • Thank you. I welcome any responses, but under Wikipedia policy I seriously doubt that the inclusion of a Know Your Meme link on a subject best known as a meme-generating Internet personality could be inappropriate.

—BLZ · talk 07:41, 10 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

User:Brandt Luke Zorn - Content submitters are volunteers with no checks, anyone can submit content, which is published and they claim to review later. So it's still an open wiki. 2 & 12 still apply. 1 of WP:ELNO also applies, as you can link to any primary sources they do. For example they cite primary sources such as google trends, youtube views, reddit threads, blog posts etc which you can easily cite yourself.--Otterathome (talk) 13:21, 19 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Otterathome: WP:ELNO 2 doesn't apply because you haven't argued or shown that the article is misleading, inaccurate, or inadequately sourced. To the contrary, you've argued that some of its sourcing would be useful for a Feature-worthy Wikipedia article (I don't agree, but I'll address that point below re: WP:ELNO 1.)
ELNO 12 doesn't still apply. Note that 12 doesn't forbid linking to all wikis, only "open" wikis. There is no clear-cut dividing line between an "open" and "closed" wiki, but a spectrum. I think a sensible way to understand how that rule defines "open wikis" is those that allow anonymous edits via IP, or where the only hurdle to editing is the low bar of free registration (without requiring some kind of identification/credentials). I think the additional policy of institutional, editorial (rather than merely administrative) oversight by a permanent staff (rather than merely volunteers) suggests further than KYM is closed enough for the external linking policy. (Contrast the dril article on KYM with the fact that there is an entire dril-themed Wikia, a link I chose not to include because it seemed to violate WP:ELNO 12.)
Another point on 12: although the policy generally forbids open wikis, it makes an exception for "those with a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors." So even if KYM is a truly "open" wiki, it has both strong stability and a substantial number of editors. Indeed, as I pointed out above, the primary author of the link at issue is a site moderator. You haven't addressed the evidence of stability and authorship by a moderator in their dril article, and it rebuts your assumption that the site's policy is somewhat of a shame and articles are merely "published and they claim to review later". Maybe that is true in other cases—we'd be taking your word for it—but it's not the case here.
ELNO 1: the KYM link does provide "a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a featured article." Wikipedia (as you know) has policies concerning notability, using reliable (mostly secondary) sources, and against original research. But as I said above, KYM has a more "anthropological" approach than Wikipedia would (or should) ever take with internet memes. Their editors are free to root around in the soil of the internet, the forums and tweets, to collect and document trends as they occur, without (as much) regard to long-term notability; it is original research. I can describe the dril moments that have made waves and were noted by reliable, professional secondary sources, i.e. professional media outlets. An example is the corncob meme, which was widely discussed.
However, KYM can also discuss things like weird comic adaptations of dril posts that were not also discussed in professional media outlets, and can cite primary, yet "unreliable" sources like reddit posts. As for reliable primary sources like Google Metrics, it's true that information could be permissibly used, but the article already uses dril's follower count (as historically reported by secondary sources, except for the current value) as a stronger, more concrete indicator of dril's popularity. I don't even know how I would translate an embeddable, constantly changing search interest chart into a sentence. On the other hand, KYM uses Google Metrics search interest charts (not just text) uniformly on each of its pages, so it's a strong indicator of popularity for them due to its universality on the site—you can readily compare trends among different memes or check for spikes in interest.
I know I'm taking a lot of time to spell out how my line of argument here, but this isn't a hill that I want to die on. Even if you think the link isn't a good idea, I just want to show that its inclusion doesn't violate policy, something I believe I've amply shown. I don't think every Wikipedia page should link to its KYM equivalent—for example, it's obvious that Justin Bieber should not link to Justin Bieber on KYM and that mitochondrion should not link to "Mitochondria is the Powerhouse of the Cell"—but for memey Wikipedia pages like dril, linking to KYM seems relevant and appropriate. It's their turf. —BLZ · talk 18:48, 20 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Improving the (((Keebler Elves))) Controversy section

I feel this section could be improved by referencing/including dril's apparent reaction to the backlash: https://twitter.com/dril/status/749438005706883072 2601:5CC:C780:1D06:EC10:779D:4120:183E (talk) 02:38, 31 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. I updated that section to include a note about dril's responses, which were noted in one of the sources, along with citing the tweet you've pointed out. —BLZ · talk 22:13, 31 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review

GA toolbox
Reviewing
This review is transcluded from Talk:Dril/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Premeditated Chaos (talk · contribs) 22:30, 16 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]


Rate Attribute Review Comment
1. Well-written:
1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct. No concerns with the prose, spelling, or grammar.
1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation. Given the length of the article, I think the lead could be longer. It's missing summaries of the doxxing, "influence on internet culture" section, and his other projects. Expanded lead is an excellent summary of the article now.

Layout is sensible. No concerns with regards to words to watch. Fictional elements (ie the dril persona) are clearly delineated as such.

I really like the boxed tweet reproductions as opposed to screenshots. They're a unique way of presenting the relevant tweets, in my opinion.
2. Verifiable with no original research:
2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline. Reference list is correctly formatted, references are clear and easy to read.
2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose). Although citations to Buzzfeed are unusual on WP, in this case I think it can be considered a reliable source for the people it interviews. Ditto for citations to Twitter.
2c. it contains no original research. Everything is cited and reffed, no conclusions are drawn that are not supported by the refs. No WP:SYNTH.
2d. it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism. All quotes attributed in-text and are correctly cited with references.
3. Broad in its coverage:
3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic. Gives a good overview of dril's style and impact such that you would understand the topic reasonably well even if you knew nothing about it when you started the article.
3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style). With a prolific and memetic topic like dril, there is a danger of going overboard with examples, but this article avoids that by focusing on particular tweets that have been specifically remarked on by reliable sources. Again, there are enough examples that you understand the style and the humor, but not so many that it overtakes the article.
4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each. No POV concerns. Any POVs are quoted and attributed.
5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute. I made a few tweaks during my review and the author has been making some here and there but the majority of the content is stable.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content. The work put into the fair use rationale for the dril avatar (and also used on the lead image of the two dril screenshots) by Ajfweb is scarily thorough. I'm impressed.
6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions. Relevance of images is clear via the captions.
7. Overall assessment. Brandt Luke Zorn, if you can expand the lead a little to summarize more of the article's contents, I think this is a solid pass. Lead has been expanded, all else is good. I say this is a solid GA pass! :D

Comment: review basically ready to pass, just holding on the expansion of the lead or a reply from BLZ. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 07:33, 18 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Good to go! Incredible work. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 04:01, 19 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Identity

Since this article says that Dril's real name has been revealed, why isn't it on this page? Is it simply to "preserve the mystery"? And if that's the reason, is that really something Wikipedia should be doing? I can imagine Wikipeida would not hesitate to name Banksy if the time came.

I realize the author is a private person, but the article seems to state he is not really hiding his identity. And considering Dril has one million plus followers, and has heavily influenced Twitter culture as well as some of the popular culture, I'd say he's become a public figure. PBP (talk) 16:59, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think any reliable sources have published the name. They've published the fact of his doxxing, but I don't think any have actually said "Dril is X". So we can't really include it, because there's no sourcing, and without good sourcing, it's a BLP violation. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 17:11, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Whether to include dril's name is something I've given some careful thought. Here are the factors I've considered:

First, I want to say that "preserving the mystery" is not the reason, and I agree with PBP that that would not be a good reason. If that were the only reason, or even a major reason, it would be tailoring the page to fit a non-neutral viewpoint, namely, a view that dril's name should never be included in the page no matter how widespread or verified it became, because the "mystery" outweighs any other encyclopedic principles. For the record, that is not my personal POV: I think there are numerous possible circumstances that would warrant inclusion of his name—the most obvious being if he came right out with it in an interview or a public statement.

I'm approaching this issue guided by the policies at Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons#Presumption in favor of privacy, specifically the subsections on "Privacy of personal information and using primary sources," "People who are relatively unknown," and most of all "Privacy of names". I also referred to Wikipedia:Who is a low-profile individual. I'll admit that none of this policy is squarely on point in terms of drawing a clear line that perfectly fits this case; if anything, dril's doxxing presents a sort of novel set of circumstances that, while not perfectly encapsulated by current policy, will probably become increasingly common as more and more culture originates online. Nevertheless, the guiding principles and overall policy rationale tend toward erring on the side of caution. Take, for example, this paragraph from "Privacy of names":

Caution should be applied when identifying individuals who are discussed primarily in terms of a single event. When the name of a private individual has not been widely disseminated or has been intentionally concealed, such as in certain court cases or occupations, it is often preferable to omit it, especially when doing so does not result in a significant loss of context. When deciding whether to include a name, its publication in secondary sources other than news media, such as scholarly journals or the work of recognized experts, should be afforded greater weight than the brief appearance of names in news stories. Consider whether the inclusion of names of living private individuals who are not directly involved in an article's topic adds significant value.

None of this policy strictly forbids inclusion of dril's name under the present circumstances. dril is not so low-profile or so incidentally noteworthy that we would never even consider including his name. However, the policy does generally guide us to prefer erring on the side of excluding his name at the moment. Since we're in a gray area, we should resolve that ambiguity in favor of privacy, at least a time comes when the circumstances are unambiguously in favor of including the name.

So, what are the circumstances right now? As PMC mentions above, most of the articles about the doxxing omit dril's name. These news orgs are following a lot of the same principles that we would be. There's nothing yet that absolutely confirms dril's identity and the orgs themselves aren't independently verifying it, so they're erring on the side of caution and privacy. The closest any sources got to providing the identity were New York, which coyly hinted "Any of the links above will clue you in on who the actual the writer behind the Dril account is," and The Daily Beast, which included the first name (and an exhaustive recounting of the clues that led the Tumblr user to the identity, which is too trivial for us to include anyway).

The New York article's approach is more or less the approach of the Wikipedia article right now; anyone who really wants to find the name could click around through sources included on this page and find it quite easily, or google it themselves. (The Daily Beast article is not currently used in the article, but I was planning to incorporate parts of it. My browser crashed when I was expanding that section and I lost the edits I was making, and haven't gotten around to redoing it.) Although The Daily Beast includes the first name, I still think we should err on the side of exclusion, since it's a sensitive topic and most news orgs erred on the other side of this issue.

So far, dril has hinted at confirmation of the doxxing in his Patreon/reddit statements, but I don't think that really suffices. All of these statements remain somewhat oblique or suggestive. Their purpose isn't to say "I, dril, am X". He's reacting an unwanted, unplanned doxxing—and to that extent, they are valuable statements, and are included in the article toward that purpose—but none of these statements suggest that he is choosing, as part of that reaction, to now voluntarily forfeit anonymity.

In sum: I think there are a lot of "close, but no cigar" moments, and I also think it's likely (but not certain) that we will eventually pass the tipping point for inclusion in the future. We should wait for a clear signal to include it, and in the meantime err on the side of privacy. —BLZ · talk 19:29, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, thanks BLZ. I understand the approach a little better now. PBP (talk) 05:33, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Skeleton war: y/n

I feel like we would be remiss not to include discussion of the memetic success of the Skeleton War, a famous dril coinage — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.81.90.37 (talk) 23:18, 26 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You're more than welcome to take a stab at it. I don't want the article to get too bogged down in minutia (despite all appearances; I want it to be thorough, yes, but not exhaustive). That said, the Skeleton War tweet has been mentioned in reputable sources. There are currently at least two sources in the article that refer to the Skeleton War, which are footnotes 58 and 59 in the current draft. Right now those sources are used as citations for the fact that dril has cross-platform appeal outside of Twitter, including on Tumblr. There might be other sources that mention it as well. I could see an addition about the Skeleton War somewhere in size between the parenthetical footnote about DigimonOtis and the subsection on Large Adult Sons. —BLZ · talk 00:52, 27 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 00:51, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion at Wikipedia:Files for discussion/2018 November 23#File:Dril.jpg

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Files for discussion/2018 November 23#File:Dril.jpg. Marchjuly (talk) 01:14, 23 November 2018 (UTC)Template:Z48[reply]

Categories