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. There is clear consensus against a standalone article; the merge suggestion didn't get further support, but if anyone wishes to work on a merger they may request a draftspace copy. I can see the argument for a general discussion about area code articles, but I don't see the need for such a discussion invalidating the consensus evident here. Vanamonde (Talk) 15:50, 6 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

01489[edit]

01489 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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Stumbled across this article when looking for something else, and I can't see any reason it needs to exist - it contains several pieces of apparent WP:OR. We have a List of dialling codes in the United Kingdom and I don't know why this WP:MILL area code needs its own specific article - the article itself doesn't explain why this code is notable. Flip Format (talk) 08:18, 26 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Computing, United Kingdom, and England. Flip Format (talk) 08:18, 26 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete per nom. See also Special:Contributions/Sigma714. 0xDeadbeef→∞ (talk to me) 09:07, 26 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep pending a broader discussion. The article format here is nearly identical to the others in Category:Area codes in the United Kingdom, and contains the sort of information I would expect to find in an encyclopaedia article, e.g. the full history, not just a description of the present. Rather than singling out this example article, I think it would be much better to have a broader discussion about what is and is not encyclopaedic and what level of coverage we want in Wikipedia, and only after that comparing each article against that standard. The articles in the category seem to have been started by and worked on by a variety of different people so aren't just one person's pet project the rest of the world doesn't care about. I will give a courtesy ping to MRSC who has edits to most of the articles in the category (but not this one). Thryduulf (talk) 10:11, 27 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  That's a fair point. I don't think there's a blanket "area codes are never notable" rule. Most (all?) US area codes have articles, and there are some clearly notable area codes such as 020 which has generated WP:SIGCOV over time simply because it covers so many people. I'm not sure this area code is notable - and the article doesn't specify why it would be notable over and above all the other little codes that cover one or more small towns.

  Category:Area codes in the United Kingdom is odd - we have nine articles out of however many hundred area codes exist, and they are a seemingly random selection, with minor towns like Redditch and Romford covered but no article for major city and region codes, eg. 0161 or 028. I freely admit I'm not an expert in the field of area codes, though, so perhaps there is something special about this batch. Flip Format (talk) 11:14, 27 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  I was puzzled at the selection too, but equally I'm no expert either. Personally I think I'd prefer an article about Telephone numbers in London or something rather than 020 but I've not read the article in detail nor looked to see what the arguments against that might be. The articles about US phone codes are something I look up occasionally when I want to know what part of the country they cover, and anecdotally I've never found one without an article - and it is another reason why I think we should discuss the set first. If some codes are notable and some aren't then such a discussion would be the best way to get consensus about what things do and don't convey notability. Thryduulf (talk) 16:03, 27 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete per WP:NOT#IINFO. This is an absurd level of detail for a very small part of the UK phone system, and even if it's verifiable it's not encyclopedic. I could understand having an article about telephone numbers in London or another large city, but I've barely heard of any of the places covered here and I live about fifty miles away. Nor does the article cite any reliable sources, instead it's entirely sourced to self-published web pages by people who are apparently very interested in UK phone numbers. Hut 8.5 18:19, 27 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  My point is that there appears to have been no discussion to determine what area codes in the UK are and are not encyclopaedic in general, but this article (if verifiable) would appear to be equivalent to e.g. Area code 802 and Area code 925 (picked at random) which seem to have been determined as encyclopaedic with a similar scope. That may or may not be a problem, but it is something I think should be first addressed on a systematic level before keeping or deleting individual articles. Thryduulf (talk) 09:09, 29 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The fact we haven't had a general RfC on whether these are encyclopedic doesn't mean we can't delete this one for being unencyclopedic. I don't agree that this article is comparable to US area codes, for two reasons:

• US area codes tend to cover a much larger area than UK ones. The 802 area code you linked to covers the entire state of Vermont, which has a population of about 650,000. I added up the population of the villages listed as comprising this area code and got a figure of about 58,000. So the US one is more than ten times as big.
• Area codes also tend to have a different status in US culture. The article on the 802 code says (with a source) that it "has become a source of pride in the state". I don't see any indication that anything like that has happened here.

And even if that wasn't the case we expect that articles are based on reliable sources (WP:V, WP:GNG) rather than self-published web pages. Hut 8.5 12:04, 29 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I've re-looked at this article, and if you take out the WP:OR (such as the stuff in the lede about what "residents" "refer to" the area code as) and the stuff that is sourced to (or "deduced from", more OR) one guy's website (like all the historical numbers) then you are left with an article that says "01489 is the area code covering town Z and town A", which is prime WP:NOTDIR territory.

Even articles for area codes covering major UK cities are really thinly sourced, because there's just not that much written about area codes. The article for 0191 also contains heaps of OR, phrases like "it is believed that" (by whom?) and what is sourced comes from things like a supermarket store locator, a random company website and a church yearbook, apparently to "prove" little more than that these places have a certain telephone number. I also feel like we're in WP:IINFO land with this stuff. Flip Format (talk) 20:22, 1 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete per Flip Format and Hut 8.5. We need to work against WP:BIAS in favour of anorak interests, and this article is a particularly egregious example. RobinCarmody (talk) 21:15, 3 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • BIAS is best countered by increasing the quality and quantity of our articles about poorly-covered subjects often neglected by mainstream sources for POV (e.g. only relevant to Africa), etc reasons than by deletion of articles about subjects that mainstream sources often neglect due to POV (e.g. only relevant to anoraks), etc reasons. Thryduulf (talk) 12:38, 5 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete - unless someone can show significant third party references which show that the UK area numbers have individual notability the assumption should clearly be IMO that they are not notable. Other area codes in other countries may or may not be notable, that's got nothing to do with this. JMWt (talk) 14:02, 4 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why should we assume UK area numbers have or do not have individual notability before we have examined any of the evidence? Thryduulf (talk) 12:38, 5 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

• Merge into Botley, Hampshire. It's weird to let a village in UK to have an article on this code, while it could represent other things elsewhere (say, post code for some other locations). The contents can be used to create a whole dialing code section for the article of the village. Tutwakhamoe (talk) 23:45, 5 May 2023 (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.