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. – Avi 07:20, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

College Tonight[edit]

College Tonight (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Procedural relisting after a "convoluted" close of previous AfD. Original nominations follow:

From the first AfD:

As it turns out, this page was twice speedily deleted before, but since I can't see what was there before, I have no idea if this is substantially the same as before, but it reeks of advertising, and the company is so new that I suspect Wikipedia is not a crystal ball may also be in play.

And from the second AfD:

This article was originally created by single purpose account User:Thesuchman (a name very similar to one of the site founders), and it is an obvious advertisement. This was enough to successfully speedy Evergreens UK, and this article has itself been Speedied twice before. … Even with possibly-valid media mentions, this article is still nothing more than a blatant ad with no prospect of improvement in the forseeable future, and should be removed ASAP.

(Disclaimer: I voted to keep in the first AfD which ended with "no consensus".) Kimchi.sg 05:19, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong delete Granted, the site has a number of media mentions, but these seem due more to the publicity-savviness of the site's creators than to any actual newsworthiness of the site itself. There really is nothing whatsoever to the article so far that wouldn't apply to just about every other moderately-sophisticated web-forum out there. Also, the original wording of the article (plus the username of the creator) suggests that it was planted in WP by one of the site-founders as a means of boosting their search profile. I don't want to reward that. --Arvedui

Further comment, if there were even a single detail both notable and unique to the site, such as some well-known cultural or internet phenomenon that originated there or an obviously unique net-subculture that inhabits it, I would probably vote to Keep. But as it's basically a two month old dating/party-promotion site, this seems very unlikely. Also, I'm not calling for a speedy delete here, since those seem to get overturned, though I think the sooner this article is gone, the better. --Arvedui 05:41, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete without being able to see the first discussion, and having no part in it, this still reads like an ad and fails the Crystal Ball test. SkierRMH,07:16, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Strong delete Fails WP:WEB. Two month project hasn't any notability. This should be on Google but not in Wikipedia. Tulkolahten 13:54, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep The sources given in the article seem to satisfy WP:WEB. JoshuaZ 14:54, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. Non-notable website, fails WP:WEB and/or any other notability measurement. The two "reliable independent sources" mentioned in the first AfD were a school newspaper and a syndicated column on msnbc.com. Media mentions do not automatically give a subject notability if the subject itself is obviously non-notable. --- RockMFR 15:30, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Social networking websites frequently go belly-up. This one was only recently launched and has not yet achieved notability. Get multiple independent mainstream and reliable sources which document its notability and come back in a year or whatever. I do not approvve of using Wikipedia to achieve notability. Edison 15:41, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak Keep - I'd like to vote delete, but the article does not currently fail WP:WEB. Whatever sources were in the first nomination were irrelevant, the subject is covered by MAJOR networks (ABC, MSN). --Elaragirl^Talk|Count 17:03, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Keep in mind that WP:WEB is a guideline, not a policy, and also includes a paragraph in the introduction to the effect that "Wikipedians are averse to the use of Wikipedia for advertising, and Wikipedia articles are not advertisements is an official policy of long standing." That is, of course, precisely and completely what this article is, which is the whole problem, major media mentions or not. --Arvedui 18:18, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I know that. Two delete votes were per WP:WEB, however, which I do not feel it fails, which is why I referenced it. I am going by notability and references asserting notability. --Elaragirl^Talk|Count 18:22, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

per WP:WEB and other details. In any case, even if it doesn't fail that particular guideline (which I don't necessarily grant in this case due to the nature of the media coverage), don't you think the anti-advertising policy should trump it? (I'm just trying to give you a reason here to do what you said you wanted to do... :-) ) --Arvedui 18:36, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It fails point: except for the following: * Media re-prints of press releases and advertising for the content or site. There is not any notable non-trivial published work fulfilling point 1 of WP:WEB. Tulkolahten 21:39, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, it passes that exact point. "Trivial" in point 1 of WP:WEB refers to "newspaper articles that simply report the internet address, the times at which such content is updated or made available, a brief summary of the nature of the content or the publication of internet addresses and site or content descriptions in internet directories or online stores." And the articles from the WP:RS MSNBC, Red Herring, AZfamily.com are not media re-prints or press releases (all even cite a reporter). Srictly following WP:WEB guildlines, the published works sources are decisively non-trivial and demonstrate notability. --Oakshade 21:55, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is obvious advertising. How the two months old project can be notable ? How ? Tulkolahten 22:09, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Because of verification of notability from independent reliable sources. I always agree that advert aspects of articles need to be changed. --Oakshade 22:25, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Like I mentioned above, if I could find a single thing worth writing about this website, I would agree and vote Keep. But once you take away all the advertorial aspects (seriously, go read the revision before mine), basically you've got an article that says "Here is a social-networking website that focuses on colleges and universities. It's been up since September. Check out all our media coverage!" That's not an article, and I don't see any prospect of that changing over anything like a reasonable timeframe. Once there's actually something there to write about, we can gladly accept it, but until then, it's an ad and has no place here. --Arvedui 00:17, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Like with all these kinds of articles, they need to be written in an objective WP:NPOV manner. It's currently not, I agree. I just added an advertising tag, which I'm surprised nobody did when this article first appeared. --Oakshade 06:46, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think anybody expected it to survive this long. ;-) The fact it was Speedy-deleted twice may have had something to do with the lack of tag as well. (I'm not clear how it got itself restored, let alone more than once.) As for the content itself--once you strip away the adcruft, what exactly is there left to be NPOV about? I'm just not seeing it. And I say that as someone who tends towards inclusionism. I'm all for an article on the site, once it's actually done something worth writing about (not just gotten a mention on a morning show). Thanks for tagging, tho. --Arvedui 06:59, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, articles like this one makes Woogle from Wikipedia. Tulkolahten 12:12, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am the one who posted the first nomination. For the record, the reason it was restored was because after the initial no consensus, I asked to see what the two prior versions of the article were. (see my request to W.marsh[1] and my talk page). -- Sertrel (talk | contribs) 22:06, 28 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak Keep The verification of notability from WP:RS appears present. --Oakshade 21:07, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete, advertising for new social network. The fact that it has succeeded in getting a few media mentions does not make it notable: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a news site dedicated to regurgitating press releases and hyping the latest Web 3.0 buzz. If this social network actually succeeds, Wikipedia will still be here to receive an article about it, but right now? Too soon. Delete now without prejudice to recreation if the subject turns out in retrospect to be a notable one. — Haeleth Talk 22:36, 20 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep, meets the relevant standard. If it reads spammy, edit it. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:42, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • How, exactly? "Here is a social-networking website that focuses on colleges and universities. It was founded by two guys and has been up since September. Check out all its media coverage!" That's an article? There's nothing else to say. Anyway, it meets the relevant guideline while contradicting the no-ad policy. I think the latter obviously trumps the former. --Arvedui 20:44, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • The media mentions make it meet WP:WEB. I don't think the article has to contradict our "no ad policy," which is the point - it's easily possible to make an article that meets the notability standards, so that's why I say keep it. If it reads spammy, edit those parts out, and voila. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:49, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • It was created by a single-purpose user account under a name that suggests it was one of the site-founders themselves putting it in for the express purpose of advertising their (then-nationally-nonexistant) website. It's an ad by definition, and always has been. Cut that out and there's nothing left. --Arvedui 21:03, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
        • First, whether the account that made it is here for a single purpose or not is irrelevant. The article should exist or not based on its merits as a subject, nothing more and nothing less, and we have various notability standards to help with that. If we cut the advertising and replace it with neutral language about the site, and we have at least a viable, verifiable stub. --badlydrawnjeff talk 21:09, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I can't imagine I'm going to convince you to change your mind here, as I've never seen anyone to date manage to convince you of anything you hadn't already decided on... that aside, by all means, demonstrate what you're talking about and edit the page appropriately. If it still seems worth keeping at the end, I might even change my vote. --Arvedui 21:46, 21 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. This is useful content, although it could use some polishing to be more NPOV. Unfocused 17:25, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Useful for what please ? I am trying to find why this is encyclopedic. Tulkolahten 20:54, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• I too am having a very hard time figuring out why people seem to be ignoring the fact that this article was placed in WP as a blatant ad (a particularly egregious one at that...) or how this case differs in any real way from the Evergreens UK article, which was quickly and uncontroversially speedied for committing identical wiki-sins as this one has (single-purpose user account/website operator placing own site in WP for ad purposes) despite being a page which could easily be argued as far more informative and better written than this one has ever been, or will likely ever be. This seems highly unfair, and no one arguing to Keep seems willing to talk about it.

Is a fluff-piece interview on the Today Show *really* so authoritative that it grants a license to spam, even if in watered-down NPOV language? WP's value to article-spammers as a source of high Google pagerank should not go unconsidered, NPOV wording or not. If we keep this one, we only encourage more of the same. --Arvedui 07:13, 23 November 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.