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 redirect to Cheerleading#Dangers of cheerleading. BJTalk 01:19, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Kristi Yamaoka[edit]

AfDs for this article:
Kristi Yamaoka (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

Well, its been five months, so its time for another round I think. This is the sixth time this article has appeared here. The previous five can all be found through the article talk page and I am not going to bother linking them here, though someone less lazy than myself can certainly do so if they feel the urge. Now, rather than having a free-for-all, I hope I can focus this debate on a single issue (yeah, I know never going to happen, but I can dream can't I?). There is a wikipedia policy (not guidline, essay, proposal, etc, but honest to God policy) that goes something like this:

"Wikipedia is not a newspaper. The bare fact that someone has been in the news does not in itself imply that they should be the subject of an encyclopedia entry. Where a person is mentioned by name in a Wikipedia article about a larger subject, but essentially remains a low-profile individual, we should generally avoid having an article on them.

If reliable sources only cover the person in the context of a particular event, then a separate biography is unlikely to be warranted. Marginal biographies on people with no independent notability can give undue weight to the events in the context of the individual, create redundancy and additional maintenance overhead, and cause problems for our neutral point of view policy. In such cases, a redirect or merge are usually the better options. Cover the event, not the person." (see Wikipedia:BLP1E#Articles_about_people_notable_only_for_one_event

Now what this means is we should not have a debate here about the fall. Yes it got news coverage, yes it led to changes in the sport, and yes the incident still gets mentioned from time to time today. Does that make it notable? Doesn't matter. We are not here to debate the notability of the accident. Now what about this Kristi Yamaoka herself. Lets focus on a few select quotes from the above-quoted policy: "remains a low-profile individual," "reliable sources only cover the person in the context of a particular event", and "no independent notability."

Criteria one, "low-profile individual" seems to apply here. The first page of my google hits for "Kristi Yamaoka" give such hits as wiki and its mirrors, her facebook page, a youtube of the accident, and a few articles on the accident. Going through a few more of my 3,310 hits, I am seeing nothing but stories related to the fall or wiki mirrors. She has not become a celebrity, not become a spokeswoman for the dangers of cheerleading, and has had no media coverage relating to events since the accident. Definately kept a low profile.

Criteria two, "reliable sources only cover the person in the context of a particular event" also applies. See above. I have not found any coverage of the individual not related to the fall. If someone can find a reliable source that does so, please feel free to bring it here and we can discuss its merits. If no one can do this, then criteria two is open and shut.

Criteria three, "no independent notability". I realize I have chosen three phrases that essentially mean the same thing and have the same evidence, but I am trying to make a point based in wikipedia policy here, so I think the redundancy is a good idea. Sure the accident made national news in the United States; I'm with you there; we may have established notability of the event. Now what about the person? Has this person done anything covered by a reliable source that might fit into the nebulous definition of notability? I am not seeing it, but if someone sees an indicia of independent notability, please bring it here to duscuss.

Well, there you have it, I have posted a wikipedia policy, dissected it, and shown how the subject fails to meet it. If someone can provide a reliable source that establishes either a high profie in the media or a notability independent from the accident bring it here and we can discuss. If all we get are keep votes that make no attempt to satisfy the policy requirements posted above, I hope the closing admin will remember a particular portion of the Wikipedia:Deletion guidelines for administrators policy that states: "Consensus is not determined by counting heads, but by looking at strength of argument, and underlying policy (if any). Arguments that contradict policy, are based on opinion rather than fact, or are logically fallacious, are frequently discounted." Now lets see if we can have some good old-fashion policy debate on this page. Indrian (talk) 18:55, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  1. This has already been considered in numerous other failed nominations.
  2. There is no separate article about the one event.
  3. The nomination itself states "a redirect or merge are usually the better options" and these are not achieved by deletion.
  4. There has been renewed reportage regarding her return to cheerleading and the legal aftermath and these constitute multiple events.

Colonel Warden (talk) 22:53, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • As to number 4, please cite so we may discuss here. Your other objections are irrelevant as I see it. As to number one, this issue may have been raised in the past, but it was never the hinge upon which the nomination rested. This new nomination brings the policy debate into better focus and allows for a thourough discussion of that issue. As for number 2, the BLP policy makes no distinction between events with a separate article and events not covered in a separate article; it merely states that if notability is limited to a single event and there is scant information in reliable sources independent of the event, then a biography is best avoided. As for number 3, it is competely irrelevant because it only states preferred methods of resolution; it is not a binding statement requiring all such articles to be merged rather than deleted.
Finally, I take issue with your characterization of this nomination as disprutive. I would agree that MSJapan nominating the article the first three times in fairly rapid succession was not helpful, but this is only the third nomination since 2006 and the first nomination ever put forth by me. The last nomination was five months ago and resulted in a no consensus with a strong urging by the admin to reorganize the information. A "no consensus" does not have the same force as a "keep" as a discussion ender and none of the suggestions of the closing admin appear to have been followed. I feel that your characterization of the nomination as disruptive may unfortunately be an attempt by you to cover up your weak arguments in unnecessary rhetoric. I hope you can answer my response to your concerns in a more constructive manner. Indrian (talk) 23:26, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have constructively added sources to the article. You propose that this work be deleted. Please explain how this would improve the project. Notice how a reader came to the article just a few days ago to look up details of this person after she was again covered in the news. You would have this reader go away empty-handed and none the wiser. Please be more constructive and withdraw your unhelpful nomination. Colonel Warden (talk) 23:46, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I am sorry your frustration has led you to feel you must take such an uncivil tone, as this derails what could be a debate about policy and turns it into a mud-slinging competition. I have given a measured argument as to why I believe policy dictates this article be deleted. You made a good first step at sticking to issues with your initial post, and I provided counterarguments to the points you raised. If you have the sources I requested above for discussion or wish to argue matters of policy further, I would be happy to continue our dialogue. If all you have to offer is more unhelpful rhetoric such as what I am responding to now, then our conversation is at an end. Indrian (talk) 00:22, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Tu quoque. I have continued to work on the article to improve it. Your policy argument is internally inconsistent, as I explained above. You fail to explain why we should not even have a redirect for this title, as the policy you cite advocates. Colonel Warden (talk) 09:43, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • If you want to make a go at changing this article to one about the incident itself with a rename and change of focus to reflect that, and then redirect the name Kristi Yamaoka be my guest. This AfD has nothing to do with the incident, only the person. You are focusing on a single sentence to argue an inconsistency, to wit: "Where a person is mentioned by name in a Wikipedia article about a larger subject, but essentially remains a low-profile individual, we should generally avoid having an article on them." This compeltely ignores two other sentences that have equal value and stand separately from that one: "The bare fact that someone has been in the news does not in itself imply that they should be the subject of an encyclopedia entry." and "If reliable sources only cover the person in the context of a particular event, then a separate biography is unlikely to be warranted." You cannot pull one sentence out of the middle of a two paragraph policy and claim that is the entire policy. This distorts the truth. The issues of the notability of the person and whether or not wikipedia has an article on the incident are separate. Furthermore, your claim of an inconsistency because the policy prefers a redirect is even more bizarre. Show me the place in the policy that states the only recourse for a violation is a merge and redirect. I think you might have some problems with that. If you have a counterarguement for why we should ignore the two sentences I have quoted here, I am all ears. Indrian (talk) 14:09, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Please notice the word separate. The point is that an event does not justify separate articles about the people involved in the event. For example, the event of 9-11 does not warrant articles about the many individuals caught up in that event. But in this case, we have a combined article which addresses both the event and the person together and so there is no separate article and so no problem. And then there's other policies like WP:BEFORE... Colonel Warden (talk) 16:00, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think this is really the crux of our disagreement right here. You take the line about a separate article to mean the policy only applies if an article on the event also exists. I can see how the policy can be read that way. I personally think that reading does not make sense because notability does not hinge on the existence of another article. Now as I said before, if you want to create a new article on the event, take out certain pieces of information not related to the event, refocus the information so that it does not attetempt to read like a bio, and then make "Kristi Yamaoka" a redirect, I would not bring the new article up for AfD (though I would consider voting if someone else did so, whether for keep or delete I do not know). I believe this article violates policy, however, and should therefore be deleted. Indrian (talk) 16:16, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Your extraordinarily long statement may have broken the formatting for the AFD. I have tried to fix it just now but am not sure that all the tecnicalities are right. It may be properly categorised now but we're still not getting links to all the previous AFD discussions. This technical failure arguably invalidates the AFD. Colonel Warden (talk) 21:52, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Colonel Warden, may I ask where it states that this type of a technical fault invalidates this AFD nomination? JEdgarFreeman (talk) 22:25, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • If a process is not followed correctly then it is thereby invalidated. In this case, the nominator failed to follow the process of WP:BEFORE, contemplating better alternatives such as redirection or merger. The article's creator or other contributors were not courteously notified per WP:AFDHOWTO. The AFD header was munged so that it was not properly categorised and the history of vexatious repeat nominations was not visible. The AFD reason was filled with excessive verbiage which is greater in length than the article in question and so has deterred editors from reading it. In short, this AFD is what is commonly known as a train wreck. When a process is botched to this extent, then it cannot said to be fairly delivering a consensus sufficient to overturn the consensus repeatedly established previously. Colonel Warden (talk) 09:23, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sigh, for every decent policy discussion we have you have to go and say something silly and unproductive that smacks of a surprising desperation to invalidate this discussion. The AfD has been accesible the entire time through links on both the article page and the main AfD page. Just because the header is not perfect does not invaildate the AfD in any way. Don't know where you are getting these strange ideas. Indrian (talk) 22:35, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Colonel Warden, I believe I understand why you think that "If a process is not followed correctly then it is thereby invalidated", but I do not believe Wikipedia guidelines communicate the same viewpoint for AFD nominations. According to WP:AFDHOWTO, informing editors heavily involved in an article which has been nominated for deletion is a recommended, not a required, practice. I believe that the nominator should have followed this practice, but I believe that not following it is not evidence to use to assert that the nomination should be invalidated, because the practice is not compulsory. As for adding links to previous nominations at the top of this discussion, that has now been done. Also, although it is very long, I understand the nominator's reasoning for posting an explanation the length of what it is for why he has nominated the article. More importantly with regards to the length of the explanation, I am not aware of any Wikipedia policy that states that an AFD discussion should be considered for invalidation due to the fact that its introduction is very long. If you can show me such a policy, please do so. I agree that the nominator should have looked at the option of merging, before nominating this article for deletion, but I do not think that is grounds for invalidation of this discussion, though I could be wrong. Thank you for reading. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 12:03, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion is only open for 5 days and its quality is suspect if the AFD has not been properly formatted during a significant portion of this short time. This issue might be addressed by relisting it. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:12, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Whilst I determine my position regarding your proposal, may I ask, Colonel Warden, if you know any Wikipedia guidelines/policies which state, due to the problems you have listed, that an AFD nomination must be invalidated? atm, I am at a loss to find any Wikipedia guidelines/policies that even recommend invalidating due to the issues you have raised. Thank you in advance. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 12:26, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
WP:DRV indicates that substantive procedural errors are reason to overturn a deletion. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:08, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I have found that WP:DRV states "Purely procedural errors may be substantive and result in an overturn (such as failing to tag a page for its XfD discussion) or irrelevant (such as closing 1 minute early)." However, WP:DRV concerns articles whose AFD nominations have been concluded, not AFD discussions that are ongoing. Plus, I believe there has only been one procedural error, and that was the nominator not examining a merger first, and I do not believe that if a big enough problem to warrant invalidating this nomination outright. All the other problems you have raised; long introduction, not informing heavily involved editors of the article, and not adding the links to other nominations from the start, are occurences that do not against procedure, as I elaborated upon in an earlier comment in this discussion. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 13:27, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We disagree on the facts of the matter. The AFD was badly formed and this is another evident procedural error. The general effects of these errors has been to keep the discussion from interested editors and so they are material. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:23, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that the AFD nomination could have been executed in a much better way, but I still cannot find any Wikipedia policies/guidelines that state that, due to the issues you have raised, this nomination must be invalidated. Please direct me to specific Wikipedia policies/guidelines that state either that the article must be invalidated, or that the article should be considered for invalidation, due to the issues you have raised. Thank you in advance. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 14:42, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
See above. Colonel Warden (talk) 11:03, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Please see above where I showed that WP:DRV does not apply to this suituation, and where I said that most of the problems you have highlighted do not go against procedure. As for "The AFD was badly formed and this is another evident procedural error", the AFD has been fixed. In any case, I do not believe that a delay in fixing the code of the AFD has meant that this AFD is ruined. An AFD is around for five days, meaning that an error that occupied it for its first day is not able to ruin the entire duration of its existence. To be frank, I do not believe this discussion about whether the nomination should be invalidated needs to continue. The AFD has been around for a few days, and there does seem to be any strong movement by the community to invalidate this nomination. I suggest we focus on the article at hand, as opposed to its nomination. Thank you. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 11:56, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There is no invalidation process - the process is invalid as a consequence of not having been followed. What becomes of this remains to be seen. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:06, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • No, the full history of contributions should be retained per the GFDL. It is a legal requirement. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:06, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment By that reasoning, if I have understood it correctly, no articles at all can be deleted. I don't think that radical argument will hold much ground in this AFD discussion. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 13:25, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • No, this issue arises only when the proposal is to keep the content but delete the article. Deletion and merger are contrary processes and several editors here seem to misunderstand this. Please see WP:MERGE, for example, ...regardless of the amount of information kept — should always leave a redirect or, in some cases, a disambiguation page in place. This is often needed to allow proper attribution through the edit history for the page the merged text came from.. Note also that we already have a merge proposal at Talk:Cheerleading#Merger proposal and so this AFD is redundant. Colonel Warden (talk) 13:37, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I understand your point now. My apologies for not getting it earlier. I can confirm Colonel Warden's discovery that text has been copied from Kristi Yamaoka, to Cheerleading#Dangers of cheerleading. Unless that copied text is removed, deleting the Kristi Yamaoka article is not allowed, as Colonel Warden has stated. If the copied text isn't replaced with text conveying the same type of information, then I will vote for a Merge. Also, although it may not warrant invalidation, I think it is incredibly bad form on Indrian's part that he nominated the Kristi Yamaoka article for deletion, when the article clearly showed that a merger was being discussed. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 14:09, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Two things. I really don't care if this is deleted or merged so long as the independent article goes away. Second, I take issue with your determination that a merger discussion was going on. A merger proposal was made a month before the AfD. At the time, one person commented without a vote. A month after MSJApan made that proposal, Colonel Warden gave a response opposing the merger after this AFD had already begun. A month old request on which two people have commented is not in any meaningful way an ongoing merger discussion. Indrian (talk) 14:31, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I didn't mean to be rude when I said that you had acted in "incredibly bad form", but what I said is the truth, imo. 4 seperate people have been involved in the merger discussion in the past 9 days, 2 before the article was nominated. I consider that an active discussion. Having said that, I don't believe that nominating the article for deletion whilst a merger discussion is going on for it, is grounds for invalidation of the nomination. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 16:04, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
(outdent) First of all, I find ColonelWarden's behavior terribly disruptive - he spent four days trying to find some sort of policy problem that to my mind really doesn't exist, even aside from the facts regarding the merger. I suggested the merger, and I got not enough response to do anything with it, despite listing it on the proposed mergers page. So, it really wasn;t necessary for Indrian to consider anything aside from deletion. I also tried redirecting it at one point, and it was undone by an admin for supposed lack of discussion. Informationally, the copied text is fully sourced bare (and indisputable) fact - it has is the basic "who what where when how", and there's really no way to "change" that other than to reorder it. MSJapan (talk) 14:33, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I also believe that many of the issues Colonel Warden has raised are not policy violations, as I have explained to him. As for the merger discussion, I would like to quote what I told Indrian "4 seperate people have been involved in the merger discussion in the past 9 days, 2 before the article was nominated. I consider that an active discussion. Having said that, I don't believe that nominating the article for deletion whilst a merger discussion is going on for it, is grounds for invalidation of the nomination." JEdgarFreeman (talk) 16:04, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Before I respond fully to the latest points MSJapan and Indrian have made, I would like to state that I am in the process of re-writing the copied text on the Cheerleading#Dangers of cheerleading. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 14:36, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

 Done I have replaced the copied text. As a result, I believe deletion is now an allowable option. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 15:37, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

☒N It is not so simple. The copied text still exists in that article's history and may be restored or reused at any time. The GFDL issue remains. Colonel Warden (talk) 15:51, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • User:MSJapan has nominated this article for deletion previously four times even though numerous editors said on each occasion that it should be kept. Repeat nominations in the hope of getting a different result are disruptive per our policy WP:DEL. My action in drawing attention to the numerous flaws in this nomination are quite proper since it is the purpose of the AFD process to protect content from improper deletion. Colonel Warden (talk) 15:27, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I do not believe anyone is disputing that you should argue for the article if you believe it should stay. It's just that many of us do not agree with many of the points you have made. MSJapan certainly has nominated this article many times before. However, due to the fact that there would be appear to be a consensus for a delete or a merge, I believe this nomination should remain up. JEdgarFreeman (talk) 16:04, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete and merger are mutually exclusive, as previously explained - one results in the article being deleted while the other results in it being kept. A consensus to do both is therefore a logical impossibility. The opinions of the numerous editors who commented in previous discussions should also be borne in mind as there do not seem to have been any significant developments since. The nominator made no effort to inform such interested parties and the existence of the previous discussions was concealed. Colonel Warden (talk) 16:21, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I take offence at the suggestion that Indrian concealed the existence of previous discussions. The very first lines of the introduction he made in this discussion was "Well, its been five months, so its time for another round I think. This is the sixth time this article has appeared here. The previous five can all be found through the article talk page". Also, informing interested parties, although it is considered "courteous", is "not required". [1]JEdgarFreeman (talk) 16:30, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[2][reply]
  • The garbling of the header so that the links to previous discussions were not visible and the discussion was not correctly categorised was perhaps an inadvertent consequence of the extraordinarily long nomination, as I indicated above. My point is that, if we seem to have a different result on this occasion, it may be as a result of these technical errors. Consensus in such cases should be judged in a cumulative manner so that the opinions of all editors who have troubled themselves over this case are properly represented. Otherwise we have the injustice of double jeopardy (sixfold in this case). Colonel Warden (talk) 16:53, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I think, if I am wrong please let me know, everyone who has contributed to this discussion so far does now agree that an article on Kristi Yamaoka breaks WP:BLP1E. The big question now over the article would seem to be, whether the article should be merged with Cheerleading#Dangers of cheerleading, or whether it should be deleted outright. I look forward to seeing the admin's decision..JEdgarFreeman (talk) 16:25, 9 September 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.
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