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. Never mind the motives for creating this article or for filing this AfD, there is a clear consensus to delete. JohnCD (talk) 22:29, 5 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

List of published lists[edit]

List of published lists (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log • AfD statistics)
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This article was created for a WP:POINTy reason. So I am going to AfD it for an equally WP:POINTless reason, as it fails to meet WP:TPA Martin451 (talk) 23:16, 18 February 2010 (UTC) I am also nominating the following related pages because it is a redirect to the above article:[reply]

  • One doesn't need WP:SALAT to realize that lists that are too general or too broad in scope have little value. The inclusion criteria of this article covers hundreds, if not thousands of lists that have very little in common. Take a look at [1], [2], Category:Top lists or Category:Lists. The list is clearly unmaintainable and serves little practical purpose. — Rankiri (talk) 00:08, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I only counted 20 or so in the Category:Top Lists. If WP can handle one article on each I don't see a reason why a list of them, each being notable, would be unmaintainable.Steve Dufour (talk) 04:46, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why don't you check the subcategories and the rest of the given links? — Rankiri (talk) 04:48, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I checked out Category:Lists a bit, not every subcat, and only saw WP lists, not published lists. Steve Dufour (talk) 04:50, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Also please note that these lists have nothing to do with WP:List, although the list of them does. This seems to have been a source of misunderstanding. Steve Dufour (talk) 04:32, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The lists that you mentioned that were published in notable publications, not just on WP, could be added to this article with no problems.Steve Dufour (talk) 06:36, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Let me just summarize my point and move on. Considering that all Wikipedia's entries must be attributed to published sources, the inclusion criteria for the list ("published informative or entertaining lists") is practically meaningless. The list is potentially unlimited and unmaintainable and was created for the sake of having such a list. WP:SALAT specifically says that lists that are too broad in scope have little value. WP:NOTDIR expands on this, stating that Wikipedia articles are not lists of loosely associated topics. Unless you can demonstrate a meaningful connection between such entries as The 50 Best Inventions of 2009, Seven deadly sins and America's Most Miserable Cities, the list looks like a direct violation of the above guidelines. — Rankiri (talk) 13:16, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. Here is the introduction of the article: "Various publications have published lists to inform and sometimes to entertain their readers. This is a list of some of the more well-known." By "well-known" I intended to imply WP:Notable (or at least notable enough so that the list is mentioned in the WP article on the publication, as is the case of Golf World's "100 Best American Golf Courses.") Of course the publication itself also has to be WP:Notable. The Seven Deadly Sins list, like the Seven Wonders of the World, has been around before the invention of printing and other mass media so was not introduced in a notable publication. The other two you mentioned could be included if they and their publications meet WP's notability standards. Steve Dufour (talk) 14:25, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Open any textbook and you'll see dozens of lists (list of seas and oceans, list of chemical elements, etc.) that are published, notable and well-known. As for your objections, see [3] and [4] and please stop discussing every single example taken off the top of my head and address the bigger issue of indiscriminate selection criteria. — Rankiri (talk) 14:36, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I would have no objection to explicitly restricting the list to those lists that have WP articles, and the publication also having an article. Textbooks usually do not. Steve Dufour (talk) 14:42, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's not up to you though. I say List of oceans is a well-known list, informative and published[5]. According to the list's inclusion criteria, it has just as much right to be there as Fortune 500. — Rankiri (talk) 14:50, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If you can find a source that shows where "List of oceans" was first published then include it by all means. :-) Steve Dufour (talk) 14:52, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note also that WP does not have an article about "List of oceans" like it does about the Fortune 500. Steve Dufour (talk) 14:55, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • First, the list is already filled with entries that have no WP articles. Second, the list's inclusion parameters don't support your personal views on what should and shouldn't be included. See WP:OR. Third, according to WP:TITLE, article titles should be recognizable to readers, unambiguous, and consistent with usage in reliable English-language sources. And finally, this discussion is truly going nowhere as you deliberately avoid the question of indiscrimination. I'll let other contributors weigh in on the issue. Perhaps, the consensus will be formed without the approval of the article's sole author. — Rankiri (talk) 15:15, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Please see the talk page of the article. I would welcome other people's contributions. On the other hand, if I remain the sole contributor there will be no danger of the list becoming indiscriminate and unmaintainable. :-)Steve Dufour (talk) 15:23, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Maybe I need help in the wording of the introduction. I kind of understand that, for instance, a "List of people from San Francisco" really means (on WP) a list of WP:Notable people whose origins in San Francisco have been documented in WP:Reliable sources. So what I intended to imply in my attempt at an intro was: "List of notable lists that were first published by notable publications." On the talk page I mentioned that I was limiting my entries to lists of over 100 items that have a useful life of at least a year. This would exclude the New York Times best seller list which changes every week. I said that if someone else added it I would not remove it, however, since it and the Times are clearly notable. Steve Dufour (talk) 16:32, 19 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It should have its own article. There are dozens of articles about individual published lists. Steve Dufour (talk) 16:28, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I removed them since they are not WP:Notable lists and not in notable publications. WP's notability policies govern every article and list on WP. I could have stated that in the first sentence of the article but I thought it was already implied. Steve Dufour (talk) 16:48, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • And just so you know, I have all rights to revert that edit: [6], [7]. — Rankiri (talk) 16:59, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I added those two entries (sorry for the pointiness), but we could come up with thousands of lists that would pass "notability" as it seems to be defined for purposes of that article.--Milowent (talk) 04:03, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why does it fail WP:SALAT or WP:NOTDIR? The scope is huge, I agree, but we can have it as a collection of sub-lists, like Lists of people. Notable lists are indeed a notable subject, and they can (and should) be listed too. WP:TITLE is irrelevant because it can be dealt with moving the page to a more appropriate title, so it falls under WP:ATD. --Cyclopiatalk 23:08, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • What additional arguments do you require? As I said before, a complete lack of connection between such potential entries as "FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives", "List of oceans" and "List of Tiger Woods' mistresses" clearly marks it as a repository of loosely associated topics. As for the scope of the article, it's not simply huge. With 7,280,000 Google results for "published the list of" alone, the list is going to be virtually infinite and impossible to maintain. I also don't see any similarities with Lists of people or Lists of topics. These lists are Wikipedia's organizational portals. Their scope and inclusion criteria are quite different from those of the discussed article. If you wish to see more appropriate examples, consider List of books with lists or List of published photographs. — Rankiri (talk) 14:38, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think List of notable photographs would be a problem.Kitfoxxe (talk) 18:00, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, NW (Talk) 01:48, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Mandsford. I changed my "vote" to delete and will restart the article (when I get around to it) following your suggestion to restrict it to notable annual lists and include secondary sources for each item. Steve Dufour (talk) 18:25, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If the article is kept I will move it to a new title, "List of major annual lists in popular magazines" or something like that, and remove the nonconforming items. Steve Dufour (talk) 22:02, 28 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think that's a reason to delete it. Most of the debate here seems to be about the motivation of the author. The article itself is not so bad. It should be kept with a better name and some cleaning and straightening up. Kitfoxxe (talk) 04:26, 1 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: It is also an indiscriminate list with seemingly no criteria. The name is inappropriate and too vague. It is unencyclopedic. It relies on and encourages WP:OR violation for its list population. Cirt (talk) 05:10, 1 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. Those are legitimate reasons to argue for deletion. :-) Kitfoxxe (talk) 05:18, 1 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Nod, agreed, thanks. Cirt (talk) 05:20, 1 March 2010 (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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