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. Barkeep49 (talk) 01:49, 18 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Piercing Mildred

[edit]

[Hide this box] New to Articles for deletion (AfD)? Read these primers!

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Fails to meet WP:GNG and WP:WEB. The most substantial mentions of this game I can find are eight sentences in the Orlando Sentinel, a very short paragraph in Wired, and finally, an esoteric mention in a German magazine – which I could find no information on – called Pizz@. The creator of the article seems to be an SPA; essentially every edit besides one relates to Piercing Mildred or its creators (e.g. Domenico Tassone) in some way. This leads me to believe there's an undisclosed conflict of interest with the subject, though it's clear to me based on the low frequency of editing and the nature of the unrelated edit that if this were the case, it's at least in good faith – i.e. they're somebody trying to share their passionate knowledge about the game, not somebody trying to game Wikipedia in any way. Nevertheless, the article simply doesn't meet inclusion criteria. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheTechnician27 (talk • contribs) 02:18, 1 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Websites-related deletion discussions. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 09:36, 1 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Video games-related deletion discussions. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 09:36, 1 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per nom. Worth mentioning that an article for Domenico Tassone has been deleted twice, within weeks of each other, alongside one for the company he co-founded. Links to both now-deleted articles appear in the article creator's other contributions. I don't want to assume bad faith here but this is a really, really narrow SPA with a COI in my eyes. (But do correct me if I'm wrong, I've never participated in an AfD before!) --Velvetune! t • c 00:52, 3 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, ✗plicit 06:59, 8 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Changing to abstain, for now, as I've grasped the ropes a bit more since and don't trust my initial evaluation, and in light of BennyOnTheLoose's comment. Velvetune! t • c 19:38, 9 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Weak keep. Further sources found via newspapers.com.

Articles with adequate coverage to count towards meeting GNG, in my opinion:

Daily News (New York, New York) 17 Sep 1995, Business Page 4 - a few paragraphs.[1]

The Daily Herald (Provo, Utah) 17 Sep 1995, Sun Page 50 - a few paragraphs.[2]

The Orlando Sentinel / Chicago Tribune article mentioned above.part1,part2

Shorter mentions:

The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) 26 Jul 1995, Page 11: a couple of paragraphs.[3]

The Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) 18 Nov 2000, Icon page 14 - one paragraph.[4]

The Daily Times (Salisbury, Maryland) 02 Feb 1997, Page 20 - one paragraph.[5]

The Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia ) 01 Nov 1996, Page 54 - one paragraph.[6]

Also The Observer (London, Greater London, England) 01 Mar 1998, Life, page 66,[7] mentions that there was coverage of the game in a BBC Two show. It's a weak keep from me for now, but I'll watchlist the discussion page as I may change my mind later. Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 13:01, 9 June 2021 (UTC) (Looks like the game is in The World's Weirdest Web Pages and the People who Create Them too. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 13:11, 9 June 2021 (UTC))[reply]

@BennyOnTheLoose: Note that the articles in Daily News and The Daily Herald are exact copies of that in The Orlando Sentinel and that paper's Joe Kilsheimer is credited as the author in all three. In The World's Weirdest Web Pages (archive.org; pp. 96–99) are three pages of a very weirdly formatted interview (~600 words including questions and answers) and a short what-if introduction. I'm yet to make up my mind but if The Orlando Sentinel is the only in-depth, independent, secondary coverage, WP:GNG (WP:42) or WP:NVG might not be met. IceWelder [✉] 12:51, 10 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Can the sources above be hyperlinked, to ease review of them by others? Both parties present compelling arguments (there are sources - they are bad). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 05:42, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Piotrus: Added above. I clipped both parts of The Orlando Sentinel story so the author credit is preserved. Regards, IceWelder [✉] 07:21, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
- IceWelder, Thanks. The 'longer' mentions are so-so quality, and they are all in fact the one and the same article by the same author reprinted in different outlets. The shorter ones are "capsule reviews" at most. Overall, this is very borderline. In the meantime, I found a mention of the game in one academic work: [8] but I don't have full view of this outside this: "For a look at a unique use of humor, check out www.mildred.com. Dave Skwarczek, principal of Streams Online Media Development, has created an interactive application called "Piercing Mildred," using body piercing as a metaphor to explain how the Web works". And a look at Google Books gives us more passing mentions, the site was clearly noticed enough to be listed in quite a few "weird Internet trivia" lists. Out of those, it was mentioned in the PC Mag [9] (but it's just a short paragraph again). Another academic mention might be here: [10]. This might be reliable: [11]. It might have been discussed here, but I can't get a preview. From the academic perspective, this has some relevance to health/fashion (body) topics, and seems to be mentioned on the margins of not just "weird trivia" works like the "CyberHound's Internet Guide to the Coolest Stuff Out There" (1996) but also of some more sciency books (wonder if this is a textbook]?). Wow, this is a fun weird borderline case. For now I'll go with the abstain crowd, it would be fun to rescue this, but it won't be easy. What we have is pretty much a few dozens of reliable-ish, independent but trivial/WP:SIGCOV-failing mentions, variations of "look at this weird website", and copyright as usual obscures most of what is out there. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:06, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Wow - Headpress gets a look-in to increase my 90s throwback vibe. I have some early issues somewhere but not the one that would have Piercing Mildred in. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 15:43, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I managed to get a look at Composing Cyberspace: Identity, Community, and Knowledge in the Electronic Age, which is indeed a textbook. Bizarrely, the relevant chapter is by Dave Barry and has exactly the same text about the game as in his Dave Barry in Cyberspace which is now cited in the article. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 15:52, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Health and fitness-related deletion discussions. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:08, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Fashion-related deletion discussions. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:08, 11 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. Review those first three sources again: They're the same article by Joe Kilsheimer. They're attributed in the syndicated reprints. The other links are passing mentions. We can't write an article that does justice to the subject on these sources alone and there are no viable merge targets. Please ((ping)) me if you find otherwise. czar 02:54, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - as mentioned earlier, I may well change my vote, but could somebody point me to the policy about multiple instances of a syndicated article and notability etc.? I've seen syndicated articles in other circumstances (e.g. Bob Dylan album reviews) so I'd like to understand our policy. Thanks. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 10:02, 13 June 2021 (UTC) Also, I've added some content - trying to avoid real WP:REFBOMBing as there appear to be quite a few short mentions in 1990s web books etc. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 11:26, 13 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per Czar. Fails WP:SIGCOV,4meter4 (talk) 20:27, 16 June 2021 (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.