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 no consensus to delete. Indiciation of a consensus to merge to Collaborative fiction, which personally I think might be best. But this concept seems to be well-documented enough (though the article could be improved), I will add the merge suggestion template, to spur further discussion. W.marsh 18:23, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wikinovel[edit]

Wikinovel (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

Tagged as CSD A7, but I'm not deleting that based on that because this is about a concept of wiki-based novels, not any specific site. That said, I'm not sure we should have an article on this; few people have tried writing wiki-based collaborative novels yet (A Million Penguins is one of the few examples, of not the only example, that has gained any media attention at all), so this probably suffers from general neologism problems. wwwwolf (barks/growls) 12:27, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Speedy Delete So then, where are the assertions of notability? The multiple non-trivial independent media mentions, the verfiable information, the Reliable sources. What I think we have here is an advert for Million Penguins trying (and failing IMO) to masquerade as an article about wiki novels. The Kinslayer 12:37, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm not saying this article should be spared; I'm just saying I don't see what speedy deletion criteria this meets. Notability is a tricky one because we don't, er, have notability criteria for neologisms. It does fail quite a few of WP:NEO points, there's no sources that would say this is a particularly widespread term yet - that's why it's deletable material. I just don't see how it could qualify for speedy deletion - neologisms are specifically listed under "non-criteria", and one can't really argue this is blatant advertising. Thus, the Process. --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 13:58, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Wikipedia is not a dictionary. Documenting the word once it can be confirmed to be in widespread use is Wiktionary's remit, not ours. (For one thing, that's primary research that Wiktionary editors are allowed to do and we are not.) An encyclopaedia article entitled "wikinovel" would be about wikinovels — what they are, who came up with the idea, how successful they have been, what their impact upon the world of creative writing has been, and so forth. Thus you need only apply the criteria of Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research. If the idea of wikinovels hasn't yet been documented, we shouldn't have an article. Now look at the several sources, cited on the article's talk page, documenting the idea of wikinovels. Uncle G 14:31, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Yup. So the big question is this: Is this a correct, widespread term? Does it warrant a discussion in a separate article anyway, or just a small bit in wiki? How famous of a phenomenon we're talking of here? I'm not so sure myself yet (just checked Google and seems I got whopping (193 distinct hits for "wikinovel"); perhaps the web links may convince me but I'm not really in condition to read a lot of stuff now. =/ --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 14:49, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • As far as I'm concerned, 3 sources and 193 ghits does not constitute widespread popular use. More to the point, the kind of project it's supposed to be is not new, and goes by a name that escapes me at the moment, so essentially this is a new name for an old idea, the main difference deing that it is done through wiki making it easier to facilitate than the previous websites that do open-ended group-written novels. Given that, I say the claim that the idea 'began' in Februart 2007 is bogus. At the most, only the term 'Wikinovel' was coined in February 2007, which brings me to my next point. If the concept was only, er, conceived in February then according to the article it can only be 16 days old at best, hardly enough time for something to have made it's way into general usage. I'd have to say WP:NOT for something made up in school one day. It doesn't say that policy only applies to the students in school. The Kinslayer 14:53, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Thinking of it in terms of a 'term' and looking for 'widespread usage' is still thinking about it as a dictionary definition, which, admittedly, is how the article was originally written. But a dicdef isn't what a wikipedia article is supposed to be. We want to look at whether reliable sources are discussing the idea, which they are (see my !vote below, and the !vote between here and there for examples, as well as the ones on the talk page). This clearly suggests to me that it is a notable idea; it clearly meets the description at WP:N, at least. BTW: I don't think something that Penguin Books have sponsored can be described as "something made up in school one day", even if it is a student project. JulesH 18:42, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. I did find a sort-of source here, but that isn't going to be enough by itself to establish notability. -FisherQueen (Talk) 13:35, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Notable subject, discussed non-trivially in a variety of reliable sources, e.g. The Guardian, The Observer, BBC Radio 5. The recentness of the interest in this idea doesn't make it non notable. JulesH 17:30, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment I have rewritten the article to more closely follow Wikipedia policy. JulesH 17:43, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak delete It wouldn't fail DICT if it was more notable.. so it can wait for then.. Whilding87 17:56, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Just because it's a still emerging form of wiki doesn't make it non-notable.martianlostinspace 20:16, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• But just because it exists doesn't mean it is. Weak delete pending something more substantial. GassyGuy 01:21, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Five reliable sources in a variety of types of mainstream media is insubstantial? This clearly satisfies the criteria at WP:N. JulesH 14:03, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• By my reading, those sources are all about A Million Penguins, not about wikinovels. Wikinovels are therefore not the subject of them, so it would not pass WP:N. GassyGuy 05:19, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Yes, but it's clearly because of the concept of a wikinovel that this site has attracted attention. I mean, you can't argue that articles about (e.g.) SpaceShipOne don't indicate that Private spaceflight is a notable subject, surely? JulesH 08:59, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• There are references on the page for private spaceflight that have the concept as their subject, so there's no question that it's notable. All notability criteria say that the concept has to be the subject of the work. Yes, I'm saying in this case that a specific example of the concept appears to be notable, but the overall concept of wikinovels does not. GassyGuy 18:46, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong Delete NN Neologism. SakotGrimshine 04:08, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• keep - recent (2/15/2007) blog entry on New Scientist blog and mirrored on other popular blogs (including 3qd show this to be a growing phenomenon. Smmurphy^(Talk) 06:23, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment to those saying it should be deleted as a neologism: the guidelines at WP:NEO don't apply, as they are targetted for discussions about terms "as observed in communities of interest or on the internet — without attributing these claims to reliable secondary sources". Five such sources have been linked from this AfD, and more are linked in the article's talk page. This clearly invalidates any cause for concern relating to that guideline. At which point, WP:N is the only guideline we have, and that clearly indicates that this article should be kept. JulesH 14:03, 17 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep per JulesH. Has received media attention. Has apparently taken off strongly - the guy on the radio said they had to upgrade their hardware on the first day. Penguin Books are notable. -- RHaworth 05:21, 18 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep The opinions. here seem to be divided into those who HEARDOFIT and those who hadn't. & i think it's clear by now that with the refs it is N. DGG 04:47, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• All of these sources are establishing the notability of A Million Penguins, not of wikinovels in general. GassyGuy 06:12, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• I kind of think of what is happening as similar to the discovery of the first extrasolar planet or first extrasolar earthlike planet, which would lead to the whole class of objects possibly getting a wp article, even though all the news is only about the one that was discovered. Over time more would likely be discovered, and any important planets could get their own page. So to me, since one exists, people are going to be interested in what a wikinovel is. They are likely to ask a good encyclopedia, and right now, we have the beginings of an answer. If more form or become prominent, we will have more data points from which to talk about what these are (and thus answer UncleG), but right now with only one we don't have much to say, but it is better than nothing, it is interesting, and, to me, it is encyclopedic.

Of course it could turn out to be a fluke (evidence could show that there are no real extra solar earthlike planets) and after some time we could want to delete the article, or make it an article about a short lived meme or something. Smmurphy^(Talk) 17:54, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

But as an encyclopaedia, we are not supposed to document things as they emerge - we are supposed to document things when they become notable. Wikipedia is not a news service, nor is it a collection of everything. If wikinovels do become notable, and it is perfectly possible that they will, to some degree that somebody actually writes something about wikinovels (and not about this or that example), then we can create an article. That's not to say there can't be a sentence or two at, for example, wiki, but it clearly has not been the subject of anything we can source at this point, and failing the primary notability guideline seems to preclude having its own article. GassyGuy 18:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Merge to collaborative fiction. A mention each in The Guardian and by Bloomberg might be not enough for an independent article, but surely it's enough to merit mention in the larger article. -- Antaeus Feldspar 19:24, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge to collaborative fiction, per Antaeus Feldspar. Smmurphy^(Talk) 23:51, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Speedy Keep Notability has been displayed by the references provided. --Parker007 02:24, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment Collaborative fiction also seems like a good housing place. I would not be opposed to that merge. Re: "Speedy Keep" - this doesn't come close to meeting any speedy keep criterion. GassyGuy 02:44, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge to A Million Penguins. The current article's claim that A Million Penguins is "the first well-known wikinovel" implies there are other well-known ones, but the references don't support that. While there are enough sources for an article here, there's little point in having two separate articles until and unless there is another notable example. Some mention of this in collaborative fiction would also be appropriate, but merging the whole article there seems like Recentism. —Celithemis 02:51, 20 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  I don't think merging is a good option; Wikinovel should be a seperate article. --Parker007 00:59, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  Why? Can you document the existence of other wikinovels? —Celithemis 21:23, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  No, but can we document that A Million Penguins is the only one? Unless we can be reasonably certain it is, the information about the general form and which would apply to any such project should stand alone. JulesH 15:29, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  Yes: [1] [2] [3]. JulesH 15:35, 22 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Merge with Collaborative fiction, it does establish verification and some notability but not enough to stand on its own. Darthgriz⁹⁸ 20:51, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose merge The problem with a merge to Collaborative fiction is that that article starts "Collaborative fiction is a form of writing by two or more authors who take it in turns to write a portion of the story." A wikinovel doesn't meet this definition, because it is not structured this way. I agree that it is a form of CF, but the CF article would have to be substantially rewritten for a merge to take place without introducing self-inconsistencies. JulesH 15:27, 22 February 2007 (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.