Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Brooklyn Artists

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 keep. Numerically it would be no consensus, but the keep !votes were more policy compliant. The list technically isn't indiscriminate because it has both a context (affiliation with Brooklyn) and sourcing. The fact that in its current form it duplicates the function of a category is not a reason for deletion. Xymmax ^{So let it be written} _{So let it be done} 19:53, 12 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Brooklyn Artists

Brooklyn Artists (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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This function is met by the Category:Artists from Brooklyn. No references, orphan, not maintained. Don't see other "list of artists from" cities or states, just countries. Vrac (talk) 20:39, 24 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of New York-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:04, 29 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Arts-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:05, 29 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:05, 29 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:05, 29 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep per WP:CLN. Honestly below the state (if not national) level, we should only be maintaining Fooers from Footown in list form. It's kind of ridiculous for a category to intersect a career with part of a city, given that these "from" categories don't even link the location to where they actually practiced their career. But lists can be maintained at a much more detailed level without interfering with anything else. postdlf (talk) 15:48, 1 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

If that's the case why are there no "List of artists from" Queens, New York City, Massachusetts, Berlin, etc....? Maybe they are there under some other name but I'm not finding any. I only see countries. The understanding I have of "from" in a category is that they were born or grew up there. Vrac (talk) 19:07, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete per nomination. Article has been tagged with {{unreferenced}}, {{improve categories}} and {{Cleanup}}, but having seen outcomes of multiple AfDs similar to this one the chances of these issues being corrected in the near future are low, at least according to my standerds.

Psst…The article is not an orphan, as other articles do link to it. Wiki you now, Wiki you later! (talk) 00:33, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment – I have cleaned-up, formatted and added sources to the article. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 00:56, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: If you want to salvage it there is still a long, long way to go. The category has 41 entries. As far as renaming goes, is that people working in, or is it living in, and not from? This individual on the list, for example, was born in California, lived in Brooklyn, then moved back to California. So is it a list of people that were in Brooklyn at some point in time? The article went 7 years with hardly any modification. From MOS: "certain lists may get out of date quickly; for these types of subjects, a category may be a more appropriate method of organization". I'd say given how stale this thing is, it fits the bill. Vrac (talk) 01:58, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

How would a list of artists from Brooklyn get "out of date"? It's not a phone book, so if they move, die, or stop making art they wouldn't be removed from it. The list should correspond to the category and be renamed List of artists from Brooklyn. Such occupation/place classifications are almost always broad (as has been the practice since categories were adopted over a decade ago), encompassing people who are from a place and then go do their job somewhere else as well as those who do their job in that place. But so long as there is a core of indisputably verifiable content inclusion is not at all a deletion concern, but rather one for normal editing and discussion to resolve. On your other arguments, see WP:NOEFFORT, and "unreferenced" is irrelevant as references can clearly be added or it may be judged sufficient for such a mundane list to have the references in the linked articles. Either way, the information is verifiable, and that's what counts here. postdlf (talk) 15:25, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

A list of artists from Brooklyn gets "out of date" because it's not a list of people from Brooklyn, it's a list of a few artists who at one point in time worked/lived in Brooklyn. If they leave (which some have), it's out of date. I see User:Northamerica1000 refactored his comments to remove the "List of artists in Brooklyn" name he was suggesting, that was what I was responding to. "List of artists based in Brooklyn" suffers from the same problem. If it's renamed to "List of artists from Brooklyn" a number of names will have to be removed. A list that contains incorrect information and that no one updates doesn't add anything positive to an encyclopedia. Vrac (talk) 18:48, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"A list of artists from Brooklyn...[is] not a list of people from Brooklyn"? I'm afraid you lost me there. You're right that we shouldn't title it "in Brooklyn", because that would wrongly suggest just at present and we don't do that with lists or categories for the very reason that it would be unmaintainable and easily get out of date. A list of people "from" somewhere can't get out of date beyond its need to add new entries; the old entries, once verified, would never be removed, so I'm not sure what "number of names" you think would "have to be removed" or why. postdlf (talk) 19:17, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

None of these people: Andrea Zittel, Jeffrey Wright (actor), Colson Whitehead, Sufjan Stevens, Stephen Shames, Stephen Shames, Mark Morris (choreographer), Jhumpa Lahiri, Jonathan Safran Foer, Jennifer Egan, Kyle Bobby Dunn are actually "from" Brooklyn, they were born and grew up somewhere else. That's 11 people out of a total of 18 in the list, or 61%. That's why I said it's not a list of people from Brooklyn. To encompass all the people on the list you would have to name the article something like: "List of people I (the creator of the list, and anyone who has added a name) associate with Brooklyn". It's a form of original research. Who's to say Andrea Zittel isn't a "California Artist" and not a "Brooklyn Artist"? I could make a good case: she was born in CA and lives there now. If you change the name of the article to "from", all the people I listed have to be removed. Vrac (talk) 19:54, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

And what makes you think "from" can only mean the place where someone was born/grew up? Linguistically, the word is not limited to "original point of origin", and the WP community has consistently used "from" both in lists and in categories to encompass residency at birth, at retirement, or any time in between, for many, many years now. I myself have previously advocated "associated with" as a better phrasing (and indeed started at least a couple lists under that title), but custom and numbers have been overwhelmingly against it, as can be seen in the contents of Category:Lists of people by city in the United States or Category:People by state in the United States. So, again, nothing would "have to be removed". Indeed the practice for someone like Zittel would be to list her in both "artists from California" and "artists from Brooklyn", and note the long-stable inclusion criteria given at Category:Artists from California. Note that we've moved away from phrasing it as "Brooklyn artists" or "California artists" to avoid drawing just the distinction you're trying to insist upon (see this CFD, for example). postdlf (talk) 22:42, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

If you think someone who wasn't born in, didn't grow up in, and doesn't currently live or work in Brooklyn qualifies to be on this list then there isn't much point in continuing this conversation. Vrac (talk) 23:23, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep per WP:NOTDUP relative to Category:Artists from Brooklyn. "It is neither improper nor uncommon to simultaneously have a category, a list, and a navigation template which all cover the same topic. These redundant systems of organizing information are considered to be complementary, not inappropriately duplicative. Furthermore, arguing that a category duplicates a list (or vice versa) at a deletion discussion is not a valid reason for deletion and should be avoided." I recommend renaming the article to List of artists based in Brooklyn. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 00:42, 2 July 2015 (UTC) Another option is naming the article List of artists from Brooklyn as per above. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 15:40, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Wikipedia is not an WP:INDISCRIMINATE collection of information Snuggums (talk / edits) 20:45, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • And discussion isn't a collection of WP:VAGUEWAVEs. Can you explain why you think WP:INDISCRIMINATE applies here? postdlf (talk) 22:42, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
    • It is an indiscriminate list because there isn't really anything notable by itself about artists being from Brooklyn Snuggums (talk / edits) 23:12, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
      • @SNUGGUMS: Actually, artists from Brooklyn is a notable topic. The list satisfies WP:LISTPEOPLE, WP:NLIST and WP:LISTN. The article qualifies per the latter because the overall topic of Brooklyn artists has been discussed as as a group or set by independent reliable sources. See source examples below. ^[1], ^[2], ^[3], ^[4], ^[5]. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 23:29, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• It's a bizarre interpretation to consider "indiscriminate" the equivalent of "non-notable". And regardless of whether such a grouping satisfies WP:LISTN (as North America argues well above), it satisfies WP:LISTPURP as an index of WP articles on people subdivided by place and occupation. Such lists are standard, and so long as the classification is not unusual, there need not be anything notable about the organizing fact (whatever that even means; notability pertains to topics, not facts), whether it's being an artist from Brooklyn, dying in 2015, or being an alumni of Brigham Young University. postdlf (talk) 01:23, 3 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete it's an WP:INDISCRIMINATE list of people mere connected by a common? geographical workplace?/residence?/birthplace? Also "Brooklyn Artists" (with capital A) suggests a particular group or organization. But the list is an array of "Brooklyn artists" (with lower case a). Kraxler (talk) 18:28, 9 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • The list can and should be renamed to list of artists from Brooklyn, so that problem is easily fixable. I don't understand your first comment, unless you're just generally against lists of people by place (whether or not further subcategorized by occupation), which is too common in both our list and category systems (and a practice that is routinely endorsed in deletion discussions) for us to tolerate arbitrarily knocking out one instance on a completely abstract complaint. Do you have an argument specific to this list and its corresponding category? postdlf (talk) 19:20, 9 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

It's bizarre to badger !voters when 5 of them agree that it's an indiscriminate array of unconnected items. Lists are very useful if they have a purpose. Just to list something for the sake of listing it (like here), is not helpful. There is already Category:Artists from Brooklyn, with much more entries, which serves the same purpose. To throw into one bag everybody who once in his life painted, sang, scupted, wrote, õr made any other kind of art, and was born, resided, worked, passed by or just once set foot in Brooklyn, is ludicrous. Kraxler (talk) 14:45, 10 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The five !voters are all making arguments that are contrary to guidelines and practice in this area, and that seem to just show a lack of very basic familiarity with lists and categories of this kind. The connection is career and place. It's well established that's sufficient. And it's not reasonable to consider it ludicrous in list form but not in category form because it's the same information either way, just in different presentation formats. That's the whole point of WP:CLN. postdlf (talk) 15:22, 10 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it's much more reasonable to create a list of People from Earth, the connection is career and place, it's well established and I'm sure I could produce some refs who talk about people from Earth. I suggest you change from admin-weight-pushing mode to common-sense mode. The already mentioned 5 !voters disagree with your interpretation of the guidelines. Period. Kraxler (talk) 16:11, 10 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"People from Earth" is called Lists of people, or Category:People. And your argument (an irrelevant hypothetical that is not specific to place or occupation) is called a straw man. The problem with the 5 !voters is not that they disagree with my interpretation of the guidelines and policies, but that their comments merely contradict the guidelines and policies without explaining why they should not apply here, or without even acknowledging the guidelines exist. Everyone who says this classification is fine as a category cannot per WP:CLN simultaneously claim that it somehow isn't as a list, and WP:NOTDUP within that same guideline says you can't delete a list because you think that the "function is met" just by the category. And everyone whose criticism focuses on the current state of the list is not presenting a valid argument for deletion per policy at WP:PRESERVE and WP:ATD. That's not my personal interpretation, that's plain language. postdlf (talk) 16:37, 10 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

No, it's your personal interpretation. For comparison: There is Category:Members of the New York State Assembly but there is not List of Members of the New York State Assembly. Why? Because the list would contain thousands of names from different centuries without any encyclopedic info, or a duplication and repetition of the same info which is elsewhere (in the articles with lists on any one legislature, and the persons' bios) presented in context, see WP:INDISCRIMINATE "To provide encyclopedic value, data should be put in context with explanations referenced to independent sources.". That's plain language. Also check out Wikipedia:Discriminate vs indiscriminate information#What exactly is an "indiscriminate collection of information" ? and tell me why Andrea Zittel is a "Brooklyn artist". Kraxler (talk) 14:51, 12 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

You keep throwing out examples of hypothetical lists that would be overly general and have a lot of members, and so like subcategorization would be better converted into lists of lists with the content handled by sublists. Which is a bizarrely off-the-mark point to keep trying to make (and also smacks of WP:OTHERSTUFFDOESNTEXIST), because this list is a rather specific sublist, far narrower than List of people from Brooklyn, which does exist. So I don't understand at all what argument you're trying for there (and this list could also be converted into a list of lists such as List of sculptors from Brooklyn or List of 20th-century artists from Brooklyn, if you had an argument that this list was too large...which you don't). Nor is a list of articles "data"; INDISCRIMINATE even links to data so there should be no confusion as to what is meant (see instead the intro sentences to WP:NOTDIR, and do try to read WP:CLN and WP:LISTPURP and demonstrate you understand the guidelines that actually apply here), and in any event even if it were necessary (which it is not), every list of articles is capable of being annotated to summarize their relationship to the list and why they are notable. So again we have a complaint that ignores the list's potential for expansion and development, and so provides no support for deletion. And though (as you should know) that AFD is not for resolving disputes about particular article content, Zittel's article clearly states that she began her significant work in Brooklyn, so there is no question that a) she's an artist and b) she once lived in Brooklyn and even practiced as an artist there. So her inclusion in this list is completely verifiable and consistent with how we treat lists of occupation and place across the board. postdlf (talk) 15:15, 12 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

This list is a real example of being overly general and it would have a lot of members, ten thousands, if anybody cared to complete it: All entries in Category:People from Brooklyn who once in their lifetime touched a piece of art, all artists on Earth who ever set foot in Brooklyn (thank God the NYC airports are located in Queens, lest any artist who changed planes or just stopped at JFK or LGA would be included here), all artists on Earth who were born in Brooklyn, any artist on Earth who ever talked about Brooklyn, and anybody else who would qualify on the flimsiest grounds; because the list entries are presented out of context, contrary to WP:INDISCRIMINATE. Guidelines are guidelines, and they should serve a purpose. Kraxler (talk) 15:41, 12 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete This looks like an attempt to listify Category:Artists from Brooklyn but it is incomplete. I think it is more appropriate as a category than a list in the state that it is currently in. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 20:38, 9 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • That's contra WP:CLN, and more important, contra WP:PRESERVE. Deleting it certainly won't help it become complete, and we do not delete content based on its current state rather than its potential. postdlf (talk) 21:21, 9 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep and rename to List of artists from Brooklyn.

  Wikipedia:Notability#Stand-alone lists says, "Notability guidelines apply to the inclusion of stand-alone lists and tables." Northamerica1000 (talk · contribs) has shown with several sources that "List of artists from Brooklyn" is a notable topic.

  I also agree with postdlf (talk · contribs) that several of the "delete" votes advance arguments that conflict with the guideline Wikipedia:Categories, lists, and navigation templates#Overlapping categories, lists and navigation templates are not considered duplicative, which says:

  It is neither improper nor uncommon to simultaneously have a category, a list, and a navigation template which all cover the same topic. These redundant systems of organizing information are considered to be complementary, not inappropriately duplicative. Furthermore, arguing that a category duplicates a list (or vice versa) at a deletion discussion is not a valid reason for deletion and should be avoided.

  Another argument for deletion is WP:INDISCRIMINATE, which has four bullet points: (1) Summary-only descriptions of works, (2) Lyrics databases, (3) Excessive listings of statistics, and (4) Exhaustive logs of software updates. None of these bullet points can be applied to "List of artists from Brooklyn".

  Cunard (talk) 18:12, 12 July 2015 (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.