Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of most-followed Instagram accounts

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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. Reclosing as No Consensus per Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2017 December 22 -- RoySmith (talk) 00:08, 30 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

List of most-followed Instagram accounts

List of most-followed Instagram accounts (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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This page is far from a properly sourced encyclopedia article about the topic, with no evidence of significant coverage of the topic. This is a WP:ELNO-violating index of offlinks to numerous Instagram accounts, violating WP:NOTDIRECTORY. Wikipedia isn't a platform for hosting links to other websites' content. Links in a list article should be internal links to other Wikipedia articles, not offsite refspam links to other websites. ~Anachronist (talk) 23:05, 29 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Related discussions:

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 23:57, 29 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 23:57, 29 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. For starters, the number of people who follow any given Instagram account changes daily for any number of reasons: new followers adding it, old followers removing it, and on and so forth — so it's a characteristic that's in a state of constant flux and renders a list dynamically unmaintanable. Secondly, the references aren't reliable sources at all — with just one exception they're merely the primary source Instagram feeds themselves, and the exception is just a raw ranking aggregator and doesn't contain any content to analyze or explain why the rankings would matter. Which means that ranking people by the size of their social media following isn't a thing that reliable sources do — it amounts to original research that we're doing ourselves. Having more Instagram followers than somebody else does is not a comment on their relative worth or talent — Selena Gomez doesn't have more Instagram followers than Adele because she's a better singer or makes better music, she's just a bigger gossip magnet who plays the celebrity game more actively (basically, people are just hoping she'll post revenge porn of her ex-boyfriends' peckers.) And it doesn't even mean Selena has a bigger fan base than Adele does; Adele's sold more than 14 times as many records as Selena has, and the only difference is that more of Adele's fans are adults who have more important things to do with their time (like being the parents of Selena Gomez fans) than clcking the little hearts on Instagram posts all day. And when the single most widely followed account (with almost twice as many followers as the runner-up) on Instagram is, well, Instagram itself, that's not really telling you very much at all — people follow the host account because they want to keep up with the platform's news releases. Big fat hairy "Tom on Myspace" deal. Who over the age of 12 really gives two hoots about ranking people by the size of their social media followings? Bearcat (talk) 21:10, 30 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Which means that ranking people by the size of their social media following isn't a thing that reliable sources do You sure about that? Because I was easily able to find sources that do - including Reuters and People magazine (not just tabloids). Most of your argument seems to be a personal dislike that people are ranked by their media following - but that doesn't mean it should be deleted. Galobtter (pingó mió) 14:03, 4 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's also rounded to the nearest million so it wont change daily. Can shorten to top 25 and have "updated as of xyz". Galobtter (pingó mió) 05:00, 7 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Fewer words, but Bearcat put it all best (and much more hilariously), it's a fluid list that changes way too much for us to maintain (and yeah, Selena isn't going to post a picture of a certain Canadian ex's endowment or she'd no longer be on Instagram for a TOS violation). Nate • (chatter) 05:23, 1 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep – At 10'000 views a day,[1] this list is obviously of interest to many readers; and some of them, I suppose, are over 12. Evidently Bearcat is entitled not to ever lay eyes on this travesty of 21st-century culture again.[FBDB] The list itself is sourced, not OR, and it does not require much maintenance when you count followers in millions for a mere top 50 accounts. See also similar arguments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of most-followed Twitter accounts. — JFG talk 21:40, 1 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Page views isn't a valid reason to keep. This is a web directory masquerading as a list article, and the topic is not notable. Where is the subject discussed in any reliable sources? ~Anachronist (talk) 22:55, 1 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Definitely a good reason to keep. Subuey (talk) 02:47, 15 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete as the topic of most-followed Instagram accounts falls short of WP:LISTN. I also don't think viewer interest is or ought to be a factor here. Notability is about the potential to write an article about a given topic that complies with RS, OR, NPOV, and contains more than a few sentences; and the NOT requirements are about advancing Wikipedia's broader purpose. Also: WP:POPULARPAGE. Rebbing 23:32, 1 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete not an encyclopedic topic, a bunch of WP:RAWDATA that is primary-sourced. power~enwiki (π, ν) 00:11, 2 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Trivial directory based solely on primary sources. Hrodvarsson (talk) 00:36, 2 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep [2][3][4][5][6][7] documents the set in clearly reliable sources (reuters, people magazine, businessinsider) - from WP:LISTN one accepted reason why a list topic is considered notable is if it has been discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources and The entirety of the list does not need to be documented in sources for notability, only that the grouping or set in general has been.. Not sure whether the number listed should be trimmed to be easier to maintain (top 25?), but a list of at least the top 10 is clear from RS. Galobtter (pingó mió) 14:03, 4 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Some of those sources you list are clickbait, and some are rather trivial, but some are OK. I wouldn't object to keeping the article if it were trimmed to the top 10, because that's what seems to have coverage by two or more of the sources you list. ~Anachronist (talk) 17:08, 4 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep per Galobtter. PhilKnight (talk) 20:53, 6 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. Requires constant maintenance to remain accurate. If you want to do monthly snapshots, that could work, but not this format. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 22:13, 6 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Well that can always happen. This seems like a WP:SURMOUNTABLE problem. The list can be trimmed to top 25 or top 10 and then done monthly. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:36, 7 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: For further discussion

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Babymissfortune 23:42, 6 December 2017 (UTC) [reply]

Not sure how it's a LISTCRUFT violation - there's clear parent article - instagram. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:40, 7 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete. It may be worth mentioning the top ten in the Instagram article itself, but beyond that the concept is trivial. bd2412 T 22:04, 7 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. the information is appropriate, and the list is a summary of the information in the other articles. This sort of a list is much better separated from the parent article. DGG ( talk ) 00:17, 9 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Popular culture-related deletion discussions. J947 (c · m) 04:23, 12 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep as a major indicator of cultural notability, but add "as of" dates to headers, like with List of most popular websites. Note this one, a far more useful list, has been tagged for improvement since June and still has 7-8 month old rankings, so temper your expectations about how frequently the updates will be done. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 17:58, 13 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I just added the date to the column header. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 22:05, 15 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete: This article is a WP:BLP related article (look at all the names of living people) and I placed a BLP template on the talk page. I really should not have to go any farther -- but -- Please read from the policy page: "This page in a nutshell: Material about living persons added to any Wikipedia page must be written with the greatest care and attention to verifiability, neutrality, and avoidance of original research.", and from the lead: "This policy applies to any living person mentioned in a BLP, whether or not that person is the subject of the article, and to material about living persons in other articles and on other pages, including talk pages.". There is then the question of WP:notability. The article is well referenced, having 58 of them, but they are all from "Instagram" which are primary (a subsection of Wikipedia:No original research) which states: "Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them.". This leads us back to WP:BLPPRIMARY that states: "Where primary-source material has been discussed by a reliable secondary source, it may be acceptable to rely on it to augment the secondary source, subject to the restrictions of this policy, no original research, and the other sourcing policies.". Considering all this there is evidence the article should have been blanked because of BLP violations. The statement, that I have seen variants used several times, "...and the list is a summary of the information in the other articles"., does not give an exception to WP:policies and guidelines, and introduces concerns of original research and certainly synthesis. Maybe we should re-visit List of most-followed Twitter accounts (52 references with 99.98% primary), and other "List of most..." articles, with some of this in mind since BLP issues have apparently been overlooked Wikipedia-wide? -- Otr500 (talk) 02:50, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The top 10 can easily be sourced to RS - like reuters. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:06, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Normally I'd agree with regards to BLP, but here's the critical difference. This article is reporting what Instagram shows as the number of followers, and makes that clear from the sourcing. So, as long as you can verify that Instagram reports these numbers on their site, they are de facto verfied. To prove this, I picked #50 Vanessa Hudgens and went to her profile [[8]]. It matched the 27.5 million number (rounded up to 28). This topic is also notable, as seen by the media coverage including [[9]], [[10]] and many others. Big picture - social capital is today's currency. 27.5M followers as the #50 account on this list has shows more notability than an article in the NY Times, USA Today and Wall Street Journal, whose combined circulation is one third of Hudgens' followers. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 05:19, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Also, you quote Where primary-source material has been discussed by a reliable secondary source, it may be acceptable to rely on it to augment the secondary source - reliable secondary sources do discuss instagram followers, sourced from instagram. So we can use the instagram website. Galobtter (pingó mió) 05:39, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Seems like there's still room for discussion.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, ansh666 07:35, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • delete as always inaccurate. It doesn't matter that people are stupid enough to search us instead of Instagram. Mangoe (talk) 11:52, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Like many other lists..can just put "as of xyz".. Galobtter (pingó mió) 12:06, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Normally I am for keeping lists, as they can be useful reference tools for research. However a list of most followed accounts is impossible to keep up-to-date as the numbers of followers change daily. An alternative might be to create lists of most followed account in years past, e.g. 2016 - however that does beg the question of whether anyone today would look up The 1000 most popular pages on Myspace in the year 2005. Lists are useful but overuse should not degrade Wikipedia to a factoid-collection site. 13:07, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
The numbers posted are rounded to just be in the millions. That won't change very much. A sweep through every 6 months would be sufficient. Since the list is helpfully compiled at one of the cited pages, it's even easier to see how the relative rankings have changed to identify significant changes in the number of followers. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 17:03, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I'll also add that another article that I've put some time in, List of wealthiest families, is much more difficult to create and maintain, but that hasn't been a deterrent. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 19:52, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I posted a couple of articles above that address the subject of whether an Instagram following is notable. We have List of wealthiest families. It's not a big leap to make the jump that social following is a form of wealth, since it can be monetized. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 19:52, 14 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: "Some people" argue to keep articles that are blatant violations of a mandated BLP policy. WP:OTHERSTUFF is only a valid argument when these are allowed to remain by consensus not violating policies and guidelines. Having sources "out there" somewhere might be alright with some articles but we let one article after another creep in, usually a compilation of content thrown in which is WP:OR and we argue "keep" then on other like article because we now have "other stuff". I am not going to argue this type of content is not interesting. I am not going to argue that it is usually outdated shortly after being updated, because that does not seem to matter. I am going to argue that according to the BLP policy these types of "primary sourced" only BLP related articles are a direct violation of policy. It doesn't matter how much we like them, or how we skirt policy to allow them to remain, or that they survive a AFD by no consensus, they are not properly sourced BLP related articles and the whole lot should be examined for possible expunging. Just because we make it look good, without reliable sources to back up the title, it becomes a pile of WP:INDISCRIMINATE information under a false title, while we are throwing names of living people around like the mandated BLP policy is really just a suggestion. Properly source the articles, or remove them, is the only clear solution to stop degrading Wikipedia. Otr500 (talk) 10:35, 15 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I think the BLP argument against this article is tenuous. Where is the contentious material about living persons? I think WP:BLPSELFPUB is more relevant. These verified Instagram accounts are effectively self-published in the same way that an individual's own website would be. It is entirely appropriate to reference such sources in an article about those sources.--Pontificalibus (talk) 12:54, 15 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You are arguing that my BLP comments are weak, yet you point to a section of the same BLP policy, and #5 of the criteria for using self-published sources states "the article is not based primarily on such sources.". We are back to the fact that a BLP OR BLP related article should not be based primarily on such self-published primary sources and I seem to think that an article based on 99.98% of self-published primary sources fail #5. Secondary sources establish notability. By watering this requirement down we allow this type of article to exist, where even the title is original research, and then they expand and we get other predominately primary sourced articles like List of most-followed Twitter accounts, where all but two out of 52 references are primary self-published. How is this list article considered Wikipedia:Listcruft? The Meaning section, #11: The list's membership is volatile and requires a disproportionate amount of effort to keep up to date.. We attempt to solve the issue by rounding up a half a million so it won't need updating as often. Now we are just adding figures for the fun of it just to support social networking fancruft on Wikipedia. Otr500 (talk) 05:13, 18 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
It's not difficult to keep this up to date - the compilation source does the heavy lifting for us. Rounding the numbers is convenient because the exact numbers aren't important except in the event of a tie - it's the relative ranking and differences between numbers of followers on the list that is notable. There are plenty of sources substantiating this ranking as notable. Passes WP:GNG. TimTempleton (talk) (cont) 20:51, 19 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Actually there aren't even two sources substantiating this top 50 ranking as notable. Top 10, maybe. And whether or not it passes WP:GNG, it still fails WP:BLP. If the article is to be kept, it needs to be kept in a way that is compliant with all policies, not just cherry-picked ones. We don't get to pick and choose which policies we should comply with. ~Anachronist (talk) 00:24, 20 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Anachronist: How does this article fail BLP exactly? I sincerely do not understand where there may be a BLP policy violation. — JFG talk 09:10, 20 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@JFG: Did you not see WP:BLPSELFPUB point number 5? The vast majority of the citations are self-published sources. ~Anachronist (talk) 20:41, 20 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
We don't need all the listed Instagram accounts as sources. The secondary source (Socialblade) listing the top accounts is enough. — JFG talk 23:43, 20 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Comments: I am not for just listing google search result pages, because there are mirror sites, fan sites, and "less than reliable" sites that cloud the figures but on a WP:BEFORE I went three pages into search results. I found the one site used on the article (Socialblade) and one from birdsonganalytic that was current as of April 2017. That article shows Selena Gomez with 117 million followers which is far below the 131 million listed on socialblade so is outdated. We can try to argue GNG, and one source backed by 57 primary sources (that does violate policy), merge a smaller list (top 10) to the parent article discussing the reliability and current standings of statista, businessinsider, also covered by socialblade, but we have to watch out because other references like forbes was last updated with Selena Gomez at 103 million followers. techcrunch list top 25 (to try to list article standalone) and dailydot list top 30 (current)
I can find consistent top 10, that could be placed in the parent article, but looking to squeak in enough to satisfy WP:SAL I just can't find it without using one source, and that just does not justify a standalone list, certainly not when related to BLP's, because as stated above (about picking and choosing), even "SAL" mandates following content policies and notability criteria. We need multiple reliable sources to not degrade Wikipedia to a social media reporting site landing in the middle of what Wikipedia is not.
Just to mention the statement of passing GNG which includes: 1)- "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject", 2)- ""Sources" should be secondary sources, as those provide the most objective evidence of notability", 3)- "Multiple publications from the same author or organization are usually regarded as a single source for the purposes of establishing notability.", and 4)- "Independent of the subject" excludes works produced by the article's subject or someone affiliated with it. For example, advertising, press releases, autobiographies, and the subject's website are not considered independent. Now, for notability we have a one source list article. I am having a real hard time equating the above to passing GNG. Otr500 (talk) 07:30, 20 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Did you not see the sources I listed above? There's a 20 day old reuters article with 130 million as the number. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:13, 20 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
And a dang fine reference it is for the top five people on a list of 50. I have actually, even though it might not seem so, been trying to find reliable sources to give justification for a list of 25 or a list of 20 (see above). A list of 10 or 15 could be used on the parent page. I would have thought **someone** would have addressed some issues ---shhh!! it is allowed. Instead, I am reading comments steadfastly proclaiming it is a perfectly good list-class article, breaking no rules, and that all the policies and guidelines listed that it does break are acceptable because people like it, ---and--- that it is not hard to update from the one, single, solitary source other than primary, as long as the principle "updater" is alive, healthy, and has internet access.
As stated above (way up there), WAIT! by you, that maybe the list can be shortened. It can be reliably sourced to the top 10 but there is absolutely no reason to have a stubby stand-alone list of the "10 most followed Instagram accounts". A list like that can be presented in a section on the parent article and nobody will question some added primary references to an article with 289 other references. Otr500 (talk) 00:05, 21 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
There's absolutely no space for it in the main instagram article. Also Where primary-source material has been discussed by a reliable secondary source, it may be acceptable to rely on it to augment the secondary source, subject to the restrictions of this policy, no original research, and the other sourcing policies. It doesn't say has to be in the article. I don't see the problem with the primary references. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:59, 21 December 2017 (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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