Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Math Girl

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. The one "keep" doesn't address the arguments for deletion.  Sandstein  20:25, 16 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Math Girl

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

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Poorly sourced article about a three-episode series of animated short films on YouTube, with no strong evidence of notability per WP:NFILM. Of the sources listed in the external links section, two are dead links (and one of those, further, was a university student newspaper that never counted toward WP:GNG even when live), one is a PDF of an article by one of the creators in their own employer's staff magazine (a primary source that cannot assist notability), and one is a glancing namecheck of the films' existence in an article that isn't about them. As always, something like this is not automatically entitled to a Wikipedia article just because it exists — it must either be shown to meet a specific criterion in NFILM, or at least be referenced to a lot more reliable source coverage of it than this. And for added bonus, the article was created by User:Vjungic — a transparent WP:COI if you check the names of the films' creators. Delete. Bearcat (talk) 19:23, 23 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment. I found a few hits for this: [1] from Inside Higher Education (trivial mention), [2] from Maclean's (another trivial mention), and [3] from The Globe and Mail, which is finally a bit more substantial. The problem is that I don't think one good source can really demonstrate notability. I'm curious what others think. Since it's an educational project from a math professor, I think it would be alright to be a little more lenient than usual. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 03:51, 24 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for finding the Globe and Mail source. Note that it contains two separate long passages about Math Girl, including in the second passage about how it was inspired by one diminutive female who reluctantly stood up to acknowledge that she was the one student in a large mathematics class to score 100% on an exam. In 2007, Youtube (created in 2005) was young. This educational innovation to produce a motivating cartoon and post it freely was a "high tech" approach, and in the article was celebrated along with a) "clickers" and b) the recording and posting of lecture videos, two then-new innovations that are now hugely important. Perhaps the educational world would be far better today if the art/skill of creating avatars/characters and generating new educational cartoons would have become as widespread, also. --doncram 04:54, 25 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment. Is "math girl" an example of a teaching avatar that one source is about? Rename/move to that more general topic. This is not commercial work for anyone's financial gain. It is okay/good/great for persons connected to a topic to contribute about it. See wp:coi. Try to work with this positively please. And I think I have heard of this, it may well be notable topic. doncram 04:00, 24 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Notability is always contingent upon the quality of reliable sourcing that can be provided to support the article — Wikipedia does not have any policy that educational or non-profit projects get a special exemption from our sourcing rules just because we respect or like their mission. And a COI is not "okay/good/great" — it's acceptable for people with a direct connection to the topic to make purely factual corrections to an article, but they're not allowed per COI to (a) start the article themselves, (b) tilt it in an advertorial/PR direction, (c) make up their own special sourcing or notability standards for themselves that aren't compliant with our sourcing and notability standards. So a COI is forgivable, if the proper sourcing exists for us to repair the article with — but it's not "great", if the sourcing isn't improvable. And I don't appreciate the insinuation that nominating an article that isn't complying with our notability and sourcing rules, and can't be brought into accordance with those rules because the volume and quality of reliable sourcing just isn't there, is somehow not being "constructive" — my responsibility to be constructive attaches to Wikipedia, not to every individual person or organization or project that thinks of Wikipedia as a nifty little free PR platform. Bearcat (talk) 18:19, 24 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Let me say I appreciate the nom's good intentions, and also that I just revisited wp:COI and see that its text has hardened greatly relative to when I really learned/absorbed it. The AFD nomination may perhaps be in tune with relatively harsh attitude of current 2016 wording. However IMHO it is unduly harsh relative to wp:COI's September 24, 2007 wording when the article was started by editor Vjungic. Vjungic is presumably Veselin Jungic, who was then self-described as "a working mathematician", which does not sound inappropriately promotional to me. The COI standard then emphasized in its lede "Merely participating in or having professional expertise in a subject is not, by itself, a conflict of interest. < br > Editors who may have a conflict of interest are not barred from participating in articles and discussion of articles where they have a conflict of interest, but must be careful when editing in mainspace. Compliance with this guideline requires discussion of proposed edits on talk pages and avoiding controversial edits in mainspace." Also sourcing standards have changed since 2007. It seems unfair to insinuate in the nom that something nefarious was done ("And for added bonus, the article was created by User:Vjungic — a transparent WP:COI if you check the names of the films' creators.") The editor was in fact properly revealing of their connection to the topic by their username choice, IMHO. And there has never been any suggestion that the editor violated COI policy by imposing wording that was contentious in any way...indeed there is no criticism of the article ever suggested at its Talk page. Suggesting that the editor was mistreating Wikipedia as a "nifty little free PR platform" or that they "make up their own special sourcing and notability standards" is unnecessary, especially without providing any support for the implication that the editor benefited financially or in any other way from the writing. I rather imagine the editor was honestly trying to contribute to development of knowledge, and that then the idea of "teaching avatars" was new and promising. So I am sorry that my comment causes some offense to the nominator in 2016, but I don't think the editor was wrong to contribute in 2007. If "teaching avatars" did not become much of a thing since 2007, and if Math Girl herself didn't get developed much since then, I concede it would be appropriate to criticize the article, but along the lines of tagging it and commenting at the Talk page that there's now some problem, hoping for a constructive rewrite or merger or something.

Commenting more broadly about AFD, not especially about this one, it dismays me to see the energy put into negativity/destruction relative to the passivity about searching for better alternatives. Such as when (not necessarily here, but very frequently) there could be a list-article started that would reasonably include the topic as a list-item. Dismissing and deleting all or substantially all of an editor's contributions is especially bad (not saying that is happening here, I didn't even check), when almost all of us started with contributions that don't look great to ourselves after many years. I personally would like to see a serious review of AFD and what it has done over time. --doncram 04:36, 25 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. Article was consistent with wp:COI standard when created. --doncram 02:24, 2 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The primary basis of my deletion rationale was not the COI — it was the article's total lack of sourceability to any substantive coverage in reliable sources, a condition which no article topic ever gets an exemption from having to meet under any circumstances. Bearcat (talk) 03:05, 3 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete at best for now as my searches found nothing better. SwisterTwister talk 05:06, 3 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete due to lack of notable sources.ZettaComposer (talk) 20:04, 8 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Fictional elements-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 21:00, 9 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Comics and animation-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 21:00, 9 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Mathematics-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 21:00, 9 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 21:00, 9 March 2016 (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.