Talk:2008 Universal Studios fire

Patti Smyth
The article links to Patti Smyth but there is no artist by that name. I can see the error comes from the NYT article. Is it Patty Smyth or Patti Smith? -Lopifalko (talk) 06:33, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
 * It's Patty Smyth. Patti Smith recorded for Arista, which Sony owns. Patty Smyth's second album came out on MCA, which is a Universal label and could have been affected. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 14:52, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

Artists without articles
I was curious if anyone had noticed if there were artists on Rosen's list that did not have Wikipedia articles. Chubbles (talk) 14:26, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Per FoxyGrandpa75 (h/t), here are the remaining artists without articles:
 * Jimmy Anderson (musician) ,
 * Don Bennett (musician) (discussed at length in the original Rosen article)
 * Colours (band) ,
 * Beverly Jenkins (musician) - now redirects to her husband, and honestly I can't find anything to substantiate that she should have her own article
 * Vega Brothers/The Vega Brothers - ,
 * Whycliffe/Donovan Whycliffe - ,

I may try to write one or more of these if I can find enough. Chubbles (talk) 01:56, 1 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Technically The Trapp Family Singers do not have a page, even though all the individual von Trapps do, and there's a whole template devoted to them. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 03:07, 2 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Here's a few more I found while adding the whole list to the page:

I'm not sure if any of the artists without articles need one or not, just listing for completion's sake. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 14:25, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Don Everly - Who, quite surprisingly, does not have a separate page from The Everly Brothers. Added to the list in the article.
 * The Gospelaires - No article. Group once included Dionne Warwick, and evolved into The Sweet Inspirations after lineup changes.
 * Vicky Hamilton - Has a page for now, but it's up for deletion, with a possible redirect to her partner Dave Mackay being the result.
 * Matthews Southern Comfort - Redirects to frontman Iain Matthews' page.
 * Rick Nelson & the Stone Canyon Band - Covered by the Ricky Nelson page. Don't see a reason to make a separate one.
 * Pepples - No article. Could be a typo of Perri "Pebbles" Reid, who recorded for MCA.
 * The Pinetoppers - No article. R&B band led by Johnny Jenkins, best known for once featuring Otis Redding in its lineup.
 * Bill Plummer - No article. Isn't the baseball player.
 * Leroy Pullins - Redirects to "I'm a Nut", his only hit.
 * The Ray Charles Singers - Redirects to a section of the Ray Charles page. Added to the list in the article.
 * The Rover Boys. No article. Mentioned in a section of the page of the same-named book series. Seems to be an obscure one-hit wonder.
 * Gary Saracho. No article. Impulse! Records artist.

Shouldn't this article be added to a music WikiProject (and rated Mid or High importance for it?)
I guess the recently assessed Low importance ratings for the WikiProjects this article is currently a part of make sense, but shouldn't this article now be added to the appropriate music project as well? I would expect it to rate at least Mid importance in that context, if not High, given how much musical history was lost in this fire. --Dan Harkless (talk) 01:48, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
 * It does seem this way. The question is which one. Daniel Case (talk) 02:44, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
 * My best guess for one that would fit would be the American music one. Shame there's no music history WikiProject, that would have been the ideal fit. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 05:18, 9 July 2019 (UTC)


 * I see the article is now part of WikiProject American music; thanks to whoever added it. I'm surprised to see it's been assessed as Low-importance within that project, though.  --Dan Harkless (talk) 23:05, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Full list
The list of artists affected in this article is now over 500; there are some 700 named in Rosen's full list. Is there any reason not to fill this out with the full list? Chubbles (talk) 02:45, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Not at all at this point, especially with how many names are there now. My initial concern was that a complete list could be mistaken for a copyright violation later on, but I don't think that's going to happen. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 05:16, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
 * It's an alphabetically ordered list of names - there's no creativity involved in the ordering, so I don't think copyright will be an issue. Chubbles (talk) 06:17, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Slowly adding them all now. Had to stop before G tonight, but I'll add the rest tomorrow if someone else doesn't get to them first. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 04:19, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Whole list has now been added to the page. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 14:27, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
 * The "show list" button isn't present; what's going on?--Electricmaster (talk) 22:25, 4 May 2021 (UTC)
 * , it's there for me - on the right-hand side, it says "[show]". Not sure why it doesn't appear for you - maybe try asking on the WP:HELPDESK? Popcornfud (talk) 23:01, 4 May 2021 (UTC)

Title
Shouldn't this be "2008 Universal Studios fire"? I mean, maybe LA locals call it "Universal" for short, but to the rest of the world - and I stress there is a rest of the world - the word "universal" means: pertaining to the universe. --  Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  18:49, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
 * , although we might want to wait until after its DYK date is set, as it would require renaming the nom as well and that can be tricky IME. Daniel Case (talk) 19:00, 10 July 2019 (UTC)


 * What's the for? (Template:1 didn't help).  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  03:50, 14 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Same thing the +1 button is for ... indicating agreement. Daniel Case (talk) 06:06, 14 July 2019 (UTC)


 * I wasn't aware of that button (my tentacles into the cyber world only go so far ...), so thanks. --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  06:51, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

The rationale is rather obnoxiously presumptuous about why the article was named as it was; the rest of the world does not capitalize Universal in colloquial usage. But I nevertheless support the renaming, as it more closely mirrors the name of the corporation. Chubbles (talk) 02:00, 15 July 2019 (UTC)


 * The title can also refer to the several NBCUniversal properties who are directly connected to the events in this article all at once. Not only did the fire happen at Universal Studios Hollywood, but it occurred in a building that housed Universal Music Group recordings. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 03:22, 16 July 2019 (UTC)


 * I see that the article has been renamed from 2008 Universal fire to 2008 Universal Studios fire, but the Talk page content wasn't brought along (I guess because the new name previously existed as a redirect?). Not sure what the usual procedure is in such situations — does someone just manually cut & paste the content over to the new Talk page?  --Dan Harkless (talk) 23:20, 5 August 2019 (UTC)


 * My guess is that someone forgot to check the box when they made the move. I suspect a history merge may be be necessary because the other talk page now has plenty of discussions on it. Daniel Case (talk) 03:48, 6 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the pointer on how to request such a merge. I've added:
 * to Talk:2008 Universal Studios fire. --Dan Harkless (talk) 04:46, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * to Talk:2008 Universal Studios fire. --Dan Harkless (talk) 04:46, 6 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for taking care of that. Note to anyone looking for the discussion previously at this URL from June 2008: you can now find it at Talk:2008 Universal Studios fire/Archive 1.
 * P.S. The weird bolding and dehyperlinking of what are now self-links in my posts above is apparently a standard thing the MediaWiki software does – that's not in the markup. --Dan Harkless (talk) 01:11, 7 August 2019 (UTC)


 * In my experience, WIkipedia has always done that where a page includes a link to itself. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 05:01, 7 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Ah, I see – thanks. I guess all the self-links I've run across have been via redirects, in which case the bolding and delinking doesn't occur.  But now I see how the bolding of the current page's name in topic navigation footer boxes works; I'd always assumed that was somehow special-cased.  --Dan Harkless (talk) 07:06, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

Why do we need the year? Have there been other Universal Studios fires? The current title suggests so. Surtsicna (talk) 09:05, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Per the guideline page for titling articles about this sort of thing: "Industrial accidents and incidents should generally be titled according to the year, the location and a description of what occurred." Daniel Case (talk) 16:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks! Weirdly enough, that guideline contradicts a policy, namely WP:PRECISION. In this case 2008 Universal Studios fire is too precise (see the policy). Also see WP:CONCISE. To me, the present title indicates that there have been other fires from which this one needs to be distinguished. Surtsicna (talk) 16:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, my understanding is first, that if it is desired to make a specific exception for a particular topic or subtopic of articles from that general policy, it is done where consensus allows it. (If this bothers you, I suppose, you could open a discussion over at WT:NC) I also commend to your attention the logic that carried the day in a discussion which did end with the contrary result over at Talk:Schoharie limousine crash (scroll down to where it starts). The argument for including the year in that article's title was that, for transportation disasters where the vehicle or trip being taken does not have some sort of unique identifier like a name or flight number, a year helps readers remember what the article is about even if it is not necessary for disambiguation. However, for that article those of us who opposed the year in the title carried the day since limousine crashes with two-digit death tolls are rather unusual and don't require a year to jog the memory (bus crashes, on the other hand, did). Here, since fires at warehouses are actually rather common, I can support using the year. Daniel Case (talk) 17:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The intro list
Re the recent edits to the list included in the intro and discussion about whether we should have it: I think summary style here dictates that we not name any artists, perhaps instead just giving a rough count. I could see naming a specific artist if, say, all or nearly all of their masters were found to have been lost Hah! Love that twist of phrasing! , but as noted, as is, it is an open invite to add everybody's favorite affected band. Daniel Case (talk) 17:27, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I think there is some utility in naming a few very significant artists as it makes the scale of the incident easier to grasp. Examples make abstract ideas concrete. But I'm also completely cool with removing the list and you make a good case, so if you wanna go and do that, I'm down with that. Popcornduff (talk) 17:38, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I feel like listing artists in the lead, no matter the situation, is passively promotional. 100cellsman (talk) 19:34, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Also a fair concern. Shall we just rip it out? Popcornduff (talk) 05:29, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm also having second thoughts about it as well. That article link to the best selling artists doesn't list labels in accordance to artists. 100cellsman (talk) 08:12, 8 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Sales are a poor metric of the cultural impact of an artist, particularly in the post-record store era. I deleted the demand that the list not be changed, and added Eric B. and Rakim because that's where I linked from (also, why not?). I don't think it's wrong to have a list per se -- mentioning anyone or anything on WP could be considered promotional, which is why we rely on context -- but if the list is to be curated on the basis of sales alone, it will be wholly inadequate. If anyone differs on this, please explain how Smash Mouth is more culturally relevant than Eric B. and Rakim, using something other than album sales to prove your hypothesis. Should be easily done if true, right? 174.115.100.93 (talk) 15:50, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The list was explicitly a list of bestselling artists. No one said anything about cultural impact.
 * As Daniel Case predicted, it seems this list remains a magnet for people to add their favorite bands, so I've removed it in its entirety. Popcornduff (talk) 15:58, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I figured that was bound to happen eventually. That short introductory list, or something like it, worked when there were fewer known artists who may have lost tapes but it doesn't anymore. I tried to include best-selling artists as a limiter and it just didn't work. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 15:38, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

This sentence is nonsense
As of 6:14pm EST Sept 15, 2019 the article contains this sentence: QUOTE: On August 28, 2019, Universal ordered Soundgarden to back out of the lawsuit, but the surviving band members declined. UNQUOTE I mean, Wikipedia, who in God's name do you have reviewing your stuff before it goes live? I'm NOT an attorney. I have NO specialized knowledge. I just read a newspaper or watch a YouTube from CNN or NBCNews every now and then. But even someone who is as ignorant as I am knows that Defendant does not get to order a Plaintiff to back out of a lawsuit. A JUDGE might "order" it (i.e. dismiss), but when YOU get sued YOU are not in a position to order Plaintiff to so much as blink. How does someone NOT know that? Why does Wikipedia let this drivel get into print? And the source cited doesn't back up the contention that Universal had binding authority under law to issue such an order.74.64.104.99 (talk) 22:18, 15 September 2019 (UTC)Christopher L. Simpson
 * I think we compounded an error in the source, which reads in relevant part: "The company ordered Soundgarden to be dropped from the lawsuit and asked the judge to dismiss the suit in full." You are correct that defendants can't exactly "order" this; this is yet another demonstration of the pitfalls of letting people who don't totally understand how court proceedings work write about court proceedings. Or at least the late Frank Zappa's observation that rock journalism is people who can't write interviewing people who can't talk for people who can't read . It would be nice if we could find another source on this, and indeed Rolling Stone reports it more plausibly, first referring us to Variety's story that broke this, which reports that Universal claims it has documentary proof that Soundgarden and the other bands were notified about the lost masters within days of the fire, instead of letting the band learn about it through the Times Magazine article as the band claimed. It quotes the studio's attorney at some length:
 * "In a declaration, Scott Edelman, an attorney for UMG, wrote: "I informed Plaintiffs' counsel that UMG had discovered written correspondence with Soundgarden belying Plaintiffs' allegation that to this day, UMG has failed to inform Plaintiffs whether any of their Master Recordings had been destroyed in the fire. Specifically, I noted that UMG expressly told Soundgarden over four years ago that UMG had lost in the fire two compiled album master 1⁄2 analog reels of one Soundgarden album 'Badmotorfinger' but that UMG was still able to issue a remastered release of this album with Soundgarden's knowledge and participation, using a digital audio tape safety copy." The letter continues, "I further explained to Pla UMG currently has 1301 assets in its vault related to Soundgarden and that only 21 assets were impacted by the fire, none of which were multitrack masters. "I have previously written you as to why you should immediately drop the other plaintiffs besides Soundgarden," he concludes, "because UMG's investigation has confirmed that no original master recordings embodying their performances were lost in the fire. You should immediately drop Soundgarden as a plaintiff as well. As shown in the attached emails, they and their representatives have known since May 2015, at the latest, that UMG lost Soundgarden-related assets in the fire. That you would accuse UMG of fraud for failing to inform Soundgarden of loss from the fire shines a bright light on your failure to conduct pre-suit diligence in your rush to be the first to file.""


 * According to Rolling Stone, Edelman (rather presumptuously IMO) asked that Soundgarden "immediately dismiss their case against UMG within 24 hours." (I get this weird idea that Mr. Edelman is an associate). The band's lawyer responds appropriately:
 * ""Gibson Dunn may be the biggest law firm in the world, but they are not the judge," he tells Rolling Stone. "Their arbitrary deadlines have zero force or effect. Until UMG reveals what it collected for their litigation claims to extensive damage to master recordings, we cannot accept their belated claim that no damages were actually suffered.""


 * It sounds as if there has already been some heavy words between Edelman and Howard King (Soundgarden's lawyer), and the next time the two sides have a status conference or something, both their firms will have to send extra lawyers not only for the billable hours but to keep the two of them from dropping their briefcases and punching each other out (If, as the old joke goes, people don't win people fights, lawyers do, then who wins lawyer fights? )). Anyhow, I suggest that at the very least we amend this sentence to substitute "demanded" for "ordered" and replace the Spin article with the Rolling Stone and Variety articles as cited sources. Thank you, Mr. Simpson, for bringing this to our attention. Daniel Case (talk) 19:57, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Nat King Cole
What about Nat King Cole?

Nat King Cole recorded for Decca for a short time as a member of "Eddie Cole's Solid Swingers". In 1973, there was a two record album released by MCA Records called "Nat King Cole: From The Very Beginning". Can it be that Universal Music doesn't know anything about these particular recordings if they were lost in the 2008 fire? Eddie Cole also happens to be Nat's brother. Does anyone even know about these particular recordings if they were destroyed in the 2008 fire? Thanks in advance for any answers. Frschoonover (talk) 23:02, 12 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Cole is not on the list of artists that was featured in the New York Times, therefore it's impossible to verify whether any of his recordings were affected. Furthermore, the article notes that it is impossible to know which of an artists' recordings were affected by the fire, even if they appear on the list. Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 23:44, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

"This is not AT ALL how we do things"
Greetings, Wikipedia User:Daniel Case!
 * 1) I noticed you undid the edits that consolidate details about the damage into a separate section called "Damage." Why? MOS:LEAD doesn't really pertain to that revert, as far as I can tell.
 * 2) "This is not AT ALL how we do things" seems rigid and inconsistent with WP:5P5 . In my humble opinion, it tends towards the top-down, command-and-control, autocratic school of thought which has a way of alienating people unnecesarily. I think the collegial approach works better. We're a team, eh? There's more than one way to get to the end of the trail.

Cordially, BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 23:08, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I apologize for being a little gruff; I should perhaps have cited MOS:INTRO instead:

"The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article ... Consideration should be given to creating interest in the article, but do not hint at startling facts without describing them." What you would have us lead with: "Universal Studios Hollywood, a film studio and theme park in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles County, California, suffered major damage in a three-alarm fire which broke out on June 1, 2008. The extent of the damage has been the subject of conflicting reports." is a little vague and short, no? The nut of this story is the potential loss of so many master tapes, some of which may have had considerable historic value. You'd never get that from your version—there's not even the hint at startling facts. Your intro reads, frankly, more like a writing-class exercise in trying to fit the article into as few words as possible, which has its uses in developing concision but is not what most other article leads read like, not when they've been developed to the extent this one has. Consider also what MOS:LEAD does say: "The lead is the first thing most people will read upon arriving at an article, and may be the only portion of the article that they read." For that reason I have always described the lead as "the executive summary of the article". Since the writer is generally limited to four grafs, I think we can err in that direction here. Certainly an abstract would also have more information than your intro does. Daniel Case (talk) 05:44, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Understood. Thanks for the feedback. Cordially, BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 12:43, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

Removing single-sentence mentions from musician biographies
I think we should remove single-sentence mentions in articles about musicians and other performers who were listed by Jody Rosen in the 2019 piece published by The New York Times Magazine. An example may be seen at the Jimmy Dorsey biography.

The problem with these single-sentence entries is that the list of artists published over two weeks by Jody Rosen was shown to be exaggerated. As an example, Joe Jackson was listed as having lost tapes but this was later contradicted by a UMG confirmation that his tapes were not destroyed. Nirvana, Smash Mouth, the Tragically Hip and Sheryl Crow stated that the listing was in error—they had not lost any tapes. Beck said some of his session tapes were lost but no master tapes.

The lawsuit by Steve Earle, Tupac Shakur, Tom Petty, Hole and Soundgarden was dismissed after most of the artists' master tapes were shown to exist. The huge list by Jody Rosen was proved to be an exaggeration.

We should continue to discuss the fire and tape damage for artists that responded to the issue, describing for the reader how they responded, citing later sources. We should always mention the fire in cases where multiple sources confirm that a recording was lost. Binksternet (talk) 16:06, 2 March 2023 (UTC)


 * I agree. I have never liked those sentences. They take information from the Rosen articles out of context. We have this passage in this article:

''"Two weeks later, Rosen wrote a follow-up article, listing at least 700 additional artists named in internal UMG documents as possibly affected. Determining which recordings had been destroyed, or how much of an artist's discography had been affected, was impossible, he wrote. For example, Rosen said it was difficult to confirm whether the Neil Young recordings listed in the documents were the original master tapes of the albums he recorded for Geffen Records in the 1980s, or session outtakes from those records." ''
 * Why add that sentence artist by artist when the actual source article has those qualifications to it? Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 16:34, 2 March 2023 (UTC)


 * I agree with this. The 2008 fire was a significant and important event, but that does not also follow that every artist who may or may not have had tapes damaged in said fire needs to have the fact noted in their article.  I've noticed this all over musician articles, and it has a WP:IINFO smell to it.  In general, I think most of these should be removed unless the damaged tapes are discussed in sources outside of the initial reporting about the fire itself; i.e. unrelated biographies of the artists discuss the loss of the masters etc.  The initial list by Rosen (even if it were entirely accurate) is insufficient to demonstrate that it is information significant enough to be mentioned in an artist's biography directly.  -- Jayron 32 16:35, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
 * The only sentences that should stay are those where there is added context, like the passage on The Carpenters. But I believe those are very few and far between. I also believe there was a cull of these sentences some time ago, and they no longer appear on several pages. How many are still on artist articles? Doc StrangeMailbox Logbook 16:41, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
 * This is a pretty good list; and it's less than I thought. -- Jayron 32 17:05, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
 * It was larger yesterday. I think it's about as small as it should be by now, after a bunch of pruning. Binksternet (talk) 17:49, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Oh heck yes. I've my own history on these. They were really awful in the first place ("On 25 June 2019 The New York Times Magazine listed Petula Clark among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire." My first impulse was to just remove "reportedly". Then I decided "who cares who listed it", and "who cares on what date it was reported", and reduced them to "Petula Clark was among hundreds of artists whose material was destroyed...". But really almost all of them didn't belong at all. The person who made all these entries was unwilling to fix his own mess. Glad you're doing so. --jpgordon&#x1d122;&#x1d106;&#x1D110;&#x1d107; 20:50, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Oh, then I removed a whole bunch of them; I missed a lot because they didn't match my regexes. --jpgordon&#x1d122;&#x1d106;&#x1D110;&#x1d107; 21:05, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

Warner Bros. Studios Fire
Recently, we got another studio fire is Warner Bros. Studios. I know it had nothing to do with Universal, but it's other news. Stephenfisher2001 (talk) 15:10, 2 July 2023 (UTC)


 * If it's notable, get together the sources and start an article on it. Daniel Case (talk) 18:45, 2 July 2023 (UTC)