Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cyber-utopianism


 * 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. L Faraone  22:37, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Cyber-utopianism

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No real evidence this is notable, or that the several mentions of this term refer to the same idea. Appears to be more of an obvious pairing of words that has no one distinct reference. Hairhorn (talk) 02:38, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Also redundant to Technological utopianism. Hairhorn (talk) 16:32, 19 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete No evidence that these two words point to a definite, notable topic. Steve Dufour (talk) 07:02, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete Appears to be made up be a single author Millermk90 (talk) 07:45, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Weak Delete There are enough mentions of this term in reliable sources to see that this is a real idea that might reach notability standards at some point. However, for a new neologism we need to see extensive discussions of the term itself, rather than just brief mentions, in reliable sources, so at this point I would lean to delete. Nwlaw63 (talk) 18:10, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Philosophy-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 01:56, 11 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete per nom. A few people coming up with a clever syllogism does not make it a subject. --Legis (talk - contribs) 07:48, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep We're not talking about some kind of bullshit neologism that someone made up: cyber-utopianism as a view is widely discussed in the academic literature. Google Books gives me 38,000 results. The views of the opponents of cyber-utopianism are widespread now, but to understand the critiques of Nick Carr, Andrew Keen, Evgeny Morozov etc. you need to understand the cyber-utopianism of Wired (magazine), John Perry Barlow, Kevin Kelly, Ray Kurzweil, Howard Rheingold, the futurists and their admiration for the transhumanist/cryogenics movements etc. These topics haven't just magically popped out of thin air, there is a long history, and many hundreds of sources that show this. The article claims that the term was conjured up by Morozov: this is not true. Morozov attacked the concept, but the term itself has a much longer history, as you can see by doing a search on Google Books where there are books using the same term for roughly the same cluster of ideas going back to the late 1990s. See, for instance,, , , . —Tom Morris (talk) 10:19, 16 December 2011 (UTC)
 * No one is arguing that the term has never been used before, so stacking up examples is beside the point. I don't see any real sign that everyone using the term has the same thing in mind. The second reference, for example, throws around loosely defined neologisms pretty freely ("digital divide", "digital capitalism", etc), all in the same sentence as "cyber utopianism" (without a hyphen). Wired/Kurzweil et at. are already covered at Technological utopianism. Hairhorn (talk) 07:01, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
 * You think "digital divide" is a neologism too? There are books on that topic going back to 1995. It's as much of a neologism as "World Wide Web"! The policy on neologisms isn't that they are banned on Wikipedia, it's that creating a Wikipedia article in order to boost a neologism isn't allowed. That said, if there's an existing article on digital utopianism, why not redirect and merge? —Tom Morris (talk) 09:27, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I'd be content with a redirect to Technological utopianism, but I don't see much content worth merging. Hairhorn (talk) 16:01, 19 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, v/r - TP 03:39, 19 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep and expand. Books and Scholars find a variety of writers using the term in a wide variety of contexts.  Certainly the underlying idea is familiar; the world is flooded with hogwash about how the Internet or social media will bring down tyrants, unite the world, or at least make us money.  It seems to me to be a concept that can be described from sources. - Smerdis of Tlön - killing the human spirit since 2003! 16:05, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

"Keep" and "Expand": The topic certainly is viable. The word is instrumental in defining the "theory" that wherever there is internet, democracy follows. I am currently a student at Farmingdale State College, completing a course titled, " Mass Media and Politics. The term was extremely important in understanding technology's relationship to "positive" political change. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.41.60.167 (talk) 04:55, 22 December 2011 (UTC)
 * And the difference between this and Technological utopianism is?... Hairhorn (talk) 18:35, 22 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   08:13, 27 December 2011 (UTC)


 * 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.