Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fritz Pflaum Hut


 * 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.  Sandstein  09:20, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

Fritz Pflaum Hut

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Article fails to establish notability of the subject. I tagged this for a lack of notability in May 2012 and nothing was done to establish notability. There are now three references in the article but these do not establish notability. The main reference is a guidebook describing "over 100 walks and multi-day treks" in Austria. The other two provide "hotel guide" type entries to various huts, only a small handful of which seem independently notable. None of the sources provide the "significant" coverage required by WP:GNG. A search for other sources that might go to establishing notability comes up with sites that are generally blogs, other self-published sources, and travel guides. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 11:17, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Oppose i.e. Keep. The Fritz Pflaum Hut is an important base for mountaineering and hiking in the Kaiser Mountains. Whilst the article is a work in progress and should be further expanded, its basic notability has been established by the internationally recognised Alpine Clubs of Germany and Austria (not "hotel guides" as mis-stated above) as well as a hikers and climbers guide to the Austrian Alps (not a "travel guide" although inclusion in a guide is surely an indicator of notability). As the creator of several thousand Wikipedia articles, my sense is that the nom is demanding a higher level of notability than Wikipedia normally requires for this type of article. Regrettably, he has also refused to engage in discussion on the article talk page, has not given opportunity for a third opinion and, having twice reverted my edits to remove the notability hatnote after adding references, has jumped straight to a deletion request to avoid the "three reverts" rule. If this deletion request is accepted, all Alpine hut articles in Europe will no doubt follow as most of them have already been notability tagged by the nom. --Bermicourt (talk) 12:05, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
 * A claim to notability has to be established, and that hasn't happened. Whether the sources are "hotel guides" or a "hikers and climbers guide", they're still "guides" that list other huts equally. Note that I didn't say they were hotel guides, I said "hotel guide" type, which is still the case. Claiming that I haven't engaged in discussion on the talk page is a misrepresentation. I opened a discussion on your talk page to discuss the process we use for establishing notability, not only for this article, but for all articles, which you don't seem to accept. And yes, this AfD is likely to affect all of the other hut articles that fail to establish notability. Unfortunately, there are many of them.
 * "inclusion in a guide is surely an indicator of notability" - No it isn't. Otherwise every hotel, motel and person with a telephone would be notable. Notability is not inherited. The guide might be notable, but that doesn't mean the individual entries are notable. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 12:35, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Well that's your view and others differ, hence the number of articles. What we really need to do is work together to improve, expand and reference them. Bermicourt (talk) 13:03, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
 * It's a view that has been upheld at numerous AfDs. I suggest you read WP:NOTINHERITED. As you are well aware, you've previously discussed the notability requirements on my talk page, over two years ago, and yet there has been no attempt to address the problems, other than to remove the notability tags. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 13:50, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Be careful not to mislead. You've avoided discussion on the talk page which is where issues are meant to be resolved. And "no attempt to address the problems" is slightly undermined by the fact that references have, in fact, been added and there is a willingness to add more. --Bermicourt (talk) 14:18, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
 * As I've already explained above, I opened a discussion on your talk page because the problems exist at multiple pages where you keep removing notability tags despite pages not establishing notability.
 * "is slightly undermined by the fact that references have, in fact, been added" - Yes, three years after the tags were added and two years after you asked how to resolve the problems. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 14:33, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Oppose. In addition to the reasons cited above by Bermicourt, the article's notability is supported by WP:GEOFEAT. Bede735 (talk) 13:48, 6 December 2015 (UTC)
 * GEOFEAT does not say that all buildings are notable. It says that buildings can be notable, but that they require significant coverage by reliable, third-party sources to establish notability. This is the basic problem with this article and Bermicourt's reasons do not address the lack of sources. GEOFEAT, in fact, supports the arguments that I have provided on his talk page and here. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 14:23, 6 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Austria-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 20:50, 6 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Oppose. I do think AussieLegend does us a service by raising questions about notability about articles relating to the Alps which are potentially of questionable significance. It makes us think about what we are doing. As a newcomer to joining the Mountains of the Alps project, I have been surprised - almost shocked - by how brief many of the articles are, yet there are so many stubs that are very clearly notable, and probably a few longer ones - like this one - that are somewhat less certain. Sadly many have remained that way for quite some time, but the European Alps is a big place with a lot of notable features within it, and few Wikipedians signed up to help out. Work does not need to be done to create new stubs, but enhance existing articles, and I note the talk page discussion on that very point was agreed to by Bermicourt in 2013 on AussieLegend talk page, but was rather curtly responded to.
 * I don't believe that a quick look around Google should be the basis of asserting lack of notability, but I applaud AussieLegend for raising the concerns. I would offer the following observations:


 * There are at least six printed and commercially available guidebooks to the Wilder Kaiser/Kaisergebirge mountain range. (See bottom of this page). I don't have access to these, but I would hope that AussieLegend does, and that's why he thinks he is correct in suggesting this article relates to some non-notable mountain hotel, of which there are many in the area, and none have articles on them. If he hasn't checked the literature, but only looked at Google, he cannot assert the hut is not notable. I think it is. From my experience of other parts of the Alps, the climbing guides we use are not available online, but the high mountain bases described within them clearly form a key and notable element to all current mountaineering and historic mountain exploration within those ranges, and I would tend to view most of them as notable within the context of our project, including this particular high level refuge.
 * The Fritz Pflaum refuge is clearly not one of the many low altitude tourist hotels in the range, as has been implied. The Austrian online map portal shows it is remote and, indeed, the highest mountain refuge in its range, and therefore would have been inextricably linked with mountaineering achievements of exploration of notable summits in that range.
 * I don't accept that WP:GEOFEAT support's AussieLegend's view at all, but neither does it provide clear justification for every alpine restaurant marked on the map from the valley to the summit to be notable. I think it gives us a guide, and it steers me towards notability, especially when all the other points I am raising here are taken into account.
 * There are numerous adjacent mountaineering/rock climbing routes published from the Fritz Pflaum Hut.
 * That the Fritz Pflaum hut is a high, remote mountain refuge in a prominent and significant position within a cultural feature - a nationally designated and IUCN recognised nature reserve.
 * Alternatively, by taking the reverse view, one could argue that the Fritz Pflaum hut and others like it could be regarded as part of the local mountain community. I don't like this approach myself, but if it were taken, I would be obliged to quote from WP:LOCAL that:Editors will generally not object to articles about places of local interest that are sufficiently long (not a stub), contain appropriate information (e.g. several of the ideas for information to include above), and are reasonably well-referenced. Such articles can be kept as separate articles, even if they weren't created in accordance with the above suggestions.
 * The Fritz Pflaum moutain hut is a recognised and properly mapped feature which, whilst not being sufficient justification in itself for meeting WP:GEOFEAT, gives it verifiability, and the fact that it is the highest and most remote mountain refuge which has stood for 103 years within a notable mountain range leads me towards accepting notability.
 * The mountain refuge has a corresponding page on German wikipedia, which has not received a proposal for deletion.
 * There are some 40Mb of online documentation regarding the 100 year history of the Fritz Pflaum Refuge, including an account of Pflaum's Jewish background, how the hut had its name changed during the Anschluss, and on Pflaum's climbing achievements and his subsequent death when he fell through a crevassse on an ascent of the Monch and died of his injuries a few days later. It would be good to see some of this content incorporated into the article under consideration for deletion.
 * Accepting this proposal for deletion because it has taken some time for further enhancements to be made does, in AussieLegend's expressed view, give him or others a rationale for taking the same approach on similar high mountain refuges articles. I find this to be of concern, and not a position I would wish to accept.
 * I would normally wish to chastise anyone (who I sometimes light-heartedly refer to as a 'Wikipedia Nazi') if they rush to propose deletion of an article or suite of articles, especially if they have little knowledge of the subject area and no access to the relevant literature (and not just to Google), and especially if they've not given the article editors time to enhance it, or raised concern on a talk page. I don't think the former has been done at all here, but the latter most certainly was - on Bermicourt's talk page, anyway, although not the article's. That said, the proposer should refer to WP:NOEFFORT which does not provide any justification for deletion just because some time has gone by and they have now become frustrated. Recent changes have clearly now been made, and I hope the links I've included here may assist others in adding a few more.

All the above points now having been said, my clear conclusion, as I stated at the outset, is to Oppose. Parkywiki (talk) 12:32, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't accept that WP:GEOFEAT support's AussieLegend's view at all - My view is that WP:GNG requires significant coverage by reliable, third-party sources to establish notability. Bermicourt seems to disagree, believe almost that a single source is all that is required. this is not significant coverage. WP:GEOFEAT specifically says They require significant coverage by reliable, third-party sources to establish notability, which clearly does support my view, since my view is that of WP:GNG.
 * I note the talk page discussion on that very point was agreed to by Bermicourt in 2013 on AussieLegend talk page, but was rather curtly responded to. - It only appears to be a curt response because Bermicourt failed to discuss further or request further guidance. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 13:51, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Actually you are misrepresenting my position. I have never said that a single source is sufficient for notability (although WP:GNG implies that it may be in some situations). And your explanation of your response is not logical: your response wouldn't have become less curt if I'd responded to it. Actually I gave up because I could see you were not prepared to discuss these articles open-mindedly or work towards a consensus. As this latest episode has proven. Bermicourt (talk) 14:02, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Indeed you haven's said that a single source is all that is needed. You don't seem to believe references are necessary at all, given the number of unreferenced article from which you have removed the notability tag. I have always been willing to discuss these articles but when I have responded, you disappear. You don't need me to help you improve the articles. You seem quite content to create the articles, but not to reference them or even convert their infoboxes from German, which I had to do for you. I shouldn't have to chase you to get a response. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 14:25, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Some other issues:
 * There are at least six printed and commercially available guidebooks - Generally, guidebooks do not go towards establishing notability unless they provide the "signifcant" coverage required by WP:GNG, or WP:GEOFEAT
 * the high mountain bases described within them clearly form a key and notable element to all current mountaineering and historic mountain exploration within those ranges - Notability is not inherited. The history of exploration might be notable, but that doesn't mean the hut is notable. Notability has to be established separately.
 * the fact that it is the highest and most remote mountain refuge which has stood for 103 years within a notable mountain range - Again, notability is not inherited and age does not demonstrate notability. I have a fossil in front of me that is 290 million years old. It's not notable either.
 * the Fritz Pflaum hut is a high, remote mountain refuge in a prominent and significant position within a cultural feature - The cultural feature might be notable but, again, notability is not inherited.
 * The mountain refuge has a corresponding page on German wikipedia, which has not received a proposal for deletion - WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS.
 * the 100 year history of the Fritz Pflaum Refuge, including an account of Pflaum's Jewish background - I note that there is no article for Fritz Pflaum here or at the German Wikipedia. That would seem to indicate a lack of notability.
 * I appreciate your arguments but the article still does not seem notable. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 17:36, 7 December 2015 (UTC)


 * OPPOSE and STRONG KEEP Clearly a notable and noted structure and an important waypoint for climbers. Given its high perch and relative inaccessibility, the amount of coverage is telling.  Moreover, there was no compliance with WP:Before.  7&amp;6=thirteen (☎) 13:53, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Your assertion that there was no WP:Before is completely incorrect. I have been watching this and similar articles since 2012, when I first created Infobox hut and have been trying to get notability established since then. However, attempts to notify editors of the requirement to establish notability by tagging the articles with notability has been thwarted by User:Bermicourt who persistently removes notability tags, apparently for no other reason than he doesn't understand WP:GNG. Over the past 3 1/2 years I have attempted to establish notability myself, but establishing notability of a hut in Germany or Austria from Australia has proven almost impossible. As stated in the nomination, a search for other sources that might go to establishing notability comes up with sites that are generally blogs, other self-published sources, and travel guides. The travel guides include online and offline sources. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 1:25 am, Today (UTC+11)
 * Given the nature of the subject matter, what is wrong with travel guides as a WP:RS. You think maybe this should be written up in a scholarly journal?  7&amp;6=thirteen (☎) 17:41, 7 December 2015 (UTC)
 * No, of course it doesn't need to be in a scholarly journal. That's a silly suggestion. Per WP:GNG and WP:GEOFEAT the subject must receive "significant" coverage in sources independent of the subject. That means more than a casual mention. A travel guide dealing specifically with the hut would qualify as a reliable source. A travel guide dealing with 100 other huts would not. The travel guides that I've seen fall into the latter category. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 09:46, 8 December 2015 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, ansh 666 03:41, 13 December 2015 (UTC) Apparently we are "relisting" because you don't like the result. This is just a serial relisting, i.e., a process in search of the desired result. 7&amp;6=thirteen (☎) 03:56, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Clearly, since I haven't commented on the discussion and I obviously have no stake on either side in the matter... ansh 666 05:01, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
 * It's common practice to relist xfDs that haven't had a lot of traffic. We aim to get a wide input to these discussions, and not just restrict it to people who have a vested interest in keeping or deleting articles. User:7&amp;6=thirteen, I suggest that you be more civil in your communication with other editors, and not attack people for following process. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 06:51, 13 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete (I have never seen people use "oppose" before, usually the votes are either "keep" or "delete"). I've had a look over the article's sources, and while they seem to verify that this hut exists, they do not convince me that it is in fact notable by Wikipedia's standards.  I am especially surprised that a claim of notability is being made for the hut before an article has even been written for the person for whom it is purportedly named (which seems backwards at best).  If this structure were notable, it would be discussed (not merely mentioned) in multiple reliable sources (in any language)— arguments about it being the "highest" such hut, etc., aside, this does not seem to be the case.  07:11, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Architecture-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 00:21, 14 December 2015 (UTC)
 * <small class="delsort-notice">Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sports-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 00:21, 14 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Keep . Further references have been added and the article's notability is now established by 5 books, the Alpine Journal and the official websites of the German and Austrian Alpine Clubs. Almost every sentence is now referenced. We could add still more, but that begins to look like overkill. I hope that helps. Bermicourt (talk) 20:01, 15 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Please note, you can only vote once. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 7:33 pm, Yesterday (UTC+11)


 * Attention. In view of the recent major improvement to this articles' references, it would be make sense if the editor(s) who have voted "delete" could confirm their vote or update it to "keep" if they see fit. Bermicourt (talk) 19:04, 16 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Keep I gave ten or more detailed and reasoned bullet points (with sources) which, taken collectively, supports this article as being notable and relevant to the Mountains of the Alps in a previous discussion just a couple of weeks ago. I was then surprised to find the discussion about it spilling over onto my own Talk Page. I offered both opposing viewpoints a reasonable way forward. I see little evidence that AussieLegend has looked at relevant mountain guidebooks from the area, and find this discussion both disruptive and unhelpful to efforts by the Alps Task force to enhance article quality.Parkywiki (talk) 01:43, 17 December 2015 (UTC)
 * I have indeed looked at some guidebooks, most recently as Monday. I still find notability lacking because of the depth of coverage provided to the hut. Please also note that, as I had to remind Bermicourt, you can only vote once. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 01:48, 17 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete for lack of significant coverage and failure to state a claim of notability. Individual buildings are not inherently notable simply because they are verifiable. WP:GEOFEAT Parkywiki said: I don't believe that a quick look around Google should be the basis of asserting lack of notability. That is precisely why so many Wikipedia editors spend a great deal of time checking sources and providing accessible citations before producing even a stub article. It is very difficult to prove a negative (such as lack of notability); it is far easier to prove notability by providing citations to multiple independent, reliable sources that provide substantial coverage of a topic.  While the text is likely accurate in this regard, self-published works like Kühntopf's Juden, Juden, Juden are not generally considered to be reliable sources. The reliable sources mentioned, like guidebooks (which generally are highly reliable about realia, less so about history and folklore), do not have substantial coverage.  In fact it is hard to imagine substantial coverage about most alpine huts, and they are probably better dealt with in articles about specific mountains, or ranges.  A few alpine huts may have achieved historical importance.  There is no evidence that this is one.  Maybe your team of alpinist editors should rethink having a bunch of quasi-notable stubs about huts, and instead include the relevant information in comprehensive mountain and range articles. --Bejnar (talk) 03:17, 18 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Comment These are no ordinary individual buildings. In each case they are the only one for miles around and are used by hundreds of climbers and hikers in order to access remote parts of the Alps. Perhaps the fact they are referred to as "huts" is a problem? After all a hut in English is normally nothing more than a shack. But in this case it's a translation of the German word Hütte which, here, is invariable a substantial stone building, marked on topographic maps, signed on the ground and listed in numerous publications. I could add dozens more references but that would be overkill even by English Wiki standards. And BTW these are hardly stubs. Many are full articles and there is every chance of expanding the others. Bermicourt (talk) 22:47, 19 December 2015 (UTC)
 * That they are remote and/or used by a lot of people does not go to demonstrating notability. Nor does being listed in numerous publications. As I've alluded to elsewhere, hotels and motels visited by thousands of people every month are listed in multiple publications but that doesn't mean that they are notable. The word "hut" is not an issue here. Anything can be notable but that notability has to be demonstrated and that requires significant coverage in reliable sources. I haven't seen that coverage.
 * "I could add dozens more references" - You've been saying that for two years but so far, you've added only a handful. This article has only 3 references and they were only added in the past two weeks.
 * "but that would be overkill even by English Wiki standards" - At the moment the articles are suffering dramatic "underkill". If you've got these references, they need to be added to establish notability. Making claims without evidence does not help any of these articles. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 04:30, 20 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Keep Interesting topic, 100-year-old building built by community fund-sourcing, known to climbers who would come from long distances.  Sourcing found.  Fits well within the type of article that Wikipedia can produce that most encyclopedias would not have the resources to produce, which is probably the real reason for the continued debate after the initial objections were satisfied.  One Section in the article is without sourcing so should either be sourced or removed as per WP:V.  I note in passing that the AfD nomination skipped the parts of WP:BEFORE which consider links from other articles and versions of the topic on other language Wikipedias, and there is no discussion of any problems with the article on the talk page.  Unscintillating (talk) 01:04, 21 December 2015 (UTC)
 * "there is no discussion of any problems with the article on the talk page" - I note that your comments skip the parts of this discussion where I have mentioned that I have been discussing the notability requirements with Bermicourt for more than 2 years. As for your comments regarding WP:BEFORE, if you actually bother to look at the links in articles, as I did before I nominated, most of them don't actually deal with the hut itself, they are generally just guidebook style mentions. Clearly, the verifiability requirements on the other Wikipedias are not to the standard that we require here. Fritz-Pflaum-Hütte for example, contains no inline references, only 3 external links. It's existence therefore cannot be used to assert notability here. To claim that it does is pretty much the first example at WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. -- Aussie Legend  ( ✉ ) 07:12, 21 December 2015 (UTC)
 * You've bundled multiple points in the reply, but I'd like to follow up to the part where you mention that you've had previous discussions with Bermicourt about notability. He states on your most recent archive page, User_talk:AussieLegend/Archive_24, "I think you may be setting a bar for notability that is a little higher than Wikipedia demands..."  I can confirm this to be the case and can document at least partly why.  You've been using a dictionary definition for "significant", when this is a technical term defined by WP:GNG, that being, "Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention..."  Regards, Unscintillating (talk) 04:18, 22 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete - Clearly does not meet GNG, and has been pointed out, mere proof of existence doesn't meet GEO for a structure.  Onel 5969  <i style="color:blue">TT me</i> 12:42, 21 December 2015 (UTC)
 * You seem to be saying that you've looked at the sources. Did you get access to Kaisergebirge by Hofler et al?  Unscintillating (talk) 04:18, 22 December 2015 (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.