Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Happy Meal toys (2nd nomination)


 * 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. Clearly, we are all in agreement that happy meals and happy meal toys are notable subjects. Arguments about this article, the list, weigh strongly in favor of deletion. Mango juice talk 18:46, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

List of Happy Meal toys
AfDs for this article: 
 * – (View AfD) (View log)

This list seems to have no use other than to collectors, making it fancruft/Listcruft. It is uncited. It is probably impossible to complete. It appears that little or nothing has improved since its previous AFD 6 months ago where even the people who had "week keep", and even "keep" suggested the page should start including actual article content on the toys, which hasn't happened, and looks unlikely to happen. The only existing sources are an unreliable Geocities page which has no references itself, and a collector's personal site which also has no references. TheHYPO (talk) 06:46, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete - this article has multiple redundancies (multiple entries for variations of the same toy line) as well as duplicates some of the information in the McDonald's advertising article. A simple list of McD's promotional partners on the ads page is more than enough for Wikipedia. - Jeremy (Jerem43 (talk) 08:09, 19 November 2007 (UTC))
 * This AfD nomination was incomplete. It is listed now. DumbBOT (talk) 17:12, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Crap - sorry, my bad - I missed that step in all the confusion learning how to 2nd-nom TheHYPO (talk) 00:02, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete per nom. RMHED (talk) 17:32, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep - as I noted the first time around, sources exist for this article, for instance McDonald's Happy Meal Toys Around the World: 1995-Present and McDonald Happy Meal Toys from the Eighties. The fact that no one has yet sourced the article doesn't mean that it fails WP:N. "Multiple redundancies" is an argument for cleanup, not deletion. Otto4711 (talk) 19:43, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Here's a source that discusses toy production in sweatshops. Otto4711 (talk) 19:48, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment: As mentioned in the first AFD, I think that the sources show that Happy Meal toys would be notable as the topic of an article (it's a subsection of Happy Meal right now), but I personally think that a book about happy meal toys does not make a list of releases notable - particularly since so few of the elements in the list (if any) will be, themselves, notable to anyone other than collectors. It's like having and article on XUniversity - there may be a section on student life or the student body or even articles/books about that - but a list of students at XU would not be notable. And so fan, in 6 months, noone has taken any steps to actually create an article with any encyclopedic content TheHYPO (talk) 00:08, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete- per nom Astrotrain (talk) 21:20, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - there has been no valid deletion rationale offered in the nomination. Nominator cites two non-binding essays, the use of which in AFDs is controversial. Other concerns raised by the nominator call for editing and research, not deletion.Otto4711 (talk) 03:42, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * There was a call for editing and research 6 months ago and none has occured (after 2 years of the article's existance as well). I thought wikipedia policy was not only to keep bad articles around if there was hope for improvement. Noone seems interested in researching and adding any actual article content to this to make it a notable topic. Right now, the suggestion is that a list of toys released is not notable information; even if the overall concept of a "Happy Meal toy" is notable, a listing of them is frivolous. As for official policy and guidelines, I didn't link to them, but the nomination clearly implies the guidelines. WP:Lists notes that there are 3 purposes of lists. This list is clearly not intended for navigation or development, so it could only fall under "information", which cites "The list may be a valuable information source." It is the proposition of the nomination that a list of happy meal toys is not "valuable information" (which I interpret as relating to wp:notability. I also don't have policy on this, but if there is a published happy meal toy catalogue out there, it seems to me that someone either has to get it, copy out the entire guide (for completeness) and cite the guide, or else just link to the book as a citation or external reading on an actual article Happy Meal or Happy Meal toys, which is an article, and not a list. Finally, I would suggest that 6 months not improving suggestions from the last AFD and 2 years of article history should also suggest that noone will ever source the article to get it up to wp:verifiability standards. Combined with the relatively useless trivial of the information to anyone but collectors, and the fact that right now almost anyone could add toys and dates and they would be very difficult to challenge, and the fact that the list is 90% 2000-present, and considering the toys have almost 20 years (I believe? There is no information to tell me in the articles) of history, and the article's 2 year existance suggests that the list will likely never cover even half of the actual existing items that should be in the list. TheHYPO (talk) 04:45, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia does not have due dates and the fact that reliable sources exist shows that there is hope for improvement. Nor is there any requirement that a list be complete for it to exist. An incomplete list, also known as a dynamic list, is acceptable Wikipedia content even if the list is likely never to be complete. Otto4711 (talk) 06:43, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep Crazy as it may sound, the "Happy Meal" (and most other "kids meals")is notable.  Notwithstanding all the social consequences that came with the concept of giving a toy to a child as a part of eating lunch, the toys are also representative of what's been popular in the last 25 years.  Sometimes, the toys are as a reflection of what kids liked, and sometimes a reflection of what the restaurant chain attempted to make kids like.  I can't agree with the idea that this is merely a "checklist for collectors".  Mandsford (talk) 00:56, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment: The subject of the article is not "Happy Meal". It is not "Happy Meal Toys". It is "List of Happy Meal toys". I would not oppose an article explaining what happy meal toys are, and their significance, influence and history. I do oppose a list of every minor release of them in the past 30 years. None of the specific toys themselves are notable, and a list of them is unimportant trivia. Star Wars may be a notable franchise, but "List of theaters that played Star Wars" is trivial, even though it relates to the topic. As to your comment that the list reflects what has been popular in the last 25 years, your other comment negates it - The toys are usually tied to a promotion of an upcoming film or release, which means they are an attempt to improve the populatity of a franchise, and don't necessarily reflect what is already popular. So this is a list of "things McDonald's wanted kids to like"? There are lots of Happy Meal toys for films that turned out to be duds, for example. The list is also alphabetical, making an analysis of what was popular in the past very difficult - if this were the intention, the list should be chronological. The alphabetical nature seems to imply checklistedness. TheHYPO (talk) 04:45, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep There seems to be an agreement (or at least, no signficant argument that the subject of Happy Meals merits an article). Fine.  Logically, it seems to me that folks would want to know what toys have been released as part of the Happy Meals.  I would certainly include such in the main article, except, well, it would be rather long.  Thus this sub-artile.  If you wish to make this list better by making it Chronological, that is a reasonable course of action.  I would support doing so.  68.101.22.132 (talk) 09:16, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per Mandsford and Otto4711 and because the article already passed an AfD this year. Plus, the toys are what make Happy Meals notable.  Considering the incredible influence of McDonald's around the world, such a recognizable aspect of McDonald's is surely encyclopedic enough for us.  Best, --  Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles  Tally-ho! 17:03, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Note to closing admin. Consensus can change, so articles can be nominated more than once. This user knows this already (yet still uses it any chance he can in 2nd nominations). RobJ1981 (talk) 07:49, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * and I think every admin at WP knows this too, without needing to remind them.  DGG (talk) 04:57, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Suggestion: Would people support the compromised solution that the article be moved to Happy Meal toys, and the not list template be included on the top to encourage actual information on the notability and importance of Happy Meal toys? I know the premise is that articles should not have massive lists in them, but as of right now there is no Happy Meal toys article; so if there was a one or two paragraph explaination preceding this list, I don't think the list would be getting in the way as if the article were several sections long. Once the article (if ever) is built to a respectable length, the list could be spun off back to its own article. But I think that if people claim this topic is notable, we should encourage creation of some actual actual article content which explains why the notability of the topic of this list. TheHYPO (talk) 17:18, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I would be perfectly fine with this and in fact this is pretty much what I've been suggesting, using this list as the basis for an article on the topic. Or in the alternative start a separate article at Happy Meal toys and keep this as a sub-article. Otto4711 (talk) 18:18, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Strong Delete It doesn't matter if the article survived a AFD before, this is a unmaintainable list. We can't just list every toy that every burger stand makes. The toys can be part of section on the subjects of what the toys were made of, this is seriously uneeded. DBZROCKS   Its over 9000!!!  20:41, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom. 22:11, 21 November 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bearian'sBooties (talk • contribs)
 * Delete listcruft. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 07:37, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete as per all of the above. Greg Jones II 15:15, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep It's understandable why people want to delete this, but you can't deny its notability. I think it's just the subject matter that makes people tend to think less of it. Oh well. Rocket000 (talk) 07:55, 25 November 2007 (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.