Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of cultural references to Stephen King


 * 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 &mdash; it's clear that an article about Cultural influence of Stephen King would be a good one. This is not it. This is an unsourced list of trivia. Even the "keep" arguments acknowledge that this needs sourcing badly. I suggest that people arguing for retention work on fixing it up; articles can only persist under the "keep and cleanup" argument once or twice. --Haemo 05:01, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

List of cultural references to Stephen King

 * – (View AfD) (View log)

This is a cluttered trivial unsourced list of mentions. They don't show notability or any reason why they should exist here. There is a decent sized section on the Stephen King article already, which does a fine job explaining things. Stephen King is notable himself: but a list of everytime he is mentioned isn't notable. A prose is much better than a massive list that never ends. As a note: a prod was on the article: but because I was stalked, it was removed. RobJ1981 06:03, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * It was i who removed the prod tag, and I did it in patrolling prod. I patrol prod every day or two, as I have the chance, to rescue a few articles--& speedy those meriting it, such as G10s and copyvios which are there by inadvertence. I am obviously going to look at every cultural references and related article deletion by any process. Stalking would be if I followed around someone's unrelated articles that I wouldn't otherwise comment on. What I said in removing the prod, is that it would obviously be contested, and should better go to AfD. I should mention that following that, the ed above made 2 successive attempts to change the article to a redirect to King, and refused discussion of it. I do not know why this was done instead of just bringing it here, and seeing the consensus. But I'm glad it's here, for this is the proper place. I'll comment later on the merits. . DGG (talk) 09:26, 3 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Speedy Keep Seriously, what's the point of this? Rocket000 10:03, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep First of all, this list does need to be sourced. That is the main problem with it right now. Stephen King is notable, so an article that deals with the numerous culture references relating to him should be inherently notable. Next, quoting from WP:LIST, an informative list should be organized by theme. This particular list is separated into references from television, film, music, comics, games, and books. Additionally, it has a lead section that explains where the references are from. It is admittedly weak on criteria for inclusion and needs to be alphabetized, but that is not a reason for deletion. I am a little disconcerted by the fact that the nominator went straight to AFD as opposed to voicing his opinions on the talk page. This article needs to be improved, not deleted. -- Cyrus      Andiron   11:43, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I strongly contest the notion that King's notability is inherited by every time his name or one of his books or something that in the unsourced opinion of an editor might be a reference to him or one of his works. WP:LIST does not excuse lists from meeting all relevant policies and guidelines. The most-perfectly formatted list of, for instance, White Pages listings is still a directory and WP:LIST doesn't save it. This list fails WP:NOT, WP:NOT, WP:TRIVIA and WP:OR and WP:LIST doesn't save it. Otto4711 19:15, 4 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep, Even though it indeed requires referencing, articles like this are exactly the kind of thing Wikipedia excels in. You can either like that or not, but if we delete all the excellent articles on perhaps slightly trivial, but nonetheless interesting topics, not much will be left here to read. --Cpt. Morgan (Reinoutr) 12:24, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - given that you have copied and pasted this comment into multiple AFDs I have to question how much actual consideration you have given to this specific article. Otto4711 18:17, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Um, arn't you in the habit of launching large numbers of identikit afds? Artw 20:44, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * No, I'm in the habit of starting similar, but not word for word identical, AFDs for articles that are of similar poor quality after reviewing the articles and based on the content of the article. As opposed to copying and pasting comments based in generalities. Otto4711 23:14, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Hello! Please let's keep the discussion on the article and not each other.  Otto, I posted a friendly suggestion to your talk page.  Best, --  Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles  Tally-ho! 00:15, 4 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep, source, and I'd recommend a rename to "Cultural References to Stephen King." "List of ~" is sort of redundant in a case like this; it would also encourage expansion of the header section.  ◄   Zahakiel   ►  17:18, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Strong delete - directory of loosely-associated items, indiscriminate collection of information and massive trivia dump with a liberal dose of original research. This is an obsessive attempt to capture every time anything refers to King, or something that resembles King, or resembles something that was in King's work or simply says the words "Stephen King." It is not encyclopedic in the slightest that some fictional character or another said "Stephen King" in an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic book. "A guy said Stephen King on TV" is not a sound basis for an encyclopedia article. "A character said a line that was also in a Stephen King book so it must be a Stephen King reference" is not a sound basis for an encyclopedia article. Otto4711 18:11, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Merge If it's that important, put it back with the Stephen King article. I'd vote delete, but several editors feel strongly about preserving what looks to be a list of mentions, one-liners and parodies of the master of horror and his works.  I think he described this type of obsession in Misery.  Mandsford 20:55, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * At least one editor feels equally if not more strongly that this shouldn't be merged, since according to the talk page it was created expressly to keep this stuff out of the main article. However, creating bad articles to try to preserve good ones is a very poor reason for the article. Otto4711 23:14, 3 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete Just a page of glorified trivia. Yes, Stephen King is popular, that's why he has his own article, and most of his novels do as well.  I have the problem with all the keeps votes basically saying "he is popular, keep this page".  This is just trivia that has no place here, and here's a list of 200+ similar articles that have been deleted too.  Dannycali 22:16, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete As an indiscriminate, original research list, plain and simple. None of the dot points in the article is covered by in-depth secondary sources. This fails WP:ATRIV, WP:IINFO, and WP:OR horribly. Spellcast 23:32, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Strong keep, the article demonstrates the impressive influence of one of the leading writers of the past half century on culture. I agree with the suggestions above about renaming the article Cultural references to Stephen King and adding additional references.  If I have a chance in the next day or so, I'll do a reference search for the article, but in any event, there's no real reason to delete this one.  Best regards, --  Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles  Tally-ho! 00:04, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete- per usual list reasoning, per Dannycali, per Nom. Make a sub page on King's page...JJJ999 01:00, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep but for this article I cant say as much specific as usual--I certainly appreciate most of King's works, but I have almost no familiarity with the subsequent works here that refer to them. I assume they're notable, because they all have WP articles. I see they're relevant, since they have quotes supporting the relevance. Since such works usually have discussions and reviews, they're presumably sourcable. The general subject is certainly shown to be notable with sufficient RSs at the end, showing  independent notability. One thing I can't say here is ILIKEIT, because I don't particularly. No personal interest, but it seems that other people think his influence notable. so be it. I accept the consensus on that, rather than my own feelings that I couldn't care less about the subject matter. DGG (talk) 06:37, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, the things on the list that reference King or are claimed to reference his work are notable. But they are not notable because they reference King. No one, in thinking about Family Guy or The Tick or ABBA or Ultimate X-Men or Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star is going to think, "oh yes, I remember that show/comic/film, it had a Stephen King reference in it!" If this list were called what it actually is, List of things in which someone says 'Stephen King', even you might have some difficulty supporting it. But because it's dressed up in "popular culture studies clothing" and with your stated bias in favor of pop culture articles, you're for it. Otto4711 12:40, 4 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Comment. I agree with Otto, it seems like people see anything with the words "cultural references" or "pop culture" in the title and they instantly vote keep no matter what. Do you realize, the Stephen King article probably had a big list in the first place? This is just a moved section most likely. Why is it so hard to condense and put into prose form? Instead, people just move it to a new article, and it ends up in AFD: where it's kept (and for the most part: the article sits in the cluttered shape after the AFD is over). Perhaps people need to consider making a pop culture Wiki for this content. There is a good percent for these types of articles, so a pop culture wiki would solve these problems. Wikipedia shouldn't be a guide to every trivial mention, period. RobJ1981 19:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete per otto &rArr;    SWAT Jester    Denny Crane.  01:39, 8 October 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.