Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of selfie-related injuries and deaths (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 no consensus. Sorry, can not envision any other outcome. Good arguments from both sides, roughly the same number of keep and delete votes.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:41, 26 June 2016 (UTC)

List of selfie-related injuries and deaths
AfDs for this article: 
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This page lacks notability. It lacks depth of coverage (many articles are clickbait, short lists of gore, etc), it lacks diversity of sources (the main sources mirror one another, they cite this article). Sources for this article are yellow journalism. Verifiability is damaged when one article sources two articles, one of which uses different data and one of which uses no data. One 'article' links to a study claiming it shows men are twice as likely to take recreational risks "even when it comes to selfies". The study says nothing about selfies. There is also a question of 'duration of coverage' much of blogging and churnalism focuses on one or two viral phenomena. One source is a content generator promoting a content tracker, it's advertising made to look like a valid source. The comparison to similar lists rings false. Relating a death to a shark is fundamentally different than relating it to a selfie. A selfie doesn't have valid studies connecting it to death in the way that HIV, LGBT-related suicides, and motorcycle deaths have. It's closer to a list of injuries and deaths with eyes closed, or in the presence of a potential mate, or with less than 8 hours sleep. Fiachaire (talk) 15:07, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. Fiachaire (talk) 15:07, 15 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete a total WP:COATRACK of non-notable news stories. The only positive is that there are some really dumb people who are no longer in the gene pool.  Lugnuts  Dick Laurent is dead 17:48, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Keep Claims are well-sourced. Whether there are scientific studies is irrelevant. It's still notable due to all the coverage. Whether or not you like the coverage is irrelevant. Smartyllama (talk) 18:50, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions. North America1000 21:43, 15 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep – The topic passes WP:LISTN, having "been discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources." For source examples, start with the the previous AfD discussion. The list is also a valuable information source, as per WP:LISTPURP. North America1000 21:44, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete Most of this seems to be a collection of news; valid content is at Selfie. "Selfie-related injuries and deaths" may be a suitable topic for an encyclopedia, but this list is not. Peter James (talk) 22:24, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Keep per the significant coverage in multiple independent reliable sources.    The article notes: "Seconds or minutes after these people took these shots they were dead - including a vet who accidentally shot himself and a bride-to-be taking an in-car shot involved in crash"  Here are the selfie-related injuries and deaths listed in the article:"a 21-year-old woman in Moscow accidentally shot herself in the head in May while taking a selfie while holding a pistol. She suffered head injuries but survived"</li><li>"In January, two young men blew themselves up in the Urals while taking a selfie holding a hand grenade with the pin pulled out. The cell phone with the selfie survived as a record."</li><li>"In May, a teenager in the Ryazan region died while attempting to take a selfie as he climbed on a railway bridge and accidentally came into contact with live wires."</li></ol></li> <li> Here are the selfie-related injuries and deaths listed in the article:<ol><li>"Last April, inspired by a trend of Russian youths climbing tall structures to take selfies at the top, a Saint Petersburg teenager died when she fell on railroad tracks.</li><li>"Another young woman fell to her death taking a selfie on a bridge this past weekend,"</li><li>"and a Moscow woman accidentally shot herself in the head while posing with a gun in May."</li><li>"Earlier this year, a civilian plane crashed in Colorado, killing the pilot and his passenger, when the pilot lost control of the plane while taking selfies."</li><li>"Another man was electrocuted to death in Spain when he attempted to climb atop a parked train to take a photo with friends."</li><li>"In 2014, a viral video of a man getting kicked in the head by the conductor of a moving train while shooting a video of himself attracted over 37 million views on YouTube. He was unhurt, but three college students from India attempting a similar stunt weren't so lucky."</li></ol>The article notes: "The list of accidents under thrill-seeking circumstances goes on and on – and that's not even counting the accidents caused by people snapping photos of themselves while driving."</li> <li> The article notes: "The shocking incident comes amid a spike in deaths resulting from selfie-related negligence. Indeed, this is not even the first example of a death resulting from a posed photograph with a loaded weapon. According to Priceonomics, there have been four deaths related to guns and selfies in the past two years alone. ... In recent tragic examples, a 20-year-old student fell to his death at a luxury hotel in New York while trying to get a photo from a high position, a Japanese tourist died after falling while taking a selfie at India's Taj Mahal monument and a teenager in Texas killed himself while posing with a loaded weapon."</li> <li></li> <li> Here are the selfie-related injuries and deaths listed in the article:<ol><li>"Last month, 18-year-old Tarannum Ansari and her two friends fell into the sea while snapping selfies near the Bandra Fort. ... Ansari's body was never found."</li><li>"In Chennai, 16-year-old student Dinesh Kumar was run over on January 31 when he tried to take a selfie in front of a speeding train."</li><li>"Just two days after Kumar's death, a woman fell off a train while taking a selfie. She survived after fellow passengers stopped the train with an emergency button and rescued her." </li><li>"Earlier this month, in Maharashtra state's Nashik, an 18-year-old student drowned in a dam while taking a selfie and his friend who jumped into the water to save him died too."</li><li>"In March last year, seven teenagers drowned in a lake in Nagpur when they stood up for a selfie and flipped their boat."</li></ol></li> <li> <ol><li>"Earlier this month, an 18-year-old student on a class picnic lost his balance while taking a selfie atop a rock by a dam near the central Indian city of Nashik. He fell into the water and drowned, along with a classmate who jumped in to try and save him."</li><li>"Last month, an 18-year-old woman fell and drowned in the sea while taking a photo of herself at Mumbai’s Bandstand Fort, a popular tourist spot. Two of her friends had to be rescued by a passerby."</li><li>"An engineering student sustained fatal head injuries when a rock on which he was standing cracked and sent him tumbling. He’d been trying to take a photo with friends in front of the Kolli Hills in Tamil Nadu."</li><li>"In January 2014, three students aged 20 to 22 died when they stopped to take a photo with a speeding train approaching, and were hit."</li></ol></li> <li> The article notes: "Here are six examples of selfie-related deaths." It provides examples from Lebanon, India, Russia, Spain, and Washington State.</li> </ol>There is sufficient coverage in reliable sources to allow the subject to pass Notability, which requires "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject". Cunard (talk) 04:33, 16 June 2016 (UTC)</li></ul>
 * The subject also passes Notability, which says, "One accepted reason why a list topic is considered notable is if it has been discussed as a group or set by independent reliable sources, per the above guidelines; notable list topics are appropriate for a stand-alone list." Cunard (talk) 04:33, 16 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Pinging Articles for deletion/List of selfie-related injuries and deaths participants who have not commented here:, , , , , , , , , and . Cunard (talk) 04:33, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Keep In the very list there is links to reliable sources where the phenomena/topic is discussed as a whole as well as the links to the individual instances of it happening. There is no requirement that it meet some scientific standard of proof. This is also the first time I've heard of the The Christian Science Monitor, a 108 year old multiple Pulitzer prize winning newspaper referred to as yellow journalism. This is article deletion, not article cleanup. If you have a problem with individual citations edit the article.--Savonneux (talk) 05:24, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Point taken and discussed below. Thought you might get a kick out of this: "The term was coined in the mid-1890s to characterize the sensational journalism that used some yellow ink in the circulation war between Joseph Pulitzer's New York World and William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal." Fiachaire (talk) 11:51, 17 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep. After taking a look at the sources, it does seem that selfie-related injuries and deaths is a notable topic, and as such, it can be accompanied by a list. I'd start with the main article and create a list later, but.... --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 07:02, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Re: your 'but....', is that a 'but you can't make editors make articles, and I sure don't want to write it'? If so, would there be any appropriate policy such as the previously suggested merge, or an incubation, or relevant tags, or moving to a user page that could provide consensus, serves the encyclopedia, and maybe provides incentive for an article first approach? I'm not asking if we can do something novel (I doubt I will ever have a novel suggestion, and I'm thinking of diplomacy here), but wondering if there is a useful precedent, or are we on a keep/delete binary? Fiachaire (talk) 14:18, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * It may be useful, before closing, to clarify which sources you acknowledge as notable/reliable, unless, of course, you feel they all are. I also wonder what definition of 'selfie' is used here, and what parameters 'related' has, but discussion seems unlikely. I also suggest that in a "keep" finding where you do not feel all of the sources are reliable that the page be given a cite check tag with explanation. Beyond that, there seems little reason not to close this AfD promptly. Fiachaire (talk) 23:07, 18 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep If anything, the article has become even more notable and well sourced since the last AfD request less than a year ago. A 10 day old editor, who made a todo list consisting of "Delete List of Selfie Related Deaths and Injuries" as one of their first couple edits, sure feels like a purpose built sock of someone who didn't like the outcome of the first AfD. Close this as a spurious nomination. Pschemp (talk) 08:33, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Just want to say, appreciate the discussion. Not a sock, just a newbie. I did have delete on my list, and reading pages about editing quickly changed it to discuss. I did post on the talk page, look into the sources, follow the sources sources, search for other sources and check them out. I did leave a notice with the author. I continue to read guides and policy. I did not read the Christian Science Monitor article, in part because I didn't think a single instance of government response was validating for a list of x-related y into perpetuity. I thought the previous AfD reached consensus by lack of discussion, and was closed somewhat reluctantly by admin. I still feel the sources are there but unreliable. That said, I do hope this wasn't a spurious nomination, or needlessly contributed to backlog. If so, by all means close it, and I will strive to do better.Fiachaire (talk) 10:12, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Have read the CSM article. It is of higher quality. It does open and end with a joke about the Russian news, and is largely a list of people who died engaging in risky behavior while also self-documenting. The release of a guide by the Russian government seems to me unlikely to satisfy the guidelines for WP:Events. If the list gains notability from the event of the Russian guide, then wouldn't the prime candidate be selfie-related deaths in Russia prior to the release of the guide for cause, and after the guide for effect (Edit: Unlikely media will report Russians not dying of selfies! They may report a drop in over all selfie-related deaths or a drop in deaths while engaging in risky behavior)? As for WP:Depth, this doesn't appear to be feature length article about the Russian guide. The guide/coverage doesn't satisfy WP:PERSISTENCE as it is a singular event. If the list depends on article covering the guide, then I question it. If it doesn't, also don't understand how we verify that the people who died in the article did so because of the selfie and not because it had rained, or it was a windy day or they were doing something dangerous that in itself leads to death and injury. Also would this article then support a list of texting-related deaths and injuries due to the Utah reference? (I've also done more reading about socks, if the admin is in doubt I would point to good faith contributions re:lynching as well as a series of dumb ones re:rugby which I reverted after noticing my mistake. Growing pains, not malice.) Fiachaire (talk) 11:24, 16 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Cunard has compiled a great list of sources which I think deserves some examination. First I would like to address Priceonomics (their website may be temporarily down). A search on google news leads with [The Sausage Index: Which dating apps have the most dudes?] and in its description reads "This post is adapted from SurveyMonkey Intelligence, a Priceonomics Data Studio customer. Does your company have interesting data?". [This article] defines Priceonomics: "Rohin Dhar is the CEO of Priceonomics, an immensely popular startup that creates viral content as its ONLY form of advertising....Priceonomics uses ZERO “growth hacking” or paid advertising…just sticky content that virally spreads to millions of eyeballs each week. Think one part PR hacking and two parts viral marketing." Over at [TechCrunch]: "This is content marketing, and Priceonomics is very good at it. So good that today the Y Combinator startup announced it’s pivoting from price guides to blogging, or more accurately, the web scraping and research it does to inform its blogging....As Dhar wrote in a post announcing the pivot today, “Since we crawled such varied sources of data, we started building generalizable tools for data extraction from the web so that our lives would be easier. We got pretty good at crawling data.” So, “Today, we’re launching Priceonomics Data Services, our new data arm that helps companies crawl and structure data from the web. If you’re a company that needs to get data from the web, we can help.”". In short Priceonomics is exactly the sort of source that concerns me. Viral is not notable. Vendors are not sources. By the way, the reason I noticed this wikipedia list is because it's been posted to [Hacker News] 5 times this year. This list is actively part of a loop. One should also note Hacker News is run by Paul Graham who heads Y Combinator which funded start-up Priceonomics. The list above also includes an IBT article, which was noted as suspect by the admin in the previous AfD, and uses Priceonomics for its source. I would think that a source momentarily loses reliability when it is sourcing a data crawling business designed to manipulate search returns and media content.Fiachaire (talk) 12:43, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Having gone through the other articles in the list each article after the Priceonimics article refrences it. Time does so without referring to the name, and the Guardian does so explicitly saying 'according to' and calls it a 'data service provider'. Prior to the piece, The Christian Science Monitor stands out for quality (adressed above), while the others are listicles peppered with cool photos, with the possible exception of PCMag. Problem there is I looked into the official [report] on the pilot in Colorado. It reads "Based on the evidence of cell phone use during low-altitude maneuvering, including the flight immediately before the accident flight, it is likely that cell phone use during the accident flight distracted the pilot and contributed to the development of spatial disorientation and subsequent loss of control." The part that should stick out is "including the flight immediately before the accident flight". That doesn't sound selfie-related. That sounds like they were using the flash for frequent phototaking, and interacting with a screen they oughtn't be. So I looked at the next one, the woman wasn't taking a selfie, she died "seconds after she posted selfies and updated her status on Facebook". Not selfie-related, Facebook-related. I humbly ask for the purposes of this discussion, should any of the listed sources be disregarded as unreliable or struck through on this page? Fiachaire (talk) 13:53, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Methinks the lady doth protest too much. I can't wait to hear why TIme, CBS News and the Guardian aren't reliable sources either.Pschemp (talk) 14:16, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Ha! It's true, I'm excited...first dance and all. I love the Guardian, but I don't consider everything it produces hard journalism. The others I think have a poorer ratio than the Guardian. But neither here nor there. As I said, I find Priceonimics unreliable as a source and the journalists who wrote the pieces you refer to sourced Priceonimics all the same. The Guardian noted what they were doing, the others didn't. I think that makes a difference to the quality of the article, and therefore a difference to its acceptability here. Also, WP has policy guidelines that make it clear that the source is not always reliable because of who publishes it. For example, multiple AP reprints. There is a lot of looping and recycling going on here, and I don't know which sources are most relevant to this discussion. Would appreciate correction or help in focusing over responses that pivot focus.Fiachaire (talk) 14:35, 16 June 2016 (UTC)


 * The Priceonomics article was published Jan 29, 2016. Most of the citations were published well before that even existed.--Savonneux (talk) 07:39, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
 * I already addressed that above. There are four either side of the Priceonimcs link in the list above (so, not "most"). Of the four, PC Mag and Christian Science Monitor standout as arguably reliable. Both of those articles refer to a selfie-related death in Colorado which depends on an official report which says something quite different (namely selfies with flash and general phone interaction happened on the pilots previous flight, and that (the flash, the screen) may have contributed to disorientation in the second (unrecorded) flight. The report points to cell phone usage, not taking a photo of oneself. The report also sees this as a possible secondary cause for theoretical disorientation, the other, more serious causes: it was nighttime and a plane was plummeting out of the sky. From RT: "The NTSB report also found that Singh did not meet the currency requirements for flight in instrument meteorological conditions or night flight with passengers." Furthermore, the CSM article says explicitly that the pilot lost control while taking selfies and links to another CSM article with a headline 'selfies likely caused' which links to a Reuters article that simply states selfies happened (again, in the previous flight). The latter CSM article also references the woman who dies while uploading photos of herself on facebook while driving. Again, cellphone-related, not a selfie. Here's a quote I picked up while trying to clarify my point (take it or leave it): "Let's turn to the World Health Organization to see how it breaks down the issue. WHO gives the example of a woman tripping over something on the floor and hitting her head on the counter; you'd never say that the thing on the floor killed her — that's just the underlying mechanism. (Also, stupid.) The direct mechanism was hitting her head, just as in most "selfie deaths," the direct mechanism is being struck by a car, falling down, what have you." I consider the selfie to be further removed than the thing on the floor in most if not all of these cases. However, I am open to a List of Thing-on-the-floor-related injuries and deaths. The CSM article also refers to the Russian teenager who fell to her death, referring to this article which reads "According to other sources, the reason for girl’s death was a broken fence on the bridge that she leaned on while taking the photo." And says an investigation will take place. But selfies are sexier than fences so which do we report, and then smudge? The investigation isn't covered, the lead is buried, and in this case the lead may well have been a teenage girl leaning on a fence taking a photo with her friends who didn't die. You said before that this was the first time somebody had accused CSM of yellow journalism, "a type of journalism that presents little or no legitimate well-researched news and instead uses eye-catching headlines to sell more newspapers. Techniques may include exaggerations of news events, scandal-mongering, or sensationalism.", and I would be willing and able to go further to make that case specific to this article, but I don't think I have to. The source is problematic at best. Why should it stand? Fiachaire (talk) 08:39, 17 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete - Well a year later and my opinions are no different .... Per my prev !vote: "Unencyclopedic and quite frankly a moronic list of morons unable to take an image of themselves without fucking it all up!. This is is the kind of crap that belongs off of the internet", That aside they're non-notable news stories and perhaps would be better off merged to Selfie. – Davey 2010 Talk 13:40, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * So WP:IDONTLIKEIT, then? That's not a reason. Smartyllama (talk) 18:46, 16 June 2016 (UTC)
 * And your personal opinion (in contrast to policy based) on the issue still counts for exactly as much as it did a year ago.--Savonneux (talk) 07:34, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
 * WP:IDONTLIKEIT is exactly what it is and I don't expect the !vote to be counted nor I did expect it last year, Saying that I did make a suggestion this time so not all is bad. – Davey 2010 Talk 23:41, 18 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Keep The only relevant points I see discussed here re. the keeping of this article are the notability guidelines, and as per 's demonstration further up on this page, this is a topic of widespread public interest and coverage that satisfies both the general and list-specific notability criteria. Samsara 11:41, 19 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Comment – Interestingly, the article was recently shared on Wikipedia's official Facebook page, days since the start of this AfD. This is presumably for its "shareability" rather than its importance. It's interesting that the social media team would share an article with a big red "this article will possibly be deleted" banner at the top.  McLerristarr &#124;  Mclay1  20:34, 19 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Keep. The content is well-sourced and thematically related to the article's topic. -- The Anome (talk) 09:27, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete The sources themselves may be reliable, that is insufficient; they must demonstrate WP:LASTING and WP:PERSISTENCE, which, each entry being so WP:TRIVIAL, they do not. <sub style="color:green;>Muffled <sup style="color:red;">Pocketed  11:08, 21 June 2016 (UTC).
 * [New York Times], The Murky Meaning of the Killer Selfie. [Washington Post], No, selfies have not killed more people than sharks, that's ridiculous. [Washington Post], What's fake on the internet this week: Selfie lice, Joey Fatone and James Earl Jones RIPS. [The Daily Beast], Debunking the Great ‘Selfies Are More Deadly Than Shark Attacks’ Myth - When it comes to which is more deadly—selfies or shark attacks—no analysis would have been better than a bad analysis. Fiachaire (talk) 12:17, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Perfect examples of the interest this topic continues to generate, hence: persistence! Samsara 12:25, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Totally (except they're all from last year, a sizable chunk away in this topics lifespan). I'm kind of torn between drafting a list of cyber-banging-related deaths and injuries or a list of modern day Oedipuses. Actually a list of proximity to the sun-related deaths and injuries might be best. Fiachaire (talk) 12:49, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Time Magazine - 6 Times People Died While Taking Selfies March 16th 2016 --Savonneux (talk) 07:20, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
 * The lead and its sources have been changed by the pages creator. The CSM article is gone, unsure why. The lead has narrowed or clarified, though the title remains the same, and the source making its case is now a Telegraph article which itself sources the list. It also repackages prior Telegraph article, sources the Mirror, and the Mashable piece much discussed above (sharks v selfies). I also noticed that the priceonomics article written for the purpose of content marketing also uses information from Wikipedia (presumably here) to build it's attractive graph on the hard numbers behind this "debate". WP:CIRCULAR seems pertinent in addition to not sourcing e-commerce/vendors Fiachaire (talk) 16:20, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * You seem to be a rather confused person. If you are as new and innocent as you claim, perhaps you should consider taking some time to truly understand how wikipedia works, rather than blustering about.Pschemp (talk) 20:07, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * How many times do you imagine you'll have to post a comment about me before I ask you for one? Please consider discussing the article (which has changed for the better in my opinion), though I admit I'm getting less curious about what insight you may have. Fiachaire (talk) 22:43, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Weak Keep - There's a decent case for WP:NLIST based on coverage of selfie-related injuries and deaths as a group, but I think the stronger reason to keep is considering this as a split from Selfie. There's no doubt that selfie-related safety has gotten quite a bit of attention sufficient to be prominent in the article about selfies, but there are enough examples such that it makes a bit of sense ("a bit" hence "weak" keep) to just spin it out. &mdash; <span style="font-family:monospace, monospace;"> Rhododendrites <sup style="font-size:80%;">talk  \\ 05:23, 23 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete instead and Draft if needed for improvements later because this is still questionable at best and is still vulnerable to questionability of notable stories and information. Could be its own article but it's currently still questionable. SwisterTwister   talk  06:36, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
 * AfD isn't article cleanup.--Savonneux (talk) 07:26, 25 June 2016 (UTC)
 * This word salad approach to AfD is getting out of hand... &mdash; <span style="font-family:monospace, monospace;"> Rhododendrites <sup style="font-size:80%;">talk  \\ 13:10, 25 June 2016 (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.