Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Natural Area Code


 * 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. No prejudice to speedy renomination. TonyBallioni (talk) 23:34, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Natural Area Code

 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

I was unable to find significant coverage of this geographic coordinate system; most results are mirrors of Wikipedia or the organization who created the system. The only source is primary, after I removed WP:OR regarding the intellectual property claims on this algorithm. –LaundryPizza03 ( d c̄ ) 08:06, 25 August 2022 (UTC) Comment The page was initially created by the banned user in 2004, but according to articleinfo tool, the main contributors are a 99.xx IP geolocating to Mississauga; ; ; and. I found a discussion from 2013 questioning notability on the talk page:
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Organizations, Geography,  and Mathematics. –LaundryPizza03 ( d  c̄ ) 08:06, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Are there independent and reliably published sources that go into depth about this system that we can use to establish its notability? Google scholar found only 9 papers mentioning it, and some of them mention it only very briefly as an example of a grid-based system. One of the sources that does go into depth seems to explicitly argue against notability, calling NAC "another not very popular coordinate system". I hesitate to take more drastic steps with this article after the uproar over the related deletion of Base 30, but its current unsourced state is not acceptable. —David Eppstein (talk) 04:08, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Notability is not popularity. We're surely planning to keep Ford Edsel and buggy whip. Andy Dingley (talk) 12:05, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Sure, but those were all well known at one time. Was this? —David Eppstein (talk) 16:05, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Officially adopted by the state of Mongolia as the main addressing system: Yk4ever (talk) 18:26, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
 * I'd still like to see non-primary sources about this (the link you give is primary) but that is enough to at least sway my opinion from its previous value of "the fact that all sources are primary suggests that it is likely not notable" to "likely to be notable but needs better sourcing". —David Eppstein (talk) 18:57, 4 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Mongolia passed a resolution to use it in 2008, but was it ever carried out? I can't find anything beyond the resolution press releases.  There is no mention in any WP:RSS.  The article itself makes no WP:Credible claim of significance.  Thundermaker (talk) 01:57, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

–Laundry<b style="color:#fb0">Pizza</b><b style="color:#b00">03</b> ( d c̄ ) 08:17, 25 August 2022 (UTC) Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz <sup style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: #006400;">Read! Talk! 22:18, 1 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep - It is a proprietary system and I question its longevity, and thus how much can be said for it. Nevertheless it seems to meet notability. Plenty of sources refer to it, such as, there are papers about it such as , stuff that I cannot read but also that seem to cite it such as and mention in books too, such as . I will put one or two of those in the article further reading. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:13, 25 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment If it's proprietary and seeing we're spaning a 20 year period on its notability, I think we have a rational nexus for suggesting delete. I will hold off on voting but this is what I found:
 * The format is by a nonprofit organization, NAC Geographic Products Inc. website looks like it recently came back online?
 * Blog entry from 2004 explaining its usefulness. Even though it's self published, this seemed like it explains the usefulness at the time - before smartphones and when GPS was still a new thing for consumers.
 * do we have an article of different types of addressing or coordinate systems? That would be a good alternative to deletion. – The Grid  ( talk )  14:07, 29 August 2022 (UTC)
 * <p class="xfd_relist" style="margin:0 0 0 -1em;border-top: 1px solid #AAA; border-bottom: 1px solid #AAA; padding: 0px 2em;"> Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   20:51, 9 September 2022 (UTC) Relisting comment: Final relist. Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz <sup style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: #006400;">Read! Talk! 23:16, 16 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Delete. After all this, there seems to be only a single secondary source that discusses this in any significant detail.  That doesn't add up to WP:GNG.  Regarding the Mongolia thing, they may have officially adopted it, but I can't find anything to show it was actually used.  And they seem to have | changed to a different system in 2016 anyway.  So we have a proprietary system, similar in form to many other systems, that doesn't seem to have been written about in any significant amount, or used in any significant amount.  I don't see a good merge target here, so I think deletion makes the most sense. 35.139.154.158 (talk) 16:07, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment - I am unhappy with delete because I think the sources I found above demonstrate some notability worthy of inclusion on Wikipedia somewhere. There is a published paper about it, and even though it is largely historical now, it is historical. A minor footnote but not nothing. I have no objection to merge. There is not much to say about this, and we don't actually need the detail of the encoding as that is in the paper that can be cited. But I think it should be a footnote somewhere. Address geocoding is another page that is not in a good way and I don't have time right now to improve it. However, it links to the NAC article and I would be content with a close that is a merge to the Address geocoding page, where instead of linking to the article, the merged content is a line indicating its existence and describing it in a sentence and linking to source [3] above. I could find time to merge that in, but not to improve the page itself. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 16:42, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
 * I have now added mergeable content to Address geocoding and Geographic coordinate system. If consensus is delete, I would suggest a redirect to Address geocoding. I note that this article is in better shape and more obviously notable than Place code linked from that page. I haven't done WP:BEFORE yet on that page, but the nom. may wish to consider if that one should go to AfD too, especially if consensus here is delete or merge. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:11, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
 * <p class="xfd_relist" style="margin:0 0 0 -1em;border-top: 1px solid #AAA; border-bottom: 1px solid #AAA; padding: 0px 2em;"> Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * <p class="xfd_relist" style="margin:0 0 0 -1em;border-top: 1px solid #AAA; border-bottom: 1px solid #AAA; padding: 0px 2em;"> Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. <b style="color:red">Please do not modify it.</b> 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.