Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/President Obama on Death of Osama bin Laden (SPOOF)


 * 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 KEEP. The unanimous consensus outside of the nominator is that this article is sufficiently sourced, notability is demonstrated for the subject, and any promotional or other POV issues can be dealt with through normal editing. postdlf (talk) 14:38, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

President Obama on Death of Osama bin Laden (SPOOF)

 * – ( View AfD View log )

Fails the GNG and related SNGs; coverage is fundamentally trivial and subject has no independent notability apart from the performer involved. It's a Youtube-only video parody of Obama's announcement that Bin Laden had been killed, and there's very little substantial coverage of it, just a lot of bloggery. The article overstates the sourcing greatly; for example, the supposed CBS News coverage turns out to be superficial coverage by a blogger who posts links to funny videos (only on weekdays!) on a low-visibility page on the CBS News site. Giving this its own article is like giving every SNL sketch on every show its own article; every Tina Fey impersonation of Sarah Palin, all of the Kristen Wiig fake-commercials for Christine O'Donnell got coverage that was orders of magnitude higher. The Youtube play count may look impressive at first glance, but a barking cat got a million more hits in half the time, and neither the cat nor its video has its own article here. Finally, while not strictly grounds for deletion, the article is laced with promotional phrasing, and somehow it's creator can't manage to turn up a single negative comment about the video, which would put the performer's official approval rate up there with Kim Jong Il's. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 19:10, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep - This thing is sourced to the gills; I grabbed one footnote at random from the San Francisco Chronicle and it wasn't misrepresented or superficial. I suppose one could argue in favor of an WP:IAR-IDONTLIKEIT-NOTCOMEDYCOMPENDIUM delete, but that would be pushing a big bolder up a big hill. Best for the nominator to grit his teeth, avert his eyes, and move along, in my opinion... Carrite (talk) 19:39, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Reply. I'm sorry, but you're simply wrong on this one. The "San Francisco Chronicle" source is an almost perfect example of misrepresented sourcing. Although presented in the article as coming from the newspaper itself, it actually comes from a blog which the paper's website displays, but exercises no editorial control over. As the "Editor's Note" in the page's far-right column declares. "This is an SFGate.com City Brights Blog. These blogs are not written or edited by SFGate or the San Francisco Chronicle. The authors are solely responsible for the content." That's not the kind of sourcing that generally acceptable for Wikipedia use, especially in a BLP-related subject." Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 20:39, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
 * For the record. SFGate goes on to explain "About City Brights. City Brights are prominent local citizens and experts with a unique Bay Area perspective that is often enlightening, sometimes infuriating and always thought-provoking"--so contributors are pre-screened for their reliability. Further, WP:BLP protects the individual's privacy, and is not for preventing his videos from being critiqued. RCraig09 (talk) 22:06, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Speaking of being completely wrong, this defense is simply contrary to RS and BLP, which don't have "prominent local citizens" exceptions, nor does it explain why RCraig09 misrepresented the source, in the article. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 22:49, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Reply to vagueness, sarcasm and false accusation. SFChronicle's specifically authorized contributor, whether staff/employee or (as here) pre-authorized non-employee contributor, does not need an "exception." Any supposed "misrepresentation" was due to my not seeing the small "Editor's note" on the side of web page cited in one of 40+ footnotes, is countered by the "About City Brights" explanation that immediately followed the Editor's note and thus is not a "completely wrong" "defense," and in any event is a matter of (editable) wording and not substance related to deletion of the article. RCraig09 (talk) 05:39, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * *Hubba wazzah?!?! -- "That's not the kind of sourcing that generally acceptable for Wikipedia use, especially in a BLP-related subject." Are you actually voicing BLP complaints about a parody of Barack Obama? Carrite (talk) 01:35, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Reply. Not with regard to Obama, but with regard to the performer, Iman Crosson. As I see the article, it's heavy-duty fancruft, intended to promote Crosson by inflating his reputation, created by a person who's apparently close to the performer. When the Foundation adopted its BLP resolution, it listed its concerns about promotional editing first: "Many people create articles that are overly promotional in tone: about themselves, people they admire, or those they are paid to represent. These are not neutral, and have no place in our projects." That's the BLP concern I'm raising. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 02:33, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Reply to uncivil insult, presumption of my "intent," and uninformed conjecture. I (article creator) have an interest in many people who use the Internet as a medium, some of whom have Wikipedia articles. If I'm "close to the performer" or "paid to represent" him, it's news to me. The references I found were essentially unanimously positive (given the occasion of Obama's announcement and the message/humor of the video) and the direct quotes that pervade the article determine its "tone." It is not fancruft (read details). RCraig09 (talk) 05:39, 26 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Speedy keep, speedy close, trout nominator Obvious WP:IDONTLIKEIT nomination. Sources need a cleanup, but Carrite proves that decent ones exist. Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • (Otters want attention) 19:41, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep I agree that the article might be one-sided, but we have tags for that (I've added one). I also agree that there are several posts that seem to only show the video, and provide no actual content.  But this doesn't account for all the sources  WP:NEWSBLOG informs us that blogs from professional news editors are still reputable sources.  More importantly is WP:WEB, specifically criteria #1:
 * 1) ''The content itself has been the subject of multiple non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the site itself. This criterion includes reliable published works in all forms, such as newspaper articles, magazine articles, books, television documentaries, websites, and published reports by consumer watchdog organizations except for the following:
 * Media re-prints of press releases and advertising for the content or site. Trivial coverage, such as
 * newspaper articles that simply report the Internet address,
 * newspaper articles that simply report the times at which such content is updated or made available,
 * a brief summary of the nature of the content or the publication of Internet addresses and site, and
 * content descriptions in Internet directories or online stores.''


 * I'm willing to contend that some of these provide content that is more than just a brief summary, such as this Huffington Post article, this Syracuse Online article, or this POPDUST article. The coverage is not ideal, and could be much better, such as in Charlie bit my finger, but it is sufficient.  Also, deletion is never really about about the views this video got compared to some other video. I, Jethrobot drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 20:01, 25 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep Nominator's reference to GNG and SNGs is vague. Coverage of video is not trivial, and has plenty of citations apart from Crosson himself. There are numerous non-blog citations, and in any event there is nothing inherently unreliable about blogs (blogging being a format and not a reliability indicator, especially when the sources are CBS News, The Huffington Post, Al Jazeera, MSNBC, Sean Hannity, New York magazine, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Atlantic, The Post-Standard, and Funny or Die). Focus on the specifically quoted passages from the well-known sources for substantive coverage/content; the various "short quotes" lower in the article were included to tell the story of how the video became viral, not as evidence that "that video was good." The video itself makes political commentary, and can't be compared to a 23-second long barking cat video, just because it's in comedic form.  RCraig09 (talk) 20:23, 25 July 2011 (UTC) (Disclosure: I am main writer of article)


 * Keep - May be offensive to some, but WP is not censored. Plenty of secondary sources discuss this spoof.  --Noleander (talk) 00:07, 26 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Why is spoof in all caps?--Yaksar (let's chat) 00:17, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Explanation: The allcapped word is part of the literal title of the video. RCraig09 (talk) 05:39, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Haha whoops, got it.--Yaksar (let's chat) 03:37, 27 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Film-related deletion discussions.  — • Gene93k (talk) 18:39, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions.  — • Gene93k (talk) 18:39, 26 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep - I support the President and this article. Lighten up, folks, it's not treasonous. Bearian (talk) 18:30, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Question - I don't understand the point of the spoof. Didn't Bush capture Osama bin Laden? I specifically remember seeing images of a bedraggled Osama dragged out of a spider-hole. Isn't that why we re-elected Bush? As such, isn't the spoof a Personal Attack against Obama? Since when does Wikipedia allow Personal Attacks in the mainspace? Dekkappai (talk) 22:17, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Not sure how your reasoning qualifies this as a personal attack. Also, it was Saddam Hussein who was captured under the Bush administration. I, Jethrobot drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 23:37, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Hussein?!?! SHIT!!!! Dekkappai (talk) 02:20, 29 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep Worthy of note. Easily sourced topic showing the solid meeting of WP:GNG and the meeting of SNGs WP:WEB and WP:NF (and yes, NF can applied to video lampoons as well as to feature length films), despite the WP:WAX comparisons and the cherry picking of a few weaker sources as if they were representative of the overall available. Per WP:NOTCENSORED, We at Wikipedia can also respect the First Ammendment and accept that we US citizens are allowed to mock and spoof our leaders and sometimes such lampoons meet inclusion criteria, like it or not. As an aside, I think THIS one is funnier.  Schmidt,  MICHAEL Q. 07:07, 29 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment. Now that the usual suspects have dropped in, this is officially a debacle. I'll just note that this whole "First Amendment"/NOTCENSORED argument is a complete smokescreen, since the BLP issues mentioned -- in particular, overly promotional content -- relate to the performer involved, not to the politician. The fact remains that the coverage for this subject remains fundamentally insubstantial, and isn't particularly significant. Virtually every sketch that runs on SNL gets substantially greater coverage. For example, while this video turns up 25,000 GHits and only 1 GNews hit, while the Kristen Wiig spoof of the "I am not a witch" ad turns up nearly 400,000 GHits and 11 GNews hits . Neither is sufficiently notable for an independent article, particularly one concocted by a publicist and laced with puffery. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 12:31, 1 August 2011 (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.