Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sylvia Spring


 * 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. Of note is that the article was rewritten and significantly expanded (around 27x compared to its state at the time of the deletion nomination), which included the addition of many sources (diff). Some, but not much analysis of the subject's notability relative to the added sources has occurred herein after the rewrite. After two full reslitings, ultimately no consensus for a particular outcome exists at this time in this discussion. North America1000 07:36, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Sylvia Spring

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WP:BLP of a film director, which literally just states that she exists and then filmographies her films without even attempting to make or source a claim that she passes WP:NCREATIVE for any of them. And all that's present for sourcing here is a deadlinked page on a defunct website whose content is impossible to verify at all, and the IMDb page for one of her films. As always, every filmmaker is not automatically entitled to have an article just because one or more of her films have IMDb entries -- a filmmaker needs to have a credible claim of notability that would pass NCREATIVE, and needs to have reliable source coverage about her to support an article. Bearcat (talk) 20:11, 7 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete, I previously nominated for PROD, as the article makes no claim that would justify notability (and isn't borne out by sources). The one potential argument for notability as far as I can see is that the subject reportedly has an entry in a film encyclopedia, although the page is currently broken, and its unclear whether this encyclopedia provides sufficient coverage of its entries to justify creating an article here purely on the basis of the existence of the entry. signed,Rosguill talk 20:16, 7 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Women-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 07:14, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Canada-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 07:14, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Actors and filmmakers-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 07:14, 8 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Comment There is information on the filmmaker -, apparently she is the first female Canadian director to make an English language feature film in Canada, and one of her films won some minor awards. I'd guess that might be what she would be notable for, although I haven't decided yet if that is sufficient. Hzh (talk) 00:14, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
 * The broken link to Canadian film encyclopedia is archived -, there is also something on her work and bio at Library and Archives Canada . Here there are some references to reviews and articles on one of her films - , her work is also revisited in this 2002 issue of Take One.Hzh (talk) 10:26, 12 October 2018 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Keep Probably marginal notability, but according to the sources given above, her works have been given serious critical attention (her 1970 work Madeleine Is… received reviews and was still discussed in 2002), therefore she may qualify under WP:CREATIVE. Apart from being the first Canadian woman to make an English feature film in Canada, she was also appointed by the Canadian government to scrutinize "Sex-Role Stereotyping in the Broadcast Media" and set up Media Watch, therefore she may have some significance in Canadian feminist history. With the sources given and those not archived on the internet, she should qualify under WP:GNG. Hzh (talk) 10:26, 12 October 2018 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, North America1000 00:56, 14 October 2018 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Delete. I read the profile from the archived profile from TIFF, but I don't think there's enough there to say she passes WP:GNG.  She might be revered among Canadian cinephiles, but I don't believe she meets Wikipedia's guidelines.   PK  T (alk)  16:02, 15 October 2018 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   20:23, 22 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep From the sources identified by Hzh and other sources found on Jstor and Google Scholar: The subject of this profile wrote and directed a film which was shown internationally, and is still being discussed 40 years after it was made. She also won awards for a documentary and for a series made for schools. Her work on the task force on Sex-Role Stereotyping in the Broadcast Media is quoted in articles about Canadian policy and also internationally (eg in Australia), and starting Media Watch in Canada is significant. I am not aware of Wikipedia criteria for notability for activists, but I believe that she is notable. The "article" is not even a stub, so deleting it or keeping it hardly matters - I have started adding more information and references, but as it amounts to starting a new article, I have copied this to my sandbox. I'll paste it back here as soon as it has any substance. If someone else works on this article here, I can just add in anything else I have. RebeccaGreen (talk) 11:51, 23 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Strong keep. Agree with with RebeccaGreen and Hzh. I have expanded the article a nodge resulting in a situation where some of the delete statements above no longer hold water. Spring meets WP:BASIC, WP:FILMMAKER #1 and WP:ANYBIO #2. gidonb (talk) 10:55, 27 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment I have written a new article, which I believe substantiates this subject's notability and provides reliable sources. I hope discussion about whether the article should be deleted will now consider this new article. RebeccaGreen (talk) 05:39, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, that is somewhat better, but you may also need to read up a bit on what we call reference bombing: I'm seeing things like IMDb in the sourcing, which is an absolute no-no at all times, and I'm seeing other primary and unreliable sources, and I'm seeing too many statements upon which you've stacked two or three redundant sources — there are almost no circumstances where any statement in a Wikipedia article actually needs two references for it instead of just one good one, and very definitely zero circumstances where any statement in a Wikipedia article ever needs three references stacked one after the other onto the same statement. When I tried to fix the punctuation errors in the article just now (commas or periods or closing parenthesis go first and then the reference tag, not vice versa), it was literal flaming hell trying to find where the corrected punctuation was supposed to go given all the reference-tetris. Yes, there's some media coverage in the mix now — but there's still too much junk sourcing being used, so it's still not free of problems. Bearcat (talk) 04:44, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
 * The legitimate references are enough to establish notability, and we are really only interested in establishing whether the subject has enough notability here to warrant an article, which no doubt she has with the sources found. Also references that do not establish notability can nevertheless still be used to support certain facts. If there are other references that aren't good, feel free to remove them, including the content supported by those references, I do think it is too long-winded and could do with trimming anyway.  Hzh (talk) 09:31, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Thank you, Bearcat, for the information about where the references should be placed in relation to commas and parentheses. I was aware that they are placed after periods - I thought I had seen them placed before commas. I would have been happy to correct their placement myself, if I had been given that feedback. As for the number of sources - I have observed in articles rated 'good article' (GA) that there are often two references for one piece of information, and sometimes more - three is not uncommon, and I have seen as many as eight. So it appears that other Wikipedia editors take a different view of multiple sources. As Hzh said, I hoped that there were enough of what Wikipedia considers legitimate references to establish notability, and the other references provide evidence of particular information. I note that you are in Canada, and I would appreciate your advice on which newspapers are considered reliable there. I have the impression that some papers published in a particular town are actually distributed nationally, and are regarded as having serious journalism, much as in Australia with the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age in Melbourne - but as I am not familiar with Canada, I am unsure which are not credible sources. The IMDB reference was in the original article as an external source, where I gather that it is acceptable - I changed it to a reference in the Madeleine Is .... section, as the personal entry on IMDB did not seem to me at all useful as a source for the subject of the article, whereas the entry for the film does provide more information (eg about the film crew). If/when the subject's notability is considered established, others will no doubt edit the article, perhaps adding information and sources not available to me, perhaps deleting some. RebeccaGreen (talk) 10:36, 29 October 2018 (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.