Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Wire (Indian web publication)


 * 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. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 19:51, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

The Wire (Indian web publication)

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 * 1) First reference - Alexa Site info.
 * 2) Second reference- self website source.
 * 3) Third reference- Business standard is third party source. But Business Standard is a notable newspaper with business related news. And the given source is like company list, not focussing only on The Wire, but "The Quint is one of several portals in the Indian cyberspace which are re-imagining news. The Wire, Quartz, Scroll, Catch News are among the other 'original content websites"
 * 4) Fourth reference- About Us. The Wire.
 * 5) Fifth reference- Related website.
 * 6) Sixth reference- The news about this website being launched, as it is founded by a notable person.
 * 7) Seventh reference- Columbia Journalism Review, article not exclusively about the website. More about the founder Siddharth Varadarajan, who is already notable.

Other sources are related to this website for being in the news for writing controversial articles about famous politicians. The "third party independent" articles are more about the controversies, denials, counter-accusations. Marvellous Spider-Man  16:33, 18 October 2017 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of India-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 17:33, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Websites-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 17:33, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of News media-related deletion discussions. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 19:48, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

I do not think that this article merits deletion (or even nomination for deletion) under Wikipedia's Articles for deletion policy. Though one may criticize the quality or relevance of specific sources used in the article, in general the sources are relevant to the ideas they are being cited to support, and to the article generally.

A user advocating for deletion, Marvellous Spider-Man, has repeatedly complained that the sources cited are not solely about The Wire, but include other information. This, Marvellous Spider-Man contends, merits the article's deletion. The logic behind this contention is flawed. A source need not be solely about the article in question; it just has to have some information that is relevant to what it is being cited for. This is the standard for citations across Wikipedia, including for the encyclopedia's most established and high-quality articles. For example, in the Wikipedia page on the element "Boron" - which is well cited and complies with wikipedia's policies - the second citation is "Atomic weights of the elements 2013 (IUPAC Technical Report)". The majority of this source does not concern the Wikipedia article's topic, Boron, nevertheless, the information it does contain about boron is relevant to the article. Thus the reference is a useful and appropriate one. This is just one example of the phenomenon of legitimate Wikipedia sources that contain information beyond what they are cited for.

The Wire is a prominent and popular publication and website: the Wikipedia page on the website is well sited and impartial. As a result, it meets the essential criteria for inclusion on Wikipedia, and it's deletion is unnecessary and inappropriate. Any specific problems in the article can be fixed by edits, and other users have not demonstrated why deletion is merited.

Finally, I would like to add some context to the nomination for deletion of this article. The article's namesake publication - The Wire - has published a variety of controversial articles about Indian politics. In response, The Wire has been threatened with lawsuits and possible coercion by the Indian government and others. Such persecution has been especially acute since the site published an article called "The Golden Touch of Jay Amit Shah" on October 8th, 2017. Only a few days after the backlash to this article's publication in India, The Wire's Wikipedia page was nominated for deletion under flimsy pretexts. One cannot help but wonder whether the article's nomination for deletion is part of a broader attempt to censor, delegitimize and obscure The Wire. A Wikipedia page cannot advertise or advocate for any side in a conflict or controversy, but should stick to the facts as supported by robust references: the article on The Wire does this. As such, to delete the article would reflect a bias - with Wikipedia seeming to take the side of the current Indian administration in its conflict with The Wire. To uphold Wikipedia's ideals of impartiality and objectivity, this article should not be deleted. Screensofthought (talk) 18:00, 22 October 2017 (UTC) — Screensofthought (talk&#32;• contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

No coherent justification for this article's deletion is put forth by users, therefore its deletion is unjustified. Marvellous Spider-Man seems to imply that information contained in the Wikipedia page on The Wire is already contained in the Wikipedia page of one of its editors, Siddharth Varadarajan, and that this renders the page redundant. In actuality, The Wire involves many individual editors and journalists, of which Varadarajan is just one player: the publication is not at all synonymous with him. Varadarajan's page contains only a small amount of information about The Wire, which barely overlaps with the information contained in this article, thus concerns about redundancy are not legitimate. Siddharth Varadarajan and The Wire are seperate entities that are prominent in their own rights and each merits a separate page. Marvellous Spider-Man also seems to object to the fact that some of this article's sources mention Siddharth Varadarajan in addition to The Wire. As Screensofthought has said above, inclusion of information about other topics does not invalidate the relevant information contained within this article's references. 96.246.32.210 (talk) 18:24, 22 October 2017 (UTC) — 96.246.32.210 (talk) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus. Relisting comment: No !votes

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Night  fury  12:31, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Keep Appears to satisfy Notability (web). The CJS article quoted by the nominator discusses the business model of the wire extensively. Numerous articles appear to have been written about the two court cases against it, focusing the discussion on the mission of the wire (not just reporting the outcomes of the cases) (cf., , ,  - I just pulled these off the first couple of pages of a google search, there are many more).  --regentspark (comment) 17:34, 26 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Mentioned in The New York Times this morning in an op-ed on censorship in India . There seem to be enough references for a keep.--regentspark (comment) 12:13, 27 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Keep This passes Notability guideline for web content, also brief search through above newslinks yields numerous instances of detailed mention. Keep and tag for improvement rather than delete –Ammarpad (talk) 11:06, 28 October 2017 (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.