Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/This Man


 * 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 redirect to Bryan Bertino. This was a well-conducted and civil debate that reached a thoughtful conclusion. Thanks to all involved. NAC— S Marshall T/C 22:53, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

This Man

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 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Popular culture-related deletion discussions.  Cliff  Smith 17:19, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Popular culture-related deletion discussions.  Cliff  Smith 17:19, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Apparently non-notable viral-marketing meme. Most of the content is self-published stuff from the website that launched the meme; all others are from random websites and it seems dubious to what extent they are independent of the original marketing campaign. No serious reliable coverage in any of the sources cited. Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:46, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Comment. Hmm... from what I can find of this so far, I'm going to go along with your theory that this is pretty much something that was made up for a marketing gimmick. My first thought was that someone created this to make it more likely that their movie script would be sold (and if so, it worked). However, being unlikely doesn't make it automatically non-notable. I'll see if I can find anything. Offhand I'll say that if stuff is found, the article needs to be re-written because right now it looks like an advertisement for the site and is highly promotional in nature.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 13:47, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
 * OK, I'm cleaning out the nonsense from the article. "Folklore"? Hardly. It's best described as an internet meme, which is what I'm changing it to.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 13:52, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Got the worst out, so now if anyone looks in here, they'll be less likely to want to burn it with fire and start anew. I'm somewhat leaning towards potentially incubating this. My rationale behind this is that this all looks to have been an attempted media blitz/meme for a movie that was in development in order to make it more likely to be picked up. Since the advertising worked and a movie is in the works, if it gets made it's likely to be notable given the production house. But right now? I'm not entirely so sure that this meets GNG, but I've still got some searching to do. So far all I've found are a few half-hearted meme sites and lukewarm blog posts.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 14:15, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Viral-marketing memes can sometimes be found notable. See Elf Yourself.  Schmidt,  MICHAEL Q. 22:27, 17 July 2012 (UTC)
 * True, true, but this didn't really get as much coverage as Elf Yourself did. It did get a little coverage in some reliable sources, but most of the talk ended up being in places like forums on Snopes and the like. As far as memes and marketing stuff goes, it sort of got an indifferent shrug from the internet before moving on to stuff like Chocolate Rain. I do think this could make for an interesting article when the movie gets released, but right now it just doesn't seem to have gotten that much attention. I think it'd be good as an incubated article, but if all else fails I'd be willing to userfy a copy of it.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 22:36, 17 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Incubate or delete merge/redirect to Bryan Bertino. This isn't a clear cut case of deletion, unfortunately. When it was popular-ish back around October of 2009, this got a small (and I emphasize small) flurry of attention from various news sites. Not really from anyone overwhelmingly notable, but enough to where it does come up with a search. However, the attention seemed to be extremely, extremely short lived and from what I can see, it didn't really get any attention from reliable sources until a few months later in May 2010, when GHP announced that they were making a movie about This Man. As far as memes go, it was just good enough that it got some attention but nowhere near enough to where it'd warrant an article to itself. As far as movies go (and I'm now positive that this was all one genius marketing gimmick for a movie), this film has yet to start production, so it fails WP:NFF. Since Raimi is one of the names behind the film company making the movie, I don't doubt that it'll get attention enough when/if the film is made. But right now? No. There's no notability and that there's no reliable coverage of this meme/myth/hoax apart from a short period of time in October 2009 shows that there's no depth of coverage. It fails all notability guidelines, but again- I'm relatively sure that if/when the movie is made, it'll be notable and this could work as something to keep in the Incubator.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 14:26, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Comment. Don't know where apparently non-notable viral-marketing meme came from. People go to the website daily. It has an Alexa rank of 300,000, which isn't amazing, but it means a few thousand visit the website daily. It's notable. We're not sure if it's viral-marketing. It's a speculation.--MrIndustry (talk) 22:42, 17 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 00:34, 14 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Film-related deletion discussions. Tokyogirl79 (talk) 16:01, 17 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Merge and then redirect to Bryan Bertino as a project-in-development. The Wayback Machine indicates the thisman.org website has been around since 2003. It was part of an episode of Tosh.O in 2009. The site seems to have generated a great deal of blog traffic, and IS dicussed in reliable sources IO9 WTF News The Wire et al. However, and far more recently as a "film", This Man is currently "in-development" by Ghost House Pictures which asa topic is getting far more coverage as a film-in-pre-production with Bryan Bertino set as director. et al... enough so THAT this much can be written of in the Bertino article, nicely expanding it. The topic of the meme would later merit a mention at the article at This Man (film) when that film is made...  with meme-as-inspiration examined in the film article's development section. Merging suitable information from the stub would not overburden the Bertino article.  Schmidt,  MICHAEL Q. 23:04, 17 July 2012 (UTC)
 * It was around since 2003, but it looks like the website was originally for a musician/rapper and was unrelated to its current content.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 00:03, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Ahh. Likely so. The earliest Wayback Machine screenshot showing its current version was in early 2010. And the domain history shows it more likely than not that the domain name was re-accquired and the site re-built in 2009-2010 using that domain name as a promotional device to hype an upcoming film. My reasons for a merge are thus strengthened. I suggest the redirect as it is a searchable term in relationship to the director, and it can be overwriten if or when a film is made.  Schmidt,  MICHAEL Q. 01:34, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Bryan Bertino can be fired as the director/writer at any moment. I don't think we should redirect towards him. It should be redirected to Ghost House.--MrIndustry (talk) 04:03, 18 July 2012 (UTC)


 * IF Bertino were to be fired from the project (and no sources even hint at this), we could easily change the redirect. And even IF it were to happen, we still have enough sources speaking about his part (so far) in the planned production that it is reasonable to send readers to where it makes sense to have such sourced discussion about Bertino and his part in the screenplay and pre-production. And if you've noticed, we really do not have an article on Ghost House Pictures... as it is redirect itself to the Robert Tapert article... an article which does not iself actually contain anything about the history and background of the production studio.   Schmidt,  MICHAEL Q. 09:26, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
 * To be honest, never even clicked on the Ghost House Pictures link. This would make sense then.--MrIndustry (talk) 16:40, 18 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Comment. I'm changing my vote slightly to put merge/redirect as an option. Is it possible to do the merge/redirect and put a copy in the incubator or whatnot?Tokyogirl79 (talk) 22:28, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I can go ahead and place information in the proposed target, Bryan Bertino. A closer can incubate the article and then set a redirect. IN the incubator, the article needs to be then modified to be about the proposed film, as THAT has far more coverage than does the meme.  Schmidt,  MICHAEL Q. 05:38, 19 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Redirect target now ready.  Schmidt,  MICHAEL Q. 01:32, 21 July 2012 (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.