Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/O RLY? (3rd nomination)

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. And the wikifaeries giggle, because they know about this stuff. Gwen Gale (talk) 18:20, 1 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

O RLY? (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

This article has problems mainly in the verifiability department. One source is a forum; one is from a newsgroup; and one is from 4chan. The other two sources are about a virus that used the O RLY? Macro. Note that earlier this month, I deleted a whole, largely unsourced, trivial list that was nothing but examples of O RLY? in common use (diff). While the term does seem to be very widely used, this is little more than a dicdef and examples of its usage, and will not likely grow beyond that. The last AfD from 2006 was peppered mostly with "keep it, it's notable" !votes from peeps who didn't even bother to sign their bleeping posts. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells•Otter chirps)} 19:52, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Extremely weak keep I've added in one reliable source I could find searching through Google News, but to be quite honest, there are not many reliable sources for this meme. Still think it should be kept, but tagged with {{refimprove}}.struck because it's already tagged with it Kesac (talk) 20:45, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete per WP:NOTDICDEF and WP:V. The phrase isn't as globally recognised as the internet abbreviation/slang word LOL which has even found it's way into the dictionary now. ——Ryan | t • c 21:24, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge and redirect to Image macro. Sources can be found that explain it but not enough coverage for notability. --Snigbrook ^(talk) 22:13, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Although I'm not sure if image macro is notable. Maybe merge to List of Internet phenomena instead. --Snigbrook ^(talk) 22:18, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Changed opinion about suggested merge target: List of Internet phenomena, not image macro (see my comments in particular the one above this and my reply to user:Memset). --Snigbrook ^(talk) 12:25, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Merge/Redirect to image macro or interenet phenomena list. These things very rarely have enough non-trivial coverage for a standalone article but can serve readers as a part of a list. --Rividian (talk) 22:54, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak keep, a few sources do exist (Tiger Weekly, Toronto Star, and this book: [1]) and permit short article in compliance to WP:V. Merging into an article describing several of those memes is possible, but no such article exists at the moment; Image macro is unsuitable because the article in question is not only about the owl picture but also about the "O RLY?" expression itself; List of Internet phenomena is intended as an overview linking to specific articles. -- memset (talk) 21:19, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The List of Internet phenomena includes a few that do not have separate articles, for example Kersal Massive (actually that one was deleted as the result of AFD, recreated after DRV, and deleted/protected, incorrectly as CSD G4 and apparently out of process, but there are others that do not have their own articles). --Snigbrook ^(talk) 22:37, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Kersal Massive was unanimously found non-notable in its AfD entry, in fact it should be removed from List of Internet phenomena. If O RLY is notable (I think it is, and notability wasn't really questioned this time) and there is more than a single sentence of verifiable content about it, it should have either a seperate article or a section in some article. The list will become too bloated if we start to merge complete articles into it. -- memset (talk) 13:24, 26 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Kersal Massive was deleted as the result of the unanimous AFD on 26 December 2006, and a new version was restored via deletion review on 6 November 2007. I am not saying that it should still be a separate article, and would support a merge/redirect if it was relisted at AFD, but I think it should be restored to allow useful content to be merged to its entry at List of Internet phenomena. Returning to the topic being discussed here, I also think the O RLY? article should also be merged and redirected. There is not enough coverage in reliable sources, and the sources in the article are useful for the understanding of the meme, but the majority do not constitute coverage of it. --Snigbrook ^(talk) 23:14, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep, I was actually looking for this term. I strongly agree with Memset here. — N-true (talk) 13:27, 26 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Neutral. I'd note that as an "internet phenomenon" sourcing for this article, almost by definition, is going to be difficult to acquire and largely limited to forums and newsgroups. If the primary sources for this were books, then it wouldn't be an internet phenomenon. —Astarf (talk) 19:36, 26 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Forums and newsgroups are not reliable sources, and give no indication of importance. The Lolcat article has more sources, and asserts notability, but it looks like only one reliable source is cited in the O RLY? article. --Snigbrook ^(talk) 12:19, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• STRONG KEEP. NO WAI should you delete this article. O RLY is too famous.--Jack Cox (talk) 20:08, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Question— Why can't this just be reduced to a stub? It's not exactly what I would call a dicdef, as it could still be a valid sub-article with sufficient context. --Mizu onna sango15/水女珊瑚15 01:04, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Strong keep per 2nd voting. --Tbonefin (talk) 19:40, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. O RLY? --FlagFreak ^TALK 20:22, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• RLY Weak Keep. It exists, and there's some evidence of notability in reliable sources, although it's pretty thin. This could very easily be covered as a subsection of the Internet phenomena article, but equally I think there's about enough to justify its own article. Terraxos (talk) 02:16, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. I agree with Memset and Jack Cox. Gizmoguy (talk) 11:56, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. O RLY is important internet history. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.215.247.10 (talk) 16:26, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. It squeaks past, and works better separately. In addition, I'm in favor of restoring at least some of the deletions TenPoundHammer mentioned, as featuring in commercial releases of such things as Steve Jackson Games and Capcom products and prominent anime is not trivial for something like this. --Kizor 19:56, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak keep, as it is a rather popular Internet meme, if not, merged into List of Internet phenomena ≈ The Haunted Angel 21:21, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Ya'll suckas be hating, o rly be making, your money yo cars, that sheet takes it far, orly kicks but, gota funky ol' strut, beat's your best page, well off da gauge, so don't try to front, you'll all take da brunt, of orly's 'leet force, He'll win- Of Course.... Wack ass sucaks be fronting on da owl, he out on da prowl, gonna kick down yo door, don't post here no more- fool65.185.93.86 (talk) 01:56, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete unless notability established. Existing references talk about the notability of Something Awful, 4chan, and the Hooting virus. However, the references do not establish why the meme itself is notable. At best, merge/redirect elsewhere. --Alan Au (talk) 07:36, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep, it seems marginally notable due to all the references it gets in so many different places. Everyking (talk) 08:12, 31 May 2008 (UTC)'[reply]
• Merge witg internet phenomena- that's what it is, just with a few sources. Lunakeet 13:29, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge with List of Internet phenomena or transwiki to Appendix:Internet slang. —Animum (talk) 16:33, 1 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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.