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Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Silent protagonist

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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. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 05:53, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Silent protagonist

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Silent protagonist (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

This article has no references. It does not assert notability. The topic seems to be discussed on things like message boards, but it does not seem to be the subject of multiple reliable secondary sources. As such, the whole article is original research. Croctotheface 21:42, 28 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • If there exist sources, so be it. As a rule, I certainly don't prefer deleting articles to not deleting them, but this is a tertiary source. If we are just assembling material from primary sources, or echoing the work of people on message boards who have done the same thing, then we are outside the scope of this wiki. There is now a single footnote. The subject of that footnote is NOT the phenomenon of a silent protagonist. As it stands, I don't see any evidence that this topic has been the subject of a single secondary source. How can we verify this information? I see no basis for users expressing such STRONG desire to keep this article when it seems to fail every conceivable test we could articulate. If there are sources, please find them and cite them. If the subject is notable and if the article becomes referenced, I would support keeping it. However, I just don't see the sources. I see people who WP:ILIKEIT the article and believe it could be sourced. Well, it's not. It hasn't been. If it were newly created, I suspect that it would have trouble sticking around because it does not assert that it has been the subject of the kinds of sources that encyclopedia articles are supposed to be based upon. Croctotheface 10:10, 2 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Meh. The truth is that video game art criticism is rather thin on the ground, at present. Other than the coverage at TVTropes.org, I know of very little serious structural analysis of video game plots and story conventions. Nevertheless, the phenomena of the silent protagonist is very well known, and we don't always have to be a tertiary source. Anyway, would a "List of silent protagonists in video games" be more acceptable to your standards of notability? Thanks, Luc "Somethingorother" French 13:09, 2 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The problem isn't that this article lacks sources for its content, thereby failing WP:V (though it does do that, which is not exactly a point in favor of the article). The problem is that the article lacks sources that show us that this TOPIC has any kind of currency in secondary sources, which, contrary to the above assertion, are the kinds of sources that encyclopedias are built upon. If we are synthesizing material from primary sources, then we are engaging in original research, which is outside the scope of WIkipedia. Croctotheface 06:17, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Are any of those sources ABOUT this topic, or do they just mention it? In other words, they go for notability, not just verifiability? If they do go to notability, then great, let's fix the article. Croctotheface 09:08, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Lack of sources is no cause for deletion for an article on a notable subject, just for a {{unreferenced}} template--Victor falk 09:47, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not thrilled that I need to explain my argument yet again after making like five comments on this page already, but I never said that unreferenced meant not notable. Maybe it was a mistake to have "this article cites no sources" as the first sentence in my nomination, since it seems that some people didn't read past that. I think I've been very clear about this point, including in the above comment that you responded to. We need evidence of notability. It is my contention that the current article does not assert notability. It does not assert notability by pointing to sources because it has none. The article reads as though this concept is basically exclusive to video games and there are a few other cases such as Mr. Bean and Silent Bob. From the article, I don't see any evidence that this is not OR. Victor, your comment on the talk page seems to belie the whole article, basically. So it's possible that the concept is notable, but it really needs to be fixed in a major way. All the content that is there now is basically an original synthesis of people playing a video game and saying, "Well, the playable character never speaks, so I'd better write it up in Wikipedia." There could be an article here, and I would be happy if one came about, but right now, I don't see why what's there now is appropriate for an encyclopedia. Croctotheface 09:59, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, perhaps others are not thrilled that instead of fixing the article through normal editing you have chosen to send it to AfD. Per WP:AFD - If you can fix the article through normal editing, then it is not a good candidate for AfD. I will start to go through some of those sources to establish which might best help address the article's needs. Benjiboi 10:31, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
At the time I nominated, I did not see any evidence that it could be fixed. It's not my responsibility to prove that the concept is not notable if the article does not assert notability itself. Croctotheface 01:35, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
These seem to be decent source material and can be viewed by anyone whereas most on the Scholar search were subscription journals of one sort or another. Benjiboi 11:32, 3 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
At the time I nominated, I did not see any evidence that it could be fixed. It's not my responsibility to prove that the concept is not notable if the article does not assert notability itself. Croctotheface 01:34, 4 October 2007 (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.
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