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 delete. There's no doubt that there are sources which talk about this. The only question is whether they are independent, reliable sources. The consensus here seems to be that they are not --
RoySmith(talk) 00:02, 5 May 2014 (UTC)reply
Article has no
reliable sources, and I doubt that any can be found; I certainly didn't find any with a web search.
The main source for this article is a website called ufoevidence.org, which
copied an article from
about.com (dead link).
QVVERTYVS (
hm?) 11:21, 25 April 2014 (UTC)reply
delete as non-notable.
Mangoe (
talk) 12:40, 25 April 2014 (UTC)reply
That is irrelevant to the deletion debate. We don't treat Wikipedia as a reliable source, see
WP:OTHERSTUFF. SpinningSpark 10:48, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Another credible source to support the article's validity:
[7]— Preceding
unsigned comment added by
184.145.91.252 (
talk •
contribs) 10:06, 26 April 2014
A couple of points on conventions here:
Please sign your posts
Please do not alter the posts of others as you did
here,
here and
here. I have reverted those edits. If you are user Shinyam, as I suspect you are, then you should log in before making such alterations. In any event, we would prefer you not to alter posts people have already replied to and instead make a new post. If you wish to retract something strike it through like this. SpinningSpark 10:48, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Thanks for the tips. Newbie here.
Shinyam (
talk) 11:25, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
A lot of this coverage is about
John E. Mack's investigation into this incident (or the film subsequently made of it) and seems to be itself notable. By the way, if you are relying on Gnews to find news articles I think the archive search has become thorougly broken, it no longer seems to find anything other than recent material. I really do not believe there were no news items on
Princess Diana between 1990 and 2009, which includes the year of her death. SpinningSpark 14:21, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Your sources are about the film or the filmmaker. Do you have any sources that cover the alleged incident only - independently of the claims of the film or the filmmaker? -
LuckyLouie (
talk) 14:50, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Let me explain a bit further. Our ostensible article concerns
extraordinary claims i.e. space aliens landed and spoke with schoolchildren, so we need to find objective, non-
fringe sources rather than the claims of Randy Nickerson and
John E. Mack that are associated with the promotion of a film. So far, I don't see evidence of notability for the "incident", but possibly for a film about it, and given that, it's possibly deserving of a paragraph at
John E. Mack. -
LuckyLouie (
talk) 15:17, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Yes, the articles are about the film, but they also discuss the incident. For instance from the Cape Times;
During morning break on September 14 of that year, 62 schoolchildren between the ages of eight and 12 saw a strange craft land 150 metres from the Ariel School in Ruwa, from which two small beings emerged which were described as having "big eyes like rugby balls". The children's individual descriptions of the phenomenon were so similar that news of the sighting spread around the globe.
I'm not going to go looking for reliable sources claiming this to be true. There won't be any because it is a heap of bollocks. That does not mean that the incident is not notable—it has still had a lot of coverage. SpinningSpark 15:58, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
No, I didn't mean we should find RS claiming it to be true. I meant we need RS showing in depth coverage of reports of the incident itself. If all we've got is sources describing it in relation to the promotion of a film from the filmmakers perspective, it's impossible to write an objective article about the incident itself. -
LuckyLouie (
talk) 16:22, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Well, there's
this article from Bulawayo News 24. They do mention Mack's visit but nothing about the film. SpinningSpark 17:02, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Comment-While it could be interesting-you can't possibly have a page for everyone who claims to have seen a UFO-which of course they really are weather balloons really most of the time-which I heard a news story on why people tend to think at times the weather ballons are UFO's I don't remember what it was though. Iffy on this.
Wgolf (
talk) 15:12, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Delete, possibly leaving a redirect. I removed the unreliable sources (e.g. YouTube videos and a loon website) and we're left with an interview with Cynthia Hind and a book by Cynthia Hind. Guy (
Help!) 21:36, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Comment -
User:JzG: did you see/read the sources listed above in this discussion?
NorthAmerica1000 12:25, 1 May 2014 (UTC)reply
Weak delete - there are some sources but I'm not sure they constitute (together) significant coverage in independent sources. Maybe they do, I dunno. All of the sources seem to have the same genesis and it's not really clear whether that's the kids or Hind.
Stalwart111 12:08, 28 April 2014 (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.
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 delete. There's no doubt that there are sources which talk about this. The only question is whether they are independent, reliable sources. The consensus here seems to be that they are not --
RoySmith(talk) 00:02, 5 May 2014 (UTC)reply
Article has no
reliable sources, and I doubt that any can be found; I certainly didn't find any with a web search.
The main source for this article is a website called ufoevidence.org, which
copied an article from
about.com (dead link).
QVVERTYVS (
hm?) 11:21, 25 April 2014 (UTC)reply
delete as non-notable.
Mangoe (
talk) 12:40, 25 April 2014 (UTC)reply
That is irrelevant to the deletion debate. We don't treat Wikipedia as a reliable source, see
WP:OTHERSTUFF. SpinningSpark 10:48, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Another credible source to support the article's validity:
[7]— Preceding
unsigned comment added by
184.145.91.252 (
talk •
contribs) 10:06, 26 April 2014
A couple of points on conventions here:
Please sign your posts
Please do not alter the posts of others as you did
here,
here and
here. I have reverted those edits. If you are user Shinyam, as I suspect you are, then you should log in before making such alterations. In any event, we would prefer you not to alter posts people have already replied to and instead make a new post. If you wish to retract something strike it through like this. SpinningSpark 10:48, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Thanks for the tips. Newbie here.
Shinyam (
talk) 11:25, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
A lot of this coverage is about
John E. Mack's investigation into this incident (or the film subsequently made of it) and seems to be itself notable. By the way, if you are relying on Gnews to find news articles I think the archive search has become thorougly broken, it no longer seems to find anything other than recent material. I really do not believe there were no news items on
Princess Diana between 1990 and 2009, which includes the year of her death. SpinningSpark 14:21, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Your sources are about the film or the filmmaker. Do you have any sources that cover the alleged incident only - independently of the claims of the film or the filmmaker? -
LuckyLouie (
talk) 14:50, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Let me explain a bit further. Our ostensible article concerns
extraordinary claims i.e. space aliens landed and spoke with schoolchildren, so we need to find objective, non-
fringe sources rather than the claims of Randy Nickerson and
John E. Mack that are associated with the promotion of a film. So far, I don't see evidence of notability for the "incident", but possibly for a film about it, and given that, it's possibly deserving of a paragraph at
John E. Mack. -
LuckyLouie (
talk) 15:17, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Yes, the articles are about the film, but they also discuss the incident. For instance from the Cape Times;
During morning break on September 14 of that year, 62 schoolchildren between the ages of eight and 12 saw a strange craft land 150 metres from the Ariel School in Ruwa, from which two small beings emerged which were described as having "big eyes like rugby balls". The children's individual descriptions of the phenomenon were so similar that news of the sighting spread around the globe.
I'm not going to go looking for reliable sources claiming this to be true. There won't be any because it is a heap of bollocks. That does not mean that the incident is not notable—it has still had a lot of coverage. SpinningSpark 15:58, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
No, I didn't mean we should find RS claiming it to be true. I meant we need RS showing in depth coverage of reports of the incident itself. If all we've got is sources describing it in relation to the promotion of a film from the filmmakers perspective, it's impossible to write an objective article about the incident itself. -
LuckyLouie (
talk) 16:22, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Well, there's
this article from Bulawayo News 24. They do mention Mack's visit but nothing about the film. SpinningSpark 17:02, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Comment-While it could be interesting-you can't possibly have a page for everyone who claims to have seen a UFO-which of course they really are weather balloons really most of the time-which I heard a news story on why people tend to think at times the weather ballons are UFO's I don't remember what it was though. Iffy on this.
Wgolf (
talk) 15:12, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Delete, possibly leaving a redirect. I removed the unreliable sources (e.g. YouTube videos and a loon website) and we're left with an interview with Cynthia Hind and a book by Cynthia Hind. Guy (
Help!) 21:36, 26 April 2014 (UTC)reply
Comment -
User:JzG: did you see/read the sources listed above in this discussion?
NorthAmerica1000 12:25, 1 May 2014 (UTC)reply
Weak delete - there are some sources but I'm not sure they constitute (together) significant coverage in independent sources. Maybe they do, I dunno. All of the sources seem to have the same genesis and it's not really clear whether that's the kids or Hind.
Stalwart111 12:08, 28 April 2014 (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.