Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Series of tubes

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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. Wizardman 17:18, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Series of tubes

Series of tubes (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

no reliable sources younger than a year, the article pretty much says it was a temporary item of news, and was only made to live longer by virtue of being a running gag on Jon Stewart. Also, a lot of the references look very suspect, like Fark, Youtube, and Neopets Will (talk) 02:06, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Previously nominated here. Will (talk) 02:08, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
If you think it needs more recent references, here are three 2007 books you could use. Dicklyon (talk) 03:40, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep or Merge I still see this used all the time and I think it needs to be covered, on its own page or elsewhere. BJTalk 02:15, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Protest -- the article has not been given an AfD tag, so this discussion is out of line. Dicklyon (talk) 03:00, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment added the tag, I don't think the hour time difference matters. BJTalk 03:04, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • OK, then keep, in agreement with the others. Dicklyon (talk) 03:30, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep, per BJ. -- RattleMan 03:10, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep. Notable enough and well written. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 03:23, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep, more than one article about the phrase in the paper of record, for goodness sake. · jersyko talk 04:39, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Weak Keep I sent my vote through the series of tubes, and it arrived. If there were no tubes, how would the internet work? Notability is established. Alansohn (talk) 04:52, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep The internet is not a truck! Oh, and it is pretty notable, given the circumstances it was spoken in... Master of Puppets Care to share? 05:53, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep - I concur that it's notable enough to merit inclusion. Was widely reported, and the term is still used regularly. Aussielocust (talk) 06:04, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep Widely used in media and online. Scienceman123 talk 06:35, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep Notable meme across several internet communities. CWC 12:34, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete and transwiki we as wikipedians, need to take a step back and ask ourselves if what is basically a gag on the Jon Stewart show deserves an article in an encyclopedia. The target audience for The Daily Show is pretty much identical to the group that edits wikipedia is it not? To elevate a silly analogy used on one occasion to a lengthy and well sourced article is worrying, not laudable. If Jon Stewart is ever stalked he would do well to consider the IPs of the editors who wrote this article. There is no possibility of this article being deleted now and I am not going to make myself popular, but I urge people to take a step back and consider how silly this makes wikipedia look. I remember sadly confirming that Steven Colbert was correct when he mocked the standards of a encyclopedia that has more information on Truthiness than it does on Lutheranism - something which is still the case after about 2 years. Hell, Truthiness is a featured article. You see, what Colbert did not understand is that for there to be a wikipedia article on something, people have to care enough about it to write it up. Though there are far more devout Lutherans than there are Daily Show obsessives, within the demographic of wikipedia editors this is clearly not the case. Who remembers the days when clicking on "random article" would most likely give you a Pokemon article or something about a fantasy world monster of some kind? Wikipedia is all about who contributes. So 20 something editors like ourselves should try and understand that we cause this bias in wikipedia and try to control ourselves, in order that we don't bring further mockery and derision down on wikipedia as a (literal) collection of jokes (which are ruined by this kind of obsessive treatment in any case.) If I was Jon Stewart, and I saw the millions of words on wikipedia devoted to him and his show and everything he has ever discussed I would be very scared indeed. Lobojo (talk) 14:42, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    Comment, articles on this subject have appeared in The New York Times and other major media. Calling this phrase merely "a gag on the Jon Stewart show [sic]" is a oversimplification. Also, the solution to the problems you perceive regarding the relative coverage of certain topics on Wikipedia is to fix the disparity by adding to articles. I fail to see how this concern is a ground to delete anything. · jersyko talk 15:08, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    Oh please, it was mentioned in a trivial fashion at the end of a diary entry. Anyway you need multiple, and the daily show is not a reliable news source. I mean Jesus! Imagine if every diary entry in a newspaper got its own article! This is just so, so lame. You know you are a "digging" when you start bringing "Digg" as a source. This is all BS. I could summarize the article into 100 words and move it. Not only that but the whole damn thing is comprised of an original synthesis. The whole time-line of how it was popularised needs to go, since that is not sourced anywhere. As do all the quotes where it is used in the daily show. Wikipedia does not list Daily Show gags - this is obvious. The NYT article does not even mention the "series of tubes" comment. This needs to be moved to wikitionary. PS I am sorry I didn't cite the name of the show properly I know how important it is to some people. Lobojo (talk) 16:55, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    Um, don't mind me when I say that this phrase has been used by pretty much everybody ever. I heard it used on radio stations as I was traveling across Canada, news shows in the U.S... it is a pretty big deal, seeing that it was spoken by someone who was making decisions for a nation, and should've known what he was talking about, but frankly didn't. And yes, it has been mentioned in NYT (and TIME, I think... I'll have to dig around my collection). Also, if Wikipedia is not a repository of Daily Show gags, does that mean it is a repository for SNL gags? Master of Puppets Care to share? 17:36, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    I agree it belongs in wiktionary, not here. Once you remove the OR, extendel quotations section and blogs, that is what you are left with. Are you suggesting that every dumb error that a politician makes needs an encyclopedia article? The fact that it has become a widely used and notable phris not ase means that it belongs in wikitioary, not here. It has been mentioned in hundreds of news sources as it happens, that is not relevant here though. Its notablity is not in question. Lobojo (talk) 17:39, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    So then I don't understand why it isn't deserving of an article. Yes, I agree that it can be worked on, and the 'video game citations' and whatnot should be integrated into the main article. However, I don't think it should be outright deleted. What about Bushisms? That has kept its own article for a good number of years. This one could be used in Criticism of George W. Bush, for example. Master of Puppets Care to share? 17:50, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    We are in complete agreement then, neither do I. I mention belongs in the artilce in the politician and another mention in the article on the daily show. Lobojo (talk) 18:51, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    Of course not every flub deserves an article. Only those with significant coverage in multiple independent sources meet wikipedia's notability criterion. Dicklyon (talk) 17:51, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    Lame late reply, actually, this is the NYT article I was referring to. That's not a diary entry, that's an article devoted entirely to the phrase. Anyway, I'll leave it there, no reason to belabor the argument any further than necessary. · jersyko talk 21:55, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep. This deletion debate is a series of nonsense, as this article has notability. ViperSnake151 17:09, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep. Notable, referenced, verified.- (User) WolfKeeper (Talk) 17:49, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep There are whole stories about this on ABC.com, LA Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, etc. Not just stories which mention it, but stories either entirely about the Stevens remarks and the backlash, or about Internet memes generally which lead off with tubes as a notable example. <eleland/talkedits> 18:13, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete or transwiki to wikiquotes. This is essentially an internet meme; a phrase used by a well-known person which caught the interest and attention of the popular press. An analogy would be Nixon's plain cloth coat; this is covered in United_States_presidential_election,_1952#The_Fall_Campaign, and given more attention in Checkers speech. That speech was significant, not just for the subject matter, but because of the person who gave it (then Republican VP candidate, later President of the US) and the fact that it was a groundbreaking use of TV for political purposes. And, for all that, there's no plain cloth coat article, just a passing mention in a couple of other articles. That is about the level of attention it deserves. If we wrote an encyclopedia article on every dumb thing said by a politician in public, we'd run out of electrons to write with. Our job is to document things which are notable, not be part of the process of making them notable. -- RoySmith (talk) 18:42, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    See Bushisms. Also, having significant press coverage seems to make something notable, don't you think? Master of Puppets Care to share? 18:46, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
    Bush is a sitting president, Stevens is a senator. Things presidents do are more notable than things senators do. And, bushisms is not about any particular thing he said, but about a long series of things he's said over time. I could see this being notable enough to mention in an article about Stevens. Or in an article about network neutrality, but it's not notable enough to justify an article on its own. And, no, I don't think significant media coverage is inherently sufficient to demand a wikipedia article. That's what wikinews is for. -- RoySmith (talk) 19:55, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Redirect to Ted Stevens#Internet and network neutrality. That section covers it well enough. Colonel Warden (talk) 02:04, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep per the existence of multiple sources, and the fact that it's a fairly extensive article, demonstrating its notability in a way.--h i s s p a c e r e s e a r c h 02:11, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep, obviously there will not be sources that are older than a year for a concept that was created a year ago. Sourcing is sufficient. Axem Titanium (talk) 22:25, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep or Merge I just looked this phrase up and was glad to see a Wikipedia article about it. The whole Net Neutrality Debate makes this topic relevant. So Merge it into Net Neutrality or keep it. Swilk (talk) 04:08, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep and certainly do not merge. --Kieran Bennett (talk) 11:47, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
  • keep What a great page! 78.151.159.41 (talk) 23:02, 28 December 2007 (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.