Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of songs about weather

=[[List of songs about weather]]=

:{{la|List of songs about weather}} – (View AfD)(View log)

WP:NOT violations galore with list of songs a topic.. articles. About 10 have been nominated and deleted recently so I'm just going to pile together all the ones that fit the same bill.

Included in this nomination are:

Bulldog123 16:26, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Strong Delete as nom Bulldog123 16:50, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Speedy Delete All Rackabello 16:54, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete all I can't stop laughing. Who knew? YechielMan 17:13, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete per the arguments given in all the previous discussions, in particular WP:LC. If somebody wants to transwiki, maybe to the [http://music.wikia.com/ Music Wikia]? (Just a thought.) --B. Wolterding 18:23, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • delete all thank goodness someone finally went and just compiled these. i was sick of them showing up on here every day. Barsportsunlimited 19:32, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete x 26. Indiscriminate, loosely associated, blah, blah. Deor 19:44, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Nuke the lot of 'em! (Well, maybe not the one about tequila. Hell, nuke it too.) WP:NOT. WP:NOT. WP:NOT. --Evb-wiki 19:52, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Goodness. Goes to show you can make a list of almost anything, can't you? Hmm... List of items my cat clawed the hell out of... nah, it'd be huge. Delete Tony Fox (arf!) review? 20:29, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete all. With fire, preferably. Universally unsourced, indiscriminate, and generally useless. Zetawoof(ζ) 20:51, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletions. -- -- pb30<talk> 20:57, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Music-related deletions. -- -- pb30<talk> 20:57, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete, WP:NOT. --Tone 21:32, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete - Let's do it all in a row and video tape it. A whole lot of not. Cool Bluetalk to me 23:01, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep all. It would be a better use of editors' time to establish a consensus guideline that clearly addressed the issue of "List of songs about topics." There is some residue from previous discussions that suggests that work should be started up again. Regarding these specific nominees, I'm here because of List of songs about the environment. I came across that list a few weeks ago and found it interesting but clearly incomplete (and incapable of being "complete"). I added Little Boxes, which clearly fits any criteria that could be devised for a list with this name. I spent some time looking for other ommissions and for songs that didn't belong there, and I planned to do more. While I now know that this effort was to some, both sickening and laughable, I do not know what Policy clearly demands the erasure of this work. What the list of environmental songs needs is a link to an appropriate article or section on Songs about the environment or Environmental protest songs, or even Protest songs, where such a list would be needed and would be a useful research tool. I do not agree that most of these lists are WP:NOT. Their problem is WP:V, for the songs that do not already have articles (especially those that never will), and ongoing article maintenance. Most of these lists need cleanup and editing help, which should have been begun, or at least proposed, prior to initiating AfD. I realize that this multiple-list nomination is an efficient way for regular AfD participants to handle a bunch of stuff they don't like, but since this one nomination could eliminate thousands of edits by hundreds of editors, based on the particpation of a few dozen (mostly) flippant members and one administrator, it seems to me to be wholly inappropriate.--Hjal 23:45, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

:Update: There is a Protest song article, but no longer a List of protest songs. Look at the current state of the article, which must, in part, result from the deletion of the related list, then look at the January 2006 version: [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Protest_song&oldid=36021372]. It is much easier to deal with problematic entries in simple lists than to have to maintain oversight of paragraphs such as those in the current version. It is certainly easier to write a balanced article when a list is available to place legitimate, but marginal, information.--Hjal 00:11, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Keep all and try to develop a general policy about these lists, just as with the lists about people. It's easy to find fault with a particular list, but there is no present WP policy against this type of article, and I doubt they would be general agreement among WPedians. This is a topic for a centralized discussion. DGG 02:02, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment Granted, some of these lists are of limited interest or too broad (like "songs about weather"-- If 'Itsy Bitsy Spider' isn't on there, it's incomplete....) Some of these lists may sound like clues on The $25,000 Pyramid, but some might have relevance. I suggest a line-item veto. Bulldog has scanned these, and some aren't that great. The ones that might have a good concept, IMHO:

As for the rest, I'm sure there are plenty of songs about motorcycles and cars, zodiac signs, streetwalkers, Pakistan, radios, dogs, tequila, dance moves, video games, death, children and childhood, non-nuclear end of the world (as we know it). Lots and lots of country songs about divorce, cheatin', etc. But are these a reflection of popular culture, or have they ever been? Mandsford 02:22, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Weak Keep Yes, several of these lists are much too broad. Yes, attribution is sorely lacking in several of these articles. However, this nomination is much too broad. I'd rather see these go up for deletion one at a time than in a mass AfD. --Transfinite (Talk / Contribs) 02:57, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Look, there's always going to be someone unsatisfied. Either there will be OTHERCRAPEXIST complaints or "Don't mass AFD" complaints. My advice would just be to point out the ones you feel are absolutely necessary to keep. Otherwise, I don't see why we can't break a few eggs to make an omelet. There isn't a single list on there that couldn't be re-made if the contents were ABSOLUTELY DESPERATELY NEEDED. So why are we keeping dozens of horrible lists just because a few might have potential for recreation with sources and an all-together better article? Why not just userfy the ones that have potential and then recreate them? So much easier and more progressive. Bulldog123 03:19, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete all the precedents have been uniform or at least lately they have been; let's finish the job so that we move on. There are no real keepers in here; I made an argument about keeping the suicide songs because their effects on society (litigation usually) and that can be a stand alone article as could fears of nuclear war during the 1980's and how that was reflected in music (assuming some WP:RSes have already hit upon the connection) ditto car crash songs; school; and all the rest of them. Carlossuarez46 04:32, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete all Yes, they are interesting. Yes, a lot of people have worked on them. No, they don't belong in an encyclopaedia. If the topic itself is somehow encyclopaedic, it would be best to use well-chosen songs as textual examples to elucidate upon whatever specific topic and not to simply list songs which, as has been pointed out, often times are only tangentially related. GassyGuy 10:50, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Speedy Keep Equal to AfD debate on 9 September 2006, The result was No Consensus.

Besides, this is a group nomination, and this is not the intent of the deletion policy. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of songs about drugs for a previous mass deletion. --Patrick1982 13:26, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

:* As for "equal" debates: We had a number of very similar discussions recently, such as Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of songs about sleep and many more, where the discussion resulted in delete. That's not directly an argument however. Still, I think we deleted enough similar lists with similar arguments (the most prominent of them are given above in the discussion) to justify discussing the next set of examples in one batch, rather than 26 individually. --B. Wolterding 13:38, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Delete all - vague standard for inclusion. Many of the songs included on the lists are not "about" the topic but instead merely mention the topic in the lyrics or have a particular word in the lyrics or title and what with Wikipedia not being a directory of loosely-associated topics this doesn't wash. There are many precedents for similar lists being deleted recently and these don't appear to be any better. To address some of the specific keep comments: it's true that some of these lists have been considered for deletion previously and remained as either keep or no consensus. However, consensus can change and, especially in a no consensus closure from 10 months ago, it's not unreasonable considering the recent deletions of a number of similar lists to revisit these. While mass nominations can be problematic in determining consensus, they are not forbidden by policy and IMHO seeking to procedurally keep these lists on the basis of the form of the nomination is not a compelling argument. The nomination and the comments in support of it riase compelling arguments for deletion and seeking a closure on procedural grounds does not rebut those points. Otto4711 14:48, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Note I have invited particpation from several projects that may be interested in or affected by the outcome of this discussion, at Wikipedia:WikiProject Songs, Wikipedia talk:Lists (stand-alone lists), and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Music. Several of the individual lists nominated for deletion appear to fall into other, more specific, Wikiprojects, but I don't have time to deal them individually. It would seem to be good practice to make notification of affected projects an obligatory step in the AfD process. BTW, is there an article deletion project somewhere?--Hjal 16:31, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
  • I was going to protest that the nuclear war one could still be useful (in relation to the Nuclear weapons in popular culture article), but going through it, many if not most of the songs have barely any actual reference to nuclear weapons at all, it is just a hodge-podge of original research and songs which feature the word "nuclear" in any context. Bleh. --Fastfission 22:44, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

:*Comment That is not a trivial point, but, it can still be useful (and encyclopedic). It is partially annotated now, and it should have more work done on it, including some culling. Couldn't a reader or user coming to that list from the article you mentioned be interested in songs that refer to nuclear war in different ways? Anti-war protest songs? Allegorical references? Space opera? Tempestuous love affairs? A list allows for annotation or sorting as it develops. I just added the dynamic_list template and edited the opening paragraph to read as follows: This is a list of songs in which the primary subject is nuclear war, whether actual, contemplated, or imagined, or that include an explicit reference to nuclear war or use of nuclear weapons in the title. Link or annotate the entries to indicate their content, with appropriate citations." What do you think?--Hjal 05:06, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Keep all I do not see where WP:NOT is violated in any of the lists. The songs in the list are not at all loosely associated, as it was argued, they are closely associated with the topic of the list. In my opinion the content can be useful for some readers. There might be mistakes in the lists that require cleanup but that does not affect the value of the list itself. doxTxob \ talk 01:59, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • "Can be useful for some readers" is not a valid argument. For the loosely associated lists, I would like to quote WP:LC: "A 'list of X' should only be created if X itself is a legitimate encyclopedic topic that already has its own article." Since there is nothing encyclopedic to tell on "song about tequila", or the like, there's no point in keeping a list of such songs. It's just a random intersection of two concepts, song and tequila. That's also the reason why these lists are so arbitrary: If an article "X" existed, then it would hopefully be clear what the good examples are that need to be included in "list of X". But in the current state, the lists just contain any song that would contain the word "tequila", or similar. --B. Wolterding 08:22, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • The list should start with a better statement about the criteria for inclusion, I think, but it does tie to an encyclopedic section of an article, at Tequila#Popular culture:

:::{{see also|List of songs about tequila}}

:::Tequila is a common topic of popular culture, ranging from films that simply use the name, such as Tequila Sunrise (film) (1988) to songs about the drink. According to Tom Robbins's book Still Life with Woodpecker tequila is the preferred drink of outlaws. Sandra Lee of the Food Network refers to tequila as "her friend." In song, tequila is diversely portrayed, ranging from Jimmy Buffett's semi-serious Margaritaville to The Eagles' maudlin Tequila Sunrise. Tequila even enters the popular news media. For example, Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic outburst when arrested for drunk driving was attributed to tequila consumption.{{cite web | url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15235573/ | title=Mel Gibson didn’t mean what he said: ‘Road Warrior’ continues to blame tequila, not himself, for bigoted rant | author=Popkin, Helen A.S. | date=2006-08-16 | publisher=MSNBC}} Sammy Hagar, rock star (singer of the bar anthem "Mas Tequila"{{cite web | url=http://www.sing365.com/music/Lyric.nsf/Mas-Tequila-lyrics-Sammy-Hagar/61E79E2880E2A15148256EDE000F957A | title=Mas Tequila lyrics}}) and owner of Cabo Wabo Tequila described tequila's stigma as, "the stuff that you go, 'I will never drink that as long as I live,' and you have gotten sick in college on rot-gut tequila." This image of tequila as the instigator of particularly egregious intoxication and hangovers is pervasive in references to the drink in popular culture,{{cite web | url=http://www.tequilaaficionado.com/article.php?sid=133 | title=Interview with Sammy Hagar from Cabo Wabo Tequila | publisher=Tequila Aficionado Magazine | year=2006}}

:::*In a way, that precisely illustrates my point. There is no article "tequila song"; and if someone created it, it would probably be deleted due to lack of notability. There is, of course, an article about "tequila", and that one refers in one sentence to songs about tequila. Expanding this to a whole list of all(?) songs that refer to tequila is not an encyclopedic addition to the topic "tequila"; rather it is mere trivia. In fact, articles of the type "References to X in popular culture", whether in list form or not, are usually regarded as problematic, as described in WP:POPCULTURE. --B. Wolterding 14:32, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Delete all - per previous reasoning. Haven't got anything to add that hasn't already been said, the reasons for removal are pretty compelling. DarkSaber2k 12:15, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete all. We can have equally useless and unmaintainable "List of songs about ..." for hundredths of thousands of topics. Pavel Vozenilek 15:20, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep all (although there are some I would delete if presented individually I won't support the mass removal). These have been poorly maintained, but it would not be "impossible" to maintain them. These sorts of indexes are useful and cannot be created/replaced through the usual wikipedia means. We discourage articles on marginally notable songs, so categories wouldn't work well. I'd like to see a higher threshold for inclusion (e.g. each song listed must link to an wikipedia album article or be supported by a citation from an external source), and possibly some well-sourced text to introduce the list. -MrFizyx 16:54, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep All I don't see where any of them fall under the deletion criteria. And as for what Wikipedia is not....it is not paper. - T-75|talk|contribs 20:08, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete All! Now! Songs about Pakistan? Why not about Kiribati, or Lesotho? —JackLumber/tɔk/ 21:56, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • I do hope whomever closes this is a reader and not just a counter. There is simply too much being lumped together here. -MrFizyx 23:10, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • As do I, because if the closing admin is a reader, he won't need to count. Let's have a review of the keep arguments:
  • Keep because I don't get why we're deleting them
  • Keep because I don't like mass nominations
  • Keep because the list rocks
  • Yup, really strong arguments. Any one who closes this AFD as is with a no consensus or keep is just asking for a deletion review. Bulldog123 02:46, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Reply: First, my comment above was not targeted so much at you, Bulldog123 or anyone providing an argument as it was at the many editors who are swooping in, voting "delete" on a list of 26 articles (without reading them), making some joke, and moving on. Second, your characterization of the debate is of course entirely false, but then again a reader will know this. I'll pass for now on posturing by putting my own spin on the deletion arguments. Lets talk about the one part you got more or less right, my position which you describe as: "Keep because I don't like mass nominations."
  • The problem as I see it is that you cherry picked through :Category:Lists of songs about a topic for, what I assume was in your opinion, the easiest to eliminate. If you really wanted to discuss similar articles, you could have, for example, presented List of songs about Pakistan alongside of List of songs about California, List of songs about New York City, and other, List of songs about {place} articles. Through careful selection, you've managed to avoid all the crazies that come out when you nominate List of songs about masturbation, and I assume you wouldn't dare nominate List of songs about the Vietnam War or List of Halloween songs, because many more editors would immeadiately see the value in these.
  • I have voted "delete" in the other presently occurring "List of songs about..." debates, and I'm not about to defend List of songs that depict radios. Within the 26 articles listed above, however, are lists that connect nicely to encyclopedic topics and some that have survived past VfD/AfD nominations. All deserve a fair hearing. The list you have composed above offers a grouping that is no more significant than the worst of the ones that you would like to see deleted. -MrFizyx 14:11, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
  • I did only select the ones I thought would meet with succes. Had List of songs about masturbation been thrown in, there would have been more people keeping all solely for that one. Bulldog123 20:07, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
  • So you admit it. You didn't really "pile together all the ones that fit the same bill," as you claim in your nomination and that your choices skew the debate by avoiding what you see as the "wrong kind of attention." I think that is reason enough to reject this nomination and ask you to return to doing these one at a time as suggested in the closure of the previous very similar debate from last November. -MrFizyx 21:06, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
  • I DID pile together all the ones that fit the same bill. The masturbation and Vietnams don't fit the bill. Vietnam songs might have some kind of significance so a separate AFD is warranted. The masturbation one underwent and AFD too recently to nominate, and I wouldn't nominate it in bulk anyway because of such strong feelings. I did pick and chose ones, but I don't see that there's anything wrong with that. Bulldog123 01:10, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Reply: Many of these might have some kind of significance, all warrant separate AfDs as a means of determination, not one editor's selections. List of songs involving video games has returned from debates as "keep" three times. -MrFizyx 17:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
  • CommentYes, that's right, there is quite some discussion, but there is quite a list of proposed deletions as well. The problem as I see it is that the lists we are talking about are similar, yet not identical enough to delete them all at once. So it is hard to judge them all together as there is only the option in this case to either delete all or none of them. As Jack Lumber expressed his surprise about "Songs about Pakistan?". Maybe that indicates the right way to go here, take them one at a time. Inspired by B. Wolterdings argument above, I looked at some of the lists and found that quite some songs have articles about them. And when we are talking about "A 'list of X' should only be created if X itself is a legitimate encyclopedic topic that already has its own article.", we should notice that the X is the song on the list, and if you find some songs about a common topic Y that are each encyclopedic enough to have articles the list might be created. That might be a way to figure out the lists that might not be encyclopedic, suggest them for deletion one at a time and find out if their content is encyclopedic enough to stand the test. doxTxob \ talk 23:47, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete All - What purpose could any of these lists possibly serve? Besides maybe a few hours of entertainment for the bored.. ~HJ [talk]@½ -08:45, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep there needs to be a general decision about policy with these, because I think most WPedians would think these lists appropriate, and would want them kept, and improved, not deleted. I understand trying out an article or two to test the waters, but to put them all in like this, when there's even one you say is the best of the lot. It's hard to raise the question when deleting the first one without using 'othercrapexists", so we need to think how we can best evaluate these. When its a general question over a type of article, AfD may not be the place. DGG 05:17, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

:*Comment - as the nominator stated in the nomination, several of these lists have been nominated and deleted in the recent past. The water has been tested. Otto4711 14:46, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

:*Further comment to closing admin: this is DGG's second !vote in this AFD. Otto4711 14:47, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

::Comment AfD's are not a vote, the outcome of the discussion is determined by the quality of arguments, not the number of them. doxTxob \ talk 17:04, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

:::Thank you, I am aware that AFD is not a vote, which is why I put the exclamation point in front of the word "vote" in my comment, which is standard shorthand in XFD discussions. The point still stands that this is the second commment from the person which starts with the bolded word Keep, which is improper, and it is completely reasonable to post a comment drawing attention to that so that the closing admin doesn't misconstrue the bolded word. Otto4711 01:01, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Delete all lists that can never be complete or referenced - including these. By "referenced" I mean for the list, not individual inclusions on it, as that would still leave no evidence of completion, or ability to reference non- inclusion. --Scott Davis Talk 13:47, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete All - they're all just pointless trivia IMO, and there's precedent for them being deleted. FredOrAlive 13:51, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep all - I fail to see why they violate WP:NOT. Also, some may be substandard quality, but others are not. Some of these lists have already survived AFD in the past. As said above, some of them are useful and they closely associated with the topic on hand. --Andromeda 17:07, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete all but "... about bands or musicians", as that seems to be the only one that would be verifiable, and (at least to me) seems more encyclopedic than the rest. The rest are just fluff and can go. Ten Pound Hammer(((Broken clamshellsOtter chirps))) 21:49, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete All per nom. Small enough list for me to not be the same as the prior problem group nom. Unmaintainable. Dimitrii 22:53, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Delete All -- I hereby propose the ULTIMATE LIST TO END ALL LISTS: The List of Things Banned by the Taliban (contents: every single work of art, music, science or literature ever made except the Qu'ran. And most articles of clothing. And many foods. And....)--Mike18xx 05:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment: There are too many unrelated topics here for anyone to defend within the span of an AfD. Lets suppose I were to choose the first, List of songs about weather. First, I need to demonstrate that this is encylopedia worthy. I need to show that these lists have been compiled in reliable sources and that others must find them useful. I might start with these (after a bit of googling):
  • Bob Dylan, "Episode 1: Weather", Theme Time Radio Hour, XM Satellite Radio (Dylan selected weather as the song topic for his first show!)
  • Alan Robock, [http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175/BAMS-86-4-483 "'Tonight as I Stand Inside the Rain': Bob Dylan and Weather Imagery."], Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 86:4, April 2005, p.483-487 (I don't know the contents, but it sounds damn scholarly)
  • Rachelle Oblack, [http://weather.about.com/od/educationalmaterials/ss/songlessonplan_2.htm "Using Weather Songs in the Classroom: A Lesson Guide for Teachers"], weather.about.com (includes lesson plans and pages of "top 10" weather songs by decade dating back to the 1960s)
  • [http://www.abc.net.au/newcastle/stories/s1345080.htm "Wondering whether we have all the weather songs..."], 1233 ABC, Newcastle, NSW (list compiled by a radio station)
  • Rikky Rooksby, How to Write Songs on Guitar, ("The most common imagery in popular song is meteorological: the weather. Think of cliches like 'winds of change', 'my tears fell down like rain', ...")
  • Rob Reid, Children's Jukebox: A Subject Guide to Musical Recordings and Programming Ideas for Songsters, p.150~153 (section devoted to weather songs)
  • Annalisa McMorrow, Wacky Weather! Reading, Writing, and Speaking about Weather, 1998 (includes some songs)

:Second, I would need to address concerns brought up here, such as how the list is to be maintained. This would require a clean-up, setting up some standards for the songs entry into the list, etc. A lot of work. Third, then and only then could I try to persuade any knee-jerk deletionists that there might be something to this. A couple of editors might pull this off in a debate about one article, but there is no way to do this in a debate about 26 articles. If the closer decides that he or she must delete these, please userfy all of them for me so I can give them proper consideration (you may place them in a format such as User:MrFizyx/songs/List of songs about weather, etc.). I still think it would be much better to reject this nomination and let the debates continue at a reasonable and measured pace. -MrFizyx 05:11, 18 June 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.