Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Armeniapedia.org

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. Spartaz ^Humbug! 03:25, 30 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Armeniapedia.org

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Non-notable. no coverage. delete. Merrill Stubing (talk) 14:37, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The site has won a national award in Armenia in 2006, which according to Wikipedia:Notability (web) should establish it as notable for an article here. The award in e-Armenology was sponsored by the government and the private sector and included a significant prize, which was a multiple of the average national monthly salary. The site is also widely linked to, referenced and respected. I say keep. --RaffiKojian (talk) 17:57, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: Errr ... the criterion states that it must be a "well-known" award, and it's tough to describe an award hosted on a now-defunct website as "well-known." (This quite aside from that Armeniapedia.org didn't win the award at all; the article states that it was the runner-up, which of course doesn't qualify.) If it is as heavily referenced and respected as all of that, surely someone can proffer sources saying so. Ravenswing 20:48, 16 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In response to this I would like to make a couple of points. First of all, the runner up award came with the large cash prize I mentioned as well. It is an award and it DID in fact win. It was also as I said, sponsored in part by the government. The award ceremony was huge and included a performance of the Armenoids. Unfortunately, Armenia is a small country, poorer and is just becoming well wired. There may not be good established award systems and much of the news at the time was not well archived, but there is nothing out there you can compare this award to. It was simply huge. The website, with about 5,000 pages may be the largest Armenian website in the world in terms of regular web content (ie. not a daily news site). It has entire books online. A large travel guide book, a large and very extensive teach yourself the language course (much more detailed than anything else out there), historical novels, the entire church service, genocide testimony, books on nature, a large cookbook, etc. The site has been used by the New York Times and by Australian courts. There really is nothing out there even close to compare it with, and I think it would be hard for someone who is not Armenian or heavily involved in things Armenian to know the notability within the Armenian world. --RaffiKojian (talk) 19:32, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: It is certainly hard to do so without any reliable sources attesting to the site's notability, that is true. Without those sources, however, an article cannot be sustained. Ravenswing 06:35, 19 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Websites-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 02:23, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Question. RaffiKojian, I do note that Armeniapedia seems to be cited as a source in several hundred articles on English Wikipedia[1], but can you provide some examples of references and uses by reliable sources? I found 2 references in New York Times blogs[2][3] but little else[4]. Well, actually, there is a 2007 article from the The Australian in which Armeniapedia is (mis)identified as "a Wikipedia website", and an Australian immigration tribunal's ruling is reversed on the ground that its "reliance on the information/material contained in www.armeniapedia.org was illogical and/or irrational and/or unreasonable."[5] --Arxiloxos (talk) 19:52, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Arxiloxos - most of the content on Armeniapedia is digitized material, unchanged from the original sources. The sources are noted, and those materials are as reliable as the original source. There is selectivity involved in what goes up. Unfortunately there are not so many good, scholarly sites up on Armenia, so aside from the many links to the site and the number of sites which steal the material without any reference or link, it's hard to point to much more than the New York Times links you mentioned above, and occasional references in things like the AGBU Magazine and other Armenian publications which usually don't preserved online. The only reason the Australian court reversed the use of the Armeniapedia material was because of their inherent suspicion of wikis, not because of the material. They had originally asked questions to the defendant based on the Armenian church service which is on the site in its entirety, used with permission from the church. --RaffiKojian (talk) 20:05, 21 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Courcelles 21:49, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Whether or not the armeniapedia website's contents are accurate or wideranging is irrelevant. What's at question is the notability of the website - and I think it fails the GNG pretty decisively. bobrayner (talk) 19:40, 28 December 2010 (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.