Wikipedia talk:Notability (comedy)

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Contents 1 It's a start. 2 Sounds good so far; 3 We don't need more notability guidelines. 4 Changing one word in guideline 3 to tighten requirements 5 Usefulness 6 WP:BIO 7 Response to comments at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals) 8 why comedy specifc?

[edit] It's a start.

I know there is probably room/need for guidelines for humor columnists and the like. Thoughts? --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 08:49, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

While I appreciate the effort, and can see a plausible need for it, "comedy" seems a bit muddy. Could there not be a supercategory for musicians, comedians, acting/improv troupes and so on, such as Notability (performer) or Notability (entertainer)? --Newt_ΨΦ 16:09, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

That's a good idea, particularly since the (music) one appears like it may be merged. And there's enough overlap that maybe while some parts of the other guideline are merged, the performer aspect could be split off into a merged performer guideline. In my mind, the whole process looks like a water ballet. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 19:56, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

You should probably throw in something about recorded releases as part of the notability criteria. This especialy concerns comics up until about the 1980s, when you had entire labels devoted to comedy recordings, and artists like Richard Pryor and George Carlin built their careers around records. WesleyDodds 18:05, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with that. I wasn't sure how to restrict it. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 19:56, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, thanks as always for the kind words; not sure whether I deserve them sometimes. And may I compliment you on your tireless efforts. Lots of us edit and create articles, and that's good. You see the bigger picture of what Wikipedia can be. It's a yin-yang thing. Makes for a nice feeling of teamwork, of community — each to one's own strengths.

The requirements under "Comedians humorists, and comedy ensembles" seem spot-on; there's a bar that has to be topped, but it's a reasonable ones in term of notability. I might suggest adding longevity item. New York and oher cities have venerable troupes that have become local insitutions even if not the single "most prominent representative of ... the local scene of a city". For instance, the NYC troupe Wingnuts, which lasted more than 10 years, was a revolving incubator of talent, some of whom went on to everything from TV series to more famous local groups. In NY, LA, San Francisco, Chicago, etc., after all, even such second-tier comedy troupes (compared to Upright Citizens Brigade, Second City, Chicago City Limits, etc.) can be notable. Maybe something to the effect of: "Incubators: Comedy groups of at least four [or whatever seems reasonable] years' standing, with at least six [again, just a springboard # for discussion]] alumni who have gone on to individual comic notability (i.e., a Wikipedia article)."

That's a rough-and-fumble description, but it's a start. I'm good either way. ALSO, here's a resource that may be handy in verifiability and notability: http://dailycomedy.com Try it, it's a riot. And thanks again for asking! --Tenebrae 02:09, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I lived in NYC for a year, studying and performing improv at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre and seeing lots of other shows. I don't recognize the name Wingnuts, but I think it may be a common improv group name, like "Off the Top" or "On the Spot". It may not longer be around. Here's the thing: I want to differentiate between the few notable groups and the inordinant number of groups currently operating in NY, Chicago,and LA. For instance, I don't think that each house team should have its own article unless it is notable under one of the guides listed. At UCB, notable groups include Mother, The Swarm, Respecto Montalban, and the Reuben Williams. They are emblematic, they represent a style of improv, and they have members who have gone on to better things. I do think we should have articles that list house teams for the various theaters.

As for your suggestion regarding years and number of notable members, I'm not entirely sure where to draw the line there. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 03:09, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, the more I think about it, the more arbitrary my numerical suggestions seem to be. I guess the best I can suggest is a one-word change from "most prominent representative of ... the local scene of a city" to "a prominent...", since some large cities may have more than one such ntoable group. Like NYC has both the Yankees and the Mets. --Tenebrae 13:19, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Good point. I agree with you. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 23:22, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sounds good so far;

however, you might want to remove the first-person stuff in the final proposal. Looks good though. Crystallina 02:13, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Good point. I really appreciate your response. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 02:17, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] We don't need more notability guidelines.

What it says on the tin. This is not filling a needed gap, it's just adding yet more bureaucracy and arbitrary criteria that thousands of editors adhere to blindly. No, no, no, and no, without prejudice to the contents. Change the existing ones if you must, but we don't need more in this byzantine web of pages.--SB | T 05:03, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. I see an awful lot of articles about non-notable groups, and it needs to be addressed. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 06:59, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Additionally, nobody should blindly adhere to these guidelines; all editors should challenge what they disagree with. Notability guides are there to help editors in creating articles and in judging the validity of articles. Your problem seems to be with how editors use the guides. I'm telling you they are needed. Can you give me a more helpful response? --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 07:11, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Changing one word in guideline 3 to tighten requirements

I've made a change to a single word in guideline #3. Instead of saying, "Contains at least one person", I've changed it to, "Contains at least one comedian who was once a part of or later joined a group or show that is otherwise notable; note that it is often most appropriate to use redirects in place of articles on side projects and such." The reason for this can be seen at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Foe Pa, which is about an unknown troupe in Los Angeles whose only ability to assert any notability whatsoever is that two of its members already have articles on Wikipedia. The problem is that they both have articles because they're anime voiceover artists. Neither article says anything about them having any comedy background at all. I think this tiny change will prevent other similar gimmick troupes from being able to assert nobility unless they pass one of the other criteria. (After all, if Mike Wallace decided to start an improv group for kicks in the basement of his condo, I don't think it would automatically deserve a Wikipedia entry just because he's on 60 Minutes. --Aaron 05:30, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Good point. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 11:48, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Usefulness

This guideline has so far proved useful in the deletion discussions for All Sorts of Trouble for the Boy in the Bubble Sketch Comedy, Women Fully Clothed, Swami X, and Foe Pa. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 12:01, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WP:BIO

I believe that it would be better to add a paragraph on comedians to WP:BIO than to create separate guidelines for various professions. (Radiant) 11:45, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

How would that work? BIO currently is not set up for individual types of people. The items in this guideline cover all of the bases with regard to comedians and groups; can it all be pasted into BIO? --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 09:42, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

• Tentatively yes, because many of the criteria overlap. Note that several of the criteria on this page are somewhat redundant or obvious (e.g. #8 is redundant with #1, and the half-an-hour cutoff seems arbitrary). In my opinion, comedians should follow WP:BIO, but WP:BIO should have a subsection explaining what e.g. the Major Awards are for comedians. (Radiant) 10:45, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Response to comments at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)

I just wanted to expand and clarify some things as you seemed to misunderstand what I had to say on notability:

• The whole point of notability is to establish that an article can actually be written about a subject. Since all information must be verifiable, one cannot include unreferenced and unsourced information to an article. If there exists no references to a subject in reliable, third party sourced than there cannot be an article written about that subject. It is that simple.
• If a commedian wins awards, appears in a TV show, or any other of a number of things, it does not mean that there exists references about which we can use to write an article. Notability is not about "worthiness". It is about what kinds of verifiable information one can build an article around. If all we have to write about a comedian is that they appeared on a show once, but there is not further information outside of wikipedia to reference, what article can we write?
• The main test is known as the Primary Notability Criteria: Does the subject of the article appear outside of wikipedia as the subject of multiple, third party, non-trivial references? There is no need to establish notability beyond "Someone else cared enough to write enough about this subject that I can use that information to write this article". That's it. Information such as awards, appearences, directories, yellow page entries, etc, may verify that the subject of the article is real, and it does exist, but those sorts of references do not provide enough information to populate the article with referenced facts. If we cannot add any referenced, non-trivial facts to an article, why have an article in the first place.
• When any secondary criteria extends notability BEYOND the Primary Notability Criteria, it always should do so for a narrowly defined reason, which is a unique problem that could not otherwise be fixed by other means. For example, in WP:CORP, there is the secondary criteria that "The company or corporation is listed on ranking indices of important companies produced by well-known and independent publications." This criteria is included ONLY to "ensure that our coverage of such rankings will be complete regardless. of whether or not the article on teh particular company will ever be a reasonably encyclopedic article. To say it in another way, it means that a company that is part of the Fortune 500 list is automatically notable even if no relevent facts can be added to an article about the company beyond this, but this policy exists only to complete the coverage of the Fortune 500 list and for no other reason. There is no compelling reason that Wikipedia needs complete coverage of, say, Comedy Central's Premium Blend show, and thus, merely appearing on the show should not cause a comedian to merit an article in absence of verifiable and non-trivial information availible outside of wikipedia.
• There does not seem to be any compelling reason that any comedian could be notable and never written about or discussed in reliable sources outside of wikipedia. Thus, why have all of the 20 or so criteria that allow an article which could never be populated with verifiable, non-trivial facts to be kept.

I know that I was verbose here, but I want to explain in detail what notability means, and that articles still need to be able to contain real, non-trivial, verifiable information. --Jayron32 03:48, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Please provide a link to those comments on the VP as it is archived very rapidly. Thank you. (Radiant) 16:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
  • This dif doesn't point directly to the comments in question, but it DOES contain the full discussion located at the heading "7 Wikipedia:Notability (comedy)": [1]. I hope that helps put these comments in context. --Jayron32 04:35, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] why comedy specifc?

Why should we limit this to comedy? Why not make a broader "performer" guideline, so we can include things like theatrical troops and magicians who should follow similar guidelines, but whose performances aren't specifically comedy. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 19:03, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

• Good idea. Broad scope is better. (Radiant) 10:34, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Or even better, we could make a broader "people" guideline so that we can use the same criteria not just for comedy, but also for movie stars, politicians and other people. >Radiant< 14:15, 2 January 2007 (UTC)