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 no consensus. This has run a month, and I do not see any situation where a consensus is going to evolve. Note, socks, duplicate votes have been disregarded, but even among established editors and the later trend-we do not have clear keep consensus here. Suggest discussion continue editorially as to whether a merger would be a solution or a size issue. Star Mississippi 14:14, 8 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

List of Bengali songs recorded by Runa Laila[edit]

List of Bengali songs recorded by Runa Laila (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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like the dozens of other articles this user has created, this isn't a necessary standalone list and is basically just an itunes directory. Anything relevant can be included in the main article about Runa Laila (as in anything that can be sourced outside of places to buy it.) PRAXIDICAE💕 20:09, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete because wikipedia is WP:NOTDIRECTORY BrigadierG (talk) 20:14, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

What would you say about those articles? List of songs recorded by Neha Kakkar, List of songs recorded by Lata Mangeshkar, List of songs recorded by Shalmali Kholgade. They are also similar type of directory and should be deleted for the same reason. I hope everyone will consider my points. Abbasulu (talk) 20:41, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Strongly Keep - there are similar aticles List of songs recorded by Shalmali Kholgade, List of songs recorded by Lata Mangeshkar. Why they aren’t deleted? Abbasulu (talk) 20:16, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Abbasulu: Please see WP:WHATABOUT. "What about (something)?" is an argument strongly discouraged in deletion discussions. The linked page says:

The nature of Wikipedia means that you cannot make a convincing argument based solely on whether other articles do or do not exist, because there is nothing stopping anyone from creating any article.

I.hate.spam.mail.here (message me | my contributions) 22:17, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Music and Lists. Shellwood (talk) 20:19, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Women, Albums and songs, and Bangladesh. CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 20:34, 2 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete per WP:NOTDIRECTORY and WP:INDISCRIMINATE, obviously enough. Wikipedia is not itunes. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 19:15, 3 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  There are many list articles precisely of a person’s discography, very similar to this. Why nominate this article for deletion in particular? Abyan Malek (talk) 04:59, 4 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Probably you have not watched these articles List of songs recorded by Armaan Malik, List of Urdu songs recorded by Shreya Ghoshal. Both of these articles are similar, they are simply a collection of names of their songs, as is this article. And the latter lne is a collection of just 12 entries, very small article. This can easily be redirected or merged in her discography article. Plaese consider these cases and judge fairly. I see many similar but weaker discography or itules type indiscriminate lists stay in wikipedia for years but not raising any eyebrews. Abbasulu (talk) 14:33, 4 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  Happily obliged: both of these are now at AfD. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 02:40, 5 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep because arricles like this exist but theres no reason to delete this because it may be similar to an 'itune' listing. Abyan Malek (talk) 5:06, 4 June 2022 (UTC)

  Per WP:DEL-REASON: Reasons for deletion include, but are not limited to, the following: 14. Any other content not suitable for an encyclopedia. This, being a trivial directory-like listing of seemingly every song ever recorded by some artist (information which probably is of no interest whatsoever except to the most dedicated of fans), is obviously "not suitable", as explicitly established by the community. Similarly problematic lists should also be deleted - go read WP:WHATABOUTX: it is quite possible that the other article should also be deleted but nobody has noticed it and listed it for deletion yet. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 05:28, 4 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Redirect to Runa Laila#Discography as WP:INDISCRIMINATE. SBKSPP (talk) 23:31, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Previously closed by Superastig as "redirect to Runa Laila#Discography as an WP:ATD. Discarding the "keep" votes which state WP:OTHERSTUFF. Anyone is free to merge anything important to the target article." This was overturned as a WP:BADNAC at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2022 June 20.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 08:17, 28 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Redirect to Runa Laila#Discography because this is an excessively lengthy directory, and the encyclopedia would be better served with a more selective listing. Reyk _YO! 09:08, 28 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Albums and songs, Lists, and Bangladesh. Worldbruce (talk) 00:10, 30 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete The only arguments for keeping this list are of the form WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, an argument to avoid in deletion discussions.

In contrast, there are strong policy-based arguments that this list does not belong in Wikipedia, which does not aim to be a list of everything, but to be a high-quality encyclopedia. Being an encyclopedia means not just listing songs in a discography, but providing prose analysis of them, summarizing what reliable sources say about their recording, reception, significance, and influence.

This list also fails the most common notability guideline for lists, because no independent reliable source has discussed the Bengali songs recorded by Runa Laila as a group. And it fails the three purposes of lists. Without analysis, the list does not convey encyclopedic information. Out of the roughly 700 songs, none has a Wikipedia article, and there's no evidence that any of them are notable, so the list does not allow the reader to navigate among them. If it is intended as a development list, it should be in user space, not article space.

Merge is inappropriate because only about 4% of the songs cite any source, the sources don't always support all of the content where cited, and the sources aren't always reliable (IMDb, Amazon). Redirect is an alternative to deletion that recognizes that the content does not belong on Wikipedia. Redirect is not inappropriate, but not particularly helpful in this case, as any reader looking for a list of songs recorded by Runa Laila will find Runa Laila with or without a redirect. --Worldbruce (talk) 01:23, 30 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding a redirect, I agree that WP:RKEEP 3 (aids search) does not really apply. Searching for the exact list title returns unrelated "List of songs recorded by" articles, but the shortened and more likely Bengali songs Runa Laila returns Runa Laila as its first result, followed by an Urdu song list and this list. Intersecting List of Bengali songs recorded by Runa Laila#Album songs and Runa Laila#Discography, the only overlap is the album Ganga Amar Ma Padma Amar Ma. Its track list is not included in her article – to be clear, I oppose merging it as it would overwhelm the section – and it doesn't have an article, so a reader looking for Bengali songs would not find them. This approaches common WP:Redirects for discussion rationale "not mentioned at/in target" and WP:RDELETE 2 (confusing). Flatscan (talk) 04:35, 30 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Instead of replying, Please clearly cast your opinion, whether you support for deletion or keeping. It will count as a vote. Thank you. Abbasulu (talk) 08:08, 30 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The policy based argument, made in an old AfD of a similar article (recently quoted at another AfD), appears to be WP:WORKS. Hemantha (talk) 12:09, 4 July 2022 (UTC) ( Blocked sockpuppet) --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 21:01, 4 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Strongly Keep - The other two articles on Runa Laila has successfully survived deletion. This discussion is meaningless. Most of the directory articles have easily survived deletion. Abbasulu (talk) 08:02, 30 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That's twice now you've voted. Avilich (talk) 12:38, 30 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Abbasulu You're not allowed to vote twice. SBKSPP (talk) 00:03, 2 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep: Discography of a notable singer is a valid WP:CFORK. Venkat TL (talk) 08:20, 30 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Music, and India. Hemantha (talk) 12:00, 4 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep, per arguments that have been extensively developed in related AFDs (and which I thought, apparently incorrectly, that I had already posted here), and in particular per the following:
  • Absent strong considerations to the contrary, WP:EDIT and particularly WP:PRESERVE prevail, and issues over the scope and content of these lists should be addressed through collaborative editing (the "wiki process"), for which AFD is neither necessary nor helpful. And there are no policy-based reasons for deletion or removal here, let alone any strong ones, as detailed below.
  • I'm not sure CFORK is quite on point here, but it doesn't matter, because this seems like a perfectly cromulent WP:SIZESPLIT.
  • NOTADIRECTORY first observes that Wikipedia does often provide useful directory-like functions, but qualifies this with six examples of directories that Wikipedia is not. Only two of these exclusions could conceivably apply here, but neither actually does: (1) This is not a "simple listing without contextual information showing encyclopedic merit", because the value of this list precisely comes from the "contextual information" with which this list is richly endowed. (2) This is also not a "non-encyclopedic cross-categorization": language is a logical categorization that arises directly from the subject matter. A "non-encyclopedic cross-categorization" would be something like "Songs performed by X in movies that also featured views of the Taj Mahal."
  • INDISCRIMINATE states that "data should be put in context with explanations referenced to independent sources", and provides some specific examples of indiscriminate content (none of which apply -- a list of songs is not a "lyrics database"). Even if a "should" could create a basis for deletion, it does not do so here, because this list does put its data into context. Although we might quibble over the current state of sourcing of this list, that is a matter for improvement, not deletion.
  • WP:NLIST: (a) does not provide an independent basis for deletion, since it merely enumerates one example of a type of list that is generally considered non-deletable, and (b) is highly unlikely to apply when the topic of the list is the very same body of work for which the singer is notable in the first place, as is the case here.
  • WHATABOUT / OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is a subsection of an essay about how some Wikipedians dislike some arguments. In fact, the longstanding presence of numerous lists of this kind is a far better guide to global Wikipedia consensus, as established through collaborative editing, than any local consensus could ever be in the unrepresentative environment of AFD. (For a different take than mine, but one that still takes the wind out of the sails of this popular shout-down, see the essay Wikipedia:When to use or avoid "other stuff exists" arguments.) I could write up an essay about how WHATABOUT is a silly argument and go around citing that as if it were policy, but that would be just as ridiculous as citing WHATABOUT in this way.
  • Finally, per the great-grandmother of all policies, this content is useful and encyclopedic and Wikipedia would be diminished by its absence. Therefore, any guidelines, policies or essays that appear to militate against its inclusion are either being misconstrued or are so inapposite that they can reasonably be ignored in this and similar cases. Likewise, any claims that arguments not grounded in (other) Wikipedia policies should be ignored as not being "policy based" should be disregarded, because (a) they ignore the reason for having policies to begin with and (b) such gatekeeping is fundamentally contrary to the idea of an open wiki. -- Visviva (talk) 04:59, 5 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Lists like this of notable singers in South Asian Indian film industries where songs are important to the films are perfectly fine, but they've got to be better sourced. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 11:06, 5 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Runa Laila is notable and her work is notable. This informative list belongs in Wikipedia. Aymatth2 (talk) 14:00, 5 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Visviva's overview is an excellent rationale. Shahid • ^Talk2me 19:00, 5 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Discography not discussed in WP:Reliable sources ("If no reliable sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it"). Does not contain "contextual information showing encyclopedic merit" (IINFO, NOTDIRECTORY, etc.), and is only as good as the spotify and apple music directories which it solely cites as sources. Avilich (talk) 02:32, 6 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep: Per Visviva, the many "policy-based arguments" for deletion are, at the very least, misconstrued and wrongly applied to this article and do not stand under scrutiny. The suggestion that a listing of songs of a singer (that is, their body of work) is not notable is silly when the singer's claim to notability is coverage of that very body of work. The grouping by language is most likely a WP:SIZESPLIT because a single page would be too long to navigate comfortably. DeluxeVegan (talk) 17:25, 6 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Per Visviva; + would especially like to emphasise this part of WHATABOUT which is all too frequently ignored: "If you reference such a past debate, and it is clearly a very similar case to the current debate, this can be a strong argument that should not be discounted because of a misconception that this section is a blanket ban on ever referencing other articles or deletion debates." Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 10:11, 7 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep per arguments above, this seems like a perfectly valid supplemental page. Artw (talk) 16:02, 7 July 2022 (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.