Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bicycle Shaped Object

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. After consultation with User:TParis (see history). King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 20:55, 7 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Bicycle Shaped Object

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Non-notable neologism. Sources (those that are admissable) confirm that it's in use in the cycyling community, but provide no significant coverage. Might be appropriate for Urban Dictionary, but not for Wikipedia. Yunshui 雲‍水 22:17, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I suggest merging with Bicycle or Bicycle performance. Biscuittin (talk) 22:27, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Transportation-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 17:49, 21 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Weak Delete It has something to do with bicycles, but I don't think this information is encyclopedic. Kinkreet^{~♥moshi moshi♥~} 23:20, 21 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
~~Strong~~ Delete - seems to be an obscure British cycling-related neoligism/joke. As an English cyclist I've never heard this phrase used. The article content is a mostly unhelpful essay about cheap bicycles. The links are mostly WP:SELFPUB or non-notable sources. --Salimfadhley (talk) 09:52, 22 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Keep This is perhaps more of a US term than UK. It's certainly widespread on Usenet news:rec.cycling There's scope for a good article here, but if anything, it's WP:NOTHOWTO that would be the biggest problem for it. Andy Dingley (talk) 12:02, 22 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Question Are you sure? - perhaps Google is biasing my search results but most references to this phrase seem to be in British cycling-related message boards. I still have not seen it used in anything that we can reliably reference. I still do not think it passes the WP:N test, but I'd bet that it probably will do in a year or two. --Salimfadhley (talk) 12:19, 22 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Delete an essay on cheap bicycles titled after a neologism. -Drdisque (talk) 18:14, 22 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. It's basically just an essay on what might be wrong with a cheap bicycle. (Also, as it says "Usually between AU $80 to $200 (Australian Dollars)", maybe it's more of an Australian term?) -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 23:15, 25 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I think this can be made into a proper article. I've certainly come across the term in the UK, as indicated by the references below:

If the decision is keep, then I'm prepared to try and improve the article over the next month. Murray Langton (talk) 21:17, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Weak Delete The sources do exist that show that the term is being used on a more widespread basis, however this article doesn't really discuss the term itself. Rather, as others have said, its just an essay about what might be wrong with cheap bikes. The whole article would essentially have to be completely rewritten, and even then, there's the question on whether or not this neologism actually passes the GNG at this point. As Salimfadhley said, its possible an article with the same title could be eligible to be created at a future date, it should be deleted for now. Rorshacma (talk) 17:50, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per WP:GNG, above sources from Murray Langton and [6][7]. -- Trevj (talk) 10:40, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, —SW— ^gab 17:34, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Weak keep after move. There are some reliable sources on the topic. The BBC and Guardian articles are productive, among others. However, the primary problem at the moment is a failure of NPOV. I suggest a move to the neutral descriptive term flat pack bicycle and inclusion of industry sources. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:22, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not all BSOs are those that arrive as flat packs for home assembly. Some are sold "assembled"_(sic) by shops, but they're still just BSOs.

(I was out for a ride in the good weather last weekend, met a parent and child out riding too. Poor kid had their front fork on back to front - it must have been terrifying to ride. So these things do happen out in t'real world.) Andy Dingley (talk) 19:03, 5 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Both I, and the sources, would suggest that a flat pack bicycle is still a flat pack bicycle whether assembled by the end-user or the vendor. If we're going to have an article on the topic, WP:NPOV is probably not ideally served by locating that article at the current title. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 20:42, 5 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

We've a couple of flat pack bicycles here. There's nothing wrong with them, it's a pragmatic approach to shipping retail products - so long as they're good bikes, assembled competently. A BSO, in contrast, is a poor sort of bike to ride afterwards, as described by a community of experienced cyclists. This is a subjective POV judgement, but that's not a problem for WP, as it wasn't WP's judgement to describe them so.

WP's NPOV task here is to describe the behaviour of the cyclist community in identifying this class of problematic "wheeled artifacts", in applying the label to them, and in their critique of how such things happen to exist and what can be done about fixing them. We (as editors) can do that much objectively. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:50, 5 April 2012 (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.