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 Keep. Rough consensus keeps the article– PeaceNT 08:13, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Aerican Empire

Aerican Empire (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) - (View log)

Article about a non-notable, unimpressive make-believe country. Survived a seemingly votestacked AfD several months back... there were a large number of Keep votes coming almost exclusively from unestablished users or IPs, including self-proclaimed members of the club.

A couple of quotes from the article itself:

"Annually, the Empire holds story-writing contests, role-playing and wargaming days, and such events as the Dog-Biscuit Appreciation Day Scavenger Hunt."

"Nationally recognized holidays (and "niftydays") within the Empire include 2 January Procrastinator's Day, 27 February *Oops* Day, 19 March What the Heck is That Day, 14 April Tempting Fate Day, 25 May Towel Day, 28 August Significant Historical Events Day, and 26 October Topin Wagglegammon, The Niftiest Day of the Year."

Google yields 513 results for "Aerican Empire", but most seem to be passing mentions, directories (mainly stuff like this), the website for Aerican Empire, or Wikipedia links. It seems to me like a small group of individuals (the X dozen belonging to this club) trying to force notability and best the system, by getting it listed as many places as possible.

The Aerican Empire website itself states that anyone can become a citizen by filling out a simple webform. Here's a complete list of "citizens", which seems to number in the upper two-digits. The Wikipedia article proudly proclaims that the number of people who have joined is above 100.

Undeniably cute and well-written, but completely unremarkable and unencyclopedic. Strong Delete, and perhaps even protect from re-creation. Also, I urge whoever closes this AfD to PLEASE be on the lookout for meatpuppetry/votestacking. --Czj 19:12, 20 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment The problem here isn't notability. This topic may indeed be notable, the sources do seem to indicate this, so an article on this topic isn't necessarily unjustifiable. The problem is that the article is written as if this place actually existed, the article presents the Aerican Empire as being real. The entire article is written this way, presenting fictional material as being factual. The entire page needs to be deleted and rewritten. --The Way 17:33, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Once again, this is not a fictional empire. This is real and affects the lives of real people. Regardless of how silly it may look, please do not treat this as something out of a story book; there are people out there who believe in this and put work daily into its growth, and whether or not that sounds sane, it elevates us above Lothlorrien and The United Federation of Planets. Timcrow 17:41, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Any individual could sit down and make infeasible claims to whatever land they wanted, but that doesn't make it true, nor does it automatically merit an article. Getting 100 people (or 150 -- whatever insignificant number we're arguing over at this point) to fill out a short web form to join a club is not that impressive. There are small MMORPGs with 5,000-10,000 players that have been deleted for lack of notability/significance, and this group is a LOT smaller. Age is not criterion for inclusion, either. It doesn't matter how old this group of friends have had this club... Wikipedia is not for things made up in school one day, whether that day happened to be in 2007, or 1987. --Czj 18:44, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've always taken "not made up in school one day" to mean it shouldn't be posted that day. After all, arguably, Microsoft was made up in school one day, and then it was built upon for years. The "made up in school" rule exists to prevent children from posting their fantasy-of-the-day and was never meant to be used to exclude organizations which simply had the misfortune to be invented in a specific place. Timcrow 18:53, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No matter how much you claim it is real, it is not as real as the article makes it sound. It is not a real nation under any understanding of the term. The article makes it sound like an actual, existing country. It is not. It may indeed be a real organization with membership and whatnot, but it is not a country. The article needs to reflect what this really is in context with the actual world, not what members of the 'organization' want it to be --The Way 19:18, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't fully agree, obviously, but it's an interesting point. It would be easy enough to add something about it being an "aspirant state" or that it has the eventual goal of nationhood while saying that it is not one yet. Any suggestions? Timcrow 19:22, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
How about beginning by actually sourcing some of the seemingly ridiculous claims throughout the article? --The Way 19:45, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I fully object to the deletion of this page. What reason is there to delete a glorious nations Wikipedia page? When people are interested in seeing examples of successful micronations they will want to read about The Empire of Aerica. The Empire of Aerica has also been mentioned many times via newspapers and I heard even on television a few times. The documentation can all be found on the official website. Thank you. Crud3w4re 18:28, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, I thought the idea here was for the article to get rewritten and improved. I've been working on it. I don't see the contradictions myself. The records were lost (they were all five-year olds, after all), but the goal was the same as today. And yes, it did mature... doesn't everyone and everything, ideally? Timcrow 19:26, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That is my very point. The records were regarding the purpose of creating the nation. It was unknown, because the records had been lost. They're still lost, but suddenly it becomes known that the purpose all along was to create an internationally recognized entity? No offense, but something like this wreaks of "it's being made up as we go". --Czj 19:34, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The original records said that records had been lost, becuse young kids didn't bother writing things down. However, given that the founders are still alive, we have the ability to ask them. This doesn't consitute proper record keeping but, since we're trying to make the article sound more like an encyclopedia and less like prose, it seemed reasonable to change it to read what the stated goal had always been. I see this as a pretty minor change, but I can see how you might disagree. The point is, there's no contradiction, merely use of a different point of view (records kept on paper versus ask somebody who was there). Timcrow 19:45, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment This 'micronation' has no legitimate claims to any sovereignty over anything, is not recognized by any official body, has no currency, etc. It is a made-up organization with a insignificant number of members who claim a bunch of outlandish, unsubstantiated things. It is certainly not an empire under any standard definition of the term. Furthermore, much of the article is unsourced. It's, quite frankly, little more than a practical joke that has gone on too long to be funny. The lack of a substantial number of members comined with a few trivial sources does not establish notability. It is not a country and it will never be one. As it stands, unless better sources can be supplied and the article gets properly sourced and unless the article is written to reflect what this really is then it should be deleted. --The Way 19:44, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Again according to Webster, "multiple territories under a single authority." Seems like it fits to me. The word "empire" is actually pretty circular, if you look it up, since an "empire" is just a body ruled by an emperor and an "emperor" is whoever rules an empire. Blame the English, not us. I will, however, see what references I can put in to specific points; thank you for suggesting that. Timcrow 19:51, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Several things; first of all I do admit my choice or words was poor when I called the cited sources 'poor.' There are valid, legitimate sources listed. However, if you'll look at some of my previous comments I had already admitted as much and had stated that notability has seemingly been established. You will also note that I have not been supporting a total delete, rather I've indicated that most of what is in the article needs to be deleted and rewritten (i.e. delete the article and start from scratch). The topic does seem to deserve an article, but the article as it stands needs substantial work and much should be deleted. Also, in reply to Crud, this micronation has, quite frankly (and I recognize that this particular point doesn't have any bearings on this AfD), absolutely no chance of ever becoming a recognized and sovereign state (I'd be happy to discuss why elsewhere, say on my talk page, since this has no real implications for this AfD). However, this doesn't mean there should not be an article on the subject. Also, in reply to Tim, by empire I was referring to the concept of empire in political science, not the simplified definition supplied by Webster's Dictionary. However, again this doesn't have direct implications for the AfD since the word 'Empire' is part of a proper noun rather than simply being an adjective (ie. saying "The Aerican Empire is a micronation" is fine, saying "the Aerican Empire is an Empire" is not. Finally, in response to Milburn, of course my previous comment had POV; we are arguing our interpretations of policy and such here. INPOV only fully applies to actual article writing; your comments are also POV (for example, it is your pov that this micronation has the best chance to become a sovereign state, it is also your pov that the article should be kept as is and it is my pov that it should be rewritten). All in all, please try not to be so hostile to other editors because they don't share your view in an AfD and I will do the same. --The Way 22:55, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: It wasn't me who made the comments about the POV, although, it is understandably difficult to keep track of what everyone said when answering like that. My only concern in response to your comment you answered in the opening couple of lines of this comment, and the problem was brought about by me not linking you to your earlier comments. J Milburn 23:02, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: The references are looking rather good now. I implore The Way and other editors who said that a complete rewrite was needed to have another look at the article, and decide whether it should stay in its current state, as I definately believe it should. J Milburn 23:05, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment There are definitely still problems with the way things are stated at various points throughout the article, but mostly this is cause for a cleanup and can be discussed on the articles talk page and such. --The Way 02:15, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I, for one, would be genuinely happy for pointers on how to clean the article up, since I'm obviously not very good at making my writing less prose-style. We may argue a bit over what points are and are not realistic and worthy of inclusion, but that's a chance I'm prepared to take. Timcrow 02:57, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Response: In regards to the notability of sources: 1) Being listed among a short list, when literally hundreds if not thousands of these microstates exist, is still a feat of some small note. 2) Le Soleil, The Montreal Mirror, and the Leader Newspaper Group, all of which made the Empire the main focus of their articles, are all papers with readership exceeding the million mark. None of them are widely internationally-read (although Le Soleil sells fairly well across Europe) but none of them are small. Also, just to explain why this material isn't in the micronation article in the first place, the discussions at that article have long-since concluded that in general the article is dedicated to the phenomemnon and individual states should have separate entries, to keep the main article from growing too long. Hence, individual entries for Empire of Atlantium and Republic of Molossia, for example. Timcrow 15:22, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
At the risk of being extremely repetitive, can I just once again point out that an idea stops being "made up in school one day" when a magazine article (and presumably "book chapter" also qualifies) gets written about it. It says so right in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:NFT and I really don't see why this issue should be a point of contention. Timcrow 22:08, 23 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I completely agree with Timcrow. Look at the references- whether or not this was literally made up in school one day, it is now VERY notable, easily meeting the primary notability criteria. This isn't a few obscure websites either- this is books, and articles in MAJOR newspapers. J Milburn 22:46, 23 January 2007 (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.
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