Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Otrium

Otrium

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Otrium (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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Fails WP:NCORP. Routine startup coverage. scope_creep^Talk 10:49, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Companies and Netherlands. Shellwood (talk) 11:41, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
• Delete The article is very little more than a list of funding rounds. Zero notability and clearly fails WP:NCORP. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 14:00, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

User eyeballed the article instead of analyzing sources per WP:NEXIST and WP:BEFORE. gidonb (talk) 00:47, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

You have no idea what the user did. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 09:29, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

I see the results ;-) gidonb (talk) 20:41, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

Yup, and the results is a delete vote. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 05:52, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

• Keep As part of WP:BEFORE, always check to make sure a large chunk of properly sourced info wasn't removed before the nomination was made. You may be voting on a weakened version intended to support the nomination. I restored the info about the business model, renamed simply as business. It's an entire section with nothing about funding. After rereading and trying to see things in the eyes of the nom, I rewrote the business section so nobody could claim it's a manual. Future participants and closer, please review with this new info in mind. The multiple independent sources that are there demonstrate that the organization has received significant independent media coverage, meeting the critical requirements of WP:NCORP. I'll point out that the media reports that the organization has 3 million customers, which clearly makes it notable. TechnoTalk (talk) 18:28, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
• Keep. Meets the WP:GNG and WP:NCORP per [1][2][3][4][5]. Nomination is a WP:BEFORE failure. Removal of information was improper. gidonb (talk) 00:49, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
• Keep after reviewing the above citations provided by gidonb, I agree that there is good coverage on them and they are notable.Zeddedm (talk) 02:57, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
• Comment An overnight conspiracy with a virtual WP:SPA turning up, particularly since it doesn't meet NCORP. scope_creep^Talk 06:03, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
• Delete. Even the removed material and its citations don't really meet the requirements of WP:NCORP. It's just routine business stuff, not the impact I describe in WP:SERIESA. User:Technotalk's argument about the number of customers is irrelevant for notability; we need some kind of in-depth coverage in reliable secondary sources. And it's all like: won this award; raised that amount of money; profiled in Forbes again; is in business. FalconK (talk) 08:55, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

That is a handsome article. I've not seen it before but I will need to start using it now. scope_creep^Talk 09:04, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

Seconded. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 09:30, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

• Inserted comment - I went to your essay and there's a section about significant coverage that says it should "contextualize the impact the company had on the history of its field of industry, its community, or society". Wouldn't having 3 million subscribers suggest that there's an impact on society, just like you wrote you'd like to see? TechnoTalk (talk) 00:40, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

• Comment Lets examine the references:
• Ref 1 Receives 750k funding Fails WP:CORPDEPTH, of a capital transaction, such as raised capital
• Ref 2 120milllion raised Fails WP:CORPDEPTH, of a capital transaction, such as raised capital
• Ref 3 Partnership Fails WP:CORPDEPTH of the expansions, acquisitions, mergers, sale, or closure of the business
• Ref 4 Raises 102.3m raised Fails WP:CORPDEPTH of a capital transaction, such as raised capital
• Ref 5 raised a €7m Series-A round PR.Fails WP:CORPDEPTH of a capital transaction, such as raised capital
• Ref 6 Invests 7million Fails WP:CORPDEPTH of a capital transaction, such as raised capital
• Ref 7 Tech Crunch. Raises 26million. Fails WP:CORPDEPTH of a capital transaction, such as raised capital

You start to see how banal these refs are and its more of the same. Routine annoucements, startup news. Fails WP:NCORP, WP:SIRS. scope_creep^Talk 21:41, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

You just said a lot and really nothing. Notability is judged by sources, NOT by references. I provided 5 sources, all in independent, nationwide media. All but one proudly signed by journalists. The fifth is sourced from the Dutch independent prime press agency. gidonb (talk) 23:45, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gidonb: Thanks for finding those sources. Unfortunately the Dutch seem to be following our lead with paywalls. Hopefully someone will add more info from them. There's also significant non-financial related coverage in this Forbes article. The writer lists 20 years of retail journalism experience on her bio but I've seen others question the "Forbes contributor" (senior contributor in this case) byline and use that in their deletion arguments, so I left it out. But once this is kept, I can use that coverage to improve the article. TechnoTalk (talk) 01:10, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

@TechnoTalk: I managed to read all with my free subscription of Het Financieele Dagblad and Google's own paywall workaround ;-) 01:24, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

• Comment I managed to miss the references at the top. Looking at each of one of them.

• European Off-Price Designer Marketplace Otrium Launches In U.S. Low quality Forbes ref. Routine annoucement of company launching in the US.Fails WP:CORPDEPTH Standard notices from a press-release. of a product or a product line launch, sale, change, or discontinuance The 120million Series funding press-release.
• Paywalled. Unable to read it.
• Paywalled A March 2018 article, when they got a 750k funding round, so probably a press-release.
• Paywalled Growth of designer outlet webshop Otrium positive for XL Business Park in Almelo
• Paywalled. The url states. 120-miljoen-dollar-op. Press-release.
• Paywalled. The url states. 7million raised. Press-release.

Assuming AGF and taking the 3 press-releases as typical of the five, they are extremely poor references that fails WP:ORGIND and WP:NCORP. IThey are all from company news, PR. This whole article is native advertising, for a shop. As cool as its a shop, its completly typical coverage of a startup. The article fails WP:NCORP. scope_creep^Talk 08:29, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

• Comment Nom has made several statements that show WP:BEFORE was not done, and that this is a bad faith nomination. Since he says he's a new page patroller, I'm also concerned about his ability to understand what he's reading, or at least the haste with which he's reviewing and nominating articles. He writes above that this article is about a furniture store, and describes the furniture as "cool" and the company as a "shop", but it's a multinational online clothing retailer. I can only assume he saw a picture of their office in one of the Dutch articles and didn't do a translation. He claims to have read the Forbes article but brushes it off as a repurposed press release. Anyone can click on that link and see that's not true. I posted a link to the Forbes writer's bio above. He mentions WP:SPA, which I don't see. He even calls a personal essay an article above, when it's clearly marked as an essay. Finally, as I also pointed out above, he deleted a big chunk of info with sources, since trimmed and restored, before nominating this for deletion, instead of letting the nomination play out. TechnoTalk (talk) 14:01, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

@TechnoTalk: If you keep making personal attacks like this WP:NPA, I will need to make a report at WP:ANI and cut out the bludgeoning per WP:BLUDGEONing. It is deeply uncool. scope_creep^Talk 18:22, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

@Scope creep: None of what I posted is a personal attack. I'm simply repeating what you said and did, and explaining why it makes me question your ability to fairly monitor and review articles. You on the other hand accused me of being a paid editor once this started to go the wrong way, and said you're going to go after my other articles, so that's grounds for me to take you to ANI. Feel free to save me the trouble of opening a case, and watch for WP:BOOMERANG once your previous block for similar targeting and harassment is brought up. You'll also get another one-way IBAN. TechnoTalk (talk) 20:02, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

@TechnoTalk: I routinely received the same threats from the same user. Maybe his way to cover up WP:BEFORE failures? He does seem to try to jam through his plentiful, poorly researched nominations. I don't care, I look at the data, not at the people. If nominator one day comes up with a nomination that does make sense, I would support it. It's the best strategy for sanity at Wikipedia. Keep focus on the data at all times. gidonb (talk) 15:29, 25 June 2022 (UTC)

• Delete This is a company/organization therefore WP:NCORP guidelines apply. There are particular criteria for establishing the notability of a company. As an aside, unless blatantly obvious (e.g. Blog posts, no attributed journalist, Forbes contributors, etc), I'm assuming all the sources are reliable and the publishers are corporately independent from the topic organization - but there's more requirements than just "RS" for establishing notability.

• NCORP and WP:SIRS make clear that we require references that discuss the *company* in detail. WP:SIRS says *each* reference must meet the criteria for establishing notability. The takeaway here is that the quantity of coverage is irrelevant - what we require are multiple sources (at least two) of deep or significant coverage with in-depth information *on the company* and (this bit is important!) containing "Independent Content".
• Some editors don't fully look at the definition of "Independent content". It says that content, in order to count towards establishing notability, must include original and independent opinion, analysis, investigation, and fact checking that are clearly attributable to a source unaffiliated to the subject. This is usually the criteria where most references fail. References cannot rely *only* on information provided by the company. Articles that are essentially copies of a basic company description, quotations, press releases, announcements, interviews, etc and without some other in-depth content, fail ORGIND.
• Several sources were included by an editor above, claiming that those sources meet GNG and NCORP. I disagree and there's not much point in berating/accusing the nom for not carrying out BEFORE and then producing regurgitated announcements and press releases with claims that they meet GNG and NCORP. All of the sources fail as follows:

• This from fd.nl headlines with "Dutch online clothing outlet Otrium raises million in investment" regurgitates the company's announcement of the same day. Just like the other articles covering the news of their new investment like this is WWD and this in TechCrunch. None of these articles contain any "Independent Content" and fail ORGIND
• This next from fdl.com is a "puff piece" based *entirely* on an interview with the founders. It contains much of the usual format we're used to seeing with puff pieces (Background, Problem, Initial Idea! and solution, investment, problems overcome, vague future-looking statement) and also has the obligatory "cool" photo of the founders. It has no "Independent Content" and fails ORGIND
• This in ad.ml (and also carried by a couple of other publications) cannot be viewed without a subscription but from the summary I can see, I cannot find any reasons to believe it might contain in-depth "Independent Content". The article appears to be focused on the topic company's logistics within Europe which is handled by "Bleckmann Fashion & Lifestyle Logistics" and says that the popularity of the brand has been positive for the area (Twente/Almelo). It goes on to interview Bleckmann's Commercial Director (who is a supplier and not unaffiliated to the company). I'm not seeing sufficient CORPDEPTH nor "Independent Content". If someone else has access to the rest of the article and finds something, let me know.
• This from rd.nl deals with the same topic as the first two sources above - the raising of 120m. This article refers directly to the announcement in the Financial Times but it is significantly shorter. There's nothing in the rd.nl article that isn't contained in the longer ft.com article which in turn is based on a valuation provided by an "unknown source" (so not RS) and quotes from the company. It has no "Independent Content" by way of analysis/opinion/etc and fails ORGIND.
• This from nu.nl says in the first sentence "the company announced on Thursday". It's about the company raising €7m in 2019 and contains a summary of the Press Release from the investment company on the same day. Fails ORGIND

None of the references meet the criteria for establishing notability of the company, or come close. Topic fails WP:NCORP. HighKing⁺⁺ 21:11, 28 June 2022 (UTC)

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: There is a fundamental disagreement over whether or not there are adequate reliable sources to prove notability. It would be nice to see fewer comments on contributors and some consensus on the sources or this could go "No consensus". Also, it is unwise to remove large well-sourced sections of an article before it is nominated for deletion.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 21:58, 29 June 2022 (UTC)

• Comment I'll get on my soapbox here and defend the sourcing, as requested above. A recurring argument with this nomination and other AfD nominations of company articles is that funding announcements don't make a company notable. But when we see a funding announcement, particularly one that values a company as a tech unicorn, doesn't that tell us that an experienced investment company or investor has carefully studied a company's business model and has faith in their management team? They have access to private information that we as editors do not have. Significant repeated funding rounds tell us that someone has done the background checking for us. Until there's consensus at Wikipedia that I'm mistaken, these sources all help with determining notability. Also, the funding announcement is often the first time the media hears of the company, and it then spurs them to do additional coverage of the company. That's why there's more info in the article than just funding. It's just being ignored. If it's because the source is paywalled, I'll be happy to send it to any reviewer. TechnoTalk (talk) 18:43, 30 June 2022 (UTC)