Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/AOHack programs

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 Delete, after discounting the !votes from non-established Wikipedians. Whether AOL4Free is notable enough (for at least a mention in AOL) can be discussed elsewhere, but otherwise, the consensus here is to deleted this particular article Deathphoenix ʕ 13:26, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

AOHack programs

It doesn't seem notable and there's always been a lack of sources. Looks to be from original research and unverifiable research, too. The one news source indicates that there should be an AOL4FREE article, but not an article on "AOHack programs" in general. Maybe AOL4FREE should just be a note in the AOL article and nothing more? Anomo 12:15, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

• Comments - most google hits look like Wiki mirrors. But there are a lot, including a mirror from answers.com. -Patstuart 22:03, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
  • answers.com is a Wikipedia mirror. Zetawoof^(ζ) 00:41, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
  • In that case, Delete, as per ConMan's comments. -Patstuart 00:43, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete - 118 unique Google hits for "aohack programs", which drops to 81 if I exclude pages including the word "Wikipedia", and only 22 if I exlude those containing a fragment of a sentence from the Wikipedia article, with the remaining links looking pretty much like garbage -- i.e. no content outside of Wiki-mirrors. Confusing Manifestation 00:38, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
• the underground aol scene was huge and a catalyst for many to go from IRC into mainstream. i think this page merits saving.The undertow 02:07, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
• Delete as nominator. Anomo 03:51, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
• Keep AOL4FREE was a program that became famouse due to Nicholas Ryan being prosecuted. The others, and there were 100s, didn't achieve the notoriety but were used even more. However, to ignore the fact that these programs existed and were a major part of the America Online community in the mid 90s would be wrong. These programs were the first mass distributors of pirated software and mp3s and is often recognized as the precursor to massive online peer to peer file transfer systems such as Napster and Bittorrent. By the way, my searches lead me to several websites with lists of the programs. Just because you guys aren't looking past page 2 on your google search doesn't mean you should delete it. My suggestion is this, in the program list, the unverified programs should be removed but I can find plenty of references to about 20% of the programs in there. Also, if you guys are search "AOhack programs", you are searching wrong. 68.196.250.47 05:44, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
• Keep it There are several references you can get that these programs were valid and a significant part of AOL for a number of years. The previous poster was right. You can't serach "AOHack Programs" and expect to get results from google. There are way too many wikipedia mirrors that drown out the term now. AOHack Programs is just a generic term. Some people called them AOL Proggies, AOL Progz, AOLHacks, AOHell Clones, etc... There were a million names so a generic serach or one name, specifically the title of the wikipedia article itself will naturally not yield any results. There are legitimate lists of programs that were popular that still exist. [1] [2]. On top of that, these programs faded out nearly 10 years ago and the detailed information on them is not widely available. There were literally hundreds of programs and I do think that the "list" of programs needs to be cut down. The scene was described here [3] and programs were reviewed here [[4]] There is an old copy of a newsletter that reviewed many of the popular programs.[5]. And, that was just with 2 minutes of searching. There is a lot of info out there but you have to know how to find it. Part of the problem is that to have good search results, you need to have atleast a significant amount of knowledge of these programs, the AOL warez scene, and the state of AOL at the time. I'm assuming most of you who simply find "wikipedia mirrors" don't. That's no reason to delete it. I agree that this article has a lot of unverified information but that doesn't mean the rest of the article is non notable and should be deleted. I noticed a trend in the history of people adding single programs which were most likely the programmers themselves adding their program to the list. I suggest the program section be cleaned up and only notable and/or referencable programs be allowed on the list. I suggest the non-notables be added individually with a requirement to reference it. That way, we don't get someone cutting and pasting an entire list of 100s of programs into the article. Also, the private room list needs to be cutdown as well. As far as I know and can find, the only rooms that should be in the list were "Warez", "Freewarez", and "MacWarez". The fact of the matter is, these programs were very popular, used by millions of people at the time, and they were significant part of the history of AOL security flaws, warez developement, file transfer, and led to the prosecution of a few people which made national headlines. This article needs cleaning up not deleting. Please keep it. Coumarin 17:42, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Keep There's no reason to delete it. Just remove the unverifiable stuff. There's been more than enough links provided. Read them. Google search statistics mean nothing. TheArizona5 21:57, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Delete, but split the AOL4Free program into its own article. 24.55.106.132 01:40, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

• I disagree with doing this. AOL4Free wasn't close to any of the more popular programs in popularity. It wasn't used nearly as frequently as the others. It gained recognition from the media due to the legal ramifications. That doesn't make the others non-notable as they were used by more people.BenihanaLee 21:45, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

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.