Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Soyombo Revival Society

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. RL0919 (talk) 05:33, 24 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Soyombo Revival Society

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While this page is attributed to an anonymous editor on ruwiki, I believe that it is the same person who made this page on enwiki. An editor with the same name as the one who made this page in enwiki made another page regarding this organization here, using an edited picture from Republican Xinjiang. While Bekteev was met by Sven Hedin under the service of Ma Zhongying, this was after the decline of much of the ROVS, and Xinjiang is very close to Mongolia. Furthermore, citation 7 seems to be a permanently dead link, and a search for it yields no relevant results. Citation 8 is behind a paywall, but it cuts off right after explaining the Kumul Rebellion. From a quick re-read of a section of Source 9, it seems that it does not mention the OVS at all. Roniius (talk) 05:31, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Roniius (talk) 05:31, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Let me clarify here: you're saying this isn't notable because the sources are poor (i.e. it fails WP:GNG)? That it didn't actually exist? What does its creation by the same user as on RuWiki have to do with it? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 06:13, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Comment per CaptainEek, I am confused as to what the argument for deletion is here. -- Sirfurboy (talk) 08:29, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
- @CaptainEek: @Sirfurboy: I have reason to believe that this organization did not exist. The sources do not mention this organization at all, and the creation by the same user on ruwiki may have a connection to the user being the one who made this up - As this user may be the only person to create articles on different language Wikipedias (and a Wikia article with an edited image that I could not find elsewhere, thus making it suspicious that it may be made up by the user), it makes it more likely to have been the fabrication of one person (I find it unlikely for different users on different language Wikipedias to work together to create articles about an obscure fake organization). Roniius (talk) 11:08, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the clarification. So yes, on the face of it, it looks like it could well be a WP:HOAX. I will do some more digging and come back with my thoughts soon. -- Sirfurboy (talk) 11:33, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. This does indeed look like a WP:HOAX. I don't speak Russian which makes things harder, but it is suspicious in itself that most of the refs are Russian only, with no translation of key material, and that they are of poor quality. Searching for the name of the society in the better quality Russian pages finds no hits, and Google translate of these seems to confirm no mention. One ref is to a file hosting site. The user generated sites are already described by the nominator. The English refs do not check out. Searching vol 32 of Foreign Affairs here:[1] I get no hits for Soyombo, OVS, OBS or anything similar. Hits for "revival" do not check out. The ref is used in a related context on another wikipedia page, but this version strips it of page numbers, which is the kind of thing a hoaxer would do to make it harder to verify the ref. Basically is seems to say this imaginary society was part of that real rebellion, but does not provide enough information to disporve the claim. Nevertheless as it is not even mentioned in the only two English refs given on the page, it fails GNG and is very likely a hoax. -- Sirfurboy (talk) 11:58, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Well at any rate it fails WP:GNG. An explicit google search shows just 14 results, none more than just including the phrase of the society. A wide variety of different search terms and looking around showed me...surprisingly nothing. Of the existing sources, the Ruspole one is blog content hosting a primary source that doesn't even mention the SRS. The third ref just took me to a phishing website and my anti-virus had a cow, sooo don't think thats legit. The rest are books in Russian, which I don't have access to. But I'm surprised that not a single google books result came up. I even tried in Russian, using the Russian transliteration of "Общество возрождения Соембо". While it brought up the Wikipedia pages in both English and Russian, it brought up basically nothing else, and no results in Google books. While I won't go so far as to say its a hoax (although it sure could be), it certainly fails the GNG anyway. Someone who speaks Russian might be useful here to determine if this is a hoax or not. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 19:50, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I tries search in Russian, and I do not get any hits beyond Wikipedia derivatives--Ymblanter (talk) 12:20, 18 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Fails WP:V as best I can determine. 24.151.50.175 (talk) 15:33, 20 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I find Yugoslav agitation in Mongolia in the 1920s incredible, but white Russian would not be. However this article appears to have some sources, apparently RS, meaning that I cannot accept that it is wholly a hoax. Peterkingiron (talk) 13:34, 22 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per WP:RS and WP:V, even if it is not a hoax. Bearian (talk) 21:09, 22 January 2020 (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.