Talk:NORAD Tracks Santa

message: I'm not sure if that's what you'd call it, but this article is in serious need of a clean-up to distinguish fact from fiction.  Having a background story for the kids is nice and all, but this is an encyclopedia. Freyyr890 01:16, 11 December 2015
Cheddar Cheesia 23:16, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Haha J'onn J'onzz 03:11, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

text: NORAD Tracks Santa is a big annual effort by NORAD and many partners for the young and young at heart at the annual Christmas Season. The recent updates provide a way for people to know how NORAD Tracks Santa has changed in the first decade of the 21st Century and a way to access audio and video files from late January thru late November when NORAD Tracks Santa website is an empty shell. Tomsmith0002 (talk) 03:37, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: In-universe style

message: This article should be rewritten. It is almost entirely a direct copy of the Santa tracking website, even using "we" in places. 81.58.34.171 13:00, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I guess that somebody was thinking the exact same thing when I wrote this. Fixed now. 81.58.34.171 13:01, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Personally, I think it should be rewritten to exclude all of the nonfactual bullshit from the site on it. --76.73.166.12 (talk) 03:08, 25 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rewrite 

message: The links to CONELRAD were citations for the evolution of the story.  Do you really believe our "external link policy" forbids the inclusion of references?!? ➥the Epopt 05:29, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  CONELRAD links 

message: NORAD unfourtantly will no longer track santa claus there tradition will no longer exist. despite the webstie recieving hits
-MrJanitor1  —Preceding unsigned comment added by MrJanitor1 (talk • contribs) 18:25, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If you checkout the website you will see that they are indeed going to be tracking Santa again this year. 999mal (talk) 00:04, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  And in fact are... -- Cain Mosni (talk||contribs) 14:24, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discontinued?  

message: This article seems to insinuate that the Santa tracking is real when of course it isn't. See Wikipedia:SANTA for more info. Deamon138 (talk) 04:40, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Needs at least partial rewording 

message: I'm trying to fix the references into a more formal citation and fix linkrot.
Reference 11 seems to be a dead link and a Google search for it only shows one vaguely related link. I have marked it as a dead link. Would appreciate any feedback on a better way to deal with it.
--Sultec (talk) 22:06, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  linkrot 

message: Can someone add the 2005 and 2006 North Pole  link(s). -Y
Santa Web Cam Links now exist from 2002 thru 2009.  Does anyone have 2001 and earlier links ??Tomsmith0002 (talk) 04:30, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: 2005

message: The image captioned "Santa location map, 2007" seems a tad political for an article about Santa Claus. Presumably Guantanamo is not where the elves are now. :) NORAD has no jurisdiction over Guantanamo Bay camp, that is exclusively US. There is no special Christmas-related significance to Guantanamo, Cuba. So why is the image shown with that name?
Perhaps the answer is that an image is needed to illustrate what a map is, or how it looks on a computer screen, and we need to use a copyrighted image? I don't think that passes the NFC test, since it can be conveyed with our own text. Should the image be removed? Franamax (talk) 05:55, 5 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image in 2008 section 

message: In the last two days, a massive number of links have been added to this article, mostly by single-purpose accounts. I propose to revert back to  and go forward from there. --John Nagle (talk) 00:23, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Added links for 2009 and updated to good links from deadlinks for other yearsTomsmith0002 (talk) 04:30, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Most of the new links promote an account named "HawaiianShooter" on YouTube.  --John Nagle (talk) 04:58, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Massive linkspam 

message: If anyone has the 1997-2001 please contact me or Tomsmith0002. - MCPearl at 12:52 PM Eastern Standard Time on January 2, 2010.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by MCPearl (talk • contribs) 17:52, 2 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  1997-2001 

message: I still think that this article needs a serious cleanup;  what would you think if you saw this at Homer Simpson's article?
:Homer Jay Simpson is a middle-aged man who lives in Springfield, USA.  He lives with his family, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie, at 742 Evergreen Terrace.  He is employed by Montgomery Burns...
and so on.  Notice that there is no mention that he is a completely fictional character created for a TV show designed to make fun of people.  Well, the same goes for this article.  It is getting closer and closer to complete lies.  
ajmint (talk•email•contribs•subpages) 22:33, 17 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fact from Fiction 

message: I have tagged this article for multiple issues. I am aware that the huge template sort of defaces the article, but this is secondary to the real problem: This article is a disgrace.
Please do not remove any issues without addressing them first:
* Intricate detail (also known as "fancruft"): Speaks for itself.
* Notability: Perhaps the least critical of the issues. I have never heard of this advertising stunt, but that's normal since I live on a different continent. The reason why I have included this is that most of the numerous citations to reliable sources seem to refer to Christmas infotainment, which according to WP:SENSATION is not enough to establish notability. If there is serious third-party treatment hidden in this huge article, please point it out and this issue can be removed.
* Advert: Speaks for itself. Basically this is a summary of most of the other problems.
* Fiction: Santa Cam appears to be a piece of fiction continued annually as a media event. If it is notable, we can cover it, but coverage has to follow the fiction guidelines, which it currently does not do.
* In-universe: Just one example. "Fortunately the systems used by NORAD, NORAD Tracks Santa, and Santa Claus were all Y2K (Year 2000) compliant." The joke of treating Santa as real is so overused in this article that it's not even remotely funny any more.
* Long: The article is currently at 200 KB, more than 3x the recommended maximum size. For some articles, such as William Shakespeare or United States extreme length may be justified (note that these two articles are still shorter than this one), but NORAD Tracks Santa is obviously not a key encyclopedic topic.
* Examplefarm: The problem includes what seem to be complete lists of episodes, each with a short plot summary. That's excessive detail, contrary to encyclopedic brevity.
* Rewrite: Obviously necessary. If the main editors of this article agree that a complete rewrite addressing the article issues is necessary, this may be the only issue that needs tagging until the task has been accomplished.
* COI: It seems obvious that at least two of the significant editors at this article have a conflict of interest. This would not be a big problem if the state of the article did not reflect this very clearly.
* External links: Lists of deep links to a site are not acceptable. This issue is probably the one that is easiest to address.
There are two possibilities now. (1) The main editors of this article learn about Wikipedia's content standards and make a significant contribution towards getting this article in line with them. (2) I try to get additional eyes to this article by posting at various noticeboards, such as WP:COIN and WP:CN. Hans Adler 09:10, 8 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Update: Nikkimaria has done part of the necessary work. As a result I could remove "external links". The number of external links is still relatively high, but now the selection seems reasonable to me. One of the external links is really a reference to an online article, but as it's the only reference that doesn't appear in a footnote I left it as it is. The link to Jane's is broken; if we can link to the Web Archive (currently it's also broken), then that would be a second reference to an online article and a demonstration of the kind of silly season reporting that the article subject gets. Hans Adler 17:01, 8 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Multiple issues 

message: The article currently uses :Template:Infobox military unit. It appears to me that the subject of this article is not a military unit. One could argue about whether this kind of joke is acceptable in the encyclopedia, but we have had a widespread discussion before regarding the use of :Template:Infobox Military Conflict on Emu War. The result was: The infobox is not used.
I guess the simplest solution is to correct the entry under "Role". It should explain the actual role of "NORAD Tracks Santa", which I suspect is either public relations or a private undertaking by NORAD staff. Ideally the article should say which it is, really. That kind of information is why we have encyclopedias, after all. Hans Adler 17:12, 8 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Infobox 

message: There are at least two excessive quotations from the NORAD website. In my opinion they are so long (and so pointless) that they are probably not covered by fair use. I will try to cut them down to reasonable dimensions. Hans Adler 17:40, 8 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You do know that ALL CAPS is YELLING, don't you? Please have a read at WP:CIVIL. --Chris (クリス • フィッチュ) (talk) 20:44, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

text: I am not an American and I am not a fan of this silly programme, just trying to clean up after you. You didn't bother to learn about our policies before turning this stupid article into a tumour and then even making it spread. But I am supposed to learn the details of American copyright law before I am allowed to help you? Thank you very much. Hans Adler 23:51, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Copyright violation 

message: It has been two weeks since those editors responsible for making this such a problem article have done any further editing to it or spammed any more links to it across the rest of Wikipedia. Hopefully, from now on this can be an encyclopedia article instead of a fan page.
I have performed the following edits:
* Trimmed the external links back down to those left by User:Nikkimaria om 8 March 2010. The Jane's article seems to be unobtainable.
* Removed the "Santa Claus tracking system" section, it was all purely fiction.
* Removed the "Celebrity messages" section. All it amounted to was saying that some celebrities did commercials for the program in 2005. Is that really notable?
* Removed the music. What was listed as "NORAD Tracks Santa theme" was in fact "Sleigh Ride", written in 1946. There could be a copyright problem, besides it was just a feature of the fan page nature of the article.
* Removed tables of statistics and list of media. Unlikely to interest the general reader.
* Paraphrased the lengthy quotation at the start of the article. It may be in the public domain but it was also "in-universe". The colonel didn't really get his staff to find out the current location of Santa Claus, for obvious reasons.
* Rewrote text to remove remaining "in-universe" sentences and tone down the promotional nature of the article.
* Reduced the number of sections.
* Removed the military infobox because no evidence has been offered that NORAD Tracks Santa is considered to be a seperate military unit.
I think this really leaves the issue of reliable third-party references and with it the question of notability.
It's also worth pointing out that the copyright status of most of the images that have accompanied this article has been questioned on Wikimedia Commons and false claims have been made about some of them being in the public domain, as can be seen here. That's something that future editors should bear in mind.Simon Peter Hughes (talk) 14:20, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Addressing the issues

message: A picture of Col. Shoup, and maybe even the briefest of bio info, would be cool.PurpleChez (talk) 16:13, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Col Shoup

message: There is now a certain amount of in-universe NORADcruft at Santa Claus, added recently by a new user whose name is very similar to those of the two editors previously responsible for the mess at the present article. Hans Adler 12:28, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problem seems to have moved to [[Santa Claus]] article 

message: Why is every editor who dares goes against the British-German editor "clique" on the NORAD Tracks Santa article accused of being a "sock puppet" or a "meat puppet" of NORAD and NORAD Public Affairs (who are supposedly in the guise of banned users) ??
User:Jack Sebsation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jack_Sebastian) at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Santa_Claus/Archive_8#Santa_tracking_websites had to counsel and caution both Simon Peter Hughes and Hans Adler against wholesale reversion and how "I don't believe that the consensus you speak of is that clear, Hans.I'll let other people chime in before commenting, though. I will additionally point out that arbitrarily turning the clock back to your favored version is not only non-conducive (because it's always going to get reverted) but not really in keeping with the idea of collaborative editing. When you remove a lot of contributions, you are saying that their contributions aren't important. But lets get some input from others. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 20:51, 20 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Anyone can claim to be anyone on WP - positng "letters" is not any kind of proof whatsoever. Nor can we as editors makes calls to verify information, that is not how WP works. And as far as "trusting the government" goes, HAHAHA. We could start with the Tuskeegee Experiment, and go down from there! - BilCat (talk) 22:22, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: For the benifit of other editors, I would like to point out that Albert z chan was not accused of being a sock puppet of NORAD. He was accused of being a sock puppet of a banned user. --Simon Peter Hughes (talk) 15:14, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Concerns of NORAD Sock and Meat Puppetry ?? 

message: Ronz added the undue weight template to a new addition to the article, but I disagree with this. I simply don't see how this is undue. What are some other viewpoints on this, and what can be changed to remove this so-called undue influence? — Huntster (t @ c) 00:56, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not undue influence. It's giving briefly mentioned information (available from a single source, where it is a very small portion) too much prominence in this article. Trim it. --Ronz (talk) 02:15, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Undue weight: What to change? 

message: Should we add :File:Official NORAD Santa Tracker - Theme Music.ogg to this article? 76.65.128.132 (talk) 09:27, 1 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: To be blunt, I see no reason to add this to the article. I don't see how it strengthens the material, or would act as anything other than a filler. — Huntster (t @ c) 21:20, 1 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[:File:Official NORAD Santa Tracker - Theme Music.ogg]] 

message: Does anyone know why a city is depicted as a stop for Santa by Norad? They seem to be a combination of major cities along with US military bases. 2 stops in 2010 and possibly 2011 were Roswell, New Mexico and Enderby Land, Antartica. (Have screen shots of both)22yearswothanks (talk) 03:07, 20 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cities visited on web site 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 4 external links on NORAD Tracks Santa. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111225033711/http://www.noradsanta.org/en/track3d.html to http://www.noradsanta.org/en/track3d.html
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130523121156/http://forces.gc.ca/site/commun/ml-fe/article-eng.asp?id=3985 to http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/Commun/ml-fe/article-eng.asp?id=3985
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130703170911/http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/Commun/ml-fe/article-eng.asp?id=3987 to http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/Commun/ml-fe/article-eng.asp?id=3987
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110919135446/http://sse.jpl.nasa.gov/news/display.cfm?News_ID=4004 to http://sse.jpl.nasa.gov/news/display.cfm?News_ID=4004
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 23:48, 10 February 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified (February 2018) 

message: There seems to have been some previous discussion on the talk page, although it is not clear what the resolution was. The lede, as it reads is factually incorrect. The project does not track Santa as he leaves the North Pole, since Santa certainly does not exist. The project tracks an imaginary Santa in his journey. My previous edit on this issue was reverted with the comment that "kids look at this page." However, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia; its objective is not to perpetuate culturally specific fairy tales. In fact, precisely because some children might take it seriously, it is important not to perpetuate fables on Wikipedia. So, I am re-editing it to make it factually precise. Of course, if someone would like to claim that the project really tracks Santa Claus, I would very much appreciate an RS to that effect.
Jacob2718 (talk) 09:51, 25 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: The question of whether or not you believe in Santa does not fall within Scope of this page. All reliable sources, including NORAD itself, claim they track Santa on Christmas Eve. Regardless on if you believe Santa is real or not, references to this page provide that Santa is factual and real. FirstDrop87 (talk) 16:36, 25 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think that NORAD counts as an RS here! But, in any case, the accurate statement is then that "NORAD claims that it tracks Santa ..." I hope you do not want to revert to "NORAD tracks Santa" as a statement of fact, which would be absurd. Second, it is important to mention that this is part of Pentagon public outreach. I've added that and a reference. Jacob2718 (talk) 02:14, 26 December 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: I continue to disagree. There are no reliable sources that dispute the tracking of Santa by NORAD. To the contrary, many reliable sources support the fact that NORAD does indeed track Santa every year. FirstDrop87 (talk) 14:25, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title: Lede

message: I took a few screenshots of the 2020 version where Santa is wearing a face mask, and I'd like to upload one for posterity. Does anyone know if the tracker interface is public domain (as a federal project) or under copyright? I'd like to know which license I should use before uploading. Tisnec (talk) 22:01, 25 December 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Screenshots copyright? 

message: @MrOllie There needs to be a disclaimer that the content involves fictional subjects. Otherwise this article is written in an in-universe style. Kuhnaims (talk) 15:30, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: I've tried to reduce the in-universe style as much as possible. Which part of the article do you think is still written in an in-universe style? Félix An (talk) 15:31, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: 2nd line, tracking Santa Claus, i think there should be an adjective to stress that Santa is fictional in context of NORAD, like mythical or legendary Kuhnaims (talk) 15:37, 27 December 2021 (UTC)

text: There have been lots of discussions about this over the years, (particularly on the talk page of the main article about Santa Claus) and the consensus has been that words like 'mythical' and 'fictional' are not really accurate. Stylistically, we also should not repeat the same point multiple times, particularly in the opening sentences. The lead of the article clearly states that this is a simulation, and that is enough. MrOllie (talk) 15:36, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
replies: text:  The lede sentence already uses the word "simulates" and the lede of Santa Claus uses the word "legendary." That is sufficient; while Wikipedia is not censored for children, we also don't need to bludgeon the fictional/legendary of Santa at every opportunity. OhNoitsJamie Talk 15:37, 27 December 2021 (UTC)

text: Sure, but how exactly is mythical/fictional inaccurate? You do realise Santa isn't real...? Kuhnaims (talk) 15:39, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: Santa Claus is an exaggerated version of a real, historical person called Nicholas of Myra. Something that is 'fictional' originated in fiction rather than in history. MrOllie (talk) 15:47, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  December 2021 

message: Santa Claus is a real person and he lives at the North Pole. Every Christmas Eve, he delivers presents to good children.  NORAD tracks this activity as part of its general commitment to track objects within the North American airspace.  Certain disaffected persons circulate the scurrilous and false notion that Santa does not exist based on a false concept called "scientism." NORAD tracks Santa, and it is very bad for North American air security to deny the existence of Santa Claus, because it is obviously false.  If we can't trust NORAD, who can we trust?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:569:7D68:4700:5093:B502:9BEE:B045 (talk) 09:57, 28 July 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Please see WP:FRINGE. Félix An (talk) 14:03, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

text: Also, WP:SANTA specifically addresses this issue. BilCat (talk) 18:44, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

text: Add in WP:DNFT. Ravensfire (talk) 18:49, 28 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Santa Denialism 

message: This edit is simply bad writing and confused phrasing. Please don't start up this edit warring about Santa all over again. It was disruptive last time around, and we don't need to go through it again. MrOllie (talk) 02:14, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: The lead you are trying to restore was changed by someone who put "Keeping the magic just for today pls" (see the edit history). Wikipedia is not a website for that. Félix An (talk) 02:27, 14 March Félix An (talk) 02:31, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Additionally, please see the history of the talk page and you will see the many issues with this in the past (before I was actively editing Wikipedia). Félix An (talk) 02:32, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Simulates