Gotta disagree with some of your points Blue Screen, but I guess that'll become more clear once this posts goes on. But I'll run by them as Alex brought up the points in the OP post, just to follow the current focus of the thread.
1.) Importance: When it comes to stuff being documented, the staff often gives priority to the newer stuff from what I know. Keep the site updated with what's going on at the moment and get the information while it's still fresh. I can agree with this policy, as it allows for documentation of what's big while it's still big.
Problem with this policy is that older stuff either gets pushed on the backlog or just forgotten. Staff and mods have a pretty big doc filled with entries we still like to launch. Not to forget that you also have a lot of old entries that can do with some rewrites. This is what I really dislike about the site focus. Some of the old classics deserve much better than what we left them with. I really wish we'd put some more focus at times on fixing old stuff.
2.) Sources And Reliabilty: This is a doubt factor on a few areas, being 4chan and internet slang. A lot of old 4chan memes are just lost and forgotten in terms of origin and spread, you simply can't find enough sources anymore all the time to proof it has spread. Internet Slang is those type of things that just fluently merged into internet culture, you can't exactly pinpoint notable events.
Then there's the point of a large ass community. Sure, if something has spread to multiple websites, we have clear sources of Spread. But with the big communities (4chan, Reddit, Tumblr, Facebook), spread outside of the website in question isn't directly necessary.
For the regular stuff, you can quickly get an idea of what's "notable". Certain websites nowadays are quickly in covering specific content, and from there it can grow regarding news coverage. If it remains small in general, you'll notice. It's not possible to give an exact number here, as specific factors just determine how quickly something is bound to get covered. Like for example a movie like Pacific Rim is bound to get news coverage, but that you'd have various sources talking about a Jaeger Designer app, that's notable.
3.) Popularity: This is of course an important factor. However, it must be remembered that popularity is not time restricted. Something that managed to get a moderate amount of attention over the course of a few months is just as notable as something that gained a shitton of attention over the course a few days. Of course they need some degree of attention, but if it's something that appeared out of nowhere that you suddenly can't avoid anywhere, it probably can be considered notable. In specific occasions we can decide here to document them as Events.
And then you have to look at the difference between the older and newer memes. A couple of years ago, getting 100k views on Youtube was the shit, and at a Million you had a meme if given the right amount of remixes. Nowadays 1 million for a "notable" video is kinda meh and definitely not something to write an entry about. What was extremely special back then, is just common nowadays, as the internet has evolved. But that doesn't make the notable memes from back then lose their credibility, as they managed to become memes in a time it was simply more difficult to spread.
BSoD wrote:
Entries that appear to be the result of a one-time-only typical internet occurrence will most certainly be deadpooled.
Nope.avi. Even these events can still be notable, it's just a matter of how they're received. Some of the most popular old 4chan memes originated from "one-time-only typical internet occurrences", in this case being just another day without another large quantity of shitposts on 4chan. 4chan is a pretty cool guy, eh makes memes and stuff and doesn't afraid of anything. Of course if it's just one-thread material that died after that, insta-deadpool.
4.) Critic: How they're received on one side doesn't determine how they're received on the other side. "If You Know What I Mean" was widely hated by one side for being from 9gag, but the other side loved it and embraced it, giving it staying power and eventually making it a legit meme.
Then you have the Events that got notable through hate, like the Chick-Fil-A Gay Marriage Controversy, or Cyberbullying victims, or just the more gory stuff. These topics gained attention through controversial content, and not exactly positive attention. But this is KYM, we prefer to stay objective in those cases. Spread through hate is still spread. And notable is notable, regardless of type or content.
As for the votes of the community. It should be quite obvious that the average comment in the comment section has pretty much zero vote on what we do with an entry. Posting "+1 Dedpul" or insulting the OP has never actually resulted in an article being deadpooled. If they're willing to discuss its potential and give arguments, it can have an effect of course. Of course not any argument will suffice, but there were various times where a well thought out comment made me reconsider some parts in an entry and later change them.
