The company Astronomer has a Wikipedia article now. Should it?
The viral moment has been memeified, discussed, debated and now added to Wikipedia. But why?
For years the disambiguation page for “The Astronomer” had four bullet points on it:
Vita Hludovici or the "Limousin Astronomer", the anonymous author of the Vita Hludovici, a biography of Holy Roman Emperor Louis the Pious
The Astronomer (Vermeer), a 1668 oil painting by the 17th century Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer
The Astronomer (Wild Cards), a character in the Wild Cards book series
Astronomer (comics), a Marvel Comics character
The page has had little action in its two decades of existence. Until July 18th, 2025, it had been edited a total of 14 times.
On July 18th, a fifth bullet point was added. It read:
Astronomer Inc is a technology company specializing in data orchestration software built around the Apache Airflow platform.
The editor who added it provided this explanation:
Added Astronomer Inc, since everyone is searching for it now
The next edit happened hours later. It was a relatively minor change, adding a comma, dropping the word “is” and hyperlinking “Astronomer Inc” and “Apache Airflow” to their respective pages.
Astronomer Inc., a technology company specializing in data orchestration software built around the Apache Airflow platform.
The next edit removed it, as it was a “red link”—meaning a link to a page that does not exist (or, at the time, did not exist… yet)
Then the final edit, which updated it to the much simpler:
Astronomer (company), a data operations technology company
Here’s what it looks like now:
But let’s return to that first edit and the explanation its editor provided: Added Astronomer Inc, since everyone is searching for it now
You probably already know the answer, but let’s ask it anyway:
Why is everyone searching for “Astronomer” these days?
Like I said, you already know the answer.
If not, I’ll sum it up in the simplest way I can:
Coldplay concerts apparently include kiss cams, like the kind they do at baseball games.
A couple had a really weird interaction to being featured on the kiss cam.
This inspired the Coldplay guy to say: “Either they're having an affair or they're just very shy.”
This subsequently inspired the internet to find the couple. Turns out the man was the CEO of a company called Astronomer and the woman also works for Astronomer. They are allegedly both married to other people.
This also might have been the biggest news story over the last week.
Most of what can be said about this story has already been said. I do think this 404 Media article—The Astronomer CEO's Coldplay Concert Fiasco Is Emblematic of Our Social Media Surveillance Dystopia—is a good look at the situation overall.
But I’m not here to write about the stuff people are already saying. The question I’m asking is: does Astronomer really deserve a Wikipedia page now?
Let’s look at the Astronomer Wikipedia article
As I write this—Saturday evening, July 19th, four days after the Coldplay concert—the Wikipedia article entitled Astronomer (company) has existed for less than 24 hours. It has been edited 43 times by 19 different editors. It consists of four paragraphs and has seven references, plus an info box.
It has also been nominated for deletion.
It’s so short that I can copy-and-paste the whole thing right here:
Astronomer is an American data operations technology company,[3] specializing in artificial intelligence, with a valuation of $1 billion.[4]
History
The company secured $93 million in a Series D funding round in 2025.[5]
In July 2025, CEO Andy Byron went viral after being displayed on the jumbotron embracing Astronomer's head of HR, Kristin Cabot, at a Coldplay concert. Both were married to other people. Further videos submitted by audience members showed the pair kissing and embracing throughout the concert. [6]
On July 17, 2025 CEO Andy Byron resigned.[7] Co-founder and chief product officer Pete DeJoy was appointed as interim CEO.
Here are the seven references:
"A Logo Story". Astronomer.
"US tech CEO Andy Byron suspended after Coldplay concert embrace goes viral". BBC News. July 19, 2025. Retrieved July 19, 2025.
Morse, Brit. "An HR crisis is taking the internet by storm and there could be 'severe consequences for the company's culture'". Fortune. Retrieved July 19, 2025.
"How a Cuddle at a Coldplay Concert Brought Chaos to a Marriage – and a £1BN Company". The Telegraph. July 18, 2025. Archived from the original on July 18, 2025. Retrieved July 18, 2025.
Nuñez, Michael (May 1, 2025). "Astronomer's $93M raise underscores a new reality: Orchestration is king in AI infrastructure". VentureBeat. Retrieved July 19, 2025.
McBride, Jessica (July 18, 2025). "Andy Bryon is the CEO of a Company Called Astronomer. He's in a Social Media Firestorm". MensJournal. Retrieved July 19, 2025.
Bacon, Auzinea (July 19, 2025). "Astronomer CEO resigns after viral Coldplay incident". CNN. Retrieved July 19, 2025.
Of these seven references, the first is the Astronomer website itself and the fifth is an article from May about its funding. The other five all tell the same story: Coldplay, kiss cam, social media backlash, resignation.
Now, I’ve had to make a decision here: should I participate in the deletion discussion or should I write about it? I previously upset a YouTuber and her fans by writing about her article while also editing it. I do not wish to make such a mistake again.
In this case, I’ve decided to write about it while watching the deletion discussion unfold. There are two reasons for this:
I think it’s an interesting story to write about, and
I don’t know if the article should be deleted or not.
This article has a few reasons not to exist. It violates, in my opinion at least, a few rules listed on the Wikipedia project page “What Wikipedia is not.”
This list includes:
Wikipedia is not a soapbox or means of promotion
Wikipedia is not a newspaper
Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information
Wikipedia is not a battleground
In my opinion, each of these give good reason for this article not to exist.
However, at the same time, it’s very possible that this moment will have a legacy still discussed twenty years from now. While Wikipedia is not a newspaper, it does capture specific moments that have lasting notability, including memes.
Consider:
However, the current version of the article is not dedicated to the controversy itself or the memes it has produced. It’s ostensibly about the company. A more useful, accurate and honest article might look something like the one on Know Your Meme, entitled Astronomer CEO Andy Byron's Affair at Coldplay Concert.
The question becomes: why should this article exist? Which brings me to the great irony of the situation.
Most CEOs really want Wikipedia articles for their companies
I have written about this before, specifically in the post Do you deserve your own Wikipedia page? Almost everyone I know wants a Wikipedia article for their business. Most of them don’t get one, partially for the reasons of “Wikipedia is not…” listed above.
In the case of Astronomer, they never had enough press to warrant a Wikipedia article. There also appears to have never been much interest in either Astronomer or Andy Byron until this week. They were, quite simply, not notable enough for Wikipedia.
But now? There are thousands of articles across the internet discussing Astronomer and Andy Byron. As far as I can tell, The Economist and The New Yorker are the only two major new sources not to write about this (yet).
So yeah, Astronomer might’ve earned itself a Wikipedia article, in one of the worst possible ways. If the article withstands its deletion discussion, it will always mention this incident. I predict it won’t remain but I wouldn’t be surprised if the incident itself ends up with an article. Perhaps “Coldplaygate” will get an article, as some people seem to be calling this.
This, in turn, is why I often warn people away from the idea of thinking they deserve a Wikipedia article. Not only do they usually not deserve one, but no one can control their own Wikipedia article. You are in the hands of the editors.
I should also note that Andy Byron has his own Wikipedia article now. It was created on July 18th and has been edited 105 times by 28 different editors.
And yes, Andy Byron’s Wikipedia article is also nominated for deletion.