Talk:John Robb (author)

Speedy Deletion

I don't really understand why this page was marked for speedy deletion. Anyone got any ideas?

Interstar 00:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

This article has been deleted once already, and was brought back. To answer your question, the reason it was marked for deletion is that it didn't explain the significance of John Robb or his work. I've tried to fix that a little bit, but clearly there is more that needs to be done on this article. I just haven't had time to work on it as I've wished I could. Grant 21:09, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

What seems strange to me here is that I thought the whole point of Wikipedia as an "organic" encyclopedia is that it lets articles "grow" through the accretion of multiple edits. When I created the page I didn't have time to create a full explanation of the subject, but I hoped that others would swarm on the target and add their own contributions to build it up into a worth-while resource.

It seems that something like the "significance" criteria works against the possibility of that. If, when you create an article you're going to have to demonstrate to any random reviewer who wanders past that the subject is "significant" you can't really plant a seed for others to cultivate. You have to come with a fully formed article. Doesn't that defeat the whole point of the thing?

Interstar

Article Outline

This article needs to be greatly expanded. There needs to be a bit more biographical information included, especially the stuff like USAFA, counter-terrorism work, and things like that to explain why he can write with authority. Also, there needs to be a description of his thesis to include system disruption and urban take-down, open-source warfare, and the implications it has on state security. There also needs to be something on his proposed responses to these threats, namely a more robust, responsive and distributed security apparatus. This is how I see an outline for this page working:

• Education and Military Career
• Post-Military Career
• Global Guerrillas
  • System Disruption
  • Open-source warfare
  • Attacks on the State system
  • Responding to Global Guerrillas

I know that John himself linked to this bio of him, hopefully he will help fill in some of the more biographical information. Grant 13:12, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

>> Question - granted, John Robb's background does give him an insight into various issues, but is the sole criterion for inclusion in Wikipedia 'being able to write from authority'? What about the quality of the ideas? I thought that we ditched the whole argumentum ad verecundiam idea with the Enlightenment!

Draft Article Sections

Since these don't contain any information yet, I've moved them here so they can be worked on and moved into the article once they have some content. Grant 14:36, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Open-source warfare

Open-source warfare is dependent upon having a "Plausible Promise", according to Robb. He describes the plausible promise this way:

An open source war is built on an idea that has wide acceptance. The key is finding the idea (eject the occupation or force a government to abandon an egregious exploitation of a target area -- see my notes on Indonesia in the post below). Once it is found, it needs to be turned into a plausible promise. This is accomplished by making successful attacks, an alpha release if you will, on the target. If done correctly, this proves that the target is vulnerable and the war has the possibility of being won.

Responding to Global Guerrillas

References

This looks like a CV!

Do we really need to know John Robb's salary as he worked up the career ladder? This information seems intended for employers. I suggest we delete it. --Alberto.cottica (talk) 22:47, 12 September 2010 (UTC) Update: I checked the edit history and found that the IT career parts of the page have been added by anonymous editors. I am going to tentatively delete those parts myself. I leave this as a reference for future editing. --Alberto.cottica (talk) 22:56, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Infobox Military Person

I want to add Template:Infobox military person but don't have all of the information for it. Can anybody fill in any blanks, this is what I have so far:

{{Infobox Military Person
|name=John Robb
|lived=
|image=
|caption=
|nickname=
|placeofbirth=
|placeofdeath=
|allegiance=[[United States of America]]
|branch=[[United States Air Force]]
|serviceyears=
|rank=[[Major]]
|unit=
|commands=
|battles=
|awards=
|relations=
|laterwork=Military Theorist
}}

Grant 17:08, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Just so everybody knows, these are the missing fields:

• Lived
• Image
• Caption
• Nickname
• Place of birth
• Place of death: N/A
• Service years
• Unit
• Commands
• Battles
• Awards

Grant 14:33, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Notability

Why is this person supposed to be notable? ButOnMethItIs (talk) 14:31, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Change Title/Merge

John's work has expanded beyond military theory. The title of this page should reflect that., hence the merge request. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Secretsquirrel87 (talk • contribs) 14:40, 19 March 2013 (UTC)