Wikipedia talk:Notability (people)

Some practical advice

I don't know where this fits in, but it's excellent advice for a Jewish writer on writing biography — both online and off. The expression "maran" means our teacher:

• Yehuda Azoulay. "But are the stories really true?". Community Magazine.

Ambassadors and Diplomats

Can we rediscuss criteria for the notability of Ambassadors and Diplomats? WP:DIPLOMAT currently takes you to notability criteria for WP:POLITICIAN which is an extremely US-centric outcome (only in the US, among developed countries, are ambassadors frequently political appointees). The prior discussions, Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(people)/Archive_2014#Proposal:_remove_WP:DIPLOMAT, and Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(people)/Archive_2014#Ambassadors_and_Permanent_Representatives_to_the_United_Nations seemed to produce very little clarity on notability and the AfD discussions on diplomats are confused, to say the least. As a comparision, Military officers of flag/general rank are generally considered notable and those below flag rank are not. In most countries (e.g. the US) Ambassadors are considered the equivalent of flag rank with respect to Senior Civil Service / Senior Executive Service status, so I'd like to propose a stalking horse criterion: Ambassadors (and equivalent, such as High Commissioners, UN Permanent Representatives and EU Permanent Representatives) would be presumed notable but lesser diplomats (counsellors, first secretaries, consuls-general etc) would NOT (barring other reasons why they should meet WP:GNG). Fiachra10003 (talk) 22:59, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

@Stanning, Student7, Enos733, Necrothesp, Pburka, and Thincat: - all of you weighed in before, though in separate discussions. "Proposal:_remove_WP:DIPLOMAT" resulted in the current status. "Ambassadors_and_Permanent_Representatives_to_the_United_Nations" seemed to reach a different conclusion, but no action was taken, perhaps because of the conflict. Would you like to share your views again? Fiachra10003 (talk) 16:06, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I completely agree with this proposal. Ambassadors and equivalent ranking diplomats should be presumed notable. Lower-ranking diplomats should not barring other reasons. I have long argued this. An ambassador is the representative of his or her government to another and is therefore a very senior figure. The fact that most are not well-known figures is not at all relevant to their notability as senior government officials. Wikipedia is not intended to be an encyclopaedia of celebrities or pop culture, although that is clearly how some see it (don't have "celebrity" status? Not written about on endless fansites? Not worthy of inclusion!). -- Necrothesp (talk) 17:00, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I think there are two things here:

1. Point 4 of WP:POLITICIAN is sometimes taken to apply to all ambassadors, especially as WP:DIPLOMAT currently points to it. WP:POLITICIAN is about politicians (the clue is in the heading) and point 4 is clearly intended to refer to politicians who are given ambassadorships. Politician /= diplomat; politicians may be given diplomatic posts but many, or most, diplomats are not politicians. I propose
   • Change point 4 of WP:POLITICIAN to say
     4. For the purposes of this guideline, ambassadorships granted to politicians are not considered international offices.
   • Remove WP:DIPLOMAT altogether for the time being.
2. WP:DIPLOMAT, before it was deleted in December 2013, only said "Diplomats who have participated in a significant way in events of particular diplomatic importance that have been written about in reliable secondary sources. Sufficient reliable documentation of their particular role is required." That doesn't seem to me particularly helpful – if a diplomat meets those criteria, presumably he/she meets WP:GNG anyway.

   I and others have tried to create a more specific form of WP:DIPLOMAT, without success, because although I do think some ambassadors are notable because of their positions, it's difficult or impossible to define criteria to include the notable ones and exclude the non-notable ones, of which I agree there are many. My own opinion is that an ambassador of a major country who has held multiple posts including to another major country is inherently notable, but what is meant by major isn't easy to define.

   As Fiachra10003 says, we had lengthy discussions in Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(people)/Archive_2014#Ambassadors_and_Permanent_Representatives_to_the_United_Nations and also in Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(people)/Archive_2014#WP:DIPLOMAT: notability of ambassadors
   and failed to reach a conclusion. In one of these Enos733 said "the notability of ambassadors [should be] made on a case by case basis." Let's leave it at that.

Stanning (talk) 17:31, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I think that there may be some disagreement or misunderstand over what a politician is. A politician is a person who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making. Politicians need not be elected officials (for example, a monarch is a politician). An ambassador generally has the same powers as a head-of-state (e.g. a president, king, or governor-general), even though they may not frequently exercise those powers (like heads-of-state, in many countries, where that role is largely ceremonial). It is my opinion that ambassadorships are international offices, ambassadors are politicians, and that WP:POLITICIAN should apply to them. Pburka (talk) 20:22, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

That's too much of a generalization. It depends from country to country. It many countries diplomats, consuls and ambassadors are (senior) civil servants and not politicians. -- fdewaele, 29 January 2015, 21:27 CET.

@Pburka: Technically, of course, you're right – that's the dictionary definition. In practice, what you say is a bit of a stretch! A distinction is made in most democracies between party politicians in elected office and professional career civil servants who are (or are supposed to be) independent of party politics. It's clear from the wording of WP:POLITICIAN that it means people in elected office. (WP:POLITICIAN mentions "politicians and judges" – that's US-centric – it's rare elsewhere for judges to be openly associated with political parties.) In the UK, and as far as I know in any other European monarchy, nobody would refer to the monarch as a politician – the whole point of a monarch in a modern constitutional monarchy is that he/she is above politics – "politician" is understood to mean someone who engages in party politics. British ambassadors are called "Her Majesty's Ambassador to [country]" and that's not a formality: their oath of allegiance is to the Queen (that is, to the country) not to whichever political party happens to be in power. Category:Diplomats is not a sub-category of Category:Politics. If we can't agree that party politicians are distinct from career diplomats, we may as well abandon this discussion. Stanning (talk) 22:56, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Having participated and nominated many ambassador AfDs, I strongly disagree with granting ambassadors inherent notability. for a number of reasons,

• Pburka asserts "An ambassador generally has the same powers as a head-of-state". absolutely not true, they generally have powers of a senior public servant, in fact in Australia and many countries they are classed as and paid as public servants not a politician. they don't endorse nor produce legislation . the role of a public servant is to deliver the Government of the day's agenda. and that's what ambassadors do, they don't set the agenda. heads of state can sack governments and politicians and swear them in, can any ambassador do that?
• Almost all ambassadors get spikes in coverage when they present their credentials, and then disappear in coverage. if they get ongoing signficant coverage, then they satisfy WP:BIO.
• most ambassadors jobs are routine, eg hosting business delegations, attending meetings.
• clear consensus in various AfDs that ambassadors are not inherently notable.

LibStar (talk) 23:58, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• Ambassadors extraordinary and plenipotentiary are empowered to act on behalf of their head of state, and may, for example, commit their nations to treaties. While that power is generally reserved, it does exist. This is little different than, for example, a Canadian governor general who has the power to dissolve parliament, but only ever does so on the advice of the prime minister. If WP:POLITICIAN is intended to apply only to elected officials, and not appointees (such as cabinet ministers in the United States and senators in Canada) then let's make that explicit in the guideline. Pburka (talk) 01:37, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

ambassadors don't commit to treaties, foreign ministers or prime ministers/presidents do. doing things on behalf of the head of state/minister/government is the legislated function of a public servant, even a cadet. as for powers of Governor General, the 1975 Australian constitutional crisis shows you don't have to get advice from the Prime Minister. LibStar (talk) 01:44, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• I've said this before but I'm happy to say it again - in the vast majority of cases, ambassadors are simply senior public servants whose workstations happen to be located in a country other than their own. In some cases, former parliamentarians/congressmen are appointed - those people were already notable. In some cases, the diplomatic relationship is such that the person in the role is likely to already be notable or to become notable soon thereafter because of a spike in interest in them, their appointment, etc. In other cases, their work as the representative of one major country to another will make them notable over time, or the importance of the relationship (between neighbouring countries, for example) is such that the same will result. As I've said before, I've lived in Canberra where almost all embassies to Australia are located. My child played in a football team alongside the son of one ambassador, against teams that regularly featured the sons of other ambassadors. They were ordinary, regular people, paid lower wages than most senior public servants (by whom they were greatly outnumbered) and driving ordinary cars and living in ordinary houses. A handful have "residential" embassies (like the US) but then those are often the ambassadors who are notable anyway. People who have participated in these discussions with me before know I describe John Berry as a "rock star" who sweaters are almost independently notable. He was notable before he arrived on our shores and remains more recognisable than most of our Members of Parliament. But the majority of the others will never be notable by out standards, unless we introduce some silly arbitrary rule that says all ambassadors are notable, despite the fact that "real life" strongly suggests otherwise. St★lwart¹¹¹ 00:22, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
• As an aside, those pinged above are only those who have supported calls for the inherent notability of ambassadors. Those who have actively opposed such suggestions were, conveniently, not canvassed. Any "consensus" resulting from such a discussion would surely be considered invalid, so we're not off to a good start. St★lwart¹¹¹ 02:50, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

agreed. LibStar (talk) 02:53, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm disappointed I wasn't canvassed, too. I agree with Necrothesp. I think ambassadors, like general and flag officers, should be presumed to be notable. As for the argument that they're just civil servants, sometimes that's true. Just as often they're patronage recipients and will continue to show up in public life. I wish we had a version of WP:DIPLOMAT that could enjoy consensus. Chris Troutman (talk) 03:01, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

The fact that there were other supporters the OP forgot to canvas doesn't make the canvassing any less problematic. Perhaps you just weren't as emphatic in your support? We've discussed flag officers in the past and the comparisons between diplomats in the US (who have military-equivalent "ranks") and elsewhere (where military rank is irrelevant). There are always plenty of US/UK-centric views in these discussions and no real understanding that the diplomatic atmosphere and environment in the US and UK is very different to everywhere else. Given it's power, almost all US-to-wherever ambassadors will be notable. Likewise 90% of those posted to the US, given the importance of the US and that relationship, will be notable. You only have to experience things one country North or South to gain a different perspective. Otherwise we should just create separate WP:DIPLOMAT and WP:USDIPLOMAT guidelines. St★lwart¹¹¹ 03:14, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

@Chris troutman and Stalwart111: I'm very sorry if I missed you - I went through the two discussions and picked out the names of ALL of the parties who weighed in in the 2014 discussions. I guess I missed out yours. Enos733, for instance, opposed the notion of inherent notability. If you know of anyone else who might have an opinion, please ping them or let me know and I will do so. Fiachra10003 (talk) 14:45, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

I moved your comment which split two others. Except that there were about 4 just last year. The point is that despite those discussions you looked at (in which the idea of inherent notability had support from the same editors each time) there were other broader discussions (including an RFC) where there was no consensus and plenty of opposition to the idea. And so we're back here re-hashing the same concepts all over again, responding to the same US/UK-centric arguments. Why? Everything suggested so far has been discussed several times before. Nobody has managed to put forward a cogent argument to explain why Australian High Commissioner to Kiribati should be considered "as notable" as the US Ambassador to Russia or the French Ambassador to the United Kingdom. St★lwart¹¹¹ 23:38, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

if they continue to show up in public life, then they will easily satisfy WP:BIO or WP:GNG. the vast majority of ambassadors do not. LibStar (talk) 03:04, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• Idea/compromise, how about this for a compromise. The office of an Ambassador, is notable. Individuals who don't meet WP:GNG, or other notability guidelines, are redirected to an article List of Ambassadors of X to Y. Those who are independently notable have a separate article that is linked in the list, others are redirected per something similar to WP:BIO1E, where the event is the individual is holding the position of a presumably notable office.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:15, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Because the office of "Ambassador" isn't notable. But do you mean like List of High Commissioners and Ambassadors of Australia or one of the many (non-notable) X-X relations articles? We don't need even more lists of non-notable ambassadors between random country X and random country Y. Again, the vast majority of people are coming at this from the perspective of the UK or US where the vast majority of ambassadors to and ambassadors from are notable, simply because of the importance of the relationship they represent. In most other countries they are mid-level public servants, without "flag" status, without military rank and less recognisable than the local Miss [Town] Fair 2014 or local television weatherperson. St★lwart¹¹¹ 23:38, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

X - Y relationship articles are often notable, and an embedded list of ambassadors would make sense,if a stand-alone list article isn't thought to work well alone. It would give the list more context.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 05:16, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

We need to recognize that things have changed since the days of sail, when a Treaty was signed ending the War of 1812 and the memorable battle fought after the war which Americans like to remember since they won it!  :) After Franklin, Jay and whoever was trying to entice France into the Revolutionary War. Extraordinary plenipotentiaries, perhaps. Nowdays, we have instant communication, gag rule to surpress Eleanor Roosevelt at the UN. Few opportunities for real policy innovation. All done back home even for developed countries. Small countries are delegated ambassador to a number of countries. While this may seem like a "bigger" job, they really dilute the effect that a permanent ambassador might have.

Note also this article Diplomatic_rank#Traditional_European_diplomacy, which discusses why the rank of ambassador has changed. So ambassadors prior to a certain date might be considered notable in all cases. But with political correctness and rapid communication, this can no longer be the case after (say) 1940. (date is arbitrary). Proof of notability must be made today IMO. Student7 (talk) 21:07, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

• Attempt to summarize points of consensus. There's two issues here: (a) presumption of notability for certain diplomats and (b) whether the current status of WP:DIPLOMAT makes sense. Clearly there is no consensus to have an presumption of notability for any diplomat here. However, on the second point, nobody has disagreed with Stanning's point re. WP:DIPLOMAT: "Change point 4 of WP:POLITICIAN to say ...4. For the purposes of this guideline, ambassadorships granted to politicians are not considered international offices. ... Remove WP:DIPLOMAT altogether for the time being." In my view this makes a great deal of sense as it clarifies a policy sentence that currently makes no logical sense. If we need to retain WP:DIPLOMAT, why not simply reiterate that diplomats' notability should be determined in accordance with WP:PEOPLE? Fiachra10003 (talk) 14:49, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

Agreed Remove WP:DIPLOMAT altogether for the time being. If WP:DIPLOMAT is desired to remain a separate "Additional criteria" it should simple state something along the lines of "the notability of ambassadors should be made on a case by case basis." or something similar. --Enos733 (talk) 05:53, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

• Comment.I'm mystified by those who oppose inherent notability of ambassadors by saying they're "just senior public servants", since it seems to me obvious that "senior public servants" are notable. In Britain, it is usual to grant officials at this level honours, such as companionships or knighthoods, that easily meet WP:ANYBIO #1 (and have been held to do so in AfDs again and again, so let's not get into whether that's justified or not, since prevailing opinion is clearly that it is). This, luckily, means it's much easier to provide keep arguments for senior British civil servants and diplomats, but does discriminate against countries that do not grant such honours. -- Necrothesp (talk) 20:36, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

Which is why I prefer the term "mid-level". By "senior" I simply mean "not junior" but I equally do not mean departmental secretaries, directors or CEOs. We're talking about public servants who have risen through the ranks to the point where they run a small division or unit within a department of foreign service/foreign affairs/state and are simply moved sideways to a similar role that happens to be overseas. Public servants that run major national-level departments that enjoy extensive coverage are probably notable. Those are the sorts who received such honours (like our OAMs and such). St★lwart¹¹¹ 03:14, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

"since it seems to me obvious that "senior public servants" are notable" that's ridiculous, you will find most heads of public sector departments/agencies do not have WP pages, if they do it's because they've moved on to become an elected politician and meet WP:NPOL, or satisfy WP:BIO through coverage of their achievements. A senior public servant would also include a deputy CEO, director general of a government department, WP Bios on these are even harder to find. The notion that "senior public servants are notable" is plainly false. LibStar (talk) 03:57, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

I am of the position that the position is notable, within the context of the foreign relations between country A and country B, and thus an embedded list would make sense, but the individual is not necessarily notable and thus must meet other notability criteria to have a stand-alone biography article. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:04, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

My, my, LibStar, you really don't like people having opinions that differ from your own do you? The notion is not "plainly false", since it's an opinion, not a statement of Wikipedia policy. Not having a WP article yet does not mean they will never have a WP article, and using the fact to "show" lack of notability (in a WP sense) is therefore intensely flawed. This is a work in progress you know. As I said, British public servants at this level usually have honours that easily satisfy WP:ANYBIO. Lucky for those of us who write British biographies, since we're protected from daft notions about people only being notable if they're celebrities or politicians (but not, apparently, if they've got a lifetime of achievement and service in a job that the average fanboy on the web has never heard of), but a bit discriminatory against those who write biographies on countries without comparable honours systems. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:19, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

And the nature of British relationships with other countries (especially given its history of colonialism) means that many British ambassadors will be notable without or without such honours. That's not the case in Australia or Canada, France or Germany, Russia, Spain, Belgium, Italy, Mexico, India or even China. The UK shares that in common with the US and basically no other country. As I've said, notability-by-default is something likely to be enjoyed by UK and US ambassadors and high commissioners but extending that standard to other countries (that appoint diplomatic "nobodies" to represent not-very-important relationships overseas) is contrary to policy and consensus. Unfortunately, "achievement and service" have never been yard-sticks of notability here. St★lwart¹¹¹ 12:22, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

Note that many British ambassadors, although not heading major national-level departments, hold the CMG, which does satisfy WP:ANYBIO (the OAM, of course, would not, as it's far too low-level). -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:19, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

Necrothesp, despite asserting in AfDs hundreds of times without any basis that ambassadors are inherently notable, even this discussion doesn't have consensus to give automatic notability to ambassadors. In the absence of inherent notability, I've never seen you actually search for sources to meet WP:BIO for an ambassador. Some of the arguments here like ambassadors somehow have powers of the head of state (implying they are notable like a head of state) )are stretching it. LibStar (talk) 12:56, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

I think Rightcow's statement deserves closer attention. If the position is notable, can non-notable people fill it? He believes so. I'm not so sure.

I'm pretty sure that most people cannot name Sierra Leone's ambassador to South American (I would doubt that they have ten ambassadors, one is probably "roving"). And his accomplishments, if any. Probably not notable. People who imagine ambassadors to be some glorious position are thinking of the world of steam and 19th century history. Today, the ambassador is merely a functionary who routes stuff from home to the proper office in the country he's in. And transmits back information that might be helpful to his government. Sounds great on paper. Not so great in actual duties or performance. It's a job that may have outlived it's usefulness. When you have a Secretary of State flying from place to place, s/he conducts foreign policy initiatives that oldtime ambassadors used to conduct. While they probably ought to do away with the position, they won't becuase it gives them a chance to "honor" somebody with a useless title, like Knighting somebody. Brits will understand that. At least when the Brits do it, the person is already notable! In this case, there are no policy matters to consider and the position is merely titular in function. Student7 (talk) 17:34, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

So are "oldtime ambassadors" notable? Thincat (talk) 19:55, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Perhaps not "by default" but my view is that they are far more likely to be notable than their modern cousins. Ambassadors stopped wars (and started them), negotiated marriages between royal families, and served as critical messengers between allies and prospective allies. Ambassadors had a place in royal courts and (in an era without instant telecommunications) were responsible for representing their countries to Kings and Queens without the ability to go back to their own to "check" the diplomatic message-of-the-day. The presentation of an ambassador to a monarch was a big deal - easily big enough to generate significant coverage in reliable sources (by our standards). My favourite examples come from John Bargrave who wrote extensively about diplomatic intrigues of the 17th century. The ambassadors of Sweden to Italy (of that era) would have played a critical role, especially with regard to Queen Christina and her conversion and travel to Rome. By comparison, we haven't had an article about the five most recent holders of that post. We have articles for only 2 of the last 14, in fact. St★lwart¹¹¹ 23:36, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Let me clarify the logic for support creation of WP:DIPLOMAT, just as a non-notable individual can become notable by receiving a highly prestigious notable award per WP:ANYBIO, and a previously non-notable individual can become notable by being elected to a political position in a regionally important city or to sub-national legislative office per WP:POLOUTCOMES, so can an individual who was previously not-notable be considered notable by virtue of being appointed to an ambassadorial office/position.

That being said, my position is a compromise one. If the subject is not individually notable per [{WP:GNG]] or other established notability policy/guideline/essay(s), than the individual should be included in an embedded list in the article about the foreign relations between nations A & B. If the individual is independently notable other than the position of the office of ambassador, than a stand-alone article is created, and a wikilink to that list be included in the embedded list. Therefore, WP:DIPLOMAT would actually be included in a section of WP:OUTCOMES.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:29, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

That's a step in the right direction but WP:OUTCOMES is, by definition, summary position of common outcomes for related AFDs. In this instance, the common outcome is that they have regularly been deleted and kept only where they separately pass WP:GNG. We'd need to think about how that is presented. St★lwart¹¹¹ 22:15, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

How about this, an essay can be created named WP:DIPLOMAT, with my above proposal (if a consensus can be found), and be included as a link to WP:BIO as is the current case for WP:SOLDIER.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 19:23, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

• I've always thought that people at the top of any profession are notable. This applies to ambassadors, who are normally the most senior and distinguished people in their country's foreign service. In cases where the are political appointment rather than career appointments, they're invariable very important political figures (or sometimes very important businesspeople, etc. ) who would likely have been notable anyway. DGG ( talk ) 01:54, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

That might be the case in the UK and US but Australia rarely appoints, "the most senior and distinguished people in their country's foreign service" and many other countries are the same. Our ambassadorial corps are littered with ex-political advisors, middle-management types. A random sample from this list quickly provides an idea of what I'm talking about. Before being appointed High Commissioner, one was the director of a business unit, within a division, within our Department of Foreign Affairs. That's like being the State Manager of Sales for a large commercial enterprise - a critical function but hardly "senior and distinguished". Compare that to Michael Potts (who doesn't have an article) - a genuinely senior public servant and previously Ambassador to Austria and Permanent Representative to the United Nations - now ambassador to New Zealand with whom we share multiple domestic sporting competitions, significant trade, banks, brands, cultural exchanges, migration, basically open borders, military treaties and a section of our constitution that would still allow them to become a state. Think I'll go and start an article... St★lwart¹¹¹ 02:47, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

As proof that my approach to this topic isn't sheer bloody-mindedness, I've gone ahead and created what I think is a nice little article about Mr Potts; a thoroughly entertaining character and (by all accounts) a thoroughly decent bloke. St★lwart¹¹¹ 03:50, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

my vote is that Potts is just above the threshold. Lacking fewer incidents I don't think I would deem him "notable." Accepting off-road vehicles is something I (or you could do!) Student7 (talk) 16:33, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Perhaps only just, yes. St★lwart¹¹¹ 22:15, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

The job clearly needs to be in a policy-making capacity. Much of the time, higher level Civil Servants are not. They believe themselves assigned to their roles to "protect jobs" within their organization and to (BTW) save their own job. This differs substantially from a commercial organization where you are often expected to show increased efficiency each quarter, reduce your workforce, and, eventually, do away with your own job through merging with compatible organizations within your company. No such demonstration is required of civil servants, no matter how high up they are. Therefore, they may keep their jobs, but they are not notable. Infamous, perhaps!  :) Student7 (talk) 16:33, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

RightCowLeftCoast offers to write an essay (above). This could be worthwhile. Essentially, what he is saying (I gather) is that diplomats/ambassadors are not automatically notable. In his (and my) opinion.

And, IMO, anyone can write an essay saying just about anything, so he doesn't need my (or our) vote to do so. It has a neat WP name and could be useful.

Having said that, I've never seen an essay promoted to a guideline or policy. But I may not have been paying close attention. Student7 (talk) 22:05, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Weak consensus for removal

Reviewing the discussion that lead to the deletion of WP:DIPLOMAT, three editors Pburka, Thincat, and Enos733 overturned consensus that had existed since 2008. That seems rather bold to me.
Later a consensus for notability for Ambassadors and Permanent Representatives to the United Nations was built, yet it appears that no change to this page was made. Later, there did not appear to be consensus for a new form of WP:DIPLOMAT. Therefore I would like to point out that there appears to be a flaw that lead to the creation of the current wording found on this page:

For the purposes of this guideline, ambassadorships are not considered international offices.

As such, I would argue that the old 2008 wording be reinstated, or that we begin on building a consensus for a WP:DIPLOMAT essay with work from WP:INTR.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 05:50, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

• Endorse new discussion - the old definition is worse than the new one (if you can call the new one a "definition" at all). I'd support the development of a new WP:DIPLOMAT which reflects current policy-based consensus (which would need to be gauged) and a non-UK/US-centric view (prevalent in those discussions which focus on examples of UK diplomats). It would almost be worth starting a new article for WP:DIPLOMAT so that we can use the talk page for a discussion about the guideline itself. But a discussion is an excellent suggestion. St★lwart¹¹¹ 06:12, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Here is my idea, as I proposed above. A position of ambassador or high commissioner or (insert title here) might be relevant to an article about the foreign relations between to nations (say Philippines–Saudi Arabia relations) and thus can include (if can be verified by a reliable sources) a list of ambassadors between the two countries in an embedded list per WP:LISTPEOPLE. Now, if an individual meets WP:ANYBIO, WP:GNG, or any other applicable notability guideline or well respected essay (such as WP:SOLDIER) an individual article can be created, otherwise, a redirect to the list is sufficient. (this would be similar to how some municipalities have a list of former mayors embedded within them, but the office itself doesn't automatically confer notability upon the office holder).
Another possibility is that the position itself is notable such as United States Ambassador to South Korea, but individuals who hold the position may not be notable (meaning that they may not meet WP:ANYBIO or WP:GNG requirements), and thus those who don't would fall under under WP:BIO1E rules and be redirected to the notable position.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 07:04, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

The first is only problematic where the X-X relations article doesn't exist and shouldn't but is created just to house an equally non-notable list of ambassadors. The second is more problematic and seems far less likely. Where the office is notable in and of itself, the individual holding it should probably be considered notable in most cases, there not being all that many offices we consider notable. My preference would be for the first, then, with a specific note to discourage the creation of non-notable "relations" articles. St★lwart¹¹¹ 07:45, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Late to the discussion here, but it seems clear to me that whether an an ambassador is notable depends. Just talking about "ambassadors" in general is no more useful than talking about "baseball players" in general (or whatever). It all depends, and depends entirely, on whether your a major leaguer or not.

An ambassador from one large and powerful country to another large and powerful country is prima facie notable. The Russian ambassador to China, the Indian ambassador to Germany, the American ambassador to Italy... these people are important people representing important countries to other important countries and therefore can be assumed to have been involved, or at least potentially involved in issues of at least peripheral world-historical importance. They should usually be in in, even if they don't meet GNG, provided there's enough material for a stub. The Slovakian ambassador to Thailand? The Sudanese ambassador to Spain? The American ambassador to Bolivia? No, I don't want to see an article about them unless they're otherwise notable and/or meet GNG.

However, how would you write WP:AMBASSADOR to reflect this? I'd write it "Ambassadors where both the sending and receiving countries had a population of 50,000,000 at the time of the ambassadorship are assumed to be notable, otherwise not" (however your write "sending" and "receiving" in diplo-talk). Why not? Herostratus (talk) 12:56, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

disagree with a 50,000,000 threshold, that gives a free pass to countries like Bangladesh, Burma, and Democratic Republic of Congo when in reality they are small players in international relations (just look how many embassies are actually based in these countries ). Singapore, Australia and Canada are more influential in international relations yet have sub 50,000,000 populations. LibStar (talk) 13:02, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

• Comment My thinking has not changed about the presumption of notability for ambassadors. I also believe that many ambassadors do meet WP:GNG, but I do not presume to believe that all (or even most) ambassadors would meet the reliable sourcing standards articulated in WP:GNG. However, when discussing policies, we must, contra Herostratus, consider ambassadors, as a class, similar to way way we consider all members of "state or provincial legislatures" notable per WP:POLITICIAN, or all baseball players if they "have appeared in at least one game in any one of the following active major leagues" WP:WPBB/N. Wikipedia is an international encyclopedia, and we must treat all nations in a similar manner and the role and policy function of the chief diplomat for each nation is similar - meaning that we should not presume notability only for ambassadors from G-8 nations, but not for other nations. So, whatever guideline that is proposed must not be US/UK/G8 centric and accept the believe that the reason we presume notability for a class is a shortcut to finding independent reliable sourced material about the subject. Enos733 (talk) 18:21, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

well there's the rub, isn't it? That's Wikipedia for you. One person agrees with the principle but disagrees with some particular. 50,000,000 is a very gross measure true, but what are you going to do? "Over x% of the world's population AND X% percent of world GDP at the time"? or should be "...OR..."? And what should "X" be? or should it army sizes instead? subjective opinion? or what? And of course no general agreement on these questions is likely.

Another person is like "We have to have a clearcut line". This has the virtue of avoiding argument. On the other hand, you then have situations where every baseball player who "has appeared in at least one game in any one of the following active major leagues" rates an article, and that's just silly, and it's obviously silly. There's no good reason to have an article on a person who appeared in one major leauge game in 1903 and not allow articles on people are very much more accomplished, interesting, notable, important, worthwhile, and article-worthy except for this one virtue: clearcut line.

So then you have people like me. No, I am not going to support a standard where the Ecuadorian ambassador to Chad rates an an article, period (absent clearing GNG or having some other source of notability, of course). I'm not going to support that because it's silly and it goes against my personal standard of what level of non-GNG-clearing people should have articles. So there you have it, gridlock, as usual. Herostratus (talk) 19:49, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

There will always be someone who objects, but consensus does not need to be unanimous consent.

An essay can be written by anyone, but the strength of an essay is the process that goes into building it, and how well it is defended. I think this is why WP:SOLDIER, while not achieving consensus for guideline status (mainly by those whom believe that only GNG should exist), has shown strength because individuals experienced in editing within the field of Military History were the creators, and they have used it as a further guidance tool on the "well-known and significant award or honor" portion of WP:ANYBIO.

If we can create at least an essay with strong backing, that can provide further guidance upon not so clear wording in an existing guideline, than WP:DIPLOMAT or WP:AMBASSADOR may be a net positive rather than instruction creep.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:21, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

How about this for the wording of an essay:

Positions of Head of mission are relevant to an article about the foreign relations between two nations (example: Canada–United States relations) and thus can be include (if it can be verified by a reliable source(s)) a list of Head of mission(s) between the two countries in an embedded list per WP:LISTPEOPLE. If an individual who is, or was, the head of mission meets WP:ANYBIO, WP:GNG, or any other applicable notability guideline, or well respected essay (such as WP:SOLDIER) an individual article can be created. Otherwise, a redirect to the list is sufficient. (this would be similar to how some municipalities have a list of former mayors embedded within them, but the office itself doesn't automatically confer notability upon the office holder (see WP:POLOUTCOMES)). If a non-notable "relations" article has not yet been created, do not create one for the sole purpose of creating embedded lists of ambassadors between two nations.

--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 19:27, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

• I think that's a very good start. The idea of presumed notability for ambassadors is unsustainable, in my view. With regard to "classes" of people, "baseballer" is a class but then we set an inclusion threshold (the "line" referenced above), and likewise with soldiers, politicians and others. I'm happy for such a line to be implemented for diplomats but I don't think we're going to get agreement on what that line should be. There's no professional league for diplomats. Nor is there a population cap, GDP cap or combination of those that will accurately reflect the notability of respective ambassadors. So we either go for all (which opens the flood-gates to every nobody with a diplomatic numberplate) or we stick to GNG but with a complimentary essay that allows editors to argue exceptions to the rule in cases where making an exception is WP:COMMONSENSE. And there will be exceptions. And the essay should be drafted on that basis. Take the example given above of Italy–United States relations. Being a US ambassador, John R. Phillips has an article. But his counterpart, Claudio Bisogniero, doesn't. He has a profile and news feed here and has an article on it.wp (of course). He probably meets WP:GNG anyway, but even if he didn't, he should probably be considered notable. St★lwart¹¹¹ 01:24, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

Agreed that this essay is a good start. I am not sure about the wording of the first and last sentences - since they refer to articles about bilateral relations, rather than ambassadors per se. I also think that there needs to be something said about ambassadors to the UN, other international bodies, and other diplomatic posts. I probably would also like to see something in the essay relating to the previous criteria for notability included (to a certain degree) in the essay to suggest how diplomat other than the head of mission might warrant an article (although in all cases, WP:GNG is still the overriding criteria for inclusion. Enos733 (talk) 02:20, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

I am open to suggestions. Wikipedia after all is a cooperative effort.

How about modifying the first sentence to read:

Positions of Head of mission are relevant to an article about the foreign relations between two nations (example: Canada–United States relations). Furthermore, positions of Head of mission to international organizations (IGO) are also relevant articles about a nation's membership in an organization (example: Fiji and the United Nations). Therefore, those articles can include (if it can be verified by a reliable source(s)) a list of Head of mission(s) between the two countries, or between a country and an organization, in an embedded list per WP:LISTPEOPLE.

I don't know if (given the brightline criteria for other fields is to reach the top level positions in that field (i.e. playing in a major league game)) the essay being crafted need to give guidance to non-head of mission diplomats, as there is WP:GNG and WP:ANYBIO to cover those who haven't reached to top of their field. We can include a criteria like there is in SOLDIER like:

Other notable diplomats may include those who have received significant coverage in crafting a treaty or bilateral or multilateral agreement, or received significant coverage related to a notable diplomatic event (i.e. Trent Affair)

Therefore the essay would read:

Positions of Head of mission are relevant to an article about the foreign relations between two nations (example: Canada–United States relations). Furthermore, positions of Head of mission to international organizations (IGO) are also relevant articles about a nation's membership in an organization (example: Fiji and the United Nations). Therefore, those articles can include (if it can be verified by a reliable source(s)) a list of Head of mission(s) between the two countries, or between a country and an organization, an embedded list per WP:LISTPEOPLE. If an individual who is, or was, the head of mission meets WP:ANYBIO, WP:GNG, or any other applicable notability guideline, or well respected essay (such as WP:SOLDIER) an individual article can be created. Otherwise, a redirect to the list is sufficient. (this would be similar to how some municipalities have a list of former mayors embedded within them, but the office itself doesn't automatically confer notability upon the office holder (see WP:POLOUTCOMES)). If a "relations" article has not yet been created, do to it being non-notable per established notability guidelines, do not create one for the sole purpose of creating embedded lists of head of mission between two nations, or between a nation and an international organization.
Other notable diplomats may include those who have received significant coverage in crafting a treaty or bilateral or multilateral agreement, or received significant coverage related to a notable diplomatic event (i.e. Trent Affair).

--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 21:20, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

I would probably word it this way (not necessary changing any text:

Positions of Head of mission are relevant to an article about the foreign relations between two nations (example: Canada–United States relations). Furthermore, positions of Head of mission to international organizations (IGO) are also relevant articles about a nation's membership in an organization (example: Fiji and the United Nations). Therefore, those articles can include (if it can be verified by a reliable source(s)) a list of Head of mission(s) between the two countries, or between a country and an organization, an embedded list per WP:LISTPEOPLE. If a "relations" article has not yet been created, do to it being non-notable per established notability guidelines, do not create one should not be created for the sole purpose of creating embedded lists of head of mission between two nations, or between a nation and an international organization.
If an individual who is, or was, the head of mission meets WP:ANYBIO, WP:GNG, or any other applicable notability guideline, or well respected essay (such as WP:SOLDIER) an individual article can be created. Otherwise, a redirect to the list is sufficient. (this would be similar to how some municipalities have a list of former mayors embedded within them, but the office itself doesn't automatically confer notability upon the office holder (see WP:POLOUTCOMES)).
Other notable diplomats may include those who have received significant coverage in crafting a treaty or bilateral or multilateral agreement, or received significant coverage related to a notable diplomatic event (i.e. Trent Affair). ~~ Enos733 (talk) 03:55, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

I see what changed there. One paragraph for the heads of state positions and two sentences regarding individual diplomats. Let me see what I can do with this, tweaking it a bit:

Positions of Head of mission are relevant to an article about the foreign relations between two nations (example: Canada–United States relations). Furthermore, positions of Head of mission to international organizations (IGO) are also relevant articles about a nation's membership in an organization (example: Fiji and the United Nations). Therefore, those articles can include (if it can be verified by a reliable source(s)) a list of Head of mission(s) between the two countries, or between a country and an organization, an embedded list per WP:LISTPEOPLE. If a "relations" article has not yet been created, do to it being non-notable per established notability guidelines, one should not be created for the sole purpose of creating embedded lists of head of mission between two nations, or between a nation and an international organization.
If an individual who is, or was, the head of mission, meets WP:ANYBIO, WP:GNG, or any other applicable notability guideline, or well respected essay (such as WP:SOLDIER) an individual biography article can be created. Otherwise, a redirect to the list is sufficient. (this would be similar to how some municipalities have a list of former mayors embedded within them, but the office itself doesn't automatically confer notability upon the office holder (see WP:POLOUTCOMES)).
Other notable diplomats may include those who have received significant coverage in crafting a treaty or bilateral or multilateral agreement, or received significant coverage related to a notable diplomatic event (i.e. Trent Affair).

I removed the strikethrough, and added "biography article".--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 17:06, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

Are there any objections or suggestions regarding the above wording?--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 04:06, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

It has been a week, without objection or further comment, I will create the essay now.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 05:58, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

OK, here it is Wikipedia:Diplomatic notability.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:13, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Delete WP:DIPLOMAT

The section above began with reference to "the discussion that lead to the deletion of WP:DIPLOMAT". In fact WP:DIPLOMAT hasn't been deleted: the redirect still exists, pointing to an anchor called "Diplomats" attached to point 4 of WP:POLITICIAN. That is nonsensical. Have we reached a consensus to actually delete the redirect WP:DIPLOMAT? Stanning (talk) 21:35, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

Unless I've misinterpreted it, I think the discussion above is about crafting a new essay/quasi-guideline to which the WP:DIPLOMAT wikilink will point. I think we're pretty close to something (at least in draft form) that can be contributed to a something in a standalone page. You think we should delete the WP:DIPLOMAT redirect until that point? St★lwart¹¹¹ 22:38, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

I think leaving it as is is fine for now, while this is in process. Yes the changing of the wording for which DIPLOMAT now points to was done with a weak consensus, but as we're looking to replace the redirect with a stand alone essay (which may or may not be elevated to part of this guideline at a future date and time), I don't think a deletion of the redirect is needed right now. Now, Enos733, I had invited WP:FOR to the discussion here, but without a lot of input from the Wikiproject since.

As essays do not need a large consensus, what we're doing is fine for now. If we seek to elevate the essay to a guideline, than we can start an RfC and post to Template:Centralized discussion, when that time comes.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 23:26, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

Suggest more specific wording to help reduce capricious behavior

The present wording at the beginning of Additional criteria invites capricious behavior. The sentence in question is:

People are likely to be notable if they meet any of the following standards. Failure to meet these criteria is not conclusive proof that a subject should not be included; conversely, meeting one or more does not guarantee that a subject should be included.

The problem is that contributors writing a new article to the standards set out below this introductory paragraph, meet frustration when they submit the article to AfC and are met with rejection because the reviewer says "Meeting one of the criteria of WP:NAUTHOR does not guarantee that a subject should be included" There's not point in providing the standard if reviewers can simply ignore it.

I suggest that the paragraph be edited down to:

People are likely to be notable if they meet any of the following standards.

...only.

Thoughts?

SageGreenRider (talk) 15:40, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

The problem is not the standards for notability, but the quality of the work at afc . The criterion for passing afc is not notability. The criterion for passing is that the article is likely to be kept at AfD. This depends both on the material present, and the nature of the evidence for it. In doubtful cases, the articles should be accepted, but it's a matter of judgment. The quality of reviewing of material at AfC and the level of judgment being exercised there is so erratic that no wording to the notability standard will help. The only thing that will help is educating or removing the inadequate reviewers.

I would be very reluctant to change language in the is very widely used guideline just because of problems at afc DGG ( talk ) 01:49, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

That's very insightful. Thanks. I'm curious as to why AfC is so asymmetric with respect to AfD... AfD is much crisper. The nomination gets posted in various places. Three or four people chime in within a week or two. A consensus generally emerges. Then a neutral third (or fifth or sixth) party closes and caps it. In contrast AfC process is very fuzzy... SageGreenRider (talk) 17:35, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the only time AFC ever comes to my attention is because of a reviewer having made the wrong judgment to exclude an article, and the reasons for that have been everything from the reviewer's own lack of experience (in some instances, a lower edit count than the creator whose work they are reviewing!) to a reviewer citing the AFC backlog as an excuse for not investigating whether sources actually cited in the submission were reliable instead of just assuming (incorrectly) that they weren't. I don't know how common that kind of thing is, but I think it at least needs to be made more clear at every step that the process (for logged-in accounts) is completely voluntary, and so having a submission declined is at best an advisory opinion. I'd rather risk more worthless articles getting posted than anything of merit getting blocked and the editor given the false impression that it was a correct and final decision (which also sounds like a good way to lose new, valuable editors). postdlf (talk) 20:15, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. The particular AfC draft I'm frustrated with the treatment of is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Vince_Molinaro and any advice is welcome. SageGreenRider (talk) 01:02, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

American Folklore encyclopdia as evidence of notability

I'm thinking of writing an article for Mac E. Barrick, who is cited in several articles in a way that makes it seem like some of his work is key in certain niche field(s). I'm not sure if he meets WP:BIO/WP:SCHOLAR because I'm having trouble finding general reviews of his work, but American folklore and associated sociology are not my field. One I did find an entry for him in American Folklore—An Encyclopedia, a volume in the Garland Reference Library of the Humanities (ISBN 0-8153-3350-1). And his entry notes that he "compiled a major regional archive of folklore from central Pennsylvania" that now sounds like it is a major special collection/publicized component at the university where it is held. Have I met the notability threshold enough for a stub? DMacks (talk) 21:27, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Not sure that he would meet the criteria at WP:SCHOLAR but if his work is cited that way, there's a case to be made that he meets the requirements of WP:ANYBIO#2. Just my opinion, but it would probably be enough for me to argue for it to be kept at AFD. St★lwart¹¹¹ 04:06, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

Improvements to NAUTHOR

I recently had a bit of kerfuffle at an AfD and all that aside, it does bring up something that has frequently happened at AfD: there have been multiple times where we've had articles for published authors deleted. Now these aren't self-published authors, but authors who have been published via fairly major publishing companies. What I'm proposing is something that's more in line with criteria #5 of WP:NBAND, which I've used as the basis for the following criteria:

Has released four or more print novels, anthologies/collections (where they are the only author), or book-length works via a major publisher or through one of the more important indie publishers (i.e., an independent publisher with a history of more than a few years, and with a roster of authors, many of whom are independently notable). Works that have been self-published (ie, CreateSpace, Lulu) or released via a vanity publisher do not apply. Journalists and academics who have only published journal articles do not qualify for this criteria.

While it seems a little broad at first, take into account that this would not cover self-published works and at this point it would only pertain to novels or other full-length works that have been released in print. If this works well then this can be expanded to cover e-book only releases and authors who have only published short works of fiction in various mainstream publications but have never had their works collected in one format or another. NBAND has been using this criteria for a pretty long time now and it's worked out relatively well for them. We could always add to this or expand upon it, but for now I think that it'd be reasonable to add this to the list. More people are getting published now than there were in the past, but getting published through a mainstream publisher isn't entirely easy and if the author has published multiple books under a mainstream publisher (think Penguin, Simon & Schuster, etc) then that should be something to count towards notability. I'd say we should start with two, as that's what NBAND currently has as a criteria for notability. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 04:59, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

• Here's an example in my userspace: User:Tokyogirl79/Eli Cantor. Cantor is an author who published multiple novels. Two of them were published by Zebra Books, one by Crown Publishing, and one by Outlet Book Company (ie, RandomHouse), all in the 70s and 80s. One of the books was even made into a film. By all accounts he should have coverage, but he doesn't. Adding in this criteria would allow authors like him to have an article. Now I am aware that this would open up a bit of a can of worms from people looking to create vanity page, but I think that we can handle pages like that. The big thing is that as long as these can be verified somehow (ie, a link to Google Books or similar) then I don't see where this would irreparably harm Wikipedia. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 05:12, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

• Hey TG, what would we consider a "full-length" work? For example, that sentence is as full-length a work as I will publish anywhere today. Is there an established standard for such things? Aside: thoroughly worth considering - nice work. St★lwart¹¹¹ 05:47, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

• I would say anything that is over novella length and would be published as a stand-alone work. In other words, book-length works. I was thinking of that mostly for the non-fiction authors that have released multiple books under a mainstream publisher. I was going to include essay books in this (ie, ones where there is a short story or novella by the author that is accompanied by multiple academic essays on the work), but I think that this would be better off as a different criteria altogether since that would need a lot of tweaking. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 07:45, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
• Something like this would be slightly iffy as a full length work since it's 176 pages, but it has been published on its own in paperback by a major publisher (Simon & Schuster). It may be better to put the minimum books level at three, but I think that this would allow for a lot more authors to have articles. Making the requirement printed works instead of e-book only releases would help raise the threshold to where it'd be at least somewhat discerning since there are more than a few of the bigger publishers that have released a glut of e-books that would make this somewhat unwieldy. For example, I'd consider Ellora's Cave to be an indie publisher that would qualify for as a more important indie publisher (no comment on the various controversies surrounding them). They have released a ton of e-book only releases but they have published some works in print format. The print versions would qualify but not the e-book only releases. If this criteria does well then we could make a second criteria that addresses authors that are predominantly or solely e-book authors. I've got a few ideas for that (centering upon the e-book hitting the top ten of mainstream bestseller lists like USA Today or NYTBL, OR the author releasing multiple book-length e-works through a mainstream publisher), but for now I think it's best to focus on this criteria. In any case, I'm throwing out two more authors that would benefit from this work: Sunny, an extremely popular erotica author, and Gerry Bartlett, an author of a fairly popular chick lit vampire series. Both are published multiple books under Berkley Books, an imprint of Penguin, yet neither have really gained enough coverage to warrant an article as of yet per the current guidelines. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 08:05, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

• The minimum number of books depends on the importance of the books. There are authors of a single book Harper Lee who are unquestionably notable (I realize there are just recently plans to publish another book), but still she will have written at most two. And there is Margaret Mitchell. DGG ( talk ) 07:56, 16 March 2015 (UTC)
• DGG: I have no problem with the criteria being set at two. The main reason I'm lobbying for this would be for authors who have published multiple books under a major publisher but have never really received coverage in reliable sources to satisfy the other criteria of NAUTHOR. This would not be an exclusionary criteria since we would not eliminate an author solely because they do not pass this guideline. I see it as being more inclusionary since it'd allow us to have more articles on authors that would otherwise fail notability criteria. I can't tell you how many times I've participated in AfDs where people complained that we were deleting articles on authors that were publishing through mainstream publishers (most recently the Donovan AfD), so this would allow for more articles and hopefully, more incoming editors. The basic requirement of this is that the authors have books that are already published and available for purchase in print somewhere. This would still require confirmation in some aspect, so we'd still require a source to back up proof of publication. I imagine that these could be passing mentions in reliable sources (trade magazines, newspapers, etc), in-depth reliable sources (of course), and primary sources such as the publisher's website. I do think that for the final one it should be the publisher's website or something that is just as solid (like a Google Books link) so we can avoid people posting blogs to claim that someone published under this or that major publisher. I also want to note that this would specifically make it easier for us to have pages on foreign language authors where finding specific coverage may be difficult due to a language barrier. Many publishers tend to have English language portions of their website, so it would be easier to prove publication that way. This would result in a lot of bare bones articles, but in my experience people are more likely to expand an article if there is one to expand. The list of requested articles in any given WikiProject space will show that there are many who do not prefer to create their own articles. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:14, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

• This also has the potential to be somewhat far reaching, so I would say that for now this should only pertain to novels or book-length non-fiction works. If this is successful in driving up editor numbers then we could see about expanding this to cover other areas like manga and light novel submissions. My idea for that is that author notability would be counted by series as opposed to each release, as it's common for there to be authors who release one multi-volume series through a major publisher/magazine but not really anything else past that point. The series would also have to be published in paperback (ie, like this manga or this light novel series). I'm not lobbying for that, but I did want to include this since it has the potential to allow us to be more inclusionary for authors that are extremely well known but for whatever reason haven't received the amount of coverage necessary to pass on other criteria. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:26, 18 March 2015 (UTC)
• I also need to again state that while this would initially seem a little too inclusionary, take into account that this criteria has been in place with NBAND for a fairly long time now and it's still pretty exclusionary. We'd see an initial spike of pages getting created, but I see that as a good thing since it'd probably mean more editors and after the initial spike dies down it'd probably end up settling down. It'd also decrease the amount of pages that would go to AfD, which would also be beneficial for obvious reasons. (Fewer candidates on the list means more time can be spent on other AfDs.) Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:26, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

the question is whether you want to use this as an alternative to GNG or an additional requirement. If as an additional requirement, I think it's a very poor idea, because of the authors whose single books are notable, and even the very occasional author whose self-published book or books are notable. If you want to use this as an explicit alternative, then the rule needs to say so specifically, essentially the way WP:PROF does, because there will always be people arguing at afd that the only guideline is GNG, and anything else is only presumed notability, that can be contradicted by not finding GNG quality sources. I agree the way we use GNG for books or authors is absurd: anything can be done by manipulation of the keywords in GNG--in order to get reasonable results, I've always argued that local and even regional newspapers, especially from the author's region, do not show notability, on the basis that publishing them does not show editorial discrimination. In the other direction, it's been argued that SLJ and Booklist and the like are non-selective review sources. There's also an occasional argument that since all books from mainstream academic publishers get eventually reviewed in the special it academic journals in the fields academic publishers eventually get reviews in academic journals, these too are indiscriminate. I've always argued against this, again, in order to get reasonable results.

the problem is that all mainstream publishers publish trivial and unsuccessful books, usually in greater number than significant ones. If we include all the authors of two or more of them, it would be getting over-inclusive for even my views. But it might be the simplest, and if you think we can get consensus for it, I'll support it, at either the 2 or 3 level.

One thing is very easy for books in English from the major English speaking countries and should be no concern at all: every one of them will show up in worldcat, so there is no problem at all in verifying the publications. Books in the major European languages usually show up in WorldCat also. Books in any language from Asia can be another matter, unless a US library happens to acquire one. Though there are sources for some of the countries, such as Japan and China, which are usable only by people who know the language and are in libraries in those countries or in one of the very few other libraries that get those databases (Princeton gets them for Japanese, but that does me no good at all--there's not even an English interface). For the near East and India, the situation is hopeless. So we're going to have immense cultural bias. Perhaps it won't be worse than we do already.

On the other hand, I do wish to deprecate the GNG, because tBhe results from it are totally inconsistent.

• @DGG: It'd be an alternative to GNG and not an additional requirement- NAUTHOR is strict enough as it is and mostly I want to find a way to allow more of the "common sense" authors to have pages. (IE, authors that publish via notable publishers, sell extremely well, are extremely well known, but have never garnered enough coverage to pass GNG.) I'm open to raising the number of required books to a larger number (3-4+) if you think that it would keep it from being too inclusive. We could also probably restrict this further by saying that the author has to have released 2-3 books in hardback through notable publishers. I know that this isn't always the rule, but I know that publishers are more likely to release something in hardback if the author has routinely sold well enough to warrant that additional expense. It'd unfortunately exclude some of the authors I'd like to add (mostly old 80s horror fiction and young adult authors), but it would keep it from being too inclusionary while still allowing for more authors to have articles. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 09:45, 18 March 2015 (UTC)
• In other words, it would still technically be part of NAUTHOR (since it'd be lumped in with that) but it would be one of the criteria that articles had to fulfill for notability purposes. Authors only have to meet one of the criteria and it would make it easier for these borderline cases if there was a criteria that allowed for authors to pass if they've published multiple book-length works through a notable publisher. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 09:47, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

OK, I didn't understand at first. I think it's a basically good idea, but I need to think about the details. Some of the restrictions, such as hardback , don't really apply in many genres (like sf, but there's no problem getting sf authors declared notable here because there are many fans) YA are sold in HB if they expect libraries to buy them. Some countries, e.g France, publish almost nothing in hb. Perhaps it should be limited to notable publishers with WP articles, which will help a little. I';d really like to use a list -- this is familiar to me, for it is similar to the way libraries buy books--they typically tell the dealers from what publishers they want to see books for approval. The problem with setting it at relatively restrictive at first and then opening it up is that each time thats done, there will be opposition. (There will be anyway, but let's look at some recent declines at afd. My idea & I think yours, is that it should not really be more inclusive, but should make it easier to decide. and more consistent. We got WP:PROF accepted because absolutely everything who worked in the field accepted it. I;'m not sure that will be the case here. DGG ( talk ) 09:55, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

• I like the idea of requiring that the publishers have articles and making a list- I've never really seen one of those, but I've heard of them. What you've written is pretty much what I want- I'd like it to be easier to decide at AfDs, although an added bonus would be that it'd take a lot of frustration out of creating and keeping articles. When compiling a list, is there anything that I should do when discarding a publisher as unusable for the purposes of the list? Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 11:44, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

If authoring two books and having those two books by a major publisher is sufficient to pass WP:NAUTHOR, one could argue, being an Ambassador is sufficient to be notable. How is it that notability can be seen as writing two books, while it takes someone being a recipient for their nation's highest medal for valor to be notable? Something more stringent please. Perhaps being the author of a book that has received a major significant award (thus clarifying the notable award criteria of WP:ANYBIO), is something to be looked at. But just being a published author doesn't make one notable, otherwise, every major journalist is a published author of notability after publishing two long form articles, based on one way to interpret above suggested addition to the guideline.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 05:19, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

• Going back to the original proposal here, what qualifies as "a major publisher?" What makes WP:NBAND work is that there is some agreement on what constitutes a major record label. The other question about this change is that it would likely change the approach WP:PROF, since many professors may meet a more open criteria of WP:NAUTHOR. Enos733 (talk) 07:11, 19 March 2015 (UTC)
• I think that one of the best ways to describe a major publisher is that it'd be one that has received substantial coverage in reliable sources, enough to where they'd warrant an article themselves. They'd also be a publisher that has routinely published works that have received enough coverage to where either the authors or their works would pass notability guidelines as well. As far as the concern over the journalists go, this criteria would only pertain to people who have published book-length works through a major publisher, meaning that the works would typically be 300+ pages on average. This would not cover newspaper articles regardless of the length, as it is extremely unlikely that the average newspaper (or even a journal article) would have a submission that is of book length. This can be changed to specify that this does not cover journalists or academic journal articles, a change I've made above. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 07:58, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

With WP:PROF, the effect may be still substantial, since many of the major academic presses, i.e. Harvard University Press, Yale University Press and the University of California Press, all have their own Wikipedia pages. The consensus on WP:PROF was "simply having authored a large number of published academic works is not considered sufficient." In addition, changing the standard for published books (with a major publisher) (and especially to two), would unintentionally provide notability to academics in certain fields where research is traditionally published in book form (versus journal articles).--Enos733 (talk) 03:09, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

• Also, the number of minimum works can always be raised, so to address those concerns I've changed this to four books instead of two, although three is probably better. This could very easily be further changed to raise this bar. The thing is, publishing isn't easy. It is cheaper and easier for major publishers to put out works, but this hasn't really turned it into a free-for-all where anyone can submit a book to Berkley (or even Zondervan and they're fairly liberal) and get accepted. There's still a very rigorous screening process and most will not get published at all, let alone in print. Even if the person gets a contract for this or that number of books (usually about 2-3), there's still no guarantee that this contract will be honored and it's entirely possible that a poorly performing author will be dropped before they've published the promised amount of books. There can also be a coda added in that if the author has only worked on one book series (ie, an ongoing series with one character) and the series is notable enough to have an article, then it would be better for the author's name to serve as a redirect to that series page. The thing about all of this is that books are pretty niche and unless something really grabs the public eye, you can have extremely successful authors that solidly fly under the radar despite having large followings and selling large amounts of books. This can be extremely offputting for incoming editors because for them it just won't make sense. Now I'm not talking about someone who has published a few books under an obscure publisher, but people who have published multiple books in known publishers that have published extremely notable authors (that are not in the public domain). This would enable people like the ones I've listed above to have an article, as well as people who have received some limited coverage for their work, but just barely fall shy of fulfilling notability criteria. It would revolutionize notability guidelines to a degree, but in a good way since it'd give us a way to keep most of the "common sense" articles that get nominated for deletion or get turned down at AfC. It'd also help give us a way to have articles on authors that published during a point in time where publishing was extremely difficult and any truly in-depth coverage has not been put on the Internet. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 08:14, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
• Here's an idea: how about we include the book amount but also require that the books be held in a certain number of institutions on WorldCat? For example, what if it was as follows:

Has released four or more book length works that have been published via a major publisher or through one of the more important indie publishers, and are held in a minimum of 200 libraries throughout the world. Book-length works are defined as works of fiction, non-fiction, and/or anthologies/collections where they are the only author that are over 250 pages long. Qualifying publishers, including indie publishers, are defined as publishers with a history of more than a few years, and with a roster of authors, many of whom are independently notable. Works that have been self-published (ie, CreateSpace, Lulu) or released via a vanity publisher do not apply, nor do works by authors that are contracted to ghost write for another author (ex, Andrew Neiderman) unless they are the sole ghost writer and the author passes notability guidelines. Journalists and academics who have only published journal articles do not qualify for this criteria.

This will need to be whittled down more and it'd be best if we could make up a list of publishers, but this would still be fairly exclusive. For example, a WorldCat search shows that the aforementioned author Gerry Bartlett would probably fail this criteria. She'd pass on the amount of books published, but so far only two of her books are substantially carried in libraries throughout the world. Eli Cantor would also fail this criteria, as likely would a number of authors, but at the same time there would be a lot of authors that would that have otherwise failed notability criteria. Sunny would pass this criteria as four of her books are held in over 200 libraries, so she's an example of an author that would benefit from the version I've posted above. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:39, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

• I've added a bit about ghost writers, which would also help whittle down the qualifications even further, although I'm open to this being left out. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:53, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

I think this is still too inclusive. I think something about clarifying what "notable awards" means in WP:ANYBIO when it comes to authors means (as I suggested above). If the author's work(s) (say three or more) have received significant coverage in non-primary (and non-publisher related) reliable sources (and have not won a major award), it should be fair to say that is sufficient to say that the author themselves have received significant coverage for more than one book release, and thus are notable beyond WP:BLP1E (where the event is the book release), than that should be considered notable. Just cause someone has X number of books published might not make the author notable, especially if the books being published aren't notable.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 23:27, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

• What I'm trying to accomplish with this is to help show notability for books and authors that haven't received enough coverage to pass the current guidelines but for all practical purposes should pass notability guidelines. The thing about publishing in print is that it's not entirely a free for all- for someone to publish a certain amount of books through a notable or major publisher isn't a small feat. However I can see where this may seem too inclusive, which is why I added the information about the author having to have 4 of their book-length works held in over 200 libraries on WorldCat. Now where publishing alone may be too inclusive for some, publishing and having your book in over 200 libraries is not an easy feat. Publishing doesn't guarantee that libraries will purchase the books for their shelves, especially nowadays when many libraries are downsizing their collections and trying to only include the books that they know that patrons want. Some libraries are able to afford more books than others, but by large libraries have to be exclusive in what they choose. DGG could probably back me up on this since he works in a library. Now this isn't 200 libraries for all four books, but 200 libraries per book. That's where it'd be a little more exclusive since this addition would exclude a lot of authors unless they achieved notability via other criteria. For example, Sunny's Mona Lisa Awakening is held in over 200 libraries and she has three other books that have similar holdings above 200. Gerry Bartlett (I've had a chance to look a little closer at her books) also passes this criteria with several of her books ([1], [2], [3], [4]). However at the same time this would exclude a lot of authors who publish but don't have enough of a demand to warrant libraries purchasing their work. For example, Lucy Arlington has three books that are in many libraries but her fourth book is only held in 139 libraries. This means that unless she has coverage that would otherwise allow her to pass notability guidelines, she would fail this criteria, as would many other authors who would say, have a series that is popular and successful enough that their publisher would continue to honor their contract but not to the point where libraries would carry that author. The issue I've run into is that we've frequently had articles for people that for all practical purposes should have articles but fall just shy of notability guidelines. A great example of this would be authors like Jamie McGuire. She has an article now (although the article's sourcing is exceedingly shaky right now), but I know that for the longest time she would continually fall shy of the notability guidelines despite having an overwhelmingly large fandom that managed to catch the eye of Atria Publishing, who contracted her for multiple books. Basically this is a way of proving that the authors have a large enough following to warrant an article. This is one case where we really do need to be more inclusive because there are a lot of authors that continually fly under the radar of reliable sources to where they don't gain in-depth coverage to satisfy notability guidelines but do get repeatedly published and have a fairly substantial number of libraries that carry their work. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 05:16, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

If the books of the author don't achieve GNG, than why should the author? If any of the books of the author don't receive a notable award, why should the author be notable? GNG is the general guideline. POLITICIAN works, as it is shown that there is a presumption that there are sufficient offline sources that any sub-national legislator has sufficient non-primary reliable sources to pass GNG. I don't think the same can be said about the authors which this attempted advised guideline would bring into the fold. The WorldCat based guideline is subjective, as far as I can understand.

Again, if the authors books are sufficiently notable per GNG, than it is safe to assume that the author themselves will have received sufficient significant coverage in multiple reliable sources to pass GNG. Again, if an author has written a book that has received a notable award, than it is safe to assume that the author meets criteria #1 of WP:ANYBIO.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 05:45, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

WP:POLITICIAN Issue

I believe there is a problem with WP:POLITICIAN as it is currently worded. Point #1 currently reads: "Politicians and judges who have held international, national or sub-national (statewide/provincewide) office, and members or former members of a national, state or provincial legislature.[11] This also applies to persons who have been elected to such offices but have not yet assumed them." The first part of this seems OK, but the latter part (even considering the text of 'note' [11]), specifically the "...members or former members of a national, state or provincial legislature.[11] This also applies to persons who have been elected to such offices but have not yet assumed them", and especially the "state or provincial legislature" part, seems very problematic. For specific examples, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives has 203 members; the New Hampshire House of Representatives has 400! A not insignificant number of these, especially in the New Hampshire House of Representatives, serve only a single term. Do we really want to confer "automatic notability" on anyone who served a single term in the New Hampshire House of Representatives, let alone somebody who simply ran a campaign for an office like this, and lost?!

I would suggest that we need to think about rewording WP:POLITICIAN (esp. the "state or provincial legislature" part)... Thoughts? --IJBall (talk) 05:11, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Seems fine to me, don't see the need to change. Sub-national legislatures is a good cut off point for state, provinces, prefectures. Otherwise, cutting out sub-national legislatures would remove individuals elected by in elections involving possibly hundreds of thosuands of persons.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 05:38, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

So, it's simply the number of voters that confers "notability"? Or the single set of references that cover election night results? This seems extremely thin to me, as many state legislators have no notability in their own right, outside of the circumstance of their election (i.e. most don't have important laws authored or named after them, most don't chair important committees or are in their party's leadership, etc.). In other words, there will be no secondary sources for them, outside of election night coverage... While I'm fine with WP:POLITICIAN #1 at the level of national legislators, I don't think it should automatically include all politicians elected to (or even worse simply running for) "sub-national legislatures". Most such individuals, for wont of a better word, simply aren't "notable" enough. --IJBall (talk) 05:48, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

For those who do not win see WP:POLOUTCOMES, which results in a re-direct. Normally individuals who win a sub-national election at the legislature or executive level meet WP:GNG beyond just that single election. The alternate is that the position is notable, but the individual holding the position is not, leading to a list article being created; however, thus far, that idea has not gained a lot of traction here.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 05:55, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

"The alternate is that the position is notable, but the individual holding the position is not..." – I think your statement here would probably describe my feelings on this issue quite well: the office of a state legislator is "notable", but that doesn't necessarily mean that the officeholder is "notable". Thanks for clarifying that for me in my mind... --IJBall (talk) 16:20, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Note: Parallel discussion on this subject is now taking place at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#WP:POLITICIAN. Just FYI. --IJBall (talk) 16:48, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Please do not parallel discussion, please attempt to centralize discussion here IJBall.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 16:58, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

RightCowLeftCoast – FTR, I didn't start the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy). Both this discussion, and that one, in fact have spun off from topic at WP:ANI – Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#User:Victoriadseaman. In any case, there's nothing I can do about the separate discussion now taking place at Village pump (policy), as I didn't start it. --IJBall (talk) 17:02, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. Legislatures are where the actual work of government takes place. It is my experience, as the creator of hundred of articles on state legislators, that the information is out there, if somebody just does a little work. The proceedings and journals of the various sessions, the press coverage in the local papers: the possibilities are rich. While it is undeniably true that some national legislators of some countries are not adequately covered (how many British MPs are still redlinks?), I just don't buy the argument that state legislators don't inherently meet GNG. I would urge each state legislature, and each national parliament, to consider funding a position to research and then create or expand the articles for all their past members. --Orange Mike | Talk 18:42, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Individual office holders likely do, but not all. That is what is at issue here.

I can see the arguments for inherent notability (as this is given to anyone who plays in a major league sports game)(arguably less impact than being in a significant elected office).

The thing is, and this is a larger issue, should anything trump GNG?--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:46, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I think your last point is right on. The fact is, there is probably a significant portion of members of the New Hampshire House of Reps who never receive (significant) coverage in outside press and media. So the question – should state legislators like that be included in this encyclopedia just because they are "state (or provincial) legislators", even if there is no secondary sourcing for them?... --IJBall (talk) 19:39, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm always surprised that anyone would think "too many articles!" is a cause for concern or a meaningful reason for deletion. These discussions about whether any subject should be presumed notable for any reason are WP:PERENNIAL and often ignore that GNG is itself "merely" a guideline, and that, like animal species or named populated places, there are certain topics we simply want covered even if the best we can do for some members of that topic group are barebones facts sourced to (reliable) primary sources. So we've decided over and over that it is not worth spending any time arguing over individual cases in such groups, and that there is value to being as comprehensive as possible for those topics. Bottom line is, as OUTCOMES has shown time and time again, we are not going to start deleting state legislator articles, and any attempt to try is just going to cause bad will and a waste of time for all concerned. We have other ways of doing with COI, which was the reason the ANI thread started in the first place. Those who aren't interested in such articles are always free not to work on them. postdlf (talk) 19:46, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

• I'm not seeing a problem with the current wording except perhaps where it singularly mentions persons "elected", to the exclusion of appointees, which many judgeships and other political posts often are.--John Cline (talk) 20:45, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
  • It uses the broader phrase "held...ofice" generally, which would include appointees. It only uses the term "elected" in the context of those who have won election but have not yet been sworn in (i.e., "assumed" the office). I suppose it could say "elected or appointed" there, as I guess there could be a similar gap in time between an appointment becoming formal (whether through confirmation or just an executive's decision) and the actual swearing in, though honestly I don't remember that ever being an issue. postdlf (talk) 21:16, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

I agree that the sentiments are present, as you describe. Mine was a first impression, and it assumed quibbling that apparently has not transpired. I do not see the current prose as problematic at all.--John Cline (talk) 23:37, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

What a horrible idea. WP:POLITICIAN is already one of the stricter notability guidelines we have; there is absolutely no need for it to be watered down. To begin with, 99.9% of these people will pass GNG anyway without even breaking a sweat, if you know where to look. But even those that maybe take some more work deserve to be here, and taking that away will seriously damage the comprehensive nature of our coverage of politics. At the Australian project we've been making serious headway getting articles on state politicians, and I've never found one who I wouldn't have included were it not for WP:POLITICIAN. It's kind of standard to think that the guidelines in areas where we don't generally work are absurdly lenient (I for one find almost every criterion under WP:ATHLETE ridiculously inclusive), but this is one that works logically to ensure we have a comprehensive picture of important legislative history. Frickeg (talk) 23:23, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

I think Frickeg nailed it - it's not that surprising that people who don't work in areas think those guidelines are lenient, but these people are notable, and you can't have a comprehensive and coherent coverage of state politics without articles on each legislator. There is far more coverage of state legislators than there is of people who played one major-league game, and to use IJBall's example - perhaps you couldn't source an article on each New Hampshire legislator, but I definitely could, and I'm in freaking Australia and don't have access to half your sources. Changing WP:POLITICIAN in this way would mainly serve to burn out editors working on politics worldwide: ensuring that editors have to keep stopping what they're working on to fight off deletion discussions on people who will inevitably pass WP:GNG (and AfD) by the depth of coverage that inherently comes with their position anyway, but wasting editor time and pissing off good editors in the process. It is definitely a horrible idea. The Drover's Wife (talk) 02:18, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

This is a severely short-sighted proposal. Please try visiting a research university library in any US state: you'll easily find dead tree coverage of any legislator from that state. You're not likely to find the Indiana Legislative Directory online, for example; Bill Long (politician) gets essentially no online coverage because he left office 30+ years ago, but he gets lots of printed coverage in the Directory along with every other Indiana legislator who held office since they started publishing it. Yes, this kind of source sometimes don't exist for 200-years-ago legislators, but they're covered in other publications; most of the 19th-century US state legislators were celebrated in county histories, as you can see with articles like Martin Wines, and these histories often aren't really findable by a Google search for the legislator's name. Your inability to find solid online sources proves that these people are obscure, but not that they're non-notable. Nyttend (talk) 04:39, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

• As an Australian, I can't help but agree with my compatriots above. I understand the logic of an argument that says not all members of a 400-person state legislature are going to be GNG-notable but that's an Ameri-centric POV. In an Australian context, we're talking about legislatures with a couple of dozen people; I think the ACT has only 12. To be more restrictive makes no sense outside the anomalous examples given. New Hampshire and its ilk seem to be the exception, not the rule. St★lwart¹¹¹ 04:54, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

17, and soon to be increased to 25, but to be fair we're talking about more of a glorified local council than anything with the ACT; the rest of the state parliaments (Tasmania and NT excepted) are all 50+. Even with 400-person legislatures, I would be shocked if GNG were not easy to pass. The point of guidelines like this is not to waste people's time on deletion discussions that are never going to pass. Frickeg (talk) 05:01, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Really? 25! Bloody hell. That seems... Anyway, yes, if the NSW Legislative Assembly was a 400-member institution (perish the thought!) they would probably still all be very easily notable. There are plenty of local councillors that almost fit the bill. That's the level at which notability is a matter for debate in Australia. St★lwart¹¹¹ 05:42, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

For the record, I was thinking more along the lines of recent one-term legislators from places like New Hampshire that won't get coverage, not state legislators from 150 years ago (which were perhaps more likely to have gotten local press coverage in that era). And something like a "Legislative Directory" would likely count as another Primary source when I was explicitly discussing whether Secondary sources for some of these legislators would be available. But there's no need to bother any more with this – it's clear that "inclusionism" reigns as the philosophy here, whether every legislator will explicitly clear GNG or not. I'm now 0-for-2 on suggesting changes to Wikipedia guidelines. I won't be making that mistake again: lesson learned – whatever may be problematic in the guidelines as written, rest assured there are enough entrenched interests content with the current guidelines that they won't be altered, regardless of whatever defects may potentially exist in them or whether there's room for even minor improvement. Thanks to RightCowLeftCoast for the thoughtful responses. P.S. Nyttend – I have been visiting a "research library" a couple of times every week lately to try and improve the U.S. House of Representatives Elections articles by actually referring to book sources(!) – but maybe I should quit, because I obviously don't know where such a library is, or how to use one?!... [[File:|25px|link=]] --IJBall (talk) 06:08, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

That seems rather defeatist, especially considering the thread above yours is about 50/50 for a change to that guideline and one further above that led to significant concessions, the development of a new essay and movement toward a new guideline where one had previously been deleted (in an area of considerable disagreement). It's not that views are "entrenched" (by any stretch of the imagination) and few of those who participated are "inclusionist" by nature or record. But your proposal is based on a "problem" experienced in only one location and this isn't Ameri-pedia. If something might work for US editors but very much won't for the rest of the world, it is unlikely to enjoy much support. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't keep proposing things - the proposal itself was well-crafted, wasn't accusatory, identified an actual issue (though limited in geographic scope, it was a genuine concern for you) and you invited participation and then participated in the discussion. Everything else you nailed. Don't stop suggesting things can be improved just because (in this instance) people happened to disagree with you. St★lwart¹¹¹ 06:41, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Honestly, I have much less of a problem with this result – at least this one is grounded in an identifiable and rational "philosophy" (even if I don't agree with it 100%), and makes the guideline easily to follow actually. My experience trying to revise MOS:INFOBOXFLAG was the experience that really put me off trying to get guidelines revised – if something as trivial and schizophrenic as MOS:INFOBOXFLAG can't be improved... But, thanks for the encouraging words. --IJBall (talk) 07:10, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Please consult the books that I've spoken about, or just look at a Worldcat record: the Indiana Legislative Directory is a secondary source, compiled by the Indiana State Chamber of Commerce under the auspices of the state government. This is in contrast to most news publications, including the press coverage you mention for the 150-years-ago legislators, which are primary sources because they report what just happened, rather than benefiting from a chronological separation from the event being reported. These books, and others like them that I've seen (comparable to the Official Congressional Directory for the US Congress), are compiled by professionals who are able to concentrate on the significant components in their subjects' lives because they use primary sources like news media articles. Nyttend (talk) 22:02, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Seconding Nyttend. Basically every state parliament has biographical dictionaries (under various names, but basically the same thing) outlining the histories of every person to hold legislative office in that state. Calling these "primary sources" is a comical stretch of the definition of a primary source: they're secondary sources, usually compiled by academics, that happen to come with the office. The combination of those and the inevitable press coverage is one reason why it's so easy to write a well-sourced article on any state legislator ever. The Drover's Wife (talk) 02:57, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Nyttend and Orangemike. Another example would be the Wisconsin Blue Books compiled by the Wisconsin Legislative Research Bureau. And you also have press coverage. Thank you-RFD (talk) 12:06, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

New Hampshire is indeed a special case--the proportion of legislators / inhabitants is unusually high, but it's one specific case only, and not representative. It would be wrong to change a widely accepted general rule to accommodate it, or even to make a special exemption. The overall policy, one of the most basic policies at WP that has been a key factor in our success, is NOT PAPER. DGG ( talk ) 04:36, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

I, too, oppose any change in the notability guideline for politicians, which works quite well in my experience. In contrast with New Hampshire, with a population of 1.3 million and a gigantic legislature, California has nearly 40 million people, and a very manageable State Senate of 40 members and State Assembly of 80 members. I can assure you that these people are highly notable with extensive coverage in reliable sources, and have been for 165 years. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:03, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

Sri Lankan provincial councils

Are members notable under WP:POLITICIAN? Do they count as sub-national legislatures or are they just local councils? AfD discussion here. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:24, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

Hawayo Takata Reiki master

Hello -- Arthur goes shopping ! I Have been knocked back on this lady Bio several times as the reviewers say you is not a person of notability. ! well, There is already a published work on wiki under that name, so I changed my to her full name Mrs Hawayo Hiroumi Takata to distinguish it from the other piece of rubbish wich was IMO derogatory of her good name.

So I get knocked back again. for the same reason. 

Have you ""Arthur goes shopping"" bothered to do a general internet search on this lady Hawayo Takata ? No obviously not.

I am submitting again as I know Mrs Hawayo H. Takata is a person of considerable notability to a few million. or does that not count in you realm ?12:09, 25 March 2015 (UTC)12:09, 25 March 2015 (UTC)12:09, 25 March 2015 (UTC)12:09, 25 March 2015 (UTC)