Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Benjamin Bryant

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or on a Votes for Undeletion nomination). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was DELETE. Linuxbeak | Talk 00:37, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Benjamin Bryant

This page is one of a circular set of self-refential non-notable (low google hit count) bios, all of which have a family relationship and have been created in the last couple of weeks

There's also a set of redirects for various forms of each of the names. Josh Parris # 06:59, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

  • Weak keep, seems notable. Any wikilinks to NN persons can be unwikified. Delete (as Isotope23) -- Egil 11:53, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Weak keep. Somewhat notable. Logophile 13:35, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Delete - OK let's break it down. Searching for Benjamin Bryant + Majic 95.5: [1]. 3 hits that actaully are on topic... 2 of which are from his website. Searching for Benjamin Bryant + K-Juice: [2] yields one hit... from his website. So basically, he qualifies as a non-notable disc jockey. The behind the scenes stuff (i.e. Program Director) isn't merit enough for inclusion either. He won a Paul R. Ellis Award, which has it's own wiki entry compelete with mention of Mr. Bryant; not so surprising when you notice that the author of that article is the same as the author of the Benjamin Bryant article. I would surmise the Paul R. Ellis Award article was added to support Mr. Bryant's article...
    • This delete nomination seems kind of personal, probably one of the reasons I felt compelled to research it a little more in-depth. As for the award, the author may be same, but a quick web search for the award supports that it is an award of some repute from a nationally recognized organization. When the entry is worthy of inclusion on its own, do we get to disqualify it because we question the motives for inclusion? http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=3027862 [3]
Moving on, Mr. Bryant hosted and emceed some local events, nothing more exciting than what many local "celebrities" do. Mr. Bryant then moved on to column writing. [4] produces one valid hit, which puts him on the level of every other column writer that doesn't have a bio on wikipedia. The claim that The early 2000s saw Bryant’s writings published on all of the industrialized continents, and translated into several languages... appear to be non-verifiable.
    • This is verifiable, I found a list (with some links to original material) on Benjamin Bryant's website (the same one you cite): A number of these publications appear to meet the circulation requirements of the Wikipedia biography policy and they, in what I, at least, found interesting, cover a wide variety of topics. You seem very insistent that this point is unverifiable. One look at this page (and the links to actual scans and/or reprints of the original publications) kind of debunks that...Benjamin Bryant is clearly a widely published author, if not an author of the "sexy" material variety (No Brad and Angelina articles, though there is a piece on a beauty queen). http://www.benjaminbryant.net/stringbook/ [5] el_amante 21:41, October 12, 2005 (UTC)
      • There is nothing personal about it el_amante and you seem to be inferring bad faith on my part just because I'm actually trying to support my argument for a deletion. I agree that the Paul R. Ellis Award is worthy of inclusion in wikipedia on its own... I just don't agree that getting this award confers notability to the recipient. I view in the same way I view the Medal of Honor: If someone has done something notable, and happens to be a medal of honor recipient as well (regardless of whether or not the notable action is tied to receiving said honor) the MoH certainly merits mention in the person's article. However, just receiving the MoH is not, in my opinion, sufficient merit for inclusion in wikipedia. My argument against using the Paul R. Ellis Award as a benchmark for notability is solely based on that reasoning and my mention of the genesis of the Paul R. Ellis Award was simply a comment, though perhaps inappropriate in the context of an AfD.
Per your second statement, I don't know how you are inferring that I am very insistent that the point about his published work is unverifiable from the statement appear to be non-verifiable... denoting the fact that I could not verify the claim. I missed that link you posted when I originally looked at Mr. Bryant's website. Having reviewed it, I still don't see anything that meets my criteria for notable published works. It is a collection of local newspaper articles. The Soap Weekly article I mentioned in my original vote, and some technical writings and press releases. I'm not judging this on the "sexy" nature of the material, but rather on precedent. Looking around wikipedia, I don't see many articles on local newspaper writers (baring those who write for nationally distributed "local" papers like the NY Times, Washington Post, etc.) or for technical/ad copy writers.
There is nothing personal about my delete vote. My long explanation for deletion in my original vote was simply because that, based on the article, a simple "delete - nn-bio" was inappropriate based on the numerous contentions of notability. I was at least trying to do some due diligence and look at the claims the author made. If this article stays, it needs a cleanup to removed POV wording (like "cinderella-like"), but ultimately I simply disagree with retaining an article on someone of such low notability.--Isotope23 15:28, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

The rest of the article concerns his lineage (which does not confer notability unless you are Paris Hilton), some minor awards, and his career. An unpublished novel and an unfinished play cap it all off. Taking it all together, I don't see anything that confers notability her. It is a well written article with tons information. It would make a great resume, but there as of right now, I don't see anything that distinguishes Mr. Bryant as notable. If his book ever comes out I may change my mind on this...--Isotope23 17:59, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

  • Delete per Isotope23's excellent analysis. The page, although well written, is absurdly bloated for an unkown DJ. Quale 18:43, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep – the page is well-written, and all the information is relevant. Having won a number of awards, and being related to an Emmy-winner, he is clearly a noteworthy individual. He also holds the record of 'youngest director of a mid/major market commercial station in all of Texas', which is undoubtedly of interest to somebody. Simply not being well-known does not mean that the subject is not noteable. It may be possible to merge all of the Bryant articles into a single article, but deleting is too crude and wasteful.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Ronald Collinson (talk • contribs) 21:57, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
    • If "[s]imply not being well-known does not mean that the subject is not noteable", then what is the definition of notability? MCB 01:37, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
    • So if I am related to someone who does something notable, like win an award or become CEO of a company, I'm therefore notable enough for a wiki article? I better start writing up my copy...--Isotope23 13:45, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
    • C'mon, let's keep this discussion fair and reasonable. Obviously, being related to a notable is not simply enough, but when the person is a published writer related to another published writer of significant note, and obviously part of a family of significant achievement (and we can debate whether a given person is or is not) I think they can qualify for an entry, at least on principle, to be evaluated individually.--el_amante 19:34, 12 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep. I was on the fence of "keep" vs. "strong keep" but I ultimately chose strong keep for the following reasons: While this person is not well known, the accomplishments are legitimate. Though some of the Google searches link to his site http://www.benjaminbryant.net (click through to the "professional" site), an actual review of the site provides plenty of supporting information--including several newspaper articles, and a complete list of works written for major publications and public relations campaigns managed in various countries. The most notable are the Black History Maker of Tomorrow award, which I know from watching a TV special years ago is (was?) a legitimate national award given by McDonalds, and being the youngest Program Director of a commercial station in Texas. Other supporting information includes being named "Most Memorable of 1996" and working on a major Defense program that is always in the news. ALONE, the circular reference to the other family members (some of which are also clearly notable, others not so much) or the fact that the Ellis Award entry was entered by the same author, might challenge the article's legitimacy, but there are clearly enough supporting factors to keep this one. I do not think we should be too dependent upon how many Google hits a person turns up--many people accomplished things before the Internet was in widespread use, particulary for archiving. I also think that one of the brilliant things about Wikipedia is that we can include "B-list" notables that might otherwise be left out of traditional encyclopedias due to space constraints. Wikipedia can be less elitist and I think that's a good thing. Sorry for the length of this, but I wanted to rebut the detailed entry above, as I strongly disagree with using primarily quantitative data (hits, etc.) as justification for keeping OR deleting--and I'm not sure that while Ben Bryant's page was cited, that the author actually followed many of the links on that page, which support Mr. Bryant's notability el_amante 19:45, 12 October 2005 (UTC).
    • A note: I noticed that the bio on the site(and even the tone of the bio) is not the same as this Wikipedia article, which I often find is the case when a person has done their own their own vanity page. el_amante 21:54, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

I *would* be interested in User25be answering some of these points, so I invite him/her to do so before the 5-day deadline if he/she comes across this discussion. el_amante 19:45 12 October 2005 (UTC)

  • Delete (as Isotope23) Josh Parris # 00:17, 17 October 2005 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in an undeletion request). No further edits should be made to this page.