Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Diggory Press

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 in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete: lack of reliable sources. Moreschi ^Talk 18:53, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Diggory Press

Diggory Press (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Marketing promotional piece. Doesn't seem to have much if any independent coverage and hence doesn't seem notable. Also, the creator of the page (Rosalindfranklin (talk · contribs)) appears to be an employee of the organization. Flex (talk/contribs) 13:38, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

• The article has it's problems with flowery language but I think the topic of the article is "worthy" of an article. The business is associated with a number of authors who are notable in their own rights. (according to the article that is). For now I recommend 'stubbing and not deletion. ---J.S (T/C/WRE) 14:07, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Are the authors you are referring to the long dead ones (John Owen, Jonathan Edwards, John Bunyan, etc.)? Their works are in the public domain, many are also available online (e.g., at Project Gutenberg, the Christian Classics Ethereal Library, etc.), and many are in print by any number of other (dare I say, more notable?) publishers (e.g., Yale University Press, Banner of Truth Trust, Ligonier Ministries, etc.). Hence, Diggory Press is not unique or notable because of its association with these authors. I would say we need some independent coverage of this org, or at least some reliable stats on its distribution volumes or something. --Flex (talk/contribs) 14:17, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
    • You can see Diggory's worldwide distribution volumes via places like amazon.com. It is notable in that many of the books published are NOT available anywhere including online (although some of course are). Also books published by Banner of Truth and other Christian publishers are not always as available as Diggory Press. Diggory is unique too in that the prices for Jonathan Edwards books etc are considerably lower than the university presses et al (eg 9.99 instead of 99.99 fo theological tomes). It also publishes many other lesser-known authors (over 600 of them which are not available anywhere else), including a book by the member of UK Parliament, Bill Wiggin, it has just included the most famous authors on the page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rosalindfranklin (talk • contribs)
      • I mean statistics on how many books you actually sell. As for pricing, having a lower price than, say, Yale's critical editions of Edwards does not seem to me to be a factor for notability, and moreover there are a number of other publishers of many of the same volumes at lower cost than Yale (e.g., [1], [2], [3], [4], [5]), not to mention the two two-volume Works that are available relatively inexpensively ([6] and [7]) or his Works on CD ([8]). So still, you don't seem to have a unique relation to any of the older Christian authors that would establish notability. Moreover, publishing any number of lesser-known authors does not seem to be an argument in favor of notability. Yours seems to me more like a micropublisher — not that that's a bad thing, just that it's not necessarily encyclopedic. --Flex (talk/contribs) 16:21, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I think the fact that we produce effectively mass-market editions of (usually) very expensive important and often very hard to find theological books does establish a degree of notability for us as a publishers. That along with the other factors that make us up as a press should be considered. eg - Our imprint Exposure Publishing is the fastest growing UK publisher, with sales around four times more in one single year than other print on demand publishers in their whole lives. That is notable in itself as well as the fact we offer the best royalties in the self publishing industry at the lowest cost. Our sales outstip lulu.com whom you list. We also have several important authors on our books including MPS, charities and a Procol Harem band member and was the first British publisher to publish a book in Punjabi.

The Diggory Press side do publish rare works that you cannot get anywhere else for love nor money, whether in book form, CD or e-format. Furthermore a lot of the Jonathan Edawrds or John Bunyan books have not been available as single editions for many years - and not all Christians wish to purchase their whole collections of their extensive works from Banner of Truth et al who we acknowledge nonetheless, do a great job. We do not just publish dead theologians, but also world war one titles, nursing history books etc that are also important. I cannot obviously disclose exact sales figures but we are a key figure and sell a lot of books each month worldwide. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rosalindfranklin (talk • contribs)

If these things make your company notable, they should appear in the article. But also note that the article should be verifiable, and claims like "fastest growing", "best royalties", "four times more than", etc. should be footnoted with a reliable source. As for rarity, let's take a test case: Which specific books do you publish by Edwards that can't be had elsewhere? --Flex (talk/contribs) 18:32, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

(deindent) Rosalindfranklin, if you could provide a list of news articles about your business this might help resolve this issue. If the answer is "none" then that helps resolve this too. ---J.S (T/C/WRE) 18:51, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

As far as Jonathan Edwards in concerned, I believe all his work is available online as well as in a complete collection from Banner of Truth Trust. However very few of his works are available in print singularly at any price. If we go by amazon, there are no other editions of 'The Apocalypse and Final Judgment' available, or the highly important works 'The Justice of God in the Damnation of Sinners' or 'Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God'. Ditto with some of John Bunyan's works. G A Studdert Kennedy, the famous war poet, his book the Unutterable Beauty was completely out of print and not on the net or CD or anywhere else. Ditto with 'Una and Her Paupers' which we paid a fortune for as a rare antique book to scanned to be made available as well as Linda Richards, the famous nurse's pioneers' life story. We have also published other very rare books not available anywhere else. Our books are regularly reviewed in newspaper, magazines or TV and radio. Media events include The Richard and Judy show (2006) and a host of radio shows. In recognition of our success, we were invited to the Galaxy British Book Awards hosted by Richard and Judy Finnegan in London in March 2007.

At least three of our books have been nominated for awards - 2006 Emme Award for Astronautical Literature, The Lulu Blooker Prize 2007 and The Holyer an Gof Trophy 2007.

We were in the Sunday Times on June 3rd 2007, Writers Forum Magazine, March 2007 and Writers Forum Magazine, February 2007 as well as a host of other smaller newspapers and magazines. I am not always aware of all the publicity as I do not have time to look it up. Everything I said is verifiable (eg we have the sale stats in writing from our distrubutors) but I am not sure whether I can get it from 'published sources' easily for you so will therefore remove those 'unverified' to your standards claims. Rosalindfranklin 20:34, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Which reliable sources call those two Edwards books "highly important works"? Moreover, if the works are widely available online and in print from multiple publishers, I don't think printing them as stand-alone volumes qualifies as a notable attribute for your company. I can't speak to the books from other areas, but I must admit I'm dubious. The reviews in various outlets and nomination of your books for minor prizes may mean the books themselves have some notability, but I don't see that that notability thereby transfers to the publisher. As for your company's appearance in various media outlets, are any of these substantial (more than a few sentences paragraphs)? The one from the most significant source, The Sunday Times, is naught but a passing mention of you as a self-publishing outlet. Can you provide links or, failing that, scans of the others if they are more substantial? As for your sales figures, we cannot take your word for it; they must be verifiable in independent, reliable sources (even Amazon reports would count), or they're not verifiable at all for the purposes of the Wikipedia. --Flex (talk/contribs) 21:03, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: Interestingly enough, Diggory Press has published a number of books by Ms. Franklin herself. I pulled her up on the UK Amazon, and she's got respectable sales rankings [9], enough to support notability in her own right. Whether her publisher is thereby notable is another matter, and certainly we've a large WP:COI issue here. Right now I'm neutral on the subject.  RGTraynor  19:03, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
• Delete Pamphlets would be a more appropriate term than books. I would strongly oppose an article on someone publishing such unsubstantial material, if it were based only on amazon sales rank--in fact, i would oppose any article based solely upon amazon sales rank. Back to the press, that amazon lists the material is not relevant a a criterion of notability, for they will list anything if they get their commission--it has about the same evidential value as a listing on eBay. That proper scholarly editions are available at high prices, does not make selling reprints of PD versions at lower prices notable. DGG 22:12, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
• Neutral Article looks okay to me, doesn't read like an ad, etc. Author should read WP:CORP and provide references to independent sources writing about the company (press releases don't count). My shallow google search didn't turn up anything promising, but that doesn't mean it isn't out there. Capmango 22:42, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
  • It may look better than my description above because I tried to improve it a bit. Still, I am in favor of its deletion as non-notable. But I'm open to hearing evidence to the contrary. --Flex (talk/contribs) 01:30, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletions. -- John Vandenberg 01:23, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

• "Which reliable sources call those two Edwards books "highly important works"?"

Oh come on, Flex, every protestant theological student knows how important these books are. Don't make me jump through hoops to prove something that is really, really obvious already. They are not in print anywhere else apart from as a complete and volumnous collection of Jonathan Edwards works. Fine if you are studying at Princeton but not for Joe Public. By splitting these books up, not only do we make these more available and affordable, but also we make the public more aware of what he did and did not write and make them more likely to read any of his works. For example, I personally, although interested in theology, would never for leisure buy a complete works of any Christian author, apart from possibly one by James Hudson Taylor, my 'hero'...but then he did not write nearly as much as Bunyan, Owen or Edwards et al. A single edition is a good chance of dipping one's toe in the water to discover whether you like the author or not. A lot of Christians struggle with the idea of eternal damnation, and many are not aware of this book 'The Justice of God etc' because it is hidden in a vast collection with lots of, dare I say, drier material. We have made it readily available and 'out there' for those wishing to research this subject as we have done equally with the apocalypse etc etc. Theology should be more avilable to the 'man on the street'. Anyway, I repeat, that is not the only thing that makes us 'notable', it is just a contributing factor with lots of others. And of course, if you were going to maintain your current argument, then it disqualifies a lot of other publishers listed on Wikipedia.Rosalindfranklin 13:43, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm just saying that, IMHO, you're overstating your case by using the qualifier "highly important". Calvin's Institutes is highly important; Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress is highly important; Edwards's "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" is highly important -- their continued appearance in the Western cannon and being continually in print since they were written, their being widely analyzed, studied, and referenced, is evidence enough of this. The same cannot be said of all of Edwards's (or Buynan's or Calvin's or anyone's) other works. They may be highly important in some limited context (e.g., the history of the First Great Awakening, the development of the writer's thought, etc.), but that doesn't make them highly important in general. If you think I am wrong in my assessment of these particular works, provide a reliable source. The burden of proof is on you. But this is all rather secondary to my main point: even if these works were notable, that notability does not automatically transfer to a reprinter of them, particularly when they're widely available in other formats. --Flex (talk/contribs) 13:45, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

"As for your sales figures, we cannot take your word for it; they must be verifiable in independent, reliable sources (even Amazon reports would count), or they're not verifiable at all for the purposes of the Wikipedia

Do you do this to other publishers too?! Sales figures are rarely published except possibly in places like Publishers Weekly etc by the main players such as Random House and Penguin, and even then you do not get the whole story. As we as a press publish aiming mainly to a niche market we are unlikely ever to make it to rankings page on Publishers Weekly (one day though maybe!), just as Banner of Truth and most other Christian publishers will never make it in there. For example we know a lot of the Samuel Zwemer books will not sell huge amounts (I publish them more as a service than anything else as I have an interest in training and mobiling more Christian missionaries to Islamic countries.) and equally there is not a huge demand for John Owen's books nowadays. However as I feel they should be in print, I make it so. And before you say his collection is already out there, the 16 volume set published by Banner of Truth is US398 dollars on amazon (http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Works-John-Owen-Set/dp/0851513921/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-3468277-5156716?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181481647&sr=1-1), which let's face it unless you really love Owen you are never going to purchase. However, just because our sales figures do not get onto Publishers Weekly best-seller lists does not make our titles or our sales insignificant. There are lots of other important 'small' to 'medium sized' presses out there equally who keep literature alive whose sales figures are never published. If we all aimed just for the mass-market, then God help us, most classics or academic books would never get published. Here is a link to the Feb. article in Writers Forum, this is not an advert, we do not advertise anywhere as we are too busy as it is - [[10]] I have a scan of a March article in Writers Forum from another author which I do not know how to attach. Both were two to three page articles. I also have a photo of me at the 2007 Galaxy British Book Awards with the soccer player Sir Bobby Charlton who presented one of the awards. I was invited out of only 10 UK publishers (NB the only woman publisher) because of our significant clout in the market place. I have not kept every media article. We were also on Richard and Judy show in 2006 and lots of radio shows which is hard to prove in retrospect. I don't think we should be penalised as being unnoteworthy because we don't have a PR machine feeding out lots of information about us to the press, or collecting all the articles on us that are out there. We are too busy publishing and selling books to bother feeding the media. The only amazon reports you can access (which does not show all our titles but it will do) is for the Diggory Press titles on amazon.com - [[11]] for the Exposure Publishing titles on amazon.com [[12]] and a similar thing can be done on a host of other websites including amazon.co.uk and barnes and noble etc. Note that despite what some think, amazon is not the main player for booksales, we make many more sales to bookshops and libaries.Rosalindfranklin 13:43, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Sales figures aren't a requirement, but they would help substantiate that Diggory is a significant player in the marketplace. If that's not true or can't be substantiated, Diggory could still be notable for some other reason. In any case, all claims to notability must be verifiable from reliable sources. Please see your target at WP:CORP#Primary_criterion. --Flex (talk/contribs) 13:45, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

• Keep, published material kept in real libraries[13]; it certainly doesnt hurt to keep a record of the publishers. John Vandenberg 13:51, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
  • It seems like you're employing Wikipedia:Arguments_to_avoid_in_deletion_discussions#It_doesn't_do_any_harm, which is generally not an acceptable argument. I'm proposing deletion on grounds of the notability guidelines in WP:CORP. What say you about that specific complaint? --Flex (talk/contribs) 13:45, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
    • In my opinion, CORP is insufficient for companies whose legacy will continue after the company dies. CORP is intended to keep companies of little lasting value out of the encyclopedia, whereas keeping stubs for even minor publishers is feasible on Wikipedia. At the risk of putting my own contributions on the line, consider W. Metcalfe and Son; this publisher would not have been considered notable at the time, but it published a few unique works. Piecing together the history of minor publishers is not easy. John Vandenberg 14:16, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
      • I'm not persuaded that either of these entries belong, so I nominated that one for deletion also. If I'm wrong, I'll trust the community to set me straight, but in all fairness to this entry, that one fails on the same criteria -- lack of secondary sources asserting that it is notable. (BTW, if you think WP:CORP is wrong, you should lobby for changes to it.) If it's any comfort to you, I feel like a louse for nominating that one after you mentioned it here, but I also can't help but feel that nomination is appropriate. --Flex (talk/contribs) 18:43, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

"Pamphlets would be a more appropriate term than books"

That is highly unfair. These are properly bound books of a high print quality often of a larger than usual paperback size (eg 6 by 9 inch, some bigger). Therefore the same word count can be got into a 108 page than other publishers stretch out into 250 pages. Furthermore, how can you possibly call a book such as [[14]] a pamphlet??? I am sure Edwards and Bunyan and many other Christians would argue with you about their works 'substantiality' which WERE usually originally published as single works. And also this is not about being based solely on whether we are on amazon or respective sales ranks on amazon, the amazon mention is proof that we are out there and that our books are widely available but it is only one factor along with many others.Rosalindfranklin 14:00, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm quite aware how these were published. Before and during the rise of magazines & newspapers in the 18th century, material that would now be of article length was inevitably published separately, in what would be considered today as pamphlets--a commonly-used name at the time was tracts, and such formats for works of religious outreach continued through the 19th century. They were many of them republished as larger collected volumes, & many religious figures also wrote substantial single books; I recognize some members of of each class in the Diggory line. Almost all of these have also been reprinted in other formats--the most accessible is the free online formats, and the most reliable the collected library editions. It is a worthy business enterprise to provide them in convenient printed editions as well. But the notability of the authors and the works does not necessarily transfer to reprinters. There are a few notable reprinters; Pocket Books for example has an article--they republished many thousands of titles during a span of half a century; Diggory has published 150, and existed for only a few years.

Neither is Diggory entirely a specialist publisher: from the article, it has a subsidiary that engages in what the article calls "self-publishing", its line of 800 books would more objectively be called vanity press productions. Vanity presses are not generally notable. That it has published a book for a MP makes neither the book nor Diggory/ Exposure Press notable.

Some publishers are famous, as publishing houses and as individuals, but it generally takes more than 150 published reprints to get there. The usual WP criterion of secondary sources applies: the major publishers have not only scholarly articles but whole books written about them individually: some of the older university presses have multi-volume treatises devoted to their activities over the span of centuries. Some individual editors also have been the subjects of full biographies. Such firms and people are appropriate for WP articles. Even many less important historically known ones have significant mentions in comprehensive works. The study of publishing includes books both academic and of more general interest, and a number of specialist journals--I'm even on the editorial board of one. Diggory can't be expected to be treated in this way yet, and of course it isn't. Optimistically, perhaps you will, and then there will be an appropriate article. You won't have to write it yourself--I'll do it gladly.DGG 04:14, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The reprints are often substantial reprints of well over 250 pages at 6 by 9 inch size. That is far from a pocket book or a pamphlet or tract. Some of our books have NEVER been reprinted since their first publication and were extremely rare and NOT online anywhere. We do more than publish 'reprint's too, publishing original and novel works. There have been two full length articles this year in Writers News about us (Feb and March). There is also a full length article here: [[15]]. We are far more notable than many other publishers and individuals you have listed here but frankly, do what you want, I have had enough and am out of this discussion.Rosalindfranklin 19:57, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Regarding your books: I will reiterate, a publisher of notable books is not necessarily notable itself. Can you supply links (or email scans) of the Writers News articles? I'll investigate the Write Words article (UPDATE: I read it, and it is not independent coverage. It is you giving an interview about your book publishing, and you do all the talking. Again, there's nothing in your efforts that's not commendable; it's just that this can't yet be substantiated as notable from reliable sources and is therefore not encyclopedic.) As for other junk, that's not a good argument in your favor (see WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS). --Flex (talk/contribs) 20:30, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

• Delete. Wikipedia is not the same thing as an open directory. There is no reason for someone to create an article about themselves, or their company. If their company is notable enough, it will one day get an article written by a third party. The fact that the creator of this article not only is so involved in trying to keep this article, but also that she has a vested interest in this article, is a big conflict of interest. There are no sources cited. This article was listed for deletion 3 days ago, yet there has not been a single source added to the article, even though many editors raised this concern days ago. We must have multiple non-trivial third party sourced discussing this press, or we need a full length feature from a reliable source, per out notability guidelines. This request has not been met yet. The article also reads a bit like a promotion (i.e. It also has a self-publishing arm to make book publishing and ebook publishing an option for authors from all over the world.). -Andrew c 14:56, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

• Delete. Not enough independent sources. --Akhilleus (talk) 05:21, 14 June 2007 (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 a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.