Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/EcoDuro

This page is an archive of the proposed deletion of the article below. Further 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 NO CONSENSUS. Essjay · Talk 22:28, July 22, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] EcoDuro

Blatant advert - creator is the company chairman --Doc (?) 23:17, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

• Delete nn self-promotion. --Etacar11 01:15, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
• Delete per above. Dcarrano 01:53, July 13, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete self-promotion. Niteowlneils 04:42, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• Keep valid listing of a company in the Company section. Ronreed 04:54, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• Comment Yes, I am the Chairman, but I am a legitimate creater of articles for the benefit of Wikipedia (see my other articles...Cindy Cohn, Preferred Stock, American Alpine Club) and I plan to continue to add to this and articles about other companies with sustainable products and solutions. This Company has patents that appear to change improve sustainability (as do our one or two competitors, which will also be added by me this weekend with issues around sustainable logistics). Why does it matter if the author is related as long as the author discloses themselves (which I have done, by using my actual name as the user). I ask this sincerely, since I intend to spend my time on Wikipedia focusing on the business sections. Ronreed 04:54, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• Comment Reviewing the deletion policy, there is no reason stated for "self promotion". There is a reason for vanity, which I tried to avoid by trying to express the facts in a neutral way and to describe the importance of the business to a broader market, as described in the VANITY PAGE discussion. Also, this is not an advertisement, since I specifically tried not to discuss specific products of the Company. If you believe this could be writtin in a more neutral fashion, then perhaps we should edit it accordingly. Lastly, this Company will have additional importance as I focus on Michigan Business, since I intend to develop more information around venture backed companies in Michigan. I started with the one I know well, but intend to develop profiles around others in Michigan (Arbor Text, Supply Tech, Handy Lab, Nephros Therapeutics, Nano Bio, among others). I have proposed to others in Michigan that we use Wikepedia as a place to build our history of venture backed businesses. Please leave comments about my comments, since I am a new user and am eager to learn and want to be a productive contrutor. Ronreed 05:14, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• Keep Appears to be a legitimate company. ElleBigelow 05:38, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• Comment I am also, curious why it matters whether he is affiliated with Company or not. I assume it will be more accurate if he writes about it. Also, I looked in the Company listings and it seems that the more entries in there, the better. I looked, he is correct, there is no "self promotion" category (other than in the Vanity guidelines which caition, but don't explicitly restrict) in the deletion policy. ElleBigelow 05:38, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• Comment I have made some changes that make it less like an advertisement (taking out some of the promotional things about the product and making it more generic).
  • Unfortunately, I think no matter how you phrase it, it's not going to matter much because the company simply is not notable. This is really what the "advertisement" shorthand is about, though admittedly it is shorthand: A Microsoft article by Bill Gates would no doubt be accepted, and if Bill hyped up his company, that could be edited out rather than deleting the article. However, if someone writes an article hyping up a small, unknown company, the assumption that this person is taking advantage of a free opportunity to advertise has usually turned out to be correct. Sometimes, even if evidence of notability is not presented in the article or easily Googled up, it can still be shown... people will cheerfully change their votes in that case, once they're shown it. The rule simply is that the company has to become notable before we write about it. It's an encyclopedia, not a business directory. If you plan to write further articles, please keep this in mind; your insights on business matters in general or on major Michigan businesses will be really valuable; your insights on specific startup companies, probably not so much. It is nothing at all against you or your company, it's just a question of what the project is about. Dcarrano 06:53, July 15, 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment Thank you for your thoughtful comment. I really appreciate the feedback. It sounds like a contributor needs to produce some evidence any company's notablity. Perhaps we could start a conversation about the "notability test or guidelines". Certainly, Microsoft is inutitive at this point, but where did it cross the line from being a little software company started by a few friends to being "notable". I guess the real question is for whom will the Company be notable? I understand the objective of Wikipedia is to focus on an informational resource and not a "pure play" advertising resource, but I suspect we are still in early days here and the Wikicommunity is still relatively small compared to the potential audience that will someday use the resource. Although I've heard about it, I listen to NPR and watch for these kinds of projects. I have a sense, that as Wikipedia matures, Wikipedia will become part of any suject matter expert's tool kit. An expert in any field will someday mention, as part of their creidibility, that they are a wikipedia contributor on a topic. I can envision being at a conference in the next could years and seeing someone introduced as "Ms. So &So is blah, blah blah and noted wikipepdia contributor. The point is that the nature of participation in Wikipedia by experts will become self-promotional. While I think the wikicommunity has to watch this closely, I believe the benefits to the experts will also improve the value of this resource. Further, I believe that some of the information that may seem insignificant to a small group of people today (like a paper pallet company with patents issued in the major industrial countries of the world) may be some of the seeds that draw in an entirely new part of the Community. Therefore, I would be cautious about the "notability test". One person's unnkown company is very possibly the leading emerging player for a new industry that is not yet represented on Wikipedia, but should they be drawn into the Wiki by, say a reference to the site by some of these companies (EcoDuro plans to point to WikiPedia for packaging industry info and to help education people information on the established/emerging standards and technologies).

I'll try here, to make the case for EcoDuro meeting the notability test. At this point, the Company has been asked to present at three major venture capital conferences in the last fourteen months. The Company has been issued patents (another topic, but should Companies list their patents). Its products have been tested by the two leading packaging in the US (one of which is the leading in the world, Michigan State University). Articles are being written about it by notable sustainability investment writers example The World is Changing author Jamais Cascio. One of the leading investors, was formerly the Chairman of MeadWestvaco who is also helping to drive technology transfer for sustainable packaging and products in other Companies (Pollywood). The Company is in a rapidly changing. "After delays, misfires and more government bureaucracy than most care to remember, 2004 appears to be the year that many major world markets will get serious about implementation and enforcement of the global IPPC standard for solid wood packaging", by Pallet Profile Dec 2003. I imagine this all looks pretty boring to most people, except for a few fun facts.

• Pallets are about an annual $19 Billion industry.
• “[Big City Forest] says the national recycling rate for wooden pallets, crates, and packaging is about 10%, with the majority ground into low-value applications like fiber or chips and more than half of the ground wood burned for fuel. BCF estimates that harvesting just the discarded wooden packaging in big U.S. cities would conserve about 300,000 acres of virgin timberland a year. The 88 million pallets discarded annually in the 49 largest urban areas contain about 1.5 billion board feet of usable lumber, or roughly three times the amount of virgin timber used to produce all the hardwood flooring sold in the U.S. every year. -- source: [http://web.indstate.edu/recycle/9619.html
• Since the 1980s, the primary increase in the use of lumber is for Pallets. According to the US Forest Service, No major technological changes or innovations were expected to slow this growth. Source: USDA Forest Service Forest Products Laboratory.

For these reasons, the EcoDuro company is starting to get more notable and most importantly, Companies like Ocean Spray, GE Medical, Pfizer have begun using products that don't spread insects and are recycleable/repulpable. Thanks again for comments. Again, the question is whether a "Notability Test" is a proper test for the Wikipedia and if so, what are the guidelines for notability? Best Regards to all. Ronreed 14:10, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

• Keep. Well written article, honestly. No? Redwolf24 21:02, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. As long as there's no advertising in it, why begrudge the man his article?Robludwig 21:46, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
• CommentSince it has been seven (7) days and the votes to keep outweigh votes to delete (4/3 excluding the vote from the author -me, there is still a vote 3/3), I am going to remove the VFD notice on the page. I assume this is the process according the VFD guidelines. Thanks for everyone's thoughtful consideration (including the votes to delete). --Ronreed 02:40, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
  • No, that's not the process. Admins close the vfd. --Etacar11 02:44, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. The article is well-writte, even the author's argument on whether the company is notable or not. As he has pointed out, we don't know if this company "will be the leading emerging player", at this point it isn't and it is not notable. However, I encourage the author to keep writing, I see the quality of his writing, but it is not written in a NPOV, "unique engineered", etc. --Vizcarra 02:56, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
  • I used the word unique due to the patents that are in place. I assumed propose that patents make the pallet "unique" as opposed to other pallets that are "standard" according the GMA (Grocery Manufacturers Association). Standard wood GMA pallets make up most of the 1 billion pallets used in the US. Thanks for your comment by the way, but I still don't know about the "notability standard", but I think it is my challange to pursue this discussion elsewhere on the general VFD pages. We've started the process of creating a Business, Economics & Finance Portal and I believe this issue of notability will emerge again, since I intend to encourage people to put up information about business. I guess the general question for the Wikipedia is "where are the edges of the information that is desired for Wikipedia"?

• Comment Sorry for taking changing the VFD. Thanks for correcting it. I'm learning, however slowly. --Ronreed 00:24, 22 July 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.