Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/James Donahue

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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 of the debate was Delete, discounting socks. Deathphoenix ʕ 15:56, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] James Donahue

James Donahue's main claim to fame appears to be as the father of Aaron Donahue, whose article was recently deleted despite the - ahem - enthusiastic support of one User:Cro..Scream, who is the author of this article. Two other claims to notability are incliuded: as webmaster of a website (which, assuming it's the link in the article, as seems likely with no other link provided) is hosted on Tripod; and publishing some books. Which he has: "over five" books, of which four are listed, all of which are local history books about the Great Lakes. They sound quite colourful, but they don't seem to have set Amazon's sales rank on fire yet. At least two of the publishers appear to be defunct, one of them replaced by at least two other companies of the same name, so I can't see if they are self-published. There's n o reason to believe they are, but neither is there any reason to believe that they have more than a minor local market. Just zis Guy you know? 20:56, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

  • Delete, not notable. --Tone 21:08, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep; my standards for published authors are pretty low, and he's over the bar. -Hit bull, win steak 21:15, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
  • The fact that he supposedly had a long career as a journalist that isn't discussed at all suggests that this is just here to prop up the deleted Aaron Donahue article, and not a real bio of an independently notable person. That said, he does have those books, albeit published by a small publisher specializing in Michigania... it adds up to the weakest of weak keeps. But what the hell is a newsangor? · rodii · 23:57, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
  • PS: Guy, they're not self-published--Northmont Publishing, at least, is or was real, publishing works by John D. Voelker, among others. · rodii · 00:00, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • According to this page, one of his books is probably self-published, in that he established the publisher that published it. Of course, the page also lists another book he co-wrote that's not in the article (published by the Historical Society of Michigan), so the net effect on his claim is pretty minimal. The page also claims that his newspaper work was for the Port Huron Times-Herald, a Gannett paper with a daily circulation of 27,000+. This would qualify him under the guidelines for published authors, if it can be verified that he did in fact write for them. He doesn't have any articles in their online archive, but it only goes back to 1999, so that's not necessarily illustrative. -Hit bull, win steak 14:08, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Comment: User's account was less than an hour old at the time of this recommendation. Stifle (talk) 11:50, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Pardon me? · rodii · 11:57, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
    • I think he's talking about me, not you. As for the implication, I was here because I noticed a newly created page (Brenda Frese) on AFD, and after voicing my opinion there, I gave a quick look to some others that were nearby. I'm not a sock/meat of Cro..Scream or anything like that; I've never heard of the gentleman until this AFD. -Hit bull, win steak 13:45, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • WHAT??? Don't you know that only Cro..Scream and his socks are allowed to vote keep in the Donahue walled garden? Heavens above , man, get with the programme![1] Just zis Guy you know? 19:42, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete Not notable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.170.224.208 (talk • contribs)
  • Delete per WP:BIO. Stifle (talk) 11:48, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep He has written 5 books, has been a respected journalist, and has wel visited news website. do we need to unearth the many newspapers he worked for? Cro..Scream
    • I need some time to contact James and ask him if there are any websites or online newspaper articles that support his claims of being a journalist.
  • Delete per WP:BIO.  RasputinAXP  c 14:42, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep Fascinating cutting edge news! Flowingjawa 14:58, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Comment Another brand new account. Edit history (contribs) shows one typo correction and two contributions to the Donahue deletion saga. Fan1967 15:28, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Flowingjawa is indef-blocked as a sockpuppet. Just zis Guy you know? 21:50, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete, not noteworthy. Dr Zak 15:29, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Just as a further clarification, the LOC catalog lists two of his books (Schooners in Peril and Steamboats in Ice) as published by Anchor Publications, which would leave him with two-and-a-half published by an outside body. WorldCat lists 86 library copies of "Terrifying Steamboat Stories" [1], a pretty good count, but only one for "Fiery Trial". On the balance, I still lean toward keep. -Hit bull, win steak 15:31, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment I do apologize that i caused a lot of the Ed Dames suporters to come here and try to delete this article because James Donahue is the father of Aaron. His books are sold on Barnes and Noble, ShopIreland and AbeBooks and i keep seeing some German and Japanese sites pop up, but those are import websites. Cro..Scream
  • I've never heard of Ed Dames or the Donahues before this controversy, and I'm tired of your accusations of bias, prejudice and censorship. For me the only issue was notability. I would guess most of the "delete" voters above, who are names I recognize, feel the same. Although your sacred cow is being gored here, for most of us this is just one in a long, long string of discussions about notability. There's nothing personal or ideological in it, or there wasn't before you and your sockpuppet pals started disrupting things. Either respect the process and assume good faith, and stop whining or go away. · rodii · 16:52, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • That's nice. · rodii · 17:04, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
It is trivially easy to get a book on those sites. Vanity presses specialise in it, in fact. Being listed on Amazon signifies nothing, I'm afraid. Just zis Guy you know? 17:10, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete, nn author, his books rank well over 1,000,000 on amazon, which makes it unlikely he's sold 5000 copies, thus failing WP:BIO. User:Zoe|(talk) 18:37, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I don't know that your assumption is a fair one. His 2.5 non-vanity books were all published before Amazon was even founded in 1995, so it's not surprising that they'd score poorly on the current sales ranks. -Hit bull, win steak(Moo!) 21:21, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I love you all, goes around wiki giving everyone a hug. Cro..Scream
  • Delete as non-notable. --Ed (Edgar181) 19:30, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete Below the bar. Runcorn 21:21, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Comment may contain traces of irony.


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.