Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John Lilburne Research Institute

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 DELETE. Essjay · Talk 11:22, August 6, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] John Lilburne Research Institute

This is the second VfD for this article. As shown below, the first time there was twice as many votes to delete, but it was kept. This article is a vanity/soapbox/original research by User:MPLX. The only Google references to this organization are from Wikipedia or Wikipedia mirrors. The same user who did this article also created a series of questionable articles and inserted original research on several more. The other articles by this person that are currently on VfD are:

• Four Freedoms Federation - (talk) - (VfD)
• Province of the Carolanas - (talk) - (VfD)
• Eric Gilder (professor) - (VfD)

Detailed info can be found on the various talk and VfD pages. --JW1805 00:50, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

I (MPLX) left Wikipedia some months ago after running into the onslaught of the ill-informed Christian right wing. Although I am not monitoring Wikipedia and do not have any intention of rejoining Wikipedia due to the small cabal of noisy and ill-informed (as opposed to uninformed) people who love deleting stuff, I have been pressed to add this comment due to the sudden interest in deleting a few of the articles that I contributed to. (I have written about many topics.)

It would appear that someone has it their head to sever any ties between John Lilburne and the foundation of American law. This led to a constant barrage of negative comments on the Hugo Black article. Now I see that the idea is to claim that "Carolana" is a misspelling of "Carolina" and to go further and claim that the article about Carolana is a hoax. To this end both Dr. Kenneth Brown of the University of Houston and Dr. Eric Gilder of the University of Sibiu have also been smeared as being not noteworthy and at worst as the creators of vanity and even hoax articles. Such rants by the few lunatics who have gained a noisy control over Wikipedia are one reason why I left Wikipedia and why Wikipedia is in danger of becoming the refuge of right-wing idiots.

It would seem that a handful of people are trolling with the intent to delete anything that they may disagree with. I noticed the same approach was used on the subject of copyright law within articles dealing with the subject of recorded music and broadcasting which I also contributed to. Now I see that all broadcasts by 4FWS have been tagged as not worthy because they were on "pirate" radio stations - even though several were on licensed stations. However, everything is being smeared and tarnished to make it appear that everything and anything that I contributed to was either a hoax, a work of vanity or unnoteworthy. I also created the history of the development of the jet fighter, but I have not as yet (and probably won't bother) checked to see if those entries are also being targeted.

It is unfortunate to say the least because I thought that Wikipedia had merit, but when I discovered that a mere handful of dedicated zealots could take it over and put their own stamp of ideological approval on it - I left.

Before making more claims that Carolana never existed I would suggest that you perform a little serious research. Unfortunately the zealots have decided that they are a jack of all subjects (and master of none), and because they have never heard something before it means that the subject is either a hoax or a vanity creation by someone else. How pathetic for Wikipedia!

66.90.213.45 00:23, 3 August 2005 (UTC) (the former MPLX)

• Strong delete. Whatever this institute might be, it's clearly not the subject of this incoherent article. Monicasdude 04:03, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
• The original VfD had this article redirected, but the original author brought it back to life. Therefore delete outright or return it to Redirect. --Calton | Talk 06:10, July 30, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete hoax. - ulayiti (talk) 08:08, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, hoax. Do not redirect. Radiant_>|< 09:00, July 30, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete: nonnotable, promotion, incoherent. Wile E. Heresiarch 16:20, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
• Delete vanity junk CDC (talk) 19:57, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, nonsense. Nandesuka 22:14, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
• What is this? An institute whose purpose is to prove that somebody name John Lilburne was an ancestor of Thomas Jefferson? Libertarian-geneological original research, unsupported, it seems. In that case, Delete unless author rewrites completely before this is closed. DavidH
• Delete nn/possible hoax. --Etacar11 00:59, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. nn. DS1953 16:10, August 1, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, non-notable, vanity. Lovingly crafted, but still a vanity article. Tempshill 18:20, 2 August 2005 (UTC)
• Keep and probably merge with Four Freedoms Federation (assuming it survives), per Gene poole's vote in the original discussion (archived below). Definitely needs a lot of NPOV, though. Lusanaherandraton 14:33, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

• Note to admins: if this page is deleted, you should also delete Genie Baskir. This is the only page that this links to (except a couple talk page references by original creator).

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.

This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record.
The result of the debate was keep (no consensus; however, article has already been merged and redirected). Mindspillage (spill yours?) 04:42, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] John Lilburne Research Institute

I am nominating this vanity page for deletion because I strongly suspect that it violates several Wikipedia policies, especially:

• no original research
• Wikipedia is not a soapbox

A Google search for this so-called institute brings up only 501 hits.

The user who created this page has been attempting to link several pages (like Miranda v. Arizona) to this page when such links, if any, should link to John Lilburne. Furthermore, as I have already argued at great length on the John Lilburne talk page, Lilburne's impact on modern law may well be of historical importance, but in terms of how modern American criminal law is practiced at present, his impact is minimal when compared to giants like Blackstone, Story, and Ely.

--Coolcaesar 18:41, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Keep — and clean up/merge some elements of the article. You are joking when you say it "only" brings up 501 google hits, aren't you?? The JPS 19:00, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

No, I'm not kidding. Typing in John Lilburne Research Institute into Google brings back only 501 hits, and putting quotes around that (in order to search on the phrase) returns only 9 hits (which all appear to be Wikipedia content, either direct from WP or mirrored). Why the heck should Wikipedia have a page on an institute that obscure? --Coolcaesar 19:24, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ah, I see what you mean now! Still, I think some reworking could result in this being a good useful article. The JPS 20:16, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Delete, vanity. This article was written with love and care by an insider who tried to make this non-notable group sound as though it had an actual impact in the world. I would also vote for deletion of Four Freedoms Federation and all the other links these articles contain to non-notable groups and people. This set of inter-linked articles has the veneer of gravity to it, but it's all just a well-crafted set of vanity articles. Tempshill 23:03, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• Keep unless you can show me why an organization that essentially went into decline around 1992 should have a lot of hits on Google in 2005? By this reasoning only current organizations can be mentioned. Second, this organization obviously did attract attention back in the period from 1984 to 1992, as referenced by publications and broadcasts. For some reason Coolcaesar who describes himself/herself as a "law student" has decided that it is of no consequence that Chief Justice Warren linked Lilburne to Miranda in his opinion of the 1960s, because according to some strange logic here, only cases of the present age are of merit according to this "know-it-all" law student who does not cite books but only various Internet research tools. But not everything is already on the Internet. That's one reason for having Wikipedia! Consequently Leonard W. Levy who won a Pulitzer in 1969 for his work (Origins of the Fifth Amendment) that has Lilburne at its core, is of no avail according to Coolcaesar, who actually went pretty much to the limit by virtually calling Justice Black a senile old git who could not remember the day of the week for adopting Lilburne as his hero. Coolcaesar dismissed Black's biography as being "what did she know, he was too old". I have not used the Heritage Foundation and many other sources for reference because the article is quite long already. However Coolcaesar is making a POV rant by his call for deletion to get rid of something that was news to him/her that did not fit in with something that he/she already knew because on this score Coolcaesar has gone to great lengths to explain his/her superior knowledge about all matters relating to law ... without having a clue as to who he/she is attacking. Anyway, its only a historical article, so whatever. However, if this article falls for this silly reason, then just imagine how many other articles totally unrelated to this subject would be immediately struck from Wikipedia using the same criteria used by Coolcaesar. The sad fact about many Internet junkies is that they declared war on traditional libraries and it is within the books of those libraries that the jewels of education are to be found. When the Internet swept in many libraries began dumping and sometimes selling huge quantities of books and anything else that was printed in order to make space for computer screens. Fortunately many collections were rescued, but not all. But what has been created is a world where books are dispised and the computer screen is thought to hold the keys to all truth. In 2005 it does not. MPLX/MH 02:02, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • None of the above rant answers the criticism that this odd set of articles is, collectively, a vanity piece that doesn't belong on Wikipedia. By the way, John Lilburne is not the subject of the discussion, but John Lilburne Research Institute. Tempshill 22:13, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. What an odd article. RickK 06:58, Apr 16, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, vanity/promo. Odd is right. Wile E. Heresiarch 23:00, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Promo article. I asked some lawyers, and and only one had heard of John Lilburne, and called him a "footnote in English history" and not really part of legal history. Another said that to call him a "footnote" in legal history was overstating things. --Calton | Talk 04:04, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. It may well have been a crackpot group promoting fringe theories, that's all the more reason to ensure Wikipedia records its existence. The article does need some serious NPOV surgery though.--Gene_poole 00:26, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
• Delete as vanity. Radiant_* 13:24, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.