Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2006 December 3

Ignatz Lichtenstein (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)— (AfD)

Ignatz Lichtenstien was a notable author and former Rabbi who famously converted to Christianity around the turn of last century. His existance is scandalous to Judaism, but people should not be deleted from history just because some editors do not like their point of view. The editor who proposed the deletion called for just that (a y'sh as they say in Yiddish), and the administrator who closed this as a delete would be expected to share the same bias. Although when originally proposed for deletion, the existance of Ignatz Lichtenstein was only confirmable from unreliable sources related to Messianic Judiasm, who consider the man a heroic forbear, the author's existance and biographic details were subsequently confirmed by dead-tree sources dating back to 1894, including a famous Jewish author, Gotthard Deutsch, in 1917, and by reputable library catalog sources, such as those at Harvard. The closing admin seems to have just ignored all that. -- Kendrick7^talk 22:59, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
I am neither biased nor did I vote count. I encountered the AfD by accident after previewing the edits of Daniel575 whom I indefinitely blocked a few days prior. I found the subject too much of a borderline case, and I stand by my closing statement. El_C 03:53, 4 December 2006 (UTC) Having finally located the type of source I asked for, you can now explain why I "would be expected to share ... bias" on this topic, Kendrick7. El_C 23:15, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

It is fortunate I happened to google just his last name and home town (with all the right diacritics) and discovered this source; I joked in the AfD that editors were acting like Lichtenstein had three heads, as it turns out he's had three names (Isaac, Ignatz, and now Ignác). A brief look at your recent contribution history gave me an undoubtly incorrect impression; I read your check-in comment here and stopped at the word "Israel" and the joke went over my head. Sorry for resorting to polemics against your sense of judgement; at the time I was a little verklempt. -- Kendrick7^talk 00:02, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and undelete. Meets basic standards, and look at some of the delete recommendations. Two note verification issues in direct disregard of the evidence cited, another runs with the somewhat bizarre "continuous POV lies." I don't see a consensus to delete here. --badlydrawnjeff talk 23:05, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

• Naturally, the inflamatory comment from the guy whom I indefinitely blocked a few days before was dicounted, as were several others. El_C 04:21, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and undelete. The fact that this AfD turned was hijacked is unlikely to be a one-off, so relisting is not a reasonable solution. As above, there certainly were references. If there are questions about the veracity of the claims in those references then that's a content issue and not a reason to delete the article. Clearly closed by vote counting, but AfD is not a vote. Angus McLellan (Talk) 01:28, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• How was it hijacked? I did not notice this having taken place, but am interested to learn more. I actually thought there were more keep than delete votes, but I guess I was slightly off. The raw numbers played a negligable role in my decision process, as they always do. El_C 04:21, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• I read AfD nearly every day, so I have a fairly good idea who hangs around the place. Only a handful of those who weighed in are AfD regulars. Equally, if I select a few names I don't recognise and try to figure out their interest in the question, it seems pretty obvious that this is largely editors of two religious persuasions having a content dispute. Dispute resolution is somewhere else. As for the close, if you didn't close it on a head count, please do expand, because I am clearly missing something fundamental here. As I read it, the keep people demonstrated that there were sources, reliable if not necessarily true, and the delete people didn't have any argument beyond the partiality of the sources. As Kendrick said right at the start: "An early pioneer of Messianic Judiasm is only mentioned by subsequent followers? This is shocking how exactly?" "External verification" is just a sort of shrubbery. Seemed like a content dispute to me, and AfD doesn't fix those, except in a few BLP cases. Angus McLellan (Talk) 10:36, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• I'm not sure why you expect AfD to be dominated by such a committee of "AfD regulars." I, for one, would expect to (also) see interested parties, not least those who edited the entry in question. Yes, I expect something in the pertinent historiography. El_C 12:25, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• When there are no sources independent of a movement about someone in the movement its very hard to write an article with any confidence whatsoever and this goes seriously to issues of WP:V. In contrast for example if you looked at the possibly fictional Avraham ben Avraham it has sources not from their movements themselves. Without such things we have no way of knowing what facts are accurate what are propaganda, what context is being removed what is being exxagerated or anything like that. And given that the sources we have can't even agree on what his first name is it is very hard to call them reliable. JoshuaZ 16:53, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and relist. A few people seem to have missed that merely verifying that the guy exists is not what WP:V is all about. In all fairness, there are valid comments on both sides. That some zealot decided to brand it as "continuous POV lies" does not mean that all the delete comments endorsed this position. Similarly, that some of the keep comments regard the deletion attempt as "anti-Semitic" does not devalue the others. Chris cheese whine 01:50, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• That is a good point. The problem was that mentions from independent sources were too isolated. El_C 04:21, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Fair enough, but it needs to be discussed properly (preferably without hijacking) hence the relist. If it goes down twice, there can be little argument. Chris cheese whine 07:45, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Please explain to me how you find it has been hijacked and how you consider such hijacking to have affected my decision. El_C 12:25, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• This is in no way related to your decision. In such a case, I would ask for a relisting no matter who closed it. Chris cheese whine 13:03, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Except this is effectively a 2nd AfD, so no point in relisting. The comments here may as well be titled keep / delete. El_C 13:55, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and undelete. Agree that AfD turnout looks "hijacked" and that the "Delete" comments are generally non-substantive (and where they are substantive they only address concerns that can be fixed with editing, and thus do not merit deletion of the entire article.) — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 02:51, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Again, please expand about the hijacking. I thought my closing statement was relatively substantive (as a closing statement). The problem is that all the issues combined, which may be addressed, may not end up being addressed (that is what the AfD period is for, to address these). Otherwise, it can just be recreated when everything has been neatly compiled. El_C 04:21, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• AfD nominator Endorses Closure. Verification could not be obtained from independent sources. There are lots of messianic partisan sources adduced in the article - but nothing independent and impartial. Besides, I kinda liked the closer's decision, I admit! :) - crz crztalk 07:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse Crzrussian is correct. The only item in a reliable source was not much more than existence. The other supposedly reliable sources about him a) don't even get his name correct but have it as Isaac and b) are all exclusively messianic. El_C made a correct call here. I'm also annoyed that this is being portrayed as a messianic editors vs. traditionally jewish editors. I'm easily in the second camp and searched for additional sources because he seemed interesting. I wasn't able to find anything satisfactory. I'd like to see an article on him since if the material in the sources we have is accurate his life would be a fascinating story. But without reliable sources on the topic we don't have much choice. JoshuaZ 07:19, 4 December 2006 (UTC) Changing viewpoint to Overturn, relist since we now have substantial new information. JoshuaZ 20:04, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Comment Please list, on this page, a few key sources -- what you think are the best sources -- that verify not just existence but the key facts of the article. Thanks, --Shirahadasha 07:47, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
  • OK, here. (The first source is probably the most complete; there was a link to this at Talk:Ignatz Lichtenstein).

Smith, Eugene R. (1894). The Gospel in All Lands. New York: Hunt & Nation, 507-508. 

Deutsch, Gotthard (2005). Scrolls: Essays on Jewish History and Literature and Kindred Subjects V1 and V2. Kessinger Publishing, 118-119. ISBN 1417952172.  (reprint)

Gillet, Lev (2002). Communion in the Messiah: Studies in the Relationship Between Judaism and Christianity. James Clarke & Co., 206. ISBN 0227172256. 

Additionally, the following books by him are available at Harvard, as another editor first pointed out, though I haven't walked over there to look at them. Two are translations into English, the others are on microfiche and in Hungarian. (Note: JoshuaZ is correct that Harvard's catolog incorrectly lists him as Isaac Lichtenstein (possibly the translator's mistake) and J. Lichtenstein (classic European I/J mix up), as he appears to have written only under his first initial.) You may confirm this with a little hunting here:

Lichtenstein, Isaac (1908). The points of contact between Evangelical and Jewish doctrine : an address, delivered at Leipsic / by I. Lichtenstein ; translated from the German by Mrs. Baron.. Northfield, England: The Hebrew Christian Testimony to Israel. 

Lichtenstein, Isaac (between 1894 and 1908). An appeal to the Jewish people / by I. Lichtenstein ; translated by Mrs. Baron.. London: The Hebrew Christian Testimony to Israel. 

Lichtenstein, J. (1902). Zwei Briefe oder was ich eigentlich will. 

Lichtenstein, J. (1907). Két levél / közli. Budapest: Feinsilber Róbert. 

Lichtenstein, J. (1902). Begegnungspunkte zwischen Juden und Christen : Gesetz und Evangelium.. 

Lichtenstein, J. (1886). Der Talmud auf der Anklagebank durch einen begeisterten Verehrer des Judenthums. Heft I.. 

And newly discovered, he is also mentioned in a PDF from the Hungarian Electronic Library here on page 11, as Lichtenstein Ignác under the heading for Tapioszele (his home village) alongside a mention of his book Judentum und Christenthum -- Kendrick7^talk 08:47, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

And the biographical details that will be necessary to write a biographical article ...? Chris cheese whine 08:51, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Not every published author is notable. As it stands, I would not be able to get that entry published in a biographical dictionary. El_C 12:25, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

All three of the secondary sources contain essentially the same basic biographical details; the lead of the article before it was deleted was perfectly well sourced. Certain people in oppostion to the article seems to hope by saying over and over that these sources only mention him that this would make it true, but it is simply not the case. If you follow the google books link here, you'll find the 1894 article on him, for example. -- Kendrick7^talk 09:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Your search - The Gospel in All Lands Ignatz Lichtenstein - did not match any documents. El_C 12:25, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Try this one - it appears the OCR misread Ignatz. (His full name is given at the start of his bio, on the previous page.) --NE2 12:38, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

DRV shouldn't be a rehash of the AfD but I will point out that we already discussed the questionabl reliability of the Gospel in All Lands piece which in fact says that it is taken its data from a magazine of whose reliability we know nothing. JoshuaZ 16:37, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse deletion; it's well within a closing admin's discression to ignore 'votes' that countermand basic Wikipedia policy. Proto::type 10:11, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Such as demanding "impartial", or "independent", rather than simply "reliable" sources ? Angus McLellan (Talk) 10:42, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Absolutely. This, of course, failed to happen here. --badlydrawnjeff talk 11:41, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• You need to reliably establish the subject's notability; affiliated sources fall short. Give me a mention in a journal article, anything. El_C 12:25, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• I see plenty of reliable sources cited in the AfD and DRV. I also don't see "affiliated sources" as a roadblock at either WP:BIO or WP:RS. --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:37, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• They fail to establish the notability of the subject due to their affiliation with it. El_C 13:52, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• And what are you basing this on? --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:53, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• A careful reading of the material. El_C 13:57, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• What material are you referring to that affirms your position in how we operate here? --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:17, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse Closure and deletion per above. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 14:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Comment The information on Lichtenstein in the Deutch book cited above comes from this brief passage on pp. 42-43 (listed as p. 119):

I happen to be in possession of a pamphlet, issued by some missionary society, containing the biography of one Ignatz Lichtenstein, who was rabbi in Tapio Szele, Hungary, and had written pamphlets advocating conversion to Christianity while still a rabbi. The statement was declared by somebody who had reason to hide himself behind the cover of anonymity, an invention. My pamphlet, a very insignificant production, rehashing the usual missionary cant, becomes important in addition to my quotations from various Jewish newspapers, representing all shades of views. In the course of my investigations I came across the fact that this Ignatz Lichtenstein was confounded with a Jehiel Lichtenstein, a former "Wunderrabi" of Bessarabia, who was in the service of the missionary institute of Leipzig, where he died in 1912.

This seems to be the only source listed not of missionary origin, and it seems ambiguous as to whether this individual existed. If the "quotations from various Jewish newspapers" pertain to this individual, perhaps it would not be impossible to produce some of them. This would appear to clear the issue. In addition, this source appears to suggest that the distinct "I" and "J" initials may represent something other than a library scanning error. Perhaps not all of the material attributed to the "I" individual was originally claimed to have been written by him. It also seems clear that Deutch is a secondary source who never met the individual. He indicates his information comes from pamphlets etc. Perhaps there might be someone who did? Best, --Shirahadasha 16:35, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

I think this (the html version of the pdf I found last night) may be as close as we'll get online; from a Hungarian work, perhaps a biographicsl dictionary (Zsidó Lexicon), published in Budapest in 1929 (dated in preface here). Of course, it is in Hungarian; for all I know it says the guy had a rabbit named Jezus, and Judentum and Christenthum was his favorite band. -- Kendrick7^talk 17:43, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn: The 1929 Zsido Lexikon (Jewish Encyclopedia) article [1] says the following about him:

"In the 1890s the village [of Tápiószele] became known nationwide because of a remarkable incident. Ignác Liechtenstein, the rabbi of the village, published a pamphlet called Judentum und Christentum [german: Jewry and Christianity] with the motto "those for whom the Jewish creed is too difficult, should seek their rapture in the arms of Jesus". The pamphlet's publication caused great consternation across the country and demands for the removal of the rabbi. He also had supporters, which laid the ground for a massive conflict. In the end the rabbi stepped down voluntarily following the public indignation. The rabbi's seat remained empty until 1923."

Ergo: He had his 15 minutes of fame when he was known nationwide; he also published articles and pamphlets. Thus he fulfils the notability criteria. An encyclopedia source should constitute sufficient verifiability as well. -- Marcika 19:50, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Excellent. Thanks very much. We can now reasonably have an article on him. JoshuaZ 20:04, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

It would have been better (expectation of bias-wise) to present that source much earlier on. El_C 23:15, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn I waver between overturning because new and better sources have been found or a more basic abuse of discretion by the closing admin. Wikipedia:Independent sources (an essay I regularly link to, especially here) is about having sources that are independent of the topic of the article, not about having sources that come from different points of view. As the Rabbi has been dead for decades, and nobody is asserting he founded any still extant organization, any website is independent of the Rabbi. To quote WP:INDY: "These sources should be independent of both the topic and of Wikipedia, and should be of the standard described in Wikipedia:Reliable sources." As such, none of the keep opinions should have been discounted, and those delete opinions that relied on citations to WP:INDY should have been discounted for contadicting the standards they purported to uphold. Having written that statement, the real reason for overturning is clear; I believe that this close represents abuse of discretion. GRBerry 18:17, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

• Your claim of clarity (not the first in this debate) has been noted; but so has your own bias. At the event, the issue was about notability. El_C 11:39, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

• That is the trouble with using an abuse of discretion standard, when you find it and say so, it irritates people. I still think that is the right standard to use in deletion review, not de novo review. Anyway, which of my relevant biases are your referring to, the three most relevant ones are described at User:GRBerry#AFD, User:GRBerry#Notability, and User:GRBerry#Process. The box about religion is not particularly relevant, as my being a DRV regular means I'd have gotten here even if I didn't watch the deletion sorting page for Judaism. The relevant standard was WP:BIO, which you completely failed to address in your close, instead substituting other criteria that are far more restrictive and do not represent the consensus of Wikipedia editors. A lack of mentions in Hebrew is totally irrelevant, ditto for searches limited to Israeli scholarship. GRBerry 10:22, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

if you have a complaint about an admin, take it to the appropriate notice-board, don't mouth-off about it here - random insults do irritate people. opting for an accusation of 'absue of discretion' over an obvious procedural point (the closure is now, arguably, overturnable because of a new independent source, as you are well aware) is a serious breech of agf, quite apart from being a gratiutous insult. the relevant bias is, obviously, your fundamentalism. also hebrew is just the langauge in which to look for polemic against an allegedly apostate rabbi.  ⇒ bsnowball  11:16, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that it is entirely clear that Hungarian Jewish communities were publishing in Hebrew in the 1890s; we certainly haven't found any sources by Lichtenstein written in Hebrew, and obviously the new source is from the Hungarian Jewish Encyclopedia, written in Hungarian, not Hebrew, and its publication date of 1929 is well after the Haskalah (which did much to revive Hebrew as a language). Had I been more cognizant of WP:INDY, I myself would have used this to more clearly explain that the sources we had already met its definition during the original AfD, and I am thankful for GRBerry providing the link. -- Kendrick7^talk 11:57, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Israeli scholarship is the most comprehensive one to cover Jews — it dosen't matter when, where, and which language. El_C 13:37, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I wish I could say the same for Vatican scholarship and Christians. It seems like they've been known to misplace a heretic now and again; though without full knowledge of the secret archives it's hard to say anything definitive on the matter. (I don't know how any scholar religious can protect both history and their particular faith without some sort of secret archive to squirrel such history away in; there's too much of a conflict of interest sometimes.) -- Kendrick7^talk 20:46, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm sure that's an issue, but Israeli scholarship is largely secular (though of course there are clerical tendencies) and possibly thousands of times more active than that of the distinctly clerical Vatican (i.e. by virtue of being a nation with 1,000 citizens versus one with 6,000,000). At any rate, I didn't say he isn't mentioned in the former, I said I could not find mention of him there (big difference). Which, nonetheless, is in and of itself quite revealing. El_C 13:00, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and undelete, this deletion was a mistake. Silensor 07:29, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
• Overturn without predjudice to closer. New sources presented during DRV tip this one. Eluchil404 08:14, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Isabella V (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)— (First AfD) (Second AfD)

Closed delete by User:DakotaKahn as delete. Nom claimed it wasn't notable, one person claimed it didn't meet WP:BIO and 6 people said the same. One other said something about Wikipedia's "dream of hate and lies." It was demonstrated by two users to have widepread media coverage, destroying any argument that the subject didn't meet any notability or verifiability standards. Upon questioning DakotaKahn about the closing, the response: "Nine to delete-four to keep." This suggests a vote count, which is simply not how it's supposed to be done. Overturn and undelete. --badlydrawnjeff talk 22:49, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

I should have indicated to badlydrawnjeff that I did google it and read the entire discussion. Your questions were answered as you asked them.--Dakota 23:29, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn or relist - there were some serious misapprehensions about our core policies among the "delete" opinions, such as this, this, and this. Bizarre. Confession: I !voted keep, along with Jeff, AnonEMouse, and MacGyverMagic. If verifiability (or attributability, if WP:ATT is ever a policy, in which case we'll need a new word) isn't what matters, a lot of editors are working to provide references which don't actually matter. Angus McLellan (Talk) 01:15, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• If this is true, then there's been material published about it. If it's a hoax, it appears to be a well-documented one. Relist. Chris cheese whine 02:19, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Overturn and undelete - Notability concerns clearly met, and AfD Is Not a Vote. The AfD was closed in a bogus manner, and the concerns raised do not appear to actually address substantive Policy issues. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 02:54, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Approve deletion. This is not the place to re-argue the subject's worthiness or unworthiness for a Wikipedia article, but the review is for whether or not the process has been properly observed. The AfD discussion ran the full five days and the closing admin made a call on the result. Essentially it boiled down to whether the subject is a notable person, a notable hoax, a notable meme, or none of the above, and at least one of the sources that were cited essentially said that the story was essentially nonsense (but not necessarily in the Wikipedia definition of the term). Closing admin made a tough call and decided that WP:BIO was not met, regardless of whether the subject is fact or fiction. B.Wind 22:56, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
  • According to th admin, he did not make a call on the result, but instead counted votes. If this is indeed about the process, our policies and guidelines were ignored and the result did not reflect greater community consensus, but rather a strict vote count of the second discussion of its kind. Reconsider. --badlydrawnjeff talk 23:11, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
    • • Dakota is a lady. Also I took the liberty to fix up your mispelling of her name. Apologies in advance if it is a bit bold, but other people do the same to me and I am fine with it. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 07:30, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
        • Not a problem, and a public apology to DK for screwing it up both ways. --badlydrawnjeff talk 11:38, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
    • I didn't read it that way at all - and it would be best for the admin to justify the closing completely here rather than a sentence fragment summary. If you're bringing this here as a result of it, then he/she must account for it; however, looking at the full document of the AfD, it seemed to be, again, that there were basically two arguments, and - "votes" or not (and AfDs are not votes, they are discussions), the admin makes the call as to whether there was a consensus or not. As I said earlier, it was a tough call, but the five days have run its course, and the call had to be made. If anything, the five days run counter to your argument of "the result did not reflect greater community consensus" as you, in fact, had a minority viewpoint. B.Wind 00:16, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
      • Am I? The community as a whole has largley said that notability comes from multiple reliable sources. The delete "voters" in the AfD ignored greater community consensus and didn't use any logical arguments to back up their claim. This means nothing? --badlydrawnjeff talk 00:26, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
        • Which part of WP:BIO applies - the part for living people/people who have lived, or the part for fictional people? Does WP:WEB apply as this might have been an Internet meme? That's the problem here - while we agree that "multiple reliable sources" are necessary to establish whether a subject is "worthy" of a Wikipedia article, most of the people who commented indicated that it in itself is not sufficient as 1) the person was never established to be real or a hoax, and 2) the references in themselves don't establish the notability (in fact, Esquire seems to indicate otherwise). Also, I would have been persuaded more if there were additional, more recent coverage if this person were real (see D.B. Cooper for an example) or a more recent review of the "hoax" from a reliable source - without it, I'd have a difficulty saying that it rises to the notability bar, but that's just one person's opinion. On the other hand, you did state a minority opinion when you advocated "keep."B.Wind 01:13, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
          • WP:WEB or WP:BIO, both meet the requisite standards for attention. If anything, the sources and information presented should have answered both your #1 and #2 - it reaches notability due to the attention, and part of the reason for the attention is the lack of clarity regarding whether it's real or a hoax. While I may have been the minority position at the discussion, if I were the minority regarding what constitutes minimal standards for notability, the guideline wouldn't exist. If only... --badlydrawnjeff talk 02:55, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse deletion - The article did not substantiate on the popularity or notability of the subject of the article, simply asserting it without explaining why. Thus it did not establish notability. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 07:30, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
  • And the AfD? --badlydrawnjeff talk 11:38, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
    • • It was slightly better, but still, you can recreate the article anyway if you explain the notability and demonstrate it in the text properly. In that case, it is not speedy deletable under the repost criteria. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 23:34, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
    • It ran its five days. That speaks for itself. B.Wind 01:13, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Image:Yamauchi.jpg (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Image deletion and undeletion procedures are an absolute joke. Whereas for prods etc, they can be speedily undeleted, especially if the closing admin or nominator missed some information. I saw that something was wrong, and re-uploaded a deleted fair use image, only to have it speedied again for not following "process" even though it never went through a proper deletion process anyway. But that's largely irrelevant, what is relevant can be seen on the Image talk page.

Hiroshi Yamauchi was a long-time serving Nintendo president who presided over some great changes and growth in the comapny. Even in business, he was a private figure, as can be seen from the BBC3 "Inside Nintendo" documentary. He retired completely from business and the public eye in 2002. User:Chowbok seems to think that it's possible to upload a free image of this retired private individual, and User:Quadell agreed, deleting the image. User:Nihonjoe voiced some legal concerns and disagreed with whether it was replaceable, myself, I added new input to the private nature of Yamauchi, dismissed previous arguments dubbing him a "celebrity" and boldly re-uploaded a new photo. I was smacked down with process, and now I'm here. I do not think that it is possible to obtain a freely available image of Yamauchi and am asking for the undeletion of the image. - hahnchen 01:36, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn deletion. What the heck? We can't have fair use images if it's possible that someone somewhere at some undetermined point in the future will have a slight possibility of getting a public domain one? -Amarkov ^blah_edits 02:42, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn. Until a free equivalent is in available, "fair use" is not a sensible deletion criterion. NB: You still should've followed process. Sockatume 06:26, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
• Overturn. Do they seriously think it's reasonable to expect that a free image of a recluse is easily available? Replaceable fair use it might be, but given the likely difficulty of actually replacing it, I think we can afford to live with it. Chris cheese whine 07:47, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse deletion regardless of if I agree (or not) with the above sentiments that the policy as stated is too tight "1. No free equivalent is available or could be created that would adequately give the same information", that is what the policy is, and deletion review cannot redefine that policy just merely because we disagree with it. As a side issue the image is incorrectly tagged as {{promophoto}} which by definition are photo's specifically released for "free" usage for publicity purposes i.e. in a press pack. The source given for this is not a press pack, this cannot be verified to be a promo photo from the sources given. --pgk 09:52, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
  • We are not "redefining" policy. In what appear to be extreme circumstances, there was clearly room for discretion. Where possible, we should be enforcing the spirit, rather than the letter of our rules. That someone makes it near-impossible to get a decent photo of them satisfies the "no free equivalent available" test. Chris cheese whine 13:38, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
    • I fully understand the spirit vs literal meaning. However (a) I am not sure about the extermity of the situation, has anyone tried to get one of the existing images relicensed? No one has said and (b) The point here was that this gets us no where if the image gets restored by "us" and then redeleted in a weeks time on the same grounds, DRV isn't a supreme authority on wikipedia, the deletion is "good" by policy. If there is an issue the correct venue is to revisit the policy pages and discuss and to bring in the closing admin and discuss, indignation here doesn't help. --pgk 07:10, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
      • To add to this point 1 also adds "However, if the subject of the photograph still exists, a freely-licensed photograph could be taken.", and the list of counterexamples includes "8. An image of a living person that merely shows what they look like.", there is no assertion of any specific significance of the image beyond showing what the person looks like. --pgk 13:41, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse deletion, as it has been made evident in the past, Chowbok knows his business. This is done as per WP:FU; and the image does not qualify for fair use on Wikipedia. — Nearly Headless Nick ^{L} 13:50, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Comment - Mistakes are made, deleted edits cannot be seen, you cannot check his past history of taggings. I can cite many erroneously deleted images, indeed, I started a checkuser case against a sockpuppet who was tagging images incorrectly and getting them deleted. The admins did not actually look at the image tagged or the conditions surrounding them, but deleted them without question in the majority of cases until I picked it up. There is a suitable thread on WP:AN relating to that issue. Deleting of fair use images is made too easy. With AFD, the closing user should not take part in the discussion, yet given the nature of the man in question, this is clearly not a clear cut case, and yet we have the an admin declaring his thoughts at the beginning and then carrying them out in the end. Why is a discussion period even needed?

In this case, I feel that taking a snapshot of a private individual in his retirement would be more a breach of Yamauchi's rights (please also see Nihonjoe's related legal concerns on the talk page) then the use of a fair use photograph. Or, as I mentioned on the image talk page, we just wait until he's no longer the only living ex-president of Nintendo and then use the exact same photo. - hahnchen 16:56, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Please check criterion 8 of which images are not fair use on WP:FU. And I can see the deleted image. — Nearly Headless Nick ^{L} 12:38, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn. Reclusivity is certainly a reasoning for irreplacability. When someone leaves public life, they generally do so for a reason. This guy was pretty reclusive even when he was still with Nintendo, now he's just a retired private citizen. Furthermore, the photo depicts an important person in a specific historical time period: when he was still president of Nintendo. He's not anymore, so the image uploaded cannot be replaced by a free image which converys the same information. Therefore, it should be restored. TheQuandry 19:09, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
• Overturn. Citing "1. No free equivalent is available or could be created that would adequately give the same information" - its obvious to me that we should keep the picture until someone *finds* a free picture that is as good as the non-free picture, and updates it (replacing the citations and tags). Fresheneesz 20:13, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
• Comment: Is there any evidence that this person is a recluse, unavailable for photographing? Or is that merely asserted without evidence? – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 20:20, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Try and find footage from the BBC3 documentary "Inside Nintendo", it mentions the private nature of Yamauchi even when he was Nintendo president, and includes an interview with Henk Rogers about how hard it was for him to set up a meeting with Yamauchi. Since his retirement from the board at Nintendo, I have not seen or heard of any interviews. The last interview he gave seems to be in early 2004 before he stepped down in 2005. And how suitable would an image of the man in his retirement be, when an image of him at his height would be much more useful. - hahnchen 20:49, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the answer. – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 23:03, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

• Comment: Is the difference between his looks now and then significant? Is that difference discussed in the article? – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 21:16, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't have thought so. Of course, I wouldn't know for a fact. - hahnchen 00:55, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

• Comment as I mention above, has anyone tried to get one of the existing photos released under a free license? --pgk 07:11, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Overturn. Like many others have asserted there is no fair use image available of Yamauchi and most likely never will be. A photo adds quality so we can't go without one. A person in their retirement who keeps away from the cameras definitely won't be easy to get a picture of and there are legal concerns as someone else said. --WikiSlasher 10:44, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
• Comment: I was the closing admin, so I'm not voting. But I have a few comments. First, several voters have said we should use the non-free image because a free image is not available at this time. Such an argument flies in the face of criterion #1 at WP:FUC, which requires that "no free equivalent is available or could be created that would adequately give the same information" (my emphasis). So if (and I stress if) it would be reasonably possible to create a free replacement, then our policy says we can't keep this one. Another argument many have been making is that we should keep this image until a free one becomes available. This is explicitly against policy: such as statement claims the images is replaceable (as the statement assumes the image could be replaced), and non-free replaceable images cannot be kept. Another specious argument is that the image shows him as president of Nintendo, which he is not anymore. There is no evidence of any significant difference between his current appearance and his appearance at the time, and his looks are not discussed in the article, so I can't see how that argument carries any weight. The only reason I can see why we might keep this image is if he is a recluse and is unavailable for photography by members of the general public. Hahnchen's information on the topic is interesting, and I did not know it when I deleted the image. (It was not given on the image's talk page.) If the closing admin here finds this argument compelling, I can see why the image might be restored. – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 13:36, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

  I'll add mention as above of the counterexamples - Here are a few examples of uses that would almost certainly not be acceptable as fair use: 8. An image of a living person that merely shows what they look like. --pgk 13:45, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Seeing his photo will give the reader a better idea of what he's like. --WikiSlasher 08:48, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

That is so vague as to be meaningless, you can say that about any picture of anyone, you merely seem to be confirming that the shot "merely shows what they look like", there is no significance to the shot, the article contains no contextual information concerning the photo etc. which is what counter example 2 is about. I'll also add it fails counterexample 9 whilst we are at it "Any image found on the Internet where the original source is unknown or not verifable" --pgk 09:46, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Sorry I'm not too familiar with the fair use policy. It didn't sound good when I posted it but I thought it was worth a shot. Now I know what not to say next time! --WikiSlasher 09:53, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

The shot does show what the subject looks like, that's the whole point. What's been neglected here is the reclusive nature of the man in question. The images at Steven A. Cohen merely show what he looks like, but due to his private nature, and the extreme unlikely-hood of generating free use equivalents, we use a fair use image. I mentioned above, that taking a photograph of this man now, would be more an invasion of his privacy than to use a fair use one. The "almost not" bit of the Counter-examples section refers to cases like this. - hahnchen 16:37, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

I realise the point is to show what he looks like, and that is exactly the point claiming a photo of unknown origin merely to show what they look like fails the fair use criteria. It also fails the counterexample 9 in that the source given certainly isn't a press pack whilst it is tagged as a promo photo, i.e. it is just an image found on the internet for which the original source is not known (or it isn't a promo photo, your choice). You seem also to be of the view that the only way to get a free photo is to take one, I'll ask the question again has any one asked those currently with copyright ownership of photos if they are willing to release one under a free license. --pgk 18:36, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

For the record, the source listed on the image description page was this. It's not a promo photo, and should have been tagged {{Non-free fair use in}}. – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 18:46, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Your point over whether anyone has contacted Nintendo/Yamauchi in regards to obtaining a free example is moot. Following this, no fair use images would be allowed, as the copyright holders may one day finally relent and release a free example. I haven't contacted companies to obtain a free version of album art or screenshots I upload either. What I have done, is look for free images online, and found none. It may not be a promo photo, and incorrectly tagged, but had I uploaded say the image from here, I'm sure that would have been speedily deleted too. - hahnchen 19:30, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

It isn't a moot issue and if you can't see the difference between photographs of individuals and an album covers or screen shots then I'm lost for words. Why Nintendo/Yamauchi anyway? The website that image has been obtained from (though I suspect it is not the original source) is neither. The other image you point to from Forbes is also not a promo photo, it has to be released by the owner of the copyright explicitly for use for promotional purposes (That image is from getty and will have been "individually" licesed to Forbes) --pgk 07:28, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

The {{Non-free fair use in}} template would be fine, and for the Getty image, we have a definite source. You've absolutely missed my point regarding free replacements. It's absolutely a moot point that you make, it doesn't matter whether anyone has asked for a free license from the copyright holder, because that absolutely isn't part of our Fair Use criteria. We do not have to preclude every fair use upload with a request for a free image. - hahnchen 16:40, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm not saying there wouldn't be a tag available, but promophoto wouldn't have been it. As for your our fairuse criteria doesn't mandate the request, maybe not in so many words, but it does mandate unavailability of a free equivalent. Establishing if a free version is available or not would seem to involve seeking one from the likely sources, in the case of the corporate world asking the corporation would be one of those steps. If not your establishing that a free image is available seems to be fundamentally flawed. The policy isn't "equivalent is available by doing a couple of internet searches", otherwise everyone would just "look the other way" and claim no availability. --pgk 15:05, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Comment I think it's important to have a picture of the man that was taken during his tenure with Nintendo, preferably in his business suit. The only notability attributable to him is his Nintendo presidency, so I feel that even if a picture could be taken of him currently, it would not convey the same information. TheQuandry 19:13, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Did someone (the closing admin) seriously suggest that someone could *create* an image that matches the usefulness of a photograph?? Is someone gonna make an anime drawing of him or what. Don't be ridiculous. Fresheneesz 03:19, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Photographing the person would be creating a new image. – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 21:42, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse deletion -- note that this photograph also failed WP:FUC #10 and should have been deleted as having insufficient source information. Jkelly 00:08, 8 December 2006 (UTC)