- Jonas Jacobi (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (restore|cache|AfD)
I think this AfD should have been closed as no consensus, or as withdrawn by nominator. There were three Delete votes, and two regular Keep votes. The nominator then retracted his position, changing it from Delete to Keep, making the vote count 3-3 tie or arguably 3-2 Keep depending on how you look at it. The case for deletion was an attack on notability, and the subject's notability as a published author is at least borderline if not unarguably sufficient (see e.g. this and this, easily found with a very quick search and posted in the AfD), so I think (lack of) consensus should have been followed. — xDanielxTalk 00:28, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- Endorse my deletion. I closed as delete primarily because there is no WP:N: the article lacking sources say he's a product evangelist for a big company - that is not inherently notable: evangelist is a fancy word for marketing guy; First (a) it's not a vote; majority doesn't win or necessarily give a consensus; and even the editor bringing this to DRV (along with the other keep voice) could only muster "weak keeps", again acknowledging the problem of notability, and the other containing a thinly veiled personal attack (b) a nominator may withdraw a nomination, but when contrary voices are heard the withdrawal does not require a close in the nominator's favor; and (c) consensus is demonstrated not only by what is said at the AFD, but by the guidelines including WP:N and policies such as WP:BLP.
If we were purely counting noses there were 3 deletes, 1 neutral, the nominator who wanted to withdraw the nomination, and 2 weak keeps, one claiming that the nominator was biased. The delete voices - including the nominator - while focusing on the spamminess of the article, also noted there was no Notability, in fact arguably there is no assertion of notability (see WP:CSD#A7). The neutral expressed concern with the notability issue. The keep voice had more procedural than substantive objections, but this is really not a court of law, and if the subject fails WP:N and the nominator fails to waive his hands in the proper order, it doesn't invalidate the argument and position of those who follow. The keeper also provided two websites that mention Jacobi in small articles as evidence of his notability. Those are not reliable sources (WP:RS) we expect to demonstrate notability; moreover, a brief blurb about somebody does not show notability. So in a nose count one could say 3 deletes + 1 neutral questioning notability = 4 vs. 0.5 (a weak keep), letting the nominator and keeper claiming bias thereof cancelling each other out. But we're not counting noses, we're evaluating the arguments, of which the deleters had by far the stronger position.
I wouldn't mind a relisting or a recreation, if those who !voted keep can demonstrate meeting WP:N with independent reliable sources - not the business or trade press that if we took 2 blurbs = notability would give notability to virtally every professor, band, high school athlete, patentee, or businessperson. A position inherently rejected here given that we have notability guidelines for some of these none of which suggest that 2 blurbs is sufficient to show notability - in fact the hurdles are significantly higher. Given their inability to do so during the week this was on afd, I cannot expect that they can do so now. I would like to see someone cite these reliable sources in this DRV since no one bothered to add them to the article nor cite any during the Afd, rather than take it on trust that they'll magically appear. Carlossuarez46 01:05, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- Your summary of the AfD is many things, but it certainly isn't neutral. "[L]etting the nominator and keeper claiming bias thereof cancelling each other out" is peculiar logic, since (A) they both supported keeping the article and (B) the claim of possible bias seems to have been made without noticing that the nominator had retracted his position, so we can ignore the claim for the purpose of evaluating consensus. Counting a weak keep as only half of an opinion is rather unfair since the motivation for a Week Keep is generally not "I don't want my vote to have as much weight as anyone else" but rather "I support a Keep but for the sake of courtesy I'll acknowledge that this is a close call." Counting a neutral vote as a Keep vote is bizarre, for lack of a better term. The editor said "I'd like to see a more thorough and cited discussion regarding this person's notability", not "this person is not notable". He then proceeded to point out why the subject appeared to be notable. I think his comment suggests that he was leaning Keep, but for the sake of impartiality let's consider it a neutral vote, since that's what he said it was. The vote was very clearly a 3-3, with 1 neutral--and there was no nominator support for the deletion, so if we're comparing this to AfD standards where the nominator contributes a sort of "ghost vote" for delete it's effectively the same as a 3-2 for Keep.
- Granted, the AfD forum is not a vote. But with exceptions for extreme cases (sockpuppetry, clear copyright violation, etc.), it's up to the community to judge whether a subject meets standards of notability and the like. Your own assessment of notability does not trump the community's. The subject of the AfD is a published and well-read author, well-known essayist, a CEO, and an overall influential figure in his industry. These attributes have been recognized by reasonably reliable sources which were brought up in the AfD, such as this one. It may not unquestionably pass WP:RS with flying colors, but there is no obvious reason why it wouldn't, and no such argument was brought up in the AfD. The traditional requirement is that deleting an article requires a two-thirds vote. The two-thirds rule is now essentially deprecated to encourage constructive discussion rather than bureaucratic vote-shooting, but it's still a fair guideline to follow as long as the votes express reasonable judgments and no illicit tactics were involved or what not. In this case there was either a 3-3-1 tie (no consensus) or a 3-2-1 keep, depending on how you look at it. You gave yourself a super-vote by closing the AfD as Delete given a clear lack of consensus. This is very much against WP:DGFA, especially when your (unstated) reasons for supporting deletion were no different from the reasoning that was already presented, considered, and rejected by a good half of those involved. — xDanielxTalk 09:07, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
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- The other keep voice claimed the nominator was biased against the subject, do you credit that? Seems not, but can't be sure given your comments and nose-count. If so, then the nominator's voice is discountable as being acknowledgedly biased. If you don't credit that claim, and it seems that you might not given that you now claim that it was made in ignorance of manifest facts, do you want to grant validity to someone who casts such aspersions you acknowledge are ill-founded and only then can come up with a "weak" keep apparently based on the aspersions you no longer endorse. And the nominator's withdrawal is not a "keep", a nominator's withdrawal is a withdrawal - it may be neutral, it may be that he just didn't want to be maligned by false accusations, you read more between the lines than are there, I'm afraid. We should read the comments and arguments not just the "votes" - the neutral which I didn't count as keep despite what you say (you did that, really) - wanted to see something that no one could or did provide. Again, you ackowledge that the sources as to his notability do not pass WP:RS. Not surprising because he is not notable and borderline speedy because nothing in the article asserts his notability. The 2/3 rule is you cite: Where is that noted? Where can I find that? And if that's the stated protocol, then to hell with comments, why doesn't everyone just vote (as apposed to !vote) because under such a rule, it's purely a head count. I belive that there is no 2/3 rule and that the community has spoken in consensus by adopting the WP:RS and WP:N and WP:BLP - is it troubling no one that this is an unsourced article about a living person? So if 1/3 of the people, plus one, who show up and comment during the week to say "keep" despite these guidelines then the article is kept - that's neither been the rule nor the outcome here. If you'd like to propose adoption of that rule, you should discuss it at the talk page of WP:DELETE. Carlossuarez46 17:18, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- In the first place, the final "keep" commentator relied mostly on the opinion of xDanielx, adding the suggestion of bias merely as an afterthought. In the second, I don't know how you read his comment as acknowledging that the sources don't pass WP:RS - all he's saying is that they could be better. With regard to the neutral commentator, I think he mis-typed, and what he meant to do was take issue with your claim that it was effectively a "delete", which is patently false. With respect to the nominator, suggesting that he withdrew his nomination because of a throwaway suggestion of bias (understandable given the somewhat aggressive tone of his nomination) is absurd. Regarding the more substantive point, while AfD is not of course a vote, the balance of commentators often helps to gauge community consensus on an issue. In this case, sources were produced which purported to demonstrate the subject's notability. It was claimed that they did not pass WP:RS (which is arguable); several editors considered this claim and rejected it, and no consensus was formed. It's as simple as that. David Mestel(Talk) 18:14, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- I'm still trying to fathom your statement that the allegation of bias was "understandable" in light of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA and WP:AGF. Carlossuarez46 23:48, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- Read that again, Carlos. That isn't what David is saying at all. Xoloz 03:07, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
- Xoloz or David: What does the parenthetical here mean: "With respect to the nominator, suggesting that he withdrew his nomination because of a throwaway suggestion of bias (understandable given the somewhat aggressive tone of his nomination) is absurd." Carlossuarez46 19:01, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
- Mathmo, I think, made his comment without noticing that Rursus had retracted his nomination. It was understandable since the original nomination was, as David said, rather aggressive, and Rursus's retraction wasn't highlighted with big bold letters. Also, let's not exaggerate what Mathmo said -- "also smells of potential personal bias" is not as strong as "this nomination was biased and made in bad faith." It was a minor communication error and doesn't change the fact that both Rursus and Mathmo supported keeping the article in the end. — xDanielxTalk 06:22, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
- Carlos, if you're only interested in attacking straw men then there's not much point in arguing. I did not say that we should count the neutral vote as a keep vote; I said "for the sake of impartiality let's consider it a neutral vote, since that's what he said it was." I did not "ackowledge that the sources as to his notability do not pass WP:RS". I quote: "It may not unquestionably pass WP:RS with flying colors, but there is no obvious reason why it wouldn't, and no such argument was brought up in the AfD." I did not say that the 2/3 guideline is a part of current policy. I said: "The two-thirds rule is now essentially deprecated to encourage constructive discussion rather than bureaucratic vote-shooting, but it's still a fair guideline to follow as long as the votes express reasonable judgments and no illicit tactics were involved or what not." If you'd like to see the deprecated (not to be confused with "current") policy, you can go through the page history or view an archived version such as this one. I did not say that we ought to follow the 2/3 rule strictly as was done back in 2004. Please read my comments more closely before criticizing them. — xDanielxTalk 10:21, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
- Relist but someone else will have to sponsor the deletion rather than the original nominator, for he withdrew the nomination in the course of the debate. I have no opinion on the merits, which seem equivocal, but a delete in the face of that seems a little excessive. (I agree it was not an automatic speedy keep, because someone else had spoken for deletion.) I'd have closed no-consensus if I had thought that his withdrawal was wrong. DGG (talk) 03:52, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- Overturn as no consensus. While the subject's notability may be rather dubious, it's certainly arguable on both sides, and I don't see anything remotely resembling a consensus in the AfD, especially since two of the deletes were submitted before some of the sources came to light, and the final delete cites as its sole rationale the nominator, who had withdrawn his somewhat curiously-argued nomination. David Mestel(Talk) 15:35, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- Overturn as no consensus, with no prejudice to re-listing. When the nominator flip-flops, it seems the consensus of other participants should be extremely clear to justify deletion. --Ginkgo100talk 22:51, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
- Endorse, AFD is not decided by vote counting, and that misunderstanding appears to be the sole reason Daniel brought it here. >Radiant< 08:33, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
- If I may ask, which argument was it that you found so overwhelmingly compelling so as to justify overriding (lack of) consensus? Was it the "'...for Dummies' books aren't notable enough" argument? If so, it may be worth noting that he never wrote any such book; Pro JSF and AJAX doesn't present itself as one, anyway. Was it the "seems to be only marginally notable" statement? Or "[d]elete per nom, down with spam"? Was it one of the four retracted nominational arguments? The first is not really a deletion argument; the second is unevidenced, contradicted by links which were listed in the AfD discussion, and not a reason for deletion anyway; the third was again unsupported and not a reason for deletion; and the fourth was a complaint/warning about sneaky websites. If I may quote Descartes, there doesn't seem to be any "argument so strong that it can never be shaken by a stronger argument [or by community consensus]." — xDanielxTalk 11:38, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
- You'd have to ask the closing admin for his reasoning, but your statement again begins with a fallacy. If there is an "overwhelmingly compelling" argument, that does not "justify overriding consensus", but instead it means that consensus lies with the argument. Consensus does not consist of the ten-twenty people that participated in any particular AFD, but of the Wiki at large. >Radiant< 12:59, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
- Since when has the "consensus" position been taken to mean the closing admin's idea of the stronger position? The role of the closer is not to determine which side s/he fancies, it is to gauge consensus based on the opinions expressed in the AfD. There can be exceptions in light of clear, uncontentious policy violations (see, e.g. WP:DGFA), but borderline notability generally isn't one of them, least of all when the argument was already considered by each of the AfD participants and rejected by exactly half. — xDanielxTalk 22:16, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
- And that is a false dichotomy, not to mention a straw man. >Radiant< 08:51, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
- A dichotomy of what? Where is the straw man? — xDanielxTalk 09:23, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
- Overturn as no consensus; neither the weight or numbers nor weight of arguments for deletion is compelling. Evouga 22:43, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
- Endorse deletion Simply put, I cannot claim that the deletion of this article -- which lacked WP:RS completely, and contained assertions of notability that were very thin -- an abuse of administrative discretion. I could imagine some folks using CSD G11 to delete this; although I wouldn't support that, it also wouldn't be absurd. As it stands, the draft is quite weak. Xoloz 15:10, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
- Endorse deletion. The deletion debate was side-tracked by secondary issues of COI and AGF but the fact remains that this is a bioagraphy article with no assertion of encyclopedic notability. Thus deletion is so clearly the correct outcome that a relist is unnecessary. Eluchil404 03:50, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
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