Talk:Jessamyn West (librarian)

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Wikipedian An individual covered by or significantly related to this article, Jessamyn West (librarian), has edited Wikipedia as
Jessamyn (talk · contribs).
This user's editing has included this article.

Readers are encouraged to review Wikipedia:Autobiography for information concerning autobiographical articles on Wikipedia.
This was previously nominated for deletion.
Please see prior discussions before considering re-nomination:

Contents

[edit] MetaFilter

Jessamyn West also moderates Matt Haughey's Metafilter.com. Is this worthy of inclusion?

[edit] Naming

The librarian-blogger is commonly known simply as Jessamyn West, which is the same as the novelist's. Since her full name is Jessamyn Charity West, I decided to put this article under her full name in order to avoid creating a disambiguation page, and cross-reference the articles to each other. This way, at least some users—the ones that want the novelist—will get what they want without having to follow a link.

The naming convention says "Use the most common name of a person or thing that does not conflict with the names of other people or things." Jessamyn Charity West is not the librarian-blogger's most common name, but her most common name does conflict with the author's name, and the author was there first.

One reason I chose to do this was that I wasn't sure what to use for the disambiguated name. "Jessamyn West (librarian)" would seem to be the obvious names, but the problem is that according to her blog, her current position as librarian ends in April, 2005 and she is moving on to a new position that involves teaching computer skills to the elderly, so "librarian" does not properly describe her, and I don't like any of the other alternatives I could think of such as "Jessamyn West (blogger)" or "Jessamyn West (librarian.net)." Dpbsmith (talk) 20:53, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

  • P. S. It doesn't matter at this point, but for what it's worth, according to an email exchange with Jessamyn West, she feels that "librarian" is defined by training and profession, and thus she can correctly be called a "librarian" even if she is not currently working as one. Dpbsmith (talk) 23:49, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Member of the ALA Council

I've contacted Jessamyn West via email during the course of the VfD. Among other things, she mentioned this:

Of possible note is that I am an elected member of the American Library Association Council, the governing body for the ALA with 200-something members. I only mention it because it's my most "official" title. It's a big deal to librarians, probably no one else. Please feel free to check this overlong URL for more
http://www.ala.org/ala/ourassociation/governanceb/council/council.htm

[edit] Deletion?

Is this figure of particular significance outside the library/wikipedia community? The page seems mostly self-created, and does not assert the significance of the author. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jacklasa (talk • contribs)

Perhaps, but she has authored a few things. Is that not wiki worthy? I think there's a whole pile of other reasons for keeping her in as well. I lean more toward inclusion than exclusion. Why not look at the 2005 effort to delete the page to see if that helps you any? So I say keep it, unless you can convince me otherwise. --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling 22:48, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
Just for the record, except for minor edits and addition of the photo, I did not create this article. It was primarily written by Dpbsmith which is obvious if you look at the page history. It has been nominated for deletion three previous times. Jessamyn (talk) 23:29, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
You might also note that the results were keep and obvious keep from the two previous AFDs noted on this page. Jessamyn (talk) 23:37, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. For the record,

  • Yes, the article is primarily my work
  • I am not Jessamyn West, I am not a librarian, and I don't live in Vermont.
  • The early history of the article is here. The article on Jessamyn West (librarian) doesn't have the entire history because it was split out of an article that described both the author and the librarian of the same name.
  • The article came to my attention when I was stunned to see that an article on "Jessamyn West" was up for deletion. Assuming, naturally that "Jessamyn West" was the famous Indiana Quaker novelist, I was even more stunned to see that the article's entire contents was
Jessamyn West, AKA the Rarin Librarian. One of Library Journal's Mover & Shakers, West is best known for her 'blog, librarian.net.
  • I was primarily concerned about remedying Wikipedia's lack of an article on the Jessamyn West (apologies to the librarian!) but in researching both I was convinced that the other Jessamyn West passed my bar for notability, mostly because I found material about her in reasonably mainstream sources like The New York Times, Wired, and Library Journal. The most notable things seemed to be the attention she attracted as an opponent of the USA PATRIOT act, and her inclusion in history's first group of "credentialled bloggers."
  • Two deletion discussions arrived at the same judgement as I did. Dpbsmith (talk) 00:46, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Unreferenced quotes

There are several direct quotes from both the subject of this article and others but they are not referenced. It's particularly important to reference direct quotes and I hope that editors involved with this article will help find and add the appropriate references. --ElKevbo 03:07, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bad grammar

All, this sentence in the opening paragraph has bad grammar, in my opinion, and I can't figure out how best to fix it: "Jessamyn Charity West (born September 5, 1968) is an American librarian and blogger, best known as the creator of librarian.net and for her unconventional views of her profession." The problem, to me, is she is best known as the creator ... and for her views. One's a noun and the other is, well, not a noun. In such lists I believe that consistency is required -- all nouns or all verbs, but not a mixture. If I'm not explaining myself, it's because I can't put my finger on the problem. But does anyone have a way to rephrase the sentence to improve it? --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 01:25, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, if you ask me (it's basically my sentence, heh), the problem is really the "best known ..." bit, which is sort of an awkward Wikipedia convention designed to summarize someone's notability in a phrase or sentence. When I get around to expanding the article (especially about the blog) a longer lead will make getting rid of that easy. Otherwise, be bold. --Dhartung | Talk 04:37, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
BOLD! There, I was bold. --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 04:54, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Too much emphasis on where she lives

Just an observation. There seems to be a lot of detail on the particular places where she lived. I think it's too much. It doesn't add anything. And is where she lived really encyclopedic? --LegitimateAndEvenCompelling (talk) 17:45, 2 April 2008 (UTC)