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 was revert to disambiguation page. While I normally wouldn't close a deletion debate so early, it's clear that this article is not going to be kept and I see no evidence that another four days of debate will change the outcome or help the project. However, the page can be a completely legitimate disambiguation page. --MZMcBride (talk) 05:12, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

David Gerard[edit]

David Gerard (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

Being a director of a very minor company that never traded and is now being wound up is not notability.

However, we now get to put David in the stocks and pelt him with non-notable tomatoes. Scott Mac (Doc) 20:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak keep. Being regularly quoted in the press concerning activities at a very popular web site (ie Wikipedia) is enough to justify keeping this, IMHO. He's clearly considered important by the UK press. And, yes, I am considering the need to avoid self reference. I don't think it applies here. JulesH (talk) 20:52, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Revert to disambig version as kingturtle tried to. I would support a closing of this AfD; pretty unnecessary, and should be a foregone conclusion. GlassCobra 20:53, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Please Revert to disamb version. Kingturtle (talk) 21:03, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete Wikimedia UK isn't notable enough for it's own article, so being a director of a defunct/not yet/incorporated/in limbo project doesn't assert notability. rootology (C)(T) 21:03, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete/revert. "Being regularly quoted in the press concerning activities at a very popular web site (ie Wikipedia) is enough to justify keeping this." NOT. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:08, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep: I'm sure I can do something with this, to make it very interesting, possibly up to FA staus. Looking at the basic material, there seems little of interest her. Giano (talk) 21:16, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Revert to the disambig page and if necessary protect it. What next, an article on Kelly Martin? No-one outside Wikipedia/Wikimedia will ever care who he is, and those who do are perfectly capable of reading his userpage or any WP:BADSITE of their choice. (Plus, the photo currently used on this article is awful. If this article is kept, I'm sure someone can find a more appropriate picture to illustrate it.) – iridescent 21:24, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete or revert to the dab page - this is silly. --B (talk) 21:34, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Per Giano and WP:EATYOUROWNDOGFOOD -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 21:36, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Revert to dab page and for crying out loud, can we stop poking each other with sticks for a while? Tony Fox (arf!) 21:39, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Revert to Disambig: this page was more distinguished in its disambiguate role—now it just appears to be fanboying of Wikipedia itself. To quote DG himself "User:David Gerard, [..] is not notable, just noisy". If DG starts to be noisy and notable then I suspect he'd probably voluntarily step down from the role of being an (intentionally) faceless spokesperson for Wikipedia. —Sladen (talk) 21:45, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Subject justs meets the GNG IMO. RMHED (talk) 22:11, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • "IMO" is a rather poor argument for AfD. Do you have any evidence to back up your claim? –Juliancolton ^{Happy Holidays} 22:12, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Aside from the muliple refs from reliable sources, and that's without even mentioning his interview on the Radio 4 Today programme or Channel 4 News. RMHED (talk) 22:28, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • … neither of which actually document one single fact about M. Gerard xyrself. M. Finkelstein talks about practicing what one preaches. What we here at Wikipedia preach is that everything must be verifiable and article topics must be notable. So please practice that. Sources which provide not one single fact about the subject at hand do not make for verifiability, and provide zero basis for building an article about a person's life and works. Sources documenting a person's life and works do that. What we have here is almost an outright "coatrack" article. As Friday says, what the sources actually document is Wikipedia. Uncle G (talk) 00:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete not notable beyond wikipedia - the interviews etc are all publicity related and have far less weight. (dab again after deletion) Viridae^Talk 22:46, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete having an article of a Wikipedia editor, is tricky stuff. GoodDay (talk) 22:48, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• There are sources, sure, but they're all about Wikipedia. Friday (talk) 22:49, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• It strikes me that someone whose visibility relates to periodically being quoted as an unofficial "spokesman" for Wikipedia (assuming there are no other activities worth noting) has about the same level of significance as someone who periodically writes a column for, say, The Guardian (applying the same assumption). Perhaps we should yoke the result to Seth Finkelstein; keep both or delete both. --Michael Snow (talk) 22:51, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would indeed apply the exact same standards - If David Gerard would declare that he had absolutely no confidence in the Wikipedia process to keep a biography free from libel and defamation, that he had a well-founded fear that a Wikipedia biography would be a tool in smear campaign against him by those who wished him ill, that Wikipedia vandalism and trolling would be a source of constant personal grief, that it would all be an attractive nuisance to anyone with a grudge - then I would most charitably respect his wishes and change my !vote to "Delete". I'm perfectly ideologically consistent there. But it is my impression that he feels somewhat differently about the quality of Wikipedia. So I would also respect his wishes there, not being so arrogant to believe my circumstances form a universal imperative. Am I mistaken in my understanding of his view about Wikipedia quality? If so, I beg correction. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 23:11, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I didn't presume anything either way about his views, as they have no bearing on my comment. In fact, even the assumptions I did make are reasonably easy to argue against. Rather, my thought was about how those who make themselves frequently available in the media must deal with the visibility that results, and beyond some point public figures can no longer decide to be visible only in places of their choosing. Where to position either one of you in those terms may not be obvious, but I'm at least confident that you're in a similar place. --Michael Snow (talk) 23:40, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • If "his views, as they have no bearing on [your] comment", then you're way, way, behind the state of the art - so much so as to be shockingly unfamiliar with the debates on this most sensitive topic, given your status in the Wikimedia Foundation. The wishes of the subject are a major part of reforming WP:BLP policy. When you suggest "keep both or delete both", given our (me and DG) presumably vastly differing views, you're, well, how can I put this so I don't get blocked for violating WP:CIVIL - umm, err, huff, must remember WP:AGF - I give up, I can't think of the right expression. -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 00:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • Neither his nor your views about the personal impact of having a Wikipedia article relate to the issue my comment is about, that's what I was saying. I did not say they have no bearing at all on the overall question of having an article about either of you. I think you overrate the importance of the subject's wishes to the policy on biographies of living persons, though, presumably because it serves your purposes to do so. That question is hardly touched on in the policy, except with respect to inclusion of information like birthdates, although it's been a handy argument in getting people to understand why such articles warrant special care. Nevertheless, in nearly all cases it's quite possible to reach an appropriate result by applying a duly high standard for the content, without needing to punt on the matter by having the subject dictate the outcome. I have resolved several problematic cases using this approach, and have sometimes seen the subject's wishes about having an article do a complete about-face as a result, when they see the difference between a hatchet-job and a properly balanced, neutral presentation. --Michael Snow (talk) 01:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Notability is not fame, importance, or significance. Start with User:Uncle G/On notability#Notability is not fame nor importance and Jimbo's "No." and work on from there through Wikipedia talk:Notability and many other places where this has been repeated, if you don't see why this is. Uncle G (talk) 00:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• weak delete Ok. First smack Doc with a trout for writing this article. More seriously I'm seeing a few mentions in the press but I'm not seeing any about David. He does not as of yet appear to meet WP:BIO(it is arguable that he does but I'm not seeing it strongly). There are instead a handful of occasions (maybe two handfuls?) of David being quoted or referred to. Being quoted a lot isn't generally enough for that. Seth's call for keeping seems pointy especially given that Seth is much more notable than David (sorry David). While obviously having actual articles on major Wikipedians would likely help them see some of the more serious problems we have with BLPs this is not a good reason to modify our inclusion criteria. Finally a procedural note: There are two other people with similar names to David at the top of the page. If this debate does end up favoring deletion we should instead just keep the page as a dab page. JoshuaZ (talk) 23:25, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • He didn't write it, he made a redirect to Gerard David Viridae^Talk 23:28, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ah. Misread the history. Ok, slap Crotualus Horridus. JoshuaZ (talk) 23:33, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Funning aside, I have long felt that Wikipedia people should default to having a bio page about them, because it does seem to make them more sensitive to WP:BLP issues. This not something new with DG, but a long-held position, what I mean by WP:EATYOUROWNDOGFOOD. Again, see my comment above, raw notability is not the only factor I think should matter - the subject's own wishes, and yes, some practice-what-you-preach, should all factor in (note I said "factor in", not "are dispositive") -- Seth Finkelstein (talk) 23:38, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete He's a spokesperson, as Seth says, so his name will show up incidentally in a lot of material. None of it appears to approach significant coverage of the subject of the article, David. That's the threshold for notability and he doesn't meet it. Protonk (talk) 23:27, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. Fails WP:BIO, if nothing else. --Conti|✉ 23:34, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete/revert, David's in the press a lot, and wonderful at it, but spokesmen are not inherently notable. --fvw* 23:39, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Come on, seriously? There's not a single reference about him, he's just mentioned incidentally as a spokesperson. (It can go back to being a redirect if people want, I don't have an opinion either way.) --Tango (talk) 23:41, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Don't see the notability threshold being met. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 23:45, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Not notable. Jheald (talk) 00:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Tango said it all. Professor marginalia (talk) 01:48, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Living people-related deletion discussions. -- Fabrictramp | talk to me 02:21, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
• Revert to dab page (which should also include David Gerrard, BTW). There may or may not conceivably be a weak case for an article on our own Mr. Gerrard, but if there is, I doubt it would qualify as primary article. As such I would say weak delete, but if the article is kept it should be moved to David Gerard (Wikimedia) or similar. Grutness...wha? 02:25, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete (revert to dab page) - by any objective measure, David Gerard doesn't pass our notability test. The 'references' provided all quote him as a spokesperson for the Wikimedia Foundation on some other Wikipedia-related story - they're not about him at all. Until such time as a reliable source writes an article about David Gerard, having this page is simply navel-gazing. Terraxos (talk) 04:50, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  On the other hand, I think it would probably be OK to include a line on the disambiguation page saying 'David Gerard is a volunteer spokesperson for the Wikimedia Foundation', or something like that - just so long as no one tries to turn it into a blue link. Terraxos (talk) 04:50, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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.