Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Up to Now (autobiography)

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 keep. It's snowing. The issue of merging/redirecting is already being discussed on the article's talk page. Ron Ritzman (talk) 17:54, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Up to Now (autobiography)

AfDs for this article:

• Articles for deletion/Up to Now (autobiography)

Up to Now (autobiography) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log  • AfD statistics)

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• Note: The article has been moved to a new title: Up to Now (Shaw autobiography) Voceditenore (talk) 08:23, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

I created this article on 4 January. Since then it has been disruptively edited and vandalised beyond recognition. I am not able to edit to construct it further because of this. As the author, I would therefore like for it to be deleted Wikipedia:CSD#G7 Also, I have repeatedly placed sources on the page which are repeatedly deleted by editors or administrators. Therefore the page does not have recognised sources.

It is also said to fail the notability criteria.

Merging with an article on its author is proposed. But nothing would be added to that article by the bare information contained here

This request was initially denied by an administrator SarekOfVulcan who has previously blocked me for an alleged edit war where he did not block the other party - it takes two to edit war, except apparently on Vulcan. He has since alleged a breach by me of the three-revert rule although I have made no such breach. His or her actions appear ego-driven. Unfortunately, the only conclusion is that this administrator has personal issues with me and is not an appropriate person to resolve this.

The refusal seems bizarre and arbitrary. This page is very short, it is not progressing and is subject to multiple tags and criticism. The best thing for it would be deletion. There is nothing to be gained by keeping it - and I say that as its creator and author. Time Will Say Nothing (talk) 05:17, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Completely moot an pointy — there's a merge-discussion going on; result will most likely be merge; others are encouraged to leave comments there. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 05:42, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

This editor is one of those who has disrupted and vandalised the creating of the article. There is nothing to be gained by a merger. Independent review, please? Time Will Say Nothing (talk) 05:45, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Please redact the above personal attack, TWSN. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 05:46, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - I've flagged the article for {{Rescue}}, because the terms it's spoken of in the books TWSN has mentioned suggests to me that it should have WP:reliable sources out there, if someone can find them. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 05:46, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

This is arbitrary and vexatious. I added sources that were repeatedly deleted for not being relevant. Now it is said that these sources are somehow relevant!

Not a personal attack, but valid reasons why neither this admin nor this editor should be involved in this process. Admin and editor challenge my actions on principle. Alleging vandalism and disruptive editing is not a personal attack but airing a legitimate concern.

Significant integrity issues here, sadly. Time Will Say Nothing (talk) 05:50, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 now threatens me with sanction for alleging vandalism against him or her. A rogue editor abusing his or her position. Seeking to act as judge and jury in an allegation of vandalsim against him or her - inappropriate. Now attempting to move towards a block, in order to prevent me from contributing to this discussion. independent intervention, please. Time Will Say Nothing (talk) 06:03, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Further, I have been the persistent target of cyberbullying by editors including Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556. I was told that alleging bullying was grounds for a block. Cyberbullying is a criminal offence. It is Wikipedia policy to use a block in order to prevent a justified allegation of a criminal offence by an officer of Wikipedia? I am sure that is not the case. Does Wikipedia have a policy on cyberbullying by editors or administrators? If so, could I be directed to it, please? Thanks. Time Will Say Nothing (talk) 06:11, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Delete, or Merge. This has gone on long enough. I'm sorry that we weren't able to come to an agreement on this article, but for now, I think that the best thing to do would be to either delete it or merge it into the article suggested on the talk page. It can always be recreated with proper sources at a later point in time. Nakon 06:12, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Nakon. I agree with you. Obviously, I propose delete. I also regret the inability to come to an agreement. Time Will Say Nothing (talk) 06:29, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Comment The article hasn't been "vandalised beyond recognition". I can show him hundreds of examples of vandalism, but this isn't one of them. Listen, TWSN - if you don't want your writing edited, don't submit it here. If you withdraw your legal threat and return to editing, he should know that a) this is not your article, and b) it doesn't not qualify for WP:CSD#G7 because you aren't the only editor who has made significant contributions to it. Sarek is correct, TWSN - I'm sorry that you don't like it, but the policy is clear as day. This AFD should be closed pending the merge discussion on the talk page. KrakatoaKatie 06:49, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Close as a pointy attempt to use AfD as a forum for making legal threats and personal attacks. -- œ^™ 08:52, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Redirect The deletion rationale provided by the nominator is, of course, not going to fly, because per WP:OWN and WP:REVOKE editors are not permitted to revoke their contributions or to delete articles they started just because they don't like what other people have done since. That being said, there was already a near-unanimous consensus at the talk page that the notability of this article is questionable and the article ought to be deleted or merged, so we might as well go ahead and discuss that. (If someone wants to houseclean, go ahead and procedurally close this AfD and procedurally open a new one with that rationale.) Then eventually someone is going to have to take the initiative to clean up all the POV, unreferenced, and/or unencyclopedic writing that TWSN has added to other articles, as it seems he is essentially a single-purpose editor out to write flowery prose about his family members. rʨanaɢ (talk) 09:41, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Keep. Merge to Martin Shaw (composer) without redirect (See my comments below) At the moment, there really isn't enough notability for a stand-alone article, although it would be a useful addition in its own section in the article about the author. There is room for slight expansion if editors can get access to the following journals. It was apparently reviewed in The Musical Times, Oct. 1, 1929, vol. 70, no. 1040, p. 897-898 and Theatre Arts Monthly, Volume 14, 1930, p. 89 ("This is an entertaining little autobiography, ambling and inconsequent, full of revealing anecdotes about other interesting people..."). It was also adapted into a 45-minute play by Robert Shaw and performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2010 although the reviews were not favourable [1], [2], [3].

  I would not recommend re-directing unless the article title is changed. Al Smith's autobiography published the same year by Viking Press has the same title and is far more notable in terms of citations, coverage, and library holdings: [4], [5], [6], [7]. I have written in a similar vein at the merge discussion on Talk:Up to Now (autobiography), where four other editors have also opined that the article should be merged. – Voceditenore (talk) 12:14, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Comment. I have a few concerns about the accuracy of the Oxford Companion to Music quote which is very vaguely referenced (no exact title for the entry and no page number). Googling the exact phrase (or shorter phrases within it) produces zero results, and many editions of the work have been scanned by Google Books. Even so, there probably was something similar written about it there. Of the four results in Google News cited by Dream Focus, only one is relevant for establishing notability, The Sun. The Evening Post article is about one of the people discussed in the book, Viscount Grey of Fallodon, and is merely relating an anecdote about him from Shaw's book as part of the story. It is not about the book or a review. The Los Angeles Times article is not referring to the author of this book at all, but to Martin Shaw, the actor, and simply uses "up to now" as an expression (note the capitalisation). The Lewiston Daily Sun is a two line snippet concerning the two books with the same name, and I had already added it to the WP artcle. Having said that, I have since found a review in The Times and will shortly add it to the article. This, combined with the review in Theatre Arts Monthly (already in the article) and the review in The Musical Times, which I'll probably be able to access at some point, plus the 2010 stage adaptation, albeit by a family member, probably lets it scrape past the notability threshold. Although I've changed my opinion to a weak keep, I'd also be happy with a merge. Voceditenore (talk) 06:17, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

• Its from a review of notable books. [8] They mention it, then quote one of the characters to give an example of it, that working out better than just writing about it. Most news sources do not archive their stuff from more than 80 years ago, or don't have it typed out where you can actually search it. But if the person was notable, than this book about them surely would've been reviewed. Dream Focus 07:20, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

• Ah, seen in the context of the whole page, it would count as a review of sorts. Just as well, because from what I can see of the Baltimore Sun article, it is a similar item to the snippet in the Lewiston Daily Sun about Shaw's and Al Smith's autobiographies having the same name. The Baltimore Sun clearly doesn't even know who Shaw is, because they refer to him as "the English philospher". Having said that, I don't think it's valid to argue that an article should be kept simply because there must be reviews somewhere. They need to be found and verified. Otherwise, it's saying that any book written by any "Wikipedia notable" person is worthy of a stand-alone article. Some may take that view, but it's not one that I share, and it's not one expressed in Wikipedia:NBOOK either. But that's a moot point, as I think there probably is enough verifiable coverage in this case to scrape a keep. Voceditenore (talk) 08:24, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

• Update I managed to get a snippet from The Musical Times as well and have done just about as much as I can with the article. I now think there's enough there to establish notability for a stand-alone article with definite scope for expansion for an editor with full access to The Musical Times and to the book itself. So, just a plain old keep, not a weak one. Voceditenore (talk) 17:57, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 20:00, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

• Keep per added Oxford Companion reference. Knew the sourcing was out there somewhere. :-) --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:33, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

• Keep A Google news search for "Martin Shaw" and "Up to Now" has results. [9]. The first one is from the The Sun Sep 25, 1929, but you have to pay to read the article. The Evening Post in Australia gives a review about it. [10] Dream Focus 05:14, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

• The nominator of the article has been blocked from Wikipedia. [11] Dream Focus 00:50, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
  • The history of both the nominator, and this article has been 'fraught', to say the least. [12], [13], [14], [15]. Nevertheless, since the AfD has started, and the article is now radically different from the one created by Time Will Say Nothing and subsequently nominated for deletion by him, we might as well judge it on its own merits and put the subject to rest. Voceditenore (talk) 07:23, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

• Note: The article under discussion here has been flagged for {{rescue}} by the Article Rescue Squadron. SnottyWong ^prattle 15:10, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
• Keep - Invalid nomination. We don't delete articles because they're being vandalized. Apply for page protection or report the vandals to administrators. SnottyWong ^prattle 15:10, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
  • If you check the edit history, the talk page, or any of the numerous links provided above in this discussion, you will see that this article was never vandalized; there was a content dispute and, as usual, one party who got fed up decided everyone who doesn't agree with him was a vandal. Please don't tacitly accuse that the rest of us who edited the article are vandals. rʨanaɢ (talk) 15:06, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
• Keep, although an invalid nomination by a disgruntled user, at least the AFD has led to the article being improved beyond all recognition thanks to the super efforts of User:Voceditenore, to the point where one cannot even consider merging it. Rob (talk) 17:32, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
• Keep - subsequent work has established notability --Errant ^(chat!) 15:16, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

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.