Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ewan Dobson

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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 delete. The arguments citing WP:BIODEL are most convincing. Randykitty (talk) 17:58, 3 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ewan Dobson[edit]

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Ewan Dobson (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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Here is the reality. I am Ewan Dobson. I am not famous enough at all to have my own article. I am a private person who does not pursue fame. I don't have a number one record, If I book a tour only 10 people will come to each show, sometimes none. This page only exists because of a few friend fans who put it up.

Plenty of people have won guitar competitions and have viral videos from a time in the past, and don't have a wikipedia page. I am not even close enough to being famous for this, and I frankly don't want one.

  • Delete I would have voted keep, however the subject above asks for a delete — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lubbad85 (talk • contribs) 21:39, 25 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep I added some additional sourcing to demonstrate that Dobson meets WP:MUSIC. He's gotten significant press attention in Canada consistent with inclusion here. Chubbles (talk) 11:00, 26 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete The article appears to be promotional and the subject is not notable Gristleking (talk) 14:58, 30 March 2019 (UTC) Sockpuppet of a previous voter. —DoRD (talk)​ 13:44, 2 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per WP:BIODEL. Strictly speaking, having a Wikipedia article does not require the subject to be famous — it just requires the person to have achieved something that passes a notability criterion and has reliable source coverage about it. However, we do not necessarily always keep an article about every winner of every award that exists on the planet, but rather we take the notability of the award itself into account: for example, a Juno or a Polaris clinches the notability of a musician, while a local music scene award does not; an Oscar or a Canadian Screen Award clinches the notability of an actor, while a regional dinner theatre award does not. So local Rotary festivals are definitely not notability clinchers, for starters — and even the awards that do sound more potentially notable, the Canadian Fingerstyle Guitar Competition and the International Fingerstyle Guitar Competition, do not have Wikipedia articles at all for me to judge whether they're notable enough to clinch NMUSIC notability for their winners or not. So I'm inclined to defer to the subject's stated wishes here, because nothing stated in the article is "inherently" notable enough to require a Wikipedia article about him — and if the nominator is correct that his own friend created it (which is definitely supported by the fact that the original creator was an WP:SPA with no history of ever editing any other Wikipedia article but this), then the creator still had a conflict of interest by virtue of creating a Wikipedia article about someone he knew personally. Bearcat (talk) 17:14, 18 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Just for the record, I would also note that this discussion was formatted improperly, and has been flying under the radar since March 25 because it was never transcluded into any AFD deletion sorting logs at all. I've corrected the formatting, and it was only just now daylogged for the first time. Bearcat (talk) 17:17, 18 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Canada-related deletion discussions. Bearcat (talk) 17:27, 18 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Musicians-related deletion discussions. Bearcat (talk) 17:27, 18 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete if someone does not want an article on themself in Wikipedia we should respect that.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:09, 20 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • We don't know that he has requested it; someone claiming to be him has nominated this article (and socked it a bit). Even if he were, there are plenty of people who probably don't want articles about themselves who clearly rise to prominence above the marginal cases permitted by BIODEL (Cass McCombs is an example of someone who specifically requested his own article be deleted), and Dobson (if it is him) is being quite modest. He is an internationally famous Canadian musician who has toured Europe and the United States and received press coverage from a number of reputable publications (e.g., Guitar Player, CBC, Now Toronto, Niagara Gazette, KLCC-FM). He meets WP:MUSIC bullets 1, 4, 5, and possibly 9. Chubbles (talk) 04:32, 20 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Firstly, we assume good faith. For one thing, we don't actually have any process on here for people to prove that they are who they say they are — so unless somebody shows some hard evidence to the contrary, we accept that he is who he says he is until proven otherwise and not vice versa.
    Secondly, you're clearly overstating things with "internationally famous" — yes, the guy's done some touring and gotten some regionalized press coverage, but he's not famous by any normal definition of the word. "Famous" means you can walk up to literally any rando on the street, ask if they've heard of the subject before, and already know that the answer will be yes before the rando even opens their mouth to respond — Beyoncé, Sia, Adele, Ariana Grande, Drake, Justin Bieber, George Clooney, Bruno Mars, Madonna — and does not automatically encompass every single person who's gotten their name into a couple of newspapers.
    Thirdly, yes, it's true that some media coverage exists and has been shown, but the context of what he's getting coverage for is not so "inherently" notable that we require an article about him. He's obviously a working musician, and he obviously isn't flying completely under the radar, but he isn't so very Beyoncé-level famous or so very widely covered by a genuinely broad spectrum of national media that Wikipedia keeping an article about him would be mandatory. NMUSIC #9, for example, is not automatically passed by every single music competition that exists — it is passed by music competitions that regularly get reliable source coverage about the competition, and not by music competitions that don't, so the key to getting somebody over NMUSIC #9 is to show that the competition itself passes a notability criterion. But that hasn't been shown here, because none of the music competitions involved here have Wikipedia articles at all, and his placement in them is referenced to their own self-published content about themselves rather than to reliable source coverage about the competitions — so none of those competitions represent an automatic pass of NMUSIC #9 just because their names are present in the article. A competition has to pass our notability standards as a competition before it's notable enough to confer notability on its winners and finalists, and every music competition on earth does not automatically do that just because it has its own self-published website to verify that it exists. And NMUSIC #5 is not automatically passed by the existence of albums, either: it requires the albums to be released on either a major label or an important indie label on the order of Merge or Arts & Crafts or Sub Pop, and is not automatically passed by minor specialty label or self-released albums.
    So unless you can find hard proof that the nominator is lying about his identity, none of this is so very highly meganotable that we need an article about him even if he doesn't want one. Yes, Beyoncé would fail to get an article about her deleted if she tried that — but this guy is nowhere near that level of fame. Bearcat (talk) 16:57, 20 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't know why so much of the discussion revolves around his awards - he is not notable for this alone (though since multiple independent media sources spend time covering these, I'd say that gives notability for the awards credence). I also don't know why there's such a focus on the requirement of a mandatory article - the language makes no sense. All I'm saying is that he clears, by a fair margin, the requirements of notability such that we should want to cover him - for having somewhere north of half a dozen reputable third-party sources about him, some in international media; for having several releases on a label noteworthy according to WP:MUSIC's threshold; and for having received media attention for international tours (leaving aside the media attention for the festival wins and the media attention for having a viral YouTube hit, to the tune of 18 million views according to those media sources). Chubbles (talk) 22:46, 20 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Firstly, there aren't "multiple independent media sources spending time covering" the awards — those are referenced, right across the board, to primary sources, not anything resembling media. Secondly, NMUSIC #5 does not confer an automatic freebie on everybody who's released music on just any record label that has a Wikipedia article — NMUSIC #5 is passed only by major labels and an elite tier of highly notable indie labels, and does not just automatically extend to every indie label that exists at all. And thirdly, you're the one who said that his notability claim is so tremendously important that we should override his right as a low-profile figure to request WP:BIODEL — it's precisely the point of my argument to point out that he's not so highly visible or internationally famous that BIODEL would be out of the question here: none of this is so very meganotable as to override his personal privacy rights at all. Bearcat (talk) 23:18, 20 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • The first point is a misinterpretation of the sources; his wins are mentioned several times by the reliable sources (not just the ones the wins are currently footnoted to - e.g., the Guitar Player and CBC sources both mention them, too). The second point is goalpost-moving of WP:MUSIC; it does not and has never been restricted to an elite tier, and the label Dobson was signed to was not a totally insignificant indie. Lastly, I think his personal privacy rights aren't determinative when he sought fame, gained it (again, internationally), and then later came to regret it; he is a public figure, and public figures who meet the threshold of notability should be included here, just as Cass McCombs was (he's the only example I have, but I can't imagine he's the only one). Chubbles (talk) 04:59, 21 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Firstly, I'm not misinterpreting the sources. The test for whether an award or competition is notable enough to get its winners over the award or competition criteria in NMUSIC is not determined by whether you can find mentions of the award in sources about individual musicians — it is determined by whether the award gets coverage about the award. This is, for example, why the Canadian Screen Awards are a notability-clincher in and of themselves for an actor or actress, while the ACTRA Awards are not: the Canadian Screen Awards get reported as news in and of themselves, while the ACTRAs do not. The question of whether a music award or competition gets its winners or finalists over NMUSIC #8 or #9 works the same way: an award or competition gets competitors over those criteria if the award or competition it itself the subject of regular media coverage about the award or competition in its own right, and does not get competitors over those criteria if it cannot show such coverage. The competition has to be sourceably notable as a competition before it's notable enough to confer an NMUSIC pass on its winners or finalists.
    Secondly, I am not moving any goalposts: NMUSIC has always restricted notability per #5 to an elite tier of indie labels rather than extending it to just every indie label that exists at all. It even explicitly says, as written, that it is restricted to important indie labels and not just every indie label that exists.
    Thirdly, you're still using a weird, non-standard definition of the word "fame": again, "famous" is "you can walk up to any rando in any shopping mall and know that they've already heard of the person you're talking about", not "anybody who's ever gotten their name into any newspaper for any reason". There are, in fact, lots of contexts where Wikipedia does not automatically keep an article just because some media coverage can be found: we do not keep articles about most city councillors or school board trustees, even though every city councillor and every school board trustee always has some local coverage. We do not keep WP:BLP1E articles about people who get a momentary blip of media coverage for a viral video or a controversial comment, but then never get sustained coverage again after that blip fades. We do not keep articles about people who have a couple of pieces of human interest coverage in a context that doesn't clear an SNG; we do not keep articles about people who've gotten into a newspaper real estate section for having unique taste in furniture; we do not keep an article about every local restaurant just because its existence is verified by the local media; and on and so forth.
    GNG does not just automatically mandate the creation or retention of an article about every topic that surpasses a certain arbitrary number of media hits, but rather it does also take into account the context of what the person is getting coverage for — and winning an obscure music competition that gets no coverage about the competition itself, paired with a few stray examples of local concert dates that can be sourced to local media with no evidence of nationalized coverage at all, is not a compellingly hypernotable context that necessitates the retention of an article or fulfills any rational definition of "fame". And by the way, those CBC hits are CBC's local news bureau in one city, not the national news division, so they don't represent nationalized coverage either.
    And finally, the touring criterion in NMUSIC is not passed just because you can find one source that lists the tour calendar either: it is passed if and when you can source every individual concert in that list to a review of that specific concert itself. Bearcat (talk) 15:23, 21 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Alright, I think we're bludgeoning the process here with all these brickwalls, and the rhetoric in this last post is rather dramatically distorting my position, so I'm going to leave things here, as I think I've laid out the case in favor fairly compellingly (and done quite a bit of sourcing of the article, to boot). Chubbles (talk) 10:21, 22 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Meets WP:MUSICBIO #5 "Has released two or more albums on a major record label or on one of the more important indie labels", with 4 albums released through CandyRat Records. (I disagree that this criterion means "an elite tier of indie labels"; what it actually says is "i.e., an independent label with a history of more than a few years, and with a roster of performers, many of whom are independently notable". CandyRat Records meets those criteria.) Dobson may meet other notability criteria too, but one is enough. Whether or not the AfD nomination is from the subject, I don't see how someone who has been competing for over 20 years, has released 14 albums and toured 15 countries can credibly claim to be "a private person". RebeccaGreen (talk) 14:57, 25 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
CandyRat is actually not properly sourced as notable at all, but rather its article is relying entirely on primary sources and glancing namechecks of its existence in coverage of other people with literally zero evidence of any reliable source coverage about CandyRat. The notability of a record label, for the purposes of both whether it qualifies for an article at all and whether it's notable enough to get its artists over NMUSIC #5 or not, is not determined by the ability to provide technical verification that it exists — every record label in musical history is always technically verifiable as having existed, so there would never be any such thing as a non-notable record label anymore if verification of existence was all it took. A record label's notability, rather, is determined by the extent to which the label is or is not the subject of reliable source coverage about the label itself as a company, and CandyRat is showing exactly no evidence of actually clearing that bar at all. Bearcat (talk) 15:33, 26 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, -- Scott Burley (talk) 07:40, 26 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak delete. With all due respect, we can't be sure the op is Mr. Dobson - or someone else. And of course we don't delete articles upon requests (what a can of warms this would be...). Having reviewed the sources, I find Bearcat's arguments convincing - the sources are pretty local/niche, so are the awards, and the subject seems to fail WP:NMUSIC unless we stretch it a lot. As for Rebecca's argument, well, I am not convinced that "CandyRat Records" meets the vague criteria of being a " more important indie labels". Such vague statements are the reason we are drowning in sport spam bios, since sport fans use their equivalents to argue that, errr, cyclist x competed in competition y, competition y is "an important competition" because they think so, so the bio stays. Ugh. No. Unless you can prove to me with a reliable source (academic book, etc.) that a reliable scholar or expert described this indie label as important, nope, it is NOT. Bottom line is - not every musician is notable, nor should be, and this is a reminder of that. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 09:03, 26 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
WP:NMUSIC #5 says more than just "one of the more important indie labels"; it goes on to define what that means. It seems that you are suggesting a revision of the definition, so that rather than saying "i.e., an independent label with a history of more than a few years, and with a roster of performers, many of whom are independently notable", it says "a reliable scholar or expert described this indie label in a reliable source (academic book, etc.) as important". But that is not the current policy, so basing a delete argument on it is not in line with current policy. RebeccaGreen (talk) 12:07, 26 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • wp:BIODEL He seems on the notability level where BioDel applies. If it really is Ewan Dobson (and someone can verify that) it should be an obvious delete. If on the other hand it isn't Ewan Dobson then soft keep. Neonchameleon (talk) 17:02, 29 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question for the BIODEL folks - how much more coverage would we need to find to keep the page over the BIODEL claim? (I'm guessing I'm asking for a version of the WP:HEY standard here). I mean, we've already got multiple CBC articles, Now Toronto, several other major newspapers (some US-based), and even a German album review. (and that's just for a claim on bullet 1, leaving aside the others I've already noted Dobson meets.) Chubbles (talk) 00:19, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • We'd need him to be famous enough that he can't honestly be described as "low-profile". Bearcat (talk) 19:07, 2 May 2019 (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.
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