Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John Ortberg

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. John254 00:18, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

John Ortberg[edit]

Bio of an author. Only source is author's official web site, which links back to this article. Potentially a speedy A7 candidate. Does not meet notability standards of any biography: The person has received a notable award or honor, or has been often nominated for them. The person has made a widely recognized contribution that is part of the enduring historical record in his or her specific field. Skinrider (talk) 20:57, 7 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Living people-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 00:20, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 00:20, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Illinois-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 00:21, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that the current version of the article is week on sourcing, but this is definitely not speedy A7 material. There are meaningful claims to notability in the article ("best known for his award winning books ..." - and that publisher is one of the major's in his fields. GRBerry 00:36, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Expanded: Gaah - I hate google searching for authors - swarms of booksellers have pages trying to sell the books, and keywords to eliminate their pages also eliminate all the reliable sources we want to find. The first source I found was this 2003 interview published in Christianity Today, which is all by itself enough to demonstrate notability for an editor who actually knows this field. This individual has been a pastor at America's most prominent megachurch, is a published author with multiple books published by one of of the leading publishers in his field, and has been interviewed in one of the leading magazines for his field. This is a slam dunk keep. GRBerry 00:52, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - I think he meets the notability criteria. One of his books has won the Christian Life Award [1]. Another has won the Christianity Today Book Award [2]. He has also been the subject of a magazine article [3]. --Megaboz (talk) 00:50, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep--Meets WP:N, thanks to the sources provided by Megaboz and GRBerry.--Jmundo (talk) 03:54, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
My primary argument for deletion comes from the fact that this article appears to be nothing more than self-promotion, what with the only source being the author's own bio, which links back to this article. However, I think the above posters have done a very good job of showing that Ortberg is actually notable in his field. Would one or more contributors be willing to add some of these sources and research to the article? Then if Ortberg's own bio could be used as an external link instead of a reference, I would have no further issues with this article. Skinrider (talk) 15:49, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I expanded the article, and now it has plenty of references --Megaboz (talk) 22:26, 9 January 2009 (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.