Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ronen Shilo

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 no consensus.  Sandstein  15:48, 11 September 2015 (UTC)

Ronen Shilo

Ronen Shilo (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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Reading through these sources, it appears that Shilo is in no way independently notable from Conduit; at that, none of these sources are really about Shilo, but about Conduit, which already has its own page. Without significant GNG showing Shilo himself as notable, there is no real reason to have this page. Grump International (talk) 22:10, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Businesspeople-related deletion discussions. — JJMC89 (T·E·C) 03:03, 19 August 2015 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Israel-related deletion discussions. — JJMC89 (T·E·C) 03:03, 19 August 2015 (UTC)

• Delete. (1) None of the sources is substantial coverage of Shilo. (2) Searches for information about him produce mostly sites such as LinkedIn, Twitter, about.me/ronenshilo, businessinsider, Crunchbase, YouTube, FaceBook etc etc: no sign of substantial coverage in independent reliable sources. (Note: the article was created by a single-purpose account, with no edits not related to Shilo and his busines.) The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 13:29, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Note that the deletion nominator is almost a single purpose account, but one that looks to have had previous experience before using this login due to their knowledge of procedures here and skill in Wikimarkup. But in any case the page should be just judged on its merits not on the personalities involved. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:34, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

comment: deletion nominator's account, User: Grump International appears to be a sock puppet and should, therefore, not be counted toward consensus. Nominator shows extensive knowledge of procedures here and skill in Wikimarkup, but their account is only a year old and has a handful of edits. This entry for Ronen Shilo and the related entry for Conduit (publisher network and platform) have come under repeated attack over the past few years and both have had to be protected by admins. Note that the nominator is simultaneously challenging the articles of related entries Conduit (company), where Shilo is CEO and Perion Network, which acquired a major part of Shilo's company. The use of a sock puppet account for all these simultaneous challenges to related entries suggests the nominator is biased and may have an undisclosed WP:COI.BC1278 (talk) 00:12, 23 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278

• Keep He's the CEO of Israel's largest Internet company but apparently hasn't granted many in-depth interviews, but given his prominence it's worth trying to find a way to keep him. As the company I run has a business relationship with Conduit, I have a WP:COI. I've never edited this article. I see it could use more sourcing, so I created a new proposed draft on my sandbox here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:BC1278/sandbox It includes articles focused on just him from Fast Company magazine and Inc. Magazine, both very high quality sources, as well as more information about his early and personal life from Israel magazine sources. I'll also put the request on the article's Talk page for the sandbox edit to be considered. I also see the article has seven named contributors over three years, two of whom, User: Diannaa and User: Bearcat are admins of Wikipedia. BC1278 (talk) 21:29, 21 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278
• comment The draft looks to be an improvement, but Fast Company does not look to be independent as Ronen Shilo has written for them. So it looks to be a author profile. Is the Technion entry independent? I cannot read Hebrew so I can't tell. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:43, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

It's an extended profile of him by the magazine of the university. Technion – Israel Institute of Technology is like MIT in Israel so it would have the equivalent value of a high-quality alumni magazine. You can read about the world ranking of the university, which is one indication of the quality of their magazine, in the Academic section of the Wikipedia entry. I'll see if I can find some more sources.BC1278 (talk) 00:08, 22 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278

I found another interview with Shilo on Pando Daily, a prominent tech website with well regarded journalism. Added it to the sandbox draft. I have reached out to friends who can do searches on Google's Hebrew version. It is hard to believe he could lead the largest Internet company and second largest technology company in Israel without attracting extensive personal profiles press, but that seems to be the case. He wrote a essay in Fast Company about why he avoided the press. BC1278 (talk) 00:52, 22 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278

comment: As per WP: NOTABILITY "If the depth of coverage in any given source is not substantial, then multiple independent sources may be combined to demonstrate notability." According to this essay in Fast Company, Shilo intentionally avoided the press, even though he runs the largest Internet company in Israel (second largest tech company), which when it had 100 million users was the 29th most popular site on the entire Internet, and peaked at 260 million users. The website had more users than Twitter at the time. He maintained majority ownership of his company, which was valued at $1.3 billion. See Conduit (company) for citations for all of the prior information. While it appears to me like he's only consented to one in-depth profile (in Hebrew), I did find may sources where he speaks to the press about his company, finance, Israel and technology. e.g. the Wall Street Journal (“Conduit’s vision is to grow the company and keep the headquarters in Israel,” Conduit CEO Ronen Shiloh said. “We want to be a global Internet company. Having a company at this stage that’s all Israelis is overall better for the state of Israel.”), Financial Times ("Short-term investments have gained Israel a second nickname, “Quick-Sell Nation,” said Ronen Shilo, founder and CEO of Conduit, which recently became Israel’s first billion-dollar Internet company."), Inc. Magazine ("As part of our series on entrepreneurs whose companies are worth $1 billion, Inc staff writer Jeremy Quittner spoke with Shilo about his billion-dollar valuation, the social worth of a company, and doing the laundry."), Haaretz (Four Reasons Not to Hate Israel's Big Business Tycoons, "...Ronen Shilo ‏(Conduit‏) [has] in fact shunned the quick buck of an M&A deal and stayed the course.").

References

Comment - I only see the above as proving how the CEO is not independently notable from the company he ran. I just don't see enough here to meet GNG, something mixed with rather slanderous accusations above. Either way, I just don't see how Wikipedia needs this suite of articles on a fairly narrow subject. Ronen Shilo, Perion Network, Conduit (publisher network and platform), the now deleted Como page, Conduit (company)--just feels like spam to me. Of them all, Shilo is the least notable. Grump International (talk) 21:37, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

User: Graeme Bartlett decided to split Conduit (company) and Conduit (publisher network and platform) into separate articles. Conduit was a bigger platform than Twitter, by monthly users, just a couple of years back and has been the subject of hundreds of news articles. Conduit (publisher network and platform) is defunct as part of Conduit, but the admin wished to preserve it because the article has attracted dozens of editors over many years. It needs a massive clean up and could also exist in the history section of the company. Perion Network is a separate, publicly traded NASDAQ company that acquired a large asset from Conduit. It's pretty obviously notable as a NASDAQ company. As for Ronen Shilo, I won't repeat myself again, but obviously the CEOs of large and important companies (e.g. like Conduit, the second largest technology company in Israel just a year ago and one of the top 30 websites in the world, according to Google) who have been written about widely (if not deeply), are in a very different category than the CEOs of small companies that just barely qualify as notable. As I've been open about my COI, and made no direct edits on Ronen Shilo or on any of these articles, I'd request that user User: Grump International please reveal his/her primary Wikipedia account(s) so we can check if they've been one of the attackers rebuffed by admins over the years on this and the Conduit article, as bias will affect consensus. User: Grump International has used this account for just a year to write articles about a small Florida real estate broker, a single condominium building, and a minor architect and it's just very hard to assume good faith given that their Wikipedia skill level could not have been achieved with these simple edits. I could understand the motivation of a purist intent on Wikipedia being used for articles about only the most important of people in the world, but not the nominator, who used this small account to contribute substantially to obviously promotional articles like Vanessa Grout, a very minor, unknown real estate broker in south Florida. And yet is challenging an article about the CEO and founder of one of the largest Internet companies in the world. So knowing the editor's main account(s) seems relevant. BC1278 (talk) 03:32, 25 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278

All I read above are paranoid personal attacks and no further evidence that Shilo is notable. I remain in the delete column. Grump International (talk) 14:44, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, – Juliancolton | ^Talk 02:09, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

I'd like to recommend that the draft in my sandbox replace the current article so consensus can be reached around an improved article with better sourcing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:BC1278/sandbox I can't make any direct edits myself (other than adding citations) because I have a WP: COI, explained above.BC1278 (talk) 18:37, 27 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278

You can read the details of the nominator's undisclosed COI editing here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Brickell_Flatiron An admin on the WP:COIN board immediately placed two of User: Grump International's promotional articles up for speedy deletion and Grump did not contest in either case. All Grump's contributions, except for two minor revisions, prior to the nomination of the Shilo article, fall into the COI category. The COI investigation into Grump on the COIN board continues. Grump's use of Wikipedia to advance undisclosed personal agendas is clear. Grump's nomination and opinion should not count toward consensus.BC1278 (talk) 20:09, 29 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278

Again, I suggest you stop bullying other users. No COI was found; the articles were deleted for CRYSTAL, not COI (and were prodded, not put up for speedy deletion--and one of the two was fairly quickly de-prodded by other editors as even under CRYSTAL the article was notable; additionally, I did not write that article myself, only made a minor edit). I did not contest because they were right. You, however, as you can see from my previous sentence, are incorrect. I read your sandbox; still recommend deletion. Grump International (talk) 16:22, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

User: Grump International's use of this account as an undisclosed COI is self-evident - just read the WP:COIN complain above. The formal adjudication on the account will take some time, but corrective action on two articles was taken immediately. Other experience editors, not me, described the user's contributions as "blatant[ly] promotion" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Brickell_Flatiron by User:Nagle and "borderline spam" https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Grump_International&diff=677850261&oldid=677824535 by B137 Note that Grump deleted from their Talk page the comment from B137 that their contribution was both a NPOV violation and borderline spam. I bring all this up because the user has a clear history of undisclosed COI editing and bias, plus the use of a "near single-purpose account" with very Wikipedia few edits prior to this deletion nomination despite very sophisticated Wikipedia mark up and policy skills picked up on undisclosed account(s) (i.e. a probable sock puppet) --- so their opinion should not count toward consensus on this article. This and a related article cited above has had a history of attacks over several years, prompting protected and semi-protected status. Calling out Grump's undisclosed COI account challenging a frequently attacked article and related subject is not harassment because it is directly relevant to whether their opinion counts toward consenses. Why was an editor with just a few small edits at the time patrolling other articles for deletion and "news release" flagging Conduit (company)? Given the Grump account had no recorded interaction with other editors BC1278 (talk) prior to this deletion nomination, where did they learn their Wikipedia mark up and policy skills? Since some of their own handful of contributions have been challenged as "blatant promotion", "spam" and violating NPOV, why does Grump feel qualified to weigh in here at all, unless this account is a sock for a main account where they have much more experience? 18:14, 31 August 2015 (UTC)BC1278

You know this is a deletion debate about Ronen Shilo, right? You have lost your battle at COIN, and have not evidence of sockpuppetry, because, alas, no such thing has occurred. I highly suggest you stop bullying others and being addressing the problems with the articles you have taken an interest in. Again, I see no reason why Shilo is independently notable from Conduit, and thus there is no reason for Wikipedia to have an article about him. Grump International (talk) 20:29, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

Your history of undisclosed COI editing is highly relevant because it indicated your opinion here should not count toward consensus. The COI discussion as to your account and articles is ongoing at Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Brickell_Flatiron. An editor on that board has just been notified that you removed a proposed deletion tag on an article you created about a proposed condominium that he deemed "blatantly promotional" - you added new material but left in all the promotional spam. Your promotional edit to Brickell Flatiron was removed entirely. The editors on WP:COIN will reach consensus on what to do with your account and contributions with time. It's not an instant decision. In the meantime, your history of what several editors have now characterized as inserting promotional material and spam into articles (the definition of COI) makes it clear to me at least, that you do not disclose personal bias and are likely to have one here, too.BC1278 (talk) 15:02, 1 September 2015 (UTC)BC278

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Randykitty (talk) 16:58, 3 September 2015 (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.