Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sean Perryman

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 redirect to 2021 Virginia lieutenant gubernatorial election. Redirecting now to preserve history for a merge. Tone 16:39, 30 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sean Perryman[edit]

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Does not meet NPOL. There is some coverage of his potential run (in the 2021 Virginia lieutenant gubernatorial election, a year and a few months away with primaries still to be held), but little of depth outside of this election. Eostrix (^{🦉 hoot} _hoot🦉) 13:24, 11 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. Shellwood (talk) 13:30, 11 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Virginia-related deletion discussions. Shellwood (talk) 13:30, 11 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Delete unelected candidates for lieutenant governor are not notable. The election is not until November 2021, before that he will not be notable.John Pack Lambert (talk) 16:16, 11 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Perhaps the politician angle is not the right standard. General notability means a reasonable number of mentions for their achievements in secondary sources. The subject seems to meet that standard.

As a note on standards, I just came out of an AfD discussion about a woman, where the standard of what counted as notability was raised over and over---one person said she isn't notable until her book is nominated for a Nobel or comparable prize! The standard for earning a line in Wikipedia's database of six million entries is that the person is of enough public interest and has done enough to be reported on in a number of reliable secondary sources, and I really hope that the standard for this individual doesn't arbitrarily get raised beyond the norm. B k (talk) 17:48, 13 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. People do not get articles just for declaring themselves as candidates in future elections per se — but since every candidate in every election can always show some evidence of campaign coverage in their local area, the existence of such coverage does not automatically hand candidates a "GNG"-based exemption from having to pass NPOL, because they every candidate would always get that exemption and NPOL itself would be inherently meaningless. So for media coverage to rise to the level of exempting a candidate from NPOL, it's not enough that it exists: rather, it has to demonstrate that either (a) he already had preexisting notability for other reasons that would already have gotten him into Wikipedia before he was ever a candidate for anything, or (b) it demonstrates a credible reason why his candidacy could be considered much more special than everybody else's candidacies, in such a way that even if he loses the election in the end his candidacy itself would still pass the ten year test for enduring significance anyway. Nothing here passes either of those tests. Bearcat (talk) 18:31, 13 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Are you saying that because the subject is running for office, he has to meet GNG _and_ NPOL? That seems odd to me. If we remove the last line about how the subject is running for office, the article still covers his career as Counsel in the House Oversight Committee, Director of a division of the Internet Association, and other points unrelated to candidacy but notable enough to be discussed in reliable sources. Even if he loses the election, we can expect that he won't leave the public spotlight for the next ten years. And one more time: the norm on Wikipedia is to rely on secondary sources to advise GNG, and make an effort to not rely on arguments listed in WP:PPOV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by B k (talk • contribs) 18:56, 13 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I'm saying that because every candidate in every election always receives campaign coverage, and thus every candidate in every election can always claim to have passed GNG and thus be exempted from having to pass NPOL, the existence of campaign coverage is not in and of itself the test of whether the candidate has gotten over GNG in the first place — because if it were, then NPOL itself would be inherently meaningless, because nobody would ever have to pass it at all anymore. GNG does not just count the number of footnotes and keep anybody who has surpassed an arbitrary number — it also tests the sources for their depth, their geographic range, their timeframe and the context of what they're covering the person for.

For example, you say that the article discusses his career as counsel in the House Oversight Committee, and director of a division of the Internet Association — but (a) those aren't inherently notability-clinching roles that guarantee a person an article just for holding them, (b) his career as counsel in the House Oversight Committee is not referenced to sources which demonstrate that he was getting substantive coverage in that role while he was holding it, but to a brief mention of it as career background in coverage of the candidacy, and (c) his job as director of a division of the Internet Association is sourced to a single brief blurb of the "person gets job" variety, which is not in and of itself enough coverage to make him notable for that.

If you can't show ongoing coverage of his work in a job, then the fact that you can show one brief blurb about his initial hiring for it is not a notability clincher all by itself — and if you have to depend on mentions of his prior work as background information in coverage of the candidacy, then you haven't demonstrated that his prior work got him over the "preexisting notability" bar if you can't show that he was already getting notability-making media coverage in that job at the time.

And none of this is my personal opinion, either: it's the established consensus around how political notability works. Politics is one of those fields where people are very highly prone to attempting to misuse Wikipedia as an advertorial PR platform for campaign brochures — so our rules around political notability are very strict because they have to be. And one of those rules is that the existence of campaign coverage is not in and of itself enough to exempt a person from having to pass NPOL on the grounds that he technically has enough press coverage to claim that he passes GNG instead — every single candidate could always make the exact same claim, but we do not indiscriminately accept every candidate as notable enough. So the test for getting a candidate over GNG on campaign coverage alone is not "campaign coverage exists", but "the campaign coverage demonstrates a reason why he's much more special than every other candidate". Bearcat (talk) 15:09, 14 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Keep per WP:GNG. The article contains more than a dozen sources - including ones from universities and nonprofits - explaining why he is an expert on tech policy and specifically AI/ML bias issues. Per most recent edit, the article now contains 23 separate sources. If his NAACP advocacy doesn't rise to the notability threshold, his speaking and advocacy as a part of Internet Association definitely does. Recommend keep. Lalalalllla7 (talk) 13:58, 15 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sources "from universities and non-profits" don't assist in building or supporting notability. Real journalism from real media is the only kind of sourcing that does that. Bearcat (talk) 03:23, 19 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 14:12, 18 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Keep per WP:HEY and WP:GNG. Agree he fails WP:NPOL, but meets GNG. AleatoryPonderings (talk) 14:40, 18 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Accomplished, not yet notable. Caro7200 (talk) 16:11, 18 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]
~~Very, very weak Keep~~ Largely this discussion shows the limitation of GNG and NPOL as guidance for article creation. It is very likely that the page was created because the subject announced their candidacy for Lieutenant Governor of Virginia. As a candidate, the subject does not meet the community expectations of passing WP:NPOL. But, the original article only mentions the candidacy in passing and focuses on the subject's life and career. What we have is numerous sources that suggest the individual has done a number of interesting things that get press coverage, even if those occurrences may not meet the community's notability standards on their own. So, while my inclination is to say "delete" interesting individual and move on, I do think there does becomes a point where an individual does become interesting enough as a spokesperson that a global audience would start caring about a subject. --Enos733 (talk) 16:37, 18 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]
For the most part we have passing mentions (student award), routine PR announcements from employer, and coverage that arises from Perryman's candidacy (which exist for any candidate and to a large extent is feeding self-promotion to the press). If we limit sourcing to pre-2019, before becoming a candidate, it is obvious Perryman is not notable.--Eostrix (^{🦉 hoot} _hoot🦉) 06:39, 19 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Striking vote, leaving rational. Many of the sources are underwhelming even as there is coverage from many parts of the subject's career, especially some of the subject's work with the Fairfax County NAACP (and very recent coverage of his challenges to the racial demographics of the faculty in Fairfax County schools). So, to me, the appropriate standard is, or will soon be, WP:GNG as the subject's work with the NAACP appears unrelated to the subject's Lieutenant Governor run. --Enos733 (talk) 15:23, 24 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. Not (yet) notable. Perhaps recreate after the election. Stifle (talk) 15:44, 27 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to 2021 Virginia lieutenant gubernatorial election. In general we need to recognize that Wikipedia exists in the real world. So while Perryman is not notable on his own, we are well served by having some information, say two or three sentences, present in an article given the coverage that does exist and I don't think Wikipedia should be giving incumbents an advantage (not in play here but generally speaking). More prose on the 2021 LG election page would not, in my mind, be a bad thing. If closed this way I will do the work for all the candidates listed (so we're not giving Perryman UNDUE coverage) if someone pings me. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 01:33, 30 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Merge with 2021 Virginia lieutenant gubernatorial election: very selectively, per Barkeep49. I don't see independent notability here, but it's a plausible search target and he's notable in the context of the election, (a mention at that article is merited). Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 16:02, 30 August 2020 (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.