Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Officer's Guide to Police Pistolcraft

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. WP:SNOW (non-admin closure) RadioFan (talk) 16:27, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The Officer's Guide to Police Pistolcraft[edit]

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Non-notable book. It is a sequel to Police Pistolcraft, which was recently deleted by AfD; this article was listed as being under that AfD, but this book is different and should be considered separately. However, the lack of notability of that predecessor has a bearing on the notability of this sequel. Very narrow in scope, only two refs, and the article seems to be somewhat promotional. The article's original author admitted to having a business relationship with the book's author and/or publisher in the first AfD. I don't see how the sequel is any more notable than the first book. - Realkyhick (Talk to me) 01:03, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - It's the key training manual for the Massachusetts State Police; it's reviewed, referenced, and cited with approval at every major online law enforcement news site I can find; it's discussed as either a key text or relevant text in multiple law enforcement training projects, and as such meets WP:BK. More to the point, the article was created less than a week ago, it's being actively improved by myself and User:Drmies, and it's in the middle of a significant expansion, so we'd appreciate it if we could have a week or so to show you what it could be before people weigh in on the topic. - DustFormsWords (talk) 01:10, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment: You might want to add some more of those references to the article in fairly short order (this AfD lasts five days, sometimes more). And if you could, please comment on how this book might be notable when the first book in the series was determined not to be. In other words, how do they differ? - Realkyhick (Talk to me) 01:14, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - Comment - You're misunderstanding the last AfD. It was closed on the basis that the subject page had become a redirect, pointing to a page about a different subject, not on the merits of the article. To reverse the question - if my claims above are correct, and I can substantiate them, would you argue that a book that changed the direction of law enforcement in at least one state police force, which has multiple reviews in reliable sources, would not be notable? I'm not asking did it/does it, I'm saying if I can establish that, do you still say it's not notable? - DustFormsWords (talk) 01:18, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

- - - My apologies for misunderstanding the previous AfD. I might not have started this one had I realized, but I still believe this subject is not notable. But I am willing to be persuaded, and I've reversed course before. - Realkyhick (Talk to me) 03:14, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
~~Comment~~ Keep - I suspect DustFormsWords may have a case here, but I will withhold a position a bit until that case is made. In the meantime I would strongly suggest that editors desiring to improve this article review ~~WP:Books~~ WP:BOOK and more specifically Notibility (Books) for advice on structuring and sourcing the article.--Mike Cline (talk) 02:50, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I will, I'd forgotten there was format help for this kind of thing. Also I think instead of WP:Books you meant WP:BOOK, which is a different (and more useful) page. - DustFormsWords (talk) 02:56, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

* Indeed, Book not Books, old, tired mind at work. Thanks--Mike Cline (talk) 11:44, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A little help, anyone? - Actually I could really use some help on this one. I'm not a gun owner, gun enthusiast or law enforcement officer, so this is all foreign ground to me. Researching the article is starting to lead me into survivalist and extremist websites, which I'd definitely prefer not to go to on a work connection - or, ideally, ever. Also "police officer" and "readable website design" don't seem to be two terms that go hand in hand; every second place I end up linking to with this looks like something from mid-90s Geocities. If anyone could give me a hand in touching up the article and making it less jargon-filled that would be excellent. - DustFormsWords (talk) 02:56, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I ran into this problem myself. Frankly, some of the sites I ran into began to creep me out a little. Part of the problem I have with this subject is that it is a book for a very narrow market, and therefore does not appear to meet general notability guidelines. I realize that we make exceptions for subjects that are notable for a specific field, but how narrowly do we carry that concept, especially when that narrow focus make information difficult to verify with independent refs? Also this article was originated by someone with an admitted conflict of interest, which always raises big red flags for me. But let's keep digging and see what comes up — hopefully not something unseemly. :-) - Realkyhick (Talk to me) 03:14, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's been argued elsewhere that specialised interest matters can be intensely notable (academic papers that significantly advance obscure disciplines). That's why the general notability guidelines are so broad. You need nothing more than significant discussion in multiple independent reliable sources. Three neutral critical reviews is usually sufficient (and, coincidentally, the article currently cites three neutral critical reviews). - DustFormsWords (talk) 03:31, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - Based on everything that is here so far this seems to just about meet the criteria for Keep. It meets the base criteria for books, it is used as a training manual which appears to make it meet criteria number 4 for books (although in a rather unorthodox way). It also appears to have enough coverage to meet WP:N. The article needs work, but it seems like a keeper. Panyd^{The muffin is not subtle} 15:20, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Law-related deletion discussions. —LadyofShalott 01:22, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Massachusetts-related deletion discussions. —LadyofShalott 01:24, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep though I think it barely squeaks by. The article is a bit too long in my opinion, but for such a specialized book it seems to have received enough attention, and Conti appears to be something of an authority in his field. Drmies (talk) 01:47, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note - The article is now as deletion-proof as I'm capable of making it. While I'm aware of further content that could be included in the article it won't weigh one way or another in terms of notability. I still feel the article could benefit from expert insight and I've accordingly tried to attract the attention of WikiProject Law Enforcement, thus far to no avail. - DustFormsWords (talk) 02:39, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep notability in a special field is sufficient; very little in Wikipedia is notable to everyone. The G in GNG does not refer to "notability to the general interest reader" but the general condition that we use for notability We should probably expand this to cover both books; the other AfD result seems to have been a error which we are now rectifying. DGG ( talk ) 05:13, 16 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. It is a niche audience, I'll grant you that. And this article depends heavily on few sources, one of which is not a RS and I'm going to remove from the article. But the extensive review by Mroz, in particular, makes the difference to me since Mroz is a prolific writer on the topic of defensive firearms use. Niteshift36 (talk) 16:02, 16 February 2010 (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.