Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jennifer MacLean

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. Stifle (talk) 08:55, 12 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Jennifer MacLean

Not notable. Richard Pinch (talk) 06:45, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete as nominator. Evidence of notability in reliable sources is confined to one item, a mention in a list of 100 most influential in her industry. I think this is too weak. Richard Pinch (talk) 06:48, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Strong delete Currently chairperson of IGDA. The online site of IGDA is managed by Elonka Dunin, aka as wikipedia administrator Elonka, who was responsable for a company initiative [1] to insert biographies on wikipedia. Seems to be institutional meatpuppetry; a way of subverting the aims of a scholarly encyclopedia for free publicity. User:Subversified could be another employee. Mathsci (talk) 08:24, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per notability, reliable third party sources, possible conflict of interest. -- Jeandré, 2008-09-07t09:10z

Note: This debate has been included in the list of video game related deletions. MrKIA11 (talk) 12:16, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak keep — She is listed as one of the top 100 women by Edge Online here. Regardless of potential WP:COI and meatpuppetry problems, there does exist a scant amount of verifiability in this article. conflict of interest issues can be reported to WP:COIN if necessary. MuZemike (talk) 20:02, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Unjustified accusations of bad faith should be sanctioned. The Enchantress Of Florence (talk) 21:31, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. No real notability, nor is there much in the way of sources to actually base an article on. --CalendarWatcher (talk) 21:52, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. In a male-dominated industry like video games, it's not unusual for there to be just a few press mentions about women. The fact that she's the chair of a significant trade organization also makes her notable, regardless of gender. Subversified (talk) 22:06, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Some interesting general points here. Firstly, it implicitly accepts that there are insufficient references to justify retention but attributes that to prejudice rather than lack of notability -- there is no consensus for that being an argument for retention. Secondly, there is currently no consensus that being the chair (for one year) of a trade association confers notability -- this would be quite new. Richard Pinch (talk) 06:10, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note. I'm far from an expert on wikipedia precedents. She's obviously notable to me, someone working in the videogame industry, so I did a little searching to find out what wikipedia considers to be a notable person. I went here Wikipedia:Generally_notable_people and found these things that I thought applied. "The person has made a widely recognized contribution that is part of the enduring historical record in his or her specific field." I believe this is proved with the list of her credits referenced on the article page. Further down the page, under creative professionals, I believe these apply. "The person is regarded as an important figure or is widely cited by their peers or successors." I believe her inclusion in the list from Edge Magazine proves this. Also in being elected as Chair of a major industry organization. She was elected by her peers, not hired as an employee by the organization. "The person has created, or played a major role in co-creating, a significant or well-known work, or collective body of work, which has been the subject of an independent book or feature-length film, or of multiple independent periodical articles or reviews." Perhaps the article needs to make it more clear that she was influential in creating the Civilization games, one of the most well-known videogames even beyond the industry. Subversified (talk) 19:15, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The explanatory note to "enduring historical record" quoted reads Generally, a person who is "part of the enduring historical record" will have been written about, in depth, independently in multiple history books on that field, by historians -- not the case here. As regards the body of work you mention, this is not referred to at all in the article. Richard Pinch (talk) 22:15, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note to closing admin — There is an open request for comment on the admin in question as we speak. MuZemike (talk) 01:45, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - lightweight guff per WP:NN and WP:BIO Shot info (talk) 06:45, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. MacLean is notable, considering that she's the chair of an international non-profit, and is listed as one of the most influential women in the industry. I do agree that the sources on this article could be improved, to clarify notability. --El on ka 13:32, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Keep: Not so much that I'm sold on the subject's notability - the award is about all that holds me here - but that this is being used as a blatant stalking horse is a WP:POINT violation is objectionable. To suggest that the subject is non-notable because she's chair of a company associated with an admin associated with a project to (wait for it) add or expand Wikipedia articles is baroque beyond belief. I just went to the link Mathsci posted, and saw the ghastly clarion call of: "The goal of the IGDA Wikipedia Initiative is to identify those IGDA game developers who are notable enough to have biographies on Wikipedia, who either do not yet have such a biography, or whose bio needs to be expanded, and to create or expand those biographies as appropriate." Is that wording any different from the mission statements of a hundred Wikiprojects? If you subtracted "IGDA game developers" and substituted "20th century African novelists" would anyone bat an eye? There may be bad faith at work here, but it isn't in the article. Ravenswing 13:51, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I believe that the argument "chair of allegedly notable organisation implies notable" is wrong: or at least, runs counter to WP:NOTINHERITED, where notability of a parent entity or topic (of a parent-child "tree") does not always imply the notability of the subordinate entities would seem to apply. Richard Pinch (talk) 17:53, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
weak delete I'm trying to ignore the drama. The award comes close. If it were a game or book with such an award, I'd likely go weak keep. But with people we tend to be more selective. Hobit (talk) 18:30, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Further comment A single RS that covers the subject in any kind of detail would push this over the bar to keep for me. In a search of news, I'm finding her quoted in one article, and a PRwire article in another. But if something better does exist, consider this a keep vote. Hobit (talk) 18:36, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. A brief mention in a top 100 list does not notability make, particularly when most of the other people in the list appear to be equally non-notable. We don't have an article for every vice-president or chair of directors of a notable organisation. - makomk (talk) 11:29, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: Reuters calls her One of Industry's Most Influential Women here. The article just needs some expansion. XF Law (talk) 11:56, 11 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

To be precise, Reuters repeat the press release of the company she works for, quoting again the single article that named her one of the 100 most influential etc. The clue is in the Reuters URL and comparing it with the press release already cited in the article. The question remains as to whether that single article is enough to establish notability. Richard Pinch (talk) 17:13, 11 September 2008 (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.