I didn’t know there was a Legal Insurrection entry at Wikipedia until I found out it had been deleted
Can someone figure out what is going on? Here is the Google cache version, if that helps.
I need to fix this before my in-laws find out.
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Comments
What are you asking here? Why there's an entry or why it's been deleted?
I am not an "approved author" for Wikipedia, so I can't help you. From the warning block it sounds like all blogs are subject to this deletion if the entry is not sufficiently "justified." From all I've read, no Conservative blog entry would be approved by the Wikipedia "reviewers." I am sure more will post as the day goes on with helpful information.
Tell the in-laws that you are one of the country's top blogs!! That should make them happy!! (hopefully)
It looks like this following item was the specific reason for the deletion under the criteria for speedy deletion of Wikipedia.
"A7. No indication of importance (individuals, animals, organizations, web content).
An article about a real person, individual animal(s), organization (e.g. band, club, company, etc., except schools), or web content that does not indicate why its subject is important or significant. This is distinct from verifiability and reliability of sources, and is a lower standard than notability. This criterion applies only to articles about web content and to articles about people, organizations, and individual animals themselves, not to articles about their books, albums, software, or other creative works. This criterion does not apply to species of animals, only to individual animal(s). The criterion does not apply to any article that makes any credible claim of significance or importance even if the claim is not supported by a reliable source or does not qualify on Wikipedia's notability guidelines.[4] The criterion does apply if the claim of significance or importance given is not credible. If the claim's credibility is unclear, you can improve the article yourself, propose deletion, or list the article at articles for deletion."
The "Legal insurrection" entry that was posted was rather hastily cobbled together and put there by someone who failed to even capitalize the word "Insurrection," and who gave no description of the "the claim of significance or importance" of the site.
So, it is pretty clear that the determination was not a permanent exclusion, just a deletion of that posting.
As two examples of other conservative blog sites, each of which spell out that "claim of significance or importance", see the posts for "Hot Air (news site)" and "Powerline."
Watch out professor, the entry for you as a person is also on the chopping block, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_A._Jacobson
Apparently Wikipedia doesn't believe Professor Jacobson is a notable enough person to warrant an entry on a web-site that most schools won't allow a student to use as a primary source when making reports. I wouldn't worry too much about it.
The entry was probably attacked politically which is a common occurrence on Wikipedia. Many times they have to lock entries to keep editing wars from breaking out. Your website is conservative and controversial so the thought police are after you.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_A._Jacobson
If you click on the "view history" you will see who has been editing an entry.
People who have been editing your William A. Jacobson page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Feezo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/206.230.48.50
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mandarax
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Epbr123
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Cydebot
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Notyourbroom
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Nick_C
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:FerventCowboyKiller
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:FrescoBot
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ironholds
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Siind
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:AMuseo
(a sock puppet of below)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Historicist
http://toolserver.org/~soxred93/articleinfo/index.php?article=William_A._Jacobson⟨=en&wiki;=wikipedia
http://toolserver.org/~daniel/WikiSense/Contributors.php?wikilang=en&wikifam;=.wikipedia.org&grouped;=on&page;=William_A._Jacobson
This is the guy who removed the Legal Insurrection entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Stephen
He has deleted 8500 pages, including yours. He does not seem too political. In any case the Legal Insurraction entry can be recreated, it needs some good sources to establish it's bona fides.
Wikipedia was used as a tool in the Global Warming debates as a place to post ad hominem attacks on any scientist who criticized or refuted the Global Warming thesis. People, including a PR firm in British Columbia, would seek out any negative information on skeptics and post it on Wikipedia sometimes leading to very bad results for people's career prospects.
The attack on your personal posting which is characterized as an "academic posting" looks to me like it is decidedly more personal (having been posted by an editor as "uncontroversially a deletion candidate") . . . but because it is only a "proposed deletion" the process for addressing which is described here, there is certainly time to deal with it . . . i.e. after 02:41 on 1 February, in order to remove that designation.
Once removed, it cannot be put on the chopping block again. "An article may be PRODed only once."
Thereafter, of course, you'll need to keep an eye on it because undoubtedly some wags out there will attempt to edit the posting to include false or highly canted information about you.
Try adding some citations that demonstrate your CV and/or 'blog are, in fact, notable.
IIRC, a person is not allowed to create their own entry, but once it is up there, they are free to edit it, and unbiased citations are the best way to support the inclusion of what one writes on one's page.
Do any of my readers have the ability to edit / add to Wikipedia entries? If so, can you try to deal with the deletion of the Legal Insurrection entry and the pending deletion of my personal entry?
Good update, viator.
As I noted above, I don't think the deletion of the blog name was political. It certainly should be re-posted and expanded to include "the claim of significance or importance" of the site. There is no question that description should include the undeniable role this site played in the successful senatorial race of Scott Brown in Massachusetts, among other matters.
But as for the "Proposed deletion" and flurry of activity on the "William A. Jacobson" posting, well . . . I smell a rat.
Hello from Australia. I've been editing Wikipedia for a few years, and can explain what's happening (but not reverse or prevent the deletions, alas).
Despite what many people think, Wikipedia is NOT based on the knowledge of we who write it. Instead it is (supposedly) a collection of statements from 'reliable sources', meaning fact-checked publications such as newspapers, magazines, academic books, and academic papers. There's a general rule that any person, organization etc that has been the main topic of two or more 'reliable' reports is 'notable' enough for an article. (There are also specific rules about this 'wiki-notability' in specific areas: for example, any academic holding a named chair is automatically wiki-notable.) Moreover, any article which does not mention why the topic is wiki-notable can be deleted; this is what happened to the 'Legal Insurrection' article.
If it's any consolation, Prof Jacobson, you are not the only conservative blogger to be disadvantaged by those rules. For both commercial and ideological reasons the MSM is very reluctant to cover (ie., give free publicity to) conservative blogs, so it is often very hard to demonstrate wiki-notability. As a related example, we once had a fairly good article about zombietime, but it was deleted despite my best efforts. (I'm the "CWC" in that discussion.)
The wiki-notability rules have lots of problems (as does pretty much every area of Wikipedia, really…). A good set of rules would classify this blog as wiki-notable, but I have no idea how to write such rules, let alone get them accepted.
And all this from the wonderful people at Wikipedia who falsely and libelously (slanderously?) attributed some silly racist quotes to Rush Limbaugh and allowed them to stand for years? Say it ain't so! These nasty folks use that site to break laws and take pot shots at anyone they disagree with, usually conservatives. I'd consider it a badge of honor, Wikipedia hates me also. They call my ideas "vandalism".
BTW, congrats professor on reaching your 1,000 facebook "likes".
Hi, Professor!
The criteria for a WP article require that the topic's "notability" be demonstrated. The usual evidence for this is press coverage or other published writings on the subject (passing references may not be enough). If the article about your blog didn't have footnotes to demonstrate such coverage, it's a candidate for deletion, fair and square.
I've taken part in a few deletion discussions on WP, and the participants do make a serious attempt to search the web for material to back up any article that has been proposed for deletion. When such material is found, some editor will add references to the article, and the deletion proposal is rejected. The discussion and voting is open to any Wikipedia user with a registered username, so there's no cabal running everything. If there's no consensus, no action is taken.
A deletion decision is not final, and if the Professor or his blog become the subject of published writings in the future, then someone can create an article then.
The whole point of Wikipedia is that anyone can edit it. Of course, that is the problem as well. I’ve edited many articles over the years, and finally created a user id in 2006. Just like here on Blogspot, that is a completely automated process which anyone can do. Most articles can be edited without even signing in, but some more heavily edited articles are protected, which requires the editor to sign in first. I can be reached on Wikipedia as “hald”.
i wouldn't lose much sleep over any issue dealing with wiki.