Talk:Alex Steffen

Content on the book
Hi. I think the Alex Steffen article is developing pretty well, at this point. It's good that the book, WorldChanging, is described favorably. I like the book. I've learned from it and continue to learn from it. I've recommended and shown it to several people, and will continue to do so. But I have mixed feelings about the amount of material in the current A.S. article that's devoted to his book. For one thing, so much of this section consists of lengthy quotes from reviews and from book promos by credible, noteworthy people – and the quotes are, overall, quite bulky. As time goes on and the book has become more generally familiar to the public, this amount of material will be unnecessary and less appropriate.

The material will need paraphrasing and streamlining. In the long run, it is probably content that in its current form is simply inappropriate to an encyclopedia. Reads too much like promo or fan material. And I say this although I'm a fan. Joel Russ 17:51, 11 August 2007 (UTC)


 * What a lovely little resume Mr. Steffen has written for himself here! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.35.153.222 (talk) 18:56, 22 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I think it may be time to reduce the material descriptive of the WorldChanging book. The book is no longer new.  It's been reviewed a lot – readers can go to Amazon.com or wherever to find quoted reivews, and assessments by customer/readers.  The section is just too long, besides which other sections of this article om Mr. Seffen attest to his recognition, his thoughts, and his activities.  The article should be shaped more like an encyclopedia article now.Joel Russ (talk) 00:41, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Structure and citations
While we want to be respectful to the many authors of this entry, I think a top-to-bottom rewrite of this entry would be useful.

It's not very clearly structured or complete, dwells too long on the book (as Joel notes below), has muddled citations, doesn't say much about AS' ideas, neglects AS' best known work, at WorldChanging.

There is clearly some conflict about whether some of the descriptions are appropriate or not. Some seem descriptive and appropriate to me: in other cases, more information is clearly called for. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.53.196.2 (talk) 04:37, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

The difference between encyclopedia articles and marketing advertisements
As other editors have indicated before, previous versions of this article seem to have been written by someone who more familiar with the writing style of marketing texts and book blurbs than with the neutral, factual style which is required in Wikipedia - or indeed, common to most encyclopedias, a text genre which that author seems not to have read frequently.

I have started to bring this article into a form more with Wikipedia principles such as Neutral point of view and Verifiability, and I explained the changes in my edits comments (see ).

For example, there were six sources cited for the claim that Mr. Steffen
 * is considered to be one of the world's leading thinkers about environmental sustainability, technological innovation and social reform,

but none of them actually supported the claim in that form.

Unfortunately, 67.53.196.2 keeps reverting back to the old, advertising-like version (as he/she does in Worldchanging) without addressing these concerns, only mentioning one point. To answer this one again:

67.53.196.2 does not seem to understand why "award-winning" is one of those listed under Avoid_peacock_terms. A quick explanation: "Award-winning" is a very vague term which does not indicate the importance of the award in question - is is the Nobel Prize in Literature or the first place in a college student writing contest? Because of this wide range, the term is quite meaningless in an encyclopedic context.

We can discuss other changes here, but I really would appreciate it if 67.53.196.2 would first familiarize himself with Wikipedia's policies and understand that Wikipedia is not a free advertising space.

Regards, High on a tree (talk) 14:58, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

The media mentioned in the "Media Coverage and Response" section
This section of the article says that Alex Steffens 'ideas have been covered' in the long litany of magazines, radio and TV programs, etc that are now given in the article. But there is a difference between real focus on (or substantial discussion of) a writer or his/her ideas and simple mention in a book review. This list given in the article is suspicious.

I like Mr. Steffen's work and respect him as a thinker, speaker, and activist. But the article loses credibility if it just name drops and is fluffed out by rather insubstantial claims.

Look at the Wikipedia treatment of other major thinkers and writers for comparison. Very few of them strain to make a splash for an author or his/her work, even though many authors have been mentioned in hundreds of publications, or radio or TV shows. I realize that not all Wikipedia biographic articles are written the same way, by any means. But my point is that this degree of media name dropping is unusual to the point of being ludicrous.Joel Russ (talk) 17:36, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Updated perspective on Mr. Steffen's contributions needed
Much of the material still included in the Alex Steffen article strains at establishing that Mr. Steffen is an important thinker and communicator. This material could be further reduced, because the point could be made with less.

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill has been a huge news story and has underscored, in the public mind, the urgency of a better relationship with our natural environment. Why not trim the fooferah about Mr. Steffen's book and his celebrity, and add some mention of what Mr. Steffen has been saying about this (and other) high-profile recent issues, and provide links to web sites that publish his comments on these issues?Joel Russ (talk) 15:07, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

External links modified
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