Talk:Booknotes

Request for assistance re: C-SPAN's Booknotes
I've prepared a proposed improvement / replacement for this article, which at present is clearly lacking references, as well as much information that I believe should be included. The current article is little more than an overgrown stub. My proposed replacement version can be found in my user sub-space, here: User:WWB_Too/Booknotes. This version is more substantial, and everything within is carefully sourced, primarily to newspaper articles. I've also written the article with WP:NPOV, WP:VERIFY, WP:SPAM and related policies and guidelines in mind.

Because I work with C-SPAN's communications team, I would like for someone else to weigh in. I have previously asked for assistance at WikiProject Television, without response as yet. If you are so inclined, please give it a read, offer any thoughts if further work is necessary, or just let me know that you think it's appropriate to move, or move it as you like. Looking forward to your input. Cheers, WWB Too (talk) 15:17, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

This users improvement looks better to me its well organized and written. DavidR2010 (talk) 17:12, 4 November 2010 (UTC)DavidR2010DavidR2010 (talk) 17:12, 4 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Agreed, the re-write looks much better. The only suggestion I have would be to link any of the newspaper articles that are available online. I wrote the Brian Lamb article and have his biography, Founding Father. I know the program was discussed in the book, but read it a while ago. I'll add anything I can find later, but for now I'd say go for it! --  black ngold29  17:27, 4 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks to you both for looking at this. Good suggestion about adding links where available; I ran a search for each, and it turns out that only the NY Times article is online—most are just too old. In any case, I will move this over shortly. Anything else you might have to add, especially from that book, would be great. Cheers, WWB Too (talk) 19:55, 4 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Looks good, sounds completely neutral (no POV). – sgeureka t•c 16:03, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

=Contents of old List of Booknotes interviews page= I split the old page List of Booknotes interviews into one page each for the years 1989 - 2004. The contents of that page's discussion tab are shown below. I am redirecting that article to this one. Here is a link to the history of List of Booknotes Interviews, and here is a link to the discussion page: Talk:List of Booknotes interviews. KConWiki (talk) 03:58, 11 September 2011 (UTC)


 * This was a good-faith effort, but the inline links in the various pages appears to violate the guidelines on how to use external links, particularly how they are used in lists. ~TPW 17:45, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Splitting into pages by year?
My thought is to split this one huge page into 16 pages, one for each year. Any comment? KConWiki (talk) 02:35, 9 July 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, seeing no objections, I am going to leave this as a page with the links to the individual pages by year. That will help preserve some of the page history, too. KConWiki (talk) 01:56, 11 September 2011 (UTC)
 * After further thought - I am going to redirect this page to the main Booknotes article. However, I am also going to copy the contents of this page on to the discussion page for that article, and leave links to both the main page history and this discussion page.

Links need fixing
Also, the official Booknotes sites has changed the addresses of individual pages. This will need to be fixed here. KConWiki (talk) 02:36, 9 July 2011 (UTC)
 * This should be all taken care of now. KConWiki (talk) 02:08, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Work in progress
This is a work in progress. KConWiki (talk) 14:02, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

To-do list

 * Do we want links to each interview on this page? -- YES! - DONE
 * Put whole article into approp. categories. - DONE
 * Go through author names in red, link or redirect if needed (i.e. Col. David Hackworth) DONE (First pass)
 * Review each author name in blue for any names leading to someone other than the author (incl. disambig pages) and fix. DONE
 * Check titles with colon, spacing, and capitalization issues (i.e., Clever title:Clever subtitle -- No space after colon) DONE
 * Check for ampersands that should be "and" DONE
 * Standardize width of table columns - (Can't find the formatting to do this. What is it?) - Copying from List of Beverly Hills, 90210 episodes
 * Do we want to add another column w/ links to the subject matter? Example: Empires of Light: Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse, and the Race to Electrify the World -- Link to Thomas Edison, Nicola Tesla, George Westinghouse, History of electromagnetism. - YES DONE
 * Figure out at least one linkable article related to the content of the book. DONE
 * Scan for memoirs/autobiographies and include links shown below. DONE
 * Look at all book titles
 * Scan book titles for likely candidates for books w/ existing Wiki articles and link them. DONE
 * If appropriate, add a link to the pertinent transcript or interview. DONE
 * Example:  *Booknotes interview with Brzezinski on The Grand Failure, April 2, 1989. 
 *  [http Booknotes interview with XXX on XXX, MONTH DATE, YEAR.] 
 * Doing book articles first - DONE
 * Then, do author articles and/or subject articles
 * Linked interviews to author pages through Shelby Foote, for those authors whose books already have a page (and thus, already had a link made that could be copied and pasted).
 * Redirect those books that do not deserve their own pages to the pages of their authors; However, do not wikilink those book titles on this page. (MAYBE - Low priority)
 * Add deserving wiki pages (or categories)? Example: Stevenson political family
 * Scan author names in red for worthy candidates for article creation. Examples: Annette Gordon-Reed, Haynes Johnson (Somebody beat me to both of these!)
 * Scan book titles for candidates for books that should have Wiki articles and create them. Examples: No Ordinary Time, Gilbert biography of Churchill

Memoirs/Autobiographies
For memoirs and autobiographies, I am including the phrase Memoir/Autobiography along with a link to one or two articles that are commonly associated with the author. (Such as The Vietnam War for David Hackworth.)

Memoir/Autobiography;

Premiere date can't be right
This says the first episode aired April 2, 1989 with Zbigniew Brzezinsk as guest. But if you watch that video on the C-Span website, the date stamp on the video itself is "04-09-1989." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:6C55:6700:342:C912:D784:1093:F9C2 (talk) 07:14, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

"Complete list of Booknotes interviews" listed at Redirects for discussion
A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Complete list of Booknotes interviews. The discussion will occur at Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 January 24 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Elliot321 (talk &#124; contribs) 12:11, 24 January 2021 (UTC)