Talk:Michael Kelly (editor)

To put it bluntly...
Does anyone know if Wilbert Davis died in the crash too, and if so can they add it to the article? ʄ! •¿talk?  02:15, 2 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Both men died. I've clarified.  --JayHenry (talk) 02:27, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Glass Scandal in Introduction
A vandal appears to be trying to whitewash Kelly's role in the Glass scandal from the introduction. Due to the film on the scandal, that is probably what is he best known for, outside of relatively small U.S. journalistic circles, and as such belongs in the intro. Karaff (talk) 03:37, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Well, I think you struck a nice balance there. Scooge (talk) 06:59, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

GAWKER, really? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.233.47.79 (talk) 20:29, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

COI edit request
I cannot edit this page, as it is about my late father, and I do not want to violate the COI guidelines that I so frequently warn other users for ignoring. However, I do feel that this article has significant problems, namely in that it focuses almost entirely on my father's involvement in a scandal to which he was tangential, and ignores the bulk of his journalistic career. I won't pretend to be unbiased about this, but all I know is that when I meet people and they find out who my father was, they always mention his political commentary, not his involvement in the Stephen Glass scandal. There are several useful sources which this article does not reference, including his New York Times obituary and his official biography at the Kelly Award website. This strikes me as an article where a relatively small amount of effort could create a relatively large positive change; all an unbiased editor needs to do is look over these sources and update the article to reflect more broadly on his career, as opposed to a brief, if notable, chapter in it.

Also, would anyone object if I removed the "To hell with Michael Kelly" post on this talk page? It seems quite uncivil, and I think if I saw an editor speaking so rudely of the dead on any other talk page, I'd delete the comments. — further, Francophonie&#38;Androphilie sayeth naught (Je vous invite à me parler) 18:28, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

1. Make a specific request, such as please change THIS to THAT (using reference SOMETHING) and people here can consider it. We can't deal with a nebulous request to 'make it better'. An unbiased editor could work with such a request.

2. Sure, I removed it.

Please feel free to post further but please, be specific about suggested changes. Thanks. Shaz0t (talk) 23:37, 18 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Right right right. I knew that rule and completely forgot it.  I'll give a specific request next time I feel like actual content-editing. — Francophonie&#38;Androphilie  (Je vous invite à me parler ) 02:33, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
 * A conflict of interest is only a problem if the edit is problematic. No need for edit requests, unless it is an edit of a non-neutral or poorly verified nature. Drmies (talk) 00:33, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Very good point, and there are still a few noncontroversial things that could use some touching up. I just didn't want to look like a new user trying to pick up some credibility and then promptly get down to his real, COI-tinted motives. Of course, my general laziness when it comes to actual content edits extends even here, so I doubt it should ever be an issue. Think I need to put up a connected contributor here, just in case? — Francophonie&#38;Androphilie (Je vous invite à me parler ) 00:45, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I didn't know such a template existed. Again, I wouldn't worry about it. If an edit is highlighted and held up to scrutiny, whether it passes the neutrality test or not won't depend on a template somewhere but on its own merit. (I'm starting to sound like Pascal.) If your motives are indeed to turn this or some other article into a whatever, those edits will probably be scrutinized and reverted anyway. Just go ahead and touch up whatever needs touching up (a photo would be nice), and if it's more than a touch-up be mindful of the usual requirements. Sorry if that sounds mundane. ;) I need to read this article more carefully: he seemed like an interesting man, but I have some other issues to deal with right now. Happy days, Drmies (talk) 01:04, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Nope, sounds perfect. À vous aussi. — Francophonie&#38;Androphilie (Je vous invite à me parler ) 01:06, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
 * F&A, if you have any pictures, a photo might make a good addition to the article.  Λυδ α  cιτγ  11:26, 10 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Yeah, yeah, I'll get to it. Leave it to me to procrastinate something that would simultaneously benefit my father's article and effectively prove my defense against any future sockpuppet accusations. Oh well. But yeah, I'll upload one soon-ish. — Francophonie&#38;Androphilie (Je vous invite à me parler ) 11:35, 10 December 2012 (UTC)
 * A photo of Kelly with his family (including four-year-old Tom) would be a fine second choice, after a portrait-style photo in the infobox. Binksternet (talk) 14:41, 10 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Btw, a photo of his grave would also be appropriate as the cemetery he's buried in has numerous well-known people and is thoroughly documented.Crtew (talk) 00:36, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

Feature Status
Let's bring this article up to feature article status! Please contribute ideas below about what this article needs. Crtew (talk) 00:38, 12 December 2012 (UTC)


 * I like your enthusiasm but there are prerequisites to writing an FA-Class biography. It would be very helpful to have a well-written book dedicated to describing Kelly's career, for instance. Chip Scanlan's Kelly bio at Poynter gets partway there but it is short on background, very short. My opinion (as an experienced editor of GA and FA articles) is that this biography can rise to GA with a little work but FA is probably too unlikely. Binksternet (talk) 05:41, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

COI edits to this article
I'll quote the guideline: "You should not create or edit articles about yourself, your family or your close friends." I haven't said anything about this until now, but I think its time for User:PinkAmpersand to step away from this article. It's one thing for a new user to arrive and ask honestly "As the subject's son, I have the most direct connection to this subject, but would improvement along these lines by against NPOV?". It's quite another for the editor to actually edit the pagespace himself, especially in the arena of what sources say regarding legacy and criticism. I don't think it serves PinkAmpersand or the article well. Further, I think any edits by the son of a subject will eventually draw media attention and reflect badly on Wikipedia in general and this page's watchers/stewards in specific. I urge PinkAmpersand to stop editing this livespace. I'll deign not to go into the substance of his recent edits, but the types of edits he has made recently have, in my humble opinion, crossed the COI guideline in a slippery slope way. BusterD (talk) 09:21, 17 April 2013 (UTC)


 * If he's made an edit that is objectionable, then we should talk about that edit. But in my dealings with him, I have found that he has followed the policy to the letter. If you read lower than the above quote, policy clearly states: "Some editors declare an interest in a particular topic area. The benefits of this are that most editors will appreciate your honesty and may try to help you; you lay the basis for requesting help from others to post material for you, or to review material you wish to post yourself." That's exactly what he's done. However, any editor helping should make independent verification and decisions -- positive or negative about the subject. Furthermore, the same policy lists a number of non-controversial edits that can be made. The guideline in this case of a declared COI, is that someone can object to an edit, and that makes it controversial. So what edit are we talking about? Crtew (talk) 09:57, 17 April 2013 (UTC)


 * I see no problems here. The reason we have a COI guideline is to prevent non-neutral editing, and I see none of that. Binksternet (talk) 14:14, 17 April 2013 (UTC)


 * The majority of my edits to this article have been minor in nature. The most controversial thing I've done has probably been to add uncited data involving the awards, after they'd been given out but before any press statements had been released. (I couldn't find anything in WP:NOR strictly prohibiting this, since it's not original theory or anything... regardless, I added the citation as soon as it was available.) The only edits I've made vis-à-vis his legacy and criticism have been these two wording changes, which didn't actually remove any critical comments, but simply avoided putting any point of view in the encyclopedia's voice; I also clearly invoked a variation of WP:BRD in my edit summaries. If you and others feel that my edits weren't neutral, then I'll gladly stop touching any controversial parts of the article and use request edit in the future. Otherwise, though, I think I have just as much a right to edit this article as anyone else, since I'd like to think it's pretty well-established that I'm not a single-purpose account. (Oh, I also made this edit of a similar vein a few months ago... once again, a minor phrasing change so that something read more like summary than synthesis.)
 * BTW, in the future, if you want to get my attention about something, it's much quicker to post on my talk page than to post here. — PinkAmpers  &#38;  ( Je vous invite à me parler )  14:03, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
 * When I was working with you, I actually found using your tips helpful in adjusting my search terms. As for your summary above, everything sounds above board to me, but I wouldn't add any information that can't be independently verified with an outside source (on the Internet or through other widely published forms). Crtew (talk) 14:32, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Article organization
I found the organization of this article to be a little odd and not really encyclopedic. Normally when I real a bio page, I expect the sections in this order: 1) Early life 2) Career (can be divided into early and later career, or into different topic areas or work areas, etc.) 3) Views, or discussion of critical analyses that sources have made of the subject's work, etc. 4) Personal life concluding with death, or in the case of a notable death (as here) maybe a section on death (as here). Sometimes (3) and (4) can be swapped.

However, it's really strange to read an article organized with early life followed by death (particularly a notable death, as here) leading the article before we even get to what else the man did during his career. This may not have been intended, but there is a possible interpretation that the arguably heroic death of a war correspondent in combat is being used to draw attention away from the subject's notable involvement in scandal which occurs further down the page - or at least make the leading part of the article more positive.

It would seem more consistent with the requirement for neutral tone to present the early life and career chronologically and end with the subject's death rather than leading with it. TheBlinkster (talk) 19:27, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20141016032951/http://gawker.com/5993525/a-stupid-death-in-a-stupid-war-remembering-michael-kelly to http://gawker.com/5993525/a-stupid-death-in-a-stupid-war-remembering-michael-kelly
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External links modified
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I have just modified 2 external links on Michael Kelly (editor). Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://archive.is/20130201161256/http://www.salemnews.com/local/x1150899109/Five-years-later-Kelly-family-has-good-days-and-bad to http://www.salemnews.com/local/x1150899109/Five-years-later-Kelly-family-has-good-days-and-bad
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'both political parties'
As a non-US reader I found the sentence "Kelly was critical of the political establishment in both political parties" a bit unclear. I've added a link so it now reads "...political establishment in both political parties". Not sure if this is the best way to approach this? Any feedback welcome. Ascendingrisingharmonising (talk) 16:15, 20 March 2022 (UTC)

Gawker as a source for a high-profile biography
SouthernNights: It seems that you reverted my removal of Tom Scocca's opinion on Kelly's legacy – I should ask, what business does his opinion have in this article? I'd have to imagine that if it criticism is to be included, it should be from somewhere much more qualified than a sensationalist gossip blog... theleekycauldron (talk • contribs) (she/they) 00:31, 24 June 2022 (UTC)
 * The source is an opinion column from Gawker's editor at the time about Kelly's legacy. The column was referenced by Ta-Nehisi Coates in The Atlantic (who wrote it was a "very hard—and very fair—assessment of Kelly's role in the Iraq War"), by Michael Tomasky in The Daily Beast (who called it "a fantastic piece up at Gawker putting Kelly's death into what seems to me the proper perspective") and by Jonathan Chait in New York Magazine, among other places. This take on Kelly's life and legacy was influential, agreed with and supported by other reliable sources, and meets Wikipedia's requirements.--SouthernNights (talk) 12:14, 25 June 2022 (UTC)
 * This is a difficult situation. Gawker is not a reliable source for facts per RSP, but we're not talking about facts here, but rather an opinion, and under WP:RSOPINION there are no reliability issues. The question then becomes whether the opinion is influential enough to warrant mention. I was planning to weigh in as neutral on that, but seeing SouthernNights' evidence of several high-profile individuals referencing it, I have to conclude that it's due and should be included. &#123;{u&#124; Sdkb  }&#125;  talk 20:21, 25 June 2022 (UTC)
 * (COI comment) I've avoided commenting on this passage for years, even when a few people in my family have asked me to, but since we're discussing it now, I will point out briefly that the words "As Scocca said" place the subsequent quote in the encyclopedia's voice, which I would say runs afoul of MOS:EDITORIAL and WP:NPOV. Changing it to something like "Scocca further wrote" would solve that, I think. I offer that without comment on whether the quotes should be included at all. Oh, and while I'm here, "Gawker" should be italicized.  --  Tamzin  [ cetacean needed ] (she&#124;they&#124;xe) 07:34, 3 July 2022 (UTC)
 * I've gone and made the suggested changes, including the italics, which I forgot to mention in my edit summary. I don't have any strong opinions about whether the passage should stay or go however. Graham 87 15:42, 3 July 2022 (UTC)
 * I'm totally good with the "Scocca further wrote" phrasing.--SouthernNights (talk) 17:20, 3 July 2022 (UTC)

Edit request 3 July 2022
Would someone mind adding bidirectional hatnotes to this and Michael Kelly (journalist)? here; there.

(Or perhaps the latter should be at Michael Kelly (Irish journalist), with the "(journalist)" title redirecting here. I'd say this is the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for a journalist named Michael Kelly, and both men are/were both journalists and editors, so I question whether "journalist" vs. "editor" is sufficient disambiguation.) --  Tamzin  [ cetacean needed ] (she&#124;they&#124;xe) 02:13, 4 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Done ... I've moved the Irish journalist to Michael Kelly (Irish journalist). I also added an "other uses" to the hatnote because of Mike Kelly (journalist). Graham 87 03:41, 4 July 2022 (UTC)