Talk:Red Circle Authors

Discussion of sources
Copied from reviewing comments and user talk page discussions

Your comment regarding number of references on Draft: Red Circle Authors
Hi RoySmith, thank you for leaving a comment on Draft:Red Circle Authors. This is my first article and I have been wondering what to do so getting a comment is really helpful, especially an actionable one! Following various edits and help from others to make the article's text more suitable I added more references as I was told previously there were not enough and more is better.

Nonetheless, I understand that it is time consuming to review them. To show that this publisher is notable and has not been mentioned just in passing by one major publication/news source I would like to point you to three references:

1) The Japan Times, Japan’s oldest and most important English language newspaper (https://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/2018/12/22/books/red-circle-authors-sending-japanese-literature-westward/) - ref No. 2. They ran a full feature on Red Circle Authors;

2) An article that cites the publisher in the Nikkei Asia Review (owner of the FT) (https://asia.nikkei.com/Life-Arts/Arts/Bull-market-in-bungaku-highlights-Japanese-literary-revival) ref No. 6 that says Red Circle Authors is "an ambitious publishing venture"and;

3): an article in the publishing industry magazine (Publishing Perspectives) linked to the world’s largest international book fair, written by the former President of the International Publishers Association (IPA), citing Red Circle Authors as a publisher that other publishers should take a look at. ref No 3. (https://publishingperspectives.com/2019/02/richard-charkin-nine-lessons-from-an-indie-publisher/).

These three examples, I think, indicate that this new publisher is notable. The third one is more of a passing reference but given who, where, and how it is referenced I feel it also shows the publisher is notable and worthy of attention. Another longer discussion of the publisher and its books can be found in ref 23 (https://www.popmatters.com/books-red-circle-minis-2630072908.html). If you wish to review another after looking at these three, I would suggest this one.

There are also several in Japanese by major Japanese news publications (Kyodo and Mainichi Shimbun) which are obviously much harder to review. I hope this reply is appropriate & helpful, and apologies for its length --WikiGeoffrey (talk) 15:35, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, WikiRoySmith, for you additional comments. I can continue adding more references to this as there are many. I think, however, this is not the main issue now. I and others have edited it to remove/reduce the promotional tone. We can remove the sentence "Commentators and reviewers said after their publications that the approach taken was "not about resizing big books into small objects, but rather about celebrating textual brevity in book form itself" [23] [24]something that Japan has a long tradition of[25]" would that be enough? Do you have any other suggestions of how to follow up to 1) improve and 2) get a review of the Japanese sources if that is really required? WikiGeoffrey —Preceding undated comment added 16:25, 26 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I suggest asking at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Japan to see if you can find any additional reviewers. At this point, I'll step back and let others give their input.  -- RoySmith (talk) 16:36, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

Thank you. I have taken your advice and left them a post on their page. I had wanted to point you to other references (The Complete Review Not 17, 20 etc) which one Wiki Editor said was good, and a new one, since their review, No 24 from Books and Bao - also completely unconnected). Last time round the feedback from other Wiki editors was the tone was fine but more references were required. As you point out many have now been added. Understand that you are stepping back and I need to find other reviews. Thank you again for the feedback. --WikiGeoffrey  —Preceding undated comment added 17:12, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

Response (as a reviewer comment)
Per WikiGeoffrey's comments on my talk page, I've taken a closer look at four sources:


 * 1) The Japan Times.  This looks like an excellent source.  Major newspaper, a long piece devoted entirely to the subject, and, I'm assuming, a writer with no ties to the subject.
 * 2) Asian Review.  Another reputable publication, but this seems like a small minor mention in an article which is mostly about the Japanese publishing business in general, and Red Circle is just used as one example.
 * 3) Publishing Perspectives.  A passing mention in an industry-specific outlet (see WP:AUD).
 * 4) Pop Matters.  Looks like a reputable publication (we have an article on them), and the piece is largely about the subject.

In summary, I think this is close to being sufficient sourcing, and comes close to meeting WP:NCORP. It would be good to get additional review of the Japanese-language sources from somebody who is fluent in that language.

The biggest problem is that this still comes off as promotional. The author has a COI (declared on their user page), and it shows in the writing. Taking a step back from the source review, this still sounds like somebody wrote the article based on what they knew and/or wanted to emphasize about the company, then found sources to back up the statements. That's fundamentally backwards of how this is supposed to work. A good encyclopedia article should start with the sources, and then present a distillation of what the sources say. This is a perfect example of why WP:COI editing is so highly discouraged. It's almost impossible to write a truly WP:NPOV article when you have a connection to the subject. I'm not going to reject this outright, but based on the promotional tone, I can't recommend it be accepted in its current form. -- RoySmith (talk) 16:09, 26 April 2019 (UTC)