Talk:The works of Michael Gorman

Hi, I and others have been working on this page for several weeks now but the deletion notice has just appeared. I've removed two of the quotes that didn't have references but can't see anything else that suggests personal reflection of an author's works and we added in the front covers to make the page more interesting. Can you indicate specifically what is wrong so that I can fix it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by stephoidj (talk • contribs)

Cheers


 * I wasn't the one who added the prod, but I agree with it. In general, we don't have articles like this.  It is acceptable to have an article about the person (which already exists), which can include a general discussion of his works; it's also acceptable to have a bibliography separately from the main author page if the person has a very long bibliography (and especially if those works themselves have pages)--see, for example, Stephen King bibliography. But we probably shouldn't have a detailed list of information about all of his books.  Furthermore, the person who prodded the article is right that this information is promotional.  Consider, for example, "Within the challenging environment that librarians face – technological advances, budget and funding cuts, pressures of multitasking, job insecurity - Gorman highlights the comfort in knowing others encounter similar problems and frustrations."  That's not a neutral statement--it's a pitch to sell the book.
 * Also, the Britannica blog section isn't encyclopedic--most major writers, actors, sports stars, etc., maintain or contribute to a blog of some form or another; we would need some evidence that his blogging work is particularly notable. Receiving 200 comments is not such an indication (that's actually a tiny number in the grand scheme of things).
 * I think that the best plan would be to take any relevant information from the "Themes" section and merge it into Michael Gorman (librarian), although it looks like some of it may already be there. The bibliography is already there, and the detailed discussions of the book contents doesn't appear to be appropriate.


 * Having said all of that, I am going to remove the prod from this article. Any time a deletion is contested, a prod should be removed; then, if someone still thinks the article should be deleted, we can do the more robust "Articles for Deletion" process.  I'm on the borderline on this, so I'm not quite ready to AfD myself, but I'll let the prodder know in case they want to follow that path. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:33, 24 April 2011 (UTC)


 * I proposed it for deletion, but I'll wait a week before merging this to Michael Gorman, to see if other editors can improve it substantially. Mr. Credible (talk) 12:57, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Since the issue is contested, please do open a Merger discussion, as described in WP:MERGE. If you're not sure how to do that, just let me know and I'll complete the necessary steps. Qwyrxian (talk) 13:20, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, I have now proposed it. Please feel free to correct anything I got wrong. Thanks, Mr. Credible (talk) 13:29, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

I understand that blog contributions would not generally be included in a list of works however we felt that it was worthy in this case as Michael Gorman is a former president of one of the largest library associations in the world and he was asked to contribute, as an expert, to the Encyclopaedia Britannica blog and he chose to discuss the implications of Wikipedia, Web 2.0 and in general the impact of digital resouces on the library profession. The number of comments on the blogs may not have been outstanding but his comments caused a lot of further comments by professional librarians around the world on other personal blogs, which we did not include, and as such Michael Gorman has become a standard bearer within the LIS community for the old-fashioned way of thinking. Anyway, we are happy to do whatever wiki thinks but just thought we would put in our justification for the blogs. Shipnopanda (talk) 20:35, 26 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Shipnopanda, I really think you're misunderstanding the most important issue here; I'll try again. Unless someone presents a clear, coherent argument about why this page should be kept, it's going to be merged into Michael Gorman (librarian).  That means this whole page is going to disappear, and any relevant information will be added to the other article. If you think this article should be kept as an independent article, you should focus on that issue.  Qwyrxian (talk) 01:00, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

I've completed the merge now, by moving the publications section into Michael Gorman (librarian), omitting what looked to me like unreferenced personal analysis per WP:No original research and some promotional language. I've also tried to format the journal references a bit better using Template:Cite journal. Mr. Credible (talk) 11:24, 1 May 2011 (UTC)