Talk:Where's the Birth Certificate?

Prod tag removed
I started this article earlier today, and I am taking the liberty of removing the prod tag because not only were the claims it stated unsupported when first made, but there is even less support for them now. The tag indicates "Where's the Birth Certificate" it is not a notable book yet even the early text of this article shows it is about a matter of national and even world concern, that the author has written several best-sellers and that he has written at least one book that affected the outcome of a U.S. presidential campaign. The book has also had substantial pre-orders; the publisher was not then and is not now a "primary source" and the Southern Poverty Law Center is a reliable source; it is renowned investigator of extremist groups and trends. In addition, since the prod was added to this article, I have added more sources for a total now of about 10 from publications such as The Guardian, TIME magazine, The Washington Post, The Daily Beast, and from The Associated Press. I am completely baffled why the originator of the prod would even begin think this would indisputably be an article for deletion or why he would later say he could find no further sources or even why characterized the Daily Mail article as providing "only a passing mention". Regardless, I hope this removal is agreeable, if not, then I will defend the article on the AfD page. KeptSouth (talk) 23:07, 3 May 2011 (UTC)


 * about a matter of national and even world concern - the subject of the book is entirely irrelevant to whether or not it meets notability requirements.
 * the author has written several best-sellers - notability is not inherited; it does not matter how well-known the author is, or his other books. This article is about this book.
 * the publisher was not then and is not now a "primary source" - in WP:PRIMARY, it states that they're "accounts written by people who are directly involved", and I consider the publisher of a book to be involved in its publication. Regardless of that, the publisher of the book can certainly not be considered independent, as required to assert notability.
 * Southern Poverty Law Center is a reliable source - the Law Centre may be, but I'm not convinced that page is; the site states, "This is a moderated blog. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) encourages user comments on blog postings, but these comments are the personal opinions of the individuals posting them and do not necessarily reflect the views of the SPLC." - blogs are very rarely considered reliable sources. I do not think the author, Ryan Lenz, actually works for that organization. If, however, you claim it is a reliable source, then we could ask on WP:RSN.
 * The Washington Post ref is a blog, not an actual item from the newspaper. The item "Publisher Of Upcoming 'Birther' Book Makes No Apologies"  states it actually originates from Associated Press - is it a press-release, perhaps? World Net Daily [ http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=292213 ] - their "Senior Staff Writer" is a Mr. "Jerome Corsi" [ http://www.wnd.com/who%27s-who ] - is that coincidental?

 Chzz  ► 06:10, 4 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Chzz, if you want to continue to dispute notability, then put the article up for deletion, and see whether others agree. Generally, I believe your reasoning is pretty thin on this point, but more importantly, I see that in your apparent vehement advocacy against this article,  you also completely ignore clear indicia  of notability.


 * I will respond briefly here to your recent claims about sources in the order you have stated them. There are two meanings to primary source here, and the now one-day-old article has never relied on the publisher's description to establish notability. It is only cited once, for the information it gives on the upcoming book. Many WP articles do include such self descriptions; usually that is ok as long as the article is not based primarily on such sources, and it was not, and is not. User comments on published articles would of course not be a RS, but I do not reference or rely on any. Go ahead and ask if the Southern Poverty Law Center is a RS - that would be fine with me. Online blogs from major publications such as The Washington Post are accepted as Wikipedia  RSs, and they have been for quite some time - I am surprised you want to dispute this. Finally, and frankly, it is absurd to claim or even opine that the Associated Press is a publisher of "press releases". They have been a news service since the 1840s.-KeptSouth (talk) 08:37, 4 May 2011 (UTC)08:35, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Of course, it is perfectly OK to cite the publisher or other involved parties, as long as a) it is just for fact, not opinion or claim, and b) recognizing that it does not help show notability. All I said was, at the time I proposed deletion, the fact that one of the three refs was the publisher, another ('hatewatch') being questionable as an RS, leaving just the Mail left be questioning notability.
 * Are you able to track down the actual AP reference, as opposed to what appears to be / claims to be a copy of it? I've searched but only see it posted on various blog-type sites. Maybe it originates from MSNBC?   Chzz  ►  08:43, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
 * You have stated you were concerned there was not significant coverage in RSs and have said you could find none. I had little trouble finding additional sources, but you immediately began challenging them here for reasons such as a possible lack of employment contract between a journalist and the Washington Post, and the possibility that the Associated Press was a mere printer of press releases. Rather than respond to my posts, you generally find another objection to pose. And now, is seems you are taking another crack at the same AP article claiming, apparently that AP subscriber WITN is not a RS and I must provide a link to an AP News feed to verify that the station reproduced it accurately? I'm not sure what you want here... Are you saying the news dept of WITN is not a RS?  Are you saying the only articles which are not changed in any way by subscribers to the AP newservice are acceptable? Or are you claiming that an additional step of some sort is required before using an AP article?


 * In the meantime, as you challenge the reliability of sources with inventive and improbable speculations, and reiterate your original concerns and set new goalposts that are not part of WP policy, you seem to ignore the plain indications in the article that this is a notable book.To sum up, it seems to me that you are, in the main, avoiding directly responding to my remarks, except to go on with further, novel challenges to the reliability of generally accepted RSs. -Regards - KeptSouth (talk) 10:00, 4 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I'll step away at this point, and leave this debate to others; apologies if I didn't manage to express myself well enough, but we seem to be struggling to communicate, and I don't see further attempts at discussion as likely to be constructive. Best of luck to you,  Chzz  ► 11:31, 4 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Ok, then I take it you are dropping your objection to WITN.com (Winner of the AP "Best Web Site In North Carolina") being used as a source for an AP article, and I will never know the meaning of your question: "Are you able to track down the actual AP reference, as opposed to what appears to be / claims to be a copy of it?". -Best regards- KeptSouth (talk) 14:04, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Amazon pre-orders, Amazon best seller
I restored sourced text removed by Czz and temporarily added quotes to the refs, and added one more ref. Hope that settles the matter. KeptSouth (talk) 12:07, 6 May 2011 (UTC) KeptSouth (talk) 14:07, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Inaccurate information removed
Per Publisher's Weekly - WND Books is no longer in a partnership w/a religious publisher Thomas Nelson. In fact, it has been several years since they went their separate ways,, and a look at the WND Books listings clearly shows that there are few Christian religious and family values titles. Therefore the characterization by The Guardian the WND Books is "a niche producer of rightwing conspiracy theories, religious books and 'family values' tracts", is mainly inaccurate, and I have removed it. KeptSouth (talk) 19:21, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
 * There may be a good reason to modify or remove that particular content, but this explanation doesn't seem like it. The characterization of "The Guardian [said]" is inaccurate as far as either of the two statements taken from that article, since it is an op-ed opinion piece which needs to be attributed as such. But if the piece itself is a reliable source, we should be basing which parts to include on relevance (and the other usual suspects – weight, etc.), not on personal opinions of accuracy. The quote is not that WND Books is in partnership with a religious publisher; it's that the works they publish fall into certain categories. It's original research to argue that the number of books in some of the categories is insufficient to include those categories in the statement. Conversely, saying only that they are a publisher of right-wing conspiracy theories could be argued against since their list include religious and family-values tracts as well. It would similarly be original research, but closer to meaningful, to ask whether there are books on their list that do not fall into the named categories. Fat&amp;Happy (talk) 20:46, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
 * At the outset you say, "There may be a good reason to modify or remove that particular content, but this explanation doesn't seem like it", and that appears to be your main criticism - that I have not provided an explanation that is satisfactory to you, though you more or less agree with my actions. (However, you have previously deemed a two word edit summary of "off topic" to be a sufficient explanation when another user removed an entire paragraph of background information on the book's author.) The rest of your post hints at the problems you see with having the 12 words of "particular content" in the lead. Although I do not see any concrete or practical suggestions in your remarks, your hints have drawn my attention to several issues, and I will respond with a corrective and constructive edit.--Thanks --KeptSouth (talk) 09:05, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
 * No, "may be a good reason to modify or remove" means it's possible there is a justification for the removal of sourced content another editor had previously restored with an explanation. Subsequent comments made a case for "modify" rather than "remove", including a suggestion the content (and other from the same source) be properly attributed. Having an open mind about whether specific content should be included does not equate to agreeing with your actions; it merely acknowledges the possibility your actions were justified while suggesting they need further consideration and discussion. (In reviewing the article history to try to find out what you were on about with the "off topic" comment, I see you re-added the material under discussion, so I guess this has become moot. Please note, though, that eliminating bold red error messages caused by an edit indicates concern for the professional appearance of the article, not necessarily agreement with the edit itself.) Fat&amp;Happy (talk) 16:04, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I found your previous comment to be vague and of little guidance in article improvement. In other words, it was possible you meant a number of things. However, I wanted to respond in the interest of improving the article. I assume that is why you posted here. Bearing that assuming in mind, I articulated what it seemed you were saying, and that is why wrote that "appears to be your main criticism." No words were put in your mouth. In trying to determine what you were saying should, or might, or could possibly be done regarding the 12 word quote (that the publisher was "a niche producer of rightwing conspiracy theories, religious books and 'family values' tracts"), I looked to see what standards you had recently applied to edits made to this article, and they seemed inconsistent. Yes, it is laudable that you fixed a format error by commenting out the unused cite.


 * I addressed each of the concerns you seemed to be raising, through the edits I made to the article. You seem to be disregarding that. I may return here and post of summary of the changes in the hope of ending this unnecessary dispute. - Regards - KeptSouth (talk) 17:57, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

In all honesty, I could not have given a better response to the generalized statements of F&H for article improvement. Here are my diffs as proof. In summary, I characterized the Guardian quotes as opinion, re-added the 12 word quote to the article about WND being a religious publisher, etc, (but not to the lead as it is a mistaken opinion, not widely held and not a main point of the article, in my view.) Then I balanced the quote out with the publisher's characterization. Note that I made these improvements many hours before F&H continued to complain here, as if the improvements had not been made, and seemingly as if I was disregarding his earlier comments.


 * 08 May 09:11 (UTC) (add opinion characterization of publisher to section on author & publisher)


 * 08 May 09:25 (UTC)(→Author and publisher: add balance - pub's own description per WP:ABOUTSELF not unduly self serving, no reasonable doubt as to authencity does not result in article being based primarily on a self-published source)


 * 08 May 09:27 (UTC)(→References: add)


 * 08 May 13:48 (UTC)(trim quote per mos also to fit the prose; clean up using AutoEd)

This last edit also added the author's name to one of the Guardian quote and specified the material was commentary. AutoEd marks edits as minor, and I forgot to uncheck the box!! That probably gives someone grounds for an ANI complaint, I am sure. However, such a complaint would be absurd, particularly since I have laid out all the changes here. KeptSouth (talk) 18:26, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I wasn't disregarding, per se; I just review items on my watch list in the order they appear. When I noticed the particular edit on this subject – after most of the reply to your post here was typed – I acknowledged it as essentially closing the discussion. I haven't looked at the other edits closely, but figure that like your edits in general they are probably good and reasonable. That doesn't mean I'll think they're perfect, or that I might not disagree with something in one or more of them. I'm not sure it's necessary, though, to raise the specter of an ANI complaint because someone disagreed with one edit. Fat&amp;Happy (talk) 20:29, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Summary and proposal to close this thread - I made an edit, described what I did in the edit summary and discussed the edit here on the talk page. In response, F&H posted a criticism which I believe, in all fairness, was ambiguous and lacking in practical suggestions. Seeking to make the best of it, and to move the article forward, I responded by indicating where I thought there was a point of agreement. I concluded by saying I would make corrective edits based on hints I had gleaned from F&H's post, then made the changes. Many hours later, F&H posted here vehemently opposing my statement that we agreed on anything, and discussed his use of the word "possibly" and my misconstruction of it. His banter, was largely unrelated to article improvement, and trending toward discussion of this contributor only. I would have let the remarks pass with no response, except for the fact that F&H completely failed to note or comment on the fact that I had made changes to the article in response to his initial criticism. At that point, if one were to read the talk page, it would falsely appear that I was being tendentious or unresponsive, when in fact, the complete opposite was true. Therefore, I felt it necessary to follow up here summarizing the changes I had made, and listing the 4 diffs in which I had made those changes. F&H then replied obliquely regarding his actions saying, "When I noticed the particular edit on this subject... I acknowledged it as essentially closing the discussion", a statement that is plainly untrue. F&H's response also left other misimpressions including that I had raised "the specter of an ANI complaint" against another editor. In the end, it seems there is no issue here relating to article improvement, and nothing further to be discussed in this thread. I propose to close and shrink this discussion in a day or two to allow space for talk on actual article improvement.KeptSouth (talk) 19:03, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Alternate Summary and Agreement thread should be closed. KeptSouth made an edit deleting certain sourced content – which had previously been deleted and had been restored by another editor – and explained the deletion here. I expressed the opinion that the reasons stated for the deletion were invalid (and constituted original research), while acknowledging that there could be other, unstated, reasons for deletion. I also suggested a proposed modification to the content which could be used instead of deletion; I felt this would be taken as a suggestion to discuss the content further, possibly determining whether the source was reliable or not, and arriving at a consensus as to how the content, and other content from the same source, should be handled. KS instead interpreted this that I agreed with the edit and was merely quibbling over the phrasing of the explanation, and expressed an intent to make further edits in the future. When I saw that post, I began a reply – certainly not vehement – to clarify that I did not necessarily agree with the deletion. In the same response, KS had also questioned the validity of my objections by pointing out my failure to similarly object to another totally unrelated edit by another editor. Perplexed as to what this other offending edit might be, I reviewed the article history and, in addition to locating it, noticed that KS had made some additional edits in the interim. I saw that one of those edits had re-added the deleted content with an attribution somewhat in line with that suggested in my original posting. Seeing this, I modified my response by adding an acknowledgement of the change, also adding "I guess this has become moot". KS responded by accusing me of disregarding the changes made to the article, which is clearly inaccurate. In that post, KS then embarked on a summarization of each intermediate edit, which seems rather pointy in a discussion of one particular edit which I had already described as moot; KS closed out the summary with an apology for marking some of the edits as "minor", speculating on the possibility of that being the basis of an ANI complaint, which seems a gross over-reaction to the discussion until then. I again pointed out that the edit in question had been acknowledged and, the common understanding of "moot" to be "no longer an issue", indicated I saw my comment as meaning the edit essentially closed this discussion. Obviously KS still feels it is not closed, but I agree that it has become pointless and should be formally closed. Fat&amp;Happy (talk) 20:13, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

RE: Unneeded escalation and suggestion to bury the hatchet now - F&H is apparently asking for an escalation from an informal closing between the parties where we would simply speak our peace and close the discussion -to a formal closing, presumably involving a 3rd editor or admin, which would result in some sort of determination of fault or blame. That is one reason why I am responding here with further remarks. The other is that F&H has brought up new issues in explaining his good faith. I suggest that one way to approach this might be to take each party at their word regarding their own, stated intentions, and to look at whether the issue regarding the 12 word quote was resolved. That is what I will endeavor to do here.

F&H has explained his initial remarks were intended to spur further discussion. His remarks mentioned terms such as original research, reliable sourcing, relevance, weight, other issues that he called "the usual suspects", proper attribution of op-eds and he proposed that I or someone engage in "meaningful" original research. I said I intended to move the article forward by making edits based on hints I had seen in his initial remarks, and immediately made 3 responsive edits, followed by 1 more a bit later. Together, all 4 edits comprised a response and a work-around to some of the issues F&H had listed. I clearly attributed 2 uses of the op-ed as "opinion", included the author name for further attribution, placed the opinion viewpoint of the Guardian into a section called "Author and publisher" so as not to give it undue weight by having it in the lead, and added another source, (the publisher's self-characterization), to balance the Guardian opinion.

F&H's response, which followed my edits by many hours, focused nearly entirely on my mistaken notion that there had been a point of agreement between us; an issue to which he later returned. In my view, F&H did not seem to acknowledge that I had made any responsive edits to the article or even that I had restored the disputed material. His response certainly did not discuss my responsive edits; a fact which seems incongruous given his previous listing of multiple issues, and his express desire for "further consideration and discussion". Therefore, I viewed his response as giving a false impression that I was being tendentious and unresponsive. I then posted diffs for the 4 responsive edits I made which were not all consecutive and not all that obvious. F&H calls the posting pointy, my intent was to present it but once, as defensive proof and but also to settle and conclude whatever discussion F&H wanted to have on the edits relating to the Guardian article.

However, F&H has just now clarified that he had indeed noted the changes I had made, and has called the matter moot. He has pointed out that these comments are contained in middle of a discussion enclosed in parentheses that deals with a largely unrelated matter. This is the passage:


 * "(In reviewing the article history to try to find out what you were on about with the "off topic" comment, I see you re-added the material under discussion, so I guess this has become moot. Please note, though, that eliminating bold red error messages caused by an edit indicates concern for the professional appearance of the article, not necessarily agreement with the edit itself.)"

There is no reason to doubt his claim, particularly since he has taken pains to add minute details of exactly how he added the comment as he was typing, and what his thought processes were as he searched the history of the 5 day old article. I surely wish I had such a detailed memory.

I believe it's important to consider whether the parenthetical reference can be reasonably viewed as referring entirely to the unrelated matter, because that is how I saw it. In other words, I absolutely did not see that he had noted any sort of response from me or called this entire issue moot. The matter discussed in parentheses was paragraph blanking of author information that another editor had explained with a two word edit summary: "off topic". I had re-added that material several days prior, and the change had not been disputed, making that matter actually moot.

Thus F&H's comment can apply 100% to the unrelated matter of an earlier paragraph blanking. The fact that I had first broached the question of why he had not challenged the blanking, or the edit summary of "off topic" in a comment that I had enclosed in parentheses, and F&H had chosen to discuss it again in parentheses, makes my interpretation - that he was talking about the paragraph blanking and nothing else - entirely and completely reasonable.

My mistake should have been obvious to F&H, but he apparently did not see it, and continued the debate. Basically this can be wrapped up as a mutual mistake of fact. If parties are to be faulted then we have ambiguity on F&H's side, over defensiveness on mine, repetition on both sides, mutual mistake. Clearly it's time to bury the hatchet without further brouhaha.KeptSouth (talk) 13:42, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Getting closer. Given the explanation above, I can see how KS could have misinterpreted my phrasing in the snippet quoted. Of course, if KS's mistake "should have been obvious" to me, it should have been equally obvious to KS when I subsequently denied the charge of disregarding KS's changes by pointing out where (I felt) I had acknowledged at least the specific one that was under discussion here; instead, my claim/explanation was characterized as "plainly untrue".


 * Other than the above comment, I agree with the final paragraph of KS's most recent post. In case my earlier use of the term "formally closed" is the source of another misunderstanding, I see no need for any third-party intervention; I merely meant, use some appropriate "shut it down and hide it by default" template (I'm only familiar with hat/hab, but have seen the results of others that look better suited). I would look for one and apply it right now, but for a feeling it would not be appropriate to close the discussion directly after making an additional comment. Fat&amp;Happy (talk) 15:57, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Amazon
I am curious to know if the release of the Long form certificate has impacted pre-publication sales of the book. We currently note that the book was at the top of the pre-publication orders at Amazon... but is that still true? Is there any way to find out how many people canceled their orders once the certificate was released? Blueboar (talk) 17:47, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I think it may have, but I can't find this info. Somewhere, Amazon publishes a weekly bestseller list, I believe, but all I can find is the hourly one. It is clear from 3 sources I found that it was selling well around April 20-22, so based on your remark I made the text a more specific. -Regards-KeptSouth (talk) 19:27, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

cover photo
Has anybody come across any sources for where the cover image of the president was found? If it was a White House-provided image, it's public domain and the book cover could be uploaded in higher resolution to the Wikimedia Commons. —  Fourthords  | =/\= | 01:25, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

RfC
An RfC: Which descriptor, if any, can be added in front of Southern Poverty Law Center when referenced in other articles? has been posted at the Southern Poverty Law Center talk page. Your participation is welcomed. – MrX 17:41, 22 September 2012 (UTC)