User talk:Bernardo.Malfitano

Welcome!
Hello, Bernardo.Malfitano, and welcome to Wikipedia! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Unfortunately, one or more of the pages you created, such as User:Bernardo.Malfitano, may not conform to some of Wikipedia's content policies and may not be retained. In short, the topic of an article must be notable and have already been the subject of publication by reliable and independent sources.

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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you have any questions, ask me on my talk page. You can also type help me on this page, followed by your question, and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome! Air on White (talk) 18:04, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of User:Bernardo.Malfitano


Hello, and welcome to Wikipedia. A tag has been placed on User:Bernardo.Malfitano requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section U5 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the page appears to consist of writings, information, discussions, or activities not closely related to Wikipedia's goals. Please note that Wikipedia is not a free web hosting service. Under the criteria for speedy deletion, such pages may be deleted at any time.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, and you wish to retrieve the deleted material for future reference or improvement, then please contact the, or if you have already done so, you can place a request here. Air on White (talk) 18:04, 17 June 2024 (UTC)


 * I wish this speedy deletion nomination had been more specific than "the page appears to consist of writings, information, discussions, or activities not closely related to Wikipedia's goals". I thought that the point of a user page was to give information about the user. If a user says that they work for a certain institution, have a certain hobby, earned some degrees or other accreditations, published work in their field, etc., then which parts of that consist of self-promotion or spam? The deletion complain was so vague that I had to delete all the text on my page, because I couldn't tell which part was not appropriate. Like I mentioned in the talk page about the RV-2 article's deletion: If there is no advantage to being a real expert rather than a random anonymous stranger on the internet, I can create a pseudonymous screen name instead and use that instead of my real name. Bernardo.Malfitano (talk) 17:38, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Managing a conflict of interest
Hello, Bernardo.Malfitano. We welcome your contributions, but if you have an external relationship with the people, places or things you have written about on Wikipedia, you may have a conflict of interest (COI). Editors with a conflict of interest may be unduly influenced by their connection to the topic. See the conflict of interest guideline and FAQ for article subjects for more information. We ask that you:


 * avoid editing or creating articles about yourself, your family, friends, colleagues, company, organization, clients, or competitors;
 * propose changes on the talk pages of affected articles (you can use the edit COI template)—don't forget to give details of reliable sources supporting your suggestions;
 * disclose your conflict of interest when discussing affected articles (see );
 * avoid linking to your organization's website in other articles (see );
 * do your best to comply with Wikipedia's content policies.

In addition, you are required by the Wikimedia Foundation's terms of use to disclose your employer, client, and affiliation with respect to any contribution which forms all or part of work for which you receive, or expect to receive, compensation. See Paid-contribution disclosure.

Also, editing for the purpose of advertising, publicising, or promoting anyone or anything is not permitted. Thank you. Air on White (talk) 18:04, 17 June 2024 (UTC)

Contested deletion
This page should not be speedily deleted because (your reason here) I have edited it to remove the content in question.

Your submission at Articles for creation: VanGrunsven RV-2 (June 18)
 Your recent article submission to Articles for Creation has been reviewed. Unfortunately, it has not been accepted at this time. The reason left by Ratnahastin was:

Please check the submission for any additional comments left by the reviewer. You are encouraged to edit the submission to address the issues raised and resubmit after they have been resolved.


 * If you would like to continue working on the submission, go to Draft:VanGrunsven RV-2 and click on the "Edit" tab at the top of the window.
 * If you do not edit your draft in the next 6 months, it will be considered abandoned and may be deleted.
 * If you need any assistance, or have experienced any untoward behavior associated with this submission, you can ask for help at the [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:WikiProject_Articles_for_creation/Help_desk/New_question&withJS=MediaWiki:AFCHD-wizard.js&page=Draft:VanGrunsven_RV-2 Articles for creation help desk], on the [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Ratnahastin&action=edit&section=new&nosummary=1&preload=Template:AfC_decline/HD_preload&preloadparams%5B%5D=Draft:VanGrunsven_RV-2 reviewer's talk page] or use Wikipedia's real-time chat help from experienced editors.

Ratnahastin (talk) 09:51, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

AfC notification: Draft:VanGrunsven RV-2 has a new comment
 I've left a comment on your Articles for Creation submission, which can be viewed at Draft:VanGrunsven RV-2. Thanks! Robert McClenon (talk) 15:23, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Nomination of VanGrunsven RV-2 for deletion
A discussion is taking place as to whether the article VanGrunsven RV-2 is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Articles for deletion/VanGrunsven RV-2 until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article until the discussion has finished. Air on White (talk) 18:30, 18 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Hi User:Bernardo.Malfitano -- I just noticed the above and would like to help. I've found many passing references to the RV-2, and the "Theatre in the Woods" video is definitely a non-trivial source. I'd consider the RV-5 restoration video borderline non-trivial, but since it's by Van's themselves, it doesn't help establish notability. It's pretty rare that we're unable to establish notability for a design (even unfinished one!) from a notable aircraft maker, so I'm optimistic that the sources are out there! Do you have any other leads? Or connections in the Van's community who might know where to look? My gut feeling is that we'll find what we need in magazine articles or interviews about Van's history. --Rlandmann (talk) 10:39, 19 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm afraid that the only sources I'm aware of, about the "missing number" RVs (2, 5, and 11) are the ones that I list as sources in those articles. Indeed, several sources (the old version of the company website, and a couple of magazine articles) only mention the RV-2 in passing and only say it's an all-wood tail-less glider. The only real substantial source is the Theater in the Woods presentation, which specifies the wingspan and shows the side-view sketch and the photo of the wooden structure. I guess I was hoping that the fact that the information comes straight from Richard VanGrunsven would be sufficient. Bernardo.Malfitano (talk) 16:01, 24 June 2024 (UTC)
 * From a Wikipedia point of view, the interview is sufficient from the point of view of verifiability, but on its own, not strong grounds for why the type should be discussed in its own article (as opposed to, say, lumping it in with VanGrunsven's own article, or as a section in the Van's Aircraft article about the "missing numbers".) From an information architecture point of view, and a network effect point of view, I think the policy as it stands is bad, but unfortunately it is what it is... :/ --Rlandmann (talk) 22:22, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

About Wikipedia
Hi Bernardo, I am sorry about your rough landing here, you look like you mean well but need to understand how we work a lot better. We have developed many policies and guidelines to help us build a useful encyclopedia. I'd suggest you follow the link I just gave. It's all a bit overwhelming at first, but you can start by reading up on the ones which seem relevant to the issues being raised over your posts here. You will need some time and patience to become a proficient editor here, so I hope you can keep climbing the learning curve and not expect too much from yourself during this early time for you. In particular, I would draw your attention to some advice on Expert editors, as this is always a difficult issue to deal with.

I am not as active an editor as I used to be, but if you drop a note on my user talk page (see my sig at the end of this paragraph for the link), I will always be happy to help where I can. &mdash; Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:08, 24 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much. I appreciate your taking the time to give me encouraging feedback.
 * However, I gotta be honest; Editing Wikipedia might just not be worth it. I say this based on my experience with the RV-2:
 * I was recently (Couple months ago?) having a conversation where I mentioned the RV-2, and someone said "Wait, there's info out there about the RV-2? What do you know about it? Are there any images?", and it just so happened that I knew about Richard VanGrunsven's EAA presentation where he describes the airplane and shows a couple of images. I then thought: This seems like a perfect addition to Wikipedia: Information that people are actually interested in (due to the gaping void in the RV aircraft number series) but that is "locked away" in a source that few people know about.
 * So I decided to create an RV-2 article. I checked that Wikipedia has an article about the RV-11 (VanGrunsven's other unfinished glider) and, of course, about countless other airplanes that never flew (e.g. X-planes and SSTs). I even created and upload my own RV-2 image based on the published (non-free) sketches, and uploaded a non-free image (with all the proper justifications clearly written out) that is the only photo of the project, as part of creating the RV-2 article. That was a non-trivial amount of work.
 * Still, after all that, the article was quickly listed for speedy deletion, due to it supposedly failing the "general notability guideline" (despite the existence of articles about the RV-5 and RV-11, and the WikiProject:Aircraft notability requirements being met: reliable sources, a significant project by a manufacturer of otherwise notable aircraft...) and supposedly lacking "reliable sources" (despite the aforementioned EAA presentation).
 * So, again, I do appreciate your support. But I'm realizing that it's unlikely that I would be able to contribute anything Wikipedia-worthy beyond what other people have already contributed. Bernardo.Malfitano (talk) 18:42, 24 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, I can see you have put a lot of work into it. Never take too much store by the existence of other stuff on here: some of those articles might get deleted or merged if someone came across them, or maybe they are better sourced than yours. In the present case, most of your sources do not appear to meet our reliability criteria (for example anything published by the company itself). These are necessary to establish the notability of the topic. There are several that I have not been able to create for this reason, even though I know from unpublished private sources they deserve it. Sometimes I can collect enough sources to meet our general notability guidelines, sometimes not. &mdash; Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 21:51, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

I'm also really sorry for your terrible experience here. I'm following that up elsewhere. But let me say that I, for one, am extremely grateful for what you've brought to the project so far, and that I do hope you'll stay. We frankly need people who have your blend of subject matter expertise, passion for the topic, and who can also sling words. And I honestly believe that as a community, we generally give people a better experience than the one you've had :(

And I see you already found your way to WikiProject:Aircraft. If you are of a mind to stay, that's our hub for articles about aircraft types. It's pretty quiet right now, but that comes in waves. If you want to see some other stuff we've been working on, you can find it here: New articles (Aircraft)

Cheers! --Rlandmann (talk) 22:17, 24 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Update: At their invitation, I have left User:Air on White a message about their interactions with you. --Rlandmann (talk) 23:21, 24 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Rudi, thank you very much for your patience and support. I do appreciate your welcoming attitude.
 * I thought that the "misuse of Wikipedia as a web host" and the COI thing seemed a little over the top, so, thank you for confirming my suspicion. However, I realize that the best online communities are the ones with active moderators, and I'm new and I know that Wikipedia is a community with its own culture, so, this was an effective way to learn about it.
 * As for the RV-2: If it doesn't meet Wikipedia's criterion for notability, then, oh well, I can accept that. As an airplane geek, I can see how my measure of notability is a little biased for things like that, and it sounds like you can probably see where I was coming from there.
 * And I've very glad that User:Steelpillow posted that link to Expert editors. That helped me see that writing a profile page describing my credentials was a mistake, and that using my real name probably is too. I might edit Wikipedia in the future, but if I do, it will be under a pseudonym. (Except for uploading images to Wikimedia, because I do want my name associated with those) (Although, realistically, I often see images in articles credited as "Source: Wikipedia", including by professional publications/institutions that really should know better, but that's a pet peeve of mine that's not worth going into right now...)
 * Thanks again for being supportive and welcoming... and for the aviation-related work on Wikipedia. Please keep it up! Bernardo.Malfitano (talk) 13:34, 25 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your understanding and patience! And even if the AfD decision is that the RV-2 article should not stand on its own, your work will not be wasted, since this information can (and will) be incorporated elsewhere. Right now, thanks to you, Wikipedia is the best and easiest go-to for anyone wanting to answer the same question that was in your mind: "I wonder why there's this gap in the designations?" The literal application of our General Notability policy sometimes operates at the expense of the forest when it deems that a tree should not be here. --Rlandmann (talk) 23:47, 25 June 2024 (UTC)