User talk:Ericwatts/AGMC

Oy. Those are painful cuts. Question: I can sort of understand why you wanted to delete the "Concert History" section, as much of the information there is repeated in the "History of the AGMC" section, but I'm not sure why the biographical information on the Artistic Directors isn't suitable for inclusion. Could you clarify "unencyclopedic" in this context? Would it be appropriate to create a new Wiki article for them, either individually or collectively? Bios for the AGMC's previous directors is *not* included on the current AGMC web site and to the best of my knowledge, not available online anywhere else.

Also, would it be appropriate to include the information on the AGMC's 16th through 28th seasons, previously in the "Concert History" section, in the current "History of the AGMC" section, which currently ends with the 15th season, as a sort of placeholder until I can finish work on the narrative history? As you can see from the revision dates, I have been working on this article for quite some time in the belief that a thorough and comprehensive historical narrative would be both proper and desired.

Thank you for your feedback. Ericwatts (talk) 19:54, 17 November 2008 (UTC)Ericwatts


 * Hm. Where to begin.
 * I guess the biggest thing to note is that you've done quite a bit of writing, which is great, but is mostly "original research". In other words, you'd be hard pressed to find any material that's "readily available" that says any of the information here.  You may want to review Wikipedia's No Original Research policy, which basically states that Wikipedia is a collection of what *other people* have written - we don't create content, we report on it.
 * Creating articles for the Artistic Directors is only appropriate if they individually meet Wikipedia's notability criteria. "Notability" can be established if there is "significant coverage on the person from multiple, reliable, third-party sources."  Given what you say about their bios not being available *online*, are they available *anywhere*?
 * One last thing I have to point out is Wikipedia's Conflict of Interest guideline. Writing the article on the AGMC may be very difficult for you, as I gather you are directly a part of the organization.  I'm happy to work with you on it, but at some point you may get very fed up with me :)  I hope not, but it's quite possible :) Please be patient with me :) -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 03:59, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Hello again. Re: "original research" vs. "readily available." The AGMC's Archives Committee (of which I'm a member) spent more than a year collecting, organizing and archiving historical material and preparing it for presentation as a large exhibit for the group's 25th anniversary concert in 2006. The committee wrote and published an extensive history of the chorus and published it in the weekly membership newsletter ("Homo Voce") during that season. So, the research wasn't done specifically for Wikipedia, but it *was* done by a small group over the course of a year, collected from an enormous amount of concert programs, newspaper and magazine articles, and member and patron newsletters published the previous 25 years, all of which are now stored in our archives. The serialized articles published in "Homo Voce" were distributed to the entire membership but not outside the organization, so I don't know if that qualifies as "readily available," but they, too, are on file and could be made available if necessary. The bulk of my work for this Wikipedia article has been to take the historical narrative as published in that newsletter, convert it from first person to third person, and strip the many embellishments out of it, reducing it to as factual and straight-forward an article as possible (for example: "We presented our fabulous Holiday Concert at the gorgeous Cathedral in Buckhead" edited to "The AGMC presented its 1995 Holiday Concert at the Episcopal Cathedral of St. Philip").

The bios of our artistic directors were compiled from their bios as published in various concert programs over the years as well as on the group's web site. Again, the concert programs have been archived, and the web site only lists current chorus staff. Whether they, individually or collectively, are "notable"... well, the chorus certainly thinks they are, but I suppose that remains for someone else to decide.

All the information contained in this article is verifiable, but may not necessarily be online or "readily available" to the public. After all the research was done and the 25th anniversary exhibit was over, we thought Wikipedia would be an ideal place to publish much of the material, which has not been as thoroughly or comprehensively assembled anywhere else as it has been here. Truth be told, I was not aware of Wiki's many content restrictions when I began this project earlier this year. I (on behalf of the AGMC) would like to include as much information about the group's history that meets your criteria as possible, and yes, to answer your question, I certainly welcome your assistance to help make the article the best it can possibly be. :-)

Ericwatts (talk) 19:40, 27 November 2008 (UTC)ericwatts


 * Hi, Eric! Thanks for getting back to this!


 * The interesting thing about all the writing y'all have done is that it is *great* information! Unfortunately, it may not fit in Wikipedia's guidelines.  Wikipedia is supposed to be a repository of third-hand information - or at very least, second hand.  Most of what you're describing is "primary source" - stuff the group itself has written, rather than something someone has written about the group.  For more on the differences, take a gander at WP:PRIMARY.
 * Given that, what we're left with is information that has been published in secondary (or tertiary) sources. I note that the article currently references two articles in the AJC, one in Pulse, and one in Gazette.  The article can certainly contain *some* information published by the group itself (Homo Voce sounds like a reasonable source), but not the bulk of the article as it stands.
 * As a side note, you might consider having the full article stored at OutHistory.org. I believe there's a Wikia (or another similar) wikipedia-based site that also might be what you need.  As it is, though, the "AGMC’s Artistic Directors" and the "History of the Atlanta Gay Men’s Chorus" sections can both be considered "Original Research that could be deleted. -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 08:12, 28 November 2008 (UTC)