Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alan Baker (shogi)


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was No consensus. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 06:10, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

Alan Baker (shogi)

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Not sure if this person satisfies WP:N WP:BIO. Baker is referred to as a university professor, yet his notability seems to only come from his shogi playing exploits. A recent to the page says that Baker is an American Philosopher, yet there is nothing in the article related to his achievements as a philosopher. There are no mentions made of any books or articles he may have published. Nothing about any research projects, etc. he may have been involved in. No lists of awards or other types of recognition he may have received. No mentions of any memberships in professional societies. The fact that he started a shogi club, won a few tournaments and was rated as high a 19 on some shogi organization's rating list is not, in my opinion, sufficient enough to establish notabilty. There are lots of amateur shogi, chess, go, etc. players who are also probably pretty good at their chosen game and may have even won tournaments. How many of them have their own Wikipedia pages? Moreover, the sources cited to establish this notability are for a Swarthmore College webpage (Shogi and me) that no longer exists and, judging from the title, does also seem be primarily about Baker the shogi player; a profile page on a shogi organization's website that just gives his name and shows that he has played only 34 shogi games over the past 14 years (which does not seem very active); a website in Russian which appears to be a recap of a tournament that Baker played in and took 3rd place; and a rating list of shogi players in which Baker is one of 995 other players listed. All true for sure, but not very notable, especially when it comes to WP:SIGCOV In addition to the above, there is the possibility that the article is nothing more than self-promotion. It has been edited three times by an editor named Alanshogi whose only edits have been to an article about a shogi player named Alan. If these two people are one and the same, then this would seem to be contrary to WP:NPOV, WP:COI and WP:PROMO- Marchjuly (talk) 03:06, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Automated comment: This AfD was not correctly transcluded to the log (step 3). I have transcluded it to Articles for deletion/Log/2014 March 14.  — cyberbot I  Notify Online 03:29, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions. §§ Dharmadhyaksha §§ {T/C} 03:55, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. §§ Dharmadhyaksha §§ {T/C} 03:55, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sportspeople-related deletion discussions. §§ Dharmadhyaksha §§ {T/C} 03:56, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Philosophy-related deletion discussions. §§ Dharmadhyaksha §§ {T/C} 03:58, 14 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Comment. He is an active researcher with a Google scholar profile here and cv here. This is a low-citation field so it's difficult to tell how significant he is as a philosopher just from the numbers. But given that the article is almost entirely about his connection to Shogi, that seems a more promising direction to look for notability. —David Eppstein (talk) 20:04, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Weak keep. Thanks for finding the GS info which I tried to find myself but failed. I am inclined to a weak keep on the basis of citations in this low cited field. I have no idea about shogi. Xxanthippe (talk) 23:21, 14 March 2014 (UTC).
 * I'm not really sure if the GS info is relevant to establishing notability for a page titled Alan Baker (shogi), but if it is, then that is, in my opinion, where the main focus should be, and not shogi. Maybe the name could be changed to Alan Baker (philosopher)? - Marchjuly (talk) 09:52, 15 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete. There are thousands of (more active) chess and board game players with higher rankings that do not have Wiki pages. This seems to be self promotion. AndyGibsonSon (talk) 20:24, 15 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete. If this article is for the purposes of academia and his professorhip, it needs to be completely rewritten. If the article is for the purpose of Shogi dealings, it is non-notable. Like Marchjuly and AndyGibsonSon have mentioned, there are thousands more players that are more notable. A Shogi template of wins/losses might be used to further Shogi tournament wins in the future, but even in that case this is a non-notable person. Kbabej (talk) 20:28, 15 March 2014 (UTC) Struck sockpuppetry. Spartaz Humbug! 19:05, 24 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, -- RoySmith (talk) 02:24, 25 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete Not notable for shogi. Can't really tell if his academic record is notable or not, but that's not the focus of the article.  Burden of proof is on those claiming notability.204.126.132.231 (talk) 17:58, 26 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Comment We shouldn't nominate articles for deletion on valid noteworthy topics simply due to weaknesses in the article's current state.  I agree that someone who is an expert Shogi player, who merely happens to be a professor, is unlikely to be notable.  But I am concerned that Alan Baker may be a notable academic, and I would feel a lot more comfortable if nominator had shown they had complied with WP:BEFORE.  Would the NYTimes have used questions from one of his exams in their pop quiz column if he was a nobody?  Geo Swan (talk) 03:06, 29 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Keep I don't have much experience with h-index's in this field, but looking through three of the references to Baker I was able to pull up in Highbeam, I found a 1-paragraph review of "Are there Genuine Mathematical Explanations of Physical Phenomena", in the Review of Metaphysics in 2005, a passing reference in the same journal in 2010 that suggests a piece is "defending its theses over objections by so-and-so and Alan Baker", and another one paragraph reviefw in the American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly.   I don't have deep JSTOR access, but this review  appears to be a peer-reviewed paper whose entire point is arguing against one of Baker's arguments.  This all starts to get at GNG by itself, but just as importanlty, it gives me (a) the sense that Baker is a non-trivial part of the conversation of his feild, and (b) hope that there is enough material that a knowledgable editor could write a neutral and not entirely trivial biography from it.  I do think academic work should probably be the focus. --j⚛e deckertalk 16:00, 4 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, NorthAmerica1000 02:35, 5 April 2014 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.