Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cal Wells


 * 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 delete. Davewild (talk) 06:47, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

Cal Wells

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User:JamesBWatson moved the only article of this name to Cal Wells (motor racing businessman) at the behest of another Cal Wells who felt his reputation was being besmirched by being mistaken for the person who supposedly "bankrupted his team". However, nowhere in the article (or any prior version AFAIK) is that claim made. I only find it in this forum. I just don't see a problem that requires JamesBWatson to invoke WP:IAR to override the dab guidelines. See also User talk:JamesBWatson for our prior debate. Clarityfiend (talk) 09:39, 10 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete. There must be millions of people who share their full name with existing Wikipedia articles. I don't think the hatnote is valid either, but it is much better than a purposeless dab page. &mdash;Xezbeth (talk) 11:14, 10 April 2015 (UTC)


 * Keep In March 2014 a request for help was made at User talk:Calwells. A man by the name of Cal Wells said that he was repeatedly being confused with another Cal Wells in reports, to the detriment of his reputation, and that he thought that the confusion was encouraged by the fact that people who searched on Google or Wikipedia for him were finding a Wikipedia article on someone else of the same name and assuming it was him. I checked, and found that there was a significant amount of adverse publicity surrounding the Cal Wells who is the subject of the article. For example, a forum post about him said that he had "bankrupted his team". I found many other pieces of negative reporting, but it was over a year ago, and I have not kept a record of them all. Clarityfiend says that "nowhere in the article" are the damaging claims made, but that is missing the point; the point is that people searching for information about one person have been led by the Wikipedia article to wrongly connect him with another person, and therefore to associate with him damaging claims made elsewhere. I posted a note at the top of the Wikipedia article stating that there was another Cal Wells, in a style somewhat like a Wikipedia hatnote, but it is all too easy to just dive straight into the main text of something you want to read, and not check all the little details such as a note in italics at the top. I do that sort of thing all the time, and I am sure most people do. Therefore, I moved the article to the title Cal Wells (motor racing businessman), and created a sort of disambiguation page at Cal Wells. That way, anyone searching Wikipedia for "Cal Wells" will first find a page which explicitly states that the two are different people. I am, of course, fully aware that this is not in line with the usual way that disambiguation pages are used in Wikipedia, but Wikipedia's guidelines are just guidelines, not rigid rules, and in this case the risk of inadvertently contributing to damaging the reputation of an innocent person is a far more important issue than the risk of having a page which does not comply with a guideline.


 * In answer to Xezbeth's statement that "There must be millions of people who share their full name with existing Wikipedia articles", yes indeed there must, but not all of them have problems caused by the fact of sharing a name. The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 11:18, 10 April 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete hatnote is more than helpful. If the financial investor wants to improve how he comes up on a Google search, that is fine, but there's no need for a disambiguation page. If the financial investor could somehow legitimately meet MOS:DABMENTION, I might be prepared to reconsider. The financial investor has other options for looking at his online reputation. Boleyn (talk) 10:50, 11 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Disambiguations-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:05, 11 April 2015 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Spartaz Humbug! 08:08, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
 * Delete and move back. There's no guarantee that this confusing (and policy-violating) change will even stop people confusing the Cal Wellses. WP:BIODEL suggests we may delete articles about people who're not especially notable, but that does not apply here. Wikipedia of course endeavours to present information in a clear way that is not misunderstood, and maybe the article could be rewritten, but Wikipedia is under no obligation to publish disclaimers about non-notable individuals. Keeping this page would represent a significant change in WP:BLP policy, and this shouldn't happen without a wider debate, input from WM lawyers, etc. You may think this will not occur again, but how many people share names with people where name-sharing may cause embarrassment, shame, or confusion? If someone has the same name as a widely-despised 80s TV star, pop performer, or "internet celebrity", do they merit a similar treatment? --Colapeninsula (talk) 11:48, 20 April 2015 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, &#8213; Padenton &#124;&#9993;  01:33, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete as this flies in the face of our dab guidelines. Other users above said it better, so I won't echo their statements. Tavix | Talk 03:16, 2 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete the dab page and move the racing businessman back to "Cal Wells" as there is only one of them which has an article here. Text about the confusion, clarifying that there is another Cal Well which this one is not, could be added to the article. There is already a not-conforming-to-the-guidelines hatnote. Kraxler (talk) 17:07, 10 May 2015 (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.