Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cass District Library


 * 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   keep, all points considered. Enough verifiable information exists to justify an article. Regards,   A rbitrarily 0    ( talk ) 15:58, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Cass District Library

 * – ( View AfD View log  •  )

A non-notable library with five branches; no reliable sources provided or apparently available; I actually believe this should be a redirect to the county's article and copied useful information there, but the redirect I created was reverted so I'm taking this route; I'd ask the closing admin to look at the edit history and restore the redirect to Cass County, Michigan if it seems appropriate. Accounting4Taste: talk 21:13, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Michigan-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 22:11, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Museums and libraries-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 22:12, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Merge and redirect to Cass County, Michigan. Currently not enough information to warrant a stand-alone article. Location (talk) 22:17, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep This is a small article that I have started to try and document more of the history of Cass County and Southwest Lower Michigan.  The Article is still adding information.   There is more information than what should be in a county article, as the library is more than just a entity of the county.   This is one of the many Carnegie Libraries that was established, and has historical value to document that part of American History. The library has over time grown and several small libraries have been incorporated in it. Looking at another library in the area which has a wiki page you see Kalamazoo Public Library.   The Kalamazoo Public Library has the same number of branches.  The library is notable, because it is part of the Carnegie Libraries, there are reliable sources however, they article is just getting started. What Accouting4Tates thought was useful which he copied over does not have all the information about the history of library and its collection.    I agree the article needs more developing, but should be it's own article.   I however, am not in the area that often and have not been able to get pictures or more information on the library (other than the site itself) to document this history.  Jsgoodrich (talk) 23:51, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
 * That's because nobody thought it was interesting. Abductive  (reasoning) 07:38, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I would point out that not everyone will find every article in an encyclopedia interesting, but they are their. Jsgoodrich (talk) 08:56, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * When I say "nobody" I mean no authors of secondary sources. Abductive  (reasoning) 15:36, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * The Kalamazoo Public Library article has no inline citations. I have just rated it a stub, and added a Noreferences template, hoping that editors will improve a well written article that has no sources beyond the link to the official Kalamazoo Public Library website. This article has eleven inline citations, and now has photos. I say again, Keep this article.


 * Comment We have often accepted county libraries as notable, but I think it would ordinarily depend on the size of the library. All the ones I can find are several times this size, and the average size county in the US, is twice the size of this one. There may be some special reason why this would be notable, but it would take sources. However, if we decide to accept such units as a matter of course, there are only about 3,000.   DGG ( talk ) 01:24, 22 December 2009 (UTC)  Please note that upon re-examining the article and the sources, and thinking more carefully, I have said athat I think the article should be kept: my rationale is at the bottom.    DGG ( talk ) 14:06, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
 * (PDF) Estimates 1,000,000 libraries worldwide. Dethlock99 (talk) 15:05, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
 * It would be helpful when establishing a guideline to know how many of those libraries have buildings listed in the National Register of Historic Places, as the Cass Library District does. Firsfron of Ronchester  16:53, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
 * And to know if the historical buildings already have their own articles already. Like the the Cass Library District's branch.  That branch is in a notable building.  The building will be notable even if the branch is moved to a new building. Dethlock99 (talk) 15:57, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Your position, Dethlock, is not unreasonable (unlike the "Delete; source's titles are unencyclopedic" !vote below). Not unreasonable, but I don't agree. To draw an analogy: one could argue that a town's buildings are notable and then claim the town itself is non-notable. But the town is composed of the buildings. Even though notability is not inherited, stating that a library's buildings may be notable, but that the library itself is not, is not something I can agree with. Without a building, there is no library. And, yes, the library's books could be moved to a less notable building, but that hasn't happened. Firsfron of Ronchester  20:14, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
 * In that case I would merge and redirect the non-notable town to the notable building article. If the town becomes notable it gets pulled out and given its own article.  By your logic we should write articles on every tenant of a historic building.  That could be quite a few in places like England where some building are 1000 years old.  Dethlock99 (talk) 04:43, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I didn't make my point clear enough, sorry. I don't believe that a town with notable buildings could itself be non-notable. I also don't believe we should write articles on every tenant of a historic building: most of those would not have been the subject of significant coverage from reliable sources that are independent of the subject. The subject of this article, though, is. Firsfron of Ronchester  06:38, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Ref 1 is to a user submitted database and thus is not third party.
 * Ref 2 is a web hosting service for the town. Not third party.
 * Ret 3 & 4 are local books
 * Ref 5 is from the local chamber of commerce. Not third party.
 * Ref 6 is, apparently, about problems with the library from a paper in an adjacent county.
 * Ref 7 is about an expansion bid from the same paper as Ref 6
 * Ref 8 is about the building
 * Ref 9 is from from the townships web page
 * Ref 10 is from the local paper
 * Ref 11 is from the library itself.
 * The only things even remotely notable are the building and a donor. The library, itself, appears to be very mundane. The article should be Merged under the county, building or donor's artilce.  Tell me why this library is notable other than its association with the other notable entities. Dethlock99 (talk) 17:07, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * See WP:NOTINHERITED Dethlock99 (talk) 17:10, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * What sense does it make to tell me to "See WP:NOTINHERITED" when I linked to it myself, above? Firsfron of Ronchester  17:25, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * As you stated in your post bellow, where you said is wiki better or worse with out this article. I think this is developing it has only been on for a month, and I have yet to see anyone local on the debate as an editor, I am in Ohio just grewup their and visit.   I think there is a lot more aobut the library and the system.   As I have pointed out there are a lot of other library stubs that have been on week for several years which make wiki worse for beeing on wiki with no improbements on them.  I think looking at the kalamazoo library looks like a advertisment more than infomation.  I took the time to document what history I could find to make this a article that was worth wiki.   I also think taking a new artle off is tearing down the house while it is being built.  Please do not take this a personal attack, but your user page states that you patorl new pages, I wish we would spend more time patoling the pages that we, that are of no use.  I think the articles that seat for years with no development no information, and no use should be looked at over new articles.  I just think it is a diffrence in how you and I see wiki.   I think things should be given time to develop to see if they are worth wiki, you I think what editors to be gatekeepers.   I think you and I see the role of wiki diffrently is all.  I do not know which one is better or worse, which is why I think wiki is very usefull and help develop what I think is a nice documntation of worthy topics with many views.   There is an article on local place of intrest I can not find it right now I will post it later that I think covers this library and why it should stay.Jsgoodrich (talk) 17:47, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * To Firsfron: You said "I don't believe that a town with notable buildings could itself be non-notable."  That is in direct contradiction to WP:NOTINHERITED.
 * To Jsgoodrich: I happened upon this article while commenting on a different AfD.  When I patrol new pages, I do so from the back of the new page log.  Those articles are typically a month old and have not been previously patrolled.  If I would have been the one to patrol this page, I would probably done it differently.  But that does not address the fact that myself and others consider the subject's notability to be suspect.  I consider your contributions to valuable and I consider new page patrolling to be valuable as well.  If you think patrolling existing sub-par articles to be a noble undertaking, by all means do it.  There is a definite need for it.  If you just hit the random article link you can find a poor article in about five attempts.  You should copy the article to your user space.  Even if the article ultimately gets deleted, you can continue to improve it and resubmit it later.  I think the worst that will happen is a merge, but we can always split it out again if you find a good national source.  Something like a NY times article is the Holy Grail of the notability world.  Dethlock99 (talk) 19:17, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, I've read the WP:NOTINHERITED essay, and telling me to see an essay I've already linked to you is not helpful. Further, arguing for the deletion of an article by citing an essay doesn't carry the weight of policy The article's contents are verifiable and sourced. Those are actual policies. Firsfron of Ronchester  19:50, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry if I offended you by relinking WP:NOTINHERITED. I do not give it the same weight as policy, but I do give it weight.  I'm not advocating deletion.  My position, currently, is Merge and Expand. Yes, the article's contents are verifiable and sourced, but the library is not notable.  I would like to see a source with wider readership about the library system itself.  Are you saying that anything that can be sourced and verified should be included in wikipedia?  Are you saying that because they are guidelines and not policy that we should ignore WP:NOTABILITY and WP:NOTINHERITED? Dethlock99 (talk) 05:20, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm emphatically not saying that we should ignore WP:NOTABILITY. WP:N states "If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject, it is presumed to satisfy the inclusion criteria for a stand-alone article." I'm saying that this subject has received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources which are independent of the subject. You can scoff and say, "well, those are mostly county papers", but local newspapers are not excluded in the guideline. You can scoff and say "well, the other papers are from the next county over", but the guideline does not exclude newspapers from the next county over. You can scoff and say, "well, the circulation of one of the papers is very low." but the guideline says nothing about excluding newspapers with low circulations. You can scoff and say, "well, some of those sources aren't truly independent of the subject," but the guideline does not say that every source must be independent of the subject for the subject to be notable. In short, what you've done here is ask me if I am ignoring WP:NOTABILITY, when the guideline says nothing like what you think it says. Not only am I saying we shouldn't ignore WP:NOTABILITY, I'm saying that there is a danger in requiring more "notability" than what is actually in the guideline: things like requesting sources, and then when those are provided, requesting secondary sources, and then when sources are provided, changing the request to "sources with wider readerships". At some point, these requests become nothing more than bullying: "your article will be deleted if you don't provide a 2-page article from the New York Times"-type things. When these sorts of requests are made by someone who does little more than tag and template articles (and these actions do not significantly improve the encyclopedia), it has the effect of driving away good article writers ("this guy's just playing zap-an-article... why do I still bother writing here?"). It takes great effort to dig up and research articles on many subjects. It takes no effort at all to push a "template this" button. Someone who only adds automated templates to articles just may not understand this. Firsfron of Ronchester  07:43, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
 * "'Presumed' means that significant coverage in reliable sources establishes a presumption, not a guarantee, that a subject is suitable for inclusion." from WP:GNG  I thought this discussion was about notability of a sourced article.  "How reliable a source is, and the basis of its reliability, depends on the context. As a rule of thumb, the more people engaged in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the writing, the more reliable the publication." from WP:RS Small papers tend to have small staffs and thus fewer people fact checking, etc.  That makes them less reliable than large papers and other more prominent sources.  I'm also saying there is a danger in requiring less notability than the guidelines require.  I'm still not advocating the deletion of this article and I never have.  Asking for better sources is not "bullying".  I'm sorry you think so little of my editing.  I view tagging as essential.  Tags act as warnings to readers and editors that problems exist with the articles.  Is this germane to the topic at hand?  "An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument toward the person" or "argument against the person") is an argument which links the validity of a premise to an irrelevant characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise." from ad hominem Dethlock99 (talk) 15:42, 28 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Merge or Delete. I cannot find any secondary sources that say anything encyclopedic about this library system. There is absolutely no reason to make a special rule for county libraries, given that nearly every county has one. Also, given how short the average article on US counties are, it would be better to just add all the info on county services there. Cass County is no exception. Abductive  (reasoning) 07:38, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * While I agree that a large number of counties do have library system, as so do many towns, not every library has something notable.  Cass County District Library has a large set of local history in it's local history branch, which documents the area.  While some libraires have collection, this library has taken the time, effort, and money to build a rich history collection which help the current WikiProject Michigan is a WikiProject formed to foster better articles on the U.S. state of Michigan with a spirit of cooperation.   People travel to it from all of the U.S. to trace there family history.  With the rich history and other information stored at this over 100 year old pre-Carnegie library this merits a reason to set this library with its own page. Jsgoodrich (talk) 08:56, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * All you need are secondary sources saying that is important. Abductive  (reasoning) 15:36, 22 December 2009 (UTC)


 * I would point out the following county libraries have pages on wiki that have less information, no or limited sources Brazoria County Library System, Corvallis-Benton County Public Library, Marin County Free Library, Monmouth County Library, Solano County Library, Ramsey County Library, Fort Bend County Libraries, Atlantic County Library, Alachua County Library District, Bergen County Cooperative Library System and Logan County District Library I could go on and on about the less libraries which have been allowed to stay on wiki. I think the article should be kept, that the history of a almost 140 year old library is worth a small place in wiki, so that people looking for information on this library can find it. Jsgoodrich (talk) 09:21, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Nobody will bat an eye if you merge those. Abductive  (reasoning) 15:36, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Also, as you may discover, very few people read articles, and as you atomize the topics, even fewer people read them. For example, in the interval between the article's creation and this AfD, Cass District Library got 0, 1 or 2 page views a day, consistent with search engine bots checking the page. By comparison, Cass County, Michigan got 26 page views a day on average. Abductive  (reasoning) 15:43, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep and expand. This deserves to be WP:BETTER, not merged; in particular, the library's unique holdings of historical newspapers (which I just hotlinked) showed missing entries for  most of them.  There's plenty of room to expand.   Edward Vielmetti (talk) 17:43, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Without secondary sources, the is nothing to expand. Even with primary sources, there is little to say. Abductive  (reasoning) 17:55, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * There are secondary sources, the problem is that they are not electronic.  I lived in that county for 18 years and never knew that they had the holdings they have.  I only found out about them on my last trip to Michigan.  There are reason to document historical preserved material and those that preserver them.  They are part of American history.  There are secondary sources on Cass County and this library.  however a lot of the information is in non-electronic from.  Cass County has been one of the poorest counties in Michigan for some time (I think that may of changed a few years back).   Most people in the county do not even have access to high speed internet.   So this makes it hard to publish online sources.   I would point to the wiki Don't demolish the house while it's still being built.   Books are a secondary source, and just because they are not electronic, does not mean they are not good sources.  It will take time to get these source loaded to the page.    I think this library and it's collection (mostly local history branch) are worth a wikipedia page. As for not a lot of page views, the page is less than a month old and is only linked on two or three pages, as I have not had time to post other links.Jsgoodrich (talk) 20:37, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * If there are secondary sources, I will of course agree the topic is notable. However, I wish you would consider the fact that 10 times more people will read about it in the county article than as a standalone. Abductive  (reasoning) 02:09, 23 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep. I have found several secondary sources on the history of the library in newspaper archives. Someone found the library noteworthy. The history of the library is sourced and verifiable. These things just take a bit of research in off-line publications, as Jsgoodrich correctly states. Jsgoodrich, please continue to expand on this article. Firsfron of Ronchester  21:01, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
 * So far only of local interest, though. Abductive  (reasoning) 02:09, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Please note that local interest is not a subject that Wiki is not, wiki does have suggestions for these articles Places of local interest.  The information on the history of this library may currently be local, but it holds interest to the state as whole has keeping a part of this history, and to America as the stories of westward migration.  Also the article is less than a month old and the article has already grown to nightlight some key facts of the library and its rich history through secondary sources.   Jsgoodrich (talk) 02:35, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I remain unconvinced. These sources are not some much rich and analytical as they are mundane descriptions of operations and financing. For example, "Problem at Cass Library: Termites, Not Bookworms, Board Told Roof Also Like Sieve" and "Cass Library Phase 2 Bid $602,545" does not strike me as encyclopedic. Abductive  (reasoning) 02:42, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes that one is, but you overlooked the rich history the cite The "carnegie-legacy-seen-in-100-year-old-cass-district-library"  This is a 100 year old library, and it has a very rich history.  I ask that the administrator that reviews this look at the whole article and not just the ones that are cherry picked to make the article look less the noteworthy.  Jsgoodrich (talk) 02:59, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I think you misunderstand my position, which is that a merge is best. Taking the article in the Cassopolis Vigilant as a decent, if local, secondary source, the encyclopedic information therein is meager. For example, that source states that Carnegie built thousands of libraries, making the one in this article less notable. I am trying to convince you, not the closing admin, that a merge is the way to go, and that you will have more readers, in the Cass County article. Take a look at the few articles I have created with this account; nobody reads them. Abductive  (reasoning) 03:23, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * And I remain unconvinced that the title of a newspaper article should be the measure on whether an article is kept or not. Strange logic. Firsfron of Ronchester  04:09, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * To me, the title is more about Carnegie's legacy than the particular library. In any case, one article in a local weekly, circulation 800, doesn't move me. Abductive  (reasoning) 04:20, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Then your opinion can be disregarded by the closing administrator. Please note that Wikipedia's guidelines on notability do not require that a source must have a minimum circulation size, only that the content in the article should be verifiable and reliably sourced from sources independent of the subject. Nor does WP:N require that a source's title "be encyclopedic"; these are your own constructs, and have nothing to do with Wikipedia's own policies and guidelines. Firsfron of Ronchester  04:42, 23 December 2009 (UTC)


 * I am not sure why there is talk only about a title of an article there is a whole article about the libary and it's 100 year aniversity and what the libary now does. It is not just a title.  It can be viewed []Jsgoodrich (talk) 05:37, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * WP:N does require sources plural, and I said the source was decent, if local. My concern here is about atomizing topics into their Least publishable units, and I am attempting to educate an editor who, as I did long ago, started out writing articles like this one for topics is my local area. I've never had an article be merged or come up for AfD, but that was pure luck. Now that I have mucho experience, I know that most articles remain pitifully unread, and that information on something as local as a public library is better placed in the town or county article, with a redirect to catch the tiny number of people who rarely look up the official name. Abductive  (reasoning) 05:08, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * The article does have sources plural, but you have rejected two of the newspaper sources since their titles (!) didn't seem encyclopedic to you. Such a rejection is in no WP guideline or policy, it's something you yourself created. Your attempt to "educate" the article's main editor with guidelines you invented yourself is unnecessary. Also, please note that an article's popularity (grok.se stats) has nothing to do with whether an article should be kept or not. You stated above, "If there are secondary sources, I will of course agree the topic is notable", but now that secondary sources have been provided, you've decided that the titles of the secondary sources aren't acceptable. Firsfron of Ronchester  05:26, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Newspaper articles on a leaky roof and a bond issue didn't cut it for me. My interpretation of secondary sources is that they need to analyze the topic in depth. As for saying I invented these guidelines myself, I have seem comments similar to mine in innumerable AfDs. Finally, I did not nominate this article for deletion. Abductive  (reasoning) 05:41, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Both news articles cover the subject in depth; all you're going on are the titles of the articles, a poor method of judging an article's merits. You've decided in your own mind what these articles cover, from their titles alone: pure speculation. Because your opinions are based on your own spurious decision, I'm fairly certain the closing admin will give your views little weight in closing this debate. Firsfron of Ronchester  05:59, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I would like to point out that the link on the leaky roof was not added by me, so I can not state all why it was added for sure. But to me it was to show that there is information in offline sources about the topic.    The article that I added was the 100 year anniversary [] which is one online article.   There are several articles which are offline, that do look at the history.  I do understand that a lot of articles set on wiki with no one looking at them.  That sometimes it is good to have all in one place like under a county page.   However, sometimes I think there needs to be a time to have them on their own.  I think there is enough information in good sources they just have to be offline which takes time to develop.  Jsgoodrich (talk) 06:09, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * There is no "link on a leaky roof". There are, however, references to two newspaper articles detailing the history of the library: one verifies the building of a new library in 1977, another verifies the purchase of an earlier library building in 1959. The title of one of the articles mentions the leaky roof, but Abductive is using that as a reason why the the Wikipedia article on the library should be deleted. An extremely poor argument, of course. Firsfron of Ronchester  06:15, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * What's with the hostility? There is a difference of opinion, with some people thinking that a local library district's building woes/financing being evidence for notability, and others not. Abductive  (reasoning) 06:56, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Merge and expand. If the section on the library evolves, then we can split it later. I would suggest that everyone reread DGG's comment as he is an expert on this subject. Abductive is also correct about readership of articles. IMHO, county libraries need sources outside of the county to establish notability, because local puff pieces are so common. Perhaps we should work on criteria for notability of libraries. Dethlock99 (talk) 21:22, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Not that I don't agree that a notability guideline could be established, but two of the sources I added are outside of the county and are also not puff pieces. They're news articles documenting the history of the library. Best, Firsfron of Ronchester  22:38, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * * I did read DDG post, and that is why I found the document that talked about the library and the mission that it is still playing in the Carnegie legacy and in the community. I think this makes this worthy of an article.  There are still many sources which are in offline material.  The two biggest newspapers around this area are the South Bend Tribune and Kalamazoo Gazette do not publish a lot of their material online, they are in the old school model of what a paper is/was.   This article is already bigger than the ten's of thousands of stubs that wiki has.   I think this information is already to much to load down the county page with to much information about one part of the county.   Thus making the county article more of an article for the library than the county as a whole.  I am working on expanding more information about the county page, which would also make the county article a more useful article. I think there is enough information in offline sources that make this notable.  I think there is enough to start this as its own article and develop it more I think to delete or merge this article so soon is premature as I stated earlier a form of  [[Wikipedia:Don't demolish the house while it's still being built]].  Jsgoodrich (talk) 23:59, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I was working on doing some updating on the Cass County page and was looking at the template for U.S. counties form the wiki project of U.S. Counties WikiProject U.S. counties and could not find where a library system should be listed on the county page.  While templates are not set in stone, if we are looking for conformity, I think they should not be merged.  There are templates for libraries I think that is setting up idea that libraries should have their own article.Jsgoodrich (talk) 08:59, 24 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep! Public libraries are important and useful to the residents of places throughout the United States, and especially in states like Michigan with high unemployment. This particular article is well documented and being improved by editors who care about it. Other editors have supplied detailed reasons above better than I could do. --DThomsen8 (talk) 13:30, 25 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree that libraries are important. Not just in the US and Michigan, but the world over.  The article is sourced. Yes.  The question is:  Is it notable?  There are guidelines as to the notability of subjects and that is what is being discussed.  Those guidelines can be ignored if it will improve Wikipedia.  If editors continue to improve the article and its sources, I'm sure it will stay in some form.  Nothing we do here is etched in stone.  The article can be relisted for deletion if kept, or posted again if deleted.  The article has editors who care about it, and, here, are editors who care about Wikipedia.  I have seen many editors who cared about an article, but didn't care how adversely their article might affect wikipedia.  We are fortunate in this small debate to have, in my view, editors on all sides who care about both the article and wikipedia.  Will wikipedia be better with this article or with out it?  Right now, I would say neither.  But if the article continues to improve, that would quickly change my opinion.  Dethlock99 (talk) 15:57, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I have added a talk page template to Kalamazoo Public Library saying class=stub, because it lacks any inline citations, but earlier I ranked this article as class=C, before it had eleven inline citations and the creator added photos. Do other editors agree with this quality ranking? If so, it is another point in saying, keep this article. --DThomsen8 (talk) 12:58, 27 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep I have re-examined the discussion following after my earlier comment, and I am convinced by the keep arguments. True, I have previously opposed articles on individual branches of a county library system, and I still continue to think they should be included within combination articles in the system. However, I think we should indeed make an article for every county or similar library when we have Verifiable information to do so, on  the same basis as high schools: there will always be sufficient material  to  meet WP:GNG if looked for properly--as they are here.  Local sources are what document local events., & there is no reason not to use them.  WP:LOCAL is an essay,  and I think would not get approval as a guideine; the quite different WP:Notability (local) is a failed guideline,--between the two it shows there is no general  consensus about articles on institutions of local importance only.    (My personal view is that we should deal with local topics by a Wikipedia supplement, WikiLocal) But as we do not have that, we should put them in Wikipedia  if they meet our guidelines--after all, we are not paper and if there were to be articles on a  million libraries, there is no problem finding a place to put them--the only problem is getting people to write them. The people who do, should be encouraged--it's a good project for local students.   I point out that an article needing improvement is not reason to deleet it; considering the state in which almost all Wikipedia articles started out, the encyclopedia would never have developed at all.
 * incidentally, I am unable to understand Abductive's point above that the sources are not " rich and analytical"--the onlhy requirement in the GNG is for significant coverage, which is much less than that. Perhaps 5% of   Wikipedia  articles have rich and analytical sources.  "Mundane and descriptive " sources do perfectly well for writing about the mundane world, which is properly  the subject of most of the encyclopedia.

 DGG ( talk ) 13:49, 28 December 2009 (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.