Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Damon J. Smith


 * 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. Spartaz Humbug! 07:03, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Damon J. Smith

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

Fails notability test. Article created by SPA, likely to be an alias of subject of article. Many superfluous non-notable citations. Appears to be blatant self-promotion.

I found this article from a suspicious entry in List of jazz fusion musicians and became suspicious as the music published by this artist is amateur (in comparison to other artists listed on this page such as Miles Davis). After checking edits by user who added the entry, and a quick google search it became obvious that this account was an alias of Damon J. Smith himself, and this page is being used for self-promotion. Ludston (talk) 11:16, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of California-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 12:00, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Poetry-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 12:00, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Bands and musicians-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 12:00, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Radio-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 12:01, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Businesspeople-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 12:01, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Sportspeople-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 12:01, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Authors-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 12:02, 28 March 2019 (UTC)


 * Delete Name does not return any results. The sources present in the article are not enough to support WP:GNG as most are brief mentions. AmericanSoil (talk) 12:44, 28 March 2019 (UTC) Confirmed sock. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 12:57, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Entertainment-related deletion discussions. 13:49, 28 March 2019 (UTC) -- PATH SLOPU (Talk) 13:49, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Entertainment-related deletion discussions. 13:49, 28 March 2019 (UTC) -- PATH SLOPU (Talk) 13:49, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

I created this page many years ago after meeting Mr. Smith and being impressed by his many varied accomplishments. He is a celebrity in the Northern California area, very well known in the motocross industry, and I felt his status warranted the page. I've compiled over 50+ verifiable media sources to ensure this page was always in line with Wikipedia's BLP criteria. I feel as though this page is being attacked by users who may have alterior motives and are hiding behind aliases in order to remove a valid page. It's curious that a previous user actually got the the page deleted a few weeks ago, and then as soon as another user restored it, that user disappeared and now this "Ludston" user, who has no prior contribs, is attempting to delete it again. His basis is the same accusation the prior user made, saying that my username is an alias for Smith himself, which it most certainly is not. As I said, I met the man, but I am not him. I am happy to set up a Skype or provide other means to verify my identity. I do not hide behind aliases in order to tear down anyone else on Wikipedia or anywhere else for that matter. I am happy to edit the page if there are constructive critiques of what I included, but there is no basis for deletion of the entire page. Taryndejesus (talk) 23:56, 29 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment


 * Hi again - I just did a little cleanup of the music section of the page, removing any citations that may be considered superfluous or non-notable, leaving references Billboard magazine and No Depression magazine, which should certainly be considered notable enough to include. Please let me know if this suffices to remove the AfD flag. Thank you!Taryndejesus (talk) 00:21, 30 March 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment Having looked at the article for about 2-3 weeks. The article is highly promotional spam, full of puff and I'm verging towards delete. The music section alone is terrible and is coming out, particularly since he has less than 4000 plays on Spotify and 1005 on Soundcloud. It is plain native advertising and plainly cack. The rest of the article would need a significant rewrite. I think he is perhaps borderline notable.  scope_creep Talk  07:48, 30 March 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment Where does it say in Wikipedia's guidelines that a musician has to have 4K+ followers on Spotify to be worthy of referencing their music on Wikipedia? Not every musical artist promotes him or herself on Spotify. If you look at his Instagram he has over 30,000 followers there with a high level of engagement. Is it not noteworthy to at least reference that his music charted in a top 10 spot on Billboard, when he started his career as an athlete? And why does your opinion of his music count toward whether or not his entire page should be deleted? I'm sorry if this sounds combative, because I am not trying to be contentious, just protecting this page that I have worked hard to create and maintain over the years. I am from the Northern California Bay Area, where he is quite a celebrity. So maybe you haven't heard of him, but I haven't heard of a lot of people on Wikipedia, and I could probably care less about some of the people you might truly herald. I could probably go right now and find a dozen or more Wiki biographies of people who have accomplished less, have less verifiable citations, and frankly contribute nothing to the richness of people highlighted on this online encyclopedia. To me this appears to be a case of a handful of Wikipedia editors who simply just don't like the guy, or want to say he's not "noteworthy" enough because perhaps there's some element of jealousy toward someone who has accomplished a great deal more than the average joe. Like I said above, I am not just writing about some guy I think is great because of his small town accomplishments that very few people know about. I compiled well over 50 third party media sources from California to Canada, including national magazines such as Essence and Billboard. I am all for upholding the integrity of Wikipedia, and to that end I am more than willing to edit based on constructive criticism. But none of this feels very constructive. Taryndejesus (talk) 22:49, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

Did a little more cleanup of the page to remove anything that could be deemed "puff" or "advertising" - look forward to your response. Taryndejesus (talk) 02:23, 31 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment

Comment I do not see how Damon J. Smith fulfils any of the criteria of notability for Wikipedia, and I will try and colour this. Please understand that this is not a personal attack.

In this article you reference Damon's "achievements" in multiple categories, (football, motocross, business, music) I see you have already removed reference to his music career, so I will go through each of the others.

Motocross: We look here, to justify notability: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(sports)#Motorsports Damon has only appeared in one professional Motocross competition called the "AMA Supercross Championship", but I see no evidence that he has competed in any race with significant prize money at stake.

Football: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(sports)#American_football/Arena_football/Canadian_football According to his wiki page, he never played in a professional football game.

Business, of which there is no specific notability page for, so we use the default notability test. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research#Primary,_secondary_and_tertiary_sources None of the citations provided are secondary sources.

You have my apologies if this is process is causing you some kind of distress or frustration. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ludston (talk • contribs) 12:04, 31 March 2019 (UTC) Ludston Thank you for your thorough response. I have been somewhat frustrated because this didn't seem very straightforward, and since this article has been in existence for many years (longer than you and other editors appear to have been contributing), and because there were accusations that I am somehow an alias of the guy, it felt like a personal attack. But I believe I have a better understanding of your concerns, and I can see how I could have done a better job of highlighting what Wikipedia considers noteworthy, rather than what I think is noteworthy. I will edit the page accordingly and provide a summary of my edits below when I have finished editing the page. Taryndejesus (talk) 17:54, 31 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Response

Strong Keep I have done some cleanup to the page with the Wiki notability guidelines in mind. In response to Ludston, I would like to point out:

Motocross: Passes Motorsports notability guideline #3 (Competed in a series or race of worldwide or national interest), as Smith competed in Loretta Lynn's Amateur Championship, which, according to Wikipedia, is "known as the world's largest amateur motocross race." I also just found articles showing he returned to AMA Supercross this year, taking 7th overall in the vet class of the AMA Supercross Futures event. His performance was highlighted in Motocross Action Magazine as a "strong finish," but I have not yet added that because I'm unsure if the Supercross Futures events pass the notability guideline. I would appreciate feedback on whether or not that should be added.

Football: I don't know if Ludston didn't read this section thoroughly, or if perhaps the way I previously wrote it was confusing, but Smith certainly did play in pro games with the Calgary Stampeders, meeting notability requirement #1 for American football/Arena football/Canadian football. I cleaned up the copy to make sure it reads properly. He was injured while playing in the 9th game of the season, and I've sourced articles from the Calgary Herald that can attest to this fact. Additionally, I would point out that his ranking in the top 50 on the all-time NCAA football list further undergirds notability requirement #2.

Business and media: I cleaned up this section quite a bit, and expanded on the Essence Magazine source, which I believe certainly is a secondary source (quote from the Essence article: "DOING RIGHT: Last year this engineer traveled to Brazil, where he was so touched by the plight of 6- and 7-year-old children in the slums of Belo Horizonte that he created the documentary Don’t Let the Fire Die.") While the music section has been removed, I added back the reference to the Billboard Magazine chart because I firmly believe this is a notable source and also should be referenced because of the context it brings to the rest of the article. I would understand the argument to leave it out if music was his only pursuit. While his music may currently only be borderline notable to Wikipedia editors, in the greater context of him starting his career as an athlete, then becoming an engineer and author, charting on Billboard is certainly notable. Additional secondary sources are provided from No Depression (magazine), and All About Jazz, both of which reviewed his work.

I again would like to say that I am completely open to refining this article further based on constructive criticism. I am in fact thankful that this scrutiny has forced me to improve my wikipedia editing skills. I hope that this will yield a much better biography of Smith, because I sincerely believe that biographies of people like him bring value to this online encyclopedia. Thank you. Taryndejesus (talk) 06:48, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Only one vote is allowed in the discussion. Please read WP:DISCUSSAFD.  scope_creep Talk  08:15, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus. Relisting comment: Lots of comments, !votes not so many...

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Randykitty (talk) 16:57, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment Routine sports reporting on football and motocross dominates the references. My search found a source (unsure of its reliability) that says he played part of 1 regular season game for Calgary in the CFL when he replaced an injured player before getting injured himself in the same game.  Technically that's enough to meet WP:NGRIDIRON, but it's very weak.  I'm not impressed with the great majority of references--even the list in Essence is just a short blurb in a list of names.  No vote at this time. Papaursa (talk) 00:46, 6 April 2019 (UTC)

Comment Being somewhat new to the AfD process, and seeing that the discussion does not seem to be leading to any sort of concensus, I would like to add a few more thoughts about this page and its apparent controversy with the hope it will contribute to a positive conclusion. First off, I'd like to paste the first paragraph in Wikipedia's guidelines on BLP and Notability: "On Wikipedia, notability is a test used by editors to decide whether a given topic warrants its own article. For people, the person who is the topic of a biographical article should be "worthy of notice"[1] or "note"[2]—that is, "remarkable"[2] or "significant, interesting, or unusual enough to deserve attention or to be recorded"[1] within Wikipedia as a written account of that person's life. "Notable" in the sense of being famous or popular—although not irrelevant—is secondary."

The editors who seem to be leaning toward deletion are focusing solely on whether or not Damon J. Smith is famous or popular, which according to the guideline above, is supposed to only be a secondary factor in determining whether he is notable or not. Indeed, the person who proposed this article for deletion did so because he thought his music was amateur in comparison to Miles Davis. That's a pretty high benchmark! If every jazz artist listed in Wikipedia had to be as good as Miles Davis to be included, it would be a pretty small jazz section. I highly suspect that the editor probably looked up Smith's music and, being that one of his albums could be considered socially controversial, was perhaps offended by his music and set about to get his page deleted (and again I note this in light of a prior user who had attempted a "speedy deletion" of the page, which succeeded until another editor undid his action, and then the user disappeared completely before this new user appeared with his sole contribution to Wikipedia being proposing this page for deletion.) I would also point out that his proposal for deletion of this page was followed up with a confirmed sockpuppet vote to delete. I firmly believe that this point alone is worthy of discrediting the entire discussion. Yet I find it interesting that there remain other Wikipedia editors who share that same critical spirit in proclaiming Smith as not noteworthy enough simply because they don't think he's famous. They discredit the fact that he charted on Billboard because it was in a genre of music that they don't think is relevant, or they discredit his being highlighted on Essence Magazine because he was one out of 50 men highlighted in that annual issue (so if we use that logic, then maybe we should discount every person who has ever been highlighted as one of People Magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People in the World articles). Forgive me if I sound as though I'm "playing the race card" (for the record, I myself am not black), but this really looks to me like a panel of non-black Wikipedia editors discussing whether this incredibly unique and accomplished black man is worthy of their approval to be included in this online encyclopedia. I'm not calling anyone racist so please don't take this as a personal attack, but I do think everyone is operating out of a personal bias that they may not even know they have. I would encourage everyone to consider just how challenging it is for people of color to achieve "notability" when the gatekeepers who determine who is notable and who is not notable are most often white.

Which brings me to point #2, which is actually the first and apparently more important criteria according to Wikipedia's guideline on BLP, that the biographical article should be "worthy of notice" [1] - that is "remarkable" or "significant, interesting or unusual enough to deserve attention or to be recorded within Wikipedia as a written account of that person's life." I will again reiterate that I wrote this article many years ago because I live in Northern California where he is well known as a remarkable person with a unique combination of interesting and noteworthy achievements. The Sacramento Bee wrote a feature article in their music section about his transition from being a football player to a social activist musician. This was followed up by another full page article by the Vallejo Times Herald (not a republish, but a separate interview and original article). Perhaps each of his singular achievements, from football to motocross, to business and music, when scrutinized in a vacuum do not merit inclusion on Wikipedia. However, I argue that all of these achievements, which are all backed up by a variety of reliable sources, combine to make him "significant, interesting and unusual enough to deserve attention."

I apologize for the length of this comment, but I hope this helps bring the AfD to a close. I rest my case. Unless someone wants to challenge me further on this topic. Thank you. Taryndejesus (talk) 20:44, 10 April 2019 (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.