Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Herb Ringer


 * 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The result was   Nomination withdrawn. (non-admin closure) Ron Ritzman (talk) 00:08, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Herb Ringer

 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

It's with some reluctance that I nominate an article that has a certain bathetic appeal, but that asserts minimal significance; that even for this assertion relies on sourcing that's demonstrably unreliable (see its talk page), minimal, and laughably credulous; and that has other issues besides. However, it's sported warning templates quite long enough. Hoary (talk) 00:42, 1 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Nomination withdrawn; see below. -- Hoary (talk) 08:34, 17 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Photography-related deletion discussions.  —Hoary (talk) 00:47, 1 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions.  —Hoary (talk) 06:03, 1 September 2009 (UTC)
 * I never have felt well enough to do the reduction to make the entry a simple summary with references to the biographical details, as was mentioned on the talk page. The blahs just have dogged me for months. I think a man who documented the west in the mid-20th century merits an entry. A few minor details about cameras is rather extreme to declare the source "unrealiable". I am saddened at what I perceive as the growing self-pomposity and myopia of the guardians of Wikipedia. Now only bigshots merit entries. What a sad statement of what should be a more democratic entity than traditional encyclopedias. But I am not going to put up a fuss if you delete the entry. Just shake my head at the sad spectacle of it all. User:Dgabbard
 * the growing self-pomposity and myopia of the guardians of Wikipedia -- Why the plural? Only one person had said anything here about Ringer: me. Now, while other people might be offended by a charge of "self-pomposity and myopia", I'm not offended at all; still, I am a little surprised. &para; I should elaborate on the charge I make above of credulousness. I quote from the article: Ringer had near total recall of his travels, and Stiles found all he had to do to prompt a memory was (for example) state "OK, it's the summer of 1941 and you're getting ready to head west again from New Jersey." Within moments Ringer would respond "Yes. I remember I left about eight in the morning. It was a clear cool day. Not too hot. I traveled north on Route 22 and stopped for breakfast at a little diner." Many people have the ability to convincingly give surprising detail about past events. A much smaller number can actually do so reliably. I'm willing to believe that Ringer was among that smaller number. But I don't see any hint that he was. Nobody would expect that a newspaper writer would subject him to some memory test, but there were surely plenty of opportunities for the writer to announce that yes, his researches had proved that this or that implausible detail that Ringer claimed to remember was in fact true. &para; a man who documented the west in the mid-20th century merits an entry Well, there were a fair number of people who did just that, a number of FSA photographers among them. Of course, this doesn't mean that WP shouldn't present more, and I'm very willing to believe that Ringer's interests (and use of color) set him off from the mainstreams -- and even this is unnecessary, but let's see evidence of a degree of recognition. &para; Now only bigshots merit articles: Absolutely not: among photographers, consider the FSA photographer Sheldon Dick, a minor and at best mediocre photographer whose work is treated with some respect in the article here; Kensuke Kazama, who until recently was standing in a Tokyo park on sunny days, selling his photos for a thousand yen a print; Mieko Shiomi, an amateur whose works have appeared in a single book that she published herself; and I suppose a whole lot of others besides. &para; As for the shock of having one's own article flagged for possible deletion, (i) this article has had other warning templates for a long time (neither you nor anybody else had touched it for five months), and (ii) when my learned friend Dicklyon did something similar to one of "my" articles, I was so pissed off with this/him, and was so dogged by the blahs, that I improved the article. You are (and anyone else is) very welcome to do likewise to this article. -- Hoary (talk) 00:34, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Maybe he might be notable, though it's hard to sort that out from the overdetailed bio. I removed the material which would give any reasonable person a bias against the article. Next step, it would help to have some additional source--are his photographs are in any collection? Where, besides this one local magazine were they published?    DGG ( talk ) 01:15, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you DGG for doing the summary I readily admit I should have done. SIGH. Yeah, additional sources would be helpful. Ringer seems to have fallen between the cracks as to being documented. And I think Mr. Stiles is the one with custody of the photos and there is no indication when/if they might be donated to an approriate archive. "growing self-pomposity and myopia" I guess is a reaction to some of my encounters with editors and also all this talk in media reports that edits will soon have to pass muster with editors who will police the site. Not always a very plesant experience. If the slimmed down version passes muster I am grateful. User:Dgabbard
 * All those media reports: here's a sample. If I understand the change correctly, it will have absolutely no impact on your attempts to edit the minority of articles that would be affected, as long as you were logged in. Neither the article on Ringer nor this AfD would be affected. But this is better discussed elsewhere. -- Hoary (talk) 02:05, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
 * and at this point it's only BLP's that are being considered.   DGG ( talk ) 20:54, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
 * any chance of an article on Stiles, or his magazine. It would give some perspective on importance?   DGG ( talk ) 20:54, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Article on Stiles would take time to research. Not sure how much perspective on importance it would contributeUser:Dgabbard
 * There's enough out there. See this for starters. (I might even start something later today.) -- Hoary (talk) 01:20, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, JForget  21:13, 7 September 2009 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.


 * Comment. I'm disappointed. Unlike a lot of articles on obscure photographers, this one can't be promotional: the man's dead, and nobody seems to be attempting to make money off his work. I like to hear of photographers who are doing something that isn't merely commercial; I'd hoped to hear more about Ringer that would lead me to withdraw this nomination. Well, there's still time. -- Hoary (talk) 09:18, 11 September 2009 (UTC)
 * PS and if JForget undertook to do some work on this within a year from now, he'd be welcome to have it userfied in the meantime. -- Hoary (talk) 22:33, 12 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Sure I could if it is deleted, although I will relist this a final time. JForget  20:15, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, JForget  20:15, 14 September 2009 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.


 * Note: Relisted for a final time. JForget  20:15, 14 September 2009 (UTC)


 * I don't know what to say. DGG did the necessary editing to make the entry a summary of what Ringer did and why he matters. He documented a world that no longer exists. Decades from now historians will celebrate having his visual record of mid-20th century western culture as a resource to draw on. I am sure in time the photos will be donated to a institution that will make them available. I think all that merits an entry. If it doesn't measure up, I appreciate a fair discussion was held on its merits. User:Dgabbard

Nomination withdrawn. Although I think immediately above Dgabbard overstates the case for Ringer, and although Ringer seems only to have been noticed by a single, local publication, that publication itself seems article-worthy and this article is now scrupulously compiled. Incidentally, my own sagging bookshelves contain several volumes of photographs from the miraculously preserved collections of negatives of this or that photographer -- Victor Barsokevitsch (fi:Victor Barsokevitsch), Johannes Pääsuke, etc) -- and I wish all the best for Ringer's afterlife. -- Hoary (talk) 08:33, 17 September 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.