Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John Couriel


 * 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. The article's subject is found to lack notability. &mdash; Coffee //  have a cup  //  beans  // 14:55, 24 March 2016 (UTC)

John Couriel

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Unsuccessful candidate for state legislature and former Assistant U.S. Attorney who has not received significant coverage in reliable sources. Fails WP:NPOL and WP:GNG. Hirolovesswords (talk) 15:56, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions.  /wiae   /tlk  18:15, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Florida-related deletion discussions.  /wiae   /tlk  18:15, 5 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Unelected candidates for political office do not get Wikipedia articles just for being candidates — if you cannot make and properly source a credible claim that they were already notable enough for a Wikipedia article independently of the candidacy, then they have to win the seat, not just run for it, to become notable enough. But nothing here suggests that he would get over any other notability criterion, as his work as a lawyer is referenced entirely to primary sources (like a press release from his own law firm, etc.) rather than reliable source media coverage about it. So WP:GNG has not been met here either. Delete. Bearcat (talk) 03:45, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
 * I have to disagree with Bearcat's reasoning. Criteria 3 of NPOL says that an unelected candidate is notable if they satisfy GNG. The source of confusion here is that a candidate who satisfies GNG may be excluded on grounds of BLP1E if he has received coverage only in respect of his participation in one election. The reason being that he can be covered in the article on that election. But BLP1E does not apply to a candidate who has coverage for participating in multiple elections because that is two or more events and there is no BLP2E. And Couriel appears to have coverage for participating in more than one election: see, for example, this coverage of his participation in the 2016 election in addition to the coverage for the 2012 election. 1E is also strictly one event, not one type of event. James500 (talk) 05:26, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
 * No, an unelected candidate does not get over our inclusion bar just because they've run in more than one election and thus escape WP:BLP1E — at a conservative estimate, at least half of all unsuccessful candidates for office don't try just once and then walk away never to even dabble in electoral politics again, but rather try again a second or third time (sometimes for the same office, sometimes for a different one, but quite often still more than just once.) So if BLP1E were the issue, then we'd still have to keep articles about at least half of all the people who ever put their name on a ballot anywhere in the entire world, just because they ran more than just once. Notice, as well, that I said nothing about BLP1E anywhere in the entire comment you responded to — you're arguing with something I didn't say in the first place.
 * Rather, the issue is that because the media have an obligation to grant "equal time" coverage to all candidates in all elections taking place in their coverage area, meaning that all candidates for all offices could always claim to pass WP:GNG on the basis of that campaign coverage alone, such coverage can't carry notability in and of itself because it falls under WP:ROUTINE. Once the person has a valid and substantive claim of notability (i.e. by winning election to a notable seat), then it can be dug back into for supplementary confirmation of facts — but it cannot be the foundation of a GNG claim in and of itself, because it's a type of coverage that all candidates for all offices always get by virtue of having stood as a candidate.
 * If campaign coverage could pass GNG in and of itself, then we would have to always allow any candidate for any office at all (even "village dogcatcher") to keep a Wikipedia article on GNG grounds. So that campaign coverage cannot pass GNG in and of itself, because if it did, then there'd be no remaining way for us to control the onslaught of campaign brochures — and then we wouldn't be Wikipedia anymore, but Ballotpedia. Bearcat (talk) 16:13, 6 March 2016 (UTC)
 * (1) WP:ROUTINE applies to events, not people. (2) An SNG cannot restrict GNG or another SNG. The introduction to N makes it clear that they are alternatives, not co-requisites. ROUTINE is only intended to restrict the inclusive criteria of NEVENT. (3) Before you mention it, NOTNEWS is inapplicable because this individual has received lasting coverage for several years. James500 (talk) 02:08, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
 * (1) WP:ROUTINE most certainly does apply to people. It is entirely possible, and indeed quite common, for somebody to try to start an article about a person solely on the basis of purely routine "coverage": I've personally seen articles about people whose only source was their death notice in the local newspaper classifieds, even though every person who dies gets one of those regardless of their encyclopedic notability or lack thereof — or their "So-and-so announces their wedding to such-and-such" notice in the local newspaper classifieds, even though that's also a thing that anybody can get if they place one. Articles about musicians can and do get created solely on the basis of their inclusion in concert listings directories, without a shred of reliable source coverage about them. I've seen articles about people created solely on the basis of their own "our staff" profile on the website of their own employer. And on and so forth. The fact that the topic is a person rather than an event does not make those types of coverage "not routine" — any coverage which falls in the "to be expected in this context, and not distinguishing the topic as out of the ordinary in any substantive way" falls under ROUTINE regardless of whether the topic is an event, a person, a place or a giraffe.
 * (2) No, SNGs and GNG do not create exemptions from each other — they operate in tandem, not as alternative paths to each other. Passing an SNG, for example, does not exempt a person from having to be properly sourced — for one thing, many SNGs are so vaguely written that it can be debated whether they've actually passed it or not, and especially for people the passage of an SNG can be obfuscated with unverifiable and/or outright false public relations claims. We've actually seen writers try to get Wikipedia articles by claiming to have had a national bestselling book when they really hadn't, and musicians try to get Wikipedia articles by claiming to have had charting hit singles on Billboard when they actually hadn't — and we've seen total hoax articles about people who were claimed to have served in a national legislature but never actually even existed at all. So claiming to pass an SNG is not an alternative to having to meet GNG, because we still have to be able to verify in reliable sources that the claim of notability is actually true. And as I've already noted, every politician who fails NPOL could always claim to have passed GNG anyway, because local coverage of the election campaigns, and local coverage of local politics, always exists. So for coverage of a non-winning candidate, or a holder of an local office that doesn't confer an automatic NPOL pass, to count toward GNG at all, that coverage has to nationalize into something far beyond the scope of what that person could naturally expect to receive in the local media. And again, that's not a personal rule that I made up myself, but the established consensus about what counts as getting an NPOL-failing politician over GNG and what doesn't: nationalized coverage counts toward GNG; the purely expected and routine level of localized coverage does not.
 * (3) Kindly don't presume to be able to read my mind: I wasn't going to say anything about WP:NOTNEWS at all. Bearcat (talk) 17:28, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   10:47, 15 March 2016 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Delete Non-notable person who fails WP:GNG and WP:POLITICIAN. The references are mostly election related, and include a Facebook page, several press releases, and other non-acceptable sources. The one source from an actual newspaper is about a scout hike he took when he was 14, and it doesn't even confirm the fact it is cited for; it is cited to show he was an Eagle Scout but in the article he was still only a Life Scout. This page should have been deleted years ago; kudos to the nominator for finding it now. --MelanieN (talk) 00:33, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   12:49, 24 March 2016 (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.