Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John McBride (photographer)


 * 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.  MBisanz  talk 06:13, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

John McBride (photographer)

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

A photographer who, we're told, has had individual photographs published here and there. No mention of any exhibitions (let alone solo exhibitions) or any major contributions to anything (let alone entire books). What's said to be his best known work was published in The East Villager (now redlinked). There is a mention in a note of a single review, but the context suggests that this is not of McBride's work but instead of an album for whose cover McBride contributed a photo. No other critical commentary is cited. We do read that a selection of McBride's photographs were chosen for inclusion in the permanent collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, but this claim rests on a letter from the museum to McBride. No mention of where this letter is published. Perhaps the editor citing it can see it directly, as this article has been written by this one author, whose contributions to Wikipedia all seem to have been on or directly related to John McBride. However, McBride doesn't seem close to meeting WP:CREATIVE. Hoary (talk) 14:58, 21 March 2009 (UTC) .... One part deleted as now obsolete -- Hoary (talk) 16:06, 24 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Photography-related deletion discussions.  —Hoary (talk) 15:03, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Living people-related deletion discussions.  —Hoary (talk) 15:05, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Original author responds

As I am very new to contributing to Wikipedia I have tried to do the best job possible as I also prefer well-written articles. I am glad that there are people like Hoary who volunteer the time to edit Wikipedia and improve articles. The edits made by others of the article on John McBride have been mostly good and by forcing me to correct my mistakes I am slowly learning how to properly structure articles. I must say, however, that I am a little taken aback at the tone of the negative comments and this certainly dampens my enthusiasm for making further contributions to Wikipeda, and I can't see the point of the comment "gibberish...still terrible."

Maybe I'm incorrect, but my impression of Wikipedia was that it was better than an old-fashioned encyclopedia because it is democratic, free and its openness allows for a healthy wide-range of views as to what is important and/or notable, while the old encyclopedias suffered from an institutional bias and were restricted by the physical limitations of space (limited number of pages).

- I responded to earlier criticisms to the article by adding, or attempting to add whatever information others said were missing and I can add more relevant info if need be. I added numerous references to back up the text of the article, even though I thought it overkill, but I was responding to criticism of missing sources.

- There is no Wikipedia page for The East Villager newspaper as of yet, although there should be as it was a well-read paper serving a very prominent area of New York City. The fact that there isn't one yet doesn't mean that it was unimportant, and I am often surprised to find that an important subject does not yet have an article on Wikipedia.

- The Rolling Stone review was used as a source with regard to the Masters of Reality album, not John McBride, so I am unsure how to respond to that comment. Rolling Stone doesn't review the work of photographers to my knowledge. This part of the article may needed to be edited though as it may be a little more info than needed.

- The source for the inclusion in the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston was added in response to criticism. The website for the museum does not seem to have updated their list so the letter was used as a source. Many books list letters as sources in their endnotes and clearly very few letters are published - most are in private collections - so I don't see why the letter cannot be a source until the museum updates its list.
 * Update:Source found by Wperdue at Annual Report 2006-2007, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (PDF file, 7.05 MB}\] --Darknessandlight (talk) 15:41, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

- McBride's work has been published numerous times and the list in the article is just a partial one.

- McBride's work has been in group shows but I thought that would clutter the article.

- Is there a "book" standard that defines notability in terms of being a noteworthy photographer vs. publications in newspapers or magazines?

- As stated, McBride's work is in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston and is also in private collections.

I am grateful that Hoary has written articles on numerous subjects including Japanese photographers and I am glad that I can browse Wikipedia and learn more about them. Such Japanese photographers would most likely not ever be mentioned in a standard encyclopedia, and the fact that I haven't yet heard of them nor read about them makes Hoary's contribution, in my mind, more valuable and not less so.

Clearly, I think that John McBride (photographer) meets Wikipedia's standards and I hope that Hoary will reconsider his opinion. --Darknessandlight (talk) 17:13, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Weak Keep It appears to meet WP:Creative though not by a lot. I did find an additional web reference from The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. It appears to include a list of works by John McBride purchased by the museum http://www.mfah.org/pdf/AR2007.pdf Added in this edit at 17:40, 21 March 2009 by Wperdue
 * brief reply to article writers comments: Wikipedia is not a democracy, as described at What Wikipedia is notMercurywoodrose (talk) 18:52, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep - Although not exactly an article that we could demonstrate as the criteria of WP:CREATIVE incarnate, the article still meets the criteria by receiving significant critical attention and has played a role in creating significant work. He seems to be notable within his own field.  Jd 027  (talk) 19:04, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete Not notable, also for what it's worth a clear case of conflict of interest, and WP:NOTMYSPACE. This is one more example of a problem that comes up in AFD time and again - confusing evidence of output with evidence of notability. Any journalist, illustrator, editor, backing singer, etc. etc. will generate a certain amount of Google hits (and even the occasional minor award) simply by virtue of being active, working professionals. Multiple ghits, however, do not of themselves support an individual's notability. The core policy is absolutely clear, "significant coverage" is required for notability, which means sources that "address the subject directly in detail, and no original research is needed to extract the content". That is, several authors in reliable sources need to have considered the individual sufficiently important to warrant an article or two about them as the primary subject, not simply mention the individual in the context of something related, such as an exhibition or news incident. Articles such as this, when sourced at all, are inevitably lists of random mentions of an individual's output containing few if any references to coverage of the individual as a worthy subject by him or herself, which on a related note means that they fall into the problem of original research as well. AngoraFish   木  21:50, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * AngoraFish: "This is one more example of a problem that comes up in AFD time and again - confusing evidence of output with evidence of notability." Interesting that you should say this. I have mixed thoughts about it, as "notability" in WP terms often means little more than buzz of a kind assiduously generated by PR flacks. The Beckham bambini (for example) have this ersatz "notability", a fact that appears to embarrass even the "coverage"-bedazzled writers of the notability page, who make an exception for mere family members. My own inclination is to be impressed by output and the hell with buzz; thus for example my stub on this fellow. -- Hoary (talk) 00:45, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Perhaps I'm misreading you here, but it appears that we are in agreement. The 'buzz' that you talk about is very much the kind of dross that ends out padding out articles such as this. WP's core policy on notability is significantly more rigorous than "three mentions in a mainstream newspaper and he/she/it gets over the line". Tragically, the "three mainstream mentions" rule is the most common standard applied at AFD. AngoraFish   木  09:39, 22 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep (this vote by orig. author) (1) Thank you to Jd027 for finding the source for the acquisition of work by the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. (2) As for the East Villager, it deserves a Wikipedia page.  By the way, the editor of the East Villager was Steven Vincent, a journalist who was later murdered in 2005 (by death squads) in Iraq for his writings on death squads within the Iraqi police forces. --Darknessandlight (talk) 23:04, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I think that it was Wperdue who found the reference (though the confusion over this is understandable). -- Hoary (talk) 00:52, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep and cleanup – it doesn't even need terribly that much cleanup for it to be a perfectly OK article. Clearly notable. MuZemike 00:20, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Kind-of apology: Darknessandlight writes: I must say, however, that I am a little taken aback at the tone of the negative comments and this certainly dampens my enthusiasm for making further contributions to Wikipeda, and I can't see the point of the comment "gibberish...still terrible." That's from my edit summary ("removing the most obvious gibberish, etc; still terrible"), for this edit. Distinctly below the standard of edit summary I expect from people messing with my articles, I must admit. Sorry about that. Well, I was in a bad mood, as I was still recovering from the ardors of half-heartedly attempting to socialize with friends around one table in a restaurant while a much larger group were hooting, shrieking, and (this being Tokyo) clapping around a nearby table. (So, I'm a misanthrope.) "Terrible" was an unnecessarily harsh description of the article as presenting notability. I didn't mean "gibberish", I meant "puffery"; and I meant this for only some of what I removed, specifically: (i) internationally recognized, (ii) noted, and (iii) my black beast legendary; each about a separate person. All of this looked as if it had been intended to sprinkle stardust on McBride by association, and none of it's necessary: all three of these people deserve articles; one already existed, a second has just been provided by Darknessandlight himself (thank you!), and time permitting I'd be happy to create the third myself. -- Hoary (talk) 01:16, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Apology accepted even if it is a "kind-of apology." I promise it wasn't me at the noisy table!  As for articles needed, at least in reference to this thread: (1)Anne Tucker, curator of photography has been written up in Time Magazine, very noteworthy in my opinion, deserves mention in Wikipedia (2) East Villager newspaper as noted above. (3) Rick Rubin already has a long article - he is very famous. (4) George Krause has article although it could be expanded.--Darknessandlight (talk) 03:54, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Dammit, D&L, if we go on like this, pretty soon we'll even get to be friends or something. Anne Wilkes Tucker, as I think she's more often/properly called (tho' feel free to correct me), has just got a crummy stub towards an article, and within a few minutes she'll get a redirect from Anne Tucker as well. Evidence in a publicly accessible PDF of museum holdings is to my mind a major help toward establishing the notability of McBride; do please continue to improve the article and I'll keep an open mind about it. -- Hoary (talk) 05:22, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Any suggestions on improving it? I don't think it needs expansion...maybe to reduce length of Publication Credits section - and reduce number of footnotes in this section - seems to be overkill, no?  Popular Culture section should be kept I think and it is properly footnoted.  Also I removed mention of Ann Tucker earlier, thought maybe it was too wordy.--Darknessandlight (talk) 07:01, 23 March 2009 (UTC)
 * You can never have too many footnotes, especially while your article is in AfD hell. Indeed, you might elaborate and improve the footnotes by linking to what's available online (as I did here). &para; No evidence for a place in a second collection? -- Hoary (talk) 15:32, 23 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Not sure. Private collections?  Hard to find a reference for that.  Added a source for Pop Culture section.--Darknessandlight (talk) 16:56, 23 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Right: I have the works of two photographers of some note in my own private collection; there's no reference for this, as it's a very unremarkable fact. If my private collection were famous, things might be different; but the majority of private collections are unremarkable. Well, you're going to have to dig around some more. You could make things a lot easier for your readers: see this latest edit of mine, in which I link to a source that you gave and for which I had to Google. (Unfortunately the source doesn't mention McBride.) -- Hoary (talk) 04:03, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks for fixing the source link. The notes for this section fit together.  Shadow back issues are not online yet as far as I can tell.  http://mediafilter.org/mff/shadow.html is the Shadow website but Archive is a dead link.  Clayton Patterson, mentioned in the article that you linked, is another person deserving of an article imho.--Darknessandlight (talk) 04:57, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * If you know exactly where something once was (or should be) but it has gone, try asking web.archive.org for the URL. -- Hoary (talk) 05:26, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete Insufficient notability to meet guidelines. It's nice that people want to stretch and accept letters from museums, but if it hasn't been reported on it's not notable by definition. ChildofMidnight (talk) 06:21, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * And it was nice of Hoary to make an article on Anne Tucker, but I don't see how she meets inclusion criteria either. Where is the substantial coverage from reliable independent sources? A note from "mom" just doesn't cut it. ChildofMidnight (talk) 06:24, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Anne Tucker was called "America's Best Curator" by Time Magazine in 2001 see http://designtaxi.com/news.jsp?id=966&monthview=1&month=3&year=2004. Source for McBride's work in Museum of Fine Arts, Houston was found in the 2007 Annual Report for the museum and available in PDF link see notes for John McBride (photographer).--Darknessandlight (talk) 06:45, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Come come, let's not natter about other articles here. If on the other hand you'd care to nominate Anne Tucker for deletion, go right ahead. -- "Mr Nice Guy" Hoary 06:49, 24 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Weak Keep The museum material does show the necessary notability. True, the source is informal, but the criterion is having works in major museums, not having published sources that show works in major museums. Given the problems of getting this information from most museums for anything recent, the letter is sufficient. DGG (talk) 14:48, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Um ... I see one claim about museum holdings, that his photos are in one museum. This claim is impeccably sourced. Am I missing something else? -- Hoary (talk) 15:50, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, you're missing substantial evidence the subject of this article is notable. There are lots of museums. Some are more notable than others. Every work in every museum, does not make every artist notable. ChildofMidnight (talk) 17:37, 24 March 2009 (UTC)
 * It's certainly true that there are lots of museums and that some are more notable than others. But what are you saying here about the Houston Museum of Fine Arts or about possession by this museum? Hoary (talk) 00:19, 25 March 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.