Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nihal Sri Ameresekere


 * 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 02:24, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Nihal Sri Ameresekere

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

Vanity page. Lots of big claims, lots of big name domain names are name-checked in refs, but none of them are giving substantial coverage about the subject of this article.

The one website that does host content specifically about him is glowing - and so it ought to be, as the copyright footer indicates that this is merely a recycled press release from the subject's own consulting company. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:05, 3 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Delete Promotional, and no evidence of notability. In fact, I wouldn't complain if it were speedily deleted as spam. Only one of the 11 "references" even mentions him, and that one, as Andy Dingley has indicated, is clearly a promotional page written by or for the subject of the article. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:30, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Sri Lanka-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 01:49, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Authors-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 01:49, 8 December 2012 (UTC)


 * KeepI have cleaned up the promotional expansion of User:GDJ12 and User:C21Publications and added references which could establish the subject's notability. The subject is well known in Sri Lanka for his public interest related activities and page for him on Wikipedia is justifiable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Manjulaperera (talk • contribs) 10:00, 8 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Comment: I stub-sorted the article many months ago and have no other interest in it, but today received an email from User:Manjulaperera informing me of this deletion discussion and claiming that there was a witch hunt going on. I do not think this was an appropriate use of Wikipedia email, as any message alerting other users to an AfD should be done openly and on-Wiki so that issues of Canvassing can be considered.  Pam  D  10:23, 8 December 2012 (UTC)


 * I did, but with the last para on my email, Please have a look on the issue and cast your vote appropriately. You are free to cast your vote, even a Delete here.Manjulaperera (talk) 10:35, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I received a similar e-mail, which I'm reproducing here, both in interests of full disclosure and because it includes some potentially useful sources on the subject:

<<Since I have interacted with you on the subject Lasantha Wickrematunge, I need your review on the above subject, "Nihal Sri Ameresekere". There is a deletion discussion on the above subject.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nihal_Sri_Ameresekere

There is a possible which hunt on this issue.

Recently "Association of Business Executives(UK)" page was deleted by User:JamesBWatson and there was a argument on ANI.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive777#Association_of_Business_Executives.28UK.29

User:Andy Dingley also commented there more or less against User:EconomicTiger who created "Association of Business Executives(UK)".

Then User:EconomicTiger raised the issue with User:JamesBWatson on his/her talk page.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:JamesBWatson#Association_of_Business_Executives.28UK.29

After that User:Andy Dingley placed the deletion tag on Nihal Sri Ameresekere which was once created by User:EconomicTiger and deleted and then created by me. And the first "Delete" was cast by User:JamesBWatson.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Nihal_Sri_Ameresekere

Nihal Sri Ameresekere has contributed a lot on Sri Lanka's sensitive and controversial "Public Interest" issues. I think he deserves a page for him.

Please see some of the reference about him and by him.

http://www.dailynews.lk/2005/11/15/bus10.htm

http://www.thesundayleader.lk/archive/20090809/issues-2.htm

http://www.dailynews.lk/2012/01/14/news37.asp

http://www.dailynews.lk/2008/01/25/bus12-1.asp

http://www.nation.lk/2007/10/28/busi10.htm

http://www.dailynews.lk/2004/03/29/fea02.html

http://www.sundaytimes.lk/121111/business-times/public-interest-activist-demands-legal-action-against-perpetrators-of-hedging-deals-19414.html

Please have a look on the issue and cast your vote appropriately.>>
 * FWIW, these do appear to me to reliable sources giving the subject significant coverage, but I'll refrain from formally voting Keep for obvious technical reasons. -- Khazar2 (talk) 13:49, 8 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep Believe there are now sufficient reliable sources to show this subject to be notable in Sri Lanka, per WP:GNG. Green Cardamom (talk) 22:23, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * The article still doesn't actually make any actual claim of notability, as opposed to mere existence, in its current form. It's not good enough to list a bunch of potential sources in the deletion discussion, if they don't also find their way into the real article. Bearcat (talk) 22:24, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Not sure what "make any actual claim of notability" means. Per GNG just need sources, which we have, in the article. They are not inlined citations but that shouldn't be a reason to delete the article outright, just a reason to tag it for cleanup. -- Green Cardamom (talk) 07:46, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

I also received the same e-mail from the same user, so I'll repeat here the same basic information that I e-mailed the user in response: a deletion discussion on Wikipedia is fundamentally an assessment of the quality of the article as written, and not a "personal attack" on the topic. An article can be kept if it's properly written and properly sourced, but can be deleted if it isn't — that's not a reflection on Mr. Ameresekere as a person, but on the quality of the article.

As currently written, for the record, this article asserts and demonstrates his existence, but fails to present any credible reason why he should be considered notable enough to be in an encyclopedia — in its current form, the article's entire body text consists of the sentence "Nihal Sri Ameresekere is a Sri Lankan Author and Public interest Activist.", followed by a list of inappropriate offsite links to Google Books pages for his published works. It fails to include any content which explains why he should be considered a notable author and public interest activist; it just asserts that he exists and then supplements that with advertising links, which is not the same thing as a credible notability claim.

That obviously doesn't necessarily mean that he isn't notable, but merely that the article doesn't demonstrate his notability properly. As such, it needs to be deleted if it isn't significantly improved by closure, but can be kept if it is — and even if it does get deleted, then a new version which cites real sources and makes a real claim of notability can still be recreated at a later date. Another alternative would be to move it to the user's own sandbox so that it can be worked on at that user's leisure.

But the article simply cannot be kept in its current state, because it simply does not meet our inclusion and quality standards as currently written. Keep if sourcing and content improvements are in place by closure; delete if not. Bearcat (talk) 22:24, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
 * A deletion discussion most certainly is not about the "quality of the article as written". Whatever gave you that idea? Phil Bridger (talk) 20:59, 12 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Of course it can be. WP:BURDEN means that the author demonstrates notability (not just handwaves on an AfD) or else it goes. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:57, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Um, the fact that policy explicitly states that an article has to make a properly sourced claim of notability to be keepable, maybe? The fact that a new article which makes a better, more properly sourced claim of notability than an earlier version did can be kept even if the earlier one was deleted as "non-notable", maybe? The fact that the user in question was claiming that the existence of this discussion constituted a personal attack against a person whose article wasn't actually making a claim of notability at the time, maybe? The fact that the difference between a deletable article and a keepable one is the absence or presence of reliable sources that support a credible claim of notability, maybe? Bearcat (talk) 08:32, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Please quote where in policy you find all of that. According to deletion policy the decision about keeping or deleting depends on the existence of sources, not whether they are currently cited in the article. Phil Bridger (talk) 13:08, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
 * WP:CSD: An article about a person, living or dead, can be deleted on sight if it doesn't explicitly make a claim of notability — which, at the time of my comment, this article didn't. (It still doesn't make a particularly strong one, but it at least makes enough of one to no longer be speediable.) Also technically WP:BLPPROD, by which an article about a living person must contain at least one source that's present in the article (although since this article did, and that's a process which takes as long as this one does, it doesn't apply here.) Either way, it's important to remember that articles about people are subject to stricter inclusion rules than articles about concepts or inanimate things are; the mere fact that sources may exist is not sufficient if the article doesn't directly contain at least one of them and/or doesn't even make a claim of notability in the first place. And either way, the process is not a political attack on the person, as the editor claimed, but an evaluation of whether the article is good enough to meet our inclusion and content standards or not. Bearcat (talk) 14:12, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes but once the AfD process starts, CSD no longer applies. ie. this article is currently not subject to Speedy Deletion. Also, the phrase "make a claim of notability" is problematic. The article doesn't need to claim notability which is what the SNG rules cover - claims of accomplishment etc, rather at a minimum we just need show significant coverage by multiple sources per GNG. Ideally the article would be cleaned up and rewritten during the AfD process but it's not strictly required for it to pass AfD. Although often what happens is an article will pass AfD without being cleaned up then someone will 2nd nominate it years later. -- Green Cardamom (talk) 15:27, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, yes, I know that CSD no longer applies once an article's actually in AFD — that's why I commented on the article's lack of a notability claim in this discussion, in response to an assertion that the topic was being "witch hunted", instead of speedying it. Bearcat (talk) 17:53, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  MBisanz  talk 00:26, 11 December 2012 (UTC)




 * Keep?  WP:notability appears to have been established.   The question mark is because I did only a fast review. North8000 (talk) 01:57, 11 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep  With recent changes article appear to be maintaining the Wiki standards. Nishadhi (talk) 16:38, 15 December 2012 (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.