Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Order of the Sword and Shield


 * 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 speedy delete. Even if AfD is requested on grounds of possible notability, we cannot have a copyvio. &mdash; RHaworth (talk · contribs) 00:18, 5 February 2013 (UTC)}}

Order of the Sword and Shield

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Procedural nomination: A number of editors have raised concerns that this qualifies as an A7. There has also been some opposition to the tag. I feel like a 7 day discussion would be better, it certainly doesn't hurt. I'm neutral until I can look into it more. Ryan Vesey 21:58, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Speedy Delete: Not only does the organization fail WP:GNG and WP:CLUB, the article does not even assert importance.  This appears to be the full membership of the organization and there appears to be only one chapter.   At best, I believe the WP:SPA that created the article is using Wikipedia for promotion.


 * The LinkedIn Group for this club was created yesterday by Jeffrey P. Grossmann (whose LinkedIn profile is linked to from the article) and has exactly 1 member - himself. Far too coincidental not to be part of a social media promotion initiative on the part of Grossmann and our SPA editor, Social media promotion? Just because we create a page on Linkedin means we are social media promoting?  I do not understand your use of the term "coincidental"?  Are you implying we are on a marketing spree to sell something? If so, please tell me what we can sell. We could use some money to get a "real" website, not google sites., IMHO.


 * Note that there are many similarly named organizations that are not this one and have been mistaken for it including:
 * Strategic Order of the Sword and Shield
 * Most Glorious Order of the Sword and Shield
 * Royal Order of the Sword and Shield
 * Sacred And Mystical Order Of The Sword And Shield
 * Toddst1 (talk) 22:04, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Supplemental information: Article creator has confirmed "This was just an avenue to inform the world of a very important and noteworthy academic movement..."   Toddst1 (talk) 22:47, 4 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Delete I originally tagged this for speedy as an A7, which was contested. Unfortunately I was googling for the wrong thing ("Order of the Sword") and I should have been more careful. Upon realizing that the CSD had been contested and the editor commented on my talk page I realized my apparent mistake. However, after a day or so I have been unable to satisfactorily source this to any notability. One of the things that threw me off immediately was the Google Sites homepage, which no organization would be caught using instead of a real website. After perusing said page I can see that this is a student organization from St. John's University which has been lucky enough to have a few notable people involved with it, but that doesn't mean anything much in terms of notability for the group itself. And the main issue was that I confused it with this, which is an entirely different thing. So right now there simply aren't enough reliable third-party sources that could help establish notability. Actually there are none whatsoever. I agree with Toddst1 that this is indeed a clear A7 candidate, and his deletion was entirely correct. § FreeRangeFrog  croak 22:23, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

______________________________

To be fair FreRangeFrog, this organization is considered notable by many non"googable" sources. US Congressman, just do not give up their time to honor students for academic achievments everyday. I do not understand how you can be so objective and use words like "lucky enough" and "caught using of a real website". You are right, we are not an organization that makes money, therefore we have to use free resources like google sites. I am glad you are the "fair and accurate" editor that will help decide the fate of this article. You have clearly demonstrated a lack of objectivity in your pursuits, of which I have duly noted. The fact that you were ready to delete this article after "googling the wrong page" shows your devotion to objective investigative research. The Department of Homeland Security wrote a nice piece about our organization in their monthly news letter to their employees. Unfortunately, you cannot google an internal document. I would be willing to send it to you though. Your arguement that "we were lucky enough to have a few notable people involved with it, but that doesn't mean anything" is also a bit confusing. Despite your thoughts, this has been a very noteworthy project. Our guest speaker at this year's national honor society induction will be Janet Napolitano, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Another "lucky" achievement for the Order of the Sword and Shield I guess.

On another note. Have you looked at any other article entry (literally hundreds) of academic honor societies in Wikipedia. There are no cites and/or references for nearly 2/3's of them other then their school's own websites. And I couldnt find anything about them after a simple google search either, other then their Wiki article and their website. I am glad to see we can apply equal objectivity across the entire spectrum of Wikipedia, also duly noted.

_____________________--- — Preceding unsigned comment added by Grossmaj (talk • contribs) 23:25, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * No offense intended, these discussions tend to be like that. Don't take it personally. In truth if I had figured out my mistake from the beginning we would not be having this conversation since the article would have been deleted outright, because your organization obviously doesn't meet our notability guidelines. As to your questions about my remarks, I will point you to a very specific guideline we have: WP:NOTINHERITED. You'll realize why I say that while you have been "lucky" (to use a term) in that notable people have been directly or indirectly associated with your organization, notability is not inherited. Thus, even assuming that you invited Barack Obama or The Pope to speak at one of your ceremonies, you would still not rate an article. We look for secondary and tertiary reliable sources that tell us that other notable people, organizations and media outlets consider yours to be important. As of now you have none of that, which is why we are having this discussion. Again, I apologize if you feel offended by my comments, I never intended to suggest you were trying to deceive us. There's no need for that now that the details (or lack thereof) of your organization have been more closely scrutinized, and you have unambiguously stated that this was just an attempt to promote your order. We have another guideline: WP:TOOSOON. Perhaps in the future the Order of the Sword and Shield will be notable and you won't have to go through all of this. I do realize it can be a bit overwhelming. Cheers! § FreeRangeFrog croak 23:39, 4 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Comment (Mostly directed at Gorssmaj) At this moment, it's looking like the article's here a bit too soon as FreeRangeFrog says.  I can only get a clip of what is here, but it looks like a society that was originally local but is becoming national.  Once it gets adequate coverage a new article can be created.  The point is moot for now, I've requested deletion under criteria G12 as it is a copyright violation from the website.  It could be restored if the website author released the material under a valid license, but I would advise against it.  The A7 tag does seem to be correct and the material, like any material copied from an official website, is too promotional for encyclopedic purposes.  If some big name academic sources or news agencies start talking about this society, leave me a note and I can see about helping you turn it into an article.  For the time being, you can work on collecting sources whenever they appear at User:Grossmaj/Sandbox. Ryan Vesey 00:10, 5 February 2013 (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.