Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Regius Professor of Computer Science


 * 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   merge to Regius Professor. It's pretty clear from the arguments that this can't possibly be a delete. So, we're down to whether this is keep or merge to Regius Professor. As far as I can tell, Regius Professor lists all these professorships, some of which are notable enough to also be broken out into their own article. Looking at those that are broken out, some (say, Regius Chair of Law, Glasgow) have fairly extensive histories and some (Regius_Professor_of_Botany_(Aberdeen), are just stubs. It's unclear what the criteria is (or should be) for being broken out into a distinct article.

I'm also mindful of 's comment that "the above editors have a fundamental misunderstanding of what they're actually commenting on", fearing that, not living in the UK, and thus unexposed to the way things work there, I may well be in the same camp.

So, I'm going to call this a merge, with no prejudice for somebody breaking it out again, should there be sufficient material and reliable sources to write a non-stub article about this particular professorship. I would suggest if you want to go that route, try it in draft space first and talk it up on Talk:Regius Professor to gauge consensus.

-- RoySmith (talk) 00:54, 28 March 2014 (UTC)

Regius Professor of Computer Science

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

No indicateion *where* this post is: title is not appropriate for one specific university(?)... Imaginatorium (talk) 08:41, 19 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Keep/merge It seems that there's only one of these currently — Nick Jennings (professor) — and he's based at School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton. In time, there will be more — compare Regius Professor of Divinity, for example.  AFD is not cleanup. Andrew (talk) 13:00, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Keep. I've added Southampton to the article. It would have been easy enough to find. Regius chairs are most definitely notable. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:51, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Schools-related deletion discussions. Necrothesp (talk) 16:51, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of England-related deletion discussions. Necrothesp (talk) 16:51, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions. Necrothesp (talk) 16:51, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:00, 19 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Keep as above. Xxanthippe (talk) 21:36, 19 March 2014 (UTC).
 * Yeah we keep this sort of thing'. Barney the barney barney (talk) 12:03, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Merge to Regius Professor -- I rarely disagree with most of the above voters, especially when they support a Keep, but on what basis is this post, as opposed to the holder of the post (which is a clear keep), notable? There are many many endowed chairs at major universities where all of the holders have been notable, but very few chairs that are in themselves notable.  Some of the Regius Professor chairs certainly are; and the Regius Professor designation as a whole definitely is.  But where is there any citation of this chair passing GNG? The citations in the article only have passing mention of this post in a list of 13 new regius professorships that were awarded; the fact that more were created last year than in most centuries might argue against past prestige being inherited to new articles. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 18:31, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
 * I was, and still am, mystified as to the *referent* of this article. Is it the notional category of Regius Professor(ship)s in Computer Science? This would seem bizarre, since it is just the productive combination of the two notable categories of Regius Professor(ship) with Computer Science. Or is it just a list of RPs in CS? In which case there is surely no need for a separate page. (I didn't know anything about the 13 RPs, which might indeed merit an article.) I am relatively new to WP editing, and I find distressing the tendency to split off countless "articles" which are unlikely ever to exceed a 1.4-sentence paragraph. Obscure composers get divided up into several pages, one of which amounts to "Second symphony in C major: Allegro, Andante, Presto furioso". Sorry to drift... Imaginatorium Imaginatorium (talk) 19:08, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
 * It is normal to keep articles on named chairs at major universities. The most senior named chairs in British universities are the handful of Regius chairs, so it would make no sense not to have articles on them. -- Necrothesp (talk) 09:33, 21 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, if this "article" refers to the chair at Southampton, it should surely be titled "RP in CS at Southampton" or similar. And I'm sorry, but I can't accept that the fact that some RPs (no doubt with long and interesting histories, and many worthy incumbents) are worth articles implies that this one is. Of course the information (RP + CS + Soton + Jennings) is notable enough, but would surely be vastly more useful in a list of the 13. Imaginatorium (talk) 13:05, 21 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Since it's the only Regius Chair of Computer Science it doesn't need further disambiguation, any more the Disney Professor of Archaeology does, for example. As I said, generally all significant named chairs are considered worthy of articles, and you can't get more significant than a Regius chair. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:42, 21 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete or merge per WP:TOOSOON. Unlike some of the other Regius professorships this one has not had time to attract the in-depth coverage (as opposed to brief mention in a list of other new chairs) needed for WP:GNG. And WP:GNG, not WP:PROF, is the correct notability standard, because this is an article about the chair, not about the person in the chair. —David Eppstein (talk) 01:40, 22 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Keep or possibly redirect to its holder. As a professorship created by the Queen, it is certainly notable.  However, I may draw an analogy with articles on peerages where there was only ever one holder of the title.  There we have an article on the title, but it is a redirect to a bio-article on the only holder.  Peterkingiron (talk) 15:19, 22 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Delete or merge/redirect - as above. Neutralitytalk 05:19, 23 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Keep. This page mirrors those of the more established Regius chairs.  Whilst there is only one person to have held this title at the moment, since it was created last year by the monarch, as time passes more will hold this position. hacscience (talk) 09:25, 24 March 2014 (UTC)
 * I think that the argument runs a bit afoul of "Wikipedia is not a Crystal Ball". When the chair gets independent notability as other Regius chairs have, it can be recreated, but not yet. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 23:59, 26 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete - This is basically an award category, and I don't think that something so recently created could have attained the stature of a Nobel (which is what we hold awards to). See WP:OCAT. --Lquilter (talk) 17:39, 26 March 2014 (UTC)
 * The Nobel Prize is too high of an award to be the minimum standard for having a separate award category, but I agree with the general sentiment that it is an award category with a single winner and no independent confirmation of its own notability. I think of it as something like, the Van Cliburn award for piano performance is a notable award in itself. If tomorrow they established a Van Cliburn award for bassoon performance, for clarinet, for timpani, for saxophone, and seven others would all those awards get their own WP pages even if the only press coverage were "Van Cliburn adds eleven new awards for other instruments" because the piano award is notable? -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 23:59, 26 March 2014 (UTC)
 * It's not an award. It's a post. The holder hasn't won anything; he's been appointed to a post. It's like saying the President of the United States is an award category; and he has actually won something (i.e. an election)! Saying it's an award shows that the above editors have a fundamental misunderstanding of what they're actually commenting on. -- Necrothesp (talk) 09:39, 27 March 2014 (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.