Wikipedia talk:Notability (poker players)

message: Neither notability criteria, nor any other kind of guidelines on Wikipedia, are created through voting on them.
This discussion has been archived. Please do not modify it.
The following is an archived debate. Please do not modify it.
Note: This discussion was moved from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Poker
Tally (9/6/2)
Please indicate your support or opposition to the criteria here:
===Support===
#Support Balloonman (talk) 06:08, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: QFT - I agree re:Balloonman.  If anything, guidelines would REDUCE the number of Wiki articles on poker players, not increase the number. ♣♦ SmartGuy ♥♠ 05:02, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why do cash game players get no love?  The games usually aren't televised, but chess matches are usually not televised either. ♣♦ SmartGuy ♥♠ 04:42, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: True neither are usually televised however other than a World Champion,whose matches are heavily reported, and an occasional grandmaster chess players aren't usually held to be notable. I have to feel the same is true of cash game players, they either make significant coverage or they don't. Cash games aren't held in the public eye to the degree that tournaments are. Horrorshowj (talk) 07:59, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed Notability Criteria

message: #Support Balloonman (talk) 06:08, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: '''Support'''

message: #Oppose I am against the concept of "inherent" notability, for two reasons: 1) I think it leads to too many articles written without, and surviving AfD without, having any substantial secondary sources, and 2) keeping track of the inherent notability criteria of each narrow field of knowledge makes it too hard to edit WP consistently (is a poker-playing writer subject to the inherent notability requirements that apply to proker players or to writers?).  I think the existing, source-based criteria in WP:BIO apply fine to all people, poker players included.  All that said, I don't think there will ever be a case where anyone qualifying under Baloonman's proposal would not have sources that would qualify them under WP:BIO (which I guess makes the poker-specific guideline unnecessary) UnitedStatesian (talk) 16:02, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: QFT - I agree re:Balloonman.  If anything, guidelines would REDUCE the number of Wiki articles on poker players, not increase the number. ♣♦ SmartGuy ♥♠ 05:02, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: '''Oppose'''

message: #Neutral for now.  The above criteria is certainly a good start; however, we need to include some additional criteria to cover cash game players and authors.   Based on the above, Bob Ciaffone and Matthew Hilger would not qualify.  They do meet WP:BIO but we should include some cash game and author/writing criteria to avoid conflicts and arguments.  Off the top of my head, we could include something like:
#:*a minimum, verifiable net cash game winning threshold - $1 million?
#:*regular publication in notable poker magazines
#:*authorship of a major poker work
#:Also, let's start thinking about how we will go about reviewing/updating/deleting all of the individual player articles once we have agreed on a set player bio criteria. ♣♦ SmartGuy ♥♠ 14:42, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why do cash game players get no love?  The games usually aren't televised, but chess matches are usually not televised either. ♣♦ SmartGuy ♥♠ 04:42, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: True neither are usually televised however other than a World Champion,whose matches are heavily reported, and an occasional grandmaster chess players aren't usually held to be notable. I have to feel the same is true of cash game players, they either make significant coverage or they don't. Cash games aren't held in the public eye to the degree that tournaments are. Horrorshowj (talk) 07:59, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: '''Neutral'''

message: Our intention was never to subvert BIO/N, but rather to provide an interpretation upon the section that is used to defend non-notable poker players---namely, "Competitors and coaches who have competed in a fully professional league, or a competition of equivalent standing in a non-league sport such as swimming, golf or tennis."  Too often, as I cited above, an article is written for a player who made the money in a WSOP event or won a "major tournament."  Having won a major tournament or made the money in a WSOP/WPT event, does not convey notability---even if they competed in a "competition of equivalent standing in a non-league sport such as swimming, golf or tennis."  This guideline, straight from WP:BIO is completely inappropriate for Poker because anybody with the buy in can compete in a WSOP/WPT event.  Thus, we wrote our criteria to close the doors, but we did so in the affirmative---we defined what notability was.
Perhaps we should have written it in the negative?  And rather than trying to establish what we view as notable, we should have defined what we don't see as notable.  Furthermore, while OUR original intent was to write a guideline for the PROJECT, not I say we go for the gusto!  Get it included on the main BIO page.  To that end, I have the following proposal:
Competition of equivalent standing in poker is generally limited to the winners of WPT/WSOP/EPT events or Poker Hall of Fame inductees.
This would accomplish what we, as a wikiproject would like (limiting the vainity articles written on poker players) it would also accomplish what the critics would like--while staying completely within the current bounds of BIO.  It still opens up the door for people to achieve notability in the primary manner, but it closes the door that the Wikiproject wants to see closed.
Despite what the critics may think, our original criteria was much stricter than what currently exists on WP:BIOBalloonman (talk) 09:50, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That is a good idea, and pithier.  2005 (talk) 10:07, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

text: I'm still a bit split of having a highly specific guideline that can fall squarely into one Wikiproject be added at the Wikipedia level; however, a question I throw out is that is there any similar type of "competitive activity" like poker that has similar low levels of entry that can also be included with poker players as to expand the guideline as to include a a general statement on people in such competitive activities? --MASEM 14:35, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: We could have the sentence added to BIO, or not.  This page was not created by the Poker project.  We would be happy with just having the sentences on a separate project page.  Discussing the "where" is just wikilawyer silliness.  The point is to simply have something to refer to that has significant consensus that mitigates against vanity or non-vanity not-notable-enough articles.  ESPN defines poker players as athletes, which is a powerful reference, so as currently worded, BIO is too liberal about assigning general notability to professional players.  So we want to reign that in a bit and say poker players have a higher standard to be "generally notable" than athletes, but otherwise the normal criteria apply. Again, I don't understand anyone opposing this as how BIO is currently worded any professional poker player woud be cosidered generally notable, which means about 10,000 people would be generally notable while we are saying about 40 would be (who don't currently have articles).  Why do you want the 10,000 instead of the 40? 2005 (talk) 04:28, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I am in no way saying that what is currently suggested should not be followed - this is a great addition.  I just don't think we need to carve a special case on the Notability (People) page for "poker players".  (Yes, I know adult film stars have a special carve out, I believe that to be a mistake).  Doing so will generate a case of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS and people will want to carve out other notability issues (as sacrastically pointed out by one for Overweight Plumbers) that don't have Wikipedia-wide use.  However, if we can get a common criteria for "causal sports" which could possible include bowling, pool, etc., then I'm all for adding that, since it spans more than a specific project. --MASEM 04:45, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not a carve out. There are already articles about poker players on  Wikipedia that have survived AfD based on low level televised appearances such as Poker Royale. It was felt that the appearance met "fully professional". Much like the porn guidelines, this eliminates a lot of articles by restricting the notability criteria that applies. Another advantage is that all the criteria are concrete, which means they are less twistable at AfD. It should be added to WP:BIO not made as an independent guideline, although I think that will satisfy a lot of the votes against it. Horrorshowj (talk) 07:29, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

text: Even better idea, let's get rid of the ludicrous "pro sports players get articles" bit altogether. Most pro sports players receive little to no coverage. That's not to say we shouldn't have an article on Michael Jordan or John Elway, because of course in those cases plenty of source material exists, but we probably shouldn't have one on the guy that was on a pro team roster as a backup for a single season, or just played along but never received much coverage. Lists exist for a reason, there's nothing wrong with List of players on the 1997 Denver Broncos to aggregate a bunch of permastubs. Seraphimblade Talk to me 19:05, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  SB, your observation can be applied to most special cases at BIO.  I think that a reliance on WP:N is really all that we need, and that the premise of BIO, ORG, and the even more specific guidelines is flawed.  --Kevin Murray (talk) 19:08, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

text: * But what other line?  What actually needs to be said on the issue of poker player notability? —gorgan_almighty (talk) 12:19, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: New Proposal