Jump to content

Wikipedia talk:Notability (organizations and companies)/Archive 18

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Archive 15Archive 16Archive 17Archive 18Archive 19Archive 20→Archive 25


WP:CORPDEPTH list

The length and visibility of this list of examples overshadows the fact that they're supposed to be used as examples of "trivial coverage", leading to really unhelpful discussions of whether a source was "based on an interview" or "an announcement from the company" (aside: how many news articles aren't...?) rather than whether the coverage is "trivial", itself a reference to the GNG/significant coverage. I'd pare down the list or at the very least heavily emphasize the word "trivial". I am no longer watching this page—ping if you'd like a response czar 16:05, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

I think that most of the list you mention is concerned with the "well beyond routine announcements" bit (i.e., trivial-because-unimportant sources) rather than the "brief" (trivial-because-short sources). WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:50, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

Regular discussion of restaurant chains and justification for inclusion is often based on discussion in major outlets. One line of argument is the regionality of the source. The New York Times is considered national coverage; For a Virginia restaurant, the Richmond Times Dispatch is not. I suggest we also consider that the section in which an article appears counts, too. The Travel section in the NYT doesn't carry the weight the front page or business sections do. Has the NYT Travel section won a Pulitzer? A paid NYT obit doesn't count. An NYT obit with a byline does. I was astounded by a recent discussion which conflated National Geographic with National Geographic Traveler. I suggest we be more cynical when an article proponent brings a stack of references from national sources. Rhadow (talk) 12:26, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

RfC on Independence in Journalistic ethics

The RfC that was here has been repeatedly disrupted.  We will probably want to regroup at WT:N, or possibly at WP:VPP.  Unscintillating (talk) 06:58, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Example from "No inherited notability" and person with restaurants

"a notable person buys a restaurant, the restaurant does not "inherit" notability from its owner"

I understand many problems wtih article for 1. each such restaurant, but 2. all restaurants can be listed at page dedicated to person?

Articles about 1 would have little content, but 2 will boost article about person with reasonable details. D1gggg (talk) 15:09, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

  • I generally agree with this, and for businesses in a broader sense. If a notable person buys or starts an otherwise non-notable business, this should be mentioned in the article on the notable person (to the extent that it is reliably sourced) and the name of the business can redirect to that section of the article on its notable owner. bd2412 T 22:31, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

Any interest in reviving/merging WP:CONG?

I ran across a questionably notable local church article (Immanuel Lutheran Church (Hodgkins, Illinois)) and noticed that Wikipedia talk:Notability (local churches and other religious congregations) had never gone anywhere as far as gaining support, but it was suggested on its talk page that it be merged with this guideline. It has quite an extensive list of qualifications which could probably be trimmed down considerably, but since schools are here it seems like something should be said of churches as well. Wikipedia:Notability (buildings, structures, and landmarks) is another failed and possibly relevant proposal. Any interest in reviving discussion on this topic and maybe adding something here? Having a uniform standard would be helpful, like how we say high schools are notable but not primary schools (generally), if I'm not mistaken, although I don't see that spelled out here. —DIYeditor (talk) 09:21, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Journalistic independence RfC

Independence is a matter of journalistic ethics, not propinquity.  02:14, 1 December 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Unscintillating (talk • contribs)

  • I have no idea what this RfC question is asking because its not formatted in the way of any RfC I've ever seen while on Wikipedia, but I am assuming it is regards to this addition to WP:ORGIND based on the conversation above, which the OP has tried to remove despite it being the stable version of the guideline. So, to answer the question as to if we should remove the addition, my answer is clear: no, we should not remove the addition to the guideline concerning press release based sources. We require intellectual independence, not structural independence. If a source is not intellectually independent of the subject, it does not count towards notability. WP:SPIP already makes this clear, and this addition simply spells out more clearly what SPIP already implies.TonyBallioni (talk) 02:33, 1 December 2017 (UTC)


[I have removed the modified version of the above RfC that was posted here 2017-12-01T05:00:33 by User:JJMC89 in this diff.  There was an additional edit made to this text by Jytdog to remove a template, an action he below calls "killed the RfC".  I will allow the RfC bot to restore the RfCID.  Unscintillating (talk) 03:20, 2 December 2017 (UTC)]

I killed the RfC because it doesn't ask a question and removed the listing at centralized discussion, and warned the OP. Jytdog (talk) 05:13, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
I again killed the RfC and am giving an edit war warning. Jytdog (talk) 03:35, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Comment  For a second time, User:JJMC89 has copied and moved the RfC as a quiet move, and Jytdog has "killed" the ersatz RfC.  On his talk page I have told JJMC89 that he doesn't know what a signature is, and doesn't know how to format an RfC, and asked him to stop refactoring.  Hopefully, Jytdog is done with being afraid that the community will discuss independence in journalistic ethics.  Unscintillating (talk) 05:18, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
Just reminding, that WP:NPA is a policy.And egregious violations like this can lead to a block.Regards:)Winged Blades Godric 07:17, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
It would be wonderful if highly experienced editors could write clearly worded RfCs, and also write English prose that ordinary people can understand. Start by explaining the issue. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 07:47, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

RfC on "Independence of sources"

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
The disputant of the RFC poser, (in the eyes of Jytdog), Unscintillating prefers not to hold this RFC.So, we're done for now.Thankfully, Winged Blades Godric 07:49, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

The WP:ORGIND section discusses what kinds of sources are independent of an organization and are therefore useful for establishing notability of the organization. The section also lists kinds of sources that are not considered to be independent.

Currently any material which is substantially based on a press release is included in that list (in other words, is considered "not independent").

Should this be removed from the list? Jytdog (talk) 04:02, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

!votes

Discussion

This arises from this and this and this and the discussion above at Citing articles based on press releases. This was originally proposed just above, here - just posting that to honor as much as possible what I gather is the intention. Jytdog (talk) 04:05, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
You have to actually remove the {{rfc}} tag to stop the RfC. I have done that. Fine, if you don't want to get the community's feedback on the change you want to make, so be it. Jytdog (talk) 04:45, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
You are the first editor I have met capable of disrupting a minor edit.  Unscintillating (talk) 05:20, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
@Unscintillating:--I have redacted the accusations you have thrown at Jytdog, while collapsing the RFC.This is a gen. talk page, not your own t/p to house your own commentary bordering on unsubstantiated accusations on the summary-notes of a disc.And, clearly hatting was neither the apt response nor something to be executed by you.This template should only be used by uninvolved editors... Cheers! Winged Blades Godric 07:49, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
The close here is erroneous, because it fails to document that there are no requestors in this "Request for comment", and that that is why it was closed.  This was a classic WP:POINT RfC.  Sorry you didn't like the template I used, but for people who don't use javascript, the difference is indistinguishable.  Unscintillating (talk) 20:11, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
So now there are three editors in the last 48 hours "helping" me with what I write here.  This "help" includes adding, rewriting, and redacting.  Unscintillating (talk) 19:19, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
There is a general consensus as to the manner in which article t/p(s) are maintained and templates used.And, it is not the trio of us but the broader community that did set it up.So, you know your way forward.At any case, if you really want any help as to framing the RFC, feel free to ask:)Winged Blades Godric 16:03, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
As per Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Kenta_Kawanaka, you are not an expert on "community consensus" or the "broader community".
As for your suggestion, I guess you could comment on the RfC, such as by stating if you agree or disagree with the statement in the RfC and why.  Unscintillating (talk) 22:17, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
I needed a good laugh! And, no RFC is currently running at this t/p.Winged Blades Godric 08:59, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

NCORP standards, continued

Thanks for the feedback Jytdog (talk) 02:14, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

We started discussing raising NCORP standards for for-profit companies (not nonprofits) to be higher than simple GNG here, based on the amount of spam we get about companies.

There were proposals about publicly traded companies and about private ones.

I went through that discussion and have pulled out some threads. Again the very goal here is to raise notability standards for companies.

In addition to satisfying the GNG, a for-profit company is considered "notable" in Wikipedia only if one of the following criteria is met:

  • It is a publicly traded company listed on the most significant indexes in the country of incorporation (i.e. S&P 500 Index, Dow Jones Industrial Average, NASDAQ-100, FTSE 100 Index, DAX, or their equivalents). with at least a $1B market capitalization
  • It is a private company that has raised more than $100M and has been in business for at least 5 years
  • It has been listed as a member of the Fortune 1000, Forbes Global 2000, or an equivalently regarded business ranking.
  • It is considered by multiple independent reliable sources to have made a culturally significant impact in a geographic area. This is distinct from passing local controversies, getting good reviews, or the like.
  • It is considered by multiple independent reliable sources to have made a culturally significant impact. This is distinct from passing local controversies, local patronage (custom), getting good reviews, or the like.
  • It is regarded by multiple independent reliable sources as having significant impact in its industry, including technical breakthroughs in marketed products. This is distinct from mundane product differentiation-type claims; every company is "unique".
  • It has been involved in fraud, antitrust, or another activity that receives enough ongoing coverage to meet WP:NCRIME.

The RfC will include a secondary proposal to also include an employment-based criterion:

  • Employs at least 1,500 people

I would like to put an RfC out there to add this as a subsection of Commercial organizations. So let's try to focus on drafting a concrete proposal.

For folks replying here, if you are opposed to any effort to raise NCORP standards for companies please just say so -- I understand very well that some people will take that position; there is no point arguing about that. There are a bunch of people who want to try, and you can oppose at the RfC. Jytdog (talk) 03:49, 7 December 2017 (UTC) (add 2ndary employment-based criterion Jytdog (talk)) (refined some points per feedback below. Jytdog (talk) 19:16, 6 January 2018 (UTC)) (amended per Rentier below Jytdog (talk) 04:56, 7 January 2018 (UTC)) (geographic again again redacted Jytdog (talk) 05:14, 7 January 2018 (UTC))

  • I’m not opposed... but I am cautious... I think it would be helpful to explore what might be excluded if we adopt the proposed language. Could we discuss some examples of for-profit companies that pass GNG, but DON’T pass any of the proposed criteria? Blueboar (talk) 12:16, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
Zady Jytdog (talk) 14:40, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
Hmmm... Based on the sources cited in the article, it seems to pass the “cultural impact” criteria listed above (as well as GNG). Any others? Blueboar (talk) 14:05, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
User:Blueboar how in the world do you get there? There have been plenty of companies focused on ethical consumerism - we even have an article on that. But perhaps you are giving an example of how companies will argue like crazy that they are indeed differentiated such that they are a unique cultural contributor? (i haven't experienced you as pointy so this would surprise me...) Jytdog (talk) 04:45, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
  • What's exactly the case for why the current notability standard isn't high enough? Users of Wikipedia want to search information about many topics and having independent information about companies is one use-case.
I think one of the core problems of Wikipedia is it's decline of editorship by being too deletionist, the idea of having an RfC here means basically that you are saying that Wikipedia isn't deletionist enough already.
A while ago, I created an article about the Andin International Diamond Corporation which had $250 million in annual sales. Michael Roach who was an early employee in the company and claims in his book "The Diamond Cutter" that his Buddhist philosophy allowed the company to be very successful. In New Age circles that's used his supposed commercial success is usd as an argument for why his business philosophy is right. It's not easy for the reader of the book to know about the true history of the company. If Wikipedia would have the article a reader would see that Michael Roach wasn't a founder of the company who was founded by two Jewish people which makes the argument that this companies shows that Buddhist philosophy is a great way to run a business isn't as well supported as Michael Roachs own representation in his book suggests. The current notability criteria was enough to get the page deleted and therefore make it harder for readers of the book to know about the true history of the company.
Your standard that takes away the ability of people to inform themselves about facts that are important to evaluate real world claims because an article doesn't have an analytical discussion of the strategy of a company that could be used as a Harvard Business case unnecessary keeps articles out.
When it comes to the list of standards, VC-backed private companies raise a lot of money but there are companies that are self-funded that have similar notability. I would also set a bar that a certain amount of yearly revenue qualifies a company for notability. ChristianKl (talk) 23:14, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
Making lots of money certainly makes a company successful, but it does not necessarily make the company notable. When we say a company (or any other topic) is “notable”, what we actually mean is that independent sources have taken NOTE of it. A company can quietly make lots of money without any independent sources taking note of it. Of course, that is the basic GNG requirement. Blueboar (talk) 23:58, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
I would also like to sound a note of caution here. We need to be careful that our coverage of companies and organizations does not appear to be favoring big business entities over their smaller competitors, and American and European companies over equivalents from less developed countries. Of course, there is a degree to which we are hamstrung by the same biases being shown by the media outlets we consider to be reliable sources. However, we are the first source of information to which many people look to find out information about all sorts of things, including businesses, and I am concerned that we may be signalling to readers that large corporations are more worthy of their business because smaller entities are excluded from coverage altogether. bd2412 T 00:02, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia doesn't exist to create fair competition. We are not a vehicle for promotion, and little companies are more likely to go for cheap PR by hiring people to write articles for them, or to come here themselves to try to get visibility through WP. From a risk management perspective, we want to exclude subject matter that is mostly likely to waste our time. Jytdog (talk) 00:07, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia exists, generally, to provide information about things people are likely to be interested in. That is the whole purpose of an encyclopedia. Also, we would be utterly naive to think that the big companies are not also working to burnish their image and promote their products through Wikipedia. If Nike puts out a new shoe, we will have an article on it in minutes. They are just using more sophisticated PR to do it. bd2412 T 00:10, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
I will not be replying to you further. I requested above that if you oppose raising NCORP standards, that you not comment but rather simply oppose when this gets proposed. Please honor that rather than derailing this conversation. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 00:13, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Long story short I don't think that the (SNG) standard should be raised. North8000 (talk) 13:52, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

  • Proceed -- BD2412 says, "Wikipedia exists, generally, to provide information about things people are likely to be interested." I agree, but would add "curated information", which the transcription of the websites of and founders' quotes for non-notable companies does not provide. The RfC should continue. Rhadow (talk) 14:13, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
  • There is a practical reason to raise the SNG standard: currently this page is effectively a list of reasons of how you can argue that the GNG doesn't say what it clearly says. We need that list of reasons because otherwise we would be overrun by corporate spam for every app startup within 24 hours of it hitting the Apple App Store or Google Play, but it has the disadvantage of making the site very difficult to understand for good faith new users. We already don't use the GNG when it comes to corporations, but we pay deference to it by doing linguistic gymnastics to make it seem like our rules are the same for every single subject: they aren't, and they never will be, and that is okay. I want an objective SNG that is stricter than the mental gymnastics we currently play here, but I'd settle for an objective SNG that was just objective.
    To BD2412's point about not favouring big companies, I actually think this would have the opposite impact. The standard deletionist complaint about SNGs is that they are too loose, because they do protect the borderline subject that has had real achievement but no press. That is a lot different than our current standard where a company could have had real achievement and we will go to great lengths to find a way to exclude it using the current mental calculus that is required to figure out the requisite amount of sourcing for a company. SNGs are a double-edged sword: they let things in that the GNG wouldn't, but they also de facto exclude things that a plain reading of the GNG would allow. NFOOTY and PROF are probably the two best examples of this, and I think moving in that direction would be helpful. TonyBallioni (talk) 14:18, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
    • There are two edges to this. First, there are upstarts that accomplish things that impact people's lives but do not get coverage because they don't have the media pull of big, established companies. Second, there are companies that are doing things with substantial impact on people's lives but which avoid media coverage because their activities would draw negative responses (e.g., companies contracting to drill for oil in lands converted from public parks to private use). I realize that we are not investigative reporters here, but I generally believe, in both cases, that our coverage should err on the side of greater coverage. bd2412 T 14:45, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
      • Thank you BD2412 for making my point. A small, unnoticed company should have an article with curated sources if it is drilling for oil in a protected spot or has invented a truly new food. Another gas station chain or another donut shop, irrespective of local press coverage, simply doesn't belong. Rhadow (talk) 14:52, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
        • See bullets #4 and #5. Please respond to the actual proposal. Jytdog (talk) 14:56, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
          • BD2412: I agree with you. What I'm saying is that an objective SNG would be beneficial for these points: it would specifically include cases of companies that are excluded under the current system but where coverage is important (for positive or negative reasons), but would also specifically exclude things such as startups that have done absolutely nothing and aren't even funded, but have been generating a lot of press because their founder is good at marketing. That is the benefit of the objective SNGs: they are both broader in areas where they should be broader and narrower in areas where they should be narrower. They serve as a tool to fight against systemic bias, and as our current GNG-in-light-of-NCORP application is completely arbitrary and largely depends on who shows up to the XfD, this is something that we need. TonyBallioni (talk) 17:58, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
  • raised more than $100M I am wondering why 100M (apart from being a nice round number :-) . I've seen plenty of floppy startups raising more than this. A $1M is not what it used to be 15 years ago... In any case, I support putting it to RFC. And after it is done, it is good to have discussion about free/opensource software. Quite a few businesses are quietly making quite a buck on these "freebies". Staszek Lem (talk) 19:35, 12 December 2017 (UTC)
I was writing something about how I found a startup raise 1 billion$ - Grail - but doesn't seem notable, but the 5 years in business might cover that - lot of startups fold quickly, and the ones that don't will have more coverage. I think we'll have to do analyses of companies that have and don't have articles and see which would have articles before and not after and see if it's reasonable to have articles on them. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:26, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
One way to do that is to search for 100 million raised with a setting for before 2012, to see what startups are there, and to see if all that survived till now seem like articles we'd want to have. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:38, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Also, how would this work for historical companies, especially private ones? Those probably don't need to go through extra hoops.. Galobtter (pingó mió) 05:19, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
    • A while ago I wrote a stub about a long-established company which I found was a near-monopolist in manufacturing some industrial shit (now I don't remember), but it was deleted soon, because all I can find is some passing notice that it was a monopolist and various industrial catalogs - "not enough in-depth independent coverage". Staszek Lem (talk) 17:46, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
      • That would likely have been easier to get in under these standard or a similar SNG. TonyBallioni (talk) 17:50, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
      • No company would describe itself as a monopolist in a press release or interview. An editor with good judgement would look at a source so bold as to write that (and diligent enough to explain the assertion). If it appeared reliable, it should be included. On a different note, I would like to see a reiteration that a company doesn't inherit notability from its investors. It's a good indicator of spam when a company article includes a list of investors, or particularly, is categorized as a Y Combinator startup. Rhadow (talk) 18:13, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
        • No company would describe itself as a monopolist -- ( ((Disclaimer: Old man grumbling here: Why did you conclude I saw it in press-release? This is a bad problem with many Wikipedians who extrapolate too much. This leads both to wrong original research creeping into articles and to sore miscommunications.))) I didn't say I read somebody said "monopolist", I say "I found". I don't remember exact detail now (may be I saw it had 80% market share or something), but that was the reason I wrote the stub. Staszek Lem (talk) 19:22, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

Proposed addition: I would also include a company that demonstrably has 1,500 or more employees. Even a company engaged in a mundane task like making paperclips or fruit bars or the like will have a broad impact on a lot of lives (more than the populations of many towns we cover) if they have that large of a base of employees. bd2412 T01:49, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Nah... Having a lot of employees does not make a company notable unless an independent source discusses the fact that it has lots of employees. Having an impact on lives does not make something notable unless an independent source discusses that impact. It all comes back to independent sources discussing the company... ie GNG has to be met. Blueboar (talk) 19:53, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
@Blueboar: The proposal above is to add further restrictions on entities that already meet the GNG. All of these are GNG-plus, so this would be "meets the GNG, plus demonstrably has 1,500 or more employees". I can't imagine that we would exclude a company that meets the GNG and is that large merely because it does not meet one of the other specified categories. bd2412 T 23:08, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
But if it meets GNG, it’s notable. Why are companies different? Blueboar (talk) 00:29, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
Some editors believe that exacting higher standards for companies is necessary to prevent spammers, scammers, and self-promoters from abusing Wikipedia for their own profit. bd2412 T 00:36, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

I agree with the proposition that any guidelines alternative to the GNG should be more stringent, not less. Any proposal should take care to ensure that it cannot be used to dodge GNG. James (talk/contribs) 18:43, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

I am wondering whether we have specific guidelines which allows for a broader inclusion compared to GNG. To state more generally, it may be a good idea to mark every clause in specific notability guidelines whether it expands or restricts GNG. This would make AfD discussions easier. Staszek Lem (talk) 20:10, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
  • I suggest removing defunct companies from any new grouping because, especially for historical companies, the criteria do not apply too well (I suspect GNG criteria fit better). Also, the problems of CoI and spam are probably not so severe. They could be treated along with non-profits. Thincat (talk) 11:02, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm skeptical of the whole notion that a stricter standard than GNG is needed. Aside from that, the proposed rules are far too strict. A few examples of companies that might be excluded: Albertsons, Foster Farms, AMC Theaters, Big 5 Sporting Goods, ACCO Brands. At a minimum, any publicly traded company on a real stock exchange should be included. For private companies, the rule seems to be focused on VC-backed startups, which are only a small fraction of the economy; most companies grow by earning money, not by "raising money". And the rules about making a "culturally significant impact" or "significant impact in its industry" are too mushy to be of much use. Toohool (talk) 21:51, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

  • I think this is a good idea, and I think it covers the majority of my concerns. I did have to smile a bit at the comment about a company that brings in $250 million in sales per year. This may come as a shock, but any individual Costco or Walmart store will bring in about that much in sales in a year; nobody would realistically argue that each Costco store is notable enough for an article. Looking historically, at least 20 of the articles deleted in the old "Orangemoody" sweep came pretty close to meeting GNG; it's why they were deleted without prejudice to recreation by experienced Wikipedians; but I don't think any of them would have met this enhanced notability standard. It really isn't hard to meet GNG. Risker (talk) 00:22, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
    • Risker, thank you for your feedback. It is appreciated with all the experience you have working through topics such as the Orangemoody case. I agree re: GNG, my somewhat joking statement regarding it is that anyone in a given AfD could meet the plain text of the GNG within a month or two if they tried hard enough. In regards to this specific text, do you have recommendations as to what should be done on the point It is a private company that has raised more than $100M and has been in business for at least 5 years. I am not sure, but I've been thinking recently that it might be better to remove this standard and replace it with one about either employees or storefronts (for retail). I'd appreciate your thoughts. I think what we need now is a clear text to put to the community, as there does seem to be some consensus here that something like this would be workable. TonyBallioni (talk) 00:35, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
      • Hi Tony, I think that because there is a range of "notability" options, the $100 million capitalization/5 years is just fine. I'm really hesitant to use either employees or storefronts as notability standards, because in both cases the numbers would have to be high to prevent gaming, but might be used against actually notable companies with fewer employees or storefronts in challenging notability. Risker (talk) 00:46, 27 December 2017 (UTC)


Examples

Folks can look in Category:Companies established in 2017 and step back through the years to 2012 (soon, 2013)

Here are some specific ones that would fail under these criteria:

lots more that one could pull from those cats... Jytdog (talk) 04:54, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

Do you consider that a good thing, that these articles would fail (at least, as written)? bd2412 T 19:56, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
Whatever, but some of them sit vandalized or months, meaning nobody cares about them. So why bother to have articles at all? I.e., these are not essential encyclopedic knowledge. Staszek Lem (talk) 22:54, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
Unattended vandalism also happens to companies that unquestionably meet the criteria proposed above, and to many other kinds of articles (small villages, minor professional athletes). There is a difference between no one caring about them as editors, and no one caring about them as readers, a much larger pool. bd2412 T 23:02, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
The thing is even this company does not freaking care what wikipedia says about it. Why do unpaid volunteers should waste their time and reputation on that? Staszek Lem (talk) 01:33, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
I don't think that's relevant to our mission, which is to write an encyclopedia. If unpaid volunteers are writing these articles (which I presume they are, because I would think paid editors would also fend off vandalism), then why should we undo their work? From the above listed articles, some of them would seem to fail multiple criteria, but it would be a shame to lose, e.g., Atiak Sugar Factory, since our coverage of business in Africa is so far behind what we have for other regions. bd2412 T 01:42, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
Agree that whether there is vandalism or whether the company cares about their article (TBH it's better if they don't) doesn't mean they should be deleted. However, most of these articles are still promotion. By having an article on wikipedia, and then (taking the case of VideoKen) explaining how VideoKen's patented AI-based technology is used for corporate and academic learning where users search, personalize, curate and share video clips. Users can use the tool to search for freely available videos on internet, quickly discover interesting sections of a video by using the automatically generated Table of Contents etc. These articles are usually based off of press releases/based off of material that is based on press releases. So only positive stuff that people can find by going to their website and routine merger/acquisition stuff is there. However I don't think Atiak Sugar Factory is one of those that we need to keep out with extra stringent standards (though there isn't much to the article). Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:24, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
Sorry for being unclear. I am not saying that vandalism is to be an argument in AfD. I am saying that lack of interest is a "red flag" calling for a closer attention to the notability of the article. Staszek Lem (talk) 20:15, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
IMO, these could be deleted on current standards too; I think the advantage might be easier deletion of them, rather than stricted standards.. Galobtter (pingó mió) 03:52, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
The first debate ended with a speedy delete though. I think rather than being more strict, what these guidelines would do is make it a lot easier to delete articles. Galobtter (pingó mió) 06:15, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

Any tweaks?

It's been two weeks since I posted above. I don't see any calls for significant changes to the proposed language above. I am looking to launch an RfC on Jan 7th so please make any proposals for concrete changes to the language above, if you have any. I am posting a notice at WP:N and WP:VPP as well to get more input to ensure the proposal has been well vetted before taking up the community's time with an actual RfC. Jytdog (talk) 18:01, 29 December 2017 (UTC)

I still think a provision should be added for companies demonstrably having a set number of employees. The number can be as arbitrary as any valuation number here, but employing large numbers of people is a significant thing in and of itself. bd2412 T 18:04, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
I don't agree. Unless it's stated in one of the sources that the company is remarkable for having lots of employees, some arbitrary bar isn't enough. Reyk YO! 18:11, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
Thanks User:BD2412. I would be would be willing to include a subproposal to also include something based on sheer number of employees - (am proposing 2ndary, subproposal because this didn't get a lot of support above). What number do you reckon -- a thousand perhaps? Jytdog (talk) 18:17, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
I had proposed 1,500 above. I think that it is reasonable to assume that an entity with that many people depending on it for their livelihood has enough of an impact to be considered inherently notable. bd2412 T 21:14, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
 Done Jytdog (talk) 23:16, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
I do have an issue if one tries to say that a SNG should be more strict than the GNG as to exclude topics that otherwise meet the GNG as a minimum threshold for presumed/likelihood of notability. However, one can be very explicit in an SNG as to what sources should be considered as acceptable or unacceptable relative to the GNG to effectively make that "stricter" version. For example, here, for NCORP, I would easily say that press releases (whether published directly by the company or through another media outlet) do not count towards GNG demonstration. Similarly, local "micropapers" (for example, the Seattle Times or Houston Chronicle) or otherwise local sections of larger regional papers (like the New York Times) should be avoided as solitary sources for demonstrating the GNG. The base SNG criteria here still works on its own, but you really should avoid making the SNG require topics to be more strict and invalidate the use of the GNG. --Masem (t) 18:10, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
Thanks for replying User:Masem. This is unambiguously aimed at being more strict than GNG which in practice allows all kinds of trash and worse, time-wasting arguments over trash and marginal cases. If you want to oppose on the basis that this is more strict than GNG then you can of course do that when the RfC launches. Thanks again for your comment. Jytdog (talk) 18:14, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
I'm just pointing out that to assert this SNG is more strict than the GNG and thus limits the use of the GNG in this topic area would require WP:N to be changed too (since that asserts the GNG or an SNG). The sourcing route is a way to avoid having to touch WP:N to achieve the same goal. --Masem (t) 18:20, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
I agree it will be hard to change WP:N. IMO all that you've proposed is included under WP:AUD and WP:ORGIND - however it could be more explicit. I think a lot of companies should already be deleted under current guidelines -this proposal would make it easier though. Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:31, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
(ec) I think this looks OK, and I agree with most above that any guideline of this sort needs to be stricter than GNG in order to give less weight to all the copious marketing churn every company gets. Reyk YO! 18:11, 29 December 2017 (UTC)

@Jytdog: Perhaps you missed my comment above pointing out examples of some blatantly notable companies that might be excluded by these standards? As for concrete proposals, I suggested allowing all publicly traded companies on well-known stock exchanges. For private companies, adding some options based on revenue, number of employees, number of locations, etc., would go a long way towards making this proposal more realistic. Toohool (talk) 19:09, 29 December 2017 (UTC)

Your suggestion about "any publicly traded company" is too low to be useful as it includes the whole world of penny stocks. In any case you made it clear that you are more or less opposed to raising N standards for companies; as I noted in the OP you can feel free to oppose the RfC. The goal here is definitely to make it harder to add promotional articles to Wikipedia about little companies looking to abuse WP for publicity. Unambigiously so. Jytdog (talk) 19:44, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
Penny stocks are generally traded on the Pink Sheets, not on a stock exchange - at least in the US. And yes, I can't say that I support this proposal, but if there's a chance of it being enacted, I would prefer that it be realistic. Are you saying that you are OK with enacting a rule that might call for the deletion of Albertsons? Toohool (talk) 19:53, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
Albertsons clearly passes the criteria 1, 2, 3, 4 and most likely 5. Rentier (talk) 20:18, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
Your link to WP:NOTTEMPORARY suggests that meeting a criterion at any time in history is enough to pass - that should be made explicit if it's the intent. Ok, I missed that Albertsons is on the Fortune 500, fair point about #3. How do you figure it passes #2? How did you determine that it passes #4 and #5? You found multiple sources stating that the company had a "culturally significant impact" and a "significant impact in its industry"? (We can consider other examples like H-E-B or Big 5 Sporting Goods to avoid confusion from talking about a company that clearly already meets other criteria.) Toohool (talk) 20:56, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
  • I was mistaken about #2, but I think that a convincing case can be made for Albertsons and H-E-B passing #4 and #5. The "significant impact on industry" should be easy to establish for almost all big companies. Taking Albertsons as an example, the FTC taking anti-trust actions shows by itself that the company affected its industry in a significant way. I see multiple academic case studies analyzing various facets of the company's activity. It was the first to combine grocery store with a drug store, one of the first to chains to add a gas station, it pioneered certain supply chain management processes, the list goes on. The "cultural impact" is more difficult. For Albertsons, there are things such as being the first food chain to start a perishable food recovery program or sponsoring multiple cultural events and objects in the Boise area, which have received significant coverage. H-E-B is described as having “century-deep Texas roots” that “make it an iconic brand that Texans love to root for”.
  • Big 5 Sporting Goods doesn't seem to have received much coverage. It would be covered by the newly added criterion based on the number of employees. Rentier (talk) 02:12, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
Antitrust action seems like a good indicator of impact on the industry, but that's really just a proxy for having a large market share - maybe there should be a criterion for that. I think a lot of this illustrates the problems with #4 and #5. If we were at AfD, we would have to go back and forth about which of these claims constitute a "significant impact", because the proposal doesn't give much guidance. Is being the subject of case studies an example of industry impact? That seems like a GNG-based argument - the company is notable because people have written about it. Is putting a gas station in front of a grocery store really a breakthrough? Were their supply chain innovations really that influential? Is sponsorship of important events really an example of cultural impact? Your quotes about H-E-B could be paraphrased as "The company is old and has good brand recognition and people like it." Is that cultural impact? I think #4 and #5 need a lot more fleshing out, especially since they would be by far the most commonly invoked criteria - I would estimate that all the others combined cover maybe 5% of the existing articles on companies. Toohool (talk) 20:45, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
User:Toohool thanks for your feedback. I added some elaboration as shown in the redaction to #4 and #5, in this diff. Thoughts? Jytdog (talk) 19:17, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment  The basic concept of notability is shown by the evidence of sufficiently significant attention given to the topic.  Assertions that topics have not received attention is better described as denial.  What the editors here want is WP:NOT guidelines.  Unscintillating (talk) 23:24, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
  • This is classic WP:CREEP – arbitrary, complex and unworkable. Are we supposed to inspect audited accounts to determine these numbers? And how are we supposed to obtain them? Do you not realise that private companies typically like to keep their financials secret? Andrew D. (talk) 00:23, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
  • As others have pointed out, the $100M criterion for private companies may unduly favour VC-backed startups (the index-based #1 is much stricter). I think it would be nicely complemented by a market capitalization threshold for public companies. Not sure what the optimal value would be. Rentier (talk) 02:12, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
User:Rentier thanks for your thoughts... on the private company side, the idea is to include only copies that do receive significant VC backing at first and then allow any company that manages to survive at least five years (and that meet GNG of course). This is meant to exclude private companies that are new and don't meet other criteria here - the ones that will be pushing hardest to get "visibility" via Wikipedia. On the public company side, the various indexes all have market cap floors and I am fine with leaving it to them to set those floors. With your suggestion for a market cap for public companies, are you looking to loosen this a bit, standardize it, or what? Jytdog (talk) 19:53, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
@Jytdog: I agree with the rationale and I think that overall the change would be a boon for Wikipedia. The aim of my suggestion is just to standarize, to avoid/mitigate arbitrary outcomes due to the company being private or public and due to the country/index size. For example, the smallest DAX company has a market cap of ca. €10B, while the Austrian Traded Index has a few companies in the €1B range. I think I would put a global market cap. floor at $1B. It's a reasonable valuation of a private company raising $100M, so the two criteria would be aligned. Rentier (talk) 03:44, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
  • The introductory sentence is awkwardly constructed 'In addition to satisfying the GNG, a for-profit company is considered "notable" in Wikipedia only if one of the following criteria is met:'. I suggest 'A for-profit company is considered "notable" in Wikipedia if it satisfies the GNG criteria and, in addition, any of the following criteria are met:' Thincat (talk) 09:38, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Concurring with Risker, I think this is a very good idea in principle, and necessary. VC funding does not make a company notable, and indeed, a lot of today's 'impeccably' formatted company articles with strings of 'sources' are about start-ups and contain little other than press releases or other reports about their funding. Being funded is not about what a company has done. The firms that will meet these new criteria are so big that they are not going to benefit from the additional exposure of being 'on the Wikipedia'; it's not about favoring big business entities over their smaller competiton, it's about preventing Wikipedia from increasingly becoming an advertising platform. OTOH, there are plenty of operations that employ a lot of people, I believe some of the large malls and plenty of factories here in Thailand have over 1,000 employees under their roofs and it doesn't make them notable. Otherwise, go for it, Jytdog. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 10:53, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Funding and longevity as criteria seem to be contradictory. Successful companies, those with longevity, are marked by turnover and profit. It's only the spectacular failures such as boo.com and the South Sea Company which are measured by (lost) funding. Once a company has survived 5 years the funding it received in year 1 should be worth no more than a passing comment. Cabayi (talk) 11:51, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
  • A couple of things I am wondering about here. First, per other comments, I would hesitate to use this standard for now-defunct (or merged, or whatever) companies that had a major impact in their time. So long as it is clear that these standards are for "BLP" companies, that would be important. Montanabw(talk) 18:35, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
Montanabw, I think it's implicit in every notability guideline that notability is not temporary. Any other reading would lead to nonsensical outcomes, such as deleting an article when the company leaves a stock index. That said, I would not be opposed to applying a looser standard to defunct companies. Rentier (talk) 03:59, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Second, I am a bit concerned with any language that overrides GNG completely with "only if" phrasing, as small, private, non-publicly traded companies can be notable. Also, if misapplied, this could exclude articles on small companies that generated significant notoriety (example; Whitefish Energy). So long as GNG can apply to certain exceptions and this SNG is primarily for profiles on major businesses, intended to exclude purely PR puff pieces and not intended to preclude reasonably newsworthy small entities then proceed. Montanabw(talk) 18:35, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Size is not the same as notability, so I'm opposed to any more scope creeping on notability. If anything the standards are too stringent as they are. I don't see what problem this is supposed to be addressed.Egaoblai (talk) 00:47, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
  • As with several others above, I don't see this as helpful. We have a severe shortage of good business coverage in my part of the world, and the last thing is random and arbitrary hoops written entirely around United States big-business in 2018. This would be an absolute disaster for our coverage of business in parts of the world we already cover badly (e.g. Africa, as others have noted above), and nearly all of the criteria don't even apply in the case of the extremely underrepresented topic of historical businesses. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:06, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
User:The Drover's Wife, as noted in the OP, you will have the ability to oppose in the RfC. If you have any ideas about improving the proposal, please provide them. Jytdog (talk) 03:13, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
I think the refusal to engage with these objections is unhelpful. Numerous people have listed numerous problems with this proposal as it is currently framed, and rather than try to address any of those things, a response of "you will have your chance later to oppose it" is disappointing. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:25, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
I noted in the OP that there are people who will oppose from the get go and you will have your chance to oppose at the RfC. Again if you have any kind of criteria that would not rule out the kind of companies you think should be in WP please propose them. A general "no" is just a waste of bytes at this point in the process. And your description as "refusing to engage" is a misrepresentation. I have responded to concrete proposals. Jytdog (talk) 03:29, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
@The Drover's Wife: Can you provide examples of companies that would not meet the proposed criteria but should be included in Wikipedia? Rentier (talk) 03:50, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
  • It is considered by multiple independent reliable sources to have made a culturally significant impact in a geographic area. This is distinct from passing local controversies, getting good reviews, or the like. - What is this even supposed to mean? What is a geographic area? A limited geographic area? A local geographic area? Any geographic area? Isn't anything on earth within some "geographic area"? If a company passes GNG because of coverage in secondary sources (let's say for a controversy) isn't it notable? What does "geographic area" have to do with anything, what if it is a worldwide or non-geographic cultural impact? —DIYeditor (talk) 03:22, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
User: TonyBallioni this was something you and User:Smallbones wanted in the prior discussion and the reaction just above is kind of what we were expecting. How do you think this could be refined? User:DIYeditor please review that discussion and if you have ideas about how to clarify the intent that would be great. Jytdog (talk) 03:35, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Perhaps something like the equivalent of a US state, Canadian province, etc. (I'm not sure what the equivalent would be in the UK). Obviously a company such as Cheerwine, which is basically the state soft drink of North Carolina, should be considered notable. I'm also fine with leaving it broad: if there is significant reliable sourcing on the impact of a company on half of a state (think Southern California), that has extreme regional importance. The important thing here is that there needs to be commentary on it's significance to a specific region. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:40, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Perhaps just eliminate "in a geographic area". If something has made a culturally significant impact it is notable - geographic or not. The exclusions for good reviews and local controversies are sensible, and I think they may be the key part of this that distinguishes the proposed NCORP from GNG. Wording it to cover local geographic areas excludes broader cultural impact by omission - limiting this to a specific region would prohibit articles on companies of only national or worldwide rather than regional impact. I would add to the exclusions ("local custom" for example if Americans would know what "custom" means - perhaps "patronage") rather than try to word it like this because the result is illogical.
It is considered by multiple independent reliable sources to have made a culturally significant impact in a geographic area. This is distinct from passing local controversies, local patronage (custom), getting good reviews, or the like. —DIYeditor (talk) 04:00, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Something that has national impact would certainly be allowed by this: a country is a geographic region. I'd be nervous about your proposed wording per the Cheerwine example (technically about the drink, but easy example to use that I'm familiar with): very obvious cultural impact on a state. It should have an article. Would your wording be used to exclude it? I'm not a huge fan of local press, but if academic sourcing has been written on how one factory has had a cultural impact on an area, that is significant. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:07, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Well, you're saying it is culturally significant in impact and it is not only local custom (not just "everyone hangs out in Smallville at Jimbob's Cafe"), so that would be allowed. The problem with the other wording is that something of non-specific or worldwide impact is not "in a geographic area". All I've done is eliminate that restriction and add another proviso that this not be merely a local impact. I guess it matters how "local" is interpreted but it is already being used in the criteria. Technically a county, town or district is a "geographic area". —DIYeditor (talk) 04:22, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
(I hope I'm not causing an edit conflict) Also I think my wording only eliminates local custom; other local impacts (except passing controversies) would be allowed. I just don't feel the "in a geographic area" wording is clear in its intent or logic. What isn't in some geographic area? 10 square feet? The world? In patches around the world? —DIYeditor (talk) 04:38, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
(EC)I'll say go forward with the RfC with @DIYeditor:s wording on the "geographic" issue. BTW Smallville is a pretty nice place Smallbones(smalltalk) 04:41, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
OK,  Done Jytdog (talk) 05:14, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) @Smallbones: Unintentional reference to your username. :) @Jytdog: We could expand this to something like "culturally significant impact, whether local or broad" if TonyBallioni is concerned that it would be interpreted narrowly otherwise. I can see how someone might want to read "culturally significant impact" as meaning only major impact on culture in the broadest sense. I don't think that is a logical reading though - a local culturally significant impact is still a culturally significant impact. If they interpreted it without qualification only to mean a broad cultural impact where do they draw the line? National? English language? Continental? Global? I think it is best left unqualified. —DIYeditor (talk) 05:30, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
I’m fine with your original wording. I think the above might go too far in the opposite direction. I’d prefer my wording re: geography precisely because it is broad, but I get your opposition, and I prefer stricter to the opposite. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:35, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Perhaps "impact on a regional or larger scale" is more what you are looking for? To me leaving it open may satisfy a lot of inclusionist concerns along these lines that X business is notable for more than its status as a money-making enterprise alone. Would we be better off saying that Katz's Delicatessen has had a cultural impact beyond its local custom or that it has had a significant impact on its industry? No examples come to mind, but it's possible that a business could have similar cultural impact without impacting its own industry to the same degree. —DIYeditor (talk) 06:57, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Two Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/TeamHealth sources

At Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/TeamHealth, I provided two sources about which HighKing wrote on User talk:Cunard, "I don't believe either of those references meets the criteria for establishing notability".

Here are the two sources:

  1. "Fortune 500 2012: Rank 672. Team Health Holdings, Inc". Fortune. 2012. Archived from the original on 2017-12-18. Retrieved 2017-12-18.

    The article notes that TeamHealth's ranked 672 on the Fortune 1000 and had $3,141,700,000 in revenue, $65,500,000 in profit, and $928,300,000 in assets.

  2. Brass, Larisa (2010-08-26). "From ER to executive suite, physician created an industry leader". Knoxville News Sentinel. Archived from the original on 2017-12-29. Retrieved 2017-12-29.

    The article notes:

    Emergency department services comprise about 80 percent of TeamHealth's business. The second largest segment is active-duty military hospitals. The company is the country's second largest hospitalist provider, and provides medical staff in psychiatry, radiology, pediatrics and locum tenens - industry speak for temporary physicians.

    In addition, TeamHealth's services have evolved to include billing, coding and collections, and in 2000 the company launched its own malpractice insurance.

    TeamHealth grew from a regional to a national provider through a series of acquisitions in the 1990s.

    ...

    Between 1992 and 1997, TeamHealth acquired or merged with a series of medical outsourcing firms, tapping each for particular skills - the solid managed care experience of a California firm, the best fee-for-service management in South Florida, a quality residency training program for ER physicians in Ohio, risk management skills in New Jersey.

My explanation for why these sources help establish notability:

  1. The Fortune link helps establish notability not because it provides analysis or opinion or significant coverage. It helps establish notability because it verifies that TeamHealth was a Fortune 1000 company in 2012. That is the sole reason I included that link.
  2. The article contains quotations from the company's founder. But it also has substantial independent material the journalist researched and verified about the company. The quotes help demonstrate notability by verifying that TeamHealth is "the country's second largest hospitalist provider" and that it "grew from a regional to a national provider through a series of acquisitions in the 1990s".

We agreed to open a discussion on this talk page about whether these two sources help establish notability.

Cunard (talk) 03:44, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Thank you Cunard for opening this discussion. For a while now, I've questioned Cunard's responses at AfD, both the overly-long formatting and selective quotes that I believe is disruptive and unnecessary especially since (in my opinion) most of the references posted by Cunard fail the criteria for establishing notability. We've had a short discussion and agreed to use a couple of examples and discuss here to understand that opinion of the wider community. Cunard's views are above and he has kindly replicated what was posted at the AfD. I disagree that either of those references meet the criteria for establishing notability.
The Fortune reference fails WP:CORPDEPTH, third point, inclusion in lists of similar organizations. The footnote states Inclusion in "best of", "top 100", and similar lists does not count towards notability at all, unless the list itself is notable, such as the Fortune 500 and the Michelin Guide. Inclusion in a notable list counts like any other reliable source, but it does not exempt the article from the normal value of providing evidence that independent sources discuss the subject. The fortune link provided by Cunard shows that the company is outside the Fortune500 therefore this reference fails the criteria for establishing notability.
The knoxnews reference fails WP:ORGIND. It is based on an interview, therefore a PRIMARY source with no independent analysis or opinion. The facts and data provided in the article are not the independent opinion of the journalist and were like provided to the journalist by the company.
Can we get other opinons please? HighKing++ 12:54, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
So wait, is the question whether the two sources count towards notability, or whether they establish notability themselves? Definitely not to the second, but "meh, they don't hurt, but they don't add a ton" to the first. They're sources, but weak sources -- a fact of sometime inclusion in a moderately significant list and an interview in a local business journal. That said, if Cunard just linked them with the others in a short list of links rather than expanding to take up the whole page, I imagine this wouldn't be much of an issue (but that's not really a matter for this page). — Rhododendrites talk \\ 16:02, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Rhododendrites, the question is whether these references should be considered when determining if the topic company is notable. That is, that the references meet the criteria for establishing the notability of the company in question. We have a different opinion - I say they fail the criteria, Cunard disagrees. I have raised the point about his formatting elsewhere. HighKing++ 18:01, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

RfC: Raising NCORP standards

withdrawn, needs work. Thanks for the input. Discussion ongoing below. Jytdog (talk) 16:33, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Following on the extensive discussion above which in turn continued the discussion started last July here, after many people have said "we need to raise NCORP standards" in many places, here is an RfC to do that.

The goal here is to raise notability standards for companies.

There is a main proposal and an additional one. Please make sure you !vote about each one.

Main proposal (#1 if you like)

A for-profit company is considered "notable" in Wikipedia if it satisfies the GNG criteria and, in addition, any of the following criteria are met:

  1. It is a publicly traded company with at least a $1B market capitalization
  2. It is a private company that has raised more than $100M and has been in business for at least 5 years
  3. It has been listed as a member of the Fortune 1000, Forbes Global 2000, or an equivalently regarded business ranking.
  4. It is considered by multiple independent reliable sources to have made a culturally significant impact. This is distinct from passing local controversies, local patronage (custom), getting good reviews, or the like.
  5. It is regarded by multiple independent reliable sources as having significant impact in its industry, including technical breakthroughs in marketed products. This is distinct from mundane product differentiation-type claims; every company is "unique".
  6. It has been involved in fraud, antitrust, or another activity that receives enough ongoing coverage to meet WP:NCRIME.
Additional criterion (#2 if you like)
  • It employs at least 1,500 people

-- Jytdog (talk) 02:25, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

RfC !votes

  • Support per my comments above: we need an objective criteria here. AfD on corps is too contentious currently, and this will help a lot. Also, no opposition to point 2, but I consider it secondary to the first. TonyBallioni (talk) 02:31, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Strong support for the main proposal, as a way to cut down on promo cruft. I think the 2nd part is probably moot, because it would effectively be covered by at least one of the criteria in the main proposal. --Tryptofish (talk) 02:53, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose. These criteria are US-centric, 21st-century-centric and would be absolutely catastrophic for our coverage of notable business topics, especially outside of the United States and anything prior to the 21st century. Beyond that: #1 is completely useless for anything not-current for obvious reasons. #2 is very vague (what use of "raised" is intended there?). #3 is very literally US-centric. #4 and #5 are so vague as to not really provide useful guidance. The additional criterion is totally arbitrary: why does 1,500 employees make a company notable? This does nothing that we can't already do to crack down on promo cruft, but basically invites deletion battles on just about every historical or non-US company article. The proposal needs to be killed with fire. The Drover's Wife (talk) 02:58, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • They would arguably be significantly more favourable to non-21st century topics: points 4 and 5 in particular favour older and no longer extant corporations. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:01, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
      • By forcing them into #4 and #5, they place virtually every historical company and the overwhelming majority of plainly notable non-US companies into a category where their notability is always considered to be arguable, and where any editor writing content would have to prepare for the likelihood of having to try to fight out their significance regardless of their sourcing. I do not want to have to defend every Australian business article or every historical business article because this change effectively declared open season on them all. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:12, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
        • That's literally no different than it is now with the GNG, which is significantly worse for that because of it's complete ambiguity in terms of what we are looking for in sourcing. This would make it easier to include the notable companies you are discussing by making it clear the type of coverage we are looking for. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:14, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
          • No, it doesn't: it means that deletionists can force editors in this area to have to have an argument about the significance of the company on top of having already passed GNG. This is not a recipe for encouraging editors to improve our coverage in these areas. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:17, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
            • That already happens with the current NCORP which is focused on even more subjective criteria than these. This would add clarity and actually make it less likely a notable corp would be deleted in the scenarios you are talking about. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:19, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
              • NCORP has absolutely no barrier to historical articles or non-US articles in the same way that this proposal does. It is not an impediment to good business coverage at all. The idea that having to satisfy GNG and these very stringent criteria that don't take into account historical or non-US companies at all is going to help is ludicrous. There's nothing that saps editorial enthusiasm on notable topics like battles to stop arbitrary deletion of their work by people who've never heard of (significant) subjects.. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:23, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
                • I agree that if an article passes WP:GNG it should be kept. This would mean the sources are secondary, independent sources. I think the meaning of that is well-established and excludes most media sources that are largely based on company statements. But sometimes an article will be nominated for AfD because an editor has never heard of the topic before, or personally believes it is non-notable. An article that meets WP:GNG with academic sourcing (journal articles, Brill, Routledge, OUP) should not have to meet extra criteria just because it is about a corporation/organization. (I would support tightening up the guidance on using media sources in general, not just for NCORP.)Seraphim System (talk) 04:21, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
                  • There are people who !vote keep even when the media sources are clearly promotional or at-least not very independent. Some way of making NCORP clearer on this could help. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:54, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
                    • I agree but if editors are not following the policies we already have they probably will not follow the new one either, and admins are reluctant to create an appearance that they are "supervoting" even though AfD is technically not supposed to be a vote.Seraphim System (talk) 06:13, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • @The Drover's Wife: Since the main thrust of the problem seems to be self-promotion, what if the criteria only applied to active corporations? -- irn (talk) 15:21, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support in principal, needs refinement We need to increase the requirements for companies. Companies hire PR firms to get coverage of thier company, and so GNG is basically useless to verify notability as it is often impossible to determine if a source was solicited or not. Wikipedia is in danger of becoming a directory of companies. Note that criterion #2 should be inflation adjusted for historical companies (probably implied anyway). I also suggest that "including" in #5 be changed to "such as" to avoid confusion. EDIT: I am also concerned about how this would affect small family owned wineries and other such businesses. Impact on a national or even only a regional level for some of these wineries is significant enough to warrant inclusion, but few would qualify under the above criteria. I think it needs refinement. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here) 03:09, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • How would you work out the market capitalisation of a company in 1925? Do you expect every editor covering business history to turn up profit figures and then work out how to adjust them for inflation? The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:15, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose per The Drover's Wife. I have written several articles about notable small and medium sized businesses, and consider this rigid standard to be a straightjacket that would stop me from writing such articles in the future. It would wipe out our coverage of Michelin starred restaurants and family owned wineries, for example, which often have in-depth coverage in hundreds of reliable sources going back decades. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 03:33, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Exactly. Carrite (talk) 03:48, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
@Cullen328: Since this is something you work on a lot, perhaps you could suggest additional criteria? Maybe something about receiving a Michelin star or the impact of these wineries that makes them more notable? Or having more sources over a longer time, which you also mentioned? -- irn (talk) 15:21, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support as written. We could also go some way to meeting @The Drover's Wife: objections (but we better do it fairly soon if we do it). This could be for "currently active companies" (i.e. "BLP companies"). The third point could end " or an equivalently regarded business ranking in its home country." The first 2 points could include (in 2017 dollars) after the dollar amounts. The 1,500 employees would further loosen this. Our spam problem isn't caused by Moroccan or Mongolian companies, or by defunct companies, it's more like donut shops, real estate brokers, fly-by-night financial brokers, and PR firms, which would be excluded in either case. Support either version Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:35, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Profound Support This has been a long time coming, so many UPE's take advantage of Wikipedia and in AfC, our hands are tied at stopping it. Personally, I'd like to outright ban CORP from AfC, but this is a step in the right direction. As per the second point, I'm in favor, but the first is much more crucial. Drewmutt (^ᴥ^) talk 03:44, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Ridiculously over-the-top overreaction to a valid problem that will absolutely obliterate our business coverage. The benchmark numbers are way, way, way the hell too high... BTW: it is companies of that size that are able to pay full time PR people to manicure their WP pages 24/7, not the small fry. Just sayin'... Carrite (talk) 03:39, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
User:Carrite actually paying someone to create a Wikipedia article is probably the cheapest form of PR on the planet - way cheaper than hiring a PR firm. I believe you know this. Jytdog (talk) 16:48, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Yes, but the huge potential problem at WP isn't the obviously non-notable spammy small business pieces by single purpose paid editors, which are already annihilated by the truckload through our established deletion processes, but the pages of mega corporations which are "maintained" by paid staff. This proposal throws the baby out with the bathwater in terms of smaller companies while entirely missing the mark on the larger problem. Carrite (talk) 17:58, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Those big companies are undoubtably "notable" and problems there are not handled under NCORP but other policies/guidelines. The "problem X is bigger than problem Y" argument is classic derailing bullshit in any case. And I suggest you spend some time at NPP to see the ongoing tidal wave of promotional pollution about small companies that people dump into WP everyday and fight to keep. I have no more to say. Jytdog (talk) 18:02, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose Ditch NCorp for the GNG is a more viable solution. L3X1 Become a New Page Patroller! (distænt write) 03:43, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • That would be the death of this project: it would open up the doors for literally every single new startup to have a page as they all meet the GNG without the current NCORP restrictions. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:46, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
      • Not necessarily, WP:SIGCOV already includes a requirement for in-depth independent sources, and this is the most common decline reason for CORP articles at AfC. NCORP just provides a lot more detail for new editors about what this means. We have also WP:NGO, WP:NCHURCH, WP:NSCHOOL - I think this proposal would have to be limited to (non-historic) Commercial Organizations in any case. We really shouldn't open the door on nominating the Order of the Garter for deletion because it's a mere "local patronage" Seraphim System (talk) 04:48, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support The bottom line is that a company must be recognized for having made some kind of impact to be considered notable. If a family owned, Michelin starred restaurant hasn't significantly influenced other restaurants (impact on industry) and is not considered culturally important (which can be quite broadly construed), why include it? Rentier (talk) 03:46, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
An encyclopedia with 5.5 million articles would be making a very big mistake to decide to exclude coverage of Michelin starred restaurants and influential, highly reviewed wineries, and similar types of distinctive and notable small and medium sized businesses. People come to Wikipedia to get information about such businesses. That notion seems absurd on the face of it to me, Rentier, and I will oppose such rigid restrictions vigorously. "Culturally important" is a very vague term. I live in the Napa Valley and this change would decimate or nearly obliterate our local business coverage. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 03:57, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Why wouldn't you include a michelin starred restaurant - a restaurant that people would care to learn about in an encyclopedia? Galobtter (pingó mió) 03:59, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Cullen328, I expressed similar concerns above, which is why I originally proposed it as being significant within a geographic region to take into account such concerns (which I consider very relevant). The problem with trying to work out any criteria is that it is either going to be too strict or too vague. I can't think of a better way to analyze than by sourcing considering cultural impact, but if there is a more objective criteria (top X% in revenue in a region or something similar), I'd strongly support it. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:04, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Uh, I agree, I didn't notice that those words were removed. My reading of the proposal has been that any influential (even locally) business would be covered by criteria #4 and #5. Rentier (talk) 04:23, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Reluctant Oppose I'm reluctantly against - yes a lot of companies would fail, but I think a lot would fail even under current standards if NCORP was enforced properly (or just from sending to AfD). And more importantly, I don't think this targets tightly enough the kind of companies we want to remove, even though I strongly support some way of doing so. I don't know exactly what a "perfect" criteria would look like, however I don't think it is possible unless vagueness is there - more vagueness than is there in this one. Making it apply to only current companies would help but I don't think solve this problem. Essentially, this works well to remove the kind of spammy companies one finds in NPP, but the problem is that it applies to all companies even if they are very different - a U.S PR firm is very different from an Indian restaurant or an Russian Airline etc. Galobtter (pingó mió) 03:59, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • Galobtter: there is literally no perfect criteria. This is a step in the right direction, and like with all guidelines can and will be tweaked as needed (and that can be done pretty easily). I'd encourage you to consider changing your !vote if it is looking for a perfect criteria: the perfect shouldn't be the enemy of the good, and while this is far from perfect, it is much better than what we currently have. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:04, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • Galobtter: fix ping. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:06, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
      • "There is no perfect criteria" is not an argument for replacing a criteria with something in many areas much worse. I think there's a solid argument that it could be fixed, but the interest in actually engaging with any of the issues with it (besides "put a specific amendment to us") wasn't there until this was actually put out to an RfC - which has been too late. The Drover's Wife (talk) 04:10, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm not looking for a perfect criteria. However this simply isn't good enough. It needs to move towards being a "perfect" criteria (which I was thinking of how that would work) somewhat more. In general vaguer criteria like NCORP are better in that they can cover a wide-range of topics, while such a spelled out criteria like this one is unworkable, I think. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:11, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Opposing because I doesn't fix spammy articles enough would be letting perfect be the enemy of the "good". But I'm opposing because it would hinder article creation on non-spammy historical etc articles. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:13, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Despite what has been argued, the exact opposite is true for non-spammy historical articles: this would make it significantly harder for them to be deleted, while cutting down on spam. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:18, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Not every historical (and notable) company is culturally significant or has made a significant impact in its industry. The other criteria of 1 billion$+ etc need to be adapted at the very least for inflation, other countries etc otherwise it doesn't work. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:22, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Needs refinement. At the very least, it needs to be explained that this refers to 21st century US non-financial companies--for firms elsewhere, or earlier, the financial standard may be too high--for financial companies where the relevant figure is funds under management, it's too low. If this is a supplement to the arguments will still be about the meaning of the GNG qualifications , for what sources count as reliable. We do need to do something along this line, but I haven't yet found something adequate. −
As an illustration of some problems, using the example given,: I think it would be much better to say that all Michelin-starred restaurants should have an article. For the ones that aren't, then we'd need standards. I'd further assume that any bank or investment company with over $10 Billion assets is appropriate for an article. The problem of ruling out the ones that aren;t is more a matter of ensuring against articles that cannot be more than directory articles or advertising. The objection that this standard "would obliterate our local business coverage" is in fact essentially what is intended. DGG ( talk ) 04:16, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
I think this is along the lines I was thinking. It either needs to be tighter in scope (refer to only certain types of companies in the first world, manye not U.S. only) or have some vaguer criteria. Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:20, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
TonyBallioni, I think you are an excellent editor but I disagree with you profoundly on this proposal. This would have a severely negative impact on our encyclopedic coverage of businesses. Our main tool should be assertive removal of promotional content from articles about notable businesses, rather than aggressively deleting articles about notable businesses. Our goal should be to improve the encyclopedia, not to disassemble the encyclopedia. DGG, the "local" Napa Valley businesses I referred to have received heavy significant coverage in national and international publications and books for decades. Should we really be removing all articles about the great historic family owned wineries of Napa and Sonoma and Chile and South Africa and New Zealand and France and Spain and so on? Cullen328 Let's discuss it 04:26, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
I think giving some examples of the wineries could help Galobtter (pingó mió) 04:29, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Galobtter, please take a look at "Category:Wineries in Napa Valley" which has 72 articles. I am not saying that every one is in good shape but I think we should have articles about most of these companies (and more). The one article in this category that was mostly my work is Hagafen Cellars. We have similar categories for all of the major winemaking regions of the world. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 04:45, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Cullen, thank you for your kind words: I would actually agree with you in the wineries, and think that they should be included (and as I said, I wanted a specific mention of geography of some sort in this proposal for along the same reasons you mentioned. I think it still would allow them, for what it is worth, but I certainly understand where you are coming from). TonyBallioni (talk) 04:32, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Cullen328, I misunderstood you. I would certainly keep articles about important historical businesses--you are right about there importance, just as are similar institutions of other sorts. The historical dimension of WP needs to be expanded, not limited. (& at least we don't have a problem there with promotionalism and undeclared paid editors) The question is local recently-founded small businesses--I mentioned in my comment 21st century, though possibly 1990 is a better cutoff.) Similarly, there was a comment above that business covered by academic sources are notable regardless of size. I agree they are, if the coverage is substantial, though I would make an exception for the multiplicity of case studies in business school publications. The problem in the use of the GNG is the problem with current newspaper and magazine sources that are susceptible to PR. The problem is better stated not as "notability," which has too much accumulation of detail and qualifications and history of bad decisions in a way that is incomprehensible except to those with relevant experience here, but rather the basic concept: what is suitable for an encyclopedia . And, as I've said before, variations in the notability standard one direction or another don't damage the encyclopedia in any fundamental way. It's accepting material that amounts to advertising that could kill its value. WP should not be Google. DGG ( talk ) 04:41, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose The aim of the GNG, if we go back to when it was first developed, was not to determine what was worth writing about, but to provide criteria about what we could write about. Because of our focus on NPOV and verifiablilty, we can only write about topics where there are sufficient independent sources to create a verifiable NPOV article. Accordingly, the various specialized notability criteria have not been about setting standards as to what should be written about, but making clear the sorts of topics which are viable given the GNG (often because it can be hard to establish if the sources exist during an AfD). Thus they are generally worded to be along the lines of "x is notable if it meets the GNG or ..." rather than "and". WP:NCORP has always followed this, with the important proviso that WP:CORPDEPTH defined the sort of sources which met the "non trivial" side. My problem with the proposed approach to strengthening NCORP is that it is making decisions about what is worth having a article about, not what can have an article on. Rather than changing the focus like this, it would be better to strengthen CORPDEPTH so that we can allow for the changing nature of online coverage and the way it can be gamed, but leave out criteria regarding worthiness. - Bilby (talk) 04:44, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support in principle, oppose as written per The Drover's Wife. As written, the rules would obliterate historical and non-US businesses. But I agree that in Internet age where every start-up can come up with a min of 10 sources, we need some better rules to keep the spam out. Renata (talk) 05:00, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support with reservations per Renata and The Drover's Wife. Dschslava Δx parlez moi 05:20, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support as a guideline, though I would prefer not to have this be an unwavering line. bd2412 T 05:39, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
If it's a guideline doesn't it become a stick to use at AfD? I would like to see more analysis of what all articles might end up being deleted under this. —DIYeditor (talk) 05:54, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Yes, it does, which is a good thing. It becomes an argument for removing probably bad articles which those who want them kept would need to address. bd2412 T 19:33, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Then if it were a guideline wouldn't it need to be reworded for the cutoffs not to be unwavering? —DIYeditor (talk) 02:42, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose current incarnation: The effort to eliminate promotional and trivial company articles and reduce the appeal of Wikipedia as a means of promotion is worthwhile. However, while I think the cultural and industry impact criteria are pretty good rules of thumb, overall this proposal may affect articles that readers might reasonably expect to find on Wikipedia with in-depth coverage in secondary sources. Further, the hard dollar figure, age, and employee requirements are nearly useless measures, are US-centric, and fly in the face of the spirit of GNG and the basic understanding I think readers have about what kind of information Wikipedia caries. Big and "important" don't equate to notability or fitness for an encyclopedia article, and smallness does not indicate a lack of fitness. A business merely existing, large or small, isn't encyclopedic. It being examined and referenced in secondary sources for more than existing is what matters. It is not only the largest companies, or the companies which have made the most profound cultural or industry impacts, that are interesting in our context. Somewhat along the lines of what Bilby says, I would like to see CORPDEPTH refined with what is useful in this proposal: having a cultural or industry impact, or significant controversy: yes, that is depth; local patronage/custom, positive reviews or passing local controversies: no that does not count as depth. My two cents. —DIYeditor (talk) 05:50, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Good idea, but it's too weak. Just require significant coverage in reliable secondary sources, excluding primary sources by people who can't be counted on to know much of anything about the subject (a genre commonly known as "news reports"), and you'll resolve tons of problems. Nyttend (talk) 05:53, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Reluctant Oppose... I was tempted to support this - until I read Bilby’s comment above. I agree that the better solution to the problem is to strengthen WP:CORPDEPTH. Blueboar (talk) 06:10, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support This will help us deal with the large volume of low quality promotional editing we are dealing with. With respect to historically important businesses we have "having significant impact in its industry". Happy with the adjustments proposed by User:DGG Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 08:39, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose Per Bilby, this isn't the right way to deal with the issue of corpspam.AlasdairEdits (talk) 09:36, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose Per several of the above. In particular, hard-coding monetary amounts relevant in the developed world and in the 21st century would be harmful. That is exactly what is meant by "systematic bias". There is also no mention of GNG. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:00, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose As above. The proposal was obviously an attempt to solve a serious localised problem but it must be universal and address organisations in emerging economies too. Notability is fine for the experienced editor but it serves a road block to the new editors we are trying to encourage. If this change goes forward it becomes a tick list for the new page patrol. A criteria for a mv from Draft space. If this changes goes forward it is the new editor who moves from successfully writing a few paragraphs to having to justify himself using our policies and TLAs, using a level of argument seen here. A second reason is that if an organisation article is refused, where do we transfer it to.ClemRutter (talk) 10:33, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose Per several of the above. Especially Cullen. —usernamekiran(talk) 10:58, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Weak support I saw this on centralised discussion, and thought 'yes, yes!' until I realised the specifics, which are currently very U.S-centric. As Cullen328 notes above, the new very high bar along with its American-centrism would wipe out some institutions which are indeed worthy as articles. I would like to see a note added which would be along the lines of "Discretion is advised when applying this criteria, especially for companies outside the United States and/or the English-speaking world". I get this guideline's intentions, and it is a good nuclear option for COI/(U)PE, but it needs refining to stop affecting innocent articles. Oppose #2, employee numbers != notability. And I assume this will be grandfathered, right? !dave 09:10, 21 January 2018 (UTC), put in the right section 12:54, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose per The Drover's Wife and Cullen. In favor of the spirit of the idea, but this would cause far more problems than it would solve. Gamaliel (talk) 13:14, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Moral support The scale of the problem with corporate advertising requires a specific response. If quantitative thresholds can be made global then this may be a solution. And yes there has to be an exception for "significant impact", meaning an assessment has to be made in each case, there is no getting around that. A needful change is to state that the new policy applies only to extant, not historical, companies: Noyster (talk), 13:25, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Although I strongly support the motivation, connecting the inclusion criteria of a major field to facts that come from primary sources is the wrong way to go. Wikipedia covers things that others have already covered. Wikipedia does not support editors doing WP:OR with primary sources, or alternatively creating swathes of company directory pages, even if limited to > 1500 employees. I much prefer my idea, as suggested at Wikipedia_talk:Notability/Archive_60#Paid_editing,_Advertorials,_and_Reference_bombing. This idea is to require all articles on currently trading companies, including articles on their products, founders and CEOs, to explicitly identify two to three notability attesting sources. Usually these are required to be independent, and reliable, and say something about the subject directly in at least two sentences, but the bottom line is evidence of others having written about the topic. Say these 2-3 sources must be listed in the first saved version, but when push comes to shove, the test is whether the 2-3 notability sources are in the current version. This will make deletion substantially easier than the current test, which is whether such sources exist, and because the author is de facto required to identify the 2-3 sources out of the dozens of WP:Reference bombing sources. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:43, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose on principle no SNG can exclude a subject that clearly passes GNG. The whole rationale for the existence of SNGs is to allow for the inclusion of certain subjects that do not strictly meet GNG. In other words an SNG is used to lower the GNG bar, it cannot raise it. Killing CORPCRUFT is necessary, but this is not the way to do it. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 14:45, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
User:Dodger67 thanks for your input. What is the correct way to "kill CORPCRUFT" in your view? I really am interested to hear. Jytdog (talk) 17:22, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose per The Drover's Wife. Way too prescriptive for a notability guideline, and it would lead to a massive bias against articles about older companies or companies from smaller markets. As Dodger67 said, a subject notability guideline should not restrict what can pass under the GNG. A better set of notability guidelines might be needed, but not in the manner proposed. Many existing articles would fail the current guidelines, so I think a bigger issue may be that many NPRs are afraid to nominate articles to AfD. Kb.au (talk) 15:29, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Support, per DGG: The objection that this standard "would obliterate our local business coverage" is in fact essentially what is intended; and James: Not everything that can potentially be written about should have an article. The fact that something can be sourced does not mean it's automatically appropriate for an encyclopedia. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:44, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Well, kudos to both of you for freely declaring your intention, at least. Carrite (talk) 18:00, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose this version, waiting for refinements. There are a lot of publicly traded companies with less than a billion dollar capitalization which are household names, and it seems like this could be used to hide those that aren't. EllenCT (talk) 17:54, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose, mostly per Cullen328. I appreciate the intent behind the proposal, but I think it introduces a bias that is contrary to our overall goal. I too have written articles about small companies that would fail these criteria, for example Solar Ship and Lick Me I'm Delicious. I'm also aware of notable Michelin starred restaurants which I researched when I created several articles about their executive chefs. These do have a cultural impact and should be included in our body of work when their notability can be demonstrated by coverage in reliable sources. I couldn't agree more that we have to be vigilant against allowing this encyclopedia to be co-opted by people and organizations who only want to use it to establish credibility or use it as platform for promotion.- MrX 🖋 19:03, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose any and all specialty notability guidelines containing the words "...GNG and in addition...". Passing the GNG should guarantee inclusion, because it is a universal standard saying that we have enough data to compile a reasonably neutral and well sourced article. I should add that the WP:Orangemoody scandal should remind us that corruption to keep *out* well sourced articles about corporations is more fundamentally dangerous than the relatively minor pecadillo of small business owners trying to get their company an article, no matter how common and annoying the latter may be. Since this policy change would not eliminate GNG-based determination, it would increase rather than decrease the opportunity for corruption. Wnt (talk) 01:54, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose per The Drover's Wife.Kevin Dewitt Always ping 14:35, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

RfC discussion

A few were listed above, here. But you can look at companies listed in
and see that many of those would fail. Jytdog (talk) 02:50, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
I know where the intent is, but I'm worried that the last point is going to raise a lot of issues and debate at AFD where "significant impact" falls (even with the added "in their industry" field. I know the goal is to prevent COI and commercial interests in company articles, but I'm wondering if we need, in this case, the bright line (the first 4 points at least + GNG), a prohibited line (eg only sourced to dependent sources, etc.), and acknowledgement of a grey area where editors should try to determine if the coverage is being promotional or that the company is notable and not build off COI sources. There are companies that I'd say don't necessarily make a significant impact (if one wants to be pedantic about it) in their field, but are still discussed at depth by independent sources to build out full articles that are far from promotional. We need something of this grey area for proper discussion at AFD. --Masem (t) 02:58, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
As the person who proposed those points: this acknowledges the grey area, while limiting the type of coverage: it must talk about impact to demonstrate notability. We could find enough verifiable information on literally any company created after 1950 to write an article on it. The point here is that as written, NCORP is basically a list of reasons to pretend that the GNG doesn't say what it actually says. This would move away from the GNG vs. NCORP games that are currently played at AfD and bring substantially more uniformity to corporate AfDs, while allowing for grey areas for corporations whose importance is not most easily judged objectively (such as historical corps or corps in developing nations). TonyBallioni (talk) 03:05, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
The points as read do not give a grey area here. It gives a bunch of wikilawyering on bullet #5 as a black-or-white thing because of the fact this is to override the GNG. It's problematic in that regard. I know we shouldn't read it like that, but less experienced editors will. --Masem (t) 03:42, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • User:The Drover's Wife, I asked you above if you could make a concrete proposal to carve out the kinds of companies you are concerned about. Would you please define "historical companies" for example? Would a criterion like "No longer exists" meet your needs? Jytdog (talk) 03:00, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • What I was trying to get at was that the whole thrust of the proposal was focused entirely on US-based companies in the present day. There was no thought given to companies outside the United States or historically notable companies: all of the specific criteria (and all of the discussion, which I was following) doesn't apply. The end result is that it quite literally forces everything non-US and non-current to be stuffed in #4 and #5, which makes even the most inarguably notable company in either category absolutely up for debate. This would have a catastrophic chilling effect right across this area - a disastrous end result considering these areas of business coverage are terrible as it is and badly in need of expansion. I don't have a good (or at least, an easy) fix for this: this was why I was trying to point out during the previous discussion that it was becoming a runaway train in ignoring all of this stuff. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:08, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
      • It's also extremely frustrating that US-based editors who entirely see this as a spam reduction measure won't engage with these issues. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:12, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
        • How about if this set of criteria was applied only to extant companies (at least in first-world markets)? Obviously, defunct companies are far less likely to have spammers trying to market them, so if an article is made on a company that is out of business, the motives of the article creator should be given greater leeway. bd2412 T 03:43, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
          • I'd be fine with that for extant companies. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:44, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
            • Yeah I think I suggested that above. Galobtter (pingó mió) 03:45, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
              • I think this would be a very useful step: it would eliminate one of the major problems with this entirely. It would be great if someone could come up with a solution for the non-US problem though: I am extremely against the possibility of having to argue deletion battles over Australian household-name companies any more than we already do. There also absolutely needs to be a solution to Cullen's concerns above or the impact of this is going to be catastrophic in ways that weren't even on my radar. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:49, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
                • This is why I suggested the geographic area part of the cultural impact criteria above, but people raised objections to it. It's important to take into account regionally and nationally important corps. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:54, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Does it have to be WP:NCRIME - coverage about civil litigation should be included also. Seraphim System (talk) 03:41, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • In retrospect, I would also like to suggest a provision for including companies that have demonstrably existed for a long period of time - perhaps a hundred years. bd2412 T 04:18, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

Just a few problems that come to mind from what has been raised:

  1. Why not in business for 50 years? 75? 95? 99?
  2. Do secondary sources define "historically notable" for companies no longer in business? Do they have to term it "historically notable"? Non-trivial coverage in multiple sources isn't enough? Is this something editors decide?
  3. Similarly, who interprets "significant impact" (culture or industry) if the source doesn't explicitly saying anything like "significant impact", will the AfD be an original research majority vote on the matter?
  4. Why the US Supreme Court? What's equivalent to that in other countries? Is the high court of Andorra equivalent to that? But the high court of Androrra is of greater importance than the high court of California? Liechtenstein is of greater import than New York City? Lesser?
  5. What of a company that is primarily local like Katz's Delicatessen but not regional or national yet (to me) clearly deserves an article for cultural notability? How does the logic of TonyBallioni's "geographic area" apply to that - I don't understand his reasoning at all - if it has a significant cultural impact, a regional company already qualifies, what does "geographic area" have to do with it? What isn't in some geographic area?
  6. What of companies just under any of the hard number limits for dollar value, revenue, ranking (Fortune 1001? 2? 7?), employees? What makes those magic numbers have any validity? A company in Bangladesh is less significant purely because it is worth less? How exactly do we equate the Bangladeshi corporate rankings to US? The top Bangladeshi, Liechtenstein, Malta company is equivalent to the top US company? Less than equivalent? The top 50 Bangladeshi Companies vs. the top 1000 US? 1000 vs 1000? Whatever number the arbitrarily selected rankings happen to include?

To sum it up: What of a company that is clearly notable and worthy of a Wikpedia article but somehow falls through the crack of all these micromanaged qualifications and exceptions? —DIYeditor (talk) 06:17, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

  • @DIYeditor: The U.S. Supreme Court has certiorari jurisdiction - that is, it can decide which appeals it wants to hear. Supreme courts that do not have that that discretion basically have to hear all appeals brought before them. When a court that has such discretion chooses to hear a case, it amplifies the importance of the parties involved. bd2412 T 21:43, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
To follow up one of DIYeditor's question Katz's is an icon but I think it's better to keep the article because it meets WP:GNG then to base the deletion decision on whether a consensus emerges at AfD that recognizes it as "culturally significant" - we may keep Katz's because media sources constantly refer to it as an "icon", but would we keep Gray's Papaya - they both meet WP:GNG but would we have to discuss individually whether each one was "culturally significant"? It sounds like it would come down to JDLI at AfD.Seraphim System (talk) 07:00, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • A question to ask : can anyone provide examples of articles that fall under NCORP that 1) are clearly promotional material but 2) pass the GNG, or at least have been argued to pass the GNG at AFD? There seems to be a claim those supporting these that the GNG would allow purely promotional material to pass through which I seriously doubt, due to the need for works to be independent. --Masem (t) 15:37, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
There are a lot of pieces in newspapers that a reasonably clearly self-promotion/press release base or just a press release etc but because they aren't marked as such, people still argue for keeping on that basis (one person even said that it's perfectly natural that all newspaper articles on companies are positive, and that doesn't mean they aren't good sources). Other-times people don't really realize they are press releases, routine etc. I'd just say take a look at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Deletion_sorting/Companies - it's dime a dozen. Galobtter (pingó mió) 15:45, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Which should be properly called out during AFD when those type of sources are presented. It would also make sense for NCORP to have a section for how to determine when a source is a press release or similar dependent promotional material. --Masem (t) 15:51, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Of course - but often it feels like a sisyphean task when the fact that it is a press release isn't explicit (and when it appears in publications generally reliable) That'd definitely be useful. Galobtter (pingó mió) 15:58, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
However even currently a lot of articles on companies could be deleted under current criterion. Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:00, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Making NCORP more explicit could help; otherwise just going and nominating articles for deletion. Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:10, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • I am going to leave this going for another day or two but am going to pull it before it ends, to refine and relaunch. I'll note that stuff people are writing here about sourcing doesn't reflect what WP:CORPDEPTH and following sections -- especially WP:ORGIND -- actually say. User:Masem, User:Bilby, User:Seraphim System and User:SmokeyJoe please go read them; you may want to strike or refine what you have said here. When I relaunch this I will copy paste that section of the guideline or be sure to link to it, so that the next one isn't derailed by this kind of stuff. Jytdog (talk) 16:51, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • @Jytdog: WP:GNG says "Independent of the subject" excludes works produced by the article's subject or someone affiliated with it. For example, advertising, press releases, autobiographies, and the subject's website are not considered independent. - I have reviewed a lot of articles at AfC and I can not remember ever seeing one that would pass WP:GNG and fail WP:NCORP, I don't think this is a significant contributing factor to the overall problem. Sometimes there are disagreements about whether a source is substantially based on on a press release, but usualy the issue is that the article is promotional in its current state - in that case, the nuclear option is G11 and admins gotta use it. Some articles that go up for AfD should have, imo, been speedy deleted as G11.SeraphWiki (talk) 21:07, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
      • OK, so on the one hand you are agreeing that both N (which I didn't discuss) as well as this guideline are very clear already that press release, churnalism, etc, are not OK to use in considerations of notability. That is what my note above was about, with regard to these strange objections that we should do something that has already been done.
      • As for whether this is helpful or not, I hear you that you believe it is not. DGG suggested away below that we are probably going to have to do some case studies of AfDs that ended in "keep" that should not have. I guess that is what we need... Jytdog (talk) 21:17, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • Jytdog, I don't see what you think your proposals has to do with WP:CORPDEPTH and WP:ORGIND. WP:CORPDEPTH and WP:ORGIND speak to qualities of the sources. You proposal speaks to facts regardless of sourcing. Your proposal #1 1,2,3 and #2 are source-independent factual criteria. They can be sourced to the company website, or a directory-stle listing. #1 4-5 are no-better alternative phrasings of ways to meet the GNG. #1 6 is a mixed fact-based criteria and cross reference to another guideline. On the whole, unimpressive. I think your approach is wrong. The right way to go is to focus on quality sources. A WP:CORP emphasis on what makes a source independent, and reliable, and of substantial coverage, would be good. Business partners, and publishers that advertise, should be be declared non-independent. Customer supplied reviews are not reliable. A thorough description of the products of the business is not substantial coverage. A major problem with reviewing CORP drafts is WP:Reference bombing. Checking all the references is a barrier to efficient reviewing. That is why I suggested turning around the onus to do the work to the author, to idenetify the best notability attesting sources, as opposed to the usual standards of AfD participants supposedly needing to argue that no good sourcing exists. If the author's opinion of the two best sources are non-suitable sources, the topic is to be deleted, and/or the author needs to learn what makes quality sourcing for starting an article. Your criteria, #1 1-3 & #2, will give a pass to articles on companies that have been written with no suitable sources suitable for writing any prose. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:41, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Hi SmokeyJoe. yep the proposal was built on what is already in the guideline about sourcing. Your vote is all focused on problems with sourcing, as are your comments just above, which again puzzlingly don't deal with what those sections actually say and you write things like it "would be good" if NCORP did ... exactly what it does, via CORPDEPTH and ORGIND, which are part of NCORP. So... ?
I agree that people don't apply what is already in the guideline well, and one of the goals here is exactly to add additional criteria to help alleviate that problem.
Please also be aware that this is not "my proposal" - it summarizes discussions that have been ongoing since the summer, which are linked in the intro. All these criteria were suggested by other people and received some level of support from yet others. I am however, shepherding this along.... the issue of raising NCORP standards has been stated so many times, and we need a focused effort to do it. Am very open to taking this where ever it goes, as long as we end up with something that makes it easier to keep promotional articles about companies out. Jytdog (talk) 16:30, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

Refining

Additional introductory content.

Please read WP:CORPDEPTH and especially WP:ORGIND before you comment. We already require multiple, independent sources for articles about companies; press releases and churnalism refs are already excluded from notability considerations. We do need more clearcut criteria for companies, to help people who work at AfC and NPP, and to improve deletion discussions, to ensure that articles about new/recent companies are appropriately encyclopedic and are not hijacked pages in Wikipedia that are just providing visibility to companies that are seeking it.

Main proposal (#1 if you like)

A for-profit company that is a going concern and was established after 1990 is considered "notable" in Wikipedia if it satisfies the GNG criteria and, in addition, any of the following criteria are met:

  1. It is a publicly traded company with at least a $1B market capitalization
  2. It is a private company that has raised more than $100M and has been in business for at least 5 years
  3. It has been listed as a member of the Fortune 1000, Forbes Global 2000, or an equivalently regarded national or global business ranking based on size or quality -- inclusion in the Michelin Guide, for example, qualifies.
  4. It is considered by multiple independent reliable sources to have made a culturally significant impact cultural, artistic, scientific, technical, economic, or political impact as judged on a national basis. This is distinct from passing local controversies, local patronage (custom), getting good reviews, or the like.
  5. It is regarded by ongoing national coverage in multiple independent reliable sources as having significant impact in its industry, including technical breakthroughs in marketed products. This is distinct from mundane product differentiation-type claims; every company is "unique".
  6. It has been involved in fraud, antitrust, or another activity that receives enough ongoing coverage to meet WP:NCRIME or the equivalent for a civil matter.
Additional criterion (#2 if you like)
  • It employs at least 1,500 people

I've added limitations that this applies to extant business founded after 1990, and added some refinement to #3, based on some of discussion above. If folks have other ideas, am all ears. User:DGG do these refinements help bring this where it should be, in your view? Jytdog (talk) 17:24, 21 January 2018 (UTC) (amended to explicitly include civil matters as discussed below and some changes suggested by DGG. Jytdog (talk) 17:53, 22 January 2018 (UTC))

Poasible changes:
2. At least 5 years is too narrow. There will be some that have had great public interest before that point, often on account of the very notable founders. This can in some cases be the case even if the company is only planned.
3. "national or global."
4. "culturally significant" is can be interpreted very narrowly, or very widely. I anticipate many years of interest AfDs. To indicate a little what is meant, possibly "cultural , artistic, scientifically , technical , economic or political impact , as judged on a national basis. "
5. "ongoing national coverage"
6 It employs at least 1500 people full-time
However we word it, thee are going to be exceptions in both directions.
I also have a problem with extant companies. This should apply to ones that have closed down also. As worded, any such company only needs to meet the GNG. There's also a problem with mergers. We normally write the article on the successor or principal company, unless the earlier of minor ones are of special importance. I would suggest some time to think of the details, before this is finalized. I think it needs to be analyzed against some AfD results. DGG ( talk ) 18:08, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Re: "employs at least 1500 people full-time" - how would you treat a business for which a reliable source indicates that it employs 1,500+ people, but does not indicate full-time/part-time status? My thinking in requesting this provision was that a company that employs a large number of people will touch a lot of lives, irrespective of how fully employed they are. If full-time employment is a substantial consideration, I would suggest a separate figure - say, at least 1,000 full-time employees, or at least 1,500 employees overall. bd2412 T 21:22, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Also, I otherwise agree with the above points of refinement (1-5_. bd2412 T 21:23, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
User:DGG I am not sure we are pulling in the same direction here... my understanding is that we want to raise NCORP standards primarily to help stem the torrent of articles about companies looking to abuse WP for promotion. In my view these are generally existing, small-to-medium companies looking to gain visibility through WP. I cannot imagine that we have any sizable problem with spam articles about companies that are not going-concerns. I added that specifically to address objections from User:The Drover's Wife about ensuring that we don't exclude "historical companies" - I am still a bit unclear about what they mean by that, but a defunct company would definitely be "historical". So i don't get why you are objecting to that. Please explain. Jytdog (talk) 17:32, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • I'm not fully understanding why inclusion in a national stock market index was dropped. Including companies above a market capitalization floor or are/were in a national index would be one way of addressing the systemic bias concerns raised above. MER-C 19:46, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Nothing against having the stock marked index-based criterion in addition to the market cap. However, I don't think it substantially addresses the systemic bias concerns raised by others. The major indexes cover only a handful of companies, then the are private companies, etc. Rentier (talk) 17:35, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

Concerns:

  • Biggest problem, the hard line numbers are US-centric and arbitrary. What of something slightly below the hard line? What of a company in less developed country that's still significant? Market capitalization, profit margins, etc. do not absolutely determine notability especially when they have arbitrary cut-offs. DGG: A company with 1450 employees is not notable but 1500 is?
  • DGG: "National or global" ranking standard - a national ranking in Andorra is more important than one for California? Similarly, ongoing national coverage in Somalia or Liechtenstein is of greater importance than ongoing coverage across New York City? How do we equate foreign countries?
  • Culturally significant is the best part of this proposal but doesn't this leave a lot of personal judgment in AfDs? It's difficult to interpret. Closers would have a lot of power and there would be arguments ad infinitum. Does it become of a majority vote of whoever happens to show up? Does the closer become arbiter of cultural significance? Same could be said for industry impact. "Interesting AfDs" indeed - participation would become mandatory and the time sink would be profound.
  • NCRIME is somehow specially worthy of mention but other ongoing major coverage is not? I don't get that. Again, arbitrary.

Again, I would like to see all the hard number figures and ranking lists dropped and the cultural and industry impact provisions added as positive and negative qualifications to CORPDEPTH. —DIYeditor (talk) 21:35, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

  • @DGG: failed to correctly notify you of mention above. —DIYeditor (talk) 03:01, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • This is not an improvement. 1) #3 is worse because it now includes a requirement that these sources be "global" (even though all the examples are from the United States), when the point that other equivalent sources from other regions/countries could be used was the whole argument for that not being a mess last time around. 2) 1990 is too early a cutoff: it doesn't need to be that late to target the plethora of startups looking for articles today, and retains a lot of problems in regard to major non-US companies that took off in that decade. 3) I agree with DGG's point that this is going to lead to many years of unnecessary AfDs to clarify what #4 and #5 mean because they're so vague, and suggest this would have a chilling effect on long-term editors working on notable business coverage, further abandoning the whole area to spammers and newbies. 4) Conversely, DIYEditor raises good points about the impact of arbitrary cutoffs. The Drover's Wife (talk) 21:55, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Beyond this, I think this proposal is still barking up the wrong tree. The current proposal appears like it is going to be rejected, and the attempt to put it again after 24 hours with comparatively very minor amendments (picking off two of the issues raised, but ignoring the others - most notably the non-US issue) suggests the same disinterest in engaging with editors who are critical for various reasons that doomed this attempt. There are a number of alternatives that have been raised, such as Bilby's suggestion of clarifying and strengthening WP:CORPDEPTH to target issues of quality sourcing, rather than having this messy argument about worthiness, and it would be great to see them engaged with rather than being absolutely determined to proceed on exactly the same path of this failed attempt. The Drover's Wife (talk) 21:55, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • I agree, there is no reason for Michelin Stars to be singled out, especially when so many chefs are giving them back. The assumption implicit in our policy is that if a subject has won a Michelin Star, or has won a Grammy, then it most likely will meet WP:GNG anyway. This is fair and impartial - if they haven't won a Grammy but meet WP:GNG that is ok too. I don't follow this policy because I think Michelin Stars are particularly impressive or inherently notable, but because sources usually exist for these subjects. These sources are usually in-depth "independent" reviews. This moves us away from a neutral notability policy, closer to a statement about the worthiness of restaurants that don't have Michelin Stars but otherwise meet WP:GNG with similar sourcing. Like the article I created last night Harry & Ida's Meat and Supply Co..
    • Also, the WP:NCRIME needs to be broadened to include coverage civil litigation and there was consensus for this last night - there is no conceivable reason why a criminal matter would make a company notable, but a civil matter would not. Seraphim System (talk) 22:33, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
    • User: The Drover's Wife you are personalizing this in a very odd way. What I wrote was I am going to leave this going for another day or two but am going to pull it before it ends, to refine and relaunch. I never said i was going to relaunch it right away. That would indeed be stupid. Stop misrepresenting me and please see your talk page Jytdog (talk) 16:50, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
    • User: The Drover's Wife - when you write "barking up the wrong tree" I am not sure you understand what the tree is, that is being barked up. There is a torrent of spam articles from companies that are marginally notable or not notable, looking to abuse WP for promotion, and people from those companies argue like mad to keep them - they view WP as an essential vehicle for promotion. Raising NCORP standards has been suggested a zillion times as a way to stem that torrent. That is the tree being barked up.
It would be very helpful to hear ideas from you about ways we can exclude such spam articles but keep ones that should exist - that are indeed encyclopedia-worthy. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 17:38, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
There is a torrent of spam articles from companies that are marginally notable or not notable, looking to abuse WP for promotion, and people from those companies argue like mad to keep them - they view WP as an essential vehicle for promotion. It would be very helpful to point out a half-dozen of so of the "worst offenders" here of AFDs where they were argued kept that should have failed the GNG or the like. All this sounds like a issue to firm up what sources are appropriate for corps to meet the GNG, not to restrict the GNG, but its hard to tell without having examples. --Masem (t) 17:41, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I have stated very specific concerns about the impact of this specific proposal on our business coverage in ways that have absolutely nothing to do with stopping a "torrent of spam articles from companies that are marginally notable or not notable, looking to abuse WP for promotion". It is extremely frustrating that these problems with your five specific criteria are continually being interpreted as not understanding the problem or not being sympathetic to the problem. As I said on your talk page, I'm an AfC reviewer: I've declined tons of corpspam and had still tons further that I left in the queue because I couldn't be bothered delving through the 20 or 40 crap references in order to justify a decline. You come up with a solution that makes that easier, I'm all ears. What I am absolutely not here for, however, is treating the project's entire business coverage as acceptable collateral damage. The Drover's Wife (talk) 17:55, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
User:The Drover's Wife
a) please stop representing these as "my proposals". They are not "mine".
b) With these or similar criteria, you wouldn't have to wade through twenty sources on some articles, right? that is a good thing for you and everyone, if we can get there.
c) if you review what you have actually written here, all you have said is "no".
d) What I and others keep asking you for, is what you would say "yes" to. It doesn't have to be related to any of these five or six things - the intention is just to add new matter to this guideline to improve our ability to exclude promotional articles about companies that are not really encyclopedia worthy. If you want to add criteria to this list, that specifically 'saves" the kinds of articles you think are in danger, that would also be great. (I added the "going-concern" thing - this applies only to going-concerns, specifically to deal with your objection about "historical companies", and I am still unclear exactly what you mean when you say that). If you propose something (anything) that gains consensus I will be very happy.
But if, in your view, there is no way to change NCORP to more easily exclude promo articles, other than for editors to apply the existing guidelines better, so be it.
But continuing to misrepresent what is happening here is not helpful. I am not going to respond further to your misrepresentations as this is becoming distracting drama. But please stop. Jytdog (talk) 18:39, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
For someone who talks so much about being misrepresented, you keep suggesting that I think there's "no way to change NCORP to more easily exclde promo articles, other than for editors to apply the existing guidelines", even though I have at no point even remotely implied this. As I said on your talk page earlier, the most common sentiment in the RfC - including from me - was "I sympathise with the problem and agree with the idea of raising standards in principle, but this is not the way to do it", so claiming that this means "we want the status quo" is not remotely helpful. This is not a simple fix, and I don't have easy answers. The change about historical companies was great - but it didn't address other issues (most notably the non-US companies, the notable-small-business issues, fix for Michelin restaurants only aside, or the concerns about arbitrariness). As another one we didn't quite get to: having #1 centre on market capitalisation basically means that you need an economics degree to know whether any given company meets notability guidelines or not. The Drover's Wife (talk) 18:56, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I have been looking for ways forward with you and I appreciate your thoughts on sourcing below. I am hopeful we will be able to find at least some high level ways, via this list (or a completely different one) where we could quickly exclude some companies. Looking at a draft article about a young company and being able to quickly determine that it is less than five years old and has raised just $1M and is just selling yet another Fidget spinner and being able to determine, "out it goes", without having to wade through the 15 crappy refs they provided, would be great right? Are there any criteria like that, that you would find helpful? You don't have to answer right away... this refining process is going to take a while. The pre-RFC discussion was open for a month a half, and this one has only open a few days. Jytdog (talk) 19:11, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • I would oppose any draft adding extra requirements over and above the GNG, regardless of how it is written. Your only hope of success is to try to define "churnalism" in a way that would guide editors to exclude certain sources and articles as not truly secondary sources or not truly independent of the corporation. This may be doable. Wnt (talk) 01:56, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Since MrX and Seraphim System have mentioned some of theirs, I too have created an article, Tom Bihn, that I think meets GNG for repeated national and international coverage that I think would not survive this proposal. I think people come to Wikipedia for a (hopefully) reliable collection of information on that sort of thing when they encounter a mention of it.
  • And to expand slightly upon the problems with arbitrary cutoffs, are we to delete and recreate an article every time a marginal company slips off and back on of these lists of the largest? Or every time the currency a company's assets and income rely on gains or loses relative value to US$? I find the basic premise of dollar values, hard numbers, and lists to be entirely unworkable. It's inclusion by lottery, not relevance. —DIYeditor (talk) 02:56, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
    • As someone totally unfamiliar with the subject matter, Tom Bihn reads like it might only be known for a minor controversy. This said, I'm absolutely sick to death of having to defend household-name Australian companies against deletion bids from editors who know nothing about Australia. The Drover's Wife (talk) 03:15, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
    • Fails WP:NOT#NEWS. If there was more existing coverage of the company besides that, that would be an interesting antecote, but even then might not be appropriate to include. --Masem (t) 03:41, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
      • It's not one news event and it's not a current event so WP:NOT#NEWS does not really seem to apply, it's several events over more than a decade. Indeed it is a small company primarily known for a repeated controversy, so maybe it is really not a good example for this discussion where we are looking for things we could not risk not having an article on, but it is not a "passing local controversy"; it's a persisting international one with fairly in-depth and specific coverage in multiple reliable sources. Just thought I would put something marginal of my own out there since other editors had. —DIYeditor (talk) 03:54, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
        • No, it was not an "in-depth" controversy. It's the type of thing that is liner notes for a serious work. If this was a person at the center of this, we'd not include it per BLP, much less have an article about it. NOT#NEWS applies to any past or present news event to understand that we want to only cover events with enduring notability, which this controversy did not have. --Masem (t) 06:37, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
          • I don't see anything at all in NOT#NEWS that reflects what you are saying. Perhaps you could quote it. This might be better left for elsewhere; I think we are distracting from the real issues here. Since you have some question about whether the article even meets notability or what Wikipedia is not, it's hard to discuss how this proposal relates. By my reading of the letter of those rules it qualifies, but it would be more useful to focus on something that we could agree definitely meets current standards and would be eliminated by the proposal. —DIYeditor (talk) 08:25, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
            • I think it's recognizing that just because a company appears in the national/global news scale at any time doesn't necessarily make it notable. Being in the news may lead to more attention about the business overall, but that's not an assurance. We should look to whether it is the event or the business that is notable. Take for example, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. This is an ongoing SCOTUS case that involves a specific business (I've written a lot for this). I can tell you that the business has been mentioned several times in the news, but I would maintain it is not notable by itself, it is notable for being part of this event, which has a different set of notability considerations. It is a similar approach to when we talk BLPCRIME for persons; for example while Steven Slater is the person well known for the JetBlue flight attendant incident, we don't have an article on him because he's not notable for anything else outside that. Same principle has to apply to businesses (though we're not as bound by BLP there) --Masem (t) 16:42, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • DIYeditor makes a good point above. The individual fortunes of companies change. In addition, we have the issue of national currency collapses relative to USD -- does Brexit mean that only half as many British companies are notable? And of course (perish the thought) what if the USD should suffer a collapse and abruptly small businesses all over the world are valued in the trillions of dollars? I mean, it's silly, but it exposes a systematic national bias of a form that should be highly worrisome where biases of interest to business and nations are concerned. Wnt (talk) 16:21, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • No: "once notable, always notable" so once a company has cleared whatever thresholds we set, then it stays in WP for all time (like former sports players, long-dead historical figures and so on): Noyster (talk), 17:51, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment I'd be curious to know how we treat the other for-profit organisations that are not "companies" as such but fall under NORG such as " charitable organizations, educational institutions, political parties, hospitals, institutions, interest groups, social clubs, sports teams, companies, partnerships, proprietorships, religious denominations, sects", a lot of these will have been registered as a company so that they can have a legal identity but would not meet any of the criteria. The only way for these to pass is to prove their impact as per N°4 and that is even more vague than GNG. I can see a lot of sports teams being nominated for deletion, for-profit schools, social clubs or hospital trusts. Domdeparis (talk) 16:18, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Sourcing

Here is what this guideline currently says about sourcing


Depth of coverage aka CORPDEPTH/ORGDEPTH

The depth of coverage of the subject by the source must be considered. If the depth of coverage is not substantial, then multiple[1] independent sources should be cited to establish notability. Trivial or incidental coverage of a subject is not sufficient to establish notability.

Deep coverage provides an organization with a level of attention that extends well beyond routine announcements and makes it possible to write more than a very brief, incomplete stub about an organization. Acceptable sources under this criterion include all types of reliable sources except works carrying merely trivial coverage, such as:

  • sources that simply report meeting times, shopping hours or event schedules,
  • the publications of telephone numbers, addresses, and directions in business directories,
  • inclusion in lists of similar organizations,[2]
  • the season schedule or final score from sporting events,
  • routine communiqués announcing such matters as the hiring or departure of personnel,
  • brief announcements of mergers or sales of part of the business,
  • simple statements that a product line is being sold, changed, or discontinued,
  • routine notices of facility openings or closings (e.g., closure for a holiday or the end of the regular season),
  • routine notices of the opening or closing of local branches, franchises, or shops,
  • routine restaurant reviews,
  • quotations from an organization's personnel as story sources, or
  • passing mention, such as identifying a quoted person as working for an organization.
Audience aka AUD

The source's audience must also be considered. Evidence of significant coverage by international or national, or at least regional, media is a strong indication of notability. On the other hand, attention solely from local media, or media of limited interest and circulation, is not an indication of notability; at least one regional, statewide, provincial, national, or international source is necessary.

Independence of sources aka ORGIND

A primary test of notability is whether people independent of the subject itself (or its manufacturer, creator, or vendor) have actually considered the company, corporation, product or service notable enough that they have written and published non-trivial, non-routine works that focus upon it.

Sources used to support a claim of notability include independent, reliable publications in all forms, such as newspaper articles, books, television documentaries, websites, and published reports by consumer watchdog organizations[3] except for the following:

  • press releases, press kits, or similar works;
  • any material which is substantially based on a press release;
  • self-published materials;
  • any material written by the organization, its members, or sources closely associated with it;
  • advertising and marketing materials by, about, or on behalf of the organization;
  • corporate websites or other websites written, published, or controlled by the organization;
  • patents, whether pending or granted;[4]
  • any material written or published by the organization, directly or indirectly;
  • other works in which the company, corporation, organization, or group talks about itself—whether published by the company, corporation, organization, or group itself, or re-printed by other people.

Self-promotion and product placement are not routes to qualifying for an encyclopaedia article. Qualifying published works must be someone else writing about the company, corporation, club, organization, product, or service.

Once notability is established, primary sources and self-published sources may be used to verify some of the article's content. See Wikipedia:Autobiography for the verifiability and neutrality problems that affect material where the subject of the article itself is the source of the material.

References

  1. ^ "Source" on Wikipedia can refer to the work itself, the author of the work, and/or the publisher of the work. For notability purposes, sources must be unrelated to each other to be "multiple". A story from a single news organization (such as AP) reprinted in multiple newspapers (say, in the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the Orlando Sentinel) is still one source (one newspaper article). If multiple journalists at multiple newspapers separately and independently write about the same subject, then each of these unrelated articles should be considered separate sources, even if they are writing about the same event or "story". A series of articles by the same journalist is still treated as one source (one person). The appearance of different articles in the same newspaper is still one source (one publisher).
  2. ^ Inclusion in "best of", "top 100", and similar lists does not count towards notability at all, unless the list itself is notable, such as the Fortune 500 and the Michelin Guide. Inclusion in a notable list counts like any other reliable source, but it does not exempt the article from the normal value of providing evidence that independent sources discuss the subject.
  3. ^ Examples:
    • Microsoft Word satisfies this criterion because people who are wholly independent of Microsoft have written books about it.
    • The Oxford Union satisfies this criterion for having two books (by Graham and by Walter) written and published about it.
  4. ^ Patents are written and published solely at the direction of the inventor or organization that the inventor assigned the patent to. Their contents are not verified to be accurate by the patent offices or any other independent agency. See Wikipedia:Reliable source examples#Are patents reliable sources?.

Improvements?

How would people improve those sections to raise NCORP standards without excluding truly encyclopedia-worthy subject matter? Jytdog (talk) 18:18, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

As I said in response to your user talk discussion, I'd like to see NCORP clarified to make clear what we would be consider to be good business coverage - because it's so vague (very strictly applied, it could just about take out all MSM business reporting) that it gives PR types a chance to play in the grey area. This would make it much clearer and less arguable what doesn't meet that bar. I'm specifically thinking of the millions of crappy trade and industry journals/websites/magazines that get used to bolster the sourcing of articles on companies too insignificant to have had more than passing attention from mainstream media. Hell, while we've been having this discussion I had someone leave a message on my talk page arguing that a couple of these got his company to notability. A clearer guideline that explicitly knocked that stuff out (and contrasted it with what we consider acceptable) would make everybody's lives easier. The Drover's Wife (talk) 18:44, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Yep trade rags are difficult. I work a lot on biotech/pharma articles, and there are some trade rags in that space that are total garbage, and some that can provide great in-depth coverage of the kind we need, but that still also republish press releases, have churnalism, or will publish something pretty crappy (obviously promotional and placed) on a slow day. Excluding trade rags them from notability considerations could be a great way to go.... Jytdog (talk) 19:05, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
A very valid point. Like much provincial journalism these days, certainly in the UK, these trade gazettes survive on re-hashing PR handouts, or by "sponsored" content or by running "interviews" which are really just variant PR approaches. As a consequence, it's pretty easy to get a half-dozen of these, often all recycling the same PR handout, and assert "significant coverage". One I'm arguing about at the moment has a small print disclaimer " "NewsBTC is not responsible for the accuracy of any of the information supplied in Sponsored Stories/Press Releases such as this one"! KJP1 (talk) 19:33, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
That "sponsored" ref is already excluded by the guideline. I hope you are able to bring that argument successfully! Jytdog (talk) 19:46, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Jytdog,The Drover's Wife. I'd support something along the lines of "publications specific to the industry in which the company operates may be used as sources (if reliable) but do not contribute to notability; a company must receive coverage in reliable secondary sources outside its own industry to be deemed notable". — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here) 23:17, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I'd be keen on that. I'm not sure it gets to the plethora of "entrepreneur"-themed crap publications, but it's certainly a start. The Drover's Wife (talk) 23:56, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I haven't the expertise or experience to make suggestions, but I would support any steps, even if they are partial as they are likely to be, to strengthen and tighten Notability standards around companies. Having taken up Afc reviewing fairly recently, I've been amazed, and appalled, at the sheer volume of company drafts coming though, so many of which appear, to me at least, to be not very well disguised advertising for non-notable businesses. Very often written by single-purpose authors who almost certainly have undisclosed conflicts of interest. In almost every instance, another existing article is cited in support of Accepting their draft which, when one looks at the comparator, one wonders how the hell it got here. I very much liked the proposal above, is that not being proceeded with? KJP1 (talk) 18:53, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I withdrew the RfC as it was trending toward "no consensus" at best. Am trying to hear where there were "opposes" that raised objections that can be addressed. There are "inclusionists" in WP who will say "no" regardless and there is nothing to do about that. But it is undergoing refinement now, and I or someone else will relaunch it if/when it feels like there is a better chance of getting consensus. Any input you have here - to tighten our sourcing standards -- or above, would be great. Jytdog (talk) 19:05, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
You need a line or section to omit local sources as not being independent, putting stress that there may be metro papers that have a worldwide audience but that they also cover local businesses too, and thus these should still be considered local source and not sufficient for independent coverage for sourcing evaluation (eg restaurant reviews in the NYTimes). We can use these sources after notability has been shown otherwise.
Also, consider the "enduring" factor of the coverage of a business. Even if the coverage is not fully local, if the business is only covered in a superficial manner over a couple of dates when it was launched and no implication that any further news about it will be coming, that's probably a problem and that we shouldn't have an article. --Masem (t) 19:43, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Those are both helpful for what we need. :) btw the second sentence is horrible, right? "If the depth of coverage is not substantial, then multiple[1] independent sources should be cited to establish notability" This is the gaping hole that these companies try to exploit all the time. That "if...not" is killer and we should remove that. Jytdog (talk) 19:48, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Something like that. It has to start with "deep coverage from independent sources from the company" to meet the GNG, no ifs-ands-buts. I think I can see the problem that if read as a hard-nosed statement, that all I need is a press release regurgitated in several trade works to be notable. But that's neither the point the GNG makes, and what NCORP absolutely needs to make crystal clear. Once you establish a statement without any "ifs", then the advice here to establish what we mean (or, more what we don't mean) for deep coverage, and what we mean by independent sources. --Masem (t) 19:58, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I think this is exactly the kind of tightening up we need to get to, on both counts. The Drover's Wife (talk) 20:51, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Having both positive and negative examples would be useful. With positive examples there is a standard to compare against for inclusion. Some ideas...

Examples of depth:
  • Significant artistic, cultural, economic, political, scientific, or technical impact [per DGG but eliminating "national" for Liechtenstein vs. California reason]
  • Significant impact on the industry
  • Prolonged controversy ranging outside local area
  • Prolonged legal issues with impact outside local area
  • Major recalls, product safety issues, defective products
  • Overwhelmingly positive or negative reception of products or services with widespread coverage
Trivial (in addition to existing):
  • Local patronage (custom)
  • Passing local controversies
  • Mundane lawsuits by or against other commercial entities
  • Routine product reviews
  • Innovations that do not significantly affect the industry
Non-independent sources:
  • Probable conflict of interest or pattern of promoting that particular entity

The examples of trivial need expansion, that's what I could think of. —DIYeditor (talk) 20:12, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

Hm that is kind of interesting. You are applying the criteria about the company in the section above, to what the sources discuss - to the analysis of sources step. That is interesting. Jytdog (talk) 20:41, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Make it abundantly clear that postings on various sites by freelance contributors without editorial review or fact-checking contribute nothing to notability. I believe this is covered by existing policy, but it is still argued to death at AfD. Specific examples to include:
    • articles by Forbes contributors - these are routinely bought and sold on Upwork just like Wikipedia articles, see for example this gem,
    • Huffington Post, Entreprenur.com, Inc.com, TechCrunch, etc. [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], etc.
A fraction of those postings may be acceptable for verification of specific claims, but notability should never be established based on them. Rentier (talk) 21:07, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm not super-familiar with that site - how many of those are likely to actually get fulfilled by contributors with that access, as opposed to PR flacks being optimistic? The Drover's Wife (talk) 21:26, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
The Drover's Wife, Upwork shows when money exchanges hands. The amounts range from hundreds to thousands of dollars. I see lots of completed contracts with positive reviews, certainly enough to believe that those posting the ads know what they are doing. See also [7] about a Forbes contributor asking £300 for a company profile. Rentier (talk) 22:01, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Interesting. How would you draw the line with those kinds of things? The Drover's Wife (talk) 23:59, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
  • The words added by Jytdog below are a good start. I would like "and the like" to be better defined, but I am not sure how to formulate a general rule. Some of the common features of the contributor networks that I believe should be excluded:
  • there is no editorial oversight,
  • the contributors are not paid for the articles or paid only based on the number of views,
  • there is a disclaimer "Opinions expressed by contributors are their own".
There is no real drawback to broadly excluding them all. I doubt a legitimately notable business can have no coverage other than the contributor/guest postings. How about:
"Pieces by non-staff "contributors" in publications like Forbes, Huffington Post, Entreprenur.com, Inc.com, TechCrunch, Medium, and other publications allowing a wide range of contributors to publish without significant editorial control should not be counted toward notability."?
It might be redundant but I would also add "Guest posts should not be counted toward notability unless the author is recognized as an authority on the subject by independent reliable sources." Rentier (talk) 08:32, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
  • I think this proposal is fairly good. WHat is non-independent could be more specific. I am supportive of significant and influential reviews being treated as independent sources. They are at least as independent as major press stories on the academy awards, or NY Fashion Week, or the grammys. It shouldn't be pushed to the point of Reductio ad absurdum - just what is needed to more effectively manage the low quality COI article problem. On a practical note, one valuable addition that was discussed in passing yesterday was to add a note to the policy that ref-bombing a draft does not make it more likely to be accepted. Opening up a new A7-type speedy cat for AfC submitted drafts would also help reviewers - but most editors are against this being applied in draft space. (I think it could be limited to resubmitted drafts).Seraphim System (talk) 00:37, 23 January 2018 (UTC)


  • What do we primarily want to do? I think it is to address the problem of WP:ADVOCACY by dealing with a class of particularly susceptible targets (not the only class to be sure, but currently the most prominent one--others can be dealt with subsequently. This is supplementary to other even more difficult ways to reduce promotionalism -- finding some way of identifying undeclared paid editors, increasing our efforts to remove their work regardless of notability, finding some way to more effectively control content within an article to reduce our dependence of article removal. I think we need all these approaches simultaneously. The reason this is the priority is that the entire purpose of WP is a community written NPOV resource, and if we allow large parts of it to be written by people interested only in their commercial POV,it will create an environment where very few volunteer editors want to work, and destroy our purposes altogether. It's not that large company articles will be free from promotionalism , but there will be fewer of them to watch, and more volunteers interested in working on them.
A secondary factor is to actually mean something by NOT DIRECTORY. Routine factual information about companies of all sizes is a reasonable thing to ha e, but is not an encyclopedia. I would not at all be opposed to having a volunteer-compiled web directory, but it lowers the value of an encyclopedia if it includes material that that over-emphasises the most minor .
If we want to raise the notability standard for this type of article, there are two methods: we can stick with the GNG, and decide in practice by having stricter requirements for what sources are reliable and independent enough for notability. We're getting a little more sophisticated here, but this will always be totally subjective. So many sources are borderline in these respects that it can be equally argued in either direction. The result of that is that the decisions will be based upon the essentially random factor of who comes around, and how good they are at the necessary techniques of AfD. The net effect of such a procedure is to make erratic decisions, and give a public impression of incompetence.
The other way is to have additional or alternative standards that limit the articles beyond the GNG. Many of the ones proposed are objected to as too USA-centric, and I agree--we will need to adjust them further, but we have to start somewhere. Similarly, many of them have subjective factors, and it might be good to rely only on numbers, but I think the consensus would be there are other indications of what's appropriate for an encyclopedia . At least this will focus the arguments where they belong, on whether the subject should or should not be in the encyclopedia . People will always differ about some, but it will give more rational results than going only by sources. For the numerical factors, there are no obvious numbers,and the only approach here is to compromise, which is exactly what consensus is good for.
Why would someone oppose this? There are still some people who think including promotionalism is an unimportant problem. Spending a few hours at WP:COIN, the conflict of interest noticeboard, will I think show them otherwise. There are still many people who think the GNG objective--they really haven't looked at the absurdity of the results that this leads to. In this field in particular, applying it blindly leads to saying that whoever advertises effectively enough should have an article. When I came here, I thought the GNG a very clever simple idea to avoid disputes, but the extent of disagreement at AfD soon convinced me otherwise. DGG ( talk ) 00:50, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
DGG, I have to agree 100% with your last paragraph, having once been one of those editors that didn't understand the extent of the issues that result from applying unrestricted GNG to CORPs. I think it is necessary to include wording such as "if the suitability of a source is 'borderline' or in doubt, it is better to exercise caution, and exclude the source for the purposes of establishing notability." The notability of CORPS in an AfD should never be a contentious matter IMO, notability should be more than obvious, or else it should be removed, other topic types might be discussed as 'borderline' but we should generally er on the side of deletion when it comes to the notability of CORPs (due to their increased ability to manipulate the press and plant coverage). — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here) 01:12, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
Insertcleverphrasehere: added that to that proposed re-write below. Will see if it survives. Thanks, Renata (talk) 02:36, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
(In response to DGG) I think it's unhelpful to think that deleting content alone is the solution to preventing large parts of the encyclopedia written by people interested only in their commercial POV. We have (to my knowledge) no active business WikiProjects on the site - and that's because there's no way to contribute in this area without being prepared for very regular trips to AfD, because the solution to "the site is getting used by businesses for promotionalism" is being treated by some editors as "whack every company article that I come across". I also think an overzealous approach to WP:DIRECTORY is extremely unhelpful: if I go to an article, I want to know information about the subject - starting with the basic stuff. Treating basic information that would be completely uncontroversial about any other subject as an ad or a directory listing when it concerns a notable company is a disaster, and ensures that Wikipedia will never develop good business coverage written by uninvolved editors. We need a middle ground that actually targets the advocacy stuff without driving regular editors out of the area wholesale - because we're succeeding at the latter and utterly failing at the former right now. And this is why we need solid sourcing standards: defining what is good allows us to much more clearly identify what we consider to be not good and turf it, and reduce the debatable areas that PR flacks have a field day with. GNG is only struggling in this area because we can't make up our mind what we consider to be good coverage and what we consider to be insufficient coverage, which can be easily fixed with a consensus high standard. The Drover's Wife (talk) 01:23, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
(In response to Insertcleverphrasehere) Erring on the side of deletion is also a disaster when basically any company is bound to get nominated for deletion at some point. We need to get a consensus on an actual standard of what we think is good coverage and what we won't accept, because having to fight to keep articles on national-household-name-for-generations-companies is doing absolutely nothing to stop the reams of startup spam. The Drover's Wife (talk) 01:26, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
​I was referring specifically to judging whether individual sources contribute to notability. In short; when in doubt, no they shouldn't. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here) 01:30, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

One issue that concerns me is the differentiation between local daily newspapers and regional daily newspapers, which is clearly not defined in the link in the guideline to Newspaper#Local or regional, which is piped to "regional". I am confident in saying, that where I live, the Napa Valley Register is a perfectly respectable local daily newspaper, whereas the San Francisco Chronicle is a trusted regional newspaper. However, there is nothing in that link that would allow a less experienced editor in doubt to make that differentiation about another pair of newspapers elsewhere. How could someone determine whether the Los Angeles Times is a regional or a national newspaper, and does that distinction have any functional significance?

Another issue of concern is our stance on trade publications. I agree that many trade magazines are worthless for establishing notability, but there are some exceptions, in my opinion. I believe that repeated, in depth coverage of a company in Aviation Week & Space Technology for example, is a strong indicator of notability, whereas a personnel or product announcement would not be. In the discussion above, I raised the issue of the notability of wine businesses. I believe that detailed, multipage feature coverage of a winery in a prestigious publication like the Wine Spectator is an indicator of notability, whereas a brief mention in their wine tasting notes is not.

I also have a concern about the opinion expressed above that a restaurant review in the New York Times does not contribute to notability. I consider an in-depth review of a fine dining establishment in that newspaper to be a very strong indicator of notability, especially if the restaurant is located outside the New York metropolitan area.

I believe that the section "Special note: advertising and promotion" is either confusing or logically weak. First, we are supposed to edit the article for NPOV, then we are supposed to remove any advertising content that remains. I have a hard time understanding how advertising content could remain if the text meets NPOV -perhaps specific examples could be provided. Aggressive editing for NPOV by experienced, uninvolved editors is a better solution than deletion for many company articles, and I also believe that lengthy protection of articles subject to chronic promotionalism is a tool that can be used more widely. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 01:01, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Cullen328, Wouldn't a company with repeated in-depth coverage in Aviation Week & Space Technology also be very likely to have at least some coverage in non-industry publications to establish independent notability? The same would be true of Wineries with regards to Wine Spectator. If we allow some trade publications, this opens the rabbit maze to the point that it invalidates the criteria entirely (everything becomes subjective and an exercise in 'weighing the sources' against some arcane metric where there is no one-size-fits-all). The solution of aggressive NPOV editing by experienced users is the current status quo, and it is failing. We don't have enough of those editors, and the volume of promotional CORP articles is only on the rise. It also violates WP:BOGOF, which I believe is always good to keep in mind. In protecting the wiki, the last thing we want is to encourage a system that just enables the COI editors at the expense of volunteers. — Insertcleverphrasehere (or here) 01:26, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
Cullen, I come across so many articles that are not selling ginzu knives (buy one get one free!) but were so obviously placed in WP to gain visibility for the company. Having a WP article at all is seen as being essential for business visibility. Have a look at the marketing of paid editing companies -- here are some:

SEO

According to Alexa, Wikipedia is the 5th most trafficked website in the world, and the 7th most trafficked website in the United States. Additionally, Wikipedia pages are usually in the top 5 links to show up on Google results of your name.

By having a Wikipedia page, your brand or organization can appear at the top of search results and also obtain a Google Knowledge Graph."

Narrative

Through a Wikipedia page, you can more easily direct people to read about your story from one credible source, instead of having obtaining different information from various sources.

Brand Perception

The largest companies, figure, and brands have Wikipedia pages. By having a Wikipedia page, readers will have a larger perception of your name online.

Why have a Wikipedia page?

Google loves Wikipedia and as such ranks it high in search results. Wikipedia is also the first place people go when they Google your name. By leveraging Wikipedia, you can help control your brand and present yourself to the world.

If you do not already know the stats behind Wikipedia, here are a few that should consider if you are thinking of creating a Wikipedia page (see image

This goes on and on. There are zillions of these (google search results), all saying over and over that "It is essential for your business to have a WP article"! That is the pressure that we are dealing with. That is why we have all this mundane articles about non-notable companies pouring into WP every day.
A page doesn't have to say "buy a ginzu knife and get one free!" to be an advertisement. The point is to simply be in Wikipedia. Jytdog (talk) 01:54, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
Jytdog, I am well aware of most of that material and the underlying problems, and I favor aggressive pushback by WMF legal, high visibility spokespeople (JW) and volunteers worldwide against paid-editing-for-hire operations. I favor stricter standards for declared paid editors, including an outright ban on direct editing of paid articles except for reverting blatant vandalism. I would favor some sort of advisory to administrators encouraging full protection of company articles subjected to persistent promotional editing. But this discussion is about something different: how we evaluate the notability of companies so that we permit a well-referenced NPOV article about that company. There are actually experienced generalist editors here (like me) who sometimes write and improve articles about small and medium sized businesses we sincerely believe to be notable, without payment or COI, even though they would be subject to deletion under the drastic tightening of notability standards advocated here. I think that we need more NPOV coverage of businesses worldwide, not less.
As for the trade publications issue, perhaps the companies receiving in-depth multipage coverage in respected trade publications will also have received dozens or hundreds of briefer mentions or a sentence or even a paragraph in broader circulation publications. But determined deletionists will always argue that this is insufficient. I believe that in-depth, author signed reliable trade publication coverage can be considered as an indicator of notability, along with other type of sourcing. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 02:30, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
There is some "philosophical divide" but we all want the same thing - articles that provide knowledge to the world. I do not believe that an article about a company that is really just a mundane (or even fluffy) directory listing provides knowledge... there should be something to say. There are so many subjects that really are notable that we don't cover yet. I don't think we are ever going to run out of stuff to write about if that is what worries you :) Jytdog (talk) 02:36, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
I do not write or expand mundane directory listings, Jytdog, and I recommend deleting much more often than keeping at AfD. And when I learn of what I believe to be a notable topic at AfD, I will do the work to expand and reference the article if I am the least bit interested in the topic. It would be terribly disappointing to me if a radical restriction in business notability resulted in the deletion of most of my business related contributions. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 02:51, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
I didn't mean to imply in any way that you do! Jytdog (talk) 02:55, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Sourcing part 2 - concrete proposals

Depth of coverage aka CORPDEPTH/ORGDEPTH

The depth of coverage of the subject by the source must be considered. If the depth of coverage is not substantial, then m Multiple[1] independent sources with ongoing coverage should be cited to establish notability. Trivial or incidental coverage of a subject is not sufficient to establish notability.

Deep coverage provides an organization with a level of attention that extends well beyond routine announcements and makes it possible to write more than a very brief, incomplete stub about an organization. Acceptable sources under this criterion include all types of reliable sources except works carrying merely trivial coverage, such as:

  • sources that simply report meeting times, shopping hours or event schedules,
  • the publications of telephone numbers, addresses, and directions in business directories,
  • inclusion in lists of similar organizations,[2]
  • the season schedule or final score from sporting events,
  • routine communiqués announcing such matters as the hiring or departure of personnel,
  • brief announcements of mergers or sales of part of the business,
  • simple statements that a product line is being sold, changed, or discontinued,
  • routine notices of facility openings or closings (e.g., closure for a holiday or the end of the regular season),
  • routine notices of the opening or closing of local branches, franchises, or shops,
  • routine restaurant or other reviews,
  • quotations from an organization's personnel as story sources, or
  • passing mention, such as identifying a quoted person as working for an organization.
  • Passing local controversies
  • Mundane lawsuits by or against other commercial entities
  • Innovations that do not significantly affect the industry

Examples of deep coverage are sources discussing:

  • Significant artistic, cultural, economic, political, scientific, or technical impact
  • Significant impact on the industry
  • Prolonged controversy ranging outside local area
  • Prolonged legal issues with impact outside local area
  • Major recalls, product safety issues, defective products
  • Overwhelmingly positive or negative reception of products or services with widespread coverage
Audience aka AUD

The source's audience must also be considered. Evidence of significant coverage by international or national, or at least regional, media is a strong indication of notability. On the other hand, attention solely from local media, or media of limited interest and circulation, is not an indication of notability; at least one regional, statewide, provincial, national, or international source is necessary.

Trade magazines must be used with great care. We have a presumption against counting sources in trade magazines toward notability as these are widely used by businesses to increase their visibility.[3] That said, feature stories only from leading trade magazines can be used but the burden is on the person proposing it to obtain confirmation at RSN that the specific source contributes to notability.

Pieces by "contributors" in publications like Forbes, Huffington Post, Entreprenur.com, Inc.com, TechCrunch, Medium, and the like should not be counted toward notability. These are often similar to trade publication pieces and often serve to promote an organization, product, or concept

Independence of sources aka ORGIND

A primary test of notability is whether people independent of the subject itself (or its manufacturer, creator, or vendor) have actually considered the company, corporation, product or service notable enough that they have written and published non-trivial, non-routine works that focus upon it.

Sources used to support a claim of notability include independent, reliable publications in all forms, such as newspaper articles, books, television documentaries, websites, and published reports by consumer watchdog organizations[4] except for the following:

  • press releases, press kits, or similar works;
  • any material which is substantially based on a press release (churnalism);
  • self-published materials;
  • any material written by the organization, its members, or sources closely associated with it;
  • advertising and marketing materials by, about, or on behalf of the organization;
  • corporate websites or other websites written, published, or controlled by the organization;
  • patents, whether pending or granted;[5]
  • any material written or published by the organization, directly or indirectly;
  • other works in which the company, corporation, organization, or group talks about itself—whether published by the company, corporation, organization, or group itself, or re-printed by other people.

Self-promotion and product placement are not routes to qualifying for an encyclopaedia article. Qualifying published works must be someone else writing about the company, corporation, club, organization, product, or service.

Once notability is established, primary sources and self-published sources may be used to verify some of the article's content. See Wikipedia:Autobiography for the verifiability and neutrality problems that affect material where the subject of the article itself is the source of the material.

References

  1. ^ "Source" on Wikipedia can refer to the work itself, the author of the work, and/or the publisher of the work. For notability purposes, sources must be unrelated to each other to be "multiple". A story from a single news organization (such as AP) reprinted in multiple newspapers (say, in the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the Orlando Sentinel) is still one source (one newspaper article). If multiple journalists at multiple newspapers separately and independently write about the same subject, then each of these unrelated articles should be considered separate sources, even if they are writing about the same event or "story". A series of articles by the same journalist is still treated as one source (one person). The appearance of different articles in the same newspaper is still one source (one publisher).
  2. ^ Inclusion in "best of", "top 100", and similar lists does not count towards notability at all, unless the list itself is notable, such as the Fortune 500 and the Michelin Guide. Inclusion in a notable list counts like any other reliable source, but it does not exempt the article from the normal value of providing evidence that independent sources discuss the subject.
  3. ^ "Trade magazines: Still a marketer's best friend?". Inprela Communications. 30 May 2017.
  4. ^ Examples:
    • Microsoft Word satisfies this criterion because people who are wholly independent of Microsoft have written books about it.
    • The Oxford Union satisfies this criterion for having two books (by Graham and by Walter) written and published about it.
  5. ^ Patents are written and published solely at the direction of the inventor or organization that the inventor assigned the patent to. Their contents are not verified to be accurate by the patent offices or any other independent agency. See Wikipedia:Reliable source examples#Are patents reliable sources?.

Sourcing part 2 discussion for concrete proposals

Concrete proposals only, if it is possible... I have offered some changes above, based on the discussion in the section above... I acknowledge that the thing about trade publications may be controversial but i am looking for a way to establish WP precedents that can be cited rather than establishing them by fiat here.... Jytdog (talk) 01:53, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

  • I think you've handled the trade publications issue well (possibly more generously than I might have). I think the main ongoing issue with this is that it needs to do a better job of clarifying what we consider to be acceptable sourcing. The suggested additions in this new draft are a start, but they're very slanted towards companies that've done something wrong: most notable companies that've been involved in a scandal (and probably some that aren't notable) could get up, while notable companies that haven't are held to an extremely high bar. To illustrate just how high a bar (compared to every other notability guideline we have on the project), what would be an individual source that would indisputably establish "significant artistic, cultural, economic, political, scientific or technical impact" or "significant on the industry"? The answer is that you're probably taking out literally all media coverage and left to only topics with their own books. This is unworkable in practice, which means that people have to really stretch these terms to cover even very notable companies - which makes everything arguable - and takes us back to where we started. I feel like it might be a good idea to hash out what people think a good source in this area looks like before we start trying to hammer out a specific proposal - we've skimmed over it here but not really done it in detail. The Drover's Wife (talk) 02:12, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
What we say now is "Deep coverage provides an organization with a level of attention that extends well beyond routine announcements and makes it possible to write more than a very brief, incomplete stub about an organization.". Would it be helpful to move the list of examples up? About what you said about needing a book-length treatment, I don't know that this is true. this piece in Bloomberg is a marvel of in-depth reporting on how Mylan was able to raise the price of the EpiPen - it gets into society and culture stuff (worried parents), politics (the lobbying Mylan did to change laws to make it OK for anyone to inject anyone with it, which they needed to get schools to stockpile them), patent law stuff, regulatory stuff... it is deep. This NYT piece goes into depth about a major deal between two pharma companies, with each one trying to manage the risks of the business by concentrating on X and getting rid of Y and vice versa, so they swapped assets. here is a ref by a Forbes editor (not contributor) - one of the main biotech commentators today - talking about George Scangos, and executive about whom we really should have an article and don't - it talks about how he has managed things when he made the move from a small old-school biotech to the giant Biogen... These are all in-depth, careful, thoughtful, stuff you can learn from... Jytdog (talk) 03:07, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
  • I sometimes create articles about Linux and FOSS software and one issue is that as these standards increase, I think it is also time to separate WP:NSOFTWARE - it is currently a pretty good and thorough essay. I don't think FOSS software should get mixed up with this commercial organization fracas, and WP:NSOFTWARE notes this difference and recommends WP:NCORP for commercial software. (Some guy's homebrewed Unix clone is hilariously Linus Torvalds' posts about the History of Linux) - this does come up at AfD, and I think the sooner FOSS software is formally separated from WP:NCORP's higher and stricter standards, the better for Wikipedia's coverage of software and technology. SeraphWiki (talk) 03:23, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
  • The additions to examples of trivial coverage seem fine, although I'm don't really like "innovations that do not significantly affect the industry" - it doesn't really fit in with the others. As to examples of what counts, they're not really examples of good coverage as such, so much as a restatement of the previously proposed criteria. I'm aware that this is in keeping with DIYeditor's suggestion, but I don't think it works- what we need here is about extent of coverage rather than focusing on topic of coverage. What I'd like is discussion about the impact the company had on the industry (if any) rather than specifically significant impact; I'm more interested in coverage of how the company was formed than on a specific controversy. What I think we're looking for are sources that allow us to write about the organisation in detail and from a NPOV, rather that sources that demonstrate worthiness. - Bilby (talk) 12:22, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
Some people want the discussion to focus on source analysis, some people want to try to develop criteria about the companies themselves. We will see where the consensus-building process takes us. What DiYeditor was up to, was a consideration of what kinds of things a source with "deep coverage" will discuss. That was an interesting suggestion (after all, if we are to know if a company has made "an impact", we will know that because it is in a source... I do hear you that an independent source that describes the history of how the company was formed in detail would probably be "deep coverage"; will consider how to add that sort of thing...Jytdog (talk) 12:52, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
Criteria about the companies themselves isn't a direction a like. I much prefer saying that we can write about a company so long as it meets the GNG, but this is what we mean by non-trivial, independent sources. In which case, our interest isn't in the topics that the sources cover, but the extent to which they discuss the company. The list of examples is about the topics - it is possible, for example, that a source discussing a major recall would fail to have anything viable to build an article around, or that a source looking at a prolonged controversy would be a company's equivalent of BLP1E, and not discuss the organisation outside of the controversy. I feel that the focus should be on sources that allow us to write an NPOV article, rather than sources that speak to the worth of the topic. - Bilby (talk) 12:59, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
I second this FWIW. The Drover's Wife (talk) 13:45, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
  • I agree with Bilby’s take on this. We should focus on the sourcing not the company itself. However, there is a second part to it that is key... I think we need to better clarify what we mean by INDEPENDENT sourcing. Blueboar (talk) 14:19, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
That's all great. Can we please use this section to make actual proposals, rather than high level stuff? Bilby/Drover' Wife would you please propose language that says what you are after? Blueboar would you please review what the ORGIND already says and suggest improvements (I think this is fairly well beat to death but perhaps it can be improved further...)? thx Jytdog (talk) 14:21, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
Where do we comment on your proposal, then? - Bilby (talk) 17:02, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
The concrete proposal above distills stuff from the section above it. It is not my proposal. Feel free to redact the thing above or post something here. Whatever. Jytdog (talk) 17:17, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

A comment about the trade journal/AUD piece. I don't disagree with this, but we want to be clear that there may be fields with field-specific works that are not trade journals but otherwise reliable and which coverage is good to have. For example, the Hollywood Reporter and Variety are works primarily on the US film industry, but they would not be considered trade journals so company news that appears in those, assuming depth of coverage, would be just fine for us. --Masem (t) 20:05, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

  • Regarding trade journals I think they have to be allowed - otherwise, it would completely halt link development on any article but the parent. I'm not saying CloseUp media is the greatest source, but even LexisNexis includes it so it's probably a must-have for companies, and we should allow it too. We're all about making a free encyclopedia right? What I would support is clarifying the policy to protect legitimate articles - like, do we treat software as a "commercial product" even if its FOSS?
  • The solution for promotional articles is clear, ignore the notability debate and G11 the offending articles. If there is something preventing this, or drafts are passing review before they are ready, or being kept at AfD - adding more layers to tighten up the notability policy is not going to cure this. It's only going to hurt legitimate article creation. I don't think AfC reviewers need more reasons to decline articles. I've still seen drafts pass with external links in the article text, even though the policy about this is unambiguous - reviewers work fast and the process is imperfect. I don't think there is a policy fix for that.Seraphim System (talk) 21:48, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

A quick thought on merging rather than outright deletion

I believe that we tend to have groups of articles with the same kinds of sourcing issues arising out of the same kinds of industries. I would like to propose as a general rule that we basically have list articles on companies in these industries which get borderline coverage. Redirect the article title to the list, merge in the content up to a limit of, say, 500 or 700 words, with the best handful of sources, and let it sit with every other thing of its kind until it can be demonstrated that the sort of better sources exist to separate it out of this status. Remember that subjects named in a list do not need to be independently inherently notable if the subject of the list as a whole is notable. I think a list of companies in a given field of business would be an inherently notable list, with at least some sources discussing the subject for every field that is conceived broadly enough. I also tend to think that a "merge" argument is a lighter load to carry in a discussion. bd2412 T 05:14, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Not a fan of this. I've almost never seen a "list" of that nature that actually gives any useful information to the reader - usually, it winds up as a "merge" to a list that just mentions the name of the thing. Even if this were the exception that did have useful content, this would inevitably sprawl into very long lists of barely-related subjects. Either it is notable, in which case it should have its own article, or it is not, and it should be deleted. The Drover's Wife (talk) 05:24, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
I read most of the opposes below as based on likely consequences of it being a list. Requiring prose implicitly requires secondary sources which fits WP:PSTS and the GNG, unlike lisitified data. One problem with orphan small company promotional articles is the lack of industry articles that would provide the context. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:59, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
Retrieved from "https://wiki.riteme.site/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(organizations_and_companies)/Archive_18&oldid=1254521637"