Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 01:22, 1 July 2006

This page documents an English Misplaced Pages notability criteria. Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page.

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See also: Misplaced Pages:Importance.

This page gives some rough guidelinesTemplate:Fn which Misplaced Pages editors use to decide if a book should have an article on Misplaced Pages.

Important note: Failing to satisfy the notability guidelines is not a criterion for speedy deletion. An article that fails to even claim that the subject of the article is notable can be speedily deleted under criterion A7, however. A mere claim of notability, even if contested, may avoid deletion under A7 and require a full Article for Deletion process to determine if the subject of the article is notable.

Many Wikipedians are wholly averse to the use of Misplaced Pages for advertising and promotion of non-notable material, and Misplaced Pages articles are not advertisements is an official policy of long standing. Advertising is either cleaned up to adhere to the neutral point of view or deleted. In the latter case, it may be first proposed for deletion and if proposed deletion is rejected, and article may be more formally listed at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion, where Misplaced Pages editors apply the criteria outlined at notablity to come to consensus. This guideline is a part of that process.

Please note that the failure to meet any of these criteria does not mean an article must be deleted; likewise, the meeting of any of these criteria does not mean that an article must be kept. These are merely rules of thumb which some editors choose to keep in mind when deciding whether or not to keep an article that is on articles for deletion.

Also, please keep in mind that the article in question must actually document that any criterion cited from here is actually true. It is not enough to make vague claims in the article or rant about a book's importance on a talk page or at its AfD page—the article itself must document notability.

Criteria

A book is notable if it meets any one of the following criteria:

1. The book is by a bestselling author.
2. The book has sold more than 100,000 copies.
3. The book is listed on any major newspaper's or major online bookstore's bestseller list.
4. The book has been made into a major motion picture that was released into multiple commercial theaters.
5. The book has won a major award (a list of book awards my be found here.
6. The book has been the subjectTemplate:Fn of multiple, non-trivial Template:Fn published works whose source is independent of the book itself.
   • The immediately preceding criterion excludes:
     • Media re-prints of press releases, flapcopy or other publications where the author its publisher, agent or other self-interested parties advertise or speak about the book;Template:Fn
     • But includes published works in all forms, such as newspaper articles, other books, television documentaries, and reviews.Template:Fn

Other considerations

Books should have at a minimum an ISBN-number, be available at a dozen or more libraries and be catalogued by the Library of Congress. However, this is exlusionary criteria rather than inclusionary; this does not mean that a book which meet these criteria is notable.

On this tack, it should be especially noted that self-publication and/or publication by a vanity press is indicia, but not determinative of non-notability, and many vanity presses books are both assigned ISBN numbers and are listed by the Library of Congress as well as are amenable to being found through a Google book search.

Other indicia of notability include:

• Publication by a major publishing house;
• Returning 1,000 unique Google hits. To check unique hits, scroll to the end of a a google search page until no more results are displayed. At the top oif the page will be listed a range ouit of a total. For example "Results 1 - 50 of about 908,000." Thus, google found 50 unique hits. The final, very large number is irrelevant.

Derivative articles

It is a general consensus on Misplaced Pages that articles should not be split and split again into ever minutia of detail, with each split normally lowering the level of notability. What this means is that while a book may be notable, it is not normally advisable to have a separate article on a character from the book, and despite that the book may be notable, that derivative article may not be. There are notable exceptions to this, especially in the case of very famous novels. For example Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange has a 'subarticle' on its protagnoist, Alex DeLarge.

Notes

• Template:Fnb Try not to apply guidelines reflexively; as if they are written in stone. All deleion discussions should be approached on a case-by-case basis with an eye toward the peculiar circumstances presented.
• Template:Fnb The "subject" of a work means non-trivial treatment and excludes mere mention of the book, its author or of its publication and price listings.
• Template:Fnb Non-trivial normally excludes blogs, online periodicals, personal websites and other media that are not themselves notable. Be careful to check that the author, his publisher, agent vendor etc. are in no way interested in the third party source.
• Template:Fnb Self-promotion and product placement are not the routes to having an encyclopedia article. The published works must be someone else writing about the book. (See Misplaced Pages:Autobiography for the verifiability and neutrality problems that affect material where the subject of the article itself is the source of the material). The barometer of notability is whether people independent of the subject itself (or of its author, publisher, vendor or agent) have actually considered the book notable enough that they have written and published non-trivial works that focus upon it.

See also

• Misplaced Pages:Naming conventions (books)

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