Jon Ossoff ( talk| | history| logs| links| watch) ( XfD| restore)

"The result was Keep. Recall that WP:NPOL is only a guideline; it has been well-demonstrated in this discussion (and consensus has been reached) that this individual meets the general notability guidelines.)" [1].

I asked NW about this yesterday [5] however he has not edited since closing the AfD and does not seem to be very active [6] Jbh ^Talk 13:12, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• In case it is not clear, my opinion is that the consensus, as it stood at the time of closing, was to redirect to the campaign article and full protect it. That outcome, or reopening the AfD is what I think would be appropriate outcomes here. Jbh ^Talk 15:24, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• Endorse. The only way to close this as delete would be to vote-count, which is not what you're supposed to do. The keep close makes perfect sense if you observe that most of the deletes came before Modern_seneca introduced a number of good sources; full-length articles in mainstream media which are substantially about Ossoff. If I were closing this, I might have opted to relist it with the comment that new sources had been introduced and I wanted to give people a chance to evaluate those sources better. But, the existing close is perfectly fine. What does concern me is that Modern_seneca, the primary author of the article, is an obvious WP:SPA ( contribution history), and presumably somebody associated with the candidate, and thus there's obvious WP:COI issues. Not to mention the spammy tone of the article. But, the bottom line is sources, we seem to have more than enough WP:RS to pass muster, and NuclearWarfare did a good job of reading and evaluating the discussion rather than just counting noses . Full disclosure: my political leanings are to support Ossoff's party. -- RoySmith (talk) 14:20, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

Based on Hobit's comment below, I've struck my endorsement. All the stuff about WP:COI, WP:CANVASS, and WP:SPAs, while valid, is besides the point. All that really matters is the sourcing, and as Hobit points out, the best course of action is to relist to allow for a better evaluation of those sources. I'd urge that the existing discussion be re-opened, rather than starting a new one, and that the remit to the discussants be explicit that evaluating the sources is the key task. -- RoySmith (talk) 14:25, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply

PS, I agree with Hobit that it is strange that after not having closed an AfD in over three years (as far as I can tell, December 2013), the closer chose this particular discussion to get back into AfD closing. I'd be interested to hear from @ NuclearWarfare: why this AfD? -- RoySmith (talk) 14:35, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply

I've gone back to endorsing the original close. The NY Times has front-page coverage of Ossoff this morning. If there was any doubt about the sourcing, this should settle the matter. I suppose one could still make an argument about whether the close, at the time, was correct, but I don't see any possible way this could fail at AfD now, so sending it back there for another week of discussion would be silly. Yes, I know, just being a candidate for office doesn't automatically make you notable, but candidates for house seats in Georgia don't usually make the front page of the NY Times either. -- RoySmith (talk) 13:33, 8 March 2017 (UTC) reply

And, some additional coverage I see over the past few days in major national media:

• L.A. Times
• Washington Post
• Huffington Post
• NPR
• The New Yorker

-- RoySmith (talk) 14:26, 8 March 2017 (UTC) reply

Vote count, while not dispositive is however indicative of the views of the participants in the AfD. There was considerable discussion by Bearcat about the added sources, as well as five of the eight redirect/delete !votes being made after Modern seneca's comments/additions. Discounting !votes because they did not bludgeon the AfD !votes, particularly when the issues are already being addressed by a well known editor and admin seems odd. I, as one of the two three !votes before Modern Senica certainly did not change my mind - I would have noted it in the discussion, (as I modified my !vote to "no objection to redirect if full protected" after Modern Seneca's additions) if I had and AGF requires that we assume that the others would have as well. Jbh ^Talk 14:47, 2 March 2017 (UTC) Last edited: 14:55, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

While there is an arguement to be made that he passes GNG even if the coverage is merely typical campaign coverage, there was clearly no consensus that that was the case. If NW felt the sources presented by MS were sufficient to Keep per GNG then they should !voted based on that not super-vote via closing. The delete/redirect !votes were based on good faith interpretations of Wikipedia's content guidelines and can not be discounted by the closer simply because they disagree with those interpretations. Jbh ^Talk 15:12, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• It is also likely that it is someone not connected with the campaign but excited about the candidate. This is getting a lot of attention within liberal circles. As such, it might be a good idea to welcome the editor, provide some guidance of WP policies, and encourage him to take part in a wider range of pages. Casprings ( talk) 15:35, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• Endorse-Note: Voted Keep in the discussion He is getting national attention and will continue to so. This is the first competitive election after a strange and historic Presidential election. He has already received an extremely large amount of money and support. When we look back in 10 years, the election and the major candidates will likely have historical importance. It will be seen as the first time the results of the 2016 Presidential election were tested. Beyond those arguments, he (and not just the campaign) is getting national coverage and that coverage clearly meets WP:N. All of that said, if the decision is to overturn and delete, could we move it to Draft:Jon Ossoff instead? I would likely bring this back up if he won the April 18th primary and may like to edit and further prep the article. Casprings ( talk) 15:31, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply
• I'm not going to express a formal opinion one way or the other in this DRV, because I was an active participant in the original discussion. I'm perfectly willing to abide by a properly formulated and unequivocally clear consensus that differs from my own personal opinions — but what I'm not seeing in this discussion is any basis for arguing that a keep consensus actually exists here. However, I do want to raise a few points in response to RoySmith above.
  Firstly, of the four keep votes in the discussion, two are from editors who had been dormant for a year or more before coming back specifically to vote keep in this discussion. I've been around Wikipedia long enough to know that's usually indicative of a conflict of interest and/or off-wiki canvassing — if former Wikipedians who have been largely absent from the project for that long come back just for an AFD that they had no organic reason to even know about in the first place because they weren't here, that suggests manipulation rather than honest consensus. Besides the article creator himself, we have only one other keep vote here that came from an active contributor — and since the creator himself is also an SPA with a potential conflict of interest, that means there's only one keep vote in the entire discussion that actually earns the benefit of the doubt on whether or not it's tainted by COI or canvassing concerns.
  Secondly, while it's true that there are sources present in the article, what we don't have is the depth or volume of coverage it takes to make an as yet unelected candidate for office notable because candidate per se. Media coverage of all elections always exists, and therefore no candidate for anything would ever fail GNG if "some coverage of the campaign exists" were all it took — rather, it's a longstanding principle of AFD that such coverage falls under WP:ROUTINE, and a candidate does not clear the GNG bar on the basis of campaign coverage alone. It's not enough to just show that "the campaign got coverage", because all campaigns always get coverage — for a candidate to clear the GNG bar despite not satisfying NPOL yet, what needs to be shown is that either (a) he was already notable enough for a Wikipedia article for some other reason besides the candidacy alone, or (b) the coverage has exploded to a volume wildly out of proportion to what would be expected to exist, such as what happened to Christine O'Donnell in 2010. But neither of those conditions is being met here: the coverage is not showing that he would have passed any notability criterion before becoming a candidate, and there's only a fraction as much coverage being shown here as there is in O'Donnell's article (which has 166 footnotes in it.) The volume of coverage shown here would be expected to exist in any election for any office; it is not showing that he's more notable than the norm for a not-yet-elected candidate for political office.
  There's a longstanding consensus that a politician does not get into Wikipedia just for being a candidate for office in and of itself — campaign coverage of all elections always exists, so every candidate for any office at all would always clear GNG if campaign coverage alone were enough, and NPOL would be entirely disemboweled. But NPOL is intentionally designed to prevent Wikipedia from turning into nothing more than a hosting platform for aspiring officeholders' campaign brochures — which is precisely why the routine and expected level of campaign coverage is not enough in and of itself to make a candidate's article keepable if there's no other evidence of notability besides the campaign coverage itself. Bearcat ( talk) 15:44, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• It isn't routine for a congressional candidate to raise this much money in such a short amount of time, for the opposition to have a $1 million ad buy this early in a safe district, or for this level of national coverage. These should indicate that this is not a "normal" environment and we should use subjective judgment to allow the article to remain. Casprings ( talk) 16:57, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• The amount of money a candidate happens to raise has no bearing on notability at all — it is entirely possible for an underfunded candidate to win the election, and for a much more well-funded candidate to lose. Special elections always generate media coverage, and the first one after a presidential election, which is happening because of a vacancy caused by the cabinet selection of an incumbent officeholder, always sees a funding bump from the opposing party's base to maximize their chances of taking a seat away from the governing party — elections in these circumstances pretty much always turn into an unofficial proxy for recontesting the presidential election. This is no different from the first special election in 2009 after an Obama cabinet pick created a Congressional vacancy, or the first one in 2001 after a Bush cabinet pick did the same — it speaks to the notability of the election itself, not the separate standalone notability of every individual candidate within it. Bearcat ( talk) 17:21, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• Along with Bearcat, I am not going to take a formal position on the DRV as an active participant in the AfD, but I did not and do not understand the closer's reasoning for the close, especially this comment "and consensus has been reached." While there were some keep votes suggesting that the subject's name had been mentioned in national articles, my sense of the discussion was that most participants believed the subject should be redirected into the appropriate election article, with allowance for recreation if the subject won his election or the subject, and not the race, receives coverage outside of the norm. Each AfD needs to be evaluated on its own merits, but in general, the AfDs regarding political candidates usually end up as a delete or a redirect, and that campaigns are treated as WP:ONEEVENT. -- Enos733 ( talk) 17:33, 2 March 2017 (UTC) reply
• This is a crazy-hard case. We've got COI issues, sources added after some of the discussion, and GNG vs SNG. The COI issues weigh in favor of deletion. The sources, of course, help with the keep argument. The GNG vs SNG leans heavily toward the keep side because the SNG in this case, makes it _really_ plain that meeting the GNG is enough, so there really isn't a conflict. The discussion of the sources in counting toward the GNG is really limited. Relist to get a better sense of what people feel about the sources meeting the GNG. The relist should include something of the form "it's agreed he doesn't meet WP:NPOL 1 or 2, but does he meet the GNG (NPOL 3)?" On that basis we can reach close. I feel that the AfD closer substituted their own opinion about the sources in place of the lack of consensus found in this discussion. NC is also tempting, but my sense is that a properly directed discussion will likely reach consensus on the sources meeting the GNG or not. Hobit ( talk) 04:57, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply
  • OK, I've looked a bit more closely and I'm going to change to overturn to delete on the basis of SPA/COI issues in the AfD.
    • Modern_seneca is a pure SPA who has only contributed on the topic of Jon Ossoff.
    • Jkfp2004 has only one contribution since 2015 other than contributing to this AfD.
    • Nuujinn has only a handful of contributions since 2015, all on the topic of Jon Ossoff.
    • Casprings has contributed more broadly, but as far as I can tell, solely on the topic of American politics.

Also, this is the only AfD the closer has closed since at least 2013 if I'm reading that history correctly. This whole thing seems very problematic to me. That is everyone !voting to keep and the closer who seem either to be a SPA or otherwise getting involved in a way that they haven't for more than a year. @ RoySmith: could you take another look at this AfD with that context in mind and see if that changes your thoughts on the right outcome here? Hobit ( talk) 14:19, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• This should probably be a overturn to redirect and protect or some such, but the basic theme is that I think this AfD had enough problems on the keep side that the only proper reading of the discussion is to remove the article. Hobit ( talk) 21:48, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply

Comment: These argument seem ad hominem to me. THe fact remains that multiple WP:RS of national scope and outside of the local media market are commenting on many aspects of the race. This ranges from the amount of money raised, the opposition becoming involved at a National level very early, etc, etc, etc. Some sources below:

• NPR: Attack Ad Marks New Era For Millennials Running For Office
• WP: GOP super PAC launching $1.1 million buy in Tom Price’s Georgia district
• Roll Call: GOP Super PAC Attacks Georgia Democrat for Dressing Up as Han Solo
• Huffington Post:Liberal Readers Just Raised $1 Million For The Democrat Looking To Replace Tom Price
• LA Times: Democrats see a path to salvation in the Sunbelt — and Newt Gingrich's backyard

I understand the desire of other editors to view this as simply another person running in another special election. That said, much like the Scott Brown race in 2008, sometimes things have greater WP:N and the people involved in them have greater WP:N because of what that event represents to people. It isn't up to editors to decide what is WP:N. It is up to them to objectively review the coverage in WP:RS and make a judgment based on the circumstances. It shouldn't be a cookie cutter. @ Hobit:, you are correct that I have contributed a lot to American Politics. That is where my interests are. However, should my logic and argument be discounted because of that? Should the others? The sources and coverage are the sources and coverage, despite who is pointing that out. Casprings ( talk) 15:47, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply

The place to make arguements about sources, notability, keep/delete is at the AfD if it is re-opened. The purpose of this review is to determine if consensus was properly judged by the closer. Jbh ^Talk 18:43, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply

If the rationale to overturn this is that keep arguments were from SPI/COI accounts, it is worth noting that: 1. The evidence and arguments are still valid. 2. There isn't good rationale to overturn this based on where the keep votes come from. Moreover, new sources are also important to this discussion. WP:N changes. Even if it wasn't WP:N at the closure of the delection discussion, continued national coverage shows it may be now. What is the logic for ignoring gathering evidence that this meets WP:N? Casprings ( talk) 01:07, 4 March 2017 (UTC) reply

Scott Brown, for the record, was not deemed to have any special notability because of the 2010 special senate election in Massachusetts per se; he was an actual officeholder in the state legislature before running in the special election, so he already had an article on that basis anyway. If he had not, and the election campaign itself was the first that anybody had ever actually heard of him, then no, he would not have gotten a Wikipedia article prior to winning the election. The reason he already had an article before winning the election, in other words, is because he had already passed WP:NPOL as a holder of a notable office — he did not get an article for the fact of being a candidate in and of itself. Bearcat ( talk) 17:49, 4 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• I don't think that the discussion shows a Keep consensus. The argument for deletion is a bit more subtle than asserting that an unelected candidate for office can't be notable through the GNG. It's that the coverage the candidate has received is routine for someone in that position, and we don't consider that people in that position are typically notable. It is a well established function of SNGs to interpret the standard of the GNG for that topic area. Also note that most of the people who didn't want to keep the article wanted to redirect it rather than delete it, indicating that they thought the subject was best covered in the context of the election rather than as a standalone article. Even if some subject does meet our notability guidelines that doesn't necessarily mean we have to have a standalone article on them. Given that I don't think it's fair to discount the Delete/Redirect arguments.
  If the discussion had to be closed in that state I'd go with No Consensus, but as pointed out above there are reasons to think the discussion wasn't satisfactory - not enough evaluation of the sources and the fact that several of the participants may have been canvassed. Therefore I'll suggest a relist. Hut 8.5 20:23, 3 March 2017 (UTC) reply
• Comment Jbh For the moment, this subject meets WP:N, as I see it. However, if he's not elected to Congress, I suggest that you watch the article, keep track of his notoriety, and then make a redirect to to the article for the Congressional district, if notoriety fades. Tapered ( talk) 06:03, 5 March 2017 (UTC) reply

@ Tapered: please read WP:NOTTEMPORARY. -- RoySmith (talk) 14:03, 5 March 2017 (UTC) reply

@ Tapered: We are not discussing the subject's notability here but rather whether the closer of the AfD properly rest the existing consensus of the AfD discussion. My assertion is, regardless of whatever the conclusion about the subject's notability may end up being, that there was no consensus at the AfD to Keep the article nor was there any consensus, as claimed by the closer, that the subject passes GNG and that NPOL, POLOUTCOMES, ROUTINE and BLP1E should be ignored. Jbh ^Talk 16:01, 5 March 2017 (UTC) reply

@ RoySmith and Jbhunley: Please review WP:DRVPURPOSE, #3, "if significant new information has come to light since a deletion that would justify recreating the deleted page." Continued national coverage such as New Yorker:CAN THIS DEMOCRAT WIN THE GEORGIA SIXTH? again points to the growing argument that he is WP:N. New and relevant information is absolutely relevant to this discussion. Casprings ( talk) 16:33, 5 March 2017 (UTC) reply

The coverage of an election race is expected to keep going until election day, because that's the very nature of the beast. So that happening does not constitute "significant new information" that would change the notability equation here; it still does not bolster a WP:GNG claim in advance of his winning the election. What would need to be shown to satisfy DRVPURPOSE #3 is new evidence that either (a) he already had more preexisting notability before the candidacy than the original version of the article had shown, or (b) the coverage suddenly exploded to Christine O'Donnell proportions, such that the number of sources that could be cited was much closer to the 166 footnotes that are present in O'Donnell's article than to the just 19 that are present here. The fact that the coverage of the election campaign simply kept chugging along at exactly the normal and routine volume and pace it's supposed to appear at, does not confer improved notability on a candidate who's simply generating the volume and pace of election coverage that would be routinely expected to exist for all candidates in all elections. Bearcat ( talk) 15:57, 6 March 2017 (UTC) reply

Coverage of house candidates from Georgia don't normally appear on the front page of the NY Times. Again, at what point is the new information significant and relevant? NY Times: A Democrat in Conservative Georgia Rides Opposition to Trump

As I've pointed out before, there are only two ways in which a candidate for office gets a Wikipedia article without having to win the election first: either (a) you can show improved WP:RS evidence that he was already notable enough for an article for some other reason (e.g. already having held another notable office, or passing our notability standards in another field of activity entirely) before becoming a candidate, or (b) the coverage of his candidacy explodes to Christine O'Donnell proportions. Neither of those has been shown here, and we do not have to revisit this or reevaluate the case for includability every time one more new source comes along. Again, our core notability test is will people still need this information ten years from now, not who happens to be newsy today — if he wins the election, he'll obviously pass the ten-year test, but if he loses it people in 2027 are not still going to be looking for information about him. As I've said before, if campaign coverage were all it took to get an as yet unelected candidate for office over GNG in and of itself, then we would always have to keep an article about everybody who ever ran in but lost any election at all — because media coverage of all elections always exists, and the volume of coverage being shown here is simply not out of proportion to what would be expected to exist. Bearcat ( talk) 18:02, 9 March 2017 (UTC) reply

• Relist. Discussion was catastrophically overrun by COI editors and people who just wouldn't shut up and let others have their say, to the extent that it was basically un-closable as it stood. Needs input from new people.— S Marshall T/ C 16:28, 5 March 2017 (UTC) reply
• Re-classify to "Closed, no Concensus" From the 'realpolitik' faction of Wikipedia. I agree with User:Jbhunley that there was no concensus in the discussion. He does have dedicated reliable sources coverage. Let the article alone for awhile. If he wins the election, it's a no-brainer. If he doesn't, watch the article and the media to see if he attracts any more significant coverage. If not, create a new AfD based on WP:NOTTEMPORARY. Tapered ( talk) 00:16, 6 March 2017 (UTC) reply
• I'd have gone for no consensus myself, but keep is functionally the same for all material purposes. Meh. Stifle ( talk) 09:49, 7 March 2017 (UTC) reply
  • I think it's fair to categorize all but one of the keep !voters as SPAs. Doesn't that affect things? Hobit ( talk) 14:14, 7 March 2017 (UTC) reply
• Endorse, with the same argument as Stifle. ``