Talk:David Downes

There are 3 persons with this name: An Irish composer, a New Zealand composer, and a sociologist. For the longest time, this page contained info on both composers. Lately there has been some back and forth editing to wipe out one composer and replace him with the other. That seems to be problematic. I tried to create a page for the New Zealand composer but he was deemed to be too un-notable to have his own page. Please refer to the following: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/David_Downs%28New_Zealand_composer%29 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.112.192.100 (talk) 08:53, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

The claim that "For the longest time, this page contained info on both composers" appears to be mistaken. This was the original version of the article, in Oct 2006, about the NZ composer. There were a couple of additions over the next few years that look like they were confusing him with the Irish person, eg [1], but they were quickly reverted. As far as I can see, it wasn't until this change, in March 2010, that the conflict really started. The request to create a new David Downs(New Zealand composer) article was only made after the long-standing original was usurped and changed to describe the Irish person -- Boing! said Zebedee 18:17, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Additional: The request to create a new David Downs(New Zealand composer) article was made by 174.112.192.100, with a copy of the contents of the original, after this recent set of changes, partly made by 174.112.192.100 -- Boing! said Zebedee 18:33, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

True, but of the two David's one has been declined at articles for creation and the other hasn't...... I'm tempted to take it to wp:AFD and let the community decide if either merit an article. ϢereSpielChequers 18:25, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

But the one that had been refused at Articles for Creation had actually been in existence since Oct 2006, until it was incorrectly rewritten very recently. Sure, there are notability problems, but that's a separate issue. 174.112.192.100 was simply wrong to usurp and rewrite the original to refer to a different person, and I think my message to him/her was valid. The way to go about this is to separate the two issues, take the current article to AFD if that is thought necessary, and create a separate article about the Irish person. -- Boing! said Zebedee 18:33, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

PS: Just to be clear, I have no doubt that 174.112.192.100 was acting in good faith -- Boing! said Zebedee 18:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

PPS: And the current article should be reverted to its original version, the one about the NZ composer, as that should not be exterminated without the Community having the opportunity to partake in AFD discussion. -- Boing! said Zebedee 19:15, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

We also have David Downes (sociologist) who at the least should get a hatnote here. Howabout I try and split this article into David Downes (New Zealand composer) and David Downes (Irish composer) then turn David Downes into a dab page? ϢereSpielChequers 19:26, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good to me, but I think you should start by reverting and moving the current David Downes page to David Downs (New Zealand composer) in order to retain its edit history, and then recreate David Downes as a new dab page. -- Boing! said Zebedee 19:34, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

OK I've done the split. I deleted David Downes, restored the Irish related edits and moved that to David Downes (Irish composer), then I restored the NZ edits and moved that to David Downes (New Zealand composer) then I left notes on the two talkpages. ϢereSpielChequers 21:12, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Wow, and you've even been able to reconstruct the appropriate edit histories for them both - nice work :-) -- Boing! said Zebedee 12:00, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Here's my perspective. I came accross an article [2] that had information about 2 persons as if it was about one. I untangled the mess and made it clear that these are 2 different people. WereSpielChequers then added stuff about the Irish guy and removed the New Zealand fellow for reasons that were not clear to me. Mbbpler then removed the previous 9 or more edits without any documentation, thus wiping out the efforfs of WereSpielChequers and myself. I felt that was too drastic so I hit the undo button. I like how it ended up getting resolved. Good work Guys. After reading WP's notability criteria, I don't think the New Zealand composer measures up, in spite of that, the article serves a purpose and have no interest in removing it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.112.192.100 (talk) 06:37, 4 April 2010 (UTC)