Talk:Iain King

Did Iain King write '9'?

According to this wikipedia page, and the entry for him on LibraryThing, he did; but there is another Iain King who probably wrote that book (which is about football, and the other Iain King writes about football for The Sun newspaper). Neither of Iain King's Amazon author pages say he wrote '9'. Which is correct? If he didn't write '9', it should be taken from his bibliography.Squareanimal (talk) 15:39, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Iain King CBE / Iain King the Philosopher and Writer

I got more references for this article. Iain King got his CBE for work in warzones, not for his philosophy. They are the same person, though, because it says so in several places, including on the official blog of his publisher, 20th June 2013, here. It is still his philosophy which makes him more notable, though. Hairy poker monster (talk) 15:19, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Contested deletion

This article should not be speedily deleted for lack of asserted importance because... This article provides several independent references both to the subject (Iain King) and to the importance of his work. His work has been praised by the Liberal Democrats (who are in the UK Government) as an example of an important philosophy, it has qualified for discussion on the international broadcaster CNN, it is discussed at some length in at least three different books (there are probably others, too). Please see the references to the piece, which provide details of all this. In my own work at University, there are several live debates about issues raised by Iain King and the solutions he presents. He is very notable in the world of philosophy --Felixthehamster (talk) 12:30, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Search for more references

I've just spent a long time updating this entry, and did a large-scale search for references. Does anyone have any more on the Aristotle paradox about lying, and whether or not Iain King has made a signficant breakthrough on this? Also, there are lots of Iain Kings who come up on an internet search. Some things attributed to 'Iain King' on other webpages I left out, thinking it was someone else. Does anyone know?AlexMoore300 (talk) 09:43, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

And your "large-scale search for references" has just unearthed loads of copies of publishers' blurbs in catalogues rather than the independent reliable sources requiredx to support an encyclopedia article. Phil Bridger (talk) 10:29, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

That's not true - look at the economist review, or the quote from the Royal Institute of Philosophy cited on the publisher's webpage, or the quote from the Observer (again, cited by the publisher); the 'Publishers Weekly' review is definitely independent, and I'm sure a large publisher like Bloombury wouldn't say things like the Kofi Annan quote without a basis for it. The Daily Telegraph review, I accept, is 'from the publisher'; the 'National Library of Australia' description seems to be their own. If you think some of the quotes are based on publisher's promotional stuff, then either put that in the reference/footnote, or qualify the comment appropriately in the text. But your deletion has just taken out lots of references, most of which are perfectly valid, even by your unfairly strict criteria. AlexAlexMoore300 (talk) 12:41, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

The National Library of Australia description attributes the summary to the book jacket - NO READ IT AGAIN - ONLY THE LAST PART IS FROM THE BOOK JACKETAlexMoore300 (talk) 12:57, 31 January 2013 (UTC), so it is certainly not their own NOT TRUEAlexMoore300 (talk) 12:57, 31 January 2013 (UTC), and the Royal Institute of Philosophy description is also just a catalogue entry, not a review - NO IT'S THE JUDGEMENT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY - PLEASE READ IT AGAINAlexMoore300 (talk) 12:57, 31 January 2013 (UTC). Such catalogue entries are routinely taken from publishers' descriptions. Th first three sources that I checked all clearly misattributed the publishers' words to other institutions, so I was perfectly entitled to revert your edit. You can't expect others to sort out the wheat from the chaff when you misrepresent sources in this way. If you want to update the article on the basis of independent reliable sources, such as the Economist review, then please go ahead, but leave out the dross. Phil Bridger (talk) 12:53, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

No, YOU read the NLA source again. BOTH paragraphs are in quotation marks, meaning that the whole text is lifted straight from the dust jacket. Phil Bridger (talk) 13:04, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

I reverted Phil Bridger's comments - my original edits were in good faith, and I tried to maintain a 'Neutral Point of View' (even though I am, as Phil summises correctly, impressed by Iain King's philosophy work). Can someone else, please, go through each part of my large edit, reference by reference, checking them, amending or qualifying them where appropriate (for example, if an independent source, like the National Library of Australia or the Daily Telegraph is drawing too heavily on the publisher's promotional blurb). Note that the economist review described King's book as 'excellent'; I only drew out the word 'sensationalist' - I've tried to be as neutral as possible. AlexAlexMoore300 (talk) 12:57, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

It's not a case of those sources drawing too heavily on promotional blurb, but of consisting entirely of such material. Phil Bridger (talk) 13:04, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

They don't.AlexMoore300 (talk) 14:07, 31 January 2013 (UTC) Accepting the suggestion of PhilBridger's latest reversion, I've tried to accept some of his points. So, I've just editted the page again, taking a charitable interpretation of his comments - even removing the opening description from the NLA. Where a source - such as the Royal Institute of Philosophy - is quoted/cited by the publisher, I've tried to be clear on it in the references; but I think the view of the Royal Society are important here and need to remain in, appropriately qualifed and their original source noted. This latest version should not be wholesale reverted - please make any edits to the text, point-by-point.AlexMoore300 (talk) 14:25, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Without even checking the references it's obvious Phil called it right, the entire disputed passage belongs on a publisher's dust jacket and not in an encyclopedia. If it's editorial consensus you're looking for IMO either remove the content or make it look like something that belongs here. Batvette (talk) 22:53, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Bad ISBN

Because it is causing a Checkwiki error #72: "ISBN-10 with wrong checksum", I removed the ISBN from the entry:

Peace at Any Price, 2007 (ISBN 9951-417-03-7)

I have tried unsuccessfully to locate the correct ISBN on the Internet. We need more bibliographical information to distinguish this entry from the Peace at Any Price How the World Failed Kosovo entries. In fact, I would delete all Peace at Any Price entries except one because it's a "Bibliography" section for a person, not a "Publication history" section for a book. Knife-in-the-drawer (talk) 13:16, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Sourcing issues

See:

• User:Tokyogirl79/sandbox3
• WP:RSN#Help with an AfD?

Sources not yet used in the article:

• http://www.bloomsbury.com/author/iain-king
• Oisín Tansey. Review of Peace at Any Price: How the World Failed Kosovo by Iain King, Whit Mason in International Journal, Vol. 62, No. 3, "What Kind of Security? Afghanistan and Beyond" (Summer, 2007), pp. 717-720.

--Francis Schonken (talk) 09:54, 10 September 2015 (UTC)

• Francis Schonken, I've removed the Amazon link. There are several issues with merchant sources. First off, getting on to an Amazon list is not a sign of notability on Wikipedia, partially because it's not really all that hard, given that there are so many different, small sections of Amazon. It's really not that uncommon for someone to sell in a small subgenre and then say that they're bestselling. That leads to another issue with Amazon - people can and have manipulated these rankings in order to get to the top of a list. I'm not saying that King did it, but I've seen people that have and that's part of the reason why Amazon sales rankings (and pretty much any merchant site listing) is specifically excluded from giving notability per WP:NBOOK. It also doesn't help that King doesn't state which area he sold well in, just that he sold well in two areas. As someone who shops on Amazon in various genres, I can tell you that there are many of them and getting into the top of any of those isn't really a big deal. This means that this is essentially a WP:SPS and there's really nothing to back this up anywhere, which is one of the other problems with Amazon sales rankings: not only is it fairly easy to manipulate sales rankings on there and claim bestseller status, but it's also near impossible to really verify. Someone can be #1 for a day or hour and there's no way to prove or disprove this.

The other problem with using merchant links is that they're always inherently promotional. The primary goal of a merchant is to sell you something and using a link can be seen as an endorsement of the site or product. Also, I need to warn you that listing Amazon bestseller status on a page is usually seen as promotional in general since it's normally used by self-published and/or minor/indie authors to try to establish notability for someone that's really not notable. In this case King is notable enough for an article but it doesn't really help him out much because there's such a strong negative connotation to listing this.

I'm aware that per this section of WP:RS you can use merchant sites to back up basic details, but it's also extremely discouraged per the wording, which states that pretty much anything else would be preferable. Also, the merchant sites should only be used to back up basic details and what you're trying to back it up with is not a basic detail. Even though Amazon sales can't be used to show notability, claiming bestseller status is still a fairly major thing. If you want to claim it in the article that's fine, but it should be backed up with a non-merchant, non-SPS. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 04:36, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

• I also need to say that the profile also states that it sold well on the UK Amazon website, which receives far less traffic than the US version does so it's much easier to hit bestseller status on there. Basically, this is sort of one of those WP:PUFFERY type of deals when it comes to claims, which is why merchant sales figures amount to nothing on here as far as claims in general goes. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 04:45, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
• I will bring this up at RS/N, though. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 04:48, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

RSN is a good idea if we can't agree on this.

But there's a basic misunderstanding: something not counting in a notability logic (e.g. NBOOK) is not necessarily excluded from article content once the notability of the topic has been established. --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:01, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

• However at the same time, this is an extremely, EXTREMELY vague claim. Basically what we have here is someone claiming something that by all accounts cannot be verified by anyone. We don't know when it hit, how long it was a top seller, or even which category it was selling in. For all we know it could have been #1 for five minutes in a very, very specific category that's comprised of only 4-5 truly active selling titles. The other issue is that we have no way of verifying that the sales were legitimate. As was stated above, authors can and have manipulated their own sales on Amazon. Heck, I knew an author who did just that and purchased a bunch of their own books and had some friends and relatives do the same, just so they could claim that they were the bestselling in a very minor category on Amazon. This is why it's really not something that can or even should be listed on here, because it's something that's very hard to verify in various different ways and is almost always used as a bit of vanity promotional puffery in press releases and other avenues. The only thing we have to back this up is the author's profile, which shouldn't be seen as a reliable source - it really needs to be backed up with something that isn't coming straight from the author's mouth. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:09, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

• The long and short of this is basically this source really, really isn't appropriate here. Not only is this a merchant source, but the source is essentially primary. We've had authors claim various things in their official profiles and on their Amazon lists. Heck, this guy claims that he's written for Newsday (as far as anyone's been able to tell, he hasn't) and that his books are banend from Wikipedia and Amazon (in the sales page for one of his books). That's why if you want to list this, you really need to back this up with something that isn't a merchant source and isn't a primary source. Even then there's still a big issue of whether or not something like this should even be mentioned for the reasons listed above, although my main point here is just to say that you really, really need a better source for this. People can claim whatever they want on their author pages. To show that it really warrants mention you need a secondary source for this, although personally I don't see why it should be on here. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:14, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
• I also need to point out that the article for King had some fairly large issues in the past when it came to sourcing and claims, to the point where anything in the article really needs to be backed up with very good sourcing. This was actually the reason why the article got a very, very thorough scrubbing because of the issues brought up at the AfD for his book. Part of the issue was that whomever wrote the article at first puffed up claims to the point where the legitimacy of them was somewhat in question. That's why I really, really, REALLY think that any claims made by King need to be backed up with a non-merchant, non-SPS source. This started off with me mostly contesting the use of a merchant source, but now that I'm remembering the overall issues with the article, now I genuinely think this should be left off until it's backed up with something that isn't King. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:28, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
• Comment: No, the source is not a reliable, independent one to verify the claim " At launch in July 2015 it became best-seller in two UK subcategories at Amazon." Finnusertop (talk | guestbook | contribs) 06:30, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
  • Proposing to stop discussing this here for the time being: you've launched the WP:RSN topic at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Merchant sources as a source, then that's where we'll have the discussion until its conclusion there. No need to keep posting at two places on the same topic (I've closed threads for less). --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:34, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

Third Opinion

A third opinion has been requested. I see that a request has also been made at the reliable sources noticeboard. A third opinion is only applicable if no other dispute resolution is in progress, and RSN is a dispute resolution process. I am withdrawing the third opinion request, because RSN will provide the opinion. Robert McClenon (talk) 14:28, 13 December 2015 (UTC)