2009/4/27 doc <doc.wikipedia(a)ntlworld.com>om>:
The sourcing issue on notability is silly. It
seems to me to be the
brainchild of scientists who want to deny the fact that what's important
in human life is subjective and cannot be reduced to some arithmetical
formula: sources *n / PI = notability.
To take an obvious example. An article on an 18th church building, which
has been created using a well-researched webpage from the church and
perhaps some mention on the denomination's site, plus one brief mention
on the site of the village in which it is situation, is deleted as "not
notable" because it lacks "multiple third party sources".
If an 18th century church has managed to avoid appearing in any of the
books on random bits of village architecture and in any of the local
histories that fill the shelves of libraries it's not very notable. If
a church has managed to exist since the 18th century without being the
subject of even one local news piece it's heading towards impressively
non notable territory. I can see it happening with some of the 60s
built churches (assuming the local newspaper has a ban on printing
anything religion related) but even 19th century would be rather
surprising.
There always are going to be edge cases. Discussions of the inclusion
business do tend to resolve into people denying that the given case is
an edge case. Nothing much we can do there - an eighteenth century
church would be much more notable in Idaho than in Ipswich anyway.
Don't tell me such a thing in England wouldn't be in Pevsner, though.
Charles