Talk:Rock & Roll Library

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I'm new to wiki (today) and I added Rock & Roll Library because it is a "notable" organization that has run national programs with international recording artists including Melissa Etherdige and Gavin DeGraw. They are a nonprofit organization providing free lesson plans for teachers and are also building a free online resource for music fans and provide cool things like music trivia, this day in music facts and a big photo gallery.

I didn't know that I shouldn't be externally linking to artists in their music archive like Eric Clapton (who is their featured artist which is why I added him) or Melissa Etheridge and Gavin DeGraw.

I really don't see why what I added to ME and GD was deleted from their wiki entries. I understand if you want to remove the link but the content? Wiki doesn't consider Melissa Etheridge or Gavin DeGraw showing up at a school to talk to about education notable? I guess I really don't understand your reasoning. In earnest, I ask that you please explain so I can better understand. realkyhick sent me a message about it and I told them that I was new and asked what I should do to fix it. They replied with a less than helpful response, deleted some very relevant content from ME and GD's wiki entries, threatened to ban me and now the Rock & Roll Library page on tap to be deleted. All I did was try to add some RELEVANT content about a "notable" company with cool music programs.

I hope a reasonable person from wiki will read this and review the content so that they can see for themselves what I'm talking about. I admitted that I didn't know external linking like that wasn't allowed, it's not a big deal to me and I stopped AS SOON AS I WAS TOLD. RockLibrary.com is a reliable source for music information. They're doing something for music like IMDB so I would think that you'd want to link to it but if not it doesn't matter but that doesn't mean that ALL reference to them should be deleted from the wiki as happened today.

I think that I created a talk page about Rock & Roll Library here but I'm not sure, it's my first day and I'm still learning. If I need to do something else someone please let me know. I would appreciate some help rather than being yelled at and threatened with banning.

Sincerely, A newbie --Teamplayer007 03:43, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

We appreciate your efforts, but unfortunately your idea of what is notable doesn't agree with Wikipedia's notability guidelines. The main problem here is that, as it is current;y constituted, the RRL is mainly a local (Boston) non-profit organization with lofty goals, but which hasn't achieved those goals yet. One measure of notability for groups such as this is having something written about them by independent, reliable sources such as newspapers, magazines and major web sites. A Google search will for a notable organization will usually turn up at least a couple of dozen hits, at the very minimum, not counting hots from Wikipedia itself, sites which are "reflectors" for Wikipedia, or the organizations' own web site(s). Unfortunately, a Google search for "rock roll library" turned up nothing related other than pages from rocklibrary.com. And no, an appearance at a school or two by a celebrity like Melissa Etheridge is not notable — stars do stuff like that all the time.

In short, the organization simply doesn't meet Wikipedia's standards for notability. It may at a later time, but it hasn't yet. I've referred you to this page before, but you really need to know about Wikipedia policies for notability, so please read it. It is the primary criteria for determining whether or not an article stays or goes. "Notability" is a word that gets thrown around a lot around here, for better or worse.

If you persist in re-posting articles about a non-notable subject after they have been deleted, you are violating WP rules and may be banned.

It's nothing personal toward you or your writing — virtually every editor here has gone through the same thing when we were newbies. The issue is simply the notability of the subject.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask. Realkyhick 05:28, 30 May 2007 (UTC)