Sunday 15 September 2013

Dealer Dave's Monstrously Erudite Polymathism not for Wikipedia


Not so long ago Dealer Dave Welsh self-proclaimed polymath was boasting of how monstrously erudite he was, having devoured a mountain of numismatic books. To prove it he created a Wikipedia page on "Classical coins" by cutting and pasting a page from his commercial website which "has been acclaimed as a valuable survey and introduction to the subject".  His hope was that it would "become the definitive online treatment of the subject", and a "valuable informative and impressive presentation of the inherent value and contributions of ancient numismatics" (for the benefit, it seems of "some archaeologists who [...] have dismissed coin collecting as mere institutionalized (sic) acquisitiveness, without taking the trouble to learn anything about the subject"). Well, sadly I guess the thickheaded archaeologists won't have a chance now. The page has been summarily deleted (06:24, 15 September 2013). 
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Classical_Coins

This is a very nice essay but it is completely redundant to both coin and numismatics (and the broader series of articles on the history of coins in various contexts). Suggest the author contribute to those articles rather than trying to get his original research published on WP. Stalwart111 06:23, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
And on closer inspection, the essay seems to have been written to drive web traffic to (wait for it...) www.classicalcoins.com, an online coin shop (and most links go to specific pages where you can buy the coins in question) run by someone with the same name as the original author who talks about creating the page on his blog. That's not what Wikipedia is for, sorry. I have removed those links so we can deal with the article on its merits. Stalwart111 06:54, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Northamerica1000(talk) 08:07, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

  • Delete as WP:FORK. Recommend author read WP:COI before considering additional contributions to Wikipedia on this topic. -- Green Cardamom (talk) 15:45, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Delete I am sure that WP will have adequate articles covering all the coins discussed. This is a mere essay, followed by a long bibliography, which is not linked to the text as in-line citations. I would recommend that the author should investigate what we already have in WP and seek to improve that from what appears to be his extensive library on the subject (and without inserting links to his website). Peterkingiron (talk) 18:34, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Delete WP:NOTESSAY, WP:NOTPROMOTION, WP:COI: take your pick. Agricolae (talk) 02:57, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Delete per above. I tagged it under CSD G12, which the author circumvented by adding a CC-BY-SA-3.0 to www.classicalcoins.com, cf. Talk:Classical Coins. Sam Sailor Sing 15:55, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
  • Delete per above. Nothing new here, and a scattered approach.--DThomsen8 (talk) 13:18, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
Looks like it's back to the drawing board for Dealer Dave. Perhaps if he wanted to write something presenting the "inherent value and contributions of ancient (sic) numismatics", he'd do better to produce a stand-alone book on the topic which does not consist of a long exposition of Roman history illustrated by a few coins.

Anyway the question of at least one of those "some archaeologists" was not about the results of this research, whatever they are, but the theory and methodology of that research, which define it as a discipline. It is this issue which "professional numismatist" Dealer  Dave (having himself raised it) is consistently trying to dodge by now writing a series of highly insulting posts on the subject of the questioner. Perhaps it's time instead to simply address the question?

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