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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) Tymon.r Do you have any questions? 23:10, 11 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Harald Tveit Alvestrand

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Harald Tveit Alvestrand (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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Subject does not meet WP:GNG nor WP:BASIC due to lack of significant coverage by independent reliable sources. Also does not meet WP:NACADEMIC - Scopus shows that his scholarly authorship consists of 4 non-memo articles with 18 citations total per Scopus while Web of Science reveals no articles. He also published RFC memos which should not count as "research", of which only RFC 2434 is heavily cited (Google Scholar gives 6 memos with over 50 citations and several memos of fewer citations) even if they did count, and 4 non-memo articles with 18 citations total per Scopus. Also sat on the board of a few standards organizations but that in itself doesn't grant notability. — MarkH21 (talk) 22:47, 4 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Norway-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 22:49, 4 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. — MarkH21 (talk) 22:52, 4 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions. — MarkH21 (talk) 22:52, 4 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Being the subject of the article, I'm not going to take a position on this, but I fundamentally disagree with the poster's dismissal of RFCs as "memos which should not count" when determining notability. RFCs are, in my opinion, much more influential than most formally published sources. Alvestrand (talk) 20:09, 7 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    • To clarify, I do not mean that RFCs are not influential nor important. But they are not the usual peer-reviewed academic publications. If a particular RFC is highly cited by journal articles, conference articles, or academic books then it can certainly count towards "either several extremely highly cited scholarly publications or a substantial number of scholarly publications with significant citation rates" per Criterion #1 of WP:NACADEMIC.
In this case, it does not appear that these RFCs satisfy the above property (even the citations of RFC 2434 are almost exclusively from other RFCs). I'm not making the statement that your work is not influential, but that I cannot find evidence of it currently meeting WP:NACADEMIC nor the other notability guidelines. — MarkH21 (talk) 20:36, 7 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I would say Harald's contributions in IETF, as specialist, Applications Group leader and writer was vital for the Internet we know today. Important standards such as all the email, directories and internationalisations standards were created in part or in full by him, and are still what carries our daily communication FrodeHernes (talk) 21:07, 7 March 2019 (UTC) — FrodeHernes (talk · contribs) has only contributed to the article(s) under discussion for deletion and this XFD page. — MarkH21 (talk) 03:46, 9 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: With regards to WP:BASIC and WP:GNG, I have found one source from a reliable secondary independent outlet with significant independent coverage of the subject (the same exact article is also published here and a similar article by the same author appears here). I could not find another one but if someone does, that should be sufficient for notability. — MarkH21 (talk) 21:57, 7 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Keep: Noting that scientists are "referred to as 'academics' for convenience" and accordingly mapping the WP:NACADEMIC criteria to the context of the IETF, I would argue that authoring a dozen RFCs, half of which are BCPs (including the IETF's mission statement), already clearly satisfies the first ("significant impact") test, as well as the seventh test ("substantial impact outside academia") given the widespread adoption of said RFCs in industry. His membership on several selective and significant boards satisfies test three and/or five ("elected member" and "named chair" respectively), and being the chair of the IETF for a non-negligible time satisfies tests six and/or eight in this context ("highest-level post" and "chief editor" respectively). I also note that his IETF predecessor and successor both have articles with similar profiles, yet neither is listed in AfD. -- samj inout 07:35, 8 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    • I will just note my disagreement with a few points. The "significant impact" and "substantial impact outside academia" may be true but 'need to be demonstrated by external independent sources'. Membership on editorial boards and boards of directors of non-profit companies (granted, they are not typical non-profits) is not equivalent to being an elected member of a highly selective and prestigious scholarly society or association (e.g. a National Academy of Sciences or the Royal Society). It is even less close to being equivalent to being a named chair or distinguished professorship (e.g. the Sadleirian Professor of Pure Mathematics or an MIT Institute Professor). The existence of similar articles that have not been AfD'ed yet is also not relevant (it is possible that they should be as well). — MarkH21 (talk) 18:41, 8 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
      • While I agree that the predecessor and successor do not provide basis for an argument, their presence under a similar interpretation of the guidelines (described in the context of academia "for convenience") is relevant. I'd also argue that the selection process for both contributors and contributions in this context are at least as stringent as for academia, and the impact, to the point made below, typically far greater. Hence opting for a "strong keep" rather than soft balling it. -- samj inout 05:18, 9 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep: User:SamJ summed it up well, so I won't bother repeating all of that, but suffice it to say, I think being an IETF chair (and the first non-American, and the who wrote their mission statement, etc.) makes him plenty notable enough for Wikipedia. Beginning (talk) 08:05, 8 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep leaning towards User:SamJ, while we can talk up or down impact, and WP:N is not inherited from the other chairs as we need multiple non-primary / third party sources for GNG which isn't met yet. In this case, I think despite a BLP, primaries are OK as per NACADEMIC which is the spirit here. I will remove my old notability tag. Widefox; talk 22:14, 8 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: Concerning RFCs: standards track RFCs are very heavily peer reviewed. While they are not the standard academic journal article, they are a notable intellectual work. From a pragmatic perspective, they have more impact, on average, than normal scientific work. And it's more than slightly ironic that any web site question this. Please consider the work that is at the basis of the site and the whole Internet: RFC 791 (IP), RFC 793 (TCP), RFC 2616 (HTTP), and RFC 2660 (HTTPS) just to name a few. Harald's specific contributions are easily seen here.Tony1athome (talk) 01:56, 9 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Keep: I am with User:SamJ on many levels. I would also reiterate the sentiment expressed by User:Tony1athome about RFCs being heavily peer reviewed. If nothing else, he does qualify under “The person has had a substantial impact outside academia in their academic capacity.“ TonyHansen 03:42, 10 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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