Talk:Phil Chen

Age at death

Message below moved from my talk page. Ghmyrtle (talk) 22:53, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

Phil Chen was born 10/21/46 and was 75 at the time of death on 12/14/21. Source: his family has been trying to correct this all day. Please refer to his official Facebook page where we have added his correct birth date: https://www.facebook.com/PhilChenBass/posts/343054860962894

Thank You. 68.7.231.151 (talk) 22:46, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

The issue here is that Wikipedia is based on what reliable published sources state, and all the sources that I've seen give his age as 80, not 75. If they are wrong, can I suggest that you raise the error with those newspapers, and others, to make sure that what you believe to be the correct dates are published. Then, we will be able to make any changes here. Unfortunately so far as you are concerned, we do not normally accept Facebook postings, or comments from family members, as necessarily reliable. Ghmyrtle (talk) 23:29, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

@Ghmyrtle:, normally I would agree with you on the Facebook front. However, two things. That's his official FB page and what his family are saying should be carefully considered. More importantly though, we do have some RS's that say 75. Here and here. In this instance, we can use these RS's and ignore the ones that say 80. Perhaps the solution would be to add a note to the lead or infobox clarifying his year of birth e.g. "Whilst many obituaries claimed that Chen was 80, others claimed he was 75, which matches the information shared by his family on his Facebook page at the time". Thoughts? --Jkaharper (talk) 03:33, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

@Jkaharper: - Well, the second source you cite now gives his age as 80 - but his entry at Discogs has been edited to show the 1946 date. I'm happy to go with the 1946 date, maybe with a footnote - I'd originally included a similar note in the "Personal life" section but it was removed in this edit. Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:33, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

PS: Another oddity is that, though the Discogs entry now gives his full name as Phillip David Chen, this anonymous and unexplained edit back in 2011 gave an "alias" as "Phillip Edward Chen". I suggest we remove that one and use the Discogs-supported name. Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:40, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks @Ghmyrtle:, I've had a look on Ancestry and every residency record from California and Florida (two plays he was based for a time) says he was born in October 1946 as Phillip David Chen. I honestly have no ides where this 1940 birth year has come from. Classic example of one media source printing a mistake and then all the others copying it without checking it seems. --Jkaharper (talk) 13:08, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

The Discogs reference should be discounted as Discogs is a wiki (I often edit it, and I've no idea why it's being used as a Wikipedia source on this occasion). But the Guitar.com is a reliable outlet and should be believed. Ref ^(chew)(do) 14:56, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

I've removed the {{dubious}} tag as this now seems to be resolved. Ghmyrtle (talk) 15:02, 16 December 2021 (UTC)