Talk:Sheldon Brown (bicycle mechanic)

Photo

Anyone know if we can put up a photo of Sheldon? There are lots on his web site, but I can't find any kind of policy for using material from his site... which is surprising because TONS of people copy images from his site to illustrate technical questions on bikeforums.net. Moxfyre 00:17, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Um, what about the one that's on there now? Just zis Guy you know? 14:54, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Did you ask Sheldon if he's okay with that photo being used on here? Moxfyre 16:30, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Organization of Entry

I think it would improve this article to delete the heading "Online" and to replace it with at least two other headings along the lines of: "Encyclopedic Efforts" and "Original Work."

Under the "encyclopedic" heading, Mr. Bown's efforts to develop an on-line resource for bicycle specifications, rare parts, etc. could be described.

Under the "original" heading, Mr. Brown's original contributions to bicycling could be described.

To the extent that much of this was posted online could, of course, be mentioned as appropriate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.42.245.81 (talk) 15:30, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Go for it! --Wiley (talk) 23:07, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Sheldon Brown edited Sheldon Brown. So what?

A recent edit added an info box stating "A contributor to this article, Sheldon Brown (talk · contribs), may be covered by or significantly related to this article. This user's editing has included significant contributions to this article. Relevant guidelines covering this situation include Wikipedia:Conflict of interest, Wikipedia:Autobiography and Wikipedia:Neutral point of view." The relevant edits are: [1], [2], [3]. Looking them over I see nothing sugesting conflict of interest, or non-neutral about the edits. Nor would I say they qualify as a significant contributions. I would like to see it changed back to the previous info box stating "The subject of this article, Sheldon Brown (bicycle mechanic), has edited Wikipedia as Sheldon Brown (talk · contribs)."--Keithonearth (talk) 04:41, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. Done. (returned to default status, using the uptodate template). -- Quiddity (talk) 19:36, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Data of Death Confusion

When I first saw the Death Certificate, I thought that it was inappropriate. However, I have changed my mind. Most sources, including the obituary I wrote for Sheldon, contain the wrong date of death (Feb. 3 instead of Feb. 4). If we do not keep some definitive evidence that Sheldon died on 2/4 linked to the article, people will keep trying to change the date back to 2/3, because that is the date published in most media sources. Ebikeguy (talk) 16:31, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Gripes

First it was:

• This article relies on references to primary sources or sources affiliated with the subject.
• The topic of this article may not meet Wikipedia's general notability guideline.
• This article needs additional citations for verification.

And after the obituary in The Times and BikeRadar were moved to the lede, and links to articles in The Boston Globe and Wired were added, it became:

• This article relies on references to primary sources or sources affiliated with the subject.
• This article needs additional citations for verification.
• This article reads like an editorial or opinion piece.

To which I would like to respond:

• wp:selfsource specifically allows for using self-published sources as sources of information about themselves. Would it be better to simply delete the references to "sources affiliated with the subject", and assume the points are uncontested? Is there a question about whether he suffered from MS or had to ride a tricycle near the end?
• There is exactly one "citation needed" flag. Does that warrant a banner at the top of the article?
• This article reads like an obituary. What is the editorial point or opinion that it is accused of pushing? That his work is appreciated? That he's missed? That's why he got an obituary in The Times, The Globe, and BikeRadar.

General flags are not helpful. Please be specific. -AndrewDressel (talk) 03:16, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

Affiliated self promotion. The thing is, the website still continues to generate revenue and when subject's own words or someone closely related is used to reference something like

the commercial pages are maintained and updated by Harris Cyclery employees, and the informational pages by his widow, Harriet Fell and his friend, John Allen, a noted bicycle authority.

The bolded part is a disputable opinion statement with a COI and it is something like this where improper use of self reference comes into place. You can not rely on a primary source to say that a the author's friend is notable. There are sections in sentence where it gives promotional tone and opinion pieces written based his own website. -Cantaloupe2 (talk) 06:07, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

Disputable by whom? He's nationally known:

John S. Allen has written over 200 articles for national bicycle magazines. He frequently serves as an expert witness-consultant in bicycle accident cases. Mr. Allen is also the author of The Complete Book of Bicycle Commuting (Rodale, 1981), and has co-authored or contributed to many other publications. John is very active in bicycle advocacy organizations including the Massachusetts Bicycle Coalition, Massachusetts Bicycle Safety Alliance, and the Federal Highway Administration’s Steering Committee for development of a national bicycling curriculum.[4]

Since the words "noted authority" are somehow being construed as editorial content, despite the well documented evidence to support them, I have replaced them with a direct quotation from one of the published, third-party sources: "a nationally recognized bicycling expert who helped found the Cambridge Bicycle Committee." -AndrewDressel (talk) 13:21, 28 December 2012 (UTC)

"His 'gain ratio' is significant standing alone. "

Among many things on his website, this was arbitrarily chosen for inclusion. Why should we include this or his expression of opinion on chain? They're both referenced to his own website and while this shows that he made those contributions, what makes this notable? We need secondary source asserting significance of these two points. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 01:14, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

I believe that we specifically do not need to establish notability for any detail in this article, based on my reading of Wikipedia:Notability#Notability_guidelines_do_not_limit_content_within_an_article. The detail in question here was inserted by some previous editor who, in what I can only assume was good faith, thought it should be included. I can think of no good reason to remove it at this time. -AndrewDressel (talk) 18:05, 28 December 2012 (UTC)

I can think of no good reason to include these examples, especially the latter about his OPINION, which is something every has and they all stink. There is no WP rule says "any inclusion that is a good faith shall be included". Cantaloupe2 (talk) 21:55, 28 December 2012 (UTC)

You have amply demonstrated, however, that you are completely unfamiliar with the subject, even seem hostile to it for some reason, and so it comes as no surprise that you would not know what should or should not be included in this article. Your very first edit to this article, questioning the notability of the subject when the references already included links to obituaries in The Boston Globe and The Times of London, suggests that you didn't even take the time to check the existing sources to gain some familiarity with the subject before you started editing. You have also demonstrated that you are unfamiliar with the applicable guidelines, that self-published sources may be used as sources of information about themselves and that there is no notability requirement for content of an article about a notable subject, and continue to ignore them after they are pointed out to you. At this point, I can think of no reason why your opinion about this article or its contents should matter in the least. -AndrewDressel (talk) 01:25, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

You fail to understand that Wikipedia is not a repository for every opinion Brown spewed and the selection of what to include should be based on a secondary reference. Arbitrary selection of what to include is an opinion decision and your opinion matters no more than mine, or anyone else's. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 07:29, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Cantaloupe2, you wrote "I can think of no good reason to include these examples, especially the latter about his OPINION, which is something every has and they all stink." It is not clear whether you mean that everyone's opinions stink or that Sheldon Brown's do. In whichever case, it does seem that you need to realise that Wikipedia editors are expected to regard the considered judgement of a recognised expert on matters falling within the area of his or her expertise as more deserving of inclusion than that of someone who is not a recognised expert.

In this particular case, you seem to have started with or acquired an attitude of contempt towards Sheldon Brown ("every opinion Brown spewed"). Unless you can provide a rational basis for that contempt, it might be better if you were to step away from editing in this area. NebY (talk) 10:57, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

What I'm saying is that it is one of many things he's opined. Of those, that example was chosen by an editor who I would guess is an advocate of that. Why should that opinion be included? It isn't cited, it isn't noted as particularly notable by secondary sources. Lawyers are experts in legal field. So, should we just quote an opinion of a lawyer out of nowhere? Though not cited, currently the prose reads there's no generally accepted opinion among riders or lubricant manufacturers, so whether his opinion is valid here or not is particularly controversial. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 11:30, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Please reread Wikipedia:Notability#Notability_guidelines_do_not_limit_content_within_an_article and appreciate that Wikipedia stands or falls on the ability of its editors to select salient features of a subject for inclusion in an article, and please do not attack those selections on the basis of what you "guess" about other editors.

Your assumption that we should not record someone's views unless they are generally accepted is absolutely wrong with regards to articles about persons; consider for example how impoverished our article on Fred Hoyle would be if we applied that rule. This is not in any way "particularly controversial". It is merely a situation in which you need to recognise that there is consensus here with the sole exception of yourself, that that consensus is founded on knowledge and experience which you lack, and that it would be disruptive for you to continue. NebY (talk) 12:36, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Unreliable sources

An editor claim that there is a wide spread disagreement among and inserted it in prose at one point. Two references were added to WP:SPS websources published in first hand reflective style and neither of them are established experts per WP:RS. These sources appear to be written to reflect the authors' personal opinions. They're two accounts of anecdotes which are too dubious and fail to substantially prove the claim "a topic which is often a source of disagreement[citation needed] among riders and among lubricant manufacturers Cantaloupe2 (talk) 05:26, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

While the first source is not great, the second source is Greg Kopecky, Technical Editor at Slowtwitch.com. I believe this is more than sufficient for this small detail. I can find no prohibition against "first hand reflective style". Instead, wp:rs explicitly states that

Note that otherwise reliable news sources—for example, the website of a major news organization—that publish in a "blog" style format for some or all of their content may be as reliable as if published in a more "traditional" 20th-century format.

I have modified the article text to more-closely paraphrase this source. -AndrewDressel (talk) 05:39, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

It depends on if the blog is a news style with editorial board oversight, or more a column which includes author's opinion, including his anecdotes. If the source is not known for fact checking, the author's statement that its a controversial area maybe nothing more than something based on his personal experience, which is not admissible.

Is it your impression that Greg Kopecky meets the criteria "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications" and "slowtwitch.com" meet the generally accepted definition of "reliable third party publication?

Once again, you demonstrate your unfamiliarity with this topic. Mr. Kopecky is not "self-published", his articles on slowtwitch are not a blog, and "slowtwitch.com" does meet the generally accepted definition of "reliable third party publication". You are welcome to question it on Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard, but you will get the same result as you did with Sheldon Brown. By having the title of "Technical Editor" at such a publication, he is an established expert on technical topics related to bicycles. When he reports that a something within that realm is controversial, then it is. -AndrewDressel (talk) 06:15, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Let's agree to disagree over if "technical editor" of the website "slowtwitch.com" constitutes "have been published reliably in secondary source" criteria under our policies governing expert. I am looking into this and will consider soliciting RSN opinion on it. Thank you, Cantaloupe2 (talk) 09:32, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Also, please explain why you removed the self-published tag from a business owner's commentary from his own business' site when the said owner does not have established and verifiable expertise through publications in relevant field. - Cantaloupe2 (talk) 05:46, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

This version of the article suggests that I did no such thing. -AndrewDressel (talk) 06:15, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

In this edit, you removed two tags. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 09:49, 10 January 2013 (UTC)Cantaloupe2 (talk) 09:28, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Yes, and a quick check reveals that neither one of those tags was a "self-published tag from a business owner's commentary from his own business' site," so it has become difficult to understand what you are complaining about. -AndrewDressel (talk) 16:56, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

The SPS that go after the slowtwitch which we're not quite in agreement with, as well as the primary source tag which applied to both that and obviously dubious opinion piece bikesportmichigan. My position is that Greg Kopecky fails to meet the guideline of "reliably published in secondary source" criteria. Google search "Greg Kopecky" and bicycle returned zero result in Google Scholars and in Google news, it returns a result that he filed a legal action against a city after he ran his bicycle into a parked city vehicle in contrary to local ordinance and he received a settlement of $50,000. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 09:49, 10 January 2013 (UTC)Cantaloupe2 (talk) 09:28, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

So, is your complaint about "a business owner's commentary from his own business' site" or about Greg Kopecky at slowtwitch.com? You do realize that they are not one-and-the-same, right? -AndrewDressel (talk) 16:56, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Both. 1.) why did you remove SPS tag from some Michigan bike shop's employee commentary?

Okay, now we are just going in circles. You keep making this accusation, which is simply not correct, as far as I can tell. I did correctly remove the tag from the slowtwitch reference, twice, because it is not self-published, but I never edited the Michigan Bike shop reference after I added it. In fact, this edit shows that the tag was still in the Michigan Bike shop reference when you deleted the entire reference. Please, either provide a link to the edit I made removing the tag, or stop making the accusation. -AndrewDressel (talk) 16:32, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

I'd have to see where the tag got dropped...Cantaloupe2 (talk) 17:54, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Please do. I have looked, and I do not believe that I deleted it. When you find it, please post a link to it here so that we can check it. If you do not find it, please post a retraction of your repeated accusation. -AndrewDressel (talk) 09:31, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

however, it looks like this self published bunk reference got added in this. edit AndrewDressel, why did you insert this self published source?Cantaloupe2 (talk) 17:54, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

I inserted that reference because there was a citation needed tag, and it was the first one I found. As the edit history shows, I followed it up within minutes with a better reference, which exactly confirms that "bunk". Finally, that same "bunk" has now been backed up with a reference from a confirmed established expert in the field. -AndrewDressel (talk) 09:31, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

2.)Greg Kopecky, though not quite as obvious appears to fail reliable source criteria.

It is only unreliable in your opinion, which appears to be based on a demonstrated lack of familiarity with the subject. -AndrewDressel (talk) 16:32, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

It seems that this whole discussion is moot, now that Sheldon Brown's web site has been declared "a reliable source, as attested by reliable independent commentators and no informed dissent cited." I have updated the sentence in question to reflect that fact. -AndrewDressel (talk) 16:56, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Not exactly. What part of what he said is worth mentioning is an editorial decision and a secondary source should be used to do so. I still don't find the claim that it is a controversial area among manufacturers adequately supported. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 11:19, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

First, the opinion in question has been edited to better match the reference and no longer mentions manufacturers. Second, the editorial decision of what opinions to include should be left to those editors familiar with the material and who have not already demonstrated a point of view by commenting about opinions that "they all stink." -AndrewDressel (talk) 16:32, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Agree to disagree. It should be left to someone who does not make preemptive bias that Sheldon Brown is bicycle god that affects their ability to edit objectivelyCantaloupe2 (talk) 17:38, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Excellent. I believe that the evidence confirms that I fit that description. I have not shown a "preemptive bias that Sheldon Brown is bicycle god" because I do not have such a bias. I merely believe, based on my long history of reading, working, and editing in this field, that he is an established expert in this field, and this has recently been confirmed by the discussion on the reliable sources notice board. -AndrewDressel (talk) 09:31, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

I think not. your edit comment to advance your position appears to go against NPOV. "expand description to reflect Brown's well-documented reputation as an expert ("guru", "encyclopedic knowledge", "bike-tech wizard", "human encyclopedia of bicycling knowledge") in the field of bicycles.)" Cantaloupe2 (talk) 18:38, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

You are welcome to seek a second opinion, but the simple fact is that Brown was known for being an expert on bicycles, as the provided references amply confirm, and the article should reflect that. Why on earth would he even be notable otherwise? Because he was a bicycle mechanic? Because he had a web site? Of course not. The only point of view I am bringing to this article is that the it should accurately reflect the source material, and that was my point when I quoted the sources ("guru", "encyclopedic knowledge", "bike-tech wizard", "human encyclopedia of bicycling knowledge") in my edit summary. You don't like my paraprasing the sources with "expert"? Fine, I'll just follow the example of how best to avoid puffery in WP:PEACOCK, and use a direct quote from The Times, which described his knowledge of bicycles as "encyclopedic".

If anyone has demonstrated a point of view here, it is you. You have some ax to grind, I know not why, and you continue to grasp at straws in an apparent effort to eviscerate this article. You started with questioning notability, although it already had a reference to his obituary in The Times of London. Then you questioned his reliability as a source, even though WP:SELFPUB clearly states that self published sources "may be used as sources of information about themselves". In that process, you managed to get Brown confirmed as a reliable source for all articles about bicycle technology. Finally, you've gone on a citation-needed tagging spree so that now the article has 33 references and only 19 sentences. The only details you've managed to get removed are the approximate dates that he worked for various publications. What a relief it must be that the world is spared from that original research.

I think you misunderstand "verifiability". It means that something can be verified, not that it already has been verified. WP:CHALLENGE specifically states that editors should "attribute all quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged". (emphasis in original text) That the original contributors to this article did not think that a detail was likely to be challenged is not a reason to accuse them of original research. The only reason I can imagine for you finding so many details questionable is that you came to this article with some preconceived notion about Brown and are trying to make the article fit it. Your profile states that you consider yourself to be a deletionist, and that's a pretty clear point of view. I think it is long past time for you to stop your disruptive editing of this article, and if you do not, I will seek outside intervention. -AndrewDressel (talk) 19:38, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

It's uncalled for to bring up a tag to what I subscribe to in order to sway consensus. I attest that unreliable source is valid, because I find it to be that Greg oh boy I ran into an illegal city parked truck let's sue 'em for $50,000 guy's opinion. He starts off with the hook "Why then, is there so much controversy surrounding chains?" and offers his opinion. Slowtwitch does not have strong editorial and peer reviewing like academic journals, so him being published previously does not quite establish his opinion as "expert opinion" per WP:SPS standards. So, his claim is challenged. Now unreliable source tag is added. Your argument was that "the website of a major news organization—that publish in a "blog" style format for some or all of their content may be as reliable as if published in a more "traditional" 20th-century format.". That slowtwitch site does not even compare to the credibility of blogs.NYTimes or other mainstream news blogs, but you're welcome to ask RSN to get more input. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 22:21, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

• I do not see how bringing up a tag to what an editor subscribes to is any different than bringing up an editor's edit summaries or an editor's posts on user talk pages. Could you explain the difference? -AndrewDressel (talk) 23:57, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
• I do not see how a technical editor's lawsuit has any bearing on whether they are a reliable source or not for topics about which they write? Could you explain why you think it does? -AndrewDressel (talk) 23:57, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
• I have asked RSN for more input here: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#www.slowtwitch.com.2F_and_Technical_Editor_Greg_Kopecky -AndrewDressel (talk) 23:57, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Atheist

"In August 2007, Brown was diagnosed with primary progressive multiple sclerosis. He died on February 4, 2008 in Newton, Massachusetts, after a heart attack. Brown was an atheist."

What is the relationship between those sentences? He died as a curse for being atheist? I don't understand.--200.223.199.146 (talk) 13:46, 16 March 2017 (UTC)