Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Elphel

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 no consensus.  Sandstein  18:45, 7 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Elphel (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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Fails GNG; almost all refs are SPS; other sources are passing mentions. Did a BEFORE and all there are low quality blogs. Article has been edited extensively by eponymous account. Jytdog (talk) 00:45, 24 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Photography-related deletion discussions. Lepricavark (talk) 13:49, 24 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Companies-related deletion discussions. Lepricavark (talk) 13:49, 24 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Software-related deletion discussions. Lepricavark (talk) 13:49, 24 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• It is a notable Open Source Hardware company IMHO, in the sense that they are known by many practitioners of OSHW like myself. I remember seeing a presentation by their CEO in Geneva in 2014. They are listed in a list of companies/projects using the CERN Open Hardware Licence, maintained by CERN. --Pam pam orellut (talk) 14:19, 26 October 2017 (UTC) — Pam pam orellut (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

• I created this article, due the importance of this Open Source Hardware company, the creators of the Elphel camera, a camera that is Open Source which isn't a common practice amongst the photography/videography hardware makers, I ask not to remove this article, as I find very important to allow more people to know about the open source cameras, it's important for me to allow the people to consider openness when it comes to choose a camera, and this article helps it to be possible. I'm not and I've never been affiliated to the company, but back in time I fount It unjustifiable to not have a article on Wikipedia about those open cameras, I've been working on Elphel cameras software outside the company out of the importance it has to me this openness: albeit very incomplete it is a first step from me, and the other pals we where working, our intend was to open up the possibilities for cinematographers in the future. I also worked within the Apertus community back when they where working with Elphel cameras (today no longer in their path) so to me this article function is still very useful, and I ask not to remove it, and in case of a technicality being the problem, I ask what could be changed in the article to not be suitable to be removed as I'm looking forward to amend whatever from the article. --Biel Bestué (talk) 16:55, 26 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That is all ideological and has nothing to do with how we think about whether to delete or keep an article. Jytdog (talk) 03:54, 27 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• well I proposed I could give a hand on changing whatever it was needed to be amended in order to keep the article, and let me ask you again, what could I change in order to maintain the article?

besides, my reasons can be ideological, it's my freedom on why I consider an article important and why I made it, isn't the whole Wikipedia concept about the freedom of the individual to know more in an efficient way? and yet isn't this the same ideology stance as mine? all my articles I've made where made following this ideology (specially the ones about Anarchist cinema production companies in Barcelona in the 30's), then why this article is not wanted and those are kept?

I also introduced my ideology in my previous statement because when it comes to OSHW companies or the OSHW "way of life" there is always a component of ideology in their endeavours, in fact defending the freedom of the end-user is clearly a ideological stance.

But do you consider, maybe, that this article is about them making an advert out of it? because I don't find this article any propagandistic for the Elphel company to gain money, as it only states their existence, the cameras they produce, and even there is a reference to Axiom which isn't made by them.

So let me reiterate, as a friendly gesture, what should I change so Wikipedia keeps the article? Biel Bestué (talk) 07:31, 27 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I also consider the work that this company has done: 1) first hardware Theora implementation, 2) first open camera effort (before CHDK, Magic Lantern, and reason for the starting the Apertus project) 3) their radical different approach in camera calibration for stereogrammetry more than enough reason to justify both a company page. I would even say that Filippov as scientist would deserve a personal entry. Like Biel, would want to support this article with writing effort. --Skinkie (talk) 18:52, 5 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Elphel is a peer recognized and part of Open Source Hardware Movement history. This is not enough as you said, so here are a few more references about the company. Elphel is cited in books, magazines and over 150 papers on Google Scholar , many of those are peer reviewed . Elphel was the origin of [1].

Elphel has received distinct covergage on the most relevant news site in the area, like Imaging Sensor World , Linux Devices , Make Magazine, Xilinx's Xcell journal and others . The article could be improved to cite those sources and make sure it records the participation of the company in the social and cultural development of open source hardware.

Phsilva (talk) 01:27, 31 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Please read WP:Golden rule. Some of those refs are in the article. Others like github are not independent reliable sources with significant discussion. A paper using the camera, is not a source about the camera. Jytdog (talk) 01:52, 31 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Jytdog, as a founder of Elphel I am not discussing the company, but I have a concern related to the process. Can you please confirm that there is no CoI here, that you have found Elphel page on your own (using some software tool, or just manually scanning all company pages from A and by now reached E), not with the help of some anonymous tipster who may have used your great service to Wikipedia without disclosing possible CoI? Andrey Filippov 166.70.117.129 (talk) 20:13, 31 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete Non-notable company which fails primary notability requirements for inclusion into the encylopedia. All this WP:BLUDGEON is getting very irritating and furthermore @Jytdog i think you should open a sockpuppetry investigation. i suspect suckpuppetry at play here.Celestina007 (talk) 01:19, 01 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Jytdog, please excuse me my "spamming" and don't take it personal - I'm not accusing you of any wrongdoing, like PE. And I'm not advocating for my company - nomination for deletion does have negative impact on any business, but it will fade soon after page will be deleted. The number of users coming to the company web site from Wikipedia is negligible compared to those coming from the search engines and more specific sites discussing related areas. Once we had referrer block on the company web site for links from Wikipedia to make sure we are not using it for promotion - it is easy to restore it. But I believe I have a legitimate concern related to manipulation of the Wikipedia editors in general, especially with such predictable behavior. Google search knows you as a "notorious Wikipedia editor" and while you are proud of 100K+ edits, amount of the pages deleted by you should also great. And when it comes to large numbers, statistics kicks in and you are very predictable. Let's assume you are 100% politically neutral concerning American political parties. And some organization (e.g. Putin's Internet trolls :-) ) tips you off with small Wikipedia pages that are pro-democratic. And you honestly, believing in the good for Wikipedia and humanity as a whole nominate those pages for deletion. Don't you think it would make Wikipedia biased? My insider info does not provide a prouf, but gives me a strong evidence that this time you acted within 24 hours after receiving the tip, as a well-oiled machine.Please excuse me and do not take it as an insult. Andrey Filippov 166.70.117.129 (talk) 15:37, 1 November 2017 (UTC) (yes, it is one of my company's IPs for the last 10 years)[reply]

I have no connections, financial or otherwise, with any camera companies or any organization that might compete with Elphel. There is no "russian inteference" tipsterism going on. I am not sure how i stumbled across this hijacked Wikipedia page - I was looking at some digital imaging stuff around that time and it happened then. That was days and many, many WP pages ago.

The page remains abysmal and has gotten worse as this AfD has unfolded - someone has even added another WP article as a "source" which is invalid per WP:USERGENERATED. Jytdog (talk) 23:16, 4 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Jytdog, I'll take your word that it was your free will and not an anonymous tipster. Please be assured that I never accused you with any connection - financial or otherwise to some "competitors" and could not do it even theoretically. "Anonymous" implies absence of connection. Andrey Filippov 166.70.117.129 (talk) 05:49, 5 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - Elphel developed the cameras used for Google Street View, per this Forbes article [2]. The Forbes article and the fact it developed cameras used by Google (plus coverage in Make Magazine [3] makes them notable to me. GigglesnortHotel (talk) 15:39, 2 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete as the claims do not really prove that this is a notable company. Furthermore, the citations used are not exactly the high quality references I expect, which makes me sceptical of some of the claims. Some observations
  1. Ref #1 (Forbes) is a contributor article which actually quotes from Wikipedia. See the sentence "...I didn't find the Elphel name mentioned in any recent Google posts, however, I did find them mentioned on other sites including Wikipedia..." An article which uses Wikipedia as a source of claims is not useful for proving notability.
  2. Nasa.gov seems to have no mention of Elphel that I could find. I found a mention on Nasaspaceflight.com, but that is not an official website.
  3. When I evaluate OpenSouceProjects, I look for not only sources discussing them but also how widespread is the use of the project among the community. There is a google blog [4] which does mention that Google used Elphel cameras in 2007 for book scanning and street view. (Which they later replaced with their own design if I am not wrong) However, apart from this, there is little else which I see as a claim to notability.
  4. Google Scholar lists papers, but the top 3 are by the founder of the company himself. While some of the other papers mention Elphel, there is hardly anything by the way of a description. I cannot find mentions in Tier-1 Graphics/Vision conference papers. To me this strikes as a niche scientific product, used in certain experiments but perhaps not widely used.
• I will go for a delete here. As the only claim to notability is that it was once used in Google Street View, I believe a mention in the Google Street View article is warranted. But I don't see enough for it to have a separate article.--DreamLinker (talk) 20:01, 4 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello DreamLinker, as you mentioned GSV article, may I request related Wikipedia edits? I do not have (and may not have as an interested party) any objections to deleting Elphel page, but red links in Google Books and Google Street View pages may become misleading to Wikipedia readers as there will be no explanations available through the links. What is important for me is that readers know that over 30 billion available online images (through Google Books) of the most valuable books (what Google scanned in the first 8 years of the project are made with free hardware designed cameras, running free software under GNU GPL, not just some no-name Elphel proprietary company. Similar for GSV, but the GSV imagery will eventually be replaced by more recent shots, while the valuable book pages will remain there for a while. It may leave the wrong impression that Open Hardware is only something like blinking LEDs or nice (I love and use them), but still simple designs like Arduino. So my request is to change references to Elphel to references to free hardware designed cameras running GNU GPL software in both Google Books and Google Street View pages (perfectly OK not to mention our company name). Andrey Filippov, founder of Elphel 166.70.153.65 (talk) 07:12, 5 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - Passes GNG. Leading firm in the manufacture of open-source panoramic cameras. In addition to the Forbes coverage above, see THIS COVERAGE in the book The Frankencamera: Building a Programmable Camera for Computational Photography,by Eino-Ville Aleksi Talvala. Carrite (talk) 19:15, 5 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I guess you can call somebody's dissertation a "book" and get all-caps excited about it if you like, but in my book somebody using X to build Y as part of an academic project is not exactly notable. And yes the use in the Google Street Views camera has been mentined as the only real claim to N. That's it. Jytdog (talk) 19:58, 5 November 2017 (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.