Svetlana Velmar-Janković

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 delete‎. ✗plicit 23:45, 23 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Chris Macdonald (scientist) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

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Fails WP:SIRS and so fails WP:GNG. - UtherSRG (talk) 19:15, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: People, Academics and educators, and United Kingdom. UtherSRG (talk) 19:15, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Authors, Science, and England. WCQuidditch ✎ 20:33, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

 Comment: Has anyone seen if he passes one of the criteria for WP:PROF? The Prof Test is an alternative method of showing notability, so please ping me. Bearian (talk) 18:11, 10 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete. This is a young professor who has just gotten an under-40 years old award. The "extensive coverage" of his work is the newspaper reports generated from a single University of Cambridge press release. He appears to have only that single paper in Google scholar, which has mixed him up with a Canadian business professor. It is too soon for him to have an article. StarryGrandma (talk) 18:59, 10 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Do Not Delete:.

• Dr Macdonald has multiple publications: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3880-6563
• His coverage was not the result of a ‘single University press release’ – it was the featured research story on the University homepage – and independently of that, it was covered by BBC, ITV, etc.
• He clearly passes the criteria for WP:PROF (of which you only need to meet one):

1. The person's research has had a significant impact in their scholarly discipline: His recent article is “in the top 5% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric”.

2. The person has received a highly prestigious academic award or honor at a national or international level: His research won the National Innovation Award, the Digital Health Award, and the 40 Under 40 Award.

3. The person has been an elected member of a highly selective and prestigious scholarly society or association: Dr Macdonald is a Fellow at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of the Institute of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability

7. The person has had a substantial impact outside academia in their academic capacity: His research has appeared in over 100 international news outlets. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JayneDavis07 (talk • contribs)

JayneDavis07, our criteria can be confusing for a new editor. Most researchers have multiple publications. What matters is not how many they have published but how other researchers have responded to those publications by citing them in their own papers. That is how we determine significant impact. Most awards, and definitely not young investigator awards, are not what we mean by "highly prestigious". Having newspapers cover ones research when publicized by their employer is common and not considered "substantial impact". "Fellow" is a term used in many different ways. In Macdonald's case the first Fellow is one of the terms used by Cambridge for their employees, so does not qualify. The second Fellow is just the name of the level of dues paying member of the ICRS, not an honorary award given for major contributions to a field. Macdonald is a promising researcher, and may well qualify according to WP:NPROF in the future, but not now. StarryGrandma (talk) 23:23, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

For the impact of his publications see here. He has only been publishing for a few years. We would need to see over a hundred citations per paper for impact, but he is just starting out so hasn't had time to develop. He does have 14 papers in Google Scholar, but his latest one is linked to another author. StarryGrandma (talk) 23:39, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Do not delete:

Fellow in the Cambridge system is not merely a term for employees. Fellows are voted in by the Governing body and are special honours for “distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry.” There are different types of Fellowship at Cambridge (Visiting Fellow, Research Fellow, Fellow Commoner, Bye-Fellow, etc) – Dr Macdonald holds a full unrestricted permanent Fellowship and as a result is a full voting member of the Governing Body of the University – the highest honour.

Under the criteria for WP:PROF, Academics only need to meet one of 8 conditions.

1. The person has received a highly prestigious academic award or honor at a national or international level.

With regard to condition 1 – Dr Macdonald won the 40 Under 40 Award in the Science category. The award has two rounds of voting – the first is an expert panel, the second is a public vote – the award programme is at the national level and is for the nation’s most influential and accomplished leaders.

7. The person has had a substantial impact outside academia in their academic capacity.

With regard to condition 7 – Dr Macdonald developed and launched a virtual reality public speaking platform to help individuals overcome speech anxiety. He made the platform fully open access, and it is used by people around the world. It is a first-of-its-kind platform – the only to be free and accessible on all platforms and operating systems. Accordingly, it received widespread global media attention - it was covered in over 100 media outlets - including The Times, The Guardian, ITV, BBC, etc, etc. This is outside of a conventional academics remit.

It makes the academic “significant, interesting, or unusual enough to be worthy of notice”.— Preceding unsigned comment added by JayneDavis07 (talk • contribs)

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Relisting. No consensus here yet.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 23:07, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete I have not been able to find evidence that Chris Macdonald meets the criteria for GNG or NPROF. As noted by StarryGrandma, most of the publicity appears to be based on a press release from cambridge. Public press about a single VR program is not indicative of academic notability.

• Responding specifically to arguments above concerning NPROF:
  • 1. AltMetric is not good for determining academic notability as any mention on any site online can improve altmetric. If we're considering notability based on academics, then his work needs to be highly cited by other academics, which it is not.
  • 2. The awards he has won do not appear prestigious on a national or international level, names notwithstanding. Think Nobel prize (international) or something like a Priestly medal (national chemistry award in US). I'm not even sure which 40 under 40 list he was included under because there are so many of these lists today and the specific list is mentioned nowhere in his bios. A public vote for an award is also not good criteria for academic notability.
  • 3. Elected member/fellow of a society. A fellow at a uni is not the same thing. Reading through the types of fellow at Lucy Cavendish College, it sounds like he is just a professor (not the same thing as Cambridge wide fellowships --- each college has their own processes). Nor is being a "fellow" at a non-profit think tank funded by a bunch of corporations in the name of "responsibility"
  • 7. Unlikely over 100 international news outlets covered his virtually reality public speaking VR work independently. This is also definitely WP:TOOSOON as the impact of the work that was released a month ago is not yet known.Anonrfjwhuikdzz (talk) 03:13, 17 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete - based on the above discussion, he lacks significant coverage and fails the PROF test. Bearian (talk) 03:24, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete - super promotional -- cannot find anything to support the keep. The 40-under-40 award is from a company whose only purpose is giving 40-under-40 awards...that is not they type that creates credibility. A lot of Cambridge fellows are notable even if their articles don't show it, so I did some look around. I just don't see it in the article or at large. -- Michael Scott Asato Cuthbert (talk) 09:51, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete fails WP:PROF and WP:GNG.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 05:27, 23 April 2025 (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.