On 08/04/07, Fred Bauder fredbaud@waterwiki.info wrote:
How many of the scientists, authors, inventors, and other individuals who are not celebrities, but whose work is continuous and relevant would opt out? I expect very few would. Those who would, would be those who notability is based on some kind of sensation, like [[John and Lorena Bobbit]], an excellent example of the pernicious effect of spot media coverage of non-notable figures.
OTRS gets not a few requests like this.
Leaving aside those who want their article deleted because someone's using it as a scandal sheet, the usual "please delete this, I'm not notable" request is anecdotally... hum, junior academics, mostly, the odd writer who's turned a couple of mid-range books, a minor artist or two. Only once did I see a really significant academic request it (a very modest and private man, one assumes) - not a Nobel laureate, but certainly in the top layer of his field.
(I don't know what we did with that request)