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Talk:Namira Salim

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The images formerly in the article from blocked user Farahdally have been removed. About six weeks ago, they were all nominated for deletion at Commons:Deletion requests/Files uploaded by Farhadally, because the claim that they are Farahdally's "own work" isn't credible. I don't know why it's taking so long. In the meantime, a couple of people, Sdillonripley and Elisardojm have re-added File:Namira Salim Photo.jpg to the infobox. The image from which this crop was taken can be seen at http://spacetrust.com/print/ for example, and there is no indication of a free license. I don't know if it's possible to use it anyway under "fair use" rules, or what would need to be done if so. Anyone? --IamNotU (talk) 16:15, 15 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Virgin Galactic

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@Beeblebrox: I just saw that you deleted the Virgin Galactic section. I don't disagree that details about booking a space-tourist flight that didn't (yet?) happen could be considered undue weight. But I'm wondering if the content should be kept anyway, in order to give a reasonably accurate account of it? It seems to be a big part of the overall notability claim, and is discussed by many of the general references given in the article. If you Google her, it's one of the main things you'll find stories about in the press coverage. Many of the stories seem to have a fair amount of puffery though, and miss some of the facts, referring to her already as "the first Pakistani woman in space" etc., and sometimes giving the impression that she's a NASA-style astronaut. I don't think I feel very good about leaving all the references containing that kind of information, while removing the better-researched details from the article that serve to fact-check them.

Being the "first Pakistani astronaut" is also apparently (?) one of the main reasons she received the "Medal of Excellence" from the president of Pakistan in 2011, along with being the first Pakistani to skydive over Everest, and the first to reach the North and South Poles. I'm sure she deserved the award, but the accomplisments haven't always been quite what they've been made out to be in the press and PR releases - and formerly in this article, due to heavy promotional editing by a COI user. I get the impression that she has access to a lot of wealth somehow, and can afford very expensive adventure tourism trips, which she promotes as "peace missions". The skydiving was a one-off tandem jump (i.e. strapped to an experienced skydiver) over near Everest [edit: actually it was at an airport about 12 miles away, with Everest as a sort of backdrop], she chartered a helicopter to the North Pole for a few hours, and her "sub-orbital spaceflight training" consisted mainly of a ride in a simulator built by the company who did Disney's Mission: Space attraction.

Again, she did receive the medal, and a lot of press coverage, and I guess that makes her meet notability requirments. So I think we should try to give an explanation about the things she got them for. Happy to hear any other suggestions... --IamNotU (talk) 22:22, 29 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Latest updated on the "Space"

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I discovered Namira Salim is mostly known with this "Space" content. I took out sometime to look for sources and added the section with proper info. Estarosmārṭ (talk) 12:35, 21 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I removed a bunch of it because it was about Virgin Galactic's operations and not about the article subject. Frankly, this person seems to be notable for doing a bunch of expensive rich people stuff. Chartering a helicopter to the north pole isn't the same thing as being in an actual expedition. Tandem skydiving over a mountain isn't even close to the same thing as climbing it. And buying a ticket to be a space tourist for ten minutes certainly isn't the same thing as being a professional astronaut. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:07, 21 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I restored the content of this section for now to the previous version that was deleted on 29 August. First, much of the new content added by Estarosmārṭ was copy-pasted from the older version without attribution. Second, I think the existing version was more accurate and less promotional. For example, Salim is not a commercial astronaut, a term that applies to the crew, not the passengers. I've left the undue weight template in place. I'm happy to discuss how to further cut down on any unnecessary details or promotional bias, as many of the sources presented, especially of the "celebrity news" type, have had characteristics of "puff pieces", and/or seem to have taken information from Salim's press releases and self-promotional material, as well as earlier and very promotional versions of this article, without adequate fact-checking. --IamNotU (talk) 15:33, 22 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I just updated the "Known For" and "Occupations" to reflect who Namira is. Please let's edit constructively not scaring others. We all have equal rights as editors. ThanksEstarosmārṭ (talk) 10:49, 7 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]