User:SOTO/Forum Archive/Inclusion debates/@comment-31010985-20190928203157/@comment-6032121-20191014212728

Still pondering what on Earth you're on about regarding publishers and self-publishers, the one vaguely-relevant thing I can find in Wiki policy s at T:OFF REL again: is that what you're thinking of?

"For prose fiction, release date is whatever is given by the publisher as the release date. Even if you get a copy before that date, you cannot write about that story here until the date the publisher gives as the official launch date."

- T:OFF REL

If so, I think you're basically the only person to ever have interpreted "publisher" in that sentence as "what is legally called a publishing company" rather than "whoever is legally publishing the work". This piece of policy is clearly about preventing early leaks and other scheduling hiccups from overruling the official release date, not anything to do with "publishing company" vs. "self-publisher". For the last time, as far as non-lawyers are concerned, a "self-publisher" is a kind of "publisher". In fact, it is etymologically obvious that this should be so. "Self-publisher" means "publisher of self". The operative words being publisher of.