Should this book have its own article? The copyright page credits David Gerrold, not Paramount Pictures, which indicates it might be unlicensed. --NetSpiker (talk) 14:05, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

This is right on the edge of a gray area - we dont have a lot of "meta" articles about these kind of reference lit sources -- and youre right that the "unofficial" books are not our focus.

In terms of the justification -- David Gerrold is of course one of the heavy-hitters of TOS era personalities, so i think that's the main selling point on article status. Like, if this was an "unofficial" book written by a third party not associated with the show - i'd say delete --- but since this was in the early era and Gerrold was part of the production staff of (at the time) TOS/TAS and (later) TNG - i think we might have a case for establishing a class of meta articles we'd keep. looking for more voices of consensus based on that rationale -- captainmike 14:27, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, that was my line of thinking, that having a page for the book on MB was justified by Gerrold's status along with the historical significance of this being the first book of its kind. -- Meacott (talk) 16:05, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

While Ballantine Books had the license to print TOS reference works in the 70s, it seems like they had some latitude with assigning copyright. The Making of Star Trek was © Stephen Whitfield and the Star Fleet Technical Manual was © Franz Joseph, while the Star Fleet Medical Reference Manual and Star Trek Blueprints were © Paramount. -- Meacott (talk) 16:31, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Strange. I could've sworn The Making of Star Trek was © Paramount. Maybe, like the Star Trek Concordance, the early Ballantine editions were licensed but the later ones weren't. Unfortunately, I sold my copy years ago, so I can't check.

Anyway, this decision about including possibly unlicensed works by established Star Trek creators might be worth adding to Memory Beta's policies. --NetSpiker (talk) 11:35, 12 June 2021 (UTC)