Template talk:Refimprove

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Templates for deletion This template was considered for deletion on 2007 September 20. The result of the discussion was keep.

Contents

[edit] Protection request

I feel this template should be protected from edits by non-registered or newly registered users. Does anyone else agree? --Anthony5429 14:34, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

I Agree, Protect it from edits by non-registered or newly registered users. Jeepday (talk) 00:03, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Category:Articles lacking sources

I am probably going to be sorry I brought this up,(deep breath) ok, here goes. It would seem kind of pointless to use {{unreferenced}} for article with absolutely no references and {{More sources}} or {{Refimprove}} for those that are poorly sourced if they all place article in the same category. As it happens {{Refimprove}} puts articles into Category:Articles lacking reliable references, so perhaps Category:Articles lacking sources should be limited to {{unreferenced}} and everything else like {{primarysources}} should go to Category:Articles lacking reliable references.

[edit] Too many templates!!!

There are too many of the templates for articles needing references! Especially for new/casual editors!!! Yuletide 20:25, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Everyone does different things, just learn the ones you related to what you do. Jeepday (talk) 02:27, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I actually think there's not enough templates.. This one seems to make editors think it means they should add additional citations to a single already cited statement to improve it's verifiability.. I have never seen a template yet that adequately and specifically deal with an article that's lacking, but not completely absent of, sourced statements. It's really irritating to see an article that has only two or three sourced statements and not being able to explain the actual problem.. Repku 22:40, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Quite. We used to have {{Fewreferences}} and {{More sources}}, but the template police got them. {{One source}} is still out there (though I suspect not for long now that I've pointed it out). It's frustrating to not be permitted to tag such extremely common and dissimilar problems like too much reliance on too few sources, most (but not all) of the article being unreferenced, referenced statements not appearing in their sources, or referencing to unreliable sources with anything more specific or helpful than "not good enough". —Cryptic 23:30, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Merge and Redirect, after speedy close of TfD

Apparently there was a TfD for Section specific maintenance templates to merge and redirect 9 section templates to the article templates. I happened to catch it when they changed the text of {{refimprove}}. I reverted the change [1] before I realized there was a TfD because the change was done with out any discussion. I have started a discussion at Template_talk:Unreferenced#Merge_and_Redirect.2C_after_speedy_close_of_TfD Jeepday (talk) 02:56, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Different format

Many people are using the {{moresources}} template (which redirects to this template) in the following way: {{moresources|article|date=May 2007}}. However, because the syntax used in this template is different, we're getting a large amount of articles being tagged incorrectly — just take a look at this category for proof.

Could the syntax in this template be changed so it matches other maintenance templates? -Panser Born- (talk) 12:33, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

  • This template should put articles into Category:Articles lacking reliable references, I would think that changing the syntax to make that work correctly would be a good move. I beleive what you are asking is to add syntax to allow editors to use as {{refimprove|Section or article|Date =date}} which would make it rendor the catigoery correctly when this version of {{more sources}} is used. Jeepday (talk) 13:14, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Template clean up

Posted at TfD for clean up Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion/Log/2007_May_16#Clean-up_of_templates_needed result keep the merge {{more sources}} to {{refimprove}} Jeepday (talk) 03:33, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Too Many templates

I think that this template might be redundant. One of the reasons for deleting a template is because another template that serves the same purpose is more widely used - and that's exactly what {{Citations missing}} is. Thoughts?--danielfolsom 12:17, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Exactly, this template is too vague and largely overlaps with an existing and commonly used template. Mathmo Talk 23:44, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Parameter usage is broken

... at least so far as I can tell; the first parameter seems to correctly identify either "article" or "section", but the "tagged since ..." line picks up the same parameter, reading "tagged since article", which is a little absurd. +ILike2BeAnonymous 23:59, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes indeed, fixed now though. Rich Farmbrough, 18:18 20 September 2007 (GMT).

[edit] Is it time to add an icon?

A conversation has been started at Template talk:Unreferenced#Is it time to add an icon? to consider adding an icon to the {{unreferenced}} family of templates, including this template. Jeepday (talk) 13:50, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Image or not, this needs colour and a border as seen at Wikipedia:Article templates via using the type parameter. I tried adding it using the type parameter, but there seems to be an issue at Template:Ambox. -- Reaper X 03:27, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
Nevermind, my cache wasn't cleared/bypassed. -- Reaper X 03:37, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
Ditto the problem and its fix for me. --Kralizec! (talk) 02:47, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Refimprove up for deletion

If you haven't seen already, this template is up for deletion at TfD. -- Reaper X 01:46, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Please add "See talk"

If this template had a "See Talk:whatever for details", then the person adding the template could say why it's there, and others could see why it's there and try to address these issues so that the template can be removed.

It's currently too vague. --Gronky 13:06, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Added "talk" parameter. Rich Farmbrough, 19:03 20 September 2007 (GMT).
Thanks for reacting, but I think it's very unlikely that anyone will add it when it's just a parameter. This tag will continue to be used without any explanation for why it's there and no information for when it can be removed. Could it be added to the default for a trial period and then discussed in the future if it causes problems? --Gronky 13:22, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
Does a month of no reply mean "No"? --Gronky 02:49, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
It could mean 'no', or it could mean no one noticed the old request. To the matter at hand: there are often cases where it is obvious why the tag was added, such as if there are no citations at all. Also, if this tag is used in conjunction with {{fact}} tags, then those {{fact}} tags serve the purpose of specifying where citations are needed/requested. —Centrx→talk • 18:26, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Date display

I've added in the date (only) as per some other templates. Some find it useful, and on it's own it's not clutter. Rich Farmbrough, 12:56 25 September 2007 (GMT).

{{Editprotect}} Please replace {{#if:{{{date|}}}|''({{{date}}})''}} as removed in this edit per editor note. Jeepday (talk) 03:20, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Done. It is of course useful to me when I am manually fixing up the many broken instances of these templates, because I get a visual clue where the problem lies. Rich Farmbrough, 10:20 4 October 2007 (GMT).

[edit] inline cites

This template used to indicate the value of inline citations connecting particular parts of an article to particular reference sources. It currently doesn't do this. Is there a template which can be used to specifically say, "This article lacks connections between the "references" listed and the material in the article, which inline citations would fix."? (sdsds - talk) 00:07, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

I think the closest to what you're looking for is {{Citations missing}}. -- Satori Son 00:17, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
or {{citation style}} Jeepday (talk) 00:53, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Oh yes, these were the ones I was looking for! Thank-you both! (sdsds - talk) 01:23, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Template placement

I want to take issue with this advice:

Unlike {{fact}}, Refimprove places a very conspicuous banner at the top of the article.

This is the same debate as that at template talk:unreferenced#Template placement.

[edit] Place at the top of the article

Definitely want to not only get the editors attention but the readers attention with the fact that the article may be totally made up or spam or non-notable or whatever. It's notes like these that warn the casual researcher away from using articles with tabloid sentences and "construed" opinions. Basically, the article shouldn't be here in the first place but other editors (having been there themselves) want to give the originator a chance before consigning it to limbo. Student7 (talk) 20:40, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Your argument is valid if an article has no citations whatsoever. If however, the article does have citations, requests for more citations would be more appropriate at the bottom. That is, requests for more citations are not as high-priority as requests to have at least some citations.
Also, the casual researcher better not rely entirely on Wikipedia content, whether cited or not. It can well happen that an article is thoroughly cited and then somebody changes something in the text, and as result it is inaccurate. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 02:42, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Place in the reference section

  1. It is a maintenance template and I think such clutter should usually be on the talk page -- after all that is what talk pages are for -- but in this case it also has some important information that is useful for a reader. --Philip Baird Shearer 17:43, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
  2. I agree with that. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 21:23, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
  3. While I believe the placement (top of page or in references section) should ultimately remain a matter of editorial choice, I fully support its use in the references section as the default. Placing the banner at the top of the page might also be appropriate in some special circumstances. For instance, if some of the unreferenced claims are controversial, and the {{controversial}} template has been used on the corresponding discussion page, and no other banner appears at the top of the article, using refimprove there might be a good editorial choice. (sdsds - talk) 21:35, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
    I modified the text of the documentation saying that it should be placed at the bottom of the article. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 16:44, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
    I watch a LOT of articles whose references seem to be the top of somebody's head! Probably correct but nobody's listing refenences. I think the reader needs to be clearly warned. In Kennedy Space Center, this six page article including many fine details has only two footnotes! Clearly putting this in "references" where the naive reader would not think to look, is a bit of a travesty. Active editors who insist on not using footnotes, of course don't like this blantant banner at the top and would like to conceal their failure to properly document. We need some help here. One of the offending editors just tried to move the notice to references quoting this page. Amazing how they can find supporting references for whatever they are doing (wrong) readily enought within Wikipedia! Student7 (talk) 13:48, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
    I think you are right here, however {{refimprove}} gets often abused, and placing it on top is distracting. I would suggest you place {{fact}} in places which strike you as needing most references. I am doubtful how much a banner at the top would motivate people. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 16:08, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Place on the talk page

I think the editorial comments, cleanup, refimprove and the citation-related editorial comments, belong on the talk page. These bulky tags clutter up a lot of pages and detract from its readability. Furthermore, they have nothing to with the subject matter. Also, in my opinion putting them on the content page violates the wiki spirit which is to contribute content. If a user wants to see more "cleanup" in an article they should contribute and do it themselves instead of whining about it and cluttering up the page with their anonymous whine. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.248.107.194 (talk) 18:40, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Not Citations

Please change [[Wikipedia:Citing sources|citations]] back to [[Wikipedia:Citing sources|references or sources]] in the template. {{Refimprove}} is placed on articles that need references per Wikipedia:Verifiability an official policy. {{Citation style}} is placed on articles that could use citations per Wikipedia:Citing sources a style guideline. Jeepday (talk) 03:14, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

"This article needs additional citations for verification " so your concern is addressed in the second link "for verification". So it current reads: use a guideline (a citation) for a policy (verification). --Philip Baird Shearer 09:26, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
The previous version was:
The article needs additional references or sources for verification.
I replaced it with:
This article needs additional citations for verification.
putting into the edit history "Fits in better with Template:unreferenced as well as with template:Fact and Wikipedia:Verifiability". My other reason for this change was that the link under "references or sources" was already to "Wikipedia:Citing sources" not to Wikipedia:Reliable sources. I think it better that the word citation appears in the text if the guideline to be used is WP:CITE and not WP:RS.
There is a broader issue. Is simply putting references in a reference section still the best way to fulfil the content policies or have we not accepted that an article ought to cite its sources as well? I think the general consensus over the last year has moved from "No references bad, some references good" to "no cited references bad, cited references good". As such this template ought to reflect that consensus. --Philip Baird Shearer 09:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
If you feel a link to WP:RS is better then a link WP:CITE I am fine with that if you think it will help editors more then CITE will to reference their contributions. The point is that this template is for articles that need additional references (see the many talks about Any or Adequately at Template talk:Unreferenced). {{unref}} is for article with no references. While it would be nice if the articles that {{refimprove}} where placed on had inline citations as well, the articles need to have references or risk deletion of content. I believe that [[Wikipedia:Citing sources|references or sources]] was chosen for because it describes both the rationale for using references and the most acceptable way to post them. Currently content may be deleted if it is not referenced but but is generally not subject to removal if there is not inline citations. Reference = Content Policy while Citation = style guideline.
I am in full agreement that inline references[1] are the best solution to referencing. Take a look at Road for some of my rework. But {{unref}} and {{refimprove}} are not about style they are about core content policy and verifiability. Jeepday (talk) 15:04, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
I am not sure what you mean by inline references, but I assume you mean footnotes via references tags, however WP:CITE also includes Harvard referencing. --Philip Baird Shearer 15:32, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
Footnotes via reference tags. Harvard references at the end of a paragraph are ok until someone comes and edits the paragraph without using the listed source.
Why do you think that Harvard references can not be used on any sentence just as reference tags are? --Philip Baird Shearer 22:31, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
Not saying they can't. But usually I see them used at the end of a section or article. Jeepday (talk) 14:52, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
  1. ^ A reference inserted in the text perferably using Wikipedia:Citation templates
Jeepday (talk) 19:45, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
Articles do not have to have references that is not part of Wikipedia policies. Personally I do not think that there is any point including references unless they are cited. Also thinking about it it may not be as you say "this template is for articles that need additional references" it can also be used for articles that do not need more references but do need more citations from the references that already exist (the person adding this template presumably does not know which). I suggest we wait before altering the template again and see what others think. --Philip Baird Shearer 15:21, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
I am confused on why you think having references is not part of Wikipedia policy. Could you point to what policy you think it that supports articles without references? Jeepday (talk) 19:45, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
The policies only say in WP:V "All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation." but although the same policy says "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources..." It does not say that the references have to be provided on the page. --Philip Baird Shearer 22:31, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
WP:PROVEIT The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation.[1] The source should be cited clearly and precisely to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question. Does the last sentence here need to be written as The source should be cited clearly and precisely in the article to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question." to remove any doubt about reference placement? Jeepday (talk) 14:52, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
The text you have highlighted is conditional on the previous sentence. "All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation" so if the text has no quotations or any material likely to be challenged then references are not mandated. If it does contain "quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged" then citations should be provided so I think the current the wording of this template better supports the policy with "This article needs additional citations for verification." rather than the previous wording "This article needs additional references or sources for verification". --Philip Baird Shearer 06:39, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
I would qualify placing a request for references on the article as a challenge to the authenticity of the article and a request for reference, would you? As the template requested references until you changed it then every article it was placed on would have been challenged and reference requested. First you argued that policy did not require references "Articles do not have to have references that is not part of Wikipedia policies" now you are saying only quotes and challenged content must be referenced "so if the text has no quotations or any material likely to be challenged then references are not mandated". So please define what qualifies as a challenge according to policy in your view. Jeepday (talk) 01:53, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
What constitutes reasonable grounds for a challenge is beyond the scope of this template, that is something to raise on the WP:V policy talk page. However If one is raising a challenge to the content it has to be specific enough for there to be a chance to add "reliable, published source using an inline citation", that rules out just challenging all of the content and asking for references in a reference section of an article. BTW my position on this had not changed which is the reason for my change of words which you are objecting to. The previous version was:
The article needs additional references or sources for verification.
I replaced it with:
This article needs additional citations for verification.
Which is a better fit for the section of WP:V that can be viewed by via WP:PROVEIT we have been discussing. --Philip Baird Shearer 12:13, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
You argue in circles. If you feel it the template must use the word "citation" how about "This article does not adequately cite its references or sources" which is was the what it was intended to say[2] when it was built to end the "Any" vs "Adequately" argument at {{unreferenced}} and is nearly copy and paste of the current {{unreferenced}} "This article does not cite any references or sources" Jeepday (talk) 02:18, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
I think the current wording is better because it is an imperative not an observation. --Philip Baird Shearer 22:23, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Please fix error

In the sentence "Please help this article by..." is supposed to read "Please help improve this article by..." but there is a character (vertical bar) missing so the wiki-link is broken and the word "archive" is not shown. Please fix this by adding the vertical in. Also: I think that it would be appropriate to add a link to the article Talk page to encourage the editor who adds this template to an article to explain the specific problems because it otherwise leaves a heavy burden on editors of large articles to figure out what the complaint is about.--Moneyhabit 07:33, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

I have put a space in front of the word "improve", but I am not sure what you mean by "but there is a character (vertical bar) missing so the wiki-link is broken and the word "archive" is not shown". --Philip Baird Shearer 09:24, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
My mistake: that action=edit thing requires a full URL, not a wiki-link so it is a space, not a vertical bar to separate the link from the label. I was thinking about how some templates like "Mergeto" have a handy pointer to the article talk page, but maybe it is not easy to provide such a link in this case.--Moneyhabit 10:32, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] minor fix

{{editprotected}} Please insert a space between the word removed and the date. Currently, the final sentence reads like this in articles with a date= variable: "Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.(October 2007)". Other such templates have the space. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Esrever (talk • contribs) 22:14, 19 October 2007

Done. —Cryptic 22:45, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks! Esrever 01:49, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The talk parameter

The talk parameter should link to a specific section of the talk page rather than to the talk page as a whole. Right now, if you click on the link that the talk parameter generates you can end up on a page with a long list of discussions, in which case it is not clear whether the issue still exists, whether it's still being discussed, if so, where, etc. Shinobu (talk) 11:32, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Dual-purposed

Isn't the intent of this template dual-purposed? It currently says, "This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed." This addresses the editor audience, but the reader audience only obliquely. Shouldn't the sentence, "It may contain inaccurate and/or unverified information that may be removed at any time" be added and placed before the request for help? This alerts the more plentiful WP reader to verifiability issues. This is a concern for many of our maintenance tags: they face inward only, ignoring the external reader who isn't interested in editing (are we forgetting WP's purpose?).
Jim Dunning | talk 15:58, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Please revise this template to add the middle line below—
This article needs additional citations for verification.
Readers should be aware that some content is missing citations and may not have been verified as coming from reliable sources. This may affect its accuracy and stability.
Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.
This alert is directed at WP readers, while the last line is directed at editors.
Jim Dunning | talk 05:30, 7 February 2008 (UTC) {{editprotected}}
I'm inclined to fulfill this request, and implement the same at {{Unreferenced}}; my only reservation is that the proposed middle line addition is a bit wordy and extends further than one line even on my widescreen display. Is there a good way to chop off a few words? Perhaps dropping the last sentence ("This may affect... stability.") would do, but that may be harsh. Thoughts? – Luna Santin (talk) 09:05, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

No, this should not be done (per Wikipedia:No disclaimers in articles). These tags are not meant to be disclaimers for readers - they are meant to advise editors. --- RockMFR 00:03, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Er. These tags are in part to warn readers; that's why they're on the articles instead of the talk page. No disclaimers in articles is about warnings about the type of content, not its accuracy; it even specifically states "Templates that provide content warnings but do not duplicate these disclaimers, such as {{current}}, {{disputed}}, or {{POV}} are permitted." —Cryptic 05:48, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Icon

Other ref tags have icons. Please add the standard one or better yet remove the full protection so someone else can do it. It's been long enough. Equazcion •✗/C • 15:17, 27 December 2007 (UTC) {{editprotected}}

I second that. Please add: | image = [[Image:Question book-3.svg|50px]] -- Lea (talk) 02:36, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Y Done - Nihiltres{t.l} 19:04, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Robot adding

We need robot adding vi:Tiêu bản:Chú thích trong bài. JacquesNguyen (talk) 07:37, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Need a {{too many reference}} (not like {{Cleanup-references}})

See by example Calligraphy#References Yug (talk) 15:36, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] {{nofootnotes}} and {{morefootnotes}}?

I removed Refimprove from Yaoi, which also calls for an expert on the subject, warns of original research, and uses {{morefootnotes}}. I figure that more footnotes trumps Refimprove, as it gives more specific instructions as to what can be done (ie. someone reading the further reading and turning them into inline citations), whilst still giving the impression that the referencing system should be improved. I think this should be called to attention on the Refimprove documentation.-Malkinann (talk) 00:11, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Not helpful

I'm not finding this article very helpful. When I get to articles with this template placed upon them, I do not know what to cite, where to begin or how to remove it. Could we not deprecate this in favor of {{fact}}? Hiding T 13:46, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Use on stubs

Is there really any point in placing this template on short stub articles (one or two sentences)? Doesn't "stub" status imply that the article needs such things as references? Please comment here and/or at Talk:Metzgeriaceae#Request for Third Party. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:01, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

No! and if I see it used on a stub I remove it because the stub templates fulfil the same function without overwhelming the stub. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk)

[edit] Please stop using this template!

I was editing Wikipedia pretty seriously a couple years back, and while I still make minor edits from time to time, I consider myself more of a user of Wikipedia than an editor. As a user, I would like to ask the editors most sincerely: Please stop using templates like these! Obviously Wikipedia is a work in progress, and will probably always be a work in progress; on many if not most articles, there will always be significant work to be done. Pointing this out on individual articles does not help the user; it makes the articles look cheap and ugly, and undesirable to link to. Given the incredible multiplication of "fix this" templates since I was a regular Wikipedia editor, I can only surmise that adding templates calling for other people to do work is for many editors a substitute for actually doing the work. Please, stop vandalizing Wikipedia with these awful tags; when you see problems, try to fix them, and if you can't, assume that the people with the ability to fix them will be just as good if not better at solving problems than you are. That's the wiki way.

Sorry, thought I was logged in. Nareek (talk) 01:49, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

It's great to hear the perspective of someone like yourself, who has been an editor for a couple of years! While I agree that littering articles with templates like this can be a problem, that problem isn't sufficient to advise editors to cease using the template altogether. Note in particular the last sentence in the messagebox: "Unsourced material may be challenged and removed." That indicates the proper place to use this template: if you are considering challenging the veracity of material in an article because it is unsourced and (in your view) potentially incorrect, giving other editors notice of your thinking is more a common courtesy than a "substitute for actually doing the work." Giving that notice in the article itself, rather than on the talk page for the article, could be considered an attempt to make the article look "cheap and ugly," but it could also be an attempt to bring the lack of citations to the attention of readers, so they can more easily form their own opinion about whether the material is credible. (sdsds - talk) 03:18, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I see this template most often added to stubs simply because they have no references. It is not used only on articles that may be challenged, but on easily verifiable topics, such as scientific names of organisms or groups of organisms. Most often, it is indeed used as a substitute for doing work. --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:29, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
Suppose what you have observed is representative of the template's actual use, i.e. this template is "most often added to stubs." Suppose you removed the template from any article marked as a stub. Perhaps no one would mind your doing so, if you explained in your "Edit summary" your reason. So if you can improve wikipedia by removing this template from clearly marked stub articles, that's making a fine contribution! As they say, {{sofixit}}! (sdsds - talk) 06:01, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
A fine supposition, but again, that is not the reality. Those who plaster the template over every stub and article are adamant that the template must be worn like a scarlet "A" by all articles deemed uncited. The acolytes of this movement adhere only to the forms and rituals of plastering the template, not only lacking the vision you describe, but positively counter to it. And please know that my limited time improving Wikkipedia is better spent actually adding improvements rather than removing needless templates. --EncycloPetey (talk) 13:53, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I do not think this template should be used on stubs as the stub templates fulfil the same function. This template if used should be next to the {{reflist}} not at the top of the article. I do think there is a place for this template when it is necessary to put dozens of fact requests into an article.

The most common criticism levelled against Wikipedia in the press was until recently that Wikipedia articles could not be trusted to be true. In the last two years as articles with lots of citations have become more common, this criticism has lessened lots of citations tend not to have that criticism levelled against them. It is not use saying that citations are only needed on uncontroversial information because there is a whole range of other facts that need citations. For example dates, facts and figures, otherwise how does the reader know that they are accurate? Further, just because you as an editor on a subject you are interested in know that something is uncontroversial and accurate, how does the reader who is reading this article to know something more about a subject, to judge if a statement is accurate?

While I agree that if there are only a couple of paragraphs in an article that need citations then just {{fact}} those paragraphs (or sentences). But sometimes there are articles that carry next to no citations, in which case placing one template like this in the "References" section is better than placing facts on the whole article. To see what I mean consider these two articles: compare the Battle of Waterloo as it is now and as it was at the start of 2007. Not a lot has changed in the content, but it is now fully cited. Which version of the article is the most useful for someone who wishes to read about the battle and cite Wikipedia as a source? I have just added this template to the article the Battle of Mauchline Muir, it is not that I know there is anything wrong with what is written it is just that I do not know that is written is accurate, placing this template in the "Notes" section, is in my opinion better than placing a {{fact}} template on every paragraph, most of which are probably quite correct (but without citations there is know way of knowing unless one is already familiar with the battle). --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 11:00, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

This template gets away from using references to verify challenged or questioned claims... most people who use it are treated references like they're decorations, asking for more just because the article doesn't have "enough" references, even though they don't doubt a single claim. Referencing an article is difficult work and very few people who see this tag are just going to say "Hey! I'll spend the next 6 hours finding references because this tag is here!" In 99.9% of articles it's an eyesore until the article gets referenced naturally then someone thinks to remove the tag. But to modify a quote by Ronald Reagan... "The closest thing to immortality on this earth is a maintenence tag" - once created, these things just can't be deleted or even slowed down, no matter how silly or ineffective. --Rividian (talk) 12:36, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I read the discussion above and as a general sceptic about this craze for referencing will comment. First, the two versions of 'Waterloo' seem superficially quite different to me, aside from issues of referencing. It would take me some time to see if the content has changed. As a user of wiki (as distinct from as an editor) it normally makes not the slightest difference to me whether a piece has detailed referencing. It is not possible for me to immediately check a source unless it is online, which is frequently frowned upon as a source anyway. As someone who has recently being going through a history page, I have been adding refs as I add material, as much for my own convenience as anyone elses, so that I know where to find stuff. But this would be totally useless to someone who wanted to check that i had accurately reported the source texts. There is no way to tell that I have left out all the 'anti' passages and faithfully inserted and referenced all the 'pros'. References may be usefull to a very small minority of readers (perhaps ones who write newspaper articles for a living?), but they are much less important than actual content. I don't mind people arguing that references are desirable (I have got accustomed to reading through legions of footnote numbers), but making general labels is pretty pointless. A reader can see if there is one ref per sentence, one ref per paragraph or one ref per page. This is simply a means for people who want citations everywhere to annoy people who are not bothered about it, and thereby coerce them into spending time on frankly a minority interest improvement to a page. Content is more important than labelling.
One page I have been working on has a big sticker on the talk page failing it as a B-grade history article because it has no inline refs. Another is happily rated B (with citations), but contains some arguably embarassing mistakes. Hmm. Sandpiper (talk) 12:44, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Please continue to use this template

Many articles are created out of a single reference. When new editors make additions or add new material, none of this is footnoted either. The article starts to degenerate with people adding unsubstantiated "observations" and other unscholarly remarks. This sort of thing tends to give Wikipedia a bad name. Readers should be properly cautioned that what they are reading may be utter garbage. Most properly this is placed at the top of the article so the article can be skipped by careful readers until the editors get around to furnishing references for unsubstantiated statements and eliminating nonsense! Student7 (talk) 04:58, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Why not deal with those unsubstantiated observations? People complain about those kinds of things, you're right. But I've never seen them say "Well, it's okay because there was a {{refimprove}} tag on the article". The solution to bad prose in articles isn't to leave tags on the article for years... it's to actually fix the article. And references alone do nothing to prevent bad claims from being in articles... you still have to read the claims and read the references. --Rividian (talk) 12:47, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
I'mk not at all happy about this obsession with referencing. The basic principle was supposed to be that only contentious material is required to be referenced. Where do you stop. Source A provides a fact forming the first half of a sentence, source b provides the second half, and source c supports part of each. So is that one ref in the middle, one before the full stop and one after the stop? This becomes absurd. Ordinary books are not written with every single fact referenced. If people cannot understand that wiki is voluntarily created by anonymous people, is 99% right but has some real howlers, they should not be referring to it. Putting literally thousands of citations on a page does not make it any easier to spot one which is wrong. Sandpiper (talk) 12:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
(OK, hundreds, but it seem to be growing exponentially)Sandpiper (talk) 12:51, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia is a huge effort, and it's true that what makes sense for some parts of that effort might not make sense for other parts. Each of us has a different experience of the need for referencing. Here's a suggestion for anyone who wants to gain experience in places where good referencing is important: take a look at Wikipedia:List of controversial issues or at Pages that link to Template:POV. Add three of them to your watchlist. Watch what happens for a week or so, and decide for yourself if -- by adding citations of reliable sources -- the situation could be improved! (sdsds - talk) 14:57, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
I think you are saying refs are useful where there is disagreement other the text. I would not doubt it for a minute, producing good sources is an excellent way to try to settle a difference of opinion. The issue is that this template is being used to require citation of undisputed text in an ever increasing way, sentence by sentence. This has to stop. Sandpiper (talk) 21:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I see your point, and agree that template usage like that is annoying if not outright disruptive. What articles are having this trouble? Would the approach of moving the {{refimprove}} from the top of the article (where thoughtless editors often place it) into the == References == section be a possibility? In a way this is offering a compromise to the other editor, and it makes it clearer to third parties when the article really is sufficiently sourced. (sdsds - talk) 03:58, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
The template is also added to articles that have some citations, but not enough in the eyes of the person adding it. How large does the citations section have to be for the template to be removed? And consider, please, the cases when this template is added to newly-created, short, one-sentence stubs. You are saying the solution is to create an entirely new section for this template? --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:14, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
This template is never appropriate on an article marked as a stub. As for how many cited references are required: one per paragraph is often enough for non-controversial topics. But in cases of controversy, every assertion made in the article should be substantiated by one of the article's references, and that reference should be cited either directly after the assertion, or directly after some nearby assertion which is substantiated by the same source. Yes, that's a huge burden on editors. And yes, that's what will save wikipedia from total chaos. (sdsds - talk) 08:03, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
(Back to non-stub articles). I've been amazed at how much othewise uncontested parts of paragraphs (and sentences) change after an editor has been asked to footnote them. The first insertion was "quick and dirty." The second, realizing that the material might be scrutinized, causes all sorts of swirmy contortions towards the real truth!
And you would be surprised at how many people claim the subject of their biography or their city is "the best" which seems quite realistic ("uncontested") until they are asked to footnote it which it turns out they can't because some other person or city has (surprisingly) eclipsed them. "Uncontested statements" are fairly often wrong or not worded quite right because there was no high standard of truth when it was written. Someone did it from memory which tends to be fallible. If this encyclopedia is going to be written "top of the head" it will be ignored. Real encyclopedia aren't written that way because they use real experts not us! Most of us are amateurs trying to sound professional. Nothing wrong with that unless we are unchallenged by "mere footnotes." Some of us are "too good" for footnotes. Maybe we should be applying to Brittanica for pay! Student7 (talk) 12:06, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

[de-indent]Student, what you are saying is that every single sentence needs a footnote. I do not accept this because I consider it wholly impractical that a long article gets a ref list one or more entries per sentence. Such a list is unwieldy and counter productive. Also it is fundamentally contrary to the basic principle of this encyclopedia, that anyone can contribute. You are saying only anyone with a text handy can contribute, everyone else get lost. Even more, I utterly and fundamentally disagree that a text is worthless without references. It is merely better with refs, and sometimes only marginally better. But if this were the accepted view, then the template is wholly redundant and should never be used, because it would be axiomatic that every sentence without a cite needed one. The template only has any purpose if it is to highlight something specific about the particular page. Untill there is policy to cite every sentence, don't use it that way. Once there is such a policy, never use.

sdsds, yes, the template is much more sensible if attached in the refs section. It makes a kinda sense there because it is a general statement about that section. I'm afraid I do not find it helpfull anyone adding a tag saying generally more refs are needed about certain specific points, unless it is explained which points they are. I just find such a tag annoying, and ask the poster exactly which points they meant. When they tell me they dont know exactly, I take the tag away, becaus such a tag is pointless. Those out there who think inline cites are needed, just go ahead and add them when you work on pages. Keep at it enough and it will happen. Don't leave litter on the pages which doesn't help anyone.

Sdsds again, if what you say is true, that the tag should never appear on a stub, perhaps this should be explicitly mentioned in the instructions on the page? Incidentally, the page also makes reference to the tag appearing at the top of the page (section differences with fact), somewhat contradicting the earlier suggestion to place it at the bottom. Sandpiper (talk) 20:39, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

PS Student, it happens I know someone who did some work for a real encyclopedia. Sure she knew something about the subject, and checked things she wasn't sure about, but then she just winged it like we do. People who write real encyclopedias are not experts on every single article. Sandpiper (talk) 20:45, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Most good references are good for a paragraph unless it involves quantities which are only available from one source which doesn't have any other info to help the editor. My guess is about one reference per short paragraph. But yes, every single fact needs to be documented. I admit looking the other way when there are a lot of links. But those are dependent upon someone else's facts which can supposedly be copied into the current article (if they are there). I haven't seen this yet but I expect to - an editor relying on someone else's (undocumented) "facts" (in another article) which turn out to be wrong but the editor of the new article doesn't discover this.
If the fact is so well known that it is boring, what is it doing in Wikipedia in the first place?
Some editors are just too used to blogging/email that this requirement (and it is a requirement) for precision annoys them. There is money to be made out there in the world of fiction. Most of us here aren't getting paid! You always wanted to write that book. Do it! Not only will you be paid, you won't be bothered by these pesky requests for accuracy! Student7 (talk) 21:08, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Afterthought: The articles I watch are places, schools, and history, and a few bios mostly. These really require something every few lines at least. I wouldn't know about book reviews even though I do watch a few. Can't crib another's review - that's plagiarizing. Can't review it yourself (supposedly) - that would be WP:OR, but I suspect that is what most people do. It would be hard for me to ask for frequent footnotes in that environment. I suppose there are other articles which might not require precision footnoting. Or for which, our editors haven't yet formulated and enforced a coherent referencing strategy. Student7 (talk) 22:42, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Speaking as someone who was in danger of breaking records for length of argument over Harry Potter articles, I can say that while I agree precise referencing ought not to be so important when the subject is essentially opinion, the experience merely demonstrated that the main purpose of quoting refs on wiki is to keep score in disputes. Absolutely nothing to do with article accuracy. wiki does not have a policy of creating accurate articles, merely referenceable ones. This is an important distinction which short-circuits this debate about the supposed reason for having refs, to boost credibility amongst readers.
I'm not used to blogging nor do I send many emails, more likely have to check it is working when I need it, for lack of use. When I last looked, it is not a requiremnt that anything on wiki be referenced. NOT. It is merely a requirement that it be refererenceable.
  • Wikipedia:Verifiability, which is policy, says that attribution is required for direct quotes and for material that is challenged or likely to be challenged. (sdsds - talk) 00:35, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Some may argue it makes life easier if the references are there in the first place, in case a disupute arises, but all that matters is that there exists somewhere a ref which someone could find. The principle is that a fair minded editor will not arbitrarily challenge material unless he feels there is a problem with it. Anything else is merely disrupting the encyclopedia (destroying good content) and wasting editors time.
Re your comment that one ref is good for one para, how do you know? I do not support linking every single clause, but unless you do that, there is no practical way of telling whether a ref placed at the end of a para refers to all the content, or all except 6 words someone slipped in the middle. This whole business becomes impossible: what is the purpose of it? unless you can cast-iron guarantee every single edit, however small, which may have altered the meaning of a sentence, you are not guaranteeing accuracy at all with all these refs. The whole structure of wiki as an open contribution encyclopedia means nothing is any better than the last edit. (Or the first: there is mention in the winston churchill article, which I was looking at lately, that he suggested machine guns be used on striking miners. I doubt it very much, but it has been in the article since its very first version. No one has challenged it despite god knows how many reviews.) A history article (eg churchill) might have one para with points about that topic taken from six different books, all mixed together.
wiki does not want well know facts? well scrap the article about George bush being USA president then. One mans obvious fact is anothers dunno. Obviously dont want anything relating to secondary school level or below, nothing short of degree level is worth including. This exactly demonstrates what wiki is for. Someone who knows all about one thing can run off a lovely article which all the rest of us can benefit from. All this insistence on referencing is completely throwing out the one essential ingredient which permits wiki to exist. Sandpiper (talk) 23:59, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
People have objected before when I came out with numbers on references. I think that for many articles, one per paragraph is probably a good aim for editors. Particularly the ones I work on:place articles, etc. as I've mentioned earlier.
Try (for a good article I had nothing to do with) McGill University. Those guys are thinking about FA status. I was impressed. (casual visitor).
On the other side of the ooin, try the first paragraph in Air rights#Airplanes and air rights. I'm guessing that you can tell that the editor (not me!) was starting to exceed his knowledge of the topic and was winging it. This is great for a middle-schooler who has maybe never before considered the topic. Lousy for a college student who doesn't even get a reference s/he can use out of the several sentences of, essentially, b.s. Have I done that before? Yep! But at least I have the courtesy of blushing. (Unfortunately, this can't be seen by the reader! :(
You may be a genius with a photographic memory. You need to allow for the fact that the memories of some of the rest of us are fallible. I was constructing an article last night and forgetting important "minor" details as I was summarizing a website. Was it dollars? Euros? What was the exact name of the government agency (they tend to be similar but not quite). What the name of the agency important? I had to keep looking back. Doing this from memory? I don't think so! Maybe your memory! Instead of telling you to use footnotes since your memory is perfect, maybe we should be suggesting that you hold your fellow editors to a higher standard than you hold yourself to! Our memories are definitely not perfect. You should not be trusting them/us!  :) Student7 (talk) 11:57, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Student, I have no objection to people improving articles. Please go ahead and rectify any deficiencies you see in the air rights article. I am happy for you to do so. But because you may feel the article does not help you, does not mean it helps no one. It may even be that some people would be much happier with a waffly general article than a tight legalistic one full of law references. It depends on what level of information they are at. Either way, why do you have a problem with leaving the article alone if you yourself are unable to improve it? Articles get better by growing based upon what is there already. You just said that yourself. You said you write something, then go back and add points. Well.... thats just how wiki works. One person writes 'the sun is yellow'. The next adds, 'it is in the sky'. The next, more knowledgeable, explains the earth orbits around it. A really clever chap talks about elliptical orbits and adds some mathematics refs. General stuff is good good good. Someone may see it and add something because they reckon they can do better. It is a collaboration. No one should be expected to produce finished work. The difficulty with this tag is it is simply saying something obvious and unhelpfull, that the article could be better. It is essentially part of a threat to those people who did their best writing something where previously there was something worse or nothing. You are telling them to bugger off, that unless they do it perfectly you will delete their work, so no point their even trying. Sandpiper (talk) 23:13, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Sandpiper you wrote "I can say that while I agree precise referencing ought not to be so important when the subject is essentially opinion", but opinion is when references are needed the most. In history articles facts are usually fairly easy to come by, it is the interpretation of those facts that is where the controversy comes from (and PhDs). For example was the Second Battle of Fallujah a massacre? Sigfrido Ranucci and Maurizio Torrealta think it was, Paul Wood does not (see Fallujah, The Hidden Massacre). To present an opinion about the status of the battle would be a breach of WP:NPOV and probably WP:OR, to quote a third party view about a controversial topic like this is probably a breach of WP:BOLP unless it is backed up with a citation. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 16:21, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

well, I see it differently. Where there is a consensus amongst people informed about a subject that a certain thing is so, then you can reference that as an established clearcut fact. Where informed people all disagree with each other, then the value of any one statement is considerably devalued. Which one is correct? It is not possible to say when all the experts disagree. It is not possible to cite one example and say, 'here, read this, it shows what I told you is right'. What I would do (and yourself?) is read what was available to me and try to create a synthesis. i.e. do original research to extract from those contradictory sources a summary which can be understood by a reader. I may list where each of the mentioned facts comes from, but essentially I have still written my own opinion. A different editor would have balanced it differently, giving a different impression. And a third would differ again. The more fractured are the views of the 'experts', the more useless any one reference becomes. Ok, someone could take my ten referenced books, read them all and form their own view of whether my summary was accurate. But that is impractical. I do it here as an editor because I am writing about something which interests me (really, the other way about: I write on wiki about something I have become interested in outside), but who is going to spend a week reading all those books to check my version of the article is correct? Perhaps there is a difference between people who think wiki articles are a starting point for learning about something, or a reference source to find an answer. If the latter, then the multiple refs are no help at all to check if the article is correct. I look at an article on wiki to find out something, now. If there are clear links to a webpage elsewhere I may read that too, The purpose of an encyclopedia is to give me the predigested summarised info about something. The main usefullness of references on wiki has nothing to do with readers of the encyclopedia, but is for the convenience of editors. Real encyclopedias absolutely do not include all these refs, even though the author may have such notes, because they are not helpfull to readers.

Sandpiper (talk) 23:13, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Should we be physically moving the above discussion, and subsequent arguments, to WP:FOOT? We may have a better audience there? While it does pertain to refimprove, it seems more to pertain to the concept of footnoting. Student7 (talk) 23:33, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Why? what does it have to do with how to make footnotes?Sandpiper (talk) 21:25, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
BTW, I agree that we shouldn't kill little birds in their nests! I generally leave stubs and brand new articles that look lost, alone unless the facts seem wildly out of kilter.
Having said that, we are trying to achieve some sort of consistency here. It may have been okay three years ago to sling something on wiki. We're at over 2 million articles now, a commendable quantity. I think we should now focus on quality. We should no longer write for the middle schooler but develop articles in our sandboxes (that's what we tell vandals! Why not take our own advice?). So what comes out, even initially, should have some credence IMO. We need to rectify our quality reputation which was not that great. High school students should be able to use our articles without criticism from their teachers. Most cannot now because of our old reputation of being slap-dash. This will take time to overcome Student7 (talk) 23:33, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
The way to 'rectify our quality reputation' is to teach people how to use wiki. Teaching them about the article history etc so they can check other versions, check discussion to see whats going on. Understand the sort of errors inevitably part of how it works. Wiki is not a conventional encyclopedia, though in the comparisons I have seen it did quite well against them. Wiki's dodgy reputaion, if it has one, is because pages contain real howlers, and like as not some placed there just minutes before the reporter read them. The reality is that these comments about mistakes on wiki only arise because wiki is becoming widely used. It should be obvious to anyone who considers the statistics that ongoing stupidities will always keep cropping up, because people vandalise articles all the time. The more people are using it, the more often some visitor will find mistakes. Wiki works by people discovering problems with articles and then fixing them.
There is a suggestion kids are being told not to use wiki, but I suspect this is because 1) it straight away gives them the answer, 2) everyone hands in exactly the same homework (all containing the same one mistake). Neither case helps the school look good. But from what I could gather, absolute rubbish extracted from some other website is quite acceptable. I'm afraid no one has explained to me how having loads of refs on a page guarantees quality. I agree there is no sensible assessment mechanism on wiki which tells people how good we think an article is. Sandpiper (talk) 21:25, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Edit request

{{editprotected}}

old → ← new


Description: Please replace Image:Question book-3.svg with Image:Question book-4.svg. I believe this is an uncontroversial edit because the images are fairly similar. I think that this new image reflects the colour scheme of the template a little better, and the image looks cleaner (note the visibility around the top of the question mark), and is smaller in filesize. If consensus believes this new image is inferior then please discard the request. Oh, and if you fulfil this request, feel free to upload another version to Wikipedia and perm-protect it to reduce the risk of vandalism. Thanks in advance! TIM KLOSKE|TALK 21:46, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Support - Much improved, thanks for doing this! As you say the question mark is much more identifiable. (Frankly I'm not sure I even realized it was supposed to be a question mark prior to this!) (sdsds - talk) 22:49, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
Y Done An excellent image, thanks. PeterSymonds (talk) 10:51, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
Oh, just so you know (because I forgot to change the filename when I was uploading it) the image is titled Image:Question book-new.svg. I hope that doesn't matter too much. Best, PeterSymonds (talk) 11:02, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jimbo quote

Jimmy Wales is often quoted as saying: "I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced."[3] (sdsds - talk) 08:09, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

So what is the difference between random, speculative, I heard it somewhere info, and a page typed in from memory by a history professor? Interpreted aggressively, we should immediately go out and delete 99.9% of wiki. Is that what we are supposed to do? Sandpiper (talk) 20:03, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
If there is anything that we are "supposed" to do, it would be to familiarize ourselves with Wikipedia policies and guidelines. To the extent we agree with them, we should make our behavior conform. To the extent that we disagree, we should engage our fellow Wikipedians in constructive dialog with the intent of improving the policies and guidelines. No one editor has the responsibility to "delete 99.9% of wiki." Each of us may, though, on a case-by-case basis, delete material the inclusion of which does not conform with policy.
Understanding Wikipedia policy is not easy. Luckily, it's quite rare that an edit made without complete understanding of policy will truly harm Wikipedia! So by all means, be WP:BOLD (but not reckless) with your edits. We shouldn't fear to undo the changes of others, and shouldn't fear to make changes others might undo. Instead, we should be eager to engage constructively with other editors with whom we seem to disagree. From some of them we can learn about the subject of the articles we edit. From some of them we can learn about the practical application of Wikipedia policy.
(Also, of course there are times when a disagreement gives us a soapbox from atop which we can preach! ;-) (sdsds - talk) 23:31, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
I am glad to see someone added a ref for that quote. I looked at the source. The inference is that Wales is particularly referring to biographies of living people. This does not come across from the quote, which arguably misrepresents Wales statement. Rather makes the point that having a rule permitting this quote to stand as is, might be verified but not accurate. Or was that the point of quoting it? Perhaps this is what people distrust in wikipedia? Sandpiper (talk) 00:21, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Inappropriate for use on stub or start articles

In the course of the disussion above it was commented that it is inappropriate to place this tag on any 'stub' article. However, this is not mentioned on the page. I therefore propose that this should be added to the instructions on the page. I also suggest that this should apply to 'start' class articles. Sandpiper (talk) 20:48, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I am not convinced there is a consensus for prohibiting the use of this template on stub articles. Like most cleanup tags, its use should be evaluated on a case by case basis. Specifying a huge class of article upon which it cannot be used is an improper limit on our editorial discretion and smacks of needless instruction creep, IMHO. — Satori Son 13:45, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
Not on stubs has been the consensus on Template:Unreferenced since May 2006 (Template talk:Unreferenced/Archive 1#This template should not be used with stubs.). The current wording on unreferenced is "Consider not adding this template to extremely short articles." I think that should be added to this template. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 14:01, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
Respectfully, I remain unconvinced. I do not believe that discussion from over two years ago reflects current editorial practice: the {{Unreferenced}} tag and similar templates can be found on a very great number of stub articles.
That being said, I am not opposed to adding similar wording to this template, since it is not an outright prohibition and still allows editorial discretion. — Satori Son 14:43, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reference density

I think there should be a formal number set for something like reference density. Lets say x refs would be needed for y characters (or z words) of an article. Later, automated tagging could make use of this.--Kozuch (talk) 13:37, 13 June 2008 (UTC)